The Winter in the Diamond’s Eyes

“You know what you should do?” Aline suddenly asked. “Tell me.” Twinkle Star sighed. Here we go again… “Do something with your hair.” Twinkle Star stopped walking. “My hair?” She couldn’t be serious about this… “Yeah. You got pretty hair, I told you before. It’s so long and shiny! I’m sure you can do lots and lots of nice stuff with it.” Aline said excited. “Yeah, right.” Twinkle Star shook her head and resumed walking. You have got to be kidding me, she thought. They would reach the Friendship Lands by nightfall or so, and Aline was talking about her hair? “No, I mean it! You can do so much with it, you’ll look much better!” “Excuse me?” Twinkle Star said, offended. “Ehh… ehehe that’s not what I meant, I mean, you look great of course and all, but you should try something, it won’t kill you! Let me do it for you otherwise! I could braid it for you! Or a lot of little braids! Or what about a knot?” “No, really…” Twinkle Star began, but Aline interrupted her. “Oh come on! I took some ribbons with me!” “RIBBONS?” Twinkle Star yelled while she abruptly stopped walking again. She turned around to look at Aline. “You’re telling me you took ribbons with you, even though you forgot to take a blanket with you for yourself?” Honestly, she thought, honestly!  “Maybe… but hey, see it as a good thing! Who knows, they might be come in handy sometime!” “You’re hopeless…” Twinkle Star sighed.

It was late in the morning now, and they had been walking for several hours. Twinkle Star could see the mountains growing with every step she took. She hardly could believe it when she first saw them this morning. They were there already? The mountains really were huge, she had realised. They still were really far away and still they could see them clearly now. What’s more, they were on the entire horizon. She couldn’t see the end of them on the left or the right. This must be the broader side of the old lands, she realised. If that was so, the mountains would go on for about a hundred miles before there was an opening. Maybe this was more troublesome than she had thought… But seeing those walls again, even though she had never seen them on the outside, but to know what was inside… Her old home. The place that holds the memories of which she had been running away from for so long… And now it was there, right in front of her own eyes. She knew she couldn’t go back now, she had to go on to find Stelline…

“So, what’s your plan?” Aline suddenly asked. “Plan?” Twinkle Star asked a little confused. “Yeah. You know, for when we arrive at those mountains. Where are we going to start looking, how are we going to enter, all that stuff? I don’t think there are signs or anything right?”  “Well…” This time it was Aline’s turn to stop. “You don’t have a plan, do you?” Aline asked sharply. “Well, no. Not exactly…” Twinkle Star admitted. It was true enough. She never really thought how they were going to get inside, or how they would find Stelline. It had always felt so far away for her, she never thought this was something she had to worry about already. “Twinkle Star! Look at the size of those mountains! That country is huge! How are we going to find Stelline before we starve ourselves to death?” Aline asked, a bit angry. “beats me. But hey, we’re not going to get there with stopping all the time, are we?” Twinkle Star said and continued to walk. “Besides, why didn’t you come up with a plan? You wanted to go there just like me. Why am I the one who has to come up with a plan?” Twinkle Star heard Aline sigh behind her. “Because it’s your sister we’re looking for, right?” “Yeah, so. That wasn’t the reason you came with me was it? You wanted to see that place. Why don’t you have a plan of your own?” Aline didn’t respond. Figures, Twinkle Star thought. She didn’t think about what she was doing at all. To rash, to rash…

After two more hours of walking they decided to take a little rest and eat their lunch. Somehow it looked as if the mountains really weren’t getting any closer at all, since the few hours they had been walking. “Maybe they’re still further away than we thought, Aline…” Twinkle Star said, while she was getting a drink out of Fiume. “Yeah, I think they are. You think we’ll reach them before the night comes?” Aline asked. “No, I don’t anymore. I thought we might, but it’s too far. We’ll get there tomorrow evening.” Aline sighed. “I’m so tired of this! This stupid brown stuff on the ground here, the… the emptiness!” She complained. Twinkle Star agreed. They had been walking for more than a day and nothing had changed. If she didn’t know any better she would have thought they hadn’t advanced at all, as their surroundings hadn’t changed. But what would be there waiting for them? Wouldn’t it be just as empty? She sighed. If only she was able to use her wings… She would have been able to travel twice as fast, but she didn’t want Aline to know her secret, so there was nothing she could do but simply walk. “Have you noticed it has gotten a lot warmer, the closer we get?” Aline asked. “Yes, I have, but it doesn’t surprise me. In fact, I was surprised that it was so cool up until now, in this place. There is no shade whatsoever. In summer it must be really, really hot here.” “Yeah, it is. In the village, too. It’s almost like a desert here, you know. No shade and all that. My friends and I, we used to go swimming in the river in the summer. Was lots of fun!” Twinkle Star smiled. “I’m sure it was…” She knew it was fun to play in Fiume. She used to do that all the time when she was a little girl, playing in the river in the summer, with her two older sisters… “You ok?” Aline asked. Twinkle Star looked up. “Yeah, I guess my mind just wandered off a bit. Well, let’s keep going, ok?”

That evening they finally got the idea that they had advanced a little bit. The mountains definitely looked closer now. Maybe they really would reach them by the same time tomorrow. The sun was setting now which somehow looked really sad to Twinkle Star. The sun was making the mountains look like nothing but a dark silhouette that made the light disappear faster. And that’s where we are going, Twinkle Star thought. It gave her an uneasy feeling, and she noticed Aline felt the same way. She hadn’t talked for half an hour now (which was very unusual) and was constantly sighing. It had been hot all afternoon and this had made this day a lot harder than the previous day. If it wouldn’t have been for the dark mountains that they saw right now, Twinkle Star would have been really relieved by the setting sun. “Aline, do you want to rest here for tonight? I know it’s a bit early, but I figured, we’ll just get up earlier tomorrow.” Twinkle Star said while she stopped walking. Aline nodded. “Yeah. I guess I’m just really tired, and my hoofs hurt, and, well…” “And you don’t like the look of those mountains now, do you?” Twinkle Star finished. “Yeah. It’s just so… spooky, so dark.” Twinkle Star nodded. “That’s settled then. We’ll just rest here for the night.”

It didn’t take long for the sun to set completely and Twinkle Star noticed the temperature was dropping really fast now. She once again let Aline borrow her extra blanket. She really wanted to use it for herself this night, but she didn’t want Aline to sleep without any blanket at all. Twinkle star had noticed Aline had fallen asleep within a few minutes after they decided to get some sleep. They had talked a bit during dinner but once again Aline hadn’t talked much. Well, she did, but compared to what Twinkle Star had gotten used to by now, it was really nothing. Twinkle Star didn’t mind to talk with Aline, but sometimes she could just go on and on about something unimportant, like hair or flowers. Twinkle Star didn’t really care about stuff like that.

Twinkle Star wasn’t able to fall asleep so easily this night, though. She was really cold and she noticed it was still getting colder. She wouldn’t be surprised if it was just a few degrees above the freezing point by now. “Why! Why is it so cold! It was so hot this afternoon and now it’s almost freezing!” Aline suddenly yelled and Twinkle Star was on her feet before she realised it was only Aline. “Don’t ever scare me like that Aline! I thought you were asleep!” Twinkle Star yelled. “I was I was, but this cold woke me up! Oh, why does this always happen when it’s cold!” Aline yelled back. Twinkle Star was finally calming down a little. She noticed Aline had gotten up now, too, bu it was still very dark so she couldn’t see clearly. “Okay, what? What happens when it’s cold?” She asked. “This! I always get tears in my eyes when it’s freezing. It’s so annoying, because they freeze immediately! Besides, why is it freezing here anyway? It was so hot before!” “That’s not so hard, Aline. Look, when there’s no shade, there’s no place where the warmth of the sun is blocked, thus, it gets really hot.” Twinkle Star explained. “But when the sun is gone there also is no place that can keep the warmth here, so it gets cold really fast. Got that?” “Yeah, mom.” Aline answered sarcastically. “Anyway,” Twinkle Star continued, “What do you mean with it freezes? Tears shouldn’t freeze that easily.” “I know. And I shouldn’t start crying like this. My mom used to make fun of it. That they could see the winter coming in my eyes and everything.” Twinkle Star looked up. “What?” “That they could see the winter coming in my eyes. You know, when I got tears in my eyes that they knew it was going to be a strong winter and everything…” Twinkle Star stared at Aline. She heard that before. The winter in the eyes… “Aline! Don’t you know what you just said?” “Yeah, that my mom used to say that…” “No, no, you fool!” Twinkle Star interrupted Aline. “The winter in the eyes. Doesn’t it sound a teeny bit familiar with you?” “Well, let’s see… as in winter in the air? Or maybe tears in your eyes? Or maybe…” Aine began. You have got to be kidding me, Twinkle star thought. “The prophecy, Aline! You know!” “Oooh! Yeah but, that was different, right? That was the winter in a diamond’s eyes. I don’t really look like a diamond or anything.” Twinkle Star sighed. Aline had a point there. There was nothing here that represented a diamond or had anything to do with it, and Aline didn’t had anything like it. Her symbol was a flower, her body was pink, that’s not really diamond-like. Not even her pendant was a diamond… Suddenly Twinkle Star remembered something. “Aline, do you remember what I told you yesterday, about the children of the queens who became duchess of certain regions in the country? Those six ponies gave their names to the families. Have your parents ever told you your family name? Or your last name, what is your last name?” “well… I don’t really know. I know my parents told me but I wasn’t allowed to use it outside. Something like Vayra… No that’s not it. Vaida? No, that’s not it either… I don’t really remember Twinkle Star. I haven’t used it in years, I’m sorry.” Vayra… Vaida… No, those weren’t names used in the royal family… But Twinkle Star did recognise the sound if it… Think Twinkle, she thought, think!! “Daiya! Aline, was it Daiya?” “Yeah that’s it! But how do you know?” Aline said, a little confused. “Because it’s a Royal name. Most royal names have a meaning, Aline. Daiya used to be quite a common name for a royal child. I even had a cousin who was named Daiya. Anyway, that’s not the point. Like I said, it means something. Now you guess what it means.” “I don’t know…” Is this girl stupid? Twinkle Star thought. Had she forgotten what they were talking about already? “Diamond! Daiya means diamond! I guess we’ve figured it out then, that part of the prophecy. The winter in the diamond’s eyes, that’s you, Aline! You’re part of the Daiya family and an ancestor to princess Daiya!” Twinkle Star felt excited. So maybe the prophecy was true after all. Maybe she was going to find her sister. “Yeah ok, so what do I have to do?” Aline asked. Twinkle Star didn’t know either. The prophecy didn’t say anything about that. In the word where everything is lost, go find the winter in a diamond’s eyes, unlock the tear in your soul and the future of the lands that are lost will be revealed. She just had to find her, right? “I don’t know Aline, but I’m sure we’ll find out! Now, what about we get some more sleep before we go on?  It’s going to be a long day tomorrow, right?”