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"There is more to a being's worth than just power Cally. Treasure is just one kind of wealth, friends who will help you, care about you, and share with you, are a different kind of wealth. Gold can not feed you nor slake your thirst, and servents can't give you much. What about those other kopolds? We rescued them, but instead of helping to rescue you, they left you behind and went home because they valued themselves more than you. If they were your friends, they would have come to rescue you from poblins, no matter the difficulty. There is a kind of power to be gained by having friends to help, and that power is greater than any you have seen, but it does require making friends and that means treating others as equals."
"Friends are not servants Cally. Friends are equals and work together as a team, and without that equality, without working together, there can be no friendship, only lonelyness. Your sister may be weaker than you, but she has far greater control and training than you. If you want her defeated, than you must train and learn to control your power much better."
"You have been bewitched by the poblins. There are no treasures here. Your necklace is the remains of a chain that had tied you to that spike. Those nasty poblins have a dark master, and it is playing with your mind. Your real treasures are not here, taken by the poblins after they locked you in this room. We can defeat the master who bewitched you." While speaking, Moonstar moves to stand near something she can duck behind should Cally let loose another burst of flame.
"If Cally really wants to keep safe what she has, she will need the poblins destroyed, and if she wants to succeed, she will need to work with us to destroy them and make this a safe place for her hoard, at least until she she finds a better place."
Moonstar looks at Cally "We are not here to take your treasures Cally, but if you want tributes, you must earn them. I can teach you how to earn tributes, lots of tributes."
"Cally, whatever else he may be, he is loyal, and you cannot buy loyalty. Not with gold, nor terror. You should value him for that if nothing else. Without him you would still be trapped in this room alone." Moonstar rises to full height once more but makes no move to interfere with what she does to Meepo.
After, crouching in front of Meepo from the flames, Moonstar has moved, nor even twitched.
Moonstar looks at the table at the mention of the scaled occupant. Looking, and sounding, as regal as she ever has, she speaks in draconic, "You are the one named Cally yes? I have come, along with the one called Meepo, to get you away from the poblins. I can also teach you how to use your power so you may never again be captured by such creatures. I can teach you to how to be the great dragon you were born to be. So, will you accept my help and tutoring, or will you stay here?"
If Shubshi fails, "Did anypony find a key on the poblins, or in the guard room?" If that is a big resounding no, then she will burn the door a time or three to weaken it then, "Okay Shubshi, it should be weak enough for you to break it down now."
Moonstar nods to Midnight, "It is alright, though perhaps accounting for everyone after a fight, and before closing doors, would be a good idea." As the kopolds start chattering, she listens intently to the kopolds conversation, gleaning what details she can from it, particularly since Meepo doesn't seem to be keeping up very well.
Moonstar puts the poblin out of it's misery. Burning alive is a wrong way to end even for these primitives. She does a quick check for any pouch, necklace, or anything of the sort, taking anything useful or that might be recognizable as belonging to that particular poblin, and studies it's face and patterns so she can copy it later. Then finally being pushed out by the heat, she exits the corridor, reclosing the door behind her. Following where everypony else went, "Next time, close the door after I'm out of the way. It was dreadfully hot in there."
Moonstar quietly signals mac and checks the barrels near the fire and looks at the ceilings and such to get an idea of ventilation a'd flow of smoke, to get an idea of whether she should let the fire spread or not.
Mac speaks to Zophio, "Would you like a lift?" If Zophio accepts, Mac will lift him up the wall. In the meantime, Moonstar aims a ray of flames down the hallway at the fleeing poblin.
Moonstar's hooves grew long and sharp as she faded from view, as the poblin reached the door to strike out, she slashed out at the little creature with her sharpened hooves.
Moonstar hops from Mac to the wall and checks out the other door, the one that isn't the source of the attacking poblins. Mac flies up and takes an out of the way spot where he can see everything.
"Mac, if you would..." Mac and Moonstar rush forward and then Mac grabs Moonstar and lifts her up just in front of the wall where Moonstar lets loose a a quick flash of purplish dark fire from subtly green glowing horn. The fire spreads through the group on top of the wall, though she deftly avoiding catching the griffon in her flames.
"I say deception. I have a spell to change my appearance. I can look like a poblin, make feathers here invisible, though only momentarily, then one of you can be the pony I caught all by myself. Then when they all think combat isn't going to happen, we all strike suddenly, and throw the group into chaos. Or I could send them on a wild sprite chase." Moonstar whispers to the others, and waits to see what they are comfortable with.
Moonstar rushes forward,and sends a small purple bead just over the crenelations where it suddenly bursts with fiery strands of purple fire filling the area for a moment.
[Draconic]"It is okay Meepo. You just don't have good training yet. Get good training and protecting Cally from such dangers will be easy."
Moonstar responds with fire, purplish dark fire bathing everything in front of her, as she steps backwards from the bushy things with a forehoof sweeping Meepo behind her.
Moonstar studies the plant, and it's "pot," carefully, touching only with her telekinesis.
[Draconic]"Stop! Bad bush!Meepo don't want to touch bush. Bush will make bad things happen." Moonstar suddenly exclaims, and pulling Meepo with her magic to keep him from touching the bush.
While Meepo collects himself, Moonstar turns to Heart, "More like a young dragonling needs our help, possibly from some great evil in charge of the poblins under this place. An evil that Meepo doesn't really want to talk about because it is that bad. We need every scrap of information we can get and aside from the ponies we are tracking, we may be the only ones in a position to stop this evil. So I would rather take things slow and extra careful from this point forward." as she finishes she looks at everypony in turn, then she turns back to Meepo and attempts an encouraging expression.
[Draconic]"Meepo needs to be brave right now. Meepo needs to help save Cally."
[Draconic]"Hmm, do you think perhaps the poblins took Cally to give to, the one below? If that is why they took her, maybe you should tell us everything about it, so we can be best prepared to rescue Cally." Moonstar gives Zophio a supposedly meaningful look, but it probably just seems odd.
[Draconic]"Let us find Cally, then Meepo can return to tribe as a hero who saved Cally. But first, can you please tell us what happened? Every detail helps."
"Oh he is leading us to trouble, big scaly trouble. His missing friend is a young dragon. No idea what she knows of the agreement between ponies and dragons. Now he wants to take us to his tribe to help find her, but the tribe never lked him, tolerating him only because he was the one that got the dragon to hatch. So they miht try to kill him, and us." Moonstar follows Meepo, looking like she is deep in thought. [draconic]"Meepo, are you sure your tribe will let you tell them you found help? Might they tell you to go away without listening? Perhaps we should find Cally first."
Moonstar speaks trying to sound more gentle, but not her forte, so she still sounds somewhat commanding, though not harsh. [draconic]"None here will harm you. Are there others around? Or are you alone?" She waits patiently for an answer, or at least until he calms down a bit if he doesn't answer quickly.
Moonstar steps forward, [draconic] "Hello, I am Moonstar Eclipse. What is your name?"
"We can check the neat door later. I too am very curious, but our duty is to our goal. Further, the lovebirds, who we do not want dead, are in a very dangerous place, and I'd rather not find them dead because we spent more time satisfying our own desires. You don't agree, just look at every noble ever called a tyrant. Most of them acted out of their own selfishness, ignoring their duties. Is that how you want to be remembered?... Come for now. We will return later." Moonstar opens the door the three ponies we are after went through.
Moonstar carefully examines the coins, since they have markings likely dating the period.
"Well, this I recognize. What do you think Mac? Thorn the Tireless?" She tossed a coin to Mac who looked it over before bagging it. He replied, "That was before Gerrick, right?"
Moonstar, the pony, lets loose another spurt of purple flames.
Moonstar fires a quick jet of purplish flame from her horn at one of the skeletons.
Moonstar carefully picks her way around the room while trying to think of any stories of old coats of arms, nobles losing castles, or other history that might tell her about this castle.
"While you're down there, why don't you add a quick release, so if we are being chased out of here we can re arm it to catch our pursuers." Moonstar suggests matter of factly. Not quite a commanding tone, but not far from it.
"This will only last about 20 minutes, so let us not take our time down here." Moonstar levitates a small bit of rubble and it starts to glow brilliantly. She then levitates it up front near whoever is in the lead.
Moonstar drops down, casting a cone of fire on her way, just before landing on top of one of them.
"Three of us have wings, that means only a single trip, unless they would rather have two flyers per pony." Moonstar said contemplatively, "Of course, a group should check below just in case somepony fell."
"Oh, this is neat. I'll have to come back later and explore this area. Anypony going to brave the bridge, or shall the winged ones play ferry?" Moonstar smiled mischievously at those with wings.
Moonstar frowns and stands over the graves a moment. For a liitle while she seems thoughtful.
"I get a strange feeling about that place. Perhaps we should check it out." Moonstar starts cautiously heading for the door, from an angle so as not to be to easy to spot, and peeks inside. Mac exasperatedly, yet silently, follows behind her.
Moonstar is completely oblivious to Zophio's feelings, perhaps because she just isn't really familiar with such feelings, she does seem to notice that Midnight is uncomfortable about something, possibly involving Zophio? She decides to wait and see if it becomes something she needs to resolve, or if it handles itself.
Moonstar smiles again, "I would indeed still love a few bottles of cordial." In response to Midnight, "Don't worry Midnight, you'll have a chance for a visit, a proper visit even."
Moonstar doesn't seem to notice anything amiss. "This is very good. You certainly know your craft well. If you have any bottles left, I wouldn't mind buying a few for road myself." Moonstar smiles, though it probably looks haughty given where she learned to smile.
Luckily, Moonstar didn't laugh out loud, must be all the practice she had as a foal to not give herself away when sneaking around under tables at balls when she was supposed to be asleep.
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