It was still dark out when Applejack poked her head out the door of the abandoned house. The mucky streets were empty save for the occasional patrol, lit only by the stars, moon and soft glow from the shield wall above. She sighed, and shrank back inside - no sense getting themselves caught.
"Y'think Twilight 'n' Rarity are okay?"
Zecora slid a couple of boards over the doorway to conceal their presence better; Pinkie was doing the same with the stairs. "Twilight is a capable mare; I am certain they will take care."
The farm pony frowned, and tried to get herself comfortable on the stone floor. "Ah sure hope so... ah don't like this one bit."
"Yeah, all this dark dank stone is making my face sad, and it's hard and uncomfortable and it hurts my-"
"Pinkie." Applejack shot a glare at her fellow. "Ah'm talkin' about our friends gone missin'."
Zecora chuckled, and with the aid of her staff, found herself a perch on top of a ruined shelf. "The matter is out of our hands for now; it's best this time some rest allows." She paused, screwing up her face and mulling over the rhyme in her head again. That made sense, sort of? Sort of. Close enough.
Applejack sighed again, and pulled her hat down over her eyes. "Ah guess yer right..." Truth be told there were probably more comfortable places around the room to doze off, but she didn't want to sleep too heavily. Disciplined sleep training can only get you so far, and they needed to be up at the crack of dawn. She knew she'd pay for it in the morning, but there were bigger things at stake that comfort. Sleep came quickly to all three of them - the day had taken its toll, and none of them had the energy to spend on worrying.
"Ugh. Still haven't gotten the hang of flying with these things."
"Are you complaining about your rack again, Misty? If that isn't irony, then..."
"Guys! Hurry up and suit up, Spitfire should be back any minute now..."
Pamf. The cloud wall to the mares' dormitory in the Wonderbolt barracks exploded, and a frantic looking yellow pegasus with a halberd strapped to her back stumbled in. A few red spots marked her shoulder and top. The three half-dressed pegasi jumped in surprise, one of them taking to the air by the wall mirror.
"You weren't kidding!"
"Okay ladies, listen up. Grab your shit and be ready to go in two minutes. Soarin's getting the guys. We'll all meet up en route to Canterlot."
The blue mare by a bunk on the far side of the room quirked a brow. "Canterlot? That's an... odd angle of attack."
"I'll explain on the way, but uh... let's just say we're not taking orders from Jetstream anymore." Spitfire's news elicited a few grins and fist-pumps from around the room. "I still have a few guards to give the runaround, so, I never passed through, got it?" Dutiful nods, serious looks. "Alright! Let's go!" Grabbing a spare pair of goggles from her bedside table, she started back out the hole she made and resumed her circuitous route around Cloudsdale, leaving her bemused comrades to fix it before anyone got suspicious.
They mustn't have been very deep down at all, Twilight reasoned. The reading room may have been tucked away in one of the older parts of the castle, but it was just a single floor below a corridor that ran along the ramparts, with narrow windows that overlooked the woods below. Archers were standing by near most of them, but she still had a clear view of the sky - and she wasn't thrilled by how red the rim of the horizon was looking. They must have been unconscious for a few hours - it might already be sunrise in Manehattan, which meant that sunrise here was only a few minutes away. She could probably overpower these guards with ease and make a break for it, but the sheer number of them and their uncertain position still left her and Rarity in a very vulnerable place. She gulped and kept walking.
They ascended another two levels by spiral staircase, bringing them on to the parapets of the city walls. Inside, the patchwork of shacks, ruined stone buildings and new constructions lay asleep in the shade of the mountains. Outside, beyond the translucent, swirling mauve wall, the long shadows of treetops catching first light sprawled over each other, with just the orange tips of leaves sticking out, the haze over the visible north and east horizon glowed red with the reflections and distortions of sunlight through the dust, and stars vanished in the glare by the second. In the distance, in the general direction of Trottingham, swarming, fluttering dots grew slowly closer. And on the ramparts themselves, waiting for them, were a collection of grim faces, none quite as unhappy to be there as the captain of the guard.
"Twilie?" he whispered. "What are you... how did you..." Blueblood shot him a hard glare, and he stood back to attention. The guards threw Twilight and Rarity to their knees, prompting yelps of discomfort. From the corner of her eye, Twilight could spot Princess Cadence watching the scene from behind a bodyguard a short way away, looking about as pleased as her fiancée.
Getting back in his stride, the Prince began pacing the clearing, twirling his sword in his hand. "It seems, fillies and gentlecolts, that we have a couple of spies in our midst!" His casual smirk and theatrical tone had the air of a rehearsed performance about it - like he was expecting something like this. "A pair of plucky Ponyvillians, poking around in my private possessions?" Yep, absolutely staged.
"That was my book. You stole it," Twilight spat. Shining winced at his sister's refusal to make things easy on herself.
Blueblood raised his weapon to her, the tip uncomfortably close to her face. "I'm sorry, who's the one holding the sword here?" With a pout, she just grabbed the end of the blade with magic, yanked it down and pushed back, destabilising him. When he recovered his balance, he looked ready to explode, but he took a couple of deep breaths and muttered some nothings to himself to calm down. "As I was saying..." Twilight busied herself with trying to probe the tumblers in her cuffs, while Blueblood resumed pontificating. "Under ordinary circumstances, spies would be incarcerated and interrogated. But these..." He swung his blade out at the horizon, toward the cloud of approaching black dots. "... are no ordinary circumstances. By sunrise, the horde will be upon us, and in the inevitable chaos, a breakout - much like that of our good friend Fancy Pants last night - is all but inevitable." Rarity looked up with the traces of a smile on her face. At least it wasn't all going down the tubes. "And as if that wasn't enough, Miss Sparkle here is one of Canterlot's 'most wanted'! A spy and a traitor. Fancy that..." He cast Twilight a menacing look. She kept up a defiant facade, but inside she was beginning to panic, and lose her concentration on the lock.
A skittish-looking young guard bounded along the ramparts and slid to a halt, launching straight into a salute and a message. "Sir, scouts report that the horde has reached the north watchtower. Estimated time of arrival is two minutes!"
"Very well. Let's not beat about the bush." Giving his sword quick rub with a cloth, he stood by the parapets, opposite the prisoners, with the book in arm's reach. "Under the circumstances, we have no choice but to execute the pair of you without delay. Captain Shining Armor..." He turned to him with an almost casual look, like he was discussing dinner plans, and levitated his sword over with the handle facing him. "... would you do the honours?"
Shining blinked incredulously. He looked at the sword handle facing him, then up at the smiling Prince, then at Twilight. He gave a quick glance to Cadence - she had her hands clasped to her mouth in shock. He knew what he had to do. "No."
"I'm sorry?"
Shining stepped forward and batted the sword away. "I can put up with cutting ties to the other towns. I can barely tolerate locking out refugees. But asking me to execute my own sister is where you cross the line, Blueblood. I'd sooner take her place than go through with it."
"Hm." Blueblood nodded softly and looked around, like he was mulling over the decision for a moment. "Okay then." Without warning or prompt, he turned the blade in the air and drove it through a joint in his armour, into his stomach. The stab was quick and precise, and he prolonged drawing it out, allowing blood to flow liberally down the shaft. While everyone was staring in abject disbelief, and the shield wall started fizzling out, he casually flicked the blood on the ground and returned it to his hand. Shining's legs started to go weak, and he dropped to his knees. There was a clatter as Cadence pushed her bodyguard out of the way to rush on to the scene, throwing herself at the ground by his side.
Twilight, on the other hand, stood up, lifted Blueblood in the air by his neck, making sure to grip his throat tightly. "I'm gonna strangle the life out of you!" she growled, through gritted teeth.
The Prince just chuckled, despite his constriction. "Ah-ah-ahhh..." As much as the smug little grin made her want to snap his neck there and then, she thought it prudent to check what he was laughing about. A quick glance over her shoulder showed her Rarity, with a guard holding a sword to the back of her neck. Cursing under her breath, she let him drop, scowling while he coughed and spluttered.
"I'm not interrupting anything, am I?" A deep, bombastic voice piped up, coming from the airborne form of a gryphon; his approach had been concealed by the writhing Prince before.
"Well isn't that timing?" Blueblood wheeled in place, struggling to hold his reserve together. "I needed the shield lowered to parley anyway. King... Eisen, is it?"
With Fluttershy and Derpy Hooves marshalling the refugees away from Canterlot, Rainbow Dash was left to watch the scene on the walls of the city from afar, hidden in the upper branches of a tree. She rubbed her eyes and yawned - it was entirely too early in the morning for this carry-on. Now, figuring out what to do would be so much easier if...
"Hey Rainbow Dash! What are they doing?" Scootaloo's voice, practically over her shoulder, made her jump, nearly right out of the tree. The high-pitched giggle that followed told her that Kalza was with her. While she was clinging on to the branch, on the ground below she could see Applebloom, Sweetie Belle, Dinky Hooves and... is that Pipsqueak? Hm. They musta really hit it off.
Reclaiming her perch, she resumed her lookout. "What are you guys doing here? I thought I told you to go with Fluttershy and Derpy!"
"We're going!" Scootaloo whined. Dash rolled her eyes - she knew that meant they had no intention of leaving.
"Ugh... they're parleying. Talking before the battle. It's customary. Or, that's what Eisen's doing anyway, it looks like there's something else going on up there, but it's too far away..." She frowned, and turned to the gryphlet, sitting on a branch closer to the trunk, with Scootaloo sitting behind her. "That reminds me, Kal, what's your dad's name?"
"Uhh... Wolfram. Why?"
"Just... thought I ought to know. I get the feeling he's gonna be looking for me."
With Blueblood and Eisen preoccupied with slinging threats and veiled insults at each other, Twilight took her chance to check on her brother. Cadence had rolled him on his back and had made a couple of attempts to pull his armour off, to little success. He was bleeding out at a frightening pace, and most of the wound was covered by the lower plates, hiding its extent. Rarity took advantage of the guards' distraction to shimmy over too.
"Shining, are you okay?" she whispered, hoping to avoid drawing Blueblood's attention again.
"Never better," he chuckled, though it caused him to clutch his stomach in pain.
The Princess tapped her shoulder. "Twilight, please tell me you have a spell for this."
"If only Blueblood didn't have my book... I have one I know by heart though. It won't do much, but it should help with the worst of it. Shining, this might feel a little weird..."
"I'm sure it can't be any worse thaaahmmmm..." Cadence clapped a hand to his mouth, while holding one of his with her free hand. Gathering her concentration and shutting out the shouting match behind her, the lilac unicorn set about probing the wound and assessing the damage. As far as Shining Armor was concerned, she might as well have been wiggling her finger around in it. All sorts of things had been cut up here, but two were proving the most problematic - a major vein had been severed, dribbling blood like an overflowing basin, as had what she guessed was part of the gut. She went about stitching the vein back together first. The tear in the gut might prove painful later and lead to infection, but it wasn't a top priority, so she went for it second.
Or she would have, if she wasn't distracted by the pang of reverberating metal. She wasn't sure what she heard or from where, but it shook her out of her trance with her job half-done. Like a rabbit in the headlights, she looked around in bewilderment, only looking over her shoulder in time to catch the first couple of arc-seconds of the sun creep over the peaks of the mountains. Time seemed to slow down - the gaps in the argument filled increasingly lengthy silences, Rarity's confused look became more vacant and detached, and... hold on, time was slowing down.
The noise around her faded away into silence, leaving her for all intents and purposes alone. This wasn't like her own perception magic - she could still move, for one thing. She saw no harm in struggling to her hooves and sneaking a look at the frozen argument. Eisen's crown had been lifted from his head (and he didn't seem too happy about it), and the Apple was in the middle of being prised from it by Blueblood's magic grip. He was also leafing through the pilfered copy of Magic of the Body, nestled in the shade between two parapets.
An unmistakably smooth voice spoke in her ear, about as comforting as a lump of ice dropped down her back. "Time's up, Twilight."