Sunset's Oboe
Chapter 12
Sunset's Oboe
Celestia put one eye to the telescope and observed the military preparations going on around Ponyville.
Sunset’s camp was astir; zebras armed and armoured for war moving this way and that, striking their tents and loading stores onto heavy wagons. Elephants lumbered amongst the zebra masses, griffon mercenaries circled in the air, ponies in glittering caparisons formed into ranks, and Celestia’s brow creased into a frown as she watched a great host of diamond dogs arriving from the north to swell the numbers arrayed against her folk.
“They are coming for us,” Celestia murmured. “Or perhaps it would be better to say that Sunset is coming for me. Oh, Sunset, what has become of you?”
She lifted her eye from the telescope and turned to Catseye and Lancer, who stood with her upon the wall. Lancer’s chest was swathed in bandages, while Catseye kept shuffling her hooves with ill-disguised impatience. Celestia could guess what was on her mind.
“How are the evacuations proceeding?” Celestia asked.
“The last trains haven’t returned from the Crystal Empire yet,” Lancer said. “But the airships are prepared, as you instructed. Although, Your Highness…” He trailed off, and for a moment the only sound upon the parapet was the flapping of the banners in the morning wind.
“You may speak,” Celestia said.
“We have evacuated the children, the sick, the elderly,” Lancer said. “And rightly so, better they be spared the privations of a siege. But…the last ponies to be evacuated, those you have earmarked for the airships: half the guard, the companions of Princess Twilight. Your Highness, with such reduced numbers, and those the populace might look to for strength sent away, I cannot guarantee our ability to defend the city.”
Celestia smiled. “It is good that you have not given up hope, Lancer. I will reveal my plans very soon. I ask only that you trust me a little while longer. Do you trust me, Captain?”
Lancer slammed his hooves upon the battlement as he came to attention. “Of course, Highness.”
“Then trust,” Celestia said calmly. “And find Rarity, Rainbow Dash, Pinkie Pie and Spike and bring them to the throne room along with all your guards who remain in the city. I will join you shortly, and all will be revealed.”
Lancer saluted. “Yes, Princess.” He turned away and, still moving rather stiffly from his injuries, made his way down from the wall and into the city.
How he will protest when he discovers what I have planned for him, Celestia thought. How they will all protest. I only hope that they will not protest my most crucial choice.
Celestia turned her attention to Catseye, still fidgeting as she looked out at the host of Sunset preparing to move against them.
“You have something you wish to say, Catseye?” Celestia asked with an undercurrent of amusement in her voice.
Catseye nodded curtly. “With Your Highness’ permission I would like to take the Night Guard and launch-“
“I am afraid I must deny your request, Captain Catseye,” Celestia interrupted, her voice cutting smoothly across that of the night pony like a river sweeping a bridge aside.
Catseye’s green eyes blazed. “Surely we have a duty to rescue Princess Luna if we can?”
“Nopony would like to see Luna safe more than I,” Celestia replied, allowing a touch of frosty sharpness into her voice. “But she would not want you or any other pony to sacrifice themselves to no purpose upon her account.”
“No purpose?” Catseye snapped, before she remembered to whom she was speaking. “I apologise, Princess, but it won’t be to no purpose. We have superior mobility to anything the enemy has, even their griffons can’t match us in the air. A small force, using hit and run tactics, there’s no way a lumbering host like that one could catch us. We can do better, Highness, let us reform and hit them again, I know we can do it!”
“You do not even know where Luna is being held,” Celestia pointed out.
“I…we…” Catseye’s voice trembled as she wiped at her eyes furiously with one leg. “Please, Princess. I’m her guard, I can’t just leave her out there!”
“This will be small comfort, captain, but I do not think Luna will be ‘out there’ for much longer,” Celestia murmured. “Now, please assemble the councillors and notables and bring them to the throne room. I will be there soon.”
Catseye bowed, then took to wing, leaving Celestia alone upon the wall, with an army determined to destroy her upon one side and a city looking to her for salvation upon the other.
I pray that Sunset is not so far gone that she has forgotten mercy, Celestia thought.
She put any misgivings from her mind. The plan she had devised was the best plan - the only plan that stood any chance of success. Now all she had to do was make the final choice - the crowning choice. Celestia chuckled at how very apt that phrase was for the decision before her.
Rarity. Rainbow Dash. Pinkie Pie. It would fall on one of them. Fluttershy was in the field, by Celestia’s command. Applejack was a prisoner. Twilight, dear Twilight, on whom Celestia had placed so much trust and so many hopes, was imprisoned even more securely than Applejack. It would have been an easier decision if Twilight had been at her side, then she could have placed the burdens upon her back and trusted that her friends would help her bear the weight. But Twilight was beyond her reach for now, and so it was to those same friends that Celestia would have to turn.
Rarity, Rainbow Dash or Pinkie Pie? Each one was admirable in their own way, each was flawed after their own fashion. None was perfect, yet each was wonderful. But which of them was best suited for this charge? Which would be best as the chief prop, and which would be better as a support. Which could lead, and make other ponies follow?
Rainbow was a brave mare; one of the bravest Celestia had ever met. She was bold and headstrong, but at times she was too much so, and Celestia knew from the letters she had received that sometimes Rainbow allowed her sense of her own worth and abilities to blind her to her faults or follies.
Pinkie had a good heart, and Celestia suspected that she was wiser than she let on, but that was just the thing. She appeared silly, even ridiculous, to those who did not know her, and there was little time for her to earn the trust of those who might have to follow the child-like mare. Celestia doubted that Pinkie would be able to lead those who could not see the mare of worth beneath the eccentric exterior that she presented to the world.
It would have to be Rarity. Though she was not nobly born, she had more of grace and poise than any aristocrat in Canterlot, and yet she tempered it with a compassionate heart and a generous spirit. In her manner she was what ponies expected of a leader, certainly more so than her friends. And, though she was not without her flaws, her tendencies to vanity and melodrama, those could be ameliorated with the support of loyal friends more easily than could Rainbow’s lack of caution or Pinkie’s seeming silliness.
Rarity. Celestia recalled her early meetings with her, and in spite of the circumstances the princess smiled. “Who would have imagined?”
She spread her wings and took flight towards the palace.
Virtue walked swiftly through the ranks of his Chevalians, barely responding to any calls of greeting from the ranks. All around him his fellows, the boldest warriors in Chevalia, were making ready to march out: girding their armour on, donning their capes of war and their splendid plumed helmets, and ordinarily he would have saturated in their company after so long an absence. But right now there was only one pony whom he wished to see.
“Glory?” he called. “Our Glory, where are you?”
“I’m behind you, pet,” Glory replied, coming out of her tent dragging a halberd behind her, which dropped on the ground before turning to face Virtue. “Took you long enough to come looking, didn’t it? I’ve been here since last night.”
Virtue turned, a smile spreading across his face and turning his severe features soft as melting butter. “Come here!” he said, pulling Glory into a tight embrace. Like slow dancers they clung to one another; Virtue could feel the warmth of Glory’s cheek against his own.
“It’s wonderful to see you, Glory,” he whispered. “Absolutely marvellous.”
“It’s good to have you back, Virtue,” Glory replied, as they broke off their embrace. Glory Seeker was a tan brown earth pony with an orange mane and sea-blue eyes. Her cutie mark was a high harp, reflecting that she had the desire and skill to win such great renown that songs would be sung of her throughout the great halls of the land.
“How are the troops?” Virtue asked. “They seem in good spirits, did you have any trouble?”
Glory shook her head. “Once I banged a few heads together they got the message. Those zebras though…if they turned their noses up any higher at us their necks would be craning over backwards. I’ll be glad to be rid of them, let me tell you.”
“That may not be as soon as you’d like,” Virtue murmured.
“That doesn’t surprise me,” Glory replied. “What about you? How has Her Most Beautiful and Terrible Majesty Queen Sunset Shimmer, Queen of all She Surveys and proud owner of the biggest head in the nine worlds been treating you?”
“She’s not so bad, our Glory,” Virtue protested.
Glory gave him an old-fashioned look by way of a response.
“What?” Virtue demanded.
“Your gallant sickness is playing up again,” Glory said flatly.
“My what?” Virtue scoffed.
“Your gallant sickness,” Glory repeated herself. “You do this all the time; you can’t see a mare who speaks fairly or acts like a lady but that you want to put on armour and ride out to solve all her problems. Do you call her ma’am?”
“That is merely courtesy-“
“I know exactly what it is,” Glory said. “Listen, you know I love you, but we have to think about the good of Chevalia; and the good of Chevalia is not served by licking the hooves of Sunset Shimmer. We should kill her and be done with it.”
“Not so loud,” Virtue hissed. “In any case, we cannot strike her yet; the time is not yet ripe.”
“Why not?” Glory managed to demand an answer while keeping her voice low. “If you say the word honour then I swear I will-“
“Suppose we did kill her, what then?” Virtue asked. “The spell that holds our people captive is powerful and complex, it would take a unicorn of immense power to undo it, and we have none save Mistress Sunset. She alone can undo the spell she wrought and free our folk, and so we must bow and serve and fight her battles until she does.”
“If she does,” Glory muttered.
“She will,” Virtue replied. “She has no cause to play us false.” Though she would if she knew what we were saying here, he thought.
Glory snorted. “It sickens me to think of our families bound within that egg, hostage to our valour. It enrages me that we must have the kneeling sickness whenever we stand near a barbarian mare who has no birth nor title even in her own land.”
“I know,” Virtue said, deciding not to mention that he was nowhere near as convinced as he had been that these ponies were the barbarians he had thought them. “But what could we do? We had no other way out but the escape that Mistress Sunset offered.”
“I wish you didn’t call her that,” Glory said. “I hear it and I worry that she’s getting her claws in you.”
Virtue smiled. “That’s why I need you here, our Glory, to keep me honest.”
“Virtue! Glory!” Sunset’s voice cut like a knife, peremptory and commanding. “Over here!”
Glory muttered something under her breath as the two of them walked through their camp to where Sunset Shimmer waited for them. She was flanked on her right by Emerald Ray, who had a bandage over his ear from where Miss Applejack had sewn him to the floor, and on the left by a large female diamond dog, clad in armour of ebony, adorned with spikes and set with glistening diamonds.
“I hope I didn’t break up the happy reunion too quickly,” Sunset said, a smirk passing fleetingly across her face. “But the army is moving out soon and I have orders for you. By the way, this is Precious Redfang, the warlord of our new diamond dog allies. Precious, this is Virtuous Fury and Glory Seeker, of my Chevalian followers.”
Virtue blinked. Precious had a face like a wolfhound, with long grey fur and sharp teeth jutting down from under her lips. “You do not look like a Precious.”
“You don’t look very virtuous,” she growled in reply. “And it’s Redfang to the likes of you.”
“Of course it is,” Glory said brightly.
“Emerald Ray is going out to track down those three fillies that escaped during the battle,” Sunset announced.
Virtue frowned. “Is there any need for that, Mistress? They are only foals.”
“I will take no chances,” Sunset declared. “Emerald: bring them back, or don’t, but they will not threaten me.”
Emerald grinned savagely. “I guarantee it.”
“Provided they have neither needle nor thread,” Virtue remarked.
Emerald Ray’s face burned with rage, and for a moment Virtue thought the crystal pony who attack him. Try me, you big brute.
But Emerald controlled himself, stalking away from the other ponies to begin his mission in high dudgeon. Disloyal as it was Virtue hope those three fillies would be all right, they had been quite spirited.
“Glory,” Sunset continued. “You will take the Chevalians and go after a pegasus named Fluttershy. Yellow coat, long, lilac mane, green eyes. Virtue here let her go, and I want her back.”
“We just made a forced march from the coast and now you’re sending us back south again?” Glory demanded.
“Yep,” Sunset said. “And there’s no time to waste, so get moving. I expect she’s gone south towards Appleoosa, hoping to raise the buffalo against me, so try there first.”
Glory glanced at Virtue. If he pushed against this, then so would she. Virtue, in turn, looked at Mistress Sunset.
She knows, Virtue realised, as his blood chills. I don’t know how, but she knows! So she is sending Glory and the rest away to weaken me and squander our strength in a wild goose chase.
Virtue gave a minute shake of his head. This is no moment for defiance. We must walk small now, and be the most loyal servants that ever were. Otherwise, we may lose everything.
Glory bowed her head. “Very well.”
“And of course, that means that you, Virtue, will have the pleasure of accompanying me on to Canterlot,” Sunset concluded. “We move out in one hour.”
Virtue nodded. “As you command, Mistress.”
“Of course,” Sunset said breezily. “Redfang, come.”
They walked away. The sight of the enormous dog hanging off every word of a pony less than half her size would have been amusing in different circumstances.
Glory spat. “Why didn’t you fight that?”
“Because she knows, or at least suspects,” Virtue replied. “We must disarm her suspicion.”
“She knows?” Glory asked. “How could she…a spy?”
“I think not,” Virtue said. “Mistress Sunset has…many powers. She may be able to spy on us.”
“Well that’s comforting,” Glory muttered. She turned to walk back to her tent, leaving Virtue to follow. “So, what’s this about a prisoner you let go?”
Virtue coughed, knowing exactly what Glory would say. “Miss Fluttershy, she, um…she was sweet and mild and gentle; she…struck my heart with guilt. I could not keep her confined.”
Glory sighed. “What did I say? Gallant sickness. What’s she like then? Not a warrior, from what you’ve said.”
“I think she takes care of animals,” Virtue replied.
“Brilliant,” Glory muttered. “Not only a wild goose chase but a pathetic prize at the end of it. Still, I daresay I’ll manage to get hold of her. She’ll probably curl up into a ball as soon as she sees me coming.”
“Be careful, our Glory,” Virtue said. “Don’t take her lightly. She’s stronger than she looks.”
“Don’t worry,” Glory jammed her helmet on her head and grinned widely. “So am I.”
Celestia glided into her study, her eyes resting briefly on some of the pictures hanging on her wall. They ranged from ancient woodcuttings, to antique oil paintings, to photographs, some in black and white and the most recent in colour. It was on a photograph that her gaze lingered now; a picture of herself with Twilight and her friends, taken in that little doughnut shop after the Grand Galloping Gala. Celestia was kneeling down to get into the frame, Twilight’s friends clustering close together so that nopony had any part of them clipped off the edge of the photograph. In spite of the disappointments they had suffered that night, Twilight and her friends all managed to look happy. The incongruity of their slightly battered ballgowns with their surroundings brought a smile to Celestia’s face every time; it did so now, if a smile less broad than was usually the case.
“Come back soon, Twilight,” Celestia murmured. She recalled being told that Dawn had been trapped in the box along with Twilight, and felt a twinge of guilt about it.
Poor Dawn, too proud to either serve or lead, was mixed up in this entirely due to Celestia’s poor judgement. I have not done well by you, have I, Dawn?
Celestia put regret from her mind as she took up quill and ink and walked over to the writing desk in the corner of the room. She wrote out the document hastily, but in an elegant script, then rolled it up and stamped it with her seal. That done, she teleported into the throne room.
When she arrived, appearing in a flash of golden light, she found that her captains had done well in assembling all the necessary ponies. In addition to Pinkie, Rainbow, Rarity and Spike – who were accompanied by Pinkie’s grey-faced and unsmiling sister – they had brought together some of the best of Canterlot’s elite unicorns, her secretaries and scribes, her councillors, her remaining guards and every magnate of commerce remaining in the city. They lined the walls of the throne room, waiting for her appearance, and now that she was there they hung upon her word.
“I apologise for the showiness of my appearance,” Celestia murmured, walking to the base of the royal dais and halting there. She had no need to sit to perform this duty. Indeed, given that it was likely to be some time before she sat the throne again, she had better get used to exercising her hooves.
“By now I trust you are all aware of the situation,” she continued. “A great army marches on Canterlot. Evacuations from the city have been in progress since last night. Airships have been prepared to take you all, and others, out of the city before this hostile army reaches us.” Celestia paused. “I will not be on any of those airships.”
For a moment, the silence could have been shattered by the buzzing of a fly. Then Rainbow Dash said, “If you’re going to stay and fight, Princess, the we want to stay too!”
Celestia smiled. “That does your courage great credit, Rainbow Dash, but I am not staying to fight. I am staying to surrender.”
“Surrender!” Rarity gasped.
“Your Highness,” Lancer protested. “If it is a question of confidence then-“
“This city is not a fortress,” Celestia said, her voice running over his. “I will not subject the citizens to the cruelties of war if I can avoid it. There is a tale the griffons tell, of a griffon who came to a river and saw a great many fish circling lazily in front of him. This griffon took out his oboe and began to play, hoping to entice the fish onto the shore, but not a single one answered his call. So the griffon took a net and threw it into the river, dragging the fish up onto the bank where they lay, flapping and wriggling. ‘It is all very well your dancing now,’ the griffon said. ‘But the time for that was when I was playing my oboe, and then you refused to so much as shake a fin.’ If Canterlot fights then Canterlot will fall, and having fought will receive harsh punishment; I doubt the zebras have forgotten their earlier humiliation here. It is my hope that, if the city surrenders, the ordinary ponies will be treated with greater mercy.” Provided Sunset still remembers mercy.
“But why do you have to stay and surrender too, Princess?” Rainbow asked.
“Because the leader of this army, Sunset Shimmer, is here for me in particular,” Celestia replied. “If she finds me here, then perhaps it will blunt her fury towards the rest of Equestria.”
Rarity frowned. “Princess Celestia, if I may ask: if the city is going to surrender, what is the point of any of us evacuating.”
Celestia smiled. “Just because Canterlot has surrendered, Rarity, does not mean that Equestria is surrendering. You are all here, because I trust you all to continue the struggle for Equestria’s freedom in my absence. Rarity, come forward.”
Rarity stepped out of the crowd, walking slowly towards Celestia with trepidation evident in her step and her expression.
Celestia held out the scroll she had just written. “Bear witness, all of you. I, Celestia, Princess of the Sun and ruler of this land, do by these letters appoint Rarity the unicorn Regent of Equestria and Protector of the Realm, until a princess shall come again.”
"R-regent," Rarity stammered. "But...but Princess Celestia, I don't know how to-"
"You already know how to win love, inspire loyalty, make decisions. All the rest will come in time." Celestia smiled. "You are better than you think you are, Rarity. You will do very well."
Rarity looked down. "I don't-"
"Rarity," Celestia said firmly. "Do you trust me?"
"Of course, Princess."
"Then trust me now," Celestia said. "I place Equestria upon your shoulders. I would not do so if I did not think your back could bear the weight." She looked away from Rarity and swept her gaze up and down the assembled company. "I charge you all to go with your new regent, to follow were she leads, do as she commands, and keep Equestria alive against all hazards. Rainbow Dash, Pinkie Pie, Spike."
"Yes, Princess?" Spike asked.
"No single column can bear an entire ceiling, though it be the greatest prop in the entire state. Rarity will need her friends around her now more than ever. Can I count on you to stay by her side?"
"You got it!" Rainbow said loudly.
"Anything you need, Rarity," said Spike.
"I'd never abandon my friends," chirped Pinkie cheerfully.
Celestia smiled fondly. "I had no doubts. Now, you had all best get aboard the waiting airships. I would like you to put as much distance as possible between you and Canterlot by the time Sunset arrives."
Rarity nodded. "And you, Princess? What will you do?"
Celestia chuckled. "It has been too long since I last saw my errant student. I shall prepare to welcome her home."
Sunset smiled with anticipation as her army mustered in battle array before the gates of Canterlot. Her zebra nobles in their glittering array, her diamond dogs in armour thronged with gems, her mercenaries and reluctant conscripts all deployed before the golden gates, ready for battle.
"What will you do now, Celestia?" Sunset asked. "How will you answer such a force as this? With barred gates and silence?"
No other answer seemed forthcoming. No army sallied forth, no Celestia emerged.
"What do we do now?" Firethorn asked quietly.
"Peg the hostages up outside, they'll come running quick enough," Redfang growled.
"That's barbaric," Virtue snapped.
"War is."
"To barbarians, perhaps," he muttered.
"No wonder Sunset needs my help if her chief captain is such a prissy pony," Redfang jeered.
"I will match my sometimes meagre stock of namesake against your savage fury and we shall see who has still their head when the dust settles!" Virtue snarled.
"Enough!" Sunset yelled. "In answer to your question, Firethorn: I will give Celestia a chance to meet with me. Virtue, deliver the challenge."
Virtue nodded. He picked up a flag of truce between his teeth and carried it towards the silent city. Sunset's army was as quiet as Canterlot, and the only sound was the beating of Virtue's hooves upon the earth.
He stopped before the gate, the walls casting their shadow over him, and planted his flag in the dirt. Then Virtue took his great horn and blew a dolorous note, a solemn sound that echoed unanswered through the still air.
"The Lady Sunset and the Lords of Grevyia are come!" he declared ringingly. "Let all leave this land or yield them up, doing homage to the mistress of the eve."
"He does these things quite well, whatever his faults," Sunset murmured.
"Then make him your herald, for he is too soft to be a soldier," Redfang replied.
There was no answer to the summons. So Virtue trotted closer to the gate until he could strike it with one hoof. The sound boomed like the ringing of a gong.
"Let Princess Celestia come forth," Virtue shouted. "That justice may be done and our grievances addressed."
For a moment: nothing. The with a shudder and a great clanking sound the gates opened and Princess Celestia, uncrowned, unarmed, unarmoured, stepped forth.
Sunset had forgotten how beautiful she was. How fair, how radiant, how full of majesty. She made the kings and warlords Sunset had known pale in memory, fading to mere brutish creatures by comparison. Her mane and tail danced behind her as she walked, unflinching, unafraid, directly towards Sunset.
Virtue barred her way, but at a single glance from Celestia's eyes he cried out in pain and terror, closing his eyes as though they might burn out of his sockets, staggering away from Celestia and collapsing onto the grass.
Celestia ignored him, advancing into the heart of Sunset's host. Sunset saw then that, while she wore no plate nor mail, was barded not for the travails of war, Celestia was armoured in the majesty of princesses, the divinity that hedged a throne and swept all before her like the bow wave of a great galleon splitting the sea in its stately progress.
All cowered before her, and fell back: proud Gevyian lords from houses old in honour, fierce warriors of the deserts and the skies, slobbering diamond dogs, all fell to their knees as they allowed Celestia to pass. Redfang whimpered. The shadowbolts begged forgiveness. The Ponyville conscripts wept with joy. Firethorn cowered behind Sunset. None could stand before the majesty of the sun.
None save Sunset herself. Though her knees longed to bend, her head to bow, she resisted the urge with all the will at her command. It was now or never, if she did not stand as an equal to her teacher now then she never would.
Celestia halted before her, looking down upon her old protégé, something like sorrow in those eyes. When she spoke, it was not with the outrage of a ruler to a conquering warlord but the sternness of a teacher who has received a sub-standard essay.
"Sunset," she said. "I confess that I am disappointed in you."
"Disappointed?" Sunset asked. "Look around you! Look at all that I have done!"
"And yet you have learned nothing," Celestia replied. "Have achieved nothing of permanence. What have you wrought that is not sustained solely by your will? What have you created that will outlast you?"
"The memory of my deeds will live on when I am gone," Sunset declared.
Celestia's gaze lowered. "Indeed, that is what I fear the most. What do you call yourself, Sunset? General, princess, empress?"
"Sunset Shimmer is fine, to you," Sunset said quietly.
Celestia nodded. Then, astonishingly, she knelt. "Then, Sunset Shimmer, on behalf of the city of Canterlot I surrender to you, without condition."
"What?" Sunset yelled, her cry half-strangled by her shock. "You can't do that!"
Celestia smiled. "How wonderful to know that I have not become predictable in old age."
"No, this is not how it is supposed to go," Sunset snapped. "You're supposed to fight, we are supposed to fight: you and me, master and pupil, armoured in finest steel, clashing with magic and with blades; it was supposed to be glorious!"
Celestia looked disappointed. "I did not teach you to be a brawler, Sunset."
"No, I had to learn that on my own."
"Are you so eager to fight even when it is unnecessary?"
"No, I-" Sunset stopped, glowering. "I will not let you control this like one of our tutorials! I wanted to beat you, to humble you! And you're denying me that! You're up to something, aren't you?"
"I had hoped for mercy for the folk of Canterlot," Celestia said.
Sunset glared, but before she could say anything the voice of Shrike, harsh in its triumphant crowing, cut through the army.
"So, the fool has come. I see that you are as vain and arrogant as you are selfish."
Celestia eyed the source of insult with curiosity. "It is...Shrike, isn't it? Luna's-"
"Faithful servant, aye," Shrike boasted.
"Not the term I would have chosen," Celestia murmured with distaste.
There was a thudding sound as Shrike's hoof struck with serpentine speed and slammed into Celestia's face.
"You mock me, as you always mocked me; as you made little of your sister," Shrike snarled. "But Lady Nightmare is safe from you now, witch. I will see to that."
The spell Celestia had cast upon her foes was broken. Zebras and dogs who had a little while ago cringed in fear now whooped in triumph.
"Bind her in chains!" Redfang roared. "Let her be muzzled."
Celestia did not cry out as the threw ropes around her and pulled her to the ground for the amusement of the mob. She said nothing as they put chains around her legs. She just looked into Sunset's eyes, her gaze containing only pity.
Cowards, Sunset thought. They would flee in terror the moment you resisted. This isn't what I wanted. I wanted to defeat you, yes, but to show my superiority, to give this worthless mob a chance to rejoice in your humiliation.
"Shave off her mane! Cut off her tail!" Shrike yelled.
"Yes, yes, give me the shears," Redfang howled ecstatically. "I'm not afraid to show her as she is."
"NO!" Sunset roared, and flames dashed along the ground to surround Celestia, to burn off the ropes, to melt the chains. Several dogs and zebras were burned to ash, and the rest recoiled in panic, howling in fear as they scrambled away.
"I alone have the right to stand in judgement over Celestia!" Sunset shrieked. "I alone! Should you worms touch her again you will answer for it! Virtue!"
Virtue picked himself up off the grass, his expression wary. "Mistress?"
"Assemble a trusted escort, Celestia and Luna will accompany me to the palace."
"No!" it was Shrike's turn to yell. "Lady Nightmare-"
"Is mine, and always was," Sunset said coldly. "All that you have is what I give to you. Remember that."
She turned away, wishing she could ease the disquiet taking root within her soul. She done nearly everything she set to do: Canterlot taken, Celestia a prisoner, Twilight Sparkled out of the way.
So why did she feel so empty inside? Why could she take no pleasure in any of it?
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Hehe, not so sweet a fruit was it, Sunset?
(So glad to see an update, I was beginning to worry.)
I like the Aslan reference with Celestia at the end... Interesting to see it averted by Sunset. And apparently Celestia will be reunited with her sister, so that seems a bright side to things. I also highly approve of the idea of Regent Rarity... Long live the glory of Free Equestria!