Title: Derpy's Folly
Pairing: Derpy Hooves/Nightmare Moon
The Queen always won. That was the central tenet of their whole society. Mountains could crumble, seas could rise and the skies could fall, but the Queen always won.
Derpy didn’t open her eyes when the door opened. She heard whoever it was cross the floor and come to a halt on the other side of the curtains. If she had possessed the energy to prise her lids apart, she would have seen their shadow silhouetted against the fabric.
“Majesty?”
The mattress creaked. “Understand, Captain, that if you do not have an exceedingly good reason for entering my chambers without my permission and disturbing my rest, your head will decorate the castle gibbet.”
The voice swallowed audibly. “Indeed, Majesty, but I bring news and you previously stated that if we were to unearth anything about the rebels –”
Derpy’s feathers fluttered in the breeze created by the Queen leaping through the curtains. “What news do you have?” she demanded in a voice close to a snarl.
“Our intelligence agents have reported they will be moving their children in envoy tomorrow. Since we stopped their supply lines their tenacity in their current location is precarious. We believe they will use the old tunnel system from old castle dungeons that runs beneath the forest.”
“You can swear to the truth of this?”
“Yes, Majesty.”
“Good. Rally my forces. We attack tonight. No prisoners. I want an example made of them for the other rebels who already moved out. I suffer no insubordination and I do not spare anypony who defies me – not even children.”
“It shall be done, Majesty.”
The pony departed and the door shut. It took several moments before the curtains moved and Derpy felt the brush of dark feathers against her face.
“Your daughter is among the rebels now, is she not?”
Her breath ought to have caught at the words.
“I do hope you said goodbye when you gave her to them.” The much larger mare sank onto the bed beside Derpy, purring her words almost sultrily. “Did you think I did not know of your plans? I know everything, little pegasus. I knew you had been sent to assassinate me. I knew the rebels’ leader was hoping you could charm your way into my bedchamber. I knew your plan from the very beginning. It simply served my own needs to have you linger in my bed a while before I informed you of your own folly. Then again …”
The shift in weight on the mattress told Derpy the other mare was touching her, but she could not feel it.
“I think you are aware of your own folly now. I do hope you at least came to that conclusion when I snapped your spine. You mortals are so fragile. One simple romp and you’re all broken to pieces.”
Derpy wanted to cry. She wanted to scream. She wanted to leap up and fly away, to warn Applejack and Pinkie Pie to get the foals to safety before it was too late. She wanted to hug Dinky one more time–
“You rebels need to learn what my ponies already do,” Nightmare Moon whispered. She leaned in close, her lips almost touching Derpy’s ear. Vague pressure on either side of her head and the pulse of magic in her ears signalled the Queen’s horn coming to life. “I always finish what I start and I always win.”
Dink–
SNAP!