Thicker Than Water

Cranberry looked ahead at the little bubble of rose light, bobbing in the dark on the path ahead. When Apricot had barged past them all on the verge of tears, every instinct had been to rush after him and comfort her son. But when she saw Inger, lingering at the back of the group with hollow eyes, everything suddenly clicked for her. Apricot must have been awake last night, after all. Which means he heard us fighting… She squeezed her eyes shut and cursed.

Going after him would only make things worse. Instead, she asked Pollux to try calming him down, but after the mage closed his eyes for a moment and his hornglow brightened, he frowned and shook his head. “He’s blocking me out,” he said, almost apologetically. “I think he wants to be alone.”

So, for a while, she gave him that. It went against every motherly bone in her body, but she stayed with the group and continued their march across the strangely curving lake path, allowing Apricot to walk alone. But her eyes never left the glow of her son’s horn.

Between the shouting match last night and now this, everyone now had to be aware of the conflict between her and Inger. Thankfully, none of them had offered her advice—or worse, sympathy. It was a double cruelty, to have her marriage self-destructing so publicly. All Inger had to do was swallow his damned stubborn pride and apologize, and she’d at least be willing to talk. But he seemed unable to make even that small overture. She at least had the petty satisfaction that he hadn’t spoken to Tybalt, either.

Eventually, just when the tension had grown almost too great for her to bear, Pwyll quietly whispered an offer to go check on her boy. Grateful, she’d nodded and silently wished him luck. Whatever he’d said to Apricot seemed to be working. The two were still talking, far enough ahead that their voices did not carry clearly over the water.

As Apricot and Pwyll reached the outer tip of yet another ray of the path, a wall suddenly loomed in her son’s hornlight. Cranberry perked up along with the others. A large double door was set in the stone—tall, but made of ordinary metal, not glass. “Finally,” grunted Tybalt. “I was beginning to think this place would never end.”

The two advance members waited for the rest of them. As the greater group caught up, Cranberry nervously peered at her son. He didn’t meet her gaze—or even look at her or Inger at all—and there was no smile on his face, but at least his eyes seemed to have dried. While the group took a short rest beside the door, stretching their limbs and cracking necks, she swallowed and approached Apricot. “Hey, honey… Do you want to—”

“How much longer ‘til we can go home?” he interrupted, sullenly staring at the floor.

She exhaled. “I’m not sure.”

He nibbled a hoof, looking about to say something, before he set the hoof down and shook his head. Still not looking at her, his eyes flicked anxiously across the lake. “Yeah. Okay.”

Cranberry jumped as a loud metal screeching filled the cavern. Castor, Kaduat, Tybalt, and Inger were hauling the two halves of the door open. From the sound of the shrieking hinges, it hadn’t been oiled in living memory. Yet Locke had been through here—waiting for them behind the doors was a tunnel with a descending staircase, and a small chalk sigil on the wall. Wooden planks, spaced at the width of a cart’s wheels, were fastened on the sides of the steps.

Apricot bolted past her toward the stairs. Before she could even call after him, he’d begun to trot down the steps, his horn casting pale rose light on the curving walls. The stairwell swerved left almost immediately, vanishing behind the smooth stone. Cranberry sighed again, shaking her head as she followed. The others fell in close behind. Their hooves rang off the stone steps as they descended.

The slope of the stairs was steep, but after the initial sharp turn, the leftward curve of the walls became so subtle that they almost seemed straight. Cranberry suspected they were descending along the outer perimeter of the lake chamber. Perhaps the water went deeper than she’d imagined, or another cavity lay beneath the star-lake. At least their course was clear for the moment.

She had totally lost track of time since entering the obsidian door. Had the sun yet risen above ground? She’d barely slept at all, and knew that the others couldn’t keep up this pace much longer than she could. Maybe Camp Moonstone lay at the bottom of these stairs. They seemed to stretch on forever. The minutes lengthened, filled with the cacophony of hooves in the narrow passage. Ahead, Apricot marched down the steps with his horn aglow and his gaze sunken to his hooves.

All three of the pegasi were growing visibly uncomfortable under the low ceiling and tight walls. When Cranberry caught Inger wiping sweat from the back of his neck, she tried not to feel like he deserved it. But even she was starting to feel claustrophobic as the stairs descended endlessly into the dark. The only way out is through, she reminded herself.

A faint, high-pitched sound suddenly echoed up from below. It was like a faint screeching, from far away. The noise of hooves ceased as every member of the group froze together. Cranberry’s head turned sharply and her eyes crossed a few alert faces before falling upon Beatriz, who stared down with absolute terror. I’m not the only one who recognizes that wail, she thought, her belly cold. It’s the same sound that creature made.

“It’s not dead,” whimpered Beatriz, fumbling at the stair behind her with a hoof. “It’s still following us!”

“That’s not—” Tybalt shook his head, distressed. “That blackpowder blew it up, and buried it in two tons of rock for good measure. There’s no way it could have—”

The keening sound pierced the tunnel again, but quieter this time. It faded slowly, leaving only the wary breathing of the group. They waited in silence for another call, but none came.

“It can’t be the same beast,” muttered Kaduat. “Even if it survived, it couldn’t have come through the door. And that sound is coming from ahead of us, not behind.”

“A shortcut, maybe. There must be more than one way down into these caves from the surface,” said Pollux, his tired eyes glinting in the hornlight. “But I don’t…” His forehead wrinkled in concentration. “I don’t sense it in the magic. If it is that thing, it’s far away.”

“So maybe you’re all just jumping at shadows,” said Castor gruffly. “We’re all tired. No one’s eaten or slept. Time we spend worrying is time wasted.” He sighed heavily. “Besides… it’s not as though we have much choice. Let’s move, while we know it’s safe.”

They resumed their course down the steps with renewed celerity. Everyone kept their ears craned for another wailing cry, but none rose. Now Cranberry found herself wiping sweat away.

She was almost startled when they finally reached the bottom. The stairs leveled out for a few meters before ending in a matching double door to the one above. This one was already ajar, the crack glowing with a pale blue-green light. The group pushed the doors open, revealing the chamber beyond.

It was another cave, not as high-ceilinged as the star-lake, but stretching far into the distance. And it was filled not with dead water but with life. Cranberry’s eyes grew wide as she took in an impossible, vibrant, underground jungle.

Towering mushrooms, with stems the size of tree trunks and caps large enough for several ponies to stand tip to tail upon, rose high above their heads with dangling tendrils. Other mushrooms, so varied in shape and size as to defy a counting, sprouted beneath them in an explosion of color. Mosses and lichens covered the stones like grass, with flower-shaped petals of shredded fungi scattered amongst them. Roots dangled from the ceiling, stretching down like grasping claws at the mushroom canopy below. Vines, or vine-like mycelia, stretched between the huge caps as if they were branches. The enormous mushrooms glowed from within like jellyfish, neon lines of blue and green melding together to fill the entire cave with an unearthly light that was neither day nor night.

The air was thick with moisture, as heavy as the rainforests of the Golden Isles, so dense that the cave seemed to have its own weather. Cranberry could feel a faint breath against her skin, and realized with amazement that there was a gentle underground breeze. The upper reaches of the cave were hazy with clouds of wet air, and flecks of moisture dripped onto her face like a light rain. Glowing spores drifted lazily through the air, reminding Cranberry of falling leaves.

A jungle beneath a lake beneath a forest, she thought, awestruck. The entire group gawked at the sight, stunned silent. A sudden series of clicks and screeches filled the air, and a group of small dark shapes flew overhead. Cranberry blinked, drawing back, and watched as the flock vanished into the strange foliage.

Kaduat breathed a sigh of relief. “Bats!” she said, laughing.

Everyone seemed drawn back to reality, some chuckling or giving sighs of relief. Beatriz was the only one still staring after the bats in wary distrust. Cranberry turned back to survey the underground jungle, shaking her head in amazement. “The garden,” she said, suddenly recalling the journal’s brief mention. “Locke called this place the garden.”

“You think all this formed naturally?” asked Kaduat, her voice filled with wonder.

“I don’t know,” said Cranberry, shrugging with delight. She loved not having all the answers. Nothing to make you feel alive like a mystery. “I don’t know anything about mycology or caves. But it’s gorgeous.”

Ahead, a stone path remained clear of the moss. Bumpy and plain, it ran on into the the depths of the jungle. Above the ground, at the start of the path, floated a glimmering shard. It was obsidian, yet within the black surface gleamed a rainbow of colors, like an oil slick made of glass. It slowly spun as if suspended by a plumbline from the ceiling, though Cranberry could spy nothing holding it up from above or below.

As the group crept forward, still taking in the sights, Zaeneas hesitantly lifted a hoof and tapped the shard. It quivered, and suddenly rang with a familiar piercing wail. Everyone clapped their ears and recoiled. The ringing slowly faded, as Castor gave the zebra alchemist an admonishing glare. “Sorry,” she said, dropping her hooves with a grin. “At least we know it wasn’t a monster making that sound.”

“Just don’t touch anything else, please,” said Castor, like an exasperated parent.

“You sure? I can only imagine the alchemical properties some of these plants must have. Do these even count as plants?” The zebra mare looked around hungrily at the towering mushrooms. “I’d give my stripes to harvest this place…”

“Let’s not linger,” said Tybalt, fiddling with his locket. “Take samples if you wish, but we must press on.” He stifled a yawn. “The camp can’t be far…”

They set off along the path. Cranberry spotted occasional signs of prior passage. The track of a cartwheel imprinted in the moss, or a piece of string caught and fluttering between the branching stems of a multi-capped mushroom. They found more of the floating shards, dangling just like the first above the path every few dozen meters, like mile markers. Cranberry, as perhaps the second-most knowledgeable pony alive regarding the works of the Elken Dominion, hadn’t the faintest clue what they were for.

More of those shrill, ringing shrieks rang out occasionally from ahead or behind. It was not until they’d been walking for twenty minutes through the winding forest path that they saw the cause in person. A glowing spore, drifting on the faint current of underground wind, crossed the path. It gently collided with one of the floating shards, and suddenly its blue-green light winked out. The shard glowed the same color, before whirling faster for a moment and emitting that keening cry.

After seeing the glass siphon the light from the spore, the group began to give the shards a wide berth. Cranberry’s hooves were starting to ache from the hard stone as they trudged onward beneath the mushroom caps. But it was Beatriz who eventually held up a hoof. “I can’t keep going,” the antelope rasped, shaking her head. “I’m sorry, everyone…” She took a deep breath, letting her hoof fall. “I need to sleep. Even for just an hour.”

Tybalt’s lips thinned impatiently, but after he met Cranberry’s stern eyes, he nodded.

“Okay,” said Cranberry. “Everyone, get comfortable. We’ll stop for an hour’s nap. Make it count.”

“At least we’ve got moss for bedding,” said Kaduat, yawning loudly as she lay on the dark and grassy-looking mat beside the path. “Better than bare stone.” The others were swift to toss down whatever bags they carried and join her. The group sheltered beneath one of the massive mushrooms, and after closing their eyes, it was not long before many began to snore. Even Inger, looking reluctant, leaned his back up against the mushroom’s column and let his head rest on his forelegs.

Cranberry kept an eye on Apricot, who was curled up and lying away from the rest of the group. She wished she could guard his dreams, but she was no immortal alicorn goddess. Rubbing her eyes, she instead sat down with her back to the mushroom’s stem. With a yawn, she pulled her satchel open and yanked out the journal. It was unlikely she’d find another opportunity to read this privately. She intended to make it count. Lifting the tóirse to cast its light over the book,she waited for Locke’s script to once more burn itself upon the pages.

29 October, 328 AC

I have had so little time to write these last few days, between the work and the excitement. But I must begin to catalog my thoughts before they slip from my grasp in the flood of new discoveries.

First, our architectural findings: at the bottom of the steps, we found what we’re calling the royal causeway. It features statuary more marvelous than anything in our museums. I have some theories about using them as a dating method that I want to run by Cranberry when we return to Canterlot, but it can wait. The causeway runs through a forest of aspen trees, all made of stone. They look so real that I keep expecting to hear the whisper of leaves, but their branches stand bare.

Bizarrely, the ‘forest’ floor is covered with what seem to be real leaves. Were they carted down here from the living forest above for ambiance? They’re so ancient that they crumble to dust at a touch. Every so often I feel like I can smell sap, or feel a fresh breeze on my face, but after a moment I realize such a thing is impossible. The artistry of these trees is that lifelike and stunning.

In the forest, we’ve found three strange, identical structures. They are spaced evenly around the massive central tree in a circle, each a perfect 120 degrees apart. Hobb broke out drafting tools and a length of string, and measured the angles. The structures are large obelisks, but curved toward the tree like flowers toward the sun.

Hobb has taken to calling them ‘pylons’, which seems appropriate enough. Their surfaces are stone, but I am certain there is another obsidian core within them. Standing beside them makes the glass shard in the pouch around my neck sing. I can feel it whispering with fierce joy at its return to the home of its twin.

The stonework is not smooth like the gates, but patterned like large bricks. The lines run orthogonally across its surface, breaking it into hundreds of irregular rectangles. Within each is elkish script, a dialect I recognize from my work with Cranberry as coming from the Late Dominion. I have scribbled a few samples here.

What followed were pages of rough sketches. Cranberry’s eyes widened as she scanned them, seeing familiar words. From these fragments she couldn’t discern much of the greater text, but she spotted lots of simple verbs. Turn. Push. Connect. Awaken. Sleep. Flow.

And Locke was correct—given the frequency of some of the unusual phonemes she could see in these carvings, she estimated they’d been written sometime between 35 AD-4039 AE. A time when the empire was so diminished that the modern calendar abandoned the label of Anno Dominium for that of Anno Equestrii. The last days of the Late Dominion, swallowed until now by a recordless dark age.

Any artifact from that period would be worth multiple papers by itself, and it was just part of Locke’s preliminaryfindings. She flipped eagerly ahead to the next entry, sinking into the pages as if entranced.

Cranberry would be able to give a more precise date, but my educated guess is that these runes were carved not long before the Dominion’s mysterious collapse. This could be the most recent site of theirs ever discovered, intact or otherwise. It might have been built right at the end! And I believe we’re the first living souls to set hoof here since its construction.

After our initial exploration of the forest, we approached the center. Ah, the grand tree. Such an impressive structure that I feel it should be rendered as a single word—grandtree. It is so large that the old earth pony myth of Yggdrasil comes to mind. Was this perhaps the seed of that legend? Or an elkish attempt to create a World-Tree of their own? Fortunately, this is not the mythical Tree of Many Leaves itself—we found no dragon gnawing the roots, nor a chattering squirrel to greet us.

It seems dead, now, to my unsurprised dismay, the wood long ago petrified. How it ever grew to such a size deep within this cave is a total mystery, but our passage into its hollow interior through the doorway at its base made it clear that it was indeed once a living plant. The wood grain is still visible in its stony walls. I even spied the tiny boreholes of termites or beetles in a few places. How did they grow such an immense thing without the light of the sun? A mystery I suspect we will not soon solve.

Our ascent to the top of the tree was eased by a functioning elken walkway, still powered by some unseen source of flickering magic. Walking on it is an experience I could only dream of as an undergraduate. Hermia found it most disconcerting, and I could not resist teasing her about it. For one who flies on a daily basis, she seemed almost scared of the height.

When we reached the top, it was revealed to be a vast depression, smooth and even on all sides. It slopes down like a wide drinking vessel, so perfectly carved from stone that I could find no seam. The structure appears to be a monolithic bowl carved from stone, but its most marvelous feature is the unnaturally smooth silver mirror that coats the entire interior. A thin layer of that crystal-clear obsidian protects it, shining my dark reflection back up at me from the curving side of the bowl. I can’t imagine the weight of the dish, nor how the elk got it up to the top of the tree, but the way the petrified wood grips tightly around the bottom and edges of it makes it seem as though the grandtree grew up around it.

At the northern edge of the bowl, a large flat platform extends, supported by the tree. Here stands a stone dais, part of the monolith, along with four carved circles. The dais has a small, round cavity, as if ready to receive something. Before it sits the first circle carved into the ground. Flowery patterns extend inward from the perimeter, which contains a shape I’ve been seeing everywhere of late—a pair of intricate antlers.

From the edge of that circle, three lines run outward toward the vertices of a triangle. At the end of each sits another circle, with the same flowery patterns, yet a different symbol lies at the heart of each. I admit, I feel a chill as I recall them. Familiar shapes, like the kind we put on foal’s toys: A five-petaled flower. A pair of outstretched wings. And a thin, spiraling horn. Why is an elkish relic, from thousands of years before Equestria’s unification and located far across the sea from our homeland, engraved with the sigils of the classical pony tribes?

There is more. Three great arches rise from the edges of the bowl, all equidistant from each other—and I suspect, though we have not confirmed it yet, matching the positions of the forest pylons. They meet in a small ring above the very center of the dish. The vast glass helices that coil around the tree all seem to point to this ring as well. It feels like the center of it everything. Not merely the tree, or this chamber, but the entire underground system we passed through to get here. Perhaps even the Elderwood above. The shard sings an answer, and I believe it: this is a place of power.

The six huge branches stretch out from the bowl in a rough hexagon. At the end of each lies a gate, just like the ones I found before. My shard vibrates when I touch them. To think, I’m finally here, at the center of the wheel. If this system was active, I could enter this stone arch and be home in Equestria with one step.

Unusual symbols are carved into the stone bark before each of them—locations, I’m certain of it. I recognize one: the same sign was carved on the floor of the secret chamber in Middengard.

Below Locke’s words was another sketch, of a familiar rune with a right-aligned column and three curving prongs extending left. Cranberry recalled the obsidian door and inhaled sharply. Home, she thought, memorizing the symbol. That’s the gate we need…

The gates are all inactive, like the rest of this place. I wonder if they were ever turned on at all, or if they were abandoned before construction could be completed. I may soon find out, for our greatest discovery was a true treasure trove of information. Hermia found it when she left Hobb and I atop the tree to explore the other chambers inside the grandtree. I had hoped she would find signs of long-term habitation, for thus far the city has seemed quite inhospitable, but she found something even better. A library!

Or something like one, at least. It is filled with scrolls and books, but they are all packaged tightly in slotted shelves. I dare not touch any until we return with preservative oils and Hobb’s mages can assist in opening them without damaging the fragile, ancient parchment. But there are less delicate writings here as well, carved on wax tablets that Hermia found neatly filed beside the other writings.

The desk at the center of the room suggests it was some kind of office. I spied numerous drafting tools on the desk, though we have not touched any of them or opened the drawers as yet. There is a rich rug beneath the furniture, covered with dust and delicate floral patterns. Clearly the occupant must have been wealthy and important, but the tools suggests a functionary, not royalty. I imagine this was the office of the chief architect or overseer for the construction of the city.

For now, I’ve satisfied myself with taking a number of the wax tablets that could fit into my bag. These should tide me over at Camp Moonstone while we wait for Zerrikess to build that lift.

We’re returning from the city tomorrow. But tonight, we celebrate! I plan to open that bottle of Marelot Tybalt sent with us when we departed from Canterlot. The same vintage he and I shared on our first meeting, all those years ago. I hope Hermia likes red wine.

Cranberry turned the page, and blinked. The next entry began with half a dozen crossed-out words, then a few scribbles, then more half-finished words struck through with scratches.

30 October, 328 AC

Things got out of hoof last night. But, Celestia forgive me, I don’t regret a moment of it.

During our little party around the campfire, Hobb passed on my offer of wine. He decided to take one more look at the pylons before our return to Moonstone in the morning. Hermia’s friend—Flavius, I think his name is, but oh, this headache makes it difficult to recall—went to accompany him, and left Hermia and I alone.

She is truly a remarkable griffon. I’ve never spent enough time with one before to realize just how beautiful those feathers can be, or admire the aquiline curve of her beak; and imagine my surprise at what gentle caresses those sharp talons can deliver. When she told me that in Grypha, it’s usually the boys who kiss the girls first, I was such a fool that I thought she was trying to start another talk about pony culture. Well, after another few drinks, she showed me my error, and we retired to the tent for some… further cultural exchange.

Goodness. I sound like a tittering undergraduate in love. Oh, but now I understand them better than I ever have! An old pony like me doesn’t deserve someone as beautiful and vivacious as Hermia. She may be twice my age, but with the long lifespans of the griffons it feels like starting a relationship with one of my students. Highly unprofessional of me.

But I don’t care. I’ve never felt this way about anyone, not even my closest of friends. Many back home would shun her for being a griffon. Her nation’s crimes have left deep scars on our people, it’s true; but I’ve studied the elk for long enough to know that even in the worst regimes, there are always good hearts, and Hermia is one of them. I haven’t yet asked what we’ll do when we’re done here on Elketh… a conversation that can wait until our studies are completed. For now, I think we’re both content simply to enjoy each other’s company.

To think, that the greatest discovery I’d make down here was with me the whole time.

Cranberry stopped, staring incredulously at the string of little hearts he’d drawn after the last sentence. A smile crept onto her face as laughter bubbled up. Oh, Locke…! she thought, beaming with amused delight. She’d never expected her solitary, bookish friend to find this sort of happiness. He’d always seemed married to his work. But it appeared there was someone who could melt his heart, after all. The teasing opportunities this opened up were irresistible.

Then her warm humor was instantly doused by the cold memory of a body lying in dark sand. A pang went through her chest. When we find him, I’ll have to tell him she’s dead, she thought. Her lip trembled. Swallowing, she began the next entry.

22 November, 328 AC

I haven’t written anything in weeks. I doubt I’ve even lifted my nose out of those tablets long enough to pen an entry. Hermia has to keep reminding me to eat. If it weren’t for her company, this dank cave would have driven me mad a month ago.

The lift construction is behind schedule. Getting the materials down all those twisting stairs is turning out to be a taller order than Zerrikess expected. Her new estimate for completion is in a week’s time, at the earliest. At least our food shipments have not been so delayed. Communication with Camp Whisperleaf and the world beyond remains steady, and Tybalt is keeping us well-fed.

I feel guilty for not updating him on our progress beyond a few scant confirmations that we’ve found an elken site and are preparing for further excavations. I am sure Hobb is sending his own reports, though I don’t know if he’s been any more detailed than I—he seems to spend all his time down below, along with the rest of his coterie of mages. Every five days, they come back up just long enough to resupply on food, before demanding the griffons fly them back to the platform in the pit. Then it’s back to the city to do… whatever it is they’re doing.

Hermia went with them last week, and said that they largely stood around one of the pylons, their horns glowing as they tried various magical probes. I could suggest trying blood, but frankly, with how uncommunicative that antelope has been, I’m willing to let him stew on it until the lift is completed.

I was relieved when Hermia returned to camp. Sharing our nights is a balm for the soul, but it’s also good to have someone I can talk to about my work and trust with my secrets. The tablets have not held the information I was hoping for—either about the city and its inhabitants, or about the workings of the strange device atop the grandtree—but what they do contain is invaluable, all the same.

They’re largely a record of timetables and progress reports concerning the construction of something called a solar siphon. Between the lists of material and endless sums of money, I have been able to glean a number of fascinating details. This place was built at the command of an elken king named Síoraí.

It was an ancient elkish word that meant eternal. Cranberry’s eyes widened. She’d never heard of such a figure. But those last years of the Dominion had such scant surviving text that it was possible he’d simply fallen through the cracks of history. And Locke’s tablets were the most primary of primary sources—directly written under this Síoraí’s rule. Was he one of the last elken kings? Perhaps the very last?

Síoraí’s reign was marked by something the tablets refer to only as ‘the Calamity’. This is the first direct mention of an empire-threatening event from this period that I’m aware of. The tablets are light on detail, as no doubt everyone involved in this project was already familiar with it, but I have enough for a rough theory. The Calamity appears to have spread across the Dominion from Ellánon itself. First carried to the other islands by ships, but then crossing the seas to reach even my homeland.

At first I thought it was a disease, perhaps a strain of the scarlet fever that hit Canterlot so harshly sixteen years ago, but one of the tablets regarding worker conditions contained a list of sicknesses present at the site, and none were even remotely fatal. If there were a deadly plague ravaging the entire empire, I expect quarantine procedures would be first and foremost on the overseer’s mind, yet he seems totally unconcerned by infection vectors.

Interestingly, the tablets made an offhand mention of requesting more workers be diverted from the lush wheat fields of Ellánon. Yet Elketh is an island notoriously devoid of arable land. Nothing save root vegetables and flowers has been grown here in recorded history. This always seemed unusual to me, but the forests themselves contain plenty of edible plants, so I thought little more of it.

But what if the verdant fields of the Emerald Isle were not always covered in wildflowers? A growing Dominion would require farmland. It makes sense that crops once grew here in abundance. The question then: where did they go?

The Calamity, I believe, was some sort of crop blight. Given these records of its transmission, I suspect it was a fungus, or perhaps a ravenous pest insect. It spread like wildfire through the farms of Elketh, and then consumed the other islands as well. The Dominion soon found itself starving at home, and became reliant on shipments of food from its far-reaching colonies on the Equestrian continent. When the Calamity reached those distant shores as well, the entire empire was thrown into a justified panic that their sole remaining breadbasket was in peril.

King Síoraí appears to have put forth some kind of solution, but from these records it feels like a desperate one. The entire wealth of the Dominion poured into this city, and the siphon within it. Construction had been ongoing for at least ten years by the writing of these tablets, and I am still uncertain whether it was ever finished. The author of the tablets praises the king as a hero, the savior of the Dominion, an almost holy figure who promises to bring the power of Elendriolanera herself under his control and use it to end the Calamity.

Hobb was right. This place was meant to steal sunlight.

With a hiss, Cranberry lifted her head. Suddenly she recalled the door, both the familiar cutie mark carved at its highest point, and the word splashed in red across the obsidian door. Taíonnan. Usurper. This elk had sought to claim what belonged to a goddess. Even the most deranged and power-hungry rulers of the Dominion had never attempted such a feat.

Cranberry didn’t consider herself a particularly religious pony. Having a personal relationship with the goddess behind all the veneration sometimes made it difficult to see Celestia as the divine being she truly was. The princess herself seemed to encourage those around her to treat her as merely a powerful, graceful pony; not the immortal incarnation of the sun itself.

But reading these words, Cranberry felt a stirring of pious fervor. Every tongue recognized her goddess’s power. She was the Sun Queen to the zebras; Lady of the Sun to the griffons; Elendriolanera to the elk. Even the dragons had a name for her: Solashemesh, a term uttered with both hatred and respect. Trying to usurp her went beyond crime. What this “Síoraí” had attempted was blasphemy.

Her thoughts were shattered by a distant, keening wail. Cranberry looked up in alarm, before realizing it must be another of those floating shards. She tried to relax, lifting the journal, and then she heard a rumbling series of clicks.

Her blood ran cold. It was the same sound she’d heard that lamprey-mouthed monster make, just before it attacked her son. She hastily stuffed the journal and tóirse back into her satchel. Twisting her head to and fro, she scanned the surrounding jungle for any sign of the glass monstrosity. All she saw were mushrooms and moss, glowing quietly in the humid cave air.

Cranberry waited a few minutes, still alert, before she sat back against the mushroom’s stem. Suddenly she was aware of just how long it had been since she’d properly slept. Even her grumbling stomach couldn’t jolt her enough to find the energy to lift her forelegs. She ought to take the journal back out and keep reading, but her eyelids felt like iron weights. Digging into the satchel, she brushed against the tóirse. Her fumbling hoof fell still as her chin slumped down onto her chest.

“Hey, Cranberry, you coming?”

She blinks, lowering her head. The rough stone steps stretch upward, snaking up the mountainside. High above, the remains of the castle still glitter in the bright moonlight. Thankfully, they aren’t making the full trek up there tonight.

* * *

A sob startled her awake. Cranberry sat up, rubbing her eye with a hoof. She felt somehow worse than she had before falling asleep. Everything was sore, and the phantom taste of wine lingered on her tongue. Hunching forward, she massaged her temples. Another sob drew her attention to the side.

Only one other member of the group was awake. Beatriz, her shoulders heaving, sat beside a large boulder, with her forelegs pressed against it and her head buried between them. Cranberry’s brow creased, as she shouldered her satchel and stood to approach her weeping friend.

The crying antelope didn’t react as Cranberry sat beside her, or even when she wrapped her foreleg around Bea’s shoulders to pull her into a hug. It was only when Cranberry whispered “Hey, Bea. I’m here,” that her friend flung herself into a desperate embrace with both forelegs.

“I can’t do this,” choked Beatriz, between sobs. “Not again. After Simone died, Virgil was the only… he was…”

Cranberry tightened the hug. “I know.”

“I don’t have anything to remember him by,” she cried plaintively. “Not even his fiddle. It b-burned up in the wild—in the wildf—” Her voice vanished into more gasping breaths.

“I know. And… I know it hurts even more the second time,” said Cranberry, resting her chin on Beatriz’s shoulder. “I’m so sorry.” The ghosts of Apricot Strudel and her father Strawberry seemed suddenly close.

She took a deep breath, squeezing Beatriz. “But—you can survive it, Bea. You will. In fact, you don’t have a choice.”

“I can’t,” the antelope cried, burying her face in Cranberry’s chest. “It—it hurts so much, I don’t—”

“Shh.” Cranberry patted her back. “Remember when you tried to cheer me up, back on the ship?”

Beatriz nodded, squeezing her eyes shut.

“Well, it didn’t work,” said Cranberry, with a sad laugh. “But I was so grateful that you tried. And since then, it has gotten easier.” Thinking about Papa, at least. “I guess you reminded me that… I don’t have to face it all alone.” She hugged Bea tight once more. “What I’m saying is, I’m here for you. Whether you want to talk about Virgil, or Simone, or birdwatching, or not talk at all. Whatever you need. Just remember that you aren’t alone.”

Looking up, she took a sharp breath. “Oh… Bea, look…” The antelope lifted her head, wiping away tears, and gasped.

The cave, it turned out, held more than mushrooms and mosses. Countless tiny insects had suddenly risen at some unseen signal of nature, clumsily buzzing through the humid air. They glowed like fireflies, but in a rainbow of colors. Blues and greens, reds and yellows, even bright violets and indigos all flashed in the air like hovering stars. Amidst the enormous fungi, they made the cavern sparkle like a sea of gemstones.

Beatriz watched them, her teary eyes shining, as her mouth quivered into a smile. “It’s lovely,” she whispered.

Together, they watched the glimmering jungle for a time. Even in the darkest reaches of the world, there is still beauty, Cranberry thought, and wondered if it was foolish to find that comforting. Beauty didn’t make them any safer. But as she took in the rainbow-flies, it felt that maybe all the heartache, all the tears, and all the trials could be, in the end, worthwhile.

Beatriz sniffled, wiping her snout. “I wish he could see it…” She sighed, bowing her head. “Thank you, Cranberry. You’re right about… about not having a choice. I can’t… I can’t fall apart. Not now.” Her next breath was deep and shaky. “Like you said. We just… go on.” The antelope turned her head askance. “I’m sorry about your friend Locke, too.”

Cranberry stiffened. “Locke?”

Beatriz gave her a knowing, sympathetic look. Cranberry felt shaken. On the ship, Beatriz had waved Cranberry’s doubts about his survival away. Had that confidence been so thoroughly stripped away? She couldn’t be saying what it sounded like she was saying.

“We haven’t found anything to confirm that Locke’s—” Cranberry looked away. “He’s still alive, Bea. I know it.”

Her colleague’s words leaped off the page with such lively energy, like he was sitting right beside her. Surely, if he were—if he was dead, then she would feel it, wouldn’t she? She hadn’t been able to save her father, or Papa, but she could still save Locke. She had to.

Beatriz bit her lip for a moment, but then she just closed her eyes and hugged Cranberry again.

* * *

Her grieving friend had fallen back asleep a little while ago. The allotted hour had surely passed, but Cranberry didn’t have the heart to force the group back into a march just yet. Instead, she flipped through more entries from the journal, scarcely absorbing Locke’s reports about his ongoing research and the expedition’s progress. She tried not to tell herself that she was searching for some proof that he was alive, that this rescue mission still had a chance to succeed.

The entries started to sound weary. Spending week after week without the light of the sun had begun to take its toll on Locke. He mentioned food losing its taste, and days losing their meaning. Hermia tried to convince him to take a break and go back to the surface for a few days, but he refused, staying down to study more of the tablets being brought up from below.

Cranberry recalled finding him pacing in the bottom of Middengard at three in the morning, muttering to himself. She sighed, frustrated. You always push yourself too hard, Pad.

Sometime near the end of November, two of the expedition’s team disappeared on a routine resupply from Whisperleaf to Moonstone. Locke feared that they’d taken a wrong turn in the caves, so he ordered the chalk signs all redrawn, as well as posted sentries at each major intersection of the cavern path to keep an eye out for them. The missing zebras had left Camp Whisperleaf with plenty of food and water, so hopes were still high that they’d retrace their steps and show back up before they were in danger of starvation.

She was stopped cold by the next entry, penned in an unsteady script. Several abortive attempts at a start were crossed through.

5 Deceb

5 Decem

Zerri

There was noth

5 December, 328 AC

Today we had our first death. While overseeing the final stages of the lift construction, Zerrikess stepped too far out onto the platform. A small rock broke away from the ceiling, hit her on the head, and

and it—

Sisters. I saw her tip over the edge. I was right there, talking to her, just a minute before it happened. My hooves are still shaking. Hermia dove after her, but she couldn’t—

I’ve tried writing a letter, for Tybalt to pass on to Zerri’s family, wherever they might be, but I keep crumpling them up and throwing them away. It feels like it’s my fault. I was pushing her too hard, being too demanding about finishing the lift. I know she felt guilty about it taking so long, but she wasn’t really to blame—it’s a miracle she managed to get all that lumber down here in the first place.

I can’t stop thinking about the argument we had right before she fell. Hermia’s been trying to comfort me, saying it was just an accident, that no one’s to blame; but if I’d just been more patient, if I hadn’t yelled at her, then maybe Zerri would still be

A few torn out pages followed. With leaden hooves, Cranberry turned to the next.

8 December, 328 AC

The lift is complete. None of us found any joy in the occasion. I had originally planned a little celebration, but instead found myself holding a memorial service. I tried not to feel like a hypocrite as I praised Zerri’s dedication and hard work. Hermia and Mistral recovered her body yesterday, and it now travels back up through the caves to return home, with my pitiful letter. I doubt her family will be comforted to know she died in service of a academic cause, no matter how important.

I took the inaugural descent on the platform with our geologist Smoky Quartz and a few others—including Hermia—today. Mistral and Borras preferred to swiftly fly down. I suppose the pegasi are wary of spending too much time beneath the brittle stalactites over the pit after what happened to Zerrikess.

Hobb met us at the bottom, to my surprise. On our way to the city, he brought me up to speed on his team’s progress. He says the mages have discovered that the pylons can be configured into multiple formats. Furthermore, the machine they’re a part of runs up the entire length of the grandtree, and perhaps even further. It’s clear that this ‘solar siphon’ was not built here in the city—the city, rather, was built around the siphon.

A troubling development. I had imagined the gate network to be a transportation hub, but if it was tied so closely to this device then perhaps that was not its function after all.

As we reached the stone forest, Hobb parted from us to return to the pylons with his fellows. Before he left, he told us all to keep a weather eye out for any small glass artifacts. The antelopes believe there is a component missing from the machine, a sort of key required to activate it. I sternly asked what he needed such a thing for, but he laughed at my evident concern. He explained that it could expose the whole inner workings of the machine to them, much like the whispers of my shards had led us to the central nexus of the gate network.

Once we reached the royal causeway, Mr. Quartz quickly set to work on the stone aspen statues. After examining the trunks for a few minutes, he told me he had suspicions about them, but refused to speculate aloud until he could chisel out some samples. I’ve left him to it. That earth pony is good at his job, and unlike Hobb, he keeps me informed. The pegasi, along with one of Hobb’s mages, are heading to the overseer’s office to try removing some of the delicate scrolls there.

Hermia and I returned to the top of the grandtree to study it further. That great mirrored dish continues to baffle me. I wonder if it was meant to be an artificial pond, perhaps filled with fish; the mirror would reflect them to create an infinite lagoon beneath. Yet something about it feels more functional than decorative. On a hunch, Hermia suggested we measure the curve, and she was right—it’s perfectly parabolic.

Suddenly, this whole structure reminds me of the Gazellican Institute Observatory’s immense reflector telescope that I saw when I last visited Dr. Duiker in the Antellucían capital. This is far larger, but I’m not certain what good a telescope would do anyone underground. The ring where the three arms meet above the dish is where the smaller reflector would sit, to divert light to an eyepiece. But the ring is empty. It would be quite a fall if one were to tumble through it, almost twelve meters. I have been keeping to the edges of the bowl, which seem safer.

Nothing further to report yet, save for personal matters. Hermia, bless her, brought me a flower back from her trip to the surface last week. It was delicious, a welcome reminder that life still goes on, green and golden, high above our heads. It’s easy to forget that, sometimes, down here in the dark with only the whispers in the glass for company.

12 December, 328 AC

My clumsiness has led to another discovery. Were Cranberry here, she’d chide me for my lack of care with that exasperated eyebrow of hers. When I tripped and fell into the reflecting basin, I could have been seriously injured, or worse, damaged the mirror. Fortunately, I managed to tuck in and roll until I came to rest at the bottom. An impressively spry feat for a pony of my age, if I do say so myself, though there was no one to witness it. Hermia is still off getting lunch to bring back up for us to share.

I won’t escape this bowl without her help, so while I wait for her return, I did some exploring. The smooth mirrored surface seems completely perfect, so precise and even that it had to have been ground down with magic. But at the lowest point, hidden in the shadows of the arms above, I found something new.

A small glass sphere, covered in graven whorls—bloodlines, I have no doubt—rested in the center of the great bowl. It must have rolled down here eons ago, dropped by some elk in a hurry or panic. Why had they not come down to retrieve it?

I tried to reach into it with my magic, but felt the familiar slipping sensation of my energy being swallowed by dark glass. The last year has given me a great deal of practice in dealing with such devices. I didn’t even hesitate as I pulled the shard from my pouch and made a fresh cut on my fetlock.

With a drop of my blood spread upon it, the sphere sprang to life. The inside began to glow vibrantly with the light of my own horn. A million tiny stars lit within it, and I gasped. It’s an intact tóirse! And I suspect more than just that—I can put two and two together. I can’t see the dais, with its spherical cavity, over the edge of the dish, but I know this device would fit perfectly into it. No doubt I have discovered Hobb’s ‘key’.

While I do believe that he could use it to map the machine’s inner workings—the shard whispers as much to me—I don’t trust his motivations in doing so. For now, I think I shall hold on to it. It will be safe in my saddlebag while we continue our explorations of the ruin. There’s no need to inform Tybalt of it, either.

Ah. I hear familiar wingbeats. I hope Hermia doesn’t scold me too badly for trapping myself down here.

Cranberry set the book down, and cupped both hooves under the tóirse. She regarded the gently spinning galaxy within it with new wariness. So, he put more than just light into this, she thought, recalling the thicket of scars on Locke’s foreleg.

She’d counted new ones appearing on his skin, even after they’d returned from Middengard, and voiced her concerns more than once. But after the day when he’d snapped at her that it was nothing to worry about, she’d stopped bringing it up. He’d become so cavalier about spilling his blood to work the ancient artifacts… Cranberry had wondered if she was watching an accelerated demonstration of how the Dominion’s elk had become inured to the cost of their creations.

And maybe his attitude had infected her more than she’d realized. Nervously, her eyes traveled from the tóirse to the thin red line on her own fetlock. She hadn’t thought twice before making that cut. There’d been no time to argue with anyone about it, especially Inger, and it hadn’t even hurt that much, but… she recalled how right it had felt when she’d smeared her blood on that dark surface, and felt the cold tingle of magic in her foreleg. Cranberry shuddered.

She wished Locke was here in body, not merely in words. Together, she knew they could tease out the answers they both wanted about this siphon device, and the Calamity, and whatever King Síoraí’s intentions had been.

But he wasn’t, and if she was going to have a shot at figuring out how to work this gate network to get everyone home, then she needed to bring at least one of her allies up to speed. Preferably without Tybalt overhearing. Apricot was too young, Beatriz too lost in grief, and the loyalties of Kaduat, Zaeneas, and the twins were not entirely certain. Her usual confidant was someone she couldn’t even stand to look at right now. That left Pwyll.

Cranberry gently shook the deer awake. “Hwuh…?” he mumbled, blinking as he lifted his head. “Time to go?” He groaned.

“Shh, Pwyll. Not yet. I need to talk to you.”

“Of course, Prof—” he yawned, covering his mouth. “Professor.”

Whispering, she told him about the journal. Pwyll’s eyes widened as she described the city Locke had found below, along with what he’d learned from the tablets about Síoraí and the Calamity. “Does any of it sound familiar?” she asked. “The pylons, or the tree? Did Ciaran teach you anything that might help us work the gates?”

Pwyll shook his head, scratching an antler. “I’ve never heard of anything like it before. It sounds incredible, though…”

Disappointed, Cranberry sighed. “I guess we’ll have to figure it out as we go.”

“I’ll help however I can,” Pwyll promised. “I’m sure between the two of us and Pollux, we can get the gate working long enough to escape.”

“Did someone say my name?” came a yawning question from behind her. Cranberry stiffened, turning to see Pollux rubbing his eyes. “I suppose that means we’re moving again.”

“Uh… yes,” she said, wondering suspiciously how long he’d been up. How much did he hear? Will he tell his employer?

Suddenly, the wariness fled, and her shoulders sagged. You’re being paranoid, she thought, closing her aching eyes for a moment. Was it the fight with Inger that had her feeling so frayed and distrustful, or the insomnia? Pwyll is right, anyway. We’ll need his aid with the gates. “Can you two help me wake the others, please?”

The three of them roused the rest of the group, who all looked as if the short nap had done little to ease their exhaustion. Beatriz was the only one who seemed improved, giving Cranberry a grateful nod as she helped her stand. After a few minutes to shake off sleep and gather their things, the group resumed their course through the mushroom jungle.

After another twenty minutes or so, a huge pillar of stone—slightly hourglass, as if a stalagmite and stalactite had met and merged, but far too thick for that—loomed out of the fungi ahead of them. At its base was another massive door, this one yet again different than all the previous ones. It was made not of metal or glass, but stone; a huge rectangular slab of it covered in more swirling patterns. The shapes were not abstract antlers or flowers this time, but dozens and dozens of little elk, all raising their forehooves in reverence. Above, a sun with eight wavy rays hung carved at the door’s highest point, and within the solar circle, another elk stood lifting his hooves above the throng below.

Síoraí the Sun King, Cranberry thought, gazing at the last lord of the Dominion.

“How do we…” Kaduat ran her foot across the stone, pausing as she passed another chalk keyhole cutie mark. “I don’t see a crack to open it.”

“See those?” Tybalt pointed to each side of the rectangle, where large metal rails stretched above. “I think it slides up.”

Kaduat gave an incredulous snort. “This has to weigh at least two tons. There’s no way we can—”

Pollux cleared his throat, lighting his horn. The camel rolled her eyes, sighing. “Show-off.”

“As much as it wounds my pride,” Pollux replied dryly, as his crimson aura slowly wrapped around the stone, “I don’t think I have the energy to do this by myself. Apricot, Beatriz, can you help?”

Apricot didn’t show his usual enthusiasm at being included, huffing as he lit his horn along with the others and closed his eyes. Pwyll watched the three other magic-users in frustration, giving his dark, velvety antlers a helpless scratch. There was a great rumbling of grinding stone as the door slowly lifted. Beyond was another stairway, just like the one before. It, too, curved sharply to the left and down.

Cranberry and the others hurried through, and the three holding open the door made a slower crossing. They let the door slide back down behind them, sealing off the light of the glowing fungi and leaving only the mixed glow of their horns.

“Good thing we took that break,” grumbled Zaeneas, as they set off down the steps. “If these turn out as long as the last stairs, we’d all have fallen asleep and tumbled before we got halfway down.”

Cranberry rubbed her eyes, hoping she wouldn’t prove that prediction a prophecy.