End of an Heir

Though the Severius Empire has declared war on Equestria, the alicorns had no true idea of the events that set it into motion.

Emperor Duilius has now set many different operations in order to fully militarize the country.  Taxes have been raised to pay for expenses and the army is now being expanded.

Duilius wished to send a message to the alicorns, showing them they are not invincible.  Gregorios and a small detachment of his century have already placed heavy injuries onto Prince Clash.  Rather than keep him as a hostage the Emperor sends Gregorios and his century to ‘demonstrate’ the future of the alicorns.

Gregorios now leads his century to the pony capital of Chandleridge… and they expect a fight from what they’re about to do.

In the time of midnight, the century of three-hundred men march to the beat of multiple war drums.  Gregorios is at the front of the formation and at the rear a large catapult is pushed along the rode by common laborers from their city.  Behind the catapult was a group of soldiers dragging net and inside the net Prince Clash.  He attempts to struggle free but repeatedly fails.

Soon the city comes into sight looking quite pathetic compared to the Severius city.  Small stone huts line across the dirt roads with ponies going about in their struggles for survival.

Gregorios stops the march upon seeing a stone palace in the distance.  The stone palace sits with no real amazing traits, but a large balcony that leads into the throne room.

“Promptus ad catapultam!”  He yells to his century.

The lines of legionnaires behind him disperse to the sides to create new smaller lines as the catapult is pushed up to the front.  The wooden catapult lurches to a stop and the workers begin to prepare it to fire.

“Adduc principem!”  Gregorios then walks to the area behind the catapult as the prince is dragged up to him.

“No, what does that mean?”  Clash asks in fear.

“It means you’re about to fly.”  Gregorios answers as he takes his helmet off and hands it to a laborer.

“Are you letting me go?”  The prince asks desperately as his face lights up in hope.

“More or less…”  The centurion answers again, now turning around to look at the alicorn, revealing his full face.  Clash looks up to see the human’s short black hair, along with hazel colored eyes.

“Well… how am I going to fly with my wings injured?”  He asks, attempting to flaps his wings, but to no avail.

“We have a way.  Aliquam ipsum.”  He commands to the legionnaires dragging the prince.  The immediately pick up the alicorn and seamlessly place him into the basket of the catapult.

Clash looks about quickly realizing the situation.  “No, y-you can’t!”

“I don’t see why you resist.  You’re going home.”  The centurion pointed to show the palace in the distance.  “Your mother and father will be there and it will all be fine.”

“Don’t you dare talk about my family, hindwalker!”  He spits at the centurion.

“Why not?  Clover the Clever and Commander Hurricane would love to know that their son is all right.  Or if he’s dead.”  Gregorios then readied his sword to cut the tension line below the basket.

“How do you know?”  The alicorn’s eyes widened at the human.

“Ponies aren’t exactly the most self-conscious of races.  We know a lot more about you then you know of us.”  He then cut one of the strands from the rope creating a loud snapping sound.

Clash struggled about in the basket, unable to move out of it.  “Please!  Let me live!  We can make peace here!”

“Desperation leads to many empty promises, prince.”  Another strand snapped.  “Personally, I don’t know what your parents were thinking.  Sending their heir into foreign lands with no abilities for defense, and he can barely use his only advantages over us.  How pitiful.”  The next snap lurched the basket slightly upward by a couple of centimeters.

“Please stop!”  Clash yelled out through tears coming into his eyes.

Only one strand remained on the rope, straining about, in the process of already ripping.

“I’ll let fate decide here.”  Gregorios then slid his sword back into its holster and took a step back.  “It seems a little less violent.”  He stated plainly now watching the alicorn squirm about. Gregorios then took a scroll from one of the commoners and approached the basket yet again.

He shoved the scroll onto the alicorns back and held it as a commoner applied tree sap to glue it on.

Gregorios then stepped back away and continued to watch.

Suddenly with one final snap the basket flew forward and launched the alicorn into the air.

Queen Clover sat on her throne in thought.  Her green mane shimmered along with her white coat, creating a small glow in the room.

She looked over to the empty throne besides her belonging to her husband, King Hurricane.

A sigh escaped her breath as she then looked to the balcony leading into the throne room.  The area in which Hurricane would always enter and they would be reunited again, but today he remains on tour in the southern lands against the draconequess clan.  Today she was alone, her son, Prince Clash going on some task for Star-Swirled the Bearded.

She was worried due to her son being gone for almost a full day, but he knew how to handle himself… right?

Clover then stood up and began to walk through her empty throne room.  Only accompanied by two guards next to her throne who continued to stand still as she passed by.  She came to a stop as she walked out onto the balcony, leaning onto the railing with her hooves.

She looked up at the sky to see the midnight sky graced by thousands upon millions of stars in the sky.  The night sky always did put a smile upon her face, even during the times of the wendigo blizzards.

She looked across the land to see something that confounded her.  Something was moving across the sky at an alarming speed.  Screaming from a familiar voice met Clover’s ears.

Clover cast a spell to illuminate the area in a green shade of light revealing Prince Clash flying through the air.

“Clash?!”  She yelled in surprise.

Clash immediately slammed onto the balcony, sounds of cracking bones filled the throne room as Clash bounced and then began to slide across the floor, coming to a stop in the center of the room.

The two guards quickly dashed over to the prince as Clover teleported next to him.  Clover gasped upon seeing her son with heavy injuries upon him, heavy cuts on his side have been reopened bleeding extensively.  Heavy gashes on his head from the landing in the room also bled slightly.

The guards attempted to heal him with magic, only to find that the injuries were too great and Clash has already lost too much blood.

“Clash, you’re going to be okay, just keep looking at me, alright?”  Clover stated desperately looking down at her son.

“Mother… the humans.”

“What?”

“The humans… are coming.”  Clash then released a large cough of blood as his head dropped back onto the floor, lifeless.

“Clash?!  Clash?!”  Clover yelled, shaking her son’s body, attempting to get a response out of him.

“My queen, he is gone.”  One of the guards states solemnly.

“No… It can’t be.”  Clover felt the sadness take her as she stared at her son.  She closed her eyes tightly as tears began to roll out.

She opens her eyes again to notice the piece of parchment between his wings.  Clover rips it off of her son’s coat, cringing upon the sound of it ripping off with the tree sap.  She opened up the scroll and began to read out loud.

To Queen Clover,

Your son, Prince Clash, has treaded upon our lands without our permission.  As you can see, we have punished him to the fullest extent of our law system.

Your species controls the mainland of this continent and you have done a terrible job of managing it.  We look about to find small villages, unworthy of this great land, and then we find your people, unfit to survive much longer.

We shall redeem this land; pull it into a new era of prosperity and progress.

And we will drag you and your people into it with force if necessary.

Spitefully,

The Latin Severius Empire or, as your species whispers about us, ‘Hindwalkers’

Queen clover felt many emotions tide over her once she finished reading.  Anger, for the species that has forsaken her son, fear, for a new enemy that has managed to kill an alicorn, and insulted to called unfit to survive.  Over all of those she instead felt sadness for her son, who had only become an alicorn only a few weeks ago.

The fact that the son of her and Commander Hurricane was but an Earth Pony astonished them.  They have yet to fully understand biology and how it affects breeding.  His job was just to defend a village in the north and he effectively did it after fighting off many creatures in his short time there.  He became enlightened in the arts of combat, his father was proud and his mother supported him.

Now, Prince Clash was dead, the heir to the throne is now gone and the people will surely be angered.

“Guards!”  Clover commands, and the two salute too her upon the call.

“Gather the garrison; we are hunting down whoever did this.”  She states in a strong tone.

The two guards nodded and head off out of the throne room.

The human soldiers sat upon the hill in a shield wall formation facing the city.  Gregorios stood to the side of the formation watching the city, waiting for any signs of movement.

His wait was rewarded when he saw a cloud of dust moving about in the center of the town.  He waited a while longer to find an entire garrison of troops exiting the city, kicking up the clouds of dust as the moved.

“Vestibulum!”  The centurion called out and the troops instantly stood ready behind their shields as the garrison approached.

The garrison was mainly composed of unicorns and Earth Ponies in light hide armor instead of the steel humans used.  Armed with spears and small sword the infantry looked completely inferior to century of human troops.  The only true force that warranted attention were the Pegasi flying above the formation, armed with bows, and spears.

The bows look to be extremely simple in design, not capable of applying enough force to truly pierce armor, but can still annoy a legionnaire.

“Et tandem lineam!”  Gregorios instead calls for a line formation and the century instantly replied taking their shields and heading into a line formation.

The troops are more mobile in the line, and they can cover each other far easier.  The first line is made of one-hundred-fifty legionnaires and the line farther back was the same.  The reserve line can take on troops only if necessary, but the Pegasi can prove to be a problem.

The centurion headed back to a resupply station for the troops.  Unused gladuis sat about on stands, scutums also, and pilas sat in holders.

Gregorios would simply take care of the Pegasi himself, he picked up an extra pila and then made his way back to the front with the soldiers.

The century of troops then waited as the unorganized mass of troops came to a stop about twenty meters in front of their shields.

The Pegasi hovered above them readying to fire their bows with looks of fear on their faces.  All of them had true looks of either uncertainty as they looked at the legionnaires in front of them.  All that they saw was a line of shields with legs below them and no other details shown.

Clover descended to the front of the formation with two Pegasi hovering next to her as guards.

Clover locked eyes with the centurion and it felt as if the land had stopped moving due to the tension.  Feeling as if he should explain himself, Gregorios broke the silence.

“Beautiful night, isn’t it Queen Clover?”  He asked in a genuine tone.

Clover instead grits her teeth in anger at the centurion.

“I guess we should explain ourselves, because it seems that your troops have seen a ghost.”  He gestures to the frightened pony soldiers.

Clover looked about at her troops and then turned her attention ahead to fine the wall of shields as the only sight.  She gulped in nervousness due to the fact that the humans seemed advanced in their military by leaps and bounds.

“We are humans or the ‘Hindwalkers’ you’ve taken to call us in your stories of lore.  Now, I take it you read the message so eloquently delivered by your son?”  Gregorios cracked a small smile after delivering that line.

“Yes, and I would like you to know that we wish you no harm.”  Clover remains determined.

The centurion instead chuckles.  “Putat sunt a facie terroris!”  He calls out to his troops and they return laughs to the ponies.

The ponies remain dumbfounded at the ancient language spoken between the humans as the laughing dies down in all of them.

“Queen Clover, you would love it to be like that, wouldn’t you?”  He asks.

“It is like that, human!”  She yells in anger back at the centurion.

“That’s what I was looking for.”  He states in a satisfied tone.  He then bashes his shield with his gladuis, creating a loud bashing sound.  He continued this as the rest of the humans joined in the bashing creating a synchronized beat.  The war drums then began to beat loudly behind them.

“We outnumber you, humans!  Our powers of magic will see us through!”  She yells as she takes a defensive stance, readying for the inevitable melee.

“We will see where your magic gets you when you armies are crushed, your cities burned, your head on a stake, and your people enslaved!”  Gregorios yelled before pointing his sword to the ponies.

“Praecipe!”  He screams out to the world.

The first line of the legionnaire’s then dash down the hill, yelling their own war cries.

Now, the blood will flow…