//------------------------------//
// Chapter 16 
// Story: Shadows Watching 
// by SaltyJustice 
//------------------------------//

	Before me, as before, stood the statue of Princess Amoria, shimmering in the other sight, made of a million sparks of light.  I finally felt at peace with myself, finally understood everything and finally had laid to rest all my doubts and indecisions.
I opened my real eyes, to see the sad remains of the statue, molded with plaster and stone.  The histories missed so much, it was funny to see all the truly important details in the recordings we make laid bare for what they are.  History talks of kings and emperors and princesses, it forgets the ponies who live each day as best as they can, theirs being the only important thing.  So profound, yet so mundane.
I turned around to see Tia, standing behind me in all her glory.  Her face was like the sun, shining over mine as she smiled broadly at me.
"Tia?  Is that you?" I asked her, looking up.  She was much taller than me, she always had been a tall pony but living as a teenager put me at a severe disadvantage.
"Welcome back Amoria," she said, leaning down to place her neck over mine.  The embrace felt good, it was good to be back, sort of.  I pushed her away after a moment.
"Please, call me Cadence," I said.
"Hah, that's right, isn't it?  I better get used to calling you that," she said, her laugh a faint reminder of 'Victoria', one of her many alter-egos.
No doubt most of the guards had been in on her little scheme.  Sometimes I thought she manipulated others simply for the fun of it, then again, perhaps that's what she did to pass the time.  Pranks never get old, and the more difficult, the more exciting.
Many of my memories remained dark.  They would come back to me in time, or when I needed them, yet so many were hidden from me.  I felt I needed to give Celestia a whack, so I did.  I smacked her with my hoof lightly on the chest.
"Why did you bring me back so early?  Can't a girl enjoy some innocence?  Gah!" my head started to hurt suddenly, I winced in the pain.  Celestia stepped back and looked out through the door at the party still going on outside.
"I'm sorry, and I know it hurts.  Please understand that I can't keep going without you," she said, turning back to me.  "I'm desperate."
"Ooh, I forgot.  The mighty Princess Celestia has a soft side.  Consoling you isn't worth the headaches," I said, my skull still reporting the pain from within.
"It's not that, I'd never put you through this for something so trivial," she said.  Tia had a way of considering everything before acting, always doing her best to make sure everypony was accounted for.  Surely she had a good reason.
"You were there, the seals are weakening.  They're going to come back soon," she said.  They.  The faceless, black invaders made of terror and doubt.  They needed no further explanation.
"Was that the thing I saw, that big thing I ran from?" I asked.  My mind was still dark, it'd take time to remember everything, Tia's explanations would do for now.
She nodded.  "They're not at full strength yet, they don't even have real bodies, but they're getting stronger.  It's all going to come to a head, and very soon, I think,"  she said.
"How soon is soon?  Don't you have a plan?" I asked.  I was trying to navigate this conversation with only half of my head working.
"Amori - Cadence, haven't you noticed?  The plan is just out there," she said, pointing out the door.  I walked to the door and followed her lead, she was pointing at a little purple filly who was chatting with her brother.  She had his oversized helmet on her head, struggling to hold it up and pose in a salute.
It took me a few seconds to process what it meant.
"You think Twilight is the one?" I asked her in shock.
"I know this is a lot to take in, so please bear with me for a little longer, okay?" she asked of me.  I was answering questions without fully understanding them now, making observations I couldn't quite grasp.  Usually it was after I had come of age that I would remember who I was, when I was ready to resume my duties.  Sometimes, something would trigger it early, and I would suffer under the burdens until I was ready.  This time, Celestia had found me and deliberately set the process off.  I should have been furious with her, yet she had a good reason.  That reason was Twilight.
Such an unassuming little filly.  She was so thoroughly in touch with magic she was not even aware of it, practically a bomb waiting to go off.  Long ago, in a different time and in a different place, we three, Celestia, Luna, and I, had given almost everything and lost almost everyone to defeat an evil which should never have been.
Yet, we refused to give everything and everyone.  We faltered, we blamed ourselves, and we left our task incomplete.  Instead of being destroyed, we left the evil bound, so far below the earth in a forgotten place, bound with only shadows watching until the end of time.  So we had thought.  And now that evil was returning, and our only plan was to wait and hope that a hero would come who would not falter where we had and finish what we had started ten thousand years ago.
That hero, in our approximation, was Twilight.  A being made of almost pure magic, given physical form.  She stood with one hoof in the magical realm at all times, a feat which even I could only perform with great concentration.  Yet, for all her might, she was vulnerable if she did not know how to use it.  It would require study and discipline just to contain her powers, much less unleash them.  We had to protect her until she was ready.
"And so, I'm going to leave you as her foalsitter for a little longer, okay?' Celestia had been talking this whole time.  I already knew where this was going.
"Then, this fall, you'll just happen to suggest to her mom that she should enroll in my magic school.  I'll be able to keep watch over her from there," she said.
"And what of me?  What will I do then?"  I asked.
"You'll have to shadow her whenever she goes out, don't let her know you're there.  It's best if she lives a normal life until it's time.  It will be a lot, I know, but you're the only one I can count on," she said.
"And what of me?  I have parents, friends, I have a life!" I protested.  This was worse than arguing with mom and dad about privileges.
"Tch, I bet you said the same thing about that foalsitting job.  It worked out for the best, right?"
Foalsitting job?
"Tia, just how much spying on me have you been doing?" I asked, taking a firm tone.
"I just did some research, that's all!" she said, trying to look innocent.  That's a dead giveaway she was anything but.
"Oh, so you're the one who switched my assignment.  Are you also the one who just happened to get Twilight's mom to work late and just so happened to be shopping for chocolates that night?"  I demanded, piecing it together as I went.
"Okay, that one, yes.  But I really do go there for chocolates, they're to die for, see?"  she said, pointing at the snacks table.  The same chocolates I had seen her buying a few nights previous were in a pyramid on the table, with a number of ponies standing around it all agreeing with one another about something.
Why can't anypony just be straight with me?
Celestia sighed.  "Look, I'm sorry about all this.  I had to be sure it was Twilight, and what better way than to put you in as her foalsitter?  That couldn't have turned out better if I had planned it," she said.
Celestia was no doubt referring to the summer sun festival, after which my life had started to take on some curious turns.  In retrospect, that had her hoofprints all over it.  Only Celestia could make subtlety require manipulation of entire government agencies.
"All right, enough stalling, it's time for the big reveal,"  Celestia said, as she prepared to open the doors.
"Wait, I thought we were going to be moving the statue out," I said.  It looked fairly incomplete, I wondered if it would impress anypony.
"Don't be silly.  I told everypony that I'd be revealing Princess Amoria, and that's just what I intend to do," she said with a wry smile.
"All right all right," I said.  Celestia had probably made some clever invitation which implied a statue or artifact would be revealed, but a careful reading of the language would indicate nothing of the sort.  Then she would go to sleep laughing at her own cleverness.  Some things never change.
"I have one condition first," I said, preparing to be gawked at by hundreds of aristocrats.
"Name it," she said, her hoof on the door.
"When you introduce me," I said, holding my hoof up, "call me Princess Cadence".