Crystal heart

by A pensive Squirrel

Free no more

With the recent disparity between the dragon kind and those equine, it was unusual to see them in synod around the accused Pegasus.

The king had slept in but he refused to say why. Sappheire already knew. It was impolite for her to speak out when he must be outspoken.

He mounted the executioner’s stage and used his magic to steal a tomato from the crowd’s arsenal, a putrid one at that. He hurled the diseased fruit at the disgraced messenger. He sat upon his laurels, affronting of his statesmanship, and plucked some orange rind from Quicksilver’s long face.

“You actually believed you could outfly my squadrons of the sky? I will give you a chance, one chance, to explain yourself, to appeal to my better nature. This is your moment, Quickie. Don’t waste it.”

Salem’s voice was emotionless, as if he didn’t care for the destination of his loyal serf’s soul.

Quicksilver shook the pickling of rotten foodstuffs from his face and tried to flick his sodden mane from his eyes.

“We don’t join, we don’t continue! Our children will be bucking slaves. Our grandchildren will have no chance to learn, no prospect of ever accomplishing anything. This egalitarian frame of mind cannot go on!”

“Do you propose the sisters’ plan is sounder?”

“It will be a struggle at first. A great divide will form between the noblemen and women and the peasantry. But we will live on. Our legacies will be ink on scrolls, and perhaps we won’t be heroes, but we won’t be villains either. That is the smut of comic books, glittery idealisms that drive the sagacity and narcissism of our once great leader!”

“You are here today accused of espionage, providing classified information to our enemies, multiple counts of homicide and to top it all off, you vehemently denied it. How do you plead?”

The sickly looking Pegasus went quiet. He wriggled and squirmed in his bindings like a slimy maggot. To no avail he fought for the cuffs to loosen and the stock to release him. He spat out a wad of mucus and let his head limply hang.

“I’d plead insanity but you have that base covered.”

“How do you plead?”

“With my mouth, bloody moron…”

“Where are my paladins? How do you receive orders? How long have you been lying to me?”

“You won’t find them. They should’ve mind their own, and not dallied in my affairs.”

“You’ve been made, Quicksilver. The jig is up. The people cry execution. The hooded steed has been practising his swing. I am not one to be swayed by public opinion. But today I’m feeling rather vain. The popular choice might be spiffing good fun.”

“This is why she wants this place levelled! You hear him preaching, right? This pit is stuck in the past. There are mechanisms steam driven, assisting peripherals for the disabled, and heavy machining and industry. Just outside those walls, the walls he put around you, is the future!”

Salem could feel the favour of the public leaning right from its leftmost coordinate. He could taste the savagery of the headsman’s axe, whittled by age and dulled by use.

“Your modern swamp is flawed! It may be basic here, and the hygiene may not be as good as it could be, but the model cities and donjons that pollute the once untainted lands of my father’s father are run by companies. They are directed by whoever signs the biggest cheque. Is that progress?”

Salem stumbled over to the executioner. He was slow and his route there was clumsy and meandering. Even when he slept the fatigue wouldn’t lift. He placed his lips near the steed’s large fluffy ear and whispered.

“I have no more words for this waster. Separate his head and body and be done with it.”

“He is yet to give an answer my King. I can’t end a stallion’s life without first knowing his response. Is he guilty, or are you barking up the wrong tree?”

Salem had had enough. This was the straw that broke his back, his back being his pacifism towards his own. With this reserve broken, Salem threw the bulky earth pony against the block and purloined his weighty axe.

“Insolence is no longer tolerated. I have given you all many chances. You will remember that I am the King, the only King in this enclave, and I will not be humiliated by hoof-dragging imbeciles! What say you all, my subjects, what will be the fate of this insubordination?”

Salem saw his daughters in the crowd and his heart grew heavy in his chest. He dropped the axe which took a wedge of the black with it, and held his head in shame.

There was a long silence. No one made a sound, not even a sneeze. Those who could help it didn’t even breathe. The quiet swilled about the courtyard, circumventing the congregation with its eerie kiss.

“Do not forgive me. This has all been too much. One head cannot process all this hate, all this loathing. From here on there will be a government, a system of jurors, magistrates and ministers to spread the weight of responsibility. I will leave this to a vote, to be adjudicated upon completion by my decorated commander.”

Salem left the stage and then cynically stared down the streets that lead to Martingale’s abode. He tucked his chin into his chest and mumbled.

“If he’s awake…”

Salem had exchanged platitudes with gatekeepers and was well on his way to his seat by the pond in his private garden when a huge scaly something landed next to him.

“Sire, you abdicated your throne? Is it official?”

“Worry not, grand dragon. I am becoming more and more susceptible to Luna’s comings and goings. It is better this way. She will overwork herself trying to corrupt the senate, and the many governing bodies. She’ll burn out. I have a plan to catch her.”

“Do tell.”

Ignatius said. His voice was laced with enthusiasm.

“Don’t be upset, but I cannot hinder you with this knowledge. It is my artifice and mine alone. Oh, and call off the search for the wolf’s bane. It wasn’t Luna’s handiwork.”

Ignatius took off to the skies and left Sombra to mull over his options. He put his hooves up on the bench and watched a frog as it leapfrogged across the lily pads in hot pursuit of a fly. Nature was weird. Had the flies not the ability to recognise the amphibious totalitarian world they lived in? How could the rules of the mannered and magnificent be attributed to the short lifespans of insects?

“How would I get her to stay?”

Salem asked the deserted garden. The trellises didn’t honour him with a reply and neither did the daffodils tantalisingly hanging in baskets.

A few solutions reared their fetching heads, but they were probably too ambitious to work. Did she find him attractive? He thought back to one of the first nights of her visiting, she said she wanted the queen gone for more reasons than one. Had she feelings? Had she feelings for someone besides her charming self or her wretched family?

Questions, more questions, they swam around in shawls but now answer was heard. Eventually Salem left his puzzlement in the picturesque pond and set course for the home of Martingale. Not before nabbing a bloom from the hanging baskets, he was missing breakfast every day.

He nearly stopped to think about the use of food as armature on the sculptures of buildings, but he had a drunk to awaken.