# Ponyfinder: Roots of Stone

## by David Silver

### 55 - Always Seeking

Fast pushed forward through the branches, the soft clinking of her armor her only companion. She had to get somewhere, but she didn't remember where it was. Wasn't she just yelling at something?

It came to her suddenly as her surroundings became a well-appointed hallway. The clinking faded away. She was wearing chain armor, not the sort that should be making too much noise anyway. More than enough for yelling at cadets at least. She looked down at her hoof spikes and turned them one way and the other, smiling. They were a gift from the empress herself, or the Queen, as she preferred to be called. "Everyone knows she's a bloody empress." She kicked open a door. "Alright, everyone better be ready!"

A dozen young souls and two older looking ponies all got into rough lines for her as she looked them over. They were dressed properly at least. "And everyone's on time, very good. Now, are you ready?" Fast began giving drills, no wait, that wasn't her name. What was it? She stood there in a daze, trying to unearth it from the depths of her psyche.

She started awake when an explosion tore the ground beside her. This was no time for self-reflection! She was a soldier in the would-be Queen's army. She had to win, or she might never get the chance. With a loud cry she charged forward, her lance bobbing in its well-worn and overtaxed saddle rack. She crashed into the enemy line, stabbing, dodging, and rolling with the blows as she took scores of wounds, slowing with every new one. She was certain she'd fall that day, but she'd be damned if she didn't tip those scales, even a little. The battle wouldn't be lost for her shirking her duties.

She was walking down another hallway. She was in one of the Seekers of the One Herd's headquarters. She knew it well. It was the very one she trained in so long ago. She nudged open a door. The guild leader, a handsome stallion, smiled at her. "Fast Shadow, it truly is a pleasure. I hear it's your fault Dawn even came back from that last one."

Fast nodded at him. "Just doing my job, you know that. The Seekers don't abandon one of their own."

He nodded back. "That is the rule, but you know as well as I it isn't always followed as well as we'd like. I'm glad we have you around." He settled back on a soft looking cushion. "Where would we be without your example? He won't admit it, but your actions really affected him. Know he's thankful, even if he never admits it."

Fast smiled, but the scene shifted suddenly, the same guild master was sad and old. "Two children... How could you just leave them like that?"

Fast recoiled. "What?"

"The off-worlders. They trusted you, and paid the price. They were to be protected, and you left them. How?" He sank to the desk, his head on it. "The world is collapsing around us, and you, of all ponies in the world, in the guild, how could you be the one to let our motto fall so far? Is this just another sign of the end of us? Should we just surrender?"

Fast felt a terrible tension in her chest. Every word was like a little stab at her. "No! No! We can't! The Seekers were there before the queen, and we'll be here after her."

"Empty words." He drew out a slender wand and set it on the desk. "Do you know how many Seekers have abandoned their posts, taking what they can, in the last week?"

Fast trembled softly. "H-how many?"

He met her eyes as silence grew between them, only the soft labored motions of his breath, as if living was an effort he didn't much care for. "The Queen is dead. We had the One Herd. We found it, and we failed to protect it... Some say the answer lies with the humans, but I won't join their herd." He lifted the wand. "I'm sorry... My herd is gone."

Fast suddenly understood what was going to happen and surged at the pony as he turned the wand on himself. Her hoof reached out, almost touching it as it blasted him with fell and dark energies. He crumbled to the desk lifelessly even as she cried to him. Her words would not bring him back.

Her herd was gone. She collapsed, cradling his lifeless form, and she wept. She sobbed and cried, and she knew, at least in part, it was her fault. Why had she failed?

She was walking. She'd been walking for weeks, or was it months? She couldn't remember. She just kept walking. Anything that crossed her path and tried to stop her was met with her full fury. She drove hoof spike and lance into soft bodies until they stopped being in her way. She didn't know where she was going, only that it hurt, and that nothing would dull the ache she caused.

Then she collapsed.

As the sun set, she laughed miserably. The sun was setting... The day, and her life. The sun... was setting...

Somehow it felt as if all that had gone wrong was her fault. Even the falling of the Queen was somehow her fault, despite not being one of her agents. Certainly she had failed in her duty. "At least you have your revenge, in part." She flopped onto her side. "I'm sorry..."

She heard the thump of a book closing, but could see nothing.

"Are you done?"

What sort of question was that? She tried to focus on the female voice, but still saw nothing.

"Of course you aren't. I have more stories to tell with you."

Fast heard a new book being set down and turned to the first page.

"Once there was a brave and noble warrior. Her name was Fast Shadow. Her friends could count on her to always be at their side, protecting them even when things got bad."

A scowl came over her and Fast tried to roll up, but had no strength. "Stop taunting me. I failed. I failed two foals that needed me. It wasn't even hopeless. I was a coward! I was so loathsome I drove my mentor to kill himself."

"She was an earth pony, with the rugged lines of the prairie tribe. She was proud of what she was, but could always see the power of others, never underestimating them. Her favorite weapon was the lance, which she wore at her side whenever she could."

"Stop that!" Fast managed to clop a hoof against the darkness. "Stop it... I'm dead."

The book was suddenly visible, overwhelming her vision. She could see a younger version of herself drawn lovingly on the paper, smiling up at the reader, lance at her side. "Fast Shadow loved to adventure. To go into dangerous places with friends, hoping to find lost secrets and great treasure." The image changed, showing her beside Wandering Note, a cloven friend of hers, surrounded by small piles of coins. "Like a good friend, she always shared fairly, and her allies were always delighted to have her on their side."

Fast slowly forced her way up to her haunches, heaving for breath. "Why are you showing me this?"

"When things didn't go as well..." The page turned, showing an image of Fast with no money, just bruises and cuts, with Wandering Note looking much the same. "She would smile." And the image did smile. "She would encourage her friends to try again another day." Wandering Note returned the smile.

Fast fought, staggering and falling several times before she got to her hooves. "I didn't do that for them! I ran. I feared for my life and decided they weren't worth it. I gave my word, and lost it, and my herd. I lost it all..."

"There is always another story." The book slowly closed. "Maybe you can do better this time. You have friends."

Fast's ears flipped back even as images of Paul, Tabitha, Tree and Maud appeared there, drawn in the same way as the sketches of herself. "They believe in you."

"What if I don't believe in me... How could I do that..." She clopped against the ground. "I was happier not knowing! Sheila? Is that you? Take it away! I was happier not knowing."

"The story must go on."

"I..."

"We must all play our parts."

Fast hung her head. Her strength was returning, but her will was worn and frayed. "Sheila, you ask too much."

She could feel her plate returned to her. She wasn't old, she was young still. She had a life to live. She could make a difference, hopefully a positive one. She was in the middle of the forest, with a narrow trail before her. With a frown, she pushed through it, for a slender figure to step in front of her.

"Your visions were fouled, but in a most fascinating way." It passingly resembled a pony, but it had long and slender horns. Its entire body was slender. It was more like a deer than a horse. "What being watches over you with such intensity?" That voice was soft, but masculine, and old. Very old.

Fast felt no immediate threat from the thing and nodded lightly. "Good day, I suppose. I had doubts... before, but I have become the plaything of the gods. I call to the Sun Queen, but it was not her hoof I felt there."

"You regularly call to these outside presences?" The deer seemed repelled by the idea, as if it disgusted him.

Fast frowned at it. "Why do you act like that? They are kind beings, not demons or their like. They are literally our gods, of the ponies. How could I not favor them?"

"Lost creature... It is no wonder you ache so. Your friend awaits you, but she will not be served by walking alongside a cultist."

"Cultist!?" Fast snorted loudly. "You take that back. I'm no such thing."

It raised a cloven hoof at her. "You can explain it to the others. Will you come peacefully?"

"Will you take me to the others?"

He nodded slowly. "Presuming they emerge from their visions, they will be taken to the same place. Come." He turned away from Fast and began to walk, the forest flowing around him. "I am trained in the ways of outsiders. Do not attempt to wield their magic against me."

Fast fell into step behind him, trying to look around, but the trees didn't allow sight to go very far at all. "I'm a warrior, not a damned cleric or the like. You have little to fear from me when it comes to magic."

"And yet, there it is, inside of you." He looked over his shoulder. "You should not even be alive. Your every step is a minor insult to nature's order, and you don't even know it."

His words brought her frown back all the more, but was he wrong? If her vision was true, perhaps not. How long had she lived? She had been so certain the priests of Sheila were just being melodramatic, and obscure, as priests were all too often. To have it thrust at her as a literal truth was difficult to bear.