Ponies of Choas' Dawn

Chapters

Prologue
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3

Prologue

"Once upon a time, in the magical land of Equestria..."

“The Wendigoes were a clever move. You very nearly had me.”

I appreciate the flattery, but I think it’s very clear that you were ready for them.

“Nonsense! Clover, Pansy, and Smart Cookie had achieved their positions long before your pets arrived. Are you suggesting that I countered your move more than a decade before you even made it?”

You’re very good at building in contingencies.

“Fie on you and my ‘contingencies’! In order for my ‘plan’ to work, I’d have had to know that all three tribes would migrate to the same place! There’s no way that I could have arranged for that, even if I might have nudged a few pieces into the right places ahead of time…”

I am curious to find out how you knew that they would all eventually meet back up in those caves…

“My dear, you should be aware by now that I never ‘know’ anything about what those little ponies will do! I just have faith…”

…faith? In them?

“Faith that, in the end, Harmony will win the day.”

There is a weakness to Harmony: it requires the cooperation of a group. Groups require order. No order, no group, no Harmony.

“So long as even just two ponies can agree on something, there will always be a ‘group’ where Harmony can flourish.”

And what if there is no such group of ponies? What happens to your precious Harmony then?

“Well…then I guess I’d lose. Why, do you know how to accomplish such a thing?”

…perhaps.

“It’s your turn, I believe.

“Make your move…”

* * *

Her father was nervous.

It was something that was inconceivable to the little cream colored filly sitting next to him. Throughout her life, she had known the steel gray pegasus stallion to always be completely fearless and resolute against anypony who challenged him. Well, unless Mommy was unhappy about something. Her father tended to be quite a bit more flexible when facing off against the silver sovereign of the unicorn race. That was probably why he was out here right now, the little unicorn filly reasoned. Her mother hadn’t been in a very good mood for the last couple of months.

She had overheard some of the castle’s staff mentioning that it had been much the same while the princess had been pregnant with her. The pink-maned filly hadn’t yet mustered up the courage to ask her father if that was the truth. Nor did she believe that right now was a very good time to broach the subject either. The commander of the recently unified pegasus and unicorn armed forces sitting on the floor outside of the bedroom he shared with his wife didn’t look like he would have been very open to answering any questions at the moment.

He was very nervous.

If the filly next to him was going to be perfectly honest, she was feeling a little scared too. The muffled sounds coming from the door made it sound like her mother was in pain, and she could hear other ponies talking loudly to her in very stressed and excited tones. She couldn’t make out any of the words though, and that somehow made it worse.

Still, she knew deep down that everything was going to be just fine. After all, her mother had been through all of this once before and everything had worked out okay. Besides, the filly knew that the best physicians and nurses in the whole princedom were in that room with their princess right this moment. So, even if something did go wrong, the most knowledgeable ponies in the whole world were by right at hoof to set everything right. Including her mother’s most trusted advisor and confidant: Clover the Clever. That meant that everything was going to be just fine.

Nervous though she may still be, the filly was also a princess herself. Her mother had taught her from a very early age that when moments of tension or crisis emerged, that ponies looked to a princess to know whether or not everything was going to be alright. Therefore, it was of the utmost importance that a princess never let anypony see that she too was scared. More than that, it was also her responsibility to calm her anxious subjects.

So it was that the younger pony sitting next to the tense pegasus stallion placed one of her tiny little hooves on his flank. The older gray pony jerked before he realized what the sensation had been. Then he looked down at his daughter with his seafoam eyes, “what is it, sweetie?”

“It’ll be okay, Daddy. Mommy’ll be okay. You’ll see,” she was internally very proud of herself at how self-assured she had sounded when she’d spoken.

It seemed that her father was a little taken aback by the surprisingly composed and mature tone of his young foal as well. His expression melted away from one of worry into a wry smile. One of his massive wings stretched out and folded itself around the little white unicorn, enveloping her almost completely and holding her close to his side. The stallion leaned into his daughter and sighed, “I know, sweetie. Daddies…well, it’s just our job to worry. Even when we don’t really need to.”

The young filly pressed herself firmly up against her father and leaned her head against his chest, listening to the beating of his heart. Her amethyst eyes stared at the door in front of them as the pair of ponies waited patiently. She felt both herself and her father each tense up and hold their breaths when the yelling suddenly grew louder and more fervent. The way the pegasus stallion’s hooves were shifting beneath him, it was clear that he wanted nothing more than to charge in there and do something—anything—to help her. The fact that what was causing his regal wife such distress wasn’t a tangible foe that he could pummel, or strike down with a well-placed thunderbolt, just frustrated him all the more.

Then the yelling crescendoed and suddenly stopped. For a couple of heartbeats, there was no sound at all. The stallion and filly both held their breaths, though it was doubtful that either realized they were doing so.

The piercing wails of a newborn foal’s cries emanated from the door just moments before it opened to reveal a topaz unicorn stallion wearing a blue smock. He pulled the thin facemask down from over his muzzle and revealed a broad grin to the pair of patiently waiting ponies, “Commander, Your Grace,” he greeted each in turn with a respectful nod before returning his attention to his liege’s consort, “would you care to come in and meet your new daughter?”

“A filly?” the stallion mouthed the words nearly breathlessly before repeating more loudly, “it’s a filly?” the physician nodded. The gray pegasus turned his own beaming smile on the alabaster unicorn beside him, “what do you say, sweetie? Shall we greet your new sister?”

The young filly nodded her head excitedly, losing the princess-like composure that she had schooled just a minute prior. The pair trotted through the open door and into the sprawling bedchamber that was shared by the rulers of the unicorn and pegasi ponies. A pair of nurses were busily changing out sheets and towels that had become soiled by the delivery. At the side of the bed, a cloaked mare with bright golden eyes and a viridian coat stood protectively over the occupants.

As they neared the edge of the bed, the stallion picked up speed, leaving his now-eldest daughter slightly behind as he ran up to nuzzle his wife. The pair shared a long, tender, moment of assurances that everything was alright before either of them even seemed to realize that there was anypony else in the room with them. The gray pegasus glanced down at the cream filly who wasn’t yet quite tall enough to see over the edge of the large bed and lowered one of his wings to the ground. The filly stepped lightly upon it and allowed herself to be lifted level with the top of the mattress so that she could easily walk onto it.

It was then that the filly got her first good look at her mother. The silver mare’s features were tired and drawn, and her coat was matted with sweat. It was quite a shocking sight to behold, considering how much care her parent usually took with her appearance. Princess Platinum of the Unicornia-Pegasopolis Alliance didn’t even go to the bathroom in the middle of the night without ensuring that she was wearing makeup and that every strand of hair in her mane and tail were in their properly resplendent places. To see her looking like a haggard commoner was outright unthinkable!

Only the gleaming eyes and tender smile on her mother’s face, despite the appearance of the rest of the regal princess, assured the filly that everything was indeed perfectly fine. Those same sapphire eyes were locked onto the dandling blanket clutched in her hooves. It was several seconds before the mare seemed to realize that anypony else was in the bed with her. When she finally noticed the cream colored filly, the silver unicorn mare beckoned her over and shifted the bundle to give her a better look.

The filly made her way carefully across the quilted comforters and tangled sheets of the bed and craned her head around to peer at what her mother was holding. She noticed the wings first; tiny little tufts of indigo pinions that protruded from the sides of the snoozing newborn foal. Wisps of a damn cerulean mane crowned the little pegasus filly’s head. The sudden shift had been enough to briefly wake her, and eyes of pale blue stared up at the older filly.

“Celestia,” the filly’s mother whispered in a tired voice, “I’d like you to meet your new little sister, Luna…”

Chapter 1

"You must maintain a professional attitude and keep your emotions in check. Am I making myself absolutely, one hundred percent crystal clear?"

“You’re fidgeting again.”

“I am not!”

The alabaster filly rolled her eyes and frowned inwardly at her younger sister’s rebuttal. She took a deep breath and puffed herself up a little straighter, since she had detected that her posture had begun to slouch somewhat. Meanwhile, she noticed that the right wing of the blue pegasus sitting beside her twitch once again. Her violet eyes darted to the movement and narrowed. It wasn’t just that the wing was moving about, at least one of her pinions was very noticeably out of place.

“Really,” the unicorn filly sighed, “you’re going to choose now to start molting? Mother’s going to throw a fit when she sees you,” before her younger sister could respond to the comment, her horn started to glow. A moment later there was a startled and only half-contained ‘yelp!’ from beside her.

“You,” the younger pegasus bit her lip and glanced around the palace’s great hall, noting the guard ponies that were in attendance. She also noted the absence of either of their parents, or any members of the earth pony delegation that they would be greeting shortly. Sensing that it was relatively safe to speak, the filly glowered at her older sister, though at a much lower volume than she had started with, “you did that on purpose!”

“Of course I did,” Celestia replied evenly, not appearing to rise to the bait of her sibling. The indigo feather that was still glowing with the pink aura of the unicorn’s telekinetic field floated up between them for the pegasus to see, “one of us has to mind how we present ourselves.”

The younger blue filly huffed at the insinuation, but she was cowed slightly by the sight of the obviously ragged feather which had been on her wing only moments before, “it’s not my fault,” she insisted, “I just preened myself an hour ago! It must be a new one,” she stretched out both of her wings slightly and scrutinized each in turn once more.

“Of course it is,” the unicorn filly made only the most cursory of efforts to hide the note of doubt in her tone. Her eyes darted to the pegasus once more, focusing on her hind hooves this time, “and I suppose that’s a new scuff on you right rear hoof too? The one that you got yesterday while flying in the dining hall,” in a lower tone she added as an aside, “even though Mother told you not to do that ever again after what happened the last time…”

“I already told you,” the younger filly snapped in a stage whisper, “somepony moved that chandelier! I really can fly through the whole castle with my eyes closed,” she added in a petulant tone. As she spoke, she was looking idly at the aforementioned hoof and subtly tucking it further behind her forelegs so that it wouldn’t be as noticeable.

“Just because you can do something doesn’t mean you should,” Celestia intoned quietly to her sister, “for example, I can use my magic to undo all of the braids in your mane the moment everypony walks in here,” she cocked an amused brow at her sister’s baleful expression, “but I won’t.

“It’s called: being a princess,” she once more schooled her features and faced the large double-doors that lead into the palace’s Great Hall, “you should try it some time.”

“Well, I think you should try sucking on a—”

Whatever un-sisterly advice that the pegasus had been about to offer to her older sibling was lost in the sounds of those doors unlatching and swinging outward to admit a cluster of ponies. Celestia instantly took in a subtle breath to help improve her posture, while her younger sister made a much more visible show of gathering her composure after allowing herself to become disheveled by their argument’s growing heatedness.

Leading the plethora of ponies were the principle participants of the day’s discussions: Princess Platinum of the Unicornia-Pegasopolis Alliance and her counterpart among the local earth pony tribe, Chancellor Smart Cookie, who had only recently been elected to the position after her the preceding chancellor’s term in office had ended. Celestia still found the earth pony’s system of governance quite baffling. How were ponies supposed to be able to know who to turn to in a crisis if somepony new was in charge every time you turned around? It had to be dreadfully confusing for them.

Their mother, as always, wore resplendent attire that befitted her position and title. Jeweled shoes clicked sharply against the marble floor with every step. A flowing purple robe that was trimmed with white lace and decorated with a mixture of rubies and sapphires seemed to drift around her as she walked. Her ivory mane was folded up into an intricate bun that was held together with strands of golden thread, and topped with a silver diamond-studded crown.

Walking beside her, seeming to be completely out of place in such a regal setting, strode a chestnut mare with a crimson mane and emerald eyes. Her clothing consisted of a simple, but certainly well-tailored shirt and vest. The material of each was sturdy and of high quality, to be sure, but lacked any of the glimmering accents or flourishes that were found on every piece of clothing that their mother wore. Had this drab choice of clothing been intentionally crafted as a slight to the realm? Celestia wasn’t sure, but if her mother suspected anything, the silver mare gave no outward sign of having been insulted.

Behind them walked a couple of earth pony colts. Like the older mare leading them, they too wore simple but well-made jackets of a cotton-wool blend. The two of them were making a noticeable effort not to appear distracted by their surroundings; the ivory unicorn filly could see their eyes grow a little wider once they stepped into the palace’s magnificent gallery which had been specifically designed in order to impress visitors to the realm. Otherwise, their features were rather well schooled, which reflected well upon their upbringing, Celestia thought.

Bringing up the rear of the delegation were three other ponies. One of them was their father, Commander Hurricane, consort to the current sovereign of the unicorn principality and the supreme commander of the militant pegasi race. As was his kind’s own custom during affairs of state, he had donned his parade barding; a suit of gilded brushed steel that had been molded to fit his body almost perfectly. A short scarlet cape was draped over his right shoulder, stopping just above his greaves. His helmet had been omitted, as today’s business was to be conducted inside.

Walking beside him were two other earth ponies. At first, Celestia had assumed that they were bodyguards for the Chancellor, but she quickly realized that neither of them was wearing any sort of armor, or carrying a weapon that she could see. Her next thought was that they were servants that the earth pony leader had brought with her. However, the unicorn filly was not firmly convinced of this, either. The stallion and mare beside her father weren’t carrying themselves like members of a staff. They weren’t royalty, to be sure, but neither were they of the sort to bend fetlock to anypony. It was something that Celestia internally puzzled over the entire time while the procession approached.

“…and these are our daughters,” their mother said by way of introduction, waving a hoof at the pair of patiently waiting fillies, “Chancellor, may I present to you the princesses Celestia…and Luna,” both fillies stood erect and bowed in turn, at the mention of their names, to the chestnut earth pony. When they rose back up, they remained standing. From this point on, they would follow the group as they made their way to the garden for the luncheon that they were to share while they deliberated.

“S’a pleasure to make yer acquaintance,” the mare dipped her head slightly. The drawl of her words caused Celestia’s ears to twitch slightly. She’d never heard a pony, especially one whom was a leader among ponies, speak quite so…plainly before. While she acknowledged that proper articulation was, in and of itself, not a direct reflection on a ruler’s acumen; it was also quite certainly a key aspect in maintaining an air of confidence in the abilities of a leader. If a pony couldn’t be trusted to speak properly, how could they be trusted to lead properly?

“These here,” the mare stepped aside and waved at the colts behind her, “are my nephews, Wise Cracker and Tough Cookie,” each of the colts issued a curt nod. Celestia even noticed that one of them was blushing slightly, while the other managed to make himself look slightly taller than he had been a moment ago. The chancellor continued on, looking to the other ponies near the pegasus stallion, “and those there are my little sister and my brother-in-law, Sugar Cookie and Stud Muffin.”

“It is an honor and a privilege to meet you all,” Celestia said with a broad smile as she once more bowed. Luna had been given no lines of dialogue to speak at this moment, and so she bowed in silence beside her older sister. The unicorn filly’s amethyst eyes darted briefly and caught her mother approving smile.

“Yer just sayin’ that ‘cause you don’t know us yet,” the crimson-maned mare laughed, winking at the fillies. Then she nodded back at the colts, “I’m sure these two tornaders with hooves will have you cursin’ our names in no time!”

“Aunt Cookie!” the older colt said as he flashed the earth pony chancellor a reproachful look before glancing back at the pair of fillies and shifting uncomfortably.

Celestia managed to hide most of her smile, which had started out as something more akin to horror upon hearing the chestnut mare break with protocol like that. Seeing that she was not the only one who seemed to have been startled by the remark helped to ease her discomfort. It looked as though her mother was only barely maintaining her own composure at the sudden departure from formality as well.

She made a courageous effort to regain control of the conversation though, “I’m…sure they’re not that bad,” Princess Platinum replied, forcing a grin. After a brief moment of thought, she added, “I can assure you, having raised my own daughters; fillies are much more of a hoofful,”

If it were at all physically possible, Celestia was certain that she would have gone even paler than she was. Her carefully manicure expression fell completely away as she gaped at her mother in stark surprise. Beside her, Luna’s frazzled pinions suggested that the pegasus was experiencing her own feelings of gross embarrassment. The unicorn filly glanced at the colts, who were now the ones smiling at them.

“You say that,” the chancellor smirked, “but you ain’t never seen what these two can do when they get the notion into their heads to try and herd cattle on their own,” she favored the colts with a wry glare, “we were chasing down spooked heifers fer a week!” she cleared her throat, “and we’ve only rebuilt three of the five barns that got leveled…” the colts exchanged grimaces and suddenly looked a lot smaller beneath the gaze of the two earth ponies looking disapprovingly at them from behind.

“Remember that topaz shortage a while back that caused the bit to sharply devalue against the Yakistan Bauble?” the unicorn sovereign arched a knowing brow at the chestnut mare before nodding at Celestia, “somepony decided they didn’t like the color yellow that week, and turned all the topaz in the royal vault into garnets. Which,” Platinum continued with an anxious little smile, “is why there might be a bill giving a slight ‘bump’ to tariffs going through the House of Lords at the moment,” she winced apologetically, “sorry about that. Things should level out next year,” she hastily assured the chancellor, who was grimacing at the news.

“Also,” Hurricane grunted from the back of the group, “that hailstorm last month was supposed to be a light drizzle. We think somepony,” his eyes were locked on his younger daughter, “knocked the labels off some of the clouds and didn’t put them back right while she—I mean they—were wandering around the part of the weather factory their father told them never to go to.”

The chancellor burst out laughing at this revelation, “I was wonderin’ about that! I thought y’all were still mad about the Pickle Barrel Fiasco of Oh-Nine!”

“No,” the pegasus shook his head, “nearly everypony’s recovered from that, and the rest will be having their last therapy sessions in a few months.”

“That’s good to hear. Give’em my best; bless their poor little hearts,” the mare shook her head slowly, “anywho, no harm done with the hail. I just hope you like your summer squash extra squashed,” it was Hurricane’s turn to laugh this time, in his customary low chuckle, “It was supposed to be watermelons, but a couple of ponies got into the seed barn and stole ‘em all,” she nodded subtly at the colts, as though nopony in the room yet knew that the younger ponies continued to be the subject of what the adults were talking about, “as I understand it, they fed them to the chickens to see if melons would grow inside of ‘em and make ‘em pop!”

“And what did we learn from that?” the earth pony mare beside Celestia’s father asked sternly of her foals.

“Never let Wise choose the switch; because he thinks thinner ones ‘hurt less’,” the older colt mumbled under his breath so quietly that Celestia only barely heard him as he idly rubbed his hindquarters at the memory. More loudly he said, “seeds are for planting, not for playing,” his mother issued and approving nod.

“Well,” the silver mare said, by way of diverting the conversation back on track, though she was still wearing a rather broad smile and chuckling to herself, “it seems that we both well know the trials of foal-rearing,” she received assenting nods from the other adult ponies. The younger generation merely did their best not to make eye-contact with anypony as they stared at the floor, “might I suggest that now is a good time to turn our attention to the fruits of our realms’ mutual labors?” she chuckled, “literally. Come, our luncheon awaits us on the terrace,” she cast a wry smile at the chancellor, “as does an old friend of yours, I believe.”

“Clover’s here?” the chestnut mare perked up noticeably, “well golly, it’s been an age since we last talked,” she cast her gaze at Celestia’s father, “I don’t suppose Pansy’s about?”

“I’m afraid that Sergeant Pansy is on assignment with a trade delegation in Mulan that ran overlong,” he waved away a worried look from the crimson-maned mare, “no, it’s good news. They hit things off pretty good, it seems, and the donkeys invited them to stay for some sort of festival. That pegasus has a knack for knowing how to get into somepony’s—or donkey's, I guess in this case—good graces,” he rolled his eyes and frowned slightly, “which is news to me…”

“Well, I’m glad she’s holdin’ up alright. Good fer her,” the chestnut pony looked back at Princess Platinum and licked her lips, “now, there was some mention of ‘fruits’, I believe?”

Dinner was a much quieter affair, as most family meals in the castle tended to be. Celestia was grateful for that. It wasn’t that the lunch that she had shared with the earth pony delegation had been ‘bad’, per say; but it had certainly been…different. In the filly’s experience, meal times were for eating, with very specific moments set aside for polite discussion; such as during the soup course, or especially while drinking tea at the end. It seemed that the earth ponies had very different customs though. They just talked whenever they wanted, even during the entrée!

Ever the graceful royal personality, their mother had maintained her composure throughout it all, never issuing a single criticism. Though it had been obvious to Celestia that a few of those etiquette faux pas’ had pushed some of her buttons. Clover, the realm’s archmage and First Councilor, had done a much better job of acting oblivious to all of those possible slights. If, in fact, it was acting. The viridian mare had seemed to be genuinely overjoyed to meet with Chancellor Smart Cookie, and the two had spoken at length throughout the meal.

Celestia and Luna had not been present for the actual political discussions that were the true purpose of the delegation's visit. Honestly, that had been a little odd. In the past, both of them had regularly been in attendance of even those most boring and tedious moments of such proceedings. It was well understood that the both of them needed to be aware of the seriousness of their ‘princess’ titles’, and the implications that it had for their futures. Not this time, however.

Instead, both of the fillies and the earth pony colts had been dismissed to play in the nearby garden while the rest of the ponies talked. It would come as a surprise to nopony that all four young ponies offered up not the slightest bit of protest to this notion and bolted before the polite excusals were completely out of their mouths. Each of them had felt that they had been embarrassed by their older relatives quite enough, thank-you-very-much!

They had played among the many trees and flowers of the Royal Garden for hours. At first, their antics had consisted of demonstrations of what made their own breed of pony superior to all the others. Celestia had thrilled them with her levitation magic and the light spell that she knew, Luna executed feats of acrobatic flight, and Tough Cookie effortlessly lifted both fillies and his younger brother into the air with one hoof. Celestia had been forced to admit that she found the feat of strength impressive. She wasn’t prepared to acknowledge earth ponies as being superior, but she did concede that she could never in a thousand years have replicated the stunt herself without using a spell. Nor, truth be told, could she have lifted all three other ponies using her magic. Not yet, anyway. Her lessons with the Archmage Clover progressed slowly but surely. In time, she was confident that she would be as powerful as her tutor someday.

After their obligatory bragging and showing off, the four of them had engaged in more traditional games; though they all added little twists to them that their innate abilities allowed for. In all, Celestia didn’t begrudge acknowledging that it had been great fun, and she had gotten the impression that she would be seeing more of those colts and the rest of the earth pony delegation in the future. The ivory filly didn’t think she’d mind that in the least.

Once the main course had been cleared away, and fresh cups of hot teat had been deposited in front of everypony, the family dinner conversation began. Their mother was the first to speak, with an eye on her two daughters, “so, how did you enjoy your little ‘play date’ with those colts today?” their father hid a slight frown at the mention of ‘play date’ behind a sip of his tea.

“They were a bit…rugged,” Celestia remarked, thinking back on some of the games that the colts had suggested that involved a lot of wrestling and running. Though, she supposed that there wasn’t much more that an earth pony could do, really, “but it was a lot of fun.”

Luna nodded her agreement, “I liked them. Wise Cracker knows a lot of good jokes,” her eyes lit up and she looked at her older sister, “shall I tell Mother and Father the limerick about the mare from Nanbuckit?”

Both fillies and Princess Platinum were all immediately drawn to the sound of Hurricane as he suddenly started to cough up a mouthful of tea that he must have been in the middle of swallowing when something went horribly wrong. The pegasus stallion hurriedly recovered and set down his cup, leveling his gaze at his daughters, “they taught you what now?”

“It’s a story about a mare who—” Luna began, delighted at the prospect of being able to share the story she’d heard earlier that day.

Celestia’s eyes went wide and she quickly interrupted her younger sister, “—lived happily ever after, the end!” she grinned broadly at both of her parents. When the younger pegasus filly glared at her, she issued a quick kick under the table, “it’s a lovely story, sister, indeed. I’m sorry to have spoiled it in my excitement,” she leveled her gaze at Luna and gave her head a quick shake.

“It’s…rather brief,” their mother frowned, looking at her husband, “isn’t it, dear?”

“It’s fine,” the stallion quipped evenly and went back to drinking his tea, a knowing eye on the fillies.

The silver unicorn shrugged, “anyway, I was wondering if you would like to see either of them again sometime soon?”

“They were both good fun,” Celestia nodded, “perhaps when next they visit, we can show them the lake?”

“Oh, a lakeside picnic sounds like a wonderful notion,” their mother beamed, “doesn’t it, dear?” their father merely grunted as he took another sip from his teacup, which was sounding to Celestia to be quite empty by now. Their mother frowned for a moment and then looked back at her daughters, “we could organize some games, too," she thought for a moment and then smiled, “perhaps a six-legged race? Celestia, who would you like to be paired up with, Wise Cracker or Tough Cookie?

Their father grunted again, more derisively this time though. Celestia and Luna looked at him in confusion while Platinum issued a stern glare. Quirking an eyebrow and waiting for an explanation that didn’t seem forthcoming, Celestia slowly turned back to respond to her mother’s question, “could I be paired with Luna? We could race fillies against colts,” she suggested.

It was obvious from their mother’s strained smile that it was not the answer that she had been seeking, “I see…I cannot think of a reason why we would not be able to do that. So…I guess we can. Um,” she thought for another moment and then raised her hoof in triumph, “I know! Seating arrangements!” she looked back at Celestia and Luna, “which of the colts would you rather sit next to? It’s a round table, so you’ll have to be sitting next to one of them…”

“Celestia and I could sit across from each other one way, and Wise and Tough can sit across from each other the other way,” Luna pointed out, “that way we’re next to both of them.”

“Yes,” their mother sighed, “that is correct. I had not thought of that. Give me a moment to think of something else…”

“Oh, for…” their father growled, finally giving up the charade and putting down the tiny cup that had not been doing a very good job of hiding his growing scowl, “this is ridiculous, Platinum. There’s no need to go through all of this. For pony’s sake, they’re the nephews of the current chancellor! In a few years somepony else will be in charge of that rabble and you’ll have married our daughters off to a couple of commoners with no political ties whatsoever!”

“Hurricane!”

“What?” the stallion snorted in response to his wife’s mortified outburst. He nodded his head at the pair of fillies, “were they supposed to not know what you were trying to get at? Why not? When were you planning on telling them, the day of the ceremony?”

Both Celestia’s and Luna’s eyes were wide as they gaped at both of their parents. For her part, the unicorn filly didn’t know what she found more shocking: the sort of argument going on that her parents had never had before in their daughters’ presence, ever; or the notion that this whole day had apparently been arranged in order to feel out potential marital matches for the two of them. Had Wise Cracker and Tough Cookie known about the purpose of the visit?

“Hurricane,” the silver unicorn mare sniffed haughtily, “you simply cannot be so candid about these things, especially not in front of the fillies!”

“I’m sorry, is this not any of their business?” the pegasus quipped.

“It's not like that—girls, it is not like that,” their mother shifted her target to the young fillies seated at the table, her expression morphing immediately from annoyance to something approaching grief, “it is absolutely your business who you marry someday, but…” she winced slightly now, “…there are certain…grown-up things—considerations—that need to be taken into account when you make that choice…” the mare frowned and pawed a hoof at the air as she tried to come up with a better way to phrase what she wanted to say.

“You mean like when you married Father?” Celestia asked, “so that the unicorns and pegasi would never go to war?”

Her mother gaped at the older filly while the gray pegasus wore a broad smile. The stallion chuckled softly, “see, Platinum? She gets it,” he nodded at the alabaster filly. Then his expression hardened slightly, “and I’m sure she’ll get why it’s a bad idea to arrange a marriage with a colt who doesn’t have any political value in the long term.”

Celestia’s face scrunched up as she thought about her father’s statement. It was clear that her mother had considered the argument to be lost, and was nodding her head in sour acknowledgment of her husband’s position. That was probably why it came to a shock to the both of them Celestia continued the discussion.

“That’s not true,” she said quietly. Both of her parents looked at her in surprise. The cream colored unicorn straightened up in her seat and explained her thought process, “it would still be a political union, and it would still serve as a symbolic tie to bind the earth ponies to the Alliance,” she said. She looked at her father, “you’re right, neither Wise or Tough are nobility, and have no titles of their own or permanent ties to the leadership of their tribe. For one of the only two princesses in the realm to be married to either of them could be seen as a waste of a possible political alliance to another tribe or race.

“It could also be seen as a commitment. We would be giving up something that the earth ponies know is very precious to us: marital leverage. It would be a demonstration of how much we are willing to symbolically offer in order to make a formal treaty endure. It doesn’t matter if neither of them still has any ties to earth pony politics in ten years; it only needs to exist for just long enough for the wax seals to dry on the treaties that come of it. Treaties that, hopefully, last for many years beyond the lifespan of a single princess and her common-born consort.”

When Celestia was finished, she looked patiently between her parents. Both of whom were staring in wide-eyed astonishment at their daughter. Luna was likewise gaping at her.

“That was…wow,” her mother finally managed to get out before she fully regained her composure. She took a breath and settled herself before continuing, “that showed remarkable insight, Celestia. How did you ever become so familiar with such matters?”

“Master Clover,” Celestia replied simply, a wry smile forming on her muzzle, “in addition to magic, she teaches me political theory during our daily lessons,” her parents exchanged glances, and somewhere from the next room, Celestia heard laughter from a pony that sounded very much like the First Councilor. The filly waited another beat in the tense atmosphere before speaking again, “I also think that Luna should be the one that has to get married.”

“Huh?” her younger sister balked at the sudden suggestion.

“She told me that she thinks Wise Cracker has a cute flank,” how she maintained a straight face, the unicorn would never know.

“That was a secret!” the pegasus filly shrieked at the top of her lungs. Her younger sister coiled up in her seat, her wings fanning out as she made ready to leap across the table at her future murder victim.

“DinnerwaswonderfulIneedtogostudynowloveyoubye!” Celestia might not have had wings of her own, but she made a very impressive attempt at flying from the table as fast as she could, a dark blue streak following close in her wake.

Chapter 2

"We thought you two would be perfect together..."

Celestia was not happy.

For what must have been the hundredth time that morning, she raised her hindquarters up until she was standing up straight in a properly postured posed and held herself there until she heard the contemplative ‘hrmm’ from her regal mother. After just a few seconds, she winced as she heard those fateful words once more:

“One more time with the lilac one?”

The young unicorn filly felt the corner of her right eye convulse slightly as she returned to the sitting position that she had just been in and waited for the seamstress attending to her to replace the ‘pink’ bow that had been tied at the base of her tail with one that was a slightly pinker ‘pink’. Celestia couldn’t honestly tell the difference between the two of them, and she suspected that the mare altering her dress had accidentally mixed the ribbons and their subtly varied hues up a few times throughout this process; but that had not stopped Princess Platinum from whittling down their options at an excruciatingly slow pace. Had it been up to the young heir, she would have forgone the bow completely and simply called it a day. In fact, there was a lot about her garment that she would have preferred to omit, if she were to be truthful.

Not that she was going to breathe one word of any such thoughts to her parent. Long ago had been the day when the little white filly had learned that her mother could not be moved by any force on Equus on a few matters. One of those matters was formal attire.

Of course, Celestia had been of the notion that the meeting that this dress was intended for was supposed to have been anything but ‘formal’ in nature. As the scenario had initially been explained to the filly, it was to be a social occasion. Well, it was mostly a social occasion, if one wanted to be technical about such things. There would be hours spent carousing and talking and laughing—even some games for the younger ponies to play—but all of that was really just a façade, Celestia knew. While not even her much more bluntly spoken father had been crass enough to come right out and state the point of the gathering, the filly understood what the ultimate purpose was:

She was going to be picking her future consort.

There would be many years to go before anything was ever formally put to paper or publicly announced. Her parents would be keeping most of these proceedings looking rather innocent and innocuous for the time being. Not every peer in the Unicornia House of Lords was a firm believer in the Alliance and the policies that their liege and her rather rugged consort were pushing through the parliament. There had been considerable grumbling when their numbers had been thoroughly infiltrated by dozens of pegasi as an inevitable step in the unification process between their nations.

The militant pegasi tribes had not been possessed of anything that quite approached nobility the way that unicorns defined it. Theirs was a meritocracy where it was not simply enough to be born to notable parents—though that often opened many doors early in an aspiring Pegasus pony’s life. In order to be held in high regard, and attain positions of power and authority, a Pegasus had to earn them; typically through feats of arms and strength. Commander Hurricane had not been born into the leadership of his tribe; he had earned it through a lifetime of hard-fought battles and grueling trials. As was the case for the rest of his senior officers.

Meanwhile the peers of Unicornia were where they were today because that was where their parents and grandparents had been. Positions of leadership were their birthright, and they were groomed from a young age to hold those positions and execute their duties as befitted their noble heritage. To suggest that they somehow needed to ‘prove’ that they could do the very job that they were raised to perform was nonsense!

Many heads had butted between the two sides of the new House over these matters. A lot of the sitting nobles felt slighted to see such pegasi ‘rabble’ brought into their ranks; as though it somehow reduced their own personal worth. This would not be the first time that the nobility had grumbled in the history of the unicorn tribes; and the royal bloodline had traditionally applied salves to these personal injuries in the form of stately marriages. A colt or filly from one of the more powerful families would be taken into the royal house, thereby inherently ‘lifting’ the status of the family in question and bind them more faithfully to the crown.

Several of those families were no doubt privately eyeing the two young princesses even now as they plotted amongst themselves to see who would have the privilege of getting their colts married into the monarchy. Tensions were certainly running a little higher after Celestia’s mother looked outside of the peerage for her consort in an effort to avoid future animosity with the Pegasus tribes. While most of the powerful noble families certainly understood and even applauded the move openly, they still privately recognized the lost opportunity for themselves and the stark break with tradition.

Now their mother was designing another such match to bring the princedom even greater prosperity. Celestia and Clover the Clever had discussed the political and practical ramifications of a formal and enduring alliance with the earth ponies. There was simply no practicable reason not to do it; and simply leave the land open to the possibility of another Long Winter like the one that the tribes had faced a decade ago. The euphoria of their initial survival and first years of cooperation was starting to wane, and old wounds were being reexamined. Something much more substantial than a trade agreement was needed.

However, taking one of the available princesses out of the equation when it came to the Peerage was going to twist quite a few very powerful horns. Once Celestia’s hoof was formally promised to an earth pony, there would a great deal of infighting among the noble families as they clamored to be selected for Luna’s hoof. Given her sister’s physique, Celestia had to wonder if it might not lead to an even fiercer divide within the House of Lords as the long-standing unicorn nobility began to worry that one of their new winged comrades might not be favored for a match.

Never mind that the pegasi didn’t go for such arrangements—Luna had no martial acumen, nor would she ever; but that would not occur to the unicorn nobles. They would see matters in terms of breed and perhaps discount the notion of any of them having their families elevated entirely. That would be very…dangerous for Princess Platinum and her family. If none of them felt like they had a chance, then it was very possible that they would begin plotting to overthrow the throne and place themselves upon it.

Oh, yes, there was a great deal of risk that their mother was taking with this little proposal of hers. Hopefully that aspect would not be lost upon the earth ponies when a formal announcement was made; not that Celestia believed most of them had a firm grasp of the inner workings of unicorn pony peerage politics.

That was years down the road though. The filly was trying to keep her thoughts more focused on the immediate future; which consisted of tomorrow’s trip to the lake for a waterside picnic with Smart Cookie’s family. It was something that would be far easier to do if she didn’t have to keep standing up so that her mother could see how her dress and its accents caught the light as she moved.

“Hrmm…” Celestia barely managed to suppress a shiver as she heard the familiar sound once more, “…I don’t know,” there was a long pause, “which one would you prefer, sweetie? The lilac, the lavender, or the mauve?”

The young princess forced herself to take a deep breath and not dwell on the fact that a good two hours of fussing and thought had just been reduced to letting her ultimately pick a color anyway. She merely smiled and turned her head to face the three cuts of silk that were floating in front of her. It was a testament to her ability to maintain her composure even under the most stressful of circumstances when the little white unicorn found herself faced with what looked—to her eyes—to be three swaths of fabric that were all the exact same color.

After only a moment’s hesitation, which the filly attributed to a mild stroke she had just suffered upon beholding the source of the extended deliberations, she pointed her hoof at the stream of shimmering cloth in the middle, “oh, that one is every so lovely!” she gushed, “it’ll match my eyes perfectly!”

Princess Platinum beamed at her daughter, “you’re absolutely right!” to the seamstress she said, “we should be done here then. Are you sure you can have everything ready by morning?”

The tired looking unicorn mare tasked with dressing the members of the royal household nodded, “of course, Your Majesty. They will be awaiting Their Graces in their dressing rooms the moment they’ve had their breakfasts.”

“Perfect,” the reigning princess looked to her eldest daughter. Her magic played with the hem of the flowing gown as she looked thoughtfully at the ensemble, “…do you think it would look better if the skirt were pleated?”

Celestia and the seamstress shared a brief look of matched dread at the prospect of being here any longer. Fortunately, the filly had an excuse that would assure her escape from this ordeal, “oops! Look at the time; I’m going to be late for my lessons,” she flashed a veiled wink at the seamstress before shucking the dress completely and shrugging helplessly at her mother, “I guess the dress will have to suffice as it is. See you at dinner, Mother!”

Princess Platinum managed to get out something approximating an acknowledgement as she glanced around for the non-existent clock that her daughter had used to confirm the hour of the day. By the time she looked back, the filly had vanished from sight and the other unicorn mare was hurriedly making her way out of the room with the dress in order to complete it according to the timetable that she had set for herself.

The truth was that her lessons weren’t going to be for a little while yet, but it had been a convincing enough sounding reason to be permitted to leave. By the time Celestia’s mother was able to track down a real timekeeping device and discover the deception, it truly would be time for the young princess’ lessons with the First Councilor. In the meantime, the little unicorn mare decided that she would swing by the courtyard and see how her younger sister’s own tutoring was going.

While the two siblings did study together on most academic topics like history, etiquette, and such, their days did include private instruction that was tailored to their specific needs. In Celestia’s case, this constituted learning magic with the Alliance’s archemage. Meanwhile, the younger sister spent that same time in the care of their personal armsmare, Captain Maelstrom, learning the finer parts of advanced flight maneuvers. Some of these techniques trod on the fine line of genuine combat maneuvers, and Celestia was never sure if that had been something her father had specifically given his blessing on—certainly their mother wouldn’t have—or if it was a liberty being taken by the good captain. In either case, the little unicorn filly could not think of an instance in which Luna had complained about the drills.

Once she was outside, it did not take the young ground-bound princess long to spot her lofty sibling. The smaller winged filly was soaring in the company of an armored crimson mare as the executed a series of aerial acrobatics among the rising spires of the castle. Celestia had often beheld the flight drills of the pegasus component of the Alliance’s military as they exercised near the castle for her father’s appraisal; so she quickly recognized how slow the armsmare was taking things with the much younger flier. On a good day, the little unicorn suspected that she could have easily run just as fast as the pair was currently flying. Of course, she doubted that speed was the purpose of their current lesson so much as learning the finer points of careful control of one’s flight path.

As she watched, she could spot when Luna seemed to drift slightly out of formation with her instructor; at which point the older scarlet mare would slow even further and straighten out while she waited for her charge to reacquire her proper place at her side. Then the pair would resume their previous course once more. In the unicorn’s estimation, her younger sister wasn’t doing too badly—not that she knew all that much about flying. Except for the occasional, and admittedly rare, misstep—misflap?—they seemed to be flying rather gracefully around the many spires and parapets of the castle.

“A stunning sight,” Celestia stiffened suddenly at the unexpected sound of somepony talking nearby. She had been so enamored by her sister’s flight that she must have lost track of her surroundings. There certainly hadn’t been anypony around her when she’d arrived. She recognized the owner of the voice too, which did little to help calm the little princess, “if I may say so, Your Grace.”

Composing herself and calmly turning to look over her shoulder at the sharp-faced unicorn stallion who had apparently sat down nearby to watch with her, the filly smiled and nodded her head, “indeed, Duke Ironshod. My sister is becoming quite the skillful flier.”

The ivory stallion who had taken it upon himself to join Celestia in providing her younger winged sister with an audience for her lessons was—unfortunately—not a pony that the little princess could overtly snub or dismiss, no matter how much she might have wanted to. Most of those reasons were rather political in nature, and had been explained to Celestia in great detail after a much more naïve little filly had had the impropriety to repeat some sentiments that she had heard her father express regarding the duke. That had not changed the opinion that Celestia had of the stallion, of course. Indeed, a now much more knowledgeable filly found herself in complete agreement with her sire after learning about the details concerning the animosity.

Where ponies in the Pegasus tribes needed to earn their positions of authority, unicorns had them appointed to them. Sometimes these appointments were based upon merit, but far more often they were political calculations. The more powerful a family’s influence was, and the more resources they had, the more prestigious the position they could expect to be given by the Crown. Duke Ironshod belonged to one such powerful family in the princedom. In exchange for his support, and a few favorable votes on matters placed before the House of Lords for consideration, he had been bestowed with the title of, First Lord of the Calvary. This effectively made him the premiere military authority and its supreme commander—save for the reigning monarch herself, of course.

However, as with a few other things in the ostensibly ongoing merger of Unicornia and Pegasopolis, there were…disagreements regarding the duke’s authority as it pertained to the Pegasus military units. According to the literature regarding the duties of the First Lord of the Cavalry, the pony holding the title was granted nearly unilateral control of any and all members of the princedom’s armed forces—though the Royal Guard fell into thankfully different hooves. Thus, the duke—somewhat rightfully—felt that this meant that it was he and not Celestia’s consort father who should be in command of the newly integrated air force the Alliance possessed. Commander Hurricane, of course, was not about to relinquish control of his command just because he’d gotten married. According to every Pegasus tradition, he was to rule over his tribe until the day he died.

There was also the small matter that absolutely no Pegasus soldier was ever going to even think to obey a command given to them by a pony who had—technically—never even donned armor. Things were already contentious enough among the pegasi as her father worked to get them to accept control of the tribe passing to one of his daughters after his death without trying to get his soldiers to listen to some random unicorn noble.

The legal sparring between Celestia’s father and the duke would have been bad enough on its own to earn the stallion a position of low esteem in the princess’ eyes. However, the rather abrasive noble was also one of the peers who happened to be maneuvering himself into a position whereby he might have good footing to ask for the hoof of either Celestia or her younger sister at some future date. Thus far, the majority of his attempts to engage the princesses in cordial conversation had been rather keenly focused on the unicorn filly. Celestia judged it to be a rather calculated choice, rather than because he actually held the young unicorn in any high esteem. As the eldest, Celestia was the heir apparent to the Alliance, which would have made Duke Ironshod the prince consort upon the eventual death of her mother. It was Celestia’s theory that the duke believed he would be able to ‘manage’ his younger bride and rule through her.

The princess found herself torn between the desire to demonstrate to the duke just how wrong he would be should such circumstances ever come to pass; and the feeling of utter revulsion that she felt at the very thought of being wed to the pompous stallion and his overinflated ego. A part of the filly very much desired to ‘spill the beans’ on her mother’s designs to have her eldest daughter marry an earth pony and watch the duke’s face as he saw all of his lofty schemes be rent asunder in a matter of minutes. However, she knew better than to be quite so crass. Her mother was well aware of the duke’s designs and was making her own plans to deal with him when the time came.

The stallion smiled down at the young unicorn filly, “she is, Your Grace,” he said, his blue eyes lingering on the little princess, “however, I was referring to Your Grace’s radiant self, sitting here in the sunlight.”

Celestia managed to suppress a grimace and keep the reaction an internal one as she processed the stallion’s vapid compliment. Had she been some gilded young mare of the court, she could see how somepony might have appreciated such praise and even responded positively to it. However, the princess had been taught by Clover the Clever and her parents—especially her father—to have a much more cynical view of any compliment paid to her by a member of the Peerage. While Celestia made no claim to be a skillful player of the ‘Great Game’ that was engaged in by the realm’s noble houses, she was knowledgeable enough to at least be aware of when somepony was attempting to move her about like a pawn.

The little unicorn’s job in such situations was to play along and allow the other ponies to think that everything was going according to their plan. As such, the young filly feigned a blush and turned her head away coyly, “you are too kind, Your Lordship,” she responded, both happy with how convincing her performance sounded to her own ears and disgusted with herself for actually saying the words aloud, no matter how insincere they might be, “you need not flatter me so.”

“Nonsense,” the stallion said, sounding obviously pleased at the response that he had gotten. Encouraged by the princess’ reaction, he strode up closer and sat next to her, his piercing blue eyes focused on her, “every princess deserves to be praised for her stunning beauty and robust character. What sort of loyal stallion of the Crown would I be if I allowed Your Grace to go even a day without hearing how much she is admired by those who serve her?”

Her skin veritably crawled to have him so close to her, but Celestia didn’t let her smile falter. In an effort to divert the duke’s attentions, she put her eyes skyward towards her younger sister, “have you ever wondered what it would be like to fly, Your Lordship?”

Out of the corner of her eye, the young princess saw the duke’s smile flicker at the sudden shift in the subject of their conversation. He glanced upward, following the filly’s gaze, and spotted the pair of fliers. The stallion cleared his throat even as his expression noticeably soured at the sight of the armsmare, “I can’t say that I have, Your Grace. The ground has so much to recommend it, that I have not thought much on the subject of leaving it.”

“My sister insists that it is great fun to fly,” Celestia continued, taking no small amount of glee in sensing the stallion’s dislike of the topic. The duke didn’t like much that was related to pegasi, come to think of it, “I should like to try it sometime.”

The duke snorted in an amused fashion, “I am afraid that Your Grace might find that such a dream will go unfulfilled; unless you should find a means by which to grow wings. Myself, I would suggest much more reasonable endeavors.”

“Such as?”

“Your Grace has such a lovely voice,” the duke inclined his head slightly, “I should think that the whole realm might beg a chance to hear you sing someday.”

Celestia cast her gaze at the stallion. This was certainly a new tactic for the stallion. Again she had to applaud his skillful negotiation; a more receptive mare might have fallen to his charms by now, “singing? That had not occurred to me,” which was the honest truth, actually.

“I’m shocked that nopony has remarked upon the matter before, Your Grace,” the stallion even sounded a little genuinely distressed at the news, “it would be a tragedy for the princedom to be deprived of such a thing,” he tapped his chin for a second, as though he were thinking hard about something, before an idea ‘spontaneously’ occurred to him, “as fate would have it, I think I have a solution!”

The little unicorn managed not to roll her eyes. Of course the duke had a ‘solution’ to the problem that had not existed before he mentioned that it even was a problem. She politely waited with an expectant expression to hear the stallion’s revelation, “my sister is the proprietor of an opera house in the city. I am quite sure that I can persuade her to come to the castle and tutor Your Grace, if you would like?”

“I wouldn’t want to impose upon your sister, Your Lordship,” Celestia began to protest, but the duke would have none of it.

“It is never an imposition to serve the Crown, Your Grace!” he insisted, “it would honor me greatly if you would allow my family to serve you in this way,” the duke executed a low bow to the filly.

It took the young unicorn princess a few seconds to come up with the proper stalling tactic. She knew that this was some new plot of his to get himself in a better position to eventually vie for the role of consort, but Celestia couldn’t quite see it yet; and she was loath to agree to something when she couldn’t see all of the angles. She needed time to find out what the repercussions would be, “I’ll need to confer with my mother, Your Lordship, before I can accept. She’ll need to make accommodations among all of my other studies in order to fit in lessons with your sister, if they even can be.”

The duke at least seemed to find this to be an acceptable excuse as he straightened up, “of course. I had forgotten how busy Your Grace is. Please, do bring up the matter with Her Majesty when next you see her. It would honor my sister greatly to be of service to the Crown.”

“I shall, Your Lordship,” Celestia briefly inclined her own head slightly. Then her eyes darted to a robed mare who was walking their way, “my apologies, Duke Ironshod, but it seems that those studies I mentioned have come to call.”

The stallion glanced briefly back and noticed the approach of the princedom’s archemage, “do not let me keep you, Your Grace,” he assured the filly. To Clover, he nodded slightly, “Lady Clover.”

“My Lord,” the First Councilor acknowledged before turning her attention to the princess, “Your Grace, if I might escort you back to my study?”

“Of course,” she glanced briefly back at the duke, “until next time, Your Lordship,” and with that Celestia and her tutor trotted off in the direction of the castle’s south tower, where Clover and her own mentor, Starswirl the Bearded, made their residence.

“Remind me to properly demonstrate my gratitude for rescuing me just now when I am in a position to grant you a fitting reward,” the filly murmured once the two of them were safely out of earshot, “I am thinking of something along the lines of a fief in the southern lowlands…”

The archemage chuckled, “I have often styled myself as a baroness,” the older unicorn mare mused. Then she stuck out her tongue, “but then I remember that I would need to take my seat in parliament next to such, erm, charming ponies like the good Duke Ironshod.

“Might I suggest you reserve appointing me a fief until such a time as I offend you deeply, Your Grace?”

The two of them shared a laugh at that notion, “I concede your point,” Celestia allowed with a sigh, “mother assures me that she is aware of how much of a problem the duke is becoming, and I know father would just as soon he were outright stripped of his titles altogether to put the matter to rest for good,” not that there was ever a chance of that happening. While technically within the purview of her mother to do; without a firm founding for such a drastic action, there would surely be an open revolt against the Crown from nearly every other noble in the realm if Princess Platinum did so.

Clover the Clever winced at the thought as well, “a more delicate hoof is needed for that one,” she said, confirming Celestia’s own thoughts, “and his are not that only designs that could make mischief for the Alliance,” at the younger filly’s questioning look, the mage elaborated, “Lady Juno recently made mention to me of her concerns regarding the next round of Crown shipping contracts. Again.”

The young princess frowned thoughtfully. That was concerning, since it brought to mind one other hurdle that her mother was going to have to cross while forging her alliance with the earth pony tribes. Their agrarian prowess was well-known among all breeds of ponies, and indeed a full three quarters of all of the food consumed by the citizens of the Alliance was imported from earth pony farms; much as it had been for generations. However, the means by which this food was transported to Alliance lands were through shipping companies owned and operated by unicorns.

With so much cargo being reliably transported on a regular basis, receiving contracts to oversee all of the Crown’s food shipping for the next year was an incredibly lucrative proposition. Typically, as another means to appease certain lords and ladies of the peerage, those contracts were awarded to satisfy disgruntled nobles. Besides, the contract had to go to somepony, and it might as well benefit the Crown in some way.

This time though…

The truth was that the earth ponies were possessed of a much more robust and efficient freight delivery system. The objectively stronger breed was simply capable of hauling more goods over longer distances in less time than an equal number of unicorns. There was also a good deal less graft involved which made their contracts far cheaper. The only reason that the Alliance Crown didn’t currently employ them is because of how unseemly it would have been for the monarchy to be looking outside the realm for such services when they could be provided by members of the government.

That was all going to change once a more formal arrangement was made with the earth ponies and they were brought into the Alliance. Once that happened, they would be citizens of the realm as well, and there would be no objectionable reason not to use those cheaper and more efficient freight companies. It was going to stick in the craw of a lot of the peers who were used to being the only game in town when it came to such matters though.

“Mother is going to renew the contracts,” Celestia said evenly, “this time. In the future though, she and the others are going to need to reconsider their business models,” the princess cast the older mare an aside glance, “perhaps if you could steer them towards other business ventures?”

“You are greatly overestimating my leverage with the nobility, Your Grace,” the archemage snorted in amusement, “they do not heed any of my advice, they just vent their grievances; because they know that I hold your mother’s ear. They believe that anything that they say to me will be brought to her.”

“I am not sure what causes me more distress,” the filly grumbled, “that the nobility is so stupid as to believe that is the case, or that they believe the Crown’s First Councilor to be so vapid that you would come galloping to mother every time you heard tell of somepony fussing over trivial matters.”

“Would you prefer that they approach you and your sister?”

“No, now that I think of it,” she admitted, “though I was of the mind that there existed a proper forum for the Peerage to voice these concerns,” the filly pointed out, “or have a greatly misjudged the reason why mother and father hold Court every day for several hours a piece?”

“What?” the emerald-eyed mare said in a shocked tone, “are you suggesting that the nobility whine to the Crown?! They would never survive the blow to their dignity,” she chortled.

It was at about this time when the pair arrived at the thick wooden door which led to the First Counselor’s study. The archemage’s horn glowed green and the heavy portal swung inward. The unicorn then offered a slight bow to her liege, “after you, Your Grace. I hope that you have been studying your amniomorphic spells…I’ll take that pained groan as a ‘no’…”

“And...flare,” the surprisingly deep and gravely voice of the pegasus mare flying along beside Luna commanded in its usual firm tone. Obediently, the younger dark-blue feathered filly flexed out her wings out to their fullest extent and pumped them several times. Her forward momentum died quickly, leaving her hovering nearly motionless in the air. A heartbeat later the next command came, “roll left.”

The little winged princess tucked in her left wing while simultaneously pushing downward with a powerful stroke of her right. The result was that the young flying princess rolled over onto her back just as the older crimson mare next to her was, “dive,” just as Luna righted herself, she clamped both of her wings in close to her sides and felt herself start to plummet downward.

Her cyan eyes caught sight of the armored figure of Captain Maelstrom as her personal armsmare pulled ahead of the falling princess. The mare glanced behind her at her charge, “the cloud on the left,” she said, “try to stop yourself as close as you can without actually touching it,” she looked forward once more, and her body somehow seemed to stretch out like a missile as the elder pegasus increased her speed and pulled further ahead of her pupil, “like this!”

As Luna continued to fall towards the indicated cloud, she watched intently as the pegasus captain arc to one that was nearby at speeds far greater than the younger princess could have hoped to achieve. Her velocity was such that the little filly was positive that the mare was going to simply burst right through the cloud and reduce it to so much invisible vapor. It was with wide eyes fully of amazement that the princess watched the more experienced flier snap out her wings at the last possible moment in a large sweeping movement that happened so quickly her pinions looked to have been all around her body all at once.

The guard captain then calmly extended all four of her legs, setting them gently upon the surface of the cloud she had been aiming for without budging the rest of her body so much as an inch. She had stopped at the absolutely perfect height above the cloud. She flashed her brown eyes at the royal sister who was currently still in the middle of her own descent and gestured to the nearby cloud that she had instructed Luna to mimic the maneuver upon.

Of course the little blue pegasus knew full well that there was no hope of perfectly replicating the actions of the superior flier. However, she at least intended to improve upon her performance of her previous attempt of this same exercise yesterday.

She narrowed her eyes at her indicated target and prepared herself to open her wings and mirror her instructor's own performance. All that she needed to do was wait for that perfect moment when the cloud was just—oh.

The little blue Pegasus grimaced as she poked her head up out of the cloud bank. She shook her head furiously for several seconds in order to dislodge a few fragments of white fluff that had adhered themselves to her mane. With all of the dignity that the little princess could muster, she extracted herself from the inside of the cloud and started to very deliberately shuffle bits and fragments of it around with her hooves until she had smoothed out its surface, leaving no trace of her recent misadventure.

Only after she was satisfied that her perch had been properly reconstituted did the young flier seat herself regally upon it and clear her throat, “I miscalculated.”

To the crimson guardsmare’s credit, she managed to keep her expression rather neutral, “oh, I’d say tha’s a fair observation, Yer Wee Grace,” after a moment’s pause, she added, “if I may though, princess: you were spot on with yer aim. A commendable bull’s eye, I reckon,” she leaned over to appraise how centered the filly on the cloud beside her was.

“Are you going to make me try again?” Luna did little to try and hide to reluctance in her question.

Fortunately, it seemed that her protector was going to take pity on her this afternoon, “not at this moment, no, Yer Wee Grace,” the mare shook her head, “we’ll jus’ park ourselves here a might an’ rest yer wings,” she cocked a smile and stretched out her pinions, “mine too, now I think abou’it,” she groaned.

“You’re really tired after that?” the young Pegasus inquired, sounded dubious. She certainly wasn’t tired from their day’s activities, so she found it hard to believe that her much older and more experienced instructor could have been.

The mare snorted, “not tired, per say, Princess. Jus’ old.”

“You’re not that old,” the filly protested, “you’re younger than Father.”

“It’s not the years, Princess, it’s the mileage,” the scarlet flier insisted, her spine issuing several audible pops as she arched her back sharply. The mare sighed contentedly, “ooh, tha’s the ticket!” she exhaled slowly and reseated herself, looking at her charge, “I’ve flown from one side of this world to t’other more times n’I’ve ever cared to count, you know?”

“Really?”

“Oh, aye,” the older Pegasus nodded. Then she favored the young filly with a sly look, “I dinnae get this assignment jus’ on accont’a my radiant beauty, believe it’re’not.”

The little blue princess giggled as the other mare struck up a mock coy pose and fluttered her eyes. The joke, of course, lay in the fact that only stallions with a very specific taste is mares might ever have described the captain of the guard assigned to watch over the Royal Sisters as ‘beautiful’. In Luna’s estimation that older mare was certainly not ugly, but her features were, um, ‘unpolished’ might have been a sufficiently polite way to describe them.

There was no comparison that could be made whenever the guardsmare was in the company of the usual mares of the royal court. Where those regal Ladies possessed meticulously groomed coats and faces that were exquisitely painted with the finest make-ups that made them glitter and positively glow in the right light; Maelstrom’s coat was dull and plain, and her main was cropped shorter than most stallions. Her face was broad, and her jaw squared and pronounced. From the right angle, one would have been forgiven for thinking that the crimson captain was a stallion. Even hearing her speak would not have necessarily cleared up any misconception, as her voice was gravely, and her tone on the deeper side.

Her deficiency where any of the gentler attributes associated with the fairer gender were concerned notwithstanding, Maelstrom did not give any indication that she considered it a detraction from her worth. Indeed, on one accession Princess Luna had heard the mare remark: “if I ever felt a need to take a stallion home wi’me, well, I reckon I could jus’ as soon suplex the sod an’ take him home wi’me! Seems a lot simpler’n battin’ my lashes until they as near fall off m’face…”

“Does that mean you’ve met griffons? Is it true that they have wings like a Pegasus, but a head like a bird and paws like a manticor?” Luna asked with piqued interest.

“Pfft,” Maelstrom waved a dismissive hoof at her royal charge, “I’ve met far stranger folk’n griffons!” she leaned in close, as though the scarlet guardsmare were about to divulge some great secret, “there’re a tribe of hippogryphs far to’da east, beyond the Foggy Mountains. Folk as got bird heads and wings with pony legs. I e’en met a sphynx while I’as there.

“A sphynx?” the princess’ mouth played around with the strange word as she repeated it.

“Oh, aye, Wee Grace! Sphynx’re a folk what look like a Pegasus and a manticor fu—er…um,” the mare clamped her mouth shut and cleared her throat as she rethought her choice of phrasing, “…started a family.

“Suffice it t’say, Princess,” Maelstrom said in a tone that suggested she was eager to bring their conversation to a close, “this world has many’an odd folk innit. I’m certain in due time, you an’yer sister’ll make their acquaintance as th’Alliance grows.

“An Ol’ Maelstrom’ll be there to keep th’ nastier ones in line fer’ya. I may even bring along th’ rest o’the guard if’n I feel like sharin’!”

“Clover says we shouldn’t assume that tribes we meet want to fight,” the younger princess ventured, “she says it’s better if we approach them as friends first, so that they don’t get the wrong idea about us.”

The scarlet mare’s face scrunched up in a slight cringe as she cleared her throat and chose some rather more diplomatic words than she might have been apt to use with other, less regal, company, “all respects to Mas’er Clover, Yer Wee Grace, but not e’ry folk I’ve met is inclined to be friendly; no ma’er how widely yer hol’in open yer hooves.”

“But what if they misunderstand and it starts a war?” there was no missing the note of concern in the little pony’s voice.

The crimson guardsmare studied her young pupil for a moment, and then reached out and drew their clouds together so that she could drape her foreleg around the younger filly. It was probably not the most proper of actions with regards to the protocols to be observed with royalty, but Maelstrom hadn’t been raised in a climate imbued with those rigid tenets were concerned overmuch. Doing this felt more natural; and she figured it would do more to calm the little royal filly. Luna leaned into her protector.

“In my own experience, Yer Wee Grace, if’n folk aren’t lookin’ fer a fight, then they ain’t. It dun ma’er how big yer smile is. If’n they are though…that big’ol grin’ll jus let’em knock out yer teeth!

“Now, I ain’t sayin’ you shouldn’t be all polite n’tha. Mind yer P’s an’ Q’s, surely,” the mare amended, “but it dunnae hurt to bring along a squadron’re two to meetin’s t’let’em know yer not a pushover either.”

“That’s what Father calls a ‘show of force’, right?”

“Exactly!” the older mare beamed, “it’s jus’ fer show. Like a fancy dress to impress th’court,” she added after a brief moment’s reflection, “only it’s made’a chainmail an’ spears!”

Luna grimaced, “that sounds like a very uncomfortable dress.”

The mare chuckled. Then her eyes widened, “Oi! The dress!” she glanced up at the sun and then started to frantically glance around the courtyard before her eyes finally settled on a very dour looking silvery mare who was wearing a jeweled circlet of state upon her head. Maelstrom cringed noticeably, “I seem to’ve let our time go o’erlong, Princess…”

It was now the younger blue filly’s turn to peer at the ground, where she too quickly spotted her royal mother impatiently tapping her hoof. A short ways beyond the waiting Princess Platinum, Luna also spied the seamstress who was supposed to be doing her fitting this afternoon, “oops.”

“Oh, aye, ‘oops’.”

Chapter 3

"You're supposed to say 'Who's there?' This is the most basic of jokes!"

In the shadows of the mountainside metropolis of Canterlot grew the verdant expanses of the Everfree Forest. Lush with flora and teeming with beautiful woodland denizens, it was a place that the royal sisters always enjoyed visiting on their rare trips outside the city. Beyond the eastern boundaries of the forest lay the town that was the heart of the earth pony tribe’s nation of Urth, Fillydelphia. As a result, it had only made sense for this mutual meeting between the leadership of the Alliance and Urth to take place within the woods of Everfree. Specifically, at the shores of Shimmering Lake.

As Celestia might have expected, the Alliance’s entourage was the second to arrive on the scene. Last minute fussing over the wardrobe of the royal family, coupled with reservations about the arrangements for the meal, had resulted in a delayed departure. It was nothing that had not been anticipated on the part of the palace staff, as they were accustomed to such trends, but the elder daughter had to wonder how the earth pony delegation would respond to their tardiness.

Smart Cookie, at least, seemed to take the delay in stride, limiting herself to only a single passing remark before greeting her guests more formally. Though, Celestia observed, there were clear indications from the onset that the Alliance and Urth delegations had possessed rather divergent views on exactly how ‘formal’ this luncheon was going to be. The party of unicorns and pegasi were attired in the regalia that suggested this was to be much on the tier of a typical palace gala event; while their grounded neighbors were dressed much more…um, informally, Celestia supposed was a fair term.

If Princess Platinum viewed this as any sort of slight, there was no outward sign of it. Granted, the alabaster princess well knew that her mother rarely took a pointed interest in the wardrobes of others any more than was necessary to confirm that her outfit outshone all the others. Hurricane, her father, on the other hoof, was clearly irked at the knowledge that he could have worn something other than his parade best and not been underdressed for the occasion. Not that his wife would have heard any such notion on the matter.

That wasn’t to say that Smart Cookie and her family weren’t wearing what Celestia was confident were very proper garments from their point of view. While not as formal looking as what they had worn during their visit to the palace, they were clearly rather recent acquisitions. The young princess’ keen eye noted that both Tough Cookie and Wise Cracker were nipping idly at their vests in an effort to get the never before worn garments to sit right. Their manes had also been the subject of a recent touch-up with a pair of scissors, if Celestia was any judge.

“Sakes, Princess,” the chancellor said as she beheld the train of staff and attendants that followed in the wake of the royal family, “if I’d’ve known you were bringing the whole Alliance with you, I’d’ve packed more fritters!” she nodded her head back at the blanket that had already been spread out by the lakeshore, and the basket filled with freshly baked fruit pastries.

Ever the diplomat, Princess Platinum smiled and waved away what she had taken to be a polite apology, “that’s quite alright, Chancellor. It was an oversight on my part not to insist on exchanging a formal list of attendees,” she nodded a wordless command to one of her mares-in-waiting, and the teal unicorn began to direct the rest of the staff as they set up the pavilion tents and serving tables that they had brought with them, “so I made sure that I brought enough for everypony, just in case.”

Silver platters laden with artfully composed hors d’oeuvres and crystal decanters of fresh juices appeared and arranged themselves on the long serving tables. Chaise lounges materialized seemingly out of thin air, arranging themselves loosely around a smaller circular table bearing a selection of cheeses and chocolate fondue.

While all of this was rather typical where Celestia was concerned, she did not miss the wide-eyed astonishment on the faces of Chancellor Smart Cookie and the rest of her family. Her mother either did not notice though, or was simply choosing to ignore the reactions as she went on to explain her intended arrangements.

“I decided that we should start with a few appetizers and juice while my chefs work on preparing the main course, a zesty four cheese tortellini served in a rich alfredo sauce, accompanied by toasted garlic bread. Dessert will be a sumptuous crème brulee and hot chai tea,” she beamed at the earth ponies, “doesn’t that sound marvelous?”

“Y’all don’t do anything by halves, do ya?” the chancellor mumbled as she took in the sight.

“Hm?”

Smart Cookie must have realized that she had in fact spoken her last comment out loud without intending to and schooled her features into a pleasant smile of her own, “that’s mighty thoughtful of you, Princess, but y’all didn’t need to go through all that trouble. This is just a cozy little lunch, after all.”

“I know,” Celestia’s mother said, a note of confusion in her voice and she look around at the meal that had been set up, “that’s why it’s only three courses and an after-meal tea.”

“…right.”

“If you think this is over the top, wait until you hear what we had for breakfast,” a new voice called out, and the emerald form of the Alliance’s First Councilor emerged from the milling bodies of the palace staff still setting up the encampment. The mage trotted up to her old friend and the pair of them exchanged a brief hug, “and you don’t even want to know what dinner with the nobles is like…” she added with a waggle of her eyebrows before leaning in close for a stage whisper that the rest of the earth pony’s family could easily overhear, “fourteen courses!”

Smart Cookie blinked, “fourteen?”

“Three of them are soups,” Clover nodded in grave confirmation. Celestia knew that it was not an exaggeration; though, to be fair, each ‘course’ was rarely larger than a few bites. It was more like a very extravagant ‘taste testing’ than what most would have considered to be a true ‘meal’. Still, it was amusing to see the frankly astonished expressions on everypony’s face, so she decided to forgo any clarification.

“Do you guys always travel with so many ponies?”

Celestia turned her attention to the auburn stallion and his younger sable brother who had finally approached her. She cast a glance at the baggage train and the castle staff pouring over their contents as they put the finishing touches on the lakeside camp, “well…yes, actually,” she admitted, feeling a little embarrassed. She was keenly aware of the rather blatant display of such opulence, and how out of place it must have been for something like this. But such was how things were done in her mother’s household.

“Why?”

It was tempting to answer with something along the lines of, ‘because that is how it’s always been done’ but that was such a lazy explanation and Celestia knew that. Besides, a real reasoning behind the practice might help the two of them to not think that it was as weird as they likely must, “it’s actually supposed to be sort of a compliment,” she began, fully expecting the questioning looks from the pair of colts, “it’s like saying: ‘see all of the effort I’m putting into this trip? That’s because I know you’re worth it.’”

“Really?”

“Pretty much,” there were a great many more subtle undertones and specifics that Celestia could have spent weeks explaining—as she had indeed spent years learning them at home—but that would certainly suffice for now, “in Canterlot, at least among the nobles, putting forth anything but your best effort could be seen as an insult. So it sort of becomes a custom to go really over the top,” she shrugged.

“That’s an awful lot of work to go through just to be polite,” Tough Cookie noted, nodding at the array of tents, “we’d have been fine with y’all just sort of showing up, you know that, right?”

Celestia smiled wanly at the pair, “you might have, but the nobles back in Canterlot wouldn’t. This was really more for them.”

“But they’re not even here, are they?”

“No, but they saw us leaving,” she explained, “and if they thought we weren’t treating this like a ‘serious’ meeting, it would cause a lot of grumbling back in Court. There are already a lot of ponies who are unhappy about what we’re doing as it is,” she said the last with a slight frown.

“Really? Why?”

A flutter of motion out of the corner caught Celestia’s attention and she turned to see that her younger sister had joined the three of them. She was suddenly a little more conscious of her surroundings with regards to the topic of their conversation, and of the members of the staff that were within earshot. The nature of Courtly politics, and the knowledge that her mother had instilled in Celestia at a young age with regards to the long-standing practice of Unicornian nobles to bribe members of the palace staff for any knowledge or hearsay that might give them the inside track on any upcoming dealings prompted her to hold off on an immediate answer.

Instead, she turned her attention to her mother, but then saw that Princess Platinum was already deep in conversation with the earth pony chancellor and her First Counselor. Her father, on the other hoof, was not looking quite so engaged, “Father? Is it okay if we go for a walk around the lake? It’s a lovely day out, and we’re not hungry yet.”

The slate gray Pegasus glanced at the currently conversing mares for a brief moment to confirm that they were too occupied to field the request and then barked a curt summons, “Captain Maelstrom!” the crimson flier appeared in a flash, hovering above them and issuing a formal salute, “the children will be taking a walk. Arrange a suitable escort.”

The scarlet guardsmare cast a glance at the four young ponies, making sure to note the subtle frown that her elder charge had not been able to completely mask upon hearing that there would be an escort. Maelstrom then rendered a second salute to her commander and called over one of her own subordinates, “Sergeant Fourragere!” a white unicorn dressed in the golden parade barding of the royal guard cantered up, “take charge of things here. I’ll be accompanying the princesses until further notice,” she flashed a subtle wink at Celestia, who appeared visibly relieved at the news.

It would have been too much to hope that she and Luna would be allowed out of sight without any sort of escort at all—that was how it was for members of the royal family—but she was grateful at least that the commander of their personal guard detachment had decided that she was going to handle the matter personally and afford them as much privacy as she could in the process. Celestia suspected that she had one of the many novel compromises that had been made between her parents’ respective tribes to thank for it too.

The royal family of Unicornia had always been protected by a specially drafted detachment of the regular army. The soldiers that served in this unit were selected for their fierce loyalty to the Crown, and were instilled even further with a sense of devotion that ran right to the bone. It caused many of their members genuine distress if they knew that the royal family wasn’t under the watch of any of them for even a few idle moments. Traditionally, no room where a member of the royal family was could be without at least one guard in it as well, even sleeping chambers.

Soon after their marriage, Commander Hurricane had managed to…amend some of those traditions. It had taken him some time and—if Court rumor was to be believed—was why it had taken nearly a decade for the two to produce their first heir. One other arrangement that their father had managed to alter was where the care of those heirs was concerned. It had been a much easier fight for him to win, diplomatically, as it was hard to deny the core intent behind it. As part of the broader integration of the Unicornian and Pegasopian militaries, Hurricane had lobbied hard for his own version of the Crown Guard; but specifically for his and Platinum’s heirs. The protection of the Princess and her consort would still be the purview of the same guards it had always been, but the safeguarding of their children would be overseen by a crack group of pegasi soldiers.

The more conservative members of the Peerage had cried bloody murder, but were eventually shouted down by the majority who saw it as a very logical compromise. Celestia was rather glad for this, since the guards of the pegasi contingent were far more…reserved than their unicorn counterparts where privacy was concerned. They were not bound by centuries of protocol and tradition the same way the rest of the Crown Guard was, and so treated the assignment like most any other they received, with only a modicum more seriousness, since it was to protect the offspring of a pony they greatly admired and respected.

Had it been up to the veteran members of the Crown Guard, Celestia was certain a half dozen or more soldiers would have been marching with them, forming a protective ring around the young ponies. Maelstrom could be counted on to keep a respectful—but acutely attentive—distance as they walked.

“Thank you, Father,” Celestia nodded before looking at the scarlet flier, “Captain.”

“Yer Grace,” the scarred mare bowed to her alabaster charge before bowing to Luna and the others in turn, “Wee Grace. Sers. Shall we?” and with that, she alit into the air and hovered about the small group of young ponies.

“You really don’t get to go anywhere on your own, do you?” Wise Cracker noted.

“Nope,” Celestia confirmed as the four of them began making their way along the shoreline of the sparkling lake.

“So,” Tough Cookie probed once they were a suitable distance away from the rest of the crowd, “about those unhappy nobles you were talking about…?”

“It has to do with the Peerage, and their relationship with the Crown,” Celestia began to explain, and then drew up short when she saw the befuddled looks on the faces of the colts, “how familiar are you with Unicornian politics?”

The pair exchanged brief glances before the elder snorted, “we barely know about earth pony politics,” he admitted.

“Talking about that sort of thing gets adults really heated,” Wise Cracker chimed in, “so it doesn’t come up much.”

“You’re fortunate,” Luna mumbled. The younger indigo Pegasus princess was not a fan of their regular lessons on the workings of the Alliance Court. Truth be told, Celestia found it tiring at times as well, but there was little point in pretending it was something that she had to know about.

“That could make things tricky to explain, but I’ll try my best: the Peerage is the collection of all of the nobles of the Alliance. They are responsible for voting on much of the legislation that governs the realm. While the Crown—that is, our mother—can technically take any unilateral action that she wishes, to do anything without the support of a majority of the nobles would be folly.”

“If they didn’t like what she did bad enough, they could even revolt,” Luna put in.

“Correct,” Celestia nodded, “and so the Crown is often taking measures to ensure that it has the support of as much of the Court as possible,” she flashed a wry smirk now, “usually this can be accomplished with gifts of gold and jewels.”

“Bribes,” Luna chimed in as she took off and engaged in a lazy aerial circle of her own close by.

The elder sister frowned slightly at the rather abrasive characterization, though she could not deny the accuracy, “indeed. But such measures are very temporary, and hardly a way to create lasting bonds of support. For that, marriage is preferred. The Peers themselves will marry between their families to form political alliances in the Court, and when the need is dire, the Crown will marry into these minor coalitions to secure their votes on important legislation.

“More powerful nobles will often…strongly suggest, that a royal union might be in the best interests of the Crown if they feel their family has enough connections with other nobles.”

“So, what? They basically say, ‘let me marry your daughter or you don’t get the votes of me and my friends’?” Tough ventured, following Celestia’s broad description of how her nation’s government operated.

“Basically,” she shrugged, “they’re far more veiled than that, of course; as they are aware that most of their ‘friends’ are probably making the exact same suggestion while their backs are turned.

“But, as you can imagine, the news that one of those daughters may be betrothed to somepony outside the Court entirely,” she flashed a keen eye at Tough Cookie, “has ruffled quite a few withers among the Peerage. It was scandalous enough when Mother married Father. Hearing that the same sort of thing may happen yet again so soon…” she rolled her eyes, “you’d think it was the end of the world the way some of them are carrying on!”

“You don’t sound very upset by any of this,” the older colt noted.

“If I let myself be upset by every noble that wasn’t getting their way I’d spend every waking moment sobbing into my pillow,” Celestia chuckled before adding as an afterthought, “and perhaps a few sleeping moments as well. There are a lot of nobles.”

“Actually, I was kind of talking about the whole ‘betrothed’ thing,” he amended, “the idea of getting married to somepony just so your mother can get ponies to agree with what she’s doing doesn’t bother you?”

Celestia was a bit more somber when she answered this time, her eyes drifting to her younger sister and Wise Cracker, who had parted ways from them during their conversation and were now engaged in some sort of game than resembled a variation of Tag, “not for myself, no. I’m the eldest, and as such will eventually inherit the Crown after Mother passes. Were I to marry a Peer of the realm, it would be a political alliance that would endure throughout my reign. Picking the right stallion could make or break the entire Alliance. It is a weighty responsibility, but not something that ‘bothers me’ in the way you mean.

“It would be different for my sister though,” she sighed with a note of regret, “she truly would be just a pawn in such an arrangement. The power her eventual husband wielded in the Peerage would be invaluable to me during my rule, but…I would truly regret using my sister like that, however necessary it might be. Under normal circumstances, it might have been possible to allow her to wed whomever she would prefer; primarily capitalizing on the influence of my own husband. Unfortunately…”

“…Me and Wise don’t have a lot of friends in that Peerage of yours,” the colt supplied with a smirk.

“Correct,” Celestia nodded, “if we commit to this alliance between our tribes, there will be a lot of ‘grumbling’ in the Peerage, and a lot of nobles that will threaten to withhold their support in the future,” she sighed, “by that same token, if we were to approach it with anything less than the full endorsement of the Crown, then the Peerage won’t take it seriously, which could only serve to degrade the treaties over time.”

“See all of the effort I’m putting into this treaty? That’s because I know it’s worth it,” the older colt paraphrased, casting a grin at the princess walking beside him.

Celestia was forced to laugh at the subtle twisting of her own words from earlier, “exactly!” then her mirth eased, “it’s going to be hard back home,” she admitted, “but I do believe in what Mother and Father are trying to do. Chancellor Smart Cookie does too, I think.”

“Oh yeah, our Aunt’s got really high hopes for this whole thing,” he confirmed, “Ma and Pa are a little iffy about it,” he cleared his throat, “and honestly, I wasn’t all on board from the gate either.”

“Oh?”

“Well, y’all just got done talking about what it means to be a princess and how you gotta go on about dealing with other ponies and how it determines who you’ll marry; but we don’t have any of that where I’m from. I’ve never met anypony who ‘had’ to marry somepony else for any reason other than ‘cause they wanted to.

“So imagine how me and Wise reacted when Aunt Cookie came by and asked us to come with her to Canterlot Castle and what it was for,” he snorted and shook his head, “she made us promise to be nice and behave and all that, but both of us were plumb set on not going through with it.”

“Were?” Celestia remarked, catching the tense that the auburn colt had used.

“Yeah, well, that was when I was sure both of you were spoiled little brats that grew up always getting whatever they wanted,” he waggled his eyebrows at her, “like all rich unicorns.”

The alabaster princess narrowed her eyes at the colt’s own playful expression, and wasn’t quite able to hide her own crinkle of a smile on her lips as she replied, “much like I was expecting a grubby, turnip brained, farm hoof to come trapesing in through the Grand Hall?”

“Hey!” Tough Cookie sounded almost reproachful, “I was not trapesing,” he defended, managing to look almost genuinely insulted, “it was a ‘confident swagger’, I’ll have you know!” he thought for a brief moment, “all the other stuff you said is right on though,” he grinned once more.

Celestia snorted in an effort to contain the laughter that bubbled up inside of her, “oh, when the Court sees you walking down the aisle,” she shook her head, “I can think of at least four of them who will certainly die of apoplexy!” and she wouldn’t be sorry to see it either, come the think of it.

She noticed that the colt was looking at her with a vaguely quizzical expression now, and cocked her head. He asked, “did one of us just propose?”

The young princess blinked a few times as she thought on the matter, “it had actually not occurred to me that either of us would need to,” she admitted, “since everything was more or less being organized by my mother and your aunt.

“Besides, any actual marriage would still be many years off in the future yet. A formal betrothal announcement would be made to the Peerage upon ratification of the treaties, but nothing much would really change between us,” Celestia informed the colt, “a lot can yet change in the Court’s political climate,” she admitted, “after so many years with the treaty in place, a marriage may not even be necessary to maintain it further.”

“So, this all could end up being just for show?”

“It’s possible,” though not very likely in the princess’ opinion, “in any case, there’s no need for you to feel quite so…tied down, just yet.”

“I get it,” the colt said, sounding a little more subdued, “you’re trying to let me down easy. I didn’t really think somepony like me had a shot at a for real princess.”

Celestia balked, “no, no, that’s not it at all!” she stammered in an effort to get her words out quickly enough, “I just thought that maybe you…” her words trailed off as Tough Cookie looked back into her eyes, and she saw the sparkle of amusement in them, “…you are a bad pony, Mister Cookie.”

“Prince Cookie, thank you very much,” he insisted in a playfully haughty tone, “ooh, I like the sound of that…”

“There’s still plenty of time for me to choose your brother, you know?”

“Not if you don’t like jokes,” he laughed, “if you think I’m bad, then there’s no way you’d be able to stand him for more than an hour.”

“And who says I don’t like jokes?” she favored him with a coy expression before stepping past him to continue their trip around the lake.

“Well, I sure haven’t heard—oop!”

Whatever the young pony had been about to say was cut off in an abrupt exclamation of surprise followed by the sound of somepony collapsing to the ground in a rather unceremonious fashion. Celestia, of course, had a pretty fair idea of what terrible fate had befallen the colt, and so she turned around and let out let out a blatantly feigned gasp of surprise, “oh my! It seems as though, somehow, the draw-strings on your new cuffs became tangled and caused you to trip! What a terrible ‘accident’!”

Tough Cookie glared up at the filly standing over him and then looked at the offending garment on his fetlocks, “so I see,” he grumbled, “they became so ‘tangled’ that it’s like they were tied to each other,” he spread his forelegs apart until the strings between them became taught, emphasizing the neatly tied bow between them, “what rotten luck.”

“You should be more careful,” Celestia grinned at the colt.

“I suppose I should at that,” he said before tugging at the knot with his teeth and releasing his bound legs, “I stand corrected,” Tough Cookie got back to his feet and nodded in deference to the alabaster princess, “I didn’t have you pegged for a prankster.”

“Me? A sweet, innocent, princess of the realm; a ‘prankster’? Perish the thought!” Celestia winked.

“Uh huh,” he kept a more wary eye on her after that as they continued walking. Their conversations, fortunately, took on a much lighter tone as they went on around the lake. Celestia was fascinated by life in Fillydelphia, and plied Tough Cookie for even the most mundane story about the folk that lived there. No peers or ponies of noble birth, no dynastic machinations, and no magic. It was all quite a foreign concept to the young princess.

In turn, Celestia told her presumed suitor all that she knew about magic—which actually was not all that much. She also regaled him with descriptions of the habits and mannerisms of pegasi, for he’d seen scant few of them throughout his life either. In all, it was a rare moment that she got to share with Tough Cookie. Even with the colts her age in the Royal Court back in Canterlot she had to guard herself. Anything that she told them was sure to make its way at least to the ears of their parents, and from there to the rest of the Peerage. This pony had no such ties, and so, for perhaps the first time in her whole life, the young filly was free to speak and act as she pleased. She could relax, and she liked it.

The two of them soon came to a narrow stream that fed into the lake. To say that it barred their path would have been a gross overstatement. Indeed, at its deepest it might only have been a couple of inches, and it wasn’t more than a couple feet wide besides. Either of them could have deftly hopped across without even the need to get their hooves wet. However, it seemed that Tough Cookie saw in this moment a chance to make a jest of what he thought to be an expected chivalric act by a typical noble Canterlot stallion.

“Fair Princess,” he bowed speaking in an absurd mockery of a highborn accent that made Celestia chuckle, “allow me to see you safely across these treacherous rapids,” he bent low to the ground, “if Your Highness will permit me?”

Celestia was forced to cover her mouth with her hoof to keep from laughing out loud at the very amusing display. Being a good sport about the whole thing, and enjoying the frivolity that was all too rare a thing for her to experience back home, she followed suit, to include her own exaggeration of the speech that she listened to frequently, “oh, noble knight! Brave for me these waters, and see your princess to safety!” she then carefully gathered up her dress and gingerly climbed up onto Tough Cookie’s back and deposited herself there. Just as the other day in the garden, the earth pony colt bore her weight with hardly any indication that she was even there. The young colt might not have spoken or dressed like the knightly champions of legend, but he certainly possessed their fabled strength! The filly noted this approvingly.

Celestia continued the charade and extended her hoof, “onward!”

“As you wish,” Tough Cookie bobbed his head and began to march with exaggerated steps towards the stream. The two of them were hard pressed to keep from grinning like fools at the absurdity of the whole performance as they forded across.

Then, with startling suddenness, Celestia felt herself fall at precisely the same time Tough Cookie let out his own yelp of surprise. The next thing the young filly knew she was mere inches from the surface of the water. Thinking that this had to have been some trick on the part of her companion, Celestia turned to glare at the offending colt and berate him for the scare, only to find that he was looking rather surprised as well. He was also up to his neck in water.

The pair of them exchanged glances with one another before looking back at the trickling water around them. To either side of them, the depth of the stream was patently obvious, and it remained just a few simple inches. However, for reasons incomprehensible, the portion that Tough Cookie had chosen to walk through was deep enough to have nearly swallowed the earth pony.

“What just happened?” the colt asked, not taking his eyes off the stream around him.

“I don’t know,” Celestia admitted, looking around in confusion, “are you alright?”

“I think so. I might be going crazy though.”

“Me too. Can you get out?”

“Probably,” he sounded hopeful, “you should go ahead and get off me first,” he nodded towards the shore less than a foot away.

“Yeah, that sounds like a good idea,” Celestia stepped cautiously over to the bank and proceeded to put a respectful distance between herself and the shockingly unpredictable water. She watched Tough Cookie cautiously place his own hooves on the banks and pull himself out. Fortunately, he did not seem to encounter any further surprises.

The sopping wet colt turned around and glanced back at the stream, “that…was really weird,” he noted. Then he looked down at his clothing, “and my mother’s going to kill me.”

Celestia stepped over and examined the garment. It wasn’t ruined all that much, really. Any one of the hoofmaidens that her mother had brought would be able to restore the garment good as new with a simple spell, and Tough Cookie’s own parents need be none the wiser. She informed him of as much and then looked around, “we can probably have Captain Maelstrom fly it back for you and get it taken care of in a few minutes…if we can find her…”

“That pegasus? I’m pretty sure she stayed back with Wise Cracker and your sister.”

That reminded her, “where is Luna anyway?”

“They were racing turtles or something last I saw,” the colt supplied, “so they probably haven’t gone far. Just stay here for a minute and I’ll be right back, okay?” Celestia nodded and watched the earth pony make a running leap across the stream to ensure that he achieved sufficient clearance over the deceptively treacherous water to put his mind at ease and then continued to canter until he was out of sight.

Celestia watched him go, and then turned to survey the stream once more. That had certainly been rather unexpected. She admitted that she hadn’t looked very closely at it before, but it had not looked as though it could have been anywhere near as deep as that! In fact…the princess blinked in surprise and slowly eased a tentative hoof into the water, feeling it meet the soft, muddy, bed just below the surface. She withdrew her hoof with a start.

That wasn’t possible! She had clearly seen Tough Cookie get nearly swallowed up by the water at that exact spot! It couldn’t be that shallow! How…

The alabaster unicorn princess became aware of the sound of laughter nearby. Surprised at the appearance of the sound, she wheeled around and glared off into the wood line, “who’s there? Show yourself, I command it!”

“You should have seen your faces!” the disembodied voice cackled out from the shadows. A moment later, a pair of crimson pupils framed in gold appeared, moving with the mirthful cackling, “they were priceless!”

Celestia took a step back from the trees and those strange eyes, “I demand that you reveal yourself!”

“My, my, my, and here I thought you said that you could take a joke?” the voice jabbed testily.

She tensed. Whoever, or whatever this thing was, he’d been eavesdropping on her conversation with Tough Cookie. Celestia found herself feeling rather anxious now, and for the first time in many years wishing that she were not quite so far away from any of the guards assigned to look after her wellbeing. She forced herself to look composed, remembering who and what she was, and what that meant.

“Am I to take it then that you’re responsible for what happened to Tough Cookie?” Celestia was pleased that her voice didn’t so much as crack as she spoke.

“The bit with the stream? Oh, yes, that was me! Not my best work, I’ll admit, but sometimes it’s all about finding joy in the simple things in life, isn’t it?”

“Why are you following us?”

The eyes widened slightly, “me? I’m not following anyone! You’re the ones who’re walking through my forest,” they narrowed now at the princess.

She narrowed her own gaze in return, “what do you mean, ‘your’ forest?” she demanded, “are you saying that you live here?” it would have been difficult to believe, as Celestia had not heard of any intelligent being that called the Everfree Forest its home.

“Sometimes,” was the response that she received, which only made her frown deepen, “I am living here now though. I gather that you’re one of those things that pretends to use magic that lives on that mountain over there?” the eyes bobbed in the direction of Canterlot.

'Pretends to—!'…Celestia glared at the eyes, but nodded, “My name is Princess Celestia, Daughter of Princess Platinum, and heir to the throne of the Unicornia-Pegasopous Alliance. Now,” she puffed out her chest, “I demand to know who you are!”

“Why…” the young filly just about jumped out of her hide as the voice that responded didn’t come from the pair of crimson and amber eyes in the shadows of the forest, but from something that was standing directly behind her where nothing had been only a heartbeat before. She spun around as quickly as she could, nearly tripping over her hooves in surprise, and found those same eyes peering down at her, “…my name is, Discord…”