“So you beat me to Blueblood, huh?” Quicktail said as she marched next to Luna, a lascivious, lopsided grin on her face. “You minx.”

“Thou speakest of him as though he is some grand trophy,” Luna replied, scanning the dark paths for any signs of danger and pointedly not looking at Quicktail.

“Maybe not for you,” said Quicktail, flipping her bright, ruby-colored tail back and forth. “But he could have made me a princess and set me up for life.” She sighed heavily. “No biggie though. I'm happy for you, friend! If you need a best mare, just let me know.”

Luna snorted quietly and poured more energy into her light spell. The caves had transitioned from obsidian back to more common gray rock, though they still had a smoothness to them that suggested artificiality. There were also many similar tunnels branching off. Throughout the journey, Luna had noticed many indistinct shapes darting away from the edges of the light.

Lyra quickened her pace and joined them, coming up to Luna's other side.

“Ma'am,” Captain Lyra said, “have you noticed the increase in temperature over the past mile?”

Quicktail chuckled. “How long did it take you to come up with another way to say 'it's getting hot in here'?” she said.

“Indeed I have, Captain,” Luna said, casting a significant glare at Quicktail, who backed away with an exaggerated grin while humming an unfamiliar song. “I have also noted a distant sound underneath us, like the flowing of a great volume of liquid. We are likely about to pass over a magma channel.”

“Anything we should be prepared for, ma'am?”

“No. These caves have many. We have actually passed several others, which only my heightened senses have allowed me to detect. We shall be safe.”

Lyra nodded, but she also maintained the same pace to keep at her side. Unbeknown to Lyra, Luna marginally slowed down her gait to allow her to stay there more easily.

“So, how are you?” Lyra asked in a hushed voice. Luna was at the head of the party, so they were already somewhat separated from being overheard, and the sound of fifty armored soldiers marching generated a lot of noise, but they both knew that Luna would be able to hear her fine.

“I am not asked that question often...” Luna was tempted to dismiss it, and if it had been any other pony, she likely would have. Instead, she reflected. What she saw in the reflection was a huge and ugly thing, which would not be easy to speak about. The image of Lyra running toward her, carrying a maimed pony on her back, and shielding the slave from arrows with her own body, appeared in her mind's eye briefly. It stayed there long enough, though, to make her try to put words to what she felt.

“In truth,” she said at last, “I am disturbed by what I have seen down here, and wroth as well. These diamond dogs have been inflicting such abuse upon us, and Celestia hath done naught? I can scarcely believe it.”

“I'm sure it's complicated.” Lyra frowned and lowered her head. “But I know what you mean.”

The scattered tents of the fringes of Barkstone gradually came into view, only now they were occupied once again. Diamond dogs gave the armed party of ponies a range of looks from terror to fury, but they all did so from the safety of the shadows. Luna watched them carefully, and they shied from her gaze as though it were a physical weapon.

“I am beginning to realize that,” she said. She considered asking Celestia about it when she returned to the castle, but she was still unsure she was ready for any sort of conversation with her sister. 'Tis amusing. I can face down armies and monsters, yet I shrink from the thought of looking my sister in the eyes.

“You should talk to her,” Lyra said, shaking her out of the reverie. Luna turned a startled eye toward Lyra, but the captain was busy dutifully scanning the opposite section of the tunnel for trouble, and did not notice her surprise at the perfect guess of her train of thought. “It doesn't have to be about that, specifically, but you're getting married. Your sister should know that, at least, shouldn't she?”

“Would that truly be a good idea?” Luna asked.

“I don't know.” Lyra shook her head. “Maybe just think about it?”

Luna's marching slowed further as she pondered, and Lyra had no trouble keeping up with her then.

“Anyways,” said Lyra. “Do you mind if I ask you about one more thing?”

“I do not see why not,” Luna said, dipping her neck in a gesture similar to a walking shrug. “We have several hours left before we reach the city.”

“Okay.” Lyra took a moment to lick her lips and swallow. “You... you've been married before, right?”

“Indeed.” Luna looked straight ahead, closing her eyes fractions of a second longer than necessary to blink. A soft, barely detectable sigh passed through her lips. “Whence cometh this question?”

“Well, I'm curious,” Lyra said as she cleared her throat. “Have any of your marriages been to an earth pony?”

Luna raised an eyebrow at Lyra. “Yes. My romantic past is not something I tend to dwell upon though.”

“It's true I wouldn't mind hearing about your experiences,” Lyra said as she smiled gently, “because you're a pretty stand-up lady, but you don't have to tell me. I mainly wanted to know what the wedding ring customs were in your time. For... research.”

“Research?” Luna laughed gently when the wheels clicked and she figured out why Lyra wanted to know. “Then I shall happily oblige. Customs varied widely with time and place, as anyone as intelligent and educated as thou art no doubt aware, but I shall tell thee a story that may be enlightening.

“The first time I married an earth pony was also the first time I married for love. He was our court jester, and I greatly enjoyed the mockery he would cast upon the nobility at our court. I was, however, less than impressed when he turned his japes toward Celestia and myself for the first time. I do not recall over what. I seethed in silence for several nights, until Celestia suggested that a more constructive alternative might be to play a trick upon him in kind. I am quite fond of trickery, so I spent several more nights planning all manner of stunts.”

Luna's mouth curved into a wry smile.

“It would have been poor form to humiliate him in front of other ponies, so I resolved to catch him alone. Oh, he did set off several of my traps and schemes, but unfortunately, I had concocted so many of them that I lost track and... wound up triggering many of them myself. That was how I ended up outside of his room, suspended in a net and covered in tree sap, while he ended up in the doorway with a bucket of honey upon his head and with his coat dyed a cacophonous array of garish pastels.

“I warned him not to move, because there were more tripwires set across his threshold. When he heard my voice, he said my name and laughed. Even through the bucket, his voice resounded with a surprising warmth. 'Twas infectious and insidious, and I found myself joining him in his mirth.

“I had arranged for the royal guard to be patrolling elsewhere that night, and I had cleared out the nearby rooms using one excuse or another, so no one was there to hear us. Nor to help us. Unless I used my magic to get us out, we were stuck, though I felt no special desire to do so quickly.”

Luna's smile remained small, though over the course of her speech, it had spread along the rest of her face, wrinkling her nose and lighting up her eyes. She saw Lyra suppressing a very undisciplined giggle.

“When at last our guffaws ceased,” Luna continued, “I attempted to explain myself, but he told me there was no need. He understood, though he also told me that he was now bound by the honor of his profession to repay me in kind. I felt no wrath at the thought. Indeed, as I explained to him, I relished the opportunity to match wits with a pony aside from my sister, for a change. He accepted the challenge with much bravado, even in the face of my centuries of experience and magical ability, rightly pointing out that I had done just as much to myself as to him. In that moment of absurd courage, I felt it. That spark in one's soul that can change it forever, if it is properly fed and stoked. Hast thou felt something like that, Lyra?”

Lyra was in so rapt a state of attention that she did not notice the question at first. Then she jumped a little and spent a second adjusting her already perfectly situated helmet. “Yes,” she replied. “Yes I have. When my sweetie... when Bon Bon gave away a batch of candy to some fillies who said they had lost their money, I happened to pass them on my way to make an order of my own. I noticed a full pouch of bits hidden under the ringleader's belt. I was outraged. I hated seeing such a generous and gorgeous pony being taken advantage of like that, and I might have used those exact words when pointing it out to her.

“I was so mad that I didn't see her blushing until I replayed the scene in my head later. But you know what she said to me? She said, and I remember this like she's saying it now, 'You have to have faith in other ponies. Even if they did mean to trick me, at least they'll have money to spend on other things to make them happy.'”

Lyra nodded once, grinning, with a faraway look in her eyes. “Yeah. I felt a spark then.” She turned to look at Luna again. “But could you continue what you were saying, if you don't mind?”

“I suppose I can,” Luna said, one corner of her lip curled up. “The trickery escalated rather quickly, before transforming into something more. I usually try to reign in my tumultuous passions with firm commitments and clear rules, not only in love but in all aspects of my life, yet this was one time when I embraced them completely instead. Our affair was all the more scandalous, and thus all the more exciting for me, due to his unremarkable lineage and un-prestigious profession. And I am rambling. I should explain why I am mentioning all of this, probably...”

“Nah,” said Lyra. “I get it. You loved somepony the ponies around you didn't approve of, and that caused you some problems. You're saying it's like my situation with Bon Bon.”

“Not exactly alike,” Luna put in quickly. “I did not have to endure the pain of familial rejection. I am merely trying to convey that I can relate a small fraction to thy situation.”

“Hey, I'm not offended.” Lyra offered a reassuring smile, which helped to lessen the frozen panic on Luna's face a great deal. “Honestly, I'm happy you're coming around and trying to understand where I'm coming from.” She stepped a little closer for a moment, angling with her shoulder as if to gently bump Luna with it, but Lyra took a quick glance back at the other soldiers and resumed walking straight ahead.

“But anyway,” she said, clearing her throat, “the two of you got married despite the objections of your court, right? How did it happen? Was it super romantic?”

“Oh yes, quite.” Luna laughed, a soft and quiet sound that was nevertheless as clear and distinct as a bell, even over the sound of marching boots. “I made the night sky perfect, with the full moon shining down upon us through a canopy of blossoming cherry trees. Fireflies danced around us, creating a pattern of light like a scintillating diamond. Beneath a shower of shooting stars, I presented him with an exquisite silver torque and asked him to be my husband. In retrospect, my efforts may have been rather... overwrought, because he thought I was playing another trick on him at first. I was quite wounded by his laughter, and I responded with fury. I would not speak to him for many days.”

Luna sighed softly, closing her eyes for a few moments and relying on sound and her earth pony magic to guide her steps. As she did, she got the distinct sensation that something had changed far underground. It felt like the roar of a river, though not one of water, and it was getting closer. Her eyes snapped open.

“We shall have to finish this discussion in a moment,” she told Lyra. Then she raised her voice so the rest of her company could hear. “Soldiers! Quicken your pace by two steps. Something is coming toward us from below.”

“What's going on?” Lyra asked in alarm, as she and the other soldiers dutifully sped up.

“It could be nothing,” said Luna, “or it could be some manner of ambush. See that everyone is prepared.”

After checking on the troops, then having a brief, barb-filled argument with Quicktail over military procedures, then trying to get Quicktail and Blueblood to at least agree to march in formation, Lyra returned. Her smile was gone. Luna immediately resumed their previous discussion, hoping to see the expression again.

“To come to the point, when my sweet jester at last agreed to my proposal, rather than wearing the torque around his leg, he had his septum pierced and placed it there. Not to be outdone by that rapscallion, I did the same.”

“Whoa, wait a second,” Lyra interjected. “You had your nose pierced?”

“Yes, I did. I had to have it done many times, in fact, because my body would regenerate the piercing in short order whenever the ring was removed. Thus, I endeavored to wear it as often as possible.”

“That is so cool.” Lyra giggled as professionally as she could.

“Thanks?” Luna looked down and might have shuffled her feet if she were not marching. “Anyway, the point of my story is that one must know one's potential spouse and, more importantly, one must be adaptable to their wishes. Make the initial gesture as romantic and ideal as possible. The practicalities can, and, I believe, should come only later.” Luna gave Lyra a knowing wink. “Particularly if one plans on marrying a very practical pony.”

Lyra marched on in silence, since her breathing was becoming quicker now that they were marching at about the pace of a trot. Luna guessed that the lesson she told Lyra to take away from the story was not actually all she was thinking about. When Lyra spoke again, her question proved it.

“How do you deal with it?” Lyra said in between carefully controlled breaths. “I mean, losing ponies that close to you over and over for hundreds of years... it can't be easy.”

“Aye, 'tis not easy,” Luna replied, still smiling wanly and not even sweating at the pace. “But it would be a disservice to myself and to their memories to close off my soul and become a cold and distant husk. I do not always succeed in avoiding that fate, but that is not who I wish to be...”

Luna saw Lyra instinctively ready all the muscles she would need for a walking hug, but then she relaxed them. Luna was momentarily disappointed, but it could wait. Not least because the heat was getting closer... and it was beginning to run parallel to their course as well.

She squinted down each side tunnel they passed, and could make out a faint orange glow emanating from somewhere past the twists and turns of the rock. As it grew closer, a lone diamond dog stepped out from among the ramshackle dwellings of the cave slums to block their path. He wore a toga, like many of the upper classes, but his was colored a dark purple, with black trim. In his paws he carried a black staff that had a smooth, bright sheen to it. Around his neck was draped a necklace of half a dozen horns. Unicorn horns. Each of them were glowing a different color, as were his eyes, shining so brightly that they seemed to burn.

Everyone but Luna stopped in their tracks, mouths gaping more the less formal training they had received. Luna herself pounded forward with a snarl on her lips, her head lowered, her eyes narrowed.

“That's far enough!” the diamond dog shouted. He raised his staff and a shimmering barrier of six colors appeared between him and the advancing Queen, covering the entire passage.

Luna pulled her neck back and stopped, scanning the barrier warily. It sparked and crackled with intermittent flashes of crimson, violet, cobalt, gold, brown, and green. Each flash, she realized, once belonged to a pony's eyes. She knew she could power through one unicorn shield easily enough, but she was less certain about six. With a low grunt, Luna began to stalk around the shield, searching for a weak point. Her tail flicked back and forth wildly, and her breathing came fast and hot out of her flared nostrils.

She was so distracted by her emotions that she only heard the yelps and howls around them when everyone else in her entourage did. What few diamond dogs were still watching from windows and tent flaps quickly hid themselves completely as carbon dogs, their magically animated, furnace-like 'cousins', poured in from the side tunnels. Instead of flying into a mindless rage like when Blueblood and Quicktail had fought them, however, they simply took up positions at every possible escape route, which required at least a hundred of them. Even from that distance, the fire inside their bodies was hot enough to make the ponies sweat.

“I take up hermitage in the Everfree Forest for a few decades,” the diamond dog with the staff said, “and suddenly ponies have taken over my country? My apologies, princess, but I cannot allow you to cut off my research supply, and the cheapest way is to buy slaves. Will you please reinstate the trade?”

“What?” Luna said, stopping in her pacing and looking aghast. “Of course not! We shall wipe the wretched practice from existence wherever we find it.”

Behind Luna, Lyra was busy giving commands to the fifty members of the honor guard. Blueblood, and even Quicktail, obeyed her as well, with only minor grumbling from the latter.

“You've fought these things before, right?” Captain Lyra asked. “If the two of you have any special tactics we can use to defeat them, now would be a good time to share.”

“Hit them,” Quicktail said. “Hit them really hard.”

“That's it?” Lyra scowled at the glib response.

“What my dear friend is trying to say,” interrupted Blueblood, sliding himself between the two mares before they could advance on each other, “is that it's useless to target their vital organs, because they're animated by some other force. The only way to take them down is to do enough damage to their bodies that the magic dissipates.”

“Oh,” Lyra said. She craned her neck from side to side, even up slightly, sighing as she calculated the odds. They were outnumbered by at least two-to-one, probably more, against a tough and unfamiliar opponent. “Is that all? Let's get ready then. Form up!”

Grabbing her spear from the luggage the procession had dropped, Lyra put herself at the head of a bristling phalanx of fifty armed ponies. They waited in silence as the carbon dogs stared at them with their hollowed-out, fire-lit eye sockets.

“I thought you'd say something like that,” the diamond dog said after a few moments of reflection—and reinforcing his magical shields. “In that case, give me your horn, and everyone here can walk away from this without suffering any harm.”

“Who art thou to make such preposterous demands of the Queen of Equestria?” With a sweep of her hoof and a flash of light from her horn, Luna shattered the first layer of the magician's defenses. Behind her, the carbon dogs growled, but held their position, for now. “And where didst thou acquire that robe? I have seen its like before.”

“I found it lying around in the forest,” he said with a shrug. “No one was using it. Why does it matter? I am nobody important. Simply a humble wizard who wishes to study in peace and become immortal, the same things anyone wants, really. A true alicorn horn would help me tremendously with both.”

“Why would I possibly agree to such a thing?” Luna stepped forward, pressing her face as close as she dared to the crackling energy of the diamond dog's shields. She made sure it was close enough for him to see her eyes.

“I assume you've noticed that you're surrounded, and so I can conclude that the death of your soldiers doesn't concern you too much.” He started backing away slowly as Luna searched for any other weak points in his wall of energy. “And you clearly think my offensive powers are not strong enough to stop you. That leaves me with only one option for negotiation.”

The wizard's staff began to crack, blacken, then glow a fiery orange, as if it were filling up with magma. Then he leveled it at one of the nearby hovels.

“I can and will make an army out of these poor peasants,” he said with steel in his voice. “Maybe the death and binding of mere diamond dog civilians into my very own carbon dogs won't bother you, but the doubling of the size of my little entourage just might.”

Luna fixed him with her hardest stare. “None of those paths will end with thou leaving these caves alive.”

“Who can say for sure?” he said. “Either way, you're going to suffer quite a bit to get there. Why not forget all that and agree to a sure trade? The removal of a horn is entirely painless. Physically, at least. I even hear it's possible for some ponies to regain some magical control eventually.”

As Luna stood there for several seconds in silence, muscles throughout her body shaking from her hard she was clenching them, her companions called out to her.

“You can't seriously be considering this, Your Majesty,” shouted Lyra. “Right? We can handle ourselves. You take him down.”

“I would prefer to get out of this situation alive, thank you,” Quicktail stage-whispered.

“You despicable coward.” Lyra's discipline in holding formation overrode her desire to go kick the ex-bandit in the face.

“The most we've ever faced of these things is twenty, and that was not easy by any means. This is suicide.”

“Quicktail may be right,” Blueblood said, involuntarily scratching the scar on his face with the back of his foot. “But I'd prefer to go down fighting like the hero I am, regardless. Don't take either of those deals, my dear fiancée.”

“Equestria hath officially annexed these lands, and thus I am now the sovereign of these innocent diamond dogs,” Luna replied, loudly enough for her voice to echo throughout the cavern, perhaps even to carry to the exit in the distance. “As long as I draw breath, I shall not allow any subject of mine to come to harm through my actions!” She sighed and gazed upward at the tip of her horn. “Someone fetch me a saw-blade from the luggage.”

“No way!” Lyra yelled, bursting out of the spear formation to face Luna. “Look at all the damage he's done with unicorn horns. What do you think he's going to do with yours? Won't that cause just as much harm in the future?”

“I can only deal with what I see before me,” Luna replied, her tone level and stern, her muscles still tensed. “I shall deal with the future when it cometh.”

While the others argued, Quicktail slid silently over to where the party's packs had been dropped and began rooting around. A few moments later, there was a clang as a serrated hack-saw landed by Luna's feet.

“Before you rip into me, pinhead,” Quicktail said quickly as Lyra whirled around in shock and fury, “take a look over there. Mister staff-dog is getting impatient... and getting an itchy trigger finger. We're running out of time to debate. Luna needs to decide now.”

The dark-robed diamond dog's forelegs were indeed shaking as he held the staff pointed at one of the inhabited homes, and droplets of lava had begun to leak from it.

Luna lifted the saw in her forehooves.

“Lower thy weapon,” she said softly. “I shall do it.”

The wizard returned his staff to a resting position and gradually drew down the power stored within. The molten rock that had leaked out hardened quickly, forming another layer of sleek obsidian on its surface.

The entire company of ponies strained to see what was happening while still keeping their eyes on the carbon dogs.

Luna placed the saw against her horn. She began to draw it back and forth, very slowly at first. Pony horns, and alicorn horns in particular, were extraordinarily tough bones. She could easily break the teeth off of the blade if she went too quickly.

Her soldiers, particularly the unicorns among them, winced as the chamber filled with the sound of metal grinding against bone. Several times, Lyra and Blueblood took steps forward to stop their Queen from the act, but they went still at the sound of growling carbon dogs inching closer to them.

Lyra decided to plead one last time.

“Even if this mutt doesn't immediately decide to kill us, Luna... how will you rescue Zecora without your horn?”

Luna paused in her sawing for only a second, then resumed the process as she spoke. “I plan to see my... friend very soon, but not without a clear conscience.”

Lyra's head sank.

Luna continued to stare down the diamond dog, whose eyes had ceased glowing and returned to their natural ruby color. She did not even blink as dusty flecks of her own horn fell in front of her face.

After only a few minutes, it was over. Except for a tiny nub, Luna's horn, her magical focus and an integral part of her very identity, dropped to the cave floor. Without its power to direct and control her spells, her unicorn magic was now as much of a danger to herself and her allies as it was to her enemies. She knew from past battles that the horn would grow back, thanks to her regeneration abilities, but she did not know if it would be soon enough to continue her plots as planned. Luna knew this in her mind, but her heart carried only the hope that what she had just done would actually save lives.

She kicked it contemptuously to the edge of the forcefield blocking the tunnel.

“Well?” She growled. “Take it.”

“I...” The diamond dog smiled awkwardly. “I would be much more comfortable if you'd take just a few steps away first, Your Majesty.”

Luna stepped backwards, her gaze never wavering from the wizard's eyes. Once she was several yards away, he lowered a portion of his shield, ran forward to grab the horn, and dashed back under its protection as quickly as he could. Luna stood unmoving the entire time.

As the magician held the dark horn in his paws, he began to laugh joyously.

“Thank you!” he shouted. “Thank you so much! This is just what I needed. You are truly a most magnanimous monarch. Have a pleasant journey.”

With a gesture of his staff, all the assembled carbon dogs began retreating back the way they came. Several found their way to his side. Only once he had gathered about fifteen of them and backed away a few more yards did he drop his protection spells.

As soon as they went down, Luna's wings and legs sprang into action. She was too heavy in her armor to get a good flight going quickly, so she simply used her wings to generate some lift and add a little, critical extra speed to her run. Just as the diamond dog turned around to counter the sudden rush, Luna leaped onto the first of his bodyguards and crushed it beneath all four of her hooves.

“We had a deal!” he screamed, scrambling away and blasting fire spells in Luna's general direction. She dodged some, and positioned herself to allow others to merely scorch her armor. “I thought you had honor!”

Carbon dogs began pouring out of every tunnel and crevice, surrounding Luna's soldiers and cutting her off from them. Their furious, strangely hollow-sounding barks and growls were deafening.

“No amount of honor weighs more than the lives of my subjects!” Luna shouted over the din.

“I am truly sorry you decided to take this path,” the wizard called back, “but so be it. You will regret this.”

After forming a screen of carbon dogs that would keep Luna busy for at least a few seconds, he turned his staff to the nearest tent so that he could begin adding to his army. He gathered the spell in his staff, pointing it at a trio of diamond dogs too frozen by fear to run out of the way.

“No!” Luna screamed, pushing forward with all her might. Her enemies piled on top of her, finding the gaps in her armor and raking their hot claws against her flesh. When she threw one off, another took its place. She could not reach the wizard in time.

Behind him, a different kind of mass bark sounded. It was a more natural one, loud but uncertain, and it came from a group of more than a hundred diamond dogs who had grabbed whatever was nearby—pans, sticks, bones, tent poles—and were charging straight for him. He wavered just long enough in deciding whether to attack them or his original targets that the first few of the ragtag army were able to reach him. They tried desperately to wrench the glowing staff from the wizard's grasp.

The barking of the underclass of Barkstone gradually coalesced into a kind of battle cry, and into a word: “Luna!”

The staff was soon knocked out of the wizard's paws and sent sliding toward the originally intended victims of his carbon dog creation spell. Blasting his immediate attackers back with reserve spells from the unicorn horns around his neck, the magician rushed for the staff in a blind panic. Right as he was about to reach it, a phenomenal gust of air sent him flying into the opposite wall of the tunnel with a crack.

After creating the small twister with both of her wings, Luna immediately returned them to a relatively safe position under her cloak, so that the increasing number of attackers she was facing could not easily maim her. A few of her feathers were ripped or burned during the moment of vulnerability, but not enough to keep her from flying.

As the dazed wizard struggled to his feet, he found the three diamond dogs in the tent pointing his own staff at him. They were shaking so much that it took all three of them to hold it steady, and it took all three of them to fiddle with it enough to figure out how to release the spell. Before they could, he threw up every defensive spell he could think of, backed up by the formidable, lingering might of the horn of the Princess of the Night.

When the spell was released, he focused all of his mystical ability on reflecting it from the point of impact. Yet the spell was well designed. Before it made contact with his shield, the stream of white, sparkling magic fire made a sharp turn and blasted straight into the ground, melting through the rock like paper. Then, only an instant after he felt the heat underneath his feet, the energy blast burst up from the ground inside his shield. The surpassing strength of his shield now worked against him, trapping the blaze inside as it immolated its original wielder. He did not even have time to scream. When it was over, the spells all dropped, and the wizard had turned into simply another part of the mindless horde.

Without a leader to direct them, the remaining carbon dogs, while still ferocious, blood-thirsty fighters, became little more than a rabble. The diamond dog allies around Luna swelled tremendously as well, and under her clear, confident command, they were able to form something resembling a line against the magical abominations. As they called her name over and over with every unskilled but courageous attack, Luna tried to force her way through to reestablish contact with her ponies.

Her soldiers had formed a ring of spears around their wounded and were fending off the carbon dogs bravely. A severely burned Lyra, her hair so black she might have passed for a “ninja” again, stood shoulder-to-shoulder with Quicktail, whose unarmored body was covered with cauterized claw marks. One strike from both mares at the exact same time was enough to bring down one enemy. Like clockwork, they would pick out an advancing monster, wind up, and then both stab into its body at the same moment, before winding back up and repeating the process. Luna was proud of the sight, but the fact that they were still being wounded and worn down in the process cut her pride short. It turned around completely into dismay when she saw that Blueblood was not among the fighters... his white body, marred by deep burns, lay motionless in the center of the phalanx.

Unable to see Luna's face from beneath the shadow of her helmet, the group cheered when they caught sight of her.

“Have courage, warriors!” she cried, giving much similar encouragement as she pressed her way through to finally meet up with them. Desperation seized her and she ran forward, heedless of the heat and claws that were searing her flanks. She instinctively tried to cast a spell, but the first few sparks that popped out of her amputated nub combusted violently before she could even form them into anything besides raw energy. At least, she thought, the sparks exploded while she was surrounded by foes, rather than allies.

Joining the ranks of the pony spear-wielders at last, Luna and her new battalion of diamond dogs trapped the enemy in a flexible pincer attack. Assaulted from both the front and the back, the carbon dogs were all killed with only a few more casualties, mostly among the untrained Barkstone citizens.

Growling with primal fury, Luna scanned the battlefield for any remaining enemies. The heat became even more oppressive as their bodies burned to ash, but none of them were moving. Satisfied that the battle was over, she immediately turned and pushed her way through the exhausted but cheering soldiers to get to the wounded. There was a single medic dashing back and forth among five injured ponies. Five more were dead. Luna flew to the side of Blueblood the Younger, dropping to her knees in the process.

His chest rose. He was among the former group of casualties... so far.

“My Prince!” she shouted, wrapping her forelegs around the parts of his neck that had not been burned. “Do not leave me!”

Repressing a healing spell before the exploding sparks from it could kill Blueblood, Luna lifted her head to the medic.

“Will he recover?” she said, with rivulets of tears running down her face.

“I don't know, ma'am,” he responded in a clipped voice. “I can check again in a few minutes, but right now I need to focus on the ones I know I can save.”

Only Luna's intimate knowledge of the realities of war kept her fury at the dismissive response at bay. As she had trained him to do, the medic had to put the highest priority on the soldiers he was most confident of being able to treat, to reduce the number of deaths. So instead, she looked back down and cradled her bridegroom's head as gently as she could.

Lyra soon appeared and began trying to cast healing spells on the wounded too, but the spell fizzled out almost immediately and she collapsed to the ground, becoming another unconscious casualty for the medic to try to save. He grit his teeth and checked her condition.

“Bad, possibly critical,” he mumbled. “Low priority.”

Luna wept with every inch of her body. Her rough, ragged sobbing was the only audible sound in the vast cavern.

After this was all over, her students, who wore robes just like the one the diamond dog had, owed her a lot of answers.

Author's Notes:

An update! I know the chapter is rather short for such a long wait, but hopefully it is epic enough to make up for that.