//------------------------------//
// Camp 
// Story: River of Light 
// by LunasCaptain 
//------------------------------//

	"Some of us refused to accept that our Princess was gone, replaced by a cruel and terrible spirit.  Still they served her and did her bidding, and those of us who chose to defend Equestria and its Sun were forced to meet them in battle.  That is how Noctus fell--Darkling refused to see reason, and tore his throat out in the name of our Moon."

My eyes were shut against the winds that swirled off of Moth's helmet and wings, but I clenched them tighter.  I knew Darkling.  Actually, I knew her well--Morpheus slept above me in our barracks, and she slept next to him.  Her eyes had been a pale gold.  Once, she had almost broken my jaw for looking at her plot.

"I killed her, and Celestia named me captain of the Lunar guards," Moth continued matter-of-factly, raising her voice in order to be heard over the wind.  "By then, there were only forty-two Royal guards still accounted for, including myself.  You were one of them.  At this time, it had been nearly half a moon since the emergence of the Nightmare.  Hundreds of guards, both Lunar and Solar, were either dead or corrupted, and the same was true for the Equestrian citizenry.  The crops had withered in the fields and the livestock had frozen.  The air was thin and cold.  Celestia retrieved the Elemental Crowns from the vaults of the north and hid the Princessling Cadance in the Crystal Caves of Mount Canterlot, with a smattering of nobles from all three Houses and a mixed regiment of guards.

"She called those of us who remained to her, and told us of her plan to confront the Nightmare and free her sister with the Elements.  She asked us to accompany her, but told us we were not bound to it.  Some turned away.  More stepped forward.  Many died in the battle, and I thought you one of them.  I myself did not see your head severed, but I was informed it had happened.  They did not use your name."

I didn't answer, being preoccupied with holding onto her crest.  I couldn't believe it.  Moth had explained our country's latest struggle to me in a calm monotone, describing Luna's degeneration over several days into the demon Nightmare Moon.  The failure of Celestia's first attempt to vanquish her.  The fracturing of the Lunar faction.  But, somehow, I couldn't accept that this had happened.  My Princess, Luna, Regent of the Moon, Keeper of the Stars, the Silver Warrior, Guardian of Those Who Walk in Shadow, was strong.  There was no way in Tartarus she would yield to anypony, allow herself to be corrupted.  Even the fact that I had apparently witnessed these events, influenced them, couldn't convince me of their reality.  Maybe because I didn't actually remember them.

Not to mention that I was already struggling to cope with my current physical state.  The addition of this Luna situation meant that I wasn't making headway with either problem.

Aren't I clever.

Moth banked suddenly.  I leaned to the side, to see around her neck, and would have fallen off of her back if I hadn't clenched my jaw and kept my hold on the crest of her helmet.  We were approaching a rough mountain, one of many.  A series of grassy ledges were connected to each other with hastily-constructed rope bridges, and each ledge held several clusters of tents.  Gold, white, purple, and pink--Celestia's colors--silk billowed in the wind that was near-constant this high up.  The Solar flag flew everywhere I looked.  I saw a few small groups of silver, black, blue, and sea-green tents, but even they had banners of the Sun flying from their poles.

"Allow me to welcome you to Camp Canterlot, Dart," Moth called back to me.  She raised her wings slightly as a pair of golden-armored pegasi blew past us, hiding me.  "Behold our stronghold in the days of the Lunar War.  This is where we withdrew to when the Nightmare claimed the Palace of the Royal Pony Sisters as her own foul nest."

I wanted to ask why she wanted to hide me from the other ponies here, but I didn't dare open my mouth.

Captain Moth spiraled down to the largest gathering of Lunar tents, which was still dwarfed by the smallest Solar cluster.  She flapped twice to slow herself down before she hit the ground, but there was still a bump when she landed severe enough to jar the crest of her helmet from out between my teeth and knock me to the ground.

I bounced once, my vision jarring and my fangs locking on my tongue (again), then came to rest on my side in the grass.  I glared up at the sky with one eye, but had to close it when a gust of wind blasted over me.

"My apologies, Dart."  Moth nudged me back into an upright position.  "I did my best to land gently."

"It could have been worse," I replied, spitting blood onto the grass.  At least my blood hadn't changed.  It was still darker than that of a normal pony, with a faint silvery cast to it.

"Captain Moth!" somepony called.  Moth immediately stepped in front of me.  I could see that two Lunar guards, a mare and a stallion, were coming towards us.  The stallion had a ruddy cast to his wings and a vaguely Arabian tilt to his eyes.  I didn't recognize either of them.

"Iridescence," Moth greeted them stiffly.  "Dhan'kur."

They saluted, pressing the tips of their right wings to their brows.  The mare, presumably Iridescence, was the first to relax.

"How many dead, my Captain?" she asked.

"As of yet, I do not know," Moth replied.  "Many."

"The Moon mourns," Dhan'kur said in a heavily-accented voice.

"I am sure she does," she agreed heavily.  "What of our remaining Princess?  Is she within the camp?"

"Aye, Captain, you are just in time," Iridescence said.  "She returned from the Crystal Caves with the Princessling and the gentry not forty wingbeats ago.  They have retired to her tent."

"I must speak with her," Moth said.  "Iridescence, fetch me a basket and a hoofkerchief, a large one."

She saluted again and trotted off, just fast enough to be out of range when I loudly complained, "Your plan is to carry me in a basket?"

"Dart--" Moth snapped at the same time that Dhan'kur rumbled, "Who speaks?"

"He does."  Giving up and stepping to the side, she shoved me forward.  I stared up at the Arabian soldier, who was not nearly as impressed as I thought he would be.  He studied me for a few moments before turning back to Moth.  

"He is the one they call Poison Dart," he stated.

"What are they saying of him?" Moth asked.

"They say that his head was cut off and that it was no great loss."

I scowled.

"Do you wish me to keep the secret of his survival?"

"For the moment.  News of a severed head revived by by the Nightmare's magic is the last thing we want to spread through the ranks."  She undid the straps and buckles of my helmet, lifting it off my head.  Immediately, a gust of wind lifted my sweat-matted mane off of my forehead and eased the pain in my skull, though it had begun to diminish as soon as we left the ruins anyway.  I kept my crest lowered, just in case, because I was in the presence of another male.  One does not declare a challenge when one can be kicked off a cliff with a single hoof.  

"Place this in the armory," Moth said, shoving the helmet at Dhan'kur.  "Repurpose it.  He has no further use for it."

He saluted just as Iridescence reappeared with the handle of a wicker basket in her mouth.  A folded silk hoofkerchief was draped over the side, and I eyed it disdainfully.

"Pink?" I asked, disgust evident in my voice.

Iridescence set the basket at Moth's hooves.  "Who said that?"

"Be silent, Dart."  Moth set the silk aside, then seized me in her forehooves and lowered me gently into the basket. 

"But, Captain, Solar forces wear pink--"

"We're all Solar forces now," Moth replied, draping the kerchief over me.  I flicked my ears in irritation.  

I heard Iridescence's voice, shocked and slightly muffled.  "My Captain, what was that?"

"Tell nopony."  I felt myself suddenly lifted into the air, and Moth's next words came out around what was presumably the basket handle.  "We do not wish to incite a panic."

"Does the Princess know of this?"

"She will soon."  Moth turned, and, if my memory served me correctly, began heading towards one of the rickety-looking bridges.  "Iridescence, keep this between your partner and yourself.  That is an order."

After a few moments, the sound of Iridescence and Dhan'kur muttering to each other (or, more accurately, her muttering to him) faded from earshot.  The hoofkerchief snapped against the basket in the wind.  I heard nothing else besides Moth's boots sinking into the grass.

"Oy, shadowmare!"  A voice that I vaguely recognized as belonging to a Solar guard rang out, shattering the silence.  "What have you got in that basket?"

I heard a slight sigh that might have been the wind and might have been Moth, but her hoofsteps didn't falter.  He must not recognize her as the mare who had so recently become his technical superior.

"Blaze, you idiot!"  This new voice was angry, rather than leering.  I heard metal ring against metal as he apparently cuffed his fellow over the head.  "That's the captain of the Lunar guards!"

I stared at the brilliant speckles of sunlight coming through chinks in the wicker as he added, in a much lower voice, "You never know when one of them will break."

The wicker creaked as the muscles in Moth's jaw tightened.  I looked up, imagining I could see the shadow of her face against the billowing folds of pink silk.  

"How long has it been like this between the factions?" I asked.

"Do not speak, Dart," she mumbled around the handle, but she answered me a wingbeat later.  "Since directly after so many of our faction rebelled and chose to serve the Nightmare.  A Solar guard--who, incidentally, has since died--accused us of being as tainted as our Princess.  He said we were all powder kegs waiting to be ignited, and that any of us could become a raging monster at the drop of a bridle.  Captain Bow rebuked him, of course, but the idea seemed to stick in the brains of those who owe fealty to the Sun."

I remained silent.  It seemed that more had changed than I thought.  The majority of Equestria had always feared my kind, because of the marks of our dragon ancestry.  Our membranous wings, our crests, our fangs--they had marked us as outcasts among the general public.  But I didn't know of a time when we hadn't had friends among the Solar Guard.  We had been equals and partners to them ever since we had entered Luna's service.  

"Is that why you're so frightened of somepony seeing me?" I asked at last.

"Yes," Moth replied.  I heard the creak of wood and felt my basket sway in her jaws as she stepped onto the bridge.  "Can you imagine the uproar that would stem from the captain of the Lunar Guard bearing a severed head through Celestia's military camp?"

Unfortunately, I could.  Which was why I kept my mouth shut the rest of the way to the Princess's tent.