//------------------------------//
// Family Ties 
// Story: The Child of Sun and Moon 
// by Darkest Night 
//------------------------------//

He awoke feeling much better…physically anyway.
The three potions he stole from Mender’s lab had been exceptionally powerful healing elixirs, on a level with the one that Princess Twilight had used on him after his battle with Moonshade, and the three of them used in succession over the night had done a world of good for him.  He awoke in the midafternoon with no pain at all, at least while at rest, and moving only brought a feeling of mild discomfort, like he’d pulled a muscle. It only hurt when he moved in certain ways.  He awoke to find Moonshade already awake, laying sedately on the side of the cave holding the entrance and keeping her eye on the incline, which was easy for her to do.  Summer Dawn was still asleep, and hadn’t even moved since he put her in her bedroll.  He checked on her after climbing out of his bedroll, took a long drink from the small pool of water in the center of the chamber, then rummaged through the packs and pulled out a chunk of honeyed spice bread, a thestral army staple of which Moonshade had packed into their supplies in prodigious amounts.  He decided to join Moonshade on the side of the wall, walking over and settling in beside her, so they could talk without disturbing Summer Dawn.  “When did you wake up?” he asked in a low, hushed tone.

“Just after noon,” she replied.  “I’ll take a short nap before sunset.  I just didn’t feel comfortable not having somepony standing watch.”
“The shield I put over the entrance won’t fade for another five hours,” he told her.
“I’m not used to magic,” she told him.
“It has its uses,” he replied, glancing over when Summer Dawn made a low mumbling sound and then rolled over in her bedroll.  That was a good sign, it meant she was now sleeping naturally rather than being near-comatose in an exhausted slumber.   “How long will it take to reach the village?”
“Just a few minutes after we head out,” she replied.  “It’s about ten miles away, and from what I remember, it’s not all that much.  The village isn’t that old, it sprung up not long after—“ she cut off, then looked over at him.  “It was founded after the Night King came down on the Longwing clan after your mother ran off with your father,” she told him.  “That’s why I’ll need you to talk to them.  For the last ten years or so, the Longwings have all but shut themselves off from the rest of thestral society, and I have to admit, we helped that along.  All the Longwings were forcibly discharged from the army, all their holdings were seized and doled out to the Night King’s allies and lackeys, and a crushing tax was levied against all commerce originating from the clan.  So, the Longwings all abandoned their original villages and founded new ones on the edges of the Nightlands, getting as far away from the rest of us as possible, and they moved to basic subsistence farming and hunting to evade the commerce taxes.  They don’t interact with the rest of us, their villages have become self-contained communities, and they’re nearly as hostile to us as they are to outsiders.  I can’t blame them, really.  I thought that my grandfather had made a poor decision when he did that, because the Longwings were an integral part of the army.  We depended on them to hold the hippogryphs in check, since they can match a hippogryph’s aerial agility.  But, I was just a trainee then, I didn’t have a say in anything,” she grunted.
“If they’re as hostile as you say, you can’t show up in their village wearing Night Blade armor,” he warned.
She nodded.  “And the little slip has to stay hidden.  Shrunk down in the bag,” she added.  “If they find out we’ve got a unicorn with us, it may get messy.”
“She’s not a Theradale, so at least we have that going for us,” Starjumper grunted.  He sat down, looking down but at nothing as he thought.  “We should convince them to leave,” he told her.  “Do you remember what the Princess said about my clan?”
She nodded.  “If Sombra returns, he won’t have control over them.  They’ll be the first ones he kills,” she said.  “But we can’t warn them, Starjumper.  For one, telling them would mean you reveal who you are, and if you don’t recall, every thestral in the Nightlands will kill you on sight,” she said firmly.  “For another, it will confirm to my mother and the army that we’re here.  They saw how badly you were injured, odds are they won’t think that you’re healed enough to even move, let alone get all the way here.  If we alert the Longwings, we warn them that we’re here, and that means it makes it that much harder for us to get there.”
She was right.  He was so worried about his clan that it blinded him to the reality of their situation.  “We have to do something,” he fretted.  “I’ve never met them, but they’re my clan, Moonshade. My family.  Even if they do hate me, I have a duty to try to protect them.”
“You truly are a Longwing, Starjumper,” she said approvingly.  “But I don’t really see what we can do other than take the Night Stone before they’re in danger.  That’s really the only way we can help right now.”
“I guess so…but I don’t have to like it,” he said quietly.
They moved back to the floor of the cavern and went over the route, and then Moonshade went back to sleep to let Starjumper keep watch.  He spent the time in quiet contemplation, trying his hardest not to think about his wing, instead thinking over all the potential possibilities that might come about from this mission, from them failing and Sombra being resurrected to them thwarting the Night Queen but him being unable for some reason to move the Night Stone.  Moonshade’s description of the village also made him realize that Moonshade was right about not warning them about what was going on.  If they found out what the Night Queen was up to, the Longwings might complicate things by attacking the Cathedral of Night before they got there, which introduced a real danger to their plans.  And Moonshade was right in that the best way they could help the Longwings was to accomplish their mission.  After all, if their plan worked, the Night Stone would be spirited away, protecting it from the Night Queen, and thus protecting his clan from Sombra.
He thought about it while waiting for the sun to set, long enough for Summer Dawn to finally stir, awakened by him rummaging through the packsaddle to make sure they refilled all their waterskins. “Mmmm, what time is it?”
“About an hour before sunset,” Starjumper replied, and his voice caused Moonshade to stir above, the rustling of her wings audible as she unwrapped them from around her body.  “You can sleep a little while longer, Summer.  You too, Moonshade.”
“No, it’ll take us a while to get ready,” the thestral said, dropping from the ceiling and landing beside Summer Dawn.  “Besides, I’m hungry.”
“Me too.  I can’t believe I slept all day,” Summer Dawn groaned.  “I feel so stiff.”
“That’s normal for sleeping like the dead,” Starjumper chuckled.  “But still, Summer, I’m so proud of you for lasting almost the entire night.  You are truly something special.”
“Aww.  Thank you, Star,” she said with a gentle smile.
“Let’s eat first, then get ready to move out.  It should nearly be sunset by the time we’re ready,” Moonshade called.
She was right.  By the time they finished eating, packing up, and gearing up, it was nearly sunset.  Moonshade had her armor off, shrunk down and packed away, so she looked decidedly different to him as Summer Dawn helped her put on the packsaddle, much less intimidating.  Moonshade was actually an attractive mare, in the thestral way, but it wasn’t always easy to see since she was almost always covered in armor.  Starjumper also decided not to wear armor, so as to not to look threatening to the thestrals, wearing only his saddlebags.
Since they were inside the cave and his clock was destroyed, he was honestly surprised when the moon rose, its light seemingly going through the walls of the cave and piercing him to his soul.  And again, the transformation seemed empty, incomplete, because of his lost wing, because he felt nothing from the wing that he had lost.  He refused to look back as Summer Dawn cleaned the blood off his sides and face with a rag, folding back his remaining wing and preparing to endure his second night being less than whole.  “How do you want to do this, Moonstar?” Moonshade said deliberately, getting into the practice of addressing him by that name.
“I…I think I’ll just walk to the village, but we can’t do it from this direction.  It’ll look like I came in from Unicornia,” he said.  “I’ll need you to carry me around so I can approach from the other side.  Summer, go ahead and open up the cave for us so we can get out, then shrink down and get in the pack.  Remember, most thestrals don’t like unicorns, so stay hidden unless you think somepony’s about to get hurt.”
“Are you sure?”
He nodded.  “I’ll be fine, I promise,” he told her.
Moonshade carried him well around the village, flying very low through a series of connected valleys to stay out of sight, then she set him down well down a narrow valley with a fast-moving river in it that led from the village deeper into the Nightlands.  From there, it took them about ten minutes to walk to the village, which sat at the end of the valley on a raised plateau that was cut in half by the river flowing down the middle of it, forming a narrow gorge that widened into the valley from which they came.  The village consisted of a series of cave entrances along the sides of the valley that all opened up to the flat area, each cave entrance covered over by a leather or hide flap—which made him glad Summer Dawn was hiding in the bag—and there were several small stalls or work benches in the flat area on either side of the gorge.  The smell of blood and fresh meat was strong at the entry to the village, proving Moonshade right in her statement that these thestrals hunted to survive, and there were only three thestrals visible as he walked up the steep incline that held the road and entered the village proper.  All three thestrals gave them a long, suspicious look, then one of them flew over and landed in front of them.  He was a very large stallion with a slate gray coat and raven black mane and tail, his main cut short and his tail long, in the thestral tradition.  “Hold,” he said in Thestralla.  “Outsiders are not welcome in this village.  Go back.”
“Not even clan?” Starjumper asked, opening his remaining wing to demonstrate that he was a Longwing.  The larger stallion gave him an empathetic look.  “I don’t want to stay here, clanspony.  I just want to buy as many supplies as you can spare, then we’ll be on our way.”
“What happened?” he asked, looking at where his missing wing would be.
“The army happened,” he replied stonily as he folded back his remaining wing.  “I hate to be rude, clanspony, but we’re in a bit of a hurry.  Do you have any supplies I can buy?”
“We don’t have much, but I think we can help you out,” he replied after a moment.
“Whatever you can spare will be greatly appreciated.”  Moonshade reached into the packsaddle and pulled out a small bag of gems, which hadn’t been lost when the bag was slashed open.  “We have some gems we can offer as trade, but little else.”
“We’ll have to talk to the village chieftess,” he said.  “Follow me.”  He opened his wings, turned, and took off, flying towards one of the cave entrances on the far side of the village.  Starjumper opened his wings—
He froze, then closed his eyes with a pained expression and turned his head down and away, then slowly folded his remaining wing.  Moonshade gave him an empathetic look, then she took off and put a hoof on his saddlebag strap, then lifted him off the ground and carried him up after the thestral stallion.  They entered a long gallery past the cave entrance, a natural one which had been worked by the thestrals to make it more livable.  They’d broken off the stalactites and stalagmites, done what they could to open up the chamber using hammers and chisels, causing the walls to show signs of both natural rock and worked stone. There were two irregular passages out of the chamber on the far end, one near the floor and one in the ceiling.  There were three thestrals in the chamber, a very tall, burly mare and two very young  foals.  “Chieftess Starglow,” the stallion called, and that name made Starjumper gape for a split second before he recovered himself.  Starglow?  That was the name of his aunt!  Was this his mother’s sister?  Were those two foals his cousins?
The tall mare turned to look at them.  She had a raven black coat and a mane and tail of dark gray with three streaks of white through it, and her cutie mark was a series of seven small stars surrounded by an irregular coma of lighter color, representing the radiance of starlight on a clear night.
Her eyes narrowed, almost dangerously, and she took a single step forward as Moonshade set Starjumper down in front of her and landed herself.  “Why are you here?” she demanded.
“We only want to buy supplies, and then we will move on, chieftess,” Starjumper answered.
“Not you.  You,” she amended, pointing her hoof at Moonshade.  “Will I be seeing the rest of the Night Blades descending on the village, Moonblade?”
Moonshade gave her a startled look, as did Starjumper.  “How did you know who I was?” she blurted.
“I was in the army,” she replied.  “I met you years ago.  Now why are you here, Moonblade?  Using this lamed clanspony to play on our sympathies, see if we have anything worth taking?” she asked in an icy voice.  “That’s an underhoofed trick, even for you.”
Moonshade gave him a helpless look, and he returned it.  This was not something for which either of them had planned.
Starjumper, however, managed to recover himself, and he went with the first thing that crossed his mind.  “She’s not the Moonblade anymore,” he said.  “I’m surprised you didn’t hear about it.”
“We don’t talk to other thestrals,” she said stonily, almost glaring at Moonshade.  “And I find that very hard to believe.  The Moonblade doesn’t just quit.”
“She does when her mother gives her an order that goes against everything she believes in,” Moonshade said strongly.
“Really.”
“You can send your thestrals out to scout the surrounding mountains,” Starjumper told her.  “You’ll find that we’re alone.  All we want are supplies, and we’ll pay you what little we have for what you can spare.  And we’ll wait for you to confirm that this isn’t a trick.”
Starglow glanced at the stallion and nodded slightly, and he turned and left the cave.  “If this is no trick, should I expect an army patrol to descend on my village hunting for you?”
“That’s entirely possible,” Starjumper said honestly.  “If they knew where we were.”
“Then why should I help you at all?”
“Because you are not like them,” Starjumper answered evenly.  “And they have done you no favors.”
She was quiet a long moment, giving both of them a hawkish stare.  “And why did you turn against your mother, Moonblade?”
“She used me and then threw me away,” she bristled.  “And the less you know about what happened, the safer you are.  If you knew the full truth, my mother may try so silence you the way she tried to silence me.”
Starglow gave her a long, penetrating look, but said nothing more.  She then turned her gaze on Starjumper.  “And who are you?  I’ve never met you.”
“My name is Moonstar,” he answered.  “I’m from Torn Rock.”
“I’ve never been there.  How did you come to travel with her?”
“Army thestrals came to our new village and ransacked it,” he said emotionlessly.  “When I tried to resist, they cut off my wing, carried me out, and then dropped me.  They were laughing as I fell,” he said, his voice charged with emotion.  “I landed in a river and was swept downstream.  Moonshade found me, nursed me back to health, and now she’s helping me escape the Nightlands.”
“Where are you going?”
“Anywhere but here,” he answered heavily.  “I can’t—I can’t stay like this.  I can’t fly, I can’t hunt, and the army will kill me if they see me, so I can’t stay in the Nightlands.  I have to find a groundbound town, someplace where a thestral who can’t fly anymore can find some way to make a living.  Besides, if the army finds me, they’ll kill me.  It’s no longer safe to be here.”
“For either of us,” Moonshade added.
“You won’t find a warm welcome going this way,” she warned. 
“I’m going to Equestria,” Starjumper said.  “I think if I put the sea between me and the army, they won’t find me.  It’s really the only place I can think to go.  The griffons and hippogryphs won’t take me in, the Theradales wouldn’t accept me, Maretonia and Magestria are too close to the Nightlands for me to feel safe.  It was a choice between Saddle Arabia and Equestria, and I’m not all that fond of sand.”
“I’ll get him to Maretonia, then he should be alright the rest of the way on his own,” Moonshade added.  “Then I’ll be coming back.  I have unfinished business with my mother,” she said in a dark, hostile voice, her eyes narrowing dangerously.
“When you get there, go to a city called Baltimare,” Starglow told him, her voice…strange.  She sounded almost remorseful.  “There’s a thestral that lives there.  Her name is Nightsong.  She can help you.”
“I’ve heard that name.  I think I’d rather take my chances with the ponies.  I don’t want help from her,” Starjumper said harshly.  “She betrayed the thestral race.”
“Be careful what you say about my sister,” she said suddenly, glaring down at him.
That settled it.  This was his aunt.  He looked up at her, trying to keep the emotion out of his expression as he took his first real look at somepony that he knew was family.  He never thought he’d ever see a thestral relative outside of his mother and sister…and he wasn’t exactly sure how to feel about it.  She seemed protective over his mother, but there was no telling if that sentiment extended to him.  And besides, she’d never so much as sent his mother a letter, for years and years and years.  That hinted to him that Starglow had disowned her sister…yet the heat in her voice as she defended her to him was unmistakable.
The stallion returned before he could reply, landing at the cave mouth and trotting in.  “They weren’t lying,” he announced.  “There are no soldiers anywhere near the village.  They’re alone.”
“Then we can get back to the matter at hoof,” Starjumper said.  “We don’t have much.  A couple of gems, a few things we might offer for trade.  We just need enough food to get us to Maretonia, maybe two days’ worth,” he said, looking up at the taller mare.  “Are you going to help us, or not?”
She was quiet a long moment, her gaze shifting from him to Moonshade several times, then snorted audibly.  “Alright.  We’ll take the gems you have in return for two days’ worth of food,” she announced.  “All we have is blackcap bread.  The hunting has been very poor.”
“We don’t really care what it is, as long as it’s edible,” Moonshade said simply.
Starjumper felt something tugging at his foreleg, and looked down to see one of Starglow’s foals pulling at him with his hoof, clinging to him.  It didn’t register to him for a long second what the foal was doing, and when he did, he bent his forelegs with a hiss of pretend pain.  “Chieftess, can you get him to let go?” he asked.  But when he looked up at her, he saw her eyes wide, her mouth open, and she took a step back from him.
“Starjumper?” she blurted.
He was too late.  She saw that the foal didn’t pull at his skin and fur, because he was blood related to his cousin.
Moonshade turned quickly and squared off against the stallion, who looked confused, and Starjumper very nearly took hold of the foal as a hostage.  But she didn’t charge him, she didn’t try to rip his throat out with her fangs, she just stared at him in shock.  Her speaking his name had incited yet another reaction, when Summer Dawn lifted out of Moonshade’s saddlebag and quickly returned to full size, her horn glowing with pink magic as she took her place at his side.
“What is going on here, Starjumper?  What are you doing here?” she demanded.  “And why are you with the Moonblade and a unicorn?”
“I’m not who you think I am,” Starjumper said.
“I know what I saw,” she said simply.  “Blacktree, let go of him and go to your room,” she ordered of the foal.
“Okay, mommy,” he said, taking his hoof off Starjumper’s leg.  He tensed up, expecting her to attack the instant her foal was out of the way, but she just stood there.
“Are you insane, nephew?” she demanded once the foal was out of the way.  “You shouldn’t be here!  You have to leave, right now!”
“Where do you think we’re going, Aunt Starglow?” he replied.  “We just need food, and we’ll be gone from here.”
“What are you doing here?  Why are you here?” she asked.
“I can’t tell you, but I can promise you, I’m not here to shatter the Night Stone,” he answered.  “We just need enough food to get to Maretonia.  That’s all.  Just give us that, and we won’t bother you again.”
He tensed up when she stepped up to him, then she put a hoof on his shoulder.  “How is Nightsong?  Is she happy?” she asked in a soft, regretful voice.
“She’s happy,” he answered.  “She’s very happy.”
She gave a wan smile.  “I’m glad to hear it,” she said.  “Highwing, go get enough loaves to last all three of them two days,” she ordered the stallion.
“What’s going on, chieftess?”
“Trust me,” she replied.  When he was gone, she looked down at him again, her expression much softer.  “Now explain what’s going on, Starjumper.  Why you’re with the Moonblade and this unicorn.”
“Her name is Summer Dawn,” he said, and she looked over at him when he said her name.  “And I can’t tell you what’s going on, aunt.  It’s best for everypony if all you know is what we’ve already told you.”
“Did they do this to you?” she asked, pointing at his lost wing.
“I can’t tell you.  I’m sorry to be so deceptive, aunt, but I’m protecting you as much as I’m protecting us.  I don’t want the army to fall on your village, they won’t be any kinder to you than they were to me.  I wouldn’t even be here putting you at risk now if I had any other choice.  But I don’t.  We’re almost out of food, and it’s a long way back to Equestria.  We’re desperate,” he said simply.  “It’s safest for everypony if you simply give us the food, take our gems in payment, and let us go.  If the army comes, you can be honest when you tell them what happened.  The only thing you have to leave out is, well, this.”
“Star?” Summer Dawn asked.  She had no idea what they were saying, and was probably getting anxious.
“Hold on, Summer,” he told her in Ponish.  “And stand down.  She’s not going to attack.”
“She knows who you are.”
“He’s my nephew, unicorn,” Starglow said in fairly decent Ponish.  “And family does not attack its own.”
“Even when that family is a Lykan?” Starjumper asked directly, switching to Ponish.
“You gave me your word you weren’t here to shatter the Night Stone.  That’s good enough for me,” she said simply.  “I’m not entirely sure what’s going on here, but I’ll trust you, nephew.”
“What about the stallion?  He heard you call my name.”
“That’s my husband, Starjumper.  He won’t say a word.”
“Oh.  I had no idea,” he said, looking back at the cave entrance.  “He didn’t act like he’s your husband.”
“I’m the chieftess, he treats me with proper decorum in front of strangers,” she replied with a slight smile, a fang peeking out under her lip.  “If you’re going through Unicornia, nephew, you must be very careful.  They very well may attack you.”
“They already did,” he told her.  “But we don’t have any choice.  We have to get back to Equestria fast, and that’s the shortest route.”
She nodded, then gave him a long look.  “I can see Nightsong in you, nephew,” she said, a bit wistfully.
“Why haven’t you written?  Uncle Shadowstep sends letters.”
“It’s a long story, and not a very kind one.  The simple truth is, the anger I felt when she left faded years ago, but now I’m certain she wants nothing to do with me.  Some very harsh things were said, Starjumper,” she sighed.  “I tried to talk her out of it, and we got into an argument.  I said—“ she turned away, closing her eyes.  “I’m not proud of what I said,” she told him.  “If Shadowstep hadn’t been there, we very well may have tried to kill each other.  I doubt she’s forgiven me for that.  My anger only grew after the Night King stripped us of our property, forced us out into the hinterlands, but I’ve come to realize that it wasn’t her fault that happened.  The Night King was a petty tyrant and a scoundrel, and the quality of the throne has not improved since his daughter took it from him.”  She gave Moonshade a look, almost challenging.
“My own mother is trying to kill me, Starglow.  I’m not going to challenge you over the truth,” Moonshade told her.
“It was the Night Queen that expanded the punishment of the clan, started going after thestrals who had nothing to do with what happened.  She stole our goods and our lands and gave them out to her lackeys.  It’s why we’ve ended up here, within sight of Unicornia, where no other thestrals want to live,” she said bitterly.
“Unicornia…you should be careful, Aunt Starglow,” Starjumper told her.  “We had a major run-in with them on the way here, and no doubt we’ll have to all but fight our way through Unicornia on the way out.  They very well may try to invade the Nightlands.”
“Why?”
“The King there wants the Night Stone, and I think he’s capable of trying to invade the Nightlands to get it,” he told her.  “This village is literally right on the road he’d have to use to do that.  So you should keep a close eye on the border, and if you see the unicorn army marching in, get out of the way.”
“Seriously?” she asked, looking at Moonshade.
She nodded.  “I wouldn’t put it past them,” she agreed.
“But, they’d be stuck at the first mountain they reached.”
“They’re Theradales, Aunt.  If they get close enough to the Night Stone, its magic is going to affect them, the way it did back in the olden times, before they were driven out of the Nightlands.  They’ll gain clinging magic when they get close enough, which will allow them to get deeper into the Nightlands.”
“That seems outlandish, nephew.”
“Trust me, Starglow, I’m not lying,” he warned.  “We learned about this in Equestria.  And I shouldn’t explain any more, it may put you in danger.” 
“And what role does this Magestrian play, nephew?” she asked, looking at Summer Dawn.  “Is Magestria allying with the Theradales?”
“I’m from Equestria, ma’am, not Magestria,” Summer Dawn told her.  “I came along to help Star and Moonshade.”
“We wouldn’t have gotten this far without her,” he said fondly, looking down at her.
Starglow gave her a long look as her husband returned, carrying a large burlap sack.  “I have the supplies, chieftess,” he called.
“Thank you, Highwing,” she said as Moonshade took the bag from him and stuffed it in her saddlebag.  She then set the small pouch holding the gems they had on a nearby table.  “Now if you please, wait for us down on the commons.  They’ll be down in just a moment.”
He nodded, then turned and left the cave.  “Is there anything else I can do, nephew?” she asked.  “I can send a couple of clansponies with you.”
“It’s best for all of us if you just let us go, Aunt Starglow, we’ll be alright,” he told her.  “And pretend that this never happened.  But, I think it’s about time you wrote a letter to mother.  I think she’d very much love to hear from you.”
Her eyes softened, and she stepped up and gave Starjumper a brief, fierce hug.  “Be careful out there, Starjumper,” she told him.  “And I’m happy I finally got to meet you.”
“Me too, Aunt Starglow,” he replied.  “I hope to be reading a letter from you very soon.”
“That’s a promise.  Now you’d better go.”
“I was about to say the same thing.  We have a long way to go, and we don’t want you to put you in any more danger than we already have.”
“What is danger to a thestral, nephew?” she smiled.
She didn’t see them out, maintaining the illusion that they were just travelers, though she did watch in interest as Summer Dawn shrunk herself back down and returned to the carry pack.  Highwing as well didn’t say anything when Moonshade carried him down to the flat area at the base of the village.  “Be very careful out there, clanspony,” he said in concern.  “It’s a dangerous time to be a Longwing in the Nightlands.”
“Don’t I know it,” he agreed with a nod.  “Be well, clanspony, and thank you.”
“Safe travels.”
He and Moonshade started down the narrow, twisting road descending down into the valley, and once they were out of sight and sure they weren’t being watched, Summer Dawn shrunk Starjumper and brought him into the pack, and Moonshade took off.  She flew nearly back into Unicornia as she circled the village, staying under the peaks so she couldn’t be easily seen, then she put herself on course to reach the first of their planned stopping points within the Nightlands.  The first was only about twenty miles from the border, a small cave that Moonshade knew about that was very well hidden.  They were going to lay over there long enough for Summer Dawn and Starjumper to be able to teleport back to it, then she’d fly on to the next one, which was about forty miles away.  There they would lay over for the day, since flying in the Nightlands was nowhere near as fast and easy as it had been flying over the ocean or the relatively flat Maretonia.  Moonshade would be flying below the peaks most of the time to stay hidden, flying a zigzagging route that would actually be much further than forty miles, even though it was only forty miles from the first cave to the second cave in a straight line.  It would take them most of the night just to go those sixty or so miles, and no doubt Moonshade would be tired by the time they got there.  Flying in the cold, thin air of the Nightlands in the winter was a very demanding and draining endeavor.
And that was if they ran into no trouble.  It was entirely possible that they would, since the Night Queen knew they were coming.  Their only advantage in this was that Starjumper had been so badly wounded that the thestrals may believe him incapable of moving for several days.
The air coming through the mesh was definitely cold.  It was bitterly cold, arctic, and would have frozen them to death in seconds in their shrunken state if not for their heat stones.  Starjumper laid by the mesh window, looking out over the rugged mountainsides of the Nightlands, which were some of the steepest, highest, most inhospitable peaks in the entire world of Equus.  The only places for thestrals to live in this extreme terrain were small, narrow plateaus formed where several mountains met and along the gorge-like valleys between them, which were thousands of feet lower than the peaks and whose bottoms were filled with icy cold, fast-moving streams and small rivers.  Virtually any flat space in the Nightlands was purposed by the thestrals for living space or farming space, if it was low enough to be below the freeze line, though many thestrals settlements were built on the sides of the mountains, made up of caves or buildings anchored to the steep walls.
“I can’t really see anything,” Summer Dawn said in a low voice as she laid down beside him.  “It’s too dark.”
“You’re not missing a whole lot,” he told her.  “From what I remember, this stretch of the Nightlands is uninhabited, both because it borders Unicornia and because there’s not enough here to support a thestral community.  No doubt my aunt’s village just barely scrapes by on what they can forage and what they can hunt.”
She shuddered.  “I am so glad they didn’t give us any dead animals,” she said.
“Meat’s too precious to sell,” he replied.  “There’s not much out here, Summer, at least on this side of the Nightlands.  Even finding a rabbit is a stroke of luck.  Most likely, the village thestrals sneak over into Unicornia and hunt along the foothills, which is a dangerous proposition.  The southern and eastern sides of the Nightlands are lower, with lots of land below the freeze line, so there are trees there, and animals.  The northern and western stretches of the Nightlands are all like this, high, jagged mountains with little more than bare rock.”
“What about the center?”
“The Frostmoon Plateau is there, and it’s where the thestrals have most of their settlements,” he answered.  “The plateau is below the freeze line to the south but above it to the north, so it’s almost all farmland on one side and a city on the other.  The thestrals fly out to the farms to work them during the summer.  The only real thestral city is there, which is also called Frostmoon, named after the plateau.”
“Sounds like we’d better avoid it.”
He nodded.  “Moonshade’s route has us going through the most rugged parts of the Nightlands, because they’re virtually uninhabited,” he told her.  “If we’re lucky, we can get to the Cathedral of Night without seeing a single thestral, civilian or army.”
“I hope so.”  She was quiet a moment.  “So that was your aunt, hmm?  What did you think of her?”	“She reminded me of Mother in a few ways,” he replied musingly.  “I’m glad I met her, truth be told.  I thought I’d never get the chance to meet any of my other family…thought I always thought it would be Uncle Shadowstep.”
“Do you really think the King will invade?”
“I think he’s mad enough to try,” he answered.  “He had me in his hooves, then I slipped away.  He knows where I’m going, he very well may try to invade the Nightlands so his forces are in a position to capture us when we start back for Equestria, to take Night Stone from me.”
“But Moonshade can fly.  We go much faster,” she protested, then she bit her lip and looked away. “And he knows that we can teleport.”
“He doesn’t know how far we can teleport,” he told her.  “Remember, Summer, most ponies that can teleport can’t go very far, because they don’t really understand how the spell works.  Not like we do,” he said simply.  “Even unicorns capable of using the magic think they can’t go further than across town using it.  They have no idea that a pony can teleport miles, dozens of miles, if they know what they’re doing.  I’d bet that the King will picket forces at strategic points all through the Nightlands and Unicornia to try to catch us as we come back.  He has no idea that you can teleport halfway across Unicornia in one spell.  He has no idea how powerful you are, Summer.  None of them do,” he said proudly.
“I’ll do what I can, because I know it will keep you safe, Star,” she said, leaning her head against his neck.
“I’m much more interested in keeping you safe, silly mare,” he told her gently.
The first part of the night passed without incident, at least until after they stopped in a small cave to eat and to rest.  The small cave was the first of Moonshade’s planned stops, one of the points to which Summer Dawn would teleport when they had the Night Stone.  Because of that, both she and Starjumper spent nearly an hour carefully studying the small cave, until they were both confident they could teleport to it safely.  “I was planning on spending the day here, but that plan is out the window,” Moonshade said as they packed their things.  “We’re not going to reach the next point before sunrise.  I know of another place we can stop when the sun rises, not nearly as comfortable as the next stop, but it will get us through the day without being seen.”
“I’m not surprised, mother said there are thousands of small caves along this stretch of the Nightlands,” Starjumper said.
“Yeah, just none of them are big enough to be more than cracks in the walls,” Moonshade agreed.
Just before Summer Dawn shrunk the two of them down, they heard the leathery flap of wings outside the cave, then the sound of metal-shod hooves on the stone.  Summer Dawn reacted incredibly fast, and hastily shrunk the three of them down.  They ran forward and got behind a protrusion on the floor.  They then heard another set of metal-shod hooves hit stone, and then voices.
“Anything, Private?” a voice asked in Thestralla.
“I thought I saw pink light, but I guess not.  There’s no light in the cave.  I don’t see anypony, but I can smell three scents.  Two thestrals, one unicorn,” the reply came.  “I think they were here, Corporal.  The report said they had a unicorn with them.”
“How fresh?”
“Very.  I don’t think they left the cave more than a few minutes ago,” he replied.
“They have that unicorn, check the cave to make sure they’re not hiding in it using magic,” the second said, his voice disgusted.  “What foul magic did the unicorns use on the Moonblade to make her betray her own kind like this?”
“Hopefully we can undo it,” the first said.  Starjumper peeked around the protrusion a tiny bit, he saw a thestral soldier stepping inside the small cave.  He looked around carefully as a second soldier waited outside.  Summer Dawn had a clear look of fear on her face, but she held absolutely still behind the rock, didn’t even flinch when the soldier’s armored hoof came down past the rock, barely six inches from her and Moonshade.  Starjumper looked up and saw the soldier looking to the left, to the right, then upwards—thestrals looked up where few other ponies did—then his hoof lifted and pulled away as he started to turn around.  “Nopony here, Corporal,” he reported.
“Very good, Private.  They can’t have gotten far.  Let’s report back to the Sergeant that we found their scents.  He’ll know what to do.”
“Yes, sir,” he replied, his voice fading.  The three of them held still until they heard the sound of leathery wings, then both Starjumper and Moonshade looked over the rock and saw they were gone.
“Fast thinking, little slip,” Moonshade said approvingly.  “You saved us from a fight.”
“Maybe we should have, they had to have supplies,” Starjumper said as he continued to look out the entrance.
“First rule of searching.  When your searchers go missing, you know where your quarry is,” Moonshade said.  “The first time they missed their check in, we’d have had an entire company of soldiers swarming the area.”
“Oh.  I didn’t think of that.”
“You’re a good fighter, but you’re not a soldier,” she told him honestly.  “Let’s wait a few minutes for them to clear the valley, then move out.  They’ll come back to see if they can pick up our trail, so we can’t be here when they do.  Just much more carefully,” she grunted.  “No doubt they have patrols out in addition to the search parties.  That’s going to complicate things.”
“And the closer we get to the Cathedral of Night, the more patrols there will be,” Summer Dawn predicted.
“Just so, little slip.  I may have to change our plan,” she said absently.  “But it’s going to slow us down.”
“We don’t have time to waste, Moonshade,” Starjumper said.
“The key to getting there is avoiding fights, Star, and we’re not going to do that staying out in the open,” she said.  “About half a day’s flight from here is a cave system.  A very, very big cave system.  It runs through most of the western Nightlands.  I know a way through that will bring us out only about thirty miles from the Cathedral, but the downside to that is that it’s going to be a dangerous trip…or maybe not,” she said, looking at Summer Dawn.  “There are places where the passage is so small that we’d have to wriggle to get through, but if the little slip can shrink us in those places, we can move much faster.  We’ll lose about a day going through the caves, but we’ll be much, much harder to find.”
“It won’t work,” Summer Dawn said before Starjumper could say the same thing.
“Why not?”
“We can’t use the cave as a jump point when we teleport out,” Starjumper explained.  “Trying to teleport through that much solid rock would be prohibitively dangerous.  If either of us makes a mistake, it could kill all of us.  We’d be displaced through so much solid rock to reach an empty space that we’d be nothing but ashes by the time we reappeared.”
“I thought you were good at teleporting.”
“I am, but I’m also not reckless,” he replied bluntly.  “But if you recall, I’m not the one getting us out of here.  She is.  And trying to teleport into a cave deep inside a mountain is too dangerous for her.  She doesn’t have that much experience.”
“Oh.  Oh, alright.  I keep forgetting that,” she said.  “She does all the other magic you taught her so well, I forgot she hasn’t known how to teleport very long.”
“Well, I’ll take that as a complement,” Summer Dawn chuckled.
“But, I think we can still use my idea, by coming up to a surface entrance and letting her use that as a jump point, where it will be safe for her to teleport,” she said.  “Like I said, the cave system is extensive, it opens to the outside in dozens and dozens of places.  We can move through the caves, then come up and let her memorize a cave entrance.  The drawback of that plan is that it’s going to slow us down even more.”
“So, we have a choice between having to fight our way to the Cathedral or go through the caves, which will cost us time,” Starjumper grunted.
“We’re out of healing tonic, Star,” Summer Dawn said.  “I think Moonshade’s idea is the safer path.  Besides, if we’re in the caves, we can keep moving even during the daytime.  Moonshade can give us directions and sleep while we carry her.”
“You said it’s extensive.  Would it be possible for us to fly between cave entrances and then move underground in some places?  That way we make up some time flying, yet we still disappear underground and make it harder for the soldiers to find us.”
“Hmm,” she said.  “I…think so.  I know where the entrances are, and I think I can guide us to the right ones.  We surface, fly a little while where I think it’s safest, then go back underground.  We can take the caves through the places I’d be the most exposed when I’m flying, which would be where I think they’d have the most patrols, then we can fly in the places I’ll have the most cover.  I think that would work, Star,” she nodded.
“It sounds good to me,” Summer Dawn agreed.
“With you and the little slip using magic to speed us up through the caves, the soldiers wouldn’t believe we’d go that fast if they see us go into the caves,” Moonshade added.  “That gives us an advantage.”
“Then it sounds like we have a plan, and we’ve waited long enough.  Unshrink Moonshade and let’s get moving, Summer.”
“Okay.  Ready, Moonshade?”
“Ready.”
It was a fairly nerve-wracking hour as Moonshade flew very low in the valleys between the peaks, always staying close to the walls so she could land and hide if thestrals appeared over the valley sides, until she reached a narrow crack in the side of a mountain, near the valley floor.  “Here’s the first cave,” she declared as she stepped inside, addressing them inside the bag.  “Just stay inside and shrunk, this cavern is fairly large.  We’ll follow it about fifteen miles, and it comes out in a valley to the east, not far from a village.  Little slip, you’re not going to be able to see at all,” she warned.  “Once we get inside the cave, it’ll be pitch black for you.  It’s important that you do not make any light.  Even the light you’d make in the bag will interfere with my ability to see.  And keep your voice down, I’ll be relying on my ears once we get deep inside the cave.  When you’re shrunk, your voice creates a chittering that interferes with my ability to hear echoes.” 
“How can she see in the pitch black?” Summer Dawn asked Starjumper as the thestral soldier started into the cavern.  “You said that even thestrals can’t see in complete darkness.”
“Your eyes can’t see the light she’ll see,” he answered.  “Thestral eyes don’t only see some colors that ponies can’t see, we can also see light that ponies can’t see.  These caverns are filled with lichens and other cave-dwelling plants that give off that kind of light, that ponies can’t see.  She’ll move into the cavern and wait about ten minutes or so for her eyes to adjust to seeing that light, then she’ll start out.  It’s not going to be bright as day deep inside the cave for her, there will be places where she’ll be as blind as we are, but that’s when her other senses take over.  She’ll guide herself through the blind areas by hearing, touch, and smell.  Her hearing will warn her if she gets too close to a rock wall or stalactite because of the echoes of her hoofsteps off of it.  Her sense of smell will tell her which passage has fresher air, and if there’s any movement of air, she’ll feel it on the membranes of her wings.”
“Wow.  That’s neat,” she said in an impressed voice.
“Thestrals are well suited for delving the deep caves, Summer,” Starjumper told her easily.  “Now, we have to get away from the window, get on the other side close to Moonshade’s side, and tie ourselves down.  She very well may have to walk upside-down, and we don’t want to get flung all over the place in here.” 
Moonshade ventured well into the cave, then did as Starjumper predicted, she stopped and waited for her eyes to completely adjust.  His did as well, the utter darkness slowly giving way to a very dim illumination that cast the cave in shades of less-dark that he couldn’t describe to a pony that couldn’t see them, cast by a light that ponies couldn’t see at all that was radiating from colonies of lichens on the walls.  In that light, he could see no detail, just rough shapes and contours…but that was all that Moonshade would need to see to navigate the cave.  The cave was quiet, with only the sound of Moonshade’s hooves on the rock echoing off the walls, or the sound of her wings when she flew in areas where the chambers of the cavern were large enough to give her room to do so.  Summer Dawn stayed quiet, tied down inside the bag  right beside him, her head against his neck…in this cave of sensory deprivation, where she couldn’t make light or even speak because it may interfere with Moonshade, all she had was the feel of him against her.
But the way wasn’t completely easy.  There were areas where Moonshade had to wriggle through narrow cracks and fissures or crawl through tight passages, often crushing the bag and forcing the two of them back away from the window, and the way was not horizontal.  Her ability to cling to things was critical in a place like this, where she was often walking up or down vertical shafts, and as he predicted, there were several times when she walked upside-down over the roof, mainly to avoid deep water.  Water was a common feature in the deep caves.  There were times when she waded through shallow water on the floor, and times when she avoided the water by walking in the walls or roof.
There was one reprieve, a little past midnight.  Moonshade stopped in a passage and had them come out.  “This is one of the jump points,” she informed them.  “Actually, it’s a small cave just up the passage from here.  We’ll stay here only long enough for you two to be able to teleport back.  How long will that take?”
“About an hour or so,” Starjumper replied.
“We can have lunch while we’re out,” Summer Dawn said.  “I’m getting hungry, and it’s hard to eat when you’re moving through the caves.”
“Then let’s break out the blackcap bread.”
After the meal and enough time for the two of them to memorize the cave, Moonshade got them moving again.  However, the trip ran into a slight snag barely half an hour after they got under way again.  Starjumper became aware of a tiny spot of visible light coming through the mesh window on the far side of the bag, and almost at the same time, they heard Moonshade curse.  “A ghostflower,” she growled.  “Starjumper, shut your eyes.”
“What’s a ghostflower?” Summer Dawn whispered.
“A kind of magical flower that only grows deep in caves.  It gives off visible light.  The ghostflower will mess with our vision, make Moonshade stop for a while for her eyes to re-adjust after she gets far enough away from it.”
“Oh.  Can’t she just step on it or something?”
“That wouldn’t stop it from glowing.  They even glow when they’re picked, and they glow for days and days.  The magic that makes them glow fades very slowly once they’re picked.”
“Oh.  Ohhh!” she said quickly.  “We have to make her stop!”
“Why?”
“That thing may be useful if thestrals come after us!” she said.  “We can pick it and put it in a bag, then drop it behind us if we get chased!  It’ll blind the thestrals after us!”
“That’s pretty clever,” he said approvingly.  “Moonshade, stop!” he shouted, one of the prearranged signals they’d prepared.  She couldn’t understand what he was saying, but the fact that he was shouting warned her that they needed out of the bag.
“Why are we stopping?” she demanded as she did so.
“Grab a sack and you do it, Summer,” he told her.  “It won’t matter if your night vision gets ruined by the ghostflower.”
“Got it.”  She left the bag, and a blaze of pink light flooded the chamber as she unshrunk herself.  “We’re going to pick that ghostflower, Moonshade,” she told her.  “And stuff it in a bag so the light doesn’t bother you.  That way if thestrals chase us into the deep caves, we can drop it behind us to blind them.”
“Smart,” she agreed.  “You do it.”
“You bet.  Give me just a second.”
She returned to the pack a few minutes later, carrying the neck of the bag in her teeth to prevent the light of her magic from bothering Moonshade.  She tied herself back down after sticking the bag in one of the tents sewn to the bottom of the pack.  “All done,” she declared.
“Here’s hoping we don’t have to use it, but it’s good to have it, just in case.  Well done, Summer.”
She leaned her head against his neck in appreciation of his compliment.
It took Moonshade the rest of the night to traverse the cave, and for him and Summer Dawn, it was like time stood still.  It was hard to sleep with her so frequently going up and down walls and across the ceiling, so they were awake for most of the journey.  After a time that seemed like forever packed into just a few minutes, faint visible light started filtering through the mesh on the far side of the pack’s floor.  “We’re almost out,” Moonshade called.  “And it’s nearly dawn.  It’s too far to the next cave, we’ll have to lay over here.  Go ahead and get out, both of you,” she called.  They untied themselves, then Summer Dawn levitated them out and unshrunk them into a small oval chamber with a rough, irregular floor.  Two passages left the chamber, one in the lower part of the floor leading down, and the other exiting nearly the top of the chamber, going up.  That passage was the one that had the faint light filtering into the chamber.  The passage outside wasn’t straight, it curved, which meant that nopony could stand at the entrance and see all the way down into the chamber.  “It’s about thirty miles to the next cave, and the sun’s going to rise in just a few minutes,” Moonshade repeated.
“We’ve lost too much time, and they already know we’re here,” Starjumper said.  “We have to keep moving.”
“They’ll be on us in seconds if I fly in the daytime,” she protested.
“You’re not going to carry us.  I am,” he replied bluntly.  “I’ll get us to the next teleport jump point my way, and we can rest there.”
“You can’t levitate any faster than I can fly.”
“But I can teleport far faster,” he replied, which made Summer Dawn’s eyes widen and nod vigorously.  “They already know I can teleport from the fight in Canterlot.  What they don’t know is how far I can go when I do it, so I’ll keep that little surprise hidden.  So, what I’m going to do is keep us moving by teleporting us up as high as we can go without injuring us, then teleporting in the direction of the next rest point, and then have you guide me to it once we’re there.  We can rest there and give me and Summer the chance to memorize the area so we can teleport to it, then we can move on when the moon rises.  Just tell me which way to go, and I’ll get us there.”
She was quiet a long moment, then gave a single nod.  “It’s worth the risk.  If you do it right at sunrise, the light will limit the vision of the soldiers.  But you have to go up further than that.  How high up can you go?”
“As far as you say.”
“Then go up another fifteen thousand feet, that should be up high enough that you’ll be nothing but an unidentifiable tiny speck,” she told him.  “Our heat stones will keep us from freezing, and if you do it fast enough, we won’t pass out from lack of air.  Go up, teleport over, then teleport back down quickly.  I can get us to the cave from there.”
“Summer can help there.  Summer, you’ll need to use magic while shrunk,” he told her.  “When I say so, put up a shield around the inside of the carry pack, one that will stop air.  That will seal your air inside the shield.”
“Can’t you do the same?” she asked.
He shook his head.  “I’d have to teleport the entire contents of the shield, and if I’m going thirty miles in one jump, I can’t take that much extra volume with me,” he answered.  “If I was only going five or six miles, sure.  But not thirty.  I’d pass out when I reappeared.  Moonshade, I’ll take the pack.  You and Summer shrink down and get inside to give her time to work out the dimensions of the shield.  Summer, make it as big as you can inside the bag, trap as much air in with you as you can.  The instant I have my horn, I’ll teleport us three times.  Summer, remember, three.  After the third teleport, you can drop the shield, let Moonshade out, and return her to full size so she can guide me to the cave.”
“Okay.”
“Moonshade, which way do I teleport?”
“You want to go just a shade north of east northeast,” she replied.  “The cave is in a narrow, twisting valley that goes between two high peaks that are shaped like ridges.”
“That’s enough to get me in the general vicinity,” he assured her.  “Now let’s move the pack so you two can get ready.  I’ll be teleporting as soon as the sun rises.”
They moved with skill ingrained by repetition, Summer Dawn helping Moonshade take off the pack and then settling it on Starjumper’s back, then she adjusted the straps and secured it to him.  The two of them then shrunk down and got back into the carry pack, and Starjumper prepared for his task by taking deep breaths, hyperventilating so he could hold his breath as long as possible when he began.  The light filtering down the tunnel got brighter and brighter over the moments, until the rising sun seemed to pierce the rock with its light and send its rays directly into his soul.  That triggered the change, and he felt his remaining wing burn to ash and crumble onto the pack as his horn tore through his forehead, spinning around itself to form that iconic spiral pattern as it grew with magical speed.
The instant he felt the connection to his inner magic reform, he acted.  He took in a deep, deep breath, clamped his teeth shut, then teleported blind, teleporting straight up by fifteen thousand feet.  He reappeared so high over the Nightlands that he could see the curve of the horizon, could see the sun to the east.  He caught himself in his own magic, levitating himself as he oriented himself east northeast, then turned just a hair more to the north, following Moonshade’s instructions.  He then prepared himself for a major teleport, a fairly dangerous and exhausting one since he would be teleporting in the most inefficient way there was, measuring the power required carefully to teleport exactly thirty miles, something he could do because he had so much experience with teleportation.  He had practiced for months with teleporting exact distances, so he was completely confident he could teleport thirty miles.
When he had his direction and distance firmly in mind, he defined all other aspects of the teleport and then enacted it.  His horn blazed with nearly blinding magical light as he unleashed a torrent of power from within, and then he vanished in a circular burst of golden energy.  He was teleporting so far that he had a fleeting impression of the otherspace through which he moved when he teleported, a sensation of hot wind flashing over his coat and mane, a shimmer of form and substance beyond the golden energy that surrounded him, isolating him from the outside as he moved through this other place, and then he reached his destination.  He returned to the real world in a burst of magical light that faded quickly, and immediately caught himself before he started falling and looked down to find a landing spot to get back down to breathable air.
The peaks.  He could see the peaks.  Two long ridges standing side by side with a treacherous, narrow valley twisting through the space between them.  He fixed his gaze on the south peak, on a ledge to the side of the snow-capped rock that was clear of snow, and then he teleported to that position.  The transit was much rougher than the others, since he was teleporting to a place that he was viewing from a great distance and thus his ability to envision his landing point was severely limited, and thus it required much more energy to teleport and created more resistance than normal.  A tiny waft of smoke issued from his shoulder and mane when he reappeared standing on the ledge just below the snow line.  Summer Dawn and Moonshade floated out of the pack and returned to normal size, the thestral clinging to the side of the mountainside as Summer Dawn floated just in front of him, since there wasn’t enough room on the ledge for any other pony but him.
“Pretty accurate, Star,” Moonshade complemented him.  “This is the valley, but we’re on the wrong end of it.  The cave is about three miles that way,” she added, pointing with her hoof.
“I saw the mountains you described from the air,” he told her.
“Did you see any soldiers?”
“I was up too high,” he told her.  “I couldn’t see them any more than they could see me.”
“You two shrink down and get on my tail, I’ll cling to you.  I’ll carry us the rest of the way,” she told them.
He nodded without responding and cast the shrink spell on himself, feeling the effort of it, then he levitated up and burrowed his legs into the hair at the end of her tail.  Summer Dawn did the same, and when Moonshade saw they were secure, she turned and vaulted off the side of the mountain, her wings keeping her aloft as she started down the valley.
“You look a little tired, Star,” Summer Dawn noted.
“Getting us here took it out of me,” he told her.  “Porting to a place I can’t see and don’t know is the hardest kind of teleport, and on top of that, I had to go thirty miles.”
“I felt it a little bit in transit.  I’m glad you did it, if I did, our manes would have been on fire when we reappeared,” she laughed.
“Just give it time, Summer,” he told her with a gentle smile.
It only took Moonshade about five minutes to reach the cave, and when she reached it, she had Starjumper take them in enclosed in a shield so they left no scent on the rock near the entrance to give away their presence.  It was a small opening that went upwards into a fairly large chamber that was long and narrow, but sported a relatively flat floor at the back end of the chamber.  The chamber was considerably warmer than the air outside, insulated by the rock.
“This isn’t bad, but that’s better,” Starjumper said without lowering the shield, pointing at a small hole in the back of the chamber.  “We should stay shrunk down to make it even harder for them to find us.”
“It certainly worked against that soldier this morning,” Moonshade nodded in agreement.  “He could smell us, but didn’t see us.”
“I’ll do it,” Summer Dawn offered.  “You’re looking a little tired, Star.”
“I’ll be alright after some sleep,” he assured her as her horn blazed with pink magic, and then the chamber around them seemed to grow vast in a brief moment.  Starjumper carried them into the small hole, which had a flat enough floor for them to make a proper camp.  They unpacked their bedrolls and the food and water, then settled in for a meal before they got some rest.  “How far away are we from the castle?” Summer Dawn asked.
“About sixty miles,” Moonshade answered.  “It’s northeast of here.  We’ll stop about halfway at another jump point, then if we’re lucky, we’ll reach a cave about ten miles from it where we prepare to go in for the Night Stone.”
“Then we might get there tomorrow,” Starjumper mused.
“That’s going to depend on if we got far enough ahead of the searchers,” she countered.  “They may not have a lot of patrols out here, they probably don’t believe we could get this far this fast, thanks to you teleporting us.  If there’s not many patrols, then we might get very close to the final cave tomorrow.  If there are, we’ll have to move through the caves, and we’ll probably only make it to the next jump point.  But no matter what, we’re a maximum of three days away.  We might get there tomorrow, we might get there early on the third day.  It’s going to depend entirely on how many thestrals are looking for us.”
“That’s a relief,” Summer Dawn said.  “Then we get the Night Stone back to Equestria and keep it there until it’s safe to bring it back.”
“And stop your mother from resurrecting Sombra,” Starjumper added, looking at Moonshade.
“Luna make it so,” the thestral said emphatically.