Prologue
The roar of the wind filled her ears, drowning out the sounds of the land far below her. She reveled in her absolute freedom, bound by nothing more than the gentle caress of the air flowing over her body and the soft warmth of the sun, her rainbow mane and tail shining in the sunlight. Her mane tickled her wings, drawing her attention there, where she could feel every individual feather with each stroke.
She sighed in happiness, and then looked downward. The land shone with a golden color, the sure sign that the running of the leaves would soon arrive. But for now, everything looked like it was simply enjoying a relaxing afternoon in the sun. The grass slowly swayed back and forth from the breeze, giving the illusion of waves rippling across water. The few ponies she saw idly walked along, enjoying the peaceful scenery around them, while others looked to be taking naps in their favorite spots, something that she was tempted to do herself. But she continued on, lazily flying above the treetops as she took in this wonderful day.
Inhaling deeply, she closed her eyes and focused on her body, noting each and every sensation she could feel. The way the wind lovingly supported her, the comforting heat of the sun, and the open space around her. No matter how many times she flew, she never grew tired of how it felt, the feeling of pure freedom. There was no place she enjoyed more than the open sky, and while she once again contemplated finding a nice comfy cloud to take a nap on, she decided otherwise.
There was only one thing she enjoyed more than the feeling of drifting in the air, and so, she exhaled, and she snapped her eyes open.
With a powerful flap of her wings, she soared directly upwards, causing her to appear as a blur as the ground quickly fell away. Her heart beat faster with each pump of her wings, and she rocketed herself through the first cloud line as she continued her ascent. Soon, she passed Ponyville’s air boundaries, and it was only when she cleared the very last cloud that she stopped her flapping and tucked her wings.
As her momentum slowed, she looked across the land, grinning ear to ear at being able to see for miles in every direction. To the east, she saw the white puffs of a train, to the south stretched the Everfree Forest, and to the north was the awe inspiring view of Canterlot atop the mountain that was still some distance above her position.
When at last her body came to a stand still, she closed her eyes and savored the sensation of weightlessness. Up here, in these brief moments at the peak of her flight, everything was quiet as if the sky was meant only for her. All she could hear was her heart beating and her feathers ruffling from the breeze.
Then, before gravity could bring her back down, she twisted her body so that she was facing forward and unfolded her wings. Opening her eyes, she simultaneously kicked out with her hooves and flapped her wings, propelling herself forward.
Her wings worked furiously as she soared across the sky, flying faster and faster as the ground became a golden blur. The wind was now a thundering roar, her coat was flattened as the air ripped across her body, and her feathers shook from the intensity of the flight. Her mane whipped wildly, and she squinted her eyes as she continued to pick up speed. Her heart raced as adrenaline filled her body, accompanying the sheer joy she felt. And with a grunt of effort, she pumped her wings harder, and she flew faster still.
Ahead of her was a massive cloud that had drifted from the Everfree, one that would take a whole team of pegasi to clear in any reasonable amount of time. But she continued pushing herself forward, and she burst through the cloud with such force that she left a massive gaping hole the size of a house. She grinned as she quickly left the cloud behind, and turned her focus on to the far horizon. The open sky was completely hers, the world below was but a passing blur, and everypony could see her rainbow form streaking across the sky. Up here, all of Equestria was within her reach. There was no place she could not see or go.
This was her life, and Rainbow Dash loved every moment of it.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Stretching her legs, Rainbow Dash let out a relieved sigh. The tension in her muscles had finally cleared after her afternoon flight, and now she patted her stomach in anticipation. “Time for a snack,” she said to herself, and she lazily flew into Ponyville, floating just above street level.
Hovering forward without a care in the world always felt more relaxing after an intense workout, and since she cleared a few clouds on her flight back, Rainbow Dash felt perfectly justified in taking it easy the rest of the day.
Should she stop by Sugarcube Corner for some sweets to reenergize herself? Or should she get something more filling like a hay sandwich? She couldn’t decide, and her grumbling stomach wasn’t helping matters.
Thinking over her choices far more seriously than she ought to have, Rainbow Dash flew towards the town center, humming aloud as she passed various restaurants. Whenever the smell of food caused her to lean one way, another tantalizing scent made her lean in the opposite direction. Pies, hay-burgers, carrots, and an assortment of more delicious food caused her to zigzag as she flew. But when she sniffed the scent of fresh fruit, she came to a halt.
Actually, when was the last time I had some apples from AJ? I bet those Golden Delicious apples are ready for eating now. Rainbow Dash brought a hoof to her chin. Eat in town and then find some spot to take a nap, or head to AJ’s and eat in the spot that I’m going to nap in?
Choosing between a bustling restaurant over a quiet apple tree branch wasn’t a difficult choice, but it was only then that she remembered what had happened the last time she tried the same stunt.
She vaguely remembered Applejack telling her something about how the Golden Delicious apples were the farm’s main seller after cider season, but she hadn’t paid too close attention on account of her trying to stay out of Applejack’s reach while high-tailing it from the farm.
Rainbow Dash hummed to herself as she weighed the risks, but shortly shrugged her shoulders as she smirked to herself. I’m sure she’ll let me have some if I ask this time. No worries.
She began to move in Sweet Apple Acre’s direction, already imagining how she’d go about asking Applejack to cut her a special deal, but paused as she took notice of a familiar pony sitting beneath the shade of the library tree.
Huh, didn’t realize I floated this far into town. I should probably say hi first. Putting her grumbling stomach on hold, Rainbow Dash flew towards the library.
Even though the shade of the tree was cover enough, the pony also lay underneath a large umbrella, causing her darkened position to stand out on such a sunny day. With her sun hat set aside, and a book floating in front of her, Twilight Sparkle appeared to be completely engrossed in her relaxation. But despite her focus, her ears flicked at the sound of Rainbow Dash’s approach, and she lifted her head and smiled in Rainbow’s direction.
Rainbow Dash merely smirked. I just can’t sneak up on her anymore. I really need to get with Pinkie on figuring out what to do about that.
Landing just a short distance, Rainbow Dash trotted up to the library. “Hey, Twilight.”
“Hello, Rainbow Dash,” Twilight replied. “What are you up to?”
“Nothing much. Had a little practice flying, and was thinking about taking a nap after I get some food.” Walking to her side, Rainbow Dash tilted her head as she tried to see which book Twilight was reading, but grimaced when she recognized the blank cover of the book. “How’s uh… How’s your reading going?”
Twilight’s tail flicked in excitement. “Pretty interesting actually. I was just going over a few shadow spells.” Her horn flickered as she flipped a few pages back. “There’re a few spells that I’m still trying to wrap my head around. Did you know that for most of the magic regarding shadows they treat them as both corporeal and incorporeal? It’s all about knowing just the right time to solidify them, and even then, you may not have gathered enough from your surroundings.” She leaned forward as she quickly scanned a passage. “I still don’t understand how some of these even work at a fundamental level, and the ones I do understand looked to be done so inefficiently that you’d need a large reservoir of magic to cast even the simplest ones. Despite the large amount of knowledge here, the ponies back then really skipped on the basics of magic. It looks like they just winged it half the time.”
“Oh, that’s cool, I guess,” Rainbow Dash replied. “You uh… Read much on the other part?”
Twilight’s smile fell, and the note of enthusiasm dropped from her voice. “Yeah, I have. I’m still in the beginning, though. I haven’t really made much time to go through it all yet.”
“Oh,” Rainbow Dash said. After a moment of silence passed, she coughed into her hoof. “How’re the bat ponies? I haven’t seen Willow Shade and Cloud Shadow in awhile.”
Twilight’s smile came back, and she set the book down. “They’re good. The restoration on the castle has been going pretty smoothly. In fact, by next spring I’d say we’d even be able to bring some of the bat ponies who want to move from Dusktown.”
“Cool. That’s cool,” Rainbow Dash replied. “I bet some of them can’t wait to try some real flying. I’ll have to show them how to fly through Ghastly Gorge when they feel ready for it.”
“I’m sure some of them would love it.”
Ever since Twilight had become a vampony, fought and came to terms with a split personality that still resided in her head, and defeated possibly the strongest vampony in all of existence, she had become much more comfortable with dangerous things like flying through Ghastly Gorge, and Rainbow Dash was immensely glad for that.
“Hey,” Rainbow Dash said in excitement. “Maybe tomorrow night you and me could take a fly through. You’ve been getting a lot better at it.”
“Maybe another time,” Twilight said. “Don’t get me wrong, I’d love to, but I was planning on studying the Tree of Harmony tomorrow. Now that we’ve cleared the last of Discord’s vines, I can finally study it without any obstacles.”
“Right,” Rainbow Dash replied. “Any luck on that mess?”
Twilight shook her head. “As far as I can guess, the tree’s being recharged by the Elements of Harmony. There’s simply no telling when it will release them again. Until then, Equestria will have to face its problems without them.”
“You mean we’ll have to face Equestria’s problems without them,” Rainbow Dash corrected. “After all, we are Equestria’s biggest heroes.”
Twilight smirked. “How could I forget when you keep reminding us.”
“How can I not? Discord, Sombra, Night Walker... Okay, that last one was pretty bad, but we took care of it in the end!” Rainbow Dash hopped onto her hind legs and threw a few jabs. “There ain’t nothing we can’t take down.”
Twilight rolled her eyes, but kept her smile. “Well, with the Princesses’ efforts, we’ll hopefully not have to face everything by ourselves. The guard is being expanded and their training curriculum is getting extensive updates.”
Rainbow Dash fell back onto her four hooves. “Getting ready for the other two?”
Twilight nodded. “I’m meeting up with Celestia and Luna later this week to discuss the details. Now that Ruby has finished healing us after our encounter with Night Walker, and the bat ponies are doing well in their new home, it’s time that I joined in preparations. I’ll most likely be in command of the vampony segment that we’re working to form.”
“How many are you up to now?”
“As of last week, eighty.”
Rainbow Dash raised an eyebrow. “I’d figure you’d have done more than that.”
“I’m still studying the effects of the new vampirism,” Twilight replied. “So far most of the issues with the bat ponies clear up after becoming vamponies, but not all of them become fully healed. The new vampirism is definitely for the better, but I’m taking it slow. I don’t feel comfortable just hoofing it out until Ruby and I fully understand it.”
“Right, I get ya,” Rainbow Dash said.
She totally didn’t get it. Why wait when you could just fix ponies there and then? But she trusted Twilight’s decision, and instead turned her mind to more important matters.
“We’ll, I’m gonna leave ya to your reading. I gotta talk to AJ about some Golden Delicious apples.” Rainbow Dash turned away as she prepared herself for flight.
“Applejack?” Twilight asked. “Oh, she’s at the castle.”
Rainbow Dash tucked her wings and looked over her shoulder. “What? Why?”
“She’s bringing the bat ponies a wagon of apples. I asked her to since they didn’t get the chance to come to town to buy some. The road between the castle and Ponyville is still being built, so the young and elderly can’t go shopping just yet.”
With her magic, Twilight lifted the book and looked for where she left off. “She’ll probably be back later this evening, so that’d be the best time to catch her. The apples and cider disappear pretty fast whenever the bat ponies are involved, so I can’t imagine she’ll be gone for too long.”
“Cider?” Rainbow Dash replied with wide eyes. Immediately, her face was pressed against Twilight’s. “What cider?”
Twilight leaned away with a shocked expression. “The leftover cider I asked her to keep. You know, because the bat ponies weren’t able to make it to town when she was selling-”
Rainbow Dash didn’t have time to hear another word. At once she leapt off the ground and tore through the sky towards the Everfree Forest, knocking over Twilight’s umbrella in the process. Golden Delicious Apples and an afternoon nap could wait. There was cider to be had, and given the ravenous nature of the bat ponies towards Applejack’s wares, every second meant life or death.
Dealing with an angry vampony later on for leaving in such a hasty manner was completely, one-hundred percent worth it if it meant that Rainbow Dash would be able to get her hooves on just one bottle of cider.
Yet, as Rainbow Dash raced towards the Castle of the Two Sisters, she was unaware that another pegasus was heading in the same direction from the west. Though he was still far, far away, he soared through the sky with powerful wings, outpacing the guards in their efforts to warn the rest of Equestria.
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You know , I know it's Dash , and that she isn't the most polite pony (given the ending of this chapter , that's an understatement
) but I can't help but find her rude for not at least saying "hello" to Ruby ... unless it was implied when she greeted Twillight , but still , given the fact that in the previous story they sometime asked for Ruby input (thus considering her a separate pony)...
...unless there is another reason for that ...
(Then again , I could undestand if it's to avoid having a double greeting each time the character is used , as it could quickly become bothersome for you
)
7501386 Everyone kind of settled into their own way of greeting. Twilight's friends for the most part greet her as Twilight, while most of the bat ponies will greet her as "Princess" since it's an easy way to address both of them, and it'll generally be them that ask for Ruby's input since they know her more than others. Though, I can already imagine a few situations where it's clear as to which one they are talking to.
Bat Pony : "Please, Twilight? It'll be awesome!"
Twilight : "No, I just don't think it's a good idea, or a safe one for the matter."
Bat Pony : "Ruby? Puh-leeeeeeeeze?"
Twilight : ".... Ruby says yes, but I still don't-"
Bat Pony : "Yay!"
Nice start to your new story and I enjoyed the mood music.
So Dash is going to become a Kirin?
7501801
I'm going to go with the term 'Drake'. While Kirin is a good word, the eastern aesthetic it implies doesn't really fit in this story.
7501811
oh well, dragons and Dash and stuff... Thats gonna be fascinating read
Second Princess of the Night was absolutely awesome and I have no doubts that you'll make Dragonfeather surpass its predecessor! Keep up on the good work!
So what... We'll have Twilight the Vampony and Rainbow Dash the Dovahkiin?
Just finished reading Second Princess of the Night and I loved it. I have no clue how I never saw it before until yesterday. Can't wait to see where this story goes with Rainbow Dash
7502578 and Cursed Rarity. The curse was re-sealed, but might break again later on.
Also I hope we get an evil Rainbow Dash for a bit. Would be awesome.
img09.deviantart.net/1277/i/2014/248/9/4/daedric_prince_of_loyalty_rainbow_dash_by_spectrumblaze-d7y00nd.jpg
7502578 something tells me she'd be more like the Grey Wardens without the death issue than A Dragonborn
Why doesn't Discord just snap his fingers and give Twilight and Ruby the ability to switch control of their body at will? (And, obviously, a bit of a makeover so that everypony would know who's in control.) It's been bugging me throughout the first story.
Other than that, your doing great! This series is a great read!
7515372
Glad you're enjoying the story. Discord was away on business throughout the first story, and while he will make appearances now and then in the stories, that doesn't mean he will be helpful. I like a playful and only somewhat helpful version of Discord. He can do a lot, but that doesn't mean he will due to his fickle nature and the joy he gets in watching others struggle through stuff. At somepoint in this story Discord will even comment that he took a peek back in Equestria while he was away, saw what was happening to Twilight, and promptly laughed while wondering how it will all turn out. As for Ruby and Twilight switching control over their body, they can't do it yet, but there is a reason why I said that the glass mirror had become a glass door at the end of 2PotN.
7515454 I see. Thanks!
Great story.
Holy crap that picture looks cool
. But I am pretty sure that was not the picture you were going to use at first.
7552045 Nope. I'll explain it in the author notes of the next chapter, but pretty much the art I wanted to use is spoken for. The pic I would have used was a dragon about to breath fire on Rainbow Dash.
7552058 When is next chapter?
7554025 It's currently awaiting the editing passover
Not dead, but I haven't been keeping up with Second Princess like I meant to. RL got in the way for a while and I just never had the chance to give each chapter a review like I wanted to.
Anyhow, I'm looking forward to this story as well, but I'd always been hoping when it came to Rainbow Dash's turn, we'd be seeing this:
img07.deviantart.net/34e8/i/2014/217/3/7/reaperdash_by_zilvart-d7trxgx.jpg
7556312
No worries, life happens. But that's an awesome picture, and now I'm kinda sad I didn't go that route.
7556538
It's never too late?
I tease.
7556783 Well, there is still two books to go, and while RD is going and a different route, the concept could still be used. The other books haven't been completely set yet, and The Dead still has yet to arrive.
7556946
I suppose the most fitting an perhaps harshest choice for the Dead would be Fluttershy. She's so connected to animals and nature she's virtually a druid. That would make Fluttershy being a target quite challenging.
Twilight is a vampony...
I have to brutally slaughter her due to my divine obligation to exterminate tween girl tropes.
GOD TOLD ME TO DO EEEEEEEET!!!
4.bp.blogspot.com/-KSwdvc1bDiY/Uskt-I2IBGI/AAAAAAAAAco/B_FiTCTmopk/s1600/crazy-looking-crazy-man.jpg
(Alondro has cleaned himself up a bit, obviously...)
Welp, now that I've finally caught up and completed Second Princess of the Night, I can finally start here and give it an actual readover and review.
I am happy to see Twilight and Ruby are getting along, and have been creating new vamponies/thestrals. I am also very happy to see that the bat ponies and vamponies are being given the chance to live outside of Dusktown. It was a beautiful cage, but a cage none-the-less.
I am curious about some things though, given that this was originally inspired by that series of pictures, which are quite good mind, will be be seeing anything from them such as the possible development of a Twilight/Ruby+Rainbow Dash pairing? I do admit I have a certain fondness for it. And there's also the fact that Twilight and Ruby are the ponies closest to Rainbow that will be necessary to deal with her new predator instincts.
It bugs me some that the Elements are now sealed within the tree. How is Rainbow supposed to find any balance in herself without them?
7556946
Edit: On second thought, probably Applejack or Pinkie Pie for the Dead. We've got one Unicorn/Alicorn with Twilight and Ruby, now with Rainbow we have a Pegasus, so to complete the "trinity" we need an earth pony.
Yeah didn't lime Harmony Castle either. But is Sunset a thing?
Holy Emperor of Mankind, it's been awhile since I've read the first story! Welp, time to start reading this and see what's happened since...
100 Vamponies vs Tirek that's a fight I'd like to see.
9950975
Same. It'd be cool to write as I really liked parts of Tirek's character, but I'm keeping this series largely at the time it was started in (Season 3, maybe 4?). It was also tempting to use the canon Starswirl and reasons as to why he was gone for all these years, but I'll probably be sticking to my imagined version when I began writing.
9951101
That's fine.