//------------------------------// // Where Eternity Begins // Story: Kindness and the Fate of Shadow // by Raven-Flight //------------------------------// Her stomach growled, and Fluttershy opened her eyes. It was dark. The light in the floor had gone out, or maybe Discord had taken them somewhere else while their eyes had been closed, but in any case, he was here. She could still feel his arms around her. “You’re sure you’re ready?” She had to giggle. “Yes. Are you?” “Of course I am! Why even ask?” “Because your heart is beating very fast.” “Well that’s only because—alright, you got me. I’m nervous. Silly, right? I’m the Lord of Chaos, the most powerful being in the multiverse, and here I am shaking in my skin over some little ritual.” “It’s not silly,” Fluttershy assured him. “This is something you feared for I don’t know how long, and even though you actually want it now, it’s still… You know, big.” A sigh. “You’re right. Thank you.” "So… You never told me what actually happens in these soulmate rituals.” "It’s pretty straightforward. Queen Ilmatar will guide us through the steps. But you should be prepared for a lot of attention. I’m sure there’s not a draconequus in existence who would miss our binding ceremony.” Fluttershy shuddered. All those eyes… “I hadn’t though of that.” “I’m sorry. Just try to focus on me the whole time, alright?” “Alright.” Then she felt Discord’s body tense. “What?” "You should also know the last part of the ceremony isn’t very comfortable. Quite—erm—painful, in fact.” “What… happens?” “That’s the part where magic binds our souls together. It’s rather invasive, I’m afraid. But it will only last a few seconds, and then the pain will knock us both out cold. That’s when the dream quest starts.” Fluttershy buried her face in her hooves. “Okay, don’t tell me any more. I don’t want to know. Let’s just do it.” Discord gave her a squeeze. “We’ll get through it together.” He snapped, and they were in the center of The Center. Little sparkling, fairy-like lights hung indolently in the air all around, and there was now, in the very center, a ring of carved stones. A few dozen draconequui were milling about the edges of the gathering place, but they swiftly stood to attention once they noticed Discord and Fluttershy’s arrival. A mischievous grin broke across Discord’s face. “Let’s summon the throngs, shall we?” With a snap, every wall, floor, and ceiling in The Center vanished and beams of bright, colorful spotlights roved the emptied landscape. Invisible trumpets blared a fanfare. Startled draconequui, who had been in their homes and shops one moment and abruptly exposed and illuminated the next, flew and ran and galloped toward the center. Now Discord held a fishing rod. With exaggerated, dramatic flair, he leaned back, whipping the line in an arc over his and the growing crowd’s heads, and cast. The hook must have hit its mark, for the line went instantly taught. Whistling out of tune with the trumpets, Discord reeled it in. Then he paused and held the rod out to Fluttershy. “Finish pulling them up, would you please? I need to see that our guests are dressed for the occasion!” Fluttershy was astonished to find the reeling easy, though the weight on the line seemed great, and even more astonished when she saw that she was dragging all her friends and Queen Ilmatar up from below. Meanwhile, Discord swirled over the gathering, shooting streams of magic everywhere that decked every draconequus in extravagant costumes upon impact. The crowd responded variously with cheers and wide-eyed, awestruck silence. Fluttershy smiled to herself. Apparently the current generation of draconequui weren’t as accustomed as she had become to Discord’s wild and ebullient displays of raw, reality-altering power. Then Queen Ilmatar and the other ponies came up from the ground and landed, and the fishing rod and line disintegrated. The Queen, one of the few draconequui left who’d ever seen Discord at work, caught Fluttershy’s eye and mirrored her knowing smile. Then Discord blasted the newly-arrived group with costumes and plunked himself down next to Fluttershy again. “We’re ready when you are, Ily!” Queen Ilmatar erased the surprise from her face almost before Fluttershy could notice it. “You want me to officiate?” “Who else?” Discord scoffed. “I’m sure you’ve done it a thousand times by now.” “Several thousands,” the Queen corrected. “But I can’t. You officiated for Ptah and me. It wouldn’t be right.” Discord’s hands landed on his hips. “In case you don’t remember, I created these rituals. I know them better than anyone! The magic will still work. You’re officiating.” “Very well,” Queen Ilmatar bowed, “but in that case, I’m afraid you’ve attired me improperly.” A soft but concealing white glow passed over her, and when it abated, her rainbow poncho and sombrero had been replaced with a silvery toga. “Now then,” she announced, briefly eyeing the hushed crowd, “Discord and Fluttershy, pilgrims of Existence, you have reached the final leg of your separate journeys. From this morrow onward, you shall walk as one. Let us begin at the Torrent.” As they filed down toward the Torrent of Becoming, the crowd falling into ranks behind them, Discord not-so-inconspicuously leaned down to Fluttershy. “She’s added a lot of obsequious mumbo-jumbo to the script since I left,” he whispered. Fluttershy snickered. Ahead of them, the Queen’s ears flicked once, but she was apparently pretending not to hear. They arrived. Queen Ilmatar placed Discord and Fluttershy side-by-side on the Torrent’s bank, facing away from the flow. Facing toward the crowd of spectators. So many faces, so many eyes, all waiting and watching. Fluttershy felt sweat prickling on her back. She didn’t know what she was supposed to do. The Queen’s voice was swallowed up in the sound of her heartbeat—what if she missed an instruction? What if she messed up? A hand casually stroked Fluttershy’s ear. Discord. He was right beside her, and he had said he was scared too. Somehow it made Fluttershy feel better. She wrenched her wandering eyes from the crowd of draconequui and focused instead on the faces of her friends, who stood just behind the Queen. They each smiled back, and Fluttershy found she could breathe again. “...will purge you of all forgery,” Queen Ilmatar was saying. “The binding magic will abide no falsehoods. Discord and Fluttershy, if it is your true and honest will to be bound to one another, prove your sincerity now by stepping back into the Torrent of Becoming.” Fluttershy gasped as her first hoof was submerged. The ethereal liquid prickled with an acid burning. Hot or cold she could not tell, but her ankle went numb almost immediately. But she continued. When she and Discord stood in the center of the rushing stream, Queen Ilmatar walked out to them. She placed herself close beside Discord and whispered in his ear. He nodded, and with one quick motion, she dunked him fully into the current. Discord was upright again and speaking in the blink of an eye. “Her fangs are hot and I keep waiting for her to bite me.” An uproar of hoots and cheers from the crowd. Discord’s face turned a miraculous shade of crimson. Queen Ilmatar was unperturbed, merely smiling indulgently and giving him a pat on the shoulder. Then she waded toward a cowering Fluttershy. “Can you stand on two legs if you lean on my arm?” asked the Queen. Fluttershy reared up shakily and caught her front legs over the densely-furred draconequus arm. Then the Queen leaned down to Fluttershy’s ear. “Think of Discord as I dunk you, and allow yourself to give voice to the first thought that crosses your mind when you come up again,” whispered she. Suddenly Fluttershy understood why Discord had said what he did, but the stinging Torrent closed over her before her blush could bloom. In that brief moment of submersion, the flow scoured her. Her fur was torn away, her skin, her muscle. No more was she a pony—she was a swarm of butterflies, she was a watchful forest, she was a jealous rabbit, she was five ponies and a dragon, she was a friendly town, she was a wily draconequus. Air pounded into lungs she didn’t know she had, light dazzled eyes she’d forgotten. “His voice gives me chills. Even before we were friends, it did.” Then she felt chills ripple down her spine as Discord laughed with delight. Standing between Discord and Fluttershy, Queen Ilmatar addressed the crowd on the banks. “Fellow seekers, you have heard their statements! Are there any who believe this bond is genuine?” A jubilant chorus of affirmatives. “And are there any who object?” Silence. The Queen lead them back onto the bank. “Discord and Fluttershy, we bear witness that the Founding Spells have wrought kindred souls in you.” She swirled a ball of light into her hands, and out of it precipitated a tall vase (which Twilight silently identified as a loutrophoros) made of a glittering, translucent stone unlike anything found in Equestria. “Take this vessel and fill it together with the substance of the Torrent of Becoming.” They did so, then were instructed to carry it between them back into the center. It was an awkward process, as the loutrophoros was tall enough that Fluttershy had to fly in order to lift it at all. It was also heavy, and she broke into a sweat under the weight of so many gazes watching her struggle. Halfway there. Every wingbeat was a searing effort. She was sure she was going to fall, spill the fluid everywhere, and ruin everything! “Fluttershy,” Discord murmured in her direction. “Remember there’s no time here. We’ve been carrying this thing for no time at all.” Of course. How could she be so fatigued when she’d only just picked up this burden? She probably had enough strength to carry it for a whole minute, and that one minute would never pass as long as she didn’t want it to. Before long—before any time at all—they had returned to the center of the center of The Center of the center of the multiverse. Queen Ilmatar gestured placidly to the ring of stones, and Discord and Fluttershy poured the gleaming liquid into it. The Torrent stilled instantly into a mirror. Next, obediently, the pair of them stepped into this reflective ring (the fluid now felt cool and sweet on their ankles) and Fluttershy stood on her hind legs so Discord could take her front hooves in his hands. Queen Ilmatar spun a gleaming cord into existence. “This represents fate,” she explained, loud enough for the crowd to hear, “which has drawn the two of you together across the great wilderness of Existence.” She began wrapping the cord over hand and hoof, tying Discord and Fluttershy together. “With it shall we now hallow and seal your bond as soulmates.” Beneath the tug of the cord, Fluttershy could feel Discord clinging tightly to her hooves. He was trembling almost imperceptibly. As the Queen finished off a knot and stepped backward, Fluttershy lifted her hooves and his hands up an inch and back down. It was enough to get his attention, and she caught his eyes and projected to him every ounce of love she had. The trembling stilled. They didn’t break their gaze from each other as Queen Ilmatar again raised her voice to speak. “Discord, do you accept Fluttershy wholly into yourself, that she may partake as an equal partner in your being?” “I do.” Chills again at the conviction in that tantalizing voice. Chills of fear, of exhilaration. “Fluttershy, do you accept Discord wholly into yourself, that he may partake as an equal partner in your being?” “I do.” “Then by the magic that formed the multiverse, be ye joined!” A breeze kicked up, spiraling through the center and dragging the little fairy-like lights in toward them. The lights clustered over their hearts, glowing brighter and brighter as the breeze grew to a howling wind. Brighter too glowed the cord of fate around their wrists, the mirror of the still torrent beneath their feet. Then, a flash, a chest-piercing pain and two gasps in unison. Senses fell away, there was only agony and light, and Fluttershy clung to Discord’s gaze like her life depended on it. Twilight had been taking diligent mental notes, determined to pen an essay or perhaps a whole book on the strange and wonderful draconequus ceremony. But the moment Discord and Fluttershy gasped, she lost hold of her thoughts. She could only watch, riveted, mind blank of all but wonder and terror. Little leaves and flowers and tendrils of pure light sprouted from their chests. Then the tendrils became thorny vines, reaching out to twine around the two bodies. Tighter pulled the cord of fate, digging into their skin and glowing and glowing, until they themselves began glowing. White brilliance obscured first their hands and crept up their arms, even as the wind strengthened to a gale, billowing Fluttershy’s tail and mane out and around them, and the vines constricted and pulled the two close against each other, and their bodies were consumed in the overwhelming glow until only their faces were left, foreheads touching, dazzled eyes strained from anguish. And just as they were completely lost in that blinding storm, those eyes slid shut at last. The light winked out, the wind stopped dead, and Twilight’s screaming lungs filled with air all in the same moment. Blinking, heart pounding, she looked around. A sea of draconequui was swaying as their minds, too, were returning to themselves. Queen Ilmatar still held her hands at her chest, head bowed, smiling. Rarity, Rainbow Dash, Applejack, and Pinkie Pie all were staggering from varying degrees of shock. But Discord and Fluttershy were nowhere to be found. “Where’d they go?” Just like that, Pinkie Pie had recovered and was dashing over to inspect the now empty ring of stones. A hand of light lifted her by the scruff and set her back a few paces as Queen Ilmatar waved away the ring with a gust of luminescence. “The magic has whisked them away to a private pocket dimension where they will be undisturbed during their dream-quest.” Twilight stepped forward. “Your highness, if I may ask, what is the dream-quest, exactly?” “I’m afraid it’s not something that can be explained to the satisfaction of any mind who hasn’t experienced it. And besides, it’s different for every couple.” “So how long does this dream-quest thingy take? When do you reckon’ they’ll be back?” Applejack walked up next. Rarity followed her. “Yes, I daresay we’re rather stranded here until Discord returns.” “And what about Fluttershy? That looked awful! Is she going to be okay?” Rainbow Dash was the last to join the little crowd in front of Queen Ilmatar. "Be at ease, my friends,” said the Queen. “No physical wound accompanies the pain of the ceremony, and it will hardly be remembered in the joy that is to follow. As for ‘when’ Discord and Fluttershy return to The Center—well, I cannot blame you for being unused to the absence of time. We will see them again when we are certain among ourselves that their activity is completed.” “So you’re saying we decide how long their dream-quest takes?” asked Rainbow Dash. “No.” The Queen lifted her otter-like arm to her chin. “Hmm. Let’s say, for sake of explanation, that when they return, you believe they were away for what felt like a day. Fluttershy and Discord may report perceiving their absence as having lasted for what felt like a month. Both perceptions would be true, for they were merely perceptions. Does that help you understand?” Rainbow Dash, who had been flying, hastily brought her hooves back to the non-ground and groaned. “Supposin’ I think their dream-quest should only take about a minute,” Applejack postulated, “and I believe they ought to be back any second now—er, moment, uh… You know what I mean.” She looked over her shoulder and all around. “So where are they? If I think they should be back already, why aren’t they back like you said?” “Because I am standing here with you, and I am of a different opinion. Perhaps if you were to retreat to a solitary place, the moment you truly believe they ought to be back, you will find yourself summoned to greet them. You may do just that if you choose, however, I and my fellow seekers would be quite happy to show you around more, even to get to know you better. You may spend the interim however you like.” “Cool!” piped Pinkie Pie. “In that case, I’m gonna see if I can run to one of those dimension gate star thingies!” “Race ya!” Rainbow Dash challenged. The two speeding ponies found themselves accompanied by a draconequus. “Greetings, friends! I am Ptah! Ilmatar sent me to accompany you, as you may find yourselves arriving at the gate sooner than you bargained for. If you like, we can go on to observe the world that lies on the other side!” Back in the center, Applejack turned to her marefriend. “I don’t reckon’ I want a solitary place after witnessin’ all that. Wanna take a stroll through that fancy botanic garden with me?” “I’d love to!” That left just Twilight with the Queen. “I’d like to spend my time—my…morrow?—in the Library, if I have your permission. Will I be able to find parchment and a quill? I want to learn everything!” The smile with which Queen Ilmatar answered was oddly sympathetic. “Yes, you are welcome to peruse as much of our Library as you wish this morrow. However, I’m afraid I cannot grant your request for parchment. We typically limit the knowledge we share with our interdimensional neighbors for fear of making an improper impact on their worlds.” “...Oh.” “You have already seen more of us and our ways than most; for we have made exceptions for you on account of one of your kind being the soulmate of one of ours. You may read as much in our library as you like, but you may only take from it that which you can contain within your memory.” Twilight brightened a little. “Well, I do have an excellent memory. I suppose a test of its capacity is due. Thank you, Queen Ilmatar.” “Before you bury yourself in study, Princess, might I ask a favor?” “Of course!” “Would you tell us more of your Elements of Harmony? Our kind is unlikely to reach your universe for many a long generation, if ever, and this may be our only opportunity to add knowledge of your fine race to our Library.” “It would be an honor, your Highness.”