Eventide

Chapter 1: Nightfall

by Lan

Two cloaked figures strode across the night, dimly lit by the distant glow of the moon high up in the cool air, masked partly by gloomy clouds, bereaved at their sun's passing. The pines seemed to call out to the two, beckoning them to plunge into their murky depths, filled with the sounds of fellow creatures of the night. The allure to stray from the path gripped the first equine figure, bringing his shrouded head astray, glancing forlornly at the hospice the trees offered. The second, a female form, stopped with a slight hint of worry in her posture, her eyes piercing the darkness that surrounded the two, screaming, begging, for her companion to proceed.

After an eternity of waiting, with the pines beginning to lean towards the couple over the aged dirt path, the figure in front let out a gruff grunt and proceeded forward, his hooves making a louder clopping sound than usual in defiance of the trees. The trees, as if in response, screamed back to the two in rage of their perversity, the wind howling along their backs, but in vain, unable to disturb the figures.

The two made a strange sight indeed. They both wore long, drab robes that came just to their hooves, encasing the two in an infernal blackness that would have rendered them invisible if not for the moon's glimmering light. Their saddlebags, each the same tenebrous shade of void as their owners, bulged with the weight of a couple lifetimes of acquirements.

The figure in the lead was a rather lank pony that had neither horn nor wing, but possessed a far more distinguished trait that brought him down his path in life as well as the one before him. It was a trait that haunted him since foalhood, forcing him into a life of exile and exodus. He traveled the lands, never leaving any ties to those places he had come.

She was all too much the same as him, although she did possess one thick, dark blue horn. Her trait led her down the same path as the one before her. Happenstance brought them together and fate interwove the threads of their lives from that point on. Presently, they traveled together down the oft-used road, never talking to those whose lives were brought down the same narrow strip of land that punctured the otherwise unblemished wild landscape. Their lives were led in a shared secret, now codependent on one another for survival. Although they were never formally wed, the two would never be found separated from one another, joined like fingers to a hand.

Midnight dawned on the pair of almost imperceptible shapes drawn on the side of the road, and although they felt like the path ahead of them never moved, a wooden sign drew ever-closer. In the monotone setting, neither could read the scrawl on the sign until they drew close, but neither needed to read the inscription on the wooden plank, for they knew their destination. The arrow extending off the shaft in the ground read Ponyville.

The trees suddenly departed from their course, a border to the wilderness that would not claim the idle town they had drifted into. Despite the late hour of the maturing night, several of the quaint cottages, with thatched roofs and clay walls flanked by timber supports, still secreted light from their open windows, letting out all the putrid odors and vile sounds that should have been contained inside.

On the reverse of the sign was imprinted Everfree Trail. It was the threshold to a new land, unspoilt to their touch until the instant their cursed hooves touched the soil that lay beyond.

At last, the pair departed from the designate path, nonchalantly strolling down the forest's edge, a pair of ants walking up the side of a dish. They stopped after a brief interval, pulling off their saddlebags with a soft thud as they hit the soft debilitate grass below.

Not one denizen from the town would notice the dark green tent that magically erected itself on the horizon the following day. Likewise, not one soul paid any attention to the two figures that prowled in the tired alleys, as nonexistent as a shadow in the vacuum of space. The pair crept up to one of the houses on the interior of the town, making sure to unite their souls with the safeguard that was the realm of shadow. At last, they stopped in the alley laden with cobblestones bound by two little cottages. The one on the right had all its lights off, ignorant to the horrors that were about to besiege them. The one on the left produced a warm lantern's glow in the street that threatened to reveal the cloaked twins of the night. To their luck, not a living thing, animal or beast, wandered the lazy streets.

The thoughts of what follows could only be described as “wickedly joyous” in his mind. All sense of self became lost; Thought became instinct, but with a sentience all its own. He would never hurt her for she could talk to him without an uttered word, control him briefly if need be. She could only stare at the cloaked stallion as he stopped being a stallion.

His hairs matted down as if doused with oil. His snout grew longer, sharper than before. His entire form grew in length, but lessened in width. The hairs assimilated into one conglomerate shell akin to the exoskeleton of an insect, but far more flexible and strong. From the bottom of his hooves sprang forth a variety of spikes of different lengths and radii. Teeth became talons attached to the thing's jaw, so large and arced that its lips could no longer meet. The entire form took a more ursal posture, capable of both bipedal and quadrupedal movement. The inky cloak slipped through his ever-thinning shoulders, landing on the ground between the two buildings without a sound. It became hard for her to look upon what her lover had once again become.

Its ears perked and became more like that of a fox. Its mane remained unchanged except that it seemed to grow sharper at the tips, like the barbs on a porcupine. Its eyes dilated and became almost completely black, removing what little of his red irises were visible. It took to its hind legs, which looked more like that of a predator, ready for jumping and leaping rather than long-distance running. The whole body seemed like it was melting, that it should have fallen apart but was kept together by an unseen force. Her eyes darted away from the averse sight, pained to acknowledge its existence, as if not perceiving it would halt the inevitable process that continued unperturbed.

A light black gas seemed to pour off every hidden pore on the creature's body, masking it even further than its pitch black coat already provided. Above all, what marked the creature as something unearthly was that the form suddenly became difficult to look at, as if something existed in the space that the universe wanted to deny existence, the effect being analogous only to staring at the naked sun.

The creature, as if seeing itself for the first time, stretched out its lean, muscular forelimbs, flexing the muscles several times before beginning its contemptuous act. It reached out one spiked hoof to the side of the right cottage, moving as if made of smoke held by an invisible container in the shape of the creature. The clink as the longest spike met the clay wall echoed down the alley, but drowned in the ambient sounds from the adjacent buildings. The spike slowly began to sink into the clay, leaving not a record of it having ever met the surface. Inside the dark abode, the shadowy outline of the umbral form glided across the wooden floor, its hind legs sliding across the surface, never leaving from the ground. The spectre made not a sound as it slowly ascended the staircase across from the front door with murderous intent and a cruel smile that spread from ear to ear.

~~~~~~~

“What's all the commotion about?” inquired Twilight Sparkle to one of the ponies gathered around the small house, nearly having to shout above the cacophony raised by the crowd.

“Everypony inside has been found dead!” the mare shot back, returning her focus to the front door, where a stallion in royal armor stood. Things like that just simply didn't happen in Ponyville! Perhaps the mare was wrong?

Twilight, her errand immediately forgotten, circled around the crowd, pushing her way to the guard, exclaiming many “Excuse me!”s and “Pardon me!”s along the way. When she did finally reach the guard, her mane in a raggedy disarray, she reached her hoof out in front of the stallion to grab his attention. Over the noise, she investigated, “What happened?”

“Everypony inside was found murdered this morning,” the guard replied bluntly.

The mare was right! Half in shock, half in awe that such a thing could happen, Twilight interrogated, “How did it happen?”

“I'm not at liberty to discuss the details with those not associated with the victims.”

“But I'm the princess's number one pupil! I know she would want me to investigate the matter, so...” She tried to push around the guard, but he lifted his left hoof up and brought it slamming back down  to the ground.

“No one is allowed entry without Her Highness's explicit permission!” he declared.

Rather disgruntled at the guard's lack of willingness to cooperate, Twilight countered with a glare that read I'll just get permission, then!  and trotted off back to the library, her errand completely forgotten.

~~~~~~~

The black-coated stallion sharply rose from his dead sleep, gasping for the first breath he had taken in hours, now that his lungs were working again. The cot he had been sleeping on shifted as he stood up, taking jerky steps as the blood began to flow through his veins once more. He called out for his lover, “Slumber! How long has it been?”

From outside the tent, the soothing feminine voice called back “It is already the afternoon. I prepared a meal a little while ago. It should still be warm.” When no response returned from the tent, she proposed, “Why don't you come out here and have some?”

“I don't feel like eating, as you should very well know.”

She only giggled in response. After a little while, she beckoned, “I could really use some company out here all by my lonesome.” Finally, a black stallion with a black mane sporting a red splatter cutie mark emerged from the provisional dwelling and sat down next to his lover. Her coat was a dark blue, her mane a crimson shade of purple. Her cutie mark was a clock without hands.

They just gazed at the town, not saying a word to the other. They didn't have to. There wasn't anything they had left to say that they hadn't discussed a million times before. To break the deafening silence, Slumber asked softly, “When should we make our appearance?” She already knew the answer.

“Not until the third day.”

The two spent the rest of the fading day sitting in each other's presence, watching over the little town as the sun set over it. The second day since their arrival was spent digging an inconspicuous hole into the ground under their tent, shoveling all the dirt behind the line of trees. Their new subterranean home was a complex maze similar to an anthill, with many passages that led to rooms yet without any designate purpose. Despite being dug from soft soil, the walls were padded down to form a framework for their new home, independent of supports. Slumber had conjured small embryonic blue orbs of pure energy inside evenly spaced nooks in the walls, pulsing with a pale blue light up and down the earthy interior of the den's rooms and hallways.

At the end of the second day, the tent above folded in on itself as a magical aura pushed it together and it vanished down the mouth of the new-born cave, followed by the couple not a second later. They slept well that night, wrapped in each other's grasps as their cares, their torments, their sufferings faded away into the darkness in the peace of their new home.