Silvercharger stood in front of Rainbowdash and Applejack. The Orange pony dug at the ground in anticipation while the blue one flew a few feet off the ground next to her. Time seemed to slow down with each flap of her wings. They had agreed to start the match when the stick he threw in the air hit the ground, however, no pony was looking up. They couldn't risk the other get the jump on them. It was silent, nothing else mattered right now except their opponent on the other side of the garden. Out of the corner of his eye, Silver saw the stick get close to the ground. He took a deep breath and closed his eyes. Then it was heard, the slam of wood breaking on the hard ground. Slowly he opened his eyes and sure enough they were charging at him. It all seemed to move so slowly for him, after all...it was just another day for him. He lifted his hove and slammed it on the ground before running forward too.

"So Blooming star-"

"Just Bloom is fine" The yellow pony said with a smile.

"Right, Bloom. I never got around to thank you for healing me and my friends." Twilight said a little embarrassed. She thought back to the incident and remembered how powerful her magic was. How it looked so easy for her to break her spell.

"It was no problem, though I have to admit, it took a lot out of me. I've only used it twice before, all on Silver."

"Considering his attitude, I bet he gets in a lot of fights." Said Spike before taking a bite of a hay sandwich that was offered to him by a maid pony bringing their lunch.

"Yeah, he's kind of a hot head. But I can't say it's bad. It was because he is quick to jump into action that I'm alive right now."

"Oh? What happened?" Asked twilight, putting down her food to listen.

"Well, I had just taken the oath to use Dragon's Bane, kind of a rite of passage for my family. I think I was just out of fillyhood. As a test, my family took me to the center of the castle to activated the spell for the first time. However, I wasn't able to do it. It was really weird. My magic was far from lacking, but the spell just wouldn't activate it. Ashamed, I ran out of the castle and into the woods. Silver and I usually played their together, so it was safe enough. Or so I had thought." Bloom looked down at her tea. She saw her reflection and her thoughts raced. The image in the cup was rippled as a tear left her eyes and hit the tea. Twilight looked at her newly made friend and got worried. She was about to say something to her before she was stopped by the Princess.

"It had started to rain, but I didn't care. I was much too preoccupied with self pity. That is, until I heard a loud growl. Looked behind me to find a dragon, an adolescent. Thankfully it wasn't an adult dragon or I would have been dead long before I had heard the growl." Bloom looked again at her reflection and remembered how the rain stung against her face as she ran away from it. She tripped and fell many times, each time the dragon had gotten close to clawing at her, or sinking it's teeth into her flesh. But her endurance didn't last very long. She had made it out into a clearing before she had dropped.

"By the time I ran all I could I had only made it half way back to the castle. I knew there was no way I would survive this. I fell to the ground and placed my hooves over my head, as if that would have protected me at all, still, I was terrified, it's all I thought I could do. I remember hearing the dragon growl once more before leaping at me."

Silver was pushed back, his hooves left a track on the dirt beneath him. He barely had time to regain his composure before he saw Rainbowdash charge at him from the air. He dodge to the left.

"What happened to all that big talk?" mocked Rainbowdash as she looked down at Silver, circling around him.

A little annoyed, Silver looked at them. Maybe it was bad to underestimate them after all. He had to take this seriously. He changed his center of gravity and stood up on his hind legs.

Applejack saw it as an opening and ran full speed at him. It was a mistake. This was Silver's method of fighting, by standing on his back legs his front legs were free to do jabs and grabs. Silver moved one of his legs back and slide it around. Applejack missed her tackle by pure centimeters, Silver grabbed a hold of her torso and moved his legs to support the extra weight as he threw her at Rainbowdash up in the air. Surprised, Rainbowdash barely had time to react and catch Applejack.

"What in tarnation? You move on just two legs?" Silver narrowed his visible eye and said,

"It's fighting style I developed while training. After all, an Earth colt needs an edge over ponies with magic and wings. Now..." He said as he raised his hooves into position. "Allow me to show you what a real warrior can do."

Fed up with his cockiness, Rainbowdash put her friend down and flew circles around Silver as she bought her time to attack from a blindside. Silver didn't move an inch. He could feel the air around him change pressure from how fast she was going. He definitely did not want to be hit by her going at that speed. RD suddenly switch directions, she charged at him from behind. Silver knew that out all angles, an attack from behind was the more probable. The moment he felt the winds shift he knew he was right. As if on ice, Silver's hooves slid across the dirt. He turned himself around and his body faced Rainbowdash just as she was about to hit him. He leaned back and grabbed a hold of her hair. Silver allowed himself to fall, as he did, he placed his hind legs positioned against the blue pony's stomach. that one second where they were in mid air allow him to flip half way and kick her away with her own momentum.

"AHHHHHH!" Is all that came out of Rainbowdash as she flew across the air at a bush on the other side of the garden.

"Having long hair is a hindrance in battle..." Silver said as he stood back up on his back legs, getting into his fighting stance again. However, by the time he realized, Applejack was feet away from him, she twisted her body and roundhouse kicked him. Silver barely had time to react, but not enough to completely avoid the attack.

"Well your hair isn't exactly short either." Said Applejack as her back leg made brief contact with Silver's head. She saw it, if only for a second, but Silver's mane lifted from his face. She froze as she realized that Silver's mane wasn't just styled for looks. His right eye was closed shut by three large scars across it. He was blinded by what seemed to have been a bear claw, or maybe something worse...

"When I opened my eyes I saw Silver standing over me and the dragon sent flying back a few yards. But before I had time to thank him, something hit my cheek. At first I thought it was the rain, but it was too dense...to heavy. I look up and I see Silver with a bleeding face. He didn't just push back the dragon, he took that deadly hit for me and because of me...he lost an eye."

Twilight looked down, not knowing what to say. Spike was the same, he looked down at his right hand, more specifically his claws. Spike never once thought of hurting someone with his claws. He knew that it was possible to seriously harm someone, but to know that damage like this was real...he was just expecting it...I guess I really am still a baby dragon...He thought as he realized how naive he had been until now about who he was.

"I remember looking up at him and wanting to scream. I wanted to do something, but nothing came out of my mouth at all. I felt more and more helpless. But then he looked down at me and...and...and he smiled at me. 'I'm so glad you're okay Miss Bloom', I couldn't believe what I heard. Even after taking such a terrible hit, he was still worried about me." Bloom's tears began to fall more and more. The Princess place an arm around her as she tried to regain control of her voice to tell them the rest.

"He looked over at the dragon who was getting back up and really to fight and said to me, 'You stay right here Miss Bloom, I'll be right back. Won't take more than a minute.' as he walked forward and took up his usual fighting stance. I saw it then, his side glowed and he received his cutie mark. The insignia of my family."

Receiving a small shock to the head, he moved one of his hooves to keep his balance. He looked over at a frozen Applejack. He was sure she caught a glimpse of his scar. A brutal reminded of who his is and why he must fight dragons. He looked at Rainbowdash who was flying straight at him, but suddenly Applejack stopped her.

"Wait!" She said as she caught Rainbowdash before she could tackle him.

"What? We're kind of in the middle of a-" The blue pony couldn't finish before Applejack pressed her hove against her mouth to shush her.

"Listen...we're uh sorry about the trouble, think we could place our duel on hold for a bit?" Silver sighed and nodded. He began to walk away as he heard the two ponies bicker with eachother, the orange one giving excuses about why she put a pause on the duel, but he knew she was just taking pity on him. Everyone who has seen his scar had pitied him. He cringed his teeth as he walked out of sight. Just before he turned around the corner Applejack got one last glance at him, she slightly frowned and went back to calming down Rainbowdash.

"The fight didn't last long. Silver won swiftly, he ran circles around that stupid dragon." Bloom said with a smile, pushing her tears back and trying to be happy again. "It just proves that he wouldn't have gotten hurt like that if it wasn't for me. I felt so bad about it, but I remember how he walked back to where I was and smiled at me again. He glanced at his new cutiemark and said, 'Lucky me, looks like I get to be beside you all times now...so please Miss Bloom...please don't run off without me again.' I looked up at him and saw him tearing up while he smiled at me. I stood up and cried along with him. I didn't notice, but my horn was glowing. It was then I used that healing spell. It happened on its own. However, I wasn't able to save his eye..."

"It's fine, it's not like I need it." Said a hard sounding voice from behind them. Celestia looked back and smile at Silver who was walking back.

"Have a nice stroll around the castle?" Silver looked at her with a dead stare.

"Well...I could go on for hours about how bad it's defenses are, or how your guards wouldn't last a second in an actual attack, but I'll skip Bloom's lecture later and simply say, Yes, it was a good walk." Bloom puffed up her cheeks, a little annoyed at Silver who made her come across as naggy.

"Oh you, be quiet." She said before giggling at herself. Twilight smiled as she saw Bloom look happy again. She wasn't sure why, but it was apparent that this stoic character could brighten her day.

"That is until your friends challenged me to a duel." Twilight stood up shocked and angry.

"They did WHAT?!"

Silver glanced behind him and saw Applejack and Rainbowdash coming around the corner and a wild idea came to him.

"Why yes, they made a huge deal about how they were better than me. They even went two on one cause they couldn't wait their turn to try to punch my face, quite sad really, I put them in there place though."

Silver hadn't even finished before Twilight raced over to her friends and proceed to beat them, shouting things like 'I can't believe you'd do this' and 'When the Princess is around of all times'. Silver couldn't help but snicker at himself. Bloom took notice and realized he exaggerated his statement. She wanted to lecture him, but felt more happy then angry. She was happy he was finally relaxed. Silver regained his usual look at glanced over at Spike who was laughing at how Twilight was beating her friends. Somehow it was odd. He still felt that dragon's were his enemies, but this 'Spike' has made it of his list of dragon's to kill...for now.

The Princess went over to Twilight and her friends to split them up.

"Ahem!" She said. Everyone froze and they looked at Celestia.

"Twilight, I would like you and your friends to accompany Silvercharger and Bloomingstar back to Dragon's Bane."

Twilight and Silver looked rather shocked.

"W-what?"

"You see Twilight, Bloom here still can't seem to activate Dragon's Bane, so I would like you, as my precious apprentice, to help find out why."

"Dragon's what?" asked Rainbowdash, but she was pushed aside by her purple friend.

"Y-yes! We won't disappoint!"

Silver looked over at the girls and the small dragon that were to become his new companions and sighed.

"Well...looks like the trip back will be much longer than the trip here..."

Next Chapter: Journey Home Estimated time remaining: 2 Hours, 15 Minutes