The lights flickered on, and Cobblestone groaned, rolling over in bed. She knew that if she was not on her hooves in the next two minutes, she would be reprimanded by the guards as they passed by. Sure enough, she could hear the steady beats of their gaits as they turned down the corridor.
“Time to get up!” one of them cried. “Breakfast is in ten minutes! Clean your rack and let’s move!”
Cobblestone yawned, opening her eyes slightly, wincing as the bright lights of her cell drove their little daggers into her. She had always hated mornings, and the regimented lifestyle she was forced to endure certainly wasn’t helping change her opinion of them.
Grumbling, she rolled out of bed, standing up on wobbling hooves just as the guards marched past her cell, checking inside to make sure she was up. The one closest to her nodded approvingly as they went by, glad to see she was finally adapting to the schedule set for her.
Sleepily, she stretched the covers back over her bed and tucked the top back in. It was both easier and warmer, she found, if she didn’t pull up the edges of the covers while she slept. And she needed all of the warmth she could get. The “mattress” she slept on was about as thin and hard as a sheet of plywood, and the cells themselves were kept at a cool temperature without becoming dangerously cold.
Cobblestone glanced at the desk where Hob was still asleep, his ears twitching as he dreamed. She didn’t know much about cats, but somehow she doubted that he was actually asleep, nor did he need to eat as often as he claimed to, or at all. Complaining had become his favorite pastime when he was alone with her, and the only reason she tolerated it was because it was better than having no company at all.
Finishing her bed, she stomped her hooves against the stone of the floor, waiting for the cell door to open. The strange shimmering, she had found, was far more effective than a set of bars could be. The closer she got, the more difficult it was for her to move forward, until it was an effort to lift a hoof when she was more than half a meter away from the corridor. The hum at the front of her cell stopped, and so too did the shimmering. Cobblestone’s stomach growled as she stepped into the corridor, ready to start her day.
She waited in line with the other “guests”, as they were called, for the order to go ahead. Her first time there, she had attempted to walk down the corridor by herself, and had almost immediately been restrained by one of the guards and held back in her cell until the other prisoners had all gone ahead. By the time she had been allowed to go to breakfast, what was available had already been picked over pretty well.
A single tone sounded, like that of a bell, and almost in unison, the line began to move forward along the path that they all knew so well towards the mess hall. They filed out of the cell block, down one hall, down another flight of stairs, turned right, and were shuffled through the doors of the room where most of the facility met at one point or another. The smell of starch and musty air wafted towards them.
Cobblestone shuffled into line, took a tray, and received a bowl of dull oatmeal and a small apple before moving down the line to get a cup of milk. Straining a bit, she managed to lift the tray into the air with her magic. A bead of sweat formed along her brow. She wasn’t allowed to do much more than that, and the spells woven into the walls would make sure that she didn’t, but this was only the second time she had been able to lift the tray on her own.
Magic was like any other muscle, she reflected as she sat down to eat. It grew weaker with disuse, and she hadn’t used hers properly in quite some time. And she had strained it recently, too. She still had the occasional headache, still woke up at night smelling ozone and with the impression of blinding light lingering behind her eyes. And her magic felt different, somehow, like she was seeing with someone else’s eyes, or feeling with their skin.
She mechanically began to spoon the oatmeal into her mouth, pausing only occasionally to wash it down with the milk. The spoon, made of a soft material she could not identify, rattled in her bowl as she took a few quick bites out of the apple, chewing these thoroughly. She had always liked the taste of apples, and though these were small, they were surprisingly good.
Speaking of muscles, she thought, today was the day where she was going to finally be allowed some exercise, having just been cleared to do so by one of the staff doctors yesterday. She needed it, too. She could almost feel herself going soft, losing valuable skills and strength she had not used recently. She frowned, finishing off the apple. Cobblestone was going soft, and the young mare didn’t like it one bit.
Getting up, she joined the small crowd of ponies who were standing by a large-ish door to one side of the one she herself had stepped through a few moments before. This was the door to the exercise yard, and the brisk morning air she hadn’t felt in nearly a week. Come to think on it, she hadn’t seen the outside world in nearly a week, either. Cobblestone was determined to enjoy as much of it as she could, too, because the use of the exercise yard came at a cost. Today she would meet with a counselor for the first time, who would begin to discuss with her what options she could take.
It wasn’t as if she was afraid of them, Cobblestone mused, far from it. The guards here were considerably more kind than the ones of the Crescent City jails. No, it wasn’t fear. It was the idea of being deconstructed that she didn’t like. Sitting in a room once a week with a pony who knew how to open you up at the most basic level, one who could get you to reveal things about yourself you would never tell a soul about, all without you realizing you were going along with it, that was what she wasn’t too fond of. And that was once a week, she had been told. For years. No wonder half of the ponies here looked like they wouldn’t last five minutes in a back alley. If they could get your thoughts out of you, who was to say they couldn’t put something in?
“Look alive!” the guard by the door said. “Keep to the track if you’re running, today’s counterclockwise. If you’re going to be using the exercise yard, stay in the boundaries of the yard. No fighting, no pushing, no horseplay. Got it?” The crowd mumbled general assent, which appeared good enough for the guard. He stepped aside as the door opened wide, and the assembled crowd began to file out.
The courtyard wasn’t large, a square perhaps three hundred meters in length per side, and it was comprised of concrete walls, from the tops of which stretched a net of steel cables, in order to prevent Pegasi from flying into or out of the space while still giving them enough room to stretch their wings and fly about another forty meters up.
Cobblestone joined the group heading towards the track, and broke into an eager trot which turned into a slow canter as she felt her muscles limber and warm, driving away the chill of the late autumn air. She began to run in earnest, the canter speeding up into an almost-gallop as she left all but the most swift of her fellows behind. Ahead of her were three ponies, two of them Pegasi, but lagging behind them was an Earth pony it looked like she could catch. The unicorn smiled to herself, and began to push her limits.
She drew up next to the Earth pony, who was panting heavily herself, and the two of them exchanged a look. Cobblestone flashed her companion a grin, and the Earth pony relied with a brief nod, accepting the challenge. The duo, matching speeds, began to speed up, moving to the inside of the track. Their hooves pounded on the ground, digging into the softness of the earth as they rounded the far corner and began galloping into the straightaway.
Cobblestone exulted in the feeling of stretching her legs, feeling the breath come heavy and fast, relishing the burning in her legs as they protested their overuse, shedding the cobwebs of stillness from themselves and becoming strong again. She and her partner took the next corner hard, gaining even on the Pegasi who were up ahead of them, and sped down the straightaway. So preoccupied was she in her race that Cobblestone did not notice the much larger pony until he had stepped on the track ahead of her, eyes intent of the lifting equipment he was going to use.
The resounding collision was, needless to say, spectacular. Cobblestone slammed into his side, sending them both tumbling head over tail over hoof down the length of the track for a good twenty yards at least, before the rolling ball of pony and dirt and regret came apart and skidded to a halt in a shower of pebbles and grass. The yard became deadly silent.
“Son of a whore!” the Earth pony raged in a heavy Trottingham accent, standing up and shaking dirt from his eyes. “Who did that?”
Cobblestone picked herself up from the ground just as he spotted her, blinking heavily to clear her head as her vision improved just in time to see the broad shoulder of the Earth pony before it hit her hard across the face, sending her down onto the ground again with him following. The force was unbelievable, rattling her hard enough that she felt her teeth vibrate as her head slammed back down into the ground.
Frantically, she threw a hoof at her assailant, catching him on the side of the head as he straddled her, his hooves raised to pummel her into the dirt. The blow managed to throw him off-balance just enough for her to roll out from underneath him, getting onto her hooves as he did the same. Some dim part of her noticed guards rushing towards them both, but realized that they were a bit too far away to restrain this monster before he could take her head off. She was on her own, at least for the moment.
Her horn flashed brightly as she attempted to blind the colt, succeeding in doing so and enraging him further. Odds were good that she could evade him now, until the guards showed up, but the fight wouldn’t end today. She’d see him again, and next time, Cobblestone might not be so lucky. It was best to end it now.
The Earth pony threw a punch near where her head would have been had she not moved it just in time, and stumbled forward into her, hoping to close for a grapple. Unfortunately for him, Cobblestone was no stranger to street fighting , and as he did so, her own hoof flew through the air, impacting him right in the throat, followed by another blow to the side of his head as she reared, only just clearing the top of his head as she did so.
His face, normally a ruddy red, turned even more so as he collapsed, wheezing for breath. She hadn’t struck him with enough force to do any lasting damage, but it was definitely enough to take him out of commission for the immediate moment. Seizing her moment, she bent down next to him to whisper in his ear.
“Next time, you won’t get to walk away. Stay away from me and we won’t have trouble.”
She felt strong hooves on her shoulders as the guards arrived and began to lead her away, and noticed that the other ponies in the yard were looking at her with a healthy mixture of respect and fear. As she was hustled out of the prison yard, she smiled to herself. Maybe there were still ponies here with a bit of fight left in them, and maybe she hadn’t gone entirely soft.
Vino regarded the letter in front of him with a mixture of apprehension and disbelief. It was well-written, on fine parchment, using the finest calligraphy instead of the typeset letters that were so in vogue with the military minds of the day. For all of that, though, this document was in fact military in nature. The content was proof of that.
“To Sir Vino Hedera,” it read, “Lord-In-Waiting to the mantle of House Hedera, greetings and good health.”
“Sir, I hope this letter finds you well, and if it does not, I hope that the news which I am about to impart shall improve your stature in some small measure. As you may have heard, I am assembling a small personal guard, numbering approximately sixty fine fighters and spellcasters, for the dual purposes of defense and political necessity.”
Vino had, in fact, heard. It was practically the only thing anypony was talking about these days, aside from gossip about the recent trial involving the young thief, which for some reason stood out in the public’s eye.
“After I enlisted your aid in recent days, I was tasked with the formation of this group, as well as the recruitment of those I would wish to have in my personal service. You have shown remarkable ability since your arrival in Starfall, combining both discretion and competence with skill and good sense. It is therefore my wish that you attend the final auditions for the formation of this guard, and try for a spot as one of my personal knights.”
The newly-minted knight winced at that. If he were to arrive, the competition would be fierce, and his opponents would likely be far more skilled than he. Vino was unsure if he would do anything other than humiliate himself by showing his face at a competition that would surely attract some of the finest military talents in the kingdom.
“I realize this letter maybe a bit forward, and for that you have my apologies. I write this to you in the hopes that its personal nature conveys my earnestness in this offer, and my sincere goodwill towards you, regardless of what my past actions may have indicated. I have absolute faith in your martial ability, and look forward to your arrival at the final audition in two days’ time with hope in my heart.”
The letter was signed with a neat, curling valediction, “Evening Reigns, Her Ladyship Serale Armonia Everstar.”
Vino read over the letter again, for what must have been the tenth time that day. It made no sense; the signals given off here were quite frankly baffling. The expensive paper, the deliberate and delicate application of ink, the wax seal bearing her personal insignia, all for a request that he audition? He sniffed the parchment, almost but not quite sure that he could detect the slightest hint of perfume. Perhaps he was imagining things.
He set it to the side with a moan. He needed to talk to somepony about this, but he didn’t exactly have close friends here in the capital. Except…he did have something perhaps better than friends. He had family. Quickly, he rose to his hooves, standing in front of his mirror. He noted the time, mid-morning. Aura never saw clients before noon.
Reaching out, he pressed his hoof softly to the surface of the mirror, waiting for the rush of tiredness that meant the spell inside had taken his energy in lieu of magic to fuel its connection. He cleared his throat, shuffled nervously, checked his reflection, and then spoke.
“Show me Aura Hedera.”
The mirror rippled strangely, went completely blank, and after a brief moment of waiting, a new reflection faded into view. Lady Hedera’s visage filled the mirror, blonde hair lying freshly curled and damp against the rose of her coat. She arched an eyebrow at Vino in surprise, though not displeasure.
“Vino!” she said. “I must admit, I wasn’t expecting a call from you. How are things at the palace?”
Vino bowed his head briefly in deference. “Aura. Things are going well here. I apologize for not having the time to write, I’ve been a bit busy with the reprimand from my superiors and…”
“Did you say you received a reprimand?” Lady Hedera inquired sharply, her tone taking on a dangerous edge. “Whatever for?”
“That’s what I was calling about,” Vino said. “When I started my first day of duty here, I…ran into somepony.”
“Who?” Hedera asked.
“Lady Serale Everstar,” Vino said. “And she…I suppose you could say she ordered me to accompany her out of the palace on a mission to visit a friend of hers. A convict.”
Lady Hedera’s perfectly maintained eyebrows slid up her brow slowly. “Really?” she said, her voice becoming carefully neutral. “And what about this earned you a reprimand?”
Vino flushed ever so slightly. “I found out only after we departed that she was ordered by her mother not to leave the castle grounds.”
“Ah,” Lady Hedera said, “I see. Well, that would have earned you a talking to, I suppose.”
“That would have been bad enough,” Vino said, “But after we arrived, she dismissed me because I wasn’t allowed inside. She sent me to a shop down the road from the house, one in Lantern Square.”
“Was that you?” Lady Hedera asked. “I’d read something about a conflict between a young knight and a group of anarchists.”
Vino slumped. “It was.”
Aura tutted, shaking her head. “Oh, Vino,” she said disparagingly, “What have you gotten yourself into?”
“That’s not the point!” Vino said. “Today, I received a letter from Lady Serale asking me to join the personal guard she’s forming. Not only that, it was her own calligraphy, sealed with her own seal. I think she might have used perfume, too.”
Lady Hedera became still, and any onlooker would have remarked how much she looked like a hunting beast in that moment, one who had just spotted particularly slow or stupid prey. “I’m sorry, dear,” she said politely, “Could you say that again?”
“Serale Everstar sent me a letter asking me to be one of her personal knights,” Vino repeated, “Written herself, sealed herself, and I think she might have sprayed perfume on it, and I have no idea of what any of this could possibly mean! Is this a love letter or a job offer?”
Aura laughed. “Oh, Vino!” she said brightly, “I suppose it would be a little of both! In the current parlance of the Court, a letter written personally and signed personally means that you favor whomever you are sending it to. The fact that Serale Everstar used perfume means that she has an emotional investment in your success as well. Perhaps not love, but something similar, like a strong desire to know you better!”
Vino’s brow furrowed in thought. “So…it’s a sign of favor?” he asked.
Aura nodded. “Significant favor,” she said, “And it indicates that you’ve done something to earn Lady Serale’s affection, if not precisely her love for you. What’s wrong, Vino?” she asked, noting the troubled look on her son’s face. “Surely this is good news for you!”
“It is,” Vino said, “But I wonder if it might be too good? I’ve never really distinguished myself in front of Lady Serale. Why has she chosen me to be part of her personal guard?”
Lady Hedera pursed her lips thoughtfully. “Perhaps it is because she knows you,” she said. “Others competing for a chance to serve her are likely career soldiers, ones she does not know well. She knows you, Vino. Your father once told me that you and she often played together as foals. Perhaps she still harbors some fond memories of you?”
“Maybe I should decline her invitation,” Vino said. “There must be others better suited to the job than me.”
“No!” Aura cried, her face twisting unpleasantly. She blinked, composing herself. “Apologies, Vino. I did not mean to shout. It’s just…to decline this invitation would be the height of rudeness, and a potential scandal at that. Lady Serale took a great risk sending that letter to you. If it was known in Court that you scorned her invitation…”
“So I’m required to attend this…spectacle?” Vino inquired angrily. “Or else we both become social pariahs?”
“You are required to attend,” Lady Hedera said calmly. “And politely decline a position among the ranks of her guard if you so desire, though I don’t know why you would.”
“I don’t want to serve her because I feel like she used me,” Vino said. “Picked me up and tossed me aside. What says she won’t do it again?”
“That letter,” Lady Hedera said. “I think I know why she sent you such a personal note. It’s her apology, Vino. She’s trying to make up for it, I think.”
Vino started to speak, but Lady Hedera held up one elegant hoof, forestalling him. “I can’t tell you what to do, Vino. You’ve grown up and now you make your own choices. But realize that Serale Everstar may have used you because that’s all she knows, Vino. Maybe, somewhere underneath the veneer of polish she puts on for the Court, there lies a young mare who is scared and needs a protector.”
There was the sound of a distant chime, and Aura’s eyes flicked off to one side. “I have to go, dear,” she said. “Do well, and consider my advice. You bring great credit to your House, Vino. Talk to you soon.”
Her image faded out, replaced with Vino’s own reflection once more. The young knight considered himself in the mirror. He hadn’t thought of his situation in that way. His eyes went to the letter on the bed, then back to his reflection in the mirror. He sighed.
He would go to the audition, and he would make his decision there. Maybe his mother was right after all, maybe this was a genuine gesture of goodwill and, just maybe, it could have been a cry for help.
Miles away, Lady Hedera stood alone in her study. She walked delicately to the window, gazing out over the rooftops below to the castle which loomed in the distance.
“What game are you playing with my Vino, Serale?” she murmured. “What do you have in store for him?”
Serale considered the portfolios in front of her, and wondered about the letter she had sent to Vino.
It had taken every ounce of her skill with letter-writing in order to get the proper message across in the way she liked, and for a time, she had tossed aside nearly fifty sheets of parchment, some with full paragraphs and others with but a few lines on them. On some of these, the message didn’t quite come out right. On others, her writing had become sloppy, as she had accidentally slurred a word or two to the quill which sat upon her desk, perched in its inkwell expectedly.
She had finally gotten the right letter, written the right way, after nearly six hours of trial and error on her part. She had been very careful with the wax and even more so with her seal, a signet ring she had not used since the day she had received it on her thirteenth birthday, a gift from her mother. A few carefully applied dabs of the rose water she used on occasion, and the letter was finally ready. She had handed it to one of her most trusted maids, and told her not to stop for anything save the Lady herself. Of course it was going to generate gossip, but she simply needed Vino to understand how important it was that he attend the tryouts.
Serale had not been idle in the six days since Cobblestone had been imprisoned. She had thrown herself into the task of choosing her guard, and had requested detailed dossiers on every member of her mother’s spellcasters and soldiers who had applied for a position in the ranks of her newly formed protectors. The boxes currently occupied a full third of her room, their contents strewn across every available surface, including the floor in front of her door. She had not left her room in nearly four days, ordering meals sent straight to her and turning away every maid or visitor who attempted to see her for any other reason.
There were precisely two thousand, eight hundred and ninety-four applicants for the guard itself, of which more than two thirds had not made the final cut according to Serale’s criteria for the competence she expected in their field. Left with about eight hundred serious contenders, she began to systematically eliminate most of them based on one simple criterion.
Serale wanted soldiers and mages with a healthy disrespect for authority and a record of new and original thought.
The idea had come to her after she had been dismissed from her mother’s study and had realized that she would need a guard of a different type than the one her mother wanted. Twilight wanted good, reliable ponies protecting her daughter, one that could be relied upon to follow the orders of their superiors and keep her safely contained behind a wall of discipline.
Serale didn’t want that. Serale wanted fighters, not soldiers. She wanted ponies that she could rely on to be fierce, to react quickly to problems as they arose. Where her mother wanted logic, she wanted creativity. Where discipline was valued, Serale wanted camaraderie and spirit, like the Condottieri tribes of the northern mountains, the ones that she had only ever seen once or twice guarding her Aunt Cadance like packs of barely-tamed wolves.
That was why it was so important to have officers who thought the same way, or could at least be made to. Vino showed promising signs, though his service record was by far the shortest of any applicant she was considering to help her lead this motley band of miscreants. He had apparently shown great skill with nearly every weapon he had trained under, could think under pressure, and was above all a natural-born leader, though his strategic mind left something to be desired. It was absolutely imperative that he try for a position with her guard.
It wouldn’t be easy, however. She had already requested most of the rank and file troops be transferred under her direct command, and the responses she had received were invariably ones of simultaneous relief and warning. Be careful with him, they said. He talks back, doesn’t obey the proper procedures, won’t stop suggesting crazy ideas. You’ll have your hooves full. Serale liked what she heard in those letters. It meant she was on the right track.
Fifty regulars were chosen, all of them competent and disliked. Five spellcasters were to be chosen next, already being assembled in the Regia for their competition in the morning. This left slots for five captains, each of which to command ten ponies and one spellcaster as support. Invitations had been typed up and sent out at her express order, calling to knights, rangers, and scouts stationed near the city and inviting them to compete for a new and honorable title.
Serale estimated half of them would arrive for the challenge, which meant she would be dealing with around thirty assorted fighters when the day came. One in six weren’t bad odds, she decided. Much as she would have liked to help Vino, there was no practical way for her to do so without exposing her potential aid, and then the whole thing would fall apart.
Vino would do just fine, she told herself. He was more than competent. According to Sir Ironhide, he was something of a prodigy with a weapon. And he had the perfect amount of ability and deference to help her lead what was sure to be a very ragtag team of ponies, at least at first. The dossiers didn’t lie, though. If his influence was not among her officer corps, his combination of charisma and deference, then her chances of making her new guard work would be very slim indeed.