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Duties

by Hiver

Chapter 7

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Chapter 7

I was flipping through the book of notes as I walked through the hallway, a snowstorm howling outside.

With the meeting over, I’ll be able to get some writing done later. The book was soon going to be done enough to send over to Twilight for editing.

Swashbuckling adventure with skyships and floating islands. Fully original work which was exciting.

I think it was pretty good, but that’s for other ponies to decide really.

Kind of looking forward to getting it back from Twilight once I send it and then having to rewrite the entire thing from the ground up.

Girl was scary good at finding errors, both grammatical and story mistakes. The fact that she was willing to be paid in being the first one reading a brand-new book was just icing.

Not that I didn’t make sure to get my best friend's marefriend an extra nice Hearth's Warming gift.

The question is what to write next.

How to tame your alicorn?

Nah, Luna would kill me. Grinning at that thought, I pushed the door open and entered the dining room, “Evening, Sunshine.”

“Evening, Page,” she said and looked up from her dinner, “Glad you could join me.”

“Love you too,” I said and sunk down on one of the pillows by the table.

She looked at me for a second and I flicked my ears before I frowned, “Stop that.”

“Stop what?”

“Wondering if I’m okay after going into the changeling hive and wondering if you should blame Skitter for it,” I said, “I get enough of that from Luna. My choice, I did it.”

Celestia smiled a bit and shifted her wings, “That’s not it. I have confidence that you can handle yourself and you are the best equipped to handle changelings out of of all of us.”.

“Oh.”

“I was actually wondering how you were feeling.”

“…Better,” I admitted, “Bit tired, but I’ll be mostly back to normal tomorrow,” before I looked at her in return.

Her wings were moving slightly, ears perked up, her coat almost seemed to have an extra shine to it.

“Something has you excited,” I commented, “Clear Skies coming to visit?”

Celestia nodded happily as my food arrived. Ooh, baked potato.

I waited until the servant was out of the room before I smirked at her, “Tomorrow? I’ll have time to buy some earmuffs then.”

“Why, do we make things hard for you?”

“Well, difficult to sleep if anything else,” I countered and poked my meal.

She gave me a dubious look, “Your tower is on the other side of the castle from mine.”

“Oh, I know,” I said with a smirk, “And so does most of Canterlot.”

That actually got a small blush from the alicorn along with a small glare.

Score.

Better enjoy my victory while I could, it was rare I got one over either of the sisters, more so with Celestia because I couldn’t just cheat and tickle her until she surrendered.

Deciding to be the mature one, she stuck her tongue out at me before returning to her dinner, “So, how are things going with your guard?” she asked after a moment, giving me the round.

“Pretty well, actually,” I told her and had some extra butter on my stuffed potato, “We talked about deployment to guard positions at the Night side of the castle today and finally picked a name.”

“Oh?”

“Ended up with the Dream Legion,” I shrugged, “Names are difficult.”

Not that twenty-five ponies were much of a legion. But I had to pick something, or they would!

Celestia nodded in agreement, “And their abilities?”

“Well, they are well drilled and practiced,” I said before I admitted, “But they aren’t really tested. But I think I’d put them up against your guard in equal numbers.”

She looked thoughtful as she chewed on a piece of tomato before she smiled at me, “Willing to put that to the test?”

I frowned at her, “How do you mean? Some sort of wargame?”

Celestia nodded, “We decide on an objective, your guard tries to complete it and my guard tries to stop them.”

That sounded interesting and would let them see if their new tactics were useful or not against an experienced force. Safely too.

“Sounds good. What’s the objective?”

She smiled, “How about… retrieving an item placed in the throne room? Start in one week and it will last for a week.”

I nodded in agreement, “They get the objective and we win. The Solar Guard keeps them from it and they win.”

Celestia nodded and eyed me for a second, “How about we raise the stakes a bit?”

“What do you have in mind, Sunshine?”

“We both join our forces in the exercise and we put a bet on the line.”

This was a massive fucking trap and even a blind pony would have been able to see it from the fricking moon!

What to do… no way in hell I’m backing down from her!

“Sounds good,” I agreed, “What’s the terms?”

Celestia looked thoughtful before she shrugged her wings and sipped her water, “Not sure. We can figure that out later.”

Yep. She had something planned.

“Nothing that involves me taking over your job,” I pointed out, shifting my wings, “And a change of objective. I get on the throne, I win.”

“We capture you, we win.”

“Deal.”

We watched each other across the table for a moment before she spoke up again, “No asking Twilight, Cadence or my sister for help.”

“Same for you.”

“Agreed.”

How to go about this… hmm…

First of all, psychological warfare.

“So…” I started, “What’s your measurements? No, wait, never mind… Rarity likely has them on file.”

She frowned a bit at me, “How so?”

“I mean, she’s likely going to need at least a couple of days of warning before my victory to whip up a maid uniform that’ll fit you. Don’t think they have your size as standard.”

She smirked, “What make you think I don’t have one already?”

I blinked at her in surprise. Wow.

Okay, score to her.


Author's Note

AN// Big thanks to FPSCanarussia for betaing this section.

Next Chapter: Chapter 8 Estimated time remaining: 2 Hours, 15 Minutes
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