The summer fair

“You look… indescribable.” Ruki said while looking at Sakurako.
The large hat, the long cloak, both made of the finest silk, contrasted sharply to whatever it was Sakurako used to wear. If anything, she wore a grey cloak, and maybe sometimes she tied up her hair in a simple tail. This dressed up Sakurako looked indescribable indeed, and Ruki failed to keep in a grin.

Sakurako sighed.
“Shall we just go?” She said grumpily, well aware these clothes looked silly on her. Yet funds were running short, so they could not afford to randomly buy new clothes. Kuro, one of the male ponies of the Asana Bond, would come with them to escort them. Ruki didn’t know him very well, but it seemed nobody did and that was exactly why he was chosen to come with them; nobody would be suspicious of them.

Glancing out of the window, Ruki could see the decoration in the street, and all the ponies walking on their way to the festivities of the summer festival. Sakurako, Kuro and her would join them soon. The summer festival was a perfect opportunity to learn more, and also to relax a little bit, even though the latter was never spoken out loud by either Takato, Ruki insisted on enjoying herself a little, too. It was only summer fair once a year after all.

“You are going out?” Ruki heard Takato say.
She turned and saw him standing in the hallway, hidden by the darkness. He was not allowed to be seen, and going out now would surely be too risky. Ruki felt sorry for him, and for the others who would be too recognizable; they had been forced to stay in the house for so long now…

“Yes, we are.” Sakurako replied.
 Takato nodded. “Good. I trust you three to keep your eyes open. Even on the fair you might learn something. And especially tonight, at my father’s speech. He might reveal something that the others might not pick up, but you can, because of what you know already. So keep your eyes open, and look not only at my father but also at the ponies surrounding them.”

Ruki nodded. “Don’t worry Takato. We will. We’ll report back to you tonight, after the speech.” She ensured Takato, and not much later, the three of them were off.
Ruki stared at all the gorgeous decoration put up even in their street; lamps were hanging on the trees, thin ropes with flags on them were stretched from lamp to lamp and every single garden was specially decorated in its own way. It was truly a gorgeous sight, making the city look loved and alive.

As they entered the main street, Ruki gasped at all the stalls she saw. Four rows of stalls, two on each side of the road, filled the street from the bottom at the gates almost all the way up to the castle gates. The top most part was reserved for a big stage where Shanjahen would hold his speech that night and the area in front of it, though now covered with moveable stalls selling mostly candy and drinks, would be free too.

Walking over the market, Ruki and Sakurako wandered from stall to stall, admiring beautiful statues, vases, clothes, hats, jewelry, tools, and later on all kinds of exotic fruits and other food. “It’s Bamunde!” Ruki exclaimed when she saw the rare fruit that doesn’t wither for months. She used to eat it on her father’s island, and later they sometimes had some on their journeys for the Asano Bond.

Of course, they had no money to purchase it here as it was ridiculously expensive, like everything, but Ruki wished they could. The haste of it had always transported her back to the safety of her father’s island. Well, she thought, maybe it’s better if I don’t dwell on that for too long anyway. Focusing on the fair again, they strolled through the market until they got tired from the crowd, and decided to walk through some of the smaller streets.

Enjoying the decorations and the small events, like ponies playing music, some small theater, a lower royal pony showing off his ability to manipulate the color of Prana, which was a rare gift indeed, and the general beauty of the city. There was so much to see, Sakurako and Ruki were absolutely sure they would not be bored until the speech, and poor Kuro was forced to follow them.

“But I really want to hear that music…” Stelline said softly.
“I want to hear it too. But I have to agree with Hikary, that free tour in the museum of the history of ZoroAster sounds very promising, too, and might be more interesting to our cause.” Taira counter argued.
Hikary was happy to see her sister sided with her, but she didn’t like to see the look of disappointment in Stelline’s eyes.

Stelline was not the kind of pony to quickly say she wanted something, but she had been enthusiastic about this concert, which was music made with instruments whose design dated back a thousand years, and was sure to be beautiful. And her poor sister was already forced to wear a hat all the time to hide the fact that she was a unicorn. Hikary sighed. “Well, maybe you three should go to the concert, then. One of us at the tour will be plenty.” She offered.

“Are you sure? Are you even allowed to walk around on your own?” Taira asked.
“Well, yea, as long as it’s before sunset, and let’s face it, it’s barely noon. Just to be sure I’ll have Yuuro write me a letter saying he gives me permission and that he is to be found at the concert. I’ll come look you three up once I’m done.” Hikary said, and Taira seemed satisfied. Stelline shined.

After Yuuro had written the letter and Hikary had said her goodbyes, she parted from the others and walked through the crowded streets on her way to the museum, which she had seen the day before from the outside, so thankfully she knew where to go. She quickly arrived at the museum, and she was just in time as the tour was about to start. The museum was an old building, but kept in proper shape. The large rooms inside allowed for a generous display of items from the past and miniature versions of ZoroAster as it once had been.

The tour was truly impressive, even though with her broken Aster Hikary could not understand much of what the guide was telling the group. Still, she had noticed, she was learning the language slowly, and she was beginning to understand basic words and simple sentences. Nonetheless, she was amazed by what had been preserved of the past here, showing off how ZoroAster had been an impressive city even ages ago.

She found a few references to the east, to her surprise, most of them dealing with the old Friendship Lands and the connections that had once existed between the Friendship Lands and Asterian. She wasn’t sure, but apparently there used to be a lot of trade and contact, until the decline of the queens there, which caused the High King to pull back out of the east almost entirely.

The final room of the museum, however, managed to spark her interest even more. In this room the museum showed how the citizens of ZoroAster worshipped. Of course, prana itself was worshipped in both spring and fall as it still was, and there were several parks, which still existed today, which were created to worship the existence of prana which had made their life so much richer and easier.

Way more interesting, to Hikary at least, was the worship of the guardians and the supreme goddess, Vitalia. A miniature version of the temple was displayed, of course, and some older statues from an earlier temple were shown, showing Vitalia as a unicorn with feathered wings, soaring up into the sky. She was definitely female, which surprised Hikary; she had not thought that in the west there would ever be a female worshipped. She understood that this temple was only there for historical reasons today, however, as no one worshipped a goddess who was sure to be nothing but a legend. As far as she could tell, however, she did not find any reference to the guardians. Apparently they were not very well known in the west.

Moments later, Hikary was outside again, enjoying the warm sunlight after being inside for what was sure to be over an hour. Time had flown by and she had learned a lot. She decided to hurry to the concert, and hopefully catch a glimpse from it as well. Even if she wouldn’t she didn’t want to let the others wait for her, so she began to walk in the correct direction.

After crossing a corner, she noticed a few stalls and realized they were stalls from organizations like a pottery club and a cooking school trying to recruit new members, and there were several younger ponies interested in what she had to say. Realizing this was something completely new to her, Hikary looked around, until her eye was drawn by a particularly yellow pony. Sure that it was Taira, Hikary made her way in the pony’s general direction, until she realized this pony was a shade lighter then Taira was.

She stopped, staring at the pony, who beneath her soft pink hat had mane shining as bright as the sun and a coat that did not look much different from bars of gold. Such a beautiful girl, Hikary thought as she looked at the girl having fun with her friend. Unfortunately, the pony seemed to notice her staring. A few moments passed where the two women looked at each other, and a split second before the girl’s friend uttered her name, Hikary realized who she was looking at.

“Ruki?” the pony’s friend asked, but Ruki had already dashed off.
Hikary sprinted after the pony into an alley, which was hard due to all the other ponies walking there. They yelled at her for running, but Hikary barely heard them. Ruki. It was truly the name the other girl had said, she was sure she had heard correctly. Besides, even without that name, Hikary was sure beyond a doubt.
This is Taira´s daughter.

The alley led them to a larger road which had no stalls or events, but was still rather crowded. Ruki was still running, and Hikary was still on her heels, though the distance grew slightly. The girl had an incredible speed and seemed very adept to the large crowds, but Hikary wasn’t. 

This road, eventually, brought them to the main street of the city. More crowded than ever, Ruki ran into the crowd without slowing down even a little bit. Once she entered the shopping crowd too, however, Hikary could see even Ruki was forced to slow down. Still, due to this same crowd, Hikary could not get any closer to Ruki and was usually being slowed down even more for being the second person in a short while to force her way through the crowd.

“Ruki!” Hikary yelled, hoping that it might stop the girl, but it did not.
Come to think of it, why was Ruki running away anyway? She hadn’t done anything to her and they had never even met before.
“Ruki, please!”  She yelled once more, using the Aster language as Ruki was of course raised in the west.

Forcing herself through the crowd, Hikary could see the gap between them widen every moment. Ruki was smaller than her and more flexible, and Hikary was, well, large and managed to bump into ponies a lot. Eventually, she only caught glimpses of the shining yellow coat ahead of her, but she refused to give up. She had to talk to her, she had to tell this girl that her mother was here.

Losing sight of her completely, Hikary still refused to give up and began to push even harder, almost throwing over some vases from one of the stalls. After quickly apologizing she pressed on, refusing to lose time. She couldn’t lose Ruki, not now. This city was too big and too crowded to go randomly look for her. Seeing the castle ahead of her drawing closer, Hikary realized she was nearing the end of the main street, and she wondered how long she had been on this chase.

Hoping she would find Ruki in the space that would come at the end of the stalls, she rushed on, but when she finally emerged on the open space, she saw many things and many ponies, but there was no trace of Ruki anywhere, and there were too many ways she could have gone. She had found Ruki… and had lost her again.