CHAPTER 6
Cold wind swept its way through the spherical dilapidation. Once placed on a great mountain, the aged fragments were enemy to the elements, swayed only so much to continue existing. The frigid tendrils caressed Luna, easing her inwards, gripping her heart and forcing simple steps to come further.
She felt a growing danger with each foot. It wasn’t fear, or insecurity; the feeling called to her to think, to fulfill her curiosity. Using the air as its voice, it commanded her to progress deeper. She lost her chance to leave long ago. Her only motivation to follow the strangling call was desire. A desire loomed around her, placing its warm fingers - not tendrils – and leading her down the path she chose. Why escape from something so caring of her?
Sickly, deep down, Luna wanted to run from those endearing hands. On the inside she was scared, psychotic, mesmerized, angry, and prone to burst from her shell that seamlessly hid her true self; yet on the outside, she was calm and collected. Her false sense of the possible approaching calamity dug inside, scraping away that hard shell.
A pedestal – carved upwards – rose to her waist. Six smaller plates rose around the face, each with a singular stone placed with delicacy on them. The stones were gray, plain. Their true worth lie in the center. They each were imprinted with a symbol of different color: purple, pink, yellow, white, orange, and blue. The symbols resembled cutie marks, but marks that were very much seen before. Twilight and her friends – the Elements of Harmony – had these specific symbols branded onto them. Magic, Friendship, Laughter, Generosity, Honesty, and Loyalty. She hovered a shaking hand over the stone of magic, wanting to hold it like she did so long ago.
“Come on Luna, do what you came for,” she whispered under strained breath.
Quickly, she snatched up the frozen hearth. Her fingers tightly coiled around the object, rubbing dry cracks across the indents. Crisp shedding fell under her touch ingraining further upon the old rock. “Please,” she spoke softly. “Please work”. Clasping it in both hands, she took it in a bow of prayer. Biting her lower lip, and squeezing out a final “please” before raising it to her breast, pushing it against the crest of the moon.
The rock – hidden beneath her angel stance – emitted a soft glow. Not much brighter than the twinkle of the stars. It shone from her cage. As quickly as it shone, the rock became dead. Just as before, it was a normal rock.
Luna expected more from it, patiently waiting for a second coming of the light. But it remained dark. She lowered it to its plate, wondering if it needed to be there. Before it so much as grazed the stone slab, it crumbled into dust in her hands. The sandy remains – held tightly – seeped from the gaps between her grips. They floated to the ground, and were picked up by the wind, soaring away. Her eyes watered, and a cold shiver spiraled down her back, reaching under her arms and beyond her physical body. The seconds turned into minutes. With her motionless. Blue eyes filled with life let loose the gates of the sea, sending her down with the ashes. She wept into her hands; the soft thumps of her moans disturbing the silence.
She garbled spited words into her mask. Moving them away, she revealed her torture. Face red as a phoenix’s temper, furious tears bathed in sadness gnashed away. “Why!?” She screamed to the high ceiling. “Why!? Why! Why!” It became more a statement with each succession. She wore her throat out with constant shouts, but still she didn’t cease to berate whoever she pleased. “What have I done?! So much done, and I’m treated like this! Does Thou think less of Thy!?” The royal voice screeched away. Animals that came too near were thrown off, scampering far out of her reach. “All this,” she said pointing to the piles where the stones were. “For nothing!”
If her tears could be blood she would let them. Her insides on fire, she slowly brought her rattled body up. The physical and toil she had been made to suffer were iron weights keeping her down. At a loss for anything but frustration, she swayed in place. On the floor, the ashes sifted away, not wanting to have anything more to do with her. A lone pebbled – from the stand – stayed underneath her foot. The small chunk acted oddly near her; it wriggled, scraping to move away. As the pressure lifted, it zoomed across the ruins, rose to eye level, and blinked out of existence.
The fallen princess didn’t have a clue as to what happened. She walked with care to where it vanished, grabbing at the air. Nothing. The pebble simply disappeared with no conclusive reasoning. The only substance in her vision was air, swirling air. Swirling air. She narrowed to the exact point that it disappeared. Air in that particular spot swirled clockwise. If she hadn’t been that close she would have missed it entirely. Nearly invisible to the naked eye. Now what’s this all about?
Before she could inspect further, Luna felt herself moving. A subtle slide brought her to the left, going past what remained of the table, and to one of the pillars. She slammed into the closest, sending a shockwave of pain through her. The rest of the ruins – not being bolted down – followed suit. On instinct, she wrapped around the pillar, and was lifted off the ground and over the edge. Below, a long drop to the rocky waters plopped with falling debris.
Reeling against the inconceivable fate, she had no choice but to swing back around. One strong swing would do. Problem being she didn’t have one. Any exertion would toss her off the pillar, or into the water below. The shifting stone seized from the low dip. Luna held strong, digging her fingers into it deep. Her fingertips became ghost white with small trickles of blood dripping off them. Blood rushed to her head as she strained to pull herself up. Another seizure shook her farther down. The throbbing sensation of a ready-to-burst vein made her vision take a nosedive. Blurred grasps of reality were the only things keeping her alive.
Sucking in hot air, she lifted with all she had. Luna found herself flinging like a feather, and flew inside the crumbling ruins. Her arm twisted outwardly for a moment before it ricocheted back into place with a loud snap. Hurriedly she got up and bullet-ed for the entrance. The ancient architecture wracked with each nudge of gravity.
One of the massive pillars caved in. She barely had time to react to it; jumping away as the column crashed through the floor, and into the angered waters.
Symmetrical patterns of destruction heavily raged. When one end of the world tipped, the other repeated. The normal flow of horizontal and vertical were thrown off as her shifting perception was too. She had been reminded of musical compositions that were similar. They told of a fight against one’s own reality to battle a bigger cause. Fate leaped in to save the would-be-dead; giving those heroes the chance to repeat it all over again. As she swayed with the tides of the tipping ruins, she wondered where her “fate” was. Were he to do the same, she could fight again.
Fate wouldn’t come Luna realized.