Twilight shivered as the cool March breeze tugged on her mane and slid through her coat. She and the Princesses had relocated to Luna’s tower as the blue mare took the reins from Celestia to bring forth the moon and the night. They had set aside the journal for now, taking time to reflect on everything and simply relax after the day’s stress. Now, they were resting on Luna’s balcony, watching over the twinkling lights of the Canterlot nightlife and the sleepy Ponyville in the valley below. Overhead, the stars and planets shone brightly through the midnight sky, and the moon glowed like a milky beacon, shedding its gentle light on the world below.

“Truly, tis a beautiful night for stargazing,” Luna said softly, almost to herself. Her teal eyes jumped from constellation to constellation, and she smiled faintly. “Our thanks to the pegasi for keeping it clear; the weather teams that run night shifts are so often underappreciated, as are most things that shine in the dark.” Her horn shimmered, and a trio of meteorites streaked across the sky, leaving colorful and sparkling trails in their wake.

Twilight gasped, watching the warden of the night work her magic. “You can do that?” she asked, incredulous. “I thought you just moved the moon.”

Luna smirked faintly. “A misunderstanding of Our power. We do not simply move the moon; our domain is the night in its entirety, not just its herald.” Faint trails of blue Arcana drifted off of her horn and seemingly melted into thin air, but Twilight could tell the alicorn was concentrating. Soon enough, the stars above increased in their intensity, some even shifting through a spectrum of color. Blue, purple, and golden auroras joined them in the night sky, gently dancing to and fro among the thin, wispy clouds that were so high up not even pegasi dared move them. The night was alive, vibrant, and beautiful. It stole Twilight’s breath.

“Wow… that’s beautiful,” she whispered. The unicorn turned towards the midnight alicorn. “Princess, you’ve been back for a while now. How come you haven’t done anything like this since the Elements restored you?”

Twilight was almost certain she saw a faint blush to the princess’ cheeks, but it disappeared as quickly as it had manifested. “A simple whim, really. We—I was overcome with the caprice to do so.” She waved a wing at the display before them. “And thus, behold.”

Celestia smiled, her demeanor gentle, loving, and encouraging. “You should make these displays more often, sister. The ponies of Equestria would love to see them.”

Unfortunately, that only seemed to damper Luna’s mood. She looked away, her eyes focusing on a distant figure standing in the shadows, its slitted yellow eyes never blinking as it watched over the land below. “We have tried that path before. It was not noticed, nor was it appreciated. Tis merely a waste of Our efforts and time.”

The white alicorn draped a wing over her younger sister’s back. “Times have changed since then, Luna. See that?” She opened her other wing and swept it across the twinkling lights of the city and the countryside. “More ponies stay up into the night than ever before. Manehattan has earned a reputation as ‘the city that never sleeps.’ Trust me, sister, you are appreciated more than you know. Loved even more so.”

Celestia’s assurances seemed to decompress the stress from Luna’s shoulders. “Thank you, sister,” she said, flashing a weak smile. But the topic still seemed to bother her, and Twilight bit her lip, feeling the chill coming off of Luna’s wings. Looking around for a change of topic, her eyes settled on the journal. She grabbed hold of it with her magic and held it in plain view of the two alicorns.

“Do you want to read the next chapter?” Twilight asked, her eyes looking from one to the other.

The sisters exchanged glances, then nodded. “Yes, We would like that very much,” Luna said. Casting a look back over her shoulder, she nodded at the shadowy figure with the yellow eyes. “Our vigil is still held by Eldest Sister, so we may retire to my chambers. Come.” She beckoned with a wing, opening the glass doors to her bedroom with her magic. Celestia and Twilight followed her inside, and Luna pulled several cushions of a dark blue plush fabric seemingly out of thin air for them to sit on.

While Celestia opened the journal to the bookmark, Twilight settled a little deeper into her cushion. Turning to Luna, she leaned forward. “Princess Luna?”

The midnight alicorn raised an eyebrow. “Yes, Twilight?”

“That figure out there... is she one of the thestrals Cyclone and Typhoon were describing?”

Luna nodded. “Yes. Her rank is Eldest Sister. She is the champion of Our Night Guard, and is maintaining Vigil for Us while We share this story. There are others in the Guard, but they are away on duty. I keep Eldest at the castle as my protector, not unlike Celestia’s chosen.”

Celestia’s eyebrow softly arched. “I gave you lieutenant Morning Star to be your bodyguard, as opposed to one of... those things.”

Although her demeanor remained unchanged, Twilight could sense the hesitancy in her voice. Luna responded by giving her sister an expression of dull anger. “Thou hast chosen thine own defender and champion, sister, and I exercise my own right to do the same. While the lieutenant is respectable as a military pony, he has no desire to be Our friend, and We mirror his sentiments. Therefore, I prefer their loyalty with such sensitive matters as the protection of my life. Even then I am frankly much better at protecting it myself than any bodyguard I could be given, and her presence is solely for her company. Unlike some princesses, my magic has not atrophied for a thousand years, and is still very much prepared for battle.”

The white alicorn frowned and started to object, but Twilight interrupted her. “Princess Luna, what exactly are Night Guard?”

But Celestia spoke first, and her voice was filled with a sort of damning anger that Twilight had only heard from her on sparse occasion. “We do not need to discuss this. They are unimportant.”

“Unimportant? Sister, you insult their memory.” Luna shifted on her bed, the satin sheets rippling under her hooves, but her eyes remained fixed on her sister. “I won’t deny what I did, nor will We let thou stop thine student from learning about them.”

“They are unimportant to the journal,” Celestia objected.

Luna raised an eyebrow. “They are exceedingly important to the journal.” Again Celestia opened her mouth to speak, but Luna stomped her hoof with a resounding krack—a truly terrifying feat considering the soft bed she was slamming it against. The shadows in the room flickered in intensity, and Twilight cowed back towards her mentor. “The Night Guard art mine own, sister. They art not thine. I have the right to discuss them as much as I want, and in as great detail as I find necessary. Thou will not deny me this.”

Celestia pursed her lips but said nothing. The shadows around the room faded back to their normal intensity, and Luna nodded, seeming satisfied. “As to your question, Twilight, the Night Guard is populated with the souls of ponies on the cusp of being condemned to Tartarus. They were sinners who sought penance, criminals who sought redemption, but were too short on time to fully atone for their wrongdoings. Rather than damn them, I found a better solution in the Night Guard.”

Twilight blinked, then furrowed her brow. “You mean the Night Guard are dead ponies?” At Luna’s nod, she looked between the two alicorns. “That’s... horrible!”

Luna simply raised a hoof, and Twilight immediately quieted down. “Thestrals are not zombies or skeletons, mindless thralls bound to do the bidding of their creators for all of eternity. Each thestral is a pony, yet not. As such, they act and think like normal ponies would, even though they serve me.”

While not entirely convinced, the scholarly portion of Twilight’s mind made her lean forward and fold her hooves over one another, willing to hear Luna’s explanation. “So how exactly are they different?”

“What you must understand first, Twilight, is that the pony’s soul remains mostly intact throughout the process.” Her horn flared to life, and a grid-like illusion appeared in the air before her. Simple pictures made out of pure Arcana took up the space like the vertices of a triangle. Gesturing to the bottom left picture, the princess continued. “A living pony is the embodiment of all three types of magic, although they may only use one of these, depending on their race. Arcana is the power of their mind, Empatha the power of their soul, and Endura the power of their body.” Here she traced a line from the pony in the bottom corner to a ghostly apparition of one at the top of the triangle. “When a pony dies, the arcane and empathic pieces of their identity separate from their enduric body, and move on to be judged. Celestia and myself catch these pieces, judge them, and then reward them with the Summer Lands or condemn them to Tartarus.”

Twilight frowned, scrunching her muzzle as she tried to visualize what was going on. “Let Us rephrase,” Luna said. “Imagine, if thou wouldst, a bur. At the center of the bur is the soul, the very core of a pony’s being, and attached to the center are spines. These are the thoughts and experiences of the soul. The ‘spines’ are easier for my sister and I to catch hold of when the pony dies, and easier to attach to the Summer Lands or Tartarus once they have passed judgment.” She paused, and raised an eyebrow. “You understand now?”

The purple mare nodded. “I understand all that. But isn’t making a zombie or a skeleton with necromancy the same process?” Twilight paused, organizing her thoughts. “To use your example, pulling a soul away from the afterlife is like trying to tear a bur off when it’s still caught in your fetlocks. You can’t really get the whole thing, because some of it still clings to the hair and breaks off. So how do you make a thestral instead?”

“The same thing still happens in a sense, but using alicorn magic as opposed to Arcana mitigates some of this damage,” Luna explained, crossing her forelegs. “As I mentioned earlier, a pony is made of all three types of magic. A unicorn practicing necromancy only has access to Arcana, which is sufficient enough to grab a soul by its ‘spines’, but, as you said, tears it to pieces in the process, irrevocably changing the very being of the pony they are trying to resurrect by removing their experiences and losing parts of the soul.” The line connected the ghostly pony at the top of the triangle and a thestral at the bottom right corner flashed. “By using only Arcana, a necromancer tears a soul apart as it tries to bring it from the afterlife. Without Empatha to manipulate the soul or Endura to sustain a body, you get zombies and skeletons. Such are little more than vassals that have pieces of a soul trapped with arcane binding, and require the consumption of living flesh to restore their mana and continue to function.

“Now, if you have access to all three types of magic—alicorn magic,” she elaborated, “then you can make a thestral.” Here, the line at the bottom of the triangle connecting the living pony with the thestral flashed. “With Arcana, you can catch hold of a soul before it flees for the afterlife. With Empatha, you can guide that soul to its body. With Endura, you can provide the means to reattach the soul to the body and sustain it in a manner that it is compatible and familiar with. Furthermore, Endura allows the mage to modify the body to her liking—thus, a thestral.”

“Oh,” was Twilight’s response. After thinking it over for a few seconds, she angled her head to the side. “So it’s like Mortal Coil’s spell, then?”

Luna blinked. “Thou knowest of him?” The relapse into archaic speech accompanied the sudden shift of her expression from scholarly to shocked. “How so?”

Celestia waved a hoof. “I told her Mortal Coil’s story years ago when she was much younger.” The corners of her mouth twitched. “I believe it’s the reason she’s taken so keen an interest in Commander Hurricane’s legacy.”

The younger of the two sisters didn’t seem thrilled. “You told her that story when she was but a youth?”

“Not all of it, Luna,” Celestia assured her. “We both know that there were parts of that story she wasn’t ready for at the time.”

“Wait, you mean there’s more to his story?” Twilight suddenly broke in, pointing to the journal. Frowning, she pointed at the book. “Well, is Morty going to be in this? Or Gale?”

Luna recoiled as if she’d been struck. “Thou knowest that name as well?” She looked to her sister, concern plainly written across her face. “We thought thou were reluctant to let anypony know of her story.”

“It came with the story of Mortal Coil,” Celestia said. Then, turning to Twilight, she smirked. “And as for your questions... maybe. We’ll see. After all...” She shook the journal in her magic. “...there’s still plenty more pages to go.”

“Then it would be most prudent to continue,” Luna observed. Twilight nodded in excitement.

With the rustling of pages, Celestia’s magic opened the journal to its book mark. “Let’s see... Ah, yes. We had just arrived in Everfree, hadn’t we?”

The chattering of birds accompanied the rise of the sun the next day, as the golden orb which dawn heralds lifted above the horizon far to the east. Within the Everfree castle, the shadows peeled off of the stone masonry and into the dark niches of its rooms and halls, clinging to shelter where they could. In the topmost tower along the eastern face of the structure, the sunlight slanted through the stained glass to fall upon the face of a sleeping pony in a myriad of different colors and lights.

In but a few moments, the mare stirred from her sleep. Her amethyst hair hung loosely across her neck and shoulders, the strands a pleasing contrast to the ivory of her coat. Hooves shuffled under the thin summer sheets draped across her body, and with the cracking of bones and a ladylike yawn, the mare opened her tired blue eyes. Squinting at the sunlight, Queen Platinum slowly rolled off of her bed to land on the silk carpets with a soft clop from each of her hooves.

The lethargic movements of Equestria’s monarch were the same as they had been for the four years since the castle had been built, and would be the same for many more years to come. After leaving her downy king-sized bed, Platinum wandered over to her dressing table and stared in the mirror. She was thirty-three now, and already the wrinkles of age were beginning to pull at her brow and gaunt her cheeks. Bags hung under her eyes, and without the powder to sharpen her well-defined beauty, even her face was starting to lose the luster of its youth. Every morning, Platinum knew, she’d look in that mirror and lose a little bit more of herself. There was no denying it; Equestria’s queen was growing old.

She knew she still was beautiful; those very, very slight lines and wrinkles under the ivory fur of her face made her appear wise, not wizened. She was thin, slim, and trim, and when she walked her hips still moved with a flowing grace and daring that everypony expected of younger mares. She knew how to talk, how to flirt, and how to seduce, and there was no shortage of suitors at her door. But now the variety was dying, with the same young noble stallions trying to court her month after month. There was no love, no passion, no fire. And the real stallions, the ones she wanted, the ones who were adventurous and smooth and caring gentlemen, were few and far between.

In the reflection of the mirror, Platinum could see her bed. It was much larger than she needed it to be; it was designed to host two ponies in all the luxury and comfort they could need. But Platinum only ever used the one half of it, and she always slept facing the other half, hooves outstretched as if she was trying to find something, somepony to hold onto. Across from her, nestled in the corner of the room, was a small crib, the blankets gently folded and laid out with care, a few toys left exactly as they were all those months ago. A mobile with a trio of pegasi, earth ponies, and unicorns dancing in happy circles overhead creaked with the slight breeze through the window.

And then Equestria’s monarch moved onto the next step of her daily routine, one she’d only started a few months ago. Bowing her head, she buried her face in the soft fur of her forelegs and wept until she simply couldn’t cry anymore.

It took ten minutes to cry herself dry, and then ten minutes more to recompose herself. Sniffling, she grabbed a handkerchief with her magic and blew her nose, then folded it up and dried her eyes. That was why she always washed her powder and makeup off the night before, for otherwise it’d turn to the consistency of clay and cake to the fur on her face. Once she finally got her shaky breathing under control again, she found a comb and began to straighten her hair.

This step was always the most therapeutic for Platinum, which was why she took care of it herself rather than having one of her handmaidens do it for her. With each stroke of the brush, it was as if she pulled one of the previous day’s worries and problems out of her life. Both her mane and tail received the same treatment until they were dead straight with just a little wavy curl at the ends.

A knock on the door followed exactly three minutes later, just as Platinum expected it, and she opened the door to let a filly wearing a pressed and embroidered white gown enter the room. The little unicorn filly set a cup of tea in front of Platinum as she simultaneously levitated a hot curling iron to Platinum’s mane with her pink Arcana. Her rose hooves massaged the queen’s neck while her magic worked the iron and Platinum’s hair back into their usual curls, while her long, yellow mane tickled the queen’s shoulders.

“Are we having a good morning, your highness?” the filly asked as she worked through Platinum’s curls. Platinum caught her eyes watching her face in the mirror, but the filly blushed and looked away as soon as she did. She was still a timid handmaiden, but Platinum liked her because she genuinely cared about how Platinum was doing—and was courteous enough to not press into matters that she had no business in.

“Yes, Dahlia,” Platinum answered. Her voice still bore an edge of weariness, and she only stared into the eyes of her own reflection as she talked. She knew that Dahlia knew she was lying, and Dahlia knew that Platinum was aware of it, but rather than confront one another over the matter, the two unicorns were content to perpetuate the lie.

The handmaiden continued curling Platinum’s mane for a little bit. “I heard one of the guards saying that Commander Hurricane had returned.”

Platinum raised an eyebrow. “Really?” Seeing Dahlia nod in the mirror, she sighed. “Hopefully he’ll have some good news on whatever he was off searching for. It seems like the rest of us can’t get through a single year without him going on some insane solitary mission.”

“He also said the Commander sent word that he was bringing guests, and that they would be staying in the north tower for the time being,” Dahlia added. Her eyes briefly flickered over Platinum’s reflection. “They mentioned your name too.”

“I would imagine. If Hurricane’s bringing guests through the north tower, they’re obviously important, and thus I’m obligated to meet them out of courtesy.” Platinum shook her head, causing Dahlia to bite her lip and carefully twist her grip on the curling iron so it wouldn’t scald her queen. “At least it’ll be better than having another private meeting with the Chancellor. I’ve half a mind to send him off hunting one of these days.”

The filly raised an eyebrow. “Why’s that, milady?”

“Oh, no reason,” she said, waving a hoof. “Hopefully it’ll be a fun time for him; safe and accident-free.”

“Of course, milady,” Dahlia murmured. Platinum winced as the nervous handmaiden accidentally tore out a strand of her mane as she furiously tried to curl it. Closing her eyes, the queen took a deep breath, counted to three, and released it. She didn’t want to give herself any reason to snap at her favorite handmaiden.

“So,” Platinum began after a brief moment of silence, “Who’s this guard I’m always hearing about?”

Dahlia blinked. “Your highness?”

Platinum smiled faintly. “I know you’re blushing under that pink coat of yours, darling. I’m just a curious mare looking out for her handmaidens. Who’s the lucky stallion?”

The pink unicorn looked away, but Platinum could still see the hint of a euphoric smile at the corners of her lips. “Brass Wing, your highness.”

“Ah. A pegasus, then?” Platinum asked.

“Yes, milady.”

“Young?”

Dahlia nodded.

“Handsome?”

The handmaiden nodded again, this time a bit more feverishly.

“Good for you,” Platinum said, nodding once. Shifting on her seat, she twisted her hips so she was resting on one flank so Dahlia could begin curling her tail. “You know, when I was your age, a unicorn and a pegasus loving one another was quite the taboo.”

Dahlia raised an eyebrow. “Really?”

Platinum smiled, actually thankful that her handmaiden had forgotten to address her properly for once. “Oh, yes. Why, for the longest time, us unicorns considered the pegasi nothing more than tools, machines of war that we could direct against the Crystal Barbarians. Sure, their militant leader, Hurricane proved difficult to control, but the Court of Nobles believed that we could tame him in time.” She shook her head. “Of course, by the time of the Eternal Blizzard, Hurricane had his pegasus legions deployed across the entire countryside, and we learned then that Cirra was the one with the power and means necessary to run the Diamond Kingdom, not the other way around. But the fact that he didn’t taught us a lot… even if his son and heir burnt half of River Rock to the ground and murdered my father when we were suffocating in snow and ice and at our weakest.”

“I remember…” Dahlia murmured.

The monarch nodded. “Yes, you were old enough then, weren’t you?”

“Yes. I was eleven, milady. I remember mother telling me to hide in the castle kitchen when it happened.” She shook her head. “I’m just glad that Cyclone’s Fallen Legion never made it to that part of the castle.”

Platinum raised an eyebrow. “Oh? They have a name for the Cirrans that fought for him, now?” She chuckled softly. “I wasn’t aware.”

“It’s only been going around recently,” Dahlia said. “With the riots and everything happening every few weeks, Brass Wing and the other guards are talking about how some of the older soldiers are drinking to Cyclone and the Fallen Legion when they think they’re by themselves.” The handmaiden examined the last bit of Platinum’s uncurled tail and bit her lip. “Could you please lean forward a bit, milady?”

Platinum complied, but she wasn’t really paying attention to Dahlia anymore. Again? This was happening again? But why? Everypony who was in the Legion remembered what had happened during Cyclone’s rebellion. So why would they try again? Could it be that Equestria was really failing that badly, and the constant rioting was starting to wear away on the minds of the ponies tasked with defending it?

It made sense to Platinum, at least more than the madness that had driven Cyclone to try and seize River Rock five years ago. She, Hurricane, and Puddinghead had tried to tie their nations together into one large state without the consent of their subjects. Granted, it worked initially because of their subjects’ faith in their authority, but in five years there really wasn’t much to show for it other than two large cities, an expensive castle, and a handful of colonies both inland and overseas. The economy was faltering so terribly that many of Equestria’s smaller towns like Danzig and Lubuck had split off into some economic league of theirs called the Horseatic League. Even though they were technically part of the Equestrian kingdom, they had far more autonomy than Platinum liked. Perhaps it could be that Hansa’s independence was an example spurring the secessionist cries and riots rather than being simply a symptom of them?

Still, she had warning now, and with Hurricane back at the castle, she’d be able to discuss her concerns with him, hopefully before matters got out of hoof. The last thing she needed was to follow in the hoofsteps of her father; or at the very least avoid his tragic end.

“There you are, your highness,” Dahlia said, stepping away with a satisfied smile. “I hope it’s to your liking.”

The comment forced Platinum to shake her head clear of thoughts of Legion conspiracies. She gave her appearance a quick glance in the mirror and nodded. Everything was curled perfectly, and she was already a far cry from the tired mare that had crawled out of bed earlier that morning. “Of course, Dahlia. Excellent as always.”

Smiling, the filly motioned for Platinum to hold still while she applied her makeup, powder, and perfume. It was finished in a few minutes; Dahlia had become an expert in applying the queen’s makeup, and the process didn’t afford Platinum a lot of room to talk or converse while she was being beautified. When it was finished, Platinum nodded again, and with her magic, procured a gold bit from a bag near her bed and pressed it against Dahlia’s chest.

“Don’t spend it all in one place,” Platinum advised her as the filly stared at the shiny coin.

“Oh, thank you, your highness!” Dahlia exclaimed, holding the bit in her hooves. “You’re too kind.”

Platinum shook her head. “Don’t worry about it, darling. Now run along; I won’t be needing your assistance again until later tonight, and it’s a lovely day outside.”

Dahlia barely spared the time to curtsy before trotting out the door, happily singing to herself. Platinum smiled softly as she went. It was only a single gold bit, just good enough to buy a nice meal, but it was probably more than the filly’d had in her possession for quite some time.

Pushing back her chair, Platinum stood up and trotted to the large wardrobe built into the wall of her room. Inside, she pulled her royal dressings off of the mannequin and gently draped them across her body, securing the hidden straps and loops to her neck and shoulders so the garments wouldn’t fall off as she walked. Her magic reached out and took hold of the polished gold and diamond crown she’d grown so accustomed to wearing for the past five years, ever since it’d moved from her father’s head to hers. It was a heavy thing and sometimes irritated her horn to no end, but she bore under its weight as was expected of her, a symbol of Equestria’s strength and the very representation of its face. She was Equestria, and she needed to look strong and regal. After all, if there was anything she’d learned from private talks with Commander Hurricane in the years they’d worked together, it was that appearances can mean so much more than even a legion’s worth of soldiers.

Dressed up and made-up, Platinum looked every bit like the queen of Equestria she was. Still, before she left her room to begin her day, she walked in front of her mirror and reached out with her magic. A small heart-shaped locket made out of gold lifted off of the corner of the mirror, its golden chains twinkling in the light blue aura of Platinum’s Arcana. A squeeze of the latches popped it open, and Platinum sighed as she looked at the small portraits within.

There were two small paintings inside. In the left half of the heart was a portrait of her husband, Gilded Line, his eyes bright and smiling with that careless charm of his that had first drawn Platinum to him. He’d chosen to not have his portrait painted in his royal garments and in a formal setting; instead, the jasmine unicorn stood in the fields to the east of Everfree, dressed in casual attire with a novel tucked against his breast. Behind him were the blurry grays and browns of an Everfree still being built. It’d been four years since Platinum had that portrait made, but to the mare it felt like a lifetime ago.

The other half of the locket contained a simple picture of the queen’s only child, Platinum II. The little filly had inherited her mother’s silvery coat and her father’s white mane, giving her a curious appearance, like a charcoal sketch or a portrait half finished. The only real color to the filly were her eyes, a deep and lustrous blue like the purest of sapphires. She was sitting on Platinum’s bed, eyes wide and staring at the artist as her portrait was taken. Platinum laughed a sad laugh as she remembered how hard it was to get the foal to sit still long enough for her portrait to be finished.

Closing the locket, she held it against her breast and shut her eyes, taking deep, long breaths. Every time she opened the necklace she wanted to cry, but she never wanted to forget, either. Those portraits were the only pictures she had left of her family that she could carry with her wherever she went. While remembering hurt, it also gave her the strength to continue, day in and day out. She would never, never disappoint her husband and daughter by letting the grief consume her as it once nearly had shortly after their deaths.

Her hoof rubbed her neck at the memory, and she shuddered as she opened the door and left her chambers behind.

The castle was eerily quiet this early in the morning. With the break of day outside the window, the legionaries were in the middle of changing guard. Little was spoken between the groups of soldiers as they traded off, and they only paused long enough to bow to Platinum as she passed before moving on to their posts or gaining some much needed sleep. Still, save for the clop of her hooves against the stone floor and the soft hiss of her dress as the train slid after her, there was hardly a noise stirring within.

At least until Platinum reached the north tower, that was. Her ears flickered, and Platinum could catch the sounds of muted conversation behind the heavy oak doors separating the tower from the rest of the castle. Pausing just outside, Platinum picked out Commander Hurricane’s slow and gruff voice giving a brief history of Everfree City. But there were two voices she didn’t recognize. Two mares, both speaking with intelligence and authority, would stop Hurricane every so often to ask a question or leave a comment on the history of the city, the Compact Lands, or the situation in Equestria.

Platinum blinked. Just who could Hurricane have brought back?

Deciding to find out, Platinum rapped thrice on the door before pushing it open. “Commander Hurricane,” she began even before she entered the room, “how wonderful for you to have rejoined us. Not only did you leave without notifying Puddinghead and I, but you left me to have to deal with his nonsense all by my lonesome. And just who did you bring back with… you…”

Her voice trailed off as she rounded the massive door and finally took in the scene before her. Hurricane was seated at the middle of the round table that covered the majority of the north tower’s floor with his helmet resting on the wood in front of him. On either side of the pegasus were two of the largest ponies Platinum had only seen. Not only that, but the two mares owned both wings and horns. Even more astonishing to the queen were the icons each mare bore on her flanks: the sun on one, and the moon on the other.

“Sun and Stars,” Platinum whispered. “Is it…” She looked to Hurricane, her eyes filled with disbelief. “You couldn’t have…”

“Hello, my little pony,” the taller white alicorn greeted. Her voice was soft and motherly, and she fixed Platinum with a gaze of the purest benevolence. “Do not fear, for my sister and I mean you no harm. Please, come closer.”

Platinum walked forward in a daze. Her mind was reeling and her knees felt weak. Once she was fully inside the room, the younger, darker alicorn shut the door behind her with Arcana the color of midnight. Unlike her sister, she said nothing, only fixing Platinum with a deep and scrutinizing stare.

“Are… are you really… them?” Platinum asked. Her voice wavered, and if the room wasn’t perfectly quiet it wouldn’t have been heard.

The white alicorn nodded. “Yes. Hurricane has already told us how we’re revered by your three races of ponies, unicorns and earth ponies especially.”

“Celestis,” Platinum murmured. “Lunis.” Her eyes widened, and she immediately knelt before the two alicorns. “Forgive me, goddesses, for I doubted you.”

Hurricane’s grunt surprised Platinum. “Stand up,” he ordered. “They hate it when you do that.”

“Supposedly,” the darker alicorn muttered.

Blinking, Platinum rose back to her hooves, yet she still maintained an awkward distance from the two alicorns. Hurricane nodded and motioned for her to sit with his wing. As Platinum made her way to a chair, the pegasus commander continued. “Their names are Celestia and Luna,” he said, gesturing to each alicorn in turn, “and I already did the whole ‘praise be upon you’ thing when I met them. I’m sure they’d rather avoid the song-and-dance routine again.”

“And you must be Queen Platinum, First of her Name,” Celestia said. Then, to Platinum’s disbelief, the white alicorn bowed to her. “It’s an honor to meet you.”

“Likewise,” Luna said from where she sat across the table. “Hurricane has spoken much about you and Equestria. It made for excellent conversation on the flight back.” Squinting, she leaned forward and bored into Platinum’s eyes. “You remind me of your father.”

“My father?” Platinum asked, agape. “How did you know him? If you pardon my asking,” she hastily added.

Luna waved it off with a wing. “Discard the formalities, Platinum, and we’ll both spend less time dancing around the point.” At Platinum’s small nod, she continued. “I visited your father many times in the dreamscape to soothe his pain. He could not sleep well with the Scourge, and would often wake in agony. I never spoke with him, but his dreams were… pleasant.” The alicorn paused, as if double checking that was the correct word, before giving a single nod and continuing. “He was not a stallion that needed comforting like so many others do. If even a sliver of his spark was passed onto you, child, then you are destined for great things.”

Platinum smiled weakly. “Please… Luna, you’re far too kind.” Then she turned to Hurricane. “Why did you bring them here? Their presence is a blessing in itself, but how did you even find them? Or get them to agree to leave their sacred home?”

“I found them because I wasn’t looking for them,” Hurricane said, his voice simple and straightforward. “I was searching for something else that was stolen by one of Luna’s servants, and I happened to track it back to their home. But that isn’t important now. What is important, Platinum, is that they’re here now and that they can help us.”

“Help us?” Platinum echoed. Her eyes widened and realization, and she nearly squealed. “You’re going to help us with the riots? Oh, Sun and Stars, this is a miracle!”

“Hurricane managed to convince us that our intervention was the only thing that could save Equestria,” Celestia said. With a sad sigh, her eyes seemed to fixate on some point far in the past. “My sister and I have been dreaming of a union of ponykind such as this for millennia, but never has it happened before. Your races were always fighting each other and segregating themselves. Now, three out of the four are here in one union, and the fourth has founded their own Union to the north. And to hear now that this unity is threatened…” she shook her head. “We couldn’t stand by and let things fall apart once again. So my sister and I decided to travel with the Commander to Everfree City and hope that our presence is enough to stabilize the nation and put an end to the riots.”

“I believe it will work,” Hurricane added. He spun his helmet in his hooves, staring into the frame. “It’s the only option we have left short of military force and martial law. Even a Cirran such as myself knows that you can’t run a nation with a heavy-hoofed military. And at this point, another show of force is going to break the careful balance we’ve struggled to maintain in the face of these riots and open the floodgates of hatred and revolutionary fervor.”

Celestia nodded. “That is why my sister and I intend on speaking at an assembly in the town square today to let the citizens of Everfree know of our arrival,” she said, turning to Platinum. “That should be a start.”

But the gears in Platinum’s mind were already whirring, and she fervently shook her head, her coiled mane flouncing on either side of her neck. “No no no, that won’t do at all.”

Luna furrowed her brow. “Pardon?”

“A simple public speech? Really?” Platinum shook her head in disbelief. “That’s much too dull and bland. That sounds like something Hurricane would come up with.”

Hurricane frowned at her, but Celestia shared an apologetic look with the pegasus. “Well… you’re not wrong.”

“I thought as much,” Platinum said. Then, looking directly at Hurricane, she nodded once. “Fetch Puddinghead and Star Swirl. We’ll need their help—especially the Chancellor’s.”

Cloudsdale had certainly changed in five years. While it was still the heart of Cirra and garrisoned tens of thousands of soldiers at any given time, something had changed since Commander Hurricane ceased to live in its lofty clouds. The air felt calm, quiet—yet, it felt like it was waiting for something. Waiting for the day when its commander would return to it.

Of course, Pan Sea knew that it would never happen. He flew by the old palace, with ‘old’ being something of a misnomer as the building was hardly twenty years old, even if it was modeled inch for inch off of that legendary building that fell in Stratopolis. The clouds were quiet, much unlike how they’d been what felt like a lifetime ago. Since Cirra’s Commander Maximus had gone to the ground, it’d become the headquarters of the Praetorian Council, the Legion’s governing body, and a tourist attraction for those who wanted to fly through Hurricane’s old residence.

The Council would’ve yielded to Hurricane’s request to retake residency there, if the commander had ever made such a request, but Pan Sea knew the real reason why Hurricane wanted nothing to do with Cloudsdale anymore. Too many ghosts and too many memories haunted him in those halls. At least in Everfree he was safe from those torments, even if the price Hurricane had to pay was living in a city that half despised and half adored him. Riots and rebels the commander could crush and kill; the ghosts of the past, not so much.

Leaving the monument to Cirra’s glory behind, Pan Sea glided into the wealthier portion of the city. Here, cloudstone buildings three or four stories tall lined paved cloud roads, with each building decorated in its own unique arrangement of colors, the colors matching the crest of each family that resided within. Most of these houses belonged to senators and their families; while those pegasi might spend more time in Everfree than in Cloudsdale as a result of their profession, it was still unthinkable for a senator to lack a house in the city. Somewhere in these streets Twister maintained her own large home, designed by the mare herself and paid for with her own wealth.

None of those thoughts were on Pan Sea’s mind as he singled out his destination: a large, spacious house with airy balconies on each side and a flat landing space on the roof traditional of pegasus homes. The ionic columns supporting the upper levels of the residence were all decorated in a white and red motif, with a merchant’s coat of arms emblazoned across the banners. Stained glass windows, again in red, white, and gold, added some flair to the exterior of the building, and a small flower garden on the roof completed the picturesque image.

Fluttering his wings, Pan Sea braked and descended to the front door of the house, landing on three hooves while the fourth sheltered a bouquet of flowers against his side. Approaching the door, he checked his appearance in the reflections in its glass and made sure he looked absolutely proper. His mane was groomed and combed, his wings were freshly preened, and the armor he wore would have passed as a mirror. Clearing his throat, he flicked a bell hanging beside the door with a wing and straightened his posture.

It took all of three seconds before the door opened. There in the frame stood a petite mare, her face filled with elation and brimming with joy. With a happy squeal, she fluttered out of the doorway and flung her forelegs around Pan Sea’s shoulders, nearly crushing the bouquet he held at his side. Pan Sea laughed and wrapped his wings around hers, and the two of them shared a tight and loving embrace.

“Pan Sea!” the mare finally gasped as she separated herself from the centurion’s embrace. Her eyes widened with happiness, and she gently took the bouquet the stallion offered her. Pressing the flowers to her nose, she closed her eyes and inhaled their fragrance, her wings twitching at her sides. “Mmmmm, these are beautiful! Thank you!”

Pan Sea smiled and kissed the mare on the cheek. “Fresh picked from the riverside this morning,” he said. His lips twitched as the snowy mare held the pink and yellow flowers against her chest, her soft and downy wings peaking higher against her sides at the emotion flowing through her. “I know you only deserve the best, Feather.”

“You’re too sweet,” Soft Feather teased, caressing his cheek with a hoof. Breaking the contact, she quickly retreated into her house to put the flowers in a vase before stepping back outside and shutting the door. Her green eyes traced over Pan Sea’s polished armor, and a white hoof teased her pink and lavender mane away as she shielded her eyes. “Gods, your armor’s bright today. How long’d you spend on that?”

The centurion shrugged. “An hour, maybe more.” In reality, he’d spent the better part of the night before polishing it to a perfect sheen. Offering his hoof, he led his fiancée down the steps of her house. “I just wanted to look my best for you.”

“You always look your best for me,” the mare said, taking stride immediately next to Pan Sea so their wings brushed as they walked.

Pan Sea chuckled. “It comes with the career, I suppose. Everypony in the Legion always looks their best, even when we’re fighting in the mud for our loved ones in the skies.”

Soft Feather leaned her neck against Pan Sea’s. “At least your fighting days are over. I’d be heartbroken if somepony took you from me.”

The centurion winced as Feather’s comment reminded him of the limp in his leg he’d grown used to by now. “I’m glad they’re behind me too,” he said, “but I’d be lying if I said they weren’t some of the best years of my life.”

Feather nodded. “Ante Legionem nihil erat…”

“Et nihil erit post Legionem,” Pan Sea finished. “Once in the Legion, always in the Legion. But that doesn’t mean I could never find room for you in my life.” His wing traced Soft Feather’s jawline, making the petite mare blush and smile. “You’re my other half.”

“Oh, save the sappy love talk for the bedroom,” Feather scolded him, giggling. “I haven’t been able to see you lately with everything you’ve been doing on the surface. Let’s just have a nice lunch in the capital and enjoy the day, hmm?”

Pan Sea smiled and nuzzled her cheek. “Sounds good. There’s a nice place down by the river that Twister says is worth checking out.”

Soft Feather laughed. “Any place Twister recommends usually has a steep price tag attached to it. You sure?”

“Of course I’m sure,” Pan Sea assured her. “The food’s great and the view’s worth it.”

“Well, if you’re so eager to blow your centurion’s pay,” his fiancée teased, stretching her wings and taking flight. “Shall we?”

“After you.”

The two pegasi rose above the cloudstone streets of Soft Feather’s neighborhood and flew towards the southwest, where the sparkling blue waters of the Maressissippi passed by Everfree after leaving the Mountain of Dawn. Several trading galleys sailed up and down the waters, the oarsponies working hard to force their way against the current while those heading out to sea simply coasted along and let the winds and current propel them. From up above, Equestria’s capital could easily be split into two parts. On one side was Everfree proper, with the castle built on a small hill and ringed with a moat. Expanding outwards from that central point were the stone houses, shops, and industrial buildings that made up the majority of the city. The town square and its large, commemorative fountain were surrounded by ponies simply enjoying the warmth of a summer’s morning.

Then there was the slums. Just south of the Choke, the stone buildings gave way to wooden shanties, mud, and ash. Unlike the order of the western half of Everfree, the slums were chaotic, disorganized, and unruly—every bit a reflection of the types of ponies that lived there. The Choke itself split the two halves of the city like a clean cut from a gladius, a stretch of empty no-mare’s land kept clean by ranks of legionaries on patrol. A small plume of black smoke rose from a cluster of buildings on the edge of the slums. Pan Sea knew it’d burn itself out in time; small fires like that were common enough.

Soft Feather sighed at Pan Sea’s side, bringing his attention back to his love. Her eyes were closed and her wings were outstretched, simply catching the air currents and gliding down at a steady pace. Pan Sea smiled and mirrored her, making small adjustments to his wings and watching her feathers ripple with the air. Catching a thermal, the two pegasi ascended slightly and readjusted their heading towards the river.

“Enjoying yourself?” Pan Sea asked, touching wingtips with Soft Feather.

The mare smiled and opened her eyes. “Oh, it’s been too long since I last took a leisurely fly like this. I’ve spent too much time inside taking care of father. The doctors claim it’s just a bad case of hay fever, but I’m beginning to wonder.” She shook her head and twisted her wings to catch another rising thermal, which Pan Sea followed. “The medicine we’ve been giving him seems to be working. Thank the gods we can afford it. I just wish that the rest of the family would help out sometimes.”

Pan Sea raised an eyebrow. “You mean they don’t?”

Feather shook her head. “I mean, mom does, but she’s gotten all wrapped up in that Horseatic League stuff in the east. She’s hardly around anymore because of her job. Grandpa raised her to be an investor and a merchant, and by the gods is she cleaning house at there. If it weren’t for her, we’d have run out of money ages ago.”

“What about your cousin?” Pan Sea asked. “I thought you and Winter Storm were real close.”

“Winterspell,” Soft Feather corrected. “And we were until he got that captaining job he always wanted. Ever since then he’s been sailing the east coast between all the little towns there. The last time he was in Everfree or Cloudsdale was almost a year ago.”

Pan Sea shrugged. “Sorry to hear that.”

Soft Feather waved it off. “It’s okay. I know his job’s important to him. I just wish that he’d come and visit every once in a while.”

The yellow stallion nodded sympathetically, but no more words were spoken. The two pegasi were content to glide the last few miles to the riverside in comfortable silence, enjoying each other’s company and companionship. At last, flaring their wings, the Cirrans touched down outside a small, rustic diner that hugged the pebbly banks of the river.

“Here we are,” Pan Sea said, gesturing to the building and holding his right wing open. Smiling, Soft Feather slid over to his side, letting Pan Sea drape his wing across her back. The golden clasp around the base of his right wing flashed in the late morning sun, glinting just as brightly as the clasp Feather wore around her own right wing. Together, the two pegasi made their way to the front door of the restaurant, proudly displaying their engagement rings as they entered.

There was just the perfect crowd in the restaurant, an eatery by the name of The Zephyr that mixed Cirran and Low Valley cuisine into its own style. There were a half dozen tables inside the restaurant itself, but none of those were occupied. Everypony there was on the pier behind the restaurant, dining at the numerous tables outside in the sun. The pier was a repurposed loading dock for the cargo ships that sailed between Everfree and Platinum’s Landing that had been bought out by the restaurant’s owners when the owning merchant’s trade business floundered. Now, trade galleys passed at a distance, giving the patrons something to watch while they ate their meals.

Pan Sea and Soft Feather went straight for the pier, where they found a nice two pony table right against the pier’s railing. Sliding into their seats, the two pegasi turned their attention to the river, where the ships drifted downstream and several colts were attempting to fish off the riverbank. It wasn’t long before a waiter arrived to take their order, but soon he was gone too, leaving the Cirrans alone to their conversations.

Their words wandered from Pan Sea’s career to Soft Feather’s home life and everything in between. They talked about the past, their memories in the old Empire, how the war changed them both. Pan Sea’s journey with Commander Hurricane during the Eternal Blizzard five years ago. What Soft Feather was doing in Cloudsdale as the temperatures plummeted and plummeted and pegasi were dying of starvation and the cold by the dozens. How they first met three years ago during the second annual celebration of Hearth’s Warming and the founding of Equestria. The plans for their upcoming marriage in little less than a year. Life after that, into the quiet sunset of old age, and the eternity awaiting beyond.

Food arrived before them in short order, a mix of seasonal greens grown by the earth pony farmers mixed with a few cutlets of pork and rabbit, a dish that only really entreated the Cirran palette. As they worked their way through the meal, with the slight tugging of the breeze on their manes and the gentle murmurs of the other patrons around them, Soft Feather suddenly frowned. Pan Sea’s eye caught it, and he set aside his fork.

“What’s the matter?” he asked, reaching across the table to touch his fiancée’s hoof. “It’s not to your liking?”

Soft Feather shook her head. “No, the food’s good. I was just thinking, that’s all.” A pause. “What’s the matter with you?”

Pan Sea blinked. “Me? What do you mean?”

“It’s probably nothing, or I’m just paranoid because this is the first time I’ve seen you in a week and I’m worried that it’s going to be over all too quickly.” She sighed, looking towards the water. Her wings twitched uncomfortably at her sides. “You just seem… nervous. Tense.”

The centurion shrugged and stroked her hoof. “I’ve just been busy with a stressful job is all,” he admitted. He too turned to look out across the water, his eyes following a galleass struggling to row its way upstream and into one of the nearby docks. “It’s been tiring and nerve-wracking to say the least.”

That made the worry in Soft Feather’s eyes darken. “What do you mean? It’s not dangerous is it?”

Pan Sea shook his head. “No, no. Not at all. It’s perfectly fine. Twister wanted me to look into some things for her, and they’ve been a little hard to get a look at, so to speak. A lot of searching and sniffing around. That’s it.”

“My father was a senator for thirteen years,” Soft Feather reminded Pan Sea. The corners of her lips upturned the slightest. “I know that anything involving Hurricane’s sister is anything but easy and straightforward.” At Pan Sea’s wary expression, she leaned forward and took the hoof that had been rubbing hers in her own. “Maybe I can help? You know you can trust me with a secret.”

The butter yellow stallion seemed to deliberate on it for a moment. “I really wouldn’t want to put the burden on you. It has to do with Equestria’s future as we know it.”

Soft Feather bent her wing around the table and gently stroked Pan Sea’s side with the tip. “Equestria’s future? My, don’t you have a hefty weight on your shoulders.”

“Tell me about it. It’s hard for a pony to carry it all on three legs.”

“Darling, you could do it on one if you really had to.” She smiled, and Pan Sea smiled with her. “That’s the kind of stallion you are. You’ll do anything for anypony.”

Pan Sea shrugged. “I wouldn’t put it that way. I just try to be helpful.”

“So I want to help you,” Soft Feather said. “I’m sure you’ll love having somepony you could talk to this about and get it off your shoulders. Right now you just seem agitated, and I just want to help you relax.”

“There are other ways of accomplishing that goal,” Pan Sea quipped. He barely ducked under the playful swipe directed at his muzzle.

“Stallions,” Soft Feather muttered, although her face carried a bemused look on it. “Come on, you can tell me.”

“I don’t know. Twister said I couldn’t tell anypony.”

“Do you want me to use The Face?” Soft Feather asked. Already her lips were curling into a pathetic expression, and her ears flattened against her head. “Don’t make me use The Face.”

“Fine!” Pan Sea exclaimed, holding a hoof out to block the mare’s face. “You know I can’t handle that!”

Soft Feather chuckled. “Believe me, I know.”

“Mobius have mercy on my soul,” Pan Sea muttered. Then, reaching into the pocket of his armor, he extracted a small silver brooch. “I’m looking for anypony wearing one of these.”

Feather took it in her hooves. “Oh? Why, what’s important about it?”

“Well, if what Twister told me is correct, the higher-ups in the rebels and rioters like to wear them,” he said. “It’s a variation on a popular design, so it’s hard to really pick out unless you take a long look at it on somepony.” Taking the brooch back, he laid it on the table so he could point out the parts with his hoof. “It’s got the wings, horn, and crown like the Equestria brooch that the senators and lots of the unicorn nobles like to wear, but they’re… distorted.” His hoof traced the jagged and pointy contours of the wings and horn. “Not really something you’d notice at a distance, and something that’d be overlooked when you’re talking with somepony in close quarters, but if you knew to look for it, it’s as clear as day.”

Soft Feather blinked and thought it over. “So you’re trying to find if anypony important is wearing one of these?”

Pan Sea nodded. “Twister thinks that somepony in the government is working with the rebels. Probably some of the younger blood, or the ones with more influence. Hell, it might be some of the senators from that Horseatic League thing in the east that your cousin’s involved in. They certainly seem like they’d profit if the current government collapses and they get some changes in there.”

“Any leads yet?” Soft Feather asked. Taking the brooch in her hooves, she spun it around a few times to get a closer look at it.

“Not yet,” he admitted. “I thought I might have found something with Mayor Greenleaf, but Twister figured it was nothing short of usual unicorn power politics.” He shook his head and chuckled. “I swear, unicorns are born campaigning for office with how they can act.”

Soft Feather shared in his chuckle. “And our senators aren’t?”

“At least in Cirra you usually have to command a legion or something before the rest of us will actually elect you.” He leaned back, and the metal plates of his armor clinked against each other. “You actually have to prove your worth, not just be born into the right family. Although that still helps immensely.”

The mare nodded and passed the brooch back to her fiancé. “As any pegasus who’s sat on the Senate before will tell you,” she added. “I’ll see what I can find around Cloudsdale; I doubt these conspirators you’re looking for are limited to Everfree. They know that if they’re going to have any success overturning Hurricane’s government, they’ll need Hurricane’s soldiers on their side.”

“Yes, well, after Cyclone’s short-lived uprising five years ago, I don’t think there are many soldiers left looking to repeat his fall,” Pan Sea said. “The commander may have executed the officers who were involved in the whole thing, but the legionaries that actually fought for Cyclone stayed with him in River Rock. Hurricane was fine with that; he wasn’t particularly keen on slaughtering thousands of pegasi for treason when the cold would do that for him.”

Soft Feather dipped her head. “I suppose you’re right,” she said. “But I’ll still keep my eye out for them.”

Pan Sea smiled. “Thanks. Just please don’t get yourself in trouble out there.”

The white mare rolled her eyes. “I’m more worried about you, Pan Sea. You’re a soldier, even if you don’t fight anymore, and that’ll draw attention from some ponies. Me? I’m just a mare in her early thirties. Nopony will think twice about me stealing a few glances here and there.”

Pan Sea smiled and rubbed one of her ears, drawing a small grin to Soft Feather’s face. “I suppose, I suppose. Just don’t get in trouble.”

“I could say the same to you. In fact, I am saying the same to you. Don’t get in trouble.”

The centurion rolled his eyes. “I put my life in danger too many times for me to count when I was travelling with Hurricane. This is easy compared to that.”

“Good. Then can we talk about something else? All these conspiracies are making me lose my appetite, and the food’s too good to let it go to waste.”

“Ah, so you do like it.”

“Mmhmm.”

The two Cirrans happily returned to their meal, and once again their conversations wandered into other things. Eventually, they finished their lunch, and after paying the waiter, left their table behind and took to the skies. Twirling about once overhead, they redirected back to Cloudsdale, becoming little more than black specks in the sky, slowly growing fainter and more indistinct against the clouds.

As soon as they were gone, a green unicorn took a slow draw on his glass of water, dropped his bits down on the table, and left without a word.

“Gods, your house is beautiful!”

Marigold’s eyes lit in delight as Finder opened the gate surrounding his and Rain’s house. She, Finder, Rain, and her three children were standing in a semicircle around the gate to the Tuscanter-style home. Yellow walls and stony arches made the majority of the house, and tall, thin trees framed long glass windows skirted with wrought iron rails. The orange stucco of the roof tiles was spotless, and the columns supporting the upper levels of the house were strong, sturdy, and beautifully detailed. On the second level, the windows were all slightly opened to let in the breeze, and two tall trees rising from behind the house swayed in the wind.

“Thank you,” Finder said as he ushered them inside the gate. “My friend from the Red Cloud War is an architect; he made the house for my wife and I when we all settled down in Everfree. It’s nothing like a home in Cloudsdale, but Rain insisted on staying close to the center of the action. So, here we are.”

Marigold’s two foals that could walk scampered on ahead, oohing and ahing to themselves as they rushed towards the door. For a moment, their abandonment of their house in the slums and the misfortunes of the night before were forgotten in a moment of wonder. Marigold followed behind, the two year old filly resting on her back, asleep. Rain kept pace with the merchant while Finder relocked the gate and took up the rear.

“I think I’ve walked past this place dozens of times, but I never thought I’d meet the ponies that owned it,” Marigold continued, her eyes sweeping up and down the masonry.

Iron Rain raised an eyebrow. “Oh?”

The merchant nodded. “Yeah. I’d make it a point to take a walk around the… cleaner parts of Everfree whenever I could get away from the slums. The change in scenery was always nice.” Flicking her tail, she bent over to inspect the flower garden growing alongside the cobblestone path leading to the house. “Of course, that was before the Legion established the Choke and segregated the two halves of our city, and I really couldn’t leave my reality behind then.”

Finder was sure he saw Rain’s ears flick in embarrassment as they ascended the steps to the front door of their house. She was, after all, the pony in charge of organizing the large majority of the Choke’s patrols and policies.

“Well, we didn’t have much of a choice,” Rain said, rubbing a hoof behind her mane. “The orders came down from the top, and I had to make sure that they were followed. Such is the soldier’s life.” Shaking her head, she paused to let Marigold enter the house first. “In the meantime, just relax and take it easy around here until the heat’s cooled off, at least. The rebels have to know that you survived by now, and they’ll be looking for you to tie up loose ends. Frankly speaking, you know too much.”

Marigold’s steps faltered, and she put on a weak smile. “Yes, well, I don’t intend on heading far from your house any time soon. Thank you again for letting us stay here.”

“Not a problem,” Finder said as he caught up with her and his wife, entering the house with them. “After all, we went through all that effort to save your life, and it’d be a waste for you to just throw it away again.” He smiled, making Marigold chuckle a little.

“Thanks,” she said. “I don’t know what we would’ve done without you two.”

“Probably died,” Rain muttered. Finder kicked her with a rear hoof.

Marigold didn’t seem to notice; she was too preoccupied with trying to keep her children from touching everything in the house. As she herded them back towards the foyer with her wings, she asked the soldiers, “So, where can we stay?”

Rain gestured with a wing to the staircase. “You can have Gray’s room for now. We’ll move him in to our room for the time being; we don’t really have any extra bedrooms. It’s upstairs, first door on your left.”

“Oh, thank you,” Marigold said yet again. Turning toward her kids, she led them to the stairs. “Your children won’t mind?”

“You won’t hear a peep from them,” Finder said, flexing his wings. “I’ll make sure of that.”

Rain rolled her eyes. “Right, because you’re the stricter of the two of us.”

“I know how to manipulate our children. It comes with being a parent.”

“And I’m a legate, so I know more about—”

“Mom?” A voice interrupted from the top of the staircase. “Dad? Who are these ponies and why are they taking Gray’s room?”

Everypony present on the ground floor craned their necks towards the railing at the top of the staircase. Standing there were a trio of Cirran youths, watching the newcomers with a wary unease. In the middle of the three was the filly that had spoken, with a white coat and a sandy blonde mane framing golden eyes. At her right was a slightly younger filly with a teal coat, sapphiric eyes, and a curious stare. That expression was almost mirrored to the letter by the colt on the central filly’s left, with his gray coat and blonde mane. His eyes were a little more calculating and frighteningly penetrating for a colt no older than ten or eleven.

Finder smiled at them. “There you kids are. Come on down. We have guests.”

Reluctantly, the three youths left the bannister and fluttered down in front of Marigold and her children. The young ponies present stole glances at each other while pretending not to notice one another, and Finder chuckled. Raising a wing, he pointed at each of his three children in turn. “This is our oldest, Shimmer.” Shimmer returned a curt nod, making Marigold blink. The filly was definitely her mother’s daughter.

“The blue beauty’s Zephyr,” Finder continued, pointing at the bouncy teal filly. “She’s thirteen and the life of any party. Gray Rain’s our youngest; he’s eleven.”

“He has an officer’s eyes,” Rain added, smiling. “They all have their sights set on joining the Legion when they’re old enough.”

“Not surprising, given their parents,” Marigold quipped. Stepping back, she scooted her two older children forward. “It’s nice to meet you three,” she said to Finder and Rain’s children. “This is Lavender, and this is Aspen,” she said, patting her pegasus daughter and unicorn son in turn. “The little girl on my shoulders is Lily.”

Zephyr bounced a little closer to the new children. “Hey! It’s nice to meet you! Is your mom friends with our mom?”

Lavender nodded. “Yeah. They saved us last night from some really mean ponies that were trying to hurt mommy.” She frowned in worry at her mother, but brightened when she saw Zephyr’s happy smile. “But we’re all okay now thanks to them!”

“Is that why you guys are so beat up?” Shimmer asked, quietly. Finder and Rain exchanged worried looks; they both still wore traces of dried blood, and Rain’s wing was held limply at her side with the hole burnt through it clearly showing. Sighing, Rain nodded to her daughter.

“Yes, honey,” she said. “Daddy and I had a good fight last night. But we’re both safe and okay.”

Shimmer nodded once. “Did you kill them?”

The question took Marigold back, and even Finder seemed a bit surprised. “Why… yes, darling,” Finder said. “We didn’t really have a choice.”

Again, Shimmer gave them a curt nod. “Good.”

A tense silence filled the air, but it was soon broken by Zephyr bounding between them all. “Hey, you guys wanna check out the pond behind the house? We’ve got these huge fish that’ll just let you touch them with your hooves if you’re friendly enough!”

Lavender’s and Aspen’s eyes lit up, and they nodded vigorously. Giggling, Zephyr led them off through the house, launching on a whole diatribe about the pond and the types of fish they had in it. Gray followed them wordlessly; the colt hadn’t spoken a single word yet, but it was pretty clear he was studying the newcomers closely. Shimmer waited, looking back at her parents, before Rain shooed her off with her wing.

Finder shook his head when all the kids were gone. “Sorry about that. Shimmer’s just a smaller version of her mother, and neither of us know what Gray’s thinking half the time.” Chuckling, he added, “I showed him how to play chess when he was six. After playing three games he understood it perfectly. Coincidentally, that’s the same time I stopped considering myself good at chess.”

Marigold raised an eyebrow. “But he doesn’t have his mark yet?”

“Not in chess,” Rain said, shaking her head. “He’s good at strategy, not just chess itself. And when he sits there just looking at you, it’s like he’s picking you apart, piece by piece, and figuring out exactly what makes you tick.” She laughed. “If he doesn’t end up being a praetorian commander someday, I’ll be damned surprised.”

“Give him a few days and he’ll know what your kids are planning on doing before they know themselves,” Finder added. Gesturing to the staircase, he nodded to the sleeping Lilac on Marigold’s back. “First room on the left is Gray’s; you can rest Lilac on the bed if you like. We need to get moving.”

Marigold’s brow jumped in alarm. “Need to get moving? What for? We just got here!”

Finder checked his tone and smiled at the mare. “Sorry, sorry. I didn’t mean to upset you. I’m just anxious to get moving on these tunnels underneath Everfree. The longer we wait, the more danger Typhoon’s in.” He shuddered. “I don’t even want to imagine what they’ve been doing to her to try to get her to talk.”

The merchant bit her lip, but eventually she sighed and nodded. “Okay, I’ll show you guys over quick. There’s an access point about a five minute’s flight from here. Then I’m going to lay low with my children for the next week.” She glanced at Lilac sleeping peacefully on her shoulders. “Just let me put my little one down, okay?”

Rain nodded. “I’ll go tell the kids that we’re leaving, and for Shimmer to look after them all for us.”

“Are you sure she can handle them?” Marigold asked. “Will she listen?”

Finder chuckled. “Marigold, this is a Legion household. Shimmer’s more disciplined than a Low Valley minutemare. She’ll do just fine.”

It made Marigold’s shoulders relax slightly, even if it didn’t make her sigh in relief. “Okay,” she said, turning towards the stairs. “I trust you know your kids best.”

Ten minutes later, the three pegasi were trotting west out of Everfree before making a turn north for the river. Iron Rain couldn’t fly with the hole burnt through her wing, and Finder didn’t want to reopen his wound, so they were forced to take a leisurely pace along the dirt and cobblestone streets. Marigold kept glancing over her shoulders, certain that somepony was following her. She’d insisted on heading west out of the city to leave as soon as possible and taking an indirect route to the caves to minimize her chances of being seen by somepony tied with the rebels.

As they were nearing the edge of town, Marigold suddenly piped up. “Shimmer surprised me.”

Finder looked over his shoulder at the mare. “Really? What do you mean?”

“I just…” Marigold shrugged. “I wasn’t expecting anything like that. She isn’t like most children.”

Rain shook her head. “No. She isn’t. And there’s a reason for it.” Ice began forming along the edges of her wings, catching Marigold by surprise. Rain glanced over her shoulder for half a second, but in that second Marigold saw the tears glistening in her eyes. Turning away, the mare choked out, “Sorry… excuse me,” and trotted off ahead.

Marigold looked to where Finder silently strode, biting his lip. “Sorry,” she whispered, “I didn’t know…”

Finder shook his head. “It’s okay, Marigold. It’s just… tough on Rain and I.” Sighing, he angled his gaze up towards the skies. “Shimmer used to be a very happy child, like Zephyr. I think both her and Zephyr took after our oldest, Sky. She was so full of optimism, and Rain loved her more than she loved anything else in the world. More than she loved me, even,” he added with a melancholy smile. But there he stopped, and walked in silence for several seconds more.

Marigold knew why. “I’m sorry… When did she pass?”

“Five years ago,” Finder answered, his voice little more than a hoarse whisper. “During the Blizzard. She got sick. Really sick. Our medic friend smuggled medicine for her as best she could, but… well, there was nothing we could do.” Blinking several times, probably to keep the tears out of his eyes, the old stallion looked away. “She passed in her mother’s arms. ‘Mommy… I’m not cold anymore.’ Those were her last words. Then we lost her.”

“Gods,” Marigold whispered, holding a hoof to her mouth. “That’s terrible. I’m so sorry…”

“Time heals all wounds, but some scar badly,” Finder said. “When we lost Sky, it broke Shimmer. Her happiness was gone. She wasn’t the bright and happy filly we once knew. And the worst part is that I think it’s because she wanted to be strong for her sister and brother.”

Marigold looked at Finder, but she couldn’t see anything under the mask he wore over his face. “Why’s that the worst part?”

“Rain and I, we...we always promised we’d protect them… keep them safe, you know?” Finder looked to Marigold with a frail, trembling smile. “We couldn’t protect Sky. We couldn’t save Shimmer’s big sister. And because of that, Shimmer lost her faith in us, that trust that kids have that tells them ‘mommy and daddy will protect me’. She had to learn at nine years old that we couldn’t protect her from everything..” Finder sighed, but it was perforated with small shudders. “She’s matured far faster than she should have. Faster than we ever wanted her to. She tried to become so strong so fast…”

He sighed, and looked to where Rain was walking ahead of them, leaving a frosty trail in her wake. “She’ll make a good soldier some day.”

Eventually, Rain dropped back to let the two of them catch up. She was still a little shaken, but she’d pulled her legate’s helmet down over her brow to shadow her eyes. “How far are we?” she asked. Her voice was cold and oddly neutral; Marigold knew how much she was struggling to keep that façade.

“Just a few more minutes,” Marigold assured her. Holding out her wing, she swung a right towards the river. “There’s an embankment with a copse of trees on it. In the center of those trees, there’s a boulder covering a tunnel. It leads under the city.”

Finder raised an eyebrow. “And how are we going to avoid bumping noses with any rebels that might happen to be there?”

“It’s not used by the rebels,” Marigold said. “It’s too far and out of the way. They’d use one on either the east or south ends of town if they wanted to get out of the city limits to do something; there’s nothing in the northwest. Besides, there’s already one they use in the west which leads directly into the forest. It’s more secluded there; less of a chance for them to be seen on the way in or out.” She shook her head. “You won’t run into any trouble with this one. As for the rest of the tunnels, if you keep your heads down, you should be okay.”

“Okay,” Finder said. “Keeping my head down is something I’m good at. I haven’t survived being a scout for this long without learning how.” He looked at Rain and smiled. “My wife, on the other hoof…”

Rain snorted. “All I’m offering them is a fair fight. The world would be such a better place if we solved our problems one on one.”

Finder rolled his eyes. “Nimbans,” he muttered.

Marigold’s ears flicked. “Well, some of us are less suited to dueling than others.”

Rain shrugged. “Then get better,” she suggested.

“Like it works that way.”

“You’d be surprised.”

Shaking her head, Marigold led them across the clearing towards the river flowing to the north. As they got closer to the water, Finder noticed a small group of trees standing a short ways away from the green backdrop of the lush forest to the west and across the river. Fluttering forward the last few steps, Marigold wound her way between the trees and came to rest on top of a modestly sized boulder in their center.

“Here we are,” she proclaimed as Finder and Rain weaved through the undergrowth and thick brush. Hopping up and down on the stone, her hooves made solid clicks with each bounce. “I’ve used this tunnel a few times myself to get in and out of the caves. The rock will move with a solid shove; just cover it up when you go in on the off chance somepony happens to find it.”

Iron Rain planted her hooves on the rock and grunted as she pushed. The stone slid fairly easily across the hard ground, leading to a dark shaft plunging deep into the abyss. A simple rope ladder was hammered into the clay walls, but about twenty feet down, the walls and floor turned to stone. Dripping water echoed from somewhere in the tunnels beneath the earth, but all was lost in shadow and darkness.

Rain shuddered at the sight. “Have I mentioned I hate caves?”

“Most pegasi do,” Marigold assured her, although her words hardly seemed to have any galvanizing effect.

“You get used to them,” Finder added. Already he was peering into the darkness, trying to get a glimpse of what might be awaiting them below. “And this connects with the rest of the tunnels?”

Marigold nodded. “The tunnels are all interconnected under Everfree. In fact, some of the city’s sewage systems use the tunnels as natural dumping points. I’d… stay away from those. Messy.” She stuck her tongue out. “Rather than wandering around in the dark, I’d suggest trying to find where a few tunnels meet up and following ponies around. The ones that live down here know where they’re going. If you aren’t prepared, you could easily get lost down there. It’s like a labyrinth.”

Rain shrugged and flexed the blades on her wings. “We’ll mark our path as we go. If worst comes to worst, we can follow the scratches back out in no time.”

“Okay.” Marigold took a deep breath, closing her eyes. “Okay. Just please be safe down there. I don’t want to be responsible for your deaths after everything you went through to save me and my kids.” She smiled sheepishly. “And it’ll be kind of hard to keep living at your place if the owners are declared missing or dead.”

“We’ll be fine,” Finder said, patting her back with his wing. “Thanks for showing us where we needed to go. We would’ve never figured this out without you.”

Marigold nodded. “It was the least I could do. I’ll be waiting at your house for when you return. Taking care of the kids and everything. After all, somepony has to do it.”

Waving a wing, Finder moved towards the ladder. “We’ll be back by nightfall,” he said, placing his hoof on the first rung. He stopped before he descended any further and called out to the yellow mare again. “Also, when you get back, go to a centurion and tell him you’re delivering a report from scout centurion Pathfinder for Twister. Let her know about this tunnel and that we went in. You know… in case something does happen.”

“The only thing that’s going to be happening here is a lot of rebel deaths,” Rain growled. Despite her menacing tone, she hesitated when Finder motioned for her to step towards the ladder.

“Come on in, honey,” he said, descending deeper into the darkness. “The shadows are great!”

Rain scowled at him. “The things you put me through…” Regardless, she still placed her hoof on the first rung after him.

“I don’t know about you, Rain, but the view from down here is spectacular!”

“If you ever wanna see it again you’ll shut up.”

Marigold watched from a distance as they descended. When they slid the stone closed overtop of them and their chatter was lost, the mare sighed and hugged herself.

“Please be safe,” she murmured after them.

The creak of a door echoing down a long hallway woke Typhoon from her fitful sleep. Blinking awake, she struggled to move her weary limbs underneath the heavy woolen covers draped across her body. Yawning, she sat up on the bed and stretched her wings. In doing so, her left wing brushed a damp, stony wall.

Opening her eyes fully, she took a clear look at her surroundings. The room she was in looked more like a blocked off section of a cave than any sort of building or structure. The walls, floor, and ceiling were all rough-hewn stone, seemingly carved out of the earth itself, while the far end of the room was a wall made of heavy stone bricks, within which a solid and damp wooden door was framed. A few torches provided ample light within her “quarters”, which contained an old cot, a nightstand, an iron pitcher half-filled with water, and a plate with some bread and a thin slice of meat. Taking a sniff of the meat, Typhoon realized it was still warm. Somepony had cooked this recently and brought it here for her.

Taking the plate with both hooves, she set it on her lap and began to chew on her meal. Her conditions were… comfortable. She’d expected some sort of damp, dark dungeon with chains and shackles holding her to the wall. Not this. She was fairly certain the door to her quarters only had a small deadbolt to lock it—and that was on the inside, too. Whomever had brought her here certainly didn’t seem to be worried about her trying to escape.

She grit her teeth and clutched at her skull. Was she even really ‘here’? Her mind was filled with the screaming cacophony of dozens of terrifying memories over the past few days. She’d died several times, only to wake up in some new torment. Was this another?

The combination of frustration and terror made her want to scream. She was losing her grasp on reality, and it scared her. She couldn’t tell the difference between what was real and what wasn’t, the illusions were so expertly crafted. She never knew until it all went horribly, horribly wrong.

Doubling over, she hugged her tail against her body and waited. Waited for her reckoning to come. Waited for the pain that would send her spiraling off into a new, more terrifying nightmare.

A knock on the door startled her, and her pupils shrunk as she stared out at it. With a dry creak, the door slid open on rusty hinges until Typhoon could see the silhouette of a unicorn standing in its frame. She instinctually drew back and flared her wings in alarm. Hooves slowly clopped across the floor as the stallion approached, matching perfectly with Typhoon’s accelerating heartbeat.

As the stallion approached, Typhoon’s wide eyes picked out the details. Coal coat. Blue eyes. A gray and black mane. He looked like he was in his mid forties. His cutie mark was obscured by the cloak he wore over his shoulders and down his back. And he was smiling.

Typhoon shuddered. She felt like she should know him from somewhere, but she couldn’t place it. She couldn’t put a name to his face, but she recognized it nonetheless. Some part of her shuddered in fear. Another part screamed for her to kill him, to pummel him to paste with her hooves if necessary. Yet the part that ultimately won out was some small voice in her head that told her to wait and see. To watch him closely.

She realized then that his smile wasn’t malignant, wasn’t fueled off of some twisted anger or pride in her confusion. It was a friendly smile. It was a smile of relief, like a dear friend had just barely survived a brush with death and was finally recovering.

It only made the mare more confused and worried.

“It’s good to see you awake, child,” the unicorn purred. “We were beginning to worry we were too late.” His black horn bathed itself in green magic, and he pulled a stool over from the wall to sit on. A stool with heavy iron legs. Iron legs that’d make a good makeshift weapon. Leaning forward, he steepled his hooves together. “How are you feeling?”

Typhoon refused to answer him, instead keeping her wings flared and trying to keep her breathing slow and steady. She was writhing in agony inside with how close this unicorn was to her, but he seemed respectful of her personal space and kept his distance. If that changed, however…

The unicorn seemed to sense this and slid back a few inches. “Easy, easy. I’m not here to hurt you. Those were the ponies we saved you from. You’re safe now.”

“I… I d-don’t understand,” the mare murmured. “What do you mean? Where’s my father? Where am I?” She started to hyperventilate and began scanning the walls for something, although she didn’t know what. Her eyes snapped back to the unicorn. “Who are you?!”

“You don’t remember…” the unicorn said, more to himself than Typhoon. Frowning, he looked over the few items scattered around her bed before his gaze settled on the pitcher. Once more his magic reached out, lifting the pitcher and its contents off of the ground. Before Typhoon could wonder what he was doing, he splashed the water across her face.

The scream was deafening.

When Typhoon came to, she felt strong forelegs cradling her as she trembled against somepony. Opening her eyes, she realized she was hugging the unicorn for dear life, who’d at some point shifted from the stool to her cot. As her mind caught up to what her body was doing, Typhoon roughly shook herself free and slid to away.

The unicorn regarded her for a few moments with a concerned look on his face. “It’s as I feared. Star Swirl’s magic is still twisting your mind.”

Typhoon looked over from where she was hugging herself. “Star Swirl? What do you mean? He wouldn’t do anything to me. He… he and my dad are friends!”

Biting his lip, the unicorn shook his head. “Typhoon, there’s so much you need to know.”

“What?” Typhoon frowned. “What do you mean? I don’t understand.”

“Typhoon,” the unicorn insisted, raising a hoof to quiet her. “I know you’re confused. It’s understandable, given what you’ve been through. But your life as you knew it is over.”

Typhoon stared at him, dumbfounded. “…What?”

“Think about it,” the unicorn said. “Push through the fog Star Swirl put over your mind and remember how you got here”

“I… but I…” At the stallion’s stare, she nodded. “Okay. Okay. Just… give me a minute.”

She closed her eyes and tried to focus. Fog wasn’t a very good metaphor; it was more like trying to push through mud and muck in the riverbank. Still, feelings and images began to claw their way to the surface of her mind.

Cloudsdale. Cyclone’s betrayal. Her torment in the hooves of her captors in River Rock. Her escape with Star Swirl’s aid. Her fight with Cyclone. Birthing Tempest. Helping her father with Everfree and raising her son. Coming home to find her son missing. Storming through the castle to see her father. Blood. An arrest. Confusion. Darkness.

The nightmares began after that, but Typhoon shut them down before she could think on them too much. Without looking at him, she asked the unicorn in a quiet, frightened voice, “What happened to me?”

The unicorn slid closer to Typhoon. He looked like he wanted to wrap his foreleg around her shoulders and comfort her, but he respectfully maintained his distance. “All I know is that they say you killed your father,” he said. “We knew that you would never do such a thing, so we rescued you.”

Typhoon’s eyes widened. “W-what? What do you m-mean?!” She frantically shook her head, but a haunting feeling in the back of her mind told her exactly what the unicorn was telling her. She remembered the accusations. How they locked her under the castle for days. How she screamed that she was innocent until her voice wore out on her. Crying in her cell, praying that Tempest was okay and that it was all a big misunderstanding.

“Now, think,” the unicorn insisted. “All we know is what they said to the public.” As Typhoon shuddered, he gently nudged her chin so she was looking at him. “What happened? Think and try to sort your memories out. It’ll help. Trust me.”

Typhoon looked away and nodded. “I... I remember coming home two weeks ago. I called for Tempest, but he didn’t answer me. It was odd...” She shook her head. “He always came running to see me when I came home. But I figured that he was just at Twister’s or something.

“But when I got into the kitchen, there was a note on the table,” Typhoon continued. “It had the Legion’s seal on it. I remember opening it, and dropping my helmet in shock. They... they...” she squeezed her eyes shut and shook her head. It took her a deep breath to calm herself enough to continue. “They’d taken Tempest away from me. The letter didn’t say why. It just said I was legally incompetent to be his guardian.”

The unicorn nodded, his attention raptly fixed on Typhoon. “Go on,” he urged, motioning with his hoof.

Typhoon took a breath. “I sprinted back to the castle with the letter. I don’t even think I shut the door behind me. But when I got to my father’s office, I opened the door, screaming, and...”

She shook her head like she couldn’t believe what she had seen. “Dad was lying in a pool of his own blood,” she murmured. She remembered it clearly now. “Star Swirl arrived right after me. He saw what happened and told me he was fetching the guards. I didn’t… didn’t know…”

“Didn’t know that he was getting them to arrest you,” he finished for her. Reaching a hoof out, he lightly, ever so lightly touched her shoulder. “What happened next?”

Everything was so vivid. “They took me to the dungeon. I tried explaining that they were making a mistake and that I’d found him like that. I was screaming for Tempest right until they put me in a cell and left me there, and then some.” She shook her head and stared at her hooves. “Then the accusations came. I… I told them the truth. It wasn’t me. I know it wasn’t. Then I saw Star Swirl and…”

“And everything gets blurry beyond that point?”

Typhoon nodded. “Yeah… yeah it does.”

The unicorn leaned back. “When Star Swirl couldn’t get the confessions he wanted from you, he started… messing with your mind.” Again he grabbed the pitcher with his magic, and Typhoon flinched away. Spinning it in its green aura, he said, “The very first nightmare… terror… whatever you want to call it—the very first one of those had something to do with water. We figured that out whenever we tried to make you drink and you instinctively gagged and thrashed.”

“He drowned me,” Typhoon stated rather bluntly. “I was chained to a bed and he drowned me with a skin of water.” She paused. “And what do you mean? Was I out?”

He nodded. “Three days ago, my comrades and I had infiltrated the castle to acquire Legion plans and troop movements. We need to stay one step ahead to survive, you see. But when we were there, I overheard your screams.” Setting the pitcher down, he moved back to the iron stool. “We waited until your tormentor left. That’s how we found out that Star Swirl was behind your torture. When it was all clear, we freed you from your prison. It wasn’t easy, and we lost a good many ponies in providing a distraction so the rest of us could get away. You were in a coma because of his meddling; he was probably trying to fabricate and extract confessions from your mind. We had to kill the legionaries on watch to get you out. I’m sorry about that, by the way.”

Typhoon said nothing.

Sighing, the unicorn stood up. “I was hoping you’d recover sooner, but it’s clear you need time. Star Swirl has soldiers everywhere on the streets looking for you. With your father recovering and you missing, Twister stepped up to fill in. But she’s busy with politics, and she can’t spend all her time on managing the Legion, so Star Swirl offered to help. He’s supposed to be relaying information to and from Twister, but it looks more like he’s giving the soldiers his own commands. In the meantime, we know that Hurricane hasn’t woken since he was stabbed in the back, giving the archmage free reign over Equestria’s military and police forces.” The lights flickered around the room as a sudden draft swayed them, and the unicorn looked around, biting his lip. “It’s only a matter of time before his soldiers find these tunnels… and find you.”

Typhoon wasn’t paying attention to that. She was staring at the unicorn again. She knew she recognized him from somewhere, but according to his story and her own memories… some little voice in the back of her mind was panicking again.

“Who are you?” she asked, uncertainty creeping back into her voice.

He stopped and turned back to Typhoon, flashing her a quick smile. “Oh, I completely forgot to introduce myself, didn’t I?” Bowing to Typhoon, he swept his cloak around him in a fanciful flourish. “My name is Abaddon, and I am the leader of the Founders—the same ponies who gave their lives to rescue you so Equestria can have a chance at a brighter future.”

Typhoon frowned. “What do you mean?”

Abaddon smiled. “We are all children of Equestria. But this Equestria cannot stand as it is. It’s corrupt and preys upon those who serve it—like yourself.” Turning towards the door, his horn washed itself in a green aura. From around the corner, he floated in a long, thin burlap sack and passed it to Typhoon. “We’re freedom fighters. We fight for a better tomorrow. For a more unified tomorrow. We’re what the politicians call the rebels, the rioters, whatever. But that doesn’t describe who or what we are.”

Holding the sack in one hoof, Typhoon unwrapped it with the other. There in front of her was her sword, Hiems Osculum, in perfect condition. Not only that, but it’d been sharpened and polished. As she held it in front of her face, Abaddon continued. “We are the builders. We are a unity. We are what Equestria should become but is too timid and too caught up in hatred to realize. We, Typhoon, are the Founders.” He stuck his hoof out and nudged Typhoon’s sword lower so they could look eye to eye. “And the future… well, it’s built on us.”

He turned around and walked towards the door again. “I know this is hard. I know you’re scared and confused. If you want to walk away from this all, I won’t stop you. None of us will. But I won’t throw more lives away on trying to save you a second time. You go up there and Star Swirl gets his hooves on you, it’s game over. But if you stay… if you help us…” He nodded once. “We can give you the help you need to get your vengeance, save your son, and maybe change the course of history.”

Typhoon said nothing, instead choosing to stare at the blue sheen of her sword. At some point, Abaddon walked out of the room and let the door bounce off its latch, but it didn’t close all the way. His hoofsteps faded down the stony corridors until it was just Typhoon and the sound of her breathing.

The door didn’t open again.