TiM story number 15. Moving on with your life after the loss of a loved one, the grief never fully goes away.
Story number fifteen of the Twilight is Magic series. See author notes in first chapter for link to read order.
Radiant Star, son of Princess Cadance and Prince Shining Armor. Royal Prince of the Crystal Empire, widow to Princess Firestar, and father to the twins Flash and Blaze. And loving uncle/cousin to many many foals from Princess Twilight and Rainbow Dash's family. He's had a long life, one filled with pain. But also filled with love and happiness. Indeed, to most ponies he has a life to be coveted, one to idolize and long for. There’s just one problem.
Radiant Star isn’t living his life. Radiant Star is simply waiting to die.
It was the smell. The smell of lilacs and roses woke Prince Radiant Star that night. He’d just gotten to sleep, the task of running an entire empire without his mother, wife, or sons weighed heavily on his old frame. He’d thought about quitting more times than even Twilight could’ve kept track of. He hated it, he hated the show, he hated the grander, and he hated having to pretend like he was okay.
He was not okay, he was anything but okay. Every day was nothing but pain and sorrow. Every single day that passed felt like the worst in his life, and they just kept getting worse. Each day he’d wake up and notice—first thing—that she wasn’t there. She wasn’t by his side. For how could she be? She was gone... lost... dead.
Firestar; his wife, and in his not unbiased opinion, the most beautiful mare that had ever lived. The mare that showed him life was worth living, that he could—and should—live for something other than himself. The mare that brought him happiness, that showed him what happiness even was. She had been taken from him, snatched in the worst way possible. She had been killed by his mother, Princess Cadance.
No, that wasn’t right. Princess Cadance hadn’t killed his wife; rather, she had been used as a tool to kill his wife by the monster Mindsink.
Twelve years ago, Radiant Star had exacted his revenge. Blessed by the power of the god Eros, power that had been delivered by his spirit of his love, Radiant had conjured a blade capable of cutting the world itself in half and split the psychopath in twain.
That was the day that taught Radiant the worst truth the world has to offer: revenge solves nothing. Yes, he killed his wife’s murderer, something most would take pride in; even more so because Mindsink was a demigod on par with his niece, Princess Shimmering Night. But that didn’t change the fact that Firestar was dead.
Nothing could change that.
Ever.
He could be considered luckier than most, Radiant Star was given Eros’s blessing through his dead wife. The God had parted the veil between life and death and allowed one final moment between the two. Radiant got to talk to his wife, to hold her, and to kiss her one final time. He got to say goodbye, he got to tell her how much she meant to him, and to hear about how happy she had been with him. How fulfilled he had made her in life.
And, in a double-edged blade, he got to know, to truly know that her love for him was just as deep as his love for her, if not deeper.
That boon came with one last request. The hardest vow he had ever had to uphold. Harder than surviving a titan falling on him, she’d asked him to keep going. She made him promise to carry on, for her, and for their sons. Her last gift to him.
Had he known it would be this hard, he might have said no. No, he could never tell her no for anything. She got her way one-hundred percent of the time. As in life so in death, as, even dead, he’d still been unable to tell her no.
So he did like any good soldier: he followed orders. He followed his wife’s orders. To Radiant, there was no higher authority on the planet. He played the part, with the help of Twilight and Night, he kept the Crystal Empire running, he was there for his sons. He watched as Flash and Vela developed a rather… inappropriate relationship with each other, but nopony that saw them could ever doubt how they felt for one another. He watched as his son Blaze found a rather… interesting companion in a colt. It made Blaze happy, so Radiant didn’t say anything.
Radiant’s happiness? That was waiting for him on the other side. Sure, he was happy for his sons, proud even as he watched them come into their own. But he himself couldn’t be happy, not without… her.
He had stopped crying himself to sleep each night four years after her death. It hurt, it left a gaping hole in his heart, but he simply had no more tears to cry.
Or so he thought.
On the tenth anniversary of her death, he cried again at night. And he’s cried himself to sleep ever since for one important reason: he could no longer remember her voice.
It was absurd. Every day of his life he’d held tightly onto her memory. He replayed her last words to him, the promise of that day, the last thing they had ever said to one another. He remembered it like it was happening right then. He visualised how she felt, how she smelt, the tears she cried, her laughter, her sorrow, and her beautiful smile.
Yet against all rhyme or reason, on that day, ten years after her death, Firestar’s voice, how she sounded, it escaped him.
The self-recrimination began soon after. He felt like he betrayed her, like he was forgetting her, he called himself every insult, every barb he could, and he cried again. He cried like a colt that lost his favorite toy.
He cried himself to sleep. Forcing himself to stay up as long as he could, to bare through the pain.
She was gone, and he had forgotten her, he deserved no less.
Her voice, her sweet voice was no longer in his memory. He just couldn’t… couldn’t remember.
That part of her was gone, lost to the true enemy, that bastard called time.
But her smell? That was still his, that he could never forget.
It was little wonder he woke up when it drifted into his nostrils.
The white unicorn with the cutie mark of two swords clashing shot up in a cold sweat. Firestar, Radiant thought. His eyes quickly adjusted to the darkness as they darted around the room. Looking for any sign at all of his beloved. Logically he knew she was not there, that she was gone, dead. But experience had taught him that anything was possible. That logic had little sway over the power of gods.
There was no sign of her. His room was empty, dark, and cold. The room was exactly as he had last seen it through his tear-stained eyes.
Radiant took stock of the situation. I’m dreaming, it was just… just a dream, he told himself. He shut his eyes and took three deep breaths, just as his mother Cadance had taught him all those years ago. In through the mouth, out through the nose. In through the mouth, out through the nose. In through the mouth, out through the nose.
When he felt his heart start to slow down, Radiant Star shut his muzzle, closed his eyes, and laid back down. He fully expected the tears to start up again at any moment.
There was activity with his eyes, just not tears. Radiant’s eyes shot open as he breathed in his wife’s sent through his nostrils again. He shot up and threw his covers off the bed. Taking another whiff through his nostrils, he smelt her once more, even stronger.
Firestar! Radiant’s mind screamed as he kept sniffing the air. He moved quickly, running to the other side of the room near the doors and windows. The scent was stronger the closer he got to the window. A window that was—for some reason—now open.
Radiant didn’t pause to try and figure it out, in truth he didn’t even notice. The old stallion stuck his head out the window and quickly looked around. His eyes darted to and fro, until, at last, they rested upon a spot in the distance.
In the local park, moonlight dripped down from above in a column of coalescent energy. It seemed to highlight the center of the park, radiating outward in a blessed light that seemed to flow in magical waves that closely resembled those of the Crystal Heart.
He knew without being told, that those waves were not coming from the Heart. The Crystal Heart was kept on guard twenty-four seven against anyone that might try and snatch it. Experience with titans had taught them that lesson.
Radiant teleported down from his room to the base of the Crystal Castle. He teleported and ran as fast as his four hooves could carry him. There wasn’t a doubt in his mind that Firstar, or at least her smell was coming from the epicenter of that light.
The white unicorn zipped past empty shops and streets. His eyes were locked upon the light illuminating the night sky. Not that he needed it to tell him where to go. Outside, this close, he could smell her. His wife’s scent was clear as day to him, the perfume she loved to wear filling his nostrils, granting his old bones strength that he otherwise would not have had.
He rounded the bend, his path having cleared the city streets and houses to take him right to the park. What he saw there, who he saw there, it took his breath away.
A tan pegasus mare with a sky-blue mane looked up from the center of the light. Her blue eyes locked upon Radiant’s and she did the most wonderful thing in the world: she smiled.
Radiant’s jaw dropped as he watched Firestar walk... glide over the grass to him. The mare’s eyes never left his, her beautiful smile never fell from her face.
He couldn’t look away. Not even if Firestar was a second Equestria-bound sun, one that would’ve blinded him for life, he would’ve gladly traded his eyes for this one moment a million times, no, a billion times over.
To his eternal delight, Firestar didn’t take her eyes off him either. The mare floated as if on the wings of an angel directly to her love. His body was overtaken by her scent, by her. As such he didn’t even realize when their lips pressed together. When he felt her kiss again, when he felt her warmth again.
A part of his brain, a part he’d lobotomized if it got in the way right now was screaming at him. It was telling him that this was impossible, that he was falling into a trap, that Firestar was anything but Firestar. That he was being dumb, that this could lead to greater trouble than he could possibly know.
The rest of his brain had that section duct-taped, straight-jacketed, muzzled, buried in cement, and thrown into the deepest ocean with ten-thousand pound weights chained to it.
The cold vanished from Radiant’s body the moment their lips had connected. He couldn’t remember the last time he’d felt so warm, so energetic, so invigorated. It was as if her single kiss was the most welcoming fire he’d ever experienced. As if nothing else existed in all of Equestria.
The cold, the snow, the night, the building, the street, and even the grass, it was all gone, all melted away in that one moment.
Firestar pulled her muzzle away from his and tilted it in just that way he remembered, letting her blue and white mane fall over her right eye. The smile on her face, the way she held herself, the way her hair had fallen just so, it all said more than words ever could.
He answered her unasked question, her—did you miss me?—look the only way he could. Radiant kissed her again, and again, and again.
After the seventh time, she raised her hoof and moved it to his face, wiping the tears away from his eye. There was a look of concern on her face as she examined just how much he’d been crying, how much he’d been hurting.
Radiant responded by wrapping her in a hug and burying his muzzle into the side of her neck. At that moment a dam burst behind his eyes as they poured tear. The unicorn could only sob while inhaling her sent with every gaping breath he took.
A hoof wrapped around his neck, returning the gesture with an equal amount of force. Firestar let him cry out everything he had, everything he’d been building up for years. All the hurt, all the anguish, all of it, she took it from him, gladly.
Another part of Radiant joined the first in the ocean. It dared to doubt that this just might-possibly-maybe-could be, not Firestar. That Firestar would never put up with her prince sobbing like a filly into her mane.
Radiant Star’s body fell into the snow-covered grass. He didn’t even feel the cold, the wet snow, he just felt her, he just felt Firestar. For her part the mare simply followed her husband to the ground, not letting him go for even a second.
Enough time had past, they’d been apart for years. No more, not if either of them had a say in it anyway.
When she felt the tears stop, Firestar generally pulled her husband’s muzzle away from her fur and, without any malice at all, started to lightly chuckle at what she saw.
Confused, Radiant blinked twice—an action that felt like the first he’d done since he’d seen her—as he stared into his wife’s eyes.
There he saw it. He saw his reflection in those blue eyes. He saw his fur matted to his face, the—rather undignified—sobbing nature of his muzzle almost made him chuckle as well, almost.
Only Firestar would laugh at me at a moment like this. If there was any doubt that he might have had left that this wasn’t her, that action silenced it for good.
Radiant watched as Firestar’s giggle turned back into that lovey-lovey smile of hers. Again she pressed her muzzle against his own. The action seemed to share her warmth, her essence with the stallion all over again.
The wing she spread out started to glide gently down his flank in a smooth petting motion, hitting the spots only a true love could possibly know. Radiant almost purred like a newborn kitten at her touch. The softness of her fur, the way her feather teased, tickled, and satisfied all in one fluid motion, it was like nothing else in the entire universe.
After all, it was like her. And to the stallion there was nothing else like her in the universe.
He breathed deeply, refusing to let a single breath go by without knowing her smell, a single moment go by without knowing her touch, a second second to go by without seeing her all over again.
He’d already forgotten her voice, he refused to let himself forget anything else. This, whatever this was, a dream, a trap, a gift, a nightmare, he took it as an opportunity, an opportunity to never let anything else of hers go.
Never again.
Hours felt like seconds as he held on, as he remembered, as he experienced his wife all over again. The two did nothing, said nothing, they simply held each other, caressed each other, kissed one another. As such it felt like a shock to his system when the first rays of sunlight blinded the old stallion.
He blinked away the glare, an action that caused him no small amount of displeasure as it forced him to look away from Firestar. He rubbed his eyes with a hoof, desperate to see again, to ensure that she hadn’t vanished, that it wasn’t just a dream.
To his relief, she was still there, smiling at him when his vision cleared.
To his horror, she wasn’t fully there. The light seemed to pass right through her, almost as if she were transparent.
Radiant’s muzzle opened to speak, an action that Firestar put a stop to with another well placed kiss.
She smiled that smile of hers all over again as her form faded into the day’s rebirth.
Please find me, my idiot.
Radiant woke in a start. His breath heavy, his coat and bed soaked through with sweat. He found himself unable to catch his breath, unable to form conscious thought for the longest time. When thought returned only one thing raced through his mind.
Her voice… that was her voice… that was the voice of…
Radiant's eyes shot over to the two crystal guards that barged into his room. Both of them had worried looks on their muzzles. He knew, without being told, that he must look a mess. That his appearance would match how he felt.
What he didn’t know; what he had no way of knowing, was what he felt.
But that was something he could figure out later.
“I’m fine, it was just a dream,” Radiant said as he wiped one hoof over his face and waved the two guards away with his other.
“My Lord, you look…”
Radiant looked up. “What?”
“You look… different, Lord.”
“How so?” Radiant asked as he floated a mirror over to his bed to gaze at his reflection. “I’m a bit soaked but a bad dream will do that.” In truth he couldn’t actually say the dream was ‘bad’, but it was a reasonable excuse given the cold sweat he’d woken up in.
“You look… younger, Lord.”
Radiant stared at the guard in confusion before returning his gaze to the mirror. He squinted and glared at his reflection, trying to see what they saw. To him, to the ruling Prince of the Crystal Empire, he just saw himself. He saw the same, tired muzzle staring back at him, the same baggy eyes, and the same matted mane.
It wasn’t until he pulled the mirror back that he saw what the guards had seen. He did indeed look younger, about five years if he had to guess.
“Huh…”
“New rejuvenation treatment?”
Radiant chuckled at that. There were some of his family that would just love to get him the spa, to try and ‘magic the age away’ as Aurora might say. He’d politely refused, and then less-politely refused when they started to get annoying. The stallion had said that growing old was a sign of wisdom, that it was a privilege.
In truth he saw it as a mark of the passage of time, a sign that he was one day closer to seeing her again. But he would never tell them that, they’d never understand, they’d try and ‘fix’ him. There was no fixing him. He was half a soul, half a being waiting patiently until the day he would be reunited with his other half.
“New diet, must be working,” Radiant lied as he waved a hoof again, dismissing the guards.
“You’ll have to share the details one day, my Lord. I know my wife would love to know what your secret is,” one of the guards said with a chuckle as they turned around to leave.
“Heh, maybe one day,” Radiant replied as he placed the mirror down on the bed and went to stand up. The feeling of his hoof hitting the ground was paradoxal, his hoof felt both strong, stronger than it had in years, and shaky, like it’d fallen asleep on him.
Testing it several times, he followed up with a second hoof, then a third, and at last the fourth. All four hooves felt the same, at first. He shook his head as he finally regained his footing.
It’s like I just got off a ship, Radiant thought, the difficulty standing reminding him of the last cruise he’d been on. Based on the amount I sweat last night that might not be too far from the truth.
The last time he’d seen his bed this wet Flash had dumped a huge bucket of water on him while he slept, something he’d been egged on to do by his brother, Blaze.
Memories of his sons played through his mind, which inevitably led to thoughts of where they were now, or more specifically, who they were with. Between the special some ponies his two sons had found, Radiant was most off-putted by Flash’s. Vela, the hippogriff, was—technically—family. Vela’s grandmother was the brother of Flash’s grandfather which made them second cousins if Radiant did his math right. While nopony could ever cast doubt on how happy the two were being together, the looks they’d share, the smiles they’d steal, the way they made each other better, Radiant couldn’t quite put that factoid to bed, not fully anyway.
He resolved years ago to let them have their happiness. Such a thing was rare enough as-is, he’d never get in the way of that, not when it was as true as theirs was. Shaking his head, Radiant looked back at the mess he was leaving behind.
The maids are going to think I wet the bed, he mused, not really caring what they thought one way or another. But what was that…
Please find me, my idiot.
She’d said that to me…? I… I remembered her voice. I… after two years, I… I remembered her voice. Why?
Radiant found himself shaking again, shaking at his thoughts, at his memory of her, of Firestar. Every moment of the dream came rushing back like a raging river. Her smell, her touch, her breath, her feathers, her fur, her mane, her eyes, and even… her voice.
Radiant cried again. He let the tears fall freely as he remembered her voice, a voice he’d thought lost, forgotten forever to the passage of time.
Seconds were lost to minutes before the stallion recovered himself enough to carry on with his day. He knew not what had caused the dream, if it even was a dream, but there was nothing to do about it now.
While it hadn’t happened in a long-long time, it’d not been the first time he’d dreamed of her. And those dreams, just like this one, had left a mess.
Albeit then it had been a different kind of mess.
He sighed and walked into the bathroom. There was no way he’d step outside his chambers looking like he did.
Boredom, adjective, the state of feeling weary because one is unoccupied or lacks interest in one's current activity.
Radiant Star, the seventy-two year-old Prince, Son of Princess Cadance and Shining Armor, Nephew of Princess Twilight Sparkle, was used to being bored. Bored was the standard M.O. across all of Equestria, at least for ponies in his position.
Other ponies, they lived their lives, they went to their work, raised their families, and made friends. Radiant, he did not. Sure, he had a job, per se, but not really. Everything ran itself here, and elsewhere.
There were no major decisions to make, no crises to solve, no major threats to be dealt with—at least not in the last decade—and as such there was nothing to do. No decisions he made mattered.
His job—if you could call it that—was to sit upon a throne, listen to pompous ponies jabber on, spending words like they were foals with a bag of bits at the arcade, all the while saying absolutely nothing, with Radiant expected to smile and nod the entire time.
He’d lost track of the number of ribbons he’d cut or foals he’d kissed. The years of ceremonies, dedications, promotions, royal galas, balls, and millions of other events he’d attended blurred in his mind. All that was standard, normal, boring.
He was used to being bored, he welcomed it even, but today… today he felt something… something different. It was a feeling similar, yet different.
“Get on with it,” Radiant said, sighing, loudly, as the pony currently in the center of the court rambled on about a land deal.
Gasps filled the chamber as every pony, both nobel and servant, turned their gaze upon the prince.
“My… my lord?” the crystal earth pony asked, shocked.
Radiant realized what he’d said far too late to take it back, to stop the words from coming out of his muzzle. “Sorry, I mean… if you could…”
“What our Prince means is that today has been rather tiring, if you could… expedite what you need that would ensure he can get his rest,” one of the royal advisers said, stepping forward in an attempt to help.
Radiant nodded at him, grateful but also confused himself, What is his name again? In truth it was his advisers that ran the Empire, his job was just to stamp his hoof upon the paperwork and play the figurehead. When did I lose track of things like that?
The pony in the center nodded in understanding and continued on, off put but getting to the point. For Radiant’s part, he paid no more attention then he had before. His eyes darted to the ponies around him, taking in their faces as if it was the first time he’d seen them.
I know these ponies… I’ve worked with them, I trust them, why is it I don't know what their names are? Why can’t I… did I ever know their names? Did I ever care to learn them? He started to adjust his sitting position, unable to find a comfortable spot no matter how hard he tried.
Am I losing my memory? Radiant began concentrating on what he knew, on who he knew. He started by going over the—rather extensive—list of ponies he was related to. Next he went through all the events that occurred over the years. Finally he walked himself through Blaze and Flash’s life, from the moment of birth to current.
He got to the moment when, as a prank, his kids had shaved Cadence's mane before his adviser intruded. “My Lord, let’s take a recess. It looks as if you might need to stretch your legs.”
Blinking away the memories Radiant replied, “Y-yes, that sounds like a good idea. Old age and all. Thank you, Mr...”
It was a lie, in truth he hadn’t felt this good in years, but his mind just wasn’t in the mood for all this, it was… elsewhere. Worse his body matched, he felt nervous, jittery, and this just felt tedious.
“Fair Play, Lord,” the adviser said with a smile as he offered a hoof to help his prince off the throne.
Radiant didn’t need the help, but he knew that it’d go a long way to sell the lie. After all, if you’re going to use your age as an excuse to get out of work, it helped to look the part. “Fair Play, yes, I trust you can handle the rest of today’s schedule?” Radiant asked as he took the hoof and slowly got up.
When the unicorn nodded in agreement Radiant smiled back at him, “Old bones and all, tomorrow I should feel better. I just need to work out some kinks and get a good rest.”
“Did you not sleep well, my Lord? Bad dreams?”
Radiant paused at that. The dreams, the experience, her… they all came flooding back. “My… dreams? My dreams were fine, it was just a restless night.”
“Would you like a new bed, L—”
“NO!” Radiant shouted, a little more forceful then he meant to. Seeing the eyes of those left in the throne room turn towards him again, he forced himself to be calm. “No, no thank you. I’m sure tonight will be fine.”
He’d never get rid of his bed. He’d die in it if he had the choice. It’d been his marriage bed after all.
Fair Play nodded. “As you wish, Lord.”
With that Radiant turned and left. Not knowing or caring what else would happen in the throne room that day. In truth, if put to the test, he couldn’t recall a single thing discussed in there in the last ten years. As such, while it nagged on him that he was basically in dereliction of duty, he was easily able to move past it.
There or not there, it doesn’t matter. This Empire will be just fine when I’m gone. The thought brought both sadness and happiness. He was happy with how the Empire functioned, with how, well, everything was really. There or not there his ponies were going to be just fine either way and that’s all any leader could ask for.
He’d heard it said more than once that the mark of a good leader, a good ruler, was one that made themselves irrelevant. And while Twilight, Luna, and Shimmering Night would never claim something akin to that—after all, the sun and moon wouldn’t raise themselves—he could. And that was something he took pride in.
His sadness came from knowing his sons wanted nothing to do with picking up after their old man. Neither of them would rule when he was gone. Flash had flat out said as much. “Just let them pick their own leaders,” his words echoed from the past. “My place is here.”
Flash had found his new home in Warclaw, capital of the Griffin Empire. He’d went there years ago with Vela and, save for vacations, random visits, and holidays, simply never returned. Radiant recalled the last time he visited his son. Vela and Flash were racing through the sky, play fighting with real weapons. The two were, beyond a doubt, happy. If home is indeed where the heart is, Flash had truly found his home by Vela’s side.
The two even had a foal of their own with another on the way. Flash had confessed that he was nervous about that, after all their first took way too much after Vela, he doubted he could handle three of them, even with all the help in the world.
Aurora had called it the mother’s curse. Twilight, Rainbow, Shimmering Night, Taz, Nighttide, Luna, and Dayspring Gleam had laughed at that. That wasn’t something Radiant found funny.
Blaze, well… he was never an option.
Radiant loved his sons, both his sons equally, but if asked, with enough drinks in him, he’d be forced to admit that Blaze simply wasn’t born to rule.
Blaze was born to play pranks, to joke, to laugh, and to make others laugh. He was energetic, bouncy, a jokester through and through, but a ruler he was not. That pegasus couldn’t be serious for a minute if you put a sword to his neck.
He had found his love too, a colt by the name of Grilled Cheese, said to be the grandfoal of the legendary Cheese Sandwich. The two were making quite a name for themselves all over Equestria and beyond.
Radiant was proud of him. The ability to make others laugh, the ability to bring levity and humor to any given situation. That in and of itself was a gift.
They’re my gift to you, the last bit of me that you have.
Firestar had said those words to him in Tartarus. And, for the first time in two years, he remembered them in her voice.
That had been the last time he’d ever expected to hear her voice. That is until…
Please find me, my idiot.
“Lord?”
Radiant looked up in surprise at where he was. Somehow, lost in thought and with no real direction to go in, he found himself heading to the workout arena next to the Crystal Palace. A crystal pegasus guard was looking his way.
“Are you hurt, my Lord?”
“I—” He paused, noticing that the tears had started up again. “Just a walk through memory lane, that’s all soldier.”
“Good memories I hope?”
“Some of the best, and worst.” Radiant didn’t know why he was sharing so much. It was very unlike him.
“Worst?”
“What’s your name, soldier?”
“Bright Guard, Lord,” the pegasus said, snapping to attention.
“And, Bright Guard, how long have you been a soldier?”
“Three years, Lord.”
“You can drop the Lord title, Bright Guard. I haven’t been a Lord in decades. Right now I’m just an old pony.”
“But my Lo— Radiant,” he quickly corrected himself when he saw the look of dissatisfaction upon Radiant Star’s face. “You’re a hero to many in the Crystal Empire. I could never think of you as nothing more than an old pony.”
“A hero, huh?” Radiant chuckled a little at that. “Tell me, what do they say about me?”
“Lo— Radiant, you’re the hero of Stalliongrad, you were instrumental in defeating the titan, you returned the Crystal Heart, you helped end the scourge of the Demon God Red. You’re the son of the Crystal Princess. The ponies love you, we all do.”
Lies and half truths, they see me as a legend and the reality is, at best, I was nothing but a bit-player in those events. My Dad, he was the hero, he’s the one that saved the empire, that saved his family. He’s the one who gave his life for his people. Me… I just got lucky, I survived when my wife… All these years Dad, and I’m still chasing your shadow. Firestar… she just caused me to forget that.
“You didn’t see any of those things happen. How do you know they’re real? That they happened the way they said they did?”
Bright Guard looked as if Radiant had asked how he was sure that the sky was blue. “Lord?”
Radiant shook his head and walked away, knowing that he was pressing too far. A part of him didn’t care, it wanted to stamp out this legend Bright had in his mind, to tell the truth, to let it be known so he could be judged for what he truly was. I’m nothing but a failure. I couldn’t even protect the most important pony in my life. If I hate myself, why shouldn’t they?
Even getting revenge had changed nothing. What did it matter that he’d cut Mindsink, and the decaying body of Tartarus, in half? She was still dead. And nothing could change that.
He ignored that thought, pressing it far down. If they thought he was a legend, if that was his role, he’d play it. After all, they weren’t fully wrong, per se, it was simple exaggeration of events. A common phenomenon when larger than life things happen.
Survivors tend to be remembered as legendary heroes, as noble ponies that stood up to defeat the evil because it was the right thing to do, because of their natural heroism, because no matter the cost, they couldn’t allow such villainy to succeed.
The reality, of course, was nothing of the sort. Survivors, they’d just gotten lucky. They fought, not because of any grand idea, but because they didn’t have a choice. They fought to save their lives, or the lives of those around them. The few, the lucky few to call themselves such, they’d simply rolled the dice and gotten boxcars.
Many, most, they rolled poorly, or even just above average. They didn’t survive.
Radiant had survived. He’d survived over and over and over again. Each roll of the dice, each flip of the coin, and he’d come out on top, again.
Regardless of how much he might wish otherwise.
Firestar, you deserved to survive. You should be here, not me.
The old unicorn paused, noticing something odd. I’m not… I’m not crying anymore?
He’d expected the tears to flow again, to finally break down in a sobbing fit in front of everyone. But nothing came, there were no more tears to cry. Rather he found himself angry, angry at the loss, at the words Bright Guard had spoken, at the so-called legend he was supposed to be.
Buck it.
Radiant started running. He ran down the last flight of steps and onto the training field. His loss, his anger, his memories, his life, they all bounded together for the strangest reaction. They caused him to run.
Needless to say, it attracted the attention of every pony and griffin in the training field. Several guards ran up to him, catching up to him easily. “My Lord‽ What are you—”
That only served to piss him off even more. “Get out of my way!” The two guards gave each other a look at that order and slowed down, not letting him get too far away but also staying clear of his eyesight.
“Isn't he like... a hundred?”
“This can’t be safe…”
“Should we… should we call someone?”
“Who?”
“I’m going to go get a medic. Just in case.”
“He’s probably just pent up. Does anyone know how long it’s been since he’s gotten any exercise?”
“Dude, no one here is that old.”
Radiant overheard more and more comments from the random ponies he ran past. Each one only served to drive him on further, faster. Or at least as fast as his seventy-two year old legs could take him.
The two guards directly behind him didn’t even break a sweat holding pace.
Round and round the track he went. Radiant completed a full three laps before he felt his energy start to wain. He pushed through, forcing himself to bear it, refusing to listen to anyone that tried to stop him.
He wanted this, he wanted to run, to force himself to the brink, to know what that felt like one more time. No one would stop him.
“Oh, who you running from uncle? Or is this a chase? Maybe it’s those two guards? Do you want me to take them? I bet I could, I’d rustle their fur so badly they wouldn’t be see-through for a month! Are you exercising? I’ve never seen you exercise before? Do you want me to keep track? How many laps have you done? Can you beat me? How fast have you gone before? How—”
Radiant almost tripped over his own hooves as a mint-green bat-pony with a mane that sparked like stars at night in five different shades of blue that merged into purple flew upside down over him while launching a barrage of questions he had no chance in Hades of answering. Her clear, golden eyes were almost hypnotizing to look at.
Nightshade landed on Radiant’s back, her light frame barely noticed by the unicorn. Her words though, that was something he took heed of.
“Don’t worry uncle, I’ll get them!” Nightshade shouted as she launched herself from Radiant’s back, with more force than he expected, directly at the two guards that had been keeping pace.
He quickly came to a stop and spun around, worried that the two might hurt her in some way. What he saw showed that he worried for nothing.
Nightshade was crawling all over one of the earth pony guards that had, up until this point, simply been keeping pace with their prince. The little bat-pony used a combination of wings and teeth to try and playfully maul him.
In Radiant’s opinion, she looked like a kitten attacking a hoof with all its might.
“Leave my uncle alone, evildoer!” Nightshade said with a growl as she sank her teeth into the pony’s ear and hung from it.
For his part, the guard stoically took it.
Nightshade lost her gip and fell right on her rump. The little mare rubbed her butt before looking up at the guard in a pouty face. “Hey, I got you!”
The guard’s deminer broke, “Ah, my training never prepared me for the deadly assault of such a vicious thestrial. I’m down, avenge me!” He fell to three hooves, then two, then rolled over onto his back, playing dead.
“Against such fearsome attacks? I must sound the alarm, the Empire doesn't stand a chance!” The other guard yelled out before turning around and running away.
Nightshade turned around and stuck her chest out in pride. “Ha, I got them for you, uncle!”
For what felt like the first time in forever, Radiant Star smiled. It wasn’t forced, it wasn’t because he was supposed to, but because he felt joy. Because, looking at this little miracle directly in front of him, this gift of pure heart, of pure kindness, he simply couldn’t do anything else.
Given that the Element of Kindness had chosen her as its bearer before she was even born, that came as little surprise.
“The wrath of Nightshade has been felt in the Crystal Empire. Stories will be told of this day.” A voice came from behind Radiant. One he recognized all too well.
Turning his head to look at the newcomer, Radiant asked, “Dayspring, brother, how could you bring such a horror to my Empire?” The two weren’t literal brothers, but that didn’t stop them from sharing the bond of brothers.
“I’m not a horror, that’s mean!” Nightshade yelled in protest. Her ‘victory’ all but forgotten at Radiant’s words.
“Oh little one?” Dayspring said as he walked towards her, “I disagree. I’d say you’re a horror of adorkable proportions.”
“That’s not even a word!” Nightshade huffed out in denial at the unicorn.
Radiant laughed. “Yes it is. And I think it perfectly describes you.”
“Indeed,” Dayspring nodded.
“What’s it mean‽” Nightshade asked, still unsure if they were playing with her.
“Adjective, unfashionable or socially awkward in a way regarded as appealing or cute,” Dayspring said with enjoyment in his voice. Teaching was something he always took pleasure in.
“Adorkable horror?” Nightshade asked as if she were testing the term on her tongue.
“The most,” Dayspring said with a smile as he nuzzled her with his muzzle.
Five silent seconds passed as the two unicorns watched the bat-pony roll the term around in her head. Her decision reached, she shot up ten feet into the air. “Crystal Empire beware! I’m the Adorkable Horror, Nightshade!”
The two laughed as she shot away to the nearest pony, play attacking them just as she’d done the first guard.
“Soldier, what is your name?” Radiant asked the guard still playing dead on the floor.
He shot up and to attention. “Strong Heart, Lord.”
“Watch her for me,” Radiant said. “Not a hair on her head is to be harmed.”
“Yes sir!” Strong Heart saluted and turned to run.
He was stopped when Radiant gave a final warning in a much more commanding voice. “Not, a, hair.”
Strong gulped a little as he ran off faster than before.
Dayspring looked over at Radiant. “Is that a worry?” he asked in disbelief. He couldn’t imagine anypony anywhere in Equestra actually harming Nightshade. Maybe a stern talking to, Luna knew it wouldn’t be her first, but harm?
“No, I just wanted to make him sweat for making me look bad,” Radiant replied with a chuckle.
In spite of himself, Dayspring took one last look down the field just to make sure. He saw that the newest Adorkable Horror was already making a name for herself. Nightshade was leaving a trail of faux corpses in her wake as she leapt from pony to pony, attacking each in much the same way she’d attacked Strong Heart.
Dayspring chuckled and knew that—at best—they’d have five minutes to talk. Nightshade quickly took up new activities, but tired of them easily. When that happened she’d be back. “Speaking of looks,” Dayspring said in an almost lecturing tone. “What in Tartarus were you doing anyway?”
“What do you mean?” Radiant asked defensively.
“Don’t give me that. Running, at your age?”
“I’m not that old,” he lied.
“You’re in your seventies. Exercise, fine, heck I approve, but you weren’t exercising, you were running. Sprinting even. I fully expected you to fall on your muzzle and break something when I saw you.”
“You never needed to just… run?”
The deadpan look Dayspring gave him told Radiant all he needed to know.
“Okay, maybe not you, but I’m not like you. I’m used to being physical, to keeping my strength up.”
“Why are you bucking lying to me?” Dayspring asked in a tone that said he wasn’t buying any of it. “You haven’t trained in at least a decade.”
Radiant glared at him, a stare that Dayspring matched point for point.
It was Radiant that broke first. He knew it was pointless, that Dayspring saw right through his facade. He was right, and Dayspring was impossible to argue with when he knew he was right, something made worse when you knew he was right as well. Radiant sighed and sat down on his flank. “Fine, no I wasn’t trying to exercise. Now wipe that smug look off your muzzle. ”
“So what the buck where you doing?” Dayspring asked as he sat down on his stomach, enjoying the feeling of the soft, cold grass on his fur.
Radiant recognized the tactic instantly. Dayspring had established dominance over him with his forceful questions and glare, then when compitulated too, he got down lower than him, putting Radiant at a high plane of eyesight and thus at ease.
You’re as manipulative as ever, but damn if it doesn’t work, Radiant thought. “Something happened last night, I’ve been feeling… ancy? Fidgety? Like I have ants in my fur... It’s like my skin wants to leap off my bones.”
“That’s not too uncommon. Is this the first time you’ve been out of the castle in a while?”
“It’s not cabin fever,” Radiant said, already knowing where Dayspring’s mind was going. “My mind too, I’ve not been able to concentrate on anything today. I keep drifting off.”
“Sounds like cabin fever.”
“It’s not! It’s… I don’t know. I’ve been… ugh…”
“Ancy, pent up, frustrated, unable to concentrate. Knowing you, overworked, not taken a day off in months, too concerned with duty and keeping appearances.”
“You’re an ass.”
“Uh-hu. And you’re still…” Dayspring paused, considering his next words very carefully. After a few pregnet seconds he practically whispered, “You’re still missing her, you’re still blaming yourself, aren’t you?”
“Firestar! You CAN say her name around me, you know‽”
Dayspring stood up to his full height. “Can we? Look how upset you get when you say her name.”
Rage returned to the white unicorn. “I should buck your teeth out for that.”
Power started to build on Dayspring's lavender horn. “There was a time, in your prime, you could do just that. But we both know that, right now, you wouldn’t stand a chance against me. You’ve gotten soft, lazy, old.”
A sword flashed into existence behind Radiant. “Shall we test that theory?”
“Go ahead, prove me right.”
The staredown lasted longer than Dayspring thought it would before the sword vanished. Radiant huffed and sat back down on his flank. “I bucking hate you some days.” They both knew that there wasn’t another pony in all of Equestria who’d talk to Radiant the way that Dayspring did. But that was a double-edged sword.
“I know you do,” Dayspring replied. “But I think my point was proven anyway.”
“You’re not as smart as you think you are.”
“Yes I am. Sure, that pisses ponies off sometimes, but I’d like to think that the good outweighs the bad.”
“The bad being your ego.”
Dayspring laughed at that. “Coming from The Greatest Swordstallion in all of Equestria, I’ll take that as a complement.”
“Luna, I really did call myself that, didn’t I?”
“Well, you weren’t wrong. Although I’m pretty sure that Vela could take you these days,” and with a quick glance over Radiant’s frame, Dayspring added, “and quite easily at that.”
It was Radiant’s turn to laugh. “Yeah, she probably could. Those days… I was something else. We were something else, weren't we?”
Dayspring glared over at him. “What’s this ‘we were’ business. I AM something else.”
“Sweet Luna, could you give it a rest?”
“My wife doesn’t rest for anything.”
“You know what I mean.”
Dayspring chuckled. “I’m just messing with you. In truth, I feel it too. Even with the years I skipped.”
“Bit unfair, you know. You were born a year after me, yet now you’re what? Ten-twenty years younger then you should be?”
“Oh don’t you start, Aurora gives me enough shit about it.”
“Really? She looks younger than you do.”
“Yeah, but she’s pissed that she has to work for it.” He paused, “Speaking of age. You look…”
“About five years younger than the last time you saw me?” Radiant said, already expecting where Dayspring was going.
“Yeah, so about ten years older than you should look.”
“Funny,” Radiant said.
“But seriously, wha—”
Dayspring never got to finish his sentence as at that moment a mint-green bat-pony all but slammed into him. Nightshade hugged her uncle with all her might. “Uncle! I saw a crystal pegasus, a crystal unicorn, and a crystal earth pony, and then this crystal guard started to chase me around, but I fought them all off!”
Dayspring glanced down the field at the ‘corpses’ she had left in her wake. He was impressed, Nightshade had managed to down every pony she’d found, even if some were starting to get up and return to their tasks. The only pony that hadn’t been mauled was Strong Heart who was galloping back as fast as his legs could carry him.
Radiant saw him too and smiled, his small revenge for earlier complete.
Only Rainbow Dash had the speed necessary to keep up with this filly’s energy, a random earth pony? Even a trained guard? He never stood a chance. “Strong Heart, thank you. You’re dismissed.”
Completely out of breath, Strong only had the energy to salute before turning and running away with whatever strength he could manage. Fear that Nightshade would take off again and he’d be sent out after her granted the stallion a fresh surge of energy.
A loud ‘PFFT’ was heard as Radiant turned back to Nightshade. The filly blew the guard a raspberry as he left. “That meany wouldn’t fall down like everyone else.”
“Really?” Dayspring asked in surprise.
“That might have been my fault. I gave him an anti-adorkable shield,” Radiant said.
“Ohh, that explains it. But why did you do that?” Nightshade asked, looking slightly hurt.
“Someone had to give you a decent fight, no?” Dayspring asked as he picked the filly up with a hoof and placed her on his back.
“Yep, that makes sense, everypony else went down like chumps!”
Radiant laughed at that. “Young one, you are a gift, do you know that?”
“Yep! That’s what everyone tells me!”
“It’s true,” Radiant replied as he nuzzled her ever so softly. “Having you around is always a gift to me.”
“I like that,” Nightshade replied.
“Like what?” Dayspring asked.
“Giving gifts to ponies,” Nightshade said matter-of-factly. “It’s the best thing I know. It’s better than getting gifts myself.”
“Oh? Why’s that?” Radiant asked.
“Because when I get a gift only I’m happy, but when I give a gift everyone else is happy, and that makes me happy too, so everyone is happy.”
Dayspring was practically beaming with pride when he next spoke. “Out of the mouths of foals.”
“Is there something in my mouth?” Nightshade asked, suddenly concerned.
“The wisdom of the ages,” Radiant said as he playfully cuffed her mane.
“I don’t remember eating that,” Nightshade said as she made a point of pulling away from Radiant’s hoof and fixing her mane.
Both Radiant and Dayspring laughed at that. Nightshade gave them both her ‘angry face’ before Dayspring turned his head as best he could to look at her. “Ready to go see the Crystal Heart next?” Dayspring asked, breaking her concentration and causing her smile to return.
“Oh, is that what brought you two here? And here I thought you wanted to see me,” Radiant said with a faux hurt look on his muzzle.
“Oh shut up,” Dayspring said as he cut his niece off. “You were the first thing she wanted to see. But her first trip to the Crystal Empire would be wasted if she only saw you.”
“No it wouldn’t, I love uncle Radiant!” Nightshade said in protest. “But… he doesn’t come down often.”
“So the one thing she wanted for her birthday was to come see you. She said, and I quote, ‘if Uncle Radiant is so busy at work, he must need a break, and I want to give him one.’ So I volunteered to bring her. Called it a learning experience, even said I’d show her around. Although I did warn her that you might be too busy to spend time with us. She’d said that she’d take whatever time she could with you, no matter how little that might be.”
Dayspring’s words were like a sword plunged into Radiant’s chest over and over again. The worst part was the ‘out’ he’d left him. Dayspring had given him an excuse, all wrapped up with a pretty pink bow on top, if he wanted it.
“I sent a gift.” Even though ‘he’ wasn't the one that picked it out, he knew that somepony would have sent one in his name, especially as Nightshade’s birthday just happened to be on Hearth’s Warming Eve. But the excuse sounded weak even before the final word left his mouth.
“I know, and I liked the crystal pony figurine you got me, but I… I just wanted us to be together for my birthday, as a family. Everyone came, everyone, but you,” Nightshade said with tears starting to build up in her clear golden eyes.
Radiant Star, Prince of the Crystal Empire, had faced down Gods of Death, Titans, and even a Dark Revenant-Possessed Twilight Sparkle. But not even he could bear to hold Nightshade’s gaze for more than a second. “Work, it…” Radiant found himself at a loss for words. In truth he couldn’t remember what he did yesterday, or any other day in fact. He hadn’t even known it was Nightshade’s birthday. Not truly, he’d just knew that one of his advisers would have made excuses for him and sent something in his name.
“I think we’ve given the Lord of the Crystal Empire a hard enough time, don’t you?” Dayspring asked his niece.
“Oh, I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to make you sad Uncle Radiant,” Nightshade said, her own sadness forgotten at the thought of Radiant being upset.
He looked up at her. There was a look of genuine worry on her face. She’s concerned that I’m upset, he realized. That I feel bad. Radiant found himself flabbergasted, again. He’d been a jerk, he’d been the one to deny this young filly the one, completely unselfish, thing she’d wanted for her birthday. He’d not even remembered that it was her birthday, and yet she’d been the one to apologize to him.
“If that’s why you’re up here, then I must absolutely insist on something,” Radiant replied with all the authority he could muster.
“What?” Dayspring asked, although the look on his face showed that he already knew the answer.
“That I give the tour, personally.”
In a mint-green blur, Nightshade leapt from Dayspring’s back and almost tackled the old pony to the ground. The strength of her hug surprising the old stallion. “You mean it? Thank you, thank you, thank you!”
Radiant hugged her back with all the strength he could muster before looking up at Dayspring. “You wanted to see me too, didn’t you?”
“You’re my best friend. It’s been seventy years, and we’ve been through several lifetime’s worth of events, but that’s one fact that’s never changed, nor will it,” Dayspring replied, smiling. His smile faded as he added, softly, “We’ll talk later.” His last words said that talk wouldn’t be any fun, although, as with everything Dayspring did, it would be needed.
“Sure, when she’s asleep,” Radiant replied as he helped Nightshade climb onto his back. Her lack of weight again coming as a surprise to the stallion. “Until then, I think this one deserves the royal tour!”
“Onward and upward!” Nightshade shouted as she pointed a hoof at the Crystal Palace in excitement.
“We’ll end the tour there,” Radiant replied. “Let’s show you around the town first. I know a wonderful pie shop that I’m sure you’ll just love.”
“Onward to pie!” Nightshade exclaimed at the top of her little lungs.
“And we’ll end our tour here. This, young one, this is the pride and joy of the Crystal Empire. An artifact of immense power, the Occulous of the God Eros, the Crystal Heart.”
“It’s sooo pretty,” Nightshade said with wide eyes as she started to walk towards it, entranced by the blue energy coming off the heart. “Can I touch it?”
Two spears came down directly in front of her, blocking her path. Dayspring glared in anger at the two crystal unicorn guards that had dared raise their weapons against her. For his part, Radiant simply placed a hoof in her path and gingerly pushed her backwards. “Like I told you before we came to this chamber, no one is allowed to get near the heart, not until the Crystal Ceremony.”
“Not even you?” Nightshade asked as she looked up at her uncle.
“Nope, not even me. These two guards right there. They’re part of an elite cadre of crystal ponies that I had created called the Heart’s Guard. They’re tasked with the protection of the heart at all costs. Not even I can override their orders.”
“If they raise their weapons against my niece again…” Dayspring growled.
“They’re just doing their job, Dayspring. It’s nothing personal.”
Dayspring conceded the point. He didn’t like it, but he understood.
They both looked on in surprise as Nightshade leapt over Radiant’s hoof and walked up to one of the guards. The crystal pony stood tall, resplendent in his specially designed armor, one that made him immune to all but the most powerful spells. He looked down at her, but as she wasn’t approaching the heart, he made no move against her.
“Thank you for protecting the heart, Mr. Heart’s Guard,” Nightshade said with a smile as she hugged the unicorn.
To everyone's surprise, the stoic unicorn hugged back. “You’re welcome.”
Radiant found himself about to tear up when he noticed the strangest thing. A blue wave of energy was coming off the heart and going to Nightshade. It was small, slight, but still noticeable. It looks like… like it did in my dream, with… Firestar.
The day he’d had, the unexpected meeting with his brother, the pie, the inevitable cleanup afterwards, the tour of the town, it had all taken his mind off his dream. It served as a good distraction for the last few hours, but now the dream was back, fresh in his mind.
The mood changed when Nightshade returned to her two uncles, something Dayspring took notice of.
It wasn’t anything major, just the way Radiant carried himself from then on. It was small, slight, but noticeable to an old friend. Sure he still smiled and laughed at Nightshade’s jokes, but there was a heaviness to him, like a weight far greater than the little filly laid on his shoulders. “Nightshade, it’s getting late. How about we go to sleep?” Dayspring asked as they finished the tour and made their way into the throne room of the Crystal Palace.
“But I’m not tired, uncle,” Nightshade said, pouting a little. Dayspring knew it was for show, the two of them had been up for almost fifteen hours, he was feeling it, and so was she.
“You may not be,” Dayspring continued. “But your uncles are old, we need our sleep.”
Radiant looked over at Dayspring, confused. After a few seconds he nodded in understanding. It’s time for our talk, isn’t it?
“Okay, but… we’ll hang out more tomorrow?” Nightshade asked as she ran up to Radiant and pleaded with him.
“Of course,” Radiant said as he nuzzled her muzzle. “I’m yours as long as you’re here.”
“Yeah!!!” Nightshade shouted as she ran out of the room and up the stairs.
Dayspring and Radiant looked at each other, counting down the seconds. They got to ten before hearing her run back down the stairs. “Where am I sleeping again?”
Radiant chuckled as Dayspring smiled and turned to her, “I’ll show you. I trust you won’t mind if your favorite niece takes one of the royal suites?” he asked Radiant.
“I’d be upset if she slept anywhere else,” Radiant replied.
“That’s mean, you shouldn’t have favorites!” Nightshade said in protest as Dayspring led her upstairs.
Radiant jumped up onto his throne and sat down. The weight of the day finally taking its toll. “Now that, my dear niece, would be impossible,” he said to himself as he waited for Dayspring to return.
That wait turned out to be just as long as Radiant expected. He suspected, quite correctly, that Nightshade would browbeat Dayspring into a story, and then another, and another. He also suspected, again, correctly, that Dayspring was more than willing to give in to such demands just to see the smile on her muzzle.
After twenty minutes Radiant started kicking himself for not joining them. At thirty he jumped down from his throne to do just that, only to be stopped as soon as he saw Dayspring round the corner. “Can we talk here?” Dayspring asked.
“Yeah, I made sure the room is clear,” Radiant said, sighing as he jumped back up on the throne.
Dayspring watched, and, without a moment’s hesitation, walked over and jumped up on the throne right next to his.
Her throne.
“Brass balls,” Radiant said, eyeing him.
“I did get some of mother’s attributes,” Dayspring replied as he settled onto a throne that hadn’t had a flank parked on it for decades.
Radiant huffed as he looked away.
Dayspring simply watched him, waiting for the white unicorn to say something. When nothing happened, he made the first gesture. “If it bothers you I can get down.”
Unwilling to admit that it did, Radiant replied in a tone that said the exact opposite of his words. “It’s fine.”
“Well, if that’s how you feel I’ll stay put. It’s quite a comfortable seat.”
Several more seconds past, each filled to the brim with frustration and anger for Radiant. Finally the tension snapped. “Why do you go out of your way to piss me off?”
“Because you’re only ever honest when you’re mad,” Dayspring replied in a matter-of-fact tone.
“I don’t lie to you,” Radiant replied before adding, “much.”
“True, but you lie to yourself all the time.”
“Like what?”
“Like with how miserable you are.”
“What? How am I miserable? Give me one example!”
“I’m supposed to give you an example? Of what, the act you put on in front of us?”
“It wasn’t… an… act.”
“You were around Nightshade today, Radiant. She could make Tartarus smile like a filly. Also you were with me, your lifelong friend. That today, that was an act, that was how you wanted us to see you. That wasn’t how you are, that’s not you.”
“You know a lot about me.”
“Isn’t that my job?” Dayspring replied.
“Spying?”
“Concern,” Dayspring corrected.
“That depends on your point of view.”
“My point of view is that of a friend, a best friend. What’s yours?” Dayspring asked.
Radiant looked at the floor before replying, “Ass.”
“Dick.”
The two chuckled.
“She’d hate what you’re going, you know. What you’re doing to yourself.”
Radiant looked over, “You didn’t even know her.”
“Am I wrong?”
“...”
After a few seconds, Dayspring added, “Thought not.”
“It’s not always about being right, you know.”
“True, but it does help.”
“What does Luna see in you?”
“Someone who’s usually right.”
“And that doesn’t piss her off?”
“She’s old enough to not care anymore who’s right or wrong, she just wants what’s best for her ponies. In truth I think she just wants to make her sister proud. It doesn’t matter to her if she has the right answer or if it comes from someone else, just so long as we get it.”
In spite of himself, Radiant whistled, “You found yourself quite a mare. Firestar was… not like that.”
“Pretty sure being over a thousand years old will mature you.”
“True that.”
“So tell me, honestly, how are you doing?” Dayspring met Radiant’s eyes when he asked that question.
Radiant closed his eyes for a long second before opening again. He didn’t turn away from his friend as he said, “Not well.”
“Go on.”
“I’ve been… I’ve been a ghost. I haven’t been living my life, I’ve been surviving it. The exact opposite of what I… of what I promised her.”
“Your promise to her in Tartarus?” Dayspring asked. Of all their family, he’d only told Dayspring the full story of that event.
Radiant nodded, too afraid he might cry again if he spoke.
“You were doing good for a while. The fight against Typhon, the year after. But then you stopped.”
Again Radiant nodded.
“It was tough for you when Flash and Blaze left, wasn’t it?”
“They found their happiness. I wouldn’t…”
“Nor should you have. But I’m not talking about them, or any other. I’m talking about you.” Dayspring laid a hoof on Radiant’s hoof. “You live up here in solitude. I thought you needed space, that this was what was best for you. Maybe it was, in the beginning, but now I think it’s killing you.”
Radiant withdrew his hoof. “This is my responsibility.”
Dayspring gave him a deadpan expression. “Another could take it over.”
“Who?”
“Taz and Nighttide.”
“The fuck-bunnies? No.” When—based on the look Dayspring gave him—the usual insult proved to be ineffective, Radiant added, “Besides, they’d take Nightshade with them and then you and Lunar Light wouldn’t get to see her every day.”
Dayspring conceded that point, but added, “Ataxia and Shimmering Night.”
“Ataxia, up here? She’d melt the empire to the ground during the first winter.”
He conceded that point too before his mind thought of the perfect rulers to take Radiant’s place, “Echoside and Starlight.”
“I… They’re too young.”
“You know that’s BS. Starlight was born to rule, she’s more than ready and willing.”
“I…”
“You’re just trying to come up with an excuse not to leave. You know damn well that you’d be better off down in Canterlot with the rest of us. You’d be happier too. You’d be able to enjoy your life again and spend your days playing with your nieces and nephews.”
“Dayspring Gleam, let me make this as crystal clear as a crystal pony. I’m not leaving. I live here and I will die here.”
Even Dayspring was taken aback by the rage in Radiant’s eyes. But that didn’t stop him from seizing on the opportunity, “Why?”
“Because this is where we were together. I lived here with her, I’ll die here with her.”
“But she’s not here anymore. This is just a land, just a castle, just a flight of stairs, just a chair, just a table, and just a bed. The her you still hold on to, the her you made a promise to, she’s in your memories. And you take those wherever you go.”
“That’s not true,” Radiant said without meaning to.
“How so?”
“She… I’d…” Radiant struggled to find the words, he was losing the argument and simply couldn’t think of the words to make Dayspring understand. In the end he gave up and simply hoped he could convince him with the unabated truth. “I’d lost her, Dayspring. I’d lost her voice.”
Dayspring paused. The tears in Radiant’s eyes coming as a surprise to him.
“I couldn’t remember her voice. I’d just… I’d lost it.”
“Voices are the first thing to go, the first thing the memory forgets.”
“I’d held onto it for all these years, and two years ago, it just…”
Dayspring reached for Radiant’s hoof again, something the white unicorn denied him. “But last night it came back to me. I remembered her voice all over again. It came to me in a dream.”
“How?”
“I don’t know. It’s like my looks. How I look younger. That happened last night too. You weren't the first to comment on it.”
“So let me get this straight. Last night, out of the blue, you dreamed about Firestar, and then just happened to wake up looking five years younger this morning?”
Radiant nodded.
Dayspring’s horn glowed as he scanned the room, the palace, and then the empire itself.
“What are you looking for?”
“Somepony that has a deathwish,” Dayspring reliped as he continued his scan.
“You think somepony attacked me?” Radiant asked.
Dayspring paused in his scan with a ‘no duh’ look upon his muzzle. “And you don’t?” His tone was of somepony who knew from experience that such ‘gifts’ came at the worst costs.
“Well, if this is an attack they have a different definition of the term then I do.”
“You’re not that dumb. Nothing comes for free, Radiant. The younger you would be just as concerned as I am.”
Radiant rolled his eyes at that and waved a hoof for Dayspring to continue. Dayspring closed his eyes and powered his horn, returning to his work.
Luna this is boring. Radiant thought as ten minutes had passed. He knew Dayspring would be thorough. He could feel it, the skill, the power radiantating from the light purple unicorn. If he focused he could even track what Dayspring was doing.
That got old after five minutes. Dayspring started with a generic scan, then a specific localized scan, then a pony-by-pony scan. By the time he was done every single pony in the Crystal Empire, and some in the neighbouring counties, would have had their privacy magically invaded against their will.
Not that they’d have known. Radiant knew because of his proximity to Dayspring, and because he knew what to look for. While the Prince of the Crystal Empire’s skill with the sword might have dulled in his old age, it appeared that Dayspring’s skill with magic only sharpened as he got older.
As such he let it happen. In truth Dayspring’s concern weighed heavily on him. After everything they’d faced over the years this incident should have threw up every red flag Radiant had. Yet he hadn’t even considered the possibility that an evil force could have caused it.
“Nothing,” Dayspring said as he got up and stretched his hoofs.
“This really didn’t feel like an attack,” Radiant said camly.
“Still, I should probably tell mom about this.”
“Twilight? Why?”
“She could scan further then me. Night could even look into it. Just in case.”
“So you’re going to what? Send Twilight a message saying I had a dream and appear to be a little younger?” Radiant asked as he raised an eyebrow to Dayspring.
“Yes.”
“And completely ruin all their plains, causing everypony to swarm the Crystal Empire for days looking for something or someone not even you couldn’t find?”
“Yes,” Dayspring replied in his usual matter-of-fact tone.
“Meanwhile they’d prod me for as much information as I can remember, forcing me to tell them everything, all my deepest secrets no matter how much I’d wish otherwise.”
“Y— It’s for your safety.”
Radiant stood up while glaring at Dayspring. “Forcing me to talk about her, to everypony. Ones that would want to help me in their own—special—way.”
“...”
“The obvious always escapes you, Dayspring.”
“Fine, you’re right. I won’t do that to you,” Dayspring said as he stood up to match Radiant's height. “On two conditions.”
Radiant sighed. This was the Dayspring he remembered all too well. Yes his friend was a smart-ass, one that was usually right. But few saw his other side, his all-too-eager willingness to concede to a better idea but then immediately run with it in a direction you never saw coming.
“Fine, name them.”
“You let me scan you.”
Radiant’s face betrayed his shock, “You didn’t already?”
Dayspring shook his head. “You’re my friend, I wouldn’t do that without your permission.”
“And the second?” Radiant asked.
“You tell me everything. All of it. And not just the dream, but everything that’s happened in the last ten years, everything you’ve kept to yourself.”
“And I assume if I say no, you’ll send that message to Twilight?”
“It’s for your safety. I’d rather be wrong with you hating me then be right standing over your grave.”
“You really are a manipulative bastard,” Radiant said as he sat back down on his throne, getting comfortable.
“Not really, my parents were married.”
“Shut up and… get on with it.”
“So that’s a yes?”
“Yes,” Radiant said with a long drawn-out sigh as he saw Dayspring’s horn power up. “Everything stays between us though, right?”
“It’s a pinkie-promise,” Dayspring said back as he began the scan.
Dayspring performed the scan with all the thoroughness he did everything. Which is to say he left Radiant feeling violated on a molecular level by the time he was done. The light purple unicorn had taken his time, scanning every cell in Radiant’s body for the smallest amount of residual magic he could find, be that unicorn, alicorn, demi-god, or full-fledged god.
“I want dinner and a movie after that,” Radiant said as he shook off the lingering effects of Dayspring’s power.
“Funny, it wasn’t exactly a pleasurable experience for me either,” Dayspring relied.
“Bullshit, I’m sure you learned tons. And learning for you is always pleasurable.”
“Violating my friend’s privacy isn’t,” Dayspring replied with sad eyes.
That comment gave Radiant pause. An empty silence filled the chamber, one that quickly grew awkward before he found words to fill it. “So… what did you find anyway?”
“Well you’re completely unhealthy and out of shape. Your fat to muscle ratio is incredibly high, and you have the heart of a seventy-five year old.”
“Nothing new then?”
“And the cells of a sixty-five year old.”
“Wait, so it’s not just a one-time thing?” Radiant asked. “This isn’t just an off day or something?”
“No,” Dayspring replied as he sat back down. “Radiant you’ve gained between five and seven years, permanently.”
“By gain you mean?”
“De-aged. You’re physically younger. It’s no wonder you felt like you were jumping out of your skin today. Your body isn’t used to this energy, your lifestyle isn’t used to it.”
“How?” Radiant asked in disbelief.
“That’s where things get interesting. Your cells are brimming with excess energy, excess magical energy. Energy that’s far beyond my pay-scale.”
Radiant huffed at that. “Great, Gods again? Which one?”
“Well… yes. But that’s another conundrum. It’s not just one.”
“Huh?”
“It’s energy similar to Eros’ but mostly... Gaia’s.”
“Twilight?” Radiant asked in total disbelief.
“Yes.”
“Twilight’s screwing with me?”
Dayspring shook his head. “No, I said it’s similar. As in close, but not the same. Besides mom wouldn’t do that. Or at the very least Night or I would have noticed if she’d tried.”
“You’re going to message her anyway, aren’t you?” The involvement of God energy raised the stakes more than either of them felt comfortable with.
Dayspring thought about it. “I don’t know,” he answered truthfully. “Tell me what’s happened with you since Firestar’s passing, tell me what happened in your dream. Everything.”
Radiant sighed, loudly. He found himself conflicted, part of him, a large part, didn’t want to share a thing. His memories of her were his. Another part was screaming at him to tell Dayspring everything for the sake of his kingdom. It saw the dangers of this event, of what this could mean for more then him. He didn’t truly know what part was bigger.
Finally the unicorn came to a realization. Another part, bigger than the other two, wanted to tell, everything for his own wellbeing. It wanted to spill his guts out at least once before he died. And, it reasoned, there was no pony else who he could tell. Radiant wanted this, he needed this.
So Radiant told Dayspring everything. Everything he’d felt for the past decade. He told Dayspring about how he’d taken the news, how it’d broken him on the inside. How he’d even thought of killing himself immediately after. He told his friend how even his sons being around, their wellbeing, had done nothing to convince him otherwise. How he’d only carried on to seek revenge against Mindsink during those times.
He relived the events around his revenge, his last goodbye, and the promise he’d made Firestar. He emphasized how he’d promised to live a life that she’d be proud of, that’d show her he was worthy of spending all of eternity with her when they were finally together again.
Dayspring said nothing as he listened. He watched as his best friend in the world poured his heart out to him, and his tears. He felt his heart break a dozen times over for his friend’s suffering. Suffering he’d gone through alone.
Radiant confessed how he’d been the year after. The ‘role’ he’d tried to play, how he really did try to live up to his promise to Firestar. He told him about his life after Flash left for Warclaw. How he’d handled that. Then five years later, how it’d been when Blaze left.
Then he told him how his life truly was. How everything had become harder, how it felt like he was walking through water the entire time. Radiant told him how, two years ago, he’d forgotten her voice, and with it, any pretext to trying to keep his promise, how he’d given up on actually living his life. How he’d just wanted to die, how he was waiting to die, how he was still waiting to die.
It was at that moment he felt Dayspring’s hoof wrap around him pulling the two old ponies into a tight embrace. Radiant’s tears fell on Dayspring’s back and visa-versa.
“I’m so sorry,” Dayspring said.
“What are you sorry for,” Radiant all but choked out the old colloquialism.
“For being a bad friend,” Dayspring responded.
Radiant chuckled. “You’ve been a great friend.”
“No, no I haven’t. You’ve been hurting and I’ve only suspected… I left you up here all on your own and did nothing.”
“Dayspring, you have your own family, your own life to live.”
“When something, when someone matters to you, you make time for them, not excuses,” Dayspring said as he pulled back to look Radiant in the eye. “You matter. I should have made the time.”
“That sword cuts two ways,” Radiant replied. “I didn’t even make time for my niece’s birthday.”
“We can’t change the past, but we can learn from it so we do better tomorrow.”
“Always the teacher.”
“And the student,” Dayspring replied with a sad smile.
Radiant rubbed his face with his hoof, the toll of telling the story weighing heavily on his old frame. “I guess I should tell you about my dream now.”
Dayspring returned to Firestar’s throne and leapt on it. He settled in and nodded for Radiant to continue.
“I didn’t know I was dreaming. Not until I woke up. I was just lying in bed, just like any other day when suddenly, I smelled her.”
“Smelled?”
Radinant nodded. “Her scent came out of nowhere and faded just as quickly. It was like I’d just walked out of a room and caught a faint trace that she’d just walked down the hallway. I thought I’d imagined it at first. I even closed my eyes to try and get some sleep. And then it happened again.”
Dayspring simply nodded for Radiant to continue.
“Tracing the scent, I ran to the window and looked out. There was this… this light coming from the center of town. It reminded me of the Crystal Heart actually, with the blue magical waves to match. I teleported down and ran to it.”
He paused, choking up on the next bit. “She was there, Dayspring. Firestar, she was standing right there, right in the middle of the light. I stood, flabbergasted as she walked out of the light, right to me.”
“What happened next?” Dayspring asked.
“She… she… she kissed me. We kissed for the first time in a decade. I felt her lips, her breath. I started crying as she pulled back and nuzzled me. She even rubbed my back as I fell to the ground like a little colt, crying.”
“She just held you?” Dayspring asked as Radiant’s story broke down into sobs. He knew this was hard for the old stallion. Radiant wasn’t the crying type, but today he’d shown a side of himself that he’d never let anyone else see.
Radiant just nodded until he could regain his composure. “We stared into each other's eyes for the longest time, until… until the sun rose in the background. It almost blinded me with its brightness.”
“Did that cause her to disappear?”
“No, not at first anyway. She started to fade with the sunrise. But before she left she spoke to me. She said ‘come find me, my idiot.’ And then… then I woke up. Sweating more than I have in years, but I was in my bed. Like this,” he gestured to his hoof, referencing his age. “Her voice, it was just like I remembered it, before I, you know, forgot it. Ever since, I’ve been able to remember it all over again.”
Dayspring didn’t reply. He took it in, processing the data just like a computer would.
“What do you think it means?” Radiant asked, unable to keep the hopeful tone that this was somehow good news, or at the very least, that Dayspring might have the answer, out of his voice.
“I… I don—”
“Maybe she wants you to find her?”
Both heads shot to the door just in time to see a groggy mint-green bat-pony walk through it. At that moment, with the ‘cuteness’ succumbed by sleep, with the way she walked, the small tear falling down from her eyes betraying just how much of the story she’d heard, Dayspring couldn’t help but see his niece in a different light.
Why do you remind me so much of Aurora? He was forced to admit. The mare Nightshade would grow into, she’d be a thing of beauty, with a heart and brain to match.
The next words out of her mouth reminded Dayspring that of those three attributes, Nightshade’s looks mattered the least.
“That’s what she said in your dreams, right? That she wanted you to find her. Maybe that’s why she came back to you. Maybe you lost her, and she found a way to help you remember. That’s what I’d do if someone lost me. I’d try and help them find me again.”
Radiant sit up on his flank and invited the little pony to join him. When Nightshade jumped up on the throne he hugged her tightly. “What if… what if I don’t know how to find her?”
“Well, I doubt she’d only try once. Maybe she’ll come back to you with another hint tonight?”
Radiant kissed Nightshade on the top of her head and then looked over at Dayspring who merely shrugged and said, “It’s hard to argue with that logic.”
Radiant hugged Nightshade close to him and said, “I might just try that. But enough about me, what are you doing up, little one? It’s past your bedtime.”
“I was sleeping,” Nightshade protested. “But then this pegasus came into my room and said that you were sad. She asked me to cheer you up.”
Taken aback by that, Dayspring asked, “A crystal pegasus asked you that?”
Nightshade shook her head. “No, she was tan with a cutie mark of a comet shooting across the sky.”
Both stallions were left speechless. The color, the cutie mark, they’d been Firestar’s.
“It was weird though, when I got out of bed she was gone and my door was shut.”
Radiant hugged her even tighter as he asked, “Are you sure you didn’t dream it?”
Nightshade nuzzled into Radiant’s fur as she shrugged and said, “Maybe.” She then looked up at Radiant and asked, “Can I have a cookie?”
Lying in bed Radiant was forced to admit that Nightshade had a point. Cookies and milk did indeed make a great bedtime snack. Dayspring, Nightshade, and Radiant had left the throne room for the kitchen, the shock of the little filly’s words weighing heavily on the two old ponies.
Their shock didn’t last. It was hard to feel anything but happiness and love when around that particular filly. Her kind heart tended to override any other emotions one might experience.
I bet she really could make Tartarus smile like a foal, Radiant thought, grinning himself as he finished off his glass of warm milk.
The cookie debacle had been rather fun too. Nightshade liked her cookies and milk warmed up, something Radiant hadn’t understood until he’d been browbeaten into trying. He’d been forced to go back and try again three separate times before he’d gotten it right.
Dayspring and Radiant both knew that Nightshade was simply playing them in order to stay up as late as she could. And in truth, after their conversation in the throne room, they welcomed the distraction. It was good to smile, to laugh, and to feel love after something like that.
Thoughts of their conversation, of what was discussed stole the grin from Radiant’s muzzle. He sighed before laying down on his bed. His thoughts quickly turned to the words Nightshade had spoken in the throne room.
“Was that really you, my love? Did you send her down?” Radiant asked the ceiling as he raised a hoof up into the air.
He couldn’t help but feel a little disappointed when there wasn’t an answer. Sighing, Radiant lowered his hoof and rolled over. Normally he’d have enjoyed the fresh linens and warm blanket. But tonight his mind was far too busy, its thoughts outpaced any feelings his body might have interjected.
Dreams, that’s the common link. Did she dream you? Did I dream you? Was Nightshade right, did you find a way to reach me? Is it… is it because I lost you and you’re helping me find you?
“You must be so disappointed in me,” he said to the air. “I promised you, I told you I’d prove myself worthy of you, and I’ve failed. I’ve battled titans, revenants, and gods yet I couldn’t manage that one last thing. I couldn’t manage to live my life without you.”
The silence filled the air, almost as if it stood in judgement of him.
“Why did you come to me now? After all these years what’s changed? Did Eros let you?”
Silence.
“You want me to find you. What does that even mean? Do you exist? Are you out there? Am I supposed to storm Hades for you? If that’s what you want, I’ll do it. I’ll do it hogtied with my horn cut off. I’d crawl there for you. I’d do… I do anything. Please, let me know.”
If you’d do anything for her, why couldn’t you keep your promise?
At that thought, Radiant shut his eyes and sat up, his hind legs hanging off the side of his bed. “It’s… it’s so hard. I can’t just act like everything’s okay. I just can’t. I miss her, I miss her every second of every minute of every hour of every day. And yet… yet time moves on. This castle is full of ponies that never knew her, that’d never even seen her. Ponies are born that have never heard her name.”
Life doesn’t stop just because someone‘s gone. You know that full well.
“It should,” he argued with himself, somehow losing the conversation and making himself feel worse in the process.
He jumped out of bed and got to his hooves. Radiant made his way to the window, looking for something, anything to distract himself from his own thoughts.
When your argument is that of a foal you tend to need to change the subject.
“Shut up,” Radiant all but growled as he looked out the window.
The Crystal Empire that night was resplendent. A small fresh layer of snow covered everything, allowing the buildings to shimmer ever so slightly in the moonlight. The streets were covered as well, providing the illusion of pure untouched symmetry. With a hot drink and the right company, it’d have been a perfect night so simply enjoy the sights.
Radiant huffed and closed the window, then returned to his bed. He had neither of those things at the moment, and as such, wanted nothing to do with the sights. He’d just wanted… hoped that he’d see the blue light again, that Nightshade was right, that she’d find some way to return again.
She’d have loved it.
For the first time that night he didn’t disagree with himself. “Firestar, why do you waste your time on me. How was I worth it? What did you… what did you even see in me? You’d have been better off without ever… without ever even knowing me.”
Radiant rolled over and pulled his sheets up. “At least then… then you’d be alive and I’d be dead in a ditch somewhere. Exactly where I belong.”
Radiant shot up, throwing the covers off as a very familiar smell reached his nostrils, again. “You… you came back.” Without even checking, he teleported himself to the extent of his abilities, landing with a ‘umph’ several hooves out of the castle’s walls.
Radiant pulled himself from the snow and looked around for the light. His eyes darted too and fro until, at last, they fell upon it. “The… the training arena?” He shook the fresh snow off and started running as fast as he could to the training arena.
Cresting the top of the stairs, Radiant looked down to a scene from a painting. The same blue light shone in the middle of the field. The same blue waves flowed from it in alternating directions. His mind went blank as he saw her again.
Firestar stepped from the light and pawed the snow like a cat seeing it for the very first time. She rolled a small amount into a ball and tossed it high into the sky. She raised her head to watch it as it fell apart, coating her in soft snowfall of her own making.
To Radiant, she’d never looked as gorgeous in all the time he’d known her. The unicorn made his way down the stairs, doing his absolute best not to trip and fall on the way down.
He didn’t know if he could actually hurt himself in a dream, but he didn’t want to find out either.
After all, he didn’t want to miss a second of this.
Firestar stretched her back like a cat. She began stretching, almost as if she was warming up. The pegasus started with her wings, first the right, then left, then her legs. Radiant took this moment to re-familiarize himself with every inch of her body that he could see. He stared at every contour, every curve, every feather.
Firestar arched her front shoulders, flexing them over and over again as one might after a long sleep.
Radiant finally made the field. He walked over to his love. Ready to share another night with her, another gift he never thought he’d get again.
“Firestar, it’s really y—”
Smack!
Radiant almost did a one-eighty, the speed and power in her hoof shocking him to his core. He landed on his flank stunned into absolute silence. The burning sensation on his cheek and the loose tooth almost went unnoticed by the unicorn. “Wha… why?”
Firestar didn’t say a thing. She simply glared at him. Her face was one that said ‘I love you, but you bucked up’.
Radiant rubbed his muzzle, feeling the sting as a sharp contrast to the cold weather. “Okay, yes, I probably deserved that.”
In response Firestar simply raised an eyebrow. Her expression telling him to try again.
“I definitely deserved that?”
She sat back on her flank, closing her eyes and nodded sharply, once.
“I deserved that,” Radiant repeated.
At that the harshness in her demeanor changed. Firestar got up and walked over, kissing him on the cheek. It soothed the burning but did little for the pain in his mouth.
Radiant made to stand up but was stopped when Firestar unexpectedly pushed him over onto his back. The mare stood over him and looked him muzzle to muzzle. She wants something from me. What is it? Radiant thought as he tried to hold her gaze.
For the first time since they’d been together, Radiant found that next to impossible, the shame at his confession earlier weighed heavily upon him, especially as he was looking at the mare who he made the promise to dead in the eye. However, just as in life, this ‘dream’ version wouldn’t let him go until she got exactly what she wanted from him.
“It’s because I broke my promise to you, isn’t it.”
In reply, Firestar did nothing.
“Because I said I wanted to… I wanted to die?”
Still nothing.
It finally dawned on the stallion. “I… I know why you’re mad.”
Firestar closed her eyes and gestured for him to continue with a small head nod.
“It’s because I still haven’t learned. I still don’t know what you see in me. I still see myself as unworthy of you, that I’m not worth your time and you shouldn’t… you shouldn’t bother with me.”
In reply Firestar pressed her hoof on his chest, she pressed firmly, but didn’t apply any pressure down.
“I’m not! You shouldn’t… you shouldn’t waste your time on me…”
She applied pressure, far-far more than he’d ever thought possible. The Titan falling on him did so with less force than that one hoof.
Radiant grunted, unable to even scream out as pain washed over him. Then, just as suddenly, it stopped. He opened his eyes to see that she was off him.
“It… it really is you, isn’t it?” Radiant asked between deep breaths as he got up.
Firestar looked at him, her expression was one of hurt, hurt that’d it took him this long to figure that out.
“You’d never let me be this pitiful when you were alive either.”
Those words brought back the smile, the most beautiful smile in all of Equestria.
“How… how is this possible? Did Eros grant you… us this boon?”
Firestar looked past him, to the north, an uncertain expression on her face.
“It was you that woke Nightshade up, you sent her to me, didn’t you?”
At those words, she walked up and nuzzled him, as if to say, ‘of course’.
He nuzzled back, taking deep breaths of her scent. “Thank you. I needed that.” The double entendre of his thanks weighed heavily in the air.
Her hoof wrapped around him, applying pressure in a deep hug. One he welcomed, one that he became deeply self-conscious about when it found a fat fold and started to squeeze lightly, as if unsure just what it was touching.
Radiant pulled back, embarrassed as Firestar moved in closer to inspect Radiant’s frame. She pawed the fat-fold and several more with her hoof in total disbelief at what she was seeing.
Disbelief at how fat he’d become.
“I… it’s… you’ve been gone a while and I…” Radiant stammered.
Firestar gave him a ‘are you for real with this’ look, turned around, and sashayed away. Her walk exaggerated to be almost a trot, her tail flinging back and forth in an extravagant motion, her head held high like a noble that just saw a pile of dirt on the floor.
Radiant gaped in total disbelief as she turned and left, making for the light.
“You can’t be serious!” he shouted.
She paused right before reaching the light, turned her head to look at him, and then threw a snowball directly at his muzzle.
This one, unlike the one she’d thrown before, didn’t break up in the air. It collided with his gaping maw.
Radiant wiped the snow from his muzzle, his mind racing at what had just occurred. She… she pranked me, from beyond the grave she… His eyes caught hers, the mischievous look she gave him unmistakable.
“You little minx,” Radiant said with a laugh as he got up and started to run after her.
Firestar smiled and ran as well, right across the field and to the track.
Radiant grinned as he followed. The mare was fast, just as fast as she’d been in life. However, she stayed on the ground, giving Radiant a chance.
It was—technically—cheating, but Radiant didn’t follow the same path she’d taken, not exactly. He cut across the corner, making up ground.
Firestar made him pay for that. As soon as the stallion made the track she increased her speed, leaving an almost comical trail of dust in her wake.
Radiant grunted through it. The energy he’d felt pent up in him today returned tenfold. He focused, giving himself to this chase, this opportunity to do something that mattered, to prove himself, to her, and to himself.
One last time.
For her part, Firestar kept stealing glances back to him. She’d look over her shoulder every time Radiant increased his speed, every time he’d start to gain on her, and run just a little faster.
Radiant felt his heart in his throat as he ran. He focused as hard as he could, pushing every fiber in his body to the brim and then beyond. He gave himself to this, to this run, this last chance to show her, and himself, just who he was, what he was made of.
They rounded the fourth corner, Firestar ten hooves away from him. He pushed harder than ever in a zealous frenzy to catch up.
Nine, eight, seven hooves.
Closing the distance gave him extra motivation. The stallion felt his muscles burn throughout his body. But, at this moment, his body could be damned as far as he cared.
She was in front of him, within his reach, all he had to do to get her was to catch her.
He’d said he was willing to do anything for her, this was his chance to prove it.
Six, five, four hooves.
The two rounded the first corner again, leaving puffs of fresh snow in their wake as they raced for all their worth. Fifteen years ago, this would have been a normal day in the Crystal Empire. But those times were in the past, this event, once so common, now existed only in dreams.
That didn’t matter to Radiant. If anything he found himself more motivated than ever as he dug deep, deeper than he’d done in a long time. Radiant forced his body’s protests to the back of his mind. Right now his heart was in control, it was the only thing that mattered.
Three, two hooves.
Radiant felt his front hooves come down on the ground, hard. He cried out as something tore in his front shoulder, the pain radiating up his body and lancing into his brain. Experience told him that he’d just torn a muscle tendon in his right shoulder.
Logic told him the race was over, that he’d be lucky to not fall on his muzzle after that. His heart bucked logic right in the face. Radiant’s back hooves came down and kicked off the ground, lifting him up and at Firestar with all the strength he could find.
Radiant crashed, muzzle first, into the ground. Snow rushed by him, filling his nostrils and mouth with the bitter taste of failure. The burning sensation from his shoulder increased, joining the new feeling of having ripped some of his fur off in the impact.
His breathing deepened, tears started to reform in his eyes. The pain of his wounds was secondary to the pain of failure.
A warm hoof touched the side of his muzzle. Radiant opened his eyes and looked up, right into the blue eyes of his lost love.
“You idiot. I never loved you because you were the best, or because you always kept your promises. I loved you because you always tried, you always give it your all, no matter how much it might hurt.”
Despite the pain, joy returned to Radiant’s heart at the words his wife spoke.
“I had to make sure that my husband was still in there. That you were still him. Glad to know that I was right.”
“Y-you can talk?”
The mischievous grin returned to her muzzle. “And of everything, that’s the thing you say to me, really?”
“I-I-I didn’t think you could…”
Firestar bent down and whispered to him, “That’s because you’re my idiot. Leave the thinking to smarter ponies.”
Radiant found himself laughing at that. The pain in his chest hurt, his exhaustion and injuries taking their toll, but he just couldn’t stop.
Firestar kissed him on the forehead before quickly glancing to the east, the sunrise had started.
Radiant saw it too. “We’re almost out of time, aren’t we?”
She nodded. “Radiant, something’s off. This connection isn’t natural. I feel… I feel split. I’m dreaming too, in my Elysium, but even when I wake I feel disconnected. I need you to find out why.”
“What… what’s going on?” Radiant asked, the concern evident in his voice.
“I don’t know. I think I’m in your world, but not. I think I exist in both now. I need you to find me, out here.”
“Where?” Radiant asked, worry written on his muzzle.
“To the north. The mountains. I think… I feel myself there,” Firestar said as she started to fade.
“Firestar, wait.”
“Make it quick,” Firestar replied as she glanced back over her shoulder at the quickly rising sun.
“Are you… are you okay, where you are I mean?”
Firestar’s smile lit up as she faded away, her words left behind on the wind. “Well it is paradise after all. That being said, even paradise can feel a little lonely at times.”
That made Radiant smile too. He smiled until the sun rose in the sky, all but blinding him and forcing him to close his eyes.
Radiant blinked his eyes open, unsurprised by the view of his bedroom ceiling above him. What did come as a surprise was the pain he felt. His entire body felt exhausted, bruised, and battered.
Without thinking, he went to roll right out of bed. The unicorn collapsed when his right hoof gave out, the pain in his shoulder returned tenfold.
“Agh!” he yelled.
The two guards stationed outside burst into his room. “Lord‽” they shouted. One of them ran to him. “You’re injured. Get a doctor,” he said, his gaze moving from Radiant to the other guard.
The second one nodded before turning around.
“No, get Dayspring!” Radiant shouted at him.
“My Lord?” the first guard asked.
“Do what I say,” Radiant said through gritted teeth as he tried to stand in a vein attempt to regain some of his authority.
The second guard nodded in understanding and then took off out of the room. His objective the visiting prince from Canterlot.
Radiant quickly regretted his decision to stand up. The unicorn almost fell back to the ground again, the only thing that prevented that from occurring was the quick actions of the first guard who pressed against him, helping him to support his weight.
“Damn, this hurts,” Radiant absentmindedly said.
“Lord, what… what happened? We were standing guard all night. No one came in or out.”
“This isn’t your fault, soldier. Let’s just say that this was a long time coming. And well deserved.”
“Deserved?” he asked inquisitively.
Radiant chuckled a little. “Don’t worry about it.”
The guard looked as if he wanted to inquire more, but was interrupted by a flash of purple energy coming from the center of the room. The two looked at the new intruder. Dayspring Gleam looked a mess, his fur unkempt, and his mane matted to his face.
That was all expected. What wasn’t was the haunted look in his eyes. Radiant couldn’t remember the last time he’d seen Dayspring with that look before, the last time he’d seen him scared.
“What happened‽” Dayspring demanded.
“I’ll explain everything, just… give me a hoof?” Radiant asked as he felt something loose in his mouth. Feeling around with the tip of his tongue he knocked out the loose tooth and spit it out. All three ponies watched the blood-stained moler land on the floor.
Dayspring looked from the tooth, to the guard, and finally to his friend. He sighed and closed his eyes. Powering up his horn he lifted Radiant off the ground with his magic.
Radiant felt immediate relief at the pressure being removed from his shoulder. “Thank you,” he said to Dayspring as his friend’s energy arranged several pillows on his bed before strategically lowering him down upon them.
“Lord, you should really see a doctor.”
Radiant turned his attention to the guard. “Yes, I will. But I’ll be fine for now. You’re dismissed.”
The guard sharply saluted before turning to leave. As soon as he was out the door Dayspring shut and locked them behind him. The light purple unicorn turned to his friend. “Now who the buck kicked your flank?”
“Firestar,” Radiant said with a smile.
“Come again?” Dayspring asked, completely flabbergasted by his friend’s answer.
“What can I say?” Radiant smile never left his face. He had the same grin on his muzzle that a teenage colt might when describing his first sexual conquest to his friend. “She’s watching me. And that pity party I’ve been throwing myself this last decade? She let me have it for that.”
Dayspring just stared at him, as if he expected Radiant to say ‘gotcha’ or something similar. As the seconds past it dawned on the unicorn that his friend wasn’t about to say anything like that. Finally he opened his mouth. “Do I… do I need to tell you how crazy that sounds?”
Radiant raised an eyebrow in disbelief. “As crazy as you being conceived from two mares? Or Twilight being a God, or your entire family possessing their magic? Or Rainbow breaking the moon? Or—”
“Okay, point taken,” Dayspring interrupted.
“You sure? I can go on, for like, a while.” Dayspring gave Radiant enough shit over their lives, Radiant learned over time to enjoy the moments he could hang the obvious over his friend’s head.
“And of all the ponies affected, I figured you were the last one I needed to remind about the cost of those events.”
Radiant shut his mouth. On a different day, under different circumstances, that would have been the start of a fight. One that would have seen at least one of them, if not both, put into the hospital.
Dayspring saw that he’d overstepped, he wasn’t the best at reading ponies, but even he could see that much on Radiant’s face. “Sorry, that was too far.”
“You’re damn right it was,” Radiant said.
“I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to imply that you’d forgotten the cost. I know you’d never.”
Pain lanced through Radiant’s frame as he adjusted a little too far to the right. He welcomed it, the pain served to pierce through his anger. “Some days I think you’re the smartest pony in Equestria, others I wonder if you might be the dumbest.”
“In the proper context those two things would not be mutually exclusive,” Dayspring said as he cracked a small smile.
Radiant saw it and chuckled a little. “I’ll take your word on it. And yes, I forgive you.”
“Thanks. Trust me, it’s not the first time I’ve put my hoof in my mouth, and I doubt it’ll be the last.”
“That, I believe.”
“So… she came back, just like Nightshade said she would?” Dayspring asked, trying to change the subject.
“You suck at small talk,” Radiant said, ribbing his friend just a little. “But yes. I’ll tell you everything, but first would you mind?”
Dayspring looked over as his friend gestured lightly with his head to his shoulder. “Radiant, I’m not a doctor.”
“I know that,” Radiant replied. “But you can take a look, tell me if I really need to.”
“You should probably go to one.”
“Why? So I can be poked and prodded? So they can wrap up my hoof in a bandage that’ll do nothing for me? Buck that. I’ll go if I absolutely need to go. Otherwise I can take care of it myself.”
Dayspring looked at him in disbelief. “Damn, where did that come from?”
Radiant laughed. “Told you, I got my flank kicked last night. It’s about time for me to end the pity party I’ve been throwing myself. That’s not who I am. And that’s definitely not the stallion she married.”
“Now, that’s the friend I’ve always known. Although we both know it’s not that easy to overcome the past,” Dayspring said as he powered his horn to examine Radiant’s injury once again. He was proud of his friend for admitting the issue, but Dayspring knew personally that Radiant was kidding himself if he thought it was that easy. Those demons were not that easy to get rid of.
In reply Radiant shrugged and said, “I was never one to back down from a challenge just because it’s hard. After all, that’s what she loved about me.”
Dayspring hadn’t lied, he was not a doctor and to make matters worse, his magical talents were definitely not in the medical fields. However one thing he definitely was, was a quick learner. The stallion had read countless books on the physiology of ponies and other species. That coupled with the scan he’d completed just last night put him in a unique position to assess every injury Radiant had.
The shocked look on Dayspring’s face alerted Radiant that something was wrong. “Damn, I’m going to have to go see a doctor anyway.”
“No, you’re not,” Dayspring said, unable to comprehend what his own scenes were telling him.
“No?”
“Radiant, you’re… you’re as healthy as a forty year-old.”
“What‽”
“Well, physically anyway. Your cells are more in the range of fifty-six, fifty-seven. But your fat-muscle ratio is about twenty percent what it was yesterday. Your heart is almost back to your prime, and your bone density has increased by thirty percent.”
Radiant looked down at his belly. I’ll be damned, he’s right. The fat that Firestar had given him hell about was gone, truly he couldn’t remember the last time he’d seen his belly that tone. Looking proved to be a mistake as the pain from his shoulder lanced again.
“What about this then?” Radiant asked.
“Your shoulder? Torn muscle. You just need some bandages and ice. I can take care of that now if you want?”
Radiant nodded his head. At that Dayspring went to work, he teleported the necessary items, lifted Radiant in his magic, and bandaged his shoulder. Once that was completed he wrapped a small ice pack on just the right spot, holding it in place with a few extra bandages.
“You know, for not being a doctor you sure have a talent for it,” Radiant said as he watched his friend work. From start to finish Radiant had the bandage professionally wrapped on him in ten seconds. “You might have missed your calling.”
“It comes with a few perks,” Dayspring said back, his shit-eating grin more than giving the game away.
“I bet.”
“And besides, normally when I play doctor it’s a lot more fun,” Dayspring replied as he laid Radiant back on the pillows.
“Sorry to disappoint,” Radiant replied back with a look of faux hurt on his muzzle.
Dayspring ignored him. “There’s nothing I can do for your tooth. Night might be able to but I don’t have her… command.”
“Not the first I’ve lost,” Radiant said. “I doubt it’ll be the last.”
“Now, while you rest for a minute to let the swelling go down, what’s this about Firstar kicking your flank in your dreams and you somehow deserving it?”
“That’s right, you never really knew her. I forget that sometimes.”
“Sorry,” Dayspring said. “I was a little busy trying to keep Taz safe during those years.”
“Sure thing, Sunshine Spring.”
“Stop deflecting,” Dayspring replied.
Radiant stuck his tongue out at dayspring before continuing. “Firestar was… well… strong.”
“Physically?”
“No, no more than any other Captain of the Wonderbolts.”
“So very strong then.”
“Shut up,” Radiant said, chuckling. “No I mean there was no situation she couldn’t handle. Firestar wasn’t the type of pony to sit back and let others solve her problem. She’d always jump in, hooves first, no matter the situation.”
“She sounds like mother.”
“Rainbow? Yeah… those two were a lot a like. But Firstar had this sense of pragmatism to her. She was as wise as she was brave, if not a little reckless. You know, our first fight was over me not wanting her to fight the Titan? I, stupidly, tried to order her away from it.”
“Damn, that must have went bad,” Dayspring replied as he made himself comfortable. He couldn’t help but admire this situation. And not just the story, or the first hoof account of a mare he’d never truly known. It was Radiant that truly had his attention. The stallion spoke with a brand new life to him as he told his story. The act of remembering Firestar in a positive light, it was doing wonders for Radiant in ways he’d never know.
“You have no idea,” Radiant replied as he chuckled at the memory. It was something he could laugh about now, but at the time had been anything but funny. “She, rightfully, disobeyed orders and dumped my flank.”
“I would have too,” Dayspring commented.
“Please, you’d be lucky to have me,” Radiant replied back.
“Meh, I could do better.”
“Anyway, it was at the final fight with the Titan. We marshaled our forces and with help, a lot of help, defeated it. But… then it fell, it fell on her.”
“What? How did she...”
“I ran to her, I ran as fast as I could and reached her before it fell. It was amazing, but kinda dumb in retrospect. I mean yes we were together, but that just meant we were going to die together. However, when I finally had her back in my hooves I didn’t want to let go, ever. Not even in death.”
“How did you survive?”
“For the first time in my life, with everything on the line, I managed to cast Dad’s shield spell.”
Dayspring whistled, impressed. Radiant’s talents lay in offensive magic, the ability to create and control several magical blades that could cut through almost anything. Defensive magic should have been near impossible for him to pull off, never mind a spell that advanced, one powerful enough to protect him and Firestar from the weight of a Titan.
“What can I say, I had motivation.”
“Staying alive is great motivation,” Dayspring stated.
Radiant shook his head in disagreement. “No, it wasn’t about my survival. I didn’t care at that moment if I lived or died. I just wanted… I just wanted her to live. That’s what mattered to me. That was my motivation.”
“I stand corrected.”
“From there we’d gotten back together. She was… well… injured. The doctors said she’d be a cripple for the rest of her life, that she’d never make a full recovery.”
“I assume she got mom’s help on that one?”
“Hell no. Firestar wasn’t like that. Besides, at that time Twilight had lost her memories and Night hadn’t come into her own yet.”
“So she what? Willed herself better?”
“Don’t make me smack you,” Radiant said, glaring at Dayspring.
“Okay, okay, sorry.”
“She simply didn’t give up. They said one thing, she knew another. So she dedicated herself to, well, proving herself right and them wrong. It also might have helped that we’d agreed to marry when she could walk down the aisle without help.”
“She sounds like quite the mare.”
“One of a kind,” Radiant replied with a look of longing on his muzzle. “We’d married six months after the incident with the Titan. When I saw her walk down the aisle, Luna… I don’t think I’d ever been more in love with the sight before my eyes in my life.”
Dayspring just nodded.
“Mom performed the ceremony herself. It was… it was beautiful, Dayspring. Every moment of it. I wish you could have seen it.”
“Sorry, I was a bit too preoccupied being dead, and then the slave of the Grim Revenant.”
“And then ghosting on us for what, a decade?” Radiant asked. “I still can’t believe you didn’t come back, that you’d thought we’d hate you for what that thing did.”
Dayspring’s expression grew to one of hurt. Part of him had known this day was coming. The two were friends, yes. But their history was long and complex. When they’d gotten back together there was enough to look forward to that the past never came up, not in any meaningful way like this between them anyway. This walk down memory lane was a double-edged blade, and Radiant wasn’t the only one with skeletons in his closet.
However unlike Radiant, Dayspring had faced his demons already. He didn’t defeat them, no pony could ever claim that victory for long; rather, he’d learned to live with them. To accept his past for what it was, and to simply try and do better going forward.
“We’ve all tripped and fallen, Radiant. What matters is that we pick ourselves back up and keep going onwards.”
“You have a saying for everything, don’t you?”
“Am I wrong?”
“It’s not always about being right.”
“It helps.”
“Luna help you, Dayspring. You really are too smart for your own good.”
In reply Dayspring simply shrugged. He was who he was. Whether or not other ponies accepted that wasn’t his concern.
“Things went… well… bad around the Ataxia incident.”
Dayspring’s eyes grew wide at that. He knew about this incident all too well. Albeit his memories were from the other side of the battle. With the help of his memories, Grim Night had engineered these events to an almost surgical level of precision.
“The pregnancy took a turn. We were at risk of losing our colts. She risked her life to ensure they were born. She risked the entire empire in fact.”
“No, it wasn’t her. It was me, well, Grim Night that set those events in motion. He’s the one who you should blame.”
“Oh I do,” Radiant said, glaring at Dayspring as if he was going to attack him. But his expression quickly changed. “Kidding. I don’t blame you. I know it was that creature using you against us. But still.” There was a hurt look on his face, as if Radiant was hating himself for something.
“What?”
“It wasn’t… it wasn’t the right choice. It wasn’t the choice of a ruler, a prince. I should have… I should have ordered her moved, even if it did cost me my sons. A ruler puts the needs of his subjects first and foremost, no? We’d endangered everyone putting our own needs first.”
Dayspring stood up and walked to the bed, his expression one of anger. That made Radiant gulp.
“Prince Radiant Star, son of Princess Cadance and Prince Shining Armor, ruler of the Crystal Empire. You sir, you are truly an idiot.”
Radiant's only reply was a look of shock.
“Yes, you’re a ruler, and a good one at that. You care about your subjects and would lay down your life to defend them. But first and foremost, you’re a good pony, a good husband, and a good father. And if you failed in your duties there, how could any pony ever respect you as a leader?”
“Even if it put everyone in danger?”
“We’re judged not on how we handle the easy problems, but on how we handle the harder ones.”
Radiant grunted a little. “You… you might be right. I don’t know.”
“No one really does,” Dayspring replied as he sat down at the edge of his bed. “I think we all simply try to make the best decision we can at the time, the one we can hopefully live with. Then do it again, and again, and again until the day there are no more decisions to make.”
“Seventy years, and that’s the best summary of life that I’ve ever heard.”
“We are the sum of our choices,” Dayspring stated. “I can’t take full credit, I’d heard it, well, something similar, from Red.”
At the mention of that name, Radiant’s body tensed up, anger causing his brain to send adrenaline through his body.
Dayspring noticed that. “Sorry, I didn’t mean to bring him back up.”
“It’s fine, he’s dead, we won.”
“It’s never that simple, is it?”
“No,” Radiant admitted as he lowered his head to bed. Contrary to his statement earlier, Radiant started to cry again. “He took her from me, well, his bastard brother did, on his orders. He took her, and… mom.”
“In the cruelest way possible,” Dayspring said as he laid a hoof on Radiant’s.
Radiant didn’t pull away. “Mom… she blamed herself till the day she died.”
“You said she died saving you. I’d like to think she achieved the redemption that she sought.”
Radiant wiped the tears away. “Now who’s being an idiot.”
Dayspring looked away. “I’ve never known anything harder than forgiving yourself.”
“Same,” Radiant replied, looking at the bed.
The two sit in silence for a long time until a knock on the door gave them something else to pay attention too. “Enter,” said Radiant.
“My Lord, the guards informed me that you were attacked?”
“Fair Play,” Radiant said. “It’s not like that, I was injured though. I’m sorry, I should have sent someone to tell you. While I heal I won’t be able to take court. I trust you can handle anything that happens?”
“My Lord? Me? Are you sure?”
“I was, are you telling me that you can’t handle it?”
“No my Lord, I mean yes, I mean... I’m honored you’d put your trust in me.”
“Then see to it. I’ll return after my shoulder heals up. But of course if any crisis occur… major crisis occur, send me a message immediately.”
“Yes Lord,” Fair Play said, saluting. But before he turned away, he added. “On the note of crisis, I think there’s a, shall we say, small-major crisis brewing in the kitchen that you, or Prince Dayspring, might want to handle.”
“What sort of crisis?” Dayspring asked out of curiosity.
“A crisis of an... Adorkable Horror variety,” Fair Play said as he turned and left.
“Nightshade’s up,” Radiant said, smiling.
“You know there’s nothing stopping you from returning to duty now.”
“Yeah there is,” Radiant replied as he made to stand up. His shoulder already felt better, but it still hurt to put weight on it. As such he leaned on Dayspring, something his friend was more than happy to assist with. “Firestar has a task for me. It was the last thing she’d told me in my dream. And as you said, I have a duty as a husband.”
“A task?” Dayspring asked as the two made their way out of the room and to the kitchen.
“She said… I don’t really understand, but she said there were two of her. That she’s here, and there. And that’s how she’s crossing the barrier in my… our dreams.”
“And what are you supposed to do about it?” Dayspring asked.
“She wants me to find another version of her up here. She said it’s in the north.”
“And what will you do if you find her?” Dayspring asked the obvious.
Radiant stopped walking, he hadn’t even considered that. “I… I don’t know.”
“Would you destroy whatever doppelganger she might have up here? Could you even bring yourself to do it? Would you try and save it? What about the one responsible, if there even is one?”
“I don’t know, okay!” Radiant yelled. “I… maybe you should come with.”
“Me? Why me? Just get Twilight or Night to come with you. Hell even mother.”
“Come on, Dayspring. You know why it’s gotta be you. This is my wife we’re talking about. I have to go, I don’t want to repeat this conversation with anypony else, and there’s no pony alive I’d rather have by my side than you.”
They started walking again as Dayspring said, “They’d get it done quicker.”
“But you’re the one who already knows everything. You’re the one I trust. And, you’re bucking with me, aren’t you?”
Dayspring laughed. “Did you really think I’d let you go on this adventure without me? Of course I’ll go with you. Besides, if things go bad I can have mom here in seconds.”
Radiant shook his head. “I should’ve known earlier. Well, that still leaves us one issue to deal with.”
“What’s that?” Dayspring asked as they rounded the corner to the kitchen.
“That,” Radiant said with a smile as he pointed a hoof to the white bat-pony currently gorging herself on cookie dough on the kitchen counter.
Dayspring took in the scene before him. The kitchen was trashed. Empty pots and pans littered the floor, a few of which managed to find themselves in strange locations, such as the top of the refrigerators. Flour covered every surface and object, including the cause of this fiasco.
“Young lady!” Dayspring screamed. “You’re ruining your breakfast!”
The former mint-green pony looked over at her two uncles and started to quickly gobble down what was left of her meal, a freshly opened can of cookie dough.
Dayspring lit his horn and lifted the pony off the counter. He attempted to tear away the meal she was gorging herself on with a flick of his horn.
It came as a surprise when it took him three attempts. Nightshade’s hooves simply refused to let it go. When he finally succeeded, she shouted, “Hey, no fair!”
“No fair?” Dayspring asked. “You know full well that you can’t have cookie dough for breakfast.”
“They said I could have anything I wanted!” Nightshade said as she pointed a hoof at the two cooks who were even now trying to clean a section of the kitchen. “I wanted ice-cream and they said they didn’t have any. So I went looking for something myself!” The flour covered pony begin squirming in Dayspring’s magic, trying to get down.
“Nightshade, where you taking advantage of these poor ponies?” Radiant asked in a stern voice.
Nightshade stopped squirming. “No, I was just… but… they said.”
“And what, exactly, did they offer you?”
“We’d offered to cook her whatever breakfast she wanted,” the head cook said as he came forward.
“And is ice-cream a breakfast food?” Dayspring asked his young niece.
“Well… no.”
“Is cookie dough a breakfast food?”
“No,” Nightshade’s expression begin turing sheepish.
“Then what do you have to say for yourself?”
The mare started looking down at the ground, her expression one of regret as she said, “I’m sorry.”
“And what are you sorry for?” Dayspring asked.
“I’m sorry I took advantage of you. And ate your cookie dough, and made a mess of your kitchen.”
“Atta-girl,” Dayspring said as he lowered her to the ground released his magical hold on her. The cookie dough he floated to the trash can.
“You are forgiven, young princess,” the head cook said as he bowed his head to the little white mare.
“Thank you,” Nightshade replied right before Radiant used his magic to start lifting the flour from her fur.
It took the prince several minutes to get her clean. In that time Dayspring helped the cooks clean the rest of the kitchen.
“Thank you for taking care of her,” Dayspring said to Radiant once he finished.
“We’ll I’ll admit to being out of practice, but it’s no worse than some of the messes my boys used to make.”
“Oh, Flash and Blaze used to make messes?” Nightshade asked, her interest suddenly peaked at the possibility of stories of her cousins.
Radiant laughed. “The worst. Some days the simple act of walking down a hallway was the equivalent of navigating a minefield. I remember one time they dyed my hair pink, just like my mother’s.”
“That sounds mean!”
“Well, a little bit,” Radiant had to admit.
“It was a prank, Nightshade,” Dayspring said.
“Prank?” Nightshade asked.
“A harmless joke at the expense of others, not to be confused with bullying, which is having fun at the expense of others,” Radiant said.
“Those sounds like the same thing,” Nightshade replied.
Radiant opened his mouth to reply, and then shut it again. He looked over at Dayspring who simply nodded for him to continue. “Umm… okay, they kinda do, but they’re not. They’re… How do you not know what a prank is?”
“Gotcha,” Nightshade replied with a big grin on her face.
Dayspring broke out into laughter. “You fell for it! What did you think she didn’t? With Rainbow Dash as her grandmother? Really?”
“Oh, go buck yourself,” Radiant replied.
“That’s a bad word!” Nightshade exclaimed as she took flight and landed on the counter next to him.
“Yeah, yeah, I’m sorry. I shouldn’t use such words.” Radiant replied.
“Curses and swears leave sore derrieres,” Nightshade replied in a sing-song voice.
“And when have you ever had a sore derriere?” Radiant asked in disbelief.
“Well… umm… that time I fell on my flank from ten feet up!”
“Oh, that sounds like a story.”
Nightshade perked up at that. “Yeah, I was flying with grandma, and she was teaching me these moves where you fly upside down and catch the updraft going zoom! Then then wham in a downward spiral. But then when I tried it I, umm… missed.”
“And Rainbow didn’t catch you?”
“She was laughing at me,” Nightshade said with a pout.
Dayspring cuffed her mane. “She didn’t mean to be mean. You know your grandma loves you.”
“Oh I know, we went out for ice-cream later! I got my favorite, the one with chocolate sprinkles!”
“Oh, I’ll tell you a secret.” Radiant said in a conspiratorial tone.
“What’s that?” Nightshade asked as she leaned in so only she’d hear.
“That’s my favorite too.”
“Really‽”
“Shh, it’s a secret.”
“Oh, sorry,” the little mare stated as she lowered her head, her ears pressed flat against her head.
“Maybe you and mother can go get some tonight?” Dayspring said.
Nightshade looked over, confused. “Tonight? Is she coming up to join us?”
“No young one, we have to send you home early,” Radiant replied, a little said at the prospect. “I’m afraid something’s come up, Dayspring and I have an issue we have to solve.”
“You… you don’t want to hang out with me anymore?” Nightshade asked as her eyes grew wide.
“No, it’s not that. I love hanging out with you, I ju—”
“So you think I’d be a burden?”
“No, I—”
“You think I’d get in the way?”
Radiant opened his mouth to reply, then shut it again. Pausing for a second he looked up at Dayspring and asked, “How am I losing control of this conversation?”
“I don’t know what you’re talking about. You’re doing great, keep it up,” Dayspring said, his mono-tone and forced straight face all but giving the game away.
Radiant rolled his eyes at him and turned to Nightshade. “Look, we’re going someplace dangerous. We just can’t put you in that sort of danger.”
“But won’t you two be there to protect me?”
“Y-yes, but—”
“Are you saying you can’t do it?”
“Well, no…”
“And you’re going by yourselfs. So that means you haven't told the others?”
“Where are you going with this?”
“Well, I mean, if you’re going someplace sooo dangerous, that you’d be worried about me even with your abilities that means it’s someplace that might endanger you. So if you sent me back early I’d be worried about you too, which means I’d need to tell the others, you know, for your safety.”
Radiant paused and looked up at Dayspring. The light purple unicorn was almost bursting into laughter. “What have you taught her?”
At that he’d lost it. Between laughs he managed to say, “What can I say, she’s a quick learner.”
“So that means you’ll be taking me? Right‽” Nightshade said as she placed a hoof on Radiant’s chest.
“I’m being blackmailed by a ten-year old,” Radiant realized.
“What’s blackmail?” Nightshade asked.
“What you just did, and it’s not a good thing!”
Nightshade looked on in puzzlement at Dayspring. “But you said that it—”
A purple energy latched her mouth shut.
Radiant turned to Dayspring unable to keep his anger out of his voice. “It was you!”
Dayspring simply raised his head up and to the left ever so slightly. “I simply taught her how to see the end result of what other ponies might have missed.”
“You taught her to blackmail ponies to get her way.”
“Nonsense. Pointing out the obvious is never a bad thing.”
“Luna help you, Dayspring,” Radiant said in disbelief.
“Relax okay. She’s right, we can handle whatever comes up.”
“So you’re fine with putting her in danger?”
“Radiant, there’s little we’d encounter that you and I can’t deal with. And should the worst happen I can get all three of us out of there in an instant. And besides, could you really tell that face she can’t go?”
Radiant knew better than to look over, but he couldn’t help himself. Nightshade’s face all but broke his heart. The way her mouth sagged ever so slightly, the hurt look in her eyes, the way her eyelids held open, how her mane fell over the left eye.
He knew then that he’d lost. “Fine…”
“Yeah!” Nightshade shouted as she leapt on him and gave him a huge hug.
“But the first sign of danger, Dayspring. And I mean the first.”
“The first sign of something we can’t deal with easily,” Dayspring confirmed.
“That’s not what I said,” Radiant replied.
“I know, but that’s my offer.”
Radiant glared at him, but nodded.
“Great!” Nightshade exclaimed. “But uhh… where are we going?”
“All that excitement and you don’t even know where?” Radiant asked.
Nightshade let go of Radiant and landed back on the counter. “Oh, I don’t really care. I just wanted to spend more time with you.”
“Young one… you… you… never change.”
“It’s a pinkie-promise!” Nightshade said as she crossed a hoof over her heart and stuck one in her eye.
“Speaking of promises,” Dayspring said as he butt in. “Nightshade, we’re going to the frozen north. We’re going because Radiant had another dream.”
“Oh did the nice mare come back to you?” Nightshade asked as she walked closer to Radiant.
“Not here,” Radiant said as he noticed the cooks looking at the three of them. “Let’s go someplace a bit more private.”
“Your room?” Dayspring asked. When Radiant nodded he powered his horn and in a flash of purple the three of them teleported from the kitchen back to Radiant’s chambers.
“That was sooo cool!” Nightshade said as she started to fly around the room.
“That’s not your first teleport, that’s not even your first teleport this week,” Dayspring replied. “I teleported us up here.”
“Yeah, that was cool too!”
“We were much the same when we were that young,” Radiant said as he gestured Nightshade to join them. The mare came over, but only after finding something on the rug that she nabbed.
“Uncle, this is supposed to go under your pillow,” Nightshade said as she held the bloody tooth up to him. “Not on the floor.”
Radiant took it in his magic. “My fault. Thank you Nightshade.” Then as an afterthought he added, “That doesn’t gross you out?”
“What? The blood? Nah.”
“She is a thestral,” Dayspring added.
“Yep!” Nightshade said, baring her teeth.
Radiant shook his head at that. He’d forgotten her nature. Spending time with her, talking to her, it was so easy to forget that little detail. “I stand corrected,” he said. “And to answer your question. Yes, she did indeed come back, just like you said she would.”
“Oh, I’m happy for you,” Nightshade replied, smiling.
“And kicked your flank,” Dayspring added.
“Dayspring!”
“Wait… but why would she…”
Radiant glared at his friend for several long seconds before turning back to Nightshade. “No, she didn't kick my flank. She simply… educated me using physical means.”
“She hit you?” Nightshade asked.
“She’s not dumb,” Dayspring added.
“Is that what happened with your shoulder? And your tooth?”
“Yes,” Radiant said, giving up on any sort of pretense.
“Did you deserve it?” Nightshade asked.
“Yes.”
“Oh, okay then.”
Radiant looked at her, flabbergasted. “Wait, that’s okay with you?”
“Grandma always says to only beat up ponies that deserve it.”
“What does your other grandma say?”
“She says to only ever use violence as a last resort. That words are your most important weapon, not hooves.”
“And what do you say?” Dayspring asked, the smile on his face already revealing that he knew the answer.
“Well… I don’t know if I could actually ever hurt someone,” Nightshade said as she ran a hoof up her leg, unsure of herself. “Unless they were trying to hurt someone I cared about.”
Radiant cuffed her softly. “That sounds like a good philosophy to me.”
“Me too,” Dayspring replied, pride radiating from him.
“Me three!” Nightshade added, causing her uncles to laugh.
“As I was saying,” Radiant replied after a few seconds. “Yes she came back to me in my dreams, just as you said. She told me that something was wrong. That I was needed in the north, that something was causing her to cross over in her dreams.”
“And we’re going to stop it?” Nightshade asked.
“That’s what she asked me to do,” Radiant said. “More or less.”
“Oh, but… why?”
Radiant looked confused. “Why?”
“Why stop it? Don’t you want to see her in your dreams?” Nightshade asked.
Again Radiant found himself lost for words. Try as he might he couldn’t answer that question. In the end it was Dayspring that solved it for him. “We’re just going to find it, not necessarily stop it. That’s what Firestar asked.”
“Oh, okay then,” Nightshade said.
Radiant glared at the two before saying, “My turn to ask you a question, young lady.”
“What do you want to know?” Nightshade asked.
“How much time do you spend around Dayspring?”
“All the time!” she exclaimed with pride.
Radiant glared at Dayspring, “Brother, you’re a horrible influence on this little pony.”
“Besides, I'm teaching her the finer things of life while her parents go on like rabbits.” Dayspring replied, sticking his tongue out at Radiant.
“They want more offspring?” Radiant asked, jaw dropped.
“They just want more of each other, offspring is just a bonus.”
“A gift!” Nightshade said.
Radiant chuckled at that. “Anyway. Let’s get packing. We got a long trip in front of us. Wait… speaking of Taz and Nighttide, are they going to be okay with her coming with us?”
“I see more problems with Taz on that point, but I'm sure Nighttide will keep him from murdering us once we're back,” Dayspring casually answered, snickering. “Probably more fun for him as a treat.”
Radiant sighed. “I have no idea how you can be so calm about this.”
“I knew she was coming the moment you asked me,” Dayspring replied. “We go everywhere together, isn’t that right, kid?”
“Team always together!” Nightshade said with a big hug to her favorite uncle.
“I really have to talk with Nighttide about being a mother,” Radiant snorted.
Dayspring glared at him. “Nighttide is a wonderful mother. And she loves her kids with all her heart, all of them.”
“I can't believe she's trusting you with her filly then,” Radiant poked back, grinning. “You're such a bad influence.”
Dayspring chuckled at that. “I’d say I’m doing just fine. My two came out okay.”
“You sure that's thanks to you and not Luna?” Radiant continued, having trouble holding his laughter now.
“Oh, definitely their mother,” Dayspring said, grinning at Radiant as the two kept exchanging barbs. “As far as influences go, you should see how Taz is around my oldest.”
“Please tell me it's not cunnilingus with his wife.” Radiant facehoofed.
“Don’t worry about that. Luna made clear her expectations regarding that issue.”
“She set his butt on fire, again?”
“Yep,” Dayspring said with a laugh. “Held a torch to him and everything, quite a sight.”
“Tell Luna I love her.” Radiant laughed.
“Lunar Light!” Nightshade shouted out of nowhere. “I almost forgot to get her a present!”
Dayspring turned to Nightshade who’d run off, already bored of this conversation. The little filly never understood adult hangups about stuff like that. So, with the exception of a few chuckles at Radiant’s use of the term cunnilingus to try and hide what he was talking about, as if she didn’t know what that meant, or Dayspring’s insistence on Luna’s conversation with Taz having somehow prevented his oldest from knowing about such things as well, Nightshade simply avoided the conversation altogether. That being said, at the mention of Luna she couldn’t help but think of her best friend in the world: Lunar Light.
“You did promise her, didn’t you?” Dayspring asked.
“Oh my, oh my, oh my, I almost forgot!” Nightshade exclaimed as she started to bounce around the room, looking for something, anything she could get her friend.
When she almost knocked over the third statue Radiant powered his horn and caught her tail with his magic. An ‘umph’ could be heard as she tried to fly out of it, only to fall and hang by it. “Calm down, you haven’t left yet so you haven’t forgotten anything yet. But I seriously doubt she’s going to be interested in anything from the room of an old stallion like mysel—”
Dayspring and Nightshade looked over at him, unsure why he’d paused.
“Actually… how big is Lunar Light?” Radiant asked, somewhat embarrassed by not knowing much about his friend’s oldest foal.
“She’s about twice this one’s size,” Dayspring said, unsure where Radiant was going but gesturing at Nightshade absentmindedly.
“Mom says I’ll be fully grown when I’m good and ready!” Nightshade shouted in a well-rehearsed protest. She’d always been on the small side of the equation, something time seemed to be making worse.
“I might have something for her,” Radiant said as he went to his closet.
Dayspring and Nightshade watched as Radiant went into his walk-in closet, all the way to the back. They saw him sort through and even throw several old and stinky—in Nightshade’s opinion—articles of clothing out until he finally came back with a red box.
“This…” Radiant said as he placed the box on the bed. Using his magic he lifted the lid and unfurled a dress. “Was the dress Firestar wore on our first date.”
It was practical and elegant dark blue dress with sky blue highlights, a dress that seemed like it’d cover everything and nothing all at once. When he unfurled it the wind caught it in just the right light, lighting up everything.
“Wow,” Nightshade gasped.
“Radiant, I’m not sure… I’m not sure this will fit her,” Dayspring said as he reached out a hoof to touch the material.
“She’ll grow into it,” Radiant said.
“She’ll love it!” Nightshade shouted as she took to the air. “But... are you sure?” she asked Radiant. “If this used to belong to someone important to you I don’t want to take it from you.”
“When you give a gift it makes everyone else happy, and that makes you happy too, so everyone is happy,” Radiant replied with a sly smile.
“Thank you, thank you, thank you!” Nightshade shouted as she hugged Radiant again.
“Who says you can’t teach an old dog new tricks?” Dayspring asked with a grin of his own. He then added, “Seriously though, are you okay with this? I mean, this is a rather special gift.”
Radiant looked down to the dress that Nightshade was carefully spreading out on the bed. For how rambunctious she was, for how much energy she had, she was treating the dress as the greatest treasure in Equestria. He closed his eyes and nodded.
“She looked beautiful in it, and I know she’d hate to just have it sitting in a box in a closet. I think it’ll be a good fit for Lunar Light.”
“She’ll love it,” Nightshade said as she started to lovingly fold the dress up so it could go back in the box. “I’ll put it in my room so I don’t forget it when I get back.”
“You still want to go with us?” Dayspring asked. “I could send you back to her now if you wish.”
Nightshade finished packing up the dress before turning to Dayspring. “And miss going on an adventure with you and uncle Radiant? No thank you. I’m going!”
“She really is taking after you,” Radiant remarked.
“Start packing a bag little missy, cold weather gear!” Dayspring shouted at Nightshade as she left the room to put up the box with the dress inside before he turned to Radiant. “I was never like that when I was young.”
“Oh I don’t mean the young version of you,” Radiant said, chuckling. “I mean this version of you. The version that lives for things like this. The version that likes being the smartest pony in the room.”
“Oh please, I’m not the smartest. Have you met my mom?”
“That’s different,” Radiant said as he turned and grabbed some saddlebags from out of his closet. “Twilight's smart, that’s beyond a doubt. And yeah, she might-might be smarter than you. But you have a tendency to hold it over everyone’s heads, she’s more…”
“Humble?”
“Yeah, somewhat, but more… aware that other ponies don’t like to feel inferior.”
“And I’m a know-it-all that loves to make ponies feel inferior?” Dayspring asked with a raised eyebrow. “And I’m teaching that to Nightshade?”
Radiant came out of his closet and did a double-take when he saw the look on Dayspring’s face. “Oh don’t act offended.”
“Yeah, because what you said wasn’t offensive at all.”
“Oh no it was. Don’t act offended because you know it’s true.”
At that Dayspring’s demeanor changed, he started chuckling. “Damn you’ve gotten smarter, old stallion.”
“Nightshade might be able to pull that one on me, but not you.”
“She’s a special one, isn’t she?” Dayspring said as he watched Radiant turn back into his closet.
“One of a kind,” Radiant replied as he pulled on a winter coat. “And no, you’re not teaching that to her, she’ll never be like you in that way. Rather she’s…”
“She has too kind of a heart.”
“Kind.” Radiant repeated. “She’s simply too kind.”
“How long do you think that’ll last?”
At Dayspring’s question the mood, the conversation turned sour for both of them. It was as if a dark cloud magically appeared in the room.
Radiant didn’t answer right away. He let the silence permeate the room for a long while before coming out of the closet once more, bags packed. He chose his next words very carefully. “Life isn’t… isn’t kind to those who are kind, is it?”
Dayspring shook his head. “No, no it’s not.”
“That’s… that’s why you’re teaching her, isn’t it? Trying to increase her knowledge so she’ll be better armed, when life…”
“If,” Dayspring corrected. “If life…”
“We both know it’s not an ‘if’. But… but she’s got a lot of ponies looking after her,” Radiant replied, trying to liven the mood.
“You know that it won’t help. They won’t stop it. They’ll fail to stop it. That’s just how life works.”
Radiant looked away. “Yeah. I know.”
“And if history repeats itself, they’ll fail her afterwards too,” Dayspring added.
The pain in Dayspring’s voice as he said those words caused Radiant to know that he wasn’t speaking about Nightshade’s friends anymore.
Radiant looked up at Dayspring. The light purple unicorn looked sad, old, and tired. There was hurt in his eyes as he looked at Radiant. Their eyes locked. “Maybe she won’t hide it and sequester herself like I did?” Radiant asked.
“Pain has a way of making smart ponies do dumb things.”
“Yeah… yeah it does.”
After several minutes of silence between the two, Dayspring asked, “Is there anything worse than memories of the past?”
“Worrying about the future?” Radiant asked.
That caused both of them to chuckle.
“Oh, did I miss the joke? Was it good? Can you tell it again?” Nightshade asked as she walked into the room.
Dayspring turned to her as he scanned her bags. As he expected they were jam packed with treats and sweets. He chuckled at her, “I’m afraid it’d take nigh-on seventy years to fully tell.”
“I got time,” Nightshade replied.
Dayspring laughed at that. “How about you help me back my bags, I can tell you a story about how Aurora and I joined the Cutie Mark Crusaders.”
“Oh I love stories!” Nightshade said as she followed Dayspring out of the room.
Dayspring turned his head before he was out of eyesight of Radiant, “Out front in about twenty minutes?”
“Make it thirty,” Radiant replied. “Give me a chance to get something to eat and to come up with an excuse for my absence.”
“Thirty it is,” Dayspring said as he left for his own room, a gleeful Nightshade asking a million-and-one questions about a story he’d not even begun yet.
Radiant smiled at the now empty doorway. He kept smiling for a few seconds after, their conversation echoing down the hallway and to his room.
After that, the silent, empty oppressiveness came back and with its return so did his frown, and these thoughts.
What am I doing? He thought, unsure. Is there really something out there? If so can we even find it? And even if we do find it, what then?
His thoughts weighed heavily on his mind as he took one last look around his room and left. Using his magic, Radiant shut the door behind him as he made his way to the kitchen for a good breakfast.
As the door to his room shut a shiver went down his back. Radiant couldn’t help but think it might very well be the last time he’d be in that room.
Thirty minutes later.
“Uncle!” Nightshade yelled as she flew down the stars and latched onto Radiant.
“It’s been thirty minutes,” Radiant said, smiling as he hugged her.
“Thirty minutes too long!” Nightshade complained as she let go and landed on her hooves right next to the white unicorn.
“Tell you a secret,” Radiant said as he lowered his head to whisper the next part in her ear. “I agree.”
“Sorry to keep you waiting,” Dayspring said as he walked down the stairway.
“Waiting? You’re on time as always, brother. I’m the one that finished early and came out to wait for you two here.”
“So that means we did keep you waiting, so sorry is appropriate,” Nightshade chirped in as she took wing and landed on Radiant’s back.
“You should never apologize for doing exactly what you said you were going to do,” Radiant replied.
“What if I say I’ll hit you in the gut?” Dayspring asked as a counterpoint.
“Okay,” Radiant huffed, “You should never apologize for doing exactly what you said you were going to do provided it didn’t hurt anyone.”
“But doesnt making people wait hurt them, mentally?” Nightshade asked.
“How do you mean?” Radiant asked.
“Doesn't it make them feel like you don’t respect them, that your time is more important than theirs?”
Radiant looked from Nightshade to Dayspring. “What are you… why is this…”
“Just accept the apology so we can move on,” Dayspring replied with a grin.
“Fine,” Radiant gave in, unsure just how he’d lost the argument, or for that matter, how the argument came to be in the first place. “But I’m having a talk with Taz once this is all over.”
“Does that mean you’re coming down to visit us?” Nightshade asked, her tone overflowing with joy.
“You act like I’ve never been before.”
“I… I actually don’t remember the last time you’ve been down,” Nightshade said.
“Oh it couldn’t have been that long ago,” Radiant replied, unsure of himself.
“It’s been four years since you’ve last been down to Canterlot,” Dayspring replied.
Radiant looked at him, “Four… years?”
“Lost track?” Dayspring asked.
“Yeah… I guess I have.”
“Oh, they’ll be sooo happy to see you!” Nightshade chirped in.
Radiant paused as he considered what had been said. He’d known he’d lost track of time, but that long? “I’ll… I’ll be happy to see them too.”
“Glad to hear it,” Dayspring replied as he walked up and lightly brushed his coat on Radiant’s. His actions also allowed Nightshade to jump over onto his back. “So, what direction are we heading in anyway?”
Radiant blinked three times in quick succession. His mind jarred by the sudden change in topic but grateful for it all the same. “The north.”
“The north is a cardinal direction, and not the way forward, much less one that’ll get us to a destination. Unless you mean our goal is true north?”
“You need a direction to find a way to reach your destination and achieve your goal!”
Dayspring rubbed her mane playfully for that comment. Nightshade smiled throughout and made quick work of resetting it as soon as he was done.
Radiant chuckled. “No, I don’t think we’re going true north. She pointed out the direction in my dream. Let’s start at the field and we’ll go from there.”
“Journey of a thousand miles,” Dayspring said as he signaled for Radiant to lead the way.
“Starts with a single step!” Nightshade finished.
“Come on you two. We haven’t started our first step yet. We’re just going to the point where we can start our first step!” Radiant yelled from ahead of them.
“Oh,” Nightshade replied.
Dayspring just chuckled as he started walking forward. The three of them made a quick path through the freshly fallen snow. Each with freshly packed saddlebags of supplies and stowed winter coats.
The temperature in the Crystal Empire was cold, but their natural coats were more than enough protection. When they got up north, that’d change, and quickly.
As they stepped onto the field Radiant took a look around. Dayspring and Nightshade watched in silence, an unusual state for one of them. They watched as Radiant retraced his hoofs in his dream. A dream that came back to him clear as day. At last he reached the point in his dream where Firestar disappeared, her last act was to point in the direction she needed them to go.
“That way,” Radiant said as he pointed a hoof off in a north by northwest direction.
Dayspring didn’t ask if Radiant was sure. He simply nodded and lowered his horn in the direction Radiant pointed. A flash of magic later saw a purple energy sphere shoot off from his horn in that very direction.
“Wow… cool!” Nightshade said as she watched him.
Radiant simply nodded his head in agreement. Sure, he was a unicorn with his own magic. He’d been present for many of his kin’s achievements as well, achievements that defied all logic, but there was something about watching Dayspring work that always impressed him.
Dayspring lacked the power or ability of Twilight or Night, nor could he simply will something into existence like Ataxia. Rather, Dayspring’s abilities came from his intelligence, his studying, his smarts. He’d most likely forgotten more than most ponies would learn in their lifetimes. Watching him work was like watching a seasoned master put paint on canvas. It was watching efficiency, not an ounce of magic power wasted, not a single flaw anywhere in his casting.
It was quick, it was clean, and it was utterly effective.
“And with that, we shouldn’t lose our way,” Dayspring said as he turned back to the group.
“Whatcha cast‽” Nightshade asked.
“Nothing much, just a beacon in the sky that’ll stay in place for a week. It’ll prevent us from getting lost and we’ll be able to see it even in the harshest blizzards.”
“Ohhh, how far away is it?” Nightshade held a hoof over her eyes and squint to see it in the distance. Radiant didn’t know why, it was clear to see and would no doubt spook several ponies that saw it. They’d think a new star suddenly appeared, one that could be seen in daylight.
“About seven-hundred miles, give or take a few feet.”
Radiant huffed at that, “Nothing much he says.”
“Oh come on, Twilight or Night could have done something far more impressive with minimum effort. This is something any unicorn could do.” Well, any unicorn married to Princess Luna, those late nights are fun in more ways than one, Dayspring thought.
“Any unicorn with decades of training and experience, plus the natural talent for it,” Radiant corrected.
“Maybe.”
“Plus they’re Gods.”
“Yeah.”
Radiant shook his head. “I’ll never understand why you’re so brazen showing off your intelligence but so modest about your magical abilities. You can and have done amazing things, and you’ve done them in spite of being a ‘normal unicorn’, of not being a God.”
“Maybe he thinks his intelligence is his true gift, and his magic is just a benefit of it?” Nightshade asked.
“Kinda like how your sword skill is your ability and your magical blades are simply an extension of it,” Dayspring said to Radiant as he nuzzled the little pony on his back.
“How do you mean?” Radiant asked, unsure.
“Well, let me ask, what’s your special talent?”
“Sword fighting.”
“Yes, and how skilled are you?”
“Very, or at least I was.” Although maybe I am again with this younger body?
“How many swords could you control, at your best?”
“About sixty.”
“You could fight, effectively, with almost sixty blades all at the same time.”
“Yes. Where are you going with this?”
“That’s very impressive, that takes concentration, skill, and situational awareness the likes of which few ponies could ever hope to match.”
“Okay.”
“Now conjure a single blade in front of us. Don’t think about it, simply create one.”
With no small amount of doubt running through his head, Radiant did as he asked. In a flash of white light a magical blade appeared between the two. It lay horizontally in the air two feet off the ground rotating lazily on its x axis.
Dayspring gave off a respectul whistle as he walked up to inspect it, although if it was genuine or not Radiant couldn’t say.
“Now that is a blade. Look at it, perfectly balanced. The edge,” he paused, scanning it with his magic, “monomolecular sharp. You could cut a building in half with this blade and it’d be just fine afterwards.”
“I have,” Radiant admitted.
“So why don’t you consider this to be your talent? Why isn’t creating weapons like this your pride and joy? Even if they are made out of magic, creating objects like this takes real work, real skill.”
“Because it’s what you do with a blade that matters.”
“Exactly,” Dayspring replied. “Your blade is just a tool, much akin to a painter’s paintbrush, it’s what you can do with it, what a painter can create with it, that’s where the real talent is.”
“But wouldn’t your intellect be the brush then, Uncle Dayspring?” Nightshade asked.
Dayspring turned to her. “Is that what you think?” he asked with a smile. The unicorn lowered his head and closed his eyes. White magic begin building from the bottom of his hooves and traveling up his legs, his back, and to his horn.
Nightshade and Radiant watched as the very air around them darkened, the light sucked into Dayspring’s horn as it channeled more and more energy from the very land itself. After several seconds Dayspring opened his eyes and released the spell.
A gold hoberman sphere the size of a house appeared directly above him. His two travel companions and everypony else lucky enough to be able to view it watched as the sphere rotated on every one of its axes while expanding and contracting with breathtaking beauty.
Dayspring added a second sphere to the display, followed by a third, and then a fourth. Each sphere fit perfectly into the design and they all moved as one, their contractions perfectly synced up with each other.
“B-e-a-utiful,” Nightshade said, awestruck.
“Now tell me, is my magic the paint brush, or the painting?”
“The brush,” Radiant replied, gasping in spite of himself.
“And that’s why I don’t brag about my skills, my ability with magic. Magic, all magic, even that of Mom or Night’s is simply a tool,” Dayspring said as he killed the spell. The spheres hanging above his head vanished, the brightness returning to the sky as they left. “It doesn’t matter how much power you have, what matters is what you do with it.”
“That’s what you used to tell your students,” Radiant said.
“Yes, and I still stand by it to this day.” He turned to Nightshade. “Use the skills you have to paint your own picture, little one. It doesn’t matter what brush you have, what tools are at your disposal, the only thing that matters is what you do with them, what you create with them. Never let anypony tell you otherwise.”
Nightshade nodded her head in agreement. The lesson wasn’t one she fully understood at the time, but it was one that stuck with her.
“Not that this wasn’t informative. But we should get going,” Radiant cut in.
“Yes,” Dayspring agreed before adding. “Are you… are you going to be okay, with your injury and all?”
Radiant turned his head to his bandaged shoulder. “This barely hurts anymore. Besides, I have you with me. I’m sure we’ll be fine.”
“If you say so,” Dayspring said before turning back to the direction. “I should be able to teleport us to the horizon, but I don’t want to do more than two a day, just in case.”
“Only two teleports? I thought you were getting stronger, not weaker,” Radiant poked him in the flank at that, teasingly.
“Hardy har. No, I can do more than two, but I don’t want to overextend, just in case…”
Dayspring let the last words hang in the air, something Radiant picked up on to mean ‘just in case something happens, and I need to get us out of there.’ He nodded. “Meh, a little walking would do these old bones some good. How about you, kiddo?”
Nightshade chirped up, “Oh, I don’t mind, I’m not sure how much walking I’ll be doing though.” She added the last bit with a smile.
“More than you expect,” Dayspring said.
“Huh?”
“Nightshade, we’re going into the frozen north. That means snow, which means snow storms. When we get up there we’ll need winter coats. I’ll do my best to keep us warm but there’s no doubt that it’ll affect your ability to fly.”
“Oh,” Nightshade said as she extended her wings and retracted them. Her eyes glancing to one wing and then the other as she did so. “Will I still be able to ride on you?”
“Always,” Dayspring replied with a smile.
“Then let’s go!”
“She’s got a lot of Rainbow in her,” Radiant said with a grin.
“That she does. Although, I think I see more of Taz in her myself,” Dayspring said as he concentrated on the necessary spells. Group long-range teleports to unknown distantinations by ponies that didn’t count themselves in the divinity were advanced to say the least. However for a pony of Dayspring’s skill, they were almost second nature. That being said, his concern was notable, too many such teleports would leave him exhausted, and should that happen at the wrong time the group could be in trouble.
“How do y—” In a flash of magic the group disappeared from the center of the arena and teleported almost five miles north, directly in the direction of the faux star that Dayspring had created earlier. “ou mean?” Radiant finished as the group landed in a location with far more snow, and with it, far more cold.
Dayspring felt Nightshade try and burrow herself deeper into his coat. The biting wind coming as something of a shock to the little one. He concentrated on a heat bubble around the group, warming the air twenty to thirty degrees.
Nightshade relaxed a little. “Thank you,” she all but purred.
“You’re welcome.” Dayspring said as he saw Radiant start to pull his coat out of his bag and put it on. The white unicorn did the same with Dayspring’s, playfully burying Nightshade as he did so.
“Hey, no fair!” Nightshade said as she climbed out from under Dayspring’s coat.
“Deal with it,” Radiant teased as he pulled her coat from Dayspring’s bags and did the same with her. “You’ll need these soon enough. Dayspring’s spell will help, but we’ll never hear the end of it if you get sick.”
Nightshade pouted a little as she tried to worm her way out of the coat. Once she realized that wasn’t going to happen, the little pony gave up her attempts and then tried to fit her bat-wings through the slots on the sides that were normally meant for pegasi.
“You should probably leave them inside your coat,” Dayspring said. “Like I said, you’re not going to be able to fly in this weather and leaving them inside your coat will keep them, and yourself, warmer.”
“Okay,” Nightshade replied as she gave up biting at the coat in an attempt to open it enough. “Now we go forward?”
“Yep,” Dayspring said. “We’ll walk to…” he looked around trying to spot some place higher up to get a better vantage point for the next teleportation. “There.”
Radiant followed Dayspring’s eyes until he saw the same thing his friend had. A taller glacer about two miles away. “Mhh… that should work.”
“It’d be helpful if we knew where we were going.”
“You know what I know,” Radiant replied.
“Maybe ask for more details when you next see her in your dream?”
“Sure, if she visits again.”
“Who?” Nightshade asked as the three started to move forward.
“That’s right, we never actually…”
“Told her.” Radiant finished.
“You… you don’t have to if you don’t want to,” Nightshade said as she saw the look of hurt on Radiant’s face. “I’m just happy spending time with you two.”
Radiant couldn’t help but crack a small smile at that. “No, that’s not fair. You’re involved in this too, for better or worse.”
“You remember that mare that came to visit you last night? The one with the tan fur?” Dayspring asked.
“Yeah, she was really nice.”
“That’s my wife,” Radiant said. “My… deceased wife.”
“Your… I was haunted‽ That’s soooo cool!”
Dayspring laughed at that. “No, you weren’t being haunted. It’s…”
“It’s something else,” Radiant finished. “She’s… someone… something has happened to her. Or not to her but something’s occured that’s splitting her, it’s causing her to exist both here and there.”
“Why would someone do that to your wife?” NIghtshade asked.
“That’s why we’re going out here, to find out,” Dayspring said.
“Oh, that makes sense. But… umm… where’s there?”
Radiant looked back to her. “Where’s where?”
“There. You said she existed here and there, if where going where here is, then where’s there?”
“Say that three times fast,” Dayspring joked.
“That-that-that,” Nightshade replied, beaming with pride.
“She’s good,” Radiant said with a smile. “But I get your meaning. You want to know where ‘there’ is, or where she is when she’s not here.”
“Exactly!” Nightshade replied.
“There… there is her Elysium.”
“Elysium?”
“It means paradise,” Dayspring replied. “It’s a place of pure happiness, of joy, one where all your dreams are reality and everything you’ve ever wanted is yours for the taking. When your pass on, when you die, if your soul was pure you go to your Elysium for the rest of eternity.”
“What if your soul isn’t pure?” Nightshade asked.
“That’s nothing you have to worry about, little one,” Radiant replied. “I can promise you that. Of everypony I’ve known in my life, yours is the purest that I’ve ever had the pleasure of knowing.”
“But what about the ones that aren't?” Nightshade pressed the issue, curious and unwilling to drop it.
“They… they go someplace else, someplace not as nice,” Dayspring said.
“Forever?”
Dayspring answered by nodding his head.
“That’s awful!”
Radiant couldn’t help but growl a little at that. “If they’re bad enough to get sent there then they deserve it.”
“Not forever! That’s mean, they shouldn’t be punished for eternity for a few bad choices now!”
“What if those bad choices were killing somepony?” Radiant asked.
“Well… a few years, sure. But no, not forever, not even then.”
“And if someone killed Dayspring? Or even Lunar Light?”
“Radiant,” Dayspring gave him a warning.
“No, I’m curious.”
“I…” Nightshade found herself at a loss for words at that thought.
“Someone, someone evil who’d done almost nothing but bad in their lives. That someone took from you the ponies you love, Dayspring, Lunar, your parents. Where should they go? Should they only be punished for a few years and then get to spend eternity in Elysium?”
“I… umm…” NIghtshade looked down at her hooves.
“Radiant, you’re pushing too far,” Dayspring said.
“Consider that, someone took from you everyone you loved, they murdered them, you’ll never see them again. What would you do?” Radiant asked. The tears in his own eyes told Dayspring that Nightshade had touched a very tender nerve and he wasn’t thinking straight.
When there was no answer Radiant added, “Consider that for a while.”
“Enough,” Dayspring all but yelled. “Let’s just walk forward in silence for a while.”
Silence descended on the group. Dayspring walking slightly behind Radiant. Every few feet he found himself checking on Nightshade. The little pony somehow felt even lighter than she normally did on his back. Dayspring found himself feeling sorry for her at Radiant’s actions, sorry for Radiant at how awful he must feel for going off on her like that, sorry for Radiant that the conversation had even went there, and mad at Radiant for losing his cool like he had. It was rare for Dayspring not to know what to say, so he said nothing.
Radiant was in much the same boat. When his anger subsided he started to kick himself for what he’d said, for how much he knew he bucked up. He couldn’t help but feel like he’d stolen something from Nightshade, something that could never be given back. However he couldn’t bring himself to look back at what he knew must be a shooken filly.
When the silence itself became worse than the feeling in his chest, Radiant spoke. “Nightshade, I’m—”
“I still wouldn’t want them to suffer forever.”
The group paused. Radiant and Dayspring both looked back at her. “What?” Dayspring asked.
“Even if they took everyone from me. I wouldn’t want them to suffer forever. Forever is forever, and that’s not right.” There were tears falling down her eyes as she spoke, but the resolve in her eyes was unmistakable. “I would be reunited with the ones they took from me when I pass on, so if I don’t suffer forever, why should they?”
“Nightshade, you don’t—”
“No, you don’t understand, forever is forever. That’s not right. Everyone deserves as many chances as it takes to make the right choice! Once you put somepony in a place like that, you’re saying they have no more chances, that they can’t be helped, no matter what, ever, and that’s not right!”
“You’d hate them for doing it,” Radiant said with tears in his own eyes.
“Hate’s a poison you choose to drink, Uncle Radiant. Forgiveness is the only antidote.”
At her words Radiant turned and glared at Dayspring. For his part Dayspring just shrugged his shoulders ever so slightly; a clear acknowledgement that yes, he did indeed teach her that, and that he didn’t think she was wrong.
Radiant didn’t say any more on the subject. He simply walked up to Nightshade and wrapped her in a large hug, one that showed her just how sorry he was for making her cry, for saying the things he had.
Nightshade returned it with all the strength she had, the force of which surprised Radiant as he felt a few of his bones adjust ever so slightly. The two held the embrace for a long while until Dayspring broke it up. “You’re kinda heavy,” he said, the weight of Radiant’s frame holding onto a small pony on his back taking its toll.
Radiant let go, “Sorry.”
Dayspring just nodded. Nightshade surprised them both by jumping from Dayspring’s back to Radiant’s. Radiant nuzzled her ever so softly before they continued on their way.
A few minutes back into their journey, with Nightshade cuddling softly into his back, Radiant spoke, “I think I see what you mean.”
“About what?” Dayspring asked.
“About her being like Taz.”
Dayspring nodded. “She’s got his determination, his drive.”
“And his character,” Radiant added.
“Dad’s the greatest!” Nightshade chirped in.
“Yes, yes he is,” Dayspring said as he reached over and ruffled her mane again.
As the group continued, Dayspring couldn’t help but reflect upon just how happy that conversation had made him. He had respect for his baby brother that few others in his family shared. They were too quick to define Taz by his relationship to his wife, Nighttide. They judged him for it, for how much him and his wife enjoyed each other, physically.
It was easy to see why. Nighttide was unbashful and sexually aggressive and in Taz she found a partner that was more than happy to go along for the ride. Those were a combination of traits that tended to make those around Nighttide and Taz uncomfortable. Dayspring suspected that part of their judgement of her and Taz was rooted in jealousy.
He knew that to be a fact in Ataxia’s case, the mare had said as much, and often.
However that was simply one aspect of Taz. His character, his drive, his motivation was what truly defined him. Dayspring had known the stallion for most of his life, in one form or another. Taz was honrorable, trustworthy, kind, stoic, loyal, and if Dayspring was being honest, quite the fighter. He was all this and more.
Taz had always impressed Dayspring. His spirit, his determination to be a stallion of his word, to always do the right thing, these things only seemed to increase as time went on and he added loving father and husband to his already impressive list of traits.
That was the Taz that Dayspring knew, the one he admired. And, as the conversation had just verified, the one that Nightshade knew as well.
True, he suspected, quite correctly, that Nightshade probably knew way more about sex than she should, but it didn’t seem to have any negative impact on her at all. If anything it seemed to verify his own personal viewpoint that foals are as mature as you let them be.
It was that viewpoint that caused him to be far more honest around their kids than others might like. His policy was to never lie, to never sugarcoat the truth more than absolutely necessary. He’d always answer any question as honestly as he could. That policy had bought him a fair share of scorn, especially from Twilight, Shimmering Night, Luna, and Aurora, but it’d also bought him the respect of the kids. Flash, Blaze, Vela, Starlight, and even Echoside had learned over the years that if they asked him a question, any question, he’d tell them the truth without judgement where others might lie.
As such when he continued that policy with their kids, none of them said anything about it to him. He wasn’t sure when he took on the role of confidant, of the wise uncle, but he couldn’t deny that the role fits him like a glove. Even if it did cause him to know far more about his family then he ever thought he would.
Not that he considered it a bad thing. Knowledge wasn’t inherently good or bad, it was what you did with it that matters. And he’d never betray the trust he’d built up with everyone. Such trust took decades to establish and only seconds to destroy, something he knew all too well.
“You weren’t joking,” Radiant whispered to Dayspring as the group made their way to the high point. “She’s not dumb, naive, but not dumb.”
“Told you so” Dayspring added. “I can’t take the credit though. That goes to her parents. She’s intelligent, more so than most ponies I know.”
“From you that’s quite a compliment.”
“She’s also not that naive.”
“You—you agree with her then?”
“I do.”
Radiant thought about that for a while. Finally he shook his head, unable to comprehend the logic. “How?”
Dayspring looked at him. “Mother.”
“Rainbow?”
“Yes,” he said. “She’s the one that showed me just that.”
“Wait, so Nightshade got that from her?”
Dayspring shook his head. “No, she’s just arrived at the same conclusion. Rainbow Dash, the fastest mare in the world, the one that killed a God. She forgave, or did you forget it?”
“You’re talking about Tartarus?”
Dayspring nodded. “Yes. She forgave him, vouched for him at the end of our battle, or did you forget?”
“That’s not what she said, she said that she’d never forgive him!”
“Words Radiant, those were words. What were her actions?”
“She…” Radiant thought about it, understanding began growing in his eyes.
“A pony will lie through their teeth, but their actions will always show their true intentions. I’ve studied up on what happened, on how he killed mom. On what he took from my family, my friends. I know that Rainbow was there, that she sunk the sickle directly into his skull. It doesn’t take a genius to know how the great Rainbow Dash would feel about someone that did what Tartarus did. And yet, when Tartarus was looking at a second death in the chamber of the sands of time, it was Rainbow Dash that came to his defence. She’s vouched for him to the three primordial Gods that were deciding his fate. She forgave him, she forgave the one that took her love from her.”
“I’m not… I’m not that strong,” Radiant replied as he lowered his head.
“It’s okay, uncle Radiant, don’t be sad,” Nightshade said as she started to lightly stroke his red mane.
“I suspect that few of us are,” Dayspring replied as he magically lifted Nightshade from Radiant’s back and placed her on his own. The metaphoric action not lost on either of them. Neither was Nightshade’s actions when she leapt right back onto Radiant’s back and gave him a huge hug.
“Don’t be sad, I’m not mad at you,” she said, hugging him tightly.
“Actions will always speak the truth. Who you help, what you spend your time on, how you treat others, how you handle the good, and the bad. Those reveal your true intentions. What you think matters, who you think matters, not your words. Talk is cheap. You make time for the things that matter to you and excuses for the things that don’t.”
“I make time for everyone!” Nightshade exclaimed proudly.
“Yes you do. Sadly, I… I did not. Radiant I don’t blame you, I don’t judge you for how you feel. I blame myself.”
Radiant pulled his head back at that. “I’m my own pony, Day. My choices are my own responsibility, not yours.”
Dayspring shook his head. “You’re right, and wrong. Yes we are each ultimately responsible for our own choices, but none of us live in isolation and there’s not a single pony who gets through life on their own. We all stumble and fall, and that’s why we have friends who are supposed to be there for us, ones that should see something’s wrong and help us when we need it. That was my job, and… and I failed you. And no, the irony of the son of the Princess of Friendship being a bad friend is not lost on me.”
“You couldn’t have known.”
“I suspected. Three years ago when I last saw you, in Warclaw. I suspected. I saw you, I just thought… I thought you were just feeling bad about Blaze leaving.”
“I was,” Radiant replied.
“It was more than that though. I should have pushed further.”
“That feels like a lifetime ago. But like I said, I’m done with that.” Radiant forced a stiff upper lip as he pressed forward.
“You don’t have to lie, uncle Radiant. It’s okay to feel sad,” Nightshade replied.
“Not you too,” Radiant said, sighing.
“I know what you said, and I’ll restate what I said, we both know that it’s not that easy. The past… the demons that live there, they don’t ever leave us. They’re a part of us, forever.”
“Especially when your friends don’t let it go,” Radiant replied, a little annoyed to still be the center of attention.
Dayspring shook his head. “Letting it go is what got us here. You can’t do it alone, no one can. Life just doesn’t work like that.”
“It’s lonely to be alone,” Nightshade said as she continued rubbing his mane.
“That too,” Dayspring said, smiling a friendly smile. One that fell away when Radiant didn’t return it. Realizing that he was pushing too far too fast, Dayspring turned to Nightshade and said, “Why don’t you tell Radiant everything that you got for Heartwarming Eve?”
Radiant plucked up a little as Nightshade started to ramble on, eager to tell not just who gave her what, but also how she shared all her gifts with everyone else, spreading the happiness around. Dayspring only half paid attention to the filly’s musing. He concentrated on their path forward and occasionally stole glaces of his friend.
To Dayspring, Radiant looked happy, well, happier then he had yesterday anyway. He could tell that Radiant was internalizing at least some of their conversation. That being said his friend was still hurting, that much Dayspring could read. There was a defeat in Radiant’s walk, a resignation to him, one that Dayspring knew wouldn’t go away over a weekend no matter what was said.
You’ve convinced yourself that you’re done with the pity party. But that’s just as dangerous as what you were doing before. It’s not that easy, you know it and I know it. Life just doesn’t work that way. Luna, how do I help you? What more can I say?
If there was an answer, Dayspring couldn’t think of it; however, he did see they were almost at their destination. He interrupted Nightshade’s story by clearing his throat. “We’re almost there.”
Radiant turned from Nightshade and looked forward, seeing the glacier edge in front of them. “Time sure flies, huh?”
“We’re going up there?” Nightshade asked.
“Yep. Nightshade why don’t you come over to me. I think Radiant should take this part,” Dayspring said with a smile.
Radiant looked over at him, confused. What are you planning? You could get us up there easily.
“Why don’t you carve us a path?” Dayspring asked with a wink as Nightshade hopped over to his back.
Ahh, you’re giving me a chance to show off, he thought. “Alright, I think I can manage that,” Radiant added as he turned to the glacer face. “Watch carefully, kiddo,” Dayspring said with a smile.
“I wouldn’t miss it,” Nightshade replied.
The pair watched as the white unicorn with the red mane approached the glacer. Dayspring couldn’t help but notice an air of confidence that seemed to exuberant from his friend. He knew why this was Radiant in his element, doing what he was born to do, what he trained to do, what he lived to do.
Radiant rotated his left forward hip, and then his right, barely noticing the slight pain from his torn ligament. If anything the slight shooting pain only served to revergerate him from the cold that much more. Something that had come back tenfold as soon as he’d stepped away from Dayspring’s circle of protection.
Nightshade’s eyes went wide as she saw Radiant conjure a blade, then another, and another. The magical energy of their creation just as impressive to the young mare as it had been in the stadium earlier that day.
She blinked and lost track of them. “Dayspring, where did they go?”
“Up there,” Dayspring said, his eyes on the glacier itself.
Nightshade stranded her eyes, seeing only flashes of light that’d spark into existence for an instant before disappearing. “What?”
“Watch, carefully,” Dayspring added.
Nightshade strained even more until she could make out a pattern in the flashes. She gasped as she watched Radiant’s work. With lightning-quick flashes of his blades, Radiant was carving out a ramp in the ice.
“Wow…” NIghtshade gasped.
“Oh, he's not done yet,” Dayspring said.
Radiant upped his game. WIth an additional three blades he began work carving from the top down, two more saw the beginnings of a ramp to slide away the small blocks of ice his work was leaving behind, another ten began carving out a flight of stairs for them to comfortably take.
Dayspring hadn’t lied earlier when he complimented Radiant’s blades. They truly were a thing of beauty, but even he was slightly taken aback by how much control Radiant maintained over the blades. They grew and shrunk according to Radiant’s will, becoming small enough for detail work one second, and large enough to leave twenty foot slashes in the ice the next.
That level of control, of dedication, of concentration, it was the mark of somepony that had truly mastered his craft, his talent.
All in all, it took Radiant thirty minutes before he finally powered down his horn and returned to the group. The sweat on his face had already begun to freeze, but even still he looked satisfied to no end.
“A work of art,” Dayspring said.
“It’s a painting,” Nightshade said with a huge grin as she jumped down from Dayspring’s back, played a quick, impromptu game of leap frog through the snow, and jumped up to hug Radiant with all her might.
“Thanks,” Radiant replied, smiling. He looked back, taking in his work fully. In truth he expected that he could have finished in half the time, but opportunities like this didn’t happen every day and he couldn’t help but put a little artistic flare on it.
While he’d never claim to be an artist, he was happy with the overall result.
“The mural of Nightshade might have been a little much,” Dayspring said as he admired the ten foot decoration Radiant had carved in the stairwell.
“That’s the best part!” Nightshade yelled in protest.
“I agree,” Radiant replied as he ran his hoof over her mane again.
“Still, what you’ve created here Radiant, it’s amazing. This… this is something that may last years.”
“Thanks,” Radiant replied as he began to appreciate his work in that new context.
Dayspring concentrated, building power in his horn and releasing it in a wave of purple energy. Nightshade blinked clear the after-image before asking, “What’d you do?”
“Oh, I just ensured that it’ll last a little longer. I think work like this should be appreciated for more than a few years.”
“How long?” Radiant asked.
“A few… centuries.”
“Damn Dayspring.”
“That’s a bad word!”
Dayspring just ignored Nightshade’s protest. “What are you going to name it?”
“Name?” Radiant asked.
“It’s a fixture now. Needs to be on the map, so that means it needs a name. What are you going to call it?” Dayspring asked.
“I… I don’t know.”
“Can I name it?” Nightshade asked.
Radiant looked at her, “Sure, little one. What do you want to call it?”
“The Star Crossing,” Nightshade said.
“Why the Star Crossing?” Dayspring asked.
“Well, we’re following a star,” Nightshade replied, pointing a hoof up at the faux star they were following to their destination. “And it was created by uncle Radiant Star.”
Radiant was floored by that, with just how well the name seemed to fit, but more so with just how honored he felt that she’d name it after him. “I think that’s a great name,” he replied as he nuzzled her ever so softly in thanks.
“Thanks,” Nightshade said proudly. “I’m glad you like it.”
“I love it,” Radiant said back. “Dayspring, I think I owe you an apology.”
“Oh? About what?” Dayspring asked cooly as the group made their way up Star Crossing.
“You’re a great influence on her after all.”
“Told you,” Dayspring replied adding a small raspberry for good measure.
Radiant chuckled at that before turning to Nightshade. “Maybe you’re the bad influence.”
“Yep!” Nightshade replied proudly. Her response caused the group to break out in laughter.
The three made their way up the slope of Star Crossing. In spite of himself, Radiant couldn’t help but take pride in his creation. The slope was just the right angle to promote safe travel without risk of slipping and falling down. And with Dayspring’s enhancement any snow that fell upon it would simply melt away, ensuring that it’d last for ages.
They reach the top of the slope in five minutes, their new vantage point granting them greater clarity of the next leg of their journey. Something that caused Radiant to sigh, loudly, when no obvious end goal presented itself.
“Did you think it’d be that easy?” Dayspring asked.
“Hoping...” Radiant replied.
“You’re old enough to know that nothing is that easy,” Dayspring replied. “If it was it wouldn’t be worth doing.”
“Why’s that?” Nightshade asked.
“Because anyone could do it,” Dayspring said back. “And if anyone can do it then it doesn’t take any talent to get it done.”
NIghtshade cocked her head ever so slightly. “That’s kinda’ rude.”
That took Dayspring aback. “How do you mean?”
“Well, it implies that tasks that can be completed by anyone aren’t worth your time, that you’re somehow above such tasks, that you’re somehow better than everyone else.”
“Wait… that’s not what...“
Radiant chuckled under his breath as he said, “She’s got you there.”
Dayspring rolled his eyes at Radiant. “Okay, let me rephrase. Easy tasks solve easy problems, hard tasks solve hard problems. If a problem is hard, we don’t expect it to have an easy solution, because if it did it would already be solved.”
“You sure that’s not just a lack of imagination on the part of the solver?” Radiant asked.
“Radiant, shut up,” Dayspring said.
“Uncle, don’t be mean!” Nightshade protested as she rapped him on the back of the head.
“Okay, okay, I’m sorry,” Dayspring said in defeat.
“And what are you sorry for?” Nightshade asked.
This time Radiant broke out in full on laughter. Dayspring sighed even louder. “I’m sorry I was mean to you Radiant, I won’t tell you to shut up again, around Nightshade,” he said the last part under his breath.
“That’s better,” Nightshade said with a smug grin.
“I agree,” Radiant confirmed.
Quick to change the subject, Dayspring glanced around and smiled when he saw their next destination. “That should work,” he said, forcing the other two to divert their attention.
“What?” Radiant asked as he looked in the direction Dayspring was. “Oh, that.” What they saw was the tip of a peak out in the distance. With their extra height from being on top of the glacier and the height of the peak, the group could see further than the five miles from before. It was easily thirty miles away from their current position. “It’s a good spot, but looks cold.”
“Not more cold,” Nightshade complained.
“It’s called the frozen north for a reason,” Dayspring said. “But that’ll be it for today.”
“What do you mean?” Radiant asked.
“Two teleports, like I said, that’s all I can do for traveling. I need to make sure I don’t overextend, just in case.”
“Seems like a waste of the rest of the day, couldn’t we just travel by hoof afterwards?”
Dayspring shook his head. “Up there the snow will be built up higher than Nightshade. The extra energy it took to transverse it would be spent at little to no real gain in distance traveled. We’ll be limited to teleports from that point on.”
Radiant rolled his eyes but nodded. He disagreed, again, but that didn’t stop Dayspring from being right, again.
Dayspring used his magic to tighten the coat around Nightshade and strengthen the warmth spell around the group. “You two ready?”
“Ready!” Nightshade exclaimed.
“Ready,” Radiant said in a muted tone.
In a flash of magic the group was gone, teleported away to a much colder, much more dangerous place in a journey whose destination they could never have foreseen.
Although we can Never Truly Escape our own Thoughts
Radiant stood guard, his coat pulled as tightly as he could get it to his frame. Dayspring hadn’t lied about the cold, if anything he’d undersold it. The air at the top of the peak was easily below zero, never mind the wind chill. To make matters worse the snow they had landed in came up to Radiant’s neck.
He chuckled a little at the memory of Nightshade jumping from his back and disappearing into the snowbank. When they asked her why she had done it her response was that anything had to be warmer than where she was.
That had given Dayspring an idea. The unicorn built a snow igloo and froze it for the group to stay in. While it did wonders to keep them warmer, that didn’t change the fact that somepony still had to keep a lookout. The north was a dangerous place at the best of times.
The death of Shining Armor, Radiant Star’s father, had taught them that lesson. It wasn’t one that Radiant would ever forget.
The group had told stories, roughhoused a little, and even played a round of practical jokes on one another for most of the afternoon. They had to, there was nothing else to do. The snow was too packed and their destination too far to make it there before nightfall.
Given, Radiant didn’t quite believe Dayspring’s ‘two teleport rule’. Part of him suspected that Dayspring was using that as an excuse to spend more time with him.
Radiant looked back at where Dayspring and Nightshade were cuddled together sleeping. The little filly was locked tight in his embrace, curled up next to a warmth spell that Dayspring, somehow, kept going in spite of being asleep. Radiant was to switch off with Dayspring around two in the morning, or when the star flashed twice as he had put it.
Seconds became minutes, which turned to hours. The silence, the cold, and the darkness all weighed heavily. Radiant found himself stealing glances back into the igloo to spy on the two. Viewing Dayspring in such a content state, the evidence of his way of thinking undeniable, it caused his words to weigh on Radiant much heavier than they did before.
The unicorn sighed as he watched his friend and niece together. They looked, in a word, cute. But that cuteness didn’t quite remove the anger Radiant had felt almost all day. He had told Dayspring that he was done with the pity party, that he’d moved on, and yet Dayspring had—over and over again—refused to drop it.
“Why do you never believe me?” He said to nopony in particular.
Maybe because he’s smarter than you.
“He’s smarter, not wiser,” Radiant replied to his thoughts as he turned and looked back at the night’s snowfall.
You should leave the thinking to smarter ponies. That’s what she told you.
“Doesn’t that mean you should shut up?”
Touché.
Radiant smiled at that, until he realized that the argument he just ‘won’ was with himself. He sighed loudly as the seconds ticked by.
Despite the ‘victory’ he’d claimed over his thoughts, they begun to return. Thoughts of the last two days, the conversations with Dayspring, and, finally, as if they were simply inevitable, thoughts of Firestar.
He thought of her playing in the snow, of her running around the track, and of her nuzzling up to him in his dreams last night. As the time passed by, as the thoughts raced through his head, they were only stopped when he felt a stinging on his cheek.
Radiant reached a hoof up and wiped away a frozen tear.
“I’m… I’m crying again? Why? I said I was done. I ended the pity party…” He looked around in disbelief at himself before a random thought caused him to peer back at Dayspring. “Damn you. You were right, again.”
She told you.
“Fine, she was right again.”
That knowledge made him angry. He moved away from the igloo, far enough where sound would not carry through to the two sleeping ponies. “Why, why, why, why, why, why!”
His yell was lost in the snow.
“This is my life isn’t it‽ I’m just this existence! I cannot… I won’t… I refuse to let go! And because I can’t, I can’t live!”
You know that didn’t make any sense right?
“Shut up, just shut up and let me think!”
Again, no sense.
He moved further way, continuing to use his magic to force the snow out of his way. “Just shut the buck up.”
Once he felt he was far enough away Radiant raised his head to the sky and screamed, “I bucking hate you! I hate you so much!”
His voice carried less than ten yards before it was lost in the snow.
“I hate you!” He yelled again.
Who?
“Everyone!” Radiant yelled again. “And myself!” That unintentional admission stole the strength from him. Radiant lowered his head. “Mostly myself…”
The last part wasn’t a yell. The effect of the cold on his body sapping his strength. “I hate myself.”
You do, don’t you?
“With every fiber of my being. I hate me more than anything else. So should everyone else.”
“I don’t hate you.”
Her words arrived at the same time as her smell. Radiant quickly spun around in the snow. His eyes locking onto a tan pegasus sitting five yards away from him. It was both a source of great joy and great sadness to lay eyes on her again.
“Why don’t you hate me?”
“Why should I?”
“Because I wasn’t there, I didn’t save you.”
“Do you think you could have?”
“I’d have done anything to prevent it.”
“Radiant, in the off chance you had been in the Empire on that day. There was no way you’d have prevented what occurred. That creature’s suggestion in Cadance was almost absolute. She’d have distracted you with some mundane task, or waited until you were on the other side of the castle. And, even if that wasn’t the case, even if you had, somehow, arrived during the attack. You’d have killed Cadance in my defence. You’d have killed your own mother, forever staining your hooves with the blood of someone that wasn’t responsible for her own actions. I for one am grateful that you weren’t there.”
“Still…” Radiant knew he sounded like a petulant foal but he didn’t care. “I still hate myself for it. I should have been there, or you should have come with me that day.”
“We both know that it couldn’t have happened any other way.”
“Then, if that’s the only way it could’ve gone down, you’d have been better off never knowing me, you’d have been better off with another life.”
“I’d never have wanted any other life.”
“You’d still be alive if you did.”
Firestar smiled, it was that same damn smile that made him truly believe that everything would be alright. That the world wasn’t a horrible place that did the worst things to good ponies. “But just think of the life I’d have missed. Would you have deprived me of that?”
“For you to be alive, yes,” Radiant admitted as he wiped a frozen tear from his eyes.
“It’d have been a life poorly lived,” Firestar said. “One lacking in joy and happiness.” Radiant lowered his head as she came closer. He could feel her warmth, her touch upon his fur. “Now stop hating yourself.”
“I tried,” he admitted as he sank his head into her fur.
“No, you took the first step. You admitted there was a problem and then, not unexpectedly, immediately decided that admitting it somehow fixed it and that it wasn’t a problem anymore. It’s not that easy and you know it.”
“You sound like Dayspring,” Radiant said.
“From the stories you used to tell me about him, he sounds like a smart pony,” Firestar replied.
“Not half as smart as you.”
“So still two times smarter than you?”
“Probably,” Radiant said, chuckling.
Radiant felt her wing wrap around him. “I’m so sorry, you’re hurting so much.”
“It’s… it’s so painful.”
“I know,” Firestar replied as she nuzzled deeper into his fur.
“Firestar… I… I don’t know if I can do it anymore.”
“Do what?” Firestar asked as she rubbed the back of his head.
“Pretend that everything is okay,” Radiant replied as he started crying into her fur. “Keep up this…” Dayspring’s words came back to him, “act.”
“Who’s asking you to?”
Radiant pulled away enough to look her in the eye, “You… I thought.”
“My idiot,” Firestar said with tears falling from her eyes as she stared directly into her lost love’s crying face. “I only asked you to live your life, to be there for our sons. I never asked you to pretend that you were something you’re not.”
“But I haven’t?”
“Yes you have, you’ve been pretending to be okay.”
Radiant lowered his muzzle as the tears started to pour from his eyes, Firestar increased her grip holding him tighter against her. “It’s okay to not be okay. It’s fine to feel sad, to feel hopeless, and to ask for help. You’re not alone, and you don’t have to pretend to be. Nor do you have to carry such heavy burdens by yourself, or even at all.”
She continued, “You’re a great ruler, Radiant. You’ve cared for your ponies and did right by them. You’re a wonderful father and shepherd our foals to be the stallions I’ve always known they could be. They’re both happy, content, and know love. That’s all I’ve ever wanted for them. You’re an admirable father, a caring, kind, generous husband. You made me happier than I could ever say. Laying in bed with you, talking with you, going on walks, spending our life together, even thought it was cut short, it was truly the most exquisite part of my existence.”
Her tears started to fall on his head as she finished, “You’ve always questioned how I could love you, how I could fall for someone like you. How you were somehow worthy of me. But you’ve never seen the truth, not really. It was I that couldn’t believe why you’d love someone like me. How I was somehow worthy of this wonderful, dashing, loving, caring, kind, generous, talented, and gifted stallion who just so happened to carry the title of ‘Prince of Equestria’.”
Radiant broke down into a full crying fit, to the stallion it felt like his heart was trying to leave through his mouth. He could barely breathe through the tears.
Firestar simply held him tightly, like she used to hold Flash when Vela used to pick on him. She knew, as a mother and a wife, that this pain he felt, it was something that needed to happen, it wasn’t something she could, or even wanted to prevent. So she let him cry, cooing softly as he did so.
In time—the exact amount of which was lost on both ponies—the tears stopped. Radiant didn’t look up. He took a moment to simply enjoy the feeling of being held by her. At a different time, he might have noticed that he felt warm, in spite of the cold, but at this time, at this moment that was the last thing on his mind.
“Thank you,” Radiant managed to get out despite his dry throat.
Firestar chuckled a little, “You don’t have to thank me for anything, you never have, and you never will.”
“Nightshade might disagree,” Radiant replied with a chuckle.
“Nightshade’s an interesting filly who has her own part to play.”
At that Radiant did look up. “A part to play in what?” There was almost a defiant tone in his words that surprised them both.
Firestar wiped some of the drying tears from his face. “Radiant, the story goes on, forever. Old ponies pass on, young ponies take their place. It’s the cycle of existence. All foals have their own stories to act in, they shepherd the future. It’s the job of the current generation to prepare them for it, not to try and save them from it.”
He laid his muzzle back on her fur. “You’ve learned a lot about all of this in our time apart.”
Firestar chuckled, “Eros has been keeping me company. We talk a lot.”
“Why does she talk to you? What do you even talk about?”
“She told me about how love, all kinds of love connects ponies to one another. About the bonds that are created in life. The ones that format birth between a mother and a foal, between siblings, between friends, and the strongest, between lovers. She said that such bonds transcend life and death, that they can even pass through the metaphysical. That they’re strong enough to even bypass Taz’s Null power.”
Radiant nodded at that. He remembered several stories from his youth, Twilight had encountered and said something similar.
“Well, if she’s to be believed, ours is rather… stronger than most ponies. Something about you either being indirectly related to her or the fact that we spent so long directly above her Occulous. She says she spends so much time with me because she wants to study it, to learn how it might be duplicated for others. And she says it’s that very connection that causes my paradise to be slightly different, that causes me to remember you even though I shouldn’t until you pass on. But between you and me,” Firestar lowered her voice and whispered the next part as softly as she could, “I think… I think she feels a little guilty for what happened. For not being able to stop it.”
“She should.”
“Radiant Star.”
Radiant pulled back slightly, not out of her grip but enough to signify that he knew he had just bucked up. That was Firestar’s ‘cut that shit out’ tone of voice, one he knew all too well.
Firestar continued, “You know damn well it wasn’t her fault. Stop trying to assign blame to anypony other than the one truly responsible.”
“I got back at him already,” Radiant all but mumbled.
“So why are you still trying to blame others?”
“Because it changed nothing!” Radiant admitted as he started to cry again. “I got revenge, I made him pay, I cut bucking Tartarus itself in half and yet… yet it didn’t matter. You’re still gone, mom’s still gone, and I’m still here. I’m stuck here, alone, without you.”
Firestar kissed him, forcing his muzzle up and the look of doubt on his face to turn into surprise. She held him in that state for several moments, at that moment the moonlight broke through the snowstorm and shone brightly on the two. When she broke it off she said, “My idiot. You’re not alone, you’ve never been alone. You’ve suffered alone because you chose to, because you believed that vengeance is all you needed. Vengeance that solved nothing, that fixed nothing.”
“I’m glad he’s dead,” Radiant replied, almost definitely.
“You’re not the only one. He had to die, that goes without saying. But his death wasn’t what you needed. It will never heal you, it will never fill that hole in your heart. You know this, don’t you?”
Radiant could only nodded.
“You need to forgive, you need to find it in you to forgive everyone for what happened. It’s not Eros’s fault for failing to stop it, it’s not Twilight's fault for not arriving in time, it’s not Rainbow’s fault either,” at her words Radiant looked up in surprise. He’d only blamed those two in his darkest moments, and that hadn’t been for years now, “And, most importantly, it’s not your fault either. Forgive the gods, the ponies, and the world for its faults Radiant, but most importantly, forgive yourself. No one, not god, pony, griffin, dragon, or yourself is perfect.”
“I… I don’t know if I can.”
“Why do I love you?”
“Huh?”
“Don’t tell me you forgot already?” Firestar asked as she played at being hurt by his words.
“Because I always try,” Radiant said.
“And that’s all I can ask for. Hate’s a poison you choose to drink, Radiant. Forgiveness is the only antidote.”
“You’ve been spying on me, huh?”
“Of course,” Firestar replied chuckling.
Radiant chuckled in turn. “I must seem so pathetic now.”
“Do you really think I’d ever laugh at your pain?”
“Well, there was that time I broke my leg, or the time I fell down the stairs, or that time I pulled my back in training, or that time I was doing the sword trick for Flash an—”
“Your MENTAL pain, not when you’re being an idiot. I’ll always find that funny.”
“No wonder I could always make you laugh.”
“It was the best part of being married to you.”
“The best?”
“Well… top five. Or at least in the top ten.”
“That’s the mare I remember,” Radiant replied with a chuckle.
“Still had doubts?”
“It’s been a decade.”
“Ponies change, but the bonds we share will never break. Not even death will do that.”
“I love you,” Radiant replied.
“I love you too, idiot.”
Radiant squeezed her tightly as he noticed, finally, that the snow had stopped falling. The land itself seemed to be perfectly silent, simply letting the two have their moment together. It was then that he started to think of their mission, and some other things. “Does… does this mean I fell asleep on watch?”
Firestar chuckled at that. “No, I think you’re still very much awake.”
“Then what is this? I mean I’m not complaining, but…”
“The pull here, it’s getting stronger. It feels like whatever force split me, it’s becoming more powerful on this side. I think… I think that our connection is getting in the way. I think that’s how I was able to visit you and Nightshade in your dreams. And now, in your waking dreams as well.”
“So this is like a hallucination or something?”
“Or something,” Firestar replied, chuckling. “Didn’t I teach you not to question a good thing?”
“You mean like on our fifth anniversary?” Radiant said with a sly grin.
“Exactly,” Firestar replied as she bopped him on the nose.
“Why didn’t we do that more often?” Radiant asked.
“Because then it wouldn’t have been as special.”
“Every second with you was special.”
“Ahh, when did you become such a softy?” Firestar teased.
“Old age, it tends to focus the mind, to make you realize what really matters.”
“You’re getting smarter, old stallion.”
“As long as I’m yours, you can call me whatever you want.”
“You’ll always be mine,” Firstar said as she snuck another kiss.
“We’re getting closer to our goal, aren’t we?” Radiant asked as they pulled away.
“Yes, you’ll be there tomorrow.”
“Any idea of what we’ll find?”
“No clue. Whatever part of me is being pulled there, my conscious is going to you.”
“Let me ask, are you the reason for my… change?”
“No, well… not directly.”
“Huh?”
“It’s complex. Eros doesn’t even fully understand it. She said it has to do with what you’ll find when you get there. I’m sorry, I cannot tell you more because I don’t know more. I know it has to do with what’s happening to me and with our connection, that’s it.”
“You know, for being a god she’s criminally unhelpful.”
“I told you they’re not perfect. They may be beings of phenomenal power, but that doesn’t mean they don’t make mistakes, or that they’re not prone to error. How could they be? Anything produced by something perfect would by definition be perfect. If we’re not perfect, how could they be perfect?”
“Eros tell you that?”
“Yep.”
Radiant rolled his eyes, his idea of what a god should be and the reality definitely were not matching up. But he couldn’t really argue either. However, that lead to another question. “I can’t even imagine what that’s like. Do you two just meet for tea each day? What’s it like having such regular conversations with a god?”
“Not as great as you might think.”
“Really?” Radiant asked in disbelief.
“I sometimes think they’re more flawed then we are,” Firestar said. “Eros frets a lot about what’s going on. About the past and the future. She talks a lot about Tartarus too. Personally I think she uses our time to vent a little about him.”
At that Radiant’s mood soured a little, “She’s supposed to be keeping him in check.”
“Oh she is. But you know how it is between lovers. Everyone has their moments, their little… what was the world she used, eccentricities that are cute at first but then gets more and more annoying as time goes on.”
“You mean like how I’d always hum the same song after sex?”
“Exactly,” Firestar said, half glaring at him. “It hasn’t been so bad. I’ve learned quite a few techniques that I cannot wait to try on you. Even if I do know more about Tartarus’s lovemaking skills than any mortal pony has ever known in all of existence.”
“Not from personal experience I hope.”
“Jealous?” Firestar asked as she started to slowly get Radiant to his hooves and start walking him back to the tent.
“You’re damn right I’d be jealous.”
“Relax, no I’d never. Not with him anyway.”
“What about Eros?”
The deep red blush on Firestar’s face was hard to miss. “Well…”
“Firestar! You little minx!”
“Hey, I’m dead, doesn’t count.”
Radiant started to laugh at that. “I guess I can’t really blame you. I mean if the God of Love wants to give you some personal lessons, I doubt there’s too many ponies who could say no.”
“You know it wouldn’t kill you to get a little something-something too.”
“I don’t know…” Radiant said.
“Radiant, how long has it been, ten years? It’s okay to find some happiness, just so long as it’s for fun. Your heart still belongs to me. Just like mine belongs to you. Always and forever.”
“My wife’s telling me to go get laid, I must be dreaming,” Radiant replied with a chuckle as the pair came to a stop.
“I’m telling you to find some forgiveness, and some happiness in your life, happiness that my memory alone can’t give you. Do that for me, okay?”
“I… I’ll try.”
“That’s all I can ask.”
“Is it my turn to take watch?”
Radiant turned his head and looked into the igloo, surprised to see Dayspring starting to stir. As the pony yawned and made to get up without waking Nightshade, Radiant turned back to see if Firestar was still there, but she was nowhere to be seen. He looked down, hoping there was at least some tracks of her leftover; there was nothing from her, just his own.
“Yeah, It’s your turn.”
And our Internal Demons will, Inevitably, Become our External Ones
Radiant shuddered as he got up. The biting cold had returned, and to make matters worse, it seemed to get through the igloo barrier that Dayspring had set up the day before. The little filly laying tightly next to him shivered as his body warmth left her. Her body noting his absence even in her sleep.
To help compensate, Radiant moved her closer to the fading ball of energy Dayspring had cast the night before to help keep them warm. When her body relaxed slightly he nodded and stood the rest of the way up. He looked out the igloo, the snowstorm had returned but even through it he could still make out the daylight that was doing its best to shine through the clouds.
Of Dayspring, Radiant saw no sign. Sighing, he tightened his coat and braced himself for what awaited him outside.
It was worse than he thought it would be. The moment Radiant stepped outside the wind pierced right through his coat, his fur, his skin, and his muscles. He felt it in his bones. Instantly his teeth started shaking as he walked through the snow buildup and out into what passed for daylight.
“You’re awake?”
Radiant looked around for the source of the voice. Had he not been half asleep he wouldn’t have bothered, the sound came from inside his head, an obvious indication that it was spoken but sent via magic. “Where are you?” he asked, his voice traveling about five feet before becoming lost in the snow.
“Behind you.”
Radiant turned around and rolled his eyes at what he saw. Dayspring was sitting on top of the igloo, a magical force bubble shining all around him. The stallion was relaxing with no coat on. Radiant huffed and made to join him.
On the second attempt to climb on top of the igloo Dayspring powered his horn and gave Radiant a magical assist, letting his back leg find purchase where there previously was none. Radiant huffed and climbed the rest of the way up the igloo and into the magical bubble.
He wasn’t surprised to find it at least sixty degrees warmer inside. Beyond the warmth though the most welcome relief was the lack of wind. “Enjoying yourself?” Radiant asked with a huff as he made to take off his coat.
“Being on watch doesn’t mean you have to suffer,” Dayspring replied matter-of-factly.
“I guess,” Radiant replied.
“Did you?”
“What?”
“You know, dream about her again?”
“Oh, that,” Radiant looked away.
“C’mon, even after everything we’ve talked about, you’re still shy about your feelings?”
Radiant turned back. “Look, talking about things like this… It’s not exactly…”
“You?”
“Yeah, I mean I’ll tell you, but that doesn’t mean it comes naturally.”
Dayspring chuckled. “I guess you can’t expect an old stallion to change his coat that easily.”
“It’s really not an issue for you, is it?”
“No,” Dayspring said with a shrug.
“Why not?”
“Because I’m me,” Dayspring replied.
“What does that mean?”
Dayspring tilted his head and took a deep breath. “I am who I am. I am my thoughts, my emotions, my actions, my deeds, my words, and my choices. All of these things make up the pony known as me, known as Dayspring Gleam. I am not ashamed of myself. I’m very proud of who I am, who I choose to be. I’m proud of the sum of my parts. So why would I be ashamed of the components of that sum?”
“That’s a cute saying and all, but it doesn’t change the reality, the judgment of others.”
“And there it is,” Dayspring said.
“What?”
“Judgment of others.”
“And? Everypony deals with that.”
“Why?”
“Why what?”
“Why do you care?”
“Care about what?”
“What others think.”
“Because!” Radiant started to get frustrated again. “Dammit quit being so obtuse and make your point already!”
“An answer given is meaningless,” Dayspring replied almost automatically.
“I’m not your bucking student,” Radiant huffed.
“I’m your student,” Dayspring said.
“What?”
“I said I’m your student. You’re teaching me so much and you don’t even realize it.”
“Luna damn you, Dayspring.”
“It’s true.”
“How is it true?”
“Because it’s true for everyone. We all experience life differently, we all approach things in our own unique manner. If you pay attention, if you watch carefully, everypony has something to teach you. Even if it’s just what not to do.”
“You really are a pompous ass.”
“I thought we established that already.”
Radiant laid down, and then found himself doing the oddest thing, he started to chuckle. “You really don’t care if ponies think of you that way, do you?”
“Nope.”
“Why not?”
“Because I’m happy with who I am,” Dayspring said. “If someone thinks negatively of me, that doesn’t change who I am, it doesn’t change my own happiness.”
Radiant stared at Dayspring, half expecting him to say ‘gotcha’. When that didn’t happen he sighed heavily. “How do you do that?”
“Simple, be happy with yourself. Stop basing your self worth on the opinion of others, base it only on your opinion of yourself.”
“Simple, you say.”
“Well the concept is simple, in practice few could ever truly manage it.”
“Then why bring it up?”
“Because it’s the only thing I’ve seen that works,” Dayspring said.
“Seriously?”
“Yep. Take mother for instance, She has a very healthy self image, and she’s happy. Whereas Ataxia hates herself, I doubt many ponies would call her a happy mare.”
“I think Ataxia would disagree with that statement.”
“Of course she would. It’s an act to her, an appearance she works rather hard to maintain. Talk to her one day, get past the sexual innuendos and get her to let her guard down. You’ll see what I’m talking about.”
“I somehow don’t see her opening up to you.”
“Well, it took a lot of alcohol.”
“How much?”
“About… seven barrels.”
Had it been anypony else, Radiant wouldn’t have believed him. “How did that not kill you two?”
“Well… Ataxia is Ataxia,” Dayspring said.
Radiant shrugged in agreement.
“I’ll admit it took about… four uses of a blood purifying spell for me not to pass out.”
“Only four?”
“She drank most of it,” Dayspring replied with a chuckle.
“Okay, that makes sense, but… why? Why did you go through all that?”
“Shimmering Night asked me to.”
“Ahh, any way you’d tell me what she wanted?”
“Nope, that’s between her and I.”
“Must have been an interesting night.”
“Very, but we’re getting sidetracked. Did you dream about her again?”
Radiant huffed and rolled his eyes. I should have known I wouldn’t get him off it. “Dream? No, not really, not any more than usual anyway.”
“An interesting qualifier.”
“Huh?”
“You answered, but you answered in the context of a dream, you qualified your statement as to not lie to me. So what happened?”
“It wasn’t… I wasn’t dreaming.”
“Huh?”
“She came to me, but I was awake. It happened a few minutes before we switched off last night. She was just kinda… there?”
“Sounds like it might have been a waking dream,” Dayspring said.
“A what?”
“You see them from time to time as a teacher. When the brain is just about to fall asleep it can enter a dream-like state before the body actually falls asleep. It normally goes unnoticed as sleep follows shortly after.”
“Bored a lot of students to sleep?”
“Occupational hazard,” Dayspring replied with a chuckle.
“I don’t know if that was it. It wasn’t like I was tired, rather, she was just kinda… there. Like you are now.”
Dayspring nodded.
“She… she told me to stop hating myself. To forgive myself, and for the love of Luna stop nodding.”
“What can I say? It’s hard to disagree with a statement like that. I wonder who else told you something similar.”
“Yeah yeah, you were right. Shut up already.”
In reply Dayspring just grinned.
“Ugh, you’re insufferable some days.”
“That’s a big word for you.”
“I remember Shimmering Night using it about you.”
“That explains it.”
“Anyway, yes, you and Firestar were both right. I’m not done with this… pity party,” Radiant lowered his head at that.
“It’s not a pity party.”
“Yes it is.”
“No, stop calling it that. It’s your emotions, your feelings, it’s part of who you are, and it matters. It matters a lot. By dismissing it as just a ‘pity party’ you’re dismissing part of yourself, you’re saying that feelings are dumb, that you should just get over it in a snap. And need I remind you that it’s that very behaviour that got us in this situation.”
“Us?”
“I’m your friend, your brother, Radiant. What happens to you happens to me.”
“Sorry to be such a bother,” Radiant replied in a snippy tone that he didn’t truly feel, but also couldn’t entirely suppress.
“It’s been the greatest part of my life.”
“Seriously?”
“Would I lie about something like that?” Dayspring asked.
“You… well… no, I guess not. It’s just strange to hear. That taking care of me is the greatest part of your life?”
Dayspring sighed and then shook his head. “No, you still don’t get it.”
“Then explain it in a way where a dumbass like me would understand!”
There was a pregnant pause that lasted half a minute before either pony spoke. Dayspring stared at Radiant, holding his gaze until, at last, Radiant looked away. “Sorry,” Radiant spoke.
“It’s easy to be sorry, it’s much harder to accept your own apology,” Dayspring replied.
“I wasn’t apologizing to myself.”
“You should, you’re awfully mean to yourself.”
Radiant's anger faded at Dayspring’s words. “Firestar… she said something similar.”
“It’s easy to see why.”
“You know if we didn’t have seventy years of history between us I think I’d deck you and walk away.”
“Probably,” Dayspring replied with a chuckle. “But to answer your rather inappropriate question. Being friends with you has indeed been the greatest part of my life. We do have seventy years of history between us. But that’s seventy years of adventures, sleepovers, laughter, joy, and sorrow. That’s seventy years of knowing that I have someone to turn to for anything, and that someone values me enough to turn to me when they need something. It means always having someone in my corner, or to tell me when I’m being dumb. Do you even appreciate how valuable that is?”
“The son of the Princess of Friendship lecturing about the importance of friendship, how cliche,” Radiant replied with a smile on his face that spoke the exact opposite of his words.
“It’s true.”
“Yeah, I suppose it is.”
“I won’t press anymore about the personal stuff, not until you want to bring it up. But did she say anything about our mission?”
“Thank you. And yes, she said we’d be there today. That our destination is close. But that the pull was getting stronger, and that’s how she was able to come to me without me being asleep. In that, what did you call it… waking dream?”
“What about the deaging?”
“She said she doesn’t know what’s causing it. Neither does Eros for that matter. But they are sure that it’s linked to whatever is going on. Speaking of which, how old am I now?”
Dayspring took a second to scan Radiant. It only took a second as it was a process that was very familiar to him now. “You lost another year.”
“Just a year?”
“Yes, it seems to be stabilizing. Which Is good, I don’t need to be responsible for two foals on this journey.”
“Was that a worry?” Radiant asked, the thought just now clicking with him.
“That you’d de-age forever? Wait, that wasn’t something you’d considered before?”
“No…”
“For the love of Luna, Radiant…”
“Yeah yeah yeah,” Radiant said.
Dayspring facehoofed. But let it go, there were other more urgent matters that had to be discussed. “About that other thing.”
“Stop playing the pronoun game, what other thing?”
“Eros.”
“Oh, that other thing. Yeah, apparently Eros has been spending time with Firestar,” Radiant replied, then chuckled as he added, “They talk, even meet for tea among other things.”
“So Eros is aware of what’s happening.”
“Yep.”
“That’s interesting, but what’s her interest in Firestar?”
“Something about the bonds of love that connect us all together, she says that ours is stronger than most and she wanted to study it. She’s not sure if it’s due to my mom being her Avatar or the time we spent living above the Crystal Heart. Or at least that’s what she told Firestar.”
“I assume Firestar has another theory?”
“She says that Eros might feel guilty for what happened.”
“I’d say I was surprised by that but it makes sense that she might feel that way. She did have a front row seat after all.”
“Don’t remind me,” Radiant said with a sigh.
“Sorry.”
Radiant waved it off. “I need to face it, right? Make peace with my demons and all that?”
“Something like that.”
Radiant rolled his eyes. ‘Casual dismissal’ wasn’t the reaction he expected Dayspring to have to that. “Of course you’d be difficult, even with me agreeing with you.”
“Radiant, we’re talking about a decade of repressed feelings. Of hatred, anger, sadness, depression, loss, grief, and fear. There are no easy answers for any of it. You’ll never make peace with what happened, not fully, but you can accept it and move past it. Healing, true healing takes time. Far more than the two days we’ve spent together.”
“Still trying to get me to come back with you?”
“Just to get you to seriously consider it. Do something selfish for yourself, just this once.”
“You really think Starlight is ready to take my place?”
“Doesn’t matter what I think, what do you think?”
“Yeah… yeah I’d say she is. But do you think she’d want to?”
“Oh yes. I know for a fact that she’s rather… shall we say, bored.”
“She’d be more bored up north. Ruling isn’t exactly intellectually taxing.”
“Not if you’re doing it right anyway,” Dayspring agreed. “But she’d find things to keep her busy, and, more importantly, she can handle a crisis if it happens.”
“When, when it happen.”
Dayspring just nodded at that. “So will you consider it?”
“If I say I’ll consider it will you drop it?”
“Not forever,” Dayspring admitted.
“I guess that’s the best I can ask for.”
Before either pony could continue a loud shout came up from in the igloo. “It’s too cold!”
“Nightshade’s up,” Radiant said with a laugh.
“Just think, you could wake up to this and so much more every single day,” Dayspring replied as he powered his horn and opened a hole in the igloo. “You want to come join us?” he asked.
Nightshade was huddled around the warmth circle like she was a cat and it was her favorite ball of yarn. The mare looked up with a rather angry expression on her face. “It’s cold!” she shouted in anger.
Both Radiant and Dayspring looked down at the mare and then to each other. Nightshade turned her face up at the two of them, her ears were pressed back against her head and her eyes glared at them as if they were somehow responsible for the temperature. Neither said a word, but they both had the exact same thought, Her mad face is just adorable.
“Come on up here,” Dayspring said as he used his magic to reach down and scoop her up. Nightshade fretted as the magic forced her to let go of the rapidly fading warmth ball she had been death-gripped to.
Her demeanor did a one-eighty as soon as she was brought into the warmth of Dayspring’s shield spell. Nightshade practically jumped between Dayspring’s legs as she sought not only an even greater source of warmth, but to also show him thanks for the relief of the icebox below.
“You okay now, little one?” Radiant asked.
“Better now,” she said.
“Good, because we’re going to have to head out soon, after we eat of course.”
“Food does sound good,” Dayspring replied as he pulled out his sack and started to retrieve the rations he had there.
“Oh no need, I bought my own!” Nightshade exclaimed as, completely forgetting about the cold, she leapt back down into the igloo. “Ahh! Too cold!”
Dayspring laughed as he yanked her back out with his magic and generally placed her on top of the igloo. “Yeah, no. Stay here. Besides we’re not having the sweets you packed for breakfast.”
“Please Dayspring?” Nightshade replied in her sweetest, most innocent voice.
“No,” Dayspring replied with a little more scorn than Radiant expected.
“Meany,” Nightshade said in a pout.
To his credit, Dayspring simply ignored her as he went about preparing a more reasonable breakfast for the three of them to eat. Radiant sat back and watched Nightshade in fascination as, over the course of three minutes, she moved from pouty-mic-pout-pout, to curious, to helping.
“And that’s the proper way to prepare a sandwich in cold weather,” Dayspring replied as he put the finishing touches on a dafildeal sandwich and floated it over to Radiant.
“Ohhh, that makes sense,” Nightshade replied as she put the finishing touches on one of her own.
Radiant chuckled as she finished her first sandwich at the same time Dayspring finished his second. The part he found funny was that rather than eat their own, Nightshade insisted that Dayspring take hers and she take Dayspring’s. Her comment being that food prepared for someone else out of love always tastes nicer.
And Radiant was forced to admit as he finished the sandwich Dayspring had prepared for him, she kind of had a point. It was one thing to eat food prepared by a chef, and quite another to eat food prepared by someone that loves you.
He couldn’t stop himself, at that moment, at that time, an old memory came to the forefront, one he’d not thought about in a long, long time.
“I told you that you’d get icing everywhere,” Firestar said with a laugh as Radiant tried and failed to catch one of her cupcakes in his mouth on their latest late-night romp to the kitchen.
“Yeah, yeah, but I couldn’t help myself.” Radiant replied, chuckling.
“Because you’re my idiot?”
“I would say it was a measure of… tactical genius,” Radiant said as he eyed her and grinned.
“Oh, why’s that?” Firestar asked, the smile on her face lighting up the room.
“Because now you get to clean me off.”
Firestar’s grin went to one of seductresses as she moved up to Radiant. The unicorn smiled back as he lowered himself to give her the best possible angle to lick the icing off his face. Firestar slowly, seductively stuck her tongue out to lick his cheek free of the cream.
Only for a second cupcake to splatter right across Radiant’s other cheek.
“Clean yourself off,” Firestar said with a laugh.
Radiant grinned as he picked up three more cupcakes with his magic. “Oh, so it’s going to be like that?”
“Radiant, no, don’t you da—”
At that three cupcakes flew and splattered themselves across Firestar's muzzle, mane, and barrel.
“Oh you’re so going to get it now!” Firestar replied.
“Promises promises,” Radiant replied as he started to run behind the counter, ducking and weaving several tossed cupcakes as he did so.
“Uncle Radiant? Are you okay? Why are you crying?”
Radiant blinked, clearing his eyes of tears as he looked down at Nightshade. The filly was sitting directly in front of him, worry and concern written heavily on her face. “I… um… I…”
“He’ll be okay, Nightshade. Just some good memories,” Dayspring said as he lead her away from Radiant with a hoof.
“But why cry over good memories? Shouldn’t they make you happy?”
“They did,” Dayspring said as he gave Radiant time to collect himself. “Happy tears. We’ve talked about that before, no?”
“Oh,” Nightshade replied as she stared to help Dayspring pack up his supplies. “Like when Luna gave birth to Shining Night?”
“Yeah, just like that. Sometimes you can be so happy that you start to cry. Memories can cause that too. He’ll be alright, just give him some time.”
“Okay,” Nightshade replied.
In spite of his words, Dayspring looked back at Radiant, who did his best to clean the tears from his face while also trying to pretend, to someone, Dayspring wasn’t sure who, that he hadn’t been crying at all.
Radiant wasn’t sure how Dayspring knew what had occurred. He knew his friend better than to accuse him of somehow reading his mind, but that didn’t answer his question. It wasn’t until he realized that he was still smiling in spite of himself that he figured it out.
Thanks.
In reply to the unspoken word, Dayspring just nodded.
The group packed up quickly after that. Dayspring considered tearing down his igloo but in the end decided it wasn’t worth the effort and simply left it for the next traveler who found their way up north.
“So back on the old dusty trail?” Radiant asked.
“It’s not dusty, it’s snowy,” Nightshade replied. “And cold,” she added.
“It’s an expression,” Dayspring chimed in.
“No, expressions are on your face, everyone knows that,” Nightshade said with a chuckle.
“Expression is one of those words that can mean more than one thing,” Dayspring replied. “It’s all in the context, see—”
“Let’s save that for later,” Radiant broke in. “We’re heading that way,” he said, gesturing with a hoof to the star tracker Dayspring had made at the start of the journey.
“Yeah yeah,” Dayspring said as he examined the destination as best he could. “Based on what I can see there’s a glacier’s top that should work, as well as give us a better viewpoint of whatever’s beyond.”
“To the glacier’s top!” Nightshade exclaimed.
“Young lady, what do we say?”
“Please?” Nightshade replied with a little less enthusiasm.
“Much better,” Dayspring replied as he powered his horn and in a flash of magic the group disappeared.
The three ponies reappeared in a flash of light. The group immediately took notice of the ten degree drop in temperature as Radiant and Dayspring instantly started to check their surroundings for any possible physical threat.
“Clear,” Radiant replied as she finished checking the east.
“Clear,” Dayspring replied as he finished with the west.
“What’s that?” Nightshade said through shivering teeth as she pointed at something to the north.
Dayspring took note of that and poured more power into his heating spell. It was the only reason the group hadn’t frozen to death already but even still there was a limit to what it could do, especially when he was letting it operate passively.
“That is something that shouldn’t be here,” Radiant said as he took stalk of what Nightshade had found.
“What?” Dayspring asked as he finished increasing the temperature to something a bit more manageable. “Oh… that.”
“Yeah,” Radiant replied.
From their vantage point, the group was looking down at a structure about half a mile away. It was a complex of three different buildings, two of which looked like storage bunkers and the third appearing to be something along the lines of a research laboratory. Dayspring could tell as much based on the equipment sticking out of the sides and roof. His mind instantly recognizing the appendages of several pieces of equipment he was quite familiar with.
However much all of that was strange and unusual to see in such a place, the part that took him aback wasn’t the three buildings, the high-tech equipment, or even their location. It was the green grass that completely surrounded the buildings for approximately two hundred feet in every direction, and the fact that none of the buildings had even a small amount of snow on them. Now that he knew what to look for and could see it, Dayspring could sense that a high level enchantment protecting the complex, it completely blocked out the cold and snow with ease. An ease that made him a bit nervous about who could set up such a thing.
As unsettling as that was, what truly unsettled him was that he couldn't detect anything beyond the walls of the complex. Whatever was in there was passively blocking his magic. A feat that could only be achieved by three, possibly four, ponies he could think of.
“I think we know where we’re supposed to go,” Radiant said.
“No, we’re going in,” Radiant protested, already knowing that Dayspring was having second thoughts.
“Radiant, you don’t understand. That enchantment protecting the complex is no joke. To top it off I cannot penetrate the building, I have no idea who is in there, how many, or even how powerful they might be.”
“You think I can’t tell that‽” Radiant said in protest. “I can sense that much just as well as you. But this is important, Dayspring. This is my mission, our mission. Firestar asked me to handle this. Not Twilight, not Shimmering Night, not Rainbow, and not you, she asked me, personally. I have to go.”
“And no one is arguing that you don’t, I’m only saying that we should have backup.”
“Then summon them when we know for sure they’re needed. We got this.”
Dayspring gestured to Nightshade. “Weren’t you the one saying we shouldn’t put her in unnecessary danger?”
“Weren't you the one who said that we wouldn’t? That we’d get out of here at the first sign of anything we can’t handle?”
“Ah-chew!”
Both turned to Nightshade who sat in the snow, shivering in spite of the warmth spell. Seeing her like that caused Dayspring to grown internally. “Fine, we’ll go in. But I’m keeping a message spell prepped.”
“Agreed.” Radiant capitulated and then added, “So what’s the play? Teleport directly into the building ready for a fight?” Radiant asked.
“That’d be rude. What if they’re having breakfast or something? We should knock and be invited in,” Nightshade replied.
Dayspring and Radiant looked at each other. The seriousness of the situation devolved into light chuckling and then full on laughter at her suggestion.
“What‽” Nightshade retorted with a sniffle.
“Nothing, that was just…”
“A perfect idea,” Dayspring finished.
“What?” Radiant asked.
“Hey, we’re not here for a fight, right? Let’s try it her way,” Dayspring replied.
“And people call me an idiot,” Radiant said in a huff.
“Your wife called you an idiot, and you deserved it,” Dayspring replied.
“No name calling!” Nightshade said in a retort.
“It was more a… term of affection,” Radiant said as he ducked low, giving Nightshade the right angle to climb up onto his back as the three made ready for another teleport.
“Calling you an idiot was being affectionate?” Nightshade asked.
“It’s a long story,” Radiant said.
“Not really, he tried to use his rank to control her actions, she broke up with him and did what she was going to do anyway. So afterwards he made her promise to always call him an idiot so he’d never do something like that again.”
“Okay, maybe it’s not that long of a story.”
“I’d have called you an idiot too, you can’t control the ones you love like that silly uncle, you have to let them be who they are, after all, isn’t who they are the reason you love them in the first place?”
“Out of the mouths of foals,” Dayspring said with a smile.
“Okay, this time I know I didn’t eat the wisdom of whatchamacallit!”
“Maybe you were just born full of wisdom?” Radiant asked.
“Oh, maybe?” Nightshade said as she pondered that possibility.
In a flash the group disappeared from the glacier top and reappeared someplace decidedly warmer.
Dayspring’s warmth spell was a marvel of spellcraft. It truly had kept the group alive in the cold climate they were traversing; however, even that had its limits. The spell managed to raise the temperature around the group by seventy degrees.
An impressive accomplishment, until the temperature had started falling into the negative double digits. At the top of the glacier Dayspring estimated that the temp was easily below negative one hundred degrees. There winter coats became even more necessary as they traveled.
But this complex, this zone, it was a spell unlike his. As the group appeared they instantly started to sweat. Nightshade was the first to squirm out of her jacket, an action that almost caused her to fall off Radiant and land right on her rump if not for a last minute save by Dayspring’s magic.
“It’s hot!” Nightshade protested as Dayspring helped her undress, her struggling only managing to make the task that much more difficult.
“She’s not wrong,” Radiant replied as he started undoing his own jacket. The stallion managed to undress himself at the same time Nightshade and Dayspring managed to get Nightshade’s jacket off her.
“And the Captain Obvious award goes to…” Dayspring mumbled as he finished getting Nightshade’s back hoof out of its jacket-prison.
“Free!” Nightshade exclaimed as she immediately took flight, her wings beating for all they were worth.
“Well, that’s one problem solved,” Dayspring said, and then looked down, surprised to see a magical aura helping to unlatch his coat. He looked up and nodded in thanks to Radiant.
“Don’t make it weird,” Radiant replied. “You’re starting to sweat.”
“I didn’t say anything,” Dayspring replied as he started to asset. Together the two took off his coat and then stashed all of their winter wear in their bags. When they finished Nightshade landed directly in front of them.
“See anything good?” Radiant asked.
“Science stuff and snow,” she said.
“What’s wrong?” Dayspring asked, her tone of voice and unusual attitude taking him aback.
“I… umm… this place feels weird, strange. I don’t like it.”
Dayspring took a look around with both his physical senses and magical ones. It didn’t come as a surprise when the latter was rejected from piercing the building, just as it was up on top of the glacier. “I know what you mean.”
“You want to go home?” Radiant asked surprising Dayspring.
Nightshade thought about it for longer than either one of them expected before shaking her head. “No, we came here to help uncle Radiant, so we should help him.”
“It could be tough,” Dayspring said.
“It could be dangerous,” Radiant added.
Nightshade grinned her normal grin and shouted. “For the Adorkable Horror? Nothing is too dangerous!”
“For the Adorkable Horror and her two uncles, you mean,” Radiant corrected.
“Yeah, that!”
“Why do I feel like that’s going to bite us in the flank before the day is over?” Dayspring said with a shake of his head.
“Oh relax,” Radiant said as he turned to the building. The center building of the complex, the science bay, it was a standard Quonset hut design, with a large metal grate that rose up to allow passage in and out. Radiant concentrated his magic and created a hammer of rudimentary design, hammers not being part of his normal reputar. “Knock knock.”
He pulled his blow seconds before it collided with Nightshade who flew between him and the grate. “Uncle Radiant, you knock nicely!” the filly protested.
“Luna, Nightshade. Don’t do that, you almost gave me a heart attack,” Radiant said after his heart started beating again.
“Nightshade, you don’t do things like that,” Dayspring chided.
“And you don’t go knocking random doors down all willy-nilly!”
“Fine-fine,” Radiant grumbled as he raised a hoof and banged it three times against the door. “There, happy?”
“Much,” Nightshade said in pride.
Dayspring just rolled his eyes at the two. A gesture that came to an end as, at that moment, the gate started to open all the way to the top. “We’ll, looks like we’re welcome inside.”
“See, told you,” Nightshade said.
“Okay, I get it,” Radiant grumbled as he lead the three inside.
Dayspring took a step inside and gasped at what he saw. The old stallion quickened his pace as he started to examine the hut’s contents. Everywhere he looked there were tables full of scientific equipment. Beakers, pipettes, Bunsen burners, magnifying glasses, funnels, crucibles, and burnets littered the large open area.
Radiant took a more practical approach and examined the room as a whole. Best he could tell this main area accounted for roughly half of the building’s total area. In the back, he could see several rooms that were segregated to stand alone. Including another large grate that lead to a side chamber whose purpose he could only guess at.
“Radiant, this is amazing, the level of detail here,” Dayspring started as he floated over several notepads for his examination and then ran to the blackboard nearby to examine the equation written in chalk upon it. “Do you know what this is‽”
Radiant rolled his eyes as he and Nightshade moved closer to the highly excited unicorn. “Do you think I know what this is?”
“This is Starswirl’s third law of magical exchange! And this…” Dayspring ran over to another blackboard. “This is… this is… I…”
“What?”
“I don’t know what this is…” Dayspring admitted. “It has elements of Starswirl’s hypothesis on magical energy binding, but this addition here… it’s… I’ve never seen it before.”
“Uncle Dayspring, you’re scaring me,” Nightshade said as she started to inch closer to Radiant.
“That makes two of us,” Radiant said.
“I’m sorry,” Dayspring replied as he, through extreme force of will, tore himself from the blackboard. “You’re right, both of you. This isn’t our priority right now. But it’s… I just need a few minutes to…”
“Dayspring!” Radiant yelled. “I get that your excited, but we have to figure out who is doing all this, you can play with the new toys later.”
“Toys‽ I…” Dayspring paused and took a deep breath. “Okay. Okay, you win.”
“Keep an eye on him,” Radiant whispered to Nightshade who simply nodded her head in agreement as the group joined back together and started to make their way deeper into the hut.
“This place is big!” Nightshade commented after thirty seconds of silence, a time that Dayspring couldn’t help but have his eyes wander from station to station.
“A bit too big,” Radiant replied with a snarl as he looked back at the distance they had traveled. A dark thought occurred to him, one he wanted to run past Dayspring. “Day, what do you think? Day? Dayspring‽”
“What?” Dayspring asked as he pulled his mind back to the present.
“Focus, Day, I’m serious,” Radiant glared at him. “It’s not funny anymore. We need you here, now.”
“Radiant you don’t understand, this is… ugh… fine, sorry, what did you say?”
“How is this place so big?” Radiant asked in clear terms, never breaking eye contact with Dayspring.
“Big?” Dayspring looked around. In spite of their initial glances, they’d only cleared about half the distance to the end of this room. Looking back, he saw that it wasn’t a case of them having not moved, but of the building simply being bigger than they expected, bigger than it should be, bigger than it could be. “Must be spell, something to increase the area inside the building while not affecting the area outside.”
“That sounds like big magic,” Radiant replied, keeping his eyes focused on Dayspring’s. “Think, who could do such a thing?”
“Gods, Twilight, Shimmering Night, and Ataxia on a good… great… okay, not Ataxia…”
“Who is likely to have done this?”
“Twilight,” Dayspring replied almost as if on instinct but he quickly caught himself. “But no… she wouldn’t have… I’d… I’d have known.”
“Who else has this level of scientific knowledge or even wherewithal? Beyond you, and I’m gambling on you not being responsible for this, other than Twilight?”
Taken aback, Dayspring found himself in an odd state of being, he found himself getting mad. “Are you really accusing mom of screwing around with your wife?”
“Who else‽” Radiant yelled. “Who else has the power, the knowledge, the expertise? Who else has any experience with life and death, or the afterlife in general‽ Who else could do all this‽” he gestured around to a million bits worth of lab equipment and scientific knowledge.
“I… I... “ Dayspring found himself in another odd state, he found himself at a loss for words.
“I think it’s time you sent that message. Tell Twilight we found her secret study and we want to speak to her.”
“I… I don’t think that’s grandma,” Nightshade said as she pointed at a figure at the end of the room.
Dayspring and Radiant’s head snapped in the direction Nightshade gestured. Four eyes immediately fell upon a tall unicorn mare with dark-blue coat and purple mane. They watched as she strolled out into the room and went straight to a workstation to check on something or another. Levitating behind her came several notepads, a quiver, a half eaten apple, and a tall glass of half drunk liquid.
“I don’t think she knows we’re here,” Radiant said in a whisper. His mood and demeanor changed to one of tactical prowess.
“Yes-yes-yes-yes-yes-no, no no no no, why did that happen? That wasn’t supposed to happen. What did I do wrong? No, yes, that… that’s it. Ah ha! I just need to adjust for the energy flow!”
“Who’s she talking to?” Nightshade in a low tone asked as the mare’s voice carried the hundred feet between them.
“Please, be quiet, just for now,” Dayspring whispered. “Radiant, do you know who that is?”
Radiant half shook his head. He didn’t, not truly, but that didn’t stop her from seeming very familiar to him. “I… I’m not sure.”
Dayspring just nodded. “She seems familiar to me too.”
“I’ve never seen her,” Nightshade replied.
“Oh, it’s the subversion ratio!” The mare exclaimed as she started to dart down the hut and to a blackboard on the other side of the room. Radiant and Dayspring prepped themselves for her path took her within ten feet of them. But if the mare noticed she gave no sign of them, the mare completely ignored them and rushed to another blackboard, she quickly started to erase several numbers there and scribbled the changes she was making to her equation.
“Yes, yes-yes-yes-yes! I can’t wait to try again tonight! The derivative qualifier is exactly what I was missing!”
Radiant turned to Dayspring and asked, “Did you get any of that?”
Dayspring shook his head no, “What she’s saying makes no sense, unless…”
“Unless what?”
“She’s working on three completely different equations at once.”
“Oh the quantum coefficient! I can augment the negative integers to better align the energy bindings! Yes, yes, yes this will work! Or will it? Why am I doing this again? This is wrong, I should stop… no, this will work, yes! The energy exponent, I can change that too!”
As the group watched her run to a completely different blackboard Dayspring added, “Make that four… five different equations.”
“Is she insane?” Radiant asked with wide eyes.
“I think that goes without saying. Still think Twilight is responsible?”
“She could be working for her.”
Dayspring glared at Radiant.
“What? To be honest she’s not acting that different to any of you when you get in a zone. Not to me anyway.”
“We… we should say hi,” Nightshade cut in.
Both stallions looked at her. They saw that she was afraid, scared, and yet… yet they could see a part of her truly did want to reach out to this mare, to show her that small act of kindness.
“I’m not sure that’s a good idea,” Radiant said as he eyed the mystery mare running across the room again.
“I… I think you should,” Dayspring said, his tone conveying the uncertainty of his thoughts.
“What? How could you possibly think that?” Radiant asked, eyeing his friend.
“Well… think about it like this, if you were so engrossed in your work that you didn’t even notice another nearby, how would you react if two grizzled old war veterans like us snapped you out of it?”
“I’m not comfortable putting her at risk like this.”
“I’d tend to agree, if not for two things.”
“There you go again playing your games. Just say it, don’t make me ask.”
“She’s got power, that much is obvious. The level of risk to Nightshade is great if we trigger the her ‘fight’ response of her fight and flight instinct. I’d argue it’s the greatest risk right now.”
“And the second?”
“Nightshade’s already over there,” Dayspring replied as he gestured across the room to the mare.
Radiant turned just in time to see Nightshade lightly poke the mare’s side with her hoof. “Excuse me, my name is Nightshade, what’s yours?”
The strange mare had just finished taking a bite of her apple as she felt the hoof poked her side. She paused, her drink, notes, and glass falling from her magic. Dayspring and Radiant tensed up ready to jump in a second as she slowly turned to the filly at her side.
Nightshade stared into deep red eyes as the mare looked at her, almost as if she was looking through her. “I… you’re… you’re not supposed to be here… Are you… are you real?”
Nightshade put on her best smile as she fought back her fear. “I’m real. You look lonely though. Are you here by yourself? Would you like to be friends?”
“Friends? I… no, no-no-no-no, no… I mean yes I’d love to be friends, but no, no this isn’t right, it isn’t ready. You shouldn’t be here, I should… I should go, I need to plan, to make notes. It’s not right, it’s not ready. I need time. I need… I’m failing, I should stop, I should go back, I need to… no, no I got it. I’m so close. I gotta… I gotta… I have to use the restroom. Excuse me.” At that the mare turned and galloped past Nightshade, Dayspring, and Radiant. As she ran past Dayspring and Radiant both heard her say, “Hi Dayspring, hi Radiant.”
The stallion’s jaws practically fell open. Dayspring at his name being called out. Radiant at what he saw. His mind didn’t recognize it the first time she went past him, but this second look left him no doubt.
“Ana, wait!” Radiant could never forget her hairbrush cutie mark, regardless of whatever other changes she went through.
She stopped before opening the door to the back room and simply froze.
“Ana?” Radiant asked in disbelief. “It… it is you, isn’t it?”
The mare tilted her head to look at them, a sad, lost expression on her face as she said, “Hi,” and then immediately disappeared through the door. Her absence left the room as silent as the grave.
It was Nightshade that broke it, “Was that… was that really Ana?”
“Yes,” Dayspring said. “She’s… she’s the one responsible for all this?”
“It would seem that way,” Radiant replied.
“Told you it wasn’t mom.”
Radiant went to argue, but conceded the point. There was no way Twilight would ever keep Ana secret from the rest of them, not with how long she’s been absent, or how much Ataxia would lose her shit if she ever found out.
Ataxia had, without a doubt, had been getting better over the years. Some might dare say that she’d matured with age. But Ataxia was still Ataxia, and woe be to he who forgot that little tidbit.
“We should go after her!” Nightshade yelled as she flew past the two and followed Ana into the next room.
“Wait!” Dayspring yelled, her sudden movement breaking his concentration on his message spell.
“Ahhhh!”
“No time!” Radiant shouted upon hearing Nightshade’s scream. The white unicorn galloped after Nightshade.
Dayspring huffed and followed. Only to miss running directly into Radiant’s flank by a millimeter. “Radiant, what the… what?” he stammered as his gaze took in the room they had just entered.
The room was just as large as the one they’d left, something only achievable by magic. However the size wasn’t what took Dayspring’s breath away, rather it was what was in the room. Jars upon jars, containers upon containers, and vats upon vats lined the center of the room and the edges. Each one contained biological matter floating suspended in amniotic fluid.
As Dayspring took in the scene, it reminded him of several books he’d both read and co-wrote with other authors. What was directly in front of him was a real timeline of the growth of cells. The first few containers contained two to three cells each, each container magically magnified to show their contents. He followed the progression of the containers, seeing cell Mitosis, division, and growth layed out in real time.
Skipping ahead he took in fetal remains at different stages of growth. There were at least a hundred such containers, each one seeming to capture forever a different stage of growth for each day a fetus would mature in a living body. As the remains got bigger, so did the container.
“What… what is this?” Nightshade asked, terrified.
“Dayspring?” Radiant chimed in as he held Nightshade back, protectively, and awaited his friend’s input.
Dayspring didn’t reply. He moved past them and down the room. Seeing the remains mature in real time. It was as if someone captured a time-lapsed remains of a single pony—as there was no longer any doubt as to what the remains were—throughout its entire maturation. Every container, every vat contained the remains of a pony at each day of its life, starting at conception.
It didn’t stop either. He watched as it moved past birth to foal hood. The pony was a female pegasus, that much he could see. The vats started to jump ahead after they pony in question would have turned three. Going from one a day to one a week, then once a month.
He paused dead when he got to the age where the pony achieved her cutie mark. “Radiant, you… you should see this.”
“Do I want to?” Radiant asked.
“No, but you should see this anyway.”
“Well, at least you’re honest,” Radiant replied and then gasped as he closed the distance and stared at what Dayspring saw. He had avoided the more… matured vats, them being in the back and behind all of the maturation ones Radiant had failed to notice them, or chose not to notice them, but now there could be no doubt. “I’ll kill her.”
“Radiant…”
Twenty blades materialized around Radiant, causing Nightshade to “Eeep” in fright on his back. “She’s dead, she’s bucking dead…”
The pony in question, the one who’s maturation was captured in painstaking detail in each of these vats, was, without a doubt, Firestar. The tain pegasus mare in front of them with the comet cutie-mark could be no other.
Ana had done this. Somehow, someway, she’d captured Firestar’s entire life, a day at a time, from conception in physical form for study and Luna knew what else.
“If you start breaking this all you’re going to do is create a mess,” Dayspring said.
Radiant’s form was the textbook definition of angry in Dayspring’s eyes. In truth he’d seen fighting cats that looked more approachable than Radiant at that moment. But the truth of his words, somehow, managed to reach him. One by one the swords faded into nothing as Radiant claimed himself.
For her part Nightshade lept from Radiant to Dayspring’s back. The mare was scared, but she was trying her absolute best not to get in her uncles’ way.
“Come, we need to find the point of all this.”
“I’m going to hurt her,” Radiant said, stewing.
Better than kill I suppose, Dayspring thought as the three wandered down the next line of vats. They followed Firestar’s growth through the years. Seeing her go from her pre-teens, to her twenties, thiritys, forties, fifties, sixties, fifties, and then forties.
As they reached the end of the vats, something only achievable by skipping several hundred rows, Dayspring appeared to be flabbergasted. “I… I don’t understand.”
“What?” Radiant asked. For his part he’d kept his head firmly looking at the floor, not wanting to look at whatever was going on, whatever expermanation was being done to his wife in fear he might just snap and start destroying everything.
“This last one… she’s forty again?”
“This is all bat-shit crazy, what’s that matter?”
“You don’t see the parallel do you? Think for a second, with what happened to you.”
“Huh?”
Dayspring huffed and started running back. “Look here, in these she’s a mare in her seventies, and then it starts to go backwards. Everything up to this point, everything that had been captured moved forward. This time we’re moving backwards in time. She’s getting younger.”
“What’s that matter?”
“You got younger. You moved from your seventies to your forties too.”
“Wait, you’re saying that this crazy is connected to me?” Radiant asked in disbelief.
“It’s not crazy, this is… well, it’s crazy, but it’s crazy in a genius sort of way.”
“Dayspring, choose your next words very carefully. I am not in the mood.”
Before he could reply, all three of them heard a voice coming down the vats. “Come, come, come, come, time for the next attempt, yes yes. I hope it works this time, it should work this time, I don’t know if it will work this time. It might, it should, yes yes yes… Wait… what was I doing again? Why… I don’t… I can’t… yes yes.”
“There she is,” Radiant all but growled as he pushed past Dayspring and made towards Ana.
“You hurt her and you know what Ataxia will do,” Dayspring said as he followed.
“I’ll deal with that later,” Radiant said.
“You’d risk the Crystal Empire like that?”
Radiant paused.
Dayspring released a breath he wasn’t aware he was holding. “It’s one thing to risk it all if someone is at risk, but that’s not the case here. I know this is a grave insult but it’s not worth it.”
“Worth it? Worth what?” Nightshade asked.
“I’m sorry little one, I cannot explain right now. We don’t have the time. Please keep quiet for the time being, I pinkie promise you that I’ll explain everything later.”
Nightshade nodded her head and hugged Dayspring’s frame a little tighter at that. The extra weight and force did wonders to ground Dayspring’s thoughts. “Can you be calm?”
Radiant shook his head. “No, but I can let you do the talking,” he managed.
“That’s about all I can ask,” Dayspring said as he took the lead and moved to find Ana again. Nightshade nestled into his back as Radiant brought up the rear.
When they rounded the corner Dayspring went to call out but stopped himself. The sight before them caused even his prodigious mind to blank. There were literally not the words to rationalize it.
Ana walked up to a steel door and, with a flick of her magic, raised it from closed to open. “Okay Firestar, come on out,” she said in a sing-song voice.
Directly behind the door, a tan pegasus took a step, and then another, as she walked out of the room behind the door. The blue of her eyes a stark contrast to the rest of the room.
Dayspring expected that to be the end, he expected, in spite of his warnings of future grave consequences, Radiant Star to snap and charge forward in an attempt to murder Ana. However, as the seconds past, that didn’t happen. Dayspring looked back at Radiant, expecting him to be angry, instead he saw a look of disgust on his old friend’s face.
“That’s not Firestar,” Radiant mumbled.
Dayspring looked back at Ana and this pony she was leading out. The mare looked like firestar, in her forties if he had to take a rough guess, but…
He saw it then. The mare had no life of her own. She walked, she breathed, but other than the involuntary actions, she took no voluntary actions, not on her own. Ana led her out of the room, Ana lead her across the way and to an examination table, Ana helped her sit down as she took samples for testing.
It was a walking, breathing version of Firestar. But that was it. There was no life there, only a puppet to command.
In many ways it reminded Dayspring of Ataxia’s sex puppet, Shimmering Cunt, who she’d affectionately nicknamed SC. Although unlike SC, Dayspring suspected that this Firestar clone wouldn’t simply disappear after a few hours.
“It’s time we get to the bottom of this,” Radiant said as he walked forward.
“I agree,” Dayspring replied as he followed.
“Ana!” Radiant shouted.
The mare at the microscope examining the latest samples she took from Firestar jumped out of her seat in total surprise at hearing her name called. Ana’s eyes shot up at the pair, her expression of bewilderment the exact same as it was when she’d first saw Nightshade in the other room.
She’s… she’s already forgotten that she just saw us. Dayspring thought.
“Ana, it’s time for you to explain yourself! What are you doing and why‽” Radiant shouted. His mind not putting together the pieces.
“I… no, no-no-no-no, no… I mean, but no, no this isn’t right, it isn’t ready. You shouldn’t be here, I should… I should go, I need to plan, to make notes. It’s not right, it’s not ready. I need time. I need… I’m failing, I should stop, I should go back, I need to… no, no I got it. I’m so close. I gotta… I gotta… Why are you here? How did you find me? Oh no, no, no-no-no-no-no…” Ana stammered as her eyes darted to and fro, looking for a place to run.
“No more running!” Radiant shouted as he conjured blades in each of her possible escape paths.
“Oh no,” Dayspring said as he watched Ana’s instincts move from ‘flight’ to ‘fight’. The mare’s horn glowed with a bright hue as she shot out a blast at Radiant.
Radiant placed two of his blades directly in front of him in a criss-cross formation to cut the magic in pieces before it reached him, Dayspring conjured three shields to protect his friend, and still the magic shot that Ana released broke through every defence they mustered and shot Radiant back ten yards.
“Radiant!” Dayspring yelled.
“Another?” Ana said as she went to attack Dayspring.
“No, please, don’t hurt them anymore.”
Ana turned her head in total surprise as Firestar spoke. The mare had, all on her own, turned her head and pleaded with Ana, a tear falling from her eyes.
“I… how… what… me… you… speak… it worked? How…”
As Dayspring ran to check up on his friend Nightshade jumped off his back and started to approach Ana and the Firstar clone. “That’s… that’s just how she sounded the other day.”
“The… other… day?” Ana asked as she turned to Nightshade.
“She came to me, when I was sleeping, she told me Radiant was sad—”
“Are you okay?” Dayspring asked as he reached Radiant.
“Yeah, cheap shot is all. I underestimated her and she took me by surprise. It won’t happen…” he paused as he overheard the conversation between Ana and Nightshade.
“Yeah, she came to me, did you send her? If you did, I just wanted to say thank you.”
“Thank… me?”
“Yes, she was really nice. And uncle Radiant loved her very much. Thank you for letting me meet her, and for letting Radiant spend more time with her.”
“I… I ummm…”
“It was your doing, wasn’t it?” Dayspring asked.
“I… I was just trying to… trying to… trying to… I…”
“You were trying to bring her back?” Dayspring asked as his mind connected several dots.
Ana just nodded her head in agreement.
“That’s… that’s...” Radiant found himself as lost for words as Ana was.
“Ana, that’s a wonderful kind thing you were trying to do,” Dayspring said, hoping to capitalize on the opening Nightshade had given them. “Thank you for that.”
“I was… I was… I was so mean, I wanted to do something so evil, I… I had to… I had to make it up to you. To all of you…”
“How are you able to do this, all of this?” Dayspring asked as he gestured around the room.
“Nightmare Moon. She awoke… she awoke… she awoke…”
“A power inside of you?” Radiant asked.
Ana just nodded in agreement.
“Why are you having trouble speaking?” Nightshade asked.
“You haven’t spoken to anyone in over a decade, have you?” Dayspring asked.
Again, Ana nodded.
“You’ve been all alone?” Nightshade said with tears in her eyes. “That’s horrible, no one should be alone,” the filly then flew over and hugged Ana for all her worth.
Ana started crying as she was hugged by Nightshade.
“Dayspring, what’s going on?” Radiant asked, he knew his friend long enough to recognize the sense of wonder on his face. It was the same look he got right before finishing a new spell or a new formula.
“I’ve long thought… no, I’ve long suspected that our family was special, but this… this is insane.”
“You can say that again,” Radiant added.
“No, you don’t understand. Not insane-insane, insanely powerful. We have the bloodline of gods in us, Radiant. Shimming Night is a literal Demigoddess, Twilight an incarnation.”
“You’re rambling,” Radiant said, not liking where this was going.
Dayspring found himself struggling to find the right words. “No, you don’t… ugh… okay let me put it this way, Shimming Night is the Demigoddess of Magic, right? She can command magic to do her bidding.”
Radiant nodded.
“But it’s hard, she has to know exactly what she wants magic to do, how things work if she wants magic to obey her wishes. She can’t just snap her hooves and create a clock, she has to know how the clock works, how its components are placed, what they’re made of.”
“Okay…”
“Think about what we’ve seen here. The study, the formulas, the tanks, and vats. She’s spent the last decade learning just that. Also consider what Firestar told you in your dreams.”
“I’m trying not to.”
“No, you… ugh…”
“Dayspring get to the point.”
“Ana is the Demigoddess of Life.”
“What‽”
“That’s what this is. Whatever Nightmare Moon awoke in her, it’s her power, her divine magic. She’s been spending the last decade learning how life works, how to create life, and… I think… how to return life,” the wonder in Dayspring’s voice sent shivers down Radiant’s spine.
Radiant turned from Dayspring to Ana, the mare was in a full on crying fit being held by a little filly who she had almost done unspeakable things to before she was even born. “You… you cannot be… you’re serious, aren’t you?”
“Ana… she might be the key to conquering death itself.”
“Do you know how crazy that is?” Radiant asked.
“Do you understand the possibility here? The implications? This is phenomenal!”
“What the hell are you talking about? It’s not like it even works!”
“But it is working,” Dayspring said, unsure exactly why Radiant couldn’t grasp what was happening. “Look for yourself!”
“That’s just a clone body!”
“Because her soul is going to you,” Dayspring replied. “You told me yourself, she’s being split. Most likely because that connection Eros told her about. Ana’s trying to restore her soul to that clone and her connection to you is causing it to be diverted. That’s probably why you were de-aged too. When Ana restores Firestar’s body to the age of forty it’s having the side effect of affecting yours too.”
“I… I… I cannot believe…. I…”
“Think about it, seriously, think.”
“Why do I feel like I’m the only one who is!”
“No, you… ugh…”
“Dayspring, consider what you’re saying.”
“No, you should! You could have her back, Radiant. If we stay and help I’m sure we could finish the process, we could restore her soul to her clone. You could have her back. And then… then we could refine the process. Whenever anyone dies we could bring them back! We could bring back everyone! Celestia, Icarus, Siros, Spike, Rarity, Fluttershy, Applejack, Pinkie Pie, everyone who’s ever died!”
“I…”
Dayspring capitalized on the small opening he had made. “You could have her back. Her, Cadance, Shining Armor?”
There was a long pregnant pause as Radiant considered this development. Considered the fact they’d have to use a rather insane and insanely powerful mare to forever shatter the natural order.
“If I say no?”
“Why would you?”
“If I say no?”
Dayspring sighed. “If you say no, I’ll summon Twilight, we can destroy this place and take Ana home.”
“And if I say yes?”
“Then we’ll stay and finish this. Show mom and the rest what can be done. We’ll restore Firestar to life. You can go home with her again.”
“I…”
“Consider this, this might be the one chance we ever have! Don’t make this decision lightly. You want to be with her again, right?”
Radiant thought about it for a good ten minutes. He considered the options very carefully. The choice was his, Dayspring, that rat-bastard had maneuvered him into this situation. Whatever they did, it would be his decision. His mind fought with his heart. There was logic in what Dayspring said. The unicorn had a way with words, with knowing exactly what would tempt you into doing exactly what he wanted.
His eyes darted up to the Firestar clone. His heart almost skipped a beat in seeing her again, just like she had been, even if it was the equivalent of simply seeing a 3D painting of her. Could I really get her back? Is that…
He fought down that emotion. Whatever decision he made, he had to think, not to simply act. The cost, there’s always a cost.
He, without a doubt, wanted to say yes. But the way Dayspring was manivouring him into saying yes also bothered him.
While Radiant thought about it, and Dayspring pleaded with his friend to make the decision he wanted him to make, Ana and Nightshade held each other, Ana letting out ten years worth of grief and anxiety upon the little filly.
“Did… did… did… did you mean what you said?”
“What about?” Nightshade asked.
“That… that… that… we could be friends?”
“Of course,” Nightshade said with a smile, one that Ana returned.
Radiant watched their exchange, he took in the two starting to play. His eyes then darted to Firestar, to the clone that had, somehow, talked, that had prevented Ana from attacking them again. There’s something of you in there, isn’t there?
“I know what I want to do,” Radiant replied at last, there was no indecision on his face as he said those words.
Dayspring’s face lit up at that.
“I—”
They will Always be with you, a Memory to be Mourned and Cherished Forever
Radiant Star laid on his back, enjoying the feeling of the sun warming his coat, the lap of the wind on his fur, and the smell of the salt water in his nostrils. He closed his eyes and sighed in content as the sound of rushing waves filled the air.
“You taking a nap already, old stallion?”
Radiant opened his eyes again to see his wife, Firestar, hovering above him. The smile on her face was worth all the gold in Equestria. “And miss a moment of this? Never,” he said with a grin.
Firestar huffed and landed next to him. The mare nudged Radiant with her muzzle. “Just in case, get up. Let’s go for a walk together.”
“Like old times?” he asked.
“Well… almost, in old times you’d have rutted me six ways from Sunday by now.”
“Is that an offer?” Radiant asked teasingly.
“You wish,” Firestar replied as she kicked sand over him. “Now get up and walk with me.”
“As you wish,” Radiant replied as he rolled over and got to his hooves.
Firestar smiled as she watched the unicorn stand up, her eyes taking in the show of his over-exaggerated movements and his flank, mostly his flank.
It was Radiant’s turn to kick sand at her. “Hey, my eyes are up here,” he said with a grin.
“Hardy-har,” Firestar giggled back as she walked up side by side with him.
Radiant pressed himself closer to her, enjoying the feeling of her warmth, her movements against his own. The smell of lilacs and roses soon filled his nostrils, joining the smell of saltwater and sand.
“I’m proud of you, you know,” Firestar said in a half-purr as she placed her head against his neck.
“That makes one of us,” Radiant replied back as he gently laid his head upon hers.
“Still not sure if you made the right decision?” Firestar asked as she pulled her head away and looked him in the eye.
“Of course not. I think… I think I always will be unsure. I’ll always be left wondering if I did the right thing. About what would have happened had I went the other direction. But…”
“But what?” Firestar asked.
“I think… I think I’m okay with that.”
“Life is nothing more than making the best decision you can at the moment, and then another and another, until there’s no more decisions to make, right?”
“Right,” Radiant replied, laughing as he did so.
The pair walked together as the sun’s rays began falling below the water, the effect was turning the colors of the sky all different shades.
“It’s a shame they can’t do that slowly,” Firestar said as day turned to night quicker than either of them would like. “It would be wonderful if ponies could bask in that for a few minutes each day.”
“I’ll have to ask Twilight next time I see her,” Radiant said. “But if you ask me, it doesn’t compare to the beautiful sight in front of me.”
“The stars?” Firestar asked, looking up.
“Nope.”
“Then what?” Firestar asked as she turned to face him, only to see him looking at her. “Oh stop it.”
“Never,” Radiant said, sitting down on his flank.
The blush on her face gave the game away. Firestar sat down next to him. “Well, if you’re going to be a sentimental dork, at least you’re my sentimental dork.”
“Always.”
“And forever,” they both said as one as they leaned into each other and kissed.
One final time.
Celestia’s Palace
“Uncle!”
Radiant woke up with a loud ‘oomph’ as a rambunctious filly jumped right on his stomach.
“Nightshade! You can’t do things like that!” Nighttide lectured as she came into the room and lifted Nightshade from her painful porch.
“But mom!”
“No buts, now go get ready for breakfast young lady.”
Radiant grunted as he rolled off of bed and to his hooves, his seventy-year old body protesting with every movement he made. “She’s fine, you really don’t have to concern yourself with me.”
“She needs to learn boundaries and respect,” Nighttide replied.
Radiant conceded that point, but not completely. “Such things come in time. You’re only young once, right?”
Nighttide laughed at that. “Do you not know who you’re talking to? This is my second time around, old stallion,” she said as she walked out of the room.
Radiant chuckled at that as he got out of bed. There was so much to adjust to he simply added that little tidbit to the list.
“Oww, my everything hurts,” he complained to himself as he started walking. He had just recently started a workout regimen with Rainbow, and then with Taz as soon as Taz saw the ‘workout’ Rainbow was trying to put him through. His body had yet to fully adjust to the latter or heal from the former.
In spite of the pain, or the events that occured, Radiant was forced to admit that Dayspring, that rat bastard, had, once again, been right. Moving to Canterlot had indeed been good for him, he found himself having, dare he say, fun.
Even still, as he made his way out of the room, Radiant couldn’t help but look back at his new bed. The sense of longing and a small amount of regret hung heavily on his heart. He pushed through it. The old unicorn sucked up the strain in his muscles and went downstairs, the smell of a freshly cooked breakfast leading the way.
Dayspring Gleam huffed as he sat at the breakfast table across from Twilight, partly because their breakfast was his dinner, and also because he still couldn’t get over what had occurred last week. To make matters worse, the target of his ire had just returned that morning.
“Something wrong?” Twilight asked as she buttered up her bread.
“Nothing,” Dayspring replied.
Twilight chuckled at that. “You’re seventy years old and still pout like you did when you were nine.”
“I’m not pouting.”
“We would say you are,” Luna said as she took her seat next to him. “You’ve been acting this way for a week, we have kept track.”
“Luna,” Dayspring pleaded with his wife.
“It’s fine,” Twilight replied. “I mean my own son is just ignoring me and all, no big deal.”
“The big deal was up north. Was…”
“Need we remind you, ‘tis you that gave Radiant the choice.”
“Yeah, but I didn’t expect him to…”
“Choose wisely?” Twilight asked.
Dayspring glared at her. “Depends on your prospective.”
“From my perspective he choose wisely, giving up his personal wants for the greater good, you could almost call it the mature choice.”
“Mature? It’s mature to give up the future? The opportunity to defeat death, once and for all?”
Twilight shook her head at that. “Let me ask you this. Let’s say he had said yes. You’d worked with Ana and finished her research, and now had the ability to restore life to anyone who dies. Would you restore everyone who’s ever died?”
“Well… no, obviously.”
“Of course not. It’d be a full time job. So you’d pick and choose, bringing back those important to you, right?”
“Yes.”
“And preventing anyone around you from dying, no matter what happens, right?”
“Yes.”
“What about those you don’t know? Say the mayor of Las Pegasus, would you restore him if he died?”
“Yeah… maybe?”
“Or how about the nobles that live on the side of the town?”
“Of course not.”
“What if they offered money? Donations?”
“I get where you’re going.” Dayspring said as he visibly slacked in his chair. Images of a never ending feudal system playing in his head with dynasties that lasted throughout time of the same ponies in power forever.
“There you go. You’re not wrong, son. We do have power, divine power, power enough to change the world if we saw fit, but power is self-defeating without the wisdom to use it properly. I looked over a lot of Ana’s research, it’s genius, in a mad-scientist sort of way, but that doesn’t mean we should use it. Once we put ourselves up on that pedestal, once we start picking and choosing who lives and who dies there’s no going back.”
“You’ve not been tempted?”
“More than once,” Twilight admitted.
“Same,” Luna added.
“But the first rule of warfare is?” Twilight asked.
“A tactic used by us can be used against us,” Luna answered.
“And we’ve put down some enemies that I’m sure none of us wish to see again.”
“Yeah, I guess you’re right about that,” Dayspring capitulated.
Twilight smiled and, using her magic, raised his head ever so slightly. “Relax, it’s not about winning or losing, right?”
Dayspring smiled weakly, “That’s what they say.” The old axiom he’d used a hundred times over the years coming back to haunt him. “How did… how do you avoid it?”
“Avoid what?”
“Making decisions like that? I mean… if I had my way…”
“Oh I’ve made a few doozies in my time,” Twilight said as her memories returned to her. “Trust me on that one.”
“We would agree, as would our sister,” Luna said as she nodded her head.
“What… what gave you the wisdom to get through them?”
“That’s easy, my friends,” Twilight replied.
“Learning from your friends,” Dayspring said, it wasn’t a question.
“You say it, you’ve even taught it, but do you truly understand what it means?” Twilight asked.
“Of course.”
“I’m not sure you do,” Twilight replied.
“What do you mean?”
“Well… think about your interactions with Radiant over the past week. You’ve taught him, you’ve helped him, you’ve given him your time and patience, yes?”
“Yes.”
“But did you ever truly learn from him?”
“Yes…”
“Did you? You’ve spent the last week wondering why he chose to destroy the lab, to have Ana restore him to the right age, and to give up that chance to have Firestar back. Are you any closer to figuring out why he did those things? Why he made that choice?”
“No,” Dayspring admitted.
“So can you honestly say you learned from him? That you understand the wisdom in his choice?”
“No…”
“I know you value intelligence above all, and your faults do not, in any way, diminish your strengths, son. But while intelligence is important, it’s only truly useful when tempered by wisdom. And sometimes…” Twilight paused as certain memories returned to her, “the wisest thing we can do is to not do something.”
Dayspring considered her words for a moment. It’d been a long time since he’d been lectured like this, and while he couldn’t fully squash the temptation to rebel, to take offence at the notion he could possibly be wrong, he did take her words to heart. “What… what should I do?” he asked.
“Spend more time with your friend. But as a friend, not as a teacher, or assistant. Watch him, learn from him.”
As if on cue Radiant appeared at the entrance to the dining hall. “Something smells good,” he stated.
“Hey, what do you have planned for today?” Dayspring asked.
“Oh, you’re talking to me again? Here I thought you were going to teleport to your room as soon as I walked in the door.”
“Sorry,” Dayspring admitted. He hadn’t been ignoring-ignoring Radiant, rather he’d spent the last week simply avoiding him. There was always enough to do around the palace to keep a pony occupied if they were of a mind to be, so he’d done just that. It seemed like Radiant had noticed though. “I shouldn’t have avoided you like that. I can stay up a little while longer, you want to… Can I hang out with you for a while today?”
“You sure I won’t bore you?” Radiant asked dryly.
“You’re many things, Radiant, boring isn’t one of them,” Dayspring said with a smile.
“Fine, you can tag along, but you gotta do everything I’m doing,” Radiant replied, his smile telling everyone in the room that there was a devious nature to his words.
“Sure,” Dayspring said, knowing he just agreed to something he was definitely going to regret.
“Great, Taz wants me to do three laps around the castle in two hours time. So eat up, you’re going to need the energy.”
The laughter from Twilight and Luna eclipsed the sigh from Dayspring.
“Is she going to be okay?”
Shimmering Night turned to Ataxia, the look on her wife’s face was almost heartbreaking to see. Ataxia was never the type to worry, to be concerned about anything really, but as they stared into the window at Taz and Ana sitting together in what was tantamount to a padded, magically reinforced room, not even Ataxia could hide her emotions. Shimmering Night had managed to convince Ataxia to let the experts handle it; but, sadly, Ataxia’s patience was limited on a good day. In a different set of circumstances Shimmering Night would have considered it a minor miracle that she’d kept Ataxia away for this long.
“We’ve installed null rock all around the room, and attached three magic nullifying rings to her horn,” Shimmering Night said as she looked away from Ataxia and ran down the checklist of ‘precautions’ they’d taken. “She’s being monitored around the clock and this room is located one floor above Taz’s, so he keeps his null ability fully active at night. It should… it should prevent her from harming anyone...”
“That’s not what I asked!” Ataxia all but yelled.
Shimmering Night looked back at her, both of them were crying. “I don’t… I don’t know… She has Dementia, an advanced form of it too. When I talk to her… she doesn’t remember me, not for more than a few minutes anyway, then she… she keeps talking about needing to go back, about needing to finish her research, to be forgiven. She doesn’t… she doesn’t understand where she is, who she’s talking to, or what’s wrong, not fully.”
“Let me talk to her!”
“Do you… do you honestly think that’d be a good thing?”
“Why wouldn’t it be‽”
“Ataxia…” Shimmering Night replied in a tone that said ‘you know why’.
“I could… I coud…”
“Fix her?”
“Yes!”
“And that’s why I won’t let you.”
“Someone’s gotta!”
“Please, please stop,” Shimmering Night replied as fought to not break down. “You know what would happen. Why you cannot, why I cannot…”
“Because… because we’d change her…”
“The mind is complex. Force it to change with magic, even divine magic, and you risk changing who they are on a fundamental level. You might be able to fix her, but at the cost of losing her forever. Is that something you want?”
“No…”
“Me neither,” Shimmering Night said as Ataxia placed her head against her neck as the two looked in on their daughter.
Inside the room, Taz sat across from Ana. “How are you doing today?” he asked.
“Hello, do I… do I know you?”
“Yes, we were friends, best friends for years,” Taz replied with the same calm and patience he’d shown every day during their morning meetings. The doctors they’d brought in had left them with such instructions, that repetition, understanding, and time was what she needed. That it would make it real for her.
“Taz… oh I know you…”
“You do?”
“Yes… you’re… you’re…”
“Don’t force it,” Taz said.
“You’re… Is that filly coming back? She was nice.”
“Nightshade? Yes, she’ll be back at noon, just like always.”
“I like her,” Ana replied.
“Most do,” Taz said with a sincere smile.
Taz’s smile faded as he watched a haze return to Ana’s eyes. It was slight, but noticeable as her eyes started to dart ever so slightly back and forth across the room. “I gotta go back, I gotta finish, they’ll forgive me if I finish, you’ll forgive me if I…”
“Ana, we’ve already forgiven you,” Tears fell from Taz’s eyes as he pleaded with her under his breath.
“Taz, you shouldn’t be here, it’s not time, it’s not ready, I gotta… I gotta… I gotta… No, I need to stop, I need to… Oh, I know how I can fix it! I can… Oh, hello, do I know you?”
“You two should get to bed.”
Shimmering Night and Ataxia both looked up in surprise at Rainbow Dash. Somehow the mare, who usually prides herself on making an entrance, had snuck up on them without their knowing.
“We… we will,” Ataxia replied.
Rainbow didn’t turn to face them, she simply stared into the widow, watching as Taz repeated the same conversation over and over again.
For the first time in what felt like forever, Rainbow felt completely and totally defeated. She had all the power and ability she could ever want, but against this enemy, against this foe, there was nothing she could do. All her power and speed could do nothing but let her watch as the granddaughter she’d not seen in ten years suffered under the weight of her decade long isolation and regret.
A tear fell from a magenta eye, landing all but unnoticed in a room that had known many over the last week.
The Crystal Empire
“Excuse me, Princess,” Echoside snidely replied as she roughly bumped Starlight, intentionally causing her to fall into their new bed.
When Starlight didn’t give a retort back, Echoside stopped in her tracks and turned back to her. “You know I was playing, right?”
“I’m… I’m not in the mood,” Starlight replied as she huffed and lay her head down on the bed.
“You’re the one that wanted this…”
“Yeah, I know.”
“And it’s a great opportunity, the once-in-a-lifetime type of opportunity.”
“I know.”
“And you wish you’d said no, don’t you.”
“No… yes… maybe.”
“So you could be with your sister.”
“Yes.”
“Do you want to go back?”
Starlight looked up off the bed and to Echoside. They both knew that if she said yes that would be it. They’d return to Canterlot and stay there, forever. Starlight wouldn’t have it in her to leave again. “I… no, no I don’t. Does… does that make me an awful sister?” the tears in her eyes were hard to miss.
“I don’t know. I never had any siblings,” Echoside said, shrugging her shoulders.
Starlight huffed and lay her head back down. “Of course you’d be an insensitive jerk about it.”
“How was I a jerk‽”
“You’re supposed to say no, to lie to me if you have to, and say I did the right thing!”
“If you wanted that you should have married some stallion that’d worship the ground you walk on.”
“Jerk.”
“Stuck up brat.”
They both laughed at that before Echoside chimed in, “I don’t know if you did the right thing and I don’t know if you did the wrong thing. I know you did the right thing for you, for us, for our foals, and for this kingdom. I know that you’re the best pony for the job and that they were right to choose you, and I know that you were right to accept the job. I know that you wouldn’t have been able to help Ana, and I know that if you were down there right now, you’d… we’d be suffering.”
“So I did do the right thing?”
“Well, you did leave your sister high and dry when she needed the most help, so…”
At that Starlight powered her horn and tossed a pillow directly at Echoside’s mug. “You jerk!”
For her part the thestral just took it. She was smiling when the pillow fell to the floor. “Feel better?”
“A little,” Starlight admitted.
“I’ll make a thestral out of you yet,” Echoside said with a smile.
In spite of herself, Starlight smiled back.
Celestia’s Palace
“There you are. What are you doing?”
Nightshade turned her head from the window to address her mom. “Watching daddy make Uncle Radiant and Dayspring exercise,” she replied.
Nighttide walked over and took in the view. Taz was indeed working both of them, and, judging by the amount of sweat pouring from the pair, he was doing a good job at it too. “Not going to go join them?”
“Nah, I did yesterday, but dad asked me not to.”
“Getting in the way?”
“Yes,” she said sheeply. “I just wanted to talk, apparently I almost made Uncle Radiant faint. I didn’t mean to.”
“I know,” Nighttide cooed as she wrapped a hoof around Nightshade. “How are you doing with all this anyway? I know it had to be tough.”
Nightshade looked up at her to respond, and then, just as suddenly, looked down at her hooves. “I… I think I’m sad.”
“Why’s that?” Nighttide asked.
“Well… I’m happy that Uncle Radiant joined us, and that he seems happier, but… he’s not going to get to see his wife anymore. And that’s sad…”
“It is sad. But you’re wrong about one thing.”
“What’s that?”
“He will see her again,” Nighttide said as she looked down at the three ponies in the yard. “When someone you love passes on, they stay with you. They stay in your heart, in your mind, and in your dreams. Sure, you might forget some things, but the feelings they leave you with; the way your heart aches when you miss them, that is them. That’s what they leave you with.”
“Heartache is what they cause you?”
“Well, yes.”
“That doesn’t sound nice.”
Nighttide smiled as she gingerly said, “You’re wrong about that.”
“How so?” Nightshade asked in disbelief.
Nighttide’s gaze fell upon Taz as she replied. “Because it means you loved them so much that they left their mark on you. It means they mattered that much to you. It’s a gift, one that stays with you forever.”
“I like giving ponies gifts…” Nightshade replied, her tone indicating that she didn’t fully understand the lesson her mother was trying to teach her.
“You’re a gift to everyone, little one,” Nighttide said as she tore her gaze away from her husband to look at her daughter. “Speaking of everyone, it’s about time you visit your new friend, isn’t it?”
“Oh yeah! Do you think she’ll remember me again?” Nightshade asked as the two started walking down the hall.
“She’s not forgotten you yet,” Nighttide replied. That fact alone was the reason why Shimmering Night and Twilight allowed Nightshade’s visits. Somehow, someway the little filly had left a mark on Ana. Nightshade was the only one that Ana didn’t seem to forget. Given, even with the friendly nature of their relationship, their visits were heavily monitored by either Nighttide, Luna, Dayspring, and/or Shimmering Night. Taz had attended their first meeting, but for some reason seeing Taz and Nightshade in the same room had caused things to end poorly. Ana could be with either one individually just fine, but never both together.
No pony wanted to believe that Ana would ever hurt Nightshade, but no pony could completely rule it out either.
“You said he’d see her again?”
“Sorry?” Nighttide asked.
“Uncle Radiant, you said he’d get to see her again.”
“Oh yes. When he passes on, he’ll be with her again.”
“Oh… I don’t want to think about that.”
“It’s not something to fear, little one. It’s part of life. Ponies are born, they grow, and they die. It’s sad, but that’s what makes it special.”
“It’s special because it doesn’t last?”
“Exactly.”
“Does that mean you and dad will…”
“Taz will… one day. I’m not sure about me though. I think I’ll end up living a long, long time,” the hurt in her voice was hard to miss.
“What about me?”
“In truth…” Nighttide fought off the instinct to lie. “I don’t know. You might have your father’s lifespan, or you might have mine.”
“I don’t want to live without everyone…” Nightshade said as she started to tear up.
Nighttide nuzzled her as she wiped a tear away. “That’s what I’m trying to tell you. Even when they’re gone, you’ll never be without those you love. They will always be with you, a memory to be mourned and cherished forever.”
