The changeling sat on the edge of the forest as night fell. His targeted farm was small and quite run down, but not empty. He watched from afar as one large male earth pony tilled the fields all afternoon, only stopping as dusk fell. Though the changeling was too far away to see the cutie mark of the working pony, he could discern his dark brown coat and golden mane. Near sundown, two more earth ponies came from the lowly cottage. One female, with a white coat and silver mane, presumably the worker’s mate, and one small filly. She bounced and laughed in her youthful exuberance. “Ah,” mused the changeling to himself, “a child. Perfect.”

The cottage’s rough stone chimney puffed smoke and dim candlelight came through the dusty windows as the scent of fresh bread wafted in the air. The trio of ponies went inside and a low thud was heard as the door was shut and barred.

As night fully fell over the land, the changeling looked up to see a full moon in the sky. The presence of the moon would mean his pack would be in full alert. He had to move quickly and get back before his family came looking for him to join in their singing to the moon. He shifted about in the grass, twigs and branches falling off his back as his magical coat softened and fell from his black shell. He stretched, letting his purple-hued membrane wings catch the cool night air, and sighed deeply. He liked night better than any other time. It brought coolness from the heat of the sun and respite for his eyes, which always seemed to work better in the dimness of moonlight or starlight. A flight would be nice after the past several decades spent living as a unicorn, but that would have to wait until later. He closed his eyes and concentrated, and fine blue hair sprouted along his back. Feathers appeared and grew to cover his wings, and a long flowing mane and tail appeared from where none had been before. The wooden tooth he had jammed in his own mouth fell out, and shining white molars took its place.

The time was right.

He crept over the hills and glided over the fields leading to the farm. He paid special attention to the fresh tills and the soft earth; he could not afford to leave a single lasting impression of his visit there. Creeping about the thin dusty windows, he peered carefully in each one. Here, a kitchen; there, a dining room. Moving around back, the next window held a view to the bedroom. Carefully scanning the room, he saw all three ponies slept in the same room, albeit different beds. The changeling’s mouth turned to a scowl. He needed separate bedrooms to make his hunt easier.

He could easily go on for several more days without nourishing himself on the stolen love of others, but he found it was always best to look as often as possible and flee if the situation got too dangerous. That modus operandi had kept him alive, albeit sometimes hungry. But alive was most important. Better to try now and chance upon something, rather than wait and hope for something big down the line.

Pulling back from the window slowly, he let his consciousness drift into the quiet room. the first mind he touched upon was soft, caring. The mother. She slept peacefully, holding her husband tight to her. Her husband, however, had very little emotion - his mind was shut like a steel box. Strong. Powerful. But he carried the weight of his family’s survival on his shoulders, and so a sense of worry pervaded the ether around him.

Moving yet further, the changeling came upon the filly. Fitful sleep tonight. Her mind switching between curiosity and fear. She was dreaming.

Opening his eyes again, the changeling considered his next move. He needed a way to get one of them to express the emotion he needed. If there were separate bedrooms, he might have a chance. As it stood, getting the child out of that room was nearly impossible. The door was secured, and judging by the look of the rotting timbers that composed the cottage’s frame, the floorboards probably squeaked like hell.

A howl sounded in the distance. The pack had finished with the deer carcass and was now on the move. With time running out, the changeling looked back towards the forest where he’d left his timberwolf coat among the grass. If they found the branches he had left in the grass, they might assume he had been killed and would follow his scent right to the cottage. He simply could not afford to lose the timberwolves that he had so much time cultivating, and so took off in a sudden flight back to the forest.

The rush of air created by his wings rattled the old windows of the cottage in their frames, and the sleeping filly woke with a jerk from her dreams. Sweating from her nightmare, she carefully got out of her bed and approached the window to investigate the sound. Looking out into the moonlit night, she spied a dark alicorn moving away from her farm, carried by her feathered wings with her sparkling blue mane stretching out behind her. Her body relaxed, and she made her way back to bed. Smiling as she drifted back to sleep, she whispered, “Thank you Princess Luna.”

…

Flying swiftly, the changeling spied the spot in the grass where he’d left his timberwolf coat. As he tilted his flight towards the ground, a howl rang out nearby. The pack was in fact looking for him, and he needed to be fast. He started to soften his coat before even touching the ground, letting it slide off of him as he landed. Quickly grabbing his rough timberwolf coat and throwing it back over his shoulders like a cloak, he concentrated to make the “skin” re-absorb and re-harden. His warped hooves stretched back into claws, and he picked up the real branches that had fallen off and stuck them wherever they’d fit back in his coat. He stomped his foot down on the wooden tooth and ground it into the dirt, not wanting to re-live that excruciating experience anytime soon.

A volley of howls sounded nearby, and the changeling raised his own snout to the sky and let loose an answering howl. A few barks sounded and the pack closed in on his location. The changeling turned to his recently-shed coat and jumped on it, eating it as quickly as possible. While it really didn’t taste like anything, it was a fast and easy method of destroying the evidence, and he was able to recoup some of the energy he used in making it back into himself.

The oldest female was the first to come out of the trees, and seeing her alpha eating, she stayed back. The rest of the pack soon arrived. The changeling licked his lips and raised his head to the sky, letting out a triumphant howl. The pack joined in, their voices echoing across the land.

In the cottage, all ponies were now awake and looking out the front window. The male hugged his wife and daughter close. TImberwolves did sometimes hunt along the forest’s edge, but rarely came onto the farm proper, especially this time of year when prey was easily available in their natural habitat.

“Daddy, why do they sing on moonlit nights?” the young one asked, not looking away from the window.

“I remember asking that of my father too, darling,” he replied, stroking her soft mane reassuringly. “He told me that the wolves pay homage to their dark princess of the moon. He said that Nightmare Moon gave life to them before she was banished, and when the moon appears they sing to their lost mother.”

His wife shot him a glance that said, “That’s not true,” but kept any comment to herself.

“Daddy that’s so sad,” the young filly said. “Do they sing to Luna now that she has returned?” Her eyes brightened. “That’s it! I saw Luna tonight! They must be singing to her!”

Her father looked down at her. “When did you see Princess Luna?”

“Earlier tonight! I woke up from a bad dream and went to the window, and saw Luna flying against the moon. She was flying away from our house. I think...I think she was trying to help me in my dream?” the filly furrowed her brow as she tried to remember exactly what he had been dreaming about.

Her father turned back to the window, where the howls faded as the timberwolves retreated to their den. “I don’t know honey. Luna is not Nightmare Moon anymore. She protects us, not them.” He paused, wanting to end of the conversation before she could ask more questions he didn’t know the right answer to. “You need to go on back to bed.” Despite her protests, he gently pushed her back to their room, and his wife wrapped one arm around their daughter, leading her to her bed.

He looked back out the window again, this time scanning the sky. Seeing nothing, he too reluctantly returned to bed.

…

Morning came early this time of year to the forests in Equestria. The sun would not penetrate the thick canopy of the forest until well into the morning, but the temperature rose along with the sun. It was to his warm air that the changeling awoke surrounded by his pack. The females were curled up against him and the pup against them, and the rest of the pack further towards the den’s exit. Sore from sleeping next to a hard rock wall, he slowly brought himself to his feet, stretching as he did so. The others in the den roused with him, also stretching, and moving out the narrow exit and back into the forest. The changeling stopped the females, giving them a “Good Morning” nuzzle and making sure they stayed put and out of danger.

The changeling led his pack from the foothills towards the cliffs that marked the true edge of the tall and foreboding Smoky Mountains. The eastern and southern edges of the mountains have relatively moderate slopes, but the changeling led his pack around the northwestern side, where the sheer rock cliffs precluded any upward progress. The hunting was poorer here, but the changeling was not interested in the same thing as the rest of his pack. As before, his pack spread out to chase down what prey they could find, leaving him to his deliberate search of the caves on this side of the mountain.

The mountain was old beyond reckoning, and due to the slow movement of water, time, and earth, it had shifted to open new caves and craigs over the millennia. the caves nearest the top of the mountain had long ago been colonized by dragons, who contributed to this process by clawing out new sections over their long lifetimes.

The lower caves had been formed partly by tectonic activity, but mostly by the water that permeated into the mountain from snow and rain that dripped down its interior into the depths of the earth. These dark places is where he needed to go. A changeling hive would still need an exit - probably several - but he only needed to find one.

Stopping in the shade inside of one such opening, he sat and closed his eyes to send his thoughts into the dark. Never having met another of his own kind before, he was unsure if this would even work. His idea was to look for the telltale signs of love emanating from somewhere in the cave. Scanning deeper still, he detected nothing. The changeling opened his eyes and continued to walk around the cliffs looking for another opening.

As he walked, he wondered to himself why he was even doing this. Surely he had enough skill and knowledge on his own to just continue his operations in the world at large? But that thought brought him to a sudden stop in the forest. “I don’t want to do this anymore,” he said to himself.

That realization brought the weight of dozens of lifetimes down upon him. He lives he had lived, the things he had seen, the places he had visited and the lives of others that he had ruined. And for what? Just to go somewhere else and do it again? And hate it all over again?

Oh, sure, there had been some over the years that he had liked, but they were so few and far between to be basically irrelevant. He always kept himself at bay of would-be suitors and hopefuls. The families he had inserted himself into had often been kind, and he felt no ill-will to them personally. But the bulk of society fell squarely into the category of “Waste of Space” as far as he was concerned.

The changeling sighed long and deep. The honest answer was that he didn’t know how to do anything else. He had lived the life of an undercover agent for so long that exactly what other options might even be available to him were unfathomable. “Maybe its my destiny,” he said dejectedly, starting to move along the cliffs once again.

His search continued long into the day, and with each hour that passed he grew more tired from his exertions. He had not consumed for several days now and it was beginning to take a toll on him. He was not used to shifting forms so often and staying in the role of alpha was physically demanding. His pack had occasionally brought over something that they had caught but he refused all: a rabbit, a squirrel, another rabbit. He let them eat and take it back to the den. He could still taste blood in his mouth and the thought of any more sickened him.

The changeling happened upon a wide cave entrance and stopped there to rest for a moment when two of his pack trotted up, presumably to check on him. They approached carefully, tails wagging, and suddenly bared their teeth and stopped, staring straight into the blackness of the cave. The changeling followed their gaze down into the inky blackness and saw nothing.

He looked back to his pack members, and they had not moved nor averted their gaze. They were clearly not looking at him, but into the cave. Something was down there that they did not like. He encircled the cave entrance himself, growling and barking, but only heard faint echoes of his own sounds coming back. There was no animal in there, but it did appear to go down a long way.

The changeling knew from past experience that the timberwolves possessed a sense that he did not, and that if they were alert or on guard, he needed to be as well. He took one small step into the cave, and then another. His pack whined at him, not wanting their leader to go in but not willing to follow, either. They pawed at the ground and whined loudly as their leader who had brought them such good bounty over the past few days was now going where they were unable to follow.

The changeling paid no heed, knowing he had found what he was looking for, going deeper into the cave.

…

The darkness seemed to have an oppressive quality to it, restricting the air around him and stifling the sounds that he was so accustomed to in the open air. As he went out of view of his pack, the changeling had changed his form slightly to allow his twisted horn to poke through, allowing him to cast magical spells to light his way and mark the varying paths through the underground that he had taken. He retained his timberwolf coat however, in case he should need to beat a hasty retreat and blend back into his pack who no doubt were still awaiting him at the cave entrance.

He stopped every so often to feel for any signs of sentient life down here. At first he thought he detected something, but eventually he conceded it was just hunger pains. He never felt love himself, and had always assumed that as a changeling, he was incapable of producing it. If so, he should not expect any other changelings to be able to do so.

Stopping at yet another fork in the cave, the changeling stopped to gather up a bit of strength to cast another marker. Before doing so, he noticed a set of claw marks along the left path in the fork. Upon closer inspection, he recognized the pattern: three fingers and one thumb. Dragon claws. He swiveled about, looking back from where he came and down the path in front of him. If a dragon was calling these dark tunnels home it would explain why the pack was so reluctant to enter.

However, he had not seen any other marks to indicate recent occupation. He moved closer to the marks, to see if he might be able to determine their age. As his face came just inches from the marks, they faintly began to emit a green magical aura. The changeling lowered his horn and saw that the aura intensified.

“Not a dragon,” he whispered to himself. “Changeling magic. They marked the path to keep outsiders away and our kind on the correct path.” He followed the marked path, and the slope increased its downward slant, leading him deeper underground. The further down he went, the more the temperature seemed to rise. The floor became damp and slick, and every step became precarious. Caves were new to him, and he found that it was becoming hard to determine if he was traveling uphill or downhill. He panted, the exhaustion growing more and more unbearable. He needed to either find what he was looking for or turn back and try again some other day.

He sat against the wall, tired, hungry, and discouraged. He decided to turn back, he would need to fully replenish himself and then could come back to try again. Moving more slowly back toward the surface was even slower going, and as he reached one of his magical glowing markers he spied something moving in the near-darkness ahead.

Hunching low to the floor, he barked twice in rapid succession, attempting to flush whatever it was into the open so he could better assess his enemy. No more movement was to be seen, so he carefully made his way closer, scanning back and forth in the tunnel to pick up any more signs of movement.

He inched his way forward, ready to fight or flee should need be; not positive on what he saw if anything, but not wanting to risk the danger of being careless. As he approached his marker, he dimmed it so as not to blind himself and lose precious night vision. As he approached within a few feet of his marker, he could feel air brush against his face as something passed at high speed past him.

The spear missed his face by less than an inch, and the obsidian tip wedged itself far enough into the rock wall beside him to hold the wooden shaft of the spear horizontal. Looking to where the spear was thrown, a small changeling stood on the edge of the light cast by the marker. His eyes and horn still had remnants of a green aura from when he had used his magic to hurl the spear with immense force. The aura matched his wings in color which fluttered in anticipation of a fight.

A skittering from behind drew the timberwolf’s attention to his rear, where an identical changeling blocked the path back with a spear of his own. They closed on the larger timberwolf, intending to smash it and scatter its parts.

The changeling timberwolf whirled about, fueled by adrenaline. He reared back his legs and gave a powerful backward kick to the stuck spear, breaking its wooden shaft and leaving just the stone tip embedded in the wall. The loud noise in the tight confines of the cave was deafening, but intentional. The changeling softened his timberwolf coat and used his levitation magic to wrap it around the remaining spear, binding it and yanking it out of the grasp of his stunned attacker.

His disguise now on the floor, the changeling stood fully erect, his twisted horn almost touching the ceiling of the tunnel. The guards, on the other hand, stood several feet shorter, and their shock at the sudden attack turned to amazement. They recovered quickly however, and kept their defensive stances against the newcomer.

“I have come to see Mother,” the larger changeling stated flatly. “Take me to Her. I will not resist further.” He rotated his shoulders slightly, and his armoured shell making a muffled scraping noise as it rubbed against itself.

The guards inspected him. The one who had thrown his spear spoke first, his his voice colored with cruelty and mistrust. “No, purple wings, you are not one of us.”

His partner chimed in, “How do we know that you are not sent by an enemy hive to infiltrate us?”

“What do my markings have to do with any of this? You saw me change. Take me to Mother or I will continue on my own.” He made a show of turning about but hesitated, allowing the guards a chance to reconsider.

The guards looked at each other, and nodded. “Fine,” the first one said. “We will take you to Her. But know now that if She is unsatisfied by your answers, you will regret coming here.”

The larger changeling only nodded, and the guards led their “captive” down the fork he had not followed. One without a weapon walked in front, the other retrieved his spear and followed behind. The guards obviously knew the route well enough to continue without light, but the other changeling did not. “Can you at least provide me the ability to see where I am going?” he asked, tripping over unseen rocks in the dark.

The guard in front of him grumbled but lit his horn, allowing a faint green glow to illuminated the uneven terrain. They had not gone far when they reached a crack in the rock leading straight down. The leading guard motioned for his charge to go first. “Fly down gently. When you reach the bottom do not move, it is filled with traps and I would be oh so upset if you got killed before Mother has the opportunity to do so herself,” he said, sarcasm pervading every word.

The larger changeling let his purple wings unfurl, and the guards also noticed that they were tinged black at their tips. The second one narrowed his eyes but said nothing. They escorted their prisoner down into the depths. They gave an occasional jab with their spear to nudge his progress downward, but shortly they landed on soft earth at the bottom. Following the guards, they entered the Hive.

Author's Note

If you have questions, I promise they will be answered in the next chapter.