Forgotten Kingdom

by Invisible Cadance

Chapter 0: Prologue (Luna's Story)

Princess Luna slowly walked through the dark, dusty corridors of her former castle. Its location deep in the Everfree Forest made sure that no pony had taken care of it during her banishment. Glass-shards from broken oil-lamps littered the floor in the dark corridor. Her royal armaments protected her hooves as she shattered the glass by walking over it. Everything reminded her of how it had looked like during its glory days, so full of life and light. She had to hold back a tear upon a seeing painting with a silver frame on the floor. The dust covered it entirely, but she remembered the painting of Starswirl the Bearded that used to hang on the wall with the same frame.

She soon found herself back at the main entrance. The floor was covered by her hoof-prints in the dust; they led off to the other side of the castle. The main entrance door had fallen apart, and its remains littered the overgrown road outside. A staircase stood just opposite of the entrance but fared no better; the lower half of it had fallen down to the ground where it was crushed into hundreds of pieces. The remaining parts of the staircase showed large cracks poorly hidden beneath the dust. It was unlikely that it would be capable of holding a pony’s weight.

With a few quick flaps of her wings she soon found herself on the upper floor. The corridors were just as much abandoned as the lower floor. Dust, glass, paintings, and stone covered the floor. She retraced the steps she had walked so many times under livelier circumstances. All that could be heard was her hooves crushing glass. The quietness made her miss when it was full of laughter and talks.

Her steps soon took her to the room that had once been the throne room. The magnificent doors that had once stood guarding the room were now gone. Left vulnerable, the room looked emptier than she remembered it. The carpet that she remembered being dark blue was now simply grey of dust. Except for a few oil-lamps that had crashed to the ground, a throne was the only object the room contained. It was full of cracks and looked like it would break apart at any second. Behind the throne a broken window stood, yet only small amounts of sunlight shined through it. What remained of the window showed signs of stained glass, but it was too shattered for her to see what it had symbolized.

Crash!

The sound caused the floor to shake, and Luna hunched backwards with her horn glowing. Seconds passed without any other sound than her heavy breathing and her magic being channelled. She took a quick glance around the room, but everything was the way it had been when she entered. With that information she finally ended her protective spell and lowered her head in relief. At her front hooves she noticed a small shard of stained glass; it depicted a sun. The sun bore a close resemblance to her sister’s cutie mark with its eight flames striking out of the middle. A tear rolled down her chin as she remembered when she and Celestia had ruled together in the castle. It was time when ponies gave the castle life, and she brought harmony to the lands together with her sister. But it was before her madness, and now it all had fallen to emptiness.

She snapped herself out of the memories with a light kick to the floor. Using her magic, she levitated the shard of stained glass and placed it on her back. With it secured, she exited the room and headed back into the corridors. With the exception of her hoof-prints in the middle of the corridors, they looked just as dead as they had been when she first got there. She hurried through until she was back at the main hall. The first thing she noticed was that the upper part of the staircase had fallen down and joined the rest of the staircase, most likely creating the crash she heard earlier. But it was another sight that caught her attention; in front of the entrance the shattered pieces of the old elements of harmony lied. Her own hoof-prints left a flat print on the floor due to her armaments, but around the remains of the elements hoof-prints that looked like they were made by naked hooves covered the floor. They led into a small corridor where they disappeared into the darkness.

She flew slowly down to the bottom floor while keeping a look out for whoever created the other hoof-prints. Upon landing on the floor, she approached the broken elements that looked at her as if they had eyes. The memory of her destroying what she had once wielded was still fresh in her mind. She sighed at the thought of never being able to wield them again.

“I’m sorry, sister,” Luna whispered while placing the shard of stained glass on top of the elements.

Why would anypony bring the shards here? She analysed the hoof-prints closer, but there was nothing unusual about them. All she could come up with was that they didn’t belong to her, something she had figured at first sight. After another sigh she decided to follow the hoof-prints into the corridor. She had already been through it, so her hoof-prints covered the floor along with the unknown pony’s prints.

The chase took her deep down into the castle until she stopped at a small hatch leading to the basement. She had passed going down there on her first way through, but the hoof-prints stopped right in front of it. The dust on the hatch didn’t lie as compact on the hatch as it did on the untouched parts of the floor. She had never spent much time down there, it wasn’t considered very royally of her to be in the underground parts of the castle. After her madness took over, she remembered converting the basement to something horrific. The screams of the ponies whose fate was sealed down there still echoed in her head as a nightmare.

She slowly opened the hatch with her magic while trying to shake of the memory. A foul odour met her as a set of dusty stairs was revealed. They were covered with hoof-prints that led all the way down into the darkness. Using her magic, she summoned forth a small orb of light and sent it down before following with careful steps. The stairs didn’t lead far, and she soon found herself stirring up an ocean of dust with her hooves on the basement floor. Her body shivered from the cold air. The cobalt blue light revealed a long pathway that led past cells on both sides of her. They were of a small rectangular shape that contained only a bed and a bucket. Most beds were in a destroyed shape and parts of the ceiling had fallen down in some of the cells. She recalled walking past the cells when they were filled with starving and badly beaten ponies, yet there were no skeletons in them.

With a light knock to her head she brought herself back from the memories. The hoof-prints continued along the pathway and led to a thick wooden door at the end of the room. Small splinters were missing from it, but aside from that it seemed to have handled the aging well. She opened the door with her hoof and the hinge let out a loud creak. Beyond the door a large circular room awaited her. She allowed the orb to light it up entirely before she stepped inside. It looked mostly intact; only small parts of the stone walls were damaged and letting a cold draft through. The room’s only objects were large steel chains hanging from the ceiling. They hanged in pairs of four, and some of them had started to rust. The hoof-prints led to the end of the room where they stopped beneath a pair of chains with the skeleton of a pony dangling upside-down. Even in death the chains wouldn’t let the poor soul go. Images started appearing before her eyes of a green coated Pegasus dangling from the very same chains. Blood were dripping down to the ground from her hooves and only worsened as she desperately tried to flee using her wings. The Pegasus’ eyes stared helplessly into Luna with tears rolling down her forehead.

The Princess quickly looked away from the sight and started exploring the rest of the room. “I’m sorry for hurting you.” She whispered the words, yet they echoed lowly throughout the room. Her legs started dangling slightly as she felt something from her stomach want to leave through the front. She hunched over in an attempt to contain it. The light from the orb started to slowly fade away as she felt her body starting to weigh more than before. She looked again towards the floor where the hoof-prints ended as her legs were fighting to keep her up. The fight made her start panting heavily; she could only barely hear the draft over it.

When the orb died out, she fell down to the ground and stirred up dust all over her body. A small red glow appeared around her hooves and gave the room a dim light. She tried to kick it away, but her legs refused to obey her. Only sparks came out of her horn when she tried to defend herself using magic. She had spent enough time around magic to know when it was being directed at her.

The red glow remained uninterrupted and slowly picked off the armaments from her hooves. A second light removed the crown from her head. Among the shadows she could see the gesture of a unicorn. It was too dark for her to see the stranger clearly, but the horn glowed red as blood. Before she could study the unicorn any longer, something cold touched her hooves. A loud clang could be heard as a sharp pain went through all four of her hooves. She allowed a short scream to escape her before being lifted up into the air. She didn’t need to check what it was holding her up; she knew it was the chains, and now she was hanging the same way the Pegasus had hanged.

The red light from the unicorn’s horn went out and left the entire room in darkness. Only small sparks left Luna’s horn as she stubbornly tried to free herself. Each try left her weaker than before. She couldn’t see the unicorn, but she could hear its breaths. She closed her eyes and felt a warm fluid running down her hooves. One more try.

Author's Note:

This story takes place during season one. I'm trying to go for a weaker and more shy Luna, like she was in Elements of Harmony rather than the way she is in Luna Eclipsed and beyond.

Comments

[PartidgeInAPearTree]

Okay, here's your review! Now release my family

Its location deep in the Everfree Forest made sure that no pony had taken care of it during her banishment.

This should be "Its location was deep in the Everfree Forest...

You also add a lot of unnecessary information to your sentences like:

Her royal armaments protected her hooves as she shattered the glass by walking over it.

Your readers can probably infer that Luna is walking over the grass.

Other than that, I really enjoyed this first chapter! Onto the next one!

[Darth Quadro]

Alright so heres my first impression with your prologue (sorry ive taken so long to get to this)
I rather liked it, you seem to have a talent for creating atmosphere in your writing your very descriptive with scenes and as far as i can tell its quite well written with no too obvious of grammar mistakes (those are the only kind i can pick out. Your depiction of luna following the events of the return of nightmare moon isn't bad so that gives me some high hopes of good characterization. For my first impression i would say that i will deffinately continue reading (although im crossing my fingers that nothing bad happens to luna as im huge luna fan... please dont hurt her)