Chapter Text
You begin to hear your own breathing. It’s labored, but you’re not sure why, or how you got here - or where “here” even is. You try to open your eyes, but it’s incredibly difficult. Whatever happened to you must have been seriously bad if it’s so much trouble to just do that.
Your eyes open, only a little, but enough to know that wherever you are is very dark. Your skin tingles, a combination of coolness and dampness making you feel very uncomfortable where you’re laying. And to add to it, it feels like you’re laying on a rock.
Am I in a cave? It would surely explain what your surroundings feel like. I must be , you think, what else could it even be? And how did I get here?
Before you have more time to think back on what led you to this cave, you hear very faint footsteps. Whoever it is must have something to do with why you’re here.
I need to ask them. Suddenly the footsteps stop, even though they sounded far too soft to be close to you. As your eyes crack open again, you see a silhouette. Well, what you assume to be a silhouette, because it just looks like a person with a blanket draped over them.
“Wh- who are you? Where am I?” you manage to squeak out. Even the sound of your own voice throws you off. “ Who am I?”
The person doesn’t respond. You feel their gaze tearing through you. You try to make out their face, or anything about their appearance but the darkness of the cave makes it impossible. You can’t even see what color clothes they’re wearing, not like it would help you identify them.
“What happened to me?” you ask.
The silhouetted person steps closer. You can now make out a little bit of their appearance. Their robes are red, their hair a slick black. You can’t quite make out their face, but you see a little bit of it. They have gray skin, with scars all across their face. As you’re trying to discern more about their appearance, they start to speak.
“I am the reason you are alive,” the person says. They have a voice that is equal parts soothing and terrifying, and it makes you want to run away. But you can’t, as you’ve just now noticed there are some sort of restraints holding you to the rock you’re laying on. As you begin to open your mouth to speak again, the voice interrupts you. “You were dead, but my powers have no limits, and I have brought you back to life.”
I was dead? They’re lying, they must be, you think. Before you get the chance to express how outlandish you think this claim is, they stop you from speaking with a response to your inner ponderings.
“I know it seems absurd,” they say, “but it’s true. If I weren’t in such desperate need, I doubt I ever would’ve tried such a spell.”
“Then who am I?” you blurt out.
“I cannot tell you that yet. If I do, then it could possibly reverse the spell, killing you instantly.”
They’re lying, it wouldn’t do that, you assume. “How am I ever supposed to figure out who I am then?”
“You must figure that out yourself,” they say, in a way that seems reasonable - although it’s not like you know anything about necromancy, and such vagueness certainly doesn’t help.
“Then how do I start?”
Glimmer jolts awake suddenly in a cold sweat. She feels… less magical. Her first instinct to test this theory is to create a light with the sparkles she has, which works.
“Huh,” she whispers under her breath. “Maybe my sorcery is inhibited?” She begins to draw a rune, a simple one used to illuminate an area, but for some reason it isn’t working. She tries to feel her connection, not only with the Moonstone, the source of some of her magic, but also the moons of Etheria, which give the Sorcerers their power.
As she does so, Bow wakes up next to her. “Glimmer?” he asks quietly. “What are you doing?”
“My connection with the moons is… wrong,” she responds.
“I don’t know, the pink sparkles in your hand seem to say otherwise.”
“Not the Moonstone, the moons . You know, the source of power for sorcery on Etheria.” She tries again to create the illumination rune, but with similarly dull results. “I’m gonna go find my dad.”
After she leaves their bedroom, she makes sure to be quiet as she moves throughout the castle. While most people in Brightmoon won’t wake up to someone walking around, or, in Glimmer’s much more convenient case, teleporting, it’s still best to try not to disturb anyone.
She reaches the door of her father’s bedroom, but before she can knock to ask him about the strange sensation, it swings open, revealing a very tired-looking King Micah.
“Ah, I was just about to look for you,” he says, clearly still drowsy. “I take it you feel less connected to the moons too?”
“Yes,” she replies, “but I don’t know why. Since I started practicing sorcery, I’ve never felt anything like this. Something must’ve happened.”
They look at each other, both pondering the possibilities while also trying not to fall over and pass out. After a few seconds, Glimmer’s eyes light up.
“What is it?” Micah asks.
“I’m gonna go to Mystacor really quick to see if Aunt Casta or any of the other Mystacor sorcerers know anything,” she spouts in a flurry.
“Wait, take-” before the King can get his sentence out, she vanishes, the faint linger of her magic used to teleport still there. “-me with you,” he finishes.
When Glimmer arrives in Mystacor, she immediately knows something’s wrong. Far too many people are awake for this time of night, even with Mystacor’s typical nightlife and the nice weather. She starts looking for Castaspella, who, as the head sorceress of Mystacor, is more likely to know what this is than anyone else.
“Aunt Casta!” Glimmer shouts. “What’s happening? I felt disconnected from the moons, and so did my dad. I figured if anyone knew what was happening it would be you.”
“Glimmer! Oh, it’s so good to see you, although, these circumstances are not ideal.” Castaspella replies. “I’m not completely sure, but I think someone is draining the magical energy from the moons. I’ve never felt this way before, not even when Shadow Weaver used the Spell of Obtainment.”
“Well is it someone in Mystacor doing it?” Glimmer asks.
Casta shakes her head. “I’m afraid not,” she answers. “Whoever it is, they’re not here. I feel like the most likely place for them to be is the Whispering Woods. The natural labyrinth it creates would be great to hide such dark magic.”
Dark magic. The words ring through Glimmer’s head. Her memory of Shadow Weaver draining her power in the Fright Zone comes back to her, and then the memory of being trapped in place by Micah. She really doesn’t want to deal with another power-hungry sorcerer that’s using dark magic.
“I think I’m gonna go back to Brightmoon then,” she says while yawning. “I’m still pretty tired, and tomorrow we can get a group together to search the Whispering Woods for anyone- or any thing- unusual.”
“Okay, well be safe. Whoever it is probably has bad intentions,” is the equally exhausted reply from Casta.
Glimmer teleports back to Brightmoon Castle, intent to at least get some sleep before she starts to hunt down this dark sorcerer. Her tiredness proves troublesome though, instead of teleporting into the hallway just outside her bedroom, she appears in her dad’s room, who has already fallen back asleep.
Guess I should be quiet when I leave, she thinks. As she starts to creep out of the room, Micah suddenly sits up.
“Who’s there?” He shouts. “Glimmer? Did you have to wake me up?”
“Sorry Dad, I was trying to teleport to my room but I missed by a little bit.”
“Eh, well have a good night,” he responds groggily. “Wait. Did Casta know anything?”
“Yeah, she did,” Glimmer answers. “I’m too tired to talk about it now, we’ll discuss it in the morning.” She begins the walk from Micah’s room to her’s.
As she enters her bedroom, she hears Bow groan.
“When you left you could’ve at least closed the door.”
“What? I thought I did.”
“Well, you didn’t close the door,” Bow says faintly. “Whatever, let’s go back to sleep.”
The next morning, with a feeling of magic somewhat restored, Glimmer finds her dad after he eats breakfast. She explains what Casta told her during her impromptu visit to Mystacor the previous night.
“So we’re supposed to chase down some dark sorcerer? Seems a bit rushed to me,” Micah says.
“You don’t have to if you don’t want to,” Glimmer responds. “Bow and I are going to look for them, and Catra and Adora will probably help too.”
“Are you sure? We don’t know what they’re capable of, it might be worth it to have a bigger group,” Micah suggests.
“Relax, Dad, we’ll be fine,” she answers. “There’s nothing the four of us can’t handle. Now let me go find Catra and Adora.”
She teleports to a house near Brightmoon, with a view from the backyard that overlooks the Bay that the castle is built on. It’s nice, Glimmer thinks, as she approaches the front door. It’s been a while since she’s been here; Catra and Adora typically go to the castle when the Best Friend Squad is meeting up. She knocks on the door, expecting the response to take a few minutes, but it is almost instantaneously opened.
“Glimmer!” the teenaged magicat shouts.
“Hi Finn!” Glimmer responds. “I need to talk to your moms, this is really important.”
“Ugh fiiiiine,” Finn begrudgingly answers. “I’ll go get them.”
As they walk upstairs, Glimmer goes into the living room and sits in a chair, the same one she usually sits in when she’s here. After a minute of waiting, Finn returns, with Catra and Adora in tow.
“Hey Sparkles,” Catra says as she enters the room. “Couldn’t even be bothered to bring Arrow Boy with you?”
“Oops,” Glimmer mutters. “Hang on a sec, I’ll be right back.” As soon as she finishes her sentence, she disappears, clearly having teleported back to the castle to get Bow.
“And you say I’m the dumb one,” Adora jokes to Catra.
“You’re such an idiot,” Catra responds before leaning in to kiss her wife. As they separate from each other’s lips, Glimmer and Bow suddenly appear in front of them.
“Okay, where were we?” Glimmer asks. “Oh right, whatever’s going on with the moons.”
“Ooh, something weird with the moons? I want in on whatever’s happening,” Finn says from the corner of the room.
“No, you shouldn’t be a part of this, whatever it is is really weird,” Glimmer responds.
“They can stay, at least let Finn know what we’re getting into,” Adora replies, causing Finn to pump their fist in victory.
“Well, last night I woke up suddenly and I wasn’t sure why. I felt something wrong with my magic, but I could teleport and create sparkles just fine. I tried to make a pretty simple rune but, something was stopping it from working. I talked to my dad, and he didn’t have any ideas so I went to Mystacor to ask Aunt Casta who seemed to know a bit more. She said someone was draining the power of the moons, causing sorcerers across Etheria to be weakened. Apparently it wasn’t anyone from Mystacor, but she thought whoever it was could be in the Whispering Woods, as it could help them hide.”
“Ooh so we’re gonna hunt down a dark sorcerer?” Catra asks enthusiastically. “You know I’m always willing to fight people that remind me of…” she winces.
“I want in,” Finn interrupts. “I know you don’t think I’m ready but I am. Let me prove it.”
Catra and Adora look at each other, as if discussing the request telepathically.
“Fine,” Adora says. “Are we splitting up into teams to search?”
“I think we should,” Bow answers. “It’s pretty much due south from Brightmoon to the Crystal Castle, from there we could split into 2 or 3 teams.”
“I can go by myself,” Adora says. “After all, I am- ” Suddenly, the curtains fly open revealing a pegasus with rainbow wings.
“Did somebody say Swiftwind ?” the horse butts in.
Adora sighs before continuing. “As I was saying, I can go with Swiftwind.” The pegasus whinnies in excitement at Adora’s suggestion.
“Well it would seem wrong to have you two be on one team with the other 5 of us on the other,” Catra says. “So we’ll split up into three. Sparkles, Arrow Boy, you two should look together. I’ll take Finn and Melog.”
“So it’ll be three teams, me and Swiftwind, Bow and Glimmer, and Catra, Finn, and Melog,” Adora says. “Let’s get going then.”