It was the hangover that woke her: a clawing, needling pain just behind her horn and eyes that persisted no matter how Star tried to ignore it or wish it away. As consciousness slowly pounded its way back into her skull, she squeezed her eyes shut, fired off one of the many hangover spells she had learned over the years, and spent the next few moments considering the possibility that perhaps she had over-indulged just a little.
Despite the throbbing of her brain there was a certain, distinct pleasure in waking up in a warm bed, especially when the bed contained another pony. Two or three extra would be nice, but she wasn't about to complain. The pony at her side wasn't nearly large enough to be Lucent, which also ruled out Glint. Not that he would have been interested in her anyway, at least not without Lucent in between them.
With her magic finally infiltrating her aching mind, Star was able to consider her surroundings more clearly. She didn't dare risk opening her eyes yet – she'd found very early in life that hangovers like this left her ridiculously sensitive to even moderately bright light, and the problem had only gotten worse as the years passed by – but she could still hear well enough. What she heard began to worry her a little. A fire was burning somewhere, crackling low and steady as if banked for the night. Beyond that she could hear the creak and rustle of trees shifting in a gentle breeze and wildlife of every sort calling and yelling and shuffling amongst the undergrowth.
"Blasted rural idyl," she muttered as she tried to tune out the noise.
With her next breath, her nose was filled with the musty stink of earth and wood and the heady aroma of spices, and smoky air thick with the scent of tarragon and plantain and a hundred other things that carried memories of a distant time and place, when her life had been simple, and her future nothing but possibilities. As Star's sluggish mind processed the scents, she idly ran her foreleg and muzzle against the pony next to her, only to find a coat completely and utterly wrong. Familiar, but dimly so, from a long time in her past.
With a sigh and and a snort Star's companion rolled onto her back, mumbling something in a language Star hadn't heard for more than a decade. Dreading what she would see, yet knowing the inevitability of it, Star cracked open one eye and tried to focus on the pony next to her.
An incomprehensible maze of dark and light greeted her wincing eyes, before resolving slowly into the familiar shape of a zebra. Her heart lurched in her chest, and for a brief moment Star wondered if she had somehow dreamed the last thirty years of her life, only to awake back in some nameless zebra village on the plains. Then she recognised the face of the zebra at her side, and some semblance of reality returned to her mind.
"You."
Zecora's lips twisted into a sly smile as she opened her eyes. "And a good morning to you too, Star Sparkle of Canterlot. Though it seems that perhaps you believe it is not."
"That's one way of putting it," she grunted. Star shook her head, only to regret the act as her headache returned, refreshed and invigorated by its short rest. All things considered, she would have preferred the mind-bending fantasy. "How much did I drink last night?"
"Enough."
"I suppose so."
Zecora snorted again and murmured something vaguely insulting in her native language. Yet she made no effort to move, despite how close their bodies lay.
With nothing better to do, Star let her foreleg drape across Zecora's side and closed her eyes. As she took another deep draw of the musty air, she could almost imagine she was back on the Marengeti, and that the last thirty years of her life hadn't been leached from her and burned away by time and temper. Even the rumbling growl of a manticore in the distance felt as if it had been plucked from her past, bring to mind memories of nights spent huddled in the middle of an Ngulube herd while the proud young warriors of the tribe circled around and about, on the lookout for lions and other predators, their gait awkward and lopsided as they favoured the precious obsidian claw blades strapped to their hooves.
There were days when she wondered what might have happened had she simply stayed.
The bed shifted. Star felt Zecora crawling across her belly, mumbling incessantly as she moved, until with a loud thump her hooves found the floor. The zebra pottered away in silence, and a moment later Star could hear the sound of logs thudding into the fire. Soon the room had warmed enough that staying in bed threatened to become even more uncomfortable than it already felt.
Star rolled to one side, flinging a rough woollen quilt from her body as crawled to her haunches and rubbed her eyes before looking around Zecora's hut. The zebra in question had retreated to a niche on the far side of the single large room and now lurked beneath the curl of a great, old root of the tree that served as her home's roof. Her snout was buried in a tattered old book. Between her niche and the bed a line of scattered scrolls and parchment lay, angling away and around the room to another table on the far side. The sight brought back vague memories of a heated argument over the content of the scrolls, not to mention the possibility that Zecora was hiding something important. And then...
Another pulse of low pain flared behind her eyes; Star winced rubbed a wrist against her forehead, forcing her horn to cast a faint aura. Normally that would have boosted the analgesic spell she had cast, but today it didn't seem to have an effect beyond sensitising her horn and focusing her mind on the existing ache. And other things. She let out a pained sigh, stretched her back, and flopped to the floor.
"I'm starting to suspect you lied to me, zebra," Star declared. She rolled open the nearest scroll, slowly lest she damage the aged parchment, and stared at the faded scrawlings upon it. A trade receipt, one of the many dozens Zecora had waved at her the previous night, long after any semblance of rational discourse had left them. With a snort she dismissed the scroll and turned her glare toward Zecora again. "You told me last night that you knew the location of Great Tswana, then spent the next several hours fobbing me off with diversions and alcohol. And then—"
"Does it pain you to be so easily led with promises and pleasures to another's bed?" Zecora looked up from her book, fixing Star with a narrow-eyed gaze.
The scroll at her feet wound itself up with a quiet slap. Star opened her mouth to respond, only to realise she had no answer; instead she leaned forward to grasp the parchment between her teeth. If nothing else it got her away from Zecora's glare for a few moments.
More scrolls were piled on a table on the far side of the fire pit, which now rose with a steady, crackling flame beneath a soot-blackened cauldron. Star briskly circled the pit and deposited her scroll with its companions, before turning to look across the room again.
"You must have had more than this rubbish," Star growled.
Zecora looked up, raising her eyebrows at Star's outburst, but didn't reply. Wincing against the light again and rubbing her head with both hooves, Star tried to recall the direction their conversation had taken the previous night.
"When we came here you said you were going to show me everything you had," she muttered as her hooves slid to the floor. "But as far as I can recall you've only shown me this pile of worthless scrolls and your—"
Despite the light, Star's eyes grew wide as she turned to eye Zecora. The zebra tossed her head and chuckled, before nosing to a new page in her book.
"You tricked me."
With a loud, spine-breaking crack, Zecora's hoof slammed against her book. She flipped it closed and stood up, glaring at Star all the while. "I did no such thing to you, who told me that she liked the view. You took me to my bed last night! Do you regret by morning's light the thing you so desired from me, and this form you praised so lavishly?"
As Zecora spoke she moved, circling the quietly simmering cauldron with short, purposeful steps that soon brought her face to face with Star. Her deep blue eyes gave away nothing of her feelings. Every part of her body was still, and as silent to Star's perceptions as if she had been made of stone.
"I used no tricks to bring you here, and it was you that whispered in my ear and set us on this path of lust. To blame me now would be unjust." She snorted and nuzzled at Star's neck. "Not that you had much complaint when I was licking at your—"
"Celestia's creamy teats!" Star reared up on her hind legs to push Zecora away. "You don't have to tell me about it!"
"I could show you instead," Zecora crooned, narrowing her eyes. Her lips curled into a lopsided smile. "You don't even have to be in bed."
"Thank you, but no."
Zecora shrugged Star from her shoulders and stepped back, her eyes sliding up and down Star's frame before she turned away. The way she shook her tail as she crossed the room would likely have got her arrested in Canterlot – not that Star could claim innocence of such behaviour herself in the past, although she had never found herself in those situations without at least some memory of what had transpired beforehand.
She stole another glance at the pile of parchment and frowned.
"There must be something else. You said you'd been to Great Tswana, but all you've done is wave a few old letters at me." Star batted at the pile of scrolls and snorted. "This rubbish could have come from anywhere."
"It is from Elitswanakhulu," Zecora huffed. "I am surprised I cannot convince you."
"Frankly it would take more than a few of your mangled rhymes to do that, especially after—just tell me where the city is, for Celestia's sake! You've been there, you must know how to get back!"
Zecora turned her eyes to the ceiling and sighed. "I would tell you where to end your journey, but I fear that you would not believe me."
"So this whole excursion was a complete waste of time. Wonderful! At least I got a drink out of it." Star brushed a hoof across her head, not caring that it left her mane stuck out at odd angles. She turned to gather up the scrolls Zecora had laid out, while the zebra sauntered back to her alcove and sat down again.
"Despite what you may believe, your invitation to my home was not meant to deceive." Zecora rested her hooves on the table and let out a quiet sigh.
"Oh of course not, you just decided to get me plastered and—" Star blinked as another memory surfaced. "Oh. I'd forgotten I could bend like that..."
Zecora's tail twitched. On any other day, on any other face, the toothy grin she wore would have seemed entirely innocent. Not today, Star thought, as she lowered her head and took a deep breath. In through the nose, out through the mouth. It was supposed to help calm the mind, but despite the assurances of the woebegotten 'princess' Shining had married, it didn't work even slightly.
"Fine. All right. Might as well carry this farce out to its conclusion." She sat down on the floor. "So. Are you going to tell me, or should I just walk out of that door?"
Zecora's chair creaked as she leaned to one side, but then she paused and shook her head. "For me to tell this path to you, a final thing you first must do."
"Really? So you're not content with tricking me away from my family, extracting promises that I'll stop 'tormenting' my daughter—" Star snorted as Zecora rolled her eyes "—and getting me completely drunk and taking me to your bed, now you want to make even more demands of me?"
Rather than respond, Zecora leaned forward to pick up her book from where it had fallen on the floor. She placed it on a table and nosed it open, sighing over its shredded spine, before gently teasing a loose page back into place.
"It is but a small favour I ask, and then I shall leave you be," she said, lowering herself back to her seat. "In your slumber you named a pony, Amaranth."
As she spoke she turned a narrow-eyes gaze on Star. In the shadow of her nook, her eyes appeared bright as golden fire, and for a moment too long to be just coincidence, Star found herself unable to look away.
"Who is she?"
"I—" Star's mouth dried out and closed up all at once. She turned her head, swallowing and coughing as she tried to wet her tongue, and tried to suppress the tension that reached across her stomach and back like a coiling snake.
Zecora returned her gaze to her book, tilting her head as she examined it. "I have found in deepest sleep that seldom we our secrets keep. This Amaranth you named again and again. Her memory must bring to you great pain."
Star trotted around the room to Zecora's nook and pushed her head into it, one hoof resting on the pages of Zecora's desk, the other on her withers.
"Amaranth is none of your business," she growled, her hoof grinding against the tattered pages of Zecora's book until another popped free with a quiet crack.
A hiss of air escaped between Zecora's teeth, and she winced and leaned back from the slowly disintegrating book, until finally Star relented and pulled her hoof away. The book gave out a series of quiet crackles as it settled back from its torture. With a gentle hoof, Zecora poked at the book and then winced again as something within the binding popped, and the front cover slid loose.
"If this price cannot be met, my friend, then your time with me is at an end," Zecora sighed. She lifted her gaze from the book and closed her eyes. "These scrolls are of no use to me. Take any you wish, from those you now see. Within their dark hide is all that you need to find your goal, if their words you heed. Turn now away from that distant far place, and see your desire in front of your face, for the thing you most want is not where you expected, but shall be found where family's love-bond was rejected."
Gritting her teeth, Star glared at Zecora even though the latter seemed entirely oblivious to her frustration. When it was clear that the zebra wasn't going to say any more, Star backed away from the alcove and began sorting through the rough assortment of scrolls and parchments.
"I knew this was a mistake," she muttered as she gathered up her haul. "You bloody zebra are all the same. Can't get a straight answer out of any of you."
Ignoring Star's jibe, Zecora lifted her forelegs to either side of her head and began to quietly sing. It was a simple song, one of loss and sorrow, and hope for the future. The last time Star had heard it had been at the Parting of her Ngulube hosts, when she and Indy had watched the males of the tribe depart for their winter grounds, before their own expeditionary group left the remainder of the tribe to return home.
No. Not the last. There had been one more.
A pile of scrolls hovered in Star's magic, close to her head and unmoving. She pressed a clutch of them into her bags, but then paused to stare at the rest. and her heart filled with disgust. Useless, they were all useless. She tossed the scrolls to the floor and walked from Zecora's cottage without a backward glance., and into a small clearing.
The bright light of the mid-morning sun died at the edge of the marshy, brush-buried clearing, cut short by a near-impenetrable hedge of trees and undergrowth that was rendered all the more daunting by the endless, misty gloom beyond. As she reached the perimeter, Star looked over her shoulder at Zecora's hut, then up at the great tree amongst whose roots the ramshackle cottage had made its home. It was completely isolated, with nary a single branch of the surrounding forest so much as daring to reach toward it.
She let her eyes trace down the trees to the spot before her, which looked just open enough to squeeze through. In fact Star wasn't entirely sure how she'd come to the clearing the previous night – there seemed to be no obvious path, yet she remembered the way being easy enough. Perhaps it had just been excitement, she mused as she ducked beneath one low branch and shimmied over another.
Eventually, after gathering enough leaf litter and mulch in her coat to feed a small garden, Star found herself at the edge of a broad and fairly straight path that looked at least a little familiar. She stepped onto the ancient, crumbling stonework and paused to look both ways along the road; to her right it travelled back to the forest, losing itself amongst murky undergrowth and swirling blue mist. Left took her toward light, and through a break in the trees she caught a glimpse of a clear sky and a patch of open grassland. Star turned from it and back to the gloaming forest, idly scratching at a patch of muck on her neck as her mind wound back to the jungles she had travelled so long ago.
A distant manticore call snapped Star from her reverie. She quickly retreated toward the light, leaving the Everfree and its secrets to the mist. Her walk became a brisk trot, and in a few minutes she plunged from the darkness and into the bright, sun-soaked bowls of the Saddles. That too sparked memories of her earlier life, though the plains of the Marengeti were flat and burnt and endless, studded with acacia and balanites, while this was a vast green-and-gold sea of low hills and long, rolling grass.
A trail curled across the landscape toward Ponyville, little more than earth beaten down by the regular passage of perhaps a half-dozen ponies. As she followed it, Star's well-trained eyes would occasionally light on remnants of dressed stone or shards of corroded metal, half-buried in the earth and all but lost in the tall grass.
At a turn in the trail, in the lee of a shallow rise, she paused and looked down at a broad, flat stone inlaid with faint traces of what might once have been an intricate carving. Star leaned down to the stone, glaring at it as if she might intimidate it to release its secrets, but all she found was impenetrable granite. Then her stomach rumbled, and Star remembered that she hadn't eaten properly since breakfast the previous day. She briefly considered and rejected waiting until she had returned to town – chances were some element of her extended family would drag her off to do something 'important' before she had a chance to shower, let alone eat – before plunging her snout into the meadow and cropping a fat mouthful of sweet grass.
Star wandered up the slope, chewing at her improvised meal, and selected a spot to sit and watch the Everfree Forest. From here it looked peaceful, almost inviting, especially compared to the slimy, muddy jungles of her youth. She took a fresh mouthful of grass, and withdrew a selection of Zecora's scrolls from her bag.
They were old and blackened by time, but the spidery Duncan script was still legible if she squinted. Star tugged her glasses free and, after straightening the arms – a legacy of her tumble with Rainbow Dash the previous day – dropped them on her snout to take a closer look.
"To she that rises over the mount, and the name of her... thigh... I love... I greet you," she read, slowly, and then shook her head. "Call myself a scholar, I can barely read this rubbish. Maybe I'll con Twilight into translating it for me."
As she moved on to the next document, Star blinked. And then a moment later she realised that she hadn't blinked at all. Star's head jerked up; she tugged her glasses from her nose and stuffed them into her bags along with the scrolls, while her eyes roamed the cloud-speckled skies for sign of whatever had overflown her.
She turned to face Ponyville just as something thudded to the ground, and Star found herself face to face with a very grumpy sky-blue pegasus.
"Of course it's you," she grunted, as Rainbow Dash trotted the short distance toward her. "Come to drag me back to the minotaur's lair?"
"What? Minotaur?" Rainbow Dash shook her head. "No I've come to—woah what is that smell? Did you fall in a septic tank?"
"Actually I was exploring your quaint little forest," Star replied, shrugging. She looked over her shoulder at the border of the Everfree and shook her head. "Seems rather tame."
Rainbow Dash leapt into the air and hovered just above Star's head, from where she jabbed Star squarely in the chest with an outstretched hoof. "Tame? Have you seen the crap that lives in that place?"
"If by 'crap' you mean your friend the zebra then, yes, I am rather intimately acquainted. Other than that..." Star stepped back from Dash and smiled. She could see the pegasus about to speak again and quickly held up a hoof for silence. "What are you doing here, Rainbow Dash?"
"I was gonna ask you the same thing." Dash settled back down to earth and folded her wings, ruffling them once or twice until she seemed satisfied with their state. "Twilight almost blew a hole in the roof when she found out you were gone last night."
"She made it abundantly clear that I wasn't wanted," Star replied. "And as I was presented with the opportunity for a little archaeological study, I thought I might as well give her some space. It appeared to be the wisest course."
"Yeah well, you're just lucky Lero managed to talk her down and convince her you weren't doing anything dumb." Dash frowned as she looked over Star. "Right?"
"I'm a tenured professor, Rainbow Dash. Quite possibly one of the most intelligent ponies you've ever met."
"I'm pretty sure Twilight's smarter than you, but she does dumb stuff all the time." Rainbow flapped her wings, their force just strong enough to hop her briefly into the air. She stepped back a distance from Star and nodded back toward Ponyville. "Come on, I have to get you back before she decides to prove me right again. And you need a shower."
As they set off, Star tilted her head to one side and took a shallow breath through her nose. She winced. "I don't think I'm going to argue on that point. This is almost as bad as my second expedition."
Laughing, Rainbow Dash hauled herself into the air and looped over Star, before slowly flapping backward in front of her. She seemed to be showing off, but persistent breeze across Star's back was just enough to keep the growing stench from drifting Rainbow's way. "You mean you've stunk like this before?"
"Oh I've endured far worse," Star confirmed. She let her eyes trace the motion of Rainbow's wings as she thought back. It was a novel experience, having an audience that wasn't either ignorantly hostile or criminally lazy. "My second expedition was to northern Dumanya, to a place we usually called the Marengeti, though the zebra who live there call it something entirely different that I can't even hope to pronounce. It was myself, Twilight Velvet and a few postgrads performing a hippological study with the aim of creating a more complete model of Zebra tribal herding practices. Make-work really. We already knew everything we needed to know by then. Twilight and I were just there to oversee the postgrads and make sure they didn't get pregnant."
"How would they get pregnant?"
Star rolled her eyes. Perhaps she'd overestimated this lithe little creature after all. "We spent eight months living with a tribe of two hundred and eleven zebra, just over half of whom were stallions. I think even you can work out the details, my dear."
"Wow..." Rainbow Dash almost went cross-eyed as her mind wound over the possibilities. She settled to the ground and began to walk alongside Star. "But you had a herd already, didn't you?"
"You think I would risk my bond with Lucent over a quick lay with some big-balled idiot zebra? I'm not going to endanger my position chasing every unsheathed male in sight!" Star frowned at the sound of Rainbow Dash's throaty chuckle. She glared at the pegasus. "Believe it or not, Rainbow Dash, I have some self control, unlike some of those randy little idiots I was tasked to look after."
"That's not what Glint Garnet told me," Rainbow murmured. She looked away to the horizon. For a while they walked in silence, until Rainbow Dash cleared her throat. "So... how'd you end up stinky?"
"Eight months in the tropics without a shower."
"Oh."
"I'm not sure what else you expected." Star shot Rainbow a grin. "I suppose I could have spun a story about finding some ancient treasure in a mud-filled temple somewhere—"
"Oh come on! I thought you were an archaeologist!"
"I am, but that trip was too early in my career for that sort of thing. Nothing but interminable conversations about courting habits and the occasional mud bath. I remember Velvet quite enjoyed those..." Star lifted her leg and poked Rainbow's shoulder. "But that's hardly the sort of Daring Do adventure you're thinking of, my girl! Now my fourth expedition took me through the deep jungles of Boarundi, a place that makes this Everfree Forest of yours look like a petting zoo. I and a select group of colleagues spent almost an entire season tracking down an ancient temple of an extinct nation called the Kuur, allegedly the home of a trove of priceless historical artefacts, and let me tell you it was a hard-won prize..."
* * *
A stream of violently hot water rained down upon Star's back, sluicing away the last grimy remnants of her morning excursion. The close humidity and the pressing heat had also driven out the final vestiges of her hangover, along with an utterly annoying knot of tension across her shoulders that she hadn't even noticed until it was gone.
She barely moved as she stood under the shower, letting the water cascade across her withers and neck and face while her mind worked over Zecora's parting words. She wanted to dismiss them as the ramblings of an addled old shaman, but Zecora had either aged incredibly well, or she was still relatively young. Of course that didn't rule out a little addling, what with all the odd herbs and roots and things that she was sure to have consumed as part of her profession.
With that, Star's already tenuous train of thought departed entirely, leaving her to contemplate the wall of her hosts' shower. Like everything else in the house this human had built, it was tall, and consequently felt constricting and narrow despite its deceptive breadth. Everything – from the controls, to the shower-head, to the handle of the oversized glass screen shielding the rest of the bathroom – was at the very edge of her reach, and only a particularly athletic pony or a unicorn would be able to use them comfortably. Or a minotaur, perhaps. Not that any of those creatures would be caught dead in something so utilitarian as a shower if they could choose one of their overly-complicated bath-houses instead.
Star's magic reached out and cut off the water, and she stepped out of the shower and into the bathroom. Of course the size difference was reflected here as well, right down to the towels hanging from a rack on the far wall. Star lifted the corner of one and pondered it for a moment. It was incredibly soft, and she found herself wondering if the human had ordered them specially. A quick tug of her magic pulled one of the towels to the floor, where it spread out like a bright woolen carpet.
Star prodded at the thick quilting with a hoof. Then, giggling in a way she hadn't since university, she flung herself upon the to roll around like a foal in a summer meadow. It wasn't a particularly dignified way for someone to stumble upon her, as she found out just moments later when, laid out on her back with her legs all in the air, Star opened her eyes to find the towel's owner staring down at her from the door. He had his head tilted to one side and what she took to be a bemused expression, though it really was so difficult to tell when his ears remained so stubbornly silent.
"Enjoying the view?" She grinned at him. A moment later he gave her an uncertain smile in return. Star lowered her legs and rolled to her side and then her front. With the human staring down at her from atop his slender legs, it felt like an unusually submissive position.
"That's my towel," said Lero. His head tilted to one side as he spoke.
"I borrowed it. I assumed you wouldn't mind."
"That seems to be something you assume quite often," the human replied.
Star grinned and shook her head as she remembered the last time the pair had engaged in a verbal sparring match. "It's inevitable anyway. I just cut to the chase."
"Would that be when they chase you out of the building for being so overbearing?"
"You're rather quick-witted for a monkey."
Something that could have been anger flashed across his face. It was barely a flicker, but the emotion was real enough. Star filed the thought away for later and grinned again, until the human abruptly knelt down in front of her.
"Ape," he said, reaching out one of his all-encompassing hands toward her face, and wiggling his rat-tail fingers in front of her eyes. "Humans aren't monkeys. Opposable thumbs and no tail. See?"
The hand twisted and slid under Star's muzzle, gripping her jaw from both sides with surprising strength; she found quite quickly that his grip was just firm enough to keep her from moving unless he allowed it. Still smiling, Lero lifted Star's chin until she faced him, and gave a quick tweak of his finger and thumb to lift the corners of her mouth. Then he let her go, and when he stood his body rose with such haste that Star was left feeling quite dizzy.
"You should smile more often," he said as he turned away. "I might have an idea of how Twilight will look when she's your age, if you did."
"She'll look exactly like me," Star grunted. She hauled herself to her feet and set about folding the towel. "After all, I am her mother."
"I agree." Lero's hand reached out of nowhere and tugged the towel away from Star. "Her smile will look exactly like her mother's."
Humming quietly, the human folded his towel into a neat little parcel and dropped it in a basket by the door. He held his hand out to Star and beckoned her forward.
"Time to face the music."
"Celestia's horn," Star groaned. "Don't tell me you're going to sing again."
"I hadn't planned on it." Lero's reply was slow and considered. He rubbed his chin and then scratched behind his ear, and Star found herself wishing for a similar ability. A hoof could only do so much, and there were times when magic wasn't quite up to the task.
"Well good," she grumbled. To her annoyance she felt a very slight tickling sensation at the base of her neck, just where her hooves couldn't reach. How typical "I had wax dribbling out of my ears for days after the last time."
"I think you're trying to provoke me," he said once they had stepped out into the hallway. Star looked up at him, and saw a faint smile on his lips.
"And if I am?"
The smile only broadened as Lero ushered her through the empty house. She paused by the door to tug a few scrolls and a folder from her bags. Ignoring Lero's questioning look, she strapped the folder across her back and stepped out into the sun. Across the road, opposite the house, Star could see a knot of ponies milling in one corner of a park – the same park Star had found herself nearly barrelled into the previous day.
As they crossed the road – itself barely more than a flat stretch of grass – Star caught sight of Lucent, Twilight Velvet and a third very familiar young pegasus. They were stood a little way from the main group, conversing in a tight triangle, though the way the pegasus kept fluffing her wings made it clear that she'd rather be doing something else entirely.
Star grinned as she turned to Lero, and gently waved im away. "Thank you for the escort, young man, but there are some family matters to attend to. I'm sure you understand."
Before he could reply she trotted away. A lack of protest from the human almost made her pause. Before she reached Lucent she glanced over her shoulder and saw that the human had made his way over to the rest of her family – and his – and was in the process of scooping up little Guiding Light from the ground at Lyra's feet. Just for a moment, Star felt a flash of something in her gut at the sight.
She dismissed the thought as she cantered toward her family.
"So nice of you to finally join us," Lucent remarked as she tramped to his side. To an outsider his voice would have sounded light and casual. Star was anything but an outsider, and when her gaze flickered to the ground beneath Lucent she found a number of very deep hoofprints.
"Well..." Star drawled. She smiled at Lucent. "I'm afraid I got myself rather caught up in the shower. A girl has to look her best of a morning, don't you think?"
"There are only ten minutes of that morning left." Lucent raised his head and stared out over the park. There was a smile on his face when he spoke, but his voice was humourless. "And not to put too fine a point on it, Star, but you were gone all night."
"I thought I should get out of Twilight's mane. Both of them." Star winked at Twilight Velvet and stuck out her tongue.
"And take the chance for another of your little dalliances?"
Star pursed her lips. That was Velvet through and through, always showing off her erudition whenever she was upset, to the point where Star could gauge her mood purely by how soon she had to resort to looking up words in a dictionary before she could reply.
"I was offered a chance to advance my research. Speaking of which..."
Before Star could even think to reach for the folder on her back, Twilight Velvet snorted and tramped at the ground, digging out a fat divot of earth and unconsciously mirroring Lucent. "Research. I suppose the fact that she was a zebra had nothing to do with it?"
"Don't you start. I had an opportunity, I took it," Star shot back. She turned to nuzzle the pegasus, ignoring Twilight Velvet's muttered profanity. "At least you two were kind enough to bring me breakfast. Good morning, Cinnamon."
"Oh stop it you old goat," Cinnamon replied. She flapped a wing in Star's face, as if this would somehow discourage her advances. Instead, Star drew a little closer and tucked herself under the wing before Cinnamon could fold it properly away.
"You love it really, you know." Star closed her eyes and pressed her cheek against Cinnamon's neck for a moment. "What about Crystal and Scintilla?"
"They're in Manehattan," Cinnamon sighed as she pushed herself away from Star, though her wing remained resting on Star's hips. Star could feel a feather tickling at the base of her spine, accompanied by a steady warming of her lower body. Not for the first time she wished she hadn't told the young pegasus about that particular spot. "Some last-minute thing. They took Mal and the girls with them as well, told me to fly over here and let you know rather than shelling out for a rail ticket."
"Of course, they would pull out at the last moment," Star muttered. She tried to discreetly shift herself out from beneath Cinnamon's wing, but the pegasus somehow contrived to keep it in exactly the right place.
Twilight Velvet shuffled up next to Lucent and frowned at Cinnamon. She seemed to be entirely oblivious to Star's growing discomfort, though Star also considered the possibility that she was fully aware of it, and just didn't care.
"Surely it wouldn't take you all morning to fly here from Canterlot?"
"Oh, well, I had to walk part of the way," Cinnamon replied. She bit her lip and smiled, then leaned toward the two mares and spoke with a lowered voice. "There's a farm near here with this gorgeous hunk of a stallion wandering around all by himself. One look at him and I was grounded."
"I know that farm." Star shrugged Cinnamon's wing from her back and turned away before she could drop it in place again. She'd have to corner Lucent later. "One of Twilie's friends owns it, I think. It's only a few minutes walk from here."
"As if you're the one to worry about timekeeping," Twilight Velvet muttered. She looked away before Star could give her a decent frown, and it was only after a moment that Star realised her gaze had travelled to the human again; he lurked in the background as Lyra demonstrated a few simple magic tricks to Guiding Light. The youngster was enraptured, and entirely oblivious to the creature towering over her.
Star's ponderings were interrupted as Cinnamon shuffled closer to her side, pressing them both up against Lucent's broad body. The young pegasus looked up at Lucent with a shy grin.
"I might have got myself caught in a tree for a couple of hours..." Without warning, Cinnamon leapt toward Star and wrapped a foreleg around her withers. "Oh you should have seen him, Star! Great big shoulders and a neck like a mahogany tree trunk! And those thighs—"
Lucent cleared his throat. He raised his eyebrows and looked down at Cinnamon, then looked away to the horizon again. A sigh escaped Cinnamon's throat as her body collapsed against Star.
"Sorry," she murmured. A moment later, Lucent smiled and leaned down to nuzzle her cheek and chin.
"It's all right, Cinnamon. I realise I haven't been as attentive as I should be the last week or so," he said. Under his gentle but insistent nuzzles, Cinnamon stretched and relaxed, lifting her head to snuffle at his throat a few times. "I'm always here for you."
"I know, but he was just so gorgeous..."
"Well now, I can confess I'm not above appreciating a little, ah, rustic charm either. Perhaps if I were a few years younger we could invite this young chap to join us." Lucent's frown returned, deeper than before, as his gaze fell on Star. "But this herd is rather large already, and frankly none of us are as young as we once were. You keep us all busy enough, Cinnamon. I'm surprised even Star has the stamina to go chasing other mares these days."
"She makes up for it with sheer bloody-mindedness," Twilight Velvet growled. Despite the tone of her voice she barely looked at the trio as she spoke. Instead her eyes were fixed on Guiding Light, and after a moment she stepped away from Lucent's side and took a step toward the distant filly, but then paused, pawing at the ground.
Uncertainty wasn't something Star was used to in Twilight. When they had first met she had been shy, though determined, and the years had only hardened her resolve into a frozen blade that rarely saw the light of day, but that always lurked just behind her pleasant demeanor. A knife in a velvet scabbard was the term Cinnamon had used once, though she'd been writing for nearly three days without sleep at the time.
Star looked to Twilight Velvet, and found the mare staring right back at her. Everything she couldn't bring herself to say burned behind her eyes, and Star felt a tremendous urge to buck off the weight of expectation draped across her shoulders. Instead she shrugged herself from between Cinnamon and Lucent, and walked the short distance to the gaggle of ponies that had now gathered around Lyra and Guiding Light.
The youngster watched with wide eyes as Lyra reared onto her hind legs. With magic sparking fitfully from her horn, Lyra tumbled in a broad, weaving dance that circled around and back, all the while humming a jaunty tune. Her final step landed her before Guiding Light, and with a flourish of her hooves she bowed like a minotaur, before settling back on all fours. Her eyes opened, and she looked down at Guiding with a smile.
"When a pony is in balance with the world, she can move in ways that seem impossible." Lyra ruffling Guiding's mane. She looked around at the group. "To be balanced is to join seamlessly with the rhythm of all things, and if I had my instruments here I'd show you exactly what that means."
"Perhaps they floated away down a river," said Star, rolling her eyes. Lyra merely smiled at her.
"Where they are is where they are meant to be. If I fought that to retrieve them, I'd be missing out on this little one's company. Of course I'd also be missing out on yours."
Star looked down at Guiding Light, then back up at Lyra, but then flinched as a hoof came to rest on her back. It was Glint. He glanced at Crincile to his side and then shook his head.
"She was only showing the child a few tricks, Star."
"Though your concern for her is admirable," Crincile added. There was a twinkle in her eyes as she looked back to watch Guiding Light. "This hostility to our hosts, on the other hoof... After all the silly rumours I'd have gladly believed that this stallion of Twilight's would be a ravening monster, but he really is rather laid out."
"Except when it comes to his prices..."
Glint grinned, and a moment later his musing was answered by the human's laughter. He shook his head and held out a fisted hand to Glint, who bumped it with his hoof.
"I don't believe I've been particularly hostile. I'm just here to make sure that none of you eat Guiding Light," Star grunted. She pointed a hoof at Rainbow Dash. "Especially you."
"Whatever, ya crazy old coot," Rainbow Dash muttered as she lay her head down on Lero's thigh. The human gave Star a cool stare as he ruffled Dash's mane.
"Admirable, as I said," Crincile replied. She sniffed, and it seemed to announce a moment of quiet amongst the group. Lyra had resumed her meditations, remaining firly on all fours as she swung around in an ever-changing spiral that now had Guiding Light at the centre. Again the youngster watched with the sort of wide-eyed innocence that only little fillies could muster. Star found her mind drifting back to her early days with Shining, when he'd still been young enough forgive her unconditionally... and then to Twilight. Her own Twilight.
As if hearing her thoughts, the young unicorn shuffled away from her spot at Lero's side and wandered over to Star. At first she only stared, her jaw tightening and relaxing, whilst the others milled around behind her – Lyra had abandoned her dance once again and turned to showing a few simple spells to the youngster, and Glint and Crincile both were carefully joining the fun.
Twilight was still staring when Star let her attention return to the young unicorn.
"If you're expecting me to shed my skin and show my true evil nature you've got a long wait," she declared, to which Twilight's only answer was a roll of her eyes.
Despite that, some of the hostility seemed to drain from the air between them. Twilight's stance softened. She settled back on her haunches and took a long, deep breath.
"You were gone all night, mom."
"Of course I was! You seemed quite concerned about my presence, and Zecora had offered to show me something that I had thought might help my research. Evidently I was wrong." Star let out a sigh and looked away from the crowd, toward the distant forest. "I suppose I shall have a few more items for the university's ancient Zebrican history catalogue, but without context they're next to useless..."
"Ancient... ancient history? What were you doing last night?"
"Reading old letters, mostly. Oh and drinking that vile zebra poison your human seemed to like so much." Star shrugged the folder from her shoulders and opened it to reveal the small selection of parchment within. "That 'boar bon', or whatever it's called. All I got from the night was a headache, a sore back, and these."
Twilight barely glanced at the parchments before looking away. Shelet out a slow breath through her nose; the way her body seemed to deflate, it was almost as if something had escaped from within her.
"I think..." Twilight paused, swallowed and closed her eyes. "Did you ever find yourself trying to figure out something that you simply couldn't understand?"
"More than you'd know," Star muttered. She pulled out her glasses and turned her attention to the contents of the parchment.
"It came to me when I was researching—well it doesn't matter what I was researching. I had Lero with me, and we were both looking for the same thing, and I suddenly realised I was missing something."
Star nodded as she ran her hoof across the page. "You and me both."
"He'd fallen asleep. He'd curled up with his arm under his head and the other one wrapped around a book like it was his only friend. He hadn't even said anything to me... just waited there while I kept reading, and I hadn't even noticed. It could have been hours for all I knew. When I thought about it afterwards I realised that it was a little bit like your—um—the way you sometimes just leave. I thought, maybe if I did that too often, ponies would start to think I didn't care. I did do that when I was studying, and they did think that. Kind of..."
It took Star a few moments to realise that Twilight had fallen silent. She tore herself from the parchment and looked toward her daughter, frowning. "What?"
"Are you even listening?"
"Oh." Rubbing her face, Star looked back at the parchment again and frowned. "Sorry, sweetie, I've been trying to puzzle my way through this all morning. I was going to ask Twitwi to help with the translations, but apparently she's not interested."
"I can't possibly think why," Twilight grumbled. Nevertheless, she moved around to look at the parchment Star held in her magic. "What is it?"
"An old letter that Zecora gave me. She says it's from Great Tswana."
"Let me see..." Twilight ran across t he page, tracing a line of text, and read aloud. "Kuokuenyuka phezu kwentaba lelanga..."
Star felt her heart jump. She turned to Twilight. "You can read this?"
"Sure. Oma taught me while you were away." Twilight peered at the text and frowned. "Though I never saw this kind of address before. 'To she that ascends the mountain of the sun, and in the name of the moon—'"
"Moon?" Star tugged the parchment back. "I thought that meant 'by her thigh'. It was used as a mark of respect for a strong leader," she added before Twilight could question the logic.
"Not this time. Moon. See? 'Inyanga'." Twilight held the tip of her hoof over the parchment. "Thigh would be 'inyonga'. Of course I only know it from cross-referencing foreign language texts for analogues of our mythology of Nightmare Moon—"
"That's it!"
Star's exclamation was loud enough that Rainbow Dash jumped back with her wings flared, and even Lyra seemed momentarily perturbed. The pegasus glared at mother and daughter as she settled her wings back into place. "Could you keep it down, guys? We're trying to have a conversation over here."
"You should be used to Twilight making loud noises by now, Dash," Lero murmured, which sent a blush of colour across both Dash and Twilight's faces. Star had to suppress a grin, but raised her eyebrow at the human; he returned her look with an even stare, before looking away to scratch at Rainbow Dash's ear.
"Charming. But never mind that now. I have to get back to Canterlot."
"Now? But you—"
"I know, but this is more important than—well, it can't wait."
Star tucked her parchments away and turned back to the house, ignoring the muted protests of the ponies around her. Let them mutter, it wasn't like they wanted her around anyway, was it? She was almost at the road before she realised another pony had fallen in beside her. It was Twilight.
"I wasn't finished."
"You never are," Star replied, with as broad a smile as she could muster. Strangely, Twilight didn't return the gesture.
"Mom, every time I try and talk to you I either get sarcasm or you just ignore me complete. It's been even worse since I told you about the wedding—"
"Hah!"
Twilight rolled her eyes. "You're hardly proving me wrong."
They reached the door. Twilight hung back as Star pushed it open and stepped inside and made her way through to the living room.
The curtains were half-drawn, giving the place a dismal orange glow that served only to highlight how confining and narrow the room felt. With the ceilings so high and the doors so tall, Star felt as if she were trapped in some foal's nightmare.
"I don't know how you can live in a place like this," she muttered.
"The rooms at home are just as big."
"Just as tall, maybe," Star amended. She dropped her folder on an occasional table before flopping on the couch with a sigh. "Home. I barely even live there anymore. Nearly all my time is spent stuck at the university or on some damn political junket to the arse end of the planet."
Momentarily spent, Star rolled her head back against the couch and sighed.
"Never let yourself be conned into diplomatic work, sweetie," she said quietly. "They make it sound like you'll get to travel the whole world, but you spend all your time in hotels and conference rooms. Still. With these things in my hooves I might be able to change that."
While Twilight frowned at her claim, Star hauled herself upright and found a more comfortable position on the seat. She briefly wondered if this human had made all his furniture himself; it seemed unlikely he could have just bought it.
Twilight finally pulled herself from her thoughts. She stared at the envelope, still frowning. "Was that letter so important?"
"Of course! The mountain of the sun and in the name the moon? It's obviously a letter sent to the diarchy! I've no idea how that witch got hold of it, but—" Star clopped her hooves together and giggled. It was uncharacteristic that Twilight turned to stare at her in shock. She didn't care. "Oh goodness, it was high Duncan! This means the Kuur nation had some form of diplomatic relations with Equestria when it was at its height! We always suspected there was some communication, but we'd assumed the distances involved meant it was fairly sporadic and low level. This could change everything. If only Indy could see this..."
Star hopped from the couch and snatched up the folder again, before trotting to deposit in her bags. She circled the room, taking in the minimal decorations and the ranks of books arrayed around the walls. It was apparent that this human liked to read, and almost as broadly as Twilight if Star was any judge. Subjects as varied as ancient history, pop science and magical theory jostled for place with adventure fiction, biographies and a several well-used cine reels.
As she reached her previous spot on the couch, Star paused and looked across the room at Twilight. "Of course I'll need to speak to Princess Luna." She took a step toward Twilight and smiled. "And I'd like you to help me."
"Help you... talk to Luna?"
"To begin with, yes. If Equestria was in communication with the Kuur at some point, then both princesses probably knows where Great Tswana is, or was, I suppose. Besides, that overbearing tutor of yours is about as likely to help me as she is to quit stuffing her face with overpriced pastries." Star took another step, but faltered when she saw Twilight backing away from her. "If you're worried about my manners, I promise I'll be on my best behaviour."
"I've seen your best behaviour..." Twilight shook her head. Star found herself wondering how much she might have enjoyed whatever incident her daughter had in mind. "I still don't understand why you need me along with you."
"It... it's difficult to explain. Princess Celestia might present something of an obstacle."
Twilight pursed her lips, and Star could almost hear the buzz of energy as the young unicorn's mind went to work. Trust her to inherit Lucent's ability to overthink things. Any minute now she'd finish working her way along some highly unlikely chain of circumstances and blurt out the conclusion as if it were self-evident truth.
"You're afraid," said Twilight. And then she smirked.
The laughter that burst from Star's gut was impossible to hold back, though the way it wiped the humour from Twilight's face meant she probably didn't share the joke. Unable to contain herself, unable to even stand, Star stumbled back to the couch and flopped against its oversized arm.
"Afraid? Of that overgrown, self-righteous buzzard you call a mentor?" Another bout of laughter choked Star. She coughed and held a hoof to her throat, as if that would make any difference. "She might have you cowering under her hoof, child, but not me!"
"So just walk in on her then. Just do what you always do and take what you want without asking." Twilight looked over her shoulder at Star before stalking to a narrow book-case on the far side of the room. She pulled a volume from it and flipped it open seemingly at random.
"I have no idea what—"
The room echoed with a loud crack as Twilight's book snapped shut. She set it back on the shelf and turned to face Star again. "I'm tired of that lie, Star."
The response Star had lined up faded away before she could give it voice. She'd never heard her name in Twilight's voice before, not in the entire time they'd known one another. At least not to her face.
"The last time I was in Canterlot, Luna asked me why you never go along when she invites you and Dad to the palace." Twilight returned her attention to the shelves of books at her side, running her eyes across their thick spines – and for the first time Star realised just how many were bound in rich, dark leather, where even her own library was mostly card or wood, or paper.
"Well... Princess Celestia can be a little touchy when it comes to her sister. I just didn't want to antagonise her."
"I'll believe that the day I grow wings and fly." Twilight paused in examining a particularly old tome and frowned before moving on until, with an outstretched hoof, Star took Twilight's chen and turned gaze away from the shelves. Strangely, Twilight didn't resist. Instead she waited and watched from beneath a lowered brow, and in her eyes Star could see a hint of the predatory gleam the human displayed whenever they were together.
"Understand me, Twilight. You're my daughter. My own flesh and blood. I know you are as driven as I am to uncover the truth of things. You might dig in books and I might dig in far away lands but we both dig, we both search." Star pulled Twilight closer, until their snouts were almost touching. "I want you to help me search for a change. This is an opportunity for you and I to finally come together over something, to finally have something in common! Imagine it, Twilight. We could find this city together, we could finally uncover one of the greatest mysteries of of history. Together! But to do that I need to convince Celestia to let me talk to Luna about it, and if you're there with me, if the pony that saved her life is there, she'll be more inclined—"
"Stop!" Twilight's jaw tightened and she turned away with a loud snort. "I'm not interested."
"But Twilie—"
"I said no! You've had years to talk me about this life of yours, Star! Years! You're only doing it now because you think I'll give you an advantage getting whatever it is you want from Luna!"
"That's not true! I—" Again she was cut off, this time by another frustrated snort and the loud stomp of Twilight's hoof. The young unicorn clattered away to the far side of the room and tugged Star's bags from the floor with her magic. "Sweetie, at least let me explain."
"Get out." Twilight held Star's bags aloft, not caring how her rough magic battered their contents.
"Twilight—"
"Out!"
Before the echo of Twilight's shrill cry had even died down, Star felt the greasy tingle of Twilight's magic around her body as she was pulled toward the door. Her bags were dumped across her back and the strap cinched painfully tight around her waist. Twilight glared at Star, one eye twitching ever so slightly, and flung open the door.
"Just like that?" Star sighed and shook her head. She stepped out of the door. "Well don't let me catch you saying I didn't try."
Twilight's answer was little more than an incoherent grunt as she slammed the door against Star's rump. The lock clicked a moment later, followed immediately by a pale reddish glow enveloped the lock, door and a large section of the front of the house, as if that would somehow keep Star from returning. The symbolism was enough.
The others had left the park, perhaps to explore some other part of town, though Star had no idea what they'd be exploring in such a twee little place. Maybe a giant apple, or some carefully collected exhibition of cutlery. Their absence made her final decision a little easier, at least.
At the end of the road she paused and looked back, half expecting Twilight to have barrelled out of the house after her, or that Lucent might have rounded the corner to watch her leave again. It was a vain hope of course; no matter how she might have been raised and whatever influences might have grown about her, Twilight was still her mother's daughter at heart.
"Stubborn as a mule," Star murmured. She smiled a lopsided smile and shook her head as she resumed her lonely journey.