Steel.

by Petrichord

Round and Round

Spike and Bookworm were having lunch when Ember demonstrated how it is possible, without an imposing build or a bulky outfit, to barge into a dining room with all of the elegance of an enraged manticore.

“Bookworm.” Ember spat. A spiderweb of tiny cracks blossomed over the half-eaten crystapple in her hand.

Bookworm jerked his arm back from a bowl of gems as he spun to face her. “Yes, Your Majesty?”

Ember’s shoulders slumped as she exhaled like a deflating balloon. “Nothing, it’s...nothing. Don’t worry about it. How many points do you have?”

“Oh!” Bookworm grabbed his notepad off of the table, flicked it open and began rummaging through the pages. “...Twenty-three, Your Majesty.”

Ember’s shoulders slumped a little further down. “Good. Did you make a list of our commodities?”

“Yeah. It should be finished soon. Spike’s been helping me with the estimates. You wanted numbers to go along with the list, right? Because he’s been really good at those.”

“I didn’t-”

Ember turned towards Spike, who grinned at her. He probably didn’t even realize that he was jeopardizing her authority, again. Maybe it was “A Pony Thing” to have an utter disregard of tact while trying to help out others, or maybe Spike really was that dense. Quietly, Ember hoped that it was the former.

“Didn’t what?” Spike interrupted.

“...I didn’t ask for number estimates, but I probably should have. Thanks for reminding us, Spike. Bookworm?” Ember nodded at the skinnier drake. “Finish the estimates, then you can have the rest of the day off. I’ll take care of any bookkeeping stuff if I have to.”

“Are you sure?”

“Absolutely. Are you done with lunch?”

“Yes!” Bookworm stumbled slightly as he rose from his dining chair. “I’ll get right on that, but…”

“But?”

“Can I use the bathroom first?”

“Sure. Go for it.” Ember sloughed into a chair next to the one Bookworm had vacated, and held out a limp arm towards him. “Your notepad? I want to look this over.”

“Oh! Uh...sure!” Bookworm replied, awkwardly thrusting the notepad into her paw before skittering out of the room. Ember waited until he had turned a corner and disappeared from view before groaning and slamming her head against the table.

“Um...is everything okay?” Spike asked.

“No. Everything isn’t.” Ember lifted her head, rubbed her eyes and stared at a nondescript patch of wall. “So. You guys have princesses, right?”

“Yeah! Princess Celestia, Princess Luna-”

“I get it. So, if instead of calling her “Princess Celestia” or whatever, if you called her, uh…’Ugly Fartsniffer Celestia,’ that wouldn’t be really polite, right?”

The question hung in the air for a couple of seconds, stale and unappetizing.

“...Do you not like Princess Celestia for some reason?” Spike replied.

Ember groaned and turned towards Spike. “Your princesses are fine. I’m not talking about them. But that wouldn’t be a nice thing to call them, right?”

Once again, the question hung. A fly buzzed out of the mouth of the chamber, towards where the two of them sat. An irrational wave of spite surged up Ember’s spine, and she spat a gout of flame at the insect, then returned her gaze to the wall as the fly’s ashes drifted slowly to the ground.

“Why did your dad say something mean to you?”

Ember’s gaze snapped back to Spike. “Who said it was my dad?”

“Bookworm said it was on your schedule. R-right?” Spike wavered.

“Oh. Right. I guess.” Ember sighed. “Spike, what does the word “commander” mean to you?”

“Um.” Spike furrowed his brow and rested his chin between his thumb and index finger, as if he was thinking really, really hard about the question. Given that it was Spike, Ember found it impossible to tell how hard that really was.

“It’s not supposed to be a hard question, Spike.”

“I guess like a general? Like, of a huge army? The one guy at the top that everybody trusts, who’s got a strong bearing and a fancy hat and everything?”

Ember chewed on her lip. “You know, that actually sounds kind of cool.”

“It’s supposed to be cool! It’s a really big honor!” Spike puffed out his chest, saw Ember’s expression and promptly deflated. “But I’m guessing that’s not what it means to a dragon, huh.”

“It means “One who commands.” Like, that’s it. The dragon that gives orders.” Ember sighed and laid her head on the table. “It doesn’t mean you’re worthy of respect, it doesn’t mean you’re awesome, it doesn’t mean that anydragon looks up to you. It means they do what you say because they have to, but all things considered they’d rather you just dropped dead.” Ember turned to catch Spike’s gaze, and her throat hitched. “It...it isn’t what I wanted to be.”

“Wait, your dad said that about you?”

“I mean, what should have I expected? A medal and a solid gold statue? That’d be stupid. This is stupid. Emotions are stupid.” Ember pushed herself off of the table, sat up straight and flicked the notepad open with her thumb. It was easier to avoid looking Spike in the eyes when she was pouring through rows of objects and numbers, sorted with the care of an amateur and written with the neatness of a practiced scribe.

Perhaps she was a terrible ruler, but at least she was decent at giving a lukewarm shoulder. Spike didn’t interrupt her for fifteen seconds, and his reiterated question was phrased at least slightly less childishly this time.

“...What did you do? To make him angry, I mean. What happened?”

Barely tilting her head upwards, Ember tossed him the cracked half of the crystapple. “Take a bite.”

Spike sunk his teeth into the crystapple.Then he bit into it again, and again, and in a matter of seconds he had utterly devoured the crystal, cracks and all.

“That, uh...did you like it?” Ember probed.

“Yeah!” Spike beamed. “That was amazing! Like, it was juicy, but still really crystal-y. But really sweet! It was like the best kind of-”

“Like pony food and dragon food mixed together?” Ember arched an eyebrow.

“Yeah, but in the best possible way! Like, I dunno, I think even Twilight might like this! And Rarity! And Everypony!”

“They might need better teeth for that. And stronger stomachs.”

“It could still work! Like, maybe if you made it a little softer and more pony-like, I bet it’d be the most popular thing ever! Come on, Ember, I know you like this idea!”

“I do?”

“Yeah! I mean, why else would you be smiling?”

“I’m…” Ember reached up with her now crystapple-free hand and touched her jaw. Huh. She was smiling. How had that happened? “I...I’m still not as optimistic as you, I guess. Like, what if trying to give some to your friends in Ponyville made them sick?”

“That doesn’t mean they won’t try it. What’s the worst that could happen?”

“Oh, that’s easy,” Ember sighed. “I poison them by accident. They think it was on purpose, and try and make some sort of “sanctions” against us. Whatever it is ponies do.” Ember set the notepad down and arched her hand against the table’s surface, crudely imitating a four-legged creature. “So then they come over to us and say“oh! Poppycock! I’m a pretty pastel princess and, um, and we’re not going to allow you over anymore! In fact, you have to move far, far away, because I’m a pretty princess and all of you are a bunch of filthy, animalistic, rock-dwelling-”

Ember’s other hand bunched up in a fist and crushed her first hand against the table. Pain shot up Ember’s arm, and she did her best not to wince. Spike gasped and recoiled, and a small, perverse part of Ember took pride in getting her point across.

“...Yeah. Then they fight, and then everyone loses, some more than others, the end.” Ember unfolded her hands and stared at her palms, as if expecting to see a set of instructions written on them. “So that’s the worst possible thing. Not saying it’ll happen, but.”

“I mean...It won’t happen. It couldn’t.” Spike mumbled.

“Why not?”

“Because we’d understand that it was an accident. That you weren’t trying to do anything bad to us, and that you wanted to do something good. Because you’re you, right? You’re my friend. That’s how friendships work.”

“Yeah, but that’s not how dragons work. You’re not a pony, Spike. You’re one of us.” Ember stood up and stretched, wings splayed in an alular yawn. “And not understanding accidents and doing bad things is what dragons do. Sorry to burst your bubble.”

Spike’s face fell. Ember stared at Spike, blinked, then reached across the table to pat his shoulder.

“Hey, Spike? You’re not a bad guy, okay?”

Face unchanging, Spike nodded.

“...Uh. Okay. I’m gonna head over to my cave and check over the figures again. Just to make sure everything adds up, so...you can hang around with Bookworm or whatever, okay? I’ll probably be done in an hour, and I’m gonna check up on Clump after that. You can tag along for that visit if you want, too.”

Pivoting on her heel and trying to ignore the faint throbbing in her hand, Ember walked out. Images of Clump and Clump’s ruined hand snuck into her brain, and right behind them were images of Garble’s-

No. No, she wasn’t thinking of that. She was thinking of statistics and figures, that was all. That, and being a good dragon later. And helping Spike, and helping Equestria, and helping all of dragonkind. Good things.

Because she would be a good leader, and do the things that had to be done.

Comments

[FanOfMostEverything]

I see embracing the worst-case scenario as thiugh it were the only possibility is a species-wide trait. Hopefully Ember can recognize that her foreign allies aren't dragons... though that doesn't change the fact that her subjects still are.