Moonstone's breath was coming in ragged gasps as she stopped once again for rest on one of the many treetops. She'd been flying as fast and as hard as she could for hours, but the city she had seen in the distance seemed to be minimally closer. Her arms were screaming with pain whenever she moved them, and she'd been needing to take more and more frequent breaks to catch her breath the last few miles.
Someone or something is making this difficult for me... She thought quietly to herself as she glared out at the infuriatingly distant signs of civilization. There was no way she would be able to get her body to move for at least a few more minutes, so the best course of action was to simply try and get a mental grip on what was going on. This isn't an illusion, it really is that far. If they're trying to stop me, then it's because they want Penn to freeze out there. That means they're our enemy, and probably in league with that black cloud that cursed us... She shook her head as a chill ran down her spine. We can't send any letters, I can't fly faster than their magic seems to be setting me back, again, and somewhere out there, Pennington is turning into a Quill-sicle! What am I supposed to do to help?
"Well, well, well! Why, what a wry and wily little wyvern!" a voice crooned just behind her, as if talking to an infant, "it seems like you've got this all figured out, don't you?"
Immediately, Moonstone leaped forward and away from whatever had sneaked up on her, catching herself with her wings and gliding to the next tree. The moment she felt her claws grip the branch, she spun around to look at who or what had caught her off-guard.
It appeared to be a pony reclining on the tree branch where she had been standing, absentmindedly examining her gold-tipped hoof, then matching it against the color of her hair. The mare had an impeccably white coat and a golden mane that ended in blood-red tips. As her sky-blue eyes turned to Moonstone, however, her entire body seemed to flicker and distort, as if her very existence was dictated by a failing spell. When the flickering stopped, a shimmer ran down her body like the light on the bottom of a large pool of water, and she seemed to be "real" again. Once Moonstone had gotten a good look at her, she began to notice something behind her: a large cloud of black smoke, twisting and turning in place as if being stirred by a nonexistent wind.
Moonstone tried not to let her fear show, but as she realized that she was standing face-to-face with their attacker, her heart began to pound in her chest, slamming against her ribcage in a barely-contained panic.
The mysterious pony raised an eyebrow as her smug grin grew wider, staring at her with what could only be described as a mix of pity and amusement.
"Oh, don't be frightened, little Moon Moon!" she chuckled, laying down on her stomach and resting her chin on her hooves, seemingly held up by the air itself. "As hard as it is for me to choke down my urge to make that beating heart of yours break out through your chest, dance a little jig, and then force itself down your throat..."
Moonstone swallowed loudly, one of her claws reaching up and pressing itself uncomfortably against her chest.
"... I think the winds are blowing in a different direction today."
There was a devilish glint in her eyes, and Moonstone tried her best to take what comfort she could from the statement. She tended to be brave around Pennington, mostly because it was her job to not be afraid of what he was, but when she was alone, she became painfully aware of the fact that she was young, small, and lacked his ability to grin and quip in the face of danger.
As if she could sense Moonstone's reminder of how weak she was, the stranger leaned forward, refusing to obey the laws of gravity. That shimmering light that Moonstone had seen running through her body seemed to collect in her eyes, scintillating for a moment before flashing with the light of the sun, forcing her to blink and look away, shielding her own eyes. When she opened them again, the pony was gone.
That is, she was gone until Moonstone felt a firm hoof take an uncomfortable grip on her shoulder, and weightless strands of gold-and-ruby hair floated into her peripheral vision. Immediately, she froze, paralyzed with fear.
"Do you want to know what I'm going to do to you, little truth-seer?" the sultry voice whispered into her ear. "I'm going to show you something. I'm going to show you death."
From the corners of her eyes, Moonstone could see the black mist gathering around her. Small amounts of it were even brushing up against her face, toying with scales and pressing at her eyes. Even as she screwed her eyelids shut, she could feel a pressure building just behind her eyes, growing with only the smallest of rates.
"I wouldn't shut them, if I were you, or this might get messy..." There was a slight edge to her voice, a threat that hadn't been as serious before.
Moonstone quickly decided that she would prefer to not get what this sadist would define as "messy," so with a deep breath, she forced herself to open her eyes again. When she did, a firm hoof collided with the back of her head, forcing her to stumble forward. With the impact, however, came something much, much worse: the sight of her own eyeballs leaving her skull as the pressure behind them was released. Somehow still able to see without them, Moonstone watched in horror as the mysterious pony caught the falling orbs in her hoof, quietly floating back around from behind her and into sight.
Mortal terror was quickly beginning to overwhelm her capability of thought, and her breathing progressed from hesitant and shallow to hyperventilation in a matter of seconds. Just as she was drawing in breath for an uncontrolled scream, more of the mist entered her mouth, solidifying and blocking the sound in an effective gag.
"Don't worry, I'll put them back where I found them!" The stranger chuckled as she walked into Moonstone's field of vision. "I just thought they needed a good old-fashioned cleaning, is all!" With a low chuckle to herself, Moonstone watched her pucker her lips and suck her cheeks inward. After a moment or two of swirling back and forth, she slowly let her mouth hang open, and a large dribble of spit descended, landing on the lavender eyes she was holding. With near-expert skill, she revolved the two orbs in her hoof, drizzling her drool lazily onto the two of them. After they were both thoroughly drenched, she closed her mouth again with a small smile. After revolving them a few more times to make sure that they were completely covered, she grabbed a large portion of her hair (once again defying gravity by using both of her front hooves at the same time) and dropped the eyeballs into it, seemingly doing so to remove the excess saliva. After a few seconds of vigorously rubbing with both hooves, she looked down into her hair.
"No, no, no! Those are rubies!" she muttered before spitting into it again and beginning the toweling off again. After a few seconds, she tried looking in again. "Griffin hearts? Well, I am hungry..." She seemed to take a moment to ponder simply eating them then and there, but shook her head, repeating the process. This went on for several minutes, with each result being more and more horrifying, until she finally looked back inside and smiled.
"Ah! There we go! Two eyes, good as new!" She seemed almost genuinely cheerful as she reached down into her hair and pulled Moonstone's eyes back out. From what she could "see," Moonstone could tell that they had changed. Her beautiful lavender irises had been tinted to a blood-red. Unable to do anything to stop her, Moonstone cringed as the pony stepped forward, gently placing each eye back into its socket. Considering the violent nature that she had talked about, Moonstone would have been surprised by how gentle the action was. Except, of course, for the fact that, after blinking several times, she realized that she had been moved.
Now, she was standing at the edge of a clearing in the middle of the some forest: and Pennington was laying in the center, collapsed.
"Penn! What happened?" Moonstone went to run forward, but found herself rooted to the spot, unable to move. Pennington didn't hear her, but with a low groan, began trying to stand up, one hoof at a time. As he raised his head, Moonstone gasped with horror.
His face was showing every sign of having been horribly abused. One of his eyes was swollen and blackened while the other appeared to have burst a blood vessel, turning the previously white area red. His face was covered in numerous other cuts and bruises, almost beyond recognition. As he gritted his jaw in pain, Moonstone could see that more than half of his teeth were either missing or broken, as well. His legs were all drenched in blood, as well, as someone or something had opened up his old changeling wounds. He grunted loudly as he finally stood up on his hooves, seemingly barely able to do so. Looking around, he saw no sign of his tormentor, and gave a soft sigh of relief.
As he did, however, there was an ear splitting crack, and Moonstone saw a tree behind him beginning to topple.
"Penn! LOOK OUT!" She screamed, trying to reach out to him, despite her rooted position.
Pennington's head turned as quickly as it could to look around, and seeing the tree, he fell to the side, rolling as best he could out of the way. The tree landed beside him with a thundering crash, and he was quickly buried in the branches.
There was a moment of terrifying silence, and Moonstone wondered if it was possible that he might have still been killed.
After a few seconds, however, there was the sound of faint coughing, and movement from beneath the branches and leaves. Unbearably slowly, the beaten and broken Pennington crawled out, panting heavily and moaning in pain, several large gashes from the impact torn open in his sides, back, and even along the back of his neck. One of his back legs was broken, bending far enough midway between the knee and ankle for Moonstone to see a pointed edge of bone emerging from a bloody tear in his skin.
Seeing that he had survived, regardless of injury, gave Moonstone hope.
Hearing another tree falling ripped it away again.
This time, the attacking foliage was directly in front of Pennington, a old evergreen with a thick trunk. In the moments as it began to fall, Pennington turned to look back at his injured leg, looked up at the tree descending like a guillotine... and closed his eyes.
"PENNINGTON! NO!"
There was another thunderous crash, the sound of every bone in a pony's body being snapped like a twig... and then nothing. All was silent as the grave.
Moonstone stood, trying to understand, trying to process the fact.
He's... dead...
And then came the laughter. The chuckle. The ever-more-familiar giggle of that stranger.
"Oh, don't worry, he won't be dead for long!" She laughed, appearing on top of the trunk of the tree that had killed him. "Where would the fun be if I only killed him once?"
Moonstone's eyes narrowed, and she could feel a fiery wrath beginning to build in her chest. Baring her fangs in a snarl, she turned on the pony, pointing an accusatory claw in her direction. "Who are you? What are you? Why are you doing this?"
"Moi?" She held a hoof up to her chest, seemingly surprised at the questions. "Why, I'm the nightmare! The horror that waits in the dark! The monster under the bed of every child and every grown-up! I'm chaos given life, and the mistress of death! I am everything horrible and evil in this rotten world bundled together and given the sole purpose of gleefully exacting whatever makes herself happy! I am the Alicorn Assassin, created to eradicate from existence anyone and anything that stands in my way! The magnum opus of the draconequui! I am the endless conqueror, never happy until all existence bows and dies for my amusement! And before all of that, before the Elements of Harmony were forged or the alicorns rose to power..." her eyes narrowed threateningly, "I was the killer of Quill, Ixia, and Threadmane: Equestria's first guardians."
There was a brief moment of tense silence, the two staring one another down, though Moonstone's steely gaze had reverted back to one of wide-eyed fright. After that, however, she put a thoughtful hoof to her chin.
"I'm also occasionally known as 'The Lord of the Dance.'"
Moonstone shook her head in disbelief. "But- But Quill was killed by Scorch! His dragon companion!"
"And who did you think drove Scorch insane?" She raised a single suspicious eyebrow, as if daring Moonstone to answer the question. "It certainly didn't happen on his own!"
"And Ixia..." Moonstone's brow furrowed in thought as she tried to remember the history she'd been taught during her days in Canterlot. "...was killed in battle with Discord!"
"Discord was there, yes..." she yawned, daintily pressing her hoof against her mouth. "But I remember quite clearly, killing her was the first thing I did when I was born. Vaporized her on sight, I believe! It's almost funny to look back on, I didn't know much self-restraint back then." She giggled lightly to herself, as if remembering a joke. "Oh, and the look on Quill's face was priceless!"
"And Threadmane... She died of old age, didn't she?"
The stranger's smile grew again. "Is that what the official records say?"
Moonstone wanted to try to back away, but her feet were still rooted to the spot.
Rolling her eyes, the pony hopped down from the stump, knocking aside the fallen tree to reveal Pennington's crushed remains. Moonstone cringed and turned away, trying not to look at the mangled corpse.
"Now, then, shall I tell you the rules of our game?" She muttered, looking almost disappointed at the remains, a small fireball appearing in one of her hooves and dropping down onto the bloody mess. "Because you should probably be going, soon."
"You may not realize it, but what you're seeing right now is all contained within Pennington's mind. What I killed is his perception of himself, which means from his perspective, he just died. Even if his body is alive." She smiled. "It's more fun this way because I can pull his deaths from his own memories and fears, even the ones that he suppresses, and the pain never gets duller over time! And I'm going to kill him over and over again. It'll be quite fun for me..." She walked back to Moonstone, and as she did, their setting seemed to fade away like an illusion, leaving them both back where they had started. "And every once in a while, I'm going to show you and your 'special eyes' one of those deaths!" With a sweeping motion of her hoof, she pointed back to the city she had been trying to reach. "But don't forget that poor Penn's little body is still going to freeze, so you need to get help quickly!" She grinned evilly at this moment, making what most would consider a beautiful face contort into something disturbing. "But here's the catch: if you walk, I'll kill him at a leisurely pace. If you run, I'll kill him twice as fast. If you fly..." She chuckled, putting a hoof beneath Moonstone's chin to force her to look into her sky-blue eyes. "I'll kill him ten times as much. Time means nothing in a pony's mind, so there's no assurance that just because I'm going faster, it won't be drawn-out and painful..."
Moonstone shook her head. "But- I can't get there before he freezes if I don't fly!"
"Then fly fast!" She chuckled.
"And when you get there, tell them Eris sent you, and that she won't be far behind..."
"Fairytrail is in another few stops..." Whipstitch muttered, staring out the window. "It feels like we've been on this train for months..."
Lily couldn't help but chuckle. It had been no surprise to her when Whipstitch and Pennington had become fast friends after the seamstress had moved to Ponyville. Both were impatient, impulsive, and knew themselves well enough to understand the other.
"Lily, there is something I should warn you about..." Whipstitch sighed as she sat back, turning her gaze towards the ceiling. "Remember when I bought your old place from you in Ponyville?"
"Well, of course I do! That's how I was able to afford to set up a business in Canterlot!" Lily laughed. "If it weren't for you, I'd probably still be stuck there!"
A small smile tugged at Whipstitch's lips. "Yeah, you had big dreams... Well, do you remember how I paid you? Did it seem odd?"
Lily's brow furrowed. "Well, you gave me the full price I was asking for..."
"In bits. Up front. Right?" Whipstitch sighed, as if what she was saying was coming out as easily as pulling teeth.
"I was so happy, I have to admit, it didn't really seem that important at the time, but that is weird... I wondered how you got all that money after I was gone, but I didn't want to ask."
"Well, that was the last of the money that my family gave me when I decided to leave Fairytrail..."
Lily felt her jaw drop. "They gave you enough money for a house?"
"Well, to them, it wasn't much. My grandmother thought I'd just come running back again after a while, anyway." She shook her head, sitting up and looking Lily in the eye again. "What you should know is that you're going to have to brace yourself... Fairytrail kinda makes a big deal out of Threadmane's bloodline... And so does the rest of my family. Sometimes it's just unbearable..."
Lily sighed, sitting back. "So, are you some kind of celebrity or something?"
Whipstitch rolled her eyes, looking back out the window. "You'll see..."