The Tome of Exalted Ponies

The crimson pentacle stylist keeps his foes at a distance and gathers up soup with long swipes.

…

At the next major tengese city on their list, Salt-Founded Glory, the circle had more planned than just looking around: The royal house of the lowland princedom was seated there, so Sullen Hoof instantly left to seek out and identify the house elders.

Cash equally sought out the tengese merchants headquartered in the city, leaving Speaker and Sunrise somewhat high and dry – bereft of purpose.

“I say we verify some of the things the coven told us. Our entire plan is based on what they said, but I would like to hear it from the locals” Sunrise mused, looking around at the bustling city that appeared to have more canals than streets.

With a slight grimace, for the city reminded him an awful lot of Nexus in how it was laid out with its canals, Speaker shrugged: “Sure – how is your seatongue?”

“It’s not – you’ll have to be the interpreter” Sunrise noted cheerfully.

Speaker paused for a moment: “Ah…. That’s why you talked to the immaculate monks back at Dragon’s Jaw – you found someone you could actually talk to”

“Exactly” Sunrise said unrepentantly, heading down the pier from the ship they had arrived in.

Across many a canal bridges, through the various wards of the city, the two solars didn’t have to look long before Speaker identified a building that looked very similar to something he had seen in the City of the Steel Lotus: “That… looks like a tourist information service, let’s go”

Without really lying, the two presented themselves as part of a foreign merchant’s retinue to the tourist information agent: “My god friend Sunrise here is curious about the ways of the Tengese, for we come from the far east, so I was hoping you could explain a few things for us”

The young mare at the particular booth that Speaker and Sunrise had walked up to, looked very much like a local tengese pony, while also appearing quite bored. She gave the two a quick look-over, with glances at their foreheads – seeing no horns – to which end she just barely bothered to sit upright and point to a sign. The sign read “Fifteen cowrie fee for information”

Quickly checking their belongings, both Sunrise and Speaker quickly realized that they only had eastern silver coinage on them – Cash probably had some, but he hadn’t given them any spending money. A quick visit to a nearby money lender saw currency exchanged – likely at a rate that would have made Cash froth at his mouth – after which the tourist information agent was finally paid, to which she simply said in seatongue: “Alright, what do you want to know?”

Sunrise fumed – finding the young mare’s attitude quite disrespectful. Speaker wasn’t exactly impressed either, but he didn’t have charms to force the mare to behave – and with the language barrier Sunrise couldn’t really use her charms very effectively.

“We’re curious about the ways of the tengese. We’ve been told that the elder mares of families are the ones who wield all the power. Is that true?” Speaker asked earnestly.

The mare rolled her eyes – as if to say ‘such silly foreigners and their stupid questions’: “No. But the man of a house or a farm only rules it with the permission of his wife, or more likely his wife’s grandmother. Families here are matrilinear, and that’s actually our definition of a tengese pony: Someone who can trace their family back to ponies who have lived here for many generations and done great things – if you have no family, you’re by definition not a true tengese pony. Anything else?”

Sunrise didn’t have any follow-up questions, while Speaker inquired into the prince of the shorelands, wanting to know more about him.

“That would be his royal highness Prince Laxhander of the glorious reign. As per instructions from his court, prince Laxhander of the glorious reign has a standing invitation to all visiting realm unicorns, with an offer to entertain them at his court” the young mare said in a notably deadpan tone, sounding not terribly keen on having to recite all that, as she rattled off the clearly well-rehearsed monologue.

The two solars left the bored information agent, contemplating the information they had gained. The next day at the house Cash had rented them, Cash finally showed up, reeking of fancy perfumes, sex and fine drink – his saddlebags laden with coin, gem and far more valuables than what he had arrived with in An Teng.

“I’m just going to assume that you had fun – did you learn anything useful?” Sunrise said, looking not at all surprised.

With a chuckle, Cash fiddled around with his saddlebags, retrieving his collar of dawn’s cleansing. It snapped on instantly as he put it to his throat, resizing itself properly and with a stroke of its magic Cash’s funk was all gone: “There we go… oh I learned plenty – but you first, I need to unload”

“Sure. We didn’t learn much, but found a tourist information service that told us that the local prince has a standing offer to entertain visiting realm unicorns” Speaker said, raising an eyebrow as Cash just kept pouring money and gems out of his saddlebags onto the table next to him as if there was more space inside the bags than what their outwards appearance would indicate.

Cash finally managed to shake the last of the cowries, silver and gems out of his saddlebag, giving the pile a quite appraising look – his caste mark flaring for an instant: “There we go, all there… and that fits with what I learned. Prince Laxhander with the silly self-chosen epithet is trying to have his family birth a dragonblooded pony who’ll exalt and link his family to a realm great house by blood. His mother doesn’t like what he’s trying to do though, so I think she’ll make a good candidate for our dream heist”

“So, it’s in an attempt to shore up the power of his house – trying to force an alliance with a realm house? I can see how that might upset the nationalists… and if his mother is already against it, then we might not have to influence her much” Sunrise commented, as she tried to push Cash’s money pile together a bit, so nothing would roll off the table.

Quickly starting to float coins of various sizes around, sorting the money pile with charm-enhanced speed, Cash agreed – to a certain extent: “Could also be that the prince himself should be the target. A good nightmare to show him the error of his ways, maybe framed as an omen of the gods warning him not to lead his house astray?”

“I can rework a dream to look like that – the dreamweaver left most of the dreams we got quite open-ended, expecting us to customize them for their targets” Speaker said, seeing the logic of Cash’s alteration to the plan.

Sullen Hoof showed up later in the afternoon, Cash having entertained Speaker and Sunrise with the stories he had learned from the tengese merchants he had partied with: “Hey there you are – I was just talking about how the merchants I stayed with, are not shy of bragging of how they dodge realm tax collectors, or how they fence pirate booty from the lintha”

“I’m sorry… you mean the demon-worshiping cannibal pirates, working together with tengese merchants?” Speaker wondered, having to do a double take.

Sullen Hoof didn’t look terribly surprised: “I spotted several lintha ships at Dragon’s Jaw, unloading goods – but they were flying under merchant flags. I checked a few of the ships, their ledgers were very good forgeries. They seem subtle enough about it to not attract undue attention”

“Well, they have to fence their stolen goods somewhere – it’s too far to Coral from here – the merchants I talked to say that doing so also means they do not attack tengese shipping” Cash noted, sounding quite amused.

Speaker wasn’t entirely sure what to think: “So…. they don’t prey on tengese shipping? What about the realm merchant ships going around the rivers here?”

“The realm patrols the rivers of An Teng – they’re safe enough, but once out at sea its anyone’s game” Sullen Hoof pointed out, having seen the realm patrol vessels docking at Salt-Founded Glory or passing it by.

With that somewhat out of the way, Sullen Hoof confirmed Cash’s information, and supported the idea of inserting a dream into the local prince – not any elder – for the prince’s mother already seemed to on board with working towards independence.

To this end the circle began planning how they were going to track down the prince – which according to Sully would require traveling to the City of the Steel Lotus, because prince Laxhander apparently spent a lot of time there, in and around the satrap’s court.

Journeying to the City of the Steel Lotus didn’t take long, being located less than a hundred miles up the river of queens from Salt-Founded Glory. Arriving there, the circle at first discussed where to find lodgings.

Cash insisted on Speaker trying to contact his one-night stand Ledaal Asina, but Speaker wasn’t sure how she would react.

“Come on Speaker – we know that the commander of the legion garrison in An Teng is a Ledaal, and you said that she was easily well over two hundred years old. She will know a lot of useful information, I guarantee it” Cash insisted, find Speaker’s hesitance rather annoying.

Sunrise at least seemed to understand Speaker’s reluctance: “Cash, what if she uses that connection to the garrison commander to sick the local realm forces on us? We should at least let Sully scout her out first, to see if she’ll be friendly or not”

Sullen Hoof quickly sought out the Ledaal estate, while the rest of the circle camped at a café so they could pony-watch. Cash appeared to greatly enjoy seeing the various realm unicorns and their entourages going about the city. The three spires of the central government palace, the house of the satrap’s government, could be seen above the many low rooftops. Charming their waiter, Cash was able to get the waiter to explain to them that what they were seeing the spires of the Palace of Threefold Magnificence.

As they still waited for Sully, the three solars walked the tourist circuit. This brought them to the aforementioned palace. It was replete in gilded teak, lapis and mother-of-pearl. It looks quite beautiful – but around the royal district, where the palace was at the centre, were all the noble estates, palaces and villas. It was among them that the Ledaal estate stood resplendent, appearing much grander than most of its neighbours – it was apparently quite profitable to be the family controlling the local realm military garrison.

Around this ring of estates, was a second ring of neighbourhoods made up of middle-class residences and shops that catered to the wealthy tourists, which appeared to make up the market district. Outside of this ring was the final ring of the city: A halo of swampy slums, where all the poor local workers lived in mud up to their hooves.

“This place will be a vital target to seize when the fighting starts – where do you think the city’s realm garrison is based?” Sunrise said, looking across the canal from the Market District, towards the outer slum wards of the city.

Cash shrugged, noting that they hadn’t really seen much of a military presence throughout the city: “…but all the realm estates around the royal district were walled compounds – each their own little fortress, but their defences seemed to mainly be good against riots”

“True – there’s no real city wall, and not that many canals inside here either, so they can’t block enemy troops at canal bridges either” Speaker pointed out, wondering if there were troops hidden somewhere.

“Each realm estate has at least fifty or sixty ponies at arms – assuming that they can be combined into a single force, then they can field a small army pretty quickly” Sullen Hoof said, having appeared next to the circle, sounding ever so slightly out of breath.

Cash laughed: “Fat chance – they would never be able to agree on who should be in charge, unless that Ledaal Shuri comes to take charge – but that’s probably the idea”

“All the more reason to get to Shuri through Asina – and I think we can talk to her. I found her private journal. She’s been making discreet inquiries into eastern events, angling for news about Sunhill, but they don’t even seem to have heard of Thorns having been liberated yet” Sullen Hoof explained.

“That’s great – but while we visit Asina, could you go scout out the prince and look into how Speaker can get in for a dream implant?” Sunrise said, Sully quickly nodding and leaving for the royal palace.

The three remaining solars made their way to the Ledaal compound, the carved stone and wrought-iron railings surrounding the compound making it easy enough to see the wealth on display inside, but the curly and pointy iron bars made it very difficult and painful to climb over for any intruders. At the gate, Cash strolled ahead of the circle and informed the guards that Lady Asina’s eastern storyteller and his friends were hoping for an audience.

A small tengese foal was sent off as a messenger, and not that long after did a well-dressed older stallion – his mannerisms, mane style and fashion marking him as being from the blessed isle – come to inspect the would-be visitors.

Speaker recognized the stallion as one of the house servants of the estate, and the stallion seemed to recognize Speaker just the same. He simply nodded at Speaker and turned around, walking off.

“I think he recognized me – let’s see if we get attacked by a wyld hunt, or greeted with open arms” Speaker said tentatively, not sounding quite sure what they were about to get.

It took a bit longer, but another well-dressed servant arrived at the gate, asking for the circle to come to the tea bungalow. Cash shot Speaker a very pleased look: “So… you think you’ll have to shag her before she’ll cooperate with us?”

“I’m still worried whether she’s gathered a bunch of immaculate monks for an ambush – there’s no telling how she’s rationalized our encounter after Shimmer and I left” Speaker worried, following along as the circle ventured into the Ledaal compound.

It was all still beautifully carved and decorated teak buildings, replete with lapis and mother of pearl – very similar to the royal palace, perhaps the same architects now Speaker had something to compare it to. Cash greatly enjoyed the south-western architectural aesthetic and the many trophies taken from sea monsters on display had Sunrise comment: “I’m not seeing many land animal trophies here – they must prefer their big game hunting at sea around here”

“I hadn’t thought about that… but it makes sense – if An Teng has been a realm satrapi for centuries, then the forests have probably been picked clean of any big game predators worth hunting” Cash figured, eliciting nods of agreement from the rest of the circle.

In a stately building one was meant to call a tea salon – for the Ledaal estate was comprised of multiple single-story bungalows, the circle was ushered inside. Cash quietly remarked that the tea and cake table on display would probably have told Sully something interesting: “…but honestly, all I’m getting is that servants lining the walls are on edge. I guess Asina had them set this up pretty damn fast”

“That explains why we were led the long way through the trophy gallery part of the garden” Sunrise commented.

Ledaal Asina entered, her beautiful embroidered silken robes of the finest and latest blessed Isle Canterlotian fashion, her mane braided and done up expertly, her jewellery resplendent… and yet when she saw Speaker, her carefully maintained facade of noble superiority faltered for but a split second. She quickly composed herself and continued to the table, but Cash managed to learn all kinds of fun thing from that little gaff.

“Well, if it isn’t Bright Machine Speaker – and you brought friends – to what do I have the honor of hosting you here? And please, have a seat” Ledaal Asina stated in high realm, her eyes going back and forth from Speaker to Cash and Sunrise, but always back to Speaker.

Speaker nodded to Cash, who made the introductions while Sunrise and Speaker sat down: “Greetings Lady Asina. I am Cash Charmer, master of coin and lord of Sunhill. My two peers here, you know Speaker, are also lords of Sunhill, with Sunrise on my left being our high priestess. We were summoned here via an acquaintance in need of aid – so right now we’re touring An Teng to get a lay of the land”

“That is quite impressive…” Lady Asina said as Cash sat down, the elderly unicorn mare sitting down and pouring herself some tea. It was clear that she was taken a bit aback by Cash’s bravado and bold introduction, but to Cash it was all just because she hadn’t been able to read him – she had no clue what the trio wanted from her.

Sunrise cleared her throat: “Indeed, but so are our goals here. Last Speaker was here, before leaving, he and our fellow lord Last Shimmer managed to talk a rebel organization out of using summoned demons to swarm and liberate An Teng – we are now here to aid them, to ensure no other missteps in the transition of power”

“Transition of power? You make it sound as if the uprising already happened” Asina replied, sounding a bit surprised, but also smirking for such a statement clearly amused her.

Cash shrugged and smirked in kind: “With us here it might as well be – when the lords of Sunhill have a goal in mind, things tend to happen, fast”

As Asina once again appeared to ponder whether she should feel intimidated or not, Speaker felt thankful that he had learned high realm from Cash back before first traveling west, to better aid his old cover story of being the scion of an exiled realm noble – if nothing else it let him follow along in the conversation, but now he felt the need to join in: “Some salient examples could be how over the last four months we’ve done away with two more deathlords since last we met, so please don’t underestimate the power we can bring to bear – we came to you seeking cooperation for a peaceful transition of power, ideally to avoid bloodshed, for these rebels mean business”

With what was being asked of her somewhat clear now – though the specifics had yet to be stated – Ledaal Asina found herself in a very strange predicament: “Is that so? That certainly explains some of the latest news I’ve heard come out of Thorns – I couldn’t quite believe that a circle of Tepet unicorns could defeat a deathlord on their own, but now you’re asking me to… what exactly? Have my niece order her troops to stand down?”

“That’s one possibility – you simply summoning General Shuri so we can have a chat with her could also be of great help. Either way this rebellion is going to happen, the real question is just how many ponies have to die before it’s over. We have done battle with undead hordes, changelings, multiple realm legions – so a single half-strength legion spread out over An Teng is no match for us” Cash stated quite firmly.

Lady Asina processed what she had been told – and she was no fool: She had sent agents far and wide for information on Sunhill, having learned of both what the guild, Lookshy and other eastern power brokers thought of them – and now they were at her doorstep… not just one, but at least half the circle of powerful solars she had heard so much of, basically telling her that they were planning on taking over the country she lived in.

It was clear for the three solars that the unicorn mare before them was thinking hard and fast – and they understood that their request was a heavy one. Lady Asina floated over some tea-cakes to herself, gesturing for her guest solars to help themselves: “Realm legions – as in, plural?”

“We are a city state openly ruled by a circle of solars. The realm has thrown quite a few forces at us – both directly and indirectly. Let’s just say that house Sesus hasn’t as much lost legions to us, as had legions politely ejected from certain places by us, with them losing quite a lot of very expensive weapons and artifacts in the process – along with their pride, especially since they then had to seek safe harbour in Lookshy-controled ports afterwards” Cash said, sounding endlessly pleased that he was able to spin their victory at Port Calin into something useful, without giving away that it was at Port Calin or why the circle had attacked the place – indeed, now he hoped that Asina thought the two realm legions had attacked Sunhill instead, and then gotten chased off to somewhere Lookshy controlled.

Being over two hundred years old, Lady Asina knew damn well the martial reputation of house Sesus – but she could just as well easily imagine a couple of Sesus legion generals trying to pull a single target invasion of a scavenger land city state, if they could veil it as a grand wyld hunt: “That sounds like Sesus alright. But surely, you must understand that the realm isn’t in the habbit of ceding land willingly”

“The realm is in a civil war right now – a succession war. It’s not thinking about An Teng at all. We have seen dozens of unicorns milling about here already, who seemed perfectly happy using An Teng as a hiding place to stay out of the fighting. We don’t mind you doing that, the only real change would be that the three princes no longer answer to a satrap or a missing empress – and you’ll likely have to start paying your staff better, if you want to keep your servants” Sunrise pointed out, speaking her truth to the realm’s future lack of power in the region.

Lady Asina took a deep breath, appearing quite aware that her bold little statement had been utterly revealed as naught but a paper tiger: “Fair enough… it’s not as if the armed guards that the local princes and their nobles have were ever enough to pose a threat to our garrison – never needed that many troops to hold this place, mainly to guard it against coral pirates”

The circle accepted the explanation, but still, Asina was no fool either – she might not have planned to negotiate for her very life and ability to remain in An Teng that day, but by the dragons, if that’s what she had to do, then that’s what she was going to do!

The negotiations that followed took most of the day. Lady Asina appeared quite well read on what Sunhill could pull – though her information was a few months old, so Port Calin’s capture was unknown to her, and there were certain details about Thorns she hadn’t understood correctly. Still, she seemed to recognize that with the realm as it was, then it wouldn’t be possible to call in additional legions to defend An Teng if the lords of Sunhill were about to organize a proper nationwide uprising – especially not with solar-trained troops

To this end, she negotiated on behalf of all house Ledaal operations in An Teng. She understood that once realm control was gone, the guild was going to come and set up shop – competing with realm merchants for tengese goods, though with how the circle explained their adversarial ‘relationship’ with the guild, then the guild might not want to officially do so, at least not if the lords of Sunhill’s involvement in the uprising became public knowledge. Cash and Speaker equally told of the Sunhill light rail network, talking about how they were basically outcompeting the guild when it came to moving goods around for much of the east, and their plans to expand that to south-west, across the dune sea, assuming that they could organize the funds for it.

“And you’re assuming that the new government of An Teng would commission Sunhill for that?” Lady Asina wondered, still sounding quite impressed at Sunhill being able to produce such first age infrastructure.

Sunrise gave the unicorn mare an earnest look: “We see no reason why they wouldn’t want to – it would open up all of the eastern markets to them, and let them bring goods there to sell at a fraction of the time it would take to sail there – without having to dodge pirates or realm fleets. It will bring An Teng a level of wealth previously unimaginable! They could sell fresh fruits during winter in the east, or bring eastern goods here for western markets as a virtual monopoly”

It was a bit strange for Speaker to hear Sunrise talk a bit like Cash – but he could see her logic, and agreed with it fully.

The negotiations continued: Asina knew that she couldn’t negotiate officially for the businesses and operations that other realm houses controlled, but she knew that she could set some basic rules and terms for the transition, to allow realm staff that wanted to, to leave unharmed with their personal belongings and wealth. If any realm scion helming a local merchant house or plantation was too stubborn to take that offer, they would have to stay and compete in a free market for labour and local services – without being able to order tengese serfs to work for them for next to nothing.

Asina equally agreed to summon her niece – the local legion garrison commander, General Shuri. The circle promised not to assassinate her, though Asina did warn them that Shuri considered her posting in An Teng a well-deserved vacation and reward for decades of loyal service to the realm, so she wasn’t terribly interested in leaving. The circle didn’t mind that, as long as Shuri could be made to stand down – but again Asina warned that Shuri’s pride would likely prevent that.

“Lady Asina, I will be very honest with you. Between the myriad of powers that the lords of Sunhill have at their disposal, then this General isn’t going to get a choice here – the main question is just going to be how and perhaps why her troops will stand down – but my promise to you stands, we won’t kill her” Cash said, trying to sugarcoat the less than pleasant fact that the circle didn’t really have time for a single unicorn getting in their way.

The old noble-mare recognized the polite warning, and seemed to accept it without protest.

Come dinnertime the circle was invited to stay overnight, though Sullen Hoof’s sudden appearance and his report that the prince was both in the city and possible to reach – sort of – meant that the circle politely had to leave Lady Asina for a short while, though they would be back a bit after bedtime.

Ledaal Asina wasn’t stupid – she knew that the circle was probably going to do something relating to the rebellion they were trying to set up, but she also seemed more than aware enough that if she tried to stop them then she wouldn’t get to do much other than get buried the next day – she did find it rather surprising that this Sullen Hoof was a local tengese pony though. Sully didn’t correct her.

At the Palace of Threefold Magnificence, late at night, Sullen Hoof pointed out the wing of the palace where the braziers were lit and the banners flew high – that was where the prince was staying: “He’s in the highest of the towers there – he hates to sweat while he sleeps, so the humidity down at ground level at night bothers him”

“Sounds like he’d also have to sleep with open windows then” Speaker mused, in an attempt to connect Sully’s factoid to their overall plan.

Sullen Hoof agreed completely with Speaker, saying that this was how he was going to get Speaker in – by floating out a rat in a small bamboo cage, the being quite busy trying to gnaw its way out.

“Sully, what’s with the pet?” Cash simply had to ask.

Looking up at the high castle tower, Sullen Hoof weighed the caged rat on a hoof: “It is a lot easier for me to stealthily carry a sleeping rat in cage into a castle, than having to haul Speaker up there in person – and his flaming wings would draw a bit too much attention”

Nobody could argue with that – so under the cover of darkness, Speaker put the rat to sleep and used his dreamwalker kata to enter the rat’s dream. To Cash, Sunrise and Sully it looked as if Speaker simply disappeared into a puff of silvery vapor that quickly slipped into the rodent.

Sullen Hoof quickly raced off with his sleeping passenger, using a mix of charms that let him walk on walls, ceilings, run silently, run very fast, and jump quite far, to quickly and quietly scale the castle and avoid being seen by any of the castle guards.

Now, for Speaker, this was the first time he had truly used his dreamwalker kata – but he found to his great pleasure that he still had a sense of the surroundings around the rat he was in. This let him know exactly when Sullen Hoof had magically picked the lock on the balcony door to the prince’s bed chambers, Speaker exiting the rat right on cue – happy to be out of the dream of endless cheeses.

The dream implant was just a question of walking over, poking the sleeping prince once with the right dreamcatcher, and then leaving again – at least to anyone who didn’t have essence sight.

Leaving the castle was done a tad less subtly than how the two solars had entered – namely because Speaker had Sullen Hoof use a charm or two that let him toss Speaker all the way across the dark night sky right into the Ledaal compound’s swimming pool. Ledaal Asina was scared absolutely shitless as her otherwise calming midnight swim was brutally interrupted.

Speaker, glowing with a golden light from his shield charms that had prevented him from getting hurt by the watery landing’s impact, could only smile sheepishly: “Oh come now – I wouldn’t want to visit An Teng and then not pay you a private visit”

The old unicorn mare, quite naked as she had been swimming, glared at Speaker: “Anyone else pulling something like that – even my own children – I would have seen them flogged and quite possibly executed…”

“A unicorn mare did order me flogged a couple of months before we met for the first time – didn’t quite work out that well for her” Speaker mused as he swam to the edge of the pool.

Lady Asina joined Speaker, helping him out of his soaked clothes: “I’ll let it slide if you do that thing with your tongue again…”