“Please, your Majesty! Wait!” The mare desperately threw herself at him, only to be blocked by guards.
The prince sighed sadly and shook his head.
Another broken heart by the sad reality. They all thought he was their prince charming, which, he had to say, was a rather accurate definition. Unfortunately, none of those mares ever thought that he had no say in the matter of whom he might one day marry. That choice rested in his parents’ hooves alone, with the exception of his aunts if they had some plans for him.
His marriage would be one of interest, this much had always been clearly laid out to the white stallion.
He was part of the most prestigious family in Equestria; it was his duty to help improve it further with the right alliances. He had accepted that as soon as he was out of colthood and his father had fired his first marefriend’s mother as retaliation for his defiance.
Still, Blueblood was not completely at peace, looking at the guards taking the love struck mare out of the vicinity. In fact, as of a few weeks now, there had been a lingering taste of bitterness in his mouth whenever this had happened.
‘Cadence…’ he thought.
She had been allowed to follow her heart. Her aunt had actually allowed her to marry a commoner.
Why did he have to reject every mare’s advances then? Per her rank, Cadence more than anypony should have been subject to that rule, yet had eloped outside of duty and inherited a whole kingdom as a reward.
‘She’s an alicorn. She is special.’ He repeated mentally.
The bitterness would not leave.
She was more special than him. It was as simple as that. His auntie simply appreciated Cadence more. Why wouldn’t she? His cousin was an alicorn princess, just like their auntie. It was natural for them to relate more. That was all there was to it.
He bit back a growl. It was not fair, but he was a prince. He could take it. He’d work even harder to show the kingdom how great of a pony he was; he’d invest more of his time in his royal duties and get back his auntie’s love and approval again.
In a way, the prince kept his promise. He showed his beloved aunt Celestia exactly what he was like.
It was not good enough, she had all but told him.
He was not special enough.
Blueblood awoke to a world of pain and with not even the slightest idea on how it had happened. Confusion ran wild in his mind. It was as if he was swimming in a whirlpool of mixed-up sensations.
At first, it was simply the aching in his muzzle, but when he coughed blood, his body agitated by spasms, pain surged from his sides and his left hind leg. The noble instantly gave up any attempt at standing up that had crossed his mind.
It also resurrected the memories of the past few hours.
He had been beaten up! Him! This was an outrage!
Not to mention darn painful…
As soon as he had lost the battle of will and openly mocked the mare’s crazy assumptions to his heart, she had let out a shrilled scream and jumped him in blind fury. Seconds later, her two bodyguards had run into the dining hall to protect her.
Not that she needed any help. The ‘lady’ had truly been a demon in sheep’s clothing, hiding a monstrously vicious personality. The prince had had no occasion to defend himself, though his upbringing may have prevented him from trying in the first place. How he sorely regretted being a gentlecolt…
Though now that the moment had passed, he would rather wait for his injuries to heal before moving again. With what appeared to be a chained collar to his neck anyway, he would not be going anywhere anytime soon.
But, woe is him, his ‘host’ had no intention of letting him rest peacefully.
“Ah, I see that the worm is awake,” she spat venomously.
The golden mare trotted up to his body, looking down on him with hatred.
“I cannot believe that you would be making a joke like that, my prince,” she whispered threateningly in his ears. “You know we’re made for each other, don’t you?”
His dignity demanded that he take a stand against this crazed pony, but his fear overwhelmed his judgement and he quickly nodded.
It was… a strategy… He would simply play along for now. Then, when her guard was down, he would…
Wait… why didn’t he use his magic right now?
The mare was slightly intrigued to see her lovely prisoner blink slowly, as if he had remembered something very important just then.
Prince Blueblood’s horn started glowing a blue light, his eyes narrowed on her slender form.
He would have to be delicate, even if she was crazy she still had sa-
A bolt of lightning passed through his body, sending him screaming in agony.
Every nerves of his body went into overload, flooding his brain with pain signals, causing him to thrash loudly without any restraint. His muscles contracted so violently a few of them were torn in the process, increasing his ever growing torment. If any of his wishes could be granted, ever, it would be that this agony stopped.
“No, my prince. You must not be naughty,” the pegasus said slowly, as if scolding a small child.
Her voice went right over his head, as, even if it had lasted only a second, the assault had not only aggravated his injured state, it had broken his determination in half.
When she closed in on him, the stallion whimpered and backed away, to the stony wall behind him, crawling on the ground as he did. He would have disowned himself for this pathetic attitude in a more normal context, but as of a moment, the prince no longer cared about appearances.
“Oh, my foolish love,” she lamented dramatically, “did you not think that I have had many unicorn slaves? Did you not stop to think that I had a way to prevent them from using magic to escape?”
She let out a delicate crystalline giggle, which really computed as insane in Blueblood’s mind, considering the violence she had voluntarily displayed on more than one occasion.
“Take a look, my prince.” The mare turned around slight, exposing her now unclothed flanks and her cutie mark.
A heart struck by lightning.
“My special talent is manipulating storm clouds,” she explained sweetly. “I can control them without any physical contact, unlike my fellow pegasi.”
Following those few words, she raised a hoof to point at a corner of the room, where his chains were linked. As the prince had dreaded, a dark cloud was resting untouched in that corner.
“Bad ponies have to be punished. You understand that, surely.”
Yes, but he was not a bad pony!
“Sister?” The voice was tentative, quiet, so unlike the usual tone favored by Luna, Princess of the Night. “What troubles you?”
Celestia diverted her gaze from the window and the sight of her kingdom, thriving under her sun. It was the same as always, she knew that, so why had it appeared so gray to her?
‘Nephew,’ she thought, guilt tying her throat in a knot.
Celestia knew. It was her fault. She had sent him away and he had been taken by the same thing that had spirited away her subject. Her goal had been to simply have him reconnect with their subjects. This was… unexpected.
“This is my fault, little sister,” she finally said, wavering.
It did not escape Luna that her elder sister was avoiding to make eye contact.
“Tia,” she called and was satisfied to catch a twitch on her sister’s neck, indicating she had fought to urge to look up. “You have already sent reinforcement for the search party. They will find him.”
At that, the white alicorn did look up, but her gaze was not one of relief. Luna found herself uncomfortable under those piercing eyes that seemed to see right through her.
“He looks up to you too, little sister.”
Luna flinched, uncomfortable with this sudden development.
“Did you know that?” Celestia asked, pressing the issue further. “Do you notice his heartbroken eyes every time you look down on him?”
Of course she did. It was why she did it in the first place. Prince Blueblood’s ego needed to be cut down to size. That stallion had nothing to his name to justify his arrogance, just an old lineage and riches passed down to him from his parents.
Why did he believe himself so much above his fellow ponies then?
At first, it had revolted the Princess of the Night to observe how much the nobility had degenerated into a gathering of pompous fools, only good for sucking up to greater ponies than them. If she had followed her first impulse, she would have decreed the cessation of this masquerade immediately.
Yet they had their importance. They kept Equestria stable.
She refused to acknowledge her arrogant nephew however.
Even if it was painful to see, times and times again, winces of fear and hesitations every time he looked at her…
Why, the first time they had met, he had not even screamed ‘Nightmare Moon!’ like quite a few others. His words had been carefully measured, but they had not held fear. For a troubling moment, she had thought he was struggling to keep himself from openly admiring her.
That had been the last time too.
It had not even been a big event, nothing outrageous, at a first glance.
Her nephew had blown off the servants that had prepared the Grand Galloping Gala. Their work had been superb; the darker alicorn had been impressed by such a display of splendor. Perhaps the shock had come from her isolation, but so many riches exposed at the eyes of so many, their castle converted into an immense ballroom…
Her astonishment had been toppled right afterward, when the prince had commented on the tackiness of some decorations, criticizing such hardwork with little consideration, not even looking at the desperate and exhausted servants as he did so. The unicorn had simply ignored them, their obvious physical state and demanded that they redo so many things!
She could have forgiven this. After all, it was a celebration in honor of her elder sister and her nephew clearly adored her, but she had been convinced by the look in his eyes.
There had been nothing in them, not an ounce of empathy.
The second his eyes had met hers, they had lifted up with concern and outrage, asking her confirmation that it was indeed unacceptable to overlook that Lord Longhorn’s family crest was red and as such would contrast horribly with this blue statue. Luna had almost convinced herself she had dreamed the desire to see the servants pay for their mistake.
Unfortunately, the aforementioned ponies were all shaking with apprehension, especially now that one of their princesses was involved.
Her indignation had flared, her nostrils letting out a bout of hot air.
The prince learned to keep his mouth shut that day, a valuable lesson and something that most servants blessed their princess for.
She knew Blueblood had overstepped the line, that he had played with fire in a rather disgusting way, so... why did she feel so much regret now that the young noble could not look at her without fear?
His limbs hurt.
It was a pure outrage, he kept repeating himself darkly. Never before had one insulted him so gravely as to assume right to his body and his heart like that, right to his freedom and his status, right to his health, be it physical or mental.
Put mildly, the prince was positively murderous. If the crazed mare had had access to his thoughts, if she knew him a tenth as well as she claimed to, she might not have dared be left alone with him.
As it stood however, the pegasus was willfully blind to the evidence that her prince charming was wishing her grievous body harm in ways reminiscent of monstrous nobles such as King Regal Importance, better known by history by the title he took later on in his life: King Sombra of the Cristal Empire.
To be entirely fair, Prince Blueblood was unable to deal out any punishment at all. Sprayed over an uncomfortable mattress, he could only listen with ever growing anger to the endless tirades and declarations of love his tormentor submitted him to. Too used to getting his way, he simply hadn’t thought when he had reached a new breaking point and she had punished him again.
The odor of burnt fur had momentarily filled his nostrils, making him almost recoil in shock when he realized it came from his own martyrized flesh.
‘T-this cannot be! My royal coat, ruined!’ He thought in panic, before his brain caught up with the truly important details and a terrible fear assaulted his every sense. ‘W-what damage did the lightning do to me?! What is this cold in my legs?’
Broken? Burnt? Paralyzed?!
For a being as pampered as him, the fear of death was truly foreign. Not even his service in the military had appropriately destroyed his image of being untouchable. As of this instant however, a tiny speck of doubt was slowly crawling into his mind, insidiously, deviously bringing an extinct part of his being into light.
And she was still rambling.
“Oh my prince, I cannot wait for the time we will be as one,” she whispered longingly, looking through an open window. “Then… yes, then the world will have truly become a haven of goodness and love, as it should be.”
Wait… he knew that line. It came from one of Canterlot’s most prolific writer, but not from his only romance novel ‘Till the Dawn’.
Blueblood’s felt ice fill his veins as he realized which book exactly had been quoted, namely ‘Greater than us both’.
A tragedy.
Through a complex and heartbreaking adventure, Lily Belle, poor soldier’s daughter went through the greatest of trials in the clearing of her father’s name, uncovering a conspiracy lead by her long-lost childhood friend and crush, Noble Heart. Adding to her tribulations, it all came in the light of her unhappy marriage with the gentle and mute Hidden Image, whom child she carries.
A perfect load of sentimentalism that Blueblood had hated through his reading experience. Lily Belle had allowed her emotions to come in the way of her duty, chasing desperately after an image that was long gone.
While most readers had been moved to tears, the prince had ended his reading of the book with a satisfied and slightly condescending smile. It had been a perfect expression of the nobility’s values.
A few times, he had fancied himself as a character of this book, a work of art in its subtlety and the wording, he would not deny.
However, the idea of reenacting that tragedy now left a bitter taste in his mouth.
“My prince… I cannot wait for the time you come to reason…” The mare leaned closer to him, a hoof stroking his mane tenderly, even as he shrank back. She did not acknowledge it. “For then Equestria will come to know the names of Blueblood and Love Struck as the cursed lovers, the tragic story of a lifetime wasted before true love could be shared. Foals everywhere will learn about love through us, my prince…”
The touch was burning to him, a constant remember of the pain she had and would inflict on him. As such, he could not help the terrified supplication he let out.
“G-go… away…” He whispered weakly.
By a great stroke of luck, the pegasus did not seem bothered by the remark. In fact, she even smiled tenderly.
“My prince, your fever seems to have gone up.” She nodded. “I see, you need your rest.”
‘How… generous of her.’ Blueblood let his head fall against the mattress, though he had to twist around to make sure the chains holding him would not strangle him in his sleep.
“You must be exhausted, my love…” Love Struck stated with great worry. Her voice shaking, she trotted out of the small room. “I will send for a servant to take care of you.”
‘Good heavens…’ the stallion thought with great relief. ‘Her misconception of healing me would probably involve some obscure zebra ritual and an exchange of saliva.’
On that thought, the prince shuddered.
Oh he would sooner kiss a toad than that delusional female. How could anyone fool themselves so thoroughly?
On that, he allowed himself to sink further into a state of rest, waiting for sleep to come and start the road to recovery. How he longed for his rescuer to finally come and save him from this living nightmare…
For a moment, the prince could see the magnificent structure of his aunts’ castle, with all its luxury and its comfort. It was just on the edge of his vision, just outside of reach.
A terrible emptiness took place within Blueblood’s heart. He simply wanted his life back… was that too much to ask for? Why had this all happened to him?
The prince’s eyes were moist. His memory taunted him with the knowledge of what awaited him back home, where he was not at the mercy of a dangerous psychopath, where his legs and his chest did not hurt every second he was awake, where he was safe…
Weakly, the stallion raised a hoof, reaching forward for the life he had lost. He only managed to stumbled off his mattress, pain erupting in his jaw when it hit the stone tiles.
“E-excuse me…” A meek little voice rang to his ear, making the noble blush.
Had he truly shown such a pathetic image of himself to one of his subject?
Scrambling, Blueblood tried to get his body off the ground, but his front legs refused to support any weight.
Before he had any chance to try again, a delicate frame lifted him, with gentleness proper to his rank. In his position, he was unable to see the pony’s face, but pale green coat and mane of a darker shade flashed before his eyes. Unfortunately as it was, he was too injured to be moved without any pain.
Delicately, he was lied down on the hard mattress, with a soft apology in response to his grunts of pain.
Breathing heavily, Blueblood finally got a good look at the helpful pony.
She was a frail, weary earth pony mare. Her mane was tied up and her apron seemed too dirty to be worth wearing anymore. She might have been pretty once, even by the noble’s high standards, but her time here had worn out the more delicate aspect of her person.
Shackles bound her legs together and there was no mistaking the purpose of the collar she wore around her neck, nor the reason she was present. If there had been any doubt before however, then a single look at her brown eyes would have sufficed.
They spoke of a broken creature, with a dwindling will and too little strength left.
Blueblood felt a strange pity at the sight of this mare, lighting up a small flame within him. It tore down something inside his mind, a… reluctance of some sort. Pushed by a newfound desire, he spoke the first words that came to him.
“W-who are you?”
“Mint Spring, your majesty.” She bowed her head, atrociously massacring the protocol, but he had little care for that at the moment.
“You… you know who I am?” He hesitated, recalling how his royal status had not mattered much to quite a few brutes so far.
“Of course,” she said, her eyes briefly shining with amusement. “You are the prince of the unicorns and the biggest playcolt in Equestria since three generations ago.”
“Ah, yes, Gemini Symbol has a legendary reputation,” he chuckled good-naturedly.
A shadow of a smile graced her lips, striking the stallion with the remnant of a once beautiful mare. It caused a hint of pain to imagine how she must have been before this. It made him fear somepony would think the same of him someday.
“Pleasantry asides, your majesty, I am here to help you heal…” She leaned closer, taking out a roll of clean fabric and what seemed to be ointment. At this distance, he could detect the most subtle nuances in her scent. And while she carried the expected earthly and rustic air of all earth ponies, he noticed something odd about it.
Something he could not identify…
A firm grasp on his shoulder made him gasp, loudly.
“By my Aunt’s mane, Mare! Be more careful!” He hissed, still reeling from the shockwave of pain that had erupted in that part of his body.
“My apologies… it has been a while since I helped a stallion, my prince…” Mint Spring pleaded, voice fading quickly.
Blueblood blinked, his mind picking up the crucial detail. “When was the last time you helped a stallion?”
She shrank at the intensity of his stare. “A… a few months back… the last time the mistress chose a lover…”
Oh dear…
“S-she has… a herd, I suppose?” He asked, feeling a vague nausea, knowing the most likely answer.
“N-no, not as it stands…” Mint Spring replied, applying oil over the burnt areas. “She is currently single… was…”
“And the others…?”
“Left.” She deliberately dodged his gaze at those words.
The Blueblood in the past would have assumed there had been a messy divorce. The Blueblood that lied down on the mattress, a collar binding him to a storm cloud, knew better.
He paled beneath his white fur. No words escaped his mouth for the rest of the treatment. Not even as the mare took her leave did he acknowledge it with some sound. She barely received a nod…
“This… this can’t be happening…” Blueblood swallowed with difficulty, anxiety seizing control of his body.
He had to get away fast.
“True love my flanks…” He muttered poisonously, thinking back on Love Struck rambling.
But for all his struggles and his intellect, the prince had no idea how to help himself out of the mess he had stumbled into. Never before had he needed to. It seemed improper to try.
Surely, his aunts’ guards would find him soon.
But the reassurance was weaker than before. Time had already gone by without any sign of help. Little by little, his hope was fading, replaced by an abject terror.
“P-please, Auntie…” He whispered, shaking with tears. “Come and save me… I… I’m scared…”
The stallion curled up on himself, alone in his cell, with nothing but his tortured mind for company.
“I need you… come… please, come and save us…”
He would later fall asleep, his prayers unanswered.