Twilight sat on the floor, staring at the speaker stone Luna had given her. They had been here two days now and she still hadn't contacted Celestia to let her know they were safe. Part of her didn't want to, partly because they hadn't achieved much apart from dwelling in the abandoned building by the pegasus compound, and mostly because Celestia hadn't told her the whole story with the pegasus and Twilight was a little bit ticked off about that.

There was a snort across the room causing Twilight to look round at the source which happened to be Octavia. The day before she'd had a bucket of freezing water dumped over her for being 'a filthy horn lover.' As they were in the city center and surrounded by ponies at the time, Twilight had been unable to cast a spell to dry her. Octavia herself had insisted Twilight not dry her until they were safe in their den. Unfortunately, in the cold weather, she had quickly caught a chill and was now doing her best to sleep it off.

Twilight sighed and went back to staring at the stone in front of her. Deciding to just get it over with she charged her horn and pressed its tip against the green rune adorning the stone. The rune absorbed the energy and changed to a bright vibrant white. Not knowing what to do next she continued to lie down, and waited.

Thankfully she didn't have to wait long until Celestia's voice emanated from the stone. "Twilight? Twilight, can you hear me?" Her voice had a strange echo like quality as it came from the stone.

"Yes I can hear you."

"Thank goodness. Are you all ok? I was beginning to get worried something had happened."

"We're all fine Celestia. Well... mostly. Octavia had a bucket of water thrown over her yesterday for being a 'filthy horn lover', and she's come down with something. I'm hoping she'll get better soon, because we can't really move on until she's well enough to travel."

"Oh dear," said Celestia with something approaching motherly concern. "I do hope she gets better soon. I'm guessing that since you can't travel that you're still in Stalliongrad?"

"Yeah, unfortunately. This place is horrible. Now there's something I wa-"

"I agree Twilight, I think you ought to head east towards Prance. You may find the weather to be more pleasing at least."

"Yeah, that's what Fleur said. I really need to ask you somet-"

"And how is Fleur? And Trixie for that matter?"

"They're fine, and Fleur is rather full of surprises. They're out gathering stuff for our trip when Octavia's better. Can you plea-"

"I'm glad they're okay then. I'd hate to imagine what would happen if you were all taken ill. I'd pro-"

"Celestia!" Twilight yelled, her patience wearing thin. "Why didn't you tell me about the pegasi living in that labour camp as well as how they're treated?"

There was a static rattle from the stone, which Twilight guessed was a sigh. "Fleur's shown you the camps then?"

"Why? Wasn't she meant to?" Twilight asked angrily. "And what do you mean camps?"

"Yes she was meant to. In fact, I asked her to. And I mean camps as in there are many more than just one. There's a camp in most population areas in Mauritania. After all, the weather needs managing all over the country."

"Ok, fine. But why didn't you tell me?"

There was another static rattle as Celestia sighed again. "Twilight. I wanted to tell you but I was worried that it would poison your view of the ponies in Mareitania. Most ponies there are fundamentally good, doing their best to get by in the situation they were given. I was afraid that telling you about the camps before you found that out would make it seem like the ponies of Maretania are all complicit in the treatment of pegasi, which simply isn't true."

Twilight went silent as she digested that bit of information. She couldn't deny that she could see Celestia's point, but it still irked her. "Ok, I can understand that, but if I'm to do this I'm going to need all the facts. From here on no more secrets."

"Of course Twilight, thank you. I'll be honest with you now though when I say that my knowledge of the country is limited by what ponies from there tell me, so if there's something you think I should have told you, it's possible I didn't know myself."

"Yeah, that's fair. I guess I'll... uh, hold on a mo." Twilight twitched an ear at the sound of hooves rapidly approaching. They were quickly followed by a yelp as Fleur ran into the room and tripped over Octavia's rear legs. Barely managing to catch herself, she took a moment to breath before yelling "Trixie's been arrested!"

Twilight jumped up. "What!? When?"

"About twenty minutes ago I think." Fleur replied between breaths. "I ran straight here soon as it happened."

Twilight stood still as she tried to think. "Right, Celestia, I gotta go."

"Yes, you do. Get Trixie back safe Twilight."

"Will do. I'll contact you soon." Twilight watched as the rune faded back to green before turning back to where Fleur was helping Octavia to rouse herself. "Fleur? Do you know where they would take her?"

"Well, yeah. They'd take her to the guard headquarters which is in the city center."

Twilight nodded. "Take us there."

The journey to the guard’s headquarters was rather more sedate that Fleur's journey to the hideout. Mostly this was because of Octavia not being able to keep up if they went too fast. Twilight figured that Trixie probably wasn't going anywhere so the speed of the journey didn't matter too much.

Since they had the time Twilight had Fleur explain to them just what has happened. Apparently Fleur and Trixie had gone back to the market in the hopes of getting more supplies for their trip. Fleur had asked Trixie to create a distraction while she relieved some of the merchants of their financial burden, a task the showmare had taken to with relish.

Trixie had started by wowing the crowd with some card tricks and had moved onto juggling fruit with her hooves, which Twilight had to admit was impressive, most unicorns didn't have the hoof-eye coordination for that sort of thing; when an earth pony mare had launched a tomato at Trixie. Trixie caught the tomato in her magic and threw it back at the mare, splattering it across her face, which the crowd found amusing but the mare less so.

Fleur was working her way through the crowd when the mare had returned five minutes later, with a guard in tow, demanding that he arrest Trixie for casting malicious magic on her. Naturally the bias against unicorns prevailed and she was arrested without any questions being asked. After that Fleur ran back to the hideout as fast as she could.

Fleur's explanation had taken most of the journey to tell and a couple minutes later the three ponies were in a street adjacent to the guard’s headquarters. Twilight studied the building as she thought. The building was quite low, roofed with a dome and had stairs leading up to a columned entrance which overlooked a square courtyard. All in all the building looked grey, boring and horribly secure. One piece of decoration Twilight was glad to see was the bored looking guard sat outside next to a noticeboard.

"Octavia, do you think you're up to talking to that guard, see if you find out what's going to happening with Trixie?"

Octavia sniffed and nodded. "He might just tell me to go away though. I wouldn't want to talk to somepony with this much snot dripping out of their face."

"Oh... right, hold still a moment please." Twilight closed her eyes and focused her magic, while trying to ignore the sensations she was receiving through her magic as she cleaned out the gunk from Octavia's nose. Flicking the ball of grossness she had in her magic down the street, she opened her eyes to a very freaked out expression on Octavia's face.

"You could've bloody told me what you were going to do!"

"Sorry. Do you feel better though?"

Octavia breathed deeply, sending her into a fit of coughs. "As long as I don't do that again, yes, thank you." she said once she recovered.

"Good. Go talk to the guard and see what you can find out."

Octavia plodded over to the guard, feeling like her legs were made of lead. "Excuse me sir," she said whilst trying to disguise how ill she felt, she couldn't help but notice the guard look a little grossed out. I really must look as bad as I feel she thought to herself. "I believe you had a unicorn brought here earlier, pale blue with a silver mane and tail, and likes to refer to herself in the third pony a lot?"

The guard cocked an eyebrow at her. "Yeah, we did. What's it to you though?"

Clearly this guard hadn't read the Canterlot guide to good manners. "Well, you see, she's in my employ and I was hoping that you could see fit to release her if I promise to keep her out of trouble."

"No can do ma'am. She's been charged with casting malicious magic on a member of the public. There's no way she'll be released now before her sentence is carried out."

"Sentence? What sentence?"

The guard tapped the noticeboard next to him, where a number of scraps of paper had been pinned, including one about Trixie. "Since she's been caught using magic on a member of the public," Octavia could almost hear him mean to say earth pony, "she is to be publicly dehorned tomorrow morning."

Octavia managed to keep her cool as he said that, mostly because she was expecting him to say she was to be executed or something similar. At least dehorning was something she could walk away from. "What?" she said, doing her best to sound outraged rather that horrified. "You can't do that! She'll be useless to me after that! And how was that so fast? She's barely been here an hour!"

The guard shrugged. "Fixed penalties for unicorns. And it’s not my problem she can't work ma'am. There are plenty of other unicorns out there, you'll have no problem finding another."

"Ugh, fine. Could you at least arrange to have her effects returned to me, since they are my property."

The guard stretched his neck towards her, scrutinizing her. "Just where exactly you from miss?"

"Neigh Orleans." she replied, saying one of the other two place names she knew of in Mareitania that wasn't Stalliongrad. "Why?"

The guard leaned back into previous look of nonchalance. "No reason, I just don't hear a lot of ponies talk fancy like you do. Guess you ain't used to the weather up here either, seeing how ill you look. Go on in and talk to be pony at the desk, he'll see to you getting your stuff back."

Octavia thanked the guard for his assistance and headed in, wishing for all the world that she could be curled up in her nice soft bed back in Canterlot.

Twilight had watched all of that exchange from the street entrance, doing her best to look like she wasn't doing anything wrong. The only thing that took her attention away from Octavia was the occasional banging coming from the raised platform that was located on the opposite side of the square the guard headquarters was facing.

She couldn't tell exactly what the ponies on the platform were doing. They appeared to be erecting some kind of smaller structure on the platform. The fact that they were erecting it in front of a gallows just made the hollow feeling in her stomach ten times worse. She was still staring at the work ponies when Fleur poked her in the side, indicating that Octavia was coming back, laden with Trixie's cloak and saddlebags. "So? Where is she?" Twilight asked as she relieved Octavia of her burden.

"Locked up tight. She's... uh... she's to be…publicly dehorned tomorrow morning. She'll be released after that."

"What!? They can't do that? That's horrible!"

Fleur sighed wearily and nodded gently. "This is the fixed penalty thing isn't it? Damn I hate this country."

Twilight really didn't want to ask, but did anyway. "H-how will they dehorn her."

Fleur pointed to the platform across the square. "Do you know what a guillotine is?"

Twilight nodded. "I've read about them."

Fleur gestured at the platform. "If that's what I think it is, it’s like a guillotine, but designed to remove a pony’s horn rather than their entire head. Then they press a hot iron to the stump to stop the bleeding. I wouldn't be surprised if it’s actually a poor attempt to stop the horn growing back though."

Twilight now felt really sick. "We have to save her." Fleur snorted and looked away.

"Not that I'm saying we shouldn't rescue her, but that place is a fortress." Octavia said timorously.

"And the cells are magic proof," added Fleur. "Not to mention we're supposed to be keeping a low profile. Daring rescue missions aren't exactly low profile."

"Doesn't matter," Twilight said with an air of determination. "If they do that wrong they could kill her, and frankly I have no desire to see anypony die."

"Then how? How Twilight?" Fleur threw her forelegs into the air in exasperation. Twilight just looked at the floor.

"We could always interfere tomorrow morning." Octavia suggested. "If Twilight can use her magic to stop the guillotine and we fight off the guards, perhaps we could get her out?"

Twilight looked at Fleur, "It could work. If we do it quick we could grab her and run before they even know what hit them."

Fleur rolled her eyes dismissively. "This place will be full of ponies watching the dehorning, as well full of guards. Think we can fight them all off? Especially since Octavia would struggle to fight off a kitten right now."

Twilight stomped angrily. "Fleur, you came here to free this country right? Why does it seem like your giving up already? If you don't want to help us save Trixie, fine, but don't expect us to not try." Twilight turned and started to head off when a hoof on her shoulder stopped her.

"You're right, I am letting this place defeat me. Seems you can take the mare out of Mareitania, but you can't take Mareitania out of the mare. I'll help, but we'll need to come up with a solid plan."

Trixie shivered, but not from the cold. She didn't know what was happening and it wasn't very nice sitting here in her cell, waiting. Some guard ponies had already come in and put her in shackles and had placed a black, metallic cap over most of her horn, which inhibited her magic, and had then left without saying a word.

Points for Equestria, Trixie thought, there you can take over an entire town using a dark magic amulet and barely get a slap on the fetlock. Here I get arrested for throwing a tomato.

Trixie groaned and pressed her back to one of the corners of the cell. Trixie wasn't the most patient of ponies at the best of times, and she had been in here for what seemed like days. Finding a small piece of stone, she lifted a shackled hoof as high as she could and spent a minute or two scratching a mark into the wall, the first line of a tally. If the cell had been better lit she would have seen the cell was full of similar marks, very few of them going above one.

A few minutes later hoofsteps approached her cell door, followed by some jangling and a clank as her cell was unlocked and opened, allowing a couple of guards to enter. "Miss Lulamoon, come with us.

Trixie swallowed and got up, shuffling out of the cell as fast as her manacled limbs would allow. The guards, one in front and one behind, led her up through the guardhouse in complete silence. Trixie wanted them to say something but from the way the rear guard shoved her every time she slowed down she didn't think it'd be a friendly conversation. The only sound she got out of them was a laugh, when they took her to the front door and she asked if they were going to let her go.

She was not prepared for what she saw when they opened the doors and shoved her out hard enough that she fell to her knees. The entire square was full of ponies, all of them jeering and booing, with a few throwing tomatoes for good measure.

The guards hauled her back onto her hooves and led her on a path through the crowd which continued to boo and jeer and throw various food items at her. There were also one or two comments about her parentage that would have made her raise an eyebrow if she weren't too busy being concerned with other things. Mostly the gallows.

"You're going to hang me!?" she screamed in a panic. The guard in front of her chuckled.

"Oh no, you don't have to worry. We ain't gonna kill ya." Trixie sighed in relief. "We're gonna dehorn ya."

"What!?" Trixie turned and tried to run, but the guard behind her quickly grabbed her and set her on her previous path. "You can't do that!"

"Can and am, missy." the guard replied as he led her up the stairs onto the platform, where a big grey stallion wearing a black hood stood waiting next to some kind of contraption. There was also another pony, a skinny, ratty looking brown stallion that definitely had some kind of rodent in his heritage if Trixie was any judge. He was holding a scroll that he unfurled and read.

"Miss Trixie Lulamoon, you stand accused of using magic in a malicious manner against a citizen of Mareitania. The puni-"

He was interrupted by a pale green earth pony mare, which Trixie recognised as the pony she threw that tomato at. "She cursed me she did! Hexed me! I can feel meself withering away because of that witch's dark magic!" She stopped her tirade when a guard stepped forward and pushed her back into the crowd.

"Trixie only threw a tomato at you!"

The pony reading the scroll cleared his throat before continuing. " Miss Primberry, this is the third unicorn you've accused of cursing you, and you're still here. Now, as I was saying, the punishment for which is to have your horn removed, so that you might learn from this to never cast magic on another. Is there anything you might say in your defence?"

"Trixie was framed! It wasn't me! It was my evil twin!"

The ratty stallion rolled his eyes and nodded at his hooded companion, who grabbed Trixie and pushed her onto the bench of the contraption, Trixie screaming and struggling all the while, and stuck her horn through a board with a hole in attached to the upright part, her nose sticking through a gap between the upright and the bench. He then proceeded to strap her down before whispering his own peculiar brand of encouragement to her.

"Make sure you don't try and cast a spell when it 'appens, the magic feedback from the inhibitor will blow yer brains out the back of yer 'ead."

Had Trixie been in a calmer and more thoughtful frame of mind she might have said such a thing was nonsense. As it was all she think about was her imminent dehorning and all her focus was spent on screaming and crying, which was mostly blocked by the cheering of the crowd.

Out of the corner of her eye Trixie could see the ratty stallion raise his hoof, causing the crowd to fall silent. She closed her eyes, a few tears escaping as she did, and clenched her teeth and waited...

And waited...

Twilight rested against the chimney of the building whose roof she currently occupied. As a scientist and a scholar she had no issue with waiting usually, but the idea of sitting up here, waiting for a bunch of ponies to turn up to cut the horn off an innocent unicorn like it was a spectator sport just rubbed her in all the wrong ways.

She looked down at the square, and mentally went over what she was supposed to do when the dehorning happened. Having done that she went back to waiting.

"Ugh. Rainbow Dash must be wearing off on me."

Eventually ponies began to trickle into the square, amongst which Fleur should be lurking somewhere. Twilight spent a few minutes trying to track her down and eventually spotted her to her right, standing with her hood up by the leg of the platform. Confident that Fleur would perform her part of the plan Twilight looked over to the opposite side of the square where a weary looking Octavia caught her eye and gave a small wave, before picking up all their saddlebags and heading off. Because of her poor health Octavia wasn't taking part. Instead she was to take their belongings and wait by the eastern gate out of Stalliongrad, since the plan was to rapidly depart the city once they had saved Trixie.

Finally Twilight noticed a bit of commotion by the doors of the guardhouse to her left and was guiltily relieved that the guards were finally leading Trixie out for her sentence, although she was less pleased at the way the guards pushed the shackled Trixie around, and at the way the crowd jeered and booed. Not everyone joined in though, although most were jeering, there were many other ponies, earth ponies and unicorns alike, that wore expressions varying from malicious glee, to sadness and resignation.

Putting that out of her mind Twilight looked back to the proceedings. There was a small brown stallion reading something that she couldn't hear, not that she needed to hear it to know what it was probably about. She watched as a pale green mare came forward as he spoke, gesturing wildly, and continued to watch as a guard shoved her back into the crowd.

Finally the moment she had been waiting for arrived as Trixie was strapped into the guillotine. They had planned to stop the dehorning at the last possible moment to cause the most confusion for the guards and onlookers, hopefully giving them a better chance at getting away. "Remember Twilight," she said to herself, "telekinesis only."

As the small stallion raised his hoof, the hooded stallion prepared to pull a rope attached to the guillotine. A guard standing nearby pulled a glowing iron out of a brazier next to them, and Twilight hastily wrapped a scarf around her mouth and nose before reaching out with her magical senses, hoping she didn't mess this up.

The stallion's hoof fell and there was a gasp from the crowd as the blade fell an inch or two before stopping. Twilight was able to make out the hooded stallion saying something about the blade being stuck, and smirked as her telekinetic glow spread over the blade and onto the upright. When it had covered the whole of the upright, she wrenched downward, breaking it in half before tearing the blade free and ramming it into the wood of the platform until only the ring the rope was attached to was visible.

As that was happening, Fleur was looking over the edge of the platform, with her horn aglow, as she tried to detach the key ring from one of the guards, and also his knife. She then waited for part two of the plan.

Once the guillotine was destroyed to her extreme satisfaction, Twilight jumped off the roof of the building she was on, into the street next to it, catching herself in her magic before she landed. Grabbing the pile of cobblestones she had spent the previous evening acquiring, she charged out into the square and towards the platform, largely unnoticed by the guards and the spectators who were all milling around in confusion.

Clambering onto the platform she launched her first stone at the nearest guard who yelped and staggered sideways until he fell off the platform with a thump. Just because Trixie had no issues with launching projectiles at ponies heads doesn’t mean she could. She launched more stones at the guards, keeping them distracted from Fleur, who jumped up onto the platform at the back and set about cutting Trixie off the bench using the knife she had acquired.

"You girls have no idea how glad I am to see you!" Trixie exclaimed once she was free, relief dripping off every syllable. She lit her horn and picked the small stallion up and threw him off the platform at the pale green mare. "It was only a bloody tomato!"

The three ponies gathered into a circle as Twilight fended off the guards with the stones, apparently alicorn level telekinesis could throw stones really hard judging by the pained and nervous looks the guards wore. "Twilight! I think it’s time we got out of here!" Fleur shouted once she had finished un-shackling Trixie.

Twilight nodded and launched the remainder of the stones at the guards before picking them up bodily and throwing them off the platform. She then started ripping boards off the platform itself, moving them so they created an arrowhead shaped wall in front of them, about as tall as she was. "Get ready to run Trixie!" she shouted before jumping forward off the platform and running into the crowd, Fleur and Trixie close on her heels.

Using all her not inconsiderable strength, she plowed through the crowd, using the wall to push anypony aside. She veered towards the right, to where Octavia had been earlier, and as soon they were through the crowd and into the street she dumped the wall, and put all her efforts into running for the east gate and to freedom.

Funnily enough, to Twilight's adrenaline addled brain, the escape through the city was remarkably easy, in complete contrast to the effort it had taken to get to escaping.

"I guess we must be going faster than the news of our attack is!" she panted between breaths.

"We'd have been caught long ago if they had pegasi on the force!" Fleur shouted back. "I guess they really didn't think that racial inequality thing through very well!"

"As good as it is their bigotry has helped, Trixie doesn't think they're that far behind!" Trixie flinched as a whistle sounded uncomfortably close to them. "See!"

"Right! This way!" Twilight shouted, running left into an alleyway, before pulling over the stack of boxes and debris she had spent some time stacking the night before. "Octavia's in an old storeroom near the east gate! Once we're there we'll grab our stuff and leave Stalliongrad." Twilight explained to Trixie as they ran. "We can't stay on the run in the city!"

"But what about my stuff? I'll freeze out there!"

"We have your stuff. Octavia got it back."

"Oh. Okay!"

It wasn't much longer until they came to the storeroom that Twilight mentioned, a groggy looking Octavia peering out of the doorway. "Wow Octavia, you look terrible."

"Good to see you too Trixie. I'd hug you but I doubt you want what I got." She passed Trixie her cloak. "I avoided using it as a hanky. You're welcome."

"Come to Trixie my sweet, sexy little cloak." Trixie said as she wrapped it around herself, placing her saddlebags on top.

Octavia hauled herself to her hooves. "I guess it's time to go then?"

Twilight nodded. "Yeah, you don't have to come though. You could always stay here until you're better. The guards aren't after you."

"Going with you sounds a lot better than hanging around in this awful city any longer. That and I'd have no money or anything." Octavia shrugged, "I'll be fine." she said, a blob of snot taking its opportunity to escape her nose.

Twilight looked like she was going to argue, but Fleur stopped her, saying "We need to go now. If the guards guess where we're going they might shut the gate. Then we'd be in real trouble."

"Ok, fine. Try to keep up Octavia. In fact..." Twilight lifted Octavia's bags and placed them over her own. "Right, let’s go."

Twilight peeked around the edge of the doorway and waved the others out once she saw it was clear. It only took a minute to run to the gate, and Twilight was worried to see Octavia looking out of breath already, but they were too late. The guards had closed the gate and were in process of barring it.

"Wait... that's it? They just bar it? Ooh... such a big scary lock Fleur, we’ll never get through that." Trixie teased.

"Oh shut up. It's not like I've been here in the last decade to remember this stuff."

Twilight shushed them and waited as the guards finished barring the gate, and waited further to see if any of them left. Most did, splitting into teams to go in three different directions, unfortunately one of which just happened to be towards them. Thinking quickly she cast a want it, need it spell on the first thing she found, which so happened to be a rusty tin can, and floated it in front of the two guards who quickly became enraptured by it. Waving it back and forth a couple times she then threw it down the street behind her and away from the gate, the two hapless guards eagerly chasing after it.

"Hey, why don't you do that to a giant bomb and stick it in the middle of wherever the Duke and Duchess live? That'd be cool, right?"

"No Trixie, that would not be cool, especially if you got affected by the spell as well. Besides, it’s a safe version I developed. Only works on a few ponies at a time and wears off after a few hours. I learnt my lesson about the full strength version, trust me."

Twilight and the others snuck closer to the gate, until they were about a stone’s throw away. Twilight went to find another object to cast the want it, need it spell on, when a pink glow appeared next to her. A moment later four illusions of themselves ran past the guards, drawing them off.

"Hey you! Get back here!"

They waited a few seconds for the guards to run off. "About time Trixie got to do that."

"Bravo," Fleur congratulated her. "Now I really think we ought to get out of here."

"Agreed." said Twilight as she lifted the bar out of its place and pushed the gates open. "Stalliongrad is the worst."

"Yep," the others agreed as they ran out of the gate and into countryside, not stopping until Stalliongrad was completely out of sight.

Author's Notes:

And that is the end of my already sort of ready chapters, so expect bigger gaps from now on.