"What the hell do you mean the Prince is missing?!" Sheriff Oakflank yelled at the three royal guards who stood in front of him.
These three knuckleheads had a single job, making sure that Prince Blueblood is safe and protected. And what does he find?!
THEY FAILED!!!
First Starlight Glimmer managed to escape, And Now Prince Blueblood has disappeared!
What's next? The Princess Finds Out?!
Oh...
"Sir, We assure you that Starlight couldn't have gotten far," The Orange Pegasus tried to reassure the fuming Sheriff.
"Yes! She couldn't have made it far with all the snow outside! All we have to do is send out a search party! I'm sure that we'd find both of them before the Princess even finds out about it!" The Red Pegasus also said loudly, likely in an attempt to reassure herself more than him.
But Sheriff Oakflank ignored both of them and instead focused on the pony behind them, A pony that only the green guard managed to see walk in, and smartly kept his mouth shut.
"Until the Princess finds out about what?" The pony that stood behind the guards asked, and likely not hearing that the pony who asked the question wasn't the sheriff, the Red Guard answered.
"Until she finds out that both Starlight Glimmer and Prince Blueblood are missing of course!" Oakflank and the two male guards looked at the only female Pegasus in the room as if she was the stupidest pony they'd ever met.
And seeing the looks aimed at the inexperienced Royal Guard, Princess Luna couldn't help but agree.
"We have returned from an arduous day of flying all over the country," Now it seems that the Guard managed to catch on to what was happening, "And not just to Canterlot and Back, We have spent our precious time assisting these fine ponies with the return of the Cutie Marks that were removed and held by Starlight Glimmer," The mare slowly turned her head to see that her two coworkers were looking away from her.
"And what do we hear when we reach the precinct?" Cherry Pop finally turned her head enough to see the new Princess of Equestria, Princess Celestia's long lost sister, Princess Luna, Staring at her as if she was not even worth her pity, such was the sheer amount of disappointment that could be felt directed straight at her.
"That the pony you three were specifically tasked with protecting has been taken?" None of the guards could look at the Princess, and Oakflank couldn't blame them.
If he was as young as them, he might have started crying.
But he wasn't young, Oakflank has been in the police force for over forty years, He knew how to deal with angry nobles.
"Your Majesty," He bowed his head, Exactly how he did it twenty-four years ago when the grandson of a visiting diplomat was foalnapped, "Allow me to show you where the scene of the crime happened, perhaps you would be able to find something we didn't," He waited for the princess to nod before he straightened up, grabbed a winter coat, and led the Princess of the night to Bluebloods Carriage.
Looking at the scene in front of her, Luna frowned.
Broken branches littered the clearing, burnt spots in the dirt indicated where blasts of magic were struck, and the snow has clearly been shifted as if somepony rolled and ran through parts of it.
A clear sign of a struggle, which if Luna followed the order of events that seemed to form when she looked at the marks, all ended in one spot.
A circle in the ground, devoid of snow, or grass, almost as if something appeared and ate everything inside of the circle but the ground itself.
Or more realistically.
Moved it somewhere else.
"But how can that be?" Luna whispered as she studied the empty patch of dirt.
"A Teleportation spell is carefully adjusted to only take the things you want to teleport, the grass and snow should still be here," Luna took another look at the clearing, and at the small indents in the ground that were slowly disappearing as the slow wind pushed snow to cover them, but not enough for them to disappear.
"Hoof-steps... They're bigger than the ones that look to be walking backwards into the circle, so these must be Blueblood's" Luna studied the two sets of hoof-prints.
"Starlight Glimmer walked backward, keeping her horn aimed at Blueblood," Luna looked in the direction that the hoofs would be facing, seeing the burnt spots on the ground and a pile of snow below a tree clear of the stuff, "Starlight tried shooting Blueblood, which caused him to roll out of the way, leaving these spots of shifted snow and dirt, So she tried dropping this here pile of snow on top of him, but he once again moved out of the way,"
Luna studied the hoof-prints more carefully.
"Starlight's prints only started here, but Blueblood was running from over there," Luna looked to a different part of the clearing, where she could spot another two sets of Hoof-prints, where this time the smaller pair disappeared before reappearing next to the path leading to the circle.
"So she teleported to get away from him, But why didn't Blueblood use a- Of course! Blueblood is a Prince, not a Warrior!" Luna exclaimed when she finally pieced all the pieces together.
"He doesn't know any spells that he found to be useful in this situation, so he used his larger body to his advantage in close-quarters combat!" Luna once again looked over the prints where Starlight seemed to have Teleported away from him, noticing that the smaller set of prints was stepping over itself, almost as if trying to balance itself after being hit!
Eyes now wide, Luna looked at the circle of missing snow where the two sets of hoof-prints ended.
"Starlight was planning on Teleporting herself to a more secure place to continue the fight, but Blueblood caught up to her and hit her again, ruining her concentration on the Teleportation spell! That's why the snow and grass are gone! She lost control of the spell so it took everything in its radius!"
A realization hit her, "But if that's the case! That means she also lost control of where the Spell dropped them, And Starlight is a Powerful Unicorn, a Teleportation spell going haywire to a Unicorn like her... The two of them could be anywhere in the north!"
Luna quickly spread her wings and flew back to the Flamefall County police department, intent on telling the Sheriff of what she figured out.
Starlight was cold, but she was also warm.
Her whole body hurt, and she didn't know why.
She tried moving her legs, but she found herself too tired to do so.
She tried opening her eyes, but found herself too cold to try.
"What's happening?" She asked out loud, barely able to hear herself with how fry her throat felt.
"Just hang on," She heard a voice from underneath tell her, "I've almost reached shelter," She didn't recognize who that voice was, It sounded like they were carrying something heavy, but she didn't care enough to check what they were caring or who they were.
Because Starlight was cold, Oh so cold, but she was also warm.
And when her tired and cold mind returned to the gentle embrace of sleep, she dreamt of a Unicorn walking through a frozen tundra, carrying another Unicorn on his back, her body wrapped with the only coat the two of them had, leaving the Unicorn who was doing carrying without a coat.
Forcing him to face the elements of the frozen north all by his lonesome.