Greenleaf 14th 3473 EE
Well, ever since we gave the worst parts of the nobility of Canterlot the horn, things have quietened down. Well, except for the wedding. Blue Mane is the second unicorn filly I've ever had more than a passing acquaintance with who hasn't been some entitled, titled, flat muzzled, horn pointing, dense as forest, smug, whiny brat.
If you're wondering, the first one is Luna. Blue Mane is charming and funny, some-pony who pretty much redeems the whole sub-race and gender. She's been at Maresia Keep pretty much the entire time since we flew our iceberg, and she and Luna have become as thick as thieves.
You know, that's a very odd idiom. I would have thought thieves would have to be fairly bright to have any success. Maybe if we hadn't been born to the nobility, the three of us might have had to turn to a life of crime.
With me to 'case the joint' from the air and do 'second story work' (after all any-pony who's rich enough to have a second story on their house would be worth our attention), Luna to take down magical defences and locks, and Atlas as inside pony (no-pony notices another Earth pony labourer), I think we could be quite successful, in fact I know so.
Well, rather than relieving those prong-headed posers of their valuables, we'll be relieving them of their control of Equestria, and like that old legend Robbing Hoof, we'll be engaged in more equitable redistribution of what we take. But more on that later, for we talk now of weddings.
As I said, Luna's become closer to Blue Mane than I have, even opened up to her more than any-pony outside the family she's ever met. Well, except for Silver Spoon, her Earth pony maid, but that's not quite the same. I'm really happy for her, little sis needs more friends. She's become more assertive too, never more so than when Silver Tongue showed up, looking to apologise.
Luna was there as soon as he was let in, flanked by a pair of household guards wearing full armour and hoof-blades. She looked like some hero of ancient times as she stood by Blue Mane, horn glowing like the full moon. Gone was the diffident pony who would have hidden behind her guards, this was a Luna ready, able and willing to buck some major flank on behalf of her friend.
As it happens, it wasn't necessary. Silver Tongue was cut off from family funds after his little escapade, and it seems that having to shift for himself has forced him to grow up a bit. I think his fair weather friends in Canterlot left in droves as soon as his bits went bye-bye. Looks like he's gained some pony-sense from the experience.
He made a most handsome apology, both to Blue Mane and to Atlas. He even gave them a wedding gift, a token, but a well considered one, which in my book gets him more points than something outlandish. It was a pair of magically linked necklaces, one for each of them. They have a sympathy spell that allows each pony to feel what the other's mood is, and a general sense of where they are.
Luna was taking nothing for granted, and gave them a pretty thorough magical going over, but that's all they were. It gives me hope for the future. Maybe he had to have his muzzle rubbed in it, but if even a bigot like Silver Tongue can change his cutie-mark, then maybe we can push through reforms more easily than I'd imagined, once we rub the nobility's collective muzzle in the fact that their so precious 'destiny to rule' is a load of horse-apples.
Blue Mane's mother isn't with us any-more, and she has no sisters, so Luna and I stood as her bridesmaids, along with Silver Spoon, and Sundancer, my maid. I never knew Luna was such a clothes-horse! I like to keep things simple, high speed, low drag, which means Sundancer's job is pretty easy. She's a pegasus too, but that's a matter of practicality, not prejudice. No-one else can keep up with me.
Note to self: Raise Sundancer's pay, and do something nice for her for putting up with me. Make sure Luna and Atlas know so they can match it for Silver Spoon and Baggin.
So I like to keep things simple clothing-wise. However, between Luna, Blue Mane, my mother, Atlas's mother and the half dozen or so tailors, seamstresses and random passersby, I went through more outfits than a mercenary with itchy hooves. My only relief was that it wasn't as bad as what Blue Mane went through. The difference being she enjoyed it.
I think the head seamstress, Beauty, couldn't decide what to do with my wings, or Sundancer's. However, I was not going to let them be bound, so she had to work with them. Add to that all the fancification, decoration and level of grooming that I never usually have time for, and by the end of it, I was scared to move in case I ruined something. I'll admit though, the final product was worth the effort.
It's odd, but there was something similar happening for Atlas. He's the only stallion among our generation of the family, and the only other noble near his own age to whom he's close is Gladstone. There's our master at arms, Sergeant Apony, who's not noble, or even a unicorn, but that Earth pony taught Atlas everything he knows about the fine art of doing unto others before they return the favour.
However, Blue Mane, though she doesn't have any sisters, has a couple of big, strapping brothers. They filled out the grooms-pony side of things, along with Gladstone, Apony and Baggin, Atlas's pegasus valet, though despite the fact that they'd all been polished and primped as much as we had, it was a question from looking at them whether they were going to a wedding or war.
There was a good reason, after all he'd recently humiliated some fairly powerful nobles, and with the wedding being a public event, we decided to take precautions against any possible unpleasantness. Doing something like that would be stupid beyond belief, but while few of our rivals are actually drooling idiots, despite what I may have said, sufficient arrogance and outrage could generate a pretty good subsitute.
So, while we were so floofy I thought we were going to float off without the aid of wings or a balloona, the tailors had gone for matching blue and gold military cut tunics for them. I may have mentioned that Atlas is built along the general lines of a stone keep, and he wore a mouth-blade on a baldric across his back. Most of the unattached females were drooling enough that we could have managed without that iceberg.
Apony was an ebony statue and wore his hoof blades, shined up to a blaze. In short, he looked like the reason the fight finished. I heard him chivvying the others as they were getting ready, just as if they were raw recruits. He was using that old 'flanks and fetlocks' line he's used on every new group of household guards since I was a foal.
Neither Chalcedony or Saxony, Blue Mane's brothers could match those two, but neither of them is a half bushel weakling either. Rather than wearing blades they weren't trained with, they carried their own tools. Saxony is a herbalist, and Chalcedony a gem-smith, but that's rather misleading. Both are the sort who go out after their own raw materials, and I wouldn't want to be the bandit who picked a fight with Saxony's sickle, or Chalcedony's pick.
Even Baggin was carrying a wicked little poinard mouth-blade. He's from a western Fife, the Shire, but he's utterly loyal to our family, and to Atlas in particular. His sister caught the eye of a particularly unpleasant 'noble' scion, Alfalfo, and was about to be taken as a concubine, read slave. Of course, her duties didn't require her to keep her wings…
Atlas, fresh at Court, for we were barely out of foal-hood at the time, overheard bozo the unicorn boasting about what he was going to do, and decided to do something about it. Of course, he convinced his dear sisters to help him, not that either of us needed any convincing. She and her family mysteriously disappeared, the filly in question from a locked room in Alfalfo's manse. On a completely unrelated note, I said I knew we had the talent to be a team of thieves.
Tricolor, for that was her name, still had her wings but had burn marks on her withers and belly. It seems Alfalfo had a fondness for playing with fire, or at least red hot pokers, possibly compensating for something. Shortly afterwards he had an unfortunate accident with a set of stairs, a hot poker and any dynastic pretensions he may have had, minimal as they were.
As valet, Baggin was of course the ring bearer, for both Atlas and Blue Mane. While as tradition dictates the ceremony was performed by a smith, and there was a brazier by him, the Fife of Maresia has abandoned the barbaric practice of sealing the marriage of a non-noble to the family by branding.
The three big windows at the south end of the great hall are glazed, unlike the simple shutters on most of the keep windows, and each window is made up of stained glass. We had it commissioned and it was worth every hoof mark. The left shows the land and fields in warm orange brown tones, the centre the sky with the planets circling the sun, and the right an abstract gold and yellow representation of magic.
Of course, they represent the three kinds of pony, but the meaning is a little more subtle. No panel is bigger than another. All three work together to produce something better than they could alone. No-where more so than that day. The sun was co-operating, with a little help from myself and a team of pegasi, and it shone down through the window, bathing the entire hall in multi-coloured light.
Note to self: It takes an expensive pigment to create coloured light in those window panes, but the ice crystals we've been forming seem to produce an entire rainbow when the light hits a them right. What's with that? After we've done the power enhancement thing, figure out why this happens, and see if it's possible to reify it with magic. It might not have any practical use other than producing cheaper dyes, liquid rainbow maybe, but that would be good for Maresia's trade balance by itself.
The ceremony was simple enough, an invocation to our ancestors to bless and watch over the marriage, an exchange of vows, and an exchange of rings. Though once again we broke with tradition. Normally for nobility the rings would be fitted for each others horns, but with Atlas being an Earth pony, we went with torcs that went over the fetlock, properly shorn in Blue Mane's case. It also makes them the most expensive wedding rings ever, but this is one case where no-one begrudges it.
At the end of the ceremony, we all sang the traditional song of well wishing for the happy couple, though I don't think they noticed it they were so deep in each others muzzles. Luna was crying like a river, and even I... well the sun was very bright, and I found my eyes watering. That's my story and I'm sticking to it.
I also felt so... joyous. While few of the noble families were there, except for the handful allied to us, common ponies of all breeds made up the numbers, indeed they were crowding out in the courtyard, even outside the bailey. Everyone stood together, sang together, celebrated together. It was nice that our wedding party was also a mix of every-pony.
Okay, so there was a massive party for all afterwards, but I honestly don't think that's why some ponies travelled from other villages in the Fife to be there. It's the sort of thing we've been wanting to see our whole lives, and I can't think of a better wedding gift for Atlas. It gives me hope that we will prevail, make Equestria over in the same image.
Of course I stripped down and loaded up on food as fast as possible, because I had a little trip to take them on. Luna souped up the enchantments on the chariot so I could provide a liveable bubble for all three of us,and shield them from the high speed winds. Blue Mane has seen me fly before towing the iceberg, she was helping maintain the cold spells, but she's never seen me buck it up to full power.
The sunset where the sky thins out is unlike anything I've ever seen, and I was glad to share it with them. It had already set by the time we lifted off from the keep, but once I got high enough and fast enough, we caught up. So they got a twofer.
But the big significant thing happened on the way back down. Being up there reminded me of my idle musing about the nature of the sun, and I had an inspiration. I had thought about trying to use the sun, moon and the earth under us as anchors for the hetro-thaumic triune, but there was one huge problem.
To create an anchor, you must have a sample of what it is you're using, an obvious application of the law of sympathy. While any lump of undisturbed earth or rock would do for Atlas, getting the other two would prove a little tricky. As for all of us using earth, we need different anchors, 'pulling' in different directions to make this stable. It would be like tying all your pavilion ropes to one tent-peg.
My big idea was, philostogen can be generated, and if the sun is primarily philostogen we can use it as a sample. As soon as I was back and out of harness, I dragged Luna down to our laboratory, and made up some philostogen. Even with the sun not up in the sky, some fairly simple sympathy spells proved my hypothesis. So we have my anchor!
That left only Luna, where to find a rock from the moon? I may have flown up to the edge of space but that doesn't mean I can fly across those kind of distances. However, it was as if some sort of dam had broken. There is something that falls from the sky that we collect, those sky-fall stones, meteorites in the classical dialect.
Our family has always paid a finders fee for any that fall on our lands. The metal ones often make far better tools and blades than any normal iron, and take magic more easily, maybe because having come from beyond, they aren't saturated with our own world's ambient magical field.
The stone ones are little more than curiosities, but we collect them, as they share the same quality, and are occasionally useful for powerful warding stones. What I realised, the moon, as far as I can see with my keen vision, looks like it might be made of the same stuff. Could one of them fallen or been knocked from the moon.
The answer was yes, we found a recently fallen meteorite that responded very strongly to the similarity spell. With this, the last piece of our work falls into place. The triune is worked out to the last sigil, the most powerful ever created, and self sealing. Once the ritual starts, nothing gets in and out until it finishes, a safety precaution.
We have a transfer medium for each of us that will regulate the power for the sharing, and now we have anchors to stop ourselves getting sucked in. We can wait two weeks, so Atlas and Blue Mane can have their honeymoon, but then we get it set up and go for it! The only thing is, we need a name for what we'll become.
Flying unicorns is incomplete,and doesn't recognise the Earth pony qualities, I was thinking a tweak to the nobles. Unicorn means 'one horn', but since we'll have all the powers, how does Allicorn sound? Hmm... maybe shorten it to Alicorn? It has a nice ring to it. Anyway, in just a few short weeks, the whole future of Equestria is going to change. That is a promise.
