The pony slid down the snow dunes. She was instructed to gather supplies for the remaining leg of her journey, and that there were stores of it that remained in what remained of the Crystal Empire. With a bit of longing, she diverted slightly off to the side where she could see parts of the Crystal Palace stand, its partly crumbled heights steadfastly staring into the storms.
In an hour, she managed to come to the city limits. What little of the Crystal Heart’s power still remained, making it easy to tell were the edge was: a sudden drop in snow level.
She pawed at the edges, and sighed slightly when she found a broken shard of crystal. She pushed them aside, and went towards the only tall pillar of snow in the middle of the entire circle.
She recognized it, despite being almost completely obscured. She had seen this place before, one civilization agol. She could see where the balconies used to be, where the towers and spires used to be from where she used to look over the world.
She lifted her scarf to rub at her pendant again, letting a warm red glow to spill out. She shuffled awkwardly sideways, pointing the glow at a tower's walls. It took a few minutes before it reared the edge of a buried window. She kicked through a wall of snow to reveal one of the third floor balconies. She walked in and looked around. She was told that supplies were left behind in the kitchen, wherever they were.
She trotted through the empty halls, wincing slightly whenever her hoof steps were too loud and echoed repeatedly through dead silent tunnels. She wandered until she found a room she recognized, reoriented herself, then went in search for the kitchens. She found the staircase and began walking down, careful to place each hoof carefully in case of ice.
She glanced at some of the rooms she passed, a solemn look passing over as old memories briefly overlayed the ruined rooms. Bedrooms snowed in, art galleries iced over and fractured, cold and desolate hallways drained of life. She took what solace she could get from the hope that defrosting could bring back the castle she once felt such joy in exploring.
Soon, the kitchen door was forced open, and she stepped in. Food rot was mostly halted from the worldwide freezer, and she quickly picked out what she could eat, what she could store, and what she would have to burn for heat.
She pushed her choices outside, then opened up her satchel to pull out a cut branch. She retrieved a hatchet from her other satchel, and shaved pieces off to make a small pile of kindling, which she started burning from a packaged flint. The heat helped melt some of the drier foods, which she proceeded to help feed the flames enough to warm the rest of her meals and finally give her muscles a chance to relax from the chill.
She pulled down her scarf, gasping in fresh air after hours of muffled breathing. She began scarfing down food as fast as her mouth could warm them, the chill being a constant drain on her energy reserves.
It took half an hour of constant chewing before she felt satisfied, and after a brief rest, she started packing the remaining food for the rest of her Journey.
Returning to the surface was another lonesome Journey. She wanted to pull out her wings, but now that she left her fire the air temperature was back to ‘freeze your eyeballs’ unless you wore insulated goggles.
She found a window that was covered in snow after several flights of stairs, and stepped back out into the snowfall. The wind was had picked up again. A light snow still fell constantly, swirling past her, creating frost she had to rub away. She paused to glance back at the glowing point of the mountain--
A wall of snow on the side of the tower puffed outward as a gloved talon punched through. Another heavily clothed figure stepped through, an outline of a beak underneath the heavy scarf wide open, yawning. The griffon froze when she saw another standing with her, and made a sound of questioning.
The pony shrugged, and pointed at the mountain.
The griffon nodded, looking across the snow dunes and mostly buried buildings. She looked back at the pony, grinned, then slid down the slope, rapidly building up speed..
The pony gaped in shock, before a grin started growing across her face. She laughed once, sharply, and dashed after her, quickly sliding down the loose snow.
She lowered her head, dodging cracked crystal roofs as she chased the griffon. Heart thundering in her chest, she let out a whoop as she leapt over the griffon, somersaulting before landing back on her hooves. She jerked her head, as if daring the griffon to go faster than her.
The pair shot meters above the snow-buried streets, bobbing and weaving between the spires that stock out of the endless dunes, letting speed remind them of the days of blue skies and endless thermals.
Ahead of them, the mountain and the small, huddling buildings clinging to the sides of the slopes loomed.