Shadows of Canterlot

Chapter 4

Soon enough, the small group of friends had relocated to Fancy’s house instead. Though Fleur was worried it would be in no state for a party, Fancy (true to his word) was able to make the arrangements quickly and discreetly. Before long, the modest frescos on the walls were illuminated by hanging lamps and brightly-flickering sconces, the light sparkling on the atrium pool. It had started raining earlier that night, but the compluvium window right above the pool was shut tonight, so none fell through.

It had been a bit of a hassle to make the preparations on such short notice, but somehow, Fancy got it done: The dining couches were moved into the main living room, with enough room for at least a dozen; the table had been spread with the best cloth, dishes and silverware tonight, and was laden down with food from a caterer who was more than happy to work late if he was paid well; the best wines were drawn from their casks and poured into jugs, carried diligently on trays by Fleur and Fancy’s servants. Fancy had a little bit of trouble acquiring entertainment on such short notice, but thankfully, Octavia had a few musician friends from the Royal Conservatory who were happy to help.

With all that said and done, Prince Blueblood lay back in the middle of his couch with a contented sigh, hashish smoke floating away from his mouth to mingle with incense fumes from the atrium. “Now this... this is much better.” he said, his voice quiet and mellow, handing the small hookah to the next pony over (in this case, Fancy). “No Golden Gavel, not nasty crowd, no noise, good company-” He flashed a bright, happy smile at Fancy, who returned it just as eagerly, “-it’s practically a dream after earlier.”

“Amen to that.” muttered Fleur, lifting her cup of wine to her lips and leaning back on her couch as well, snuggled into Fancy’s right side and on the opposite side of the couch from Blueblood. She had decided not to partake yet, so she was still a little irritated from the events of earlier, however much she tried not to let it show. “By the way, what did you put in his drink, anyway?”

Blueblood smirked, chuckling so hard he had a fit of coughing. “That’s *cough cough* a secret you will *cough* find out very soon. For now, I’ll keep that as a welcome surprise.” He took a sip of wine to help the coughing stop, and cleared his throat. “Believe me, he’ll be thoroughly regretting his insults, don’t you worry.”

He sounded a little too excited about the prospect, Fancy thought. “It won’t be anything too bad, will it?” Fancy asked, draping a foreleg over Blueblood’s side. “After all, we don’t want to almost start a feud like what happened with Atia and-”

“I swear by Bellona’s breath, nopony will ever let me live that one down!” The matron huffed from her couch on the other side of the table, lifting a small hooful of roast walnuts to her mouth. “There are worse things than being called a whore, after all, especially when it’s literally true and they deserve it!”

“True or not, it’s not something many ponies take kindly to, Atia.” snapped Fleur with a sour expression.

Atia looked confused for a moment, then promptly facehooved. “Oh, right. Terribly sorry of me, my dear Fleur. I’d nearly forgotten about those comments at the party.” She offered an apologetic nod towards Blueblood as well. “You too, your Highness. It was very rude of me to imply-”

Blueblood cut her off with a wave of his hoof, his eyes slightly red. “No, it’s all right, Atia, I know you meant no offence to me or her. It’s not your fault, at any rate- it’s Golden’s.” He looked introspective for a moment, lifting his head forward. “I know I’m hardly a model noble, after all; I am, as Fleur said earlier, a ‘half-drunken, sex-addled pervert.’ ”

He felt Fancy squirm next to him, and chuckled. “Don’t come to my defence, Fancy, please; you know it’s true. It’s who I am, and I accept that, with what consequences there may be.” He suddenly clutched his cup tightly in his magic, cracks starting to appear along the stem. “But that doesn’t mean I have to like it when arrogant little toads like Golden Gavel maliciously rub it in my face in front of everypony because they know it’ll humiliate me.” He spat, glaring daggers at his cup as if expecting it to burst into pieces by sheer force of will. “He’s damned lucky I didn’t do worse to-”

Blueblood’s outburst was interrupted by a light touch to his shoulder. He turned his head to see Fancy looking up at him with a soft smile, and what was left of his anger slowly ebbed away. “Breathe, my friend.” Fancy muttered just low enough for the prince to hear, rubbing small circles along his tensed shoulders and neck.

Blueblood felt his eyes close half-way, and he sank down onto his couch with another drawn-out sigh of content. “Sorry, Fancy. I...I got carried away.”

Fancy nodded in sympathy, reaching for the hookah with his magic as it made its way around the table. “I understand. Another draw?”

“Yes, please.” Blueblood replied, opening his eyes long enough to bring the hose to his lips, his cheeks sucked in slightly as he took another long pull. The familiar feeling of floatiness spread from his head to his hooves, a sense of inner calm penetrating the remnants of his anger and replacing it with warmth and peace. He passed the hose back to Fancy before exhaling slowly, a billowing mushroom cloud of aromatic smoke floating away towards the ceiling. “Ah.... thank you.”

Fleur, in the meantime, turned towards Atia and gave her a calculating look. “What do you think will happen next, Atia? I don’t think the conservative faction will take kindly to their chief spokespony being poisoned, even if it is non-lethally.”

Atia looked away from her conversation with her daughter, leaned her head on her hooves, and smiled. “Simple, my dear; they’re going to make a move on us in retaliation, whether in the senate or otherwise. Golden will probably be either too embarrassed or too incapacitated to do anything himself, depending on exactly what Blueblood used-”

Blueblood snickered, nearly dropping the cup in his magic’s grip. “Oh, he definitely won’t be showing up for a couple days unless he fancies dying of shame.”

Atia ignored the comment and continued, “So, somepony else will have to take charge. I say we take a leaf out of Blueblood’s book and just poison them all to buy us time to prepare for-”

“Atia, you can’t be serious!” Fancy frowned, stopping his ministrations to Blueblood’s shoulders to stare at her across the table in disbelief. “First of all, that’d be an absolutely dishonourable trick; and second of all, how the hay are we going to poison all our rivals non-lethally at once? The logistics of that plan leave something to be desired, not to mention the morals.”

“I’m with Fancy on this.” piped up Night Light, looking up from his own couch. “It’d look horribly suspect if all our rivals fell ill at once, not to mention there’d really be no point to it! What can they do to us, really? Insult in public or private? Spread rumours and gossip? Try to block our motions in the Senate?”

“They can dig up all our little secrets and use them to destroy us. Because if they do that, I suspect we’d eventually be on the verge of civil war.” spoke up Octavia, looking terribly serious all of a sudden. She looked around at the others, who were all eyeing her with faint curiosity mixed with scepticism. “Just hear me out, will you? The people love Princess Celestia and Cadance, right? And they don’t like the group of patricians who seem too busy being idle or engaged in their inter-family squabbles to do anything useful, right?”

The guests shared a look of slight confusion, but nodded in unison. “Right...?”

Octavia glanced towards her mother, who gave her a sign to continue. “Anyways, for centuries now, things have been stable; The Princesses holds ultimate authority, while administrative and legislative responsibilities are merely delegated to us, right? It’s a privilege we hold, which can be taken away, not an absolute right. We make decisions, she approves them if she thinks they’re fair and vetoes them if she doesn’t. She can at least tolerate the worst of the conservative patricians, because they haven’t always been bad eggs, and some still aren’t. However, we have a new Princess with equal authority who doesn’t understand how the current system works, nor likes or get along with them on principle, and they don’t like her either because she doesn’t allow them the liberties or the control they once had under Princess Celestia alone. So, if somepony wanted to upset the balance of power in their favour, what would they do?”

The room was silent for a nearly a minute, the guests thinking to themselves. Finally, Octavian, oddly enough, broke the stillness, setting his book down on the table. “Discredit all those who oppose them, all the way up to the princesses. They can’t do anything to Princess Celestia or Cadance, because they’re fairly neutral, revered figures. But Princess Luna is new, hasn’t gained a tolerance for the conservative faction, nor they respect for her, and largely prefers force and simplicity over stealth and intrigue; not to mention she’s still got the shadow of the whole Nightmare Moon thing hanging over her in many ponies’ eyes.” A number of them winced collectively; that was still a sore point for Princess Luna, as well as those who had been through Nightmare Moon’s brief reign of terror.

“...And since, for the most part, she seems to back us, if there was a chain of secrets and rumours leading from us all the way to her, her authority would be damaged in the eyes of the populace at large, and she probably would not react as kindly to blackmail as any of us. Worst comes to worst, she’d be painted as a tyrant, the conservatives would clamour for her removal, Celestia would most likely not give in, and there’d be an all-out civil war with the conservatives, with the support of the people they’ve convinced they’re defending from a tyrant, and we’d be outnumbered, discredited, and destroyed.”

A nervous laugh issued from Atia’s mouth, her brow wrinkled. “You can’t possibly think that’ll happen, do you? I mean, Princess Celestia could just strip them of their titles and authority if they try to go after Princess Luna, and take most of their lands for the crown. I mean, a conspiracy on that level is tantamount to treason.”

Octavian shook his head. “Except that would make Princess Celestia look like a tyrant, too, which would mobilise the people against both of them. You’d be surprised what ponies will do if someone can play on their fears to win their support- and most ponies, at the very least, distrust Princess Luna at the moment. If the conservatives can convince a majority of ponies that Princess Luna is still a threat to the country, or at least not fit to rule via some scandal; then Princess Celestia would be considered a threat to their faction as well if she was seen backing her sister instead of the mobs. Then, instead of a small-scale civil war between one faction in the capital and another, worst-case scenario, we’d have a full scale revolution on our hooves; and Bellona knows that’d be an even worse outcome. The country would be in chaos, and we’d probably either have to flee the country, end up with our heads on pikes, or watch as thousands of our fellow ponies die for no good reason.”

“So.. how exactly are you supposed to do that?” asked Petunia, who until now had remained quiet on her couch, in between North Star and Twilight Velvet. She wasn’t a political pony by any means, but she was at least eager to look for a way for the future to not look so... bleak. "I mean, this is an entirely hypothetical outcome, right? This all sounds very 'worst case scenario' to me. We don't actually know what they plan to do, just speculate about it."

“Well, I know the first thing we’re going to have to do, just to be on the safe side.” muttered Fleur, looking around the room. “Any secrets we might have, any scandals we want to keep hidden, we keep among ourselves and make sure not to create any more.” She looked pointedly towards the Philharmonicas. “Atia, no more drastic measures to humiliate your rivals unless strictly necessary. No buts. And as for you two...” Octavia and Octavian withered under her gaze. “No more gods-damned incest. You're not a pair of siblings from some backwater village nopony in Canterlot notices, like Hoofington or Ponyville. Whatever you do, at any rate, keep it discreet enough that no one could possibly find out; especially not any of Golden’s spies.”

She frowned, looking around. “Speaking of which, all of us might want to be on our guard from now on; keep an eye on your servants for any suspicious activity- interrogate them if you must. If they find out anything, offer to pay them double what Golden is so they can’t blackmail any of us.”

“And if that doesn’t work, can’t we just threaten them until they wouldn’t dare comply? Having one’s face posted all over the alleys and holes-in-the-walls of Canterlot with a little message blacklisting them as untrustworthy employees seems fitting enough.” said Blueblood, his cheerful smile a little unnerving at the moment.

“Worst comes to worst, we could always just poison them before we can go blabbing.” said Atia matter-of-factly, before seeing the expressions on her friends’ faces. “What? Like with Golden, it wouldn’t have to be anything lethal; just some kind of vocal cord paralysis agent or something like that should do fine.”

Night Light buried his muzzle in his hooves with a groan. “Atia, what is it with you and poisoning? There are far more subtle and less drastic ways to get things done!”

“Well, it works, doesn’t it?” The mare snapped, letting out a huff of exasperation. “It’s simple, quick, direct, and they won’t mess with you for a while afterwards-”

“And when they do, you might want to start checking your food and drink before every meal, just in case. After all, you can’t possibly expect them not to retaliate in kind; and unlike us, we cannot guarantee their revenge would be non-lethal.” Night Light reasoned, glancing down at his own plate for emphasis. “Actually, come to think of it, we might want to start checking our food and drink from now on anyway, at least at meetings with the other factions.”

“Especially since I’ve unfortunately set a precedent where drinks are concerned, I think that’d be wise.” said Blueblood, looking into the depths of his cup. He looked up with a frown. “When is the next meeting, anyway?”

“Two days, the day before Parliament reconvenes. Ruby Brooch is hosting at her villa.” Atia wrinkled her nose. “Unfortunately.”

“And we’re going to be as perfectly civil as possible. Right. Mother?” Octavia said with an almost painful-looking smile.

Atia scoffed, draping her silk shawl over one shoulder. “Of course. We shall be the paragons of every virtue while we talk with our inferiors. After all. It’d be terrible manners otherwise.”

“So is poisoning ponies, even if they are our rivals.”

Blueblood narrowed his eyes, looking across the table at Octavia. “You have to admit, Golden had this one coming-”

“Not you, her!” Octavia groaned, waving a hoof wildly towards her mother. “Since Mum seems to think poisoning everypony in our way is an ethical way to-”

“I never said it was ethical. I said it was simple, direct, and effective. And as far as manners go, as long as nopony’s breaching hospitality if it happens, hypothetically, no one could prove it was us who poisoned them.”

“Not us, mother. You. We’re not going to poison anypony else. Nor condone it.”

Blueblood smiled wryly, the little bit of eagerness in his tone concerning Fancy and the other guests just a little. “Unless strictly necessary, of course-”

“Blue, don’t you get started, too. I am not going to let you get in the habit of taking revenge in the heat of the moment.”

“Fancy, I swear nothing suspicious will happen to anypony... who isn’t asking for it.” The second part was muttered under his breath.

Fancy narrowed his eyes. “I heard that, Blue.”

“I didn’t say anything.” Blueblood said with a slowly-widening grin.

Fleur was torn between bemusement and concern for Blueblood’s emotional stability, as the others in the room were pointedly trying not to listen in on their conversation. “Blueblood, try to tone down the vindictiveness a tad, will you? It’s not an attractive trait. You don’t want to eventually turn one of those ponies that tries to destroy others for minor slights.”

Blueblood opened his mouth to protest that he would never go that far, but was cut off by Fancy. “She’s right; it’s not a very attractive trait. Besides, you’re better than that- I know you are.” He leaned forward into the crook of Blueblood’s neck, his voice dropped to a whisper. “Show everypony why you’re not like than those overgrown brats in Parliament- please, if not for you, then for me?”

The prince sputtered and squirmed, looking around the room as if expecting to find a good retort written on the walls. Then he sighed, closed his eyes, and muttered, “Dammit, Fancy, you always take her side...”

“I’m not taking anypony's side. I'm just trying to be the voice of reason, and you know that.”

Blueblood looked like he was tempted to roll his eyes, but refrained. “Yeah, yeah, I do. I get it. You're apparently my bloody conscience, now.” he muttered, trying to sound petulant about it but failing when a smile threatened to crack his muzzle.

“Good.” Fancy’s serious expression fell into a more relaxed gaze, leaning back into his previous position. He looked around the room with a genial smile as he went back into gracious host mode, finally raising his voice again to be heard by all of them, “On a lighter note, you are all, of course, welcome to stay tonight. The guest rooms are off the courtyard garden; and if you’re too tired to get that far, there are three smaller ones along the atrium,” He pointed towards doors to the north, south, and east walls of the atrium. “Dinner ends at midnight, and breakfast is served in here at seven, with either tea or coffee of your choice.”

“Got that? Good.” He clapped his hooves together, as more servants emerged from the kitchens bearing more pitchers of wine. “Now, enough politics for now. Let’s get back to the party and enjoy ourselves, shall we?”