There was a sense of wrongness the instant Jack stepped through the door. The walls of the cave were cramped, claustrophobic. No room for her to stretch or reposition. If there was something up ahead, there was no way she could react without toppling everyone behind her like dominos.

For some sort of reassurance, she reached her hand backwards as she made her way through the cave. It was met soon enough by Rarity’s own hand, squeezing tightly in wordless comfort.

The farmer ran her fingers across Rarity’s palm and froze.

There was no brace on Rarity’s pinkie finger.

So? she thought, ‘course there ain’t. Magic ta hide the injury. She was doin’ that earlier.

Except that was wrong.

Rarity may have been vain to some degree, Jack had accepted that fact throughout the time they’ve been together, but she wasn’t this vain. They were inside an area that was dangerous enough that it got a man killed, maybe even more men than Galahad. Rarity would keep her magic accessible and would limit the drain on her powers in any way possible to prepare for what lay ahead. That included things like illusion spells over her body. She’d wear her injuries, albeit reluctantly, because that’s what the situation would call for.

Could jus’ be an oversight. Maybe she forgot ta cancel her spells.

Bullshit. Rarity could forget things sometime, sure, but nothing this important. Nothing that could come back to bite them hard. And this, even though it was a little thing, something Jack might have missed a few meager years back before she had gotten at least a bit of a keener eye, it was enough to tell her one of two things.

Either the hand wasn’t Rarity’s, or something had changed when they went through the door.

Jack whipped around, nearly colliding with the soul-folk, who jerked back in surprise.

“What’s wrong?” Rarity questioned, looking up at the woman.

“Cut the crap,” Jack countered hotly. She looked around the tunnel, trying to spot some alteration to it, something that would prove without a shadow of a doubt that Jack was in a strange situation with a strange group of people that weren’t her friends. Seeing nothing, she pressed on. “This ain’t my first rodeo.”

“What?” Rarity questioned. “Jack, what’s gotten into you? Do you think now is the time?”

“I think Rarity would know this is the exact time fer it. This is an illusion. Skip the damn middle man an’ show yerself already.”

It was a bit of a bluff, a bit of an educated guess. This felt too much like old ground. Years ago, Dmitri had tried something similar to this. He had even used Rarity inside the illusion as a way to stall Jack.

“You’re behaving irrationally. What are you doing?” Rarity asked, her gaze bordering on nervous as she stared at Jack.

“What happened ta yer middle finger?” Jack questioned, narrowing her brow at the tailor. “Why ain’t it broken?”

“Illusion spell, of course. You know that,” Rarity answered, rolling her eyes. She shut them and let out an exhale, bringing the hand up and pointing to the brace standing across her middle finger. “See? Good as new. Or, rather, bad as new.”

Jack gave a weak chuckle in reply, then with the speed of a coiled up snake, she snapped her fist forward and threw her weight behind the strike, cracking Rarity across the face so hard the soul-folk twisted and fell to the ground, blood pouring from her mouth, her jaw at a sick angle, obviously broken. Even before she looked up, Jack had her shortsword drawn and held it out as a ward to the others.

“It was her pinkie,” Jack sneered. “I ain’t playin’ ‘round. Show yerself.”

“Brash,” the thing wearing Rarity’s skin remarked, her once-pleasant voice garbled and slobbery. She grabbed her jaw and without even an inkling of pain, snapped it back in place. “You seem the last out of the group for tricks. Rather, you seem the sort for brute force.”

Though her voice had cleared a bit, now it held a tone underneath, one that whispered dark dreams and of blackened trees, of graves and rain and mold, as if two people were speaking at once, puppet and puppeteer.

“Clearly unimaginative as well,” the puppet gestured, waving its hands around in a mocking display of Jack’s wife, pointing to the drab cavern tunnel-walls surrounding them. “No real danger, no real thought within you. Only an end goal.”

“They told me ta keep a clear head when I came in here. I planned on doin’ jus’ that.” She looked towards the others. They sat limply on the ground, devoid of life, devoid of action, the masquerade holding them awake and functioning long-discarded. Jack set her sights back on the not-Rarity.

“An’ I ain’t gonna bother dealin’ with ya. This ain’t nothin’ but an illusion anyway, no time fer this.” With that in mind, she focused on what would let her out of the illusion: pain. She brought her hand towards her shortsword, intending to draw a line across the back of her hand, when the thing laughed.

“Eager to go back so soon? I won’t stop you. In fact, I’ll cancel the spell. I’m only here to serve a warning. You’ve set a destination, haven’t you? But you move towards it without a thought of who you crush underneath. Without a thought of what Celestia could do with the grail.” It smirked. “Rather, you cling to the desire to selfishly keep what you have. Is that honestly the right course of action?”

The grip on Jack’s sword loosened for the briefest of seconds, before tightening once more.

“I don’t know if it’s right,” she admitted, then narrowed her brow, her conviction still shining out despite her moment of weakness. “But I know what’s wrong. An’ her havin’ that is wrong. Even if she can do a lot of good.”

“Your actions could be considered treason by many. Celestia included.” Not-Rarity smiled, the expression slimy, insincere, the exact opposite of Rarity’s joyous grin. “Are you ready to pay the price for your actions?” She—it—stepped closer; Jack instinctively held up her sword in warning at it. “Maybe you’re not scared of death. Maybe you welcome it and are just looking for a reason to fight something beyond your comprehension. No matter how gentle a soul Celestia is, treason isn’t a crime easily forgiven.” The puppet stepped forward; Jack stepped back, still holding the sword defensively upwards. “It will do more than stain your honor. It will stain your family's legacy. Your life is forfeit, their life is forfeit, and—” the puppet propelled itself forward, plunging its neck through Jack’s blade, embedding itself all the way to the hilt. Its eyes were wild with glee and it cackled, the noise now held no traces of Rarity within its maddening tone, rather, it held only the tone of a madman that knew a secret she didn’t. Smiling once more at Jack, it whispered three words that terrified her more than anything else could have.

“Hers is too.”

The illusion spell instantly faded and Jack jerked back with an alarmed yell, her arms flailing as she nearly fell, but caught herself. Breathing in a sigh of relief, she turned and froze.

The others stood, statues with their heads bowed, no doubt in the same situation she was moments ago. What they dreamed, Jack couldn’t know, maybe she didn’t want to know.

Any normal situation and she would have been trying to wake them, dispel them from the dreams they found themselves within. But now was no normal situation. Right now was a time she needed to act, a time when she and God were her only judge.

Looking ahead, she saw a door with an odd series of runes, much like the ones outside. This door, however, was a sliver open and she pushed it, surprised at first by its resistance, then pushed harder, bringing the strength she held within her to life. Her nostrils flared as she exhaled and she felt a vein in her head throb as she pushed, but the door finally opened with a low, rumbling groan and she stepped through its threshold.

The room was wide, easily able to swallow her living room back home and most of the kitchen, with a ceiling almost twice her home’s size. It was a level area, circular. Reminded Jack a bit of a coliseum, like Bloom had read about in her homework, and it was lit from above, silvery light oozing from a sort of strange, pentagonal chandelier, the coloration of the thing magical in nature, if she had to guess, and it let her absorb the carvings that lined the walls of the place.

At the far end of the room Jack spotted something that made her draw in her breath and tremors, faint at first, but increasing in intensity rocked her body as she stood in… awe? Fear? She didn’t know, couldn’t come up with the words, felt like there wasn’t a single poet in the world that could come close to saying what needed to be said as she looked over it.
A man stood, his form encased within the crystal that littered the rest of the cave. Or, rather, to clarify, the man, the man from within her dreams, the man that had gotten the grail and had bested Galahad.

Tirek.

He stood, youth far beyond what seemed possible for someone so old, and his face housed blinding fury, the crystal acting like some camera to a distant past, capturing him not only mid-stride, but mid instant, his hair and clothes mid-lift, the necklace he wore floating inches from his chest . In one hand was the familiar glow of the soul-folk, a spell in mid-cast, its power filling Jack’s nostrils with the stench of magic. In his other, holding in an iron-grip, was an object that was so beautiful that Jack’s eyes were watering as she took it in. Golden wouldn’t describe it, rather, the word Jack would use would be pure. Something pure and beautiful and alluring. An object that she felt like she could stare at for eternity, could walk across the entire world for. That could tempt her to any evil, if she only could hold it.

Stop, she warned herself. The damn thing’s like a flytrap. Might look pretty, but it’ll chomp ya good if ya let it.

That was right. It was a trap. The whole damn thing was a trap. That had to be it. Tirek had to be messing with them in their illusions. Had to be convincing them that the grail was their best option. It was the same reason he was discouraging Jack from taking action. He was trying to let Celestia take the grail and possibly reawaken him when the crystal broke.

Not jus’ possibly. Remember the wendigo. That thing went kill-crazy soon as the crystal broke. I’m sure this son of a bitch’ll be the same.

She had to stop them. She had to hope words would work. Because the alternative was hard to think about. What she might have to do in order to make sure they stayed safe.

He wasn’t wrong ‘bout treason, then, Jack mused. Because ya know fer damn sure that if ya get between her an’ this what’ll happen.

It wasn’t something that she had ever wanted. Even now, she couldn’t believe that it was a possibility. But it was something that just couldn’t be risked. She might have to fight Celestia.

Before, it was just talk, it was trying to convince, even for a while during their travels, it was acceptance that maybe she would end with it. But now that Jack had seen it, now that Jack had seen him, the holder of the grail, she knew. She knew they couldn’t let him awaken. Come hell or high water, Celestia had to be stopped.

Dropping to a knell and reaching into the satchel at her side, Jack began her preparations.