Everything beneath the horizon was black. Stars twinkled overhead. There was no moon.
Under a fluttering hood, Sunset tramped onwards. The breeze whispered beneath her cloak and through her twitching ears. Sores throbbed in her hooves. Her lips felt like stone; she’d gone so long without speech…
A poor little lamb, she thought, that’s lost its way.
One spark ran along her horn; a magical flame hovered inches before her. Shifting the spell, she stretched the flickering spark into a searching beam that cut through the shadows. Stone slabs. She scanned either side. Churned-up mud, which left deep shadows where ridges caught the light.
Somewhere close by, a wolf howled into the void. She stopped. Her ears swivelled.
Nothing but the wash of the wind over the unseen treetops. She carried on.
Sunset glanced up at the stars, shivering. Not that the emptiness bothered her: back home, twelve hours of this darkness was just a good time to retreat indoors and “catch forty winks”, as they said in the country. Yet she felt like she’d tramped for years, without food, without water, rest, help – and still nothing in the sky had changed.
How am I not dead yet?
Up ahead, the beam caught the bifurcating pathway just before it rose up and caught the signpost. Further up, one arrow pointed left. At the top, another arrow pointed right.
Sighing, she came to a halt and stared up at both arrows. Neither had any writing on them.
“OK, I’m here,” she said with a shrug. “Now what?”
Mist billowed from a distant peak, its tendrils silver under the light of the Milky Way.
“Don’t mess me about!” she called. “I’ve been through too much to let you stop me now. A promise is a promise.”
For a moment, she swore a shadow flashed past overhead. Stars vanished behind it. Hastily, she aimed her light –
A pale owl, hooting at the sudden illumination, drifted silently across and vanished into the row of pines on her left.
Don’t be jumpy, Sunset. All the same, she switched her horn off. It can’t follow you all this way. It’d have to know which direction you went. Perhaps it lost your trail. Relax. Relax.
As though on cue, creaking wood tickled her ear. Sunset held her breath and waited. First, the creak was a suggestion, as though a distant and ancient mill had caught a gust. Next, the creak grew louder, becoming a rattle as of cogs and contraptions. Hoofsteps clattered under the noise. When she thought it was almost on top of her, the rattle of the carriage and the tread of the horses stopped.
One… two… She lit up her horn.
Behind the signpost, the two pathways ran parallel like a tuning fork. The carriage gleamed silver where she caught it except for its wheels, which were dark as coal and gave not so much as a sheen when lit. Her beam travelled to the driver’s seat.
No one was there. Strangely, both of the horses pulling the carriage remained utterly quiet. Her beam travelled down to their faces.
To where their faces should’ve been.
Do not panic. Do not panic. Anything can happen here. You can’t back out now.
Two piebald stumps twisted as though looking up. The headless horses shook themselves down.
A crash: Sunset swung the beam past them, and saw that the carriage door was open. One sapphire shoe extended before the midnight leg came out, but the rest of the figure was lost to a white robe. Black rope curled around its neck as though the figure had thrown on a monochrome curtain with tassels. Above it, the dark hood could not conceal a lock of hair like midnight sky, nor could it conceal the icicle of a horn.
Sunset stood where she was, refusing to shiver, though the breeze ran claws of frost under her flapping cloak.
The figure turned to face her. At once, she saw the other side of the robe was dark where it should’ve been white, the other side of the rope white where it should’ve been dark, and half the hood as brilliant as an angel’s halo.
Sunset waited until the stranger towered over her. An obsidian crown bound the starlit mane above a glare like two full moons.
“We received your invitation,” intoned the stranger. Sunset’s bones quivered and her ears shrank under the echoes; this was not a voice that dealt in half-measures. “Most unusual. Ponies in the real world rarely manage to cross over – and reach this far – into Our other domain.”
The stranger seemed to give this some thought.
“Or rather they do. All the time. Just not with a return ticket.”
Without taking her eyes off those glaring moons, Sunset reached into the folds of her cloak and threw cold metal. A moment later, two discs chinked on the path between them.
The stranger’s gaze flicked downwards. “Ah. So We see.”
“I know how it works,” said Sunset hastily; their staring contest was making her eyes water. “Everything has to be kept in balance. There’s always a choice.”
“Not necessarily a pleasant one.”
“I know.” Sunset tried to ignore the growing tears under her lids. I can’t show weakness. Anything she does could be a test. I have to weather the storm, whatever it takes.
“Do you, now? Then you know the magnitude of what you ask. However, We are nothing if not custodians of ancient tradition. Very well. We shall grant you passage to your heart’s desire… After you have met Our challenge.”
Despite herself, Sunset groaned. Immediately, she bit her lip, but too late: the shining eyes narrowed.
“It’s nothing.” Sunset took a step backwards before she remembered she wasn’t meant to show weakness; she stopped on the fourth step. “Please. I’ve done enough. Please don't challenge me again.”
Rumbles stampeded across the sky. Accompanied by a jangle of their reins, the headless horses reared and flailed their forelimbs in midair.
“Such impudence!” The stranger raised her head to its fullest extent while, from the horizons all around, clouds oozed together and swallowed the stars. “Do you forget your place so easily, Sunset the Runaway? Do you forget that you are in the presence of the Ultimate Reality? Of the Falling Ebb and the Rising Flow? Of Fearful Life and Painless Death? Of the Darkest Shadows and the Holiest Light? There are no negotiations, no appeals, and no escape! You will answer my challenge, or you will turn back now!”
Lightning ripped the sky in two. In that flash, the robe, the crown, the sapphire shoe and the midnight body briefly vanished, revealing…
Space without time. Time without space. Empty matter and a vacuum full to the brim. Something there and not there simultaneously. Sunset’s eyes stabbed with pain; she stumbled backwards, clutching at her tightly shut lids.
The last of the rumbling thunder sank into the sullen depths.
Why did I agree to this? Did I really think I had a chance?
Two discs chinked like coins. Sunset opened her eyes and relit her horn in time to see the stranger’s hoof tuck something under its robe. Whatever Sunset had just seen was only a glimpse of the creature’s true form. A mere glimpse.
“I’m not a runaway,” said Sunset, but she kept her voice polite. There was no question of getting another glimpse of that… thing.
“We can hardly call you a ‘confidential transfer’, now can We?” With a wave of the figure’s hoof, the clouds slid back like curtains. Stars twinkled once more. “No matter. Perhaps your time in Our world will have shown you what it means to come to the Crossroads of Fate.”
Sunset took a deep breath. While I still can, she added privately.
“You know why I’m here,” she said. “Why do you need to hear it again?”
Sunset noticed for the first time that the figure was levitating a red apple behind her – behind its – hooded head. Her gasp became a sigh.
“AJ,” she said quietly.
“We don’t need to hear it again.” Whereas the headless horses shuffled and shivered in their harnesses, the stranger was a statue of marble and obsidian… which glared down upon its subject. “You need to rehearse it. Now, proceed from the beginning…”