The Guardian (K)Night

by InfiniteBrony


Feeding & Fear

Shining Armor awoke to screams. Screams and thrashing. The first thing he became aware of upon his sudden and jarring return to consciousness was the sensation of falling, followed immediately by a heavy impact that resounded through his body. Flailing about in panic and confusion, he felt his limbs becoming more and more constricted, which caused him to become only more panicked and exacerbated the situation. After a moment he was completely encased, his movements restricted, forcing him to calm down and assess the situation. After a brief moment, all the memories of last night came rushing back and he realized where he was. Carefully, he used his magic to untangle the bed sheets from around himself, stood up and turned to his sister, lighting the room’s candle as he did. Immediately, his breath caught in his throat.

Twilight’s eyes were wide and panicked, all but glowing red and pupils dilated to razor-thin slits as they darted madly back and forth. Fangs, glistening and wickedly sharp hung from her jaw, bared for all to see as her lips were pulled back in a terrified snarl. She was thrashing about in a frenzy, her limbs caught up in the blankets as his were, her head flailing about and tearing holes in the bedding and bed-frame alike with her suddenly razor-sharp horn. She was all but howling as she shouted strange words, spittle flying from her lips. “Ignaei! Venne! VENNE!”

Shining Armor looked on in horror as his little sister struggled violently and spoke in tongues. Eyes wide with fright and worry, he leapt upon her, doing his best to use his bulk to restrain her so she couldn’t hurt herself. “Twilight, please! Calm down!” he screamed as he tried to wrap his legs around her.

Unfortunately, all he succeeded in doing was untangling her from the blankets wrapped around her limbs. With unnatural and unforeseen strength, Twilight managed to snake her legs beneath Shining’s barrel and with a shove threw him across the room. He collided with the wall just beside the doorway and fell to the ground in a heap, the breath driven from his lungs. Gasping, with trembling legs and eyes wide in surprise, he stood up again and looked at his sister. Slowly, she was lurching to a standing position on the bed, her movements disjointed and jerking, like some freakishly large insect. Her mouth hung open, saliva dripping from her fangs like venom, and with a glass rattling shriek, she began bounding for the door.

Reacting more on instinct than thought, Shining Armor jumped in front of her, blocking the doorway and containing her so that she couldn’t run about the castle in her crazed state. She barreled into him, but he had already taken into account her strange strength, and using the training he received over several years of loyal service to the Royal Guard he was able to redirect her momentum. He dug in his hooves and stood resolutely as he used his body to block the doorway, Twilight desperately trying to worm her way past him, screaming, “Loca! LOCA!”

“Twily, please, I’m begging you, calm down!” he shouted back, thrusting out his chest to try and drive her back. “Please, just tell me what’s wrong!” He pleaded, frightened tears in his eyes. After several seconds of no response Shining reached out with his forelegs and pulled her into a deep hug, gently rubbing her back as he spoke in her ear, “Please, just tell me what’s got you so scared.” It seemed to be work, Twilight was suddenly silent, and wrapped her own forelegs around him, returning the hug, her entire body trembling violently. Shining Armor let out a relieved sigh, his own body starting to tremble in response as his sister finally started to calm down.

Then suddenly, his entire world became fire and pain. Every muscle in his body contracted at once as his entire body seized, a burning agony lancing through him. It was a horrible pain unlike any he had ever felt before, cutting through all his defenses and thoughts like a knife. It transcended physical sensation and seemed to dig into his very soul, wiping all thoughts from his mind and making every moment drag on for a torturous eternity. He tried desperately to fight it, to regain his senses and push away the hurt but it was a futile effort. It quickly became all he could to even hold onto his sense of self as the overwhelming, all-consuming pain threatened to strip even that away from him. With a tremendous effort of will, he managed to turn a single eye downwards in an attempt to find the cause of his unbearable torment, and what he saw filled him with a sense of sadness and betrayal every bit as horrid as the fire that laced his body: Twilight had bitten him. She lay against him, calm and oblivious, eyes closed and fangs sunk deep into the flesh of his neck as she suckled at his lifeblood with the content expression of a foal suckling at a teat, excess of the crimson fluid staining her face and his hide.

Slowly, the tide began to turn on the ocean of agony that consumed him, the flame in his veins turning to ice. His vision began to darken, the already dimly lit room fading away, leaving only his sense of hearing to observe his situation. Soon enough, even that began to slowly fade too. He could hear his own heartbeat beginning to slow, and what few thoughts remained in his head became sluggish. It felt as if his very life was being leached away, draining away through the holes in his neck, and he worried that may very well be the case. He struggled valiantly, but it was in vain as his body refused to listen to him. He was so very cold, like all the warmth had left the world, and the only bit of it left continued to dribble down and coat his left side. He could feel the darkness reaching in to consume him, and his last thoughts as he slipped into the abyss were of Twilight.

*~-/^\-~*

Twilight Sparkle had been dreaming. Once again she had been in an endless white expanse, though this time lacking in any sort of fog or mist. Instead, she had been rooted in place, unmoving and staring straight ahead. Fire danced just beyond the edges of her vision, close enough that she could feel the warmth of it and it felt like her own coat might catch alight at any moment. That wasn’t what made the dream unusual or uncomfortable though, what was unsettling about the dream wasn’t that even though she couldn’t see it, she knew that there was something behind her, something horrible, and she knew that if she turned to look or even so much as twitched it would get her. She could feel it right behind her, just standing there ominously, its immense shadow dancing in the flickering light of the flames all around her. It made the fur on the back of her neck stand up, the thing was close enough that she could hear its constant low grumbling and growling in her ear and feel its breath on her neck. It seemed like she sat there, still and unmoving, for hours before the thing just behind her spoke a single word with a reverberating voice that sounded just like her own.

“Hungry.”

Twilight awoke at that moment, though it was not an immediate or violent awakening like she had become accustomed to. Instead she awoke slowly and gradually, the soothing darkness of her closed eyes replacing the endless white landscape of her dreams. A deep content and comfortable warmth enveloped her, the kind of which brought to mind fond memories of cold winter days where the air was sharp and cold but far away as she lay in the enveloping warmth of her bed, content knowing there was no need or reason to leave it. A satisfying fullness lay in her belly, having filled an emptiness she hadn’t even been aware of. She gave a blissful sigh and snuggled deeper into the warmth, causing a wetness to spread across her muzzle and neck. Curious, she groggily blinked open her eyes with a frown, the world around her slowly swimming into focus.

It took her several moments to understand what she was seeing. She wasn’t in the bed where she had fallen asleep, but instead laying on the threadbare rug just in front of the room’s only door. She was still cuddled up to her older brother as she had been when she had fallen asleep, though there was something off about him. He was limp and still, and a little cold to the touch. He seemed a bit paler than usual, and for some reason his entire left side below the head was wet and colored varying shades of red. She furrowed her brow in puzzlement, licking her lips and tasting copper and berries. Then suddenly, it hit her.

A heart-piercing, shrieking wail tore itself from her throat, louder than any before it, as she leapt to her hooves and stared desperately down at the too-still form of her brother, many fat, burning tears streaming down her face.

The door burst open as guards rushed in at the deafening commotion, and with trained eyes immediately took in the scene before them. Twilight stood over the prone form of their Captain as he lay still, coated in his own blood as more of it dripped from her muzzle. One of them tackled her out of the way as she pawed desperately at him and babbled incoherently, the rest of them rushing to his aid. Twilight scrambled back to her hooves and tried to rush to his side but the guard who had tacked her struck her across the face with the business end of his spear, drawing a long but shallow line of blood and shocked and pained yelp from her. “Stay back, you monster!” he screamed, leveling his spear at her as she stared on in horror.

The stallions surrounding Shining Armor did their best to administer what little first aid they could, struggling and failing to find a pulse. Quickly and cautiously, they loaded him onto the back of one of them before all dashing down the halls to the infirmary, shouting for a medic all along the way. The guard pointing his spear at Twilight was the last out of the room, the look of burning hate and fear on his face the last thing she saw before he slammed the door shut, the sound of it being barred from the outside echoing through the room.

It all happened so fast Twilight barely had any time to react, the sound of wood and iron sliding home and locking her in startling her and shocking her back to her senses. She belatedly rushed to the door and began pounding on it desperately, causing it to rattle in its frame. “Please! Please, let me out!” she pleaded, trying as hard as she could to chase after her brother. All higher thought or logic was gone from her mind, replaced with desperation and fear, all her thoughts focused on her brother and a furious need to do whatever she could to try and fix what had happened. Had she been able to think objectively, she would have realized she was in shock, the reality of situation too much to understand and internalize at once.

So she pounded at the door, babbling and muttering and bargaining, struggling in a foalish effort to undo the harm and make everything alright again. To make her big brother okay. But there was nothing she could do. Slowly, the situation began to really sink in, and her furious pounding and scrambling and screaming died down as her weeping became worse, hot salty tears streaming down her face in torrents. Shining Armor was hurt, hurt badly. He could be dead. And it was all her fault. She had bitten him. She had bitten him and drained his blood and left him cold and still on the ground. The guards had attacked her, locked her in her room like a criminal. Or a caged animal.

Slowly, she slid down the door to lay on the floor, curling up in a ball as her weeping grew quieter, but no less fervent. She paid no mind to the sting on her cheek where the guard’s spear had cut her, not even noticing as it already began to close. For a long while she just laid there and cried, and even though she had just awoken her strength left her and darkness began to take hold of her. She began to fall asleep, though not before she realized something.

Princess Luna, the guards, Dr. Prototype, they were all right. She really was a monster.

*~-/^\-~*

Luna stared down at the white stallion laying the bed before her, hooked up to the various machines of modern medicine, and felt a mixture of emotions roiling inside of her breast, chief among them a deep sadness and pity. She had been away for longer than usual, stalking The Dream Lands as she was wont to do when she was particularly upset, when she had felt the pulse of fel magics from the castle in the Everfree, and she had seen how it had reacted with the sleeping mind of the former unicorn that had vexed her of late. She had kept a wary eye on it fearing the worst, and when Twilight had returned to slumber not long after waking Luna had seen the troubles that plagued her and knew that her fears had been justified. She decided it was time to return to the world of the waking, stepping out of the Veil directly into the castle’s infirmary, startling the nurses and doctors on duty as she seemed to appear out of thin air.

Shining Armor was in a wretched state. His bright white coat lacked its typical lustrous sheen, and instead had the sickly pallor of a corpse. His face was gaunt, the skin especially tight around his eyes and cheeks, the shape of the bone beneath clearly visible. His chest only moved with the aid of a machine like twin bellows, and another machine Luna understood measured the beating of his heart only beeped faintly and irregularly. Though he had already been thoroughly scrubbed, his left side was still vaguely pink from his own blood, and more of the life giving fluid ran from bags through tubes into the crooks of both forelegs.

Luna was distracted from her examination by a heart-broken gasp and choked sobs coming from the doorway. Turning her head, Luna saw the pink coated figure of her niece standing there at the room’s entrance, a hoof over her mouth and tears in her eyes, her shoulders shaking with quiet sobs. After a brief moment of shock, Cadence rushed to his bedside, and had to visibly restrain herself from throwing herself across him. Instead she reached out to him, her hooves trailing up and down his body, taking in his sad state but never quite touching him, as if afraid a single touch would shatter him like glass. For several minutes all was quiet save for the beeping of machines and the soft weeping of Cadence, before she turned to Luna and with teary eyes asked, “What happened?”

Luna turned away, unable to look the other princess in the eyes lest her own sadness take hold. “That is a good question,” she responded, her face tight with a schooled lack of visible emotion, “one that We intend to seek an answer to.” Without another word, Luna walked away, leaving Cadence alone with her husband and stalked down the castle's inner corridors.

She did not pay much mind to the many guards she passed on her way, though she did note the abnormal tightness on their faces and tension in their limbs. It seemed that news traveled fast, and bad news all the faster. Word had all but certainly reached her sister by now. Luna could only imagine how she was taking it. Most likely she was devastated, for a good many number of reasons as well. The situation with Twilight was already taking its toll on her, and now that it had escalated like this... Luna didn’t even want to think on it.

It wasn’t long before the hallways she walked gradually became darker and cooler, and the shining marble was slowly replaced grayer, more mundane stone. Luna turned a corner and took note of the more than a dozen fully equipped guards standing outside an innocuous wooden door that had been barred shut. They all turned and saluted her as they noticed her approach, but she paid them little mind, continuing right up to the door. She stood there for a moment, deciding on her next move, before saying to guard stallions around her “Retain thy wary vigil, we shalt go and speak with her alone.” With that, she turned her body to smoke and stardust, flowing through the cracks in the door and rematerializing on the other side.

It was as dark as she had expected, though such a thing mattered little to one such as her nor, she suspected, the room’s only other occupant. Turning around she saw Twilight still asleep where she fell, curled in on herself in front of the door, the fur on her face wet and matted with tears. Luna stood before her, and couldn’t help but wonder how something that seemed so small could be so dangerous. Looking at her now, she just seemed so tiny and helpless, and Luna felt a sudden surge of pity. But regardless of how she may seem, she had still committed a terrible act, and that needed to be addressed. Channelling a tiny amount of dream magic into her voice, Luna spoke a single word; “Awaken.”

Immediately, Twilight’s eyes flew open wide, as if she had been conscious the entire time and merely waiting for Luna to break the silence. Slowly, she uncurled from her position on the floor and rose to her haunches, her joints popping in protest of the movement after sleeping on the hard ground. If she was surprised to suddenly awaken and find Luna before her, she showed no sign of it, and turned to look the princess in the eye. As she did, Luna took in the sight of her.

She was tense, even after just waking, her muscles coiled taught like a spring. Her fur was ruffled and matted, her mane and tail likewise unkempt and frazzled, hairs sticking every which way and forming a tangled halo around her head, making her look like some sort of wild, unwashed feral pony. Her hooves were scuffed and scratched, one even lightly bleed from where she had repeatedly clawed at the door, though it looked like she didn’t even notice or care. Her horn was likewise unsightly, the spiral grooves full of dirt and grime and a barely noticeable dent near the tip. Her eyes though, her eyes were the worst of it.

They were dry and puffy and bloodshot, as to be expected, but that wasn’t all. They were dark. Empty. Full of sorrow and hurt and defeat. Luna knew this mare before her, and though she did not like to admit it even to herself, she deeply respected her. Twilight was strong. She was smart. She loved the world, loved books, loved to learn and loved her friends most of all, and it always showed in the gleam in her eyes whenever she enjoyed those things. She was the sort to never back down and always follow through, even when all seemed lost and everything was hopeless. She had even managed to free Luna from her own darkness. There was a spark in those eyes, one that couldn’t be extinguished even by the deepest darkness.

But now that spark was gone. Those eyes were cold, and dark. Those eyes were dead. And with a surge of tumultuous emotions that caused her breath to catch, Luna realized that she recognized those eyes. How could she not. How many times now had her own failings and mistakes haunted her, how many times had she woken in the middle of the day in a cold sweat with nightmares of the moon and fighting her sister lingering on her mind. How many times would images of her own sister, broken and defeated as she proclaimed unending night crawl unbidden to her mind and she would see those same dead eyes staring back at her in the mirror.

“Luna-” Twilight croaked, her voice raspy and hoarse from crying and thick with emotion.

Before Twilight could say her piece, Luna interrupted her. “Shining Armor will live,” she spoke, saying so very much with just a few words.

With those words, it was as if a spell had been cast. Twilight stiffened in place, not a muscle so much as twitching. Then, slowly, like ice cracking in the first thaw of spring, her entire expression started to break down. Her mouth hung open and pulled down into a deep frown, her expression of exhausted apathy melting away. Her entire body went limp as all the tension left it in an instant, nearly sending her toppling over. Fresh hot tears began to roll down her cheeks anew as her eyes came alive again. With a cry full of relief and pain, she fell forward, burying herself in Luna’s breast, sobbing uncontrollably as she was overcome with emotion.

Luna looked down at her with pity, and wrapped her up in her wings in a feathery embrace, feeling quite a bit like her sister in that moment. “There there, hush now. He will live,” she soothed softly, gently running her hoof through Twilight’s frazzled mane. They stayed like that for a good long while, Twilight weeping into the princess’s fur and Luna whispering quiet comforts, and slowly the tension that neither of them had even realized hung in the air faded away. Along with it went Luna’s anger and pain at Twilight’s recent words and deeds, replaced instead with an increasingly prominent feeling of pity, as well of some guilt at indirectly causing the whole affair and a brief sparkle of kinship at the similarity between them.

Finally, Twilight could cry no more, and as the tears stopped, she pulled away, Luna opening her wings to allow her to back off and look each other in the eye. “Luna,” she barely managed to rasp out, her voice still quiet and scratchy. Swallowing, she tried again, “Luna, I’m so sorry. I’m so, so sorry, about... about everything.”

“Do not be,” Luna responded, her voice still whisper quiet and soothing. “We do not believe thy harsh words the eve before last nor the attack on thy brother to truly be any fault of thine. Tell us, what exactly happened?”

Twilight looked away, not able to meet Luna’s gaze and for several moments was silent, working up the courage to talk about it. When she did finally speak her words came at a rush, spilling out of her like she couldn’t hold them in anymore, “I... I don’t really know. I was just sleeping and having these weird dreams like usual and then I woke up and I was really comfortable but I opened my eyes and he was just lying there and I screamed and the guards came in and attacked me and they took him away and locked me in and I couldn’t get to him and I just-”

Luna silenced her rambling by laying a hoof on her shoulder, causing Twilight to fall silent mid-sentence. Twilight blinked several times, choking back the rush of words, and looked into the princess’s eyes, taking a deep and calming breath. Letting it out, she quietly and timidly asked, “Princess, what’s happening to me?”

Then it was Luna’s turned to give a deep sigh and turn her gaze. “We... cannot be certain, but We do have a theory,” she said hesitantly, choosing each word with care. “But thou wert only recently Turned. It was no doubt a most traumatic affair, and thou hast spent much time since then in deep slumber. It would be hardly surprising then, if thou were to experience the changes that Afflict thee over the course of time, rather than all within an instant as conventional wisdom - or conventional fiction as such cases similar to this may oft be - would dictate. ‘Tis Our belief that the beast within thee yet still continues to grow and awaken. And when the rush of fel magics coming from our ancient home within the Everfree reached here, we believe they called to the beast, causing it to stir, and you to lash out at thy sibling.”

Twilight listened attentively to Luna’s explanation, though her ears perked up at the last sentence. “Fel magic?” she inquired with a frown, seeking clarification.

Luna nodded, a frown coming to her face as well as she thought of it. “Aye. ‘Twas a dark and evil thing. Old and unnatural, full of hate and triumph and other unknowable things.”

Twilight gulped and nodded. “Do you... do you think it might have come from the portal?” she asked quietly, looking away and wincing, as if she were afraid of the answer.

Luna looked at her, her expression going neutral as she regarded her for a silent moment. “It would not surprise Us if it had,” she answered slowly, carefully watching Twilight as if to measure her response.

Twilight only seemed to droop further at the confirmation, like Luna’s words were physical weights upon her shoulders. “So this is my fault too,” she said softly, almost more to herself than to anyone else.

Luna frowned, expression stern and placing a hoof beneath Twilight’s chin to lift her head and force her to meet her gaze, said, “Thou mustn’t blame thyself for every travesty or ill fate that occurs around thee, it is not upon thy shoulders alone that responsibility for all of Equestria’s woes does fall.”

Twilight just shrugged of her hoof, turning away and almost seemed to close in on herself. “It is my fault. I was the only one who could have done something about it and I failed. Everything that’s happening is because I wasn’t good enough to stop it,” she responded, her tone stubborn and self-deprecating.

“Be silent,” Luna retorted, a hint of heat entering her tone as she moved over to sit beside Twilight and wrap a wing around her to pull her in close. “Thou art but one pony alone. None could shoulder the burden thou speakest of on their lonesome, not even mine sister or myself, despite the inordanitate faith the ponies of Equestria place in the crown. Thou hast proven thyself a magus and scholar most talented time and again, were it that thy efforts were not enough to forestall tragedy than it is not inconceivable that such was never fated to be prevented at all.” Luna was kind enough to pay no mind to the soft tremor that shook the little pony in her embrace.

It was silent for several minutes longer before Twilight spoke up again. “I’m scared Luna. I don’t understand what’s going on. I’m hurting the ponies close to me even when I don’t want to. In a single night my entire life has turned upside down and I don’t know what to do now or what’s happening to me.” Her shaking got worse until she was trembling as if she were sitting naked in the deepest snow drifts of winter and with a pained and horrified rasp she whispered, “I almost killed my own brother.”

Luna pulled her in tighter, wrapping her up in both forelegs and wings in a deep embrace, stroking her mane softly as if she were a frightened filly in the midst of a nightmare. A fiction not far from truth. “Hush now, Twilight Sparkle. Do not think thyself alone in thy pain. Thou art not the only one to harm thy beloved elder sibling when ensorcelled in the depths of thy inner darkness. ‘Tis no reason or excuse to lose thyself within doubt or despair. Thou are not alone.”

For a moment Twilight just sat there, before slowly leaning into Luna and raising her forelegs to return the hug. The room was filled with a soft and comforting quiet for several minutes longer before Twilight softly asked, “How do you do it?”

Luna huffed a soft breath, deciding how best to answer. When she did, she spoke slowly, as if trying to piece together her answer or struggling to find the words, but as she went on she spoke more and more confidently, become more and more sure of what she was saying. “It gets easier, day after day. Every day We learn more about Ourselves and hope to cope with the guilt of Our mistakes. Were We went wrong, and how we can learn from it. We have ponies to lead us through the dark times, and – most importantly of all – We never allow Ourselves to doubt that Our sister will always love us, no matter what.”

Twilight nodded her head a bit where it was buried in Luna’s chest to show she understood, before pulling away and wiping her eyes. “Thank you, Luna. I guess you’re right.” Twilight’s tone was sincere, but if anything her expression only continued to fall further, like situation still weighing heavily on her. Slowly she started to pace the room, becoming restless. “Still, I can’t go on like this. Constantly afraid of myself, terrified of when I might lose control again and unsure if next time some innocent bystander might not be going to the infirmary but instead to the morgue. Locked away like a beast in a cage in some dark and hidden corner of the castle by ponies just as frightened of me as I am. Cut off from everypony while Celestia only knows what happens all over Equestria because I didn’t stop that thrice-blasted ritual. Not knowing anything, kept in the dark, not sure when or if I might snap and go feral or what’s going to happen to me next.”

Luna just watched as the increasingly agitated pony tried to wear a groove in the floor, venting her mounting frustrations before the only pony that was there to listen. Quietly, Luna agreed with what she had to say. The current circumstances were no real solution, and were not exactly conducive towards finding any real answers or managing to situation and moving forward. “Perhaps…” Luna wondered aloud, stopping when she felt Twilight’s attention turn to her. Gathering her thoughts, she nodded to herself and said, “Perhaps, We might have a suggestion to make. A solution is not yet evident, due most in part to the fact that we simply know too little about either thyself or the situation at large. Moreover, it is as thou espouse, ‘twould indeed be ill thought out to keep thee locked away. A proposal then that We make; send thee away to find the answers we seek.”

“What do you mean, Princess?” Twilight asked, a look of confusion on her face.

“’Tis nothing complex. We simply meant to send thee to investigate the crux of the issue. All problems we face stem from the same source – the foul cultists’ ritual. To Our knowledge the site has remained untouched since the unfortunate incident. Due to thine own studies into the cultists’ machination at Our own behest thou art something of a leading expert in their means and motives. Would that anypony be able to find the answers we need, it would be thou and it would be there. Moreover, thou hast something of a vested interest We would assume. Thou hast forged a connection to that place several times over, and though it is but a guess on Our part, We believe it would be the best place to find answers and guidance regarding they own affliction as well.”

Twilight was silent for several moments as Luna explained, taking in all in and all but glaring at her hooves as the gears turned in her mind. Finally, she looked up, the fires of determination alit behind her eyes. “You’re right, Princess. If there’s one thing I’m good at it’s research, and there certainly nothing to be learned by sitting around here.” She turned towards the door, each step swift and purposeful. “Come on, there isn’t a moment to lose!”

She stopped when Luna put a hoof on her shoulder and pulled her short. “’Tis good to see thee in greater spirits, Twilight, but a moment if you would. We have things We must prepare, and shall me thee there later with Our own captain of the Lunar Guard. We shall send thee ahead at the stroke of midnight upon Our own personal chariot with an escort of guardsponies.” For a moment Luna bit her lip and glanced aside, as if nervous or unsure what to say next. “Whilst thou await thy departure, perhaps it would be best to see to thine own preparations,” she said, gesturing towards the room’s single mirror atop its vanity.

Twilight, suddenly nervous, approached the mirror slowly, afraid of what she might see. For the most part it was normal, albeit unkempt as she had expected. Mane a rampant mess of knots and tangles, falling every which way in a discordant mess. Fur dull and matted, flattened and crusty in some places and sticking up in others. Her horn dark and grimy, and in dire need of a good filing. Her eyes though…

They were puffy, and bloodshot, of course. After as much crying as she had done there was no way they wouldn’t be. But that wasn’t really what she noticed. Her eyes weren’t just red, they were red, almost shining a bright and vivid crimson that almost seemed to glow mesmerizingly in the dark. And even were her pupils, thin and razor sharp, seeming like they could cut through to one’s very soul and sending a shiver up even her own spine. But perhaps worst of all…

Her eyes weren’t changing back.