Wings Against the Sun

by sentinel28a

Prologue: A Taxing Problem

WINGS AGAINST THE SUN

A My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic Fanfiction

By Sentinel 28A

Princess Celestia sat back on the upholstered cushion, listened to the birds chirping outside, and sighed blissfully. It was shaping up to be another wonderful, spring day. She levitated a cup of coffee to her lips, took a deep drink, smacked her lips, and set the coffee down. Yes, it was a good day to be ruler of Equestria.

Then the door crashed open. Celestia winced. She turned and saw that it was Twilight Sparkle, wings spread and eyes wide in panic, and holding a scroll between her teeth. She galloped down the stairs into Celestia’s sitting room, briefly forgot that she now had wings, and leapt the last three stairs. Her wings provided more lift than Twilight was used to, and she glided with a squeak nearly into the table. She just managed to get her hooves under her to slide to a halt short of disaster.

“Good morning, Twilight,” Celestia said.

Twilight tried to say something, realized that she could not talk very well around a mouthful of scroll, and spit it out. Then she realized what a faux pas that was. “Oh, Princess! I’m—I’m so sorry—I know better than that—“

Celestia almost sent the coffee pot Twilight’s way, then realized that a flustered Twilight was better than a caffeine-fueled flustered Twilight. “Calm down, Twilight.” She waited patiently, dabbing at her lips with a napkin. Once Twilight had her breath back, Celestia continued. “Now. What is it?” She glided the scroll towards her.

“Um…Equestria’s broke, Your Highness.”

Celestia stopped midway through opening the scroll. “Broke?”

“Out of money.”

The princess laughed. “You exaggerate. Equestria’s not out of money, that would be quite—“ Then she read the scroll, and paused. After a moment of rereading the scroll, Celestia set it down. “Hm. Well. It does seem that we are a little short of gold, at that.”

“What do we do?”

“Convene Parliament and make some cuts to the budget, I suppose.”

Twilight cocked her head to one side. “Can’t you just—“ Then she caught herself, putting a hoof to brow. “Oh, right.” She remembered: under the terms of the Great Charter of Canterlot, Princess Celestia could not herself make changes to the royal budget. She could propose laws, pass them, pass sentence, send young ponies to near certain doom, and even dismiss Parliament, but she could not change the budget. Only Parliament could do that. This was to put some sort of brake on Celestia’s power, and it was a brake Celestia herself had suggested. Normally Equestria chugged along rather well, with Parliament, Celestia, and Luna operating in harmony. Sometimes, however, there were hiccups, events which the Royal Librarians referred to as “history.”

This, it seemed, was one of them. Running Equestria cost bits, a lot of them, and expenses always seemed to exceed revenue. Ponies paid taxes, and Celestia did her best to keep the budget as balanced as possible, along with a small legion of accountants. Normally, Equestria would be fine this month, but as Celestia read through the scroll again, this was obviously not the case. The realm was not broke, as Twilight said, but it was close. Too close for comfort. The reasons were threefold: repairs to Canterlot after the Changeling Invasion, the royal wedding of Princess Cadance and Shining Armor, and the investiture of Princess Twilight Sparkle. Taken by themselves, any one of the three events would be well within Equestria’s ability to pay for them, but all three was too much. It would take too long to convene Parliament; this matter needed to be taken care of immediately—but Celestia could not simply demand more taxes.

Still, Celestia was not just ruler of Equestria because of her ability to raise the sun. “There are ways around this, Twilight. I am surprised this was not brought to my attention earlier. Who was in charge of drawing up the budget?”

“Duchess Golden Lily, Princess.”

Now it was Celestia’s turn to facehoof. “I am getting old, Twilight. How could I have forgotten?”

“It’s okay, Your Highness.” Twilight smiled to reassure her mentor. “What do you want me to do?”

Celestia returned the smile. “You are so kind. We will have to secure a loan to cover the expenses. This is not that much of a problem. Equestria’s credit is good.”

“Who do we go to? Not the Griffin Kingdom.”

The princess shook her head. “No. One reason why we’re in this fix is because of the need to maintain a larger armed force on the borders with the griffins. A decade ago, this was not necessary, but with the new Emperor, Ironwing…” Celestia sighed again, this time not blissfully. Ironwing was young, headstrong, and made no secret that he would love to expand his holdings, at Equestria’s expense. Relations with the griffins were strained. Not helping matters was Ironwing’s offer to marry Luna to link the royal houses of the two nations together. Luna refused, loudly and angrily. Celestia was expecting a courier with an offer to marry Twilight Sparkle any day now, and wondered what the consequences of that would be. When Luna rebuffed Ironwing, the latter had moved troops to his border. He was wing-rattling, nothing more, but it was just one more thing to deal with.

Celestia realized she had not answered Twilight’s question. “We will have to go to the Iron Bank of Germaneigh, of course.”

“Is that a good idea? Isn’t Germaneigh pretty much right between Equestria and the Griffin Kingdom?”

“Germaneigh has always been neutral. The Griffins owe them more money than we do. I expect no trouble from that quarter. As I said, Equestria’s credit is good, and I will be happy to sweeten the deal.” Celestia rested her head on her forehooves. “I will send Luna.”

“What about the moon?” Twilight asked.

“I can handle the moon for a few days,” Celestia reassured her. “I did it for a thousand years, after all.” She hesitated a moment. “I think I’ll send you as well, Twilight. You could use the experience.”

“Of course, Your Highness. I’ve always wanted to visit Germaneigh anyway. But what about Golden Lily? She’s always dealt directly with the Iron Bank herself in the past, right?”

“That is a problem.” Celestia smiled slowly. “I think I have the solution, though I will need to call on one of your friends, Twilight.”

“They’d be happy to help!” Twilight chirped.

“Don’t agree for them before you know what the mission is, my little pony.” Celestia fixed her with a look. “You may not be fighting Discord or Sombra, but this shall require diplomacy…and diplomacy is one of the most dangerous games of all.”

Author's Note:

I've been in the mood to write some political intrigue lately. This won't be quite as serious as "When Night Falls" or "Blood On the Moon," however--though the comedic elements in this story will lend more to the darker side of humor.

I really need to write one (or two!) more chapters on "When Night Falls" and work on "Top Pony," but when the muse calls, you have to answer. This is somewhat easier to write though, due to the fact that I'm rewriting an existing unpublished fanfic based in a very different universe from MLP. All I need to do is ponify it...

...that's not that hard, is it? Anyhow, this should whet an appetite or two, hopefully.

Comments

[Sonik]

I'd say that for the first chapter, this is leaving me in quite a bit of suspense, as I am curious to see how this story is going to turn out. Good job! I hope to see more of it very soon.

[Beware The Carpenter]

So they blew all their money on extravagant parties and now their almost broke; it's happened before.

Are there like, any stories that have Ponies and Griffens with good political relations?

[sentinel28a]

3021135

I think it's because we haven't seen any protagonist nations for Equestria in MLP. The Griffins get it by default, even though Gilda and Rainbow Dash were friends.

[Beware The Carpenter]

3021405

I think it's because we haven't seen any protagonist nations for Equestria in MLP

Don't you mean antagonist?

[sentinel28a]

3027226

Yes, that's what I meant. I was just testing you.

Actually, no...I can't back that up.