To Bring Light to Eternal Darkness

by scifipony

Foreigners

I could gallop only so far. I ended up going the wrong way, twice. I even met my first Unicornian mare, a pink-maned pink merchant filly casting Motivate. She painted the wheels of her cart blue, driving a load of boxed goods and barrels at the speed of a trot ahead of her. She sported a cracked-egg cutie mark.

Yeah, she wore only her cutie mark.

The pair of blue fabric saddlebags on her back were each emblazoned with her cutie mark—which struck me as very risqué, though not so much if mares sometimes didn't wear clothes. I think we stared at each other until even a foal would realize it was rude, and we both broke into laughter. She'd seen the mages take Crest Highway east toward Five Waterfalls Township late yesterday. She pointed.

I trotted along in what had to be the very early morning a'clock. The sun had long ago tried to set in the west, then gotten stuck an hour before a proper sunset. It now bathed the world in the golden light that, over the past few years, had become what I thought of when I thought of daytime.

It was still hot. The pegasi saw that this part of the Heartstrings Valley got plenty of rain, so it wasn't a desert like the High Desert plateau thirty miles uphill behind me. Delicious looking green leaves danced and rustled in the breezes that tussled the canopy of the trees that lined the road. Woods dotted the landscape. Lush wild oats waved enticingly in the summery weather.

I took time to graze by the roadside, enjoying a nutty flavor you can't get from a bale. I even waded into a brook to drink deeply from the cool waters. The brook really did sound like it was chuckling, as was styled in the tales I'd heard.

I clip-clopped past fields plowed in precise parallel furrows. Cold-hardy cabbage and kale grew in purple and dark green profusion. In one field, I saw early-rising earth pony stallions— one tan, one yellow—eating apples. They stared at me as I cantered on down the deeply rutted road.

They were, of course, hornless, but it was hard to escape the creepy sensation that they were somehow maimed. I knew that earth ponies had no horn, but I'd never really studied what they looked like before. The ones that sold vegetables at the farmers market were stallions and a good mare didn't look too closely at male strangers. These two were hefty, muscular farm-hoofs. Being in a foreign land made me aware of everything—like the violet and crystal blue color of their eyes—because I knew I knew so little that anything could be dangerous. I had to look.

It was an excuse to stare anyway.

Unseen insects went buzz-buzz-buzzzz. Loudly. Gnats swirled in occasional clouds.

The water-fed lushness—and the folk that lived amongst it—looked very alien indeed.

About the time I noticed a group of daubed-mud-and-lumber thatched cottages around the bend, I saw light-blue ponies milling around them. As I picked up my trot, they resolved into blue-robbed mages. Their two-wheeled pony carts were painted the same shade of blue.

I tried to go faster, but my legs felt leaden. I settled for focusing on my question and slowing my breathing such that I might speak intelligibly.

When I came close enough that the clatter of my hooves reached their ears, one mage left the group. Large multi-pony caravan tents stood nestled between the trees, each striped blue and white with gold fringe. Silver Unicornia unicorn-bust flags waved in the breeze. A few mages did calisthenics and stretched while others executed a smooth flowing dance that reminded me of butterflies on a breeze.

I recognized the white-bearded blue stallion I'd identified as the leader yesterday. With his hood back and no hat, I saw his short cropped bristly mane. I had long ago lowered my hood as an accommodation to a humid heat that left me perspiring. As I came up rapidly, I said, "I am sorry to bother you, sir, but—"

He was of average stallion height, but he still had to look up at me with his deep-blue, practically indigo eyes. "Meeting you again, Sunny Daze, is surely no bother."

I stopped with my mouth open, non-plussed, my mind scrambled. He had met me once, a mere mare. He'd met a hundred other ponies afterward, and he'd remembered my name?

He chuckled. "It's been a long journey if you trotted all this way during a'night. May we offer you breakfast?"

I stepped back. Foreigners. They had different ways and didn't know what was improper for a mare—

—A High Desert mare, anyway.

"No? Well, the offer stands. I am truly sorry that custom prevented you from being tested. I presume you traveled here so you can participate in the Five Waterfalls examination?"

"I— I— Mares don't do impractical magic."

His laugh came out as a snorted whinny. "Impractical magic? Like raising the sun? All the queen's subjects are valuable, Sunny Daze. I smell the magic in you. If you can read—"

I nodded.

"And you have 'magic strong', the queen commands you to be tested." He grinned. The glitter in his eyes looked sincere, benevolent even.

I swallowed the lump in my throat. I was a High Desert mare and I had responsibilities. And a purpose. "Thank you, sir. You are very kind." I raised my hood and felt a bit more protected, mayhap more confident, though instantly hot. I added, "But I am here at considerable risk to ask in stead for my brother—"

"Summer Daze." He gazed up into my hood at my unusually long horn. When I didn't reply, he added, "You're fraternal twins, aren't you?"

"You remember him?"

"Remember him? Reminds me of myself at his age. Always my nose in a book. Were it not for my parents' annoying interruptions, I would have starved. You can be trained out of it if somepony insists on teaching you the rules of social contact, and the benefits you'll accrue. Being drafted as a squire helped, too. Really, though, a surprising book found in a deep dark library stack is still a good way to disappear for a day or two." He grinned wistfully.

I found my hoof tapping as he rambled. The instant he stopped—"Why didn't you accept him into the Collegiate?"

"The examination wasn't precisely about accepting—"

"He's qualified."

"Oh, very much so."

I felt my frown grow and my head tilt. "Then why did you turn him away? His age? Couldn't pay admission? That he didn't help raise the sun?"

"We don't know why that worked, except that it wasn't the petitioners."

"Why did you turn him away?"

"Have you spoken with your brother?"

"Yes."

He shook his head, waggling his beard. "Hyperfocus can be a curse."

I huffed. I thought about my baby brother and recalled what I had concluded: He'd wandered away, bored. I pushed back my cloak; sweat dripped down my neck. I wished I could throw off the cloak altogether, all the way to my cutie mark like the pink mare, but, even though it was perfectly normal here, I'd never be able to do it. I'd be ashamed. I looked down apologetically and said, "Yes. I did ask. He told me his magic hadn't helped to raise the sun and that he had decided to head home."

The blue pony nodded. "You have that all correct. What else did he say?"

"Nothing."

He laughed. "Wait until I tell Tin Whistle about this. He'll start hitting his head against a tree. Tin—"

"What's so funny," I asked so soberly it sounded like a statement.

He faced me. "Didn't he tell you that we offered him an apprenticeship in the Collegiate in the capital? He said, 'Thank you, but I think my sister is in trouble.' He just walked away…"

Suddenly everything coming into my head stopped making sense. His voice turned into a whining buzz as he finished, and his words repeated and repeated, not making sense because how could they make any sense? I stood unblinking, and soon my sight also blurred. Then a shaft of sunlight through a wind-tussled tree's canopy speared me in the eyes and caused the world to whirl around...

Comments

[Blaster M]

Destiny is calling

[djthomp]

Take the test, Sunny!

Then a shaft of sunlight through a wind-tussled tree's canopy speared me in the eyes and caused the world to whirl around...

Oooo, hopefully this will do it.

[Skulljack17]

Oh Summer, you're as brilliant as you are daft sometimes. You make up a spell that shows your ability beyond what most could expect, and instead of presenting yourself you used it just so you could read the books the mages had. Along with that, you turned down an opportunity to become an apprentice and learn because you saw your sister being led away by Umbra. You're a brilliantly daft fellow, and it's no wonder I'm a bit mad because it reminds me of myself!