//------------------------------//
// The Walker's Path 
// Story: Children of The Night: The Two-World Walker 
// by Night-Moon-12 
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	It was midnight, and a pony with a few vampire features all but slept peacefully and quietly in her bed. It had been heavily raining during the night, drawing forth dark emotions none should bear on themselves. The mare dreamt of horrid things, dark beings of pure shadow with blood dripping down their gaping muzzles. Creations not meant for the pony psyche, let alone the dreamscape of one such as herself.

The mare tossed and turned, trying with all her might to banish the evil creatures from her mind. They had uttered no sound and made no breaths. As if to add insult to injury there was a soft voice repeating the lines of a dark poem in her mind. Finally her fidgeting and rustling came to a stop as she shot up with a sharp gasp. She looked around her room and saw nothing but darkness and the shadows that were cast from the droplets slowly falling down her window. She controlled her breathing as she got out of her bed. She stared up at the shining and beautiful full moon that covered the sky. Staring long into the moon, she could remember Luna silently singing in her dream.

Follow sweet children I’ll show thee the way.

Through all the pain and the sorrows...

The mare hoped to find some hidden answer behind the lines that repeated in her mind but came up with nothing. Why had she received this dream? What did it mean? She elicited a sigh of disappointment as she turned her head away from the moon, and looked towards Spike who was sound asleep in his little bed on the floor. A brief saddened expression spread across the mare's face as she watched the purple dragon sleep.

She drew in a deep breath as she lit a candle with her magic. As the small flame came to life she hovered it close to herself, hoping to expel any unseen shadows that would dare harm her. She quietly found her way downstairs, the only sound to be heard was the quiet clopping of her hooves. She carefully placed the candle on the top of the bookshelf. She glanced over the titles of many books. 'High Seas: Reference Guide to the Waters of Equestria', 'Myths and Legends of Equestria', 'The Arcanic Shift: What is it?'. The mare found many more titles like those, many far fetched titles that she would not catch herself reading at all. She enjoyed books that were written about something practical, however she did always enjoy a good book by Rick Riordan. That pony could write a good book. She slowly shook her head and focused back on finding what she needed for answers.

Finally she had found the book she was looking for and all it said about Children of the Night was a poem that read,

Come little children I’ll take thee away,

Into a land of enchantment,

Come little children the time’s come to play,

Here in my garden of shadows.

Follow sweet children I’ll show thee the way,

Through all the pain and the sorrows,

Weep not poor children for life is this way,

Murdering beauty and passions.

Hush now dear children it must be this way,

To weary of life and deceptions.

Rest now my children for soon we’ll away,

Into the calm and the quiet.

Come little children I’ll take thee away,

Into a land of enchantment,

Come little children the time’s come to play,

Here in my garden of shadows.

Reading the dark words on the page sent a shiver through her spine. But as she read on the mate found out that the Children of the Night apparently were ponies that instead of worshiping Celestia, Goddess of the Sun. Worshiped Luna, Goddess of Moon. That was all that was written in the book, the poem and then that. Nothing more.

The mare felt wrong to read this and uncomfortable to think about it. The words of the poem repeated in her head. Over and over again. All of a sudden she heard the hoof steps in a hallway nearby.

The marr’s heart raced as she called out into the night, "Who... who goes there?”

As if expecting an answer she stood waiting for a reply. Nothing but the sound of rain against wood. But the mare walked in the direction of the hoof steps. Holding onto the candle with her magic she crept through the shadows. Moving past the stairs and to a hallway that extended straight into the kitchen and two adjoining rooms. The mare looked around the corner and saw nothing beyond the field of vision that was given to her by the candle.

The mare heard the hoof steps again but it was much louder. It sounded like it came from one of the rooms in the hallway. She looked into the room and saw nothing but a single mirror. A mirror that was not there before. She walked over to it and looked at her reflection. A purple mare unicorn with a messy mane and tired eyes. Her coat was rough and course.
After minutes of staring at herself she was about to walk away when her shape in the mirror changed. It swirled into the form of Princess Luna. She wanted to scream in joy but she could not because happiness had gripped her vocal chords and she could not move or make a sound. The Princess stared into her soul and said in her mind,
“Twilight Amila Sparkle, you must remember the poem. My Other Children will arise soon and with it a dark shadow to be cast upon this land. You must resist. But none can resist the lure of the dark."

The Princess’ face smirked and dark mist began to envelop Twilight and she could not move or speak. The mist fully engulfed her and her vision blackened and she heard Luna say, "Here in my garden of shadows.”

* * *

It was a rainy and cold night as Princess Luna tried to find the source of what sounded like a wailing foal, she had been searching for nearly an hour since she had first caught wind of the noise. A little colt  named Dracula or Silverdawn was helping his Mother look for whatever was cuasing wailing sound, he had heard the noise first before Luna did. But something seemed wrong, the wailing became loud sobbing which Dracula heard from ten feet away. Luna became dependent on finding out what was going on, Dracula saw something about five feet in front of him and pointed it out to  his Mother.

Dracula saw a crow land near what looked like a pair of corpses. The differences were hard to tell, but the body structure gave the gender of the corpses. The corpse on the left was a stallion who was clutching a moving fuzz-ball, and the corpse on the right was a mare who was clutching some sort-of box. The sight was gruesome the mare's stomach had been bitten into for some reason, and the stallion's muzzle was covered in thick blood.

The blood made Luna think that this stallion had bitten into the mare's stomach to help birth a foal, which she thought was the moving fuzz-ball. Luna looked at the fuzz-ball who began wailing again, but not as loud as before it seemed more tired like. The fuzzy figure shifted in the dead stallion's hooves, the figure wanted to move around and didn't want to be held within a pair of dead hooves.

When Dracula moved closer to the figure the head moved to reveale the figure's face, the pupils were slits held within lilac orbs. Two little fangs shown easily against her bottom lip, at her sides were wings that looked like a mix of bat and dragon features. The base of the wing looked like a dragon's wing, while the appendages looked like a bat's wing. The vampire featured figure looked at Dracula he took notice of a unicorn horn on the figure's forehead, it became clear that this figure was a half vampire-half unicorn... A halfbreed, a vary rare and special creature.