The Last Nightguard

by Georg

16. Reveille

The Last Nightguard
Reveille

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“Just a reminder, commercial sunglasses are not permitted to be worn with uniform armor even during sunrise and sunset. This also applies to hats and scarves, even if they are Sun or Moon-themed.”
—General Circulation Memo after the ‘Sunset Sunglasses Incident’

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Dawn was bringing Ebon Tide a new experience with every new Sun.

This one was particularly uncomfortable.

He was not a pillow. In particular, he was not a pillow to Her Highness, Ruler of the Moon and Night Sky. Or at least he was not supposed to be. Reality differed from rules at the moment, and Princess Luna was heavy. A few days ago, he would have been in serious danger of being suffocated to death by her bulk, which would have been so terribly ironic that he almost laughed.

He managed a brief wheeze instead.

“Mgumph?” Princess Luna, his Dread Sovereign, lifted her head up and away from his bare belly even though she was still technically connected to Eb by a long thread of saliva.

“Get up,” he managed. “Thy obese tonnage doth crush me into a flatcake. ‘Tis a posture most unbecoming of thy station in life. Get thy fat— Ommph!”

Luna dropped her head back onto his belly, wriggled a bit to get comfortable, and let out a soothing purr.

“You are not a cat,” said Eb sternly.

Luna purred again, although there was a bit of a giggle in it.

It was the role of the Guard to protect their charges, but Sun was barely up, and Eb had the tolerance of a badger with a bad tooth. He was still not used to sleeping during the day and waking in the evening, so his ire bubbled around his belly without an appropriate outlet. It helped that Luna was obviously happy, and a happy princess did not invoke the forces of darkness in order to become Nightmare Moon again, so…

“Good news deserves to be shared,” he managed despite the weight. “We take it thy setting of Moon this morn proceeded well?”

A faint wave of tension swept across Luna’s body, but she did not respond for quite some time. Eb waited, because there was little else he could do in his current situation.

“We did not speak,” said Luna at last. “Perhaps we never will again. Our words pit us against each other far too well. But it was so pleasant to be with her again.”

“True,” admitted Eb. “I am… pleased that you are not fighting. I am scarcely in a position to separate you like I once did with my children, and you are far too old to be sent to your rooms.”

“They are painting our chambers.” Luna sniffed. “It may take a night or two in order to dry, so—”

“So you are destroying my lecture on the Cubiculum by resting within my bedchambers.” Eb strained to move to one side of the soft mattress and would never have been able to make it if Luna had not shifted her position to assist. “We are not wed, nor are we secret lovers. Yet your presence here will cause rumors to flourish like wildthunder. You have not matured a moment since your abeyance.”

“My sister has changed,” said Luna from her side of the bed, where she had curled up sufficiently to prevent Eb from draping one limb out of the covers to make some space. “She is no longer the wild and free spirit we so appreciated when our moods overcame us.”

“Hire a jester,” grumbled Eb.

“Why?” Luna shifted position and stretched, extending just a bit over the top and bottom of the bed. “We have a perfectly good stallion to serve in such stead.”

“You are using me,” said Eb, turning just enough so he could watch Luna from one eye. “Guilt and anger are bitter seeds to swallow without your sister’s ridiculous antics, so you turn to the one creature in all of the palace that you know will obey your commands and not treat you as some ancient relic with no relevance in the modern age.”

“Possibly,” said Luna, who had stopped squirming around on the bed to get comfortable. She fluffed up the pillow on her side, then considered it with far more intent scrutiny than a piece of cloth and feathers deserved. “More than possibly,” she admitted. “How did you know?”

“Because I feel like an ancient relic with no relevance in this modern age,” he growled. “I am a warleader without a war, much like you are a princess with no overwhelming task to accomplish every eve. How long before your weakness and vanity betrays our country again, only this time without your sister to thwart your fel desire for power? I should have killed you already and saved the world from a great threat.”

Without saying a word, Luna leaned toward Ebon Tide and bared her neck.

“As if.” Eb bared his gums and exposed the short white stubs of growing teeth. “Should I clamp my jaws down upon your neck and chew, all I would do is give you pleasure much like some young filly with a colt nibbling in forbidden places.”

“That…” Luna lashed her tail against the mattress.

“Perhaps you would prefer the punishment of the Guard,” he went on. “A quirt drenched in salt water. Dereliction of duty, five lashes. Cowardice in the face of the enemy, ten lashes. Sleeping on sentry duty, twenty lashes. Were there a punishment for betraying our country, you would be lashed day and night without end until the blood flowed and—”

Eb caught a glance at the face that Luna was making, with her eyes nearly closed and her breath coming rapidly and shallow. At first he did not recognize the expression because it was practically unthinkable, but the implication soaked in through his thin skin like ice water and he practically leapt from the bed.

“Y-you’re aroused!”

“We are not!” declared Luna, but eroded that decisive statement by promptly backtracking. “It’s just that… we deserve to be punished!”

“Not like that!” protested Eb, who had backed up in the bedroom until his bare rump touched the cool metal of the door.

Wait. The bedroom door is not made out of metal. But armor—

“Warleader Ebon Tide,” sounded Shining Armor’s deep and very sincere voice from directly behind him. “Princess Luna. Beg pardon for disturbing your time off, but Princess Cadence requested the pleasure of your company this morning for breakfast, if you were not otherwise engaged.”

There should have been some sort of smirk on the new captain’s face when Eb managed to get turned around and look. There was not. Shining Armor was the perfect model of an official Guard with a straight face and not even a hint of the giggles. Upon even a small bit of reflection, Eb remembered that he was the intimate companion of the Princess of Love, and therefore might have already been exposed to far more compromising and personal experience than the one Eb found himself in the middle of right now.

Maybe.

On the other hoof, behind the stoic captain stood Private Pansy, looking much like a young recruit who had just stepped on a Minotaur wiremine with a ‘click’ and was waiting to see if the resulting explosive coil of razorwire would hurt before it dismembered him. There had obviously been a relaxed expression of mirth on the large pegasus’s face just a few moments ago, because small fragments of it still remained in sharp contrast to the look of abject terror that was growing exponentially every moment.

“Pansy,” said Shining Armor without even looking behind him, “at ease.”

“But—” started Pansy.

“At ease,” repeated Shining Armor over his shoulder before turning back to Ebon Tide. “Sorry, sir. Won’t happen again.”

“Nothing happened,” said Eb, frantically attempting to grab onto one tiny fragment of solidity in an ocean of embarrassment. Her Highness had even taken off her crown when she got into his bed, leaving the alicorn princess completely and totally naked, although still slightly more dressed than his hairless self.

For one long and terrifying moment, Eb thought Princess Luna was about to contradict him just out of sheer spite, but she restrained herself to a low grumbling noise before raising her voice slightly. “Good Captain, will my sister be present?”

“I… did not ask,” said Shining Armor in what seemed to be as close as he could get to lying.

“No,” said Luna, placing her head back upon the pillow. “We are greatly fatigued with the activity of the Night, and wish to rest. Ebon Tide will provide Our security. You are dismissed.”

Shining Armor saluted and turned, although Pansy looked to have frozen in place and was blocking his path of retreat. Showing remarkable field strength for a unicorn, Armor lit his horn and lifted the hefty pegasus just like he was hoisting a feather, then stepped out of the room and closed the door as he moved.

Silence reigned briefly in the bedroom.

Far too briefly.

“We shall not make it an order,” said Luna as she settled down on top of the thin coverlet. “Nor a request. Not even a suggestion. We are sleeping here. You may sleep wherever you please.”

“Because of the paint,” said Eb flatly.

“That shall be Our explanation, if any are foolish enough to ask.”

Eb was foolish enough to ask, but hesitated as he saw something in the alicorn that made him think of his own long-departed children and how they viewed the unknown darkness of evening. She should not have been afraid of her own Night, because she was the Princess of the Moon after all. Besides, the warmth of morning Sun eased its way in through the curtains, chasing away the darkness.

Or at least the kind of darkness that only affected the eyes. The seething darkness that wrapped around the heart was far more reluctant to pry free. Eb knew that far too well now.

The proper place for a serving Guard would have been outside the door, standing at alert until his charge awoke. Currently, Eb was barely able to stand. If he attempted to fulfill his duties, Pansy would have to sweep him off the floor and pour him into a bucket to be returned to the hospital with all the odd scents and peculiar ponies therein.

In addition, he would be exposed to the visits of Peanut Brittle and her small relatives, pests who could not recognize him for the corrupted creature he was and Princess Luna as the source of that corruption.

It tore him in half while watching Luna spread out on the bed, eyes closed and faking her slow breathing as if she were not frightened nigh unto death by this new world. She was his liege, the mare who he had promised to defend with his life, to the last drop of his blood. And yet she was an evil mare who had betrayed her position, her subjects, and her own sister, all in search for power. To put that behind himself, to forgive such a crime…

“I cannot forgive you,” he spoke under his breath, “and yet I cannot abandon you in your need. Perhaps this will change as time passes. Your fel magic fills me with hatred that itches to be released upon your helpless body. How can you trust me to lie with you?”

“Trust is not a balance,” said Luna into her pillow. “We extend it as a leap of faith, beyond any exchange. It is a gift, given from the heart, and when a similar gift is given in return, the unity of their combined powers exceed all else. If you accept this gift for now and extend your own, it shall be a small step to my redemption and your recovery. From such small steps over long times do mighty deeds unfold.”

They were mighty words, far more powerful than his own children had used when they needed the presence of their father to keep away the terrors of the night. He had spent many nights on the floor by their bedsides, reassuring the young fillies with his presence after the passing of their mother. Having the world dropped on you unexpectedly could crush even a princess, but with his support, Plum and Heli had grown into lovely young ladies.

Before they were snatched away by Nightmare Moon and thrown a thousand years beyond his life.

“Scoot over,” he eventually mumbled as he lowered himself to the side of the bed. “Were I to sleep on the floor as I did for my children, there would be much to pay for in the morning. Or evening, as my life defines time to awaken now.”

“Thou art a married stallion,” murmured Luna as she moved slightly to her side of the bed. “Even though your life’s bond has passed long ago, she still lives within your heart, as do your daughters. We seek not entry into that place. It would be improper even if you were young and without romantic entanglements, for our position forbids such dalliances even as your oath does for you.”

Eb thought he would be unable to sleep with Princess Luna so close.

He was proven wrong almost immediately.

As well as just before Moon’s rising, in a far different fashion.

Comments

[Georg]

Snuggle-guard.

[Cerulean Blue]

We are not wed, nor are we secret lovers.

There wouldn't be any secret about it if they were lovers, so I guess that's true.

[Booster Spice]

Ebon is going to ahev problems when faced with all the plushies that look like theyre changeling knockoffs?

And what pray tell is this reclining stuffed toy be named?

That E Bone Idol yer iness.

[Elsaack]

I am growing increasingly worried about where this story is going. With all the more hopeful developments of Luna and Eb happening I keep looking at the tags for the story. And none of those tags foretell a happy ending. Which will hurt because I have grown to love these two.

[Pseudosapien]

That was very cozy.

[Mythic Night]

Methinks that Luna may have some morning wood to wax in the evening…

[Eroraf86]

Note to self: never play poker with Shining Armor.

[IceHawk]

Bat horse for the moon horse.

Tia needs to get luna some nightmare be-gone spray.

[FanOfMostEverything]

I love the expression “flourish like wildthunder,” as well as the wiremine. Great bits there.

As for that last line, I’m not sure how nervous I should be. I suppose we’ll find out soon enough.

[Amos Anon]

“Just a reminder, commercial sunglasses are not permitted to be worn with uniform armor even during sunrise and sunset. This also applies to hats and scarves, even if they are Sun or Moon-themed.” —General Circulation Memo after the ‘Sunset Sunglasses Incident’

I'd have a major issue with this, lol. I'm extremely light sensitive.