Dawn of Equestria

Dawn of Equestria
by FeatherB

this book is dedicated to all those who read it
and find themselves lost within its pages

Editors and Pre-readers

Shadowed Ember - PandOracle - PeaceYinYang - Josh Irvin

Prologue

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Life in the clouds was easy, simple. It was a safe haven, void of drought or disease, decay or war. You never lost anypony you loved before it was their time, and your only concern was the name you made for yourself. But I never truly appreciated the paradise we lived in. Not until I had sat flank-deep in the hellish mire that was the world below; ruined by the Earth Ponies’ War. It had started quietly, somewhere far in the east, when I was little more than a filly. Over the moons we became numb to it; despite the shortages of food and increased labor. Only one of which, was of any real concern to me. I was privileged to be born into a line of soldiers, and when my brother had refused to carry on our name, our father entrusted me to pick up the sword. To train to become a Paladin, the elite guard of our town; it had been a dream come true.

That’s why on some nights, when I laid awake listening to the distant screams below, I envisioned myself in the midst of it all. I was a hero, locked in combat with herds of dark knights, slaying anypony who came within reach of my blade. I would stare out my window at the blood-red sky that lingered far after the sun had vanished. I hadn’t forgotten the war. If anything, I wanted to be the one leading the charge when we joined it. But the way I ended up there was not at all how I imagined.

Had I known then what I do now— the things I've seen— I never would have set hoof on the ground. I would have pretended to be asleep the night my brother came to me with his absurd notion that they needed our help; that we had to do something, anything, to help end the war. If only we had known the truth.