Righto, I'm back! (Finally).

I'm going to dedicate this chapter to TJ, since she's got the blues at the moment and needs some cheering up. Yeah, this isn't exactly in teh hour but . . . it nearly is!

Review replies:

Cat: That's just like you, Cat. I laughed at that. I still laugh every time I see it. hehe.

Beaulover: thanks! Hey, do you have a horse called Beau? Well, I looked at your profile (I DON'T TAKE REVIEWS FOR GRANTED!) and you love horses . . . YAY! Do you have a horse? Would he be called Beau? I know a horse called Beau. He's a little gun.

You like Opal that much? Aw! Well, there's some art of her on the owlcat92 deviantART account. It's called OwlWingedHorses. Wow I tell people that a lot . . . and I recommend looking up NanuKitty. SHE'S GOT COOL STUFF!

Nanu Kitty: Well, I gave you the first letter in a PM, so . . . yeah. In some coming chapter I'll put it in in code or something, or a hint. Alas, none of you have got my name yet. Shame.

Disclaimer: I own only my OCs and my words

EDIT:

UH . . . sorry with the confusion, because I posted the last chapter twice, when I meant to post this one . . . sorry for being such an idiot.

Chapter 20: MIA

When I woke up, I felt like garbage.

I groaned, not really remembering anything other than the fact I had had an unwelcome introduction to the ground. I sat up, trying to get to my feet.

Be still, Night Pegasus, you have yet to heal.

I froze. "Uh . . . could you enlighten me on who you are?" I asked it. The white shape I'd seen before—oh yeah! I'd hit the ground, fallen through the ground, and then ended up here—after the scorpion stung me!

Ouch.

Anyway, the white shape I'd seen before came into my field of vision. It wasn't actually a shape, instead it was a feminine shape, with no real skin tone at all, just as white as a marble statue. In fact, that's a good way to describe her. She was tall, and she hovered above the ground like a ghost. If I didn't know that ghosts don't actually look like that, I might have thought she was one.

Her flowing white robes billowed around her as she stood. Her face was slim and angular, with blank white eyes, white hair that flowed out behind her, held off her face with some sort of silver circlet over her brow. She may have been marble, but she didn't look like stone—more like a sort of hard mist, so she looked almost like she was a normal person—skin and bones—but she wasn't.

She radiated a white light, except for her circlet, which I couldn't pin down as a colour, it was silver one second, then gold, then blue then green then purple then—

Let's just say she looked very pale in the spots she had colour, other than that she was a white wraith-like woman. She hovered in front of me. You are safe here. It is a sacred place of Fate.

"I may be safe, but I have to get back—how long have I been here?" I grimaced and got to my feet. I had trouble putting weight on one of my back legs. The woman's face didn't change, she just remained staring at me blankly. Time cannot be told down here, for it has no hold.

"Great . . . um, who are you?"

Such cannot be revealed until the time is right, Night Pegasus. And it is not now. You have been injured—poisoned—you must remain here and rest.

I looked up, trying to see the faint smudge of the world above. I could only see a dim crack. "Where'd the hole go?"

Nothing has an absence of life. Everything heals as you would, for we are all alive. This very cavern has a heartbeat, it heals, it wounds, it ages. It lives, and someday, it shall die.

"So . . . this place is alive? How am I meant to get home?"

It was never foretold you would leave. And until it is, you may not leave.

I groaned silently. Another one. "Well, some fates are meant to be changed," I told her.

The woman didn't react. All actions have consequence. Sometimes it does not happen to the one who performed the action, but they happen.

"I accept them. Until then, I do what I have to do. You should know that all consequences cause actions." I pumped my wings and jumped off the ground, heading to the gap in the stone.

I realised it was moving—bubbling like lava. I pounded my wings as hard as they could carry me. I was going to get through that hole!

I guess I was doing okay when I crashed into open air. But then I wasn't doing that well when my back hooves got caught in it. I pulled and pulled and pulled . . . and pulled a bit more . . . I kicked and struggled in every way, but my hooves could not get out.

"Dude, what the heck did you do?!" A bay colt wandered through the trees and saw me struggling. The right side of his face was white and his black mane was blown over the left side. Was that a new look or something?

"Well, he looks like he's a bit stuck," said another colt that was draped over a branch on a nearby tree. This one had white over the left of his face and his mane tossed to the right. They were both small, maybe yearling size, but they definitely were older.

"Look, if you want to just annoy me, then by all means continue," I snapped, trying to pull my hooves from the ground again. "What do you think, Kitt? Should we leave him there, or should we use some of our skills?" the one on the ground asked.

"It depends on what he wants, Nanu," Kitt replied. I froze. Nanu . . . and Kitt? Oh dear . . .

Ah, you people need clarification! Right, you know the Stolls? Nanu and Kitt are basically the pegasi equivalent. The pranksters of the place. This wouldn't be good. [Stop laughing like that!]

Nanu turned to me. "Well, would you like our help to get you out, or would you prefer to be left alone stuck in the stone for the rest of your miserable life?"

"Gee, that's polite," I muttered, throwing myself forward to try and get my hooves out and failing. I looked up at them from the ground. "But I guess I'm going to need help."

Both colts grinned. Kitt launched himself from the branch he was on and cantered over. "Right," Nanu said. "Kitt—go and get the mixture. I'll go get Mickey." [Be quiet.]

They both galloped off, leaving me stuck in the ground again. I decided to wait stubbornly on the ground. I don't know how long exactly I waited there, but after a while both the colts returned with a big Cabin 5 un-dead skeletal horse.

"Righto," Kitt said. "This here—"

"Is Mickey—" Nanu said.

"Who is going to kindly—"

"Pull you out of the ground—"

"While we use this!" Kitt held up a bucket of some green liquid between his teeth. "It wosen't smewl woo wad," he said with it still in his mouth. I swallowed. These guys were definitely worth being scared of.

Mickey came over and grabbed a mouthful of my mane. Kitt and Nanu went and stood where my hooves were jammed in the ground.

"Wone," Kitt said.

"Two."

"Fwee."

Mickey pulled me from my mane (just so you know horse don't have nerve endings on the hair in their mane, just their tail, so it didn't hurt) and Kitt poured the green stuff over my hooves.

There was a huge POP! like a balloon and I tumbled out onto the dirt. The bad thing was that Kitt had been lying. The stuff smelled foul. [Shut up.]

"Urgh—what the heck is that stuff?" I asked them. Kitt put down the bucket. "It's a mixture of grass—"

"—Oil—"

"—Nectar—"

"—Straw—"

"—and a tiny bit of ambroisa," Kitt finished. "It eats away all non-organic matter. Well, technically rock is organic matter . . ."

"It eats away stuff that we want it to," Nanu said. "Because of the godly food in it. Kitt just likes to make it sound fancy. Basically it eats dead stuff."

I stared at them. "So . . . like my hooves?"

"Oh," they said. "Yeah . . ."

I stared down at my back feet and saw—

Nothing. They were fine. That didn't make sense. Hooves were made up of like, dead skin cells or something—like hair and human nails (well, they sort of are the horse equivalent of nails)—so why weren't they getting eaten away?

Mentally I sighed. This had something to do with being a Night Pegasus, didn't it?

Nanu and Kitt cocked their heads so their ears were touching. "That's odd."

"Maybe we were wrong."

"Doubt it. When are we wrong?"

"Maybe he's an odd one."

"Darn right."

Mickey started walking away. "Thanks, Mick!" the two colts called after him. The skeletal horse tossed its head like he was rolling his eyes, since he couldn't exactly do that, because . . . yeah.

"Right," I said. "I'll be going."

"Nice to meet you, dude," they said in unison. I found that slightly creepy.

"Hey—when you need someone pranked, just come around—we work for a reasonable fee!"

I rolled my eyes and started walking away.

Sadly, it seemed that I had been gone a lot longer than a few hours. Honey was berserk when I finally came back to the stables. "Blackjack! Where on earth were you?! I WAS WORRIED SICK!"

I winced as she yelled at me. She lets me go on insane quests but deep down she's still a mum. A mum who worries a lot. And yells at me for making her worried. Because she cares a lot.

I guess I'm cruel to her. She just lost Phoenix, and she doesn't need to lose me, too.

"I'm sorry, Mum," I told her over and over again. Honey then pushed me into my stall and locked the bolt. "You are so grounded," she said. Then she sighed.

I stared at her. For a moment she didn't look like my mum anymore. She looked so much older. "Mum?" I asked. "Mum, are you okay?"

She looked at me sadly. "Nyx said that you had roots everywhere. She meant it, you know."

"Whoa—Nyx?"

"Don't be stupid, Blackjack," Honey said. "Nyx wouldn't leave your mother in the dark."

I smiled nervously. Okay, she knew what I was. Was that good or bad?

"And I'm not surprised," she said. "'The truest of the true are the ones that are not true at all'," she said. "Blackjack, we all have secrets. Especially me, especially Phoenix—all of us. I think now is the time you knew my secret." She rested her chin on the door of my stall. "My mother was a mortal horse, and my father was a golden eagle. I was the product of an experiment gone wrong with some warlock or something."

Honey sighed. "He thought he could create a Pegasus with those two animals—combine them into one. Instead he managed to multiply them and merge those two. Creating me." Honey looked so wrecked now. I didn't know what to do. "The mortal horse was descended from some of the first horses that Poseidon crafted from the sea foam. The eagle was descended from Zeus's mighty eagle. I'm not a real Pegasus, Blackjack. I thought it was about time you knew that."

Opal was worse.

She tried to destroy the stall door to yell at me. Gods, I was getting yelled at. "Oh my gods—you complete idiot! You could have died! You could have . . ."

Opal then started to glare at me. Why at that very moment I noticed that her mane wasn't black anymore I'll never know. It was almost the same colour as her coat—a dark chocolate brown.

"Oi!" she yelled, kicking the door. I jumped. Opal glared at me harder. "Gods you have a short attention span."

"You're mane's a different colour," I blurted out. Opal looked at me strangely. "Yeah . . .? It's called I 'grew up'. I'm not a filly anymore. Gods you're dense, Blackjack."

And then she left me alone.

Which is when boss walked in.

WHOOHOO! I have a chapter done! Hopefully I can get back in the groove for posting chapters when school starts again. OH GODS THAT'S TWO DAYS! WHOOHOO!

I get Art both semesters . . . yay!

I'm looking forward to that. YAY!

Okay, until the next chapter,

Please R&R,

-Owl