Lex had been able to replenish his magic only marginally by the time noon came around.
That wasn’t unexpected, of course. Although the massive amount of magical power that Severance radiated was sufficient for him to be able to renew his thaumaturgical spells, it still took Lex an hour at minimum to compress and configure that energy into a format that his thought-matrices could contain. Even then, a single hour was only enough for a few spells; if he’d wanted to renew the full complement that his mind could hold, it would have taken well in excess of a day to prepare. The fact that it had been several days since he’d managed to overcome Xiriel and the ghoul horde should have provided him with sufficient time to do exactly that, Lex knew. But despite how much time had passed, he’d only managed to restore a small number of spells, leaving him far short of his total capacity.
In theory, that was unforgivably negligent of him; it meant that if another threat to everypony’s safety showed up he’d be ill-prepared to deal with it. But in reality, deprioritizing replenishing his thaumaturgical spells in favor of spending time on other matters had been the only acceptable choice. Faced with the very real tasks that required his attention on a day-to-day basis – including managing the acquisition and distribution of provisions, overseeing the health and well-being of the sick and injured members of the population, and creating the ritual to turn Aria back into a pony (since postponing it would likely have precipitated her becoming dangerously unruly…more so than she usually was, at least) – Lex had been forced to conclude that what would happen if he ignored those issues, even for a short while, was worse than what might happen if he didn’t.
It wasn’t a decision he’d reached lightly. Only the fact that repeated scrutiny, heightened in the wake of what had happened with Xiriel, had turned up no potential threats to everypony’s safety had convinced him to consider the idea. It was possible to go too far with defensive measures, after all; he’d witnessed that on Everglow…
Unlike how the Royal Sisters – and their fellow alicorns, now – ruled Equestria, Everglow’s ponies were governed by a single leader, a queen named Iliana. The ruler of that world’s Pony Empire, she was also its founder, having led a successful campaign of conquest to unite all of Everglow’s ponies under her dominion. Once she’d solidified control over her new state, her reign was one of peace and prosperity, protecting her subjects from civil strife and foreign aggression without oppressing them via harsh taxation or onerous regulations.
When Lex, in the course of acclimating himself to that world, had learned about Iliana’s achievements, he had been heartened. Here, at last, was somepony who shared his philosophy of governance! While Everglow might have been a harsh world – seemingly fecund with monsters, replete with meddling divine agencies, and saturated with dangerous magic – Iliana’s Pony Empire served as an example of what a strong, proactive government was able to achieve, able to stand strong in the face of so many threats. To Lex, it was nothing less than a testament to the correctness of his ideals.
But the more time he’d spent there, the more Lex’s appreciation for what Iliana had wrought had begun to fade.
He had learned early on, for example, that the Pony Empire’s society had distinct social strata between certain categories of ponies: specifically, those who were part of the aristocracy and those that weren’t. While Lex was familiar with the concept as part of Equestrian pre-history – the tribes of pegasi, unicorns, and earth ponies had also engaged in that nonsense before they’d come to Equestria and joined as one people, rightfully abandoning it once they had – the fact that Iliana had seen fit to not only preserve such an archaic system, but legally codify and enforce it, had puzzled him. After all, it was self-evident that there was no virtue to be found in exalting individuals based on their lineage rather than their personal achievements.
It had been only later that he’d found out the answer: Iliana allowed such institutions to exist because she had to. If she were to try and tear down the privileges that nobles families enjoyed – privileges that had allowed them to attain vast excesses of land, wealth, magic, and power – then they would have collectively risen up against her in wrath, potentially fracturing the Pony Empire itself. Indeed, he’d later stumbled upon evidence to suggest that the Empire was already fractured in all but name: distant cities and townships apparently operated with little more than token Imperial oversight, their local rulers apparently being allowed to do virtually whatever they wanted so long as their taxes and levies were paid on time.
That Iliana – by all accounts of sorceress of peerless aptitude – had allowed her powerbase to be so thoroughly eroded had horrified Lex. Although he felt confident that he’d never allow his own reign, once he conquered Equestria, to be so horribly neutered, Lex nevertheless began researching the Empire’s history, intent on finding out where Iliana had gone wrong. When he’d eventually found the answer, it had been chilling.
Shortly after she’d crowned herself queen, a group of dissident ponies had made an attempt on Iliana’s life. Caught completely off-guard, Iliana had only barely managed to escape, and the experience had apparently left her deeply shaken. Effectively abandoning her capital city, she’d sealed herself up in an impregnable magical fortress, its location undisclosed save for being rumored to be hidden among the foothills near the capital. That, however, had created a power-vacuum that the nobles – already a burgeoning class, having effectively bargained for hereditary special privileges in exchange for helping Iliana with her wars of conquest – had rushed to fill. The end result had been that by the time Iliana had (reluctantly and belatedly, by the accounts Lex had read) emerged from her self-imposed isolation, she’d effectively been reduced to little more than a figurehead. While still nominally in charge of the apparatus of governance, her actual control extended only slightly further than foreleg’s reach.
Lex would have found such a state of affairs unbearable, and endeavored to retake control or die trying, but Iliana apparently had no such scruples. Rather, she’d effectively acquiesced to the new status quo and retired back to her hidden stronghold, putting in only the occasional appearance in her capital city – such as when she’d sat in court to condemn Aria – and more rarely elsewhere in the Empire. While rumors abounded among the populace that she’d taken to traveling among the people in secret, taking in current affairs and righting wrongs incognito, there’d been little to substantiate such folktales. Lex felt far more certain that she’d simply holed up in her lair, abdicating her position as queen in all but name. As a result, her Empire had limped along over the years, its centralized control growing weaker, its society growing more stratified, and its infrastructure stagnating…that last one having bothered Lex the most, as he’d seen firsthand how ponies that the government should have helped had been left to fend for themselves, infuriating him.
But although he’d grown disgusted with the state of the Pony Empire by the time he’d returned to Equestria, Lex had come to view Everglow’s only major pony society as a case study in what not to do. Specifically, that an overabundance of caution became paralysis all too easily, and that a ruler that focused obsessively on defense at the expense of civic engagement ended up becoming a prisoner in a jail of their own making. It was a fate that Lex was determined to avoid, hence why he’d focused on improving the camp’s living situation rather than on restoring his spells with all possible haste.
He was sure it was the right decision. After all, that same line of logic had been in his thoughts when he’d accepted Sonata’s offer to be his spokespony. Lex was certain that he had no equal where civics was concerned, but Sonata was the one who had the “engagement” part of the equation covered.
Not that it does me any good now, Lex thought sourly as he placed Severance on his back, turning and making his way toward the door. I’ll simply have to deal with Celestia and Luna on my own-
His musings were interrupted as a question from Severance intruded on his thoughts. That was enough to make Lex stop in place, frowning as he glanced back at the weapon. He hadn’t had the scythe very long, but it had been enough time for him to know that it was unusual for Severance to initiate a conversation of its own accord, much less with such a pointed question. “Yes, in a few minutes,” he replied, narrowing his eyes suspiciously. “Why?”
The weapon’s response made him scoff. “I have no plans to discuss that with either of them, and I doubt they’ll bring it up either.” He paused again as Severance voiced its objection, his lip curling. “Because I don’t care, that’s why,” he snapped. “And even if I did, that isn’t an area where I can dictate what others-” The scythe didn’t wait for him to finish, dissenting strongly, but its recalcitrance only hardened Lex’s position. “I disagree,” he said coldly. “And I don’t want to hear anything else about this from you. Your job here is to advance my goals, so that I can turn my attention to giving the Night Mare the worshipers I promised her once the more pressing issues have been settled, is that clear?” The question being rhetorical, he didn’t wait for an answer before he kept speaking. “You’ve already overstepped your bounds with what you did to Fruit Crunch and those other foals, and the only thing keeping me from sanctioning you for that is that I plan on having you undo it once I’m done with the princesses. Don’t try my patience any further.”
He waited for several seconds, but Severance didn’t reply, and Lex grit his teeth as he resumed heading for the door. Why was everypony determined to interfere with him lately? First the princesses, then the mares in his life, then Fruit Crunch and his friends, and now Severance. It was like there was some sort of conspiracy to make it as difficult as possible for him to do what needed to be done!
Stepping out onto the platform, Feather Duster managed to bite back a yelp at the sight of him, instead swallowing nervously. “Um, sir? Sh-should I start passing out the food like you told me?”
“Yes,” muttered Lex, turning his eyes to the crowd of ponies milling around the platform’s edge. Celestia and Luna weren’t among them. Nor were Sonata, Nosey, or Aria. “Make sure to do it exactly as I told you.”
Gulping again, Feather Duster tentatively called out to the crowd, asking them to form and orderly line so food could be passed out. But Lex barely heard her, instead turning his gaze past the crowd to the northwest, in the direction of River’s mansion. For a moment he couldn’t see anything, since the medical tents were in the way, but after several seconds the sight he was looking for came into view, stepping around the obstructions as they approached the train station.
Celestia and Luna were walking side-by-side, and they hadn’t come alone. The full company of guards that they’d brought with them was marching in formation, spread out in front of the alicorns in a loose semicircle. Slightly behind and to the side from Luna was Silhouette, moving in a half-trot to compensate for his withered hind leg. All of them had their eyes fixed firmly on him.
To somepony else, the procession might have been intimidating, but Lex simply stepped forward to meet it, the crowd of ponies around the platform’s edge parting like water as he stepped down. He could hear everypony chattering around him, their voices rising with excitement as they looked back and caught sight of the approaching princesses. But Lex couldn’t have cared less, stepping forward just until he was past the crowd, coming to a stop and waiting for Celestia and Luna to arrive.
A few seconds later they did…and then disaster struck.