A Soldier in Silver Chapter 10

Disclaimer: All characters with a speaking role here belong to me, except Swordread Shieldon. He belongs to General Durandal.  All MLP FiM settings are ™ Hasbro and Lauren Faust.

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Eaglewing swallowed hard and tears filled his eyes. Destrier knew that being told that you were indeed dying wasn't an easy thing to accept, especially for one so young.

"You aren't dead yet, soldier. I'm going to try and heal you, and I may just be able to prevent that from happening," the scarlet unicorn said, "But I need you to pay attention to everything I tell you from here on out. Do you understand?"

"Yes sir."

"Good colt." Destrier turned his attention to the mares that Eaglewing still stood protectively in front of. The chocolate colored unicorn worried him a bit. She seemed to be very close to breaking down into tears, something that Eaglewing didn't need at the moment, but Destrier spoke to Sunglow first; he had a more urgent task for her. Cocoaberry would be needed for an important task momentarily. 

"Sunglow, I need you to go to the library and ask Twilight Sparkle to send a letter to the Captain of Princess Celestia's personal guard, Lanceor Shieldon. Explain what has happened here and that we need guards to escort the prisoner to dungeons beneath the castle. Can you do this for me?"

"I can." The golden Pegasus looked at the tall scarlet unicorn and nodded, relief crossing her face as she headed for the door.  There was a low rumble of thunder outside, though the storm still sounded a ways off. It would arrive soon; one could smell the rain in the air and the wind was starting to pick up. "Lanceor Shieldon, Captain of her highness' personal guard. Got it."

Honeycrisp watched her go and glanced at Wildflower. The other earth pony was terribly frightened but kept her fears to herself, except for a worried glance to the thief and to Charger.

There was crash of thunder outside. The storm was getting closer.

"Wildflower and I better go and bring the supplies in before the storm hits," she said, stepping just past the slowly recovering bandit. He snapped his file sharpened teeth at her right rear hoof as she passed, and Honeycrisp reacted instinctively. She flattened her ears, whinnied loudly, reared and brought both of her front hooves down hard upon the prone unicorn's muzzle, knocking out several of his teeth, causing him to yelp from the pain.

At the noise, Destrier turned and looked at the three other ponies, his glance moving from Honeycrisp to Charger, at once assuming the other male had just lashed out at the prisoner. The younger unicorn made a little motion with his head to indicate the paint mare. She, on the other hoof, simply glared at the thief and shook her left foot menacing above his bleeding snout. The red stallion smirked a little. His Honey had spirit.

"Someone's still frisky. Charger, you need to zap him again. Just don't kill him."

"Yes sir! Step back, Miss Honeycrisp. I don't want to hurt you."

"Thank you, Charger," Honeycrisp said with a grin as the thief began to writhe again from Charger's jolt. Then she turned and walked out of the dining room, pausing only to collect Wildflower. The other earth pony mare all but ran from the room, just happy to be away from the carnage within if only for a little while.

Destrier turned his attention back to Eaglewing and Cocoaberry. As long as she stayed where she was behind him, the colt wouldn't relax. He was running on protective instinct and his guard training at the moment, and Destrier had no idea how long Eaglewing could hold himself upright before he would collapse from the strain; this could be a very bad thing depending upon how he fell.

"Cocoaberry, come around to me. You're safe now. The other can't hurt you. Both Eaglewing and I need your help." He spoke very soothingly using his voice to coax her forward. Cocoaberry stood where she was for a moment seemingly rooted to the spot, with eyes on the floor for a moment, breathing hard. Then she moved around the flyer to his commander.

"Thank you, Cocoa."

Eaglewing instantly relaxed at the sight of Cocoaberry unharmed, his rump meeting the floor.
The rest of him would have sagged to the floor as well, but now Destrier's magic held him up. The wounds upon his body had mostly been attended to, and the blood flow from the knife wound was slower than when the unicorn had arrived.

"What do you want me to do, Comm… Destrier?"

"I need you to remove the blade using your magic," Destrier said, keeping his voice calm and even. "Quickly, so that he won't be in too much pain and I can start the healing."

There were sounds from the kitchen as Honeycrisp and Wildflower put the food away, talking so softly that their conversation was a merest mutterings to those in the dining room. Lightning flashed again; followed by a loud crash of thunder that made Cocoaberry jump, and then the rain started falling heavily outside.

"I-I don't think I could do it," Cocoaberry said, her expression changing to one of horror. She shied away from the pair near her. "I don't want to! Can't someone else do it?"

"Besides myself, there is only one unicorn other than you in this room," Destrier shifted his good eye to Charger, "and I'm afraid he's busy with that filthy misbegotten son of a mule. It won't take that long, Cocoaberry, just the merest of moments."

Cocoaberry looked doubtful, but then wordlessly stepped forward to do as she was asked. It was a good thing because during their conversation, Eaglewing started showing signs of acute distress. The colt's azure eyes were dilated in fear and he was panting heavily. This was bad. Destrier knew what he had to do. He would have to put Eaglewing under a control spell before slipping into his own healing trance. He hated using the control spell because it drained his magic and would make Eaglewing's recovery slower than if he just used his healing magic upon him, but he had no choice; he couldn't risk the flyer panicking and bleeding out, or injuring anyone else in the room, including the former commander himself.

"Look at me, Eaglewing!" Destrier said in a commanding voice. The scarlet unicorn's horn began to glow a brilliant gold. The Pegasus watched as a small ball of golden light appeared before his eyes, sparkling and spinning. Inside his mind, he could hear the commander telling him to relax and that everything was going to be alright. The words and the little dancing ball of light soothed away his fear. He could hear his mother singing him lullaby, her smiling face appearing where the ball had been. She took her colt into her hooves, rocking him gently and crooning her lullaby to him. He was so happy to be warm and safe.

"Do it now, Cocoaberry!" Destrier said sharply to the mare standing beside him. Cocoaberry couldn't see the ball of light. She knew nothing of what the commander was doing. She did as she was asked. Her magic, nearly the same color as her mane appeared about the handle of the blade, sliding it quickly from the damaged flesh. The weapon was swiftly replaced with a deep blue glow that now emanated from the larger stallion's horn. The Pegasus never moved, not even when the bloody knife dropped to the floor, clattering loudly. Then she bolted and ran to the kitchen to find relief in her friends and work.

The healing took a while. The outside storm gained strength, the winds picking up and the rain falling harder than ever. Soon the ponies within the lodge could hear the clatter of hail striking the roof and windows. Lightning flashed, followed swiftly by loud and near continuous thunder.

Honeycrisp left her friends in the kitchen, wanting to see how Eaglewing was faring, but it was not good. He had a slight grayish tinge to his coat and that made her wonder if it was too late to save him. She shook the thought out of her mind and moved through the room, heading off down the hall and into the storage closet. There were things she was sure the soldiers were going to need and getting them for them would give her something other than the possible death of the Pegasus to think about.

She dragged a featherbed into the room, moving it closer to where Destrier and Eaglewing were.  The white pony never moved, nor did the larger unicorn. Charger only moved when he noticed the prisoner starting to shift his weight in his direction. That only brought another zap.

"I've done all that I can." Destrier drew back from Eaglewing. He looked exhausted. The Pegasus was lowered gently onto the bedding. "The rest is up to Eaglewing."

There was a loud banging at the door, followed quickly by Stormchaser and another weather pony Honeycrisp didn't recognize.

"Twister's comin' — you all need… what in the Celestia's name happened here?" he asked, noticing the blood, the knife and the still twitching thief. He looked as shocked as he sounded.

"It's long story. Did you say a twister is coming?"  Honeycrisp asked, turning to look out the window. She couldn't see a thing. It was just raining too hard.

"Yeah. It's heading right for the Lodge. You better get into the basement until it passes!"

"We can't move him," Destrier said wearily. "I healed a good amount of the damage, there's a very weak spot on an artery near his heart. If he's bumped too hard, he could bleed to death internally."

"How long to we have until the twister gets here?" Honeycrisp asked, only her eyes showed the fear she was feeling. Because of that, Destrier made up his mind.

"Less than ten minutes, tops," Stormchaser said quickly. "Where are Wildflower, Sunglow and Cocoaberry?"

"Cocoa and Wildflower are in the kitchen. Sunglow went to Twilight Sparkle's house to send a letter about a half hour ago," Honeycrisp said, her voice shaking now. "That's not enough time! We can't get anything to protect all of us. There's a large closet in the hall, but we can't leave Eaglewing to the storm!"

"I can shield us in this room. Wildflower and Cocoaberry, get in here now!" Destrier said, knowing that he could use that very same spell that he had used to defend against the knife attack, only widening it so that it would repel a collapsing building once the storm tore it to pieces. The mares appeared and entered the room gathering close by their friends, but staying away from the electric blue pony. Destrier had a momentary thought to leave him out of the shield and let the building and storm take care of him, but with his luck, the twister could miss them and creep would disappear.  Explaining that to Lanceor would be hard.

A window blew open hard, banging in the hard wind, and the lamps blew out, leaving the ponies in complete darkness. More windows exploded, showering the shield with tiny shards of glass as the winds roared outside. Some of the ponies made soft noises of pain as the air pressure changed and their ears popped. Debris slammed into the walls and roof. There was a tearing sound, of the clay roof shingles being ripped away by the tornado. Yet the roof timbers held. The lodge shivered under the onslaught but in the end stood standing mostly undamaged aside from the windows, the impact of some of the debris to the outer walls and the roof. All inside the dining room were safe.

As quickly as it had come, the tornado lifted into the clouds and disappeared.  It became still both outside and inside the lodge as Destrier's shield dissipated. Honeycrisp gave the big red unicorn pony and affectionate nuzzle of thanks, before turning her attention to a sobbing Cocoaberry. Charger did the same with Wildflower who was huddled against him. The weather ponies followed the wind leaving the group behind to give chase.

Eaglewing slept through the entire event.

The would be killer jumped to his feet while Charger was distracted and raced for the door, only to find his way blocked by a pair of Pegasus guard ponies, who upon hearing Sunglow's cry of "That's him! The one who tried to kill me!" tackled him roughly.

"Hey! Don't rough him up too much! My father will think I did it. I'll get my rump chewed if he's too damaged!"

Swordread Shieldon stepped around the struggling group, turning his attention to the large red unicorn in the middle of the room.

"What a day, huh Red?" he said cheerfully as he walked further into the room. "Catching a suspected murderer red-hoofed, and then nearly getting blown back to Canterlot in a twister! If this is what retirement is like, I might just consider it myself. Uh… Red? You okay?"

"I'm… so tired," Destrier said softly. He took a step towards the newly arrived guard, but then he tottered for a moment and fell lifelessly to the floor.