> Death Valley
>  by Rambling Writer
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

> Prologue - Run
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

Pyrita was too old to be running at the speeds she was running. But if she slowed down, they might catch her.

Midwich Valley narrowed as she scrambled across the rough, snow-swept rocks and the vertiginous cliffs above felt even taller than usual, looming high enough to block out the moon. She wasn’t young enough to fly up and over them, not in one go, but she could speed herself up along the ground with small flaps of her leathery wings. So she did, fighting arthritis and the temperature alike to stay alive.

Her breath misted before her as she forced frigid air into her lungs, out of her lungs, in, out, in, out, even though her very diaphragm felt stiff. Her muscles screamed from overwork and her heart was ready to give out. But they’d seen her, she knew they had, so she had to keep moving. Adrenaline didn’t ease the pain, it just made it too easy to ignore. But she didn’t need to keep this up for long. She just needed to reach-

As the opposite walls of the valley met each other in a curve, she saw it: the entrance to the mine, yawning darker than midnight black at Midwich’s apex. Pyrita wanted to take a rest, to ease off for just a few moments, but she couldn’t afford that. She ran into the drift, giving a quick chirrup of echolocation.

Yet what came back was muddled, messy. Her hearing was beginning to go on the best of days, and now exertion had turned her heart into a drum pounding directly in her ears. Pyrita couldn’t make out enough of the return sounds to get a clear image and she didn’t trust her memory of the mine’s layout. She risked coming to a halt and chirruped again. Her ragged breathing made the sound too fuzzy for anything and what she heard back was even worse.

She couldn’t go into the mine. It was too dangerous. She couldn’t leave the mine. It was too dangerous. Panting like a dog, she looked over her shoulder. She couldn’t see them yet, but it was only a matter of time. It had to be. Her lips twitched as she instinctively mouthed out a prayer, a wish, for anything that could help-

Then she saw it. Right at the entrance, glinting in what little starlight there was. A discarded lamp. Which miner had lost it, Pyrita didn’t know. Maybe she had someone looking after her. As usual. She dove, grabbed it, gave it a rattle. Still had some oil (pity it wasn’t a gemmed version). She patted the ground around it, hoping for- Matches. She struck one — in spite of her shakes, she did it on the first try — and tried to light the lamp. And, stars above, the cussed thing caught immediately. It’d give away her position, but that was a risk she had to take; this was the only way she could move forward.

Holding the lamp aloft and murmuring out a prayer of thanks, Pyrita plunged into the mine.
> 1 - The Fool in the Crazy Eights
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

Necromancy had a PR problem.

Not without reason, of course. It was hard for it to not have a PR problem when its most prominent adherents took to evil more thoroughly than a duck did to water and had a nasty recurring issue with enslaving the souls of the dead. It was enough to give most ponies knee-jerk anxiety on hearing a word that began with necro-.

Unfortunately, that anxiety meant necromancy’s less harmful uses were often neglected. Many arcanists avoided working with death at all, even for something as harmless as talking to the spirits of the deceased. That wasn’t even getting into more complex uses, such as resurrecting the recently dead. There were applications of necromancy that could do nothing but help ponies, enough applications to fill a spellbook or ten. Yet countless ponies refused to even think about them, simply because they involved the word “necromancy”.

But if Celestia could abdicate, anything seemed possible. Three moons ago, Princess Twilight had started the Necromancy Corps, an initiative to study necromancy in-depth in contexts that wouldn’t make the average pony balk in fear, to rework necromancy’s image into something more palatable than four simultaneous zero-anesthesia root canals. Not only would its benefits be found, but such knowledge would make hostile necromancy easier to counter. And the unicorn heading the Corps, Amanita, was experienced, unrivaled, easily the most powerful necromancer in the history of the Royal Guard.





The only necromancer in the history of the Royal Guard had stage fright. Her clothes were too tight even though they’d been fine when she’d put them on and she was going to break out into a sweat at any moment and she was short of breath and her mane was probably definitely absolutely so frizzy it looked so terrible and she still wasn’t that great with the memory-display spell and had she really memorized the path of her speech maybe she ought to skip the presentation today to go back home and-

The short, slim, spectacled earth pony next to her jabbed her in the ribs. “Breathe, Amanita,” murmured Restricted Code.

Easy for you to say, Amanita panic-grumbled to herself. Code had more years of experience in ritualism than Amanita had years of life. Code was Equestria’s High Ritualist, the top pony in the Royal Ritualist Commissioned Division. Code had had the ear of Celestia herself for over a decade and a half (a period that had ended when Celestia, not Code, had stepped down). Code was here in a fancy-schmancy dress uniform with a chest full of medals that wasn’t even all of them. Amanita, on the other hoof, had been with the Guard for barely three moons and didn’t have much experience with presenting like this. Her last actual job had been nearly half a decade ago and in retail, for Celestia’s sake! Small-town retail! Four moons ago, she’d been in jail! For necromancy! The very thing she was-

Another, sharper jab. “Seriously, breathe,” said Code, almost disapprovingly. “You nearly destroyed a lich. You helped capture a spree killer.”

“And this is totally different,” hissed Amanita. “I can’t just murder the audience when things go wrong and bring them back later!” (She wasn’t being facetious. That technique had served her well in the past. Multiple times.)

“No, but I can help cover for you,” said Code. “And my help is more useful than murder.” She glanced at the clock. “And I believe that’s my cue.” Without further ado, she walked onstage, leaving Amanita with nopony to talk to and pawing at the ground.

Both too slowly and too quickly, Code reached the lectern. She cleared her throat and spoke with well-worn confidence and no notes. “I’d like to thank you all for coming to this talk. I know necromancy is still feared, but…”

As Code talked, Amanita peeped around the curtain and took another look at her audience. It was sparse, thanks to necromancy’s reputation, yet, with one exception, the few ponies present were some of the brightest minds in Equestria, the cutting edge of arcanics, the sorts of ponies laws of metaphysics were named after. That wasn’t even getting into Princess Frigging Twilight Sparkle, Starswirl the Frigging Bearded, and Celestia Frigging Herself What on Frigging Equus. Under normal circumstances, the only way any single one of these ponies wouldn’t be the smartest person in the room was if one of the others was also in the room.

And they’d come to this conference so that she could teach them.

Holy…





On the cusp of adulthood, Amanita had lost somepony close to her. A lich had taken advantage of her grief and carefully, gleefully pointed her along the path of necromancy. Yet Amanita had eventually had an attack of conscience and backed out, turning herself in to the authorities. After a stint in prison (only two years — she was lucky), Amanita was the only pony in Equestria who knew necromancy in-depth and wouldn’t get thrown in jail for it the second a guard laid eyes on her.

Technically speaking, Amanita wasn’t in the Necromancy Corps, she was the Necromancy Corps. Oh, sure, there were other ponies involved, but if Amanita decided to leave, the Corps simply couldn’t function. Which both made her incredibly important and the place where all the weight was laid.

Everything about necromancy, the Guard came to her for. Counterspells, mostly. The worst part about it was the way most of Amanita’s work was so trivial. Yes, of course fresh eye jelly worked best, why did they even need to ask? Because they didn’t know where to start, mostly. When she was able, Amanita distracted herself by properly cataloging the necromantic artifacts the Crown had collected over the centuries. And since a surprisingly large chunk of her work had involved rewriting CONOP 8888, Equestria’s own anti-zombie-apocalypse plan, the Necromancy Corps had been temporarily dubbed the “Crazy Eights”. It had taken a little bit of doing to reassure her that it was affectionate rather than derogatory. After all, given the antics of Princess Twilight and her friends, crazy was the new hip.

Once Amanita had straightened out existing data, she started poking her nose in what was uncharted territory, even for her. Between Code’s watchful eye and her own conscience, she stayed away from anything resembling zombie creation or enthrallment. Thanks to body donations, she even had a decent amount of cadavers to test with, once she’d needed to move up to actual ponies from rat corpses. She threw herself into her studies with the same fervor she’d once devoted to the sort of magic that gave you a bounty of six hundred thousand bits.

Now, here she was, with a spell only she could have created, one that was undoubtedly necromantic yet also benign, sharing it with the world. It was just the sort of thing she wanted.

Sadly, necromancers were not known for their speech-giving skills.





Amanita took a step back, letting the curtain fall, and started pacing, forcing herself to not hyperventilate. She couldn’t do this. She could do this. She couldn’t do this. She could do this. She’d never done it before. There was a time when she’d never done necromancy before. And back and forth and back and forth, like her brain was playing tennis with her thoughts. It was probably just nerves, but her mind was very good at coming up with plausible-sounding reasons for why she ought to just go home and never leave again. Even though she was the whole reason this seminar was being held in the first place.

Panic took up enough of her attention that she almost missed it when Code said, “…so without further ado, please welcome Amanita.”

With a gulp, Amanita walked onstage, barely managing to hide her shakes. She was pale green all over, but that was just her normal coloration. The crowd stomped out slightly-more-than-polite applause as she reached the lectern, thanked Code for the introduction, and arranged her notes. She waved a hoof for them to quiet down, and they did (holy cannoli Celestia and Princess Twilight did what she said).

She glanced up at the back corner. Bitterroot was up there, for whatever reason. She gave Amanita a reassuring smile and a small wave, which at least made her panic slightly less. She made sure her stance was right, looked at the audience in general, failed to ignore how small she felt, and cleared her throat.

“Psychometry,” Amanita said. Almost immediately, her mind blanked and she had to take a quick look at her notecards. Her tail twitched in embarrassment (thankfully, her cheeks weren’t burning — yet) and she looked back up. “Seeing the past of an object and… noteworthy events in its history. Hypothetically, one of- a very… versatile branch of magic. However, most attempts at spells for- at psychometric spells have been impractical at best, assuming they even work to begin with. The data- Information received from them is- hazy, very hazy, and the power requirements are steep, and the spells themselves are too complicated to justify their use.”

No response from the audience except forward-turned ears. Good sign. Amanita swallowed and held her head higher. “The- main issue with psychometry,” she continued, remembering not to glance at her notecards too often, “is that objects can’t really remember things, and when they do, it’s, it’s in ways that render psychometry redundant, such as physical notches in a sword. But bodies can remember things, and in non-physical ways. The more- impactful the event, the stronger the memory. If you get burned, you’ll automatically flinch away from fire.” (A few ponies in the audience nodded.) “And death is one of the most impactful events possible in life. After all, you can only die once.” She grinned, hoping it didn’t look too nervous. “U-usually.”

The crowd giggled. Emboldened, Amanita found herself speaking slightly louder. “With that in mind, we have created a spell that can, when properly applied, show the moment of a person’s death, so long as we have the body. Unlike many aspects of necromancy, it does not interact with the person’s soul in any way. It’s no different from looking at a photograph. We call it Tempus Mortis. If you’ll open up your packets, there are spell instructions inside.”

The room echoed with the rustling of paper as a dozen pages were turned at once. Before she launched into her explanations, Amanita allowed herself a grin and risked a thought of, This is going well.

Astonishingly, fate withstood the temptation and this continued to go well. Amanita didn’t stumble over her words or forget anything as she spoke. The crowd seemed to be following along as she laid out each step of Tempus Mortis. She didn’t miss the lost looks or disgusted cringes when she got to the parts related to necromancy, but that was to be expected. After all, she was the Guard’s first necromancer; foal’s play to her was brand-new and/or alien to everypony else. When she reached the end, her heart was almost beating at a normal rate.

“…giving you the sensation of being there at the instant the individual dies,” Amanita finished. The audience had shuffled a little as she’d spoken, ponies that had been sitting apart now close together so they could point at their papers and whisper to each other. She couldn’t make out the words, but at least the tones were invested. “Now, showing you’s better than telling you-”

Surprise rippled through the audience; Amanita was sure she felt the wind as Celestia’s wings twitched slightly open. She raised her hoof for silence. “Showing you’s better than telling you,” she said with a slightly raised voice, “and we have the body of a guard here, Sergeant Major Chainmail. With the permission of his descendants, we can show you just how he died. So if you’re, uh, not interested in seeing a dead body, move over there.” Amanita pointed to the right side of the room. “We’ll be putting up a sheet to block the view for anyone who doesn’t want to see it.”

Someone stuck a hoof up. “Will it also block the view of the casting?”

“Yes.”

Everypony in the audience went over to the left side of the room.

Amanita and Code glanced at each other. “No sheet it is, then,” said Code. She trotted offstage and quickly returned, wheeling up a gurney with the body of a ten-years-plus-dead pony on it, a unicorn stallion who wasn’t much more than bones and teeth and skin anymore. Some members of the audience grimaced slightly, but not much else. Code placed the gurney in the middle of the stage and stepped aside. As Amanita approached the desiccated corpse, her guts loosened. Finally, something she was used to.

First, she placed a hoof on the body. Hopefully, it wouldn’t be necessary in later versions of the spell, but for now, she needed a connection to the body, and a physical one would have to do.

Next, she gathered and shaped her magic. It wasn’t too complex, but the edges of it, the parts related to death, would make most ponies flinch away, by reflex if nothing else, the same way one flinches away from plunging their hoof into a corpse’s intestines. Most of the spell’s difficulty came from the caster needing a strong enough will to perform it while still keeping their lunch down, rather than any technical complexity or power requirements. But Amanita was a necromancer, capable of playing with rotting intestines with one hoof while eating spaghetti with the other; those energies were like old acquaintances to her and she worked them with thoughtless ease.

And, finally, the incantation. As she let the magic flow, Amanita intoned, “Meminerim mortem.” Technically, the words didn’t actually do anything, but the focus required for them gave Amanita that last little psychosomatic kick for the spell to work.

And what a kick it was.

Right where Amanita’s hoof was touching the body, chronology and physicality unraveled. Her existence was gone in what would’ve been an instant if time meant anything. Space ceased, leaving behind only ideas, concepts, and moments. Thanks to the spell, the most potent of those moments was the last thing Chainmail ever did. Amanita immersed herself.

Even before she saw anything, words and sounds rippled from the void, slightly echoic. A stallion’s voice, the scratching of claws, screams. “Don’t you touch them, you overgrown housecat! Get over here!” A bellow of rage, a wet slice, a crunch-

History slammed into being around her, a moment locked in time. Nothing was moving; Tempus Mortis captured the second the pony died, not an instant before or after. Everything was slightly musty, like experienced through a thin film, and limited in color, like an old photograph. Amanita was in a bar that was old even in its own time. A hole had been smashed through one of the walls, the bloodthirsty manticore responsible in the middle of the room. Glass shards, broken tables, shattered chairs, and jagged splinters coated the floor and hung in the air.

And there was Chainmail, a unicorn in the prime of life, thrusting forward with a spear, stabbing the manticore right in the eye. His face was frozen in a roar even as the manticore’s stinger caved in his chest. Even without the blunt force trauma, he wouldn’t have survived the poison, but he went down swinging. Or stabbing.

Amanita didn’t have much in the way of a body, but she could move. She “walked” around to the other side of the manticore and saw the spear exiting the back of the manticore’s head, something Chainmail couldn’t have seen. She looked over the bartop; a unicorn and an earth pony were huddled beneath it, the unicorn desperately putting up a flimsy shield to protect the two of them. Maybe Chainmail knew they were there, maybe he didn’t. Either way, time knew.

Amanita spent another few minutes wandering around the building, making sure to get a good look at the details. She saw regular ponies fleeing the scene and guards running in to attack the manticore, portraits on the walls, even the threading of screws if she looked hard enough. But she couldn’t go far from Chainmail; space vanished if she tried and she simply couldn’t move any further. The bar was where Chainmail had died, not whatever stores lay outside (although Amanita could see the trail of destruction the manticore had wrought in getting to the bar — its presence was an important part of his death, after all). Once she’d seen enough, Amanita removed herself from the past.

The last syllable of the original incantation was still hanging in the air when she fell back into being. Her head was spinning like she’d stood up too fast, but a few blinks put that to rest. She turned to the audience. “And that’s it,” she said. “The spell still follows the Law of Liminality, so no outside time will have passed. However, since you still experienced it, it can be shown with the right spells. If you’ll just give me a moment, I can do exactly that.”

And now came the tricky part.

Amanita was a necromancer, not an illusionist. And this spell, able to play back what she’d seen and heard, was an illusion spell. She’d done her best to learn it, but the finer details always escaped her — details that were necessary for the spell to function. Most of the time, it simply didn’t work for her, and when it did, it was more of an “I guess?” sort of working rather than a “Got it!” sort. But it was necessary to properly display the spell for others, and she only had to make it work once.

Amanita lowered her head and pushed magic through her horn, but when she tried shaping it, she only got sparks. Tried again, more sparks. The design kept wiggling from her grasp, like a wet, water-filled balloon. She tried one more time; still more sparks. And absolutely everypony in the room was waiting on her.

“Um, sorry,” mumbled Amanita. Then she remembered where she was and raised her voice. “Sorry,” she said more clearly, “but, um, nobody’s dead, so I, I’m having trouble with this.” She blinked and quickly turned away as the assembled archmages chuckled softly at her ineptitude and her face turned beet red. She clenched her teeth and scrunched her eyes shut and focused and-

She heard Chainmail’s voice again as the spell thankfully bubbled out of her. She breathed deeply, keeping the magic flowing, and risked a glance upward. The image, a record of what she’d experienced, was a bit fuzzy, but still perfectly “legible”. The scratching of nearly a dozen pens and pencils rippled through the room, nearly disrupting Amanita’s control. But she held on and the memory played out fairly clearly.

Once she dropped the spell, Amanita breathed a few times to stop her head from spinning, then returned her attention to the audience. Thankfully, the worst was over. “If you check the records of the Guard, you’ll see that Chainmail died in Stirrup Gap in 991, when…”

From there, it was smooth sailing, even if her mind kept glancing back. Amanita explained Chainmail’s death, went through possible applications, and was wrapping up her talk before she knew it. “…thereby providing a safe, simple, and non-invasive way to investigate death.” And that was it. Her speech was over. All that was left was the Q&A, where at least it wouldn’t be surprising if she screwed up. Her heart actually went a-flutter. “Now, are there any questions that don’t come from the princess?” (Princess Twilight’s hoof was already up on pure reflex.)

Most hooves in the audience went up as Princess Twilight pouted (and kept her hoof up). And Amanita suddenly felt ready to panic. What did she do here? Just pick a pony and let the others sit? Which one was the best one to pick? Starswirl’s hoof was up; did she go for the famous pony and risk alienating the others? Or should she-

Before she could overthink anything, she forced herself to point out at random. Then she moved her hoof so she was actually pointing at a pony. “Um, you, in the corner.”

An older pegasus stood up. “I’ve been looking through all your write-ups,” he said, “but I don’t see any ritual instructions for the spell. Doesn’t it follow the Holstein equivalence principle?”

“We, we’re pretty sure it does, yes,” said Amanita. “It’s just, we’re, uh, still trying to figure out what does what-” Her blanch was hidden by her already-pale coloration. That was a terrible way to explain it to any scientist, much less one who was probably one of the foremost ritualistic minds in Equestria; yet, put on the spot like that, she couldn’t come up with any better way to put it. She tried thinking, but her mouth locked up.

Code glanced at her for half an instant and was immediately talking to head off the silence. “You have to understand,” she said, “given the lack of research into necromancy before now, we’re still learning which ingredients have any meaning in this context and what that meaning is. We have no reason to assume this spell cannot be adapted into a tribe-independent ritual, but the setup of that ritual, and most necromantic rituals in general, is still very much uncharted territory.”

That seemed to satisfy the pegasus; he nodded and went back to taking notes. Amanita mouthed, Thank you, at Code, who gave a small nod back. Could’ve gone better. Could’ve gone worse. And the extent to which it could’ve gone better was smaller than the extent to which it could’ve gone worse. Which was… something. And something was better than nothing, so Amanita continued. “You, with the bow tie.”

Thankfully, her phrasing improved as she answered more and more questions and Code barely needed to intervene again. The questions were all easy, to boot, even if the sound of everypony taking notes was surprisingly loud. By the time Amanita picked Starswirl (!) for the next question, she was practically confident.

“I was looking at line…” Starswirl traced a hoof down his paper. “…9-” (Amanita quickly pulled up that line in her memory.) “-where you draw out the impression of death using Rachis’s Recall Rigmarole, only to cut out all but the beginning and end by setting the memory factor to infinity and sending its related fractions to zero-”

“It has to do with the nature of death,” said Amanita. “As I mentioned before, death is one of the most impactful events in a person’s life, so naturally-”

Starswirl interrupted her with a huff. “Well, yes, I understand that, but I’m speaking of measurements. There’s no proofs, no lemmas… How did you derive that?”

Amanita’s blood ran cold. She swallowed and forced herself to say, “E-experience.”

“…Ah.”

Silence fell on the room like a wet blanket as Starswirl slowly sat back down, looking every which way but Amanita. Even the scratches of pens had stopped. Amanita glanced at Code, who still wore a neutral expression but had folded her ears back and was pawing at the ground, apparently unconsciously. Amanita felt like her hooves were still stained with blood and her horn was still stained with worse.

Necromancer.

Amanita wasn’t sure whether Princess Twilight put her hoof up again to break the silence or whether she was just clueless, but she was grateful either way. “Erm, yes, P-Princess?”

“This spell was made to analyze death-” (She was talking fast. Definitely to break the silence.) “-but could it be used to analyze other physical events? Not as-is, obviously, you’d need to make a lot of changes…”

In spite of that bump in the road making everypony just a little bit quieter, the rest of the session managed to go off relatively hitch-free and Amanita soon realized she was walking offstage and ponies in the audience were milling about and the seminar was over. Her heart wasn’t even pumping that hard.

Well, there it was. Equestria’s first seminar on necromancy. If you ignored Amanita’s screwup with the memory-projection spell (which she had a hard time doing, admittedly), it had actually gone pretty well. But of course it would, everything else she’d done was so basic. Necromantically speaking, anyway.

…Huh. Basic. That was… not that far from the truth, really. So if they all learned-

“Good job, Amanita,” said Code. “You did excellently.”

Amanita nodded. “Thanks.”

“You don’t need to hang around if you don’t want to. I’ll see to it that Chainmail-” Code jerked her head back a little. “-gets reinterred myself.”

“Thanks. Again. So, uh, see you in the lab tomorrow?”

“In the lab tomorrow.” Code nodded to Amanita and trotted off.

Code leaving was almost like a signal to Amanita: the boss left, so you can, too. Irrational, she knew, but that was the way it felt. Some of her stuff was spread out across a front-row seat in a bad corner nopony would want, in case she’d needed it quickly, and soon she was packing it up piece by piece. For the moment, all she wanted was to get home.

Then her ears pricked up as she heard somepony approaching her.

“…more complicated than that,” Celestia was saying.

“I know, but that’s all I can think of!” protested Princess Twilight. “Nothing else fits!”

Amanita’s joints locked up, all the way up and down her spine. The Princess and the Prime Mover. Separately, she could probably handle either one, but both? Being in a conversation with the two most important ponies in Equestria was… It was genuinely uncomp-

“Excuse us. Amanita?” asked Celestia. “Do you have a moment?”

“Um.” Amanita swallowed and lifted her head. “Yeah.” She turned around to look Celestia in the eye, only remembering at the last second she needed to also look up for that. Celestia was big. “What, what do you need?” Please don’t be too complicated, please don’t be too complicated…

Princess Twilight began, “In all the…” She made a vague circular gesture. “…ritual foods you eat, it’s always rye bread. How come? The only thing I could come up with is that a lot of rye breads are black, and…” She nickered in a sort of disgusted amusement.

Not too complicated. Although you’d think Princess Twilight Sparkle would know better. “Well… yeah, that’s the reason. Rye bread is black. That’s it.”

Princess Twilight and Celestia exchanged looks. “That’s really it?” Princess Twilight asked. “The… color.” She sounded more disappointed than if Starswirl’s greatest written works were rendered illegible by water damage.

“Pretty much.”

“That seems a bit simplistic,” said Celestia.

“Tell that to funeral mourners,” Amanita said. For a moment, she managed to not feel mortified talking back to somepony who moved the sun itself holy crow that was a terrible idea dangit dangit dangit what on Equus was she DOING.

Talking sense, evidently, since Celestia’s response was to frown, then nod and say, “I see.” (Although based on her tone, that might’ve been a lie.)

Trying to ignore her stomach’s trapeze act, Amanita continued, “Symbols are usually symbols because they’re simplistic. It’s this… big idea packaged into a small space. And when something as simple as color can put you closer to your goal, you’ll tweak the color.”

“Huh,” said Princess Twilight. Her frown was far less regal than Celestia’s. “I was expecting something… more.”

Amanita shrugged. “That’s, that’s the way it is.” She dropped a half-eaten granola bar into her bag, clipped it shut, and slung it over her shoulder.

“Actually, wait another minute,” Princess Twilight said quickly. “I saw your resurrection and enthrallment rituals — and no offense, but they’re really creepy — and once I… actually worked the numbers out, I found that the enthrallment ritual actually uses more energy than resurrecting somepony.”

Celestia looked down at Princess Twilight and flicked her tail. “It does?”

“I know!” said Princess Twilight. “And resurrection even took less and less energy the longer it went on, where enthrallment took more! It doesn’t make any sense!”

“Yes, it does,” said Amanita, tilting her head. Did the two alicorns not get this? “Compared to enthrallment, all resurrection is is healing the body. By the time you put the soul back in, the last bit of magic that restarts the heart is so trivial the universe practically wants it to happen already.”

Judging by the looks on their faces, no, the two alicorns didn’t get this. Amanita took a quick breath. “Okay, so… it’s like this. In both enthrallment and resurrection, you start by doing a katabasis, right? Going to the underworld to retrieve a pony’s soul.”

“Is it really the underworld?” Princess Twilight muttered. “Elysium and Tartarus aren’t really-” She stopped when Celestia nudged her with a wing and motioned for Amanita to continue.

“And it’s the same thing in both, so they take the same amount of power. But, but in resurrection, you’re healing the body, and bodies heal themselves anyway. Holding healing spells together takes a lot of… dexterity, but not a lot of energy. The universe wants to do what you’re doing, you’re just making it easier.” Amanita’s words were picking up speed as she talked and she started gesturing. “Enthrallment, though, it’s subverting a pony’s will to follow your own, and… Well, wills don’t want to be controlled, that’s kinda the whole point of a will. So even though the enthrallment spell is simpler than healing on a… structural level, you need to fight the universe every step of the way and dump in thaum after thaum to get the pony’s mind secured. And you need to make it last so your thrall doesn’t get their mind back and… do something you don’t want them to do. It’s like… healing is playing an instrument, enthrallment is pulling a train car. The first one doesn’t need you to be as strong, but that doesn’t mean it’s easier.” Her ears twitched. “Does… that help?” she asked quietly, looking between Princess Twilight and Celestia.

Princess Twilight’s brow furrowed for a moment, then she smiled. “Actually, yes! Quite a lot!”

“Indeed,” said Celestia. She flicked her tail and lowered her head in a bow. “We apologize for taking up your time, and thank you for your service.”

Out of some crossed wire of reflex, Amanita said, “You, too.” Yet before she could feel silly about that, Princess Twilight and Celestia were already leaving, deep in conversation. Come to think of it, from what she knew of them, they probably did consider ruling Equestria a ser-

“Oh! You’re still here.” An auburn pegasus sidestepped in front of her, interest written all over her face. “I’m not interrupting anything, am I?”

“Well… not really, n-no,” Amanita heard herself say. “I was- just leaving.”

“Well, I can walk and talk,” said the pegasus brightly. “I was wondering why exactly fire destroys thralls so thoroughly, and you’re sort of the only pony who knows that sort of thing.”

Amanita swallowed. She wanted to go home, but this was such a simple question. She hitched her bag over her shoulders and made for the door. “Fire burns,” she said to the following pegasus. Honestly, that was, like, Metaphysics 101. “Enthrallment needs the body and soul to match up, and fire changes things on a metaphysical level.” She pushed open the door and kept walking. “If you burn wood, it’s not wood anymore, it’s ash. So, with-”

“But what about rot?” somepony asked. Amanita twitched and spun around; she’d blundered into the crowd of scientists gathered outside the room in their own conversations with each other. And once they’d heard her, they’d all started gathering around her. “Rot changes things as well, why doesn’t it have as much of an effect on thralls?”

Grinning nervously, Amanita reluctantly continued her explanation. “Well…”





Bitterroot leaned against the outside wall of Canterlot University, crisp air turning her breath into steam. The cold bit at her exposed neck with shark teeth, but she ignored it (and the fact that she still needed to buy a scarf). Amanita had seemed a bit nervous during the seminar, which, okay, she was an adult, but she could probably use a friendly face as a pick-me-up. Otherwise, Bitterroot would be homeward bound by now.

And she was half-considering doing it anyway. The seminar had ended like thirty minutes ago; what was taking Amanita so long?

Something that’d leave her really wanting to get away from it, probably. So Bitterroot waited. She was a bounty hunter, she was used to waiting.

She heard some voices ripple through the doorway and stood up, flexing her wings. It wasn’t long before Amanita stumbled out the door, thronged by a gaggle of scientists so tightly Bitterroot was surprised she was able to stand up. Yeah, that would explain things.

“-it’s, it’s more complicated than that!” Amanita was protesting. “Ponies don’t just end at death, there’s more- Look, can you let me-”

“But for all practical purposes, that’s true, isn’t it?”

“I mean, most of the time, yeah, but in some cases- I really just want to get-”

“What sorts of cases?”

Bitterroot waited for a moment, but the crowd wasn’t leaving Amanita alone. Whenever she pressed forward to escape the crush, it simply relocated so she remained at its center. As her voice grew louder and angrier, the crowd just got louder and more persistent. No way she was getting out of that on her own. She’d practically need divine intervention. But with no gods around, Bitterroot was the next best thing, so she raked her mind for the best course of action. After a moment, she settled on sounding loud and acting official. She half-roughly shoved one of the outside professors aside, yelling, “Amanita! Amanita, we need you!”

Success! The crowd immediately parted like a shoal of fish, finally giving Amanita some breathing room. Before anypony could say a thing, Bitterroot marched up to her and yelled, “We’ve been waiting for you! You’re gonna be late!”

Amanita blinked, saw what Bitterroot was doing, and smacked herself on the forehead. “Yes, of course! The- thing!”

“I’ll carry you! We’ll get there faster!” And within seconds, the pair were soaring over Canterlot, with Bitterroot’s forelegs wrapped around Amanita’s trunk. The second they were a block away from the university, Bitterroot lowered them both to the ground and lightly deposited Amanita on the street.

“Sorry about that,” muttered Amanita. “It was… I just couldn’t get away from them. It was like they were a wolfpack.”

“Scream at them and get aggressive,” said Bitterroot, folding her wings. “It works on the wolves I’ve seen.”

Amanita grinned weakly as the pair started walking home. “So, uh, you were in the audience?” 

“You sounded nervous a few nights ago and I thought I’d support you.” Bitterroot shrugged. It was the least she could do.

“It helped a little. Thanks. But did you understand anything I said?”

“No. But I had fun not understanding it. How did it go for you?”

“Ehm.” Amanita coughed. “Alright. Better than I expected.”

“…So why do you sound disappointed?”

“Well- Nothing to do with the seminar, really. It’s…” Amanita bit her lip. “Look, I’m making history just by existing. I at least want it to be good history. I mean, most of it went fine, but how is it supposed to sound when I screw up the memory-projection spell in front of Princess Twilight, of all ponies, and try to pass it off as it not being about death?”

Bitterroot blinked. “Wait, you mean that wasn’t supposed to be a joke?”

“…What do you mean, ‘supposed to be’?”

“It sounded like a joke! You said something totally off-the-wall like it was nothing! It was funny!”

“It was?”

“Not super funny, but when I wasn’t expecting any jokes at all, yeah, it was funny. Why did you think they laughed?”

“Because I’m supposed to be a skilled necromancer but I was botching something simple outside that?”

“Look, this isn’t high school. These ponies are professionals. They get that you’re a necromancer and not an illusionist. Or at least they should.”

“…Huh. I never…” Amanita stared off at nothing for a moment, then shook her head. “I, I never had that… happen to me. Circe was…”

“Yeah. I know.”

“But… still…” Amanita folded her ears back. “Mages should be… well-rounded, shouldn’t they? I mean, once everypony in the Crazy Eights catches up with me-”

“You think they will?”

“Eventually, yeah! I don’t have a master anymore, it’s just me, and- I’m just a necromancer, so once somepony else who’s a necromancer and also a decent illusionist comes along-”

“How long have you been worried about this?”

“Just since the seminar. Everypony was asking me questions that I could answer in five seconds, and if they catch up quickly and suddenly I’m not enough of a necroma-”

“Amanita, they’re so far behind you that they’re still learning the basics. They’re impressed by you looking at somepony’s past when you’ve already resurrected ponies like it was nothing. If you’re worried about job security, you’ve got it for a looooong time. And there can be two necromancers in the Necromancy Corps, you know! Just… I don’t know, it’s not worth worrying over.”

“Yeah. I’m…” Amanita kicked at a loose cobblestone. “…still getting used to having a status quo that isn’t awful. Paranoia.”

“I get it.” Some of Bitterroot’s family had gone through bad times. It was the kind of thing that stuck with you. “But remember, status quo or not, I’m here for you.”

“I know.” Amanita smiled slightly. “Thanks.”

They walked in silence for a little longer. Bitterroot raised her head, spread her wings, and breathed deeply through her nose. She could feel the crisp winter air travel through her nostrils, down her windpipe, all the way to her lungs. She let it out slow, letting her breath mist up. “Nice weather, isn’t it?”

“I guess. The cold stinks,” Amanita mumbled. She shivered. “Anyone who says they like winter is lying.”

Bitterroot snorted. “I know plenty of ponies who’ll say otherwise.”

But Amanita shook her head. “They like surviving winter. They don’t like winter itself. It’s like… It’s practically spite. You can be outside for ages in spring, summer, even fall. Not winter. The cold drains the life from you.” She pulled her coat tighter and rubbed her hooves together. “Besides, they always like early winter, when you’re still in the honeymoon phase of snow, or late winter, when you have the hope of spring. Never midwinter. Everyone hates midwinter. Midwinter is the worst.”

Bitterroot opened her mouth, immediately closed it again. She tilted her head in thought. “Okay, that actually makes sense.”

“Spend a season without modern heating or air conditioning and then tell me you like it.”

“…Spring’s still nice.”

“It is! It’s warm, the sky’s blue again, you don’t need to worry about shoveling…”
> 2 - Field Experience
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

Amanita walked into work the next morning without much thought. She’d been fretting about the seminar for so long, and now that it was over, she could just unwind a little and research different ways to magically poke corpses. (And since she was the only one who really knew what she was doing, there were so many ways to fudge that if she wanted to.) The talk about thralls and fire yesterday had even got her thinking; if most necromancers used the same methods for enthrallment, maybe she could design a spell for quick liberation. Based on Circe’s methods, it wouldn’t be too-

But she came to halt as she approached the door to her lab, for who was hovering outside her door but Princess Twilight’s messenger, Spike. (She still wasn’t sure what his actual title was. Majordomo? Chancellor? Aide? Princess Twilight just said “assistant”, he seemed proud of that, and Amanita couldn’t muster up the courage to ask otherwise.) For a moment, Amanita panicked about something to do with the seminar before giving herself a mental slap. Still, the idea of talking to the princess wasn’t exactly an endearing one. She swallowed in anticipation and gave a tentative wave. “Hey, Spike.”

“Morning, Amanita!” Spike said brightly. (They’d seen each other twice in the past three moons and he still recognized her immediately without the crutch of her being the only unicorn in the castle.) “Twilight’s got an assignment for you!” And he was away, fluttering on those tiny little wings that really shouldn’t’ve been able to support that pudgy little body.

“Wait, what?” Amanita trotted to catch up with him. “What, what do you mean, ‘assignment’? …Okay, who died where? Because if-”

“Nopony’s dead. …I think. Twilight just told me to go and fetch you.” Spike twisted around in the air to look at Amanita. “And you need to resurrect somepony within three days, right? I bet if it was important, Twi would’ve already teleported you halfway across the country.”

“Or something,” Amanita said vaguely. That… kinda sounded like Princess Twilight, to be honest. She- “Wait, how did you know about the time limit?”

Spike just shrugged. “That was one of the only facts about necromancy Twilight knew for a while. She likes to talk about magic and I listen.” He fluttered closer to Amanita and stage-whispered, “I bet if I was a unicorn, I’d be one of the best mages out there. Did you know that…”

And based on the facts he spouted off, Amanita wasn’t sure that was braggadocio. She tried drinking it in as best she could as they walked, but much of the terminology flew right over her head. She couldn’t be sure whether Spike actually understood it, of course (or even if he was just pulling her leg), but that was another matter entirely.

“…which is why even creatures that aren’t mammals can get mustaches! I’ve tried to convince Twilight to give me another one, but…” Spike rubbed at his unmustached upper lip and sighed.

Amanita decided not to ask about “another one”, so she just gave a sort of, “Hmm.”

“Yeah,” said Spike. “It’s really- Oh, here we are-” And he was pulling a door open. Just how far had they walked? Amanita poked her head inside.

Princess Twilight’s study was like a library in relative miniature, and an imposing one at that. Literally every spare square inch of wall was lined with shelves and Amanita wasn’t convinced there weren’t more shelves behind them. All of the shelves were stuffed with books, ninety percent of which were older than any of the people in the room. The newer ones, books that could actually withstand some abuse (not that Twilight would abuse them) were scattered about along with spare parchment on tables, chairs, desks, basically anywhere there was room that wasn’t the floor (and sometimes yes on the floor). The only exception was a large table in the center on which was spread out a map of Equestria. Standing around that table were Code and Princess Twilight, in idle conversation about something.

“Hey, Twi?” said Spike. “I’ve got Amanita.” Amanita nervously waved.

Princess Twilight looked up from the map and smiled. “Thanks, Spike. You’re dismissed.”

Spike saluted, nudged Amanita into the room, and shut the door behind her, leaving Amanita alone with two of the most influential ponies in Equestria.

Amanita swallowed and walked up to the table. It was bigger than it’d seemed from the door. “What’s this about?” she asked.

“Nothing bad,” said Code. “Just an opportunity.”

“What sort of opportunity?”

“You’ll see.”

“You don’t need to be mysterious, you know.”

“Yes, I do. I’m the High Ritualist, I have a mysteriousness quota to keep up. Also, I don’t want to sit through Her Highness’s explanation two more times.”

“Charcoal should be along any minute,” said Princess Twilight. “We can start the-”

At that moment, the door opened on… someone who looked like a unicorn but definitely wasn’t. Her horn was oddly shaped, her hooves were cloven, she had scales on her back, and that was just the start. After a second of staring, Amanita’s brain clicked: that person was a kirin. They’d been… suffering from some ailment or something and Twilight and her friends had helped cure them. (Celestia, Amanita thought, I really need to catch up on current events…) She was a bulky sort of lean, a little bit taller than Bitterroot but not by much. Her coat was a not-quite-pale khaki that made Amanita think of wood of an unknown tree, although her mane (which was so incredibly floofy it went all the way down to her chest, like holy crow) was definitely the color of mahogany. Her red horn was just plain enormous, even bigger than Twilight’s, and it split and twisted until it looked more like a branch than anything. Her stance was… not exactly loose, not exactly tight. It was like this was a place she wanted to be, but wasn’t comfortable in just yet.

“Hello,” said the kirin. “Is this the, uh, the wight pla- the right place, sorry.” Her eyes locked on Princess Twilight. “Yes, it is.” Her gait was exaggerated as she walked to the table and took a place opposite Amanita, like she was posing for a dressage competition. “Have we done the… introductions yet?”

Princess Twilight cleared her throat. “Code, Amanita, this is Charcoal, an expert in environmental magic. She’s spent much of her life studying how magic moves through the land.”

The kirin — Charcoal — shrugged. “Well, it’s not like there was a whole lot else to do in the Grove will Silenced. While Silenced, while.” (Magically-induced muteness, Amanita remembered. That was the ailment.)

“Charcoal, this is Restricted Code, the High Ritualist-” The two shook. “-and this is Amanita, head of the Necromancy Corps.”

“Ooo.” Charcoal’s ears swiveled forward and she leaned across the table. “You’re the pony who can resurrect the dead?”

“Yeah.” Amanita certainly wasn’t complaining if that was the part of being a necromancer that Charcoal locked on to.

“Huh. Neat.”

“…It’s pretty neat, yeah.” Amanita realized she was grinning.

Code cleared her throat and tapped the table. “Princess Twilight, if you would.”

“Right.” Princess Twilight laid a sheet of paper on the map and started skimming it. “Three days ago, an arcanometeorological station in the North started recording strange readings. Nothing major and they thought it’d die down in a few hours. That happens from time to time, sometimes pegasus magic doesn’t disperse properly. But by the evening, the readings were still there, so they decided to take a closer look at it. Short version: a nearby ley line somehow got corrupted.”

That didn’t mean much to Amanita, but Charcoal blinked and raised her head by a few inches. “And it was just overnight?” Charcoal asked. “No slow shift or anything?”

“That’s actually why it took them so long to find out it was the ley line,” said Princess Twilight. She looked at the paper again. “According to this, the scientists thought it couldn’t’ve been that because the energy of a line changing that much that quickly is impossible.”

“I mean, it is.”

“And yet it happened. They literally woke up to it.” Princess Twilight looked at each person in turn. “Ley lines are important parts of their ecosystems, and if this is left unchecked, it could damage the land beyond repair. Plants would simply refuse to grow, no matter how much earth ponies tried to convince them. Monsters would start spawning, like chimeras and hydras. It might even cause the land itself to shift with the new energies.”

Well, there was an image. Amanita gulped. And apparently, Princess Twilight noticed, because she continued, “Of course, we wouldn’t see anything for another five years, but we might as well nip it in the bud now. Code is going to take you two on an expedition to get to the source of the ley line, figure out what’s wrong with it, and purify it.”

Charcoal actually broke out into a huge grin before deciding it was unbecoming and suppressing it into a smaller grin. Amanita, though, started shifting her weight from side to side. She managed to say, “Your Highness, with… with all due respect, I… I don’t think I’m the best pony for this job, I don’t know why you picked me-”

But Princess Twilight interrupted her. “Actually, Code suggested you.”

Amanita glanced at Code. “Me? Code- M-ma’am, I’m- I don’t know much about… fixing ley lines.” Drawing power from ley lines, sure. It was a decent power boost for any unicorn who could pull it off, and her old necromancy master had been an earth pony, a tribe who could drink magic from them almost as easily as they could drink water from a lake. Fixing them? Nuh-uh.

“That’s actually why I think you should come with me,” said Code. “Ley sanitation isn’t nearly as complex as it sounds. It’s merely big. The rituals involved are relatively simple-”

“It was actually a hobby of Princess Celestia back in the 400’s and 500’s!” said Princess Twilight brightly. “She was worried that a malign ley line could damage Equestria and took it upon herself to learn what she could about cleaning them up-”

“-are relatively simple,” Code said loudly, “so even an amateur could perform them. A ley cleansing ritual is often the first field task a newly-minted ritualist undertakes. It makes for excellent field experience: it involves shifting larger amounts of power than normal, but it’s slow and methodical enough that it’s hard to make mistakes and any mistakes you do make can be rectified before much damage is done. Even with the complete unknown of the line’s precise problem, it shouldn’t take long to pinpoint.”

She cleared her throat. “Amanita, as necessary as you are to the Necromancy Corps, your skills outside necromancy are a bit… lackluster.”

Amanita half-folded her ears back. “Yeah…”

“I thought that some real-world experience would benefit you. I’ll be there with you every step of the way and can answer whatever questions you may have. However, I realize you’re still new here, so if you don’t feel comfortable-”

“No,” she said quickly. “I- I was just thinking about this yesterday, that I need to be more than just a necromancer, and-” She nodded. “I, I’ll do it.”

“Excellent,” said Code. She turned to Princess Twilight. “So where is the source of the ley line?”

“Way out here.” Princess Twilight tapped a region in a corner of the map, deep in the northeast of Equestria.

Emphasis on deep north.

“That’s nearly off the, um, map,” said Charcoal, leaning forward. “How cold is it?”

“Cold,” said Amanita. “I’ve been that far north.” It wasn’t an experience she really wanted to remember, and not because it was where she’d learned most of her necromancy. It was just… cold. Just about everything ponies took for granted in the heartlands of Equestria was missing up there. Warmth? Controllable weather? Easily-accessible grass? Clear skies? Roads that stayed clear? Roads that were paved? Gone. It was a hardscrabble life, and most ponies didn’t like hardscrabble. To make matters worse, it was in the middle of a mountain range. Now the terrain itself was out to get you, on top of everything else. But ley lines being what they were, the source existing in a mountain was to be expected. Unfortunately.

To Amanita’s surprise, even Code seemed a bit put-off; her ears were back slightly and her voice was just a little bit tighter. “Your Highness,” Code said, “when you told me to pick a few ponies, I… was under the impression that… that we wouldn’t be in the middle of the… wilderness. If we’re that far out-”

“Actually, you’ll be staying in town.”

“…There’s a town there?” squawked Amanita. “Who- Who would live in a place like that?”

“It’s called Tratonmane,” Princess Twilight said. “There isn’t much information on it, but from what I can find, it’s an old mining town, founded about three hundred years ago. It sits less than half a mile from the ley line’s source in, um…” She bit her lip. “…Midwich, it’s Midwich Valley. What it’s like there, I don’t know.”

“Probably thin,” said Charcoal absently. “Deep, real deep. Very fertile for the region. Or is it ‘lush’? Lots of plants, either way. Dead straight. Wouldn’t be surprised if there’s a river.” When she realized everyone was looking at her, she said, “It’s… a… ley valley? What else, what else were you expecting?”

“Well,” said Code, “I… Hmm.” She gave Charcoal a brief look, nodded, and turned back to Princess Twilight. “If there’s a town, I retract my complaint. What sort of transportation can we expect?”

“You can take the train. There’s a branch line-”

“How does the Equestrian railway retch- reach absolutely everywhere?” asked Charcoal. “We kirins, we’re in our grove for who-knows-how-long away from everything else, then we come out and there’s stationery already sitting four miles away.” She frowned. “Or is it meters?” she mumbled. “No, it’s miles, definitely miles…”

“While Equestrian rail construction is certainly something,” said Code, “that’s not what we’re here for.”

One of Charcoal’s ears twitched and she pulled her head down slightly. “Sorry. I was, um, mute for, it was ages, you know, and I’m still, uh, re-learning conversation- stuff. I’ll… leave it for later?”

“I know a friend who loves railroads,” said Amanita. “I’ll see if I can get an answer from-”

Code cleared her throat loudly and rapped the table. Amanita quickly said, “Sorry.” She turned to Princess Twilight and said, “Uh, you can keep going.”

Princess Twilight had been looking between Charcoal and Amanita with some interest and actually seemed disappointed at the conversation getting derailed (har har). But she quickly covered it up. “There’s a spur along the line to Griffonstone. From what I can gather, trains only travel along it once a week, but it’ll take you there. Even if you’re probably the only passengers.”

“Good,” said Code. “What sort of equipment will we bring?”

From there, the meeting turned into a checklist of necessities and itineraries. Princess Twilight liked her checklists. They needed to bring this, do this this way, bring those, maybe stop by here, be here at this time tomorrow to leave… Important stuff, to be sure, but not stuff Amanita wanted to spend much time on. It was a relief when Princess Twilight finally said, “…And I think that covers it.”

“Mmhmm,” said Code. She rolled up her notes and stuck them in her pocket. “They know we’ll be coming, right?”

“Of course. I had a courier sent out yesterday.”

“Perfect.” Code bowed, even though it wasn’t strictly necessary. “We won’t let you down, Your Highness.”

Amanita groveled that that was easy for her to say as they left the room. Code had probably already done it several dozen times. Although Charcoal didn’t seem too put out as she walked away (she was whistling), and how much work could she have done on ley lines if Equestria hadn’t even known she existed a year ago? And so Amanita started feeling not just anxious about her job, but anxious for feeling anxious about her job.

As if reading her mind, Code said, “You will do fine. More than fine. I genuinely don’t know if anyone has screwed up ley sanitation beyond a few minor mistakes, and I’ve done research.”

First time for everything, Amanita said to herself. She was already pretty good at firsts.

But just as the two split to go to their respective jobs, Amanita realized something. “Hey, Code?”

Code stopped walking to look at Amanita. “Hmm?”

“If ley sanitation is so easy, why’re you coming? Couldn’t you send another ritualist to teach me? This seems a bit below your pay grade.”

“Technically, it is. I just want to get out of the city for a little while,” Code said. “Canterlot’s… lack of spontaneity can be smothering. It’s been too long since I’ve danced in starlit fields. And if I can do it on the Crown’s bit, well, all the better. So I assigned myself to it.”

“…Being a colonel must be nice.”

Code threw back her head, sweeping what little of her close-cut mane she could through the air, and grinned. “It is quite nice, yes.” With that, she turned and strutted away.

Amanita snorted and headed for her lab. Maybe that’d be her goal in the future.





“Ever thought about getting your own place?” Bitterroot asked Amanita that night at dinner. She picked up another sprig of cilantro in her teeth and started chewing it down, centimeter by centimeter.

“A little. I have no idea what to look for.” Amanita twisted her own cilantro around a fork. “Why? You looking to get rid of me?”

“Nah, just curious.” Chew chew. “If you ever need help, though, I’m available.”

“Thanks.”

Several moons after her release from prison, and Amanita still hadn’t moved out of Bitterroot’s house. She hadn’t even moved from the couch, even though Bitterroot had offered to clean up one of the spare rooms enough for a bed. Amanita said it was “breaking her habits” (although her sleep schedule was still rather rigid). Still, Bitterroot wasn’t complaining, especially since she had somepony else to go grocery shopping every once in a while.

They ate in silence for a while, but Bitterroot could tell Amanita was trying to build herself up for something. It was in the way her shoulders were a bit tighter than usual and her ears kept twitching. It probably wasn’t bad, though; Amanita’s “conversation” wouldn’t be much more than terse grunts in that case.

It wasn’t long before Amanita said, “I’m gonna be away for a while. I’ve… sort of got an assignment.”

There it was. “Really? Like, with the Guard?”

“Yeah. It’s- Have you heard of ley sanitation?”

“…Nope.”

“Short version: ley line’s dirty, we’re gonna clean it. Code says it’ll help me get some actual experience. It’s really far north. There’s this town called Tratonmane, and- Anyway, I’ll be leaving tomorrow. It came up fast.”

“Hey, stuff happens. Congrats on the job.”

“Yeah.”

There was the terseness. Amanita was probably still brooding about yesterday and not being enough of a necromancer. Even though she’d just been selected to make her more of a necromancer.

So maybe- “Mind if I come?”

Amanita looked up. “Why?”

“Well-” Bitterroot flexed her wings a little. “I was thinking of getting out of Canterlot for a bit. There haven’t been a lot of bounties here recently, but wilderness towns always have some. Not worth a whole lot, but it’ll give me something to do.” Which was actually completely true. Bounties had been light on the ground (or in the sky) recently. “So depending on where you’re headed, maybe I could tag along for a bit.”

One of Amanita’s ears drooped. “Again: why?”

“For starters, you’re the greatest necromancer in the history of the Royal Guard-”

“Until the next one,” Amanita mumbled.

“-and I’ve never seen you do any big magic.”

“…Bitterroot, I’ve resurrected you twice.”

“And I was dead when that happened. By the time I was back, it was already over. Yeah, I know it’s not necromancy and I never learned much about ley lines, but I’d like to see it anyway. And… Well, it might be nice to have somepony to confide in if it all goes sideways. Just in case, you know?”

“That’d be nice,” said Amanita quietly. She raised her voice. “I’ll talk to Code tomorrow. You’ll need to be at the train station early in the morning with me, buy your own ticket and everything, and… y’know, Code might not want you coming with us.”

Bitterroot just shrugged. “Like I said, I was leaving Canterlot anyway. If she says no, I’ll just get off at a different station. Not a big deal.”

“Alright. And if it ever comes down to it, thanks for being there for me.”

“Sure.”

They ate.

Amanita spoke up again. “You know, maybe you should charge me rent.”





Canterlot Station was still chilly just after 7 AM in the middle of winter. Amanita pulled her coat closer around herself as the mist of her breath mingled with the mist of the train’s breath. Oil lamps hung along the platform to drive away the predawn dark. The hissing of pistons echoed in the cavernous space, especially with so few ponies to break up the sound. Her bags were slung across her barrel, tightly packed with clothes and gear. Code and Charcoal weren’t there yet, but the train wasn’t due to leave for another ten minutes or so.

Bitterroot trotted back from the ticket window. Pegasus magic probably meant she was feeling just fine in the chill. “You know,” she said, “I don’t think I’ve ever been out near Griffonstone. I always go more northwest than northeast.”

“You go north a lot?” Amanita asked. Words could fill the time.

“Mmm. Not a lot a lot. Semi-often, maybe. If bounties ever try to leave Equestria, they usually head north. A lot of ponies don’t like the North, so they think it’s easier to hide out there, and I’m like, ‘I can get ten thousand bits for capturing you, I think I can handle the cold for that much’.”

Amanita chuckled.

“Amanita!”

She looked; Code and Charcoal were trotting onto the platform, both with their own coats and luggage: Charcoal with some overstuffed bags, Code casually hauling two carts carrying twice her weight in boxes. “Good. You’re here,” said Code. She glanced at Bitterroot. “Is she coming with us?”

“If I can,” said Bitterroot. “If you don’t want me to-”

But Code waved her off. “I can’t say where you can and can’t go. Buy your own ticket and stay out of our way and we won’t have a problem. You all get on board and I’ll get these to baggage.” Without another word, she walked towards the front of the train.

“Is she always like that?” Charcoal asked as she watched her go.

“More or less,” Amanita said. “Not exactly one for small talk, is she? Let’s get inside.”

Thankfully, the inside of the train wasn’t just warmer than the outside, but actually warm, if a bit dim. Amanita breathed deeply as she settled into her seat. Charcoal sat down across from her, took off her bags, and started rooting through them, muttering.

“Worried you might’ve forgotten something?” Amanita asked.

“Hmm?” Charcoal’s ear twitched as she looked up. “Uh, no, just…” She looked back inside. “Tetruple-checking my stuff. Just to, y’know, be sure. Again. Again.” Her ears moved back a little. “Again.”

The movements were familiar to Amanita. “What kind of stuff?”

Charcoal’s ears moved forward again and she started grinning. “Natural remedies! It’s, see, there’s a funny… thing about stuff like ley lines. If you get afflicted by magic like that, it’s, it’s natural magic, see? And it’s supposed to… stick around. So when it affects kirins- um, any sort of… animal, it’s, it’s kinda hard to get out. Unless you do it in the right way. Natural pills for natural ills!” She laughed, only to keep talking before Amanita could respond. “It’s for the magic to get in, but, but it’s probably best to be prepared. And I am prepared!”

Charcoal’s horn began glowing oddly as she whipped objects past Amanita’s face, almost too fast to see. “Willow, that’s good for pain, but you probably knew that… Wilderweed, that’s a good commune- immune booster… Noonflower, that can help mana flow better… Foal’s breath, great all-arounder…”

“Wait. Foal’s breath?” Amanita asked.

Charcoal came to a stop, holding a bag of some sort of blue pills. “Uh, yes?” she said tentatively.

“I thought that was just for your- silence- curse.”

“It’s actually good against a rot- a lot of mental magics,” said Charcoal. “It’s… I actually don’t know how it works. But Princess Twilight’s done some work and these-” She wiggled the pills. “-have effervescence of foal’s breath. Good for more mental ills than you’d think. Like ley lines making you go loopy! We probably won’t need them, but if we do need them, I’d rather have them, right?”

“Heh. I’ve been without ingredients enough to know that’s true.” Amanita blinked and shook her head. “Anyway, um…” She extended her hoof. “Amanita.”

Charcoal looked blankly at her hoof for a moment, then extended her own. “Um. Charcoal.” As they shook, she said, a bit quietly, “Is this a… pony thing, introducing yourself twice? We already knew each othen. Other.”

“It’s more… We’d been introduced professionally, not personally.”

“Huh.”

“So, uh…” What to ask, what to- “How’d you get into environmental magic?”

Charcoal’s face lit up. “Well, I’m- You know the- thing with the kirin, right? How we were silenced?”

“I-”

“It’s, there’s a lot of things you just can’t do if you can’t talk. But you can study stuff. And environmental magic, there’s a whole lot we didn’t know about it, so once we were silenced, I just- started studying it. It’s everywhere, you know. In all the plants and rocks and water and even animals. It’s where things like timberwolves come from, you know.”

“That’s-”

“And then Applejack and Fluttershy came by, and they de-silenced us and that was great. When we started going out into Equestria more, I, it turned out I knew a, um, a lot more about environmental magic than most ponies just because I’d been studying it on my own for so long, like out in the wild. Princess Twilight herself contacted me…”

As they talked, the whistle blew and the train started moving.





Bitterroot hung out on the observation car as the train left. Somehow, in all the different times she’d left Canterlot, she’d never done it in the hour before dawn. Clouds were just beginning to orange up on their bottoms and a tinge of gold was creeping into the sky. Yes, it was quite beautiful.

But as the train wound its way down the mountain, the sunrise was blocked by walls of rock and Bitterroot traipsed back up the cars. She had a long, long trip ahead.

Amanita was deep in conversation with the kirin — Charcoal, right? — so Bitterroot didn’t want to disrupt her. On the other side of the aisle, Code had her muzzle in a book. Not buried; judging from the title, it was more a train station novel than anything. Well, if she didn’t want to talk, she didn’t want to talk. Bitterroot had some books of her own. She sat down across from Code and cleared her throat. “Hey!”

Code looked up. “Hello.”

“Colonel Restricted Code, right? The High Ritualist.”

“Just Code is fine.” Code closed her book and set it aside. “And I remember you. Bitterroot. Bounty hunter. You committed suicide in front of me.”

“Well, I don’t know,” said Bitterroot. “Does it really count as ‘suicide’ if you’re planning on being resurrected later? I mean, you can kill someone in self-defense, but that’s a bit different from a murder, right?”

Code frowned and flicked an ear. “That’s a good point, actually… Anyway, I remember you.”

“Clearly.” For a moment, Bitterroot searched for a topic. Deciding to throw caution to the wind, she asked, “So, uh, Amanita says you sometimes work with demons?”

Code blinked. For a moment, Bitterroot wondered if she’d accidentally broached some aspect of national security she didn’t know existed. Then Code shrugged and said, “At times. Getting to know them is fascinating. Many demons are unfairly demonized.”

One of Bitterroot’s ears dropped and she cocked her head.

“Yes, I hear myself,” said Code. “What I hear is a stereotype so thoroughly entrenched in the popular consciousness that it’s turned into etymology.”

“…Did you write that out beforehoof?”

“Eh…” Code wiggled a hoof. “Technically. I’ve had this sort of conversation many times before. Many of the demons we remember are the ones who took it upon themselves to come here and torment the less fortunate. If they were foals, they’d be the ones who torture ants with magnifying glasses. It’s the others I’m making contact with.”

“Huh.” Bitterroot imagined that if she kept asking, most of the ideas would fly right over her head with an audible whoosh, yet she kept asking anyway. “Do they… want anything?”

“Heh.” Code actually grinned a little. “Let’s just start by saying that, even for the ‘nice’ demons, they have a hard time getting the idea of just giving something away, even a few words. But if we focus on one demon at a time, we can make it work. Why, just last week, one of them actually remembered my name…”

The train chugged on through the predawn.
> 3 - Glacial Crossroads
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

The world chilled even more as the train blazed north. Over the next day and a half, the group slowly left the heartlands of Equestria behind. Hazy horizons of snowy forests and rolling grasslands were sharpened into the jagged sawteeth of icy mountain ridges. Early on the second day, they had to switch from their train, an express headed northeastward for Griffonstone, to a mixed-goods train on a due-north branch line: a few mostly-empty passenger cars and plenty of freight.

Amanita checked her itinerary for the fifth time that hour. Their stop, Waypoint, was a few minutes and less than a mile away — even as she read, she felt the decelerative twitch of the brakes — but she was in that last restless leg of a long journey, where you can’t stop fidgeting and being ready to be done. She sighed and looked out the window. The train was traveling next to a fast-moving river; beyond that lay a thick forest, and beyond that loomed a mountain range. Not stood; loomed.

If you wanted to hide, you could do it easily there. She and Circe had spent a lot of time in mountain ranges, back when her attitude towards necromancy was a lot more… carefree.

She pulled her coat tighter and took deep breaths.

Code tapped her on the shoulder. “Amanita?”

“Yeah?” Amanita asked, turning away from the towering shadows.

“I can’t believe I forgot to ask you this before,” said Code, “but I assume you want to keep your status as a necromancer a secret, correct? At least for now.”

Amanita barely held back a snort. Talking about necromancy to scientists in Canterlot was one thing. Talking about it to ordinary ponies, particularly ones way out here? She might get lynched. “Yeah. For now. If it comes out, things are… not going well.”

“I’ll follow your lead,” said Code. She glanced over to Bitterroot and Charcoal as they stood up and stretched, ready to disembark at the station. “You two heard that, right?”

Without looking at Code, Bitterroot nodded. “Don’t let ponies know Amanita can raise the dead.”

“I fought we’d be- Thought we’d be doing that.” Charcoal adjusted her bag’s straps. “I’m ignorant, not stupid.”

“Good.”

The train slid into Waypoint Station and its whistle screeched. Before the conductor had finished hollering, the crew was off — the only people leaving. Little ribbons of snow chased each other across the empty platform in the wind. The depot building itself looked actually neatly built, with carefully chopped logs and surfaces carved to be flush with each other and an oddly large door, but was clearly more interested in function than in form, especially with the way the roof could use a new coat of paint. It would keep the worst of the cold out, and if that wasn’t enough for you, well, why were you up here to begin with?

Bizarrely, Charcoal didn’t seem too put out by the cold, even with the way midwinter in the North was undoubtedly biting her. She breathed in deeply through her nose and grinned through the steam of her exhale. “Chilly!” she chirped.

“Yep,” muttered Amanita. Her memories of Northern chill had never gone away, but she still held her legs close together.

“It’ll probably get worse in Midwich,” Charcoal said. “Warm air rises out of slot canyons like that and isn’t easily replaced! Super cold.”

Amanita wasn’t sure whether she loathed that bit of information or loved that warning.

Once they retrieved their baggage, they entered the depot, not much more than a few benches and a ticket window. A pegasus mare, apparently in her late fifties and well-bundled in spite of the shelter, was whistling out a light and bouncy tune as she used a broom to clean cobwebs from the corners. When she heard the door open, she twitched and Amanita barely noticed her shoulders sinking. “Hello, Royds,” she said in a long-suffering voice.

One of Code’s ears twitched. “Who?”

The mare whipped around to look at them, then blinked in surprise. “Oh! I, uh… thought you’uns were… someone else.” Her words twanged with a mountain accent. She looked at each of them in turn, almost suspiciously. “Did y’all get off at the wrong stop? Nothin’ here but woods and…” Her voice trailed off.

“The Tratonmane branch line ends here, right?”

“…I reckon so.” One of the mare’s ears drooped; the other folded back. “You’re the ritualists, right? From Canterlot? For the ley line hootenanny.” She looked at each person in turn, lingering twice as long on Charcoal (who grinned, but took a step back).

“We are. Except for her.” Code nodded at Bitterroot. “She’s a hanger-on.”

“Shoulda known. Nobody’s never did gone up through that way since I been workin’ here.”

“And how long have you been working here?” Amanita asked before anyone else could.

“Forty years.” The mare trotted into the ticket booth, muttering nothings to herself. She opened up the ticket window, dropped a name plaque on the desk — Travel Stamp, it said — and pulled out a rubber stamp and ink pad that somehow managed to be dusty. Once she licked down the stamp to get it wet (why would she do it like that), Travel said, “You’re sure you need to go thataways? ’Cause them jaspers’re odd folk.”

“Unless there’s a town closer to the ley line, yes.” Code fished out a coin purse and dropped it on the counter. “How much for four-”

“What makes them odd?” asked Charcoal, poking her head around Code. When Code shot her a Look, Charcoal protested, “I’m just asking!”

“Four tickets,” Code said quickly.

Travel gave Charcoal a Look of her own as she rang up Code. “They jus’… keep to themselves,” she said. “Which don’t sound like much, ’cept they don’t leave that gulch noways. Only pony who comes out ’ere drives the train. Once a week, coal an’ lumber out, supplies in, an’ that’s that. Friendly enough fellow, when ’e says anythin’. And nopony else ever comes out. Not ever?” She shook her head. “You’d swear they’re a-worshipin’ the mountains up there.”

Amanita frowned. She’d been in enough small Northern lumber or mining towns to know what came off to other ponies as weird. An oddly strong connection to home, stolidity, living out here to begin with… Plenty of ways. But because of those similarities, a lot of those towns formed close bonds with each other. So for Tratonmane to be weird compared to another mining town…

“Anyway…” Travel stamped out several tickets. “Y’got lucky. Train’s comin’ in about half an hour. Give it another half-hour to switch goods, an’ you’uns’ll be off.”

“Thank you,” said Code. “How much for-”

Amanita’s ear twitched as she heard something heavy step outside. She didn’t think much of it, but Travel’s eyes immediately grew huge. “Y’need to stay there for a little while longer,” she said quickly. She snatched the tickets back and tore them up.

Code remained unreadable as the steps grew closer and closer. “Why?”

“I want to avoid yak hugs,” whispered Travel.

The entrance door banged open and the frame was immediately filled with the blinged-out mountain of shaggy fur that was a yak. “GREETINGS, TRAIN PONY!” he bellowed in a voice that literally shook the foundation of the building. His misting breath was so dense it was practically steam.

Amanita couldn’t hear Travel’s long-suffering sigh, thanks to the yak’s echoes, but she didn’t need to; she could feel it in her bones. “Hello, Royds.”

Royds marched up to the ticket window, hanging out just behind Code. “Yakyakistan sends many thanks to ponies!” he roared (Code actually stumbled forward a bit). “Waypoint and Tratonmane trees still perfect for Puunmurskausmas!”

“Once again, I sell tickets, you furry bullhorn. Thank the head lumberjack.”

“Train pony is station master! Train pony responsible for making sure trees loaded onto trains quickly! Train pony good at that! But yak will talk to lumberjack too, yes.”

“Well, you’re welcome,” said Travel, “but as you can see, I’m busy-” She gestured at Code and grinned nervously. “-so darnit, you’ll have to keep moving.”

“Apologies at time not being perfect! Yak hopes next time will be perfect! Yak see you later!” (Travel’s wheeze was probably some form of strained laughter.) Royds turned to the door-

“Why do you chalk- talk like that?” asked Charcoal. “Without articles or conjugations or grammar.”

Amanita immediately cringed and she didn’t need to look to know similar reactions were coming from each of the other ponies. Yet Royds himself seemed unconcerned with the faux pas, assuming he noticed it at all. “Yaks smash pleonasms,” he declared sagely. “Yak speech simple, yet clear and obvious. Yaks need no more words; why use more words?”

Bitterroot glanced at Amanita. “Pleonasms?” she whispered.

“I think that’s ‘using too many words’,” Amanita replied.

Charcoal raised a hoof declaratively, saying, “…” She stroked her chin. “Huh. I might have to try that.”

“Indeed!” Royds gave Charcoal a light, friendly slap on the back that probably risked breaking her legs. “Yak speech very effective. Yak speech perfect! FAREWELL, PONIES! FAREWELL, NOT-PONY!” And he departed, leaving behind only wet yak footprints and little earthquakes.

After a moment of silence, Travel breathed out a sigh of relief. “Thankee,” she muttered. “He can get rather…”

“Wood pony!” Royds bellowed from outside.

“Diplomat yak!” a pony bellowed back.

“…excitable, an’ I’m old. One o’ these days, he’ll just sqush me right flat in a hug.”

“Yaks do be like that,” said Code.

Travel quickly stamped out another set of tickets and exchanged them with Code’s bits. “Tratonmane’s thataway, if’n y’wanna watch for the train.” Travel pointed out a window, opposite the side they’d come in. “Beyond the woods, on the other side o’ the mountains.”

Amanita took that as an opportunity to leave, exiting the station to take a look at the town and the mountains. Waypoint was a decent size for its isolation, with plenty of buildings, including at least one sawmill. Maybe it wasn’t thriving, but it was doing alright for itself. Amanita had enjoyed worse in her travels. It was practically familiar.

The mountains, though…

Amanita wasn’t scared of mountains. She knew them. Ish. She’d spent years in mountains. But looking at this range, at these giant slabs of stone and snow, she was looking into the wilderness in more ways than one. She knew virtually nothing about ley lines, and the closer she got to the mountains, the more acutely she felt that and the more likely botching everything seemed. The sight of the mountains almost repulsed her with fear.

But she held. She looked up at the mountains and fruitlessly told her beating heart to slow down. She’d botched things before, after all. Her life, for one, throwing it away to chase after a dead marefriend under a lich’s tutelage, and that had worked out well. Ish. She could do this.

She had to do this. She’d be a one-trick pony otherwise.

That was why she couldn’t stop her skin crawling.





The locomotive didn’t produce any smoke or steam.

That was what Bitterroot noticed when she first saw the Tratonmane train approach. It was a narrow-gauge one, with several flatcars loaded with lumber, several gondola cars loaded with coal, two boxcars, and a single passenger car at the very back. (She wouldn’t be surprised if that one was more out of obligation than anything.) The actual engine was a bit short and squat, resembling the K-36’s out west with some strange doodads bolted on. And yet it didn’t have any smoke. She’d have to ask the engineer about that.

Travel was lying next to her, sucking on a twig, watching the train approach with an air of familiarity. Bitterroot gave her a little nudge to get her attention. “Pretty big train for something that only comes once a week,” Bitterroot said.

“In course it is. That there’s all o’ the town’s goods for the week,” said Travel.

“Really?”

“Train’s the only way in or outta Midwich.” Travel worked the twig around in her mouth. “Less you wanna walk the long way ’round. Or fly, since you’re a pegasus an’ all. It’s the lifeblood o’ the place. Cut it off and the town’d die.”

Bitterroot looked back at the mountains, really looked at them. Now, it was easy to see just how impassible they were, with no easy passes or gaps that she could make out. There weren’t even many foothills; the mountains just jutted straight from the ground. It was more like a natural wall than anything she’d seen before. And they were going right into the middle of it.

“Ley ranges are like that,” said Charcoal absently. She started making jerky upward gestures. “You get all this energy, and it just kinda pushes the mountains up and keeps them together as it rises from the earth… We’re real lucky there’s a train to there, or else there’d be… I don’t know. Not a very good path. Why do ponies build train tracks everywhere? It’s weird.”

“Don’t ask me,” Travel said. “I just live here.”

Charcoal glanced at Bitterroot. “You live in Canterlot. Do you have a compulsion to build things?”

“Nope. It’s because of wing envy!” Bitterroot said brightly, flaring hers.

Charcoal tilted her head.

“I’m serious. Pegasi can get to places easily. But transporting supplies there, that takes more effort. And railroads are pretty much the best high-volume freight system there is that isn’t rivers. So sometimes, pegasi assemble in a fertile or resource-rich area pretty quickly, other ponies get there faster than usual so they don’t miss out, railroads are built to bring in supplies for the booming population, and then everyone realizes we’ve laid another hundred miles of track through the middle of nowhere.”

“Hmm. That… makes sense. But it’s-”

“It’s really oversimplified. That’s the gist of it, but there are- You live in Canterlot, right? I’ve got a book I can lend you when we get back. Wake of Steel, by Wood Tie. It’s about nothing but this.”

“Hmm. Sure, I’d like that.” Charcoal looked at the mountains again. “I wonder why Tratonmane was pounded- founded there, though. It’s so far from everything. I guess Waypoint was already a place where-”

Travel snorted. “Other way ’round. Waypoint started for Tratonmane. Why d’you think we’re called ‘Waypoint’? That’s what we are. Nopony cares enough to name us anythin’ else. ’Specially not us. Our history ain’t much, afore you ask. Y’ever heard o’ the… Fuel Vassalage Commission?” She said the last two words slowly, like they were another language. The name was vaguely familiar, but Bitterroot shook her head.

“So.” Travel bit off part of the branch, swallowed it, and stuck the rest behind her ear. She sat up straight and continued, “Two, three hundred year ago, we get steam engines. And those engines, they’re mighty useful for gettin’ around, but they need coal, and lots of it. So Her Highness, she wants a head start on fuel, so she goes an’ sets up this big scheme where she pays for towns in faraway places across the country to mine coal.”

Charcoal’s ears went up. “Ooo! Like Tratonmane!”

“Yes, indeedy. Celestya pays — well, paid, now — she pays for vittles an’ medicine t’ go up there, so long as coal keeps comin’ down. An’ it still is. There’s such towns all up an’ down these mountains. Waypoint, we’re just where Tratonmane hits the branch. Otherwise, we ain’t nothin’. Which is nice when y’don’t want much.”

There it was. Bitterroot knew her rail history, but logistics were a bit less interesting. She’d probably read about the FVC a dozen times, only to forget it each time. Knowing where a particular hunk of coal came from was definitely a less interesting part of trains. “I see lumber, too,” Bitterroot said, pointing. “Is that also part of the commission?”

Travel just shrugged. “Lotta trees out ’ere. Get some real good earthers ’oo know how to grow plants, and you can grow trees faster’n you can cut ’em down. Neat way to bring in more bits. Waypoint makes money that way, too. My ma said Tratonmane also sold charged gems or summat, but that stopped a few years afore I’s born.”

“Mmhmm.” Bitterroot went back to watching the train; by now, it was already pulling up to the platform. The engine slid smoothly past the depot and came to a stop with the passenger car right in front of the station doors. Immediately, a grayish unicorn stallion hopped out of the engine and trotted back down the train, whistling something. He came to a stop at where the passenger car connected to the hopper ahead of it and ducked in between the cars.

Curiosity pulled her forward like a magnet and Bitterroot was next to the stallion when he clambered back onto the platform. “Hey,” she said.

The stallion actually flinched and looked at her with sky-blue eyes that probably should’ve been sparkling but seemed dull at the moment. “…Hidy,” he said. His ears were twitching in anxiety. About foreigners, maybe? Bitterroot couldn’t blame him. They were intruding. His coat was as gray as the mountains around them, his mane coal-black, but he also looked a touch too slender for his own good, like he wanted to be the physical sort but had trouble committing. He still had time left in his life; he hadn’t yet hit forty.

She nodded towards the locomotive. “There’s no steam,” she said. Not from the engine, anyway. The stallion’s breath was steaming up plenty hard. (Then Bitterroot abruptly realized that he was wearing thick furs. Not unusual this far north, but if there was a firebox, the heat ought to have kept him warm. If. The furs were clean, too.)

He blinked and twitched back maybe half an inch. “I… guess nae.” His voice could’ve had a lot of rumbling gravel, but he needed to put it in himself and didn’t feel like it at the moment, so it was rather unmemorable at the moment.

“How come? If you don’t mind me asking, I mean. I like trains, and-”

“Missis, can ye walk an’ talk?” the stallion asked, his voice tense. “Got a schedule tae keep-” He nodded towards the engine. “-and ye’re a-holdin’ me up.” His accent was even thicker than Travel’s.

“Yes I can,” Bitterroot said quickly. She started walking for the engine; the stallion was at her side almost immediately. “So, train. No smoke.”

“Havenae had a fire burnin’ in…” The stallion clicked his tongue and looked up. “…dinnae ken. Long as I been a-drivin’. Dinnae need one, aryhow. Replaced the firebox wi’ some magic hootenanny. Drives the engine jes’ fine.”

Bitterroot had heard of those. Arcane dynamos of some kind. You were supposed to be able to drive locomotives with them, saving money and weight on fuel, since you were using thaumaturgical batteries rather than coal. At least, that was the idea. As was its wont, reality felt the need to intrude, and most such dynamos were still disappointingly inefficient, utterly impractical for trains. Unless the route wasn’t long and the train wasn’t big and you only needed to make a single round trip every week. And if you didn’t need a firemare… Bitterroot looked back down the train to be sure. No conductor. “And you’re the only pony who drives the train?”

The stallion looked at Bitterroot, squinting. It was an expression Bitterroot had seen plenty of times before; he was trying to get a read on her for some reason. Then he glanced at the ponies she was traveling companion to, loading their baggage into the passenger car, and she got it.

“I’m not really with them, I’ll keep mum on any… rules violations,” Bitterroot said quickly. Too quickly? “One of them’s my friend and I’m giving her moral support. I’m a bounty hunter, not a ritualist.” When the stallion still looked doubtful, she dug into her furs and pulled out her bounty hunting license. “See? Independent, not working for the Crown.”

The stallion glanced only briefly at the license, but Bitterroot could still see the tension leave his body. “Yep,” he said. “Jes’ me. Been that way fer more’n ten year, bringin’ everythin’ in an’ out. ’Tis tough, bein’ responsible fer everythin’, but eh. Somepony’s got tae do it.” He twitched, as if realizing something, and actually laughed a little.

By now, they’d reached the engine. Bitterroot leaned into the cab. Many of the gauges were missing and where the firebox normally was, now there was a large panel protecting… something. The battery, probably. But the controls still looked like those of a normal steam locomotive, just simplified to account for the lack of steam management. Brakes, regulator, sander. Easy. Bitterroot could probably drive it herself if-

“Ahem,” enunciated the stallion. “Got me a job that needs doin’. Ye can marvel at it everwhen we get back tae Tratonmane. Really, ye can.”

“Right,” said Bitterroot. One last look and she pulled out. She headed back towards the passenger car; her own baggage needed packing. “Name’s Bitterroot, by the way,” she hollered out.

“Tallbush!” the stallion yelled back. “Pleased tae meet ye!”





A bit of shunting juggling left the full freight cars behind in Waypoint and the passenger car coupled to the front of a new set of empty cars. (Bitterroot found the juggling fascinating, but she knew she was the only one who did.) The process was quick, and soon the train was away with the crew from Canterlot.

Up close, the mountains weren’t quite as unassailable as they had appeared, even if that wasn’t saying much. There were sideways canyons in the range, almost like slots, that weren’t easily visible from Waypoint. But the route through them was winding and the train had to take it slow as it climbed across wooded slopes and through ravines, hanging onto the mountainside for dear life. Tallbush had said it’d take nearly an hour to reach Tratonmane from Waypoint. And from the snailish way the mountain was crawling by, Bitterroot was sure that wasn’t an exaggeration. At least the car wasn’t drafty.

Charcoal was leaning out the windows, marveling at the mountains for reasons Bitterroot couldn’t tell. (“Pretty mountains” counted, she supposed. They were quite pretty.) Amanita was sitting in a loose, worn-down seat, reading something and waiting for the trip to be over. And Code…

Code was sitting in the middle of the car, eyes closed, taking long, deep breaths. In through the nose, hold for two seconds, out through the mouth, hold for two seconds, repeat. Her breathing was easy and steady, borderline mechanical in its regularity. She didn’t move much except to pivot as the train rounded curves. Somehow, even though her eyes were closed, she always ended up pointing north-ish.

Eventually, Bitterroot couldn’t help herself. “What’re you doing?”

Code didn’t twitch. “Trying to feel the ebb and flow of the area,” she said without opening her eyes. “Getting a head start on the primary form for the ritual. It needs to be tuned to work for the particular… region it’s performed in. Cacti don’t grow in apple orchards.”

“Can you feel anything?”

“Not really. Moving makes it harder to keep the connection to the earth.” Code shrugged. “It passes the time.”

She’d lived with a necromancer for moons, she’d been resurrected twice, and Bitterroot still didn’t get rituals. Code didn’t seem to be doing anything, just sitting there. At least when Amanita did magic, you could watch the pretty sparkles. Maybe it was an earth pony thing. “That it does. Wish it could for me.”

Finally, Code opened her eyes to stare at Bitterroot in confusion. “What? What do you mean?”

The fact that Code sounded so surprised surprised Bitterroot. It was a simple thing. “Well, you’re feeling the earth, right?”

“And you would feel the air.” Code squinted at Bitterroot with the air of a teacher disapproving of a homework-neglecting pupil; the glasses didn’t help. “You’ve never done a lick of magic besides flight and cloudwalking, have you?”

“I can do other things besides that?”

“Quite a bit more. There’s more to weather-wrangling than just trying to kick clouds, after all.” Code looked like she was going to continue, only to glance out the window at the passing mountains. When she turned back, she said, “I can try to teach you, if you want. How to feel the energies in the land. I can’t say how good I’ll be, since we’re different tribes, but I can give it a shot.”

Eh, what the hay. Maybe she’d learn something. Anypony could do ritual magic; this might be the first step towards that. And if not, it’d pass the time. Bitterroot plonked herself down across from Code. “Sure. Hit me.”

“That quick?” Code asked, raising an eyebrow. “Alright.” She looked at her own hooves for a moment, turning one of them over like it was an archaeological artifact (of the kind that didn’t risk melting your face off). “First things first,” she said. “Try to clear your head. You’re new to this, so we’ll need to do everything we can to help you focus on the magic.”

Heh. Empty your mind. Something Bitterroot was either very good at or very bad at, depending on the situation. Stakeouts, where she could be waiting for hours on end? Blanker than a whiteboard, where anything put in it would vanish in moments. Otherwise? Yeah, no. Closing her eyes, she tried to shift into stakeout mode. No big movements while not forcing herself to stay completely still, deep breaths, steady.

“There’s magic all around us, all throughout reality,” said Code, “and we barely scratch the surface of it. You’re a pegasus, so you’re attuned to the air. Reach out. Feel it in your feathers.”

Bitterroot decided against talking back to her teacher, decided educating somepony on anatomy was more important, and spoke up. “You know that, technically speaking, feathers are dead, right? They’ve got no blood vessels in them, no nerves…”

“Yes. That’s why feeling anything with them is noteworthy.”

Point to the expert. Bitterroot extended her wings to make them more… there. Feelable. There was just enough wind in the car for her to notice. Normally, she tried to ignore those winds, but if she was trying to feel magic in them… She breathed in. She breathed out. She’d had a teenage job as a weather wrangler, and she still remembered the unruly nature of storms, the static zing around clouds. She’d just assumed that was built-up lightning, but maybe that was unfocused magic? She reached for the memory, tried to recognize it in the winds around her-

And suddenly her wings seemed to expand.

It was a hazy feeling, like an incredibly minor buzz from an electric jolt, but it was absolutely there. In fact, it wasn’t so much a feeling as awareness. She knew all the ways the air was gently ruffling her feathers without actually feeling anything. More like… proprioception. Sort of. Not really. In spite of her shock, she tried to stay calm. She managed to hold it for another moment as miniscule winds flitted about her before she just had to look at her wings.

The feeling vanished the instant she opened her eyes. Her wings didn’t look any different.

“Yeah. You felt it.” Code was grinning. “It’s always a punch when you first break through to the aether. I still remember my first time. Just the life in everything.”

Bitterroot hadn’t felt life, but that was probably just because she was a pegasus and not an earth pony. What she had felt was an atmosphere that was slowly gaining energy. What was normally cold and dry — how did she know what those felt like? — was getting charged bit by bit as they approached the ley line. It was the electric thrum of a thundercloud, but turned down to one percent and everywhere. “It’s… Wow,” she said quietly. She was already closing her eyes again. “I didn’t realize what was all there.”

Code laughed. “Most unicorns don’t realize it’s there, and they can sense magic more easily than either of us. They just rip away the magic they need and never let themselves get immersed.”

The buzz was almost coming back. Bitterroot could feel it. “And this… kind of magic is how rituals work, right? Why any tribe can use them.”

“Indeed. It all comes from the same source. Different tribes just use it in different ways.”

“Does that include restraint rituals?” Worth a shot.

“…Technically, yes. If you can draw the circle, write out the runes, and donate the blood.”

And almost immediately, Bitterroot put the kibosh on that idea. The buzz slipped away from her as she shivered.

“It’s not much blood,” Code said, far too casually, “just a few drops. You need to give some of your own life to restrain another’s. But blood is blood, and it can usually only hold for a few minutes, anyway. Rope would serve you better.”

“Uh-huh,” said Bitterroot. But a blood sacrifice was a blood sacrifice, and that thought rolling around in her head made it hard for her to find the buzz again.

“And as for the magic itself, I wish I could help you more, but I wouldn’t know how. Different access mechanisms. Just keep examining it and you’ll learn what everything means. Oh, and if you suddenly get the urge to burst into song, that’s normal. Doing so will let you draw in even more magic, although you’ll want to stay vigilant if it’s in a minor key…”





It was amazing how much you could notice when noticing was all you were able to do.

The train, for example. Everypony knew trains rattled and rumbled. Rails weren’t perfect, after all. But the more Amanita paid attention to it, the more she thought she could take a stab at the tracks. They were well-worn, smoothed out by frequent use, but still sturdy. The route wound enough that there wasn’t much of an attempt to keep the tracks straight. Fair enough; given an environment like this, it might’ve been too much hassle. For most of the trip, the train had been crawling upward, but it’d crested a hill and started shuffling downward a while back. It actually wasn’t the worst train ride Amanita had been on.

She’d tried reading, but anxiety made her mind skip like a record as she read the same sentence over and over and the same thoughts kept flitting through her head. Now, she was just keeping her head down. It was always the same; the build-up to the doing was worse than the actual doing. It’d been true for necromancy, it’d been true for running from her master, it’d been true for prison, it’d been true for offering her services to the Guard, it was going to be true for ley sanitation. Right? Right.

The carriage twitched as it went over a slight dip in the track where some of the wood would probably need replacing in the next year or so. It wasn’t the kind to just disintegrate beneath you, at the very least. Wood was stronger than most Canterlotians gave it credit for.

Knowing that didn’t make the build-up any easier. It was still there, and she was in the middle of it. Tratonmane inched closer with every turn of the wheels, potential disaster along with it. She kept getting an image of a lynch mob forming after it was found out she was a necromancer. And what would she do about that? Murder somepony and resurrect them to show that she meant well? Ponies didn’t take well to people getting murdered to prove a point.

She was slipping slightly forward as the train went over bumps; the downward slope was just steep enough for that. She wiggled her way into a proper position.

She just wanted a bit of status quo. Whether or not to keep her status as a necromancer secret kept penduluming; good idea, bad idea, for the best, for the worst… She’d almost gotten it back in Canterlot, where everypony knew her, but coming here felt like she was being uprooted. Even though it was only, what, a week? Two? Not long. Probably not even a full moon. It wasn’t like-

“Hey!” chirped Charcoal, making Amanita twitch and shattering her thoughts to pieces. “Didya see the tree line? We’re getting close!”

“No, Charcoal,” Amanita said, remaining hunched over her book like a vulture over a corpse, “I did not see the tree line.”

She hadn’t snapped, but the silence was oddly tense.

“Areyoubusy?” Charcoal asked quietly. “Um, wow, I am so sorry. I’ll just, um, be… over-”

“No!” Amanita said quickly. She raised her head; Charcoal was already shuffling away, ears down. “You’re, you’re fine. I’m just- stressed. I…” She rubbed the back of her neck; she didn’t look away. “I want this to go well. And I’m… worried of what’ll happen if it doesn’t.”

“Yeah,” said Charcoal quietly. “Me, too.”

Silence.

“Tree line?” blurted Amanita.

“Oh, yeah!” (Amanita wondered if all kirins could switch moods on a dime or if it was just Charcoal.) “Come, come take a luck! Look!” Charcoal pulled Amanita to a window and pointed. “You see how the tree line keeps getting higher?”

It only took Amanita a moment or two to find it. The effect was surprisingly strong. “Yeah.”

“The trees get more energy from the ley line, so they’re hardier, so it takes worse conditions for them to be able to not grow! It’s really neat, if you-”

Darkness suddenly overtook them and a thunderous din battered their ears. Amanita tensed up and was ready to duck under a seat to hide from the specter of danger when she realized: tunnel. They’d just entered a tunnel. And hadn’t Tallbush said the tunnel was the last thing before Tratonmane?

Either he had or everyone thought he had, since everybody began scrambling to get their baggage together. Besides her clothes, Amanita had a large bag stuffed with notes and ritual paraphernalia, necromantic and non-necromantic alike for both. (Anyone looking inside would probably be very confused.) And if anypony happened to die while they were out here, well. That wasn’t worth keeping her secrets for. She’d be ready.

Hopefully.

The carriage jolted slightly as the brakes were applied. It was the middle of the afternoon, but the train emerged from the tunnel into an evening gloom as it entered Midwich Valley.
> 4 - A Scar on the Back of Beyond
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

The cliffs were the first thing Amanita noticed. And the second. And the third. The sixth, too. Mainly because they made it too dark to quickly see much else.

Charcoal had said Midwich Valley would be deep. She hadn’t said it would be deep. Amanita craned her head to look, even leaning out the window, but the walls just went up and up and up and up and up. They must’ve been half a mile high, minimum, and they were sheer, with barely any foothills. Amanita was getting vertigo just looking at them and she wasn’t even afraid of heights.

And then there was the width of the valley, or to be more precise, the lack thereof. “Valley” was a misnomer, probably chosen to make the place sound less menacing. Midwich was only half a mile wide and it looked like it’d take less than ten minutes to walk from one wall to another, assuming you took your time. It wasn’t a valley; it was a canyon, a cleft, a rift, a wound hacked out of the earth by some immense force. With the mountains towering on either side, it felt like they were trapped between the jaws of the earth.

Combine the two, and Midwich Valley was swathed in shadow. It wasn’t even five and yet the immense walls blocked out the sun, leaving most of the canyon floor cloaked in gray. It was hardly pitch-black, more like just after sunset, but that didn’t make it feel cozy. The sky was far too blue for the dimness and one of the walls was still gleaming with sunlight that didn’t reach ponies. The color hadn’t yet bled out from the valley floor, but it was about to.

Amanita glanced out the window just in time to spot a passing sign: “Welcome to Tratonmane”. The words were clear, but it was old and battered and in need of repainting. It’d probably been up since the town was founded. Who was it welcoming, anyway?

“Holy cannoli. Now that’s a mother-ducking ley line.”

Somehow, Charcoal had been the one to say that; she was gawking out one side of the train, and once Amanita looked, she knew why. Midwich Valley was straight. Dead straight. So straight she had trouble believing it. Even with the forest hiding some of the strongest right angles, it just didn’t look natural, more like a drainage ditch than anything. She could practically see to the horizon, miles away.

Code was looking out the window, too. “Well,” she said, “at least we won’t have trouble telling which way’s north.”

“That’s north?” asked Bitterroot. “Actual north north, not north-northeast?”

“Powerful ley lines often align themselves to north or south if they’re close enough,” said Charcoal. She’d pressed her muzzle to the train window. “It’s an earth thing. That’s totally north north. I’ve never heard of a ley valley this defined before, sweet Shine…”

“And now,” said Code, “you get to study it.”

Charcoal was actually wagging her tail like a dog and her voice was downright dreamy. “Yeah…”

The valley was even narrower at the tunnel than at the rest of it, so the train had to curve as it approached the opposite wall until it was facing directly north. Midwich was on a slight downward slope, but the track stopped on a flat stony ridge; Amanita wouldn’t have been surprised if it’d been built up with magic. There was a platform next to the passenger car once it slid to a stop, but no station building. Two ponies were waiting for them in wavering lamplight, a pegasus stallion and a chiropterus mare, both well-bundled-up. Their postures were loose and they seemed to be chatting warmly.

With her baggage in her aura, Amanita stepped outside and immediately started shivering. Even through her furs, it wasn’t just cold, it was downright glacial, thanks to the shadows. If there was any opportunity for cold air to worm its way into her clothes, it was found and exploited as thoroughly as possible. She’d never felt it this cold, not even when she’d been a necromancer on the lam and had to trek through blizzards to avoid detection. (Well, there was once. But that was when she’d fallen into a nearly-frozen river, so that didn’t count.) It was cold. It was cold cold cold cold COLD.

The pegasus noticed her shakes and laughed, steamed breath enveloping his head. “Bit nippy, ain’t it?” he said. His voice was higher-pitched than expected, with no grit or gravel anywhere to be heard in it. His words sounded more joking than mocking, although he and the other pony were both taking the cold like champs.

“Come, Whipple,” said the chiropterus, “they’re outsiders. They merely need time to acclimate, nothing more.” She eyed Amanita, grinning impishly. “Although perhaps I ought to give you my coat. You seem to need it more than I do.”

“This, a-comin’ frae the bat named Midwinter,” said Whipple, giving the bat in question a playful shove. “Ye could get away wi’ wearin’ nothin’ in a cold-as-blixen blizzard.”

“That I could,” Midwinter said, smiling. “That I could.”

“Ach, but where are our manners?” Whippletree stepped forward, flared his wings, and bowed. “Whippletree, militiapony o’Tratonmane,” he said with probably more grandeur than his position deserved. “Afteren I heard the call frae Canterlot, I’s a-thinkin’ you’uns deserved a welcome.” He was just past middle age and seemed to be a big pony in a regular-sized body, with his exaggerated movements and his thick neck. His coat, unusually floofy thanks to the cold, was a downright verdant green that would’ve been out-of-place if not for being mostly covered up by his armor. In spite of the situation, he was fully decked out, a battered iron peytral over what looked like a full-body gambeson. But battered or not, Amanita noted that it’d been fitted for him.

“Militia,” said Code. Her gaze flitted across the scars of Whippletree’s armor and his lack of a hard helmet. “Hmm.” Her voice was mostly uninflected, but Amanita caught a few slight downward hitches of skepticism, the sort of thing you only recognized after working a long time with her.

“Well, it ain’t like we can lick it tae Canterlot fer what you'un’d call ‘proper’ trainin’,” Whippletree said. His voice was as light as his wings were suddenly tense. “Midwich gives gooder trainin’, aryway.” With an air of not wanting to look at Code, he started to glance over the rest of the group, only to twitch like he’d been given an electric shock when he saw Charcoal. “Ah…” He wobbled forward and back as if he wasn’t sure which way to go. “What… are ye? …I mean no offense!” he yelped.

“I’m a kirin!” Charcoal chirped as the faux pas whistled away, missing her by a mile. “I’m new. We’re new. We only entered Equestria like two seasons ago. Half a year ago. It’s complicated.”

“I can imagine,” Midwinter whispered, staring at Charcoal. She coughed, licked her lips (probably chapped; Amanita was already wishing she’d brought some lip balm), and pulled herself up. “Midwinter Fire,” she said. “I have no association with the militia and was merely here to see the arrival of those sent to help us.” She looked at least a decade younger than Whippletree. Even beneath her thick clothes, she was the sort of lean that just looked swift, even though chiropteri were generally slower than regular pegasi. Her coat was a gleaming black, not unlike coal, that nearly hid her in the darkness. Her mane shone white and her eyes gleamed copper. A red gem was affixed in a pendant hanging from her neck. “Can we commence with the introductions?”

“Ahem. Yes.” Code stood tall, which still meant she was at least half a head shorter than everyone else. She slapped a leg across her chest. “Restricted Code. Ritualist.” She pointed at each equine in turn. “Amanita. Ritualist in training. Charcoal. Environmental magic specialist. And Bitterroot. Tagalong bounty hunter who’s not working with us.”

Amanita risked clearing her throat. “She’s a friend of mine.” Once she couldn’t take it back, her mind immediately began spinning elaborate theories on how that would lead back to her being outed as a necromancer.

“Well, pleasure tae learn y’all,” said Whippletree. “Speakin’ of, did…” He glanced toward the front of the train.

Tallbush was leaning against the engine. “Aye, they already learned me, and I them,” he said, standing up. “Do you'uns need ary help?” he asked Code. “With… arythin’?”

“Unlikely,” said Code. “We just need to drop off our luggage at the inn, and then we can get to work.”

“Mmhmm. Where’ll you'uns be a-workin’?”

“Until we get a better view of the situation, that’s hard to say,” said Code. “Down near where Tratonmane meets the forest, to begin with.”

“Right,” said Whippletree. He turned his attention to Tallbush. “I reckon we ain’t a-doin’ the, uh…” He glanced at Code. “The meetin’?” he half-whispered.

“Nah,” said Tallbush at normal volume. “Dinnae got nae reason tae hold an assembly.”

Whippletree blinked twice, then nodded.

“Hopefully, we won’t impose ourselves on you too long,” said Code. “We could be out of here when the train leaves in a week. But that all depends on what the land says.”

As Code checked their cargo for damage and loaded it onto sledges, Amanita looked out over Midwich to the north and, for the first time, examined Tratonmane itself as best she could. Thanks to the dearth of land, the town was packed together more closely than similar villages, the outlines of buildings only discernible by the chiaroscuric contrast of lamps in the streets; there was even a tower or two, from what she could tell. It was maybe four hundred feet across, but quite a bit longer, almost like a snake. Amanita guessed the population at somewhere between three and five hundred. A slim but swift river wove its way down through the valley and split Tratonmane in two. The sides of Midwich Valley outside Tratonmane, right up to the walls, were free of regular wooden buildings and instead had… greenhouses, it seemed? That was one way to grow food up here. The entire valley floor seemed to sag, the edges higher than middle, as if the mountains were holding everything up.

There was a line not too far in the distance, where gray transitioned sharply to black. Amanita squinted at it and realized that that was where Tratonmane stopped. There weren’t any more buildings, there was a gap of land, and then Midwich Forest just… started. There was nothing gradual, nothing hazy, not even the slightest bit. Just a line so sharp and straight you could probably trace it with a ruler.

Amanita knew forests could be like that. She’d seen it plenty of times. But something about that got to her in ways the cold didn’t.

“Excuse me.” Next to her, Midwinter grinned. “I know it’s something, but remember to breathe.”

“Yeah,” said Amanita. “It’s just so… straight.” The forest line or the actual valley? Both, really.

“Truly, there is no other place like it in the world,” said Midwinter. “It is part of the reason I moved here.”

“Really?” asked Charcoal. “How did you hear about-”

“All set, we’re going,” Code said loudly. “Whippletree’s leading.”

With the station on the ledge, the crew had to head south to reach a downward slope before going north into Tratonmane proper. To the south, Midwich narrowed more and more until the walls finally met in a mild V shape. Several small waterfalls plummeted over the rim and down into the canyon to feed into the river, their roars oddly muted. Not too far from the station, with tracks leading to it, Amanita could make out the hulking, angular mass of a coal breaker. Well, Tratonmane was a mining town; it’d be more surprising if it didn’t have one. There didn’t seem to be many other buildings on that side of the station, just a few houses.

They reached where the rising valley floor met the ledge, then swung around to start downhill on the riverbank. Midwinter, however, came to a halt. “It’s been a pleasure meeting you four,” she said, “but I must be off. I have projects that need attending to.” Her piece said, she continued on upriver.

“Dinnae mind that,” Whippletree said casually. “She’s a throng sort, all the time a-goin’ forwards and backwards.”

Bitterroot surreptitiously glanced at Amanita. “Throng?” she whispered.

“Throng?” Charcoal didn’t whisper.

Amanita caught Tallbush rolling his eyes, but Whippletree remained as unfazed as Charcoal had been. “Oh, y’ken. Busy. A-bustlin’. Occupied. Y’ken.”

“No, I don’t ken,” said Charcoal. A pause. “Well, I didn’t. I do now!”

“I take it the mine’s that way?” asked Code, squinting upriver.

“Southmost point o’ Midwich,” Tallbush said quickly, still giving Charcoal a look that wasn’t a glare just yet.

“We might need to take a closer look at it eventually,” Code thought aloud. “Ley lines and mines have a rich history. Oh, and…”

She bent down and ate a chunk of dirt.

As she straightened up and swallowed, Code gave the shocked ponies a look like they were the weird ones. “What?” she asked, wiping her mouth down. “Earth pony, ley lines in the earth. I’m attuning myself to the ley lines. Obviously.”

“You’re… here to investigate the ley lines being bad,” said Bitterroot, her voice wavering between surprise and amusement. “Is that even safe?”

“On these timescales? Absolutely. I’m the High Ritualist, I’ve taken backlash far worse than this.”

“But-”

Amanita raised a hoof. “Bitterroot, if Code says it’s safe, then it’s safe. Trust me.”

Tallbush coughed and shuffled his hooves. “You’re, eh… a-feelin’ the magic, are ye?”

“I’m getting there,” said Code. “It’ll take a while to really get it moving around my hooves.”

“Eh-heh. Well, I, eh, I need tae go. I got… jobs that need doin’. Money. Freight.” And Tallbush was immediately trotting back to the station while trying to look like he wasn’t running away from anything, no sir.

Whippletree’s ears twitched, then he glanced at the rest of the ponies and shrugged. “Nae idea what’s gotten intae him. Let’s keep a-movin’.”

The houses started quickly once they reached the bottom of the ridge. The central road was nearly flat from constant usage and surprisingly wide; it wouldn’t have been that out-of-place in Canterlot, actually. Oil lamps and light gems lined the buildings and the scene would’ve been a cozy just-after-sunset one if not for the glare of the wall above reminding them of the light they were missing. Plenty of ponies walked the streets; mostly earth ponies and pegasi, with unicorns being relatively rare. In fact, chiropteri seemed to be more common than unicorns. Although that might’ve just been their eyes occasionally flashing in the gloom and infrequent, high-pitched chirps of echolocation.

On a whim, Amanita took as close a look at the nearest pony as she could, but although she searched, she couldn’t see any signs of malnourishment. She looked at the buildings; wooden, thick, sturdy, no gaps in the walls, even intact glass in the windows. Tratonmane was doing surprisingly well, considering its isolation.

Then she noticed the looks they were getting. The quick ones, with set jaws and lowered ears that saw them, then turned away. From just about every pony on the street. Some even ambled to the other side of the road once they were finished with their quick glare. They were familiar to her. The Tratonmanians were holding them in contempt.

It was almost certainly just them being foreigners — Tratonmane probably had a well-oiled routine that didn’t react well to Crown agents being tossed into the works — but that wasn’t the only place she’d seen them. They’d also been present years ago, after Northern townsponies learned she and Circe were necromancers but before Circe killed someone to use as a thrall and that turned to fear. Amanita had only seen them a few times, but it wasn’t a look you easily forgot.

She glanced behind her. Bitterroot seemed to have noticed, from the way her eyes were flicking back and forth. Code was supremely unconcerned. And Charcoal was losing a quarter-inch with every twenty steps she took as her ears grew more and more limp. Amanita slowed her pace until she was side-by-side with Charcoal. “Don’t take it personally,” she whispered. “We’re-”

“I know. Foreigners. I, I once did it myself,” mumbled Charcoal. “But it’s hard not to.”

“Remember, we’re here for each other,” said Amanita. “Feel free to talk to me about… anything.”

“Mmhmm,” Charcoal hummed vaguely. “But-” Her ears and head snapped further up at the same time; she looked straight ahead like a pointer dog. “What’s that?” she asked.

“We’re a-comin’ up on the square,” said Whippletree. “If’n y’ever-”

“No, the tree.” Charcoal picked up speed until she practically galloped past Whippletree to the silhouette of a tree.

And what a tree it was.

It was easily the largest tree Amanita had ever seen, several dozen feet thick at the ground and several stories tall. Thick, gnarled branches, free of leaves, reached upwards as they twisted around each other; they weren’t clawing for ponies but holding up the sky. It was too big to move much in the wind, but the movements Amanita could see were slow, portentous, like a ship of the line or a siege engine. Amanita had never seen its like before and she knew she’d never see its like again. As if to emphasize its grandeur, a thick road ringed it, lined with more lamps than anywhere else in Tratonmane. It was clearly the center of town.

Charcoal was almost touching the trunk, staring straight up. “Wow wow wow,” she gasped. “Wow. Ley lines and a ley tree like this? I’m in Elysium. Karma’s gonna have to kill me to balance everything out.”

“Karma doesn’t work like that,” said Code.

“Oh.” From Charcoal’s voice, she literally could not care less. Assuming the sentence had registered at all.

“That there’s the Great Ash,” said Whippletree. “Somethin’, ain’t it? Tratonmane grew up ’round it. ’Tis how we kenned this was someplace special.”

“Heh. Yeah…”

“Ash trees don’t normally get this big, do they?” asked Bitterroot. “You could practically fit a house in there.”

“It’s… You know how earth pony magic helps plants grow? But ley lines are nothing but earth magic. If the line’s strong enough, plants can use that instead. This…” Charcoal rapped the tree trunk. “…is basically what you would get if you had a dozen earth ponies pouring their magic into one tree nonstop for ages. Look at how pig it is. Erm, big.”

“If it’s been feeding on the ley line all this time,” said Bitterroot, “I’m not sure ‘pig’ is wrong.”

“It’s probably older than most other ash trees, too,” said Charcoal. “Ley trees often survive things that would kill other trees. You, you know Princess Twilight? How she used to live in a library?” She pawed at the ground and her tail whipped through the air. “Uh, uh, Golden Oaks! Yeah, that. I’ve seen pictures. It was a library, you know? They hollowed the entire inside, but the tree, it still had green leaves. You know how that’s possible?” She stomped on the ground. “Ley lines. Enough magic to keep it live even though they removed its heart.”

“There are an unusual number of ley lines around Ponyville,” said Code. “They come from the Tree of Harmony. Or,” she said, her voice dropping like an earth pony thrown from a hot-air balloon, “what used to be the Tree.”

“What used to be the Tree?” asked Bitterroot. “What happened to it?”

Code’s ears immediately folded back. “Let’s. Not. Talk about it,” she said in a voice that was a bit too level. She took a bite of dirt the same way a stressed pony would take a swig of any sort of alcohol.

“Hang on…” muttered Charcoal. Her horn pulsed and she delicately ran a hoof over the Ash’s bark. “Is it… dead?”

“Aye,” Whippletree said, nodding sadly. “Musta been… ten, twenty year ago. The Ash jes’ stopped makin’ leaves. Shame. I loved it in the summer.”

“Well, it had to happen eventually,” said Charcoal, her own voice a bit downbeat. She did a circle around the tree, keeping her hoof on the bark all the while. “Ley lines don’t make things immortal, although they do live longer. It must’ve been, I dunno, six or seven hundred years old. That’s old for an ash. And they don’t do well in shaded areas, to poot. It’s a miracle it lasted as long as it did.” The look she gave Whippletree was pleading to the point that Amanita was disconcertingly reminded of a puppy. “You’re keeping it up, right?”

“ ’Course we are!” Whippletree sounded offended at the very thought and his wings were fidgeting aggressively. “Its roots are ’neath all the town. It’s part o’ Tratonmane an’ we ain’t a-choppin’ it down arytime soon. It’ll take a big shift in town fer us tae be rid o’ the Ash.”

“Great!” Charcoal smiled up at the Ash and tapped its trunk. “Hang in there,” she whispered. (A passing pony gave her an odd stare.)

“Aryhoo,” said Whippletree, “you'uns’ll be a-stayin’ right o’er there.” He pointed at a large, stocky building, probably an inn or tavern (or both), deep in shadow on the western side of the square. The sign over the door called it the Watering Cave. “Cannae say what the rooms’re like. Drink’s good, though.”

“Mmhmm.” Code glanced northward, then at the sledge she was still dragging, and sighed. “I’m itching to get to the forest and get to work, but we need to get our cargo out of the open.” She took a step towards the Cave.

“Hey, wait a sec,” said Bitterroot. “Why don’t I do this? I’ll get us a room, get this all taken up, everything. You can get started.”

“You’re sure?” Code asked.

“Hey,” Bitterroot said with a casual shrug, “it’s not like I’ll be doing anything down there. Might as well make myself useful.”

“Then thank you.” Code was out of her harness almost immediately.

“If you came here just to see what it was like,” Amanita asked as she set her bags down, “why are you offering to do busywork for us first thing?”

Bitterroot looked at Amanita and grinned. “C’mon, we just got here. I’m sure it’ll be more interesting later.”

“If’n y’wanna see the forest — cannae imagine why — jes’ follow the road.” Whippletree pointed down the road. “Hard tae get lost.” He glanced back south down the valley. “If’n ye dinnae mind, I think I’ve some other things that require doin’. But I’ll be here in the future, if ye need me.”

“I’ll keep that in mind. Thank you for your help,” Code said, giving Whippletree a nod. She didn’t give him any time for a response, instead immediately turning and trotting north, Charcoal right at her tail. Amanita gave Bitterroot and Whippletree a quick wave, then took off after the others.





The houses of Tratonmane thinned quickly as the trio headed northward. One moment, they were in what was nearly downtown, then the buildings vanished and lamps were thin on the ground, replaced by open fields and chicken runs; tall grain on one side, and untilled earth on the other. Flashing lights flitted through the dark in the open field. If she squinted, Amanita could make out the shapes of foals with light-gem necklaces, playing some kind of game. After a moment, she heard their voices.

“Gotcha, Wythe!”

“Nuh-uh, nah ye didnae!”

“Did too!”

“Did not, Plumb, ye school butter!”

“Oh, that’s-”

“Foals!” a matron said firmly. “Keep it civil! Wythe, dinnae say things like that!”

Imagine trying to raise a foal in an environment like this. But they seemed to be doing alright.

Charcoal had galloped ahead of Amanita and Code and was taking the time to examine the grain. A nearby earth pony farmer was eyeing her, but although the grain was ripening, Charcoal didn’t seem interested in trying any straight from the stalk (which placed her willpower a little bit higher than Amanita’s, honestly). “Rye,” she said. “Good rye. Out of season, too.”

Amanita felt a centipede slithering down her spine. Lots of rye. For lots of rye bread. As she’d told Princess Twilight and Celestia, necromancers liked rye bread. Necromancers also liked the cold, the isolated, the remote-

No. No, this was… coincidence. Rye didn’t mean necromancers were here. Right?

“Makes sense,” Charcoal continued. She broke away and followed after Amanita and Code. “Rye glows- grows well in the cold, did you know that? It does. And, hey! Ley line! That’ll make up for a lot.”

…Huh. Very much coincidence, apparently.

Apparently.

“So, wow, we really gotta fix this,” Charcoal rambled. “If we don’t, they could… starve next year. Yeah.” She rubbed her stomach. “Bad ley line means bad plants.”

“Consider it your motivation,” said Code.

The river found its way next to the street and meandered back and forth as they walked. Lamps were less frequent; Amanita lit her horn to provide them some extra light. Further ahead, just off the road and near the edge of the river, more lights clustered together, some shining everywhere, some focused in beams. Soon, Amanita heard the unmistakable whack whack whack of wood being chopped.

“What dae y’think?” a stallion said. “Ought we dae some grubbin’?”

“Nah.” The mare’s voice was panted, like she was keeping herself from breathing hard. “We’ll get ’em-” Whack. “-on the morrow.” Whack. “We still need-” Whack. “-tae get these logs-” Whack. “-up the skid road-” Whack. “-and I ain’t doin’ it while we’re all done fer.”

“Alright. Thankee.”

The darkness sharpened into about a dozen and a half equine silhouettes crowded around fallen trees and stumps, chopping, cutting, sawing, whatever it took to make those logs easier to manage. The trees, both standing and downed, were bigger than most other trees Amanita had seen, although nowhere near the mass of the Great Ash. Code called out, “Hello, there!”

Almost immediately, the axes stopped chopping as all the ponies looked their way. Most of them were earth ponies, but Amanita caught the wings of pegasi, the eyeflash of chiropteri, or the horns of unicorns from a few of them. The cold radiating from the crowd was unconnected to the snow. About two seconds before the silence shifted from tense to awkward, an earth pony with an ax draped across her back stepped forward. “Keep on a-workin’, woodhicks!” she hollered. She was the same mare who’d been speaking before. “Them bein’ new ain’t nae reason fer you'uns tae footercooter!”

As the lumberjacks hesitantly resumed their work, the mare leaned against the nearest fallen tree, one with a trunk almost as thick as she was tall. It was hard to say whether she was large for her small size or small for her large size; she was well-muscled and had disproportionately large hooves, at any rate. She’d been working so hard that her furs were actually slightly open so she could cool off. Her coat was a shining amber, her flowing mane bandsaw gray. “So,” she said, her voice as flat as a frozen-over pond, “what brings you'uns here?”

Code cleared her throat. “You may have heard that there’s a ley line in the region that went bad for some reason. We’re the ritualist team sent to heal it.” She pointed at each team member in turn. “Restricted Code. Amanita. Charcoal.”

Amanita almost raised a hoof to wave. But that was dorky; she didn’t want to look dorky, did she? Or would it seem endearing? Did it matter? They might only be here a week and she didn’t think she’d be talking to the townsponies that much. But if she was wrong and they seemed aloof-

The mare looked at Code for a long moment before saying, “I heard.” She clapped a leg across her chest. “Crosscut. I’m the teamster fer these loggers, the finest ponies in Tratonmane.”

“Don’t let the militia hear you say that,” said Amanita. The joke sounded forced the second it escaped her control.

Yet Crosscut laughed anyway, although the laugh was bitter. “They hold wi’ that view! They ain’t a-workin’ on the edge o’ Midwich every day.” She fixed Amanita with a glare that wasn’t exactly enraged but so disapproving that Amanita still took a step back. “If ye kenned a single cusséd thing about our valley, ye’d ken we’re less’n twenty feet frae the nastiest wood in all Equestria.”

Amanita took another look at Midwich Forest and, while the darkness might’ve played a part, thought that assessment had a pretty good chance of being accurate. Code, however, seemed unfazed. “Forests do have a habit of being nasty places,” she said blandly. It wasn’t a refutation of Crosscut’s words, but it wasn’t not a refutation, either. “The Everfree, for example. Between the strange magic running through it and the monsters living in it, the Everfree’ll kill you if you look at it funny.”

“That right?” Crosscut snorted. “Midwich ain’t a-waitin’ fer an excuse. Ferget the wolves, lowlander, the trees theirselves are what’ll get ye. This dark, this long, they’re-”

“Oh, Shine,” gasped Charcoal, clapping a hoof to her mouth. “These are all night trees?”

“And they’re encroachin’ on our town more every year. Movin’ an’ all.” Crosscut spat on the ground as Charcoal leaned back from the forest. “Let ’em come. More wood fer the kiln.”

Amanita felt like she’d missed something and was flailing as if she’d gone too far up a staircase in the dark. Coughing loudly, she said, “Um, excuse me, but, uh… what’s a night tree?”

Every woodcutter and Charcoal stared at her like she’d made the sort of mistake that put you on the cover of tabloids for the next few weeks. “It’s a tree,” Crosscut said, somehow managing to not sound too insulting by explaining the obvious. “At night.”

Amanita was absolutely sure she’d missed something, and now she was suspecting she’d missed it years ago. It was only a mild assurance that Code looked the same way. “And… that’s… important?”

“Well, yeah,” said Charcoal. “Day trees and night trees aren’t the same thing.”

A blank stare from Amanita, mulled confusion from Code, nods from the Tratonmanians.

“Oh, come on, don’t tell me you don’t notice it!” protested Charcoal. “When a branch taps your widow- window, window in the day, it’s just the wind, right? But, but, but, but when that happens in the night, suddenly it’s real scary. Even though nothing changes. Except-” She waggled a hoof Importantly at Code. “-the tree’s now a night tree, not a day tree.”

“Day trees leave houses alone,” added Crosscut. “Night trees can crowd all ’round a house they dinnae like, pound the shingles off the roof, bust in the window glass an’ the door panels… That’s the sort o’ night ye dinnae wanna head out intae. Even y’all city folk ken that.”

“It doesn’t always happen that bad,” said Charcoal. “If they’re well-tended or given enough magic, night trees are pretty much the same as day trees. They just stay-” She whipped to look at Crosscut like there was a rope through her nose. “We’re so close to a ley line you’ve got a ley tree glowing- growing in the town square. How can you have this many bad night trees?”

Crosscut just shrugged. “I dinnae ken. And my ma says it weren’t this bad when she were a filly. This forest was jes’ a forest fifty year ago.”

“And nothing happened?” Charcoal said. “It just started?” It was like every part of her body had been turned towards interest; her ears were pointed straight at Crosscut, she was leaning forward, and she was practically bouncing on her hooves.

“Sure enough, bit by bit,” said Crosscut. “Nothin’ you notice right then, Ma says, but when yer a-lookin’ back, ye can see all the signs an’ omens an’ whatnot. It’s-”

One of the pegasi tapped Crosscut on the back. “Hate tae butt in, but can ye borrow me some strength? Ax got stuck.” She wrapped her hooves around the ax in question and gave it a hard yank to demonstrate. It didn’t budge.

Crosscut tapped the ground with a hoof, flicking towards the pegasus, and Amanita felt a strange buzz in the ground. Next to her, Code’s eyes snapped wide open and she started massaging the dirt with her hooves. The pegasus blinked like she’d been flicked on the ear, flexed her wings, and casually yanked the ax out with a fraction of the effort that hadn’t made it twitch before. “Thankee,” she said, and went right back to chopping.

The buzzing stopped; Crosscut didn’t seem to have noticed. “It was little thing after little thing,” she said. “Took more’n-”

“What was that?” asked Code.

Crosscut blinked. “What was what?”

“That.” Code pointed at the lumberjack. “She couldn’t pull the ax out, so you… let her borrow your strength?”

“Aye. And?”

“Earth pony strength. Magic.”

“…Aye. And?”

The look on Code’s face was one Amanita recognized well; she was anticipating a paradigm shift. “…How?”

“By… lettin’ her… use it?”

Code dropped onto her haunches and rubbed the bridge of her muzzle as her mouth worked soundlessly in what was probably a mantra of self-control. Then she calmly took a breath, calmly stood up, calmly adjusted her glasses, and calmly shrieked, “You can give your magic to other ponies?”

“Dear land, how’s that a surprise? It’s jes’ magic, ain’t it? I shape it, she uses it.”

And Amanita’s mind took off so fast it’d probably be rainbooming if it were physical.

Magic was magic. That was fact. Any ritual could be worked by a pony of any tribe; the magic was molded by the acts and the symbolism and the paraphernalia of the ritual before the pony picked it up. This had been proven time and again, and was now such a basic fundamental part of ritualism that most ritual students were already taking it for granted before their first year.

But then, who said the magic had to be shaped by the ritual?

Each of the pony tribes controlled magic and cast their spells in their own way. There was absolutely nothing saying that the pony who controlled the magic and the pony who cast the spell had to be the same pony, or even the same tribe; everypony just assumed there was. But the magic wrought by a ritual could technically be done by any unicorn of sufficient power, since they shaped the magic directly. On a fundamental level, there wasn’t much difference between “ritual” and “unicorn” as a source of prebuilt magic. And from there, just the very notion of ponies mixing magic sent ideas spinning through Amanita’s mind, threatening to block out everything else.

She immediately took the deepest breath she could, forcing herself to feel the cold air stab its way down her throat all the way to her lungs. That was for later. They’d just opened up a new field of study, but now, they needed to work on the ley line.

“…because of liminality,” muttered Code as she sketched metaphysics diagrams in the snow. “But alicorns can use all three, so why not other tribes?… If tribal differences are mostly biological-”

“Why’re you'uns a-lookin’ that way?” Crosscut asked, looking back and forth between Amanita and Code like she couldn’t decide which disaster to watch. “It’s jes’ borrowin’.”

“-then perhaps-” Code blinked, forced out a cough, and adjusted her glasses. “This… borrowing,” she said. “It’s… unknown in Equestria.”

“Unkno-” Crosscut whipped around and yelled to the lumberjacks, “Ay! Woodhicks! The Crown dinnae ken borrowin’!” The work didn’t let up, but laughter rippled through the group. Amanita felt her cheeks grow warm.

But either Code’s red coat was hiding her own reaction or (more likely) she was just unflappable. “Regrettably, we don’t,” she confirmed. “Forgotten dogmas in arcane study.” Her voice dropped. “By Celestia, how did we miss that…”

“An’ you'uns came here tryin’ tae help us wi’ magic?” Crosscut snorted. “Forget me, but it’s hard tae confidence you'uns if’n y’dinnae ken borrowin’.”

“Good thing we’re not here to borrow magic, then,” said Code. She ate some more dirt.

Crosscut didn’t look particularly reassured.

“Is that working?” Amanita asked Code.

“It’s hard to say,” said Code. She looked down and massaged the ground beneath her hooves. “I’ve never felt a ley line quite like this before.”

“How?” Crosscut’s ears twitched back slightly, and Amanita noticed the nearby pegasus pivoting an ear towards them.

“It’s still too early to say for certain, but lines are rarely this… focused,” said Code. She closed her eyes, slowly swaying back and forth; Amanita felt magic thrum around her. “You can see it from how defined the valley is. I think it’s contained entirely within Midwich. That’s quite unusual for healthy ley lines, let alone sour ones.”

“Worth payin’ it ary mind?” Crosscut asked.

“Not sure,” Code said. “We’re still in the preliminaries. We’ll need to do some actual readings before we can say for certain.”

“So we should follow the river.”

Amanita twitched; somehow, she’d forgotten about Charcoal. The kirin was staring off downriver into Midwich Forest, making little hmm, hah, heh grunts of thought as she rocked her head back and forth.

“Nay,” said Crosscut, almost reflexively.

“Yay,” responded Charcoal. “If you’re near a ley line, the course a river takes can tell you a lot about the line. It’s all, y’know, shaped by the energies of the line, the ebb and flow and strength and character and I’ve read several books about this, it’s really neat. It’s like a… glass through the earth into the line itself. If you really want to study ley lines, you look at two things: mountains and rivers.”

“Ye didnae listen at me when I told you'uns Midwich is dangerous, aye?” said Crosscut. “An’ now ye want that you'uns jes’…” She flicked a hoof towards the forest. “…head straight in. Belly o’ the beast an’ all.”

“Of course I listened and of course I don’t want to!” said Charcoal. “What kind of idiot do you take me for? But we’re not here to be safe. We came to take a look at the ley line. The river can help us study the ley line. That’s all there is to it. We want to help.” She glanced at the forest and scooted away from it by an inch. “Even if I really don’t want to go into the forest made entirely of night trees.”

Crosscut looked between each of the ritualists, then at Midwich Forest, in turn. “Ye’d do that?” she asked, somewhere between ashamed and surprised. “Danger an’ all?”

“Reluctantly,” said Amanita. “But yeah.”

For a long moment, the only sound was the continued thwack of axes and buzzing of saws. She shook her head and wiped her forehead down. “If’n it needs a-doin’, it needs a-doin’,” she muttered. “If it comes tae that, keep yer minds out an’ yer swords close, aye? We dinnae want ary more outsiders comin’ ’round ’ere.”

“Of course. We could use some help,” said Code. “A militia detachment, maybe, for protection. But following the river is a good idea, as long as we watch out for-”

The howl of a wolf cut through the darkness.

The lumberjacks all snapped to look at the forest; herd instinct (they called it “peer pressure”, now) made Amanita tense up. She’d heard wolves before. Didn’t mean she liked them. The echo rumbled and rolled up and down the valley, seeming to flatten out other sounds as it passed. There was something violent in that howl, ominous and threatening. And based on Tratonmane’s reaction, perhaps something worse.

Another howl. Closer.

“Leaf, git tae the hall, ring the bell, now,” Crosscut hissed. She wasn’t looking at anypony in particular, but a pegasus promptly took off for Tratonmane, wings pumping hard.

Before Amanita could ask what that was about, the lumberjacks pulled back from the forest; some brandished their axes and saws, some unsheathed swords or took up spears. They all immediately assembled into a defensive line, facing Midwich.

“You say yer ritualists.” Crosscut twirled her ax and didn’t look away from the forest. “I hope ye also ken how tae fight.”
> 5 - The Forest Will Eat You Alive
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

Earth pony magic being mostly focused on strength didn’t seem that impressive until you had to do what they did without magic. Code was borderline shrimpy compared to Bitterroot, yet Bitterroot was struggling with just one crate where Code had easily pulled two. Flight was nice and all, but sometimes, she really wanted to be an earth pony.

“Ye ken fer certain y’ain’t needin’ my help?” asked Whippletree.

“I’m sure,” wheezed Bitterroot as she pumped her wings and pounded snow into water until she was digging at the ground below and panted until her breath made her resemble a locomotive and the sledge budged forward another single inch.

“Right,’ said Whippletree. He glanced south, towards the station. “Then I’d best be off. Got some…”

Bitterroot stopped listening after that and continued with what she somehow managed to convince herself was pulling. After she didn’t know how long, she was able to hook her hooves around the doorframe to the Watering Cave and pull on something that wasn’t incredibly slippery. She could actually when she was inside because the air was something resembling warm. Yeah, she was going to have to work to get the crates to whatever room they were staying in.

“How do.”

Once the exertion stars left her eyes, Bitterroot took a look around the Cave’s common room. Nothing special, although the room stretched back for longer than she’d expected. Packed dirt floor, tables and chairs, she’d seen it before. A few of those chairs were occupied by ponies who were occupied with either their drinks or staring at Bitterroot. There was a stove in the center, with a roaring fire that kept the room relatively toasty and a chimney funneling smoke up and out. Across one wall, right near the door, was a bar, with oodles of barrels and a surprising amount of vegetables and a thoroughly grumpy unicorn mare who was no longer crunching numbers.

“Fine,” said Bitterroot. She gave the sledge another tug, managing to get it slightly into the room. “You?”

The unicorn glanced at Bitterroot’s crates. “Dunno. Need ’elp?”

“Only if you’re the innkeep and I wouldn’t be intruding.”

It took several moments for the unicorn to admit, “Aye.”

“Then yes.”

Bitterroot didn’t hear anything, but the unicorn’s chest moved in a way that indicated a sigh. Still, she came out from behind the bar and walked up to Bitterroot. “Cabin Still,” she grunted. “Innkeep.”

“Bitterroot,” Bitterroot replied. “Bounty hunter.”

Cabin eyed her suspiciously for a moment, then poked her head out of the door. “Ritual doodads?” she asked when she saw the sledge. “Fer the ley line?”

“Yep,” said Bitterroot. “I need help getting it up to our rooms.”

Cabin grunted again. “Log crib’d be gooder.” With a few deep breaths of exertion, she took a hold of the first crate in her magic and, with Bitterroot’s help, finegaled it into the Cave. Cabin slowly led the two of them to a door in the far corner.

“You, uh, doing alright?” Bitterroot asked. It seemed the right thing to ask.

Grunt.

“…So you are?”

Grunt.

“I’ll take that as a ‘yes’.”

Grunt.

The door led to a small storage area, dark and cold and low-ceilinged but with plenty of space for the crates. Once they moved the crates in, Bitterroot started slinging their bags around her flanks. When Cabin sullenly followed suit, Bitterroot said, “Oh, no, I got this, you don’t need-”

“Showin’ which room’s yers,” grunted Cabin. (She didn’t seem to breathe normally, only grunt.) “Goin’ up aryway.”

“Alright, thanks.”

Grunt.

Only one step creaked as they went up. Bitterroot ignored it just as she ignored Cabin’s attitude. She was an outsider, it was to be expected in a town this… closed. Best to just go with the flow and act like she didn’t care. (Which she didn’t. Experience.)

The second floor didn’t have a lot of doors for rooms, but more than Bitterroot would have expected. As Cabin led her down a narrow hall, Bitterroot asked, “How come you have… these rooms? Ponies never come here, right?”

“Buildin’s old,” Cabin said, digging in a pocket for the key. “Cheaper tae keep it’n tear it all down.”

A notion hardly exclusive to Tratonmane, or even Equestria, or probably even Equus. Bitterroot nodded. “And it comes in handy in the once-in-a-lifetime moments when ponies come to visit, right?”

“Aye.” Not even the slightest quirk of a grin.

The room Cabin gave them was incredibly bare-bones, to the point that Bitterroot had stayed in more luxurious hostels — four beds with thick blankets, something that might’ve been a desk, a few chairs — but it was accommodation and it was decently warm and it had a window with an acceptable view of the Great Ash. There wasn’t even any howling from the wind. Bitterroot let her bags drop to the floor and rolled her shoulders. Maybe she’d go for a quick flight, just to stretch her wings out a little. She didn’t use them as much as some pegasi, but they could still ache.

“Key an’ spare,” Cabin suddenly said. She tossed a ring with two keys at Bitterroot. “Privy’s at the end o’ the hall.” She left without any more ceremony.

Privy, up here? Maybe it was just a garderobe. Bitterroot glanced through the door and did a double-take when she saw a full bathroom. A cramped, somewhat rundown bathroom that was about a hundred years out of date, but an actual bathroom, with a sink and mirror and flush toilet and shower. Bitterroot tried the last; the shower took a while to get warm, but they had hot water. Naturally, the first thing she did when she was back downstairs was ask Cabin, “You have plumbing?”

“Aye,” said Cabin. She didn’t look up as she continued working through her finances. “Inventor works in town.”

“Huh.” Bitterroot had known a few inventor-ish ponies, once upon a time. Interesting people, although they weren’t the mad science types. Maybe she’d find out who and talk with them a little. Maybe she’d become the hero of the town before she left. Ah, well. She turned to step away from the desk, only to quickly step back. “Say, uh, don’t I owe you anything? Money, I mean, to pay for the room.”

“Nay. Crown Housin’ Act o’ 529,” said Cabin gruffly. Now, even her ears were angled back.

“Ah, right,” said Bitterroot, pretending that meant something rather than being one of a stupidly huge number of old laws she’d never needed to learn. She’d ask Code about it later. “Thanks.”

An even surlier grunt than usual. Somehow.

The other ponies were giving her looks bordering on dirty and it made her coat crawl, so Bitterroot headed outside. At least she’d get less dirty looks out there. Yeah, she definitely wouldn’t want to visit here. It was gloomy, sure, but that just made it interesting. It was the ponies that killed the vibe. In these sorts of towns, everything settled into a sort of comfortable status quo, and foreigners like herself disrupted that status quo. A status so quo, in fact, that ponies in other foreigner-disliking towns thought them weird, if Waypoint was anything to go by. Even absent any other factors, it wasn’t that surprising that Tratonmane’s dislike of them was nearly palpable. At the moment, Bitterroot wanted nothing more than to wing it southeast.

Which, of course, meant that everyone else probably wanted to leave, too. Amanita included. And what sort of moral support would Bitterroot be if she left the moment the going got tough? The sort that would be remembered forever, the same way crystal ponies remembered Sombra or Celestia remembered Nightmare Moon. No, she’d be staying. Maybe she could get friendly with the locals, or at least to a level less hostile than “please die in a fire”. She knew a few methods for that.

Deep breath in, deep breath out, and Bitterroot looked up at the eastern wall of Midwich. She’d never seen anything quite like it, something that bright while everything around it was so dim. The shadow of the western peaks had visibly crept upwards a little since their arrival, enough so that Bitterroot wondered if she could see it move if she sat and watched.

A light on the tip of a unicorn’s horn bobbed towards her across the street. Unicorns seemed to have an advantage when it came to visibility in a place like this, which made it surprising that there were so few. (Although the prevalence of chiropteri wasn’t surprising.) As the unicorn approached, he resolved into Tallbush. “Hidy,” he said, nodding at her.

“Hidy,” said Bitterroot. The word rolled off the tongue nicely.

“Arypony else in yer herd around?”

“Not at the moment. They headed down towards the forest.” Bitterroot pointed. It was a bit strange, thinking of north as “down”, but she’d adjust.

Tallbush’s ear twitched. “Right, right,” he muttered. He glanced towards the forest for a moment. “So, eh, y’ain’t with ’em? A-workin’ fer the Crown, I mean,” he added quickly.

“Not officially, no. Like I said, just with a friend.”

“Mmhmm.  What, what dae ye ken about ’em?”

Bitterroot blinked. Some interest in the people working to fix the ley line was expected, but Tallbush was sounding inquisitive even for that. Almost… nervous, like he needed to know the answer. She wasn’t sure he noticed his tone himself, so she kept her frown on the inside. “Mostly, I just know Amanita. The unicorn,” she said. “She’s a… junior ritualist. She-”

“I recomember o’ that frae the knock-down- The introduction.” Tallbush’s voice was fast and he didn’t seem to realize he was pawing at the ground. “What manner o’ rituals?”

“Er-” Bitterroot flinched backward and her tail twitched. “Just- kinda- in general, I guess. She needs to be able to do… a lot of different things. She’s here to learn.”

“And the others? Restricted Code an’… Charcoal.”

“Nothing you wouldn’t know from what Code told you earlier. I barely know them. You’d be better off asking them.”

“Eh… Dinnae wish tae go near the forest. ’Tis right savagerous.”

Bitterroot didn’t know the exact meaning of the word, but she got the gist. How could she not, when it sounded like that? “When they come back up, then.”

“If’n I got the time. It’s… We’ll see.”

Bitterroot just shrugged. Schedules were more rigid in Canterlot than out in the country, but they were often more full out in the country. It was entirely possible that he wouldn’t be free for Celestia knew how long. She’d see.

She looked south, up the hills Tratonmane seemed to spill down. Even in the lamplight, you could sort of make out where space began to get tighter in the town’s history based on the orientation of the buildings. There were places where the outlines of the buildings were more naturalistically placed, probably following the contours of the land, but as you went out from them, buildings and roads seemed to snap into place along a grid to make more efficient use of the space they had. If the buildings were lucky, they had some extra space around them (maybe fenced off) to keep the snapping from looking too abrupt or out-of-place. How many of those older buildings, once placed for beauty and now taking up space, were ones that wouldn’t be rebuilt along more modern lines because Tratonmane liked them too much to knock them down? How many such buildings had been knocked down anyway? There was a history of the town sitting there for all to see in its street layout alone.

Which… Hmm. “You wouldn’t happen to have any sort of… history of the town, would you?” Bitterroot said casually. “Specifically of the ley lines. That’d be nice.”

“Aye, got ’em in the town hall,” Tallbush said. “Farmers’ records.”

“Really?” Bitterroot quickly stood up straight and Tallbush twitched. “That’d be great! Can you show me?”

Tallbush blinked, chewed his lip for a moment. A surprisingly long moment. Three seconds before Bitterroot was about to speak, he said, “Sure. Town library.” He clicked his tongue, nodded in another direction, and crunched off through the dark snow, Bitterroot following him.

Their destination was right across the square from the Watering Cave, on the other side of the Ash. It was an unadorned building with a tall roof and a crosshaired window right above the door. Many of the other windows, though, were tightly boarded up from top to bottom. It was also clearly one of the older buildings in Tratonmane, maybe the oldest. That might explain the extra space on each side compared to other buildings, including a snow-covered graveyard; it’d been built when space wasn’t quite at such a premium. The building was topped off by a bell tower, four or five stories tall.

“As declared, Tratonmane’s town hall,” Tallbush said, throwing open the door. “Dinnae mind the damage; powerful bad storm recently. Broke all the glass in the place, if’n ye can believe that!”

Bitterroot stepped inside, stomping grime and snow off from her coat in the mudroom; the air was warmish, at least. The peaked, high-ceilinged room before her stretched for a surprisingly long ways, filled with row after row of benches and leading to an open space for an off-center lectern at the back. Still-glowing oil lamps hung on the walls, casting shadows every which way but providing enough light to see by. The windows on either side had been boarded up on the inside as well as the outside, apparently victims of the storm. “Lotta space,” Bitterroot commented. “You could probably fit the whole town in here.”

“Well-” Tallbush coughed. “We’d hardly be a-holdin’ our assemblies out in the snow, aye? Built more’n we really had need of.”

Better too much space than not enough space. Bitterroot nodded.

Tallbush pointed towards a door in one of the back corners. “Got a library back thataways,” he said as he led her up the center aisle. “Prolly ain’t what yer used tae, but got a lavish o’ hist’ry on ley lines in-”

He froze, head high, ears pricking up, one of his rear legs nervously twitching at the ground. Bitterroot held her breath and listened. She could barely make out the fading echoes of a wolf’s distant howl. But it was so far away, it couldn’t possibly be-

Another howl, slightly closer, still far. Bitterroot was ready to ignore it when Tallbush turned right around and walked up to her. “Gotta hike ’em,” he said quickly. He didn’t sound particularly worried, but he did sound anxious. Whatever this situation was, he’d been through it plenty of times before, but he hadn’t stopped taking it seriously.

“Why?” asked Bitterroot. “The wolves?”

“Lissen, it ain’t-”

BONG.

The sudden ringing of the bell, so loud and so close, sent Bitterroot’s teeth rattling, all the way down to their roots. The entire building shook with the force of the bell’s clangs, to the point that dust was swirling down from the ceiling.

Before she could say anything, Tallbush had grabbed her tail in his magic and was awkwardly dragging her along. Most of what he said next was cut off by another BONG, but Bitterroot picked up, “-ain’t safe tae be out-” BONG.

She still didn’t know what was up, but it was probably best to follow somepony who knew what they were talking about. She pulled her tail from his magic and trotted after him. “What’s going on? Are the wolves dangerous?”

Tallbush snorted. “Worser’n that. ’Tis like they hate us.”

In Tratonmane, Bitterroot heard yelling, the rumble of hooves, and the high-pitched chirps of echolocation. Ponies were flowing in from all over, heading towards a slope behind the Watering Cave. Unicorns had their horns lit and non-unicorns were holding lanterns high, waving others on. It was quick, but it was surprisingly orderly, with little panic. Like they’d drilled for it.

“Happens e’ery moon ’r so,” continued Tallbush, falling into line at the tail end. “Them wolves, they try tae get intae Tratonmane an’ take our ponies away. Cannae say why. Jes’ went meaner’n striped snakes afore I’s born. Got tae be ready.”

Before he was born. In Bitterroot’s inexperienced mind, this was the sort of thing that would be easily explained by the ley line, but that option was already shut. Probably. She’d keep it in mind, even though the people whose job it actually was to manage this almost certainly already knew.

With the crowd still moving, they rounded a corner of the Cave. Before them, Bitterroot saw a yawning hole in the hill, thick doors standing open. It looked like nothing more than a bunker. Ponies were quickly filing in, and soon Bitterroot was stumbling down the staircase. It wasn’t long, maybe half a story, but she had to do some awkward wing-flails to keep from tumbling onto the ponies below. The room beyond was as basic as could be: walls, floor, ceiling, support columns, benches, dim lamps, two or three doorways. It wasn’t large, either, maybe half the size of the room at the town hall, and enough ponies were in it that it felt packed. Each and every hard stone surface reflected sound around, mixing it all into a sonic slurry of hoofsteps, under-the-breath mutters, and echolocation. But just like the entry had been painless, the slurry was unworried.

Behind her, a last few stragglers came in and the bunker door was slammed shut. Bitterroot looked back up the stairs and saw a locking mechanism that banks would envy. “Is this overkill?” she risked asking Tallbush.

“Me pa didnae believe so,” Tallbush said flatly. “Neither did the crowd that built it. Mebbe is now. Prolly weren’t back then. Ain’t never lost a pony so long as they make it in ’ere.”

Bitterroot didn’t miss the implications of that last phrase. Tallbush seemed to notice, because he quickly said, “Why dinnae ye sit yerself down. Got things that need sayin’.” Without another word, he moved to a more central part of the room and stomped several times. “Alright, everpony, lissen up!” he said in the sudden silence.

Bitterroot listened for a few moments, but it was just a speech on assurances and “don’t worry”s. A good speech, to be fair, but she’d heard it before. She picked her way around the ponies, towards a dark corner where there wasn’t anypony. If she was going to be in here with a crowd of strangers, she could at least stay out of their way.

The second she sat down, Bitterroot was thinking. How long would the wolves be around? If it was too long, Tallbush would say something, right? Unless he had more pressing matters on his mind, like his speech. …The one that was already concluded and hadn’t sent him back over to Bitterroot. Still, Bitterroot could sit. It was like a stakeout, something she knew well as a bounty hunter, except she didn’t even need to keep her attention focused on anything, which was a plus. She’d give it what she thought was half an hour, then she’d find Tallbush and see what questions he could answer. Surely he could tell her something as simple as-

“Well. Fresh blood.”

Bitterroot twitched and spun around. A chiropterus nearly old enough to be Bitterroot’s mother was standing next to her, just there, like she’d materialized from the darkness. Her coloration — night-black mane, late-late-evening-purple coat — didn’t help. And then there were her furs (thinner than usual): black, seemingly from coal dust. She was even slightly smaller than most other ponies, her eye level about an inch below Bitterroot’s. She practically looked made to skulk. She wasn’t quite smirking at Bitterroot, her piercing eyes half-lidded.

“Hmm?” Bitterroot asked. She pretended to be not surprised, even though she’d convince nopony.

“Oh, you know,” the chiropterus replied, waving a hoof casually. “I’ve lived here for some time and we don’t get visitors much.” Her voice flowed, almost teasing. “Carnelian Orchard.”

“Bitterroot. You know the ley line? I’m with the ponies here to-”

“Of course you are,” said Orchard. “That’s the sole reason the Crown has sent ponies up in all the time I’ve been here. I’m merely curious as to why this is worthy of intervention.”

“Dunno,” Bitterroot said with a shrug. “Technically, I don’t work with them.” How many times was she going to have to say something along those lines? A lot.

“You don’t?” Orchard raised her head, which still meant she was slightly shorter than Bitterroot. “You don’t work for the Crown?”

“I guess I do if you consider bounty hunting working for it. I don’t. They’d need to salary me.”

“Huh.” Orchard smiled again. “I suppose in that case, I shouldn’t be asking you about their reasoning.” She threw a mock salute. “Take care of yourself. The princess isn’t looking after you.” She turned away and walked into the bunker.

Of course Bitterroot knew the princess wasn’t looking after her. That wasn’t even a bad thing. The last time the princess wasn’t looking after her, she’d snagged the largest bounty of her entire life and made a friend. Tratonmane didn’t seem quite so lucky, though.

Bitterroot glanced at the door. No one was moving toward it. Well, it’d open when it opened. She settled in to wait.





The last time Amanita had faced down animals in the North, she’d been chased by a rabid bear and only saved by a passing ranger who’d died in the process. (She’d brought the ranger back, but still.) She still remembered it well; the deep roars that rattled your bones and curdled your blood, the heavy thud of the bear’s weight, the dull sheen of claws that seemed far too long for their own good. Tartarus, she could still remember the rancid, sickly flat stench of the bear’s breath. She wanted to bolt back to Tratonmane and lock herself in her room until the danger was past. (Which room was her room? The one with the thickest walls, the biggest door, and the strongest lock, obviously.)

But she had a job to do. She had to look strong. She had to look professional. It was why she was here. And of all the positive and negative qualities alike she could ascribe to professionals, “runs to the hills at the first sign of trouble” wasn’t one of them.

So the skilled Canterlot necromancer shied away, on the verge of bolting, as the backwoods lumberjacks formed up into something like a defensive line. It seemed strong; Amanita didn’t know enough to say. Code had taken up a position on one of the flanks. Charcoal was rocking back and forth on her hooves, unsure of whether to be scared or interested in whatever was coming their way. Crosscut was in the center of the line, glancing up and down it and barking out warnings.

The deep boom of a bell rang out across the valley, once, twice, thrice. Its echoes were heard countless times more. It was clearly a warning, but Amanita wasn’t sure whether it was to the town or the forest. Maybe both.

Yet another howl, even closer than before. This one was joined by several others.

Then, behind her, Amanita heard the whisk of wings and a rumble of hooves. Before she could turn around, five ponies, all wearing the battered armor of a militia, galloped around or flew over her. Armed with a spear, Whippletree was leading the charge; as the other guards ran around the lumberjacks formed up between them and the forest, Whippletree landed next to Crosscut and somehow gave her a peck on the cheek without looking away from Midwich. “Hidy, dona,” he said.

“Hidy, jusem,” she said back, not looking at him. “Where’s Wythe?”

“In the southern shelter. Got ’er in meself.”

“Thankee.”

Whippletree flap-hopped over the line and strode in front of even the other militiaponies. They were a motley crew, ranging from the stereotypical strong pegasus of Whippletree to a scrawny young earth pony who probably wouldn’t have been old enough to drink in Canterlot to an old unicorn who held himself like a veteran. Their armor was all battered, but they all held themselves strong.

In the gloom, just outside the edge of the lights, twigs started snapping and leaves started rustling. The black rippled in that strange way where you can’t make out any shape in the dark but you can still see it moving. Whippletree’s ears pivoted this way and that; he kept jinking in different directions with his wings, keeping himself between the woods and everyone else, as the noise moved about.

“Excuse me.” Code had moved down the line and was talking to Crosscut. “Is this normal? For Tratonmane, I mean.”

“Wish it weren’t,” Crosscut said around her ax. “But they keep comin’ up ’ere, an’ we keep prickin’ ’em. Mebbe one day, they’ll get the hint. Animals o’ this sort only ken pain.”

“How often do they come?”

“Once ’r twice a-”

“Varnish!” Whippletree yelled, pointing with his spear. “Dinnae stray tae far afield! Yer leavin’ yer charges bare!”

Amanita glanced to look. On one of the flanks, the old unicorn was slowly inching towards Midwich, the glow of his levitated sword sending light cascading across the ground. “I’m watching!” he growled in a voice of boulders. “You don’t need to tell me-”

Two wolves burst from the darkened brush. Eyes glowing, jaws slavering, breath following them like fog, they were big, bigger than any wolf Amanita had seen before. They charged for Varnish, eerily silent, crossing the space between him and the forest in a second. Everypony reeled towards them, weapons up if they were armed.

Yet even distracted, Varnish outpaced them. As the wolves leapt, his sword whipped through the air, so fast the air crackled, and he almost casually stepped aside. One wolf hit the ground with blood already staining its pelt from a gash running the length of its entire body. The other landed on its paws but barely had time to turn before Varnish ran it through.

And as everypony was watching him, the next two wolves descended on the other flank.

They were smaller than the first two, but faster, and bowled over the nearest guard before he knew what hit him. Then they ignored him, pouncing on a vulnerable earth pony, each biting into one of his front legs. By the time Varnish had pulled his sword out, the victim was already being dragged towards the edges of Midwich Forest.

At the first sound of his screams, the guards pivoted. As the stallion began to disappear towards the river, Whippletree’s wings snapped open and he rocketed down the line. A cloud of snow was kicked up as Code in his wake.

Just before the view of the earth pony was blocked by trees, Whippletree slammed spear-first into one of the wolves. The force of the impact ripped its jaws off the pony. Whippletree flared his wings to come to a near-instant stop, letting the impaled wolf tumble away into the river.

Almost immediately after, Code impacted the other wolf, wrapping her legs around it and yanking it away with pure inertia. They rolled tail over teakettle across tree roots, but somehow Code ended up on top as she pinned the wolf to the ground by a hoof on its throat. In the space of a second, she hooked her other hoof around her sword hilt, drew it, and forced it so deep into the wolf’s chest that only the tip of the pommel was sticking out.

The instant Code’s wolf had let go, Whippletree bit down on the wounded pony’s mane and dragged him away from the forest. Several lumberjacks surged forward to help him. In the thicket, Amanita could make out several dark shapes rustling around, the occasional glinting eye. But with a few angry growls, the shapes dispersed.

“Ha!” bellowed Whippletree. “Y’ain’t gettin’ one today, mongrels!” Where once the treeline had been a line demarcating danger, now he ambled over it and into the river to rip his spear from the dead wolf. He took a few deep but quick swigs from the river, then said, “Midwich Militia, on me! We’re goin’ in an’ houndin’ ’em about in case they’re a-stickin’ ’round!”

As the militia galloped off into the forest, Amanita’s legs suddenly started shaking as her adrenaline bled out. It was all so fast, less than half a minute; she hadn’t even fully psyched herself up yet. And, of course, it wouldn’t surprise her if she had to go out and encounter more of them in the forest. Thoughts immediately started racing through her head of being separated from her group, getting lost in the woods, and winding up food for wolves or worse. Because, existence of Tratonmane aside, the North was like that; it was where animals that didn’t like pony tutelage went. The nastier ones, the more vicious ones, the ones that would probably be on wanted posters if they were ponies. Creatures up here were bloodthirsty.

But at the same time: Heh. The great necromancer and protégé of the High Ritualist, scared of a few animals.

Deep breath in. Deep breath out. Deep breath in. Deep breath out.

“Did you see that?” Charcoal muttered to Amanita. Without waiting for an answer, she gestured towards the forest. “The wolves. They flanned that. Planned that.”

“Mmhmm.” It had certainly seemed that way, but Amanita couldn’t muster the focus to think about it.

“I mean, that was really…” Charcoal made some vague whooshing sounds as she pointed at each exit location. “…timed. No more wolves than necessary. And quick, they didn’t go after that one guard… Did that guard have greaves? Maybe he did… It’d be harder for wolves to get a hold on those…”

Charcoal went on rambling. Still in the dark of Midwich, Amanita could see Code hacking at a tree root with her sword, and when she turned her ears in that direction, she could just barely make out Code’s growled invectives. She raised a hoof to walk over, but that was when Code stood up, resheathed her sword, and strode out, panting. She adjusted her glasses and said, a touch too calmly, “If we ever go into Midwich, watch the trees. They will try to catch you.”

“See? Night trees,” said Charcoal, grinning.

“I was out there just a few seconds,” Code said, “and I already felt one of the roots moving beneath me. I could make out enough of its intent in my magic that a preemptive thwacking seemed… expedient. I might’ve let my spite get the better of me, though.” She pulled out her sword again and examined the blade in Amanita’s hornlight. It was still in decent shape, although it was clearly chipped here and there. “Hmm… I wonder if they have enough silver for me to re-plate it…”

“How… worried should we be about… ambulatory trees?” Amanita asked. Part of her couldn’t believe the words coming out of her mouth; the rest of her reminded the first part that she’d brought back the dead multiple times, so what was so weird about trees moving?

“That depends on a lot of things,” said Charcoal. “Ley line, water, light, nutrients in the dirt, magic, how old they are…”

“Get us a list later, we could need it,” said Code. She stowed her sword with a twirl. “How’s the other pony holding up?”

Right. The almost-foalnapped stallion. The lumberjacks were gathered around him, but they didn’t sound panicked. Amanita wiggled her way into the ring to get a better look.

The wolves had bitten clean through the sleeves on his front legs and torn them open, almost ripping them off entirely. Gashes ran down his legs, thin but long, ragged. The blood they were leaking was dark in the horn- and lamplight. Crosscut and another pony were already over halfway done bandaging him up. He’d also picked up smaller, much less severe wounds on his face and his chest from being dragged like a toy across the rough ground. His teeth were gritted and his breathing labored, but his eyes were bright and clear. He’d more than live.

Pretty soon, Crosscut was tying off the end of the last bandage. “There… we… go.” She waved the lumberjack away and they all pulled back to give the stallion space. “ ’Bout as good as we can get it right now. Can ye walk?”

The stallion gathered his legs under him and slowly, slowly pushed up, groaning all the while. One of his front legs twitched painfully as the knees of his rear legs shook and banged together. His head heaved with the force of his breaths. Through clenched teeth, he said, “Aye.”

Crosscut gave him a long, long Look.

“Aye,” the stallion repeated. “I dinnae- need- nae help.” He turned towards Tratonmane, took a step, and let out a pained gasp, nearly collapsing forward.

Amanita blinked, then lurched forward. What was she thinking, letting this happen in front of her? “Wait!” she yelped. “Wait, I, I can help you. It’ll only-”

“Didnae- ye hear me?” grunted the stallion. “I-”

“Stop trying to be tough, you’re only hurting yourself.” Amanita scrambled in front of him and raised her head to look him in the eye. “Do you really think you can make it to Tratonmane by yourself?”

The stallion opened his mouth to answer, then shook his head, as if not saying it aloud would keep it from being true.

“Alright. So just lie down.”

The stallion winced, moaning softly, as he lowered himself back down to the ground. Amanita swallowed and began weaving her magic. It was ages since she’d cast this particular spell, but she still knew it even better than necromancy. Delicately, she prodded with her magic at the body that wanted to be, that it would heal into, and then nudged the wounds closer towards that body. At the same time, she telekinetically pulled the gashes together, like she was going to suture them. Gently, not too fast, to avoid too much scarring, she carefully knit the worst of the cuts back together. Over several minutes, the stallion’s whimpers died down to occasional gasps of pain petered out to long, deep breaths. He watched Amanita intently, like he was surprised she was doing this.

When she finished, Amanita unwound his bandages to reveal that all of the stallion’s wounds were closed. He had some scars, but those would fade in the next few days. Probably. “Do you feel okay?” she asked, stepping away.

“Eh…” The stallion flexed his legs, rolled onto his belly, stood up. He quizzically pawed at the ground. “I reckon so.”

“Good. Then you should be all set.”

“If he works, he ain’t gonna reopen ’is wounds, is he?” Crosscut asked. “I dinnae want ’im all stove up.”

“That shouldn’t happen,” said Amanita. “…I think. I’ve… never done it with this sort of physical work before, but I don’t see why that would affect anything.”

As she eyed one of the downed trees, Crosscut chewed her lip, then said to the stallion, “Ach, jes’ get yerself home. We got this.”

“Positive?” he asked. “I can-”

“Deed an’ double,” Crosscut said resolutely. “Stay safe an’ heal up. I ain’t gonna risk it.”

“Thankee,” said the stallion. He bowed to Crosscut and slow-trotted back to Tratonmane, moseying from lamplight to lamplight.

Crosscut watched him go, apparently to make sure he was moving fine, then said to the crowd, “We’re down a skidder. Arypony comin’ back an’ takin’ up ’is gear? Or are we leavin’ the tree fer the morrow?”

“All you need to do is drag the tree to Tratonmane, correct?” asked Code. “I could probably do it.”

Crosscut looked Code up and down, kneading the ground beneath her. Then she nodded. “I reckon so. Yer magic’s stout. Somepony help ’er intae some gears!”

The “gears” were a harness, hooked up to the tree to drag it down the road. It was a bit oversized on Code’s small frame and the tree it was hooked up to was just plain huge, but once she dug her hooves in and Amanita felt the ground beneath her buzzing, Code was pulling the tree up the road with the best of them. And from the way she was humming, she was enjoying herself. All of the earth ponies were dragging their own trees, with the five non-earth ponies all harnessed to a single tree and using large staves to help dig themselves in and pull the tree along. Amanita actually felt a little guilty, just plain walking.

The bell rang again, but it seemed less urgent now and it took longer to ring again. Amanita started to make out equine silhouettes in Tratonmane’s shadows, filtering out from whatever shelter they’d moved into. Just how often did the wolves attack?

Crosscut angled her path so she could get closer to Amanita as they walked. “So yer a blood doctor?”

“A what?” Amanita asked.

“A blood doctor.”

“What, like a hematologist? No.”

Crosscut stared at Amanita like she’d suddenly switched to Draconic.

“I’m- not a- doctor doctor,” Amanita said. “I just- I know some healing magic. It’s my special talent.” One she probably should’ve fostered instead of turning to necromancy.

“Ye stopped his bleedin’,” Crosscut said, nodding up the path. “That makes you’un a blood doctor. And thankee.”

“Okay, then,” said Amanita. “I just- I wasn’t sure what- that phrase meant, and- you​know​what​I’ll​shut​up​now.”

Crosscut snorted. “Are you’un always like this? Performin’ great magic an’ a-bein’ all shy ’bout it?”

Amanita blinked twice and one of her rear hooves twitched. How remarkably vague and remarkably specific at the same time. “I- suppose. Kinda. Maybe.”

“I wonder if we could capture a wolf,” Charcoal suddenly said. She was walking backwards, still watching Midwich.

Several trees, Crosscut’s among them, came to a halt as the ponies turned to stare at her. “I… beg yer pardon?” Crosscut nearly gasped.

“Wolf. Capture.” Charcoal raised her front hooves, paused, and smashed them together. “Like a clap. Trap.” She looked around and seemed shocked to be confronted with shock. “We need to study them!” she protested. “They’re animals! They’re more affected by the ley line than ponies! Or kirins!”

“The-” Crosscut grunted and started dragging her log again, her frustrations redirected from her mouth down to her legs. It was quite effective. “The wolves bein’ tetched in the head,” she grunted, “ain’t got nothin’ tae do wi’ the line.”

“Do we know that?” asked Charcoal. “Maybe the line’s been going bad for a lot longer and we just saw it right-”

“It ain’t,” Crosscut grunted. “Tratonmane’s been eatin’ food frae it since afore I’s born and nopony’s gone bad yet. The line ain’t the problem.”

“Oh,” Charcoal said. Her ears drooped as she turned forwards. “I… I was just…” Her voice and her head dropped with every word. “I was just thinking…”

“It’s not a bad idea,” Code said loudly. “Just not one that applies in this circumstance. Keep thinking. Not every idea’s going to be a good one.”

Charcoal made some affirmative sound, but she didn’t lift her head all the way back up. Almost without thinking, Amanita got close to her. “Don’t worry about it,” she whispered. “Seriously.”

“But it was a stupid idea!” Charcoal whispered back. “I should’ve remembered-”

“Hey, hey.” Amanita lightly elbowed her. “We all forget things. Just ignore it and move on.”

“Okay, but…” Charcoal sucked a breath in through her nose and raised her head up. “Okay,” she mumbled. “Okay. But, but what if I keep thinking like that? What if I can’t stop coming up with- those sorts of bad ideas?”

“I hope you don’t,” said Amanita. She looked back at Midwich. At the black branches clawing for the sky. At the forest that apparently wasn’t affected by the ley line, but was seemingly one of the most dangerous places in Equestria. At the place that held normal animals who nonetheless hated ponies. At the land that was deadly despite supposedly feeding on a clean ley line. “Because you might be right about not detecting any changes in the ley line until now. If this mission isn’t as easy as Code thinks it is, we’ll need all the ideas we can get.”
> 6 - Inns and Other Combat Arenas
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

In a way, Code was one of the least earth-pony earth ponies Amanita had ever known. In a tribe known for being big and bulky, she was small and slim. But size played absolutely no role in magical strength, as evidenced by the fact that Code was able to haul her mammoth log all the way to Tratonmane without pause, keeping up with the rest of the lumberjacks all the while. The grass beneath her hooves seemed to perk up out of the snow as she passed and Amanita swore the dirt was buzzing. And Code wasn’t even straining that hard, although her mouth looked like a smokestack.

Finally, the group reached a lumber mill just outside the edge of Tratonmane, between the farms and the houses. When Code unhooked her harness, she… There wasn’t another word for it. Her movements were catlike. “I should use my magic more often,” she said as she stretched. “I forgot how satisfying it can feel.”

“Start a-livin’ ’ere an’ that’ll happen most every day,” said Crosscut. “Thankee fer the help.”

“Of course.” Code threw back her head and nickered. “It’s what we’re here for.” And she ate still some more dirt.

Amanita thought she heard a snort from Crosscut, but Code was already leading them away. The snow crunched beneath their feet and their silhouettes shimmered whenever they left the lamplight. Tratonmane’s layout was simple enough that even after the one trip, Amanita knew the way back to the inn: due south, keeping the darkening but still illuminated eastern wall on her left.

…Or was it right?

No, it was left, it was on her right when she was going north. Right? Amanita hurriedly sketched out a compass rose in her mind. On her left. (Imagine getting turned around in a town this small.)

“Do you really not use your magic that often?” Charcoal said. “You’re the High Ritualist!”

“I don’t use my magic that often,” said Code. “Rituals are different magic, not mine. It’s different.”

“If using your own magic is like walking from A to B,” Amanita piped up, “using a ritual is like riding in a carriage from A to B. It’s the same result, but it feels different. And neither one is better than the other, since they do different things.”

“And sometimes you just want to walk, even though it’s harder,” Charcoal mused. She looked down and pawed briefly at the cobblestones. “Like growing a tree from scratch versus just buying and planting one.”

“That’s… not a bad analogy,” said Amanita. It didn’t make much sense to her, granted, but she could see where Charcoal was coming from: investment and your own magic weighed against convenience and rituals. And if it made sense to Charcoal, that was all that really mattered.

Bitterroot was lounging against the wall of the Watering Cave when they arrived. “Hey,” she said, pushing herself up. “I went looking for you, but it’s hard to search in the dark. Figured I’d wait here for you.”

“You don’t need to make any concessions for us,” said Code.

“Yeah, but I thought you should know that the innkeep — her name’s Cabin Still — waived the fee. Something called the, uh…” Bitterroot looked down, biting her lip and rustling her wings. “The Housing Act of, uh…”

“529?” Code asked.

“Yeah, 529.”

“You’re sure?”

“Unless there’s some other reason for her to give us free room and board, yeah.”

“But why…?” Code shook her head and walked inside, her hooves falling heavily. Bitterroot shrugged at Amanita and Charcoal and followed.

Code was standing at the front desk, drumming her hoof as her ears constantly flicked and ignoring the looks the few patrons were giving her. A unicorn, probably Cabin Still, was standing off to one side behind the desk, polishing a glass and ignoring Code in equal measure. Already, the atmosphere was getting wound tighter, bit by bit. Amanita felt she had to be elsewhere but couldn’t bring herself to move, like she was awkwardly sitting in on two friends shouting at each other but one of them was blocking the only door out.

“Our… beds’re upstairs,” Bitterroot said quietly to Amanita and Charcoal. She was moving slowly, like Code and Cabin’s standoff had hypnotized her. “They’re… I don’t think they’re that bad, but-”

“You ought to know,” Code said loudly, “that I was once involved in a ritual that lasted for nearly thirty-seven hours. No eating. No drinking. No sleep. No rest. No breaks of any sort. So if you think you can ignore me until I go away for whatever reason, you are sorely mistaken.”

Cabin heaved with a silent sigh and stomped up to Code, saying nothing.

“I heard you’re giving us the rooms for free,” said Code.

The grunt Cabin let out sounded something like an, “Aye.”

“I’d like to pay for them.”

Cabin raised her head, tilted it. “ ’Tis the duty o’-”

“I don’t care.” Code dug into a pocket and dropped six coins on the desk — high-value, based on their size. “I’d like to pay for them.”

“Ye dinnae have tae. Yer givin' a service.”

“And so are you. I’d like to pay for them.”

“It’s money!” said Charcoal. “Why are you saying no to money? Is this some weird pony thing?” She glanced sidelong at Amanita and whispered, “Is it?” Amanita shook her head.

“I dinnae need paid nor pitied,” snapped Cabin, not even glancing at Charcoal. “Act says I’m a-housin’ ye, so I’m a-housin’ ye.” Her eyes were boring into Code like drills.

Code’s eyes hammered Cabin right back. “Pity’s got nothing to do with it. Your money supports me through taxes. It’s only fair that my money supports you through paying your fees.”

Cabin grinned. “What if’n we’re real good at evadin’ taxes ’cause we’re so isolated?”

Code grinned back. “Then that’s the Royal Revenue Service’s problem, not mine. This money here’s my problem, not yours. But if you want to go by the old ways…” Still keeping her eyes locked on Cabin, she reached out a leg, as if to swipe the bits back into her purse.

For a moment, Amanita thought Code would actually go through with it. Then: “Well, money’s money,” said Cabin. She levitated the coins away and began rooting through the cashbox.

“Stick it all on our tab,” said Code. “Everything we buy, take from that. If we run out of money, let me know.” She moved to take a step away, only to turn back. “Wait. You… do know that the Act was repealed in 891, right?”

“…’Twas?” Cabin asked with a blink.

“Indeed. There was a monster outbreak out west, near… Snoweave. Small town, easily overrun. Celestia sent a Guard detachment there to take care of it, but since there were more guardsponies than civilians in the town, all being supported without compensation, the economy was devastated. Once she heard, Celestia promptly struck down the Act and paid back Snoweave’s expenses twice over.”

“…Nay. Didnae ken that.”

But as Cabin looked in the cashbox, at the money she was owed, Amanita noticed her jaw clench.

“It was a stupid law, anyway,” said Code. “Quite easy to abuse.”

Cabin slammed the cashbox shut and made some vaguely affirmative grunt. Code didn’t seem to notice. “Beds’re upstairs,” Cabin said. “Pegasus can show ye.” A long pause as if she were struggling to speak. “Lemme ken if’n you’uns need somethin’.”

“Mmhmm.”

After tearing her eyes away from Cabin, Bitterroot led them upstairs. “The rooms are… Well, they’re basic, but they’re not too bad, actually. Warm enough and I didn’t feel any drafts. Haven’t had a chance to try the bed yet, though. Oh, and there’s a bathroom. An actual bathroom, with plumbing and everything.”

“Really?” asked Amanita. Back when she was learning under Circe, plumbing was among the things she missed the most. You always took for granted how convenient faucets were until you didn’t have access to them anymore.

“Yeah, and it even works better than some metro hotels I’ve stayed at. Oh, and Code, there’s a storage room in the back, that’s where I put our equipment…”





Getting settled in, including double-checking their equipment, took a surprisingly long time, after which they all agreed to have dinner. The food they had access to was simple, hardy. Bread, some simple fruits and vegetables like tomato and lettuce, some cheeses, and not much else, although Cabin said broth for soup was available. If they wanted anything heated up, they had to do it themselves on the central stove. Amanita preferred it that way; it let her get her food exactly how she wanted it. It was a good stove, too.

As the crew gathered to eat, more ponies started trickling into the Watering Cave, mostly to drink. It wasn’t crowded yet, but it soon would be.

Amanita chewed on her stack of foodstuffs pretending to be a sandwich and watched Charcoal, who was holding a lettuce leaf in her magic and examining it for the secrets of the universe. She turned it over, stretched it as much as she could, licked it. For some reason, Amanita couldn’t work up the courage to ask what the hay she was doing.

But eventually, Charcoal just stuffed the entire leaf into her mouth and chewed. “Thif if goo’ le’ufe,” she declared.

“Mmhmm,” said Amanita.

Charcoal swallowed. “I mean it was blown we- grown well. These ponies really know how to use the ley line.” She picked up another leaf and peered at it. “You need to know what to look for, but once you do…” She waved the leaf in Code’s face like a flag and tugged at it. You’d’ve thought she’d found a treasure that would make Daring Do jealous. “In these conditions, the leaves should not be this big. But they are!”

Code nudged the leaf away. “I’ll look at them later.”

“You should. They’re really neat.” Charcoal looked at the still-growing crowd around them, then threw back her head and yelled, “WHOEVER GREW THE LETTUCE, IT’S REALLY GREAT!”

Amanita had never seen an entire bar go silent before. It was quick, maybe for only one or two seconds, but you’d have to be comatose to miss it. For an instant, the whole world turned its attention on Charcoal. She promptly reddened, pulled her hood up as far as it could go before it bumped into her horn, and hunched over her food. “I​shouldn’t​have​said​that,” she mumbled.

“Well, you did make her day.” Bitterroot pointed off to one side, at a mare with the smile of a lottery winner.

Charcoal briefly glanced in that direction and managed a small grin. “Good,” she whispered. She managed to raise her head a little, but she kept her hood up.

Code scraped a tomato seed from her chin with a knife and licked it down. “So, does anypony have any suggestions for our course of action tomorrow?”

Amanita took a big bite of a sandwich to block her face. She was just a ritualist, and a newbie at that. Why was she being asked? Just to be included? It felt like-

But Amanita’s train of thought was promptly derailed as Charcoal’s steamed on through. “The ley line only soured in Tratonmane recently,” she said. “Otherwise, I’d’ve felt it in the lettuce. How long can lettuce last once it’s been grown? Five, six weeks with magic? So, accounting for growing time, that’s… At least in and around Tramontane- Tratonmane, the line was good up until around seven weeks ago, I think, maximum.”

“But we didn’t even see anything wrong with the line until less than a week ago,” said Code.

“Yes, but only at that monitoring station,” said Charcoal. “And that’s, what, fifty miles north of here? Something like that. And based on the valley, the line starts there and froze- flows down that way.” She pointed at random walls on opposite sides of her that Amanita assumed were south and north respectively. (How good was her internal compass?) “So if something bad’s going down in Midwich Forest, it might not ever reach Tratonmane. Not unless there’s some weirdo trying to push it this way, and that’s the kind of magic we’d definitely notice.”

“…True,” Code said, drumming her hoof on the table, eyes distant. “But why are you even thinking about that in the first place?”

Charcoal opened her mouth, closed it again. She glanced at Amanita and said, “The wolves. Tratonmane’s so worried about them that they’d built shelters, but regular wolves don’t behave like that. If the Tratonmane militia keeps attacking them like we saw, trying to get into town for food just isn’t worth it and they’ll go someplace else. Unless a ley line was messing with their heads or something. But they started going mutts- going nuts like fifty years ago, right? Or maybe even more. If the line somehow got…” She wrapped her hooves around each other. “…twisted in Midwich, then got untwisted further down, then that untwist got either retwisted or ununtwisted… Yeah, I know there’s pretty much no chance that could happen, but not a whole lot else makes sense.”

“And there isn’t a chance it could be… some smaller changes that we’re only seeing now?” Amanita asked. Just in case.

Charcoal shook her head. “Ley lines are nature. And on things this big, nature doesn’t do subtle. It’s like… an avalanche or a tidal wave. It’s big and ponderous and it takes a long time to happen and you know it’s happening when it does.” She stuck her snout in her cup to gulp down some water. “What I really need is some kind of history of the ley line, where… I dunno.”

“I actually talked to, uh, Tallbush earlier today,” Bitterroot spoke up. “He said they’ve got records in the library.”

“Ooo, they do? Nice,” said Charcoal. “I’ll need to take a look at those.”

“I’ll pick them up,” said Bitterroot.

“You’re sure?” asked Code. “You don’t need to.”

“I like to keep busy,” said Bitterroot. “And it won’t take that long, anyway.”

“Go ahead if you want to,” Code said with a shrug. “Just remember: just like Twilight and her friends, you’re not getting paid for this.”

“Which means immortality’s just around the corner!” Bitterroot laughed. She grinned at Amanita. “Thanks to my friends.”

“Not quite yet, though,” Amanita said, not holding back her own grin.

“Also, we might need to go into Midwich Forest,” Charcoal said casually. She chewed her lettuce as everyone else stared at her.

Amanita was the first to speak up. “Already? I thought- It sounded like it was a… last-resort thing. You saw the wolves.”

“Which makes me more certain that there’s something up in the woods,” said Charcoal, fixing Amanita with an oddly intense stare. “So I say we look at it now, when we’re all still ready to go, rather than in a week when we’re tired and angry and more likely to become wolf chow. It won’t be that… that… intense or involved. We just follow the river, head in, see what twitches when we poke the magic, come back out. In and out before lunch.”

“Have you really thought this through?” asked Code. “Or is this an idea that just flung itself from your head?”

Charcoal blinked and her ears folded back, but she still said, “I’ve thought about it. And I think it needs to be done. We stepped into this village locking- looking for information on a bad ley line and what’s the first thing we see? Something that’s usually caused by a bad ley line. That’s a sign.”

“And a gut feeling, right?” Bitterroot asked. “Those are usually worth following.”

Code hmmed and hahed as she nudged a tiny little grape tomato around her plate. Then she took a breath and said, “Let’s sleep on it. What you’re saying makes sense; I just want to be sure it isn’t also hasty.”

With so little actual study done on the ley line just yet, there wasn’t much else to talk about. Conversation gave way to eating; the meal’s taste was nothing spectacular, but it sure was filling. By the time she was wiping down her plate, Amanita knew she’d want nothing more than to lie down in a few hours.

Charcoal immediately stood up. “I’m going to our room,” she said. “I’ve got some books I need to catch up on.” She swiped everyone’s empty plates, deposited them on the bar where Cabin had said to deposit them, and was up the stairs, ignoring every stare thrown her way.

“There’s something I’d like to discuss with you, Amanita,” Code said. “In private. Experimental.”

Necromantic, in other words. Code had been quite hooves-off while Amanita had crafted Tempus Mortis, probably because she, like Princess Twilight, was the type where one question would turn into two would turn into five until she was asking thesis-level questions. But unlike with Princess Twilight, Equestria wouldn’t patiently wait while Code asked those questions, and she wasn’t one to track down Amanita for a personal chat outside of working hours. So now, when the two of them would be sharing a room for a week (why did that sound dirty?), would be the best time to ask about some of the finer details of necromancy. Amanita nodded.

Once the two were upstairs, Amanita double-checked to be sure the hallway was empty and locked the door. Code had pulled up two chairs next to the writing desk, laid out a scroll, and was wetting a quill for writing. Once Amanita sat down, Code said, “I hope you don’t mind discussing necromancy now-”

“Of course not,” said Amanita. “It’s my job.” Maybe not for long, if she did her job too well and inadvertently taught a pony how to replace her. But she’d try to worry about that later. (She failed and worried about it now. But she tried.)

Code nodded. “Then, I was wondering: why does removing their soul render someone immortal? Liches have been rather mum on the mechanics, naturally.”

“It’s not just removing the soul, or else they’d just die,” said Amanita. “It’s… The soul is the metaphysical catalyst for change, so if you remove it properly, you prevent that change from happening.”

“Thereby keeping them from dying or aging,” Code muttered. Her quill darted across the scroll, writing nigh-illegible shorthoof.

“Basically tricking the universe into thinking that they should stay the same as they were when they first became a lich,” Amanita said, nodding. “Whenever they get damaged, that damage refuses to stick on a metaphysical level, and they fall back to their undamaged state. That’s the point of a phylactery: its static nature helps provide an… anchor for the lack of change. But you need to allow some change, for various reasons. Just not too much and not too little. Too much, and the body starts becoming emaciated while you still can’t die. Too little, and you can’t form new memories. Anterograde amnesia.”

“Heh. That’s a contrast. I haven’t seen many things sillier than a lich with memory problems…”





Bitterroot had an idea of what the others vanished off to do. But herself? Oh, she had no responsibilities whatsoever. As Amanita slipped upstairs, Bitterroot slipped over to the bar. If she wanted to feel at home in this distant village, she had some sampling to do.

Cabin gave her a cursory, obligatory look as she chose a chair at the bar. Bitterroot ignored that and asked, “So, what sorts of drinks do you have?”

Cabin just pointed at the menu board behind her. Bitterroot started reading, her disbelief increasing with every name. “Mountain dynamite… Knock-em-stiff… Tanglehoof… Forty-rod… Conversation fluid… Draconequus’s eye-water… Squirrel liquor…” And she wasn’t even halfway down the list. She looked Cabin in the eye and pointed at the menu of absurdities. “Are those supposed to be… real names?”

“Brewed right ’ere in Tratonmane.” Cabin’s face was as straight as could be. “Whiskeys.”

“All of it? What, does everypony in this valley make moonshine?”

“Aye.”

Bitterroot blinked. “Seriously?”

Cabin shrugged. “Three out o’ four families dae it. Nary a drop o’ outside liquor’s come intae Tratonmane.”

“Ever?”

“Ever.”

“Huh.” Bitterroot was used to the idea, of course. The more isolated a town was, the more self-sufficient they were — by necessity, if nothing else. But more and more, it was like Tratonmane was the pinnacle of that ideal, where the land itself provided nearly everything the ponies needed. Liquor wasn’t the easiest to make in the North, so some towns broke down and brought theirs in from outside. Tratonmane was poo-pooing the very idea.

Her eyes roved across the board as Cabin eyed her and she couldn’t stop the names from blending together. Whiskey was appealing right then, but she knew nothing about which whiskey tasted like what. She might as well be guessing.

Which… There was an idea. Bitterroot stuck three bits on the counter. “Three shots. Your favorite, your least favorite, and one in the middle, but don’t tell me which is which. I wanna be surprised.”

“Risky,” said Cabin.

“That’s the idea.”

“Yer funeral.” Cabin snatched up the money in her magic, turned around, snatched up three shot glasses in her magic, and walked up and down the line of kegs. Bitterroot looked at the ceiling and whistled as she did so. Somehow, it didn’t sound out of place.

“Here,” said Cabin. She plonked the now-full glasses in front of Bitterroot. “Splo, high life, blockade.”

Bitterroot picked up a glass. “High life’s the best, followed by blockade, then splo, isn’t it?”

“Mebbe,” said Cabin. “Mebbe not.”

“Eh, c’mon,” said a stallion who’d sat down on one side of Bitterroot. “She got ’em, firs’ try. Let ’er ken that.” That drew a slow, seemingly reluctant nod from Cabin, and the unnamed stallion grinned at Bitterroot. “Ye’re a bold one, ain’tcha?”

“Or stupid. I could be that, too.” And Bitterroot downed the first shot.

From the way it burned, it was less a drink and more a barrel of army ants clawing at her esophagus. The sensation went straight to her sinuses and made her want to cough her nostrils out. She took deep breaths, managing to not break down as she waited for the alcohol to leave and the flavor to arrive. “Splo,” she said when neither happened. “Definitely splo.” Her voice was a bit scratchier than usual and simply saying the words finally got her coughing.

Cabin’s mouth twitched upward slightly. “Aye.”

The stallion next to her chuckled. “Ye’re a-takin’ it better’n I did.”

“That’s ’cause ye dinnae drink!” said Cabin.

“Sure, but she werenae supposed tae ken that.” The stallion winked at Bitterroot.

“Next one…” Bitterroot drank the next shot. And compared to the first one, it was downright pleasant. Partly because it had some semblance of flavor, but that flavor was also pretty solid. It was a bit bitter in parts, but spicy in others, almost lemony. An unusual taste, but a good one. But was it a good whiskey or a great whiskey? Bitterroot smacked her lips. She settled on “good”; she’d order it if it was available, but it wasn’t something she’d go out of her way to look for. “Blockade, right?” she asked Cabin.

“…Aye.” Was that some grudging respect in Cabin’s voice?

The old stallion next to her was laughing, the new group behind her were chattering, and the filled glass in front of her was calling. Ready for some high life, Bitterroot prepared to snatch up the glass-

The door to the Cave banged open; Bitterroot reflexively nudged the glass to one side so she could look in its reflection, realized what she was doing, and glanced over her shoulder out of curiosity. Whippletree was standing in the doorway, his wings at his sides, his hooves spread in aggression, his nostrils flaring as he breathed. It was such a change from his earlier character that it actually gave Bitterroot pause. Rough day? Maybe. He’d had to go into Midwich Forest, although he seemed none the worse for wear.

Well, it wasn’t her concern. She took up the glass in her hoof, raised it to her mouth-

-and spilled it all over herself as she was clouted from behind. “Ye’re in my spot,” Whippletree growled. “I like this spot.”

“Sorry,” Bitterroot said. What was with bars and Special Spots? She didn’t begrudge Whippletree his, far from it. She had her own Spots at bars back in Canterlot. But ponies were attracted to spots at places they frequented for whatever reason and staked out their claim like they were colonizing some distant land. It was everywhere — and, also like distant lands, generally not worth fighting over, not when you could just move over a little and get some new territory. “I’ll move.” She immediately hopped off the chair and made for the next one over.

But Whippletree quickly put a hoof on her shoulder and shoved her away from the chair. “Ye really think that’s it?” he snarled at her. “That you’un can jes’ walk away after that?”

“Erm… yes?” One of Bitterroot’s ears was drooping. She’d met ponies protective of their Spots before, but coming from Whippletree, it was… very, very strange. “I didn’t know. Look, there’s your spot back, I’m moving.”

But when she tried to move away again, Whippletree yanked her right back. “That ain’t civil, no siree. Ye dinnae take a pony’s seat like that.”

“Look, Whippletree, what do you want from me?” Bitterroot protested. She was halfway through the sentence when an intrusive idea worked its way into her mind. When she followed it through to the end, that result was… not great, but probably better than what it’d be otherwise, defusing the situation without too much violence. She seized it. “A fight?”

Bitterroot had been in plenty of bar fights. Even in Equestria, if you spent as much time in bars as she did, pure large-number statistics ensured you got dragged into a fight at some point. So as she spoke, she prepared. Spread your legs, lower your body. It’d be bracing and lower her center of gravity, making it harder to knock her over. Wings tight. The tension the muscles required meant it got her heart pumping. Tail down. It’d be harder to take a hold of. And look your opponent in the eye. It was a minor intimidation factor that could mean the difference.

The two ponies looked at each other. Then Whippletree’s mouth grew wide in such a manner that its corners turned upward. It was probably supposed to be a smile. “Y’ken what?” He spread his hooves and his wings tightened. “Aye.” He swung.

And Bitterroot took it full in the jaw.

Or appeared to. She’d actually started moving right before Whippletree had hit her, absorbing the worst of the blow. It’d sting a little in the morning, but it wouldn’t ache. A few quick, subtle wing twitches added to her momentum, sending her spinning theatrically, making it look worse than it was. She carefully timed her stumble to take her closer to the door and even managed to fall dramatically right between two tables. Perfect.

It was simple. If a stranger strode into town and beat up a guard, that’d be memorable, wouldn’t it? She’d immediately be pegged as a Tough Gal and ponies would be cautious around her. But if that same stranger was beaten up by a guard, that was normal. Of course the guards were tougher than her. She’d been having shots; she was probably a bit drunk. All she needed to do was get beaten up and thrown out, and she’d be considered beneath notice for a lot of things. Ponies would underestimate her, at least to some degree. It was always a tossup as to what that degree was, but it was also always there.

And if she couldn’t beat up the guard in the first place (which happened more often than not), at least she could control how badly she got beaten down. That was a lesson she’d learned quickly.

As Whippletree approached, Bitterroot wondered: punchable grin or not? It depended on the crowd. …Not. Tratonmane didn’t need another excuse to dislike her. A punchable grin would make it look like she was some smug idiot getting what she deserved. “Whoa, hey,” she said, raising her voice and a hoof, “we don’t need-”

Whippletree kicked at her; Bitterroot rolled over before it could fully hit and moaned convincingly. He bit down on her mane and hoisted her onto a table against the protests of the patrons already there. “My spot’s mine,” he growled, “an’ by the Deormont, I ain’t a-lettin’ some hollow-hooved moldwarp like you’un take it.”

“Lithen,” Bitterroot gasped, affecting a lisp to sound more broken, “I’m thorry, I’m thure we can work-”

“Quiet!” Whippletree roared in her ear.

“Whipple, what’s gotten intae ye?” asked the mare whose whiskey Bitterroot’s mane was nearly in.

“She was in my spot!” And Whippletree shoved Bitterroot roughly off the table.

She tumbled as best she could, towards the door, but her head still banged a chair a bit too hard for comfort. Best to cut it short. Holding one leg across her chest like she was having trouble breathing, Bitterroot raised a hoof. “I’m going!” she wheezed. “I’m going.” Without another word, she staggered for the door, ears back.

And because her ears were back, she heard the patter of Whippletree’s hooves a second early. She lunged forward in time to absorb the worst of the buck, but still lost control and rolled out of the Watering Cave in ways she didn’t want to. Nothing broke, but she wound up face first in the frigid powder of outside snow.

Bitterroot had thought Midwich in the day was dark. At night, they didn’t even have the glow of sunlight bouncing off the valley walls and darkness had fallen like a blanket on top of another blanket. The wind was channeled to whistle up and down through Tratonmane, sounding more like ghosts than anything Bitterroot had heard before. Even the lamps seemed withdrawn in the light they gave. Her head was spinning when she stood up and the oppressive black made it worse.

Bitterroot stood up and tried to blink away the spots from her vision. It didn’t work; the world was bendable before her as the ground slowly waved below. Something was warm on the inside of her mouth. When she probed it with her tongue, she tasted copper. (Why did everyone agree that blood tasted coppery?) Must’ve bitten the inside of her cheek. Ah, well. Still not as bad as the first time she’d faked a beatdown. That one was practically the real thing.

She took a few steps and managed to stay upright. Promising. Another few, turn. Still up. Good. She was able to walk in a small circle to keep blood flowing, and although she wavered dangerously, she didn’t fall. She kept one ear angled towards the Cave; the sounds from inside were angry ones, shouty, and not all from Whippletree. Definitely not something she wanted to be a part of.

At first she thought the high-pitched ringing she heard was tinnitus, but by the time she’d completed four laps, she realized it was rapid, constant echolocation, closer than she’d heard it before. Another lap, then she squinted into the darkness.

“Heh. Was a-wond’rin’ when ye’d notice.”

It was easy once she had the sound of a voice to track. Some of the gloom resolved into the silhouette of a pony sitting just beyond the edge of the lamplight. Beyond her quite ordinary shape, all Bitterroot could make out was that only one of her eyes was glinting.

“Eh. It’s dark and I got beat up,” Bitterroot said with a shrug. She ran a tongue across her teeth; she hadn’t thought any got knocked out, but it didn’t hurt to check. Everything was there and tight. “And that’s about the extent of my excuses.”

“I’ve heard o’ worser ’uns.” And she stepped into the light.

The chiropterus before Bitterroot was an equine sword: hard and narrow. Even her lips were thin and the eye that wasn’t patched had the dull but well-used smoothness of a whetstone. But not her wings; even folded, Bitterroot could see that her wings were wide and supple. Her coat was unpolished gray and her mane was messy and unkempt enough to look messy and unkempt when only a few inches were poking out of her hood. She had a few scars on her face, visible only by the way they were slightly darker than the rest of her coat. They were even harder to pick out from the general weathering of age; the mare must’ve been over 65. Although, standing out from the rest of her was-

“You’ve got green on you,” Bitterroot said, pointing.

“Hmm?” The mare looked down and quickly spotted the splotch of green on her chest. “Ach, I’ve been a-paintin’.” She squinted at Bitterroot. “Got banged up plumb good, did ye, lowlander?”

“Eh, I’ll be fine. I’ve been through worse.” Of course she had. She’d died twice, after all. (Buuuuut it probably wasn’t a good idea to mention that just yet.)

The mare snorted. “So which shagnasty threw the hissy? Pine Bark? Bet ’twas ’er. She cannae keep…”

Hissy. Funny how some parts of language changed so much while others changed so little. “Whippletree,” Bitterroot said. “I took his spot.”

She was rolling one of her legs when she realized the silence had stretched on for too long. The mare was staring at her as if she’d made some grievous faux pas. “No, ye didnae,” the mare said.

“Yes, I did.”

“Mebbe it were somepony else. But it ain’t Whippletree,” growled the mare. “He dinnae dae that. I ken yer meant tae treat yer in-laws like poison, but he’s the nicest cusséd pony ye’ll e’er meet. He’ll hurt himself afore he hurts aryone else.”

And a few hours ago, Bitterroot probably would’ve agreed. But eh. Maybe he was just having an off night. So she shrugged. “I’m Bitterroot, by the way,” she said as a means of changing the subject.

The mare’s eye glinted, but if she noticed the diversion, she must’ve been glad for it. “Arrastra,” she said.

“And before you say anything, I’m technically not with the Crown. One of the ritualists is a friend, so I’m tagging along.” Maybe she could hone that into a reflex, be able to just say it without thinking about it.

“So I’m a-guessin’ ye cannae tell me why this be the problem that finally brought Canterlot tae interfere out ’ere?”

“Sorry, no. I just heard that the ley line could affect plants and animals in the region. I never even heard of Tratonmane a few days ago.”

Arrastra snorted and rolled her eyes. “O’ course,” she muttered. “Cent’ries wi’out ary…” Another snort. “Well, best o’ luck tae you’uns, at ary rate, even if’n ye ferget about all of’ us the second it’s done. Better’n nothin’.” Her voice was halfway between sincere and a petulant foal being forced to apologize. Without another word, Arrastra nodded to Bitterroot and strode off into the night, chirping to find her way.

A surprisingly reasonable attitude, given some of the looks Bitterroot had seen. The conversation had distracted her enough for the worst of her aches to die down, so she risked poking her head back into the Cave. Off near the bar, where she’d first run into Whippletree, a herd of ponies had assembled. There was shouting. A lot of shouting. It was hard to tell what anyone was saying, as a matter of fact. But it was a distraction. She slipped in, edged along the walls, and started up the stairs without anyone caring about her enough to stop her. One of the steps creaked and she reflexively winced, but she was the only one close enough to hear it.

The sound tapered off on the second floor, reaching a point where her next-door neighbors were sometimes louder. Amanita and Code were deep in conversation about something — probably necromancy, from the way the door had been locked and how often Bitterroot heard “death” — and Charcoal had claimed one of the beds for reading, although she kept an ear turned in Amanita’s and Code’s direction.

Bitterroot rolled her shoulders. Maybe it was the fight, maybe it was the darkness, but bed was sounding pretty good, even if she didn’t sleep just yet. She’d wake up sore, but that’d soon pass. The rest of tomorrow… She’d see.
> 7 - Beyond the Woods
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

Even under all her blankets, Bitterroot woke up to a familiar Northern chill, one that crept down her feathers and clawed its way beneath her skin. But it hadn’t reached her bones, so she was warmer than she’d expected to be. It was still dark, so she wiggled under her covers and prepared to sleep in.

It took about ten minutes before she remembered where she was and that it’d be dark for quite a long time. Bitterroot briefly panicked, remembered what she was doing here, and reluctantly crawled out of bed. The cold of the room woke her up better than coffee could ever hope to and soon she was pulling on some furs. Nopony else was in bed, so Bitterroot headed downstairs. The creak of one of the steps was somehow calming, like it was something tangible in what might’ve been a dream.

The common room was mostly empty; besides Amanita, Code, and Charcoal, there were only a few people down there, all eating something and clearly not interested in conversation. Except for Code, of all ponies, who was sitting at the bar (was it a bar this early in the day?) talking to Cabin. When Code spotted her, she waved Bitterroot over. “Morning,” Code said. “Sleep well?”

“Yeah.” Taking a seat next to Code, Bitterroot spread her wings slightly; the stove in the center of the room was lit and the warm air felt wonderful when it slipped between her feathers. “The bed was nice and I’ve slept in hotel rooms in Manehattan that were colder than that.” Not much colder. But still.

Code turned to Cabin. “Like we all said, it was good.”

Cabin flicked an ear and grunted reluctantly. (Bitterroot wasn’t sure how she knew it was reluctant.) She pointed a hoof behind her. “Breakfastes,” she grunted.

In some ways, the breakfast menu seemed more like an ingredient list than an actual menu. Before Bitterroot could mention this, Code said, “Cabin here treats you like family, so you need to make it yourself. I had pancakes, but I would recommend the eggs; they’re fresh.”

Bitterroot’s wings twitched in surprise. “Fresh eggs? Here? At this time of year?”

“Mmhmm.”

“Huh. More ley line stuff?”

“Probably not,” Amanita piped up from a nearby table. “It’s rarer for chickens to lay in this sort of environment, but hardly impossible. And if it’s already cold for them, then winter won’t make that much of a difference, will it?”

Shrug. “I guess.” Bitterroot decided to just take Amanita’s word for it. She didn’t know chickens. She did know scrambling eggs, though, and was tucking into a good-sized plate in minutes. It was delicious; these eggs were definitely fresh.

As she ate, Code said to her, “After sleeping on it, we’ve decided that Charcoal was right last night.” (At her table, Charcoal grinned to herself.) “We’ll make a quick incursion into Midwich to get a feel for it and come back. If something’s wrong out there, we’ll know, and we can send for help in clearing the forest.”

“That’s a right glaiket notion,” muttered Cabin in a voice that made the meaning of that word clear.

“It’s hardly ideal,” Code said. “But now’s the best time to do it, while the wolves are licking the wounds the militia gave them. And speaking of the militia, we’re hoping they’ll be able to provide some ”

“Need me for anything?” Bitterroot said around a mouthful of egg.

Code blinked. “I… Technically, no. But if you insist on working for no pay, you’re free to follow.”

“Hey, I’m available if you need me. There’s a reason I became a bounty hunter.”

“If you want to follow, eat fast. The three of us are leaving in five minutes.”

Scrambled eggs were practically made for eating fast, so Bitterroot finished hers in less than one. In that time, Code had retrieved something from the storage room, something small enough to fit in a bag the size of a coinpurse. “Everybody set?” she asked. “Then let’s get going.”

Bitterroot didn’t need to be told twice. She hopped off her stool and immediately was walking out the door.

At the same time Whippletree was walking in the door.

Almost on reflex, Bitterroot took a step back, memories of last night snapping back to the front of her mind. But Whippletree’s ears were down, his legs were close together, and he was hanging his head a little, like a scolded foal. He blinked at Bitterroot and opened his mouth; nothing came out.

“Um.” Bitterroot cautiously waved. “Hello.”

“Hidy!” Whippletree’s voice hadn’t changed in pitch, but somehow he still squeaked. “I… Eh… I jes’… want tae… apologize. Fer… las’ night.” He kept alternating between looking Bitterroot in the eyes and looking off to her side. “When I… assaulted. You. Yeh.” He licked his lips and grinned nervously. “I’m real sorry. I dinnae ken what came o’er me.”

“I beg pardon?” It was amazing how much Code’s voice brought to mind a fuse about to be lit.

“We had some differences last night and an unfriendly chat,” Bitterroot said quickly. “I’m fine. Don’t worry about it.”

“I’m a-worryin’ about it!” protested Whippletree. “That- That ain’t me! I dinnae care one lick about my spot in the Cave an’ I dinnae ken why I did las’ night.”

Bitterroot got the acute feeling she was standing under a spotlight; her wings squirmed, in spite of her best efforts. “You were probably drunk.”

“A, no I weren’t, and B, that ain’t no excuse.”

“Rough day?”

“Nay. Bitterroot, ma’am-” (Bitterroot flinched; Whippletree kept talking before she could protest.) “-somethin’ were wrong wi’ me. An’-”

“If it doesn’t happen again, we don’t need to worry about it,” Bitterroot said. “Besides, do I look hurt to you?” She grinned; indeed, she felt no bruises except for the little one on her left shoulder.

Whippletree opened his mouth, raised a hoof declaratively, closed his mouth, and lowered a hoof. “Sorry,” he muttered.

“Apology accepted.”

Swallow, weak half-grin. “W-well, then, I’ll-”

“Excuse me,” said Code. “Whippletree. Sir. I was wondering if you and your militia would be willing to provide protection for an expedition into Midwich Forest.” (Bitterroot stepped to one side to let them talk.)

It was like a jolt to Whippletree’s system, his demeanor changed so quickly. His ears snapped up and his hooves shifted slightly apart. “Intae Midwich?” he asked flatly. “The forest that kills ye. As you’uns saw yesterday.”

“That’s the one,” Code said in the vein of someone proposing an afternoon stroll. “Unfortunately.”

“Part o’ the… ley line job?”

Code opened her mouth, only to get lightly muscled aside by Charcoal. “Look, look,” Charcoal said, “I know it doesn’t sound the greatest, but it’s probably necessary to bet- get a good look at the ley line-”

“Ma’am-” protested Whippletree.

“It won’t be that long. Something like an hour, tops. The wolves’ll be licking their wounds from yesterday.”

“Ma’am-”

“Just this once. Promise. Then you’ll never need to go in for us again. Pleeeaaase?”

A pause, then Whippletree’s entire body heaved as he sighed. “If needs must,” he said. “But lissen.” He looked Code in the eye and stepped forward so he was practically looming over her. “If’n I’m a-tellin’ you’uns tae do somethin’, you’un do it. Midwich ain’t an evenin’ stroll. I dinnae want tae be responsible if ye die.”

Code didn’t bat an eye. “Of course. Say the word and we’ll run back to Tratonmane like our tails were on fire.”

Whippletree blinked, as if he hadn’t expected Code to agree so quickly. “Ah. …W-wait fer us by the forest’s edge. I need tae get the others.” He looked at Code, rustled his wings, and flew off.

“That was painless,” said Code. She flicked her tail and strode off, the others following. “I was expecting to spend half an hour arguing back and forth with them.”

“I guess Ramrod’s spoiled us, huh?” Amanita said, grinning. “After dealing with her, anything seems like smooth sailing.”

Bitterroot knew she was missing some context, but her mind latched onto only one thing. “Ramrod,” she said in disbelief. “Her parents named her Ramrod?”

“Dowsing Rod, actually, but she’s such a…”





Making a light wasn’t hard. It was often among the first spells a young unicorn consciously cast, and by the time they reached adulthood, bordered on effortless, even thoughtless. At least, that was what Amanita had thought; keeping that light up was giving her a headache. The thought that she might have to keep it up was making her very sympathetic to Tratonmane.

She crunched back and forth through the snow near the river, some distance away from the forest’s edge. Her last experience with dark snowy forests hadn’t been the greatest, and although she tried to say she wasn’t superstitious, she still got a nagging feeling in the pit of her stomach. Memories kept sliding unbidden through her head, tainting her perception of now. At least now she didn’t have a psychotic lich dogging her steps.

Bitterroot was pacing restlessly near her while Code was fiddling with some tiny artifice. Charcoal, though, was sitting on her haunches, eyes closed, horn ringing. (Her magic sounded like low bells. Huh.) She irregularly swayed back and forth like a reed in the wind and made occasional “hmm” and “hah” noises. When Amanita extended her own magic, she could feel a haze around Charcoal, probing for any sort of magic or mana. Amanita couldn’t tell what it was finding, but based on Charcoal’s expression, she was satisfied.

What the hay. Might as well learn something. Amanita sat down next to her. “What’re you doing?”

“Getting a general compre- impression of the ley line,” Charcoal said, her voice unusually dreamy. “Its, y’know, vibes.”

Amanita pretended she knew what that meant as she nodded.

Charcoal blinked and refocused her eyes. “Ley lines are currents in the land, right? So when you get down to it, they’re just magic. And you can sense- Wait, can you sense magic? Kirins can, but I don’t know if… unicorns…”

“We can sense it,” said Amanita, “although-”

Several swinging lights from Tratonmane caught her eye. A quick glance sharpened them into lanterns, carried by Whippletree and several other militiaponies and misted up by their breath, and a unicorn’s hornlight. Five ponies in total: Whippletree (a pegasus), a unicorn, and three earth ponies. The same ones from yesterday, with the same well-worn (perhaps overly-worn) armor and a few weapons between them. None of them seemed particularly happy and Amanita couldn’t help feeling a little guilty.

Code glanced up at their approach. Her expression didn’t change, but her nostrils flared. “Is this everyone?”

“They’re some o’ the best blamed ponies in Equestria an’ I willnae hear ye say elseways,” Whippletree said firmly. “I’m wishin’ you’uns the best in yer business, but…” He paused and cringed, like he really didn’t want to say what came next.

“You think we’re off our rockers,” said Code.

Whippletree opened his mouth, closed it again, nodded. With a sigh, he said, “We ain’t about tae satisfy each other. Let’s get it done.”

“Actually, before we do…” Code held up something like a set of strange, thick wires, halfway between headphones and earrings. “It would be best if we don’t split up, but if that proves to be unavoidable-”

“We ain’t splittin’ up,” Whippletree said flatly.

Code was unperturbed. “-we can still remain in contact. These are audio transmitters that can be used by distant parties to talk to one another. Canterlot was hoping we could give them a field test.”

Bitterroot had grown steadily more interested as Code talked and quickly turned to Whippletree. “How safe are the skies?”

“In Midwich? They… ain’t bad, I reckon.” Whippletree seemed surprised that anything to do with Midwich Forest might not be dangerous. “Safe enough. Why?”

“I can help test those,” Bitterroot said to Code. “Just let me fly above. I’ll see your lights through the trees and can be down in a flash if you need help.”

“You really should’ve agreed on payment before coming here,” Code said. She passed one of the earring things over. “Just fit this around your ear and speak. The magic will do the rest.”

“My payment is a set of these once they’re completed,” Bitterroot said. “If they work, they’ll really come in handy when I’m on the hunt.” She grinned, flared her wings, and rocketed into the too-bright sky.

Whippletree looked up after her. “She can weed ’er own road, right?” he asked. “Take care o’ herself?”

Amanita recalled the time Bitterroot had fought off a furious lich and her thralls in the middle of a thicket set aflame. “Yeah. She can.”

“Hmm.” Whippletree continued looking up for another second. “Ye can lead the way when ye’re ready. I dinnae ken where’n all ye want tae go.”

“Alright.” Code rolled her shoulders and turned her attention towards Amanita and Charcoal. “We’ll follow the river. It’ll be easier to keep track of where we’ve been. If they tell you to do something-” She nodded to the militia. “-you do it. Don’t stay too close to the trees for too long. And if it all goes to Tartarus, run south like a madmare.”

Heh. Great. Amanita swallowed as she followed Code into the forest.





Midwich Valley had looked strange from the ground. It bordered on surreal from the sky.

As she climbed towards the clouds, Bitterroot kept her eyes towards the ground. The forest, well, it was a dark spooky forest. She’d seen them more than a few times, usually chasing perps through them. The trees were gnarled and clawed for the sky, as usual. They clumped close enough that the ground resembled a bed of nails that you’d have to fight your way through to reach the forest floor. Not something she’d want to stay in, but it didn’t look as threatening as it was supposed to be.

But the valley itself… The moment she was above the rim, the world seemed to zipper shut around it. That place was narrow, surprisingly easy to miss if you flew over it, even filled in with all that shadow. Canterlot was easily too wide to fit inside. Maybe even Canterlot Castle. And the valley’s straightness was accentuated this high up. There was straight, and then there was straightedge straight. It looked more like some lazy cartographer half-assing a border than anything natural, but the scale of it, the sheer size of something that straight, made something stir in Bitterroot’s gut. But it was just the ley line, right? The energies in the ground. They didn’t need to flow “around” anything. They could just go straight, right?

Uh-huh. Sure.

Bitterroot ended her existential crisis by looking down. The branches were filtering the group’s light, but it was still clearly visible and easy to follow. Even if they weren’t, she could pick out the winding of the river they were following. Perfect. She swooped down a little so the mountains blocked the sun again — it seemed right — and tapped her not-earring. “Uh, hey, Code. You there?”





Forests in the dark were uncanny. Beyond the lanterns and hornlight, the gloom rippled and twisted with the barely-there silhouettes of trees in parallax. Distance meant little with no details to give perspective; trees always seemed to be closer or further away than they looked. And that was when the land behaved. Frequently, treading across uneven ground meant focusing on your hooves more than what you were seeing, and once you covered that craggy three feet and looked back up, the entire landscape around you seemed to have changed. Trees were trees and were rarely unique enough to provide landmarks for orientation. There was a reason forests always seemed to be haunted.

The group tread northward, staying close to the river. No shortcuts; when it turned left then right, they turned left then right with it. Better to spend the time not losing track of it. The water’s pace was fairly sedate, but the chill it undoubtedly had meant you still wouldn’t want to fall in. Even with that danger, though, Amanita felt somewhat secure next to the river. It gave her something tangible next to the gray haze of the forest.

The three Canterlotians led the way through the snow. Actually, Charcoal led the way, her eyes lidded and her horn glowing, murmuring vague nothings. Code wasn’t far behind, talking to Bitterroot through their enchanted earrings, leaving behind footprints that purred with magic, occasionally eating more clods of dirt. And then there was Amanita, just sort of following them and hoping for the best. Was she supposed to be looking for something? Casting some spell? She hadn’t been told anything. She half-trotted to get closer to Code, only to fall back. Code was busy and she’d’ve said if Amanita needed to do something. Right? (Second-guessing herself. What a necromancer she was.)

As she walked, the unicorn guard moved closer to the trio. He was big for a unicorn, built like a boulder and likely harder to budge, although it was hard to make out his coloring in the dark. “Stay close to me,” he muttered. “It’s easier for me to protect you than any-”

“Ay, stub yerself up, Varnish!” one of the other guards suddenly snapped. Her voice was sharp enough to make Amanita jump. “They dinnae need tae hear ye talkin’ yer tribalist jularkey!”

“I’m merely stating the facts,” the unicorn — Varnish — said loudly, swinging around to glare at the other guard. “Unless you can project a shield, you can’t protect them the way I can.”

“That dinnae keep the wolves away good an’ always. I can buck ’em clean o’er the horizon!”

“Ah, yes,” Varnish snorted derisively. “Physical strength. For as we all know, the most dangerous thing in the world is an earth pony with a hammer.”

“It’s a right sight more-”

“Ay!” Whippletree blurred between the ponies, giving them both solid thwacks across the head with a spear. “Dinnae fuss in Midwich!” he nearly roared. “We’ve got ponies that need shieldin’, and I will not have you’uns turned frae it on account o’ somethin’ as foolish as this! Varnish, yer a grand soldier, but dinnae spend yer view here. Poplar, curb yer temper.”

Both Varnish and Poplar made irate noises like the beginnings of an argument, but they both fell silent when Whippletree banged his spear on the ground. “Dinnae. Fuss. In. Midwich.” With each word, Whippletree looked either Varnish or Poplar in the eye. “Both o’ ye, let it drop. Now.”

There was only the briefest of pauses before Varnish and Poplar looked at each other, nodded in silence, and returned to looking forward. Whippletree’s smile was slightly less forced than a square peg’s transit through a round hole. “We got our… disagreements,” he said.

Code hadn’t reacted at all to the argument, but now she shrugged. “It happens,” she said. “At least you don’t let it get in the way of your work. …No, I’m not talking to you, Bitterroot, it’s- We’re having a little disagreement…”

To the militia’s credit, the silence that followed wasn’t tense and brittle, just there. Two ponies working together and simply not speaking to each other because they had nothing to say. But the quiet nagged at her, if only because the sound of talking suddenly going away made the sound of everything else seem much louder. The creaking of trees, the wind, the ripple of water, the crunch of dirt… No animals. Even though forests always had animals. Amanita coughed and said, “S-so, uh, the wolves just… attack? That’s about all I’ve heard.”

A brief pause as everyone tried to work out who she was talking to before Whippletree volunteered, “That’s all that we ken. They come out o’ the woods an’ do their plumb best tae eat us.”

“And you’ve never-” Amanita figured she knew the answer but found herself asking the question anyway. “-never… come out here to find-”

The militiaponies all made some degree of snort. Whippletree managed to keep his suppressed, but Amanita could still see him twitch. “Beg yer pardon, but ye’re daft. Midwich ain’t welcomin’. Ye saw what it were like at Tratonmane? ’Tis worser out ’ere.” He flared his wings in a sweeping gesture. “Get too far out an’ it’s like the forest’s got a mind o’ its own. And hates us.” He glanced upwards, at the sky inching towards blue as the sun rose outside the gorge. “We’re a-leavin’ at noon.”

“Noted,” Code said, “although we ought to be out by then. …No, Bitterroot, I’m not talking to you. …Yes, they last for a long time…”

Downriver. Amanita decided to try extending her magic and feel the ley line. It wasn’t hard to find, of course, being as packed with magic as it was. And it was definitely flowing. But beyond that? She didn’t know how it was supposed to feel or if it was even bad here. …Assume it was. Why? How? …Yeah, she wasn’t managing that. She kept her mind extended anyway, hoping to have some brainwave. She had to start somewhere.

Ahead, the river turned sharply eastward, more sharply than it had before. Amanita was ready following, but Charcoal abruptly came to a halt, saying, “Wait a minute, wait​a​minute.” Sitting on the bank, frowning, she pointed at the river. “This, this isn’t fright. Right. The river shouldn’t curve like this, I don’t think.” She started leaning back and forth, making angles with her legs in some mental calculation. “Yeah, this is not right.”

The group stopped. As Charcoal rubbed her chin, Code sat down, took another bite of dirt, and closed her eyes. Amanita felt a small but deep power from both of them, a magnet on a bar that took more strength to move than it looked. She tentatively continued her probe; the overall flow of the line continued straight down Midwich Valley, with no difference that she could see. Yet somehow, she still felt like something was off. Not overall; just right here.

The guards remained silent, slouching on their weapons or looking off into the trees. Varnish, however, had his jaw set as he watched them. Eventually, he said, “So what’s wrong with the river, here? It looks okay to me.”

“It turns way too sharply,” Charcoal said. “When a ley line is this powerful, rivers don’t do turpen- serpentines like they might in other places. This is wrong whether the line’s okay or not.”

“And which way ought it be going?” Varnish’s ears were trembling.

Charcoal pointed off into the dark, along the same general line of the river before the turn. “That way, look-” With a grunt, the light from her horn swelled. “You can see the dip in the shores where it used to be.” Indeed, although it was hard to make out, Amanita could just barely glimpse the shadows of a broad ditch winding below the trees, with the trees themselves spread out to let it pass. After she’d been following the magical signature of the ley line, even for just a minute, that ditch felt… It felt right. Why did it feel right? Why did Amanita immediately know that Charcoal was correct?

Varnish shrugged. “You’re probably seeing things. The stream’s always taken this route.”

“How often do you come back here to know?” asked Amanita. “I’ll bet you don’t think about the river down here all that much.”

“I’ve lived here,” bristled Varnish, “for longer than-”

“No, you haven’t,” said Amanita. “You’ve lived in Tratonmane. Not here.”

“And if the stream’s always taken this route,” said Charcoal, “then that just raises the question of why. Because no matter which way you dice it, it shouldn’t turn like this.”

Whatever Varnish was going to say next, it was cut off by Whippletree preemptively landing in front of him. Whippletree violently pointed away and roughly tugged Varnish in that direction, where they started talking in hushed tones. Amanita couldn’t help angling an ear towards them, although she couldn’t make anything out.

One of the other guards cleared her throat and spoke up. “I’m a-thinkin’ yer right,” she said tentatively. “The… turn o’ the land ain’t good ’ere.”

“Aye,” said Poplar. “Aryone else got their bones set intae tremblin’?”

“I feel more like it’s grating or grinding,” Code said, “but everypony feels it differently…”

Charcoal didn’t seem to notice the growing conversation. She was sitting down, still looking at the stream. “Follow the streambed, follow the stream,” she muttered. “Follow the streambed, follow the stream…”

Amanita glanced at Whippletree and Varnish again. Their gestures were quick, jabby, and angry. She could barely hear their voices, and when she did, they kept talking over each other, their words blurring into angry incoherence.

“We need to keep following the stream,” Charcoal said, to no one in particular. “The old streambed won’t show any-” She froze, blinked, and scurried away, shooting a weak bolt at the snow. “The ground’s moving!” she squeaked.

“No, just the roots,” Code said casually. “Don’t stay in one place for too long.” She took a bite of dirt.

Amanita quickly brushed some of the snow at her hooves away. She wasn’t sure the root near her hadn’t been there when she stopped walking, but she wasn’t sure it had, either. She scooched closer to the river, away from the trees. (“Flipping night trees,” growled Charcoal.)

“And I agree,” Code said. “There’s nothing to study that way.” Another meal of dirt. “Or not in these circumstances. Maybe if- Oh, for Celestia’s sake, Bitterroot, get down here. …I know you can see us, you’ve been hovering right over us this whole time. …I can hit you with a rock from here. I’m an earth pony, I have good aim.”

Within seconds, a dark shape dropped through the trees, landing right next to Amanita and making her jump. Bitterroot looked none the worse for wear as she pulled out her earpiece and passed it back to Code. “Like I said. Really nifty.”

“If a bit intrusive at times,” said Code, a touch surlier than usual. “We’ll need to find a way to turn them off.”

“We’re not going further in,” Varnish said. He was suddenly on the edges of their group, like he’d just teleported there. “Perhaps the river did change course. But it’s much too dangerous to go-”

“C’mon, we won’t need to go far,” wheedled Charcoal. “Just a view- few more minutes. We haven’t even seen anything dangerous yet!” Although she glanced down at her hooves.

“We will if we keep going further in. This is not something we can take lightly. What would you know, you can’t even speak properly!”

“Listen,” Code said, stepping forward.“This isn’t. I know how the peaceful can turn dangerous in-”

“Do you? Because it seems-”

“You do not interrupt me,” Code said, jabbing Varnish in the chest. She hadn’t raised her voice and her ears were still up, yet she felt a lot less small. “We are not tourists. We are not adventurers. We are not thrillseekers. We are specialists. We have a job to do. We are here to help you. We are not taking your job lightly, so you should not take our job lightly. And if you think we’re not worth it…” She pointed south, upriver. “Tratonmane’s that way.”

Varnish opened his mouth as if a retort would automatically spring from it. Nothing did. Whippletree looked ready to pull rank before Varnish stepped away, scowling and making sure to flick his tail in Code’s face.

Charcoal immediately said, “So anyway since we’re still going let’s keep going and we can fish up and get back out as soon as possible okay great.” Her turn downriver was stuffed full of very chalant nonchalance; Code followed her without a word, while Amanita and Bitterroot briefly exchanged looks. This time, the silence of the militia behind them was tense and brittle.

Still, they were off again, into the same darkness as before. But they didn’t have long to go before they found the bear.





Bitterroot hadn’t seen a dead animal this big in person before. (Well, okay, she’d seen a dead bear once. But it’d been trying to kill her, so she didn’t think that counted.) It was at least three times her size: big enough to feel big, not big enough to turn bigness over and stop feeling like a real thing, not like dragons. It was big and furry and far too still. The unicorns’ hornlights were throwing weird shadows through the fur. At first, Bitterroot didn’t know what had killed it.

Then she walked around a little and flinched at the ripped-open throat and pooling blood.

“Bad omen,” muttered Varnish. “We shouldn’t be here.”

He was ignored. “Dear land,” breathed another guard. She walked forward, just out of poking range. “What coulda done this?”

Amanita immediately scurried to the bear’s neck and peered at its wound. After a moment, she said, “Timberwolves, I’ll bet. These wounds weren’t made by regular claws or teeth.” She ran a hoof along the bear’s fur. “They’re too ragged, more like they were torn than sliced. And…” She plucked something from the neck, holding it up for all to see: the ragged tip of a branch. “This was lodged in too deeply. Timberwolves. …You, uh, do have timberwolves up here, right?”

“Aye,” said Whippletree. He rustled his wings and pawed at the ground. “I dinnae ken the number, bein’ they’re timberwolves-”

One of the guards groaned and planted her face in her hoof. “Three cords, Whipple,” she said. “Midwich has three cords o’ wolves.”

“Three cords?” asked Charcoal. “Oh, that’s not bad at all! As long as the line hasn’t done anything to them.”

“Hang on,” said Bitterroot, raising a hoof. “Cords? Of wolves?”

“It’s hard to count timberwolves as individuals,” said Charcoal. She was looking as closely at the bear as she could while still being six feet away. “They can split apart and recombine, you know, with two smaller ones turning into one big one or vise versa. The general rule is that if each wolf is the size of a wolf, one cord is three or four wolves.”

“Aye,” said the guard. “They dinnae cause nae trouble fer Tratonmane. Ne’er seen ary closer’n a mile tae the town.”

Charcoal’s eyebrows shot up. “Really? But that would mean the ley line doesn’t have anything to do with the wolves. The, the regular wolves, I mean.” Her voice dropped into audible thoughts and she started pacing back and forth. “Timberwolves are technically plants, ley lines affect them faster… But wolves don’t keep coming back like that… Unless-”

“Whoa, hold up,” said Amanita. She was peering at the bear’s wound more intently than Bitterroot would’ve felt comfortable doing and dragging a hoof along the edges. Blood still stuck to it when she pulled away, and whatever she saw made her very interested. “Hey, uh, does…” She extended the stained hoof behind her. “Does anyone have a knife?”

“Here.” Code pulled a knife from her bags and passed it over.

“Thanks.” Crouching down, Amanita began shaving the bear’s fur from its body. Bitterroot found herself hovering (not literally) just behind her, curious. She’d worked with certain bounty hunters to know what Amanita was looking for: livor mortis. And as the fur came away, more and more livor mortis revealed itself: a mottled gray broken up by reddish and brownish bruising from the blood settling as arteries and veins relaxed. Nothing unusual.

“Uh-huh,” muttered Amanita. She nudged one of the bear’s legs; it flexed, with some effort. “Which means we’re on the downslope of rigor mortis…” She looked over her shoulder at the rest of the group. “This bear was killed around the same time as the wolf attack yesterday. Within an hour or so.”

Silence. Code said, “Does that mean anything?”

“No idea,” Amanita said, turning back to the bear. She sniffed at the neck wound. “But something’s up here.” After a moment’s thought, she stabbed into the bear’s stomach and carefully sliced it open. Bitterroot grimaced and waved a hoof in front of her nose to ward off-

Then Amanita plunged her leg into the gash, all the way up to her withers, and the smell was instantly forgotten. She rummaged through it like it was just an overfull knapsack and not a corpse. Blood and other fluids trickled from the gash and onto the ground.

Bitterroot swallowed. “A-Amanita?” she asked.

“Yeah?” Amanita didn’t look at her.

The bear lurched. So did Bitteroot’s stomach. “…Never mind, it’s, it’s nothing.”

Amanita grunted. “Sun blast it,” she murmured. “Where is…”

She pulled open the gash and crawled inside past her withers.

Whippletree looked at Code with a supreme blend of disgust and confusion, Code was regretting something but only slightly, Charcoal seemed to be in genuine medical shock, Varnish was too surprised to have much of a reaction at all besides wide-eyed, slightly-slack-jawed gawking, and the other guards were very resolutely trying to look away from Amanita yet failing.

The body jiggled from side to side as Amanita rooted around. Somehow, Bitterroot’s revulsion was occasionally looping back around into fascination. Occasionally.

When Amanita pulled back out, her head was dripping with blood and don’t think about it don’t think about it don’t think about it. Sitting on one hoof was holy Celestia that was a HEART. Wiping her face down like she was just flicking off water, keeping her eyes on the heart, Amanita said, “It’s weird, its insides are kinda hard… Not like they’re frozen, either, more like they’re… syrup or something… I mean, look at this-” She squeezed the heart oh sisters oh sisters a few times and several large globules of blood dribbled out. “-that really isn’t the viscosity of blood… It smells funny, too-”

“What in the nation are ye doin’?” screamed Whippletree.

“Hmm?” Amanita looked up. She didn’t make the slightest indication that everyone was flinging looks her way like she was a castle and they were siege engines. “What’s it look like? I’m doing an animal autopsy.”

“Yer- covered in-” Whippletree gestured up and down as he took a step back.

“It’s just blood! Everyone’s got it!” Amanita snorted and tossed the heart over her shoulder. “Sheesh…” She plucked the knife from the ground, wiped the blade down on the chest of her coat, and held it out to Code. Code hesitated for a fraction of a second before grabbing and sheathing it. Still dripping bodily fluids, Amanita looked down at the bear and murmured, “What killed you?”

“Could, could, could you please wipe yourself down?” whispered Charcoal. “I know it’s just blood and I know everyone’s got it but it’s supposed to be on the inside I mean that’s why it’s called your insides and now​it’s​on​your​outside​and​call​me​crazy​but​I​don’t​think​you​get​a​free​pass​just​because​you’re​a​nec-”

Bitterroot and Code both snapped to look at her, but Charcoal had cut herself off before the full syllable could come out, although she looked like she’d just been sentenced to death. Fortunately, no one else seemed to notice, not even Amanita; she’d just pulled some bandages from their pack and was dabbing herself down while the guards were putting all of their attention into not leaving the area immediately.

“Strange,” said Amanita. She forced the bear’s mouth open and sniffed the inside. “Very strange.”

“Can you… tell me the next time you’re going to be strange?” asked Bitterroot. “I’d like to be ready.”

Amanita didn’t respond, but she did smirk.

“D’ye- need- tae do- arythin’ else?” Whippletree asked. You could almost hear his stomach attempting to squirm its way up his throat. “I’d rather not- stay here long.”

“Just one thing,” Amanita said. “I’m going to take a look at its death.”





Amanita didn’t know why she’d suggested it. Curiosity had gotten the better of her, evidently. It hadn’t even crept up on her, it’d just jumped out, seized her, and run off like a bandit, leading to the words coming out before she realized what she was saying.

For maybe a second, she locked up. She’d said the wrong thing. She’d be found out immediately. The second day, not even a full twenty-four hours, and she’d already screwed up. Maybe Code could save this. She was a colonel, the High Ritualist; she had to have experience with saving dire situations, right? Right? Maybe she could-

And as those thoughts stampeded their way through Amanita’s conscious mind, muscle memory led to her putting a hoof on the body and muttering, “Meminerim mortem.” She’d already decided she’d do it, after all.

She left physicality behind, skating away on the structure of Tempus Mortis. Within an idea, she found herself in the bear’s death. Animal roars, snarls, and whimpers hung in the sensation around her. And before her, the bear. It was falling to the ground, a single timberwolf clinging to its neck, digging in, tearing.

Amanita moved closer, expecting something more. Was there something special about this timberwolf? Was it infected with magic in some way? Did it have some special signature? There had to be something to explain the bear’s changes, right?

But if there was, she couldn’t find it, not through Tempus Mortis. Just the wolf. There weren’t any strange symbols on its branches or smoke coming from it. It wasn’t glowing, didn’t seem to be changing. It was just a timberwolf. She turned her attention around the area, the same clearing she had just left; nothing. Not even any other timberwolves. The region Tempus Mortis was drawing up was oddly small, like it was the only spot that mattered in the bear’s death. Even though something was going on with the bear’s insides that this glimpse couldn’t explain.

After a quick mental note to expand the senses Tempus Mortis allowed, Amanita let the spell collapse. She stepped away from the bear, trying to remember the memory-projection spell.

“That ain’t gonna take long, is it?” Whippletree asked.

“Already done,” Amanita said, closing her eyes. “Gimme a sec.”

“A- Already done?” asked Whippletree. “Ye didnae do arything!”

“Yes I did,” said Amanita through gritted teeth. The projection spell was being a pain again. “Keep quiet.”

“What do you even mean by ‘take a look at its death’?” demanded Varnish. “You can hardly-”

Difficulty slipped and Amanita’s memories sprang from her horn. The image of the timberwolf attacking the bear was woven into the air before everyone. Amanita briefly spared herself a grin before she said, “There. The bear’s death. Let me know if you spot anything.” And she dropped onto her haunches.

The guards were all dumbstruck at what they were seeing, unless they were whispering to each other. Amanita couldn’t blame them; Tempus Mortis had been surprising enough in Canterlot, where ponies invented new spells every Tuesday. Bitterroot and Code were both considerably less impressed, having already seen it or (in Code’s case) worked on it, and set to examining it. Yet Charcoal, who had never seen it before, simply frowned, squinting at the wolf and the bear. “Huh.”

Amanita followed her gaze. Whatever she was looking at was lost in the forest. “Huh what?”

“Aspens.” Charcoal blinked and shook her head. “The timberwolf, it’s, it’s aspen. Usually they’re something like moat- like oak or ash or maybe pine. I don’t think I’ve ever seen an aspen timberwolf before.” She leaned forward, stroking her chin. “Sometimes, timberwolves, they take qualities of whatever timber they’re a wolf of. Stronger, faster, more agile, larger, that sort of thing. And you know what’s special about aspens?” She whipped around, grinning at the group. “Clonal colonies! A lot of nearby aspens, they often grew from the same loot syst- the same root system and they’re technically the same plant. It’s not a grove of aspenssss, it’s a grove of an aspen, as in one.”

“What’s that mean fer timberwolves?” asked Whippletree. He was still gawking at the image.

“I have no idea!” Charcoal said cheerily. “Maybe they all share a mind and it’s just one wolf with many bodies. That’s actually not too far from-”

“How on Equus did you do that?” Varnish asked. “You just… looked at its death. With one spell! What sort of magic is that?”

Everypony looked at Amanita. Which, luckily, meant nopony was watching Bitterroot (who raised her head too much to look at ease and tightened her wings), Code (who set her jaw and kneaded the ground), or Charcoal (who widened her eyes and folded her ears back). Amanita managed to keep her tail still and waved a hoof vaguely. “Oh, it’s. Y’know. New type of spell. Experimental magic. I developed it. We’re still working on it, but I think it’s coming along nicely, don’t you?”

Varnish mouthed, You… He rattled his head like he was shaking off water and said ponderously, “Intriguing.”

Amanita managed not to fidget beneath his gaze, although the image of the bear’s death vanished. “I guess.”

“Is it-”

The howl of a wolf cut through the forest. Everybody snapped their heads to look in its direction as it echoed down the valley from further north.

Charcoal nickered quietly and pawed at the ground. “That’s pretty far away,” she said, failing to be reassuring even to herself.

“In a place like this, hearing it at all means it’s too close,” Code said, placing a hoof on her sword.

“Aye,” said Whippletree grimly. “We’re a-gettin’ back tae Tratonmane.”

“Y’know, that’s fine, I learned everything I could out here, anyway,” Charcoal said.

The group galloped upstream, taking with them more questions than answers.
> 8 - Mountain Mares
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

When they reached the forest line, sunlight was about four-fifths of the way down Midwich’s western wall, which put the time at… 10ish, Amanita guessed. Maybe 11. Why hadn’t she thought to bring a watch? Varnish stalked away about halfway between Tratonmane and Midwich, vanishing as if he’d become part of the darkness. Whippletree shook his head, muttering nothings under his breath.

When they actually reached the limits of Tratonmane, Whippletree dismissed the rest of the militia, although he himself stayed behind. “I’d like tae beg yer pardon o’er Resin Varnish,” he said. “He can be… hard.” He glanced back up the road Varnish had disappeared down. “Might could jes’ be the forest. It sets the best o’ ponies on edge an’ he’s liked us goin’ in less’n most. But that ain’t no excuse. I’ll have a word with ’im later.”

“Thank you,” said Code. “A proper amount of discipline is important.” (Amanita knew from experience that Code meant proper. No more than a stern talking-to would probably be proper at this stage.)

“’Tis,” Whippletree replied. He shuffled his hooves and flexed his wing. “So, ah, if’n ye… dinnae mind me askin’, what’d ye find?”

Code sucked in a breath through her nose and looked up. The blue of the sky seemed to be straining to reach the valley floor. “Not much,” she said. “Which at least means we won’t need to go out there again. Not unless the situation changes dramatically.”

“Good,” said Whippletree. Indeed, just the thought of not going into Midwich again seemed to be making him perk up a little.

“It’s weird,” said Charcoal, pacing a ring into the snow. “The wolves are acting funny, but it’s not because of the ley line, because otherwise the timberwolves would be acting even worse, but they stay back in the furriest- forest and don’t bother you. Except the timberwolves are acting worse, because they don’t just leave their prey to rot like that. And it was an aspen wolf, but only one aspen wolf, and not a big one at that. And then there’s the river…”

Code coughed and Charcoal yanked herself back to the present. “There’s a lot of weird stuff in the forest,” Charcoal said, “but done- none of that’s got to do with the ley line. All of our study can be done here in Tratonmane. We are not going back in. …I hope. There better not be a spriggan out there…”

“Have you seen anything else strange happening around here?” Code asked. “In the past…” She pawed at the ground for a moment. “…seven days? That was when the ley line first turned. Maybe among the miners.”

And Whippletree immediately folded his ears back. “It… ain’t really my place tae say, but… Pyrita’s been havin’… problems. Fer some reason, she went intae the mine in the middle o’ the night seven night back, came back out in the morn, and jes’… collapsed. Her sister took ’er home and she ain’t hardly moved since.”

Ah. Finally, something tangible. They could dig into that. But Amanita tried not to get too excited; it sounded like this Pyrita was comatose and, well, it was cruel to get excited about that. Still, something to study was something to study. Maybe they could help her along the way.

“You sound nervous,” Code said casually.

“It’s her sister,” Whippletree said. “Arrastra’s… touchy ’bout ’er family. She dinnae want us gosspin' like hens about ’em. I dinnae blame ’er, but gabbin’ about this doesnae feel proper.”

“Can you point us in her direction?” Code said. “Then we can discuss it face-to-face and she can buck me in the head if she so desires.”

Whippletree snorted and his wings relaxed. “Aye, I can show ye.”

“I think I’ll stay here.” Charcoal was looking out over the river. “I’ll just run a few cans- scans of the river. I wonder if there’s anything in the water to make it twist like that. Probably not.”

“I heard there’s an inventor in town,” piped up Bitterroot. “They helped with the plumbing. You could ask them if they’re doing anything with the water.”

“Oh, aye, Midwinter.” Whippletree nodded. “Sure, she an’ her family worked on that. I can take ye tae her.”

“Sure. Might as well,” Charcoal said, shrugging.

“Arrastra’s house is along the way,” Whippletree said to Code. “I’ll show ye. Come on.”





They were a ways into Tratonmane, not far from the Great Ash, before Whippletree pointed out a house. “Arrastra’s,” he said. “She’s mindin’ out fer Pyrita there. She’s a mite prickly, so be ready.”

Which wasn’t the worst recommendation of someone, but hardly the best, either. After a quick swing by the inn to wash her head and change out of the clothes she’d worn while inside the bear, Amanita did her best to keep her head up as Code knocked on the door. She could do this. She was just going to look at a comatose pony with her possibly-overprotective sister still around. Nothing wrong with that, right?

It took a little longer than Amanita had expected for the knock to be answered. The elderly, eyepatched chiropterus who opened the door looked like someone who was physically strong but whose fights hadn’t been physical for a long time. The second she saw who was at the door, she jerked her back so suddenly Amanita half-expected to hear a hiss. “Canterlot ritualists?” she asked.

Code nodded. “I’m Restricted Code and this is Amanita. We-”

“Cannae talk wi’ ye,” said Arrastra. “I’m busy.” She stepped back, ready to slam the door.

“About Pyrita!” Amanita said hastily. Sibling overprotectiveness be torn, they needed this.

It worked. Arrastra halted, her jaw set. “Ye’re a-goin’ tae help ’er?” she asked.

“Any way we can,” Code said, nodding.

There was a lengthy moment of silence before Arrastra wordlessly waved them in. Chiropteri being chiropteri, the inside wasn’t lit. Arrastra simply walked forward, chirping; Amanita lit her horn after scraping past a table in the cramped space. They were led upstairs.

Upstairs was lit; in the main room, a flickering light gem hung above an easel with a not-bad landscape painting in one corner and a lantern dangled from the ceiling above one of the two beds. On that bed, beneath the sheets, lay another chiropterus, eyes slightly open but too still to be awake. She looked even older than Arrastra, maybe 70-ish. She didn’t look hurt, but for some comas, that didn’t mean much.

“Here,” said Arrastra. “She- She’s my sister.” Her voice tried to stay strong, but Amanita could tell its foundation was brittle.

“Could you tell us what happened?” Code asked.

“Aye. We live togethern, here.” Arrastra lightly stomped the floor with a rear hoof. “An’- Six day ago, she went out tae speak wi’ Midwinter abouten the water pressure — ’tis always been high here — an’ she werenae back when I bedded. Alright, mebbe they’re a-talkin’. She dinnae like it when ponies get nex’ tae her that late, but Pyrita’s got a way o’ speakin’. But she still werenae here yet when I woke up an’ Midwinter said she ne’er saw her. I went a-lookin’ fer her an’- fer s-some tarnal reason, she c-comes a-stumblin’ out o’ the drift o’ the mine up south. She dinnae look ’urt, but she’s a-ramblin’ somethin’ fierce, r-right up ’til the moment she d-drops. I got ’er b-back home, an’… An’ she ain’t hardly done nothin’ since.”

“I’m sorry,” Amanita said.

“I’ve been up here fer most o’ the past week,” Arrastra said. She pawed at the floorboards, seemingly unconsciously. “Fer everwhen she needs… arythin’. Took up paintin’ tae pass the time.” She gestured at the easel with a wing. “As I say. Busy.”

“And what do you take care of for her?” asked Code.

“Everythin’,” snapped Arrastra. “She’s family. Movin’ ’er so she dinnae get sore, feedin’ ’er mush, cleanin’ ’er when-”

“Yes, everything,” Code said tensely. “You said she was speaking before she collapsed?”

“Aye, she w-were handlin’. Cannae recall much. …S-somethin’ ’bout… severed b-beasts, a walker, an’ a t-trisect.” Arrastra took a shaky breath and raised a leg to wipe at her eye and patch.

Code opened her mouth, but Amanita quickly elbowed her. When Code looked at her, Amanita simply shot her a glare and shook her head. Code pursed her lips slightly, but nodded.

“Sorry,” Arrastra muttered. She raised her eyepatch to wipe at the fur beneath; her eye was gone but her tear ducts weren’t. “I… I jes’-”

“Remembering seeing a family member like that is hard,” Amanita said simply. She still hated some of her last moments with Zinnia, simply because of how small and weak Zinnia had looked.

“Aye.” Arrastra drew herself up and continued, “She spoke tae me, an’ jes’ me. I cannae remember much. I’ve been a-takin’ care o’ her e’er since.” She said these words to Amanita, not to Code.

“It’s possible she was affected when the ley line turned,” said Code. “The timeline is right and the mine might be close to the line’s source. Is there anything strange or unusual down there?”

“…Nay,” Arrastra said. “Jes’ coal an’ rocks.”

“At least you’re safe,” Amanita said. She gazed at Pyrita and her hooves twitched sympathetically. “Mind if I take a closer look at her physicals? It won’t be anything major.” When she’d first gotten her cutie mark, she’d gone digging through all sorts of medical texts looking for ways to apply it. A lot of the tests she’d read had stuck with her.

“…Ye’re Amanita, right? The blood doctor?” Arrastra said.

“I am, and it’s more healing magic in general. But,” Amanita added quickly, “but I wouldn’t be able to fix her. I just want to get a general idea of her health.”

A long pause before Arrastra said, “If’n it can help ’er, go ahead.”

“Great. Thanks.” Amanita moved in close to Pyrita, peered at one of her pupils. In the dim light of Tratonmane, it was fairly dilated. Amanita brightened her horn a little and the pupil smoothly contracted. Good start.

“Let’s get you up,” Amanita muttered. She pulled off the sheets and delicately raised Pyrita into a sitting position, making sure to keep her head from flopping around. She heard some rustling behind her, like Code and Arrastra were surprised, but when they didn’t say anything, she ignored them. She looked Pyrita in the eyes. They quite didn’t have the brightness of life in them, but they didn’t have the flatness of death, either. She knew both of those quite well. Placing a hoof on both sides of Pyrita’s head, Amanita turned it carefully to one side. Pyrita’s eyes at first kept looking in her direction, then slowly moved back to the head’s midline. As expected. She repeated the action in the other direction and got similar results. Very good. Head up, same results. Head down, same results.

“Very good,” Amanita not-quite-whispered to herself as she laid Pyrita back down. “Just one more test.” She pulled Pyrita’s blankets back over her and turned to Arrastra. “Where’s your bathroom?” Arrastra blinked and simply pointed. Amanita retrieved a cup of cold water from there (the sink sprayed like mad, though), sat down next to Pyrita, looked her in the eyes again, and poured a trickle of water into her ear.

“What in the nation d’ye think ye’re doin’?” Arrastra growled, her wings rustling threateningly.

Amanita didn’t look at her. “Testing the caloric reflex,” she said. “If you pour cold water into an unconscious pony’s ear, their eyes ought to look towards that ear.” Which happened even as she explained it. She stopped pouring and used a tiny bit of magic to carefully levitate the water back out.

Setting the cup on a side table, Amanita said, “The good news is she’s probably not brain-damaged. Her reflexes are still there. Now…” She placed a hoof on Pyrita’s neck. Lub-dub, lub-dub, lub-dub… “Heartbeat’s good…” Another hoof on her chest. As Pyrita breathed, it rose and fell smoothly.

Very smoothly. Amanita waited for several moments longer than was necessary just to be sure. “Huh. Her breathing’s pretty clear.”

“An’… that’s bad?” asked Arrastra.

“Oh, no, not at all. It’s just, you said she’d been a miner, I thought she might’ve developed black lung.”

“What?”

“You know, black lung. Uh, miner’s asthma? Coughing, shortness of breath, chest pains…”

“That’s a thing?”

Amanita looked behind her. Arrastra was staring at her like she’d said something bizarre. “Yeah,” Amanita said slowly. “You’re… breathing in coal dust for most of your life… Don’t you have any old miners who have trouble breathing?”

“Nay.”

“…None. None at all?”

Arrastra shook her head. “It’s jes’ dust, ain’t it?”

“It’s coal dust, and it’s collecting in your body. It scars your lungs and just… builds up. It turns them black.” Amanita stood up. “And you’re telling me nopony in Tratonmane has it?”

“Ye need tae be tough out ’ere,” snorted Arrastra. “Seems tae me we jes’ ignore it.”

Which was a load of absolute night fertilizer. Ignoring black lung was like ignoring starvation: you didn’t. Nature didn’t care how tough you were. If coal dust was collecting in your lungs, you felt it, one way or another. Maybe your chest would ache. Maybe you wheezed. Maybe you never seemed to get enough air, no matter how deeply you breathed. Maybe you couldn’t stop coughing. You knew. Except here they were, in a town based around coal mining, and by some act of divine providence, black lung was completely absent.

Only one explanation came to Amanita right then. “Or maybe it’s the ley line.” But it didn’t seem right. It was too vague, too hoof-wavey. Rituals could be nebulous, but there was still a clear line of reasoning, if abstract reasoning, in how they worked. Not the anti-explanation of “it’s magic” that she’d heard griffons and zebras hated. Saying it’s the ley line explained nothing and satisfied no one. At least Charcoal would be happy for the work.

Arrastra just shrugged.

“Beg pardon,” Code spoke up, “but do you usually have those near beds?”

Amanita followed her hoof. All this time, she’d been looking at Pyrita, not above her. But on the wall above Pyrita, a little grain wreath was hanging on a nail. A tiny bit smaller across than a hoof, it was just a circle with two perpendicular lines across it, but it was impeccably crafted. And now that she had noticed it, Amanita had a hard time looking away. There was something special about that, she knew, something she couldn’t quite put her hoof on.

Arrastra blinked her attention back to Code and shook her head. “I… Nay. Not lessun they take sick.”

“I see,” Code said. “Interesting.”

“Um. Code?” Amanita coughed. “We haven’t discussed those yet, have we?”

“Not in our work, no. This-” Code stabbed a hoof at the ring. “-is called a grain mother. It’s a primitive but fairly straightforward ritual item. They’re not used much anymore, but only because of advancements in medicine outclassing them; in the right circumstances, they’re still quite useful. And one of those circumstances is preserving resources in long-populated settlements.” She made a sweeping gesture around them, grinning and nodding. “See, grain mothers only work because of the connection the weaver has to the land. Not magical, like earth ponies-” Amanita felt the wooden boards purr beneath Code’s hooves. “-but emotional. The land needs to be a home, an old home, a constant home. You need to have worked it — magic or plow or your own four hooves, it doesn’t matter, as long as it was you. Because if you give to the land, the land can give something back.”

Code started pacing back and forth as best she could, making quick, slashing motions with one of her hooves. “Grain is… It has an idea behind it. You see fields of grain, and you think whoever’s growing it has plenty of food, yes? It’s vitality, it’s health, it’s prosperity. So when you weave something like this, you’re calling back that idea. But that idea only truly works if you’ve been taking care of grain for a while, or else you’re just taking. If you have been working with grain, it’s more like you’re calling in a favor for the work you put in. You scratched its back, so now it’s scratching yours. Simply put, that-” Code pointed at the wreath again. “-could not have been made by anyone other than a Tratonmanian and still work.”

Switches flicked back and forth in Amanita’s mind. Code was speaking fast again, and it was sometimes hard to follow her when she fell into that pattern. “So it’s… essentially working along the sympathetic emotional connection, but with no one on the other side?”

“More or less. You create it yourself, by putting so much of yourself into it. And because it’s made from grain from the last harvest, it can still-”

“-still invoke the gestalt ideal, which heals them.” That Amanita knew. When you healed someone, you had to work towards what the body wanted; the grain mother must’ve been working the same way, but much slower. Yet even slow, that was quite impressive for something that could be made by somepony who was technically an unskilled laborer.

“It’s a charm that ’eals ponies,” Arrastra grumbled. “Ye dinnae need tae get all a-technical, fer land’s sakes.”

“In our line of work, it helps,” said Code. “We need to know how the charm works. …May I have it?”

Arrastra narrowed her eyes and half-opened her wings, but Code quickly said, “Let me rephrase. I would like to replace the charm with one of my own, just as effective, so I can study this one.”

“Why?” asked Arrastra, surprisingly aggressively.

“Because the mother was made with grain grown here, it’ll be imbued with magic from the ley line. That will give us more data to study and figure out what’s wrong with the line.”

Arrastra looked at Charcoal, at the mother, at Pyrita. With a heavy sigh, she said, “She’s my sister, an’ I ken this works. If- ye take it away an’ she gets worser-”

“If my circle doesn’t work,” said Code, “we’ll give you the mother back, no questions asked. Your safety is more important than our study.”

Amanita could tell Arrastra was thinking hard from the way her ears flicked back and forth. “Alright. Jes’… make it quick.”

“Thank you. First of all, can I borrow a few drops of black paint?”

Arrastra looked at her easel, looked back at Code. Amanita could tell the exact moment she gave up on trying to make sense of it all. “Sure. Help yerself.”

“Excellent.” Without further ado, Code grabbed the cup from where Amanita had left it and trotted downstairs and out the door.

The Look Arrastra gave Amanita was even harsher in the dim light.

“She needs paint and water to make ink,” explained Amanita. “River water’s better than tap water because it’s closer to nature and Midwich. She’s just trying to make the replacement as good as possible.”

“Ain’t much fer reasons, is she?” Arrastra said with a snort.

Amanita grinned weakly. “Not really, no. She has a bad habit of not explaining herself if she doesn’t need to explain herself.”

Her eyes fell on Pyrita. Seven days comatose. At this age. And Arrastra had been taking care of her, here, for all that time. Maybe alone. Family was important to her. More important than Amanita’s had ever been to-

Wait. Seven days… Amanita ran the numbers in her head. “Pyrita was in the mine when the ley line turned,” she said. Not just close to the date, on the date. “Maybe there’s something in the mine connected to the line.”

“There ain’t,” Arrastra said quickly. “It’s a happen-so. Coincidence. I dinnae ken why she went in tae begin with, but it weren’t the line. Elseways, others’d follow ’er.”

“But once she was in-” Amanita cut herself off. Pyrita going into the mine for whatever reason was important, but too external to the mine to have happened because of the ley line without others doing the same. Probably. Yet she’d been in the mine… “Can I feel some of the magic inside her, then? Maybe there’s something left over from the ley-”

“There ain’t,” Arrastra said. Again, quickly. “I’ve done had a charm doctor give ’er a look-see. There ain’t ary magic o’ that sort in her. Ye willnae find nothin’.”

“Right,” Amanita said, nodding. All of this had probably been done before, if she was being honest. Right down to her own tests. It wasn’t like Arrastra was on her own, not in this sort of community. They’d give her what help they could. And even if they didn’t know what the specific sort of magic was in somepony, a unicorn could still sense it and know something was wrong.

Still, Amanita couldn’t throw that thought away.

Below them, the front door creaked open and Code came trotting back up the stairs, holding a cupful of water in her mouth. She set it on the floor and pulled out a few items: a tiny bowl, a slim brush, a sheet of paper. She mixed the water and some of Arrastra’s black paint together in the bowl until it was closer to ink. Taking the brush in her mouth, she murmured, “This won’t take long.” She closed her eyes, tightened the muscles in her neck, and started jerking the brush semi-randomly across the paper, occasionally leaving behind a thin line.

“She’s feeling the rhythm of the magic around here,” Amanita preemptively whispered to Arrastra. “Those sorts of motions let the world pull the brush in a… way that’s good for magic. Like letting a compass show you north.”

Arrastra flicked her tail. “I ken north.”

“Outside of Midwich. It’ll make a good shape for the charm.”

Code’s jerks stopped and she opened her eyes to see what she’d drawn. “Hmm. Interesting.”

Amanita craned her neck to look. Acting completely on random instinct, Code had redrawn the crossed circle from the mother. Surprisingly sharply, too.

“I need a rhyme,” Code muttered, tapping her hoof on the floor. “I need a rhyme to give me time to let this art enact its part… A-ha, perfect.” She crumpled the paper up, stuffed it in a pocket, and walked over to Pyrita. With one hoof on the bedframe for balance, she extended her neck until she could almost touch the wall on Pyrita’s other side.

“We start at the top, with the head and the mind,” incanted Code. She set the brush to the wall. “The circle goes clockwise, for healing takes time.” She drew the circle in one impossibly smooth swoop. “The top to the bottom, the ears to the nails.” A line straight down through the middle. “The front to the back, from the nose to the tail.” A line straight across, perpendicular to the first. Code set the brush back in the bucket, placed a hoof on the wall right next to the circle, and closed her eyes. “It is by these actions we may hold her all and drive out the fugue that doth hold her in thrall. This pony’s mind healed; this I humbly implore. May she speak to us as she did once before.”

The roots of Amanita’s teeth twitched once. In her sleep, Pyrita made some vague murmur. Arrastra had slowly backpedaled and was standing against the far wall. Swallowing, she asked, “Who, who’re youn a-talkin’ tae?”

Code stepped away from the bed. “Whoever’s listening, even if that’s just the magic. Sometimes, ritualists need to be theologically flexible.”

“Ah.” Arrastra’s ears stopped being plastered against the top of her head. “I… see.”

“I don’t think I have any further questions,” Code said. “Amanita, do you-”

Pyrita coughed.

Everyone froze for an instant. Then Arrastra was crouched at the bedside. “Pyrita?” She lightly batted at Pyrita’s cheeks as her eyes fluttered. “Are ye there?”

Another cough. Pyrita’s legs twitched; so did Arrastra’s wings. She grinned as she said, “C’mon, I’m here fer ye, I-”

“Arrastra?” Pyrita wheezed.

Arrastra collapsed onto her haunches, laughing quietly. “I’m here fer ye.”

Code opened her mouth, only for Amanita to get her attention with a shoulder nudge and jerk her head back towards the stairs. Code paused, nodded, and took a step forward to whisper in Arrastra’s ear. “Make sure she sleeps there,” she said quickly. “If there’s any more work to be done, the circle will help. If you need to talk to us, we’ll be at the inn.”

Arrastra nodded, waving them vaguely away. “Pyrita, d’ye need arythin’? Ye’re home, ye got…”

Amanita tread lightly down the stairs, Code close behind. Without much of any other place to go, she went back outside. Glancing up at the second-floor window, she said, “The Rite of Brave Spear doesn’t usually work that fast, does it?”

“No,” Code said. She raised the grain mother to her eye level; the wreath twisted subtly in the wind. “Perhaps this helped. It’s a very well-made mother… Hmm. Let’s take it back to our room. I’d rather not lose it.” She squinted up; the sun had crawled its way over the valley rim. “It’s getting close to noon. Should we find Charcoal and Bitterroot first so we can have lunch?”

“Nah. Bitterroot’ll head there, anyway, and drag Charcoal with her. Let’s get something to eat.”





Bitterroot had come here in case Amanita had needed moral support. She’d done a lot of lackey work for free and had spent very little time with Amanita. Funny how that turned out. (Why was she even sticking with Charcoal at the moment? Curiosity, apparently.)

Whippletree was leading them south. Very south. South past the train station and coal breaker and one of Tratonmane’s towers. So south that the sides of Midwich Valley were narrowing. When she looked up, Bitterroot began feeling claustrophobic. And with the end of the valley approaching, they were in the coldest part of the valley, a place where no sunlight ever reached.

Yet plants still grew. Charcoal picked a few flowers from near the stream and held them up for Bitterroot to see. “Grass-of-Parneighssus!” she chirped. “It’s pretty common in these sorts of climes, but take a look at the hem! Stem! It’s not green at all! In fact, it looks sick, which you’d expect from living without sunlight. Buuuuuut…” She flexed the stem; when she let go, it straightened out again. “…it’s perfectly healthy! Because it’s close enough to the ley line that it doesn’t need sunlight for photosynf- photosynthesis and produces less chlorophyll. Other than that, it’s just like any other grass-of-Parneighssus.” She popped one of the flowers into her mouth. “Right down to tasting good. A lot of the time, it doesn’t matter where you get your energy as long as you get it.”

It did taste good, Bitterroot decided as she chewed. Once she swallowed, she asked Whippletree, “So what’s the deal with Midwinter and her family?”

“Ach, they work on… I dinnae ken,” said Whippletree. “Inventions. Ne’er seen ’em aside frae the plumbin’.” Shrug. “But they’ve kept the water a-runnin’ ’round ’ere fer years, an’ that’s good enough fer me. They’re nice enough.”

“Hmm.”

Although deep in the dark, Midwinter’s house was still some ways from the very end of the valley; miners occasionally passed it on their way to and from work. It was larger than most Tratonmane houses, sprawling across its open land like a tired dog. Bitterroot was reminded of some of the smaller manor houses she’d seen. Shortly after Whippletree knocked on the door, it was opened by a glum-looking, middle-aged earth pony who would’ve looked like he’d been standing in a downpour for the last twenty-four hours if he hadn’t been dry. “Mornin’,” he said. (Bitterroot glanced up; it was still morning, technically.)

“Mornin’, Fuligin,” Whippletree said, giving him a nod. “Is Midwinter around? The Guard wants tae talk to ’er.”

Fuligin’s eyes flicked back and forth between Bitterroot and Charcoal. “Aye, she’s ’ere. Come in.”

“Or, wait, this won’t take long,” Charcoal said, raising a hoof. “It’s just about the plumbing-”

But Fuligin shook his head. “I dinnae work with ’er,” he said, “jes’ for her. I cannae answer yer questions.” He waved Bitterroot and Charcoal in, leaving Whippletree to fly back to Tratonmane.

The interior would’ve been grand if it hadn’t been dark. Fuligin lit a match and soon had an array of oil lamps blazing away. He led them to a sitting room — the house was large enough to have a sitting room, with sofas and chairs and something that probably qualified as a coffee table — and said, “Wait here.” He quickly vanished through a door that looked like a stairway to a basement.

Bitterroot squinted at one of the sofas. A bit dusty and the style was old, but perfectly fine. She and Charcoal settled down onto it; comfy enough. When she took another look around the sitting room, she wondered how long it’d been since it’d really been used; everything could use at least a brushdown to get rid of the dust.

It wasn’t long before Fuligin returned from the basement. Coming up right behind him was Midwinter, wiping what looked like grease off her necklace with a cloth. Close behind her was Carnelian.

The second she was out of the stairs, Carnelian was staring intensely at Charcoal. “You… were not kidding in the slightest,” she said softly. Charcoal flinched and wiggled back on the sofa as she struggled to smile and Carnelian looked her up and down.

“It’s impolite to stare at guests,” Midwinter said, giving Carnelian a light nudge. “Even if those guests are of a people we’ve never seen before. I believe you said you were a kirin?” she said to Charcoal.

“Right, kirin, yeah,” Charcoal said. Shifting her attention from Carnelian to Midwinter made her less likely to wrap into herself. “We recently made context- contact with Equestria. It’s complicated.”

“Maybe you can tell us about it later.” As Midwinter sat down across from Bitterroot, he said, “Fuligin, could you get a light snack for our guests?” Fuligin gave a shallow bow and trotted off to the kitchen.

“Anyway, um.” Charcoal swallowed and managed a grin at Carnelian. “I’m- Charcoal and I’m- the- environmental magic specialist.”

“Carnelian Orchard,” came the reply. “And I apologize for my behavior. You are certainly… striking.”

“I’m actually pretty normal for a kirin. Except for my name- mane, that’s pretty thick, and people keep asking how I-”

“Are you two family?” Bitterroot couldn’t help asking. “I always heard it as ‘Midwinter’s family’, but you’re older, so…”

“Indeed. We’re mother and daughter.” Smiling, Midwinter gestured between herself and Carnelian. “See the resemblance?” They did look quite similar in build and facial structure; it helped that they were both chiropteri.

“It’s her family because she’s responsible for most of what we do,” said Carnelian. “I don’t mind.”

Fuligin returned, dropping a bowl of various vegetables on the coffee table. It wasn’t much — cabbage, carrots, some nuts — but it was fine for a snack. “So,” Midwinter said, “to what do we owe the pleasure of your company?” She leaned forward, plucked away a leaf of cabbage with her teeth, and started chewing.

“It’s, it’s about the ley line and the river,” Charcoal said. She levitated a carrot out, but didn’t seem interested in eating it just yet. (Bitterroot got her own cabbage leaf and began eating. Good cabbage.) “You might’ve heard, but we vent- went into Midwich Forest with some of your militiaponies and the river, it behaved weirdly in there. Like…” She wiggled the carrot. “At one point, it just- curves off to the east when it really shouldn’t, and I kinda wanted to follow it-”

Midwinter swallowed her cabbage and coughed. “I, I beg your pardon,” she said, her ears quivering, “but are you… going anywhere with this?”

“Right, sorry,” said Charcoal. She took a bite of carrot, swallowed it without chewing, continued. “Anyway, you all do plumbing work, right? And I don’t think it’s the case, but I just want to be sure you’re not- polluting the writer- river or anything and affecting the ley line. So, uh… what do you do, exactly?”

“It’s quite simple, really,” Midwinter said with a shrug. “Besides the actual laying of pipes, we make sure what’s in the water is only what we want in there. We collect it from the river, groundwater, precipitation, we maintain purifying spells to filter out pathogens, we fortify it with-”

“I mean exactly exactly,” said Charcoal. “The, the actual procedure. And what do you do with the vase water? Waste water. Do you just dump it back in the river? I don’t want to… be offensive or anything, but maybe you… missed something and-” She evidently decided she was being offensive, because she quickly stuffed the rest of the carrot in her mouth to stop talking.

Midwinter and Carnelian looked at each other. Behind them, Fuligin, still silent, was shifting his weight around and not-quite looking at, not-quite ignoring the group; one of his ears twitched. “I’m not sure we can show you,” Carnelian said eventually. “We’ve worked on it for years and it… has its foibles. You probably wouldn’t understand it.”

Charcoal actually seemed to take offense to that; she swallowed her carrot and leaned forward. “And I sill need to look at it. This is important, and we can’t just assume that-”

“It’s complicated,” said Carnelian, standing up slightly. “It has been built upon for over a decade and it hasn’t affected the line yet.”

“And I’d need to see the numbers to be sure.”

“There’s nothing to worry about! This is our work, something we know, and I won’t have a jumped-up Canterlotian proclaiming she knows better after a minute of examination! You can’t even say words right!”

“I need to look at it.” Charcoal cut in, leaning forward. Her voice was growing a bit tight, and Bitterroot swore she could feel some mild heat radiating off her. “Maybe you made some change recently, forgot about it, and it is affecting the ley line. Maybe it didn’t matter before but now that the ley line’s shifted, it does. You’ve know it for so long, you could be overlooking-”

“We can show you the setup of the Watering Cave tomorrow morning,” said Midwinter quickly. “It’s the same as for every other building in the valley. But trust us, you won’t find anything.”

“That’s all I’m asking,” Charcoal said. “Just a little bit of openness.” Then she blinked and nearly shrank into herself. “I nearly lost my temper that was bad I’m sorry,” she muttered.

Carnelian opened her mouth, only for Midwinter to shoot her a look. When Midwinter didn’t say anything, an awkward silence swooped in to fill the void. “Cabbage’s good,” Bitterroot said, destroying the silence and accentuating the awkwardness.

“It really is,” said Charcoal. She raised her head back up and cleared her throat. “That was- um- That was all I wanted to ask about, so, uh-” She turned for the door, happening to glance out the window. As a miner passed by, heading upriver, Charcoal immediately turned back to Midwinter. “Actually, quick question.” (Carnelian rolled her eyes.) “If we wanted to bet- get into the mine, what would be the best way to do that? It’s, y’know, ley line and all, it probably starts in the mine, and, yeah.” Swallow. “How could we get into the mine if we needed to? Just in case.”

“You’d have to talk to Duke Tallbush,” said Midwinter. “He-”

“Wait. Duke Tallbush?” Bitterroot repeated, sitting up straight. “He’s a noble?”

“Duke of Midwich,” said Midwinter. “And more than a noble, he owns Midwich Mine and the associated buildings.”

Right. Tratonmane had started because of the Fuel Vassalage Commission, hadn’t it? But that would require somepony to run the place, and Celestia might’ve been able to entice ponies with a noble title, even if one in a distant corner of Equestria. But that meant almost the entire town was dependent on Tallbush, so- “I guess it’s good he seems a decent stallion.”

“If he ever tried to exert too much control over the ponies here?” snorted Carnelian. “He may be powerful, but that means little if large enough of an angry mob is beating down the door, ready and willing to eat him raw.”

“And I hear horror stories, from time to time, of some of your covetous corporate heads down south,” said Midwinter. “None of those apply to him. Believe me, Tallbush is not a bloodsucking parasite in the slightest.”

“But we’ll need to talk to him to let us into the mine, since he owns it,” Charcoal said. Her tone was more completing Midwinter’s interrupted statement than a question of confirmation. “Got it. …Erm… That’s- all I have for today, and…” She gave a small bow to Midwinter and Carnelian. “Thank you for- your- meeting. Tomorrow. I’m sorry I nearly lost my temper.”

“Think nothing of it,” Midwinter said, waving a hoof. “It happens.”

Farewells were bade, and Bitterroot and Charcoal were soon walking back to Tratonmane. Charcoal’s pace was a bit fast, leaving Bitterroot to flap every few steps to keep up. “You alright?” she asked.

“…Sorta,” said Charcoal in a voice that indicated it was a very sorta sort of “sorta”.

“Do you want to talk about it?”

“No. Look, I was getting angry, and that, that would’ve been-” Charcoal sucked in a breath through clenched teeth. “-baaaaaaaaad.”

“Really?” asked Bitterroot. “C’mon, people lose their temper. There would’ve been bad blood between you and Carnelian for like a day, and then you’d both move on like adults. It wouldn’t be that bad.”

“I’m a kirin, remember?” Charcoal said flatly. “I burst into flame when I get angry.”

Right. Bitterroot’s memory was jogged hard enough to give her a headache. “…I take that back, it would be that bad.”

“Thanks,” Charcoal mumbled, hanging her head.

Bitterroot recognized that sort of expression. Time to shift Charcoal’s thoughts. “Well, they’re unburnt,” she said, “and you even set up a meeting. And it’s not even noon! The day could be going a lot worse.”

“Yeah. It could.” Charcoal didn’t sound enthusiastic, but she didn’t sound quite so morose, either.

“So do you know… that sort of magic? Water purification?”

Immediately, Charcoal raised her head again. “Oh, of course! Water purification’s one of the mean- main parts of my job. Every environmental mage needs to know at least the basics and I’m just a few potions short of being an alchemist. I’ll at least get the jib. Gist.”

“You’re sure?”

“Definitely. I wouldn’t be surprised if-” She glanced back at Midwinter’s house. “-if it’s just- kludgework they’ve all slapped on over the years. Or maybe it really is something new and I’ll need to stay up at night to study it! That’d be neat, too.”

“I think you and I have different definitions of ‘neat’.”

Charcoal quickly looked around, saw no one, and lowered her voice. “Yours is so dangerous you’ve already died twice.”

“Heh. Yeah.”

“It’s almost noon and I’m hungry. Think we should vined- find Amanita and Code for lunch?”

“Nah. Amanita knows I’ll be headed back for the inn, anyway. C’mon. Let’s get something to eat.”
> 9 - Ley of the Land
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

The pairs of pairs of Canterlotians found each other at the Watering Cave almost as soon as they arrived and, in the borderline-telepathic shared thoughts of hungry people everywhere, decided to get something to eat before talking any further. It wasn’t much, but it was food.

Lunch was the same sort of “fix it yourself” affair that breakfast had been, and Amanita’s resulting sandwich was acceptable. Once she had some grains and some greens in her guts, she asked the rest, “So… just to be clear, where do we stand?”

“This place is weird,” Charcoal said immediately. She took a small enough bite of her sandwich that she could still speak fairly clearly. “The wolves being nuts should be the result of the ley line going bad but isn’t. The timberwolves should be even wilder but aren’t. The trees shouldn’t be night trees because of the strength of the ley line but are. The river shouldn’t turn but does.” Swallow. “And I’m not even sure the ley line’s wrong in the same way as the original report.”

“Really?” asked Code. “It felt quite similar to me.”

“Yes,” said Charcoal. “Which is the problem.” She looked Code in the eye expectantly. “If we’re this close to the line’s surge- line’s source, it should feel different. Stronger, sharper, brighter. But it’s almost exactly the same. It’s like- Imagine if sound didn’t get any quieter as you got further from it.”

Code looked off into the distance and started tapping her hoof on the table. No magic; she was just thinking. And as her thoughts sped up, so too did her taps. “You’re right,” she said. “The readings in the report are from the station, not estimates of what we’d find at the source.”

“They probably didn’t have pills- skills for that,” said Charcoal. “They were, what, a meteorology station? What do those even do?”

“They monitor the last bits of magic spillover from weather teams all across Equestria, make sure it’s safe before it leaves Equestria,” said Bitterroot. “Badly-handled weather magic nearly caused war with Tarandusia a few centuries ago.” When everyone looked at her, she grinned. “You learn the neatest things with a good weather manager!”

“So they monitor the weather,” Charcoal said, still looking at Bitterroot. “And ley lines are in the ground. It’s kinda the wrong equipment, y’know? Wrong wrong. It’s amazing they picked it up at all.” Then she frowned and started pointing up and down with one of her hooves.

“Oh, and also,” said Amanita, “Pyrita was in the mine the very same day the ley line went bad. Maybe even the same hour. The line turned in the night, right?”

Code’s ears flicked forward. “…I don’t doubt you, but count it out.”

“Okay.” Amanita took a slice of her bread in her magic and ripped it to chunks. “Pyrita was in the mine seven days ago, right?” She lay down seven of those chunks. “Princess Twilight had said the station first noticed it three days ago at our meeting.” Three chunks next to the seven. “Plus the day we had the meeting.” Another. “Two more traveling here. And today.” Two rows of seven chunks. “What’s more, according to the report, the station also first saw the readings in the morning, when Pyrita vanished in the night. Arrastra thinks it’s a coincidence, but…”

“If that’s a coincidence, I’ll eat my glasses,” said Code. She stared at the bread with the intensity of a grandmaster at a chessboard. “Which might even explain why the Rite of Brave Spear worked so quickly when a well-made grain mother didn’t: the grain mother was working with the energy of the land, but the energy of the land was what rendered her comatose in the first place. So once we applied a different type of magic…”

“But why was she even in the mine?” asked Amanita. “It’s-”

“Amanita, we’re not here to puzzle out every little secret Tratonmane has. We can keep watch on Pyrita and assist her recovery, but ultimately, we’re trying to fix the ley line first.” Code shrugged. “Priorities.”

Priorities sucked. Pyrita in bed like that had looked an awful lot like Zinnia, probably with the same sort of pony who’d take her death badly. Part of Amanita, a large part, wanted to break off from the mission and figure out exactly what was wrong with Pyrita so they could heal her. But there were more ponies involved than Pyrita alone, so Amanita just nodded and swiped up her bread again.

Bitterroot coughed, and when she spoke, her voice was low, furtive. “Hey, uh…” She lowered it even further. “Cabin’s listening to us.” She jerked her head towards the bar, where Cabin was dicing carrots and angling both her ears their way.

“Which she can do,” said Code. “This is about her home and it won’t hurt anyone. Keeping it a secret would be more trouble than it’s worth.”

“Oh.”

“And believe me: if this was classified, you would most certainly not be here.”

“Are there any stations or outposts or whatever specifically monitoring ley lines?” Charcoal asked. “This one especially.”

“There are a few, mostly in the heartland, but they’re rare,” said Code. “Why?”

“Because I would really like to know how that meteor station sensed the ley line shift.”

“There are instruments-”

“I know that,” said Charcoal. “But it’s looking for stuff in the air and it found stuff in the ground. And that says a lot about the ley line, doesn’t it? About how strong the change is. But what if-” She waggled a hoof at Amanita and Code. “What if this is just the first time we’ve noticed it? If it was changing for a while and that station just didn’t notice it before? It was too small a change for anything to pick up?”

“I’ve been thinking about that,” said Code, “although not to any great degree. It seems that-”

“Wait, no,” said Charcoal, frowning. “The food here’s too good. …Yes, that’s important, don’t look at me like that! If the ley line was bad, the crops here wouldn’t grow merely- nearly as well. …What if it’d gone bad before, gotten fixed, and the wolves are the… leftovers? They’re several years old, but the plants are technically new…”

“No offense, but that kinda sounds like a long shot,” said Amanita.

“Oh, it is, totally,” Charcoal replied, nodding. “I’m just slimeballing here. …No, spitballing. Spitballing. I wonder if we could test it at al- Deaths! We could look through Tratonmane’s death certificates. If there’s a lot of violent deaths from wolves at a certain point, well, there we go.”

“It’s something to look into if we have no other options,” said Code.

“But for now, we ought to do some surveys down near the treeline, get a good feel for the ley line. Not in the trees, of course. A forest of night trees is not where I want to do some research.”

Amanita felt her stomach knot up a little. She still hadn’t learned much on actually feeling the ley line. Maybe she’d learn more during the work (finally), but… Imagine if she couldn’t. She’d just be standing there gormlessly as other people did her work. And since learning how to work with ley lines was the whole reason she’d come out here…

“If we still can’t find out much, we’ll tune the geothaumometers and leave them running overnight. No need to dig any of those out yet, those’re big.”

Which was unfortunate; Amanita had a decent handle on geothaumometers. Simply put and oversimplified, they were tools that recorded the general magic of the land in an area. Circe had taught her how to make simple ones in case she wasn’t sure if she was in the right flow for certain rituals. She could set up a geothaumometer.

But her job’s needs were her job’s needs, and her job didn’t need a geothaumometer yet.

The group polished off the rest of their food over idle chatter. Bitterroot was the first to speak up. “Say, uh, land magic isn’t really my thing-” (You and me both, thought Amanita.) “-so do you want me to look through them and see what I can find?”

Code looked at Bitterroot, then turned to Amanita. “Can you come with me on every future field mission? I like having an unpaid lackey who continually shows initiative.”

“Careful. Slavery’s illegal,” Bitterroot said, grinning.

“You’re doing this of your own free will,” said Code. “And what happens in Midwich stays in Midwich. If you want to do so, go ahead. We’ll be heading down to the treeline.”

The second they were outside the Cave, though, Bitterroot pulled Amanita to one side. “Have you tried that communication device thing yet?” she asked.

“Uh…” Amanita half-glanced after Code and Charcoal. “No.”

“They’re really neat, you should give them a try,” Bitterroot said. She held out an earpiece. “We can talk to each other if we get bored. Or if more wolves come out and you need me to call in the cavalry.”

“Eh…” Code and Charcoal were getting further away every second. “Yeah sure I’ll do that but I need to go sorry bye.” Amanita snatched up the earpiece and put it on as she galloped after the other two.

Tratonmane looked different in the light. Happier, safer, more welcoming. Midwich Forest didn’t. It was still a grim, dark thicket of upward-facing thorns that looked ready to swallow you up. But Charcoal came to a stop still plenty a decent ways away from the trees. “I don’t think we’ll need to go any closer than this,” she said, looking over her shoulder. “We’re far enough away from Tratonmane.”

“Great,” said Code. “Amanita, have you worked with ley lines before?”

“Uh…” Amanita thought back. There was the time that Circe-

Code realized something and added, “In a way that wasn’t ripping power from them?”

“…No.”

“Square one, then. Don’t worry, it’s simple enough,” said Code. She planted her hooves; Amanita felt the ground ripple around her. “Reach out with your magic. Let it burrow into the ground like roots. You’ll feel the ley current in the space between the dirt. From there, just let your magic breathe. Take in the ley energies, but don’t hold on too tightly, or you could disrupt the fabric.”

Amanita blinked. Roots? Code was good at explaining rituals, but this was something else. “…Uh-huh.”

“Does that make sense, or…?”

“Yeah, I, I think I got it.” Maybe.

Before Code could say anything, Charcoal was on her other side. “Hey. Code. You’ve felt the eddies, right?” she asked. “Tiny little vortexes. Vortices? Like, whirlpools.” She held her hooves about an inch apart.

“I have,” Code said, wheeling around. “Aren’t they common in ley lines?”

“Yes, but did you notice their patterns? They’re not quite as regular as they should be. It’s more like-”

Amanita cleared her throat. The conversation was getting away from her, so she might as well get away from it. “I’ll- I’ll be over there,” she said, pointing eastward. Code and Charcoal only spared her a quick nod, so off she went.

As the sun set, the east side was going to stay in sunlight longer, so Bitterroot was going to take what sunlight she could get. It’d help with morale.

She closed her eyes and breathed deeply. Burrow. Burrow. Like roots. Like roots. Gradually, over years? What in Tartarus did that mean? And what about “burrow”? Stabbing? Let it trickle down? Actually dig in the dirt? Given the way ritual magic worked, that last one wasn’t totally a joke…

Okay. She’d try stabbing. Stabbing into the dirt. Not physically. Magically. She gathered her magic and tried just jabbing her awareness into the earth. Like… so.

…Now what?

Amanita waited. Nothing happened, including brainstorms. She didn’t feel anything very different. The ley line was there, but she could feel so little of it… She pulled back into herself and looked off down Midwich Valley. The sun was moving and the westernmost parts of the gorge were already in shadow. Better get a move on.

Suddenly, she heard Bitterroot’s voice in her ears. “Amanita?”

Amanita yelped and looked behind her. Bitterroot was nowhere to be seen. But she had that earpiece. “…How do I get this to work?” she asked no one in particular.

“Just talk,” said Bitterroot. “I can hear you just fine.”

“Okay.” Swallow. “Um, are you… doing okay?”

“Fine. Just fine. I was just checking in with you. How’s the job going?”

Amanita’s cheeks burned. “It’s… going alright.”

“…You sure?”

“Yeah. It’s… It’s going.”

“Are you doing alright?”

“…It’s complicated. The, the magic I’m working on, not-” Amanita cringed at herself. “I’m dealing with magic I’ve never dealt with before.”

“Think you might need to get something from the inn to help?”

“Maybe. Look, it’s- I don’t need any distractions, okay?”

“…Alright. Shutting up.”

And Bitterroot didn’t say anything more. At least the brief conversation had let Amanita re-orient herself. She sat back down and closed her eyes again.

But whatever she was looking for, it didn’t come. And it didn’t come for long enough for the sun to move and whisk away her light, leaving her sitting in shadow. Lumberjacks passed her by on the road, even dragging a giant stump. And when some foals started playing a game just out of sight, Amanita stopped trying to focus.

Just what was she doing wrong? Was she misunderstanding Code’s directions? She hadn’t before, not in the moons she’d worked with Code. Code was the High Ritualist for a reason, after all. Was it her own fault? Was she just doomed to not know anything other than necromancy? Or was it something else? Was this train of thought overly pessimistic? (Yes. Did knowing that do anything to stop it? No.)

Amanita paced, staring at the ground, struggling to clear her head. This was okay. She’d been brought up here to learn. But if it was her own teacher she wasn’t learning from-

Some of the foals yelled more loudly than usual. A moment later, a ball came bouncing out of the darkness. Amanita idly snatched it up with her magic and waited for the inevitable. A few more moments later, high-pitched squeaking came out of the darkness to batter Amanita’s eardrums, quickly followed by the filly making that squeaking. She was a chiropterus, maybe ten or eleven years old, although her hooves were chunky, like an earth pony’s. Eyeshine glinted through her misty breath as she looked up at Amanita. “Who’re you?” she asked in the innocent curiosity of foals everywhere. “I’m Wythe.”

Amanita cringed inside; you could mess up in front of a crowd, but at least the adults would learn to read the room and ignore you. Foals behaved like they didn’t know a thing about social etiquette. At least, that was what she imagined; she hadn’t interacted with foals enough to really say. So she just said, “I’m Amanita.” A pause, a wave. “Hello.”

“Ye’re not from here,” said Wythe, cocking her head.

“I’m not. I’m visiting from Canterlot. I’m fixing a ley line.” Or would that just confuse Wythe? Too late now.

“My ma says yer a Canterlout.”

Amanita shrugged. Hardly the worst thing she’d been called, even in the past year alone. “Does she.”

“Dae ye ken whit that means?”

“…It means your mother respects me a lot, even if she doesn’t show it.”

Wythe flicked an ear. She didn’t look particularly convinced, even by Amanita’s limited experience. “What’re ye doin’?”

Celestia. Imagine failing being quizzed by a foal. “I’m- trying to feel out the ley line,” Amanita said. “But I’m having a hard time with it.”

“Then why’re ye doin’ it?”

Amanita opened her mouth. Nothing came out.

“Wythe!” a foal squeaked. “Didye get the ball?” And before Amanita could respond, Wythe had darted forward, snatched the ball away from her, and gone flapping back into the night, leaving Amanita wondering.

It was… Well, it was simple why she was doing it this way. Code had said so and Code had decades of experience in deep magic like this. She knew how it worked. Her instructions were right. She was a good teacher. If something was going wrong, it was Amanita’s problem, not Code’s. Right?

Right?

But Amanita was a unicorn. Code was an earth pony. Her instructions had sounded very earth-pony-focused: roots, breathing, soil. Instructions from her experience, which was all well and good until she tried to teach somepony who didn’t have her experience at all. And Code’s teaching experience was in rituals, a species-irrelevant discipline, not shaped magic.

Amanita had had a teacher of shaped magic once before. An earth pony teacher. A good teacher, one who could start her from nothing and whip her into an elite in just a few years.

Circe. For necromancy.

Circe had been a lich. When she still existed, she’d been a terrible person: selfish, sociopathic, egomaniacal, abusive. She’d also been a rather effective teacher when she wasn’t screaming invectives. She’d laid out the goal, which methods she used, why, and the ways Amanita might apply herself. She hadn’t known enough about unicorn magic to say anything definite. Yet her instructions, vague as they were, had still worked.

“See, to make a thrall, you gotta make it do what you want; otherwise, it’s just meat. I’m an earth pony, I can make plants grow. I just coax the thralls same way I do flowers. You gotta do somethin’ else… ’Ow d’you make gravity ignore your levitation?”

The cold had nothing to do with the way Amanita shivered. All the lessons she could’ve remembered, and it had to be one of the ones she’d most hoped to forget… Her heart pounded in her chest as she took deep breaths. But it’d been an effective lesson, if you ignored morality. It’d only taken a few moons for Amanita to start binding the souls of the dead to be her slaves.

Maybe that was because Amanita was a necromancer, nothing more. Or maybe it was just because Code was a crappy teacher with regards to ley lines. Amanita needed something closer to home. A unicorn well-learned in environmental magic, preferably.

A kirin was probably close enough, though.

Amanita found Charcoal much more quickly than she thought she would. She hadn’t moved from the road and was simply sitting on the cobblestones, eyes closed and horn alit, humming a light and bouncy tune. It was almost a shame to disturb her, but disturb her Amanita did. “Uh, Charcoal?”

Whatever trance Charcoal was in wasn’t deep enough to divorce her from reality. Without a twitch, Charcoal turned to face Amanita. “Yeah? Did you find something?”

“No,” admitted Amanita. “I- I’m- I don’t know what I’m looking for. I’m- I don’t know anything about this.”

“But…” One of Charcoal’s rear legs twitched, bumping the ground with the front of her hooves. “Didn’t Code give instructions on this? I saw you two together.”

“Code is-” Amanita glanced guiltily over her shoulder and dropped her voice. “When it comes to this, her teaching sucks. She’s a ritualist and an earth pony. She doesn’t work with earth magic enough to simplify it, and she was born with a connection to the earth, so she doesn’t know what I’m missing. But, but you, you’re our environmental mage and not an earth pony. You’re good at this, even if I haven’t seen it yet. And- And maybe you can teach it to me.”

Charcoal blinked owlishly at Amanita. Amanita felt her face burning. What had she done? Had she made some kirin faux pas? Had she-

“You think I’m good at this?” asked Charcoal quietly.

Amanita’s thought processes stumbled, maybe sprained an idea on the way down. “W-well… yeah,” she said. “You’ve- You were the one assigned here, after all, you… have to be good.” Right?

“…Thanks, but…” Charcoal shook her head. “Should you be contil- complimenting me like that? All the stuff I’ve done is easy. Anyone could do it.”

“Only if they know how. Do you-” A quick glance around; they were alone. “Do you know how to resurrect the dead?”

“No.”

“View their past?”

“No.”

“Banish any zombies we come across?”

“No. And now that I think about it, this is a good place for zombies-”

“Of course you don’t. Because all those? My job.” Amanita tapped herself on the chest. “They’re easy for me. But environmental magic is your job, so of course that’s easy for you. And, look, most of what we’ve done here has been based on your decisions. You know what to look for. So…” Swallow. “Maybe you can help me?”

Charcoal’s ears wiggled. She looked down and pawed at the ground. Her tail twisted around itself. Then she raised her head and said, “Have you ever been in a shower with a broken head? Or a broken hot tub?”

Amanita’s thoughts twisted another idea. “Uh… y-yeah.”

“You know how it just felt wrong, even if you didn’t know why? You just knew there was something wrong with the… with the flow.”

Dots began to be connected. “…Yeah.”

“Ley lines are kinda like that when you start. You just kinda spread your magic like a night- like a net and…” Charcoal held her hooves far apart and wiggled them. “…feel them. Don’t worry about the specifics of the energies in them yet, just feel the flow. The… the vibe. And once you’ve got that, start feeling how plants are taking it in because they know the right way to do it. And once you’ve got that… I dunno, come back to me and we’ll figure it out.”

“That sounds… really hazy.”

“Oh, it is,” Charcoal said. “And don’t expect to get it right away. But, really, you just need to try it. Then you’ll know what you can talk about.”

Amanita kept turning the instructions over and over in her head as she walked back to her assigned location. As much as they were hazy, they were better than Code’s instructions. Looser to account for changes, a more definite goal to direct her efforts to.

So. Amanita sat down on a rock and let her magic spread. She kept her awareness on it as she probed downward. The main magic of the ley line came easily, but as moments stretched into minutes and she wiggled down through the dirt, she became aware of a… shift. Where she ought to be sensing something one way but instead sensed it another. Like bass she felt rather than heard. More than magic, the line was a sense of place. This wasn’t just an easy font of energy; this was Tratonmane. Yet it was off slightly, like that Tratonmane that was wasn’t the Tratonmane that should be. The parts that were wrong.

A good start, but not quite enough to start poking at plants. She needed to get familiar with it. Not drawing her magic in at all, Amanita took deep breaths. In, out, in, out, in, o-

She was slouching to one side. She flinched and sat up straight again. Drifting off would b-

…Which way was she leaning?

She opened her eyes and looked. North. Away from the line’s probable source. In the direction of the flow.

Huh.

Amanita almost grinned. “Almost” because it could be coincidental. Maybe she was on a slope.

But the direction was accurate enough to make her suspicious. And if this worked, then one of her roadblocks had just been demolished. She closed her eyes again. More deep breaths. In, out, in, out…





Bitterroot’s confidence at saying she’d look for death certificates had hid one very important fact: she didn’t know where the death certificates were, assuming they even existed. But being a bounty hunter was all about tracking people down, and people moved, while stationery remained stationary. She could do this. Besides, she had a pretty good idea: town hall. So once the ritualists headed north, Bitterroot crossed the square to the town hall in question, quill, ink, and parchment in hoof.

Small-town town halls always made her feel a bit weird. Those halls were so… small. (Har har.) Small enough that they occasionally straddled the line between a small office building and a large house, which made Bitterroot think knocking and being let in was the correct way to enter out of politeness, even though they were public buildings and she shouldn’t have to be let in like that. It was a stupid habit that cost her more time than it was worth, one she really needed to get out of.

Bitterroot knocked on the front door three times. “Helloooooo?” she called out. “Anyone in there?” No answer.

Ten seconds later, still no answer.

Bitterroot flared her wings and ascended to the circular window above the door. Peering through the quadranted frame, she couldn’t see… much of anything. Noon meant it was light in Tratonmane, but with the boarded-up windows and unlit lamps, it was still dark as pitch in the town hall. Nobody was home. She dropped back to the ground and nudged the door open. It didn’t creak, which made going into the lightless building only slightly less of a spooky idea.

“Hello? Anyone?”

Only her echoes responded, and they didn’t sound particularly confident.

But in the incoming sunlight, Bitterroot spotted the long, thin shape of a lamplighting pole. She lit the candle at the end and did a circuit of the main room, lighting the oil lamps on the wall. They were soon burning… not quite merrily, but they were burning, and that meant she had light. On a final whim, she yelled, “No one?” No one answered. Which probably said something about her: she asked if anyone was there, there wasn’t a response from anyone, so she asked the same question. And then she did it again. Smart.

This was a public building; maybe she could go looking through other rooms for death certificates. Come to think of it, Tallbush had said the town library was in here, right? For the farmers’ records. And he’d said she could just go in, so- No, these were official documents. It’d be rude to go around rooting them without clearer permission. And rudeness carried a lot more weight here than it did in someplace like Canterlot, Manehattan, or San Franpinto.

Bitterroot decided she’d wait a little, see if anyone came who she could talk to. At least the building was reasonably not-cold. She arched her back like a cat and stretched her wings. Simply not having a wind to chill her did a lot to let her warm up, and there was the way the air inside was warmer anyway. Yeah, she could stay here for a while. Maybe even-

“What’re ye doin’, pokin’ ’round here?”

With a yelp, Bitterroot spun around. Tallbush was standing in the entryway, door open behind him, glaring at her. “Town property’s in ’ere,” he said, taking a step forward. “Ye didnae damify arythin’, did ye?”

Assuming “damify” meant “damage”, Bitterroot raised her hooves. “Whoa, hey, I was just looking for you. I didn’t touch anything.”

Tallbush glanced at the lanterns and his eyebrow went up like an elevator.

“Okay, aside from those. But I wasn’t going to touch anything. I was just looking for you and it was out of the cold and… Yeah.”

There was a long moment as the two looked at each other. Then Tallbush huffed, “Fine.” From the way his ears were moving, he wasn’t quite as tense. “What’re ye a-lookin’ fer?”

“Death certificates.”

Whatever Tallbush had been expecting, it clearly wasn’t that. His jaw briefly sagged. “Death certificates?” Confusion had bulled out any tension.

“If you’ve got them,” said Bitterroot. “We were hoping to trace any violent deaths in the past, just to see what the wolves have been like. Just in case.”

“Doubt ye’ll find arythin’,” Tallbush said with a shrug, “but I’ll show ye. Library’s right back ’ere.”

It was one of the doorways leading off from the back of the room, to be precise. The plaque above the door marked it as Library and Public Documents. As Tallbush lit the lamps in the room beyond, it was revealed as a long, somewhat cramped one, not nearly the grand display of books that “library” conjured up. Still, shelves and drawers lined the walls and more were freestanding in the empty floor space, all with their own labels telling what they held. Several tables had books on them that had yet to be properly put away. A small town’s haphazard library was still a library.

When Bitterroot took a step forward, she felt something beneath her. She looked down; the floor had infrequent bits and pieces of dirt and other outdoor debris, tracked in and left uncleaned.

“Beggin’ yer pardon,” said Tallbush as he came back around, “but, eh… ’tis a bit hard tae get in here an’ clean.”

“And you keep putting it off?” Bitterroot asked.

“…Aye. C’mon in.”

It was just wide enough that Bitterroot didn’t need to squeeze in to follow, but it was close. More books were scattered around that she needed to avoid, all of them in surprisingly good condition. After seeing that, the library seemed to be dirty mostly because keeping it clean would be an exercise in futility. (And cramped work, admittedly.)

Bitterroot and Tallbush emerged near the back of the room near a set of small tables, each piled with more books, and at the very back of the room was a large wooden… assembly that looked like a filing cabinet’s… Not quite father. First cousin once removed. A relative, at any rate.

“Right in here,” Tallbush said, unlocking the cabinet. “How many d’ye need?”

“…All of them?”

Tallbush gave Bitterroot a Look, but levitated a number of thick folders out. “Jes’ leave ’em out when ye’re done an’ I’ll get ’em later.” Then he blinked and looked back inside. “Oh, cuss it all…” he muttered, his ears back. “Hawthorn must’ve…”

“Something wrong?” Bitterroot asked.

Tallbush hastily relocked the cabinet. “Well-” His eyes darted back and forth, like he was think about something very quickly. “There’s a- book,” he said, digging through one of the piles of literature on the table. “An’ it’s- important tae the town, but ain’t where it ought tae be. Must needs findin’.” He wasn’t looking at her and his digging was growing frantic.

In a combination of might-as-well generosity and need-to-work-in-peace greed, Bitterroot asked, “What’s it look like? I can help.”

Tallbush’s digging faltered for a moment. Then he said, “Old. Real old. Brown cover, got a crossed circle on it.”

“Got it. I’ll be over there.” Bitterroot moved towards the door, poking her muzzle into each pile she saw. Maybe the book had just fallen off a pile while being moved. She knew how easy it was to misplace one.

She was entering the narrow aisles when something caught her eye. It wasn’t physical, more of a nagging feeling, gut instinct. Bitterroot looked in the gap between two bookcases; a book seemed to have slipped in. When she pulled it out, the first thing she knew was that it was old. There was no one thing she could put her hoof on, just an overall feeling of age, from the pages to the smell to the cover. Speaking of the cover, Bitterroot took a look at it. A crossed circle was embossed on there, just like Tallbush had said.

“Hey,” Bitterroot said. “This it?” She held the book up carefully, just in case it was easily damaged.

Tallbush looked ready to kiss her when he saw the book. “Aye, that’s it,” he said. He levitated the book from her with even more delicacy than she’d treated it. “Thankee.”

“You weren’t kidding when you said the book was old,” said Bitterroot. “What’s in it?”

“ ’Tis, ’tis the- founder’s journal,” Tallbush replied as he closely examined the book. “Back frae when Tratonmane firs’ got its start. Mighty important piece o’ Tratonmane’s hist’ry, it is. Mighty important.”

“So…” Bitterroot recalled what she’d heard over the past few days. “That’s two or three hundred years old, right? From the Fuel Vassalage Commission?”

And the second Bitterroot mentioned the Commission, Tallbush’s ears flattened. “Aye,” he grumbled. “Two hunnert sixty-eight year old.”

Already, Bitterroot could feel the tension growing like a spool was winding up the atmosphere. Trying to change the subject, she quickly asked, “How do you lose something like that?” She tried to keep it casual rather than anything approaching derisive.

“Eh. Dinnae ken,” Tallbush said, shrugging. His voice hadn’t changed much. “There are moments when ye ferget what’s important and the li’l things jus’… slip through the cracks.” A pause. “Ye’d best get to it.” And he stalked out of the room. Bitterroot craned her neck to watch him cross the main room and enter the door on the other side. His office?

None of her business. What was her business was the death certificates. All of them, as she’d told Tallbush. Taking a look at the deaths for an entire town might’ve seemed intimidating for most ponies, but Bitterroot knew a thing or two about death rates. She didn’t know Tratonmane’s population, so she guessed it was between five hundred and a thousand ponies. Assuming it shared Equestria’s death rates, that put it at three to six deaths per year. Still a large number, given Tratonmane’s multi-century history, but not overwhelming.

She moved the folders to a certain table and took a seat, laying out her quill and scroll. In front of her, a nice big window gave her a clear view of the square, the Great Ash, even the window into their own room at the Watering Cave. With the sun directly overhead, Tratonmane looked like a perfectly normal small town in the light, as long as you ignored the sheer rock wall behind it. It would make for a nice view, if only for half an hour. But by then, Bitterroot would be zoning out on work and not notice the view.

She leafed through the certificates. Fortunately, the design hadn’t changed much over the centuries. She looked over the top one, locating the pony’s name, age, year of death, cause of death. From just this year, in fact.



Nimble Wind — 72 — died 1005 — old age



“Old age” might not fly in Canterlot, where they wanted things like “heart failure” or “pneumonia”, but it was clearly not violent, and that was good enough for Bitterroot. On her paper, she scratched out “1005” and scrawled an N (nonviolent) right next to it.



Mattydale — 34 — died 1005 — wolf attack



Bitterroot’s heart twinged in sympathy and a V went next to 1005. And soon she was rattling away, ticking off year after year. She didn’t pay any attention to patterns yet; there wasn’t much point until she got all the data.



Halifax — 71 — died 989 — died in his sleep





Minty Fresh — 56 — died 989 — killed by bear





Shining Comet — 64 — died 989 — old age



After a little while, she figured she’d check in on Amanita, just to be sure. It was why she’d had Amanita wear the earpiece, after all. She slipped hers on and said, “Amanita?”

There was a yelp on the other end. Right. Amanita hadn’t heard it before. The sound quality was a bit of a shock. After a moment, Amanita asked, “…How do I get this to work?”

Bitterroot grinned to herself. “Just talk. I can hear you just fine.”

“Okay. Um, are you… doing okay?”

“Fine. Just fine.” She marked off another row. “I was just checking in with you. How’s the job going?”

“It’s… going alright.”

Bitterroot hesitated. That wasn’t an “alright” tone of voice. “You sure?”

“Yeah. It’s… It’s going.”

Another try, then. “Are you doing alright?”

“…It’s complicated. The, the magic I’m working on, not- I’m dealing with magic I’ve never dealt with before.”

“Think you might need to get something from the inn to help?” Maybe she could meet Amanita there, talk things out face-to-face.

“Maybe. Look, it’s- I don’t need any distractions, okay?”

Amanita was having trouble with something, and she was having trouble admitting she was having trouble with something. It was obvious from her voice. But if Bitterroot pressed, Amanita would only clam up more. So instead, she said, “Alright. Shutting up.”

She waited another few moments, in case Amanita said anything. No words came. Sighing, Bitterroot put her quill back to the scroll and continued working.



Northern Gale — 39 — died 963 — bears





Long Distance — 92 — died 963 — old age





Wicklow — 73 — died 963 — old age



Scribble, scribble, scribble. The day dragged on. The valley floor slipped into darkness as the sun set and soon one hour was much the same as the next. Or was it just minutes? Hard to say. Tratonmane dimmed slightly as less light bounced down to it from the canyon walls, but it was practically nothing.



Windrow — 23 — died 946 — attacked by wolf while on patrol





Granite Whetstone — 44 — died 946 — wolf attack





Equinox — 37 — died 946 — bear attack



And Bitterroot didn’t mind. She’d slipped into a sort of trance as she worked; it would’ve been called mind-numbing, but she was still fully aware, simply running on automatic. It was a state that had been honed through plenty of stakeouts. Death after death passed her by and she recorded all the relevant details.



Springroot — 68 — died 901 — passed in her sleep





Pressure Front — 71 — died 901 — old age





Glendale — 76 — died 901 — old age



She heard Amanita’s voice at several points, talking to someone who seemed to be a foal and later to Charcoal. Amanita seemed unaware that she was still wearing the earpiece; she sounded a bit better than before, and seemed to actually be making headway with Charcoal. Good for her.



Pyronimbus — 71 — died 842 — passed in her sleep





Glissanda — 48 — died 842 — bear





Dewdrop — 79 — died 842 — old age



A light flickered in her vision and she looked up. Across the square, on the other side of the Ash, the light in their room at the Watering Cave had come on. A unicorn was digging through their luggage, levitating this and that out of the way as they looked for whatever. Apparently, Amanita hadn’t cracked whatever problem she’d been facing. And forgotten where the ritual instruments had been stored. “Hey, Amanita?”

It took Amanita a few moments to respond. “Yeah?”

“Most of our gear’s in that storage room on the ground floor, not our quarters.”

For some reason, she sounded baffled. “I… I know that. Why’re you telling me this?”

“Well, I’m watching you dig through our luggage, and-”

“What do you mean? I’m still down near the treeline.”

Time seemed to crawl and the bottom fell out of Bitterroot’s stomach as she stared, slack-jawed, at the unicorn across the street, sifting through their bags.

“…Bitterroot?”

“Oh, Celestia, THERE’S SOMEONE IN OUR ROOM.”
> 10 - Cold Pursuit
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

Bitterroot bolted from the library, sending papers everywhere in her wake, beating her wings to get her faster. She didn’t know why somepony would be in their room at the inn, but that didn’t matter. It couldn’t be anything good, anyway.

She blew out the front door of the town hall and sped across the square to the Watering Cave, reckless in the dark. Amanita was saying something in her ear, so she plucked the earpiece out and pocketed it. Concentration. When she reached the door, she spread her wings wide to let them yank her to a halt, then carefully nudged the door open.

The common room was empty. Not even Cabin was behind the bar. With no crowd din to cover her sounds up, Bitterroot nearly said something uncouth. She delicately trod across the floor, keeping her steps as light as possible. Her ears were pricked for any sounds of movement. Nothing except vague rustles upstairs. Paper?

They could be looking through the teams’ notes. Bitterroot would bet money that Amanita had brought along notes on some necromantic spell or another. If she was found out… Bitterroot sped up as much as she dared. She reached the stairs with no problem and carefully moved on up. Thankfully, her furs blunted the worst of the hoof-on-wood impact muffling the clip-clop that could’ve been there otherwi-

One of the steps creaked.

Bitterroot froze, mentally cursing herself. She’d known about that step, she’d heard it several times as she went up and down, why did she need to forget about it right then? But maybe the robber hadn’t heard it. It wasn’t a loud sound. Bitterroot craned her ears, listening for any activity that might be panic on the robber’s part, but she heard nothing.

Even the sounds of paper had stopped.

Discarding all attempts at stealth, Bitterroot scrambled up the steps just in time to hear something crash on the other side of the door. She slammed into it hard, but it didn’t budge. Again; nothing, blocked. There were frenzied hooffalls and the high-pitched hum of cast magic as the thief sped up their-

Window. She’d seen them through the window. She could get through the window. Bitterroot shoved off the door and very nearly flew back down to the common room and out the entrance. Still no one, at least that she could see. The window up above was open; a quick flap took her up. The lights were on, but nopony was home. Bitterroot swore; they must’ve gotten the same idea just before her and she missed them in the dark, maybe by just a few seconds.

But how far could a unicorn get in those few seconds? She dropped back down. Hoofprints? No dice; the area was heavily trafficked and the prints of the crowd blended together. Bitterroot turned around, squinting in the dark, wishing she’d protected her night vision. No obvious dark shapes, nobody in the lamps. Maybe they’d gone behind. Bitterroot jinked around the corner, into the narrow roads behind the inn-

Jackpot. A cloaked pony with a tall hood was walking away from the building, not too far away. Bitterroot sped up to reach them- and quickly slowed down. Up close, she could see they had wings, dark red ones. Pegasus.

Although… Bitterroot quickly sped up again and tapped them on the shoulder. “Hey!” she said. “Hey, can I talk to you?”

The pony turned around. Stallion. He was big up close, almost a head taller than Bitterroot, appearing even taller by his pointy hood. It was hard to make his face out in the dim light, but his fur was gray. He looked down at Bitterroot, wordless.

“Have you seen anypony in the last few seconds?” she asked quickly. “Unicorn, came running around here, maybe carrying something-”

The pegasus shook his head and turned back around, continuing on his way. Bitterroot cursed and looked around him. No one. She spun, looked back around-

A-ha. Not far away, Bitterroot espied another pony, trotting down the road away from the Cave. A pony with a horn. Praying it was the right pony, Bitterroot flap-trotted after them, using her wings to land softly and her hooves to push herself forward. It was slower than she’d’ve liked, but it kept the noise down.

But before she could catch up, the pony jinked to one side, ducking into the animal attack bunker in the hill. Bitterroot quit the quiet to propel herself right up to the doorway, where she looked down the steps. The light gems inside were glowing fitfully and the pony was nowhere to be seen.

Into the dim, unground bunker. Great. If only she’d explored more when she’d been inside yesterday; she’d stayed in the first room, not looking for any sort of layout or alternate exit. But if somepony was trying to sabotage them, she needed to find out who. Stilling her wings and keeping her hoofsteps light, Bitterroot entered the bunker.





“Oh, Celestia, THERE’S SOMEONE IN OUR ROOM.”

Those words made Amanita’s blood run cold. She had notes on necromancy in there and if they got out- It was only for a moment, but it felt like her body locked up for ages. Canterlot hadn’t been the greatest once she’d revealed herself to be a necromancer, and she had Princess Twilight’s approval there. Out here, on her own, being forced out…

But at some point, she decided she’d worry about it later, because she was galloping for Charcoal. “I’m getting Code and Charcoal,” she said. “Stay safe.” Stay safe? What kind of a reassurance was that? Once she was just spitting out and hoping it was true.

Charcoal still hadn’t moved. She looked up as Amanita approached; Amanita cut her off with, “Bitterroot says there’s someone in our room.”

Charcoal was slow to reorient. Blinking at Amanita, she asked, “What do you-”

“Someone’s breaking into our room and looking through our stuff!” hissed Amanita. “I don’t know if they want to steal anything or- Do you know where Code is?”

“No.” Charcoal promptly threw back her head and yelled, “Code! Get over here!” The sound bounced up and down the valley, magnified by its own echoes. Down in Midwich Forest, birds were startled from their branches.

Okay. Maybe… that would work. Charcoal was up, pacing a circle in the snow. Amanita nearly joined her; she didn’t know what to do, and if-

Code came galloping from the dark and kicked up a wave of snow as she slid to a stop. “What happened?” she asked quickly.

“Bitterroot said she saw somepony in our room and-”

“Follow me,” Code said, and began sprinting back towards town. Amanita and Charcoal followed her immediately, somehow only barely managing to keep up in spite of Code’s short height. “Amanita, you still have that earpiece, right?”

“…Yeah!” Amanita said breathlessly. “Bitterroot! Bitterroot, are you there?”

Silence on the other.

“Bitterroot! What’s going on?”

Nothing.

“She’s not responding,” Amanita said.

“She could’ve just taken the earpiece off,” said Code. “Don’t worry too much yet.”

By the time they reached the Watering Cave, Amanita’s heart was protesting and Charcoal was breathing heavily. Code seemed to notice, because she said, “Wait here. I’ll see if they’re still inside.” And in she went.

Amanita’s heart wasn’t protesting so much that she couldn’t still be alert. Even just not running anymore made her aches start to subside. Amanita looked up at the window. Somepony might come out that way to escape Code. A hasty glance around showed nopony near. Not Bitterroot, not anyone suspicious.

Code came trotting back out. “Door’s locked, didn’t see Bitterroot,” she said quickly. She fixed her eyes on the window above. She crouched, wiggled her rump like a cat, and propelled herself straight up, where she hooked her hooves around the sill. A look inside, a curse, and she dropped back down. “Nopony’s in there and somepony moved a bed to block the door,” she said. She nudged up her glasses to wipe down her face. “Okay. Possible thief, pony MIA. But she was a bounty hunter, maybe she’s chasing the perp. Amanita, can you think of a reason why Bitterroot would remove her earpiece?”

“Focus,” Amanita said. “If she ever gets it in her head to do something, she tries to avoid all distractions.”

“Hmm.” Code tapped her chin. “Plausible. Did she only mention one pony?”

“It sounded like that, but I can’t be sure.”

“Alright. Do the two of you feel up to searching the town?”

Did she? Amanita flexed her legs as Code added, “You don’t need to be hasty about it. Simply ask if anyone’s seen Bitterroot.”

“I think I can do that, yeah,” said Amanita. Walking, she could handle just fine.

“Me, too,” said Charcoal, a touch breathlessly. “Even though-” She stretched her back and groaned. “I need to hit the treadmill more. I’m an environmental mage, why can’t I sprint?”

“Hmm.” Code looked up at the window again and frowned. “No way to see if anybody comes back while we’re gone, though-”

“Hang on.” Amanita rooted through the snow and found a small, slim branch. “You said the door was blocked, right? Close the window and put this on the top. If someone opens the window again, the branch will get knocked off.” Circe had used similar methods of easily-disturbed details as a magic-free way to see if her bags had been disturbed by bandits. Or Amanita.

“Good enough for now.” Code jumped back up to close the window and place the branch. “You two, see what you can find on the south side of town. I’ll look in the north. Sound good?”

“I’m fine with that,” said Amanita. Charcoal nodded her assent.

“Check back here in… whatever you think is half an hour,” said Code. “This isn’t a large town, Bitterroot couldn’t’ve gone far.” She galloped southward, into the dark.

“So, uh…” Charcoal said to Amanita, “how, how do we look for her?”

“No idea,” said Amanita. “Bitterroot’s the bounty hunter, she’s usually the one finding ponies.” And she could fly, to boot. What if she’d taken off and was chasing someone to the northern exit of the valley?

“Ramble around and ask any pony we run into?”

“Sounds good to me.”

“…By Rain, I wish I was kidding.”

“So do I.”





It didn’t matter how small a town was, you could get lost in it if you made enough of an effort to turn at every intersection. Tratonmane wasn’t large, but after a few turns, Amanita suspected she would’ve been completely lost in its dim streets if not for the walls to orient herself. It was like Tratonmane was larger than it appeared. Not that the small size helped much. Every pony she and Charcoal passed had the same answer for her.

“I ain’t seen ’er,” said the earth pony. The response came quick and sharp, just like all the others.

“Are you sure?” Amanita asked, more out of desperation than anything else. “We could really-”

“Certain sure,” the other snapped. “Y’ken, I dinnae faith you’uns can solve our problems if’n ye cannae solve yer own. Up-headed Canterlouts, every last one o’ ye.” Taking one last glance at Charcoal, she turned around, flicked her tail in Amanita’s face, and stomped off.

“A simple ‘no’ would’ve been just vine!” Charcoal yelled after her. “I mean, really, why?” she whispered to Amanita.

“I mean, it doesn’t exactly inspire confidence,” Amanita said. “One of our ponies just disappearing like that. We’re supposed to be the ones fixing the problem, not making more.”

“But still…”

“Do you know how long it’s been?” Amanita asked, quickly changing the subject.

“Twenty minutes, give or take,” Charcoal mumbled. “Ten more minutes of this…”

Yeah. Great.

A cliff loomed before them; they’d gone south enough to reach the slab that the railroad ended on. The houses were a bit sparser, a few of them even sporting chicken runs, and ponies were less common. Amanita wondered if it was worth finding the road to head on up. Bitterroot wouldn’t have needed it, so-

“Amanita?” Bitterroot’s voice suddenly sounded. “You still wearing this?”

Amanita twitched and felt her legs tense up. “Bitterroot?” she asked hopefully. “Where’ve you been?” Charcoal immediately snapped to look at her, ears forward.

“I’m fine,” Bitterroot said. “I just-” A cough. “I followed the thief into that bunker I told you about, and… I don’t know how, but I lost them. They just vanished.”

The bunker? What were they doing in the bunker? Whatever. Bitterroot was safe. “Can you meet us back at the inn?” Amanita asked. “We’ve been looking for you.” Looking at Charcoal, she pointed at her earpiece, grinned, and nodded. Charcoal grinned back.

“Sure. See you soon. Out.”





Bitterroot paced around the Cave’s common room, her wings twitching restlessly. She lost ponies she was tracking, every now and then. It was part of being a bounty hunter. She’d learned to live with her mistakes. But there was usually some sort of factor. Her quarry had slipped into a crowd. They’d been faster than her. They knew the streets better. She’d misjudged the footprints. Something. This? She’d seen the thief head into the bunker — the empty bunker with just a few rooms — and, somehow, hadn’t been able to track them. They might as well have teleported out.

It left her feeling mighty peeved.

The common room was still empty. She didn’t know if Cabin was in the back and she didn’t feel like looking. She didn’t need to know who was here. She just needed to see Amanita and Code and Charcoal and all of them again so that-

She looked up as the door opened. Amanita and Charcoal walked in; Amanita let out a sigh as she saw Bitterroot. “Oh, thank Celestia,” she breathed. “I called you on the- communication thing and when you didn’t respond-”

“I took it off,” admitted Bitterroot. “I didn’t want any distractions.”

“Eh.” Amanita shrugged. “Fair enough. Code should be back in…” Her voice trailed off and she looked up.

“Five to ten minutes, probably,” said Charcoal. She flicked her tail in annoyance. “I’m gonna deck- check on our gear. Maybe it got damaged.” She ducked inside the storage area.

Bitterroot stalked over to a table, took a seat, and started examining the wood grain ferociously. Amanita sat down across from her. “Are you… feeling alright?” Amanita asked.

“I’m-” Bitterroot coughed. “I’m fine. Just got a bit of a sore throat.”

“That’s not what I meant.”

“I just feel stupid for somehow missing the thief,” Bitterroot said. “It’s my job to catch runaways, so if I can’t do my job, what am I?” She blew a quick raspberry. “It’ll pass. Don’t worry about me. …What about you?”

“What do you mean, ‘what about me’?”

“When you were down by the trees, it sounded like-”

Amanita’s face drooped back, but she managed a grin. “Heh. You noticed?”

“You don’t exactly have the best poker face.”

“Heh. Short version: I was struggling with magic and Charcoal’s a better teacher than Code for this. It’s… I think I’m better now.”

“You think?”

“Somepony broke into my room before I could be sure.”

Charcoal exited the storage area and groaned, stretching her neck. “I don’t think that room was built with kirins in mind,” she said. “The ceiling got in the way of my horn. But all the crates’re there and it didn’t loose- look like any of them had been opened. That’s something.”

The front door opened again, letting Code in. “I swear,” she huffed to herself, kicking snow from her hooves, “the nerve of some-”

“Bitterroot’s back,” said Amanita.

Code’s head snapped up to see Bitterroot. “Well,” she said. “Good. What happened? Start from the beginning.”

Bitterroot laid out what there was to lay out. It didn’t take very long. By the time she was done, Code was pawing at the ground. “Very strange,” she muttered. “Well, you’re here, so let’s see the damage.”

“I can get in through the window to unlock the door for you,” Bitterroot said, standing up. “Shouldn’t take a second.”

“Check to see if there’s a branch on top of the window,” said Amanita. “We left it there so it’d fall if the thief came back and opened the window to get back in.”

“Sure.”

Out, around, through, and soon Bitterroot had pushed aside a bed blocking the entrance and unlocked the door. “The branch was still there and the glass wasn’t broken,” she said as the others filed in. “I don’t think the window was touched.”

Not much else in the room was touched, either. Some papers had been placed on another bed and were scattered around the room, but other than some bags thrown about, the place was surprisingly neat. Everyone started checking their bags in case they were missing something.

It was funny. She hadn’t been harmed and it wasn’t even her home that had been broken into, but Bitterroot still felt violated. It was like, this was the place she was supposed to feel safe, but someone had come into it and rooted through her possessions anyway. It wasn’t even the possible danger; she’d slept in more dangerous places while on the hunt. But if you settled down in a Northern forest, you expected things to be dangerous. Not here. Not this one place. And the fact that nothing was missing from her bags did little to help her feelings.

“Hey, uh, Bitterroot?” asked Amanita. “You said it was a unicorn, right?”

“They had to be, they had a horn. I saw it glow,” said Bitterroot. “Why?”

“Well… Because…” And Amanita held up several large dark red feathers.

Bitterroot blinked. Those weren’t- “Let me see,” she said, darting up for a closer look, hoping it wasn’t true. But there was no mistaking it. A knot formed in her stomach as she said, “These are from that pegasus I mentioned.”

She’d assumed the thief was solo. Why had she assumed that? Because she’d only seen the one. And yet, that one pegasus, just happening to be right there, right then? Uninvolved. Sure. She’d been talking to one of the perps right then, and just let him slip away, unimpeded. Stupid.

Yet Code seemed pleased. “Dark red wings, gray head, you said?” she asked. “Not exactly an easy coloration to hide. Pegasi with wings colored differently from their body are few and far between… Did you catch anything of the unicorn’s appearance?”

“Just that they were a unicorn,” Bitterroot replied. But, really, why should she have just assumed they were partners? She’d had no proof, then, not even a gut instinct. And when she was chasing down a perp, she usually had done some research to track them down, not suddenly jumping into action based on seeing something.

“So we have a place to start once we’re done here,” said Code. “I’m not missing anything. Anybody else?”

“Nope,” said Bitterroot. She could’ve handled the situation better. But not with the information she’d had then.

“Not me,” Charcoal said. She still had her head buried in one of her bags.

“Sort of,” said Amanita. “These papers-” She’d gathered up the sheets that had been lying around. “They were looking through some of my spell notes- not the necromantic ones!” she added quickly. “Not those. But other than that, I’m not missing anything. Not even any other notes.”

She looked at the papers again and frowned. “Okay, I guess they’re sort of necromantic, but not really… Dispelling zombies and freeing thralls… Anyway, I did bring some necromantic notes, but they’re in a journal, still locked. We’re okay.”

“So…” Code began pacing. “They didn’t ransack the place… Didn’t even steal anything… Just looked at Amanita’s notes. Notes that are more anti-necromancy than necromancy. I know they probably ran before they could get anything, but… what did they want? …Pfeh. Pegasus, dark red wings, gray head. Let’s spread the word.”

“If anyone knows someone like that in Tratonmane,” said Charcoal, “it’ll be Tallbush. We should see if we can find him first.”

“Tallbush? Why him?”

“Well, y’know, since he’s the Duke of Midwich.”

Silence. Amanita and Code stared at her. “He’s… the duke?” asked Code.

Charcoal’s ears twitched and she shied back. “We… didn’t tell them, did we?” she asked Bitterroot in a quiet voice.

“…Huh. No, we didn’t.”

“A duke,” muttered Code. “Out here. Celestia must’ve been desperate.” She shook her head. “Okay. We find Tallbush, ask if he knows anypony. After that… we’ll figure it out.”

“Since he’s the duke, he might be at the town hall,” said Bitterroot. “It’s right across the square, come on.”

When they reached the common room, it had one pony in it: Cabin, chopping some carrots. Bitterroot was halfway across, ignoring her, before wheeling about to face her. “Someone broke into your inn,” she said.

Cabin’s knife froze and she raised her head. “Pardon?” she asked.

“I saw a pony in our room,” said Bitterroot. “And I think they had an accomplice. A gray pegasus with red wings.”

Cabin flicked an ear. “I dinnae ken arypony like that,” she grunted. “Sure enough didnae see arypony out o’ the usual.”

Bitterroot leaned forward a little. “You’re sure?”

“I’m tellin’ you’uns, I didn’t see nopony.”

“Right.” Bitterroot glanced at Cabin’s horn. “Yeah. But keep an eye out.”

Cabin grunted in affirmation. After giving her one last look, Bitterroot led the others out of the inn.

When they reached the hall, Code had absolutely none of the restraint Bitterroot had had, nearly kicking down the doors to enter. “Tallbush!” she hollered authoritatively. “Are you there?”

No response. Code muttered something uncouth. “And we’ll go traipsing across this town again… And if he comes back and we miss him-”

“I could wait here,” Bitterroot volunteered. “I haven’t finished all the death certificates yet and it’s too dark for flight to be much of a help in looking for him.” And that wasn’t an excuse. She really wanted to polish off that pile. “I’ll take a look around once I’m done.”

“Sounds good,” grunted Code. “You two, same deal. You look in the north-”

“I’d be fine with spitting- splitting up,” Charcoal said. “If, if Amanita’s okay with.”

“Sure. No one’s missing and we’ll cover more ground.”

Code rattled off her words like a machine. “Fine. Me, north. Charcoal, southeast. Amanita, southwest. Good? Good. Let’s go. The sooner we find Tallbush, the sooner we can get this done.” And she stomped northward.

Once Amanita and Charcoal were gone, Bitterroot pulled herself back to the library. Her sudden exit had scattered death certificates everywhere, but thankfully, the ones she’d already covered were still in their folders. Still, she spent a good five minutes rooting around the room, making sure she didn’t miss any certificates.

And once she was done with that, right back to it. With an ear angled towards the main hall. The size made it echoic, she’d hear if Tallbush entered.



Fletch — 71 — died 839 — passed in his sleep





Arenac — 67 — died 839 — old age



So what was up with that burglary? It was a pretty lousy one, now that Bitterroot thought about it. Bright lights in the dark… The unicorn just needed to throw a sheet over the window and they’d’ve been nearly invisible. Or, hey, plain old hornlight would be easy to miss. Bitterroot knew that from experience, sadly.



Copper Sprocket — 80 — died 805 — passed in his sleep





Black Bard — 39 — died 805 — wolves



Bitterroot still felt powerless, but it was dripping away as she worked. This job just needed more vigilance. Eyes open, ears up. It’d be, well, interesting. Hopefully not like her last two interesting jobs, or else she’d die again again. At least she knew someone who could do someth-

“Hello.”

Bitterroot flinched and snapped her head up. Carnelian was standing just in front of her, examining her inquisitively. Flexing her wings to work out some of her adrenaline rush, Bitterroot said, “You’re quiet.”

“Oh, I can’t really help it,” Carnelian said, smiling. “But it does alarm some ponies. Scares them to death. What’re you doing here?”

“Data analysis. What’re you doing here?” Bitterroot kept an ear towards the main hall. No sound.

“I just wanted to check something. Maybe my local library had the book I wanted,” Carnelian replied. She slid a book in front of Bitterroot: Primrose Path. “They did. It’s a way to pass the time.” She pulled the book back. “I thought you said you weren’t a ritualist.”

“I’m not.”

“So why are you doing their work for them?”

Bitterroot shrugged. “I need something to do, I guess.”

“Well, what do you want to do? Surely you should do something for yourself.”

“Right now? It doesn’t really matter. Helping others is something for myself.”

Carnelian flicked an ear. “Truly? Doing unpaid work makes you happy?”

“I’m normally a bounty hunter. Either I catch the perp or all my work is unpaid.”

“…But these ritualists-”

“I volunteered,” Bitterroot said bluntly. “I’m fine with where I am now, thank you. If I’m not, I’ll bow out.”

“Oh, I wouldn’t be so sure you can do that. I’ve heard Canterlot bureaucracy likes to get its hooks in you.”

“Bounty hunters need to navigate a lot of bureaucracy to stay legal. I know how to work these hooks.”

Carnelian looked at Bitterroot for a long moment, then said, “Well, best of luck.” She nodded at Bitterroot and made for the exit, book under her wing.

On a whim, Bitterroot said, “Hey, quick question. Do you know any pegasus with a gray head and dark red wings?”

Carnelian stumbled on some books as she came to a stop. Giving Bitterroot a look, she said, “I can’t say I’ve ever seen a soul like that in Tratonmane.”

“Alright,” Bitterroot said, sighing internally. “Thanks, anyway.”

With Carnelian gone, Bitterroot looked back at her certificates. Where had she been, again? Ah, yes. Getting near the end.



Microburst — 71 — died 803 — old age





Abraxas — 79 — died 803 — old age







Walking randomly through Tratonmane. Again. Hooray. Alone, this time. Even better. And was the town even darker?

Amanita stalked the streets of Tratonmane, looking for Tallbush as she headed south. There were few ponies out and none of them seemed to know where he was. Or so they claimed. When she asked about the pegasus, they didn’t know about him, either. Or so they claimed. These sorts of communities were always close-knit, for better or worse.

Was she being paranoid?

These ponies didn’t like her. Okay, fine. In their position, she probably wouldn’t like her, either. Did that extend to covering theft for each other? Or worse? Or maybe she’d just been reading too many horror novels. (Which was saying something, since she hadn’t read a lot.) Why do that, anyway? It’d just bring more attention down on them.

Well, if the entire town was in on it (whatever “it” was), it wasn’t like asking ponies about the attempted robbery would make things worse; they’d know about it anyway.

It was surprising how much the railroad slab loomed, even if you weren’t close to it. Amanita stopped to gather her surroundings. She still wasn’t that far from  the hall yet, so-

Her ears pricked up at a voice. Its words were indistinct, but it sounded familiar. Tallbush? Maybe. She began tracing it through the streets, the words getting sharper. Soon, she turned a corner, and there they were: Tallbush and Varnish, heading south, towards the station. Tallbush was saying something in a low, urgent voice to the other. “-came ’ere tae help, I cannae keep-”

Amanita’s ears twitched forward and she raised a hoof to follow them. But the second she moved, Varnish’s head whipped around and he was looking her in the eyes. He quickly nudged Tallbush to cut him off and pointed. When Tallbush saw her, his ears twitched, then he threw up a smile. “Hidy, Amanita.”

“There you are!” Amanita said, as if she hadn’t heard anything. She trotted up to the two of them. “I’ve been looking for you.”

“How- are you doing?” asked Varnish.

“Not great. Our room at the Cave was broken into,” said Amanita.

“Ach, cuss it,” said Tallbush, wincing. Amanita didn’t think that was suspicious. “That’s a right shame. Ye lose arythin’?”

“No. But Bitterroot says she saw a unicorn in our room and there were feathers matching a pegasus with dark red wings and a gray head.”

Tallbush frowned, pawing at the ground. Varnish’s ears flicked. “What’re you saying?” he asked.

Potentially suspicious. But a bi-colored pegasus was unusual. “Shortly after the break-in, Bitterroot ran into a pegasus with dark red wings and a gray head.” Already, that phrase was sounding unusual to Amanita, a word repeated too often. “When we searched our room, we found feathers that Bitterroot says matched their wings.”

“But she only saw him in the dark?”

“You’d have to talk to her, but she seemed pretty convinced. Does anypony like that live in Tratonmane?”

“Nay,” said Tallbush slowly. “Ne’er heard o’ arypony like that.”

He seemed genuine. Befuddled. Surprised. Caught by something unexpected. But if there was a pony like that, Tallbush could just tell him to lay low for the rest of the week until those stupid Canterlouts solved the ley line and left. They weren’t in a law enforcement role, after all, and couldn’t go kicking down doors. (Where would they even get a warrant? And was Charcoal in the Guard or a civilian?) Assuming Tallbush and the pony were even in cahoots.

Assuming he was lying rather than telling the truth…

“I’ll get the word out,” he said. “Tell all Tratonmane tae keep an eye open.” His voice grew hard. “If’n we’ve a scoundrel lurkin’ in our town, we best root ’im out right quick.”

He was the duke, but he’d said “our town”, not “my town”. And he drove the train that carried Tratonmane’s freight, and he did it alone. Amanita had once met a pony who’d said that the nobility was more, well, noble if you got further away from Canterlot and brownnosing the princess was impossible. Maybe he was on the level.

But on the level for everyone, or just on the level for Tratonmane?

“I’ll let Whippletree know, too,” said Varnish, holding his head high. “That pony won’t dare to show his face around here again.”

“I’d rather he does dare and then you catch him when he dares,” Amanita said flatly. Varnish didn’t budge; Tallbush twitched and looked away, grinning. “But thanks anyway.” She nodded at them. “See you around.” And she set off down a street, going nowhere in particular.

She’d told Tallbush. That was about all she could do. Some things were just out of her control and she had to let others handle it. This was the best she could manage.

But before she was too far away, on a whim, Amanita looked back over her shoulder.

Tallbush and Varnish were both unicorns.
> 11 - Arcanic Surveys
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

“Everyone here is staring at me,” muttered Charcoal. The air around her horn shimmered like a mirage. “I’m just a kirin.”

“Well,” said Bitterroot, “they’ve- never seen a kirin-”

“Canterlot wasn’t like this. Applejack and Fluttershy weren’t like this. And have you met those two?”

“Sorry,” said Amanita.

The four had reassembled back at the Cave. Everyone had the same result: nopony in Tratonmane had seen anyone like the pegasus. And Code was suspicious enough that she’d taken them up to their room for privacy.

“They’re either clueless or lying,” Code said as she paced around the room, half to herself, half to everyone else. “And I can’t tell which of those I dislike less.”

“But if they’re covering for somepony,” said Amanita, “why break in now? We were gone this morning, and Whippletree could’ve told anypony while he was gathering the rest of the militia-”

“Maybe they’re just stupid,” said Bitterroot. Aware of how that sounded a second too late, she quickly added, “Or not thinking things through. After High Gloss and the Maerhwolf, we really shouldn’t put it past them.”

“True, true,” muttered Code. “Although-”

“Um. Hey.” Charcoal raised a hoof. “Is this… really relevant? Nothing’s… really happened yet, technically, and I’m… I’m not a detector- detective, but I feel like we’ll just be talking in circles and forgetting the whole ‘ley line’ thing. The- thing I know about.”

“You’re right,” Code said, heaving a sigh. “Maybe someone was just looking for money. Until we know more… Keep your eyes peeled, but remember that we’re here for the ley line first.”

It was an annoying proposition to Bitterroot, but also the one that made the one that… made the least nonsense. They knew too little to split off from their actual jobs and go running off on what might be an opportunistic burglary. And technically, Bitterroot herself wasn’t part of their group, but she normally knew who she was looking for as a bounty hunter. If she broke into random ponies’ houses, she wouldn’t be a bounty hunter for long.

So instead, she said, “And on that note…” She whipped out her scroll. “I got all the deaths for the town.”

Code immediately brightened. “All of them?”

“All of them.” Bitterroot laid the scroll out on the floor so everyone could see it. “Going all the way back to 780.”

“Thorough,” murmured Code.

“There,” Amanita suddenly said. She pointed at the entry for 946. “Look at that. Nearly three times as many deaths for any other year. And… wow, they’re all violent?”

“Must’ve been a lot of animal attacks that year,” Bitterroot said.

Charcoal had grabbed a quill and was scribbling stuff in the margins. “And the attacks dropped off after that year… Slow drop- Look at it, it’s a smooth curve…”

“Let’s not be too hasty,” said Amanita. “They might not all be attacks. How many of those were mining accidents?”

Bitterroot ran back through her memories. “None.”

Amanita moved her head up such that you could almost hear her neck creaking. She blinked. “Someone’s lying,” she said flatly. “Mining is one of the most dangerous professions in Equestria. People die in collapses all the time. It’s- You didn’t see any? Not even any of these nonviolent ones?”

“…No,” said Bitterroot, trying to ignore the feeling of the uncanny slithering in her gut. “I never saw anything like that. Just attacks and old age.”

“Weird,” Charcoal said too casually as she scribbled numbers down in the margins. “Mountains don’t usually like being bored into.”

Amanita seemed distracted, frowning at Bitterroot’s marks, as she absently asked, “The mountain’s alive?”

“Metaphorically. Mountains are, they’re complex ecosystems, and a mountain with a ley line in it, even more so.” Charcoal began making little swooping gestures with her quill. “All the rocks have settled, but you start drilling into them, and gravity wants them to fall this way but the ley line nudges them that way… There’s a lot going on. There’s even an entire set of secondary guidelines for mines built near ley lines just to make sure nothing gets poisoned. …Metaphorically. A mine this close to a ley line with no accidents is amazing. Although… the trees draw from the line, so if they shore up the line with the trees, then the wood could reabsorb the ley energies…”

“On a similar subject,” said Code, “when we were visiting Pyrita, her sister said nobody in Tratonmane ever had black lung. Could that be a benefit of the line?”

“Not passively,” Charcoal said. “It’s, the line might make you healthier, but poison’ll still kill you. It’s like… It’s like watching- washing in a river. Just standing in it will get some dirt off, but you need to scrub if you want to get clean. Actually, for towns near ley lines, there are rarely any effects on the inhabitants, but the plants are a lot healthier because they’re actively pulling energy from the lean- the line… It’s really neat, once you start digging.”

“Very strange,” muttered Code. “No mining accidents, no black lung… Whatever techniques they use, they’d change the industry, yet it’s just another small mining town in the North.”

“Anyway, getting back to, the, uh, spike in 946,” said Charcoal. “If we assume that that was the result of a ley shift, then any animals might’ve passed going nuts down to their offspring. Maybe. We’re still studying that. Which normally would’ve kept the same amount of attacks in the next year, but if Tratonmane got those bunkers built or taken other anti-wolf measures, you see this slow drop in attacks over the next few years. Like so.” She traced the years to 949. “It’s really smooth, too. And something maybe confirming that is…”

She swept her hoof down the line of years before 946. “Did you notice that there’s barely any attacks before then? Like the animals were calmed because of the ley line and just didn’t feel like it was worth tangling with those weirdos who could fly or throw energy bolts or kick down trees. That’s kinda common around ley lines, actually.”

“I did notice that, but I wasn’t sure it was relevant,” said Code. Looking down the scroll, she stroked her chin. “Ley lines, a perfect mining safety record, grain mothers, peaceful beasts suddenly turning hostile one year… How does one of the most interesting places in Equestria just… drop off the map like Tratonmane did?”

“Maybe it wasn’t interesting before it dropped off the map,” said Bitterroot.

“I wonder what all this does for the ritual environment,” murmured Code. She grunted and straightened up. “But since we shouldn’t be doing that, back to the ley line it is. And before we were interrupted-” (Bitterroot’s wings twitched reflexively, even though it wasn’t her fault.) “-I’m afraid I couldn’t feel anything specific about what was wrong.”

“Me neither,” said Charcoal. “It’s really weird, the currents aren’t behaving properly, but only once you look close at it… Not to mention the energy itself, it’s all-”

Amanita coughed. “Um… I… don’t mean to… intrude or anything, but I… kinda…” She pawed at the floor. “…don’t really know what I’m looking for in the ley line. I, I can feel it, but I don’t know what I’m feeling for.”

Code raised a hoof, ready to say something, only to pause and frown. Charcoal promptly leapt in with, “Have you ever cooked pasta?”

“…Once or twice,” Amanita said, one of her ears drooping.

“You know how, before it’s done, it’s kinda floppy, but you know just from looking at it that it’s not floppy enough, even before you bite into it or throw it against the ceiling?”

“Yeah…” The ear went back up.

“It’s just… something you learn. Just feel the ley line, get to know what it does, and soon you’ll know what to look for.”

“Uh-huh,” Amanita said, nodding.

“Which… isn’t good advice right about now, because I don’t know what to look for. And this is, y’know, my job and all.” Charcoal grinned nervously. “But that’s what the geothaumometers are for, right?”

Amanita grimaced. “Are we really going to have to set them up?”

“I’m afraid so,” said Code. “Normally, we’d have a clearer picture of the problem by now instead of continuing to flounder. So if that’s what it takes…” She heaved a large sigh.

“What’s a geothaumometer?” asked Bitterroot.





Big, bulky, and a pain to move. That’s what a geothaumometer was.

More descriptively, geothaumometers were a combination of a surveying tripod, a planisphere, a windmill, a crystalline lattice framework mounted on the bottom, and a pendulum. Looking at one, Bitterroot couldn’t make head or tail of it, so she decided to leave that to the ritualists. The things were tall, around a foot taller than most ponies once fully assembled, and had a rather involved setup process. In spite of the crystals, Amanita insisted they weren’t fragile, just a pain to build.

A brief talk with Cabin had yielded several simple maps of Midwich Valley in the space between the mine and the forest, and Charcoal quickly picked twelve locations across the valley to place geothaumometers. A bit of work, and the ritualists had wrestled the large crates in storage onto a few sledges to transport north. The treeline was beginning to loom when the three split up, each one going to set up their own geothaumometers. Bitterroot found herself walking with Code to provide an extra set of limbs, as Code lacked a horn to give herself the equivalent of an extra set of limbs, and was very glad that she didn’t need to remember the steps for assembly.

Once it was up, though, it looked simple enough: a tall frame for the pendulum to swing in, with the windmill spinning on the top. The pendulum itself was almost ludicrously simple, nothing more than a small chunk of smoky quartz hanging from a chain. The pendulum swung over the planisphere, oriented by Bitterroot didn’t know what. All of this was mounted on the tripod and able to be adjusted separately so it was level. Finally, the crystals were stowed on the legs of the tripod.

Code had a pole out and was making some final adjustments to the windmill with it. Bitterroot looked up and down at the… device. It was a confusing mishmash of stuff she had no comprehension of. It was almost scary, how odd it looked. But it was helping them do their job, so she might as well find out. Once Code set the pendulum to swinging, Bitterroot cleared her throat. “So, uh… what does all of this do? What’s involved in geothaumometing?”

“Quartz is an excellent receptacle for magic, as you may know,” Code said. “Smoky quartz even more so, thanks to its creation. As the pendulum swings, it collects magic from the air and deposits it through the planisphere, down here.” She patted one of the crystals. “Once we have it stored, we can analyze it more precisely. Additionally, over the course of this process, it gets drawn into a parallel course with the ley line. Like a weather vane turning to face the wind. Once we have all of them swinging in the proper orientation, we can triangulate them for the line’s source.”

Once Bitterroot knew what it was meant to do, she could see it. Kinda. Sorta. Granted, the actual mechanics of it all probably required a doctorate in some field she hadn’t heard of, but it didn’t look quite so overwhelming anymore. Just a bit weird. “And magic keeps the pendulum swinging instead of slowing down, right?”

“The windmill on top gathers energy for just that, as well as preventing the wind from pushing it off-course.” Code closed her eyes, ate a mouthful of dirt, and breathed in deeply. After a moment, she budged the inner disk of the planisphere a degree clockwise.

“Does a change that small really matter?” Bitterroot asked.

“Almost certainly not,” said Code. “But I like to be thorough. Now…” Taking the pole in her mouth, Code traced out a circle around the geothaumometer with an easy smoothness. Returning to the box, she pulled out, of all things, a small tangle of thorns. She placed the thorns in the center of the circle right underneath the geothaumometer and took up the pole again to sketch out a rune, one that looked like a capital Y with another vertical line between the tines. (It was on the eastern side of the circle. Did that matter? Maybe.) Taking a seat on the south side, Code closed her eyes and started muttering rhythmically. Around them, snow stirred as grass started leaning towards her.

Something snapped minutely in the air, like the pop of the world’s tiniest firecracker, and the very tips of Bitterroot’s feathers buzzed. How did she know it was just the tips? Code nodded. “We’re done here. Let’s move on.” She began working herself back into the sledge’s yoke.

“Uh, what was that?” Bitterroot asked, pointing at the circle. Something magical had happened, and you always wanted to be careful when magical things happened around circles. (Heh. Around.)

“Try it out,” Code said a bit too cheerfully. “It’ll be a learning experience.” She adjusted the yoke on her withers.

A “learning experience”. From a ritualist. The High Ritualist. Great. After suppressing a gulp, Bitterroot carefully edged her hoof over the circle-

Out of nowhere, she suddenly felt the sharp tingle of a light electric shock zip up her leg; she yanked her hoof back on reflex.

“Shock circles,” Code said preemptively. “Basic ritual. Any living thing that goes over it gets a nice, small jolt of lightning. Quick and easy animal deterrent.” She dug her hooves into the ground and started tugging the sledge to the next setup point.

“That doesn’t seem like it’d stop a pony if they really wanted to get in,” Bitterroot said, looking back over her shoulder. Really wanted to get in, though.

“It won’t, not if they set their mind to it,” said Code. “But animals will do anything to avoid pain. The capacity for self-destruction is one of the gifts of sapience. …And that sounds far more morbid than I intended.”

“You think?”





It was supposed to be simple. Set up a geothaumometer, draw a shock circle around it, repeat until all the spots were accounted for. That was probably the first warning sign.

Amanita’s first geothaumometer had the misfortune of being on an incline just slight enough to throw off the balance a little. It could stand, certainly, but Amanita felt like a strong enough wind could tip it over — the wind being of the sort that Midwich’s walls magnified. Extending the leg anchors to drill in was easy enough, as long as the ground wasn’t too cold. Oh, wait. It took Amanita several minutes to get an anchor in deep enough that was comfortable with it. One anchor. And because the effort she put in was mostly the effort of turning a screw, it was unnecessarily fiddly when doing it physically and she didn’t even get the satisfaction of a workout when doing it physically.

“Everypony-” she grunted to herself with each painful turn, “always- forgets- what- goes on- in- the North.”

Which was why she and Circe had spent so much time there.

Thankfully, the rest of the tasks were much simpler. Get the planisphere level, get it properly oriented, scrub the osmotic crystals, get the pendulum swinging, draw the shock circle. Easy-peasy.

Except for the last one.

Unlike the mental projection spell, Amanita knew shock circles. They were simple ritual magic, something she had a very solid grasp of. Draw the circle to contain the magic (you didn’t even need any special media!), lay the thorns inside to stand for the deterrent, sketch a properly-oriented algiz for protection, and use a little bit of her own magic to draw out the deterrence for the protection.

But somehow, the deterrence didn’t want to come out. Amanita pulled and needled, but the reality within the circle just wasn’t schlorpy enough, and everything stayed right where it was. She growled at the thing that’d worked plenty of times before, then started pacing.

Her missing things seemed to be the theme of the week, didn’t it? Ley lines, grain mothers, this ritual she knew ought to be working… The second she stepped out of necromancy- No, that wasn’t fair. She’d made shock circles. They’d worked before. This circle was good enough to work. Which meant there was a problem with the environment, maybe? The ley line might-

The current of the ley line necessitated a slightly misshapen circle. Right. Grauss’s flux law. How could she have forgotten that? (By it being a specific edge case, applicable in only certain types of scenarios for certain types of rituals? The irrational part of her mind looked at that and decided it didn’t matter.) Nothing quite like letting simple laws of metaphysics like that get in the way of you doing your job, genius.

Shock circles being a simple ritual, the circle didn’t need to be perfect, which was good, because the precise nature of how it needed to be adjusted kept escaping Amanita. But there were only so many ways you could smoosh a circle, and she soon had a shape for which the deterrence semi-begrudgingly left the thorns. (If you touched the thorns now, they’d seem oddly blunt and flimsy.) The circle hummed satisfyingly, so she poked her hoof over the circumference-

Bzzt. -and yanked it back. The zap wasn’t large, but it was sharp and sudden and unhindered by her furs. It was also working, and ought to work for another twenty-two-ish hours. Fortunately, shock circles were metaphysical once running. Throwing away the thorns or breaking the physical circle wouldn’t do anything; you had to draw out the actual magic. Either no animal would be able to break the circle or the animals were smart enough to use focused magic, in which case the cavalry could be called. Hopefully.

Test again, because she was paranoid and wanted to be sure it was still wor- Bzzt. Still working. Ah, science.

Once that was done, she went to the next location, further up the hill but thankfully flatter. Set up the geothaumometer, make the circle, test the circle, get shocked. The location after that, though, she was busy adjusting the level of the planisphere when a chiropterus chirped their way over through the dark. Midwinter. She settled onto her haunches, watching Amanita with interest as she traced out the shock circle. “Evening,” Amanita said as she tossed the thorns in the middle.

“Evening,” Midwinter returned.

“Flipping rigatack!” Amanita returned back as she got shocked again.

Midwinter chuckled. “Don’t like the pain, do you?”

“Not really.” Amanita looped the harness back over her neck. “But I’d rather me get hurt than other ponies.”

“Hmm.”

Amanita pulled. Not being an earth pony, she was getting tired, but that was more than balanced out by carrying only a quarter of what she’d started with; only one geothaumometer to go. Midwinter followed along, watching her carefully. “Your… team has quite the project in the works,” she said. “How’s it going?”

“It’s going,” Amanita grunted.

“I believe I’ve never mentioned how grateful I am to have you here,” Midwinter said. “Having skilled ponies working tirelessly for them is a boon anypony should be thankful of.”

“I expect you get that feeling sometimes,” said Amanita. “You and your family work on the plumbing, don’t you?”

“Oh, not as much as you may think. Varnish is rather close to a brute, no matter how much he reckons himself a knight with his sword,” Midwinter said shamelessly, “and although she has her ideas, Carnelian couldn’t weave a genuine spell to save her life, I know that much. But you… I heard of that spell you cast on the bear. A form of psychometry, was it?”

“‘Thanatometry’ might be a better name,” said Amanita. Necrometry would scare ponies off, with its prefix of necro-, plus it didn’t roll off the tongue nearly as easily. And had she heard right? Varnish was also part of Midwinter’s family? Huh.

“Still. Seeing its death for yourself — and without any focus item, if I heard correctly. You must be an excellent mage.”

“I’ve certainly pushed boundaries,” said Amanita. Just- not all of those boundaries were ones that ought to be pushed. (Her breath nearly hitched. Had she said too much?)

“What form of magic do you study?” Midwinter’s ears were forward.

Amanita’s thoughts rushed for an excuse and quickly grabbed, “Well… it’s complicated. Let’s just say they haven’t figured out what to call it yet.” Which was true; there was still some debate over renaming the Necromancy Corps to the Thanaturgy Corps for better PR. “Mostly, it… involves different ways of experiencing the past.” There she went again, saying too much, potentially sounding interesting.

But Midwinter seemed satisfied. She nodded and started whistling.

They reached the position of the final geothaumometer. With a combination of hoof and horn, Amanita rolled it off the sledge and set about setting it up. “So what’re you doing down here?”

A shrug. “Curiosity, I suppose. I merely wanted to see how this was going, get a feel for its progress. Although if it’s merely ‘going’…”

“Eh.” Amanita adjusted the dials to get the planisphere lying flat. After three previous setups, she was developing a bit of a feel for it. “Still inconclusive. We’re running further tests to find out more. We’ve still got options.”

“Well, I wish to you the best of luck. I’m much too familiar with large projects for my liking. Particularly long-term ones where constant issues necessitate the scrapping of the project after moons of work.”

“Plumbing can take that long? I wouldn’t know.” Test. Last one. Bzzt. Mrglfrgl…

“It can when you’re upgrading. When it comes to… purifying liquids like water, there are a great many moving parts. Altering a single thing can have ripple effects, ah… downstream, so to speak.”

“Wah wah wah,” snorted Amanita.

Midwinter’s calm expression suddenly dropped. “...I beg your pardon?”

“Bduh…” Amanita quickly looked down, pretending to fiddle with the circle. “It’s a- Canterlot- thing. Because of your… pun, it’s-”

“Um, hey! Amanita!”

Charcoal came trotting up through the dark, her horn glowing and ringing. “Um.” She swallowed. “Amanita, can you help me?” she asked, slightly quiet. “I… can’t really get the circle-”

“Did you remember to account for Grauss’s flux law?” Amanita asked, standing up.

“…No, because I’ve never hearth- heard of it.”

Fair enough. Few non-ritualists had. “Alright. Let’s go teach you.”

Charcoal led Amanita, and Midwinter tagged behind; Amanita got the feeling that Midwinter was bordering on gawking at Charcoal, but in a dignified manner. Charcoal’s geothaumometers had been set up perfectly, so Amanita just needed to draw the circle a bit lopsidedly.

“That was it?” Charcoal asked, her ears quivering. “Code… never said-”

“She might’ve forgotten it,” Amanita said. She was already drawing the deterrence out from the thorns; might as well quickly finish up. “I know I forgot it until I tried the circle myself.”

Once the circle was closed, Charcoal prodded the air above the perimeter. Amanita actually saw the blue glow of the sparks this time, now that she wasn’t tensing up for the shock. But Charcoal was giggling as she shook her hoof. “Wow that’s weird,” she muttered. Bzzt.

“Is it the working sort of weird?” Amanita asked.

“Yeah.” Bzzt.

“What would possess you to… do that?” asked Midwinter, her ears back and her wings rustling.

“I dunno, I just like the felling.” Bzzt. “Feeling.”

“I hope it’s not interfering with your speech. You’re rather malapropist.”

Charcoal didn’t look at Midwinter, but she folded her ears back. “That’s not my fault, I was silenced for a long time,” she muttered. Bzzt.

“Can you do that at the next circle?” asked Amanita. “We still need to draw two more before we’re done.”

“Right.” Bzzt.

As they set off, Midwinter gave Amanita a look like she was about to say something, only for Charcoal to start talking. “Anyway, I was thinking that, if these don’t yield anything, we might want to run tests on the river, since-”

Midwinter sucked in a sharp breath. “As- I- said-” she half-growled, “our purification processes do not-”

“And I’m planning on that!” Charcoal said, not caring one lick for Midwinter’s reaction. “I hope you’re right! Because if you are, then the river’s pretty close to pure, and that makes it great for analysis.” She looked off into the dark, towards (what Amanita presumed was) the river. “Rivers are… They’re kinda the… blood of a place. Everything glows- grows around the river. They follow ley lines easily. And we didn’t find much in Midwich Forest, but we could still find something in Tratonmane. And you can work the water to get even more data on the ley line, if it comes to that. Nothing, nothing to do with plumbing.”

“Ah.” Midwinter’s voice was back to normal, although she was still looking at Charcoal oddly.

“Not until tomorrow, though,” Charcoal said, peering up. “It’s getting late.” Indeed, the sky was darkening from orange to blue as the sun passed below the horizon outside the gorge. Not that you could tell unless you looked straight up. Amanita wondered just how strange a wide blue sky would feel to her once they left Tratonmane.

“In any case, your specific niche has slipped my mind. You’re the, ah… environmentalist?” Midwinter asked.

“I am!” Charcoal said, a spring working its way into her step. “I studied environmental magical systems for ages. You know, used properly, they can sustain life where it really shouldn’t be. Like in here! Midwich’s agriculture is nuts. You guys have grain! This far north!”

“Yes, we’ve certainly made the valley work for us. It’s quite impressive.”

“So we’d better fix the line quick, or else…” Charcoal shuddered, all the way to the tip of her tail. “Can you imagine? Being up here without a ley line to draw from for food? That’d be awful. You wouldn’t get much food and the food you would get would be malnourished. Any village probably wouldn’t last the season.”

“Hmm. And you do not know how long you shall be here?”

“Not yet,” said Charcoal. “This line’s a doozy for some reason. We might need to get extra help from Canterlot, but I’d really not have that happen.” She laughed the laugh of someone just anxious enough to fret.

“Indeed,” Midwinter muttered. She gave the two a bow. “It was a pleasure speaking to you, even if you fumbled the words, but I’m afraid I have business to attend to.” And she winged into the dark.

Charcoal didn’t seem to notice Midwinter’s departure. “It kinda makes you wonder,” she said. “Just what does Tratonmane get from the VFC? I mean, FVC. The mine’s mostly coal, right? How is coal so valuable that keeping a village up here is profitable?”

“Who knows?” Amanita said with a shrug. “Maybe it’s not and inertia keeps it moving. Come on. I’m hungry, and the sooner we get those circles drawn, the sooner we can get dinner.”





“We still need to talk about sharing magic,” said Code.

“Hmm?” Amanita said through a mouthful of oddly delicious clover.

“Maybe ‘need’ is too strong. But I cannot believe we’ve barely looked at it since yesterday.”

Upon finishing up the geothaumometers and shock circles, it was collectively decided to turn in for the day, and now the team was having dinner in the Cave’s common room again. Amanita was having an excessively simple (but quite tasty) salad of arugula and clover. Bitterroot and Charcoal were deep in conversation about the Elements of Harmony. And Code was playing with her meal in the fidgety way of someone who’s hungry but thinking of something still more interesting than food.

“Well, you know.” Amanita swallowed. “Work. And after dinner, you and I had that- one conversation.”

“But we left it at that,” muttered Code. “We didn’t go further once we had the time. In Canterlot, I would’ve…” She picked up a leaf of arugula in her mouth and slowly chewed, drawing it into her mouth like a spaghetti noodle as she stared at her thoughts. Then, almost like a rope had snapped, her head whipped around until she was looking at the bar, mostly empty. One of her ears twitched. “Would you like to find out?”

“Wha- Sharing?”

“Yes. Cabin seems unoccupied at the moment. We could talk to her.”

“Er-” Amanita glanced over. Cabin seemed concerned mostly with wiping down glasses at the moment. But knowing Cabin, she’d probably have an excuse ready to avoid talking to them. Still, worth a shot. “Sure.”

“Excellent.” Without another word, Code set off for the bar. Amanita quickly scurried after her.

Cabin looked up as they took seats in front of her, then went back to cleaning glasses. “Need arythin’?” she grunted.

“Do you know how to share magic?” Code asked. “Between individuals.”

“Aye. Most everypone does.”

“Can you teach us?”

Cabin raised her head, looking like Code had asked her the best way to barbeque foals. Amanita squirmed beneath her gaze; Code didn’t blink. “Ye dinnae ken?” Cabin huffed out something that might’ve been a laugh. “There’re foals that outclass ye.”

“Correct,” Code said shamelessly. “And I, for one, feel it is never too late to learn. Can you teach us?”

“Lissen,” grunted Cabin, “I’ve got importanter things tae do then teach somethin’ that ought tae be foal’s play tae a buncha-”

Code slapped a high-value coin on the bartop. “Would this speed things up?”

“Pff. Ye reckon ye can buy yer way up?” Cabin tried to look incensed, but it seemed more performative to Amanita than anything. She was looking at the shiny too often. “I dinnae ken ’ow it works in Canterlot, but ’ere, busy’s busy.”

Code shrugged. “Well, if you’re busy, you’re busy. But then I’ll be taking this back.” She pulled the coin back an inch.

Cabin managed a full second before she gave the coin a telekinetic yank from beneath Code’s hoof. “Ain’t that busy,” she grunted reluctantly. She made a show of examining it, then tucked it away. After a moment’s thought, she pointed at Amanita. “You. Unicorn.”

“Amanita,” the unicorn in question said.

“Unicorn. Ye ken how, when ye’re magickin’ somethin’ up, ye’re… pushin’ it with yer thoughts and magic?”

Amanita assumed that meant levitating something. It was… not the greatest description, but not inaccurate. She nodded hesitantly.

“Push yer magic at somepony else. Nae thoughts, let ’em find those theirselves.”

And Amanita nearly clamped her jaw shut in horror.

That was very close to enthrallment.

When you made a thrall, you pushed your own magic and will on them, smothering the identity of the original pony as you bent your soul to your own. Amanita knew how to make thralls. She’d done it plenty of times before. Now, though, the thought made her guts churn. The realization of what enthrallment actually was had made her finally decide to abandon her lich master and run. She almost cut off any thoughts of sharing magic on pure reflex.

But.

But the important part, making sure their thoughts were yours, Cabin had specifically shot down. Let them find their own thoughts. Because that was how they shaped the magic, right? Otherwise, you were just using them as a complicated conduit and might as well cast the spell directly, since-

“Ye feelin’ alright?”

Amanita blinked her way back to reality. Cabin was squinting at her, not particularly worried. “Ye’re lookin’ woolgathered,” Cabin said. “Do ye-”

“I’m fine,” Amanita said quickly. “Just- thinking.” Technically true.

Okay. Okay, she could- She could do this. Nothing to do with enthrallment. She could do this. She could. She could. She could. (It was around this time it stopped sounding like self-denial and started sounding something resembling genuine.) She took a deep breath, paying close attention to the way the chill wormed down her throat. Keep her thoughts on that, and she wouldn’t go forcing them on Code. “I, I think I get it.”

One of Cabin’s ears twitched at some certain sound or voice. “Got work that needs doin’,” she said, pushing away. “Back in a few.” And she was depositing drinks on a tray for some pony in the common room.

Code leaned close to Amanita, her voice dropping to little more than a whisper. “I recognize that look,” she murmured. “Something wrong?”

“Just-” Amanita took another breath. “Just bad memories.”

“If you’d rather not, I-”

“I, I’m fine, they’re already gone. I just wasn’t expecting them. I can, uh, try to lend you magic.”

Code gave Amanita another Look, but settled back on her stool. “Very well. Hit me.”

Amanita nodded and reached inside herself.

When she normally used her magic, Amanita had an idea behind it. That idea shaped any spells she cast, any enchantments she wove, any rituals she invoked. This wasn’t out of any intent, but like the eyes focusing on an object: it was just how things happened. But now, she tried to unspool her magic like letting a limb go limp. No thoughts, just sort of wafting it in Code’s direction.

Something twitched.

Amanita felt a sort of metaphysical jerk on her… She didn’t know what. It wasn’t exactly her magic. It was something more… She didn’t know what. The feeling was so strange that she jolted in surprise, instinctively pulling her magic back in. At the same time, Code shuddered like an ice cube was rolling down her spine. “That was you, right?” asked Amanita.

“Yes,” Code said. But she said it absently; only a small portion of her attention was on Amanita. One of her hooves was drumming on the bartop as she muttered to herself. “…difference in kind… If you adapt the right ritual-”

“So-” Amanita cleared her throat. “So now what?”

“I’d like to try it the other direction, if you don’t mind.” Code still wasn’t exactly talking to Amanita, more at her. “If Cabin’s advice was sound, I think I can do it myself. Then… we’ll figure it out.”

Amanita’s track record with “figure it out” was… mixed. But she always accomplished something, at least. “Okay, try it. Whenever you’re ready.” She began taking deep breaths. Being calm and steady seemed like the best way to prepare for this.

After a moment, something curled around awareness and batted at her sensation. It was… not exactly the liminality of a ritual, but something bordering on it. It was… It was magic. Not her magic, but someone else’s, being pushed at her. Amanita tentatively reached out with her own magic and tugged it.

Code sucked in a breath like she’d been stabbed in the gut and the feeling was gone. She put a hoof on her chest, breathing deeply, gasping, “Mother of… That is… something.”

“You okay?”

“Absolutely. Merely shocked. I’ve never felt… my own magic moved like that.”

The phrasing made Amanita hyperfocus on Code. If they were wrong about this, if sharing magic felt bad- But Code didn’t look disturbed, just thoughtful. She was muttering something about rituals and sympathetic attunement. Which was certainly a route to follow, but a bit beyond the scope of what they could study in Midwich.

“I wonder how pegasus magic feels,” Code said. “Or kirin magic.”

“Everything Charcoal’s told me says kirin magic and unicorn magic are functionally identical.”

Code’s grin wasn’t a mad-scientist one just yet, but it was in the right neighborhood. “But we don’t know. And now, we can see for certain.” She looked across the common room, to Bitterroot and Charcoal. “Think they’ll be interested?”

Amanita knew that Code would proceed no matter what her answer was, so she just said, “Might as well ask them.”

Bitterroot and Charcoal were still talking about the Elements as Amanita and Code approached. “-bigger than she sounds,” Charcoal was saying. “Her mane’s kinda ratty and she’s… I can’t remember the word. Lean? Wiry? Something like that. I guess it comes from working outside so much. She’s definitely not what you’d expect someone named ‘Fluttershy’ to be like.”

“I thought-”

“Charcoal. Bitterroot,” declared Code.

Charcoal’s tail flicked in surprise. “Ehm. Code. Amanita.”

“Cabin,” declared Bitterroot, pointing across the room. “Wait, she’s not there anymore.”

“So, uh,” said Amanita, shuffling from hoof to hoof, “we… kinda figured out how to share magic-”

“Really?” Bitterroot’s wings twitched. “Neat.”

“Not all the way,” Amanita said quickly. “It’s not, Code can’t levitate anything with my magic yet. But between the four of us, we’ve got four different magic-using species, so we were thinking-”

Code’s grin was deeper into the neighborhood and now knocking on the door of mad-scientist-dom. “Before we turn in for the night, how would you two like to make history?”

“I’m a member of a long-forgotten species coming back to knowledge,” said Charcoal. “I’m already history.”

“And I’ve-” Bitterroot blinked and looked around. “I’ve… y’know… and I’ve done that twice. I’m also history.”

“Would you like to make history again?”

Bitterroot and Charcoal looked at each other. After a moment, they grinned.
> 12 - The Logistics of Isolation
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

Amanita was stirred from her slumber by the sound of someone coughing. Sharing magic last night had been tiring in a way she’d never felt before, so she wasn’t surprised that other ponies also weren’t feeling a hundred percent. But they’d managed to learn a lot, even if no one could do much yet. Foal steps.

Her head was swimming with a stroke that meant she wouldn’t be getting any further rest. She half-stumbled out of bed, pulled on her furs, and squinted out the window and up. The sky was red, turning to blue, as the sun rose outside Midwich. Licking her lips to get them wet, she meandered down the staircase to the common room. There were still a few ponies there, including a pair at the bar; once Amanita took a seat on the opposite end as them, they got up and went to a far corner.

Cabin was standing at the middle of the bar, watching her intently. “Mornin’,” she grunted.

“Morning,” Amanita mumbled back.

Silence. Amanita blinked a few times and managed to focus on Cabin’s horn. Somehow, after their search, the thief and their room being broken into had completely slipped her mind. Better or worse than the alternative, being hyper-aware that the place she was sleeping in had been robbed? Her brain couldn’t muster up an argument in either direction.

“Ye’ll need tae tell me if’n ye want arythin’,” grunted Cabin.

“I don’t,” said Amanita. “Not yet.” She rubbed at her eyes. The throbbing in her head was going down, but that meant her tiredness was coming to bear, and it was too late for her to go back up and get any rest. “Unless you’ve got coffee.” She didn’t drink it much herself, but it seemed to wake other ponies up. Even if there was a caffeine addiction running rampant through the country that no one seemed willing to admit.

“Got what?”

“Never mind.” She didn’t like the smell, anyway, so the taste probably wouldn’t be much better.

Cabin grunted.

Amanita raised her head and looked at the menu. The menu that seemed to be ninety percent whiskey. Would Cabin serve her whiskey right now if she asked? Probably. But it was a terrible idea for a multitude of reasons. She was about to slouch forward again when she noticed something else: the prices. And that got her thinking just enough to push away some of her tiredness. “Um. Cabin?”

Grunt.

“You don’t use scrip here?”

One of Cabin’s ears twitched as she looked up. “What?”

“You’ve been taking our money. Our actual coins. You use bits and not some company token?”

“Sure,” she grunted. “Why wouldnae we?”

Amanita shrugged, making some vague mumble. “Don’t need to keep cash on hoof. Not much to spend money on. Overcharging at the company store.” Wait, why had she said that last one?

Cabin’s ears went down, and they went down fast. Her subsequent inhale and exhale sounded like the cycling of a blast furnace, and when she spoke again, her enunciation was sharp. “Ye’re new here,” she said, “so I’ll let it slide. But ken this: His Grace Tallbush is honest. Everypony he pays, he pays fairly. Everypony he charges, he charges fairly. If he were a king, he’d be a right fine one. And if’n ye say elsewise, yer sleepin’ in the streets tonight.”

Where she probably wouldn’t survive until morning. For a duke and company oligarch this far from Canterlot law, Tallbush must’ve been the epitome of a stand-up guy. Or maybe Cabin was in cahoots with him. Either way, Amanita just said, “Sorry, didn’t know.”

“And now ye dae,” grunted Cabin. “Dinnae disremember it.”

Someone coughed and Bitterroot came ambling down the stairs. She loped across the room and plonked on the seat next to Amanita. “Morning,” she said. Cough.

“You feeling alright?” Amanita asked.

“Fine, fine,” croaked Bitterroot. “Morning throat. It’ll go away in an hour.” Cough. “So what’s for breakfast?”

It wasn’t long before Code and Charcoal were down as well. Breakfast was quick and uneventful, and the moment they were done, Code stood up. “Refresh my memory. Charcoal, you were having a meeting here with Midwinter and Carnelian today, yes?”

“Yeah,” Charcoal said with a nod. “About the plumbing. Whether they use spells or potions or something else. I’ve actually got a list of questions I was planning on asking them.”

“Good. That sounds like something I ought to sit in on. Amanita, would you mind checking up on the geothaumometers?”

“No, I can do that.” Of course, why wouldn’t she be able to? Just walk up to one, take all the relevant measurements, repeat. Easy. (…She really hoped she hadn’t just jinxed herself.) “Should I go through the whole procedure on them? Triangulation, measuring, all that?”

“Yes, thank you. I can’t say if they’ll be done just yet, but they should finish before noon.”

“Mind if I tag along? I need something to take up the day,” Bitterroot said.

“Don’t,” Amanita said flatly. “It’ll be boring.” Even more than you’d expect. When you were taking measurements from a geothaumometer, there wasn’t much to do besides look at gauges and write numbers.

“C’mon, examining some magic machinery? Can’t be that dull. You can explain it to me.”

“Do you have a bachelor’s in arcane theory?”

“…No.”

“Then no, I can’t explain it to you. You’d just be sitting around watching me write things on a scroll.”

“As opposed to talking about plumbing?”

“There’s actually quite a lot of pegasus magic in plumbing,” Charcoal piped up. “Working with water and cleanness… The same sort of stuff that goes into making cloudstone. If you didn’t clean it beforehoof, you’d be picking up a tiny little bit of dirt every time you touched something. And you’ve gotta keep it clean of the dust it picks up…”

“Pegasus magic?” asked Bitterroot. “In… plumbing.”

Charcoal cocked her head. “That’s what I said, isn’t it? It depends on how it’s used, and it’s not always the most-used form of magic, but sure, you can use it for that.”

“…What degree do I need to sit in on plumbing?”

“None, I think. I understood it, and I don’t even know what pegasus magic feels like!”

Bitterroot glanced at Code. “Do you mind?”

“You can sit in if you wish,” said Code. “I can’t imagine why, but I don’t think you’ll get in the way.”

“Then I’ll stick around.”

Amanita pushed herself to her hooves. “I’ll get the map, and then I’ll be going,” she said. Although right before she headed up, she noticed that Bitterroot gave her an extra look. Probably nothing. Right now, she had geothaumometers to analyze. And a new frame of mind to get into.





Bitterroot started kicking herself almost the moment Amanita was out of the inn. It’d been a perfect opportunity to get some time alone with Amanita, with little chance of being interrupted and a nice long time before any of that changed. They could talk things out, see how Amanita was doing. It was the reason Bitterroot had decided to come here, after all. And then Amanita had gotten intense with saying “no”. Bitterroot knew that tone, where Amanita wouldn’t let go of an idea. Not wanting to talk about her past with Circe. Thinking she’d be useless to the Guard once another necromancer came around. And now, treating taking measurements as boring. Unless she was hiding something.

Of course, Amanita was the sort of mare who, once she’d decided that she needed to get away from a lich, had dropped a mine on that lich’s head and bolted across the Frozen North with minimal supplies. Sometimes, she did things… bigly. It was possible that analyzing geothaumometers really was that incredibly boring.

Maybe Bitterroot should’ve pushed. Maybe she shouldn’t’ve. Ah, well, too late now. There was a chance she could squeeze out an excuse later and get involved anyway.

For the moment, though, she was lounging around in the common room of the Watering Hole, wondering if she really wanted to take a look at plumbing. It sounded kinda interesting, admittedly, but not necessarily that interesting. “What time did Midwinter and Carnelian say they’d arrive, again?” she asked Charcoal.

“They, uh, didn’t,” Charcoal said. “Just in the morning. I don’t think I’ve even seen a clock around here… They probably don’t need them. I know the Grove didn’t. It’s like, what’s the point? There’s not a lot of people around, and you don’t even need to worry about trains, since there’s only one train that runs on that track… Yeah. Not worth it, really.”

“It can make waiting a bit of a pain, though.”

“…Yeah.”

Luckily, right then, the door banged open, letting the frigid winds of Midwich curl their way in. Midwinter the season entered the building, followed by Midwinter the pony and Carnelian the sullen pony. Midwinter shook some snow from her mane and said, “I do hope we weren’t keeping you waiting.”

“Nothing we couldn’t handle,” said Code.

Midwinter and Carnelian looked at Bitterroot for a moment before Midwinter said, “Come along. The setup’s downstairs.”

Cabin let them into the back; down a narrow staircase below ground was a large, low room. Sputtering light gems that probably needed to have an arcanist look at them illuminated a messy mishmash of whiskey barrels, food, various miscellaneous supplies for the Watering Cave, and whiskey barrels. Down here was everything the inn needed, kept out of the way of company. Midwinter and Carnelian wound their way through like they were used to labyrinthine rooms; Bitterroot and the others took quite a bit longer. Bitterroot could tell when Charcoal because of the way her hornlight reddened slightly and she let out another low string of words that technically weren’t curses but foals oughtn’t hear anyway.

Eventually, they pulled their way out and into what felt like a cubby: a small area right in the corner of the room clear of most other barrels and junk. Something that looked like a water heater was standing along one of the walls, while the other hosted an array of piping and rune-carved wooden blocks that Bitterroot was sure would make her feathers curl if she looked at them too long.

The second she saw the pipes, Charcoal’s ears went up. “Ooo,” she said, darting up to the wall to squint at one of the blocks. “That’s neat, that’s… Yeah, that’s good.”

Carnelian smirked. “You see?” she said. “I told you. You didn’t need to worry about our spells working.”

“That’s not what you said,” Charcoal replied disinterestedly, “you said-”

Before either one could get a snipe in, Code cleared her throat, making a pre-avalanche sound. “Midwinter,” she said, rather loudly. “What, in general, does this do?”

“These form the purifying systems for the Watering Cave,” Midwinter said quickly, gesturing at the pipes with a wing. “We’ve charms and spells running through the whole arrangement.”

Charcoal ran a hoof along the pipes and very resolutely didn’t look at Carnelian. “You’re very thorough,” she said idly.

“Of course,” said Midwinter. “Water’s the only thing everypony needs, young or old or anything else. It’d be quite a shame if it got contaminated.”

“Do you use the same bezel- design in every building?”

“Indeed. It helps with keeping everything running properly.”

“Right, right.”

“We’re, uh, awfully far from the river,” Bitterroot said. “How does-”

Carnelian let out a snort. “You’re not very bright, are you?” she muttered.

“Not when it comes to plumbing, no.”

“We do not get the water,” Midwinter said tightly, “from the river.” She fired a quick glare at Carnelian, who twitched her ears and took a step back. “There are wells beneath the town that we pump water up from, and we can melt snow quickly if it comes tae that.”

Charcoal was still inspecting the pipework. “There’s something like a reservation, right? …Reservoir, reservoir.”

“Could you speak properly, please?” asked Carnelian. “It’s aggravating when you-”

Charcoal snapped to look at her so quickly Bitterroot half-expected to hear the crack of a sonic boom and the air around her grew hazy, but Midwinter stepped in and quickly diverted her attention. “Yes, there’s a reservoir. In fact, we…”

The talk trailed on, mostly led by Charcoal. Bitterroot hung around in the back. Why had she decided this would be more interesting than geothaumometers, again? Something about pegasus magic. Every now and then, she heard something interesting, although she never had anything to connect it to.

Eventually, she just gave up and slunk her way back upstairs. Maybe whatever she heard about pegasus magic would be engaging, but she couldn’t bring herself to wait that long. The plumbing was just boring. Thank Celestia she didn’t need to force herself to stick with it.

She sat back down at the bar, earning a look from Cabin. “Turns out, infrastructure can be boring,” Bitterroot said. She grinned crookedly. “Who knew?”

Cabin grunted.

“You can ignore me. I’m not ordering anything.”

Cabin grunted.

Bitterroot looked down at the bartop, tracing the whorls and swirls with her eyes. What was she doing here, really? Waiting around just to see if a friend fell to pieces. When that friend wasn’t even aware of why she was here. Why hadn’t she told Amanita? She was an adult, she deserved to know. Bitterroot slipped into stakeout mode as she thought and time slipped away like water in a river. She rolled her thoughts back and forth, forth and back, around and around, doing her best to consider every angle.

…Okay. Next time she had a decent moment to talk with Amanita, she’d tell her. And then… Well. She didn’t know. But it’d be something.

She was rattled from her fugue by Carnelian coming back up. “Four waters,” she promptly said to Cabin. “We’re mighty busy.” Cabin nodded and set to it.

Carnelian glanced over at Bitterroot and smirked. “Too much for you, hmm?”

Shrug. “Guess so. Didn’t understand much.”

Carnelian snorted. “You know little pegasus magic, do you?”

“I helped manage the weather when I was younger,” Bitterroot said. “Several decades ago. As a teenager. Over the summer. Twice.”

“That kirin down there?” Carnelian pointed at the floor. “She knows more than you. What kind of pegasus do you think you are?”

Bitterroot’s voice had been sanded down to near-total flatness. “Oh no, people know more than me, aaaaaaaa.” She wiggled her hooves in mock anxiety. “Remember, I’m not really with them officially. Just a hanger-on. I’ve got no specialties they need.”

Carnelian frowned, like she’d expected some other response. She opened her mouth, closed it. Said nothing. Cabin put a tray of cups filled with water in front of her. No response.

“Look,” Bitterroot continued, flaring her wings slightly, “I don’t use a lot of magic in my life, forgive me if your knowledge set is different than mine.”

Carnelian continued to say nothing. Then, without another word, she picked up the tray of cups and trotted back downstairs. Cabin gave her a Look as she departed, then looked at Bitterroot and shrugged. Bitterroot shrugged back. Whatever Carnelian was thinking, that was none of her business.

Although… Her throat was still a bit scratchy. “Could I get some water, too?”

She was on her third cup when Code came back up from the basement, looking slightly rattled. Bitterroot sat up straight and asked, “Something wrong?”

“Yes,” Code said. “They’ve switched to graywater and waste management.”

She wasn’t even in the same room and Bitterroot’s wings were already curling. “I would’ve thought you could’ve handled it,” she said. “High Ritualist and all.”

“I can handle anything I need to, but if I don’t need to, I don’t see why I should have to,” Code said shamelessly. “I like most of my work, but by no means all of it.”

“Heh. Yeah.”

“In the meantime, I need to find Tallbush. I’d to get access to the mines so we can look at the ley line in there. I don’t suppose I could convince you to come with me? I could use the extra set of eyes.”

Bitterroot thought about Amanita, down by the geothaumometers, and telling her the truth. She couldn’t have done that much work yet, right? They hadn’t been downstairs long. Interrupting her at this point would be like interrupting her just as she got started. “Eh, sure. I don’t have much else going on.”

“That’s one way to put it.” Code clicked her tongue and jerked her head towards the door. “Come. Tallbush might be at the town hall.”





It was dark, making it hard to see. Amanita’s breath was misting in front of her, making it hard to see. And every now and then, a frigid wind would blow up through Midwich from the north, causing her to squint to protect her eyes and making it hard to see.

Amanita would be very happy once she was out of Midwich. The blue sky above seemed to be taunting her.

She walked down the road towards the treeline. It was quieter than it’d been any of the other days — no foals playing nearby, no lumberjacks working the trees. Just the crunch of snow beneath her hooves, the wind howling through the forest, and the creaking of branches. Lovely. She pulled her furs tighter around her.

Fortunately, the geothaumometers were far enough away from Midwich Forest that Amanita didn’t need to constantly stay on the alert. The first one was close to the road, even. It stood out from the dark as Amanita approached it, its crystalline reservoirs glowing slightly. Still up. Promising. When she got closer, she could feel the hum of the shock circle. More promising. She tried poking it. Bzzt. Just as strong as it’d been yesterday. Animals hadn’t interfered with it, at least.

Amanita crouched down to inspect the reservoirs. None of them were full just yet, but getting there. Another hour or two ought to do it, at least for this one. The pendulum was still swinging steadily, in defiance of the wind and gravity.

Checking the other geothaumometers: start by heading east or heading west? …East. It felt right for some reason. As she headed east, all the other geothaumometers Amanita checked showed similar results: intact, undisturbed, still a little ways from completion. She didn’t bother turning around once she hit the eastern valley wall; she’d probably see the same results on the western side. She had some time to kill. (Sadly, time was one of the things she couldn’t resurrect.)

Settling in for a wait, Amanita boosted the light from her horn to get a better look at her surroundings. She was near one of Tratonmane’s farms, where the villagers were growing… some sort of grain. She took a closer look. Oats. Mmm, oats. Still, it was strange, sitting there in the dark with snow beneath her hooves and the cold biting at her neck while also looking at something as delicious as oats growing just fine. More evidence of the ley line. She was tempted to take a nibble, just to see if they still tasted good, but that wouldn’t be nice. (Did it count as stealing? Probably.)

…And while she was thinking of the ley line…

She took a seat not too far from the geothaumometer and closed her eyes. What had Charcoal said again? Deep breath in, deep breath out. She let her control over her awareness slacken and spread as she stopped paying attention to time. Her sensation, suspended in her magic, began trickling into the dirt, bit by bit and thought by thought.

There it was. The ley line. All the power Circe had told her about, and yet so much more, all that Circe had told her to ignore. It was tiring, eking out little more than subsistence living, day by day. It was satisfying, constantly spitting in the face of hardship, day by day. It was the chill of a focused wind that had had every last ember of warmth rise out of it long ago. It was the warmth of a stove when you stepped into home after a long day. It was dark, Midwich’s cliffs suppressing the sun almost interminably. It was bright, the illuminated walls shining ethereally down on the valley floor as the sun slowly inched towards its zenith. It was nowhere else in the world. It was Tratonmane.

And it was overwhelming. Amanita was able to surf the flow at first, but its waves tried to both pull her in and cast her out. The nape of her neck itched like someone was aware of her. Something roiled in the dirt, and before she knew it, she was picking herself off the ground and wiping snow off her face.

Still, it was something. Sensation, memory… Valuable things to get from a ley line. She was learning! She’d need to do something about the time, though, see if she could speed it up.

It was a shame she was only getting a sense of what Tratonmane felt like after the line had already shifted. Poking into it more would require guesswork. But, hey, she had time to guess. She wiggled her haunches into a slightly more comfortable position and closed her eyes again.

Her magic spread her awareness again, back into the soil and frost. There was clearly a sense of place, so maybe she just had to look for the things that didn’t make sense with the place she knew? She let the line run beneath her senses and waited, like dipping a hoof in the water as you floated down a lazy river. If something felt odd, she’d notice it.

She didn’t know how long she was waiting, but something stirred through her. Prickly, sharp, the thorns of a rose concealed in a fern. Promising. But where did it come from? Amanita sat and kept wai-

“Ehm. Ma’am?”

Amanita opened her eyes. An earth pony with a chlorophyllic palette, hooves thicker around than her neck, and breath like a chimney was looking at her with some cross of mild worry and supreme unconcern. From the way the bottoms of her legs were soaked, she’d been outside a while. Farmer, maybe? “You’un alright?” asked the pony.

“Uh, yeah, just feeling the ley line,” Amanita said quickly. “Part of the study. I, I’m not in your way, am I? I can move.”

One of the pony’s ears flicked. “Nay, ye’re fine.” She didn’t stop staring, though.

Once she was no longer meditating, Amanita was aware of a crick in her back and stiffness in her joints (probably signs she’d been doing it wrong). With a groan, she stretched, her back bending like a reverse arch as she kneaded the snow beneath her hooves. She could almost hear her cartilage popping. How long had she been sitting there? Long enough that sunlight was hitting the ground on the opposite side of the valley, at least. Hours. “Are these plants yours?” she asked, mostly to break the silence.

“Ech.” The pony shrugged. “In and about. I’s the pony who takes care of ’em, aryways.”

“And they only get sunlight for a few hours a day, right?”

The farmer looked at Amanita. She looked at the walls of Midwich. She looked at Amanita again, and it was a miracle she wasn’t looking at Amanita with a “you cannot seriously be asking me this” expression painted all across her face. “Aye,” she said not quite flatly.

“I’ve heard even-” Amanita groaned as she straightened one of her rear legs. “I’ve heard even earth pony magic struggles in these environments. You’ve harnessed the power of the ley line really well, to be growing this many oats.” She’d seen it while traveling with Circe; villages trying to be self-sufficient could struggle to grow half as many crops as Tratonmane.

“…Aye,” said the farmer. “Our foremothers were right fine teachers.”

By now, Amanita had worked most of the soreness from her limbs. After giving her leg one last roll, she offered her hoof. “I’m Amanita.”

For maybe a fraction of an instant, the farmer looked suspicious. Then the instant passed and she shook. “Rutabaga.”

“Pleased to meet you.” On a whim, she added, “You probably know the ley line better than any of the ritualists. Have you felt any changes in it in the past… moon?”

And the silence lasted just long enough for Amanita to notice it.

She immediately zeroed in on Rutabaga’s body language. She was still, her ears were stiff, and her tail was flicking. And were her eyes a bit wide? But before Amanita could make any guesses, Rutabaga shrugged and either looked up the valley or away from Amanita. “I reckon so. ’Tis… I canne say what is the problem.”

“It just feels off?” supplied Amanita.

“Aye. But I’m nae help tae ye.” One of Rutabaga’s ears twitched. “Pleasure tae strike up wi’ ye, but I must needs tae be at the greenhouses.” And she was trotting off into the dark.

Amanita watched her depart. Convenient excuse to leave or genuine reason to leave? Or genuine reason that provided convenient excuse? She’d seemed surprised at the question… but why? Or was she considering her answer to hide some skeleton in her closet? (And why had Amanita just given her a reason like “it feels off”? Stupid.)

She could bring it up with Code later. Right now, the geothaumometer needed rechecking. Especially since, as the reservoirs showed, it had finally gone completely through its cycle. Amanita applied a slight amount of magic to disperse the shock circle, then leaned in close to check the gauges on each reservoir. Nothing seemed abnormal. She jotted down the readings. Meanwhile, the pendulum was still swinging and its edges were now glowing. Pulling out the map of where they’d placed each geothaumometer, Amanita found the first one. Which direction was the pendulum swinging in? She inspected the planisphere. Compass, protractor, straightedge, and the reading was marked on the map.

The next geothaumometer went in much the same way. So did the next one and the next one. Amanita was halfway across the valley floor when another shape came out of the darkness from Tratonmane. “Amanita,” said Varnish, nodding to her.

She gave him a quick token nod in return as she took readings from the planisphere. “Varnish. Do you need me for something?”

“No,” he said. For once, he didn’t sound surly. “Just making sure you’re safe. We don’t want some wolf eating you.”

Amanita didn’t think she was that defenseless, but she still said, “Thanks.”

Jot jot, angle angle, sketch sketch. She tried to avoid looking at where the pendulum lines were converging, but it was hard to miss that they were coming together near the mine. That could mean a lot of things; Amanita tried to keep all those things out of her head. She could make assumptions when she had all the data.

They were about halfway to the next geothaumometer when Varnish cleared his throat and began, “That, ah, charm you cast. On the bear.”

Amanita set her jaw as her heart rate jumped slightly. This again? Were they going to just keep pestering her? Maybe it'd have been better if she’d never touched the bear.

“Did you make it?” Varnish asked. “I’ve never seen a spell quite like that before.”

After the instant of back-and-forth that was all she could spare, Amanita said, “Yeah.” Being the idiot she was, she’d already talked about developing it with Midwinter. There was no better way to attract attention than to change your story.

“How’d you do it? It’d warm my blood to be able to cast magic like that.”

“I-it’s, y’know, advanced magical research,” Amanita said. She tried to say it casually, nonchalantly, but her own roiling emotions meant her tongue tripped over itself and some of her words came out as a stutter. “Very, very academic. A, a lot of the magic’s only been developed in the last few years, s-so it’s, y’know, probably not known here.”

Varnish’s ears folded backward so fast it felt like the tips ought to make whipcrack sounds. “Listen,” he snarled, “if you’re saying-”

“I’m saying your magic and mine’s probably developed in different directions,” Amanita said quickly. “Y-you’ve been separate from the colleges in Canterlot for, what, three hundred years? And your magic’s developed in a different direction. We, Canterlot doesn’t even know sharing magic. It’s, your advanced and my advanced are two different advances.”

“Hmph.”

They headed further west. Amanita ticked off another geothaumometer. The lines on her map were converging, and-

“So how’d you start?”

It took Amanita a few moments to shift back into the mode Varnish wanted. “The- The bear spell?” she asked, glancing over her shoulder.

“Yes. Your ideas, your principles, your-”

“It’s complicated,” Amanita said bluntly. “I don’t think I could explain it to you out here.” Which, in spite of her secret, was absolutely true; it was a complicated work of magic.

“Can you explain your… your foundation?” Varnish didn’t quite growl. “I’m just asking about your-”

“Okay,” said Amanita sharply. “The key is, in Rachis’s Recall Rigmarole, you set the memory factor to infinity, because death is one of the most noteworthy parts of a body’s existence. Does that make sense?”

One of Varnish’s ears went down and he blinked. Twice. “…No.”

“Then I can’t begin to explain it to you,” said Amanita. “That’s the foundation of it. And before you complain, no amount of complaining can change the facts: you don’t know enough for me to explain this to you. Look, I’m busy, find me later if you want to talk about it.”

Varnish might’ve said something. Amanita ignored him. With every step she took westward, she got a little bit closer to daylight. At the very least, she could handle unreasonable requests better when she wasn’t squinting through the gloom.

Finally, she reached the edge of the valley’s shadow. As she walked into the sunlight, Amanita blinked. After spending so long in the dark, the light practically hurt and she wanted to shy away from it. But it was better for her, literally and metaphorically. She breathed deeply as she let her hornlight go. She’d felt sore in the past, when she’d tried to use more magic than she was able to, but she’d never felt anything like this ache.

But the light meant it was easier to take readings from the geothaumometers, and the last few blazed past. The reservoir readings didn’t mean much to Amanita at the moment, but the triangulating…

It was actually kind of astounding how closely the lines converged on each other. Amanita had assumed the intersections would be spread over a wide range, but this region was relatively tight — the size of a small house, maybe. Once Amanita had oriented herself and placed the node in real space, there was only one clear conclusion: as expected, the source of the ley line was in the mine. Code would be happy with the simplicity, at least. Maybe Charcoal, too.

But mines were mines, some of the most dangerous places in Equestria. The Tratonmanians might not let the crew in, for their own safety.

Or maybe that’d be their excuse for keeping them out.

Shaking her head, Amanita crumpled up her maps and strolled past the farm in the light, whistling a light and bouncy tune.
> 13 - Below
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

“Hellooooooo?” Bitterroot hollered into the town hall. “Tallbush? Anypony?”

As typical, the darkened building gave no response.

“I swear,” Code muttered, adjusting her glasses, “I’ve never seen somepony so hard to get a hold of. It’s like he’s avoiding me.”

“Just you? Not us?” Bitterroot asked.

“You and Amanita run into him from time to time. I haven’t seen him since we left the train on the first day.”

“Hnng.”

“Maybe he’s at the mine,” Code said with a sigh. “Come on. If you want.”

“What the hay. Lead on.”

At least with the mine, you knew exactly where it was: where Midwich Valley was getting zippered up. As Bitterroot and Code crunched southward, following the river, Bitterroot looked up. The sky was clear and the sun was just about ready to poke its rim over the edge. She’d savor the moment. And who knew how big of an impact it had on the ponies who’d been living here their whole lives?

But as the valley narrowed, what little light bounced down from the cliffs was snuffed out and the temperature dropped. Bitterroot shivered slightly. And with the entrance to the mine lying in the deepest black of the darkest part of the valley, that got her thinking. “Code? Sorry if this is obvious to you, but… could mining have soured the ley line?”

“No,” Code said promptly. “At least, not this one. It’s…” She paused for a moment to massage her temples. “Mining is almost purely physical and so rarely causes any sort of damage to ley lines. When it does, it’s not this fast. And it’s always accompanied by some kind of catastrophe that closes the mine down.”

“…Have you… seen that a lot?”

“Not personally, thankfully. But it pops up from time to time in records. Ley sanitation is very well-documented.”

They passed the coal breaker and Midwinter’s house, following a set of cart rails, eventually coming to the mine’s entrance. There was nopony there, but Bitterroot could hear faint sounds of work coming from the uphill tunnel that led inside. She headed into the mine-

-only to immediately get yanked back out on her tail. “Don’t,” Code snapped with a voice that made Bitterroot want to sit down and never move again. “Mines can be some of the most dangerous places in Equestria. If you waltz in without knowing what you’re doing, you could bring all it down on a lot of ponies. There’s a reason we’re asking Tallbush’s permission first.”

“Yes’m,” Bitterroot said reflexively. Part of her suspected Code was exaggerating. But that was a voice in which exaggeration sounded reasonable.

“Stay.” Code turned to the mine and hollered, “OI! Anypony in there? I’d like to talk to somepony!”

The words bounced down the tunnel like a ball down a pipe, the echoes back growing fainter and fainter. Code took a bite of dirt and settled onto her haunches to wait, staring at the shaft.

After a moment, Bitterroot broke the silence. “So what’ll you do if no one comes out?”

“Be enraged,” Code said casually. “Yell again. Bemoan my lack of authority. Lose some self-control. Hopefully not stomp about impotently.”

“Was that last one a problem?”

“When I was younger, it was.”

But a creaking sound prevented Bitterroot from learning more; a set of a few mine carts loaded with coal came rolling out from the tunnel, a small earth pony hanging off the front with a hoof on the brake lever. Smeared with coal dust, she was hard to make out in the combined darkness of the valley and the mine, except for when Bitterroot could see the whites of her eyes and the glare of her helmet’s lamp. As the carts rattled past them, the mare yanked hard on the brake, bringing the array to a halt. “Ye rang?” she asked in a voice that sounded awfully young for this sort of work. And up close, she looked rather skinny in her overalls.

“We’re looking for Tallbush,” Code said. (The mare’s ears flicked upwards.) “We were hoping we could get permission to enter the mine so-”

“I dinnae ken where he is,” the mare said quickly. “An’ he ain’t gonna let ye intae the mine.”

Code grunted and kneaded her forehead. “I’d like to hear it from him. Do you-”

“He- ain’t gonna let ye intae the mine,” the mare said. “No use a-lookin’ fer him.” She released the brake and the carts started rolling away.

Before Bitterroot could respond, Code had hooked a hoof around the rim of the last cart. The train jolted to a halt, the mare nearly slipping off, as Code seemingly exerted no more effort than flipping a pancake to hold how many hundreds of pounds of coal back. “In my experience,” she said, “assuming you know what someone else has to say can only lead to disappointment. I might as well assume Tallbush will simply let us into the mine because we’re working on royal business. But I’d rather know. So I’d very much appreciate it if you could tell me where Tallbush is.”

The mare’s eyes and ears were twitching as she looked Code up and down, like she was thinking quickly. Her tail flicked. Puff after puff of breath wafted from her mouth. But she wasn’t shaking.

“One of you two is wrong about Tallbush will say,” Bitterroot piped up. “Don’t you want to prove that it’s her?”

Smirking, Code twitched in a suppressed snort. The mare looked at Bitterroot like she’d forgotten she was there (she probably had). Then the mare said, in a steady voice, “I dinnae ken where His Grace be. Mebbe he’s in the breaker.” She pointed to the hulking building down by the railyard, a dull gray mass.

“Thank you.” Code released the carts; they trundled down the tracks towards the very building the mare had pointed out.

Bitterroot looked back over her shoulder at the mouth of the mine yawning before her. Was the mare just trying to keep them safe? Or something else? The latter, almost definitely. What, though… That was always the hard part. Too bad she wasn’t in a position where she could poke. Strangers drifting into town could poke easily. Strangers drifting into town as part of a government team could… not. “Going to the breaker, then, Code?”

No response. Code was sitting down, rubbing at her temples again, muttering something as she examined the mine entrance.

Bitterroot cleared her throat. “Hey. Code?”

Code blinked. “Hmm? Oh. I’m sorry, I…” She looked at the entrance to the mine, her ears down. “It’s in there,” she growled. “I can feel it.”

“In your gut or in your hooves?”

“Yes.” Code stood up and flicked her snow from her hooves. “Unfortunately, my gut is also telling me that this is going to be a wild goose chase. It’s a shame some wild geese need to be chased.”

The pair turned around and started walking back down the slope they’d just come up. The concept of traipsing back and forth over familiar ground looking for somepony who always seemed to have just left was familiar to Bitterroot, but it was also the worst part of bounty hunting. Ugh. Hay, at least when her quarry took off into the wilderness, she had some pretty sights to see.

“Wait.” Code suddenly turned aside, walking towards Midwinter’s house. “We might as well get as many viewpoints as possible. I’d hate for the one pony I didn’t ask be the one who knows where he is.”

Fuligin probably didn’t know, but framed like that, Bitterroot didn’t want to make that assumption, either. She trotted after Code.

Code knocked on the door and had barely set her hoof back on the ground when Fuligin cracked open the door just enough to stick his head out. “Hidy, Bitterroot,” he said, “and, uh…” His eyes flicked up and down Code’s body.

“Restricted Code,” she replied. “I-”

“This ain’t gonna be long, is it? I…” Fuligin looked over his shoulder for a second. “I’m mighty busy at the moment.”

“No, it won’t,” Code said, frowning. Her leg twitched as she pawed slightly at the ground. “You wouldn’t happen to know where Tallbush is, would you?”

“Nay, sorry,” Fuligin said. (Bitterroot found herself wondering if his response was too fast, but quickly decided it wasn’t.) “I ain’t seen him taeday an’ couldnae say where he is.” Another over-the-shoulder glance. “Lissen, I, I’m busy, and Midwinter needs my help. Ye really oughta be a-goin’, ye ain’t goin’ tae find him here.”

The muscles in Code’s legs tightened and her ears went straight up. For an instant, Bitterroot thought she was going to claim some sort of authority and push her way in. But the instant passed and Code slackened imperceptibly. “Very well,” she said with a sigh. “Thanks anyway.”

Fuligin nodded and nudged the door an inch closer to shut. “Will ye be needin’ arythin’ else?”

“I don’t believe-”

Gears engaged in Bitterroot’s head and she stepped forward. “Actually, uh, just one more thing. Pyrita was in the mine a few nights ago-”

Fuligin promptly went still.

Statue still.

Bitterroot had seen shock before, but this was something else. It was like Fuligin had been petrified. About a second before she started wondering if he was still breathing, he coughed. “Uh, w-who?” he asked, his voice hitched up a notch.

“Pyrita,” said Bitterroot. She quickly started scanning Fuligin, watching for any more blatant tells. What did he know? “You know, Arrastra’s sister?”

“Right,” Fuligin said in a way that didn’t match his body language. “I ken her. What happened?”

Wait, he didn’t know? “A few mornings ago, Pyrita was found at the entrance to the mine. Maybe she was sleepwalking or something. I was wondering if you’d seen her go up.”

Fuligin blinked twice, did nothing for a moment, then shook his head. His ears were quivering. “Beggin’ yer pardon, but nay, I didnae see her. I, I ain’t seen her in a long time.”

Uh-huh. Sure. “Alright,” Bitterroot said with a shrug. “Thanks, anyway.”

“Mmhmm.” Fuligin nudged the door a little more closed. “They really belong tae do more tae keep mares that age outta the mines.” And then the door was shut, the conversation over.

Bitterroot looked to Code, who clicked her tongue and nodded down the path. Bitterroot managed to keep quiet until they were back in the sunlight, when she hissed to Code, “He didn’t know.”

“About Pyrita? No, he didn’t,” Code whispered back. “Or so he claims.”

“Did you see the way he reacted? He was surprised when I just mentioned her name. He doesn’t know at all.”

“Hmm. Unfortunately, that doesn’t mean much.”

“In a town this small?”

“Yes. It’s entirely possible he simply doesn’t get out much and didn’t hear the news.”

“…Do you really believe that?”

“No. But unless it’s relevant to the ley line, it’s best to leave well enough alone. You know how towns like this can get when Canterlot pokes its muzzle in.”

She did, unfortunately. Poke Tratonmane too hard and it’d clam up, possibly denying any further information about the ley line along the way. Bitterroot was a bounty hunter; she wanted to follow threads, but unless any given thread had a clear price tag attached, following it was pointless in the context of her job. (Her curious part tried to point out that she wasn’t on the job at the moment. Her rational part shut it down with a reminder that Amanita, Code, and Charcoal were, and she didn’t want to hinder them.)

There was a steady rumble coming from the coal breaker when they arrived. It was a surprisingly tall building, looming over Bitterroot and Code in a way not unlike the cliffs of Midwich, sprawling up and down the slope like a cat. When Code nudged open a door, a cacophony of work smacked Bitterroot in the face: rumbling conveyor belts, rushing water, rocks shattering in crushers, debris tumbling down metal shafts, the occasional pony yelling at another. When she peeked in, she was confronted with a confusing maze of machinery, conveyors, and pipes twisting about, making it nearly impossible to get light everywhere. Contrary to what Bitterroot had expected, the air was surprisingly clean.

Somehow, Code managed to get the attention of a nearby pony, and they headed outside to talk without the din of coal breaking. At Code’s query on Tallbush, the worker shook his head. “Nay, he ain’t here,” he said. “Ye’d best check the mine.” He pointed.

“He’s not in the mine,” Code said tightly. “That was the second place we checked.”

“Then he’s prolly in the town ha-”

“The town hall was the first place we checked.” Code’s teeth weren’t clenched, technically.

“Have ye checked the forest?” the worker asked quickly. “Tallbush likes tae be certain his ponies are healthful, ’specially the lumberjacks.” He pointed northwards with the force of an arrow from a bow.

“No, we haven’t checked there yet,” Code said. Her voice was more resigned than relieved, mirroring Bitterroot’s own feelings. “Thank you.” The worker nodded and ducked back inside the breaker.

Away they went, north to the forest. Bitterroot was wondering how many times she’d walk over all of Midwich’s streets looking for Tallbuhs when Code sighed. “You know…” She grinned at Bitterroot with a sort of tired exasperation. “I’m a colonel. I miss being able to send out a dozen ponies to find whoever I’m looking for. Having to track down ponies myself was something I got promoted out of.”

“Wimp,” Bitterroot said, smirking. “It happens to me all the time.”

“And that’s why we pay bounty hunters.”





When Amanita had stopped by the Watering Cave, Cabin had said that Charcoal was busy while Bitterroot and Code were up at the mine. Amanita wouldn’t want to be disturbed in the middle of her work, so she left without disturbing Charcoal, whatever she was doing. South to the mine it was. Hopefully she wouldn’t need to go traipsing across all of Midwich to find Code and Bitterroot.

She did not, running into them at the trainyard cliff near the shadow of one of the towers. Bitterroot was looking at her funny, while Code was looking impotent-against-insubordination pouty. It was an excessively rare expression, given how little she experienced insubordination in the first place. “Amanita,” Code said, nodding.

“I’m pretty sure the ley line’s source is in the mine,” Amanita said first thing. Code straightened up and Amanita continued, “I took all the readings and this is the direction the pendulums were swinging in.” She pulled out the map and spread it out before them.

Code didn’t need five seconds of looking it over before she snorted. “Of course,” she muttered. Seeing the look on Amanita’s face, she added, “Not you. It’s… Feh.”

“Tallbush is the only one who can let us into the mine and we don’t know where he is,” said Bitterroot. “Everyone’s giving us different directions.”

“You’d think somepony responsible for a duchy would be easier to find when you want to talk about matters concerning that duchy,” Code growled.

Bitterroot began counting out her items by pawing at the ground. “We looked at the town hall, we looked at the mine, we looked at Midwinter’s house, we looked at the breaker, we’re going to look at the treeline-”

Breaker. That stirred something in Amanita’s head. The metaphysics of mining. She could work with that, maybe. But the mine itself would be a better place to start. If they could get in.

“-we really don’t know where he is,” Bitterroot finished.

“I wonder if I could pull rank to get us in,” Code muttered. “We know the line’s source is in the mine, we’re here to fix the line…” She snorted and shook her head. “But that’s the Elemental option when all else fails. Maybe, maybe we can find him. Amanita, you and I need to comb the town. Find out just where Tallbush is hiding.”

Bitterroot looked closely at Code, then said, “I can help. Just, you know, a basic search pattern.” She flicked a hoof through the air and made whistling noises. “I kinda have a history of looking for ponies.”

Amanita didn’t think much of it, but Code boggled. Code boggled. “What is up with you?” she asked. “You’re not getting paid for any of this.”

Bitterroot just shrugged. “I’ve gone on plenty of hunts where my quarry slipped away and I didn’t get the reward. I’m used to this.”

“Then, thanks. Do whatever you think is best.” Bitterroot saluted and took off. Code turned to Amanita. “How do you want to do this?”

Splitting up searching? How was she supposed to know that? Amanita floundered for a second, then said, “Uh… I’ll take the north half of town, you take the south half?”

Code nodded. “Sounds good. And if…” She squinted up at the sun. “If the sun hits the western cliffs before you find him, you can return to the inn. We still need to know what Charcoal learned.”

At least “sun hits western cliffs” was something she could work with and not a specific hour. “Okay,” Amanita replied. “I’ll… see you later, then.”

“See you later. Oh, and thanks for checking the geothaumometers. You also checked the reservoirs, right?”

“Of course.”

“Great. If we can get Tallbush to let us in, we may finally make some decent headway on this.”

But they’d gone hunting for Tallbush before. As Amanita walked north, she noted that that was a surprisingly big “if”.





After lunch, Bitterroot decided. She’d talk to Amanita after lunch. Within the hour after lunch, not any other sort of after lunch. She’d’ve done it right then, but Code was getting a Look on her face. A “this really really needs to be done NOW” look that wouldn’t brook any deviation from that getting done. Not that Bitterroot could blame her, faced with the hassle of hunting down somepony who ought to be readily available. (Still, part of the reason Bitterroot liked being a bounty hunter was the ability to be her own boss.) If all went according to plan, finding Tallbush quicker would let her talk to Amanita quicker. Which, naturally, meant she wouldn’t be the one to find Tallbush, but it was the principle of the thing.

Soaring through the air, Bitterroot started with a basic grid search pattern. Not something she did a lot, but only because it was an obvious search method and criminals on the run would be on the lookout for pegasi flying like that. But when you wanted the pony to notice you… Good thing the pattern was simple enough that Bitterroot could recall it in her sleep.

Back and forth, back and forth, back and forth. It sure was lucky that she was doing this at around noon, with sunlight reaching the valley floor. But although she could pick out pony after pony in the streets, none of those was the pony she needed. It didn’t seem fair; bounties were trying to hide and often good at it — that was the whole reason she got paid when she brought them in — but Tallbush was a pony you were supposed to find and talk to, and… yeesh. Imagine if he acted like this with his actual citizens, disappearing into the aether whenever somepony had a question.

Back and forth and back and forth and suddenly she wasn’t above Tratonmane anymore; the buildings had given way to fields and open space that technically qualified as farmland. Seen in the full light of day, it was surprisingly expanse, even close to pleasant. Of course, the open space also provided less places to hide. Bitterroot began making long, quick swoops over the valley, scanning it for Tallbush. Farmers, lumberjacks, some foals playing in the fields… No sign of Tallbush. Hrrng.

Midwich Forest crept in like a rattlesnake, suddenly there in a way that made Bitterroot hiss and backpedal as she could. The line between Tratonmane’s lands and the forest was as strong as it’d been in the dark, sharp enough to look more like the work of a reality-warping cartographer than anything natural. The trees didn’t look any more friendly in the daylight, either; it was like something was off about their color, but Bitterroot couldn’t say what.

“ ’Scuse me.”

Bitterroot pivoted around in the air. Whippletree was hovering not too far from her, a look of concern on his face. “Ye’re… feelin’ alright, right?” he asked.

“Yeah, sure,” said Bitterroot. She briefly looked down again. “I wasn’t going into Midwich. I was looking for Tallbush and lost track of where I was.”

“Right.” Whippletree coughed. “Well, beggin’ yer pardon, but ye’re a-makin’ me mighty nervous. Ye can disappear intae Midwich an’ leave narythin’ behind if’n y’ain’t careful.”

“I thought being above-”

“Ye ought tae be safe,” Whippletree admitted. “It’s jes’ me.” He looked off, down the valley. “Years ago, when I was a new stallion, one o’ my friends an’ me joined the militia. An’ us tyros, we were doin’ a sweep o’ the treeline.” His voice dropped a little and the breeze started taking the quieter parts away. “We made bad trash o’ procedure, split up tae cover more ground, an’… an’ a minute later, she was gone. Never found what taked her.”

Bitterroot shivered and angled her flapping to take her southward. Just a little. “Dang. I’m sorry.”

“It’s… It’s a terrible awful feelin’, kennin’ ye’re the last pony tae see someone alive. So jes’- Jes’ dinnae be a moldwarp, alright? Utilize yer brain matter an’ dinnae be sumphish.”

“…That means ‘don’t be stupid’, right?”

Whippletree cracked a grin for a second, then broke out in a deep laugh. “Ha! Aye, that’s what it means. Forgot our words ain’t yer words. But if’n ye can put all that taegether, ye ain’t the type tae be sumphish.”

“Could you make me less sumphish and tell me where Tallbush is?”

“Ach, sorry, but I dinnae ken where he is.” (Bitterroot clamped her jaw shut on a sigh.) “Arythin’ else?”

“No, thanks.”

“Alrighty. Stay safe.” Whippletree saluted and wheeled back towards Tratonmane with more grace than Bitterroot could ever hope for, particularly when he pivoted back to face her. “And, eh, I beg yer pardon fer that… firs’ night. Again.”

Bitterroot raised an eyebrow. “You’re still thinking about that?”

“It’s- I was a real tin-hoof an’… an’ I shouldnae have done it an’ I dinnae ken why I did it!” Whippletree protested. “What if-” Gulp. “What if somethin’s wrong wi’ me?” he asked quietly.

“Then something’s wrong with me, too, because I don’t care,” Bitterroot said. “Have you experienced anything like it before?”

One of Whippletree’s ears twitched. After a second, he shook his head.

“What about since?”

Headshake.

“Then don’t worry about it! One bad night, that’s all it was.”

“Mebbe,” Whippletree said doubtfully. “But, eh… thankee.” He gave a small smile, then flew off towards Tratonmane.

Whippletree’s denial of knowing where Tallbush was weighed on Bitterroot just as heavily as the first night had weighed on him. At what point did the repeated assertions of not knowing where your duke was turn suspicious? Bitterroot was suspecting both that she’d passed that point recently and that she was being a wee bit paranoid. But there was nothing she could do about it.

She rotated in the air again, looking back over Midwich Forest and the valley zooming northward. The trees blanketed the ground with a sea of gnarled, leafless branches swaying in the wind, almost monotone; without the cliffs hemming you in, it’d be easy to get lost. There weren’t even many landmarks, from what she could see: small rolling hills, some slight gaps where the river ran, a clearing at the bottom of one of the walls, a spot where the trees climbed further up than-

An unusually cold gust of air (cold even for Midwich) stabbed the inside of Bitterroot’s windpipe and she coughed. The rapid influx of cold air made it worse and Bitterroot quickly dropped down to the ground, in the empty space outside the forest. She banged her chest to get it out of her system. It was amazing, the way a sudden cough could mess with your flapping enough to potentially let you fall from the sky and kill you if you weren’t careful. Flying was dangerous.

A familiar buzz rattled her eardrums: a… chainsaw? …Definitely a chainsaw. Huh. Following the sound led her to Crosscut’s lumberjack crew, further west than they’d been earlier, hacking away at trees. Or at least a portion of her crew; there seemed to be about half as many as there’d been before. Maybe they were working at a sawmill. Crosscut was the pony with the chainsaw, cutting thick branches off a fallen tree while the other lumberjacks worked on felling more.

As Bitterroot approached, Crosscut turned off the chainsaw. She pushed a set of protective goggles up onto her forehead and waved away the sawdust. “What dae ye need?” she asked.

“Well, I-” A fleck of dust flew into Bitterroot’s throat and her words were cut off by a coughing fit. “How,” she wheezed once she got her breathing back under control, “how do you get chainsaws out here?” She realized that was poorly phrased a second after she said it.

Fortunately, Crosscut didn’t seem to care. “Tallbush asks us if’n we need arythin’,” she said casually. “Vittles, gear, everwhat. Next time he licks it tae Waypoint, he sees if’n he can find what we want or somethin’ that fits. If he does, he buys it fer us an’ we pay him back.” Shrug. “Easy.”

Well. Easily-abused was Bitterroot’s first thought. Her second one, too. “And Tallbush is the one to tell you how much you owe?”

Crosscut’s eyes narrowed slightly. “His Grace ain’t the type tae stiff us, if’n that’s what ye’re askin’, flatlander,” she said. “Shows us the receipts an’ all.”

“Speaking of Tallbush,” Bitterroot said quickly, “you wouldn’t happen to know where he is, would you? We’re trying to get into the mine so we can study the source of the ley line.”

“He ain’t gonna let you’uns in,” Crosscut said like she was explaining that water was wet. “Too dangerous.”

“I’d like to hear it from him,” Bitterroot replied.

Crosscut gave Bitterroot a Look, then looked up at the sun. After a moment, she said, “He’s usually out an’ about right now, cannae say where ye might find him, but he ought tae be at the hall in… an hour. Give or take.”

“You’re sure? Everypony says he’ll be at such-and-such, but he never is.”

“He’s ever at the town hall at that time,” Crosscut replied, a bit darkly. “Ever.” She pulled down her goggles and started the chainsaw up again.

To be fair, this was the first time Bitterroot had heard anything like “definitely” rather than “eh, maybe?”, so maybe it would actually be true this time. Maybe. “Thanks. I’ll let Code know.”

The saw came to a stop just above the bark. Crosscut turned to Bitterroot and said, “Ye dae that.” Then she pressed the saw to the log, sending up a scream of wood being shredded.

But maybe Bitterroot wouldn’t have to do that. There was time for another swing over Tratonmane. Maybe Tallbush would pop up. And maybe she’d win the lottery when she got back to Canterlot. Nevertheless, Bitterroot flared her wings and took to the sky again.





Amanita was many things. A skilled ponyfinder was not one of them.

Once she split from Bitterroot and Code, she was left traipsing up and down Tratonmane’s streets, looking for Tallbush. There weren’t many ponies around, even when she risked knocking on doors; everypony seemed to have gone to work. The few townsponies she met gave her brusque looks and brusquer responses. None of them claimed to know where Tallbush was.

“Look, this is urgent, we need-”

“An’ that ain’t goin’ tae change what I dinnae ken.”

Amanita began categorizing them: the ones who just grunted “no” at her, the ones who said the same thing with more words again, and the ones who really felt the need to rub in that they weren’t going to help her and were probably picking the right insult for her before the conversation ended and she walked away. She could’ve forgiven it all if one of them, just one, pointed her at Tallbush.

“C’mon, I can’t-”

“Ain’t my problem if’n he ain’t here. Scram, Canterlout.”

Amanita slipped into automatic as she gathered responses and began examining their colors in the noonlight. They still didn’t know who the thief from yesterday was. Not a single lick of info. At least she slept well. (Or was that a bad thing?) If she knew what a pony was going to respond a certain way, she might as well check their colors. And yet, pegasi whose wing colors didn’t match the rest of them were rare enough that she never ran into one, let alone one with the colors she was looking for.

“Are you sure you don’t-”

“Eeyup.”

And so, even though she was grid-patterning the town, Amanita’s search took less time than she expected. She soon reached the town square with the Great Ash for the second time that search. In the light, the Ash nearly looked beautiful even dead, with its branches twisting towards the sky in complex patterns. It would’ve been downright gorgeous if it still had leaves.

Amanita shook her head and looked around the square. No ponies, but she was drawn to the town hall. Where Tallbush was supposed to be but never was. …Eh, she was already here. Worth a shot.

Tratonmane was bright for once, but with the windows boarded up, the town hall was still as black as a pit when she peeked in. The contrast changed the darkness, turning it to a physical thing she’d have to struggle through as it pushed in around her. It was certainly doing a fine job of keeping her out. Amanita swallowed and reached for her magic.

The second she lit her horn, the feeling flipped. Far from being too claustrophobic, too tight, the empty space and looming shadows now were ready to swallow her up, like there was something lurking in them. She took a few steps forward; her hooves were muffled by her furs, yet the sound still echoed in the artificial cavern. She swallowed again and yelled, “Hello?”

A multitude of voices echoed back, all of them and none of them belonging to her. This sort of place was meant to hold the entire town and her, an outsider, being there alone felt wrong. None of the voices belonged to Tallbush; Amanita waited a moment more, and when he didn’t turn up, decided it was okay if she just left. So she did.

What time was it? Amanita squinted up. The sun seemed to be just touching the western cliffs, but it was still shining full-bore down into Midwich; the contrast between it and the darkness of the town hall was astounding. But it seemed to be… 1-ish? (Seriously, why hadn’t she brought a watch?) Maybe a little later. Code had said she could stop now. She could go back to the Watering Cave, meet up with the rest of the team. And get lunch. Lunch was nice.

As she approached the Cave, Midwinter came sauntering out, whistling. Her coat shimmered mesmerizingly in the sunlight, her mane practically sparkled, and the gem in her necklace gleamed. Seeing Amanita, she approached and nodded back towards the Cave. “Your friend, Charcoal? She’s… a rather interesting mare.”

Amanita nodded. “She is.”

“I do wish I could get to know her better, truly,” Midwinter mused. “But you shall be gone from here in a few days. Ah, well.” She threw Amanita a sort of friendly salute. “Best of luck to all of you, and may you leave us well enough alone!” She immediately walked off, whistling again.

Amanita decided to take that as a friendly jibe. She took a step for the Cave, only to turn back. “Hey, uh, Midwinter?”

Midwinter stopped walking and looked over her shoulder with mild interest.

“Have you ever been in the mine?”

Midwinter blinked and her ears twitched forward. “Why?”

“I was just wondering if you’d seen anything weird in there. We might be going in to examine the ley line.”

Another blink, then Midwinter shook her head. “No. I have never seen such a thing.”

“Alright. Thanks, anyway.”

Assuming Midwinter was telling the truth.

Amanita stepped into the Cave’s common room. Even if the place hadn’t been empty except for Carnelian pouting in the darkest corner, Charcoal would’ve been obvious, sitting at a table in the middle of the room with what looked like a dozen sheets of parchment and paper before her, as well as a bottle of ink. She was deeply invested in one of the scrolls, carefully examining it as she treated the quill in her mouth like it was a tree and she was a beaver. As Amanita slid into the chair across from her, she waved without saying anything or looking away.

“That’s the plumbing stuff, right?” Amanita asked.

Charcoal’s only response was a nod and a look at the next line down.

“Good info?”

Charcoal moved the scroll aside so she could grin. “Hoo yeah. Very good info. Them being so angry at me wanting to take a look at it makes sense now.”

“Really?”

“Yeah. This actually is really good. Imagine-” Charcoal’s ears twitched and she looked around. The room was empty, but she lowered her voice anyway. “Imagine if someone walked up to you,” she whispered, “and asked if you really knew necromancy. And they even told you they didn’t know necromancy, but they weren’t so sure you did, either.”

Amanita had a sudden, intense vision of stabbing Princess Twilight to death, then resurrecting her, purely to spite some minor know-it-all noble. It was shockingly satisfying. “…Yeah. I can see that.”

“Sure, they could’ve been nicer about it, but I don’t blame them. The complicated stuff is the right sort of complicated. Like, right down here…” Charcoal shuffled towards the end of the scroll. “…they’re talking about waste and graywater treatment-”

Amanita’s stomach wobbled. Funny how she could deal with blood and guts just fine, but something as simple as poop made her queasy. “Is it really a good idea to talk about it now?”

Charcoal blinked and examined the scroll for a moment. “You’re right, bad idea,” she said. “Let’s wait for Code and Bitterroot so we can get lunch first.”

This was vengeance for the bear. Amanita was sure of it.