The Lone and Level Snows (Updated)
In a land once called Equestria, the moon hangs heavy in the sky. Above it, grey clouds drift aimlessly, long bereft of any pegasi to guide or to tame them. Beneath, a blanket of snow stretches out as far as the eye can see; cold to the touch.
Only a single set of hoofprints dare to breach its frozen surface, set deep into the smothering blanket of white.
The snow lying crushed beneath them has begun to crystallize into translucent ice, reflecting the unfamiliar light in your eyes. A light that has not existed since you first stepped foot onto this dead world.
The hooves that made these tracks are weary. They drag heavily through thick frozen waters, flattening the white peaks that block their way, but never truly driving them into submission.
A strange mark in the deepest of the trenches catches your eye. It is familiar to you, unmistakable. The overly ornate embellishment only two ponies were ever cursed to wear.
You look back at the deep trenches again, with new eyes. Now they tell you far more.
You know that Lu-that she would not usually have tread so heavily. Even had she walked she would have stepped with far more grace than this. But then she had always preferred to soar, and, if that had been an option, there would have been no tracks for you to follow at all.
Perhaps that, in itself, is fate. You decide to follow them.
They lead a straight line through the valley, past a dead oak. Its branches hang limp, bare of all but snow, framing a shattered window clinging to the deadened wood. Beneath it, the tracks pass by in careless apathy. Colder than the ice that surrounds them.
Eventually, the trail leads to the edge of the Everfree forest. Beneath these ancient tangled roots Chaos runs unchecked, its wild madness more at home here than within the ever-encroaching snows it still refuses to allow to fall. Still, no home can be made here. The last to come before broke something here, just as, in time, they broke all. They tore a rift, between themselves and between Harmony itself, that has never been able to heal. Now all hope of repair is long since passed by the wayside, left alone to shrivel up and die. Just like the tree that first brought it life.
Though he is long since slain, Discord laughs loud in vicious triumph.
Weighed down by invisible snow, the trees sag low. There have been no birds to sing from these branches for centuries, and even the fiercest of the monsters who once roamed here died many decades ago.
All, save for one.
You step away from the snow and into the graveyard. A splintered shell of a branch cracks weakly beneath you. This long dark winter has been cruel to all.
A lone wind whistles through the branches, mournful and lonely, the last voice of a world long fallen silent. A brittle yellow leaf drifts back from whence you came, landing silently on a pale hill. The snow outside your uneasy sanctuary continues to fall. Before too long the leaf is buried entirely, its golden colours somehow seeing brighter, more vibrant now in your memory than it was in reality.
You turn your head and continue to follow the overgrown path, its weak shoots feebly retreating back towards the blackened trees.
The trees themselves cave inwards, their trunks warped and desiccated from famine and neglect. Twisting and struggling, their roots flail outward, breaking the cracked surface of the ground, before returning to its depths, a starving animal desperately searching for the most frugal of meals.
All in vain.
Beneath the rotting tree, the gouged earth is littered with debris. Sharp shards of obsidian glint viciously in the feeble light. On one, something warm and wet glitters.
Blood.
Several drops glimmer softly under the light of the waning moon, splattered across the fragmented husk of the sigil of a once illustrious breastplate. They lie there, lifeless and dull, quickly crusting over in the frozen air to become part of the shattered symbol, blood-spattered foam tossed callously onto the shore by a cruel and ever-raging sea. Indistinguishable now from whatever might have come before.
You stand, looking past the fallen giant to where the magnificent ruin of a castle stands. Beneath it, hidden from your gaze, a magical tree bows, dragged low to the ground and suffocated by thick black vines rimmed with spikes and steeped in chaos.
The heart of Harmony, broken far beyond repair.
The main entrance to the castle is blocked. A masterpiece of metal, as large as the great door itself, blocks the way, an idol now fallen into decay. Moss and lichen bind the golden crescent to the ground in a never ceasing grip.
Though hoofprints alone could not tell you this, you know the pony who left them stopped here. She stared down at the collapsed spire of her might for an age, remembering all the things this place, this home, once meant. The terrified ponies working without break for weeks to meet Empress Nightmare Moon’s exacting expectations. All it had replaced. Everything it had betrayed.
You can see none of this. All that remain are four deep marks in the earth, and the subtlest scent of salt in the air.
The remainder of the tracks continue their solitary journey around the side of the castle. They pass the crumbled entrance to the servants’ quarters, before abruptly stopping at the side of a long, empty stretch of the castle wall.
You halt, frozen in place by indecision.
Time stretches on in front of you, leaving you further and further away from your goal. Still, you do not know what to do. What else is left to you if you cannot follow the last thing on this earth yet living?
Then you see the blood, shining once more its macabre glow. It glitters on the stone, still smoking in the freezing air. A small droplet escapes from the bloody mark, then another. They chase each other down to the ground, dashing themselves against the stones below with desperate speed. They pool in a small crack by the door, trickling down it towards the implacable castle wall. Then they flow beneath it, through to the citadel beyond.
You press the stone and the wall gives way, revealing the grand rusted halls of the castle beyond. Tall suits of armour line the walls, mechanical sentinels standing proud still, regardless of years or lack of comrades. Beside one, another false wall has been moved away, revealing a steep flight of stairs leading up towards the main level of the castle.
It seems, secret passages are a longstanding tradition of this castle. Skeletons too.
On the grand stately floors above, ornate marble hides the tracks of this citadel’s last inhabitant. It would be easy for you to lose her forever here in this ancient labyrinth. Only careful measuring of the dust of time, or magic words to break the silence of this cemetery could yet allow you to follow her further.
You know neither. Nor did any before you. Such is the fate of all things when no one is left to remember.
In the end, it is the thick carpet outside the dining halls which allows you to find her path again. Another door in your path is closed to you. Through the keyhole, you see a world time has yet to reach.
Plates of platinum, ringed in intricate patterns of gold and silver, reflect the clear-cut diamonds in the chandeliers hanging from the tall ceiling without a hint of tarnish. The crimson velvet of the chairs is as red as blood, far more vibrant than the faded brown of elsewhere in the castle. The foreign smell of life meets your nose. Freshly cut flowers sit on a table in the corner.
Then you open the door.
Shattered pieces of glass and metal lie scattered on the dusty floor. Beneath them, the long wooden table has rotted away, its splintered limbs thrown far away to the four dusty corners of the room. Crowning the desolation is the heavy chandelier, its frame whole, but its majesty long since lost. A bare few diamonds remain, half submerged in the deep dust, scratched and dull. Their ugly withered beauty forces you to recoil in disgust.
Only the bright blue fire in the great hearth still burns, centuries old. The enduring illusion of the Empress, cold and harsh, kept alive only by obstinacy and denial.
You turn away.
Beyond dead ghosts and cobwebs, long since disintegrated into dust, stands a courtyard.
Once, it was a walled garden. But, under the Empress, nothing would grow. So they adjusted, building a grand courtyard of stone to honour her greatness. To keep her ire at bay. Until they could adjust no more.
At its centre stands an empty plinth. Long ago it was meant to bear a statue, but once winter came none were left to finish.
The unnatural fires of the Empress burn here too. Tall braziers surround the statue in tribute, lighting the immortal words of a tyrant carved deeply into the stone.
Here stands I, Nightmare Moon. Look upon the greatness of my Kingdom, Sister, and despair.
Around the plinth only petrified flowers lie, forgotten on the fallow ground.
But the hoofprints do not lead there. Not initially. Instead they lead you up stones dissolved almost to sand, toward a tower unseen for a thousand years.
Here the sun shines in stone, bright and forgotten. And resented. The smell of salt is overpowering.
The orange and gold the walls once held have long since faded here, just as they have everywhere else. The browns they have faded to quietly whisper comfort, a voiceless promise of home and safety
Another fire, blue and cold, shines harshly from the grate. It blazes fiercely, kept alive by hate, and love, and everything in between.
Beside it a delicate music box lies fragmented on the floor, the last notes of its ancient song toneless and dull. Oil leaks from its cracks, belying its violent end. Above the shattered relic, twinned hairs of pale pink and cornflower blue drift slowly toward the dusty floor, still knit tightly together by a faded ribbon that has only just begun to fray at its ends.
Deeper in the dust, the torn pieces of an old portrait sleep untouched. Frozen in a world long past, its two subjects lie in shreds, torn apart by fury, betrayal, and grief.
In the corner of the room resides an old floor cushion, large enough even for two Empresses to sit side by side. It is this spent fabric which smells most of salt.
Even now, the yellow fabric is warm to the touch, filled with the lingering warmth of the only being left living in this frozen world. Tears darken the corner; but it is the heart which is stained scarlet.
Now you know, you do not need hoofprints to follow.
You turn back to the door. There is another path you could not see before, hidden by a worn tapestry emblazoned with an emblem alien to your eyes.
Instead of the empress there are two alicorns sewn into its fabric; one white as snow, and the other a blue so dark, at first you mistake it for black. Together they form a circle, a never-ending cycle of sun and moon. Unity.
Harmony.
Blasphemy.
Such fantasies are, of course, impossible. The moon has not set for a thousand years and will not do so now.
Even so, the tears run silently down your cheeks.
You pull the tapestry aside, the falling dust deep enough to drown your lungs. You cough harshly, reeling back.
The iron rail bends at the sudden weight, giving way. Quickly, you throw yourself out of the way, across the small room, falling heavily onto the threadbare cushion. The lukewarm liquid soaks your coat, its grasping fingers reaching through and into your skin.
Stumbling to your feet you catch sight of something entirely unexpected. Where the curtain once was are elaborate carvings hewn in stone, created with a care and creativity entirely foreign to the fortress of Nightmare Moon.
The Empress is loud. Her every thought pervades this castle, her every movement through it calculated to draw and hold attention. Even now with no audience, those walls remember.
This place is different, unfettered in a way even you cannot fully comprehend. Somehow, heedless of all the centuries that have passed, this sanctuary has remained unchanged.
You feel like an intruder here; witness to oaths sworn in stone, far too personal for you to look upon.
But you have already seen the words. They stretch along the bottom, written in a childish scrawl, shaky and bobbing, the hoof of a foal fighting to stay aloft.
Luna and Celestia. Best sisters forever.
Above it, the careful calligraphy of an artist echoes that oath. Two letters have been carefully entwined, a monogram tightly knit around the bond, sealed into the stone in which it was first proclaimed. Around them is sculpted the same sun and moon forever locked in the same eternal dance that has been denied to the world beyond for a millennia.
Beyond the stone is a passageway, dark and unwelcoming. At its end, you think you glimpse the deep purples of the Empress’s chambers. It too is filled with dust, abandoned since the last years of the empire so long ago, when she ceased sleep completely.
The room appears empty, but looks can be deceiving. This is the realm of the Nightmare and, in a room filled with shadow, anything could be an enemy.
You have come too far and suffered too much to die here.
So you bite down hard on your curiosity, turn your back on the past, and make for the stairs.
By now the stains on the stairs have turned to crimson rust. Even so, you take care where you step. There is more than one ghost here you fear to wake. Beneath your feet the stone rumbles like thunder.
You take a deep breath, then keep on walking.
On the last step, you hear a sharp crack. As your last foot leaves the stairs they crumble to rubble, sealing off a relic of history the no longer matters.
You travel back down the long ostentatious corridors. Their walls stretch wide, as thin and translucent as paper, straining to hide the rotting corpse this palace truly is.
Something in your mind snaps into place. The walls begin to close in.
They descend from above and every side, a twisted theatre backdrop grasping at your back as you sprint down the halls.
From the corner of your eye you catch a glimpse of sickly pale bone.
Heavy rocks collapse the exit behind you as you stumble outside, into the stone garden. Catching your breath your eyes search wildly for an exit.
One lies at the far end, back out into the wildness of the forest, but what stands in your way gives you pause.
The empty pedestal is empty no longer. Your quest is over. Before you stands the last living Equestrian.
For a brief moment you think her a statue. No mortal could stand frozen as she does, rearing high into the sky. Then you correct yourself. This is no mortal. This Is Nightmare Moon. Breaker of Discord. Banisher of the Sun. Doom of All.
But she is an empress no longer.
Her silver horseshoes are rusted brown and caked in moss and mud. Her ice blue eyes are bloodshot red, whilst her limbs are grey with cobwebs and dust. The mane that once flowed with stars is long gone and the tail that once matched it is now stone chaining her to the ground, its long heavy curls more fitting for a foal than a Queen.
Her black wings furl out from her back in false pride. Their feathers are worn and dull, the pinions barely clinging to their rightful place. Her coat is matted with sweat, the sickly aroma of desperation reaching through the air towards you mixed with the sharp scent of iron. A jagged line of red stretches along her side, crimson blood slowly dripping from it, down onto the base of the statue.
The only part of her untouched by time and trial is her helm, the helm of the Nightmare. As you stand watching, a single flake of snow falls from the previously clear sky. It dances around the statue, coming just an inch too close to destruction. The instant it touches the helm something ripples and the snowflake disappears.
Involuntarily you shudder.
A single strand of hair, cornflower blue, slips from within the helm of the Nightmare. For a moment it blows on the breeze, tossed on the frozen wind. Then it turns to rock, a single line on a visage of stone.
The Nightmare smiles.
The gale of snow suddenly intensifies, blinding your sight and covering the courtyard in white. In the few seconds it takes to pass the world changes again.
The fires in the braziers surrounding the plinth have been snuffed out. As your eyes clear the last azure ember dies; softer, somehow, now than the fury of before.
The Empress herself has become the statue you mistook her for before. The imperfections of before have been smoothed away into the perfect façade she ordered constructed so long ago.
Only one imperfection in the flawless design remains. Rather than look proudly upon her Kingdom the Empress has turned her head, gazing instead at the east horizon with an indecipherable expression softening and hardening the lines of her proud face. Her sightless eyes search beyond the horizon, somehow fixated on something you cannot see.
The words that defined her too have changed. The weight of an age held in a second has worn away at the stone, leaving only a cruel irony to remain.
Look upon the greatness of my Kingdom, Sister, and despair.
In the land once known as Equestria, the Sun begins to rise.
