Luna looked over the throne room from her seat. She tried to look as regal as she could as she stifled a yawn. She turned and lifted her wing so nopony present would see. The normal proceedings of the royal court were as dull as ever, and she was only here because Celestia insisted that she join her during the afternoon from time to time before Celestia finished her duties for the day. There had been a few humble ponies that truly needed their help, but most of the afternoon had been taken up by the stuck-up ponies of Canterlot complaining about petty things.
The current case was between two different unicorns disputing over where the property line was between their homes. After staring up at the stained glass windows for long enough, Luna cut them off.
“Go find the surveyors in the royal archives. They will handle this.” Luna motioned them to leave with a brief wave of her hoof.
Celestia smiled in approval. “It’s wise to recognize when others can help them faster than we can. I think you’re finally getting the hang of this.”
“Even if I am doing better,” Luna said, “I still do not enjoy this as much as my other duties.”
“When it gets boring, I like to think of some way to better teach them to take care of themselves. But not everypony is very good at learning lessons.”
Luna looked down at the floor. “I would try that, but I still think many of them do not trust me.”
Celestia stood up. A moment later, she gave Luna a tight hug.
“Many can see the good in you like I do. But you are still working against centuries of stories about Nightmare Moon. You’ll need to keep trying, and I’m here if you need anything.”
Luna sighed and looked out at the setting sun.
“At least the younger ponies are giving me a chance. But I think it’s about time to wrap up things for today.”
Celestia stepped back and rubbed her eyes.
“Yes, it’s been a long day for me. Ready to raise the moon?”
“Only if you’re ready to lower the sun.”
Luna gave Celestia a playful bump and jumped off the platform with the thrones. Celestia glided down next to her and gave her the same sort of bump as they walked out of the throne room together.
The two sisters went through their daily routine of switching the sky from night to day before retiring for a nice dinner together. Celestia went off to get ready for bed, and Luna was left alone with her thoughts on her balcony as she looked over Canterlot and Equestria.
Luna trotted off to begin the preparations for her nightly duties. Even if she was doing better at making a few friends, she could still feel that somewhere deep inside her was the desire and potential to be Nightmare Moon again. It was a part of her she liked to keep locked away.
Luna busied herself with dinner and other little chores. About an hour later, Luna stood at her post on the tallest balcony of Canterlot’s castle. The moon was already rising in the sky, but she enjoyed taking a few moments to savor the beauty of each evening before attending to her other duties. A few thin clouds were in the sky tonight, catching the silvery beams of moonlight. Luna turned and took one step toward the door when a sudden flash lit up the night sky.
Luna should have felt anything in the night sky, but this had come out of nowhere. Luna jumped over the railing of the balcony and spread her wings, racing to follow it as it streaked toward Ponyville in the distance. It was going far too slowly to be anything like a meteor, and she was slowly gaining on whatever it was. Just as it crossed over a set of hills, it broke in two. One piece fell to the side, quickly losing the light that surrounded it. A chill ran down her spine as it crashed into the ground below, carving an ugly a black streak into the grass. Something about it reminded her of how her magic had felt back when she had been Nightmare Moon. It wasn’t quite the same, but it felt wrong.
The other piece of the object continued straight for the outskirts of Ponyville. It didn’t have the same unsettling aura around it, so Luna decided it could wait.
Luna thought she saw something large and dark down below. She blinked and it was gone. Luna flapped her wings and hovered in place above the blackened crater. A set of footprints led from the crater toward the nearby farmhouse. Luna landed to take a closer look. The prints came in two sets. Luna guessed that the creature’s front feet had five toes and claws, and the back feet had four toes and larger claws. She followed the trail of footprints until it disappeared in the long grass at the edge of the crater. She reached out with her magic to try to sense any spells that might be hiding something.
Screams broke her concentration. They were coming from the farmhouse.
The door was wide open, but Luna hadn’t heard anything force it. She charged inside, horn glowing with magic. The light from her horn lit the small home, but the shadows remained around a dark figure. It looked like a dragon, but its wings and skin seemed to be more like smoke. Only its glowing yellow eyes were completely solid, and they were fixed on an earth pony blocking the doorway that led to the other part of the house.
Before Luna could react, the creature slammed a foot on the stallion. The pony yelled out in pain then collapsed as the creature pressed him against the ground. The screams of a mare and some younger ponies came from the back room as the dragon stepped past the fallen pony.
Luna was sure the beast was focused on the other ponies and hadn’t noticed her yet. She started to gather magic, but she had to be sure she wouldn’t injure any ponies. Luna stepped to the side and got a glance of the room behind the stallion.
A mare held a broom in her mouth but was stepping backward as the creature bore down on her. two little foals cowered and whimpered behind a bed.
Luna focused her magic. She would have to use precise spells to avoid hitting the ponies. She shot a ray of magic at the shadowy thing. The spell threw it into the air. It smashed against the table and slammed into the wall.
It twisted back onto its feet in a moment. It stood tall and scraped its chest. A ball of shadow clung to its claws then dropped to the floor. The ball of shadow grew in size and shaped itself into something vaguely like a pony. The dragon pointed at the other room, and the smaller shadow stepped toward the mare while the dragon stepped between Luna and the doorway.
Luna couldn’t see what was going on behind the beast, but the mare’s scream made Luna’s blood run cold. It a scream of desperation and pain far worse than even the screams Luna had heard of soldiers dying in battle. Luna flattened her ears until the scream cut off. The loud thud afterward had to be the mare falling to the floor. Luna snorted in rage. She wasn’t going to let anything do this to her ponies, and especially not to the innocent foals that the mare and stallion had fallen protecting.
The light from her horn flared. Luna threw all her magic into one massive ray of magic. It hit the dragon, and the explosion shook the house. Dust from the ceiling was the only warning Luna got before the roof collapsed. She jumped toward the bedroom and tried to aim a protection spell at the foals and their fallen parents before everything went dark.
Luna kicked the piece of roof that had fallen on her. The dust settled, and the moonlight shone down. There wasn’t much left of the house, but the ponies were all in her little bubble of magic. They were safe. Luna coughed and shook her wings.
The clatter of shifting rubble drew Luna’s attention. The dragon growled and burst out from under the wall that had fallen on it. It dove straight at Luna.
She threw up a barrier, but the creature shattered it without slowing down. Luna tried to dodge but felt an icy chill as the creature raked its claws across her flank.
Luna nearly collapsed. It felt like the claws had ripped a piece of her away. The physical pain was nothing compared to the deeper pain that Luna felt in the deepest part of her being. She could feel some part of her bleeding from her to the creature through its touch.
Her magic felt suddenly weaker, but she desperately threw what she could into a spell to get it off her. The magic blasted it away. It rolled a few times in the grass before skidding to a stop in the field next to house.
She turned and looked where the creature had touched her. Blood dripped down from where it had clawed her, but what else had it done to her? The injury looked like any other, but she could feel deep down that something else had happened. The creature moved again, and Luna’s mind snapped back to the battle.
The creature was a bit slower to get to its feet this time. It panted and growled and cautiously stepped toward Luna. To her side, the children screamed again. Luna glanced over. The smaller creature had risen from the rubble and was kicking at Luna’s barrier spell. It snarled and kicked her barrier again. Small cracks began to form in the protective sphere. The thing kicked at the barrier over and over.
Luna tried to call up her magic, but it came slowly. She blasted the little creature just before it broke the barrier between it and the two foals. The creature burst into ribbons of darkness. The shadowy dragon roared out in pain, but as it did, the remaining pieces of the shadow she had destroyed flew across the field and rejoined with the shadowy dragon. Luna was breathing hard from the effort. She hadn’t had this much trouble with magic since she was a filly.
The larger beast circled around her. It narrowed its eyes in anger and charged at her.
Luna put all her remaining power into one spell and fired it just as the thing jumped at her. Luna could feel the shockwave from her spell as it hit the creature right before it got her. The force of her magic threw it into the sky.
A moment later, the creature crashed onto the split-rail fence, splintering it with its back. The blackness that made up the creature thinned and fragmented. The creature was fading from view. Luna breathed a sigh of relief, but then its eyes snapped open again. The creature stood up as it solidified. It let out a pained growl.
Luna was past her limit, but she pulled together enough energy for one more spell to stop whatever the thing was. It vanished just before her magic hit it. Luna’s knees buckled and she slumped down in the grass. The massive headache from using too much magic hit her a moment later. Her vision blurred, and she fell on her side in a daze.
A hoof shook Luna gently. A stallion’s voice snapped Luna out of her stupor.
“Princess Luna! Are you okay?”
Luna felt a wet cloth brush against the scrapes on her flank. A hoof poked at the injury before she felt the burn of medicine as somepony smeared something on her side before bandaging her up.
Luna opened her eyes. The stallion from the farm, the one that had been attacked, was speaking. In the moonlight, his coat was a flat gray. Luna blinked as she looked over his blank flank. She wondered if her vision was still blurry, but she looked again and saw that it was true. His cutie mark was gone. The mare from the farm stood over by the foals and seemed to be missing hers as well.
Luna coughed before speaking. “I’ll be okay, but thank you for your concern.”
Luna tried to stand, but her knees almost gave out again. She carefully used all four legs and managed to stand up slowly without falling over. Her usual strength and grace were gone in her exhaustion, and she should have been recovering much faster.
She looked at the bandages on her side. They were tight. The stallion had done a good job. She flapped her wings a few times, and they were fine. Something still felt wrong. She looked over her at her other side and nearly fell over.
Her cutie mark was gone!
She brushed her flank with her wing just to be sure it wasn’t covered in dirt, but she felt her smooth coat. She brushed it a few more times, but nothing changed. If she hadn’t been in front of her subjects, she would have rolled on her side and poked herself with a hoof, but that she had to maintain some composure in front of the ponies around her.
She’d have her best ponies figure this out when she got home. She’d send her best guards to track down that creature. Only the darkest of magic could steal cutie marks, and she now knew why the creature’s touch had felt so wrong. Anything with magic like that was a danger to Equestria, and Luna was going to make sure it was hunted down and stopped.
Luna took a deep breath to clear away her angry thoughts. The earth pony family was staring at her with that look ponies had when they wanted a princess to tell them what to do. The two little foals were still shaking under their parents. Luna tried her best to look strong and reassuring even though she still felt barely strong enough to stand.
“I’m sorry about your home,” Luna said. “But I’ll have a safe place for you in Canterlot until you can rebuild.”
The mother of the family wiped some tears from her eyes. “You saved us. Thank you, princess.”
Luna wanted to fly straight back to the castle, but she had a duty to make sure these ponies were looked after.
“Let me take you somewhere safe. Come with me to the guard outpost.”
Celestia would need to know of this new threat, but Luna was sure her sister would say that helping these ponies was the right thing. They followed behind her as she walked toward the little village nearby. The few lights of Ponyville on the horizon brought Luna’s thoughts back to what had started this night.
There was still the other piece of whatever had fallen from the sky. It had fallen by Ponyville, so Twilight would be their best hope in finding it quickly. Luna would need to send a message right away.