Evening Flames

Chapters

1 - Welcome to Farrington
2 - Broken Wings
3 - Bottled Messages
5 - How Are You?
6 - Stalliongrad Connection
7 - Evening Flames
8 - Lebe Durch Frieden
9 - Autumn Mornings
0 - Healing Begins
4 - Shared Justice

1 - Welcome to Farrington

I slept through Wednesday.

To be fair, Tuesday night had been enough action for a few months, and my injuries probably needed energy to heal.

My stupid rabbit told me it was after five o’ clock, but I was still tired. However, when I realized how late it was, I couldn’t help but feel that waking up so late in the afternoon wasn’t the greatest habit to get back into.

I got up and took care of my personal stuff, including changing the Lebenwedel paste on my wounds. Already, my flank was completely scabbed over; that meant I only had to worry about my hand and shoulder...

With a little flexibility, I managed to clean those two wounds out and set a new personal record for humiliation, all in one fun act.

When that was over with, I thought about food. Hunting would be tricky with both of my arms injured, so I settled on foraging. Nuts, berries, and water wouldn’t be the grandest meal I had ever eaten, but I’d survived on less before. I needed something, after what I’d put my body through in the last twenty-four hours. Plus, wandering around the forest with a goal in mind would make it easy to avoid thinking about Farrington and the Guard. And it did.

However, by the time I had eaten, sort-of-bathed myself with pond water that I was afraid to get into my wounds, and headed back up to my cave, I had run out of distractions. I found myself alone with my thoughts, and there wasn’t much left to do except process what had happened. When I resigned myself to it, though, I found a completely different problem: ironically, the whole thing was so huge and stupid, I had no idea where to start.

Did I start with how I was a criminal, and had partially been thrown out of Farrington for that? The “partially” bit threw me off, because there was so much more to it than my own mistakes I had made.

Did I start with how, without being a guard, I didn’t have anything to do with my life? I shook my head; I had been down that road before, and while it was a problem, it wasn’t new.

I walked out onto my landing and sat down so I could watch the setting sun. The fresh night air would make it easier to mull things over. Or at least, it would if I could settle on where to start. But where?

How about the Sternwolf, and how you ignored her advice? Offending the gods was an odd place to start, which made me crane my neck a little, but it seemed simple enough. I remembered the Sternwolf’s advice: Fight and die. Live through peace. Only now, after everything got screwed up, did I realize that she meant “Stay home.”

If I had, the only thing that would have happened was that Starfall would’ve thought I was a coward. Which, compared to where I was... I shook my head. He already hated me. Why did I care about his sense of honor? Stupid gods and your cryptic blood messages.

I shook the blasphemy out of my head; I needed to focus on what had happened, not what I should have done. Like how you didn’t murder Starfall,you just turned into Father instead?

I cringed.

True, I hadn’t ripped his wing off, but in my tribe, broken wings were crippling at best, and those were hunting accidents, not stuff like what I had done to his wing joint. However, Equestrian medicine was a lot more advanced than my tribe’s... so I guessed that Starfall would probably fly again.

However, the injury didn’t matter. Neither did how it was a cheap shot. Gerard used to pick fights with me, and he knew exactly where, first chance I got, my heel was going. Still, that had been a few minutes’ pain, enough for me to get someplace public. Starfall was probably looking at a few weeks’ worth of healing, but that didn’t bother me.

At the core of it, I had always told myself I wasn’t like Father. Yet, I was very much his daughter.

Ever since I left my tribe, I’d been injuring ponies around me left and right. It didn’t start with Starfall, it didn’t even start with Dash; I used to get lectures and punishments at Junior Speedsters’ for fighting—even though that was always provoked, too.

It had ended, mostly, after I dealt with a persistent bully of Dash and me. Stormglider had been relentless in her mockery of us for the first two months of camp. After she went too far by dyeing parts of me pink in my sleep, I had retaliated in kind by kicking a cloud out from under her while she was passed out after a night of illicit partying. She hit the ground, I darted off, and to my knowledge, I was the only one who knew she hadn’t lost her ability to fly in an “accident.”

Thinking back to her made me realize how now, I had actually injured more pegasi than Father had. The fact that he would probably be proud of my achievements made me feel lower than dirt.

I shook the past out of my head again. I needed to think of what was in front of me, even if that was getting more and more difficult. I felt exhausted. I thought about going back to my blanket and sleeping; I was still healing, so I still needed rest. Then again, maybe a quick flight around my mountain peak would clear my mind.

Or how about you quit dodging the real thing that’s bugging you? I chided myself. As soon as I thought it, I couldn’t help but look down to my left, where his little cactus sat in its pot. I remembered that week, my birthday, like it was years in the past—even though it’d only been eight days ago. That was because then, I had been happy. Now...

Now, I didn’t know how I felt. Iron threw me out of Farrington. I didn’t even know if I agreed with him or not; it just seemed surreal, almost fake. One day, we were happily dating; the next, we were worlds apart because he had kicked me out of his city.

I wanted to be angry at him. He had thrown me away—thrown us away—like it was nothing, in an offhanded gesture. But even that had problems. He’d caught me dueling his friend, and I had won, so neither of us had been innocent. Heck, I had assaulted a guard, even if Starfall was acting out of line at the time.

It hadn’t been “nothing,” and it certainly hadn’t been easy for him. Even though it totally was.

Iron had to have known who was really to blame there. Both times, previously, when Starfall had a problem with me, I had been the victim. So Iron had the authority to throw me out like that, but did he really have the right?

It was easier to throw me out than to deal with me being there. That realization came with a flame of anger, but then it struck a second time. I felt like someone had let all the air out of me.

One way or another, Iron was the first individual who’d ever shown romantic interest in me. That was a terrible way to qualify romance, but that was part of my condition: I had to admit that he was one of the few Equestrians who would actually entertain the idea of a relationship with me. Granted, I had it better than some griffins, but that didn’t exactly mean I was overwhelmed with romantic options.

For one of my few options, Iron was quiet and reserved, which made me realize how little about him I actually knew. He was also about a decade older than me, which probably carried some problems with it, or more than I knew. In my tribe, males had their pick of whichever female they wanted, so age ranges weren’t really set in stone. Then again, I only had five couples to point to, and given my parents, I couldn’t say anything about how healthy those relationships were.

Ages aside, I liked Iron, and he’d liked me up to a certain point. Then I crossed that point, and now we’d never see each other again. The whole thing left me numb—not because of disbelief, but because I was used to the feeling by now. If not Iron, then Gretchen. If not Farrington, then Sharfkral-Grat.

That second part stung because Iron, unlike Father, hadn’t just kicked me out of the city because of some stupid grudge or something. More than that, I had to admit that I had somewhat enjoyed being a guard. One of the things Iron told me about on my first day had been starting to happen: ponies had been getting used to me, so I had ended up less a freak and more a pillar of the community.

Well, technically, I had ended up as “that griffin who attacked a guard.” I wondered how the city was taking that, or if anyone even knew. There was a newspaper, but only three of us had been there, so it was up to either Iron or Starfall to tell them about everything.

“Stupid city,” I grumbled.

I missed it.

With that thought, I looked over my left shoulder to my Guard’s armor. I remembered when it had been tailor-made to fit me. I remembered my oath. I remembered Iron, Sherry, and everyone in that city; then I thought about how I’d either let them down or proven them right.

I turned my head and looked over my right shoulder. Deeper back in my cave, Starfall’s knife was resting on the floor by my back wall. I’d originally thought to keep it as a trophy of our duel, but even now, I was starting to doubt that conviction. It wasn’t mine, and even if he didn’t deserve it back, I didn’t feel right about keeping it.

I did my owl impression and looked back at my Guard’s armor. I didn’t deserve it, and as soon as I realized that, I knew I had to give it back.

With a sad shrug, I stood up and headed back to my blanket. That was all I had to think about on the matter. I’d lost everything in that fight. Specifically, I’d lost huge portions of my griffin identity, slowly lending them out to the city. Losing Farrington meant I also lost the ties to the things I’d traded myself in for.

It didn’t end there, either. With a quick glance around at my cave, I knew I’d probably move out by the end of summer. Without Farrington, I’d at least have to find a new pony city to get emergency supplies from.

All of that was stuff I’d work on tomorrow, though. Or the day after. I was back to square one again, with nothing to do with an overabundance of time. So for one last time, I set my stupid rabbit alarm clock to wake me up tomorrow. Then, for one last time, I’d take my armor to Farrington...

I nestled down on my blanket and closed my eyes, failing to keep the tears in. I kept thinking about what tomorrow would bring, and then everything after that. It scared me. For now, I forced myself to focus on the one last thing I needed to do, even though it signified the end of my time as a guard.

The only thing I didn’t know was what I’d say to Iron tomorrow.

* * *

Next morning, I wore my armor on the flight to Farrington, but that was a matter of practicality. The thing was too heavy for my injured arms and too bulky to fly with. For a symbolic compromise, I put my gauntlets, belt, and Starfall’s knife in my helmet and carried it like a bucket. It was still bulky, but much more manageable.

I also made sure to practice my apology and resignation on the way to Farrington. If Iron wouldn’t let me speak again, I would just leave. If he did, I wanted to be able to say as much as I needed to in as few words as possible—especially because I wasn’t sorry to him, just to the Guard.

When I was over the lake, I could see that Iron wasn’t in his booth. Even as far away as I was, I knew what color Sherry’s face was. What threw me off more than her presence was how I could see the gold trim around the edges of her lieutenant’s armor. I wondered how permanent that promotion was, but when I drew nearer to Farrington, the thought got driven from my mind.

Two of the guards on top of the wall noticed me.

They were spaced pretty far apart, but almost synchronized, they turned and ran towards one another. The one on the left stopped before the one on the right, but when he did, they were both about the same distance from me. I raised an eyebrow in time to watch them draw their crossbows, this time, in unison. As my stomach dropped, I idly thanked my luck that I’d been forced to wear my armor.

I stopped and hovered about four hundred feet from the wall, where I hoped I was still out of their range. Armor or no, they created an impasse. I didn’t know how accurate they were, and I wasn’t wearing my helmet, but having weapons pointed at me made me think twice about how I was going to give my armor back.

I can live without honor, was the first thing that came to mind. My rational side agreed: my honor was moot to Farrington at that point. I certainly wasn’t going to die by its laws during the process of trying to leave on good terms.

Still, I’d come back for a reason. I figured that four hundred feet was a few minutes’ walk out of the city, and if they saw me leaving the armor there, that was as good a gesture as any.

I slowly descended—even at a distance, quick movements might start a fight, and there was a definite risk of me dying if they both fired both bolts. As I dropped, I kept both eyes on them, so I saw when they gave each other a sideways glance and lowered their weapons. The one on the right kept a hard face, but he raised a hoof and beckoned me into the city with three short waves.

Some welcome, I mused, but I dove into a forward motion towards Sherry’s booth. Iron wasn’t there, and I had no idea where he was, but I knew why she was there instead of him. Still, I figured it was better to formally resign rather than to leave my armor in a pile on the road.

I landed in front of her snarl of disapproval. “Nice of you to join us.”

I didn’t respond at first; instead, I set my helmet down on the ground next to me. Its mostly flat head wasn’t balanced enough to keep it from tipping over. Before I undid my buckles, I looked Sherry in the eye and said, “I know what I did, and what it means. I’m just here to hand in my armor so I’m not a thief on top of everything else.”

Sherry’s snarl dropped down into a tight, grim line. Then, she raised an eyebrow—only slightly, but enough to betray that she was thinking about what to say next.

Then, she laughed. It was different than her usual, rough laugh. Now, I heard a sharp, cutting edge of malice behind her amusement at my expense; she matched it with a gash of a smile that was equally full of hate.

“No you’re not.”

I reeled at her presumption at first, but then I realized what it was. And while I had to admit she was good at intimidation, like all idle threats, it fell apart when—

She pulled a bundle of letters from underneath the shelf-like desk in front of her, and my opposition withered into dead, dry fear.

My letters.

It must’ve shown on my face, because Sherry’s smile got wider. “Oh, so you do remember these?”

“How did...” I blinked with a shudder of my head. The post office guy must’ve given those letters to Sherry after I didn’t show up on Wednesday, to mail them—just like I asked. Now she literally held my life in her hands; if she wanted to, she could mail them, and then... “Scheisse,” I whispered.

“Stimmt. Ist Scheisse,” came her reply.

I felt my breathing quicken as my heart sped up, but those physical sensations seemed very far away. After what felt like a long time, the realization struck me that if—never mind how—Sherry knew my language, she could read my letters, and at the very least, she probably knew about my Verbannungsprüfung.

Sherry didn’t wait for an answer other than my shocked silence. “So. Here’s how things are going down. You’re not ‘quitting the Guard’ or anything so...” Her face scrunched up as she spat out the word, “Weak.” She waved the letters at me. “I don’t want to use these, but if you want to dick around with the law and think you can get away without repercussions...”

“Iron already kicked—”

“I DON’T GIVE A RAT’S ASS,” Sherry roared over my tiny opposition. I reeled. She continued, “Everyone’s got their head up their ass since you showed up, and I let it slide—on off chance that you aren’t a complete moron. I was wrong. You want to screw the chain of command, fight racists, and issue death threats?” She shook her head, then her voice turned to ice. “You wish you had it as easy as exile.”

I found it wise to stand very still and not say anything. Sherry seemed to agree. She gestured to the archway over to her right as she continued, “So welcome to Farrington, you arrogant little bitch. You broke our laws, now the laws are here to repay the favor. Since I’m guessing you don’t want to die, I’m going to tell you what you’re doing to repay your debt to society. Da?”

Only because she asked, I nodded.

“You’re going to apologize to Officer Weatherly for what you said to him. You’re going to pay five hundred bits to the city for disturbing the peace. And you’re going to be doing volunteer work at the hospital in the evenings until Starfall’s wing heals.”

She stopped listing punishments, which gave me time to think about them and... they didn’t seem too bad, at face value—especially if I were trapped in the city until I had finished with them. That reminded me of something, so I pointed at the now-crumpled letters she was holding. “Fine, but I want those back.”

Sherry smoothed them out on the desk, then rolled them up and put them away, out of sight. “Then I want a reason to be able to let go of these.” She bared her teeth in a quick, angry grin. “You’ll get them when I think I have one.”

I narrowed my eyes in a glare; I didn’t like having to trust her with my letters. At the same time, I didn’t really have choice, so I shrugged. “Okay. But that’s everything?”

She set a black sheath on the window ledge in front of her. “Two more things. First, hold on to this. You’ll need it for later. Second...”

She hesitated and looked at the sheath, which I took as an indication to pick it up. I reached forward to grab it, noting the cool air inside Sherry’s booth...

Then, she grabbed my hand with one hoof, pulled, and slammed her other foreleg down on top of it. Instinctively, I pulled my hand back; to my surprise, it came free from under Sherry’s weight. Then, I looked at it, and I saw why: she hadn’t been trying to trap my hand.

Just the talons.

At the end of my right hand’s fingers, all three of the talons now ended in a clean, straight edge after about half an inch. Once the shock wore off, I felt three sharp throbs of pain; my middle talon’s stub beaded with a drop of blood.

In her booth, Sherry had a blank expression on her face as she brought back her foreleg and slowly removed a slender... not quite sword; it was more of a thin, hilt-less blade. Whatever the weapon was, Sherry sheathed it, then locked her eyes on me. “That’s for hurting Iron.”

I had so many questions—let alone the fact that a lot of the whole situation was Iron’s fault—but at that point, I didn’t think Sherry was in a mood for answers. I seethed as I put Starfall’s knife back in its sheath, put that on my belt, and put my belt around my waist. I hadn’t eaten, or really bathed, so I felt woefully unprepared; however, with everything what it was, my only real option was to put on my armor and get ready for the day. When I got my gauntlets on, my right palm felt sore. That reminded me how I hadn’t brought my money for medicine, or food...

All in all, I was ready for a crappy day. Sherry seemed happy to oblige, too. Once I got my helmet on, she ordered me, “Go find Officer Letter in the Business District—she’s on route three—and tell her to go find her usual partner. And since you’re starting late, go to the Citadel on your break for more briefing.”

I snapped a resentful salute and headed to my guard duties; route three was near the middle of the Business District, so at least I wouldn’t have to take a long walk to get there. I also figured that I’d be able to get to the Citadel easier for my lunch break—never mind how I was being ordered to skip lunch.

I didn’t know what the city was going to be like, but even though the journey was less than six blocks, I got glares and snarls from over a dozen citizens. They were smart enough to avoid any physical confrontation, but it didn’t change the simple fact: They know.

With a quiet grin, I realized I was already used to their looks.

I patrolled Officer Letter’s route backwards so I could find her easier. Within a few minutes, I caught sight of another steel-clad officer walking towards me. Of course, she was less than happy to see me. I didn’t even get a chance to say hi before she started in with, “What the hell are you doing here?”

I made a big show of looking down at my chest and gauntlets snapping my gaze back to her. “Well, since I’m dressed for it, I thought I’d try my luck as a pastry chef.”

“I guess that’s a benefit of being the captain’s pet slut.” She bit off the last word.

I burned back at her insult, but as I made a fist, my talon-stubs hurt, which reminded me that it probably wouldn’t be the best idea to make her eat her words. I also remembered the guard on Tuesday night, so I tried to settle on throwing a verbal insult back. Then I realized I’d taken too long to respond, so I had “lost” by default.

I hated every ounce of her ignorant accusation, but with a hard swallow, I cleared my throat enough to say, “Sherry wants you to find your usual partner. Go do that, or I’ll tell her you’re disobeying orders.”

“Like she’d—”

“GO!” I shouted loud enough to make the ponies around us stop and turn in annoyed fear.

Luckily for both of us, for the first thing to go right that morning, Officer Letter decided it was a bad idea to piss me off any more than I already was. Instead, she turned and headed down a side street, muttering “Animal” loud enough for me to hear it.

I knew I’d hear more about that little encounter in the near future, but by that point, I couldn’t care less. I started my patrol, of which the hardest part was the fight to keep a neutral face.

Since I was alone, with insults fresh on my mind, I started dwelling on how Sherry had declawed me, like I was some sort of animal. I used my talons when hunting; now, I was down to my left hand with the messed-up shoulder.

And the reason? Because I had hurt Iron? And now I was being accused by everyone of being his... whore?

I wanted to find him and break every bone in his body.

The rest of the morning passed quickly, or rather, I had a chance to realize that I was going to lose most of my Equestrian money and probably most of my evenings, now, as well. That just reminded me of how I didn’t have any friends in Farrington, or a life outside those walls, which just meant I was alone...

I had to blink back tears when I realized I couldn’t even seek out Dash’s comfort over what I had done. Even if I hadn’t done nearly the same thing to her a few months ago, she loved flying, so a wing attack wouldn’t be anything but a personal affront to her. Any apology I might give her would be weakened, because I hadn’t learned my lesson last time.

Kämpf und Stirb, I reminded myself. Fight and die. Now that I was without talons for hunting, friends for company, and a city’s begrudging acceptance, the “die” part of the Sternwolf’s warning was beginning to ring truer and truer.

I just hoped she was being metaphorical.

* * *

At the Citadel, even the secretary gave me the stink-eye. On top of everything, that stung. Ever since she talked my ear off the first day we met, we’d always had a rapport of various nods, waves, and other greetings. Today, she gave me a very sullen, “Hi,” before bowing to frown at her desk.

Unfortunately, I needed more than that from her. Sherry had told me to go to the Citadel, but “more briefing” was as clear as a fog bank. I tried to be nice, but I was tired. “Hi. Do you know where I’m supposed to go?”

When the secretary looked up at me, her frown was more of a pout, but I saw a hint of consideration cross her eyes. “Have you asked your sergeant?”

I chuckled. I knew it was dangerous and scary to be laughing in a stressful situation, but... I couldn’t help it. Shaking my head, I said, “You know, uh...” I looked at her butt and tried to guess what her name was. “Smiley Face, I... I don’t even know who that is anymore.”

Smiley looked back at me and looked like she was torn between crying and ripping me a new asshole. She settled on blinking several times in rapid succession, then pointing behind me. “He’s in there. Sergeant Scales.”

I nodded my gratitude. She answered by turning to her desk, mumbling, “And I’m Memo, not... Smiley Face.”

“Right, uh, sorry.”

My apology fell on deaf ears, so I shrugged and went into the main room. As soon as I did, I realized how I could have avoided that whole conversation with Memo; sitting at Sherry’s usual desk was, I guessed by his armor, Sergeant Scales.

I couldn’t see his mane under his helmet, but the rest of him was a dark sort of periwinkle blue. As I walked over to his desk, I glowered about how I had probably learned over a hundred different colors from being a guard. It was necessary, though; if you didn’t get a cutie mark and only knew that some pony was “blue,” you’d be describing about a tenth of Farrington.

When I got to his desk, he was busy with what looked like a small novel’s worth of paperwork. I saluted and asked, “Sir?”

His ear flopped forward before he raised an eyebrow to look at me. He grinned and spoke like he were amused. “Ah... my little headache.”

It was the nicest thing that anyone had said to me that day.

He continued, “I used to wonder what sergeants did all day in here.” He waved a hoof around what looked like six different piles of forms and folders. “Then, you imparted that mote of wisdom on me.”

“Sorry, sir.”

“Don’t apologize...” He shook his head. “This is tons of fun.”

I had no idea if he were joking, sarcastic, or serious, but either way, I resorted to my old standby of standing quietly and waiting for the rest of the conversation.

Luckily, the sergeant cracked another grin and stuck a hoof out. “I’m Sergeant Scales, by the way.”

I shook it. “Gilda.”

He nodded down at his paperwork. “I figured. But, yeah, let’s get started; I’ve got some stuff we need to square away. First thing first, though, uh...” He scanned around the piles before he grabbed a small white scrap. “What... happened with you and love?”

I finally hit my limit. “Sir, he... he kissed me. Once. On the face! He was too much of a limp fish to go any farther than that before his whole stupid kick-me-out-of-Farrington crap!” It was probably louder than it needed to be, but I was too livid to care about who it was behind me that broke the prevailing silence by snickering.

Sergeant Scales covered his mouth with a hoof and shook, obviously trying to hide a laugh. Tears of shame welled up in my eyes, and I didn’t even know who I was mad at. Finally, he got ahold of himself. “I’m... I’m so sorry. I didn’t... I mean, I meant... Officer Letter. Officer Love Letter.”

I sat down. There was a cushion on my right that I considered picking up and screaming into. Given how many ponies sat on that thing, I didn’t think that was smart. Instead, I just crossed my arms, hard, until I felt a wet, searing, ripping sensation on my right hand. Warmth spread in my gauntlet, trickling down my wrist, but I didn’t care anymore.

“Er... are you bleeding?”

Before I could answer, Sergeant Scales got up and trotted off into one of the doors on the wall behind him. I didn’t know was in any of those rooms except for the one that led to the northwest corner of the building, where I had taken my oath.

My sergeant returned carrying both a roll of paper towels and a familiar-looking white box with a red cross. He handed them both to me and said, “Go clean yourself up in the bathroom. After that, we can deal with the paperwork you’ve got to fill out.”

With how everything else had gone earlier that morning, being ordered to take some private time to tend to my injuries... it made it so I didn’t have to fake a small grin as I gave a formal salute. I did, however, need to wipe off my wrist and plug up my gauntlet. I’d deal with that injury over a sink, but I didn’t want to leave a blood trail throughout the Citadel on my way there.

The bathroom shared a wall with the locker room, and it had most of the same decor as the hallway outside of it: stone walls, few—if any—windows. There were lights along the middle of the ceiling, which showed some of the differences between the bathroom and the hallway outside: the floor was polished tile, a huge mirror lined one wall, and on the other, there were stalls where ponies could think in privacy.

I passed a stallion officer on my way to the sink; he didn’t really regard me one way or another. It was an improvement over almost everyone else.

When I was over one sink, I put the towels and first aid kit on the basin of the one next to it. Then, I peeled off my right hand’s gauntlet; sure enough, the Lebenwedel paste had turned into a brown, sticky mash when I had ripped the wound open.

I rinsed my hand, wrist, and arm off with cold water. After I dried off, I threw the pink towel wads into the sink next to me. My right hand was still bleeding, but now, it was contained to the sink in front of me. With my left hand, I opened the first aid kit and pulled out a familiar white orb.

The treatment process was familiar because, back when I had first been offered a position as a guard, I had been treated for a self-inflicted stab wound. Back then, treatment had been done to get me to “trust that some individuals weren’t out to get me.” Now, as I sprayed the mist into both sides of my stab wound, I realized just how fake and empty that statement had been.

Between his knife-wielding friends, his rumors, and just him in general, it was impossible to see how I was better off now than I had been, even two months ago after Dash kicked me out of Ponyville.

I wrapped up my hand with some of the white cloth that was in the first aid kit, and then I remembered the second half of the treatment. A little red bottle, drank, not applied to the wound itself. As I swallowed its familiar warmth—still not knowing exactly what it did—I figured it had something to do with healing from the inside at the same time as the white mist did it from the outside. After all, even if my hand and throat weren’t directly connected, I was still one body.

While I rinsed the blood out of my gauntlet, I reflected some more on that two-part healing process. It came as almost obvious that, despite his motives, that was what the Guard had been for me. It was something to do with my days, so that I felt motivated and bored without something to do, which made it harder to fall into a bored, sleep-laden cycle of emptiness.

I looked at myself in the mirror, and for the first time, I got a good look at what I looked like while wearing my armor. It didn’t look bad—the farrier and his apprentice had done a good job at making the armor fit me and my curves. But that was the moment I realized that the Guard wasn’t both parts of a healing process. It was the bandage.

The internal portion was how I dealt with everything. And while I didn’t know how far along that process was coming, I knew I was better. For one, I was in a bathroom, doing something, rather than lazing around my cave and moping.

I still had some of my problems from Father and exile, but I knew exactly how to deal with them, now: join a society, don’t be a jerk, and... do whatever it was that made life worthwhile. That last one was tricky, but I figured that the first two parts would at least gain me a few friends to make life enjoyable.

Once my gauntlet was clean, I dried it off and put it back on. Then, I looked at myself in the mirror again: this time, at me, instead of my armor. From a hygiene perspective, I could use a good bath; the past few days, I had dabbed away what sweat and grime I could manage, but I didn’t want to risk submerging my wounds in lived-in pondwater.

I saw myself grin as I realized that soon, my injuries would heal, and I could continue bathing as usual. I could continue life as usual. That reminded me of how I’d failed to start a new life in Farrington. Even then, after a few months of bandaging, I was starting to heal from the inside.

Sherry’s punishments were interesting: between losing my claws, my money, and my evenings’ free time, they’d started me over fresh. I was changing my bandages, but that was because the old ones had gotten dirty. Now, this new bandage had a deadline attached. Because of Starfall’s wing, it’d probably be at least a few months until I was done. But then...

Then, I could leave.

“Could” meant two things. One, that I’d be allowed to, which was important because of Sherry’s grip on my letters. But the second meant that I’d be able to: between my unspent wages—potatoes and hunting were cheap—and learning how to fit in with a society, I’d be much better-equipped to take flight and find a new life in another town.

Next time, I’d start as far away from griffins as I could physically manage. I wasn’t able to go back home, but I sure as hell could be affected by the things my race had done to others—like a racial grudge because Father thought it was... cute, to rip someone’s wings off.

I shook that resentment out of my head, but I saw myself grin at my idea. It was something to work towards, a future goal.

On the note of “work,” though, I remembered I was on a schedule. Still, my trip to the bathroom had been the refreshment I needed. I transferred my trash from the sink to the bin near the door. Then, I repacked all the healing supplies, grabbed the roll of paper towels from Sergeant Scales, and walked back to his desk to start the second half of my healing.

* * *

When I got back to his desk, Sergeant Scales began our second conversation by asking me what Officer Letter had said. Apparently, someone had reported a disturbance between officers in the Business District. When I told him, his response was to chuckle, put the report in a drawer, and say, “Nope. I’ve got actual problems to deal with first.”

One of those actual problems was making my Guard punishments official. I signed my name about a dozen times, and my sergeant pointed out that through some trickery in the Farrington legal system, we were able to handle Guard-related disputes in-house. He told me—not to rub it in, just as a polite warning—if I had been a civilian, I’d probably be liable for some prison time.

I thought back to how Sherry forced me back into the Guard, and not for the first time, I questioned whose side she was on.

My sergeant and I filled out all the forms that my signature was needed on; by the time we finished, it was still only a small fraction of the papers on his desk. I felt bad to be the source of all that extra work, but even more, I felt curious about something. When it was time to go, I asked, “Sir? If I can ask, uh... what do you think about what happened?”

Sergeant Scales gave me a raised-eyebrow glare. “You assaulted a guard and put him in the hospital. I don’t approve.”

I shrugged. “It’s just that you’re...” I made circles with my hand, trying to find the right word.

“Polite?” he asked. I nodded, and he continued in a whisper, “Look, between us? It doesn’t take a platinum alchemist to figure out who started that thing. I patrolled with him for a few years, so I know he’s a decent guy; he just has... buttons.”

“Buttons?”

My sergeant shrugged. “There are certain crimes for which you wouldn’t want to resist arrest if he’s the guy doing the arrest.” I raised a clueless eyebrow, which earned the clarification, “Like hurting kids.”

Given what had started our Tuesday night duel, I could sort of see that. But it was a distant recognition, and I certainly didn’t forgive him for what he did. Still, I could definitely respect that Sergeant Scales was looking at the whole picture instead of taking the “Blame Gilda For Everything” route.

As I left to head back to my patrol, I gave him a grateful little nod.

* * *

Friday morning, before I left for Farrington, I counted out five hundred bits into one of the Guard’s coin sacks. That led to a pleasant surprise: I still had around a third of my Equestrian bits left over. I was glad, since payday wasn’t until next week; with everything else going on in that city, I really didn’t need money troubles.

For some strange reason, knowing I had that small base covered gave me a little bit of hope. Most of Thursday had definitely ranked up with some of the stuff that Father, in his near-infinite creativity, had done to me. But if Thursday was terrible, Friday would have a hard time outdoing it, or at least, I hoped it would.

After I counted out my bits, I ate, bathed, and cleaned out my wounds with my own personal supply of spray medicine. Thursday evening, after my shift, I had asked Sergeant Scales for some more medical supplies so I could change my bandages at home; with a small shrug, he suggested I get my own supply.

I had every intention of doing that; no matter how expensive that stuff was, it was a lot more dignified than my methods of first aid.

I took my used bandages and the empty wrappers with me to Farrington. As soon the city came into view, I noted a small problem. The guard in the south booth was wearing golden armor. Changing my course to fly to the east gate was a simple matter of flapping my left wing harder for two beats.

At the Citadel, I threw my bandages away and handed the Guard’s coin sack with my fine to Sergeant Scales. He took it, nodded, then said, “Next week, you’re at the hospital on Monday and Thursday after your shift. Don’t forget.”

I nodded, but asked, “Uh, sir? Why not write it down?”

“If we make a paper trail, that just increases the odds that someone outside the Guard might know when you’re staying in the city for two hours after your shift...” He shrugged. I remembered Red Hooves, and figured that with everything else gone to Hell, I didn’t want to risk whatever him and his stupid accent could cook up. Sergeant Scales continued, “The hospital’s cool with the random schedule, anyway; those kids don’t have much going on in the evenings.”

Before that could sink in, my sergeant ordered me off to the Residential District. Within ten minutes, I was alone with my thoughts again, so I could start properly mulling my punishment over.

My gut reaction was that I was not looking forward to being a surrogate mother for a bunch of foals for the next two months. True, in the back of my mind, I’d always thought it would be cool to have my own family. But, idle as it was, that fantasy always involved my children, not some strangers’.

When I realized that I was being condescending to sick foals, I felt a small pang of guilt. As my sergeant had pointed out, they didn’t have much, so I’d probably be a welcome distraction from being sick. However, thinking of it like that just made me realize I had no idea what to do with kids. Dash’s idea of fun was flying, which probably wouldn’t work for foals in a predominantly earth pony city. They might get put in the hospital, I mused, and I felt terrible for chuckling.

Black humor aside, I remembered when, on the days my childhood days turned from bleak to worse, it’d always been like a breath of fresh air to escape into my tribe’s legends and mythologies.

Then, I grinned as I made the connection.

I didn’t know what games those kids would play, but I figured they’d at least appreciate a good storyteller. True, I’d have to tone down the violence... and the rape. There was a lot of rape in my tribe’s mythology. But censored or no, it was a chance to share my culture with someone—or a group of someones. Monday was a few days away, which would give me ample time to prepare.

As I rounded one of the corners of my patrol, I chuckled to myself. For a “punishment,” I decided that it wasn’t going to be that bad at all.

Monday evening after my shift, I decided to visit Starfall in the hospital.

It was necessary on several fronts: Not only did I need to talk to him about what “Indefinite Medical Leave” meant, but I also had to admit that five straight days of foalsitting took its toll on me. Comet also wanted a night alone with her children, and while I probably could have taken care of things with Starfall over the weekend, I put it off until Monday, to give him some more time to cool off.

I held no delusions that he would be pleased with my decision.

Of course, my sensible plan had disappointed Maxie. I felt bad about that, but between my apologies and promising to make it up to her, there wasn’t any more that I could do. Then, when I came home after my shift to get out of my armor, she seemed disappointed again... She was my sister, but especially the past few months, she could be difficult to deal with.

Unfortunately, Maxie wasn’t the only pony in my life capable of being entirely irrational. When I got to Starfall’s room, the windowblinds were down, so I thought he was sleeping on his side in the darkness.

The light from the hallway illuminated a small streak of his white bedsheets, so I could see when he slowly craned his neck up and turned on me. The light gleamed in his good eye when he muttered, “Come to take anything else from me, or is this just a gloating visit?”

I frowned, but only slightly. I had been dreading this visit for a reason, after all. At the same time, he had started things with Gilda, and if I were being completely honest, he was one of the biggest sources of my current problems with her. Or the lack of problems, I supposed.

Either way, I wasn’t blameless in the situation, but I didn’t deserve Starfall’s ire. “Is that how things are going to be between us?” He kept glaring at me, which, given the darkness and his injuries, just looked like a single, golden eye. After it became apparent that he wasn’t going to answer, I shook my head slowly. “I came here to ask about your position with the Guard.”

“I’ve read the Times; looks like you’ve already made up your mind.” His glare deepened. “‘Lieutenant Suspended After Illegal Street Duel.’”

I shrugged, taking a step forward. “Are you truly going to treat the Farrington Times like they don’t enjoy news stories like this?”

“Do you agree, though?”

I bit my immediate reaction back behind clenched teeth. “I... With the portions about you? Yes. You are technically on some form of suspension, and it came after a duel, in the streets, which is illegal.”

“So you think I’m the one who started this?” The question was so loaded that it was almost heavy.

“Everyone had history going into this fiasco,” I replied. “Just like everyone’s responsible for their own actions despite that history.”

Starfall laughed darkly. “And that’s the only reason she’s still in the Guard and I’m not?”

I took a deep breath; if I let his ignorant accusations get to me, then things wouldn’t end well for either of us. “She was off-duty, and had the good sense to leave her armor out of the equation.”

“Just long enough to hide behind her Bulwark.”

“Do you hear yourself?” I shot back. “How can you possibly remove all blame from yourself in this situation?”

“Apparently, it’s just a matter of sleeping with you. Too bad for my job I’m happily married!”

I’d heard enough. “Maybe nine years ago.”

The hallway light reflected in his teeth as he snarled, and I knew I had gone too far. Still, it was refreshing, almost, to hear him seethe, “Get the hell out of my room.”

I turned and muttered, “I was already on my way out.”

Behind me, the hallway seemed unnaturally bright. As I brought his door closed, I felt a small satisfaction in feeling it click shut. If Starfall wanted to delude himself that he were entirely innocent of the situation, that was his prerogative. It would mean that the Guard would officially lose a lieutenant, but that just meant that the temporary promotions would become permanent, and we’d have to find... four new officers.

I reached the stairwell and began descending to the ground floor. On my way down, I had to admit that Starfall’s accusations at least began in reality—never mind that he was manipulating his role as a confidant against me. However, with Gilda, I had been struggling with objectivity, especially in trying to determine if I could be objective.

A week after their duel, I could congratulate my impartiality. Because of my “fairness” as Captain of the Guard, neither of them was speaking to me.

My stomach growled, reminding me that lunch had been several hours ago. Partly from a desire to be left alone, and partly because I didn’t want to toy with my sister’s already-troubled head by finally showing up to dinner after first declining twice, I decided to eat at the hospital cafeteria. I exited the stairwell and checked the sign on the wall: my destination was to the left.

I turned and began the process of finding the cafeteria on an intersection-by-intersection basis. I grew weary as I navigated the maze of sterile, white hallways, and I supposed it was true that no one liked being in a hospital. Ironically, I wasn’t put off by the decor. Instead, I was beginning to wonder if things in my personal life were ever going to settle down after last Tuesday. I dreaded that they already had.

Then, I passed through an intersection, and my ear prickled. Down the hall, I could have sworn that I recognized Gilda’s voice. Curious, I followed it down the hallway, into the pediatrics wing, where I found her, in the common area. She wasn’t wearing her Guard’s armor, and she was sitting in front of a few bookcases; in front of her was a group of six fur-less foals.

She noticed me and stopped speaking mid-sentence. Her abrupt pause and vacant stare at me caused her small audience to turn and look at me as well.

I knew she had been avoiding me for the past week; the Citadel hadn’t suddenly moved to the east gate, so the fact that she arrived in Farrington twenty minutes earlier to use it meant there was something in the south gate she was avoiding.

As guilty as I felt for accidentally forcing my presence on her like this, I wanted more closure on our relationship. That included the chance to apologize. To mitigate the awkward, forced situation, I quickly pointed at myself, then at her audience, and shrugged—a silent request for permission to join.

She shrugged back, but her expression didn’t change from a vacant, neutral gaze. Somehow, indifference felt worse than outright rejection, but I walked over and took a seat behind a pair of balding foals.

When I sat down, Gilda started her story back up, “So, anyway, Ing continued on his journey. But his wings got tired of flying, so when he came across a griffin who lived alone by the river...” She stopped narrating to scowl. “And, he, uh, paid her, and then left with her boat.”

As I listened to her story, I found it interesting to hear how widespread griffins were in her story. Presently, there were only the two tribes to the north—as she had corrected me early on in our relationship—and the port city of Elpithasus.

Though I supposed “port city” was a tad inaccurate; Elpithasus was a disproportionately large fortress city, compared to its population. The Elpithasan griffins built in a port so that Equestrian merchants could stop by to hire extra security for voyages. Beyond mercenary work, they grew herbs that would otherwise be in high demand for Equestria. Since Stalliongrad was closer to Elpithasus than Farrington was, they purchased most of their industrial supplies from Stalliongrad, so there was precious little direct contact between Farrington and the griffin capital.

All of this, I had learned from the Canterlot library. Part of my plans on dealing with Gilda’s and Starfall’s duel had been to, finally, send out a request for a history of griffin culture. I sent a package containing the letter and additional postage to Hoofington around nine-thirty on Wednesday morning; there, a pegasus courier could handle a direct delivery to Canterlot. Friday morning, I had awoken to find the book on my dining room table. I didn’t know which disturbed me more: the book’s sudden appearance, or how it had a note on it that said, “We hope this helps,” and was signed with the lunar half of the new royal Equestrian seal.

Regardless of the present or how I knew about it, in Gilda’s myth, griffins were widespread enough to have several settlements, not just three. It was sad to realize how far their culture had fallen; for the first time, it struck me just what she was referring to when she mentioned a disparity between the present and past of her race. I had previously understood what she was talking about, but paradoxically, hearing her story made their situation all the more real to me.

Ing’s story lasted over a half an hour longer, and he faced various trials at sea, on land, and in the air. Although she stumbled a few times, which I supposed was because she wasn’t used to telling such long stories, when she hit her stride, her narration added a level of entertainment to the story. By the end, Ing found what he wanted: He had left on a journey to find purpose, and he ended up teaching griffins everywhere how to tend to plants.

When it was over, the foals all began chattering excitedly; they liked it as much as I did. A few minutes later, a nurse came over to take them back to their rooms for dinner. With what I recognized as childlike disappointment, they said goodbye to Gilda, and five of them walked away. The little filly that stayed behind didn’t say anything, but instead, she walked over and hugged Gilda’s left hand.

I felt a twinge of panic as I saw the surprise on her face, but she recovered and patted the foal on the head a few times with her other hand. I wondered what had happened to her talons, but when I saw the thick, shiny scab on it, I figured it wasn’t healthy to be stabbed in the part of her hand where her fingers joined together.

A nurse came back over to gently pull the sixth child off Gilda’s wrist, which left the two of us alone. She stood up, looked behind her at the bookcases, and bent low in a rolling, arching stretch. I heard a few joints pop, and when I looked at the floor under her, I saw she had been sitting on the bare floor instead of on a cushion.

Then I looked back up to her face, and she was looking up at me with a vague, distant expression—almost like she were looking at the ceiling behind me. I realized that we hadn’t spoken, directly, since my mistaken, half-banishment of her on Tuesday. Now, unfortunately, I couldn’t figure out how to start things.

I spoke softly, “Hello.”

“Hi.”

My stomach clenched, but I supposed it was as good a greeting as any. “I’d like a chance to say some things. Would you be opposed to dinner?”

She thought about it for a moment, then the corner of her mouth twitched upwards. “Not really.”

I felt a flood of relief at that; I didn’t know what dinner together would bring, but it would give me a chance to apologize, or at least, we might officially start a fight. I had done wrong by Gilda. Even if I had been within my rights as captain, if we were dating, I should have approached the situation more delicately.

We walked to the exit of the hospital, silently, but together. Once we left the hospital, we turned south. Gilda sped up, even if she were walking on three limbs instead of four. I needed to canter in order to keep up with her. Something definitely wasn’t right here. “Gilda? What’s wrong?”

Silence.

We reached the main intersection of Farrington, and she turned east. As she did, I realized she had lied back at the hospital—or, done a trick of words that amounted to the same thing. In mild desperation, I asked, “Can you at least say something to me?”

Gilda lurched to a stop, and I joined her. She looked at me with eyes that were on the verge of tears, but her voice was sharp as a blade. “Who are you?”

For a brief, confused moment, I thought she didn’t recognize me without my armor. Then, I realized that was what she was talking about, so I replied, “We’re both off-duty now, so I don’t have any auth—”

The sheer force of her slap rocked my head to the right, almost knocking me off-balance. I saw stars, and I did a quick count of my teeth before replying, “O-okay, I deserved that.” It hurt to move my jaw.

“No you don’t!” her voice shook. “You... I...”

I took advantage of her inability to articulate a sentence. “I’m sorry for Tuesday. I can’t put into words how sorry I am. But I am.”

She shook her head and found her words in a harsh whisper. “Don’t you dare...” Her voice rose to a shout. “Don’t you dare apologize like that fixes things!” As soon as she said it, she turned and began jogging east again.

I followed her and tried to reason with her. “Okay, I won’t apologize, because words won’t fix things. But what can I do to fix things between us?”

“Us?” She shot me a glare out of her right eye. “There is no ‘us.’ Not anymore.”

As I thought over what she’d just said, I slowed down to a trot, and Gilda shot a few steps ahead of me. She turned and cut in front of me, stopping in a broad, defensive stance. I slowed to a stop where I was. Finally, she warned, “So leave me alone, and quit following me.”

She turned around and hustled away, and for a moment, I considered rushing after her. By the time she was a block away, I realized it wouldn’t be worth it—not because I didn’t want it, but because she didn’t want it.

And that was my fault. My mistake. That realization turned my hooves to lead, and my chest felt woefully empty.

Somehow, I forced myself to turn around and head southwest, towards the Residential District and home. The whole way there, I noted that in a very short amount of time, my life had become incredibly complicated.

Worse than the complication was how alone I was. Gilda hated me. Starfall hated me. I didn’t want to keep bothering Sherry for advice, and Maxie... I shook my head. If she didn’t know about Gilda and myself, then she didn’t need to know about the two of us.

It hurt to use that word. “Us.” There was no “us” anymore.

It had been what I feared since Tuesday night, but even Sherry’s warnings hadn’t adequately prepared me for what it meant to lose Gilda.

They hadn’t made me forget how much I cared about her.

There were almost a dozen sources of pressure from last week’s duel mishap: The press’s overzealous criticism; the not-so silent dissent in the Guard that I couldn’t outright stamp out without making an even worse political situation; and then there was the political situation, where I was going to be officially reviewed in a few weeks’ time. At that moment, those paled in comparison to the now-overwhelming sense of loss that I felt.

At least Red Hooves has been quiet for now. I chuckled, mirthlessly, but shook my head. If anything, he was the motivation I needed to clear my mind so I could start taking the proactive steps to ensure the Guard could properly withstand an external threat. And on that note, it was early July; drake mating season was soon. Between them and giant bats, we’d need to start doing maintenance and taking inventory of our aerial defenses.

As I crossed into the Residential district, a pang of longing struck me. I wondered—and worried—about how Gilda made it through such issues. Offhandedly, she had mentioned one time that her usual tactic was to sit in her cave and build a fire. But that was defensive. Would things be different if she had to fly through dangerous airspace twice every day?

Despite my best efforts, I couldn’t put the sheer guilt—hypothetical guilt, granted—of how, if I hadn’t ruined things between us, I might have coaxed her into living in the city for the remainder of summer.

At the same time, I remembered how I had to make a call as captain because she had forced my hoof. Like every day for the past week, my head swam with how confusing everything was.

My thoughts spun for a while, until I looked around to see where I was. My legs’ muscle memory had taken me to within a block of my home. Realization struck that I still hadn’t eaten dinner, but I almost laughed at the notion; there was no way I could eat now. Besides, there was no need; I had sat at the hospital and chased after Gilda for the better part of an hour, so my sister wouldn’t be suspicious that I had skipped the dinner I had “abandoned” her for.

Still, Maxie wouldn’t understand why I was upset. She couldn’t. And if I did tell her, she would just blame me, loudly, and proclaim how she was right this whole time. I didn’t need that. No one needed that.

From where I was, I needed to take a right at the next intersection in order to get home. I registered that knowledge the same way I did my hunger: distantly, and in a manner that was easy to ignore.

I didn’t make a habit of frequenting bars, but there was one where the barkeeper knew me—and my sister, but he kept that knowledge quiet. Perhaps there were more responsible ways to spend my evening: I had an entire tome of griffin history to read, I probably needed to mend fences with Maxie, Comet could probably use some company...

With a small shake of my head, I put them all off. In the span of an hour, I had lost both my best friend and my girlfriend. If that didn’t earn a few drinks at Mel’s, then certainly, I would have to hold out for an apocalypse.

In lieu of that, I’d have to settle for how large portions of my world had been shattered.

Flying home, I barely got to the lake before I broke down, sobbing.

2 - Broken Wings

She took it from me. And he helped.

Six days after being admitted into Farrington General, I didn’t entirely care that Iron had come by my hospital room to try and pull nonexistent rank in order to get me to apologize like I was the only stallion to blame.

I didn’t mind being confined to as cheap a hospital room as I could probably no longer afford. My white walls were a prison, but I preferred them to the insanity that was happening outside.

I didn’t care that, between my eye, my shoulder, and my wing, every waking moment was full of some throb, ache, or pain. My doctor, a tall, brown stallion, had used the word lucky to describe my condition. That part made me laugh. I was lucky that the damage done to me was mostly reparable.

Mostly.

He promised me that, in time, I would regain eyesight in my left eye. I’d also be able to walk normally, once my shoulder joint healed. The one thing he was silent on, however, the one injury he didn’t want to talk about, despite four separate reconstructive surgeries...

The one injury I cared about was left a mystery.

One of my surgeons had enough fortitude to be frank with me, but despite telling me about “bone fragments” and “destroyed ligaments,” the best thing he could offer was that I’d get to keep my wing, and there was a chance I’d be able to fly.

I had a chance. And that was only if they held off on administering healing potions, since the accelerated healing would cause my wing joint to set incorrectly. So my best bet was to endure a long, painful, “natural” healing process.

And Iron had the gall to trot into my room with his holier-than-me attitude?

I couldn’t care less if he thought he was smart by insulting my marriage. That score would be settled later. For now, sheer spite motivated me to get out of the hospital. He wanted to play father to my children and husband to my wife, and then all because he thought I was the only one to blame in that household, and act like it was my fault?

A nurse interrupted my seething by waltzing into my room in her usual bubbly, inane manner. My vision blanked white when she turned the light on. Her dim, fuzzy outline blurred as I hardened my glare at her general location.

To add insult to injury, she cooed at me. “It’s no fun laying in the dark! If you sit up and smile, I’ll let you choose your flavor of pudding!”

All I wanted was peace, quiet, and dark to rest in, not to have rewards held over me like I was ten. I snarled, “Close your eyes and open your mouth, and I’ll let you choose a flavor.”

The nurse’s smile only grew. “If you were healthy enough for that, you wouldn’t be here still.”

Damn hospital bitch and her damn hospital bitch logic.

Thankfully, after that little exchange, she left me alone with my tray. As much as I wanted to fling it at the back of her head, my shoulder wasn’t up to the task yet. Besides, food meant healing, and healing meant leaving. I forced the calories down.

After my dinner sentence had been served, the nurse visited again to collect my tray. She held out a peace offering—a green bowl of cream-colored goop. Without breaking my glare at her, I took the bowl, tried not to scream in agony as I swung my shoulder to the right, and I dropped it into where I guessed the trash can was. After that, I brought up my other hoof, pointed it at the door, and commanded, “Out!”

I reveled at her sad little frown as she left. At least she remembered Thursday of last week, when I had fainted trying to turn off my own lights; on her way out, she flicked the switch down.

Then I was alone. Comet had been good about visiting me every day, but since Iron had been here, I assumed she was with Hailey and Moonshine tonight. With my wife out of the equation, I resigned myself to a night alone—barring another random visitor.

Last Wednesday afternoon, less than ten hours after the duel, Sergeant Justice had come by to collect my old lieutenant’s armor. She’d tried to start a conversation with me, which I refused—I had barely been conscious, and the pain had been torture enough without having to endure the drunken ramblings of an alcoholic widow.

Thursday morning, I received a pleasant visit from a few members of Air Control—my old squad. They were, apparently, some of the only guards with their heads still on straight. Even though I had to assure Ace that no, it wasn’t worth it for him to murder the griffin for me, they at least understood the real problem in my situation.

On Friday, the secretary once again started a fight between Comet and me by sending some flowers. It was unfortunate; Memo was adorable in her own way, but no matter how many ways I not-so-subtly spelled it out for her, she had a not-very-subtle crush on me. I thought it was cute, but Comet thought I was stupid enough to rend my household over it.

After Comet had stormed off over a dozen daffodils, I discovered that something was amiss. I’d made the mistake of trying to read the Farrington Times; two paragraphs in, I needed to stab something. That was the first time I opened the plastic bin with all the possessions I had on me when I had first stumbled into the hospital.

My wallet and my knife’s shoulder harness had been the only things inside. Then I remembered where my knife was, or specifically, who I had left it in.

I’d torn my shoulder open by throwing the bin against the wall. When the doctor came and magicked some new thread through the wound, the pain made it easy to block out his stern talking-to. It made everything clearer, brighter, and sharper.

She had stolen my knife, and Iron had helped her. They could both go to Hell.

* * *

Thursday morning, nine whole days after the fight, my doctor came by to take off my eye bandage. The world was fuzzy and bright when I looked through my left eye, but even as I sat there, outlines began to get clearer and clearer.

My shoulder joint had also finally healed enough where it was a simple matter of applying a topical mist and changing bandages. I could do that on my own, at home.

I already felt better than I had in days, but I still had to ask, “What about my wing?”

My doctor used a sharp wooden stick to prod the tip of my wing that stuck out from its bright pink cast. I twitched involuntarily at the prick, and my doctor spat out his stick. “You’ve got good circulation, and our surgeons did their best to rebuild the entire socket...” He shook his head. “It’s still too early to talk about function, but we’re not going to have to talk about prosthetics, either.”

That brand of “good news” came as a hollow emptiness in the pit of my stomach. Although I didn’t fly as much as I used to, it was still an incredibly... final thing, to have the sky taken away like that.

All because I stood up for someone who was in the same situation.

Either way, my health was improving to the point where I just needed rest and recuperation, not medical supervision. I asked about being discharged, and my doctor hesitantly admitted that, if I took it easy, I could leave that evening.

Things looked better from a personal standpoint, too. When Comet came to visit, she informed me that Iron was tending to his own damn business that evening because the kids were over at a friend’s slumber party. When I told her the news about my discharge, she leaped at me in a soft, tight hug. Even though I only could return it with one forearm, it was one of those raw, passionate embraces that reminded me of our younger days—before she got attacked.

She remembered it, too, and she nuzzled my cheek before going in for a kiss. I returned it, but before things went any farther, I pulled away. Rubbing the small of her back, I reasoned, “Not here, in a hospital. But, uh, later?”

She got down from the side of the bed, but gave me a sideways nod and a look that said, “We’ll see.”

* * *

After filling out all the discharge paperwork—apparently, I was out of the Guard, but my medical benefits were still paying for almost everything—we picked a few things up from the first-floor pharmacy. I put the shoulder brace on and immediately, walking on four limbs became bearable.

I thought of taking one of the painkillers, but knowing their street value, I decided I’d rather hang on to them. I resented even having to think about breaking the law, but at the same time, I had no idea how firmly I had been removed from the Guard. Nearly eleven years of good service should have counted for something in a sane world, but I knew enough to prepare for the worst. At any rate, my family couldn’t eat my morals.

Comet and I walked to the entrance lobby together; she had thought to bring her saddlebags, so I could walk without having to carry anything in an awkward manner. I didn’t know if she knew how grateful I was for that, but it wasn’t exactly something I knew how to say, either. “Thank you for carrying my painkillers and paperwork that weigh all of a half pound?”

She’d think I looked down on her.

When we got to the lobby, I turned to the sound of Comet’s sharp inhalation. Then, I noticed what she was looking at.

That thing had just walked through the sliding entrance doors.

Iron’s wild animal saw me, too; I felt myself returning its glare with a snarl. I truly, truly hoped things wouldn’t come to a hospital lobby fight when I had almost been discharged. Then again, I wasn’t the one in control of that; if Comet were afraid, I’d have to do something.

My wife nudged me. “Come on, Star. Can we just go?” Her request was small and pleading, and I felt a welling of pity for her.

I patted her forearm, then relented. “Okay. Let’s go.”

Comet and I walked towards the entrance and the confused, stationary beast. As we got closer, a small panic rose in my gut; apparently, my body remembered being broken.

However, I wasn’t going to let fear show or slow me down. I kept my eyes locked on the griffin, fully expecting a cheap shot; by the time I could smell its usual stale cave dirt, my heart was pounding.

Luckily, we passed it without incident.

Out in the street, it took a concentrated effort to avoid breathing a sigh of relief; Comet’s silence made me think she was facing a similar fight. When we were a block away, I broke the silence: “What the hell is it even doing at a hospital?”

“Iron’s got her reading to the Miner’s Phage victims.”

That came as a shock, and I remembered seven years ago, when the news first hit. The miners beneath Mount Farrington had hit a pocket of high-pressure gas; three of them died in the resulting explosion. That would’ve been bad enough, but the gas leaked out into the Mining and Artisan Districts. The only ones who seemed to be affected by it were newborn foals, and the so-named “Miner’s Phage” was an apparently lifelong condition.

Which was something of an ironic term; seven years ago, there had been thirty of them. Now there were six.

I wanted to crack a joke about those kids being through enough as it was, or wondering if Iron’s pet could even read. However, I remembered those days of hoping and praying that one-year-old Hailey wasn’t affected by it. So all I could do was respond with a quiet, “Is that so?”

Comet dipped back and walked around to my left side; I was slightly confused, then she rested her head on my good shoulder. I unfurled my good wing and hugged her with it.

We kept walking like that, which wasn’t entirely as awkward a position as it would seem. As soon as we reached our home’s gate, Comet chuckled. “You need a shower.”

I rubbed her shoulder with my wing and replied, “I might need an extra set of hooves in there.” Which, unfortunately, was true; my wing’s cast wasn’t waterproof, and it was awkward to get the cover on it by myself.

Comet took my fun little joke to the next level. After she opened the gate for me and caught back up with me, she leaned into my ear and whispered a suggestion that made my face grow hot.

“O-okay...” I turned to her, not sure where that had come from. However, I wasn’t going to complain, either.

We went inside, and without much ado, we made our way to the master bathroom. There, despite everything that had happened to me in the past ten days, despite my uncertain future, despite my pain, injuries, and the physical limits they created for me...

It was a good evening.

Tuesday morning, a mere five mornings since Starfall had come back home, I sat across the table from him and wanted to laugh bitterly at myself. It had been stupid for me to think that, since he was home more often, things would change between us. It had been fun, but equally stupid, to think that being more affectionate would get him to open up more.

If anything, now, he was more distant, more withdrawn than before. Oh, Starfall would talk, if I asked him a question, but that was purely out of politeness, and I had to start the conversation. I hated that. We always ate breakfast together, after the kids were at school and he’d woken up after his night shift. Now that we were sleeping on the same schedule, he was up earlier than usual, but we were eating in the same, deep silence.

I told myself that it wasn't that he was a bad stallion. Sure, I knew he had a violent streak in him—the same way I knew he could be a crass, mean asshole sometimes. However, he kept himself in check around me and our children, and he was generally good at romance. Some days, I didn’t even know what I had to complain about; for a husband, he was faithful—despite inappropriate jokes to the contrary—reliable, and often, he was kind.

But then there were mornings like now, where he would be perfectly content to ignore me except to ask me simple, meaningless things like, “Pass the butter?”

I slid the dish across the table, and he thanked me. I watched him spread butter over his toast, completely tuning out my existence, and it bothered me to watch him do exactly what I was thinking about. I didn't say anything to complain, though. That was how things were with him. He wasn't cold enough to hate, he just wasn't warm enough to love. It was like he strategically did the bare minimum to call himself a husband.

Several of my friends had asked me about our relationship over the years, and the question always seemed to be, “If you’re not happy, why do you stay with him?”

The clock on our wall read six twenty-three, and there was my answer. Hailey and Moonshine would be awake soon. It sounded insane, but it was almost like Starfall took all the love he was supposed to give me—actual, deep, emotional love—and instead, he gave it to our two children. However crazy it seemed, it almost fit; if it were true, I wasn't even jealous of them. If I was the cost of Starfall being a good father, then I was happy to pay it.

Even then, I worried something had broken in him when he got hospitalized for picking a fight with that griffin. Part of me hoped it was the painkillers he had been prescribed; part of me rationalized he was supposed to be under bed rest, not being up and about like he was.

But then there was the part of me that saw the growing rift between him and our children.

That terrified me, but it turned to cold fury when I realized that if I let myself cry over it, he'd come over to me, wrap his good limbs around me, and ask “What's wrong” in an attempt to comfort me.

When the kitchen clock struck the half-hour, I felt like I couldn't take the silence anymore. Starfall’d been home for a week, but he had said nothing about money. Between the two of us, we didn’t have any income. Other than the severance benefits from the post office that had dried up eight years ago, Starfall had always taken care of things with his job in the Guard.

Last Tuesday, when a tired-looking Iron came to look after the kids, I’d asked them how their talk had gone. He’d shaken his head and, in not so few words, he told me that he still needed to talk with Starfall. Given how, over the past few weeks, Star had only mentioned Iron in passive, hateful barbs, I was concerned. I sincerely hoped that he would put his family before his friendship troubles with Iron, but again, I hadn’t heard anything about it.

I took a huff of a deep breath and started the conversation. “It’s six-thirty.”

“On the eighteenth,” he flatly agreed.

His indifference drove me to push back: “So, what's happening with you and the Guard?”

Starfall took a bite of his toast and chewed it with a glare. “I don't know. Why don't you ask Iron?”

“I did. He says he wants to talk to you when you’ve...” I realized that it probably wasn’t the best thing to quote Iron directly about where Starfall’s head was stuck. “When you’re ready to talk to him.”

“I have nothing to say to him.”

I tapped a hoof on the table, then let out an angry sigh. “So, what then? Are we going to board up the house and fight off debtors? Eat the furniture? I mean, we've got savings, but—”

He glared at me with what I thought was anger, but I supposed that was what passed for sincerity from him. “When I can, I will get a job.”

Him and his simple plans. My wing sockets prickled, which I hoped didn’t mean it was going to be a bad day, but I ignored them to press, “And when's that going to be? For that matter, where are you going to get a job that pays like the Guard?”

Starfall ran a frustrated hoof back through his stubbly stripe of a mane. “I don't know, all right? Is that what you want to hear?” He raised his voice, and I had to fight from flinching. “How I'm the lazy, good-for-nothing bastard stallion that you married because I'm sitting around the house all day when I should be out looking for work?”

I shook my head at his stupid accusations. “You need to rest. Just because you’re out of the hospital doesn’t mean you’re healed yet.”

He shrugged, wide-eyed. “Then what do you want me to do about work?”

“Talk to Iron,” I said bluntly. “He’s your friend, and he—”

“He threw that away the moment he let his sudden griffin fetish get in the way of our ‘friendship.’” He made little air quotes with his hooves to punctuate the sentence.

I stared down at the streak of jam that was left on my empty plate. Iron was my friend, too, even if he had waited until after Starfall’s fight to admit to me that he had been dating a griffin. At the same time, that was misguided thoughtfulness on Iron’s part, not malice, and I hated hearing Star talk about him like that. “What’s it to you, who he decides to date?”

“A functional memory?” Starfall shrugged maliciously.

Back on this again... I sighed. “Star, if she were two feet taller, brown, missing an eye, and male, then maybe you’d have a leg to stand on.”

“It’s the principle of the matter.”

“Principle?” I asked. “Eight years ago, a unicorn broke three of your ribs; is Iron banned from dating that race?”

Starfall shook his head. “It’s different and you know it.”

“How?!”

He slammed a hoof on the table, and my plate jumped. “Because that didn’t leave me a broken cripple!”

I gasped, and he sat there, slack-jawed, like he didn’t believe what he had just said, either.

But he had.

It felt like a slap in the face, and tears stung. I blinked them back. I couldn’t believe it.

It’d been ten years since my injury. Every time he assured me he didn't think that, every time he helped me get past the memory of flying and how I'd never feel it again, every time he helped me cope... I shook my head slowly. They hadn't all been a lie, they couldn’t have been.

Still, in a sickening twist, it all made sense. That was why he was distant with me. That was why he loved the kids more. Because they were able-bodied, with their whole futures in front of them. Me? I just disgusted him by being broken. Crippled.

I felt betrayed. Tears, frustrated and hot, started falling. Starfall didn’t walk over to try and comfort me, and I was glad. Now that I knew why, I didn’t want him to touch me.

Across the table, Starfall let out an angry sigh. I felt hollow. His silence had already said more than enough, but still, I had to know. “Is that... Is that really what you think I am?”

An entire minute passed, and I almost gave up on getting an answer. Finally, his tongue popped as he opened his mouth, and he answered in a low voice. “It’s not that you’re... like you are, it’s just... you just accept it.”

For a moment, I felt sorry for him. He had been keeping that bottled up for almost ten years? I couldn’t imagine what that would be like, and for something so...

My pity dried up when I realized just what his words meant: He was upset because I could cope with my disability? “Is that... you’re jealous that I’m not miserable like you?”

“Miserable—”

“Don’t even!” It was all I could do to keep from shouting. A decade’s resentment mixed with all my marital worries, and the whole thing fueled me to speak faster and faster. “Because, just because I don’t sit around moping all day, I’m weak? Just because one of us is coping with what happened, that means I’m just accepting it?” My voice turned to steel. “I think about what happened every day. My joints still hurt every day. Every time I look up at the sky, every time I see one of our kids flying, or even a bird, every time I have that nightmare...” I shuddered. “Every day hurts. Every day, I deal with it. But you, you have the gall to sit there and call me a cripple?” I scoffed. “Fuck you!”

I shouted the last two words, and they echoed around the kitchen for a while. Starfall blinked a few times; even with his half-closed left one, his eyes were wider than I’d seen in a long time. His shock quickly turned to a frown, and then he asked, too calmly, “How am I supposed to know this if you don’t show it?”

“How can I not feel like this?” I asked, more incredulous than angry.

His frown became a scowl and he stood up. “So, I’m a mind reader, but you always bitch at me for ‘keeping things bottled up?’”

“You...” I stood up to match him. This was not my fault. I pointed a hoof at him and shouted again, “Don’t turn this on me!”

He glared at me, which turned to a full-body shudder. He didn’t say anything; instead, he just grunted angrily, turned, and started walking out of the kitchen. I stood there watching him, disgusted, before I realized what was happening. We weren’t done yet. I followed him out into the hallway. “Starfall!”

He was already at the end of the hall. I couldn’t do anything but watch as he grabbed his wallet, threw the front door open, stepped outside, and quickly swung it closed behind him.

The doorknob’s gentle click shook me to my senses about as abruptly as slamming the door would have. With our fight over, the house boomed with silence—I perked an ear and, miraculously, the kids seemed to have slept through our shouting match. At least, I hoped they did.

I thought about running after Starfall, but without any idea where he was going, it might be hard to find him before... a public shouting match? I glanced up at the ceiling and shook my head. Hailey and Moonshine needed their breakfast.

I turned around to head back to the kitchen and sighed. I’d always thought that he just needed to show his emotions, and that was the biggest problem we faced.

Now, more than ever, I had even less of an idea what the future held in store for us.

I barely kept from slamming my door behind me. If the kids were still asleep after Comet’s ranting, I didn’t want to be the one to wake them up. Still, it took a decent amount of willpower to keep from taking my frustration out on something.

Our elderly neighbor was out, tending to her lawn. She greeted me with a cheery, “Good morning!”

After I returned her greeting back, I immediately apologized for making her flinch. That drove my hooves forward, as I decided it would be best to be somewhere I didn’t have a personal stake in. I started walking, randomly, without any real destination in mind.

Ten minutes into my trek, all of my legs were weary and trembling. A more rational mind would have noted that this was my first time leaving the house since I returned from the hospital under order of bed rest. Then again, that “rationality” was weakness; crippled as I was, I just needed to slow down.

Either way, I needed to get out of that house. I appreciated her efforts, but five days of Comet attempting to dote on me like I was an invalid, five days of responding, “I can do it...”

It wore thin.

After I took my walking speed to a more leisurely pace, I started to feel better, physically. At the very least, my wing joint no longer screamed in piercing agony at every waking moment; now, it was just reduced to a sharp, throbbing ache.

It didn’t matter. No matter how far along in the healing process I was, I hated being unable to fly—whether temporarily or permanently. Granted I only ever flew during early-morning calisthenics, but I hated that Iron’s little social experiment had taken even that away from me.

Griffins. I spat on the side of the road, to the dismay of a passer-by. I glared, and she walked past with a pompous, upturned nose of disgust. Aren’t they supposed to be dying or something? School had been more than a decade ago, and their filthy culture hadn’t interested me back then, either. When I heard that my “average” grades set me on course for a job in the weather factory, I’d started looking outside of Cloudsdale for my future prospects.

It had seemed so easy back then: Go to a place with a low pegasus population, then be in demand based solely on your ability to fly. Never mind why so few pegasi lived in Farrington, what was the worst that could happen?

I chuckled, bitterly, and then I recalled hearing about how there were only a sparse number of small tribes of those beasts remaining. I shook the pointless fact out of my head. Comet had been the one who was interested in Equestrian territories and boundaries. Comet had been the one with parents who could afford blowing two months’ worth of rent on a pointless exam. She took her “National Certified Flyer’s Licence” exam and passed; she had job prospects outside the Cloudsdale weather factory.

And look how well that worked out for her, I thought blackly. Not even ten months after she got that damn license, she ignored a landmark and flew straight through griffin territory. Apparently, it was a crime punishable by death. I remembered how it had taken her weeks just to get the strength to walk again. As I looked at the prospect of only being grounded for a few months, I wondered just how “merciful” that monster had been to spare her “life.”

But no, griffins were only single-minded, grotesquely violent freaks when provoked. We had no reason to fear them. Almost everyone I talked to in the Guard agreed: if there were any sort of organized aerial assault from a race of killing machines, Farrington would suffer heavy losses before the end of it. True, Celestia—or her sister, now—could come to our defense, but how many good stallions, mares, and foals would die before that intervention?

I wasn’t content to sit idly and wait for that to happen. Comet had always berated me for training with my knife as extensively as I had, but even ten years of that hadn’t been enough. After seeing the limits of close-range combat, I figured that a knife was too limited a weapon: Not only did it get me into too close of quarters with a griffin, but stabbing them only seemed to make them more violent.

Plus, I didn’t have my knife anymore. It had been stolen from me.

I took a quick glance at the street around me; I had wandered into the Market District, and was two blocks away from the Market Square. I chuckled at that coincidence, though it wasn’t all that far from my home to begin with. It reminded me of that night, and how next time I fought a griffin, I’d need a better weapon.

But again—I remembered Iron’s pompous crap he spun to the newspaper—we’re moving into a new era of foreign relations for Farrington. I scoffed at that, just like I had scoffed at the kindling he sent me on Saturday in lieu of our usual social gathering. Luckily, Comet had been out; without my knife or unicorn powers, my wrath at his stupid, neat handwriting was limited to a fire in the sink.

Besides, I already knew I was effectively fired from the Guard. He’d dress it up in his usual manner, but that was the cold, hard truth. When it came between his friend and his new fetish, he could apparently throw me away after two months.

That... stung, I had to admit. Ironically, it wasn’t even because he was dating a griffin; that was just who he was. I always used to joke that he needed to find a girlfriend; given how strenuously he took dating, the small part of me that actually wanted to repair things between us wished that he was single again.

Repair things, I repeated the phrase in my mind like it contained some sort of profound knowledge. Whether it was true or not, I had told Comet how pathetic I thought she acted, and she turned it around to make it look like I had a problem. If not bending down and taking everything that life shoved in me was a “problem,” then I didn’t want to be “normal.”

Hell, Comet’s tirade about how much she hated her condition just proved I was right. She had problems that she was just trying to ignore. Her fake strength was built on lies and self-delusion, and I hated how shallow that was.

If I had known she would’ve turned out like that, I would have left her to “cope” on her own, while she was still in the hospital. Ten years later, it was too late; now, I was trapped in our marriage because I had been stupid enough to father a couple of—

I stopped dead in my tracks when I realized where that train of thought led, where I was at. A dusty blue mare had been following too close behind me, and she headbutted my flank before bitching, “Watch where you’re going!”

Through clenched teeth, I lashed back. “Eat. It.”

She turned her head up at me with a “humph,” but didn’t make a bigger scene out of her mistake. After she slinked away, I took the opportunity to regain my bearings. Thanks to the clock in the intersection I was near, I was able to tell that it was exactly seven sixteen in the morning when I realized how bad a father I was.

Slowly, I started walking again, this time with a destination in mind. Between fatigue and failure, it was at a much slower, weaker pace than I had started out on my mid-morning walk. I wanted to go home, ironically, but now, I wasn’t sure if I could just yet.

In the soft morning light, the Market Square was a much calmer place than my memories would indicate. I entered from the southeast and headed to the central fountain. Five feet from the stone fixture, I looked down at the ground and remembered how this had all begun—me, standing over a griffin, the one who would later ruin large portions of my life.

With a sad shake of my head, I stepped through the area she had occupied three years ago. I walked over to the fountain’s basin, glad that despite the recent drought, it still had water in it. The bottom was white plaster and the sun wasn’t directly overhead, so I could see my reflection fairly easily. I had let my mane get shaggier than usual, and I looked... gaunt was the word that came to mind. I’d like to meet the pony who could gain weight over two appetite-less weeks, though.

My left eye had a distinctive cut running from my cheek and up to my eyebrow. It was easy to forget I had that injury, since it didn’t hurt and I didn’t see myself very often. It was deep enough where it would probably leave a scar, and while my macho mind thought that was “cool,” I wondered what it would look like to Hailey and Moonshine.

Did I frighten them?

After being discharged from the hospital, I had been in constant pain and exhaustion from my wing. Hailey entertained herself by drawing a few smiley faced flowers on the cast, and neither of them seemed different, but I could remember putting on a tough face for my dad, back when things had been hard.

I remembered, five years ago when I’d brought Hailey up to visit, I’d asked my dad how he had found the time and money for himself on top of being a parent.

He had smiled and asked, “For me?”

That had resonated with me when, for the first time, I realized I couldn’t remember him having much in the way of hobbies. Ever since then, I had vowed to try and live up to his example, to put my children first. But looking at myself, how I was beaten and broken, I had to ask who I put first.

A few moments’ of deliberation from their perspective showed me that I was a selfish stallion. I took a night shift in the Guard because I didn’t want to deal with the emptiness I felt towards my wife. I had Comet keep the kids away from the hospital for my benefit, so they wouldn’t see me broken and battered.

When I had two talons pressed to my neck, it wasn’t just the pain that caused me to goad her to “finish it.” I would literally rather die than look weak to them.

Forget selfish, was I really that petty?

I punched at my reflection, which was a lot farther down in the basin than I thought; before I knew it, my nose slammed into the bottom of the fountain while I mounted the side. The shock made me inhale, which was a mistake to do underwater; one flap of my good wing later, and I was sitting on my ass by the fountain, coughing and sputtering.

My nose smelled like copper and my eyes burned, but for the first time, it felt like my mind was clear.

I thought about Comet: Why did she need to suffer for her pain to be real to me? That was cruel, and worse, just because I couldn’t accept that she was happy... Now she was probably going to have to help out with some sort of part-time job. I knew it was partly because of her handicap, but I still meant every word of the promise I made to protect and provide for her.

Celestia only knew I had caused her enough hardship by dragging her along with me to Farrington in the first place. She didn’t need to suffer through a job on top of everything else that I had done to her.

With a deep, bloody inhale, I stood up. I needed some sort of towel, or bandage, for my nose. I had my wallet, so I could get something from the nearby pharmacy, but that just reminded me about my money troubles. I decided to head over there anyway, then I could figure out where my morning would take me.

After a few steps away from the Market Square, I thought about Iron. As much as I needed him to be as selfish and petty as I was, that probably wasn’t the case. I accused him of playing favorites and putting the job first, but really, he was trying to be a friend despite what his job forced him to do. I just made that hard for him.

Worse, he’d had a much rougher childhood than me—it was hard to remember he was an orphan sometimes—and now that he was finally coming around to the idea of romance...

I shook my head. I didn’t understand what sort of kinks he was into, but with Comet’s injuries requiring certain positions and prohibiting others, I knew something about how fleeting the notion of “traditional” romance was. If he wanted to date a griffin, I could try to accept it—though I’d prefer he’d try it with one that hadn’t stabbed me.

Then again, that had been my fault too. I smiled bitterly as I remembered that my problems with her were over, for now; since I was out of the Guard and the hospital, our paths wouldn’t need to cross anymore.

That was one problem solved, at the very least.

I rolled my eyes at how effective a solution that was. At the same time, there wasn’t much more I could do about it; with a one-shouldered shrug, I kept walking to the pharmacy.

Once there, the bell above the door announced my presence to the beige cashier to the right. From the look of him, I had disturbed his personal time. He looked up at me, snickered, and then returned to his magazine; apparently, I wasn’t worth much more of his attention.

Anger slowly filled up the space in my mind that my self-loathing had hollowed out. I bristled all the way to the first aid aisle, picked up some gauze, and returned to the cashier. On the way, I passed a strategically placed dairy cooler; then, I remembered we were almost out of milk. I wasn’t naïve enough to think that milk would solve my problems with Comet, but still, it would be one less thing for her to worry about.

I didn’t have any saddlebags, so I had to cradle the milk and gauze in my still-hurting right arm. Walking was getting to be tiring, and the cashier kept smiling at me, and as I placed my items on the counter, I vowed that if he didn’t wipe that smile off his face, he was going to get very intimately acquainted with his rolled-up magazine.

He punched a few buttons on the cash register, but then he snarked, “Love the pink.”

I narrowed my glare at him. “What?”

He tapped himself on his right shoulder, and I instantly remembered my cast. They had changed it three times during my hospital stay, but each time, “I don’t care” had resulted in it being kept the same color.

I also remembered that Hailey liked the pink, and my anger turned righteous. If this stallion was going to mock me over something my children enjoyed, then he could shove his laughter straight up his ass.

“Do you have any kids?” I asked coolly. Somehow, I was calm enough to realize how it wouldn’t do me any good to snap at him without a proper foundation.

In response, the cashier held out a small, folding picture frame in front of me. A mare about Comet’s age smiled back at me from the left side; on the right side, there was a pair of girls, probably ages six and eight. I nodded slowly at the pictures, and the cashier put them back down.

After seeing the three ponies he was working to support, I felt a bond of empathy with him. At any rate, I could look past his laughing at my cast; he was probably snarky like that with everyone.

I paid for my items and left the pharmacy feeling much more serene than when I had entered... or in a long time, for that matter. I didn’t have a clear sense of direction on any of my problems except for one:

I wanted to love my children.

After that, everything seemed like it would fall in place. I needed to be the best father possible, which included things like swallowing my own pride.

Before I started the trip back home, I opened my pack of gauze, balled it up, and shoved it up my nostrils. I was still wet from the fountain, but at that point, I was less dreading Comet’s reaction to my departure and more worried about us in the long-term.

The milk carton didn’t have a good grip to bite on, so I cradled its cold, waxy bulk in my right forearm. Two blocks later, my arm was numb. I wanted to switch, but I still wasn’t strong enough to walk three-legged on my right leg yet. By the time I got to my front gate, my head was spinning and I was starting to see spots.

Back inside, I smiled and nodded back at Moonshine’s greeting, trying not to faint in the process. Pride was one thing, terrifying the kids was another. Hailey kept quiet, but that was because she was too polite to speak through her mouthful of oatmeal.

Comet was over at the sink, washing dishes. I dragged myself over to her, then set the milk on the counter. Her eye turned to it, then up at me, then it widened in shock. “Where did you go?” she whispered.

“I, uh, fell... in the Market Square fountain.”

Her eyebrow raised, and our children laughed. Then, she shook her head and turned back to the dishes; I could tell she was still bothered by our fight that morning. My chest felt heavy when I remembered I was, too.

I leaned in for a quick kiss on her cheek, which she accepted but didn’t return. “I’m sorry,” I whispered. It was tricky to put the proper meaning into a whisper, but I didn’t know if the kids knew we had fought. If they didn’t, they didn’t need that discovery in their morning.

Comet turned to look me in the eyes after I said it, then she nuzzled my cheek to accept my apology. “Me too.”

I smiled back at her before going over to the table to be with Hailey and Moonshine. They were fighting over an orange, so I took a paring knife out of our drawer, then cut the fruit down the middle. That solved that dispute, and as I sat there, trying not to pant, I knew that I had two very good reasons to work on my relationship with my wife.

For the first time, I realized I was the broken one who needed to get over my wounds.

3 - Bottled Messages

Friday was almost over, and all I wanted was a drink.

I honestly couldn’t remember when that became part of my daily life, but it was there. I guessed it must have started sometime in the past two years, after I finally broke down and decided that sleeping in Stalliongrad was worth the extra cost of alcohol.

When I found out that some ponies would just buy you drinks... well, then it was a matter of economics over pride.

The smart half of my brain yelled at me every day to quit my job at the post office. It was boring, it didn’t pay well, it wasn’t worth it, and it was literally killing me. But at the same time, there was how—minus one customer—my boss said I was the best worker he’d ever had. Iron also... well, he never overtly complimented my work ethic, but the dumb half of my brain still didn’t want to let him down. He was already disappointed with me enough as it was.

Then again, he had a lot of disappointment in his life right now. It all started when I got home to an empty house on Wednesday night, two weeks ago. Iron’s stuff wasn’t on the rack after six sixteen, which worried me slightly. By the time he finally got home after eight, I’d been a nervous wreck. Of course, it was my fault that he didn’t leave a note or anything, because I didn’t flag down a guard and ask what happened. Like I was supposed to seek out the news of my brother’s death.

Anyway, late nights for Iron didn’t end there; he kept babysitting his loser friend’s kids all week. Then, late Monday night of last week, he stumbled back into our house drunker than I had ever seen him. That had been scary the first time. The next time it happened, I dragged it out of him that neither his friend nor the griffin bitch had taken it well when he had to punish them over their stupid fight.

Now, twelve nights later, Iron had spent at least half of them just as drunk—I was gone for two nights, so I didn’t have an exact number. But those nights when he wasn’t drunk, he was just sad; even the nights when it’d been his turn to cook, he’d just brought home takeout instead.

I wanted to stop him. I wanted to tell him to find a better way of coping, or to spend more time with his non-Guard friends. But when I tried to bring it up his drinking in a delicate manner, he just asked, “And...?”

His tone told me that he was talking about Stalliongrad, which... he never really talked about, and I never really brought it up either. It closed down the conversation, too, since I didn’t want to be a hypocrite or admit he was right.

We were just stuck in a stupid, drunken spiral of denial with each other.

The worries about my stupid drunk brother evaporated when a fuschia unicorn mare walked through the post office’s door. That would have been strange enough, in Farrington, but she also sported loud, bronze spikes for a mane. I looked from her mane to the brown box she was carrying, and then I glanced at the clock; of course it was four fifty-six. I put on my brave face as I died inside and greeted, “Hi, is there anything I can help you with?”

As she walked over to my counter, I got a good look at her package; the addressee lived in Hoofington. Every step she took, I felt myself get heavier with dread; she had come in four minutes before I got off. Now, I was looking at the very real possibility of having half my weekend eaten by traveling. Couldn’t you have been five minutes later? I asked her, silent as it was futile.

She set her package on the counter with a “Hi.”

“Hi,” I replied, careful not to bare my teeth any more than a smile. There was a chance she didn’t want it there in an insured, guaranteed two-day delivery—what I did. If she could wait, I wouldn’t have my weekend cut in ha—

“What’s the fastest that I can get this to Hoofington?”

I wanted to beat her unconscious with her package. Instead, I quoted prices.“If you want it there by tonight, it will be one hundred bits; if you want to send it with the rest of next Monday’s out-of-town mail, it’s only be five bits.” I should have charged a premium for showing up at four minutes to the end of my shift, but even though I didn’t like my job, I didn’t want to start breaking the law over it. Iron wouldn’t like that.

The spiky unicorn reeled at the price. “A hundred bits? Instead of five? It’s only getting there a few days earlier!”

I will shove that package up you if you try to argue this. I felt my eyes narrow. I blinked before putting on an apologetic face. “I know it sounds weird, but if you want it sent out outside of the usual, scheduled pickups, someone’s going to have to take it by hoof. Even though the inn gives us a special discount, it’s still forty bits for a room, ten for meals, and then it’s an eight-hour round trip for the delivery filly on top of that.”

“Fifty bits for eight hours of walking?” she sneered.

“I wish,” I blurted out. Catching it, I added, “I mean, the post office gets a cut, there’s taxes... I could go on, but are you really interested in how this whole thing works?” I had to fight from cringing; thatwasn’t the polite thing to say, either.

However, for her problems with timing, the mare on the other side of the counter let out either a light scoff or a polite laugh. “I guess she can wait a few days,” she said, placing five bits on the counter.

I breathed a mental sigh of relief; even though getting it ready to send out of town would take a few extra minutes, I’d still be home before five-thirty tonight instead of tomorrow.

So, with my last order of business done for the day, I thanked the customer and she left the post office. I took her box to the back and stamped it with the various labels it needed; when everything was in order, I levitated the package over to the growing pile of out-of-town mail. Mostponies preferred to do things the way that made sense; even though I got sent out on a near-weekly basis, those deliveries were far less common than the ones that simply entailed sending the package along with the pegasus who showed up twice every week.

Anyway, I was done; that late on a Friday, it was only me and my boss in the post office. Mr. McFeely stayed behind until seven o’ clock, for any of the miners who wanted to mail something with their fresh wages. I felt kind of bad to leave him completely alone, but since he didn’t want to pay me for two extra hours, I couldn’t feel toobad about it.

He stepped out of his office wearing his usual old colt smile. With a quick glance at the hallway clock, he remarked, “It’s a tad late for you to still be around on a Friday, isn’t it?”

“Someone came in at five-til with a package for delivery,” I replied.

“Well,” he said with a grin, “I can tell by your face they didn’t want it sent out to Stalliongrad.” I didn’t know if he knew how much I hated that city, and how lightly he mentioned it. Fortunately, he changed the subject: “But anyway, you’re free to go.”

I bowed and went into his office to get my saddlebags. I levitated them onto my back before fastening their buckles. When I went back through the door to the customer area, my boss was behind the counter with me, so as I lifted the counter to let myself through, I bid him, “See you Monday, Mr. M.”

“Good evening, Miss Ardor.” I smiled at our rapport: he wanted me to call him by his first name, but when I was polite out of habit, he started addressing me by my last name in turn. With everything taken care of, including my official dismissal for the evening, I wore my smile out with me into the streets of Farrington.

The good mood lasted about three feet out the front door. From the right side of the landing, a Stalliongrad accent greeted, “Hi there.” It chilled my spine.

I looked to the voice’s source, and I let everything unclench when I saw it was just recently-promoted Lieutenant Justice. Then, I worried that Iron was hurt, or worse, and why was she stalking me if that were the case?

“I want to mail a letter.”

Instinctively, I flinched. She used to live in Stalliongrad, so a letter... Then, I remembered I was off work already, but then she probably knew that—

“Calm your teats, filly, it’s an in-city thing.”

I frowned at her offhooved remark, but I shrugged. “Well...” I pointed at the building behind me. “There’s the post office...”

The lieutenant’s helmet slowly shook from side to side. “This is a personal thing, one I don’t want anyone to know about.” She pointed a hoof at me. “That’s where you come in. The jist of this is, I pay you a hundred bits, you take a letter up to the Market District, and you don’t tell anyone about this. Simple enough?”

“A hundred bits for that?” I blinked, then a sudden realization struck. “Wait, it’s not like a bomb or something?”

That made her bring her hoof back to her mouth over a chuckle. “No, but I like the way you think. And this could have fallout if handled improperly, but that’s where the ‘I’m paying you to keep your mouth closed’ bit comes in.” She glared at me with such intensity that I hunched back. “You’re taking a letter to Starfall. I want to hear his reaction.” Her head turned to the post office, and she pointed at it. “If he or anyone asks, this came from down that chain of command. But Iron doesn’t hear any of this for now.”

I made a sound of protest, but she raised a sympathetic eyebrow and spoke over me. “I know Iron’s not in the best of places right now. I’m trying to do what I can. Starfall needs to think, within reason, that this letter came from your brother, and I need to know where to go from there.”

She finished her instructions by reaching into her armor and pulling out a letter. “So, a hundred bits for that. No bombs, but still a possibility for disaster if mishandled.”

I took the letter and flipped it over so I could see both, blank sides. As I did, I thought about what Lieutenant Justice wanted me to do; it was easy, as long as I had a good enough cover story. However, it’d need an address on the outside to pass for that, so I magicked a pen out of my left saddlebag. Luckily for everyone, school detention slips had given me a good reason to learn how to mimic Iron’s hoofwriting. “It’ll probably look better if it’s actually addressed,” I commented. Then, I wrote both addresses on it and showed the lieutenant.

She looked at it, then back to me. Instead of being happy, she gave a harsh-sounding warning: “That’s not the sort of skill you should advertise.”

Yeah, forgery was bad, especially if it were someone with as many government privileges as the Captain of the Guard. “I’m not stupid. But you want this to look like it came from him, but got minced in the post office system? Who’s to say I didn’t see this coming through and decided to take it in-person, like this sort of thing should be handled in the first place?”

That got an approving nod. “Come find me after you’re done. And don’t tell Iron what you’re up to.”

It was simple enough, so I returned the nod. After that, the lieutenant and I parted ways. She worked in the north gate; Starfall and Comet lived more to the northeast. I headed there.

It was about a thirty minute walk from the south end of town to the north end, but a hundred bits made it difficult to complain—even if the afternoon was humid enough to make me start sweating before I even cleared the Business District.

However, I wasn’t one of those unicorns that could just learn random spells like “cooling myself down,” though. Other than quick, emotional reactions—like teleporting up to the roof when Iron blew up our stove—I was stuck with basic levitation and the ability to sort things quickly. I felt outclassed by some of the other unicorns I’d heard stories about, especially since my cutie mark was an envelope. However, when I saw the trouble that Iron had with some of the simplest of tasks, like getting pages of a book unstuck from one another, I knew it could be worse.

Magic or no, I was hot, which made me thirsty, which made me want a drink. I reasoned that water or some sort of sports drink was what I needed, not something that dehydrated me even more, but that didn’t do anything to stop my desire. The best I could do was to tell myself to focus on the task at hand: I had a delivery to do.

The remaining twenty minutes of the trip up to Starfall’s and Comet’s, I rehearsed my story to tell them. Someone put this in the Guard’s incoming mail, I noticed Iron’s name on the return address, and I decided to take it to Starfall myself. This sort of thing should be done face-to-face, not behind letters and proxies.

Which, that last part was easy enough to talk about as if it were the truth; I didn’t like being used like this. Still, Lieutenant Justice was scary, but only because she didn’t really joke about anything. She also cared about Iron, on some level, so if she said that sending this letter would get Iron back on his feet to have his friend back, I could trust her. All it took was me swallowing a little bit of my personal pride.

Then you can wash it down with a well-earned shot or two, my mind cut in.

NO! I shouted back.

A gust of wind blew down an alleyway, rustling the dust and debris along the cobblestones. I rolled my eyes up to my forehead, where I could just make out the outline of my horn. It wasn’t glowing, but I didn’t trust it; that was the scary thing, too, since magic in the streets was... frowned upon, by guards. They couldn’t do anything about it, other than cite you for a disturbance if you were showing off, but I wasn’t on a very popular road—and it had just been a gust of wind.

Anyway, I managed to get to Starfall’s and Comet’s house without blowing out any windows, and by then, my cover story was definitely a good one—if I needed it at all. One thing I’d picked up in Stalliongrad, depending on the act I wanted to play, is that ponies usually made up their own truths about stuff given what was in front of them. If they saw someone sad and alone, it was easy for them to come over and pretend to care, buy me a drink... and a few hours later, I could get the best night’s sleep possible in that city.

Which, there were sleeping potions that you could buy, but my Stalliongrad routine was like drinking: dangerous, unhealthy, but depending on who you did it with, it could be fun.

I put that whole line of thought out of my mind as I walked through the gate to Starfall’s and Comet’s. It didn’t seem right to even think about that sort of stuff around civilized ponies. So, focusing on the task before me, I walked up to the door and knocked.

I heard voices inside, but I couldn’t make out the words until a female voice got closer: “—besides, it’s probably just a salespony.”

Comet opened the door a crack, saw me, and opened it all the way. “Hi, Max!”

Like always, it was awkward to remember that these two were Iron’s friends, not really mine. Either way, I grinned back and greeted. “Hi Comet. Is, uh, your husband home?”

Her lips pursed a little. “I... he’s supposed to be resting right now.”

“And I’ve been resting. Eleven hours of it,” came Starfall’s voice from deeper within the house—their living room, I’d guess. “Fifteen minutes in the city isn’t going to kill me, neither is a guest!”

Comet’s eyes widened before she frowned, turned, and answered, “Last ‘fifteen minutes,’ you almost fainted after falling into the Market Square Fountain.”

“That was the milk, not—”

Over Comet’s shoulder, Starfall finally walked into the hallway, saw me, and stopped talking. His wife looked from him, back to me, then rolled her eyes and shook her head. “You’re right, Star. Here’s your guest.”

She turned around from the doorway, then walked halfway down the hallway and turned into their kitchen. I watched Starfall as he glared at her, the whole time, before turning back to glare at me. Then, his eyebrows raised, he shook his head, and he walked down the hallway towards me. “What do you want?”

Hello to you, too, asshole. Instead, I remembered my story. “I’ve got a letter for you.” I levitated it out from my saddlebag, then held it out in front of him.

He took it, looked at both sides, and commented, “There’s no postmark.”

I nodded, slightly impressed. “It did come through the post office, but I saw someone put it in with the Guard stuff, and given what’s going on, I figured this sort of thing should be done face-to-face.”

“And here you are...”

I shrugged. “I don’t know what I can do, but when I saw the letter, I figured this is as close as you two could get, given a letter.”

Starfall scowled at the letter, but then he reached for his shoulder. After he gripped twice on empty air, he scowled harder and brandished the letter at me. “Open this.”

With a thought, I popped the seal on the letter. He didn’t thank me; instead, he shook it open and held it up with his left hoof. He read it, and his scowl softened into an almost ambivalent stare. After he was done, he twirled it around to fold it back up. He stuck it under his left wing, then stared at me.

Then, his eyebrows raised and he shook his head slowly. “Tell Iron that I don’t want any more letters, but if he wants to come by...”

Stallions were usually bad about saying the important parts of what they meant, but I knew what Starfall meant when he shrugged.

I nodded back to him. He stood there, silently for a few moments, then he slowly pushed the door closed in my face. I scoffed a little at that, but I didn’t really want to stand around and hear him stammer through the polite ways to say “goodbye,” so I turned around and left.

There was a second part of this delivery, so I went up to find Lieutenant Justice at the north gate. I didn’t know how sneakily I needed to go there, but I figured if she could talk to me about this in the middle of the street, there wasn’t any need to hug the wall so that the guards up there wouldn’t be able to see me.

When I got to her station, I gave her a quick nod. “It’s done.”

She looked up at the clock that I knew was on the inner lip of the top of the booth. “Not bad, for time.” Then she turned back to me. “How’d he take it?”

I shrugged. “Pretty well. He said to tell Iron he wants to talk face-to-face, not through letters.”

The lieutenant nodded, then set a hefty bag of bits on the counter. “Good. Just remember not to tell that to Iron.”

I frowned at that. “Why? If they’re willing to make up—”

“Because I’m paying you...” Lieutenant Justice shook her head. “Please. There’s more that needs to happen, still. Just be patient. For Iron.”

I didn’t see how not telling him was for the best, but I guessed it might have something to do with Starfall coming back to the Guard. With a shrug, I levitated her bag of bits into my saddlebags and vowed to keep quiet. I didn’t know what “still needed to happen,” but I guessed the lieutenant knew more of it than I did, so I nodded my agreement to her.

After that, I turned and left the northern guard station. That money felt... dirty, even if it was for the best. Then, I remembered that I was being paid to keep a secret from Iron that might repair his friendship.

As I headed south down the main drag of the city, I vowed that, to make up for it, I’d try and keep Iron from sitting around moping any more. It was bad for him, it was bad for me, and for all I knew, it was bad for Farrington.

Unfortunately, now that my delivery was done, there wasn’t much I had to keep my mind off alcohol. I tried reasoning that I was homeand that sort of thing was unacceptable, but it didn’t help. Then, I pointed out how normal ponies didn’t fixate on it like I was, but the back of my mind twisted that into, that’s because they just go and get a drink when they want one. That just made me feel guiltier for having that desire in the first place, which just made me want to—

I got a grip on myself. I was not going to let alcohol dictate my life. I resolved to just head straight home, past the two bars on that route. Iron needed me. And if he didn’t want to talk about anything, I could just reread some graphic novels that had sequels coming out soon...

One way or another, it’d be a quiet evening, but a nice one.

To help push matters out of my mind, I instead tried to guess what other “things” the lieutenant was talking about—they’d help me with the Iron situation. The media had a frenzy after that griffin mangled Starfall; Iron had held up remarkably well, even when she came back to the city, and he had to explain, “She is facing justice for her actions.”

I wanted to ask why she was allowed back in his Guard and his friend wasn’t. But, given how little we got to talk that week, I hadn’t wanted to waste an hour or two because he wanted to argue about her again.

At least the incident seemed to put a damper on his “racial ambassador” routine. Though I wasn’t happy he’d replaced “dinners with a bloodthirsty animal” with “drinking alone,” at least I knew he was starting to realize that some things just couldn’t be fixed, no matter how intelligent you pretended they were.

I passed the first bar on my route—a run-down dump, despite its location on the main drag—without much incident. Then, I pondered more about Iron and his griffin. Then, I wondered how much of his current state she had to do with. Iron was a wreck because he had to cope with everything that happened, but how much of that had to do with pride?

He staked a lot on that bitch. Getting her a job, teaching her about our city and culture; it must have been a let-down when he realized that she was just a half-brained beast. It had been annoying when he wanted to try a doomed-from-the-start task instead of spending time with me, but even while I did tell him from the start, he didn’t seem to realize what I meant until it was too late.

I felt sorry for him, and at the same time, I hated her even more.

When I walked by the second bar—a much nicer venue, one I had actually been inside before—I thought I made it past without much incident. Then, a voice called out behind me, “Hey there!”

Turning around, I saw a grayish blue pegasus stallion. He stood out, not because he was an extreme minority in Farrington, but because he was wearing clothes and failing at it. His scarf would’ve looked good ten years ago. Maybe. Combined with his dorky-looking glasses and time-weathered fedora, he looked like an old stallion who got dressed in the dark. In a fashion museum. He couldn’t have been much older than thirty, though, which made the whole thing ironic.

When he saw me regarding his terrible taste in fashion, he nodded at me. “See somethin’ you like?”

I scoffed and rolled my eyes; I wasn’t interested in him or his stupid scarf. I kept walking, but he was relentless enough to rush next to me, like my decision would be affected by how close he was to me. From his breath, I could tell he had already had more than a few drinks. “Get lost, loser,” I sneered at him.

He chuckled before replying, “What’s wrong? You only get hot in a cold climate?”

I stopped in my tracks, which was enough to make him grin victoriously. He knew, I shuddered. How? Had I met him in Stalliongrad one night? Had we...? We might have, I realized, noting how sad it was that I couldn’t answer that question with any certainty. Still, I seethed, this was Farrington, not Stalliongrad.

“So, what d’ya say? A bottle of your choosing, a room of mine... we can get real cozy, neh?”

Violet light flashed from telekinesis, and his head snapped to one side as I slapped him. After a moment’s thought, I did it again for good measure.

He was still stunned over it, so I decided to get away from the situation before it could get any worse. While I turned away, he snapped to his senses and sneered, “What, that’s less than your usual rate?” I left him, but instead of following me, he started muttering to himself: “Whole friggin’ family’s fulla freaks... Ow... Bitch messed up my glasses.”

Home was still five blocks away, so I tried to keep it together. Between adrenaline and shock, I was lucky to make it two blocks, where I found a quiet alleyway to duck into. I sat down, with my back to a fence, and tried not to make a spectacle out of crying.

It wasn’t really a secret, what I did in Stalliongrad. Even Iron knew, even if he didn’t say anything. But if he did know, he should say something... I shook my head.

Regardless of what I did, I didn’t know why I did it. It was fun. It was risky. It was the only way I could sleep, other than the various alternatives. I liked it. I hated it.

I turned that anger back at the pegasus outside the bar. It was school-age drama all over again. If I were a stallion, doing what I did, I’d be hailed as some sort of hero. So why should anyone care if, when I had to go into another city, I got wasted and had sex with the first thing that moved? I was smart about the health end of things, so I wasn’t hurting anyone but me.

Either way, it doesn’t give them any right to judge, I seethed. Just because it’s not romantic or anything.

Feeling slightly better after letting off some steam, I stood up, walked out of the alley, and tried to remember where I had read that phrase before. “It’s not romantic or anything.” I definitely remembered how it had been exasperated or angry—had I said that to someone?

I chewed it over for two blocks, but when I got to my home street, I decided to put it away so I could focus on Iron. Then, it hit me like an errant frying pan:

That’s what he said.

Our fight came back to me. Back when he started going full swing with his stupid dinners with that griffin, I’d told him how stupid it was. That had been his first defense—why was it his first defense?

I shook, but luckily, I didn’t need keys to enter our house. I knew how the lock was built, so I could just undo it with magic. It was easy, something I’d probably done a thousand times before. It took me three tries.

When I opened the door, Iron scrambled to hide a bottle, which was somewhat ironic. Even moreso, he got mad at me: “Maxie? I thought you were out on a delivery...” I magicked my saddlebags off and set them by the door and started walked over to him.

“But, uh, it’s nice you’re home, don’t get me wrong. I just didn’t know, so I assumed, and... wait, Max, what the hell are you—”

I pushed his shoulders back into the couch with my front hooves and shoved my back kneecaps into his. It gave me leverage when I put my face within a few inches of his. I wanted shock; by his wide eyes, I could tell I got it.

Then, I asked a simple question. “Were you dating her?”

Iron tried to get up; between physics and awkward positioning, he was stuck where he was. He dodged the question with an agitated, “Get off me.”

“Answer me.”

He shook his head, feigning ignorance. “I... I don’t even know who you’re talking about.” His breath tasted like whiskey and lies.

I frowned, then pushed up on him a little so I didn’t stab him in the forehead when I put my glare right in front of his eyes. “Take a guess. Or tell me who else you’ve been ‘showing around town’ for the past few weeks.”

“Gilda?” he asked thickly.

I tapped the top of his head twice with my horn.

His eyes darted up, then he looked back at mine, then he closed his eyes. When he opened them again, he looked a lot more fierce and honed, not drunk and stupid. “So what if I was?”

My hind knees turned to jelly. I’d figured it out, but... it was still news to hear it.

I buckled into him and slid down his stomach before I felt the effect that was having on my brother. When I did, I put two forehooves on his knees and stepped back. I didn’t know how to react, but after my mind blanked, the first thing that came out was, “You lied...”

Iron sat back up, hunching down to look at me eye-level. “You made me have to lie to you.”

I shook my head. “Nope. Nope. Don’t blame that on me. You shouldn’t have to lie—”

“You’re right, I shouldn’t have to lie,” he cut in.

“But you did.”

“But I did,” he continued. “But, as I’m sure you’re happy to learn, things didn’t work out.”

Of course they didn’t! “Well, duh!” I shouted. “What were you thinking, dating her? You’re a stallion, she’s a wild animal.”

He got off the couch and stood over me. “That. That right there. That is why I had to lie to you.” After he dodged the point I made, he turned around, picked up his whiskey, and walked into the kitchen.

I followed him. “So... what, denial? If you lie hard enough, you’ll trick yourself into thinking you’re doing something that’s okay? That it’s not sick? That it’s not—”

“SHE MADE ME HAPPY!” Iron roared.

Before either of us said anything to break the glass-thin silence, he uncorked his bottle and upturned it into the sink—it had been mostly full, so I knew it was at least fifty bits’ worth of alcohol, down the drain. After it was completely gone, Iron dropped the bottle into the sink with an empty clink. Then he whispered, “Is that such a sin?”

My first reaction was to answer with the obvious “Yes,” but something about his question made me realize he wasn’t asking me. Or at least, he wasn’t just asking me.

For as long as I could remember, Iron was always confident, collected, and in-control. That was what made it frustrating when he made his mind up about something—it was that much harder to get him to see the other point of view. Not because he didn’t consider it, but because he had, and he had disregarded it along the way.

Hearing him ask that question made me realize what I had done to him, what I was doing to him. He had enough doubts in his mind without me.

Granted, he should. It was a griffin, not a mare. Or, stallion even. For that matter, just... a pony.

But at the same time, he was my brother. I wanted him to make the right decisions, not huge mistakes. I thought back to his week of moping around the house, after things at his job had settled. He wasn’t just missing his best friend...

I felt my eyes droop to the floor. Iron didn’t really get to “date” all that much. There was a fling or something with another miner, back in those days. Then, after he made sergeant, he went to a few dinners with the mare at his bookstore; he didn’t come home some of those, but he never did say what happened between them. Ditto with his post-funeral drinking sessions with then-Sergeant Justice.

So he wanted to date a griffin, and apparently liked her. Was that wrong?

I shook my head and started to head out of the kitchen. “I don’t know.”

Behind me, Iron asked, “What do you mean you don’t know?”

I turned my head to face him. “It... it’s a lot to process, and I don’t know?” I raised an eyebrow and shrugged; what did he think not knowing meant?

He shook his head and muttered, “Hypocrite.”

That made me spin hotly on four hooves. “Who are you calling a hypocrite, Mr. No-Drinking-In-The-House?”

Iron scoffed, then turned away from the sink. “Someone who thinks she can judge me based on my interest in one romantic partner.” My stomach clenched, but he kept talking. “Or is it the romance part that you get hung up on?”

His words hit like a punch. I sputtered, trying to think of something coherent to say. I couldn’t. He’d known, he just never talked about it except now, when he was going to mock me over it? I tried to put force and words to my devastation, but all that came out was a croaking, “Y... you knew?”

He squinted at the same time his eyebrows turned upwards. “Y... you thought I didn’t know?” He frowned back into a glare. “And then you accuse me of lying?”

I blinked back the tears, but that didn’t stop them. He knew. He didn’t care. And he... he was mocking me about it! Every ounce of hatred and self-loathing I felt towards myself, every morning-after shower that was never enough... I shook my head, and the tears started flowing.

All I could manage was a quick, “You’re an asshole!” before I darted down both legs of our L-shaped hallway, burst through my door, and locked myself in my room. There, I plopped onto my mattress, hugged my pillow to my head, and I cried.

It was sad, knowing that my pillow was the only thing I had to comfort me, that didn’t judge me while I sobbed into it. As I kept going, even that comfort felt fleeting. At that moment, I didn’t care. I needed something.

The back of my mind suggested a drink. I hated it.

* * *

A few hours later, my throat was sore and my stomach was empty, but I didn’t want to venture out into the rest of the house. I just lay there, stroking my tail that I’d pulled up over my foreleg and wondering where things got so screwed up.

My room was a kid’s room, I realized—not for the first time. Between all the pink and dolls from my early childhood, I always felt out of place in there. But I didn’t really have any hobbies outside of my graphic novels; those were on their shelves, but I didn’t have anything decorative that I liked. Growing up with Iron, two years of moving from apartment to apartment had been enough to teach me not to do anything permanent, because you might have to move in three weeks.

Iron knocked on my door.

I grumbled into my pillow. “Go away.”

“I made you some dinner...” His attempt at a peace offering was pathetic.

“I’m not hungry,” I lied.

In response, I heard a plate slide under the bottom of my door. My stomach growled as I looked over at the sandwich that was now in my room, so I levitated it over to me and rolled into an upright position. Begrudgingly, because of the source, I took a bite of it; as soon as I did, I had to fight not to smile.

For two years after our mom died, and even after we got our current house, money had been tight. That was the start of Iron’s culinary explorations—he tried to make the best-tasting things with the cheapest possible ingredients. One of his early successes, and probably my favorite still, was peanut butter and honey mixed with lemon juice.

Now, like every time I tasted it, I remembered those days when we had been a lot closer. Before Stalliongrad, before ten-hour lieutenant shifts... before we drifted apart because we were two very different ponies. Those days had always been stressful, but even then, we got through them as brother and sister.

Outside my door, Iron asked, “May I come in?”

I swallowed my bite of sandwich, then shook my head slightly to myself as I turned the lock with a little bit of magic. I kept my eyes on my dinner, so I only heard Iron as he opened the door and walked over to me, sitting down sideways next to my bed. He put the plate next to me, but didn’t say to not make a mess with crumbs.

From the corner of my eye, I saw him glance around at my shelves and decorations since he didn’t know where to start. I made it easy for him. “Yeah, I know my decorations suck. It’s okay, because you’re right. It’s not like I have any romantic coltfriends to bring over.”

He started stroking the lower part of my mane, which I didn’t really have a way to avoid, but I didn’t mind, either. Finally, he apologized, “I’m sorry, Maxie. I... shouldn’t have said that.”

I turned one eye to focus on him. “What, and keep pretending it isn’t happening?”

Iron shrugged with both hooves before wiping his mouth with his right one. “I... I really don’t know what to say about it. I worry about you, I’ve told you several times you can quit the post office if you don’t like working there... At the end of the day, it’s your choice.”

“Just not one you approve of.”

“Just not one I approve of,” he agreed. “Even with Sherry’s old coworkers looking out for you, there’s always the chance you could get hurt or...” He trailed off with a shake of his head. “I don’t want you stuck with any long-term consequences if they’re from a mistake.”

I shook my head and saw as Iron took his hoof away from me to nudge the plate underneath my still-floating sandwich. I decided not to think about the implications of having the Stalliongrad Police overseeing my little escapades; it was creepy, but that was how Iron would handle that sort of situation. Instead, I just reassured, “I’m not going to get pregnant, Iron.”

“I hope not.” He started stroking my mane again. “I mean, not until you’re sure you want to. I’ve already got a niece and nephew...” He drifted off to silence before adding a quiet correction, “Or at least, I had...”

I tore off the eaten part of my sandwich and hovered the untouched part over to Iron. He shook his head, so I bounced it off his mouth a few times and asked, “Comet won’t let you see them?”

With a smile, he finally picked the sandwich morsel out of the air with his right hoof, then he started stroking my mane with the left one again. “Thanks.” He looked at the sandwich for a moment, then back at me. “And I’m sure she would, but I’m not worried about her. Starfall’s not a fan of indirect tactics like that.”

I remembered Iron’s letter, Starfall’s reaction to the letter, and then I remembered what Lieutenant Justice said about “sticking to the plan.” With a shrug, I resigned to a generic, “Well, I’m sure things’ll work out between you two. Ten years is too long to throw away over...” I stopped myself before saying the blunt version of what happened; instead, I said, “A girl.”

Iron chuckled. “I suppose that’s what this does all boil down to.” He finished off his part of the sandwich before apologizing, “I’m sorry I hid that from you.”

“When did you two start dating?”

“That’s... a little complicated,” he admitted. “But I suppose, for my part? Since the beginning of June.”

I stuck out a foreleg and patted the back of his buzzed head. “Well, then, I’m sorry for the five stallions I kept secret during that time.”

His hoof stopped mid-stroke on my mane, and he hid his upper lip in his lower lip. Finally, he noted, “You’ve only been on three deliveries to Stalliongrad since June...”

I shrugged, then bobbed my head. “It’s a little complicated.”

Iron laughed, except it kind of came as a gust that he tried to stifle. When he got it under control, he put both of his hooves on my forelimb. “May I ask why?”

“I don’t know,” I answered, and it was true. I couldn’t answer that for me, let alone for him.

His head bobbed in awkward silence as he tried to think of what to say. “Just... be careful, I suppose. If you want a different job, we could probably use another office clerk at the Citadel.”

I looked at him and nodded. “I’ll keep that in mind.” He returned the nod, then I took a deep breath. In it, I decided I had to care more about him than my own stupid pride. “And I’m sorry about your girlfriend.” I remembered all the crap she always used to pull at the post office, so I clarified, “I mean, I don’t like her, but if she makes you happy...” I shrugged. “Just be careful?”

Iron smiled weakly. “I’ll keep that in mind, but I don’t think it matters anymore.” He rubbed his jaw and absently commented, “I think she hits harder than Starfall.”

It seemed odd, then I drew a connection. “Break up fight?”

“Break up fight,” he agreed. “Though I suppose I could’ve handled the situation better than how I did. She likes space. Lots of space.”

I shrugged nonchalantly. “She lives in a jungle.”

“Indeed.” Iron tousled my mane, then stood up. “Anyway, I was thinking. Tomorrow, we should do something.”

That’d be nice. One way or another, one reason or another, it had been a while since we had gone out together. I definitely missed that. “What do you have in mind?”

“I don’t quite know yet,” he said while narrowing his eyes with a sly grin. “But we’ll think of something. Is there anything you want to do in-town?”

For the next few minutes, we discussed ideas and plans for what to do in Farrington, or even in Hoofington since it was only a four-hour trip away. Even though I didn’t really like a lot of his ideas, he was patient with me, and I couldn’t help but think that things were just like they’d always used to be—only now, we were older, and had new problems instead of the scary ones like housing and money hanging over us.

All in all, it was a quiet evening, but a nice one.

5 - How Are You?

Often during my three years of exile, I had wondered if I’d ever be able to forget all the things Father had done to me while growing up. Once I left Farrington on Saturday afternoon, I feared how much I already had.

There was evidence, however. The three ragged, parallel lines on my chest were the most notable ones, but I had a lot of other scars. Lebenwedel and spit didn’t do a perfect job of healing, so along my arms, legs, and torso, it was disturbingly easy for me to find physical reminders of my childhood.

Early Saturday afternoon, I found the burn scar on my left leg, the one I had apparently forgotten about. By the time Monday morning came around, I had combed over every inch of my body in a desperate quest to try and find any more scars that I couldn’t remember getting. Thankfully, for every bump and imperfection I found, I could remember when, where, and how I had received it.

I needed something more than that.

At the Citadel, I put on a brave face during morning orders. If Sergeant Scales had any sort of idea how much of a wreck I felt like, he’d probably send me home. And despite my current feelings towards the futility of being a guard, I needed something to keep my mind busy that day.

“So, you’re on nine today...” Sergeant Scales gave me a weak grin. I knew why; patrol route nine was the official number of the route I’d been on when I ran into Starfall’s family, then Starfall. It all felt so distant and long ago; when my sergeant quipped, “Try not to start any more fights?” I could even chuckle a little.

After giving me my patrol, my sergeant took a quick, shifty look around us to see who was listening. Apparently finding no one, he whispered, “Nothing’s official yet, but you might be getting a partner soon. Just FYI.”

I raised an eyebrow. “FYI?”

Sergeant Scales raised a sympathetic eyebrow. “For your information.”

I stared back at him, wanting to remind him that I wasn’t illiterate. I didn’t want to say the wrong thing, though, and he did have to clarify his weird shortening of words that I had never heard phrased that way before, so I simply nodded.

Once I was out on my patrol, I mulled over his warning for a few minutes. Even if it “wasn’t official” now, I knew I’d eventually be getting a patrolling partner. It’d be a huge change for my daily routine, and exploring those ramifications would have been a perfect distraction for worrying about the psychological extent of Father’s lessons.

However, after ten minutes, I had exhausted most of my concerns about getting a partner. Since I still needed something to distract me, I spent the first five hours of my patrol forcing myself to drink in every minute detail of every building in the Market District that I passed.

There was the giant wooden hat—which, given how relatively few ponies in that city wore hats, I wondered how it stayed in business. But the hat building itself looked clean and well-maintained, so the business owner must’ve known something about selling hats.

For the rest of the buildings of Farrington, the main distinguishing factor of each one was the sign that hung over the door. Some of them were obvious, like the quill and parchment over the writing supplies store that I used to frequent. Others had names painted on them, like Suds’ Soap. Other signs were more confusing, like the one with golden lines that flowed away from a tongue of flame. It didn’t have a name, and only when I walked past it and peered through the open doorway did I realize what it was: a candle store.

Lunch came and went quickly; Spotlight was busy that day, but given the whirlwind of thoughts that were still begging at the corners of my mind to come out in the open, I counted it as a small blessing. Yeah, we were friendly, but we weren’t close enough for me to dump my entire history of problems on her.

After my quick, functional meal, I was torn between a feeling of luck and dread. Once I left Farrington, I wouldn’t have to patrol while miserable and conflicted. However, patrolling was a distraction from that miserable conflict, so I didn’t know whether or not I wanted to keep it.

By the time I was on my third-to-last lap around the city, I’d already lost my artificial interest in the buildings of the Market District. Gawking at everything like an idiot twelve times already had a way of doing that to me.

The only exception to that rule was the alleyway near where I had met Starfall’s family—the one he’d thrown me into. That landmark had some personal history to it. Even after I was bored with the rest of my patrol, I kept giving it a wary, regretful glance each time I passed it.

This time was no different, except this time, someone stood against the wall—a navy blue stallion, I noted before my eyes went up to his face. I made eye contact with Starfall in time to see him smirk, push off the wall, and walk over to me on four hooves.

Just what I need, I noted. My day was already running crappy.

However, I also noted that this was technically our first interaction where he might not actually be completely hateful towards me. In the time it took him to get to me and start walking on my right, I let my curiosity take over, at least enough to keep quiet.

After a long silence, just before I was about to tell him to talk or get lost, he asked a very neutral, “How was your weekend?”

I looked at him and tried to gauge what he meant by that; he only shrugged indifferently and clarified, “I’m not being cute. You seemed pretty messed up when you left my house is all.”

I snarled and turned back to the direction we were walking in. Even if he wasn’t being bigoted, he was still a jerk. I didn’t want to play those games. “What do you want?”

“Conversation,” was his simple reply. “Your sneak-apology was well-timed, but Justice needs to learn a thing or two about why ponies work like they do. So, now that I’m not getting punched in the face and yelled at in gibberish, we’ve got some stuff to talk about.”

Gibberish? I questioned. Then, I tried to remember which language I had apologized to him in—or, at least, which one I had ranted at him in. I couldn’t. However, I guessed it was mine, so I seethed, “It’s a language.”

“It’s a language,” he repeated, “that I never learned and, therefore, all the sounds are foreign and indistinguishable to me.” He shook his head. “I mean... would you even teach it to me if I asked?”

“Probably not.”

“Then don’t get mad at me if I don’t understand it.”

As much as I hated being backed into a logical corner, he had a point. If someone had yelled at me in a foreign language, I’d probably call it the same thing—just not to their face, unless they were some sort of jerk. I looked back at Starfall out of the corner of my eye. “So, you think we’ve got things to talk about?”

He nodded. “And one of those things on that list is ‘how are you doing?’ It’s also a decent starting point, too, since that’s how normal ponies begin conversations, right?”

We continued walking down the street while I mulled over his question. I noted his use of “normal ponies,” but considering his usual hatred of griffins, it was probably a term of respect. Probably.

When we got to the end of the street, we turned left onto the half of my patrol that was a loose square of streets that outlined the Market Square. I noted how that place also held significance for me, but then again, that was probably why Starfall had been waiting in the alley for me.

That reminded me of his original question about my well-being; finally, dejectedly, I answered it. “I mean, you’re the one who’s asking me how I am. That a good enough answer?”

Starfall grunted, but it took us until we took a right turn to keep near the Market Square. On the new street, he found his next question. “What did you scream at me about?”

With a shake of my head, I told enough of the truth: “Nothing important.”

“Bullshit.”

I chuckled at the severity of his response, but then I thought about his question I had blown off. Yeah, he was asking about personal stuff that was none of his business... but at the same time, he was one of the few who even had an idea about it. I continued musing aloud, “You know, it’s weird how you’re one of the three ponies in this city who even knows about me and my father.” I shrugged. “The short version is that he shoved me into a fire to teach me about...” I waved a gauntlet in front of my face and shook my head. “Something or other. The main thing that freaked me out was how I completely forgot about it until I shouted it at you.”

Starfall cocked his head to focus on me. “What, like a repressed memory?”

I wasn’t familiar with the term, but it seemed to fit. “I guess.” Since he apparently knew something on the matter, I added, “But if there’s one...”

“There might be more.” He nodded in agreement. Then, he blew a gust of air out of his mouth and made far too big a show about looking at the back half of me. “So, what, did he...”

I snapped my head to him. “No! And... that’s none of your business!”

He pointed a hoof at me. “Not true.”

“Why would that ever be your business?” I shook my head vigorously. “And since when do you even—”

“I care...” he began loudly. At the same time, we noticed how a few ponies in the street were staring at us. Starfall lowered his hoof back to the road and turned his head to face straight before continuing in a quieter, neutral tone. “But you’re right, not directly about you. My friend wants closure from whatever you two had, so if that comes from telling him you’re too broken to bother with, then I’ve done my good deed for the month.”

His words hit hard and low. I threw back, “Yeah, that’s you all right. I’ve seen you talk at your wife.”

He scoffed before shooting back, “If you’ve got huge problems, you need a therapist, not a boyfriend.” I tried to retort, but he spoke over me: “Iron’s more patient than anyone I know, but you can’t expect him to balance being your boss, mental health expert, and respect you as an equal partner through all that. That’s not fair to him and unrealistic for you.”

I thought about his blunt advice for a few moments. We took another right turn, meaning we were now headed south and past the “halfway” point of my patrol. No matter how far I went into it, I kept getting hung up on why Starfall was talking to me in the first place. “So, what, are you telling me to keep away from Iron? Because I don’t—”

“Of course you don’t,” he condescended. “I mean, why handle things in an adult manner when you can just take the easy way out?” I glared at him for a few seconds before he glanced back. Then, he shrugged and said, “So, what, I’m a hypocrite and that lets you get away with what you did to Iron?”

I pointed a finger at my chestplate. “What I did to Iron? What about what he did to me? Kicking me out—”

“Why do you think he did that?”

My mouth flew open to give the easy answer, but then I looked down and realized I didn’t have one. Or at least, the answer I had still wasn’t easy to say. “Because... because he knows everything I’ve been through, but he’d still prefer throwing me out of a city instead of trying to fix stuff.”

Starfall choked on his answer. “That’s... not really it, though. Like, if you take it personally, that’s one way of interpreting it. Really, he just panicked because of our...” He waved a hoof between us. “You know. But the main thing is, he went out on a limb for you, and you let him down.”

“Because of you,” I pointed out.

“Because of me,” he admitted. “And I’m not trying to say who’s right or who’s wrong between you or Iron, or if you two dating is a good idea. You have a lot of issues to work out, and I’m sure he’d be willing to help, but the whole thing still sounds like a bad idea to me. The thing that does involve me is how I made that decision for the two of you, and that’s not doing right by my friend.”

I glanced over at him. “So, what, you want me to start dating your friend again because you feel guilty?”

Starfall shook his head. “I’m not asking for anything that big, or anything you shouldn’t have done in the first place. Just go visit him, tonight after your shift, and actually talk about things.”

I focused back on the road, made sure no one was breaking the law, then thought about Starfall’s request. It wasn’t that big, and I had thought about doing it... but then, it always came back to why we broke up in the first place. I looked at the reason, walking on my right, then asked, “And what if I don’t?”

“Then I’ll go talk to him and tell him my version of why you’re not going to.”

My stomach wrenched when his threat echoed inside me, and I realized he was giving me an ultimatum: talk to Iron now, or never.

The latter option scared me.

I was confused as to why. I’d been planning on leaving Farrington for almost every day for four weeks. Every time it came to Iron, I always came to the simple solution of just leaving him behind with his stupid city.

Even after I worked it out that I could probably undo anything Starfall could say to Iron, the fear of completely losing him lingered. After all, I had avoided him for four weeks, but that was my choice...

I shook my head. If Starfall was coming to me in order to be some sort of voice of reason, then I knew I’d lost some ground in the realm of my own righteousness...

I let it all out in a sigh. “Fine. I’ll talk to him.”

Starfall didn’t make any sound of agreement, and I didn’t want to look at him to see him smirking in a self-pleased manner. After a few more turns along my patrol, he finally broke the silence: “So, what does it mean for you to ‘coexist’ with someone?”

I flicked a gaze at him. “Probably to exist, at the same time, and not bother each other?”

“And is that where we stand?”

I rolled my eyes. “You’re the one finding me on my patrol...”

He chuckled. “Right, but that’s more necessity than intention to do you harm. But what would you say if this sort of thing were more... scheduled?”

“What, you want to make Monday afternoon patrolling a ‘thing?’”

“No, but our lieutenant might.”

I stopped in my tracks; then it all clicked for me. “Wait, you’re my new...” I shook my head. I didn’t like the idea, but it probably made sense in some stupid planning way. I shrugged; it was out of my control, at least until I was able to quit. I took a little comfort in how he seemed to be a bit less... violent, now.

“Nothing’s official,” Starfall reassured, “and Iron might’ve just been making a test point. Either way, we’ll find out for sure next week.”

“Hooray,” I seethed.

He gave a cocky little scoff-chuckle, but either way, our conversation came to an end. A few moments later, we passed the other entrance to the alley that Starfall had been waiting in earlier. He turned to walk down it, but my patrol kept me heading straight.

After he was gone, I dwelled on our conversation and what it meant for me. I was almost done with my patrol lap, which would only leave two more—roughly an hour until the end of my shift. I didn’t have reading that night, so I didn’t have any good reason to stay in the city instead of leaving early...

However, my conversation with Starfall had shown me that avoiding Iron wasn’t solving anything. Now, when I tried to justify it by remembering how he threw me out of the city, I remembered that I’d done something similar to him by throwing him out of my life.

The more I thought about it, the more I knew we needed to talk. Also, I had agreed to a deadline of today; I didn’t want to deal with the hassle if Starfall spoke to Iron on my behalf.

With a shrug, I turned onto the second-to-last lap of my patrol. I had an hour left on my shift, which would be plenty of time to think about everything we’d need to speak about.

* * *

An hour later, I sat, hunched over in the southern archway—out of sight of Iron—and realized that I still didn’t know how I was going to start our conversation.

While I sat there immobilized by uncertainty, I thought of ways to get around me starting the conversation. I could send a letter, or ask one of his friends to pass on a message. Hell, even easier: if I sat where I did for another half hour or so, he’d come out of his booth, find me, and then...

And then was the conversation I wasn’t sure if I wanted to have. I didn’t want Iron to be anything other than a jerk who threw me away because he was a selfish asshole. I closed my eyes and sat up tall, then kept going. When I craned my neck back, a metallic rapping deafened me as the back of my neck throbbed in protest.

Ow! I internalized the scream, then I opened my eyes to look at the uneven ceiling of the archway. I had to suppress a chuckle. I couldn’t even sit right, let alone think, or talk. Today had been stressful—an unpleasant flavor added to what was becoming my usual bored routine.

Is anything going to go right today? Or... this month, even?

The door on my left opened. Then, out walked Captain Iron Bulwark.

Mentally, I wanted to stab whatever malevolent forces were in charge of running my life. Regardless of whatever deity I had inadvertently pissed off at some point or other, Iron and I stared at each other for a few moments. I had just spent an hour planning what I’d say to him, and preparing for the emotion I’d feel when I saw him. Now it was happening, I drew a blank on both accounts.

More specifically, I was being pulled every which way. I wanted to jump at him and hug him, crying into his shoulder and begging forgiveness while my other hand strangled him with the fury I felt because for some stupid reason, I’d let him hurt me.

I stayed still, not because I didn’t think any of those were terribly bad ideas; I just didn’t know if any of them were worth doing.

For his part, Iron did a double take, raised an eyebrow, and cocked his head to the side. “Do...” He blinked several times before he set his face straight again. “Are you all right?”

I shook my head.

Then, I tried looking away, but the toll of everything just caught up with me. Apologies, conversations, accusations, being stuck in a city, being hated for something Father did ten years ago... it all made my throat clamp shut, and I got out one wheezing gasp before I just broke down crying in front of Iron.

I hated myself in every tear for doing that, when we were supposed to just have a normal conversation. Then, I realized that talking about all my problems was a normal conversation for us, and then I remembered Starfall’s offhanded remarks about being broken, and I... I couldn’t stop.

Iron's large, metallic mass sat down next to me. He pulled me into an embrace, and I was too stupid to keep from burrowing my cheek into his neck. I felt the strap on my right gauntlet being undone; it was off my hand before I could tell him to stop. I slid my head down to his chest, Iron pulled me closer by wrapping his right foreleg under my wings, and he began gently stroking the top of my right forearm. With his other hoof, Iron caressed my now-exposed hand.

He rested his chin on the side of my helmet and whispered, “I’m so sorry,” into my ear. “I don’t know what I was thinking that night, but I should have trusted you.”

I shook my head—something made more difficult by having Iron and my helmet clamping it in place—and found some words. “It... it’s not you. I screwed up too.”

“Okay,” he agreed.

We stayed together like that for a little while longer, but the more I half-lay on him, the guiltier a pleasure it became. After a month apart, after how he’d treated me, after how I’d treated him...

I sat back up. He let go of me.

It’d been good while it lasted.

Iron handed me back my gauntlet, and I grinned thankfully at as I took it. Before I put it on, I wiped my eyes with my unarmed palm; the feathers on my arm were still moist with sweat and city dust from the day’s patrol.

I put my gauntlet back on, and out of the corner of my eye, I saw Iron doing the same for his captain’s boots. It made me smile a little, but then I remembered what I was there for. I scooted away from him a little, and then a heavy silence fell back over us.

“So... how have you been?”

His question was simple, but the answer wasn’t. I settled on giving him a sideways glance and saying, “I guess I’ve been better.” He raised an inquisitive eyebrow, but didn’t say anything, so I went on, “I mean, I’m stuck in this city, so I can’t make mid-summer preparations for my cave, which means it’s even less secure there than usual...” I shook my head. “If I move here, there goes any freedom I thought I had. Then, there’s the usual stuff with my childhood, except now I’m forgetting parts of that, which isn’t as good as it sounds...”

I looked at Iron and finished, “Then, there’s you. The Guard. All my punishments and apologies and ponies that keep coming out of alleys to talk to me.”

Iron’s eye widened. “What?”

“Your friends,” I clarified. “Last Monday, it was Sherry. Today, Starfall.”

He turned his head and frowned. “Are you accusing me—”

“No.” I turned to look at him head on. “Just saying that a lot of what happened to me over the last month involves you.” He started to protest so I added, “Not directly. Not all of it.”

Iron nodded. “It’s good you see it that way, then. Because I’m not sure if I should be held accountable for my part in a system whose rules you broke.”

I countered, “It’s not that you did it, it’s how you did it.”

“And I’ve apologized,” he replied with a hint of heat. “Twice, technically, in the last twenty minutes we’ve spent together.” He shook his head. “I mean, I don’t know what more I can do. Do ‘I’m sorry?’”

I tilted my head slightly at his words.

“It’s... one of Sherry’s phrases,” he noted. “And I’d love a chance to make it up to you. But I can’t do anything if you keep avoiding me.”

“Well... it hurts.” I turned away to look at the opposite wall of the archway. “So sorry if I’m not really keen on going back to a situation where it happens again.”

Iron’s blurry outline turned its head in my peripheral vision. “So, what does that mean for us?”

“I don’t know,” I answered truthfully. “I mean, I like you. But I’m not sure how, why, or if I should.” I shrugged. “And I’m not sure how fair it is to say, ‘Let’s start doing what we used to, except now, it’s looming over us that the whole thing might turn out to be a disaster.’”

Next to me, Iron choked on a laugh. I smiled weakly at it. “Okay, less of a disaster, but more of a...” I made circles with a gauntlet trying to find the word. “Finding out we’re not into each other like that?”

“So... basically... what it was that we were doing in the first place?” He paused. “I mean, there’s a reason it’s called dating, and not ‘move in and start a life together after knowing each other for a week.’”

“Yeah, it’s too many words.”

Iron chuckled. “Yes... greeting cards would have to use smaller lettering.” After a moment, he sighed. “But I don’t want to force you into anything you don’t want. However, I also don’t want it hanging over us that this is over because of one colossal mistake for each of us that both of us have learned from.”

I nodded slowly and started thinking about what he said. I guessed that, all things considered, we did only have a few dates together before Starfall, in his words, “Made that choice for us.”

Then I sighed. “I dunno. I mean, I do and I don’t, you know?” I turned to him, he met my gaze with a blank stare, and I realized he didn’t. “Like... being with you is good. But at the same time, this past month, all I’ve been thinking about is moving on from this city.” His mouth twitched down at that. “I mean, it’s not your fault. Kinda the opposite: without you, I don’t have anything in this city—except a lot of prejudice against griffins.” I shrugged. “When I visited Dash, one of her friends didn’t even know what a griffin was. Maybe I’d find it easier in a city like that.”

“Perhaps you would,” Iron agreed.

“Perhaps,” I repeated his word. “But that’s if I ever get enough money to leave this city, which, I know what I make, what apartments cost, and when did that become my life?”

I let the question fall on the air; like every time I asked it, I wasn’t really asking anyone in particular. This time, Iron was with me, so I got a reply. “Do you like living in...” He looked over his shoulder and gestured to the south. “Your forest?”

“Not always,” I admitted, and Iron turned back to listen to me. “It’s harsh and uncaring, and chances are high that something there will kill me. Kind of like Farrington. But at the same time, in the Jägerwald, there’s something... good about how alive and natural everything is. I’ve been to the parks here...” I paused, remembering my ten-second trip through the one in the Artisan District. “Briefly. I’m not sure if those would do it for me.”

“But you could appreciate the trees and flowers without a risk of immediate death,” Iron reasoned. “And that’s to say nothing about being able to visit the, uh... Yaygwald...”

“Jägerwald,” I corrected.

“Jägerwald,” he repeated. I nodded. “But yes. If you were to give Farrington a chance, it would be safer without much loss except for isolation.”

“Just more expensive,” I countered.

“There are several housing complexes that offer discounted rates to guards,” Iron noted. “And I would help you through the work-arounds since you’re not a citizen. And even then...” He shook his head slightly. “I could help with things. Financially.”

“You don’t have to do that...”

“The hell I don’t,” he said. “I brought you to this city, and—however indirectly—that created a situation that’s making it difficult for you to leave. I want you to get better from your past. If that means you’ve got to save up to move to another city, then I’ll certainly be sad to see you leave, but... I’d be happy for you, too.”

At his words, another lump of emotion welled up in my throat. For a moment, I thought I was going to break down crying again, but I held it together. “I... I’ll think about it.” I honestly meant it.

Iron nodded, apparently satisfied. “For the time being... some of the traveler’s supplies stores offer various types of animal repellant. Unless there’s something else you were preparing for summer?”

I shook my head and chuckled over how simple his solution was—or rather, how I’d completely overlooked buying something to solve my problem. “No... that’s mostly what I’ve been worried about.”

“Mostly?”

“I’ll figure the rest out.” Starfall’s advice came back to the front of my mind, and I realized why I didn’t want to rely on Iron to fix all of my problems. “But for now... where are we at?”

Iron shrugged. “We’re at wherever you want us to be.”

In the distance, the clock tower struck six. It was late in the day, and given how tired I was—and how the rest of the day had gone—I didn’t want to make any long-term decisions right here, on the spot. At the same time, I felt bad for making Iron wait for a month... and with everything else he’d done for me, I figured a safe answer would be better than no answer:

“Do you want to get dinner on Thursday?”

He smiled and nodded. Then, he asked, “But... dinner as friends, or... as we were?”

I sighed. “For now... let’s just take it slow.”

“So... friends?” he asked.

“Friends,” I agreed.

“Friends.” Sherry bit the word off with a glare.

I frowned back. When Gilda had come visited me at the gate—or rather, when I found her there after investigating an odd sound—it had come as something of a surprise. As soon as it had been apparent that she was having trouble, though, I remembered exactly how much I cared about her. The terms for continuing our relationship were lukewarm at best, but given how things had been between us for the past month, “friends” was better than nothing.

Or so I had thought; as soon as I broke the news to Sherry that things were beginning to heal... well, she was still glaring at me. I defended myself with, “Friends. It’s what she’s comfortable with, so for now, I’m content—”

“To pussy-hoof around like a little filly.” She rapidly shook her head. “Do you even know what my past month was like?”

I pointed a hoof at her. “And I’m incredibly grateful for what you did, but...” Her head kept shaking until I dwindled down to silence.

“I ‘fixed’ everything for you, Iron. It wasn’t cheap. It wasn’t easy. And it probably wasn’t ethical. But the first word of thanks I hear from you is right now, after you’ve gone limp at the last second?”

“Starfall and I just made up on Saturday—”

“Which you were talking about all last week.”

Which I had been... I shook my head slowly. Between Guard business and the personal fallout from Gilda’s and Starfall’s duel earlier this month, I had overlooked some of the important, quieter things—like the friend who had helped me through most of the ordeal. “I’m sorry, Sherry. I got caught up in...”

She produced a small metal flask from below her counter, unscrewed it, and belted down three large gulps. Through the whole thing, Sherry didn’t take her glare off me; I could see her eyes soften as she replaced the cap and mused, “One for victory, two for defeat.”

I tried to blink the shock out of my gaze. “Are you...” I lowered my voice in case the wall-watcher above us could hear. “Drinking during your shift? In front of me?”

“Yep,” she answered flatly. “I may be bitchy when I’m buzzed, but you won’t like me when I’m sober.”

I hated the truth in those words, especially the implications. She did have a dependency, and she probably snuck small, medicinal doses of alcohol during every shift. Regardless of the truth, I was her captain, so there were some things I needed to address—like contemptuous drinking in front of me.

I stuck out my hoof and demanded, “That’s enough for one shift.”

“Yes, sir.” She hooved the flask over to me.

My immediate reaction was to chastise her... warped insubordination; then I realized that all she had done was address me by my formal title. I shook my head. “I’ll take my lunch at home tomorrow so you can come get this—” I shook the flask. “—when we’re both off-duty.”

She chuckled. “Keep it. Five birthdays and Hearth’s Warmings, with underlings and acquaintances that only know one part of my life? I think I can make do with the other ten or so in my broom closet.”

I fought not to smile at the unfortunate, accidental enabling of others. When I realized I was actively enabling her habit, a blank expression easily found its way across my face.

Instead of dwelling on that, I went back to the source of today’s problem. “Even though it’s late, thank you for all that you’ve done. But I’m not going to add ‘forced into a relationship’ to Gilda’s list of problems.”

Sherry bared her teeth in a grin and closed her eyes. “She’s too young, stupid, and broken to know what she wants.” Her eyes snapped open. “But then again, so are you.”

The insult scathed, but I had to admit there was some truth to it. I knew Farrington and I knew restaurants, but the personal side of things was still fairly new to me. I only responded with, “Perhaps. But what if she is too young for a relationship? Maybe we should wait as friends...”

My question earned a flat, mirthless stare from Sherry. Instead of speaking, she glanced upwards, then beckoned me to come closer.

I leaned into her booth, and pain shot up my nose as she swatted it with a rolled-up copy of the Farrington Times. I recoiled, and she chastised, “Bad Iron. No grooming pre-teens until they’re seventeen—”

I rubbed my nose and tried to keep the irritation out of my voice. “She’s more than legally old enough, it’s just...”

“You’re afraid of her,” Sherry leveled.

“No I’m not...” I put my hoof down from my face. “I mean, there’s the physical end of things that will probably require some delicacy—”

“So practice tonguing a knife and buy her some bed gloves.” Sherry raised one shoulder. “If there’s one thing about ‘griffins’ and ‘physical,’ delicate is not the word. I mean, I couldn’t walk right for a week after...”

Her eyes shot wide as she stopped mid-sentence and I asked, “What?”

Her face returned to its natural, slightly smug demeanor. “Ancient history from before you were born. But we were talking about you being afraid of Gilda, and how you’re using that as an excuse to throw away my favor I did for you.”

I stood there blinking for a few moments as I tried to wrap my head around everything she had just said. Finding it impossible, I eventually decided to cut through her accusations. “What Gilda needs now is some stability in her life, and assurance that she’s got a choice in her life’s direction. I’m not going to take that away from her for your sake, Sherry. If you say that’s ‘throwing away your favor,’ then I’m sorry, but this is what’s best for her.”

Sherry shook her head. “Keep telling yourself that.” She huffed a scoff over my retort and continued, “Ponies always come to me for relationship advice, and sometimes, they even manage to keep from screwing things up. But no one ever stops and appreciates what they’ve got, or how lucky they are...”

“This isn’t that,” I cut in. I knew better than to take my relationship with Gilda for granted, especially in front of Sherry. “I swear it.”

A smile spread across her face, haunted with grief; then she locked cold, calculating eyes on me. “We’ll see, Iron. We’ll see.”

Monday evening, I made a fun discovery: Manticore repellant was also griffin repellant. Or at least, growing up, if I had ever smelled something so terrifyingly evil, I probably would have run screaming to warn the rest of my tribe about a smelly demon in the Jägerwald.

That was saying something, too. Of all our senses, smell was easily the weakest one. So when I found it hard to think when I was inside my cave due to the repellant—which I had sprayed as far away from the mouth of my cave as I thought was safe—I knew that my purchase from the Market District was potent. Or deadly.

By seven-thirty, I was getting used to the smell, which bothered me on a few levels. It was one thing to be aware of a problem, but it was another when the problem became a new baseline. Ironically, that musing about the effects of my first purchase in Farrington led me back to the reason for my other purchase.

Still, I’d visited the writing supplies store. I wanted to keep track of everything that Father had done to me while growing up, and as soon as I saw the familiar sign in the Market District, the answer seemed all too obvious. I had found a cheap little diary that I guessed would be thick enough—I only had to keep track of roughly a decade, or a hundred and twenty months—but when it came to bottles of ink, they only sold them in bundles of such ridiculous quantity that it was slightly more reasonable, in my mind, to buy an “ink and quill” set for fifty bits.

All in all, I spent over a quarter of two weeks’ wages in the Market District that day. By that time, it had been after six o’ clock, shops were closing, and I didn’t even care.

Now, at seven-thirty, before I put my all-too-familiar quill to the diary to start writing GildasTagebuch—my tribe was never very original with naming things, so I didn’t really find a reason to break that tradition—I took a moment to think about what I was doing.

In my tribe, writing was a huge deal. Some of the griffins there couldn’t even do it, which made for an interesting division that...

Well, no one really went out of their way to talk to one another there, anyway. We had our cave, the other families had theirs, and until it came time to gather supplies for winter, we were pretty much content to keep like that.

Regardless of the silent controversy that surrounded it, writing was one of the more permanent actions that few of us knew how to do and even fewer actively did. However, all it took was a trip to the Records Keeper’s cave to see how powerful a tool it was. In one afternoon, one could read about the life of someone who lived centuries ago, then go back to creation legends that started at the beginning of time, and then top the whole thing off with reading the law tribunals to see who had been accused of what in the past year.

One way or another, someone had to write those things.

I paused and realized that, as I was about to plunge one of my feathers into the leaves of an Equestrian book, there was a chance that I was about to immortalize both myself and my father. It was scary to think about who, or what, might come across this little book. Would they hold it to any level of significance? Probably not. But if they did, what would they think of it? Was I prepared to tell future generations about my father?

With a shake of my head, I started writing and decided to keep names to a minimum. I didn’t have to write out a story—more of a schedule of all the things he did to me.

Even then, it was rough.

For starters, my memories sort of blurred together into a series of images and voices rather than a chronological list of events. That meant I couldn’t just pick a date in the past and start going forward from there; I had to remember things based on their relation to other events. I started off not with a list, but a web of injuries; as I progressed, the holes began to grow smaller and smaller.

That wasn’t to say progress was fast, though. Every ten minutes or so, the recollections became too much and I had to stop to clear my head. During one such break, I stretched my right arm out, behind me, and noted that it was easy to see how the bone hadn’t healed straight. That reminded me of the winter morning when Father had done it, and despite the mid-summer’s humidity, I felt a chill run down my spine as I remembered that day.

Over an hour later, it was too dark in my cave to write anymore. I was definitely done for the day, but I was nowhere near done with Gildas Tagebuch.

Still, for the first time since Saturday, I found it easier to go to sleep.

Similarly, my patrol on Tuesday went a lot smoother. Despite the awkward encounter at the gate where I asked Iron to “smell me” to make sure I didn’t reek of manticore repellant—I didn’t, but I still decided to start stashing my armor in a locker overnight until the Jägerwald calmed down—our little banter was a much-welcomed readdition to my morning routine.

When I got back to my cave, everything seemed in order, so I got an hour’s head start on chronicling compared to Monday. It helped, too; after Tuesday night, even though I had reading after my shift on Wednesday, once I got home from the hospital, I added four more things to my journal and called it “done.”

I’d spent my entire Wednesday flight home wracking my brain, and I still couldn’t come up with any new additions. Plus, there were only two long-ish gaps in my journal that seemed to coincide with a small sense of security: one after Father had caught me reading in the Records Keeper’s, and one after he’d caught me throwing rocks for fun. He encouraged those actions, and I avoided his usual wrath for almost two months at a time.

But even those respites ended.

When I was finished writing, I picked up the journal and took a small flight to the western face of my mountain. It was lighter on that side, since the sun was setting on in front of me; it made it easier to read over my account of everything that Father did to me.

With my facts laid out straight in front of me, in chronological order, I started to think about Father in a much more... functional manner. But I couldn’t find any pattern to his “lessons,” nor did I think I would. Like I’d always suspected, they were just pain.

Luckily, I now had a mostly complete list of pain—I didn’t think Gerard was worth adding to this ordeal, and siblings normally fought. Given the sheer number of new things that I had remembered during the three-day endeavor, I felt a lot more confident in knowing that there weren’t any big surprises hiding in the shadows of my mind.

That serenity only filled me with a new source of uncertainty. I knew what Father had done. I knew how, when, where, and to whom... But that wasn’t enough.

The last question that I had, the one that had burned inside me for fourteen years—since the first incident—the only question I wanted an answer to, I drew a blank for:

Why?

It was so easy a question, with simple conditions that weren't being fulfilled. Parents were supposed to nurture, not hurt. It was a simple biological drive to make sure the next generation had the best chance to survive.

So why? Why had I been different, been singled out? We had all known to stay out of his way when he was in his home, but unless I was missing something huge, none of my other siblings had gotten it nearly as badly as I had from him.

So why me? It came as an almost new realization, but I was so used to the physical damage and pain that I rarely stopped to question why he let it happen on an emotional level.

For the first time that I could remember, I wondered why he couldn’t love me.

What was so wrong with me that, when I had been only three, I’d been thrown at a wall to “get out of his way?” What could I have possibly done to upset him?

I pondered those questions for a long time, even after the sun had gone down. Finally, when I felt myself nodding off to sleep, I went back to my cave. Trying to figure out his motives was a fool’s quest, I realized.

The only griffin who knew why Father did what he did was Father himself.

I stroked my chest and remembered that I’d never get a chance to ask him. It was... liberating, almost, even if it came with limitations of knowledge.

However, I was content to start looking for answers elsewhere. And even if there weren’t any answers, for the first time in a while, I took a small ounce of comfort in knowing that I had friends—or at least one friend—who would at least make an effort to help me cope with everything.

I didn’t like how that made me reliant on Iron like that, and I remembered Starfall’s advice. As I nestled down on my blanket to go to sleep, I realized one thing: tomorrow’s dinner wasn’t going to be a simple thing. At least I’d have a relatively clear-headed patrol to mull over everything that I needed to talk to Iron about:

Me, him, and us.

Thursday night, after my shift, I was filled with anticipation over my dinner with Gilda. Despite my constant self-reminders over the week that this was our first step towards repairing things between us, I was still nervous that things might go wrong between her and me.

They did that, often, for us.

When I got home, Maxie was lying on her couch and reading a paperback novel. I didn’t quite remember when she started reading books with paragraphs instead of panels, but I didn’t quite wish to ask her about it, either. If she were trying something new, I more than approved.

As I began taking my armor off, I greeted her. “Hi Maxie.”

She looked up and smiled. “Hi yourself. Ready for the big night?”

Strange as it was to hear her speaking plainly about my dating life, I had learned it was a much better alternative to keeping it a secret from her. That had been my logic on Monday when I spoke to her about it; while I saw the disgust on her face, she at least chose her words well during that conversation.

Now, she was smiling about it, which either meant she was finally accepting the idea or that this was the start of another complex. I sincerely hoped it was the former, so I replied, “Yeah. I’m a little nervous, mostly because...”

“It’s been a long month?”

I nodded. “It’s been a long month.”

Maxie shrugged and said, “Well... I’m sure it’ll turn out okay.”

I thanked her, then I finished taking off my armor and headed to the bathroom. There wasn’t much I could prepare for that could affect the outcome of this evening; other than worrying about it, the best thing I could do was take care of my hygiene. Even if Gilda apparently lacked a strong sense of smell, I would feel better if I started out fresh and clean for dinner.

Five cold, breath-sapping minutes later, I dried off, brushed my teeth, and noted that I was probably a few days overdue for a manecut. It wasn’t anything worth the trouble of borrowing my sister’s brush over, so I exited the bathroom, and headed left to the living room.

When I got to our front door, I turned and waved to Maxie. “Enjoy your evening, and your novel.”

She looked up and gave me one last reassuring smile. “Good luck.”

Her well-wishing lasted me through most of the Residential District, until I came to the main drag and turned south. Even as far away as I was, I could already see Gilda was waiting for me like usual. I couldn’t make out her face, but I had known her long enough to know what her vacant, lost-in-thought expression looked like.

As I drew nearer, my hypothesis was confirmed, but any smile I might’ve had from being right was dampened by the fact that she was probably thinking about us. It made me nervous, but combined with Maxie’s wish of “good luck,” it also made me hopeful.

When I reached Gilda, I waved and greeted, “Good evening.”

She blinked and her visible eye turned to me. A faint smile appeared at the corner of her beak, and she said, “Hey.”

“Ready to go?”

She nodded, then stood up and walked over to me. “So, uh... where to tonight?”

Instantly, I remembered the game of guessing where Gilda would hate to eat the least. No dairy, no artificial meats... The back of my mind joked about frying some cat food, then the front of my mind realized that probably wasn’t the worst idea ever, but finally I deflected, “Well... where do you get your lunches?”

“Diner,” she replied. “Want to do that?”

I nodded; what we ate was far less important than the fact that we were eating together.

We made small talk while Gilda led me into the northern portion of the Business District, near the intersection of the main two roads. When we reached her diner, I grinned; one way or another, she had found one of the best-valued lunch stops in the city. Many guards in the Business and Market Districts ate there for lunch; not only was it well-positioned, but the service there was usually fast enough to enjoy a meal rather than inhaling it.

After we sat down and ordered our waters, I pressed a more difficult topic than the weather. “So, how are you?”

I’d learned not to stare at it, but sometimes, her tail was the only part of her that moved. Out of the corner of my eye, I noted its curling and uncurling; however, the rest of her was frozen and staring at the table. Finally, she answered, “Better.”

“That’s good,” I replied with a nod. “I’m guessing that you’re less worried about manticores now?”

She chuckled hollowly. “It rained this morning, which I thought would dampen the smell, but no. Now my cave smells like a pack of skunks made a suicide pact in a swamp. I woke up and almost puked. It was bad.”

I gave her an apologetic glance, but only said, “Well, if it’s any consolation, I still haven’t noticed anything abnormal about your... presence.”

“Eh, whatever.” She waved her hand and changed the subject. “But your cactus bloomed this morning, so apparently, that repellant isn’t deadly to plants.”

“Or at least, not to ones from harsh environments.”

“Or that,” she agreed. “And it let me think about you and me on the flight to work today.”

“Oh?” It was difficult not to sound desperate.

Gilda nodded. “For your apartment offer thing, I’m gonna wait until fall. If I’m sticking around for winter, I don’t want to deal with firewood.” She looked me head-on. “But more importantly, if I’m sticking around for winter, I’m probably going to stick around for good.”

It wasn’t as committed an answer as I would have liked, but given the circumstances, it was probably the best one I could expect. So I assured her, “If you make that choice, my offer will still stand.”

“So why—”

She was interrupted when the waiter came by with our drinks and took our food orders. She got her usual potato; I ordered a grilled sandwich.

When the waiter left, Gilda continued in a quieter tone. “So, uh... thanks, for that.” I nodded my acceptance, and she continued, “But I guess a bigger portion of that issue comes with the question of, ‘Why should I stay here?’”

I started with a simple reason, “What about the good you do as a guard?”

The question made her bob her head. “I mean, it’s hard to see that, though.”

“You apprehended a very dangerous criminal.”

“Yeah,” she agreed, “but now I’ve got to go on random patrols because her brother’s out to get revenge or something.”

I nodded in quiet agreement. Red Hooves had been mostly silent after his sister’s imprisonment—something that either gave credibility to his cut-throat emptiness or her story that they weren’t working together. He’d hired her a good lawyer and sent me a few near-taunting letters that weren’t worth anything but the trash bin. Whatever his tactics were involving his sister, they’d soon be for naught, as her trial was fast approaching and the evidence was damning.

“So,” Gilda continued, “it’d be easier for me to start over in a new city, one with less history.”

“You’d run into hardships there, wherever that is,” I pointed out. “And I don’t mean to hold your conditions over you, but Canterlot is visited by the Elpithasus government representatives fairly often, and they’re marginally involved in Stalliongrad’s trade industry—along with other cities.” I shook my head. “I don’t know what ‘contact’ means for you, but for how much you want to avoid cities with anti-griffin history, Farrington is ironically one of the last places you’d run into another griffin.”

She raised an eyebrow. “So you don’t want me to go?”

“I’ve already told you, I want what’s best for—”

“But what about you?” she interrupted.

I blinked. Her questions were a lot more aggressive than I remembered from a month ago, but then again, she’d had a hard month.

Hell, I’d had a hard month.

With a sigh, I admitted, “No. If I’m being wholly selfish and keeping you entirely for myself, I don’t want you to go. I care about you, I’d worry for your safety, and I’d miss you too much.”

She grinned slightly, but didn’t say anything because we were interrupted by the arrival of our food. After we thanked the waiter and took our first few bites, I asked, “How much does that affect your decision, if I care about you?”

“Not all the way, but some.” She shrugged. “I mean, regardless of if things work out, you’re one of the only stallions I’ve met who’d do...” She pointed a finger at me, then back to her. “This. I’m not saying you’re the only reason I’d stick around Farrington, but you’d definitely be one of the main ones.”

“Well then...” I chose my words carefully. “Does the label for what we are matter to you? Whether we’re friends or lovers, we still enjoy each other’s company, right?”

“I could write letters and visit a friend, though.”

Despite my overwhelming urge to slap myself in the forehead in response to my own question, I simply nodded. “Right. Sorry.”

Gilda ate some of her potato. I met the silence with a bite of my sandwich. After she swallowed, she asked, “So, why do you want to date me?”

Luckily, I had rehearsed this list in my head several times in July. “You’re funny, but in a quiet way. You listen when you’re not getting hung up over something that’s bothering you. We’ve got common interests, even though they’re opposite—you with your race’s history, me with Farrington’s.” I shrugged. “I won’t lie and say that it’s always easy to date you, but the good times more than make up for the troubled ones.”

She nodded sadly at that last part. “But that just reminds me of the ‘why nots.’ Like, you’re my captain. You’re... older...” she said the word slowly. “Like, not too old, if there’s a thing such as that, but...” She stared at her plate for a few moments. “I mean, could you respect someone you have to take care of all the time?”

“I don’t have to constantly help you,” I pointed out. “A shoulder to cry on, or a sounding board for past pains? I’ll always be that for you, regardless of where this relationship goes, but I’ll never think less of you for it.”

Gilda raised an eyebrow. “Then how come I don’t know anything about your childhood?”

I inhaled a breath to respond to her point, realized I couldn’t, then let it out. After a moment’s thought, I settled on, “Not many individuals know about that who weren’t there. Sherry knows most of it, but even Starfall had to piece together bits from the newspapers.”

“What bits?”

“My mother’s death,” I leveled, omitting the circumstances and the image I’d never forget. “Caring for Maxie for most of our childhood afterwards. Mining.”

It was an abridged answer, but it was a good enough answer for Gilda. “Okay...” She nodded. “That’s a good start. Because if this isn’t an equal pairing, I’m probably going to have to say, ‘No.’”

I nodded. “That’s fair.”

“It’d be too creepy.”

The specific accusation made me blink a few times. “Creepy? How so?”

She shrugged slowly. “On Monday, the ‘other stuff’ I mentioned? That was when I uncovered an old memory I’d forgotten all about. Since then, I’ve pieced together my history of injuries...” She stopped to shudder. “I think I’m a little better. Not much, but better. But still, that’s got me thinking, what if Starfall’s right and I need something more than a boyfriend? What if I need a therapist or... a father?”

Suddenly, I knew where “creepy” came from, and it was all I could do to keep from agreeing with a matter-of-fact grunt.

Instead, I shook my head and said, “I’ll do better at making sure this is a give and take relationship, rather than a... fatherly one.” I tried to avoid emphasizing the word, but Gilda still cringed when I said it. “Sorry, but... if you’re putting that term to it, I actually see where you’re coming from. Remember when you asked about our relationship, back when we first started dating?”

“Yeah. You said you didn’t want to be ‘predatory.’”

I decided against defending my use of the term and went with: “Well, that’s what I meant. I know this city, so I’m an authority on that. I’m your captain in the Guard, so I’m an authority there...” I shrugged. “All I can do is promise you that I won’t try to look at you in an unduly nurturing manner. I’ll avoid giving any direct orders in the Guard if you don’t... actively break any laws or regulations in front of me, but other than that... I’ll respect you, your past, and your space. Is that enough?”

She raised an eyebrow. “What if I did some things in the past I’m not proud of?”

I pondered her question for a moment; at first, I was tempted to tell her that I didn’t care. Given her and her past, I decided it would be for the best if I asked, “What things?”

“I mean, I could tell you the whole story if you want, but basically, at Junior Speedsters’, someone kept bullying Dash and me, and I... accidentally went too far in getting her back.”

“Accidentally?” I asked, trying to remain neutral. “How far?”

Her eyes shot open wide and defensively. “I... I just wanted to scare her, not... hurt her.” Gilda shook her head. “I kicked a cloud out from under her while she was asleep, and she... she didn’t wake up until she hit the ground.”

I felt my own eyes widen as my lip curled down. “But she did wake up?”

“Yeah...” Gilda nodded. “Like, it wasn’t too far up to do any serious damage, I thought. But she landed on her wing funny, and...”

I took a deep sigh. I wasn’t pleased by how often she and wing injuries followed each other, not by a long shot. However, I forced myself to reserve judgement before I inquired further. “So, she was a bully? What did the camp counselors do about it?”

Gilda scoffed. “Nothing. The one time Dash and I went to them, they separated us, told me it was no big deal and I should get a sense of humor, and told her that she should make other friends.”

For a moment, I shared in her distant anger at the past; those counselors clearly didn’t handle that situation well. And Gilda had been... fifteen when this event occurred. That was old enough to understand some consequences, but not enough to be entirely judged by them.

However, I cooled off when I had to admit that Gilda probably wouldn’t really have been an easy child to deal with at summer camp. It didn’t excuse the counselor’s incompetence any, but I focused on the problem in front of me: how this sort of thing was a repeat occurrence with Gilda. It wasn’t as if she had learned her lesson from last time...

Then again, maybe she did, which was why she preferred to take matters into her own hands. “Why didn’t you come talk to me when Starfall challenged you to a duel?”

She shook her head slowly. “I don’t know. All I remember was it seemed like a good idea to try to talk to him instead of you.” She chuckled darkly. “I didn’t want to be a wedge between you guys.”

I grinned weakly; those were probably the best possible intentions mixed with the worst foresight imaginable, and it had created a terrible disaster for everyone. We’d mostly put the past behind all of us on that; the fact that she had apologized and vowed to “coexist” with Starfall was one of the main reasons I even entertained the possibility of dating her again.

That led me back to the point at hand; my weak grin faded because I had to ask, “Was there anything else? You said ‘things’ from the past you’re not proud of.”

She looked down at the probably cold remnants of her meal and thought for a while. When she spoke, her voice was low. “One more thing, but I can tell you I did learn my lesson, or something, from it.”

I slid my plate to the side to put my hooves on the table and wait for her answer. Finally, she continued, “Like, after I lost everything here, after I thought you’d thrown me out of the city...” She took a deep breath. “I just kept going, with plans on what I’d do tomorrow, you know?” She turned up to look at me right in the eyes. “I wasn’t always that strong, when looking at the possibility of a life with nowhere to go and no one to share it with. Last May, I tried to end it. Luckily, Dash saved me.”

Her confession brought three years’ worth of worry back to me in a heartbeat.

Suicide.

I’d seen enough of it during my time as an officer to last me a lifetime, but I never understood why those individuals did it. I looked at Gilda’s reason—being kicked out of her home and forced to either live in isolation or betray her griffin heritage by joining a pony city.

It still didn’t make sense to me. She had wings, and Equestria was mostly open to her. And if not this country, then the countless others to the south. Somewhere, she could find something if she wanted to.

Then again, I supposed, a weak will to live and enjoy life was probably the root of the problem. Given her past, I could see how that might have been literally beaten out of her.

I took a deep breath. She said she had learned from that experience, and even if she wanted to leave Farrington, I could at least understand that she now wanted to be part of a society in the future instead of living in desolate isolation. She was wary about settling down in Farrington, true, but given her history in the city, I could hardly doubt those reservations.

“Is there anything else?” I whispered.

“Not really...” She looked away. “But what, those aren’t enough for you?”

Despite myself, I chuckled. “I’ll have to trust you when you said you learned your lesson on how to cope with despair. But I’d find it paradoxical to sever ties with you because, in the past, you had issues coping with a lack of ties to anyone or anyplace.” I remembered Starfall’s advice about her, which wasn’t wholly unwarranted. “However, I also have to look out for myself...”

Across the table, Gilda’s eyes widened in fear.

I shook my head. I was worried too. It might turn out to be a mistake, or it might be the best decision I’d ever make. Time alone would tell. “So I suppose my conditions for things to consider are two promises from you—one: stop hurting ponies.” I realized there was technically an overlap with her duties as guard, so I added, “Unless, of course, they resist arrest or need to be apprehended as part of official Guard duties.”

She nodded and seemed to relax, so I moved on to the second condition. “And two... if you ever get into a situation where you’re thinking about suicide... promise me that you’ll at least talk to me first.”

“Okay,” Gilda agreed solemnly. Then, she let out a relieved sigh. “And, uh, you’ll work on keeping things equal between us? No direct orders, no keeping quiet all the time?”

It was only fair, so I nodded.

After that, a silence fell over us that threatened to turn awkward. I stuck my hoof out across the table. “So, are you ready to try this again?”

She looked down at my hoof, then looked up at me. “A hoofshake?”

I was about to retort when she stood up, walked over to my side of the table, and ducked under my outstretched foreleg. She flared her wings out, then retracted them, bringing my arm around her and below her wings. Then, she climbed on me slightly so she could rest her arms around my chest and her head on my neck. I drew her in deeper to the embrace, glad for how warm and soft she was.

“How’s this for a hoofshake?” she whispered. I lightly ruffled her back, which made her shake with a chuckle, and that made me laugh because of her feathers. In a low voice, she continued, “I missed this.”

“Me too,” I admitted.

“Ahem,” our waiter coughed. Gilda peeled away from me and both of us looked at him as he brandished... “Here’s your bill... and... this is a family joint, so...” He looked at Gilda. “Like, I’d ask two ponies to tone it down... so it’s not... you know.”

“I know,” Gilda responded flatly. She then used her wings to slide my hoof off her back, then walked around the waiter to get back to her own seat.

The waiter offered me an apologetic shrug, I shook my head to imply, “No need,” and then he left the bill with us.

After we’d paid and left, Gilda and I walked outside. Once again, we headed south for the end of the day. On the way, she asked, “So, what did you make of that?”

I shrugged. I didn’t really think anything of it, but then again, other than Starfall’s mild insensitivity that usually came from thoughtlessness, I was rarely a target of race-related prejudice. I assured Gilda, “I took him at face value. It is a nice diner, and we were hugging.”

“Yeah...” She bobbed her head in tune with a few of her steps. “I just... he sounded worried about it.”

I fought to keep images of pigeons out of my head. “Well, have you seen him there before?”

“Yeah, when Spotlight’s sick or off.”

“There’s your answer: he knows you’re a regular, and basic customer service says ‘don’t discriminate against your regular customers.’ We broke a rule, he was probably embarrassed to enforce it, and I think that’s all there was to that interaction.”

“I guess,” Gilda agreed.

We spent the rest of the journey to the south gate talking about her experiences in Farrington, and how—despite making a bad name for herself in the paper—things were beginning to die down again for her on that front. For my part, it was slightly frustrating to consider how she was thinking of leaving the city when she was getting nearer and nearer to the level of acceptance she desired.

At the end of our journey, it was past eight o’ clock. The torches inside the southern archway were already lit. Gilda drifted to the side, underneath one of the flames; I followed so that we could say goodbye without blocking anyone’s path—even though admittedly, this late in the day, very few ponies would be coming up from Trottingham and even fewer would be departing for there.

She turned around and said, “So, here we are, again.” Her words sounded... nervous.

I nodded. “Let’s not fight for a month again.”

Gilda laughed. “Yeah, that...” She shook her head. “That was dumb.” Then she looked up at me again. “I’m glad we’re still dating.”

“I am too,” I answered. It awoke in me a warm realization that—chance of painful ending notwithstanding—we were dating again. That warmth permeated me, and for a few moments’ clarity, I realized that the potential ending of something wasn’t necessarily a good thing to judge it by while it was still going on.

I stepped forward so that our chests were almost touching. Gilda cocked her head to the side, slightly confused, but I brought up my right hoof and stroked from the top of her head, down to the back of her neck.

She shuddered a little, closing her eyes and opening her mouth. I leaned down and wrapped my lips around her beak. She gave a quick, surprised gasp. Her beak twitched closed, sending small, momentary sears of pain. Then, she opened her mouth wider than it had been.

Gently, I slid my tongue forward to caress hers; it was a lot thinner and firmer than mine, but that didn’t matter. She returned the gesture, slowly licking the edge of my tongue in a somewhat haphazard manner, but I decided that didn’t matter, either.

Our first kiss was electric, and for a moment, I thought I could actually feel it tingling.

When it was over, I pulled back and planted a small, quick kiss on the outside of her beak. Then I looked down at her; in the torchlight, I saw... blood. I wiped my mouth—which felt rubbery and cold—with the back of my hoof; when I looked at it; sure enough, I was bleeding.

Gilda saw it too; then her mouth turned down in a desolate, horrified expression. I shook my head and said, “Dob wowwy...” before I realized that my entire mouth had gone numb.

It did little to assuage her panic. “I’m sorry!”

I shook my head again and took care to pronounce all the sounds in the words. “It’s... fi-ne.” I gave a shrug. “We’ll figur somfing out.”

She gave me a sad look and said, “We’re so bad at this...”

“I shudda...” I smelled blood and felt it on my chin, now, which made me worry if I needed to go home or to the hospital. Then head to knife store, a Stalliongrad accent suggested.

Gilda cringed, then shook the disgust off her face, saying, “Here...” She then craned her neck up and did... something near my mouth and lips.

When she shrunk away, I rubbed my lips with my other hoof, and it came away much cleaner than my first one had been. “Thanks.” I shrugged. “Nexs time, I’ll ask you firft.”

She nodded sagely. “Probably for the best.” Then, she looked up at me and said, “Good night, Iron.”

I waved. “G’night.”

After that, she took off for home. As she flew away, I kicked one of my back legs against the other; that should have been a good moment between us, not a bloody mess.

I turned around to head back to my home. I hoped that when I got there, Maxie was in her room or occupied where I could sneak past her on my way to the bathroom. I didn’t want to strain her newfound tolerance by parading around evidence of a botched kiss.

Still, even as I noted the unfortunate end to our evening, I had to admit that it was the start of something new between us. For the first time since last month, I held a decent amount hope for the future of our relationship.

Moving forward, we’d just need to plan things better.

6 - Stalliongrad Connection

“So... you really like potatoes, huh?”

I glared down at my plate, then across the table to where Starfall had ordered the same exact thing. Finally, I glared up at him. I didn’t want to start an argument, since we still had five more hours to patrol together. I answered, “So do you.”

He tilted his head in a sideways nod; then he picked up his table knife and sliced his potato open. “I dunno, I guess it’s weird to think about you in your normal habitat. Killing, to eat.” Before I could decide just how offensive that was, he asked, “What’s it like?”

I blew a whuff of air out the side of my beak. “Like you haven’t killed some criminal before.”

Starfall shook his head. “I’ve come close with a few, and one guy chose death over imprisonment at the end of a chase, but so far, I haven’t actually crossed that line.”

“Huh.” I shrugged. “But you kill plants to eat. Why’s that different?”

“Plants don’t move or have instincts or bleed,” he argued.

“Sure they move, to face the sun. And they’re not like smart, but they... well, they know which way the sun is. As for bleeding...” I grabbed my knife and stabbed my potato around a dozen times. Pointing to the starchy white insides, I asked, “What do you think that is?”

He raised his hooves in mock surrender, still holding his table knife in one. “Easy there, Sharptalon—”

“And stop calling me that,” I said through a snarl. I despised his cute little nickname for me.

His right hoof came down and he brandished his knife at me with a glare. “You broke... No, you destroyed my wing.”

“So not my fault.”

“Maybe not. But I’ve still got to wait until next month to hear if all my surgeries were even worth a damn, and if they were, I get to start what I can only imagine will to be excruciating physical therapy. So...” He flicked the knife back, spinning it around on top of his fetlock before he set it down. “No.”

For a moment, I considered bringing our sergeant into it. I shook my head and set down my knife. It wasn’t worth it yet; it was only noon on our first Monday together. “Arschloch,” I muttered.

Starfall chuckled quietly. While he was distracted, I leaned over the table, grabbed his plate, and switched it with mine. He looked down at the remains of what was now his potato, then he grinned. “Touché. Nothing like Comet’s boiled garlic potatoes, but I can do mashed.”

“Oh, shut up,” I mumbled. He always had a smartass response for everything. Luckily, he took the hint and we ate in silence. Our patrol was in the southern end of the Business District, so we didn’t have much time for chit-chat to begin with.

Inside, I bemoaned that tragedy.

Rules for patrols with a partner were fairly straightforward: there were two guards, not one. That meant there were two sets of eyes to watch over citizens and two bodies if it came down to a fight. There wasn’t a total ban on any socializing while patrolling, but it was one of those things that guards could be penalized for conduct if they did too much of it. Lucky for me, I got stuck with an asshole, so it was easy to focus on the job.

Then again, Starfall wasn’t content to leave it as “easy.” After we left the diner, side-by-side through both doors, he asked, “So, how are you and Iron doing?”

I took a few steps and sighed darkly before I admitted, “Better.”

Starfall’s head bobbed in the corner of my eye. “Good.”

What, do you want a thank-you card? I scoffed.

He continued, “Comet and I are doing better.” I turned my head to the left, and he met my gaze with a shrug. “In case you were wondering.”

“Good,” I said, despite the urge I had to scoff at how little it affected me. Then I realized he might’ve been thanking me, because I might’ve had some sort of role in repairing his marriage. Yay, me.

Still, I took it as a peace offering from him. I didn’t like him, I didn’t have to like him, but if we were going to be stuck together for forty hours a week for the foreseeable future, I’d rather pass it “neutrally” than “pissed.”

At five o’clock, when our patrol ended, we hit on a small conflict when Starfall asked, “Where do you want to go for dismissal?”

Partners had to report in to their sergeant at the start of shifts, but there was freedom in getting dismissed; you just needed to find someone who held a higher rank. There was some collaborative back-end to it that Iron explained to me my first day, but I had since filtered into the “I don’t care” portion of my mind.

Now it raised an interesting dilemma now, since Starfall lived in the north of town and I stashed my armor in the south. Even on days I read at the hospital, I usually stopped by the Citadel first. The farrier and his apprentice were talented, but sitting for an hour and a half took its toll on my unarmored butt; I didn’t want to think what would happen if I added armor into the equation.

Plus, it might scare the little guys.

To keep things as smooth as possible, I offered a compromise. “Our lieutenant?”

Starfall looked at me with thin, pursed lips. “Why not Iron or the Citadel, then?” I raised an eyebrow and he kept going, “Ever see a mid-forties stallion who’s bitter because someone half his age beat him out for promotion twice? We can go to the east gate if you want, but Comet’s not going to expect me home before six, regularly, or tonight, eight.”

“Why so late?”

He chuckled. “This is my first night of being employed after almost a month, Sharptalon. I love my wife. I love my children. But tonight, for a few hours, I am going to love being alone.”

I didn’t really understand his problem; then again, I only spent around ten hours a week with Iron. “Oh,” was all I said. “And stop calling me that, Arschloch.”

Starfall only grinned. I didn’t like how hard it was stay pissed at his consistency.

Once the two of us reached Iron’s south booth, he officially dismissed us before asking, “How did everything go?”

Starfall answered with a chuckle. “It’s the Business District, Iron; all the crime goes on indoors.”

I shrugged when Iron turned to me. “What he said.” I glared at Starfall. “Not exactly prime lunch conversation, but I’ll live.”

He grinned smugly at me. “Well, if you want food and a conversation...” He gestured at my boyfriend. “That’s his job.”

“Hey...” Iron warned.

Starfall shrugged. “Sorry.” After he said it, he narrowed his gaze at Iron, looked down at the bottom of one of his own hooves, and went back up to Iron’s exact eye-level. Iron smiled warmly; Starfall’s face deflated in a frown.

After a few more bewildering seconds, Starfall muttered “Cheater,” shook his head, and turned to walk back into the city.

When he was gone, I turned back to Iron and shrugged openly. He chuckled. “I stand four feet, ten inches tall. Starfall is four feet, eleven inches tall.” Iron lifted one of his hooves into view. “But officers don’t usually wear boots.”

I shook my head at their dumb little contest; in a few years, I’d probably end up taller than both of them. That made me look down at my gauntlets and ask, “Usually?”

“Officers don’t usually carry around bladed weapons, either,” Iron said. “Though I suppose there’s a difference between what is standard-issue and what is ‘acceptable.’”

That reminded me of something about my armor I’d never actually shown him. I popped the medallion out of my chest and showed the gold half to Iron. He blinked, wide-eyed, and asked, “Wait, that... that’s reversible?” He held his hoof out.

“And diamond.” I handed it over.

Iron examined it for a few moments, then gave it back to me. “This whole time, I thought it was part of the armor.” He met my eyes, I raised an eyebrow, and he shook his head. “I’m sorry, Gilda, but the answer’s no.”

I resocketed the medallion, Farrington-side-out, and grumbled, “Yeah, I know. I’ll just get a spear, then.”

“A spear?”

My expression cracked into a grin. “In case we’ve ever got to fight sharks.”

He chuckled. “If you can find a spear that fits in a holster and doesn’t stick up over your back, you’re welcome to carry it.”

It took me a moment to realize that he wasn’t messing with me; that was actually the regulation for weapons. I shook my head and brought up my left hand. “I think I’ve got ‘bladed weapons’ covered.”

He didn’t say anything, but he bit his lips just barely enough for me to know what he was thinking. After Thursday’s disaster, our Saturday date had ended in a much-safer hug from me and kiss on the neck from Iron. I raised an eyebrow and asked, “So, uh, yeah, how’s your mouth doing?”

Iron rocked his head from side to side. “Oh, I took care of it before even Maxie saw the cuts. So... it’s been good.”

“Well, I’m probably going to get going here soon, uh...” I shrugged. “Want to try again?”

He shook his head. “Sorry, not... not if there’s a chance to end up like Thursday while I’m on-duty.”

I nodded sadly, but on one level I agreed. Or at least, I didn’t want to deal with how I now knew what Iron’s blood tasted like for a second time.

We said our goodbyes before I realized I was still in my armor, so I went back into the city to stash it in the Citadel for the evening. When I came back to say goodbye a second, extra time, Iron bid me to come closer to his booth.

When I stretched up to his height, he kissed the end of my beak. It made me smile, and I kept it for my entire trip home.

* * *

Friday evening, I had my community service at the hospital. Other than showing up on time and on schedule, the rules to fulfil my punishment were actually fairly loose. I started things off by purposely losing a board game to the little guys.

About half an hour into the game, Coal Ember—the younger colt who was sitting on the other side of the table—perked up and pointed behind me. “Who’s that?”

I turned around to see who he was looking at, and I met Iron’s gaze. I smiled and remembered our conversation from earlier, where I’d complained about not being able to do anything with him after my shift because of my community service. However, I also realized that he’d just created an awkward situation by showing up unannounced. I didn’t really want to explain how we were dating to a group of foals.

Iron must’ve picked up on my inner turmoil; he answered, “Gilda is a close acquaintance of mine, and we also work together.”

Dawn—the filly with orange eyes—piped up and asked, “Are you her boyfriend?”

I raised an eyebrow at her guess. Meanwhile, the rest of the kids walked over to form a loose circle around Iron. Firestone, the older of the two colts, turned to Dawn and said, “Don’t be stupid. They can’t date; she’s not a pony!”

I turned back to Iron and mouthed the word “Ouch,” to him. It wasn’t really worth getting angry at Firestone’s assumption. He was seven. Iron agreed by smiling and coughing a laugh into his hoof.

Dawn, however, gave him an answer of, “Nuh-uh!”

“Uh-huh!”

“Hey now...” I turned to them. “No fighting in the hospital. What if someone gets hurt?”

She stuck her tongue out at him; he pantomimed a fake little laugh, but didn’t actually make the sounds.

With that settled, I turned back to Iron. “But, yeah, what’s up?”

He shrugged. “I wanted to come see how you were doing, and perhaps hear another story.”

At his suggestion, there was a collective cheer of “Yeah!” from the foals. I shook my head and chuckled; I hadn’t really been planning on doing one of my tribe’s stories today. Still, I knew enough of them to improvise.

I pointed to Velvet and Lilac, the two oldest fillies, and said, “Okay, you two put the board away while...” I pointed at the other four foals. “You guys get out the mats.”

Everyone had their orders, so after watching them to make sure there weren’t any misunderstandings, I walked over to Iron and whispered, “It’s cool if you’re here, but next time, no surprises?”

He nodded and whispered back, “Sorry, I only thought of it after you came by my booth this evening. And, uh, sorry for ‘close acquaintance...’”

I shook my head but gave Iron a grin. “It’s fine. Besides, like Firestone said, we can’t date here.”

Iron chuckled. “You’ll have to introduce me to everyone.”

I rubbed my forehead with my palm. “Right...” Turning around to the foals, I beckoned Iron to follow me over to the part of the play area where the bookshelves were situated. The mats were out and the board game was almost packed away, so I sat in the center of the ring of four foals that had room for two more. When Velvet and Lilac got done with their chore, they closed the circle, so I cleared my throat and pointed. “By the way, this is Captain Iron Bulwark.”

They turned around to look at him again, and I saw his confusion as he went from foal to foal. Without manes, cutie marks, or fur, it was difficult to tell them apart at first. Iron looked at me for help; I tapped a finger twice on the side of my head, near my right eye. He nodded.

I went around the circle and introduced the kids by motioning to them. “And Iron, you know Firestone and Dawn Glimmer.” Red and orange eyes, respectively.

“Then there’s Lilac...” Green eyes.

“...Coal Ember...” Smoke gray eyes.

“...Velvet Rose...” Bright purple eyes.

I came to the youngest, who usually sat on one of the sides and slightly away from the rest of the group. Her eyes were also a slightly different shape from the rest, which meant I had learned her name first—from the nurse on the floor. “And finally, this is Sapphire.”

After the introductions, Iron waved at the kids. Five of them waved back, but Sapphire looked down and away from him. I grinned, but for her sake, I figured it was time to start the story.

I threw caution into the wind and decided to wing it with an entirely new legend. “So...” I turned to Firestone. “You don’t think a pony and a griffin can date?”

He shook his head. “Nope. It’s weird.”

I kept my chuckle in my head. “Maybe. But that reminds me of the story of Donar’s daughter, who fell in love with the son of Jord...”

For half an hour, I spun a tale completely of my own creation. Even with a good knowledge of my tribe’s legends, it was harder than I first thought. Twice, one of the foals raised a hoof to ask a question about some minor point that I’d completely forgotten about.

In the end, I told a story about how the princess of the sky and the prince of the earth fell in love, and how that love endured despite their difficulties in finding a place to live together—he couldn’t join her in the sky, but she grew restless and anxious on the ground, even though she couldn’t bear to leave him.

For my first time trying something like that, it went over pretty well.

After seven, when it was time for the foals’ dinner, Iron and I left the hospital together. We agreed to get dinner—this time, I wasn’t just twisting his words around—and when we got to our usual place, Iron brought up my legend: “That was an interesting story. But I thought you told me once that there weren’t any such tales about unconventional romances?”

I shrugged and grinned slyly. “Two months ago, there weren’t.”

Chuckling, he replied, “I thought it might have been that.” After a few moments, he added, “So, was that your way of saying you want to find a mountain to live on together?”

I rolled my eyes at him. “I already live on a mountain. Our compromise would have to be a hill or something.”

“Farrington is almost half a mile above sea level, so technically...”

His tone was light and joking, but I didn’t really want to talk about the serious places this conversation was going to go. “I know, I know. I’m thinking about it.”

“Er... I didn’t mean it like that...” he quickly corrected.

I didn’t entirely believe him, but I decided not to push it any further, either. Instead, I just shrugged and changed the subject to something that, admittedly, still bothered me about the hospital: “I just wished they weren’t sick, you know?”

“Many ponies in Farrington would agree with you,” he answered gravely.

I shook my head. “Not that. I mean... well, okay, yeah, I wish they weren’t sick; I’m not that cold of a bitch. What I mean is that, they’re sick, they’re not going to get better, so getting attached is just...” I swallowed a lump before admitting. “Hard. Like, I want to enjoy my time with them, but it just always feels like, every time I’m there, I just get reminded of how it’s supposed to be a punishment.”

“The only punishment you’re supposed to be doing is in the form of community service...”

I glared at him. “Would you really put it past Sherry to do that, though? Especially since Starfall’s a father?”

After a few moments, he slowly nodded agreement. “Okay. Sherry’s good at finding fitting punishments, when she’s given that task. Maybe she went too far this time. If you’d like—”

“No.” I shook my head. I knew what he’d been about to offer. “I... I’m in too deep now. I can’t just leave them.”

Iron’s response came at a measured, cautious pace. “Well... at least you’re... good with children. That’s something good to learn from this, right?”

I wondered what was bothering him; then it hit me: We were dating, and the topic was my child-raising skills. Blood rushed to my cheeks before I deflected the praise. “That comes from being the second-oldest sister in a constantly growing flock.”

The rest of dinner passed without any awkward compliments, but soon after, it was time for me to go home again. Iron and I made plans for Saturday evening on our way to the south gate; there was a new play being put on in Farrington’s main theater. I agreed to go, if only because Iron had just sat through a hefty amount of my culture—or something based on it, at least.

When we got to the southern archway, this time, I knew what to expect when I walked around in front of him. I looked up at him, waiting, and said, “So, I guess this is good night...”

“For tonight,” he agreed, stepping forward.

I was expecting him to bend down and kiss me, but this time, he started things off by rubbing a hoof up the side of my arm and tucking it under my wing, gripping the joint. Whether he knew what effect that had on griffins or not, it sent jolts down my spine—good jolts. He pulled me forward for the kiss, and I kept going, wrapping my other arm around his neck to pull myself up.

This time, I kept my beak still as he wrapped his mouth around it. I was less panicked this time, so I moved my tongue slower when I brushed it against his.

We broke out of our second kiss sooner than the first one, but Iron still gave me a quick peck on the end of my beak. It was cute, but I didn’t want it to end there, so I leaped up and two-arm hugged him as I rubbed my neck against his.

Iron nuzzled into my shoulder and planted one final kiss there. Despite the glowing warmth that permeated me, I felt that it was a good note to end on. I broke away, stepped back, and looked up at him. “G-good night.”

He slid his hoof back from my wing, nodded, and replied, “‘Night.” It sounded thicker than his usual speaking voice, which made me feel guilty about the toll our kisses took on his mouth. However, it was hard to focus on the negatives.

For the first time, I felt like I didn’t want to leave the city that night.

* * *

The play on Saturday was entertaining. Before then, the closest thing I had to compare it to was “Skit Night” at Junior Speedsters’. However, they were two different entities entirely: The Farrington Performer’s Association carried themselves a lot more seriously than a bunch of teenage pegasi and one griffin who hadn’t even wanted to be there in the first place.

I liked the play that Iron took me to, though. It was about a pegasus mare who didn’t know what to do with her life and ended up stuck on a seafaring boat with a wise old stallion. Several comedic mishaps and one giant storm later, she found out that she’d known her answer all along.

Even better than the play was how I spent the whole performance sitting next to Iron and holding his hoof.

* * *

When I woke up on Monday, for some strange reason, I found myself grinning. It faded slightly when I questioned why, but then I realized I had a few things to smile about. Things were going well with Iron, the Guard was quieting back down back to normal, and I was doing pretty well with my “move out of Farrington” fund—even if that was becoming less and less of a priority. I was still aware that Iron was the main reason I would stay in that particular city, but after Saturday, I realized there were other things that I could do besides date someone.

My good spirits lasted exactly until I reached the city. There, they were popped by a pang of confused fear. From the air, I saw Iron, in his booth, looking like he were buried under paperwork, scrolls, and a newspaper that screamed the headline, “WAR IN THE STREETS.” It took a moment for me to realize what was so weird about everything; then it hit me that this was the first time I was witnessing strain within the Guard that I wasn’t a part of.

After I landed, Iron looked at me, smiled warmly, then turned back to his paperwork. He explained the situation: “Last night, one of Red Hooves’ underlings attacked an officer in the Guard. The officer is all right, the underling is in custody... but damned if it didn’t create a logistical nightmare on top of everything else this implies.”

I raised an eyebrow as I realized this situation might affect me, even if it wasn’t my fault. “Like... random patrols?”

“Like, your lieutenant is waiting for you in the Citadel when your shift begins...” Iron muttered. It caused a throb of pain that I shrunk down from; he looked up briefly and shook his head. “Sorry, Gilda. But you’re not going to like it, I don’t like it, but there’s some precedent for it, so if I do anything to stop it...”

“What is ‘it?’” I asked. Thinking it might help matters, I added, “Sir?”

Captain Bulwark nodded gratefully. “You’ve been assigned a schedule change. Technically, your shift doesn’t begin today until ten o’clock this evening.”

My jaw slackened, and I stood there for a moment. “So... what do I do for the next thirteen hours?” I tried not to seethe at him, but I remembered how, that morning, I had just been glad about how things were settling down and...

“Report to Horatio, report to Scales, and...” Iron sighed. “I suggest finding a place to sleep during the day.”

I scowled, blew a hot sigh out of my mouth, then shook my head. Getting angry at Iron wouldn’t fix anything. I pointed a finger at him. “I’m not mad at you.”

He nodded. “I understand, and thank you for taking this better than some officers would.”

I gave him as warm a smile as I could—which probably came off as an evil grin—but then I marched into the city, through the Citadel, to Sergeant Scales’ desk where, sure enough, my lieutenant was waiting, wearing his sunglasses indoors.

It took a force of effort to reel in my tongue and actions—getting fired from the Guard would be a permanent solution to a temporary problem. Instead, I jabbed my temple with my hand and said, “Sirs?”

They returned the salute, so I put my hand down. Lieutenant Horatio spoke, “I assume you’ve heard the news?”

I nodded.

“Any questions?”

“Just some minor ones about scheduling and procedures, sir.” It was a lie and I knew it.

My lieutenant nodded, and I saw the outline of a smile form at the edge of his mouth. “Then I’ll take my leave. For the record, I apologize for the inconvenience.”

A week of patrolling with Starfall had given me a pretty good idea about his real reasoning behind all this—a political jab at Iron—but I wisely clamped my beak shut. Maybe he was sorry that it affected me personally if he were bitter about his rank. It didn’t matter much; my only option involved nodding and accepting my orders.

My lieutenant headed to the doors that led to the lobby, which left me alone with my sergeant. Since it was just us now, I felt a bit more comfortable asking, “What’s going on, sir?”

“Officially? You’re low griffin on the totem pole, so you’re the one who gets to sub for the night shift.” He looked around to make sure no one else overheard. I did too; all of the other sergeants at their desks were either busy with paperwork or busy giving marching orders to officers. Sergeant Scales answered, “Unofficially? Buy a sword and learn how to use it. Part of Red’s danger is how unpredictable he is, even if his sister’s final sentencing is next week. He might just want to jump you for fun, not for vengeance.”

We shared a flat look until he clarified, “Jump, as in... like, ambush?”

I thanked him with a quick nod; then I realized I didn’t have anything to do for the rest of the day.

When I went to Iron’s gate to say goodbye for the day, he gave me a deep kiss “because I wasn’t on duty.” It sounded like a weak apology at first, but then I remembered how reluctant he was about physical stuff while we were both wearing our armor. Technically, that should’ve followed when it was just one of us on duty, but I guessed it was a Guard boundary Iron was willing to cross for our own relationship.

It was silver lining, or something. I hated sleeping during the day, and I hated how my shift had gotten switched around like that. When I got back to my cave, I covered my head in a wing and blanket so I could try to rest up for my night shift.

Tonight was going to suck.

Monday morning, at six minutes past eleven o’clock, I was still sitting at an outdoor Hoofington café and waiting for my Stalliongrad connection. Even though I stressed the importance of being here at exactly ten-thirty, my contact in Cold Front’s organization was now over half an hour late.

At least some things from Stalliongrad were still the same.

The early August morning was getting hot, which pissed me off. Not only was I going to have to gallop back to Farrington for my lieutenant’s shift—after cutting the timing far too close for comfort—but it was going to be a hot, sticky ordeal.

I blew an exasperated sigh out the side of my mouth and turned to the café’s window. My reflection was familiar, even if she looked completely different than me. The young, lavender mare looked down to her right foreleg, at the bracelet she wore. It had cost me almost three months’ wages back in Stalliongrad, but ever since then, a military-grade illusion spell had more than paid for itself.

I turned away from the reflection. High-quality or no, Fake-Sherry was still the same early-twenties mare that hadn’t aged a day in the past three decades. She was creepy to look at, and I cringed when I realized, since I was now waiting on an off-the-books meeting with the Stalliongrad mafia, this was exactly how things used to run near the end of my times with the Politsya.

It was the sort of shit I’d told myself I’d gotten away from.

For what must’ve been the tenth time that morning, I looked down at my iced coffee and questioned my methods. My intentions were good—they were always good. That was why I was so good at doing evil things. If everything turned out well, then by the end of the week, Farrington wouldn’t have an organized criminal element anymore. That was good intent.

The fact that I’d started this by putting one of Farrington’s officers into the hospital and framing it on one of Red Hooves’ underlings was probably where I’d crossed over into “bad methods.”

I sighed and threw back some of my coffee like it were something stronger. Ever since I’d left Stalliongrad, I’d told myself that I’d left behind all the plotting, under-the-table dealings, and death. I’d truly believed I had, too. But really, it was an elegant lie I’d told to both myself and to Iron.

His part in all this rang out louder than the others, or I felt it should’ve. Things had gotten stupid between us after Malt died—probably more my fault than Iron’s. I’d known his father, back in the day. Even if I’d failed in my responsibility of taking care of Iron, he was my responsibility. However, the only thing that had been bigger than my confusion back then had been the growing sense of emptiness and despair that no responsible mare would’ve acted on.

I should’ve known better. He was just a kid.

Four years later, he was still a kid, but he’d also grown up enough to use me. I shook my head; that wasn’t entirely how it went, and I knew it. Still, he’d thrown away an entire month of my efforts because of his own stupid indecisiveness, and he couldn’t even thank me for giving him the time that he wasted?

Hell, that wasn’t counting ten years of looking out for him, helping him through his problems, and giving him advice. I knew he did appreciate all that, but after his most recent slap-in-the-face dismissal, I had to reevaluate why I always put myself out on the line for him in the first place, and why it hurt when he just... expected it.

I looked back at the window, and the illusion of a mare that was his age scoffed back at me. I should have known better.

Being honest about Iron and me had made me realize it was time to wake up and quit lying to myself about what I was. Hell, it even numbed the pain over losing Malt when I realized one simple truth: Mares like me didn’t get a happy, second chance at life in a new town—not with everything I’d done in the past.

With all my disillusions boiled away, I was only left with one thing, the one thing I did deserve—revenge.

My first step towards that had been six days ago, when I’d put away the whiskey. The side effects of that were all shaky and annoying, but I knew my way around a pharmacy enough that I could operate with a mostly clear, sharp mind. That was the important part; if any of this blew back on me, I didn’t want it to be blamed on any mind-altering substances.

Over the next four days, I thought long and hard about where I and everyone else in Farrington were at. I’d gotten in touch with some old contacts and connections, rebuilt parts of my old surveillance network, and by the end of the week, I’d solidified my decision:

Four years ago, Red Hooves had lost his right to life. Now it was time to balance the scales.

The first step towards that was going to be handled later this afternoon, when I finally got back to Farrington. I knew which of Iron’s sergeants were in Red Hooves’ pocket; over the past few years, I’d had a little fun by feeding them slightly skewed information and watching Red Hooves’ street forces squirm. Those events usually ended in a stalemate, but I’d ended up covertly saving three guards’ lives in my time doing it. It was never enough.

Still, misinformation could go a long way. Red Hooves was a paranoid son of a bitch, and he’d be even more paranoid than usual now that one of his underlings had been apprehended at the scene of a crime against one of Farrington’s officers. I’d taken that into account, but really, the only surefire way I knew to get to him was through his sister. Since poisoning her wouldn’t generate any sort of predictable response from him, my next best option was to bait him into lowering his defenses—and what better bait than the griffin who put his sister behind bars?

If I made a big deal over keeping some documents secret within earshot of a bent night sergeant, I could practically guarantee that Gilda’s “random” patrols for the next two weeks would make their way to Red Hooves before midnight. The bent sergeant would think of himself as incredibly crafty for picking my desk’s lock, Red Hooves would get some legitimate intelligence on the Guard’s movements, and if everything worked out okay, the only thing to do after that was to make sure the entire powder keg situation turned into a controlled burn.

It wasn’t foolproof by any means. First of all, I’d have to make sure that Red Hooves even took the bait. More importantly, my whole plan was just a huge diversion. If Red sent out a large capture-or-kill squad to try and take out a griffin in a quiet manner, chances were good that he wouldn’t be watching his own back door.

Then, I would slip in, meet him face-to-face, and... I’d get creative from there.

Creative to the point where I’d need to destroy all the evidence, and that part of my plan boiled down to today’s meeting. That afternoon, I was finalizing the terms of the favors I’d called in with Cold Front, the leader of Stalliongrad’s mafia. Front was a psychedelic-peddling scumbag, but he didn’t dip into his own stash, which left him with a semblance of honor and principles. He was at least reasonable to deal with, especially from a business standpoint, especially when he owed me a debt.

When I asked for six soldiers and a special bomb, Front had sent me the killers “on good faith.” However, he didn’t want to let go of any high-yield explosives until someone in his organization had a conversation with me, which was why I’d ended up in Hoofington, on a Monday morning, for a ten-thirty meeting. By the time eleven-twenty came around, “waiting” had turned to “silently fuming.”

Finally, a thick, proud voice yelled out from the street:

“Mestik!”

I turned to face its source, but I already knew who it was. I never forgot a face, a voice, or the attitude of someone so bold that he’d come alone to represent his own organization.

Cold Front waved at me, broadly announcing his presence to the entire street. Some civilians actually turned to look at him, then to me. I wanted to roll my eyes at his flamboyance, but he was too proud for that, and I wanted our meeting to go well. Besides, there was a reason I was still in disguise; Front knew infinitely more about running a criminal organization than he did about subtlety.

I gave him a small wave, and he pranced over to me. Before sitting down at the little table I sat at, he leaned in for a kiss. I barely had time to turn my head and catch it on the cheek, but apparently, he wasn’t impressed. “Well, then. Hello to you, too.”

“You’re late,” I said flatly. I hopped over to his native language before I accused in a whisper, “And you’re here yourself. Why the hell wouldn’t you send a lackey?”

He chuckled, but answered in his language. “You asked for impressive gift. I didn’t want it falling into wrong hooves. And I am not alone; I brought friends to ensure things today go smooth.”

Coward, I scoffed. He’d brought armed guards with him; part of me wanted to take that as a compliment. With a small shrug, I gestured to the small haystack on the opposite side of the table. “Then you did bring it?”

“Da.” He tapped the saddlebags he wore, then he walked over to the other side of the table and sat down. Staring at me, he clopped his hooves together under his chin and raised an eyebrow. “My dear Mestik, mail order killers are one thing, handled by mail. But this, this is very dangerous weapon. I have worries.”

After over thirty years’ acquaintance, I knew that his “hardass” act was just that—an act. I cut through it. “Not even the best war mages in Canterlot can cook up something like this; by the time anyone in Farrington even thinks of sending for high-end magic forensics, everything’ll have vanished. It won’t get traced back to me, so how are they going to find you, unless you bumped into Celestia on the road here?”

Defeat came to Front in the form of a soft chuckle. “Okay, is true enough. But remind me again, what I am getting from this exchange?”

“What did you get,” I reminded him. “Stalliongrad. Thirty years ago, you said you owed me. This is you, repaying that favor, finally.”

His eyes narrowed. “Then what for the stallions in your city, awaiting your orders?”

I knew what he wanted, but there wasn’t a chance in Hell I was giving it to him. I shook my head. “Once Red’s out of the picture, there’s going to be a vacuum in Farrington’s underground.” I shrugged. “I won’t help you like I did back then. But I will get out of your way.”

He chuckled a bitter scoff, but his head bobbed a few times back and forth. He settled on saying, “Fine. If you won’t help, you not hurting is next best thing to hope for.” He opened a saddlebag and put a small, gift-wrapped box on the table. “Be careful with this, da?”

I looked at the red bow on top of the box, then up to him. “Really? Gift wrap?”

Front’s only response was a wide-eyed shrug.

As soon as I picked up the box, it felt like the temperature around me dropped to below freezing. My breath escaped in a surprised, chuckling fog; gift wrap or no, I hadn’t expected the tiny package to be that cold. Then again, maybe I should have. It contained enough ice-based explosives to level a building.

It was one of the final parts of an evil plan, one filled with necessary lies and deceit. I wanted to justify it as being the best for everyone’s sake: Iron’s city would be cleaned, and without order to the organized crime element, the Guard stood a decent chance to get an upper hoof against them—even if Front tried to start up a new game in a new town.

I’d be lying to myself if I said I was doing it for anything other than my revenge.

When I put Front’s gift box in my own saddlebag, I realized how fitting it all was. The meeting was over and everything was in order, so I should’ve felt glad, accomplished, or even relieved. However, the only thing I felt was the cold, empty knowledge that by Friday morning, I would finally have justice.

I’d been waiting four years for it.

For having a target painted on the back of my head, my first night on the night patrol went by pretty smoothly.

Monday evening, even though I’d napped for most of the day, I still felt groggy when I set out for Farrington. Flying and food helped to wake me up, so I was alert when I reached the city. It was lucky, too; I quickly learned that the night shift did things differently than the morning shift.

The strangest part to me was how all of the officers on the night shift gathered in the Citadel for a briefing meeting. There were about seventy of us, including the guards posted in the watchtowers throughout the city, but we all managed to cram into the main room in the Citadel to hear the nightly news from Lieutenant Sherry.

Next, the patrols were different. That annoyed me at first; I’d spent the better part of two months learning the day patrols, but none of that mattered now. On top of that, there were a bunch of different rules and regulations that were much more strictly enforced: break times, patrol laps, and sticking by your partner.

After a week of patrolling with Starfall, it wasn’t exactly a new concept to me to have a partner anymore. Still, as soon as I figured out I’d be paired up with someone new, I knew I wasn’t looking forward to meeting them.

Fortunately, I’d met my partner once before, if in passing. Her name was Sunset, and she was the purple and red mare who wanted to trade shifts with me back at the Summer Sun Solstice. I chuckled at the coincidence. Still, I must’ve made a good impression on her; she volunteered to be my partner in front of a fairly large crowd.

Things started to look up from there. Not only was Sunset cool with me, but I realized I wouldn’t have to apply that much effort to learning the night patrols. They weren’t going to be a permanent fixture in my life, and my partner had been an officer for eight years—more than long enough to lead me around the city.

Granted, it wasn’t all fun times. Sunset and I were posted in the Business District that night, but it was a completely different place than it was during the day. In theory, my guard tasks stayed the same: make sure no one was breaking the law, including the city-wide curfew after midnight. In practice, every alleyway, shadowy patch, and even the rooftops held the potential for danger, so as my eyes constantly darted around, I knew my safety depended on my ability to maintain vigilance.

Just before midnight, I started noticing the ponies who were busy going around the city and dousing all of the torches. It got darker and darker as time went on, until we were patrolling in near-pitch darkness. Right as I was about to complain about it to Sunset, everything got a few shades brighter; looking up, I saw that the Business District watchtower now had a glowing white beacon on top of it, almost as bright as a full moon.

A few diners stayed open late for us shift guards. However, at three in the morning, when Sunset and I took our break, she mentioned that civilians sometimes broke curfew to get a late-night meal. “Technically, if we don’t see them on the street, we can’t do anything,” she explained, but it was kind of a moot law to begin with. Procedure for dealing with curfew-breakers was to question them, search their saddlebags if they were suspicious, and then send them to their destination. It felt as if the whole system worked only because most citizens in Farrington already agreed with it.

I spent the entire night looking for any of the citizens who didn’t agree with the law. The few times I thought I saw movement, it turned out to be the wind, or my eyes were playing tricks on me. Whenever the second one happened, I chalked it up to the new schedule. Once everything got smoothed out, I’d be a lot more mentally alert. Griffins were mostly nocturnal, after all.

Sunset and I spent most of our shift quietly, but not silently. She kept whispering questions to me about Iron. It was weird, even after she explained it was just “friendly curiosity.” Whatever it was, I got stuck between telling her to mind her own business and trying to make a good second impression on her. Luckily, patrolling was difficult enough that I could spend a block or two to think of as vague an answer as necessary.

By the time the sky started to turn to a light shade of purple, I was exhausted. I took small comfort in how everything was slowly getting brighter around me; by the time five-thirty came around and the first business owners started to legally come out into the streets, I congratulated myself on making it through one shift. That came with a quick mental retort, though; I still had two more weeks of night shifts to go before I was done with them.

Much to Sunset’s delight, Iron came and found us at a quarter ‘til six. When he invited me to his home for breakfast, her sense of curiosity radiated off her like it was heat—or maybe that was just my face doing its own thing. Either way, I talked him down to a diner, Sunset seemed disappointed, and I tried to focus on how I now had something good to look forward to after my shift.

At the diner, Iron met me with an apology. “I hope I wasn’t too forward?”

My armor was in the citadel, which made it easier to shrug. “I wasn’t expecting an invitation to your house, but now that I think about it, I still don’t think it’d be a good idea.”

We walked inside and took our seats across from each other. Iron was quiet until we’d ordered our drinks—I stuck with water; I didn’t trust “coffee”—but finally, he asked, “Why?”

I went back to my earlier thought process. “I... dunno. Because it’s your house? I’m not sure if we’re ‘there’ yet.” I wrapped the word with finger quotes.

Iron bent his head to the side when he shrugged. “Fair enough, I suppose. I mean... is there anything I can do to make you feel more welcome, or...”

“No.” I shook my head. “You’re welcoming enough, it’s just... I dunno. Private?”

He nodded. “Okay then. Just so you know, it’s an open invitation. And Maxie’s okay with it as well, if that helps.”

“Huh,” I noted. I didn’t know how that change had gone down between them, but I guessed it did help with things. Just not enough. “I mean, that’s good, but still... no, it’s... weird.”

Iron closed his eyes and shrugged. “I understand, and again, I hope I wasn’t too forward—especially in front of Officer Sunset. But I wanted to catch you before you left the city for the day.”

Before I could tell him that it was fine, our waiter came by to take our orders. Iron knew what he wanted—oatmeal, with a side of fruit—but I ran into difficulty when it turned out they didn’t bake potatoes until the lunch menu. Since I had put off reading the menu, I asked, “Well, what do you have?”

The waiter shrugged with a wink. “Just the usual stuff, ma’am. Toast...” He tilted his head at Iron. “Waffles, pancakes, oatmeal, eggs, grits...” He trailed off; my sudden disgust must have shown on my face.

Before he could say anything else, I pointed at Iron. “I’ll have what he’s having.” The waiter nodded, but I glared after him as he left the table, following him until I couldn’t crane my neck anymore.

Iron had an eyebrow raised when I turned back to him, but he didn’t say anything. I grumbled an explanation to my placemat: “Since when are eggs food?”

The outside of his eyebrow dropped as he chuckled and shakily agreed. “Yeah... and, uh, what sort of fool would even offer them to a griffin in the first place?”

I pressed the conversation with Iron a little longer until our food came; apparently chicken eggs were a common cooking ingredient among ponies. I stopped him from listing foods, though; two items on the list already told me I’d eaten more discharge than I wanted to know about.

Oatmeal was pretty disgusting, so as far as goop went. It was tricky to get into my beak, and once it was there, it had the exact texture and flavor of pond mud. That memory reminded me of two things: one, I’d probably be eating on my way home and two, I’d probably want to close my mouth while diving into any bodies of water.

After our shared mishap that Iron called a meal, we headed to the south gate. This time, I promised to come into town early enough for us to do dinner at night; one pony “breakfast” was enough to last me for a long while.

We continued saying goodbye; Iron added, “And again, I’m sorry for putting you on the spot in front of your partner like that.”

I shook my head and grinned weakly. “She knows we’re dating and that we eat, so...” I shrugged. “It’s cool.”

With a kiss, we said goodbye again. Then I took off for home. On the way there, I thought back over the entire night; by now, it was a blur of exhausted memories. I couldn’t even make heads or tails of whether it was a good evening; the only thing I knew for certain was that I didn’t like having to do two more weeks of night shifts.

* * *

Tuesday and Wednesday nights went a lot smoother than Monday did. I started getting a full day’s sleep, Iron and I got our schedule worked out around our shifts, and Sunset and I finally established some boundaries of when she needed to stop talking:

“I mean,” I whispered, “what you just asked? I’d feel weird talking to him about that.”

She raised an apologetic hoof. “Okay, sorry. But it’s gonna come up.”

I glared at her pun, then I swept my eyes at the rooftops. “Well, then we’ll talk about it when it does.”

“All right, all right...” Sunset nodded. “I didn’t know where you guys were at—that’s why I ask stuff. I mean, it’s not everyday you run into someone who’s dating the captain.”

However, by the time our shift began on Thursday, I was beginning to appreciate how I could have gotten a lot worse for a partner—which was saying something, seeing how my daytime partner had technically stabbed me at one point.

Those amicable feelings darkened when Lieutenant Sherry handed out our patrol orders for the night. Sunset and I were stationed right in the middle of the Artisan District, sharing a route with another pair of guards. I gave a quick glance to my former sergeant, but I didn’t ask why.

She gave me a raised eyebrow that replied, “Why not?”

The strangeness of the situation wasn’t lost on Sunset, either. To space things out with the other guards on our patrol, we had to do an extra run up and down the north half of the main drag of Farrington. It was during that leg of our patrol that Sunset said in a rushed whisper, “I don’t know what the hell she’s thinking.”

I scoffed. “Yeah. Like, you noticed the random patrols?”

“Well, duh.” She shook her head. “Then there’s the whole ‘Red Hooves making an example out of officers’ that somehow got you here in the first place.”

We walked in silence to the intersection where we went into the Artisan District. Before we took the turn, I muttered, “Der Bauch der Bestie...”

Even if she probably didn’t know what it meant, Sunset replied, “Damn straight.”

The first lap around the district was about as strained and silent as I thought it would’ve been. Tonight, there was no small chit-chat between my partner and me; both of us were too busy scanning rooftops, alleyways, and everywhere that an ambush might be lying in wait.

Given the sheer volume of buildings and serviceways that were crammed into the cold, black industrial heart of Farrington, we fought a losing battle between absolute certainty of safety and keeping a regulation pace.

I almost jumped out of my skin when something prodded my shoulder; when I looked over at Sunset, she pointed her head at a blacksmith’s shop. This late in the day, it had long been closed for the night; however, an assortment of tools had been left on a workbench that was open to the street.

Before I registered what was happening, Sunset went over and picked up a hammer. She secured it on her guard’s belt, but as we started up our patrol I asked, “Isn’t that, uh, stealing?”

“Technical term is ‘requisitioning civilian equipment,’” she whispered. “It’s a twenty-bit hammer; if it’s missing or bloody by the end of our shift, I can get him a new one before he even opens for business. But no superior officer’s going to come out here to check us for ‘uniform,’ Gilda. Not while the city’s still on red alert after Monday.”

I nodded; I was made of blades and pain, so I wasn’t going to give her crap over defending herself. Instead, I took a brief moment to look up at the night sky. The streetlamps in Farrington were lit until curfew, but I still saw the stars and offered a silent prayer. It was a quick thing, and I smiled at its uselessness; even if anyone were listening, odds were good that they’d have better things to do that night.

Sunset and I spent our first eight laps around the Artisan District in agonizing, strained silence. On one level, I was almost glad that things didn’t get any easier; all it would take was one missed blur, one split second of a delay, and we’d have the lower hand in an ambush.

By the time we took our Guard-mandated break at a Guard-approved diner, I was a nervous wreck. We only had about twenty minutes at the diner, so Sunset and I split things up to make things more time-efficient. She ordered our food, I hit the bathroom, and I sat at the table while I waited for her to get empty.

When she got back to the table, our meal had arrived—technically, lunch, I mused—and we ate in near silence. It only broke when Sunset chuckled. “We totally should’ve hit a bar.”

I returned an uneasy laugh. One bad trip on cactus buds in the Waisenwüste had been enough mind-altering experiences for one decade; even then, I didn’t think it’d be particularly wise to start experimenting with new substances during a late-night shift in a potentially fatal part of town. I deflected with, “Yeah, but are there any even open?”

She shrugged, I shrugged, and we finished our meal break in silence.

As soon as we left the diner, Sunset picked up her hammer from the barrel she’d set it on before we went inside. I didn’t say anything while she rehung it from her belt; once it was in place, I led the march back into the Artisan District, the same as always: her on the right, me on the left.

Now that our break was over, I began to count down laps in a hopeful manner. It was two-forty-five, which meant we only had five laps to go. However, the half hours lingered; it was slow work to walk at a measured pace while checking every corner, alley, and shadow. Even with the Guard’s watchtowers giving us a small amount of visibility, we still patrolled in an incredibly thick darkness.

On our third-to-last lap, when we were on an eastward leg of our patrol, I saw movement.

I tilted my head towards Sunset and asked, “Did you see that?”

“No,” she whispered. “What was it?”

“Movement.” I looked at the alley I had seen a shadow had run into. It was a long serviceway that ran between two rows of businesses, so that trash collectors and supply deliveries could be made without clogging up the main streets. It ran north and south, and because of the way the streets were laid out in the Artisan District, that alleyway went on for about five hundred feet until the next intersection. I didn’t exactly remember where the other end of that alleyway was, but I remembered it was only a few blocks south of the wall.

The whole thing stank of a trap, but Sunset and I had to keep walking. Besides, I reasoned, if the trap were in the alley, then we could just walk past it, keep going to the main drag, where we could find some other guards for backup. I didn’t know the protocol for dealing with threatening situations, other than “investigate,” but seeing how we’d already deemed it dangerous, I assumed the next step was “escalation.”

We kept walking, sharp as glass. A moment later, Sunset asked, “What’s that smell?”

I didn’t notice anything, so I looked at her and shrugged—right as I heard a quiet snapping sound, followed by a fast, high-pitched whistling. Before I could fully turn to its source, Sunset twitched to a stop in my peripheral vision. I looked back at her; she wore a confusing, wide-eyed expression that looked like she were desperately asking me for something.

Before I could ask her what was up, I noticed the back end of a crossbow bolt sticking out of her jaw.

Shock drilled into my gut right when a second bolt hit her above the left eye socket, whipping her head to the side. That was it; she just slumped to the ground and lay motionless. I heard someone pleading “Nein,” over and over as fast as I could draw breath; then I realized that I was the next target.

I ducked my head in and ran forward to safety; I only made it five feet before the world exploded into a huge gust of heat.

I skidded to a halt before I hit the bright wall of flames; a quick turn around told me that I was surrounded on three sides by an inferno. I didn’t know how deep they were, but there was no way in hell I was going to fly over them; that was how meat got cooked.

A clatter near my feet was all I needed to get moving. Someone had shot Sunset; now they were shooting at me. I dashed for cover—away from the flames, into the alleyway. Behind me, I heard a wumpf of heat, then another. I turned, and line after line of fire erupted, chasing me. I had no idea how far the fire was going to travel, but I knew that I had no intention of staying there find out, either.

I ran.

“Shit!” I hissed the swear out the side of my mouth.

Seven of us had been watching over the Artisan District from the roof of a seedy motel, looking for movement, but I’d been the one holding the binoculars when the fires went off. I took them away from my eyes and shook my head for a moment. Red Hooves was acting according to plan—my plan—but I hadn’t expected him to firebomb a whole fucking street, either.

“Party has start,” came a voice on my left. I didn’t know his name, and I never would. Those were Cold Front’s conditions, and I was happy to oblige.

“Da.” I forced authority into my voice. That composure got threatened when I saw a glint of steel down below; when I took a closer look, I saw a Farrington patrol that was under attack. A quick glance around showed that the same thing was happening to the other patrols in the Artisan District. I shook my head again, then I saw jets of water vapor coming from the rooftops above the now-burning street—anti-air nets that Red Hooves’ forces had gotten ahold of.

I suppressed a swear as I saw a netted figure fall out of the air and right into the flames; Red Hooves’ stallions were definitely killing guards. That changed things. I had no doubt he was still tucked away safe in his underground fortress, but now, before I could head down there myself, I needed to make sure I wouldn’t run into an army on my trip back up.

That meant I’d need more time, more reinforcements—and a hero to pin this all on. Luckily, I’d come prepared. I turned to the three killers on my right and singled the two pegasi out. “You two, get on those rooftops. Take out those netters, and anyone else with a weapon. Stay low, stay quiet, and don’t get seen.” They nodded in unison, then jumped off our makeshift observation deck.

I turned to the remaining four—three earth ponies and a unicorn. “You four; hooves on the street. Protect the guards; kill anyone holding a weapon.” I pointed to one of the ponies. “You go watch over the captain’s house.” I looked back around to everyone as I finished, “And remember the cover story—no accents.”

This time, there weren’t any salutes or acknowledgement of orders from these four; instead we all headed over to the fire escape. My hooves glowed blue as they hit the rusted iron stairs without making a sound. When we got to street level, my soldiers headed to their destinations in the Residential and Artisan Districts, but I headed northeast to the Market District. Half of the reason was because I knew how this was going to end, and the other half was that I didn’t know how widespread Red Hooves’ end of the assault was.

When I was alone, I slid my disguise bracelet onto my back leg, over my steelweave armor—a modern approach to armor that blended the hardness of steel with the flexibility of cloth. The black fabric didn’t change color like my fur beneath it did, but no one knew I owned the armor, either. Between it and my disguise, I could move around Farrington in absolute anonymity.

On my trip through the Artisan District, I found a three-on-one fight. The officer was holding his own—over the body of his dead partner—but as I watched, he started to get backed into a wall. I sighed, hoping this wouldn’t slow me down; then I checked the blades that I wore on the insides of my forelimbs. They were secure, so I galloped into the fray.

I lined myself up with the three stallions; then I leaped forward and slit the first one. Before my hooves touched the ground, I spun and grabbed the other two by their necks. When I dropped onto four hooves, they hit the ground, bleeding out silently.

After twenty seconds, I was alone with one very terrified Farrington officer. “W-who are you?”

I smiled, equal parts act and truth. “You thought we were gone, just because our queen returned?”

Before he could stammer out any more questions, I ran off. If he survived, he’d be able to report that little quote, which would better explain my forces out on the streets. Just to make sure I wasn’t being followed by the guard—which wouldn’t have ended well for him—I slipped into a side alley and waited. I didn’t hear anyone in plate armor clamoring after me, so I ran at full speed to my original destination: the Market District.

The farther I ran down the alley, the more uneasy I felt. The flames behind me had either slowed down or stopped, but I still had a limited number of options for getting out of there. If I went up, I had to deal with crossbows. If I went back, flames.

I ran forward into uncertainty, which was my only real option; glances to my sides showed that the gaps between buildings were blocked with stacks of crates. When I was almost halfway through the alley, a quick hope crossed my mind that nothing was actually in here.

Then, I tripped.

Pain shot up my wrist as whatever it was stretched slightly, and I almost fell to the ground. Almost. As I flapped my wings to both catch my fall and jump over whatever it was that tripped me, one of my older brother’s half-wise quotes crossed my mind: “Tripping a griffin only accounts for the four limbs that don’t matter.”

I landed, but I didn’t have time to keep moving before something hit me hard and fast on the back-right side of my head. That time, wings or no, I stumbled as I desperately tried to turn to see who hit me. I felt sick to my stomach as the world started swaying, but I kept a reasonable grip on my consciousness.

The alley behind me was empty. I blinked as little lights started floating in front of my vision, but after I shook my head, a very dangerous individual walked out into the street. Sapphire fur, red mane... And I was just thinking about blowhard older brothers, I noted. Or they’re the, uh... same age thing.

Red Hooves bared his teeth in a crazed-rage grin, but it was his eyes that scared me. They were familiar, but not in how they looked. While I tried to place it, he took a few steps towards me, and I took a few steps back.

That just made him smile. “You’re stronger’n you look, y’know. But where’re my manners?” he asked in his usual, thick accent. “Good evenin’, Officer Griffin.”

The chills, and that damn lurch I felt in my gut, were what made me remember why his expression was familiar. All he needed was a beak and one less eye, and I’d be at a sudden, unwanted family reunion. From the feel of it, I already had a not-uncommon concussion.

But here we were, then. Three years after the fact, I’d gotten stronger.

Reality and memory threatened to blur, which was another source of anger; one way or another, I felt a blaze burning me back into a coherent mindset. Coherent enough to handle things officially, anyway. I pointed a finger at him said, “You are under arrest, for the murder of a Farrington Officer.”

He laughed. It was deep and merry, and when he finally finished, he flashed his teeth at me again. “So arrest me, then.”

I took a step forward to start off what I knew would be a physical confrontation—it was always a physical confrontation. Red’s smile grew, and I was distracted by the sound of loud pops of air coming from the rooftops. I stopped, but I knew better than to take my eyes off my opponent.

“D’you like it?” He winked. “I think it’sa nice touch o’ irony. Pegasus guards gettin’ netted down by the Guard’s own weapons. But don’ think any flyboys’re gonna be comin’ t’your rescue.”

I froze, suddenly unsure of whether I wanted to try my chances in a fight with this guy. My talons were under gauntlets, so I wouldn’t be able to go for anything seriously damaging; however, if I were apprehending him, I didn’t want to cut his throat open.

“So...” He cocked his head to the side. “Since you weren’ supposed t’be awake at this point o’ operations, I’m gonna make you an offer.”

The way he said it made me antsy as I thought of ways to get my gauntlets off. The talons on my right hand weren’t fully grown back yet, but Father had mostly taught me “traditional” killing attacks, which used my left hand so I could hold a right hand in my other. Regardless, I was stuck waiting to see where this conversation turned.

“The time for my original offer has passed,” Red said plainly. “But you know why you’re ‘ere. If you come quietly, willingly, I promise it won’ hurt.”

“Some offer,” I scoffed.

He shook his head. “Oh... don’ think I don’ know how to hurt you. You took the one thing from me I ‘old dear and true. You’re leverage, Officer Griffin; ain’t no one concerned with what shape you get traded in. Alive is such a broad term, so I suggest you think—really think—what the next words out your beak are.”

I can think of two, I thought. However, I was stuck in a situation that I needed to get out of. I could slip off a gauntlet if he didn’t see—which was a problem, given how the light from the fires at the other end of the street were shining on me. Of course, there was still running, but I didn’t know how many other tripwires or deterrents the alleyway held.

Neither option seemed exceptionally safe or good, so I went with the third tactic: stalling. I shook my head. “You know, for all...” I waved my hand around at the buildings and alley. “This? I think you overlooked part of your ‘master plan.’”

“Oh?” He smirked.

I chuckled. “Yeah. I mean, you—or whatever that was—didn’t knock me out, so... good on that apprentice...” I wondered if he would know a way out of this situation. “But now I’m here, we’re talking... and your plan basically comes down to you winning a fight against me.”

His smile didn’t dampen, which worried me. “Oh, I know, Officer Griffin. And I have no intention o’ facing you, one-on-one, in a fight.”

It clicked as soon as he blew a loud, shrill whistle out of his lips. The alleyway around me exploded—boxes overturned, doors opened, and ten ponies swarmed around me on all sides, forming a tight circle. A quick glance around showed that most of them were holding a weapon of some sort; the two that weren’t looked like their hooves could punch a hole in a building.

After the weapons, I noticed they were all wearing the same type of hat: small, round, and tapered to a short brim in front. That’s that hat store mystery solved, I noted, but before I could dwell on it, clicking noises from above drew my eyes upwards. Two crossbow-wielding stallions, one on either rooftop, were looking down their weapons’ sights at me.

I looked back to Red Hooves, who was still wearing his evil, overly pleased grin. He said, “Time’s runnin’ out, Officer Griffin. So... what’sit gonna be? Pain, or no pain? Or d’you think your friends in the Guard give half a damn enough t’come risk a rescue?”

On the way to Starfall’s, I had over two minutes to try and process everything that had happened: One: Red Hooves had set up more than a trap for Gilda—he’d declared all-out war on the streets of Farrington.

Two: at least four guards were already dead, and they’d keep dying until this night came to an end—unless my three Stalliongrad assassins could turn the tide. That wholly depended on how many idiots Red had convinced to follow his orders, but I didn’t want to think about numbers now.

Three: I needed a cover story of my own. Without looking down, I could smell that I was covered in blood, which wouldn’t do well for showing up at Starfall’s house—too many questions. The solution presented itself almost as soon as I thought of the problem: the Market Square fountain. It wasn’t deep enough to swim in, but the spray would help me get tactically presentable.

I dove into the fountain, trying to remember what time the guards were slated to come through the Market Square. Fifteen seconds into my makeshift bath, I looked down at the black-stained water and decided it’d be good enough. At night, the whole city was too dark to really tell the finer details.

As I started running again, I became slightly aware of the sensation of my hair and fur hardening. That brought me back to the fourth and final point of interest for the evening: I still had a regime to topple. Regardless of his warmongering, I still needed to get to Red Hooves’ main base of operations. The freezing rune-bomb was in a pouch on my hip, one I’d worn under my armor for a week to get used to the cold.

Finally, I got to the end of my cross-city dash. As I approached Starfall’s house, I looked around for any would-be assailants—Starfall’s, Iron’s, and my house were all likely targets if Red were being “smart” about declaring war on all of Equestria.

No one was in the street and the house looked quiet, so after a quick trip around the back to make sure it was safe, I pounded on Starfall’s door. Little flecks of ice cracked and fell off my lavender hoof; in a split-second’s panic, I kicked the disguise bracelet off my hind leg. There weren’t any noises inside, so I took a moment to hang it back on my belt before I knocked on the door again.

This time, I heard stirring and hoofbeats coming to the door. After the locks slid open, Starfall opened the door and we glared at each other for a few moments. He finally frowned and asked, “What are you wearing... and why are you... icy?”

“Sherry’s supposed to be served chilled,” I deflected. He grunted in frustration, so I moved on to my business: “Red’s killing guards in the Artisan District. He’s got unicorns and explosives. Get your family safe, get armed, and get in there.”

His eyes widened at first, but then he nodded and closed the door. I smiled at that. He was a good soldier; he didn’t even point out that neither of us were in a position to give or take orders. Then again, I chalked that up to six years’ loyalty to the night shift.

I sighed, which came out as a wisp of fog in the hot August night. It made me shiver, which caused a tinkling cascade of ice shards fall out of my mane. But with Starfall woken up, I could hit up two more homes of combat-able guards on my way back into the Artisan District.

That thought snapped me back into action, and I took off into the street. I’d started a war; now it was time to end it.

Fighting would be suicide. Hell, I didn’t need a Sternwolf to tell me that. Actually... I risked a glance at the stars. Probably couldn’t hurt.

Back on my planet, Red and his army were not-so-patiently waiting for my answer. Without fighting, I needed to get out of the situation—Father had not bred a coward, so I wasn’t taking the “offer” of surrender. However, I needed to get un-surrounded, which meant that I’d have to do a little fighting. But I’d go for shock and awe, like lightning, then be gone before the thunder rolled in.

“Shock” needed some surprise, so I shook my head and bluffed. Hard. “Neither of those. Because you...” I looked around at the ponies around me, one by one, and checked their hoof stances. The one behind me at five o’clock was smaller than the rest, and his tripod stance was too narrow in the back. “All of you, are now under arrest.”

Their gale of laughter was perfect; in a flash, I twisted and pounced on the stallion behind me. In the same movement, I buried my beak into his shoulder socket and bit through the tendon; with any luck, that’d slow the pack down. I pushed off him—who overreacted a little with, “SHE’S EATING ME!”—and leaped down the alleyway in a mad sprint for freedom.

The archers on the rooftops were quick. I barely cleared my victim before I felt a crossbow bolt bounce off the center of my chest armor—the medallion. Before I counted myself too lucky, I heard a metallic rap and felt a sharp pain in my left wing. That was a new pain, but I only felt it in my wing, not my side. I was alive, but my wing was pinned to my armor. With flight out of the question, the injury at least gave me adrenaline for running harder.

Seconds later, I heard a familiar gust of compressed air that washed over me in a liquid weight. I tried to get the net off while running, but it was a lost cause. I finally tripped, which only tangled me further. Despite my efforts, in a matter of seconds, I could barely move; that knowledge was followed quickly by a shroud of doubt and realization that I had lost.

The shroud took roots and threatened to overcome me. I forced it down with one brutal truth: If I were going to die, or be kidnapped, raped, tortured, whatever... I was not going down hysterically, panicking, and trapped in a net.

Razor-sharp hate steeled my thoughts, and I clung to it for dear life. It opened a tiny window in my mind, one where I realized I needed to ditch my gauntlets. If I did, I could get out of that net and better fight off Red Hooves’ gang—who I could hear rushing over to me, but I toned that out.

Instead, I slowly, methodically slid my left arm up against my chest’s armor. Once I had it there, I worked on pushing it up to my beak; if I could bite off the strap and get my talons free, the net would fall off me like wet paper. The process was slow and painstaking; to keep my mind busy, I thought back to an instance of training with Father, one that had ended with me exhausted, bruised, but luckily, not broken.

He stepped back to admire his work, and I tried not to glare as I stood back up. “You hate me,” he said with relish. “I see it on your pathetic face as clearly as I can see the leaves on the trees. As amusing as it is, I am glad. You hate me now, but just know that one day, there will be those who intend to hurt you.”

I got the gauntlet to my beak and sliced through the leather strap. I bit one of the metal fingers and slid my hand free, grateful that I could now start on the net itself.

Like usual, his advice only brought more confusion. “Why... who...” I tried to speak, but I was winded from about six punches too many to my diaphragm.

Once I made a enough of a hole to free my arm, I worked on growing it until I could fit my head and other shoulder through. Red Hooves’ crowd was almost on me; I distantly noted that I had to work faster.

“Why?” he asked in an amused tone. “One day, perhaps, you will understand. Or maybe you selfishly wish to know, ‘Why me?’ If that is the case, simply name a sister, a replacement, and I will gladly rid our race of your ineptitude.”

I climbed out of the net and turned around to face my assailants. They were only ten feet away from me. Red Hooves held up an foreleg and everyone stopped; when he spoke, his eyes flared and his accent vanished into a dark, hateful tone: “Last chance, half-breed. If you make my boys shoot again, I’m gonna have ‘em shoot for the kill. Ransom’s easier than you’re making it; don’t make me choose a softer target.”

I came in low and fast on his left, where he couldn’t see as well. He threw out a punch, but I expected it and grappled his arm. I pulled myself behind his head and brought down my right hand, talons out, into his good eye. Before my blow landed, Father grabbed my wrist with both hands and swung me to the ground like a club. He chuckled. “It is also good you have someone to fight for. But one must choose battles wisely. Some are worth fighting.” He planted one foot between my shoulders, still holding my arm. “Others, will only end...” He pulled my arm out of its socket and snapped it for good measure. “In pain.”

My eyes darted up to the rooftops. Four ponies now had weapons pointed at me—two crossbows, two net launchers. They were the real threat here; as long as I didn’t get surrounded, the ponies on the ground would be a lot more manageable.

Gone were the thoughts of mercy, of running. Now, I had only one option: dealing directly with this lowlife piece of criminal scum. He was so arrogant as to threaten me, kill my comrades, and burn my city... For what? Vengeance? It was a new source of anger, but I welcomed it like an old friend and wore it like a second suit of armor.

If Red Hooves wanted to kill me, I would show him just how hard that would be.

I stood up on my hind legs and released a centuries-old war cry. The ponies in front of me shrank back, afraid—as they should have. Ten-on-one was an even fight, and that was only because they were armed with weapons.

Silence fell over us. Red Hooves glared at me a moment before shouting, “Kill her!”

The only response from the rooftops was the sound of a commotion, gurgling, and then someone pleading, “No, no, n—” before a single crossbow fell down to the street between Red Hooves and me.

He looked down at the weapon, then up to the rooftops, then back at me.

I was already in the air, leaping for him.

One of his stallions, either brave or dumb, got between us. We connected; my momentum flipped me on top as we rolled into the crowd. Two left-hand talons in, out, and I kicked off his midsection to jump back out of the fray.

I didn’t get far enough; someone came at my right with a sword. Luckily, I caught it on my wing-guard. Then I ducked into it, under his chest, and flipped him on his back—just in time to see the stallion behind me with a knife. I dodged left as he slashed once, twice. The third time, I grabbed the blade with my right hand; thanking my gauntlet, I threw the knife down the empty alley behind me.

The rest of the pack massed towards me—except their coward leader, behind them. Getting surrounded would be bad. I leaped towards the stallion on the right flank; two seconds later, he was down, disabled, and I had my back to the wall with seven ponies in front of me. They rushed at me like water, threatening to flow around me on all sides.

I whipped out my baton to stem the tide. No time for flanking; I just rushed in and swung at the neck of the closest one. He dodged, and two blows landed on my left side. I fell into them, getting away from them right in time to see someone swinging down with his sword. I dropped my baton and rolled on my back, gripping the blade and twisting it out of the owner’s grip.

It was far from an ideal position. I rolled right, away from them, but someone was already on that side, too. Still holding it by the blade, I stabbed the sword at him. He hopped onto one hoof to dodge, so I wrapped myself around it and pulled him to the ground with me, rolling on top. I held the sword up over him, he closed his eyes; I blinked, then cut his shoulder tendon.

Two stallions on either side of me—the big guys—rushed in, massive and clumsy. I dove in, low, at the left one and cut his shoulder; he crumpled. Then I turned and leaped up to fly over the second big stallion; when I flapped, pain ripped through my left wing.

I flew right, over the second big guy, but I landed on my back. Before he could turn around, I gripped my sword—which I still held somehow—by its hilt and swung it into his flank. He fell down, taking the sword with him, but now it was just four on one.

I stood up on two legs, trying to ignore the pain in my wing. Not wanting to be forgotten, the back of my head throbbed too. That split second’s hesitation was all it took; suddenly, my adrenaline evaporated, and I felt dizzy and exhausted.

The four stallions in front of me didn’t need to know that, though. They held back, which made sense; I’d just mangled the other half of their gang. Fear works, I realized. I scrambled to pick a weapon off the ground—a spiked club—and pointed it at them. “Stand down, or I’m gonna ramp up the ‘self defense’ part of this.”

None of them said anything, which made me think they were considering it.

Then, pain exploded in the back of my skull.

I crumpled to the ground; all of a sudden, it was a fight to stay conscious. During that haze, I became distantly aware of many punches, kicks, and other blows I’d long-since learned to tune out. A few times, I lost my personal fight, but I always seemed to snap back awake to receive another jolt of muted pain.

When it was over, everything I had was tied together with rope: my hands, feet, and wings all burned at the tightness of the knots. Red Hooves stepped over me—he’d been behind me the whole time—and turned around to loom over me. He had a smarmy grin, for some reason; then I remembered the fight we’d just been part of.

Leaning down, he gloated, “Well, well, well... I ‘ope that was fun. ‘Cause now, i’ss your turn.” He patted my cheek; I bit at his hoof, which only made him smile wider. Then, he turned to his lackeys, “Get the weapons, get the griffin, and le’s get lost.”

I felt myself being hoisted onto the backs of pair of stallions, which gave me a quick view of the other two stallions’ mad dash to pick up their fallen comrades’ weapons—and ignoring their pleas for help. The back of my mind noted I shouldn’t feel sorry for them, but I couldn’t remember why.

My captors started heading toward the north end of the alleyway, and I racked my brain as to why that was a bad thing. Father lived to the north, true, but they wouldn’t be able to take me back there—I had a... banishment thing. So we were stuck in Farrington, just like after my fight with Iron.

Iron.

That snapped me back to reality with a jerk—one that earned a slap from a stallion who warned me to “keep still.” But I remembered; this was all an attempt to... what, get to him, through me, to avenge Red Hooves’ sister? The more I thought of it, the more the plan didn’t make sense; Iron was the Captain of the Guard, he didn’t have anything to do with the prison system.

That brought me to a very real possibility that this wasn’t about anything as logical as “ransom.” It was extremely likely that this entire thing was just about me, as revenge for... what had he called his sister? “His only true thing in the world?”

I did not want to go where they were taking me. It would probably involve lots of sharp things, and it’d mirror the Sterkergeist art of keeping a prisoner alive.

As hard as I tried to strain against my bonds, they didn’t budge, and I got another hoof across the head for my troubles. That time, my hand and leg on one side went numb, which scared me more than any prospective torture could. I didn’t want to die, not now, not here.

The irony was overwhelming. Three months ago, when I’d decided I didn’t have anything worth living for, I had seriously considered death as an alternative to a long, empty life. Iron had found me after that, and he’d fought for me—and against me, even—to pick me up out of where I was. Sure, I’d been the one making the choices, but he’d given me options... now, after all his help, and I was worried about dying.

Three months... the timeline reminded me of Junior Speedsters, in a scary-accurate mirror. There was the one friend in the face of all the prejudice, then there was the difficulty with counselors which led up to the physical confrontation, where the other pony ended up disabled...

Then there was the test at the end, of everything I’d learned. And when I failed, there was Father to beat the hell out of me and throw me out of my home. Except Red Hooves was going to be a little more metaphorical about the whole “life banishment” thing.

I didn’t know when I started crying, but I couldn’t breathe enough to sob. All I could do was look up at the night sky, out of the corner of my eye. Stars blurred into streaks; one blink turned them into pointed dots. I found Ziu, not the most pleasant of gods, but I was desperate enough to beg, I would give anything...

My two captors jolted to a stop.

Terrified, my eyes fell from the stars to the mouth of the alleyway we had almost gotten out of. In the intersection stood an avatar of rage; for a second, before I came to my senses, I could have sworn that his eyes burned like molten steel.

Red Hooves, still behind his troops, gave a contemptuous command: “Get outta our way, kid.”

Starfall flared a wing, planted three hooves, and gripped his knife. Through his teeth, he answered, “Or what?”

A chuckle came from behind me. “I’ss five-on-one; you don’ stand a chance.”

“Try me.”

The stallion near my head drew a sword and held the tip to my neck. “Outta the way, fly boy, or—”

Starfall’s hoof barely twitched and the stallion fell away from me, gurgling, knife sticking out of his throat. Before the body hit the ground, Starfall was charging into the two stallions that held me. They tried to set me down, but Starfall met them, and the four of us crashed to the cobblestones in a confusing tangle. I got thrown to the side, where I rolled like a sausage into a position where I could only see the entrance to the alleyway.

I heard a series of heavy, hollow blows landing: one, two, then finally, three. Starfall boasted, “One-on-one, you bastard. Now... oh, shit.”

Hooffalls approached me and, moments later, my bonds popped off, one set after another. Starfall pulled me up by my armor’s shoulder hole, “We need to catch him!”

I got my feet under me and turned; around me, I noted the four unmoving forms of my captors. Down the alleyway, Red Hooves was fifty feet away and quickly gaining distance. I took a step forward, but the exertion of turning around had been too much for me, and I collapsed. I couldn’t walk, let alone chase after a criminal lord. Starfall let out a concerned, “Gilda?” but I didn’t answer. I was completely spent.

The crossbow on the ground next to me wasn’t.

I picked it up and, from what I could tell, it was ready to fire. It was designed to be worn on the end of a hoof, so I made a fist with my left hand and stuck it on. I lined up the sights, becoming distinctly aware that I had no idea how to shoot a crossbow.

By that point, Red Hooves was nearly a hundred feet away. I had no idea how accurate the crossbow was supposed to be, but I tried to aim for his right knee...

“Aim higher than your target, to account for gravity,” Starfall said, tension thick in his voice.

I aimed at the back of Red Hooves’ head, using one of the sights that had a distance printed on it. Figuring things weren’t going to get any more accurate, I flexed my wrist against the bolt-firing mechanism, and the crossbow’s snapping was accompanied by the whistling sound that the bolt made.

It hit Red Hooves straight under the tail.

He fell forward, on his stomach, before he jerked onto his side in a fetal position. He threw up, but he was otherwise silent; from his writhing, I guessed that he couldn’t scream after having the wind knocked out of him.

Behind me, I heard Starfall half-shudder, half-cough. “Ah... ah... r... really?”

I tried to say something cute, but I suddenly felt a rush of chilly wind come over me. Cold was bad, I reminded my broken body, but it didn’t care. Everything around me went farther and farther away. The fire at the far end of the street shrank to a pinprick; Starfall’s voice faded into a dampened, soft echoing as he called out my name over and over again.

First, I struggled against the encroaching darkness; eventually, I gave in and let it take me... wherever it was taking me.

The last thing I noticed was, for some reason, it was snowing.

7 - Evening Flames

My desktop looked like I was losing a war against paperwork. I’d spent most of the weekend wearing my armor and in my office; the few times I’d been able to tear myself away from work I’d spent by eating, showering, and once—for a few hours on Sunday morning—sleeping.

Now it was Monday, at twelve-thirty in the afternoon, I noted with a glance at the clock and calendar on my wall. Next to them, the polished mahogany of my bookshelf betrayed the pristine order that my office usually held. Now, even my shelves had succumbed to the chaos of Friday morning—several tomes leaned over to fill the gaps left behind by procedures and records that I’d given out to sergeants.

I had an important meeting in half an hour, which still left me with some time to work on the pile of forms on my desk. Actually, it wasn’t a pile as much as it was a multi-layered lasagna of folders, envelopes, clipboards, and papers.

That metaphor just served to remind me that it’d been yesterday when I’d last eaten, so I turned my mind back to practical matters. I’d taken a shower that morning, so I was presentable enough; that was a small favor. I could have walked through the tunnel inside the city wall to get to the eastern archway, where my meeting was, but I felt it would be better to take the longer route through the city. If anything, my presence might give some comfort to the citizens of Farrington.

The longer route would take me fifteen minutes to get through the city if I walked briskly; accounting for delays, I budgeted ten more minutes in my office to work on forms. I held no illusions that I’d be able to deal with more than one matter before leaving, but even signing off that I’d read the... armory inventory report, I decided, would be a small victory.

When it was finished, I stood up, walked over to my door, and took a deep breath. As soon as I opened it and walked through, a clamor of noise and voices washed over me. I tried to walk quickly through the Sergeant’s Quarters; there were enough guards buzzing around that I thought I stood a chance to pass through without—

“Captain! Did you get my request for a schedule transfer?” Sergeant Gate asked.

I kept walking past his desk as I replied, “Yes.” Doubtlessly, the form was somewhere in my office, but knowing Gate’s officers, there was a reasonable chance of a scheduling conflict that I’d have to work out between both Sherry and Horatio. They didn’t have time to deal with whoever was unhappy with their shift.

“As soon as you approve it—”

“I understand.” By then, my neck was fully craned backwards to maintain eye contact, so I turned back around to see where I was going.

I escaped the Sergeant’s Quarters without hearing too many more requests for my time; out in the lobby, several non-guard citizens were gathered. I ignored their calls for my attention as I exited the Citadel; I was on a schedule, and there was a procedure for meeting with me—first, they’d have to fill out some forms.

On my way to the eastern gate, I found myself alone on a bright, humid summer afternoon. Away from my office and ponies vying for my attention, it was the closest thing I’d had to a break since my shower in the Citadel’s bathroom. I tried to cherish being outdoors, but there was too much pain, worry, and doubt on my mind.

As I drew nearer to the eastern gate, I remembered what it had been like on Friday afternoon, the last time I’d seen it. There had been a huge crowd had gathered inside the closed gates—a consequence of my own actions. As a precaution, I’d ordered the city to be closed; because there were guard-killing criminals still roaming free within my walls, I preferred to keep them in the city rather than setting them loose on the rest of Equestria.

Friday morning, after a glass-eyed Starfall nearly pounded down my front door to announce a catastrophe, I hadn’t had any choice but to request crisis guard aid from both Hoofington and Canterlot. They’d arrived on Friday night and Sunday morning, respectively; once the Canterlot guards showed up, I was able to post enough guards at the gates to form checkpoints to allow ponies in and out of Farrington.

Today, at the eastern gate, I found that the crowd had shrunk significantly. Now, there were only about thirty ponies waiting in a haphazard line to get clearance to leave the city. I walked past them, into the archway and the door to the spiral stairs; I tried to ignore the jeers and complaints that were thrown my way.

When I got to the top of the wall, I found a clock tower and read the time: twelve-fifty-six. I was early, so I walked to the eastern lip of the wall and stared off at the horizon. Hoofington was too far away to be visible, but I still worried about Maxie. She was safe, I told myself; in fact, she was secure enough to probably be angry with me.

I remembered how, at a little after four o’clock on Friday morning, Maxie had woken me up. She’d seen someone in our yard, walking past her window. Even after I checked outside and didn’t find anyone, she’d been too worried to go back to sleep. I’d spent the next half hour sitting with her in our living room, drinking cocoa and chatting.

After Starfall came by with a storm of bad news, I’d written my requests for guard aid and given them to my sister—along with seven hundred bits to stay in Hoofington. At first, she complained, but when I gave her the option of safety in Hoofington or within a holding cell in the Citadel, she quietly packed a few things and left.

It’d hurt to do that to her, but even as I did it, I’d told myself that I would never forgive myself if something bad happened to someone else close to me.

Tears swelled in my eyes as I remembered the other half of Starfall’s news—where he’d told me that he’d carried Gilda’s unconscious form to the hospital—but I forced them away with a hard blink and a deep, grunting breath. There wasn’t time to visit her, or even to check if she were alive; the only real way I’d learn about her condition was if a form from Farrington General happened to cross my desk.

I pushed Gilda into the back of my mind, where she’d been all weekend. I only had a few minutes before my meeting, so I used them to recap why I needed it. With everything that had happened on Friday morning, one very important detail stuck out in my mind. It led to some bigger questions, ones that I needed answers for.

Even the Equestrian Guard had been dumbfounded by the ice explosion in the Artisan District; outside of some of the older frost dragons in the world, they’d never heard of anything that could to turn an entire building into a pillar of ice. The snow in the Artisan District had long-since melted, but the fear of another such explosion had since run rampant through my city, and it still weighed heavily on my mind.

“Iron. You look like hell.”

At her voice, I turned and gave a nod to Sherry. Today was the first time we’d seen each other after the Friday morning bombing; seeing her face filled me with an uncertainty gripped my throat in a dry, painful manner.

I had questions. She had answers.

Sherry walked over to the eastern lip of the wall, next to me on my left. I took a quick glance to either side of me; the nearest officers on the wall were over fifty feet away—well out of listening range of the conversation we were about to have. That was an important precaution. I needed to ask her about her actions on Friday morning; I did not need to stir dissent amongst the ranks of my Guard.

Regardless of my questions, there wasn’t anything to gain by losing politeness. After what I hoped hadn’t been too long a silence, I replied, “It’s been a rough weekend.”

Sherry chuckled, but it didn’t reach her eyes. “You’re in for a lot of rough weekends in the foreseeable future, Iron. I can tell you what it’s like to have a power vacuum in a city’s criminal underground. Maybe you’re lucky that Red was...” She shook her head. “Did I ever tell you about the case that got me involved in Farrington in the first place?”

I shook my head and tried to hide a sad grin at her unfortunate timing; I’d always been curious about her past, even though today, it was the source of some of my doubts. I replied with a neutral, “I remember overhearing my father talking about someone from Stalliongrad, who I later realized was you, but he kept work and home separate for the most part.”

“Smart of him. Because that case? Involved the leftovers of two mid-range players in Stalliongrad’s crime scene. They’d come to Farrington to stir up business. I saw what Red did to his father’s ‘competition’ back then, let alone everything after he came to power. So maybe you’re lucky, what with how your girlfriend put most of his lieutenants behind bars.”

I looked out over the plains to the east of the city. “Lucky” wasn’t how I felt right then, but even in the wake of a catastrophe, I knew that could change in the future—if I took the correct steps in the present. Tentatively, I agreed. “Perhaps I am.”

“How’s she doing?”

I turned to Sherry, and tried to balance my own questions about her loyalties with the fact that she had been a friend to me over the past eight years. Starfall had been busy working fourteen-hour shifts and sleeping in the Citadel over the past weekend, so we had only gotten to speak once during a lunch that one of the sergeants had brought in for everyone. That hurried conversation had been about us, and how we were faring.

Effectively, this was the first time I’d been able to speak with someone about Gilda. I gave Sherry a weak grin before looking out to the east again. “She was taken to her old room in the hospital, I assume. I also assume that if she wakes up...” I trailed off, trying not to think of the alternative.

“So you haven’t—”

“When?!” I hissed as I snapped my head to her. She flinched, and guilt took some of the choler from my mind. “No, Sherry, I haven’t. I haven’t slept in three days, and I’m still falling behind on all there is to do. It... kills me, inside, but there isn’t any time to sit by her bed and hope. For all the good it will do, I can wish her well from up here.” I gestured to the wall around me.

She turned her head and eyed me from the side. “But you’ve got time to ask me up here for...”

“To ask a few questions.”

“About what?”

She’d forced my hoof, much more abruptly than I would have liked, but there was no helping it now. I replied out with the truth: “I wanted to ask about your involvement in Friday morning.”

Sherry rolled her eyes. “I already gave you my report—”

“And I’ll alert the Writer’s Guild that some new fiction has been produced.”

She snarled at me, which made me realize I’d probably gone too far in expressing my doubts.

Before she could retort, I clarified, “You know the rules, Sherry, and you play within them. I just thought maybe there was something more, perhaps even off-the-record postulation that might be of value.”

Her expression softened—steel instead of granite—and she turned around to walk to the western lip of the wall. I joined her, and the two of us looked over to the Artisan District. Despite being a warm day, a newly formed ice tower still stood about ten feet over the building that had all but been confirmed as Red Hooves’ base of operations. It would probably be a week before it thawed, at which time it would be handed over to forensic detectives.

Quietly and plainly, Sherry said, “The Lunar Loyalists don’t have that kind of weaponry, and they lost their balls after we took down their leader. It’s probably a frame.”

I nodded; we couldn’t state obvious, unsubstantiated facts on official forms, but there was absolutely no way that the Lunar Loyalists, a now-defunct terrorist cult, had coincidentally resurfaced on the same night that Red Hooves declared war on Farrington. That only raised the question: “If it’s a frame, then who put it on them?”

Sherry’s left shoulder rose and fell. “I don’t know anyone who’s got problems with the Loyalists, but maybe someone new in town wants to take out the competition before setting up his game.”

“Perhaps,” I agreed, “but why would Red go on the offensive against the Guard if he was merely protecting his own interests?”

She looked at me and shrugged again. “I don’t know. Why not ask him?”

I chuckled darkly. “He wishes to strike a plea bargain with the courts, and refuses to say anything else on the matter.”

“For himself?”

“For his sister.” I shrugged. We traded a glance and I explained, “He says he’ll confess everything and turn in his entire organization if she receives clemency for her crimes.”

Sherry scoffed. “Coward.”

“Perhaps,” I agreed again, “but until we hear his confession, none of his actions on Friday morning make any sense. He went to war against Farrington, for...” I scoffed. “Nothing. Even if his attack had been successful, he’d never be able to show his face in Farrington—or any other civilized town—ever again.”

“So why do it?”

I looked down at the line of ponies below. Most of them were business-related travelers, but I noted how four of them had carts full of personal belongings with them. I wondered how many of them would never return to Farrington.

That brought me to my working theory: “Retirement.”

“Retirement?” Sherry repeated slowly. “What, so Red’s going to find some island resort where he can skin ponies for fun all day?”

I grinned a little—not at her joke, but at the allegory that played in my mind: “No, I don’t think Red ever planned on sandy beaches. I’ve... known him, vicariously, through his correspondence in the years since my promotion. I have to say, after he lost his sister, he also lost a lot of his usual... zest. He started to get... pleading, is how I’d describe it. Depressed, even. So I think he lost someone he held dear, and since the legal channels of getting closure didn’t work for him, he settled on revenge—even if he knew full well that it couldn’t work out for him in the long run.”

By the time I finished speaking, I was staring directly at Sherry.

She glared back up at me. “If you have something you want to say...”

“What were you doing out in the streets of Farrington three hours after your shift ended?”

Her eyes glistened for a moment before she turned away. I cringed; that wasn’t how Sherry expressed sorrow. It was an act, and that knowledge gripped my chest like a vise.

Far too late, she turned back to me, and denied the truth: “I haven’t slept in years, Iron. You know that as well as I do. Everything’s in my report: I saw the fires, decided to go with non-regulation armor, and went out there to help. Then, in the fire and death in the streets, I decided to call for backup.” Her voice broke as she finished: “So do you have anything else you want to—”

I cut through her act. “Why were there Stalliongrad Mafia in my streets?”

Her expression widened in shock before she rapidly shook her head and shot back, “What?”

For the first time in my career, I was actually a step ahead of her. I hated it. “At four in the morning, Maxie woke up because someone was in our yard. Someone she recognized, from a delivery six months ago. He didn’t really try to keep it secret from her then that he was part of Cold Front’s organization.”

Sherry’s mouth dropped open, and she blinked slowly before jerking her head to the side spitting out, “Shlukya!”

It was as good as an admission of guilt; despite the empty, distant feeling I felt from the whole situation, I shook my head. “Sherry... what have you done?”

Her head slowly shook, and for a moment, I thought she was going to continue denying it. Instead, she cut back with, “Only what you didn’t have the... will to do for yourself.”

“Will?” I felt my jaw slacken. “Over thirty ponies are dead, and nearly a dozen of those were my... were your officers! And that’s not counting the civilians—”

“And all of that’s less than half the annual death toll from Red Hooves’ regular operations.”

“You can’t... justify it like that!” I shook my head; even though I’d suspected her, I still couldn’t believe—

“I absolutely can justify it like that.” She turned and pointed a hoof at me. “He took away the one thing I ever had. He screwed with my head during the court proceedings. So he wants to gut me back into what I was in Stalliongrad? He’s lucky to be standing where he is right now and not be dead!”

Her words were ice, but I kept from shivering. My fear was minute compared to the sense of betrayal I felt “Why... why now? After everything you said? How could you spend all these years helping—”

“Because I love you, you idiot!”

Both of us stood there in shocked silence for a moment after she said it. Tears—real tears—formed at the sides of her eyes, and she continued speaking in a rushed whisper: “But you don’t need that. She’s what you need, and if you keep taking her for granted...” Sherry shook her head. “Well, you’re not going to do that anymore, are you?”

I still reeled over her confession, and the way it colored all of our interactions over the past four years. Finally, I shook my head and turned back to the city in front of us. “No. No, I will not.” Sherry let out a little gust of breath next to me, which I returned as a sigh before asking her, “So what now?”

“What now?” She paused. “That’s up to you. You’re captain, so you get to make the hard call. And I don’t mean us. I mean that, if you bring up these accusations... there’s a chance they might even stick. But not just to me. To everyone. When it comes out you’ve got a bent lieutenant, that reflects poorly on your choices. And looking at this summer alone, are you willing to risk—”

“Absolutely.” I turned to her. “I took my rank of captain because I wanted to uphold the law, not because I enjoy authority.” My eyes watered as I continued, “So I’m either guaranteed to lose my conviction, or I’m at risk of losing my rank.” Tears stung my eyes. “The latter, I can live with. Sherry, you’re under arrest for co-conspiracy and murder.”

She turned to me with a weak grin, but then she crossed her front forelegs on the lip of the wall in front of her. “Okay. Arrest me, then.”

With a twinge of frustration, I realized she was going to force me to lead her through the Citadel, as a criminal, in front of everyone. I steeled myself for that, but then, there was the awkward fact that my captain’s belt didn’t have a length of rope on it. Lieutenants’ belts didn’t, either. My best bet was to call over one of the officers on the wall, so I turned away from Sh—

* * *

“Sir!”

The voice came from far away, and almost sounded as if it were being distorted through a vast expanse of water. It didn’t make any sense, as everything around me was dark. Am I drowning? That didn’t make any sense either; I could breathe, and now that I focused, I could hear the sounds of a panicked crowd beneath me.

I opened my eyes, which only led to more confusion. A blurry group of guards stood over me—my officers, I remembered—and two of them spoke again in a tense, worried unison: “Sir?”

My first response came as a single, guttural noise; I focused on finding my words for a moment before I could manage. “What... happened?”

The two pairs of officers looked at each other, then back at me. The ones on my right spoke: “Sir, Lieutenant Justice attacked you, then jumped over the eastern side of the wall.”

Sherry? I blinked a few times. The last time, my eyes opened in a hardened glare. I remembered, now, why I had been up here on this wall to begin with, how things had ended between us, and...

A flash of worry. “Is she... alive?”

The guards above me traded a glance again; this time, the pair on the left responded, “She... hit the ground in a roll, then took off galloping towards the south, towards Trottingham.”

Some of my former confusion returned, but this time, it felt more natural than induced. “We’re... almost fifty feet up!”

They didn’t have an answer for that, but then again, neither did I. It wasn’t a suicidal leap off the wall, though there had been injuries and deaths from officers falling off in the past. If she had rolled with it...

Sherry was gone.

Indignation fueled my hooves, and I pushed myself up into a standing position. Now wasn’t the time for lying around uselessly. I motioned to the pair of officers on my right. “You two, go to the Citadel and alert the leader of the Equestrian National Guard that we now have an inter-city fugitive situation.”

They looked back at me, confused. I nearly reprimanded them for their inaction, but the pair on the left spoke up first: “Sir, do you need to go to the hospital?”

I shook my head, which caused an explosion of fire and nausea behind my eyes. “Not... not right now. We’ve got more important things to do.”

From my right came, “Sir... there’s only... one of me.”

I turned back to what had previously been a pair of—admittedly identical—officers. After a few hard blinks, they overlapped and formed one stallion, but my vision swam, and it was difficult to keep them—him—like that.

I nodded at him, which caused another wave of pain. “Duly noted. You go to the Citadel.” I turned to the officer on my left. “You tell Lieutenant Horatio that I’m going to the hospital. Tell him to alert...” I racked my addled brain, weighing service records and seniority. “Sergeant... Harmon, for temporary, emergency promotion to Acting-Lieutenant.”

The pair snapped salutes before the officer on my right ran down the wall at full gallop. However, the officer on my left lingered. “Sir, do you want me to call an escort?”

I shook my head. “No, but thank you.”

He nodded, then made his way to the spiral staircase that was set into the walkway of the wall. After a moment’s hesitation, I noted that I also needed to take the stairs down to street level.

I turned to my left, and for the first time, I noted the pile of discarded lieutenant’s armor. The sight gripped my chest for a mournful moment, but I bargained with myself that I could worry about it later—at the hospital.

For all her evils, Sherry had at least given me an opportunity to follow her advice to visit Gilda.

With a hollow arch of an eyebrow, I wondered if that had been intentional. I walked away from her forsaken armor, and as I did, I made peace with how I would probably never find out.

* * *

At Farrington General, I received two pieces of good news.

The first came from my doctor, who informed me that I didn’t have a fractured skull, or any spinal damage—merely a mild concussion. He wrote me a prescription and told me to “take it easy and get some rest.”

I balanced his advice with necessity, and I agreed to take a few more hours off. Certainly, I needed to go back to the Citadel that night; at the bare minimum, I had to give my report of what had just happened on the wall, issue some nighttime orders, and sign off that I was, indeed, taking medical leave for a day.

However, the more I thought about it, the more I realized that Sherry’s implicit confession simplified matters. It wasn’t time for celebration just yet, but I felt I had a better understanding of the situation, which was as a good start as the situation allowed.

After I swallowed my prescription, I went up to the trauma ward of the hospital to visit all of my fallen officers—as I’d doubtlessly need to explain in my report. I started with the pony officers, as they were the ones who were awake. Their verbal reports had already been taken and filed on Saturday, but on a personal level, it felt good to tell them how their devotion to the Guard and injuries sustained in the line of duty would not soon be forgotten.

Before I went to see Gilda, I got her attending doctor’s attention. He joined me outside of her room, off to the side of the hallway. “So, uh...” My voice dropped. “How is she doing?”

“Well...” he answered. “To be entirely certain, I’m not sure how much I should tell you, what with patient confidentiality.”

I bit back my frustration. “I... what about last time?”

“Last time, Mister Bulwark, you were paying for her bills out of your own pocket. This time, it’s from the Farrington Guard’s medical budget.”

I gave him a flat look, looked down at my golden armor, and then swung my head back up to continue my glare. “I am the Farrington Guard. If you can’t tell me about her condition on a personal level, then tell me so that I can make adjustments to her schedule.”

He blinked a few times, then quickly shook his head. “Right. Sorry, the... Equestrian guards’ armor...” He shook his head again. “Anyway, she’s still unconscious, but there are some good signs. We can’t really run many tests, since we don’t know what griffin baselines usually are—” He held up a hoof. “—we’re working on it. But her heart rate and breathing are regular, and... on a good note, we’ve been noticing increased brain activity. Especially today.”

“What does that mean?”

He bobbed his head indecisively. “Well... I don’t want to say for sure, but last time this happened, she woke up within a few days.”

Relief came over me, but I locked my weak-feeling knees in place. “Awe—Excellent!”

“I mean, even if she wakes up, she’s still going to need to stay in the hospital for a few days after, for monitoring, let alone her physical injuries.” He shrugged. “Still, it doesn’t look like she’s slipping deeper into her coma.”

I nodded, trying to tone my excitement down to realistic levels. I found that I couldn’t. I compromised by asking, “May I see her?”

The doctor pointed at the door. “We close it for privacy and quiet, but it’s unlocked, and it’s visiting hours.”

We said goodbye through a pair of traded nods. After her doctor left, I pushed open the door to Gilda’s hospital room to find a sadly familiar sight.

Sunlight reflected off the beige tiles on the floor, which filled her room with bright whiteness. I closed the door behind me, which made a loud clicking noise compared to the soft beeps and whirs of a device next to her that continuously poured out a ream of paper. The room smelled... like an occupied hospital room, I reminded myself in neutral terms.

Before I sat down, I commandeered her coat rack, propping it against her bedside table to create a makeshift armor stand. I didn’t know how long I wanted to stay there, but since I didn’t need to return to the Citadel for another few hours, I thought it would be worth the extra time to take off my armor. When I was finished, I pulled up a cushion next to her bed, and I sat with her.

At first, I felt strange to be sitting there, watching her sleep. However, given what her doctor said, I consoled myself that she might wake up, and if that were the case, I could answer her questions about the events of Friday morning. If not, then my doctor had ordered me to take some rest. Even though it was selfish of me, I couldn’t think of anyone else in the city I would rather be with at that moment.

Once I got past my invasion of her privacy, I noted that I was witnessing a rare occurrence: Gilda at rest. True, she relaxed around me from time to time, but she rarely kept still; the few times she did that, I usually couldn’t see her because of our positioning—like two months ago, at the Summer Sun Festival.

Some of the feathers around her face had been displaced by the doctors’ sensors, or possibly even the attack she’d endured. I reached a hoof out and smoothed them down. After that, I moved my cushion a little closer to the bed so that I could prop an arm up on it.

When I held her hand, she smiled, and my eyes watered in joy.

Sadly, she didn’t do anything other than smile, and the beeping of her machines didn’t really change. Still, if something in her mind had been the source of some inner peace, it must have been contagious. For the first time after an excruciatingly long weekend, I felt content.

I must have stayed there for at least half an hour—I hadn’t really noted the time when I’d arrived at her room, so I tried to count backwards. My visits to the other five officers couldn’t have taken much longer than an hour, plus a half hour to see my doctor, and I’d checked in at just after one-thirty... I looked at the clock now, and it was three-forty. With a sigh, I noted that I’d have to begin putting my armor on at four, but vowed to not to dwell on that for the remaining twenty minutes.

Unfortunately, my peace with Gilda was soon interrupted by the sound of her room’s door opening. I looked over; in the doorway stood a cream-colored unicorn mare. Her long, pitch-black hair was streaked with navy blue highlights, and I could have sworn that I recognized her from somewhere. Yet, as I gave her a friendly nod, I had to admit that I my mind drew a blank.

She walked over to the opposite side of Gilda’s bed, but she didn’t sit down. Feeling the need to defend my girlfriend, I said, “Hello. I don’t recall if we’ve met before?”

She smiled back at me. “We have met, Captain Iron Bulwark, but it was very brief, and formal.”

I blinked, trying to remember the last time I had gone to a formal event; there were several throughout the year that I was expected to attend because of my rank as captain. Unfortunately, I had to admit, “I... forgive me, but I’ve forgotten your name.”

Her grin didn’t falter, but she looked away from me and down to Gilda. “In the household where I was raised, knowledge is a prized commodity.” She looked at me dead-on, and I suddenly felt tiny in her presence. “Some have eschewed that tradition, but not I.” She dipped her head quickly, motioning to Gilda. “You may call me as she calls me.”

“I...” Her answers had a way of raising more questions, which... I supposed made sense, given what she had just said about knowledge. “You know Gilda?”

“She calls me Nisht.”

That name sounded as familiar as her face was. However, I still couldn’t place it. I wondered if Gilda had brought her up in passing, some time in the past. I recalled that she was friends with a waitress at her favorite diner, and her energetic pegasus friend from Ponyville; other than those two, I honestly couldn’t remember anyone else.

The rational part of my mind doubted that Gilda would have the patience to put up with an individual who constantly spoke in evasive statements, but I kept that to myself.

“Still, it is good that you finally visited her, Captain Bulwark.”

I forced a smile and feigned as much politeness as my tired mind would allow me. “You’ll have to forgive me, Nisht, but I had a rough weekend.”

She nodded, then turned her head. Absently, she regarded the flow of paper out of Gilda’s monitoring device. “Her dreams are troubled as of late, but they grow calmer when you are with her.”

It finally clicked: Nisht was a doctor—a mage healer, to be specific. I must’ve met her at the Farrington General benefit dinner last spring, and Gilda must have encountered her during her volunteer work of telling legends to children.

Nisht closed her eyes, but rather than glowing, a light-draining aura formed around her horn. She then placed a hoof on Gilda’s forehead, and the monitor device behind her began beeping at a rapid, panicked-sounding rate. “What are you—”

She locked eyes on me and smiled. Instantly, her horn stopped channeling magic, and she put her hoof back on the floor. “She will wake soon. Your voice stirs her thoughts. Talk to her.”

Just as suddenly as she had entered the room, Nisht turned and walked back over to the entrance. Before I got a chance to say goodbye, she issued a strange request:

“When she wakes, tell her that her debt has been paid. Tell her, Nisht says that her debt has been paid. She will understand.”

I nodded. “Goodbye, Nisht. And... thank you; I’ll tell her.”

“Live through peace, Captain Bulwark.” She smiled, which stirred a deep, wondrous awe inside me. “We were happy to help.”

Moments after her strange—yet friendly—bid of farewell, she exited the room.

I was alone with Gilda again.

Talk to her. The three small words, spoken more as an order than a request, resonated in my mind. Even though I had sat in silence with Gilda for most of the past hour, truth be told, I hadn’t really thought about what I would say to her if she could hear me.

If her doctor said it could help, I figured there was nothing I could lose except time. A quick glance at the clock told me I was behind schedule, but really, I just needed to get to the Citadel before six o’clock. I could spend another half hour and still be there with an hour to spare.

I thought about what I wanted to tell Gilda, even if there was a good chance she only recognized my voice, not the words. That would make it easier to open up to her, I realized with a guilty twinge.

I brought my other arm up to the bed and held her hand between both of my hooves. Then I began:

“Hi Gilda.”

I rubbed the back of her hand, trying to think of what to say next. “I... wish I knew how to tell you how important you are in my life. I know you’ve said it a few times, especially after our fight, that I don’t readily open up, and I agree. And I’m sorry.”

My next train of thought came with a heavy breath first. “I suppose, if I had to give a reason, it would have to be because of my mother. Not that she did anything wrong... or, I suppose, anything other than the one thing.”

The memory flashed before my eyes. That afternoon, I had been excited to receive high marks on a book report. When I burst through my family’s front door, I hadn’t noticed the stillness in the air. Then, I got to our living room and saw many things I wish I hadn’t: Our sofa. An empty pill bottle. White foam.

“I was only thirteen...” I explained to Gilda, as if she would have needed it. “But she was my world, after my father died.” My eyes stung, but I fought through it. “I... I had to be strong, for Maxie. She was young, innocent...” I swallowed after the word; it felt sharp. “In the end, I suppose I destroyed that part of her.”

I shook my head. I thought of my various romantic experiences through my life: mistakes followed by even larger mistakes. Gilda didn’t need to hear about my teenage fumbling about in the mines, or a drunken, grief-filled kiss that turned to more regret.

Instead I told her, “You are not a mistake.”

Hearing my own words awoke in me a warm fire, a truth that burned like a torch in the evening. “You are one of the best things that ever happened to me. Even when things are difficult, I would rather face problems with you than find ease on my own.”

I patted her hand. “I’m not sure what that’s called, or how much a commitment there is behind what I think the word is. But I know that what I feel it is in the right direction towards it, Gilda, and even though I can’t be certain, I think I can safely say that I... I...”

I woke up, and around me raged Götterdämmerung—the Twilight of the Gods.

The legends didn’t do it justice. Whereas they talked about a final, cataclysmic war that would end both the reign of the gods and the mortal earth itself, they didn’t talk about, say, an army of magma golems fighting against ice skeletons in the frozen desert to the north. And that was one of the smaller, less important engagements.

The more I turned around and looked at my bearings, the more I realized where I was. Sharfkral-Grat, the home of the Sharfkral, stood directly west of a large, flat plateau. I sat in the middle of that plateau, facing north, but to my left, there was only a smashed, lava-weeping pile of melting boulders. It looked like the remains of a mountain ridge that had pissed off a god.

Speaking of gods—it was their war, anyway—I looked around and saw a lot of familiar faces. South of me, in the Jägerwald, Jäger and his Sternwolf were fighting with both arrow and fang to hold off a charging onslaught of massive serpents. To the distant west, Donar was hurling massive bolts of lightning down at Njord, who was answered each both with a volley of barbed ice-spears.

To the east, the sibling gods of love—Fricco and Frija—were busy... wrestling, was the term I was going to use. I turned away to give them privacy, despite how they were doing it right out in the open.

As soon as I did, the stone beneath my feet shook with terrible, explosive force. I ducked down, trying not to get crushed, and I became very aware that I wasn’t a match for anything I had seen in the past thirty seconds.

That instinct cued me into one important question that had apparently slipped my mind: Was I dead? I remembered waking up, but before that... I blinked. If I were “dead,” I couldn’t remember ever being “alive.”

My newly found ignorance took secondary importance to the fact that now, on opposite sides of the plateau, the two war gods circled each other—and there I was, in the middle of them. If I wasn’t dead already, I was very soon going to be.

“COWARD!” Ziu’s rage cut with the cold fury of a blizzard. I had heard his voice before, but I remembered the rage usually being directed at me. “She is mine!”

She? I looked down. White feathers on my chest, covered in a stripe of Loyalty’s blood, and below that...

“If you want her,” Ing taunted, “come take her!”

Ing’s voice was incredibly familiar, but it was strange, so I turned to him. A verdant aura of green light flowed around him, which made sense; he was devoted to Jord, the goddess of life and creation. Other than Jord’s blessing, Ing carried a massive shield, made of dark wood, but even I knew that no weapon could shatter it.

A disgusted scoff from Ziu clued me back into their fight. A fight over me, I realized, which was probably worse than a fight that I happened to be in the middle of—I could escape the latter.

The war gods continued circling me; Ziu, wreathed in ice-cold darkness and demands of strength, alternated his glare between Ing and me. He was sizing both of us up, and I looked down at my hands. My right one was slightly deformed; the talons were only half-grown, and a gnarled scar tore through my palm. It hurt to make a fist, but if I had been brought into a fight, then I wasn’t going to die without one.

My father hadn’t raised a coward, after all.

I blinked back to that memory, or how I couldn’t remember having a father, but Ziu interrupted: “Foolish wretch! You seek to betray me? I will unmake you!”

“She is not beholden to you!” came Ing’s steeled, defensive voice.

“Lies!”

Ziu pounced at me, I got ready to dodge, but Ing met him in midair. I leaped away from them as they fell, twisting and battling, to the plateau. They landed where I had been moments before. After several traded blows, Ing delivered a well-placed kick, and they separated. Ing then raised his shield, preparing for the next attack.

Ziu stood up, and with a hiss, he commanded the air around him. It answered by forming a shimmering, flickering blade of ice, wind, and death. He gripped it, and with a mighty leap, Ziu brought his weapon down on Ing. Ing raised his shield in preparation.

When sword met shield, an immense, white-hot light flashed out from it and encompassed me. I turned away, but the sound and heat of the explosion washed over me, and for a moment, I thought I would either be crushed or burned into dust.

It ended in time for me to glance back at the fight. Ziu fought madly, swinging frenzied attacks with his blade. Ing dodged each and every one of them, but he steadily lost ground as he was forced to retreat, almost to the lip of the plateau...

Then, an arrow struck Ziu in back of the neck. A killing blow, I would have thought, but Ziu didn’t seem to notice. He turned around in time to catch two more to the chest. I looked to see where they were coming from; above us, Jäger readied a fourth shot.

“Insolent CHILD!” My attention snapped back to Ziu at the sound of his voice. His cold fury froze his feathers into blades of ice, and several clattered to the ground as he flapped them, taking off in pursuit of Jäger. The hunter-turned-god was more nimble than Ziu, and he paced his retreating flight with well-placed arrows as the pair of them darted off to the south.

Behind me, Ing chuckled. I turned, trembling as I suddenly realized he and I were alone. Sure, he had just finished defending me, but that could be for any number of reasons—the least of which being that he wanted to kill me.

“Be at peace, child. Had Wodan wanted you dead, you would already be dead.”

That was... a small comfort. “So... I’m not dead? What is this, then?”

Ing smiled, and as he drew nearer, I realized I was less than half his height. He looked down to keep eye contact as he said,“What this is and where we are... these things do not yet matter. What does matter is that you remember who you are. Where this used to be.”

I looked back down to my chest, to the blood on my feathers. That had come from a betrayal I had committed, but the wounds beneath them, those had come from...

The world around me shifted, growing brighter and clearer. I was home, at Sharfkral-Grat, but it wasn’t my home any longer. That was in a city far to the south, one I had sworn to defend. And in that defense, I remembered everything I’d encountered: explosions, fighting, and death.

“It is good you remember, daughter of the Sharfkral. Had you lost yourself, your mind would have never been reclaimed. And your hour of importance has not yet arrived.”

His words were as foreign as they were confusing, but I could swear his voice was familiar. Still, what—not how—he spoke of was the one I wondered more about. “‘Hour of importance?’”

“That is a matter for another time. For now...” Ing walked around to my right-hand side and grabbed ahold of my hand.

Ing began muttering; the words sounded hazy and far away, but they were spoken in Equestrian. Instantly, I recognized his voice; I just couldn’t make out what he was saying.

His speech grew louder and closer; at the very end, he looked directly into my eyes and spoke one final syllable:

“View.”

I opened my eyes, and around me, everything was blindingly bright—except for Iron’s shocked expression of disbelief that looked over me.

Before I could ask, his eyes lit up to match his warm smile. At the same time, I noticed his hooves were holding my hand. All he said was a soft, glowing, “Hi.”

“Hi,” I said back. It hurt to talk because my throat was so dry. That pain cued me into the rest of my body, where suddenly, everything erupted in a dull throb of fuzzy pain. I remembered getting the crap beaten out of me—especially the back of my head, which was surprisingly not as painful as I thought it would be. That made me curious: “Wh... what time is it?”

Iron grinned. “It is Monday, the twenty-first of August, around a quarter after four.”

With an annoyed sigh, I remembered how it had been Friday when I last remembered... anything. I hated how I kept falling unconscious in hospitals and quickly jumping forward in time. Then I remembered who was responsible: “What happened to Red Hooves?”

“He’s in prison.” Iron rubbed the back of my hand. “It came with a heavy price, but we won the night, thanks to you.”

When he mentioned the heavy price, I remembered Sunset, right before the explosions. If the arrows hadn’t gotten her, the fire must’ve...

My eyes watered, and I raised my left arm, reaching over to Iron. Slowly, delicately, he leaned forward and wove himself into an embrace with me. It was firm, but not tight enough to hurt, and it was exactly what I needed as I cried into his neck.

He rubbed my side, consolingly. Into my ear, he whispered, “I’m so glad you’re okay.”

I snuggled into his neck a little more, but I couldn’t find any words other than, “Thanks.”

We stayed like that for a while, locked into an embrace. It came to an end when he said, “I... have some other things to attend to today. I’m sorry, Gilda.”

I loosened my grip on him, and he let me go. I repositioned myself on my bed and said, “It’s okay.”

He started putting his armor on, which he’d... put on a coat rack, leaned up against my dresser. I smiled at his diligence and care for his armor; I usually left mine... I looked around the room. “Hey, where’s my armor?”

Iron buckled the first strap of his chestplate before answering, “That farrier’s apprentice stopped by the Citadel, on Saturday. He expressed his apologies, and then vowed to further improve your armor to be ‘bolt-proof.’ I’ll keep it in the armory when he finishes with it.”

My wing still hurt from getting shot, so I couldn’t exactly complain about that—other than how we were already square on the whole armor deal. Still, I’d find some way to make it up to him; it wasn’t like I wasn’t sitting on over a thousand bits back at my cave.

Once Iron was wearing his captain’s armor again, he stood back over the side of my bed. “Goodbye. I’ll try to come by later tonight, but if not, I’ll see you tomorrow.”

I craned my neck forward a little, and he bent back down to kiss the tip of my beak. I smiled, then set my head back down as Iron walked away.

When he got to the door, Iron turned to me. “Oh, yes. One of your acquaintances stopped by earlier...” His eyes darted off to the side as he recollected. “She said your debt was cleared, and that you would understand what she meant. Her name was Nicht.”

My eyes darted wide. Nicht was... well, from what Dash had told me, she’d just been released from the moon last year. She still held her position in the griffin pantheon, just like her sister, so I felt honored, I guessed, to have been visited by her—though I didn’t know where Iron got “acquaintance” from. I’d worry him over it later, though.

As for what she’d said, I guessed “my debt” had something to do with either my weird dream, or with my quick, desperate prayer to the constellation of Ziu. Either way, it was cleared, so I nodded at Iron. “Uh... cool.”

He nodded back, and I noted that he was being oddly nonchalant for having just spoken to a goddess. Then again, ponies were ruled in a fairly personal manner by her and her murderess of a sister, so it made sense that Iron was a lot more familiar with her than I’d ever be.

Iron walked out my door, which left me alone with my thoughts. I didn’t exactly feel lonely; I felt more...

I pushed the button by my bed to call a nurse. I needed to hit the bathroom, but I didn’t want to move out of the bed until I’d been detached from everything. Once I got that situation taken care of, I told myself, I’d have all the time in the world to think about everything that had happened to me in the past few days.

I didn’t know if I was looking forward to it.

* * *

I spent most of Monday night busy being prodded and poked by some medical doofus who didn’t have any idea how to treat a griffin—he told me as much, anyway. He finally left me alone at seven o’clock, which let me eat my lukewarm dinner and wonder if Iron had gotten held up at the Citadel.

True to his word, Iron stopped by my room early Tuesday morning with an apology muffin. Now that my coma was wearing off, I noticed that he’d seen better days; bloodshot, baggy eyes didn’t really suit him.

He tried to apologize for not coming on Monday evening, but when I asked why, he admitted that he’d fallen asleep in his office. I felt sorry for him and how rough he’d obviously had it since Friday; I couldn’t blame him for wanting some sleep.

Other than Iron, I had a few visitors from the Guard. Tuesday afternoon, Sergeant Scales came by with a large-lettered “GET WELL SOON” card. I glared at it for a few moments before chuckling; he’d made sure I could read it, at least. After the personal side of things was over, he brought out a clipboard and interviewed me to get my side of the story; I told him everything that I could remember.

Some of the other guards from the floor we were all on stopped by to chat. I got a decent amount of practice for retelling my story of “what happened,” which at least made it easier to get through talking about what had happened. About who had died.

Sunset occupied a lot of my alone-time thoughts—including my dreams. I couldn’t get the thought out of my head that there was more I could have done for her, or that since I was Red Hooves’ target, it was my fault that she died.

My stupid brain kept replaying that image, too, over and over: her last, desperate glance at me, hoping that I could do something. Every time, I remembered how I’d stood there, lamely, and I hadn’t done anything to try.

The more I fixated on her, the more I wondered about why I cared so much. It was dumb, I told myself, for me to be that attached to someone I’d known for all of a week—less than that, even. But no matter how many times I tried to put her out of my mind, she kept coming back. Finally, I was able to convince myself that it was because I was restless from being cooped up in a hospital room for so long; it helped a little.

I got to test that theory on Wednesday afternoon, when I got a visit from a little group of foals and their caretaker. The six of them—minus the nurse—all climbed onto my bed with me, and they decided that it was their turn to tell me some stories. I sat through a few hours of “Superpony” and “Batmare,” woven into half-baked stories that often times didn’t go anywhere in particular.

I loved every minute of it, and that feeling stayed with me for the rest of the evening.

* * *

Thursday morning at seven-thirty, Iron came by for his usual pre-shift visit. During it, he very cautiously and slowly brought up the topic of my officer shift. Since I still felt a little dizzy and sluggish whenever I walked the ten feet to my bathroom, I told Iron “not yet.” A quick nod was the only other thing he said on the matter.

When Iron left at seven-fifty, just like every time he left, I surrendered myself to the notion of a long, boring morning until lunch. The Farrington Times was a stupid newspaper written by bigots, and public visiting hours weren’t until one o’clock, so my number one form of entertainment was tracing routes in the square paths between the one hundred and twenty-seven tiles in my ceiling.

At just after eight o’clock, my door opened. I looked over to see who it was, and there stood a slightly-unkempt Starfall, wearing his officer’s armor. “What’s up, Hotshot?”

I blinked at him, and before I could get annoyed at a new nickname, curiosity took over: “What happened to ‘Sharptalon?’”

He raised an eyebrow. “You’ve got a preference?”

I glared back.

Starfall walked over to the side of my bed. “Word about your ‘incapacitating shot’ to Red Hooves got out...” He glared, slightly. “Don’t do that, by the way.”

“I was aiming for his leg...”

“And you hit one.” Starfall’s glare broke into a grin. “So, Hotshot. Or maybe Eagle Eye...”

I kept glaring at him for a moment before admitting, “Just when I thought ‘Sharptalon’ was annoying...”

He nodded knowingly. “‘Sharptalon’ it is, then.”

I took a deep breath before cutting out a flat “Thanks. Arschloch.”

“One of these days, you’re going to have to tell me what that means.”

I shrugged. “Maybe. Are we even patrol partners anymore?”

He rolled his head in a half-nod, half-shake. “I don’t think even Iron knows that one. Things are pretty crazy in the Guard right now, with all the temporary replacements, council audits, investigations...”

“Investigations?”

Starfall blinked. “Iron didn’t tell you about how Lieutenant Justice left?”

I shook my head.

“Well, how she left was by assaulting him after admitting that Friday morning was her attempt to start a gang war for... fun, I guess.”

I stared at Starfall for a few moments after he said it. “That... that part wasn’t on my exam, but I don’t think that’s how you’re supposed to leave.”

“Oh... Hell no.” He shook his head. “She’s being hunted down, Equestria’s most wanted, that whole deal.” He pointed a hoof at me. “Rumor has it even your country, out east, wants a piece of the action. Apparently, word got leaked that she used you as bait.”

It wasn’t worth it to correct him about where I came from; I was still taken aback at the whole thing. Then, I remembered how she’d given me a little sneer, Thursday night, right after sending me and Sunset into the Artisan District.

For all I cared, Erntving could have her.

Starfall shrugged. “Anyway, I didn’t come here to tell you about her drunk-assed bullshit. I came to ask, uh... how you’re doing.”

I returned his shrug. “I’m in the hospital. So... not my best day ever.”

He chuckled, lightly, before his tone turned somber and low. “I meant, how are you taking everything?” I turned an annoyed palm up at his phrasing, and he clarified. “Look. Iron said you’ve mentioned your partner from last week a few times.” Before I could defend myself, he continued, “And I think it’s cool. Well, er, cool you... uh... feel bad about it...”

I glared at him while he put a hoof to his mouth and actually thought before talking.

“I know what you’re going through. Survivor’s guilt. I’ve been there before, and...” Starfall turned to the window, and his ears flipped back. “I’m there now, I guess.” He shrugged. “It’s not fun, but it’s a normal part of things when someone dies.”

I raised an eyebrow and mulled over the words. More importantly, I thought about the opportunity of having Starfall there—a slightly-better-than-neutral party, and someone who’d been there. Plus, he was only an officer at that point; Iron had asked about some of the same things, but I didn’t want to throw it on top of all his other stuff. Given how he’d done the same about all the stuff with Sherry, I didn’t feel too guilty about it, either.

“It sucks,” I agreed.

Starfall’s ears perked up, and he looked over to me. “That it does. And that’s why I’m here now, on my day off—”

“Day off? It’s Thursday...”

He laughed. “Yeah, uh... Guard regulations have something against officers working five fourteen-hour shifts in a row, or something. Which... I am going to be an officer for a very long time now...” He stared off at the wall behind me. “But whatever. They needed me, and it’s not like there’s any difference between an empty bed and a Citadel bunk...

“Anyway...” Starfall’s eyes flared open as he continued. He pointed a hoof at me. “Can you survive a walk to the north end of town?”

“I... maybe? Why?”

“This morning’s the funeral service for everyone... or at least, all the guards who died last Friday. So, maybe, you want to go with me? Iron says you’re better off not going, but I don’t think he’s had twenty uninterrupted minutes of thought since... well, since Friday. That’s not to say he isn’t working with your best interest in mind, but that ‘autopilot Iron’ plays things way too safe for their own good.”

That was a scarily accurate way of putting it, but then again, they’d been friends for a decade.

After I got done dwelling on that little nugget of Iron’s psychology, I thought about Starfall’s proposal. Did I want to go to a funeral? My gut reaction was that no, I didn’t. However, the more I thought about it, the more I realized Starfall was here in his own brand of a friendly capacity—and he did know about the whole process.

I nodded.

Starfall’s eyes lit up in a relieved smile. I returned a weak grin; then I realized he hadn’t necessarily come here only for my best interest.

After I had agreed, there came an awkward wait where he was standing over me and I needed to get out of bed. A few moments of silence later, I narrowed my eyes. “What, are you going to stand and watch me get out of bed?”

“I... Wh...” His mouth flapped shut. “I’ll go out to the hallway.”

He turned and did just that. Once he was gone, I threw off my sheets and got out of bed—not really a private affair, but one that I didn’t want him standing over and watching, either.

I walked into my bathroom and checked myself out in the mirror; I’d showered last night, but pillows and sheets had taken the edge off that. I didn’t want to make Starfall wait for me to take another one, so I compromised by smoothing out as many of my bed-ruffled feathers as I could manage.

When I was as good as I was gonna get, I walked out and met Starfall in the hallway. I took a quick look at my neighbors’ rooms and asked, “What about the other guys?”

“They’ve either been released from the hospital, or they’re at the cemetery already.” He lightly tilted his head to the side. “Farrington Guard. We look out for our own.”

I glared at him. “Didn’t you stab me last month? And what about Sherry?”

He shrugged. “Okay. Your lieutenants all have a history of sucking. But the rest of the Guard... doesn’t.”

I remembered the weeks after our duel, when practically everyone had turned against me. Then again, if Starfall were telling the truth, a fight between two guards would force everyone to take a side—and they sided with the one who’d been there longer. I supposed I could agree, even if I hadn’t really seen the good end of it before.

We started walking off the floor, but we got stopped by one of the nurses. “Excuse me! Where are you taking—”

She stopped to trade a glare with Starfall. I looked back and forth between the two of them, and finally Starfall grinned maliciously. “I’m borrowing her for an hour. I’ll bring her back, just, there’s stuff she needs to do outside.”

The nurse turned to me, and I nodded. “Yeah, sort of what he said, minus the asshole bits.”

“This completely violates hospital rules and regulations!”

“Why don’t you go find a supply closet and violate your rules?” Starfall muttered.

“Excuse me?” she spat through clenched teeth.

“You’re excused!” He replied in a loud, authoritative tone. Some of the other ponies on the floor turned to watch us, and the nurse’s rage turned into shock.

Before she could say anything, Starfall turned and walked away. I wasn’t sure what to think of the situation, so I turned and followed him. By the time I heard a “Hey!” of complaint behind us, we were almost to the double doors that led out of the trauma ward.

When we got down to the lobby, I finally asked, “What was that all about?”

Starfall chuckled. “Do you like to combine personal victories with practical matters?”

I nodded, which turned out to be a mistake, so I slowed down for a few steps.

He kept his pace the same as mine, so Starfall was still next to me when he continued explaining, “It takes a special kind of evil to be constantly cheery in a manner that makes someone thoroughly miserable. But also, if I’d let her keep talking, she’d try to walk us through the whole ‘get a pass to leave the hospital’ deal, which would need a doctor’s approval, which would probably take us until nine—and the funeral’s at eight-thirty.”

I shot a glance at the clock as we were leaving. “That’s in three minutes.”

“I know. We’re already running late without her help.”

I fought to keep my head straight as I chuckled. “Tactical assholery. Only you.”

“Only me.”

Our walk to the cemetery was a quiet, slow ordeal—made all the worse because I had to walk on my palms. The sun was bright and hot, and the sticky humidity wore me out before I’d even gone a block. After a grand total of a minute, I began to wonder if I’d make it outside the city.

Starfall dipped around me, onto my left side. Before I could ask what he was doing, he grabbed my left arm and draped it over his neck. It squished us together, so walking like that was awkward, but it was a lot less strain on my other three limbs. “Thanks...” I muttered.

He grunted to accept it. “You’re lighter than you look.”

I seethed a sigh off into the distance, but I decided he meant it as an offhanded comment, not an insult.

Farrington’s cemetery was actually about a hundred yards north of the city. A thin, wrought-iron fence ran around the entire perimeter of the vast field it took up, and inside lay rows upon rows of grave markers of various sizes. A few were carved into symbols of their residents’ former occupations: some were shaped like shields, while others looked like pickaxes.

The whole place marked a whole city’s history—ponies who’d lived and died to make it what it was today.

It was creepy. Back in my tribe, we burned our dead and took the remaining ashes—both wood and griffin ashes—to the Jägerwald. We wrote histories to remind us of who had passed; we didn’t make huge fields of symbolic reminders placed over rotting corpses.

I tuned that thought out, though. This was Equestria, this was their dead, so I’d let them choose how to deal with them.

Before Starfall and I walked through the gates, I could already see the huge gathering of ponies who were in the middle of the ceremony. Iron, wearing his golden armor, stood behind a podium, in front of a row of caskets, and he faced the crowd. I saw his lips moving, but we were too far away for me to hear him.

Starfall and I made our way to the crowd, and before we came to a stop, I could make out some of the eulogy:

“—and that together, we will band together in strength—their strength—and carry on, to live by their shining example of ultimate courage.”

Captain Bulwark spent the next ten minutes talking about the fallen guards’ honor and loyalty to their duties. He kept bringing it back to the importance of unity, and how, despite our differences, all citizens of Farrington were capable of coming together to get through harsh times.

Seeing how I spent Iron’s whole speech being held up by Starfall, I had to agree.

When he finished speaking, a trumpet blared out a loud, solemn tune. The brass notes signaled something final, an end, and around me, several ponies started crying. Next to me, I saw that Starfall was on the verge himself. I patted him a few times on the shoulder, and he silently nodded his appreciation.

After the service, the crowd dissipated. A large part of them were guards, who probably had to get back into the city for their patrols. That left the civilians—friends and families of the fallen guards.

“Come on...” Starfall nudged me, and together we headed over to the row of caskets behind Iron’s podium. Starfall steered me towards the one that was second from the left, but even before we got to it, I saw Sunset’s portrait beneath it.

There was a small group near her casket, but they made room for us to walk past. We came to a stop five feet away from her casket, where Starfall finally set me down. Then he stepped away to give me some time alone with Sunset.

I didn’t know what to think. The whole thing seemed so unfair—she’d been killed for walking next to me, but there wasn’t any warning, any pre-battle parley.

“I’m sorry,” I told her. It was the only thing I could say.

It made me feel a little better.

A few minutes later, Iron showed up on my right. In a low whisper, he apologized: “I didn’t intend to keep you from attending...”

I shook my head. It made me dizzy. “Starfall had to carry me here; I couldn’t have made it alone.”

Iron put a hoof around my shoulder, and I nestled into him in reply. After a few moments, he said, “That’s what friends are for.”

After mulling it over, I agreed. “Yeah.”

Iron and I didn’t spend much more time in front of Sunset’s casket; she had other friends and family that were closer, ponies that deserved to say some final goodbyes. When it was time, Iron picked me up, and the two of us moved over to make room for everyone else.

As the two of us walked together, I found myself being filled with a growing sense of inner peace.

8 - Lebe Durch Frieden

Saturday morning, eight days after Friday’s attack, things had calmed down enough where I could safely take the morning off to rest and be a friend for Starfall. He wanted to attend the funeral wake of the colt that he’d killed in defense of Gilda; he also rightfully saw it as a situation where he might want some form of company—or tactical backup. If I’d known he planned on attending, he wouldn’t have even needed to ask me.

Plus, if I were taking some time off, he was one of my few close friends in the city that I could actually visit with. Comet and Maxie were still out of town, and Gilda’s nurse had put her under heavy lockdown after Thursday morning—which Starfall had repeatedly apologized for, but I was frustrated nonetheless.

Either way, even if he were a tactless asshole sometimes, Starfall was my friend the tactless asshole. So at ten-forty, the two of us, dressed in our formal attire, attended a funeral wake together.

We counted for just over a quarter of the ponies present.

Of the other five, one was the owner of the funeral home, three were colts around the age of the deceased—I doubted any of them were much older than seventeen—and one of those colts had brought along a foal of his own.

It felt odd that Starfall and I were the oldest guests in attendance—excluding the owner—but it made a disturbing amount of logical sense. Red Hooves had partially built his empire by preying on unwanted and abandoned youths; by acting as something akin to a father, in his recruits’ minds, he’d inspired something beyond mere loyalty.

“It’s a damn shame,” Starfall muttered.

I nodded my consent. I looked at the colt with a foal, and it made me wonder: during the two years I’d spent mining, if I had bad luck and temptation, could I have chosen my integrity over Maxie’s survival? Fortunately, I’d never had to find out.

Starfall and I walked up to the casket, which was open. I noted the colt inside wore a formal bow tie that clashed with the nonexistent attire of his friends—then again, it was probably hiding the knife wound. I said nothing while Starfall put his hoof on the polished wood of the casket; at first, all he did was to breathe deeply and shake his head. After a few moments, he muttered, “I regret this had to happen, and I apologize.”

As the two of us walked away from the casket, I read the colt’s name—Hot Rolls—on a small easel that had been set up with his picture. Turning away from it, I then saw that the three colts his age were eyeing Starfall and me with scorn. They didn’t make any move towards us, but I made a note to ensure we weren’t followed outside the funeral home. It would be an incredibly stupid thing for them to do, but if there was anything I had learned in the past few months, it was that vengeful motives seemed to be a catalyst for acting without thinking.

Outside in the Business District, Starfall and I walked for a few blocks. Once I was certain we weren’t being followed, I let my mental defenses fall back to their usual instinctive levels. Starfall appeared to have similar timing, because I heard him sigh deeply before asking, “Three hundred and sixty-two arrests, before last Friday. Who would have thought that my three hundred and sixty third would be the one where I had to kill someone?”

I shrugged. “Statistically speaking, most officers who end up taking a life in the line of duty do so around three hundred arrests.”

He blew a hot chuckle out his nose. “Well, that helps.”

“I wasn’t saying the math makes it right, Star. But that eventually, you’re going to get to that perpetrator that makes you make that decision. I mean...” I took a slow breath as I changed tactics. “How many officers did you give help to when they had to make that choice?”

“Enough,” he admitted. We turned onto a street that would eventually connect with the main drag of Farrington. After twenty feet, Starfall finished, “It’s different, I guess, to give someone advice and to take it for yourself. I...” He shook his head. “He had his whole life ahead of him. Seventeen’s too young to make any sort of life-altering decision, let alone go out in the streets to win the ‘love’ of a monster that can’t even feel things.”

I turned to him, but I didn’t want to make an ironic point about our pasts. When he was seventeen, he had come to Farrington to start a new life with his girlfriend; two years later, when I turned seventeen, I had been promoted to sergeant during my second annual officer’s evaluation. Instead, I agreed with him: “It’s a good thing that Red Hooves is off the street.”

“Yeah...” I saw him nod. “So, what’re you doing about his whole plea bargain thing?”

I chuckled as I mused, “That is officially above your rank’s right to know, Officer Starfall.”

After a short pause, he muttered darkly, “All right then, Captain Stick-Up-Your-Ass. You first mentioned it to me...”

“Relax...” I shook my head; I’d have to bear in mind that our running joke only work when there was one rank’s difference between us. “Unofficially, the courts have asked me to weigh in, since a large portion of guard deaths over the past fifteen years can likely be attributed to him or someone in his organization.” I sighed. The next part was difficult to speak aloud, even to a friend: “I’ve advised them to accept. I’ve also requested that any executions be stayed until he and all of his guilty conspirators can be executed together.”

We reached the main drag of Farrington, but with nowhere directly in mind, we slowed to a stop. Our intersection was only a few blocks south of the main intersection of the city, which meant we were nearly the same distance between my favorite bar or Starfall’s, if he wanted lunch. I pointed to the southeast and asked, “Mel’s?”

Starfall looked around for a clock. “What time is it? I’ve got a shift at two.”

“It’s not past eleven yet.”

“Yeah, fine...” Both of us turned south, and Starfall asked, “But, uh... ‘all conspirators?’ As in, mass hanging? Why?”

“There’s precedent, for starters,” I began. “But it’ll also give the courts and lawyers time to sort things out. Third, it seems to be the... tidiest way to do things. It sends a clear message to would-be criminals, at least. And finally...” I took a deep breath and blinked the stinging out of my eyes. “If she values her revenge over the lives of her friends and subordinates, then I will save her a spot on the gallows, right next to Red Hooves.”

Starfall slowed to a stop. I turned to meet his wide eyes. “Damn, Iron. Justice was...” He shook his head. “That’s pretty dark.”

I started walking away, and Starfall caught up in time to hear me say, “If she wants to throw away eight years’ friendship and two decades’ worth of service to the Guard as if it were nothing, then what was she, Star?” I sighed. “You, at least, made your mistakes in a face-to-face confrontation without leaving a body count in the double digits...” I shook my head; I didn’t want to think of what would have happened if he had won his duel to the death with Gilda.

I continued, “So, is it ‘dark’ to make arrangements for a former friend’s execution? Perhaps. But in the end, it depends on the court’s verdict. Perhaps my larger betrayal is how I provided the Equestrian Guard with all the information I had on her—including my spare key to her home—to aid in their search. It may not be this month, or even this year, and it might not even end in death, but she will be brought to justice.”

“Huh...” was all that Starfall said in reply. He thankfully changed the topic: “But... I guess that means the streets here are safer now, right?”

I looked up and down the main drag of the city. From north to south, an expanse of just over four miles, there were less than fifty ponies outdoors on a sunny Saturday morning. I gave him a sad grin. “I don’t think there’s any individuals on the street, let alone violent criminals.”

He nodded in the corner of my eye. “Yeah, a lot of the remnants of Red’s operation are lying low. It’s why we need—”

“We need to recoup our losses and hire over a dozen new guards,” I interjected. Starfall had mentioned his idea for a special task force whose job would be to hunt down the remainder of Red Hooves’ criminal and stamp out any replacements. It was a good idea, but even with a contingent of the Equestrian National Guard, I didn’t have the horsepower to put it into action.

There was also the fact that, since I was due for a competency hearing on Tuesday of next week, I didn’t want to make any brash, risky maneuvers for my critics to use as fuel against me.

“All right...” He flared his non-casted wing in a pegasus shrug. “I’m just saying, Comet’s coming back next week, which is going to cut into my chances of overtime.”

I chuckled. Over the past week, Starfall had probably set a record for hours of overtime accrued by an officer—and that was before he’d browbeaten me into letting him continue working. Officially, he was helping out because we were so heinously short on Farrington guards, and officially, I’d signed off on an order that temporarily lifted the ban on overtime for all officers.

Unofficially, I knew how lonely he got without his wife and children. It was one of the several reasons why I didn’t mind keeping him company during his few off hours.

Regardless of my reasoning, the news of his wife and children’s return sent my thoughts to Hoofington. I had only written Maxie once since Friday; I had sent more money and apologized. Her reply had accepted my apology—but it was in a manner that was either understanding or ice-cold. I placed my hopes on the former, but I still wondered how my sister was faring that morning...

Ten minutes into lunch with Comet Tail and her kids, I was trying to decide if I wished that our café could serve alcohol. They couldn’t; Hoofington law didn’t let them do it before two in the afternoon. Since it was barely past eleven-thirty, I didn’t have any escape for my own stupidity.

Hoofington wasn’t even that bad of a city for me to be as miserable as I was. Over the past three years that I went out on deliveries, I’d always liked my one-night layovers in the city. Now, after spending a week there, I could definitely say that I liked the city for more than just its quiet hotels.

My main problem that morning was a lack of foresight. When I agreed to dinner with a mother, I hadn’t made the connection that she’d bring her kids along, too. It was obvious in hindsight, but that didn’t help me in the present, where I was currently trapped in a two-pronged conversation that came at me from both sides.

Luckily, the post office had given me four years’ experience in faking smiles and interest in ponies’ lives. Still, it was annoying how I couldn’t even use magic to help me drink my bright fruit smoothie thing—which was pretty tasty, all things considered—without it becoming a spectacle of “Oh! Can you do this randomly stupid thing?”

Kids. Ugh. Maybe in a decade. Maybe. I had no idea how Comet put up with them. Then again, she’d gotten knocked up at age seventeen, so she probably didn’t have a choice in the matter.

“You okay over there, Max? You’re kind of quiet.” Comet smiled at me, almost like she could sympathize with my situation.

I flashed a grin at her. “Yeah, I... didn’t get a lot of sleep last night.” It was a lie; almost every day this week, I’d actually gotten good sleep without any company. That really shouldn’t have come as such good news as it did, but after a ton of guards had just died in a street war in Farrington, I’d take good news where I could get it.

Comet nodded back at me, and I saw her raise her eyebrows in understanding. Like, “I understand you’re an alcoholic shut-in.” Which, I wanted to scoff at her judgment, but I wouldn’t—not in front of her kids.

Seriously, though, just because I didn’t want to go out shopping or to zoos and parks and shit with her and her little brats didn’t mean I was staying in my room and drinking all day. Granted, I’d done that for all of last weekend, but once I’d come to grips with the whole “Iron’s a giant idiot when it comes to showing how he loves ponies” thing, I started to find ways to enjoy myself around Hoofington.

Monday morning, I’d gone shopping. I’d started with the necessities—better shampoos than the stuff in my hotel room. One thing had led to another, and I’d ended up spending the whole day outside, exploring the city.

Unlike when Iron took me to new places and restaurants, I actually liked it. Hoofington was a much brighter, more-open place than Farrington. There were also a lot more unicorns around; usually, I didn’t get weird looks whenever I used magic to do stuff.

Even better, the city was quiet. I’d gotten up at dawn a few times, and the first time, I had to question what seemed weird about the morning air. When I realized it was the absence of distant, industrial-sized bellows pounding in the background, I couldn’t help but smile.

All of it made me start asking some very important questions.

At the café lunch table, our waiter came by with both of our bills. Comet had offered to pay when she first asked me to lunch, but it’d be wrong for me to accept—Iron had given me money twice in the last week, and I didn’t really know Comet. It was kind of her, but really, it’d just end up being weird.

After our meals were paid for, she smiled and asked, “So, what do you have going on for the rest of the day, Max?”

Her question sounded bright and pleasant enough, and she was probably being nice, but I knew better than to hide behind a lie. If I said that I wasn’t doing much, then I’d get roped into hanging around kids for another few hours. So I told the truth: “I’ve got a letter I’ve got to write, then I’m going to go shopping again.”

She chuckled and nodded. “Well, take care, then...” After a moment, she stood up and ordered, “Hailey! Moonshine! We’ve got shopping of our own to do before we go to the park.”

We all said a bouncing round of goodbyes, and Comet left with her kids. That meant that, finally, it was time for what I’d wanted to do since this morning—to write a letter.

I pushed away my empty smoothie glass, dried off the water ring it left behind, and then opened up my saddlebags. I’d brought ink, quills, and paper. I arranged my writing supplies in front of me to write my letter outside the post office, like a civilized pony. I’d thought hard about what I wanted to say for a while—or at least, for the past two days.

Over the last few years, I’d thought I’d noticed a growing rift between my brother and me. That’d been poisonous selfishness when really, I’d just been envious of the past when he’d been forced to spend every moment of his free time with me at home. He’d cooked, cleaned, helped me with my homework, and he always tried to put my mind at ease about everything. Until I graduated from school, he’d been more of a dad to me than a brother.

Once I could take care of myself, once I did have a job, I shouldn’t have expected things to stay the same. When Iron did start trying to split the chores between us, I should’ve seen it for what it was: He hadn’t been trying to flaunt his new lieutenant’s armor; he just needed a well-earned break.

So really, there hadn’t been anything worse between us, other than what I’d put there. Throw in some questionable life decisions and a few years’ worth of lies, and our rift had really just become a self-fulfilling prophecy.

Now that I could look past it, though, I knew we were going to be okay. I loved him, and he felt the same way back. That’d stay the same no matter what happened or where I went with my life.

Even if I took a leap of faith.

The cream-colored paper in front of me seemed transcendental, like for a moment, I was staring into the blank potential my future. I smiled as I magicked up a quill and dipped it in ink; really, that was exactly what this letter was.

I wrote:

Dear Iron,

I haven’t read much of the news, but even then, I’m sure I wouldn’t know what’s actually going on in Farrington. So, I hope you’re doing well, and again—I know you were just doing what’s right for me. I was kind of pissed at first, but I got over that.

Anyway, I really like it here in Hoofington. Like, a lot.

I took a deep breath. Even if it was just a letter, it was still a pretty huge thing to write about.

I think I’m going to stay here. Maybe even for a long time. I’m not sure yet.

I’ve checked my bank account, and I’ve got enough to last me for a while. I mean, you always told me to save up for something, right? But no, I’m going to try to do this whole independence thing the right way: get a place to live, get a job, and... well, I’ll see where that all takes me.

And speaking of a job, I actually might have come across something with the Hoofington Guard. I asked about it on Thursday; they’ve got an opening for a mail clerk.

But, they want a letter of recommendation from my former employer. Since I’m not sure where I stand with Mr. McFeely—did you even tell him I’d left?—I was wondering if you might put in a good word for me. I know I did... stuff... in Stalliongrad, but that’s not really going to be a problem, since I don’t have to travel for this job.

And, I like it in Hoofington.

So, I want to wrap things up with a few final things. One, this isn’t because I’m mad, or anything you’ve done. Ever. You did everything for me, even if I was an ungrateful little brat about it. But now, I feel, well, I dunno, it’s hard to explain. It’s kind of like that I always felt so cramped in Farrington. I’m not going to blame the city for everything, either, but I got into a lot of bad habits living there.

But here in Hoofington, I’m... I’m kind of like you, really. Exploring, shopping, meeting ponies.

Like I said, I like it here. And you’ve got a girlfriend now—

I magicked the ink off the page. All I’d known is that his girlfriend been sent to the hospital, unconscious, and I didn’t know anything else. His letter on Wednesday didn’t seem distraught, but I still used a much safer phrasing just in case:

And you’ve shown, in the past few months, that you’re ready to start dating and maybe settle down with someone. I’m not saying you’re going to be married and living together with anyone next week, but... well, you know. I think I’ve reached that point where it’s time for me to strike out on my own anyway; we were never going to be two married couples under one roof, so this had to happen sometime, right?

The most important thing I want to say is, this isn’t really “goodbye.” I mean, you’re four hours away, and I’ll send you my new address once I get things sorted out. Once things settle down on both our ends, maybe you can even come visit?

Until then, I’m being careful, and I’m being smart. I’ve really thought this through, and I know it’s happening quick, but it just feels right, you know? Like, in my heart?

In the end, you’ll always be my big brother. Even if we’re in different cities, I’m not going to fall out of touch. I promise. And I love you.

Your sister,
Maxie

I smiled as I reread the whole thing. I wasn’t a hundred percent certain about this move—I really couldn’t be—but I had a safety net, and I wanted things to work out for me. Farrington had too many bad memories for me—too much death, too much sorrow, and too many bad habits.

Hoofington wasn’t going to cure me overnight, but I could definitely use a change of pace. Without Iron hoof-feeding me everything, I’d have to work to provide for myself—once my savings ran out, which wouldn’t be until around May, so I had a bit of a buffer. Even if I didn’t have a small fortune in my bank account, I was more than okay with finding a new job in Hoofington.

Once the ink dried on the top sheet of paper, I folded it up and wrote Iron’s address on the outside. A letter probably wasn’t the best way to break the news, but I didn’t want to risk heading into Farrington to tell him face-to-face. For all I knew, he was embroiled in a war right now; he could read a letter when he had the time to.

For now, I was hopeful about the future. I also knew that, once things cooled down for him, Iron would feel the same way.

Tuesday morning, I arrived at City Hall in a hopeful mood for my competency hearing as Captain of the Guard. Or rather, due to the nature of the hearing—one that evaluated my position within the guard, and whether or not I was worthy of that role—I had my competency hearing to see if I would remain Captain of the Farrington Guard. Still, I had ten years of good service to the Guard; I trusted it would count for something.

However, the longer that Farrington’s city councilors discussed my actions over the past few months, the more my uncertainty grew. My allies on the council at least kept things from becoming too personal—which meant my relationship with Gilda was mostly left out of things.

Even with that small favor, by the end of the hearing, the most pleasant thing I could say about it was that it was over quickly. When it convened, I accepted the councilors’ ruling with the dignity and stature befitting my position.

It was my last action as captain.

Starfall had accompanied me to City Hall, but he applied some very-much-appreciated wisdom in not accompanying me as I left. His name had been mentioned far too many times in the last half hour, and while I couldn’t blame him for everything that happened, I was glad that he understood how I wanted nothing to do with anyone for the time being.

Outside City Hall, I walked the dead, empty streets of the Business District. Every step was hollow—the gilded boots I wore felt heavy, as they were no longer mine. As the hearing’s verdict stated, “Effective immediately, you are stripped of your role and rank, and pending further review by the next council-appointed Captain of the Guard, you are hereby discharged from the Farrington Guard.”

I had been appropriated one hour to collect my personal effects from my office in the Citadel. As I walked towards it, for what could very well have been the last time, I took a quick mental inventory of what that was. Fortunately, I had a set of saddlebags there; this day was already shaping up to be awful without any minor inconveniences.

At the Citadel, Memo greeted me with her usual chipper manner, and I feigned a warm smile for her. I wasn’t looking forward to the next part, where I needed to pass through the Sergeant’s Quarters in order to reach my office in the Citadel. During my three years of service as captain, I must have walked through those six desks over a thousand times—once when I got to the Citadel, and once my in-house paperwork was done, once on my way out to the southern gate station.

I had endured some hard days as captain, but easily, today was the hardest. Three sergeants saluted me, which I returned out of politeness—I was wearing the armor still, and it was easier to let them get on with their duties than to explain the situation. Still, every step I took was a battle to keep my face straight; every metallic hooffall was a resonation of failure.

By some cosmic fortune, I made it to my office without losing my dignity. Even in there, amongst the polished mahogany shelves and tables, I fought to stay resolute.

The difficulty caused my forelimbs to wobble, but I persevered. I had a task to perform, after all. It wouldn’t wait due to how, for ten years, all I had ever known was being a guard. Even before I had enlisted, growing up under my father’s example, it had always been everything that I’d wanted.

Yet it was all taken from me in one afternoon.

The eleven days after Sherry’s gang war had been a fight to restore order to Farrington, but the Guard had finally seemed to be gaining the upper hoof. I knew there were more factors to consider—mainly, my apparent lack of judgment in hiring and promoting guards—but the timing of it all still seemed unduly harsh. It was as if my efforts and sacrifices were all being spat upon.

I shamed myself out of the idle musing. I had one task to perform, and it was a simple one. There wasn’t an armor stand in my office—the office, I corrected myself—so I had to make do by clearing off the desktop and using the cushion. It would keep the gold plating from accruing any scratches, at least.

Once I was bereft of my armor, I got my saddlebags down from their rack and began packing my personal belongings. Fortunately, I had never really picked up a habit of collecting trinkets; after the first five minutes, I had to carefully scan the room to find the items that weren’t there when I inherited the room from Captain Reigner.

A knock at the door shook me from my absent-minded plundering. For a moment, I debated not responding to it; I had been given one hour, and it hadn’t even been thirty minutes since the verdict had fallen.

In the end, I decided there was a proper way to handle my situation, so I opened the door. On the other side of it stood Lieutenant Horatio. Or rather, he was just Horatio; currently, he wasn’t wearing his—

Suddenly, I realized what was happening. I fought down the anger of bitter pride as I stepped aside to let him enter the office—or now, it was his office. Horatio walked to the front side of his desk, removed his typical sunglasses, and turned to face me eye-to-eye.

After hearing his not-so-silent criticisms of my promotions above him for the last four years, I didn’t want to endure his victory speech. I simply stated a fact: “I will be out of here shortly.” I left out the bitter admission of, “You win.”

He shook his head. “I hope not. I had some things I wanted to discuss before you left.”

I pursed my lips before asking, “Which things?”

“For starters, some clarification of the things you no doubt heard me say about you during your tenure as captain.”

Fifteen seconds, I vowed. That was how long I would give him to gloat before I left his office, and damn anything I left behind.

Horatio picked up the golden helmet from his desk with one hoof and looked at his reflection in the gold. “I never said you were a bad captain, or anything close to incompetent. Just that you were better off as a sergeant.”

“Duly noted.” Inside, I kept counting: Seven... Eight...

He put the helmet down and turned to me. “You like the city, and you like making friends. But can you honestly say those ended up helping run a smooth Guard?”

“In the end, probably not.” I’d reached fifteen seconds, so I added, “But I wish you the best of luck in running things.”

I made a move towards the door, but Horatio turned to box me in. “You made a mistake, Iron. Or rather, you let your heart lead your brain, which...” He shrugged. “Honestly, you probably succeeded in ripping the roots of organized crime straight out of this city. You don’t deserve what the newspapers are going to do to your legacy.”

Even though I was effectively trapped in the conversation, I still offered a quiet, “Thank you—”

“Internally, I’m going to write this incident up as cleanly as I can for you.”

I nodded. “Again, thank you—”

“Because one day, you will be ready to step up to the rank of lieutenant. You’ll have your friends and colleagues within the Guard, but you’ll learn the proper boundaries for everything—and more importantly, so will they. When that day comes, ponies will remember the Iron Bulwark who willingly stepped down after taking out the Hooves Syndicate, not the Iron Bulwark who got sacked for promoting a ticking time bomb of mental health issues to lieutenant. I will make sure of that.”

I blinked as I tried to process all of what he’d just said. He was preserving my legacy, but... “Why?”

Horatio’s eyebrow arched. “Are... Iron, we’re in the middle of the worst deficit the Guard’s seen since this city was founded. ‘Discharged pending review’ doesn’t mean ‘go fly a kite.’ It means it’s my call, and I already told you: You’re one of the best sergeants I’ve ever seen. I can’t force you to stay...” He stepped back, giving me clear access to his office’s door. “But I certainly want to offer you the rank and role that I think you’re suited for.”

Relief flooded over me with such a heavy surge that my knees felt weak. Seconds after it came a feeling of immense foolishness at having the obvious pointed out, but I set that aside. Sergeant was better than nothing, absolutely—it was my father’s rank, after all, and... admittedly, it would carry a lot less stress from responsibilities.

I bowed my head in thanks, but curiosity drove me to ask, “What about the other ‘questionable hiring decisions’ the council mentioned?”

He chuckled. “Are you asking if I’m going to discharge the two officers whose names are plastered all over the arrests of the Hooves’ Syndicate? I’ve only been captain for fifteen minutes; it’s a little early to commit political suicide.”

“Right...” I shook my head. “This morning wasn’t the best way to cap off the past week.”

“I understand.” Horatio took a few steps back so he was standing alongside his desk, facing me. “Go home, rest up. I’ll expect you here first thing on Monday morning, Iron...” He picked his sunglasses up off the desk and put them on. “So don’t get rusty.”

I resisted the urge to groan, as that would probably have put a slight damper on his kindness towards me. All I said was, “Thank you, sir,” and after that, I exited his office.

* * *

My mind raced for the entire walk to my home. Today already, I had been discharged, reinstated, effectively demoted, and I probably had to hunt down Starfall before his guilt led him to any more terrible decisions.

It wasn’t even noon.

I would have had thought that the day had carried enough surprises, but apparently, my sister had discovered a way to vex my mind from over a hundred miles away. Or rather, after reading her letter, I blinked, read it a second time, and blinked a few more times before the third time.

She wants to live in Hoofington?

It made sense, based on what she wrote in her letter. And I had effectively gotten her fired from her job at the post office—something that was my fault, which I had already explained to her superior. So if she liked Hoofington better, and she no longer had non-family ties to Farrington...

It made sense. But I hadn’t expected it at all.

I consoled myself by cooking lunch, washing the dishes, and going back to my couch to read Maxie’s letter a fourth time. This time, her words filled me with an acute sense of loss. Despite her words to the contrary, she was moving away—or going to try out independent living, at any rate—and that was going to leave me alone.

We’d lived together since our parents brought her home one day, and I had always tried to be there for her. I had failed in raising her on my own, but even then, those years of failure had been us, together. I told myself that I respected her decision, and logically, I had no other choice, but one fact remained: I was going to miss her.

By the time two o’clock had come and left, I had sat on my couch for a few hours. I’d spent the time reminiscing about Maxie and me, all the days we’d spent together in the past, and how it had always been us against the world.

A knock on my front door snapped me out of my nostalgia. I walked over to the door and wondered if the news was going to be terrible or simply awful. After a dark chuckle, I steeled my nerves for whatever it could be; pessimism only worked as a precautionary tool if one took it seriously.

I opened the door, and Gilda was standing on my doormat.

We stood there, staring at each other for a few moments, and I wracked my brain to remember if we’d ever actually been to my home together. She had bandages wrapped around her left wing, which didn’t make sense if I were hallucinating, but then again, if my subconscious knew that...

“Uh... hi?”

Her question brought me back down to earth. “Hello,” I bowed my head. “Did... How did you know where I lived?”

Gilda scoffed and turned around to leave.

No... I told myself. I’d had enough troubles today with adding a fight with Gilda into the mix. Throwing caution into the wind, I grabbed her wrist and apologized. “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean it like that...”

She turned back to me with sad, hurt eyes. “What’s Starfall talking about? Why don’t you want to see me?”

I shook my head. “I have no idea. I...” My mind drew a blank. “I... Gilda... no idea.”

Her eyebrow raised, and she asked, “Is... everything okay?”

I shook my head again, and she stepped forward with an open arm, readying for a hug. I pulled her into me with perhaps too much force; she made a sudden gurgle noise as I buried my face in her neck’s softness.

After the initial shock wore off, she returned the hug by rubbing me between my shoulders. We stood like that, in my doorway, for what felt like a very long instant—it was enough time for me to feel better about my situation, but when she pulled away, it still felt over too quickly.

When we broke apart, I motioned to my couch. “But... come in, have a seat.”

She stepped deeper into my living room and looked around at everything. Her gaze came to rest on my empty armor stand, but she didn’t say anything. Instead, she walked over to my couch.

Before I joined her, I asked, “Would you like anything to drink?”

“No.”

With that settled, I walked over to my couch with her, and sat on the left side, away from her. It was a two-cushioned model, so there wasn’t much space, but after smothering her, I wanted to give her space if she wanted it.

She looked down at the space between us, then up to me. I shrugged, apologetically, and placed my arm on the back of the sofa. Gilda responded by shifting closer into me, and then wrapping my hoof around her.

“Now...” she said. “What’s going on?”

“First, what and when did you hear from Starfall?”

Gilda turned her head to look up at me, which tickled my shoulder. “I got discharged from the hospital today. I didn’t know where you or anyone was, and since I knew where his house is, I tried there first. He was home, just said ‘I probably want to give you some space for now.’” I felt her take a deep breath. “I mean, you didn’t visit me all weekend, then I go and hear that from him...”

I kissed the top of her head. “I’m sorry for that. After he took you to the funeral, the nurses on the floor started to give me more of a hassle about visiting hours, which fell during my usual shift...” I sighed. “Even on my usual day off, I was at a funeral with Starfall; after that, I kept working.”

“You could’ve sent a message...”

“I should have sent a message,” I agreed. “I’m sorry. I’m... apparently inexperienced at balancing my personal life and Guard duties.” I gestured my left hoof, over to my empty armor stand. “I suppose that part of my life has been made easier now.”

Gilda pulled away from me to stare at me, incredulous. “You... what?”

I shrugged. “I’ve been effectively demoted to sergeant, starting next week.”

Her eyes darted over to the armor stand, then to the wall behind us, and then they focused back on me. She pointed a finger at herself. “Because of me?”

“No!” I flared my eyes and shook my head. “If anything, because of Sherry, which they said was a symptom of my ‘over-fraternization,’ but really, they were just slathering on accusations of incompetence to see what stuck...” I shook my head. “Starfall came up in those accusations, because of his history with you, but that’s the extent of any official blame they had for you.”

“Oh...” Her head dropped down. After a moment, she leaned back onto me and said, “That sucks.”

“Indeed.” I slid my hoof back around her, and rubbed it up and down her side. When I did, I found the ridge where her brown feathers were replaced with fur, and I kept my arm there.

She gave me an inquisitive look, but shrugged before putting her hand on top of my hoof. “So, I take it you’ve had a rough morning?”

I laughed. “Oh, that’s not even all of it.” From my squat-like sitting position on the sofa, it was slightly difficult, but I kicked out one of my back hooves to nudge the coffee table, on which sat Maxie’s letter. “When I got home from it, I found out that my sister’s moving to Hoofington.” I shook my head as I pulled my leg back in. “So... just... a lot of changes, I guess. And that’s when you got here, which I... can’t say I was expecting...” I patted her ridge. “But I can’t say I mind, either.”

She craned her neck up vertically, and I craned my neck over her to come down on her beak in a kiss. After it was done, my tongue tingled, but I could still feel it enough to articulate, “How have you been?”

Gilda nestled into my shoulder a little more before she admitted, “Kinda rough, too.” I held her tighter as she continued, “Like... I dunno. The funeral helped, a little, but... I still feel crappy about everyone who died because of me.”

As much as I wanted to remind her that it wasn’t her fault, I thought it’d be best to hear her talk things out. I compromised by hugging her a little—

“Too tight,” she complained.

I loosened my grip.

“There. And I know, it wasn’t me—it was like, Sherry and Red Hooves going at it, and all of us got caught in the crossfire. But... still, I was there, and if Starfall hadn’t been there to save me at the end...” She shook her head as she tapered off into silence.

I took a deep breath. “If you’re having trouble coping, the Guard does offer counseling services.”

The back of her throat rumbled in a low sigh. “Are you saying I need a therapist?”

“I’m simply stating an option that not many officers are aware of.” I kept my tone neutral and soft.

“How many officers are doing that after what happened?”

I shrugged. “Honestly, since it’s mostly done on a sergeant-level basis, I didn’t see any of that paperwork over the past eleven days. But I guarantee you, there are some.”

She flipped her head up, and from above her, it looked like she were upside down. “What about you?”

I nodded. “I saw a counselor after the first time I had to subdue a criminal.” Thinking back to Starfall’s plight, I clarified, “As in, with the truncheon, not... killing him. At first, it seemed so strange, and vivid...” I grinned, sadly, because the nine-year-old memory was now distant and foggy. “But the sessions helped.”

Gilda shook her head. “No, I mean... from this. Demoted. De... sistered. Plus, all the stuff that happened. Are you going to see one now?”

I looked down at her and smiled. “If I see a counselor, will you?”

She nodded.

“Well...” I returned her nod. “Okay. I’ll get that set up for both of us.”

True to his word, Iron took care of everything to arrange a meeting with some shrink. He got one for himself, too, with back-to-back scheduling. So we got to go together, except we weren’t going to be together, like in the same room.

Our first appointments were on Thursday morning, which was weird, since technically, Sergeant Iron and I both had day shift patrols. He’d told me not to blame myself, but I still couldn’t help but feel bad that I indirectly lost him his job.

So, that morning, after I woke up in my inn room—my wing was still busted, so I was stuck in Farrington—I met Iron at a diner for breakfast, and the two of us went to go get our heads examined.

He went first, which left me alone in the waiting room for an hour as I... well, waited. The white walls made everything sound dimmer, somehow, and the magazines on the table in front of my cushion confused me until I realized that “December” meant eight months ago—not four months in the future. Between the conflicting messages I got from “Fifty Great Cake Ideas” and “Lose Twenty Pounds the Right Way,” I decided that the plastic tree in the corner of the room was less of a phony thing to stare at for fifty minutes.

When Iron was done, it was my turn to go in and talk to Doctor Sunshine, as the bright orange earth pony introduced himself. The room he led me to was a lot more comfortable than the waiting room had been; it was dim, and there were pictures and shelves full of toys—almost like the room was suited for living in.

There was a big couch on one wall, but I went for one of the big, pouffy beanbags—the kids at the hospital had a few for their play area, but this was the first time I’d seen one that was adult-sized. It was about as fun as I thought it’d be—not all that much—but Doctor Sunshine came over and joined me on his other beanbag.

“So, Miss Gilda, do you know what this is?”

I shrugged. “Not really. But... it’s just Gilda.”

He nodded, “Well, Gilda, since this is our first time meeting, I’d like to get to know you. But first, I’d like to tell you that anything you say here, I’m legally obligated to keep between us. Furthermore, since you’re choosing to see me, this is as much your time as you want it to be. If we get to a topic that makes you uncomfortable or distressed, let me know, and we can talk about something else.”

I looked around the room. “So... wait, aren’t you supposed to help me? How’s that work if I can just say ‘no?’”

Doctor Sunshine smiled, then folded a hind leg to rest its on top of his other knee. He then used that to support a little notepad, and he pulled out a thick-handled pencil. “You’d be surprised how easy it is to point to some problem areas of individuals’ lives that they don’t even know they’re hiding.”

I chuckled. “Oh yeah? Like what?”

“Like trust issues with strangers who have nothing to gain from hurting you.”

I opened my beak, closed it, and looked at the door we’d entered the room through. I turned back to my shrink. “That one’s easy. You just spent the last hour talking to Iron.”

He smiled weakly. “I can’t discuss any of my clients with you.”

“We’re dating...” I rolled my eyes. “I mean, what, didn’t he tell you that?”

My question fell on blank, dead eyes. “If you were dating another one of my clients, would you want him to tell me about you?”

“Well, yeah...” I nodded. “I mean, you’re the guy to talk to about important parts of your life, right?”

“Are you worried that your boyfriend doesn’t find you important?”

“No.” I felt happy at how easily and quickly the word came out. “But I mean, he...” I shrugged. The guy said he didn’t give out secrets, so I said, “The other day? He, like, grabbed me.” I held up a dismissive hand. “Not, like... in a bad way, or anything. But it was... like he wanted to, you know?”

“You liked that he was assertive?”

“Yeah.” I nodded, which surprised me a little. A shrink was at least good for keeping thoughts straight. “So, you know, I don’t want to have to hold up for bad stuff to happen before he does stuff like that.”

“So you want him to be more physically assertive?”

That time, the conflicting yes and no came out of my mouth in something that kind of sounded like “Yellow.” I thought about it: I liked being hugged, held, and kissed by him, but did I want more? “Maybe,” I admitted.

“But you’re afraid to tell him that.”

“I mean... it’s kind of weird to talk about, isn’t it?”

“Why?” Doctor Sunshine shrugged a little. “I mean, you’re both dating, and the last I heard, sex is part of romance, right?”

I flushed a little at the word. “Maybe. I don’t know. I never... there isn’t really an instruction manual for romance, is there?”

He chuckled lightly. “If there were, I’d probably need to find a new job. I wouldn’t mind, however.” After a few moments, he asked, “Did your parents ever talk to you about romance?”

“Ha!” I burst out before I could catch myself. He raised a curious eyebrow, so I explained, “My father caught my older sister spending some alone time with one of the, like, two males in our tribe.” I pointed two fingers at my shrink. “Like, talking.” I pointed at the floor between us. “About this distance, too. Father choke-slammed her into a wall so hard, it took her a week before she could tell me what happened.”

To Doctor Sunshine’s credit, he didn’t really cringe or shrink away from that story. All he said was, “I’m sorry that happened to you.”

I shook my head. “No, that was Gretchen. But that was all I needed to learn that lesson.”

As soon as I said the words, my mouth fell open. Had he done that, to her, just for me?

My shrink cleared his throat. “That... that’s what I meant.”

We spent the next half hour talking about my past, and, with ten minutes left in the session, I rushed in some stuff about the Friday attacks—my whole reason for starting counseling in the first place.

When I mentioned Sunset’s death, and how I couldn’t stop thinking about how it was my fault, he asked an interesting train of questions:

“What if it were your fault? What would you do to atone for that?”

“I...” I blinked. “I’d probably apologize to her family. But I already know they’d just say it’s not my fault, or they’d be wrong...” I shrugged. “I’d still feel bad, I guess.”

Doctor Sunshine nodded. “It’s okay to feel bad, Gilda. But it’s important to express those feelings—and all your feelings—in a constructive manner. If you keep them bottled up, they end up consuming you, and that is something that worries me.” He glanced at the clock. “Our time’s almost up today, so until next time, I want you to do two things: First, I want you to find a hobby, a creative outlet for your grief. It could be painting, poetry... anything that lets you express yourself.”

“Express myself. Got it.”

He stood up out of his beanbag and offered me a hoof. I took it, and pulled myself up to a standing position before he finished, “And secondly, don’t worry so much about what the important individuals in your life expect from you. If they care about you, they’ll accept you for who you are, and you can be honest with them.”

I nodded. “Honesty. That one’s... not so easy,” I admitted. “But I’ll try.”

After that, the two of us headed back out to the waiting room, where Iron was still sitting. I thanked Doctor Sunshine one last time before Iron and I left the building together.

“So, how was it?” he asked once we got outside.

“Good...” I admitted. “I mean, he kept things organized. What about you?”

“Also good. Would you like to talk about it over lunch?”

“Sure...” I nodded. “Where at?”

Iron chuckled. “This afternoon, I believe I’m in the mood for baking...”

That one sentence started off what ended up being an entire afternoon of cake-making. Or really, it was the beginning of an afternoon that I spent helping Iron bake a cake; I didn’t know enough about kitchens and bowls to do anything unsupervised. Even the stuff I thought wasn’t logical—like why we were putting apple mush in a chocolate food—had simple answers. Iron did a good job of explaining everything without making me feel completely dumb, but I still knew I was out of my element.

In the end, we had a lunch of slightly dry but definitely egg-free cake. True to his word, Iron and I spent the meal talking about our counseling. I mentioned what the counselor had said about expressing myself creatively; Iron told me about how he needed to open up more.

Which, that wasn’t really news to me, but I didn’t say anything. From what I’d learned earlier, I needed to do that, too; ironically, I didn’t want to bring that up. We’d had a good afternoon together, which I could appreciate after being cooped up in a hospital for a week.

I could live with taking things slow and steady for now.

* * *

When I met Iron for breakfast on Friday morning, he said he was going to try to give me a surprise on Saturday. When I glared at the irony of that statement, he explained, “I thought you’d like a heads up first.”

“Is it snakes?” I remembered the last time someone had tried to give me a surprise.

He blanched. “What? No...” After looking off to the side for a moment, he turned back to me. “Do you want snakes?”

“No.”

“Okay then...” He seemed relieved.

I spent most of the rest of Friday alone, since Iron had to run some errands. It was a good thing, too; my wing had finally healed to the point where I felt it was safe to fly on if I took it easy. I hadn’t been outside of Farrington for almost two weeks at that point, so I was worried that my cave might’ve been taken over or something.

After a slow, steady flight south, I was relieved to find my cave wasn’t occupied. At the same time, I felt overwhelmed at how empty it seemed.

* * *

On Saturday, I met up with Iron at what had become our usual breakfast diner. He was wearing saddlebags, which was strange enough; even stranger was how he said they were for a day of shopping in the Market District. I chuckled. For three months’ worth of patrols, I’d been there almost every week, and I’d even bought some stuff there before.

However, once we got started on our trip through the district, Iron led me around and showed me the highlights. His commentaries about all the buildings’ histories and owners made it feel less like shopping and more like a guided tour.

We had to walk slowly, since I didn’t have my gauntlets; even better, the talons on my right hand were now long enough that they risked getting caught in the cracks of the cobblestone roads. Iron didn’t mind, and when I thought about it, neither did I. A slow, peaceful walk through the Market District with my boyfriend sounded like a great way to spend the day—even though it was a fairly weak surprise.

I liked Mystic Spiral’s Magic Artifact Emporium—though I felt their name needed a little work. At any rate, it felt weird to like that place. Magic, unless our songs counted, was completely alien to griffins. In our legends, it carried a negative stigma, too, and I don’t think that our fairly recent history with Celestia helped matters any.

That was my tribe, though—not me. On my own, I had to admit that the inside of the store was pretty cool. Everything on their shelves and tables either hummed, glowed, or floated—sometimes at the same time. I spent a long time watching a many-faceted gem that spun slowly in midair and turned different colors—every color—in a slow, fluid way that made it hard to tell when one color ended and the next one began. I thought about getting it, but I decided against it—where would would I even put it?

After the magic shop, Iron and I headed back into the streets. We passed a pet store, and I frowned at the cages with birds in them. It seemed wrong, even if they didn’t seem miserable, to just keep them from flying free. I slowed down to look at everything else there; other than imprisoned birds, there were also kittens, puppies, and tons of various other animal companions for sale.

I turned to Iron, who was staring at me wide-eyed with his mouth turned down. After his face didn’t change for a few moments, I asked, “What?”

He simply protested, “But... those are... pets...”

I felt annoyed at first, but then I realized that it had been a long time since breakfast. Instead of dwelling on his horror, I ran with it: “Yeah... think they’d give me a menu?”

Iron shook his head, chuckling weakly, but he put a hoof on my back and gave me a slight push to get me walking again. “Come on... this is making me hungry; you can tell me how disturbing that is over lunch.”

After lunch, we continued our shopping trip where neither of us bought anything. I thought about getting some stuff for “creative expression,” but I still had writing supplies at my cave, so I thought I’d try giving that a whirl before I went crazy buying paint or clay or whatever.

We passed a hoofwear store—lots of horseshoes, boots, and other things ponies put on their hooves—and I thought about seeing what they could do for me. My armor’s gauntlets were good for walking when I was on patrol, but they were about two pounds each and made of heavy-sounding metal. They worked when I was patrolling, but if I wasn’t in my armor, I’d want something lighter and less armor-y.

I decided against it, for the time being. I’d have to have any walking gloves custom-made, and if that were the case, I wanted to first try that farrier and his apprentice. They’d done good by me in the past—and my new armor was ready in the Citadel’s armory for my shift on Monday—so I’d at least trust their referral for where to get something made.

Iron took me to what he explained was one of his favorite shops—Page Turner’s. It was a secondhand bookstore, named after its owner. Page Turner herself was a pale orange unicorn, about Iron’s age, and her circular cutie mark looked like it was made of two halves that were consuming one another. She kept smiling at Iron and me, but twice, I caught her giving us a weird look before the smile flashed back.

I brought it up to Iron after we left the store. With a sad nod, he explained, “That’s probably my fault, actually.” I waited, and he continued, “We dated a few years ago, so she probably feels...”

“Replaced by a griffin?”

“Ye—” He saw my glare and changed course: “I mean, we’ve been dating for a while, both before and after ‘July,’ but you can’t deny that we’re not a typical Farrington couple.” He shrugged. “Ponies will get used to it in time, or they won’t. For now, the only thing is to rise above it.”

I turned back to the store we’d just left and muttered, “Yeah, or we could just go back and make out on her countertop.”

When I turned back to Iron and found him stopped dead in his tracks, the look on his face was priceless. He coughed a few times before his eyes shrank back down to normal size, but that didn’t help the fact that he was blushing. Finally, he shook his head. “You are... rough on members of the service industry when left to your own devices, aren’t you?”

I thought back to my encounter with his sister back in May. “It gets old, getting treated differently all the time.”

Iron walked closer to me, and after patting me on the back, he kept his arm around me while we walked. I smiled up at him, and together, we continued meandering through the Market District for the rest of the afternoon.

* * *

“I’m just about ready to open my eyes and see where we’re going...”

“Gilda, please, it’s just a few more blocks, I promise.”

“You and your surprise...” I shook my head, but I kept my eyes closed. Apparently, shopping together wasn’t the surprise Iron had in mind; the actual surprise involved him leading me blindly through the less-crowded streets of Farrington. Based on where we started, the relative direction we’d traveled, and the sounds of heavy industry, I guessed we were in the southern part of the Artisan District by now.

Given the past two weeks, I had my doubts about my safety, but I set them aside. Iron wouldn’t take me anywhere dangerous.

Finally, he slowed to a stop and, with one final turn, I heard a door open. Noise—screaming machinery and pounding pistons—flowed out of it like a dam, but Iron led me forward into the chaos. As I walked, it got hotter, louder, and I even started to notice the stench of molten metal.

I was about to ask him just where the hell we were when he shouted over the noise. “You can open your eyes!”

I obeyed, and everything was pink. Not painted pink, but the lights did something funny to my eyes. I knew that my chest’s feathers hadn’t gotten dyed recently, and Iron wasn’t a faint shade of purple. The trick lights, combined with the huge machines that groaned and shrieked as they transported massive vats of melted metal brought me to one conclusion:

“A... a factory? This is literally the worst place you’ve ever taken me!”

“Technically, it’s an ore refinery, but I think it’s classy!” he shouted back with a huge grin.

My mouth fell open when I realized he was serious. “Classy? How?”

“Where else are you going to get refined iron?”

I stared back at him, and for a moment, I would’ve been too impressed to get mad if he’d spent two days building up a phony surprise just to make that pun. That moment passed, and Iron looked like he were chuckling—I couldn’t hear over the sea of noise we were in.

He motioned for me to join him, and still in utter disbelief, I followed him onto a gated platform. Seeing a sign that gave a maximum occupancy of four ponies or a thousand pounds raised the question: “Where is everyone?”

Iron pushed a button, and our whole platform lurched upwards, which somehow created a new source of noise. He shouted over it, “The refinery process is mostly automated once everything gets started, so someone only has to check on it every hour to make sure the line hasn’t stopped. Since I’m friends with this refinery’s forepony, she’s agreed to let me take over her line-watching duties for the evening. Unless something breaks down, we should have the whole place to ourselves!”

I let my mouth hang open before replying, “We... we could be alone at your house, too!”

Iron simply shook his head and held up a hoof. “Just wait and see!”

I shook my head and rolled my eyes. “Only for you, Iron.”

The elevator stopped and we walked out onto a narrow metal bridge. The two of us could fit side-by-side between the railings, but it was clearly designed for utility, not comfort. A quick glance showed that the bridge formed a huge rectangle all around top of the refinery. Iron led me towards a three-way intersection, and I took small comfort in the fact that at least the bridge was relatively smooth metal that was good for walking on.

When we got to the intersection, Iron said, “Wait here, I’ll be right back!” He then turned and took the path that branched away from the main bridge, over to what looked like an office. Since I was alone in the worst place I’d ever been to, I was about to complain that things couldn’t get much worse.

Then, all the lights went out.

I wasn’t thrust into complete darkness; the stupid molten metal illuminated everything in fiery shadows, so I could see the stupidly-grinning Iron as he sauntered back over to me on three hooves.

When he got over to me, I could see that he was holding a little box made of polished stone in his left hoof. It had a hinge on one side, which lined up with the seam that ran across the other three sides.

Iron sat down on the bridge, then patted the floor next to him with his free hoof. At that point, I was more curious about his box than I was annoyed at our location, so I sat down and looked at it.

With his other hoof, Iron opened the box, and I went deaf.

Seconds later, a tinny ringing in my ears told me that I could probably still hear; as the ringing faded, heard a few quiet notes of music as well. It dawned on me that Iron’s box was the source of both the silence and the music.

He smiled warmly at me and explained, “Magic. Even if there is something of a stigma against it in this city, it can be beautiful nonetheless.” He gestured out in front of him, towards the main floor of the refinery.

With all the lights out, the only hints of the machinery below were the parts that were illuminated by the bright yellow glow of molten metal. Since the vats were still carrying and pouring it at various points throughout the refinement process, everything shimmered and flowed, almost like a giant, two-story bonfire.

I turned to Iron, impressed, and apologized, “Okay, this isn’t bad.”

He grinned. “Not the worst place?”

I looked back out and waved at the fire. “This is different than when the lights are on and there isn’t a little...” I turned to look at Iron’s box; inside it, a tiny carved pony danced around on one hoof. “Whatever that is.”

Iron offered the music box to me, and I held its solid weight, being careful not to drop it. “It was my mother’s,” he explained.

After looking at it more closely—I couldn’t see the source of the music—I nodded and handed it back to him.

He took it and leaned back, to put it on the floor behind us. “Just, uh... watch your tail, please.”

I shifted over slightly so I was sitting right next to him, and then I wrapped my tail around his butt, resting the tip of it on his left knee.

He jolted a little, but after looking down and patting my tail, he chuckled. “Tail hug. That works.” Then, he put his right hoof around my waist, and I rested my head on his shoulder to return the embrace.

We sat quietly in the flickering glow for a while. I stared off into the distance, watching the repeated pouring of one of the points of the refining process. If I relaxed my eyes, it looked like a light that was turning on and off. And on. And off.

After a while, Iron broke the silence in a low voice. “So, after three months in Farrington... how do you like this city?”

It was a simple question, and really, it had a simple answer. I remembered when I used to have reservations about even setting foot in the city, but now, it was a lot more familiar to me—almost like a second home. When I thought of it like that, the tiny part of me that was afraid to lose my griffin heritage flared up, but there, next to Iron, I could easily douse that little ember of tradition.

“I like it here,” I admitted. “It’s probably my favorite place I’ve ever been stabbed, shot, and betrayed in.”

Iron let out a quick, hard burst of laughter before he patted my waist apologetically. “I’m sorry those things happened to you. But I’m glad you like it in Farrington despite everything.” I felt him shake his head. “I’m not starting in on the ‘you should move here’ argument, either...”

“I will.”

The words came out so effortlessly that I couldn’t even question whether I meant them. Iron squeezed me a little tighter, and I knew that I’d made the right decision.

“I mean...” I shrugged. “I like it here. I like being part of a living culture. I like my friends, the kids at the hospital...” I poked Iron’s knee with my tail. “And you. I like you most of all. You’re there for me, even if I’m too dumb to see it sometimes. So... thanks.”

He kissed the top of my head, and then he moved his mouth down next to my ear. “I love you, too.”

My heartrate jumped up a few notches after he said it, but I didn’t think it was from fear. It was... definitely weird, to hear those words, but the more I thought about them, it kind of made sense.

I thought.

It was hard to panic as I sat there, alone with Iron, in the glow of molten ore. It was warm where we were, and I didn’t remember being so tired when I came in the room with him. Iron’s hoof shifted, and he started rubbing my belly, which I relished; I didn’t know how I felt about him telling me he loved me, but in that moment, I didn’t exactly care, either.

I closed my eyes and shifted, leaning more of my weight on Iron as I nestled deeper into his shoulder. It was comfortable there, with him, and even better, I felt safe. I could relax around him, and for a few moments, I did just that.

* * *

“Are you sleeping?”

I felt myself jolt awake with a deep breath, but I still whispered back, “No.”

Iron chuckled, then he patted my stomach a few times before saying, “I’m sorry if I startled you, but ever since your hospitalization, I’ve... been looking for the right way to tell you. And if ‘love’ is too strong a word... at least let me say that meeting you was one of the best things that ever happened to me.”

I smiled; that I could agree with. Even counting our July-long hiccup, Iron had gone out of his way to help me time and time again. He listened, he cared, and even if he wasn’t perfect all the time, he was there for me most of the time—when it counted most. I turned my head up to him and pulled back a little to give him room; in response, he came down and met me in a deep kiss.

It started slow, with a brush of our tongues. Iron adjusted himself, turning to sit at a new angle and pull me deeper into an embrace. I let him, and once we got to our new position, I began drawing little circles on the bottom of his tongue with mine.

He started to slowly rub my shoulders, and I ran a hand up his spine—flat-palmed, so I didn’t hurt him. When I got to his neck, I felt the spiky stubble of his Guard-regulation haircut, and that seemed like a good place for my hand—my other one was still at my side. I pressed into him harder; I wanted more.

Iron broke away from the kiss before letting himself fall backwards. I followed him to the ground, ending up sideways on top of him. He let me pull my hand free from beneath him, and shifted to put both my hands on his shoulder. When he ran a hoof down my spine, between my wings, I let out a shuddering gasp before he pulled me up to his mouth and another kiss.

As part of my forward motion, I straightened out, so both of my knees ended up on either side of him. After a few moments in our new position, I pushed up off him with my arms. Panting, I looked down at him, he looked up at me...

Terror slammed into me as I suddenly realized what the hell we were doing.

Instinct took over—ironic, given the circumstances—as I flung myself off him and before I could even think about what I was doing, I ran.

“And she just left you hanging like that?”

On my left, Iron took large gulp of his drink before glaring back at me with tipsy indignation. “Hah. Funny. Ass.”

I took a drink from my own glass; the two of us were sitting together at Tap’s On, the best bar in all of Farrington. Specifically, Iron had found me at my favorite bar, after my officer’s shift, and after his date with the Sharptalon ended...

I took another drink. I didn’t want that mental image, ever. He was my friend, and she was too, I guessed, but she was still a freaky... half-bird... thing.

After I got done shuddering, I said, “Still, that sucks.”

Iron grunted in agreement.

“At least she took the L-word well. For all her issues, that’s got to count for something, right?”

Iron grunted again, only this time, he finished off his tumbler. “Yeah. She... just... gives me mixed signals about where she wants everything to go.” After I flipped my ears back and took another drink, Iron clarified, “The... relationship, to go.”

I laughed. “Thank you for clearing that up.”

“You’re welcome. Ass.”

I turned to him with a mock sad face. “I get an ‘ass’ because you said something wrong?”

He shrugged, then grumbled a few incoherent syllables that sounded apologetic.

Since his whole misfire with his girlfriend had him bothered pretty badly, I could accept it. Hell, I’d been part of his whole “demotion” thing on Tuesday, and even if he didn’t say he blamed me, I probably did deserve a few names or two. Iron was too good a friend to dwell on it, though, so I instead gave him some advice on his current situation. “Well... from what you’ve told me, she’s prone to freak-outs, but she usually talks about it afterwards, right?”

He nodded. “Yeah. I mean, she’s gonna be here... on, Monday, at least. Since she’s starting her patrol again. But that doesn’t help now, you know?”

“Probably not.” I agreed. “So, uh... she’s starting back up Monday? You gonna ask, uh...” I shrugged. “Whoever the hell our lieutenant is now, if you two...”

“No...” He shook his head slowly, widely, and loosely. “I... she is my favorite griffin, ever, but that’d screw up our guard duties and our relationship.” He brandished his empty glass me. “You told me about ‘space’ once, right?”

I nodded; it was the smart move for him. “Well, good luck, then. I’m sure you two’ll figure something out.”

“Here’s hoping.” He smiled, weakly. “She’s... very soft. I’m not even talking like... sexually, but... like, her feathers...”

“Feathers?” I finished off my drink. Then, with a feel-good chuckle, I flared my left wing and buffeted Iron in the face lightly, repeatedly. He grunted, and tried to brush it away, but he only managed to hit the feathers, not the underlying wing itself.

Finally, he gave up: “Get that thing out of my face.”

“See, now you sound like Comet, yesterday morning...”

With one last shuddering groan, Iron grabbed my wing tip and shoved it back over. I folded my wing back in as he did it, but I reprimanded, “You should be more gentle with wings, you know.”

Our bartender, grinning like a fiend, came over and refilled our drinks. I’d switched from lager to top-shelf stuff when Iron came in; I had the overtime and bits to afford helping my friend out. I took a swig from my fresh drink and offered hopefully the first and last advice I’d ever have to give: “Learn how to preen. Comet used to like that.” Memories from school rushed back to me, and the truth struck like a hammer. “I... used to like... that she liked that...”

“That’s... not your fault... Star.”

“I know.” I shrugged. “Or even, she’s forgiven me if it is.” I turned to him and shrugged again. “But I can miss her wings, even if I still love her without them, right?”

“Just as much?” Iron asked.

I stayed quiet for a moment. Given our past few months together, the months when I’d finally started to be honest with myself about her and her disability, I had to admit that things were different now than the years of denial we’d built our marriage on. She was the perfect mother to my kids, she was a better wife than I deserved, and she was compassionate enough to stick with me anyway. “Even more,” I admitted.

“That’s good.” Iron turned to me, and we shared a nod. “I’m glad things worked out for you two. Comet’s... a good friend, too.”

I grinned back at him and raised my glass. “Here’s to friends, fights, relationships, and love.”

He clinked my glass with his. “Here’s to living through peace.”

The two of us finished our drinks together.

I lay on my back on a flat mountain outcropping, only about ten miles south of Farrington. It was as far as I’d gotten before I stopped to lay down and think about things. The sun had been up then; now, it was well after sunset, well after I had ran away from Iron like a coward, and well after we’d almost had sex.

The stars were out, so I gazed to the heavens and lost myself in how tiny I was. The stars above me seemed to reach out and go forever, always burning in a beautiful, distant way. It was nearing the end of summer, so Jäger was on the horizon, just in time for the autumn hunt and his early-November festival.

I found Ziu, which reminded me of Nicht’s pardon. I didn’t want to test anything, so I kept my eyes moving, looking around for the other gods.

I grinned softly to myself as I remembered some of the constellations that didn’t really have a name, but Gretchen and I had spent a few summer nights together, under the stars, and naming them.

I wondered if she remembered their names as well.

That broadened to wondering about everyone in my tribe was doing that night... then I turned my mind to Ponyville. I wondered if Dash was doing one of her night training sessions,and even what all her other friends were doing. Then, there were other nations, other species... all of us, under one infinitely vast expanse of celestial bodies.

In the face of the cosmos, the fact that I was confused about Iron didn’t quite seem... profound.

But it was the only thing that I kept coming back to.

Only after I’d gotten away from Farrington did I realize why everything with Iron had progressed so smoothly and natural. Getting turned on like that was good, I guessed, if we were ever going to go down that road, However, that just led to conflict between whether I should have even gone that far with him in the first place; then, there was physical regret I felt for ending things where I did.

It was a lot to think about, and with a chuckle, I remembered how not-freaked-out I’d been when he said he loved me. I still felt one of the trickiest parts of our whole situation was how I felt back, but given his redefinition of “love,” we were probably on the same page.

Still, it felt good to be loved. I remembered that feeling, when we’d been sitting next to each other, hugging. It was like a warm inner glow that made everything else seem either okay or unimportant. I liked that feeling, and even now, thinking about being next to Iron made me feel that way.

Was that love, though?

That new flavor of uncertainty made everything fall into place a little neater. I felt guilty about leaving in such a hurry, and for some strange reason, that made me feel bad for blowing my therapist’s advice off. If I’d just talked to Iron, or let him know what I wanted—or even that I didn’t know what I wanted—we’d be on the same page, and it’d be easier for us to find some sort of solution.

Talk to him. It seemed such a simple answer to everything between us, but really, looking back at all my problems I’d faced with him during the summer, I knew it was the answer.

I sat up, flared my wings, and took off for my cave for the night. I didn’t know what time it was, but I knew I wanted to get a good night’s sleep before tomorrow. Tomorrow, I’d have that conversation with Iron. Tomorrow, I’d try to let him know how I felt—if I could figure that out myself.

* * *

Sunday, at half past noon, I knocked on Iron’s door. It took him a while to answer; when he did, his bloodshot eyes and ruffled fur made it look like he hadn’t slept well the night before. I felt bad when realized I was probably the reason for that, but before I could apologize, Iron bid me, “Gilda... Good afternoon.”

“Hi.” I waved at him. “Is this a bad time?”

He shook his head, then yawned and stepped to the side of the door. “No, no... come in.”

I walked into his house and again noted his quiet decor. The two sofas in the living room formed an angle with one another; both of them faced the door and, on my left, his kitchen. The walls behind the sofas had wooden bookshelves set into them; in the far corner of the room from the front door was his closed-for-the-summer fireplace.

Iron walked into his kitchen to pour himself a glass of water. He offered me something to drink, but I turned him down. It wasn’t that I didn’t trust his pipes or whatever; I just wasn’t thirsty that morning.

After a few minutes of getting settled in, we were on his couch, and I started what I’d come there to say: “I wanted to say I’m sorry for yesterday—”

“Oh...” He shook his head to interrupt me. “There’s... no need. You were uncomfortable, which was probably because—”

“Because you were going along with what I was doing?” I rolled my eyes. “That’s... no, that’s not your fault. That can’t be. I mean, I can’t climb on top of you and then say it’s your fault that things got... heated.”

“Okay then...” He spoke cautiously. “Then apology accepted.”

I nodded. “And it’s... not that I don’t like you. I do.” I shrugged and took a deep breath. Boyfriend or no, this was weird to talk about with him—not counting my therapist, Iron was the first guy I’d ever talked to about this sort of thing. “I dunno. It always seems like we’re following each other’s lead here. I mean... I want this to keep going. But you don’t want to pressure me, and at the same time, I... I’m scared,” I admitted.

“I mean... I’m not even talking about... physical issues there might be, since, you know... we’re different. It’s more... ever since I started coming to this city, it feels like I’m losing bits and pieces of who I used to be. So I started off as a griffin, then I started joining a city, then I started dating a stallion, and now, I’m so far past the halfway point between a pony and a griffin...” I shook my head and trailed off, hoping that Iron would pick up on something to say.

He did. “What would you do if, tomorrow, a letter came from Elpithasus saying your banishment has been nullified, and that you could return to your home?”

“I...” I blinked. It was a confusingly simple question. “I’d go...” Iron’s ears drooped, but I clarified, “But only for a visit. I’d see my family, and try to get some answers. Then, I’d visit Erntving and... try to get some more answers, I guess. But after like a week, I’d want to come back to here, and you.”

“Why?”

“Because... because there’s something here for me. A future. A home, even.”

Iron pulled me closer to him, into a hug. He whispered, “Then what are you afraid of losing?”

I thought about it, and I couldn’t really give an answer. I was outcast from my society—that much wasn’t new. What was new, though, was how I realized I didn’t want to go back anymore. So... they probably had a stigma against intimacy with ponies, sure, but I couldn’t live by their rules anymore. My dyed chest feathers and cut talons were proof enough that Equestrian laws were the only ones I needed to abide by now.

Farrington was my home now.

Still, my rebellious mind still had a few moot objections. “Doesn’t... doesn’t it hurt the first time?”

We were close enough to each other that I could feel Iron suppress a nervous laugh; he hadn’t expected that answer. “I’m... not sure, how it is for... females. We can... take things slowly?”

I chuckled softly. “Isn’t that another problem for us?”

Iron shrugged. “I suppose...” After a moment’s pause, he reached over, grabbed my left arm with his right hoof, and pulled me over. He spun me around on the couch, and I ended up on top of Iron’s lap, facing him.

Because of our positioning, we were eye level now. He leaned back and I shifted my knees to rest them on the outside of his. Before we went any further, I looked into his eyes for a moment. In them, I saw everything good about his society: warmth, compassion, and life. There wasn’t any of that in my tribe, or if there was, it got beaten out of us at a young age.

I was nervous about a lot of things, but that wasn’t enough for me to stop myself. I liked where I was and where we were going. I pressed into Iron in a kiss, and he locked his hooves around my hips in a firm embrace.

For one brief moment, I pushed my hands into his shoulders to pull away from his lips. After a few shuddering breaths, I knew the truth, and I found the words I needed to express it:

“I love you.”

9 - Autumn Mornings

Monday morning, two weeks after I’d asked my brother for a letter of recommendation, I started my new job. The Hoofington Guard’s Citadel was smaller than Farrington’s—and it was built out of wood—but they still had a lot of inter-guard correspondence.

I spent most of my first day walking from wooden desk to wooden desk, picking up and dropping off envelopes. Whenever my mail rounds were finished, it was then my job to head out into the city and supply the high-ranking guards with the information they needed to keep things running smoothly.

All in all, it was easy work, and I never had to leave the city—I’d made sure to ask about that point during the interview process. The best part of my job, by far, was how nice everyone was. Yeah, I was new, but I hadn’t expected the guards to treat a secretary with as much politeness as they showed me.

Four years in the service industry had clearly taken a toll on my expectations.

By Wednesday, I knew my entire day’s schedule by heart. It wasn’t the most mentally involved job ever, but I liked my routine. At four fifty-five—just like Tuesday—I finished up sorting the night shift’s mail before giving the mailroom one last round of organization. Once that was done, I headed out into the main area to find Sergeant Pepper, my boss, to let her know I was done for the day.

When I got outside the entrance to the Citadel, a gray stallion waved at me. He was a little on the shorter side, for a stallion, but I’d recognize his matted-down mane anywhere: Iron’s used to look exactly like that after a shift, before he gave up on actually having a mane.

Anyway, this guard was around my age, if maybe a little younger. I smiled back at him and asked, “What’s up?”

“Uh… Maxie, right?”

I nodded.

He rubbed his right hoof against his left foreleg, then he said, “I’m Silver Lance, and…” His face flushed. “I was wondering if you were busy Friday?” I raised an eyebrow, but before I could think about his question too hard, he shot me a sheepish grin and stammered, “B… but, if you’re busy, or don’t want to, that’s—”

“I’d love to.” I smiled back at him. Even though it was weird for me, making plans with a stallion days in advance, he was too cute to say no to. Besides, it was just dinner; nothing had to happen unless we both wanted it to. If things clicked, I wouldn’t mind having a new friend—or more—in Hoofington.

Maybe he could even show me around.

We made plans for dinner after our shift on Friday, at six o’clock; after that, we parted ways for the evening. I mused about Lance all the way home. His helmet mane reminded me about how I hadn’t sent Iron a thank-you letter. I’d asked for a letter of recommendation, but since the Farrington City Council was dumb enough to demote him, he’d come through with three: one from him, one from the new captain, and one from my old boss.

When I got back to my apartment’s blue carpet and white walls, I set my saddlebags on their hook in the hallway before heading into my living room. It was decorated how I wanted it—neat, but not sparse. I’d found a store that sold posters for some of my favorite graphic novels and a place that sold modern-looking furniture; the rest was just a simple process of making the apartment into a home.

After sitting down at my desk, I levitated out some paper. As I inked my quill, I chastised myself a little; I’d promised to keep in touch with Iron, but it’d almost been two weeks since I’d written to him. I told myself I’d have to start writing weekly letters; Iron and I hadn’t fixed our relationship just for me to throw it away by falling out of touch.

I smiled and put the quill to the paper.

September 13

Dear Iron

Thanks for the letters of recommendation. Mr. McFeely’s was a nice touch, and Captain Horatio’s was…

Well, what, is the city council drunk, or just stupid? I mean, at least you’re not Officer Bulwark again, but geez. You’d think they’d be better to the guy who’s done everything that you’ve done over the years.

But whatever.

Hoofington’s nice. My apartment’s newly refurbished, and the few neighbors I’ve met seemed cool enough. I know it’s super early to say anything, but between the ponies, the city, and my job… I dunno. I think I might do all right here for the long haul.

The guard job’s awesome, by the way (and thank you again). Everyone’s polite to me instead of nagging about prices, or what “fragile” means, or using the addressing ink to write letters…

Tell your girlfriend hi, I guess.

Anyway, now that you’ve got Sundays free again, you should come visit sometime; I’ve gotten settled, so my couch is now open for crashing on. For you. If you bring a guest or something... I’ll buy you two a room.

Sorry it took me so long to write back; I’m going to be better about writing stuff in the future. Until next time, take care of yourself.

Love,
Maxie

I folded Maxie’s letter back up and set it on my coffee table. On the couch next to me, Gilda asked, “So… how’s your sister doing?”

“Better,” I admitted. “No one’s flashed her yet, which she says is an added benefit to her new job.”

Gilda rolled her eyes and shook her head. “She didn’t say that.” Before I could stop her, she snatched up the letter, unfolded it, and read it. A few seconds later, she folded the letter back up and said, “Huh. She did talk about me.” After tossing it back onto the table, Gilda added, “Whatever.”

I gave her a flat look before requesting, “Please don’t read my mail like that.”

She raised an eyebrow. “I thought we were reading it. Like, an activity. Together.”

“Well…” I trailed off, realizing she had a point. If I wanted to keep matters private, I should probably do them in private. After a shrug, I replied, “Fair enough. I’ll… remember that in the future.”

She returned my shrug. “Speaking of future, what are we doing tonight?”

I passed the shrug back. We’d eaten dinner right after our shifts, so we’d have to actually go somewhere if we went out. I didn’t mind that one bit; the more that Gilda saw of Farrington, the more she’d be able to enjoy the city itself. In fact, she’d already found one thing: Every Tuesday evening, she continued her volunteering at the hospital.

Since tonight was Friday, and we had the potential of spending the entire night together, I offered a suggestion: “The trees in Reservoir Park are beginning to change color; we could go see that.”

“Friday, at like…” Gilda looked at the clock. “Seven, by the time we get there?” She turned back to me. “I want to do something together, not with like a bazillion other ponies.”

I nodded. “Okay then. What do you have in mind?”

Her eyes darted to Maxie’s letter and back to me. “Well… uh, I guess... well, first, I wanted to talk to you about something. Remember how I was gonna move here?”

My heart jumped up into my throat; I’d wanted Gilda to move to Farrington, not into my house with me. Between my sergeant’s workload that I brought home with me to let me patrol the streets and getting used to Maxie’s absence, I wasn’t ready to have a new roommate, let alone a live-in romantic partner.

That must’ve shown on my face, because Gilda shook her head. “I mean… move in to Farrington, not your house. That’s… well…” She reeled back away from me with a wide-eyed, horrified expression. “That’s how I feel about it, too.” She leaned back next to me and asked, “But maybe, I spend the night tonight… then tomorrow, we look at apartments?”

I wrapped a hoof around Gilda. It’d been two weeks since our date at the refinery, and this wasn’t her first time spending the night with me; still, I wanted her to be comfortable with her plans, so I tried not to give her sleeping arrangements any undue scrutiny. “That’s doable. And if we hurry, tonight, we can buy a newspaper, to look at listings.”

She nodded. “Okay, then. Let’s go.”

* * *

The next morning, it was barely a quarter past nine when we got to the third apartment on our list. As soon as the landlord opened the door for us, Gilda stated, “This one.”

I turned to her and asked, “Are... Don’t you want to go inside first?”

She shrugged “Fine. But this one has a balcony.”

I didn’t want to crush her spirits by reminding her of Farrington’s no-flight rules; still, we were three stories off the ground, so perhaps she just wanted an elevated place to sit. “Okay then,” I agreed. “Let’s look around.”

The landlord, a pale yellow mare, smiled at us before saying, “I’ll wait outside for you two.”

Gilda and I went into her prospective apartment; despite my reservations of her abrupt commitment, it was a nice place. As we walked through the rooms, I took note: the carpeting looked new, there wasn’t any overt evidence of pests, and—

“Look! A stove!”

I chuckled at our running joke for the morning. My over-exuberance at being a supportive boyfriend had resulted in some rather inane comments at the first apartment—which wasn’t a bad place, but Gilda hadn’t liked that it was underground.

“And a couch...”

She walked a little closer to me and ducked into a hug. I held her there for a moment, in the pre-furnished living room, before she started out towards the balcony. I kept my foreleg around her while she figured out the latch on the sliding door; a few moments later, the two of us were seated on the balcony, which had a wide view of—

“And a whole city.” This time, her voice was quiet.

I nuzzled her cheek and asked, “Is this the one you want?”

“Do you like it?”

I moved my lips away from her ear and pulled her in tighter into a hug. I spoke neutrally, since I was with her in an advising role. “It’s within your budget, there’s nothing glaringly wrong with it, and you like the balcony—”

“Uh, I’m a griffin, Iron.”

“Well, then, I think you’ll like it here.”

She gave a soft, snuggle-like nod. “Cool. Wanna help me sign all the stuff?”

“Of course.”

We stayed together on her balcony for a while longer; between the view and our embrace, it was quite comfortable. I’d meant it when I’d said that Gilda would like it there; more importantly, I felt it was a good home for her.

It was the home I deserved.

I scoffed, looking around at the concrete walls of my old basement apartment in Stalliongrad. It was, quite literally, a hole in the ground. Unsurprisingly, it looked the same as it did when I’d left it two decades ago. Despite the single, coverless light bulb in the center of the ceiling, the main chamber—I refused to call it a living room—was dark, cold, and barren.

Back then, I’d been Serzhant Mest, operating on one single goal in mind: to tear down Stalliongrad’s organized crime structure. From the time I transferred out of Manehattan P.D. to Stalliongrad Politsiya, it’d taken me four years to achieve that goal.

It’d taken me three weeks, after that, before I lost my righteousness and started working with the criminals.

Now, thanks to Cold Front, I at least had some earthly possessions. I spat on the floor—not like it was clean, anyway—and headed over to the stack of boxes near my front door. They’d come with a price, or rather, a new goal that I had to set for myself.

Cold Front wanted Farrington. He wanted me to help. And he’ll probably think I am, right until I pour hot steel down his throat.

The image made me grin, even though it’d take several months’ preparation before I could strike. However, that was the new rule in Stalliongrad: Farrington was off-limits. If I had to single-hoofedly take control of Stalliongrad to ensure that... well, then so be it.

Maybe that would let me sleep at night.

There was one last thing I needed to do before I began my takeover of Stalliongrad; it began with rummaging through the boxes to find paper and a pen.

I knew that I didn’t owe Iron a damn thing. Hell, from what I’d heard, he wanted me dead. It was… cute, almost, but he was making threats against someone who was miles outside his league. I felt it was only fair to warn him about the forces he was playing with:

September 18

Sergeant Iron Bulwark:

I suppose this is the part of everything where I’m supposed to tell you how sorry I am, and I regret that everything went in the direction it did. But even if I did regret anything, what would the point be of apologizing? You know what I did, I know what I did, and things can never go back to how they were.

For what it’s worth, I’m sorry.

But it doesn’t change a damn thing.

I heard about your cute little “request” to the courts, with me and Red, by the way. I didn’t take much pleasure in burning off my last few Farrington connections to have you sacked, but... if that’s how you want to play things, then here’s the rules:

1) If you ever try to pull anything like that again, I will kill you. If you have a problem with what I did, you can come and do your own damn dirty work for once. Equestrian Guard knows better than to set hoof in Stalliongrad, and you should too. Which brings me to:

2) You, your friends, your family, and your known associates can consider yourselves banned from Stalliongrad. If you come here, I will find you. It won’t be personal. I won’t enjoy it. But it’ll be what happens. I’ll let you pass that warning along.

So again, I’m sorry for how things turned out—especially with those conditions you brought upon yourself. But really, it’s only Stalliongrad (to you). Ask your girlfriend if it’s really so bad to be banned from a place that’s filled to the brim with vicious predators.

This is goodbye, Iron. As long as you stay out of my city (and make no mistake, Stalliongrad IS my city, now), I wish you the best, happiest, and most fruitful life possible.

Who knows. Maybe you even deserve it.

I stood in Captain Horatio’s office on Thursday, September twenty-first, at a quarter after five. He’d requested that I stop by the Citadel after my sergeant’s patrol, but he’d waited until we were behind closed doors before he gave me Sherry’s letter.

Because I was used to being his superior, I was well-practiced in the art of concealing my emotions from him; that was the only way I managed to keep from trembling.

I re-read her letter and tried to fit it in with the Sherry I’d used to know. It did fit, though it fit in an almost twisted, dark manner. Everything about her—down to her hoofwriting—seemed sharper and clearer. It was a sobering lesson, to find out that I’d used to be close to a monster who raged with the fury of a natural disaster.

Part of me missed those days, back when we were friends, but she said it best: Things couldn’t go back to how they were. Between Gilda, Starfall, and counseling, I had found ways to fill the void of Sherry’s death to me.

“Death” was how I liked to think about it, at any rate—especially since I was now, apparently, banned from entering Stalliongrad. The only alternative would be to lump her departure in with the fall of the Hooves Syndicate.

The Sherry I knew wouldn’t have wanted that.

Red Hooves’ “cowardly” plea bargain had gone through according to his desires, and his sister was now a free mare who was banished from Farrington. Given the glare that Fast Hooves had given Horatio, Gilda, and me down in the prison, I doubted that she truly wanted to return.

I passed Sherry’s letter back to Horatio and said, “This is either evidence or fuel for the incinerator, sir.”

He nodded. “I understand.”

We traded salutes, I left for the day, and that was the end of that.

* * *

The next morning, before our shift, Gilda and I were eating our usual Friday breakfast together. We were making plans for the upcoming weekend when Starfall walked into the diner. The first thing that I noticed about him was that he carried himself in high spirits that morning; I chalked that up to the second thing I noticed: his right wing no longer bore a hot-pink cast.

I slid over in the booth to let Starfall have a seat; across the table from me, Gilda mirrored my movement. As Star sat down, he beamed a smile and commented on her plate: “You should get hash browns; it’s breakfast.”

She glared back: “It’s eight-fifteen; I shouldn’t have to deal with you for another hour.” Starfall cringed at that, complete with falling ears; Gilda looked down and muttered. “Sorry. I’m not a morning griffin.”

“It’s cool, ST.” Starfall turned to me, paused, thought better of whatever he had been about to say, and instead began with, “Sorry for interrupting your breakfast thing, but I just got good news!”

His hooves were jittering upon the table at that point, so I grinned back at him. “Is it your wing?”

Absently, he looked over his shoulder before turning back to me. “Oh. No. Well... Okay, I guess... Yeah, this morning, Comet and I both went to the hospital; my doctor said it looks like, if I do some physical therapy, I can probably fly again in like January.”

Starfall’s excitement was contagious. I shrugged and asked him, “So... what, then?” My smile grew as I connected the dots: “And why was Comet going to the hospital?”

There were tears in the corners of his eyes when he said, “Next August.”

I pulled him into a congratulatory hug; after two pats, he broke away and I turned to a thoroughly bewildered Gilda. “Comet’s... uh...”

“I’m going to have another kid!”

Gilda’s confused frown deepened; then, she raised one eyebrow, followed by the other. “Congrats. But... isn’t it… like… don’t mares, uh…”

Starfall waved a dismissive hoof. “Yeah, Comet’s always been a bit early like that; surprised the hell out of...” His eyes shot wide open and he glanced from her, to me, and back to her. “If either of you tells her I just said that...”

Across the table, Gilda made a motion like zipping her beak shut; I shrugged and changed the topic to something I’d just remembered: “Speaking of birthdays, isn’t yours coming up?”

“Yeah, next week.” He mock-frowned. “Nice of you to remember.”

I smiled back. “Maybe I’ll have Memo schedule me a reminder—”

He shook his head. “Oh no. Seven years, and she’s never figured that one out. Don’t you dare.”

Gilda’s eyebrow shot up again. “You... and the secretary?”

“Not... me. Her. I keep telling her to stop.”

“Oh...” She chuckled. “What happened to your usual tactical assholery?”

He shrugged. “She... she doesn’t deserve that.”

From there, conversation flowed into the other various parts of our lives that morning. Gilda mentioned that she was going to be moving into the city over the weekend, Starfall offered to help, and I sat back and grinned warmly.

Despite their differences, or perhaps because of them, it was good to see Starfall and Gilda engaging in friendly conversation. When I thought more about it, the two of them had similar personalities—or at least, the two of them could be crass and brazen in the same manner. Either way, I was glad that they were able to actually speak with one another.

Even as Gilda declined Starfall’s offer for help—she didn’t own many things—I felt glad that the three of us were able to begin and share lives together in Farrington.

Life in Farrington, for me, started on the twenty-fifth of September—my apartment’s move-in day. Since that fell on a Monday, it needed some coordination between Iron and me. The plan was for me to wake up in my cave early on Sunday, pack up my stuff in the saddlebags that Iron had lent me, and spend the afternoon and night at his house. Then, on Monday evening, he’d help me get moved in and take me shopping to get the bare essentials to last me until the weekend.

When I woke up on Sunday morning, I smiled and thought about how I really couldn’t have asked for a better boyfriend. I was aware that some of my inner, happy warmth probably came from fertility hormones and stuff; however, even if I wasn’t right in the middle of the achy, yearning fun that came with every equinox, I’d have to admit that Iron was both good to me and for me.

I stood up and walked through my cave. Ever since Red Hooves’ attack, I’d mostly abandoned the place; still, I’d lived there for three years. Everything—the cracks in the walls, the general shape of the floor—had been a huge part of my life for the past three years. It had been my home.

Had been.

With a shrug, I started packing. My first decision was to just leave my blanket. Yeah, it was mine, but it’d been mine, outdoors, for three years without any sort of washing. It’d only cost thirty bits when I bought it, and I could probably earn that much being a guard in less time than it would take to clean it. Maybe some young drake or something would find it comfy, or maybe it’d just stay there forever until it rotted into nothing.

The rest of my belongings were pretty easy to pack up into Iron’s saddlebags: First, there were my loose bags of pay from the Guard. My personal coin sack was back at Iron’s house, but ever since mid-June, I’d always kept the bulk of my money off to the side to avoid stretching out my centuries-old, irreplaceable coin sack. Apparently, in Farrington, they had places that gave me money for keeping my wages safe with them, so I didn’t really have any objections to that; I’d just need to bring the bits with me to the city.

Next, there were my writing supplies I’d used to write Gildas Tagebuch. My next use for them was going to be planning out some new stories to tell the kids at the hospital; even with my additions, Sharfkral legends were starting to run dry, and they deserved top-notch entertainment. Plus, my therapist said I needed a creative outlet, so everyone won there.

I still had the diary itself, but I didn’t know whether or not to bring it with me—it wasn’t like anyone in Farrington could read my language, anyway. With a shrug, I packed it. Maybe it’d be useful in a few years, or maybe I could put in footnotes to show Doctor Sunshine, or maybe even Iron. Plus, I’d ended up sticking my letters to my sister and uncle in it; those, I wanted to keep.

Next, there was my stupid rabbit alarm clock. I chuckled; it was still far too cute for its own good, but it’d been reliable for the past few months. I’d need it for my apartment, anyway, so I put it in the saddlebag with my writing stuff, which was softer than the money in my other one. There was no need to break it mid-flight if I could help it.

After my medical and anti-manticore supplies—which would probably mess things up in the Jägerwald if I left them behind—only two things remained: Iron’s cactus and my little traveler’s chest. I left the cactus over by the mouth of my cave; I’d have to carry that in my hands, not put it in a saddlebag.

That just left my traveler’s chest. With a sad grin, I sat down next to it and popped its two latches open. There used to be months when going through the three things inside had been my only form of entertainment. One of the items had been my coin sack, so now, there were only two things inside.

The first was a feather my mother had given me, the night before I’d left to go to Junior Speedsters’. She never really talked to me or any of her kids—Father frowned on that sort of warmth—but she found ways of showing it silently. I remembered how one night, in the middle of winter, she’d placed one of my fledgeling sisters on my back; that was as warm and fuzzy as things got in our cave.

I closed my eyes and shrugged, slowly. That part of my life was over. The only thing I could do was remember my mother’s final words to me: “Whatever happens, I will always love you.”

The second thing in my traveler’s chest was a time-worn photograph of me, Dash, and everyone else at Junior Speedsters’. Seeing her smiling face made me cringe for a moment; I’d been so busy with everything in Farrington, I’d forgotten that I was waiting for Starfall’s wing to heal before I wrote her. The last time we’d spoken was during her visit for my birthday—at the end of June.

I tried to shake the guilt out of my head, but this was the sort of thing that only action would fix. Dash was my friend, and I didn’t want to lose that by letting everything else in my life get in the way.

On that note, I put on Iron’s saddlebags, closed and picked up my traveler’s chest, and grabbed Iron’s cactus. I had some more stuff to do today, the least of which was a long-overdue errand.

* * *

Two hours later, at the Farrington post office, I wrote my apartment’s address on the outside of a scroll. Inside of it, I’d written a short, simple letter:

Hey Dash

Sorry it’s been so long since I last wrote you; my summer’s been kind of crazy.

I’d like to tell you all about it, in Ponyville. I know what that means. Let me know when’s a good day for you (it’ll probably have to be a weekend), and I’ll be there.

~G.

0 - Healing Begins

I walked the cold, moonlit streets of Farrington and noted how utterly sparse they were. The days leading up to Tuesday’s storm had been seasonably humid; after the rain, the night air carried a noticeable chill. My short mane bristled and I felt my hooves tremble, but that had little to do with the temperature.

My first destination was Farrington General to make sure that Starfall had even made it there. With a wince, I hoped that—unlikely as it might’ve been—my mistakes hadn’t cost two individuals their lives this night. Instead of dwelling on that morbid possibility, I used my growing sense of dread as fuel to push myself faster and faster. By the time I got to the hospital, I was in a full-out sprint.

Because of the number of injuries in Farrington, the main hospital was one of the largest buildings in the city—even larger than some of the refineries in the Artisan District. Its clean, white walls looked silver in the moonlight, and when I reached the front entrance, the light inside spilled out through the glass to illuminate a bloody trail of hoofprints. I traced it backwards, outside of the artificial light, where the moon turned the hoofprints black on the cobblestone. Relief and guilt washed over me; even if he had to do it alone, he at least made it to the hospital.

I passed through the double-doors into the bright white lobby. Inside, a janitor was mopping the Farrington emblem in the middle of the floor. His water stank of bleach, and the mophead was stained a disturbing shade of pink. I ignored both and got his attention. “Excuse me?”

He turned to me, seemingly glad to have a distraction from his duties. “Oh! Captain Bulwark! One of your guards just collapsed in here, not forty minutes ago. Made a mess on the floor, too; blood everywhere! That stuff’s not easy to mop up, you know?”

Then get a better job, I almost snapped. Instead, I tried to confirm, “It was Lieutenant Starfall, right?”

“I didn’t catch his name, but he had a busted wing and a pretty bad stab wound, but they came and got him.”

“Where is he now?” I asked.

The janitor gawked at me cluelessly before he walked over to the information desk and yelled, “HEY, CARD!”

An irate-looking mare passed through the swinging door behind it and glared at the janitor. “This is a hospital! What is wrong with you?”

He gestured to me. “Captain Bulwark here’s looking for that other guard.”

She craned her neck around the janitor to she could see me. “They took the lieutenant to the trauma center. I don’t know anything else.”

That was all I needed to know. I thanked her, turned around, and left the hospital for Starfall and Comet’s house. It was a short trip; they lived near the northern edge of the Market District, just a few blocks from the the city wall.

When I got to their house, I let myself through their gate and walked up to their front door. I took a deep breath, then knocked loudly in case Comet were asleep. Just like Sherry had told me, it wasn’t necessary; within a matter of seconds and a rush of hoofbeats, she was at the door. As soon as she saw it was me, she let out a quiet, despairing whimper before she covered her mouth with a forehoof.

Probably too quickly, I interjected, “It’s okay, he’s only in the hospital.”

The news made Comet hyperventilate for a moment before she threw herself at me, crying. I held her, taking care not to put any pressure on her scars, and like every time she hugged me, I was thrown off by how incredibly light she was.

After she composed herself, she pulled away and put all four hooves on the ground. “Sorry, Iron,” she said with a tiny sniffle. “It’s just... he’s over two hours late, and I woke up alone, and there wasn’t a note, a-and I thought...” She dissolved into tears a second time, so I drew her into another hug. She returned it, and we stood there for a few moments while she let out her worries.

Finally, a second time, she found her voice and asked, “What happened?”

As much as I dreaded the truth, I had to tell her. “He and Gilda got into a fight in the Market Square. She put him in pretty bad shape, but he’s alive.”

She pulled away from me, looked down, and shook her head slowly for a few turns before whispering, “Idiot.” A few breaths later, she looked back up to me and said, “I need to go make sure he’s okay.” She hesitated before asking, “I know it’s late, but can you stay here in case either Hailey or Moonshine wakes up? I’ll be back before your shift starts.”

I snapped a salute at her. “I can and will, Comet. I have to work out what I’m going to do about all this; I don’t think I could sleep if I wanted to.”

She went into her house and I followed her. After she finished loading up her saddlebags with various documents and supplies for the hospital visit, I stood to the side of the hallway to let her pass. On her way out the door, she gave me a quick peck on the cheek and told me, “The coffee’s in the middle cabinet, help yourself.”

All I could do was nod before she was gone. I considered calling after her to have her wait for an officer escort to the hospital, but it was a good neighborhood and she was in a rush to begin with. Besides, the hospital wasn’t far away; Comet could probably get there before I could find a guard.

I locked her front door before I went into the kitchen to take her up on her offer of coffee. It had been a long night already, but I knew it was only the beginning of an even longer day.

While the decanter filled, I wondered about her two foals. While I hoped they slept until morning, I found myself idly wishing they’d wake up to keep me company. I shook that selfish desire out of my head; if they woke up, I’d have to explain my presence, and it wouldn’t be a fun night for anyone.

I resigned myself to being glad that my own house was empty for the night. For all the difficulties I faced that evening, Maxie was out on a delivery; at least I wouldn’t have to deal with the situation of her worrying over waking up in an empty house—and then her resulting self-righteousness.

My coffee finished brewing, so I poured my first cup of the day. Comet was at the hospital, Sherry was helping me with the Guard, and by this hour, Maxie was probably in bed with a strange stallion. Everyone else I knew in Farrington was probably still asleep, which gave me an odd sense of calm.

However, that made my thoughts wander outside the city. And as much as I didn’t want to worry about her—or what I had done to her—I couldn’t help myself. As I sat down on my friends’ couch with a steaming cup of coffee, I wondered where Gilda was, and how she was dealing with everything that had happened.

The Jägerwald was quiet, still, and deadly.

Earlier, I’d left Farrington by flying over the north wall. If anyone cared enough to net me down, they were too slow that night. On one level, I registered a sheer, raw hatred over being thrown away, but for now, I had more important matters to attend to—like the seven-inch knife that was still embedded in my shoulder. My palm also needed something more than a spit-scab.

That all boiled down to a few healing lessons that the Records-Keeper had given me. Now, that wasn’t to say she cared about my well-being—she was in cahoots with Father—so it was probably more that she didn’t want my blood to get all over my tribe’s laws and histories.

Either way, she—not Father—told me about how saliva could close almost any wound. Apparently, it came in handy after mating season. I wouldn’t know. But for intentional injuries, like the ones I always showed up at her cave with, there was Lebenwedel—a rare herb that grew near running water. Alone, it was worthless, but when chewed up into a paste, it turned griffin saliva into a potent, violent mixture that knit flesh back together.

Of course, that made it deadly to swallow. I wasn’t curious enough to ask how she knew, but the Records-Keeper told me horror stories about griffins’ throats, stomachs, and other parts closing up because they thought it was a good idea to eat it with every meal.

Still, my injuries were worth the risk of putting it in my mouth. That wasn’t the only risk I ran, either; the only place I’d ever seen it growing was near the stream that marked the southern border of my tribe and Equestria. As I walked along the southern bank of the stream, I kept glancing on the other side and off into the distance. It was almost irrational; I was in the Jägerwald. If I ran into anything that could think, odds were good that it could kill me.

At the very least, the moon was still shining bright, which helped me search for some Lebenwedel. That convenience was offset by the fact that, at that point, I only had one limb that hadn’t been cut up by Starfall’s knife. Sure would’ve been great to go to the hospital, I wanted to scream, but I kept quiet. Yelling would’ve been suicide. Instead, I listened to the stream gurgle, and I hoped I would be able to hear a predator coming before it killed me.

After nearly twenty minutes of searching, I smiled at a familiar leaf shape. It was a small victory—tiny, really—but getting my wounds closed up properly was the first step to... whatever came next in my life. I ripped the Lebenwedel out of the earth, then brought it over to the stream to get Starfall’s knife out of me.

Lucky for me, it wasn’t the first time I had been stabbed; I knew to be slow and steady when pulling the blade out. It resisted, and when I pulled harder, felt the blade tearing along the sharp edge. Teeth, I noted, and I braced myself for the fun part.

I shoved the blade back in, then pulled down at the same time I pulled Starfall’s knife out.

Pain wasn’t the right word for that agony, but I wasn’t even through the worst part yet. My shoulder flowed warmth down my arm, so as quickly as I could, I chewed up the Lebenwedel, spat the mush into my broken hand, and packed it into the wound as deep as I could manage.

Fire erupted in a searing white light that cut through my vision as Lebenwedel paste almost certainly touched one of my ribs. My right wrist still supported my weight, which was good; if I fell on my left side, I would probably have fainted in shock. I tried to breathe, but that only made it worse. I would’ve screamed, but luckily, the only thing that could escape me was a shuddering, sobbing groan.

H... hard part’s over, I mused. I hoped.

Eventually, I could see again, even though my vision swam. I chewed up some more Lebenwedel and patched up my flank and side, where Starfall had landed a slash. That burning was a cute, tiny thing compared to my shoulder. By the time I ripped the scab off my hand and patched that up, I felt...

Well, I felt like someone who’d been thrown out of a city by a two-faced asshole after his racist friend roped me into an illegal duel. So not great. But my injuries weren’t distracting me from that anymore, so I considered that a plus.

Then, I scoffed and shook my head. There were still a few things to take care of, like getting a personal supply of Lebenwedel to last me for the next few days and figuring out my bathing situation.

Before I left to start walking again, I remembered Starfall’s knife. After rinsing my blood off it, I brought it up to my eyes to get a better look at it. I wasn’t a judge of knife craftsmanship, but it looked reasonably well-made. Near the handle, there was an engraving: a heart that contained the letters “S” and “C.”

It held sentimental value to Starfall, too, which made my trophy all the sweeter. Because now, it’s mine.

Then again, I’d live with the scars from that duel for the rest of my life, so it wasn’t like I’d need a token reminder of it.

That brought me back to my healing situation, so on that note, I walked along the stream some more. It was much easier now; I trusted Lebenwedel more than I did a spit-scab, so I could put more weight on my right palm. Also, my cradled left arm was just a dull blaze now—painful, but it distracted me from the pain on two of my three walking limbs.

After what felt like an hour later, I had enough Lebenwedel to last me for a while—especially if I planted some of them near my cave. I tested my left wing; moving it was only slightly unbearable, which probably meant I’d survive the trip home if I took it easy.

Then... I didn’t know. The world was mostly open to me, barring two pony cities. I should’ve been worried that I was losing access to Equestrian cities at a fairly rapid pace, but as I took flight and headed home, the only thing I could focus on was getting back to my blanket and sleeping.

I’d earned that much, at least.

I woke up with my chin on a pillow that wasn’t mine. When I pulled my head back to look at it, something obscured the vision in my left eye. Out of my right one, I saw I was in a hospital room, but I couldn’t remember going to a hospital.

Everything felt... fuzzy, almost padded. I noted a few bags hanging from a stand near my bed; as I tried following the tubes, I noted that I was actually blind in my left eye. I grinned mildly at that fact, which in turn made me grin even harder...

Whatever they had me on, I found it difficult to complain.

Comet’s voice came from the left. “So, you’re awake.”

I turned to look at her out of my right eye. She was on a cushion by the wall, and her glare should have been worrisome. Instead, I grinned at her. “Hey, sexy. Where are we?”

Her glare got even harder as she walked over to me, which took the edge off my grin. “You’re in Farrington General. Don’t you remember? Last night, staying out two hours late, worrying me to death so you could get this?”

She shoved a hoof into my shoulder, and pain burst from it. Even though it was hazy and distant, it was enough to make me groan involuntarily. It cleared my mind, so I remembered how I had been stabbed, who had stabbed me... The rest of the night’s events came rushing back to me: Duel with the half-breed. Losing. Being shunted aside by Iron.

I looked back at Comet, struggling to focus on her even as I felt myself floating away. “Who’s with the kids?”

“Iron,” came her reply.

Anger rose in my chest and burned through the drug-induced haze. I’d never pegged him for the type of stallion to throw around his authority to impress females, but then again, I’d never seen him date anyone. Now, he was watching my children because his fetish had sent me to the hospital.

“And that’s just frigging great,” I muttered.

I felt her slap before I registered that she had hit me. “Don’t you dare...” Comet whispered, trembling with frustration. She took her voice to a normal speaking volume and continued, “What do you think would have happened last night if you had lost your petty little fight?”

“Mare, does it look like I won?” I grit my teeth at her before I tilted my head towards my now-mauled wing. For the first time, I noticed that the cast on it was covered in hot pink gauze. “Nice color, by the way. Do you like adding insult to injury?”

“You were like that when I got here, you arrogant... prick!”

In spite of myself and the drugs, I flinched; Comet didn’t swear—or what she counted as swearing—lightly. After she said it, she calmed down a little and shook her head. “What were you thinking?” she asked in an incredulous tone.

Finally, I realized she wasn’t entirely angry at me; she was just scared. I registered guilt, on one level, because yesterday, I hadn’t really planned much past the “kill the griffin” part of things. Moreover, at the end of a surprisingly even fight, I hadn’t thought of my children or even Comet; instead, I resented having my life spared by a member of a race of murderers.

What have they turned me into? I hated how those disgusting beasts were taking everything from me. First my wife’s flight, then my marriage, now even the love I felt for my children?

I would kill their entire filthy race before I let that happen.

As soon as the thought crossed my mind, reality caught up with me. I couldn’t even manage an adolescent female, let alone a full-grown male. Looking over at Comet, I lamented, “They’ve taken so much from us. Why am I the only one in Farrington who remembers?”

She frowned, then snarled, and for a moment, I thought she was going to hit me again. Fortunately, her anger subsided, and she sagged, defeated. She shook her head and said, “There’s a difference between ‘remembering’ and ‘obsessing.’”

I didn’t want to think about that yet, in case she had a point. Instead, I rested my chin back on the pillow. After a moment, I apologized. “For what it’s worth, I’m sorry for making you worry.”

She stroked my mane with a hoof. “That’s the least of our problems right now, but okay.” The words carried the weight of hidden meaning under them, but I wasn’t coherent enough to get what she was talking about. Comet took her hoof back and stepped away from my bed. “I need to head back home. Try to get some rest, and I’ll bring the kids by—”

“No...” I almost shouted, but it was difficult to get energetic. I turned to glance at her. “I don’t want them to see me like this.” Even as the proud words left my mouth, the truth in them stung. I had been stuck in a somewhat embarrassing, prone position, and I didn’t want them to see how badly I had been hurt, either.

I turned back to my pillow, so I couldn’t see my wife’s expression, but I knew the face she made when she spoke in her self-righteous tone. “Well, then, wallow in self-pity. I’ll come by if I get a chance, but I can’t make any promises until Iron gets off his shift.”

I shut my eyes and noted that the sun was making it too bright for me to sleep. I didn’t want to give Comet the satisfaction of asking for help, so I’d have to wait for her to leave.

Luckily for me, she left without saying another word.

After I called the nurse to shut my blinds, I lay there in darkness and hated everything about my situation. That didn’t last long, though; combined with the drugs, my weariness from the past night’s activities had an easy time of dragging me away into a restless, vivid slumber.

4 - Shared Justice

For two weeks after I ended things with Iron, I did my patrols under penalty of death. The whole time, I was ironically alone, which only reminded me of how fake of a thing time was. Thirteen, seventeen, twenty: The numbers that were given to days kept increasing, but what were they counting up to? August? Then what?

Technically, I had to make some home preparations for August—the biggest of which was a big fire to keep any sort of horny, flight-capable things from the Jägerwald from paying me a visit. That necessity didn’t bother me compared to how, since I was away from my home so often, it might turn into a territorial dispute anyway. Plus, there were trees below me; I couldn’t risk leaving a bonfire unattended for hours at a time.

So really, my life was being turned into a situation where I was being forced out of my home due to how I was stuck being a guard seventy miles away. The simplest solution, in a logical sense, was alluring, but I knew it was just bait for a trap.

If I wanted to live in Farrington, I’d be looking at having at least half of my monthly wages going towards paying for a room. At least. Then, there was the whole “not technically a citizen” thing, which I wasn’t sure how that worked—but even if I wanted to fix that, I was sure it’d cost money.

All of those problems put a notable dent in my convictions of setting aside money to live somewhere else. I’d face the same problems there, too, unless I made my home closer to that city.

For the time being, I set aside all the money I could into my growing pile of coin sacks. I’d think of something when the time came.

However, with my dream of travel slowly dying, my patrols became more and more monotonous and unfulfilling. The only real breaks I had from that gray, cobblestone blur were my sergeant, my reading, and my lunches.

Sergeant Scales, against all protocols or whatever, decided it wasn’t worth it to be a jerk to me. He was married and I’d had enough inter-rank romance to last me two lifetimes, so it didn’t really progress past a passing friendliness. Still, twice every day when I got my morning orders and evening dismissals, he at least tried to set a positive tone.

Over the two weeks after ending things with Iron, I tried three separate times to send a letter to Dash. I wanted to catch up with her, but I also had to explain everything that I’d done.

The first time, I had crumpled up the blank paper and apologized to Sergeant Scales, who had chuckled about it. The second time, I had managed a “Hey Dash” before I quit. After my third failed attempt at trying to find the words to explain everything, my sergeant had given me an awkward, hesitant smile before asking, “Uh... do you need help... with the words?”

I’d chuckled. Through some of Father’s family-wide lessons, all of my siblings had a cursory understanding of the three griffin languages. He had singled me out to learn Equestrian.

Still, even with all those languages, I didn’t know any combination of words that could get my point across to Dash—especially since we only shared the one language. After I had to decline my sergeant’s help, I took it as a sign to write that letter on my own time, then get it mailed.

Other than failing at writing, two or three nights a week, I got to butcher my tribe’s mythologies at Farrington General Hospital. It was one of the most enjoyable forms of emotional torture I’d ever endured. If they didn’t kill one another, Father would probably want to meet Sherry one day.

Despite how much they loved me and my culture, they were kids. Who were sick. They should’ve had their whole lives ahead of them... but because of some freak mining accident or something, the rest of their lives were lucky to be measured in months instead of years. Getting too attached would only end in pain.

However, as much as I tried not to, as much as I reminded myself that I was leaving soon, I couldn’t help but like the little guys. They were just too cute. I knew their names, their favorite colors, and two or three nights a week, I knew not to break down crying when they told me about their dreams of “one day, if I get better...”

A much more stable form of entertainment—one between peers, one that didn’t have imminent death hanging over it—were my lunches at my favorite diner. It was near the center of town, where the two main streets of Farrington intersected. That meant there was a good chance that my patrol would pass through a point that was close enough to let me get lunch there. I wasn’t stupid about the need for random patrols, either; I went there almost every day, but I’d throw my own schedule around by showing up as early as eleven or as late as three.

Spotlight—the pale pink mare who waitressed there almost constantly—took a while to forgive me after Starfall’s duel. Within a week, her boredom during the non-lunch rush overcame her, we talked about the duel, then some other things, and eventually she became probably the closest thing I had to a friend in that city.

Her mom had wanted her to be a miner like the rest of the family, but Spotlight maintained that her destiny lay all the way over in Manehattan as a show mare. She worked at the diner to save up for moving there which, given my current situation, I could definitely respect.

However, even days where I went to all three places, my sergeant, my diner, and my reading only took up about four hours of the eleven I spent in the city. The remaining seven were spent on my patrols, walking in circles, and trying to figure out ways to avoid getting trapped in Farrington when I was so close to leaving.

Every time I thought about leaving and what I would do outside that city, I always came back to Dash. Even though I tried to brainstorm what to send her in a letter, every time it came back to the same thing: I needed to visit her and tell her, face-to-face, about a dark secret.

Which was kind of how this whole thing started in the first place, I noted. I had the mottled-white stripe to prove it.

However, this time, my entry price to Ponyville was slightly higher. At the same time, I also didn’t really care about apologizing anymore. That came from pride, and there was something about having an entire city hate you that beat that notion out of you. So, if I apologized and they did still hate me? I’d probably have to ask Dash where to go from there, but I didn’t have anything to lose.

Still, I decided it would be best to wait until I knew for certain about Starfall’s condition—the one I had put him into. It would be crucial for telling Dash, since there was a difference between sending someone to the hospital and giving someone a permanent disability. That led me to realize how, if I told her about Starfall, I’d have to tell her about Stormglider. Even if that had been a lot less deliberate, it definitely had been permanent.

I didn’t know how I was going to bring all of that up to Dash, especially all in the same visit, so I filed it under the growing “list of things I needed to do in Ponyville.” I’d deal with that whole train of thought when I started making plans to go there.

For now, I was stuck as a guard. I walked lap after lap, day after day, waiting for either lunch or dismissal. For two weeks, other than the fleeting hours I spent eating or speaking to a room full of death, my life felt as hollow and empty as the three years I had spent alone in my cave.

* * *

On Monday, July 24, at a quarter past eleven, it had been two weeks since my breakup with Iron. I tried not to think of him very much, but I did. I tried to stay mad at him, but like everything in my life, that just cooled off into a sense of emptiness.

I turned a corner. Five more until I completed my route.

Instead of focusing on it, I used it to fuel an “indifferent” demeanor. That was how guards were supposed to act, after all, and it helped. Slowly but surely, ponies were once again starting to ignore me.

Another corner. Halfway done with lap number seven.

I was hungry, but I wanted to wait until later. The hours between eleven and one were the worst times for a crowd; Spotlight could talk more if I went to her diner when it was empty.

When I was almost to the end of the street, an older magenta mare stepped out from a side alley and made a beeline straight for me. Instinctively, I began taking note of distinctive features: her saddlebags had a strange insignia stitched into them, which included some of the same lettering that was on the bottom of my baton. Her bright white mane was tied up in a sharp, tight tail.

As she got closer to me, I saw that the fur on her left side was broken by what looked like a long, thin scar that ran back from her forelimb socket, under her saddlebag, and all the way back to her hip. And finally, her cutie mark: a sword with a dagger blade where a hilt should have been.

“You act like you’ve never seen me without my armor,” Sherry mused as she turned sharply and started walking alongside me, on the right.

I did a double-take at her voice, but then her color and hazel eyes locked it all into place. “I haven’t,” I answered truthfully. I didn’t know what she wanted, but given how our last interaction turned out, I didn’t want to risk pissing her off. My talons were growing back, but it’d be awhile before they were long enough to be usable.

“So, how have you been keeping?” Her question was neutral, but her voice’s tone was way too nice.

I shrugged “The usual.” My right eye wandered back to her side; now that we were closer, curiosity got the better of me, and I wanted to get a better look at—

“You like my little souvenir?” I looked back at her face, and she grinned viciously. “Stalliongrad Politsya’s rough on a good day. But when a mafia boss calls in a blood favor with a necromancer, you get to watch all your comrades die before they get back up and come after you. Re-killing them can be fun, if you know what they were, but it doesn’t do much for your good looks.”

I raised an eyebrow at the story, but I knew better than to press the matter. She hadn’t tracked me down to talk to me about her past. “What do you want, Sherry?”

Her grin strained into a thin line. “Is that how you want to be?”

I turned the corner on my patrol, and she sped up to keep next to me. Then I admitted, “We don’t have any good sayings about it, but common sense in my tribe is to avoid bigger predators.”

That response drew a deep, hard laugh out of her. “That’s the problem with you predators. Pride always gets in the way of logic.” She looked over at me, and unlike the week we patrolled together at the start of my career, we were eye-level now that she wasn’t wearing her boots. “It’s the defensive herbivores you’ve got to look out for. I mean, dragons prefer to eat rocks.”

We walked in silence for a little bit before she added, “But even dragons can get shot down if you’ve got enough artillery.” She waved upwards, above us, where I could see the outline of one of the four watchtowers that were placed in each of the main districts of Farrington. “You ever hear about the dragon that wiped out half this city in some sort of attempt to prove something?”

I looked around; none of the houses really seemed newer than the others. “Nope.”

“That’s because, forty years ago, they shot it down before it got the chance.”

The timeline of her story made me turn my head. “I thought you only came here like twenty years ago?”

“That’s the sort of thing that makes international headlines. But it’s not the sort of thing that we brag about, either.”

So why tell me?

My answer came before I could ask it, though. “And I’m not saying that to brag, or even as a threat. Just to tell you, when you come to this city and plan to do harm... don’t take it personally if you hit the city’s defenses.”

“You cut my talons off,” I argued. “That’s pretty personal.”

She chuckled. “Depends where you stick your fingers.” I scowled at her, and she raised an innocent eyebrow. “What? They do that out east. Aren’t they the more civilized griffins?”

“Where’s your horn?” I spat back. “Can’t Equestrians do magic?”

That shut her up for a whole city block before we turned onto a new street. “Well, I won’t apologize for it; the whole idea was it was supposed to be slightly embarrassing and make you remember. Besides, they’ll probably be back about the same that Starfall’s wing heals, right?”

I shrugged. “I don’t know how long it’s going to take him to heal. All I know is the day he is...” I shook my head. I wasn’t going to explain myself to her, of all ponies.

Sherry picked up where I trailed off. “So, you’re running away?”

“Away?” The word came out as hollow as I felt. I looked at her and honestly asked, “Away from what?”

She smiled sadly. “Are you at least going to say goodbye to Iron before you skip town?”

I occupied the next few seconds by looking around, making sure no one was breaking any laws. However, the Residential District was quiet, which forced me to think about her question a little. The first answer that came to mind was, “I don’t have anything to say to him.”

“And that’s how that ends?”

“What else is there?” I turned to her and shrugged. Having to think about the whole situation just... stung, so I pushed it out of my mind. Or at least, I tried to; failing that, I fought to keep my face straight.

“I’m not going to answer that,” Sherry said. “So instead, I’ll remind you your reading’s only one of the four parts to your punishment. Do you remember the other three?”

I held up a gauntlet and counted, “Fine, which I paid. Talons, which you took...” After a pause, I remembered, “And apology to that one guy.”

Sherry shook her head. “The talons weren’t official. But you still haven’t apologized to Officer Weatherly?”

“How?” I asked. I didn’t know anything about him, other than how he was stationed on the wall and, apparently, his name was Officer Weatherly.

She raised an eyebrow at me. “Well, you can form words to ask that question, so you know how to talk...” She paused, apparently deciding it wasn’t worth it to berate me. “As for when and where, you met him on-duty; his shift is from eight to four. If you need any more help...” She tapered off again, this time, only hypothetically insulting me.

“I’ll do it tomorrow, after reading.”

“Good.” Sherry nodded. “And don’t half-ass it. If I find out you’re faking apologies, I’ll take my old unit back from Horatio just so I can mess with your schedule.”

I didn’t like her threat, but I got hung up on, “Apologies? As in, plural?”

“As in plural,” she agreed. “Remember what I said when I told you to hang onto Starfall’s knife?”

My contempt escaped in a nasal sigh. I still had his knife. I didn’t want to hold onto it, but I didn’t want to apologize while I was giving it back. He started a fight with me, so, “No.”

Sherry turned to me with a slow, calculating look.

I continued, “I can’t be sincere, ‘cause I don’t feel sorry for that. He picked a fight because he’s got problems; he wouldn’t listen when I came here to talk, so now he’s crippled like his wife? How’s that not his fault?”

She looked forward and took a deep breath. “Wasn’t that the justification he used for ripping a filly’s wings off in the first place? ‘She came in our borders, how is that not her fault?’”

I lurched to a stop because her words felt like they slammed into my stomach. How the hell does she know my father?

Sherry turned around after walking past me; slowly, her expression turned into a triumphant grin. “So I’m right. You do know who did it.”

I blinked. “Forget me. How do you know who did it?”

She pointed at herself. “I don’t know who, only that it was an adult male griffin from the north. Though I guess that probably narrows the list of suspects down to around seven individuals.”

I breathed a sigh of relief, but I still shook slightly as I started walking again. “Yeah... And, yeah, I know who did it.”

“So...” Sherry raised a foreleg in a shrug. “I think that’s what Starfall wants out of this. If he can’t get revenge, then maybe that would be some closure.” We walked in silence while she thought something over. Finally, she offered, “Look, I’ll sweeten the deal. You apologize to him and tell him what you know about his wife’s attack, and you give me your word that you’ll stay in Farrington to finish serving out your community service... and I’ll give you your letters back.”

“Huh.” I was slightly impressed by her offer. Without my letters being held over me... well, I’d be in the same situation, really. However, I supposed it’d be nice to only have one less country to deal with if I somehow found a way to screw up the quiet, empty job I was doing now.

Also, having it put like that made me think that, on some level, I did owe something of an apology to Starfall—not because he deserved it, but because it was my family who attacked his.

Father definitely wouldn’t apologize.

That, more than anything, spurred me to nod. “Okay. I’ll apologize, and I’ll stick around to finish my reading.”

As soon as I said the words, Sherry nodded, then pulled a roll of papers out of one saddlebag. I recognized four of the sheets as my letters, but there was a fifth one that just had an address in the northern part of the Market District written on it. Noting my confusion, Sherry clarified, “Be there at eleven o’clock on Saturday.”

I nodded and stuffed the letters down the front of my armor, then we walked together to the end of the street. I had to turn left for my patrol, but Sherry kept heading straight. By way of a goodbye, she turned and said, “And friendly word of advice? Don’t wait until you’re forty to let yourself fall in love.”

I didn’t have a response for her right away, so I just grunted as we drifted farther apart. Despite my best efforts, once I was alone, her advice lingered with me for the rest of the day. It was an itchy bit of advice, one that I didn’t want to think about.

By the time I left Farrington that evening, I was almost impressed by how, in one conversation, Sherry had gotten me to question almost every conclusion I’d come to since my duel with Starfall.

* * *

Saturday morning, a little after eleven o’clock, I stood outside Starfall’s house. It was a nice-looking place, even if the lawn was slightly unkempt and the flowerbeds could probably use some watering. It might as well have been a dragon’s den for how little I wanted to go through the thin, black iron gate in front of the main path.

Earlier that week, on Tuesday, I had apologized to Officer Weatherly; that had gone surprisingly well. We’d come to an agreement that he was just doing his job and that he didn’t entirely blame me for the duel. Part of me wanted to draw strength from how easy it had been.

With a sigh, I looked down at my right hand. On the back, there was a smooth, pale mound of tender flesh that had a ragged outline on one side—it was almost healed, but it was a scar nonetheless. I couldn’t make as tight a fist with it as I used to be able to, but I figured that if I needed to, I had a gauntlet to throw punches with.

Currently, my short-taloned fingers were curled around Starfall’s knife. He had stabbed me with it twice, and he’d left it in me the second time. By most rights, I shouldn’t need to give it back.

But my wounds had healed. His hadn’t.

With a deep breath, I shook my head again and reminded myself that this probably wasn’t going to end anything between us. Still, Sherry was forcing me and... I had to apologize. It was my family who started this.

I undid his gate, walked up to his door, and knocked. On the other side, hooffalls approached to the door, then a pair of locks slid open. I felt my heartbeat quicken, but everything honed in and became sharper, so while it was faster, to me, it just seemed louder and at regular pace.

Starfall opened his door, and we glared at each other for a few hyper-realistic seconds. His mane looked a lot messier than I remembered from the time I’d seen him without his helmet. Now, he had a scar that ran vertically across his right eye. The eyeball itself still looked healthy, not like Father’s glossed-over milky one. That led to my observation that all three of us had eyes that were pretty close to the same shade of amber.

Finally, Starfall took a deep breath and asked, “What are you doing... at my house?” The words were hot and livid, but given the extent of rage I expected, they almost sounded neutral.

At least, I hoped they were neutral, because then he’d be willing to listen. I began, “I’m here to talk. And give this back.” To make sure that he’d listen, I waved his knife next to my head. He reached for it, but I pulled it back, out of his reach. “Talking first. Otherwise, I’ve got a friend in the Artisan District who I’m pretty sure wouldn’t mind doing some smelting work for me.”

His eyes narrowed, but he didn’t slam the door in my face. “So talk. Then leave.”

I still didn’t know whether he was only mildly pissed or if he was just weary. I banked on the latter, because that’s how I felt. “It’s been almost... what, four weeks? Four weeks since our duel, anyway, and I’m still not sure who’s to blame for everything between us. I mean, you started stuff, because of what happened to your wife. I fought back. Iron...” I shook my head. “Well, there’s the stuff between you and—”

“And there’s the sick piece of shit that attacked my wife in the first place!” he spat. “Or are you just going to forget about everyone from your race?”

I snarled at his accusation, but I forced it down. “I’m talking about things between us. Stuff we can work out.” I shrugged. “If you’re looking for an apology from the guy who did that to her, I can’t help you there. But I can apologize for what I did to you, and if it makes any difference, for what he did to her. So... I’m sorry.”

Starfall glared back at me for at least thirty long seconds. I started to doubt if he’d heard me, but finally, he sighed and bowed. “What’s his name?”

I dodged, “Look, it doesn’t—”

He snapped his head up and scowled so fast that I flinched. “Name!”

“G-Garick,” I stammered. “But that’s not going to help you with anything.” Suddenly, I was worried about this turning into an international outrage; that fear steeled my nerves. “I mean, you’ve got his name. If you go there and ask for a one-on-one fight, the only way you won’t get laughed at is if they’re too busy eating you.”

Starfall reeled, then muttered, “Disgusting.”

“Kind of,” I agreed.

“And you don’t see a problem with that?”

I shook my head. “I’m telling you not to go there.” Then a small bit of racial pride flared up. “This whole thing’s about how we don’t like outsiders. I don’t know what your wife was doing—”

“NOTHING!” he yelled through gnashed teeth. “She was delivering a letter, of all the damned things, and you’re telling me that there’s nothing wrong with—”

“It was my father!” I shouted over him. Starfall’s eyes widened, but my voice got faster as I continued, “He’s everything that’s wrong with my race: proud of the past, bored with the present.” My beak clattered, I was trembling so hard. “Your wife met him once? She was his plaything for one measly afternoon? TRY FOURTEEN FUCKING YEARS!”

Starfall blinked rapidly after my verbal onslaught, but he recovered quickly into a rage. “Fourteen years, but you can still fly! What’s—”

I punched him straight in the nose.

His eyes rolled, unfocused, as reflexive tears welled up in them. “Oh...” I exhaled in a shuddering breath. “You weren’t fast enough to dodge that? Spend a night outside when it’s winter, then.” I took a short breath. “I made a fire so I wouldn’t die. It took two months for the fur on my leg to start growing back after he shoved me into it. Lucky, that healed in time for him to break my arm for the seventh time!” My own tears were flowing now as I pointed his knife’s hilt at him. “So don’t even act like you know half of it!”

We stood in silence for a few moments after that. Starfall was aghast, and I... had no idea where that memory had come from. It made me want to break down, sobbing. I at least wanted to run away—but not yet. I needed to hold it together for a few more minutes.

Starfall was still stunned into silence, so I forced a brave face on and finished what I had come to do. “N... none of that matters anymore. It’s in the past. I’m not going to be a hypocrite and ask you to get over everything.” I turned my wrist over and opened my hand, offering his knife to him. “So can we just... coexist?”

For his part, Starfall still stood there, looking at me like I grew a second head. He blinked some of the shock out of his face, tried to say something, shook his head, then finally muttered, “Yes, then.”

He took his knife back and I turned leave him, his home, his city... Before I made it to his front gate, I heard him quietly call out, “Gilda?”

I turned my head, mildly surprised to hear him use my name for once. Our eyes met, but then he shook his head and closed his door.

I blinked, then realized that calling me by name instead of race was as close to an actual apology as I was going to get.

I didn’t care. I wanted to get out of Farrington.

As I marched to the north gate, I blithely thought about how it was slightly easier to walk on my talon-less right hand, now that I wasn’t holding his knife. I tried to console myself that now, after apologizing to Starfall, I only had one punishment left to finish.

But between having my whole past ripped open like that and, now, the new memories I had forgotten... I wondered if it had been worth it.

Knife in hoof, I stared at my closed door for a few moments after Iron’s crazy girlfriend left.

No, forget crazy. Crazy was a few miles ago from where she was at now.

She was a dangerous individual.

I reveled in the irony of how, during our first actual conversation—never mind how I didn’t understand any of the gibberish she’d screamed at me after her sucker punch—almost everything I had initially worried about her was right. The only difference was now, after looking past her species, I could respect her intellect enough to notice she was smart enough to be completely psychotic.

Something warm dripped out of my nose. I swore and clamped my right forearm over it, then rushed to the bathroom. After I wadded up two tissues and stuffed them into both nostrils, I caught a look at my reflection as I scowled. Between my nose and the scar on my right eye, her crazy outbursts were beginning to take a toll on my face.

Shaking my head, I returned to the foyer. I’d been quick enough in handling my nosebleed that I wouldn’t have to clean off the hardwood floors. I took that as a small victory; even before she had showed up to “apologize,” I had been behind on my Saturday morning chores. It was something of a milestone for me; my wing had finally gotten to a point where I could manage the pain without felony-grade prescription drugs.

Today was supposed to be my first day of doing yardwork since the duel. I didn’t have time to waste getting punched in the face by an unstable griffin.

Before I could go outside, I needed to decide what to do with my knife. I didn’t want to wear it outside; at the very least, it was evidence of the Sharptalon’s visit. Instead, I went into the bedroom and shut my knife away in the drawer of my bedside table. Later, when Comet and I were getting ready for bed, I’d tell her what happened.

With that settled, I headed outside. My family had left almost forty minutes ago for their usual Saturday shopping—almost exactly half an hour before the Sharptalon showed up. I wondered about the timing of that, but then I chuckled, wrinkled my nose and asked, What’s she going to do, attack me?

I went behind our house to my shed and got out the push-mower, then I took it to the front lawn and started tracing rows in the green overgrowth. Cutting grass was a slow, methodical process, but I liked it. It was less foreign than it was ten years ago, but my Cloudsdale youth still reveled at the novelty. Grass. Still, as long as I kept the lines straight, mowing the lawn could be a mind-emptying task.

Unfortunately, Iron’s girlfriend still weighed heavily on my thoughts—and nose.

The first thing that came to mind was sympathy, for Iron. This was his first actual girlfriend, at least since I’d met him, and she was also insane. I could be irrational, sometimes, but there was a vast difference between that and having emotions that flipped like a switch.

All because of her father, I sneered. Even if I didn’t know what, specifically, she yelled at me about, I could figure out what “his plaything” meant. Monsters like that weren’t isolated to griffins...

I still remembered the day my sergeant had asked if I wanted to investigate a neighbor’s reports of crying from a supposedly empty house next door. I volunteered. I discovered the source. And figuring that filly had been through enough, I had enough decency to take that stallion into what used to be someone’s living room before I beat him to a quivering, sobbing pulp.

That mess had been back when I was an officer, and it was the first and only time I had been officially reprimanded for “excessive force.” Eight years later, I regretted nothing. A month after things settled down, I was personally invited to Farrington’s Air Patrol, a position that came with, technically, the rank of sergeant.

However, it didn’t come to me as that grand of a surprise that Iron’s girlfriend was somehow related to the monster that attacked Comet. As much as I wanted to hate her for it, though, I just couldn’t. There were some things you couldn’t blame on somebody, and as someone with children, I held no regard for anything that was unable to adhere to basic biological logic.

I finished mowing my front lawn, unless I counted the clippings. I was starting to sweat, and while I wasn’t tired yet, my wing joint was starting to prickle. I decided to skip them for now, and damn whatever effects on the grass it’d have.

That only left the back yard which, while not huge, was large enough where I’d probably have to spend a good half-hour on it. Shortly after I started in on it, I came to the conclusion that no, I couldn’t hate Gilda. Not anymore. Granted, since I wasn’t running into her every day, it was easier to not hate her, to not be reminded of what I let happen to Comet.

However, I could pity her situation. She was outcast from her own society and, based on what I learned today, that hadn’t been a good situation for her either. I supposed between her home and Farrington, she didn’t really have anywhere she belonged.

That insight came with a distant pang of guilt. I remembered my tactics for establishing boundaries with her—she had a right, as an officer, to defer to a lieutenant’s authority for certain things. I remembered how I had shown my right to demonstrate that it wasn’t worth her time to bother me, but after learning more of her situation, I wondered if I should apologize to her.

I scoffed at that. Bitch broke my wing. Whatever I’d done to her, she’d gotten her dignity back, and she had come asking to coexist—which was ironic, given how I’d probably never see her again—not for my apology. And even if I handled it wrong the first time, I still maintained that she had no right to be near my wife or children. Not after everything her father had done to our family.

It wasn’t a matter of blame, however. It was more a matter of decency.

I took it easy for the remainder of the mowing. Even still, I didn’t notice when Comet and the kids got back. One moment, I was mowing the last third of the back yard; the next, Hailey was fluttering over to me with a glass of lemonade. She gave it to me. I smiled and thanked her.

While I drank, she asked, “Mom wants to know if you’re gonna leave our front lawn looking like a tornado passed through.”

I stared flatly back at her for a moment before chuckling and shaking my head. “You want to make five bits?”

“Not really.”

Smart kid, I mused. Then I answered, “Tell her I’ll get to it. Any idea when lunch is?”

“Nope.”

I grunted, then offered the glass back to her. “Take this back in with you.”

Hailey nodded, grabbed the empty glass, and buzzed back inside. Despite having my workload doubled, approximately, I smiled. Maybe it would be better to get the yard spruced up. At this rate, I’d have enough energy, so maybe it was time for some usual Saturday quality time with my kids.

I grinned at the thought, and it motivated me for the next forty minutes as I mowed, raked, bagged, and took care of other various bits of yardwork that I had neglected for far too long.

Saturday afternoon, I decided to visit Starfall.

On the familiar walk over to his house, I mused at how simple an outing that used to be. In fact, as far back as my seventeenth birthday, we used to have a running tradition of going to a bar together on Saturday nights. It ended when he got promoted to lieutenant; in one night of indulgence, we had managed to simultaneously celebrate his promotion and declare a lifelong avoidance of gin.

In all seriousness, it had been far too long since the last time we spoke, and even then, the last time we had spoken in a friendly manner. Even before his duel with Gilda, she had been hanging over our interactions—which was no fault of her own, granted. However, I also had to admit that now that she was out of my life, things were returning to their usual, regular fare.

The final piece of that was getting my old friend back.

Earlier in the week, Sherry stopped by my station with the simple message, “He’s still slightly pissed. Give him another week or so.” However, she’d accidentally contradicted herself on Wednesday, when she brought me her half of the Guard’s biweekly pay cycle audit.

Through some fancy bending of paperwork and red tape, we were able to keep Starfall on the payroll as if he were on disability. However, that fund was running out, which meant that soon, things were going to turn bad for him, financially. Then, there was the fact that I hadn’t officially fired him or made any of the promotions permanent—as I was reminded, almost daily, by Acting-Sergeant Even Scales. The stallion was five years older than me, but he apparently had the patience of a grade-school colt.

When the end of the week finally came around, I was aware that I needed to talk to Starfall for business and for personal reasons. After lunch, Maxie had locked herself in her room without a shouting match first, which could only mean one of two things—and I would interrupt neither. Things had gotten strange enough between us last Friday.

Instead, I had started back up on the book I was reading. After scanning the same page four times, I realized I was procrastinating, and that drove me out the door so I could finally see where things stood between my friend and myself.

Comet greeted me at the door with a huge smile. “Hey, stranger!”

I darted my eyes off to the side; one of the unfortunate side effects of having a row with my friend was that, out of respect to him, I didn’t really have a chance to speak to his wife, either. Even if July hadn’t already been part of her childrens’ break from school, where she was usually too busy at home, I would have canceled our Thursday lunches together.

She understood and patted my cheek apologetically. “Okay, I didn’t mean it like that.”

I smiled. “I know. But on that subject... is Starfall home?”

Comet waved me inside and spoke as she led me through the house. “It’s getting harder and harder to tell him to rest, but I guess that means he’s healing, right?”

“Probably,” I agreed. After a few steps, I asked, “So, is he doing well?”

We passed through their living room and into the back hallway, where Comet answered, “Better. And... I mean more than just the wing.” She shrugged, which from behind, accentuated the bones of a second pair of shoulders. “I mean, if I’d known all he needed was some empathy for a cripple, I know where to break wings where they don’t heal well.”

I stayed silent; there wasn’t a simple answer for that comment. First, it was mildly disturbing. But secondly, even though I’d done what I could to bridge the gap between them over the years, I still felt awkward commenting on it. In general, Comet and I knew how “stuck” Starfall was, but the only conversation Starfall and I had about his situation went, “Get a girlfriend, then talk to me about my relationship.”

Which, I unfortunately noted, was how it had played out.

Luckily, Comet took our conversation to a brighter place: “But... I don’t know. After his fight with the Market Square, he seems like he knows there’s three of us here he needs to care about.”

“That’s good,” I stated, and Comet agreed with a nod.

When we got to the end of the hallway, she opened the top half of the door and revealed a truly happy sight. Starfall and his two children were out in the yard, vying for control of a soccer ball. It didn’t look like there were any goalposts or rules, but their smiles and laughter told me they didn’t need any.

Moonshine was the first of them to notice me; his cheer of “Uncle Iron!” got his sister’s attention, and I had about a second’s warning to sit down before they both zipped over, through the open door, and smothered me in a feathery flurry of hugs—more affectionate than their usual fare, but it’d been the better part of a month since the last time I’d watched them for Comet.

“Do you want to play soccer with us?”

“Yeah, c’mon, it’ll be fun!”

They broke out of the greeting and hovered, waiting for an answer; before I committed, I looked up at the back door. Starfall was standing there, looking at me blankly. I gestured to his children and shrugged.

He gave a weak grin, returned the shrug, and opened the bottom half of the door. “Well, come on, then.”

I shot a quick, guilty glance at Comet. Her answer was, “I’ve got some cleaning to finish up.”

With that settled, the four of us ventured outside and split into two teams for a more structured game of soccer. However, we didn’t keep score, we weren’t stringent about goal zones, and it was the most fun afternoon I’d had in a long time.

* * *

A few hours later, Comet came out into the yard to announce that dinner was almost ready. She invited me to join them.

Again, I silently deferred to Starfall; again, he gave me a permissive nod.

After our dinner plans were cemented, Comet took the kids inside to clean up before dinner. For as sunny a day I’d been exerting myself in, I felt slightly awkward at the mention of hygiene. However, once they were gone, I found myself alone in the back yard with Starfall, and I realized I had more important concerns than sweat.

He realized it, too—I saw his eyes dart over to the hose hanging from his house before he focused back on me. He chewed his cheek for a few moments, which made me realize I didn’t know what to say, either. The simplest solution presented itself, so I began, “Look—”

“I don’t—”

After interrupting each other, we looked at each other and waited. Neither of us continued our original line of thought, however; instead, we decided to cut to the chase and admit, at the same time, “I’m sorry.”

I listed my infractions first. “I shouldn’t have just backhooved you away from the scene like that. You’ve been my friend for a decade, and you deserve better than that. And I’m sorry about what I said at the hospital—”

Starfall shook his head. “You freaked out because you expected better from me, and that’s because I lied about her not bothering me. That’s a pretty shitty thing to do to a captain, let alone your friend.”

“But I wasn’t acting like a captain,” I argued. “Or at least, not impartially.”

He shrugged. “Well, okay. But then I’m sorry I stabbed your girlfriend.”

I chuckled, but shook my head. “Apology accepted.”

Before saying anything, Starfall put his hoof out. I grabbed it to shake it, but he surprised me by pulling me into a quick, sweaty, stallion hug for two pats. Repaired friendship or no, there were certain rules to things.

After we broke away, I nodded and clarified, “Though, truth be told, she’s not really my girlfriend anymore.”

Starfall crooked his head slightly. “Really? I figured you had something to do with her little visit.”

I raised an eyebrow. “She visited you?”

“Yeah.” He nodded, straightening his head out. “She apologized, then she punched me in the face, then she broke down into her language a bit. So I think we’re good now. I don’t know how they apologize.”

I rubbed my cheek and thought about making a joke, but I still felt regret over that situation—especially my mistakes. Nonetheless, I was curious about her wellbeing. “What... else did she mention?”

“In all seriousness...” His eyes and tone dropped. “She mentioned her father. So...” He shrugged.

I didn’t know if he felt remorse over his actions or pity over her situation, so I struck an objective middle ground: “Well, yes, she’s sensitive over that issue.”

Starfall nodded. “I mean, no offense, Iron... but damn. If you’re new to dating, you might want to try someone less...” His eyes traveled off into the distance before he chose the word. “Unstable.”

In truth, I agreed with him. Things were certainly easier without her. However, I shook my head slowly and answered, “I’m aware of her... personality hangups.” It felt good to be finally able to be honest with another stallion, so I added, “Her problems tended to accentuate the good times as well as the bad times. Whenever she was in a bad mood, it was difficult. But when she was happy...” I remembered the toy otter she gave me, then shook my head sadly. “I know I should move on. I just... I wish we could talk about some of the things that happened.”

“What do you mean?”

“She’s been avoiding me since the incident,” I clarified. “I ran into her once, accidentally; after that, she almost fractured my jaw and told me to quit following her.”

Starfall’s ears drooped, then he hoofed at his lawn absently. “Well, damn, kid.” He shrugged. “I didn’t mean to destroy your relationship.”

I looked back at him, flatly.

“Well, okay,” he continued, “other than the... murder thing. If I could go back and change it, I would...” He massaged his temple. “I’ve been an ass.”

Without saying anything else, he walked over to the hose near his house, unwound a few feet, then sprayed himself down with it. He avoided his back for the most part, which I assumed was because of the cast. When he finished, he offered me the hose’s nozzle. “I’ll see what I can do to make it up to you, Iron.”

I turned the water on, then after a blast of cold water drenched me, I shivered, “N-no need.”

He chuckled. “Don’t like the cold?”

I shook my head, “There’s cold, then there’s ice.”

“Try living in Cloudsdale during the winter,” he replied absently. We shared a blank stare, then he continued, “Right. Sorry. But, no, I’ll see what I can do about closure for you two. After all, it’s the least I can do.”

His offer gave me mixed reactions. I was wary of it; since I was in the middle of trying to put Gilda behind me, I didn’t want to rely too much the hope it gave me. With a shrug, I supposed it wouldn’t hurt anything in the long run.

There wasn’t anywhere worse my relationship with Gilda could go beyond “not speaking.” And if there was, then at least I had my friend back to help me through it.

I grinned my thanks at him. Handing the hose back to him, I changed the subject. “Then only thing that remains is to ask you what you want to do, with regard to the Guard.”

He blinked at me, but he rewrapped the hose on its hook. “Iron, I assaulted a subordinate officer... twice. Should I even be allowed back?”

His question rose one of my own objectivity, but luckily, I had spoken to both Sherry and Horatio on the matter. Even he disdainfully agreed that, while it was a fiasco, it was a fairly multi-faceted fiasco.

I answered plainly, “Your service record speaks for itself: You’re not a bad guard. You’ve been injured in the line of duty over a dozen times, and you have hundreds of by-the-book arrests to compensate for the one that no one truly blames you for.” I shrugged. “As captain, I can’t afford to lose someone as competent and driven as you were. Even if there are punishments to deal with...” I shook my head. “The Guard hasn’t forgotten a decade of good service.”

Starfall’s mouth stretched thin, and he blinked hard. “Damn it, Iron...” His voice cracked, so I took a deep breath and looked upwards to let him have his dignity. After a few moments passed, he cleared his throat. “That... that means a lot.”

I looked him back in his misty eyes, and I smiled. “You’re a good stallion, Star.” Unfortunately, I needed to level with him. “But I won’t lie, this is a one-time deal. And friend or no, I’m going to be enacting a zero-tolerance policy for you, towards Gilda.” I shook my head. “In fact, part of me is tempted to get her consent before you can officially return—”

He grinned, which was intriguing enough to get me to quit speaking. Sure enough, he said, “I’m one step ahead of you there. At the end of her foreign rant, she offered me the chance to ‘coexist,’ and I took it.”

That news assuaged my fears somewhat. I pressed, “What if Horatio assigns you as her patrolling partner?”

Starfall winced at the implication, but then shook his head and smirked. “I’d make sure she’s okay with it, then ask for a permanent route in the Artisan District.”

Despite the gravity of the situation, I chuckled. They would be a force to reckon with, if they could set aside their differences. However, I shook my head and focused on the first part of his answer. It implied empathy, but there was something I’d learned earlier that put my doubts to rest:

“Thank your wife,” I leveled. “The fact that Comet says you’re doing better with dealing with your anger... that is the real reason I’m going to go through with this.”

A frown crossed his face, but he wisely remained silent on that issue. Instead, he asked, “So, busted down to officer... Horatio’s going to love that.”

I chuckled darkly. “Imagine that. A lieutenant with disdain for an officer.”

Starfall made an interesting mix between a groan and a chuckle. “Touché.” After a pause, he asked, “Will I at least keep my yearly raises?”

“Some,” I answered frankly. “But there are punishments, demerits...” I shook my head then quietly added, “If need be, I’ll help with things out of my own pocket.”

He put a hoof on my shoulder and shook his head. “No. Money’ll be tight, but we’ll figure something out.” He shrugged. “It’s better than having no job, at any rate.”

I mirrored his hoof and patted his shoulder. “When will you be able to rejoin us?”

Starfall took a moment to think, then he asked, “Isn’t Gilda using my old armor?”

“Technically.” I nodded. “I’ll get some wing-holes put in another set.”

He bobbed his head in agreement, then answered my original question, “Well, I won’t be able to make it this Monday... but give me another week, and I’ll be good.”

“Fair enough,” I agreed. Mentally, I noted how close that was coming to the end of his medical pension; if he had any injuries that required him to miss his shifts in the next few months, he’d probably need a personal loan.

However, it was a small price to pay in the long run.

To make things official, I held out a hoof and said, “Welcome back to the Farrington Guard, Officer Starfall.”

After we shook hooves, he smiled and looked at his house. “Dinner’s probably on the table; let’s get some before it gets cold.”

I agreed, but only to a certain extent. “Cold food is good food if it’s eaten with a friend.”

Starfall coughed out a laugh. “Damn. What’s that from, ‘Cooking and the Art of Writing Greeting Cards?’”

I joined him with a chuckle of my own, glad to see that things were quickly headed back to normal for us. As he led me into his house, I rubbed my left shoulder and mused that even though things with him got hectic and angry from time to time, I would choose very few stallions to replace him with as a friend.

Hours after Iron’s surprise visit-turned-dinner, Hailey and Moonshine were asleep, Starfall was in the bathroom brushing his teeth, and I was in bed looking at the night sky

I knew it was pointless to wish things had turned out differently for me, but from the ground, the moon and stars all seemed so very far away. I kept staring at the pale, yellow crescent and, like every night, I hoped that if someone were looking back, that she’d keep watch over my family.

Starfall finished up in the bathroom, and I decided that, in lieu of a goddess’s protection, he’d have to do. He got into bed with me, and his hoof felt reassuring as it brushed on my shoulder. He slid it down to my side, but I stopped him when it got to my waist.

I was glad that he’d managed to patch things up with Iron and the Guard, but still, I couldn’t get it out of my head that if he hadn’t gotten his head out of his ass at just the right moment, things would have turned out a lot worse than they did.

Of course, he was in a frisky, celebrative mood. “So, good news today, huh?”

I chuckled darkly as I pushed his hoof away. “That’s one way to put it.”

There was a brief pause, followed by, “Okay, I’ll bite. What’s wrong?”

I glared at the wall as I brought my hind legs’ knees up to my chest. “What’s wrong is how close you came to losing your job over... what, because your feelings got hurt? Because you were right and Iron was wrong?” I wanted to keep going, but I was too tired from worrying about everything. Instead, I just vented my anger in an exasperated sigh.

There was a moment of silence, then he made a frustrated grunt before sighing and asking, “Do you remember what I told you after your injury?”

“Yeah, well now that I understand why you thought that—”

“I told you I’d support you, and I meant it. It wasn’t because you weren’t able to support yourself anymore, it was... because I brought you here in the first place. I’d hate the mines, or working in a store... but it still would have been me working.”

The softness and sincerity of his voice... it was always hard to stay angry at him when he was like this. And he was getting better about his condescension, or at least now, I could see where it really came from. He felt guilty over what had happened, even though it wasn’t his fault. I wanted to let him know that I wasn’t angry at him, but if I were direct, he’d just brush it off as obvious. Instead, I started, “Do you remember, after we left, how angry my parents were with you?”

“Were? Didn’t they refer to me as ‘that worthless ass of a stallion you married’ in their Hearth’s Warming card last winter?”

I smiled at the epithet; in a drawer in the closet, there were nine cards that we kept hidden from the children, but they said the exact same thing, in the exact same words. I hoped it a term of endearment by this point; they were nice enough when they came to visit. Then again, if they blamed Starfall for what happened to me, then there was some justification for his self-righteous guilt. “They took things harder than your dad did.”

Behind me, Starfall chuckled. “Well, he’s finding it easier to live as a bachelor, now that I’m not there to eat all his food.” His voice turned pensive and quiet. “I should visit soon; it’s been a while.”

As he thought about his plans for the future, I let nostalgia take me back to the past. Our first six months in Farrington had been unsteady, like a small fire burning in a night breeze. Both of us worked our jobs, and even though I was out on deliveries a lot, Starfall had always been there and happy when I came home to him. I missed those days, when we had been young and stupid and had known that we loved each other.

I remembered how, almost half a year after my injury, on our wedding day, I had freaked out because my gown didn’t fit anymore—Hailey had been on her way, and that hadn’t done any favors for my waistline. Star had cheered me up by ripping his vest in half and vowing that, screw it, we’d get married naked.

I smiled as I also remembered Iron’s cautious tone as he later asked, “Wasn’t that a rental?”

My smile faded when I realized that, at the same time, I was glad those days were gone. Before my injury, I used to travel the world on a whim. I loved exploration, and risk... it had been stupid, so I never told Starfall, but I had known full-well whose territory I had been crossing into that day. I hadn’t expected it to be anything more than an idle thrill, something of an empty danger... but then, I got caught.

Between the terror, the helplessness, and the pain, it had been a harsh dose of reality.

“You know,” I whispered quietly, “I don’t want to accuse that monster of doing us any favors... but it’s interesting, how settling down turned out.”

Despite my defensive curl, I felt myself being pulled backwards into Starfall. He wrapped a forelimb around my knees and whispered, “I’m sorry for my part of how things turned out.”

I rested my hoof on top of his. I wanted his affection to be real, to be deep, but he would never get over what happened if he kept blaming himself. I whispered back, “It’s not your fault, Star. Try to remember that.”

He kissed me in the crook of my neck, and unconsciously, I twitched my cheek to nuzzle against his. He spoke into my skin, and I felt the three quiet words: “I love you.”

It was nice to be held like that and to have sweet nothings whispered into my ear. But I’d seen that side of Starfall too many times to believe it as more than just words. He slid his hoof between my knees, and I let him, even if that might just be empty, too.

Still, I wanted to believe his words. If I were honest with myself, part of me needed them to be real. The only solace I took was in hope; hope that, despite our barriers, and despite the odds, one day, I’d know he were telling the truth.

One day, we’d love each other again.