The marble halls of Everfree Palace seemed silent, its smooth gray corridors appeared as pristine tapestries with its stonework so much like lace, large windows and magnificent architecture. The soon to be dusk sunlight streaked through the windows causing a few hovering werelights to change their course. The castle with its sky embracing spires radiated an aura of family.

Yes, it was peaceful. Almost peaceful enough for me to forget that the world might end in a fortnight, that the doomsday could be upon us, all ponies, and even the divine, such as myself... and my family.

I could almost forget as I rushed through the halls at speed no ponies could achieve the spire-stairs and chambers of my home echoed with a Whi-ooshh! of my presence to be empty the next second. Were anypony around, the lingering glow of my divine light could be glimpsed in the empty hallways. You could hardly tell that I Lumina, Immortal God-Queen of the realm was even a resident if it were not for that light, soft glow dancing on stone.

My afternoon meditation had gone terribly wrong, disturbed by a foggy vision I could not comprehend fully. Unlike my daughters I do not dream of the occurrences to be quite as much as they did, only piece together visions of Harmony - things that Harmony itself sends me, as both her prophet and the Spark of Magic. Still, when I dreamed of all these things, the visions were powerful and potent, if less frequent, while my daughters' would often find their dreams buried below symbols and the mysterious, leading to the inklings of omens not even my dream-journals know how to pull apart and understand. Even after the decades since she's been born, I only know that my youngest, Luna, only a toddler, is the more powerful dreamer.

I rushed deeper into the castle as quick hoofed as possible descending staircase after staircase and each familiar maze of rooms until I came to the exact door I was looking for.

It had a curved design like most of the castle with the tip of the frame ending in an elegant whirling arch. Instead of a dead tree's wood chopped into planks for the door the sanctum within and the hallway here were separated by a living crystal growth pulsing softly with the natural glow of rainbow lights with the likeness of a tree carved in the growing extents.

When I was near this place on most cycles, I always felt safe, but today was not most cycles, and instead my heart pounded wildly.

Two red eyes... filled with such evil and a magic I thought dead, yet shone in them more powerfully than ever. What could it possibly mean?

Placing one hoof in front of me I stepped through the crystal as if it were nothing more then a summer breeze: present, yet not solid.

She could help me... I had faith. Faith in Harmony.

The interior of the sanctum was much like an elegantly made atrium, but with a closed roof embedded with crystals and no windows. It was also located in a subterranean area of the castle, allowing the World Tree an elegant cave for her magical presence, so different from the natural tunnels and how the forest used to look when I first stumbled across her, thousands of years ago. The world was built much differently then, too.

In some ways the chamber was bare except for a few small stones resembling sea stacks and one or two shade blossoms. In the center was who I was here to see, sitting in the middle of the room, roots exposed as she glowed with a calming and inspiring light boughs stretched to reveal what could be considered five fruits.

I trotted up to her trunk in which two carvings were laid: that of a sun and a moon. In fact the moon was recent being only a hundred or so years old... nearly as old as Luna.

"Vinnie... can We talk to you?"

No response.

"Vinnie this is urgent... We had a vision."

The tree was silent, only my spliced reflection stared back at me from the crystal trunk.

"Vinnie, We - I - need your help, just as you needed my friends and I to combat the Sorceress of the Farthest Reach with our Elements!"

Beneath my hooves the ground shivered almost as if the planet was cold and a fog emerged from nowhere, in an enclosed space of all places, and the tree became obscured from my view. Slowly, I backed away a few steps.

Was she in a bad mood? Perhaps she was busy? Or maybe she already knew what I had to say? But how would she-

"Vinnie, We really need your help!" I had already given this being, a World Tree, a pet-name, but the more childish version of the name, the one I only dared call my dear mentor, would get her attention easily.

The fog cleared and in its wake a phantom silhouette emerged from the tree.

What appeared to be an Alicorn with large powerful wings, a translucent glittery coat, a flowing pastel mane and tail of light and lastly two star-white eyes. Around her head five phantom gems floated in a circle while one magenta spark bobbed at the top calmly levitating.

"You called?"

Her calm tone was both relaxing my own panic yet somehow unnerving at the same time. That was the power of the primordial Vinora Harmonia Everfree. She was as mysterious as the mark which adorned her flank: a yellow tear-shaped gem, the odd one out of her jewels. It was also said to be seed shaped but today a tear seemed more appropriate.

"Lumina what is it that distresses you so on this eve? You do know I hate manifesting like this as opposed to my assumed natural form."

She gazed briefly at the tree and noted its still nature as if it were an illusion.

"Vin, I had a vision when meditating that was terrifying... can you interpret it?"

She looked a little more concerned especially since I had dropped the royal we.

"Lumina if this is just another bad flashback..."

"It is not!"

"Well then what was it?"

"I was walking through the a forest - a completely normal forest - and came to a clearing where everypony was Noctus, Ellie, Stolas, my sisters, all the Alicorns of this world. They were all talking and it looked like there was a party. I went up to Noctus who was playing with Celly and Luna when everything went dark... as if the sun and moon, the stars even were lights that could be put out."

I shivered a moment and looked at Vin, who remained expressionless.

"Go on, Lumina."

"The ground began to shake in the dark and the very continent we were on began to split into pieces and drift away slowly while these two horrible eyes... big red eyes with streams of smoke pouring from them... perched in the sky like hovering vultures watched and bathed all of us in its bloody glow. I knew they were demon eyes, like Antumbra's horrid eyes... and Penny's eyes..." I added quietly.

"All of us, Lumina?" Of course, when it came to Penumbra, Harmonia had no sympathy for her... and I understood why. Demons are demons.

"Well no, Ellie and Stolas were gone and Corah's son, Neptune, was gone, and some of Canterhorn's kin went unnoticed to me, but other then that everypony was panicking as if all of us were fish in a barrel, blind fish. I couldn't find Celly and Luna at all, as if they never existed, they were just lost in all the distress. There was another shake and so much noise, so much despair and we were all gone, the last thing I remember was seeing the shapes of a pack of them flying in our direction like wary crows to the vulture eyes..."

"You saw... draconequui?"

"Yes."

"Lumina?"

"Yes?"

"Do you think we have the strength to save a planet?"

"I failed last time Vinnie..."

She shook her head. "You fled last time Lumina."

"Then... yes, believe we can save our planet, I am not a filly anymore. Neither of us are, and now there are more of us. I know what it means to be a god now, and my skills are far above what they were when I was a maid running about on hero's errands and quests."

"Exactly."

"What do I have to do?"

Vinora's eyes, pupil-less, iris-less, as bright as stars, bored into mine.

"You have to leave. Gather every Alicorn above their 14th mortal age equivalency, because only they are ready to fight. By then, what I too fear will occur. I am a spirit Lumina and cannot help you in this battle, for I will be holding the very fabric of this planet together."

"Is this the end of our world...?"

"No. It is just time to tap into our inner phoenix."

I bowed my head and turned to leave, struggling to piece together what her latest machinations could mean for Noctus, Celly, and Luna... and I...

"And Lumina? One more thing..."

"Yes?"

"Tell your daughters about Shadows, as you called the demons."

"But why-"

"You may not see them for a while."

"...But I will see them again."

Silence.

"You will protect them, will you not?" My eyes already felt damp.

"Yes."

Vinora was gone.