Loving Care POV:
The unicorn mare lit her horn and slowly peeled off the bandages from her patient's chest. She winced at the ugly burn scar seared into the skin of the unconscious pony. The blackened flesh marring her otherwise gorgeous azure fur.
As the most experienced healer in Valley Dale, it had fallen to Loving to see to the healing of their town's unexpected saviour.
When Starry had first arrived, Loving had initially been highly sceptical of the mare. Valley Dale had experienced its fair share of travelling charlatans and the traveller's claims to immense power and grand lineage had bordered on the unbelievable. However, after the battle, she felt like a fool for ever having doubted the Mage. Her efforts to turn the tides of a hopeless battle had likely saved Loving's life, as well as the lives of her family.
It made the unicorn healer feel all the more useless that she couldn't do much to assist in the recovery of the mare. She had diagnosed the Mage's injuries quickly enough: five cracked ribs, minor electrical burns across her back, major internal bleeding, a collapsed lung, a U-shaped third-degree burn on her chest, some sort of heavy metal poisoning in her blood, as well as extreme physical and magical exhaustion.
However, stunningly enough, not only was Starry in a relatively stable condition but she was actively healing at a far greater rate than any of her treatments could have offered. One of her more scholarly and learned colleagues suggested that perhaps her highly enchanted cloak was responsible for the unicorn's unprecedented regeneration. Some sort of healing enchantment.
Unfortunately, there wasn't any unicorn in Valley Dale educated enough in the magical study of enchantment to confirm his hypothesis, so Loving decided not to take any chances and forbid her staff from removing Starry's cloak.
All that was left for the healer to do for the Mage was to make her comfortable, change her bandages regularly and apply burn salves to the worst of her scars.
After applying the salve and fresh bandages, Loving was startled by a knock at the bedroom door. The door crept open to reveal her husband. The tall, white-furred, red-maned earthpony bore a concerned expression.
“How is she, dear?” Red Cross asked.
Loving Care gave a brief look over the bandages, making sure that they couldn't come loose before sighing.
“She is recovering quickly, even if I'm still not entirely certain why. There is little to do but let her rest.” The unicorn replied.
“You have been in here with her for hours. The clinic is overcrowded and many others need our attention.” Her husband gently admonished.
“I know. It's just that… She has done so much for us, for everypony. Doesn't she deserve our undivided attention and care?” Loving replied.
Red gave a sympathetic smile. “You said it yourself, there isn't much we can do to help her. Let us focus on those that we can help. Our clinic staff could use some assistance.”
The healer sighed in resignation at her husband's logic. “You're right, you're right. Let's help the others so long. Hopefully Starry will wake soon.”
She took one last look at the mysterious unicorn before leaving the room with her husband.
They walked in silence through the hall of their home. Since their house connected to the back of their family-owned clinic, Loving decided to make her home available to treat the heroic mare, rather than trying to fit her in the overburdened clinic.
After a few moments, Red spoke up.
“The town council just announced that they are planning to hold the mayoral election next week.” He stated.
Loving's eyes widened in surprise. “It's only been two days since the attack. We haven't even had a funeral for Wind Chill yet. Why are they rushing this?”
The stallion just shrugged. “Maybe they think that an election would improve unity and boost morale in the town. Maybe they want ponies to be reassured by the stability of having a definite leader rather than an interim council. Or maybe one of the councillors is angling for the job themselves and this is part of some backroom scheme.”
Choosing to ignore her husband's cynicism on that last point, Loving shook her head at the answer. She never understood the nature and machinations of politics, nor did she wish to. She was always content enough in her clinic, tending to those who needed her help the most.
“Speaking of Wind's funeral, have they set a date yet?” The mare inquired.
“Not yet, but likely before the election. The council is planning a mass funeral for everypony that died. It takes a while to arrange that sort of thing, especially with so much chaos and destruction that still needs to be sorted out.” Her husband replied.
As the director of their clinic, he had always been more in the know about the various politics and ongoings in Valley Dale.
Loving sighed mournfully. “Sixty-five dead and two hundred injured. There hasn't been a loss of life like this in thirty years, not since the floods.”
“It could have been worse, a lot worse,” Red remarked. “The raiders were more focused on ransacking and looting than mass killing. Starry also drove them off before they could do worse. Smoke inhalation killed more than blades did.”
Loving felt a shiver creep up her spine at the assertion. She tried not to think too hard about what the likely outcome of the attack would have been if Starry had not saved them when she had.
“Although, the harm done to our little ponies doesn't end with those that lost their lives.” Her husband continued, coming to a stop outside the door to the couple's guestroom. The door was closed but Loving was almost certain that she could hear quiet sobbing coming from within.
After her mother's death, Wind Scale was inconsolable. She had refused to leave the mayor's side until they needed to move her to move her body to the mortuary. After that, she had spent hours sitting by Starry's bedside. Eventually, after the filly had fallen asleep from sheer exhaustion, Loving moved her into one of her spare guestrooms, where she had remained ever since.
“Poor dear…” The unicorn lamented sadly.
“This town wouldn't be what it is today without the Wind family. It's a damn tragedy.” Her husband agreed.
“What will happen to her now?” Loving asked.
“One of Wind Chill's assistants apparently heard her mention something about Wind Scale getting an apprenticeship with Starry. Although, we'll probably have to wait for the Mage to wake up to get more details. Failing that, Cloud Chaser said that his family would be willing to take her in.” Red Cross answered.
Loving surprised at the answer. Starry always struck her as a lone wolf-type pony, not the sort to take an apprentice. Though, if any pony had the political wiles to get her to agree to it, it would be the mayor. The unicorn preferred not to think about what sort of strings Wind Chill had to pull or deals she had to make to get the Mage to accept her pegasus daughter as an apprentice.
“Even if they did agree to such a deal and Starry is still willing to honour it. Do you think that this would be what's best for Wind Scale? To pack up, leave her home and venture into the unknown with a practical stranger, especially so soon after she lost her only family.” Loving challenged, though with no real heat in her voice.
“Wind Scale has always been unhappy here in Valley Dale and I have no doubt that her mother's death will only compound her misery. Letting her venture out into the world to explore new places and meet new ponies… away from painful memories. It might not be the worst thing for her mental health. Most teenagers begin their apprenticeships around her age anyway.” Her husband offered in reasonable tones.
Loving wasn't entirely convinced by the argument but the filly's future was not hers to decide. If Wind Scale planned to leave Valley Dale, the healer wasn't sure anypony could stop her.
“Let's tend to our patients.” The mare declared. Content to leave the conversation where it was. Endless speculation over hypotheticals wouldn't help them.
Her husband gave an understanding smile, before stepping over to her side and lovingly nuzzling her neck.
Good explanation as to why they wouldn't remove her cloak.
Anyways, new chapter!
Good chapter!!!!
Wow, I wasn't expecting a new chapter out so (relatively) soon! This was a great chapter very enjoyable insights.
Me gustó bastante el capítulo, me gustan estos capítulos donde se nos muestra como otros ven lo que está pasando.
I quite liked the chapter, I like these chapters where we are shown how others see what is happening.
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I've got most of the interludes already planned out and they aren't going to be very long, so I should be able to burn through these next few chapters relatively quickly.
Thank you very much for the chapter!
Have a great day!
I can agree that the dialogue in this chapter was a bit rough. It wasn't terrible or anything, but it felt a lot like a first draft where it was more important to get all the information on the page than to make it feel natural or concise. The reasoning for not removing the cloak was brilliant though, and I'm also very eager to see how the relationship between Luna and Windy develops.
I was sure Luna disguise would fall apart with the posion and as for the child I think she and Luna both need each other. They both know what it like not to fit into others ideals of what you should be like.
First of all, self-reflection is a great skill to have as a writer, the ability to take criticism is also not as widespread as one would like to believe, so those are already big plus points, so good job on that. Now, I might be reading a bit too hard into this, but please, do not be too hard on yourself. Your writing is entertaining, and a great interpretation of how Luna would act under different circumstances, believable with all its ups and downs, and of course one can see the flaws with certain segments, and I praise you for wanting to improve, but don't take improving this already fantastic story too hard on the heart.
It's the fun of writing and reading that brings us to this moment.
A narrative convenience if I ever saw one! I'm sorry to say it, but this is where Luna's little charade should have ended.
A medical team collected Luna's body and examined her on a minimum of two occasions, one to diagnose her condition and the second to be amazed to see that she was recovering quickly, all this without removing her cloak, the dirty cloak, stained with blood and contaminated with who knows how many pathogens. And then they interacted with her body more meticulously to clean and bandage her, not to mention things like checking pulse or breathing, or any of the other things a medical team would do on an unconscious and severely injured individual... and yet no one notice even one of the thousand and one seemingly out of place things that should have been apparent? This has crossed the line of suspension of disbelief that could be excused with "mental compulsion spell."
With that said, this doesn't ruin my enjoyment of the story.
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As I said in the AN, in the context of the story, this chapter is one step above the newspaper, in that its sole purpose is to convey information to you. There are no grand revelations, no great betrayals and no heart-rending moments.
While I could have undoubtedly written this chapter better, I'm not going to twist myself into knots and agonise over the perfection of an inconsequential piece of fluff.
I'd rather use that energy to write the next chapter faster and better.
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I was debating whether or not to have the cloak should have used a mental compulsion spell on Loving or not, but I ultimately decided against it. Although, if it's as much of a plot hole as you say, then maybe I should have.
However, nothing is stopping me from adding a paragraph later in the story detailing how Loving was affected by a compulsion spell but didn't realise it.
This entire arc in a nutshell
Anyway really love this story and i can’t wait to see where it goes next.
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You COULD just say that the cloak has a SEP (Someone Else's Problem) field that made it so that no one even thought to remove it. It would honestly be a good safety measure to have on an item that you don't want removed, either by accident or on purpose.
If I might make a slight nitpick, albeit an encouraging one, omit these:
You don't need to tell us this; you're already doing an excellent job of showing us this in your prose.
They didn't take off Luna's cloak and didn't expose her yet because they were afraid that he was healing her, it was necessary to get out of a dangerous situation in the plot ;)
epico
I felt like you also backtracked on Luna's promise to Wind Scale. I'm pretty sure Luna said that she'd accept her as her apprentice two years down the line, but now that her mother is gone, Wind Scale's gonna be her apprentice pretty much immediately.
11824678
I had the same thought, it's a obvious way of forcing luna to take her in before she is ready. Now she will look bad if she refuses and it will force her to reveal the truth to her and make it much harder to keep it hidden. I would've kept the mom alive but in critical condition, but just my opinion.
I feel you pace is good. I see your Luna as objective orientated. I understood from her dialogue that she wanted to skip town asap.
Eeee good chapter.
I could have sworn there was already a cloud chaser in the series. Though I could be wrong.
Great chapter! I do agree with that other commenter that Luna's wings not being discovered by a doctor here is a bit of a plot contrivance, but it doesn't affect enjoyment of the story.
Also, despite the rushed arc between Windy/Wind Scale, I really enjoyed this past story arc, so thanks for writing it!
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I think this is a pretty solid plot circumstance though. A promise for the future that has to get tested too early is a tried and true trope. Not that you have to like it but I don't think it counts as a broken promise.
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True enough. Still, the author is ultimately responsible for what comes next. I'm just saying that it looks like the author used that trope to backtrack on established plot lines.
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11825251
The battle of Valley Dale and Luna being forced to take Windy as her student was one of the very first plot points that I had planned out when coming up with this story. I didn't backtrack on anything, this was always how it was supposed to turn out.
In fact, the very reason why I put in that two-year-wait arrangement instead of Luna taking Windy immediately, was to mislead you. I wanted the battle and it's aftermath to be surprising, shocking and unexpected.
Maybe I played the misdirection card too hard if it feels like the plot did a 180.
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Then it's a 10/10 misdirection because I didn't expect the Valley Dale raid or Wind Scale's immediate apprenticeship at all. Usually in this kinds of stories, the first place the protagonist visits serves as a stepping stone before they move to another place.
11828139
I'll take that as a compliment.
Exactly. Which is precisely why I flipped the script in the way that I did. I wanted maximum shock and awe.
11828179
Still not enough of a build up imo. There should be an interlude or two between the Valley Dale arcs to show enemy point of views. Maybe see their planning stage before the raid or their agents operating in the city. That way, you'll get the same shock and awe without readers feeling like the raid came out of nowhere.
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At one point I actually was planning on doing something like that where there would be a brief POV from a shady character in the audience of Luna’s magic show to get a measure of her strength on order from his boss.
However, all the way back in October, a reader by the name of Sunset Flash private messaged me out of the blue and point-blank asked if I planned to have the raiders come back early and force Windy to become Luna’s apprentice early. Apparently, this is a common trope in anime.
After that, I became a bit paranoid that the future battle was entirely too predictable. Not a single day after I published the chapter containing Luna’s deal with Windy and one reader already knew exactly where this would lead. So I tried to mislead as much as possible.
Maybe I compensated too hard or maybe Sunset Flash is a rare anomaly among my readers in how clearly he saw where the plot was headed.
And I’m caught up. I like these little interludes but am anxious to get back to Luna and Windy’s interactions.
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Gonna be waiting a little while I'm afraid. Got at least 4 more interludes to get through.
it was a tense yet sad end to the arc. I wonder if Celestia sensed that Luna was on the verge of death. (I heard that relatives can intuitively sense when danger is approaching for their relatives.)
I am sure that during this large-scale battle there must have been wounded pegasi who were left to die. I wonder what they did with them? Did they finish them off completely or, on the contrary, did they receive medical assistance? (most likely the second option, because it's illogical to waste medicine on enemies, but I'm still interested.)
Wise decision. I'm sure
LunaStarry would approved this action.Wow! That town really got an upgrade from your original plans.
Good chapter!
I enjoyed reading it.
I liked it so far I’m happy. I think it’s fairly well written.