-=-

(the hoofwriting changes on this page)

I am on a cot in the town’s inn, which is now an infirmary.

We were successful, but I do not know that the cost was worth it.

Everything became a blur, but I will try to make it as clear as I can in case this is useful some day…

I will continue this in her journal – she would have liked that sense of completion I think…

-=-

They look a lot like Dragons, but somewhat smaller – though still bigger than a pony… They all stand on their hind legs, like younger Dragons, and none of them have wings that I saw. And they all have weapons…

It was evening when the barrage came from behind the tree line. Huge flaming balls of tar began landing around the west end of the town, instantly igniting buildings, trees – anything flammable was on fire. The world was on fire, and the smoke and heat were unbearable.

I could hear the guards bellowing for buckets as the militia milled around in complete confusion.

Then I saw one of the strange Dragons come through the trees. It was wearing some kind of shiny armor plates and carried a long rifle-like weapon. It hissed loudly, and then it pointed its weapon at us, which belched forth an incredible arc of flame that lit everything in front of it on fire.

There were several loud reports from just behind the trees. The militia was fleeing in all directions, some on fire. Through the thick smoke I could see many of the guard lay motionless, one leaned heavily on his pike, his left foreleg covered in red.

On the hill, at the tree line, some dozen of the Dragons began running down towards us, flashes of red spellfire preceding the barking report of their weapons.

Behind me, in the distance, I could hear fighting - Saddlebrook was surrounded.

There would be no assistance for us.

Next to me Whisper leapt into the air to follow orders – get clear of the fighting – and as I went to do the same, I landed heavily back on my hooves. Looking, I noticed several primaries on my left wing were simply not there... The fire from the Dragon’s weapon had splashed onto me, and in my shock I’d not even noticed I was instantly grounded. And I was also very alone – Whisper and the few other support ponies had moved back and were hunkered down behind one of the earthen berms.

I remember two thoughts bubbling up as I stood there – I was alone there in the middle of a street with a dozen angry Dragons bearing down on me, and I was about to perish. I felt ice in my veins… I locked up, staring wide-eyed at the enemy…

I think there were probably a total of two-dozen of the Dragons running down the hill as the first I had seen reached the street not ten meters away from where I was.

There was a sudden brilliant light and the Dragon screeched horribly as it vanished right in front of me. The Empress landed heavily between the now confused Dragons and my quaking, addled self; her horn still glowing faintly from the spell she had just cast.

She looked down a moment at the fallen guards and militia, and then quickly around at the fires. Her face was an impassive mask, a look of one surveying a painting or a park as she turned back to face the Dragons.

All she said was “Run…”

I know that was what she said to me, because there was nothing but her voice, and it filled me to the point there was no room for the fear. I did as I was instructed and I turned tail and bolted for the berm where Whisper and the three other support ponies were hunkered down.

As I scrambled around the edge of the barricade I heard a strangled hiss – and looked back to see that Aurora had advanced on the Dragons; three had fallen and she had just telekinetically tossed a fourth limp form aside as a collection of runes appeared at her hooves… Nearby an immense chunk of stone rose suddenly from the ground, casting a few more of the strange Dragons helplessly into the air before it returned to the earth, crushing yet more of the enemy beneath it.

I was dumbfounded…

Ponies are not, in general, very combative outside of the guard. We tend to talk out our troubles over milkshakes. But here was the Empress – a pony I’d had tea with, a pony always quick with a smile and a kind word, and a pony most saw as a mother figure – in full armor, wielding destructive spells of a magnitude I would wager few had ever seen.

She was the very image of the battle mare as she lashed out with hoof and horn, spells and fury against the Dragons, cutting them down with power and prowess that somewhat frightened me. As the last of the immediate threat toppled over she stopped, looked past the devastated area around her to the top of the hill, and her intricate golden armor fairly glowed with her power as she cast a protection around herself.

Above her on the hill probably two-dozen more of the Dragons had emerged from the forest, and some had begun firing their weapons at her as they charged. The lancing ruby lights from the weapons briefly illuminated the sphere of protection around her, and then were absorbed harmlessly.

One of the ponies next to me was shouting over the din from the weapons and waving a forehoof towards an adult Dragon at the edge of the forest off to our right. It was an immense creature with vast leathern wings and a maw full of dagger-like teeth – this was the kind of Dragon I was familiar with… He kept going on and on about how that was the leader, and if we routed it the others would run too.

Behind me I heard Aurora cry out, more in anger than in pain, but I knew one of the strange Dragons in close combat with her had found its mark. This was flowed by the sizzle of lighting, a deafening peal of thunder, and the smell of ozone and iron as the immortal released her full power upon the enemy.

During all of this the ponies I was with were formulating a plan:

Demolition explosives are huge, heavy constructs of imbued crystal surrounded by a heavy iron casing. They tend to be so heavy that they are usually moved on a wagon into position and detonated by spell from a safe distance. We had two of these, along with the Unicorn demolition master, here with us on this end of town.

While these strange Dragons were concentrating on the immortal behind us, keeping her pinned down, and the smoke was thick enough to offer cover, we could fly one of the charges over their leader and drop it. Then the demolition master, a grouchy old Unicorn who was telling us all about the last time he was in a situation just like this, could set it off from here at the barricade. But it would take two Pegasus ponies to lift one of the heavy things and have a hope of making there and back, and there were only two of us – and my left wing was out of commission.

I peeked over the barricade to look and saw that the Empress had advanced further up the hill as the Dragons leapt and tore at her. I watched her literally bite into a Dragon at the neck, and even from where I was I could still hear the crack before she tossed its limp form aside, catching another mid-leap with her horn. One of her wings hung limply, a spear of some sort through the bone and muscle where it met her chest.

Her hide from her hooves to the middle of her barrel were slick with red, and her eyes were glowing white-hot with rage as she bared her teeth… Gone was the benevolent ruler of Roanoak – this was an avenging spirit, and one with the single minded task of killing as many of the invaders as it could before it’s great heart stopped beating…

It was at that moment I knew I had to do something. I had to try. It was only two hundred meters… Two hundred meters on a bum wing while strapped to an explosive – but I could do it! I could do it for her! I could do it for Roanoak!

Above her a few of the creatures placed some sort of device on a stand, and in seconds it belched forth a cacophony of thunder and light down at the immortal.

I turned to have the ponies I was with help me with the lift harness – only to discover it, and Whisper, were gone.

I looked around for Whisper as Aurora brought her good wing around to protect her head and chest. I saw the protective sphere around her flash and ripple, its unearthly glow fading from the impacts of the weapon at the top of the hill. She concentrated, and an intricate spear of brilliant lavender light appeared next to her – floating in a nimbus of her magical power…

A single heartbeat later the weapon on the hill exploded violently, sending bits of itself raining down on the churned hill. Aurora pulled the spear of light from the destroyed weapon with a thought, and as it returned to her side I could see the effort had visibly drained her…

One of the ponies with me was telling me something about the lift harness being burnt and how Whisper had them just tie the ends of it around her neck so she could fly.

But there was no way to drop it like that…

As if sensing her failing power, more Dragons had poured from the forest and surrounded the Empress. They harried her from just out of her physical range, waiting for her to tire. She whirled and fought, catching one or two who did not move fast enough with her spear or her hooves, but for every one she felled, three more joined the fray.

Slowly – ever so slowly – the fire in her eyes went out. There were simply too many, and the reality of this was beginning to weigh her down.

As the spear of light brutally impaled two of her attackers, sending the rest back a pace, she glanced back at the town of Saddlebrook and the ponies there with a look of longing on her muzzle.

I was witnessing the end of an immortal…

I heard one of the ponies yell at the demolition master that he had to do it; Roanoak needed this to happen – he knew it … and she knew it.

The Dragons made a guttural, feral sound and charged Aurora en-mass...

She turned away from us, pulled the spear to her as if in salute, and raised her gaze to the stars above in the pre-dawn sky... I could just barely see her lips move as if in silent prayer.

A bright flash of blue green light ignited to the right, instantly followed by an explosion of energy that churned the earth around our barricade in a maelstrom of raw magical fury. Around us a brilliant bubble of magic the color of the demolition’s master’s power flickered under the impact as he poured himself into the protection.

Just beyond the now shattered berm I saw Aurora manage to get that spear of light between herself and the explosion with the speed of a thought. With it she diverted the force of the explosion around her – like the prow of a boat splitting a wave – but it still forced her back several feet, striping parts of the armor from her body in smoldering tatters; her hooves leaving long furrows in the torn ground from the force of the impact. She winced; the effort of not being destroyed by the demolition charge’s power had consumed the last of her ability.

The spear of light shattered; shards of energy twinkled and sparked in the air with the faint sound of breaking glass, and Aurora collapsed.

The Dragons around her had vanished instantly, vaporized without even a sound. Nearby, their leader was gone… There was nothing but a faintly glowing crater where the behemoth once sat.

Whisperwind had saved us all.

-=-

It has been a long time since I penned those words in a makeshift infirmary in a back-water little town in Roanoak.

This journal, over the years, has been reviewed by military tribunal and examined by the Empress herself. And now I am asked by the Empress to close this journal with my own thoughts as one who knew the author better than any other pony.

The greatest deeds in our history are not those of the powerful and privileged, or those who seek glory to illuminate their name - but those of the brave and courageous who find themselves thrust into a position where their next choice is life or death… And given that choice they still do what is needed of them for the betterment of us all.

That is a hero.

That hero was also a connoisseur of oranges, a talented artist, had humor and a smile that would light the darkest night, the filly of a mare in Canterlot who misses her deeply, and my friend.

She was every bit just like you, just like me – a collection of triumphs and failures, good deeds, questionable acts, laughter and sadness. She was no pony special, and yet the most precious thing in the world.

Just like you. Just like me.

In the end we won that battle, and we eventually won the war it was the beginning of. The enemy never made it to Morgan Castle, and Morgan stood as a beacon of the resolve of the Roanoak peoples throughout the war. From there the Empress coordinated the thrust and parry of a five year conflict that eventually ended with a rift-born race being routed back to their home and a peace accord with the Southern Dragons to ensure it never happened again.

And it was all thanks to the heroism of a little blue Pegasus filly named Wisperwind, and her love of this land the ponies who live here.

We will remember you always, Wisperwind…

~Nimbus Skybright