//------------------------------//
// Holding out 
// Story: Crystal heart 
// by A pensive Squirrel 
//------------------------------//

All but tranquillity ebbed through the mountainside citadel. The welcoming balcony of Luna begged for company. Celestia landed before the pair of gold-clad sentries and ruffled a wing or two. The density of Canterlot security had increased by a factor of umpteen.

Usually the Valkyries would only dare linger in the becalming night if there was threat of air assault, be it by griffon, dragon, or perhaps even a breezy assailment. Luna was usually at the lip of the balcony, broodily counting the heavenly bodies that danced above. She was not there tonight.

“What’s the crisis? Sister…?”

Luna turned but looked away as soon as she met the lordly countenance of her older sister, her superior in every contest.

In her hooves, clamped tightly, so much so the parchment had crinkled and the ink had smudged, was an official-looking letter. The scroll was waxed in the insignia of the Diamond Kingdom. The tocsin of the inscription was well heard. Celestia beckoned for her brother at once.

Not a breath could be taken before Empyrean collided with the mitred contemporary art plastered wall. With seeming servility, the frantic emperor scrambled from the ruins of art and bowed pathetically to his sisters. Luna was quiet. Celestia laughed so loudly the citadel might’ve woken from its sleep.

Along with the lumpish sibling, a detachment of his metallic army blundered through the room.

Celestia bit the bullet. She snatched the scroll away and unfolded its screwed pages. She would never ask for anything.

“What’s this, Luna? I thought we had the dragon mail on lockdown. How in my name did this manage to slip under our radar?”

“It proved difficult to doctor every piece of sent post. Not through lack of trying…”

“Where was this found?”

Celestia grilled. She shafted the unfurled message into Luna’s snout and asked again.

“It has been weeks, months, and you have not managed to stop the rudimentary exchanges of dragons? How can I trust you? Where was it found? Who found it? Do you know who the intended recipient was?”

Luna receded into the corner of her room, lifting her hooves up over the sullied frames as she tried to become small and untouchable next to her window.

She shivered there for a while until she could bear it no longer. Celestia crushed the frivolous furniture underfoot and stared deeply into the fear dilated eyes of her sister.

“Was it found close, close to here? Has this been happening under my nose? It mentions rebellion. We should have killed that insufferable king! Ellie! Since you have been so accommodating thus far, the populous of his state have faith in you. Drive up the number of stallions per patrol. Crackdown on anything that looks even the slightest bit fishy…”

“And sister, what would you like me to do?”

Celestia snarled as Luna broke her thought process, snapped it in two. She squashed her head up against the panelling and flicked nastily at her horn.

“You will enter Salem’s grotty, syphilitic mind again, and this time you will warn him that his uprising will be for nought. Offer him one last opportunity to give in and just play ball. But if he contradicts our clemency, or contravenes my pride once more, I will quit pacifying Ellie and let him do whatever he wants. He is quite imaginative.”

Luna nodded furiously and set about her task at the double. She vanished from sight, her room left in tatters.