58. Ashes to Ashes
The sun strode through the halls of her temple. To call it a castle was an insult, a trivialization of this altar to the majesty of the ponies’ goddess. Its golden spires and glittering rooftops were unmatched by any other structure in the world, ever since the sun had annihilated the old City of the Moon.
Mortals scurried out of her path, cringing at the sight of her radiance. Tiny tracks of flame followed in her wake, her fiery hoofprints licking the air as she passed. Her skin burned with celestial light. But her heart burned brighter still, rage radiating from her like all the shining stars of night combined.
But the night was gone. The day was her domain. That the worms sought to desecrate it with the blood of her worshippers was inexcusable. They could not possibly understand what they were doing. Her sister might have reminded her of that.
Luna always was the soft one.
She reached the base of the tower at last. She had never once skipped this climb with magic. This tower was the most sacred place in all of Equestria, though few now treated it as such. The coming day would remind them of their places in the world. She placed her hoof upon the first step.
The sun rose.
As she moved up the height of the tower, her skin glowed brighter and brighter. If any mortals dared look upon her now, they would instantly pay with their sight, the fair price for a glimpse of divinity. But the sun wanted more. Sight was not enough. She had restrained herself for far too long. The mortals below would give her their lives, a paltry trade for the fury they had wrought.
At last, she stepped out onto the balcony, the holy sanctum where she ascended every morning to begin the day. The sun inhaled deeply, feeling the air of the world fill her otherworldly lungs. This vessel needed to breathe, a mortal weakness. She frowned. Such was the price for walking the Earth. If she took on her true aspect, the planet would boil away in moments.
Below, covering the grassy fields like a disease, vast formations of mortals marched to the walls of her city. They carried sticks and stones, tiny blades of metal, the pitiful trappings of what they called war. The sun blazed brighter still. These mortals had never seen war.
And after today, none of them would get the chance.
* * *
Atop the wall, Inkpot was trying to bury her fear. Below, the griffons stretched out over the horizon. They were marching toward the city, but there seemed to be no end to their formation in sight. She shot a quick look to her sides, but found no reassurances. The wall was packed with ponies, standing nearly shoulder to shoulder. Guards, mages, pegasi, trained soldiers and militia alike, all standing together in one last defense against the tide of Grypha.
But, thought Inkpot, what could they really do? Ponies had no way to use ranged weapons, aside from the mages, and if the griffons managed to get to the top of the wall and into hoof-range, then they had lost already. Three days of training with the militia were hardly preparation for battle.
The defenders had few arms, and even fewer wore armor. While a pony’s hooves could be fearsome weapons, Inkpot felt rising doubt that she could do anything against a real griffon soldier. Her heart hammered as she swallowed, dreading the next hours more than anything she had ever feared before.
She watched the marching griffons like a convict watching a noose, her eyes wide. “Please,” she whispered, “Princess, please help us.”
* * *
General Shrikefeather held up a claw. Around him, the vast formation ground to a halt. Thousands of griffons stood at attention, their spears and swords pointed up at the skies; clean, sparkling, and thirsty for blood. They were his troops, his crafter’s tools, the brushes with which he would paint the map in Gryphan colors. They were magnificent.
A griffon alighted beside him. The fast-courier, one of many, was the messenger he’d picked to relay orders to the fourth division—the unit of his army responsible for the siege. “Sir,” said the courier, with a salute the general returned. “The mud from all the melting snow is mucking with the trebuchet wheels again, but the crews say the slave teams are pulling them through. We’ve got two dozen ready to fire, whenever you give the signal.”
“Good.” Shrikefeather adjusted his helmet. “We’ll soften the city up for the colonel. But let’s allow them a good look at us, first.” He smiled coldly. “Perhaps they’ll reconsider surrender.”
“Perhaps,” said the courier, doubtfully.
There was a deep, rumbling echo, as if the ground beneath them had turned into thunderclouds. Shrikefeather heard voices cry out in dismay and terror. He looked up, and his mouth opened. “Incredible…”
The sky was bleeding. Red streaks crept forward from all points on the horizon, eating through the blue of noon. It was not the warm color of sunset, but the dark crimson of lifesblood pouring from an artery. Slowly, the blue shrank up behind the sun, until the entire sky was bathed in scarlet.
Shrikefeather squinted straight up, watching the sun in rapture. It dimmed like a lantern low on fuel, coloring as if a red cloth had been placed over it. The general felt a tingle at the base of his spine. And so we come to it at last. His beak broke into a predator’s smile.
“Sir!” The courier’s voice shook. “What… what’s going on?”
The general looked down from the sun to the castle, sitting high on the mountain above them. “It’s beautiful, isn’t it?”
The ground rumbled again, and there was a boom. A massive blast of air flooded out from the direction of the castle, sweeping into the armies of Grypha. The soldiers around Shrikefeather flinched, but the general simply let his head be thrown back. A terrible voice spoke, shaking the air with each syllable.
”I have come upon the Earth, and with my hooves, taken possession.”
A vast column of spinning flames erupted from the tallest tower of the castle, spearing the sky. Shrikefeather’s eyes lit with awe and fierce joy as he watched the inferno climb. “Fire.”
“Yes…” whispered the courier, his eyes wide.
Shrikefeather’s head snapped down. "Fire, you idiot! Fire the trebuchets! Raze it to the ground!”
The courier snapped a salute and took off. The general turned back to watch as the tower of light rose, stretching up toward the sun. He spread his arms. “Come, goddess. Show me what you can do.”
* * *
Inkpot watched, awestruck, as the flames burst upward like an erupting volcano. From her position on the wall, she had a clear view of both sides, but even the countless griffons stretching out before her were less terrifying than the blood-red sky and the tower of fire. Her fellow ponies were all staring slack-jawed at the display.
The army of griffons below was bone-chilling; but staring up at the thunderous signs of a furious deity, all her reasonable fears were washed away by primal terror. This was beyond war, beyond griffons and ponies, beyond mortal comprehension altogether; this was something old and powerful and angry.
“I’ll be damned,” muttered one of the ponies to her right.
The pony directly on her left let out a low moan. “It’s the end of the world,” he whispered.
Inkpot licked her dry lips. So this is how it ends. Not quietly smothered in the darkness, but burned to ashes in the light.
“Look!” The pony on her right was not pointing at the tower, but at the army on the field. Inkpot’s head swiveled back to take in the sight again, and she felt her heart leap into her throat. The trebuchets, brought thousands of miles north from the sandy dunes of their construction, had finally been unleashed. Giant boulders sailed through the air, arcing up, up and over. Inkpot followed with her eyes, watching as a chunk of rock the size of her old house soared straight toward the wall.
The boulder exploded in midair, then the next, then one by one all of them vanished with booms and cracks, raining rubble down onto their heads. “What’s going on?” yelled somepony, as they ducked against the debris.
“It’s the Princess,” breathed Inkpot. “She’s here.”
* * *
The sun flew out of the inferno; a star fallen to earth, riding on a ray of light. She soared over the city and past the wall in moments, reaching out and atomizing the rocks that threatened her temple. A wall of fire trailed behind her, drawn from the vast spiral of flame.
She was on the griffons in seconds. She came to an instant halt in the air, the shock wave of her sudden deceleration booming out over them. The fire rushed around her, carried by momentum into their front ranks. Screams rang through the air as mortals burned. The sun raised her head, and her horn shone blindingly bright. There was a moment of absolute quiet, the intake of breath before a dive, and then she released her fury.
Enormous glowing lines drew out on the earth, stretching from the sun to the far edges of the griffon army like the spokes of a wheel. The mortals who stood upon them looked down in confusion and fear; the ranks dissolved as griffons fought to escape their coming fate. With an eardrum-shattering roar, vast walls of roiling sunfire burst from the ground, reaching up into the air.
And everywhere, griffons died.
The flames rose higher, a burning sacrifice to the sun, a pyre for the sins of generations of mortals. Chaos descended on the ranks of the griffons, as they fought to escape the walls of fire that surrounded them.
One mortal in particular flew high above the rest, shouting to be heard above the cacophony of fire and terror. Still struggling to maintain order, even to the end. The sun’s eyes narrowed. “Shrikefeather,” she thundered. The griffon turned and looked upon her at last, his sight saved by the distance between them. But she could see his face like looking through a telescope, see every feather, every crease, every bead of sweat. She could see his fear.
She focused all her attention on this one mortal, this embodiment of everything she loathed, and the air rumbled with the promise of death. Her horn shone violently again, and the griffon’s wings paused in the air.
“Solashemesh!”
She jerked her head up to catch one brief glimpse of a massive streak of red before it slammed into her. The power she had gathered to destroy the griffons released in a tremendous explosion, flattening everything around it.
“You are mine, Sola!” The giant red dragon’s jaws yawned wide and a blast of fire issued forth.
The sun’s horn flashed, and a boiling stream of sunfire met it in midair. Plasma and fire splashed against each other in a colossal conflagration, and the superheated air burst in another fiery explosion. The goddess and the dragon were thrown back by the force, briefly separated.
The dragon’s face was filled with a fury that nearly matched her own. “I have waited six thousand years for this! Lunalevanah is not here to save you, this time.”
“Merys!” The sun’s face twisted with hatred. Another blast of sunfire arced into existence, and was met again by dragonfire. The flames met at an angle and splashed off around the two foes, searing the air. “You should have died long ago!”
The sun pulsed like a nova, flashing forward and slamming into the dragon with a force that could crack mountains. They tangled in the sky, caught inside a whirling maelstrom of magic and thermonuclear fire, every collision booming through the air like an eruption. Claws the size of trees rent the air, slashing for her throat; jaws as wide as a river snapped closed in bites that could tear her asunder.
Sunfire poured over the dragon’s scales, and he roared in pain. The sun prepared another blast, when the dragon’s tail caught her from the side. The two broke apart once again, reeling from the blows. The dragon’s vast wings beat the air with hurricane force, and he whirled around. His wings thundered as he flew away from her, fleeing for the mountains beyond the city.
The sun pursued, all thoughts of the mortals and their petty armies flushed from her mind by the appearance of the dragon. It had been a long, long time since the last clash of dragons and gods, but she had not forgotten. She would see him ended.
* * *
General Shrikefeather landed on the muddy ground, still breathing heavily. With a long exhalation, he calmed his heart rate. He had looked upon the face of the sun… and survived.
All around him lay his soldiers, thrown down by the shockwaves from the duel between the dragon and the goddess. Slowly, they were clambering back to their feet, shaking themselves off. The smell of scorched flesh dominated the air, the stink of death hovering over them like a smothering blanket. How many hundreds—thousands—of his troops had just died? Too many, to be sure. But not enough to save the city from his scourge.
It took him a minute of searching to find the remaining members of his communications net. The fast-courier responsible for ferrying instructions to his nephew’s command was helping a fellow griffon stand and shake off the shock of what they had all witnessed. The courier noticed the general and snapped a salute.
Shrikefeather returned it. “It’s time.”
“Time?” The courier was shaking. “General, the only hope we have of surviving this battle just ran for the mountains—”
The general cut him off with a claw. “Merys isn’t running, he’s doing his job. I expect you to do yours. Go. Tell the Colonel that the way is clear.”
“Sir.” The courier saluted again, still quivering. His wings beat and he took off, headed south.
Shrikefeather turned to survey the damage. The walls of fire had been reduced to low tracks of flame, but he doubted they would stop burning entirely for a long, long time. He blinked once, then began the search for the rest of his couriers. They would resume the bombardment with the remaining trebuchets while they waited for the Colonel to arrive.
Once he did, the last piece would be in place. And Equestria would finally fall.
* * *
The barrage seemed endless. Boulders sailed through the air, arcing over the walls and crashing into the city beyond. It seemed as if they would never run out. The day went on and on, never changing under the bloodied skies, long into what should have been the peace of night.
Inkpot watched helplessly as the hours wore on and her home slowly collapsed into rubble. Occasionally, a boulder would fall short and hit the wall, killing anypony unfortunate enough to be in its way. Even the great siege engines could do little more than chip away at the walls, but for every volley that harmlessly chipped into the sturdy stone, another six flew past to crush houses and buildings to dust.
Medicos rushed back and forth along the wall-top, carrying those wounded by flying debris to the stairs inside the guard towers. Everypony was yelling, their voices blending with the constant snap-hiss sounds as mages fired spells into the endless horde of griffons below.
“They’re going for the gate!” shouted somepony down the line. Inkpot peered over the crenellations, catching a glimpse of the approaching griffons. Their main force was surging forward, headed for the base of the walls.
Her eyes widened. “Look out!”
Griffons soared up over the wall like demons from hell, their battle-claws and swords gleaming in the blood-red light. They were not wearing armor, or they could not have flown to meet the wall guard, but Inkpot had no protection herself. She stumbled back as the griffons landed, her eyes locked open in terror.
The guards and the braver members of the militia rushed forward, and metal crashed as griffons slashed and ponies drove home their hoof-maces. A foul miasma of sweat and blood filled the air. Inkpot shut her eyes and covered her ears. She’d been crazy to think this was better than hiding in the library.
Somepony shook her. “Hey! Hey, come on!” Inkpot’s eyes opened to find the face of an earth pony with blood splattered across his face. Both of them flinched as a trebuchet fired another boulder into the wall not thirty feet away from them, sending rock shards scattering across the parapet. The soldier shook her again. “If you’re not going to fight, get off the wall!”
She twisted away, trying to curl up and disappear. The soldier growled and pulled her back. “Hey, look at me.” He did not sound unkind. She looked back into his eyes, trying not to see the gore smeared across his muzzle. Her eyes blinked as fast as her breaths. “You’re scared, I know, but you have to get out of the way. You want to help?” Inkpot nodded mutely. “Get down to the gate. Help them shore it up against the rams. Go on.”
Inkpot stood, still blinking. The soldier looked to their left, as more griffons leaped over the wall, then turned back to her. “Go!”
She ran. Inkpot pushed past ponies and griffons, running as fast as she could manage. She slipped in the slick blood that spilled across the stones, nearly losing her footing. A distant boom echoed from the mountains above the city. Ahead, the guard tower was suddenly hit by a trebuchet, the part above the wall shattering into a thousand stones and raining down onto the city below.
The stairs were packed in both directions, as soldiers forced themselves through to reach the wall and medicos pushed through bearing wounded on the way down. Inkpot slipped through behind a pair of ponies carrying a dying pegasus between them. As she emerged into the streets, she paused to catch her breath.
Another rock flew over the wall, smashing through the walls of the tallest building on the other side of the street. The building shook, rumbled, and collapsed in on itself. One of the nurseponies swore. “Doctor Mical’s team was in there! They were triaging the wounded…”
Inkpot turned and ran along the wall, heading for the gate. If the griffons breached it, everything was lost. The only thing she wanted right now was to live as long as she could. Maybe, just maybe, if they kept the gate intact, she’d come out of this alive.
By the time she reached it, the gate was already shuddering under the blows of a battering ram. At least fifty ponies were racing to and fro, bringing material to brace the doors. Inkpot located the one in charge, the only pony wearing armor among them, and ran up to him.
He was yelling instructions to the ponies who were leaning a large wooden spar against the middle. “Down! Move it down! Brace against the point of impact!” He noticed her and turned irritably. “What now?”
“I—” Inkpot’s tongue felt leaden. “How can I help?”
“You with the militia?” He didn’t wait for a response. “I need more material. Wood planks, stones we can pile, anything we can use to make a barricade. If you can’t lift anything useful, bring water for the workers. We’ll be at this for hours, I don’t want anypony collapsing from thirst.” He turned away. “No, move it down!”
Inkpot raced away from the gates, hearing a boom as the ram hit them again. She closed her eyes as she ran. “Please, Princess—”
A crack of thunder rang out above the din of battle, from somewhere far away in the peaks of the Joturs. Inkpot’s prayer died on her lips, and a chill settled in at the base of her spine. Celestia couldn’t help them now. The goddess had battles of her own.
* * *
Fire seared the mountainsides. The sun and the wyrm unleashed elemental destruction unseen since a time before history, two primordial forces of nature locked in an endless battle. Jets of burning gas flashed across the stones of the Joturs. Rocks liquefied and burst; plumes of steam from boiling mountain snow filled the air. They fought on, and on, and on. Time had no meaning to the wyrm or the sun, and the burning skies held no sign of night.
The wyrm unleashed another torrent of fire. The sun flashed, and a shell of light surrounded her. The flames spilled harmlessly around, vanishing into the air. The shell shattered into a million prismatic fragments, which she sent flying toward the wyrm like darts. They plunged into his scales, burying deep into his flesh, but the wyrm kept flying. He slammed into the sun with a crash that shook the snowcapped mountains around them.
The sun flew backward hundreds of meters into the peak of a mountain, smashing completely through it and sending a cascade of ten thousand stones tumbling down the sides. The mountain peak flared, and the falling rocks turned to raining lava. The sun rose from the ruin, her wings opening with a rush of storm wind. Tendrils of boiling plasma coiled around her.
The wyrm landed on the side of another mountain, sinking his claws deep into the rock. He roared, ripping a piece of the planet away, and flew for the sun once again. His enormous muscles strained, and hurled the massive stone through the air.
The tendrils of fire lashed out. The rock melted in an instant, splashing over the sun. She shook it away, uncaring. Her own fire was hotter than any molten stone. A beam of light, focused with enough energy to incinerate a city, shot from her horn.
Roaring, the wyrm dodged, soaring above, and the beam sheared through the mountain like it was soft parchment. The wyrm spat dragonfire down upon her, but it was met by another blast of luminous flames.
Hours passed like minutes. The titans fought, the strength of worldly magic against the celestial power of the gods. The mountains shuddered with every blow, as creation and destruction rent the bloodied skies. The Earth trembled in dread, sole witness to the battle of the wyrm and the sun.
They tangled again, with an impact so strong it blasted apart the face of the mountain below. The wyrm’s claws slipped inside the sun’s guard, and raked along her side as she rolled to avoid them. She felt real, physical pain for the first time in countless centuries. Gnashing her teeth in fury, she unleashed another beam of light.
It caught the wyrm sidelong in the face, searing over his armored scales and across his left eye. With a thunderous roar of pain, the wyrm recoiled. He curled in the air, bringing a claw to his face. His eye was ruined, a charred mass of flesh. The sun felt a flush of triumph, and blasted through the air toward the wyrm’s head.
The wyrm was waiting. Just before she pulled within range of his other eye, his claws lashed out and scored a blow along her flank. The giant claw hooked in her side, and the wyrm followed through, using her own momentum to throw her down into the mountain.
She crashed into the rock, sending up an explosion of snow and steam. As the sun stood, glaring up with inexpressible hatred, her side dripped. Divine blood stained the snow, already crimson in the perpetual red light. The sun roared in challenge, rising up once again to meet the wyrm.
Fire stained the sky.
* * *
Inkpot set down the bucket of water beside the growing line she’d acquired. She dragged her hooves to the other end, looking for an empty one. There were so many…
“Hold on there, Inkpot,” said the supervisor. She’d learned his name was Gingersnap sometime during the past several hours. Behind him, the gates had been reinforced by innumerable bars and stones, and the pile continued to grow. The door still shook, but the griffons wouldn’t break through anytime soon.
She raised her tired head. “Hm?”
“You’ve been doing good work, but you need a break. Take a nap. I don’t want you wandering into the city looking for more water and getting hurt because you’re falling asleep.”
Inkpot blinked and rubbed her eyes. “The trebuchets stopped… what, an hour ago? Two?” She wondered if they’d run out of ammunition, or if the griffons had simply given up. She rather thought the former.
“Yes, but Sisters-only-know how stable the buildings in the city are right now.” Gingersnap patted her shoulder. “Go on, get some rest. You’ve been awake since the siege began.”
And how long ago was that? It felt like it had been days. Perhaps it had, with the sun immobile above them it was impossible to tell. Somehow, miraculously, they still held the wall, though the griffons outside continued to make sporadic attempts to fly over. Pegasi caught any lone stragglers who tried to go high above the reach of the mages, but the battle had worn on for so long already; nopony could fight like this forever.
Inkpot stumbled away, looking for a quiet, shady spot to lay her head. Someplace hidden from the great red eye in the heavens and its baleful glare. She looked down at the red dust beneath her hooves and her shoulders sank.
The light dimmed. Inkpot’s head rose in surprise. She looked up at the sky, but the bloodied sun had vanished behind a wall of clouds. Low clouds, lower than she had ever seen in Canterlot. At the edges, she could see several constant streams of water pouring down like the castle waterfalls. She craned her head back, trying to make sense of it. One of the streams was not like the others. Its waters ran, not clear, but all the colors of the rainbow. Slowly, she realized what she was witnessing.
And then, she surrendered to despair.
* * *
General Shrikefeather floated on a thermal high above the battlefield, looking down at the majestic thing he had wrought. Cloudsdale, the city of pegasi, the home of the world’s weather, Lord Weatherforge’s generous gift, the key to his plans, had risen in the crimson skies above Canterlot.
The capital’s walls were too thick to breach, and the griffons could pound away at her gates until summer came again without breaking through. A simple aerial assault would require his troops to abandon their armor and heavy gear, and the losses would be tremendous, perhaps even fatal to his efforts to hold the land after the campaign had ended. He’d needed a way to get his heavy infantry into Canterlot, a way to let them glide down behind the ponies and take the city.
He had initially presented the idea to his king forty years ago, the first seed of the growing invasion plan. Gryphan engineers had toiled for decades to create the massive device that now powered the city’s movement, a mechanical engine fueled by nothing more than water in the form of clouds. Shifting it north and installing it in the city had been one of his highest priorities after Trellow.
So now, as he watched the culmination of half a century of planning, he let his carefully maintained aloofness fall at last. With a grin, he held out his arms and spread his talons. He threw back his head and laughed.
From his lofty position, he could see the thousands of troops commanded by the Colonel pouring from the sides of the city down onto Canterlot. Nearly half his army was there, more than enough to purge the capital. Shrikefeather felt a pang of regret that he was not the one leading them. Trellow had been the last time in decades that he had personally taken part in battle, and it had merely whet his appetite. But he’d decided it safer to remain in command of the first half of his army, those he had positioned outside Canterlot to deal with—
The sound of a horn broke the air, a clear clarion he recognized from the beginning of his campaign. Whitetail’s horn was joined by another, a lower-pitched echo that reverberated warmly through the skies. Shrikefeather whirled with savage joy.
“She arrives at last! And she brings Norhart with her. She has gathered all my enemies, and brought them to me to die.” Shrikefeather breathed in deeply in anticipation. He would make a monument of this day, an altar to Grypha’s might that would stand in the minds of all the world for an era.
“Come, then, Firemane! Come, and I will grant you death!”
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jobs a good un
Holy shit, son. Wow. Dude, for real, this is intense. I just told a friend of mine that this is one of the best in the fandom, and I meant it. Dude, great work.
Quite.
There are no words.
DY-NO-MITE!
Sorry, I just had to, it was too epic for anything else...
Whoops. Hit the wrong button. Anyway, slightly spoilery warning that the next few chapters are going to get rather dark.
Oh dear god, that fight between Celestia and the dragon is almost too epic.
Celestia just went full racist.
...what? He moved Cloudsdale? Are you serious? That is the great advantage? Have you any idea how little sense this makes? I need for you to explain to me how this is a brilliant move. There's no way moving an entire city is better than just sending the forces in by air. Run the bucking math; if you have (just to estimate) 500 pegasi defending the city, then 5,000 flying griffons (or however many he's got) should do the exact same thing as a flying city with fewer resources and results that are not different in any way. Why fly a city over the wall when there is no physical way that the pegasi could form a cordon against so many numbers? Aerial combat is 3-dimensional, and you can't tell me that the griffons not directly fighting the pegasi can't fly over the defending pegasi in the first place.
This. Strategy. Makes. No. Tactical. Or. Strategic. Sense.
If the rest of this story hadn't been so good, I'd call shenanigans and say the whole thing just got ruined for me. It certainly killed my pleasure with the Celestia/Merys duel. Luna be damned, I waited all that time in anticipation of this?
But, this glaring stumble aside, the duel is very interesting and it's nice to see Inkpot not be soldier material. It greatly saddens me that I won't be concluding this story today.
4914295
I think the advantage is that Cloudsdale is like a a series of giant flying platforms, acting as elevators and flying barges to hold a lot of griffins. It's already explained that they want to assault the city with their heavy gear and armor, and that dropping it to fly over the walls would mean too many deaths to hold the capital afterwards. With Cloudsdale, they can nullify that disadvantage.
THIS IS IT
!