PREVIEW: Chapter 6 of The Archmage's Last Bow, opening section

Preview for Chapter 6 of The Archmage's Last Bow after the break.

The capital city of the Alicorn Empire was known by many names throughout its time.  The Roamans called it Scala ad Caelum, or “the stairway to the heavens.”  Some cultures referred to the city as the Apex of the World, the shape-changers far to the south called it the Diamond Within The Maw, the germaneic tribes spoke in whispers of a haunting twisted white city crafted from arcanostone and orichalcum whose name they were afraid to even speak, as though the gods that inhabited that city would punish them for profaning it with their lips.

The City on a Hill.  The City of World’s Desire.  The Pinnacle.  Where the Cosmos met the Earth.  And so on, and so on.

Prince Imperius always scoffed at those tall tales, spoken of by merchants who traded with the Roamans or other beings.  They were probably only trying to ingratiate themselves with the citizens of this city.  The better not to be treated like the subservients, or some other motive.  Perhaps they truly were spoken of that way abroad.  Imperius wouldn’t know.  He had never left the city.  It was his birthright.

It was Elysium.

It was home.

“Where is he?” he heard from somewhere outside of his current location, a room known as the Hall of Prophecy.  It was one of his (many) caretakers, clearly trying to fetch him for some new frivolity that his father was imposing on him.  How many more duties were to be foisted upon him?  Was Father retiring so soon?  Surely he could wait and let Imperius adjust to the current workload he had increased only last week.

They were immortal; it’s not like Father was running out of time.

That wasn’t to say that Imperius wasn’t focused on his duties.  Quite the contrary, it was because of his duties that he was in this room in the first place.

Of all of the strange, wonderful places in the White City, the Hall of Prophecy was perhaps the strangest and most wonderful.

It was common knowledge that the alicorns were gifted in the ways of all subservient races.  They had the strength of the earth ponies, the flight of the pegasi, and the touch of magic that the unicorns held, but they had something else that the subservient races lacked.  They had the gift of time.

Not immortality.  Immortality had to be wrested from the realm of the impossible.

No, some alicorns contained the ability to see outside of time.  To see what was to come, to see potential futures or alternative realities.

Imperius’ own great-grandmother was one such Timeseer, Empress Verita.  The Seer-Queen, as she was known.  She made hundreds of prophecies in her time as the Alicorn Empress.  Through some of these prophecies, she had been able to guide the alicorns toward their destiny of reigning over the entire world, though by the time she retired as empress and passed the throne over to her son Magnus IV, the reaches of the Empire had extended to dominate the northern half of the Western Continent.

Magnus had seen the Empire grow even further under his watch, guided by his mother’s words.  The Empire became a more peaceful, scholarly society.  It was under Magnus, after the passing of Verita, that immortality was seized.  It was under Magnus that the Gems of Being were forged, and that Imperius’ own friend Ars Arcanum was currently studying.  It was under Magnus that the Great Wellspring was opened up.  It was under Magnus that orichalcum was discovered and then exploited.

And then Magnus retired, and Imperius’ father Dominus took the throne.  With his grandmother’s words to guide him, Father had made the unpopular decisions to allow many subservients to flee without fear of retribution.  Father had receded the Empire’s borders in favor of strengthening their holds over a shorter area, locations rife with rebellion and uprisings.  Time had vindicated Father’s decisions, and by extension, Verita’s prophecies.  Every single one of her prophecies came true over the many years of her descendents’ reigns.

Every prophecy, except one.

Imperius stood in the Hall of Prophecy, staring down at a pedestal crafted out of arcanostone, the polished white smooth surface chiseled with magnificent shapes on it.  A velvet pillow lay atop this pedestal, with a scroll lying atop it.

The Final Prophecy.

Imperius stared down at it with trepidation.  How was it that every prophecy but this one had come true?  What was even said within it?  What was it Verita had seen?

“Ah, here you are,” came a rumbling voice from behind him.

Imperius jumped and spun around, stumbling over his legs as he did so and falling to the ground in an undignified heap.

His father stood over him, a glint of amusement in his bright blue eyes as he stared down at his fallen son.  Dominus was tall, even by alicorn standards.  His mane was black and quite full, standing out in stark contrast against his white coat.  His shoulders were broad, his hooves were large and bespoke the power he carried in them, and despite the status he carried, he carried himself as though he were no more important than the next alicorn.  His muzzle was not raised, his breast was not puffed out, he simply stood normally and walked like a normal alicorn.

“F-father,” Imperius said, getting to his hooves.  “Were you looking for me?”

“Don’t play coy, Imperius,” Father grinned.  “You’ve been hiding from your caretakers again.  They are bustling about the entire palace searching for you.”

Imperius bowed his head, knowing he was about to be lectured.

“A curious place you’ve chosen to hide,” observed Father, looking around the large room.  Shelves upon shelves filled with scrolls.  Each one came with a small card which summarized the prophecy within, and the date on which it was fulfilled.  The only prophecy which did not have one was the one sitting in this place of exalt.

“I… wasn’t hiding,” he admitted.

“Aaaah,” Father nodded understandingly.  “You wish to see what the future holds for you, I presume.”

“I was like you once, you know,” Father said, trotting over and hefting the scroll in which the Final Prophecy was contained in his hoof, scrutinizing it.  “Back then there were several prophecies that were still yet to be fulfilled from the last known seer, of course.  Rather curious that a new seer hasn’t been born in centuries, but the Law of Averages will, well, average out,” he grinned.

“Father,” Imperius gave him an annoyed look.  “If you are here to chastise me--”

“I was going to at first, I admit,” Father shrugged.  “I thought you were out spending time with Ars and Harmonia again.  But to find you here, to find you trying to determine your place in all that is to come… well, I cannot help but understand.”

He placed the prophecy back down on the cushion, and turned to leave.

“I would advise that you ignore this place until a new Seer is born, my son,” Father strode toward the double-doors that led out of the room.  “All prophecies have been fulfilled but that one, and that one is quite possibly the vaguest and most impossible to pinpoint out of all of them.”

“But this one may be relevant to me!” Imperius protested.  “I must know!  I must prepare!”

“Read it then,” Father turned back to give him an expectant look.  “Read it, and see why I would advise ignoring it.”

Imperius blinked.  He had to be jesting, right?  But Father was still watching him with an expectant look…

Imperius turned around, opened the latch on the scroll, and unfurled it.

The prophecy was short, quite unlike the other prophecies housed in that room.

“I speak to you, the final emperor of the alicorns,
I speak to you, the bringer of our doom.,
I speak to you, the one who would wear life,
I speak to you, the one who would rule over all,
I, Verita, speak to you.

Beware the god-shattering star.

Imperius looked up.  “Is that it?”

Father nodded.  “That is the entirety of the Final Prophecy of Empress Verita.  We learn nothing useful from it, as you can plainly see.”

“How can you say that!?” Imperius stamped a hoof onto the ground.  “We learn a lot from it!  ‘Our doom’?  ‘Final emperor’?”

“Imperius, we know nothing about what those mean,” Father replied calmly.  “Our race is doomed.  Nothing lasts forever, not even the immortals,  Death is an eventuality, and the best any of us can do is stave it off.  There will be a Final Emperor.  There will be a doom.  Beyond that, we know nothing.  We know not how this doom comes about, other than that it is brought upon us by someone.  We know not what ‘wearing life’ means.  We do not even know if these four lines are speaking to separate beings, a single being, or the race as a whole!  And if we tried to define who would rule over all, well,” he smiled humorlessly, “it would be a list that is sure to contain almost every being in this world, both in the past and future.”

He gave Imperius a meaningful look.

“Ignore this prophecy, my son.  Put it out of your mind.  Focus only on what you can change, not what you cannot.  What will come will come, and we will be ready to meet it when it does.”

With that, he gestured for Imperius to join him, and Imperius trotted forward, idly brushing some wayward bangs of his blue mane out of his face with a white-coated hoof.

Imperius spoke no more of this, but he returned many nights after to the Hall of Prophecy, tormented by a burning question in his mind, a question that refused to leave, no matter how much he looked to the future.  Even as the years passed and he aged, even after he had taken his father’s place as Emperor, he remained haunted.

Haunted by the knowledge that lay out of his reach.

What is the god-shattering star?

Comments

[Gboyd]

Magic?