//------------------------------// // Twisted Words and Twisted Worlds // Story: Will of The Shadow Monarch // by Silvermyr //------------------------------// Entry nr. 813 Luck seems to be on my side. The Princesses have sent a scout here, pegasus stallion. He will be the perfect catalyst to begin my journey. I have been meditating over this quandary, and I know now I cannot leave the world like this. I must give it a chance, else what king am I? I will give the Princesses one final chance to see my magnificence first. If they fail my test, fail to see the glory… then I have done all I can, for this time. Then they have refused to open their eyes, and my only option will be to cut off their eyelids. I just had the pegasus brought here. He will be my messenger, my catalyst. ***** Cadence felt like she was hovering in darkness. She looked around, dazed and confused about her surroundings. There was nothing to see; nothing but the darkest depths of blackness. She was not even sure whether her eyes were open or closed. She neither heard, nor felt anything either, not even warmth or chill on her coat. It was like she was suspended in a perfect temperate equilibrium where nothing else could exist. Not even light or sound. She probably groaned, though she could not hear it. Why did she feel so sluggish? Had she even moved at all? ”H-Hello?” Not even an echo answered. Her voice seemed to be drained of sound before it left her lips; she could not even feel her lips move. She took a step forward without moving. It made no difference; not even room worked like it was supposed anymore. ”Tetanus Somnum!” That she could hear, even though it was impossible to say where the sound came from. It seemed to come from within her rather than outside her. It was like she had thought it herself. A myriad of sensations assaulted her. Smell returned, carrying a weak fragrance of roses, and a cold feeling bit into her coat. A shudder passed through her, and she felt her wings ruffle slightly to instinctively keep her warm. She still could not see anything, but felt the soft touch of a fabric over her eyes. A blindfold. She could hear though; weak sounds of many ponies moving carefully in front of her. She stood raised up on her hind hooves with her forelegs stretched out and upwards. She could clearly feel the chilly metal manacles that kept her suspended in the unnatural position. She willed magic into her horn, only to feel like it was sucked right out of her. Cadence’s first instinct was to perform her breathing exercise, but she could not do that with all her hooves locked in place. Instead she took a deep breath of the fragrant air. The rose smell did little to calm her. ”Hello? Who is there? What is this?” She was proud that her voice was stable. ”I am here, Princess,” Golden Heart answered. His voice was neutral. ”Are you well?” She snapped her face towards the sound. ”What are you doing?” she asked, trying not to let her fear show. There was something about the blindfold that terrified her. She could not see anything and her growing child was completely exposed. How could she protect her child like this? No magic and no sight. ”Golden Heart, what do you want?” ”Don’t be afraid. His majesty does not want to kill the subjects he plans to rule… well, not more than necessary at least. But fear not, you are far to valuable for something like that. Anyway, just hold still for a moment.” Cadence yelped when she felt something cold around her mouth. Before she realized what, somepony had put as small metal lump on her molars, preventing her from closing her mouth completely. She thrashed, but to no avail. Bound like this she was helpless. ”Done. All is exactly as per your requests, my friend. Now what? There are still four of us who has not shown up. Can we proceed without them?” Golden Heart asked somepony else. ”We can. The sacrifice is the deciding factor. We could do this with only four or five of us here, eight is more than enough.” The mare's voice was harsh and stiff like an icicle. She continued, calling loudly with a charismatic tone that sent shivers down Cadence’s spine. ”Ponies of His Majesty, we shall begin at last! After today, He will walk among us again! Can you hear me in your sleep, my King!? Your deliverance is at hoof!” The ecstasy of the voice somehow only made the speaker sound grimmer rather than kinder, like she knew she was ruthless and was proud of it. ”My fellow acolytes… let us all bow out heads in prayer.” Cadence heard a multitude of ponies and fabric shuffle over the floor and positioning themselves around her. The eerie cacophony of what sounded like a dozen voices speaking exactly in synch hit her ears. Egged on by an ever increasing feeling of dread she thrashed against her bonds yet again, but the cold metal remained firmly in place. It screeched slightly as if to remind her that it was still there, keeping her still while these madponies did Celestia knew what. King of shadow give us sight Take these offers, give us might Make so we can end your plight Through this chalice of blood so bright Somepony rose up right in front of her. She heard liquid being poured. ”His Majesty’s wisdom provides. Through the power of his slaves who have so selflessly given themselves to our course, might he be reborn.” A resounding swallow. ”The sweet taste of life’s many possibilities. I now grant the Chalice of Life and Death to you, my fellow acolyte. When you have drunk your fill, pass the cup to others who thirst.” Three quick steps made her aware that ”the Chalice of Life and Death” had switched hooves. Another swallow. ”The sweet taste of life’s many possibilities. I now grant the Chalice of Life and Death to you, my fellow acolyte. When you have drunk your fill, pass the cup to others who thirst.” This was Golden Heart’s voice. Her blindness was maddening. She wanted to know what was happening. For all she knew they might have a dagger over her foal right now and she could do nothing about it. She thrashed again, until suddenly her head was held still firmly by magic. She trampled slightly with her hindhooves, but it was an empty gesture. She was completely subdued and could only listen to the eerie mantra as the chalice slowly made its way around her, back to the sermon leader directly in front of her. ”Might you accept the sacred quest which His Majesty King Sombra has bestowed upon you… Drink deep from The Chalice of Life and Death.” The leader spoke solemnly. Hoofsteps closed in. She felt the rim of metal gently on her lip. ”NO! NO PLEASE!” Cadence screamed when she understood. Her confidence fell like a house of cards. Her mouth was still kept open, and her head was kept still. ”STOP! STOP! I-” she coughed violently when she felt the vile liquid on her tongue. The sour and slightly metallic taste removed any remaining doubt of what she was drinking. She tried to spit, but could not when she felt a hoof over her mouth. Left with no alternative, she swallowed, and immediately felt the urge to throw up. ”The bitter taste of life’s only certainty,” the monotone voices chanted together. ***** Entry nr. 824 What better laboratory than a blood-soaked battlefield? Both my acolytes and I have learned more from these last few weeks of war than we have in years of pondering ancient texts. Of course, I will be defeated, but it matters not. It was the point, after all. Still, I would prefer to have as much time to study the art of warfare as I can, so I believe it is time my acolytes took a bit more of an active role… ***** With a sound like shattering glass, the invisible wall fell for Twilight and Shining Armor’s combined assault, after what felt like hours of being locked in. Shining Armor wasted not time barreling out of the room and dashing as fast as he could towards the Crystal Castle. Twilight stopped for a moment and locked the door to the office behind them, after having grabbed the journal. They could not do more for Manesbury now, and it would do no good for the rest of the empire to be dragged into this mess. After the momentary delay, she was right by her brother’s side again, racing and praying to Celestia they were not to late. Through the streets, past the doors, up the stairs and into Cadence’s room. They both stopped dead in their tracks. Two guards laid there, their bodies malformed with large swellings and wounds that seemed to have burst open on their own. Twilight backed away, disgusted, and fought the urge to retch at the smell and sight. Cadence was nowhere to be seen. ”NO! NO, DAMMIT, NO!” Shining Armor wailed in utter despair. ”THIS CAN’T BE TRUE! TELL ME IT’S NOT TRUE, TWILIGHT!” Twilight stood frozen, mouth slightly agape as she tried to fathom the horror in the room before her. Shining Armor’s piercing scream interrupted her. ”WHERE ARE THEY!? WHERE DID THEY TAKE HER!?” Twilight forced herself to look away from the bodies on the floor and instead focus on the wall. She needed to think clearly and carefully, now more than ever. They had collected a lot of puzzle pieces, but still had no idea what they were chasing or where. It was time to patch together the whole picture. She was about to perform the breathing exercise, but stopped herself. She did not want the smell to remind her of the horrors. ”That mad pony in the library,” she began, her voice somewhat thin. ”He said they… the Pale Knights, I assume, were after Cadence for some kind of ritual, right?” ”Never mind!” Shining Armor said, nearly hysteric now by the voice. ”No time to think, we need to move! ” ”We need to figure out where to!” Twilight said loudly. ”We can’t afford to run around at random now, help me here! He said something about a ritual right, and that the others were just a preparation. Who are ’the others’?” ”The other foals, must be,” Shining Armor said quickly. ”It must have been the Pale Knights behind it, and then this is also their motive. They prepared for something.” Twilight blinked. She knew the royal guard was drilled since day one of their education to think rapidly, but that deduction took the word ”rapid” to a whole new level. ”I can’t understand what they would prepare for though…” Shining Armor said. They backed out of the room and closed it. ”I think I can…” Twilight whispered, overwhelmed by the sheer vastness of the scheme they were facing. ”That madpony’s final word, ’Hailed be King Sombra’, or whatever… do you think they plan to reawaken him?” ”Reawaken?” Shining Armor asked. ”But he is dead; you can’t just wake the dead up again.” Shining Armor hesitated. No doubt Manesbury’s groping body flashed through his memory. ”Can you?” ”I don’t know, but they seem to think so. Think about it.” Twilight started pacing in the corridor outside Cadence’s room. ”The bookmarked page in Sombra’s spell book had the headline ’Regis Mandatum Maxima’, and the spell used on Amethyst was ’Regis Mandatum’. Don’t you see? If we presume they bookmarked that page, they were looking for an empowered version of the spell that revived Manesbury. Who else would they want to reawaken?” Shining Armor nodded grimly. ”So they might try to reanimate Sombra, or something, but where would they be? Where can we find them?” ”I…” Twilight hesitated. That was the crux of the matter, but she did not know. Not yet. ”Our only lead is the journal. Now that we know how to read it, maybe it contains some records that can help?” ”Why would it?” Shining Armor did not say, even though it was the first thing that came to mind. He dared not say that. Twilight was right, the journal was their only clue, and if it did not give any answers, then… …then what could he do to help his mare and foal? Nothing. He dared not think about it. ”Yea, that’s probably right,” Shining Armor said instead. ”Give me that journal. I will activate it.” ”No, I will,” Twilight said, sounding almost angry. ”I am an alicorn; my injuries are healed in a matter of minutes! We don’t know what spells Sombra might have heaped on his book, but we know I will live through them. You are not touching it!” ”Twilight, this is my problem, my wife we are looking for and my subjects in danger. Not yours.” Twilight did not answer, but flipped the journal open on an empty page and threw it on the ground. Before she even had the time to think any more, she placed her hoof on it. The shock and pain was instantaneous. She yelped as she felt like somepony was slicing open the tender underside of her hoof with a red hot razor. She closed her eyes and fought every instinct in her body that told her to move her hoof. She endured for only a few seconds before she peeped in pain and her instinct won. Still, it seemed to have been enough, as blood seeped out on the yellowed parchment, running like in small channels on the page and staying there, forming words in the same immaculate penmanship she recognized from earlier in the journal. A little bit of her blood dripped over the side of the book and presumably started on the next page. She stood like that for a few seconds before she placed her hoof on the book again. It was not as painful this time, for whatever reason. Perhaps her alicorn body reacted to the pain by reducing it? She should have to look that up. ”How… do you feel, little sis?” her worried BBBFF asked when she removed her hoof for the second time. Twilight shook her head and looked down at her hoof. It was already healing. New, soft fur closing over the small wounds. The pain was already reduced to a nothing more than a slight throbbing. ”I’m okay. Come now, we must find something in this.” Twilight put the journal on a nearby table and opened the first ”secret” page. Normally, Twilight would have savored every picosecond of reading a document like this. She was probably the only pony aside from the insane king himself who had read it, and she knew it would prove invaluable in understanding the mind of one of the most enigmatic ponies in recorded history, not to mention patching together the fragmented history of this empire. This time, however, she only scanned every page as fast as she could to deduce whether it held any information they needed before moving on. The pages were all but a flurry in front of her, each one hardly opened before she had already moved on. ”Where is it? Where?” she mumbled frantically as she scanned worthless, semi-philosophical page after worthless, semi-philosophical page. ”Come on, Sombra, where are your secrets? I must find them. I must.” An entry caught her eye, and she straightened out the journal. ”Entry 497… this might be it!” She poured over the page and the short message. ”Twelve loyalists… Command of The King…The Panorama! This is it, brother, look here!” Without waiting, she read out loud. ”My twelve have been disoriented since the ritual at the panorama of my empire was complete! That must be where Sombra initiated his Pale Knights! Maybe that’s where Cadence is now!” ”A Panorama…” Shining Armor mumbled. ”The Castle apex! That is the only place where you can see the whole empire!” ”But then everypony in the empire would see the ritual too,” Twilight protested. ”And try to stop it, right?” ”…Which suits Sombra’s arrogance,” Shining Armor said darkly. ”He knows they can’t touch him up there.” The two siblings turned away and ran as fast as their hooves would carry them. ***** Entry nr. 824 I have begun sending my acolytes out in pairs of two or three. The results are staggering. For the first time, the Equestrian army were forced to pull back from an outbreak of glanders and a host of especially engineered battle constructs. I have underestimated my students’ prowess. With enough blood paid, one of them can indeed be captured, or even killed, not that they will stay dead for very long. But two? Or twelve, heaven forbid? That is a lot of blood. ***** Call him back, our king, our knight To whom I am acolyte He who never felt but spite He whose heart is black as night Cadence thrashed again, but it was as futile as before. ”His Majesty’s wisdom provides. Through the power of his slaves who have so selflessly given themselves to our course, might he be reborn.” A swallow, yet again signaling what was to come. Candace steeled herself for the horrible taste to wash over her tongue again. ”The sweet taste of life’s many possibilities. I now grant the Chalice of Life and Death to you, my fellow acolyte. When you have drunk your fill, pass the cup to others who thirst.” Again she was forced to listen how the vile chalice slowly wandered around the room to the ponies gathered around her. This was the eleventh or something time they did this. How long would they force her to endure it? Wasn’t it done soon? She must have been standing for hours now. She was stiff and cold, though the utter helplessness and horrible, horrible blindness was far more breaking. She had long since folded her wings over her growing foal, a final, desperate effort to keep her little one safe. ”Might you accept the sacred quest which His Majesty King Sombra has bestowed upon you… Drink deep from The Chalice of Life and Death.” She tried again to avert her mouth, but in the end it only brought her a fraction of a second. A collective gasp surged through the gathered as soon as the blood touched her tongue. ”It’s working! It’s really working!” Somepony, a mare, said breathlessly. ”The walls… they are breaking…” another pony whispered in a strange, veiled voice. ”My fellow acolytes, the time is nearing. Only one last iteration is needed now. Thirteen minutes, and then it will be said and done.” ”Thirteen minutes? Thirteen minutes!?” Cadence thought, despairing. She had been here for a lot longer than that, and nopony had come. Shining Armor and her sister-in-law was running out of time! She felt a tear form in her eye. ”Cadenza, Slave of His Majesty, see what you have wrought and rejoice!” Before she even understood what he had said, the blindfold was gone. ***** Entry nr. 829 Kill. Raise. Repeat. The dancing steps of war. ***** ”What is the thing with Sombra and stairs?” Twilight asked irritably as they arrived behind the enchanted door and she once again stood face to face with the near endless stairwell. Good thing she knew how to handle it at this point. ”Okay brother, hold on tight!” She felt the familiar lurch as gravity flipped and she started flying, or falling, depending on how one saw it. ”Be ready to fight! They will not be handing her over freely!” Twilight called back and readied her opening array of spells, including one to shift gravity back. The light on top of the stairwell approached. She prepared to spring into flight. ”Take that!” She called, unleashed her reversal spell, shot from the ground, looped and conjured up a shield to defend her from the imminent attack. She let the shield expand, pushing her opponents back and giving her enough time to sling an energy beam as well as assessing the situation properly. There was nopony there. The only sound was the wind tugging at her mane and tail. And her brother’s heartrending cry. ”But… but then where?” Twilight asked nopony in particular. ”There are no other panoramas, it has to be here. It just… has to.” But there was nopony else there. The apex was deserted, and they had wasted invaluable time going here. It was more than two hours, at the least, since they exposed the madpony in the library, and Twilight was well aware that even the longest rituals she knew did not last more than just above two and a half hour. They were already struggling badly with that time frame, and even worse; she had no idea where to go now. ”Twilight… where to?” Shining Armor asked, meeker than she had ever heard him. Twilight turned to her brother. He looked at her with wide, terrified eyes, eyes she had never seen before. He was perplexed, and despairing at his own inadequacy. Twilight knew, for she felt the same. One of the most important ponies in their lives were at stake, and they did not know where to look. Time was running out. In fact, though Twilight refused to admit it, the chances of Cadence and her foal still being alive were perilously slim already. But Twilight would not let any of that show. Now, if ever, she needed all her wits about her. She performed Cadence’s breathing exercise. ”Okay, if they are not here, then it must be a metaphor. ’The panorama of my empire’ must mean something else. I… can’t think of any alternate meaning to ’panorama’, so we need to interpret ’my empire’ some other way. Do you know anything about Sombra that helps? Anything he might have considered his empire?” Silence. Insufferable silence, reminding them loud and clear that Cadence’s life was ticking away. ”Maybe… the room where we found the spell book? Would he consider his acolytes the only true ponies of his empire, and the throne his panorama?” Twilight decided not to question it, as they could not afford to be standing here any longer. They had no time to think anymore, and any place had a higher chance of finding Cadence here. So, she nodded. ”We only need to get out of Sombra’s part of the castle! Then I can teleport to Cadence’s study!” ”Don’t wait for me! You can fly down the stairwell. Get out of here and find Cadence! I will round up what guard I can and come after!” Shining Armor called urgently. Twilight nodded, dashed back to the stairwell and flew with a speed that would have yielded an invitation to the Wonderbolts if they had seen it. In a purple blur she was at the bottom, out of the door and flying up the stairwell at the other side. It took her only a few minutes, but in her mind it might as well have been hours. ”Hurry! Hurry! Hurry!” she whispered frantically to herself, forcing her wings to flap a little faster every time. She teleported and appeared in front of the dark staircase down to Sombra’s secret room. She stared at the entrance for just a moment. It looked like a dark maw, ready to swallow her. Without pause, she set off again, this time running down the stairs, every moment aware that she would probably fall forward and break her neck. It had taken her more than twenty minutes to get down last time. Now she did it in five. Breathless and teary-eyed with anxiety she opened the door, igniting her horn. The room was dark and silent. ”Silent as the grave,” Twilight thought involuntarily, before even despair set in. Silent as the grave. She stopped. Thought. The grave. She bolted up the stairs. What a fool she was! Oh, what a fool she was! ***** Cadence blinked rapidly. The light stung her eyes and forced her to look down. The floor was brighter than she had expected, all sky blue, almost like in her castle. Around her rear hooves were scribbled a host of black lines, stretching around her like a spider’s web. No, not a spider’s web, a star. When she lifted her eyes, she saw that she stood in the middle of an intricate star. She followed one of the lines to a tip with her eyes and saw a chalice standing there, and behind it stood a pony. He or she was still as a statue. Cadence had never seen a pony move so little. She could not even see breaths behind the long robes. ”Your Majesty? Can you… can you hear me?” The sermon leader asked silently, her face filled with wonder like a foal’s on Hearthswarming Eve. Cadence could see the elation in her face and hear it in her voice, despite the sermon leader wearing a blindfold of some sort. The leader's ears were focused towards Something just above Cadence. The bound alicorn bent her neck backwards to look. Just above her head, something had appeared. If she had to describe it, she would say it was a crack in reality itself. As the world was forced aside, instead was bared a terrible vista of emptiness. The rumble sounded again, and a blood red bolt of lightning snaked out from the rift to strike the ground in front of her. ”The barrier… is cracking…” somepony whispered, reverence palpable in the voice. ”Just… a little more…” Then, sudden as a gust of wind, she felt like her head was split in two. Cadence groaned and closed her eyes reflexively, but the thundering headache did not recede in the slightest; if anything it became worse. Something about it made her wrap her wings even tighter around her foal. There was something amiss with the pain in her head, like it was not only pain, but something else too, like… …like laughter. Horrible, horrible laughter bounced around in her ears, becoming stronger and stronger by the second, until she felt like her head was going to explode. She opened her mouth and screamed with a voice that was not her own. ”CRYSTALS!” The sound left her throat and the rift above her at the same time, drowning out even the unearthly thunderclaps that fell closer and closer. Cadence screamed in horror, part from the sound that had come from her own throat, and part because of what she saw. Mirrored in the crystal floor in front of her was the twisted rift in reality, and hovering in the middle, two fuming, noxious eyes, eyes that watched her every time she had a nightmare. ”It is time…” the sermon leader said solemnly. She knelt down, taking no notice of the barrage of discolored lightning that danced around her. Cadence looked away from the dreadful eyes to follow the sermon. Her eyes locked on to something behind the sermon leader. Even in the midst of the calamity around her she still found herself surprised to see a foal, younger than any she had ever seen, coming up to the leader, stopping before her. Discolored lightning bolts scorched the ground around the pair, but neither of them cared. The sermon leader said something, but it was drowned out by the thunder. The foal fell to the side, and a red glob of liquid floated up from its mouth and into the chalice. One instant later the foal was completely annihilated by a collected blast of lighting strikes. The sermon leader heightened the chalice and screamed over the thunder. Might our world and yours unite! Cleanse this land from wicked blight! Hear, my king, your time is nigh! Sombra, come, to judge and smite! ”His Majesty’s wisdom provides! Through the power of his slaves who have so selflessly given themselves to our course, might he be reborn!” The leader took up the chalice in his hooves and drank deeply, a drop of blood clinging to her lips. ”The sweet taste of life’s many possibilities! I now grant the Chalice of Life and Death to you, my fellow acolyte! When you have drunk your fill, pass the cup to others who thirst!” She passed the cup to the pony next to him. She recognized the plague doctor mask. Swiftly, urgently, the cursed chalice wandered around her for the last time until it was once again in the hooves of the sermon leader. ”My king. All has been done as you described. I beseech you now, drink deep from your chalice, and return to us.” The leader bowed, holding the chalice up to Cadence, lightning striking everywhere. A sheen, black as death, lifted the chalice to Cadence’s lips. This time she could not even shake her head. Her body did not obey. She opened her mouth and drank deeply, greedily, as much as she could. She swallowed, and a spike of pain racked her body, this time in her lower chest, just above her foal. A whimper escaped her lips. ”Finally…” the leader said breathlessly. ”My friends, the time we have long waited for has finally arrived. Might He again be born, in blood and pain of the most loved pony in existence.” She bent his head, and produced from inside of her robes a dagger. Cadence recognized it. The crossbar and handle was the finest of gold, inlaid with a ruby large as a strawberry, and the blade was formed from a dense, ashen material, with a tip red as blood. These madponies had found their king’s severed horn and fashioned it into a dagger. Their leader strode up to her, the dagger in her hoof. Slowly, reverentially even, she heightened it over her belly. Hoofsteps sounded from everywhere, as the cultists each placed a hoof or their magic around the dagger handle, holding it steadily over her growing foal. Any sound she might have made died in her throat. There was nothing she could say, nothing she could conceive of that even began to describe this. She stared, beyond terrified, at the gleaming dagger point, so close to her vibrant coat. Her mind was utterly blank, unable to form a single coherent thought. ”Resign yourself to your glorious fate,” Sombra whispered in her head, his voice cold as the North wind. The cultists heightened the dagger. Then it came rushing down, and she screamed, loud and shrill enough to fracture the crystal walls. A purple glimmer joined around the dagger, halting it less than an inch over her foal. She looked up and about, dazed in terror. Just behind the gathered cultists stood a disheveled Twilight Sparkle, struggling to keep the dagger away from her. Then finally, Cadence reached her limit. She could not keep up anymore, so her body simply shut down. The last thing she heard as she fainted was a distant explosion. ***** Twilight strained to keep the dagger away. Despite having seen just how strangely powerful the Pale Knights were already, she was surprised by the sheer power they held together. She groaned and forced more power into her spell. She had to think of something; if the Knight she had met in the library was an indication, she could not face them all together. ”NO! NO! IT IS NOT DONE! THE RITUAL IS NOT DO-” One of the Pale Knights began, only to be interrupted by what felt like a magical tidal wave. A pulse, similar to the feeling of getting hit in the face by a tornado, struck Twilight, and evidently the Pale Knights too. Without a sound, everypony aside from Cadence were sent flying backwards and into the Crystal Vault wall hard enough to leave an imprint. The boom followed the moment after, making Twilight’s ears ring. She laid still on the floor for a few moments while her body patched itself together. Thankfully her system was so saturated with adrenaline and magic she really did not feel that much. ”The ritual… has failed,” Twilight thought, uninvitedly. She did not know why she thought it. The thought felt out of place. ”So I imagine you have won this time, little foal. Bear that knowledge with pride, for the only two who have foiled me before were the royal sisters.” ”Sombra!” Twilight called out, looking around before focusing on the rift in reality and the burning eyes inside it. ”So all of this was your doing then?” ”It was, through my twelve faithful,” Twilight thought. A ripple passed through the rift, and it began to shrink. The eyes flicked quickly to the encroaching sides. ”Alas, I cannot stay in your world. But fear not, we will meet again, when all is said and done. Until then, read my journal, Sparkle. You will find it interesting, I promise.” A silent, ice cold chuckle. ”And before I forget…” With a choked cry, Twilight felt the mother of all headaches. Her horn burnt, literally and figuratively, with magic, more than she knew she had. Through the rapidly collecting tears, she saw the sheen of dark magic reflect of the walls, and if the agonizing pain was any indication, it was more powerful than any she had used herself. ”Infundere!” Twilight choked out with a voice that was not her own. With a rumble, the accumulated dark magic shot from her horn and struck someplace, though Twilight could not see where through her tears. Then there was sweet release from whatever baleful presence had taken hold of her as the rift collapsed in on itself. She staggered a few steps and then slumped down on the cold floor to catch her breath. As she laid by the elevated podium where they had nearly sacrificed Cadence, she looked over the scene before her. Cadence still stood chained in the star’s centre, fainted. Scorch marks from the strange lightning marked both floors and walls. A groan reached her ears. Her heart nearly stopped when she saw one of the Pale Knights weakly stagger up on his or her hooves. Another one got up with the help of the wall. ”His- His Majesty is gone?” one of them mumbled. ”The hay happened?” ”Never mind,” somepony said, a stallion with a familiar, featureless mask. ”There is nothing to gain here anymore. We need to escape. As long as we remain in this world, there is still hope.” Twilight knew she had to stop them, but her legs refused to move. Sombra’s dark magic spell had taken too much out of her, and left her with the nausea that always followed the use of dark magic. If she could just stall them for a little bit… she had left a hastily scribbled message for her brother in Sombra’s study. He would be here soon with the crystal guard. Alas, Twilight’s magic seemed to be more or less gone from her now. ”Bring the Princess, we will try again once we have a new hideaway.” ”No point in that.” Twilight recognized Golden Heart’s voice. ”Her time is due in mere days, and it will take longer to prepare a new ritual. Let us all leave.” ”Not on my watch, you won’t,” Twilight’s beloved BBBFF said from the doorway into the vaults, dressed in his purple armor and with a long spear in his magic. She had never been so glad to see him. ”Give up. The entire Crystal Empire guard is assembled outside the only exit. Surrender now and nopony else has to die for your former king’s insanity.” ”We don’t… have to…” Anubrisk’s veiled voice stammered from a mummy- shaped mask. ”There are many ways out… ways from before even His Majesty’s time. Follow me…” ”Guard!” Shining Armor barked, and at his command appeared two full ranks of armed Crystal ponies. ”Seize them!” ”In His Majesty’s name, prepare to be judged and sentenced,” one of the cultists said. It sounded like a battle cry of some sort. She knew the cultists were scary powerful, but at the same time the guard were almost three times as many, and the cultists must be tired after the failed ritual. ”Lancea Obscura!” one of the cultists called. Shining Armor ignited her horn in response and created a small burst of light under each ponies of his group, removing the shadows. Twilight grinned tiredly. Her brother had always been creative with his magic like that. ”You are going to need more than that old trick,” Shining Armor said disdainfully. "Seize them!" ”You should be careful what you wish for,” A cultist said in a matter-of-factly tone. She wore a mask shaped like a blindfold made of iron. Two guards swung their swords at her from different sides, only to have them by the shadows leaping up from the ground and blocking them with a metallic twang! ”Else you might just get it.” ”And I’m gonna give it to him,” Golden Heart said as he casually took a swords cut to his front leg. It did not bleed, nor did it seem to become the deranged doctor at all. ”The rest of you, get out! It was my responsibility to keep this a secret; it is only fair that I clean up this mistake.” He grabbed his attacker, gored and him with his horn, causing the guard to stumble back. ”Malleus.” ”If that is your wish,” the blindfolded one said casually as she slashed with the horn dagger, sending three attackers stumbling backwards. ”We will see each other soon, my friend. Fellow Knights, we depart!” ”You won’t!” a guardpony screamed and jumped after one of the cultists, a foal by the looks of it. Said foal twisted out of his grip, jumped up on his head and with a chillingly practiced motion snapped his neck. The little pony blew an audible raspberry. ”Trash,” the foal, a filly by the voice, said aloofly. ”Face my innermost magic, gifted to me by His Majesty himself,” Golden Heart said and gathered a crackling cloud of dark magic around his horn. ”Umbra…” ”Stop!” Shining Armor screamed and sent an energy beam straight into Golden Heart’s horn. While it would have stunned any other unicorn, it had no effect on a pony who evidently did not feel anything. ”…Pestis.” A dark green shimmer, almost like an unearthly flame, rose up all around Golden Heart’s body. The pony made a nauseated throw with his head and then staggered down on his knees, almost like he was about to vomit. He lifted his head, and, with a foul, throaty sound he did exactly that, belching forth a cloud of malformed, green vapor. Twilight was out of his way, but he still hit almost all other ponies in front of him, including the shield Shining Armor put up around himself in the last moment. For a moment, all was deathly silent. Then ponies started to scream out in pain. The cloud faded, and Twilight stared at the ponies of the guard, all of them writhing on the ground with rapidly building, sickly yellowish buboes growing all over their bodies. Only her brother stood protected in his shield, but he seemed just as dumbfounded as Twilight with what was happening around him. ”I… submit,” Golden Heart hissed tiredly, unearthly vapor still leaking out of his mouth. Twilight saw the blue pony slump down. ”I submit. Nopony can go down here now, the mummies and your guard are already infected. My friends will soon be safely away.” ”We will just see about that!” Shining Armor said savagely and sprinted towards the hallway where the other cultists had disappeared to. ”Shining… help Cadence,” Twilight pleaded. She had no idea what disease Golden Heart had conjured up, but she knew that her foalsitter should not be anywhere near it, nor anypony else. Shining Armor stopped dead in his tracks. Twilight could see longing burning in his eyes. He wanted to hunt down the cultists, he wanted it so badly. But he would not, Twilight knew. He always put other ponies before himself; that was why he became the guard captain at such a young age. He stood still for just another moment, then he turned around and extended his shield around Cadence and Twilight. ***** ”Is it now that the torture begins?” The mood in the guest room-turned-prison cell felt like a cold winters morning. The four princess’s feelings towards the deranged doctor did the impossible and went even lower. Twilight wanted to brutally lecture Golden Heart for even suggesting such a thing, but she felt her mentor’s aura of cold, restrained contempt and decided to let it speak for her. Nopony said anything. The Cadence and Twilight still tried to take in the change they saw in Golden Heart’s scornful leer from his normal carefree persona, while Celestia and Luna searched through their memories for when last they must have seen him, during the crystal war. ”Long time no see, is it not?” he asked with a challenging look towards Celestia. ”Might I hope you still remember me?” ”We still hold a remembrance day for all those who died in your plagues during the war,” Celestia answered, her voice cold like marble, devoid of any feelings. ”Glanders truly is worthy of a remembrance day. It is still my go-to killing disease,” Golden Hearts said, he glanced at Cadence. ”As those two guards that interfered with my kidnapping of you learnt.” ”Golden Heart, we are not interested in hearing more of thine twisted words,” Luna said distantly, as if she even in her voice did not want to be close to this pony. ”We have come to pronounce thine punishment for all crimes thou hast committed.” ”It has been decided that you are gong to be imprisoned in a secret location forever, or until you are considered reformed and can start paying of your debt to Equestria,” Twilight continued, studying the pony in front of her. ”And you should know that only the fact that the Elements of Harmony are gone is what is saving you from being bound in a statue or on the moon.” ”Of course,” Golden Heart said dismissively. ”A millennia ago as now, you would never kill a pony if you have the choice. Not even after seeing me return after so long you are willing to end me. Let me tell you something; that mentality is the reason my friends and I took the risk of attempting this when you would be on high alert, Cadenza. We knew there was nothing to lose.” ”You will never be free again, Golden Heart.” Celestia spoke with such simplicity, such utter clarity, that Twilight felt no doubt. Celestia had declared it, so then it would be true. There was no alternative. ”Sombra is the sole loser after this ordeal.” ”Nothing is permanent. A decade, a century or a millennia more; eventually the highest prison walls will crumble and the strongest bars will rust. And when they do, I will still be there, waiting.” ***** Twilight stared blindly into space as the horror dawned upon her. She had thought of it momentarily when she first heard Sombra whisper to her, but only now was the meaning clear. The only two who have foiled me before are the royal sisters. He did not consider Twilight and her friend’s first visit to the empire a failure, and now it was clear why. He had never meant to be banished; he wanted to die that day one thousand years ago, so that his Pale Knights could revive him with the knowledge of the Plane of Death! He had been banished instead, halting his plans for a thousand years. But Twilight and her friends had killed him with the help of the Crystal Heart. Now his plan was in motion again. She lowered her eyes to read the final, damning journal entry once more. I hear the keep rumbling. Not even my crystal traps will stave off the sisters for very long now. Still, I have the time to pen you these, my last words to my so loyal followers. Your king will leave you now, and you must do the same. Consider these my last order to you for this time. Hide. I will buy you all the time I can, and then I will die. Use that time to run away and hide among other ponies. You will be called again one day, when my power is great enough to cross the boundaries of death and life itself. And when that day come, I know you will listen. Upon my call, you will resurrect me so that I may share my secrets, just as I once resurrected you. I know you will never forgo your craft; you will continue, with or without me, to ply your trade in life and death and back again. The symmetry of this arrangement pleases me. I raised you from death once, and you will do the same to me. The dead reviving the dead… …on and on, down the years. Forever.