The reflections of the two princes in the tall bathroom mirror, which had been teleported to the study, showed varying degrees of fear and confusion over the issue with the scrying attempt, and the whole trans-dimensional debacle as a whole.
“Well... Even though I am the element of magic, I still can't imagine how difficult and complex what you did, reaching your will across the dimension to it's edge through the dreamworld. I definitely need to learn more about the dream world, because I didn't even know you could scry into it!” Dusk shook his head and looked away from the polished surface, mind reeling, and, of course, buzzing with idle calculations and theories on how to combine the two magic disciplines into a spell.
“Well... While I did scry into the realm of dreams, there was no way for me to do anything while there, through the mirror, at least. I was just viewing the realm, and I couldn't do the basic actions of a dreamwalker, though I had a lot more ease of movement and I could twist some magic in with my perception, if only a tiny bit. See, I can go dreamwalking, and enter dreams, but I can not use magic directly while there. In somepony's dream, I can twist their world a lot like magic, but it is simply the pliability of the immaterium. Like levitating a box, or... making a bed disappear.” Artemis smiled inwardly as he mentioned this example, though Dusk simply nodded and continued to ponder the issue at hoof. “These shows of magic are just twisting the dream by the conscious mind of a dreamwalker. I could never magically hide myself, much less an entire dream using the magic I saw. Solaris was definitely conscious in this dream, yet he still was the dreamer, and could use magic impossible for either a dreamer or dreamwalker, which makes me think he was scrying. But this is still quite bothersome, it seemed as if he had entered the dream as a definite realm, and the castle setting was a real place in the cosmos.”
Dusk Shine's eyes lit up, and turned an excited smile to the reflection of Artemis' furrowed brow and look of consternation. “I've got it!” The lavender prince exclaimed, slightly startling his thoughtful companion.
At Artemis' doubtful look, Dusk sheepishly amended “Well, I have an idea, at least. This trans-dimensional travel reminds me of my trip to the alternate dimension with all the... uhh... weird stuff. Hands and such.” Dusk Shine's face tinted as he recalled the silly and amusing travel through the realm containing bipedal forms of everypony he knew, and the short romantic spell with the guitar playing girl he had met there. “Perhaps we could use that artifact for such a spell. Rather than scry through a mirror, we could teleport into this alternate universe dream... thingy”
A light chuckle escaped the Lunar Prince, as his serious mood evaporated with the humorous charm of Dusk Shine's vernacular. Dusk looked away from the mirror and at the real Artemis, and busted out as well, building off his nervous energy and the drop of tension from the room as Artemis relaxed.
~~~
“After that... er... incident, my brother and I had the mirror transported back here, but to the deepest and most secure of our arcane vaults. We wouldn't want any other interference from world-crossing malcontents like Sundown Gleam.” Artemis shook his head at the name, as the two princes made their way down a deep set stairwell in the back of the archives.
Dusk Shine sighed, and gently reminded Artemis of Sundown's reform. The lunar prince nodded and said “That is why I said 'like', I know he is no longer a threat, I just like to be sure.” At this Dusk let the matter rest as they approached a large vault door, inscribed with concentric rings of runes. As the princes entered, they each lit a torch mounted in a brazier to their side of the doorway. As the flickering light better illuminated the massive metal circle that made the door, he realized that he did not recognize any of the runes that made up this complex sygaldry, he realized that this door had been forged an unbelievably long time ago, when artificing was done in Old Equestrian. While Dusk could not read Old Equestrian, he recognized the the script as each of the runes seemed to twist and slither slightly under close inspection, as if trying not to be read.
After a few moments, Dusk gave up on trying to read, and said to his friend “I have never been down here, I always thought it was just a store for old scrolls that didn't fit in the archives. I guess I should have known it was more than that, since I have never seen a scriv go down here when looking for information.”
Artemis simply nodded as he concentrated on the spell to open the vault door. After weaving together the spells he needed, he spoke in Old Equestrian as his horn lit up in bright azure flames and his eyes grew purple and green. He had been ready for the magical tongue, but the noise caught his companion by surprise, doubtless the first time he had ever heard it. To Artemis, the words seemed to roil and slide off his tongue like hot oil, but to Dusk, hearing the words hurt his ears and made his stomach turn. He did not recognize the Lunar Prince's voice in these words, as the sound reminded him of dragon claws scraping slate combined with bones and flesh being crushed. From the high ringing to the low gurgling, Dusk nearly lost his lunch before Artemis finished speaking, though the entire process had only taken a few moments.
There was a loud click and snap as magically artificed tumblers released and the door rolled to their right into the wall. The greenish-purple flames dissipated from around Artemis' eyes, and he looked at Dusk, who was in quite a state. “Oh, a thousand apologies, dear Dusk! I should have warned you before doing that. I have never been down here with anyone but my brother, and both of us spent millennia learning Old Equestrian from our parents as they wove the cosmos. This was the only language they spoke, and we had to create a new language when Mother made the ordinary ponies for us to care for. But still to us it is quite an ordeal to speak, since even we are much more real and bound to the cosmos than they that made it. Will you be sick?” Artemis asked this last question as Dusk heaved slightly trying to regain his hooves.
“Yeah, a warning would be nice.” Dusk responded meekly as he stood again took a few steps towards the now open entrance to the arcane vaults. He froze and turned to look at Artemis. “Is it safe to go in there? There aren't any crazy enchantments that will make me barf or anything in there, right?”
Artemis chuckled again at the younger prince's antics and nodded. “It is safe as long as you keep your hooves from the artifacts, which are always dangerous toys to play with.”
The two proceeded into the entrance chamber of the vault, the torches outside illuminating the chamber, Dusk immediately started walking down the only hall that extended from this antechamber at the back, but Artemis stopped and looked around at the floor. “Stop!” He suddenly barked, causing Dusk to jolt to a sudden stop and look back, fear playing out across his face. “What!?! You said there were no traps or anything!” Dusk yelped, looking around furiously for tripwires he had tripped or something equally sinister.
Artemis did not chuckle at this, as he was still staring at the floor around him with his brow knit. “Somepony has been in here recently, and they took something large with them, either in or out.” he said, pointing at the path where the thick dust had been disturbed by a set of hooves and a large object. “Nopony has access to here but my Brother and I, and we have not needed to store anything here since the mirror, but that was months ago...” His eyes widened, and he took off in the direction that Dusk had already started upon. Dusk took this as a sign he could move, and dashed off after the taller blue alicorn.
They passed many rooms with closed and locked doors, some bound with chains, and a few even inscribed with runes like the vault door. Artemis came to a stop by one door, secure and sturdy looking, wrapped in chain. As he looked closer, he could tell that the dust on this door had been disturbed recently as well, yet a glance at the ground below showed the set of hoofsteps continue past the door, though the path of the large object did not. A touch of Artemis' hoof to an artificed hoof lock had the door open with chains sagging to the floor, and a quick peek inside showed that the room beyond was empty. The two princes went inside, and Dusk Shine examined the ground for a first impression of what shape the object was, and looked up.
“This was the mirror, or where you placed it, correct?” he asked. The infuriated look upon Artemis' face was answer enough. “Why would a thief steal this artifact? There is no real point to stealing the gateway, since it would just be closed until the thirty moons was up, and then the thief could have just went through the mirror rather than drag it out.”
“No thief could get in here, Solaris is the only other being that could open the vault door, and the entire vault is surrounded by a magic barrier bound in the bedrock of this mountain. You can not even use magic in here, that is why we had non-magical glowstone lined into the vault walls and ceilings, since no torches can be magically carried by us into here, nor illumination spells cast.” Dusk nodded slightly as he looked around at the eerily glowing lines that neatly crisscrossed the walls and ceiling of the room they were in, as well as the hall outside. But then what Artemis caught up to him, and he turned a shocked face towards the blue alicorn.
“But I thought you said only you and Solaris could access this vault...” Dusk almost whispered, his right eyebrow quirking and twitching at the thought of his great and wise teacher secretly stealing the mirror out of the vault and dragging it with his teeth all the way out. 'Why did he want the mirror?' 'What purpose would he have that made him not tell anypony, even his own brother?' 'Why would he not even bring a servant to drag it for him?' Questions rolled and tumbled in Dusk's mind, but Artemis had no room in his mind for idle pondering as doubt and anger filled his mind.
Checking behind the door and in every corner again, Artemis turned from the room and walked out into the hallway, turning not the way to the exit, but deeper into the bowels of the vault, anger being melted into pure determination as he took off at a quick gait. Dusk scrambled to follow the blue alicorn, worry twisting on his face.
After a few dozen doors, the pair of stallions reached the end of the hallway, where a large pair of doors stood, metal and inscribed like the main vault door, except tall and rectangular rather than round. Seeing this, Dusk quickly brought his hooves to his ears in preparation as he saw Artemis' horn glow and eyes burn. Despite this, Dusk could still hear the gut-wrenching roll of Old Equestrian that fell from Artemis' tongue through his closed and covered ears.
The doors clicked and slid apart into the walls in the same way the main vault door had, but upon opening this revealed a bright and steady light that startled the lavender alicorn, whose eyes had grown accustomed to the gloom in the vaults so far. At first, Dusk thought that there was a magical fire burning in the room, despite what Artemis had said, but when his eyes acclimated, he noticed that the brighter lighting was due to the fact that the entire room was coated in gilded glowstone slabs, making the walls gleam like the sun. This bothered Artemis' eyes as well, but for more reasons than Dusk's.
Artemis slowly and humbly entered the room, as if he were entering another ruler's throne room and paying them respect. He noticed his companion mimic this a few steps behind him, and nodded encouragement to him. Artemis looked around the room and his worst fears were realized.
To Dusk, this brilliant room was breathtakingly beautiful, an ornate display of some curious but marvelous objects he assumed were artifacts. He could only imagine what power these artifacts held, to be kept so well sealed in such a wondrous room. “What are these?” He managed to get out, looking at the curved golden scepter and wing-guards that seemed a matched set for a ruler richer and more powerful than even Solaris. But when he looked down past the golden set of artifacts set on the left side of the room, he noticed the cause of Artemis' silence. On this side, there seemed to be an equally opulent set of artifacts in a darker color scheme, closer to that of Artemis' regalia, but more cast to gray rather than black, except it was incomplete. In the front of the collection of treasures was a bust, obviously made for some necklace or pendant, sitting naked and bare of any jewelry.
The sound of drops of water hitting the ground caught Dusk's attention and he turned to see tears falling from Artemis' snout that was turned down towards the ground. He began to automatically try and cheer up his weeping friend, but he stopped dead as he saw a look of pure rage splayed out across the Lunar Alicorn's face.
Studying friendship had helped Dusk to gain an amazing amount of empathy, as well as practice stopping a friend from acting rashly. Mostly Rainbow Blitz, he pointed out in his head, but humor was out of its depth, and he mentally brushed that wise crack aside.
Dusk saw Artemis tense up, and knew he was about to take off to do untold destruction, and headed him off at the pass with a quick jump and flap of the wings, placing him directly in front of the doors. “No! Stop! You can't go out there like this, I don't even know what is wrong, but I won't let you hurt anypony!” Dusk managed to shout out before the larger alicorn collided with him, knocking him back a bit, but not off balance.
Artemis was stunned by this sudden resistance of his friend, and hesitated a moment in confusion and rage at this shout. He again tried to push past Dusk, but to no avail as Dusk braced himself against the door frame. Tears fell hotly from his snout as he launched a spastic flailing assault again, this time much more desperately, as he began to break down weeping as emotions began to crash back into him. After a few more convulsions that resembled attempts to push past his friend, Artemis ended up just leaning onto his shoulder sobbing. A few awkward pats on his back prompted him to lift his head and step a respectable distance back from Dusk, and he looked into his eyes and saw a mix of worry and confusion, and shook his head. Artemis brought a trembling hoof up to his face to brush away some of the tears. He then cleared his throat, standing taller as he reined in his emotions.
“I am sorry, and, uhh, thank you Dusk. Something very wrong is happening, and I fear that Solaris has taken not only the mirror, but this.” Artemis pointed behind him to the empty bust. “Mother's amulet.”
~~~
Dusk still could not get used to Old Equestrian, and it sickened him both times Artemis used it on their way out, but he could feel anger and fear whenever he heard it, and wondered if the Old Equestrian was transmitting the emotions from the speaker to him. He filed this interesting and rather disturbing thought away for further research, that is, if he were ever able to find any books on the language, since he had found none yet.
Artemis schooled his mind to help cool his temper, not trying to ignore or banish the anger, but cooling it to a icy hot flame that wouldn't wreck his calm demeanor again, or at least not until it was safe. He was glad that this confrontation had happened in the magically devoid vault, for Artemis knew that if he had magic, Dusk would be a pile of dust and ash blowing away by now. Turning his head and looking at the pony in question, he couldn't help but feel gratitude and consideration for him. He felt that such a strong friend should be rewarded, thanked somehow, and Artemis knew what Dusk treasured most: Knowledge.
“Do not speak of anything you have just seen, for that room of the arcane vaults is for my... our parents' memorabilia.” Artemis glanced over at Dusk, who was ascending the stairs beside him, to gauge his reaction. Dusk's eyes bugged out slightly and his mouth opened to ask questions that were very ostensibly bouncing around his head, but he managed to catch himself. “Solaris and I kept the gifts that Mother and Father made us, as well as the regalia they left behind, in a small and well defended hoard, that we eventually moved to their current vault, vowing not to use these awesome artifacts without grave need, and sealed them away from the world. The Amulet Solaris... stole... was a tool used by our mother, which she used to view the entire cosmos and align it's realms harmoniously.” Artemis spat the word stole, unable to find a word that accurately conveyed the level of atrocity that Solaris had committed.
At this, Dusk couldn't help himself, and a question burst out of him. “Wait... wha..!?!” Embarrassed by his stumbling, the lavender alicorn planted his hoof firmly on the step he was about to climb, stopping the pair at the loud sound. “What I mean is, what do you mean? Your mother? A tool to move entire dimensions? Back up a bit for me!”
A smirk played out on Artemis' lips at Dusk's fumbling, never having see the alicorn get so flustered, and finding it slightly amusing despite his sour mood. “I don't have time now to fill you in on my entire family history. I'll tell you later about it, but I have no patience for such a history lesson now. Suffice it to say that my brother and I's Mother had the power to create realms, and she set them in place using this amulet. I once used it in my fit of rage before my banishment, looking for a realm of night where I was appreciated. Instead I found the realm of nightmares, and staying there watching the fears of all creatures transformed me into Night-terror Knight. I returned knowing what ponies feared and I fought Solaris. The rest is history, literally.”
This little quip did nothing to raise the spirits of either stallion, as each thought of how horrible a Night-terror Knight Solaris would make, and both shook their head simultaneously to try and dismiss the horrid thought.
“But I am going to guess that he isn't, uhh, crazy evil now, so he hasn't done what you did.” Dusk said, cringing slightly under the glare he received, but relaxing when Artemis begrudgingly nodded.
“But he might, and just because he has not yet does not mean he will not ever. Even if he is just using these two artifacts in conjunction, and not utilizing either to their full effect, he is dabbling in territory far too dangerous for anypony.” Artemis shook his head, and began climbing the last of the stairs. “I want you to go on back to your room and rest, because we will have no constructive intervention and confrontation in the middle of the night. Meet me an hour past moonset in my study and we shall plan our strategy.” At Dusk's raised eyebrow, Artemis sighed and amended “Half and hour after sunrise.”
Dusk nodded and trotted off in the direction of the night wing, the pair of night guards rousing themselves from their lengthy wait at the stairwell door. Giving curious looks to Artemis and each other, the guards formed up on their liege’s sides and wordlessly followed him out of the archives.
Artemis was still fighting down rage as he walked towards his quarters, and when his disgruntled niece came around a corner in the corridor ahead, his entire will was flexed to near it's breaking point. 'What are you doing in my wing of the castle?' 'Why are you here so late?' 'Why haven't I severed your vocal cords yet?' all these questions came out of him in one combined inquiry: “Hello Princess Bluebelle, what brings you to my wing of the castle?”
The blonde-haired and white-coated unicorn mare walked over to her uncle in a way that would seem graceful to any ordinary pony, but was betrayed by Artemis' annoyance with the brat. And obviously by his guard's annoyance as well, for as soon as she shook her mane out of the way of her eyes and her view was obscured, both guards broke their composure to blanch and roll their eyes at the detestable excuse for royalty that was attempting to parade herself for them. None of this was noticed by Bluebelle, and as she approached Artemis, she began whining. “Uncle Artyyyyyy! I couldn't find you anywhere! I have been looking for your help forever! These vagabond filth that attend the club down the road from my new west side condo keep spouting abhorrent noise they pretend is music! They stay at it all night, and won't turn it down, and I can't sleep with my windows open like I like to! Please demolish this hive of commoner wretchedness so I can get my beauty sleep!”
She continued complaining a bit, and Artemis knew that he should say: 'You are plenty beautiful, but I shall have my corporals investigate this disruption of the peace. Rest assured that this noise pollution will bother you no more.' But He was not really feeling that generous tonight.
Instead he started walking again, right past Bluebelle, causing his guards to startle and run ahead a bit, giving him just enough time without being seen. In this short period of privacy, his eyes lit up and flamed a greenish-purple as his horn blazed a brief cerulean inferno. When his guards looked back, they saw a perfectly composed prince walking away from a convulsing and horrified princess, though they did not see the throng of large spiders crawling all over her body like she saw and felt.
Artemis kept his steady pace, ensuring none of his guard would think it necessary to stop and help her. And inside his mind, Artemis smiled.