It all started on a normal day. Isaac’s mom was on the couch watching Christian TV shows and Isaac played with his toys as children always did. Suddenly, the woman murmured something and began taking away all of her son’s toys, consoles, and even his clothes. The next day was no better: she locked him up in his room, again murmuring something beforehand.
And then he saw through a sizeable crack in his door: his mother coming towards his room with some kind of blade in hand. He began to panic, and removed a rug from his floor to find that it hid a trapdoor to his basement. He opened it and fell in just as she entered the room.
His mother cornered him. She overpowered him, and there was nothing to be done about it…
Isaac looked in horror up at his mother, her hand holding a sharp and well-cared-for butcher’s knife. She kept murmuring something about serving the Lord and loving him above all else.
“Why, mommy? Why?” Isaac asked with teary eyes as he looked at his mother’s face.
“The Lord wills it! The Lord wants me to free you of all sin in the only way possible! You will be sacrificed to prove my love to the Lord above all else!” his mother said, sounding like a bit of a maniac as she spoke.
The poor boy closed his eyes and screamed as the knife brought an end to his short life.
Darkness welcomed the seemingly-innocent boy, who had been fighting his inner demons before his life came to an abrupt halt. All he knew was that, no matter where he looked, he saw nothing but the blackness. Had this been the afterlife, or was this a sort of purgatory for the boy?
He recalled fighting all sorts of horrid monstrosities in different places. The Headless Horseman, whose head fought alongside the main body for some reason. And then the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse: War, Famine, Death, and Pestilence. There was a fifth one as well: Conquest. Each one had a horse’s spine in hand and rode it like they would a normal horse. At the front of the bone chain was the horse’s head, though War had a bull’s head instead for some reason. He had fought seven look-alikes of himself as well, and each represented something.
Lust.
Envy.
Greed.
Pride.
Wrath.
Sloth.
Gluttony.
Yes, he fought his share of the inner Seven Deadly Sins as well. A bright light snapped the boy out of his thoughts, and he looked up at it to find a winged silhouette in its center. Was that an angel sent by God to take him to Heaven? Isaac was certain he didn’t want to stick around and find out, considering he had even fought Satan himself and emerged victorious. He wanted to run away from this light, to make sure that this divine being couldn’t reach him and do more harm than what was already done.
If only that was an option. Bloodied walls quickly cut him off from all means of escape, trapping him with the other being. The poor boy frantically checked himself to see if he had any weaponry on hand and sadly had none, so he did the next best thing: sit in a corner curled up into a ball and sob silently to himself.
The angel...or whatever-it-was descended slowly, like a feather drifting in a dream. Squelching sounds were made as it touched the floor. Its unfamiliar, tall shadow loomed over the crying boy, who had no choice but to look at its owner. This creature was unlike any he had witnessed before: a slender, elegant, tall, four-legged frame with magnificent wings of archangels. The being was entirely white, save for the hair on its head which billowed out gently in light blue, pink, green, and lavender. A very long and sharp horn was on its forehead, and its eyes were radiant rose. A tail much like the hair also billowed out opposite behind the beauty, and an orange sun was plastered onto its rear. It had a gold chestplate with an amethyst gem in its center, and a tiara with the same pattern was perched behind the horn. It had golden shoes on the ends of its legs, meaning this thing had hooves instead of feet.
“Do not fret, little one,” said the creature, its voice like that of a noblewoman: high-class, yet caring. “I am here to help thee.”
Isaac looked at the creature slack-jawed, his face still wet with his own blood and tears.
“I wish to aid thou. Would thee accept my token of kindness?” asked the creature.
Isaac nodded.
“I wish to take thou away from this... deformed hell. Would thou come with me?” asked the being, walking closer to Isaac and lowering its head to his eye level.
“Yes…” Isaac said, quietly. He broke down into another sob, this time hugging the creature’s neck in sheer joy. The creature let its head rest on Isaac’s shoulder as he wept. For some time it stayed like that.
After a while, the creature’s horn flared a light comparable to that of the sun, and the horrid flesh-walls disappeared. When the light faded, Isaac noticed that he was now in a garden alongside the creature, and in the dead of night no less. The moon hung high in the sky, pouring its soft light on the world, allowing Isaac to see, but only to a degree. The creature held a mirror in front of her, and she beckoned Isaac to look within its reflective depths.
He was shocked at what he saw: he had a four-legged framed of his own now, and he was a light peach in color. His hair was short and a golden brown, and a tail was settled at his rear. On his sides he had feathered wings, and sitting on his thigh was a blue teardrop with white wings and a halo.
“Where am I? What am I?” Isaac asked, a bit worried.
“Thou art in Equestria, dear. My name is Princess Celestia, and I have made thou more like the inhabitants. Thou art a pegasus, so do stay here in Canterlot Castle a while,” answered the being, a half-frown on her face.
“Is this... can I fly?” Isaac asked, somewhat worried as he took note that his wings were in fact fully functional as he spread them. For a foal, his wings were rather large.
“Pegasi have always been able to fly, although with a few exceptions. It’s best if thou practices first,” Celestia answered, a small grin on her face. Her wings were folded onto her sides, making her able to pass for a regular old unicorn with a case of gigantism, unless one looked at her aforementioned sides.
Isaac smiled back, though his own grin was also barely noticeable. He closed his wings, then moved his head to glance at the stars above. They twinkled like little diamonds, with the moon being the biggest, brightest diamond of all. Some stars were sapphire in hue, others amethyst or ruby. The deep navy of the night served as a contrast to its own cosmos, thus bringing out the beauty of it all.
“A sight most magnificent, isn’t it?” asked a female voice that didn’t belong to Celestia. Isaac quickly brought his face to ground level, only to notice another pony whose mane was much like the cosmos itself. Her pelt was also blue as the night, her eyes brilliant turquoise in color. She too had a horn, and wings tucked neatly at her sides.
“Mhm,” Isaac confirmed with a nod. “Who are you?” he asked, brow arched.
“My name is Luna,” answered the mare, shooting a glance at Celestia.
“I brought him here, sister. I do hope he finds Equestria to be better than his former home,” Celestia said swiftly, pointing a hoof at Isaac for reference.
Luna nodded. She turned back to Isaac, who flashed her a friendly smirk. She glanced back at her sibling. “Why do you say it like that?” she inquired.
Celestia almost immediately frowned, and then sighed before regaining her composure. “Let me just say his mother... did something awful,” she answered. “Very awful. Let us not discuss this further in his presence, though.”
Isaac cringed, the memory of his mother’s blade running through his mind.
“Understood,” Luna sighed, her wings flaring wide for a moment before shutting.
Isaac looked back to the sky again. He sat on his rump as he stared into the cosmos, the wonders it had presented before him in very distant nebulae, stars, and moon. The young pegasus could already make out a dipper in the stars, as well as the constellation of Orion. The stars made countless shapes in their very invisible framework, and it was hard for him to keep up with all those shapes. There were dinosaurs and robots; just about anything a pony from earth like he in age and mindset could ever dream of.
“I take it you like the night sky?” Luna asked, breaking Isaac from his stupor.
“It’s very pretty,” the pegasus answered, smiling. For a fleeting moment, he forgot his troubles as he resumed looking at the stars. His mind wandered elsewhere, to fond memories of himself as he played with toys.
Before, that is, shit figuratively hit the fan for him. He frowned and looked at Luna. “Do you have a bathtub and some food?” Isaac asked, remembering he hadn’t bathed in weeks after having everything taken away from him. The pegasus looked at his stomach—it was horrifically thin, with the rib cages and hip bones being very pronounced.
“Plenty. Follow us,” Luna answered, turning around to trot into the castle. Celestia followed, as did Isaac. The halls of the castle were even more majestic than the gardens in which the pegasus had arrived, line with purest white marble columns and vivid red carpet decorated in golden patterns. Stained glass depicted ponies doing various activities, from farming to defeating some strange chimera he hadn’t seen before.
There were guard ponies decked out in gold armor, some white pegasi and others grey unicorns. Some looked at Isaac with wonder, but didn’t bother him otherwise as he continued to follow the princesses. A few long moments and some twists and turns later, Isaac found himself being placed in a guest room of the palace. This one had toys, its own bathroom, and even food on the table.
The pegasus gave the biggest smile he could muster for the princesses. He thanked them and tended to his hygienic and food needs in short order—he was quite simply in heaven. After that, he played with the various toys in the room, just happy he was indeed within a better place. The princesses left his room, probably to tend to their royal duties or something, simply leaving him to his business.
Before going to bed, Isaac looked himself over in the bathroom mirror. He was sparkly clean, that much was true, but two things bothered him: one, his new wings and two, the strange markings on his hips. Why did he have these things? What did the symbol on his hips mean?
The young pegasus jumped, hearing hoofsteps echoing from outside. He trotted into the guest room and found a royal guard looking right at him.
“The princesses told me to keep an eye on you,” the guard said just as Isaac opened his mouth to speak.
“What’s this drawing on my butt?” Isaac asked, pointing a hoof at the anomaly.
The guard trotted to him and spread his wing so he could examine it. “It’s a cutie mark,” he began, “but I’m not sure about what it means.”
“Cutie mark?” Isaac inquired again, blinking. The term was foreign to him.
“It’s a symbol representing your talent, to put it in eloquent terms,” the guard answered, gingerly closing the youngster’s wing.
“Okay,” Isaac said in a cheery tune, somewhat understanding the guard’s words now. He covered his mouth with a hoof to yawn into it, quickly setting it down afterwards to steady himself. His eyes wandered off to the bed, and a feeling of exhaustion was washing over him. He sauntered to the bed and threw himself onto it, falling asleep before he could cover up.
The world of sleep, though, decided now was the time to toy with him in the worst way it could.
Dei, quod reliquum est, nolite metuere, et ossa tua liberabit, exspectans.
A series of masculine, low-pitched, ethereal voices chanted that one phrase. It never ended. Isaac stirred, finding himself in a square room with four doorways, one on each wall. Between those doorways, stained glass windows depicting crosses and crying foals decorated the sky blue walls, the light shining through cascading in tinged blue or peach-brown. The young pegasus rose languidly onto his hooves, ears perking as he heard the invisible chorus repeat its verse.
Dei, quod reliquum est, nolite metuere, et ossa tua liberabit, exspectans.
“Where... is that coming from?” the pegasus wondered aloud, glancing around and briefly flaring his oversized wings. No answer came to him. Hesitantly, he trotted to the door on his right, his hooves clopping loudly against the blue floor and echoing painfully into his ears. He stopped before the door, trembling for a moment, before continuing into the room beyond.
Dei, quod reliquum est, nolite metuere, et ossa tua liberabit, exspectans.
The next room was the same in every way, except it had only one door—the way the pegasus came from—and it had a pedestal in the center. Floating above it, shining in a ray of golden light, was a dark cloud of some kind. The young colt trotted to it, stopping again just outside the halo of light.
The cloud glowed for a moment before it floated over to Isaac, the image of his cutie mark carved into its frame in wisps of color. Inexplicably, Isaac began producing rivers upon rivers of tears, and every time he blinked, tears would fly from his face, turn into little balls, and land some distance away.
The pegasus cringed, his eyes widening. “I’m... in a cathedral?” he squeaked.
Dei, quod reliquum est, nolite metuere, et ossa tua liberabit, exspectans.
That could have explained the chorus he had been hearing all this time. The glass windows, the pedestal with the ray of light, the blue floor and walls... instantly, it made sense to him now. Hesitantly, he turned back to the door from which he waltzed in and went towards it, the cloud engraved with his cutie mark following suit.
Dei, quod reliquum est, nolite metuere, et ossa tua liberabit, exspectans.
The choir kept repeating, their eerie song pounding in Isaac’s ears at this point. The pegasus entered the room he first stirred in, and after a quick glance, took the one straight ahead. This next room yielded nothing, except for a curious campfire that was on the verge of dying out. Isaac turned around, cringing even as he walked back, and took the southernmost door.
That too was empty. That left only one room—that beyond the northernmost door of the impromptu intersection. Hesitantly, Isaac went to that room. His legs felt cold as stone, and time was the same way. The trip, which was a few minutes, seemed to have stretched to an eternity, the crying foals on the stained glass looking at him unceasingly.
Judging him.
The pegasus found this room empty, though it actually had another doorway dead ahead. This one gave off a sinister red glow that contrasted the soft blue, its frame marked by a pony’s skeleton with crude angel wings. Isaac’s eyes widened, his heart pounding like a drum in his chest, as he saw this doorway.
Dread had washed over him. His legs were stiff as bricks, and no matter how much he willed it, they could not move. The same could be said for his wings and the little cloud familiar, for that matter.
“Come closer, Isaac,” spoke a voice, one that was sinister and demonic. It came from the room beyond the glowing red doorway. Suddenly, the eerie chorus fell silent, the last repetition of their hymn fading into a melancholic echo. “Come closer.”
The legs of the colt began to move on their own accord, as if they had a mind that was not one with their owner's and were drawn to the voice. Isaac whimpered fearfully, ears flat on his skull, his mind screaming at him to not go anywhere near that doorway. His legs disobeyed, dragging him closer to the glowing blood red aura.
The room beyond was also tinged in red, and the stained glass depictions changed greatly: the crosses had a figure nailed to them whilst being held upside-down, and the foals had changed to mere skeletons caked in blood. In the center of the room, a black pony stood with its back end turned towards the colt.
Slowly, the figure turned around, revealing horns on its head. One of these horns was broken, and decorating its side were bat-like wings that spread wide, revealing red membranes. The eyes, so dreadfully scarlet in hue, sent shivers down Isaac’s spine. “We meet again, little one,” the pony chuckled tauntingly. “To think that I have a full-grown body, yet yours is still that of a child,” it added, flashing the pegasus a toothy grin.
“S-Satan?” Isaac squeaked, his heart beating a mile a minute in his throat.
“Close, but no cigar,” the black pony replied, still smiling. “My name starts with an ‘A’.”
“... A... Azazel…” the colt murmured, his jaw jittering.
“Bingo,” Azazel replied before suddenly rushing at Isaac, who then woke up screaming at the top of his lungs. Next to his bed was Princess Luna, who had a worried look on her face.
“What happened?” Luna asked, frowning. The pegasus couldn’t answer as he curled up into a ball and began to cry. The images were pounding in his skull, leaving room for little else. The choir, Azazel’s hellish gaze, the foals in the stained glass depictions...
Why did he have that dream?
“What happened?” Luna repeated, and only now did Isaac look at her with a red face.
“B-bad….dream,” he murmured, wings shifting uncomfortably.
“I see,” Luna grimaced for a moment before gaining a calm mask. “Breakfast is waiting for you on the nearby table, I hope it makes you feel better.”
Isaac looked to said table, and there was an assortment of breakfast items. Eggs, bacon, orange juice... his stomach rumbled, so he wiped his tears away and trotted to the table. He downed the food hungrily, forgetting the dream as he did.
Isaac was washing up in the tub, his stomach full from his meal. The thin pegasus was using a body brush to groom his coat, and was thankful the thing had a strap that wrapped around a hoof with ease. He made extra certain to scrub around his private areas, his tail and mane, and along his sides. He flapped his oversized wings once that was done, startling himself since they sent some water out of the tub and onto the floor around it.
Then, a smile spread on his muzzle. He flapped his wings again, and more water ended up strewn about as the liquid cascaded off his large feathers like droplets of rain. The colt did this once more, watching still more water go careening away, and as he did a giggle of mirth left his mouth.
Now, the pegasus was using his front hooves—one of which still had the scrubbie strapped to it—to splash about in the bathwater. The bubbly, slightly-grey liquid rippled violently as he hit its surface with his hooves again and again, his grin widening to the point his cheeks had to have been hurting.
Isaac’s brown eyes beamed with childish glee. The water kept rippling, the bubbles popping and making more bubbles, some even breaking off from their makeshift colonies and taking to the air for just a scant few moments and ending with another series of pops. The process repeated from there, and a beige hoof or two in addition to a massive pair of wings kept it going for minutes on end.
This was too much fun.
The colt kept splashing and frollicing in the tub without a care, wings flapping with renewed vigor and spraying water everywhere. He became lost in his antics; so much, in fact, that he did not notice a royal pegasus guard entering the bathroom until said guard slipped on the water on the floor and did a backflip, landing on the ground with a solid thump.
Isaac jumped, snapped from his fun-filled stupor as the guard groaned and sluggishly rose a hoof to rub the back of his head. “Are you okay, mister?” the colt asked, a frown on his face.
“I’m fine, just hurt my back is all,” the guard groaned as he rolled over and rose onto his hooves. “I take it you’re having fun?”
“Yeah, until I heard a thump and saw you on the floor,” Isaac answered with a nod. “It’s been too long since I had a bath.”
The guard blinked and nodded back with a simple, “I see.”
The colt spread one of his wings and looked at it. “How do I clean my feathers?”
The guard let a small smile spread on his face. “I’ll help you. Preening’s easy.” With that, he carefully trotted over and inspected the spread wing closely. The feathers were in complete disarray, and some had soapy froth clinging to them as a result of Isaac's splashing spree. "You're gonna have to rinse your wings before I can preen them proper."
"Why?" Isaac asked, tilting his head.
"Because we… use our mouths to preen our wings. And soap… tastes bad," the guard awkwardly explained, sending the colt a serene but faltering smile. Isaac nodded in understanding, and dunked his spread wing in the water, using a hoof to clear a path in the suds and grinning when some of said suds jumped ship and landed on the floor. Then he spread his wing again, and the guard waited for it to dry a bit before diving in face-first to start the preening process.
Isaac winced at first, the feeling of a mouth and teeth properly aligning his feathers into place sending shivers running up his spine and caused quite the unfamiliar feeling to spread along his body. Though after a bit it felt like he was being poked at in a sensitive spot with just the right amount of force. As a result, he began laughing, and the guard pulled away. "It tickles, I assume?" he asked with another genuine smile, and one that didn't falter.
"Yeah. It just felt funny at first," Isaac admitted, an amused glint in his eyes that all but screamed 'do it again.' The guard was more than happy to oblige, and in a little under a minute the wing was pristine right down to the backside from which it had sprouted. Isaac turned so that his other side faced the guard and spread his other wing, though not before clearing another path in the suds and making more of them take a leap of faith from the tub as a result.
The process repeated anew, though the guard stopped seconds later when he saw some bent and broken feathers framing the primaries. "Oh dear," he murmured, his smile fading. "Kid… I'm gonna have to remove some of your feathers."
"Huh?" Isaac turned to the wing's feathers and scanned them, a brow raising as he found a few of them sporting 45-degree angles and jutting way out of proper alignment. One even stood upright like a bent middle finger that had yet to fully unfurl itself.
"See this one?" the guard asked, using a hoof to gesture to the upright feather. When Isaac nodded, he added, "Feathers like these… let's put it mildly, they're useless. They have to be in tip-top shape and arranged properly, so that you can fly right. It's going to hurt." With that, the colt winced and bit his lower lip, drawing blood as defective feathers were yanked out swiftly by a set of teeth.
The only saving grace was that the tickling feeling of having his other, in better shape feathers aligned properly offset the feeling of mild stinging as a faulty feather was plucked. Once the bad feathers were weeded out, and the good more or less arranged proper, Isaac released his lower lip, only to wince when doing so made another sting of pain flare right up.
"Alright, kid. You're good to go now. Wanna go see Luna?" the guard asked, reaching into the tub with his front hooves and scooping Isaac out effortlessly. He began flapping his wings, and as soon as he was airborne he left the washroom without even giving the colt a chance to dry himself off or unplug the tub.
"Today's gonna be a long day…" Isaac lowly mumbled with dread in his voice, though the flapping of the guard's wings all but drowned him out.
Isaac shivered as he was spirited away, idly considering that he was too weak to fight the guard off, even if he wanted to—granted, malnutrition and finding himself within a new body was just the tip of the iceberg. Another thing he hadn't considered until then: why had Luna given him meat to eat? Sure, the gesture was nice and made him feel a little more welcome… but, even sheltered as he was, he couldn't help but think: didn't horses stick to a true blue diet of greens? He made a mental note to ask about that.
Then again, he hadn't really expected Celestia to appear at all, much less actually bring him here. Fate, it seemed, decided to grant him a reprieve; though it didn't exactly erase the trauma he had to endure. All he could do was let the guard drag him… wherever, as fate had also taken away his few defenses he had in… the afterlife? Hell? Everything was making his head spin, and if he could he'd swear on his daddy.
Perhaps Luna would help him clear a few things up. Or, at least, that was his initial hope—Isaac really didn't pay attention to the various details of the halls as the guard whisked him through them, all he was really concerned about was where the halls would ultimately end up. Not that he had much of a choice in the matter; the guard was simply going fast enough the halls more or less passed by in a frantic blur alive with activity, some fellow guards stationed here or there, or the occasional maid cleaning the area.
There were a few fancily-dressed unicorns—why ponies could wear cloth, Isaac had as much trouble rationalizing as the guards' barding—scattered throughout the premises, though all he caught of them besides the clothes on their backs was their noses turned sharply upward in the air. An air of contempt wafted from those particular unicorns, but Isaac simply didn't have the opportunity nor time to figure out why. It made his feathers bristle nonetheless, and his ears pin back momentarily.
"Don't mind the nobles, kid," the guard told him as he flew over the unicorns, trying his best to sound fatherly. "A lot of them have been irritated as of late."
Isaac wilted at that. "Wh-what got them mad?" he asked, half-afraid of the answer.
The guard shrugged as best he could. "Politics. I'd get into the nitty-gritty, but that'd probably bore you to tears," he answered earnestly. "Basically, the really short version is things are not going their way."
Isaac nodded, understanding the gist of that. He knew what it was like when things didn't go his way… such morbid thoughts made him shiver again. He tried to not think about such things; that was in the past, outside of the dream world.
But then again, why had Azazel contacted him—assuming that was the real deal? He almost didn't want to find out, and if Luna knew more of the bad dream in which Azazel had arrived, he doubted that she would blame him for trying to be willfully ignorant. Either way, he had far too many questions weighing on his woefully-underdeveloped mind, and if he didn't get them off his chest he'd probably end up rattling off the most uncomfortable ones first at the worst time possible.
Isaac didn't bother keeping track of time; some part of him didn't want to start asking the guard the time-worn question of "are we there yet?" And besides, he saw painfully few clocks—and things that he thought were clocks, for that matter—throughout the trip thus far. All he knew was a sinking feeling of dread at it all; he didn't know why it had to hit him now of all times, but it bit him and bit him hard in both cutie marks.
Eventually, he couldn't say when, the guard came to a stop before two of his similarly-dressed fellows that stood in front of massive double doors which looked to be hewn of solid wood, sporting a gold trim. "I brought our guest colt for an audience with Princess Luna," the guard holding him spoke.
The other two shared worried glances, brows slanted and everything. Isaac cringed when they turned to him specifically. "Um… he's looking a little ragged," the guard on the left side of the doors muttered. "Are you alright?"
Isaac nodded. "Just couldn't dry off," he muttered.
The guard on the right side of the doors lifted a hoof and smacked his face with it. "For crying out loud, Aegis Lux, let the kid finish whatever business he has before dragging him here!" he howled in exasperation. "I'm surprised the Princesses let you foalsit him!"
Aegis Lux let his ears fall back, a blush of embarrassment spreading to their tips. He glanced at Isaac. "Sorry, kid… got carried away," he mumbled apologetically.
"It's okay… happened all the time where I came from," Isaac muttered in reply, having the decency to look embarrassed on Aegis' behalf.
The guards posted at the double doors shared another glance, the righthoof one dropping his raised foreleg with a distinct clang that Isaac could've sworn sounded exasperated in itself. "Great, he's undergoing culture shock," the leftmost one muttered, mouth barely moving.
"If that's the case, I'm surprised he's taking it well for his age," the rightmost guard whispered in agreement. Reluctantly, they turned to push the doors open, and a massive, hall-shaking creak pierced the air as they swung inwards. The room inside was massive, stained glass windows at its top filtering light down on rows upon rows of pews. Behind those pews stood tall seats and massive desks, though for what purpose Isaac would not have been able to even guess, were Princesses Celestia and Luna not presently sitting in two of those seats with a third, pink mare he hadn't seen before. The pews were packed with more dressed unicorns, all of whom turned to Aegis Lux as he flew in, every single face slack-jawed and incredulous. More than one set of eyes, Isaac noted to his growing trepidation, looked at him with hatred—yet he could not count them all.
In a twisted way, it sort of reminded him of the churches back home.
It was then that Princess Luna spoke, her voice causing the gathered mass to turn to her as her voice rang across the room with clarity, "Ah, the orphaned colt. Aegis Lux, come bring him to sit next to mine podium."
At that moment, a dressed unicorn stood up and threw his forehooves in the air. "Why did you bring a mangy pegasus foal here?! Look at him! He's not fit for being so much as a hoofservant!" he howled.
Luna banged her hoof on her podium firmly, turning to glare at the standing pony. "Silence! He is a guest, and thou shalt not refer to him in such an unsightly manner!" she barked, voice holding a dangerously sharp edge tethering on anger. The standing unicorn sat down with an unintelligible grumble, and Aegis took his cue to fly up to Luna personally.
The pink mare eyed Isaac with nothing short of worry. "Auntie, is he well?" she asked. Celestia turned to her and shook her head.
"Far from it, but he is recovering," Celestia muttered somberly as Isaac was placed on the podium.
