Her first memory. The first one that mattered, anyway.
Strong hooves belonging to a pony she would learn to call Father. Holding her over the edge of their cloud, gripped tightly around her tiny chest. She was a pegasus, like he. But mother was not, and flight remained hard for the little girl.
“What do you see?” The voice was an earthly rumble, echo of his roots.
The question brought memories of coarse language and muddy smells. She scrunched her nose – deep blue, like Father’s.
“Farmers,” she pipped. “Ours.”
Father gave an angry snort, confusing the young mare. The proper words were not yet learned, but already she knew the way of things. The walking ponies farmed, the flying ponies ruled. Her friend Willow said there were horned ponies too, but he was always making up stories.
“No,” Father said. “We are theirs.”
It did not make sense. But she was an obedient filly, and said nothing as he held her even further from the cloud. Getting a better look at the walking ponies – pulling their plows, laughing and spitting tobacco.
She frowned, and Father went on. “Protect them, guard them. Or you are no daughter of mine.”
Father had a way with words. The dirt was old and flowery on his grave, yet she could still hear his voice. Stern reminder of what they are, as true and hard as the crown he passed on to her.
A voice called over the dull pop of gunfire. “Zephyr!”
Blue ears flicked up at her name, but she did not turn. A pale green pony landed, sighing in relief as the cloud caught the weight of his armor.
Willow. Or “Weeping Willow,” when thoughtless tongues spoke. A purebred pegasus, smaller and weaker than the other hussars. That and a panicky nerve had earned him his nickname.
Tonight, she would call him worse for omitting her title. “Queen” Zephyr. Ruler of Horsaw, honorable seventh of the many kingdoms of Equestria. Marshal of the Winged Hussars, all four hundred that remained.
“What news?” she asked with cool indifference. They were friends once. That was a long time ago.
“It’s as bad as it looks,” Willow groaned, a sob breaking the last word. “It’s Neighagra all over again, just with Trottingham’s troops instead of the Sun Guard.”
Zephyr peered over their cloud. Hard to see, with gun-smoke carpeting the battle. Perhaps Willow’s weeping had gotten the better of him.
...The hell it did. Zephyr knew the truth of things. Eighteen months since Sombra invaded, and nothing had changed. Fight, lose, fight, lose. Vanhoover, Hayssia… Horsaw. More besides, but she had stopped counting.
Wasn’t worth thinking about. The disasters would have played out unabated regardless of the hussars’ numbers: charge gallantly, die in smoke. The world had changed since Father’s time.
It was a queer curse that Zephyr held – to see the progress, to grasp its logic, but to hate it as only an old mare could. War was so clever now, with rifles, cannons, and little pistols pegasi strapped to their hooves. With battles won not by glorious charge, but by many thousands hurled to the front on paved roads and ships. Where the only thing sacred was the high ground, from which rifle could rake and artillery bombard. Worth ten thousand winged lancers, and she could see it in the faces of their peers. The chuckles of the Moon Guard as they checked their powder, and the mocking whispers of Manehatten’s rabble.
Angry glares, even, from ponies of all breed. They saw pegasi ruling earth ponies, heard how the hussars’ farmers dubbed them “Archangels,” and felt Horsaw an anathema. Relic of an embarrassing time of superstition and tribal conquest.
Fools. But at least it was forgotten, with Sombra’s army this close to Canterlot.
Still, Willow was unreliable. Perhaps Trottingham was winning, and the arrogant Crystal Empire might be punished yet. If they were driven back, a winged charge could deal a lot of damage.
A dim hope, but it was all she had. “Gather the flock, Weeping. We’ll form up here.”
He winced and glowered at the name, but rose without word. Fifteen, maybe thirty minutes to bring them all together. Longer than she liked, but there was no helping it. They had to stay scattered, else Sombra’s pegasi would attack. The crystal fliers would flee the lance and shoot their little carbines, winning with neither courage nor strength.
Cleverness was all that was needed these days. And however clever the Equestrians may have grown, Sombra’s army was cleverer still. With their crystal-horned helmets that could give any pony magic, and their brilliant formations that saw them shoot two or three bullets for every one returned. They were soldiers. Against them, Equestria had rallied students, farmers, and fool knights in armor. Like her Winged Hussars. Or the knights of Prance – they were so brave, charging the Imperials at that first great disaster. With armor gleaming and swords raised, and they say some of them even reached the enemy line. Hard to tell with all the gun-smoke.
Stars above, they were brave. No justice left in the world. Cleverness and cannon had shot it from a distance.
She wasn’t so brave. Neighagra, their second disaster, saw the two armies race for the sacred high ground. Zephyr saw it all – the Sun Guard ran ahead, held off the whole Imperial army. Held them half the day. Strangest thing she’d ever seen: Equestrians, outfighting the Crystals!
It should have gone better. The generals moved too slow, and six hours without help was too much to ask. The army reached the heights to find Sombra’s guns in wait, and the rest played itself out as it always did. Fight, lose.
The hussars didn’t even make a charge. The Prench would have, but they were braver than she. Zephyr was clever, damn it all. Enough to see the gory math at work.
“Math.” She smiled thinly. Like fate. In the end, only one answer.
The smile fell. It was fated, wasn’t it? Here lay the same race, with the same end. Two sides racing for a precious ridge line, with a small force thrown ahead to buy time. Today, Trottingham in place of the Sun Guard.
The same end lay in wait. They would break. They would fail. Not their fault, with all Sombra’s legions fixed against them. A fraction against a whole. The Empire would gain the high ground and pounce, wrecking Equestria’s army. A third disaster.
There wouldn’t be a fourth. Not this close to Canterlot.
The smoke was lessening, and the pop of gunshots had grown irregular. She could pick out Trottingham’s bright red uniforms, peeling away in staggered retreat. Only departing in ones and twos, but that was the trickle before the flood. Already it was growing, and soon enough the line would fall.
Faster than it should have been. Disappointing. But even so, she could not blame them. You could give a pony a weapon, tell him to fight for his freedom. Most would even die for it. But to die without saving his freedom, to watch friends die and die and the army lose and lose without saving a thing… that was harder. You couldn’t ask ponies to die in vain, and that’s all they had done these eighteen months.
The hussars gathered around her, hovering in the air or crowding onto drifting clouds. Clad in splint or lobster-plate mail, with thick-chained skirts and heavy helms. At every side was a red lance, twice as long as its owner yet borne with practiced ease. Some had pennants affixed to their ends, with Horsaw’s colors of red and white.
Pegasi, but far different than their Cloudsdale kin. Generations alongside earth ponies had created a breed of size and strength. And they were all of the nobility: rearguards of an older way, when lords carried swords instead of quills.
All of them, familiar faces. Friends, comrades, playmates, teachers, rivals. A few greying hooves had rocked her cradle, and the youngest had learned their craft by her words. Zephyr was not a young mare.
One – a lover. King and husband. She could see him over there, speaking low to the one they called Big Jan. King Goldenhoof, his silver-white coat visible beneath the crowned helm.
“Goldy,” she had called him in better times. But today their only contact was an accidental glance. So it had been since their sons died – two they had raised together, and the job was done well. Both taught the ways of lance and sword. Both taught that they ruled their earth ponies, but served them as well.
Both dead on the plains of Neighagra, shot from the sky.
No tears. Nopony’s fault but Sombra’s. But it weighed on Zephyr all the same. It felt wrong, unnatural to outlast her children. Like the mere act of living was a sin.
Well. Small time for philosophy, now. Trottingham was breaking. More and more turning tail, yet a thin red line held its ground. They and Zephyr thought the same: this was the final chance. That if the foe could only be delayed long enough, the high ground might be saved for Equestria’s army. Worse in every way than their enemies, but if they could but gain the heights and meet Imperial cleverness with bullet and cannon…
There rested the hope. Time. They needed time.
No point in waiting. No point in saving her strength, when the army had perhaps no more than one good fight left in it.
“Hussars!” The word came from her throat, loud and strong. But then she paused. No time to say all that she wanted to. Her love for them: friends, teachers, and so on. Her deep, personal expectation that they do her proud. That they meet come-what-may with all the glory of their ancestors.
No time to remind them of their heritage. That in the tribal days, the earth ponies of Horsaw called pegasi jackdaws, magpies, or worse. But Zephyr’s house changed sides, and flew to protect instead of raid. “Archangels,” they became. Guardians, champions, saints in armor.
And they are these things, still.
“We charge in ten squadrons, fifty wingbeats apart. Head-on. Follow the lance.”
She gazed out, and each one met her eyes. Rivals, playmates, students. The next hour might see them all die, and her as well. That was alright. Death was awful, painful. Not even glorious. Just gun-smoke and lead, then mud and worms. But it would be honorable, at least, and then came the reward: The Greater Sky, beyond the grave. The boundless paradise of clouds, with no ground to get in the way.
Even Willow held her gaze. Only Goldenhoof did not. He turned his head, the effeminate face glum and despondent. He didn’t believe, anymore – not in Archangels, nor the Greater Sky. The sight of two dead sons had robbed his faith. He knew that it ended with worms, while the same sight made Zephyr swear it must not.
Thus, they had ceased to speak. But she nodded to him, and he nodded back. They were Winged Hussars – the rest was secondary.
Again, Zephyr’s dry voice rang out. A few more words. It seemed improper to send them off with an order alone.
“When you first raised the red spear, you took an oath to guard Equestria, and all who dwell there, unto the end of your strength. Tonight, wherever you shall be, only one question shall be asked: Did you keep it?”
Wanted to keep talking. No time. Trottingham was broken, the thin red line plowed under. She could see the serried army of crystal foes press after them. Sombra’s ranks whooped and cheered, dashing forward to the unguarded hills. Neighagra all over again.
But Zephyr’s eyes were bright as the flock fanned out around her. Here lay a chance. The sky was empty – Sombra’s pegasi chased down their redcoat adversaries, hearts fattened by victory not yet won. A heady, drunken infection that had spread to the battle-line, making them careless. Their clever rifles were fired and not reloaded, their brilliant formations abandoned in the lunge for slaves, loot and glory.
It was a wide attack that Zephyr chose, more like a net than lance. They didn’t need to win. They couldn’t – not four hundred against an army. They just needed to stall for time.
Like the Sun Guard. She wondered if their fate would be hers, and it would all be in vain.
Well. The Greater Sky would receive her, either way.
Leaving the red lance in its holster, she raised her sword: a short, heavy, evil thing, blackened against rust. She swept it forward, and the Archangels charged. Over Trottingham’s downcast heads, and the enemy pegasi in their midst. Fast and high, and so widely dispersed that no single set of eyes guessed the strength of the blow.
Too late did the first ranks of the enemy grasp their peril: the Winged Hussars, riding out of knightly storybook with armor and sword. Some of the Crystals fled, while others fumbled to load rifles. Too late – the guns were as clubs. Twigs, even, before the great red lances of their foes!
No hint of soldierly courage met Horsaw’s charge. Four hundred lances skewered the huddled ranks, shattering them like broken glass. Zephyr’s own lance broke in the throat of a dull green mongrel. His neighbors panicked, dropping empty rifles to flee. She hacked one’s leg with the sword, causing the crystal pony to topple with a shriek.
Ignoring the wounded, Zephyr gave chase to those who ran. The hussars galloped as well, favoring their hooves over wings. A slower pursuit, but it gave them morbid cover from the next of the endless regiments. The quicker Imperials had already loaded, but now stood unsure. Before them they could only see their fleeing comrades… and then the lines met, and it was too late. The hussars were upon them.
The charge was over. Now came the brawl. Their lances gone, Horsaw waded in with swords, axes, and estocs strapped to their legs. Clumsy against magic-held bayonets, but the difference was closed with skill and ferocity. They fought as berserkers, jumping and diving with quick beats of the wings, kicking powerful hooves and rending all around them.
Zephyr slapped her wings, stunning a young mare as she fumbled with a bayonet. The tool clacked uselessly against steel plate, and Zephyr hacked open the neck. She brushed past the body, sword already moving to the next. Everywhere, red and grey – blood, and the grey uniforms of their foes.
Big Jan’s huge, brown form could be seen, setting to the grim business with hewing axe. A crack of gunshot, a puff, and he staggered… but did not fall. Instead he pounced to the aggressor, his massive, flailing hooves as dangerous as the blade.
More gun-cracks came, but they were scattered and useless. A dead or injured hussar for every dozen slain greycoats, and more besides in panicked flight.
Zephyr fell upon an officer, resplendent in black cloth and golden lace. He raised a jeweled saber against her – a thin, bright little toy. She knocked his guard wide with a brutal swing, and broke his skull with the next.
His bodyguards ran. Everywhere, they ran! Or fought on with vain, useless courage. She saw Goldenhoof with raised spear, his melancholy gone, his crowned helm shining bright upon his head as he led his folk onwards.
Zephyr followed. A word glinted in her mind, hot and bloody: Rout. There was a day not long past when a charge like this would ruin an army. The great red lances would break up the enemy line and they would flee, to be run down like a hunted boar. Like in her father’s time against the Supremacists, or his father’s against the dogs.
A dozen gun-cracks sounded at once as part of the third line volleyed. One hussar jerked backwards, but rejoined the charge. Steel covered his breast, and steel defeated lead.
Zephyr plowed into melee with the rest of them. Already she was breathing hard, and she winced as a bayonet pierced her wing. She slashed the offender’s neck and howled fiercely, and was answered by a gun-crack to her left. The point-blank shot blasted a hussar’s knee, and he fell with a scream.
Rout. She let the word pass away. Too many – too many clever guns, outreaching the longest lance. Too many crystal ponies, hurled southward on paved roads and ships.
No rout. Perhaps not even salvation. Just a vain battle, like so many before.
Things were confused now. The squadrons had broken up, and Sombra’s lines had blurred. Some still fled the berserk hussars, but far more surged forwards with bayonets fixed on loaded guns. They shot and skewered, aiming for vulnerable wings and necks.
Another slap of Zephyr’s wings flicked blood across the eyes of another. The soldier cried out in surprise and she punched him hard, her blade at work against another’s gun. A bayonet that she hadn’t noticed scraped her helmet.
No matter. A second punch felled the blinded soldier, and her sword dispatched the offender. The stallion she had parried fumbled his weapon. He tried to backpedal away from her, but tripped over a fallen comrade.
He threw up his hooves as Zephyr loomed above. She cut out his throat. No time for silliness, with another bayonet already scraping her armored side, and a gunshot tearing the wounded wing. She grunted wordlessly against the pain, and turned to engage.
Everywhere, the violence. The blur of grey and red.
And there – gold. Her husband’s crowned head, cast to the mud. The silvery white face, bloody and lifeless.
No children. Nothing to outlive him. Already, a Crystal soldier knelt to yank off his golden horseshoes.
Bullets, bayonets all around her. Zephyr turned without pause, instinct carrying her to the violence.
They couldn’t win. Not with the charge spent, and so many thousand queued against them. It was time to fold – to signal retreat as best as she could and flee the battle.
Big Jan… still alive. He barreled before her amid the smoke and blood, his armor and strength enduring shot after shot. Bleeding in a dozen places, but still hewing, still fighting.
Zephyr moved in next to him, securing his flank. An officer’s saber cut for his knee and instead found her wing. She dispatched the fool.
The wings still worked. They were large, like her, and could at least bring her to safety. Live to fight again.
But there was no “again.” Not this close to Canterlot. And she took an oath, same as the rest of them.
Her and Big Jan stumbled from the melee. The press of bodies dimmed, but the act only carried them to greater peril. More were approaching at a jog, with ready bayonets. At the sight of the pair, two dozen rifles lowered and shot.
Death, an instant away. Zephyr glared down the barrels. But at once they vanished, replaced by a gore-soaked brown wing. Big Jan had leapt before her, and the rest followed inevitably. Two dozen bullets broke jaw, legs, and skull, and the great titan fell.
Over him, Zephyr flapped her bloodied wings, and they carried her to the soldiers’ midst. They were ready – a raised bayonet almost took her throat. Instead it entered the helmet and struck her cheek, parting the flesh to show teeth and bloody gums.
Zephyr retaliated, and she did not miss the throat. Nor the necks of the two next to her. Fatigue slowed her limbs, but the short, hacking sword did its business.
“The neck, Zephyr. Go for the neck with a sword like that. Not much bone or muscle to get in the way, so you can slash right through. Stab for legs or chests and you’ll get your sword stuck, and then you’ll be dead.”
Father. A dozen brave campaigns, and only old age could bring him down. Lucky – if it was “lucky” for him to spend his last years shitting the bed, slowly forgetting all that made him great.
They sang to him when he died. Sons and daughter, gathered around the withered remnant as his soul departed. Crying, singing whatever they could manage. Mostly hymns to the Greater Sky, but a few stirring, martial tunes as well.
Zephyr swung another wing to slap, but a bayonet caught it. The tool wrenched outwards, shredding feathers and muscle.
No song, here. No gathered kin. But a good, honorable end. That was something.
…A song would have been nice. Or better still, a son. Two sons. Both unmarried, poor boys, and now it was too late.
Hot tears ran down Zephyr's face. Not for the pain. But Goldenhoof, Jan, the boys… and herself. All come down to this. Endings, endings! Endings without births.
Not true – the Greater Sky. It waited for her. Called out to her. And even if Goldenhoof was right and there was no Greater Sky, this was still a good end. A proper end for Horsaw’s Queen: to die, upholding the oath.
She could see well enough through the tears. A rifle stock, raised in futile parry. Wooden shards flew out as her sword broke it in half, then lunged for the neck.
A gun-crack, almost in her ear. A sudden numbness in her left foreleg. No pain.
Oh – there it was. Shards of bone sliding against each other, ripping through the muscles they once held aloft.
She screamed. Impossible not to. But her right leg, the blade-leg, slashed to the left, and she was rewarded with a cry.
Her gaze flew upwards, blurred and dim. Even the sky was red – or was it just her eyesight? A pale green pegasus flew above, with a sword held high: small, reedy Willow.
“Fight on!” he called, in a tenor voice more used to whining. “Fight on! The sky is red, and it sees us! Archangels!”
Zephyr’s dizzy eyes fell back to her own battle. She knew she would not see him again. She should have been kinder, should have been a better friend.
Her body fought. Her mind begged. “Please – don’t let it end here, with mud and worms. Let there be a Greater Sky! They deserve it. They are brave. They’d rather die as victors than live defeated.”
“Let there be a Greater Sky. And by the teeth of hell, LET THERE BE VICTORY!”
The Greater Sky cared nothing of victory, but she wanted it all the same. A damned clever age, but that same cleverness could bring salvation. Students and farmers against Crystal soldiers, but how equal they were before the cannon! The almighty high ground… had time enough been won?
The leg was useless. Two wings remained strong. Zephyr flapped once, pouncing through the darkening battle and landed on flesh. She grappled with it, screaming again as a crystal hoof punched the shot leg. But her blade was short, and she stabbed downwards through the dim grey figure.
It hurt so bad, the leg. Her stomach heaved, vomit flew from her mouth, yet still she rose. Crying, hacking madly at the grey shapes around her. She hit nothing. Pain blinded her, staggered her. Couldn’t even swing the sword right, anymore. Couldn’t even lift it to a neck.
Another scream. Pain and impotent fury screamed with her, calling for the Greater Sky. She was done, done! And she screamed for the Devil to finish the job.
A devil answered. Close enough for her to feel the powder on her face, the heat of the discharged rifle. Right to her bared neck, bursting open its left like a crushed grape.
Missed the throat and spine. Could still fight.
But her body toppled backwards with the shot. Her head fell, and she saw bloodied wings splayed out in the mud. So ripped and grey that she wondered if they were her own. Couldn’t feel them.
Mind still sharp, still clever. Not for long. Felt infinity’s cold blackness within her, stealing the world around. Noise fading, sight fading.
Zephyr fading.
Well.
A good charge. Maybe that was time enough. Maybe they would be remembered. Not as old relics, has-beens, or fool knights. But saviors, martyrs.
Archangels.
Zephyr opened her eyes. Blue skies, puffed clouds all around her. No ground. The Greater Sky? It seemed too cold and lonely. Her breath misted in the chilly air.
She flew. Not so bad. Still very cold. Slow, even sweeps of the wings carried her from cloud to cloud.
The ground shook. She woke up.
Zephyr’s eyes opened. Couldn’t move much else. So cold, and… wet?
Blood. All over her, still oozing from the neck.
Another tremor. A bright flash set her dim vision alight, amidst a mob of grey-coated bodies. Dozens flew to the air, broken, and the rest quivered. An officer slapped one, and they marched on.
More flashes, more explosions. Zephyr couldn’t raise her head, but she could turn it. It squelched from the bloody, ruined helmet, taking her gaze to the side. The grey tide advanced around her – staggered, wounded, but onwards to the ruin of Equestria. To the dream of a world of slaves and masters, with Sombra above all.
Another explosion. Then three more, casting bodies all around.
Her vision was better, now. She could see the ridge line, and the white smoke belching from its heights. Puffs so huge they could be seen from here, each one bringing to existence a high whine and explosive end. Raking the disorganized, cluttered grey mob.
Zephyr couldn’t remember her name. Everything was so muddled, so distant. So cold.
But she was yet clever, and she knew. “The cannons. Good, good, we’ve brought up the cannons.”
Cannons on the high ground. Math would do the rest.
She smiled, though the reason escaped her. The cleverness, snuffed along with the memories. Her smile was a stupid one, leering crudely through shredded cheek.
No thoughts. Just a few, distant images. Strong blue hooves around her tiny chest. A smile and blush on a silver-white face. A babe, asleep on her belly.
A last sigh. A twitch of the eyelid. A vague sense of slipping away.
And then… she slipped away.
Author's Note
In a better world
It is the old, who have had their time,
Who ride to the salvation of the new.
Thank you for reading.
