Myths and Birthrights
By Tundara
Book One: Awakening and Arrivals
Chapter Fifteen: The Serpent’s Lair
Upon rising to the heavens that balmy dusk, Twilight was greeted by Celestia and Luna lost in a deep conversation just above the equator. Neither seemed to notice as she drifted to a stop just a short distance away. Back and forth, they debated the merits of some plan or other that, without any context, Twilight was at a loss to understand. It took clearing her non-corporeal throat to gain either sister’s attention.
“Ah, good, you’re right on time, Twilight,” Celestia said as she swung away from Luna. There was something off about Celestia’s aetherial form, a certain resonance about her that was at once calming, and yet unsettling nonetheless. Celestia’s edges had an odd crackle to them, like she were floating next to Sol, rather than halfway across the heavens. “We don’t want to alarm you Twilight, but tonight is going to see a bit of a… shift in the heavens.”
“A… shift?” Twilight tried to keep the uncertainty from her tone.
Laying a tendril that would have been a hoof on Twilight’s back, Luna explained. “We are, finally, doing away with a spell enacted long, long before Celestia and I were born.”
“A spell? What kind of spell? And what has it been doing?” Twilight attempted to blink at her cousins as she processed all the thousands of implications, more questions bubbling up as a result. “It shouldn’t be possible for it to be older than you. No enchantment could last so long without renewal. Or, it’s drawing on magic from something. A ley-spring, perhaps? Even then, how is it maintaining its structure? Is the linking of the structure itself adding resiliency? Though, if it is as old as you claim… Could it be a sigil?”
Part of her thoughts applied the reasoning to her own puzzle waiting for her on Marelantis. The door’s wards should have faded in a time before antiquity, yet they were as healthy and hearty as the day they’d been cast.
Stifling a laugh, Celestia grinned at Luna, “I told you we wouldn’t get through this quickly.” Addressing Twilight, she continued, “There will be time enough for full explanations later. Can you be satisfied with the bare essentials for now?”
Twilight pressed the energy comprising her muzzle into a flat line as she thought. She was terribly curious to know everything about what Celestia and Luna were doing, from the how to the why. But she was also pressed for time herself with the door on Marelantis. A little, niggling thought had persisted throughout the day to ask in some round-about manner for Celestia’s thoughts. There wasn’t a great chance that Celestia or Luna knew anything pertinent about Marelantis, and if they were busy with their own troubles…
“I suppose,” Twilight finally said, trying to keep her curiosity out of her voice, “but you’ll tell me everything soon, right?”
“Of course,” Celestia agreed at once, with perhaps a touch too much enthusiasm.
Letting out a long, worried breath, Twilight waited for the explanation. When it didn’t come right away, and both of the sisters began to hum and click their aetherial tongues as they pondered just how to proceed, her impatience got the better of her, and she pressed them with a forceful, “So?”
“You’ll be the sole Shepherd of the Night starting this eve,” Luna said in a rush, followed by a slight wince at the hint of bitterness in her tone.
“Wait, what?” she almost shouted. “I don’t… what?”
“It’s very simple,” Luna continued as if Twilight wasn’t sputtering a series of confused noises. “We will be undoing the Nauta Anar Isilye. Our mothers created it to keep Sol and Selene opposite each other. Its removal will have a plethora of effects, one of which will be that ushering in the night shall fall squarely upon your withers alone.”
Had Twilight a head, it would have been spinning, and had she a body, she’d have needed to sit down. Lacking both, she settled for spreading out like melting icecream.
“There may also be a very short period of… magical instability up to, and especially around, noon tomorrow,” Celestia added, plainly gaining some amount of pleasure from Twilight’s reaction. “We didn’t want you to be worried.”
“I’m just… this is a lot to take in,” Twilight admitted. “And on top of Lev—” She quickly shut her mouth and looked away, embarrassed.
“On top of what, Twilight?” There was a mischievousness to the question, a little extra happy spark in Celestia’s playful tone. “What could you be up to on a boat in the middle of the ocean.”
“Oh, just, uh, some stuff I’ve found while translating the Book of Spring.” Twilight hated to lie, but she couldn’t say anything else without endangering Pinkie. It wasn’t a complete lie, as there were things from the book that Twilight would love to discuss with her cousins. She shook her head, and then, to deflect their suspicions further, asked, “Why are you doing this now?”
Celestia’s essence grew a little dimmer, more constrained. “Tyr’s is sick. Somehow the Fostering has become corrupted and is slowly consuming her essence. Or it was always corrupt, and I just refused to see it before. If something is not done to rectify my mistake, she will be destroyed.”
“An error you were warned against,” Luna huffed and extended a comforting touch. “It is not yet too late to undo the curse; and so we shall.”
“Except our plan requires you to be the one to make a sacrifice; not me.” Celestia shrugged off Luna and set about pacing in a wide, meandering circle. “You always suffer for my actions. After we awakened, at Airegos, the winter, Equestria, and on and on. I wonder if I did not cost you the stars as well.”
Luna let out a brusque laugh. “You are being unjust, Tia. I made my choices, and in no way could you have cost me the stars. Besides, I did not lose them, we gained yet more family. As with all the trials before, this too will be overcome.”
“I wish we knew the cause. The spell was cast perfectly; I know it, and there was nothing wrong until the Gala of the Stars, yet…” Celestia rolled her essence as she would her wings, the cadence of her energy dimming a few moments before returning to the crackling form. “If I had listened to the advice you and Cadence gave…”
“Could it have been Leviathan?” The question slipped from Twilight before she was fully aware it had formed, and her energy constricted at once in reproach of her error. Any hope that it would have slipped the sisters’ attention was lost by her inability to hide her worry and self recrimination, the emotions manifesting as a hissing pulse from her core.
Watching Twilight closely, Luna hummed to herself before answering. “She certainly has the power and wherewithal. But such would require her to awaken and get close to Tyr, which we’d have sensed at once.”
“Twilight…” Celestia prodded with her ‘concerned teacher’ voice. As always, it made Twilight squirm and feel even more ashamed.
A litany of possible excuses or deflections came to mind and were quickly discarded. Lying to Celestia was categorically impossible for her. Steadying herself with a non-existent breath, she muttered, “She might have paid me a visit the other day…”
“Truly?” Luna’s form trembled a little. Not with fear, anger, or even curiosity, but with excitement. “To be silent for so long, only to emerge now? I think I envy you, cousin, to be able to lay the oldest of the disc’s monsters low. How I wish we could lend you assistance. If you require us, we could be there in but a few minutes.”
Twilight began to shake her head, while Celestia mused to herself. “But, why would she reappear now?” Doubt, mixed with concern, pattered across her form like rain on hot cobblestones. “Are you certain it is truly Leviathan? There have been others that have made the same claim.”
“Fairly certain,” Twilight answered with an uncomfortable laugh. “I am on Marelantis right now.”
Luna almost pranced on the spot at Twilight’s reply. “Marelantis itself! The tales mother told of that place! If I could get my hooves on their forges for just a day…”
“Sister, this is hardly the time to indulge in fantasy,” Celestia chided softly.
“There is more.” Twilight cringed, and if her hooves hadn’t been incorporeal gaseous aether she’d have wrung them to help steady her nerves a little. “I can sense another alicorn on the island as well.”
“One of the interlopers seeking to ally with the serpent?” Luna fairly simmered with indignation, while beside her Celestia grew colder.
She constricted a little in on herself, a slight pop of doubt rippling from her core. Celestia twisted around into a knot, and then unraveled in a heavy exclamation. “No, it’s mother.”
Luna twisted around, her essence rippling with uncertainty and something Twilight did not recognise. “Mother? She is gone. Your unwillingness to accept this worries me, Tia. As does your need for her to return and shower you with praise again. We looked everywhere, and there was not a sign of her presence on the disc.”
“We never searched the bottom of the oceans. And if She is also a prisoner, that explains how Tyr’s fostering became twisted.” Celestia shook off her sister’s words with a casual ease. “Luna, you must go help Twilight. Cadence and I can resolve matters here in Sparkledale, but Twilight and mother will need help.”
“But you can’t!” Twilight snapped, a flash of exasperation making itself known in spidery, ruby lines. “I already told you; Pinkie and the others will be hurt if anypony else gets involved. Just talking to you could be too much. Who knows when dealing with the emotions of a demon. Besides, if Faust is this other alicorn—which is far from certain—then if I can find her, rescue her, then she can help me. Right? But, there is no guarantee that it is her in the first place. All we have to go on is the knowledge that I am not alone on this island.
“Furthermore, how do we know this isn’t Leviathan’s plan? Maybe she wants me to draw you to her as well. We can’t second guess ourselves, not now. This other alicorn changes nothing. We stick to the plan. If things get too dangerous, I will call for you.”
Neither Celestia nor Luna looked at all pleased with the idea, but neither did they have a response. Both were torn between the events in Equestria, and those on Marelantis. Celestia was effected the most, her practiced composure useless in her aetherial form, doubts and conflicting desires blazing across her soul.
Letting out a resigned huff, Celestia drew closer to Twilight. Almost touching, Celestia’s raw, crackling power held an altogether unnerving heat, Twilight’s own essence squirming in response. Peering deep into Twilight, Celestia said, “You must be extremely careful when dealing with mother. She is… different.”
Snorting, Luna boiled and drifted off a short ways. “She isn’t ‘different’, she is a cold hearted, manipulative, deceitful coward who tosses her family into the path of pain and hardship without a word. Everypony is just a stone to be placed on the board, maneuvered this way and that at her whim. If it is her, then how do we know she isn’t in league with the demon?”
“Because she is our mother. I have to hold onto the faith that she is good, if at times incomprehensible.” Celestia crackled in a steady pulse and drew Luna back towards her.
“Your faith in her is misplaced,” Luna sighed with resignation. “Not that I believe it to be her. There has to be another explanation.”
“Then we will find it together once our current predicaments are resolved.” Form settling, Celestia smiled, and with a slight pause to signal the end of that particular topic, asked, “Twilight, do you want our help?”
“You can’t. If you, Luna, or Iridia get involved…” Twilight gulped, unable to finish the thought. All her experience told her that Pinkie would be okay. Pinkie was Pinkie, after-all. Yet, Twilight was well aware that testing Leviathan’s warning was not wise. “I can deal with Leviathan, just like I healed Luna and stopped Discord.”
Celestia released a drawn out sigh. “Then I will trust you. In the event you require our assistance, have Polaris contact Selene or Sol and we will come immediately. It’s just as well, we have our own concerns at the moment.”
Twilight sagged in relief. Crises averted. A long, overly theatric yawn from Sol drew their attention to the distant west, hovering in perpetual dusk, while Selene’s flowering impatience to begin the night covered the east in a silver glow. Many of the stars had started to awaken as well, their lights a little hesitant on noticing that the Sun remained among them.
Nodding in agreement, Luna reached out to the east while Celestia held Sol in place. Twilight hovered in surprise when no ritual was performed, no ancient runes utilised to unravel the Nauta Anar Isilye. Luna heaved, her entire form rippling and snapping from the strain of pulling Selene into the sky, while Celestia likewise crackled brighter still with the effort of forcing Sol to remain in place.
Twilight’s eyes widened to the flare of auroras across the breadth of the disc, formed from the sundered spellwork of the ancient ponies. Pressure built in the lines, aether condensing in deep, iridescent light at weak points. Tracing the patterns of glowing sheets, Twilight could just make out the lay of the spell’s weave. It was frightening in scope and nature, massive yet subtle, reworking the very fundamental principles of the disc. Together the sisters let out a mighty cry, and across the heavens the lines snapped. Not all at once, but in a rolling cascade of fire and brilliant light that clung to the velvet darkness.
“It is done,” Luna panted as Selene rose, shimmering with uncertainty on spotting her sister just dropping to rest beneath Ioka. “This time, may it stay broken. I am not reforging that damned sigil a third time.”
Panting as well, Celestia quipped, “At least it will be simpler with Twilight and Cadence to help, if recasting it becomes necessary.”
“Why was it even created?” Twilight asked, most of her attention on fully bringing out her stars’ lights.
“Oh, a whole myriad of reasons. Keeping Selene locked into a single phase kept many doors barred, and others forced open. There are many spells as well, rituals really, that were made impossible; mostly those best not attempted.” Luna waved an airy hoof, ready to return to the disc and whatever task had precipitated the sisters’ actions.
Parting ways, with Twilight promising to take care and call on the sisters if she required help, threat or no threat, they all returned to their corporeal forms. Twilight did not return to the disc alone, Sirius and Polaris both making the journey.
‘Do you not think you’re being a tad too cavalier about the dangers Leviathan presents? Polaris seemed to fidget, making her light sputter and crackle.
Lifting her wings in a shrug, Twilight returned her focus to the door’s many locks. The puzzle of the locks was something that she could deal with far easier. Logic and methodical thought took over, blocking out the gnawing worry for Pinkie Pie alone with Leviathan.
If she allowed herself to worry after Pinkie, she wouldn’t be able to open the doors and rescue her. Naturally, in the course of things, Leviathan would be stopped in one manner or another.
Sirius and Polaris were not alone in coming to Twilight’s assistance. She pulled many stars from their places over the next half hour, asking each for advice. The Puzzlestar, the Rubixstar, the Gatestar, and the Wizardstar all provided little tidbits of advice that together filled the gaps in her own knowledge.
The Wizardstar was particularly useful, going on and on about different spell matrixes used in the Dark, Ancient, and even Lost eras. If she hadn’t been so pressed for time, Twilight could have listened to the star ramble on about this or that long forgotten method of spellwork for days, perhaps even weeks or months.
‘Yes, yes, those unicorns of the Lost era were something else! Very little understanding of runes at all, and nothing on how to put them together, just the basic manipulations of magic; yet they gave rise to all this. To Marelantis, and the greatest practitioners of magic ever seen. The leaps of understanding required! To have so much willfully destroyed, lost, or suppressed; it is a tragedy of the first order. Even our delightful cousin is so miserly with knowledge. Celestia has such a habit of hiding information away and hoarding it for herself.’ Tutting softly, the star then drifted back through Twilight’s mane and returned to the night. From there, Twilight heard, ‘When you desire, mistress, I will tell you all about the great sigils. Such feats of spellwork that could make the greatest artificers of this age blush with envy.’
Knowledge collected, Twilight took a deep breath and readied her final attempt to crack the door’s locks. Polaris took this opportunity to excuse herself and return to her proper place up in the heavens, her sisters needed her more than Twilight at that point. Twilight thanked the star for coming down to help before Polaris slipped through her mane back up into the night.
She’d just started to pull at her magic, directing it down her horn and towards the wards when Rainbow came up beside her, and asked, “What’s taking you Twilight?”
Startled, Twilight’s magic fizzled with a little hissing snap, one that echoed in the still air and down into her head. Wincing, she turned a little glare on her friend.
“I think I might have the answer now.” Rainbow nodded twice, and Twilight was about to restart her spell, but was stopped by the green pallor beneath Rainbow’s eyes. “Are you okay?”
“Me?” Rainbow touched a hoof to her chest and put on one of her cocksure grins. “Never better. Itching to go kick that snake’s flank, that’s all.”
“You look…”
“I’m fine,” Rainbow said, a little too much force put into her words, as if she had to convince herself more than Twilight. “Just a little lingering sea-sickness.”
Twilight shook her head and frowned deeper. “No, you really look terrible. Maybe you should go back to the ship, Rainbow. If Leviathan did something to you as well—”
“I said I was fine. Sheesh, you’re as bad as my dad, sometimes,” grunted Rainbow, the vehemence and acerbic tone of her words making Twilight step back. “And don’t you even think about sneaking off alone into that place, like Daring Do in the The Sorceresses Gambit. Not after we just went over this on the ship.”
About to counter her friend’s assertion, Twilight checked herself and then let out a little laugh at her own foolishness. Frown washing away, Twilight gave Rainbow a playful nudge and a small nod before she returned her focus to the door.
Once more she gathered her magic and went to work.
Unlocking the door, now that Twilight knew just what she was doing, was unsurprisingly easy. The ancient Marelantians had made it so knowledge was more a requirement than brute force. By applying magic in the right order to key points, the door’s wards began to unbind themselves. Mechanisms from within the door itself clattered and clanked, counterweights dropping to swing the heavy barriers open.
“Right, let’s do this,” Rainbow issued the words in one of her low growls, a challenging glare leveled on the growing gloom between the doors.
She took a step past Twilight, only to come to a stop with a shocked grunt. Entire body rigid and locked, Rainbow strained to move, eye twitching and teeth clamped hard with the effort.
“Rainbow?” Twilight reached towards her friend with a wing, “What’s the matter?”
“I can’t move,” Rainbow snapped in response. She strained harder, wings a-jitter against her sides as she fought to take a single step closer to the door.
For a half-second, Twilight wondered if she’d missed something when she’d countered the wards. A device or another layer to the palaces defences. Cautiously, she took a step past Rainbow, ready for whatever defensive magic was at work to take hold, but nothing happened. Nothing leapt up to hamper her movements, and even Sirius continued to bob along at her side.
“I’m sorry Dash, I made a mistake. There must have been something I missed.” Twilight cast a spell on Rainbow to identify whatever magic was gripping her, but the spell turned up nothing. No, not nothing. Two distinct, subtle traces of magic worked to bare her entrance.
The first, and far more powerful, spread across and through Rainbow’s every sinew. Where it originated was hidden, subsumed by the magic. Twilight almost began to panic and worry that it was something Leviathan had done to Rainbow on the ship, but the magic didn’t have the characteristic bite of something harmful. Narrowing her eyes, Twilight peered harder at the flow of the energy, and found that it was very slowly pulsing as it drew on Rainbow’s own magic, and those ambient within the air.
While slightly concerning, it did lead her to the real culprit of Rainbow’s inability to step closer to the doors. Spreading down from the magical centers at the base of her wings, Rainbow was being locked in place by spider-webs of a flashing, ruby red aether. Twilight didn’t need a second to identify the spell, or the cause. It was a very typical binding spell to hold a subject in place, similar to what many guardponies learned in the bigger towns where crimes were sometimes an issue. Far more telling, was that the magic was the same as the Element of Loyalty.
“Okay, this is going to be tricky, Dash.” Twilight licked her lips as she peered closer at the magic holding her friend in place. “It looks like the Elements don’t want—”
A deep, clanking boom interrupted Twilight, preceding a long groan as the doors to the palace began their slow, inexorable closing. Darting a look at the doors, Twilight reached out with her aura to hold them open, only for her telekinesis to slip off them. Changing tactics, Twilight instead went to pick up Rainbow and carry her inside, only for the Element’s magic to flare and drive back Twilight’s attempt.
Darting a look between her friend and the door a few times, her mind raced through a dozen different options and discarded them all. Had she time, Twilight was certain that a solution would present itself.
“I’m sorry!” Twilight said before darting through the doors, calling back as she did, “I’ll find Pinkie! I promise.”
There was only a moment to look back and see Rainbow staring after her with pained resignation. “Hey, You better kick that snake’s flank for me!”, Rainbow shouted just as Twilight slipped between the doors and they slammed shut, the hundred locks within spinning and clanking as the ward re-activated.
To Twilight’s relief, she wasn’t subsumed in darkness the moment the doors slammed shut at her tail. Streams of haphazard light bubbled through the windows and skylights, what little could find its way through the shroud of filth on the palace exterior. A quick look around gave no evidence of water ever having entered the palace.
Whether it was from some spell of the Marelantians, or Leviathan herself, the palace was almost as it had been the day the city had been destroyed, touched only by the slow withering breath of time. Broken mosaics, of such faded beauty that she felt her breath catch in her throat, greeted Twilight. Heraldic tapestries on silk so fine that the still shimmered as they settled from the breeze created by Twilight’s entrance hung down the five massive columns holding the roof aloft.
Warm golden light spilled from Sirius, giving everything a soft, wonderful glow as they slowly trotted the room. ‘Mistress, you should not go alone,’ Sirius said as she float before Twilight.
For her part, Twilight frowned and gave the star a death-glare.
“You, little lady, should have gone back home with your sisters. I can’t risk you, or any of the others. Not when Leviathan can steal you from me.” She made to grab the star, but, like in Canterlot before, Sirius darted away.
‘No. I am not a foal to be matronized or protected. I am your Firestar, and my sisters need us. I will not abandon them.’ Sirius burned brighter, turning a reddish-orange tinge that gave their surroundings a hellish, foreboding air.
Seeing that arguing was pointless, Twilight released a resigned grunt and then indicated that Sirius should follow.
Little was said between them as they went deeper into the palace. Ghosts hung thick in the air, every wall home to mosaics made of glittering gemstones held in brittle mortar and barren planters, sitting in little nooks set into the walls. Twilight could have admired the scenes for years, each done in a sweeping style she’d never before seen. There was a vague similarity to some of the Thuelesian artifacts Twilight had seen in museums. Those urns and wall fragments had been haunting, sadness lingering in the stone and history they only partially preserved. Even those seemed more like imitations of a memory pulled from a dream compared to the majesty emanating from the walls.
Then the mosaics began to move, their surfaces a fluid dance that stole Twilight’s breath away. Rooted to the spot, she twisted this way and that trying to catch everything at once. Each stylised play showed Marelantis’ history, or stories and legends of note. The lost city’s myths played before her eyes in a dazzling display, and she needed to see them all.
Glued to the scenes, her attention was held firm not just by the scholastic wonder they invoked—the history that could have been recovered!—but as with the palace doors, the spell-work involved was beyond current understanding.
If modern Equestrian enchantment techniques were akin to the crafting of gears in a clock, each spinning and working together to create a greater whole or effect, then the Marelantian enchantments were like the clock’s bells, each shaped and molded to create a single effect. The size, quality, and purity of those bells, however, were unlike anything Twilight had thought possible.
The nearest comparison Twilight could conjure was Canterlot Castle taken as an aggregate whole. If she discounted the haphazard, clunky nature of the castle’s myriad layers of wards and enchantments, and put aside that what she was seeing was a single, beautifully crafted enchantment, rather than a thousand working in concert. Or that she couldn’t begin to detect the usual base-frame-cap structuring.
So, nothing like the castle, in retrospect.
Twilight tilted her head and stared harder at the murals as they began to repeat for the second time. For a single enchantment, on its own, to create the murals defied conception.
“What the professors at Celestia’s School would do for five minutes examining this,” Twilight whispered with a little chuckle. “Or Rarity. She would adore this.”
It wasn’t a lack of complexity to Equestrian enchantments. Defensive wards, in particular, could be highly involved and intricate, with redundancies and false runes creating traps for would-be attackers. What was laid before her, however, was true artistry of a sort that defied all previous notions of what was possible with magic. Were she a musician, it would be like writing simple lullabies all her life, and then hearing for the first time a symphony.
In retrospect, the palace doors had been far closer to modern spellcasting, with hundreds of wards acting in concert. The runes in the doors were easy to spot, as were their positions within the enchantment’s structure. At the core were the base, from which the frame radiated, and then was capped at the extremities. Here, Twilight had trouble discerning one rune from the next, so that they blended together to form a single, monolithic rune of sorts.
“Which way did they go? Have we rediscovered their methods, linking spells together, or do those doors represent the old, and this their later works?” Twilight ran a hoof along the murals, and was surprised as a tingle worked its way through her frog and up her leg. Not an unpleasant tingle, and certainly nothing that struck her as dangerous, rather the sort of sensation Twilight got whenever she was about to open a book for the first time.
Responding to her touch, the murals changed, began to show mages in their towers, pouring over stacks of books and crafting new spells in their chambers or wandering through twisted woods while a dark figure flitted by overhead. Twilight’s eyes widened, a little gasp escaping her lips. Her own life swam into being, formed into sweeping and grand displays identical in style to those before. Already it had reached Discord sitting on a twisted throne with a glass of—presumably—chocolate milk in one claw and a scepter in the other. It moved onto the battle with the changelings, depicting the events with her central, but as a guiding figure above Cadence, Shining, and the battle, rather than as the defining player. From there, the mural took a shape that was Twilight alone, wreathed in her stars with her eyes closed and wings spread wide. Other ponies began to appear along the bottom edge, heads turned up and hooves clasped in prayers.
Then the mural restarted it’s displays from, Twilight conjectured, the very start of Marelantis’ history.
“It added me to it’s history?” Twilight looked down at her hoof in surprise. “That’s amazing! How is did it manage that? The variables, the sheer fact that it’s making stylized images of my past, and choosing how to display them… Is the mural alive? No, a single enchantment can’t gain semi-sentience regardless of how powerful it may be. There isn’t the number of enchantments in this area for their energies to bleed together enough for the area to gain a will of its own.”
Just to be certain, Twilight scanned the hallway again, coming up only with the illumination spells and the murals. Catching her lower lip between her teeth, she refocused on the murals.
“Unless that is the point of this spell’s structure. Could they have been making their spells actually aware? That’s impossible… Isn’t it? I wish I had time to really examine this place.”
It took considerable force of will, and a stern self-reminder about Pinkie and her stars being in danger, to pry herself away from the mural. Casting a last, whimsical look over her withers at the shimmering walls, Twilight followed the trail.
Mistress… Do you make a habit of talking to yourself? There was a note of amusement to Sirius’ question, the star floating along beside Twilight as they headed down the lit passage.
“Not often. Sometimes. Only when I’m stressed. Or… Okay, yes, I talk to myself.” Twilight sent the star a sour look.
The murals were not the only relics left in pristine condition by the long roll of the ages. Everything within the palace was amazingly well preserved, especially compared to the desolation on the surface.There wasn’t a speck of dust to be seen. Even the air was clean, carrying a slight scent of some ancient, extinct flower with a hint of incense. The finest army of maids could not have created such spotless perfection. Enchanted crystals embedded in the walls or overhead cast light without the smoke of torches. It all came together to make Twilight’s mane prickle.
Every now and then she came to an abrupt stop. Somewhere in the shadows there were eyes watching her and Sirius. Sometimes the sensation came from behind, other times it lingered ahead, hidden beyond shadows dancing at the edge of her star’s light. But there was no sound of hooves, paws, or feet that could belong to something following the pair.
Deeper and deeper into the palace, they marched, the pull of stolen stars drawing Twilight onward. Her pace hastened as she drew nearer, quickening until she was galloping breathlessly. They were so close, just around every bend, and when they weren’t, the pull was that much stronger that surely the next corner would reveal her stars.
A final bend brought them to a simple, round door made of balsa wood. Beyond it, Twilight was certain, were her stars, Leviathan, and the unknown alicorn. An old ward, faded and worn, was carved into the very center of the door. From its dull lustre and utter lack of aether either in the wood or the runes themselves, the ward had been broken a long, long time ago. Finding the cause of the break was easy enough, half the runes that made up the ward’s glyph were charred and scratched out by a single, long claw mark.
As with all the other spells Twilight had seen in the palace, the ward had once been impressive, and far different from anything Equestria was capable of producing. A shame it was damaged beyond repair or even basic study.
Turning her attention away from the broken ward, Twilight found a slight problem with the door’s design; there was no latch or lever with which to open it. Even the hinges were hidden or missing. Leaning forward to see if there was any way to open the door, Twilight was surprised to find a scent wafting through the wood.
“Basil?”
At the word, there was a click from beyond the door, and then it slid soundlessly out of Twilight’s path.
On the other side was Leviathan.
In her pony form.
Smiling.
And wearing an apron covered in red stains and the phrase ‘Envy is thin because it bites but never eats’ emblazoned across the front in bold, green letters.
“About time, I was beginning to wonder if my court hadn’t gotten to you. Better late I suppose.” The demon’s fangs glinted in the light splashing through the door. “Come in, come in. I do insist.”
Swallowing a retort, Twilight stepped through the door, wings slightly splayed for a fight and Sirius just above her head.
Leviathan’s inner sanctum. The number of beings who’d set hoof in the place were few, the amount that had left alive fewer still. In ages past, poets and philosophers had debated on the nature of Leviathan’s den. Whether it would be a place of despair and loathing, or a frightful palace of bone and eternal night. Some claimed it to be a sweeping plane of green fire and choking, poisonous vapors. Still others painted a sunken temple in the darkest reaches of the ocean.
It turned out to be a mess.
A complete and total pig sty.
Twilight’s mouth fell open as she stood just inside the open door, eyes wide, staring out at what she could only charitably describe as a dump. It was as if half the museum’s in Equestria had taken all their pieces and artifacts, and tossed them into a warehouse without any thought.
Bits of armour from a dozen eras, in three times as many styles, were scattered across the floor. Swords, spears, and shields strewn here and there, forming rolling heaps of blade and plate. Some were semi-organised stacks, but most were only in vague lumps. Stacks of faded newspapers or mounds of gemstones acted as walls between sections of the room. Statues and busts of ancient ponies, griffons, and dragons abounded in one alcove, while the next over was a semi-clear living area with three couches around a tea table, all overflowing with empty cartons of neighponese take-out and grease stained pizza boxes. Above the table, suspended by cords of rope, chain, and bits of coloured string, were painted skulls of everything from equines to a great dragon. Another dragon skull had been turned into a wardrobe, the doors impossible to open for the clothes piled up in front. Over in another area were crates of silks enough to make a hundred dresses. One side of the chamber—Twilight was fairly certain at one time the room had been circular in nature from the curve of the walls as they met on the ceiling to form a dome—stood an entire unicorn galley from the pre-classical period, complete with oars and masts knocked down and placed across the deck.
The south side of the room was more open, pathways through the junk leading to different areas, or perhaps ‘rooms’. Screens were erected as dividers between a couple beds, another open space holding an ornate Stones board, complete with pieces arrayed as if in the middle of a game. The final area was home to a kitchenette and a table formed of a flattened oak stump.
It was from the kitchen that the smell of basil originated, a large pot of some bubbling sauce, spitting above an open flame on a four hundred year old stove.
Trotting briskly along the aisle, Leviathan hurried to the stove.
“Dinner should not be long. You do like spicy Roamen, yes? It’s about all I know how to cook. Faust tried teaching me some classical Thuelesian dishes a few centuries back. I found her use of poison toad extract a little cheeky though. Oh, here I am babbling away! Can I offer you anything?” Leviathan glanced over her wings to where Twilight stood dumbfounded just inside the room. “I have wine, brandy, gin, whisky, rum, and several different ciders,” the ancient demon queen, one of the seven most powerful evils in the cosmos, looked around her home at a loss, “… somewhere…”
Twilight found words hard to come by, her mouth working silently.
Of all the scenarios Twilight might have anticipated, this… none of it… she didn’t…
“W-What is going on?” Twilight shouted after a full minute of gaping at the complete disarray surrounding her.
“I don’t understand the question,” Leviathan replied with a click of her tongue. “I know it’s a little late for dinner, but you were rather slow getting past the outer door, then you spent ages staring at the murals or lost in the upper-levels…”
“No!” Twilight stamped a hoof, causing a small rockslide in a nearby gem pile. “What I mean is… aren’t we supposed to fight or something? That’s how this has always gone before!”
“Oh, there will be time for all that later.” A dismissive wing waved away Twilight’s question. “All the pieces aren’t in place yet. No, the monologuing and ‘You’ll never get away with this!’ and ‘Soon, my vengeance will be complete!’ and the rest of that nonsense will come later, don’t worry. Plenty of time to get to know each other before you try to rip out my throat, I think.”
Leviathan hummed as she stirred the sauce and poured some noodles into another pot.
Unsure what else to do—Twilight didn’t think that she could just attack Leviathan… could she?—she went to one of the chairs at the table. “Where is Pinkie?” she asked as she sat down.
“Around. I believe she used one of my portals to get some fresh coriander and cake for dessert.”
Twilight had to rub her head, an ache starting to form just behind her ears.
“You mean she’s free? You let her go?”
Leviathan chortled as she left the stove to join Twilight at the table. “Yes. She’s served her purpose… mostly. Tomorrow I’ll hold her ransom while we have our little show down. Bisquit?”
A plate of butter cookies and chocolate covered crackers were presented to Twilight. After staring at the plate for a bit, she took a stick of shortbread. She did not eat it, rather inspected it closer while she groaned, “I am so confused right now. I should just… I don’t know…”
“Attack me?” Leviathan supplied. “But, what have I done to deserve such treatment?!” She pressed a hoof in faux-shock to her chest.
Twilight glared at the mocking tone in Leviathan’s laugh. “Oh, I don’t know; kidnapped one of my best friends? Stole three stars? Hurt my guards? Threatened everypony?”
Her laugh growing louder, more natural, Leviathan snatched up a couple crackers, and around them said, “Pah, a typical Monday.”
‘You stay true to your principles, mistress,’ Sirius seemed to shrug, and hover closer to Twilight’s horn. ‘This is all certainly part of her game. But if you just attacked her you would regret it, no matter the outcome. No, you have to make certain to give your enemies every chance to repent and correct their ways. That is just who you are.’
Sirius was correct. For all Leviathan had already done, it wasn’t within Twilight to attack without cause and evidence that such action was her last remaining recourse. “Traitor,” Twilight huffed, Sirius taking a hurt, blue colour in response. “So, what now? You seem to have this all planned out.”
“I told you—”
“I’mmmm back!” Boxes perched on her head, Pinkie popped up with her signature grin behind Leviathan. “I wasn’t sure if you wanted the chocolate double glazed fritters, or double chocolate glazed fritters; so I got both! And the lemon filled maragnes, some strawberry strudels, a coconut pie, tiramisu, and, of course, a Black Forest cake. Also cream puffs, Nanaimo bars, and some peanut butter crumble.”
With each name Pinkie spread the corresponding desert out on the table until it was heaped higher than Twilight’s horn with sugary treats. No sooner was she done emptying her seemingly bottomless box then Pinkie was in the kitchen stirring the pot of simmering sauce, sprinkling the coriander in with a happy swish of her tail.
Twilight spent the time waiting for dinner studiously not looking at Leviathan and instead focused on Pinkie. There was something off about her friend, like Pinkie’s smile was just ever so slightly forced, and the skip in her step was hesitant. When Pinkie thought Twilight wasn’t looking the veneer would slip a little, and she’d dart a furtive glance upwards and catch her lower lip between her teeth.
“What did you do to Pinkie?” Twilight demanded as the food—a wonderful smelling pasta dish with a thick sauce liberally spread atop—was served.
“Silly, she didn’t do anything to me,” Pinkie laughed, but the sound was fake. Her ears drooped a little on seeing the suspicious look Twilight gave her. “I’m just worried about a whole lot of ponies.”
“Of course you are; you have a good heart.” Leviathan reached over and patted Pinkie on the shoulders before demanding, “Pass me the salt, Twilight. But you shouldn’t worry so much Pinkamena. You mortals were created to die. It’s all a matter of the ‘how’ and ‘when’.”
All thought of conversation died with this, and the meal grew sullen and miserable. Leviathan did not seem to notice, the way she happily told one sided stories of this and that. Twilight tuned Leviathan out and instead focused on locating her stars. If she retrieved them, she could teleport herself and Pinkie back to the ship.
Then what though? Leviathan would just chase them and more ponies would be put in danger.
Grumbling to herself, Twilight pushed a tomato around her plate.
Even if she didn’t return to the Bellerophon, that was the most likely place for Leviathan to look, and Rainbow was with the ship.
Back and forth, around and around, Twilight went with her thoughts, never able to find a decisive conclusion to her problem. Leviathan was the villain. The villain needed to be stopped, and/or reformed. The villain wasn’t acting especially villainous. She was even being accommodating and, Twilight hated to admit it, if it wasn’t for taking Pinkie and her stars, she’d have been enjoying the novelty of the evening. Even the conversation would have been… entertaining. Leviathan was putting out a fine flow of divergent topics, giving anecdotes from prehistory, various adventures, and encounters with famous individuals. Even the jokes weren’t terrible, never realizing—or choosing to ignore—the morose cloud hanging over the table.
It rankled Twilight deeply.
“Well, this has been a delightful reprieve, don’t you agree?” Leviathan dabbed at her lips with an embroidered silk hoofkerchief after Pinkie cleared away the deserts. “I had a bed prepared for you, since we have a big day ahead of us tomorrow, and you’ll want to be well rested for what is coming.”
“And what is coming?”
“Just a little game.”
The grin Leviathan wore was one that could only be called enthusiastically frightening. “This is going to be so much fun! You’ll see, Twilight Abigail Sparkle Tuilerya, Goddess of Stars and Wishes, the Third Shepherd, Princess of the Taiga, Countess of the Everfree; Oh, saying your titles gives me tingles. Perhaps I’ve found a worthy opponent again.”
For the first time in forever, sleep did not come easily to Twilight.
It was an understandable state, what with the mounting worries for her friends, Leviathan’s plans, the fuzzy murmurs she could only just make out from her stars, Pinkie’s regression in sullen, forced happiness. Twilight couldn’t shake the sense that she should have confronted Leviathan at once and finished the fight.
At the same time, she couldn’t shake the final moments of dinner, and the happiness that had been flitting like a lost, uncertain puppy behind Leviathan’s big, emerald eyes.
A quick check of her internal chronometer told her that it was only a few minutes until dawn. She hoped Polaris would be able to wrangle the stars into sleep without her. Whatever the spells or materials worked throughout the palace, they did a far too effective job dulling her connection to her stars.
The feeling was odd, to say the least, and she squirmed some more beneath the centuries old and mildew covered quilt. Calming herself, she detached spirit from body and attempted to float up to the heavens. She received a nasty shock on reaching the domed ceiling, sparks shooting out where she’d tried to pass through the stone. From somewhere far off through the clutter Twilight heard Leviathan snort in her sleep, followed by a heavy thud as she presumably rolled out of bed.
Cringing, Twilight hovered slowly back to her body, ludicrously afraid to wake the demon queen.
Fed up with waiting, and since there were no explicit rules saying she had to stay in bed when in the lair of a colossal demonic serpent that ate islands, she pushed herself out of bed. In fact, it seemed rather stupid not to do some poking around while she had the opportunity. Who knew what she could find that might tip the balance in her favour.
A yawn from behind Twilight’s ear reminded her of Sirius. She didn’t debate whether to leave the star behind or not; and instead moved her deeper into her mane. There Sirius was as safe as could possibly be on the disc.
First on Twilight’s list of mysteries to solve was to find other alicorn. She’d grown almost certain that Celestia’s guess that it was Faust to be correct. A small part of her held out, however, wondering if she wasn’t being misled. It wasn’t impossible Leviathan had captured one of Tyr’s relatives from Gaea. Who, however, Twilight could not decide. To the best of her knowledge there was one somewhere in the east, another could have been anywhere on the disc, and then there were the remaining shades. A shiver worked its way up Twilight’s back at the memory of the thing that had attacked her back in Ponyville.
She tried not to dwell on the cold touch and dread instilled during that encounter. The shade had tried to leach magic from her, to take her stars. To take them… back?
Twilight pinched her brow at the fleeting thought and turned down into a section filled with ancient scrolls and rolled up tapestries. At the far end a set of narrow steps ascended to a hole cut into the side of the galley.
“Take them back… She can’t take them back, they’re mine. They’ve always been mine.” Twilight huffed to herself as she slipped slowly into the galley, boards groaning underhoof.
Nopony could separate her stars from her. Even the ones Leviathan had stolen weren’t truly gone, just caged. Twilight could still feel them, along with hundreds of others that were not in the heavens but on the disc.
Slowing, she picked her way through the galley, past where earth ponies would have been made to row in ages past. The benches on which they sat were now home to bins of yarn, knitting needles, and rolled up carpets, all labeled and categorized by size, colour, and material. She hardly made note of the way everything had been ordered and neatly placed in stark contrast to the chaos outside the ship.
Yes, there were others. Many others. With the stars in the heavens dulled, Twilight could detect those that had fallen with something… not exactly clarity, but notice them among the other stars. She’d been aware for some time that stars fell, from time to time. It was how she was supposed to grant wishes, afterall. Still, being able to sense the fallen stars came as a bit of a surprise.
Just to be certain she stopped her wandering, closed her eyes and sorted through the thousands of connections she possessed. Dimmed by the palace wards, it was easy to sort through the ‘proper’ stars and find the connections that were damaged or faded.
Touching a cord gave her a muted song, and in that song knowledge of every aspect the star. Everything was laid bare to Twilight, who she’d been, her hopes, dreams, and fears, even her memories. The first she touched, because it was a thorny strand of cracked obsidian glass, belonged to a star named Algol. Cruelty was found in equal measure with honour, and a shattered heart. Algol was a star that fell because she’d fallen in love, but had been rejected. Worse, betrayed. Captured and sold as a slave, broken and made to wage war on ponies.
Twilight withdrew from the connection, her thoughts numb and a part of her crawling like she’d been reading somepony else's journal. Centuries of memories, or the impressions of memories, lay waiting within the fractured strand. The final one Twilight had sensed, just as she broke the touch, was of Algol’s final moments, and the relief the star had felt to at last descend into oblivion and to know nothingness.
Trying to shake of the melancholy that threatened to prowl at the edges of her mind after touching the bitterness of Algol’s memories, Twilight reached out for the closest, most lively strand available.
She expected good memories, warmth and joy. With the vibrancy of the strand, and given the damage to the first one she’d touched, it seemed a logical conclusion.
Instead Twilight was struck by cold, and fear, and pain. Her body ached from running, and bruises formed along her flanks and shoulders where she’d been hit by… something. A big something that was stalking her and…
A stab of worry pierced Twilight to the quick.
Unlike Algol, this star was still alive, somewhere, and in danger. She was running through a wood or forest. There was a filly next to her; dark silvery-grey, with a two toned mane of white and black. In the distance an old castle appeared like a hulking monster out of the gloom. She didn’t slow, altering direction at once, heading towards the castle.
Scrunching her eyes up more, Twilight probed the connection. She could see her own magic in the cord, but also magic that was not her own. Unlike with the stars, there was no doubt that it was foreign in nature. None of the usual ‘hers and not-hers’ at the same time.
She needed the star’s name. Twilight could sense it there, hovering just in front of her nose, waiting to be acknowledged. A little push was all it took.
“Trixie?” Twilight yelped, losing her grasp on the cord, eyes flung open, and stumbled backwards into the galley’s main cabin.
There was no time to ponder why she had a connection binding her to her one-time sort-of-nemesis. Nor why magic seemed to be flowing along it from her towards Trixie. She wished she could analyze why she was able to get Trixie’s thoughts, and even what she was seeing and hearing.
Unfortunately, Twilight had found the missing alicorn, and she was distracted from pursuing the issue any further. In a deep sleep, Faust laid on a circular bed, rust red mane draped casually down her neck and wings, head resting on silk pillows. A few strands of light ghosted between threadbare curtains onto her stretched out wings, and played across her pointed chin. Twilight had found Faust, her aunt, and she was currently being used as a pillow by a sprawled out Leviathan.
Twilight didn’t know whether to beat a hasty retreat or to shout and wake the pair. Her entire being recoiled at the thought of the venerated Namegiver sharing a bed with Leviathan.
Another part of her squirmed, overcome with a sense of intruding in a place she should not have gone. The room had a warm, earthy sense about it. Beside the bed stood a ponyquin with a dress laid out on it. From the high, opal ruff to the rich red silk fold and scroll casing hanging over the left side, Twilight guessed it to have been from the pre-classical period. It was also a dress favoured among artist depicting Faust during her last few years among ponykind. Further along stood boxes of jewelry, vials of perfume, and a partially open wardrobe through which Twilight spotted a dressing gown on a hanger. Even Faust’s peytral was present, and everypony knew she’d stopped wearing it following the collapse of Thuelesia.
That tiny, decent part of herself was silenced by a surge of ire as her eyes fell on a birdcage sitting in a corner. Within the cage, their lights dim and flickering, hung her stolen stars.
Twilight took a hurried step towards her stars. Beneath her the floorboards creaked, and Leviathan’s eyes shot open.
“What are you doing?” The demand was spoken in a menacing softness, one heightened by Leviathan slowly pushing herself up and over Faust in a protective stance. Descending from the bed, Leviathan stretched out her wings to form a barrier between Twilight and Faust. “Don’t you have any common decency? Walking into another being’s room like you own the place. If I didn’t have plans for today, I’d rip out your throat for this invasion of privacy.”
“Me? I want my stars back, and I want to know why Faust is here!” Twilight countered, her indignation overcoming her embarrassment. The limits of her patience well past breaking, Twilight pulled together the beginning of a spell. No sooner had the first two ruins been joined than the burgeoning matrix cracked, the pieces tumbling in motes from the tip of her horn.
A pleased smirk pinched the corners of Leviathan’s eyes as Twilight took a hesitant step backwards, her mind fumbling over what had just happened. “I’m surprised you’re just trying a spell now,” Leviathan snorted, picking up the cage with Twilight’s stars and moving them next to the bed. “Before you ask; no, I have not done anything to your magic. It is merely an effect of the design of my home. Within this place magic answers to me alone.”
Twilight set her withers and swallowed the retorts that leapt to her tongue to counter Leviathan’s boast. Mind racing towards possible ways arround whatever was impacting her spellcasting, she indicated the bed with a sharp glare. “Has she been in league with you all these years?”
Surprise mingled with disdain flashed across Leviathan’s face, twisting her lips up into a cruel sneer.
“Ha! In league? Faust? Are you so foolish?” Stamping a hoof, Leviathan made the galley tremble with her foul humour. Her lips twitched into a smile, the same one she’d worn following dinner. “I see no sense in hiding it now. Yes, she is ‘in league’ with me, though not in the manner you think.”
“Don’t presume to know what I’m thinking,” Twilight growled back, falling into an aggressive stance.
“And don’t presume that I am the villain!” Leviathan countered in a bellow, rattling the galley. “You aethyr, gods, alicorns—whatever you call yourselves this century—you always make the rest of us out as the bad ones who ruined the Far Realms. The quus with their primordial chaos. The archons with their self-righteous, domineering benevolence. And you lot, trying to make everything fit neatly into your little boxes. Say what you will about demon-kind; we didn’t have to help you with the quus, but we did. It was the alicorns who committed the first betrayal. The beings of perfect order betrayed those of the egoism. The irony was not lost on us the eons we rotted beneath Tartarus.
“I am Envy, Twilight Sparkle, and I am not the villain.”
Leviathan began to pace as her rant grew in volume. Her wings continually snapped in and out, her teeth clacked with every few words, and her tail sliced the air with enough force to crack like a whip at each turn. Behind the angry demon, Faust didn’t so much as stir.
“I’ve tried to be amenable. To be friendly. I could have killed all those mortals on the ship. I could kill them still. Some of them have already died this night, others this moment, and more will this day. But, such is the price for ignoring the very strong warning posted right in front of their noses. Do you blame the wolf for attacking when you stumble into it’s lair and stomp around next to her pups?”
“What do you mean, ‘have died’?” Twilight asked in a breathless rush, her heart twisting with worry for Rainbow and the others. “What have you done?”
Ceasing her pacing, Leviathan let out a snort. “Me? Nothing, except allow it to happen.” Waving a hoof up towards the roof, she said, “You did that when you improperly opened the doors and woke the city’s defenders. The ancient Marelantians jealously guard their secrets even now. Not that they are their secrets to keep, everything they learned gleaned from my brothers, sister, and I. They were to be the means for our escape, but the others are too narrow minded. If they are allowed freedom whole worlds will burn.”
Panic rising, Twilight started for the door, only to be called to stop.
“Return to them now, and I will keep all I have taken,” Leviathan said spoke with a playful bounce, one that maintained only a hint of the anger she’d radiated moments before. “Your three stars and Pinkie will be forfeit. It is a little early for the game to start, but since you are so eager, who am I to deny?” Coming up to Twilight, she laid a wing over her withers, and in a voice like silk dipped in an adder’s venom, asked, “Tell me, Twilight, what do you possess that I should envy?”
She wanted to kick Leviathan, or rush to her friends’ aid. Yet, a portion of her said that the best way to help was to deal with Leviathan civilly. If it meant playing along for a little while, then so be it.
Twilight considered the question only a few moments. Her first guess was her stars. Leviathan had stolen three and kept them caged. But, Leviathan’s interest in them seemed only as tools to draw Twilight into her lair. The demon hardly acknowledged Sirius’ presence, and by rights she should covet the Firestar above the others as it was the most powerful Twilight possessed.
No, the answer wasn’t something physical in nature.
“My friends,” Twilight finally decided. “You envy my friendships.”
Leviathan returned Twilight’s answer with a flat stare and broke away to march up to the bed with Faust.
Spinning back towards Twilight, she slashed the air with a wing and a snort. “Really? That is your answer? ‘Friendship’? Friendship is nothing. A mere shadow. I may have given you some credence if you’d said ‘Love’. Now, there is a powerful force! But friendship? Pah. It is a mere transitory state, fleeting and easily cast aside, smothered, or crushed.”
“Oh, really?” Twilight put on her best ‘I have you’ smile. “What of the friendships I have with Pinkie, Rainbow, and the others? What of the Elements of Harmony? Our friendship has saved Eque—”
“You poor, naive thing.” Leviathan cut Twilight off with a pronounced sigh, hoof lifted up to rub the bridge of her muzzle. “What you have with them is not friendship.”
“Of course it is friendship!”
“It is not. They are your sisters. Not by blood, but by choice, and that makes it all a more potent love.”
“But… Friendship is Magic!”
“If I ever encounter the mare that come up with that insipid phrase I am going to eat her…” Leviathan growled to herself. “No, Love is Magic, friendship is merely a transitional familiarity bred through interaction and shared interests. But friends can be discarded. They fade and wither and the hole left behind will be filled by new friends. But those you love? Those that transcend beyond mere friendship? Long after they are gone you will lay awake and stare up at your stars and remember them. Their betrayals will cut deepest, and their smiles will be the most heartening.”
“You’re being pedantic about terminology now.”
Again came Leviathan’s flat stare.
“And you’re one to talk about being pedantic with terms, Miss ‘I am a scientist’.” Leviathan flopped down onto a cushion next to the sleeping form of Faust. “There is a reason why the translation of the old knightly orders is ‘sisterhood’ rather than ‘friends’ or ‘pals’ or something similar. Ask Cadence when you return to Canterlot, she’ll confirm that you love your so-called friends.”
With the gentlest caress of her hoof, Leviathan brushed back Faust’s mane so as to allow her to lay a kiss upon the sleeping goddess’ brow. Twilight cringed, and it took all her remaining control not to leap forward. Every fibre of her being screamed against the sight before her.
“Once, before the first grains fell within the hourglass of time, when all was as dreams and thought was the brush that painted reality, I had found a sister in the most unlikely of places. Side by side we brought war to the greatest of foes, and I have never been happier nor more complete than in that moment. As all things before the birth of the Second Realm, it lasted only the sweetest instant, and for a hundred eternities.”
Leviathan looked up from Faust, and Twilight was shocked to see tears forming poisoned green shards upon her cheek.
“She was wrenched from me, and then all my kind were betrayed by the alicorns. Your mother stole Faust, casting them both to the void rather than have her be sullied further by our love. For a time uncounted I waited, plotting within the prison your kind constructed for mine. Through the cracks I sent agents, until they came upon this pitiful world, and I knew the time of my reunion with Faust was at last come. And when I found her, when I tore my way from Tartarus and rose up in all my glory before her; I found she had forgotten me. She had cast aside all that she’d been and knew, taken a frail, mortal shell, leaving her grandeur faded and sullied.”
A long, weary sigh rolled from the demon before she said in resignation, “I will not allow you to steal her from me as your mother has done once already, just as you can not leave her here with me.” Pushing herself upwards, Leviathan used a wing to guide Twilight towards the living area. At the same time she picked up the cage with Twilight’s stars, holding them on her far side as she walked. “Come, I have something to show you, something you’ll find rather interesting I think. The time has arrived to raise the curtains on our little game.”
The moved in silence, Twilight debating what would happen if she tried to fire a spell at Leviathan. On entering the main living space, magic lit along the demon’s horns in sickly flames that were like talons being dragged down Twilight’s own senses. Before them appeared four shimmering, silver disc, their faces rippling like the surface of a disturbed pond.
As each began to calm they gained clarity, opening windows onto distant scenes.
The leftern most showed Rainbow, mane bedraggled with sweat and blood, her posture one of profound weariness and exhaustion. She took long, laboured breaths and, with a hoof, wiped at her eyes.
On the next window was a wooded area, and from the gnarled trees, clinging fog, and mountains in the distance just being lit by the coming dawn, it had to be the Everfree. Rarity was there, stumbling back, a crevice behind her. Silent words were spoken to somepony, or something. A pained expression twisted her friend’s face, Rarity rocking from side to side and giving her head a determined shake.
Between this window and the last was an image Twilight knew well, as it was the grounds of Sparkle Manor. She could see her entire family, old and new, along with a few other ponies. Velvet stood with princesses Celestia, Luna, and Cadence, as well as Revered Speaker Blessed Harmony. Arrayed around the five were Twilight’s foster sisters and brothers, the manor’s servants, the princesses’ guards, several Sisters of Names, and Iridia. All of the assembled ponies stood around Tyr, the filly placed at the heart of what looked like a casting array.
Another grim sight awaited Twilight on the final window, this one showing her Trixie and the dark silver filly she’d seen just before finding Faust. They were in the castle now, both darting looks into the shadows. It was from one such shadow that a face emerged that Twilight could not identify. A white halla, Twilight assumed from the antlers and snippets she’d read of the race. Trixie and the filly relaxed on seeing the halla, then all three jumped at something not shown, the adults both calling on their magic.
She knew of the spell, learning of it from one of her mother’s diaries. A Seer’s Window; but that could not be right. The spell was meant to only be able to peer into the caster’s own memories. These were clearly showing events as they were happening.
“So, who shall it be first?” Leviathan purred from her spot. “The friends and faithful you lead into danger? Perhaps those you abandoned in Ponyville? Or the family who raised you, guided you into becoming the noble mare who thinks nothing of challenging gods and demons? Or maybe the trickster?”
“What are you going on about?” Twilight demanded, turning her back on the windows with a stamp of her hoof that sent cascades of jewels and flotsam tumbling from the piles of junk.
“Why, within which mirror will somepony important to you die first, of course.” Before Twilight could react, Leviathan continued in her playfully threatening tone. “Here is the game; in each ponies dear to you are in mortal peril. You are free to go racing off to help any you so chose. Do so, however, and I will keep one of the things I have taken from you. Your stars, Pinkie, so on and so forth.” Leviathan waited long enough for the cold dread of her threat to mingle with a burning hatred in the pit of Twilight stomach. “For each that runs its course without your leaving, I will gladly return one of the things I took. Should you stay for them all, why, I’ll even apologize for my wicked ways and promise not to bother you, those you love, or any pony for that matter for… say… a century.
“So, is it a deal?”