Starry's hooves beat against the hard packed dirt as he ran along the path, he knew they were still chasing him there was no need for him to look over his shoulder. The path soon ran into the forest and he allowed his speed to slow, they had never actually followed him into the forest before, there was no reason they should start now. the young unicorn trotted up to a tree a few feet from where the treeline started and sat down for a small rest, leaning his head against the soft bark and before long falling asleep.

"good morning, firestarter." Starry's eyes shot open, they were standing around him, four colts a few years older than him, with what he could only assume was malice in their multicolored eyes.

"W-what so you want?" Starry asked as he backed up a bit an pressed himself up against the tree, his heart starting to beat faster than usual.

"Hot Shot, pin him" The grey earthpony said, the red pegasus swiftly following orders, lifting starry's forehooves and pinning them against the tree above his head. "Oh... I think you know what we want." The leader said as he slammed his hoof into starry's exposed midsection, causing the colt to let out a yell of pain, and several of the other ponies to let out quiet giggles. Starry couldnt handle it again, he was always safe in the forest. His horn started to glow softly, causing the earth pony to land another blow to his ribs."Starry you know you cant fight us, you remember what happened last time."The earth pony said condescendingly. Starry's breathing had become ragged and his horn was glowing brightly, the two unicorns on either side of the earth pony were now clutching their heads.

"S-stone, I think we should stop." One unicorn said while taking steps slowly backwards.

"Starry I said stop!" Stone yelled at the unicorn before punching him again, however at the moment of contact Starry's eyes went wide, they were white with power and after only a few fractions of a second a bright light engulfed the area.

Starry slowly came to, there was a slight rushing and crackling sound. after a few seconds he opened his eyes, the first thing he saw was a bright orange flames littering the area, the grass was seared black and the smell of smoke was thick in the air. Starry picked himself up and shook off a bit before he heard a cough and looked in the direction, a few feet away stone was picking himself off the ground and looking at him angrily.

"I...I'm going to kill you." The grey earth pony said as he took a step towards the unicorn. Starry wasted no time in bolting deeper into the forest, he could hear the other following him close behind, power was still crackling off his horn as he fled into the undergrowth, farther than he had ever dared to venture before, his scarf snagged on vines that seemed to be attempting to grab him, the thorns pulled at his coat and scratched him. suddenly Starry's front hoof caught a root and sent him tumbling headfirst down a hill, he rolled over rocks and branches as his body tumbled downwards, then he felt something, the excess power was drained from his horn and the entire world seemed to shift for a few moments.

starry finally stopped rolling, he felt he was on flat ground now, but something was different, it was much darker than it had been a few moments ago. Starry stood up and immediately shivered, It was much colder than it had been too.. In fact starry had never actually been so cold before. Starry looked around, even the plants seemed different, they were more, menacing looking than usual. Starry couldn't hear anypony else's hoof steps anymore and he wondered which direction he should start going in, after a bit of searching he could feel that there was a faint trace of magic northward, so he started walking in that direction.

Starry felt like he had been walking for hours, and his tattered scarf wasn't doing practically anything to shield him against the chill in the air, he didnt even know it could get this cold, he would like to have had a word with the weather ponies who dropped the temperature so much so quickly. Starry wished he could see the sky, so he could tell which direction he was going, he didn't particularly like wandering around aimlessly in the dark. After a while the colt finally got to a place where the trees were thin and looked up, but it didn't make any sense, the stars were all wrong, the lights weren't even up there, but the most strange thing was a large white orb that just seemed to be floating out in the middle of space. Starry stared for a bit longer trying to make sense of this strange celestial body, before the cold reminded him that he needed to find somewhere warm, and he was getting very tired.

The strange white orb had moved from one end of the sky to the other by the time that Sarry started sobbing softly to himself, he felt like he had been walking for a long time, and there was nopony around, his legs were aching and his whole body felt numb and kind of tingly, he was only able to take a few more steps before he collapsed into a snow bank and gasped from how much colder it was than just the air, but he didn't have the strength to move anymore.The power was still out way in front of him, he reached out with his mind to touch it, before passing fully out, curled up in the snow.

Twilight let out a happy sigh as she sat down in front of her fireplace, the storm outside was raging heavily and no sane pony would be outside tonight, and spike was asleep upstairs in his basket, so she finally had some peace and quiet to snuggle herself up with a good book. The alicorn had only been able to get a few chapters in when she sat up suddenly. She felt something strange, press at her mind, something near, but mostly it was something scared and in danger. Twilight put her book down and quickly got to her door and stepped into her rainboots, pulled on a scarf, put on her winter vest and jacket, then stepped out the door.

"Hello?" Twilight called out and looked around, she didn't even know what had contacted her, but whatever it was was in serious need of help. "Is someone out here?" Twilight called into falling snow, not receiving an answer. Twilight closed her eyes and cast a spell to attempt to track where the signal came from, after a few seconds there was a flash from her horn and a tiny multicolored thread appeared, leading from her horn in the direction of the everfree. Twilight quickly began trotting in that direction, thinking some traveler must have gotten stranded by the storm and gone into the everfree for shelter.

Twilight walked for a while, following the thread, every once and a while casting a spell to warm her up, until she finally got to the end of the thread. Whatever sent the signal had to be around here, Twilight began looking around for a while until her hoof hit something soft, she looked down to see the snow on the ground very slowly rising and falling. Using her kinesis Twilight pushed the snow away and gasped loudly as she saw a young unicorn colt curled up and covered in snow. she reached down with hoof and shook him lightly.

"Hey wake up!" Twilight said slightly panicked, the colt didn't respond, after a second of thought Twilight picked up the little pony and began galloping back to her library.

Twilight burst through the door of her library and sat the colt on the pillow by the fire where she had been resting earlier, using her magic she forced all the snow on him to evaporate before getting more blankets from upstairs and wrapping the colt up tight, and throwing more logs into the fire then staring down at the bundle of blankets wondering if there was anything else she should be doing."I need to get a book." she said to herself and began looking through the shelves.

Author's Note

first thing written in a while, please be gentle