LEGEND OF THE GODDESSES
Zancluse, 2,060 years ago
Soledad pushed through curtains of kelp, finding her way to a shallow lagoon, barely twenty feet deep and its floor covered in green algae.
This lagoon was home to a cemetery, tombstones bathed in the light of a full moon. Soledad crept along the bottom of the lagoon and searched out the newest grave marker.
"Hi, Jolly," she whispered, nuzzling the stone with her long tubular snout. She took off her royal headdress and held it over her heart. "I only just heard that you had died. If I only had the power to shed a tear for you, I might believe this world is still worth living in without you in it. But I cannot. Now if only I had the power to take my own life." She pulled the headdress back on. "I've missed you so much. I wish I could have seen you one last time."
"Who's out there?" a voice called out.
Soledad turned, her burning purple, yellow, and red eyes piercing the darkness. She clearly saw who was observing her, but they saw only her eyes, leading them to shriek and cower. They were three identical seapony mares with lavender coats, blue eyes, and long two-colored blond manes.
"Siren, Selkie, and Merrow," she stated.
They looked surprised at the mention of their names. One of them swam forward curiously. "Queen Soledad?" she whispered. "What are you doing here?"
"I came to see your mother's grave," Soledad muttered in return.
"Oh," the mare said uncertainly. "…Why, thank you, Your Majesty."
"She always spoke highly of you," said another of the triplets in a very high voice. "To the very end."
"She did," the one closest to Soledad agreed. "It's a pleasure to see you here honoring our mother." She began dipping into a bow, but appeared to change her mind halfway through and leapt forward to hug her instead.
"Oh!" Soledad exclaimed. "Th-thank you… um… which one are you?"
She giggled. "Merrow, Your Majesty."
"Sorry," Soledad murmured. "You three still look exactly the same. Did you ever think about having separate manestyles or something to tell you apart?"
"Yes, we've considered it, but it would ruin our image," Merrow said cheerfully.
Soledad nodded. "You're still singers, then?"
"Yes."
"You always had the most beautiful voices," Soledad said wistfully. "I remember when you were seven… but you know what day I'm talking about." She shot a glance at Jolly's grave and cleared her throat nervously. "Erm… so, last time I saw you girls, you were nineteen. How old are you now?"
Merrow looked mildly offended, but answered. "We're forty-three, Your Majesty."
"…Oh," Soledad said, pained. "Has it really been so long?" She turned back to Jolly's grave again, staring hard at it.
"Forgive me for saying so," the third sister said darkly, "but after so many fallings-out, perhaps you weren't meant to be friends with our mother at all."
"Siren!" Selkie gasped.
"No, she's right," Soledad said calmly, lifting a hoof. "I messed up too many times…" She sighed as she beheld the three mares. "You know, your mother loved you girls. I hope you know just how much she truly did love you. I was a good enough queen for her… but not good enough for you. That's what she told me."
Merrow sniffled, smiling. "And I hope you know how much she loved you, my queen. She believed in you. She had ever so much faith."
"Yeah," Soledad said quietly, looking up at the moon through the ceiling of water. "Faith isn't something you find very often in this ocean."
Merrow reached out to hold one of Soledad's hooves between both of her own. Soledad stared at Merrow with her usual furious intensity.
"Me dear sisters?" a voice called out. "Is that ye I see out there? Who's that with ye?"
Soledad turned to the source of this voice, a blue-green stallion with the exact same eye and mane color as the triplets.
"Apkallu," she whispered.
He flinched away, taken aback. "Queen Soledad?"
By some miracle, despite such a thing making no sense, Apkallu had inherited his mother's accent. Soledad latched onto this simple fact and immediately lunged for him, pulling him into a crushing hug.
"Apkallu," she sighed. "It's so wonderful to see you. I've missed you so very, very much."
"Missed me, Yer Majesty?" he repeated blankly. "I'd na realized I'd made any impression on ye at all. I've not seen ye since I were… what, thirteen?"
"Yes," Soledad breathed, staring deeply into his eyes. "And I wanted you even then."
"Yer Majesty?" he exclaimed, recoiling.
"Yes, I know," she said hastily. "I know I'm very hard to think of in that way. I know that I'm repulsive, revolting, and terrifying, and that there are deeper problems than just what I look like."
She pulled away from Apkallu and looked from him to his three sisters, focusing on them one at a time as she spoke. "You're all thinking it; the whole kingdom's thinking it. I'm a terrible queen. The seapony nation is polluted with filth and disease and poverty, worse than ever before. And I've done nothing about it, because I know we've always had filth and disease and poverty, and no previous ruler has ever been able to put a dent in it. I'm not interested in that uphill struggle. Which I know is a bad attitude for a queen to have, especially one who's going to live forever… I'm no happier about that than anypony else is."
She sank to the algae-covered floor of the lagoon. "I just don't have what it takes. But when I was with your mother, only then did I feel… capable. Capable of happiness and love, capable of anything."
Queen Soledad closed her eyes and sat motionless and silent for several minutes. Finally, she opened her eyes and lifted her head. "Apkallu, marry me," she said.
"What?" he demanded.
She swam over to him, staying below his eye level, pleading and imploring. "Come with me back to Campus Cuda and marry me. Be my husband. Be my king. I've had you on my mind nonstop for so many years. …You're a lot like your mother. You might inspire me to new heights." She put her hooves on his shoulders tightly. "If I had a pony like you in my life, I'd become everything you'd want me to become, whether as a wife or a queen. Marry me and we'll fix this country together. I promise."
Siren scowled. "Our mother said you used to make promises like that a lot. And never came through."
Soledad's tail lunged at Siren, who didn't flinch; but rather than the expected spike or club in Siren's face, Soledad simply tweaked her nose with her tail's flexible tip.
"Ah, Siren, you're a brave one," she said affectionately. "Jolly always knew she could count on you to make a stand. So, Apkallu, what'll it be?"
"I… I'll do it, Yer Majesty," Apkallu stammered.
Soledad caressed Apkallu's face. "You will?"
"Aye," he said tenderly. "I'd be honored ta make ye me bride."
"Little brother…" said Merrow, biting her lip in concern.
"It's fine, Merrow," Apkallu assured her. "I want this."
Soledad smirked bitterly, the end result hardly making her look amused. "Is it only because I promised to improve the country? …Because that's perfectly fine. That's a perfectly good reason for marriage."
"There are a lot o' reasons ta marry ye, me queen," Apkallu said hastily.
"Then we'll be married at once!" Soledad declared. "We'll set off for Campus Cuda in the morning." She hugged Apkallu tightly. "Thank you. You've made me very happy."
She swooped down on Merrow, Siren, and Selkie, pulling them into a group hug. "Thank you, ladies."
"F-for what, Queen Soledad?" Merrow said nervously as Soledad darted away.
"And thank you, Jolly," Soledad whispered, leaning over the grave marker. "It was lovely to see you again."
Apkallu's sisters shot him three identical concerned glances.
"It's a'right, sisters," he said quietly. "Fer queen and country, aye? Marriages have happened fer worse reasons. And I think she'll make a fine wife." He looked at her fondly, at the way she continued speaking to Jolly's grave.
"I'll miss you," she said. "A lot. But I have a really good feeling about this."
Apkallu smiled and turned back to his sisters. "Aye, I think with time I could love her."