//------------------------------// // Chapter 12: Grandpa Gruff // Story: Freeing Gallus // by CrackedInkWell //------------------------------// A few days after the wedding, with all the cleaning up and work that was done, both Gallus and Sandbar’s parents had agreed that they all needed some rest before they could do the traditional griffon coming of age ceremony. It was understandable, both from the near exhausting work and partly to prepare for the sacred rite to be performed. So, it is because of this that since it was still Spring Break, the husbands decided to take it easy and do nothing for a while. In the courtyard at the School of Friendship, the two of them lay in the soft grass in the sun. Sandbar lay on his stomach, flipping through a comic book about Supercolt while his husband was on his back, his talons behind his head and a content smile on his face. He was looking up at the sky, watching the clouds drift by the breeze. With the sun beaming down on them with its warm rays, the griffon sighed out of relaxation. “Are you excited?” Sandbar asked him. “What? The initiation tomorrow?” He smirked. “The sooner I become an adult to rub in Grandpa Gruff’s face and telling him to suck it, the happier I’ll be!” A thought came to the earth pony to where he looked up from his comic. “But wouldn’t he be mad though? I mean, Headmare Twilight did say that she wouldn’t write about us until after the wedding so…” Gallus raised an eyebrow. “So what? At this point, I doubt there’s anything he could do about it. I mean, even if Twilight does tell him that we’re married, what’s he gonna do? Bring a militia over and forcefully take me away?” He chuckled as he closed his eyes. “That would be stupid.” “Gallus!” Those eyes were shot open when a grumpy, screeching, gargling yell rang through-out the courtyard. The two husbands looked up to the rooftops of the school to find the vulture-like griffon with a fez along with six other younger, stronger, armed and armored griffons carrying crossbows, spears, and swords. The elderly griffon flew down to them, a glare aimed directly at Gallus before grabbing him by the arm. “Let go of me!” but the vulture grabbed hold of his ear where it was still pierced, and the ring was firmly in place. Grandpa Gruff touched it, felt the gold pieces as if checking and checking again to see if it was, indeed, real. He at times looked between Gallus and Sandbar with a look that was a mix of betrayal, shock, anger, and (at least towards the young stallion) pity. “You are coming with me.” He said, dragging Gallus by the arm towards the school. “What are you doing?!” Sandbar tried to go after them but two of the armed griffons blocked him, staring down with glares at him. “Let go of me!” Gallus cried out. “We need to talk.” Grandpa Gruff said as he dragged the younger griffon down the hallways and up the stairs towards the most important room of the entire school – Headmare Twilight’s office. Regardless of what the alicorn was doing, he suddenly burst in. “How could you!” He shouted, flinging Gallus in. “How DARE you go behind my back like this!!” Despite the mountains, hills, and valleys of paperwork she was organizing, signing, and weighing their importance on, Twilight looked up from her work. She was alarmed as she looked up in time to see the blue griffon being tossed in. “Grandpa Gruff!” “I had placed my trust in you.” He said coldly as he entered into the spacious, library-like office. “When I had him being sent here, we had an agreement: that he would do his work and you give me reports on what he’s doing. To let me be the first to know of whatever activities he does.” He slammed his tight-clenched claws on her desk, sending a few loose papers to scatter. “Now that I find out that you not only let this child get married, but you allowed it to wed someone that isn’t remotely female! Have you lost your mind?!” Despite the eye twitching from the runaway papers that were on the floor, she closed her eyes, took in a deep breath and with her magic she calmly placed those papers back in their rightful place. Instead of responding to the enraged griffon, she turned to Gallus. “Where’s Sandbar?” He told him that he was blocked by a couple of armed griffons. “Have him be brought here. I think it’s best to explain to him what precisely is going on.” Soon, Sandbar was brought into the office, and Twilight had placed three padded chairs before her desk in which she cleared off the paperwork so that she may talk to them directly. At the door to the hallway, a pair of armed griffons stood at attention. “Before we start,” Twilight began, she pointed a hoof at the guards, “why are they here?” “Originally so that if Gallus here would be sent straight home.” Grandpa Gruff answered. “After I finally got that report you so now graciously decided to send me, I was hoping to come in to see that the boy’s marriage was illegitimate and that he would be forced to come back to the Griffon Kingdom. However, it just makes things even more complicated when I can see from their piercings that they got married the griffon way.” His eyes narrowed. “And since it is legitimate, I for one am appalled at you that not only you let this happened – but you carried out the ceremony yourself!” “Actually-” Sandbar began but was immediately interrupted. “Quiet! I still have so many bones to pick out of you, but first thing’s first.” He turned back to Twilight. “What in the nine circles of Tartarus was going inside that head of yours?! I mean… Even for Equestria, this shouldn’t be anywhere near legal!” Twilight nodded. “In any other case, you're absolutely right. Normally the legal age for marriage is twenty-one. However, I allowed the marriage to become official because Sandbar’s parents have given their full permission to let it happen. If both of them told me that this should not happen, I would have to obey that and refuse to do it.” “Sandbar’s par…” The vulture trailed off, his talons pitching that bone between his eyes. If one looked closely, they could see steam coming out of his ears. “But what about us? Never once did anyone think that maybe, just maybe, we should be informed before the wedding?” “The law is very clear in Equestria,” Twilight told him, “that in order for a marriage to occur where both potential spouses that are underaged, then at least one parent must give their consent. Since Gallus is an orphan, it was on the decision of Sandbar’s to make. Although you’re the closest thing to his legal guardian that he has, there was a suspicion that, even if you were informed, you would have refused and done everything you could to prevent it.” “You’re damn right I would!” He screamed. “Gods! Why would you do this!? Why go behind my back and have them get married?” “Why not you ask them?” Immediately, the vulture glared his good eye at Gallus. The younger griffon sinks into his seat while the other waited impatiently for an answer that looked like he was ready to beat him. Sandbar spoke up. “It was my idea.” That glare was now turned to him, but gaining the courage, he continued. “I… I know what being an orphan is like in Griffonstone. I know that he’s stuck in limbo since his parents passed away before they could have him undergo that coming of age ritual. If he goes back home now, he’ll never be free from you or for you to allow him to become his own guardian.” That stare became sharper as if the ancient griffon was ready to stab him with it. “You dare…” He growled. “You foreigner, you roped a fellow griffon into something so… so… blasphemous, at such a young age, just so he can become an adult in the most unconventional, immoral, unnatural way conceivable!” “And I still took up the offer,” Gallus interjected, now getting Gruff’s attention. “In case you haven’t figured it out, this marriage thing, it’s my only ticket out! I’m going to undergo the whole ritual thing in a few days with Sandbar’s parents watching. And when I enter into adulthood, I’m gonna denounce my nationality and move to the place where I have not only real friends but the closest thing to a family that not one in the old Griffon Kingdom could ever bother to give. You could go ahead and be angry all you want, you’re already too late. This marriage thing, while weird, is only temporary for me to become an adult.” “You… conniving, little BRAT!!!” Although his claw was raised high, his talon aching to give a sharp striking slap across Gallus’s face to be the first of many, many blows he wanted to deliver, he found it stuck in the air, only to find Sandbar’s hooves and Twilight’s magic holding it in place. Gallus, all the while, winced and covered his head with his arms trying to protect himself. “Don’t you dare think that you could beat one of my students in front of me and get away with it,” Twilight said to him in a serious tone. “Sandbar, let go.” The young stallion obeyed. After Twilight released him, Grandpa Gruff suddenly got out of his chair. “Stupid kids, you don’t a clue what you’ve just done!” “It’s called outwitting you,” Gallus said. “By outwitting you mean forgetting one tiny little detail about this so-called ‘brilliant’ plan of yours,” Twilight asked him what he meant. “What these youngsters seemed to have forgotten, is that with us Griffons, there’s no such thing as divorce.” The spacious office became deathly quiet, where the only sound that was heard was the ticking of the clock overhead and the mental shattering in Sandbar’s and Gallus’s minds. “What?” Sandbar asked softly. “Think about it, numbnuts,” the vaulter griff raised a talon, “did you by any chance did the marriage ceremony the Griffon way?” “Well… yeah?” “And you took that oath too.” “Yeah?” “Do you remember what that sacred vow was?” Sandbar had to think back to that wedding for a moment. “‘Blood may spill, and skin may break, but my…’” He trailed off at the sudden realization. “‘My bond I won’t forsake.’” Grandpa Gruff finished. “To us, once that promise is made, you’ve already gone past the point of no return. Even if you’ve managed to have Gallus here undergo the rite of passage, even if he does move way, neither of you can break your marriage bond until death do you part.” His eye narrowed. “You have focused so much into whether or not you could you haven’t stopped to think if you should.” “But they also got married the pony way too.” Twilight pointed out. “It doesn’t matter! Don’t you see what has happened here, Princess? Even if they do get divorced the pony way, you’ve officially made the both of them outcasts on so many levels that I don’t know where to start! Now because you have given into their stupidity, they shall be seen in our eyes as something unclean, something so thoughtless,” he turned his fiery gaze at Gallus, “that I’d bet his ancestors, if not his parents would be forever ashamed.” “Don’t you talk about them like that!” Gallus suddenly got up in anger. “If they were alive, they wouldn’t let me be chained up in a dump like Griffonstone! Nor would they let your stupid traditions tell me how to run my life!” “ENOUGH!” Twilight's voice shouted out like a clap of thunder. So sudden was this that the room became still. After taking in a deep breath, she added in a calm tone. “Grandpa Gruff, is there anything else you wished to address beyond belittling my students? If not, I suggest you leave my school at once. You have no power here.” “Just one.” He turned to the newlyweds. “All I have to say is this: congratulations. You’ve invented a new kind of stupid, a damage you can never undo kind of stupid like opening all the cages in a zoo kind of stupid; for becoming the embarrassment of us Griffons. Also, for becoming bounded together until the end of your days for a thoughtless attempt to change something that shouldn’t have.” He marched towards the door to the hallway in which those guards stepped aside as he opened it and they followed through. And before he slammed the door so hard that the glass nearly shattered, he said one last word with a glare as coldly as the snows of Griffonstone. “Congratulations.”