"Come in," I called out.

The door opened, and the Count stepped into my room.

"Whatever it is you and your Prince did yesterday went well enough." He feigned nonchalance, but it came out more like resignation. "He’s with the doctors now, trying to figure out the source of his malaise -- though I expect they won't hold him for long."

I shrugged, finishing the equation I was working on. That was hardly news.

"I take it that last night's endeavor was a success?" he moved closer, looking over the blackboard I set up in my room. There, in chalk on the blackboard, splayed like a subject mid-vivisection, the Idol of Boreas was drawn for all to see.

"Oh yes.” I ignored the bitter undertones in his voice. “I understand the power behind the spell now. It’s all here. Look:” I scooched to the side, letting him closer to the blackboard. "Red gold, and see those indentations --" I pointed at the tiny sigils along the edges of the wing that rose from the golden cup of the Idol, "this is Coltec magic. It binds Boreas to the cup. Old magic, forged in Xicocoltitlan at the height of Ahuizotl’s reign, no doubt fuelled by the blood of his subjects.

"The gem in the middle, that's some sort of natural crystal." I frowned, "I have no idea what it is, other than it's old and powerful. That is the real power behind the spell, that’s why the griffons will follow their Prince and their King through darkest nightmares or eternal winter. It makes all those who are connected to it the best they can be -- proud, brave, loyal. Strong. But that's not the genius thing. The genius thing is this:"

We regarded the ancient, ugly cursive that I copied from the inner spiral of the idol.

"Is that… his?"

"Yes, that’s the work of the Mage. The old son of a dam made this thing." The lordling surprised me again -- not many in Equestria would recognise Starswirl's work at a glance. "I'm surprised you noticed."

"I'm knowledgeable enough to know it when I see it," he admitted. "But not quite to understand it. What does it do?"

"It's like," I grasped for a word, "a magical connecting device. Like a transmission in a clockwork. It connects the magic of the Idol that captures Boreas and the magics of the gem, to the Royal Blood of Griffonstone in the rest of the spell. The Royal Blood connects it to the King and the Prince -- and his brothers too if they claim its power. And through them -- all of griffonkind: 'Through Blood and through Law, all that beneath shall serve'.”

He chose one of my chairs and poured himself a glass of wine. "You will have to explain it better, Miss Shimmer, if you expect me to understand," he said, after taking a sip. "My magic lessons were very long ago."

"It's not something they would teach you in Canterlot anyways -- this is Old magic, much more fickle than modern wizardry. You see, normally, pony's magic will protect her against most spells -- like transmutation or mind-control, or even trying to pick up somepony with your horn. Unless you're that much more powerful than the target, magic interferes with magic and the spells just fall apart. To affect a living, breathing little pony -- or even a griffon -- when she tries to resist you, you need a weakness, a chink in that armour."

"Such as?"

"Well," I thought of good examples, "certain alchemical solutions can lower that resistance. Oaths given and even more so -- oaths broken, things of import betrayed make a crack in that magic. To swear by something important, to swear the Old way and then renege on that oath -- it leaves one defenseless and powerless, gives the lien-holder the power over the thing you forswore -- and over you.

“And then there are natural flows of power, like water flowing down from a hill. The Polyneighseans call that “mana” -- having mana over someone, having the power or ownership over the subject: victor to vanquished, mother to child, master to apprentice, lord to vassal creates the connection that bypasses the natural defenses entirely, lets your magic reach them no matter where they are or what protection they may use.

“Even owning a bit of the pony in question helps -- a bit of blood, hair, semen, bit of their magic. Else -- something important to the subject. Something that is to him like unto his own heart." I allowed myself a little smile before continuing. “That’s the kind of connection the Starswirl’s spell uses. It transfers the magic from the gem to the Idol, Idol to the royal blood, royal blood to the king, the king to all his subjects. And thus, the Idol, the most protected, the most potent, the most secret thing in all of Griffonstone is also the weakest point, the chink in the armour of their souls, and all I would need to break them."

The Count took to the wine for a while, saying nothing. Neither did I, winded from the lecture.

“So how did you do it to me?” he finally asked, prodding at the scar on his chest absentmindedly. “What was my weakness?”

I raised the bottle out into plain sight, a bit of magic making the alchemical solution swirl through the liquid in long, black tendrils. “More wine, milord?” I asked, my voice sharp and smug.

His head jerked as if slapped, and his eyes widened in expectation of the anger and feeling of betrayal that never came. He laughed instead, uneasy, forced laugh. “You learn well.”

I smiled and poured.

"Good wine, good sniff, a young warm body -- your love for your little indulgences has blinded you. You weren’t paying attention, you let me enter your room and your bed, poison your wine and take your hair, and when I made my move -- you weren’t ready to resist me. That was the chink in the armour of your soul, and all I needed to make you mine.

"Oh don't pout, my little lord.” I laughed seeing his reaction, “Didn't you try to steal my heart? I'm just more direct about it than you."

I reached out with my magic, feeling the threads of the spellwork connecting me to the little leaden box hidden in my room, to his heart within and then to him. A gentle tug sent a fluttering echo deep into the Count's chest smoothing over his little humiliation and his fear of me. And I watched, rapt, at him grasp for that feeling -- for the pain, for the fear, for the anger that never came.

And then he gave up and finished the glass. I was good wine, after all.

"Aren't you a part of the same spell now?" He asked, still not looking up from his empty glass, as if wishing to coax more wine out of it by sheer will. "That was the purpose of your little excursion, wasn't it?"

"Not really. Look:"

I opened the box with my new accessory -- a silver chain, and on the chain -- a gemstone, the baby-blue sapphire I ripped out of the Count's snuffbox.

"I made some preparations before I went into the vault, so that I could cut the mark off me, like scraping a tattoo off. Not too hard, if you know what you're doing, and prepare beforehand. Though instead of skin, I had to carve up my own soul." I tapped against the crystal, pawing against the translucent walls that contained a bit of me inside along with the power of Boreas. "It's a big chink in my magical defences, but provided everything else goes well, it'll grow back soon enough.

"As long as I wear it..." I put it round my neck, feeling the chill enter my body where the blue stone touched my fur.

I knew it was a trick. I knew how it worked-- just the spell, the trickle of magic energy from the crystal in the golden cup underneath Gormenghast infusing my mind with feelings not my own.

At that moment it doesn't matter: I feel it.

The moment the gem touches my coat, I become more. More than just complete -- more than I've ever been.

The calm confidence, surety of purpose and knowledge of my worth, unshakeable courage, all pour from the gem into me like clear wine pouring into a dirty cup. It transcends logic and knowledge, transcends any doubts or reservations.

My low birth and mixed parentage, Count's little barbs and the snickering of the stupid nobleponies fade away. Failures past and uncertainties future: all of it is powerless against me now. Even the void in her eyes...

I rip off the pendant, stumbling desperately for the Count's snuffbox; the powder burns my sinuses, and everything became clearer again, and I could finally make myself breathe.

In and out.

I was back to merely myself. And for now, that would have had to be enough.

Under the Count's curious gaze, I put the gemstone back into the top of the snuffbox, bending the silver filigree to hold it in the lid, and put it carefully on the table. This power -- perhaps it was benign, but in its own way it was as addictive as the magics of the Black Gem.

"As long as I wear it," I repeated, and my voice almost didn't break, "I am one with Griffonstone, marked by the claw of the Prince. When I don't need it I can take it off, and just be myself."

I put the box away, and gave a last look to the equations on the board, "And I think I know now how to break the spell entirely -- as long as all the winds are absent, and no one interferes. But there are other things I'd need, just as the bloody goat had said: A griffon claw, king's feather, royal blood... and we still have no solution against that very bloody goat.

Sighing, I turned the blackboard around. I would still need to sort out the details, but until I had the next step it was nothing but empty theory. But before that… “This will be the first step.” I gave the Count a parchment with a sketch of the Idol, along with my notes. “Will you be able to get it?” Doesn’t have to be perfect, but it has to be close enough.”

"Sunset,” he tried again, “it's still not too late..."

"It is, my little lord. It has been too late since the moment the first gale crossed Equestria’s borders.” I grew tired of his pleading, his whining. “Go.”

Obediently, he got, almost bumping into the princeling who was waiting outside, trying to summon his nerve to knock on my door.

"Your Highness," the Count said, his level tone and shallow bow full of barely-veiled contempt. Even now he was still playing his role to perfection.

"Milord." The ice in the prince's voice could freeze the Count's entire wine stock if it were in the room, and he kept looking at the Count all the way until he disappeared down the bend of the corridor, as if considering whether to stab the pony with his claws.

“Why was he here?” He finally fluttered into my room, “Did he hurt you?!”

I donned the gem quickly back, steeling myself against its influence. The second time it went easier than the first.

"I’m fine," I said, perhaps a little too harsh, but I forced my voice to relax. "Just empty threats. He just doesn't know how empty yet."

The princeling fluttered up in the air, his wings fluttering joyously. "Oh, I can't wait to see his face when we tell him!"

"We can't!" I pulled him deeper into the room, locking the door behind him "we have to keep it secret. Promise me!"

"I..." He landed on the rug, his wings and crest-feathers drooping." But why? "

"The Count, he has told me, in between his threats and boasting," I weaved a spell about him, masking the power that almost reeked off the little griffon since the yesterday's outing, quickly but without haste. "There will be a war coming. He was telling me how he will become the richest pony in Equestria growing fat of the war he tries to make your brother start."

"Oh. But, but that's more's the reason, right to announce it, surely? Each day that you stay in that monster's power, oh it burns me like hot iron."

"No," I tied a ribbon of red string around the claw and finished the spell with a quick knot. "The situation between the ponies and griffons is very delicate.” Keeping my carefully pre-arranged excuses, while working on a spell was hard, but I was getting pretty good at it. “While he thinks I’m in his grasp, I have a chance to stop the war, but if I left now -- that’s not something I could bear on my consciousness."

"Neither can I!" the princeling assured me hotly, "I could not bear such a thought."

"So we must keep our arrangement a secret for a little longer. This thing will pass, one way or the other very soon, and then we can announce what you did for all to see, and I'll tell everypony that I am now one of Griffonstone."

"And you'll stay here," he fluttered up again, "Safe!"

"Yes." I agreed, "But until then you must keep quiet. Promise me you won't tell anyone”

"I promise," the princeling puffed his chest out. "It'll be our secret."

“And don’t bother the string. It has a spell on it, to hide your power for a while. As long as you don’t summon it.”

“I won’t. But how long do we have to wait?” he pouted. “We’re so close to getting you out,”

“Patience, my lord, patience,” I patted him on the claw before I released it. “Just a little longer.”

"I understand." The princeling nodded. "I'll try to be patient, I really will."

"Good." I checked again my spellwork on his wrists. He had not bothered it -- a good little eaglet, and the hasty spell seemed to hold. “Good.”

I looked at the door and gave just enough that he should notice: a tremble of the hoof, a slightly exaggerated sigh, a second's hesitation.

"Politics?"

"Politics." I nodded. He nodded back -- a second's equine connection, a weak smile shared, "I have to..."

"I understand." the princeling sighed, releasing my hoof. "I'll wait."

`

"Your plan worked, at least."

Prince Gwyr sounded tired, stooped behind his desk. "My brother thinks he's ill. It made him irritated, but at least I was able to persuade him to postpone his plans until he feels better.

"But I cannot continue this forever. I will either have to stop and let my brother get better or..." He dared not end the sentence. “Whatever your plan is, I hope it comes through soon.”

“We are working as fast as we can,” I tried to keep things vague, “a few days perhaps. I hope.”

I could already hear it, just as the creature had once said -- the winds scattering beneath the Prince's wings.

"What can I do?" he looked at me almost pleadingly, "I want to help if I ca--"

The door bashed open, revealing Gideon behind it. "You!" His wing pointed at me. "Little pony. Get out! I wish to speak to my brother!"

"Your Highness must rest!" The medic-griffon finally caught up to him, panting in between his pleas, "you're sick!"

"Useless! Every one of them!" he roared, bashing the door closed in the poor tercel’s face. "Gwyr, you said you can help. What is taking so damn long? I cannot be ill now!"

"Brother--"

"Even the winds! The winds, Gwyr, even the Boreas is failing me! Back yesterday, I felt my power waning when I was working."

"It could just be Father.” Gwyr hid his distaste quite well, but I was getting better at understanding the little twitches of his wings. “He is the King, after all, the winds are his to command."

"Bah!" I had to duck under Gideon’s disdainfully inflected wing, "He doesn't use the power any more. All he does is sit with his pointless papers or chatters with the little ponies!"

"Perhaps I could be of help?" Gideon turned to me, surprised to see me still in the room. "It may not be a medical problem your Highness is experiencing -- it may be something done to you."

"Done? To me? How!?"

"Magic,” I suggested, “A malicious spell of some sort, or some natural thaumaturgical occurrence. I would need to examine Your Highness closer to say.”

“I know you, little pony. You’re the one that spoke against me in the convocation, the one with the lies and slanders. The one that beat Lord Graven. You don’t much like me, do you?”

“I don’t,” I agreed. “Doesn’t mean I want you dead, Your Highness. Not like this.”

Gideon considered it for a second, his claws drumming a staccato rhythm on the armrest.

"Brother, I don't think this is wise," Gwyr advised, unsure where I was going with this. "I'm sure rest and--"

"Do it, pony." He decided, reclining in his seat and waving a wing against his brother’s protestation. "Relax, Gwyr, it's a little pony. What harm could she do?"

“She did quite well against Lord Graven.”

“Bah. Fear and luck! Let her do her best,” he gestured again with his wing.

Playing doctor, like I was a filly again -- except the stakes were higher now. Under Gwyr’s anxious gaze, I got to work, doing every doctor-y thing that came to my mind: I tried lifting his eyelids and shining light into his eye, watching the vertically-slitted pupil respond, I took his pulse, and sent a few simple diagnostic spells into his chest. He twitched, quick to raise his claw against my magic, but he forced himself still, and let it work.

“What are the symptoms, Your Highness?”

“Nausea.” he said, irritated to repeat things he no doubts told his medics already, “Fatigue. Vertigo. Weakness.” the claws ripped through the upholstery. “A.. petit mal of sorts, a twitching of my wings and claws yesterday.” The Prince hated the idea of being weak, and especially admitting it."And when I was flying in the morning," he was pulling the words out of himself like one pulls a barbed arrow out of the wound, "my wing seized, and I fell." The humiliation of the last word was almost unbearable to the proud eagle.

I tsk'd a few times, just like doctor Hollenbach used to do when she was unhappy with my dental exam. "It may be a curse.” I said as I walked around him, “If it is, it'd require some connection to Your Highness. Has anygriffon taken your highness' blood, or feather or any other bit of viscera? Any lovers scorned?"

"No," he lied curtly. His wings shifted while I checked his feathers, as if he was preparing to fly.

Muscles rolled like a wave under his skin, powerful, synchronous. Beautiful, in their own way -- it made me wish I had a pair of my own. The feathers looked well-preened, well oiled, but there were a few ragged ones, shifting in their places as he moved -- they stood out on his immaculately-kept wings. I pulled on a few, and they fell off easily, from barely the slightest touch.

"Is this your moulting season?"

"No!" this flex, fluffing the wings wider, losing a couple more feathers, was anger, thick with heavy, leaden fear. The kind that gnaws on the very roots of your soul, leaving you sleepless in the night, that tugs, and tugs, and tugs on your mind driving you to do anything to quench it.

That was as far as I dared to push. I released the Prince’s wing and came back round to face him.

"There is definitely a spell on you or about you, my lord," I finally concluded, "and not a good one at that.“

“Well undo it then!”

“I.. it’s not that simple.”

"I don't care!" arrogant, commanding -- I felt a throb where the snuffbox was hidden, hot with desire to rise to the challenge, to prove myself, "Do it!"

"I'll do my best!" I offered hastily, taking the classic spellcasting position. Though I was not quite sure what sort of poison the younger Prince used, and I was not an earth pony or even a doctor, I did know something of poisons and chemistry and I was willing to see if my magic could do something against his alchemy.

My horn lit up with sparks, making the room bright with green, and then I weaved my magic into the Prince. My spells reached into his flesh, seeped into his blood.

It was a great temptation -- a simple spell, an artery clamped, heart squeezed, airway closed and he'd be dead and then... again, there was no then -- only death and failure. I was learning to think it through.

"That's it." I finished my spell and stood back. For one mad second, I wished I had a lolly to give to the Prince for being a good little patient. "It may not cure--" I started, but all I got was a blast of wind in my face as the Prince tried to lift off. He made it too, at the price of a few more trailing feathers, and with a victorious screech, he dove out the window.

"I don't think he heard you," the other Prince noted dryly.

"That wasn't featherbane or nightshade," I noted when we could no longer hear the wings of the Prince. "What did you use?"

"That would be all too easy to detect. Even though some of the physicians and doctors can be persuaded to look away for a while, I still had to devise something a little bit more subtle."

Listening, to make sure his brother was truly out of reach, he opened a huge folio, revealing a small paper filled with claw-written formulae and synthesis notes. He let me study it for a few seconds, waiting for me to appreciate the idea, as I ran it through, putting it together in my head until it finally dawned on me.

"Zinc salts?" I stifled a giggle. "You moulted your brother like a common chicken?'

"I would not put it like that." He looked embarrassed and pleased at the same time. "And it was slightly more complex than that. The trick was to--'

"Get it delivered through ingestion, without affecting the taste or risking an overdose. Genius!"

'Thank you." He almost bowed, flattered, before he pulled himself together, and rearranged his wings into a proper expression of concern. "It would bring him no lasting harm. Just weakness, nausea, some fever and muscle spasms. And the moulting of course -- without his feathers he won't be flying West for the next few weeks... Though I must admit, I have not anticipated that it would affect his power as well."

His Power… unlike the Prince, I knew what affected it, and the memory of it -- that moment yesterday’s night, the wing, the claws of the prince, and the ice-cold power reaching into my soul… I wanted to touch the gem in the lid of the snuffbox, to feel again the heady rush of my soul reunited with itself, a touch of something greater than I, but I forced myself into a simple shrug instead.

Luckily the Prince did not notice my awkward shuffle, already switching to the next topic. "But what have you done? It didn't cure him, did it?"

"Just a little charm of my own invention," I boasted. "A mild stimulant and a blood-purging-spell, not unlike the effect of a dialysis machine. It'll provide a temporary reprieve, and, more importantly, decrease the load you put on his kidneys so that there won't be any long-term effects."

And it also served my other purposes, but the Prince had no need to know that.

"Oh." Wings in Gratitude he nodded. "That makes sense. And if he thinks the problem is the curse, it is less likely he suspects the real reason."

"Quite so." Count's words on my tongue felt natural and smooth, just like the lies they carried.

Three things never threaten or you will not live for long: 
A dragon's hoard, a griffon's pride and mare's sense of wrong

Fancy Pants, Count Hoofington
Certain Maxims of Hisan