//------------------------------//
// Chapter Six 
// Story: War Comes 
// by Proper Noun 
//------------------------------//

	Chrysalis picked her way across the field of corpses, granting what was left of her excess energy as healing to her injured minions. She seemed in an actually cheerful mood, and Luna finally had to look away. How could anypony - any being at all - be so cheerful at the site of a wholesale slaughter? Not a single zebra had survived. She hadn't seen so much death since before... before the moon. She shook her head and straightened her posture.

"Guardsponies..." She hesitated. There were few of them left, and the battle was over. "Go home. Thou art all granted three extra months of paid leave for use at thy discretion. Go to thy families. Thy suffering this day was for them." The eight remaining guardsponies murmured amongst themselves before parting, each paying respects to their fallen comrades before allowing what remained of Ponyville's medical staff to cart the bodies away. Luna turned next to her fellow Princess.

"Now, we believe thou promised to explain this to us." Cadance sighed, and visibly stifled a yawn; fueling Chrysalis had clearly taken a heavy toll on her.

"Aunt Celestia and I have been planning our backup defenses for a long time," she said, barely keeping above a mumble. "She didn't say it in as many words, but I think this is her joke on you for sleeping through my... wedding incident."

"Thou canst not be serious." Cadance just continued to look her straight in the face. "... thou art serious."

"Very much so," Cadance said with a nod. Luna felt an old fury start to bubble up inside her, and quickly held it down. She knew what those old feelings meant, and what they could do. Still, she could allow herself to be merely angry.

"How dare she? Is such petty revenge more important to her than the lives of our subjects?! How can our sister - "

"Aunt Luna, please. You haven't let me explain." Luna nodded, and forced herself to be still, though she wanted little more than to teleport straight to Canterlot and hit her sister in the face. "We weren't supposed to have to act on this plan. Even then, she made sure at every step that it wouldn't hurt anypony. The focus of it isn't you - it's bringing Chrysalis and myself together. We still needed you to protect her until I could arrive - she's not exactly a brilliant strategist and tends to gloat too much - and we needed you to protect me afterwards. Auntie also knows you trust me enough to see this though."

"But she... we... argh!" Luna cried out in frustration. That did sound just like her sister, and it even made sense. She yelled at the sky, "Fine! You win this round, Tia, but I will get you back for this! Now, Cadance, what do the Changelings have to do with this in the first place?"

"I believe I'll answer this one. After all, this is where it becomes my story," Chrysalis said. She must have come back while the Princesses were talking. Cadance nodded tiredly. "After being cast out of Canterlot on that day, my people were spent. I had sunk too many resources and re-purposed too many laborers for the invasion. Too many were critically injured, and we were too widely scattered... those who did not succumb from injury or loneliness began to starve, instead." The changeling queen stared down at the bloodied grass with what appeared to be genuine sadness, and Luna forced herself to keep her mouth shut. She knew both that she'd have welcomed their fate, and that she would have been wrong to do so. The callous, jealous heart of Nightmare Moon still beat in her chest, and had to be kept under control. She merely listened while Chrysalis recovered herself enough to continue.

"I was, myself, thrown far to the north. Snow and ice jammed in place the plates of my carapace, and the only thing I could do was... was lie still, and place a bet with myself on whether I would die of cold or hunger first." She paused to force her composure back into place again. "... and she, of all people, found me." Chrysalis bowed her head deeply to Cadance. "She saved me, and when I had recovered, we met with Celestia in secret. When I told her of how much had changed, when I begged her to help me save my children..." She paused again, though this time, the ghost of a smile touched her face. "The terms were strict, but the deal so much more generous and trusting than... than we deserved, after what I did. We would even be allowed to slowly merge our remaining numbers with the populations of Equestria's cities, in total secrecy but with her personal oversight. In exchange, we had to do every last thing she asked of us, no matter how menial, and of course follow Equestrian law to the letter. So the Changeling Empire became a vassal state to Equestria.

"As three years passed, we regained our strength, our numbers, our prosperity. I watched my entire race begin to heal, and owed all to you." She gave Cadance another bow of her head. "So when Celestia told me to move my children into Zebrica as a contingency because of their sudden diplomatic hostility, I had long been more than willing to carry out any command without question. It was my greatest undertaking - we had to not only invent and maintain perfect cover, but prevent the zebras from noticing their population had almost doubled without explanation. I had to return to Equestria, of course, to keep myself available for Celestia, but I left my children with a plan if the zebras did begin to march. It would seem they executed it perfectly."

"We are... impressed, by thy apparent loyalty," Luna grudgingly admitted. But there had to be more. "What else did our sister offer thee?"

"Hm-hm. Aren't you perceptive?" Chrysalis replied. That touch of a smile appeared again. "There was one more thing. Should we somehow find a way to prove our allegiance beyond doubt, we would be freed from all terms, and our past crimes forgotten. We would be welcome visitors and residents of Equestria, on the sole provision that we never again resort to kidnapping and murder." The last straw of Luna's trust snapped.

"And how are we supposed to believe thou willst not use this to advantage, to attack Equestria once more?" she said, bristling. "Why should we make ourselves vulnerable to thy - "

"Aunt Luna - "

"Oh, please. Even under Celestia's hoof, my children have known such prosperity as even I have not seen in more than two hundred years. I've been hostile in my dealings with Equestria before, but now I see I was foalish to try to take by force what might be given freely, and now every last one of us has Equestria to thank simply for our lives." She took a breath, and visibly began to calm. "I am a warrior, not a politician. I bargain strictly by cost and gain. By fighting Equestria, I lose safety, I lose security, I throw away lives and prosperity. I gain nothing but a few political bargaining chips even if I do win, something I am confident I cannot do even against Cadance alone.

"I'm not an idiot, Princess. Neither am I yet your peer, but I would appreciate my fealty not being questioned on the same day I saved your kingdom."

"Aunt Luna - "

"Thou lied to us, thou impersonated us, and thou attacked us! Dost thou truly expect us to forget, and permit thy minions to shelter under our wing? Dost thou expect us to believe thy words? We - "

"Aunt Luna, shut up!"

"We all trusted Nighmare Moon," Chrysalis said calmly. Luna fell onto her haunches, her cheeks stinging. After several moments of silence, the changeling said, "I will go. This victory must be reported, and I must tend to my children. Their orders were to vanish once this is over, but I'm sure that hasn't stopped some of your subjects from trying to attack them."

"I need to leave as well," Cadance said, yawning. "I'm sorry for raising my voice, Auntie. I just wanted you two to stop fighting before it came to... that. I'm going to go now, alright? I need to grab my husband for a blanket and sleep for a year or two."

Then Luna was alone.