The Ghost of Coltistrano: Phantom Eulogy

by EthanClark

Chapter 1: “I’m old, Cadence, I don’t want to be remembered as a murderer."

The scorch marks weren’t far from the city center. Much of the debris had been cleared, buildings patched, streets swept clean of the rubble, but every now and then she would find a new mark in some dark corner of the city staring back at her. A smudge of darkness against pristine crystal streets. A reminder.

Even so, the light of another setting sun would soon fade, and the reminder would slip into the obscurity of night. It was a comfort as she continued down the road, past the gleaming denizens of the city. A pair of green eyes scanned the many smiling, drifting, almost distracted faces as she steadily passed them by. On occasion, she would catch the attention of a foal beside their parents staring up at her. It was a struggle not to grimace, and at the first opportunity she would duck behind a thicker part of the bustling streets, bringing her head lower as if to dodge some phantom gaze. Try as she might, it was hard for her not to stand out.

Her coat was more dull than others. She sported a messy mane and stood half a head taller than most of the stallions around her, a fact that nagged at her whenever she dodged her own reflection, but it had its perks. She could see the palace better this way.

The glimmering tower at the heart of the city. Sunlight danced along its western face like waves of the aurora the Empire was so well known for and served as her beacon, the signal her long shift was soon to end. She leveraged her height to carefully watch both sides of the main road before crossing over to the main gate.

“Halt! Citizen, present your identification.” The guard dutifully followed her hooves as they answered his request. “Hmm… Ah, I see. Proceed.”

He and his fellow guardspony moved in trained unison, allowing her to pass the threshold into the palace proper, her vision swallowed evermore by the lobby of the Crystal Palace. It was a familiar sight. Muscle memory guided her hooves across the floor, adorned by the sigil of the Crystal Heart, and through the spiraling hallways of the palace. There were faces she recognized, even some that smiled at her as she passed. Even so, all she could manage was a subtle wave and mouthed greeting as she came closer to her destination: a pair of two artfully carved doors. As they opened, she spotted another scorch mark within the doorframe.

But her gaze was ensnared by the glorious image of one pink alicorn, sat upon her pearlescent throne and peering down upon her with a warm smile. Her hooves nearly stumbled at the image. The princess beckoned her.

“Welcome back.” Cadence urged her forward. “You’ve been gone for days. We were concerned something happened.”

The sound of the double doors closing boomed behind her, signaling her chance to relinquish the dull disguise in a wreath of sputtering green flame, dancing along her legs and across the pristine floor as her true visage was revealed.

“Princess,” Alate said with a slight bow, slowly approaching the throne.

“I’m glad to see you’re unharmed. Have you found anything?”

“There are rumors, but the trail went cold months ago. Finding anything concrete now will mean heading south… to Equestria.”

Cadence pondered the changeling's words, caressing her mouth with a hoof. “Our friends to the south have come up empty, as well, though I suppose they don’t have you to aid them.”

“Does this mean… you’ll send me there?”

“It’s possible.” Cadence rose from the throne and approached. “But in your condition, any time away from the palace is a risk. How are you feeling?”

Her words signaled a stinging sensation from the crown of Alate’s head. The horn was twisted, standing as a darker, matte limb where her original horn once stood, green light emanating from between barely healed wounds along its shape, an image only hidden when shapeshifted into somepony else.

“I manage.”

“Alate, despite what you may think, I am worried. You’re due for an appointment with Sunburst and our healers.”

“Aren’t I supposed to be on the hunt, instead?”

“Not while it’s doing that.” Cadence’s manicured hoof pointed firmly to the green smoke rising from the grafted horn. “It’s the only way you’ll get better.”

“Right… right…” Alate’s gaze drifted to the side, earning a chuckle from the alicorn beside her.

“Why don’t I walk you, okay? Maybe you can tell me what’s bothering you.”

Such an offer stunned the changeling as Cadence gently pulled her along, into a side passage off of the throne room. Alate recognized it as a corridor for servants, one she knew too well, but to walk through it with royalty gave her a strange sense of ease. The bobbing curls of Cadence’s spring pink mane firmly contrasted her dark and worn carapace, a starkness that brought a small smile to her lips.

“So, you started clamming up back there, is it because I mentioned Equestria?”

“No, it’s… yes.”

“You don’t have to worry Alate, you know that.”

“But how can you say that? After all the things I’ve done? We’re walking through the very halls I used to try to kill your friends.”

“And you are serving your sentence by working for me.”

“But it should be much worse, and you haven’t even told them.”

“I’m the princess, I decide if it should be worse, and I decide that by serving me in secret we’ll have the advantage over Shield Wall, should he return.”

“But how could you, or they, ever forgive me?”

“You underestimate the forgiveness of Silver Spade,” Cadence chuckled. “Alate, it was months ago. You confessed your crimes and are making amends, even if it doesn’t feel like it.”

“Princess, they won’t…” Alate released a sigh. “I’m old, Cadence, I don’t want to be remembered as a murderer. Not by him.”

“I know, and what’s better is I know you mean it.”

Finally, the corridor opened into a domed room. The stained-glass skylight depicted the very princess who stood beside Alate, shimmering above them with the final threads of the day’s light, replaced by the lantern light of the calm scenery before them. A group of ponies were busy making preparations around a cushioned table Alate knew well. Beside it stood an orange unicorn, fumbling through the pages of a musty tome drawn from within his ornate blue robe, fixing his glasses as the duo approached.

“Ah, Alate, it’s good to see you aga- oh dear, that is a nasty build up of dark magic seeping out from there. Please, make yourself comfortable on the table and we’ll begin. I think I’ve uncovered a new method for treating the horn’s poisoning of your magic.”

With a reassuring hoof on her shoulder, Alate was guided to the table by the hoofmaidens that always tended to her. Bare carapace met plush fabric as she sank into them, discovering a weariness she had ignored since she returned to the Empire. Crystal magic gently coiled along the length of the foreign horn and pulled from it the smoking green fumes. Sweet clarity was her reward for compliance. Her entire body tingled as Sunburst prepared the second phase of his treatment. Words lifted softly from his lips and a piercing ray of light flew from his horn to hers. She flinched, squirmed, and suddenly the welcoming caress of the cushions became that of needles scratching against tender flesh.

A whimper dared leave her before relief returned. The smoke ceased. Whatever green light shone from the horn soon dimmed to an almost imperceptible emerald, and Sunburst shot a smile to Cadence and excitedly made his way to Alate’s side.

“Fascinating. The horn’s responded well to the treatment, and even… I hesitate to say, Alate, but perhaps a few more treatments will even render it totally inert. It’s not long now.”

The effect of Sunburst’s words was visible across her face. The culmination of months of service to the Crystal Empire, the very nation she once threatened, was something so simple as relief. She felt her entire form relax. She only barely noticed Cadence called to the main door by a guard, and only heard scant bits of their conversation as she tried to crane her head around.

“Find Captain Shining Armor, any reports should be fed to him, directly.”

“The captain is occupied with another situation, your highness, this couldn’t wait.”

“There is a chain of command for a reason,” Cadence stated sharply.

“Your highness, if you could only-”

Alate’s ears perked up, signaling the escape of all calmness within her body as her eyes slowly made their way back to the skylight above her. There was a tapping of something. Heavy, measured, and multiple. She looked back to Cadence arguing with the single guard in the open door and she fought against her own relaxed muscles to rise from the table. A louder crack was heard from above as a small piece of glass fell at Sunbursts hooves. Alate froze. She was trapped in a scene she recognized. She knew the style well.

Before she could cry out to Cadence, the skylight burst apart in a triumphant rain of glass and metal that fell upon the room’s occupants. Cadence whipped around with her horn aglow before being fiercely shoved out of the room by the guard, slamming the door behind her. Six masked figures fell from above. Their ropes encircled Alate as they surrounded her, allowing a seventh to slam her back against the soft table and pin her down.

“Target secure. Lock down the door and prep for surgery.”

“What?” Alate barely had time to react before two sets of hooves restrained her head to the table. Spurts of green flame managed to emerge from the horn, but their fervor was spent, a result of Sunburst’s treatment. She thrashed and writhed against them before she felt the prick of something sharp against her. Then, it went deeper.

The howl that crossed Alate’s lips shook the very walls, felt even by the furious princess assaulting the door, now barricaded by four of the invaders. Crashes of magical might could be heard pounding against the doors to the healing chamber, each one threatening to unsteady the knife slowly cutting across fused flesh. Even as her own blood flooded her eyes Alate struck back against one of her captors, casting him aside, allowing her to throw a wild strike to the one above who responded by simply falling into her and driving the knife out the other end of the scar tissue. He twisted, both to restrain the seething changeling and to separate the flesh, and with the smallest bit of leverage the horn was released from her head, dripping with blood and ichor.

“Horn is secure. We’re out of here.”

But the stranger had not counted on Alate’s grip to retain its strength as she threw him from the table and onto the stone floor. She struck her other captor as she rose, her quivering hoof fueled by rage and pain, laying him out before leaping onto the current wielder of the cursed horn. He was concerned with keeping the horn from her, but Alate saw only his masked face as her target. Blow after blow landed against him, but it wasn’t long before the dizziness of blood loss robbed her of her strength. Limp hooves grabbed his mask as hind legs kicked her from him, propelled by the force of two ebon wings. She slid away, the floor slick with her own blood, locking her withering gaze with a pair of slit-shaped eyes.

“G-Glint…”

The invaders regrouped, though he was the only one to rise into the air under his own power, fusing with the dark of the night sky as Cadence finally broke through the doors of the chamber and rushed to Alate’s side. Muffled orders reached her ears, but her limbs began to grow cold. Agony finally overtook her as her breath slowed. Her weary gaze drifted before locking onto something small, just beneath the table upon which she once rested. Dark, tucked just beside one of the corners, the last thing she saw as she threatened to slip into unconsciousness: another scorch mark. Another reminder.

“Sunburst, tend to her!” Cadence rushed to the ailing changeling, hoof searching for a pulse. “She’s still alive. Hurry!”

Just behind her came the thundering of metal-clad hooves, led by brilliant violet light atop the head of their crowned prince. Shining Armor wordlessly directed his soldiers to fan out, sweep the room, and secure all exits, orders the crystal warriors followed without hesitation.

“Cadence… Cadence, what happened? What’s the situation?”

“I-I don’t know, I was speaking to a guard at the door before… before this happened.” Her magic held a length of gauze to Alate’s horn, successfully staunching the bleeding.

“They came in from above,” Sunburst announced through quivering breaths. “Six of them, I think, b-but it happened so fast I didn’t have time to see who they were.”

Shining Armor took stock of the scene before him, the ruined skylight and its shattered remains now surrounding them, eyes mechanically following the destruction to its most concentrated point. The padded table was stained with blood and coated in tiny shards of glass. His mind worked fast, and the prince gave a forceful huff as it came to a conclusion.

“They came for the horn.”

“But how could they have known? How could they have even slipped past us? We’ve been searching for them for months.”

“If I had to guess, this might’ve been part of their plan.” He stared over Alate’s weary form, dripping with her own blood. “Maybe they never left, at all.”

“Then we have to let them know,” Cadence said as she urged one of the hoofmaidens, rising to her hooves and leading Shining through the same corridor back to the throne room.

“We should’ve told them a long time ago.”

“I know, I know, but with Shield Wall escaped we had to be discrete. You don’t think Silver will be mad, do you?”

Shining chuckled at the question. “Silver, better than anypony, knows the value of secrecy, don’t you think? But I suppose we have to risk communication.”

They hurriedly made their way to the throne, opening a hidden compartment within the magnificent chair to produce a quill and parchment. The enchanted feather glowed, burning its message upon the paper with magical guidance. Cadence wasted no time in drafting her missive as the parchment was hurriedly rolled up and sealed with her wax insignia.

“We can’t risk this being intercepted,” she stated. “If his agents are still in the Empire, we need a way to deliver this safely.”

“Told you we should’ve hired a dragon,” Shining teased. “I have a way to get through the country undetected, but it may take some time… will Alate make it that long?”

“I have no doubt.” But Cadence’s eyes strayed out the window beyond the throne, a frame of the twinkling night sky blanketing the nation beyond in its embrace. “I only hope we make it in time.”

Comments

[Tattered Rags]

Heck of an entrance, in more ways than one! I think you may have forgotten to bump this to a Teen rating.