//------------------------------// // Chapter 2 // Story: Beyond the Veil of Sleep // by Starscribe //------------------------------// Mira hesitated at the threshold, waiting for Kallisto to let her in. But no matter how much she wanted her old teacher to still be healthy enough for that, the reality underneath was obviously different. No hooves sounded on the floor, and the door didn’t swing open. Finally Mira could bear the wait no longer and she surged forward, ears flattening and wings lifting vertically behind her. “Kallisto?” she asked. But she didn’t have far to look. Kallisto was in her bed. She was the oldest bat Mira had ever seen—older than any of the Understory elders. Older than any of the unicorns of Hollow Shades with their powerful spells and magic healing. Kallisto could probably use some magic healing now. Her eyes were entirely glazed with cataracts. Her fur was missing in great big patches, revealing liver-spotted and wrinkled skin beneath. Her flesh sagged in places, even when she was laying down. When she spoke, Mira could tell her age, even without looking at her. It was the voice of a pony who had seen whole ages come and go—who had served under Nightmare Moon, and even the one before. “I was worried you would not come in time,” Kallisto continued. “I waited too long, and I could not perform the ritual alone.” Mira felt herself relaxing. Of course this was about something religious. How could she have ever entertained an alternative? Kallisto wouldn’t waste time with something as dramatic as last words, before dying with tragically convenient timing. She’d probably outlive Mira herself. “Ritual… which ritual?” She made her cheerful way over to the bed, settling the basket on the bedside. She selected the juiciest mushroom and a few of the least moldy bits of bread, and settled them on a plate. The priestess’s bedroom was spartan to the extreme—aside from the bed, there was only a flat wooden desk covered in papers. She didn’t even have a bookshelf, since that would mean other bats couldn’t find the books they needed. “Here. You need your strength first. You should eat, Priestess Kallisto.” The ancient mare pushed the plate aside with one shaking hoof. “No, filly. I cannot eat anymore. It is one of the ways an old pony like me can die. We eat less and less, until…” Despite her total blindness, her face tracked Mira as she moved through the room. She was alert for every sound, every twitch. “I should have done the ritual sooner. No bat who served before me would have waited so long. But I waited… I was selfish, determined to teach you all that I could. I have failed. I offer no apology, as I deserve no forgiveness.” Mira put the plate aside, though she kept it closeby. The mare might deny it now, but she would probably rediscover her hunger soon enough. And in the meantime, she didn’t have to wait. Mira picked the best-looking salvage from her basket, snacking while she waited. The priestess wouldn’t mind, so long as she was listening attentively. Still, she swallowed before she replied. “I forgive you anyway, Kallisto. Whatever you want to teach me, there’s always tomorrow.” Kallisto sighed. “Mira, I have one final task. The moon is already waning, I feel it. If the sun rises, I will die here. I need your help.” “Anything,” Mira said, before Kallisto had even finished speaking. “You know that, Priestess. You deserve to have all of Understory here helping you. This temple should be full of ponies. I’m not smart or strong, but I’ll do anything you ask.” “You underestimate yourself,” Kallisto said. “By night’s end, I think you may know the measure of your strength a bit better. Here is what you must do.” She recited a strange list—ingredients from deep in the vault below. Nothing valuable, since the monastery had long since traded away anything of worth. But a few rare species, colored glass, along with some of the herbs Kallisto mixed for injured ponies. What would Understory do when they lost their only healer? It didn’t matter to Mira that Kallisto was probably being forgetful again. She followed the old ways so strictly that sometimes even she fell short of her own high standards. But one of the few ways Mira could show respect was to treat every request like she was an apprentice with the temple. “Everything you asked!” she said, dropping the basket from her mouth onto the desk across the room. “You sure you want to do this in here, Kallisto? We usually do worship upstairs.” “I am too weak,” the mare said, and she sounded it. Her voice was thin and reedy, like it might blow away in a stiff breeze. It made Mira tense to hear. “But don’t be afraid, filly. Your arrival was not too late. I have…” She coughed, convulsing in her bed, sentence decomposing. Mira rushed to her side, holding her still with both hooves. She restrained the old mare until the coughing stopped, keeping her from rolling off the edge. After what felt like forever, it did, and Kallisto opened her blind eyes again. “You see… what I mean,” she said. “Will alone keeps me here. Another hour, and the old magic would not be enough. My soul would still find the Dreamlands, but this is better. Do exactly as I say, and know that my life depends on it.” Mira no longer felt like she was humoring the old mare. Rather, she worked through her tears as she set up the ritual as Kallisto instructed. There were patterns to be drawn, incense to burn near the bed, and words to speak. Most importantly, there was a draught to make, adding icy water from the sacred well below to the herbs Kallisto had told her about. “That’s a sleeping draught,” Mira realized, as she finished mixing. “I recognize the smell. Whenever there were nightmares, you…” Kallisto chuckled. “That is right. But this potion is not like any you have had before. Bring it here, and mind not to smudge the chalk.” Mira was careful. She’d only drawn this sacred pattern every new moon for the last six years. “I’ve done the Sundown Glyph since I really was a filly,” she muttered. “I’m not going to ruin it. I worked extra hard on this one, just like you said.” Kallisto was crying. Moisture smudged her face, and streamed from sightless eyes. She reached towards Mira with one hoof, urgently. “Quickly, the night is almost gone. You must…” She took a deep, rattling breath, as though she were about to break down into another coughing fit. But this time, she fought it back. “We say our farewells tonight,” Kallisto finally said. “We may say them here, or you can accompany me. Whatever your choice, know that I will be watching over you. I know you can read—study the ancient texts. I meant to leave you… with all the power of Oneiromancy. I failed.” Accompany you? But you can’t walk. You’re barely even breathing. She couldn’t bring herself to say so. Kallisto cared about the faith so much that her very last act would be a ritual. “I’ll go with you,” Mira said. “Anywhere. You know I would.” Kallisto extended a hoof for the bottle. “Give. When I drink… you must also. It is forbidden to dreamwalk with one who has not sworn to the temple… but I’m sure you would have, if we had time. Wouldn’t you?” “Of course.” Mira settled the bottle against her hoof. But Kallisto was so weak that she couldn’t lift it without knocking it over, so she helped lift it too, holding it in place as the green-brown liquid dribbled into her lips. Only when she finally stopped drinking did she pull it back. Half the sleeping draught remained, maybe more. “Then stay close to me.” Kallisto smiled, relaxing. “I will… good to fly again.” There was no way the potion could have such a powerful effect on her, could it? Mira looked down at the sleeping potion, considering it for a long moment. It wouldn’t be good for some strange bat like Lud to find her sleeping here, drugged beyond waking. But ponies like that had no reason to come to the temple. She guessed that anyone who didn’t find her upstairs would just turn around and leave again. What else could they do, steal old books nopony understood? Mira looked down into that ancient, sleeping face, and knew beyond any doubt that she would not wake again. Ponies have always been afraid of Kallisto’s magic, she thought. But the old mare had never taught Mira any of it—she wasn’t ready yet. Now she never would be. What do I have to lose? Mira lifted the sleeping potion to her lips. She drank deeply, fighting the urge to cough the bitter herbs back up. It didn’t act like any sleeping potion she’d ever drank before. The world slipped out from under her hooves, though of course it hadn’t moved. The single faint line of moonlight shining in under the door became a blazing bonfire, filling the room so high it poured into her mouth and nose. Mira fell into the light. Suddenly a terrible wind whipped about her, fiercer than her fastest flight. She opened both wings, but she could barely even keep herself upright, let alone stop. She screamed, and found her voice didn’t echo in the stone bedroom. There was no more bedroom, no more Understory, no more Temple of Artemis. Stars winked into existence around her, first a few pale flashes, then hundreds of little bonfires. How could she be so high up? She must be falling so fast that she would squash like bean paste when she hit the ground. “Over here!” called another voice, barely audible over the wind. Mira shielded her face with a leg, and could barely make out another bat falling with her. The voice was familiar too, though she couldn’t place exactly why. “Mira, this way! Fly to me!” Surrounded by such terror, it didn’t matter if the speaker was her dead mother or a general of the Solar Army. Anything was better than dying in a heap of broken bones and torn wings. She flew. The figure drew closer, reaching out for her with a pair of hooves. Mira got close enough to see her now—a bat mare, but not like most of the bats she knew in waking life. This was a mare like the old days, her mane in an elegant gemstone braid, her wings adorned with tassels, and sturdy explorers’ boots on her hooves. Her eyes weren’t sunken, her belly wasn’t swollen with hunger. If it weren’t for the wind, she would probably smell like mango perfume. Mira finally got close enough to touch one of her hooves. The mare wrapped around her, pulling her in as she spread her wings. She ripped her backward, out of the torrent. Suddenly they were gliding. Instead of a featureless starry void, Mira’s eyes adjusted. There was a jungle underneath, alive with the light of a full moon. She smelled no unicorn magic on the air, only familiar plants and the moisture of a recent rain. “I wasn’t sure you were coming,” said the mare, finally releasing her to glide on her own. “I wouldn’t blame you. Age slows and clouds the mind—I don’t think I was a very good teacher these last few years.” In that instant, Mira recognized the voice. It didn’t matter that this pony didn’t have a coat bleached white with age, hadn’t lost her teeth and her sight or had a wing severed in that terrible war. Kallisto’s voice wasn’t broken or damaged anymore. If anything, she seemed more alive than Mira had ever heard her. “How can you be… how is this possible?” she asked. But she wasn’t afraid anymore, she felt only awe. “Where are we?” The young, vibrant Kallisto laughed, without coughing up blood. “You grew up in the temple of Artemis, Mira. Where do you think?” She didn’t recognize it—none of what Mira saw was familiar to her. But how many times had she walked past those maps? They weren’t just religious—once, bats had been something more. “The Dreamlands,” she whispered. “For the first time,” Kallisto agreed. “And perhaps the last.”