//------------------------------//
// Chapter 13 
// Story: Whatever Way the Wind Takes You 
// by kudzuhaiku 
//------------------------------//

From the journal of Gloomy August—





Duty. I have seen creatures who live for duty. Mistral, the little colt I met in the Crystal Empire, he lives to serve. Looking back on it, I was so worried about Princess Cadance putting him to work, but it was the best thing she could have done for him. Even though he had such troubling circumstances, he seemed happy in service and he had a sort of pride about him while he dutifully followed Prince Shining Armor around.

Hachikō is another who lives for duty, and his sense of duty seems to be to inspire a sense of duty in others. I know he did for me, even though I did not see it at the time. I guess, looking back, I had only just begun to open my eyes at that point. Could it be described as waking up? It might. I learned how to be a better pegasus from a diamond dog, and he nurtured my sense of duty once it awoke.

Princess Cadance lives to serve and I saw that for myself. She has given all of herself to heal the crystal ponies of the Crystal Empire. Every day she works to restore them, to give them back their dignity, she heals them from Sombra’s awful rule. Shining Armor serves both his wife and his empire, and he is a happy pony. At least, I think he is. It seems to be that in servitude there is some sense of satisfaction, and I think about how we equines serve. Our cutie marks, each other, our Princesses.

Working on the weather team, I did my job and I existed. There was no sense of duty, of purpose. Every day, I woke up, I did my job to the best of my ability, and then I went home to my nice little house. I paid my bills and did my best to live within my means. Everything was fine and good until one day, one day I just couldn’t do it anymore. So I flew away and allowed the wind to take me.

Of course, I found Silver Lining’s egg, and that changed everything. Silver Lining changed everything. Suddenly, I had duty, I had purpose. I became a goodwill ambassador. I got my own royal rubber stamp and special stationery to show that I was a duly appointed agent of the Crown. As all of this happened, I also became a mother. A mother, a diplomat, a weather worker, and a writer. All of these journal entries, there’s been so many of them, and I guess, sometime in the future, long after I am gone, somepony will have a duty to read these, and learn something from them, and so I have a duty to tell all about how a pegasus flew away from home one day to find her purpose. How, with but one kind act, she changed the course of history and brought two nations into what seems to be a permanent alliance. The story is such a long one and it is still being told.

One pegasus with purpose can make a difference.





The Glass Gallery was a place often filled with the sounds of weeping, and Gloomy had certainly shed many of her own tears in this place. Today, so far, she was dry eyed, but the strange magic of this place—for it surely must be magic—was having quite an effect upon her. Yawning, she covered her mouth with one wing and shifted her weight from one haunch to another. Sleeping was difficult now, hard, it seemed that the moment her head hit the pillow the troubling dreams would start. A griffoness locked in mortal combat with a manticore. The blood—the horrifying scent of blood, coppery and electric—the torrent of splashing blood that flooded the dreamscapes of her mind and the memory of which left her troubled.

Her own actions and what she had done with the spear. Necessary though they might have been, some things, once done, had to be lived with. There was no going back, no return to sweet, unblemished innocence. Leaning over the Pool of Tears, Gloomy looked down at her own reflection and tried to make peace with it. Nearby, a magnificent statue of a unicorn known as Princess Amore wept a flood of tears that trickled down into the reflecting pool.

For a moment, looking down, she saw a stranger’s face looking back at her; a savage, feral pegasus scabbed over with blood, her teeth pink with it, her mane was matted and her eyes had a ferocious gleam. It was a pegasus from another time, from Equestria’s dark and bloody past… the Sanguine Age that she had learned about in school. Jerking her head back, Gloomy whimpered, terrified, and she wrapped one wing around the egg that was slung around her neck.

“Why do I keep seeing you?” Gloomy asked in a mumbled whisper as she avoided looking into the water. “What is the magic of this pool?”

In a nearby alcove, a grieving father wept and Gloomy’s ears pricked at the sound. Even in the depths of her own sorrow, compassion burned like a bright flame, and she felt pity for him. He was a father who had lost his son, a soldier, and he was a pony consumed with grief. Gloomy had spoken to him a few times, though never for long, because he could not hold back the flood.

Hearing the sound of hooves striking crystal, Gloomy realised that she was not alone. She wanted to look, but didn’t, it felt awkward sharing this place with others who were so troubled and sometimes grief wanted privacy. The hooves drew closer though, and closer, and closer still, until Gloomy realised that she was not alone. An older mare sat down just a leg’s length away, sighed, and grimaced as her old bones gave her trouble.

“Mrs. Milkweed—”

“Just Milkweed,” the old mare said, sounding tired.

Gloomy knew this mare. She was mourning her husband and grieving her own long life. A centenarian, she had outlived some of her own offspring. Milkweed was a pony that knew loss, having seen and endured much during her long life. Feeling conflicted, Gloomy scooted a little closer, and the withered, ancient unicorn of indeterminate faded grey colour didn’t seem to mind.

“This pool troubles you, does it not?” Milkweed asked.

Scooting even closer, Gloomy nodded.

“When I first started working at Princess Celestia’s School for Gifted Unicorns, it was a troubled time.” The old mare’s voice sounded dry, almost papery, like leaves rustling together in the wind. “Change was coming. The nation was tearing itself apart. Princess Celestia was so alarmed by everything happening, so very much troubled by it, that she had me teaching offensive spells to her students. I was good at them, you see.”

When the old mare leaned over, Gloomy was glad for the contact, and waited for the story to continue, knowing that Milkweed would eventually reach a point. As a very old teacher, the mare couldn’t help but lecture and educate. It was just her way, and Gloomy didn’t mind. In fact, she welcomed the distraction.

“We had that nasty business with Equestria’s uncivil war… a few separatists went a little too far and began to force their opinions on others. There was much unpleasantness, for a time.” The old mare snorted and when she scowled, her face had an impossible number of wrinkles. “Time passed, because that is what time does, and after about thirty or so years of working as a teacher for Princess Celestia, I was promoted to a Professor and I was put in charge of teaching history. I have no idea why. That was over fifty years ago.”

Some of the wrinkles fell away and the old mare chuckled a bit, amused by her own joke.

Reaching out a hoof, she gestured at the statue of Princess Amore, and then down at the Pool of Tears. For a time, she seemed as though she was about to say something, and even though her mouth moved, no words came forth. One ear quivered, the other ear twitched, and the old mare leaned even more against Gloomy, shivering a little.

Eventually, as words must do, they came.

“An eon ago, a young colt looked into this pool and saw a monster staring back. He saw shadows, death, fire, and smoke. Word has it that this troubled him, and so he told his only friend about it. So she looked into the pool, and she saw a princess. At least, that is how some versions of the story are told. Other versions of this story say they looked into the Crystal Heart and had their visions of the future. Something happened though, because Sombra preserved this statue and this pool even as he descended into utter madness. To tamper with it in any way was death, swift and certain.”

“But what does the pool do?” Gloomy asked as her impatience got the best of her.

“Near as I can tell, it shows us what we fear the most, or what we regret the most,” the old mare replied. “Word has it, from the slaves who served here in the palace, King Sombra gazed into this pool and wept many bitter tears. Some of the water down below is no doubt his, and the tears of many others. Each of those tears carry just a little spark of magic, so it is hard to say just what sort of magic this pool has evolved over time.

With cautious apprehension, Gloomy leaned forwards, peered over the edge, and down at the reflection that she saw in the water. It was, for now, herself, just as she was, nothing more, nothing less. It was confusing for her to think that some of her tears might have mingled with King Sombra’s, and she didn’t know how she should feel about such a thing. Compassion for a monster… this thought troubled her, mostly because she was the one thinking it, and a stern, flinty voice from the back of her mind reminded her that some ponies thought that griffons too, were monsters.

Chastised, Gloomy’s ears fell and her eyes began to glaze over with tears as she thought of her own reflection, the bloodied one, the savage, feral pegasus with bloody warpaint. Now, it seemed, compassion for a monster seemed far more reasonable, and she reminded herself that the troubled tyrant was once a pony, he had even been a colt once, and he had a friend. He had feelings.

And if the stories could be believed, regrets.

“This place has its own magic,” Milkweed said as she peered up at the beatific statue of Princess Amore. “Sombra filled this place with shadows, and Princess Cadance has infused her own essence into the crystal. A strange mix has happened. In the Glass Gallery in particular, I have observed much strange magic, unknown magic, and there is something about this place that makes one examine the foundations of one’s soul. There is no place in Equestria quite like it.”

Blinking, Gloomy pulled her head back, fearing the sight of her own shadow looking up at her from the pool. Aware of the darkness within herself now, she cuddled her precious egg with her wing and feared what she could be. What she might be. She was a pegasus pony and she had learned much of what she was capable of during her journey. The storm had taught her much and she was far, far braver than she had previously believed. As for the day when she had found her egg…

“What do you see when you look into the pool?” Gloomy hoped that she wasn’t being rude, but she really, really wanted to know.

“A long life,” Milkweed replied, “that stretches ever-longer. I am old and my bones are tired. My husband is gone and he was the only pony who could pull me from my melancholy. While I love my foals, and my grandfoals, and my great-grandfoals, and even my great-great-grandfoals, it seems that I have become a burden to them. A nuisance. At least, I feel that way. They’re not even allowed to play around me, because Grandmare is old and sickly and needs her rest.”

With her own troubles forgotten, Gloomy wrapped her wing around the old mare and sat there, not knowing what to say or how to respond to such a thing. Would her bloody reflection do this? Offer comfort to another? Or would she be a creature given only to carnage? During the Sanguine Age, a pony was an old pony in their twenties—just two decades, that was the allotment, and those that saw twenty were considered lucky. Milkweed was a centenarian… five glorious lifetimes. Five lives’ worth of history. She had taught longer than some ponies had lived, or had been alive.

What might a cutie mark do when one had lived too long? Did the nagging demands of duty lessen when faced with infirmity? What purpose could one serve at such an advanced age? When she was too old to flap her wings, would she still have an itch to work the weather? Would she look out the window and pine for a task she could no longer do? What was the purpose of life if one lived for so long that they became useless and purposeless?

With one wing, Gloomy held on to a pony whose life might soon be ending, and with the other she cradled and kept warm another life that might soon begin. As a mare, as a pony, Gloomy herself was somewhere in the middle; she had been born, she had grown up, and she had existed, but she wasn’t certain if she had lived. Ears pinned back in submission, once more, Gloomy leaned her head over the edge to have another glance into the pool, still fearing what she might see…