This was not what Spike had anticipated, it was almost the twentieth anniversary of him and Twilight moving to Ponyville. And here he was staring at the pony known as Daring Do, one of the most accomplished pony adventurers in the past century. The most problematic part, she barely looked like she could do anything her books had stated she had. He felt the need to ask her about this, but the artifact on the table between them held precedence over all other matters. It had writing in an ancient script, a style of writing that unfamiliar even to the Legends of Equestria.

So far, the only part that was fully translated of the script scrawling across the artifact, a brokenly incomplete statue no bigger than one of his palms, was something about a dragon’s flames restoring what is lost. Spike didn’t like this, he was used to doing things for ponies a lot but this just seemed ridiculous. Never mind the fact he finally had broken things off with Rarity almost a decade prior, he couldn’t believe it took him that long to see that his one-sided crush was going nowhere in regards to the elegant white unicorn mare. Thankfully, Rarity had stopped trying to chase ponies of noble birth and settled for dating, and eventually marrying, Thunderlane, of all ponies. Needless to say, almost everyone had been surprised, but the wedding had been lovely and Spike had graciously declined and chose to opt out of being at the event, he was still trying to get over the fact he didn’t really love Rarity at the time.

So now, here he was, with Twilight next to him looking somewhere between excited and distraught, having to belch fire on the remnants of an artifact he had never seen before. Spike would have been all for using his fire to help any pony that asked, but this was an artifact that was so old it made the Legends of Equestria look like foals, the thought of that image did make Spike give a silent chuckle for a fraction of a second. But he really didn’t want have to do this.

“Just to be absolutely sure,” said Spike, in his now deeper baritone sounding voice, “you want me to spit some of my flames onto an artifact on the off chance that the whole thing could be restored. I hope you’ll forgive my apprehension here, but I really don’t want to potentially damage the artifact in question.”

“Then you can just set your flame to something small, on a slow burn of sorts,” said Daring Do, whom Spike had to be let in on the secret of at the start of all this, “and just touch your flame to the statue, minimal damage and we don’t have to worry about it all getting burnt beyond recognition.”

Spike gave a heavy sigh, “Twilight said the same thing, I’m just worried about somepony coming in and interrupting us at the wrong time, some of Twilight’s friends have a habit of doing that.”

“He does have a point there,” said Twilight, “and if he gets startled doing such delicate work things could spiral out pretty fast. Frankly, I’m surprised they haven’t come and burst in on us already, it’s been over an hour since you arrived in Ponyville and Rainbow hasn’t burst in with one of her excitement outbursts, usually, she’d do so within the first few minutes.”

“Oh, she got that done just as I arrived,” said Daring, “I guess I forgot to tell you. Also, the pink one said something about a party to celebrate my visit later tonight.”

“Well, if that’s all out of the way already,” said Twilight, “Spike, please begin.”

Spike gave another sigh, he still had his doubts about things but still lit up a small flame from his lips and leaned in to tap the flame to the artifact, once he got close enough to tap the flame to the object h noticed some drops of fresh blood on one of the inner almost jagged pieces of the artifact. The moment the flame touched the artifact it lit up in a flame that was a mix of Spike’s flame color and Daring’s coat color before settling down as the complete work. The artifact was now whole, not showing any signs of damage but still showing its age with coloration. Spike immediately recognized the figure, thanks to his numerous trips to the Dragonlands to learn about the culture of his kind from Ember. The statue before them was Zelshirska, the ancient dragon goddess of fertility. Dragons had once had a society that practiced worshipping a pantheon of deities, but over time they abandoned the practice in favor of the more straightforward and worldly approaches of the Dragonlords and various other draconic leaders and rulers. But what was confusing was the fact it was old pony script upon the statue, mixed with an older version of one of the draconic scripts.

The figure of the statue was a lithe dragoness with hints of curves that made it seem as if she was shifting to a more voluptuous state, even with the faded coloration one could tell she was meant to be colored pearl and silver and platinum. She had no wings, but looked as if she could fly without them. Her fangs and claws were the color and appearance of pearl and her spines had colored platinum with a hint of emerald and ruby. The eyes of the statue were uncut emeralds that the statue had been seemingly formed around. It was clear whoever had made the statue had put a lot of care and respect into the product.

“I know this figure,” said Spike as he pulled back and admired the piece, “she’s an ancient fertility goddess dragons used to worship before their abandonment of such religions. But the script about the piece is definitely an ancient pony writing. So that begs the question, why would ponies put emphasis on an ancient draconic deity? And why this one? She reigned over fertility, and I’ve been told she was described as being selectively erotic in personality.” Daring had to hold back a laugh at the blush that seemed to appear on Twilight’s face, it was clear the purple alicorn had picked up on the implications. Daring herself didn’t mind the explanation too much, she actually felt a kind of excitement she hadn’t in a very long time.

“Well, I guess you’ll be joining me on a return to the site then,” said Daring, “maybe some of the clues will be there.” She did her best to hide her smile, but had her suspicions that she was doing a terrible job of it.

Spike let out a groan, he didn’t like where this was going. Something hit him at that moment, “I noticed fresh blood on the piece before it restored, care to explain that.” He and Twilight turned their gaze and full attention toward the adventurer pegasus.

Both Spike and Twilight were actually startled when they looked at Daring, mostly because the markers of her advanced age were gone. Said dark yellow mare now looked like she was in her late twenties or early thirties, with her body looking a bit attractive to Spike. Her whole body seemed well-toned, to a level most professional athletes weren’t entirely at.

“Oh, nothing serious,” said Daring, seemingly not noticing the surprise of her hosts, “just pricked myself on the piece while I was examining it. Hope that’s not a problem.” Spike did a slight shake of his head to clear it while Twilight did her best to hid her surprise, which was actually pretty good this time.

“No, it’s just that from what I was told about Zelshirska, the fertility goddess we currently have a representation of, is that couples that those were hoping to have success in bearing offspring, sometimes with numerous failed attempts, would give up something personal to her representations in hopes of gaining her attention and favor so they could have offspring. A dragon’s flame is considered very personal, it’s a sort of thing that is tied to who we are, and blood is something very personal, it informs on who you are and the lineage you belong to. It’s possible we might have inadvertently drawn her attention, assuming she is real to some degree, and the place you found her representation could be a temple or some other place of power for a divine entity.”

Daring suddenly picked up on the implications but rather than feeling nervous she felt excited, in more ways than one. If what Spike had told her was true, which she suspected was indeed the case, then that would mean she had found a site where ponies had dedicated themselves to the worship of at least one non-pony entity. Of course, if it was entirely dedicated to this Zelshirska that would mean it was a fertility temple. The very idea of finding ritual chambers dedicated to making love was exhilarating, mostly because the majority of ritual chambers she had encountered involved something malicious or trying to kill her, usually both. A ritual chamber dedicated to potentially massive sexual orgies was a welcome change of pace, and made her feel a little sexually excited.

Of course, she had yet to realize she had a much more youthful form. It would probably be a while until she did notice, Spike was curious how she would react upon that realization. Regardless, he was sure the moment would be memorable.

It had been some time since she had dealt with the likes of Ahuizotl and Dr. Caballeron in such a manner that their threats would not be an issue for quite some time, it had been chronicled in what she had penned as the penultimate book in the series. The event had somehow managed to trap them in a pocket dimension designed specifically for holding criminals that were too dangerous for ordinary incarceration, with a few added bonuses. Daring was starting to feel her age, and could see some of her foes were as well, but after the event that trapped them away, she had started feeling a little more energetic, stronger and flexible.

Chances were things were still worse for Daring, despite how frisky she had been in her teen years she had never actually been with anyone before her adventures. The greatest secret she kept, the one thing she kept out of her books no matter what, was the fact she was actually a virgin, at least until she found herself as part of a few primitive rituals where she was an unwilling participant. For some reason, she felt as if all the damage to her insides, especially the kind sexually related had been undone. There had been that time she had dedicated some of her ova to clinics to help ponies with birthing problems, but that had been before she started writing her books and chances were no one knew due to the anonymity policy of such places.

Twilight seemed oblivious, especially with her statement of, “Well then, you two better get to it. I expect a full report of the whole expedition, complete with maps of the facility as complete as you can make them, please name what you think they are if at all possible.” With that she floated a book over to Daring, “this is a copy of the most complete set of translations for the language found on the statue,” Daring took in in her hands, mostly to distract from the horny blush she was sporting in regards to her...partner. “And I think it would be best if you took a copy of the artifact with you, it might prove useful.” With that, she used a modified version of the copying spell Starlight had used for the friendship journal to create a duplicate of the artifact and floated it over to Spike.

“Twilight, we haven’t even begun preparing for the trip yet,” said Spike, “she hasn’t even mentioned how long the trip could be.”

“The structure is a twelve-day hike from the nearest train station,” said Daring, she knew it would take some time to prepare and it had been rather hard to find her potential exit. Which ironically enough, had nothing to do with the natives of the area and almost everything to do with the environment and terrain.

To Daring, Spike seemed like a bit of a worrywart, but chances were that had more to do with the fact he lived with a princess. She couldn’t help wondering if having him would even be a good idea, he seemed more the type to accidentally find trouble than know how to get out of it. And for some reason after the idol had been restored, she was starting to have less-than family friendly thoughts about him. She hoped it wasn’t something that would negatively impact anything.

The language on the idol had looked like an older dialect of the pony language but further examination showed it was actually a mix of old Ponish mixed with a completely different language’s script. The mix of unrelated languages was odd, Twilight decided to call in as many of Equestria’s top linguists as she could. Seeing as it was an old dragon religious figure, Spike offered to send a call out to Ember and see if she could help with the puzzle.

Spike wanted to postpone the expedition as much as possible, Daring did seem to be in a hurry. After several hours they decided to turn in, the experts Twilight had called in wouldn’t be in for a few days and Ember had yet to respond to his call. Just as he was getting ready to direct Daring to a guest room, something Twilight insisted on, he got a response from Ember saying that she would be over before the week was out.

With them all waiting a few days Spike decided to show Daring to the room Twilight had decided on for her. As he led her up the stairs Daring said, “I haven’t felt as good as I do right now in a long time, my limbs and back don’t feel the cramps I’ve been feeling for the past couple years now.”

Without even thinking, Spike automatically said, “probably has something to do with the statue restoring your youth, probably had something to do with your blood on the statue.” As soon as she finished he realized what had just said.

“I’m what???!!!” Daring said in surprise, “How young?”

“It looks like the statue’s restoration restored you to how you were in your late twenties or early thirties,” said Spike as evenly as he could, “you’ll no doubt want to inspect yourself at the earliest convenience, I would recommend you do that in privacy away from potentially prying eyes. Twilight probably is working on how to bring this matter to the other princesses. It’ll be a few days before potential experts arrive to inspect the idol, I recommend you work on something that resembles an official report before they get here after getting some rest.”

Author's Notes:

And here's some of the setup, let me know your thoughts on that. In my mind, in the series proper Daring Do has been at her job for a few decades. Thus, the whole bit about her being old and the Age Regression plot point. Also, I felt I needed a reason to bring Daring's age down in response to Spike and the rest of the established younger cast aging up, it's been almost twenty years in story since Twilight and Spike moved to Ponyville.

Another reason for my doing this story is the fact I have yet to find any art pieces that are just Spike and Daring together.