Romance and the Fate of Equestria

Chapter One Hundred and Sixty-Eight

Celestia stood on the balcony just outside her personal room, gazing out over Canterlot, which gleamed reddish under the setting sun. She waved a greeting to a distant Luna as she flew out into the darkening sky.

"Ah… it's good to be home," Celestia mused.

"Hello, Celestia."

Celestia looked up in alarm. Above her, slowly crawling toward her down the outside of the tower, was Discord.

"Discord!" she said darkly. "Should you be here?"

"Probably not."

"Did your mistress send you?" said Celestia. "Are you here under her orders?"

"Chrysalis?" said Discord. "Not so much, no. Her exact words were to 'go bother somepony else'. She doesn't often give me commands that can be interpreted so liberally, so I took my chance."

He dropped onto the balcony beside her and looked around anxiously. "I doubt I've very much time," he said. "Chrysalis has this new thing where if she says my name, I have to appear at her side, no matter where I am and whether she intended to summon me or not. So, let's not beat around the bush. I'm here to beg."

"To beg?" she said in alarm, her eyes widening as he got down on one knee.

"Yes," he said, gazing deep into her eyes. "I'm begging you. Please free me from the Elements of Harmony. If you do that, I will be free of Chrysalis's control. You don't want me to stay on her side, do you?"

Celestia narrowed her eyes. "I don't trust you, Discord."

"I can't lie," he said simply. "Not in this state."

"You can come pretty darn close," she retorted.

Discord stoop up and leaned in close to her. "You must know I have some trustworthy attributes. Twilight and your other favored ponies, they befriended me."

"And then you betrayed them."

Discord had no answer to that for a moment, his eyes darting back and forth. Finally, he said, "I miss you, Celestia."

She scowled at him, then sighed and lowered her head. "I miss you too." She turned and walked into her room, and he hunched over and followed her in. "I wasn't expecting to see you again, Discord," she continued. "I feel so… vulnerable and open when you're with me. It's this forced love for you that I'm forced to live with. It's the worst. But you know that, you've always known that, it's why you did it. Honestly, Discord… by the Old Gods… why in the world would I ever free you?"

They stood in silence, neither looking at the other, until Discord straightened up in alarm. "What was that?"

Celestia looked at him blankly. "What was what?"

"That very interesting thought that just flickered through your mind," Discord said quietly.

"I didn't notice," Celestia said bitterly. "What thought would that be?"

Discord wetted his lips nervously. "You… you thought that if I were to release you from the curse that forces you to love me… you would be grateful enough to love me for real."

Celestia blinked slowly, then sighed and looked away. "Well. That certainly is a strange thought. Probably true, though. It's been so long, and hurts so much, that… yes, as screwed-up as it undoubtedly is, I… I could love you." She looked back to him with a pleading expression.

"You're suggesting a trade," he realized, eager. "I free you, you free me."

She nodded. "If you freed me, I would be yours. I'd do whatever you asked."

"Hrmm," he said, stroking his beard. "How do I know that's not my curse talking?"

"It could be," she admitted. "If that's the case… free me."

"Wait, I thought I came here to beg you to free me, not…"

"Free me, Discord," she said, her voice cracking, "and I will do anything for you, anything to express my gratitude, my devotion… my love. You have my word. Just free me from this awful curse, please, I can't take it anymore!"

"And you think I can take it?" he retorted. "These Elements of Harmony… they're killing me. Slowly. Like how every breath of fresh air slowly kills a mortal being over decades or centuries. But it's still… scary. To feel my cells dying all around me. …I'll do it. A fair trade." He slowly, uncertainly, raised his eagle talon. "You will… not need to love me… anymore."

"Do it," Celestia whispered. "Please. Let me love you by my own choice, and I swear I will."

Discord hesitated, his hand shaking before he snapped his fingers.

Nothing obvious happened, but in seconds, Celestia began sniffling, and she could barely breathe.

"How do you feel?" Discord said softly.

"The weight of a thousand years just… lifted," she said raggedly.

"I am glad to hear it."

She beamed at him, pleased at his honesty.

"So about these Elements…" Discord prodded.

"Oh, Discord, let's not rush into things," Celestia said dismissively. "There must be other ways I can repay you before we get to that."

"What did you have in mind?"

She batted her eyelashes at him. "I think you know."

He gaped. "…So it's true."

"Yes," Celestia said passionately. "For ridding me of these false emotions… these feelings are truly mine now, and I want to act on them. Discord, I want you. I am your slave." She approached him, nuzzling his neck with her snout. "Surely you can't resist?"

Discord swallowed hard. "No… no, I can't."

She backed away from him, toward her bed. "Come here, Discord," she cooed. "Come into my bed and do with me as you will. Then in the morning, we'll talk about the rest of our bargain."

She drew him close. He placed his mismatched hands on the side of her face and slowly brought his lips to hers in a tender kiss. She raised her front legs, seizing him and pulling him closer, kissing him passionately, hungrily.

"Erm… I…" Discord stammered.

"What's the matter, Discord?" Celestia whispered into his mouth.

"…I think I know a way to enhance this experience for us," he said. He took a step back and pulled his limbs in close to his body. Like clay, his body rolled into a perfect sphere, and from this sphere emerged a muscled, powerful alicorn stallion, taller than Celestia, with Discord's yellow-gray fur color, huge blue wings, and a long, thick, full-bodied black mane.

The alicorn opened his eyes, revealing Discord's beady, murky red and yellow eyes. The eyes quivered, becoming the same size and a bright, dazzling ruby red.

"Oooooh!" Celestia exclaimed, wide-eyed. "You did not have to do that for me… but I'm very, very glad that you did."

"Actually, I was going to try to turn you into a draconequus," Discord admitted. "But apparently that would be chaotic and this would not. You know." He wrinkled his nose in mock disgust, which barely put a dent in his handsome features.

"I like this way better," said Celestia. She kicked off all of her golden accessories, her shoes, her crown, her collar. She elegantly crept into the bed, Discord's eyes hungrily searching all over her unclad body.

"Come on, then," said Celestia. "You said yourself you might not have much time."

"Yes, of course…"

-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-

The following morning, the moon still high in the sky, Annihilara seeped under the crack of Celestia's bedroom door and formed into a cloud of swirling smoke, her head emerging from it on a long neck. "Hey, Les, I hate to catch you before sunrise, but—WHOA!"

Celestia lifted her head off her pillow in alarm. "Lara?"

Discord slowly rose off of Celestia's pillow as well, back in his normal shape, rising and swaying like a charmed cobra. "Ahhhh," he said in fascination. "Princess Annihilara, I assume. I've heard so many fascinating things about you… always wondered what it would be like to see you in person."

"Uh, yeah," Annihilara said blankly. "Same."

Discord chuckled. "You'll notice how I didn't say I was glad to meet you, even though I am. I deliberately phrased it so you could sincerely say that you felt the same."

"Well done," said Annihilara. "How very… courteous. Um…"

"We'll talk about this later, Annihilara," Celestia said hurriedly.

"Should I go?"

"Please. And don't tell anypony about this! Except… Luna, you can tell Luna. Nopony else until… until I see you again."

"Uh, yeah, okay," said Annihilara. She vanished.

Once they were alone again, Celestia leaned over and kissed Discord. "Well… I don't think even I'm old enough to remember when this line was fresh and new and not hackneyed, but… was it good for you?"

He stretched his arms out. "Honestly, Celestia, sleeping with you is the second-best thing that's happened to me in all my million-and-a-thirtieth years. Becoming me still tops the list, but this… this comes close."

"Mm. I'm glad." She looked him over. "At what point during the passion did you lose the pony form and change back into yourself? I barely noticed."

"Neither did I," said Discord, peering at the back of his hands. "It was mostly involuntary."

"Well, I'm glad it happened," she said. "Whenever it did, things definitely got… ooh… better."

"So…" he said casually. "On to the subject of getting these Elements of Harmony out of… you know… me… here… the body."

"Ah, yes, that," said Celestia. "Ummmmmmm… no. No, I don't think I'm going to do that." Casually, she rolled out of bed and got dressed in a single burst of golden magic.

"Wait, what?" Discord said blankly.

"Not. Going. To do that," she enunciated pleasantly.

"You gave me your word!" he exclaimed, scrambling out of the bed. "You swore that if I freed you, you would do whatever I asked!"

"And with my word and a bit, you can buy a small order of onion rings. If that. Inflation, you know…"

He gaped at her in disbelief. "What?!"

"I lied, Discord," said Celestia, laughing wildly. "I lied straight to your twisted old face."

"That's… that's not…" Discord stammered. "No! That isn't possible. I'm in your head, reading your every thought, all the time. How could you ever have lied to me?"

"Years of practice," she said. "Centuries, even. Waiting for a moment just like this one." She looked him over in disgust. "You honestly thought I could really love you if you freed me? After all the horrible things you've done to me, to my country, to ponies I care about? You genuinely thought that all that simpering and sniveling and groveling at your feet was the real me, that I'm weak enough that you could have pushed me to that? Ah, Discord, being smarter than you look is only a good weapon when you actually are smarter than you look."

"What is happening?" he said in a terrified, squeaky voice.

"I just wanted the curse removed so my emotions could be mine again, old friend," she said with a vicious smirk. "And here you were, dropping that chance right into my lap. It was time to act at last."

He paused, listening to her thoughts. "I'm not… I'm not buying this. If that's all you wanted, then why did you sleep with me afterward?"

She shrugged. "I'm still a mare with needs. I haven't been with a stallion in eighty years."

"Ah, right, Towering Inferno," said Discord. "I remember him. He was terrible."

"Yes, yes he was, though in fairness to him and everyone else I've been with in the past millennium, I imagine it's not entirely their fault. It can't be easy to get me off with you in my head taunting me all the time. This proved to be a very elegant solution." She grinned broadly.

"So, you… let me just… get this straight," he said, rubbing his temples. "You lied to me. Not just verbally, but through our mental link as well. First to trick me, an archetypal trickster god, into removing my own curse. Then… for sex. Which you were able to do because you've been practicing deceiving me for centuries without my ever noticing."

"That's about the size and shape of it, yes," she said cheerfully.

"That's… wow, Celestia. That's really something. Are you sure you're not evil?"

Celestia threw her head back and laughed hysterically.

"What's so damned funny, pray tell?" Discord spat.

"Honestly," Celestia chuckled, "no, I'm not. I'm not sure I'm not evil. I never have been sure of that, and I'm less sure now than ever." She laughed again. "Maybe all the underground conspirators and Nightmare Moon cultists and all the rest are right about me. You know the rumors and theories they spread, the way they twist my actions to call me a tyrant, a troll, a molester. If the world could see what I've just done… oh, all the centuries of weird conspiracies would certainly have much more of a leg to stand on, now wouldn't they? I've just done a horrible, horrible thing, but damned if it wasn't funny."

He glared at her furiously. "I can bring my curse back, and you'll be achingly in love with me all over again."

"Ah, but you can't," she said sweetly. "You can remove a curse, yes, but you can't inflict one, not with those Elements of Harmony in you. And I will never, ever, be the one to take those out of you. Not ever."

Discord snarled. "You're still not free. I'm still in your head. Always."

"Are you? Are you, Discord? Or am I in your head now?"

Unable to get any angrier than he was, he took a deep calming breath and shook his head, astonished. "I'll get you for this, Celestia. Someday, somehow. We've got aaaaall eternity. 'Best served cold' and all that."

"Well, aren't you grumpy for a guy who just got all of this," she said, gesturing smugly to her body.

Screaming, he shot out of her window like a comet.

"Yeah, that's right, run!" she called with her voice and mind simultaneously, walking out onto the balcony and yelling out into the dark sky. "Run back to your bug queen, you little prick, and try to imagine how much I care! I hope you spend every minute thinking about how easy it all would have been if you'd just stayed on my side!"

She paused and listened for his thoughts, finding that not only could she not hear him, as was common, but an iron barrier had been erected between them, blocking her thoughts from him as well for the first time ever.

"Oh, Discord…" she sighed wistfully as she raised the sun. "I really have missed you, you know."

-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-

Celestia trudged down the hall, pausing at a corner.

"I see you there, Annihilara," she said casually.

Annihilara crept out from the shadow of a vase and formed into her physical self, with her customary cry of pain, and walked alongside Celestia.

"What was it you wanted to talk to me about?" said Celestia.

"…It honestly doesn't matter in comparison to what just happened," Annihilara muttered.

They walked in silence for a moment. Celestia noticed that castle staff were muttering among themselves, straightening in surprise as she passed.

"They all know," she realized. "Lara, I asked you not to tell anypony!"

"You said I could tell Luna!" Annihilara said defensively. "I did. Then she told everypony."

"Hmm. I suppose I stepped right into that," Celestia said dryly.

They entered the dining hall. Cadance was already there, and glanced up at them, before gasping and doing a wide-eyed double-take at Celestia.

"Ah," Celestia said awkwardly. "Yes, I suppose word didn't even need to reach you… you can tell just by looking at me."

"Yeah," Cadance said quietly.

"Well… now you know," she said, sitting down at the table, unfazed as numerous shadowy arms burst out of Annihilara and set to gathering heaps of waffles, fruits, and jar upon jar of sugar and syrup.

"Um… yes," said Cadance. "Um… wow."

Celestia shrugged noncommittally. "Well, don't hold your tongue, Cadance. You're the love expert. I'd like to know what you think."

"I… I couldn't be happier, Auntie," Cadance said carefully. "I've spent my whole life watching your heart ache under the throes of this curse, wishing that I could free. But you… you did it. You tricked the trickster. I'm proud."

Celestia blinked. "Well… wow. I can't believe we've never spoken of this before."

"We did once, when I was little," said Cadance. "You asked me never to bring it up again, so I didn't."

"Well, that was a stupid thing for me to do," Celestia muttered. "To treat you like a child, not see your potential… I would have liked to discuss it with you when you were older."

Cadance smiled. "None of that matters now. You got away from him."

"And my methods?" Celestia said sheepishly.

Cadance hesitated. "I… don't believe in repaying evil unto evil."

"No, of course you don't."

"Are you proud of what you did?"

"I'm not," Celestia mumbled. "I'm really not. I'm such a sap that even hurting him makes me feel bad."

"That's good," Cadance said forcefully. "It means you're not like him."

"What are we talking about?" Annihilara said casually, popping a whole waffle into her maw. "Baseball?"

Celestia aimed a beam of magic at Annihilara, blasting a hole through her head.

"Ow," Annihilara said dully, quickly growing the missing bits of her head back.

All three of them giggled lightly. The dining hall's doors opened and Luna stepped in, saw them there, and immediately retreated. The three remaining princesses burst into giggles again.

"Auntie…" said Cadance. "Look, you asked my opinion and I gave it, but I'd never dream in a million years of being wiser than you. The important thing is… are you happy?"

"I'm feeling… a muddled mess of things," said Celestia. "But… mostly, yes."

-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-

In the northern forests, Discord appeared at Chrysalis's side.

"Ah, there you are," Chrysalis said in surprise. "I was just about to call your name. Where have you been."

"Canterlot," he grumbled, not looking at her.

Her eyes narrowed. "Elaborate."

"Celestia's bedroom."

"Oh?" she said, genuinely surprised. "And what brought you there?"

He sighed and glared at her. "I begged her to free me from the Elements of Harmony so that I might be free of you."

"Well, it seems she…" Chrysalis froze, then leaned toward him, first sniffing him then tasting the air around him. "Discord, you taste… incredible. My dear boy, what happened? Tell me now."

"She tricked me," Discord said dully. "Into freeing her from her love for me."

Her lip thinned.

"Then she seduced me, and I spent the night, and in the morning she revealed her trickery, and I… well, I came back here," said Discord, getting through it as quickly as he could."

Chrysalis's cold glare slowly became a grin. "Oh, Discord…"

He turned his back to her. "Go ahead. Punish me."

"I beg your pardon?"

"I tried to betray you, I got rid of the… the thing… in Celestia… you could have fed from, yada yada, I've been a bad, bad slave. You'll rip me apart, I take it? Or, I suppose, it would be more characteristic to make me rip myself apart."

"No," Chrysalis said thoughtfully. "No, as amusing as that would be…" She walked around him to look him in the eye. "You've had quite a night, lover-boy. I could sense it bubbling beneath the surface from the moment I met you, of course, but now… now you know you're in love. And that makes it all the sweeter." In front of his eyes, she transformed into Celestia.

"You stop that," he hissed at her.

"You now know that century after century you've been slowly falling for her," said Chrysalis, still in her own voice despite having Celestia's appearance. "Now you're completely head-over-hooves… odd expression, that. The head is always positioned over the hooves. And on top of that, no sooner ere you made aware of your love for her than she broke your heart. The heartbreak doesn't alter the quality or flavor any, but, well, it's funny."

He grunted. "That's exactly what she called it. 'Funny'."

Chrysalis laughed. "Did she really? By the stars, I had no idea she could be so cruel. That is absolutely hysterical."

"Stop looking like her," Discord snapped.

"You don't give me orders." She leaned forward and started kissing him.

"Stop this now!" he growled, squirming away from her.

"Be still and silent and let me feed," she commanded.

He stopped resisting. She kissed him deeply and passionately, and he began quivering, growing thinner, his legs buckling beneath him. After a few minutes, Chrysalis backed away from him, drool running down her face. He was sobbing, his face gushing tears.

"That was amazing," Chrysalis whispered, changing back into herself. "Only something like you, as old as the mountains and the sea, as complex as the balance of the universe, could love so deeply. Shining Armor's love has nothing on you. You didn't do wrong at all by freeing Celestia… by tricking you into doing so, she's made me stronger than I ever could have hoped to be. I have a new food source and it is fantastic."

She looked him over, and gently placed a hoof on his shoulder. "Occupy the rest of your day with… with something you enjoy doing," she said kindly. "You've earned it. We'll be doing this again soon." She beamed. "I sincerely hope you never stop being this entertaining and… heh… nutritive."

Chrysalis walked away, leaving Discord sobbing on the ground.