Of the Lost Prince

Of the Lost Prince

Chapter I: Emergence

  In an eldritch abyss a lone beacon of energy existed.

  It had no movement, no purpose in this nothing, but at irregular intervals, great arcs of power and energy would explode out from the amorphous energy. The arcs would dissipate over a meaningless amount distance, and seemingly set the entire abyss ablaze, an awe-inspiring hellmouth.

  And, of course, on occasion a great booming voice would emanate from the abyss itself, the prisoner enjoyed hearing himself talk now and again.

  This went on for countless years.

 Literally, the prisoner had no way of gauging the passage of time, except perhaps, by the ebb and flow of his power.

  And power was something he was not stingy with. She had thought she had severed his connection to the Fates, but she was wrong. She had thought she had destroyed him, but she had not.

  And he was much anticipating telling her so, personally.

  At first he had not understood the spell keeping him trapped. He had forced his power against the prison again and again, but the walls only got stronger. He had pushed his power evenly across the prison, but the walls drank the energy. But when he simply let energy radiate from him, that was his salvation.

  The spellwork of the prison was beyond incredible, and that was what one expected from the the Oracle, but this prison was still an awe-inspiring feat. Unlike other shields and spells of that nature, this spell was not a wall, but a membrane. Like a cell with water, it kept a ratio of energy inside the prison to the outside.

  As powerful and knowledgeable as he was, he could not violate the laws of the universe, but he could exploit them.

  As he forced his energy into the abyss, the walls of prison let it flow out, and the more energy he let out the less stable the walls became, bending and stretching from the pressure as more and more of the barriers crumbled into formless energy until...

  He could feel it now. An infinitesimal portion of the great abyss, illuminated with foreign energy, as if a dust mote in a scorching ray of Sun.

  He smiled, well, as close as an amorphous blob of energy could come to a smile. Regardless, after so long pecking away at the many barriers keeping him trapped, the last, and weakest, one had been breached.

  An eggshell within a castle, so to speak.

  Quickly, before any elaborate spellwork could patch the hole, or otherwise impede upon his progress, he forced his awareness into the world.

  And laughed a deep, somehow both mirthful and menacing, laugh that resounded throughout the dilapidated corridors of stone and iron that he could now see.

  Then he began a hunt.

  He sensed every living thing within hundreds of yards, and quickly delved into their minds.

  He could see now, through a thousand eyes, hear through a thousand ears.

  Rats, mice, insects, termite colonies, and the odd bat made their way to him, until, finally, he had assembled his grand host.

  Laughing bitterly at the cruel fate that had befallen him, relying on bugs and harbingers of disease to advance his agenda, he isolated the weak, old, and sick.

  Those he selected rose into the air silently, surrounded by a sepia brown aura. Then, they began to disintegrate, being sucked of all their magical energies. What was left of them was crudely transformed into pure energy, or fell to the ground as husks and dust.

  He sighed in satisfaction as he directed the energy toward his efforts of freeing himself. The additional power was welcome, but it was not nearly enough. He needed more.

  He had existed in nothing for untold millennia, he was not eager to wait more.

  He directed his faster minions: bats, rats, flies, and so on, to find a way out of the decrepit dungeon he found himself in, and to bring him some sentient creature.

  He loathed to think at all the gossip he had missed.

  Chuckling at his own thoughts he commanded his remaining subjects to spread throughout the area and alert him to any strange happenings. He would not be snuck up on.

  He focused all his energy back to tearing apart his prison, and waited for his minions to return.

  Lucky was a bit displeased with himself, sure Fluttershy was beautiful and kind and cute and perfect in every way imaginable, but it probably wasn’t worth dying over a plant just to get her attention.

  “This is crazy. Zecora better have been right about where I can find that damn flower.”

  The flower that he was muttering about was the Foal Blue Gym Sock, a rare plant renowned for its beauty and taste, and a key ingredient in Fluttershy’s favorite dish, Plat de fleurs exotiques et francité.

  Lucky wasn’t a five star chef, but he had been practicing the dish for a month. He was confident enough in his skills to finally go all the way, the flower would be his.

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  Zecora didn’t say it would take this long. All she said was:

 “The flower you seek is to be found in the north, be wary and hastily go forth. Something has upset the Everfree’s beasts, and I doubt it is an innocent mirthful feast.”

  Then she slammed shut her door, from behind which ancient words did pour.

  So Lucky assumed that he wouldn’t want to stick around too long, not that he would have anyway. The Everfree is about as inviting and hospitable as a minotaur’s mouth, sometimes literally.

  “It’s fine, I can do this. I can do this.”

  A demonic moan from the deepest pits of Tartarus sounded through the trees.

  Lucky upped his trot to a gallop and his pep talk to nervous whinnys.

  His stomach kept pace with him, motivating him onward with its demonic moans.

  A rat skittered through the underbrush of the forest.

  It dodged and jumped and sprinted when necessary, fueled by an ancient magic that existed long before the forest was a single sapling.

  Many things it encountered were of interest to its master, the violence of the forest, the odd gnarled stature of the trees, the general intimidating nature of everything. The rat’s master had seen something like this long ago, an ecosystem of cruel rage instead of calculated necessity.

  One thing was obvious to him, much power was expended here, power that saturated the ground and air, power that over hundreds of years had been carelessly, perhaps unknowingly, weaved into a very dark blanket over this land.

  Some of this was his, the earth responded to him in a recognizable, if warped, way, but another power was much more prevalent, that of the Oracle. This was a surprise, for the Oracle was used wholly, and they could not have used it in its completeness without him.

  Something else was odd about it too. The Oracle was whole, but it was...reckless? No that wasn’t right. It was used wholly and with its consent, but without skill. As if its users were connected but did not know they were. Very, very odd, but even more exciting.

  The Oracle was nearby, it had been used perhaps only a couple of years ago. And the Oracle would lead him, one way or another, to them.

  His musing was interrupted by a most welcome sight, a pony.

  A cobalt stallion, apparently collapsed from exhaustion. The stallion was breathing heavily and slumped on the ground and his limbs were splayed outwards. In front of the stallion was a blue flower, a flower the rat’s master recognized.

  The flower was rara perfide.

  The stallion had just recognized the flower, unless there was some other reason he was dancing and approaching the plant.

  This was a prime opportunity.

  Without delay the rat obeyed its master and jumped into the small clearing that held the flower and stallion. It snapped the base of the stem and ran with the flower, a furious stallion shortly behind.

  The rat’s master smiled. He would soon have company.

  Exhausted, and just a bit ashamed that he had been running from his stomach the last few minutes, Lucky collapsed into a clearing.

  “Well, guess that’s that. I’m not going to find that flower, I’m not going to make that dish, and I most definitely am not going to have Fluttershy. Celestia I’m pathe-DEAR SISTERS YES!!!”

  As he lifted his head up he found the object of his desires, well not Fluttershy, but the legendary flower, right in front of him. He shot up, and without any thought, began advancing toward the plant with a Pinkie worthy pep in his step.

  Until a rat ran out of the underbrush and snatched the flower, before running back the way it came.

  Lucky was not pleased in the slightest.

  “Wh-what? COME BACK HERE YOU RAT!! I KNOW PONIES!!! YOU’RE A DEAD RAT, RAT!!!!”

  The rat’s master watched with hundreds of other eyes as the stallion chased the rat. He prepared a few speeches in his mind, none of them were particularly good.

  How does one say, “Hello stallion that just chased my mind controlled rat for the past couple of miles. I’m an ancient being that was petrified by an even more ancient power, and I would really appreciate it if you could give me the abridged version of the last three thousand or so years of history, thanks. Oh, and please don’t ask about why I was imprisoned,” without coming off as evil or insane.

  Of course, he was pretty sure he was as close to insane as he could get, and if anypony remembered him he was probably remembered as evil. But first impressions are everything, and it certainly wouldn’t do to be branded a menace to society immediately. Especially if the Oracle was still functioning.

  He barely escaped that last prison. He was NOT going back, ever.

  The stallion was coming now, he hesitated at the entrance, and then entered.

  Wheezing and coughing, Lucky came to stop at the stone passageway the rat had just descended into.

  “Oh, *wheeze* sure wh-*cough*-why not. An ancient stone hole, yeah, why not. Celestia I’m so dead.”

  Not heeding his own portent, he took a deep breath and entered the cave.

  Before realizing it was pitch black inside. “Hehe, well, uh, time to go home then.”

  He was turning to gallop back to bed, when the flower caught his eye. It was glowing and illuminating the rat as it ran down the passage.

  “I don’t remember reading anything about the flower glowing. Why am I still doing this?”

  A few millennia locked inside a stone and thaumaturgical cage hadn’t done wonders for his thinking.

  Of course, he should have realized that he was staring through the eyes of dwellers of the dark. A pony couldn’t very well just run straight to him in a pitch black labrinth.

  Luckily he had thought to make the flower luminescent before the cobalt stallion could leave.

  And he and the rat were close. It was time to make an impression.

  Lucky had stopped shouting at the rat long ago, but he had lost none of his intensity, despite the burning in his lungs.

  In fact, the rat seemed to be slowing down. He was winning this rat race!

  The rat turned a corner. Lucky followed suit.

  It was dark. The flower was gone.

  “Hello?” That just seemed the right thing to say really.

  Suffice to say, he was surprised when a voice answered.

  “Hello yourself, pony.” A voice came from seemingly everywhere at once. It was very disturbing.

  The voice itself, however, wasn’t. It was deep and rich and smooth. It radiated power and vitality, yet also wisdom and majesty. He would call himself crazy, but it sounded like Princess Celestia.

  “Are you frightened? There is no need to be, I shall not hurt you, and I assure you nothing can here.”

  “W-who exactly am I ta-talking to?” He whispered and swiveled his eyes around anxiously.

  “Ah, where are my manners? I have been called many things over the ages. ‘God,’ by those who could not understand my power, ‘Prince,’ by those who respected me and my sisters, and ‘Monster,’ by those who opposed me.”

  As he said those words, what must have been hundreds of torches lit themselves as he emphasised parts of his speech. They revealed a great library, or what was once a great library. Now the marble shelves were black with dirt, and the books were but husks of leather covers. Only the walls seemed unscathed, expertly smoothed rock that still shone with the light of the torches.

  “But you may call me, ‘Terrarius, Master of the earth, and Prince of the Kingdom of Equestria.”

  As he said, “Terrarius,” a great chandelier above became lit and revealed the speaker to Lucky.

  A statue of an alicorn was before him. The alicorn was bent low to the ground, in a charging position, his wings, each about the size of Lucky, were extended, and his face was twisted into a  snarl.

  The whole thing radiated power and hatred, and was a near perfect contrast with the voice’s demeanor.

  This was all too much for Lucky, who promptly collapsed at the hooves of the statue.

  Terrarius snorted, “Foal.”