Ordeal of the Crystal Princess

by PostNinja

Chapter 4: Concealed Hope

The fact that for the first time in months she was laying on a proper bed didn't bring even a glimmer of joy to Cadance's heart. Sombra had apparently decided to change his approach, so instead of the underground cell, she was now imprisoned in one of the towers of the castle.

Perhaps the monster had just given up in trying to break her will with physical abuse? The alicorn didn't really care. All her thoughts were in the south, in the miles and miles of wasteland between the Crystal Empire and Equestria. Now she knew what had happened to her husband, and the knowledge made Cadance's chest ache in pain.

Somewhere in there Shining Armor was doing what he did best, lead and fight. But not for Equestria, but against it.

Sombra had taken great pleasure in telling her how the former captain of the Royal Guard was now fighting for him against those whom the unicorn had sworn to protect. His mind trapped in a prison of dark magic like the minds of so many other ponies.

Cadance awkwardly rose up from bed, the heavy metal chains wrapped around her wings making any effort of moving both cumbersome and noisy. She walked to the side of the room, to look through the window at the city below and the snowy tundra beyond it.

It wasn't even a proper window really, just a hole in the crystal wall. There was no glass or even bars. She could jump through it if she wanted. But from this height without her wings or magic it would be nothing else than relatively painless way to end her own suffering.

The alicorn was certain that Sombra had intentionally left the window open just to taunt her. To tease her how close yet far away she was from having back her freedom. Even ending her own life would be just admitting that Sombra had broken her will to live and resist him.

Cadance refused to even contemplate from giving him that satisfaction.

She looked up from the depressingly familiar scene of the city below and turned her gaze towards the sky instead. Or at least what little of it she could see. Storm clouds were hanging above the city, circling around it in constant motion. Even from here she could feel the freezing cold wind blowing among them.

Were they some sort of side effect of Sombra's dark magic? She didn't know. The city and it's outskirts were magically protected from the weather, but she had never found out how exactly that worked. There were no unicorns or pegasi here to control the weather like it was done in Equestria.

Cadance sighed and stepped back from the window, trying not to think about her home and how now her husband was being used as a tool to conquer it. There had to be something she could do!

But what hope did she have left? Sombra had sent her here to prove that there was nothing she could do even if she was outside her cell. More Cadance thought about it, more she feared that the unicorn tyrant was right.

Even if she somehow managed to escape outside this room or even the palace and make it to the streets, what could she hope to accomplish by herself with her wings and magic taken from her? In a city filled with slaves who were either reduced to mindless drones by dark magic or were so terrified of their oppressor that they didn't even need to be shackled or guarded?

The alicorn should have felt fortunate that she no longer had to stay in that dark, cold cell. But if anything, she could now feel the dark and oppressing atmosphere that hung in the air and suffocated all hope even more strongly. It made everything seem pointless, foolish resistance of inevitable.

Was it all futile? Would it be easier to just give up? With everything from her husband to her magic taken away from her, the alicorn was starting to feel like there really was no hope.

Suddenly Cadance heard a metallic clank and the sound of something heavy hitting the floor from the doorway, turning just in time to see the metal hatch in the door pulled shut again. After a brief moment of confusion, she looked down and saw an old worn out book now resting on the floor.

For a brief moment the alicorn just stood there, not sure how to react. Her first instinct was to yell to the other side of the door that she wasn't going to play Sombra's games. But somehow this didn't feel like something he would do.

Cadance carefully walked to the book, approaching the worn out tome like it could explode without warning when she would come too close to it.

Since the book didn't do anything suspicious even when she was right next to it, she decided that it probably wasn't a trap of some sort and looked down, reading the title.

"Notes of the royal crystallers: studying the Crystal Heart."

Cadance took a moment to think about that, and then carefully placed her hoof on the book. She flipped it open and skimmed through the first few pages to see it was indeed what the cover said it was. It was real enough, written by some ancient scholar who had lived in the Empire. Or considering that the Crystal Empire had been gone for thousand years, maybe still did.

The alicorn rose her head to look at the door again, deep in thought. Then, Cadance started to smile when she understood what this meant.

Somepony had just given her a book about the one thing Sombra feared. The artifact he had hidden away before his banishment. This couldn't be a trick. The unicorn tyrant was arrogant, but not when it came to Crystal Heart.

Cadance's smile grew wider, the alicorn princess forgetting how sore her limbs were and how exhausted she felt. This meant that someone else hadn't given up hope. Somepony in this castle was actively working against Sombra. And they wanted her to know that.

Which meant that she had at least one ally in this place. If one crystal pony could overcome their terror of Sombra and bring themselves to act against him, surely so could others? If not by themselves, then at least with some help.

She wasn't alone. It wasn't hopeless.

Cadance suddenly felt almost light-hearted, a sense of warmth radiating throughout her body. If Sombra had been in the room to see the alicorn when she rose her head up, even the dark unicorn would have been shocked to see the sudden change in his prisoner. Despite the visible signs of physical abuse and malnutrition, her wings shackled and her horn covered in jagged shards of dark crystal, Cadance was suddenly standing straight with newfound strength in her limbs.

It was probably just her imagination, but for a moment it was like she was suddenly breathing fresh air again after months of what felt like suffocating smoke. Even the room itself felt less dark, shadows shrinking away from the alicorn.

Cadance closed her eyes, moving her hoof on her chest and took a deep breath, breathing out again as she straightened her arm. Then, she repeated the small exercise, opening her eyes again, now feeling calm.

The book had patiently stayed still on the floor through all this with the patience of an inanimate object, so she simply picked it up and walked back to the bed. If somepony had taken the risk of smuggling this book to her, there had to be something in it that could help her.

If nothing else, Cadance felt grateful to her unknown ally. Even if information in this book was worthless if she wasn't holding the Crystal Heart in her own hooves, it still had reminded her of what was important.

She wouldn't give up. She wouldn't allow Sombra to fool her into thinking that he had already won. There was always hope.

---

Why whenever he was so close to a complete victory that he could taste it, something happened and denied it from him?

Sombra sat on his throne, the newest report from the frontlines of his war against Equestria floating in the air in front of him. To his annoyance, things had again went wrong in the most crucial moment.

His forces had been steadily advancing for weeks, Celestia and her subjects unable to stop the advance of his army. Shining Armor's leadership had given his forces much needed initiative and adaptability. He had been relentlessly harassing the Equestrian army for weeks until they were almost at the breaking point. Just one more victory would have finally shattered their resistance and opened the way forward into the deepest parts of Equestria and maybe all the way to Canterlot itself.

But of course something had happened. Shining Armor had been defeated in personal combat by a certain blue pegasus with a very distinct mane. More importantly, his helmet had been damaged during the fight and broken the link between it and the rest of the army. With their central command disrupted, the helmets had not been able to keep the crystal ponies coordinated.

In the end, what should have been a decisive victory had turned into a disorganized retreat. Equestrian forces were far too battered and weakened to capitalize their sudden advantage, but this would give them time to regroup and resupply. It would take weeks to corner them again.

Sombra cursed aloud and with a flash from his horn shredded the report into pieces, gesturing for a cowering servant on the side to clean up the mess. As the frightened crystal pony started collecting the scraps of paper from the floor, the dark unicorn turned his gaze forward, calculating how this setback would affect his plans.

There was really no choice, he would have to leave to the frontlines himself. Shining Armor's helmet had to be repaired if he wanted Cadance's husband to be any use for him in leading the army.

Furthermore, if Celestia had already managed to work through all the trouble he had spent a great deal of time and effort engineering to take place in Canterlot, she would undoubtedly be on her way back as well.

Sombra turned his head to the side towards a heavily armoured pegasus standing next to him, his horn starting to glow again as he issued his command.

"I am leaving. You will be in command, Flash Sentry. Guard the princess and continue fortifying the city. Accelerate the conversion of the prisoners. If anything unprecedented happens, inform me immediately."

The pegasus nodded, the lenses of his helmet glowing more brightly for a brief moment as it implemented Sombra's orders into whatever illusion it was showing to its wearer, so Sentry would act accordingly.

Like Shining Armor, the pegasus was wearing one of the few more sophisticated helmets Sombra had been able to create in the limited time he had available. Ponies under the control of his regular helmets made superb soldiers and almost tireless workforce when it came to physical labour, but they were limited in other duties.

Assured that everything was going to be handled in at least satisfactory manner, the dark unicorn rose up and walked out of the throne room. He pondered for a moment about visiting the princess again, but then thought better of it. Less she knew about what was going on the better.

However, as Sombra walked down the corridor past the silent stares of his helmeted guards and the few unhelmeted servants who cowered in fear and turned their heads down the moment he looked at them, something was bothering him.

What was it? The dark unicorn stopped in middle of the hallway as he tried to make sense of the strange feeling. Something felt wrong. It was like he was being watched.

He turned his head to look around him, but everything was exactly like it should be. The helmeted guards were silently standing in attention, waiting for orders. A single servant was cleaning a window with a dirty rag, but from the way the crystal pony's hooves were trembling, Sombra could tell that she was just barely managing to keep working under his gaze. She was no threat. When he had chosen servants from crystal ponies to work at the castle, he had inspected each one of them make sure they were utterly compliant.

What was this feeling then? A simple spell revealed that the helmets of the guards were in perfect working order, and he could not detect any form of magical spying either. Yet the feeling persisted.

Sombra kept looking around himself for a moment longer and finally sighed, shaking his head and starting to walk down the hallway again. None of his wards or alarms had been triggered, and there was no pony alive who could have worked their way through his dark magic and slip through undetected. He was simply being overcautious.

Yes. Shining Armor's incompetence was an annoying setback, but in the end it mattered very little. Everything else was going exactly as planned. The only possible source of trouble was Cadance, but she was safely locked up in her tower. Without her magic the alicorn princess was harmless.

In all honesty, it would be refreshing to take part in the fighting again. His other projects could wait. What was important now was not to allow Equestria to have any respite from the war of attrition.

Oh, and if he saw her, he would make sure to tear off Rainbow Dash's remaining wing as well.

Comments

[General Soarin]

I have a soft spot for dark...and when you do it right, get that nice psychological feel...oh god you get my attention. And to think I almost missed it...seeing it in the update box and reading it out of curiosity. Author...you have my attention and my favorite.

[gliese581c]

This story really deserves more attention, it's reall well weitten