Rex Unicornis

by Magi Tail Welkin

Prologue

Princess Twilight Sparkle trotted about the Canterlot Library. Princess Luna seemed to be acting a little shaken, ever since the exhibition by Prince Blueblood, Captain Star and Lyra Heartstrings and Bon-Bon. She decided to ask Celestia and the Princess of the Sun simply told her “It’s something personal which happened a long time ago. If and where Luna wishes to discuss it is down to her and her alone. All I can say is it involved the Unicorn Royal Family.”

The Unicorn Royal Family, Twilight thought, the House of Rare Metal, founded over three-thousand years ago, by a simple Unicorn shepherd from the town of Sacrament, she and Flash Sentry honeymooned there, primarily for being the birthplace Silver Light, the central figure of both her and Flash’s religion, the Silver Enlightenment, and presumably the trio she currently carried were conceived there during those two weeks last year.

She shook her head get her thought back to the matter at hoof, something to do with the Unicorn Royal Family. Twilight didn’t know the exact ages of Celestia and Luna, but she understood from the Journal they kept as young rulers, only added to by Star Swirl’s comments after the defeat of the Pony of Shadow. So, they lived during the time of Princess Platinum and other founders of Equestria. Star Swirl the Breaded and Clover the Clever were the first principals of Celestia’s School for Gifted Unicorns, although it wasn’t call that back then. Of course, Star Swirl gave the position to Clover when Stygian came to him to assemble the Pillars of Old Equestria.

True to her character, Twilight decided to read up on the immediate family of the Unicorn Monarchs, in the Journal of the Two Sisters they wrote how Princess Platinum mentioned her father, King Bullion. Twilight never heard of him before reading the Journal, so, she decided to find him.

The Royal History Section stretched several houses in length. As a filly Twilight always wondered how come the inside dimensions every library and bookshop she entered never seemed to conform to their outside appearance. Magically buildings, like her own Castle and the Star Swirl Section of this Library she could brush off as being a side effect of being magical in nature. But as for this section and say the local bookstore in Ponyville, a place benefitting from her personal patronage, didn’t quite fit architecturally, the Golden Oak Library she could also brush off, for being built in a hollowed-out tree.

At the memory of her old home of Ponyville she sighed, simpler time, but she also reminded herself, thanks to her friends, if she ever needed to remember the Golden Oak, she just needed to walk into the Throne and Map Room and look up.

Still, the question of the dimension of places with a lot of books plagued the back of her foremind.

“Maybe the books influence reality.” Said a voice.

Twilight looked about, only seeing blank spaces and shadows. Since no-pony over than herself stood present, she assumed the voice to be her own, though it didn’t sound like her own voice. ‘Flash might be right, I’m not getting enough sleep.’ She put a hoof to her baby bump ‘Sorry if I’m not, but Mommy has her duty.’ She gave a happy sigh.

Then whatever the thought said returned to the forefront of her conscious ‘Books effecting reality?’

“Knowledge is power.” The voice said again.

‘I suppose it is.’ She paused and turned around to the shadows. The voice came from there, she charged her horn to illuminate the room and extend her wings out far “Alright, whatever you are, come out.”

The lightening of the room revealed nothing, except a shadow on the wall. A shadow of a Pony, a hooded Unicorn. The corners of the mouth curled and a pair of glowing yellow eyes opened, a peered into her, Twilight felt her soul shudder, and the foals briefly stirred.

“This one congratulates thou for an astute mind.” The shadow spoke with a refine, and ancient baritone “Most simply shrug of this one’s attempts at conversation.”

Twilight blinked, mouth agape “The Pony of Shadows? But we, banished, you.”

The shadow shook his head “There are many shadows Your Highness, what lives in the dark, is not always evil, but the good are often overshadowed.” The shadow started walking over to a shelf, wrinkling and reshaping in the light and structure of the shelf and the spines of the books. Twilight followed him.

He stopped. His hoof rose to a book and it slide out from it place on the shelf. The eyes returned to her “Thou are only just beginning on a journey. Thou may wish to pause and consider the next move, after learning of this knowledge of this one’s Great-Grandfather.” The Shadow Pony faded.

Twilight rubbed her eyes and watched the wall for a moment. After nothing happened she turned to the book sticking out of the shelves, as if wishing to be read. She pulled it out with her magic and went to a cosy corner in the library.

Again, corners and unusual space in an area with dozens of books, the ideas the Shadow Pony, she’d need to come up with a different name, one which didn’t remind her of the monster who took over Stygian, anyway what, he, exposited came back to her.

It has been said by many wise scholars, ‘Knowledge is Power’. It has been said by certain other wise scholars, ‘Power is Equal to Force over Distance, Divided by Time’. Equally, it is commonly known that knowledge resides, in a permanent, fixed form, in books.

If knowledge is power, and power is a force applied over a distance over a set unit of time, then knowledge bound in paper and ink must contain vast amounts of untapped potential energy. That’s just science.

And since science is just magic that we can understand, it’s magic, too.

She looked up and over the rest of the Canterlot Archives with her epiphany, it made a bizarre but scary amount of sense. The Library did seem to have more staircases than floors, and nearly every bookshop she entered contains rows of shelves ending in little doors surely too small for a full-sized Pony to go through. With this knowledge, she now imaged a good bookshop as a genteel Black Hole with the ability to read.

Looking for a distraction she quickly examined the front page of the book. Title, The Future Unicorn King, The young days of Bullion. And the author, Clover the Clever.

Twilight gasped and quickly turned to the opening pages. She skipped the first few pages, time didn’t allow her to dwell.

It read ‘A legend is sung, before Equestria was young. And knights were brave and bold. The Good King had died, and no-pony could decide, who was rightful heir to the throne. It seemed, that the land would be torn by war. Or save by a miracle alone! And that miracle appeared, in Canterlot. The Sword in the Stone.’

The book went into further details of the above set up.

The Good King in question, Pendragon, his son disappeared, and arguments started between nobles and the Temple Mages over which of the distant cousins, preferably the younger ones should be chosen and, as Clover put it “advised”.

Finally, the narrative returned to the sword.

God, Father, Son and Holy Spirit all agreed to intervene in the matter, and thus in the grounds of Canterlot Castle, materialised in heavenly light, a broadsword jammed within an anvil, atop a granite block. ‘And below the hilt, in letters of gold, were written these words “Whoso pulleth out this sword of this stone and anvil, is rightwise King, born of the Unicorns.”’

The heirs, their advisors and guards were called, and naturally several hundred managed to come among them and the nobles to witness the event, and eventually mustered up courage to take part.

‘Though many tried for the sword with all their strength, none could move the sword, nor stir it. So, the miracle had not work, and the Unicorn Kingdom was still without a King. And in time, the marvellous sword was forgotten.

‘This was a dark age. Without law, and without harmony, ponies lived in fear of one another, for the strong preyed upon the weak. Every-pony forget the Lord and the commandments and the words of Silver Light…’

Twilight read the words again and blinked “Clover the Clever was Silver Enlightened?”

A low chuckle sounded, and a familiar voice spoke “She was a bit of a fanatic too.”

Twilight looked up with a smiled “Star Swirl! Your back!”

The old Unicorn Sorcerer walked up beside her “Celestia said I might find you here.” He looked down to the book “So Clover documented the story, I must have been distracted. I’d be interested to learn her perspective.”

Twilight smiled and nodded “How are the other Pillars doing?”

“Rockhoof is going to become a trainer at the Royal Guard Academy, although I also hear that he and Flash Magnus are candidates for Royal Knights.”

“Really?” said another voice, or rather a pair of voice. The Unicorns turned, and Twilight smiled happily as Flashes Magnus and Sentry walked up. The Princess then blinked at the pair. Aside from the differences in coat and mane colour, and how Magnus looked slightly older, the two appeared identical, they even walked in prefect step.

Prince Flash paused at his wife’s dismayed look then chuckled “I was going tell you before you ran off here Twi. Flash Magnus is one of my ancestors.”

Magnus sighed “I was so busy with the Royal Legion and the Pillars I never had time with my family, I barely saw my wife and kids.” Tears formed in his eyes “The only time I really knew properly them was the day I spent with them before I said goodbye and joined to others for the banishment spell.”

Star Swirl sighed “We scarified so much, all because of a misunderstanding.”

Twilight got up and hugged Magnus, “If you want you can stay with us.” She rubbed her hoof over her bump “We could use all the help we could get raising the Triplets.”

Magnus bowed “Thank you Princess. I don’t think I can live in Cloudsdale, with it so different. Our King, a once a client to the Pegasus Emperor overthrown, the Royal Legion merged with the Royal Guard, and I don’t really feel I’d fit in the Wonderbolts, I’m a solider, not a stunt flyer.” He glanced to Prince Flash “And I tend to follow, sometimes I break away, but I never do it without permission.”

Flash blinked “You’re letting me give you orders, my own grand… wait…” he faulted.

Magnus chuckled “We’ll work it out later. I do feel a duty to protect the Tree of Harmony, I did help make it.” He turned back to Twilight and Star Swirl “As for the other Pillars. Meadowbrook went back to her home and her descendent welcomed her back, same with Mistmane and Somnambula. As for Stygian?”

Star Swirl smiled “Last I heard he entered as a Lecturer at Hogwash’s.”, referring to Hogwash's Arcane Acadamy, the oldest magic school in Equestria, although somewhat lacking compared to Celestia's School.

Twilight and Sentry glanced at each other, the Princess turned back confused “I didn’t see him when Archchancellor Wildwind was elected.”

“He said he’d been made the Chair of Indefinite Study, I’m amazed that position’s still going. It keeps the pony in question quite busy.” He sighed again “Equestria is very different from the place we left. Celestia and Luna have told me what happened since then. The Reign of Chaos. The Dark King Sombra…” a stir in the air gave them all pause, and they looked around.

Twilight looked to the shadow with a nervously raised eyebrow.

Star Swirl cleared his throat “And the Tale of Nightmare Moon.” He gave a big sigh “I taught Celestia and Luna how to be Princesses, to be smart, to be good, I guess I didn’t teach them how to be friends.” He looked to Twilight and gave a sad smile “Celestia was right in telling me I didn’t understand friendship, my arrogance got the better of me, I was a Sorcerer, a High Wizard, I felt myself a leader and the Pillars, we were a team, not a group of friends.” He closed his eyes and bowed to Twilight “That is where you are my better Princess. By being a friend, and being yourself, you proved you and your Elements are what Equestria needs. I’ve come to realise what I assumed was wisdom was merely intelligent, you Princess, and your student are far wiser than me.”

Twilight blushed, her horn sparkled in embarrassment and pride.

The Magnus coughed “I just want to ask, why did you put to Elements back into the Tree?”

Twilight then explained about the Plunderseed incident.

Star Swirl nodded “In that case it was a good thought, keep the fruit of our labour alive.”

Prince Flash then raised an eyebrow at Twilight “I thought the Tree of Harmony gave you and girls those Rainbow powers when you defeat Tirek, was that just a onetime thing?”

Twilight blinked “Actually I’d pretty much forgotten about them.” She faced hoofed “Maybe we could have call on them instead.”

Star Swirl hummed “I think it is best to focus of what is instead of could have been.”

A spark of magic shot passed his face making him flinch.

The quartet glanced down at the book. It started glowing.

Magnus rolled his eyes “Great, more hocus pocus.”

Star Swirl narrowed his eyes “It must be some imprinted magic residue. Clover did have some trouble control her magic.”

The book unfurled to the beginning pages. A light emerged from it and spread like a dome around them.

In the corner of the library alcove, a fade image, like a magical hologram, crackled into existence.

An elderly Unicorn mare sat at desk. Her coat a greying light blue, a mane of equally greying dark blue. Her cutie mark being a trefoil clover divided in half with one half white, the other red.

A tatty cloak with a pointed hood made of burlap and rope hang beside the desk.

She spoke, in a refined and aged country accent, as she wrote on paper with the quill in her magic “The Equestrian Royal Chronical, my last work. I am old now, I’m not the mare I once was. But even as a young mare, I was always the Crone of a Witch trio, somewhat disagreeable, but wise and wishing to help, something I’ve hopefully imparted this to Princess Luna. I feel knowing the history of the Unicorn Royal Family in it last form will help rulers in the future. The best place to start is with his late Royal Majesty King Bullion. And please, bear with my erratic writing style.”

Star Swirl nodded “She was great with spell of Witchcraft and integrating them into Wizardry, but she was never good at writing sagas, she did tend to tangent.”

The four sat down and watch as the opening verses of the book played out as Clover envisioned it. Whenever she went into a more thorough explanation the imagined faded to black and the magic refocused on her at the desk.

Author's Note:

Happy New Year (At time of writing.)

And so we start with another story of the EK Verse. I hope you enjoy it.

Comments

[Godslittleprincess]

So, you're going with Magnus and Sentry being related after all, huh? Which side of Sentry's family is Magnus from?

[Godslittleprincess]

One more thing, I noticed that you borrowed a lot of this from Disney's Sword in the Stone. Is Bullion supposed to be Arthur?

[Magi Tail Welkin]

8645772
His mother's side.

Flash is descended from Sir Defender Warden on his father's side.

[Magi Tail Welkin]

8645775
Exactly.