The wet moss served as a comfortable pillow, so soft against Lyra's head, and so pleasant that she allowed herself to imagine for the first few moments of wakefulness that she was back in Canterlot; that the sounds of birds and insects was an opium-induced haze. Who had she brought home this time, Lyra wondered. Hopefully he or she was cute, and Lyra wouldn't look back on the perfect morning with anything other than nostalgic euphoria.

Lyra’s ears twitched. She was, unfortunately, not in a drugged-out dream, as all the aches of rough living welled up. There was no pleasantness at all, for the slight scent of food reminded her of her ravenous hunger.
Curling up and trying to look around, Lyra's eyes too-slowly adjusted to the misty forest. Spinal soreness and sensory issues were symptomatic of severe magical exhaustion. The realization that the olfactory delights were probably deceptions was deeply disappointing.

"Hmm hmm... Oh! Lyra, mate! You’re alive! Good shit!" And cheery voice that sounded exactly like Pon-3 was her haywire senses too?

"Oh, damn, that's right." Lyra collapsed back on the moss, releasing a throaty groan. "I agreed to Twilight Velvet's pact." She murmured.

"Hell yes you did! Oh my gods, I was soo fucking happy- Like I can't even explain." Vinyl blabbered like a filly. "And I was such a mess too, cuts and bruises all over me. That old bat in the maid getup really beat me to hell. The teleport happened and I knew I was free, I felt better than I had in my entire life." Vinyl's actions could be discerned by the rustle of the damp leaf litter, and the slight crackle and sizzle of whatever she was cooking. "I've had hostile sendoffs before. When Phyte and Celestia exiled me, they berated me for what had to have been hours, about what an idiot I was and how I was going to everypony elses problem from then on, and if I returned to Equestria they'd cut my legs and breasts off and hang me from a steeple. By comparison, getting smacked around then sent off with a job and some veg is a fun weekend, really."

"Shut up, please. My head hurts." Lyra pleaded. "Just... some water. I could use some water."

"Oh sure!" Vinyl bounded over and helped ease Lyra into a sitting position, then guided a flask to her lips. "Keep your eyes closed a sec. I'm gunna try a hangover curse spell I remember."

Lyra prayed that the mare and misspoken and meant 'cure'. A tingle ran along her spine and to her ears. When Lyra opened her eyes again the haze had mostly lifted: Crouching over her, smiling softly, the white head, electric blue mane, and smoldering grey eyes of Pon-3/Vinyl Scratch. "Thanks." Lyra nodded, taking the flask herself and letting Vinyl return to cooking.

The situation was dour. Lyra had survived her solitary week in the highland glades of the southeast Canter, and her reward was being bound in guildmares' sisterhood to the homicidal freak Pon-3 to enjoy the cold wet mornings with. Lyra could tolerate team missions in the best circumstances and with a group she trusted, but these were bad circumstances and mare she greatly distrusted. What was worse, her mission had not been given a Star's grace, but a conniving and vicious mortal mare's: Twilight Velvet... Twilight Velvet who still had her hooves on Octavia!
"She's alive, right?" Lyra whispered, terrified of the answer.

"You mean Tavie? Oh yeah, no worse for ware than me. Maybe she's a bit more fragile, but I bet that jeeves-ass bitch went easy on her. I'm sure Tavie'll live." Vinyl nodded aggressively.

Invigorated by sudden rage, Lyra pushed herself to her hooves, to limp forward, mud and leaf litter sloughing off her, until she was right behind Vinyl. "Show some fucking respect to your missing 'friend'." She hissed. "You put us, her, in this whole mess. Not only did you provoke an alicorn's wrath by returning, putting Phyte's word and operation at risk, you directly provoked a Nightmare! At least four ponies are dead because of your recklessness! Even if we survive the next months Octavia and I will have to assume different identities for the rest of our life. That's right, not only have you gotten yourself exiled by being a complete psychopath, but you're done it to us." Lyra punctuated her yelling with a pained, despairing whine. "And poor Octavia. After Pants's murder, she all but begged to go back to the guild hall. It was you she wanted to see, one last time... you, her evil, disappointing friend, who has only ever caused her grief."

"Arg!” Lyra snatched a vegetable skewer off the campfire and sat across from Vinyl. "You don't understand because you can only think about yourself."
Lyra allowed a minute of stewing silence as she ripped into the cooked vegetables. Delicious. "Your gratitude to me is heartwarming, I guess. But in case you didn't catch on you're not the pony I wanted OR needed from Twilight Velvet. I wanted Octavia."

Confusion washed over Vinyl’s face, then a flash of anger, then a sad acceptance. She didn't say anything for the remainder of Lyra's breakfast.

Though she'd finally gotten her point through, Lyra hoped she hadn't poisoned the well too badly. She needed this mare. "Thank you for the food and the water. I understand I'm probably not your first choice of comrade, and you're not mine, but we have to make do." She cleared her throat. "Fate has put us in a tough spot, but if we do everything right we can save Octavia and find a life for ourself beyond this mess we're fleeing. There's got to be plenty of countries that still don't have extradition to Equestria."

"I get it. You've had a hard time. Your boss and your stability meant a lot to you. Now they're gone. It's been years and years since I had anything resembling a stable or save life, that I forgot their comforts." Vinyl shook her head. "You were on the verge of being totally civilian! And... It's ruined." Vinyl ruminated, but she also did not seem especially sad. In fact there was a hint of glee about her manner. The awaited-for 'I'm sorry' would never come. Whatever.

Lyra decided to change topics. "Let's get down to buisness then, from the beginning. Twilight Velvet captured you after the duels at the gatehouse. Did she explain herself?"

"Naw. As soon as we were conscious, she let her goons torture us." Vinyl's jaw set in impotent anger. "They were doing a classic good-jailor-bad routine, with the maid as the heel and Lady Velvet as the face. That frilly froufrou bitch... I swear she was getting off on it, taking turns asking us useless questions and beating the snot out of us." She shivered. "She had that boy of hers help her, doing foreign tag-team torture like I heard about in Griffany. I would have confessed to anything, if they'd actually cared."

"No no, I don't mean Velvet's kid. I mean the young stallion who was following the mares around. Sel Lech Sabonord. What a bucking freak, that guy, taking a 'student' approach to our suffering, acting like he was there to learn on the job, and apologizing the whole time. Then when Velvet's come around he'd help her care for us and read to us. Just unnerving." Vinyl scratched her cheek. "If you're trying to teach a virgin power politics, I guess that'd be the lesson plan: How to be violent, how to hurt others, but also how to keep the victim alive so they're useful to you."

"Not the worst, but I usually know if my captor is going to try to kill me at the end or let me go. The ambiguity was its own torture. Velvet kept saying how sorry she was to have to do this to us, and what rotten luck she had to be put in that position. I nearly believed her. Then, the third mare showed up." Vinyl's voice dropped to a whisper. "A little earth pony with black fur- Octavia told me that she's the one who brained Fancy Pants."

"The killer." Lyra felt her stomach drop. No mere pony, but something Lyra hardly even dared to think about: A Nightmare. "What the hell, Vinyl, why didn't you lead with that detail?! It means Velvet really was responsible for Pants's murder."

"Maybe. I don't know. I don't think she was. Because, well..." Vinyl slouched. "There's one other stallion too. The mute one we saw in the guild tunnels."

Vinyl nodded. "Yeah. I know the score: Octavia explained the little cottage industry of mutilation Phyte has going on. The mute seems to have his wits despite what Phyte did to him, and he would run Velvet's errands." Vinyl leaned in. "Plus, Velvet was also using dragonfire spells, like Phyte does."

Lyra's brow furrowed. "The dragonfire teleportation is how she captured you, right? That actually complicates the Velvet-Phyte connection, because as far as I know the mistress never managed to harness conjured dragonfire. She's totally reliant on liquid dragonfire and her enchanted birdcages."

"Yup, Velvet was freestyling that shit. She teleported me here totally by herself." Vinyl said.

"Quit cursing. You're giving me a headache." Lyra mumbled. "So, whether or not the Nightmare, Twilight Velvet, and Mistress Phyte were conspiring together all along..." She drummed her skewer against her knee, thinking. "it doesn't mean anything for us. We're still constrained to two choices: Going back to Canterlot and trying to get revenge, or fulfilling Lady Velvet's hit and earning Octavia back."

"Yeah, that's fair. I've never made a job better by overthinking it." Vinyl concurred glumly. "Though, you didn't mention that we've got a third option, of doing neither and going our separate ways."

"Because that's NOT an option. You're stuck with me until we get Octavia back or we die." Lyra stood up. The last few minutes of conversation had convinced Lyra that Vinyl could be tolerable company when she wasn't being a gremlin- It was up to Lyra to discover how best to keep the psychotic killer on track and objective focussed. "I know you will do your part, because you have no say in the matter."

"You think you're the boss?" Vinyl clucked her tongue. "Whatever. Not like I'm going to wrestle you over it. Just means the responsibility of choosing our path. So, what'll it be? We going towards Canterlot or away?"

Lyra's master was dead, but there was no room for complex revenge fantasies in her line of work. Returning to Canterlot was an idiotic notion, for if Velvet and any other conspirators caught wind they'd kill Octavia and probably Lyra's family too. That left only one choice. "Lady Velvet's letter said we'd have to kill two ponies, but it didn't say who. I'm assuming she passed that information to you."

The prospect murder reinvigorated Vinyl. "Oh ho! She sure did, and even told me I'd get my back pay for the Canterlot jobs afterward. Not the worst deal I've been offered."

"Right. Either Velvet must have thought getting Octavia back wasn't enticement enough for you, or she's got a bizarre sense of fairness." Lyra said. "Let's hear it."

Vinyl scratched her chin. "Some noble jerks in the Foal Mountains. Two brothers."

"No kidding." Lyra knew exactly who she was talking about. "Velvet wants some good old fashion inheritance-tampering, We're going to finish the job started back in '78 and wipe out the ancient house of Bright. Gods forgive us."

The mountains of Foal contained the most beautiful landscapes Lyra had ever seen. Every road she'd travelled had, at some point along its laborious series of switchbacks, an overlook that commanded an unparalleled view over the landscape, where the natural features seemed so picturesque as to be painted: Great waterfalls feeding cool clear streams feeding rivers that divided the alpine agricultural fields at the valley floor, forests of stout pines with dark green canopies, caravans of cheerful sheep and goats moving between their pasturelands, idilic pony villages tucked against the cliffs and mountains, and the austere stone castles surmounting the cold peaks.

Unfortunately for Lyra, she was after the ponies inside those impenetrable castles. Since getting Twilight Velvet's mission, Lyra and Vinyl had spent two weeks traveling to get to Foal, then two weeks putting their plan into motion. Splitting up, reconvening, splitting up, comparing notes, sneaking around castle towns and eavesdropping on courtiers... But it finally looked like the effort had come to fruition.

That was why, on a chilly afternoon, at a rustic inn on the main road between the fiefs of Glitterhoof and Glorymane, Lyra and Vinyl approached from opposite directions.
Vinyl arrived first and lounged at the inn's back door, looking out over the cliff they were situated over- Like all Foal trails, the fief road snaked along the edge of a gorge, leaving precious little room for the inn. At least it made waste disposal easy.
Lyra arrived a little later, and after a moment of mutual recognition under their travel disguises, she joined Vinyl at the cliff's edge. "Hey."

"Hey yourself" Vinyl nudged her unicorn comrade. "Sorry, I don't have any hashish left this time or I'd offer you some. I ate it all yesterday."

"Better yesterday than today." Lyra said softly.
The noise of the inn could be heard muted through the solid construction of the alpine-built walls. Her stomach turned to think of them, the paths of their lives innocently leading them to that moment, where they were enjoying themselves in good company on a cold afternoon. Those ponies had loved ones, someone waiting on them or who they were going to see.
Yet cruel fate had imbued Lyra with the power and necessity to hurt those ponies so she could get what she wanted, to see Octavia again. "I'm a little angry you didn't save me any, actually. I'm... more nervous that I thought I'd be. It's been so long since I was a proper guild mare."

"Aww, revert into a little cherry girl?" Vinyl tried to tease Lyra's nose but had her hoof batted away. "Hmph. Now that you mention it, I don't even remember you drawing you sword during the gatehouse tussle. You just slipped away." Though Vinyl could mention it without bitterness, it still deepened Lyra's frown. "It's not like we're expecting a fight today. We can set everything up and slip away, and if necessary I'm fighty enough for the two of us."

"Do not worry about me. I will see everything through and make sure it is all done right." Lyra affirmed. "I'm far from useless. I survived a Nightmare, remember. If you'd kept your shit together maybe you could have been there too and we'd have won. Then we wouldn't be here."

"Sorry, that was stupid of me to say. My nerves are worse than I thought" Lyra sighed.
It was the guild mare's job to never question orders. The mistress would not have sold a murder if she had not deemed it virtuous or necessary, and a guild mare could not turn down a mission until she found a replacement assassin.
Being an independent blade for hire meant shouldering the decision, and therefore the moral burden, of murder. That was no small part of Lyra's decision to be Fancy Pants's agent, as a servant of the empire.
There was no validation when Twilight Velvet was just some mare, and not somepony Lyra would have taken a job from even under normal circumstances. How could Lyra face her victims in the afterlife and explain to them she'd had to kill them for Twilight Velvet? She struggled to conjure a moral formulation that made it okay to sacrifice so many for so few.
"Hey." She nudged Vinyl. "You must have met assassins overseas. What are they like?"

"Oh, yeah, I met plenty. In Sahella, Zebrastan, and Chitin there's secret societies with all mystic practices, kinda like the Musician's Guild but run by zaotars rather than a Star. Around Griffany and the Saddle, the assassins are from the same batches as the soldiery, being mercenaries and expatriates: I swear, if you meet a pony with an Equestrian or Maredian accent around there it's fifty-fifty that they have a body count, as likely to stab you as invite you to a kaffeeklatsch." Vinyl explained. She paused for a moment. "Though, there was news on the wing that a secret society had been founded in Griffany too, run by Black Bell. I never saw any proof of it though." Seeing Lyra's questioning expression Vinyl clarified. "Black Bell is a Star too. Probably one of the better well known by normies, especially in Griffany. They just know her as an ancient witch."

"Then even the griffins are starting to yearn for the exculpatory powers of faith and hierarchy, as a steady refuge of scoundrel and killer. It really is the same all over the world." Lyra smirked grimly. "The old stereotypes say that nothing can separate the griffin from their deneir, not even god. Especially not god. That Black Bell has a daunting task ahead of her if she intends to systematize a killer's paradise. If it can be conceptualized as valuable, the griffins will sell it, even murder."

Vinyl shrugged. "I guess. You make it sound amoral but I liked my time in Griffany."

"A broken pony with something to sell, same as all the other expats." Lyra said, attempting a tease which came out much more mean-spirited than she intended.

"Sure was. Nothing reigns above the almighty gold deneir, dinar, or denero. When contests, contentions, and relationships were tested it all came down the the gold. Griffany's a continent with kings and dukes and republics, but there weren't any nations and borders, because gold was der souverän, and it went where it pleased and dragged armies and refugees behind it. None of the ancient bloodline bullshit matters anymore, just bank credit and cash on hoof. When I see that society, I see the future of all races and lands, everywhere. Specie will conquer the world." Vinyl said with a deep seriousness, but quickly became playful again. "And not to mention griffins breed like crazy so like half the continent is actively killing the other half and the population still rises. It's a scavenger's paradise. I have a lot of good memories of Griffany... Almost slept with a unicorn merc that claimed to be a prince from these very mountains." She chuckled. "Then I, being drunk, puked on him and had to fight his whole posse to get back to my hideout. That was the life."

There was probably some exaggeration and nostalgic misremembering to Vinyl's account. "It must be a generational thing that my cohort were never as wild as you, Octavia, and Pie were in your time." Lyra said.

"It'd be a shame if the problems matured you all, ya know, prematurely. Everypony deserves a wild phase... as long as they have a responsible figure to reel them in before they go too far and get themselves exiled." Vinyl grinned. "Ever thought about how your younger self would have approached this mission? Me, I'd have said 'buck it' and tried for collateral stabbings, knife massacre like. That's the kind of freak shit that made the Red-Eyed Miller a household name!" Her grin faded. "That'll never be me again. I didn't thunder back into history, but instead get tossed in a cage then kicked out here." She sighed. "One day the ponies will learn to fear that Nightmare, and they'll shriek in terror at her name, and never again mine."

The meandering conversation had gotten to a less uncomfortable place for Lyra. "I have often had the idea that we were in the last of the good times. Fifty years ago, guild mares were dashing rogues, prized courtiers and agents at home in any enviroment. Nowadays guild mares are cliquish thugs who fall over themselves for the mistress's attention. It's no wonder that in a culture like ours the primeval id, the Nightmare, comes alive to kill." Not strictly actuate to reality, but maybe a more poetic reality. "You saw how mistress Phyte was acting when we left her. With us 'dead' and the Nightmare on the loose, do you think she is going to keep the guild together?" Lyra asked.

Vinyl grew quiet and contemplative, weighing the question for a minute. "Lyra mate, I'm not certain she will keep herself together. The Nightmare wanted her head." She chuckled softly and scratched her chin. "Can you picture Phyte gone? Like... dead, forever? As often as I thought about attacking her I imagined it as my suicide."

The way that Vinyl said that rubbed Lyra the wrong way. "With an attitude like that, it's no wonder things turned out the way they did."

"Octavia said the same thing, the night she ratted me to Phyte. She told me I'd been living in the past my whole life, and that I should find someplace else to call home. I told her to knock it off." Vinyl said.

"How about now? Have you been broken down enough by Phyte and Velvet's successive imprisonings?" Lyra said roughly. "There are a million different places to live a good life. I bet you don't have a death sentence in even half of them. So, do you want to die or do you want to retire? Living in the past with a brain full of revenge fantasies is going to earn you the former."

Vinyl frowned. "What the fuck's it matter to you? Don't want me to die? That's charming, Lyra mate. Can't lie that I haven't gotten good at not dying, to nearly everypony's disappointment. End of the day though, it's my life and I'm going to do what I want with it."

Since Vinyl had been cooperative the past month, despite such bursts of thorniness, Lyra wasn't going to push the point to hard. "Wrong. Right now you have Octavia's life to bear as well. After today, when we earn Octavia's freedom, feel free to destroy yourself to yourself. But you've been trying for years, it seems, to no success. Not even returning to Canterlot could destroy you. If hell doesn't want you then try living for once, and see if that doesn't have better outcomes." Lyra fussed with the hem of her robe, avoiding Vinyl's glare. "But alas, it will be your choice."

A small bird swooped past the mares, landing on the eaves of the inn's back door, then letting out six sharp tweets. It flew up and around out of sight, audibly repeating the six tweets before going off along the valley.

"Blimey, six already." Vinyl said, a bit alarmed. "We're prepared right? Was there something we should've been doing instead of yapping?"

"It's fine, it's fine. As long as they arrive, that's enough." Lyra scooted back from the cliff and stood up. "All that nonsense we were talking about moving on, about maturing, about being better ponies, about transcending the traumas of the past: Chuck it all in the bin. We have to kill and kill mercilessly. We can not hesitate or we will fail and Octavia dies. Doubt and regret may come later but anticipation of it will not deter us. That's the guild mare way."

Vinyl patted her on the shoulder. "Fuck the guild. That's the assassin's way."

"I...'d say that works too." Lyra surveyed the road again. She saw two parties coming from either direction, right on time:
From the east, six ponies, four knights leading a noble and his servant. Glorymane of House Bright.
From the west, six ponies, four knights leading a noble and his servant. Glitterhoof of House Bright.

"Like they say in Manehattan, time to rock-and-roll." Vinyl smoothed her mane back before pulling up her hood. "Good luck."

"You too." Lyra nodded.
Leaving Vinyl behind the inn with the saddlebags, Lyra circled to the front. The narrow mountain road was squeezed between the inn's frontage and the sheer mountain face, with several carts and wagons taking up the precious space. To maximize the area the inn's upper floors projected past the bottom floor, and a makeshift support column had been set under one of the sagging upper corners. Wasn't it crazy that unicorns had gone out of their way to live like that, Lyra thought?

The inn's front door and windows were all open, giving Lyra an unrestricted peak inside. Like many inns a drinking/dining saloon occupied most of the bottom floor, then half-full with travelers: Rowdy adventurers, braying locals, and intrusive drunks were at all moments clambering over tables and singing and shouting and especially drinking. If there was one thing Lyra had learned the past weeks, it was the unicorns of the Foal Mountains loved to drink. No wonder such an isolated venue could attract so many ponies when it could keep them sodden.

Lyra stood awkwardly for a moment before she thought of something to do, so she pulled out a pipe and very slowly stuffed it with tobacco. "Lousy Vinyl, eating all the hash." She was extremely nervous, keeping her eyes on her task as she heard two groups of six conversing towards her. The two noble parties rounded the last corners and came face to face, at either end of the inn's frontage.
A knight stepped forward from either direction, stopping-nae-colliding right in front of Lyra.

"Hark! The lord Count of the Eastern Marche, Glitterhoof, is come!" The knight coming from along the eastern road pronounced.

"Hark! The lord Count of the Western Marche, Glorymane, is come!" The knight coming from along the western road pronounced.

The two nobleponies stepped forward next. They were so gaudily dressed and manicured it was difficult to even tell their fur color. The two stallions, Glorymane and Glitterhoof, drew close, and after a moment of intense staring began to laugh. After a brief hug they leant on each other and led their whole procession into the inn, laughing at each others jokes.

"Condition one, mutual destruction, didn't come to pass." Lyra muttered, her eyes tracking the noblestallions as they passed by her.

Though the knights readily pushed inside, keeping the other guests away from the counts, the servants hung back, hovering near the entrance for a few minutes whispering to one another. They began to brazenly stare at Lyra, refusing to look away when she glanced their way.

"Uh. Yello there." Lyra gave a little wave. "Those marche lords are your masters then?"

"Your master too, pony." One of the servants, the taller one with chestnut fur, retorted. "You're in the demesne of Duke Foaly Flux, and Count Glitterhoof is his heir."

"An heir." The shorter servant, with biege-ish fur, corrected sharply. "Technically this valley is closer to the Western March of Count Glorymane. Do with that knowledge what you will, pony."

The nobles had, thankfully, gone into the inn; Still Lyra needed to confirm that they would stay in place. "Wow. I've heard nopony gets to see the Brights. I feel so lucky." She hoped she sounded suitably impressed. "What are they even doing here? Goodness, I never thought I would see a high lord on a mountain path."

"So a neutral territory is needed." The chestnut stallion confirmed. He and the other stallion shared a glance. "That the lords can hash out important business."

"Because some day Lord Flux will die, and it's unthinkable that Foal gets divided between the heirs. The patrimony has passed through generations whole for many centuries." Said the short servant.

What did these servants have to prove? Sycophant mouthpieces surely had better things to do than correct random mares.
"I don't care about all that. Two donkeys pull the same when switched." Lyra finally finished packing the pipe, and lit it with a meagre spark of magic. "The Bright twins are so interchangeable it's a punchline back in Canterlot, and they only get talked about for their inheritance. Funny that it's the same inside Foal as well." She blew a smoke ring and offered the pipe to the stallions. "Hey, I don't mean offense. A pony's gotta work, and a boss is a boss. Can't think of a pony without both horn and wing that can't be swapped out at the drop of a hat. We don't live in a time of heroes, just crooks. Notoriety is fleeting, and obscurity is eternal."

The servant stallions eyed the pipe wearily, then wordlessly turned away and entered the inn.

"Tough audience." Lyra let out a deep sigh, part relief part anxiety. She peered through the window to see the counts and their entourages had commandeered a corner of the saloon for themselves.

"Three sides ticking. We handle the front manually if we have to." Vinyl shook her flank to accentuate the saddlebag and its contents. "We have about ten minutes."

The targets were in position. The mares could either wait from a distance or up close. Under normal circumstances Lyra would advocate withdrawing, but with Octavia's life on the line NOTHING could be left to chance: The mares had to stay close to the counts and make sure it went off without a hitch, even if it meant placing themselves in danger. "Nine minutes and counting... Enough time to party. Come on."

The two mares straightened up their cloaks and strolled into the inn. The clamor of the visitors had been significantly subdued by the unexpected arrival of the nobles, and they only looked to see if the mares were yet more knights or somesuch. The innkeeper's daughter was engaged with the nobles, but the innkeeper herself was hunched over her own table, watching the scene.

"Eh? You. I though it was you two westerners, skulking around. Still broke charity cases? No hoofouts today. The duke's lovely nephews are here and it's a roll whether they'll pay their tabs." The innkeeper grunted. In reply, Lyra dropped a few bits on the table, which surprised the innkeeper. "..."

"Well I'll be. I don't hardly count on vagabonds paying up, no offense meant. I hope you fillies didn't go out of your way to bring this." The innkeeper sighed.

"If you have a lyre, harp, or fiddle laying around we can even earn our next drink." Vinyl said.

"Used to have a sitar until some buckhead threw it off into the valley." The innkeeper scraped the bits into her apron pocket. "But I'll tell ya what: You mares are such nice gals I'll give you a couple drinks at cost, which when retroactively applied to your tab means I owe you, roughly, a cider mug each. Sound fair?"

"That is more than fair, mis. Thank you very much." Lyra nodded.
Leaving the innkeeper to her work, Lyra and Vinyl found an open table with an unobstructed view of the nobles and their guards. They hadn't attracted the attention of the other guests, who were also watching the nobles.
"Keeping the time?" She whispered to Vinyl.

Lyra leaned back in her chair, chomping at the bit of her pipe and staring at the ceiling, occasionally daring to glance at the noble party. She barely acknowledged the innkeeper returning with the drinks.
The presence of the civilians trebled her anxiety. What a terrible, terrible plan. Why had this been what they'd resorted to? With a little more wit, and a little more patience, could they have come up with something better? Her imagination tortured her with visions of Octavia, gaunt, chained to a damp dungeon wall.

The visions evaporated back into reality as somepony tapped her on the shoulder. "Heya there." It was a yellow-furred earth stallion with a curly brown mane, tinted glasses hiding his eyes, wearing a traveling cloak over light armor.

The mares faced the stallion. "Uh, hello. Can we help you?" Lyra asked cautiously.

"Oh, no I don't need anything, I just wanted to say hi, make your acquaintance and all that. I heard your Canterlot accents, which that intrigued me enough that I listened in, and I overheard you mention that you could preform music, if you just had some instrument." The stallion said. "Don't get too excited: My instruments aren't here either. But I got to wondering... what would a guild pony be doing in the countryside without their tools?"

Uh oh. Lyra stared at the stallion, trying to decipher his disposition. A local musician/assassin, perhaps? Was this professional courtesy or turf rivalry? "We don't want any trouble. We're just passing through."

The stallion quirked an eyebrow. "Yeah? Those bits you laid down have any blood on them?"

Why was this asshole questioning them? "Earned from a couple days stint in a silver mine, near Crystal Pass in the Riverpony lands."

"I could see that being true, but if you came by this way before, you're not exactly 'passing through', are you. You're more hanging out." The stallion clucked his tongue. "I'm not a professor, at least not from an accredited university, but the harsh mistress of dice taught me YOU being here-" He eyed Glorymane and Glitterhoof's table. "At the same time as the powdered wig boys over there, by happy happenstance, is muy pequeno."

Vinyl realized the game was up. "Try anything and I'll make you give birth to your teeth, earth pony." She said quietly.

"Jeez louise, I've never heard that one before." The stallion chortled. He scratched his chin. "Really don't have your instruments? Then you must be reconnoitering. Tisk, you shoulda found disguises, like a monk or nun. Those are my favorites, but this one time I got too into it and was trapped in a convent out west for four months. Lately, I've been a badass sellsword." He flexed. "I've gotten real good at forging bounty warrants, and get to bill client and the sheriff both, hee hee!"

So, a traveling assassin. "You sure like to jabber. That annoys me." Lyra said solemnly. "You aren't welcome if all you are going to do it talk shop."

"Hold on a damn second..." Vinyl scrutinized the sellsword longer. "Lyra, did you see this guy come in with the nobles? He wasn't here before." She tapped the table. "He was trailing one of them."

"What's that prove mis? Oh, you think that maybe just maybe I was hired by somepony to discreetly take care of a brother. Projection, or do you have intel? No, you just realized." The sellsword's smile became a frown. "I've never had a gig with opposing force before."

"Those servants distracted me, just like you got distracted by us. While you were eying us another killer has been at work, either the innkeeper or her daughter." Lyra said. "Look over there. One of the flagons is of a slightly different design than the others."

Lyra pushed him back into his chair. "The count must have noticed too since he hasn't even taken a sip. Actually none of them have. Your paymaster might survive another minute, no thanks to you."

"Not so smooth now. You such a non-threat that the innkeep didn't even offer you a free drink, did she. " Vinyl snickered, taking a big swig of her cider. "Guess what, probably also poisoned."

The yellow sellsword pursed his lips. "Tricky devil." He stared at the mares for a moment, until his expression softened, clearly making the foolish decision to trust them. "I deserve the tongue-lashing, but underestimating me is a bad idea too. If things got contentious I have more than enough grenades to back you off."

"Oh, yeah, I have a shit-ton of grenades I stole form an imperial armory. The plan was to blow Gl-, my target, and his carriage right off the side of a cliff. But it's been one frustration after another. His party has been on constant high alert, and those beefy plate-armored boys could probably charge through a grenade and run me off, or even through. I'll have to be looking for an opening after the two counts disentangle. Sheesh tough work eh?" The yellow sellsword laughed awkwardly. "You mares clearly know your stuff. If you've got buisness or you're just passing through... Is it too much to ask you let me collect on my contract? It's so damn lucrative and I have debts to settle, you know. Madam dice is a bitch."

Lyra was going to bitch the stallion out, but Vinyl tapped her hoof, pulling her attention.

Lyra's eyes flew open. "Some bucking pocket watch you are!" She vaulted over the table and galloped for the door.

Just a little too slow. The rudimentary gunpowder mining charges Lyra had placed around the inn went off, choking the saloon in a blizzard of splinters. At the back of the inn the moonshine and hard liquors spilled and caught light, creating a spreading lake of fire. Overheated liqueur barrels began to squirt at the seams, creating jets that instantly caught alight and spread the flames to the walls and ceiling. In a mere seconds most of the inn was a fiery inferno.
The alarmed sounds of the victims were immediate. The whole building was being cooked.

"Ten damn minutes, was that?! You brain-damaged griffin fucker, I should have let Velvet keep you!" Hacking and wheezing, Lyra crawled out under the smoke, across the mountain road, and sat herself with her back against the mountain face.
Screams of pain and terror emanated from the burning inn. A burning knight, tearing away parts of his armor, toppled out a hole in the shattered wall, where he lay still. A desperate pony on the higher floor, awoken by the blast in a state of undress, climbed through the window, dropped to the path, and galloped away.
The roar of the flame grew louder as rest of the inn's alcohol caught light, and sympathetic explosions from the sellsword's grenades or Vinyl's leftover mining charges blasted more of the lower floor out and made the whole building sag further. Fire-streaked smoke billowed endlessly from every door and window.

Then, Vinyl strolled out of the door. Her cloak had completely burned off, and her mane had been singed short in a few places, but she was otherwise unharmed. "You left your pipe, Lyra, ha ha! I saw it propelled into the innkeep's cranium by that last blast. I'll let you complete the joke."
A moment later the yellow stallion and one of the servants staggered out, supporting each other, getting only a few steps into clear air before they fell to their stomaches. Vinyl stood over the poor gasping stallion, wearing the most peculiar expression, before trotting over to Lyra.
"Talk about a job well done, right?" Vinyl said. "We didn't even have to fight the knights."

On the other side of the inn, a last sympathetic explosion: The flowing rivers of burning alcohol began to pour over into the valley below, and splashed over inn's waste and scat and urine that had been dumped off the side of the cliff for decades, and the ammonia and methane of the septic valley violently and combustibly decomposed. The whole mountain shook, and a few loose boulders rolled down onto the path.
The hellish inn creaked, then the entire section of the cliff it sat on sagged backwards, collapsing in a terrific landslide that fell hundreds of meters down into the valley. More and more of the mountain path fell away into oblivion, advancing and swallowing the closer wagons and carriages, until the erosion stopped just short of the yellow stallion and the servant.

The yellow sellsword rolled into a sitting position, carefully sliding off his broken glasses and revealing his green eyes. He tried to hide his grimace under his hooves. "I'm not actually a gambler. It was just a joke. Most things are. But I sure feel lucky now. How far to the nearest lottery office?" He laughed weakly. "I shoulda known better than think I could contend with psyco guild mares."

The youthful servant (the chestnut-furred lad) had been badly injured, and would have surely perished in the flames if the sellsword hadn't lent his shoulder. He stayed on his side, holding a hoof against a particularly nasty area of splinter-cuts. He seemed doomed to slowly bleed out. "Please, make it quick." He mumbled.

The sell sword rested a hoof on the shivering lad. "Woah, easy now, m'lord. One of these fine mares will surely fix you up after they work out their imminent spat."

Lyra trembling from slowly fading adrenaline, closed her eyes, listened to the whip of the wind over the valley.
It hadn't gone perfectly, but it had gone. Sitting there, blasted and singed, Lyra was feeling... unsatisfied. "It's over but I still feel like a slave. I am not free yet." She fussed with her mane, thinking. "I don't know what I expected. That I would suddenly find my own fate dropped into my hooves, as a gift from heaven? I don't know if I can go on justifying this life." She coughed out the last of the smoke in her lunges and got to her hooves. "Vinyl, do you think I deserve to be free?"

"Oh c'mon, you can't possibly be thinking of calling it quits now. This is the PEAK. This is everything a warrior strives for: A total victory won by cunning and strength. We just saved Octavia." Vinyl giggled, giddy. "We actually bloody did it. Like-" She twirled in place, the stopped to take in the twilight vista of the beautiful valley, marred by the burning landslide and the dozens of bodies buried underneath. "it was flawless. I've never been as satisfied with a hit I didn't do with my bare hooves." She stamped the ground, and fell into a fit of euphoric laughter, her eyes slowly turning to two stallions. "Although..."

The sellsword tried to smile. He was afraid. "Mis, Vinyl was it? Don't worry about us. This was, you know, a terrible accident. The latrine exploded and triggered the landslide. The death of the twin counts was a freak tragedy and nothing else. We never saw you."

"That'd be satisfactory. Usually. But-" Vinyl tapped her hoof on the youthful servant's lacerated leg, eliciting a groan. "This colt is your employer, isn't he. I have a fifty-fifty shot here... Glitterhoof, I presume?"

"Uh oh." Lyra's heart sank. She'd been bamboozled by the oldest trick in the book. The two gaudy ponies dressed as the counts had been nothing but decoys. And how couldn't they be? The ominous invitations to a meeting at the isolated inn (to discuss the Foal inherence no less) was obviously a trap, so each brother had taken identical precautions to protect himself from his brother's assassins. Their mistake was underestimating Lyra and Vinyl's acceptance of the massive collateral damage, where the sellsword and innkeep had shied away. "Good catch Vinyl. I wasn't paying enough attention. Which brother is it? I didn't see which 'servant' came with which entourage."

"You'll never know. N- Not even my seneschal knows me from my doubles." The servant said, his voice gaining volume with his resolve, even as he remained curled up in the dirt. "You can't risk it. Y- You can't risk it."

The sellsword was sweating, as terrified for his own life as the youth's. "Lord that won't work with these girls. They weren't sent to settle the inheritance battle. They came to kill both you and your brother."

The servant tried to turn to face the sellsword, but it was too difficult and painful. "... Then so be it. It's not mercy I'm begging for." He closer his eyes, tears in his eyes. "It was fated. I'll go out the same way as my father and brother."

"Young lord, don't say that. You can live. As long as you swear to feign death, to disappear into obscurity forever, then these mares will let you go!" The sellsword rushed out his words, hovering over the youth, trembling to comfort him with a touch but for the risk of aggravating his severe wounds. "There never was a curse. It was always murder, targeted assassinations like this one, by desperate ponies ordered by evil bastards. It's all for a throne and if you renounce that throne you can live! Please, you can live!"

"Finally you say something worthwhile, after all the irony is blasted away." Lyra huffed, hobbling to Vinyl's side. "Are you just guessing about the 'cursed' fate of the Brights, or did you play a part in it?" With the sellsword still hiding his face it was hard to gauge his reaction. "If you were part of the original hit squad that Twilight Velvet used to kill the Bright clan twenty years ago-"

Lyra let out a tired sigh. "I won't ask how you know, because I don't want to know. I... I..." She let out a shaky sigh. "I don't want to think about death anymore. I want to think about... about life. I CHOSE to think about life. I know it's selfish, because this is the absolute peak, like you said, of depraved slaughter. I CHOSE to postpone this change of heart until after I'd achieved everything a warrior can achieve."

The dying chestnut stallion let out a disdainful hiss. "You're not warriors, you're murderers, that's just that's fine. This isn't a warrior's world, because there's no wars. No chivalry, no honor, no heroic greatness to aspire towards." He lifted his hoof away from his wound. "Sit me up, merc."

"Sit me up." The count demanded again, and trepidatiously the sellsword obeyed. The count groaned as his blood-sticky flank was peeled from the dirty road. "Tell me, murderers, did Twilight Velvet really call this in?

"Ohh Aunty Velvet... I haven't seen her in years. They say she raised my brother and I, before Flux hoofed us over to a wetnurse. Damn. I can't believe I get taken out by Twilight Velvet." The count slumped further forward. "It figures. If I had a little more time..." He paused to try to wipe the bloody drool away. "I could've consolidated the duchy and smashed that upstart Twilight dynasty. I would've-" The sellsword caught him before he slumped any further. "Woulda killed every last one of them."

"Death begets death. A stupid inheritance battle isn't worth all these lives." Lyra sighed. "Why's Equestria like this? Is it because there's wretched sinners like us that sell murder? Or is it the profligate rulers like him that buy it?" She stoped the earth. "Damn it all! I'm just one mare, but I've made my choice. We can be our own ponies. I don't want to be a tool of the Stars, the government, or anypony else. I especially don't want to kill for them. I'm closed for buisness."
She scooped up the broken glasses and folded them into her cloak. "I'll be down the path at the rendezvous, if you chose to follow, Vinyl. We've earned Octavia's freedom. Let be the best ponies we can when she's released to us." She turned and trotted east.

Vinyl followed Lyra with her eyes for a while. "That mare. How'd she last? Tshh." She turned her attention back to the wounded stallions. "Lyra must be rubbing off on me because I feel kinda bad for you little lord. You simply didn't stand a chance against the Red-Eyes killer. Nevertheless your verve and lust for death is admirable. You deserve to survive today, so you can go on and seek revenge against Twilight Velvet. That's why I've been persuaded by this yellow twit. You can fake your death, go into hiding, and bide your time. Twilight Velvet will let her guard down, and you will strike back. You will reclaim your family lands and bring House Bright back from oblivion. You might even reconnect with me on your quest for revenge and we take Velvet down together! It's a tale for the storybooks, and I'll be a marvelous character. You're pretty lucky you met us, Lord Glitterhoof."

"Oh." Vinyl crouched next to the limp stallion. Indeed the youth had spoken his last.

It was a shame, really. All ponies had to die eventually. Vinyl enjoyed her role as an agent of death, and enjoyed being good at it. It was equally tragic that a spunky colt like Glitterhoof had to be snuffed out before he had done anything noteworthy to remember him by, and merciful that he had been saved from base miseries of living and the decrepitude of age. The world would never find out what a future with Gloryhoof and Glittermane still alive would look like, nor what a future with the innkeeper, the innkeeper's daughter, or any of the other dozen guests would look like. Playing with counterfactuals was boring, and no make-believe justified anypony's death. No, what justified their death was their mortality, and nothing more.

"Mission accomplished, for real this time." Vinyl grabbed the dead ponies leg and dragged him to the crumbling edge. "I'm glad I got to know my prey's face. Thanks for fessing up." She lobbed the body into the valley, to join his brother and comrades and the other innocent souls. "Rest in peace."

The sellsword stared out into the void. "Damn. Not only am I not getting paid, my client will think I caused all of this. I'm ruined."

"Welcome to hell with the rest of us. If it depresses you so bad, the charnel pit is just to your left and down five-hundred meters." Vinyl snorted.

The sellsword lamented. "What the hell is wrong with you guild mares? This gratuitous murder spree-"

"It was only your assumption we were guild mares, you podunk dumbass." Vinyl sassed back. "Are you going to step up?"

"That's the right choice. I have a good feeling about you, since you remind me of my old pal Pinkie in a lot of ways. That joke about getting trapped in a convent would have knocked her dead." Vinyl cleared her throat. "Anyhow, don't breath a word about this. Else, I will find you, and they'll call you Jane Doe during the autopsy. See ya."

The duke's regents had stood over the ruins of the inn for hours, dreading the letter they would have to pen.
As the news of the assassinations spread, the castle towns locked their gates and the bailiffs closed up the mountain fortresses even tighter. The whole of Foal went on lockdown as militiaponies watched the roads and knights combed the countryside. Everypony knew something terrible had happened despite the silence of the regents, and the unicorn elders held the silent suspicion that the curse had finally caught up to the twin Bright boys who'd carried the promise of the future.
Was House Bright really doomed to extinction? Surely Foaly Flux could pull it together to find one of his brothers' bastards and legitimize them as heir, or go make an heir of his own. Even recalling Rosen Bright from his exile in Griffany was preferable to an empty throne. Without a Bright, what would become of Foal? Was the oldest unicorn realm in Equestria going to pass into the hooves of some upstart cadet branch, a rival dynasty, or be annexed to the princess's demesne?
But maybe after two decades of neglect, where Duke Foaly Flux had flittered away his life in his swanky Castle Magoria in Canterlot, it was time for new blood. All things had to come to an end, lives yes, and even dynasties. So the regents began to plot and eye each other with suspicion, suspecting that one of their number would usurp the Duchy of Foal away from the Brights. They argued in hushed tones over whether the letter of condolence should be sent at all, or if they should arrange a grand pantomime of the dead brothers' survival. No consensus was reached, and the decision put off, yet the letter was taken by a secretary and posted by accident.

"Are you out of your fucking mind?" Rain Gnash blurted out. "Giving your lands to Twilight Sparkle and Shining Armor... Do you have any idea how much power you're giving her?" She pointed past Flux, to Twilight Velvet. "To a rank opportunist, and borderline traitor?!"

"I like you just fine when you're a viscountess's regent. I don't think I'd like you when you're mother-regent to a duchy, four counties, and two baronies." Gnash shot back. "You've gotten far being a savvy Canterlot wheeler-dealer. Very respectable job you've done to be here talking to us. But you don't deserve to be one of the most powerful ponies in Equestria."

"My lady admiral calm down. I am not being offered, nor do I desire, any endowment from my dear friend Foaly." Velvet said. "This is my son's and my daughter's benefit."

Sharphoof Lightdowser wasn't pleased either. "Firstly, Foaly, my deepest condolences for your departed nephews. Now Lady Velvet, while I do not share Rain's vehemence, there is much to critique about this. The First Student and an Imperial Knight, inheriting landed noble titles, will either have to relinquish their imperial posts to govern their new land directly, or give it to a regent. I envision you muscling into the regency even if it is not offered to you, Lady Velvet, as powerful parents have done in the past."

"You talk like I'm already dead." Foaly Flux barked, irritated. "Am I?!" She thumped his breast with a hoof. "If I keel over tomorrow, then maybe your rude criticisms of my friend Velvet would have merit. Maybe smart ponies like her shouldn't have so much power, but then again maybe dumb ponies shouldn't have power either yet here I am." He sighed. "Times like these remind you death lurks around every corner, but by the gods I hold out vain vain hope that I have more time on this earth. If I live a little longer, like my health suggests I should, then everything changes doesn't it? Twilight Sparkle and Shining Armor get a bit older and wiser, and graduate out of imperial service. I know them brilliant, virtuous, and active young ponies. They can rise to the challenge of ruling any title I leave for them. Trust me that I will guide them to developing into worthy successors to the Bright legacy. Trust me."

That heartfelt declaration gave Lightdowser and Gnash pause. Gnash tapped her hoof, collecting her thoughts, while Lightdowser stared at the back of her head waiting to see her reaction.
"If you care about the foals so much then adopt them and pull them out of their imperial duties immediately. Give them Glorymane and Glitterhoof's counties to train on." Rain Gnash suggested.

"Twilie and Shiny deserve to pace their own way while they are yet unburdened by leadership. Giving the twins the marcher counties ruined their lives, and is one of my greatest regrets." Flux said. "Are you going to ask me to repeat past mistakes? You ponies are being hysterically paranoid about the capabilities and willingness of my dear Velvet to do harm, and it has made you say foolish things. Frankly I don't appreciate it. I did not ask you for your opinion. I respect you all as peers, but won't tolerate meddling in Bright family affairs, nor Foal ducal affairs. This is my choice."

Lightdowser shook his head. "You are asking us to guarantee the inheritance. Of course we would have something to say about that. I will not put my name to an inheritance contract I don't believe in."

"You don't believe in me? Or you don't believe in Twilight Sparkle and Shining Armor?" Flux countered.

Clearly Duke Flux was intent on this. "Foaly, I think you need more time to think. Have your nephews even received funerals? The passion of grief is wearing on me; For you, it must be all-consuming." Lightdowser said. "This tragedy and the new heirs together represent a huge shift in Equestrian politics. Twilight Velvet's children will be centers of power even before they inherit, just like the twins were."

Foaly Flux seemed unimpressed by the obviousness of Lightdowser's words. "Said even as you position yourself to usurp the viziership? I don't believe your objections are on a solid footing and so will not sustain them. Good days and bad days, I have been agonizing over this inheritance. I have been thinking things over very deliberately, for a very long time." He paused, cracking a smile, a conciliatory signal. "There has to be something I can offer that will satisfy you gentleponies. If you can't be convinced, then you can be incentivized. Would you prefer that my holdings go inviolate to only one heir? Or would it mollify you if we keep the inheritance a secret between us, and us alone?"

A secret inheritance? The assembled ponies hesitated, trying to run the mental math on the implications of such a thing. Could some advantage be gained from it?

Velvet watched them with silent smugness. They were very unlucky Prosser had passed out, or he would have blown the whistle on the whole arrangement, and accused her of the twins' murder as well- Rain Gnash seemed to be suspecting it already.

It was not just Rain Gnash thinking it though. Lightdowser was also suspecting her, though not of his own accord. Iillor's comment rung in his head, that Twilight Velvet had already triumphed and gotten everything she strived for. Was the Duchy of Foal her goal? If so it did not appear like she had a signal victory, when Flux seemed to think the inheritance could be challenged. Or, was the Foal inheritance a smokescreen for something greater and more sinister? Twilight Velvet clearly had potential for diabolical behavior, considering her accord with Iillor, so to what heights did her ambition soar?
"No, Lord Flux, you needn't diminish yourself by offering to humiliate yourself or your duchy. The inheritance is your choice, and by feudal right not even the princess can interfere. Foal and Unicornia, your lands and mine, were once enemies in those barbarous days of pre-alicorn warlordism. The empire civilized us, made us our dynasties friends, to the benefit of our ponies and all unicornkind." He turned to his knight and drew her sword out of her scabbard, dipping its tip to Foaly Flux's hoof and bowing his head. "I vow to support Twilight Sparkle and Shining Armor's claim to your realm, without condition or umbrage."

Foaly returned the bow. "That is extraordinarily kindly said, Lord Lightdowser. Thank you."

"I'm not so sure unicornkind will celebrate along with you, but what do I know." Rain Gnash grumbled. "I'm not going to be pressured into signing anything by either of you. My condition... is the princess's approval. Explicit approval."

"Come now, if Princess Cadenza had any objections she surely would have shared them." Velvet countered.

"I set my conditions. No dancing around them now." Rain Gnash said, but it seemed she was coasting on contrarianism rather than having a well formulated argument. Perhaps she realized that she couldn't sustain her objections forever, so she began fidgeting. "Despite this little disagreement we are still allies, so don't worry too much about my passionate way of talking. It'll only get crankier as I get more tired, so I think I'll take my leave. I will be at my airship if you need anything." She turned and jaunted up the stairwell without another word, before anypony could stop her.

Fleetfoot lingered for a few minutes. She eyed the scorchmark on the floor, then up to Velvet. "Captain Spitfire said you ponies were trouble."

"Why are you telling me? Am I somepony you should confide in? I'm troubled you waited for your officers to leave to gossip with your 'ally'." Velvet chuckled. "I don't think you understood what Spitfire meant by half. Your Admiral does, which is why I suspect she's running off to draw out a plan of assault against this castle, just in case. Being decisive is admirable, but being brash is not. Let the Admiral know I'll treat Spitfire well, so there can be some accommodate between us." She winked.

Fleetfoot was too embarrassed to protest being saddled with the task of messenger, so she bowed and chased her admiral up the stairs.

"That's twice now you've voiced suspicion that the Admiral will attack you." Lightdowser said.

Flux glanced over his shoulder at her. "Twilight you are incorrigible. Give me time alone with the duke to work out the details of our commitment. Your clever mouth may yet torpedo my inheritance plans." He said, half-playful half-serious.

"As you wish." Velvet curtsied, as if she were still his courtier, and strolled past Lightdowser to the stairs. She hooked a hoof around Lightdowser's knight and dragger her along. "Let's let the dukes talk then, shall we?"
The mares descended.

"You're not being coerced or compelled in any way, right Flux?" Lightdowser asked.

Foaly Flux let out a belly laugh. "Fuck off." He dragged a table with stationary between them. "Do you love your son? Well of course you do, despite the rumors otherwise. I loved my nephews the same way despite them acting like entitled little bastards the last few years. And I also love my cousin's kids, without reservation or qualification. I wish the world for them and I'd do anything to see them prosper, when the rest of the Bright clan hasn't. It keeps me going to imagine them living happy lives in a happy future. If their joy is my legacy, I can bear uncountable suffering (not that I've had a choice)." He unrolled a blank parchment. "Please, jot out a basic commitment you're making to me. I'll work out the details with a lawyer and bring you something more final to sign."

I, Sharphoof Lightdowser, Duke of Unicornia, do here pledge to Foaly Flux, Lord Bright, Duke of Foal and Count Palatine of Magoria that

Lightdowser set the quill down.
"What would it mean if Twilight Velvet got everything she wished for?"

Flux's breath hitched at the word 'wish' as he realized what Lightdowser was asking. "How should I know. I can only speak for all the self-indulgent extravagances I'd fill my world with if anypony gave me something as fantastical as a wish. I could ask you the same thing, couldn't I."

Lightdowser expected it would be flipped around on him, so he played along to see if it opened Flux up. "I can not rightly say what I want. Ponies have accused me of being obsessed with my legacy but I don't think that's true. I hope you will see me being genuine when I say that I want the best for Equestria."

Flux closed his eyes, thinking. "It's all a bit childish, isn't it. I regret my question turning into this thought exercise." He thought for a few more moments. "I would wish that everything would become just the way I wanted it, or that I would be given the power to make it thus."

"That seemed tautological to the very idea of a wish. Can't you come up with more?" Flux scolded.

"No, I can not." Lightdowser sighed, exaggerating his exasperation. He raised the quill again.

...that I will support his chosen heirs, Lady Twilight Sparkle and Lord Shining Armor, both of Twilight-Bright, in their claims to his properties and fiefs after his perishing. This support will be material and rhetorical, to the extent which secures the heirs' claims, within what Unicornia and its duke can reasonably supply. So signed.

"Glad for it, friend Flux." Lightdowser nodded. "I met Shining Armor but I will need to gauge Twilight Sparkle eventually."

"Hop in your airship and fly to little Ponyville then." Flux joked, but his smile was not quite the good-natured smile he usually bore, but Velvet's twisted half-ironic grin.

A cold northerly wind whipping over the sky dock. Celestia moved unbothered, while the attempted procession of knights and functionaries struggled, trying to keep their papers, banners, and lanterns from being blown out of their hooves.

"My princess, It's dangerous to launch like this. The point of sail is not favorable." One of the airship pilots, holding down his cap with a hoof while also trying to keep her pace, explained.

Did something change the air pressures to keep the wind unsuitable, Celestia wondered. "We leave tonight. Where is my ship berthed?" Not waiting for an answer she jumped and spread her wings- large and powerful, those wings caught the wind, and she let it carry her a dozen meters up to where she could see the whole docklands. She spied the royal airship airship in one of the long-term berths, where a few panicked crew and marines were inspecting the neglected vessel's readiness.
Hovering in the wind lift, Celestia conjured up her magic and grabbed the airship. She heaved it, envelope and gondola, up and out of its berth, snapping the moorings and sending the crew flat onto the deck. Now suffering the wind, the mighty airship twisted and shook in Celestia's grasp, but by focus and power her magic dragged the vessel along. She then lowered it into place at last staith at the end of the skydock, where the moorings retied themselves onto the dock cleats.

Satisfied, Celestia folded her wings and slammed back onto the dock, sending a a small cloud of splinters. "Must I bring you a crane as well? We leave tonight. We MUST leave tonight." She ordered. "Do not over-supply. We can take the Katabatic on a run all the way to Ponyville."

"Ponyville, south-by-southwest, where the Everfree touches the Dneighper. Tell the captain I want every stitch of sail up and all I want hooves on deck. If we don't reach Ponyville before daylight comes the Sun will damn you all. All haste!"

Velvet led Lightdowser's knight down to Castle Magoria's well appointed kitchen. The servants' dismissal had left the area a bit messy, with bits of fruit and dough left around the stations. "His lordship has a bit of a sweet tooth. There's sure to be some of the Maredian candy he brings out at parties, as long as we look in the right place." Velvet said.

"If you think it's okay, m'lady." The knight nodded. "The pantry I'd wager." She took a few steps toward the passage to the pantry, then stopped. "You're not going to lock me in there, are you?"

Velvet snorted. "Am I going to be able to contain you with a door?" Her horn sparkled alive with cyan magic. "Or, do I even need a door to contain you?"

The knight eyed Velvet wearily. "I'm unarmed. The lord duke still has my sword. If you think I'm an agent or a guild mare, forget it. I'm not here to hurt anypony."

"If that's true then consider me utterly bamboozled. What are you up to, Illustrious Valor?" Velvet shook her head. "You must think you're so cute, showing up without so much as a word. Did you tag along with Cadence?"

"Like hell I do. You can altar your appearance but your stride and the way you tilt your head while listening is unmistakable to somepony who's paying attention." Velvet said. "I'm almost insulted. Actually, I am a little insulted. You thought I wouldn't notice?" She sighed and released her magic. "Are you actually going to let me push you around to keep your cover? What are you up to, Illustrious Valor?"

"The buisness with Phyte is over (congrats by the way), so it's doubtful we have anything to offer one another. I was expecting you to disappear into the shadows for a few years. You are a Nightmare after all." Velvet said. "Imagine my dismay at seeing you show right back, but pretending to be a stranger. Don't I at least deserve a goodbye and a hoofshake before you jump to my competition. You didn't say goodbye to Octavia either."

With a sigh, Iillor gingerly took off her helmet. Her fur rippled, changing her into the familiar black-furred mare Velvet was familiar with. "Fine, fine. Quit bitching, m'lady." Iillor said. "I pissed off the alicorn empress and got my ass kicked. I thought that's a perfect bow on the story of Illustrious Valor: I did everything I needed to do, advanced your's and Shining Armor's dreams, and was punished by the alicorn for it. It's a nice little poem, beautifully tragic and sure to delight the Moon."

"I see." Velvet hummed. "I can see what you're going for. But usually, when a pony wants to start fresh, they go to a new country or at least a new town: Lyra, Octavia, and Scratch are probably halfway to Manehattan to catch the first ship to Griffany, for example. But you-" She wagger her hoof disapprovingly. "You decided to latch on to the first dumbass dreamer that you laid eyes on? Sharphoof LIghtdowser?? Come on, you can do better than Sharphoof Lightdowser. That's not starting fresh. That's returning to the scene of the crime. Though, we already knew you can't help yourself in that regard, heh heh."

"I'm not going to pretend trouncing Phyte was some big favor to you, Lady Velvet, but a smidge more appreciation would be nice. You can call it what you will, but I thought you'd be touched to see me." Iillor groused. "And frankly, I see potential in Lightdowser. I can steer him right. I'll keep him safe from you and visa-versa."

Clearly, Iillor was going to have to say something to forestall the tirade the lady was formulating. "Listen, I think you'd benefit from letting me have my fun. You act really aloof of Heaven, but you're going to want friends in high places once you start drawing more attention to yourself. Doubt the Sun will chip in a good word."

"If Heaven comes knocking, I'm not asking your ilk for help; Not the Moon, and especially not you." Velvet sneered.

Iillor shrugged. "That's your loss I guess; The Moon is on the come-up. Actually though, I was suggesting something more diplomatic. Nopony could accuse Lightdowser of being your hack, so if he'd be a great character witness. He's vacuously dogmatic, but he can be trained into something more useful, mark my words."

It didn't seem like Velvet was buying it. "Useful?! Consider this from MY perspective. You leach off me, use my help to dispose of Phyte, then run off... apparently to give my dream to a more pliable pony. It's as though you're trying to replace me."

"Replace you?" Iillor laughed. She tapped the side of her head, and a streak of purple raced down her mane before returning to black. "It's not as complicated as all that. I'm just a silly mare controlled by her whims and lusts. Haven't I done right by you? Haven't I done right by Shining?"

"You have, absolutely. I'm worried to death that you're going to do right by Lightdowser. If you're actually committed to fixing him, there's a decent chance you and I end up opposed, and therefore hostile." Velvet asked. "Fighting you wouldn't go perfectly for me, Mis Valor. Not by a long shot. But you know me to be a crafty and resourceful mare. If I leave this room believing you're my enemy, every hooffall is going to mark a million new thoughts racing through my head about the strategy and tools I could bring to bear against you. So if it comes to a contest I'll probably have to make some tough choices, and make a lot of sacrifices, but it will end in your defeat, and Lightdowser's destruction."

"Then I'd better not let you get out that door thinking I'm your enemy." Iillor cracked a grin.
The air of tension did not last long. Iillor stood up and popped her helmet back on. "I've got to get back to my duke. It's never soon enough to start breaking him of the Celestiaan's tutelage, and nudging him to a more wholesome course." She trotted to the exit. "No need for drawn out goodbyes if we're going to be seeing more of each other. Congrats on your victories, Twilight Velvet, and as always stay safe."

Velvet followed Iillor with her eyes until she was out of the kitchen. Was the Nightmare being totally honest? Buck no, obviously, are you stupid? But too-clever villains always had to sprinkle in a bit of truth somewhere amongst the lies. "Damn, I forgot to ask about Shale's cursed dagger. Next time, if there is one." She cleared her throat. "Back to the world of make-believe."
She levitated up one of the apples laying around the kitchen and left with it. She didn't see any profit in following Iillor any more, so she left the keep into the cool night air. She glared at the moon with faux irritation. "Come pick up your bratty nightmare. She's throwing around your name." Of course the moon did not answer so Velvet took a bite of the apple and started a stroll around the courtyard.

Atop the inner curtain wall, the older enceinte of the original Castle Magoria design, Cadence and Spitfire watched Velvet's ambling.

"If my life is in danger, that mare is the cause." Cadence said softly.
For the whirlwind of confusion and shock that Cadence had subjected herself to for the last several hours, she felt strangely pleasant inside. A warm sort of peace had settled in her belly- She was not safer, more secure, or any more in command of her own life that earlier. Still she felt she could see the beast charging her down now, where before it was just vague- Now that she knew the terrain, she wouldn't be trapped on one path... right?

Spitfire, for her part, had intended to fly back to the airship; Her exhausted body had other ideas. So she'd perched on the enceinte with the excuse that she was just looking after the princess, pretending to herself a few minutes of sitting would give her the energy to make it back to the docks. It wouldn't. The poor pegasus was now completely fried. The soreness of the battle in the guild hall had grown, she hadn't eaten anything all day, she needed sleep, and the whirlwind of overwhelming emotion had all but lobotomized her. She could barely register what the princess was saying and certainly didn't answer, slouching more and more as she fell asleep upright like a proper soldier.

"I shouldn't let myself believe that a mortal mare, no matter how talented, could pose a danger to my life. It took years of Celestia's discipline to unlearn the terrors I had as an orphan filly back in my Riverpony villiage, to refine me from a pony who had to relate to ponies, into an alicorn who was sovereign over ponies: My body is absolutely sacrosanct, inviolable, and eternal. Celestia promised I never had to fear pony aggression, pony paranoia, pony lusts, or pony abuse. All those ills were in MY power to inflict on THEM.
"But I do believe. If a creature like Octavia could diagnose how weak I am after a short time talking, Twilight Velvet would have known for decades. I am weak. I am just... weak. I..."

There was no denying it. Every attempt Cadence made to take charge of her own life had failed. Her time at the university had terminated in scandal because she couldn't say no to a pushy lover-boy. She'd let Celestia coop her up in Canterlot Castle for years and years. She'd let Hauseway and Shining shutter her court. Just that day she'd let Celestia blow off her concerns and she'd let the Ulthar cat get away unimpeeded. Cadence's cheeks burned with embarrassment to think that even Velvet's damn maid had maneuvered her into delivering Octavia to her 'execution'.

"I'm not fit to be anybody's ruler. I tell myself I'm being nice, and I can afford to yield my desire for the citizenry I love, but I'm just a pushover." Cadence sighed. "Not going to tell me I'm wrong, Captain Spitfire?" She asked, but the pegasus did little more than mumble a bit at the stimulus of hearing her name. "If Shining were here he would have undeserved praise to repair my ego. He'd try to show me how all my faults are actually strengths in disguise." Cadence huffed. "Has my problem in life been that I love and admire placid ponies like him, rather than ruthless ponies like Twilight Velvet?"

Even Cadence's introspective musings were cowardly when shared with a mare that was unfit to remember or commentate on them. All Cadence was doing, she knew, was venting- Venting about her own powerlessness when that powerlessness was her choice. But how did she make a different choice?

"Left to myself, this is how I am: A mopey demigodess, constantly regretting my last choice." Cadence continued. "I know I can be better, step up to the moment, act how I'm needed, like how the ponies expect from me. Because I've done it before... but scorn is all I get in return... and I can bear through scorn for a while, but then I fold back up. I'm just so pathetic."

Cadence closed her eyes. Isolated, painfully alone... her heart screamed out! She needed somepony to help her work through her feelings, and give her even a little bit of validation. But there was nopony, nopony at all, to be there for her.
Where was Shining Armor? Why had fate conspired to make him disappear when she needed him most?! If Shining was there, he would try to comfort her. It would probably be awkward, and a bit silly, but his compassion and earnestness was matched only by his steadfastness.
Wherever he was, Cadence hoped Shining Armor was doing alright.

Cadence turned to Spitfire, directly addressing the pegasus. "Captain. You battled alongside Sir Shining Armor, against the Star. Did Sir Armor conduct himself well?"

Spitfire was fully slumped over, passed out, little shivers passing through her every so often.

A good pony would let that beaten and exhausted pegasus sleep. A good pony would have seen the vulnerable mare and taken steps to get her into a better position. Candace hovered a hoof over Spitfire's shoulder, but she wasn't sure why.
"I'm your princess, Spitfire." She whispered, inaudible even to herself. Then louder, "I'm owed your unceasing fealty, or at the least your attention... and you are delinquent."
She let her outstretched hoof rest on Spitfire's shoulder.

I'm these ponies' god aren't I, Cadence thought. Yet she only had one devotee. Ponykind did not respect her. Even the conspiracy back in the keep fawned on her just enough to get her approval. The stature of her rank and heritage was thought of like any barony or dukedom, not something as divine as Celestia's.
Ponies were a herd species, and respect in their societies was earned in diverse ways. As a pony, Amore Cadenza had been less than dirt, but she wasn't a pony any longer. She was intrinsically above them. And yet...

"I'm the same creature inside, aren't I. I'm still the pauper filly that hides her face, in case the wrong pony thinks it's too beautiful to belong to such a wretched girl. It's no wonder I'm despised by a species like yours: I act just like the most disposable of your ilk. I'm just weak." Cadence posed to Spitfire. She sighed. "But I can be better."
Cadence stood up, the outstretched hoof hoof under Spitfire's shoulder and pulling the pegasus up with her.
"Wake up, Captain Spitfire. Your princess is addressing you."

"Pony." Cadence. "YOUR PRINCESS IS ADDRESSING YOU."
Little sparks lanced out of from Cadence's horn. Simultaneous shocks all along her body made Spitfire's body convulse and a hundred nerves all screaming at once blasted her awake. Her eyes flew open and settled on Cadence, the throbbing pinkish magic lighting the alicorn's face in a ghoulish chiaroscuro.
"Tell me how Shining Armor did against the Star!"

Though her eyes were open Spitfire wasn't seeing Cadence's visage- The burning cavern, the spindly for of Phyte, and the helpless stallion in her grasp. 'STAR STAR STAR SHINING SHINING SHINING' rung in her head.
Spitfire tried to scream but only released a wheeze. She tried to pull away but Cadence's hoof held her in place. Pegasus instinct took over, and she batted at Cadence's head with a wing. Surprised, Cadence released Spitfire, who fell against the crenelations.

Cadence just stood there are watched Spitfire hyperventilate for a few minutes. She looked at her hoof, with which she had restrained Spitfire: She had used her strength to control a pony, and used force to make that pony do what she wanted, if fleetingly. A weakling couldn't do that.
"There will be a time that ponies like you don't just sluggishly stand up when I enter a room, but you bow your nose to the stone." Cadence tapped her hoof on the cold castle masonry. "You will respect me like you respect Celestia. You will worship me like you worship Celestia. We don't get a say in that." She sighed, forlorn.
What would Shining think, Cadence wondered.

Twilight Velvet called up from the courtyard. "I couldn't disagree more! You're fated to anything, Princess Cadence, and free will exists. Because of that, it's not a given ponies will worship you. You have to be truly awesome, truly terrifying, or wickedly clever to get ponies' worship. Just being bossy with no upside will make ponies think you're a villain."

How long had Velvet been watching? Didn't matter. "Unconditional love and mercy has ruined my life, Lady Velvet. I was silly and didn't understand what alicorn tutelage actually meant: Your species is immature, and a little bit spoiled. I can't be a mercy for the nation if I just get abused like I have."

"We're the immature ones? Cadenza dear, you're not force majeure, you're petit-déjeuner." Velvet lectured. "Open a history book, Cadence. The first sun princess tried to unite Equestria under a classical tyranny, but pony resistance was intractable; The empire and its institutions was a compromise. Alicorn rule would mediated through a nobility and a bureaucracy. The alicorns have to speak our language and not the other way around. You were made to look like us. This all points to the pragmatism of your existance: You were made to rule how ponies like, not how heaven would prefer."

The unexpected criticism shook Cadence our of her brooding mood somewhat, and she didn't have any good answer prepared. She felt a bit disappointed she couldn't think on her hooves as well against a serious opponent as she had a sleeping mare.
"That's one way to interpret scripture." Cadence sniped. She couldn't totally disagree with what Velvet had said, though she wasn't sure what it implied.

"Scipture? Smart ponies and alicorns can interpret dogma to mean almost anything they want, which is why I have never concerned myself with it. The religious justifications for alicorn rule are a shibboleth, a narrative by decedent elites to feel better about themselves. I respect the use of faith to command ponies, but personally I find the political economy of alicorn rule to be much more interesting." Velvet said. "The reality of rulership is often just bullying. It doesn't elicit worship, but it earns the next best thing: Obedience. You're on the right path to understanding that."

A guilty pang shot through Cadence as she resisted the urge to break the staring contest to make sure Spitfire was okay. She wasn't a bully! She just had to unlearn her own weakness. Maybe Velvet was trying to belittle her, attempting to talk over her head- Cadence was not in a position to discuss remotely consider ruling an empire, when she was barely resolved to rule herself.
"Lady Velvet... I just want respect. You are my friend's mother, and we've shared years of amiable acquaintance, but I'm not just another pony and shouldn't be treated like one. With how much I've been infantilized and belittled you could forget I was I was designed to reign over you mortals. I want to feel pride in what I am. I might be a far cry from the pure society of gods in Heaven, but I'm closer than you. I'll accept my limitations because my destiny wasn't to be your tyrant, rather I'm to be your mercy."

Those words sparked that deadly smile, and Velvet laughed before she spoke. "You'll accept your limitations because the alicorn is imperfect." She strode forward, levitating herself up to the level of the enceinte. She briefly checked on Spitfire: The pegasus was alert but non-verbal, breathing hard between clenched teeth. "This is OUR planet, Cadence. Millions of years of evolution gave US the sapience and magic to rule this planet. The imperial compromise bought the alicorns some time, and let Celestia squat in Canterlot unmolested by mortals or other divinities. But time's up. Rent is due." Velvet cackled. "I won't beat around the bush, Cadence. Before Hauseway shut down your court, I was making plans of my own. Violent plans. Thankfully you were a good pony and didn't put up a fight."

Cadence felt no satisfaction in her suspicions being confirmed, and she awaited a laugh or interruption that would mark the whole confession out as a joke. It was all so ludicrous, like a theatrical parody of an alicorn-hating heretic.

"You've had your ups and downs. Honestly, I like you better when you're down- One less thing to worry about. While you act pathetic, an alicorn's power is no joke, so it's better that you voluntarily stay out of the way." Velvet said. "I'm a humble mare and I have nothing on my side but a pedigree and mad luck. I don't enjoy trying to track the movement and disposition of the Equestrian power players, because while I love ponykind I mostly hate ponies. I do it anyway, because it's how my mother and her mother before her survived, and going back to my lineage's roots in Griffany. That's to say, don't take it personally that I made a contingency to destroy you." She shook her head. "By most ponies' morality, that makes me bad, anti-social, and at the very least very rude. I get it. I used to think the same way. But I got mugged by reality: The social structures that are supposed to keep ponies polite and safe are atrophied, and neither the alicorn nor my fellow pony can protect me."

Cadence sensed the hypocrisy. "Lady Velvet, you're not being evil... You're being CRAZY. Your kind of scheming is exactly the kind of thing that makes the world worse and less safe. You're trying to make that same degraded world you use as an excuse." She ground her teeth. "We won't have lunar anarchy unless mares like you create it!"

"I can't stop the destruction of the alicorn order even if I wanted to. A period of anarchy is unavoidable at this point, Celestia's happy little patrimony, bastard of her late misrule. You should prepare for it rather than fantasizing about your privileges in the ancien regime." Velvet scoffed. "The future of ponykind will be decided after the end of the alicorns, but conflicting visions will resort to the supremacy of arms and so deepen the anarchy. If there's a victor, like for example yours truly, then ponykind will have lasting peace." She smiled. "Then I won't have to make plots and contingencies for murder anymore. The promised reward for trials and tribulations is harmony, a society of trust among ponies is established on the firm ground of mutual respect and common prosperity."

"How is this real? How is this a conversation I'm having with you?" Cadence muttered. "Do you think a hypothetical utopian fantasy where you're in charge is worth the price? The Empire of Equestria is the ponies' commonwealth, their stability, their faith, and their protection! No sane pony would throw the empire away because of a thought experiment that you pretend will be better for them. Lady Velvet I know you're smart enough to know how hollow your own words are. Telling me this... Is it madness or a cruel joke?!" She tilted her head away, saddened and almost crying. "Velvet... you would want to kill me for that fantasy?"

Velvet didn't seem moved by Cadence's emotion. "I don't want to kill you for anything. I don't want anything that a normal mare, a mother, would want. I deal with facts, chance, and contingency. Equestria is FINISHED. My wants don't factor into that inevitability one way or another." She said harshly. "I'm dealing with reality as it is. You should do the same. Get it through your head!"

The sudden yell jolted Cadence. She sat silently, trying to interpret the vicious confession and absorb what it meant.
Twilight Velvet didn't care about Cadence living, and even weighed the value of killing her. Why would anypony ever ever admit such a thing? Ponies had been throne in Canterlot Castle's dungeon for less on grounds of heresy. But Velvet especially was putting her whole family in danger! Why? WHY? Why would Velvet wishcast her revolutionary fantasy just to hurt her feelings?
"If everything you said is what you really believe, then I'm very saddened. I think you're pretending or lying to yourself."
The other much for terrifying possibility is that Velvet meant every word.

Velvet shrugged and let out a little frustrated sigh. "Cadence dear, surely you've seen the sate Celestia is in. What do you think that portends?"

Uh oh. "I-" Cadence hesitated. "A-Are you implying something about the princess's health? Quit saying such terrible things to me, please."

"Or you'll punish me? Or report me? No, I will say whatever I want." Velvet said.

Velvet nodded in appreciation of the simple question. "Like anypony I'm doing what I think is best. I'm not crazy you know. I have been economizing as best I can, only sacrificing ponies when it significantly benefits me. They may be bothersome, venal, creatures, but ponies are my kind, my kin. They were meant for more than servitude to the alicorns. I, Twilight Velvet, was meant for more. I will brook no master nor souveraine above me, not even her god. I think I am better than your kind, Cadence. I intend to prove it."

Cadence felt her hoof rise, to hover right over Velvet's head. She could murder the mare. She had been so tempted thinking about ridding the world of Octavia, to eradicate a killer, a mercy for the whole of ponykind. But surely Velvet was not the same, right?
Cadence's hoof tingled, but she couldn't move it anymore, to touch or to pull away.
"The cognoscenti of the dreamscape warned me."

Velvet's smug demeanor faltered. "Really? Wow!" She laughed in disbelief. "That... makes me very glad." She leaned into Cadence's hoof and pushed into a mutual hug. "Cadence I'm sorry if what I said upset you. You're a sweet girl despite being an alicorn. If only my son had met you when you were still a pegasus, but of course it doesn't work that way." She kissed Cadence on the cheek and backed away. "I was rough with you. Honestly I... I've been so in my head about what you are who what you represent, that I let it ruin what should be a meaningful moment, and blinded me to seeing face-to-face the mare you really are."

What the buck was going on? Cadence was getting whiplash from the churn of emotion she felt. "Did you mean what you said."

Velvet shrugged with a guilty little smile. "For legal purposes, I was joking. Between friends, I meant it."

The secret was out. Twilight Velvet wanted to overthrow the alicorns. What astonishing hubris, what unparalleled ambition, to not only harbor such thoughts, not just to put her plans into motion, but to BRAG to an alicorn about it.
There had to be a hundred capital offenses Velvet had admitted to within the last five minutes. She was brazenly flouting the fundamental laws of the the empire and its dogmas.
"Lady Velvet, I'm not a good enough friend for you to tell me all those things and expect it to remain a secret. I have the authority to punish you."

"Oh yeah? Going to spank me yourself? Or thinking of tattling to one of the nobles or to Celestia herself?" Velvet clucked her tongue. "Come on, I thought we were past this. I was never worried about the alicorns finding out. When I was just starting the ponies were my biggest danger. When I was on solid footing the Star Phyte was my biggest danger. With Phyte out of the way I'm just competing against the clock."

Cadence took a step back.
"C- Captain Spitfire." Why was her voice trembling? She was a dozen times stronger than the middle-aged mare. "Put Twilight Velvet under arrest."

"Dame Spitfire you've had a difficult day, for which I'm partially to blame. It's alright to sit this one out and let the junior princess fight her own war." Velvet said. "You have an important choice to make, Cadence, the most important one in your life."
Velvet jumped up onto the wall embrasure, then onto the merlon, so she was physically higher and looking down on Cadence. The moonlight on her seemed to intensify, signaling her out against the deep dark space of the night sky behind her.
"There's hope for you, girl. Like all ponies you've had the unenviable burden of trying to discover yourself as a person while suffering under the crushing weight of expectations: Pony society, imperial rule, and divine hierarchy impose themselves on us before we're even old enough to recognize ourselves in the mirror. You had it particularly hard, and I'm proud of the mare you've become. You can be a decent mare.
"Or, you can throw it all away."

Velvet nodded. "There it is again. Recognize it, princess?" More bells joined, a goring chorus. "The alarmed pleas of a forsaken species, trying to reach the ears of their gods, but also warning each other of the reckoning they are do if their prayers are actually heard. There's no good comparison to any other species, but I'd like for you to think of it like the squeak of squirrels while a hawk is passing overhead.
"They're not for you, Cadence. They're not for the moon either. Ponykind has a vestigial race memory of their divine conqueror a thousand years gone, and when they pray they pray to the alicorn empress who looks the part."

It was time. THE time. Cadence had doubted and been proven wrong.
"Celestia is leaving." She uttered.

"Lo!" Velvet pointed out, away from the city, away from the plateau, toward the deep dark skies and the sleeping valley under it. "If you reject ponykind, and crawl back to the destiny that 'ruined your life', that is your direction. If you want to throw away your potential and embrace your destiny as a slave to your alicorn gods, that is your direction! There flies Celesti-aaaaaaaaaaaa!"
Velvet's words became a startled shriek, as she toppled backwards off the merlon, into the space between the enceinte and the star bastions.

Spitfire, who'd pushed Velvet, leaned over the wall to spy where the unicorn had landed. "Partially to blame? PARTIALLY TO BLAME?! You're entirely to blame you damn witch!" Spitfire growled. "You're such a weasel, Lady Velvet, acting detached from consequences of your actions, as though you're not accountable for anything. You talk like your an agent of history but you're just greedy pyscho! I oughta knock you out!"

Cadence's eyes were still on the dark skies where Velvet had pointed, the rolling chorus of bells growing as more and more of Canterlot took up the alarm. It was really happening.
Empress Celestia, princess of the sun, ruler of Equestria, was abandoning ponykind.

"And I..." Cadence mouthed.
Celestia, oh Celestia.
Cadence pilled Spitfire from the edge with her magic. "I rescind my arrest order. Make sure Lady Velvet is okay. If I die, that order is permanent. Understood?"

"Uh, no? What the buck are-" Spitfire's sputtering was interrupted by Cadence launching into the air. The alicorn princess swooped over the castle's bastion wall, out into the deep dark sky, where an airship could be seen heading south. "Princess! Princess!" She tried to vault over the embrasure and chase after Cadence, but was uncoordinated in her exhaustion and tripped over it, falling right beside Velvet.

The Regina Libertatis had been one of the largest and fastest airships at its completion, with the hull decorations and luxurious accommodations befitting royal prestige. It's sleek design had inspired the succeeding generations of airship which had come to surpass it, like the sky brigs used by the the Equestrian Trade Company in the east, and the mighty race-built strato-galleons of the Cloudsdale fleet. Though slightly outdated and poorly maintained, Regina Libertatis was still one of the fastest flying vessels in the world.

Not fast enough for Celestia's satisfaction. She stood on the aftercastle, where she could see Canterlot, the Mountain, and the pale moon above them. A lance of Imperial Knights waited around her, warding off anypony from getting too close

The crew was scurrying around, moving miscellania below decks and pulling up the sails.

A pony's aggravated stomping shook the ship. "What a bloody disgrace. We should be making 15 knots by now." The captain came out swaggering. The middle-aged pegasus was orange with a light blue mane. "Why is that sail not as full as when I went belowdecks?! Heave-ho and get that damn main tightened!" He straightened his uniform and jaunted up the aftercastle stairs to address Celestia. "You grace us princess. This crew is more used to hosting dignitaries and parading than an honest night of sailing princess, but we're ready to serve. We'll get you to the Ponyville Bend before light."

Celestia tilted her head his way, "Incorrect, Captain Spearhead. We are going too slowly." She said, then returned to watching the night sky.

Captain Spearhead frowned. "Are you sure princess? I set the course myself." But he saw by her stonewalling that Celestia was adamant. He turned to the nearest crewpony and pushed them alone. "Your princess needs you to HUSTLE, gentleponies! Run out the studding sails! Run up the foresails. Get the spinnaker NOW! If I don't see a spin out in the next minute you'll have fourth watch for a year! Get on it, ye damn breezehounds, on!"

The crew shivered at their captain's bellowing and redoubled their efforts. Soon every mast, boom, and spar was straining. The Regina Libertatis's pearl white sails, light blue in the moonlight, looked like wave-beset oceans for how they rippled in the wind.

One of the ponies in the rigging called down. "Cap we don't have enough pegasi onboard to maintain the moonraker!"

"Then I'll do it myself." Captain Spearhead grunted. He wrestled out of his coat and tossed his cap towards his cabin. He turned to the IHG beside Celestia. "Some of you knights have wings. Are you going to let your princess suffer from lack of sail area?!"

After looking to their princess to see if she would contradict him, the pegasi knights shed their armor and followed the captain to the top of the envelope.
The Regina Libertatis was flying fleetly, and though it was difficult to gauge speed it was certainly not less than 60 knots. It was a fantastic pace for the aged vessel, though the shakes and shivers running through the deck made all the airiners fear that it was more than the structure could safely withstand; they shook and shivered with her.

"Good gracious." Captain Spearhead sheltered in the crow's nest. "The katabatic is pushing us right along! You'd have to go stratospheric to find wind faster than this on a weekday's night, and you'd have to have a modern hull to survive it! Fast enough, princess? Haw haw!" The excitement was infectious. The crewponies delighted at their accomplishment.

"No." Celestia whispered to herself, focussing on a small dot coming from the direction of Canterlot. "Not fast enough."

Across the kilometers, beyond the distance that even their alicorn eyes could distinguish shapes, Cadence met Celestia's stare. The junior princess was bearing down on the airship, streaking through the night sky on furious wingbeats, hooves reaching forward for aerodynamic profile. The Regina Libertatis was quick, but she was quicker, much quicker. There were few creatures alive that could outfly Cadence.
Within moments Cadence was upon the airship. She banked around and circled once, eliciting a gasp from the crew in the rigging, Then Cadence banked back towards the aftercastle, and alighted on the taffrail. "Princess!" She yelled.

"I thought i wasn't possible. I convinced myself that it was lies, all lies, and there was no way you'd actually do it. No, no, it just wasn't possible, I said to myself!" Cadence said, her eyes wide and her void frantic. She hopped down and strode forward. "The signs were there, but I still doubted, because if I believed I'd be admitting our flaws and opening myself up to sin!"

"Caddy calm down." Celestia voice was calm and consoling. "I don't understand what has you worked up. Please, tell me what the issue is."

Why had Celestia been treating her this way, Cadence seethed. It was lies and gaslighting nonstop- Cadence firmly felt she didn't deserve it. "We both know what this is. You can't treat me like a filly, telling me white lies or give me instructive deceptions of convenience. It would be bad enough it you were just manipulating me, but this concerns the ponies of the entire nation?"

Celestia frowned, ever so slightly. "What do you know about the nation, Mis Amore?"

What indeed... "I led a mare to her execution today. I gave my blessing to a coup, and I let a mare get away with two murders. Then I assaulted a mare." Cadence reported. "A mix of serious and adolescent activities, sure, but it's everything that's needed from an alicorn. I have been what the ponies need from me, while YOU have not!" Teeth clenched, Cadence began to shiver in losing fight to hold back tears. "You haven't been there for any of us! Where were you when Shining Armor needed you? Where were you when I needed you? Shutting me away in the tower could have been tolerable if only you EVER came to see me, teach me, and tell me what I could do better. Was little Twilight Sparkle SO much more stimulating that she was granted her dreams, while I was given nothing?!"

"You have no dreams, Cadence, because you are an alicorn. You are something more than mortal, but also so much lesser. You do not experience life in all its wonders and horrors, but instead exist as a representation of something, a floating signifier that yet thinks and breaths. You do not 'live' per se. Instead you are a personification, a shibboleth for all the stupid mortals. You existing makes their life easier, but that's about it. Don't get an ego about the horns and wings, Cadence, it's just to mark you out for them." Celestia said. "You are embarrassingly juvenile. How am I supposed to be honest with a creature like you, who does not understand her own nature?"

"You don't want to be an alicorn princess. You want to be a pony queen, with all the trappings of mortality but given the respect and authority you think you deserve." Celestia continued. "So why didn't you accept Twilight Velvet's offer? Stop pretending you want to be an alicorn? Go let Velvet saw off your horn and wings, pass under her yoke and allow her to glorify herself with your humiliation. It would hurt but then you wouldn't have any responsibility, nothing to answer for."

It was all too much. Heaving now, Cadence could only answer the most basic part of Celestia's abuse. "S- She... Twilight Velvet... She wants to kill me! The cat had a message from the dreamscape... that Velvet was going to kill me!"

"Oh, yes... No, Cadence, that warning wasn't about Velvet. It was about me." Celestia blasted Cadence with her magic.

Cadence was struck in the breast and careened backwards, smashing through the taffrail and falling into the deep dark sky.

"Alicorn down." Cadence murmured. "Goodbye Caddy... goodbye." She returned her gaze to the moon. Was it just Celestia's involuntary shivers, or was the moon vibrating, a rhythmic little shake like the sneering laughs of a sinister onlooker?

When Cadence regained consciousness she was in a room she had never seen before, a cramped wooden space filled with somepony elses' personal belongings. Who that somepony was was quickly answered, as Cadence sat up and sat Spitfire sleeping against the wall. After a few minutes awake Cadence could feel the roll of the floor beneath them and could hear the creak of the hull planking, the sign that they were aboard an airship.
"Am I on Regina Libertatis? No, the princess's ship is a lot fancier than this." Cadence said to herself.

There was a small porthole, looking out onto the skydock. It was still dark outside.

"Goodness..." Cadence fell back onto the cot, draping a wing over her face. She felt fine physically. Mentally she just felt numb. She just didn't want to think about anything that had happened.
Was it still the same night? If so the Regina Libertatis couldn't have gone all that far. Cadence could resume the chase from significantly farther behind... but why would she? "Celestia shot me." Cadence rubbed a hoof over the patch of fur that Celestia's magic bolt had struck true. In the split-second before the attack had knocked her out she had felt the heat and force of the attack, how her sternum and ribs had shattered, and the way her body had been blown apart in all the same ways it would have if struck by a cannonball. Cadence had never had her alicorn recuperation tested so severely.

Now what?
Nothing felt appealing. All the options including laying in Spitfire's cot forever were impossibly daunting. Cadence felt regret for surviving Celestia's attack, since it meant she had to be alive and do things. Alas... If only Shining Armor was there to encourage her.

News of Celestia's flight spread quickly. It was less than an hour before messengers from the castle came looking for Prosser, and spilled the beans to Duke Lightdowser and Admiral Gnash.

"What are the chances that Hauseway and his villainous little gang are responsible?"

Prosser was not in a very good mood at all. From the minute after Celestia's departure from Canterlot, desperate plans to preserve Equestria had been racing through his head. Now, some few hours later, only one stuck. It was horrible, and it made his mind revolt at the sheer madness of it, but it came back to him over and over, demanding to be taken seriously.

Putting the nitwit Seacrest Sabonord on the Imperial Council was just about the limit of what Prosser was willing to give the devious Velvet: Enough (so he thought) to satisfy her, but not enough to keep Prosser and his friends on the council from getting their way. With Sharphoof Lightdowser's arrival, Prosser thought he'd gotten an effective check on Velvet and Hauseway both, and oddly Velvet had seemed very content with the duke's intervention.
Now, it was obvious Velvet was playing them all. She didn't care about the viziership, or the shifting alliances on the Imperial Council.

In fact, what she actually cared about was not at all clear.
When she had been toying with Fancy Pants, she'd manipulated him to get a promise of land.
With Seacrest, she'd shown him around to attract from followers from the cliques of Canterlot.
With Shining Armor, she'd placated him but installed a complete buffoon, Seacrest, in the imperial regime.
With Hauseway, she'd demurred but somehow made him accepting of that buffoon.

Seacrest and Hauseway, should never have been able to be allies, but Velvet had roped them together.
Lightdowser and Rain Gnash should never have gotten over the mutual distain for each other's tribe, but Velvet had produced common enemies for them.

"Velvet... What is this all leading up to?" Prosser asked the air.
That air happened to be on the threshold of the Chateau la Garde, where Prosser lingered collecting his nerve. Looking up at the fortification, cast in blues and reds by the sun setting on the Mountain, Prosser tried to think of a time he had been so uncertain. There was no clear path ahead. All was madness, all was fear.

The door opened. Velvet's mousy maid beckoned him forward. "Lady Velvet has been expecting you."

"Oh, okay. Just steal the wind from my sail then." Prosser frowned. He followed her through the entry halls to the grand dining hall. "You know, I've never been able to figure you out. Sel Lech and Blueblood latch on to Lady Velvet for advancement. What do you get out of your service?"

"Pardon sir, but I'm only a maid." The mare said quietly. "You needn't look any deeper than that. There is no secret to me."

"You've probably heard some, ahem, dire things in your time with her ladyship, huh?" Prosser teased. "What kinds of things go through your head when her gang are talking of deceptions, murder, and ambition?"

"I serve her ladyship and don't dwell on the day to day, except to examine how I can serve her better in the future." The maid said.

Prosser didn't have anything to say to that. How was it that Velvet could command such loyalty and authority when the revered Princess Celestia, literally the manifestation of ponykind's god the sun, attracted only the most cynical bunch of louts? Prosser saw the irony in his question.

They went up the castle's central stairway, up to the top floor. The stairway landing led to a double door, closed shut.

"This is her ladyship's library. Please act with restraint." The maid bowed her head.

"I'll be as chaste and quiet as a schoolcolt in a temple." Prosser promised.
He took a deep breath, cleared his throat, and opened the door.

last time Prosser had been in Chateau la Garde's library, immediately in the aftermath of Sunset Shimmer's little revolt, it had been very bare with only the gatehouse records and a few tomes. Twilight Velvet had transformed it into something more fitting for a Twilight.

Stacks of books lined every wall almost to the ceiling, on every topic imaginable. Scroll racks lined the path to the path to the desks and reading tables at the center of the room, where Twilight Velvet was seated with a small notebook. A few small windows let the dwindling sunlight into the dusty space.

"It been a long road, leading you here." Velvet said, putting a bookmark in her book and putting it aside. "But I get no satisfaction from this."

"It comes at the cost of a... certain kind of innocence. We grew up in a world where our princess who loved and cherished us. Right was right and wrong was wrong. Like good little fillies who obey their mother, we did as our sun and princess bade." Velvet shifted in her seat. "Through an arduous puberty, we've come to see that our princess is a deeply flawed being. She doesn't always know best. In fact, there are other role models out there. Some of them, our princess wouldn't approve of."

"Hmm. You've been a long road too, Velvet." Prosser took one of the open seats at the reading table and scooted it around to face her. "You're a different mare from the one I traded jabs with in front of the Opera House. Back then, you were a arrogant girl who knew she could do anything. Now you're something else. Something more." He leaned forward. "You know I'm not a magically trained pony, Velvet. I have to take other's words about things like that. About you've ponies have been auspicious silent. Are you..." He trailed off.

"One has to wonder. You're new pattern of behavior began right around the time you're girlfriend Iillor showed up." Prosser frowned. "Don't have to be able to feel magic to know what she is."

"The answer may surprise you." Velvet laughed. "No. I am not corrupted by a nightmare."

Velvet obliged. "But that does not mean my actions are, as I should say, unguided by certain dark philosophies." She motioned around the room. "And that sounds dire, but do not let yourself be afraid. If the Light is to allow yourself to be guided along your fate by the sun to the destiny she has planned for you, then Dark is to reject that and forge one's own path. Discovery, analysis, and one's own intelligence becomes the determiner, not the will of an alicorn." She turned back to him, a strange intensity to her state. "That's not inherently bad now is it?"

"Maybe you should look into the thousands of years of theological work on the subject." Prosser said. He kept his usually sarcastic tone in check. "The whole idea of Equestria, to bring together all the dreams and ambitions of ponykind in a harmonious way, needs everypony's acceptance."

"I guess I reject Equestria then." Velvet shrugged.
How flippant, not non committal, for such a pronouncement of treason! Prosser's stomach churned.

"All civilized creatures long ago realized that sacrifice was necessary for the greater good. You sound like you're advocating anarchy! This isn't a jungle, where the rule of life is the survival of the fittest. This is Canterlot! This is the heart of ponykind's institutions and peace." Prosser said.

"Oh I agree completely." Velvet nodded. "Sacrifice is necessary. There can't even be the beginnings of language, knowledge, or life without accord between one pony and another. It's just that one small detail..." She smiled. "I don't want to be the one sacrificing."

"SIT DOWN!" Velvet bellowed, her eyes suddenly filled with rage. Her whole body quivered and her horn came alight with energy.

Prosser fell to his flank and scrambled backward, terrified that she might attack him. "V- Velvet please!"

"Do you even see what I'm doing here?" Velvet pushed from her seat and advanced on him. "We are not acting in equal accord with each other right now. Oh not at all! My dream is being fulfilled, and yours is SUBSERVIENT. That is because I am the more powerful, and my dream more deserving to be fulfilled." Having backed up all the way to the wall, Prosser had no where else to go as Velvet loomed over him. "Clouded by that problematic little thing called faith, ponykind has kept themselves subservient to Celestia and her sun for a thousand years. In their world, our dreams have been neutered for the sake of that superficial 'harmony'. Nopony can truly strive in Equestria. There is no room to spread our wings and see our dreams come to fruition. And if other ponies have their dreams crushed in the process..."
She knelt by him, bringing the two ponies eye to eye with each other. She reached out with a hoof and cradled Prosser's cheek, forcing him to look at her. "Then their dreams were inferior. But I will not let them wallow with their dreams half-formed and their progress in this world aborted. I have a role for them."
She pulled away and trotted back to her desk. She picked up her book. "Ponykind can unify, but not as a garbled confederation of wills, selectively clipped by the princess."

Prosser stayed on the floor, trying to sort through his tumultuous emotions. "Y- You want to unify the world... Under your dream."

"Or whoever has the strength to usurp me." Velvet affirmed. "But with how my plans are shaking out, that could never happen."

Prosser took a minute to regain control of his frantic breathing. Things weren't going how he expected. He had expected Velvet to smile, wink, and tell him how she wanted control of Canterlot or a duchy or something. But no, she was after something worse: An ideology.
He looked at her, with her grayish coat and striped purple mane, and saw nothing that would betray the evil mind inside. She was just a mare, nearing fifty, with the sole adornment being her simple linen dress.

"Velvet this goes beyond ambition. You're acting delusion." He said, voice tainted with despair. "Yes, Celestia's apathy is letting you get away with this for now. That's going to change, and all too soon a new alicorn is going to come and sort you out."

"The succession, you mean." Velvet nodded. "Well, we will see about that."
She opened her book up, signaling the end of her contributions to the conversation.

"Somepony's waiting to see me." Velvet said. "It's been lovely, sincerely, but there's just not for you to do even if you did want to help."

"Velvet..." Prosser felt his desperation seeming into his voice. "Equestria is an idea that deserves to be saved."

"Equestria is the name of our continent. It's not going anywhere." She peered over her book at him, a mischievous glint in her eye. "Yet."

"Until next time. Don't be sad. This isn't an end. It really isn't. You'll understand soon."

Prosser cringed at the sound of his own hoofstep as he retreated from the library. The mountains of books much more sinister knowing that they were being bent to Velvet's goal of unrivaled selfishness.

"Guess I could kill myself. That's always a fun time." Prosser took a step towards the stairs before he noticed the pony standing in the corner. It was the silent colt in the robe that sometimes was at Velvet's side, sometimes at Seacrest's, Molar. "Oh. Hello."

"Sorry to keep you waiting. Life's been rough over at Canterlot Castle. Thanks for that, for whatever fraction of my misery you contributed." Prosser sighed.

"Nah, you're alright. Another slave to fate. It has to suck being mute. I'd die if I couldn't speak." Prosser laughed unconvincingly. "Might die anyway..." He frowned. "Or might go to the opera. Not sure yet."

Molar watched the councilpony descend the stair. Several seconds later, an agonized scream echoed up from the lower floor. The scream slowly morphed into hysterical laughs. Molar blinked, then pushed into the library.

"Coming back from Canterlot Castle?" Velvet didn't bother to turn to look at him. "Nuzzling the master's hoof?"

"Why? Nostalgia? Or do you actually like Seacrest?" Velvet wondered to herself. "Or do you like how he plays the character?"

"Ah well. Now I'm the one dwelling." Velvet chuckled. "Alright, alright. Not sure if you heard, but Foaly Flux's nephews are dead. One less threat to the establishment."

"Yes. We will let our guest free. Killing her now would be barbaric." She smiled behind her book. "Besides, I don't want to upset our burgeoning friend Lyra Heartstrings."

It was the fifth week of Octavia's imprisonment.
She was chained, hanging upside down on the rough wall of the dungeon under Chateau la Garde. It was pitch black, as it always was unless Twilight Velvet or her pet nightmare visited.

She was face up on a cobbled street staring up at a crowd of guards, Vinyl beside her. She could see the proud white Lady Velvet, her blue husband vigilant beside her, appraising her two prizes. Then in a decisive moment, her horn glowed, and green fire engulfed Octavia's vision. Memories of pain, searing her every nerve as the crude teleportation spell took hold of her, and dropped her in the dungeon.

The torture, magical needles and electrical shocks played over her body in empathy with her past self. She could almost hear her own screams again, echoing off the walls until she was hoarse. When the pain proved too great she blabbed incoherently about Phyte, the Guild, anything Velvet wanted. Worse still was Vinyl chained beside her, hearing her old friend in the throes of agony. She remembered herself begging for the punishment to be transferred to herself, and Velvet accommodating.

The vision of the last visit she’d had danced in the darkness. Velvet entered the dungeon with a cage, a mimicry of Phyte’s dragonfire birdcages. The nightmare was there with that horrible grin, and had Vinyl unconscious with gleeful vigor. They took Vinyl, and stuffed her into the cage. The glow of Velvet’s horn fills the imaginary room, going to send Vinyl to Celestia only knows where.

Every breath seems to take an hour, every drip of water is deafening. The pain of starvation competes for the pain of metal shackles, until numbness overcomes them both. Octavia hears a heart, and how it weakens every beat. The end will be near. Or was it far? Delirium mixed with acceptance, and the wrenching lonyness of a being without a body, or without a mind, or without a body, or without a mind, or without a body, or without…

An angry grinding metal sound pulled Octavia from her stupor. A sliver of light danced into the dungeon. The echo of hoofsteps on the stone grew louder, then paused. Somepony grunted in exertion, and the hoofsteps returned, uneven this time.

A cloaked pony slowly crept into Octavia's field of vision. He was carrying a large cage under one hoof, causing him to hobble. After setting it down, he entered the alcove where she was chained. The nondescript face under the hood gave Octavia a jolt: It was the mute pony she'd seen in the tunnel under the Musician's Guild a month ago.

"Hhhhhuuuaaagg." Octavia tried to speak, but a dry wheeze came out instead. She coughed then swallowed, though her mouth was no wetter for it. "Help me?" She managed to ask.

The stallion shook his head, and pointed to the cage. He puckered his lips, and whistled out a tiny gout of green fire. The heat rolled off Octavia’s face, and she twitched.

The stallion once again shook his head. He pantomimed a backhoof slap, and the recipient passing out and being put in the cage. Then he marched in place, head held up, and pointed to Octavia. Octavia got the jist of his effort at communication, despite viewing it upside-down.

"I- I will go quietly." Her loudest was little more than a whisper. "Please don't beat me."

Satisfied, the stallion approached and knocked open the clasps. Octavia fell onto her head on a heap. Her back hoof caught the edge of the stallions cloak as it fell, ripping it off his body.

When she looked up Octavia was greeted with an awful sight. The stallion was a multitude of different colors, a patchwork of the skins of different ponies. The flesh over his throat was comprised of reptilian scales, evidence of where his voicebox had been removed and a dragon's flame gland was added. Even the thing's eyes were different colors. They looked calculating, reading Octavia’s reaction.

"Holy Celestia." Octavia groaned wishing she had the energy to drag herself away. "How... Who did this to you?"

The patchwork creature played an invisible harp. Octavia's mind flashed to the glass harp that comprised Phyte's mark.

Not content with the chatting, the stallion thing snatched his cloak off the ground and repositioned it on himself. He pointed to the birdcage.

Octavia mustered the energy to pull herself forward and talk at the same time. "I- It would have been nice to have just one normal pony, even if he is mute. Instead this world is filled with demons and alicorns and demi-immortal freakshows. The Nightmare was right, this city is made for the monsters."

When Octavia managed to fit all of her unresponsive body in the cage, the stallion shut and wired it closed. He hissed out several preparatory flames, then took in a deep, rattling breath.
He let it out as a torrent of green fire, activating the dragonfire infused cage instantly. Octavia numbness and pain mellowed into nothingness, as darkness enveloped her vision from all sides.

When the Everfree Burns

by SpiritDutch

Chapter 18: Unrequited Love, Unrequited Foe, so commanded.