//------------------------------//
// End of Day 
// Story: The Olden World 
// by Czar_Yoshi 
//------------------------------//

Starlight guided Maple along with her tail as they walked the streets of Stormhoof, keeping her eyes out for both of them as her mother thought about mining waste and dead Izvaldens.

Valey trudged alongside her, a light hooded cloak covering her ears and wings. "She gonna be alright?"

"Probably," Starlight answered, touching Maple's side. "Let's get back to the boat and let her lie down." She frowned. "I hope, at least? Maple? You're being kind of sad..."

"...What?" Maple blinked and shook her head. "Sorry. No. I just needed to be snapped out of it."

"Uh-huh." Valey nodded at her. "You, uh, sure about that? Because that's what you said a minute ago, too."

Maple sighed unhappily. "Sorry. Just uncomfortable for me to think about and imagine. It touches on a lot of sore spots. And those three kind of reminded me of myself, Willow and Amber, so it's easy to feel for them. I'll be alright."

Starlight shrugged. She was still taking her back to the boat. "So what else did you think of them?" she asked, trying to keep her talking.

"I don't know," Maple murmured. "Felicity seemed nice. Senescey did too, and I didn't blame the blue one for being quiet. Do you really think they were doing those things at night?"

"What, you mean how she was talking about sneaking up into Stormhoof?" Valey tilted her head and frowned. "On the one hoof, nah. Lots of reasons. First off, it would be totally coincidental to run into someone that important by complete coincidence, though I'm not saying it can't happen. Second, she never actually said she did. She was all 'would you believe me if I told you' which is exactly the kind of thing someone would say to either test the waters or lie without actually lying. Honestly, I think she was just trying to impress me."

"Impress you?" Starlight blinked. "Well... she did say she had heard of you."

Valey nodded. "Yeah, she knew who we were. Who I was. And she also kept getting flustered, and I'm familiar enough with catching glances to guess she was trying not to look at my rear."

Starlight certainly wasn't impressed. "So what was she talking about getting up to at night then if it wasn't that? You think they're thieves, or something?"

"Maybe?" Valey shrugged. "Honestly though, there is one thing that makes me tempted to believe her: Geribaldi aside, all that is totally possible. I snuck through Stormhoof Keep myself before, and I seriously bungled it running into this insane chef. If he hadn't been there, I would have had free run of the place. It's kinda concerning, given how much they dislike batponies. I have no idea how no one's actually tried to sneak in there to mess them up before."

"But it hasn't happened, so there must be a reason," Maple offered. "Right?"

"Eh. Maybe." Valey turned a corner, walking through a stone archway close to the exit to the marina. "But I ran into Geribaldi. Got spotted by him and talked to him and everything. Dude is, like, terrified of batponies and thinks absolutely nothing of them. That's the real reason I wouldn't believe her. But who knows? Maybe he's a really good actor."

Another archway passed overhead, and suddenly they were exposed to the afternoon winds, standing at the peak of the roads and staircases descending to the docks. Valey stretched, spreading her wings beneath the cloak. "There we go..."

Masts and ship hulls passed by as they turned corners and moved along smaller and smaller walkways, passing everyone from aristocrats out for a pleasure cruise to dockhooves scraping barnacles from dinghies. One griffon tightened a hose against a pump, refilling his ship's fresh water supply, and a unicorn lay on her side, horn manipulating a knife to cut tubers from the side of the dock and chop them into bait. Starlight decided that unicorn needed a bath.

Before long, the Immortal Dream's door slid shut in their wake, and Valey left Maple and Starlight to their own devices. Starlight flopped on her bed with a noisy huff, raising an eyebrow at Maple to join her. "Well?"

"Well what?" Maple asked, taking a moment to fix a snarl in her mane before joining her. "Well... Well." She sagged into the bed, relaxing and letting herself droop into its fluff. "Those were some things I might have been happier not knowing."

"Maybe you would have been," Starlight agreed, flicking her tail with her legs spread-eagled. "But you wouldn't have been aware of it."

"I know..." Maple rolled closer, laying so she was staring at Starlight. "I really need to deal with this someday. My habit of freezing or getting sad whenever I learn something about how the world isn't a nice place..."

"Do you want to talk about it?" Starlight lifted an eyebrow, slumped in place.

Maple closed her eyes and sighed. "It's just hard. I've had... issues before, and the way I finally learned to cope with all the bad things that have happened in my life is by looking for, appreciating and trusting that good things happen too, and it'll be alright."

Starlight frowned. "So? That doesn't mean nothing bad can ever happen either."

"I know," Maple mumbled. "That's what it's supposed to mean. It's not what I want it to mean. It's also just that when ponies die like that, or are permanently hurt... there's no happily ever after. It just ends."

"You're afraid that could happen to you too."

"Am I?" Maple winced. "I don't..."

She trailed off, her thought lacking a completion. Starlight watched her for a moment longer, then crawled a little closer. "It won't," she insisted, getting up in Maple's face. "We won't die, and we will find some place or way where we can live happily and no one will ever disturb or ruin that again."

"Hmmm..." Maple smiled wistfully.

"A whole month, remember?" Starlight reached out and touched her cheek. "Mapllllle..."

Maple snagged her with her forehooves, pulling her closer. "Oh, you. I know. I just need... I don't know. It was decades ago, like you said. I'll be fine. I guess it was more surprise than anything."

Starlight frowned and let herself be snuggled. "I promise. I mean it. Someday, we'll find the perfect place, forever."

"You said that." Maple nuzzled the top of her head, then settled down again. "In the meantime, though. How are you liking... umm... Tell me something about you. Something interesting you've been doing lately. How's your training with Valey?"

Starlight sat still in her embrace. "She's frustrated," she said. "She wishes more of us would learn to defend ourselves. But I'm doing my best, because it's what I need to."

"And what else?" Maple murmured. "How about things that have happened, or things you've enjoyed, or..."

The afternoon whiled into evening around them, Starlight answering each question in her usual manner, always for Maple's sake. At least her mother seemed to be enjoying this. She just wished there was better she could do.