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The first to come to her is Mermista.
They had seen the sky and the stars – oh moons the stars more than she could ever hope to count – and everyone is reeling because they can see the stars and the sky and there are so many and it is so beautiful but Glimmer –
They regroup at BrightMoon, the Sorcerers throw up an invisibility shield, hoping to buy time. Time for what, time for who no one knows yet. Micah is King in Absence now and he is hurried off before anyone could get in a word edgewise.
(Brightmoon has always been ruled by those with a connection to the Moonstone, a bloodline stretching back far beyond the horizon of time. What will they do now?)
Mermista pulls her aside as she paces the halls – a dog with no master, a knight with no lord, friend with no comfort – and shows her the inside of her wrist.
She was taking off her cuffs to clean them, she explained, and noticed something.
To the untrained eye it looks like she had just worn her bracelet too tight, a slight mark – a pattern even, if one were to play games.
A word is blazed on skin there.
To Adora, who can read a language long dead, it says Sea-Chosen
(Underneath she thinks is says sacrifice
she goes with the first one.)
The next is Frosta and Adora feels her throat close up when she kneels down next to her – she is so small and she remembers how painful the Activation was and if she felt it to – by Mara she's so small –
Frosta finds her after her security patrol around Brightmoon’s border.
(If she stares at the horizon long enough, hard enough, will it change? Will she make out something she hadn’t seen before? Something that will make it all make sense?)
Frosta’s is on her shoulder, Ice Heart the lines tell her.
She tells her it says Brave – because that is true as well – pulls up the parka, and hugs her tight.
Perfuma finds her on the Moon stone dias – staring at its reflective surface. She has taken to meditation up here – of all the whispers in her mind that of the Moon is the quietest, almost apologetic.
She finds it soothing.
Perfuma's is easy to make out, if only because of the tanned skin. Her hair covered the back of her neck.
Forest-Taken it taunts.
She tells her it means Courage and smiles at the flowers that bloom around them.
Scorpia's expression is solemn, unusual for someone chipper as her.
She holds out her tail wordlessly.
It is close to midnight and neither of them sleep – they barely even talk – instead they patrol the castle with the rest of the guards until one of the Princesses finds them or dawn breaks; whichever comes first.
If the others can sleep, they deserve a night uninterrupted.
(They are both of the Horde, they know what vulnerability means.
Conversely, it is why Scorpia would only come to her.)
Desert-Claimed she makes out of the cracks of the armor.
Princess Adora whispers then blinks back the tears when she is hugged.
Adora was familiar with scars.
(Anyone growing up in the Fright Zone was, really. It was not the safest place)
Small ones, like the ones dotting her wrists and arms from training.
(They didn't believe in setting the blaster on low – real combat experience and all)
Big ones, like the six scratches down her back she refused to let the Sorcerers of Mystcar erase despite their insistence.
There was comfort in scars, in fighting a battle and living to see the other side.
There was pride in scars, in letting the enemy leave a mark but being stronger than it.
She doesn't know how the others feel about scars and she does not like how these came to be. A piece of her friends, carved out by the First Ones. Look it said we are long dead but we have claimed your friends. They are ours now, just as you are. We have bound their blood to yours not in camaraderie or friendship but in death and destruction. You are made for nothing more than to be our weapon.
She did not like her new scars.
They were faint, almost white against her skin but when the sun hit it just right you could make out the faint, scrolling text of the language whose people were long gone yet still designed to dictate her fate.
There are many more than the others, layers and layers of titles and epics, scattered poetry, phrases with meaning she can barely decipher – all from the First Ones. (All claiming . Just another thing they own, just another body in the fight.)
Activation codes to ships long gone, names of weapons caches long empty on planets whose names she does not recognize.
(Are they out there? These planets? Dare she hope fate would be so cruel as to make others like her? More weapons of the First Ones struggling? Or did they bow to the yoke on their neck, seize their sword they refused to beat to a plowshare, and march happily to a war they did not start but were chosen for?
Were they lied to as well? Did they know the blood that would be on their hands?
Even now it calls to her, the Sword – the Key – the power of a fucking planet – it all whispers to her to use it, to take up arms and strike against those that would cause pain to the First One’s Empire.
The sword, fragmented, lies in a case below her bed. She refuses to see what words(lies) are etched into it.
Still, she refuses to get rid of it completely - what is a lock without the Key?
She knows the cost and she will not pay it.
Not yet at least.)
All the pretty words, traced along her limbs, meant to appease the person they chose to bear the weight of the Mantle – the person who would be irrevocably changed, tied to a planet, forced to be a key .
She-ra they say along her arm, Administrator, Protector, Lodestone.
Such simple words.
She-ra they say along her neck, Keystone, Sword-Bearer, Peace-Maker
Such lies.
She-ra she says in her mind, Weapon, Empire-Breaker, World-Crusher
Failure
She wears long sleeves and high necks, despite them being barely visible.
(she can still see them)
(she wonders if Mara was covered in them)
(She wonder what they said)
High above Etheria, sitting on a bed too comfortable even for her, Queen Glimmer takes off her gloves and examines the mark on the back of her hand.
One might mistake it for a still-healing cut.
She wishes Adora were here to tell her what it means.
( Moon-Bound it says.
If Adora were here, she'd smile, kiss the back of her hand gently – vassal to lord, nothing more, both their hearts belonged to others – and tell her it said Queen. )