-War Party-

Esyllt jumped from her perch atop the monolith of rock, the large grey wolf following closely behind her. Four more wolves followed them, all the wolves walking around the fire to stand before Coalback and Rainbow Dash. Each approached slowly, taking a submissive stance with their tails between their legs.

“I be Brac, Alpha of the Feather clan,” the grey wolf said in a light and song-like accented voice, every vowel stretched out and stressed. He slowly crawled his way forward to Coalback’s paws, his tattoos seeming liquid with the movement of his shoulders and neck. They would morph, forming what appeared to be deer’s antlers draped over his shoulders and then black ribbons wrapped intricately around his neck.

“HeavyHelm, Alpha of the Metal clan, submits before ye,” another male spoke, his coat a light brown. A leather sled harness hugged his sides, chains of copper hanging down like drapes and connecting to tools either strapped to the harness or hidden in pouches. He too bore tattoos, but they wove around his paws and legs like vines.

“I cower, humbled, as Freha the Alpha of Metal clan,” the she-wolf beside HeavyHelm said. Her russet and brown patterned fur was laced through with chains of brightly polished copper, precious stones carefully inlaid into them. A gold chain was daintily braided into her fur where a single fang hung. Her tattoos, while smaller than HeavyHelm’s, were similar to his.

“We are Rhiannon and KeenEdge,” the last black coated she-wolf said, her head little more than bowed. She and her darkly colored mate wore only a wrapping of white fox skins, which Rainbow did her best to ignore. Their ears each bore four fangs pierced through them, and yet more hung from leather thongs around their necks. “Warrior Alphas of Claw clan stand before you, but our pride holds our knees firm,” she finished, both of their heads bowing slightly further.

Coalback’s lip curled up into a silent snarl, but he made no move toward the Claw Alphas.

“Please, honored guests of our pasts, allow us to feed you and dress you in our finest pelts. Tonight I guarantee your warmth, health, and full stomachs!” Esyllt said, her tail slowly starting to wag. She walked her paws out from under her chest, spreading them wide in front of Coalback. A chorus of happy yips and howls of approval roared up from the wolves around them, making Rainbow jump to attention and flinch against Coalback.

It was a nerve wracking sound to hear so many predators all around her, even if the sight wasn’t enough to make her antsy as it were.

“As much as we would be honored to accept your offer, Alpha Esyllt, we simply do not have time to waste. March back with us, fight with us. Canterlot needs the help of the wolves,” Coalback said, leaning reassuringly against Rainbow. She was unable to stop her wings shuddering, both from her nervousness and the slight flutter in her chest - and other places - that she got when Coalback pressed against her side.

“As honored as our warriors would be to fight alongside you, Blaidd-ddyn,” Rhiannon said with a frown, for once showing a hint of emotion in her splayed ears. “It is with great shame that we must refuse, acts of war outside of the Clans is forbidden under penalty of terrible death by the claws of the Empress herself,” she recited, bowing her head sourly.

“Then let us speak with the Empress; it is extremely urgent.” Coalback said, frowning slightly.

“I am afraid that is impossible, fy Argylwydd,” Esyllt said sadly, her paws retreating back under her. “The Empress meditates, and will not return until the moon has gone on high and we have sung our joy until it has turned to grief. Then she will speak with you,” she said apologetically, turning her eyes away from them. The wolves suddenly went silent, waiting with baited breath for Coalback’s response.

“An army is coming, we need reinforcements!” Rainbow growled out, taking Esyllt by surprise. “We can’t wait another minute, we’ve already wasted too much time!” she said angrily, digging a furrow in the packed snow with a hoof.

“It is impossible, fy Arglwyddes,” Esyllt said again, shaking her head. “She is beyond our reach, climbed high to the skies where not even our howls can reach her,” she explained, pressing her nose to the ice.

“Then I’ll get her,” Rainbow said, shrugging away from Coalback and spreading her wings wide so that every wolf could see her plumage. Her wings ached to fly hard; it felt to her like it had been ages since she’d last pushed her wings to their limit. At this point she was ready to take off for anything. And this was exactly what she’d been waiting for. Time to show these guys what a real flyer can do, she thought to herself.

Without waiting for any of the Alphas to protest, she launched herself into the air. She rose quickly, approaching dimly lit cloud’s bellies that had sunk into the hollow of the valley in the cold air. She heard a shout below her, but whether it was one of the wolves or Coalback she couldn’t tell.

Then, again she heard voices, they rose as one and shook the clouds: “CYFFWRDD YR AWYR, RAINBOW DASH!” the wolves below cheered, their voices deafening at even the distance that Rainbow had put between them. “YNA AROS A WLEDDA  GYDA NI!” They yelled, a great cheer that Rainbow couldn’t understand. But it was definitely a cheer, and that she could be happy with.

The clouds barely resisted her entry, a gentle chill the only change she truly noticed. The clouds were dense and slightly turbulent, but nothing she couldn’t handle. And by the time she emerged from the young cumulous she could feel the air thinning remarkably.

As the clouds fell away, they revealed the dark afternoon sky and its bountiful canvas of stars. But a strange new artist had changed what she was familiar with. Most noticeably, the long feathery strokes of ghostly green and blue. But the stars and moon had changed too; the familiar silver disk was absent. An unfamiliar amount of stars spattered behind the ever shifting strokes of ghostly colors.

It took her breath away. She’d never seen so many stars and shapes in the night sky before. But far above, almost farther than she could see, there was a shape silhouetted against the arctic lights. She kept pressing upward, and with every moment the shape grew in detail. After only a few moments she could make out a pair of wings spreading wide from whoever was flying up there.

The Empress, Rainbow realized, doubling her efforts in her climb. The shape grew and grew, she could make out something spiking from the top of her head. Perhaps it was her tiara, the crown that Merletta had told them about.

But with each stroke of her wings, the air gave her less and less acceleration. With every meter she climbed, the air held less of her weight. It was a frustrating situation, one she’d been in before. Climbing high was never easy, her wings were more made for speed than power, which lowered her flight ceiling considerably. She simply hoped that her initial speed might make up for it.

It wasn’t long before she was short of breath and was beating her wings as fast as she could make them move to keep her speed from falling away. The silhouette grew closer and Rainbow could finally truly understand who she was looking at when the Empress’s profile became clear.

Her wolfish features glowed in the ghostly light, huge hawk’s wings beat lazily at the air. A spiky ringlet adorned her head, and above that a set of sharp spiny antlers scraped the sky. The aurora flowed around the Empress like it was made from silk and water, it hugged her sides and caressed her wings and moved on.

And she was too high. Below, Rainbow could make out a ring of mountains, indistinct and jagged. Rainbow could see more of the moon now, the silver disk skirting the bowing horizon line in a slightly steeper arc. The air up here was too thin, Rainbow could hardly keep her breath let alone her speed.

Finally she felt herself reach that point of no return. Her stomach did a flip as she went weightless, her momentum halted. With one last effort she took a deep breath and screamed toward the Empress with as much volume as she could muster. “COME DOWN!” she yelled, her voice cracking harshly from the altitude and the breathlessness that plagued her now.

But the Empress heard her! Rainbow could see it. Slowly, almost painfully so, the Empress’s eyes threw back the light in her direction. And Rainbow could almost see a look of surprise - or maybe it was some sort of detached interest in the mortal that had attempted to reach her. The Empress’s mouth opened, words on her lips, but Rainbow couldn’t hear her past the winds.

Rainbow couldn’t tell if darkness had been pushing in on the edges of her vision or if the stars were going out. Why couldn’t she breath? Wind beat a her back and buffeted her wings, but she didn’t feel that pull on her tail that meant she was flying fast. She was falling. The realization came slowly, and she couldn’t tell how long she’d been falling like that.

Something ghostly green fluttered in front of her: a hoof - no, a hand, reaching out to her. She only knew one being with hands like that, and in her oxygen starved state she reached out to feel Coalback’s touch reflexively.

The fingers wrapped around her hoof, but she didn’t feel the calloused skin or the iron bands of muscle and tendon that she knew made them work. Air filled her lungs again and her eyes opened wide. She’d been mistaken, clarity returning gradually to her. It wasn’t Coalback reaching for her, but instead a mass of swirling aurora was falling with her, a hand just forming from the tendrils and ribbons.

A face much smoother and with features Rainbow could only describe as fairer than Coalback’s stared back at her through the lights, a determined look reflecting one she often wore. She could see the clothes now on this stranger, the world still moving all too slowly with her thoughts as clear as they were. She - for now Rainbow realized that that was what the apparition was - wore metal like a second skin. A confident smile, a wink, and then the specter reached forward with her other hand. The ghostly fingers dexterously wove something into a lock of her mane, but Rainbow couldn’t tear her eyes away from the spirit’s to look at it.

Her lips moved, forming words she couldn’t understand, and then she drifted apart. “Wait,” Rainbow tried to say, “what are you …” Her voice gave out, perhaps like the ghosts she was too exhausted to be heard over the wind rushing past her ears. A sad smile overcame the spirit before she fell away completely, like she knew more than Rainbow did and felt sorry for not sharing it with her before she had to leave.

The last thing Rainbow heard before her short breath robbed the light from her eyes again were thick feathers beating heavily at the air. Cool mist beat at her wings and heavy hooves wrapped around her.

---

        “Alright, now let’s see here,” Clean Cut mumbled under his breath. “Bring the light closer, Lost,” he said, waving over his shoulder to the changeling.

She took shaky steps toward the looming bookcases in front of them, the dim lantern in her mouth casting its yellow light over the ancient spines and scrolls stuffed into its shelves. “What is this place again?” she asked, eyeing the encroaching darkness all around them. “And why is it so dark?” she asked, knowing the only reason she couldn’t see was because there was literally no light in this place.

“These are the archives,” Clean Cut said wistfully, “here we keep every single bit of recorded information and history. Some of the things in here are older than the Princesses themselves. The darkness is to protect those; light can damage them- Aha!” he said, his horn lighting up as he found what he was looking for.

A stack of wide paper almost the same size as Clean Cut descended in front of him. “There she is!” he said with satisfaction, turning down the aisle of bookshelves. Lost Shadow jumped to follow, catching up with the stallion in an intersection. The thick tome shuddered as Clean Cut set it down on top of a stout reading pedestal. “This,” he said, turning toward Lost to explain, “is an in depth study of changelings and their magic, the only one in existence among ponies. I wrote it myself,” he added with a grin. “Now if I remember right, I was actually present for the trial of the Queen preceding yours,” he said, grumbling under his breath as he looked through the pages.

“There was a Queen before Chrysalis?” Lost said in surprise, her blue eyes going wide.

“Of course, and many more before her. Perhaps Chrysalis wiped out all evidence amongst your kind of the previous rulers to ensure her position and power. From what I do know she’s very totalitarian, it would make sense if- Here it is!” he said, cutting himself off and striking the page in front of him with a hoof. His eyes darted over the page, leaving Lost in a stunned silence.

She waited silently for him to start talking again, but it seemed like after awhile he became lost in his own notes. The wick inside the lantern flickered and burned somewhat dimmer before Clean Cut tore himself away from his own scribbles. “It’s worse than I remember it; I had forgotten just how clever Arachne had been,” he said thoughtfully, his hoof coming up to rub at his chin.

“Who?”

“Arachne was the Queen before Chrysalis, and Pupae had been the Queen before that,” he started, looking back at the text with a frown. “Pupae was by far the more powerful changeling, as would be expected since Arachne was only a worker. However, Pupae was a selfish ruler, all about food and riches for her and nopony else. Arachne wanted her place - for ... whatever her reasons were-” he said with a dismissive wave of his hoof “-so she found a way to cut herself off from the hive and left. She hid herself among the ponies and enlisted in our military. What she did was she found a way to not only imitate us, but replicate our experiences down to the level of muscle memory. This made her an able warrior when she returned to take the throne through deadly combat with Pupae.”

“Woah, okay,” Lost said, surprised at the ferocity with which her leaders had been decided. “Why do I need to know this though? How does it help us?” she asked, staring at his indecipherable scribbles laid out in front of them.

“Because you’re going to do the same thing,” he said matter-of-factly.

“WHAT?! No! I can’t fight the Queen!” Lost panicked, her wings buzzing in fear. She peered into the darkness with a newly kindled fear, she half expected the drones to come for her right this second.

“But you can, Arachne did it and she was no more than you are when she rose to power. I can teach you how to use it too,” he said, gathering up the book in his magic. His horn flashed and several papers appeared from the glow. “Come with me, we don’t have much time and there are a lot of things we need to get done.” he said quickly, returning his book to its space in the shelves as they passed it on the way toward the exit.

“But how does that help?” Lost said, her voice strained with fear and her wings buzzing against her back.

“You kill the Queen and you can take her place,” Clean Cut said simply, continuing in his fast paced walk.

“But if I take her place, how do you know I won’t end up just like her?” Lost asked. The idea of taking a leader’s role in her hive’s future was not one she enjoyed toying with. And she wasn’t sure if she was strong enough to avoid the allure of absolute power if she did take the place of Chrysalis.

“You will, eventually,” Clean Cut said sadly, slowing his pace ever so slightly. “But I think your concern over this is a good sign: The power of the Queen is a corrupting factor; however Coalback has looked at you and determined that you actually care about your hive, not the power itself. It may counteract it.”

They walked silently through the archive’s endless labyrinthian halls, climbing stairs and ducking through runic arches that hummed with arcane power. When they reached the entrance, where the statues of huge pony soldiers stood guarding the extremely heavy door, Lost had come to a decision. She stopped at the doorway, squaring her shoulders and taking a deep breath.

 When Clean Cut turned a curious eye to the small Changeling, she looked him in the eye, whispering, “Tell me what to do.”

Clean Cut looked back at her with a smile, deep emotion hidden under the laugh lines on his muzzle. “First, you’ll need Coalback’s armour.”

It was time to sign away the soul Coalback had freed.

---

The observation tower had been hastily converted into a war room. Maps and papers hung around every available space and the telescope itself had been pushed to one side and walled off with chalkboards. Ponies bustled about the room; writing and rewriting numbers on the boards, taking notes for their superiors, or taking down messages to be sent out to officers in the field. Everything centered around the map table that illustrated the mountain ranges, something that hadn’t been much more than a museum piece for hundreds of years.

“Hath the reconnaissance team returned?” Luna asked evenly, eying the maps and lists before her. Small figurines representing numbers of troops were positioned around the representation of the Canterhorn. Red ink outlined fortified positioned along the only viable paths for an army to march up the mountain.

“They should be returning any minute now, Your Majesty,” Spitfire, the captain of Equestria’s only readily trained air force, replied. She manipulated a few figurines constructed from clouds to represent air forces, switching out a sparrow for an owl. Beside her Soarin, Spitfire’s second in command, shifted a sculpted airship further south of the mountain with a wingtip as he consulted a paper in his hoof.

Luna sighed inwardly, gazing out over the carved map that was their table. Canterhorn, the tallest mountain in the Unicorn Range, was a uniquely fortifiable position. An invading army would be hard pressed to make it up the mountain purely on hoof, and once they got there, there was little space for them to press forward. Countering that was the amount of airspace that Canterlot was vulnerable to on its perch, which called for the large air and anti-air forces that Canterlot had once had.

However, centuries of peace had seen to the reduction of the amount of Airships available for non-Pegasi soldiers. The number of Arc-Cannons that would be in working condition to launch their ‘canned lightning’ at approaching enemies would be low as well, their present conditions still questionable.

For the longest time the Guard had mostly been for show rather  than actual purpose, much to the chagrin of the Lunar Monarch. She looked distastefully at the numbers presented to her. If her assumptions were correct, this would be no small band of terrorists that had drummed themselves up overnight. From what she’d seen at the edge of the horizon, Discord had raised an army that could easily be compared to all of Equestria’s standing forces put together.

She could be thankful that at least their Pegasus troops had remained battle-ready despite the peaceful reign of her sister. For once she was glad that the Pegasi were so war centered in their culture and past. But an air-force alone could not win against the creatures Discord had summoned.

While the “Brutes” - as some of the officers before her had dubbed them - had no capabilities of flight, she knew them too well to say that they had an upper hoof in this. Old memories were shaken loose; she remembered the wild way that they fought, like caged animals when they sensed they were at even the slightest disadvantage; she remembered their deadly strength, beating through lines of shields with nothing more than their blunt claws, their devout destruction.

One was dangerous. A pack could pillage a city and beat it to the ground in less than a day. An army would be nigh unstoppable. It had taken a forbidden spell, at the cost of a hundred thousand lives, to destroy the last army that had marched across the earth under a chaos god’s command.

A voice roused her from her inner turmoil. “Hmm? Please excuse Us, it seems that We have lost Ourself in thought,” she apologized, turning toward the acting Captain of the Guard. Studded Mace had taken Shining Armor’s place shortly after the previous captain’s wedding, a capable mare that he had picked himself.

“I asked if you would like to review the militia numbers we received a few moments ago, Majesty,” she said calmly, though Luna was sure she saw an amount of hesitation in her when she said “militia.”

“Verily Captain. How goes the Draft?” Luna asked, motioning for her to continue.

“To review, our standing ground forces number at about two thousand, seven hundred and sixty trained soldiers: Two thirds Unicorns, and one third Earth pony. Spitfire’s Wonderbolts number in only forty, but their standard forces number in eight hundred and ninety. This brings our active troops to roughly three thousand, six hundred and fifty trained soldiers,” she recited, watching carefully as Luna nodded with a frown. “So far, we have put four hundred volunteers through basic training and are receiving more volunteers by the hour. It is estimated that in two days we can nearly double our numbers if the current trend continues, taking into account a portion of the population is either unwilling or unable to fight.”

A thin unicorn colt rushed into the room, offering a hasty bow before floating a tattered parchment to Spitfire. With his charge delivered, the porter ran back out of the room to whatever tasks his superiors had assigned him.

“My recon team just got back a few seconds ago, ma’am,” Spitfire put in, lifting a curled piece of parchment. She grimaced and Luna could hear the pegasi’s wings flutter nervously against her sides but her voice didn’t waiver. “According to estimates based on the density of their marching pattern, it is assumed that Discord’s army is marching with twelve thousand, nine hundred in total numbers. In order of largest number to fewest this consists of; Changelings and a large mobile platform where it is assumed that Chrysalis commands from; the green Brutes, taking up near half of their numbers; a small band of griffons, but no more than fifty; as well as various other creatures that appear to have either been lured to them from the Everfree or to have marched from beyond the Badlands with them. No more large cats were spotted among the ranks,” Spitfire said, setting down the paper almost as soon as she was finished so she would not have to look at the damning numbers again.

The entire war room turned towards Luna, waiting for her response. Soldiers, Advisers, two Captains and their second-in-commands all stared at her in silent horror, the numbers had never been more out of their favor. Luna did not meet their eyes, to meet their eyes was to invite their fear to become real. Instead she allowed herself a thoughtful and restrained hum, unintentionally letting the moment drag out too long as her thoughts ran wild.

It had been a scant few hours since she’d sent Coalback and Rainbow to attempt to call aid from the wolves; she hadn’t quite been able to comprehend exactly how much they were in need of it until now. There had been no sighting of the wolves as they’d passed, only their mournful singing which she knew would reveal nothing of their actual numbers. But assuming even just one thousand of the wolves were able to come to their aid, it might be enough to level the odds.

It was not much to go on, but if her memory held true to today then the wolves would be a turning factor. Even when the Angels of the North had fallen, the wolves remained extremely capable warriors and strategists. They were not only adept in the formal warfare of flags and lines to charge through, but their guerrilla tactics were the things of nightmares. They had had a distinct talent for breaking through lines and splitting apart charging forces into more manageable pockets of fighting. She hoped that this had not changed.

Warfare was the wolves’ plaything.

And this was all assuming that they would come to the ponies’ aid, the wolves were a strange sort when it came to alliances. She couldn’t breath a word of doubt to them, else fear would spread through the ranks. “With the wolves fighting beside us, we have a chance,” Luna said dryly, not looking toward the ponies around the table.

“Permission to speak freely, your Majesty?” Studded Mace asked suddenly, breaking the gloom with the conviction in her voice. Luna nodded. “I’m not sure that we can trust help from predators, and a promise from this ‘Coalback’ - or whatever his name is - seems unwisely taken.”

“Careful, little pony,” Luna growled, low.

But Studded Mace took no notice, continuing, “We hold the high ground. A siege on Canterlot has never been successful in the thousand years it has called the Canterhorn home. The only way a force has ever come close to overcoming our forces was through trickery and sudden surprise attack from inside our walls. Discord’s brood stands no chance-”

“Still thy tongue, blind-pony!” Luna interrupted, she stood from her seat forcefully and summoned a threatening glow to her horn. “Think not that your inexperienced police force and hastily trained aristocrats will be enough to defend this city. Of all the ponies you should doubt, it is not Our emissary! Be thankful there is even the slightest hope from the Wolves to come to our aid!” she bellowed, coming just to the edge of a thunderous volume. If nothing else, all the ponies at the war table were stunned to silence by her outburst. “Unless you speak of our strategy in defense, then from this moment forward you shall keep thy thoughts from thy tongue.”

“Yes, Majesty,” was the Captain’s immediate, meek reply.

Satisfied that the Guard’s Captain had been put in her proper place, Luna took her seat again. She took only a moment to compose herself, gathering her frustration and anger into a tight ball to be locked away. She would deal with her frustrations at a less critical time, or a more useful one.

“Let us once more review the possible avenues of attack from the base of the mountain, we can let nothing go unconsidered,” she said, shockingly calm in the wake of her previous fury. The others shuffled their papers returning to their duties as quickly as they could to avoid any more of Luna’s harsh words.

---

When asking after the wolf pack that they’d come in with, Twilight had been directed to a part of the castle close to the observation tower. But she paused when she found their door slightly ajar, and a mournful hum trailed out from within.

She gently pushed open the door and entered the gold trimmed suite, hypnotized by the songlike sound. There was a sacred feel to the room, and Twilight did her best not to disturb the humming with her hoofsteps. She followed the sound past the common room and toward another open door. She could hear water inside, bouncing off the tiled walls of what could only be the bathroom.

She peeked inside, a tiny voice reminding her that she was very much intruding on the wolves’ privacy. The wolves were all inside the large marble bath sunk into the floor, the water lowered so that the puppies could splash around on the bottom. Greyshadow had twisted himself around to groom his flanks near the steps into the tub, humming his song as he worked his tongue and teeth over his fur.

Non lay against on her side at the far end, her head and injured leg propped up above the water. She watched the puppies fondly, nodding sleepily along with Greyshadow. It only took a moment for the she-wolf to notice Twilight through the small space in the door. Twilight made to move away, fully realizing her shameful actions now that she’d been discovered.

But Non motioned with her head, inviting Twilight in with a welcoming, soft growl. Tentatively, Twilight pushed through the door and walked to the side of the bath by Non. “I’m sorry,” she whispered quickly, “I just wanted to check on you guys, we never got the chance to talk again after we got here.”

“Don’t apologize,” Non deplored quietly, her voice unconsciously following the rhythm of Greyshadow’s humming. “We heard the battle in the castle. You bear scars from it!” Non said as she spotted the gauze pad taped to Twilight’s cheek, attempting to twist around.

“It’s not bad, just a scratch,” Twilight assured, laying a hoof on Non’s flank to keep her from standing.

Non settled back onto her side, but smiled at Twilight. “Spoken like a warrior,” Non teased, her tail wagging weakly against the side of the tub. “Don’t deny it,” Non said quickly when she spotted the frown on Twilight’s face, “I think you fight nobly when your friends are in danger,” she growled softly, once more turning to look over toward Greyshadow and the puppies wrestling with his paws.

“What about you? How’s your leg, Non?” Twilight asked after a moment, taking in the neat wrap keeping Non’s back leg stiff.

“A pony doctor changed the bandages and waved his horn at it. I will be fine,” Non assured Twilight, turning her eyes to her again. “Come into the water, Twilight. One of the braver warriors came in and made the water stay hot for as long as we liked,” she said, idly sniffing at Twilight’s closest hoof.

Twilight hesitated for a moment, but Non’s gentle encouragement got her to lower herself into the shallow water beside her. She could feel the heat being radiated magically from the floor, a simple heating spell that drew from sigils built into the palace itself. “Do many wolves like taking baths?” Twilight asked, only to gain a confused glance from Non. She’d knew most dogs didn’t like them, if Winona was any example, but it seemed that these wolves liked it.

“Wolves do not like deep water perhaps, but a shallow creek or hot spring is not always unwelcome,” Non explained, shaking her head. She refrained from explaining the belief that a drowned wolf would never find rest in death. It was not the time for such thoughts.

Greyshadow’s humming grew as he found the climax of his song before sinking back down to the low humming it had been before. Words began to form under his humming, just barely quiet enough that they could not be understood.

“What song is this?” Twilight asked Non quietly, once again afraid of breaking the peaceful atmosphere it created.

“In Equestrian, it is called Mist Covered Mountains,” Non said sleepily, beginning once more to nod along with the song.

Greyshadow opened an eye from his twisted position, an edge of a sad smile on his face as he finished grooming that flank.

“Far over,” he slowly sang, drawing out every word with an underlying growl that added a deep timber to his voice, “the misty mountains cold. To dungeons deep, and castles old,” he hummed, his voice drawing the splashing puppies to a halt. Non followed the song with her own throaty hum, sleepily laying her head against the side of the tub.

“You can sing it in Equestian?” Twilight asked Non quietly, trying not to break the song as it started.

Non nodded, whispering quickly, “Greyshadow and I almost know more Equestrian than we do Wolsh.”

“We must away,” he sang, suddenly lifting his head from the water and toward the ceiling, “ere break of day.” His voice flew across the room, bouncing off the tiled walls hauntingly. “To find our long forgotten home.” Greyshadow seemed to gain a certain gravitas with his singing, suddenly much older and wiser than his five years.

Twilight could feel their song overtaking her, a much more gentle and relaxing feeling than when she was swept up the moment back home. Combined with the steaming water, it was like slipping into a very welcome sleep. And she felt her thoughts floating along with the cadence of the song.

“The pines were roaring, on the height. The winds were moaning, in the night.”

Twilight could picture the mountains now, huge and swooping, buried in snow and blankets of wild clouds. Their stony peaks looked as if they’d burst through the trees and snow one day, somehow new and older than time all at once.

“The war was red, it flaming spread; the trees like torches blazed with light.”

Suddenly Twilight’s mind’s eye shifted, she looking at a wall of trees. Firelight danced ominously within, boots struck the earth in a steady drum. She was as entranced by the flames as she was the song. She could feel something heavy draped over her shoulders. There was a throbbing ache on her forehead as well, one that strangely filled her heart with stony determination that she couldn’t place.

She couldn’t see the glint of ghostly green light playing behind Greyshadow’s eyes. “Ashen mountain, beneath the moon. The words unspoken, we’ll be there soon. For home a song that echoes on. And all who find us will know the tune,”

Her vision shifted suddenly, a mountain range implanting itself on the back of her eyelids. Behind it In that moment, she could have redrawn every crag, rise, and crack in that dimly outlined shape. She could feel the importance of this place, even though she knew for a fact she’d never been there in her entire life.

“Far over  the misty mountains high. From carvings steep, and stone gardens nigh. We must retreat come fall of night. To hide our long past crime,” Greyshadow sang sadly, Twilight’s vision of mountains and fire fading. But once they were gone, a fog rolled over them in her mind and they were gone again.

Suddenly he stopped, his voice catching in his throat. His body stiffened with a nearly audible snap, waves of water rippled out from around him. His eyes locked with Twilight’s in a gaze that burned with so much intensity that she found herself stuck hard between looking for something to appear inside and shrinking away.

Non stiffened as well, suddenly very awake. “What is it, Greyshadow?” she growled, beginning to rise from her seat.

“The lights …” he whined, his gaze turning away from Twilight’s to look blankly at one of the walls. “They speak suddenly- Screaming! The Empress howls with fury to keep them at bay,” Greyshadow whimpered.

Non’s glance toward Twilight lasted only the blink of an eye, but she saw it all the same. “What are they saying?” Non asked urgently.

“The same thing,” Greyshadow mumbled, beginning to recite prayers in Wolsh before a bark from Non brought him back. He took a few breaths to calm himself, apologizing with a whine that was also cut short by a snarl from Non. “The last of the First,” he whispered, as if afraid to speak the words.

Non was shocked into silence, and Twilight let the silence that formed stretch on waiting for an explanation. “Is that bad?” she finally asked when neither of them went on.

Non shook her head, but it was Greyshadow who spoke. “They are talking about the Lord Coalback. But he does not want their interest; to distract the dead from their eternal dance is to invite ruin into your pack,” he said, “to invite the dead back to the earth is to invite great peril.”