Midday

     This time there was no time to prepare. She couldn’t mentalize for what was coming at her, and this time the tears that fell from her eyes weren’t from pain anymore, but from fear, from frustration that she was doomed to die in such a horrible manner… But again it seemed that destiny had other plans.

     The sword didn’t touch her, but it made a horrible scratching noise when it teared through stone and dirt, sending out sparks into the filly’s face, who groaned when she felt them burn her fur. The leader, on her side, didn’t say anything until she made sure the sword was at least half way inside the earth and then let her go.

     Windsong broke out from her as if she were still trying to kill her, but didn’t moved an inch before stumbling on the sword’s blade, firmly stuck in the floor. When she looked back the leader had stepped back a few steps, and was glaring at her with pure hatred, as if she were waiting for her to pick the weapon and fight her.

“You” she spoke instead with a forced accent. “Pick it up when you have the strength” Windsong took a moment to realize she was speaking of the sword. The filly wiped a tear from her cheek, but didn’t back away, this time resolved to defy her. The leader just dedicated another stern look at her in response. “Or don’t. It’s your choice” she turned away. “I’ll be waiting.”

    Again that hurricane rose from the ground, just as she made her wings flap to take her off. The rest of them followed her, and with the flapping of wings at unison, the wind that the flock of killers rose was comparable to a storm. Windsong didn’t care. She wouldn’t give anything else to that display of power. To her, those monsters had took away everything she held dear, crushed what little of filly she had inside.

     She looked at them as they departed, getting lost in the black clouds of smoke and the sound of the battle that still revolted around them, every time with less screams and clashes, and with more choirs of roars from what surely were the other creatures like them, claiming victory over their enemies, and soon-to-be meals. Windsong stared at the general direction of their flight even when there was nothing else to see. She hated them. She hated them with all her strength, and she’d never rest until every single one of them would be put to the sword as she had been: Amidst the fire and steel…

Rainbow Dash didn’t woke up with agitation, as she’d done before. She wasn't screaming, nor were she struggling with some unknown foe that turned out to be her blanket when she recovered her senses. She was lying on the floor, that she could know, tired and achy as if she’d been through a full contact match and lost. Things around her room were in total disarray, even more than usual, and her bed was, strangely, set against the window, like if it had been disposed to prevent some unknown foe to enter through there.

“What the he-OW!!!” she groaned when she tried to stand up. Her left wing hurt. “Tha heck?”

     With discomfort, mostly brought by her whole left side, Rainbow stood up, trying not to groan because of the pain that the fact of using her leg caused her. Just as she got up to her fours, she was able to better asses the deplorable estate in which her whole room was. What happened to this place? And what happened to her?

     The answer didn’t come straight away to her, but in the form of something hung up in her wall. A bright that caught her eye almost instantly when she passed them over it. But how could it be the cause to this? Of her nightmares? Of everything…

     It was a just gift she had received from her uncle Thunder Storm from outside Equestria. Nothing more than a good luck augury. An old pendant, at least the size of her hoof, which, according to her uncle, had been in her family for generations. A piece of jewelry that showed within a masterfully done metal frame, which showed four strange marks on each of its sides, a beautiful topaz, as beautiful as the sun, crimped in it. Her amulet of strength. Her family’s Holy Thunder.