A shadow crept across the queen’s destroyed bedchamber, weaving like a snake across the floor, as the magical maelstrom’s light whipped through the air and distorted its presence. A second splotch of black came after it reached the alicorn’s side followed by three others and a final, larger ring. The shadows settled over the ravaged bedspread, circled around the black mare like ethereal sentries.

The black queen examined the shimmering blue armour as it danced around her head, contemplating her next actions with a dark scowl. She glanced over her shoulder towards a spot of shadow in the otherwise brightly illuminated room and her facade slipped, her features softening as the frown lifted into a sad, half-grin. Nightmare lifted the cold metal of her helmet and stared up into its cushioned interior, barely containing the wavering in her aura as she slowly lowered the piece over her horn to rest snugly against her skull. Her body tensed and she spun her head back to stare into the dark cubby, tears welling in the corners of her eyes.

"I am so sorry, love. I wanted to come to you, the moment I felt the fear building in your heart, but I could not. You must believe me." She paused, nodding, and suppressed a shudder before it could work it's way down her spine. "You know that I would never try to abandon you. I had no other choice! These... foa- ...ponies you care so much about would not have survived without my protection."

The queen's head sagged, almost brushing the mane of the filly sleeping beside her, as her sadness began dropping onto the tattered silk beneath her. "You are right, but I have been trying. It is difficult, learning to care for those that have never cared for you, but I have tried just as I was trying to change for you. I- I am uncertain if I can do so without you here, though...."

Nightmare flinched, turning away from the shroud of darkness, and wiped her face with a stray corner of blanket. "Yes, your fate was of my fault alone, but I swear that I did not mean for any of this to happen! You know that I love you overly much to simply leave you to die without a reason of grave import! You are the kingdom, the world, to me, love, and you know this more than anything! How could you even believe such thoughts?"

Silence hung heavy in the room as the lunar alicorn nodded, wiping the moisture off her face and cringing as if shying away from a projectile. "I am aware of... our past. I know what I have done, but you know that I now regret all of it!" She sniffled and took a deep breath before finally looking back into the dark corner of the chamber. "But... was it not you that said our past is what molded and shaped our love?" A warm smile spread across Moon's lips and her shaking stopped as her roiling emotions slowly calmed. "Of course. I have never doubted your words, Love. Sometimes, I presume it is important to be reminded of our shortcomings, Twilight, otherwise we may-"

"Miss Moon?"

The royal alicorn flinched, dropping her hold on the remaining pieces of her armour and spun to stare down at the foal nestled into her side as she wiped the sleep from her eyes. "Yes, child? What do you need?"

"Who are you talking to?"

Nightmare smiled and fanned the remaining moisture from her face as she turned back to the shadows in the room. "I was just speaking with Twilight. There is not any need to worry. You may continue to sleep."

Cherry grinned, following her monarch's gaze with hopes that her fillyfriend would be there with her, but the smile quickly slipped into a confused frown. "But... there's nopony there...."

"What do you imply? Of course she's there, laying beneath her...." Nightmare's words trailed off as her gaze passed over the once-shadowy cubby, now fully illuminated by her spell's shimmering light, and saw only the tattered blanket her once-slave had treasured sitting motionless and flat on a splintered armoire. The mare felt a lump form in her throat and her eyes sting further as the reality of the situation dawned on her. She swallowed, breathing deeply through her nose, and her vision wavered as she stared down at the simple blue linens. From her perch, she could still see traces of her lover's blood staining the fabric from the injuries she had inflicted upon the mare, tinged brown from many months of washing and fading.

Nightmare looked down at the foal, who returned the gaze with visible concern, before turning back to the sheets. Her black aura enveloped the bundle, lifting it from its resting place and drawing it up to her face. She could still smell the byzantium mare on the fabric, a faint hint of the unicorn's sweat mixed with the rosy perfume of their shared bath products, and visions of the pony, wrapped snugly in the blanket's comforting embrace, filled her mind as vividly add her hallucinations had just moments before.

The queen pressed the sheets to her breast, clutching them as tightly to herself as she could as her walls broke down again. She screamed Twilight's name into azure blanket, sobbing uncontrollably as her tears formed dark splotches in the thick cotton. Distantly, she could feel the warmth of another body pressing up against her, squeezing what little bit of her torso it could hold on to, but all her mind could register was the dark hole recently torn from her heart and the tender scab that had just formed ripped viciously away.

For what seemed like hours, the lunar alicorn cried on the bed, shivering in the earth pony filly's embrace. Her body felt heavy, as if weighed down by an invisible force, her resolve to fight trampled by her stampeding emotions. She could hear a distant explosion, a dull, almost imperceptible boom, echo through the castle and felt the shock on her magic, but it did not register in her mind even as more concussions shook her spell's hold. Why, Twilight? Why do you listen to me? Why do you always sacrifice yourself for my benefit when I have done nothing for yours? You are much too intelligent for it to be foalish stupidity, so.... Why?

"Because you need me to. Everything I have done for you is from my love for you."

Nightmare's head jerked up to stare at the lavender apparition at her hooves, garbed in the silky dress long since discarded and chained by the ethereal shackles from her time in servitude. The queen's mouth hung open, starting at the mare's pristine coat, unblemished by any of the cuts, bruises, and scars she had accrued under the alicorn's rule. "Twilight, I.... How do you look...?"

"Don't you remember how I was before our feelings came to fruition? It has been quite some time, I guess." The unicorn giggled and stood from her testing place, moving awkwardly due to the short chains on the cuffs. "This is how I was before all of this started, before everything changed, and how I would have been had I not fallen for you. Literally and figuratively."

"I am so sorry, My Twilight. I did not want this. All that I had ever asked for was the respect and love of my subjects, yet fear and hatred was all that I received. It is all deserved now, I have done much to warrant such feelings in my subjects, but this war and your sacrifice was not...." The lunar monarch turned away as Twilight nuzzled under her chin, barely making contact before being brushed off. "How can you comfort the mare that sent you to your death? Do you secretly enjoy the torment it causes me?"

A sad smile spread across the unicorn's lavender lips as she settled up against the collapsed bed frame. "We just went over this, didn't we? I comfort you because you need it, because it's what you want, and because I love you. Do I need any other reason?" Twilight chuckled, her soft laughter echoing in the black mare's mind. "You're always overthinking things, Nightmare. You want ponies to love you, but you don't just accept the love of those that do, past or present, because you don't think that you've done anything to deserve it."

"But I have not. Why should you love me when I have caused you naught but suffering?"

She muffled her words into the soft, blue blanket, but the purple mare simply smiled and rubbed her face up against Nightmare's neck. "I'm not sure, Nightmare, but you love me, right?"

Queen Moon nodded and stared into Twilight's amethyst eyes. "I do, love. I do..., but what does it matter now?" Her eyes darkened as she peered down at the unicorn's sweetly smiling face. "You are not real, are you?"

The apparition shook her head, but kept it resting against the alicorn's neck, transferring no heat between the two. "You already know that answer, don't you?"

"It is apparent. Twilight would not call me Nightmare. Not in private. And there is no turning back of the clock. The damage done to my beloved's body is irreversible. However wonderful it would be to return her to her former self, it is impossible." Nightmare pulled back, staring deep into the depths of her hallucination's irises. "You are not real, no matter how much I would wish it to be so, but why are you here? Why must you torment me with your presence?"

The unicorn loosed a haunting giggle, the sound echoing quietly through the room, and shrugged. "Why am I here?"

A light nudging on the alicorn's side startled her out of her reverie, drawing a snarl from her lips as Twilight's form dissipated into nothingness in front of her. She spun to her intruder, a furious glare on her face, only to lock eyes with a teary-eyed Cherry Tart who shrunk away from her sight. The night queen's hard gaze slipped, softening into a solemn frown as she carefully scooped the terrified filly into her embrace. "I any sorry, little one. I did not mean to scare you.... I was just... distracted...." The foal began to calm in her embrace, her heavy quaking slowing to just a light tremble. "What did you need?"

"I was scared. The booms are happening again, but your eyes were all dark and you didn't say anything and then you growled at me." Cherry wiped her face off on Nightmare's black coat, rubbing her tears into the black fur of her chest and making hair stick up at odd angles. "Make them stop please. Moonie would make them stop."

A resounding boom thundered through the black castle as if to punctuate the foal's plea, the resulting concussive blast raining bits of obsidian down from the rafters. Another growl rumbled in the queen's throat, this time directed at the weakening stone and those causing its deterioration. "You are right, Cherry Tart. This pathetic attempt to breach my immovable might needs come to its conclusion, but first I require your assistance. Find Lord Jahurl and have him gather our armies beyond the north wall. Inform him that, come noon, we will unleash our fury upon the foals that think us weak cattle born only to fill their stomachs! Tell him that tonight we shall unleash High Tartarus upon our foes and rain moonfire down to smite any that oppose us!" Nightmare settled onto the cracked floor, her hooves clacking noisily on the stone, and turned back to Cherry with a wide, wicked smile. "Thank you, Child. You comforted me when most I needed it and for that I will repay you. I will return Moon Beam and Commander Horizons to us no matter the cost. That, I promise."

"O-okay. I can do that, I think. Y-you're gonna keep me safe, right? Nothing will hurt me?"

"You are under my protection and so you shall remain. I swore to the high commander that I would ensure your safety and I intend to keep that promise." She drew a hoof across the young pony's face, giving her as comforting a smile as she could muster. "I understand how frightening all of this may be, but you must show courage. All will be well and as it was before it all began."

Cherry leaned into the touch, feeling her spirits brighten even with such a small gesture, and bowed her head slightly. "I- I can do it. He's the big thing you were talking to, right? With two horns?" Nightmare simply nodded and gently nudged the foal towards the door with a flash of telekinesis. "Uhm.... I have a question. Wh-what are you g-gonna do?"

The umbral monarch merely smiled and turned toward the far wall, her horn aglow with her dual magicks. "If you wish to see, child, then join the congregation below and experience the true majesty of your queen."

The winter-frosted ground crunched under the hooves of minotaur and pony alive as they shuffled into their ranks, filling in behind and beside one another as their unit leaders directed them. They shivered in the chill wind, their padded armour only providing limited protection against the biting cold, but they stood as ordered, facing the fearful obsidian palace with grim determination. At the head of the ranks stood the appointed captains, carefully lining their units in file while the minotaur lord directed his own people.

From below the legs of her temporary guardian maidservant, Cherry watched the proceedings in awe, staring wide-eyed at the minotaurs as they marched in near perfect unison. "It's pretty cool, huh? How do ya think they move on two legs with such big bodies?"

The servant mare above her shivered in the cold air, her thin garments providing little protection against the chill compared to the thick blanket wrapped around the foal as a makeshift coat, and shook her head. "I d-don't know. It's freaky if you ask me."

"That's not a nice thing to say, Miss. Some of our kind are mostly normal." The pegasus yelped and cowered under the shadow of the minotaur that had snuck up upon her, eliciting a hearty chuckle from the man. "No need to be scared. We aren't barbarians like most griffons and wild creatures. We know better than to let misinformed judgement get under our skin."

"M-my apologies, S-sir. I didn't mean nothing by it. It's j-just quite weird."

"There's no need to apologize, girl. We know that there is much that is not known to most ponies. A lot has happened over the past centuries and many things have been kept from the general equine public. Until recently, most ponies would not have even known what a griffon or a minotaur is." A small grin stretched across his muzzle as he reached down and ruffled the mare's mane. "And we don't hold it against ya, either. What your princess did for you was something most nations wish they could ask of their own leaders.

"The times have changed now, though, and you all must finally experience the tragedy of war. It is a terrible mistress, one that no people should ever have to suffer under and yet she is as unavoidable as death himself." Jahurl smiled down at the two ponies before rising to his full, massive height and turning to the extensive columns and rows of both minotaurs and ponies, all of the squeezing in under the gargantuan expanse of the queen's pitch-black dome. "You're a brave filly, Miss Tart, and I'm sure that everything will turn out perfectly fine. I have faith that the queen will guide us through the night to win back all that we've lost."

Cherry beamed, watching as the final masses of soldiers filed into their places to stand at attention with their backs to the magical barrier, equally intrigued by their near-unison marching as she was about what the queen had planned. "Mister Giant! Do you know what Mi- Queen Moon is going to do?"

The minotaur lord chuckled softly and shook his head. "I don't, Cherry, but I'm sure it'll be quite the spectacle to behold." Jahurl crouched down and leaned over the filly only to lift her up onto his shoulder. "Also, there's no need to call me mister. Just Giant is fine, although Jahurl would be preferred." Cherry giggled into his ear as he held her in place, snickering comically at his own joke before turning to the trembling maid. "As for you, Miss. I'll keep an eye on the filly if you don't want to stay. You're not dressed for the cold, after all. No need for you to freeze your little flank off with the rest of us."

The mare nodded shakily, her face already tinged red from the nip of the cold, and departed without another word, leaving the foal and foreign ruler alone at the forefront of the combined armies. Behind them, the cacophony caused by the marching of iron-clad hooves and the squad leaders' speed commands finally dwindled down to a dull roar and was only occasionally stirred back up by the sound of griffon explosives being detonated on the onyx force field. Bright flashes, dulled by the black filter of the magical walls, played across the vast expanse, illuminating the dimly lit wasteland outside the castle, yet none of the beings gathered paid the display any need.

All attention turned to the obsidian walls at the peak of the castle as they glowed an ethereal blue, the glossy surface undulating as if it was a mass of eels in a mating pool. With agonizing slowness, a large section of the volcanic stone bulged out from the rest of the palace's face, bubbling and pulsating, until the black mass shattered. The ponies and minotaurs below screamed, trying to break formation in their panic to flee for their lives as their imaginations ran wild with images of being impaled and crushed under the hulking shards, but they were packed too tightly in the limited spacing to escape. As a direct contrast to the terror-stricken masses behind them, Cherry and Jahurl merely watched the pieces of obsidian burst out into the air, maintaining a face of calm composure, despite the filly's now-trembling body, and were the first to bow as the wall's fragments were reeled back in to the new hole to form an exquisite balcony that held the lunar queen as she stepped out into her night. One by one, the soldiers calmed as they realized that their expected deaths weren't coming and their panic shifted their focus into their own salutes and acts of respectful humility until every heart was crossed and mane brushing the dirt.

Nightmare's eyes scanned the congregation, drinking in her subjects' worship, forced out otherwise, until she was certain that all attention was on her before her horn blazed with its black aura. "Fillies and Gentlecolts, soldiers of Equestria, and peoples of Valtaura and Grandimino alike! These past weeks and months we have cowered under the onslaught of Griffonian sieges, trembled in our fortress like foals in fear of the Headless Horse, and lost far too many to the unforgiving barbarians from the north! Lives have been taken, our children and loved ones stolen, and terror has been drilled into our hearts by their promises of death and slavery and we've given in to their tactics!

"But no longer! I have grown tired of keeping you safe under my magical ramparts, of letting you nurse your fear into a state of incompetence! Would you allow these savages, these ruthless murderers bent on destroying all that is precious to our nation, control your lives and serve you up as cattle for the rest of eternity!?" She glared down at the stunned masses far before her, the corner of her mouth lifting in a confident smirk as the ponies began talking amongst themselves, and stomped her hoof, the deafening boom pulling their eyes back up to her. "Tonight, I shall dispel my shield! Tonight, I shall allow those that have tested my power in! Tonight, we shall show just how powerful we ponies of Equestria can be when threatened!

"Tonight, we shall end the Griffonians' siege and drive them from our home. Let tonight be the first of many that we take to the fields of war to destroy those that took our family from us and rend their country asunder!"

Resounding cheers rose to the queen's lofty balcony as the soldiers chanted their anger, raising their voices in righteous fury against the looming Griffonian threat. Jahurl beamed as his own countrymen and women joined in, adding their own cries to the cacophony, and bowed one last time to the mare high above. It seems you've finally learned what it takes to rule a country, lass.

The black mare smiled down at her subjects, patiently waiting out their cries for war and rallying cheers. "Now! Many of you will not survive the night, a terrible consequence to secure your families' and nation's freedom, so take this time to rest and prepare! Say your farewells to those that you wish, but know that any sacrifice you make for us tonight will be remembered forever! Be prepared for we strike at midnight!"

Author's Notes:

Author's Notes: Here we go, this one came out quite a bit faster than my previous few installments. Not really sure why, exactly, but still! Anyway, imagine the situation all of these poor peoples are in. Constant bombing (where the fuck do they get all that black powder!?) and relentless mental terror of the time that the shields fall. Who else but nightmare could lead them all to victory? Who says that they’re even gonna win? Oh well, you don’t get to know either way till the next chapter. Hope you enjoyed the little bit of drama in this one, ‘cause there will be more.

Peppy out~!