The Sun began to dip in the sky, heading towards the Western horizon.

The Earthbreakers had sung their song for hours after I returned from our parlay, but they finally fell quiet as it became obvious we weren't rising to the goading. But that didn't stop me from glaring towards the Fortress, commiting every dip and rise in the terrain to memory.

I was left alone for the most part. Alone with the fire I kept burning all day. The pile of ash around the ad hoc firepit was rather considerable.

There was a commotion off to my right.

Somepony would handle it I was certain.

But to my surrpise, Captain Comet came to me.

"General." He greeted.

"Captain." I nodded, still looking at the distant fortress, now partially hidden by its own shadow as the Sun plummeted.

"We found one." he simply stated.

I turned.

The stallion was leading a pair of Pegasi soldiers, between them was another, scrawny, Earth Pony stallion.

"I didn't do anything wrong! Let me go!" he shrieked, struggling.

The Pegasi kept him still.

"He was tying this to a pigeon's leg." Comet produced a scroll and held it out for me. I accepted it and rolled it open.

Tá siad ag teacht anocht tar éis luí na gréine.

They are coming tonight after sunset.

I threw the scroll into my fire and examined the captured stallion.

"Do you have anything else to say for yourself?" I asked.

"Tell these Ponies to let me go! I was searching the area for anything to forage!" he jerked in their grasp.

"I see." I coldly stated. "It's a shame then, that I can read old Earth Pony."

The Stallion's eyes widened.

"Wait no! Please! Hear me out!" he struggled.

"Lock him in a stockade." I told the two soldiers. "If anypony tries to free him, lock them up too." I turned to look the spy in the face. "At sunrise, hang him and any you catch by the neck until they're all dead."

"Yes Commander." The two Pegasi nodded.

"What?! No! You can't do this! You heartless bitch!" the spy started to fail wildly as the two dragged him away.

"Continue searching outside the camp. News of our incursion must not reach their ears." I said, turning towards Comet.

"Yes Ma'am." He bowed slightly, backing away and leaving me alone with my thoughts.

'Heartless'...

I looked down at my hooves.

Was that what Platinum had meant? When she had told me that the 'Moon Mark' isn't a mark, but how I acted.

Was I heartless?

I put a hoof over my chest, feeling the steady beat of the warm organ inside.

I didn't feel heartless... I had thoughts and feelings like anypony else.

But then again... That Pony was going to die because of me. He didn't necessarily need to, if I won here he likely would have nopony to tell the secrets I wanted kept secret. But yet, I had ordered him to be hanged.

And I didn't feel bad about it.

I knew why I was here. I knew why Casúrdomhain, Pegasopolis, and Unicornia needed to fall. And he supposedly did too. Or at least... He should've.

What sort of Pony can see a threat like the Windegos and the threat of Eternal Winter, and not work to prevent it? Why did he see Eternal Winter and presume that one of the guilty culprits needed to be saved? How exactly would such a Pony benefit from eternal snow and ice?

I turned back to glare at Casúrdomhain.

So no... I wasn't the heartless one here. I wasn't the one sacrificing innocent Ponies to improve my standing with the party guilty of bringing about the undoing of us all.

Maybe it's Ponies without a Moon Mark that are the strange ones... Nothing they did made sense.

Movement by the fortress drew my attention. They looked to be breaking formation, setting up a camp outside their own keep with the onset of night.

My frown deepened.

The sheer arrogance! If they were worried, they would've pulled back behind their walls. But instead, they believed, perhaps rightly, that their massed ranks of Knights would be enough to break any invader.

I may be inexperienced, but I refused to be a fool.

It suddenly struck me just how weird of a situation I was in. Ordering Ponies about was still a novel experience to me. But I had apparently gotten comfortable enough to just order a spy to be executed!

A shiver ran down my spine.

I was used to Ponies treating me like I was invisible, or only acknowledging me because they had to… But to have Ponies listening and obeying my every word? It was… Liberating in a sense. Was this what it was like to not be Moon-Marked? To be a normal Pony? Or was this just what it was like to be respected by somepony other than Tia?

It was strange.

But it was a strange that I wasn’t entirely sure I disliked.

Which in on itself was strange.

I shook my head, clearing my thoughts.

I needed to focus on the task before me. The Earthbreakers wouldn’t fight fair in an open contest, so I wasn’t going to either.

I needed all of my wits about me if I were to succeed.

Gold Note approached from around a tent.

"General? I have those banners you requested." He informed.

"Excellent. May I?" I asked, gesturing at the rolled up cloth in his hooves.

"A-are you sure Ma'am? The design you had..." he protested.

"I'm certain." I nodded, taking the roll of fabric from his grasp.

I unrolled it.

I smiled.

"Perfect." I told him, rolling the fabric back up and tucking it in my saddlebags. "Have more of them brought here and given to the band of Ponies I'm taking with me."

"I must protest! Surely this is a step too-"

"Gold Note." I interrupted. "It's fine."

He looked like he wanted to protest more, but really didn't have any real standing to do so.

"I'm telling you this is a mistake." he attempted.

"Noted. If you see Rock Garden, tell her to bring her volunteers here. I'll be waiting." I dismissed.

Gold Note narrowed his eyes.

"Of course General." he all but growled, before turning on his hoof and haughtily marching away.

He may not like it, but neither would the Earthbreakers, and that was the important thing.

I sat down and tended to my fire.

Was there anything else I needed to do? Perhaps don a breastplate?

I chewed my lip in thought.

No, with what I had in mind I would need stealth and speed above protection.

It was a short while later, a messenger came with a bundle of more rolls of cloth. The same color as the one Gold Note had given me.

"Was told to give these to you." the mare stated.

"Thank you Miss" I nodded. "That will be all for me."

I waited as the mare left.

Ponies began to gather around me as the Sun kissed the horizon.

There were about fifty of them. Of various tribes and colors, but they all looked grim enough for the task I had for them. I recognized only Rock Garden.

I waved the Ponies over to tell them the plan.

"Here, take these." I passed them the rolled up fabrics that had been left by the messenger. "Put them in your bag, just make sure they're secure." One by one, they all took a roll and sequestered it on their person.

I continued.

“Rub ash and dirt into your coats and over your weapons and armor, to dull your coats and hide any gleam off the metal.” I told the Ponies as they gathered in a ring around my still flickering fire. Several Ponies reached down and grabbed a hooful, and began to rub themselves down.

I lifted a nearby stick that had been too small for the fire and started drawing in the dirt.

“This is their front line, this is the moat, this is the bridge and this is the keep itself.” I gestured at three lines I had drawn, between the last two I drew another two lines connecting the two, I then carved a waving line between the spaces representing the camp and the keep. ”This is where we are currently.” I drew a circle along the curve and put an ‘x’ in the middle.

“When it gets dark enough, you all are going to hide behind the rocky ridge over here.” I drew a circle off to the side, closer to the lines then the circled ‘x’. “While you’re doing that, I’m going to make an opening in their Watchponies.” I drew an arrow leading from the ‘x’ to the lines.

“When I give the signal, I’ll probably wave a torch around or something, you all are going to sneak through the opening I make. Then, remaining as quiet as you can, kill every Earthbreaker you can.” I drew an arrow between the lines. “The goal, is to make it to the gatehouse.” I drew two short lines across the line that represented the wall. “As soon as we have Ponies in the gatehouse, the force is going to split up, half to finish off the camp, and half to sabotage the gate so it remains open until morning. Which the rest of the army is going to march through when the Sun rises in the morning.” I drew one last arrow across the camp. “Any questions?”

“Sounds simple enough.”

“Can’t complain.”

“What do we do if somepony raises the alarm?”

“Get out as quickly as you can.” I answered “If that’s not possible, start burning whatever you see. With luck, that will give you enough of a distraction to escape. Anything else?”

This time nopony said anything.

“Good. Rock Garden?" I called to the mare.

"Y-Yes?" she asked.

"You're to stay here, pass word amongst the other Captains to look for different banners over the Gate house. They'll know it when they see it. Attack as the Sunrises if you do. If you don't, talk to Clover. She'll know what to do." I turned away from the mare. "The rest of you? Go get into position. Don’t worry about me, my coat is the darkest here, I’ll be the hardest to spot.” I said.

It was true, while most of the coats were purples or blues, even a pink, mine was by far the darkest and least visible.

The other Ponies nodded, and slowly meandered into the gloom cast by the fading light of sunset.

Out of sight.

I found myself releasing a breathe I hadn’t realized I had been holding.

In the dimming light, I followed my own advice and rubbed myself down with the ash I had been making all day. Double checking to make sure none of the metal I had on my person was gleaming in the firelight.

It wasn't.

Slowly, the pale pink light of the crescent Moon rose in the East.

Finally the time had come.

I stood up and stretched.

By now, the volunteers would be in position. I just had to make the opening.

I extinguished the fire and crept along the ridge, hiding my profile from the Fortress as I started my infiltration.

Once my view of Casúrdomhain was obscured, I trotted over the ridge and began my long walk towards the fortress city.

The red Moon rose higher, casting the ground in a rather bright glow, but its reddish tint sapped any color the land might’ve had away, making me the same dismal gray that the rocks and stones underneath were. The only exception was the brightness of many campfires behind me, and the glow around the Earthbreaker’s encampment.

I slowed to a crawl, even getting on my belly as I crept forward, pretending to be just another boulder if a watchponies eyes slid over me. Slow enough to not appear to move much, but still enough to cover ground before dawn tinted the East horizon.

I finally stopped as I got within a stone’s throw of the front line.

Sentries had been placed evenly across the whole line, peering outward into the dim darkness that was only illuminated by the pink Moon.

I spotted a prime target, adequately close to the ridge and boulder field I had told my Ponies to hide in, but relatively young enough to doze off occasionally.

He was perfect.

I lightly stalked across the open ground, still so carefully slow as to not be immediately noticeable.

I stopped within merely five Pony lengths away from the guard, who I could see from my position that he was dozing softly.

Stars above… I was younger than he was…

Yet here I was, practically in charge of a whole army, and he was merely on watch.

It was sobering… In a way.

Perhaps it would’ve been my fate, to be a mere footsoldier in some army, drawing one of the short straws to stand watch through the night, had I not raised a sword to the Windegos.

But I had. And he had not.

Perhaps he had the excuse of not being present, but that didn't change the fact that he did not.

I took a breath, calming my nerves.

It was time.

And that's it for this episode!

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