Author's Note

3 chapters deep, and i finally added self harm to the warning list, I believe that makes the whole set. it is just a mention and nothing graphic, but best i put the warming up anyway,

warning, this chapter is darker than the others, and kinda brutal.

i have also made a few edits to previous chapters, mostly the first.

good morning, and goodnight Rainbow Dash

King Sombra’s mane blew gently in the warm afternoon breeze, from the high balcony Sombra could see for miles, but the land subjugated under His mighty hoof stretched further than eyes could see. Times like this he liked to look over all he had earned, all the scurrying creatures who lived in his long shadow.

Sombra closed his eyes, his horn glowed with a purple nightshade aura, and suddenly he could see to any place where his presence had made suffering bloom. Sombra’s point of vision flew down an alley faster than a Pegasus could fly: he was above the city, he was below the city, and there was nowhere under his rule that he could not see.

Further out his vision was still strong where his army had spread his new kingdom on a tide of blood. over there he could see a battle, a one sided affair, his soldiers had cornered a group of malcontents, a few dozen stallions forming a crude line to defend their mares whom had been hidden in a village once abandoned. but Sombra’s soldiers could not be repelled by such scant efforts, the soldiers would soon enjoy once again what they hungered for, there would be a spilling of blood, and once that was done a spilling of semen would follow as his guards reached the mares: such was the way of both nature and war.

Sombra’s vision spun away from the battle, and washed over the grassy plains studded with burnt farms until he crashed against a phantom barrier like surf against a Cliffside. The EverFree forest, this land had held no ponies whose anguish would allow him free roam to observe the lay of things. just like in the songs of superstition which had grown over the prosperous long years of his absence, songs that foals heard in their cribs, but would any know why they had been written? Maybe Sombra would know one day himself, one such song that related to his current thoughts undulated as a phantom in his minds ear.

“dark smoke, and dark eyes, seek out friends where stillness lies. The shadow king sees far, but not where hope is still a shining star. Home my child, gallop across plains, run from the shadows and where their lord reigns.”

Sombra wondered that if those songs had been about him, and not the king Sombra from 1000 years past, perhaps he would understand them all. Many ponies seemed to think him immortal, but an immortal doesn’t raise heirs, he raises competitors, and Sombra didn’t welcome those with open arms.

“Sire” – the word rattled around Sombra’s head, he liked that word, its aura of authority: one ‘sired’ a foal, when Sombra heard the word directed at him he heard the slap of a stallion hilting himself inside a fertile mare as he shuddered his genetic legacy into her womb. That was immortality, to live fo…

“Your grace”, the thought managed to interrupt Sombra’s previous musing, but it was not unwelcome, Sombra knew he had grace, a predatory and regal kind of presence in the world, his royal splen…

“your highness”, maybe Sombra would try another one of those white lines that Pinkie Pie had been so fond of…

“WAKE UP YOU FOOL!”.

Sombra turned to face the sudden noise, only to come face to metaphorical face with his advisor, the advisors words didn’t register with the king for a few seconds, but once they did Sombra was filled with the urge to unleash dread magic at the source of the insolence, but there was no target to be seen.

The advisor had chosen to speak to him from the dark interior of a knee-high cabinet, and Sombra knew that even his far-sight would be unable to see into that darkness while his advisor still occupied it as a pulpit. Sombra could see the slightest shift of shadows through the ajar door. Sombra had never met with the advisor so high above ground before, Sombra hadn’t been sure he even could, he was so…present when he appeared at ground level, and faded so quickly with every inch of stair ascended. as for when under the earth…

“shadow of shadows, darker than the night, the hand that casts them strong, but out of sight”

The advisor spoke: “how proceeds your work?” it's voice held no warmth, as cold, and as crackling as the frozen earth where Sombra had first met him. His voice Rattled with the dry bones of words.

“Pretty fair, pretty fair” acknowledged Sombra, “my dominion sprea...”

“have you found it yet?” interrupted the advisor, his impatient tone made the warm air feel colder, and Sombra knew it wasn’t all in his imagination.

Sombra thought on that for a moment: “we are encountering some poultry resistance near Griffonstone but we are still covering ground”.

“You should have waited, like we told you, waited until it had been located before you grasped for a throne” hissed the voice from inside the cabinet, the advisors voice would have been colder if it had not already been at absolute zero.

“who are you that gives you the right to talk to your monarch like that?” roared Sombra, he didn’t really expect an answer to the question: just like the time before, and the time before that.

“all you need to know is that it was we who brought you here, made you what you are.” With that the voice fell silent. Sombra trotted over to the cabinet and flung the little doors wide, nothing was inside but lingering cold.

Sombra’s horn pulsed, and a flash of octorine light reduced the piece of furniture to a cloud of splinters. Sombra felt a smidgen better, but he knew that the magic the advisor had taught him could not be used to harm its creator.

“The hell you did” muttered Sombra, he turned back toward the balcony and looked over the kingdom that was his and his achievement alone. “I could have done it alone – I SHOULD have done it alone” thought Sombra, very nearly believing it, he tried to focus on the pleasant view of his kingdom, but the sun retreated behind the distant mountains, all his kingdom was slowly being bathed in cold shadow.

Sombra looked into the past instead, not even a 100th the years ponies believed him to have lived, but for all it mattered yesterday was just as hard to retrieve than the days that had gone by before living souls roamed the world. The cloak kept ticking, its hands slicing lives down by hours and minutes, never to be turned back.

It was cold, the frozen north always was. the grey stallion had camped out in one of the ice caverns at the foot of a sheer rise in the mountainous terrain. He had been here for several days as he pondered on where to wander next.

He was awake but saw little reason to stir, he had everything he wanted in his arms, his mare was so warm, the outside so cold. The lavender coat of her back caressed his smoke grey underbelly, his head sat in the crook of her neck, and her swelling belly partially covered by one of his hooves.

The grey stallion watched her eyes open as the early morning sun peaked into the mouth of the cavern. No words were exchanged for a perfect minute, the harmony was broken by the grey stallion: “decided where we are traveling yet?”.

“Anywhere, so long as you are there” said the mare, the grey stallion pursed his lips to speak, but the mares own met them before the silence could be broken. They made love again, one of the grey stallion’s hooves wandered its way down her side, passing over her growing belly before coming to a stop between her legs, all the while their lips never parted, the grey stallion never desired to kiss another mare, and he never would. Outside the cavern the sun was rising fast, it was going to be another beautiful day.

The sun was setting as Sombra walked away from the fading warmth, even beneath the dust of years passed she was too beautiful for this world, thinking of her felt like a shameful act, he would look ahead even if the days remaining to him would never seem so warm as she had felt. The future was a mystery, but if Sombra knew one thing it was the light and warmth never endured, darkness and cold was the natural state of the universe, the world was floating in the endless cold blankness of space, and you were so very alone. Even if it Didn’t always feel like it.

Sombra’s thoughts had walked him into the bedchamber that adjoined the balcony, but before they could lead him any further, they were cut down by the sound of a shod hoof rapping against the door.

“Enter” said Sombra not even turning his head to face the door. The door swung open and a Pegasus guard stepped inside.

“your grace” said the guard with a rigid formality, despite his slight panting from the long climb.

“what is it that you have to bother me with now?”, mutters Sombra, still facing the wall.

“another one of the prisoners is in heat your grace” Said the guard. At this Sombra perk up a little, the flame of carnal desire growing just enough to melt the ice of his mood a little. “which one? The Purple one? Twilight’s the name right, oh she better love what I have planned for her” said Sombra, the flame now growing to melt the ice like dragons fire.

“The blue Pegasus your grace” corrected the guard.

The flame vanished like a candle on the seafloor, and so did Sombra’s appetite for flesh.

“what do you want us to do with her your grace” continued the guard “do you wish for her to be brought before you sire?”

“I want…” considered Sombra: “I want… I want…to get some sleep, I am sure she will still be in heat come morning, I always prefer my mares in the morning.”, The words felt strange and cold on his tongue.

He wasn’t tired, but he wanted to sleep anyway. after Flash had left, Sombra lay on his side, his head on the foot of the bed so he could see the setting sun out of the open balcony doors. He watched the light retreat past his vision, and once darkness had shrouded the world, he let his sight leave his body once more, he could see furthest while perched on the cusp of sleep. Lingering at the boundary where thoughts manifested as enjoyable wisps of possibility, without the chaos of the true dream world, the half sleep which ponies were pained to be awoken from, just to shoo away whatever had woken them in the hope they could get back before full consciousness obscured the way to that blissful borderland between reality and fantasy.

Sombras point of sight rose from his body, this time accompanied by a vague blur of his body that could almost add feeling to his far sight, the sensation was like he weighed so little the he could float on the buoyancy of his thoughts alone, and he could feel the wind pass right Through his ephemeral body.

Sombra drifted out of the window, and galloped across the sky on a road made of nothing at all. soon the lights of Canterlot were distant candles, just pinpricks of light as he moved forward. each effortless step carried him over miles of sky, he passed over a gleaming lake which Shined with pale moonlight, a cold body curtained by a sea of black shadow trees. He passed above flocks of bird singing songs together in the dark.

The journey could not last forever, soon Sombra pressed up against the soft wall that was the limit of his distance, not the dark Everfree forest, but the cold northern plains from whence he came, were now as solid a barrier as any wall. Unable to run further from his body, he climbed instead, running up that wall, and high into the night. There was no ghostly resistance here, Sombra passed layers of cloud, not disturbing a drop of water, and ever higher into the night, where the air was thin and the cold sharp, beyond where any creature of flesh and blood could fly, and still he kept rising, if he looked back he might have seem the world so far below him spread out like a curved map, but he only looked ahead.

Sombra floated so high that he left the whole world behind him, his kingdom, his subjects, and all his mares save for the one who was already lost, all became just distance specks too far to think about. Sombra was galloping out to the stars. One blinked pale green and followed him across the cosmos from the darkness.

An orange light grew in intensify as he caught up with the sun, the great orb grew closer, and larger until it filled the entirety of Sombra’s vision. His gallop carried him into the burning core, and all his senses became white fire so hot that it surpassed all description. His body and mind became one with the heart of a star.

Sombra's eyes opened, he was laying on his side, his head at the foot of a bed, the light of the rising sun shining onto his face, orange and warm, peaking out over the mountains beneath a dark eggshell zenith of sky that was rapidly turning into a morning blue as the sun rose.

Sombra rolled off the bed and onto his hooves in one swift motion, he felt 1000 years old, and like he had just been born. He wandered over to the dresser, and looked into the mirror, he still saw the same stallion as he had before, he stepped out onto the balcony. it had rained in the night, washing the marble free of splinters and ash. the sun was beginning to dry the exterior of the castle, it looked like it was going to be another beautiful day.

Gilmore the griffon sat in the mess hall where the guards took their meals, up until now there had always been fresh pony bodies he could rend to satisfy his hunger, but they had not executed any ponies in a few days, perhaps all the malcontents were already dead, or maybe just hiding, but the practical upshot of this dearth of victims was that the only pony meat they had lying around was several days old at the least, and thus was rather putrid, not freshalicious at all, Gilmore much preferred his meat to be still warm and dripping with hot blood, it always tasted that little bit worse when its heart had stopped beating.

It wasn’t as if griffons could not eat carrion if that was the cheapest option, but Gilmore's palette had been refined by frequent consumption of the finest horseflesh. He had reluctantly settled for the eldritch substance that his equine brethren referred to as “Grub” it was free, and how much worse could it be than week old sun ripened pony’ corpse fresh from the hemp vine?

“Grub” turned out to be some kind of lumpy porridge with a drizzle of honey, someone had besmirched the bowl of slop with a single mint leaf placed delicately in the center, Gilmore stared daggers at the green leaf until it sank below the surface like the coward it was.

“That’s right” whispered Gilmore, not breaking eye contact with his breakfast: “you better run”.

he lifted a spoon full of the substance to his beak, and was about to tentatively put it in his mouth, when a voice from behind cause his feathers to rise.

“why you talking to a bowl of gruel Homeslice?” said Private Donut, in that Mane-Hattan accent of his.

Gilmore's beak hung agape as he tried to think of a reason that didn’t make him look insane: “I like the taunt my food, tastes better when it’s scared you know…”, Gilmore realized instantly that his mission to not look like a crazy person had failed.

“you’re weird, I will be out searching the town for more ponies to rape, and kill with the normal people if you need me”. Gilmore looked to his bowl of slop, then to private Donut, then to the castle gate, then back to the slop which he was sure was laughing at him.

“you’re going out on patrol Joe?” said Gilmore, perking up a bit: “can I tag along? I’m sure there is something out there worth eating, fruit off stalls, fresh pies, children at their mother’s teats, that kind of thing”.

“aren’t you scheduled to take one of the kings mares out for her exercise?” choogled Donut.

It was a true enough statement, but Gilmore would pretty much rather be doing anything else than marching Rarity around the ramparts, making sure she did not try the throw herself off the castle walls, she had tried before, luckily it had been him chaperoning her, if it had been someone slower on the wing the mother of Sombra's firstborn would have took a vertical sprint face first onto cobbles, and maybe Gilmore would have been doing something more interesting today; but save one expectant mother from cratering and suddenly the kings thinks it's what would be on your cutie mark if griffons had cutie marks.

Of course, Sombra wanted his foals to be gestated in healthy vessels, which meant plenty of exercise, and fresh air. But Gilmore couldn’t even have any fun with them, they couldn’t get double pregnant, let alone from a griffon, but the king wanted them untouched all the same.

Gilmore was about to utter some reason to pass the task off on Flash Sentry when the conversation was interrupted by an explosion of purple light, the forced of the magical wind whipping Donut’s mane about, overturning tables and chairs. the castle chef’s artisanal gruel flew in every direction.

In the midst of the purple smoke Sombra stood atop a trestle table, a leaden statue of a true king, his curved horn still glowing with magic like an iron spike pulled from the furnace.

“Hey Gilgamesh, got a job for you, you any good at playing pretend?” boomed the powerful stallion, Sombra was perhaps a little bit shorter than Gilmore, but in the here and now he towered above the whole world.

What ever the king had in mind for him was probably better than what he had planned for today, and certainly better than that gruel.

“What must I do your grace?” said Gilmore, hoping this task would be as fun as the last such task Sombra had given him, even if Sombra could never get his name right.

“here’s what I need you to do…” explained the king.

Flash sentry was very surprised when the king appeared across from him at the other end of the large bathtub, the eruption of magic causing most of the water to explode up the walls of the bathroom.

“I made a mess of the mess hall” shouted the grey monarch, inches from Flashes stunned face “Deal with it!”, and with than he was gone as suddenly as he had appeared.

Flash sat in awe for a moment before stepping from the bath to collect his nice gold armor that the blast had scattered, his helmet had landed in the toilet - plume down.

Flash let out a long sigh of exasperation before muttering.

“A guard’s gotta do what a guard’s gotta do.”

The sound of Rainbow Dash cumming echoed off of the walls of her cell, the cyan Pegasus was spreadeagled on the cell's luxurious bed, her rear legs jutted into the air, one of her hooves buried between them, she had been thinking of Soarin that time. Rainbow relaxed onto her side, not bothered in the least by the wet patch beneath were her hoof had been going to work. Rainbow both loved and hated being in estrus, on the one hoof the pleasure was to die for, every climax felt like it was her first, a hot, tight sensation all across her athletic body, sharp pulsations of ecstasy from her genitals like being struck by lightning bolts of white hot pleasure.

On the other hoof, it was hardly the most convenient state, the restlessness, the jitters, the inevitable sore wrist, and not to mention how easily she could become aroused, just the presence of a handsome stallion was enough for her knees to get weak, and her mareparts to get runny.

Rainbow would try to get some shuteye before she felt the need to pleasure herself again, being captive to Sombra Wasn’t so bad, her cell was comfortable, and she was being well fed, if only she could know for certain if her friends were being treated so well.

The cell door slammed open, and struck the wall with a deafening crash, Rainbow screamed in surprise, an involuntary beat of her wings briefly flattening her to the ceiling, the closest to flying the cramp space would allow. A griffon stood in the door frame, its body appearing black in front of the light he eclipsed, save for its crimson eyes which shined with predatory intent, Rainbow’s heart began to race as she watched herself growing in those shining eyes as the beaked head they were attached to stalked closer.

The Pegasus backed up into the corner of the rapidly shrinking cell, futilely putting a few extra steps between her and the griffon, the beast's tongue slid across its beak as he padded toward her, before she could react the griffon had a claw clamped to her ankle like on iron vice, without a word the griffon began to pull her toward the open door with very little observable effort

“Stop! where are you taking me” shouted Dash, all the while thrashing for any purchase.

The griffon grinned and replied: “the king has decided he doesn’t need any more broodmares, you are going to dance on the Grand Galloping Gallows.”

“w-w-whaa- at!” shouted Rainbow, fear and horror leaving her lips as disbelief, her flailing hooves grasped onto the door jam, terror lent her strength, and the griffon could not pull her loose. A spark of resistant anger grew in Rainbow as her rear hoof struck the griffon were his ribs met his abdomen, the griffon dropped her to the floor with a squawk.

A savage kick to her stomach from the griffon knocked the breath out of Rainbow, and pushed her hard into the edge of the door frame wings first.

“Excuse me, did I fucking stutter?!” choogled the snowy griffon, suddenly angry: “you are going to swing from a rope tied around that pretty neck of yours until your contorting face turns purple, and your legs stop kicking.”

Rainbow didn’t waste her energy on words, what she needed to do was fight, fight for her life. Rainbow propelled herself upright with a push of her wing, as she came up, she put all the force her well honed body could into a blow aimed at the griffon’s head.

He was expecting the blow this time, the beak gripped her pastern, his claw planted near her chest, the weight she had put behind the blow Turned against her, carried forward as the griffon twisted and heaved. Rainbow was thrown past the door, and into the hallway beyond. this griffon was no preening songbird, he knew how to fight.

A word the griffon had uttered finally registered with Dash, even past her rage: “broodmares, you said the king had enough of them, who are these broodmares!” Rainbow thought she knew the answer, and that made her anger overflow, directionless, and scolding; she just needed to hear it from this bastard’s beak.

His eyes closed for a brief second as if scenting prey in the distance.: ”you know…” hinted the vicious avian,” there’s a pink one, and a yellow one, and they are all going to bare the kings progeny, he raped the white one as soon as he met her, what a whirlwind romance.” Hissed the griffon blissfully.

“why them, and not me?!” shouted Rainbow, anger at her friend’s defilement filed her words to knifes,” Didn’t think you could keep me chained to a birthing bed?”.

The griffon snorted in disdain:” ha! the king could put a foal in you as easy as any of the rest.” The griffon began to circle around toward her flank, forcing her to move toward the Centre of the corridor. “ the sticking point is…” the avian looked her dead in the eyes before continuing, “Sombra doesn’t want gutter trash like you being the mother of his child.”.

Rainbow Dash as taken aback by this even in her fury, “what do you mean?” asked the cyan Pegasus, genuinely curious to know how her reputation fell so far from inside a prison.

The griffon saw her moment of consternation, lunged, swept, grasped, laughed; and in one fast motion he had Rainbow pinned against the wall, the griffon reared up to his full,and impressive height, the strength in his hind legs sliding Rainbow up the wall so the her flailing appendages could do nothing,but fruitlessly swat at him, she may as well have been slapping at an oak tree.

“What do I mean by that?” asked the griffon playfully, “everypony knows about Rainbow Dash, the mare who has been fucked by a male of every species she met, you’re the only plot of land every sentient race has conquered.”

Rainbow stared incredulously into the griffon’s confident red eyes. “that never fucking happ…” Rainbows words where cut short by the griffon’s.

“Rainbow dash, the skank who let every Wonderbolt taste the rainbow in exchange for getting picked for tryouts, everypony is welcome in Dash’s gash”.

“muleshit!” screamed Rainbow, now as angry at the slander as she had been at the revelation of her fate, “you’re making it up you dirty lyrebird.”

“Maybe I am” said the griffon, a huge grin appearing on his beak…somehow. “it doesn’t matter if you are a Cum dumpster or not, plenty of stallions are waiting to treat you like one before you dangle from a crossbeam.”,” but for now you are all mine.” Added the avian casually.

Rainbow tried to recoil from the griffons advancing beak, but the strong paw around her neck kept her head locked firmly in place as the griffon’s beak enclosed her mouth, and his tongue slipped into her mouth. See tried to bite down on the tongue as it slid around her mouth like an oiled snake, but the lithe organ was as tough as a piece of boiled leather with bones in it.

The griffon wrenched free from her lips allowing Rainbow to gasp in some of the few breaths she had left on Equestria.

“you think that a creature with a razor-sharp beak is going to have a tongue that’s easy to bite into? Said the griffon, before clamping his rostrum back onto Rainbows lips.

Rainbow gasped at a new sensation, her genitals: damp and engorged from her estrus, were throbbing with a fresh pleasure, she peered down past the griffon’s beak to see his other paw buried between her legs, two agile digits were massaging her most sensitive nub, the griffon knew what he was doing, and Rainbow couldn’t help, but moan into his gullet as his deft paw rang her doorbell. She could see that he was as excited as she was, his tapered penis swung about beneath his belly, each suck, each writhing of his tongue against her own Caused the organ to pulse as it expanded with blood and need, soon a white bead began to form at the tip.

Rainbow kicked, and pushed at the bird, her own pleasure grew as the griffon quickened his pace, soon she was sure he could hear the vibrations of her muffled moans in his beak.

The griffon broke the forced kiss and stared rainbow in her eyes, filled with fear and shock, but no tears, a string of saliva hung between them for a moment before falling away.

“go on” said the griffon, his crimson eyes locking on to hers, “scream, nobody will think less of you for it but yourself, and she isn’t going to be here for long.”

Words of defiance where about to cross Rainbows lips l, when the griffon let a little of her weight onto the paw working her mareparts, sliding his two digits into her as her back slid down the wall, the sudden insertion made her cut off her words with a gasp.

The griffon smiled, and Dash ground her teeth and clenched her eyes shut as the griffons buried digits beckoned inside her marehood, hitting that one spot in the front of her vagina that made her legs buckle. Her fluids were dripping between the griffon’s fingers forming a little puddle beneath where she was pinned. just thirty odd foot of grunts later the pleasure overcame her will.

“A-A-A-AHHHHHHHUGH! Rainbow screamed as her climax hit her, lightning bolts of pleasure coursed from her genitals all to the way to the tips her hooves with every involuntary contraction, her legs kicked wildly at the empty air.

As soon as it was over Gilmore let the cyan mare slide to the floor with a thud, in a smear of her own fluids. “Don’t go trying to collapse yet” suggested Gilmore, “you’ve got an appointment at the swingers club, I will drag you by your tail if you won’t walk”. This reminder of her execution stoked a new incentive to escape in the blue mare, she tried to clatter onto her hooves, a sharp kick in the ribs put a stop to that, Gilmore thought he heard something crunch, but the fight had not left her yet.

A paw full of feathers torn from her wing, a shape strike to the rump which added bruise purple to the rainbow of her cutie mark, and finally a shearing snap of his beak, that filled Gilmore's mouth with the taste of her savory blood, and tore free a neat triangle of flesh from her shoulder: just a little nip. she then seemed more inclined to cooperate.

Gilmore pulled her to her hooves, her head remained down for fear of another blow, but her eyes still shined with fire. The sound of hooves came clip-clopping down the corridor. it was private Donut. “You seem to have had fun.” choogled the burly unicorn, “she seems to have simmered down now, she was a feisty one.”

“sounds like she will be a kicker” mused Donut as he used a rope to secured Rainbow’s wings to her body like they always did with pegasi. Gilmore turned to his captive and said “shame that a fine arse like yours has to go to waste” the griffon gave Dash a hard slap on her firm buttocks with the same paw he had used to make her cum, leaving a streak of her own fluids across her plot, the wet smack echoed around the barren hallway, “I wanted to rip your throat out while cumming into your snatch, but the king demands you try on a hemp necklace” choogled the griffon with just a hint of disappointment, “I guess I will have to make do with picking your flesh from your bones once you’ve stopped twitching. The cyan mare didn’t even look at him, she was utterly defeated, but still shed no tears.

King Sombra whistled a tune to himself to pass the time away while he waited for Gilbert, and constable Bagel, or whatever their names were to get done with their part so he could get done in Rainbow’s parts. The tune he whistled was old, he had heard the lyrics once, as a young child they had narrated a warning of the ancient shadow king, but in is youthful naivete , he never thought that one day he would be the ancient shadow king, it was like they said, first you believe in Santa Hooves, then you don’t believe in Santa Hooves, then you are Santa Hooves. Although even the raciest greeting cards never depicted him waiting beneath an occupied gallows for a warm hole to fill, or even for milk and cookies.

Sombra tapped his hoof in mild impatience as he waited for his mare to be brought before him. Sombra had chosen to perform his royal business without being clad in royal raiment, his smoke grey form was as naked and unadorned as the bodies which dangled from the ropes around him, save for his crown of fused electrum nestled in his black mane. The image of dark power, and royal authority was slightly spoiled by the milk, and the cookies that the leaden stallion was enjoying.

It was a fine morning, the sun shined sharply past fading clouds, the earth was still wet from last nights rain, the scent of morning dew made a valiant effort to mask the scent of rotten corpse, it wasn’t succeeding. Sombra chewed his cookie, oatmeal and raisin, and drank his milk, cow. Where were those two with the prisoner? Sombra could forgive them for taking their time with her, but this was going on vacation.

Sombra began to pace up and down the row of stiffs, most too rotten to put names to: the faceless, bloated evidence of his brutal rise to power. Sombra had made sure to leave a fresh noose empty, and inviting for the prisoner. Sombra’s trot circled around the Grand Galloping Gallows, a lazy, smooth gait, too graceful to churn grass into mud. The Gallows were not as grand as the name implied, crudely hammered together from unseasoned wood and short nails, it’s design was no more elaborate, there was no trapdoor so that its guests could be dropped below the sight of watchers so that nobody saw their neck snap from the sudden stop, this wooden machine of terror was nothing more than two posts married to a crossbeam, it got the job done by the simple tossing of a rope over the crossbeam, and pulling the victim into air with the executioners own strength, no neck had ever been broken beneath its wooden beam. Sombra had had a few ponies hanged indoors, but that was neither the most practical location, nor the most fun.

Sombra’s pacing turned him the face the gate into the castle proper, which had not to his knowledge ever been closed, some symbol of Celestial’s open armed Benevolence, and through its gaping entrance Sombra could see his blue pegasus being half led, half dragged toward him by a kite-Andean Griffon, and a mandibually endowed unicorn stallion.

the two marched the prisoner out into the soft morning light of the courtyard, when she clapped eyes on the row of danglers behind Sombra she tried to make a break for it, bolting away to the right; but the attempt only ended with her being knocked to the ground by Private Donut, who dragged her up to her hooves, her cerulean coat now streaked with mud from the well-trodden path to the gate which had been the last furlong many ponies trod. Sombra’s anticipation was not smothered by mud any more that it was discouraged by the mare’s bruises, and scratches.

The two guards dumped the mare at their king’s hooves, and stepped aside with formality, and poise, the display of synchronous discipline no less impressive despite the beige stallion’s obvious arousal from being in such close contact with a mare in season. Sombra reckoned that the sand toned stallion was perhaps a little bigger than him. The mare’s estrus was already causing blood to flow into Sombra’s own sword, which twitched and expanded in pulses as it slid free of its scabbard.

The blue mare quivered, and trembled, but she made no sound, nor shed any tears. Sombra’s horn glowed as a purple haze enveloped his mare, she remained resigned, defeated even as the magical force hauled her into the air, and carried her to a nearby cluster of barrels, her legs dangled limply, but her amethyst eyes never broke from the line of lifeless bodies, and the one unoccupied noose. Sombra preferred that his mares try to resist him, but he never expected Rainbow dash to be the kind of pony who surrendered before the battle had even begun.

Rainbow dash flopped over the barrels on her back like a dead fish. Sombra trotted over to her pathetic form, leaned himself over her so that he was close enough to feel her strangely calm breath on his snout, and looked into her eyes which expressed no reaction: already dead.

“just going to lay down, and take it like the other Pegasus did? Said Sombra - no response from the mare beneath him.: “whatever you like I guess” said Sombra disappointed that the mare he had heard was so lively turned to be just a listless cock-slot.

She made just a little sound as Sombra pushed himself into her unresisting snatch, a tiny gasp of what could have been pleasure or just surprise, but Sombra barely heard it over his own exhaling moan as his length was enveloped in the mare’s warm folds. Sombra concluded that he may as well get done with it, as clearly nothing terribly exciting was going to happen, fucking this mare was just masturbating with her cunt.

Sombra went straight into medium rhythm, and made no effort to delay his orgasm, after a minute or two of nothing but the wet slapping of his penis plunging in and out of her vagina, Sombra was about ready for a no doubt underwhelming orgasm, an anticlimax.

It had taken Rainbow dash all of her resolve to wait this long, she had played the spooked horse, they probably thought that she was just some tomcolt wannabe wonderbolt who would crumble into submissive terror as soon as they worked her over, but this pegasus wasn’t going to be marched meekly to the gallows.

She had been waiting for her opportunity, and all while acting like a broken, tiny thing, all she had needed to do was channel fluttershy.

Each time the grey stallion bucked into her she was rocked back and forth a smidgen, with just careful positioning she had made it so that the repetitive motion rubbed the rope that bound her wings against the rough surface of the barrel she had been placed on, the rope loosened and fell, but Rainbow dash still sought the ideal moment.

Dash saw her narrow window to freedom, the grey stallion eyes shut as he got close to his climax. Rainbow’s wings flew open like two cerulean scimitars being drawn, her back hooves smashed into her rapist’s stomach, his eyes shot open, and all his held breath shot of his mouth in one great ‘uugh’. Carrion crows erupted from the gallows.

Rainbow didn’t care if it was pain, or mere shock that had left the stallion reeling, she sent him stumbling aside, and leapt into the air faster than she had ever done before. Rainbow Dash rose like a blue comet in reverse, but she knew that the grey unicorn would not stay dazed for very long, she started the roll as soon as she heard the fizzing sparkle of a magical buildup. The spell ripped past to her left, missing her by a half dozen yards, an incandescent white fireball boiling the air around it, reducing a fleeing crow to nothing more than a few smoldering feathers. the effulgent earthbound star shot into the clouds faster than any creature could fly, leaving blue-grey afterimages across Rainbow’s vision.

A few wingbeats later the Cyan pegasus’s head pierced a low cloud, and she was free.

As Rainbow erupted from the roof of the cloud a force slammed into her from the side, and grasped. sharp points dug into her body, and her vision was filled with white feathers. The griffon slashed with his talons, and snapped his beak. Rainbow pumped her wings hard, but the griffon was too heavy, she was falling back to the gallows.

Rainbow struck with her hooves, butted with her head, striking the flesh under his feathers, a screech erupted from the beast as her jabbing hoof struck the base of his wing, and the whole flailing ball of griffon and pegasus tumbled toward the earth even faster.

“where do you think you’re going” shouted Gilmore, above the rushing wind.

“some place I will enjoy” shouted Rainbow, as the words passed her lips, and became lost in the upward Gail, her hoof swung hard into Gilmore’s throat, and Dash was rewarded with a choking caw, and the griffon’s grip loosened: she had been right, she did enjoy it.

They were close to the ground now, and falling fast, Rainbow had fought too hard to let them take her, she kicked hard, and one of the limbs grasping her broke free, that other hung on by a single talon.

Sensing that he was losing his grip, Gilmore’s beak shot out, finding flesh somewhere above Rainbow’s right eye, but she felt nothing, but anger under the Adrenalin, it was do or die, if she didn’t get this bastard off her she would be at the end of her rope literally.

Rainbow push with her hooves, and twisted in the air: the griffon was cast away from her just in time, as she freed herself, she felt a ripping pain above her right eye which was brilliant even through the rage fog of Adrenalin. Blood gushed over her right eye, and shoulder.

Rainbow flapped as hard as she could to stop falling, and just a few feet from the ground managed to arrest her momentum, and began to rise…then the magic struck.

Cold fire coursed in her wings, which became as immovable as stone. Rainbow fell to the grass, and before she could get to her hooves the grey stallion was on top her, she tasted damp soil as a strong hoof forced her face into the ground.

The grey stallion bellowed, in victory or in rage Rainbow could not say. “someone get me a noose, this bitch is pigfeed as soon as I’m done!” shouted the grey stallion, the anger almost rising off him like steam.

Sombra Was more savage animal than graceful monarch now, the thin layer of ermine nobility peeled away to reveal a rutting beast which lusted for dominance and sex. Evil in a different way, but no lesser than the scheming masterminds that occupied thrones of cliche .

Sombra’s penis throbbed between his legs, still shiny with fluids from when he’d been inside her. Rainbow regretted leaving his balls blue. faces turned blue before they turned purple. her escape had failed, and she was certain that she was going to die with a rope around her neck.

Sombra bucked wildly at Rainbow’s candy plot, too furious to line his genitalia up with hers, the first few strokes slid his cock across her flank leaving a streak of pre-cum across her cutie mark. Another animalistic jab had him nearly bury himself in completely the wrong hole. Not that Rainbow thought that would bother him much.

Private Donut came bounding over, a hurriedly cut noose held in his teeth. Rainbow’s mouth opened on its own to frame appeals for her life as her eyes sighted the hempen cord, but no sound passed her bloodied lips. She would not beg to the deaf ears of the beast mounting her. She would never beg…

With an ugly grunt of triumph and pleasure, Sombra’s organ found its target, Rainbow felt him push into her slick tunnel. The savage insertion pushing sparks of pleasure up into her belly, her small moan was muffled by her hoof held to her mouth. All the while hot blood still poured down the right half of her face, no more painful that a bee-sting beneath all she was feeling.

There was a sound of flapping wings, and the griffon gracefully perched himself atop the vacant space on the gallows, the flap of his big grey wings caused the ponies to swing like they must have when they had been strung up. Rainbow saw that he had something in his beak. he tapped his claws on the beam above the empty noose. Waiting. Rainbow recalled his comment about picking her bones clean.

Sombra was deep in pleasure, and deep inside Rainbow dash, pistoning in, and out of her. no rhythm but a bestial fury which made some equally animal part of dash’s biology quiver, and spasm in the joy of being bred. No stallion or mare had fucked her like this before.

Sombra’s savage ministrations slowed to a more normal, albeit still brutal tempo when he spotted the griffon.

“great save up there Gilford” choogled Sombra, “have a biscuit on Rainbow Dash – oh, I see you have already got one!” once Sombra’s stopped talking his pace moved straight back into enraged rutting.

Rainbow stared at what the griffon had in his beak and saw…that Surely couldn’t be what he had? – she would have felt it, she would have screamed, she needed to make sure. Rainbow stroked a foreleg across one side of her head, her ear flapped against her hoof like it always did; she tried the bloodied side…

She looked into the griffon’s face, who shot back a smug avian grin, then gulped down the orphaned cyan ear.

Rainbow might have screamed, but it was all becoming to much, she chuckled just so that she wouldn’t cry. Sombra wasn’t letting up, his breathing becoming ragged between snarls of ecstasy as his flesh lance plunged in and out. Rainbow gasped as a lucky thrust slammed into her snatch at just the right angle, hitting that sensitive stop that made her knees buckle, the very same one that the griffon had wielded against her outside her cell. as engrossed as Sombra was in his mounting pleasure the fertile mare’s reaction did not escape him.

“you’re going to cum as you die.” Prophesized the grey stallion through a maniacal rictus, “and so will your king.”

Rainbow said nothing, defiantly staring ahead to her fate while the stallion inside her made sure every thrust hit that special spot of her most intimate flesh, his strokes had been mostly shallow and quick, but now he made certain every thrust took his tip from her tender lips to her tight nadir, and punctuated its stop with the wet slap of his testicles against her clitoris.

Rainbow Dash would never have felt shame having an orgasm in a situation like hers in the way Flutters must have. she was a healthy young mare, mares cum when they get fucked, it was a fact of life, and only prudes thought of it as some damning mark of shame, rather than just an inevitable bodily function. But she would be damned if she let Sombra’s statement become true. One last test of endurance…

She looked dead ahead, and tried to ignore the pleasure rising in her belly. The griffon was still perched above the empty noose – her noose. He was clearly enjoying the view, his Birdbreeder stuck over the edge of the beam, a small bead of Pearlescent fluid began to form on the tip – swelled – formed a hanging drop – jiggled – and fell, a single tear landing silently below the waiting noose, Rainbow knew that when she kicked and spasmed the last of her life away in its creaking embrace, Sombra’s seed would slide down her bruised thighs to join the griffon’s fluid.

She had been so focused on that rope, that she had forgotten about the one that the beige stallion had brought Sombra, until she felt Him slip it around her neck. Its Rough, itchy surface closed about her throat just tight enough to be unpleasant, the feeling like when she would hang her head over the side of her bed to search underneath, her face began to feel tight and bloated. Sombra pulled the noose tighter every time he bucked into her dripping cunt, which spasmed with pleasure now, her throat as still open enough for her to let out a warbling grunt as a glob of pleasure worked past her terror.

Rainbow felt the blood pulsing in her veins, and her vision began to turn brown and fuzzy around the edges, as the bite of the rope began to rob her of consciousness, soon her eyes completely failed her, but she could still hear, the sound of Sombras’s increasingly ragged grunts of ecstasy and Exertion, the sound of the gentle morning breeze in distance trees, and the leathery slithering of some grinding, whispering, shadow in every dark corner of the castle.

The noose yanked upward hard, and she felt her forelegs leave the ground, she tried to reach for her throat, but whatever will she threw into her limbs they would only move as Appendages that had fallen asleep could. Rainbows jaw hung slack and she felt every muscle in the stallion behind her tighten, and so did the noose. Even at the brink of consciousness the orgasm hit Rainbow like a falling mountain, the lack of oxygen transmuting the pleasurable contractions into incandescent spasms, each of which made lights flash behind her unseeing eyes, hitting her spine like fireworks of pure pleasure, her inner muscles clenched onto the length sliding up and down inside her, which twitched and flared.

As her climax faded, so did her consciousness, the last thing she heard before darkness took her was Sombra’s melodious bellow of pleasure, and the last she felt was the hot pulses of semen thumping against her cervix. A tear rolled down her cheek, and that was the worst pain of all.

King Sombra let the rope slip free from his mouth, the cyan mare slumped over, and against his royal idiom, so did Sombra. That – that! had been something, he had intended only to scare the mare as he fertilized her by pretending she was going to die, but when she broke free, and bounded skyward his anger had been genuine, he was glad she dodged his Impulsive magical fireball, all the anger, and frustration she had inspired had been shuddered into her womb with his seed, the sudden, blissful relief had left him lying on his side In the mud, gasping for breath, when his world had stopped spinning, he got to his feet, legs as wobbly as a mares after being fucked in season for the first time. Rainbow Dash had made a mare of King Sombra. Sombra was sure she would produce a strong and fierce colt or filly.

He knew she wasn’t dead, just out of it. He ordered that Gottfried, and legate Stickybun take her back to her cell, and see that she was cleaned up.

he was careful to be very specific with Gimlets orders, the previous order he had given the griffon had been to simply drag Rainbow to the Grand Galloping Gallows, and make her feel like it was real, and it had ended with him ripping off one of her ears, and eating it. that was some hardcore method acting.

Sombra languidly made his way toward the door which would take him to his bedchamber, it was early morning still, but already he felt like he pumped all his energy for the day into that Pegasus.

He had almost started to whistle in satisfaction when he saw it from the corner of his emerald eye.

He trotted backward, and then forward again to be certain he had seen what he had thought he had. It was definitely turning to face him as he moved…the corpse of a yellow stallion turned to face King sombra like a compass.

Why was it doing it Sombra could not have said, how it was doing it Sombra did not know. How long had it been doing it? Sombra asked in the privacy of his mind, had it turned to face the tower that held his bedroom? Had its ragged eye sockets been fixed in his direction through all the hours of strange, and pleasant dreams?

Sombra wandered over to the hanging body, much too rotten to possibly be moving under its own power. He examined the corpse up, and down with his eyes, from the yellow stallion’s dangling hooves, to the tip of his crow-pecked ears – Sombra found his answer.

It was dark inside the stallion’s slack mouth, darker than mere blackness, the slithering shadow that Sombra was only too familiar with, but had never realized was capable of appearing like this. Sombra was unsettled, by the sight, if the advisor could appear in a dead body like this, could he do the same with a live one? Perhaps more concerning to the king was the movement, it took very little force to make a hanging body sway, but even that was more physical influence on the world than Sombra was entirely comfortable with the advisor possessing.

The voice came from the empty cavern of the stallion’s mouth with all the warmth of the gulf between the stars.

“come see me in my home…”

“how can I do that?” replied Sombra, “where in the world do you live?

After a long pause that made Sombra think the advisor hadn’t heard him, the voice came again, quiet, and elongated as if the forced needed to sway the body had drained it utterly.

“I don’t…” trailed the speaking darkness within the moist cavern.

“Well I can hardly buy a fucking train ticket, then can I?” Said Sombra, profanity hiding his growing chilliness.

Nothing came from within the dead stallion’s mouth now, but Sombra’s ears turned his head skyward upon the cry of some distant bird in the north sky, deep and mournful.

When Sombra’s eyes made their way back to the pulpit carcass he saw something that injected ice water into his heart. Just for a moment, one short enough to have been a figment of his mind, Sombra had seen an eye at the back of the stallion’s throat. A baleful, pale eye at the bottom of a sightless pit

Sombra stood for the best part of an hour, staring into the back of the corpse’s throat, none of his underlings questioned his action. In time he managed to convince himself almost that it had been a trick of the light…almost. By then the sedative of his orgasm was demanding that he take a nap, Sombra had always wondered if that biological quirk had been nature’s way of giving the mare time to escape…

Sombra Didn’t feel like climbing all those stairs to his bedroom, not with all those shadows between here, and there. Sombra focused his mind on the image of his bedroom, it was always easiest to teleport to familiar spaces, in an instant flash of light Sombra vanished from the courtyard.

It was the wrong choice of travel option.

The clouds of magical mist cleared, and where Sombra was expecting to see his bedroom, was nothing but darkness and cold, such a darkness he had never known.