Author's Note

As the chapter title ~~insinuates~~ outright states, this is an interlude that focuses on the forces behind the last couple of chapters and how the country's everypony is reacting to the sudden changes. Since it doesn't have any Dusk in it, I suppose it's not required reading, but it gives the other chapters some nice depth.

The next chapter picks right up with Dusk and the unnamed officer again. See you there!

Interlude- State of the Country

A white unicorn with a horn of unusual length sighed as he stretched his rear legs out from a rich velvet and pale wood chair, his hooves clacking heavily on a desk of the same material. "Do you know something, Soft Shoe? Ah, of course you don't, how could you," he chuckled, before smirking and proclaiming, "It is goodto be the Prince."

A pudgy caramel-colored unicorn across the desk paused in rifling through stacks of paperwork and looked up at the stallion. "Prince, Sir Platinum?"

The unicorn sniffed and flipped at his deep indigo mane. "Yes, Prince. Not like those mongrels that the House of Blood comes from; those whose title come from being descended from that traitorous winged freak. Luckily, the otherwinged freak so generously got rid of for us. Speaking of the freak in Question has been completely restrained?"

"Yes, Highness," the pudgy unicorn said with a nod and a reassuring smile.

"No, no, not 'Highness', that's what she was called. Call me, 'Your Majesty'! Now, continue your report."

"Very well, Your Majesty. The Striga Tincture was slipped to her upon her return, to immediate effect."

"Her return? Do you know whence she traveled?"

"No, your majesty. We found some clues in her saddlebags but they just seemed to be souvenirs from around the country. Some layered stones that we found to come from Ghastly Gorge, a bottle of saltwater that we assume to come from the lands of the seapony, and a bundle of enchanted wooden staves that appear to have come from the Deer."

"Hmm, I shouldn't be surprised that she would travel to lands of such witchery. Get on with it then, continue with how she was received."

"Where anything else we tried merely resulted in an upset stomach, the witchweed tincture rendered her unconscious in an amazingly short amount of time. Your most trusted Household Guards then bound her and carried her to the prepared chamber in the Crystal caverns below.

"Orichalcum chains and hobbles have been applied, as well as The Bridle of the Abyssinian witch Hydia. Through the Chains and the Chamber, we're applying a constant drain on Her Magic reserves, with the crystals of the cavern acting as batteries. We even figured out a way that we can tap them for boosted magical energy."

Soft Shoe's muzzle twinged down. "Though I am puzzled, Your Majesty. What does the Bridle add to your restraint on Celestia?"

He chuckled. "Soft Shoe, dear Soft Shoe. It is the keyrestraint. Eventually, she'll develop a resistance to the witchweed, and then we'll need some other way of keeping her unconscious.

"While the chains sap her magical powers, the Bridle will trap her in her dreams; dreams of her most desperate wishes and desires. She'll never even attempt to awaken. To do so she would have to realize that everything was a dream, and then destroy those things that make her the happiest." The unicorn snorted and tapped his forehooves together. "It's foolproof!"

"Of course, Sir. Forgive my impertinence."

"Forgiven, forgiven. Continue the report."

"Our household troops and the Guard units that we have managed to suborn—"

"Not suborn, just... Turned to the righteous way of thinking."

"Of course your Majesty." Soft Shoes gathered his thoughts for a moment before continuing.

"The Guard and your household Troops have managed to seize Canterlot, though not without significant leaks in the form of escaping mud hooves. Unfortunately, only a portion of the Guard forces stationed on the Border are welcoming of the restoration of the House of Platinum to the throne, though the good news is the others are staying neutral so far.

"The pegasi have remained silent so far, though if we can get a stranglehold on the majority of the mud hooves they'll have to acknowledge your rule or starve. The Bad news is that Prince Stonehoof of the house of Blood is currently commanding General of the third Equestrian Field Army section designated as the 'Stone Field' corps."

Prince Platinum let his rear legs fall to the ground as he clapped his forehooves against the desk. "What!? How did we miss this? His appointment should have made national news!"

"Rather than go through any of the usual court or military channels, Celestia personally granted his commission as commanding General of the Herd, and thus circumvented our standard intelligence channels. Considering his relationship with her, it is unlikely that Stonehoof and the herd will believe the story we've fed to the rabble, Your Majesty."

"Damn That sun-flanked winged freak! Even when everything goes my way she still bucks up my plans." He scowled down into the desktop, the filigree that had been pulled out of it still visible underneath the new varnish.

After a moment though, he snorted and switched back into a smirk. Leaning back in the chair, he flicked a hoof through the air.

"No matter. Let them rally against me. No army could stand against the might of Prince Spoiled Platinum, Ruler of the Sun."

***** ***** ***** ***** *****

General Stone Blood, known by the moniker of Stonehoof to his friends and his enemies, read over the letter again before lighting his horn with a simple messaging spell. Within moments his second in command, one Lieutenant General Steel Gaze, entered into his pavilion.

"Lieutenant," the light indigo unicorn said as greeting with a nod. "Do you remember the V.I.P we had in camp about two weeks ago?"

Steel Gaze smirked a bit, the cigar in the corner of his mouth bobbing as he said, "The 'royal messenger' who was heading back to the castle after her voluntary twenty-five-year field deployment? Did she get there alright?"

Wordlessly the general held out the letter in his magic. With a cocked eyebrow, the pale tan pegasus took it and started reading. As he did so, the flicker of laughter in his eyes cooled, until he reached the end and looked up at Stonehoof with his signature freezing glare. Looking back down at the document, he sniffed before tossing it on the desk.

"Abdicated, huh?" he said, spitting into the dirt floor before nodding. "I'm pretty sure I understand. What are we going to do about the fop?"

"That is the very reason I called you in here first," Stonehoof said, leaning back and pressing his hooves to his eyes. "I know he's a Platinum, even distantly, but he is here, commanding at one of the largest mixed corps in Equestria. If I call him in here and our little chat doesn't go well, are you okay with..."

Finding himself lacking any clear wording, he gestured to Steel Gaze's eyes.

Chuckling mirthlessly, Steel nodded as he said, "Oh aye, I could get 'em. You give the word, sir, and he'll be paralyzed in a heartbeat."

Sighing, Stonehoof nodded. Lighting his horn, he re-sent the summons from before to the other Lieutenant-General under his command.

After a longer wait than he'd had with Steel Gaze, another unicorn ducked through the canvas door of his tent, nodding to the pegasus standing beside the desk. After taking a moment to fuss with his mauve mane, the white stallion walked up to the desk and saluted.

"Sir!" the unicorn called in a faint, vaguely effeminate voice that had several rumors going around the camps at all times.

"At ease, Lieutenant General Pearmain Platinum," Stonehoof said after returning the salute. He noticed Pearmain's ears perk at the full title, and his empty little grin at the acknowledgment.

"Yes, General Stone Blood, sir. What might I be able to do for you, General? Oh, oooooh, are we doing another drill? Mayhap—"

Waving a hoof through the air, Stonehoof shook his head. "No no, nothing so droll. I would actually like you to look over a letter from the capitol for me, and give an opinion on its contents."

"Ah, yes General," said Pearmain as he took the letter. Upon glancing at it he perked up a little.

"Ah, a letter from coz Spoiled I see, from the hoofwriting," he said, smiling blandly. "It has been a while since... I heard..."

He'd stopped speaking as he read, and from the way his eyes flicked over the letter, Stonehoof could tell that he'd read ahead and was now devoting every bit of whatever brains he had to the content.

"Ah," he said after a moment, before placing the letter gingerly on the desk between them. "I believe I see. Just to be clear, General, that VIP we had a fortnight ago. She was...?"

Pearmain gulped when Stonehoof nodded slowly.

"I see, I see," he muttered, before sighing and sitting down. "Why, coz..." he whispered, shaking his head and closing his eyes.

Steel stiffened up a bit when Pearmain snorted before his eyes blazed open, his forehooves raising up to slam into the top of Stonehoof's desk as he raised himself to hover above the wood.

"I'll ready my corps," he said, all inflection gone from his voice. "When do we march?"

Stonehoof looked deep into his fiery eyes, and grinned.

***** ***** ***** ***** *****

General Iron Helm sighed as he looked around the circular table and the other four stallions currently bickering in their seats.

"Look, I don't care what that idiot says," the gray unicorn said, punctuating the remark by throwing the paper copy into the center of the table. "If she has truly abdicated, then Stonehoof should be taking the throne, not Spoiled Platinum! There are clear rules of succession in place from Princess Platinum's days, and they have only been changed once since the diarchy came to be!

"If both Princesses abscond from Equestria, then there are two options; either the throne is given to an heir of appointment or blood, or the tribes go back to their ancestral leaders! Stonehoof is grandson to Princess Luna, thus—"

"Oh, no one cares about what that abomination to nature shat out of her loins," called another of the Lieutenants across the table, waving his pale-furred leg through the air. "Every true unicorn knows that the line of Platinum should never have been forced off the throne."

A third unicorn, with a teal coat and black mane, snorted loudly. "Why-ever would any intelligent pony go with a line as in-bred as Platinum?"

Iron Helm glanced to his left, at the only other pony not currently yelling at everpony else; a young pegasus, Spear Heart, who was just gazing at the grain of the table with empty eyes. He'd looked like that ever since getting a letter from his home four days ago, three days after this 'abdication' news had arrived.

Iron Helm glanced across the table at the two lieutenants nearly coming to blows over a still yelling third one, and his blood began to boil.

"ENOUGH!" he yelled, slamming a hoof onto the table as he yelled loud enough to almost topple the three ponies across from him. Withdrawing his hoof from the massive crevice now arcing across the tabletop, he snorted at the other ponies.

"Listen here you bucking infants," the old unicorn said, leaning across the table with a nearly auditory creaking to his joints, "I don't give a demon's fart about who's on the bucking throne. We are here, in the furthermost reaches of our country, for one gods-blighted purpose: to protect those living in its border!

"We're here, on the outskirts, to keep out the griffons, the diamond dogs, the bucking dragons! The monsters outside!" He leaned back in his chair, glancing at his copy of the abdication letter.

"Not the monsters inside," he said, before using his hoof to shove the paper into the middle. "Orders as usual, and we work as usual. Adjourned."

Sighing, he nodded to the teal pony. "Next up?"

***** ***** ***** ***** *****

Lily staggered as one of her hooves slipped in the mud, nearly sending her crashing into the ground from the weight of the basket on her back. She caught herself at the last moment, weaving back into the line and hoping nopony noticed through the rain.

"Hey!" a voice rang out among the compound, and she flinched before stepping out the line obediently, her nose to the dirt.

"Good to see at least one of you cloud-brains has enough sense to stay out of the way of work," said a gravelly voice nearing her. She flinched again when she felt something metallic swat against her flank with a meaty thwack, followed by a chuckle.

"Look at that wobble. You know," the voice said, hot breath brushing against her ear. "I saw that fall you nearly had. But I don't have to report it, do I? Not if—"

There was a thudding noise before she heard the pony impact the ground beside her and a spray of warmth splatter against her face.

Glancing to the side, she grinned at the sight of a unicorn with a boulder lodged into his shoulders where a head had been. Shrugging against the loose harness, she raised her head to the sky to see every earth-bound ponies' nightmare.

A swarm of pegasus teams, flying with rocks and saplings that had been sharpened into spears.

"You limp pricks always forget," she muttered to the corpse as a flight of singular pegasi started swooping into the yard of the labor camp she and her brother had been pressed into by a group of overeager unicorns babbling about unlicensed flight in Equestria. She leaned to the side as one of the flight landed by her and used a stone knife to cut the basket and harness from around her wings.

"A Hurricane knows how to use the world around it," she said with a giant flap of her wings, pushing off of the earth and joining the flock above as the sky darkened under the cover of clouds, and a hundred wings.

***** ***** ***** ***** *****

Cherry Heart shivered as she watched the swarming pegasi over the camp where they'd taken Momma and Papa. The last thing he'd seen was a pair of unicorns coming together to levitate Momma between themselves, into the wooden walls surrounding the dirt field.

He jumped when a small blue pegasus, barely bigger than he was, landed beside him in the bushes he was hiding in. He curled up on himself and pushed away from her, but she just blew out between her lips and gave him a smirk.

"Hey, it helps if you hide your back and nah just your face," she said, before nodding her head at the flock and camp. "Ma and Pa are out there, freein' everypony in tha' place. You got kin in there?"

He slowly nodded, and her smirk unfurled into a full grin.

"C'mon then," she said, pushing the leaves and branches to the side. "We gots to work together, before the unicorns jam us all in places like that."

He slowly nodded, before reaching a hoof out to her. "I-I-I'm Ch-Cherry Heart," he said.

Still smiling, the filly knocked her hoof against his. "I'm Rain Shower," she said before she gestured towards the camp. "Let's go kick some dock, eh?"

Cherry flinched back as he heard an absolutely colossal crashing from the camp.

"What—!" he started to ask before a bubbling series of shouts started to sound from the same direction. Lifting his muzzle over the bush, he saw that the massive slab of wood that had been a door was now laying on the ground, and he saw dozens of earth ponies swarming around the hole in the fence.

"Oh, Iron must'a got it down," Shower said with a grin, spreading her wings. "Come on!" she yelled before she threw herself into the air and raised herself over the canopy to join her flock.

Cherry shivered for a moment, playing out a mental tug-of-war with himself until her sentence ran through his head again.

"Iron?" he whispered, almost forcing the hope back down into his torso before giving in and bolting out of the woods and down the plain dirt path. He slid a couple of times in the mud, and by the time he reached the door he was splattered.

"Iron!" he screamed out, standing to the side and trying to stay out of the way of the panicking, running earth ponies just trying to leave the camp. "Iron Heart!"

He pushed further into the door, glancing at the shoddy hinges that had been pulled into pieces.

"Iro—" he tried to shout again, but a mare with flared nostrils knocked into him as she galloped out of the camp, shoving him to the ground. Glancing up, he saw the sharp gleam of metal horseshoes and covered his head as he waited to be stomped by the heavy implements.

Instead, he felt himself scooped up into the air, and peeking through his hooves, he took in the sight of his savior.

The massive stallion was smirking up at him, a stocky earth pony with a long, straight mane and feathering to match, the long strands nearly covering the hooves holding Cherry completely. He also had a braid dangling from his chin, longer than Cherry remembered, though the rest of his facial fur seemed well-trimmed.

"Iron Heart!" Cherry cried, reaching out with his front hooves and hugging the stallion's face as their foreheads touched.

"Hey there little brother," Iron chuckled, before giving him a firm hug and setting him on the ground. "Ma and Da in here, then?" Iron nodded when Cherry did, turning back towards the camp.

"You should join the others grouping up outside," Iron said, rolling his neck with a series of cracks. "I gotta keep on these horn-heads. Flicker and Flynt are gathering up the ponies, and getting them ready to take back to the base."

"Base?" Cherry asked.

Iron looked down at him and grinned widely. "Ya think the earth ponies and pegasi are takin' this lyin' down?" He snorted and spit into the dirt. "The resistance is already off the ground and doing raids like this one on the slave rings. The horns forgot a very important lesson from the years before her Majesty Princess Celestia.

"If not kept in proper balance an' harmony, both the Earth and the Sky will move to swallow you whole."

***** ***** ***** ***** *****

"Luna, just what am I going to do with you," she asked with a quiet giggle, looking lovingly at the mare resting beside her.

"I do not know. Hmm. Let me see," her sister teased, before jumping a bit and giggling. "Place your hoof on mine belly, you can feel the foal kick."

"You don't mind if I do?"

"Not at all, sister. Not at all."

"... You could marry the sire, Luna."

"As much as I wish to do so, sister, I cannot. If I were to wed into the house of Blood, it would destabilize the fractious power balance of the court and the tribes. He has already sworn to declare this child his heir, and to never sire another."

This conversation meandered on until something in Luna's eyes changed, and they became sharper.

"Of all the monsters I've had to slay, sister, the ones that prey on the mind are the most horrific. The night terrors they give our ponies in their slumber... Those, sister, are the easiest to find and slay. The ones most cunning are the ones who have grown to feed on the dreams of our ponies.

"Those monsters can drain the very life of a pony in a single night. The worst of all of it is when I intervene in their feeding, I must take care that the pony they're feeding on does not fight me as I try to save them."

Shaking her head, Celestia frowned as she asked, "That is horrific indeed, Luna, but why tell me?"

"Because if you are seeing this memory, then the spell I've set in your dreams to protect you from such predators has been cast. If I have not intervened, then you must free yourself."

"Wh-what do you mean, sister?" she asked, trying to put her hooves around Luna only to find her sister not quite solid. As she watched the borders of her coat and the air became thinner and thinner before her sister was little more than a whirling storm of dark clouds.

"Ah," Celestia said sadly, watching on as a pair of serpentine teal eyes raised out of the mist. "This is a nightmare I know quite well," she whispered, before her eyes snapped open, blazing gold light onto the crystalline floor.

But even as her eyes blazed, she felt her resources being drained away from her. Chains rattled as she tried to force herself to stand, and she blearily traced them back from her hooves and into the shining walls. She tried to lift herself with a flap of her wings but found the feathers sopping with her sweat and bound to her barrel.

Even as she struggled she saw a pony rush out of the darkness of her blurred sight before she felt a wooden bowl press against her lips.

Twisting her head, she discovered a thick band around her neck as well and found that she couldn't do more than twist her head back and forth, away from the sweet-smelling potion.

Eventually, though, they plugged her nose and forced her muzzle into the bowl, and she was forced to either drink or drown.

Even as she drank she felt herself getting heavier and heavier before her eyelids once again drooped and she found herself smiling at her sister once again.

"Luna, just what am I going to do with you," she asked with a quiet giggle, looking lovingly at the mare resting beside her.

***** ***** ***** ***** *****

The mare sighed, wiping away a thick foam of sweat from her brow.

"She's waking quicker and quicker," she said, dropping the wooden bowl and looking over her shoulder at the mage in the corner, eyebrows-deep in a thick tome.

"She's getting used to the poison," he said lightly, flicking onto a new page. "It's nothing to worry about. The Bridle is doing its work, and soon enough whatever witchery she has to resist will fade, and she'll be stuck in her sister's fields forever."

The mare bit her bottom lip lightly, looking over the chained god before her.

"I am sorry, my lady," she whispered under her breath, before returning to the carafe and pouring more of the tincture into the empty bowl.