Prologue
The night air was still and heavy with the scents stirred of recent rain as Luna oriented herself to this new world. It was a world both surprisingly familiar and yet again alien to her, as was every dream she entered. The dreamscape was a forest by night, a typically foreboding motif that Luna had encountered many a time. There was a certain fear that ponies had of the dark, the unseen things lurking in shadows coiled and waiting to strike, yet never be fully revealed even when they did. Only by the gracious light of her dear sister’s golden sun did such monsters retreat back into closets and under beds and reform themselves back into common objects such as brooms and rakes, toys and hat racks, all canted or viewed at odd angles that in darkness suggested intentions much more vile.
Raising her head, Luna spied through a gap in the early spring foliage the familiar silvery disc of her celestial charge, the moon. Yet it did not give her its usual comfort this time. The alicorn princess’ gut gave a gentle twinge of shame and regret as she recognized the ominous dark shape that lay across its eastern hemisphere. There, formed of a pattern of darkened mares and craters, the silhouette of a pony head was clearly visible.
The mare in the moon.
She had first seen the image in a book Celestia had shown her shortly after her return and restoration by the bearers of the Elements of Harmony. Celestia had told her that it had been a reminder to her for those thousand years of her failure to save the pony she cared for most. Luna knew it differently. To her, it was the icon of her own folly; of the night she let her repressed resentment, jealousy, and desires for attention urged on by whispers from those lonely shadowy places that lurked unseen within the soul to finally twist and weave them into the shroud, the nightmare she became, Nightmare Moon.
Yet it wasn’t the blotting of the sun, nor the desire to cover of ponykind in the glories of eternal night that troubled her the most. Nay, it was of all her actions the desire not just to supplant her elder sister but to remove her utterly from all existence, to kill her. That was her greatest regret. And every night since she had been restored, as she had raised the once more pristine disc of the moon into the heavens, she had silently thanked Celestia for having the wisdom to save her with her banishment to that celestial prison. Luna knew with absolute clarity, that had the horseshoe been on the other hoof, the Nightmare would have delivered the fatal blow.
A shiver brought on by the damp caress of a cold night’s breeze brought the Diarch Nocturnes back from her reverie.
“Odd.” She mused aloud as she stood in the darkened silence among the trees.
And that is was. Normally when she’d manifest in a dream she’d be near enough to the manifestation of the dreamer to be able to identify them with relative ease that she might make herself known to them and then set to aiding them allay their fears. This though was not the case at present. The depth of the darkened stillness was unnaturally deep in this dream, eerily so.
Mayhaps, Luna pondered, this pony actually dreams of being a forest.
It would be unusual as dreams went, yet far less odd than say, that one pony whose dreams were of being marmalade, or such as it was. Whatever that was, Luna had to admit it had utterly stumped her, and perhaps this would too, after all she was normally drawn to dreams of fear or distress. Ironic in some ways she found that the onetime Nightmare that nearly conquered Equestria, now aided her pony subjects in vanquishing nightmares of their own.
Tis a least a tidy forest, Luna had to admit of the dreamer, and orderly too. As she noted the clean set rows formed by the trees as she paused to admire the intricate memory work of the dreamer in a nearby white blossom. It was obvious to the princess that the dreamer had a very good memory as the quality of the dream image was so exact in detail. Most dreams were far less precise in such things, rather generalistic in her experience. Yet here she was reasonably sure she could identify the flower in question. Though not as was as well read as either her sister, or her sister’s prize student Twilight Sparkle, for Luna it came down to a question of remembering which flower had four petals and which had five as the bloom in question was either a dogwood or an apple.
The implications of her affable musing suddenly clicked in her head.
Nay, tis not a forest, Luna smiled at her realization, but an orchard.
That now narrowed the possibilities considerably, as Luna recalled a friendship letter Celestia had recently received and shared with her from the bearer of the Element of Honesty, Applejack, on the benefits of the support of friends in trying times as her grand-dam, Granny Smith, was soon to be undergoing a surgical procedure to repair an ailing hip. It astounded Luna to hear of such things having been devised in the millennium of her absence. So much had changed in that lost time.
But as it stood to reason, it was likely that this dream was that of one of the kin of the Element of Honesty, if not the bearer herself. The leading candidate was the youngest of the family, Apple Bloom. Luna often found herself drawn to the young pony’s dreams of confusion and loss involving her lack of memories of her parents.
Luna could empathize with the little filly, for she too had nigh no memory of her own dam and sire beyond blurred images and the echo of a voice she could no longer tell to be male or female, only that she knew that it loved her truly. Most of what she could remember in clarity was from after she and Celestia had been found, and informally adopted, by Star Swirl the Bearded.
Her own past aside, it still didn’t answer the question as to the whereabouts of the dreamer. The dead calm that pervaded the whole of this dream was beginning to become rather unsettling to Luna.
Well then, Luna set herself to task, if there is a purpose to my being here I intend to discern it. And with that she set off along the corridor of trees her mithril clad hoof guards making no more noise than a shadow as she sought to locate the avatar of the dreamer. Yet in the shadowy recesses beyond the trees occasionally she could catch flickers of what she thought might be eyes watching. Her ears too began to pick up at first murmurs in the stillness. The subtlety growing polyphony continually shifting pitch and tone, age and gender, as the murmurs progressed from shapeless noise to forming first simple words: get, hate, me, they, will, I, and then phrases, … they hate me, … let them fear me, … have my revenge.
A rush of realization came to her as she stepped clear of the tree line where a looming craggy ridge rose before her, as the heard voices finally became her own, urging her vengeance on those who thought less of her than her sister.
The dream was tainted! Tainted, she realized, by the same manner of shadowy presence that had long ago driven her to her darkest deeds. Whoever this dream belonged to was in the thrall of unseemly and dire forces. And then her hoof bumped against something and she looked down.
At her hooves lay the bodies of two earth ponies, a light orange mare, and brown stallion. They were facing each other, their still hooves nearly touching. The mare, with a flower looped in a lariat as a cutie mark, Luna could see was likely felled by a single blow, her back obviously broken, and likely accompanied with internal bleeding; her death would have been a slow and agonizing one, yet her final expression was seemingly relaxed and calm.
The stallion’s demise she could deduce had been faster though, but far more brutal. A glance at the cracked teeth of his bloody muzzle and a touch of her hoof against his barrel informed her that he had been stomped repeatedly, his ribs all broken, until he had literally drowned in his own blood as splinters of bone had been driven into his lungs; a ghastly and violent end indeed.
Lifting her view from the two fallen ponies Luna drew in a resolute breath and raised her wings magnifying her stature, as a wave of sapphire energy radiated from her horn stifling the disembodied voices in the shadows.
“Show Thyself Dreamer! Thyne Princess Summons Thee!” Luna boomed in the Royal Canterlot Voice, the reverberation cracking like thunder across the dreamscape before dying away into the darkness.
There was no answer.
Luna pawed the ground and rustled her feathers in growing irritation at the lack of response. She was about to call out again when the earth of the dreamscape shuddered. Before her, the face of the ridgeline crumbled and slid as the shape of an immense equine head began to emerge from the slope.
“Nopony summons the Lord of the Valley and Everfree.” A heavy voice echoed from within the ridge as the edifice like face stared balefully down at her, as if utterly unimpressed by the presence of one of only three alicorns in all Equestria.
Lord of the Valley and Everfree? Luna paused for a moment to ponder the title. There was no such listing in the Grand Registry of Peerage and Nobility in Canterlot. Of that she was sure; it had been the first tome she had committed to memory upon return and restoration.
“I, Luna Diana Serenity by Stellar Ambition out of Faustian Creation, Lady of Dreams, Mistress of the Selene Orb, Princess of the Night, Diarch and Co-Ruler of all Equestria, do summon thee.” Luna raised her head and puffed out her chest in pride as she spoke. It was rare enough for her or her sister to use their full and proper names that she wasn’t entirely sure she’d gotten it entirely right.
The face on the ridge did not even bat a stony eye in response.
“There is only one Princess in Equestria,” the deep echoing voice rumbled derisively as the feature of the face began to submerge into the earth, “and it is not you.”
“Nay, Cloddsome Knave!” Luna’s temper erupted in scathing pique at the display of disrespect being shown her. “How Dare Thou Make to Depart Before I so Grant Thee Leave!”
The midnight blue alicorn lashed out, wrapping the submerging form in her magical grasp to draw it from the slope. She could shift the moon, and even the sun, should it be required, ergo this task of drawing out some itinerant pony’s ego from a dreamscape manifestation should have presented no problem.
GET OUT!
The thought exploded out of the ridgeface at Luna’s astral form in hot white rage, hurling the princess backwards with enormous force.
Luna shrieked in shock at the monolithic power, her mithril clad hooves clattered against the white marble of the balcony as she reared backward her rump bumping the rail of the same behind her. Settling herself she glanced about furtively as she gathered her wits about her. Below her the courtyards of Canterlot Castle, and the city’s skyline spread outwards to where they either embraced the mountain’s face or dropped off into the open sky beyond the outermost ledge.
The soft clatter of shod hooves making landfall on the balcony following a silent glide down from the sky, save the subtle rattle of his mail and scale barding, drew Luna’s now conscious attention.
“Is there something amiss your highness? I saw you startle.”
She recognized the voice of her personal Captain, Deadly Dream. Equus sapiens dermatoaves-nocturnum, was the scientific name for the species. By whatever name the tuft eared night flyers called themselves, beyond we, us, and our kind, if any, was unknown, even to Luna and Celestia. The common term in use was ‘Bat-Ponies’, and since the times before the fall of the Nightmare, they had served as Luna’s personal attendants.
“Nay, my good Captain. Nothing amiss. My last visitation did but end abruptly with the sudden rousing of the dreamer, nothing more. I am fine.”
She looked towards the west where the moon slowly slipped closer to the horizon, dawn would not be far off. She reached out with a sapphire shaded thought and drew aside the curtain leading from the balcony to her own private chambers decorated in a rich nebula of shades of midnight cut with bands of shimmering brilliance.
“Though please alert my sister’s chamberlain, Refractions of Dawn, that I wish to speak with my sister in the castle library following daybreak.”
The guard pony bowed low as Luna stepped inside her room, the curtain closing behind her, then took wing to carry out his orders.
Luna hated lying, even by omission; she had done far too much of it in the days before The Nightmare. But something had happened; she had been forcibly ejected from a dream. She could count only a few hooves the number of beings she’d ever encountered with the will power do such a thing, and this one was none she recognized.
* * * * *
The darkness of the dream faded through bleary eyes to the darkness of the simple room. McIntosh Apple lay there a moment collecting the cool early morning air in a deep breath, recovering himself from the emotions that still swirled, fading, from the dream. He let the breath go, and drew another. He had had the dream again, that dream, ... if only it was just a dream.
He stretched his legs and rolled from the bed to his hooves the floor giving a soft groan as it accepted his weight. The room he had was scarcely half again his own length, by three quarters wide. It was just enough space for his small bed, a bookcase for his texts and ledgers, and the small desk from where he managed the finances of the farm assisted by his secretary and sole confidant, Smarty Pants. Still, considering what he’d done, he always felt it was more than he deserved.
Taking a look out the window the moon was just above the horizon. Knowing the date and a quick judgement of the angel of the moon to the horizon, gave him the time without needing to look at a clock, 4:08 am, give or take about a half a minute.
Slipping on his yoke and stepping towards the door he gave a glance and nod back to Smarty Pants, confirming their appointment to review the farm’s accounts that evening. For all she could do, math was never AJ’s strong suit, thankfully it was his. If it weren't for that and the help he’d gotten from Pa’s best friend ‘Uncle’ Fil, in convincing Granny not to sell off large tracts of the family holdings to pay for hired help after Ma ‘n’ Pa’s funeral.
He stepped into the hall with a softness disportionate to his bulk, closing the door behind him. He turned and slipped open the door to Applejack’s room. She lay in a tangle of sheets, hind legs poking out from the end of the sheets, her left twitching slightly her fores likewise.
“First place …” she mumbled.
Mac closed the door with a smile, AJ was probably dreaming of the rodeo finals again. She was so much like their mother, beautiful, athletic, self assured, and she lead with a natural charisma straight from her heart.
Across the hall he found Apple Bloom sleeping far more peacefully, angelic in her innocence of all things, even the truth of their parents’ deaths. She still believed they’d perished in a mudslide near great grandad Oats walnut grove. That was still the official story everypony knew, as printed in the Ponyville Express. His version of events was deemed ‘preposterous’ by the investigating officer. He leaned a moment on the doorframe, watching her barrel rise and fall, someday she’d have to be told the truth.
Closing the door Mac made his way down the stairs to the kitchen. He stopped by the old stove and held his hoof to the side of the firebox to check the heat with the frog. Finding none, he opened the firebox door and blew softly on the ash pile, a few sparks glimmering to life. he carefully added some shavings and kindling and soon had revived the fading flame. As the fire slowly built to the point where he could add some larger wood, he got the rest of his usual breakfast fixings together, water in the coffee pot, and dry rolled oats in his bowl. He’d get the water in the pot hot first, make his porridge then finish the coffee while he ate.
As he munched his oats he planned his day, he’d overslept by almost ten minutes but that could easily be made up by a quicker lunch. There would be plenty of time to get through his list for the day he figured, so long as AJ didn’t get any new notions of things to do. The Equestria Games were coming up and AJ might just get a notion to want to compete in some form, it was a certainty that her good friend Rainbow Dash would be participating, and the blue pegasus seemed to have a way of spurring AJ on at times. It was as if the two shared some intangible symbiotic connection at a level he just couldn’t explain.
Placing his porridge bowl and coffee mug in the sink, Mac headed out the back door to begin his day. He made his way across the farm yard towards the main orchard gate. Stopping by the gate, he turned his attention to the small gallery grove just inside. Bounded by a low white fence that any grown pony could easily have stepped over, ‘The Family Grove’ was where members of the Apple Family found their final rest. McIntosh’s great grandsire, Pokey Oats had been the first, well before Mac’s own life had even been an itch under Pa’s saddle. The most recent were his own parents back when he was scarcely older than Apple Bloom was now. He could still hear the crunch of bone and his mother’s screams in the quiet of the orchard, and smell the blood in the earth every spring.
“Mornin’ all.” He bowed his head as he spoke softly to his ancestors. “Ma, Pa, the girls are doing fine, so don’t you worry none. An’ don’t you worry either Gran’pa Smith*, Granny’s a feisty old mare and she’d gonna pull through her surgery today an’ll be back on her hooves before the zap apples come in.”
And what about you? The tiniest of morning breezes seemed to carry the words to his ear from somewhere among the silent trees as Mac raised his head and began to head off for the first of his chores of the day.
“Don’t worry ‘bout me either.”