Princess Celestia The Changeling Queen: Stories Behind the Mask

by vren55

The History of Equestria Under Alternia Part 10 (589 AR): Aventail Armour and Plum Blossom's March North, Ch. 7 of the Saddle-Arabian War arc

Aventail Amour, in overall command of the Equestrian 2nd and Reserve Divisions, pushed her ponies hard in pursuit of Lancelock. That being said, most of her division was quite tired from the earlier Battle of Bracken Bay, so they left the reconnoitering and vanguard duties to Colonel Red Plum Blossom of the Equestrian Reserve Division.

Being the Reserve Division of the Equestrian Army, The Pegasus Colonel, Red Plum Blossom’s, ponies were green, but they were trained and well suited to their duties. The reason the division was called the “Reserve” division was due to its position in the army, and the fact it was drawn from settlements in Equestria that were too tiny to maintain their own brigade or division for that matter. As such, the individual brigades took the names of the Pillars of Old Equestria for their own, depending on their specializations. With Meadowbrook’s Engineers and The Flash Brigade leading the way in scouting and preparing the road for the rest of the army, Aventail’s forces advanced rapidly.

But Lancelock’s forces advanced even faster, albeit, in greater disorder. The Saddle Arabians simply had longer legs. Although, Red Plum Blossom ordered “Sonambula’s Wings” to harass them and disrupt their supply train, Lancelock’s Saddle Arabians managed to keep ahead of Blossom’s forces.

However, as a result of the harassment and their speed of retreat, the Saddle Arabians had lost much of their armor, equipment, and baggage train by the time they reached General Braydley’s headquarters.

The problem was that even though Braydley hadn’t assembled his whole army, he’d mustered 4,000 of his horses and combined with Lancelocks now 2,000, they had a force of 6,000 horses, and more of Braydley’s 10,000 horses were coming to combine with them.

Fully aware Braydley was going to continue to evade their forces, Aventail and Blossom decided on a simple strategy. Split up and push hard, and push fast.

Plum Blossom took her 6,000 Equestrians on a collision course with Braydley’s concentrated 6,000 horse. Aventail and her 4,000 strong Equestrian 2nd Division dashed past what Braydley had managed to assemble, with the intention to go on a search and destroy mission to disrupt Saddle Arabian lines of communication, and prevent the rest of Braydley’s forces from concentrating.

Not wishing to fight a battle, Braydley continued to retreat, but Aventail had planned for this. As Braydley retreated to the northwest, he found the roads damaged, bridges blown up, and the supply depots he had wanted to use, burnt to the ground. Aventail’s flanking maneuver meant Braydley had to stop and forage for food and supplies.

This bought time for Blossom to catch up and the Equestrian Reserve Division thus confronted Braydley on the plains outside of the city of Saharrah.

Blossom had at her disposal, two thousand earth ponies with ten cannon, two thousand unicorns, and two thousand pegasi. Setting up her earth ponies and their cannon in front, with the unicorns mixed with them, she ordered an bombardment of Braydley’s positions.

Braydley had cannon, but a lack of ammunition. So he decided to engage. Saddle Arabians had a distinct height advantage over the ponies, and he knew that staying at range would just make it easier for the Equestrians to harass and whittle his numbers down. So he ordered a Saddle Arabian cavalry charge.

Six thousand horses with lances set to point forward, thundered at the Equestrians, but in contrast to them, the Equestrians held firm. Cannon fired, repeating crossbows set up on tripods spat out bolts, unicorns launched volleys of spells. But the Saddle Arabian charge still thundered forward.

Too late, did Braydley realize that Blossom had had her engineers set up traps, which had been hidden by the unicorn’s magic. As the Saddle Arabians made contact, they ran into stakes hidden by unicorn magic and earth pony camouflage, as well as pits and ditches. The Saddle Arabian charge was broken, though, it only appeared to be at certain places.

This was completely intentional. The Equestrians planned to counterattack after all. As the Saddle Arabians took advantage of the gaps in the Equestrian traps to rush forward, they were blasted by crossbow-bolts and blasting spells, before charged by earth ponies and unicorns.

To make matters worse, Blossom chose to signal the Equestrian pegasi brigades, the Flash Brigade and the Wings of Sonambula, to attack the Saddle Arabians from the air, dropping a rain of javelins before they started to harass and swarm Braydley’s forces. Outflanked, in disarray, the Saddle Arabians broke and fled.

Braydley had been killed by flanking pegasi who targeted his bodyguard, and so Lancelock took command. He managed to extract about three thousand Saddle Arabians from the debacle, but he left the rest lying dead on the field, or writhing in agony.

In the coming days, his force would keep retreating, attempting to gather and reform with the rest of Braydley’s Coastal Command, but Aventail’s fresh division kept a sword in the Saddle Arabian’s backs and when they were supplemented by Blossom’s still intact reserve division, Lancelock found it near-impossible to reform his command.