Soarin looked around warily as the servant led him deeper into the house. The whole place felt on edge, like a pile of tinder right next to a fire; one spark, and the whole thing would explode. The servants worked with cold, silent, mechanical efficiency, as if they were afraid of causing that spark, and even the message summoning him had been uncharacteristically curt, as if the writer dared not risk their quill striking a flame.
And he could think of no reason why; aside from a meeting with Princess Celestia about Princess Twilight's new student a few days ago, Equestria had been almost completely peaceful recently. The hunt for Starlight Glimmer had quickly devolved into a series of fruitless scouting missions in the north before being called off at the meeting with the Princess, the bugbear had been apprehended, the Wind Rider debacle had been resolved, nothing new had been heard about the Changelings, the only potential problem he could see was boredom.
"Announcing Soarin Skies," the servant called out as they arrived in the drawing room.
"Thank you, Show For," came the prince's weary reply. "That will be all."
The servant bowed, dipped their head to Soarin, then left, closing the doors behind them.
The atmosphere instantly became tense, tense enough to send Soarin's hoof reaching for the blade he'd brought with him. "Your majesty," he asked. "may I ask why you sent for me? Your letter was...rather uninformative. And rather concerning; ponies say they haven't seen you that much since we met with Celestia for tea," (Their code for the meeting.) "Even the servants say you barely come out of your room now. Is everything okay, sir?"
"Sir," Blueblood's flat voice repeated. "I am no sir, Soarin Skies; 'your majesty' and 'your lordship' yes, but not 'sir.' I am not a knight, to my shame. I always wanted to be one, you know, wanted to make it onto the Scroll of Heroes. I wanted to be a hero, protect the weak and innocent, defend and spread Harmony. Instead," he scowled. "I became a politician, a-a bureaucrat, the one who oppresses those a knight is supposed to protect. I became the kind of thing I once dreamt of fighting. The-the only way I could see for my name to grace the Scroll of Heroes," he feebly stomped a hoof. "was for it to be the name of the foe of one of the heroes."
"Blue," Soarin sighed, abandoning formality; his friend needed him now. "I know ponies have given you grief, and they were right to do it sometimes, but you aren't a bad pony. You-"
"But now I see a way out," Blueblood interrupted, a crazed grin on his face. "I see a way for me to be the hero, a way for me to be the kind of pony I want myself to be. Do you remember the story of Miss Crystal Snow? She earned her knighthood by freezing a dragon, giving it painted rocks instead of coal to eat and then leading it into a blizzard. Or Miss Groundgrain, bane of the Diamond Dogs of the Unicorn Range? Or," he grimaced. "Sir Gradate Gold?"
"The griffon?" Soarin frowned. "Didn't he end up poisoning a rebel in Griffonstone?"
"Sir Gradate and a party of claw-picked companions," Blueblood sighed. "joined the camp of the usurper Gale III, saying that they'd turned their cloaks. Gale III needed every soldier she could get, so she accepted, and ordered that a celebratory feast be held that night. But Sir Gradate was only feigning desertion in order to gain access to the enemy camp, and, yes, their food storage. A clawful of deadlily in the usurper's wine cup and some nightshade in the evening's stew cut off the head and much of the shoulders of the rebels, and Sir Gradate and his companions' steel managed to do similar to some of their arms and hands. They were outnumbered, though, and quickly overwhelmed and killed. But the damage was done; the rebels were leaderless, and soon followerless, too." Blueblood rested his head in a hoof. "Opinion is divided on Sir Gradate; should he be stricken from the role for his later actions, or remembered for the valor which earned him his knighthood in the first place? Was he a coward to act as he did, or too zealous to restrain himself from doing so? But recently I have found myself thinking about him differently, namely asking myself a simple question; were his final actions wrong? He killed Gale III and the others when they expected safety, yes, but if he hadn't they might have killed civilians that expected the same. And-and if he'd done nothing, they would've died anyway; Griffonstone had the support of Equestria, any serious threat to the capitol would have been met with overwhelming force. One-one could even argue that Sir Gradate managed to save lives by acting as he did, preempting the battle that would have killed far more griffons, on both sides, than his narrow raid did."
"He broke the laws which allow peace to exist at all in order to do so," Soarin protested. "He was a criminal, your majesty, not a hero."
"Did he?" Blueblood shot back. "Yes, he poisoned his hosts, hosts who knew him for a turncloak and a traitor. Expecting a traitor to follow the rules is like-like expecting Spitfire to act nice to the recruits. Gale...Gale knew what she was dealing with when she took him in. Sir Gradate dug the pit, yes, but she was the one who jumped into it."
"This isn't you, Blue," Soarin frowned. "What put these thoughts in your head?"
"Starlight Glimmer," Blueblood spat.
"Seriously?" Soarin snorted. "You heard the Princess, she wants to reform, Twilight heard her say so. Luna even did a deep dive into her dreams and saw that she's telling the truth. She wants to be reformed, Blue; why don't you want her to be?'
"I do," he replied, his voice agitated. "And I do believe that she does, too. But think about it; the mare has a friend leave her when she's younger, and so she decides that cutie marks are evil and devises a spell to remove them. Princess Twilight finds her and defeats her, shows her that her philosophy is wrong, and her response? Travel back in time to alter history. The mare has no sense of proportionality and has demonstrated great emotional vulnerability; if somepony scares her, it wouldn't surprise me if she tore the Moon down from the sky to crush them with. She is dangerously unstable; she might genuinely wish to reform, and perhaps do so for a while, but all it will take is one small disruption to send her back over the edge. I trust Princess Twilight, and I trust the truth of Starlight Glimmer's words, but I sincerely doubt her ability to follow through on them."
"So, what?" Soarin snorted. "You want to send her to prison? Exile her? I hate to tell you this, your majesty, but both of those things would certainly count as-"
His blood ran cold.
Blueblood avoided his gaze as he gently levitated a small bottle onto the table. Inside, a thin, caramel-colored liquid sloshed, mirroring the sloshing inside Soarin's stomach.
"Manticore venom," Blueblood emotionlessly explained. "One of the deadliest poisons we know of. Acts as a solvent, one that can eat its way through almost anything."
"You can't be serious, Blue," Soarin coughed. "This-you're talking about murdering a ward of the state."
"A ward who may end up destroying that state," Blueblood retorted. "We know it to be in her power, and we can't safely conclude that it is not within her character to do so. The mare is a walking time-bomb, Soarin, and all it will take is one jostle to set her off. And when she does, a lot of ponies are going to get hurt. A lot of ponies may very well die. This," he gently tapped the bottle. "would prevent that."
"You would prevent possible deaths," Soarin pointed out. "by definitely killing a pony now. And it wouldn't be a peaceful one, either; you would force a mare, innocent of the crime in question, to sit and watch as her body turned into a puddle, all out of fear."
Blueblood flinched. "I," he hesitated. "I am not an...unjust stallion, Soarin Skies. I try to give every pony their due, however much or little that might be. Occasionally I make mistakes, but I try to do so, or to make good my failures when they occur. Starlight Glimmer...you know what she did, what crimes she committed."
"I also know that Twilight's the one punishing her for them," he crossed his legs.
"Princess Twilight," Blueblood's voice faltered. "is...idealistic. She would be merciful to all and sundry, not realizing that sometimes mercy...must be withheld. If-If Princess Celestia had granted Nightmare Moon mercy, who knows how many revolts we would have had to endure? No, if the criminal behavior continues, as I fear it may with Starlight Glimmer, granting the accused mercy would be...unwise."
"Then you withhold mercy when she actually continues the criminal behavior," Soarin shrugged. "not beforehoof because you're afraid she might do so in future."
"If we allow her to do so, we might not be around to withhold it," Blueblood snapped, hackles raising. "The mare is on a similar power level to Princess Twilight, if she does return to her former ways she might very well blow Canterlot off the mountain. If we don't stop her now, who knows how many will pay the price?"
"If we stop her now," Soarin asked. "how many will pay the price of not meeting her?"
"We don't know, Soarin Skies," Blueblood replied. "We don't know the answer to either question, and we can't find the answer. It's not within our power, not even with the help of the College of Scryers. But ask yourself this; who affected more ponies, your foalhood best friend or King Sombra?"
"What do you want from me, Blue?" Soarin frowned. "We can keep arguing in circles forever, or you can just tell me why you called me here."
"I've spoken with some of the others about this," Blueblood replied. "Fanciful, Filthy, Fleur, Spitfire. All of them had good points, but none of them gave me what I was looking for. Soarin Skies, in the name of our foalhood, I ask you," Blueblood looked at him with a shaky gaze. "Does this make me a monster?"
Soarin hesitated; almost all of him screamed at his mouth to say 'Yes' as loud as it could, but his mouth refused, wanting to deliberate.
"I know it seems like it," Blueblood continued, his question seemingly uncorking the emotions he usually kept hidden. "but think about it; Starlight Glimmer is one unicorn, one pony out of many. Equestria will not miss her unduly if she...disappears, but it will feel her presence keenly if she breaks again. Go back to the Wonderbolts and tell me how many of the ponies you see there you'd be willing to sacrifice for Starlight Glimmer, how many lives you'd be willing to let burn so that she can muddle through her sorry life until she sends it all up in flames. Is it worth it to let ponies die just so that a criminal can be given time to commit their crime?"
"Yes," Soarin whispered. Shaking his head to clear it, he continued, "You punish ponies for what they do, Blue, not what they might do. Otherwise, we'd all be locked up, guilty of a thousand temptations we didn't get the chance to turn into crimes. If I'm tempted to snatch an unattended pie from a windowsill, does that make me a thief? Does dreaming about cheating at cards make me a cheater?" He pointed at the bottle. "Does thinking about poisoning Starlight make you a murderer? No, just like Starlight isn't a criminal because of the things she hasn't done yet."
"But she will," Blueblood protested. "You know what she's like, psychologically it's a matter of time until she breaks again."
"Then help her keep that time from coming," Soarin replied. "Help Twilight reform her, help her make friends, help her find ponies who can shore up her mental state. She needs help, Blue, not poison."
"It won't be enough," Blueblood shook his head. "The only way we can make sure that she doesn't destroy us all is-"
"By acting in such a way that I wouldn't be sad to see us go," Soarin cut him off. "Blue, I understand; you're scared, justifiably so, and you want to stop being scared. But this isn't the way to solve this; you're missing the big picture, for once. The reason we don't want Starlight to destroy Equestria is because we value it, because it is valuable, and because the ponies in it are valuable. And one of the reasons Equestria's valuable is because of its values, loyalty, honesty, generosity, and the like. If you toss aside those values to kill Starlight, you'll be doing her work for her; you'll be tearing Equestria's values, its foundation, out from under it."
"I would do no such thing," Blueblood bristled. "I would be acting alone, without sanction from Equestria. Any fault would be mine-"
"And evidence of fault in Equestria," Soarin interrupted him again. "If somepony as high up as you is able to simply ignore the foundation of Equestria because it's convenient to, what does that imply for those lower in position than you? If someone near the judge can break the rules," he asked, quoting his friend. "are there actually rules at all? You told me that, when we were younger, as well as this; 'The rules aren't rules simply because of their consequences but because of their nature; a rule without punishments-'"
"-'is no less a rule,'" Blueblood murmured. "I was seven when I told you that, wasn't I? We were playing cards, and you were wondering why I wasn't allowing you to cheat."
"I thought it didn't matter if I cheated because we were just playing for fun," Soarin warmly smiled. "You sure showed me."
"And, it seems, myself," Blueblood began to mirror it. Sighing, he dipped his head, and said, "Thank you, Soarin Skies. You've saved me from making a horrible mistake. You...you saved a pony's life, today. Two ponies, actually, including me. Thank you."
"Your welcome," Soarin smiled. Pointing a hoof at the bottle, he asked, "What are you going to do with that?"
"Give it back to the ponies I managed to get it from."
Soarin blinked. "And who would that be?" he asked cautiously.
"Oh, just the servants," Blueblood replied. "You know, it's kind of funny; I was able to make one of the deadliest poisons I know of out of cleaning supplies. They put it in some of them, you know, though they dilute it. Even then, it's still quite effective at removing stains."
"Hey," Soarin said, getting Blueblood to look at him curiously. Soarin gently put his hoof over Blueblood's, smiled, and continued, "There's no stain for it to remove from you. You didn't do anything, Blue; you managed to stop yourself before crossing the line."
"Only thanks to you," he protested. "Without you, I'd-"
"Well, you weren't without me, were you?" Soarin interrupted. "And since you didn't do it, the point's mute anyway."
"Moot," Blueblood sighed. "I've told you a thousand times, it's moot."
"Just like what almost happened here," Soarin replied. "If you're not gonna punish Starlight for what she hasn't done, Blue, don't punish yourself for what you didn't do."
After a few moments, Blueblood nodded, then turned back to the bottle. "Do you know what Sir Gradate's last words were supposed to be?" he asked.
Soarin frowned. "No. Why?"
"One of the griffons asked him why he'd dared to break the laws of hospitality and kill his hosts," he replied. "Sir Gradate replied, 'I came not to kill Gale but to save the lives of those in Griffonstone.' He wasn't a criminal or a monster, he was simply making what he thought the best decision. I was the same; I thought that killing Starlight was the only way we could prevent her from unhinging again. The only difference between me and him," he dipped his head to Soarin. "was that I had a friend to show me a better way."
Soarin lowered a raised hoof, then smiled back at him. "My pleasure."
Blueblood smiled back, then fell silent. Taking his cue, Soarin prepared to leave, but stopped at the threshold. "Blue?" he called over his withers.
"Yes, Soarin?"
"This wasn't your only chance to earn a spot on the Scroll. You can still make it."
Blueblood snorted. "The sentiment is appreciated, if misguided. My day is done, Soarin; the hero in me is dead."
"Then who told you to ask me about your plan? You could've gone without my input, you did it all the time when we were younger. Some part of you didn't want to be a murderer, didn't want to let Starlight be murdered. What do ponies call ponies who stop murderers again?"
No reply came.
"Good-bye," Soarin said as he left. "sir."
