The third morning came bright and gleaming. The sky was clear and the sun shone with an intensity very unlike November, warming hearts and spreading hope. Flowers where reported to have blossomed overnight and the waters of the bay where crystal clear, unmoving with not a single wave. With an enormous amount of effort, most of the debris at Scala harbour had been cleared to the side, with a single road cleared for the procession.
As the amphitheatre high above was still magically secure and untouched, many ponies chose to gather there. At the harbour below, the triremes and Tessarakonteres where brought to anchor in a perfect line, side by side forming a path upon the water.
“There” an earth pony pointed for others to see, “the mother lodestone will let the true King walk upon the waters in that line.”
“How will he do it?” some pegasi foals asked their elder.
Wise words having repeated this numerous times, she rejoiced at the attention.
“Ah younglings, no magic, no trick that be! The King will walk upon the water as if it was sand. The mother lodestone will take him within itself and then he will emerge to return to us. Ah to see a King be made twice in a lifetime! How blessed”
The foals nodded in wonderment and looked ahead. Forgotten where the horrors of earthquake and death and blight. Overlooked where the ruins of the entire town around them. Was it not all to be mended soon?
From the ships many ponies waved banners and cloths in excitement as they must have gotten word. Most ponies in the amphitheatre stood or flew up to see, to be the first to glimpse the candidates. Everything that would happen that day, from their dresses to their words would be recorded in history.
To the multitudes congregated at the harbour, if one ignored the ruins behind them, before them was a spectacle of old. Garlands of glittery fabric, ensorcelled baubles and crystalline flowers shone brightly in the sun. On the first ships before the wooden walkway that slanted down into the water, stood a quartet of musicians. Pegasi with fanfares on the right and Unicorns with blow horns on the left. Almost unseen, diminished as she was with age a ancient looking Earth pony crone waited patiently. She wore earth priestess robes and seemed to mind not the crowds, sun or the wait, so intense was the need of purpose that compelled her.
“A rite is to be be performed here!” she seemed to exude and no pony dare question her ability or knowledge.
The fanfares sounded first as the pegasi could be glimpsed in the distance. The crowds upon ship, harbour and amphitheatre stood up in an uproar.
“Aeolus! Aeolus for Marelantis!” came the shouts as the flying ponies flew once over the entire harbour to land spot on, at the right of the old crone.
Aneris was clad in the attire she was give in the Citadel three days ago and beside her holding her hoof firmly Aeolus stood in full orichalcum armour. The entourage that had followed them had split before they landed and waited on the stone harbour, among the crowds. Behind Aneris stood only her Aunt, Azure Gale in armur herself, and behind Aeolus his comrade Peregrine.
Together, the couple to be wed went towards the earth priestess when the blow horns boomed their call from their left. It signalled the unicorns who appeared one by one on the pier. Everypony looked about for the couple that would arrive on the wooden walkway only to be stunned by the flash of Concordia's teleportation. She alone appeared. No bridesmaid behind her and apparently no groom and comrade either.
“She must have chickened out on everything!How very like Concordia.” Aneris thought in glee and tugging momentarily at her groom-to-be, she urged them forward.
“WAIT!” Concordia bellowed for all to hear, her royal voice echoing in the bay from shore to shore. “Stand aside for the royal pair, Cronus Supreme and Rhea Gale” as she inclined her head and teleported them herself along with two ponies to assist them.
Aneris’s composure faltered momentarily but Aeolus’s grip steadied her. It suddenly seemed more possessive than reassuring and Aneris found a hidden feeling within herself. She wrenched her hoof away and walked towards her parents, noticing Concordia beside her as well.
Their parents where standing, visibly weak and exhausted. Aneris surged forward to hug them and planted a kiss upon each cheek.
“Father, Mother! You are well. Look” she gestured about her “ I am about to marry Aeolus and he will try for King..we will” but halted at the mere nod of her Father’s head.
“Father?” she asked.
“He cannot speak, Aneris” Concordia said sternly while her sister looked behind her and up into her face.
“No one told..”
“He lost his voice and both their sight. Mother will never fly…” but was shushed by her sister’s pleading eyes. Concordia averted her face and them heard as her sister bend down again to ask her parent’s blessing.
In a hoarse unused voice Rhea answered. “Of course you have it Aneris you and your sister, forever.”
Concordia frowned at that, was about to turn but saw her sister walk by to join the pegasi by the edge of the walkway. The crone awaited patiently not minding that her gown was touching the edge of the water as small ripples lipped over the planks.
Raising her gaze she called in trained oratory voice.
“Stand there before us, two souls wishing to be joined?”
“Yes!” answered Aneris and Aeolus in unison.
“Stand there before us any who should wish ill of this joining?”
Many eyes drew upon Concordia, yet she withstood the temptation to speak or move.
“Then speak vows for all to hear and be joined!
Aneris spoke up, no longer in amplified voice but audible nonetheless. From her hoof, holding her beloved’s she looked up into his eyes and spoke through tears.
“My warrior! I have loved you for many years and flown with you into battle, storm and tempest. My loyalty and love its endless and I wish to share that for as long as I live. I name you Prince.”
Cheers erupted yet again, causing Aneris to notice how silent everypony was before. When by a wave of Aeolus the din quieted down, he spoke looking briefly to her the towards the ponies of Marelantis.
“My warrior princess. Your beauty and bravery had captured me as now I have captured your heart! A good companion and a fine prize. As prince I take the right to ascension for Marelantis!” and thrust a fist upwards thrice “For Marelantis! For Marelantis!”
Aneris was shocked and confused. Where where his vows of love and a joined future, he did not even look at her! He held her hoof like spoils of war and almost rattled her as he thrust his fists in a battlecry. She looked over to her Aunt who cheered along the other ponies,as flowers and bits of fabric filled the air about them. Almost in panic she looked back at her sister who returned her with a gaze of knowing disgust.
“I did…not want it so…” she mouthed as she was drawn into a crushing kiss she did not want. Behind them Peregrine instinctively moved as if in protest but with a quick snap, Azure Gale caught him. “None of that” she whispered gritting her teeth.
The earth rumbled shortly and with recent memory of ruin, everypony was petrified in fear. All faces where illuminated when in the distance on its island, the mother lodestone shot a beam of purple brilliance to the sky. The other lodestones on the mainland did the same apart from the earth pony one. A few sparkles exited the gaping whole its remains lay for none to see.
The priestess called again and all settled for what would come next. Everywhere ponies strained to see, with looking glass, spell or crowding at the harbour. It would happen anytime now.
The earth priestess smiling reverence, beckoned as if to anyone.
“Stands there before us an anointed one?”
“I do!” Aneris called.
“I do!” Concordia called as well.
The cheers toned down as everyone expected either a wonder or a confrontation.
The priestess did not seem to mind the fact that more than one has spoken and continued unperturbed.
“By champion or yourself?” she asked.
“By MYSELF!” both sisters called.
“What?” Aeolus snapped, catching his bride by her shoulders “what are you doing?”
Aneris shoved him away with strength she did not know she had.
“You are not King yet” she equally snapped back “and you Aunt, stand aside!”
Concordia had walked, shrugging Aeolus and her Aunt to the side, to stand before the priestess along by sister.
Stoic the priestess almost shrieked to the heavens as if feeling power she could not handle.
“I call upon the Motherstone to bless them and let them pass the abyss”
Ans moving to the side like the lowliest of servants she gestured towards the water that had turned dark all of a sudden. To everyone's surprise, storm clouds gathered where there where none before and blotted out the sunlight.
Trans like, moved by powers beyond themselves, the sisters took simultaneous steps. Hovered a moment over the water and stepped on its surface. Taking one step after the other, not sinking.
No pony knew if to cheer or shout. All stood aghast at what they never expected. The roiling clouds did not help with the general mood, adding it it a foreboding. Where there should have been more cheers, exhalation and joy there was the shock of the unknown. Unable to act, the ponies of Marelantis watched as the sisters walked and walked upon the waters.
No King… No King… came a susurrus among the ponies. It reached Aeolus who had stood equally stunned watching what would happen next. No King…No king
The whispers where enraging and with a cry he grabbed a spear from a guard and fled after the sisters. “NO!” Azure Gale called and drew a long knife preparing to fly. A pegasus flew immensely fast before she could alight and saw no other than her sister Rhea, the former Queen in pursuit of her son.
The twins where almost to the other side, the glow of the Motherstone welcoming and warm, when from behind a battlecry came through the air. In shock both sisters turned to see Aeolus lunging towards them, towards Concordia, spearhead first.
“This is MIIIINEEE” he shrieked the last meters when with a crashing of flesh upon armour, Queen Rhea smashed into him, hurling them both to the rocks of the small island.
Aneris galloped the last meters forward and wanted to them but was halted by Concordia.
“No!” an agonized voice called and no other than Peregrine hurled himself where Aeolus lay, who was pinned down by the spear that was meant for Concordia. Unceremoniously he shoved the former Queen aside and keened, stroking his lovers face.
“Aeolus! Aeolus wake!” he called, tears running down and falling upon the others face.
Aeolus eyelids fluttered and opened a bit.
“Beloved…P…Peregrine?”
“Yes my love I am here” he cooed.
“Did we succeed?” Aeolus rasped, with blood on his teeth.
Yet they were silenced as Azure Gale shot another spear to pierce both her son and his lover, so that inn a last Kiss they were joined in death… for all present to see.
Aneris averted her eyes at the tender spectacle while Concordia took her by the hoof forward, when Azure Gale, crazed eyes and panting landed with a thud before them.
“YOU! Ungrateful spawn! Always! always ungrateful! You murdered my son, my only son, my sister! Dead! And now she is coming!”
The sisters looked about confused and shocked by what used to be their aunt.
“YES! She comes and she will have you all. SHE WILL HAVE US ALL!” she bellowed producing her long knife lunging forward.
Aneris moved before her sister to shield her but the weapon made contact with their father who had appears between them in that instant.
Dropping the knife and looking at her hooves she then snapped her head towards the sky. Her eyes opened wider and with a silent scream she fled as if demons where upon her.
Cronus fell forward sputtering and both his daughters held him, crying, stunned, helpless.
“Take me…take me to her” he asked and without knowing how, the sisters carried their father to his beloved. The rocks had snapped her neck, yet he took her in his arms, caressed her face and kissed her before expiring himself.
At that moment it was too much. Everything was too much for them. The pain had reached its peak, the death and blood all around them, the earth trembling and the air crackling with energy.
They held each other fiercely and called loudly in a primal scream that roiled the waters and stirred the lodestones. In a sphere of energy that surrounded them, they were picked up by the mother lodestone and plunged within it.
The world turned white.
———————————
The night before Spell Wright had stumbled within the secret chamber and awakened Discord in his prison. The creature did not need any awakening, thought it did pretend having been stirred from slumber.
On the surface of his sphere he wrote mocking words, to rejoice in the agony of his tormentor.
“Aaaaah! Has you mare denounced you, little mage? Imagine! The first mage’s son. A cuckold by a princess who would rather have none than you! This is delightful! Tell me more little mage.”
Spell Wright shook.
“Shut up! Shut up!” he called while he swept objects away from tables, hurling potions against the crystal sphere and cursing..
“I will destroy everything she wants, but first I will ne King! Yes, tomorrow…”
An enticing voice came into his mind and the stallion halted to make sure it was not imagine. He had an imaginary voice for the draconequus whenever he read the words, but this wa too real…
“Hmmm…” the voice cooed “I might be able to help…”
“What?” Spell Wright rose and turned to the sphere. “What are you saying worm!”
“Oh I just mused that since you have a one way spell to bring things inside to me, you could reverse it just for me to give you this” and he brought forward the black stone on its string, that one birthday gift he never let go of.
The pony bent forward and then drew back…
“You trick me” he refused.
“Well” Discord spoke in disinterest “ if you do not so something soon enough, tomorrow you will have a new King to find you and your daddy and have you be hanged!”
Spell Wright refused again and spent the rest of the night in thought, drinking of excessive amounts of wine and destruction of objects.
Morning found him watching through a spyglass, wrapped in his cloak and feeling miserable.
A servant apperead too gleeful for Spell Wright to handle and told him the news before galloping away.
“Master Spell Wright, you father has called upon you and said you know where to find him! I am off, we get a KIng today!”
Spell Wright poked his tongue out in disgust and slowly made his way to the secret chamber. Finding everything dark he called
“Father?”
Summoning a mage light that dimmed immediately he descended the stairs and reached the far end where the lodestone tip loomed over Discord’s prison sphere. Walking around the contraption and looking up to see for any messages, he stumbled upon a sack on the floor. Rising and turning to see, reeling from his hangover, he found his father’s corpse. Crying in alarm and dismay he shouted “what happened? Father! Father!”
“Nothing happened that wasn't his doing” came Discord’s voice, deep and matter of factly. He appeared in full draconequus form, toothy grin and talons scraping against the crystal walls.
“Tell… me… how… this… happened! Worm! Or I will kill you here and now!” he stallion shouted.
Discord complied by pointing over at where they previously sent the earthquake spell into the ground. An intricate seal was drawn upon the stones and it pulsated menacingly.
“He found a solution that is all, the spell is still there waiting, but he could not handle it…it killed him in an instant. Quite painless I dare say.”
“Why!!” Spell Wright shouted, approaching the drawn symbols slowly.
Behind him Discord grinned with glee, his voice betraying nothing.
“Oh it was something about not loving the target of the spell and all. Simple actually. When she touches the lodestone and if you love the target, our sweet Concordia, you get the Chrism and you become King…”
Spell Wright neared the seal, hooves outstretched. Discord went on with his hypnotic speech.
“Your father did not love her enough as much as you do. You are the one. Touch it!”
As he said that, the stallion bend forward and touched both forehooves upon the seal. The pony died instantly but not before the seal that was no other than the reseal spell of his prison, let him out.
Crystal Quill who was compelled to appear dead, now stirred and moaned.
“Now to you” Discord growled, taking one pained step after another claws and talon clenching and his teeth extending in a grimace of horror. “I will take my time…”
“DISCORD” the voice came from within the lodestone.
“I dont need you any more Pebble, go whither and die.” The draconequus taunted.
Yet a black tendril shot from within the lodestone and caught him around the waist. Discord squirmed and wondered how it was still possible that pebble resided within the lodestones even after the explosion at the earth pony temple.
“I only wanted that from you!” Pebble’s voice boomed and the tendril sprouted another, plucked the pendant from Discord’s neck and let him fall to the ground.
“I propose you run Creature of Chaos!” Pebble said, his voice dimming.
“Soon one will arrive who can best you!”
At that moment the lodestones erupted in energy, at the call from the priestess far away in the harbour. Rampant spells were triggered and shot everywhere. Worse, the devastating deep earthquake spell came to life again and sent a pulse deep beneath the soil.
White light, everywhere and as far as they could see, met with the two ponies.
Concordia saw her sister in the distance and as the latter already galloped to her andhugged for a long time and separated to look about.
“Doesn't this remind you of that time we met Discord? But only white…”
“Yes!”Concordia exclaimed and shouted about “Discord! Are you here?”
“What are you doing?” Aneris shushed her.
“What he might be here, he might.” And sat back onto her haunches.
Aneris looked at her sister and smiled.
“You really love him don’t you?”
“Who?” Concordia said taken aback.
“You know who…Discord, you like him” she said but not unkind.
“I…” Concordia inclined her head ashamed.
“Does not matter now” Aneris said rising and handing a hoof in aid for her sister “lets find him!” she went about shouting and running around.
“It any pony here?” Concordia said dejected.
“I am!” came a voice unknown to them. While in the far distance a form shimmered.
“Aneris Look!” shouted Concordia and both ran towards the figure. Skidding to a stop at the sight.
Before them stood a stallion, the brightest of white and to their shock was both pegasus and unicorn. His mane and tail where transparent utterly colourless while his eyes the brightest of red. An albino, they both thought, a unipegasus of legend!
“I would prefer the term Alicorn, beloved sisters, Pegasus, Unicorn and Earth pony I am all and none.” With a bow he inclined his magnificent horn, longer than any they had seen on a pony. “You may call me Pebble”
“Sisters?” Concordia asked.
“Yes, I am your brother, taken as stillborn from our mother and a empty tomb in my name.” He said saddened.
“Where are you? Where where you all this time?” Aneris asked astonished.
“I am within the lodestones, I am part of them by now but watch as visions convey memories better than words”
With flourish of his hoof, he brought all his memories forth, for his sisters to see as if they where their own.
From birth to adulthood they saw. They felt his pain and loneliness, were betrayed at the earth pony priests behind this scheme, wept when they saw what their Aunt did to her utter doom and cried in anger as they saw Discord’s imprisonment. A long time and in no time at all, they were privy to each other’s thoughts and now were also aware at the peril of Marelantis.
To the west the poena was already advancing upon Marelantis with a decades worth of hunger and a tempest in her wake. To the east, the blight only momentarily dormant, stirred to surface and to the north… a destructive spell was draining the lodestones and would drain them completely to reach the core of the planet itself.
“The planet!” Aneris shouted
“You mean our entire world? Is this…the end of everything?” Concordia choked and clasped her sister’s hoof.
“There is a way…” Pebbled said as both his sisters looked up.
“Its a choice and a burden…for you see the world is doomed. But it can be delayed, for many centuries at that.”
“I dont care about centuries, eerrm…Pebble, our lands it out there, its ponies dying” Concordia said, desperate.
Pebble shook his head negatively. “Its responsibility for all the ages or nothing! Who knows maybe we can find a solution until the end”
“We?” both mares asked.
Their brother nodded, touching his chest.
“Look at me, I am possible, and within the lodestone we can make this possible again”
“You mean…”
“Synthesis! The three of us with the will of the Lodestone will be one new being!” he said in joy but not with the slightest of greed.
For along time the sisters looked within each other’s eyes and reached a consensus more akin to a feeling and walked towards their brother hoof in hoof. He took each offered hoof into his and closed his eyes. The white world around them winked out, paused as if in thought and returned to white.
“You can you hear me” a voice comprised of many voices beckoned.
With a jumble of combined thoughts and inner voices, the Alicorn can to her senses.
“I hear you, are you the Lodestone?” she asked with a new voice sounding strange to her ears. Her hooves seemed further away than usual ans she felt vast. From within and physically she felt endless, ready to surge up and be born into the world.
“Hold on, young one. As you are you would emerge in a world as it collapses.”
“What must I do” the Alicorn asked, lowering her wings.
“Accept me within your very being. Then, knowing you will be powerless before your mission, compelled and drawn to save the future from ruin do you agree to it?”
The Alicorn nodded.
“Knowing you will live long beyond any of your subjects, do you agree to it?”
She nodded again.
“Then so be it. Accept this minor gift and then bow to me”
“Gift?” she wondered and was struck by a vision. Her sight wrenched from the land, high over water and cloud. Higher higher until she saw only stars. From below immense sail ships immersed and flew away from the world, her world, towards a beckoning star impossibly far. One of the ships, the last one, bore the name “U.E.N Harmony” before it followed in the wake of the others.
When she blinked she was back in the white world and she found she knew her name.
Bowing deeply knowing by the gift of prescience, where she must guide the future to, she opened up her mind and soul to the lodestone.
Like a cocoon the mother lodestone cracked and ripped at the seams. A time wave surged out and froze everything in a single beat of the smallest time unit. The Alicorn breeched the time wave like a membrane and flew arrow straight into the sky. From her impossible height she could see, she felt, the destructive spell having penetrated the earth but advancing at a slow pace. There were no more lodestone and she knew without thinking that she was the lodestones. Thus the spell had very little power to draw on and indeed would takes centuries to even reach the core.
The land was torn though, Teutonic plates where given adequate space to rip the seafloor and the land in three and water had started surging to will the gaping crevasses.To the west, the poena had merged with the tempest she called to her and was a big as a city, grotesque demonic maw gaping to suck in souls.
Finding she could jump in and out the time-wave, the Alicorn surged below to fly across Marelantis, whisking any survivor she could as if she were plucking flowers while running through a field. Not many, eight thousand or less where transferred upon the ships, and the rest upon the small island at the mouth of the harbour. The ships she levitated, a titanic effort but a mere thought, to rest by that island as well, shielding them with a large dome. She cared not that within that dome the time-wave did not exist and ponies where slapped out of their stasis, falling and stumbling wherever they where deposited.
Thousands of eyes saw that a legend of old, a unipegasus was flying out there.
“Alicorn” came a thought into all minds, and all knew it as if it was their own.
Outside, a single enormous wave had been halted, boiling crest moving, at the northern border. “A tsunami! From the earthquake!” ponies shouted and pointed when a streak of light shot from east to west, so smash with a wave of colour against a demon cloud. The Alicorn slashed it with horn and hoof and as it retreated from her attack, she spread her wings wide. Bigger than any pony she resembled the horses from the mainland, and her wings where tipped with brightness. Her aquamarine coat brought recognition to the masses.
“Its one of the princesses! She has been chose to lead!” they cried in joy as the Alicorn swept her wings forward in a powerful beat, rainbow coloured light obliterating the demon cloud, poena and tempest alike. In the space bereft of what was before, winds and clouds swept in, even some waves, impossibly high where sucked to that point. The Alicorn seemed to move slower now, perusing the remnants of Marelantis beneath, seemed as if to sob when she clutched her chest and released the immense wave that loomed ever higher hundreds of meters above ground.
When she entered the protective dome at the islet, her aura alone brought all ponies to kneel. She diminished her aura, her being and power to that of one mundane ponies could handle. Flicking an annoying itch at her throat without taking notice what fell upon the rocks, a near perfect black gem on a string was sent into the shallows among debris and seaweed, forgotten.
The Alicorn alighted upon a short mast and presented herself so that upon ship and island she was seen.
A stallion, she knew his name, she new all of their names!, grovelled forward on the deck and asked trembling.
“Who..who are you”
In the royal voice, for all to hear she proclaimed.
“I am Harmony the Twinned and I will protect you during this cataclysm”