Dreamstrider

by OkemosBrony

Chapter 16

I never realized it until I moved to Canterlot, but the night sky in Coltlumbus has so many more stars than anywhere else I’ve been in the awakened world.

A nice, warm breeze blows past me into my room, making me smile. It’s a clear summer night, there’s hundreds of stars in the sky, and I’m back home for a few months before school starts up again. School here hasn’t gotten out yet so I can’t really go and see Cressie or do anything with Dew Drop, but at least Snowy got out early because she’s a senior. We got to go to the lake together today, and I think it was really the first time she and I have ever done much just the two of us. It was nice, especially because she’s going to Manehattan College next year so it’s not like we’ll be able to see each other that often. I guess when your sister’s nine years older than you, you won’t get much time together when you’re growing up.

I used to like looking up at the stars, but after looking at the sky in the dream world, even the most impressive night sky here is nothing compared to just the regular sky there, let alone the plain Luna once brought me to.

I can hear the door to mom and dad’s room close and them start talking, so I should probably go to bed myself. But once I get in bed, I get to thinking; I haven’t done any Dreamstriding from here, so why not start tonight? I wasn’t able to Dreamstride when I was here over Hearth’s Warming break, and I was too tired from traveling from Canterlot yesterday to try it. Luna really only has me work around Canterlot Cave, and she did say she wants me to start doing it at home every now and then to get used to doing it on my own. Tonight might be the perfect night to figure out what’s around Coltlumbus in the dream world.

After getting in bed and pulling the covers over me, I push through to the dream world and find myself on the edge of a large forest. There are a lot of dreams around me, but it’s nowhere near the number of dreams I usually see in Canterlot. It’s even way less than the number I saw during the night of the Summer Sun Celebration, and most of Canterlot was staying up all night then.

Other than the forest, there really isn’t much here, so I decide to turn and go into it. I do remember Luna once telling me what this forest was called, but I forget what it was. She did give me a map of the dream world for reference, but it’s all in Demon, so I can only understand little bits and pieces of it. Reading Demon is way harder than speaking or hearing it, because I have to do some weird thing where I unfocus my mind but focus my eyes on the writing in front of me. It's not really something I can just get, so I'm going to have to spend a lot of time this summer getting used to that.

Once I’m a little bit into the forest, the canopy starts covering the sky pretty well, making it really dark and hard to see. Is this what normal ponies see when the lights are out? Either my dark vision is worse in the dream world or it’s really, really dark here. If my vision’s just normal here, then that means this is what normal ponies see when it’s dark. It’s amazing anypony can get around anywhere at night if they all can hardly see once it gets dark. Maybe that’s why there are so many street lamps in Canterlot?

There’s some Demon coming from close by, so I stop and try to listen to it. I can’t really make it out from here, so I have to go and try to follow the source of the talking. I have to go through some bushes but then find two love demons on a fallen log, talking to each other. I can tell what type of demon they because love demons always travel in pairs of two and...well, they try and look like ponies, but don’t really seem to know what we look like.

The one on the right is bright pink and has the general shape of a pony right, but the lower half of its face is really long and thin, kind of like an anteater’s and its tail looks more like a fish’s tail than a pony’s. Its dark blue companion has the face and tail and most everything else right, but got the number of legs wrong. At least, I don’t think there’s a pony out there with three extra legs, with one of them coming straight out of its barrel.

“Hey!” I say to them, walking up to the log they’re relaxing on. “What are you doing?”

“Us?” the pink one asks, pointing a hoof at itself. It starts saying some more stuff, and although I can’t seem to understand everything it’s saying, it seems to be defending itself.

”Don’t go near the dreams,” I tell it.

The other one says something else, also in defense of itself. I can’t really tell, but they didn’t sound sincere in the little bit I did manage to pick up. I want to let them go, but Luna said that while love demons aren’t malevolent, they aren’t exactly benevolent, either. She said that if left unchecked, they can cause relationships where there shouldn’t be any, and even cause ponies to ignore their responsibilities and only focus on whoever they’re in love with.

Just to be safe, I power up my horn and shoot a quick spell at their hooves. They both jump back and start yelling stuff at me, but they’re going too fast for me to be able to understand any of it. I shoot another spell, and they seem to get the message this time and run further into the forest. Luckily they can’t actually enter dreams, so if they do ignore me and start doing things in Coltlumbus I’ll know about it.

Once they’re far away, I start walking into the forest. I have to go kind of slowly, but it’s actually kind of beautiful. There’s some cool mist starting to build up, dropping the temperature to the point where I can see my breath. If this really is what normal ponies see at night, I’m almost a little jealous. Having to be more careful with where I go means that I have to notice more of what’s around me. The mist is rising slowly, shimmering with the bright silver moonlight. A little bit of dew is collecting on the fallen blue leaves, getting my hooves damp as I walk.

Some weird sound from far away catches my attention, making me stop and listen. It almost sounded like a snapped twig, but what could be here? I know Luna said that there aren’t a lot of demons in this forest, so I’m racking my brain trying to figure out what it could be.

I open my mouth to call out and ask what’s there, but I probably shouldn’t. I don’t really know that much about where I am, so I don’t want to mess something up and alert something to my presence that I shouldn’t. Instead, I decide to turn towards the source of the noise and walk slowly towards it. I’m not sure if there’s more light or what, but my vision is a little bit better than when I first entered the forest. I know normal ponies talk about how their night vision gets better the longer they’re in the dark which makes no sense, but they all say that, so it must be true.

Since I don’t really know what to do in any situation that could happen, I probably should stay back just to be safe. There’s a bush between whenever the noise is and where I am, so I decide to hide in it and look out into another small clearing where I think whatever’s causing the noise is. I move to the edge of the bush and push aside some branches, which only lets me see some of the clearing because I still can’t see whatever it is that is in there.

The sound of splitting wood comes from the right of the clearing where I can’t see, so I try and turn ever so slowly as to not make any noise myself.

Once I can see what the thing that’s causing the noise is, I have to try not to scream in shock at just how...horrifying it looks. Its basic shape looks like a pony-sized version all the drawings of Ahuizotl from the Daring Do books I’ve seen, but a lot scarier. Like, a lot. It’s bright red, and the nails on its hands and paws are long and jagged. Flesh is rotting off its body at various parts, like on one of its arms and over its stomach, so I can see all of its bloody guts which look like they’re one sudden movement from spilling all over the ground. Just looking at it makes me feel like I’m going to be sick.

My heart nearly stops out of terror when it starts speaking, but it relaxes a little bit when I can tell it’s not talking to me. It runs its claws through the log it’s sitting on, cutting through it and sending splinters everywhere.

“Please!” another voice begs. I turn my head slowly to whatever’s speaking to it, and I can see a playful demon with one of its back legs under a fallen tree, pinning it to the ground.

The Ahuizotl creature responds with something I don’t understand, its voice sounding like it has shards of broken glass in its throat. It gets up and starts walking towards the trapped playful demon, licking its lips menacingly while doing so.

The playful demon continues to beg, but a wicked grin is growing on the other one’s face as it gets closer and closer. Its claws sink into the playful demon’s throat as soon as it gets close enough to do so, dark red blood gushing out of the wound. Now with a full-blown smile on its face, the creature shoves its hand down into the demon’s body, and before long, the ends of its claws start poking out of the demon’s chest.

I want to leave and just start running back to the awakened world, but I’m afraid that the tiniest of movements would catch its attention, and I would soon meet the same fate as that poor demon. It takes everything I have in me to not throw up when the creature rips off a huge chunk of flesh that had previously been the demon’s breast. The creature doesn’t do anything with it, even: it just shoves its hand back inside the demon and starts skewering organs on its nails.

When it starts ripping the rest of the demon to shreds, I figure this is as good a time as any to get away because it’s preoccupied at the moment. I must not have made much noise getting out of the bush, because the sounds of flesh ripping are still coming from the clearing I was just observing. Trotting as quickly and quietly as possible, I retrace my steps out of the forest as best I can. Right as I get out of the forest, I find my dream and jump inside, then push back into the real world.

Jumping back into my body as quickly as I did is pretty jarring, because my heart is racing and I’ve got a little bit of a headache. I take a few deep breaths which helps with my heartbeat, but my head still hurts a little. My mind starts racing almost as soon as my heart stops doing so; what was that thing? I don’t recognize it, and I don’t remember reading about it. Guess that means I have to look it up in the grimoire Luna sent me home with, which is currently looking very out of place on my bookshelf next to all my chapter books and my coloring books from when I was little.

As I hop out of bed and start walking to my desk, I use my magic to grab the grimoire off the shelf and bring it over to me. When I open it up, however, the pages are all entirely blank. Great, it’s one of these books. I hate these.

I close my eyes and pull up the memory of the creature sitting on the log, trying to remember every detail I can. Unfortunately, I’m doing a very good job of it: I don't think I'll ever get that image out of my head. I open the book again, and when I open my eyes, the pages are filled with all kinds of stuff. I don’t get why Luna didn’t just give me a grimoire that has everything in it when you first open it instead of this silly method where you have to think about what it is you want to know about. I don’t get why anypony would write something like this, come to think of it. Just because we can do all this cool and crazy stuff with magic doesn’t necessarily mean we should.

It’s still really hard for me to read Demon, but I at least pick up a little bit. What I saw was a blood demon, which is considered malevolent but I could have probably figured that one out by myself. It goes into a lot more detail, but it starts getting much more technical and advanced so I can’t read any of it.

Now I can only think about what that thing could do if it got into the dreams of somepony in Coltlumbus. Could it, even? Our minds are good at keeping out malevolent demons, but they're not that good. And even if it did manage to get into a dream, I’d feel pretty bad if I just sat around and did nothing while it did whatever it would do. The book isn’t much help, either. It’s nice that I have this so I can read up on anything I need to, but my Demon isn’t good enough for it to be any use. I think I can read something about a forest, which just worries me. There’s a forest right by Coltlumbus in the dream world, is it the same one?

Part of me wants to go back inside the dream world and ask Luna, but I’d be worried about bothering her. I don’t even know how far away Coltlumbus is from Canterlot in the dream world, so it could take her a while to get to me. I know she can fly and that’s how she was able to keep watch over all of Equestria for so long, but we are kind of a small town in the middle of nowhere. I wouldn’t be too surprised if it was like that in both worlds.

I can’t risk it, though. Luna said that being a Dreamstrider meant you had an obligation to the ponies of Equestria to protect them, and I need to protect my hometown. I’d rather call her for no reason than not call her and have something bad happen.

Shutting the book again, I get up and go back to my bed before going back into the dream world. My horn powers up, and I prepare the spell to send a message to her across the dream world.

“Luna! I need you!”

Now all I can do is wait. I want to go into some of the dreams here and see what’s going on in them, but I have to remember that these are the dreams of actual ponies and not to get involved unless needed. And besides, I don’t even know how to clear their memory of me yet. They’d just recognize me, and that wouldn’t end well.

“What is it?” Luna’s voice whispers in my ear, as if she was right next to me.

“Blood demons!” I reply, but get no immediate response.

“I will be there,” I hear after a few moments. Guess I’m not just worrying for nothing, after all. The demon must be alarming if she’s coming for me.

I sit down on the cool blue grass, and after what feels like forever but was probably just a few minutes, I can see her shadow in the sky, wings outstretched and gliding down towards me.

“Where are the demons?” she asks much more calmly than I would have expected.

I point towards the forest. “I saw one in there, it trapped and killed a playful demon.”

“You ventured into the woods?” she clarifies.

“Yeah, why?”

“I would not do so again.” Her voice is strong like it usually is, but I can sense a little bit of worry and unease coming off her.

My heart drops; whatever makes her worry is definitely something to worry about. “Why, what’s in there?”

“Those are the Forests of Arianrhod,” she says softly. “Long ago, there was a Dreamstrider who has been lost to time that placed a protective ward around a large area of this world to keep out malevolent demons; nearly all of the awakened world is contained within it. The Forests are at the very edge of this ward, and when you venture into them, you are no longer protected.”

“But there are malevolent demons we have to protect Equestria from,” I point out. “How can they get through, then?”

“The ward is good, though far from perfect,” she admits. “It does a very good job of keeping particularly powerful and malevolent demons out, though it slips every now and then and lets them in. And even then, it seems to work better on some demons than others: umber demons can pass through the ward with relative ease, but it is rare to see a blood demon inside of the safe area.”

“So...how worried should I be that I saw a blood demon inside the forest?”

“If it was just one, not very,” she confirms. “Thankfully, they are one of the kinds of demons that the ward is most effective against in small numbers, and they have rarely been known to be in groups.”

“Is there anything you can do to make sure it won’t be able to get inside the ward and do any damage to the dreamers?”

My optimism starts fading as she shakes her head. “No, not exactly. Now that you know about the ward surrounding parts of the dream world, you should be able to understand the spell to banish them should one break through, as it is based on the magic of the ward itself. But as for preventative measures, there is nothing you can do beyond what has already been done.”

“Can you stay here just a little bit, please? Just to make sure everything is okay?”

Once again, she shakes her head, causing my ears to droop. “No, you are more than capable. I would not have suggested that you Dreamstride on your own if I did not trust you to be safe and be able to solve any problems on your own.”

“I’m nine and only have half a year of Dreamstriding experience,” I point out. “Do you really want me in charge if something goes really wrong?”

“And here I thought you’ve continually asked me to treat you as an adult,” she winks. “I trust you, Aurora.”

“Kind of nervous to be told this is all mine to watch over,” I admit through nervous laughter. “So many ponies relying on me, and they don’t even know it. They’ll only notice once I stop doing my job.” My eyes meet hers. “Any advice?”

“None, unfortunately.” She stares off into the distance for a moment, clearly thinking something over. “Actually, yes. My sole advice for you is the advice that was given to me by Traumer, my own Dreamstriding mentor: step forth with confidence.”

“‘Step forth with confidence’?” I repeat. “That’s it? No offense, but confidence isn’t just something you can decide to have and use.”

A sly smile finds itself on her face. “Isn’t it?”

“No, no it’s not.”

“Of course it is!” she insists. “Have you ever heard the Tale of the Two Swallows?”

“Can’t say I have. Why?”

“It was a story often told in my own foalhood that has faded away over the years. It tells of two young swallows that are preparing to take flight for the first time. One of them is confident in its ability to fly; the other is not. The one that is not confident hobbles out of the nest and jumps, but is so preoccupied with trying to take note of everything around it and how it could all go wrong that it does not focus on staying airborne, thus falling to the earth and dying. But the other one jumps out, spreads its wings, and soars, worrying not about how it could fail.” Her smile now more warm than sly, she walks up to me. “Just as the one swallow was confident in its abilities and trusted in them, so must you. You must step forth into your role as a Dreamstrider with confidence that you are capable of succeeding and not waver from that view. You will stumble at times, but if you keep your course, you shall never fail. Success is not about never falling down: it is about never staying down.”

“But so many ponies depend on me now. There’s more to it than just me needing to be confident in what we do.”

“We all must start somewhere. Coltlumbus is a small town and close enough to the Canterlot Cave that you could call me in an emergency; a perfect place to gain experience.”

I open my mouth to express that I’m still not totally sure about all this, but I know she’ll just say that I need to trust in myself and repeat the story she just told me. Come to think of it, this is really the first time somepony truly has treated me like an adult and trusted me with something that’s not just a tiny little task that’s not important at all; and it’s the protection of my entire hometown. I never guessed my first taste of adulthood would be such a big jump.

“You know what you must do,” she says as she spreads her wings. “Do not hesitate to call me in an emergency, but only call if you feel there is a true disaster.”

“What’s the difference between a ‘true’ disaster and a regular old disaster?”

“If doing it would cause a scandal in the papers, then you’re in a true disaster.” Judging from her smile, that’s happened to her before. After a quick bow of her head, she takes off and starts flying away, leaving me among all these dreams that I’m now responsible for. No pressure or anything.

To start, I should probably read that grimoire and see if I can get anything more about blood demons in case one should get through. I locate my dream and jump into it before pushing through back to the awakened world, the feeling of being wrapped under my warm covers quickly coming back to me.

Instead of reading the book here in my room, I take it in my magic and head downstairs. There’s some soft music coming from Dew Drop’s room and I know Snowy is out with some of her friends, so I’ll be able to read in peace. The couch is looking very comfortable, so I place the grimoire on it and go into the kitchen to start making tea. The kettle’s already on the stove, so I just have to fill it with water. Once that’s done and it’s heating up, I grab my tea box and open it up. Everything that I’ll need is in here: a mug that thankfully cleans itself so I never have to, an infuser, and a few glass jars of blends Luna helped me make that are basically the most common ones I’ll need. Unfortunately for me, I don’t get one of the really good-tasting ones tonight. Instead, I get a blend that makes it easier to read Demon but tastes like grass and old lemon rinds. It’s somehow not a bad taste, but still not something I’d go out of my way to be drinking.

The water boils after a few minutes, so I place the infuser full of the old lemon tea into the mug and fill it with the steaming water. I take it back to the couch and get myself comfortable before taking a sip of it. I close my eyes and take a deep breath; a lot of the magic that’s moving through my body slowly makes its way up towards my head, and when I take another sip, it starts moving towards my eyes and my horn. I think of blood demons and flip open the book, and when I open my eyes, there’s all sorts of information that I can make out better than the last time I tried this. Another sip of the tea causes even more stuff to make sense, and so I place the mug on the coffee table and start reading.