The Corvus Prince

by Daemon McRae

Rating: teen
Tags: My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic, Dark, Princess Luna, Thriller, Horror, Other
Length: 8810

In a brand new book as old as old, the Penumbral waits for all. Simple words from simple minds shall bear him forth to call. An ancient rhyme as old as sound shall herald the last of light. Dawn and dusk and all between, it will even claim the night.

There exists an ancient text as new as yesterday.
Bound in things best left ignored, it has one thing to say.

A simple message told in rhyme, it waits for one to read.
Until such time as it is spoken, so to it is freed.

The Corvus Prince, Penumbral Son, the Uncrowned King awaits.
From Neverwere he rises up, and marches on his gates.

A step before a step again he walks in patient stride.
Unwavering and steady on, he rises like the tide.

Read not the words, the Prince's creed, be silent, walk away.
From the moment that the words are spoken, you have but one day.

Published 2017-10-02 19:40:07 UTC
Last updated 2017-10-09 18:53:24 UTC

Chapter One

Chapter One

Caw, Caw, the Black Prince cries
As the housecat prowls and the raven flies

Caw, Caw, he cries again
As the flowers wither where his shadow has been

Fly, Fly, the Prince commands
marching fur and feather to the farthest lands

End, End, the Black Prince prays
As he waits all alone for the end of days

Princess Luna paced in her study, not because she was nervous, or on edge. In fact, it was none of the usual reasons most ponies pace, back and forth. She paced because she was reading. A large, ancient tome floated in front of her, her eyes perusing it lazily, as if it was nothing more than a dime-store mystery novel she had found on an old shelf and approached with a lack of anything better to do.

Of course, it helped that the ancient tome was actually a few centuries younger than the alicorn reading it. In fact, she had found its contents rather amusing. It was, for the time it was written, a history text. Hoof-written, depicting ancient battles and military stratagems according to the author, who wrote from the best information he had available. This didn’t stop him from being wrong.

Luna smiled to herself as she re-read a particularly interesting passage about her and her sister’s encounter with Discord. She couldn’t lay any particular blame on the author for the inaccuracies in this section, as she had difficulty remembering the details herself, and she had been there. Chaos magic had a way of making such things as simple observation a much greater chore than necessary.

She set the book aside, ceasing her absent-minded pacing in favor of a more deliberate trot over to her private bookshelf. Considering the size of her royal chambers, it was much smaller than expected, in that it was the same size as really any bookcase you’d find in the home of a regular citizen. It was a favorite piece of hers, however, as it had been her own purchase; a venture into the modern day, to see how ponies now bartered and traded as opposed to the methods used before her banishment. It had been her first successful purchase, if only by virtue of all her other acquisitions on her trip being presented to her as gifts She had a particularly fond memory of the ratchety old shopkeep who had sold her the piece, as he had little patience for anypony trying to use their so called ‘authority’ for a lower price. A customer was a customer, and money was money, according to him. Luna found herself regularly shopping their. She had a small sitting room furnished almost entirely from that store.

The books on the shelf were near as important to her as the shelf they sit on. Some of them were texts as old as the one she had just returned to its post. Some were brand new, her foray into the recent trends of popular fiction. Some still were truly ancient texts, pieces of her collection her sister had managed to save for her eventual return. That had been an emotional day when Celestia had brought up the book filled with her old journals and picture books, textbooks and collections of poetry.

Her eyes perused the limited shelves, a collection of her most favorite books, ones she’d read literally dozens of times, showing no sign of stopping. Until her eyes fell on one old, curiously bound book. It intrigued her, in that she had never seen it before. This wasn’t new, however, as she and her sister had made it a game of leaving each other presents in natural spots, waiting until the other noticed it. It had taken Celestia almost a week to notice the new curtains Luna had bought for her (from the same furnisher, of course).

She levitated the book in front of her, and read the title aloud with a sense of dry humor. “The Penumbral Son,” she said with a scoff. No doubt her sister had seen the… what was the word… “edgy” title and left it for her as some sort of a prank. She imagined it to be some kind of collection of deeply emotional and poorly written poetry by a self-proclaimed ‘damaged’ soul the world no longer understood.

Luna had no patience for the “emo” crowd.

There was no dust on the old book, which didn’t surprise her. Either it had been there a few days, and the maids had tended to it, or it had been put there fresh. She’d been more surprised if there had been dust. She opened the book, and saw, in plain text, in an older font, the same words on the inside page as on the cover, The Penumbral Son, but with a subtitle. Below the ornate writing of the title were the words “The Tale of Corvus: Uncrowned King of Neverwere.”

Her apprehensions regarding gaudy collections of metered whining abated, she turned the page to begin reading. Until she saw that the first page was simply a large black rectangle, stopping just a half inch short of the borders of the page. She flipped the next few pages to see much of the same. In fact, it appeared at first that the entire ‘text’ was little more than the most well-measured waste of ink she had ever seen, until about halfway through, she found the first passage.

“The Prince he sits on a throne as old
As the world is round and the ice is cold

He cries no tears and wears no smiles
And sees no soul for miles and miles

In empty space and hollow verse
He recites his creed for better or worse:”

The next few lines were much harder to read, as they seemed to have a large, blocky line drawn through them, neat and clean. If she didn’t know any better, Luna would venture that it was merely part of the font, so evenly was it drawn. Of course, being the ancient, noble, and intelligent creature that she was, it was a simple matter of extrapolating the information based on the tops and bottoms of the letters that she could see.

It only took her an hour, and two notepads. Much better than the last time, when she had attempted to read her physician’s hoofwriting, only to determine she had accidentally pocketed his shopping list, her prescription for flu medicine still on his counter.

Setting aside her quills, ink, and spare notepads, she held up the final, deciphered passage on a scrap of paper next to the book, and read aloud:

“Within this cage of bone and skin
Lies my beating heart within

For when the call comes out for me
I shall return posthaste to thee

My life eternal and patience long
I shall return with verse and song

Each lyric spoken and line orated
Shall bring an end so orchestrated

As to turn the world from light
from dawn, from dusk, and even night

No longer shall the world doth turn
Once the Corvan Prince returns.”

Luna raised an appreciative eyebrow at the simple rhyme. She appreciated that, even though it had been rather bleak poetry, there was no mention of lost love and self-harm, and most appreciatively, no lines lamenting the ‘only one who understands’. She had had enough of that malarkey, thank you very much.

She noticed that there was, in fact, much more text to be read, and had begun pacing as she turned the page to continue. She was stopped in her tracks, however, as the book fell from the air. No warning, no reaction, as though she had let go of it on purpose. Which she hadn’t. It had simply… fallen. And on impact, had opened itself to one of the solid black pages. She attempted to lift it again with her magic, to no avail. It simply wouldn’t move. As if she had no magic to speak of. An experimental levitation of another text disproved this theory, yet rose many other questions.

Ones she didn’t get a chance to ask straight away, as the black page began to bulge slightly. It rose, gracefully and carefully, until it began to take a simple shape. Luna watched with a combination of curiosity and hesitation as the black ink melted away from the rising mass to reveal the shape of a single black cat, who regarded Luna with an equally curious stare. She then meowed lightly, then walked out of the room.

This in and of itself did not concern the princess.

The next two-dozen cats did.

Chapter Two

Chapter Two

”The cats, they purr, because they know
The Ravens, too, and so they crow

These beasts and birds have long since known
That where they’ve prowled and where they’ve flown

Would wither, weep, and waste away
Till naught was left but light of day

And soon, they all would take the skies
And carry death as the crow flies”

Luna had seen books perform magic on their own before. Some because they were enchanted to do so. Some because the spells they held within were so great, so powerful, as to imbue the text itself with arcane energy. Some just because Discord had found it amusing. She had seen words leap off the page, quite literally. She had seen texts of the Old Wood melt into the floor and bring forests to life around her. More than once, actually, she had seen creatures spring from the book and prowl around. So a couple dozen black cats walking about the castle, while not a common occurrence in the least, wasn’t much of a bother to her. Simply a hassle to collect and herd.

It was their tendency to melt into the walls, as if they had flattened into shadows of cats instead of real cats (which, to be fair, they weren’t), and walked about as if there had been a real cat strutting around casting a shadow. Also, the inky paw prints they left behind were proving extremely difficult to clean.

She was chasing one particularly playful feline when she came across her freshly-woken sister, stepping out of her room and pausing in surprise as the cat ran in front of her. She tuned her head to see a not-very-stealthy Luna trying to sneak up on the cat, coming around the corner, only to straighten herself when she saw that her quarry had gained quite a lead on her. “Oh, stars!” Luna exclaimed. “I liked that one.”

Celestia raised a confused eyebrow at her sister. “Dear Luna, what in the wide wide world of Equestria are you doing?”

Luna looked up at her sister with a light smile. “Oh, good morning sister! I must thank you for the wonderful present you left me!”

Celestia tilted her head with a smile. “I was wondering how long it would take you to find it.”

“Oh yes, it was rather well-hidden,” Luna conceded. Her horn glowed as she levitated the large, curious tome in front of her. “Hiding it on the shelf of ancient textbooks was rather clever. I almost didin’t notice the strange bindings!”

“Um...” said the Princess of the Sun hesitantly. “Luna, that’s… that’s not the gift I left you.”

The younger of the two sisters raised an eyebrow. “What do you mean? Of course it is! It sat on my shelf, dustless, clean as a whistle, just waiting to be read! And read it I did. Then a whole gathering of cats poured out of its pages, and I have spent the last few hours chasing the clever beasts! It has been quite amusing,” she explained, with a wide smile.

The blue aura around the text was quickly overtaken by a yellow one, as Celestia took the text in he own magic to investigate it. She scanned the cover, and, not recognizing the title, noticed something curious about the material with which it was bound. She eyed it carefully, sniffed it once, and even licked it. As soon as she had done so, she reeled back, dropping the book. “Luna!” She exclaimed. “How could you think I would give you such an atrocious gift?!”

Her sister flinched from Celestia’s sudden mood change. “What, what’s wrong?”

Celestia held the book up to her sister’s snout. “This book is bound in leather, Luna!”

The Princess of the Moon took several steps back, clearly horrified by the revelation. “Wha-what?! Why would somepony DO that?!”

Celestia, seeing how her sister was as disgusted by the concept of a book bound in treated flesh as she was, set the book aside on a nearby table. “Alright, Luna. Tell me everything that happened since you found the book.”

Luna recounted the details of her experience with reading the text, the efforts to determine the crossed-out lines, and the cats that had emerged from the pages, only to run rampant around the castle. Celestia considered this information very carefully for a few moments, before stating, “Luna, I think… I think this is some kind of dark magic. I can’t be sure, obviously, since sending out waves of mischievous cats seems less like malevolence and more like a practical joke. Of course, making them melt into the walls seems more and more like something our friend Discord would do. Maybe we should have a word with him.”

Discord himself was relatively easy to find, however, as he had taken to spending quite a bit of time in the tea room lately. He claimed his motivation was to learn more about different kinds of teas to find new ways of surprising Fluttershy, but most ponies suspected he just really liked tea. Nopony could blame him, however, as the tea in the Castle was amazing.

Luna and Celestia found him here, sampling an array of imports from Saddle Arabia. He looked up at his new guests, and smiled crookedly. Of course, all of his smiles were crooked. It was difficult to determine if he was doing it on purpose or not. “Why, Tia, Lulu! What brings you here to my little tea-tasting party?”

Luna approached him with more caution than her sister, as she had never quite gotten used to his self-proclaimed reformation. “Discord… we have some questions for you,” she said flatly. Even now she was unsure of how to address the draconequus that had given her such brief before and after her banishment.

Celestia nodded, although greeted him more amicably. “Yes, Discord. Good morning. We were wondering if you… if you had anything to do with this,” she finished, bringing forth the suspicious book.

Discord not only fell out of the air, but fell out of the chair underneath him when he landed. “Wha-what in Tartarus are you bringing that atrocious thing around here for?!” he bellowed, uncharacteristically disturbed.

Luna and Celestia both recoiled from his outburst, Celestia’s hoof pulling away from the spreading pool of tea that had spilled in the process of Discord meeting the floor. “I, um… I take it you’ve seen this book before?” Celestia asked, setting the book on the far side of the table, and eyeing it like an armed bomb.

Discord stood up straight, wiping tea off of himself. It was a testament to his current mood that he hadn’t bothered with magic to do the job for him. “Of course I have! That… that thing chased me out of my home dimension thousands of years ago! Why do you think I came here to terrorize you lot in the first place? I only recently got the place cleaned up enough to move back in! Although the Bottomless Pit has proven nigh impossible to relocate. Now I just use it to throw rude salesponies in!”

Widely sidestepping the many things wrong with that last sentence, Luna asked, “Ok, what IS it?!”

Discord stepped away from thee table as if the book had moved. “It’s a prophecy in action. A physical manifestation of an ancient legend. Gods rest the soul who actually tries to read the thing. I’m just glad I crossed out all the dangerous parts!”

Luna flinched. “And… um… what would happen if, say… a bored scholar, not knowing what the book was, spent some time in extrapolating the missing text, and then, oh, I don’t know… read… it… aloud?” she finished sheepishly, as Discord’s glare grew more and more prominent.

“You did NOT,” he stated.

“SO!” Celestia interjected, in an effort to avoid conflict. “Say all of that happened. What… what do we do about the cats?”

Discord glared at Luna for a few moments longer, then turned to the older sister. “Stay away from them. They’re just the first wave. They’re dangerous, just like everything else that’s going to pop out of that infernal book. And whatever you do, don’t let them cross your shadow.”

Celestia raised an eyebrow. Then another. She then looked down at her shadow.

Or, what should have been her shadow. Instead of an elongated expanse of black in the rough shape of an alicorn, there was instead a similarly stretched shadowy cat. It’s paws met her hooves, and it moves as she did. Luna and Discord followed her gaze, and recoiled at what they saw.

Discord looked from the floor to the Princes of the Sun, and slowly backed up a step. Celestia simply shook in fear, rooted to the spot. “What… what’s going to happen to me?” she asked, in a small, small voice.

Discord shook his head. “Well, first, you’re going to pass out. Then things get bad.”

Celestia looked even more alarmed. “What do you mean, ba-*” THUD. Celestia met the floor, her eyes rolling back into her head.

“SISTER!” Luna cried. She ran forward to tend to her elder sibling.

“NO!” Discord cried, flinging her backwards with a push of magic. “DON’T touch her, or her shadow! We… we have to leave here here for now. It’s not safe to move her physically, and your magi won’t even touch her. Neither will mine. I assume you ran into a similar issue with your magic and that… book when you first read it,” he mused sourly.

Luna thought back to the book dropping out of her mental grasp with ease. “Yes. I couldn’t even go near it, magically, until all the cats came out.”

Discord sighed. “We’re going to need a lot of help. And to let the castle occupants know not to go near the cats.”

Taking a sad look at her poor sister, Luna sighed, “Who do we know that could help us with something like this? Even you’re afraid of it.”

Discord sighed, not out of remorse, or empathy, but frustration. “There’s one pony I know more likely to have come across something like this than anypony else. The Princess of Books, Twilight Sparkle.”

Chapter Three

Chapter Three

Feathers ruffle and hackles raise
Under the Prince’s sweeping gaze

He takes it in, the dying land
And trudges on through tides of sand

No flesh or bone or breath remain
His presence naught but inky stain

The shades of beasts are all that’s left
In this land of life bereft

The castle was swiftly locked down. With Celestia unconscious, it fell to Luna to lead not only the employees of the Castle, but the country itself. The words was spread about the cats, though not as quickly as she’d liked. She was already getting reports of other ponies falling unconscious with cats for shadows. More disturbingly, it seemed that the cats now wore the pony’s shadows.

Discord had disappeared to gather Twilight and her friends, to much protest. He had been adamant about keeping Fluttershy away from such danger, but Luna had driven home the point that, should they need the Elements, they would need ALL the Elements. He hadn’t returned yet, either because gathering them all was proving more difficult than she had thought, or because Discord was delaying their return as much as he could.

The citizens of Canterlot had demanded answers, upon seeing the Castle’s gates, windows, and other points of egress shut tightly. Thus, Luna now stood on the grand balcony, addressing a select few members of the media and City Council. “Citizens!” she declared, in her best Royal Canterlot Voice. In other circumstances, she would be enthused to be using it so blatantly. She greatly enjoyed doing so. Just not in such sad circumstances. “It falls to us to inform you that Celestia has grown ill!” A measured sentence, not quite a lie, but nowhere near the truth. “Fear not, our little ponies, as we have tracked the source, and are addressing it accordingly! This lockdown is merely to ensure the good health of the citizens outside of the Castle! There have been reported cases amongst the staff, but they are few and far between!” There were only two-dozen casts in a Castle of three hundred ponies, anyway. Or, at least, she hoped that made a difference. “We are simply following protocol. As such, the Day and Night Courts will be closed for the next few days, as our dear sister recovers. We ask that you be patient, as we take the necessary precautions!”

There was a murmur of dissent amongst the crowd, quickly overtaken by the media’s demands for answers. “The nature of the illness,” she continued, grasping bits and pieces of questions stemming from the cacophony, “Has been determined. It is an old disease, brought about by exposure to an ancient text! Our dear sister merely inhaled the dust from a long-untended tome. We apologize to the citizens who ere exposed to the disease before we were able to identify it! However, we have a local expert on this affliction, and are bringing in outside help, as added assurance!”

This mixture of blatant lies and half-truths had been discussed in advance, and seemed to serve its purpose. It helps that the lie was based on previous events, when Luna herself had fallen ill after digging out her old diaries, and taking in a lungful of dust that had been there for centuries. Fortunately, the cure for Insomnambula had been discovered a hundred years prior, and she had merely been stuck in Astral from for a day or two.

How she wished the answers were so simple now. She addressed a few more questions with some white lies and empty comforts, then sent those attending away. Returning to the inner chambers, she was met with a small stampede of mares running to meet her. Twilight and her friends had arrived. “What happened to Celestia?!” Twilight demanded. “Is she ok? What happened to her? Where is she?” she rambled on, her deep concern for her mentor evident even in the way she trotted impatiently in one spot. The rest of the Elements also voiced their concerns, in their own unique manners.

“Calm thyself, Twilight Sparkle. I am glad you and your companions are here. I would appreciate your insight into the matter. Discord mentioned that you had some… experience with older texts, even mysterious ones,” Luna said calmingly.

“Actually,” Discord said, appearing off to the side, partaking in a cup of tea he felt was owed him, given the rude interruption earlier this morning, “What I said was we needed the Princess of Books. If anypony knows more about that horrible thing than I do, it’s somepony who never stops reading.”

Twilight gave him a dispassionate glare, then returned her attention to the reigning matriarch. “What are you talking about? I thought you said the princess was sick?”

Luna motioned for them to follow her, and led the precession of ponies and draconequus to Celestia’s chambers, where she lay unconscious, though breathing normally, in her bed. In fact, she looked less like she was ill, and more like she had simply gone to bed. Laying on a table in the middle of the room, by itself (Luna distinctly remembered a tea set sitting next to it, as well as a couple of quills), was the large black book.

Twilight considered the large tome, then her mentor’s restful condition. At least, apparently restful. Luna saw her move towards the alicorn in bed, and raised a hoof to stop her, instead guiding her rather urgently to the troublesome text.

Sparkle reluctantly relented, and approached the book, followed a few paces behind her friends, who up to now had opted to stay quiet. Well, until Applejack spoke up. “What is that thing?”

They circled around the table, carefully approaching it, but nopony seemed willing to touch it. Luna didn’t blame them, even if they didn’t know what it did. Or had done.

Or, at least, she thought. Rainbow Dash took one look at the book, and reeled back. “The hay is that doing here?!” she demanded, almost faltering out of the sky.

The other girls gave her curious looks. Twilight said, with no lack of disbelief, “Rainbow Dash, it’s a book. An old one. No offense, but I doubt you know what it actually is.”

“Heck yeah I do! So do you! We read that Daring Do book together!” Dash explained.

Twilight raised an eyebrow, then the other, in an expression that decently mirrored her mentor’s from a few hours ago. Then she looked, wide-eyed, at the book. “You mean that’s-”

Rainbow nodded, not answering. The est of the girls just looked at the two impatiently. “Do one a’y’all wanna explain what’s goin’ on here?” Applejack demanded.

Twilight slowly approached the book, and answered. “There’s a Daring Do book in the middle of the series that got a limited print. Rainbow and I both have copies, of course,” she gloated, then coughed, as the array of looks she received indicated that now was not the time. “It’s called Daring Do and the Sunken Archive. It’s about an ancient library at the center of the world, under the deepest ocean, where all of the most evil and corrupt books and artifacts are kept. This book was one of the major parts of the story. It’s called The Penumbral Son, but that’s not the real name of the book. The Penumbral Son was an old pony’s tale from before… before you were banished, Princess,” Twilight added apologetically.

“Do not worry about my feelings, Twilight Sparkle, we have more pressing concerns,” Luna said firmly, but sympathetically.

“Right,” Twilight nodded, continuing. “The real title is The Last Rites of the Corvus Prince. The Penumbral Son is a false front, to get ponies to read the book. The legend was about a lost heir to the throne of Equestria, lost forever in another dimension during an eclipse. The real thing is much more troublesome.”

“Yeah,” Rainbow added, taking over. “This Corvus Prince dude is like, not even a real pony. He’s just aa… what’s that thing where one thing is used to describe another thing?”

“Metaphor,” Twilight answered.

“Right, that. He’s a metaphor for the end of the world, or something. Apparently the book is like some weird how-to guide on bringing about the end times!” she ended, her voice rising to a crescendo.

Luna was skeptical. “If such a tome existed, I think I would have heard of it by now. I am aware of the legend of the Sunken Archive, although it’s not beneath the ocean. It’s approximately two miles underneath the Capital city of Saddle Arabia. Although its purpose is much the same. And in all my times visiting the Archive, I’ve never once come across this book.”

Discord scoffed. “Of course you haven’t. You’d have done something about it long before now. The book isn’t really a book, you know. It’s a… thing, from somewhere else. It just looks like a book when it wants to. It’s smart, smarter than you think. Old Corvus was a devious, patient sort, after all. He knew how to play the Long Game. Took me centuries to find a way out the last time I ran across him.”

Pinkie Pie tilted her head, giving the tome a curious glance. “Why don’t we just ask Corvus to, you know, NOT end the world?”

“Pinkie, dear, if Discord is bothered by this… Corvus fellow, I doubt he’s the kind that can be talked to,” Rarity said placatingly.

“Actually, you can talk to him all you like,” Discord muttered. “Wouldn’t do you a word of good. He’s implacable. Doesn’t stop for anything. He’s not so much a force of evil as he is an instrument. He’s entirely about function. It’s not that he’s a violent fellow, as a matter of fact. But, according to him, he has a job to do. It just so happens that that job is-”

“-the end of the world,” the book finished. All present jumped, backing away from the book, as it flipped open to one of the solid black pages. The ink receded in patterns across the page, until the block of ink had become the image of a rather dashing, if dispassionate, stallion. “Hello, Discord.”

“Corvus,” Discord said dryly. “What brings you around this time?”

“Oh, I’m always around. Just waiting for somepony to find me. You all seemed to be struggling with some of the more basic concepts of my existence, so I thought I’d elaborate. It felt like the polite thing to do,” the book, Corvus, explained.

“Um, thank you?” Fluttershy said quietly, not sure whether or not to run away from the talking book.

The image bowed it’s head politely. “Of course. Discord is correct. I wish no ill will upon any of you. Unfortunately, it just to happens that I have a duty to fulfill. This book is simply a tool. I have many tools, scattered about the land. This, of course, is the only one active right now, but it matters not. I only need the one. And should you find a way to disable it, I will simply wait until another is activated. I have no illusions of being unstoppable, or undefeatable. Merely inevitable. The mare you refer to as Daring Do disabled this tool once. So I simply moved it. You, Luna,” he added, turning to the Princess of the Night, “Have indeed crossed paths with me a few times, though I wore a different face and name. I believe you are familiar with The Nightmare?”

Luna’s entire body tensed. “That was YOU?!”

Corvus nodded. “Indeed. The end of daylight would have brought the slow, cold end to the world. Then I would have driven you to end the night, as well, after those whom you’d sought to rule died in droves under your care. Of course, the rest of you,” he nodded to the Elements, and Princess Twilight, “succeeded in thwarting that plan. I bare you no ill will, mind you. You simply fought to survive, and won. It is in your nature, as the end of all things is in mine. I like to think of myself as very pragmatic. As Discord stated, I have a certain affectation for the Long Game. Truth be told, I’d like to think I could grow fond of you ponies, were I capable of emotion. After all, once the world has ended, what more is there for me to do? I will no longer exist, either. Of course, this doesn’t mean that I will be ‘pulling any punches’. I have work ahead of me. I will do what I will do, and this time, I’m afraid none of you can stop me.”

“What makes you so sure?!” Rainbow said defiantly. “You said so yourself that we beat you over and over again!”

Corvus shook his head, a large frame with a great mane of long, unkempt black hair. Or, it looked black. There was only one color of ink in the book, of course. “No, I said you’d disabled my tools. This time, I will not be leaving things to their own devices, content to wait until my machinations have worked themselves out. No, you do not face a mere tool this time.” He pressed a hoof against the frame of his portrait, and the page bulged forward. Soon after, the hoof rose in a tide of ink, much like the cats had. The ponies backed away as he surged forward, crawling out of the book.

Once they got a good look at him, he looked only partially like a pony. Still as black as the ink he’d emerged from, his front hooves hit the floor, followed shortly by rear paws. They noticed that only his front half was that of a pony, the back half that of a great black cat. His wings unfurled, pitch as the rest of him, still dripping ink on the floor. Or what they all hoped was ink. His pony half was that of a classically handsome stallion, similar to depictions on the front of romance novels.

Although, given that he had arisen from a picture book, it was entirely possible that he merely chose what he wanted to look like. He panned his gaze across the group, and said simply. “This time, you face me.”

That was when the first crow hit the window.

Chapter Four

Chapter Four

One bright day in the middle of the night...

“Why tell us this?” Luna demanded. “Why make yourself known after using so many proxies? What makes this… attempt so special?” She flinched as another bird hit the same window. The second in as many minutes.

Corvus regarded the Princess with a sense of what would be considered curiosity on anypony else. “You know, it’s rare that someone asks me the right questions right away. Usually it’s ‘why me’ or ‘what do you want’. I would think such questions would be easy to answer. It’s never about the individual. They are merely present, nothing more. It is their own will and actions that lead them to believe they are… predestined… for something. Perhaps they are. I wouldn’t know. That is not my function. Although, I digress. You have asked me questions, and in the spirit of… shall I say sportsmanship, I will answer them. As best as I know how, of course. I am far from omniscient.”

He paced around the room thoughtfully, taking in the décor for a moment. Everypony stepped back from him, giving him room to walk as he made a full circuit. He talked as he walked, explaining, “I share this information with you, because there is no reason for me to withhold it. It grants neither of us an advantage, me to stay silent, or you to know what I know. I make myself known, not because I have chosen too, but because you have called for it. Not on purpose, of course,” he added, seeing the protest form on Luna’s lips, “But because you read the words. Most of my tools, or substitutes, are much easier to operate. The passage you deciphered and read, thwarting Discord’s valiant attempt to prevent such a happenstance, happens to be one of only a very small hooffull of ways to grant me personal access to this world.”

“Which is precisely why I crossed it out so thoroughly,” Discord grumbled.

“Why didn’t you just destroy it entirely?” Twilight barked, incensed. Another bird hit, then another, and Twilight gave the slowly cracking glass a panicked look.

“Because I would not let him,” Corvus explained. He climbed onto the foot of the bed in which Celestia lay, spreading himself out lazily like the half-cat he was, and stared evenly at the group. There were a few protests and threat to his current position, which he pointedly ignored. “The book, like most of my tools, is completely within my control. It cannot be destroyed, or altered. Simply crossing out ink with ink would serve him no purpose, for as you have seen, the ink on those pages is little more than a plaything to me. I find the written word quite entertaining, in fact. However, you,” he now addressed Discord himself, “Were rather clever, crossing out my works with charcoal instead. Shame you couldn’t do so with the entire script.”

The draconequus scoffed. “Well, it’s not exactly like I had all the time in the world to do so.”

“No, I suppose not. Also, somepony might want to do something bout that window, before-” he was interrupted as one last bird hit the glass, breaking through until its neck had become lodged in the shattered pane. “That happens,” he finished. It struggled furiously for a second, then froze, as if in a photograph. Wings extended, beak still open mid-caw, it began to melt, until its black form had melted into so much ink, and seeped through to this side of the glass. Once the last drop hit, the ink rose from the puddle, reforming the bird. Then, there was a scuffling sound, as if many tiny feet were moving across the carpet.

All present looked at the floor, with varying levels of terror and interest, as the black liquid, presumably ink, had started to gather on the floor, pooling at the talons of the feathered invader. It leaped like living webbing onto the talons, creeping up its body, until it had formed a large, bird-like shell around the creature. Then, details began to form. Still keeping the general shape and form of the crow, the beak instead became a small, snarling muzzle, the talons grew, thick and sharp, and the wings expanded like a series of blades, displayed proudly and with much malice. It flapped once, lifting into the air, and made a circle around the room, until it landed loyally on Corvus’s shoulder.

Rarity looked unimpressed. “Are we supposed to be worried about your pet… thing?”

Corvus tilted his head curiously. “No. But the rest of the flock can prove very troublesome.”

Everything happened very quickly, almost at once. Dozens, if not hundreds, of the mutated, oversized birds met the windows, creating cracks and holes at random intervals. Some succeeded in breaking through entirely, some caught themselves in the glass, opting to dissolve and reform like their vanguard, and a few merely bounced off, only to circle around and try again.

The room was rapidly filled with a flock of malicious black avians, tearing and biting at anything they could reach, even each other. Feathers and ink drops rained on the ponies as they fought. In the process of fending of the teeth and talons of the invaders, the Elements and Luna burst through the door, retreating into the hallway and running from the advancing flock. As they ran, they passed maids, butlers, and guards, all of whom soon found themselves under siege from the seemingly endless flock. Guards fought valiantly, only to be beset by another two birds for each one they felled.

The rest simply ran, hiding themselves in closets and pantries, locking themselves away in all kinds of rooms. Some hid away in bedrooms and parlors, only to reemerge, being pursued by another branch of the swarm that had found more windows to break through. Soon their were almost as many ponies running from the birds as there were birds to run from.

Luna had taken the lead, vying to lead them somewhere productive, instead of in circles, like many of the ponies present seemed want to do. “WITH ME, MY SUBJECTS!” she bellowed, garnering the appreciative attention of the stampede, as they descended a series of staircases. Eventually, they found themselves in a peculiar dungeon, with a grand vault door as its only point of egress. Once the past pony had made their way in, Luna shielded the doorway, pushing back the enraged flock, until she could safely close the door.

Applejack spoke first. “Anypony injured? Y’all need help?” The general consensus was, besides a few scratches and a collective lack of breath, the group was ok. “Good, good. Now maybe we can think of a way outta this mess.”

“That should prove interesting,” rang Corvus’s voice. The crowd looked about them in a panic, then shied away from each other as the noticed that the droplets of ink and feathers that had collected on their fur from the mad flock had started to melt away, coalescing in the middle of the room. From the puddle, Corvus arose, nonplussed.

“A panic room?” he asked curiously. He looked about him with a general sense of mild interest. “I like what you’ve done with the place.”

Chapter Five

Chapter Five

At the top of the attic stair, I saw a mare who wasn’t there...

Luna stomped forward to meet Corvus, muzzle to muzzle. “Listen to me, you abomination. I am a Princess of Equestria! I will not let you terrorize my citizens!”

Corvus tilted his head, unimpressed. “Isn’t that exactly what you’re doing?”

She took a step back. “What are you talking about?”

He began to pace around the room, a habit that Luna had grown to despise in the short time she’d known him. Then again, she despised him on principal. “Well, you have gathered your friends and servants in this safe room, locking yourself away, while the flocks and the cats run free to do what they do, amidst the populace of Canterlot and the surrounding townships. So, as I see it, you have two options- either run into into the fray, braving the slow, eventual end of the world, or hold out here with your remaining loved ones and wait for it to come to you.”

To say that Luna had grown indignant was an understatement. Her teeth were bared in a malicious snarl much like a steel trap, and her hackles could not have been raised any farther with a sky crane. “How DARE you insinuate that I would leave my citizens to die like a coward!”

“Ah, but isn’t that exactly what you were going to do by bringing eternal night to Equestria? Submit them all to a cold, dark death as their bodies withered from the lack of sunlight and food, the tides rose perpetually and drowned your coastal cities, and the wildlife ran rampant as their instincts drove them mad with no daylight?” With each word, Luna’s face twitched between existential horror and unyielding rage. She could barely form a response.

The Elements, however, had one prepared. “This ends now!” Twilight bellowed, raising into the air with her friends as the natural magic of Harmony radiated between them. Their manes grew to ridiculous proportions, and they glowed with colorful auras as they levitated to the ceiling. There was a bright flash as a brilliant rainbow burst forth, steering itself directly at Corvus.

Who simply melted into the floor, untouched by the magical assault. The rainbow beat against magically-resistant stone and dissipated with a burst of light. As the girls descended, Rainbow Dash looked around the room. “Yeah-hah! We Rainbow Lasered him into nothing!”

The girls cheered to themselves, all but one. Twilight looked around the room, cautiously, unconvinced of their victory. Her suspicions were proven correct as Corvus emerged in the middle of their group. “Valiant attempt. Poor aim, but good thinking. However, I need to borrow those,” he added, pointing at the floor, “So I don’t think you’ll be doing that again.”

The Element’s expressions melted from enraged to confused as he spoke, until they followed his gaze. There was a brief flash of horror in their faces as their shadows drifted lazily from their bodies, swirling into a pool at Corvus’s feet, until they crawled up his legs, coating him in a pitch shell, which redefined itself into a larger Corvus. He’d grown at least a foot.

Not that the girls saw any of this, as they had lost consciousness the moments their shadows had been torn away. Luna reeled back from the sight, yelling in distress. “What did you do to them?!”

Corvus gave her a dispassionate stare. “If it makes you feel better, they’re only asleep. Much like your sister. The shadows I collect, well, think of them like the consciousness of the pony they’re attached to. Some I give to the cats, to make them more useful. Some I keep for myself, like you just saw. There are a great many shadows and minds in Equestria to collect before I’m finished, so… how about a game? Not one that will do you any good in the long one, I’m afraid, but I believe it’s important to keep yourself occupied in the fact of tragedy. So here is what I propose: you go out, and collect the shadows of your precious ponies. Keep them safe. Their bodies will never be in any danger, once their shadow has been claimed. My beasts have no interest in a shadeless creature. If you can save enough of them, take them into yourself, you might even amass enough power to survive the end with me. Of course, it will just be the two of us floating in the void for all of eternity, but at least you’ll have company.”

Luna gave him a suspicious glare. “I thought you said you wouldn’t survive the end of the world.”

He nodded. “I did. I hardly consider a blind, tasteless, soundless void where I drift in isolation with nothing but my own thoughts ‘surviving’. That isn’t much of a life. But, who knows? If you can manage to collect enough power, maybe you can meet the void with me. That way we’ll have somepony to talk to, to touch, to exist with for eternity. Although I honestly don’t know if that would be better than the inevitable oblivion. I’m told I’m not very riveting company.”

Luna had had enough. “NOTHING is inevitable. I will collect these shadows, you monster. I will collect ALL of them. I will save the minds of EVERYPONY in my kingdom, until you have no power left to bring about your so-called ‘end’! Then, once you have wasted away, I will return these shadows to their bodies, and we will live on without YOU!” she cried. The threw open the door, pushing the flock outside away with a great wave of force. She marched out into the world, set on her task. Some of the staff protested, and she turned to speak over her shoulder. “My little ponies, fear not. I will save you! ALL of you!” she added, with a final glare at her new foe. Then, she disappeared into the castle, slamming the door behind her.

Corvus tilted his head with a small, nearly imperceptible smile. “Oh good. I was hoping she wouldn’t be boring,” he mused, then melted into the floor once more.

The gathered maids and butlers simply cowered together, waiting together for their Princess.

Chapter Six

Chapter Six

To assume the strength of light, its force, its grace, its power
Is to forget the will of night, the purpose of its hour.

For when the sun recedes at dusk and gives way to the moon
It is to witness darkness’ strength, the shadow’s greatest boon.

The dark exists where light does not, and patiently it waits
For it exists without the light, the greatest of its traits.

The sun exists to banish dark, to bring light to the land
But the night will wait forever until only Shadows Stand.

Princess Luna ran. Down hallways, down corridors, throwing open doors long before she had to pass them. Those ponies still standing around, either unaware of the danger, or having evaded it for now, leaped out of her way, or were leaped over. She had no time for obstacles.

She also had no ideas. How was she to start gathering shadows? They were not her domain, despite popular opinion. She knew dreams. She knew the moon, and the stars. She knew the creatures of the night. Not the dark, however. Not the shadows underneath her very hooves. There were beasts there, too. She knew that, now more than ever. None of this helped her. But she knew something that could, just maybe.

Of all of her precious books, a love that, unfortunately, had led to the very peril she now faced, there were some that even she dared not to keep out in the open. Some had to be locked away in special places, only to be read in quiet, away from prying, untrained eyes. The irony of her lack of discipline in regards to the tome Corvus had emerged from was not lost on her. With each step towards her destination, she kicked herself for her blind enthusiasm, her lack of caution, her childish curiosity.

Partway down, some part of her realized that it was those traits Corvus had been most likely depending on the whole time. She set aside that train of thought, that she had been played so easily, as she finally approached the long hallway leading to her goal.

The more dangerous books she kept, she kept in special safes. Locked away, but easy to get to, for her. The most dangerous, the most tempting, she had trapped in their own special vault, buried far and away into the heart of the mountain that Canterlot had been built on. It was into these tunnels she ran, past torchlit hallways and giant locked doors promising dangerous secrets she had no use for now. At least, she hoped she hadn’t.

At the very end of the last of these hallways, there was a great golden door. An ornate promise of illicit, Royal secrets, covered in special locks and wards.

Still, this was not her goal. Into a side passage she ducked, a hollowed out expanse of stone with roughly cut steps, as if done so by workers with no intention of staying there a second longer than they had to. Which they did not. Luna flew down these steps, quite literally, taking no risks at tripping herself up on the rough cut stone. The landing at the bottom was a tight fit for an alicorn, but soon gave way to a larger chamber, with a single grey steel door with a simple lock on it.

There were no hinges to this door. It was simply a large square slat of thick metal set firmly into even thicker stone. The lock itself was a simple metal circle in the dead center, with a single large keyhole.

Yet no key would open this door. “Librus!” Luna called. “I need you!”

The circle of metal spun, the keyhole twisting sideways, and reshaping itself, until it blinked, revealing a single bright blue eye where there was none seconds ago. The chamber echoed with a high-pitch, effeminate voice. “What do you want, Luna?” it said simply, with an impatient edge.

“I need to get into the archives! Something in there has to help me!” she cried, trotting in place impatiently.

The eye rolled. “We do not have to help you, Luna. We are here because we wish it.”

“Yes, but this is an emergency! Corvus is loose!” she barked, hoping the name would ring enough bells to open the damn door.

The eye widened, and the voice raised in pitch. “That’s impossible! I’d know better than anyone if his book had left my… my… shelves… oh dear.”

“What, what is it?” Luna ordered, looking over her shoulder, wondering if Corvus had followed her into the mountain. Seeing nothing, she turned back to the door, who, if it could, would look rather sheepish right now.

“Well,” Librus said, trying to lower the timbre of his voice to a more respectable pitch, like for instance, one dogs could still hear, “It seems as though a few… choice tomes have left their posts. Not that I could stop them if I wanted, mind you, but I should have noticed.”

Luna glared daggers at the single eye, which suddenly found the wall behind her more fascinating than anything. “Would one of these books perhaps be The Penumbral Son?”

There was a loud cough, and the door clicked loudly as it swung open. “Please, do come in,” Librus said guiltily. Luna simply scoffed and hurried into the unlit room beyond.

Soon, the whole room was cast in dim light with no source. As if the walls themselves were aglow, suddenly every nook and cranny was illuminated, if but a little. The Princess trotted up and down the aisles, glancing impatiently t book after book, her years of speed reading allowing her to analyze entire shelves of currently useless forbidden lore at once. Cursory examinations of their titles revealed such books as Lockjaw the Mad’s Methods of War, The Journals of Dimension Diver, and All Hazard’s Final Words.

Finally, somewhere near the middle, away from the great tomes bound in chains, several rows down from the books in large glass cases, Luna found a book that might in fact be able to help her.

Shadows Stand: The Last Bastion of Things Beyond the Light.

"...wait. What did you mean, a few?!"