Sun & Moon Act II: A Crown Divided

“We were not born into our positions or sent down from heaven to safeguard Equestria. Truly, the road was long, dark, and dangerous.”

• Journals of High Princess Celestia (Vol. 1)

“He said what?” Luna almost choked on her bagel. Beside her, Celestia had the morning paper spread out on the table, a mug of tea held aloft over it. The far wall was decorated now with a new damp spot where the last mug had been sprayed.

“’The ponies of the rural districts need to take their heads out of the sand and realize the situation that is quickly bearing down on us,’ says Senator Pensive Prose of Canterlot’s Fifth District,” Celestia read, her eyes wide in disbelief. “’This is not the time to be playing politics, not while ponies’ very livelihoods, perhaps even the fate of our country, hangs in the balance. Without swift and decisive action from the Senate, this crisis is only going to get worse. Thus, I call on my colleagues to finally get their heads in order and get behind us on this legislation.’” She closed her eyes and settled back into her chair dejectedly as she finished reading.

“Well, clearly that’s going to enamour Ink’s senators to his cause,” Luna said, finishing off the bagel with another bite. “I’m a little surprised that he found the time to talk to the papers with all of the negotiations going on.”

“Never mind his timetable, he’s blown up the whole process! Nopony from across the aisle is going to want to even associate with him after this! We can say goodbye to a vote this week, that’s for sure,” Celestia practically shouted, having a hard time keeping her tea steady as she drank. “Of all the most ridiculous, arrogant unicorns, I’ve met minotaurs less bullheaded than him.”

“He does speak his mind, at least,” Luna put in, half-joking despite the one eyed glare her sister was giving her. “That puts him at least a cut or two above most of the other riffraff in that chamber.”

Celestia finally put her tea back down, the saucer rattling as the mug settled back into its spot. “This is not the time for jokes, Luna. I was counting on this bill getting through in time for the system to be set up for this year’s harvest. If crop is coming in off of the fields and we haven’t settled this yet, it will be even worse than it would have been without. We need to provide assurances, reliability, and strength. Getting there is going to be nearly impossible now.”

“Well, I’ll do whatever I can to help,” Luna answered, doing her best to speak softly. It wasn’t often that Celestia got into an irritable mood, but her younger sister knew well enough to stay out of her way when she did. “If you’d like the pegasi to shut off the breezes to his wing of the palace…”

“No, we need to be tactful, Luna,” Celestia said, quieter, though there was still enough anger in her eyes to light a candle. “Increasing the tension will only lead to more obstructions. What’s most important right now is bringing everypony to the negotiation table again, and crude interference won’t help with that at all. You just focus on the weather. It’s what you’re good at.”

“Understood.” Finished with her breakfast, Luna got up from the table. “Just so you know, if you need somepony put in their proper place, I’m always here for you. But if anypony can get this negotiation wrapped up, it’s surely you.” She waited a moment in the hope that she would see Celestia’s eyes perk up at the compliment, but instead her sister stayed transfixed on the newspaper, no doubt rereading the senator’s words and trying to decipher the motivations behind them. Luna knew well enough that Celestia needed peace and quiet in order to get something like this done. That meant that it was going to be another long day on the mountaintop for her.

Celestia watched her sister go out of the corner of her eye. Luna truly was a gem, unique in all of Equestria without a doubt. But politics really was not her strong suit. If the two of them had been forced to swap roles, the Senate would dissolve into petty squabbles in all of an hour. Even so, Celestia knew that she was going to have a hard time keeping Ink from having Pensive roughed up later today.

She simply couldn’t go back into the office wing and face them down just yet. Negotiations had to be done coolly, with a well-honed instinct and a clear head.

It was ironically during that frame of thought Celestia realized that her hooves were still shaking slightly, barely able to contain her frustration at the whole situation. She was loath to take breaks, particularly when there was such important work to be done, but right now it seemed that one would be necessary.

Celestia rose and turned the opposite direction from where Luna had gone, instead ascending the tower and emerging once again in her office. To the right were three small plinths, each holding a golden circlet with a shard of a colourful jewel at its center.

The Triumvir’s Circlets, symbols of a time long past. To the left was another pedestal, this one holding a golden disk, with six identical gemstones inset within it. The Elements of Harmony, from which the new country had been born.

Her and her sister were the link between the two worlds, of darkness before and light now, of chaos before and order now. So often it seemed as though the nation was determined only to tear itself apart, but Celestia would be damned if she would let that happen.

Her eyes returned to the center of the room, where the map of northern Equestria was still stretched out on her desk. The tribes had pulled themselves apart once before, and it hadn’t ended well for them. The ruins of the old Unicorn Kingdom, buried somewhere up north, bore sharp witness to that fact. The thought was an interesting one.

All of the legendary figures of that time: Star Swirl, Clover, King Solaris and Queen Argent, none of them had been able to hold their country together as it splintered and fragmented into the snows of winter. What hope did she and Luna have of taming a force like that, alone? Perhaps, if she could discover a little bit more of what had happened in that time, it would offer a clue of how to proceed with the current crisis.

If nothing else, a chance to work on something other than policy would calm her down enough to make talking to Pensive again a workable proposition.

Morning, such as it was, came grey and cloudy to Eridian. Breakfast was leftover potatoes from the night before, and then Celestia said good-bye to Luna before venturing out into the streets with Wickerlock and Capstan. Only this time, instead of heading further up the mountain to whatever employer awaited them, they were going down, beyond the old city walls and on into the foothills surrounding the city.

Curiously, they weren’t alone. A sizable crowd of other ponies were making the same commute. Celestia picked out a few of them with the narrow poles and big buckets of water carriers. They would be headed down to the headwaters of the Everfree River, which was far enough out from the city that it was at least drinkable. Most of the other ponies in the group kept to the same worn track that the three of them were traveling. This group looked much the same as the usual ponies that walked the streets of Eridian, dressed in naught but rags, eyes down, and not a smile to be seen in the bunch.

Celestia nudged Wickerlock in the shoulder as they walked. “It seems that we’re not the only ponies to have this idea.”

He nodded. “Word of an opportunity like this would spread fast. But the way that Elderberry told it, this orchard would hire everypony in Eridian if they were all able to lift a bucket.”

“Let’s hope so. I’m not the biggest fan of having to walk out all this way only to discover that the vacancies have all been filled.”

Undeterred by such an idea, Wicker’s eyes were focused on the road ahead. “We have a day to spare, and there are a couple of other opportunities that I can think of as well. Trust me, something like this is rare enough that it deserves to be checked out. It’s no surprise that everypony else reached the same conclusion.”

As close to the city as the orchard supposedly was, the trek out there still wasn’t a short one by any means. There was some traffic along it though, which was strange in and of itself. Once in a blue moon you might see a wagon passing by on the widest thoroughfares of Eridian, but two of them met the crowd of applicants this morning alone. Each one was lacquered a deep red, with the unmistakable outline of a cored apple on the side. The ponies pulling them were a cut above the usual workers, still grim, but with clean and well-mended cloaks, and a haughty air that made everypony else in the crowd shy away. Celestia took it as a good sign. The orchard was at least somewhat successful if even the transporters were living well.

Eventually, a light appeared on the horizon, rather like a large bonfire burning somewhere out there. An hour of progress revealed the light to be a break in the clouds, perhaps four square miles in all, completely localized and with neat, square edges on the surrounding clouds. The incongruity of the seemingly artificial light was striking enough, but of course underneath it was the endpoint of their trek.

Rows and rows of apple trees dotted the hillside underneath the column of light, green and full in the morning air. Specks of red and yellow could be seen hanging from the trees, and as the group grew closer they could see workers amongst the rows, plucking apples from the branches and tossing them into bulging baskets on the ground. The bright colours of the scene shone like torches amongst the dull grey of the rest of the countryside. Strangely enough, the colour almost made the estate seem unnatural and overly shiny.

The whole compound was surrounded by a low wall of chopped lumber, coming about twice Celestia’s height. She could see guard ponies doing their rounds upon the wall, each one in cloaks the same crimson colour as the wagons they’d passed. However, these ponies also carried bright spears, their sharp points glinting in the sunlight. Two more of these ponies were manning the gate.

“Stop!” one called as the crowd approached. He was a barrel-chested earth pony with a particularly elaborate cloak over his shoulders, which Celestia presumed denoted a higher rank than the other guards. As soon as the crowd had halted, he stepped forward. “We’ve got twenty spots to fill today,” he said in a gravelly voice. “So we aren’t taking any of the poor lot. Stand up straight and we’ll see who is worth it.”

Celestia didn’t have to look around again to see that their numbers were well in excess of twenty. She gave Wickerlock another nudge, with a withering glare prepared for when he turned, but he kept looking straight ahead. As the guards came closer, Celestia figured that she had better do the same.

The two gatekeepers slid their way through the group, each one holding a clipboard that he would occasionally consult while sizing up each applicant. A few strong earth ponies were pulled out right away, along with a couple of eager-looking pegasi who were each missing an ear. Up and down the rows of the crowd the two guards walked, and Celestia felt her pulse rising. In terms of physical strength she certainly wasn’t much compared to the other two, and as bad as it would be if they were all passed over, somehow she felt like it would be worse if one of them was picked and she wasn’t. Working an odd job up in Eridian was always bad enough. Doing it alone would probably be torture.

The lead guard stopped by Capstan and nodded his head, making a mark on his clipboard. The old earth pony spared the two of them a hopeful glance before he was ushered inside.

That made seventeen chosen already. She closed her eyes, not willing to see the gates closing in front of them as the last choices were made.

“Hey, you!” Celestia jerked open her eyes again, to find the stocky earth pony guard staring right back into them. He made another mark as he eyed her horn. “Magic is an excellent plus,” he muttered. “You’ll do just fine for a transport team.” He looked over and nodded at Wickerlock too. A quick glance at the crowd revealed that in actuality nearly all of the unicorns had been chosen. Clearly, one could count on them as more reliable carriers than even the strongest earth ponies.

As they walked up toward the gates, the guards stepped in behind them. “That’s it!” the leader called to the crowd. “Come back tomorrow if you want to. Harvest is still going on for a while.” As Celestia and Wickerlock walked through, the gates clicked shut decisively.

Celestia found her hooves crunching on gravel, and she looked down to find a well-maintained little drive, curving lazily off to the left, where a huge manor-house sat prominently atop a low hill. Right in front of its door, in the center of the circular driveway that serviced the entrance, a crimson coach could be seen, its lacquer the same colour as all of the rest. This time, though, a peculiar emblem was also painted on its side, an apple and a diamond together against the background. The ponies hitched up to the coach were dressed even finer than the ones from before, with embroidery on the fronts of their cloaks, and even red-painted helmets, though for the moment those were being carried in front of their chests.

“No standin’ around and gawkin’,” came a voice from behind them, accompanied by a rough shove to the neck. “The Lord doesn’t appreciate workers who spend all of their time admiring his fineries. You’re well aware that there are plenty of ponies out there willing to take your places.”

The two of them turned around to see another guard behind them, and he pointed off toward the rows of trees that began on the right-hand side of the path. “Just walk down to the end of the row, and you should meet one of the foreponies down there. And don’t even think about trying to pocket any produce! We watch the inside of the place just as closely as the outside.”

He kept on standing there with a mean look on his face until Celestia and Wickerlock set off down the row. With the trees growing close to each other on either side of the path, the outside world faded away, especially as the sounds of birds and the light rustle of the leaves replaced the barren silence of the rest of the countryside. It was almost peaceful in a strange way, a separate world from Eridian. Celestia could almost forget that the ruined city wasn’t any more than four or five miles up the hillside.

They passed the occasional tree with a pony up in its branches picking apples. Things appeared to be right in the thick of harvest, explaining why the orchard was so keen to take on new employees. The row of trees in front of them seemed endless, every one of them bowed low with rosy apples, until eventually everything blended into a green and red haze in the distant mist. And of course that was to say nothing of the smell. It was fresh, clean, and clear, somehow awakening a distant, primal memory for Celestia. The whole place just felt right, which was more than she had been able to say about nearly anywhere that she'd ever been. So far, at least, it was looking like a successful morning.

Eventually, they came to a spot where a cross-path cut through the rows, leading to a large rectangular building in the interior of the compound. At this intersection they found three stacks of upside-down baskets, and a lean orange unicorn watching over them. “More?” she said, turning around and noticing them. “Well, soon enough we might be able to finish up the whole harvest before the snows settle in. Each of you take a basket, then head off down that way.” She indicated the row in front of them. “Any tree will do, so long as nopony’s working on it right now. When your basket is full, take it to the press over there. Just be careful and make sure that you don’t bruise any.” She went back to inventorying her baskets, and with a glance Wickerlock took one of his own and set off once more to the row.

For her part, Celestia did the same. It was essentially what she had been expecting, and it didn’t take her long to find a tree in need. As an alicorn, she didn’t need to climb the trees like the earth ponies, which certainly made picking the apples a lot easier. Even so, it wasn’t really what she would call easy work, and this was a big basket as well. It took about ten minutes for her to accumulate her first full load. A glance up the path, though, revealed that Wickerlock’s basket was still only about half full. Neither of them had seen any sign of Capstan in that time. Presumably, he was working in some other section of the orchard.

In any event, with her full basket, Celestia trotted back out onto the path. The forepony out there watched her go by, the look she gave not really an impressed one, but she’d take that over disappointment anyday.

When she got to the big red building, Celestia found a line of other ponies waiting by the door, each with their own full baskets either clutched in their hooves or else held off of the ground with their magic. The line didn’t look like it was moving particularly quickly, so Celestia settled into her own spot at the end.

She could see that most of the other ponies in this line were more seasoned workers, or at least she didn’t recognize any of them from the group of twenty that had been picked out today. The experienced group all stood in drab silence, their eyes downcast and faces grim. But she could see that a few of them had nicely-tailored patches on their caps and shirts. A couple of them even had functional shoes on their hooves.

Minutes ticked by, and still the line didn’t move. A dozen more ponies had arrived in behind Celestia, meaning that the end of the line was nearly to the edge of the clearing that the building was placed in. Building up her nerve, Celestia lightly tapped the shoulder of the pony standing in front of her. “Excuse me, but I was wondering, is it normal for the wait to be so long here?”

The pony in front turned around to reveal herself as a thin, white, earth pony mare with a mended grey scarf tied around her neck. Notwithstanding her lengthy eyelashes, which spoke of a well-to-do upbringing, the look in her eyes was all business.

“Depends on what you mean by normal, I guess.” Her accent had a bit more of a blunt sound to it than that of most citizens of Eridian. Celestia had heard that sort of tone from the ponies that visited Raspberry’s tavern from out of town on occasion. “It means that something’s gone wrong on one of the presses. So not something that’s supposed to happen technically, but you get used to it around here.”

“Will they get it fixed soon?”

The mare grunted. “As soon as somepony up at the manor gets alerted to it, and sends a mechanic down with the necessary spare parts. But that can sometimes take an hour or more. Longer, if they’re busy dealing with something else. Until then, there’s nothing to do but wait.”

Looking ahead showed that the clearing in which the press building was situated was on top of a small hill in the complex, and Celestia could spy the manor out in the distance. “Wouldn’t it make more sense to have the spare parts stockpiled here at the presses, where they’re needed?”

The other mare gave her a half-grin, the first levity that she had seen in the whole morning. “You’d think so, wouldn’t you? Tell that to Fastidious though, not me. They’re his tricoins, after all.”

“Who?”

The earth pony drew her head up into a haughty posture, pulling it off remarkably well with her eyelashes extended. “The Honourable Lord Fastidious, High Seat of House Appleton. If you’re lucky, you might get a chance to see him one of these days. He likes to walk in the orchard from time to time. Be nice and he might tip you a sampler of his product.”

Celestia cocked an eyebrow at the idea. “Cider doesn’t exactly fill the stomach. I’m not sure how much I would want that.”

The earth pony’s half-grin broke out into a smile, with a little chuckle too. “Shows where his priorities are, I guess. In his world, cider buys all of the essentials, including ponies like you and I. Don’t worry, though,” she added, seeing Celestia considering the implications of that statement. “At the end of the day, your pay will be good, solid apples, perfect for trading in whatever citizen’s market you frequent.”

Celestia breathed a sigh of relief. Apples were a much nicer proposition, useful as food in their own right, and very serviceable as trading goods. In fact, if she remembered properly you could get a reasonably-sized sack of potatoes for a much more favourable exchange on the amount of apples given. Wickerlock was more of the trader in their group; she would have to find out from him later whether it would make more sense to hang onto their wages or trade them for even more.

“Thanks,” she said, offering the earth pony a smile of her own. The two of them held each other’s gaze for a moment, then Celestia couldn’t help but laugh herself. “Sorry, it feels like it’s been forever since I’ve had another pony smile at me like that.”

“No problem,” the mare answered, giving her a reassuring pat on the shoulder. “The name’s Trinity, by the way.”

“Celestia,” she returned, offering Trinity a hoof for an introductory shake. “How long have you been working here?”

“Just started this season,” Trinity answered. “About a month or so now. Long enough to get acquainted with how things tend to run around here. Ah!” she exclaimed, motioning off into the distance behind Celestia. “The support is finally here.”

Celestia turned around to see a light blue pegasus stallion fluttering toward them through the nearest row of trees. Two more pegasi followed along behind him, straining to hold up the weight of a long timber that looked to be about a foot thick between them. When the leader got within sight of the clearing, he pulled up short, causing his two assistants to nearly crash into him from behind.

“Broken for nearly an hour,” he muttered under his breath, though Celestia was close enough to hear. “Fastidious will have my head this time, for sure.” He darted into the open doorway, roughly pushing aside the workers standing there, then emerged a second later to wave frantically at his two helpers, who followed more slowly, everypony in the line giving them space to manoeuvre.

Shortly after the group had entered the mill, Celestia spied Capstan coming out, his mane dripping with sweat, and accompanied by a few other earth ponies, each one similarly exhausted. She gave Capstan a wave, and with a look of recognition he trotted over.

“Yeah, they put me to working the press,” he explained once Celestia had finished introducing Trinity. “Something jammed though, not long after I got on, and the main shaft splintered right in two. We were looking at it afterward, and it looked like one of the shoddiest repair jobs I’ve ever seen.”

Trinity nodded along as she heard it. “You might want to get used to that, friend. Even those three that went in there will get it done quickly for sure, but it’ll only be a couple of days before something else goes wrong.”

“You wonder how anything gets done around here if everything is always breaking down,” Capstan said, shaking his head toward the direction of the mill building.

“Fastidious has a lot of workers,” Trinity answered matter of factly, “and this isn’t the only press building. I’d say that there’s always at least one of them broken, but the others get worked pretty hard in the meantime. Enough product gets out to meet the quotas, and keep on paying everypony’s salary, so no one gets mad, at least not yet they haven’t.”

Celestia frowned. That had an ominous sound to it. “Not yet?”

Trinity nodded grimly. “Oh, Fastidious is always furious whenever he gets a chance to see it for himself, but nopony has been sacked just yet. He’s always pushing for more productivity though, so I wouldn’t be surprised if somepony got the boot eventually. Just keep your head down and do your job, and if you’re very lucky a position might open up somewhere above you.”

The blue pegasus emerged from the doorway again as she finished speaking. “Right!” he called out to the crowd of workers. “We’ve got it going again, so your break time is finally over! Pressers, I’ll be needing you first. And would you watch what you’re doing for once? I’m sick and tired of having to clean up after you seasonals and your mistakes!”

Capstan offered both of them a shrug before trotting along with the other workers into the door, and soon enough a light groan could be heard from inside the mill. The line moved one place forward, and all of the other workers got back into an orderly queue, their baskets again clutched close. The light overhead had grown brighter, the Sun clearly having risen a bit higher over the sky, though Celestia couldn’t see it as she looked up. Nearly an hour had been wasted out of the workday standing in the line. Even so, Celestia couldn’t argue that it hadn’t been a very successful morning indeed.