“Day one of trying to hold court,” Rosewater murmured, glancing around the marketplace in the early morning, ponies still setting up their awnings and signs, using chalk of various colors to mark their prices and draw fanciful renditions of their wares around the edges.

Fog still crept along the ridge to the west, sending feelers out that almost touched the high-pointed roofs of the homes dotting the hills just below it, the white smoke from their fireplaces rising to mingle more thickly with the tendrils before both faded in a breeze high above the valley, shredding the veil for a few moments before more spilled out of the treeline.

Prism, at her side, followed her gaze and offered her a brief nuzzle. “It’ll get prettier for a little while when the sun finally rises high enough.”

“It’s plenty pretty right now, but thank you for reminding me how cold it is this morning.” It was, though not freezing, but the wind rolling in from the east held more than a hint of a colder night already passed.

“You’re the one who wanted to come out here early, before the bustle.” Petal nipped her neck and grinned. “Though if you came out later, you might have gotten Bliss and a nice feather blanket, too.”

“And remind me why you came out, too?” Rosewater asked, eying her friend and then returning her attention to her own board, considering the sparse few words she’d already written, terrified to write plainly what she was doing, but not sure how else to attract ponies to talk to her about holding court. “I thought you were going to poke Rosy Glass and her coterie of business interests.”

Rosewater Rosethorn

Perfume Consultation

Petal leaned over and studied the four words. “I am, and I think that works. Ponies will have heard about both the gala and your date, and at the market especially. Once they see you’re staying here until at least lunch, I think they’ll come talk to you.”

Rosewater flicked an ear and cast her gaze around the marketplace.

The wide open space with a fountain in the center, now shut off and dry, but depicting Rosethorn the Wise holding aloft a vase from which normally flowed a fragrant stream of lilac water. The basin was the same light purple the water normally was, and in the gloom of pre-dawn it looked like a portal to another world. Deep and dark.

A few ponies sat beside it, scrubbing away the scum draining the fountain had left behind and polishing the tiles. One of them kept casting glances at Rosewater as he spoke to his friends, and the others seemed to be paying more attention to him than their work.

Near one of the exit streets, a passel of guards stood, casting her obvious looks, but none of them had the finely polished gleam of the ‘elite’ guard that Roseate relied on for enforcement. They looked more like the rank and file that kept the peace and performed the duties that kept a city of laws running together.

Patrolling along a street one level above the market was the expected enforcers, a squad of four that walked slowly along the street, disappearing now and then as the street took them away from the low wall that kept foals from tumbling down the embankment.

Her stall, rented for the day for a few bits, could barely be called that. It consisted of a framework for an awning that she’d eschewed due to Bliss’s promise last night that today was going to be a clear weather day.

Her neighbors, an older stallion setting out bowls of glass beads of various colors, seemed more interested in making sure none of his stock fell out, and a younger mare hanging up skeins of colorful yarn, had only greeted her amiably as ‘my lady’ thus far and given her curious looks.

Farther out, it seemed like more ponies were giving her as much attention as they thought they could get away with without drawing either her attention or that of anypony they thought might object to giving her attention.

“Can you go rile them up? As it is, everypony looks too nervous to even look at me.” Rosewater glanced at the board of the young mare and the doodles and wavy circles that looked rather like yarn. She could draw little speckles and clouds around her border, she supposed. The stall manager had given her an eight color set of chalk sticks for an extra six bits and all she’d done with them so far was draw shine-lines out from ‘Perfume Consultation.’ “I’m going to see what I can do to jazz up my sign.”

“Draw hearts,” Prism suggested laconically and in a voice meant to carry. “I mean, you did just announce to the world that you’re courting Lord Primline Collar and, stars, you just went on an open date with him. Everypony is talking about it. Ponies wouldn’t think oddly if you wanted to show your love.”

A bowl of beads overturned with a curse and a muted tinkle as they clinked against each other and the wooden tray the bowls were all set on at the same time a row of skeins clattered to the ground.

Rosewater shot the mare a glower.

“Or write out the story in that perfectly neat, tiny hoofwriting you prize so much. Make ponies come up and squint to read it.” Petal laughed and pranced off, tail flirting in the air briefly as her high-stepping amused trot took her quickly out of casual swatting range.

“Fine.” Rosewater huffed and pulled out the white stick. “I do want to show my love.” The scene as it must have looked last night, with her and Collar standing with foreheads pressed together, forelegs locked in their dance during one of the rare pauses, flashed through her mind almost too quick for her to hold onto it.

But once she did, she sketched out the poses with proportions and marks for legs and tails and horns. A few more quick strokes formed the outlines of a mare and a stallion, devoid of their clothing from the night as she wasn’t sure she could capture it properly and capture who they were.

Her coat was easiest to fill in, white. And for her mane and tail, she crushed the tips of the red and the white and used the powder with her magic to make a crude-packed nub of pink. For his outline, she made it blue, and for his copper coat, she used red again with white and a touch of yellow, mixing the three until she had the closest she could to his natural color.

Underneath, in blue and the rest of the pink, she wrote ‘Rosewater & Collar.’

Plain for the world to see. A declaration to the world that last night wasn’t just a rumor, wasn’t a passing bit of hot air to anypony who saw it.

And, just to tweak Prism’s tail, she drew alternating white and red hearts around the border.

Prism snorted and nodded. “Bold. Maybe too bold?”

Rosewater shook her head as she turned the board around and set it to stand on its back leg. “Bold was the gala, Prism. It’s been three days, and ponies will have heard it all by now. I want to keep that momentum going.”

Prism let out a sigh, let her head, dropped it and snorted. “Alright. Yeah. Fine. Momentum.”

“I know I’m putting myself in more… direct view. But I need to do that.” Rosewater tapped the top of her board with the tip of her last stick of chalk. “And now I am.”

For the past year and a half, Silk had made her bi-monthly shopping trip for new bolts of cloth, often for clients with rather loose schedules for when they needed their dresses, or to make concept dresses to sell overseas where the novelty of owning a ‘scandalous’ Merrier-designed dress. She wasn’t the only one selling, and it made the shifting tapestry of fashions coming out of Merriedamme all the more varying.

Her signature was the use of silk in ways that not many other ponies could manage, including the Shimmersilk technique she’d inherited from her mentor and friend.

Different, today, was Moon Rosethorn chattering away happily as she pranced ahead and dropped back to ask Silk questions about what silks might still be available and what she might be able to make from her salary and the allowance her parents gave her, a not inconsiderable sum, and not unearned.

“I want to make a dress for my debut gala,” Moon blurted, then laughed and pranced ahead, then back to join her again. “Do you think I can debut this Winter Gala?”

“That,” Silk said, gently letting her down, “is up to your parents. But!” She raised a hoof to forestall the pouting huff. “I will talk to them and advocate for you if you do the entire thing on your own. I can offer suggestions and critique, but as long as the entire project from concept to the last stitch is yours, I will argue for you.”

Moon gave her a look common to most young ponies, full of a confident aspect stating clearly, ‘Of course I can.’ For an eight year old pony, she was good at handling needle, thread, and cloth, but she still mostly had to rely on Silk or her hireling seamsponies for patterns, cutting, and the fine detail work.

Her first self-made dress wouldn’t be a masterpiece, but it would be hers. Whether she wore that dress or the one Silk was already planning for her actual debut Gala was another matter. She did know that Rosary was hesitant to place her daughter up on the stage, or game board, despite the fact Silk was almost certain the little girl was feeding gossip to her mother whether she knew it or not.

Feeding gossip wasn’t an active participation in the ‘game’ Rosary was playing at her own and their mother’s behest. Active participation would put little Moon deeper into the web of lies, tangles, and dangers that being close to Roseate meant.

Moon didn’t know anything about the intrigues her mother and aunts were involved in, was likely not even aware of the danger her grandmother posed to her.

And she was still chattering on about colors and themes, topics Silk had been gently guiding her through since she expressed an interest in making clothes at the tender age of five. Three years of having the filly around on an almost daily basis, helping her mostly by watching the counter while she was consulting, greeting customers, and learning about color theory, style, and fitting ponies.

She ‘helped’ by keeping customers engaged in the wait for measuring at first, then helped with measuring, and even gave opinions to ponies as they watched themselves as Silk wove illusions around them and into silk that would eventually become a dress.

And she talked. A lot. To everypony that came to the store, to everypony that was a regular looking for an adjustment, or for a repair, she was a joy and a bright spark in the days of most ponies. It said much about the filly’s upbringing at home that wasn’t spoken aloud.

“Can I get my own measuring ribbon?”

“Mmm. I suppose. We’ll have to make sure it’s stitched right and doesn’t stretch. You know what the right stitching looks like?”

“Yes!” Moon chirped. “It’s stitched cross on both sides, tight stitching, not loose. It’s better to use silk because it’s harder to stretch.”

“That’s right.”

“Why can’t you make one?”

“I could, but I don’t have the licensing to make a registered measuring ribbon.” Silk stuck her tongue out at her niece.

“Why not?”

“Because I don’t want to have to attend the semi-annual meeting of measurers. They argue over the width of a hair for hours.”

Moon made a face. “But hair is hair.”

“So you’d think. Hence why I don’t want to split hairs over the width of a hair.”

“They do that?” Moon sounded horrified. “Split hairs?”

“Verbally, yes,” Silk said, raising her head to look around the wide open market forum, looking for one of the smaller stalls that migrated around and carried a wide variety of beading that she used in accessories. “I need some glass beads for Lady Tamarind’s new mane bow.”

Moon made a face. “It’s ugly.”

“It’s her decision,” Silk said with a wink and a flick of her tail, drawing her attention briefly away from scanning the crowded middle-morning marketplace. “I did try to talk her out of it, but she’s paying me well enough to make a travesty against fashion.”

“But it’s ugly!” As if that were the only justification she needed.

“So it is,” Sik said absently, catching a flash of white and pink through the crowd between two ponies and a cart before the cart full of crates blocked her view again. On a normal day, she wouldn’t have even thought about it, but that single glimpse off in the corner of the market brought her thoughts back to the pony she’d been thinking about for most of the past two weeks. “This way, stay close to me,” she told Moon, glancing to make sure her niece was still tucked in close beside her.

As much as she wanted to go off and explore the market, Moon was well behaved and followed directions well once she was given a direction to follow. When she wasn’t given direction, she was just like any other filly. It was distressing at times to see how closely she followed directions.

But she didn’t have to worry about Moon darting out in front of a wagoneer or getting under the hooves of other shoppers and getting hurt or causing a ruckus. It allowed her to find the flash of white and pink more quickly, and found her eldest sister sitting with two of the other Gardeners and a few other ponies with a small line of ponies waiting for their turn to talk to her.

“Aunt Rosewater?” Moon asked in an incredulous voice, looking up at Silk. “But… I never see her out.”

“She’s been going through a lot lately,” Silk said softly. “You haven’t seen much of her, have you?”

Moon shook her head slowly. “Momma says…” She swallowed and looked around, then leaned in closer, whispering in a low voice, “Momma says she’s scared of her.”

Oh, you poor filly. Silk shook her head slowly, smiling down at her sweet niece. “You don’t need to be, sweetling. Rosewater is… different now. You’ll see. And the bead vendor is just a few stalls down.”

That would get back to Rosary. It was ambiguous enough that not much could be inferred from it and entirely deniable on Silk’s side, and obvious and enough in the public knowledge that she could claim she was stating only common knowledge.

Moon glanced between Silk and her oldest aunt, still apparently oblivious to their presence as she chatted with a pair of ponies, a scroll hovering between the three of them.

“What is she…”

A break in the throng let her see Rosewater’s stall more clearly. A sign stood beside her, and a mare she recognized as one of the former Dammeguards sat just behind it and to the side, chatting with a neighboring stall owner in the lull of traffic that let Silk slip in closer with Moon still faithfully crowding in close beside her even if the tension in the little filly grew in the form of her pressing closer and closer to Silk’s foreleg.

Perfume consultation. Silk read the board, saw the art obviously of her and Collar, noted the lack of products or any way to take payment on the rug she sat on or the poles holding up the canopy, and came to an uncomfortable conclusion.

Rosewater was holding court. In the busiest and most open place in the entire city aside from the main port-clearing marketplace just off of the Dockbridge landing, her sister was blatantly holding court.

Not blatantly. Rosewater had been mostly cagey about her setup. The sign was fresh, of course, and she was sure that half of the ponies that would come by would ask about the stylized ponies in blue and pink, their names and the startling choice of red and white hearts for the border making clearer than any rumor since Rosewater’s date that she and Collar were courting.

“That’s pretty,” Moon murmured. “Aunt Rosewater is in love?”

“You can ask her if you’re polite, Moon. She’s not scary. I promise.”

“But… mom said—”

“I know what she said, Moon. I promise. Rosewater is a kind pony, and she isn’t scary at all.” Silk nodded to the side at the bead vendor. “I’ll be right there if you want to talk to her. Or you can stay with me.”

“A-are you going to talk to her?” Moon asked, sidling closer to her side as Silk settled in to haggle for fall colored beads.

“Of course. Once I get beads for the ugliest bow in the world.” Silk winked at her and met Rosewater’s eyes briefly, her older sister paying attention with an ear ticked towards her while she talked with a pair of young stallions and a mare who must have been their mother. She didn’t believe for a moment that the ‘Perfume Consultation’ was what she was up to. “She’s my sister.”

“She’s momma’s sister, too,” Moon reminded her.

“Sorry. One moment,” Silk told the vendor. “Family matter.”

The older stallion she’d been talking to nodded and glanced aside, then at his wife, and shrugged. “I’ll keep picking out brown, green, and orange for you. How many?”

“For safety, a small pouch of each. Call it a hundred beads of each color. Variance in coloration is fine. The client wants some variance, but not random colors.”

“Gradient. Got it.” He waved her away and set out a small placard saying he was filling an order.

Not quite a gradient, but it was close enough that Silk didn’t bother to try and explain. She could make it look like scattered leaves and trees easily enough.

She also didn’t bother with the line waiting for Rosewater, instead standing just off to the side of the rug under the canopy, sizing up Prism as the mare studiously ignored her and spoke quietly with another pony Silk didn’t recognize.

“Silk Rose, nice to see you,” Prism said when the neighboring stall received a customer looking for a basket of beans, then shifted to block Silk’s approach when she came closer. “Rosewater has a line.”

“Oh, I know. I was hoping she could take a break soon. My order will take a while to fill, and Moon hasn’t seen her aunt in… well. I don’t believe she’s ever spoken to her niece before.”

That drew Rosewater’s attention away from the conversation briefly before she was drawn back in. The mare was concerned not at all about perfumes, but a mother’s concerns for her sons’ future in the Merrieguard cadet academy. She was concerned that the oaths her sons were being asked to give were to Roseate, not to the city. Even at the cadet level.

It was something Silk had not been aware of. The oaths by the guards were known and grumbled about often enough in the rumor mill that she had started to ignore them. Ponies were afraid of muttering about them to her anyway.

Just how did you get ponies to talk about what you wanted them to talk about? The signage was deniability. Rosewater was the presumptive heir, and here she was in a public forum. If ponies complained at her while she was trying to conduct business, then what could she do about it?

That Rosewater was obviously taking notes didn’t matter.

Nor did it matter when Rosewater finished listening and promised the mother she would try her best to address the issue with Roseate. She could pass it off as an empty promise to anypony that questioned her whom she didn’t trust.

Rosewater held up a hoof to stop the next pony, a stallion with a woodworking cutie mark, and tipped her head towards Silk and Moon, who was growing bored and looking over the board, her eyes darting to the basket of chalk sticks by Prism, most of them worn to nubs.

“Silk,” Rosewater said, turning her sign around to show she was taking a break. “It’s good to see you again. Is this about the last payment for my dress?”

“No.” Silk shook her head briefly and smiled. “I didn’t even know you would be here, so I don’t have my ledger.” She glanced down where Moon was half-hiding underneath her, peeking out around her legs at her tall aunt. Instead of urging the young filly out, she raised a foreleg to stroke Moon gently on the shoulder. “Rather, I wanted to see what you were doing in your downtime. I didn’t know you weren’t keeping shop hours anymore.”

“Mm. It’s a little out of the way.” Rosewater glanced down at Moon, smiled brightly, and laid down to be more on her level, or to give Silk the advantage of perspective. She laid her sign down flat and pulled the basket of chalk sticks closer to Moon. “This might be a boring adult talk, sweetie. If you want to draw on the back of my sign, I don’t mind.”

“Very kind of you, ‘Water,” Silk said, giving Moon a little nudge. “What do you say?”

Moon trembled, then swallowed. “Thank you, Aunt Rosewater.”

Silk smiled at her niece and bobbed her head. “Do you have some time to talk? You look rather busy.”

“For family?” Rosewater glanced over the line waiting, giving them all smiles and nods. “Stars, Silk. Family is everything to us. They’ll understand. You don’t need to worry about taking up too much of my time.”

The second in line, a trio of older ponies with the look of farmers about them, bobbed their heads to Rosewater and wandered away, starting the dissolution of the line as ponies went about other business they had to take care of or simply to wander far enough away to give them some privacy.

“Oh. Well then.” Silk glanced at Silk, who had laid down beside the board while Moon examined the chalk with a serious eye. “I did kind of want to catch up with you out of a formal or business setting.”

Rosewater raised a brow, her unspoken worry visible only in the tremble of her jaw that Silk recognized as her biting the inside of her lip.

It’s okay. Silk smiled and sat down in front of her sister. I’m supposed to ingratiate myself, after all, and learn the secrets I already know.

Throughout saying nothing to Silk with too many words, and Silk saying just as many words with nothing passing between them besides commentary on the weather, the gala, and the taste of wine, Rosewater was giving half of her attention to Moon, her niece having grown up to the point she almost didn’t recognize the filly from the last time she’d seen her, barely a year old.

What surprised her most about Moon was that she didn’t seem to be afraid of Rosewater nearly as much as she thought she might be, considering her and Rosary’s acrimonious relationship. Rather, she seemed perfectly content to draw what looked like the beginnings of a dress form in white chalk on the back of Rosewater’s board.

Keeping up small talk was a skill that was rusty, but that she’d mastered at Carnation’s insistence long ago, and getting back into the routine of hearing without truly listening, even for a few minutes, let her pay almost as much attention to the filly as she did to Silk.

When Moon was done making a very appreciable approximation of a unicorn, she stared at the chalk outline, then pulled over the basket of chalks and rummaged through the depleted stock, her ears flattening as she set aside little nubbins of chalk in various colors that Rosewater or previous owners of the basket had left behind.

Silk noticed at the same time. “I don’t suppose you have more chalk?” she asked in a low tone, leaning in closer so Moon wouldn’t overhear her.

“I don’t. The basket was all I was given.” Rosewater shook her head slowly. “Prism?”

“I’m not leaving your side, Rosewater,” Prism huffed. “I’m sure another stall would be happy to let a foal borrow some chalk.”

Silk’s ears twitched at that.

So did Moon’s. “Auntie?”

“That’s up to your aunt Rosewater. It is her board you’re drawing on, Moon.”

“It’s fine with me, but I can’t leave, and neither can Prism. If I do, someone else is likely to snatch up the stall.” It wasn’t actually likely, but it was an excuse to stay put and let other ponies spread the news of what she was doing and where to find her. Not that it was hard to miss her.

She bit her lip, watching as Moon returned her attention to the chalk outline and what was slowly becoming the outline of a dress between bouts of tongue biting and glancing around.

“Maybe some other time?” Silk asked, turning briefly away from her to accept the pouch of beads from the merchant. “I’ve kept you too long from giving your consultations. Oh! You do still have one last payment on your dress.”

Rosewater chuckled at the ruse and nodded. “I know. I’ve been a little strapped lately, with my land purchases, having to actually put some downpayments on my cousin’s release, and the dress. It’s why I’m here, trying to drum up business instead of having fun at the Garden.” She tapped her hoof on the mat under her and grinned as Moon stared up at her like she was crazy.

“You don’t have a drum.”

“I don’t? You’re drawing on the back of my drum, little Moon.”

Horrified, the filly jumped up and looked around for something to erase her artistry.

“Moon, Moon,” Rosewater said, trying to hold back laughter as she settled in beside the little filly. “Calm. I let you draw on my ‘drum.’”

“It’s okay?” Moon asked in a small voice, picking up the chalk from where she’d dropped it and looking at the dress she’d started to sketch. “Momma says… Mother says,” she corrected herself, drawing herself into a more proper posture, “I should always respect other ponies’ property if I want them to respect mine.”

“That’s a very wise outlook, Moon.” Rosewater raised the sign and looked over the dress and the pony form drawn out in crude chalk lines. It was, for an eight year old, an amazing piece of work. “You must draw all the time. Do you always draw dresses?”

“No.”

“I like to paint with watercolor. Landscapes and flowers especially, but sometimes ponies, too,” Rosewater said and glanced around to see if anypony was waiting to talk to her. Merchants taking an extended break to talk with family or friends wasn’t unusual, but she wasn’t there to be a merchant, and she didn’t want to give anypony who wanted a chance to have their voice heard the feeling that she was putting off her duty. “Ask your mother if she would like to come by next week to pick out a piece I painted.”

As a peace offering, it wasn’t much, but it was also something that Rosary likely wouldn’t turn down as it meant getting into the space that Roseate had all but exiled Cloudy for refusing to sneak into.

“Why?” Moon, fairly enough, looked suspicious enough to back away.

“Your mother and I haven’t always been the best of friends.” Rosewater briefly formed the illusion of a diadem above her head before she let the water vapor go. “Largely because of reasons I don’t want to bother you with, but she’s still family, Moon.”

Silk was giving her a look that said she had better watch her step without actually saying anything, and gently nudged Moon to the side. “And we have the ugliest bow in all the universe to make. Let’s go pick out some silks for your dress, and we can go back to the shop.”

Like water washing away chalk, Moon’s uncertainty vanished as she bounced almost into the traffic, stopped at the edge of Rosewater’s mat, pranced back and bowed her head. “Thank you for letting me draw on your sign.”

Silk’s brows rose when she shared a look with Rosewater and offered a smile when Moon darted away again, pausing at the edge of the mat. She set a brief silencing dome around just the two of them. “Rosary has always been strict about maintaining manners in her children. That was her price of upbringing. Just as Vine’s is cleaning and mine is sticking my muzzle into rat traps.”

And mine was fear. “We all paid in different ways.”

“We all paid high prices because she was always hoping she could make another you, with our wills yoked to hers.” Silk shook her head and glanced upwards at the late morning sky and let the silence drop, letting in the sounds of the market again. “But the stars don’t work that way.”

“They don’t. Be well, Silk. I’ll have the next payment to you soon. And thank you.” She dipped her head minutely towards Moon. “Take care of her. She’s a treasure.”

Silk nodded and stepped back into her role as Moon’s guardian, and Rosewater set her sandwich board back up.

Five minutes later, she was taking notes as an elderly forester complained about getting hardwoods across the river in a timely manner, and his clients in Damme complaining and demanding prices be reduced for the inconvenience.

This had to be one of the ponies that had been tipped off, and she dutifully listened and tabulated each complaint so she could compile them later into a neater format.

Half of the ponies she spoke to didn’t want their names attached to the petition, only for the issues to be addressed, which would make it harder to address them, as anonymous complaints typically fell by the wayside in court as there were no benefactors or victims that could be identified readily.

The few that did were those whom had lost businesses or jobs to meddling with the rates, or had a client blacklisted from entering Merrie, who then broke off the contract even despite penalties, and cost the craftsponies more than lost time. Trust and belief in the need for trade was hurting them more than the surface.

As she listened to more and more ponies, and talked to Prism behind privacy barriers in between ponies approaching her, she came to the realization that most of the charges of petty interference were relatively recent. It may have been that they stuck out in ponies memories better, or, the more concerning idea, was that Carnation’s removal had emboldened Roseate along with her defeat in the dueling Arena to her own daughter.

She had been the subject of not a few petty slights and inconveniences that she was sure, but couldn’t conclusively prove, had come down from her mother in the form of licenses and scrollwork that was delayed or had additional fees added on top of the already expensive overseas trading licenses she had to purchase for each nation she had clients in.

Now she was finding out that the pettiness had gone far further afield than only her.

It made her worry that her allying with the Garden of Love would only bring—

Prism’s teeth on her ear snapped her back to the present. “Ow! What was that for?”

“It’s time for a break. That look in your eyes isn’t healthy, love.”

“We saw Aunt Rosewater at the market!”

Moon ratted Silk out the moment her mother came in the shop, startling the customers Silk and one of her assistant were helping.

“Did you, now?” Rosary asked, her voice deceptively light. “Was she shopping, too? Were you polite?”

“Se was doing perfume consultations and telling everypony she was courting Lord Collar,” Moon said happily, prompting Silk to apologize to her customer and asked her to wait for a moment.

“Oh dear, she was?” Rosary fixed a stare on Silk as she approached and rubbed at her throat with a hoof, reminding Silk of the incident in the tower when she’d pushed her sister too hard.

“Yup! And she let me draw on her sign! But she didn’t have any pink.”

“I see. Well.” Rosary took a breath and bent to nuzzle her daughter. “Finish up what you were working on, sweetling. Don’t leave a task Silk gave you unfinished.”

“Yes, mother,” Moon said, bouncing back to the counter and leaving Silk to face her elder sister’s anger.

Instead, Rosary closed off a corner of the shop behind aural and visual fuzzing and disappeared inside with a flick of her tail.

“I didn’t know she’d be there,” Silk said as soon as she entered the private area. “She set up a stall right next to the bead vendor I had to visit.”

“About the ugliest bow in the world.” Rosary’s lips quirked into a smile as she let Silk know she already knew about the trip and, likely, everything that had been said. Whether it was a charmed bangle in Moon’s outfit, expensive to maintain, or she had spies watching her daughter. “Word gets around fast, Silk, when you insult Madam Bow’s sensibilities.”

Rather than upset, there was a spark of amusement in her sister’s voice.

“I thought it would be a good chance to ingratiate myself to Rosewater, and even to get her to open up to us.” Silk kept herself from swallowing. “And she did. Perhaps it’s a trap, but she asked Moon to ask you if you would like to choose one of her paintings from her home. In a week.”

“That, I had not heard. I will have to pretend to be surprised and excited when Moon works up the courage to tell me,” Rosary said in a low tone, her eyes drifting back to her daughter with a hint of longing in her posture. “Was she happy to see her aunt?”

“She was scared at first,” Silk said, wondering just what it was her sister wanted her to say. If it was that Moon was scared of Rosewater, then what would she do?

“At first, you said.”

“She warmed up when Rosewater let her draw on the back of her sign.” And, since Rosary was going to hear of it sooner than later, “Rosewater wasn’t giving consultations.”

“I know. She’s not being very canny with her ‘subterfuge,’ is she?” Rosary looked tired all of a sudden. “Does she know how much trouble she’s causing for us by so openly courting…” Rosary waved a hoof. “Him.”

“Anypony else you would wish her to court?” Silk said with a snort. “You know mother’s tried her damndest, and succeeded, at driving away almost every male and female suitor she’s had. Stars, if she’d just stayed with that soaper, and if mother hadn’t put it in Rosejoy’s head to harass the poor mare, she’d still be childless, but less eager to buck her rule.”

Rosary winced, nodded, and leaned against the wall, rubbing her cheek against the smooth, fabric-covered wood. Whatever thoughts were going through her head, they evaporated to leave Rosary looking much like she usually did: cool and composed, a haughtiness to her bearing that bordered on arrogance.

It was public Rosary, and it wasn’t the first time Silk had seen it take her longer than usual to put on the mask.

“It’s getting heavier,” Silk said, nodding to her Moon, who looked like she was humming behind the counter as she folded and marked bolts of silk, organizing them for the projects they were for. “Especially when she’s as happy as she is.”

Rosary snorted and shook her head. “You don’t know what it’s like to care for a child, Silk. Don’t presume to guess my thoughts.”

“I know what it cost all of us to be Roseate’s children. That she’s happy at all is a testament to your own little rebellion, Rosary. Can you truly remember being happy as a child?”

“I have happy memories,” Rosary snapped.

“Name one.”

“I don’t have time for your games.” All words translated through the mask, words that Silk herself had spoken more than once. They said, ‘I can’t.’ “Tell my sister that I accept when next you see her. You seem to be very close to her, Silk, close enough for dangerous thoughts to enter your mind, perhaps?”

“Save the threatening words for somepony who cares,” Silk said with a scoff. “Mother doesn’t mean to let either Vine or I be safe and untested by our own fires. She just wants to squeeze as much out of us as she can before we’re tossed aside. Just like Glory. Where is your confidant?”

The mask shivered and Rosary flinched, but she didn’t try to justify why Roseate hadn’t seen fit to make any overtures to release Glory. After a breath, the mask was back in place, and she glowered at Silk. “She failed in her mission. And such a simple mission. Mother is still angry.”

“Two months later? She’s being punished, or discarded. The only one of us that was friends to all of us. Do you think Roseate didn’t see that she was courting some pony in Damme? For love, she’s being punished.”

“You’re dangerously close to traitorous thoughts, Silk.” Rosary raised a hoof and set it against Silk’s breast, holding firm. “I’ll forget this little slip, dear sister, because I know you have Merrie’s interests at heart. Please don’t make me tell mother that you’re actually feeling sympathetic towards Rosewater.” She patted Silk’s breast lightly and turned away, dropping the silence and the visual obscuring spells at the same time. “It’s always nice to catch up, Silk. Moon will be by again tomorrow at the usual time.”

Silk let out a breath and watched her sister leave, wondering just how much further she could push it before Rosary actually took action against her, knowing that Silk leaving would hurt Moon almost as much as if she’d lost a second mother.

She had been Moon’s caretaker during the day for almost four years, after all.

Don’t hurt your daughter, Rosary. Not for your mother’s sake.

Author's Note

Well. That's interesting, isn't it? Also, some of the secondary characters will start to become more important and take some viewpoint time as we advance towards Rebellion.