//------------------------------// // Heartspire Pt 2 // Story: Exploring the Lost Cities // by Nekiyha //------------------------------// The next morning, Marjoram awoke to find himself bathed in the early morning light that streamed through the entrance. Since he was in the path of the archways, Marjoram could easily see the rising sun in the East, back the way they came. Marjoram’s heart felt oddly heavy with the knowledge that the sunlight he was annoyed by was the only natural light to grace the halls of the Heartspire. Need to ask Spike if he’ll send Celestia a note saying we made it okay. Marjoram stood up on aching limbs, stiff and sore. He rummaged in the wagon and pulled out the camera Celestia had loaned them for the trip. It was a new type of camera, unlike the ones mostly used in the daily life of Equestrians. This camera didn’t require powder to create a flash, nor did it have a thirty second exposure period. It was new, exciting, and Marjoram couldn’t wait to try it out on the very thing he’d been sent to document: the tower and the expedition. Marjoram knew how to work the camera, since everypony had taken turns taking pictures of the tower as they neared its base. Working silently, and quickly, Marjoram captured a few shots of the wagon and its position related to the door. Then pictures of the arches, the fields inside, the flagstones, and anything else that caught his eye. Once Marjoram was relatively awake, he levitated himself up to the lowest of the globes and took several pictures. Then he took pictures-from almost three meters away-of an active one. Even that far away, Marjoram could feel the heat radiating off of the ancient ball of light. By the time Marjoram made it back down, Twilight and Kafir were already awake and making breakfast over a magical fire that left no residue. Which was a spell that Twilight had learned, a fire that used no fuel, and thus left nothing behind. “Spike thinking about waking up soon?” Marjoram asked. “Maybe. He’s pretty knocked out though. Should we wait for him to get up before moving on?” “We should wake him,” Kafir said, stirring the hearty oatmeal, “He’ll need to eat something.” Marjoram nodded in agreement, “We should wake him. He should be as awake as the rest of us when we reach the next level. We don’t want him to miss out.” “Fair enough,” Twilight moved to where Spike snored, beginning the ritual of waking the baby dragon up. Marjoram stared into the pot of oatmeal, “What do we have left for meals?” “Oatmeal, hay, grain, some alfalfa, dried flowers, some different jewels and rocks for Spike. We still have plenty of water, and there should be water inside so I think we’ll be okay for supplies.” “That’s good. When Spike gets up, we need a plan. We can’t stop in every residence we see, not if this tower is as large as it seems to be.” “No. We shouldn’t. We should definitely check out the highest residences, and probably the lowest too. We should at least check out the main hall of anywhere else we stay the night. After that, I have no idea.” Marjoram smirked as Spike burrowed deeper into his basket, “I don’t know if it’s because he’s a dragon, or if it’s because he’s young, or what, but he sleeps a lot. He hates to be woken up, it’s kinda funny sometimes. Watching Twilight try to get him up.” “Does he do that with you?” “Oh Creators, no. I enjoy watching Twilight struggle, it never takes me this long to get him up at all.” “What do you do?” Kafir’s curiosity was clearly peaked. Marjoram smiled his crooked smile, then cleared his throat, “Oh Spike, isn’t it a shame that I have to throw out these gem scraps from my experiments!?” Spike shot out of his basket quicker than Kafir had ever thought possible. Spike was wide-eyes, almost in a panic. When his green eyes surveyed the scene, Spike let out a growling whine in the back of his throat. “Again?” “You weren’t getting up. Sorry, Spike. There’s oatmeal if you want it. We can add turquoise or granite or something into yours if you want.” Spike sighed, staring longingly at his basket, “I’m doomed to be awake now, aren’t I?” “Pretty much,” Marjoram said, moving to the wagon so he could find some instant coffee. Spike sat near the still steaming pot of oatmeal, “Is it almost done?” “They’re done. Just need the bowls. Want to set them near me so I can serve?” Spike slid the wooden bowls over to Kafir, who lined them up and filled them with the oatmeal. Marjoram came back with a few cups filled with coffee, drinking one already, “Not the best coffee, but better than nothing.” Spike refused a cup, no matter how tired he still felt. Breakfast was soon over, the dishes cleaned, and everything else put away. Kafir hooked himself back into the harness, while Twilight, Marjoram, and Spike made themselves comfortable on the wagon. They made their way to the ramp that spiraled up and around the ruined gardens, slowly leading them to the greater ruins above them. *_*_*_*_*_*_* They reached the lowest residences before nighttime would have reached the desert sands outside the tower. The group could have made the trip in better time, but they had to take Marjoram's physical limitations (and Spike’s; he was just a baby dragon after all), as well as the fact that Kafir was an Earth Pony. The Heartspire had been designed for those strong in magic; teleportation, gravity reversing spells, and the like were how many occupants crossed long distances. In fact, it had been a game among generations of fillies and colts to see how far they could travel up (or down) the spire before becoming physically exhausted. The ancient journals of the few unicorns who had decided to leave the Heartspire had told that. The houses spread before the group weren’t going to be the largest residences they were bound to see, they were certainly more lavish than what anypony was used to. There was a central round plaza that held a beautiful fountain in its center. What would have likely been a flood of water was slowed to a little more than a trickle: the fountain still worked, but barely. From the plaza, somepony could peer into the different residences’ courtyards through the archways that marked their entrance. Each abode and their grounds were cordoned off by stone walls,archways marked the entrance into the courtyards, the houses offered the first doors they had seen, marking the entrance into private dwellings. There were no jewels this time, the tops of the arches were gilded patterns of gold. “How many do you see?” Spike asked, trying to peer through the gloom outside of their magical lights. “Ten, I think,” Marjoram replied, squinting at the darkness, “Scratch that, make it twelve. It’s hard to see.” “How do we pick one to explore?” Twilight said, not really noticing she’d voiced her thoughts aloud. “Roll a twelve sided die?” Kafir suggested, “Coins aren’t going to work.” “We don’t have any dice,” Twilight returned irritably, “Maybe we should have brought some.” “Pick a number between one and twelve,” Marjoram said. “Five,” Said Spike. “Twelve,” Said Kafir. “Two,” Said Twilight. Marjoram sighed, “I was talking to one of you.” “Well. Is there only residences here? Or other buildings? Like public ones?” Kafir asked, “That would help. I’d suggest public locations, like libraries and temples, first. Then we can explore a house or two.” “Um. I think most of these are residences,” Marjoram replied, “Obviously I could be wrong. It would help infinitely if we could see.” “Too bad we can’t bring one of those globe things with us,” Kafir agreed. “Well, according to the book, the only ponies who have come here found just residences. Maybe they had different views of personal space and privacy. Like, your libraries and stuff are open to your neighbours or something.” “Maybe. So what, pick a direction and go for it?” “Sounds good to me,” Kafir began to unhook himself from the wagon, “I’ll leave this here. We can bring it to the one we’re going to sleep in...” “What?” Marjoram asked, turning around to see where Kafir’s gaze was drawn. Kafir was staring at what would be considered a large mansion in Canterlot. The archway was the same as the others, but the same thing that drew Kafir’s eye drew Marjoram’s: the lack of a front door. This residence, or potentially not a residence, just had an archway built into the wall of the home, not just an archway into courtyard. “Well. That looks promising.” “Indeed.” “So, what are we bringing with us,” Twilight asked, climbing into the back of the wagon. “Lanterns, saddlebags, canteens. Maybe a snack.” “We’re not going to be in there for that long, are we?” “Can’t hurt. Just in case we get lost or something.” “The place is big enough that’s certainly a possibility,” Twilight acquiesced, “And we don’t know if these places are interconnected behind these outer walls. Why do you think they built them if they were never worried about invasions? I haven’t seen any type of door mechanisms or anything similar near the main entrance. No magical means of creating doors either, and you’d need magical foci to tie that much mana into doing one thing.” Marjoram shrugged, “Maybe a mockery of other civilizations: a statement. They didn’t need the walls for necessity or security. They wanted to build them, for the happiness and joy such things would bring them and their descendants.” Twilight nodded, “I guess so.” “You done with the saddle bags yet?” Kafir asked, yanking the back covering of the wagon open with his teeth, “We’re on a schedule, remember?” “I know! I just want to make sure we have everything,” Twilight said as she floated the bags over to everypony, “Here.” Spike took his own bag, slinging the straps over his shoulders. He stared up at the gold-topped archway, eyes shining with excitement, “Can we go in?” “Yes. Remember, everypony stick together. We don’t want to get lost, and we certainly don’t want to run into anything that might have taken up residence here. By all accounts, nothing should be here, but we should err on the side of caution.” “No kidding,” Kafir muttered dryly, making sure his sword was strapped on tightly. “Keep an eye out for scrolls, weapons, books, and jewelry. We know a lot about their pottery and pot making, but we should keep an eye out for things that we don’t have much on yet. And furniture, I’m sure there’ll be somepony in Canterlot who wants pictures of the chairs.” Twilight nodded sharply, hopping off the back of the wagon, “Are we ready to go?” Three nods of affirmation answered Twilight’s question. In near perfect synchronization, the four stepped past the archway, and began to cross the courtyard. It was made of stone, and was bereft of any benches or personal touches that could have identified the building. The archway that was the doorway into the large building was gilded in silver rather than gold. Marjoram’s ball of light flew through the archway first, and waited for everypony to enter, hovering at the highest point in the ceiling. They were met with a circular room, with three doors. Actual doors, rather than archways. The doors were still intact, but they were clearly almost rotting off their hinges. Thankfully, they were all open so nopony had to touch them. One door was straight ahead, and the other two on either side. “So, where to?” “Straight ahead first?” “It looks like it would be the central chamber. We should look at everything else first.” “Why?” “Because we don’t know what this building was for. It could have been a library, but it also could have been a lab or something,” Kafir reasoned. Twilight rolled her eyes. She pointed a hoof at a symbol above the doorframe at the first piece of iconography that they had seen, “That is an ancient symbol that we still use today in the Canterlot palace. It is the symbol we use for ‘library’.” “We don’t know if they used the same symbol-Spike, what are you doing?!” Spike, while Marjoram was examining the door and Twilight and Kafir had been arguing, had crept up to the doorway, and entered the room. He stood frozen in the doorway, staring up at something that lay in the shadows of the doorway. Marjoram directed the light inside, so it hovered just over Spike, and entered just behind, squeezing past a still motionless Spike. Marjoram stopped in his tracks for a brief moment, then rushed forward. Twilight followed after, gasping at what she saw. “This was a library!” Twilight shouted in triumph. “Look at it, it’s massive!” “Where are all the books?” Kafir asked, breaking the mood. “Don’t know,” Marjoram peered over a crystal railing, casting another spell to bring forth another ball of light. The first ball of light was sent to the highest point in the room, and was able to dimly light up the room. The library was similar to the Canterlot library; sprawling, multiple floors high, and very confusing looking at first glance. Staircases of crystal connected the floors together, joining seamlessly with the intricate stone tiles of the floor. “Maybe they took them with them, or Celestia removed them.” “If she removed them, wouldn’t we know more about the Heartspire?” “Not if whatever happened here could be duplicated relatively easily. Or if it hurt the Harmony Movement. ‘The victors create history’ and all that.” “Well. We’ll look around, and go from there. Sound good?” “Yeah. Be within sight of somepony at all times, and shout if you have to.” Marjoram wandered through a section of the library, eyes swiveling from shelf to shelf, trying to find some sign that there was any books left. Even if nopony could read them (which was likely since Marjoram hadn’t studied much in the way of dead languages beyond Tribal Unicorn and Tribal Pegasus), they could be invaluable discoveries to those who could read them. “Anything?!” Spike called. Negative replies all around. Marjoram sighed, finally hitting a wall. A mural had been painted there once, but was so faded that Marjoram couldn’t make anything out beyond little smudges of colour. Staring at it, Marjoram could swear there was something familiar in the swirling, opulent patterns that had been added to the wall, near the bottom of the mural. Marjoram turned around, making his way back to the central room. Spike was already there, in sight of Twilight who was making her way back. Kafir came to stand beside Marjoram, peering around at the vast, empty library. “This is so sad,” Twilight whispered into the silence, staring around. “Why?” Spike whispered back. Somehow it felt right not to break the silence. “There’s no books. There’s nothing sadder than a room that is emptied of its purpose.” “I could think of a few things sadder than that,” Kafir and Marjoram whispered in unison, an aside to each other. There was a shocked silence for a split second, as the words sunk in. They left the library, feeling disquiet for an entire empire that was left bereft of everything.