This wasn’t just new to Summer Dawn.
Landing on the cloud released from the Stratus Barrel, Starjumper flapped his wings a couple of times before folding them. He’d never been out over the ocean before, and flying over it was a deceptively confusing challenge to him. There were no landmarks out here, nothing under him but water, and all he had to guide him were the stars, a map, and a compass. It was amazingly clear out here, no other clouds in the sky, the stars a brilliant curtain of twinkling lights laid over the night sky, the waves on the water below reflecting the light back up in a shimmering dance of ghostly light, and when he looked up he had the feeling that he could see all the way to the end of the sky. The air was still, cold, and biting, but the heatstone pressed against his chest made him take no notice of it as Summer Dawn and Moonshade exited the carrying pack, landed on the cloud, and then Summer Dawn returned them to their normal size with her magic.
This was a planned stop, giving Starjumper a chance to eat, rest, and make sure he was on the right course. But what he hadn’t planned was that both of them would still be awake…well, Moonshade anyway. Summer Dawn was trying to stay awake so she could sleep at the same time he did, to maximize the time they could spend together when he wasn’t flying. Moonshade had flown all day, and he was honestly surprised that she wasn’t sleeping.
She’d flown them a long way that first day, getting them much further than he expected, and at the pace they were going, they were going to reach the coast of Maretonia in two days, tomorrow night. And by Luna’s grace, he was bound and determined to fly just as far as she did. He wasn’t about to let her hold that over him.
“You need to sleep, Moonshade,” he told her as he partially opened his wings and sat down on the cloud, allowing Summer Dawn to pull a small loaf of honeyed spice bread from her pack and offer it to him.
“I slept a bit after we switched,” she said. “And I’ll go back to sleep when we’re moving again. How far are we?”
“As near as I can tell, about three hundred miles from where we switched,” he answered. “It’s hard to tell how fast I’m going when there are no landmarks.”
“You should be able to tell by how much you’re exerting yourself,” she told him professionally. “I can fly with a blindfold on and tell you exactly how far I flew with nothing but a clock. Distance is a matter of speed over time. If I know the time, I can tell you the distance because I know how fast I can fly.”
“I’m not trained as much as you are,” he admitted.
“Still, if you’re right about the distance, you’re making pretty good time,” she told him as she pulled a waterskin from her pack, then took a long swallow. “We might reach Maretonia late tomorrow night or the morning after.”
“That’s what I’m hoping,” he nodded, then took a fairly large bite of the honeyed spice bread. It was an old recipe that was a staple for thestral soldiers, for the bread was filling and packed with energy.
“Look at that,” Summer Dawn said, looking down over the edge of the cloud. “It’s almost like it goes on forever.”
“I know. I’d never seen the sea until I was sent to Equestria,” Moonshade said. “I didn’t think that much water could exist in the whole world…and that’s just one sea. The maps say there’s two others.”
“I’ve seen it from the coast, but never from out here, or from so far up,” she elaborated. “Have you, Star?”
“From the beach yes, but not like this,” he replied. “I’ve never been out over the water before, or in it. I wasn’t sure if being in the water would count as leaving Equestria.”
“Really?”
He nodded. “When I learned to fly, that was the first thing my mother taught me, to never fly over the ocean. She didn’t tell me why at first,” he said musingly as he looked down at the ocean below. “Baltimare is a coastal town, so I’d fly up to the old lighthouse and sit up there and look out over the water, wondering what was on the other side. But then I learned about the treaty,” he said distantly. “And I knew I’d never be able to go. I don’t think I ever went to the lighthouse again after that. It was like…it had no meaning anymore.” He blinked, and then felt a bit sheepish and embarrassed because Moonshade had heard him. He felt comfortable telling Summer Dawn those kinds of things, but Moonshade…not so much.
“You really took the treaty seriously,” Moonshade said in a quiet, direct voice.
“I was told what would happen if I broke it, and to make sure I understood the full gravity of what it meant, Mother was not very kind or gentle about how she explained it. And for a foal, that was very frightening,” he answered. “When I was a colt, I had nightmares that I started a war just because I put one hoof in the ocean.”
He could see the compassion shimmering in Summer Dawn’s eyes, and that made him feel even more sheepish for some reason.
“How are the Thestralla lessons going?” he asked, changing the subject.
“I learned some new phrases,” she replied proudly. “But I don’t quite get the grammar behind them.”
“Thestralla is about as different from Ponish as a language can get,” he told her supportively. “And ponies seem to have a particularly tough time learning it. It took Dad years to learn it.”
“Ponies think too rigidly,” Moonshade said calmly. “And they want everything spelled out for them. Thestralla isn’t like that.”
“What does how I think have to do with speaking Thestralla?” Summer Dawn asked.
“To speak a language, you have to be able to think in that language,” she replied. “Ponish is rigid. It has tons of rules, it has an unyielding structure. It’s very formal,” she stressed. “That means ponies think that way, and that’s gonna make it hard for them to think in Thestralla. Most ponies that learn Thestralla can’t wrap their heads around the idea that you don’t have to say everything to get your point across. They always want to elaborate, fill in, and that’s not how native speakers do it. It’s much easier for a pony like me to adopt your rules than it is for a unicorn who knows nothing but those rules to suddenly be free of them. They can’t seem to function without them.”
He could see the challenge in Summer Dawn’s eyes, and it nearly made him chuckle. “She’s right about that,” he affirmed. “Mom made sure to teach us Thestralla starting from the cradle, where Dad still hadn’t mastered the language until well after Songbird was born. Like I said, it took him years to learn it. And I mean years.”
“Foals learn languages much easier than adults,” Moonshade said, to which Starjumper nodded in agreement.
“Well, I’m going to prove both of you wrong,” Summer Dawn declared. “I’m going to learn Thestralla, and it’s not going to take me years.”
“If you were some other unicorn, I’d laugh at that statement,” Moonshade told her. “But you’re not like most unicorns, little slip. You just might be able to do it.”
“What she means is, you’re a very adaptable and creative pony, Summer. I saw it in you when I taught you magic. You see what other ponies miss, you’re able to change your viewpoint to see things from a different direction when the situation demands it. That’s going to help you learn Thestralla, because you can free yourself from the rules that restrain most other native Ponish speakers.”
“Yup.”
She almost beamed at them. “Well, then, I’ll do my best not to disappoint either of you,” she said modestly.
“Between the two of us, she should be able to understand the most important words and phrases by the time we get to the Nightlands,” Starjumper noted to Moonshade.
“Yup. Maybe even more than that.”
After the meal, he was back on the wing with the mares in the carry pack, leaving him more or less alone with his thoughts. He’d always done his best thinking while flying, because there were no real distractions so long as he wasn’t doing anything like stunt flying, solitude, and the wind in his face and feel of the air rushing over his wings had always had a calming effect on him. There really that much to think about, given how well prepared they were for this trip, and that caused him to spend most of the night not thinking about the mission, or the potential dangers ahead of them, but of Summer Dawn. She filled his thoughts, both memories of her and thoughts of the future, and of course, the biggest thing he thought about wasn’t her magic, or her training, but how the hay he was going to court a girl that was nothing like him and had everything. They were true opposites. He was a brooding, guarded, unfriendly stallion with a dark past and carrying a whole lot of baggage, and she was…well, perfect. Smart, kind, gentle, funny, powerful, resourceful, courageous, determined, rich—Luna was she rich—and beautiful beyond compare. She was the mare every stallion hoped to find someday, and he still couldn’t believe that she had fallen in love with him.
A Lykan. The antithesis of almost everything she was.
Truly, opposites did seem to attract.
Most of the night was filled with thoughts of how his life was going to change with her in it, once they got back home. There was no way he was leaving Canterlot now, so he had to find a way to make a life for himself in a town where everypony more or less hated him. It was going to be hard. It was going to be emotionally taxing for him. But to be near Summer Dawn, it would all be worth it. He’d endure their cold stares and the whispering behind their hooves and the flat hostility and the fear just to see Summer Dawn smile. She was what mattered, and the tribulations he would endure living in Canterlot were nothing so long as she looked at him with love in her eyes. She was the only pony in Canterlot that mattered to him. She was the only pony in Canterlot he would fight to protect. And so long as she was happy, then he was happy.
He supposed he could do what he was doing now. He did like to teach, and Fancy Pants and Fleur de Lis showed him that he enjoyed teaching ponies other than Summer Dawn. Most of his time would be devoted to her, teaching her everything he knew, but when they reached that point, when she went beyond him in both learning and ability, he could tutor other ponies to support himself…and take lessons from her.
The time would come, and come sooner than she believed, when he would be her student. And rather than be jealous, or bitter, he would be so incredibly proud of her, proud to see her achieve her full potential and know that he had a part to play in it.
Luna’s moon, it was so strange, being in love. How his entire thought process had changed, how the center of his life had shifted dramatically. He was no longer the center of his own universe, she was, and he was still coming to grips with that revelation. But he liked it. Luna’s eternal grace, but did he like it.
He had never felt so…happy.
It was a bit of an amusing conundrum for them when they reached the coast of Maretonia, because they arrived almost exactly at dawn, after almost exactly three days over the vast eastern sea. They’d left from Manehattan at dawn three days ago, and they reached the peninsula that was the closest point of land to Manehattan in the Eastern Kingdoms a shade under three days later. Starjumper was unsure if he was going to make the coast before sunrise when he first spotted it, making him a bit indecisive as to if he needed to use the Stratus Barrel, but putting on some extra speed got him on the ground a good ten minutes before the sun rose, giving the mares time to unshrink and join him in their first steps on land since leaving Equestria. The soil here was no different from the soil back in Equestria, the grass under his hooves the same color, the same smell, the same appearance, but this land felt different to him, as if he knew he was in Equestria no longer. He wasn’t sure why he felt like that, but he did. It had to be the fact that there was no sense of peace and safety and security here. This was a land where there were no rules that protected him from the thestrals, a land he did not know. He had no hiding spots here, no hidden cubbies or caves in which to take shelter. He was vulnerable here, and that knowledge made this place seem vaguely…sinister.
It certainly didn’t look like an alien landscape. The trees in the distance were the same as the trees back home. The grass looked the same, smelled the same, as did the sea air and the sound of waves crashing on the rocks not far away. This grassy seaside plain could be the land north of Baltimare, heading towards Fillydelphia, and the tidy cottage well inland was built the in the same style as houses back home. It wouldn’t look out of place anywhere in Baltimare or out among the small farming villages inland of the city.
They’d planned to take an extended break once reaching land, so Starjumper allowed Summer Dawn to remove the pack saddle, then she opened it and started taking out the supplies they’d need to make a campfire and cook a hearty breakfast. Starjumper changed while they set up the campfire to cook a filling, hearty breakfast to celebrate reaching the shoreline, and once he had his horn, he helped her as Moonshade laid on her belly sedately beside the just-lit fire. “How far is to Marette from here?” Summer Dawn asked.
“About three quarters of a day,” Moonshade answered. “We’ll arrive late in the afternoon. We’ll deliver the Princess’ message, write that letter, and by then it should be after sunset and Starjumper can fly the next leg.”
“Sounds good to me,” Starjumper noted as he set a pan on the rack set over the fire, coated it in sunflower oil, then poured blackcap batter into it for blackcap flapjacks. “From what I remember of the map, I should reach Crystallon right around dawn as long as I don’t dawdle.”
She nodded up at him. “It’d be best if you land short of it and let yourself change. They’ll be nicer to you if you’re a unicorn…though not by much. That’s where we slow down a whole lot so we can reach the checkpoints I’ve chosen at certain times over the night when I think we have the best chance to get through without being spotted. Once we reach the final layover, we wait for sunrise, then execute the plan.”
“You’re sure you can get in?”
“Positive,” she assured him. “If we haven’t been spotted, I can just walk in. If we have, I know another way in. And if the little slip is willing to help, I know yet another way in that’s much faster.”
“I’ll do whatever you need me to do, Moonshade,” Summer Dawn assured her. “What do you need?”
“There’s a drainage pipe that runs from the side of the cliff under the castle into the lower levels,” she replied. “It’s far too small for the castle guards to defend it. If you can shrink us down, we can walk up the pipe. You unshrink me when we get to the other side and teleport back to the cave. I can bypass most of the guards that way.”
“That’s a great idea. Of course I’ll help,” Summer Dawn told her animatedly.
“How do you know where it lets out?” Starjumper asked.
“Because I used to send little pieces of wood down the pipe and try to find them on the rocks at the bottom of the cliff when I was a filly,” she answered. “The pipe opens up in a hallway near the stairs that lead down to where the Night Stone is kept. It’s part of the old dungeon. Once I’m out of the pipe, I can be in the chamber in five minutes, and get there without being seen. The guards don’t patrol those stairs or the hallway leading to the chamber.”
“That may be your best way in period,” Starjumper mused. “There’s always the chance that if you just walk in, the guards may slow you down just asking you questions about how you escaped and got back.”
She considered that for a second, then nodded. “I think you’re right. We’ll do it that way,” she agreed.
After a hot, filling meal, Starjumper and Summer Dawn shrunk down and let Moonshade carry them as she flew inland, arrow-straight for the capitol of Maretonia, Marette. Summer Dawn settled in with him and they both slept through the morning and early afternoon, sleeping beside the mesh window so the warm, dry air flowed over them, and they woke up when Moonshade gave a loud call and jostled the bag enough to rouse them. They were high over the land, a series of small hamlets under them with neat and orderly farm fields surrounding the villages, but a large city was in the distance, nestled in a very shallow U-shaped valley with rolling foothills behind it, and a river flowing in front of the city with three different large bridges spanning it, where the roads that anchored the foot of each bridge trailed off into the distance.
Though he had never seen it before, this had to be the city of Marette, the largest city in Maretonia and the home of the Duke and Duchess that ruled this land.
“So many farms,” Summer Dawn said. “I’ve never seen so many farms.”
“I guess everypony wants to live close to the city,” Starjumper guessed. “Besides, look at those roads. Most of the major roads in Maretonia must lead here, so this would be the best place to build a farm or a business.”
“No train tracks,” she noticed.
“Yeah, you’re right. I guess they haven’t built them over here,” he agreed as he turned and looked out the side mesh.
Moonshade decided to land directly in the city, nearly startling a mare and her foal out of their hooves as she dropped down and flared her wings just before hitting the cobblestones of the street. The buildings were built very close together, Starjumper noticed, even closer together than they were in Canterlot, and the streets here weren’t as wide as in Canterlot. That turned the streets into shallow canyons that felt constricting. Moonshade opened the flap, and Starjumper lifted him and Summer Dawn out of the pack and reversed the shrink spell before they even reached the street, eliciting several startled gasps from the onlookers who had been attracted by Moonshade’s sudden arrival. “You could have at least landed close to the palace,” Starjumper accused.
“I’ve been here before. I got into trouble for doing that the last time,” she answered.
“Fair enough. You want me to take the pack?”
“Sure, if you’re offering.”
Starjumper unbuckled it and lifted it off her back using magic, then settled it over his own back. He would have rather shrunk it down, but he couldn’t do that with it holding items that were already shrunk; trying to shrink a bag holding a shrunken item caused both spells to go crazy, with unpredictable and potentially dangerous results. Once he had it buckled and the straps adjusted for his chest and back, they started down the long, straight street that ended in a plaza in front of the Duke’s palace. The castle was visible at the end of the canyon formed by the street and buildings, a tall, imposing structure behind an iron fence and built of red granite, which made the spires of the building look almost like they were covered in shimmering blood in the afternoon sunlight.
“They don’t seem to like us very much,” Summer Dawn whispered to Starjumper as they walked down the street. She was right, many of the stares sent in their direction were suspicious, and ponies were giving them a wide berth. Starjumper realized as he looked down the street that it was because they were the only two unicorns and only thestral on the street. Every other pony was an earth pony.
“They’re always like this,” Moonshade growled quietly. “Maretonians aren’t very friendly, but they’re polite.”
They walked down the street and to the large plaza in front of the red granite palace, which had huge, grand windows over and around the grand entry staircase, two staircases that faced each other at the base, then curled up and around to face each other again at the top, where a large portico stood before the massive entry doors. There was a grand balcony at the top of the columns around the edge of the platform, which was probably where the Duke publicly addressed his subjects.
“Snazzy,” Starjumper said evenly as they approached the giant double gate through the tall, imposing iron fence, which had eight uniformed ponies standing around it. Two in front, one to each side, two within the fenceline, and four behind it. They were obviously the guards.
“It is impressive,” Summer Dawn agreed. “But is it me, or does that red granite make the palace look…a little scary?”
“It’s called the Blood Palace for a reason,” Moonshade told them. “Though that old name refers more to the Dukes of the past than the building itself. The old Dukes were very…harsh,” she said delicately.
Summer Dawn gave her a look around Starjumper.
“There’s supposed to be a dungeon under the palace big enough to hold the entire population of the city. And below that, there are supposed to be catacombs holdings lots and lots of bones. They dug out the catacombs so they didn’t have to take the bodies very far,” she noted, which made Summer Dawn blanch a little.
“Moonshade, stop that,” Starjumper said.
“Stop what? Are you messing with me, Moonshade?” Summer Dawn challenged.
“Maybe,” she replied in a deadpan voice that made Starjumper chuckle. “It’s called the Blood Palace because of an old story about the First Duke of Maretonia. The palace was supposedly originally white, but it turned red after the First Duke was murdered by his son in a plot to take the throne from him. The palace turned red, and the ghost of the Duke haunted his son until he threw himself off that tower right there,” she said, pointing at the highest of the towers, on the left side of the grand building. “But it stayed red after he died. It’s said that the ghost of the First Duke still walks the halls, and his presence keeps the Dukes of Maretonia honest, kind, and just.”
“Well, that story’s not much better than the dungeon,” Summer Dawn noted sourly. “Is that the real story, Star?”
“Yes,” he nodded as they neared the gates. “A little embellished, though.”
“A good story needs a little embellishment, or it’s a boring story,” Moonshade declared. “And soldiers love to tell stories around the campfire.”
When they reached the gates, the two ponies out front stepped in front of them. “Halt! State your business!” the taller of the two uniformed earth ponies barked.
“We’re carrying a message from Equestria,” Starjumper answered. “Princess Celestia told us to deliver it to the palace. Moonshade,” he prompted, looking over at her.
“Really? A thestral, a Theradale unicorn, and a Magestrian unicorn are from Equestria?” he challenged suspiciously.
“So what if I’m a Theradale?” Starjumper challenged. “You think Equestria doesn’t have Theradale unicorns? Or Magestrians?”
“Star,” Summer Dawn cut him off, holding up a hoof in front of him, then she stepped forward. “Please excuse my companion, he’s not exactly used to being a messenger,” she said in a warm, friendly voice. “We’ve just arrived from Equestria on other business, and Princess Celestia sent a letter along with us to be delivered to the Duke of Maretonia,” she explained with a gentle expression. “We’re not taking back a reply, but we were told to write a letter back to her Highness to be left with you to inform her that her letter was delivered. If you would, my good stallion, might we deliver the message to the chamberlain and be allowed the opportunity to write the letter to her Highness that our message was delivered?”
The guard looked far less hostile, even giving Summer Dawn a slight smile. “May I see the letter?” he asked.
“Of course. You’ll see that it bears the Royal Seal of Equestria,” she replied, looking back to Moonshade. “Moonshade, could you please?” She dug into her saddlebag with a hoof, then produced both of the letters, each stuck to her hoof. Summer Dawn took command of them with her magic, then after reading the outside, put the one for Unicornia back in Moonshade’s saddlebag. She then presented it to the guard, with the wax seal on the back facing him to show it to him. After he took a moment to inspect the seal, she turned the letter around so he could see the name on the front.
“That is the Royal Seal of Equestria,” the second guard confirmed. “It looks authentic.”
“I agree. If you would, follow me,” the taller of them declared. “The palace chamberlain will be summoned to take custody of the letter.”
“Thank you, good stallion,” Summer Dawn said smoothly, bobbing her head a bit as the two guards turned towards the palace. She floated the letter to her own saddlebag and slid it inside.
“Well done, little slip,” Moonshade whispered as they started after the pair. Two other guards advanced to take their places at the gate after they entered the grounds.
“Guess you don’t think me being a society pony is a bad thing now, hey Star?” she replied with a smile.
He gave her a look that made her giggle despite herself.
“Pardon me, my good stallion,” she said in a loud voice, “but may I ask a question?”
“Of course, madam.”
“Why did you call me Magestrian?”
“That’s what you are,” he replied. “Your long legs, lean body, muzzle and eye shape, they mark you as a Magestrian unicorn. We don’t see them very often here in Maretonia. We didn’t think they were native to Equestria.”
“Huh, in Equestria, a unicorn is simply a unicorn. I had no idea that we had our own tribes.”
“It sounds like your ancestors moved to Equestria long ago, and your family forgot where they came from,” the other guard ventured.
“That’s possible,” Summer Dawn acceded. “How many tribes of unicorns are there?”
“There are four,” Moonshade said. “The Theradales of Unicornia and eastern Maretonia, who are all tall and burly like earth ponies, which is Starjumper’s heritage. There’s absolutely no doubt that Starjumper’s father is a Theradale. There’s the Magestrians from the realm of Magestra, not far from Saddle Arabia, who do look like you do. There’s the Western unicorns, which are the unicorns of Equestria, and then the Kirin, who are long-legged and lean like Magestrians, but are taller and have curved horns. You do look Magestrian,” she agreed.
“Huh, you learn something new every day,” Summer Dawn mused aloud. “There are unicorns living in Maretonia? Why haven’t I seen any?”
“The unicorns live along the eastern border of the realm, and they keep to themselves,” one of the guards said, a bit stiffly. “They don’t like to mingle with earth ponies. But, they are loyal citizens of the realm,” he said begrudgingly. “When the realm needs the services of their magic, they answer the call.”
“Yeah, that sounds like most unicorns on this side of the sea,” Starjumper said darkly.
“Not so. The Magestrians are very friendly, and their cities and towns are quite a sight to see. They shape them out of living trees with magic, so every home and shop is a living work of art.”
“Wow, I wish we had time to go see Magestra,” Summer Dawn said, but a warning look from Starjumper quelled any continuation of that line of thought.
They were led through the grand doors and into a giant entry hall with a tiled floor in red and black and several huge, grand crystal chandeliers hanging between the buttresses along the arched chamber, the hanging pieces of crystal glowing with soft, white magical light to illuminate the hall. One of the guards escorting them struck a gong set near the entry doors, then they all stopped not far from the doors. A moment later, a tall, portly earth pony stallion wearing an elaborate coat appeared from a side door and approached. “Master Chamberlain, these ponies are carrying a letter from the Princess Celestia of Equestria for the Duke,” one of the guards explained.
“May I see the missive?” the pony asked in a strong, slightly gravelly voice, as if speaking loudly most of his life had damaged his voice. Summer Dawn removed the letter from her saddlebag and floated it over to him, holding it suspended in midair and allowing him to examine it. He used his hoof to turn the letter around, then gave the seal a long look. “The seal is authentic,” he nodded. “Pray tell, what orders were you given concerning this letter, madam?”
“Only to deliver it to the Duke of Maretonia, your Excellency,” Summer Dawn answered smoothly. “I believe that you delivering it to him for us would complete our task. But we were charged to write a letter back to her Highness informing her the letter was delivered and leave it with you to be sent back to Equestria.”
“I’m afraid the Duke is quite busy today and would be unable to see you,” the chamberlain warned. “I can add it to his morning paperwork, and he’ll read the letter first thing in the morning.”
“That is more than satisfactory, your Excellency,” Summer Dawn told him in a calm tone. “Our task was to deliver the letter. We were not told to wait for a reply, so an audience with his Grace is not necessary.”
“Very good, madam. If you would follow me please, I’ll show you to an antechamber where you can pen your letter, and I’ll have it sent off with some other missives bound for Canterlot.”
“Thank you, your Excellency, you are most kind,” Summer Dawn said smoothly.
The chamberlain led them to a small room not far from the entry hall that held only a writing desk, parchment, and a quill and ink pot. There were some tapestries on the walls but no windows, so the room was a bit dark, dark enough for Summer Dawn to conjure a globe of light to help her see better before taking up the quill with her magic. “I think I’d better write the letter,” she told them.
“That’s fine with me, little slip. You seem to know how to talk to these fancy ponies, so you’ll know how to write a letter to Celestia.”
“I think it’s a good thing she came along even over her magic,” Starjumper mused, which made her grin at him.
“You’d have gotten us into a war with Maretonia,” she said with playful smugness in her voice.
“Hit them enough times to make them do what you want, that’s the motto of my family,” he replied, which made her giggle.
She barely took five minutes to pen the letter, which she then folded into an envelope-like shape and addressed to the Princess on the outside. She carried it in her magic as she nearly pranced past them and towards the door, where the chamberlain was standing outside waiting. “We’re finished, your Excellency,” she said, floating the letter over to him. “And our business here is concluded. With your permission, may we be escorted back to the gate?”
“Of course, madam,” he said with a smile as he took the letter in the crook of a hoof, then pushed it into the small satchel hanging from his side. “I’ll have this added to the papers being sent to Canterlot. It should be there in a few days.”
“You are most kind, your Excellency,” she told him with an approving nod.
The chamberlain himself escorted them back to the outer gate, and with a word of farewell, left them to their own devices in the plaza. “Well, that was quick and easy,” Moonshade noted. “We have a good two hours before sunset.”
“Let’s take this opportunity to have a meal we don’t have to cook ourselves,” Starjumper suggested. “And we’ll get underway after sunset.”
“Sounds good to me. We’ll easily make up the time flying on full bellies. That does always make a thestral want to fly faster.”
“I certainly won’t complain,” Summer Dawn agreed. “I’d love to sit at a table and eat something we didn’t take out of a saddlebag.”
They found a restaurant not far from the plaza that had lured in Moonshade with her keen sense of smell, and they decided to give it a try. That turned out to be a good decision. The restaurant didn’t have an indoor dining area, all the tables were set in a courtyard behind the main building with streamers of lights and colored ribbons running from umbrella to umbrella covering the tables and on posts around the outside edge of the dining area. The food was exceptional, and they got a whole lot of it for the price they paid. The waiter seemed a bit unsure of himself, serving two unicorns and a thestral, but he was kind and his advice about the dishes served in the restaurant was good.
They finished the meal a good half hour before sunset, and since they couldn’t leave until the moon was raised, they walked slowly out of the city along its largest, widest street and looked at the shops, homes, and ponies. There was nothing but earth ponies everywhere they looked, reminding him of Baltimare in some ways, but what was different here was that almost everypony wore some kind of clothing. From the minimalists that only wore stylish scarves to the truly fashion conscious ponies that were decked out in full suits or dresses, the only ponies on the street not wearing at least one article of clothing were them. For stallions, small, stylish vests over garments that went over the front legs, chest, and upper back seemed to be the most popular, and for mares, slender saddles with stylish hats…for that matter, Starjumper noted, every mare and filly on the street was wearing a hat except for Moonshade and Summer Dawn. The manes under those hats were also stylish, often styled to complement the hat, and long manes with tails and braids seemed to be popular. Much like Equestria, colts and stallions here wore their tails very short, which put Starjumper out of place, but he did notice that few fillies or mares had tails that were long enough to reach their back ankles, where in Equestria mares often had tails long enough to drag the ground. That also put all three of them very much out of place, since thestrals wore their tails extremely long so they could use them in conjunction with their clinging magic, and most Canterlot unicorns wore their tails very long because that was the current style. The tip of Summer Dawn’s tail was just a sliver off the ground, and it would drag the ground if she lowered it from its usual arched position, and both Starjumper’s and Moonshade’s tails did drag the ground.
It just went to show, not every society had the same taste in fashion.
They walked over the middle bridge just moments before sunset, and that gave Starjumper enough time to get a good distance away from the city and take off the pack in preparation of what was to come. Moonshade and Summer Dawn refilled some waterskins in the river as they waited, and when the sun set and the moon rose, they didn’t pay much attention as Starjumper changed. Once it was over, he flapped his wings a few times to get the last of the pain and buzzing out of them, then allowed Summer Dawn to tend his sides with a cloth, cleaning off the blood. “You two ready to go?” he asked as she cleaned his face with the towel, then she dunked it in the river and wrung it out, cleaning it, before putting it back in a pack. She then picked up the main pack saddle with her magic and set it back over his back, setting it down carefully so it didn’t foul his wings.
“As soon as the little slip shrinks us,” Moonshade answered as Summer Dawn buckled the pack for him.
“All done,” she declared, stepping over to Moonshade.
They were on their way moments later, and as Starjumper ascended higher and higher over the land east of Marette, he got a better view of it. He could see that the land was the same very gentle, rolling hills covered in forest that extended for dozens of miles, but at the horizon, illuminated by the silver light of the moon and visible to his eyes, were higher hills, the beginnings of the foothills that led up to the mountains. Those foothills would eventually become Unicornia, he remembered from the map, but from what he’d just learned in Marette, the hills that he could see were the domain of Maretonia’s resident population of unicorns. They were probably descendents of the unicorns of Unicornia, most likely migrated to the western foothills over time and found themselves in another country…or perhaps they were always there and the border of the country moved past them. Either way, he intended to be very high up by the time he got there, so he was all but invisible form the ground, so as not to attract any unwanted attention.
But barely half an hour after taking off from Marette, he realized that unwanted attention was exactly what they attracted. It was long his habit to check behind him as he flew from time to time, glancing back over his shoulder briefly every so often, and one of those cursory checks revealed to him a dozen dark shapes a good five miles behind him. Their size and the shape of their wings were unmistakable, they were thestrals, and the glint of the moonlight off metal told him that they were thestral soldiers. They were coming up behind him on the same line he’d flown leaving Marette, which meant that they were there, they had seen them, and none of them had noticed them.
Moonshade’s insistence that they wear armor at all times suddenly didn’t seem quite so paranoid.
“Moonshade, Summer Dawn,” he called loudly. “We have company behind us. Twelve thestrals in armor, about five miles back, and they’re gaining. I’m going to speed up and see if I can outrun them, but I doubt it. I’m weighed down with the pack saddle and they’re not.”
He surged forward with a powerful sweep of his oversized wings, and continued to accelerate, which caused the thestrals behind him to follow suit. He also nosed up and started to climb, because in an aerial fight, the pony with altitude had the advantage. He didn’t want them to get into a position where they could dive at him. There was a shimmer of light, and Moonshade was suddenly her full size again, first dropping under him and then pulling back up once she got her wings going. She looked back over her shoulder a moment, then looked over at him. “Soldiers,” she affirmed. “Keep climbing, they’re trained to get up and over a flyer so they can dive on you from behind.”
“Summer,” he called. “You think you can return to full size and not fall off my back?” She couldn’t answer him, but a moment later, she shimmered back to her full size straddling his back like a rider and almost immediately surrounded herself with an aura of her magic, steadying herself on his back, sitting on top of the saddle packs. “Alright, Summer, time to earn your keep,” he said. “Moonshade, get as close to me as you can. Summer, I want you to teleport us as far forward as you can.”
“But I don’t know my destination!” she protested.
“Use your eyes,” he told her. “Look as far forward as you can and focus on a spot, then teleport us to that spot. It’s the only way we’re going to outrun them,” he told her. “Moonshade, this is gonna be a rough ‘port, so be ready for it,” he warned. “Since she can’t get a clear view of her destination, we’re gonna get singed in transit.”
“I’ll take a little singing over fighting twelve soldiers,” Moonshade said calmly, getting directly over him, putting Summer Dawn between them. Her belly was nearly brushing Summer Dawn’s ears.
“Any time you’re ready, Summer,” he prompted.
Seconds later, she cast the spell. Starjumper felt the resistance and felt himself get a singed as they transited the teleport, then they returned to crisp winter air that soothed those minor burns as it rushed over them. Summer Dawn had teleported them in a straight line as far forward as she could see and hadn’t changed their orientation or their motion, which was the smartest way to do it. “That wasn’t so bad,” Moonshade said dismissively.
“For you,” Summer Dawn panted. “That took a lot out of me.”
“It’s a lot harder teleporting to an unfamiliar destination,” he affirmed. “But you got us here with only a little singe. Good job.”
“Thanks, Star,” she answered.
“Go ahead and shrink back down and get some rest,” Moonshade told her. “I’ll fly for a while to give Starjumper an extra pair of eyes.”
“Okay. Just let me know when you want to shrink again and rest.”
He felt her weight vanish off his back, and watched from the corner of his eye as she walked across his back and opened the flap of the saddlebag, then used magic to float down into it.
“How far did she get us?” Moonshade asked.
Starjumper looked back over his shoulder and took in the landmarks that were now behind him. “About twenty miles,” he replied. “Not bad at all given she was teleporting blind. That might be far enough for them to give up, especially once they realize that we can just teleport out of reach again if they keep chasing.”
“This does tell us that my mother knows we’re coming,” Moonshade said grimly. “She has soldiers out looking for us. We’d better be careful until we cross into Unicornia. Not even my mother is stupid enough to send soldiers over Unicornia.”
“You think so?”
“Thestral soldiers wouldn’t be this far west in Maretonia for any other reason,” she told him. “Especially not that many.”
“Well, that just means we do this the sneaky way,” Starjumper told her, to which she nodded.
They both kept a very close watch in every direction, not just behind them, as they continued just south of east, until enough time had passed that they both agreed that the thestrals behind them had broken off pursuit. Moonshade continued to fly along with him to keep watch, however. The low, gentle hills under them slowly and consistently got more and more rugged, and hardwood forest replaced the large groves breaking up the rolling grassland, until the land under them as an uninterrupted carpet of leafless hardwood trees with the occasional pine or cedar evergreen breaking up the monotony. Those occasional evergreen slowly became small clusters of trees, then stands, then they were half the trees under them, as the lowland maples and oaks were slowly replaced with evergreens, birch, elm, and ash trees, trees more common at higher altitudes. A multitude of small streams and rivers flowed down the rugged hills, flowing down the valleys of the hills and joining into larger and larger creeks, forming the headwaters of the river that flowed past Marette.
They flew without incident for half the night, until Starjumper landed in a very small meadow at the very top of a particularly tall hill for a quick meal and brief rest. Moonshade prowled the tiny meadow, her eyes on the sky as he ate. “You need to sleep, Moonshade,” he told her. “You have a lot of flying in front of you.”
“I don’t need more than a couple of hours,” she told him. “I’m a thestral soldier, Lykan, I’m used to going without sleep. You need a second set of eyes right now. I’ll get a quick nap just before dawn and be just fine for the day. We’ll hold over just inside the Nightlands at the first layover I have planned and get some proper sleep. It’s a fairly deep and well hidden cave where we can afford to relax a little.”
“Why not lay over in Crystallon?”
“Because we’re thestrals,” she replied bluntly. “We won’t be welcome there.”
“How soon will we reach the city?”
“If we stay at this speed, mid-morning,” she answered. “We’ll cross over into Unicornia right around sunrise. And that’s what we should be working towards,” she said as she stopped and turned to walk back the other way. “They won’t follow us into Unicornia.”
“Then at least your leg of the flight tomorrow will be relatively easy,” he mused.
“It’s just trading one form of danger for another,” she told him. “When I fly over Unicornia, it’ll be so high that their magic can’t reach me. And we’ll need the little slip to talk very fast once we land outside the gates of Crystallon, or spending a few years in their dungeon will be the least of our worries.”
“Then it sounds like we’d better step it up,” he said, finishing his oat cake and standing up. “I’ve rested enough. Let’s see how far into Unicornia I can get before sunrise.”
“Now you’re thinking like a thestral soldier,” she nodded.
Starjumper was quite proud of himself. About two hours before sunrise, Moonshade announced that they’d crossed the border into Unicornia, though it was hard to tell when one looked down. The land under them was even more rugged now, towering, steep-sided foothills with the shadows of the mountains in front of them, visible now at the edge of the horizon. But when one looked up, the border between Maretonia and Unicornia was very distinct. The clear skies over Maretonia gave way to a layer of clouds over Unicornia, which covered the land below like a blanket and kept things from getting too cold. The unicorns created them with magic, Moonshade had explained, and they were a nightly fixture during the winter moons. They would burn off like fog at sunrise to let the sun through, warming the land below them, and return just after sunset to trap that heat close to the ground to take the edge off the biting winter cold. At Moonshade’s direction, Starjumper ascended up and through the clouds, then he landed atop them once he burrowed his way through. Moonshade awoke Summer Dawn long enough to have her shrink down, then Starjumper continued to get as far into Unicornia as he could before sunrise.
The clouds under him hid him from the land below, but it also made it hard for him to get an idea of how fast he was going, or in which direction he was going. He had to rely on the stars for navigation, keeping himself in line to reach Crystallon, flying high enough over the cloud deck below so he could see a good distance in every direction. The cloud tops below him weren’t flat, they were almost as rugged as the land under them, hillsides of white formed by cumulus clouds forming valleys and ridges and plateaus, forcing Starjumper to fly well over the highest of them so he could maintain visibility, up high enough that the air around him would have been dangerously cold were it not for the heat stone he was wearing.
As the moon started creeping towards the western horizon behind him, Starjumper looked down to find a good place to land, looking for a flat plateau atop one of the clouds that would give him maximum visibility and allow him to eat before he changed. Moonshade said that the clouds burned off after sunrise like fog, so they had to be ready to move when the sun rose. He surveyed the cloudscape below him, searching for the optimum landing point, when he noticed a disturbance in the clouds directly under him as he flew over. He looked down and under him to see what it was that caught his eye, and that was when he saw a glint of metal, moving quickly just above the cloud deck, moving between two sloping cloud sides and darting in and out of sight.
Thestrals! In Unicornia!
“Moonshade, Summer, wake up! We have company!” he shouted as he banked sharply to the left, his eyes scanning the cloud deck under him. He saw several other tell-tale disturbances in the clouds, and from the look of it, they had flown towards him from the Nightlands and had gone low through the valleys between the cloud tops to keep him from seeing them until they were very close. And almost as soon as he called out, a sudden swarm of well over twenty thestrals erupted from the clouds on all sides under him, racing upwards towards him as fast as their wings would carry them. Too many to fight!
He did the only thing he could, he pulled out of his slow descent towards the cloud tops and started climbing, his large wings pulling him higher and higher into the air to buy time. A shimmering flash above and behind him made him bank sharply out of pure reflex, and that reflex saved him when a wingblade whizzed by just a hair from his muzzle. They had thestrals up high diving at him, the ones below were just a diversion! He spun through a complete roll as another thestral streaked out of the night sky with his wingblade in position, feeling a sharp tug when the blade slashed through the cargo pack saddle on his left, spilling some of its contents out into the void. There was a shimmer of light heralding the return of the mares to normal size, and Moonshade barely took one glance around and dove out and away as Summer Dawn gave a scream and hastily erected a shield around herself as she held herself aloft with levitation, causing another thestral to bounce off of it as he tried to slash her with his wingblade.
“Regroup!” Moonshade shouted as she banked away from another diving thestral, a shield forming around her as Summer Dawn protected her with magic. Starjumper was forced to bank away from Summer Dawn by another diving thestral, and the slender unicorn mare unleashed a pale beam of blue from her horn, the ice beam spell, her target the thestral that Starjumper had avoided. Her beam hit him in the flank, right on the cutie mark, and caused a layer of ice and frost to form with magical speed around his flank, rear leg, and creep up his side and back, freezing his left rear leg in place….but also weighing him down with the weight of the ice, causing him to sag towards the clouds. She then turned and stared down the last of the diving thestrals, who was coming right at her, but his body vanished in a circular burst of pink magic as she used teleportation as a weapon, teleporting him directly into the path of another attacking thestral. The two of them screamed as he reappeared and then crashed into each other, and they rebounded and spun erratically down towards the clouds below, both of them unconscious from the violence of the impact.
Even in the middle of a fight, Starjumper could appreciate the fact that Summer Dawn had just triple cast a teleport spell. She was maintaining both her levitation and her shield and had just used a teleport spell. Exceptional!
Seconds later, a shield formed around him, which protected all three of them from their attackers, and it turned into a chaotic scrum over the cloud tops. Starjumper kept trying to maneuver so they were all close enough for Summer Dawn to teleport them away, but Moonshade was using the fact she was protected by a shield to go on the offensive, ramming thestrals with the shield. Moonshade had taken four thestrals out of the fight with the shield just the few short moments since the thestrals attacked, displaying her fearsome skill in aerial combat, while Summer Dawn used her teleportation to keep close to Starjumper, not allowing the thestrals to split them apart the way they had Moonshade, using her magic to protect him as the majority of the enemy thestrals concentrated on him. It reached a point where she enclosed both of them in a shield and held them motionless in the air, putting all her strength into reinforcing her shield as the thestrals crashed into it to try to bring it down.
He just had to hold out until he changed! When he got his horn, he could end this in a matter of seconds! Summer Dawn had incredible power, but she didn’t know very many combat spells, or how to use them in a fight the way he did!
“Regroup!” Starjumper shouted, which caused Moonshade to bank sharply and start back towards them. She flew right at the thestrals keeping them split up, using her shield as a bowling ball, bashing them out of the way. He saw three new thestrals approaching from the northwest, just high enough to be able to dive at them, and what he saw on the chest of the lead thestral made him shout for Moonshade to go faster.
A spell dampener. It was one of the Shadow Blades!
“We have to go now!” he boomed. “Moonshade, pull up! Summer, port her to us, then port us out of here!”
“Okay!” Summer Dawn answered as Moonshade obeyed, flaring her wings and arresting much of her forward momentum. The thestral mare disappeared in a burst of pink magic and reappeared just under them, outside the shield—
And then the shield vanished! Summer Dawn gave a scream as she started falling out of the air!
He glanced up to see the lead thestral’s gem in his chest was glowing with a brilliant light…it wasn’t the same type of spell dampener the Shadow Blades used, it was one that projected a field of spell dampening! Starjumper dove after Summer Dawn as she plummeted down, and without her pegasus feather charm, she went right through the cloud deck. He tucked in his wings and pierced the clouds right behind her, losing sight of her in the foggy murk but hearing her scream, and that guided him so he was directly over her as he came out of the cloud, in line to intercept her and catching up. He reached out with his hooves as he got closer, ready to collect her and pull out as soon as he had her, but her eyes widened and she pointed with her hoof.
“LOOK OUT!”
In an instant, he was stunned. The sky and ground traded places wildly, and he couldn’t understand where he was, what he was doing, or even who he was. He saw a flash of metal, blurring of starlight, then the wild tumble slowed enough for him to see around him. He saw a leathery wing spinning away like a maple seed caught in the wind, spinning around an imaginary axis, with a series of droplets of blood shimmering and spreading in a wide arc towards him. They were almost pretty in the moonlight, like a thousand tiny red stars twinkling in the predawn sky, and he was bemused by their dance. But then an intense eruption of fiery pain blasted through him, causing him to nearly convulse as a mouthful of blood was forcibly expelled from his mouth to add to the thousand tiny stars.
Just before the blackness took him, he realized. The wing. The spinning wing.
It was his.
“NOOOO!” Summer Dawn shrieked as Starjumper was violently knocked out of his trajectory by a thestral that had burst from the clouds at an angle and converged on them. He had struck with his wingblades, and she watched in absolute horror as Starjumper’s wing sailed away from his body!
His wing! He had lost a wing!
He was tumbling out of control, blood flying away from the amputated base of his right wing and his back where the wingblade had slashed across it, very nearly hitting the joint of his other wing as it penetrated deeply into his armor and crossed over his opposite shoulder!
In a sudden fury, she felt her magic come back, falling out of range of whatever it was that had taken her magic away, and she struck with all the anguish and fury in her heart at seeing the stallion she loved injured so grievously. A raging torrent of pure, unformed magic raged from her horn, not a spell, just a release of pure magic in a raging torrent of pain and hurt and rage and loss and fury, and it struck the thestral that had hurt her Starjumper right in the back. The thestral didn’t even flinch when the furious torrent didn’t hit him, it went through him, going directly through his body, and in a bit of dark justice, it caused both his wings to sever from his body and flutter away as the bolt of pure magic raged through him. The thestral didn’t move, he just dropped out of the sky limply as he plummeted towards the ground.
He would not feel the impact. He was already dead.
Tears blurring her vision, her horn flared with pink magic and captured Starjumper in an aura of levitation, then she did the same for herself, slowing their fall as the ground below raced towards them. Blood was gushing from his wounds, and the stub of his right wing was shivering and twitching, which tore her heart in two to see it, to see that dreadful injury and know that it was permanent. In just moments, maybe seconds, the sun was going to rise and his wings were going to burn to ash, and that would prevent her from somehow sewing his wing back on to try to save it. It would burn to ash and be gone, be gone forever, and her beloved Starjumper would never fly again.
He would never fly again!
She managed to land them softly in a meadow formed by a tumbling brook that flowed down a valley, then used her magic as a bandage, forming planar shields down into the gash in his armor to press against his ghastly wounds to stem the bleeding. She had to stop the bleeding, or he would bleed out and die! She saw in horror that the cargo pack had been torn open and most of it was lost, and it had held their first aid supplies!
A sound from above made her form a shield around them almost by instinct, and not a moment too soon! A dozen thestrals landed around them, outside the shield, their expressions almost sadistically eager. They didn’t try to rush the shield, they just stood in a circle around her, to keep her from fleeing. They were waiting for whatever had robbed her of her magic to do it again.
Robbed her…she had to move! If she lost her magic, Starjumper would die before the thestrals had the chance to kill him!
With gritted teeth and nearly a howl of anguish, knowing that she was abandoning any hope of restoring Starjumper’s wing, she focused her gaze through her tears on a distant mountaintop, her eyes making out a small clearing not far the summit with a cave entrance visible. Her horn flared with intense pink magic, and then she and Starjumper vanished in a circular burst of energy.
They reappeared nearly five miles away, and Summer Dawn wilted from the effort as they reappeared on the mountainside. She immediately picked him up and retreated into the cave, getting them out of sight, advancing deeply enough into the cave to break line of sight with the entrance. She used a cloth to hide the light of her horn as much as possible, wrapping it around her horn, then she teleported the pack saddle, breastplate, and backplate directly off of him without really thinking about what she was doing, which let her get access to his wounds. His wing was amputated almost right against his back, with just a nub left where it extended out of his back, and the deep gash started just beside it and got deeper as it went across his shoulders, nearly to the bone, then it stopped just at his left shoulder. Had he not been wearing armor, that blow would have sheared through his spine and killed him instantly! Thank Celestia for that armor!
She gasped and nearly screamed in dismay when his remaining wing suddenly shuddered, and then smoke sizzled from it as it turned to ash.
No! The sun was rising, his wings were burning away! The wing he lost was burning away, and she would never get it back! She watched in horror as his remaining wing turned grayish black, and then it crumbled to fine ash on the stone floor of the cave. It was gone, and that meant the wing he’d lost was also gone. It was gone!
He would never fly again!
She collapsed over his body as his horn tore through the fur and skin and flesh of his forehead and grew out to full length with magical speed, weeping both out of fear for him and grieving what he had lost. He loved to fly so much! It brought him such joy, and now it was gone! It was gone!
But there were more immediate concerns. With his wings gone, the terrible bleeding from the amputated wing had stopped, but the deep gash across his shoulders remained. She emptied out the remains of the pack, desperately looking for anything that might help her—
A vial of Comet Tail’s healing tonic! There was one in the bottom of the pack!
She nearly sobbed in relief and joy as she took the small vial up in her magic and unstoppered it. It must have worked its way out of the first aid bag sometime during the trip and fallen to the bottom of the pack, where it had stayed when the rest of the first aid supplies were lost! Thank Celestia for that bit of good luck! She extracted the clear, thick liquid from the vial with her magic and then quickly spread it into the deep slash on his shoulders, and it quickly started doing its work. The bleeding stopped almost immediately, and she remembered to press the sides of the wound together with her hooves as the tonic did its work, mending at least some of the ghastly injury, enough to seal the wound. The tonic continued to do its work as she watched, the deep wound stitching itself back together, and Starjumper gave a relieved sigh in his unconscious state, passing into a natural sleep.
He was going to make it. He was going to survive!
She started crying again, an overwhelming relief flooding through her as she realized that he was out of mortal danger, and it gave her a moment to get her bearings. She was in an unknown kingdom filled with unicorns that may or may not be friendly, and being actively hunted by thestrals. Starjumper was unconscious and injured, Moonshade—she didn’t know where she was, and a sudden dread flooded her as she realized that Moonshade may be dead. Even if she wasn’t, they were separated, Summer Dawn had to stay hidden to protect Starjumper, and Moonshade would no doubt be far too busy to—
“Little slip,” a quiet whisper called. There was a shadow in the cave entrance, and then Moonshade advanced around the corner!
“Moonshade!” she said in a strangled voice.
“Quiet!” she said in a harsh whisper. “They’re looking for us!”
“How did you find us?”
“I saw where you landed, and saw where you were looking when you teleported. I realized you’d go to the only place you could see where you could hide,” she explained. “It took me some time to draw off the thestrals and then shake them so I could come back. Is he dead?”
“No,” she said, her voice nearly breaking. “But he’s hurt. He’s—“ she broke into wracking sobs, her shoulders shaking.
“I saw,” she said in a grim, nearly compassionate voice. “I saw, little slip. I’m sorry.”
“His wings burned, we can’t get the one he lost back. We’ll never get it back,” she said, teardrops sliding down her muzzle and falling to the stone floor of the cave.
“I know,” she said, putting a hoof on her shoulder. “But we have to keep him alive. He’s the only chance we have to save the Night Stone. Can you do magic to hide the cave mouth? They’ll be looking for us, and they’ll look inside any cave they see.”
“I….yes. Star taught me a spell that will work,” she said. “The stone shaping spell. I can close the cave entrance, make it so small they can’t get in but still let us get air. Even if they find us, they won’t be able to reach us, not without digging through the stone. When Star’s well enough to travel, I can teleport us straight up into the sky and you can fly us on to Crystallon. I won’t need to open the cave mouth back up.”
“That’s a good plan,” she said in a reassuring voice, patting her shoulder. “Shape the stone so there’s an overhang that hides the air hole from the sky, so they have no reason to even land in the clearing,” she said.
“Okay. Watch over him while I close the cave mouth, Moonshade.”
“I will,” she nodded.
She tended to her task with fear-induced speed, both of being spotted by the thestrals and of leaving Starjumper. She couldn’t see him from where she did her work because of the bend in the cave, but her mind was just racing, and it was hard to concentrate on her magic because of her turmoil. When he woke up…Celestia’s glory, it would break her heart to have to tell him! She couldn’t even imagine the anguish it was going to cause him to know he would never fly again! She had to pause to wipe the tears from her eyes with her hoof so she could see what she was doing. And to have it happen like this, where he wouldn’t even have time to grieve his loss! They still had to get to the Nightlands, they still had to save the Night Stone or the entire world would be thrown into chaos! And now they had to do it with Starjumper suffering a dreadful injury to both his body and his psyche!
A sudden towering fury rose up in her. The thestrals had taken away the one thing in Starjumper’s life that gave him the most joy…she suddenly didn’t find anything at all wrong with Moonshade’s plan to kill her own mother! She was the one that ordered those thestrals to attack them, she was the one that took Starjumper’s wing! She couldn’t die slowly enough for it to satisfy Summer Dawn’s desire for her to hurt ten times more than she had hurt her stallion!
She had attacked the thestral that hurt Starjumper. No, she had killed him. And she didn’t feel any remorse over it. Not one bit. She was…she was mad that he didn’t suffer more for what he did to her Starjumper!
But seeing him as she came back around the corner melted away her fury, replacing it with concern and worry and fear. She sat down by his head, which Moonshade had propped on the ruined saddle pack, then tenderly stroked his mane, trying to bring him comfort in his sleep, let him know that she was there, that she was watching over him. He needed her. He would need her now more than ever, he would need her magic, he would need her emotional support as he dealt with the loss of one of the most precious things in his life. And she would be there for him. She would be there for him all the rest of their days. She leaned down and nuzzled his cheek, very gently, very tenderly, vowing that no matter what, he would always have her.
She loved him. And she would be there for him.
Always.