Silk Glade had just finished bathing her beloved baby Red. She was always delicate with him, making sure not to harm even the smallest little hairs of his brick red coat. Her own fur was of a similar red, more crimson than anything; he also had her pale yellow eyes. They even glinted the same under the candlelight that lit their small, wooden shack. It was enough for them, enough for her, however. She had a child that she cherished and nurtured nonstop; a bastion of the good spirit and hope she held.
Silk's husband had gone to war, and never returned. She still cried at his loss, his brave sacrifice. Red couldn't grieve with her because he was simply too young to understand the tragedy of losing a loved one. A loved one who never betrayed his wife's trust. A loved one who always stayed true to his vows and never lost passion for her. She longed for his touch again; she wanted him to lay her on her back, to trace his hooves up her body and kiss her deeply, and...
Red suddenly wriggled in his mother's forelegs, bringing the widowed unicorn back to reality. He looked up into her eyes, deep into them. "Mama." He proclaimed in an innocently light voice.
"Oh, my sweet little baby..." Silk Glade's eyes started tearing up when she responded. A single drop of life trailed down her muzzle in an almost artistic fashion, tracing her young features ever so carefully. "Red, my precious child...I love you so, so much."
The foal smiled wide and giggled, putting his hooves up toward his life's giver. "Hold! Hold!"
Red got what he wanted and more. Glade pulled him into a fulfilled grasp and let loose her building tears. Crying. She hated doing it, but at the same time, it was the only thing reminding her that she was alive and could feel, for the moment.
"OPEN UP NOW OR WE'LL KILL YOU AND YOUR BABY!" A gruff voice shouted from outside her home's rickety door.
She managed to keep it closed with her magic for awhile now, and whoever was outside, mostly likely another thug, wasn't too happy. With pretty much every soldier out fighting the changelings and their army, security wasn't guaranteed. Especially not for the poor, who always had to fend for themselves anyways. Her strength had been waring thin recently, her magic becoming weaker and weaker. She was finally going to lose the biggest fight in her life. The fight for survival. The worst part of it was that she'd have to leave her only child to whatever would come his way. She wouldn't let him die, though.
Her strength finally failed. The tied-together boards that made up her door broke away from its hinges and slammed onto the dirt floor. Almost immediately after, the intruder was revealed, and the intruders behind him. There stood three massive, leather-bound, black-coated earth ponies that brandished crude nail clubs. The first rushed in with defined anger and excitement. To him, her death would be another successful raid.
Silk Glade had already placed Red on her rickety hammock behind her. She was as prepared as she would ever be. With a glow of her horn, she sent one of the shards of her broken entryway straight into her assailant's throat, incapacitating him easily. As the second thug rushed her along with the third, she acted fast, but not fast enough. Red's mother charged and impaled one of the two in the chest and sent a beam into his body, essentially boiling him from the inside out. Her next move was to grab up his weapon and send it toward the skull of the last foe. As her projectile made contact, crushing her target's face in, his weapon collided with the side of her head with such force that it broke open her skin and skull.
She looked up at her baby, unable to think, move, breathe, to do anything else. She looked at him sadly until blood and brain ran down over her eyes, obscuring her vision. Her heart stopped and her horn crumbled away into dust as her remaining magic dissipated. Darkness enclosed her like a pair of hands cupping her between them. The last thing she heard before fading was Red's violent crying. He could understand loss after all.
Nightmares. They're like the evil that lingers in the back of your mind, waiting for your guard to be let down. Into your dreams they float, corrupting you ever so slowly. That was the case for Red.
It was the same as every other night. The brick colored unicorn had always found himself in some kind of old hallway in what appeared to be a castle, or atleast some structure of royalty. In fact, the kind of structure he saw in these nightmares shouldn't even be occurring to him. He'd never been in such a place; why it was in his dreams was beyond him. Perhaps it was a sort of phychic glimpse into the future. Whatever it was, it was insatiably recurring, not letting a single good image cross his mind. Yet another thing he had no control of.
Red galloped hard away from the familiar approaching black substance that chased him through the old, worn corridor. This approaching wave could only be described as blood. A blackened, tainted blood that pointed to demons and devils alike. Monsters with ravenous hungers of impossible extremes. It moved toward him quickly and widespread as if poured from a tipped-over bucket, or even like a wave hitting land, but never stopping it's course.
Though he grew tired, Red never stopped going. He wanted away from that which stalked his thoughts, destroying peace. His only guide were the many torches placed a few yards from each other up above him; the only illumination. As darkness chased him, it surrounded him as well, giving him all the more reason to push onward.
A hefty, reverberating, metal laugh finally escaped the depths of the unknown, shaking the entirety of the passage and throwing the unicorn off-balance and slowing his pace. He was nearing the end. It always ended the same way, it seemed. No matter how long he kept it up, the inevitability caught up to him. If ever there was a better way to end his struggle, he would've found it by now. A pity it didn't exist.
A trip, and Red was on his stomach, leaving him to twist onto his back and gaze on death. The blood had reached him and it was antagonizing how hot it was, frightening how thick it was. Unable to get back up, the young stallion grunted and strained against his captivating fate. More came until he was up to his muzzle in the substance and breathing heavily in fear of the loss of breath, life, and hope. More, more, more, more. No breathing, no air. Nothing.
"I can't breathe!"
"Done daydreaming, Red? That's the third time today." Explained Tomesten, the teacher of Red's spell writing class.
The unicorn, surprised at his surroundings at first, immediately sobered at the voice of his dreadfully boring instructor. Red hated magic school; too many ponies, too much noise, too many jerks. He gave a glare to the mocha-colored earth pony at the head of the room before looking back at his blank note page.
"I believe that calls for punishment. How will you ever be a successful unicorn if you never study or try in class? Detention. You can spend an hour here catching up on your notes."
"What!?" Red exclaimed in anger.
"Don't act so surprised, Red. You should look to Twilight for guidance. She seems like the only student here that wants to learn." Tomesten replied with a smirk.
Twilight Sparkle. Whenever he wasn't having nightmares, he was thinking about her. She was different for sure, she had greatness written all over her, and only he and maybe Tomesten could see it.
Twilight immediately got up from her seat in protest. "Mr. Tomesten, I'm afraid you have Red all b-backwards," the purple unicorn stuttered, "you see, h-he's actually really smart, you just-"
"Just what? Twilight, you aren't seriously sticking up for him are you? Let him have his punishment. He can't be babied." Tomesten's patience was already wearing thin. He disliked interruptions. Interruptions meant less learning. "Please sit down, Twilight."
Instead, the geeky, deep violet-eyed mare kept her place. "I won't."
"Twilight, what're you doing?" Red asked nervously, afraid of the attention he was so wholesomely getting. "You're going to get yourself kicked out!"
"I don't care! I can't just sit here and listen to you always getting picked on! It's just...just..." She silently looked down to her hooves and back to Tomesten, who was practically boiling out of his own fur.