Luna slowly opened her eyes, her vision barely returning before she was overcome by a throbbing headache and twisting stomach, each vying for which was the worse pain. She clutched herself, feeling as though she hadn’t eaten in days.
“Celestia?” she groaned, screwing her eyes tight as she fought back the pain. “Anypony?”
The reply of silence was not reassuring.
She took some laboured breaths, hoping to stave off the hunger with air alone for at least long enough to get her bearings. She once more attempted to open her eyes, grateful to the relative gloom of their environment for offering her this little pity, though her gratitude did not last long.
“Celesti—a…”
At first she could not comprehend what she was seeing, struggling to think behind the noise of her migraine, but the shape before her soon became unmistakable. Luna found herself lying on the cold, damp ground of a particularly mossy track, lit almost exclusively by luminescent green mushrooms, as Celestia stood before her in a frozen pose, once more bound by stone. It was a horrifying sight that Luna had never hoped to see again; her sister caught mid-back-peddle, a look of fear chiselled into her face from her unknown assailant. The alicorn desperately spun around, first looking for enemies, then for friends.
“M-Meadow Flower?! Sweet Blossom?!” she screamed raspingly; confused and desperate for aid, her dry voice failing her. “Rootin’ Tootin’?”
But reply came there none.
Where was she? Where were they? What should she do?! Should she try reaching into her sister’s sleepless dream like she had in the desert? She had no idea how she’d done it the first time, let alone how to replicate it, and she didn’t exactly have energy to spare. It was so hard to think clearly beside her various pains… What was the last thing she remembered…?
Discord. She and her sister had stood against Discord in the henge. But then what? Her memory was foggy… dark…
Tantabus.
It was a name she didn’t recognise, but it was all she could find in the darkness of her memory; like the oily whisper of a predator in her ear, the name chilled her to the core. But whose was it? Why did she know it? Did they do this? And what of their companions?
No, these were questions for later, after she had saved Celestia.
She stood up, or at least tried to, her knees buckling under her own light frame. How long had she been unconscious? When had she last eaten? The vivid memory of her last hearty meal—courtesy of Sweet Blossom—only served to accentuate the dryness of her mouth.
Luna tried to stand again, this time managing to slump against the nearby rotting log, her condensed breath illuminated by its mushrooms, taunting her with their patent inedibility. She used her newfound vantage to survey the scene in more detail, spotting a familiar looking book on the ground next to her embroidered saddlebag, from which a slightly withered carrot had rolled. Any concern for taste or texture left her mind as she grasped the vegetable with her magic and thrust it into her eager mouth, laboriously chewing the petty meal as she tried not to gag; eventually stomaching it with multiple swallows. Knowing what other treasures awaited her within, she tipped the bag upside down, exposing a rather soggy-looking cabbage, a few raw potatoes, and against all odds, a rosy-red apple, looking just as ripe as the day they’d bought it in Haysead. She ravenously bit into the crunchy orb, feeling life jump back into her muscles as the tart juice lubricated her throat, finishing core and all in just a few bites. Next she unclasped the waterskin from her bag and swigged it greedily, ignoring the trace drops that ran down her cheek and chin. Breathing a gasp of relief after downing half the container, she wiped the streaks from her face and leaned back against the log, sliding back to the floor with closed eyes, revelling in the satisfaction of such a meagre feast. The new residents of her stomach felt strange and almost as painful as their absence, but this would pass as clarity began to settle back into her mind and her heart rate slowed to a regular speed.
Her most basic of needs met for now, she opened her eyes and confronted her situation anew, looking up at her petrified sister with a mix of guilt and sorrow. What had happened while she was unconscious? And unconscious she certainly was, as it had been a dreamless sleep, which was unheard of for her. Her dreams were normally so vivid, visiting that vast and beautiful moonlit field of endless possibilities and serene nature… Some days she could not wait to fall asleep just to see that view again, and escape into its vast, tranquil freedom. But that wasn’t important now. Both she and her sister had been cast with an unnatural sleep, and once again she found herself awake first, though this time she felt no dream-link with which to wake her kin.
With her stomach beginning to settle, Luna pushed herself back up, now capable of standing unaided. She surveyed the scene once more. Whatever had petrified Celestia had spooked her into rearing back, likely jettisoning herself, her saddleback, and the book from her back. Had her sister not reared back, Luna’s bag and food would have been petrified along with her, possibly as well as Luna herself. Had Celestia saved her life? No, that would mean- She saved their lives by making sure she could save her in return. Exhaling under the burden of these assumptions, Luna looked once more to the familiar book, now fully recognising it.
“This is Meadow Flowers’-”
She looked around, hoping to see their companions emerge from the shadows with a smile and an explanation.
They did not come.
She looked back to the book, lifting it from the damp, mossy soil with her magic. Wait, Meadow Flower had told her about a plant remedy for this very situation! Whether it was luck or experience, Luna thanked the cosmos for the terran’s foresight. Now what was it called? Something-Tear?
She flicked through the dense pages with her magic, skimming calligraphic names and mouthdrawn images until she spotted the familiar white flower. Thank goodness Celestia hadn’t put this book in her saddlebag, or it would have been petrified with the rest of her! Now all she needed to do was find this singular flower somewhere in the vast forest of pine and danger that surrounded her, not least of which was the predator surely responsible for their situation: a cockatrice. Her heart skipped a beat at the thought of such a beast, capable of turning ponies to stone with a single glance. One mistake and the hope for Equestria’s future would be over—everything rested on her lone shoulder now.
Luna stilled her breath, pacing herself as she donned her saddlebag and placed the book and its scattered contents back within. She closed her eyes and mentally reached out to Celestia, probing her for some kind of connection like they had shared before; but just as that day in the desert, her waking mind could not sense anything within the cold stone. She exhaled, this time picturing the flower in her mind’s eye. Plants were living things, after all, so who’s to say they don’t dream too? She mentally reached out, this time feeling a faint light in the distance. The darkness of her vision gave way to a gentle glow, as though she were sensing every living being from behind her eyelids. A shining white tether sprouted from her horn, snaking its way silently and delicately through the air, leading her to something. Feeling a sense of familiarity with this power she had never used before, she did not question it, simply following its lead, walking blindly forward with her eyes still closed.
She walked an invisible path, walled by the living spirits of the plants and trees. The string led her, unseeing, through the forest, avoiding all obstacles and heightening her other senses. The musk of the mushrooms, the sound of the leaves and needles rustling in the soft breeze, the gentle compression of moss and mud beneath her hooves. It was like a waking dream; a twilight of the mind, where all life shared equal measure. Trees swayed, alive, resting, their days spanning years of pony consciousness. Berry bushes birthed fruits; a dance of giving and taking so utterly natural to the world, taken for granted by all involved. The dream of life was all around her; calm, infinitely knowledgeable, everlasting. The plants knew how to be, what they were, where their destinies would take them, and excelled in their life to perfection—something that ponies were far from achieving. Was she walking, or was she floating across the lush carpet of life that spread beneath her? Was she sleeping, or had she become one with the unconscious all? Was she following the guide, or was it pulling her like a twig downstream, unable to resist, yet absolute in purpose?
She had arrived. The tether from her horn reached down to grass-level, where a cloud of white sparkles shimmered in her half-vision. She opened her eyes, blinking back the disorientation of having them closed for so long and finding her body in a completely unfamiliar part of the woods—not that her previous location had been familiar either. She looked down, and as though she had awoken from a prophetic dream, there sprouted an unassuming cluster of the dumpy white flowers detailed in Meadow Flower’s book. A smile spread across her face—she would be the one to save her sister this time!
Luna chuckled smugly to herself, leaning in for a closer look. Now how was she going to transport the flower’s essence back? Should she empty out her waterskin as a vessel? No, it was way too big, and would waste much-needed water for the rest of their journey. Perhaps she should carry it back with magic alone? She could concentrate for that long, right? Perhaps not if she entered that dream-walking state again, considering she didn’t know the way back by sight. It would be a shame to break the flower off just for her use, the poor thing…
The rustle of undergrowth and snap of a twig from behind made her decision for her. She dared a glance over her shoulder just long enough to spy a beak and green feathers before snapping her eyes shut. Was she too late? Was she turning to stone? … No, the moment passed and she was still able to think and move her hoof, but the vicious creature was still very much there, hissing in territorial rage as it stalked towards her. There wasn’t time to think, only do, so she swallowed hard and ripped the flower’s stalk from the ground with her magic, desperately galloping back the way she had come with her eyes tight shut. She didn’t have time for the magic to take her as it had before, and as the misty half-vision slowly reappeared like candles in fog, she found the guiding tether absent from her mind. She turned her head back as she ran blindly forward, finding the white cord still trailing behind her, past the patch of white flowers and the red spectre that chased her. Where was it going?! She needed to get back to her sister, and she definitely wasn’t that way! Come on, you stupid thing! To Celestia!
The spirit-cord tugged against her will before begrudgingly re-guiding itself forward and thankfully down the path she was running, but unlike last time, it now split itself at the upcoming intersection. A bright white cord danced to the left, which she felt was redirecting to the same destination as the previous route behind her, while a pale pink cord fluttered to the right. Celestia! Without a choice to be made, Luna skidded around the corner, banking right and galloping back to her sister with the cockatrice in hot pursuit. As dreamy as her initial trip had been, this return race somehow felt longer, despite her galloping. Fear and adrenaline pushed her burning lungs and aching joints past their weakened limit as she stumbled over a fallen branch, invisible to her half-vision of living things. She skidded to a halt as the end of the pink tether came into view, where she knew her sister must be despite the lack of visible life-energy. She turned around, eyes still shut, to find the threatening red aura almost upon them. Not knowing what else to do, so she took two burning lungfuls of air and screamed:
“BEGONE! YOU SHALL DO AS WE SAY!”
The Royal Canterlot Voice boomed throughout the forest once more, disturbing another—or perhaps the same—flock of birds from the treetops. The cockatrice slid to a halt with a yelp, wide-eyed and fearful as it scrambled to retreat. Luna panted as she released the tension in her face, daring to squint open her eyes just in time to see the scaly tail of the feathered beast disappear into the darkness.
“Oh… Well that was easy.” She scratched her neck, wondering if the creature really was as scary as she had thought, before remembering the state her sister was in. “Oh, right!”
She turned back to the statue, approaching it as she retrieved the prize from her saddlebag. With a silent hope and calming exhale, she squeezed the flower’s bulbous head over her sister, seeking the ‘tear’ from within. Sure enough, a milky-white secretion dripped from its core, landing on the unicorn’s forehead and running down to her lips, just like Meadow Flower’s book had detailed. Luna stared with bated breath. This was the right flower, right? She didn’t mess up?
From where the droplet rested, colour slowly began to spread across the greyed mare’s body, returning her off-white coat and soft-magenta eyes. Luna stepped back as she watched the process, her sister remaining frozen until all colour had returned to her form. No sooner had the last tip of grey retreated from her pastel-pink tail, the unicorn resumed the scream she had been stuck in for who knows how long, slamming back into the fallen trunk behind her. As if suddenly struck by how long she had been frozen in that pose, she began to violently cough from her dried throat, desperately scanning her surroundings as she rubbed her watering eyes clear.
“Celestia! Are you okay?” Luna inched forward, lending a concerned hoof.
“You- You’re up-” she wheezed, struggling to gather herself after such a fright. “Is it- it-”
“Here, have my water.”
Luna offered her levitated waterskin, which was desperately grabbed and chugged, with the remainder used to splash her eyes. The alicorn patiently waited for her sister’s breathing to calm before asking again.
“Are you alright? What happened?”
“Chicken-” Celestia barked with dilated pupils. “Evil- Evil chicken!”
“Chicken?” Luna echoed. “You mean the cockatrice?”
“E- Evil chicken. Red eyes. Red, red eyes, right there.” She pointed a trembling hoof forward, though the creature was obviously long gone. “So red, its eyes. Cold. Red and cold.”
“It’s alright, I scared it off.” Luna gently lowered her sister’s outstretched hoof with an equally gentle smile. “You’re okay now, I saved you.”
“Saved me? But I was- I was saving you.”
“Then I guess we saved each other.”
The young alicorn smiled broadly, which was surprisingly effective at calming Celestia’s nerves.
“So… It’s gone?”
“It’s gone. For now, anyway. We should get back to the others before it thinks about returning. Meadow Flower will be so proud that I used her book, I can’t wait to thank her for lending it to us! Why did you have her book, anyway?”
Celestia looked down, her eyelids heavy.
“About that… We-”
She sighed, briefly glancing into Luna’s eyes before looking back down. Rather than continue, she attempted to stand up, using the trunk to support her weak legs like Luna had, though this time she had her sister to help. The pair stood in silence for a moment, side-by-side.
“We’re going on alone from here,” she finished, continuing to avoid eye-contact.
Luna’s mouth opened as she took a step away.
“W-Why?”
“We can’t risk their lives on our journey. It’s too dangerous. We’re not strong enough to protect ourselves, let alone others… We’ve had nothing but misfortune ever since we left town—ever since we were born!” she snapped, looking toward the darkened path she was travelling before the interruption.
“This is ridiculous, I’m going back-” Luna began, starting to turn.
“You can’t, they won’t be there. You were unconscious for days, and however long I was… like that.” Celestia rubbed her eyes again, still feeling the soreness of whatever magic had been cast on her, and definitely not a welling inclination to cry.
“Why- Why would you decide that without me?!” Luna stepped back again, unsuppressed tears welling in her eyes. “I didn’t even get to say goodbye!”
“We can visit them again one day, once this is all over.”
“You can’t just make decisions for me like that!”
“You were unconscious, Luna!” she implored, facing her sister with regret clear in her reddened eyes. “I had no choice. After your fight with Discord, I knew we wouldn’t be able to keep them or any other ponies safe. Not before we’re ready. If I can’t protect you, then…”
“Discord…” Luna turned back to the path from the henge, seeing nothing but indistinguishable trees and darkness in the distance. “What happened back there?”
“You tell me!” Celestia snapped, her regret switching to anger. “What in Equestria was that magic?! It was so dark—so- so…”
“Magic?” Luna faced her sister, her eyes becoming hazy and unfocused. “What magic…?”
“You don’t remember?” The unicorn’s anger became concern just as quickly, her eyebrows chiselling worry on her forehead.
“No. I remember… a name, and darkness. It was like-” Luna stopped, knowing she had not told her sister of the dark dream she had experienced in the desert, and her black self that had left its mark on her. “What happened?”
“I don’t know, but if that was alicorn magic…” Celestia trailed off, thinking of the lifetime they had spent in pursuit of this power, without ever knowing what it was truly like to have. She could barely remember her parents or what it was like to be around an alicorn, but history books were very clear about the catastrophic outcome of the Black Night and the destructive power their father had wielded. If alicorn magic was predisposed to such terrifying acts as erasing an entire nation’s capital from the map, perhaps it was innately evil, and not something they should continue to seek. Starswirl had never mentioned such a crucial topic in all their years of living together. Perhaps he was well aware, and this dark magic was Equestria’s last hope, good or evil.
“Did I- … Did I hurt anypony?” Luna asked after both had fallen to silence.
Celestia focused back on the present, knowing there was no good in scaring her litter sister with what might be the inextricable curse of their destiny. If they did save Equestria with dark alicorn magic, there may come a time when she would need to seal the both of them away, for the sake of the world… That destiny would be her burden to bear, not her little sister’s.
“No. You saved them, and me,” she answered with stern encouragement.
Luna smiled weakly, feeling only loss over this situation. Was Celestia protecting her? Perhaps she had scared them off with her display, whatever she’d done. She wanted to explain herself, reassure them that she was still the same unicorn filly she had always been… But she would not get to see her only friends again for a long time, assuming they even wanted to see her again after this. The young alicorn looked back at her saddlebag, within which was Meadow Flower’s horticultural book. Somehow she felt that it had been a gift intended for her, so she wanted to be the one to hold on to it for now. She would be the one to return it to her, once all of this was over.
“You’ll see them again, I’m sure,” Celestia reassured her, reading her face. “For now, we need to head to the Highlands.”
“‘The Highlands?’”
“Meadow Flower said that’s where the Resistance is—fighting dragons, apparently. If anypony can teach us something to use against Discord, it’ll be them.”
“But the thread…”
“‘Thread’?”
Luna looked back once more, this time closing her eyes. Sure enough, the white luminescent tether snaked off back the way they had come. It was pointing her to something—something important—though she didn’t know what.
“We don’t have anything better to go on, Luna. We’ll head north-west, and hopefully find some more food and water as we go. Meadow Flower said there was a town named Ponydale on the way, so if we’re lucky we might be able to sleep on real beds for a change.”
“Okay.”
Celestia turned onward, adjusting her saddlebag as Luna took one last look back toward the henge and the mysterious thread, before joining her sister as they continued through Silent Pines, now slightly more aware of the creeping eyes that lurked within the shadows. They walked in silence for a few minutes before Luna turned to her sister, sporting a wry grin that was more like her usual self than she had been in a while.
“That ‘chicken’ was in a pretty fowl mood, huh?”
The unicorn slowly met her gaze with an intense stare, though couldn’t help but crack a smile as she looked away, despite herself. Hopefully Sweet Blossom hadn’t rubbed off on her sister too much.
The following days of travel were ultimately uneventful, despite the hidden noises and lurking threats of the forest. In fact, as the trees slowly parted to reveal a picturesque river and quaint village on the horizon, Silent Pines would prove to be the least of their worries.
The sisters reached a river that ran all the way from Mount Friendship and Canterlot in the north-east, to the South Brine and furthest reaches of the San Palomino Desert in the south-west. They crossed the conveniently placed, hardy wooden bridge that spanned it; the first pony-made structure they had seen since Haysead Swamp, and wide enough for fully loaded carts to cross—likely part of the trade route between Canterlot and Klugetown. As the distant farming village came into view, it became clear that all was not right there. Little more than craters, ruins, and overgrown brush remained of what were once verdant homesteads. The homely watercolours they had seen in Equestrian travel guides were replaced by a stark vision of what life in ‘Discordia’ was like for ponies who did not bend a knee.
“What happened here?” Luna asked under her breath, awed by the horror spread out before them.
“I don’t know, but I can guess,” Celestia replied as they slowly and carefully approached the centre of what was clearly once a battlefield.
It wasn’t just the rotting food crops, displaced earth, or fire-blackened farmhouse ruins that painted the grim scene; the very ground beneath their hooves was layered and curled like sheets of paper, as though they were standing on the pages of a giant book—the culprit of which was more than obvious. Celestia kicked at the edge of a small hole, lifting up its burnt pages with morbid fascination. Did that monster’s corrupting magic know no limit?
“Who do you think he was fighting?” Luna mused, kicking a stone that bounced away like a rubber ball, to her surprise.
“The Resistance, I suppose. Perhaps the surviving Royal Guard fleeing Canterlot, given how old it looks.”
Indeed, some thirty years of growth and decay had weathered the remains of the township to little more than cairns amid the plant life that had reclaimed them. The only things that didn’t look their age were the paper-like craters and patches of quilted dirt that Discord clearly had a part in creating, the latter of which were uncomfortably reminiscent of the chequerboard he had left in the San Palomino Desert, along with their former statues. Celestia was surprised that news of such destruction hadn’t found its way back to Meadow Flower; though that would, of course, require survivors with which to bring it…
“Didn’t Starswirl tell us he once fought the centaur prince, Tirek?” Celestia recalled aloud, thinking back to one of their mentor’s many cautionary tales told in the time-bubble. “Discord was obviously involved too. Whoever fought here was powerful beyond words, that’s for sure.”
“Do you really think it was Starswirl?”
“Could be. These craters are massive, and he said that Tirek was the most fearsome creature he had ever fought—not that he had ever been in a fight before,” Celestia smirked, though it immediately turned bittersweet.
“He was in the War; though I guess casting spells from the flank is different from fighting somepony casco a casco,” Luna mused, knocking away an errant pebble as she casually trotted through the bones of a once beloved farmhouse. “Still, he was a pretty good teacher. Not that it helped us much in the end.”
“Yeah… I used to wonder if he was more of a prodigy than we ever were. He should have been the one to get the wings, not us,” the unicorn scoffed dryly.
As the pair moved through the epicentre of the destruction, Celestia began to sense something faintly familiar, like the subtle aroma of freshly baked goods on the breeze.
“Do you feel that?”
Luna looked up and surveyed her surroundings with focused senses.
“… No?”
“It feels like…”
Celestia closed her eyes, focusing only on her horn to track the ‘scent’. With sudden purpose she turned sharply and began trotting, her eyes shut as she relied solely on her heightened sixth sense to guide her. Her heart beginning to race, Luna pursued her sister, equal parts excited and apprehensive. As though bursting through the analogous door of the secluded and aromatic bakery, Celestia’s eyes snapped open as she stopped, staring intently at the source before her.
“Uncle!”
Luna arrived beside her, confused by the outburst, but now able to sense what her sister had tracked from a few houses away. Before them lay nothing but rubble and a scar upon the earth, no different from any of the other dozen ruined farmsteads here, except for one faint magical signature they had come to recognise as second nature. Not content with her first impression, Celestia scrambled into the shallow ditch; an ancient battle-scar now grassy and revived, which would have seemed no different to any other grassy divot, were it not for the lingering scent of a malicious magic upon it—Tirek, perhaps? Unlike the spoiled tang of chaos energy that permeated the corruption, this was more like a hot spice; bitter malice that singed their magical senses.
Celestia began to follow the scar down its westerly length, holding her horn to the ground like a tracking-dog until she found what she was looking for. She began to dig into the rubble and dirt like a pony possessed, scuffing her hooves with no care of cleanliness as she could not risk using her horn, lest her magical signature mask the faint trace she was hunting for like a hog for truffles. Despite her alicorn form, Luna was clearly lacking a level of acuity her sister had; unable to pinpoint the wisp she felt on the wind and forced to watch on helplessly.
The unicorn suddenly stopped her frantic scrabbling and cupped something in her hooves, turning to her sister like the picture of madness as she triumphantly held up a small stone from amid the identical piles around them. Luna briefly considered if Celestia’s encounter with the cockatrice had done far more damage than previously thought, before herself recognising the invisible yet familiar ‘scent’ from within her sister’s grasp.
“Uncle Starswirl…” Luna whispered, recognising his lingering presence at once—something she thought she would sense again.
Celestia smiled, seeming to regain some of her usual poise as she climbed out of the rut and brushed herself off, the stone held safely aloft on one hoof.
“This was his, I know it was,” she stated warmly, looking upon the nondescript rock as though it were a fond memory as she held it between them.
“But what is it? It looks like any other stone here.”
“If it was Starswirl’s, it couldn’t just be a stone. There has to be a reason it resonates with his magic, and after all this time, too…”
Luna looked around, as though expecting answers within her sight, before focusing back on the rock.
“Should we try to activate it with our magic?”
“I don’t know, not knowing what it is…” Celestia’s lips tightened. “It could be anything from an undetonated magic-bomb to just another piece of brickwork he accidentally blasted.”
“It’s only this one rock, though, right?” Luna asked with a tilted head as she tentatively nudged the stone on her sister’s hoof.
“Yes, just this one, or I wouldn’t have been able to track it down. Either way, it proves that Starswirl was here at some point.”
“And didn’t leave much else standing.” Luna sighed, shaking her head. “Not even Uncle Starswirl could stop them from destroying a village, and we’re supposed to save all of Equestria.”
“One thing at a time, sister. Think of it like a test: if you tackle the whole paper at once, you’ll stress yourself out; but tackle it one question at a time, and you’ll be done before you know it.”
A typical Celestia-ism.
“Well, no point sticking around here; we can take the stone with us,” Luna concluded, kicking a loose pebble into her sister’s ditch. “Shall we move on?”
Celestia nodded, her excited expectations for the ‘scent’ and excavated stone now tempered by reality as she slid it into her saddlebag. “There’s nothing else for us here. Meadow Flower said Pegasopolis would be north-west of Ponydale, which would be… that way.”
She pointed toward a nearby forest circling the base of a massive mountain range. Once this was all over, she would seriously consider banning all trees from Equestria.
Luna craned her head up to survey the twilight sky. “It’s a floating city, right? So it shouldn’t be hard to spot…”
“Yeah.”
Only now considering they should already be able to see their destination, the sisters hopefully scoured the sky around the snow-tipped peaks ahead, expanding the scope of their search as desperation set in. While a little imagination was required to translate the picturesque illustrations of Pegasopolis into a realistic view from below, neither sister was able to spot a single cloud one could even generously call ‘city-sized’.
“Now what?” Luna asked, having drawn the same conclusion as her older sister.
Celestia sighed. “I guess there’s only one option.”
Matching her sister’s gaze, Luna’s expression dropped as both stared up at the intimidating wall of rock ahead of them.
“No way!”
“Yes way. If we can’t see it from here, Pegasopolis can only be on the other side of those mountains.” Celestia closed her eyes, resigned to her fate. “Either way, the high vantage point will only help us.”
“I am not walking up a mountain!”
“What are you complaining for, you’re the one with wings!”
Luna scrunched up her face before kicking at the dirt, still far from confident about using her wings, and unwilling to look a fool in front of her sister. “I… wouldn’t want to leave you alone.”
“Then don’t complain. It’s not like I have a choice.” Celestia sighed, shaking her head as she turned away. “Let’s refill our waterskins and get going.”
Following after her sister, the pair trotted back to the stream they had initially crossed, which thankfully ran crystal clear and free of chaos pollution. Checking the withered and rotting fields on their way back, the princesses scavenged what few edibles had survived decades of neglect and self-seeding, before continuing on toward their next looming obstacle: the Highland Mountains.
“Well, at least we didn’t see any dragons,” Luna offered, trying to find a golden lining to the long hike ahead.
“Yet.”
“‘Yet?!’ Don’t say that!”
Celestia smirked at her younger sister’s reaction, though the reality of her own statement quickly wiped the smile from her face. They could potentially talk their way out of another encounter with Discord, but a dragon would not be so rational—relatively speaking. She swallowed, making a mental note to keep her eyes open for smoke or caves on their ascent.