//------------------------------//
// 2. Festivals and histories 
// Story: Longma 
// by JeckParadox 
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	Twilight had been flying for about three minutes, and, with the help of her Alicorn stamina, was keeping a pace at a speed that would have made Rainbow Dash proud. She slowed temporarily at the sight of the monsters below, still trotting down the roads, but she decided that she would speak with Celestia before anything else. 
The trip to Canterlot was relatively short compared to the train rides that she had to ride before she got her wings and new powers. 
She was beginning to get more and more nervous as she realized that the bat-ponies were still covering the streets, all the way up to Canterlot, along the thin mountain roads and next to the train tracks were the blue to black monsters. She began pushing herself as she shot straight up the mountain, bypassing the walls of the city and gliding into Canterlot gardens, from there it was short chain teleport to Celestia's throne room. 
"Here I am Prin- er, Celestia."
"Thank you for coming so quickly Twilight... we have an emergency on our hooves."
"I know, Princess, what are those things?"
"Those 'things' are ponies. One of the lost tribes, like the Crystal ponies. Unfortunately... the Longma are less likely to accept the thousand-year gap as well as the Crystal Ponies did..." She shook her head to clear out the doubt and began walking past Twilight. "Come on, we have to speak to my sister, she knows more about the Dragon-ponies than I do."
"Wait, wait, I mean, I never heard of Crystal Ponies before, but after a while I was able to find evidence of them, but I've never heard of anything like a Longma."
"Really? You've seen them before. Luna managed to find two of them, Night Owl and Stay I think their names were... anyway, they're acting as Luna's Chariot pullers now. I think you saw them at the last Nightmare Night."
Twilight searched her memory and stopped in her tracks. "You mean.. those two weren't in costume?"
"Well, they usually wear armor, but the eyes and the wings and the... hair?" Celestia asked almost to herself. "Well, that was all real."
They were steadily moving up the staircase to Luna's watchtower, and Twilight began to shiver as it got colder and darker inside the room. "Princess... why is it so cold?"
"Longma prefer the cold. As does Princess Luna in fact." She lit a small light on her horn and lowered it down to Twilight, and the glow covered her for a split second. "Better?"
Twilight realized that it had suddenly become much warmer, or at least it seemed that way. She could still tell it was colder inside the tower than in the throne room, but she no longer found it uncomfortable.
Finally they came to the large blue door emblazoned with a full moon. Celestia knocked on it three times. "Luna? Twilight's here, we need to speak to you about the Longma!"
"Busy!" Came the voice on the other side of the door. "Ten minutes, no twenty, promise!"
"Luna, this is very urgent. If we don't act together on this who knows what will happen! The guards are asking permission to create a barrier before any of them can get in. And Twilight needs to know about them, and I want her to hear your version first."
"Alright, alright... just, five minutes!"
"Luna!" Celestia said harshly. "We don't have five minutes to waste doing nothing, we need to get Twilight up to speed and we need to deal with the thousand upon thousand of Dragon-Ponies marching up the mountain from every direction!" When Luna didn't answer Celestia sighed and started charging a spell. As her horn began to glow Twilight frowned and began backing up. But she wouldn't do that inside... would she?  "Luna! Open this door. Right. Now." The glow got brighter. "On the count of three Luna."
No response. Twilight was beginning to back up again. 
"Two." 
No response, Twilight covered her eyes as the glow got brighter and brighter. 
"One." Twilight screamed as a thunderclap was heard as a strike of pure light collided with the door, knocking it inward.
"Why the heck would you do that?!" Twilight snapped, before realizing she was speaking to her teacher. "Sorry but... you didn't even use a beam that powerful on Chrysalis!"
"Simple, Luna's tougher than Chrysalis, and Canterlot is in more danger now than it was then."
"Changelings were invading." Twilight stated. "They were falling from the skies and capturing everypony."
"Exactly." Celestia said grimly before walking over the wreckage and summoning a small wind to blow away the dust. 
"SISTER!" Luna screamed. "You couldn't give Us two minutes?!"
Celestia gaped. "Luna... what are you doing?!" Before her stood Nightmare Moon in full armor and decoration. 
"We were about to handle the situation, taking control of the Longma and ensuring they would not make any aggressive move on Canterlot."
Twilight was holding her breath as Nightmare Moon and Celestia growled at each other, and she backed slowly out of the room, wondering if she could teleport her friends and the Elements over such a long distance. She attempted to calculate the variables in her head, but it was impossible if she had no idea where her friends were. "Twilight!" Celestia called. 
She threw aside her fears and galloped back into the room. "Nightmare! If you harm Celestia I'll-" She saw that Luna and Celestia were standing in the room, unscathed, but still seemingly mad at each other. 
"you'll what, friend Twilight?" Luna asked, slightly annoyed.
"I... I don't think I understand what's happening right now...."
Celestia sighed and brought Twilight closer with her wing. She levitated some rubble and tossed a rug across the room onto Luna's bed. "Hey!"
"It's your own fault, if you had come when I asked you could have rolled it up, and I wouldn't have had to blow up your door."
"No, you blew up my door, you have no excuse!"
"Princesses!" Twilight shouted, before regaining her composure and clearing her throat. "Celestia, you said we didn't have any time to waste, so why don't we just get to the business at hand?"
Celestia and Luna blushed and shared a look before simultaneously shaking their heads free of any competitive thoughts and regaining their air of authority. "Our story begins one thousand years ago." Celestia began, conjuring an image of Nightmare on the empty floor. "During Nightmare Moon's first appearance."
Luna took over, adding her magic to Celestia's and creating a hologram of a gigantic castle of strangely blue ice and black crystals. "This was the Castle of Darkness, the final stronghold of the Longma... and Nightmare Moon's former base of operations for conquering Equestria." Luna said shyly.
Twilight gaped at the spiralling towers rising out of the mountain, which actually seemed... small, with the castle growing from it. "It was the largest structure ever created by Pony hooves." Celestia added sagely.
"During my... er, Nightmare's rise to power we managed to combat Celestia's forces with Longma and Shadhavar, but despite my- er, Nightmare's forces obvious superiority in combat to Celestia's she managed to combat Us with sheer numbers and with more abundant resources. The war lasted almost a year, and ended with Nightmare and Celestia in single combat. During which Nightmare had managed to push Celestia all the way back to Canterlot, and was about to beat her in honorable battle, when Celestia pulled a jerk move and pulled the Elements out of nowhere and somehow managed to use them by herself when they were always half-and-half!" Luna finished,almost yelling. "I.. apologize.. anyway... the Longma had promised Nightmare Moon that they'd serve her loyally for an eternity. And when she was sealed away, they sealed themselves away as well, with the help of the decidedly less loyal Shadhavar. And... now that I've returned... I suppose they freed themselves, and are coming to pledge their loyalty yet again."
Twilight was watching the magical hologram, which had shifted from a battle between Celestia and Nightmare to an image of the castle appearing over the mountain from thin air with a burst of black smoke. "... Amazing... but why haven't I ever heard of them?"
Celestia stepped forward and changed the hologram to a stylistic drawing of a Nightmare Night. She pointed to the familiar effigy of Nightmare Moon, which was in almost every town, "I'm sure you've researched the forming of Nightmare Night, right Twilight?"
"Of course." The young Alicorn said proudly. "A few centuries ago you said that just as the Summer Sun celebration celebrated your reign on the longest day of the year, on the longest night of the year we celebrate Luna's... who the common pony interpreted as Nightmare Moon at the time."
"But have you researched the traditions?" Celestia asked. She pointed at the effigy of Nightmare. "Children were to put on costumes so that Nightmare wouldn't recognize them, and they carried candy to the effigy to make sure that Nightmare would fill up on candy and decide not to eat them."
"Completely made up foolishness of course." Luna justified. "I have never once eaten a pony."
"You did still take all the candy from whatever village you ransacked." Celestia said, amused. 
"Better their sweeties than their lives."
"Agreed, but, originally, the festivals included 'Nightmare's evil goblin-steeds'. Where a group of adults put on costumes themselves and went around the town pulling pranks on ponies and scaring children into giving their candy to Nightmare instead of hiding it away. Pegasi put on armor and dragon wings, and Unicorns had face paint and curved horn coverings. It was much more fun, but over time it became unpopular because it made the children too scared. Eventually they just stopped putting Longma and Shadhavar in the celebrations, and the celebrations were the only place that evidence of Nightmare Moon is really discussed."
"And by 'discussed' she means over-exaggerated and demonized." Luna added dryly. "Child-friendly demonization."
Twilight sighed. "Well, all this is very interesting Princesses, but what does it help us regarding the Longma marching through every town in Equestria!?"
Luna shrugged. "The bit about the holiday won't really help, but... the Longma have sworn an eternal oath to serve the Princess of the Night..."
Twilight nodded, motioning with her hoof for Luna to continue. 
"Or Princesses, as it may be."
Twilight raised an eyebrow. "What do you mean?"
"Twilight, you are currently a Princess of Equestria... but you don't have any real power, beside the physical power an Alicorn body provides, you have no soldiers, no workers, no bureaucracy beside Spike." Celestia began. "You are not Princess of anything, but Luna was planning on setting you up as Regent of the night."
"Wait... I'm a Princess of the Night?" Twilight let out in a squeak, her eyes shrinking. 
"Technically..." Celestia said hesitantly. "but you're more like Luna's understudy for now."
"Well.. that's good I suppose, gives me some time to train and learn about my responsibilities..."
"I don't think you're seeing Our point friend Twilight. The Longma have sworn an eternal blood oath to serve me, and to a lesser extent... you."
"Oh..." she began. "Oh! uh oh..."