North

Nightmare Moon had the magic of a pegasus. She had the power to shape clouds and thunder, to create snow and tornados, to fly head first into a storm and tear it to wisps.

Storm had once been a dragon, like none seen in Equestria for a thousand years. He had made of himself from the living lightning. He had become born to the ice and the typhoon. He came from the High Wilderness, where his wrath was matched only by the burning stars.

Once, she might have been able to reason with him, simply ask for what she needed. But now all that was left of him was euphoria and wrath. He spoke in lightning bolts and thunder bursts and hail. She would need to speak the same.

Nightmare Moon smashed into him, through him. His storm clouds were shredded around her and as she passed they were restored. A hundred bolts of lightning speared towards her and with a beat of her wings she scattered them all. Sharp hail raked her body, and with earth pony durability it was like a thrown pebble against tempered steel. A claw formed from ice and hail formed around her, and she put on speed and was gone. When she burst through the other side of him the tunnel she had cut was already almost as if it had never been.

They stopped and turned, looking at how they had not even scratched the other.

Nightmare Moon reacted first, firing an energy beam through his body. It passed through as harmlessly as her first charge had, the rent in the clouds filling up almost immediately. He threw a chunk of hail as big as she was, and she blew it apart with another energy blast. She grabbed a portion of his cloud in her magic, trying to catch it in a bubble and dissolve it, but it beat against the bubble from the inside and rest of the clouds flowed around the bubble towards her, forcing her to abandon it. He burst a lightning bolt in front of himself, creating a thunderclap that would bleed the ears and fracture the bones of a mortal; for her it was no worse than a distant trumpet blast. She threw a cyclone, and it whirled through his body, twisting away clouds in long streaks, and when it had passed the storm had grown it all back. He screamed in her face, words of incineration and dissolution, and the air around her crisped and blackened, and the words washed over her like a summer breeze.

She flew down beneath him, leaving a trail of stardust, carving straight lines out of the falling water. It was possible to draw Correspondence runes on non-solid surfaces, and if she could summon a great flame –

Storm followed her down, a gust from the north sprinkling the air with lacre. The ammonia-like smell of it rose around her, and –

She was in the gardens around the palace, nose almost to the ground as she followed the hoofprints of her sister. Celestia had taken Luna’s favorite teacup again, the china one with the red and blue stars, and last time Luna had had to get the servants to help her find it. But not this time! She was bigger now, and smarter, and Celestia hadn’t hidden her hoofprints. She followed them around the palace maze, around a rose bush, and into a clearing. “Surprise!” said Celestia, waving. Before her was a small rollmat with a teapot and a bowl of sugar and two teacups, one Luna’s and the other Celestia’s –

No! She shook off the lacre-induced memory and instinctively dropped down lower, the world around her coming back into focus as three thunderbolts snapped like teeth through the space she had just occupied. An ice spike passed by her close enough to feel the wind of its passing on her coat, and she cast a shield bubble, letting more spikes shatter themselves against it. Below her, the sea was raging, waves bursting up ten feet high, almost to her hooves. The rune she had been drawing was blurring and fading. She rose back up, flying a zigzag path to throw off further thunderbolts, until she burst out of Storm and was in the clear air once more.

She dipped down, towards the sea. Her horn blazed, touching one of the statues. The giant shuddered, its hands shaking and its arms flexing as the Come-To-Life spell took hold. Slowly it stood, gouts of water the size of buckets running from its torsos.

A hot wind blew from the south, and she turned to look. In distance, there was an orange haze, by the moment becoming brighter and brighter. She refreshed her shield bubble. Below her, the statue began to walk towards Kingeater's Castle, each step sending waves around it.

Lightning bolts flew up from the roiling cloud mass below, seeking her. She rolled, dodging the ones that came too close. The clouds were moving up, towards her level. The bright haze was almost upon her. She pulled some air and moisture around her to create a downward gust and held it between her and the south.

The Wax-Wind reached them, burning wax flying through the air to gather around everything it touched. It splashed against her bubble and sheared off; even from within Nightmare Moon could feel the heat that could cinder a mortal's flesh from bone. The gust she had created pushed the wax that came directly at her away, towards the statue that had reached the walls of Kingeater’s Castle. It had placed one massive foot against the walls and was reaching up, searching for a handhold.

The statue slowed even further as heavy wax collected on it, but the wax lit it up, creating burning clumps and trials across its head and shoulder and arms. Hot air rose above the flames, condensing the clouds above the statue into a light drizzle. Steam rose from the wax as the water was evaporated. Nightmare Moon hovered above it; it was warm enough for sweat to start to prickle on her coat, but it kept the air around her free of clouds.

Something shifted in the air above her, and she dodged away without looking. A large sheet of hail, smooth and flat as glass, fell from the clouds above her. It landed on the statue and shattered, scattering ice all around the burning wax. The flames guttered as the cold hit them. The Wax Wind slowed, then stopped.

Nightmare She landed on the statue, cast flame upon her horn, and touched it to the statue, melting the ice and rekindling the wax. The statue stood on the top of the walls of the castle, reaching up towards the roof, through Storm, until its arms were cloaked into clouds

She moved to its shoulder and focused, pushing pegasus magic through her horn and her hooves and into the statue’s arms. Now as its arms passed through the storm the clouds parted around them and did not reform, pegasus magic dismantling the weather around. It reached out, swinging ponderous arms, the fog dissolving into clear air between its slowly closing fingers.

There was a low rumble that echoed through the air and sea, so deep it was less heard in the ears and felt more in the bones. The storm rose back up like a beast that had put a foot on a pin, jolting away from the statue. Nightmare Moon poured more magic into the status, casting a transfiguration spell to stretch out the arms and disperse more of the storm.

The air filled with the scent of ozone, building rapidly. Nightmare Moon looked up at the violently swirling stormclouds and increased the strength of her shield bubble before diving low and casting an illusion of the raging sea over herself.

She was not the target. A giant lightning bolt, like a rent of light torn out of the sky, came down on the head of the statue. The thunderbolt it brought was less sound than solid, a wall of sound that smashed into her, spinning her around.

The sea was suddenly above her, her senses thrown. A wave of heat washed over her, blossoming from where the bolt had struck. She threw her wings open and corrected on instinct, righting herself just before she slammed into the waves. Behind her, the shockwave continued on, carrying a wall of water before it, reaching up to the heads of the unanimated statues.

The statue stood still for a moment. There was a cracking sound, audible even over the storm, and a fracture appeared down the side of the statue's head, big enough to see through. It spread down, under the wax and along the torso. The statue teetered, then fell, coming to pieces along the fault line as it collapsed. The water rose thirty feet high as the pieces hit, and Nightmare Moon rose back up towards the clouds to dodge the wave.

A direct hit from that might very well only break her shield bubble instead of her. But even if it did not touch her, it would still disorient and stun her, which she could not afford. She created an illusion of herself flying off to the side before turning to her invisible mist form and drifting back towards the castle. The mist form was slower than flying with wings, but harder to notice. The cold winds of storm and small shards of hail passed through her, but in this form she could ignore the chill.

She could still see through and control her illusion, and she wove it through the spaces underneath the storm, dodging lightning and hail, at an angle leading away from the castle and her moored boat. It had no ability to weathercraft or cast magic, but it was flying towards the south, and if she could move the battlefield there Storm would need more effort to call lacre from the north and be more hesitant to call the Wax-Wind from the south.

Unfortunately, with increased distance came a slight lag in the illusion's response time. Two lightning bolts intersected the illusion's head and flank and passed straight through into the sea.

There was a moment when the storm took a breath. The rain lowered in intensity, the hail came down in pebbles instead of spikes, and the lightning was silent.

Then a great, skeletal claw, the same color as the white clouds, came down from the storm, reaching for the illusion, big enough to crush it in its grip.

It snapped shut around the illusion, the bones audibly straining together, and Nightmare Moon let the image disperse, leaving a few shreds of color to fall towards the sea before they faded. The claw opened, and then shook in rage as the storm screamed, blasting lightning and ice down like a curtain. On one of the rows at Kingeater's Castle, Nightmare Moon hunkered down, thinking, as Storm pulled the claw back into himself.

The claw had not been made from clouds. It had been solid.

There were three more statues that were close enough to the castle for her to use. Nightmare Moon partially remanifested her material form, just enough to rebuild her horn, and she cast the Come-To-Life spell on two of them. The last one she laid an illusion of itself over, and then wrapped the real statue in an invisibility spell. With another spell all of them were wreathed in flame, kept alight in the deluge through a constant expenditure of magic. The heat rose up, sending great clouds of steam billowing up into the clouds.

The wind came like a hammer-blow, hard enough to send the waves racing south. Nightmare Moon focused harder, forced more magic through her horn as the wind focused on the fire, casting long tongues of flame from the statues. She began moving the statues forward, raising their arms, burning the cloud.

All the lightning bolts stopped, leaving only the hail and the rain, and Nightmare Moon braced herself.

The overcharged lightning bolt came down right in the middle of one of the real statues’ head, and the thunder's shockwave shook Kingeater Castle's pews and sent water washing over the altar. It staggered backwards, reeling, before its head slid apart and its arms fell to pieces, plunging into the roiling seas, the sound of it lost amidst the tsunami around them. Nightmare Moon redirected the magical energy towards the remaining statue and illusion, keeping them moving forward.

There was another pause as the storm gathered its breath, and blew outwards, towards the illusion this time. It was unharmed, the lightning passing through to crackle across the lashing waves.

Nightmare Moon in her mist form flew out to meet it as it marched forward. Another bolt came down when she was halfway there, and she had to stop to fly high enough to clear the waves. But then she had entered the illusion, and using her real body she cast flames upon it, burning intensely enough to send the rain away in hissing waves. A moment later she changed back into mist, falling away.

A claw came down towards the illusion’s head as it reached the castle, and it tilted backwards to dodge the limb. Both statutes began to climb the castle just as the first one had, seeking to reach the sky.

The black clouds above stilled. The rain slowed to a haze. The wind became a breeze. The lightning lifted.

The storm twisted inward, gathering all its strength into itself. The clouds hardened into bones and the hail into scales. Lightning burned in eyes the size of ships, bright as sunlight. A claw the size of an island formed, opening. He came down legs first in the water, too big to fly in this cavern.

He stood level with the illusion and grasped it with both arms, the powerful claws passing easily through the flames to close on empty air.

She was exposed - but this was her chance. Nightmare Moon changed to her solid form as the illusion was crushed around her, and she flew straight up past Storm's teeth. He growled as she saw her, deep enough to shake the water around him, and he opened his wings, standing up straight reach after her. She darted above him, a black moth dancing over an avalanche. His claws sliced the air below her as they reached hundreds feet above the water. She turned, aimed her horn, and fired a wide beam.

The beam played across his arms and face, leaving a trail of glowing blue in its wake, and he screamed, immediately transforming back into clouds. The clouds parted around the energy beam, as intangible as they had been before, but now there was a glowing azure band like a scar across the surface of the storm. Nightmare Moon teleported just in time to avoid a volley of lightning bolts, and Storm tracked her position, a wave of bolts chasing after her.

As Nightmare Moon dodged the lightning bolts trailed off, until Storm had stopped firing. The rain slowed to a mist falling downwards. The clouds began to glow a bright electric white like the filament of a floodlight, bathing all the sea in a burning light that made it glow bright green. There was a crackling in the air like barely restrained electricity, growing louder and more urgent with every moment. The black alicorn’s shadow stood out like a smear across a painting.

Nightmare Moon transitioned to her mist form and dove for cover, gliding under an outstretched hand as the electrical buildup reached a crescendo like the cage reached its breaking point.

The world turned white as a solid wall of lightning dropped down to the sea. The roar shook the stones, churned the water like a tsunami.

The lightning faded – except now it was the sea that glowed with that same stormy light, casting visible shadows above the statues. Nightmare Moon repositioned herself onto the palm of the hand, still in her mist form.

The statues shook as the lightning shot back upwards. There was an ominous rumbling beneath her before the stone hand flaked away, the ore broken at its core by the thunder right next to it.

When the lightning has cleared, there were no more statues. The only structure left was Kingeater’s Castle, still untouched.

Her mist form would let the lightning pass through her, but it needed energy to maintain. She could not let herself be caught out in the open or she would be forced to spend magic that she needed to reserve for offense.

She changed back to her alicorn form for speed and flew, weaving back and forth to dodge more hail and lightning, until she landed on the ground of Kingeater’s Castle. There was no roof, but there was solid ground under her hooves.

Storm was forming up further away from the castle, charging more regular lightning bolts. He wouldn’t attempt the wide lightning attack again, not while it could destroy the castle. But if he stayed there, then the two of them would simply snipe at each other with beams until one of them tired, and Nightmare Moon believed that with her flesh and blood she would be exhausted first.

She cast her teleport spell, but not at herself. A moment later, she held something bright and jagged, holding it up for the dragon to see. A lightning-bolt taller than she was, made solid; Storm’s old sky-spear.

The storm paused, its clouds roiling in on itself like something drawing in a breath.

She held it higher, trying to lure him closer. Instead, he stayed in storm form and fired another lightning bolt, and she dodged to one side to avoid it. He was being more careful, now; the azure scar was burning him, curbing his rage.

Nightmare Moon focused on the spear, casting. The Want-It-Need-It spell settled over the spear, visible even at this distance.

The storm shuddered visibly. It shifted forward, then pulled itself back. Storm was resisting; she did not tempt him enough, not yet.

One more. She flew up, darting into the sky, away from the castle and its protection.

The storm approached. She danced backwards, pulling him east. He reached forward with arms of clouds, spreading towards her.

No. She needed him to be solid, and now he was too close.

She divided her magic into two points and exerted pressure on both ends of the spear. It bent, quivering, and she focused harder, pressing more –

With a blast of thunder right over her ears, the spear broke it in half. She took each half and threw them into the sea.

The storm stopped, astonished. She hovered in place, daring him.

He screamed, and he was solid again, lashing out with his claws and wings. She flew backwards, zigzagging back and forth to dodge him, and she fired.

The beam danced across his face and his belly, and he howled. But the concentration required to aim the beam had cost her. One claw found its mark, and closed around her left wing.

She screamed in pain as he crushed the wing between his claws, grinding the bone like sand. She was held aloft by her smashed wing, hoisted high as her nerves screamed red-hot at her. Below her, Storm was opening his maw, gathering lightning within.

She fought through the pain, pushing it back into the wing, clearing her head. She aimed downwards, and fired.

The beam pierced the lightning clustered in his teeth, scattering it, and tore a deep hole in the back of his neck.

His eyes grew wide as he felt the wound. He howled in pain, his wings slowing. But then his eyes narrowed, power surging over him as the wound began to close.

She was wounded, and he was ascending, and in a moment he would seize the momentum of it and destroy her.

But he was close, close enough to touch. She reached out, grabbing his claw with a hoof, and pulled –

* * *

She was lying upon leaves, scattered over dirt and grass. She opened her eyes to see trees rising above her, under a gray, cloud-covered sky.

Pain flared in her shoulder, and she hissed, drawing in a sharp breath before turning her head to look at it.

Her wing was gone. What was left was a mess of bone and muscle, the pain like a coiled mass of coals.

She had overestimated her reaction times. If she could drag an enemy like Storm into dreams she could defeat him there, but that would require physical contact to overpower his defenses. She had attempted a ranged fight first, to avoid that danger. But when she realized that she was running out of options, she had thought she could dodge him well enough to lure him close.

She grit her teeth, before slowly getting to her hooves. She would simply have to deal with it.

She stood within a forest, with a light fog about her. She knew that if she picked a direction – any direction – she would eventually find herself on a clifftop, overlooking the sea. This was the dream of what the thunder said, a place that Storm had made for himself. A long time ago, when he had still ruled the way north, there had been priests, and sacrifices.

Unlike many dreams, though, this one had an ending.

Nightmare Moon stepped in a direction that was at an orthogonal angle to “forward,” and the world spun around her. The trees and fog became a gray blur, and she kept walking until her surroundings became brown, with bright yellow points.

She was standing in an empty street upon uneven cobblestones. Pubs built from old wood and gardens made of mostly decorative fungi were around her, lit with wrought iron lamps. Above was the black cavern roof, with the occasional light of a false-star bright enough to be visible past the light pollution from the lamps. This was Veilgarden, one of the districts of London.

She did not need to waste time searching. She walked down the street towards her destination, doing her best to ignore the pain that lit up in her empty shoulder as each step jolted it. There should have been crowds, but in this dream they were only a backdrop, like the trees in a forest.

She found him in a back alley, inhabiting the body of a poet whose coat and scarf were threadbare and stained with honey and wine. He had one arm against a wall as he staggered and reeled like an aimless drunk. He looked up as she entered the alley and stared at her wildly through the poet’s eyes. “You’ll never catch me,” he said. “I am the gale, the whirlwind! I am wings! You will stay here, scurrying among the rocks and grass, while I possess the sky.”

“An interesting idea,” said Nightmare Moon. “But a strange one. Who are you, to say such things?”

“You do not know? Impossible. I am known everywhere!” He threw an arm out to encompass the world. “When the thunder rolls you hear my voice. The lightning is my sacred writ. A thousand names are mine. They raise their faces and their voices in supplication!”

“Call forth one who knows you, then,” she said.

“I shall!” he roared. He pulled himself out to the mouth of the alleyway, towards the people on the street. He pointed at one. “You! Do you hear my voice? Have you heard it roaring in your ear?”

The man he had pointed at turned, and his eyes were full of storm clouds, and they lit up with recognition like St. Elmo’s fire. He was dancing, covered in the rain that nourished him, and when he opened his mouth his tongue was lined with lightning –

Nightmare Moon gently pushed him away. She wiped the rain from his eyes, and calmed his limbs, and brought him back to the cobblestones as she filled in the blanks of the dream. The other person was a nobleman’s son, enrolled in Summerset College, here for a night that his father would not approve of. His world was one of wine and silks and occasional Surface food, imported at great expense. He had been born and raised in the Neath, and had never known rain. He recoiled at the poet’s hand, and quickly turned and hurried away.

Storm stared, his hand outstretched.

“What is this?” he said. “I command! I…it is nothing. I still control the storm! Behold! The tears and blood of the sky god!” He turned his face towards the sky. Above, clouds were gathering, a haze obscuring the false-stars and reflecting the light from the lamps. Around them, the people were starting to stop, turn their faces as well, point upwards. One drop hit the ground around them, then another, then –

A third tear ran down Storm’s cheek, to follow the other two. The clouds were slowly dispersing, and as they did so did the people watching them as the show faded away. Storm stood, his mouth open, as a fourth and fifth tear hit the ground. He slowly lifted his hand towards his face. He wiped a tear away, and stared at his wet fingertip.

“It matters not,” he finally said. “I can still touch the sky! I climb the trees, and the wind carries me away! I…” He looked around. There were no trees in this place, only lampposts and fungus.

“Here,” she said. With only one wing she could not carry him. Instead, she drew forth a cloud, tapping the pegasus magic that still coursed through the rest of her body. With her magic she picked him up – he was lighter than a human, as light as a cloud – and placed him on the cloud next to her. With both of them secured, she flew upwards, above the city.

They came to a stop when the lights of the city were as small and distant as the false stars. The lights stretched out under the cloud, constellations marking the boundaries of the Forgotten Quarter, the Stolen River, the Unterzee.

Storm’s hands dug into the cloud. He was silent.

When they had been there for several minutes, Nightmare Moon guided the cloud back down to where they had left. She helped Storm to the ground before getting off herself and letting the cloud disperse.

They stood in silence for several moments. Storm stared at the parks around them, the pubs, the ground. Occasionally he would turn his head to look at her out of the corner of her eye, where she stood silently, waiting.

“I am feeling smaller than I thought,” he finally said.

“You are exhausted,” she said. “You need rest.” She put her one wing on his back. “Come.”

She led him several streets down, to an inn in a quieter corner of Veilgarden, surrounded by bookshops. At this hour, everyone was filling themselves with wine and honey, and the bookstores were dark and silent. She skipped over paying the innkeeper, taking Storm to one of the rooms on the upper floor. An oil lamp was lit, its soft flame illuminating the table and bed. She drew back the covers, took off his shoes, and helped him into the bed before drawing the covers back over him.

“This is warm,” he murmured. His eyelids dipped, before opening again. He reached out to where she was sitting next to the bed. He grasped her leg and met her eyes.

“I still live, yes?” His hands were loose around her leg, but tense, as if he wished to grab her like a life preserver in the sea. “I will wake, when the clouds next come.”

“You will live as you always have,” she replied, brushing his forehead with the soft feathers of her remaining wing. “Now close your eyes.”

He closed his eyes.

* * *

Nightmare Moon awoke slowly. She was lying on her side on her barge, her wing splayed out under her body. The sea had mostly calmed; the ship only bobbed up and down with the last traces of the waves the battle had stirred. She tried to move, but was met with burning agony from her open shoulder. She had successfully pushed it aside while in the dream, but now that she was awake it was flaring up again, the coal-like pain lighting up again. She grit her teeth. She would not scream.

There was a great dragon’s jawbone, caught in the hands of the statue she had left the boat tied to. The teeth were as big as she. Five of her boat could fit in the open space between the ends. Not a trace of flesh remained on it. Both bone and teeth were brown as rock from age.

The dragon this had come from must have been dead for thousands of years old.

There was a medical kit, below decks. Slowly, using her remaining wing to steady herself, she climbed to her feet.

In front of her on the deck, lying on its side, was a black candle.

She needed to secure the candle. She picked it up in her magic and went downstairs, to the stateroom that had been prepared so long ago. On her desk was a bandolier in her size, made to be worn across her chest. She put it on, then put the candle into the first slot.

With the candle safe, she made her way to the bathroom and the mirror within. She lit the oil lamp, then peered into the mirror.

Six dark lines marked her, where the knives had taken of her fat to make St. Arthur's candle. The wound her sister had given her was a ragged hole on her neck. Her empty shoulder had filled in with scar tissue, shining slightly in the night. All the scars glistened gant, the color that remained when all other colors had been eaten.

The gant where her wing had been was telling. It would not grow back, not like her earth pony constitution might heal other wounds. She could not fly now. She still had pegasus magic, could still stand upon a cloud and command it to bear her, but it would be slow and ungainly. She had gone from legs to a wheelchair.

But the Seeking Road had been forced open. St. Arthur's candle was the first light in the path. There were six slots on her bandolier to hold candles. She would need seven to complete the journey North.

She would rest for a bit, then move on. The next candle would be on the west side of the sea, in London.