Archmage: Square One

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Chapter 13: Buck Up

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My chest felt tight. I could feel my breath as it rushed into and out of my lungs, and my head began to swim. I found myself, very displeasingly, slumped over between two crenellations atop the wall. The long, smooth surface of Trottingham’s premier defense stretched down and away from me, where it met the ground three hundred and fifty feet below.

That was not helping my situation.

I was certain I was about to pass out when something hit me. Something from outside of the wall.

Something feathery.

“Star! Sheesh!” Goldy and I tumbled backwards, her landing atop me, her eyes wide and fearful. “What were you thinking?! Were you going to throw yourself off?!”

“Goldy.” I looked up at her, tears welling in my eyes. “I… I can’t do it!”

“What?!” Goldy reared back, furrowing her brow down at me. “What do you mean, you can’t do it? Can’t do what? Jump off? I should think not, you’re-”

“I CAN’T DO WHAT TWILIGHT ASKED.” I cut her off, halfway screaming it. The tears came in earnest then, streaming down my face as the first chest-wracking sob shook me from head to tail. I clenched my eyes and cried long and hard.

Being an emotionally-frustrated little unicorn like me, one tends to put these bouts of tears and snot into categories. There were four that I had encountered in my life, some with familiarity and one with a bone-shaking fear.

There was the ‘happy-sad’ cry. It’s the one I got whenever I finished a good book, and consisted of a few watery eyes and a big, goofy smile. The kind that makes your cheeks hurt. After that was the ‘upset’ cry. It’s the sort that young foals and frustrated (or jaded) lovers do when something doesn’t go their way. These days, I typically didn’t cry like that unless I found out I had messed something up for someone.

After that was the ‘oh stars, I can’t stop laughing’ cry. I didn’t get that one often.

But this… This was the sort of bawling, sniveling, wreck-of-a-pony crying that completely shut a filly down. I collapsed underneath Goldy, curling up into as tight a ball as I could manage. I quivered with the force my muscles were clenched together, and I bit my lip hard enough to taste blood. All the while, tears streamed from my puffy eyes, and I was sure I had a fair bit of snot going for me as well.

I didn’t know how, or even why, but I wasn’t on the wall anymore. The comparatively warm interior of the wall wrapped around me, and I felt like I was falling very slowly. Somepony was holding me, at least until I was inside, Then they began working the crank that brought us down to the ground level of the wall. After that, I was carried to my room. I heard other ponies asking ‘what happened?’ and ‘what’s wrong?’ but Goldy paid them no mind, and I was in no state to listen to them anyways.

There are only two things that pull me out of a crying fit like that, and only one right after the other. Goldy brought me to our room, deposited me in the shower, and held me under the hot stream until my shaking stopped and the tears abated. Her hooves worked into my mane, undoing the braid until the long strands hung down and around my neck. She worked on my tail next, which allowed me to turn my face up into the stream and cleanse my face.

After the shower, we didn’t even dry off. Goldy led me to the couch and left me curled up, and soon enough the tantalizing scent of a strong pot of coffee wafted past my nose. Just a few moments later, Goldy carried a mug of steaming coffee to me. I wasn’t aware how badly I needed it until that first scalding sip, which sent a wave of relief through me as soon as it hit my stomach.

“Thanks, Goldy.” I managed to mutter. My voice was thick with the congestion in my nose, but the coffee was helping to break that up.

“We’re gonna have to talk about this, you know that, right?” Goldy took the chair opposite the couch, her expression drawn with concern. I drew a deep breath in, still contemplating what exactly had happened. It had hit me like a hammer, taking my breath right out of my chest. I don’t remember feeling like I wanted to jump off the wall, but that looked to be Goldy’s primary concern.

“I don’t know what to say, Goldy…” I muttered, swirling the remaining half of my coffee around the mug. “I just… lost it.”

“You looked like you were about to jump.”

“I swear, I wasn’t going to-”

“Star, if I hadn’t gone for a fly around the city, I wouldn’t have been there.” Goldy cut me off, drawing my gaze to hers with words alone. “You would have died. That’s a long fall, and last I checked you hadn’t learned to teleport or levitate yourself.”

“I’m sorry.” I hung my head. “I really hadn’t meant it to look like I was going to jump, I just…”

“Felt overwhelmed?” She offered, coming to curl up beside me. I buried my face into her neck, clenching my eyes as the world seemed to bear down on me once again.

“That’s putting it lightly.”

“Star, come on.” Goldy nuzzled my ear tenderly. “Yesterday you were fine, and the day before that. What’s so different from today that you didn’t freak out this badly any given day the past two weeks?”

“I don’t know, maybe the gigantic purple barrier big enough to encompass any given Equestrian city and then some?” I spat, trying for teasing sarcasm but I’m sure I came across as just insulting. Goldy glared at me and fluffed her wings before going to sit opposite me again. “I’m sorry,” I lowered my head, feeling tears of a different sort come on now. “I just… Goldy, you had to have seen that thing…”

“Oh I saw it alright…” Goldy muttered. “I don’t see what the big deal is… It’s just a big, dumb, purple wall.”

“Yeah, but that ‘big, dumb, purple wall’ is all that’s keeping the timberwolves from ripping us apart. Even if I could - and I don’t think that I can - why would I want to bring it down? That’d just unleash whatever’s behind the barrier on Equestria, and maybe even the Griffon Territories…”

“Well, who says you have to bring it down?” Goldy mused. I blinked at her. “Maybe you just have to slip between the cracks. That’s how we look for gems and ore in my line of work. Some of the best quarries started from small fissures in the earth. And who knows?” Goldy winked at me. “Maybe Twilight left you a back door.” She slid off her seat and approached me, laying a hoof over mine tenderly. “There’s no point in feeling defeated before you’ve even begun, Star. You haven’t even spoken to Basil since you came to Trottingham. Maybe he has some insight that’ll help you.”

“Maybe…” Despite my feeling of utter defeat just a half-hour prior, Goldy’s words were beginning to strike a chord within me. I smiled at her before downing the last of my coffee. “I’ll go see if Basil has anything to say.”

“And I’ll go pick us up some more coffee. Sad to say, that’s the last of it in our cupboards.” Goldy jerked her head back towards the kitchen. “There’s about half the pot left. That ought to last you, what-”

“An hour at best.” I tossed back the last of my original cup and slid off the couch to go get another. “Here’s hoping Basil has something for me.”

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“Star! Good morning! I have something for you…” Basil greeted me cheerily, despite having been as good as catatonic earlier that morning. I guess two hours does wonders for what could equate to a literal case of ‘butthurt.’

“Morning, Basil.” I smiled at his enthusiasm. Any time Basil wasn’t making death threats against my first love was a good time. He was a genuinely enjoyable pony, just with some mysterious grudge against the Apple Family. Personally, I thought of them as a sort of ‘greater good.’ They’d done some pretty bad things, sure, but the revenue their mines brought was astronomically beneficial for Equestria as a whole.

Nevertheless, my attention was on the ‘here and now,’ and that consisted of a slightly-limping Basil and some monumental walls of magic we were supposed to overcome. Basil led me into his quaint apartment, which was laid out almost exactly like Goldy and I’s, save his bedroom had a single desk and a slightly smaller bed. I began to wonder if he would make better use of a larger sleeping surface than Goldy and I.

“So I was doing something last night-”

“-That I’m assuming was between Cobalt’s thighs…”

“-and I… Shut up, you. And I came across this.” He made for the small living room, which I saw already had a healthy amount of books and charts piled upon it. Most prominently amongst them was a complex diagram that appeared to have been recently rendered. Basil lifted it up and passed it to me for examination.

“I see,” I struggled through some of the complex formulas, and Basil had to point out a few specifics, but in the end I came to one jaw-dropping, eye-widening conclusion. “A tunneling spell.”

“This will allow us to make a ‘gap’ in a shield, but preserve the overall integrity. It’s brilliant!”

“How did you find this?” I asked, going over the spell once more.

“Surprisingly enough - though I guess you could say it’s par for the course with Twilight - I found it in among the books and scrolls she recommended I take along. Look.” He tapped one place of the parchment near the bottom-right.

“It’s her design.” I muttered, noting the signature. Any unicorn worth their salt that made publicly-available spells signed their work with an image of their cutie mark. I’d come to recognize familiar unicorns such as Starswirl and Twilight Sparkle throughout the various other diagrams I’d studied.

“Twilight sent us more than a little help.” Basil chuckled. “If we conceal this diagram with, say, a transparency arc-”

“Only we’ll know where the gap in the shield is.”

“Fantastic.” Basil beamed at me. “Twilight would be proud of you, Star.”

“Th-thanks…” I mused, looking back at the complex diagram, though a faint blush had worked its way onto my milky cheeks. I pushed my glasses up and squinted at a particularly advanced diagram near the center of the third arc. “I don’t know if I’d be able to cast this as I am, though.”

“I told you,” Basil lowered the parchment so his eyes met mine. “Twilight sent more than a little help. I’m here to develop you, Star. You’re going to be able to cast this in no time. I promise you.”

There was a few moments between us before I broke out in a wide grin and threw my forelegs around his neck. “Thank you, Basil!”

“Oof, easy kid!” Basil grunted as I flung my weight against him, staggering a little. “Some of us had a rough night.”

“Oh come off it.” I slid off of him and shook my head. “You’re not the only one.”

“Yeah, well, you didn’t fuck a boulder last night.”

“No, but I did have the most ravenous filly this side of Canterlot between my thighs.” I nudged his hip with mine, shooting a devious look over my flank. “Let’s take a day or two. To… Recuperate.”

“Sounds like a plan.” Basil nodded, though a dark expression crossed his face. He opened his mouth to say something else, but all I had to do to silence him was arch an eyebrow. He let it go with a slight grumble, turning back to the table piled high with other books and scrolls. “See you in a few days.”

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It was time I re-familiarized myself with the city. Retrieving Goldy as she came back from running her quick errand, we slipped into cold-weather coats and scarves and made our way out onto the gusty streets of Equestria’s oldest city.

Trottingham may once have been the greatest defense against all manner of invading forces, but the past few thousand years had been remarkably peaceful. Ponies certainly built things to last, but part of that meant the massive stone edifice had to adapt a little. I had heard stories from the war about sieges that lasted years at a time, and gouts of month-long dragon fire that had made the skies above the walls deathtraps for any winged being, pony or otherwise. Nowadays, the sky above the walls was clear and there was a constant stream of traffic to and from the southern edge of the city. It was towards the ever-present markets that Goldy and I turned our hooves.

It was a long hike through a cold city, but the brisk walk was pleasant with Goldy by my side. We chatted about nonsensical things, like cute mares we passed on the street or what colts we’d entertain the brief thought of a threesome with. There were innocent topics as well, but those weren’t as fun, and Goldy took to the more devious discussions with more gusto anyways. We stopped at my favorite little cafe on our way out of the library for an early lunch, and made the rest of the trip through the central part of the city so we could see my old school.

The monolithic thing hadn’t changed a bit, and as we passed, curious young ponies pressed their noses to the glass, and promptly got a swat across the muzzle with a ruler. I’d been on the receiving end of more than enough of those, so I grimaced as they reluctantly turned their attention back to the lesson.

“You really went here?” Goldy sniffed at the display of discipline. “No wonder you like spanking so much.”

“Still have the uniform, too. Socks and everything.” I teased, winking at Goldy as we left my archaic alma-mater behind.

“Please tell me you’ve been keeping that a secret from me for a good reason…” She moaned, pressing against my side as we turned down an abandoned side-street.

“Of course! What good is a surprise like that if we spoil all our fun first thing?” I gave her a quick, passionate kiss in the shadows. “And, they’re still at my parent’s place.”

“Aah.” Goldy sighed but pulled away, looking towards the South. “I presume we’re going there now?”

“Of course. My father’s a trade supervisor. If I don’t come see him after he reviews the logs and finds my name on them from just yesterday, he’d throw a conniption fit.”

“How good does your mom cook?” Goldy asked, patting her stomach with a slight frown. “That bagel hardly put a dent in me.” I rolled my eyes at her before turning back towards our route.

“My mom’s a terrible cook. But daddy’s wonderful behind the stove. At least it’s Tuesday, and he’ll be home.”

“Oh. Well, good!” Goldy trotted to catch up with me as we turned down another windswept boulevard, turning to head straight South. It took us a little longer than I would have liked, but the blame lay on myself for that one. The market was in full-swing by the time we arrived, with ponies hawking wares and shouting at passersby to take a look at the goods. There were several stalls I couldn’t have avoided if I had blinders and earmuffs on. Goldy indulged me, but only because she knew I’d be upset if she didn’t let me at least look at ‘the oldest jewelry from the Castle of the Royal Pony Sisters!’

Reserving a full trip to the multitude of markets for a later date, we hustled past the bulk of them as best we could before making straight for the southern wall.

“This the place?” Goldy asked as I pulled up before a three-story house huddled in the shadow of two other four-story residences.

“Home sweet home.” I chuckled, smiling back at her as I went to knock on the front door. Nopony answered. I looked through the tiny window set in the old mahogany door, but the front hall was dark. “Hmm… Might be that she’s-”

“GERONIMO!” Like a streak out of the sky, a pegasus came barreling at me, all feathers and smiles.

“OOF.” I took the tackle like a champ, having grown accustomed to them over many long years. We rolled on the dirty street until I ended up on top, grinning down at the offending party. “Hi, mom.”

“Starry! So glad you made it!” Olive Breeze, my mother, threw her hooves around me once more for a warm hug. She was, as her name suggested, an olive pony with a mane every bit as thick and black as my own, though she kept hers remarkably short-cut and styled in a spiky, oddly barbaric ‘do.’ She was a smaller pony, but most of the pegasi in our family were. We were all Trottingham-born, and the strong winds above the walls were easier to cut through with a slight frame. Thus, my mother stood half a head shorter than me with an enviably skinny torso and flanks. Her cutie mark was an olive branch with wings. Her talent was, unsurprisingly, picking olives from the trees south of the city.

“Where’s Dad? I thought he was in on Tuesdays…”

“Oh, he is…” Olive chuckled and fished a key from her miniature saddlebags. I took it from her and unlocked the front door while she busied herself batting dirt off my coat with her wings. “He’s just upstairs. He spends more time in his office these days.”

“Aah.” I ushered Goldy and my mother inside before shutting the door against the wind behind us. A clomping gait down the stairs signaled the arrival of my father.

If I was ‘mousy,’ he was doubly so. Audit was a slender pony with spectacles that made his eyes look far too big for his own head, and his mane was always ruffled one way or another. A smile broke out on his thin lips, however, as he saw the small entourage in his hallway.

“Star Caster. By the stars, it’s good to see you again.”

“Hi, daddy.” I greeted him at the bottom of the stairs with a warm hug. He was a skinny earth pony with a milky-white coat and dull, brown hair. He wasn’t remarkable to look at, but it wasn’t his body that attracted my mother to him. It was his mind, and his wit. As far as I understood it, his talent was incredibly dull. I glanced over his flanks at the boring tax-form there, complete with red marker highlights and miniature numbers. He was an accountant and bookkeeper, but was just as bored by his talent as any of his family members were listening to him talk about it.

He made up for this boredom with some of the most thought-provoking and brilliant conversations I’d ever had to date; he’d have given Twilight some food for thought. He was an open-minded pony who was quick to pun and even quicker to listen. I’d never been struck in my household, and had always been positively reinforced. After the discipline from my school, it had been such a welcome change that I excelled through my studies with Audit’s careful guidance.

Nevertheless, we broke from the hug and he looked over my flank at Goldy, smiling at the reunion before her. “And who, might I ask, is this attractive young filly?”

“Mommy, daddy,” I went to go stand at Goldy’s side, a helpless smile on my lips. “This is Golden Nugget…” I glanced at her, a blush rising to my cheeks. “My marefriend.”

Simultaneous reactions burst forth.

“Yes!”

“Damnit!”

“Pay up!” My dad thrust his hooves out towards the cursing pegasus, rendering both Goldy and I silent from shock. As we watched, Olive rooted around in her bags for a few moments before coming up with a small, jingling sack of bits. She passed it to my dad, who hefted the pouch before giving my mom a very un-sportsmanlike raspberry.

“And here I thought she’d be traditional…”

“I knew it.” Audit tucked the pouch into the pocket of his sweater before smiling at Goldy, his forelegs open. “Our Star would bring home a mare first thing. Welcome to our home, Golden Nugget.”

“Just Goldy.” My partner smiled and hugged my father, moving on to my mother next.

“At least you picked a cute one.” Olive grinned, giving Goldy’s flank a quick pinch. She yelped and blushed, glancing back at me. I shrugged as if to say ‘family is as family does.’

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Nothing had changed since I’d last been here. They even kept my room the way it was. Our three-story home was small, but most homes in Trottingham were. The first floor consisted almost completely of the hall, with a small dining room and kitchen taking up the rest of the space. The stairway in the hall had a small closet on the landing, but led up to the second floor. Here was my bedroom and our living room, and the small half-bath that had been scrunched into the space beneath the stairs. The top floor was a little more open, allowing for a full bedroom and a master bathroom.

It was a small home even by Trottingham standards, but it was home. Olive and Audit remained on the ground floor to start preparing us lunch, giving me time to show Goldy the rest of the house. She glanced quickly over my parent’s room, most of which was cluttered with my father’s ‘office.’ It was just a heap of papers and books piled on top of, around, and in a questionably-stable desk.

Where she got most excited was, not unsurprisingly, my room. Much to my chagrin, nothing had changed. “You actually used books as your supports for your bed?!”

“We were running out of space…” I blushed. “So my dad removed the old arms and used the books I wasn’t reading to prop it up…”

“That’s… Surprisingly economic.”

“Things usually are around here…” I grimaced, remembering the cluttered desk. “Usually. Ahem.” Shaking my head, I looked at my old bedroom with a wistful sigh. “They kept everything as it was…”

Other fillies my age had deigned to put famous singers and hunky movie actor posters on the walls of their room. In fact, posters and decorations had taken up enough surface area among Trottingham youths that could probably cover the entirety of the massive city walls themselves. I did not subscribe to that foalish delight. Instead, my walls were lined with books and magazines, action figures and the stray treasure I’d stumbled upon crawling around the walls.

Goldy stared with wide-eyed wonder at all of the books I had, stacked in columns from floor-to-ceiling. They ranged in topic from romance to action and sci-fi, all the way through to textbooks about magical theory and biology, or any number of subjects. I got a little lost as well, browsing the spines of many long-loved tomes. Whenever a stack of books came up short of the ceiling, I used it as an impromptu shelf, which held numerous trinkets of my childhood life. The majority of them were Daring Do action figures, with a few other prominent action/adventure movie stars interspersed.

“Umm, Star?” Goldy’s voice drew my attention from a wonderful figure of my idol pegasus mid-flight with a band of skeletons hot on her tail. As I turned to look at her, my blood ran cold.

“Eep.”

“Mind telling me what this picture of Justice Hayber is doing under your bed?”

“Gimme that!” I tried to nab the picture with my hoof, but Goldy danced away in the confined space easily. I growled and grasped at it with magic next, but she tucked it under her wing. I couldn’t get at it with the magical interference her feathers were throwing off. We squared off, me trying to protect what shreds of dignity I had left, and Goldy intent on embarrassing me to no end. Justice Hayber was the stuff of teenage heartthrobs, and I was loathe to admit I ever fancied him. Let alone with a hoof between my thighs.

“Give it here, Goldy.” I pawed the hardwood floor, snorting at her.

“Not a chance, lover.” She winked, lowering her stance.

“Yah!”

As luck would have it, my bed was just behind her, and we tumbled back onto the sheets with a laugh. The picture fell by the wayside in favor of wrestling and playful kisses. Those kisses were beginning to devolve into something more wet and sloppy when the door opened.

“Oh.” Olive Breeze froze in the doorway, and I froze halfway down Goldy’s stomach. “Eerm…” We held that pose for a while before my mother found her tongue again. “Dinner’s ready.”

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“That’s incredible.” My father leaned back, having listened to me share my exploits in Canterlot. “So you went from mousy librarian’s assistant to the student of Princess Twilight herself in, what, two years’ time?”

“I… Well, when you put it like that…” I couldn’t fight the blush that rose to my cheeks. My father’s Cucumber Cake remained in nothing but crumbs before us, having been devoured just a few moments prior. “I guess it is kind of incredible.”

“We’re so proud of you, Star.” My mom laid her hoof atop mine, smiling genuinely. “You’ve come a long way from impromptu landscaping.”

“Or the jelly incident.”

“You said you’d never talk about it again!” I wailed, collapsing onto the table. My parents laughed while Goldy looked confused. I caught her eye and shook my head as if to say ‘you don’t want to know.’ Had I the choice, I wish I didn’t have to know about it anymore. Alas, my klutzy history seemed intent on following me.

“Still, Star, you’ve advanced magnificently. We’re amazed.” Audit and Olive Breeze cupped their own hooves, smiling down at me. Under that look, I felt my courage return. They both made a very good point. My history was, admittedly, less-than-stellar. I’d been deemed a nuisance (not improperly) on more than one occasion. But lately, I’d accomplished quite a lot.

There was a time when my parents would pale with horror at the thought of me helping them clean up the dishes. Now, I levitated all our utensils and flatware into the kitchen sink with nary a thought. Even Goldy let out a low whistle of appreciation at the technical display. Once the table had been cleared, my father went and retrieved a bottle of brandy he had apparently been saving for such an occasion. We divvied out glasses and drank a toast. The warm liquid bit going down, but quickly turned warm.

“Okay, so, I don’t normally drink,” I set my glass down with a grimace. “But I could see how ponies fall for it…”

“Uh oh.” My dad chuckled, swirling the remainder of his own brandy around his glass. “Looks like I gave Star the bite of the creature. Careful, darling… It’s got a powerful hold.”

“No, I know…” I took another tentative sip. “I’ve had my falling out with it in the past… But considering how unstable my magic is on any given day, I tend to avoid things that make me more lax in my control. Still, you have to treat yourself now and then, right?”

“Right.” My mom lifted her glass before taking another small sip. Her portion and Goldy’s were smaller than my father and I. Pegasi were notorious for being featherweights.

“So what’s on the agenda now?” Audit asked casually. Goldy and I shared a look before I took a deep, steadying breath. Thus far, we hadn’t discussed why I was in Trottingham or what I had to do. Now, it seemed, I’d be addressing the monumental task before me sooner than I’d have hoped.

“Well, you remember the Timberwolf attacks, right?”

“Yeah, the Hayton’s nearly lost their son in the attack…” My father knew just about everyone in town. He spent his time staring at their ledgers, after all. Glad that he knew, and by extension my mother, I took another deep breath.

“Well… Twilight sent me here to investigate them.”

“... ‘Investigate them’ how?” Olive Breeze asked cautiously.

“She… Wants me to go through the barrier, to see what’s causing the Timberwolves to act this way, and if there’s a way we can stop them.”

Silenced reigned for a full minute, each of the ponies at the table seriously contemplating my words; myself included. I hated to place this sort of worry on them, but I couldn’t have lied to my parents. And besides, part of me needed some input from them anyways. My father spoke after a long while, his tone even and measured.

“I don’t suppose I need to tell you how dangerous they are…”

“No.” I affirmed.

“And that Twilight Sparkle herself has already visited Trottingham to investigate the matter…”

“That’s part of the reason she wanted me to come out here. She knows so much that she thinks it’s clouding her judgement. This might very well be a new branch of magic, unseen by anypony before now. She needs a new mind, somepony who’s not trying to categorize and inspect this new magic…”

“Hmm.” Silence again. My father spoke, but not until he had downed the last of his glass and poured another. “That’s admirable that she’s willing to step back, provided she doesn’t know what this is… I’m just unsure if she’s wise for sending somepony like you into such a dangerous area…”

“Well, I’m not the pony I was two years ago, daddy…” I spoke quietly, trying my hardest not to contradict him. I loved and respected my father fiercely. Opposing him was the last thing I wished to do. “I’ve been training a lot in the past few weeks, and Twilight’s student is here with me. He’s going to show me everything I need to know.”

“Hmm.” He replied once more. Instead of staring at his glass, my father stared at me. There were times when I thought his glasses made him seem like a changeling, an overgrown pony-bug. But now that I was under his keen gaze, I realized him for what he was.

Audit may have been a boring accountant and bookkeeper, but when it came to matters involving his family, he was observant and keen, almost to a fault. Under his gaze, I felt like a foal again.

“Alright, Star.” He sighed. “If Twilight has faith enough in your abilities to send you out here, then I don’t exactly have a reason to oppose her. I don’t have to like it, but I’m not going to stop you.”

“Please, Star…” My mom chimed in, sounding much older than she looked. “Be careful?”

“I always am, mom.” I smiled genuinely at her as we slid back from the table and embraced. She was quivering, but as my father joined into the hug, she calmed down.

When we broke apart, it seemed much darker outside of the window than I recalled it being. Olive took note, her brow furrowed with a different sort of worry. “You can stay here tonight if you want…”

“We should probably go back to the North wall.” I muttered, dreading the cold I knew lurked outside of our warm home. “Besides, I don’t think you could sleep Goldy and I under the same roof.”

“I don’t think we’d want to, you’d keep us up all night.” Audit winked at us before ruffling my mane. “Promise to come visit again before you leave?”

“I promise.” I nodded, wrapping both of them in another hug. “Oh, before I forget!” I dashed back upstairs to my room, grabbing a small package from the back of my closet. Coming back down the stairs, I was met with curious gazes from all three parties. Blushing, I waved the package in the air beside my head. “Socks.”