//------------------------------// // 23. Dawn has yet to break (Fahrenheit) // Story: Dream A Little Dream Of Me // by horizon //------------------------------// Night-Mare Dawn has yet to break, But I can feel the dreamscape splitting, parting, Spitting me out upon the shores of consciousness-- leaving me bolt-upright in the straw, gasping for air, as though it were saltwater and not sleep lapping softly at the edges of my mind. The air is as raw as my thoughts are cloying, and were it not for the heaviness of my limbs betraying their corporeality, I might have thought myself stumbled into another's dreamings; My thoughts are as fickle-flimsy as my traitorous kin. Why would they turn upon the Dawnbringer? I blink-- Staggering to my hooves in the dawn-dark, Struggling to shake the dream-dew from my eyes, Steadying the hoof That trembles so, easing open the tavern door to reveal the moon-washed world beyond-- Now is no time for hesitation.   I lurch through the streets half-asleep, and my thoughts will not clear. Wake up. The moon watches my unsteady gait with regal disapproval. The wall is so far away. And I am walking under stars I should still be drowning in, And I would be, were it not for the mare in the castle-topped mountain, waiting in a room scented with sunshine and suspicion for me to assure her Myinnkyun rises not in defiance. Waiting For me to prove that the night-song in my veins has not tainted my loyalty to the morn-mistress. I give my head a hard, des      per           ate               shake and then open my eyes, lucid at last. Voices echo from distant streets, and the soft blush rising from the east tells me I have precious little time to escape, to get out of this sunforsaken tartarus before it crashes down around me and I must present the pieces before a Court that will be all too eager to ignore the innocence of my expression. The voices have grown entirely too loud for comfort, and I ease open the door of a dilapidated warehouse, silencing its reluctant hinges with a spell. Hoofsteps grow louder, pounding a battle-cadence into the cobblestoned streets. I do not need to peek through the crack in the door to know that Sunspot approaches with his regiment. I should not have peeked through the crack in the door. I should have looked behind me. Something moist and hot sweeps across the back of my neck, and then my ears notice the deep heartbeat of Myinnkyun’s other hidden inhabitant, and I smell blood. I burst out of the warehouse, Palei Hantu behind me, and the resounding clatter is enough to bring the entire regiment running, and before I can move, we are in the eye of a hurricane of steel, the soldiers surrounding us with weapons drawn and eyes narrowed. I do not need to scry to watch to conclusions write themselves. The soldiers size me up—an unfamiliar nocturne standing with a Mooken inside of the walls (and I suspect Shooting Star can see the dream-magic lingering in the scalloping of my horn)—and then the muttering starts.   How— Foreigner? No boats in weeks— Murderer? Who— spy? traitor Nocturne? enemy friend? Spy. Why— Spy! Spy! they shout, and before I can tell them no, no that is not who I am, Palei Hantu lunges to escape, and their shouts turn from accusation to surprise and I do not wait for another chance; with a flash of light and a small tumble, I am gone. I cannot tell if any follow me. I can barely hear my own hoofsteps over the ear-splitting sound of Palei Hantu being ripped to pieces. The gate is before me, and it matters not that my head is swimming and my steps are slowing and the sound of the ocean requests my attention— because the gate is before me; I am leaving. It is no trouble to step from shadow to shadow from here to there, but with the gate behind me and the sand stretching so silently onward, I can hear the tide singing, and my soul, my soul        wants to sing            a                    l                        o                               n                                       g I turn and, with steady eyes and steadier resolve destroy the gate. The city is too large; too many streets, too many guards, too many citizens running around screaming as though there is anyone to save them from the Mooken scaling the walls. The jungle is invading; I almost say— Only the ocean can save you now. But they will hear neither me nor the seasong over the cacophony. They are slaughtering each other now. Perhaps the serenade playing so sweetly in my ears is to them a call for blood. Moonstruck does not seem to think so; in his searching eyes is the same wonder, same entrancement, same song, and briefly I wonder if the nighttide in our veins really makes us so different, and then I hear them and it doesn’t matter. My hoofsteps echo upon the empty pier, carrying me to not-so-empty waters, and perhaps it is ironic that Princess Celestia sent me away from the velvet-cloaked hostility of her Court, sent me away to investigate a disappearance. Not necessarily a murder, she had said, with eyes as dark as the shadow upon the moon. Perhaps not even a death, but a mystery all the same. She did not add that she knows I love mysteries, that I am the only one to be entrusted with courting the truth, that Canterlot is no longer safe for me, and my title of student means nothing, not anymore. Why did they have to turn against Celestia? Why did they have to brand us traitors? The water is inches beneath my hoof, and the music is deafening, for a single kelpie is entrancing but three are all-consuming, and they insist that I join them in the deep. The water is cold and for a moment everything is crystal clear what am I doing the Princess is counting on me I was supposed to be safe here i haven’t told her yet i need to tell her or they’ll say I deserted her no The song is gentle in the deep, so gentle it can only be her smile, and I think I might see her, with her hair swirling like a golden sunrise. Tell me, she says. Tell me and rest. So I smile and tell her about Cabotage and his clumsy plot for Peridot’s shares, about the ale spiced sweet and heavy, to loosen the tongue and soften the resolve, shared freely but not without a price. About Littlemoth, who was to sneak in and take the deeds Cabotage desired, in exchange for a cut large enough to make a new life in a new land, and nearly didn’t. She’s down here too, now. I wonder if Peridot slipped— as Cabotage is convinced— or if she merely let the tidesong sing her to sea. The water around me is lightening, brightening, and miles away, a princess is shining with a dawn I wish would warm my face. I just hope the Princess doesn’t think I’ve betrayed her too.