About a week and a half ago, a Canterlot missive had been sent to the ruler of both the Dragonlands and the Dragons themselves, Dragon Lord Torch. The missive was concerning the rampant Ursa Major in what used to be Ponyville, and asked for help from the Dragons. In extraordinarily rare cases, such as Lord Torch himself, Dragons could grow to be as big as, or even bigger than, Ursa Majors. With help from Dragons of that scale, the thinkers of Equestria expected that the Ursa Major could be defeated and the land could be reclaimed.

Shortly after receiving the Canterlot missive, Lord Torch had sent an emissary to fulfil his part in a diplomatic meeting between the Dragons and the Ponies. As fate would have it, the Equestrian night that emissary arrived just happened to be the same Saddle Arabian day which Cloud had left Ghyr Muhimm's care, almost as if it made for a better plot.

Twilight and Spike sat at a table in a room within the Canterlot castle, along with half a dozen of Princess Celestia’s bigwigs, waiting for the emissary to join them. Though the bigwigs were making casual small talk amongst themselves, not expecting anything particularly out of the ordinary, Twilight was incredibly nervous about what could go wrong.

“I’ve never been in a meeting like this before,” she monologued at Spike, “so I have no idea how things could turn out. I read a few books earlier today to prepare myself, but it’s never the same as the real thing!”

Spike groaned. “Twilight, I know, I was the one who got you the books. They were really hard to find.”

“What if they decide not to help us? Ponyville might never be saved! I had to spend three hours searching for the right books, but if I was faster I could be more prepared!”

Spike scowled. “Actually, I spent three hours searching-!”

“Luckily, because I’m so smart, I managed to read the books quickly and not waste time like the one who found them!”

“But according to you, you’re the one who found them!”

“Spike!” Twilight cried out in surprise. “Don’t be so sarcastic! It’s incredibly rude to shift blame onto others! You need to be more of an adult and admit when you screwed up!”

“At this rate I’ll be an alcoholic by twenty.” He paused. “Which is in five years, because you hatched me when you were six, and now you’re twenty one, making me fifteen.”

Twilight frowned in confusion. “What? Where did that come from?”

“I… I don’t know,” Spike replied, a little panicked, “it just seemed relevant for some reason.” He paused again, and his previous attitude returned. “If you were to number the walls in this room, what order would you put them in?”

“Uh…” Twilight slowly stood up and backed away. “Are you feeling okay?”

“Because the one I’d put after three is looking a little weak right now.”

“Do you need a glass of water or something?”

“Not quite broken, but a little cracked at least.”

“I’m not… um…”

There was a pause. Spike suddenly looked surprised, like someone had just slapped him awake.

“W-What?” He began looking around in panic and slight fear. “Where have I been the last two minutes?!”

Before Twilight could think about what he had just said, the doors to the room opened and a silence fell upon the crowd. In the doorway stood the emissary of the Dragons being led by two royal guards of the day.

“Introducing the emissary of Lord Torch,” announced one of the guards, “Princess Ember!”

The other guard gave a little toot on a horn.

Standing at about a head taller than the guards was Princess Ember, her scales various shades of blue and her eyes a fiery red. Unlike Spike, Ember had wings on her back and horns on her head in a style not dissimilar to a Minotaur. She stood with her arms crossed and her head to the side, like a teenager called downstairs by a parent.

“Let’s get this over with…” Ember sighed. She walked over to the table, being careful not to slip in her angst, and took a seat.

Twilight reached over and closed Spike’s gaping jaw.

It wasn’t just his scales which were hard.

It hadn’t taken Cloud too long to fly to the nearby town. I’ve really got to learn this town’s name sometime... He landed on the outskirts, dismissed his Support Circle and walked deeper in.

Going over my mental to-do list, I should first try to find a library and see if I can either find a map of the world, an idea of where to go to find a map, or the geographical history of Changelings. While I don’t need to eat or drink right now, I also need to get some food and water to take with me. I’ll most likely have to walk my way out of this desert. Maybe I’ll get lucky and the library here will be having a party like the Ponyville library! I could just swipe a little food if it was! It wouldn’t even be stealing, I’d just be taking food which was already free!

Cloud sighed. As much as he joked to himself, he really did miss Twilight. She had been his first and only friend. Even if he told himself that he couldn’t go back to Equestria, it had no bearing on him wanting to go back. He much rather enjoyed the feeling of grass and dirt under his hooves rather than sand. Of course, even if he could somehow go back to Equestria, Ponyville had become the nest of an Ursa Major. Walking on grass and dirt wouldn’t become a common activity. If I stayed in Canterlot, anyway.

He walked for a while longer, but found no sign of anything which looked like a library. After some time, he stopped to consider his options. Ghyr mentioned there might be some Horses which speak Equestrian. Finding a library will be easier if I start asking around.

“Excuse me!” Cloud called out to a nearby Horse. “Do you know where I can find a library?”

The Horse just looked at him for a while, not saying anything. Crap, they probably don’t understand me. I doubt anyone will let me cast a telepathy spell on them, so it’s probably best to just move on to the next-

“Shit, that was easy,” said the Horse. Mawr was suddenly surrounded in flames as she quickly transformed back into her regular form.

Cloud blinked. I… guess I won’t have to find a library now. I can just ask this guy what I need to know.

Before Cloud could ask anything, however, a nearby Horse began screaming, attracting two more to them.

“[Changeling!]” It screamed. “[There’s a Changeling here!]”

“[It was transformed!]” Screamed another. “[It probably killed whoever it was pretending to be!]”

“[No!]” Screamed the third. “[It must have killed dozens by now!]”

“It’s times like this when I miss having context,” Cloud muttered to himself.

“They think I’ve killed a dozen Horses because I was transformed,” Mawr explained.

“Uh... Did you?”

“Obviously not,” Mawr rolled her eyes.

“Good, so we can just talk this ou-”

“I only killed four or five.”

There was an awkward silence between Cloud and Mawr as the Horses continued screaming and shouting.

“[We’ve got to kill it before it kills us!]” The first one screamed before running at Mawr.

Mawr rolled her eyes again before throwing the Horse at a nearby window with a telekinesis spell. Before the Horse could get a faceful of glass, she suddenly stopped - Cloud had grabbed her with a telekinesis spell of his own. He placed her back on the ground before turning to Mawr.

“I don’t know what the hell you think you’re doing,” Cloud growled, “but I’m not letting you kill anyone else!”

“Oh for-!” Mawr facehoofed. “Look, I don’t have time for this! You really need to come with me!” I really miss having context…

Cloud lit his horn and shifted his hooves into a battle stance. “And why the hell would I do that?!”

“Princess Luna needs you back in Equestria! The sooner we get going, the sooner I can get out of this damn desert!”

“Oh yeah?!” Cloud spat. “Show me some evidence! All I see is a murderer!”

“Oh, screw this! It’ll be easier to just knock out and drag you back!”

Mawr used a burst of speed from her wings to charge at Cloud, then teleported behind him at the last moment before casting a disorientation spell. Realising what was coming as soon as she teleported, Cloud quickly cast his own disorientation spell to act as a counter. The two spells clashed as each caster battled for power.

Suddenly remembering his bout with Trixie, Cloud kicked sand into Mawr's face. Her concentration broke and she felt her mind slapped by the spell. With Mawr momentarily off balance, Cloud spun around and whipped the back of his hoof across her face and followed it up with a magic bolt to her chest. Though her chitin protected her from any actual damage, Mawr was still thrown backwards. She quickly refocused her mind, rolled into a standing position and threw a punch.

Cloud knocked her hoof to the side and grabbed her leg, but Mawr was ready for the counter and flew forward with the pull, making Cloud lose his balance. He quickly teleported into the air to avoid any attack she could make, summoned a Support Circle and set himself the right way up. Mawr flew up to fight him in the sky and, as soon as she was level with him, fired a blue, elementless magical beam at Cloud, who responded in kind with his red electrical beam. The two beams collided and struggled against each other.

While he could tell his beam was stronger, Cloud held back on his magic to keep the beams balanced while he cleared his mind and focused. After a moment, he suddenly dismissed his Support Circle, stopped his beam spell, teleported just above Mawr and let loose a Thunder Punch. For an unknown reason, the magical bolts of electricity from his Shock Circle were unaffected by Mawr’s chitin and she felt their full blast. Electricity surged through her innards, making her scream in pain. Her body locked up, and she plummeted back to the sand. Mawr slammed into the ground, but her chitin once again protected her from any real damage. Landing on a Support Circle, Cloud rushed over to her to knock her out using another Shock Circle.

Knowing she had no other choice, Mawr focused every last bit of magical energy she had and blasted Cloud with a telepathy spell. The spell stopped Cloud in his tracks as details of her life flashed before his eyes:

From a young age, Mawr had known nothing but killing. As she grew up, she took on mercenary work for whoever would pay her, until killing a few too many members of noble families and finally being caught. She had been locked in the Canterlot dungeons for five years.

Princess Luna freed her, as well as many other prisoners in the dungeon, to work for her as her personal guards. They were under strict training twenty four hours a day, training stricter than anything Cloud had experienced. Many of the guards in training quit, wanting to return to the dungeon, other guards were locked within nightmares for attempting to escape, but more than eighty percent of the guards were killed by the training itself.

After simply two weeks of this, only a dozen remained. Guards enduring enough to not be tempted to quit, strong minded enough to not attempt escape and physically strong enough to survive. Once Cloud’s nightly training had begun, the survivors were allowed to shorten their training to twelve hours a day, but those twelve hours were made twice as difficult.

Mawr survived for three simple reasons: For a start, she was much more experienced than any of the other prisoners with the things she had been through in her life, making her very mentally strong. Second, her chitin meant that she was immune to almost any kind of pain which the Princess put her through, giving her a very unfair advantage. Finally, Mawr was being paid well - well enough that she had absolutely no thoughts of trying to escape. As she saw it, this was the job she was born for; legally killing and getting very well paid for it.

Once Cloud had been banished, Princess Luna had sent to the castle deep in the Everfree Forest to look for an ancient artifact she had hidden away two thousand years ago. It took quite some time, but she had finally found it - a strange crystal.

At long last, Cloud saw Mawr delivering the crystal, only to be sent to Saddle Arabia to retrieve him against her will.

Cloud’s mind cleared. He stumbled, fell to the ground and promptly spewed the cactus juice he’d had for lunch. As it turned out, experiencing the footnotes of a lifetime of information in the span of three seconds was a rather unpleasant experience.

“O-Okay!” He managed to say between coughs. “I believe you!”

Princess Luna sat at a balcony, watching the sky as her moon slowly descended toward the horizon and the stars faded away.

“Hello, my sister!” Princess Celestia greeted happily.

Princess Luna did not turn to see her, merely nodding in response.

“Despite our best efforts, I sadly bring to you some good news and some bad news!” Princess Celestia did not sound sad. In fact, she sounded practically giddy, like a filly on Hearth’s Warming.

To this, Princess Luna turned. “What is it that you mean?”

“The good news is; Twilight’s assistant has a little more worldly experience, if you catch my meaning!”

“I… do not.” Princess Luna frowned with worry. “Sister, what do you mean? What has happened?”

“The bad news is; the Dragon emissary didn’t take kindly to Spike trying to touch her butt, so…”

“The alliance is not happening?” Princess Luna guessed, worry coursing through her. “Sister, without that alliance it is only a matter of time until-!”

Princess Celestia held up a hoof to silence her. “Oh no, it’s much better than that!” She was struggling to contain her laughter now. “The news is so much more exciting!”

Princess Luna showed an fearful yet angry grimace. “What?! What is it?! Tell me!”

After laughing a few second more, Princess Celestia finally calmed enough to speak:

“We’re at war with the Dragons!”

Author's Notes:

Believe it or not, Spike's 'episode' early in the chapter wasn't just a throwaway joke and is actually relevant to the plot. People who've read 'The Quest For The Past' (the story which this is a reimagining of) may have an idea of what it means...

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I mentioned this in a blog post, but since not everyone who reads this will read that, I'm going to reiterate it here:
If you ever have ideas for magic circle you find entertaining, interesting or just plain fun, please tell me in the comments at any time! I'll probably end up using it (if I do use your idea, I may change it in some ways to make it fit the story a little better), and if I do I'll credit you for the idea in the author's note of the first chapter it appears in!