The wind tugged at my mane and I stood with my eyes closed, enjoying the not freezing wind. I half spread my wings, feeling the flow of the wind across them.

It wasn’t freezing.

It wasn’t exactly warm yet, but it wasn’t cold. When I woke up this morning, the land beneath had been clear of snow. It was amazing and I just had to get out on the deck to feel it.

We had been steadily moved south since we left Canterlot and it was starting to get really noticeable.

Celestias sun was high in the sky and the balloon put me in the shade so it wasn’t warm, but it wasn’t freezing cold either. It felt almost like a spring day.

A sound from behind, an opening hatch caused my right ear to flick back towards it and I opened my eyes and folded my wings before looking back to see Moon Dancer exit onto the deck. The wind tugged at her mane and she looked around a bit uncertainly before making her way over towards me, her horn lit up and keeping a firm grasp on her glasses with her magic.

“Yes Moon Dancer?”

She shook her head and spoke up loudly over the rush of the wind, “We think we have narrowed things down a little!”

I lit my horn and threw up a half sphere shield over us, forcing the wind away, “You found more evidence?”

Moon Dancer let go of her glasses and nodded, “Yes, Princess Midnight and I managed to locate several references about ‘night demons’ I had previously missed. They all indicated that they came from the southern jungles.”

“But we knew that already?”

“Yes, but these references were from much further west. Unless it was way more common and affected several tribes of pegasi, it’s way too far away from the easternmost parts. Their original living place must have been somewhere between the old spots.”

I slowly nodded, “That makes sense. Well… unless they were nomadic.”

Moon Dancer frowned and nodded, “That’s always a possibility. Sadly a strong one: a lot of pegasi tribes during those times were at least semi-nomadic. But not all. It was mostly the stationary ones that got into more serious conflicts with other groups such as unicorns or earth ponies. The nomadic tribes usually just raided and moved on.”

“I see. And like you said before, why bother using something like this one somepony that raid you and then moves on.”

Moon Dancer nodded, “Indeed.”

“Good work in finding it,” I said, “Have you told the Captain?”

“Midnight is doing it now,” Moon Dancer said and lit up her horn again, grabbing her glasses and I took that as a signal to drop the shield.

She smiled and then retreated back towards the hatch.

I turned and looked out over the landscape below us. If they could actually narrow the search down it might save us months of work.

But something kept bothering me.

Thestrals now were the kidfriendly tame fruit eating curse modification version, not the rip your throat out and suck your blood kind. But the first one would have been nightmares compared to the pegasi it was originally cast on.

Sure, curse your enemies, that could be useful, but why in the world would they curse their enemies in a way that makes them more dangerous?

‘I curse you to fly silently, see and hear better in the dark and drink blood!’

Then again… predators didn’t stick together in large groups, especially larger predators such as thestrals of that time would have been.

It might have worked for a bit, but lack of food would soon drive the group appart or even cause infighting and…

Yeah, maybe it wasn’t such a bad plan in the first place. One or two blood sucking thestrals might be more dangerous than two pegasi, but compared to fifty pegasi raiders?

Not so much. So maybe that’s what they were thinking which in all honesty was some Xanatos level plan.

Or maybe Chrysalis, thinking about it. That was just the kind of batshit crazy plan she would have come up with.

Shaking my head, I pushed those thoughts from my head and looked out at the landscape below before I half spread my wings, feeling the wind against the magic of my wings.

I spread them wider, feeling the pressure on my hooves get lighter and lighter.

I wanted to fly.

But actually taking off now would be a baaaad idea and likely result with alicorn in the propellers.

Now, I was pretty tough, as surviving being hit by a sun showed, but I was pretty sure ending up in one of those would rip me into tiny little pieces of ex-pony.

But I wasn’t about to ask the Captain to stop this thing for a bit just so I could have a fly around. I might technically be nobility, but I’d be damned if I’ll ever end up being that kind of nobility.

...Besides, I had a strong feeling that as soon as we arrived I’d get to fly around enough that it made my wings ache.