"Swear what, Princess?" Sergeant Nocturne asked. The Night Guard had advanced as close as he dared to the ruined tapestry, muzzle wrinkling in disgust despite his professionalism. Long Spear eyed the frills at the bottom with a rag in hoof, then seemingly declared it as a lost cause and retreated.
“I…” Celestia swallowed. “I swear I will clean it myself. After breakfast.” Her horn glowed and she folded the soiled, ancient tapestry into a ball, wrenching it from the wall. Sergeant Nocturne looked horrified at the further desecration of an ancient artifact.
Celestia’s horn felt like a spike ran through it. She dropped the ball with a wince, then raised a foreleg and placed it upon the tapestry. The mare began to use one of Equestria's earliest depictions of Hearth's Warming as a cleaning rag to wipe up the remainders of her strawberry cocktails.
Her husband and escort looked on in varying levels of shock.
“T-that’s a priceless—” Swift Wing started.
“Eh,” Jungle Trek waved a hoof. “It’ll wash out.”
Celestia made sure the unicorn meant to represent Platinum got an extra swipe on the floor. She grimaced, this time in mild satisfaction. Hornhead. I still remember the look on your muzzle—
“Princess?” Sergeant Nocturne cleared his throat.
Celestia stumbled back and wiped her golden horseshoe on the tapestry one final time. “I’ll clean it later,” she rasped as imperiously and regally as she could. Considering her escort just watched her vomit up enough alcohol to kill an earth pony, none felt comfortable judging just how regal she was.
Celestia backed away, wriggling tail facing her cursed sun filtering through the windows. She breathed deeply. The headache and hornache remained, but she actually felt better. Her stomach was only a tempest instead of a maelstrom.
Prince Jungle Trek shuffled back, pausing to roll up his sleeves again. Celestia leaned her wing atop his back without any warning, then tapped his pith helmet with a misaligned feather. “The castle will pay for your rental,” she said aloud.
“Great!” Prince Jungle Trek nickered happily. “Wow, that’s a weight off my withers! Metaphorically speaking, because your wing is still on my withers. N-not that that’s a problem!”
Celestia breathed in through her nose. She started forward again on sluggish hooves, squinting with watery eyes. Sergeant Nocturne and Corporal Long Spear shared a nervous look, then Long Spear walked backwards ahead of them, mulberry eyes on the Princess’ hooves.
Ah, the earth pony is on support in case the drunken sot falls over, Celestia reckoned. She recognized the tactic from when her guards escorted drunken dignitaries or ambassadors back to their suites. Or Blueblood whenever somepony spiked his wine.
“That’s a lot of valuable stuff just sitting on pedestals in here,” Prince Jungle Trek said under her wing. “Are there, uh, spells or something on them?”
“Most, my Prince,” Swift Wing said behind them. “Many of these artifacts predate the Celestial Era—uh, that is, your wife’s reign.” Her voice took the quality of a tour guide. “I’ll be happy to explain some of them if you wish, my Prince.”
“Oh, I don’t want to impose.”
“We live to serve, my Prince.”
Celestia’s long neck creaked as she turned a watery, baleful eye back to the guard. Swift Wing was too short and too distracted to catch the glare; she was scanning the artifacts along the wall. “That one is a sculpture of Archmage Firelance, the legendary first unicorn to raise the sun.”
Celestia bit her tongue. Her headache increased. She shuffled down the hallway with the grace of a foal learning how to walk. Despite her husband’s prattle and questions over his shoulder, he moved just as stiffly under her wing.
A Day Guard came the opposite way, heading from the kitchens with a stack of newspapers balanced on outstretched wings. The moment he saw the royal couple in the hallway, the stallion bowed deep and let the newspapers fall to the floor.
“Your Highnesses!” he trilled out.
Celestia and Jungle Trek continued to shuffle down the hallway. The Prince looked up at his wife, then back to the bowing guard. He remained bowing only three hooves from the kitchen entrance.
Which was at the very, very far end of the hallway.
“Yo!” Jungle Trek called out. “Uh, rise my dude!” He cast an eye up the Celestia. “Is it okay if I’m informal?”
The alicorn did not respond. There was a strange grinding noise from her tense jaw. The distant dot stood up and scooped up the newspapers, trotting at a quick canter to meet the royals. The bobbing motion of his wings made Celestia queasy again, so she looked to the wall. Jungle Trek turned with her.
“Oh, that’s the display case of Odessey’s Adventures,” Swift Wing provided. Celestia recalled that she was a part-time tour guide, and decided that Crom was making this morning as painful as possible. “O-of course, you know t-that, Princess," the mare continued after finally catching the alicorn's severe expression. "Would you like to tell your husband?”
Celestia breathed in. Swift Wing took her heavy exhale as permission to keep talking. “It’s not the original original, but the epic poem by Homeward Bound is one of the classics! The fall of the legendary city of Trot due to the pride of Queen Helia is one of the most important formative stories of Equestrian literature.”
Jungle Trek eyed the folded-up scroll in the display case. The parchment was weathered and yellow, resting on a delicate stand. The glass was smudged. “Never read it.”
Celestia focused on the very faint imprint of green lipstick on the back of the display case. It had been cleaned off years ago, but changeling slime was hard to remove. Her teeth ground, but the whinny of shock from her tour-guard masked it.
Swift Wing gasped. “I thought Odyssey’s misadventure would have been required reading in the Cartographer’s Society! Mapmaking as an art came from the legend!”
“W-well,” Jungle Trek swallowed, “I heard there’s a movie?”
Swift Wing snorted in disgust. “Sapphire Shores can’t act. She certainly can’t play Queen Helia. Doesn’t have the flank.”
Despite herself, Celestia looked back to her flank. Her suns stared back, larger than she remembered them being. The bright, cheery beams mocked her with their smug aura.
Jungle Trek hummed at the scroll. He squinted. “Oh, I think I have heard of this one…”
It’s only the most famous epic poem in ponykind’s history, Celestia snorted to herself. Impressively, she kept it internal.
“Wasn’t Helia the Flank that Launched a Thousand Ships or something?”
“I will not be known as the Flank that Launched a Thousand Ships,” Queen Helia snorted.