You are tall, taller than you have ever been, tall enough that the golden ears of corn in their green jackets only come up to your waist as you stroll through the fields, with the wind tugging at your hair, running your hands (hands? what are hands?) along the sharp edges. Yes, you think, that is as it should be. Nature nurtures, yes, but nature will defend its own. Nature is vast and vibrant, the balance of life and death. Nature...Death...will always win, in the end—

Nature always wins...

You feel the heavy weight of a crown on your head, a crown you cannot see, but you can picture it as if you know it, a crown of gold threads and fragrant blooms interwoven, shedding a perfume that seems so familiar. Familiar and yet...not. You do not know this scent. You do not know—you do not—you—

Nature won this battle, as it always does.

Persephone shakes her head to escape the strange vision, her whole body shuddering as she releases the hilt. The ruby pommel flashes at her, brilliant blood red, and she remembers...she remembers six rubies, six drops of blood.

And then the memory is gone, leaving only an acrid taste in her mouth.

Aria shakes her head, dissatisfied with this outcome, and yet, unsurprised. The Dungeon has tested this child, and she is not yet ready. She is too young; Aria knows this. The memories that should have flooded her sink back into the stones, back into history; Aria could Call them again, if she chose, but why force the child to carry a weight she is not yet ready to bear? It would only crush her, grind her to dust beneath the weight of Time. There would be no point in Calling. 

Be ready, she says instead, ears pinned flat against her skull. The magic here has been disturbed, and now...now there is danger. Bones grind together as the wyvern draws its legs under itself, bones held together by nothing more than magic and mystery. What remains of those shattered wings flap, kicking up a cloud of dust, and Persephone whinnies, high and shrill. She shies, dancing one way and the next, unable to flee. She is frozen by indecision, and that will kill her. 

Aria's orders were only to watch and observe, unless the filly is in danger. This is danger, and Omen is free to intercede now. Aria says nothing as her Second steps forward, revealing herself.

"This way, child," she calls with authority. Her sudden presence should frighten the chestnut filly, but the skeleton is the greater threat, looming tall now as it bares its fangs, and there is not enough room in Persephone's mind for more than one terror. Omen canters away, Persephone trailing behind, as Relic slams her hooves against the stones, magic stolen from some ancient tome snaking out to wrap the bones in its paralytic grip. 

"Now!" she shouts, as the skeleton freezes midstep, caught by the power Relic claimed and made her own, ancient sorcery turned to her purposes now. Hymn rears, opening her mouth, releasing a torrent of sound, jumbled notes clashing together as she weaves a Song of Shattering, a Song of Destruction. Aria adds her own voice, a hundred times, a thousand times, stronger than Hymn's, and the wyvern's skeleton blurs as it vibrates, unseen cracks riddling the hollow bones, as if crushed by an invisible weight. 

In a moment, it will crumble into dust, unable to withstand the force of the Song-magic that Aria and Hymn wield. They are not the only ones of the Herd to hold this power, but they are the two most powerful, the ones in whom the Songs of the world sings true and strong. Relic holds her own spell fast, giving her sisters time to finish their work, straining as the skeleton wyvern fights them. The whiplike tail wrenches free, forcing Hymn to stop Singing as she leaps aside. It scores a line of blood across her hindquarters, red and hot. Aria's Song changes pitch, becoming the rumble of stone against stone, of abyssal depths.

The bones shatter.

Persephone plunges into the depths of the Dungeon with only Omen as her guide, her lantern swinging wildly over her shoulder as she gallops down the tunnel, too scared to be careful of where she lays her feet. She could break a leg down here, and nobody would be any the wiser, save for these strange, blue-purple mares who appeared out of nowhere like ghosts. Like guardians, come to deliver her from the danger she herself raised. 

Persephone tries not to think, tries not to remember. Tries not to wish she knew what was happening, because all this feels like it was meant to happen, meant to happen to her. Like Fate knows her, personally, and is guiding her hooves to the path already laid out before her. 

But in the next breath, she can't remember even that. All she knows is the burning in her lungs, the cool wind against her frothy sides, and the fear that if she stops, it will be the end of her. 

Persephone's lantern smashes against the wall as she takes a corner too sharply, scraping her shoulder in the process. The pain doesn't register. Fear reigns supreme in Persephone's psyche, and she has nothing left to spare to feel something so trivial as pain. 

In the sudden dark, Omen disappears, her dark coat indistinguishable from the shadows. Persephone races onwards, fear making her blind to the second tunnel, where Omen turns, seeking safer ground. The filly plunges instead into a tunnel damp-slick with mud, air thick with condensation. She struggles to rip her feet from the muck, slipping and sliding, her heart pounding in her ears like it's about to burst. She can't hear the wet, sucking sounds as she wrenches first one hoof free, then another, struggling not to overbalance as she fights for her footing. 

She screams as the mud beneath her feet gives way, sending her careening down the tunnel, unable to find purchase in the muck. Down, down, down...down into the depths of the earth...

The depths greet Persephone like an old friend, but she is too blind with terror to notice.