Chapter 17: Form of Honor
Starlight Glimmer was unsurprised to see a scroll waiting for her when she rose. She had slept longer than she probably should have—long enough that she could hear the distant shouts of the tournament. She had been so happy to hear the tournament wouldn’t involve any dead, as the ancient stories of griffons recorded. But there was a greater atrocity hidden in plain sight.
And it was her fault.
Starlight Glimmer didn’t want to get up. But she had put things off long enough. She had to read the Crown’s orders. Equestria might suffer even more if she failed. She shrugged the blankets off, flopping to the floor and dragging herself to the desk. Here the little glowing crystals had facilitated the delivery of this message—more convenient than feeding and caring for a pet dragon as Twilight Sparkle did.
The scroll was actually two—the inner message was sealed with thick wax and the mark of the two sisters. The outer message was simple paper, and had Celestia’s own hoofwriting upon it.
You and every other pony in New Scythia are to return to Equestria immediately. The Stalwart Stratus will arrive in two days to pick you up. On that day, deliver this message to the emperor. It is our ultimatum requiring the immediate release of every pony currently in captivity. Do not open it.
The writing was so densely packed that Starlight had trouble reading it—an obvious sign of Celestia’s emotions when she’d written it. As if the lack of greeting and terse tones hadn’t been enough.
“Well, I guess that’s the end of my diplomatic career,” Starlight muttered to her empty room. “Always wondered if I’d find a way to screw things up worse than Our Town. Turns out I can, yaaaay.” She reached down, opening one of the books on her shelf. It wasn’t a book at all, but a simple safe. She secured the sealed scroll inside it, then burned Celestia’s orders in a flash of flame from her horn.
The old her probably would’ve done something insane right now, like researching time-travel spells. She probably would’ve tried to go back in time and prevent this mistake from ever happening, or something else equally crazy. But her time with Princess Twilight had healed most of that. The old Starlight was dead now. She would have to make do with the world she had accidentally created.
Guess I won’t get to give Velar that tour of Canterlot I promised.
It seemed like a bad idea to completely sever diplomatic ties over this—but considering Starlight’s council was at least part of the reason they were in this position in the first place, she didn’t feel bold enough to raise any objections. Obviously everything she thought about the griffons was suspect. She’d been taken in by their apparent nobility and kind words. She’d let herself forget just how barbaric and backward they could be.
Celestia hadn’t been specific with Equestria’s demands. She didn’t even seem to want Starlight to know what they were planning. That also meant she wouldn’t be able to negotiate with the emperor when she delivered the scroll. Her last official act for Equestria would be as a messenger.
It took Starlight a few hours to visit everypony in New Scythia. Many of them were out on their weather shifts, and were surprised to be met with a unicorn flying through the air. But the time for subtlety was over—they had to know.
“Keep doing what you’re doing, and don’t tell anypony,” she said. “We don’t want them to be able to stop us. Be ready to leave at dawn in two days.” She extracted promises of secrecy from each pony, then returned to make her own preparations. It wasn’t even dark by the time she was finished.
Two days left here. I should probably say goodbye to Velar. But how could she do that without clueing him in to the upcoming withdrawal? For that matter, she probably shouldn’t be hiding for the rest of the tournament. It was a three-day affair, and he’d suggested that the most interesting things happened at the end. He’s clueless, but the emperor isn’t. He might suspect something is about to happen.
The emperor had been nothing but honorable from the first days of this treaty—except for manipulating her to effectively nullify part of the accord. Presumably he wouldn’t try to trap them here. But Celestia obviously thought there was a possibility something might go wrong—she wanted to give the griffons no chance to react until they moved.
I need to go back to the tournament.
Starlight Glimmer rose at the ordinary hour the next day, prepared herself with one of the formal gowns, and arrived at the imperial palace at the same time as she had during the first day of the tournament.
The guards at the steps straightened and announced her to the court as they always did—though there was nothing actually in session. She found the morning meal just ending in the great hall. The royal couple were gone, but Velar was there, engrossed in conversation with some of his guards.
They were talking about the tournament, rehashing some of the most exciting fights from the day before. Starlight might’ve been curious to hear about them, if it weren’t for all the other things weighing her down.
Velar looked up as she approached, waving eagerly with one wing. “Starlight! I didn’t think we’d see you for the rest of the tournament.”
She nodded uneasily, making her way over. She didn’t actually sit down. “I wasn’t sure you were going to see me either.” She was silent for another few moments, before adding, “You said it got more exciting on the last day, didn’t you?”
Velar nodded eagerly. “It does! Normally the crown has all kinds of exciting events planned—sea battles and cannons and sometimes even Voidsteel. But not so much this year.” He sighed. “We’ve been worried about getting the crops in, just like everyone else. So there won’t be anything crazy today.”
He went on, explaining more about the rules. Starlight no longer cared enough to learn them, so she smiled and nodded and tried to seem like she was interested. It probably worked well enough that he wouldn’t think about it. Velar loved to hear himself talk.
An hour later and they were back in the royal box for the last day of competition. The huge crowds of slaves down at the bottom were gone, replaced by maybe a dozen competitors in all. The combat grounds had been redrawn to have a single arena, with large racks of weapons and armor on either side.
“Those are practice-weapons,” Velar said, his voice a little worried. He still wanted her to enjoy herself. You stupid, innocent bird. You have no idea what’s coming.
But did she? For all Starlight knew, Celestia was declaring war on the birds for their deception. Unlikely, but… it might happen. If I was going to try and fight them, I’d do it after they already spent most of their resources farming. I’d wait for them to spread out and decentralize. Then I’d pick one house and ally with it, and use that to wipe out the others.
But nothing in the letter had suggested an actual war was going to happen. They’re not going to give up their slaves for nothing. They took a huge risk tricking us this way.
Then she had another thought, more frightening. They must’ve realized what we would think. Are they prepared to fight? Starlight Glimmer suddenly felt as though they were about to learn if any of her diplomacy had been effective. If the Accipians had managed to sneak their weapons into Equestria, she would be the first one they used them on. And I’d deserve it.
“There are guns down there,” Starlight said, pointing with her horn. “I can see them… there’s a whole rack. You aren’t supposed to have guns.” She probably sounded more accusatory than she should’ve been, because Velar put up his claws defensively as she said it.
“Hey, relax. Those aren’t real. They’re just shaped like guns, because lots of birds don’t know how to fight with anything else anymore. The bayonets are why birds sometimes pick them, that’s all.”
“Oh.” Starlight relaxed into her seat. I still trust him, after he lied to me. Why is that? “They don’t seem very useful compared to all those other choices.”
“Well… it’s about training,” Velar said. “When a slave picks one of the rifles instead of something that seems more dangerous, it usually means they’re trying to win a military contract. Even if they don’t win the tournament, someone who looks like they know their way around a rifle has a better chance than a bird who’s an expert with a sword. Swords are mostly for show these days—officer’s weapons. They won’t be worth nearly as much to the recruiters.”
As they spoke, the first pair was selecting their weapons and armor. The weapons areas were divided by a large curtain down the middle—neither one could see what the other was choosing, even as the audience could. Starlight could see both of the contestants seemed to be judging the audience reactions as they approached each weapon. That was too close to cheating for her taste, but none of the judges stopped them. Velar’s intense interest suggested this gamble was as much a part of the event as the fighting that would follow.
In the end, a heavily armored minotaur wielding a spikeless flail entered on one side, and a griffon wearing only leather barding and one of the rifles strode in on the other.
Velar hissed in disappointment, shaking his head. “That’s too bad. I was betting on Gallard to win.”
Starlight’s eyebrows went up. It didn’t matter that this tournament was unimportant to her—it didn’t matter that tomorrow her whole world would be turned on its head. And probably Equestria with it.
“How do you know?” She stared down at the stadium, but it seemed like the audience agreed. There was general booing from the Vengeance side of the stadium—the griffon was wearing Vengeance colors.
Velar leaned closer to her, though there was a little annoyance to his tone. As though he were explaining something obvious. “The rifles don’t work. That’s basically an unbalanced polearm with a blunted blade. Minotaurs already have superior reach on every other creature, and better leverage. Basically the only way to beat them is to beat them down with something blunted. Or to bleed them, but… it’s a blunted blade.” He shook his head. “Gallard’s finished. What was he thinking picking the rifle?” His claws crushed the little cup of popcorn he’d been holding, spilling it on the ground all around him. “He was so clever in the qualifiers. I was really hoping to offer him a guard contract.”
A voice boomed out from below, deep and reverberating. Impressively loud for someone without magic. The minotaur. “This pathetic challenger is no threat to me—I will allow him a second.”
The whole stadium fell still. The booing, the cheering, all of it. All attention seemed to focus on the other slaves, on each of the dozen waiting outside the ring.
“What… what does that mean?” Starlight whispered.
“It means someone else can fight with him,” he said. “If the minotaur wins, he’s granted for the finals. His competitors will be too, if they win.” Velar seemed to be considering something. He watched the other slaves intently—but none of them rose.
Finally, the not-prince himself stood. He shouted so loudly that even the royal couple were surprised. “This stadium is filled with cowards! Do none of you see the injustice here?” He lifted into the air, to gasps from the guards at his side.
Starlight watched their horror as he glided down to the coliseum floor and stood beside Gallard. Despite the absolute insanity of it, she could hear the crowd positively roaring with approval. Somehow, she could make out his voice through all of it, echoing up from the stadium floor. “I will be his second.”
Stats
Page generated in 0.02 seconds
Total duration
950 users online
1,433,862 hits today, 2,280,440 yesterday
FIMFiction
My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic Fanfiction
Designed and coded by knighty & Xaquseg - © 2011-2024
Follow & Support Us
Support us
SubStar
Chat!
Discord
Follow us
Twitter
MLP: Friendship is Magic® - © 2024 Hasbro Inc.®
Fimfiction is in no way affiliated with or endorsed by Hasbro Inc.®
Interesting. But too damn short! I need to know what exactly is Equestria's response to the griffins' deception! Excellent chapter.
Poor stupid naive Velar. So innocent, so insulated... so easily manipulated.
Dammit, I really like Velar, but he just doesn't get it.
Wonder what does the ultimatum includes, other than release of pony slaves?... Hopefully no overly "high-road" wording's or some kinda un-expected offence on griffons, due to different cultural stuff.... But thing are most likely to go south... For EVERYONE i think...
Thing is, I actually misunderstood the terms of the treaty in that way myself.
Personally, I do think the forced disarming of the Griffons from their Gunpowder weaponry was a bit harsh,
It's a security risk, I understand, but to dump countless cannon and arms into the damn sea?
It really does feel like Celestia wished to be rid of the weapons entirely. I've no doubt if she had her way, she would have any knowledge of how to create rifles and cannon be outright burned and the development of them grounds of harsh retribution.
8777371
such a waste of perfectly good iron too, could have melted it down and made useful things
So, is that just Starlight's perception of Spike, or is the dragon actually just a pet in the fic's continuity?
8777371
You're allowing an enemy nation inside your boarders. Hell yeah you make disarm them completely.
8777585
agreed, especially one that's known for military conquest with superior military technology. Even without gunpowder Equestria would be at a military disadvantage.
8777585
Seriously, do people feel sorry for the Griffins?
It's stated they've conquered (and from the looks of it enslaved) every other nation/species except Equestria , it's clear they have some kind of fucked up food thing since they serve veal, I mean... okay yeah, feel bad that their home got blown up but do people really feel sorry that Tia made them dump their weapons?
It's the equivalent of saying... actually no, it's exactly like saying, okay you can settle in our country, but you can't bring in your massive stockpile of advanced weaponry
So for the benefit of your audience can you kind of clue us in to the level of firearms tech that the Griffins aspired to?
Muzzle loaders, paper cartridge, metallic cartridge, smooth bore, rifled bore, repeaters? Gun nerds want to know.
So, one more chapter until the bird poop hits the fan.
Well now, that's an interesting twist on this whole event.
8777448
I figure a good chunk of them, including cannon dismounted from ships, were left behind in caches. Either with the intent of retrieving them later for use or as stocks of refined metal.
8778766
Yes.
I admit, I'm not a gun nerd, but to make sure I used a technologically consistent type of firearms, I sortof imagine the griffins are at about a civil war level of gun tech. Whenever I picture their basic rifles, I imagine one of these:
upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/e/e0/Springfield_1861.jpg
This also includes access to the other eclectic array of weapons that were used during that war, such as artillery and crank-operated Gatling guns.
8778097
And that's not even going into how they probably tried to weasel some into their new playground anyway, seeing as how important it is for them to stick to the spirit of their treaties. I.e. not at all.
I still wonder if and how they expect nothing serious to come from this. If they're banking on Celestia's passiveness, her not wanting to risk open conflict, or if it's a case of horrendously inflated self-importance and they believe their trick to be so brilliant, Equestria will fold like wet paper.
8777135
Do you expect that "useless" prop in the talons of that other Griffon to maybe work after all? Part of me is waiting for the shoe to drop. Maybe right on top of Velar. Would be a shame if he suffered an accident during the games...
8780005
I have little doubt. The griffon is part of House Vengeance, after all.
8780005
Really, the Griffins are gonna do something stupid (or have already done that), and then they'll have to deal with Celestia, Luna, The Elements of Harmony, the Pillars (most notably freaking Starswirl), the Crystal Empire, Thorax's Changeling Hive, and (I may have more faith in him than the author does) Discord!
Fact: It has been stated that Equestria would not last in a war with the griffons.
Other fact: Reducing a coastline to its component atoms doesn't really count as a war.
I should rename you Iceburg for how you're killing VelarGlam
8779481
Bayonets actually have surprising range. In the years prior to WWI, there was concern on the Allied side that German soldiers, because of the combined length of their rifles and bayonets, enjoyed an advantage in reach over British soldiers. When thrust properly at maximum extension, a bayonet's kill zone could extend some 11 feet from the soldier. Many years were spent debating the 'reach' gap and what it foretold for the future of warfare.
Turned out none of it mattered.
8779481
Equestria is fucked is they snuck the heavy shit in.
Well, heck.
I wanted to see the griffons’ reaction to Celestia’s ultimatum, and then I figured somepony would let things slip prematurely and screw it up. But it looks like the catbirds may not need help screwing it up themselves. Kind of a good thing that I didn’t get to this until the next chapter was out (and going on a second one)....
8779481
note, *rifled* artillery. Ability to manufacture Napoleon canons by North gave them good edge.
Erm... if he looses isn't he going to end up as a slave for house vengeance?
Whoah shit, that's allowed? But what happens if he loses?