Marks of Harmony: ReMastered
Part 1

Long shadows were cast in a dissonantly angular slant to the surrounding architecture through the impressive arches of Canterlot Castle as the brilliant orange light of Celestia’s day faded below distant mountains. And just before all consuming darkness would have taken the world, Luna lit her own horn, raising the moon to it’s proper place in the sky. The light of the world changed from the harsh orange of a dying sunset to the soft, angelic glow of a crescent moon. Luna nodded her head with satisfaction with the stars’ arrangement and promptly let off her magic guiding the moon, assured she would glide the course Luna had set for her this evening.

“It should be a calm night for your court tonight, sister dearest,” Celestia strained a weary but all the same pleased smile. “The nobility acquiesced to my requests more readily today.”

“Be cautious, Celestia,” Luna replied, brow furrowing. “They might be plotting some overly complicated bill to sneak past you and are hence buttering you up for favor… That is how the phrase is used correct?”

“More or less,” her elder sister smiled more warmly. “But as far the nobles go, I’m fairly certain that’s exactly what they’re doing. But that doesn’t mean I can’t get what I can out of it for the time being.”

“Fair,” Luna nodded. “Well, have a good reprise at any rate, Celly. We shall attempt to not burn down the kitchens like last month and shall also endeavor to not have our guards treat insubordinate nobles in the traditional manner.”

“Thank you, Lulu,” Celestia answered, her voice having gone back to the weariness from before. Luna considered that her sister did not appreciate the sincerity of her promises, but with a smart nod decided she was merely tired.

“Goodnight, sister,” Luna lilted before turning toward the throne room at a cheery trot. The official commencing of the Night Court would begin shortly, and Luna was not inclined to being fashionably late like Celestia. Ever since returning, Luna had cherished her night dwellers even more than she had as she fell into the waiting magic of Nightmare Moon. She was even coming to consider some of them friends, which aside from making Twilight Sparkle immeasurably happy for her, had rewarded her with pleasing conversations many a night. The mare, Vinyl Scratch, was always a joy when she found time to join the Night Court as were a fair few others.

Of course, she still had her fair share of problems that arose within her domain that demanded her sincere attention and royal authority (she had found that the Royal Canterlot Voice was still acceptable in many of these instances). But it seemed her night dwellers carried themselves with more common sense than what she’d seen of the Day Court. The nonsensical ‘problems’ brought to her sister’s attention… Some of those ponies she doubted she would ever live long enough to fully understand.

The doors to the throne room were opened for her by her faithful Night Guard, and those shadowing her from the darkness slipped in behind her into the waiting, shrouded corners of the hall. But where Luna would normally give them a subtle nod of appreciation for their stealthy movements, she balked. Nopony was in the hall. Even when she arrived at the appointed time for the beginning of the Night Court, there were usually a few ponies awaiting her arrival. Not this night. Not a single soul aside from herself and her guards were present.

“Ah, Your Majesty,” her senior guard, a thestral by the name of Threadwing, greeted her confused steps to her throne. “There is something demanding your full attention.”

“Enough to bar entry to the Night Court of our faithful brothers and sisters of the night?” Luna asked, a touch scathing.

“You may wish to take more drastic actions than that, Your Majesty,” Threadwing answered with a coughing grunt. “This… thing arrived just as the Moon began her course.” A small flick of his azure bat wings brought a junior officer to his side, a secure lockbox swinging from his fanged mouth.

Luna knew the box, and her eyes narrowed at the sight of it. Such was the place she and her sister ordered any and all incoming letters from foreign diplomats be stored for their personal perusal. It saw little use compared to Luna’s days before Nightmare Moon, as foreign diplomats now seemed to prefer journeying to Equestria personally if a matter demanded their attention. Since her return, Luna had only seen it used twice, and only then for trivial inquiries.

That something from a foreign land had arrived that merited cancelling the Night Court was not to be taken lightly. Threadwing produced the box’s key and deftly opened and offered Luna the still sealed letter in one smooth motion. She cautiously took the thin envelope in her magic, prepared for a magical attacked keyed to her aura. None came. Curiosity now mixed with suspicious concern as she flipped the letter to inspect the seal.

And a small gasp escaped her lips even as she put her hoof to her mouth.

“Your Majesty?” Threadwing asked, waiting for an order to action.

“Have a runner ready to wake my sister should this bode ill news,” Luna commanded as she continued to inspect a seal that should not exist before her eyes. There was a slight commotion beside her as Threadwing called said runner to her side. But all of Luna’s attention was upon the letter as she cracked the wax. Still, no arcane assault attempted to strike her down. She pulled the even thinner papyrus paper from the envelope’s confines and unfolded it to a flowing zebrican script.

And it read with all she had expected it would but hoped it would not.

Luna

It is my greatest hope that you have not forgotten me in your long absence, nor the seal which protected this letter. If this letter has successfully reached your hooves at the time intended, Our plan has already been set into motion.

Even as you read this, We have crossed into Equestria from Red Dunes, bearing my greatest gifts. I do not write this to alarm you, though I feel that is quite unavoidable at this juncture. Rather, I write to warn you. I bring with me revolution unstoppable, and if you wish to survive, you will leave Equestria. You and your sister.

Attempting to stop Us will bear you no ripe fruit, but fear not, we will give your precious ponies true Harmony. The Harmony they have deserved since you offered it to them.

As of this writing, the Land of Red Dunes declares war against the House of Sol and the House of Artemis.

The paper slowly flitted to Luna’s hooves as her magic slowly faded. She had not even bothered with reading the signature. She had no need to. There was only one name it could be, no matter how it would defy the natural laws. Luna closed her eyes and breathed deeply. Rather than how she had handled the event before, she would be composed, controlled, and swift with this. It would barely be a mark of note even in the exhaustive historical tomes.

“Threadwing, send your runner to wake our sister,” Luna said, her tone steely with vitalized determination. “And find somepony to alert Prince Armor that his presence is requested at once. You and he shall gather the collective might of the Lunar and Royal Guard immediately.”

“Your Majesty!” her captain sharply saluted before the throne room became a bustle of Night Guard activity.

“Come quietly, Aurora,” Luna whispered to herself in the din. “I shall not be able to stay my sister’s hoof a second time.”

___________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

Equestria was a large nation, respected for it’s elite Guard but still pacifist approach; and valued by many nations for the many magical academies that consistently fed the world the most talented mages and alchemists the world over. It was a prosperous place for pony and non-pony alike, and the Royal Sisters encouraged travel to and from their domain.

Yet for all her glory and prosperity, Equestria did still play host to vicious and supposedly uninhabitable wilderness. But on the northern border between Equestria and the Griffon Kingdom was a place many would only laugh if told there was indeed a small town established in its midst. But Caedmon did exist, nestled in a rare, fertile valley that had somehow not been blasted into ruin during the War of the Sun and Moon.

Caedmon was ostensibly a traveler’s town: a place for the adventurous or those cursed with insatiable wanderlust to rest as they entered or left the Equestrian nation. For those who lived in its rather drab homes and shops however, none would argue it was a hub for those trying to escape justice in their homeland. Not to mention the veritable plethora of creatures that went bump in the night. Some went as quickly as they came, while others… well, most of Caedmon’s residents took it as a strange point of pride that most of them were descended from some of the world’s nastiest stock.

“Not that we’d ever want to be like them,” the resident pegasus book-keep mumbled as a traveler left his small store (full of contraband books from around the world). The stories of their ancestors were fun for those passing through and good for keeping away the unscrupulous, but all the same, Inky Jay was as much a necromancer as the griffon king. A small, amused sigh escaped him as he began re-shelving the books the pony had been ‘interested in’. There were only a few (zebrican books banned from Equestria aeons ago), and Inky was lounging in his counter chair again after only a few minutes.

He slowly closed his eyes and leaned back. Mornings were always a busy time, what with wanderers taking the day early to continue onward to more foreign lands, and he was glad to have made it to the calmer afternoon. “Hey now,” a musically flitting voice whispered in his ears as smooth hooves began slowly massaging his shoulders, “there’s no reason to be such a drama queen. I heard them all from the back, and it wasn’t that bad.”

“I woke up on the wrong side of the bed,” Inky said, leaning into the massage.

“Yeah, I know. It was mine,” the voice answered before playfully nibbling his ear with pointed fangs. He jolted at the contact, a small, filly-like squeak escaping him as he turned around. The wonderful massage ended, replaced with giggling from the Changeling mare readjusting her wings. “I had half a mind to push you off,” she managed between snickers.

“That would’ve made it all better, obviously,” Inky said with a half-roll of his eyes and swatted at her with a wing.”

“I still say you should learn to cuddle better, babe,” she said with a playful wink. “Wouldn’t have these problems if you did, now would we?”

“Gleam…” he sighed, exasperated. “I’m asleep.”

“Uh huh,” she said simply, taking her seat at the second of the small store’s two counters. “Sounds like a stallion problem to me, sweetie.” She giggled again. “Okay, how about we try to work on keeping your wings to yourself first, hm?”

“You really do enjoy asking the impossible out of me don’t you?” he smiled in reply, her presence (and massage) having removed much of his irritation from the morning.

“Only because you try so much harder when it’s ‘impossible’,” she quipped back, setting about to begin repairing some of the more tattered books they’d received in trade that morning. “Oh! Would you find me that copy of Machinations of Stone? I’ve been meaning to repair the water damage on the back cover for ages.”

“The griffon translation?” Inky asked, making a small hop from his chair and gently flying to one of their upper shelves.

“The dragon one, sweetie,” she answered. Inky nodded to nopony in particular and moved through the maze of shelves with an expertise that only a foal and adulthood of experience could give, finding the book in question with ease.

“My lady,” he swung into a mid-air bow, presenting the book to Gleam with a small peck on her horn. “Somepony’s thinking ahead to the Migration.”

“I just figure the last thing we need is a dragon angry about the state of one of their books and burning the place down,” Gleam shrugged.

“Point,” Inky nodded. “You have the ledger by the way? I’m gonna go ahead and start to close up for the day.”

“So early?” Gleam asked curiously. “I mean, sure, we had the morning insanity but…”

“Gleam lovely,” Inky chuckled, settling onto his hooves and brushing a hoof through her mane and tilting her head to look in his eyes. “It’s the stallion, not the mare who’s supposed to forget anniverseries.” She blinked once, a blank stare settling into her vivid orange eyes. Then twice. And three times before Inky just sighed and leaned in for a deep kiss. She shook in surprise, but the moment passed, and she returned the kiss with as much passion and wrapping her hooves around the back of his head.

They pulled away after Inky needed to breathe again. “Oh,” Gleam said with a cute nuzzle. “Something tells me my problem-ridden stallion has plans then.”

“As a hopeless romantic, I resent your doubt,” Inky played, with a wink. “Yes, I do indeed have plans. So, not to ruin the moment, but I do kinda need the ledger to close us down for the day.”

“Moment ruined,” she replied, though her heavily lidded eyes said otherwise. “Why don’t you ask a mare nicely and with another kiss?”

“Payment I am happy to give,” Inky said, leaning forward.

But his lips never met hers. An almighty crash shook the earth all around. The glass in the front windows exploded in all directions, books were shaken from their shelves, and an ear-piercing magical whine singed the very air. Inky fell backward, spraining a wing and dragging a squealing Gleam to the ground with him. And it was not a single moment either. The world seemed to be falling apart around them, falling rocks from higher in the valley cracked and split, adding their shuddering noise and violent collapse to the reverberating earth and screaming air.

And just as Gleam’s first tears began to wet Inky’s chest from the unbearable chaos of it all, the world erupted with a sickly tint of pink and everything became still. They both remained paralyzingly still in the immediate aftermath, Inky tightening his grip on Gleam even as she continued to silently cry from the assault on her far more sensitive ears. But when nothing seemed to return to normal, Inky felt it safe to slowly stroke Gleam’s mane and hush for her.

“My ears… Sun and Moon, my ears…” she whimpered, barely audible. “I’m going to kill whoever did that…”

“You might have the training for it,” Inky hushedly answered, slowly standing them both up, “but I wouldn’t mess with anypony with that kind of magic. I’m just glad you’re ears aren’t bleeding.”

“Unghhhh…” she groaned, falling back to her stomach and clenching both down with her hooves. “I feel like they should be.” Inky winced, his own ears moving from numb to pain pierced.

“I’m gonna take a peek outside,” he said, blinking away tears as his eyes tried to adjust to the pink hue coating everything now.

“Like Tartarus you are!” a young stallion’s voice penetrated the room like dragon’s roar. Both Inky and Gleam recoiled from the noise, Gleam adding a changeling hiss of anger to match. “You two aight?” the stallion went on, now at a whisper after making his way through the shop’s royally disarrayed shelves. “Sorry, Gleam,” he apologized sheepishly after catching sight of her crouching on the floor, hooves-over-ears.

“So we can’t see what the hell just happened, but your beige arse can, Spit?” Inky fumed at the sandy colt.

“I got caught outside thank you,” Spit answered importantly. “But thing is, I buckin’ saw what did all that. Nopony with good sense should be outside right now.”

“Spit, you’d better tell me who just tried to kill us before I add you to the list,” Gleam hissed, clambering to her hooves and flicking a stray strand of mane out of her face.

“I mean, she’s hot Inks, but how you live with an ousted changeling guard…” Spits added, detached before seeming to catch the glare in both Gleam and Inky’s eyes. “Oh, uh, yeah,” he coughed. “It’s um… Buck it. It’s a metal airship. Thought it crashed the way it came and landed outside town like it owned the place, then magicked up some pink shield around the valley.”

“Okay, let me ask again,” Inky growled, rubbing his forehead into a hoof. “And let’s have you answer without spouting off a load of chicken -”

“I ain’t lyin’!” Spit pleaded. “I dunno what’s goin’ on anymore than you two!”

“Inky, love,” Gleam said slowly, maneuvering around fallen books to stand beside him and look into Spit’s eyes, “I don’t think he’s lying…”

“Then where the bucking blazes did it - !”

“CITIZENS OF CAEDMON! REJOICE!” the magic-garbled words exploded through the air. “YOUR TOWN HAS BEEN CHOSEN TO MARK THE FALL OF THE ROYAL SISTERS AND BEAR THE FLAG OF A NEW AGE! AGAIN I SAY…”

Inky, Gleam, and Spit all eyed one another as the first voice was cut off and another, softer voice took it’s place. “Rejoice, and be the first to be reborn.”

___________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

Twilight Sparkle carefully strolled through her new castle’s library, eyes on the shelves and magic around a plain cardboard box. Spike had joined her in the task at hoof, but was presently on the other side of the library. Without Golden Oaks serving as Ponyville’s public library, Twilight had promptly opened the castle’s own to the Ponyville populace. This of course meant it was not simply a personal, oversized bookshelf for her own pleasure and needed to be maintained like Golden Oaks had.

The libraries from all over Equestria would be swapping hundreds of their books with one another in a few weeks, and Twilight saw it as the perfect opportunity to properly integrate her castle (whose name she still hadn’t decided on despite Rarity’s many and varied suggestions) into the system. Thus, she needed copies of books that were both sufficiently numerous on her own shelves that she could easily part with a fair few but that also might be harder to come by in other regions of Equestria.

It was tiresome and tedious and filled with entirely too much guesswork for her liking, but such was a necessary evil in managing a public service. She could at least say it wasn’t a stressful job. “Twi, what’re you thinking about the advanced spell books?!” Spike hollered from across the library, his voice ringing off the crystal walls.

“Just be sure to leave at least one of each!” Twilight yelled back, not taking her eyes off the painfully large fiction section. “And don’t take a volume one if we don’t have more than one of any of the other volumes!”

“Right-o,” Spike answered. Twilight was in the process of both nodding and removing a massive chunk of the fiction section for reorganization sorting when a light knock echoed on the open door.

“Ma’am?” one of her two Royal Guards (by Princess Celestia’s insistence) asked from the entryway. “Permission to enter?”

“Of course,” Twilight said, waving him inside. “Something wrong?”

“Depends, Ma’am,” he answered, offering her the rolled morning newspaper from under his wing. “Post finally got around town, Ma’am.” Twilight’s brows furrowed as she took the paper in her magic, gently setting her book box down and unfurling the pages. She couldn’t even read the text glaring at her from the front page before she had to blink and shake her head at it’s sheer size. ROYAL AND NIGHT GUARD PERFORM FULL, ARMED MUSTER IN CANTERLOT.

“We were ordered to remain at our posts, Ma’am,” her Guard answered quickly when Twilight’s first reaction was to dart her eyes at the very pony who had delivered the paper.

“And?” she went on, expecting more. “Is this some kind of training exercise, or should I be worried?”

“I’d say concerned, Ma’am,” her Guard answered stoutly. “An en masse muster isn’t out of the ordinary to check our preparedness, but there is usually a forewarning from our COs.”

“Thank you for letting me know as soon as this was delivered,” Twilight nodded, and the Guard took note of her clear intention for need of privacy, and smartly left for his post outside the castle door. Twilight had her nose buried in the article, searching for any clues as to why the princesses would do something so drastic without any apparent need. The griffons in particular wouldn’t take kindly to a mass gathering of one of the most elite combat forces in the world.

The beginning of the article was the usual blather about the history and great feats of the Guard that typically preceded any article about them, but when Twilight finally reached the report of the actual event, the article was nearly over. The training areas for both Guards and roads leading to them have been a bustle of noise ever since last night when the call was sent out, and it is expected to stay that way well into tomorrow afternoon. We attempted to get more information on the details of the muster, but were met either by refusals or vague information. Until an official statement from the princess’ themselves, all we can say so far is this is not a drill, and that some kind of march is in the works. No word yet from any of the foreign embassies on their stance to the unfolding display of the Guard. The Equine Informer will keep you up-to-date as events carry on with special pamphlet issues.

“Are we gonna have to deal with a crying Pinkie from party stocks dropping or blitzy Dash ‘cause there’s a race she can go to that’s a town over?” Spike drawled, meandering over to where Twilight was giving the newspaper her best disapproving glare.

“Spike, hold still,” she answered, hard-edged. She placed a single hoof on his head and with a sharp crack and warped them both to her bedroom. “Two letters, stat,” she continued while Spike held his head from dizziness. “One to Princess Celestia and one to Shiny. Actually, scratch that.” She zipped back over to where Spike was clearing a space on her desk and snatched a quill and one of the pages of parchment. “You write to the princess. Ask her why she called the Guard together. You know, the professional tone.”

“I hate the professional tone,” Spike groaned, not quite under his breath. “I have to keep everything so… neat.” Twilight ignored the slight, instead beginning a rapid scribble to her brother. There wasn’t really much for her to ask or say, so as her luck would have it, just as she was putting the finishing period on her last sentence, Spike belched a massive gush of green fire. His letter was unintentionally incinerated, and Twilight put a nice, ungainly hole through her own.

She was about grumble and begin stomping over to her desk to keep from outright screaming, but it was all diffused by the three letters Spike held out to her. “Three?” she asked, recognizing Princess Celestia’s seal and the Imperial seal Shining used now, but not the third mark. Well, more or less because it was unmarked all together.

“Yeah, it was weird,” Spike replied, curiously eyeing the third scroll. “It came up with the other two, but it was like I almost choked on it at first…”

“Well, let’s see the princess’s first,” Twilight sighed, unwrapping the parchment.

Dearest Twilight, I’m sure by now that you and most everypony across Equestria has heard the news that myself and Luna have gathered the full might of our Guards together here in Canterlot. I know you well, Twilight, and I implore you not to worry over this. No doubt, everypony and their mother will make a great fuss over the whole situation, but I want you to keep a level head.

Nothing is too greatly amiss. Luna merely received a letter of war from a desert rogue last night, and we have decided to send our Guard to the border to split to and safeguard the border towns just as a precaution. It is nothing to worry over, and I hope you don’t find it distracting from your other studies.

Love,
Celestia

“Well that’s bold,” Twilight wondered aloud. “Who declares war on the Princess of the Sun and Princess of the Moon so willy-nilly?”

“Somepony who’s got a deathwish,” Spike smirked. “That’s not seriously what happened is it?”

“The princess said Luna got the letter last night,” Twilight repeated the letter, still not quite believing the gall of whomever had written it. “That’s… that seems a bit too serious to just be a stupid prank.”

“The princess’ obviously don’t think it was a prank,” Spike said, waving Shining’s letter. Twilight nodded in still baffled agreement, opening her brother’s letter. Knowing him, there’d be less helpful info about what the Guard was really doing, but she could at least tell if he was genuinely worried or more just annoyed.

Little Sis, I’m… yeah, you’ve heard already. Guard’s gettin’ up and movin’ out as they say. Somepony decided it’d be smart to up and challenge Equestria, and a face full of Guard is what they’re gonna get.

Can’t tell ya where I’m leadin’ all of ‘em off to and had to tell everypony to send their last letters home for a while. Hopefully this is all over pretty soon, an’ we can get together when I get back and laugh and talk about where I went. Love ya, little Sis.

Shining

“Good, bad?” Spike asked when Twilight’s eyes came off the page.

“I’m… I don’t know…” Twilight murmured, scanning the quick letter again. “He doesn’t want to go, that much I can tell, but I can’t figure out why. Uuuughhh! Just let me see that third one and hope it tells me enough so I don’t end up having to write a letter to the princess.” She snatched the third letter from Spike’s claw with a tug of magic and unfurled it.

And there was not a word printed on it.

It was instead filled with a single image. A painting. A very rough painting created by somepony with clear skill but improper tools. It was streaked, not the exact tint, and mildly misshapen: but there was no denying somepony had sent her a blazing image of her own cutie mark.

Author's Notes:

So, for those of you from way back when I, Inky Jay, first joined the site, you may recognize this story as my first. Or, well, a revamped, more interesting and well developed version of my first. I can make no promises about update schedules and the like, but I can promise this will not be going on hiatus like many of my others... *le sigh*

Also, for those curious, the Inky Jay character here is most definitely not a self insert, just a use of the first OC name I came up with.