The Lost Prince

As the thousands of ponies left Canterlot palace, half-asleep, sick, or even wounded, they gasped as they saw what their once beautiful land had become. It was ravaged – a sea of rocks, a useless land of misery. Fires still raged where previously industrious towns and cities had stood proud and strong. The citizens of Marelon had thought they could protect themselves against anything. They had not expected this.

The princesses were almost dead – their parents having left them as they transformed into the sun and moon. The prince, their final chance of survival, was lost – whipped up by the expansive oceans of time and thrown away from their present. But at least he had rid the land of The Shadow.

Even so, Nova had not managed to save everything. He had protected the citizens, hiding in Canterlot palace in their thousands, but the rest of their work was gone, swept away by the ghostly hands of their worst nightmare. The legend had come true.

Some ponies began to recite the legend, to calm their terrified minds. Muttering under the breath of the almost silent wind, they said to themselves:

One pony alone shall stand against all,

His breath ragged from battle, yet he shall stand tall,

The Shadow may take the sun and moon,

But the controller shall free them from Time’s typhoon.

The fight will be tough, and the controller will fall,

But peace and harmony shall reign above all.

What the future then holds is for others to decide,

Marelon’s fall, Equestria’s rise.

Their prince, Nova, was the controller. He kept the fundamentals in line with the rising of the celestial bodies. He had brought the people of Marelon the best lives they could ever wish for. Yet now he was gone, and his personality could not be replaced. They had to cope without him.

The princesses could still raise the sun and the moon – they had enough power for that – but the worldly functions and their responsibilities had to be taken on by somepony else. It would be a unanimous decision – the High Council of Magic would continue Nova’s duties until the princesses were fit enough to take them on themselves.

From the balcony of the throne room, Archmage Silver Vortex stared blankly into the space where his teacher had disappeared in a flash of light after defeating The Shadow. He sighed and put his head in his hoofs, sobbing gently. Life had been so unfair to him at times, but this was the worst thing to happen to him.

Silver Vortex could remember Nova mentioning the spell he had used to defeat the Shadow in one of his final lessons. Overdrive. Where the user would allow his or her magic to completely engulf their body and fuse physically with them, giving them more power than it was perceived possible. With use, it had a fatality chance of 100%. Nova was gone, and Silver could do nothing about it.

Silver looked away from the sky, still full of black clouds. His tears fell in their masses to the ground, where they remained, forming a puddle of salty water. Silver cried harder as the main emotions hit him like a train. Gone. And all Silver could do was cry.

Stop it, Silver chided himself, shaking his head to try and stop the flow of tears. Nova would not like to see you in this state. Be strong. Be strong and cope with it, in remembrance of him. For Nova’s sake, I shall pass on his legacy.

Silver walked out of the throne room and down the stairs into the wrecked main courtyard. The grass had been burnt to the roots – nothing could grow again here for a very long time. Silver activated his magic and tapped his horn on a partially cracked statue of the Lord of Chaos, Discord. The statue glowed once and fixed itself. Silver sighed and continued downwards.

The city was empty – nopony had remained, wishing they could forget all that had happened. Silver hoped that he could too, but he knew that Nova was too important to him for him to just use a memory spell. He had to find the High Council of Magic.

He applied a levitation spell to himself and flew all over the city, searching for the leaving ponies. Eventually, he found them, taking a dangerous rocky path down the mountain, escorted by soldiers and the rest of the High Council of Magic. Silver Vortex set himself down at the back and used another spell. He tried many frequencies until he found the frequency the High Council were using for telepathic communication.

The members felt Silver’s presence and were quiet to let him speak. Please return to the back of line. I will be waiting. He felt their minds leave the communal thoughts and approach him. Satisfied, Silver left himself and waited for his fellow unicorns to arrive.

At last, the final mage arrived and Silver began to speak. “We must decide between ourselves who is to take on which of Nova’s responsibilities. He has taught me all of the spells, and so I shall pass them onto you. I suggest we return to Canterlot palace and to our hall to discuss this further. All in favour, say ‘Aye’.”

The congregation each said ‘Aye’ one after the other, in accordance with the order of their own register. “Then it is settled,” Silver said. “Let us go back.” His horn began to glow, and then he used a group teleportation spell to send them quickly to Canterlot palace.

* * * * *

Lyra was now used to waking up and finding Nova was missing. It seemed to be part of his lifestyle back in the time of Marelon, and Lyra didn’t really want to mess with that. After all, it may help him relive his old life, which he must have enjoyed, Lyra would say to herself. Besides, I shouldn’t really…. miss him every morning.

Whenever Nova left early, he would always prepare breakfast for Lyra, be it a salad, sandwiches, or even a plate of hay. And every time that happened, the food was delicious. So whenever Nova took a break from the work he was doing, Lyra would take the chance to say thank you.

During this free time, Nova would usually tutor Rainbow Dash on her Sonic Rainboom. Through these lessons, Rainbow could now take off and break the sound barrier in under a second. Nova was trying to teach her how to take off and immediately execute the legendary trick. Unfortunately, it was proving rather difficult.

“You have to push off hard with your forehooves,” Nova explained, going slowly through the motions, “and then when you’re completely stretched out vertically, you extend your bent hind legs and blast off.”

Rainbow Dash tried again, bending down and then following Nova’s instructions to the letter. But still she couldn’t do it.

“I can’t do it!” Rainbow complained, falling back to the ground. “I’ve followed your instructions, but it’s impossible!”

“Try again,” Nova urged. “It took me many times to get this right.”

Rainbow groaned and got back up. She bent, she extended, and she pushed with all her might… but still failed. Rainbow yelled something in disappointment to the skies.

Nova sighed. “Okay,” he said, try starting with your wings stretched as far up as possible.”

“You forgot to mention that,” Rainbow muttered.

“Yeah, sorry.”

Rainbow returned to the starting position. Bending down on all fours, she stretched her wings, pushed off with her forehooves, extended her hind legs, and pushed against the air with her wings, using all of the strength she could muster.

And there it was. A Sonic Rainboom immediately from a standing start. Rainbow shouted in delight. “I did it!” she shouted. “YES!”

Nova grinned and flew up beside her, keeping pace easily. “Well, now what, hmm?” he asked. “Double Rainboom?”

“You bet,” Rainbow said, putting on an extra burst of speed. The two ponies flew half a dozen times around Equestria before landing in the central square, exhausted from the practice.

“You wanna come round to my house sometime?” Rainbow suggested, panting. “We could go someplace where there’s a wide open space.”

“That’s a good idea,” Nova agreed. “The Double Rainboom does have a few destructive capabilities…”

“Well, that’s settled!” Rainbow smiled. “Tomorrow?”

“I’ll check with Lyra,” Nova said. “She said she would take me to one of her concerts with Octavia soon.”

“Octavia?”

“She’s a cellist,” Nova said.

“Oh, right,” Rainbow said. “Heh, I could’ve guessed she was a classical musician. So, see you soon then.”

“See you soon,” Nova said, waving goodbye as Rainbow returned to her cloud home. He chuckled and turned round to see Twilight’s face blocking most of his vision.

“Found you at last,” she said, still staring him down. “I have a few more questions to ask.”

“Really?” Nova said. “Well then, back to the library, I presume.”

Twilight’s frown grew larger. “I should have known that was too obvious a place,” she muttered. “Erm, yes, come to library. NOW.” And then she teleported away. Nova sighed and began to walk back to Twilight’s residence.

* * * * *

“You have no cutie mark.”

“I know.”

“But WHY?”

“Beats me. Lyra said she didn’t see one when I appeared.”

“Yeah, okay, but why is your flank blank?”

“As I said earlier, beats me. I did have a cutie mark before I travelled to Equestria.”

“Yeah, okay, okay,” Twilight said impatiently, ruffling through some of the books on her desk. “My problem is that I found something on changelings which states some cannot copy their target’s cutie mark, and so their flank is blank!”

“Well, firstly I don’t know what a changeling is, and secondly, I had a cutie mark!” Nova insisted. “You can’t just blame me for not being what I know I am without some proper proof!”

Twilight grumbled and shut the book she had feverously been reading through again to double-check there was nothing else. “Question time is over,” she growled. “GET OUT!”

“That quickly?” Nova remarked cheekily.

“OUT!”

Nova stayed put. “I don’t know what your problem is with me,” Nova said, “so could you just tell me?”

Twilight sighed. “I’m a little edgy today,” she said. “I haven’t received a letter Princess Celestia said she would send to me. She’s never missed sending a letter before, so I’m worried.”

“There were some times when Celestia was a little bit… off,” Nova said. “I’m sure it’s nothing much.”

“I hope so,” Twilight said. “Anyway… bye.”

“Goodbye,” Nova replied, leaving her home as the night began to set in. Twilight sighed again and returned to the mess of books on her desk. She quickly looked through them and found the right one. She opened the book at the contents page.

“Page 13…” Twilight muttered to herself, flicking to the right page. “’What Came Before Equestria’…”

* * * * *

“This council has been called to order to decide on the roles and responsibilities that must be bestowed upon each member in the event of His Royal Highness Prince Nova’s death.” Silver’s strong voice echoed around the high-roofed hall, bouncing off the bookshelves lined with tomes on magic and mystery. The  14 mages joined with him in a circle each sat straight in their red leather seats. “Let us start with the register, so that we may know all are present. Starlight Dew.”

“Present.”

“Red Star.”

“Present.”

Silver trawled through the list of mages, all answering ‘present’ to their names. Morning Glimmer. Sunset Loom. The list went on until the last mage’s name had been read out and marked with a tick. Silver lay down the scroll and quill he had been levitating and brushed a few stray strands of deep blue mane away from his light grey face.

“We have 15 unicorns to split these roles between. Let us begin.” Silver began to read out Nova’s duties that had to be taken on by somepony else. If a mage wished to do the particular duty, they would raise their hoof and volunteer. If there was more than one volunteer, the rest of the mages would vote on the right pony for the job. There were many jobs, and some were much trickier than others. Silver found that most of those tasks were voted for him to handle.

Once they had finished, Silver wrote down the mages next to their selected job on another scroll. Rolling it up, he sealed it with a powerful magical seal. “And so it is done,” Silver announced. “Your tasks begin today. In order of register, I will see you in my room to teach you your spells. Good luck, and may the sun and moon shine gratefully upon us.”

The mages muttered the response necessary and dispersed, apart from one, who was to be first to learn her new spell. “Come forth, Starlight Dew,” Silver said. “Let us return to my chambers.”

The mage nodded silently and followed Silver up the stairs. Silver illuminated his horn as the stairs became darker – Starlight did the same. Eventually, they reached the top of one of the destroyed spires of Canterlot – except this spire had not been destroyed. Nova’s protection spell had succeeded in preventing The Shadow’s attempt to kill Silver as the Archmage had watched on in horror, before rushing down to the throne room and helping the citizens of Marelon to get inside safely.

Silver put the few things that had fallen back in their place and then turned to Starlight, about to say something. Then he felt a familiar touch on his magical senses. A remnant of a magical spell. It was only there for a second before disappearing again, but it was enough for Silver to know what it was.

“Starlight,” Silver said, “it may be that that entire meeting below was pointless. I have just detected that Nova used a spell to allow his duties to continue by themselves. We no longer require the temporal, spacial and gravitational spells we just assigned the mages. You may tell them that they do not have to come to me to learn these spells.”

“Yes, Archmage.” Starlight Dew bowed before him and turned to leave, but not before asking a question. “How can you only know now that Nova used this spell?”

“Whenever you use a magical spell, there are remnants of the spell left behind; it’s like when you step in sand, you leave a hoofprint behind you,” Silver explained. “Prince Nova taught me how to recognise these ‘hoofprints’ and work out what spell was used, when it was used, and where it was used.

“Of course, these prints will fade over time, and so it usually takes a day for these detectable prints to go away. There is one problem with detecting these, though, and that is that some ponies can make their print to be so small and insignificant other ponies will simply wash over it and not notice. Nova taught me how to keep my magical sight open for these prints, even if they are tiny. And Nova’s prints were the smallest.

“Unfortunately, due to these recent events, my own feelings got the better of me, and so I never realised Nova had used a spell until now. That is all.”

Starlight Dew bowed again. “Thank you, Archmage,” she said, before taking the stairs back down to the throne room. Silver chuckled and stared out over the horizon. You never cease to surprise me, he thought to himself.

And then a scroll bearing the signet of Nova appeared out of nowhere and landed on Silver’s head.

* * * * *

“Lyra?”

“What is it, Nova?” Lyra looked up from her book to see the alicorn standing in front of her.

“Do you remember mentioning that concert where you and Octavia would be performing?”

“Oh, that one!” Lyra smiled. “So you are coming then! Brilliant!” Lyra clapped her hooves together in joy, beginning to wonder about all the sorts of things she could do with him.

“Well… it depends,” Nova said. “Rainbow Dash is dying to learn the Double Rainboom, and she said we could go somewhere wide and open to practice tomorrow, so...”

“I understand,” Lyra said, sighing to herself as she returned to her book, her smile disappearing. “Our concert is tomorrow as well.”

“Ugh,” Nova groaned. “Just my luck. When does the concert begin?”

“Well, first we’ll have a large dinner party before the music kicks off at around 8 o’clock,” Lyra said, calling the details to her mind. “Then it all finishes at around 10 o’clock.”

“An evening concert? That’s not too bad, I suppose,” Nova said, pondering. “So… erm… head over to Rainbow’s at sunrise, head off around 10, practice until 5…” Nova muttered his plan for tomorrow under his breath as he tried to work out what would probably work best for Lyra and Rainbow Dash.

“Okay,” Nova said. “I think I’ll be able to come, so long as Rainbow Dash doesn’t mind tagging along. It takes a while to teach the Double Rainboom.”

Lyra felt a short pang of jealousy at the mention of Rainbow Dash being with Nova for the concert, but she knew that wasn’t professional and tried to put it out of her mind. She switched back to a smiling face.

“I’ll see you two there then,” she said. “Goodnight, Nova.”

“Goodnight, Lyra,” Nova said, exiting Lyra’s house. Lyra knew he was going to find a comfortable tree to lie in – he never asked anypony if he could sleep in their house for the night. It was strange, to see a prince roaming Ponyville as if he was just a homeless stallion, but Lyra knew it was how Nova had lived, and she would respect that. Settling back into her book, Lyra slipped away into the land of pleasant dreams.

* * * * *

“What to do!” Luna cursed, trying to write a letter while looking over her insane sister. “I know that telling Twilight Sparkle is right, but will it break her to find out her own teacher is trapped in a nightmare? Will she get mad at me, thinking I created this as revenge for my thousand years locked away in the moon?”

Thousands of troubling thoughts buzzed persistently around Luna’s upset mind as her quill scratched against the rough parchment, controlled by her dark purple magic. Many wondered what would happen when Twilight found out the news. Others wandered back to Luna’s time on the moon; a time when Luna had met the most insane pony she had seen. An alicorn, wings like black gas, a coat illuminated by stars that seemed to be part of his body. A necklace; a royal jewel, the crescent moon encrusted upon its dark metal.

Luna sighed, signing off with her signet at the bottom of the scroll. “That ‘god of the moon’ insisted that he knew me; that I was his daughter, along with Celestia and another alicorn called Nova. He ruined my entire time on the moon with his non-stop ranting over this and that – things he said I should know, but I did not.”

Celestia cried out again from her bed. “THE SHADOW!” she screeched, then resolving to a whimper. “It’s coming…” Luna shrunk back at the whimper, now not much louder than an ant’s footsteps, yet still applied with force and meaning.

Luna rolled up the letter and tied it with a ribbon. “No matter what happens to me, Twilight must be told!” Luna said. “Even if she wishes me dead!” And with that, Luna used her magic and the letter was sent, containing information that, unbeknownst to all but one, would warn of the Next Coming…

The Shadow was coming.

* * * * *

As Nova searched for a good tree to rest in, he didn’t expect to be hit by a light bluish-grey pony with crossed eyes flying much faster than one normally would after a tiring day. As the dust cleared after Nova crashed into the dirt, the pegasus fell down and landed awkwardly on top of him.

“Oh my gosh, I’m so sorry!” the pegasus exclaimed, offering a hoof to Nova. “I guess I just wasn’t looking where I was going…”

Nova took the hoof and the pale yellow maned pegasus helped him up. “Nah, it’s okay,” he reassured. “I should’ve been more alert.”

The crossed-eyed pony grinned. “Okeydokey!” it said. Nova judged from its voice that the pegasus was a female. “I’m glad you’re okay!”

Nova sneaked a quick peek at the pony’s cutie mark. Lots and lots of bubbles. “Erm, thank you…”

“Derpy,” the pony said proudly. “I’m Derpy Hooves!”

“Uh, okay, hi Derpy,” Nova stuttered, surprised that a pony could have such a name. “Uh… my name’s Nova. It’s good to meet you.”

Derpy enthusiastically grabbed Nova’s hoof and shook it warmly, although the amount of force used was a little over the top as Nova felt his bones begin to dislodge from all of the shaking. Derpy finally relinquished her grip and Nova immediately gave his forehoof a fast magical check-up before being satisfied. “It’s nice to meet you too, mister!” Derpy said cheerfully. “Hey, are you new? I can show you around!”

“Don’t worry, Derpy, I’ve been around long enough to see all of the sights,” Nova chuckled. “Now I just need to find a good tree to rest in.”

“A tree?!” Derpy exclaimed. “No no no no no, you can’t sleep in a tree! You can come round to my house and sleep! I’ve got a guest bed and muffins and EVERYTHING!”

Nova considered it for a moment. “I suppose it wouldn’t hurt… it that really okay with you?”

“No problem!” Derpy grinned, her golden eyes still managing to remain cross-eyed, which Nova couldn’t explain how. “Come on, I’ll show you the way!” And she took off, just like that. “Come on, we haven’t got all day!”

Nova looked once at the night sky, sighed, and flew after Derpy across the fields until they reached a dirt track crossing beneath them. Derpy landed, and Nova followed her example. “Okay, turn right!” Derpy instructed, turning left.

“Uh, Derpy, are you sure that’s right?” Nova asked.

“Well of course I’m right!” Derpy giggled. “Why would I not know the way back to my home?”

“Well, it’s just… never mind.” Nova walked next to Derpy along the dirt track. Eventually, Nova caught sight of lights hovering in the distance. As the duo came closer, it became obvious that the lights were part of a house. It wasn’t too big – a good size for maybe a family of 3 or 4. The straw roof was in good condition, and the wooden walls were well protected against the weather.

“Welcome to my house!” Derpy announced. “Two floors and lots of cupboards filled with delicious muffins! I’ve got loads of different kinds of muffins, like blueberry, raspberry, apple… ooh! And also I have a muffin-flavoured muffin! Mmm, those ones are the best!”

Nova smiled warmly at Derpy’s hospitality as they entered. “Thank you very much,” Nova said. “I… didn’t expect this.”

“Oh, nopony ever does!” Derpy said. “That’s why they never come over! They think I’m weird and deranged and all sorts of stuff, but at least I know they’re wrong.”

“And I know they’re wrong too, right?” Nova said. “You’re not weird – just a little awkward.”

“Thanks mister!” Derpy grinned, suddenly hugging Nova. “It’s good to finally have somepony who understands!”

Nova laughed as Derpy’s hooves tickled him. “All right,” he said, trying to stifle his laughter as Derpy stepped back, laughing with him. “Let’s get some sleep then.”

“Yeah!” Derpy agreed, pointing to the stairs just through a doorway. “First door on the left. Have a good night, and sweet dreams!”

Nova thanked Derpy and found the guest room. It wasn’t very large, but it had enough space for a bed and cupboard. Nova assumed that the cupboard was filled with muffins, like Derpy had said. Cuddling into the soft covers, it didn’t take Nova very long to settle into a deep, comfortable sleep.