Chapter 14
Father, Mother, Daughter
Luna felt sunlight on her face moments before she felt the soft wings of Celestia enfolding about her neck and Celestia’s cheek pressed against her own.
“Luna,” Celestia whispered. “Thank all things good you are not hurt.”
Luna blinked. “Celestia? How…?” Her first thought was that Celestia had descended upon Sunset’s camp with solar fire and put these arrogant fillies to flight, but looking around her it was clear that it was not so. The zebra camp still stood, the Grevyian warriors wandered here and there without care, clearly they had not seen a great disaster overtake them. Luna pulled away from her elder sister’s embrace to fix her with a stern glare. “Celestia, tell me you didn’t.”
“I did what I must for the good of my little ponies,” Celestia replied. “You know as well as I the suffering the siege would have wrought.”
“But for you to surrender?” Luna said. “If they had decided to-“
“They very nearly did,” Celestia said calmly. “But my assessment of my wayward student was correct; there is yet mercy inside Sunset Shimmer. I hoped as much, and my faith was rewarded. I am unharmed, and we are together.”
“Together in chains,” Luna muttered darkly. “Though I notice that you wear none.”
“I have given my parole,” Celestia explained. “My word as bond neither to escape nor to resist my captors. Luna, I would have you do the same.”
Luna’s head jerked upwards. “I will not, not even for your sake, sister. I may be taken prisoner and compelled to sit idly by while evil and injustice run rampant, but I will not pledge my solemn word to stand by and do nothing merely for the sake of a few small liberties.”
“Small freedoms, yes,” Celestia said. “But although small, still better than none at all. Even small freedoms may be taken advantage of.”
“What do you mean?” Luna asked.
Celestia glanced around, and lowered her voice. “We cannot fight or run; if we did, then ponies less able to protect themselves than we would suffer on our behalf, and that I cannot allow. But, though I have sworn upon my honour to observe certain rules, what nopony here has realised is that I hold honour cheap compared with what is right. I will use my freedom to wander through this camp and, in so wandering, I may discover many things worth knowing and, when night comes and dreams come with them, I may pass this information on to Fluttershy or Rarity to aid in their endeavours.”
A slight smirk played across Luna’s lips. “You are a devious creature, sister.”
“I do what I must, as I always have,” Celestia said. “Many times have I placed other ponies in danger for the greater good. Now that the time has come for me to suffer some slight discomfort, how can I refuse?”
Luna nodded. “You make good sense, as usual. If I am offered the same opportunity I, too, will take it. Now, tell me what has transpired. What is this of Fluttershy and Rarity? And tell me first of all how you persuaded Shrike to allow this reunion.”
“Shrike has been banished from your presence,” Celestia said. “She has fallen into Sunset’s disfavour, it seems. I will not let her come near you again.”
Luna breathed a sigh of relief. “Thank you, Celestia, you have no idea what a fear you have banished.”
“What did she do to you?” Celestia asked anxiously.
“Nothing, it was what she wanted to do that concerned me,” Luna said. “She sought to banish Luna once again and bring back Nightmare Moon.”
Celestia gasped. “Oh, Luna.”
“I had no fear I would succumb to darkness once again,” Luna said. “I feared only that she might take more drastic measures once persuasion failed. And, to be honest as I can only with you, I hated to see her face, that constant reminder of the evils I once wrought.”
“Evils long past and all forgiven,” Celestia said firmly. “Fear no more, you are well away from her now and safe with me.”
“And we are together.” Luna smiled. “Let Sunset beware.”
The two sister chuckled.
“Now sit down,” Luna said, gesturing with one hoof. “And tell me what I have missed.”
Sunset sat in her tent on the outskirts of Canterlot, sitting still while a pair of zebra slaves draped a cloak around her shoulders and a laurel crown upon her head.
It had been a day already since Celestia had surrendered, and she had already despatched elements of her forces into Canterlot to take control of the city. The bulk of her army, however, remained camped beyond the city limits, as did she. The zebra nobles wanted a Triumph, some kind of native ceremony in which they would trample the pride of Equestria into dust and flaunt their victory, and as their commander she would be at the head of the procession, draped and painted and transformed for the day into some kind of local god.
There was a time when the prospect would have thrilled Sunset, would have filled her heart with joy, especially since another aspect of the Triumph was to drag her enemies behind her so that everypony could see how defeated they were. Now, though, the prospect did not excite her at all. In fact, the prospect made her shiver a little as the zebras fitted her from her conquering cloak.
Why could she not feel joy in this? What was the matter with her? She had conquered Canterlot! Celestia had knelt before her! She had bested Princess Luna in battle and trapped Twilight Sparkle beyond any aid! She was victorious; she had accomplished a splendid feat of arms, worthy to take its place in the annals of history. And yet she felt no pride, no glee, no sweet savour of success. She felt only cold, and a sour taste in her mouth.
Was it because Celestia had surrendered? Would a battle have pleased her more? No. This melancholy discontent went beyond the abrupt surrender, Sunset’s contest with Luna had done nothing to please her either. Nor could she say that her distemper was the result of knowing that some of her enemies were still at large, for had they all been in chains at her hooves Sunset imagined she’d have felt no better pleased. No, this was something in her, amiss in her spirit and not in the world.
I did not use to be this way, Sunset thought. Perhaps it was a mistake to come back here. But at the time it had seemed inevitable for her to come here, to try her strength, to show the home that had rejected her what she had become once freed from Equestria’s constraints. Yet showing had spectacularly failed to please her.
She realised that she was being stared at, and recalled herself from her reverie to focus her attention upon the captains who shared her tent.
“Dreaming of your triumph, mistress?” Lord Syphax, the grandest of her zebra lords, asked her with a touch of mocking mischief in his voice.
“My dreams are my own,” Sunset replied. “What were you saying?”
“I was suggesting, mistress, that having humiliated the pony Shrike before the whole army, the safest course would be to have her killed,” Syphax said.
“You think her crime warrants it?” Sunset asked.
“I think she is offended, and if that offence leads her to strike at you, well…” Syphax shrugged. “Better a dead friend than a living enemy.”
“That sounds proverbial, is that some sort of Grevyian saying?” Sunset asked. When Syphax nodded she gave a loud sigh. “No wonder your empire is in terminal decline. Thoughts from the rest of you?”
“I do not see what made you so angry about what she did,” Precious said, scratching her ear with one paw. “But if you are concerned, then kill her and be done with it.”
“What a bloodthirsty crew you are,” Sunset murmured. She looked at Virtue. “You usually have a lot to say. Aren’t you going to tell me what the honourable course would be?”
Virtue shrugged. “What she did…some crimes are deserving of death; Chevalians know that as well as any. As ruler of Equestria, it is for you to decide where the line lies.”
“Thank you, you’ve been very unhelpful even by your standards,” Sunset said. “All right, that’s enough. All of you get out, now. Out! And send me Lightning Dust.”
They bowed out hastily, the slaves scampering at their heels. Sunset cast off the crimson cloak they swathed her in and let it fall to the ground as her magic flared to throw the laurel crown across the tent. A mirror with a gilded frame lay on a small table in front of her. Sunset stared at it for a moment, glaring at her own reflection, before she brought her hoof down on the mirror hard enough to smash the glass into splinters.
She cut her own hoof in the process, numerous cuts opening up along the soft surface, pieces of glass buried in her flesh. It probably should have left her howling in pain, but she felt only a slight smarting. Yet still it was the most feeling in her entire body.
Lightning Dust pushed open the tent flap and nervously walked in. “Uh, you wanted to see me?”
“Yes, I did,” Sunset murmured, lowering her injured hoof. “I have a job for you.”
“Am I the leader of the Shadowbolts now?” Lightning Dust asked. “Only you gave it pretty rough to Shrike, and I’m not sure she wants to hear from you anymore.”
Sunset looked the other mare in the eyes. “Do you want to lead?”
Lightning grinned. “It would be pretty cool, yeah.”
“Then you can lead, after you get back from the Crystal Empire,” Sunset said.
Lightning frowned. “The Crystal Empire?”
Sunset’s horn glowed as she levitated a sealed letter over to Lightning Dust. “This is a peace proposal from me to Princess Cadance. Inside, I agree that none of my followers will go north of Cloudsdale and promise to respect her status as ruler of everything north of that city. In exchange I demand recognition of my own status as protector of everything to the south and a free hoof in all my dealings in my territory. I don’t want any more war.”
Lightning smirked. “If you don’t want war then what are we doing here?”
“Waiting for something better than a war,” Sunset replied. “Waiting for a chance to be heroes. Take the message and be on your way at once.”
Lightning stuffed the letter into her saddlebags. “Do you really think Princess Cadance will go for it?”
“Do you?” Sunset asked.
“I know if you’d locked my sister-in-law in a magic box then asked to be friends I’d tell you to trot on then shove a thunderbolt somewhere unpleasant; and I don’t even have a sister-in-law,” Lightning said candidly. “But maybe Princess Cadance is a better pony than I am, I dunno. I’ll see what she says, anyway. And thanks for making me the boss.” Her quick smile returned as she ducked out of the tent. Sunset heard the rustle of her wings as she took off into the sky.
Sunset stood, alone in her tent, and did nothing for a moment before she got to work pulling the glass out of her hoof and dressing the wound. Then, a clean bandage wrapped around her foreleg, she pushed her way out of her tent and into the bright light of the sun. Scowling for a moment at the blazing orb, she set off in search of Celestia.
Inside Canterlot, the troops of the Grevyian Fourth Legion - Hisponia Ever Faithful - patrolled the streets. At every corner was nailed a near identical notice, and under the watchful eyes of the zebra troops the citizens of the newly occupied city came to read what their new masters had to say.
By decree of Sunset Shimmer, Regent of Equestria and the Most Ancient and August Empire of Grevyia, martial law is now in effect until further notice.
Public gatherings of more than three ponies at a time are henceforth prohibited. Anypony caught violating this stricture will be imprisoned immediately and detained until their case can be considered by such authorities as the regent will deem proper.
Private gatherings of more than four ponies at a time are henceforth prohibited. Anypony caught violating this stricture will be imprisoned immediately and detained until their case can be considered by such authorities as the regent will deem proper.
A curfew lasting from the setting of the sun until the hour of ten o'clock in the morning will be observed by all creatures not under arms or otherwise employed in the service of the regent. Any creature caught breaking curfew will be imprisoned immediately and detained until their case can be considered.
All civil courts are dissolved until further notice. Any infractions of law will be dealt with in such ways as the regent deems proper.
Any mutterings of discontent with the regent's administration will be regarded as treason and punishable by death.
Seditious mutterings or the voicing of any slurs against the regent, the Most Ancient and August Empire of Grevyia, zebras, diamond dogs or ponies in the service of the regent will not be tolerated. Any such incidents will be regarded as acts of treason.
Nopony is to leave Canterlot without written permission from the regent or an officer appointed under her.
The Equestrian Royal Guard are confined to barracks until further notice.
Rewards will be issued to any patriot who is aware of any creature committing an offence under the above regulations. To report on treasonous activity and claim your reward, approach an appointed officer in service to the Regent and tell them everything. Be prepared to name names and locations. Vague reports will be considered attempts at pranking or time-wasting.
It is an offence to prank or waste the time of the regent's forces. Such offences will be punished severely in a manner to be decided by the victims of the offence.
Long live the regent and the sun bless the Two Nations.
Have a nice day.
In a little apartment in one of the less salubrious parts of Canterlot, five ponies were gathered in the sitting room, with a copy of the proclamation telling them that they were committing an offence sitting on the coffee table in the middle. They had all read it.
"So, we've broken the one about private meetings of more than four, we're about to break the ones about mutterings of discontent and slurs against blah blah blah. And we might end up leaving Canterlot without permission. That's only four out of the eight regulations that apply to ordinary ponies like us. That's not very good is it? We'll have to work harder." Razor Wind smiled a little, trying to keep her tone light as she looked around the room. The assembled gathering needed no copy of the proclamation to know that their meeting like this was dangerous, not after Dawn had disappeared so suddenly just as all this trouble started. Razor was a dark grey pegasus with a silver-white mane and her cutie mark was a cloud slice in two, with one jagged edge and one straight. She was also the pony who had set up this illegal gathering, braving the zebra-patrolled streets to get the gang together. She was, after all, Breaking Dawn's oldest friend, and as far as Razor was concerned that made her the leader in Dawn's absence no matter what Hardy might think about it.
"Maybe we should go out on the street after dark once we're done here so we can be in violation of the curfew and the rules on public gatherings as well?" Hardy Bloom asked. "And then we can go tell a zebra that some ponies on the other side of town are planning to overthrow the regent." Hardy was a light brown earth pony with a gavel cutie mark and a mellifluous voice that was far more distinctive than her rather plain appearance.
"And then we can turn ourselves in for the reward money and have the full set," Hard Candy said with a giggle. She was another earth pony, with a mint-green coat, peppermint eyes, and a mane that was a mix of pink and white stripes.
"Well, we're sure to be arrested soon anyway, so we might as well get paid for it," Laurel remarked dryly. She was a unicorn, her coat chalk white and her mane iron grey, her watery blue eyes concealed behind a pair of spectacles. No beauty, to be sure, but Dawny had never cared about that and neither did the rest of them. Her eyes darted from one pony to the next. "I'm sure I'm not the only one to have thought that we'll all soon be hearing zebras kicking down our doors."
"What for?" Cherry Blossom asked. The co-owner, with Razor, of the apartment was another pegasus, with a coat of white and a mane of pink, with intermittent creamy flashes. Her eyes were wide now, with fear most likely. "We haven't done anything wrong."
"It's a military dictatorship, Cherry dear, right or wrong doesn't really enter into it," Laurel remarked. "Our beloved regent Princess Iceheart-"
"And that's the prohibition on slurs taken care of," Hardy observed.
"Princess Iceheart?" Razor asked.
"It's what we called Sunset Shimmer at school, when we were feeling generous," Laurel said.
"What about when you weren't feeling generous?" Cherry said.
"Then you don't want to know what we called her," Laurel replied. "Anyway, she'll have us arrested for no other reason than that we might be dangerous. Or because she can. She always hated Dawn, and she used to bully me terribly."
"You don't know that she's the same pony she was," Cherry murmured. "Ponies change."
"She's leading an army that's just occupied Canterlot, if she has changed then frankly I think it's for the worse," Laurel said.
"We can't be certain that she'll come for us," Hardy said.
"Come on Hardy, be sensible," Razor snapped dismissively. "Dawny disappeared the night before the trouble began in Ponyville. And something must have happened to Twilight Sparkle as well because she wasn't with her friends when they arrived in Canterlot before flying off on those airships. And now we find out Sunset Shimmer is behind all of this. I know if I was in her hooves I'd clear out the competition before I made my play. She's got Dawny, and she knows that we're Dawny's friends. She'll come for us, like she came for Princess Twilight's friends."
"We aren't the elements of harmony," Hardy said. "Our little misadventure with the balrog made that abundantly clear. And..."
Razor's eyes narrowed. "And what?"
Hardy hesitated, then sighed resignedly. "Somepony has to say this so it might as well be me. We have to consider the possibility that Dawny has joined with Sunset."
"No!" Razor yelled.
"Shh!" Laurel hissed. "Do you want the whole building to here us plotting.
Razor scowled. "There is no way Dawny would be a part of this, no way she would disappear without telling us if she had a choice, no way that she would get involved in anything this messed up."
"She's arguably done worse," Hardy replied.
"Whose side are you on?" Razor snarled.
"I just don't want us to rule out the possibility, we have to remember what Dawn's capable of."
"She changed," Cherry said firmly. "Dawny did some bad things, but she recognised that. Razor's right, I don't believe she's capable of being involved in this."
"Which means she's a prisoner," Razor said. "Because like I said, there's no way that she would have disappeared without telling us except because she was forced to do so. So the question now is, how do we free her?"
"Free her?" Laurel asked. "We have no idea where she is."
"I'm willing to bet she's somewhere in the zebra camp outside the city," Razor said.
"Are you willing to bet all our lives?" Hardy asked.
"Razor's right, we have to do something," Candy said. "We can't just sit here with a tyrant's hoof upon our necks."
"This isn't a play, Candy, if you die you don't get up again when the curtain goes down," Hardy remarked.
"Do you really want to do nothing?" Razor demanded. "Do you want to sit here and wait for little miss Sunshine to have us dragged from our beds and thrown in a dungeon. If we can find Dawny and get her out then she can stop this."
"Do you think so?" Cherry asked anxiously.
Laurel nodded. "Dawn's the best duellist I've ever seen. She was more than a match for Sunset then, she'll be a match for her now."
"If we can rescue her-"
"If, if, if," Hardy snapped. "You can't make a plan without any hard evidence. It doesn't work. What if Dawny isn't where you think she is, or she can't be rescued, or-"
"Then we deal with it," Razor said. "But we have to try. I'm putting it to a vote."
Hardy rolled her eyes.
"Everypony in favour of doing the right thing and trying to rescue Dawny, raise your hoof," Razor said, raising her own hoof as she did so.
Everypony put a hoof in the air, even Hardy.
"I never said I wasn't going to do it," Hardy grumbled. "I just wanted everypony to be aware of how stupid it was before we did it."
Razor grinned. "As much as you annoy me sometimes, I'm glad you're with us. Now: how are we going to do this?"
Sunset found Celestia and Luna sitting together on the ground, heads nearly touching, whispering to one another as if this was some sort of picnic they were having. Indeed, from Celestia's bearing and demeanour she did not look like a prisoner at all.
Sunset found that, although her head knew that she ought to be enraged at that, her heart found that she was glad of it, and she felt a strange desire not to interrupt the contented scene.
But interrupt it she did, clearing her throat loudly so as to get the attention of the pair.
"Sunset?" Celestia asked, turning her neck to look Sunset in the eye. "Is there something I can do for you?"
Sunset could not help but chuckle. "Shouldn't I be asking the two of you that? I am your gaoler after all."
"You could set us free," Luna said.
Sunset smiled thinly. "Sorry. No can do. Do you have any requests that are more in the line of creature comforts?"
"Something softer to sleep on than a wagon bed would be appreciated," Luna murmured.
Sunset nodded. "You can have my mattress. I don't sleep anyway. Princess Celestia?"
"I would like to know that Applejack is safe," Celestia said.
"Of course, of course. I'll have her brought to join us. We can have a party," Sunset smiled, although nopony else did. She whistled for the attention of a nearby zebra. "You, there, fetch the prisoner Applejack, at once." She watched the Grevyian warrior begin to lumber off to accomplish his task. "I said at once, that means run!" He jumped too, and put on some actual speed. "That's better," Sunset muttered.
"I see you have no difficulty exercising command," Celestia remarked.
"I do not have the privilege of commanding loyalty through love," Sunset replied. "I would rather compel it through discipline than by main force."
"I see," Celestia whispered.
There was silence for a moment, broken only by the sounds of the camp that drifted towards them. Sunset hesitated, looking down at her hooves and the dirt beneath them, kicking at the ground with her forelegs.
"I...I thought that we should have a talk," she murmured.
"I am glad you agree," Celestia said tenderly, standing up and closing the distance between them. The princess knelt, so that she and Sunset were level with one another. "I wish to tender my apology, Sunset Shimmer; I have treated you very badly."
For a moment Sunset could only stand, speechless and still as a statue. Her eyes were wide when they were not blinking in disbelief. She waited for the punchline, but there was none. Celestia's expression was in perfect earnest, her purple orbs filled with nought but sincerity. Ridiculous as it was, she meant what she said. Sunset found herself giggling. "You...you apologise to me? Have your wits been addled by your own sun? Is this some trickery to lower my guard?"
"This is regret, Sunset," Celestia whispered. "The failures of a student are the failures of the teacher. And I am afraid that you have failed most terribly. You are lost, Sunset."
"Lost?" Sunset repeated. "Yes, well, being thrown out of the only home you've ever known will do that to a pony."
"I know," Celestia said. "I should have taken more care. I pushed you too hard, and afterwards I reacted badly when you could not slow down."
"You threw me away," Sunset snapped. "You replaced me. Twice! Do you have any idea what I've been through." Her whole body was trembling now. "Look at me. Look at me!"
Sunset's horn glowed, and the glamour that she used to project the appearance of the pony she had been when she had left Equestria melted away like snow under the heat of the sun. Celestia gasped in horror, and even Luna looked shocked to see what truly lay beneath the illusion.
Scars criss-crossed Sunset's back, vicious welts and angry scabs turning her coat to ruin. Another wound disfigured her face, descending from just beneath her eye to the corner of her mouth, giving her a cruel and mocking look. Her legs were raw from where the manacles had bitten into her flesh, and her body was thin and emaciated.
"Oh, Sunset," Celestia murmured. "What happened to you?"
Sunset smiled sadly as she cast the glamour upon herself once more and became again the Sunset that Celestia remembered. "I was enslaved. I was freed. I was captured. I was tortured. Everything I tried to do, every place where I tried to make something of myself, I fell. Always the same story, wherever I went. I always ended up rejected, just like you rejected me. It's funny really, I ran away because I thought that life couldn't get any worse after you cast me aside, but out of all the ponies who ever threw me away you were by far the nicest about it. You didn't try to kill me, for one thing."
"Sunset..." Celestia whispered. "Why didn't you just come home?"
"What? Crawl back a wretched failure? Be like Breaking Dawn, living off charity, boring the legs of everypony by telling them how I could have been somepony if I had just gotten the breaks? No, I needed to be successful before I came back here, I needed to be able to show you what you had missed out on. That was what kept me going in the slave camp, that was what kept me sane in the dungeons, that was what let me do all of this. Because I knew that I had to survive and prosper so that I could come home to you in style. And now I have." And what will keep me sane now?
"Why?" Luna demanded. "What is this for, this zebra army, this war, this...all of it. What do you want?"
Sunset smiled, her eyes sparking with excitement. "I want to do something amazing. Something that has never before been done, not by the greatest of heroes. I'm going to save a whole universe." She began to pace up and down. "There is a demon called Moloch. Actually he's more than a demon, he's a demon god. Powerful. Nightmare Moon would wet herself if she came face to face with him. He has his tendrils extending in all directions, his darkness moves through space, devouring world after world. He corrupts ponies who are willing, or just desperate, and has them betray their kin and their homes to make his conquests easier. He believes that I am one such corrupted soul. He believes that I am here on his behalf, to conquer Equestria as an offering to his greatness." Sunset's smile widened. "More fool him, the big lug, I'm going to lure him here and I'm going to take him out and save everypony, on all the worlds. I'd like to see Twilight Sparkle come up with a plan like that."
"No," Luna said dryly. "No, she would never think of something like that. I am amazed."
"I know, right."
"Amazed at the foolishness of it," Luna said.
Sunset looked at her. "You don't think I can do it?"
"Sunset, please, consider this," Celestia said. "You are putting the whole of Equestria at risk to satisfy your desire for battle."
"No, I'm protecting them," Sunset insisted. "Moloch will come here sooner or later, so I'm going to fight him on my terms. I've already got it figured out. There is a legend, I came across on my travels, of a great hero called Zulqarnain, the Horned King, who travelled to the ends of the world and found an army of monsters there led by two demons called Gog and Magog. The Horned King fought the demon host with his army, and sealed them away in a mountain pass behind gates of iron and brass. This imprisoned them for all time, and prevented them from invading his world. I'm going to go one better: I'm going to summon Moloch and his army into a position where my army can destroy his, and then I'm going to imprison him under the mountains where he can rot for all time until Equestria itself comes to an end. I've already been researching the wards and circles needed to confine him and to nullify his power. That's the point of the zebras and the diamond dogs and the mercenaries. Trust me, I've got this all figured out."
"Where do you plan on summoning this demon?" Celestia asked.
"Canterlot," Sunset said. "Moloch will believe me if I summon him to a place filled with prey for him. If I try and summon him out in the wild somewhere he might suspect a trap."
"But, Sunset," Celestia exclaimed. "If you're wrong then the risk-"
"There isn't any risk, I'm not wrong," Sunset insisted. “For once in my life, Princess, can’t you just put your faith in me?”
“Such faith would be misplaced. As is your own confidence.”
It was not Celestia or Luna who had spoken. It was a male voice, deep and a little hoarse with age, and it was coming from behind Sunset.
Sunset turned around slowly, her horn glowing with a faint light as she prepared to defend herself against whoever or whatever had managed to sneak up on her so efficiently.
She beheld a black alicorn, his coat of shimmering onyx – but with a touch of Luna’s midnight blue in there as well, very faint but noticeable to Sunset’s eyes - and his mane of shimmering silver flowing behind him even as Celestia and Luna’s manes and tails trailed in their wake like page foals. His eyes blue and very like to Luna’s, whom he resembled closely. His cutie mark was…what was it? Sunset did not recognise it. It looked like a shimmering vortex of blue and red, spiralling inwards on itself, but Sunset had no idea what that could mean or what it signalled about this visitor.
“Who are you?” Sunset demanded. “How did you get into my camp?”
“He is our father,” Luna said, her voice loaded with a surprising amount of distaste all things considered. “And he has always had a talent for coming and going as he pleased. Though you were better at the disappearing weren’t you, father?”
The onyx alicorn said nothing. He did not even acknowledge Luna’s existence, let alone that she had spoken.
“Is this true?” Sunset asked. “Are you…the princess’ father?”
“I am Aeternitas,” he said. “And I have come to warn you, Sunset Shimmer.”
“I don’t care about that, I asked you a question: are you Princess Celestia’s father.”
“Tell her, father,” Luna hissed. “Tell her, if you are not ashamed.”
“Luna,” Celestia murmured reproachfully.
“I am sorry, sister, but one thousand years for you was but the blinking of an eye for me, and so, for me, the hurt that has for you long scabbed and healed is red and raw and bleeding in my heart,” Luna said. “Have you forgotten how he abandoned us without a word, and mother too? Have you forgotten, father? Did you hope to find a warm reception here?”
Aeternitas blinked. When he spoke, his voice was firm and even and without remorse. “My children they are.”
“And you abandoned them,” Sunset observed. “Now I see where Celestia gets it from. Twilight Sparkle wants to watch out if she ever gets out of that box; you obviously can’t help yourself, Princess. Anyway, I’m afraid you picked a bad time to try and reconcile with your daughters, this isn’t really a place for big hugs and tears.”
“Cease your noxious prating, foolish mare,” Aeternitas snapped. “I have not descended to this mean earth in order to be pricked by your jibes and jeers.”
“Oho, so that’s how it is, huh?” Sunset demanded, the walls of her pride – which Celestia had momentarily brought down – beginning to rise again in response to Aeternitas’ obvious disdain. “Listen, you may think you’re something special and important but you’ve got another thing coming if you think that you can talk to me like that. Nopony talks to me like that, and those who cross me tend to come to a bad end. Now get out of my sight before I have you strung up on crossed pikes.”
A low chuckle rose from Aeternitas’ throat. “As if you could.”
Sunset bared her teeth at him, snarling like a scalded tiger.
“Please, father, stop this,” Celestia shouted. “If you came here to do more than antagonise Sunset, then put aside your pride and speak to her! You said you had a warning to deliver.”
“Why should I listen to anything he has to say?” Sunset demanded.
“Because I’m clever,” Aeternitas said.
“Oh, and I’m not, is that what you’re saying?”
“Father!” Celestia snapped as Aeternitas opened his mouth. “This does not help. Have you been gone so long that you have forgotten how to talk to other ponies?” Her tone softened. “Please, Sunset, listen to him. Whatever he is, as abrasive as he can be, Aeternitas has much wisdom. If he says that you have made a mistake, if he says that there is peril in your path, then please, I beg you, hear him out.”
Sunset hesitated, and then shrugged her shoulders. “I will hear you. But keep a civil tongue in your head. Now, what is it that was so important that you had to grace us humble peons with your presence?”
“Your plan is doomed,” Aeternitas said. “Not just doomed, foredoomed. It won’t work, it can never work, all you will do is hand Equestria over to Moloch. Everything that you plan he has foreseen.”
Sunset shook her head. “Impossible. Nopony can lie like I can, there’s no way that he could see through me.”
“I have seen it,” Aeternitas insisted. “The future holds only death and destruction if you pursue this course.”
“Ah, the future,” Luna remarked. “Always the future. You never had a care for the present of your daughters but the future? That you tend with the care of a painstaking gardener.”
“She really hates you, doesn’t she?” Sunset asked.
Aeternitas ignored them both. “I have seen the future you will bring into being. I can show it to you, if it will make your turn away.”
“I will make my own future,” Sunset declared. “A shining future, free from the threat of a demon lord.”
“Foolish mare!” Aeternitas declared. “This is the future you will bring to pass!” His horn glowed obsidian black, and before Sunset could conjure up a shield to protect herself she was engulfed by darkness.
Then the darkness cleared, and she beheld Canterlot in flames, demons running amok in all directions, chasing ponies through the streets and through the air. She saw the corpses of dead zebras choking up the gateway, Virtue’s head set in a fierce grimace as it sat mounted on a spike outside the city, demonic captains turning the grass to ash beneath their step and the sky to fire with the beating of their wings.
She saw ponies dying in droves.
She saw Celestia writhing in the grip of Moloch as he choked the life from her.
She saw herself, dead, crushed beneath his feet, her body smouldering.
And then she was back in her camp, surrounded by all her strength of arms, and she shook her head furiously. “No. You are wrong, you’re wrong! That is the future I am destined to avert, my dream told me as much.” She laughed. “You are mistaken, old doomsayer, that is what will happen if I turn aside now and forsake my plans. Moloch will come here whether I summon him or no, but you would have me wait for him to choose the time and place of the engagement. No, I’ll draw him out and finish him, with my own strength and the strength of those that follow me.”
“Have you learned nothing?” Aeternitas demanded. “Think of what you saw and did not see. Your plot is ill-conceived, your friends uncertain-“
“It is an excellent plot, and excellent friends,” Sunset retorted. A part of her – a very small part – recognised the irony that she, who had so despised Virtue’s blustering chivalry, should bluster so before this Aeternitas. But she could not help it, he had riled her up and she had to defend herself and her enterprise. “I do not need a deadbeat dad to lecture me upon my actions! I have come too far, done too much, to turn aside now with the end in sight. I have gained the subservience of the zebras and the loyalty of the diamond dogs, I have rescued a people and blackmailed their followers into fighting in my battle, I killed the Emperor of Grevyia once he had given me his army, so that he would not interfere with my plans; should I stop now, after all that, having achieved nothing?”
“Better that than to lose everything,” Aeternitas said.
“Shut up!” Sunset yelled, firing a bolt of energy at him.
And he wasn’t there anymore.
It was not teleportation. Teleportation always revealed itself through a flash and a popping sound. There was neither here. He simply wasn’t there. He was behind her instead.
“You must listen to me.”
“Why?”
“Because unlike you, my mind isn’t being clouded by my ego,” Aeternitas said.
Sunset growled, and fired another spell at him. Again, he simply disappeared.
“How are you doing that?” Sunset asked. “Stop moving and fight!”
“I don’t believe in violence,” Aeternitas said smugly.
Sunset snarled in frustration. It was the same every time. She fired, he disappeared, reappearing somewhere else.
It was not teleportation. She was certain of that. The distinctive traces were absent, and even an alicorn would struggle to keep up that many teleports, unless teleporting was his special talent. That might be what the vortex stood for, but that didn’t explain the lack of flash or sound. It was more like he was just ceasing to be where he was, being somewhere else. It was like he was…
Oh, so that’s it, Sunset thought. Oh, yes, that would explain everything.
Sunset kept on firing, but every time she cast a magic bolt she also cast another spell, on a different part of the clearing. The effects were invisible, and since he couldn’t even see her casting them Sunset was confident that Aeternitas wouldn’t see them coming. All she had to do was wait for him to step on one of her traps.
And step he did. She cast a spell, he disappeared – and then he reappeared a moment later, only a few steps away from where he’d been, writing and rearing as chains and manacles erupted from out of the ground to clap their cold, unyielding grasp around him, holding him down and binding him fast.
“It seems I wasn’t the only one letting my ego cloud my judgement,” Sunset crowed. “I figured out what you were doing: time manipulation. You weren’t teleporting, you were slowing down my perception of time so that I couldn’t see you just walking out of the way of my spells. And to me it looked like you had almost teleported. But clever as it was, I’m pretty smart myself, so don’t you ever forget that.”
“Not as smart as you think,” Aeternitas growled.
“Whatever,” Sunset said. “Since it seems you can’t actually teleport, the only way your magic is going to help you now is if you slow down the time it takes to pick the locks on those shackles.”
“You cannot-“
“Trust me, I should do much worse after the lip I’ve had from you,” Sunset snapped. “Maybe I should ask your daughters what they want done with you? Celestia, Luna, would you like to get back at your father?”
Celestia, looking slightly ill, turned away. Luna looked as though she might consider it for a moment, before she shook her head.
“Suit yourselves,” Sunset said. She turned away as she heard the zebra she had dispatched returning with Applejack in tow. “There, you see? Applejack is-“
“APPLEJACK!”
Sunset caught sight a pink blur a moment before Pinkie Pie appeared, hooves wrapped around Applejack’s neck, swinging off it like a monkey off a tree.
“I’m so glad that you’re okay are you okay did they hurt you are you hungry do you want some candy-“
“Pinkie Pie!” Celestia exclaimed. “What are you doing here? You were supposed to have left Canterlot on the Sky Without!”
“Well I was going to leave,” Pinkie said. “But then I realised that Applejack would be left all alone with all of these meany critters and that made me so sad that I just had to stay and keep her company because nopony should ever have to be all alone with no friends.”
“That’s…mighty kind of you Pinke,” Applejack said. “But you have to get outta here. It ain’t safe for you.”
“Oh don’t worry, I’ve got Maud with me.”
“Hello, Your Highness,” a drab grey earth pony in a drab grey jumper said slowly as she stepped out of the bushes. “It’s nice to see you again.”
“When I find out who was supposed to be on sentry duty they’re going to be in big trouble,” Sunset said to herself.
“Is this her?” the drab pony asked.
“I’m Sunset Shimmer,” Sunset said. “Who are you?”
“That’s my big sister Maud,” Pinkie said happily. “Isn’t she cool?”
“It’s only fair to warn you that if you try and hurt Pinkie Pie I will hurt you,” Maud said.
Sunset smirked. “You know, I like you. I wish I had somepony like you in my service. Don’t worry, I won’t hurt Pinkie Pie as I’ve not hurt Applejack. Though I won’t let you go either.” She chuckled. “Since you have been so foolish as to come into my den, I shall make you wear motley and be my fool. This place could use some livening up.”
“I’m gonna do it,” Derpy said.
Lyra Heartstrings leaned closer, speaking in a hushed whisper. “Forget it, Derpy, you won’t get away with it.”
“I have to,” Derpy insisted. “I haven’t got a choice.”
The Ponyville conscripts were camped in the middle of Sunset Shimmer’s mighty host, surrounded on all sides by zebras and diamond dogs. If it was meant as a precaution against them running away it worked pretty well, but of course they couldn’t camp in the sky, and it was to the sky that Derpy Hooves was looking – inasmuch as anypony could tell what she was looking at – with a look of fevered anticipation on her face.
They were speaking softly, only Lyra and Bon-Bon could hear her. Neither of them looked too enthusiastic about her idea.
“The griffons will catch you, and if they don’t the shadowbolts will,” Bon-Bon hissed. “Derpy if you try to run they…they’ll kill you.”
“But my girls-“ Derpy began.
“You think you can just go home?” Lyra demanded. “That’s the first place they’ll look.”
“I don’t wanna fight,” Derpy said stubbornly.
“Neither do I, but we have to bide our time,” Lyra said. “We’ll get our chance to make a break for it, but not now.”
“And we can’t bring trouble on Ponyville either,” Bon-Bon added. “Even if we get away we’ll still have to hide out and wait for all of this to blow over.”
“What if it doesn’t?” Derpy asked quietly.
Neither Lyra nor Bon-Bon could offer a reply.
“It will,” Lyra offered, weakly. “It has to. This…it can’t go on forever. This is Equestria, for Celestia’s sake, not the Shattered Kingdoms. Stuff like this doesn’t happen here.”
“But here we are,” Bon-Bon said, her voice tinged with melancholy.
“I have to get out of here,” Derpy said. “I can’t die. I can’t live without seeing my daughters again. I have to get back to them.”
“Don’t do anything stupid,” Lyra insisted. “That’s the last thing they would want.”
A grin spread across Derpy’s face. “Don’t worry about that. Everypony thinks I’m stupid ‘cause of these eyes, but all that means is I see stuff they wouldn’t even think to look at. Whatever I do, they won’t ever see me coming!”
It was time for the sun to set and the for the moon to rise. And that was presenting a few problems.
Sunset scowled up at the blazing orb which, smug in its lofty seat upon the pinnacle of the firmament, beamed down upon her in mockery of her efforts.
She panted. I can do this. I have the power to do this. Mustering all the strength at her command, Sunset stretched her magic forth up into the sky towards the sun. Fall. Fall, curse you.
Nothing happened. The sun remained where it was, untroubled by Sunset’s feeble efforts.
Sunset sighed in frustration. Even if she could lower the wretched sun, what chance she would have the strength left in her to raise the moon? Perhaps she should just leave the world in eternal day for a little while and let it be attributed to her vanity or to colossal hubris.
I might even get a terrifying nickname out of it. Through my failure shall my legend grow, even if it is a legend for villainy and malice. But then, what else can I really expect at this point? I am the villain here, and shall be for many years until the memory of all I was has faded and revisionist scholars dare to suggest I was not so bad after all. At least I shall be remembered. To be forgotten would be worse than infamy.
“Allow me, Sunset,” Princess Celestia’s voice was warm, kind, unconcerned by such trivialities as the battle lines that Sunset had drawn or the war she had begun. Sunset heard the familiar tingling sound of Celestia’s magic, and watched as the sun descended in a graceful arc below the horizon, plunging the world into darkness. A moment later the moon graced the night sky with its presence, putting the twinkle of the stars to shame and turning the blackness to a navigable midnight blue as it shone its silver lamp-light down upon the world.
Sunset did not turn around to look at her old teacher. “You must think I’m pretty pathetic.”
“I think you are only a pony,” Celestia said. “There is no shame in that.”
“And if I was content to crawl through the earth on my belly there would be no shame in my being an earth-worm,” Sunset replied. “Yet I’ll wager there are some worms that would rather be butterflies.”
“A dream that they can never realise, no matter how hard they try,” Celestia said softly. “Perhaps they would be happier learning to be content as earth-worms.”
Sunset turned around, shaking her head. “Though the cocoon will never grow, through the wings will never appear, there is more honour in reaching for a sky that can never be touched than in eating mud until you’ve convinced yourself that it tastes like ambrosia. It may be that my destiny was set in stone the moment you sent me from your side, or perhaps long before, as early as the day that I first drew breath. It may be that all the ill luck and misfortune that have dogged me since are but iterations of the inevitable ruin that awaits me. But if our fates are set then all that matters is how we meet those fates. I choose to meet mine with defiance.”
“Sunset,” Celestia whispered, as she had used to do when Sunset had disappointed her. “Destiny is not set, in fact it is far from certain. We all of us have the opportunity to change our fate-“
“But for some the opportunities are greater than for others?” Sunset asked.
“Yes,” Celestia replied. “But you must understand that it is your actions that condemn you, not some irresistible force driving you on. There is still time to change your fate if you will change your ways.”
Sunset laughed softly. “I am not Luna, Princess, the elements of harmony will not make me whole again. It is too late for me.”
Celestia tilted her head to one side. “You need not have told me any of what you intend, what was done to you. You could have walled yourself away as you walled yourself from your schoolmates as a filly. Yet you confessed. Is that not proof that, deep down, you desire to be other than what you are?”
“I told you everything because…because I could never keep secrets from you,” Sunset answered. “And because…while I’ve never cared what other ponies think of me, I’d like for you to know the truth. And the truth is there is no turning back.”
“There is always the opportunity to turn back,” Celestia insisted.
“I sold my soul to a dark god for a little more pathetic life,” Sunset spat. “My body is a ruin and I can hardly feel it now. My own coat, my own soul, they aren’t mine any more. I scarcely eat for lack of taste upon my tongue. I do not sleep for dreaming of death and slaughter. I touch the fire and I feel nothing all thanks to my black-hearted creditor. And I’m planning to cheat on my bargain.”
Sunset looked down at the ground, kicking her hooves like a petulant filly. “I know that this is not going to end well for me. On that front I have no illusions. But if I can do something worthwhile with my last breath, worthwhile on a cosmic scale, then it will have made everything else, all the suffering I’ve endured, all the suffering I’ve caused, worthwhile.”
Celestia’s horn glowed golden, and for a moment Sunset thought that the Princess meant to strike her down. But, although she was indeed touched by the alicorn magic, it did her no harm. Instead she felt as though a wave of soft water were rippling over her, bathing her in light and warm. Sunset felt her glamours vanishing but she did not care, for this warmth was so soft and comforting that it was like being wrapped in goose down.
Celestia conjured a mirror and held it up to Sunset’s face. “I cannot repair all that you have suffered, but I have done what I can.”
Sunset gasped as her eyes widened. Her scars were gone. On her face, on her back, upon her legs, the welts and visible marks of injury had vanished. She still looked thin, half-starved, malnourished and deprived of sleep, but she no longer looked as though she had reeled from slave-cabin to battlefield to dungeon torture-chamber.
“I recognise myself,” Sunset murmured. She looked at Celestia. “Why?”
Celestia blinked. “I never stopped loving you, Sunset Shimmer. And I never will.”
Sunset said nothing. She did not know what she could possibly say. She had never imagined that Princess Celestia would…how could she say something like that now, after everything Sunset had done? It was…she was…
A tear rolled down Sunsets’s cheek. Soon it was not alone.
Celestia enfolded Sunset within her wings and pressed her neck against Sunset’s cheek as Sunset sobbed into her shoulder.
“Princess…” Sunset murmured as she sobbed.
“I am not my father, Sunset, I swear I will not turn my back on you,” Celestia said. “Please, Sunset, come back to me.”
“I dare not,” Sunset whispered. “The zebras, the diamond dogs, they will destroy me and all Equestria as well the moment they think me weak. I must appear strong. I have to be strong…until I can see this through.”
“You will not need to be strong forever,” Celestia said. “I promise.”
“Just don’t forsake me.”
“Never.”
In the trees, a little way away, Precious Redfang watched the two, her eyes narrowed down to mere slits of red in the darkness. Eventually she spat on the ground in disgust, and turned away, swinging her axe by her side as she did so.
With the night’s darkness now able to enfold them, Dawn’s friends crept towards the outskirts of Sunset’s camp, cloaked in dark stage-hand outfits Candy had borrowed from a theatre. It wasn’t the perfect disguise, but it was the best that they could do on short notice.
Razor held up one hoof and motioned for everypony to stop. They were within a few feet of the circle of watch-fires the zebras had built to beat off the black of night, and if they got any closer now they would be seen.
“This is it,” Razor hissed. “We split up here, just like we planned. Laurel, you’re with me. The rest of you wait until we’ve created a distraction then sneak in when the sentries have all gone to investigate.”
“Got it,” Candy said without hesitation. Hardy and Cherry did not look so keen on the idea.
“Don’t worry,” Razor said reassuringly. “Once you find Dawny you’ll be perfectly safe. We’ll all meet back home and plan how to take our city back. Stay safe and good luck.”
“To all of us,” Hardy muttered. “Don’t do anything stupid.”
Razor grinned. “I will.”
“But I won’t,” Laurel added.
Razor held out one hoof, and the others all placed their hooves together in turn.
“Six against the world,” Razor said. “Let’s do this.”
The circle broke and Razor and Laurel moved off, creeping into the night, low to the ground, until the three that they had left behind had lost all sight of them.
“Six against the world,” Hardy muttered. “Unfortunately there are only five of us.”
“But when we find Dawn, then we’ll be six,” Cherry murmured.
“Let’s hope so,” Hardy replied.
“You worry too much, Hardy. I’ve got a good feeling about tonight,” Cherry said.
“I hope it’s more accurate than the good feeling you had about your one-mare show,” Hardy replied.
“Shh,” Cherry hissed. “I think I can hear something.”
Very soon Hardy could hear it too: the sound of panicked trumpeting and hammer blows falling upon the earth. It sounded as though something was in great distress, but off the top of her head Hardy had no idea what it might be.
“What have they done?” she asked.
“I think they’ve upset the elephants,” Cherry said. “I hope they didn’t hurt them too badly.”
The trumpeting and the trampling sounds only got louder, and were answered by panicked shouts from all across the camp as zebras ran to the sound of the elephants running mad. From all across the camp they streamed, abandoning whatever they were doing, even if that meant abandoning their positions keeping watch. The three mares saw the sentries desert their posts as one, going to join the growing hubbub on the other side of the camp. The fires still burned, but what did that matter when there was no one to see what the fires might illumine.
“We should hurry,” Hardy said. “There’s no telling how long the distraction will last.”
“What’s everypony running around for?” Derpy asked as the camp dissolved into turmoil, with zebras leaping this way and that, pushing the conscripted ponies first from one side, then to the other, dashing in all directions, shouting in panic.
“I don’t know, but I hope they stop soon,” Lyra replied as she was battered first this way, then that by the currents of zebras like a ship tossed on the stormy seas. “Excuse me, can somepony tell us what’s happening? Ugh!” She was pushed to the ground, and it was only Bon-Bon’s speed in dragging her out of the way that saved her from getting trampled by a flood of diamond dogs who looked as though they wouldn’t have seen her and would not have stopped running if they had.
“Are you okay?” Bon-Bon asked.
“Yeah, thanks to you,” Lyra said. “What’s up with them all of a sudden.”
“Maybe it has something to do with that elephant sound. The one that’s getting closer,” Derpy suggested.
Lyra and Bon-Bon looked at one another. They both spoke at once. “Getting…closer?”
With a roar, an enrage elephant erupted out of the darkness, the moonlight shining on its tusks of gilded ivory and its trunk swinging wildly left and right as though it was trying to sweep the ground. The impressed ponies scattered in all directions as the elephant trampled through their section of the camp, bugling in anger as he went.
One swing of his trunk caught a hapless zebra, hurling him up into the sky with a cut-off scream of alarm.
Lyra and Bon-Bon screamed themselves, leaping out of the elephant’s path and clinging to one another as they rolled along the ground. They held one another for a moment, sighing in relief, before Lyra began to look for Derpy.
“Derpy? Are you alright? Derpy?”
She saw her then, silhouetted briefly against the moon before disappearing into the dark.
“Derpy, wait!” Lyra yelled. “Don’t do it! Derpy!”
Derpy turned briefly and waved. “Bye, Lyra. Thanks, Mister Elephant!” She turned around and flew away. She wasn’t going to fight, and she wasn’t going to die. She had to live for her daughters.
Hardy, Candy and Cherry crept through the nearly empty camp. Everypony, it seemed, had gone to try and bring their wayward elephants back under control. That would be good news for them, provided that none of the elephants stampeded to where they were.
“Dawny?” Cherry called out softly. “Dawn, can you hear me? Dawny?”
“I think we could scream our lungs off and no one would hear us over the racket,” Candy said. “HEY, DAWNY WHERE ARE YOU? WE’VE COME TO RESCUE YOU!”
Hardy clamped one hoof around Candy’s mouth. “Are you trying to get us caught?”
“No. And we haven’t been caught so it just proves that we don’t need to whisper,” Candy replied, ripping Hardy’s hoof away.
“Over here!” someone shouted, a stallion, old and a little hoarse.
Candy blinked. “Dawny?”
Hardy rolled her eyes. “Of course that isn’t Breaking Dawn, that’s a stallion.”
“Wow, what a secret to keep from her best friends.”
“Maybe we should see who it is,” Cherry suggested.
“We aren’t here to do miscellaneous good deeds,” Hardy said tersely. “We came here to get Dawn, let’s focus on that.”
“How about you focus on something you can actually accomplish, like getting me out?” the stallion asked. “Come on, I don’t have all night.”
They approached the source of the voice warily. It turned out to be an onyx black alicorn, bound in chains pegged into the ground, secured with manacles locked around his hoofs.
“Another alicorn,” Candy said. “Nopony tell Dawn about this, she’ll be furious.”
“There you are, about time,” the alicorn snapped. “Hurry up and get me out of here.”
“Explain to me why we should do that?” Hardy said. “Aside, of course, from the fact that you’ve been so courteous in asking for our help.”
The alicorn rolled his midnight blue eyes. “Look, I already know that you’re going to let me out, so why can’t we just cut out all of the irrelevant nonsense where I persuade you to let me out and skip to the good bit where you actually let me out of here!”
“How do you know we’re going to free you?” Cherry asked.
He sighed. “This is why I hate linear time. Because I know, okay? I just know. Do you think I’d have let myself get captured if I hadn’t known that somepony would come along to free me, try and keep up.”
Hardy tilted her head to one side. “If I let you out, will you stop talking?”
“What kind of a question is that?” he demanded.
“The one that will get you out of here,” Hardy snapped.
The stallion huffed and puffed, before pouting his lip and settling into an unhappy silence.
“Thank you,” Hardy muttered. She pulled a hairpin out of Cherry’s mane and held it in her mouth as she began to pick the locks on the stallion’s manacles. After a few minutes the shackles popped open and hit the ground with a thud.
“About time,” the stallion said. “Oh, I’m sorry, is it all right if I talk? Can I talk now?”
“I suppose so, though I’d rather you didn’t,” Hardy replied.
The stallion drew himself up, full of affront. “You’ve got no idea who I am, do you?”
“No, and frankly I can’t find it in myself to care. In any case you must forgive us, but we don’t exactly have time to listen to you explain exactly who you are and why we should be awestruck to meet you in the flesh; we have business elsewhere in this delightful camp. Come Cherry, Candy.”
“What’s the point?” the stallion demanded. “You can’t save her. You’ve said it yourself, I’ve seen it, I know you’re thinking it, you know what a fool’s errand it is. Actually, you don’t because you’re all primitive idiots with no conception of the stakes of what you’re involved in but, even within your own small-minded of what’s going on you know that this isn’t going to work. You can’t save Breaking Dawn and even if you could she can’t save Equestria. Only I can do that.”
Hardy blinked, and then her face hardened as she stepped closer towards the dark alicorn. “I’ve no idea who you think you are, but I’m going to give you a piece of advice: if you talk about my friend like that again I’ll alter the shape of your face. If Razor were here she’d have done it already but fortunately, I’m the calm one. Now get out of my sight.”
The onyx alicorn stared at her for a moment, then shook his head. “So small minded,” he murmured, before he spread his wings and took off into the night.
Hardy sighed. “Well, that was a productive waste of time, and speaking of time, we probably don’t have a lot left, so if we’re going to find Dawny let’s do it now.”
“I thought that I heard voices.” The night was illumined by the sun of Princess Celestia’s presence. She glowed, her body radiating light, her graceful presence sufficient to force Cherry and Candy to their knees. “You…you are Breaking Dawn’s friends, aren’t you?”
“We are, Your Majesty,” Hardy said, her voice becoming small and quiet. “Do you know where she is?”
“Is she all right?” Cherry asked.
Celestia smiled. “You came to get her out. How very commendable. I am afraid you cannot leave in the triumph you might have hoped.”
“Why not?” Candy said.
“She isn’t…Dawny isn’t part of this, is she?” Cherry said, her voice and body trembling.
Celestia shook her head. “No, but she is not an ordinary prisoner.” Celestia looked away as the sounds of zebra shouting began to draw closer. Her horn glowed as she levitated an ancient and ornately carved wooden box into Cherry’s hooves. “There is no time to explain properly, but let the brief version suffice: by dark magic, Breaking Dawn has been trapped in this box along with Twilight Sparkle. They cannot be released until they are ready, but nor can they release themselves without somepony on the outside to release the spell. Take the box and get it to Rarity in the Crystal Empire. The spell to release the prisoners when their journey is complete is this:
All your trials are now complete,
You know yourself, a worthy feat,
Return, and your new subjects greet.
“Say it back to me.”
“All your trials are now complete,” Candy parroted. “You know yourself, a worthy feat, Return, and your new subjects greet.”
“Very good,” Celestia said. “You must not forget those words, they are the only way to free Dawn. Go now, and quickly!”
“But what you-“ Cherry began.
“I will be fine here,” Celestia said. “Go! Now!”
They turned and fled, leaving Celestia standing alone as the hue and cry drew nearer to her.
Derpy landed, halfway between Canterlot and Ponyville, and wondered where to go.
It was true, what Lyra and Bon-Bon had said: if she went home now it would be the first place that they would look for her. If she wasn't caught by the zebras still there. They would take her away again, at least, and her daughters might suffer as well.
And yet at the same time the pull of her family came over her like mighty cables bearing her back to them. Ditzy. Amethyst Star. How she wanted to see them again.
What was she supposed to do? Play it safe, and torment herself until she could return to them, or throw the dice and hope for the best? Did she have the right to take risks with her daughters' safety. They were the best things that had ever happened to her, the only things she felt truly proud of in her life, could she abandon them? Could she put them in danger? What a terrible choice to lay before a mailmare.
Derpy heard the flapping of wings nearby, and she looked up in fright, thinking to see a hunting griffon or a shadowbolt, only to see an alicorn as black as onyx descending through the air towards her.
"Ah, yes, you might do," he said, his voice old and a little crusty.
Derpy blinked. "I might do for what?"
"Well, I'm not going to eat you if that's what you're afraid of," the alicorn said. "I require a travelling companion. My...my wife always told me I was more tolerable in company. Plus it has been a long time since I walked the world, I am unsure of where I'm going."
Derpy blinked. "Um...I suppose it's nice of you to offer but-"
"I'm not offering, I'm telling," he said.
"What?"
"What is there to offer, the whole thing is settled. I need a fellow traveller, you are available, ergo - ergo, therefore, ergo - you are coming with me. Chop chop."
Derpy felt as though her head would be spinning if her blood were not boiling with indignation instead. "Listen, who are you?"
"Aeternitas," he declared grandly.
Derpy waited for the rest: Aeternitas, Creator of All Things; Aeternitas, Prince of Canterlot; Aeternitas, the Largest Head in All Equestria. But nothing was forthcoming.
"Am I supposed to know who that is?" Derpy asked.
Aeternitas sighed. "Has nopony in this land been told of me? Has the Alicorn of Time faded from memory? In faith, it is truly said that an ungrateful daughter is as sharp as a serpent's tooth. But in equal truth it matters not, mere worldly vanity, I reject it. I reject it utterly! For I am above such mortal pettiness. And yet it is very rude of them. Yet I care not. But they should not treat me so. But it does not matter to me whether they do or not. In any case, we are wasting time here, we must be off."
"But I haven't said I'm going anywhere with you yet!" Derpy squawked in loud protest. "I...I...I haven't decided where I'm going."
"Where else can you go, but with me?" Aeternitas said. "Equestria is on fire, or soon to be made so. Who can protect you, if not I? Where else might you go?"
"To Ponyville," Derpy murmured. "Back to my daughters."
"Why?"
"What do you mean why?"
"I mean why bother, what does it matter?" Aeternitas said.
"They're my girls, my family," Derpy said. "My only family."
Aeternitas stared at her as though she was an idiot. "This is the root of mortal troubles. This is the root of wickedness: emotion. 'Oh, my family is so important'. 'Oh, I must assuage my injured pride.' 'Oh, I must risk everything for friendship or for love.' Does nopony see? See how worthless are all such things? Family, friendship, pride, vanity, generosity, honesty, loyalty, courage, anger, wrath, all of them irrelevant, all of them doing nothing but clouding the mind and obscuring thought. This is why you must come with me: because only I, purged as I am of such distractions, can think clearly enough to thwart the evils menacing this world. Only I can save it. Do you think your daughters matter in the scheme of things compared to that?"
Derpy smacked him. Her hoof flew through the air and collided with his face. It was like hitting stone, she wanted to cry out in pain, and only the fear of humiliation stopped her.
Aeternitas blinked. "You see? Thoroughly illogical, hence why I did not see it coming. If I had looked ahead then I would have-"
"Shut up!" Derpy snapped. "Just...shut up!"
"I'm getting that a lot tonight."
"Gee, I wonder why?" Derpy asked sarcastically. "My daughters matter to me. They are important to me. As far as I'm concerned they're the most important mares in the whole universe and no amount of you or anypony else talking down to me is ever going to change that!" She took a deep breath. "Now, where are we going?"
"Ah, so you are coming."
"Yes, I'm coming," Derpy shouted. "Because you just said that you could save my girls and that means I can't afford to let you go off on your own and mess it up! And for your information I am not thinking clearly right now, I am thinking with my heart because my head is telling me to run away from you as fast as I can."
"I don't mess things up," Aeternitas said.
Derpy sighed. "Let's just go okay? Where are we going?"
"North," Aeternitas said. "To a town called Buckingham. That's where we need to start. We need to get there before it's too late, or there's no chance at all."
Derpy took a deep breath. "Okay. Buckingham it is then. I hope Amethyst can take care of her little sister for a little longer." She glared at Aeternitas. "A thank you wouldn't go amiss."
"I do not need you to complete my task, only to translate for me sometimes," Aeternitas replied. "You're hardly essential."
"Don't flatter yourself," Derpy said. "You'd be lost without me."