The evening was a multicolored blur to Celestia. She remembered meeting dozens of nobles who congratulated her, most of whom would not have deigned to notice her only a day before. Silverlock seemed genuine enough, gruff and insensitive but utterly himself, when he spoke of admiring how she had "blasted the bloody blighters to smithereens." She shuddered at the memory of the battlefield. Don't think about it. Compartmentalize. That's what her father had suggested. Easy enough to say.
She rolled in the bed and wrapped the blankets around her body. It was cold, even in the castle's guestrooms.
"Hey! Gimme those!" The blankets whipped off her body and she felt the mattress bounce. She rolled over and was face to face with her grinning coltfriend.
"Swirly, we can conserve heat better if we stay together under the blanket." His eyes glittered as he threw the covers over both of them and snuggled up close to her. She sighed, placing a foreleg over him and drinking in his warmth.
"Maybe we should present that as a recommendation to the Academy. All ponies will be required to sleep in one pile under a giant blanket." He waggled his eyebrows, looking up at her.
Celestia giggled. "You know, lover, there are even better was to generate heat."
"You don't say?" He leaned forward to kiss her on the lips, then slowly worked his way down her neck. She reflected that the one thing that in particular was unfortunate about their mismatched scale was that he could not kiss her on the lips while making love to her. Can't have everything, she thought, as she lay back and closed her eyes.
______
"No Starswirl, we are not going to propose mandatory, heat-generating orgies to the Academy, you ridiculous thing!" She stroked his mane as his beard tickled her chest, their love-sweat already cooling on their bodies.
"Why not? It's the best idea yet! At least it would be something that would have some practical short-term benefits!"
"And what will happen to the poor earth ponies and pegasi and griffons and dragons and all while the unicorns are bucking merrily away?" Celestia lazily tickled his ear with a hoof.
'The more the merrier, I say!" He chuckled as he ran his hoof up and down her happily exhausted body. "Of course, that means we need a REALLY big blanket!"
She rolled her eyes. "Yes, especially when the king of the dragons shows up to bone you in the ass with a penis the size of a war galley."
He lost it, laughing helplessly, and shortly thereafter she joined him. They giggled for a bit until they calmed down, but when Celestia called out, “Ramming speed!” Starwirl pounded on the pillow with tears running down his cheeks, unable to breathe.
______
A few hours and several lovemaking sessions later, there was a knocking on the door. "Tia, dear? Are you awake?" Her mother's voice.
Celestia whispered urgently. "That's my mom! What are we going to do?" Starswirl's response was to kiss her and turn invisible. She heard some hoofsteps, saw a curtain move and then he was safely hidden. But this whole room smells like dirty sex! "Just a minute, mom!" She opened two windows, pushing the naughty air out of one and pulling in fresh air with the other. The bed was a hopeless disgrace, so she just pulled the covers up and hoped for the best. Then she ran to the door and opened it.
"Good morning, mother!" Celestia's smile seemed to light up the room like a rising sun.
"Hello darling! Are you through hiding your coltfriend?" Star Gazer's eyes smiled impishly.
Celestia blushed vermilion, and her heart sank into the pit of her stomach. "Why mother! Whatever do you mean?"
"Actually, I came here looking for Starswirl; he's nowhere to be found and we need him for the Council. And in any case..." she gestured towards the coatstand where the belled hat languished and Celestia put her hoof to her forehead with a groan . "'Tia, you're old enough to do what you want. Your cutie mark is delayed for some reason, and that means you can't get married yet, but I'm not going to stand in the way of two unicorns in love over a technicality. Now, pull that young reprobate out of whatever closet he is in, get showered up and come down to the Council. Somepony has brought forth an interesting suggestion that may buy us some time, at least!"
Starswirl dropped his invisibility spell and ran out from behind the curtain. "Star Gazer! What? Who?"
Celestia's mother shook her head. "Just get cleaned up and get down to the throneroom, dear colt. You too 'Tia. Don't keep the princess waiting, please." She winked at them, then turned around, closing the door behind her.
"Well, um..." Starswirl blushed from the tip of his head to his toes.
"Shower, now. And no foaling around this time!" Celestia grinned. "We can foal around later!' She kissed him and ran off to the guestroom shower, laughing.
______
When they got down to the throne room, Princess Platinum raised an eyebrow at Celestia and allowed herself a small smile. They bowed and Starswirl ran to the cluster of desks where mages were speaking urgently to one another. There was one pony who seemed very much out of place; Clover, the blue coated apprentice who Celestia had almost killed in the Arena. She was wearing shackles and there were two serious-looking guardsponies flanking her as she stood speaking to several archmages.
Celestia thought back to her recovery from the black bolt. She had been told that Clover was convicted of conspiracy to commit murder, a crime which usually carried the death penalty. Much to Celestia's relief, at the insistence of Dream Charmer, Clover had instead been sentenced to ten years imprisonment, and instead of her prison being the dungeons under Platinum's castle, she was to serve out her sentence in the Academy at the rank of novice. Her brothers were also brought into the Academy to work in the kitchens, though the youngest was too young for any labor beyond being the object of widespread adoration, a job for which the plumb-colored foal was eminently well-suited. The Grand Archmage considered herself as being ultimately responsible for the Darkfoal infiltrating the Academy and threatened to resign if her wishes in the matter were not respected. Princess Platinum granted the request; Clover's circumstances were indeed, exceptional.
Celestia approached Princess Platinum and curtsied, less formally than when she had been presented the day before. The royal reached out and touched her on the shoulder. "Please stand, my child," she said quietly. "I understand that you have been keeping one of our kingdom's keenest minds occupied on matters other than the problem at hoof." Celestia started to stammer an apology, but the princess cut her off. "No, no; you both deserve some happiness, stars and moon know. From this day forth, when court is in session, you shall both be in attendance unless you have otherwise been instructed."
Celestia bowed her head. "Yes, your highness."
Platinum smiled prettily, her silver mane shining in the torchlight. "Now, while those eggheads work on their magical solution to the sun problem, do you have any revelations about the political problem facing us?"
"The coins are still here, your highness." She tapped her torc, whispering. "Perhaps the conspirators know that it is a bluff. Or..." she paused, considering. "Could it be that the nobles are not involved? The money came from elsewhere?"
"That is a possibility. Nonetheless, whoever it is may have spies watching us even now, so let us continue with the deception. Is there anything you could tell us that would force the enemy, be they traitors or foreign agents, into hasty action?"
"I cannot tell you the source of the gold, your highness. But I am able to tell you the name of the pony who made the purse." Platinum's eyebrows raised. "It was made by the dressmaker Measure Legscye. She works in Whitherville."
"This bluff of ours bears good fruit! Excellent work, Celestia! It may be a dead end, but who knows what information this dressmaker will be able to provide us with!" Platinum was smiling. "Now for us to poke the anthill." The princess cleared her throat. "Major Thunderhooves!"
The guard commander trotted to the throne. "Your highness?"
"We command you to bring us the dressmaker Measure Legscye of Whitherville. She is to be questioned. Do not arrest her if she comes of her own free will, but do what you must to bring her here quickly and safely!"
"Your will is mine, your highness." The major bowed, glanced at Celestia and then cantered off to prepare the orders for his detachment.
"Now, my dear, shall we see what our academics propose?" Celestia moved the position Platinum indicated, to the left of her throne, facing the massed desks and blackboards of the mages. "Archmagister, what have you for us?"
Dream Charmer approached the throne, bowing deeply. "Your highness, it seems that Clover's suggestion bears considerable merit. It is not a permanent solution, but we calculate that it should give us five years of good harvests, after which solar activity will no longer be sufficient, even with this approach. Would you allow her to present the idea, your highness?"
Platinum nodded. "As you wish, Archmagister." Clover walked forward and bowed as gracefully as her manacles would allow; part of her sentence was to be chained and under guard when off academy grounds.
"Your highness, thank you for your clemency earlier. And Celesta, you saved my life twice. I can never repay you."
"You may yet do so, child. Impress us." Platinum sat, unsmiling, though Celestia could not keep a small smile off her face.
"Your highness, my proposal is to use a grouped mass spell to levitate water into the air above Unicornia in such a way as to create a lensing effect. It would require a great deal of water; several million gallons, I think, which would be angled between the sun and the kingdom. We use arcanokinetics to retain the water in a lens shape. Would you allow me to demonstrate, your highness?"
The princess nodded and one of the guards used his magic to remove the coffle from Clover's horn. She used her magic to take a sheet of blank paper from a stack on a nearby desk, set it on the floor, then took a torch from a wall sconce, holding it several feet from the paper. "Here is Unicornia," she said, indicating the paper, "and the torch is the sun." She glanced at a pitcher full of water and drew approximately a cup from it, moving the globe in a silvery nimbus of magic to a position in between the torch and the paper. Then she concentrated and the globe flattened out into a disk that was thicker in the middle than the edges. The light on the paper brightened in the center and dimmed at the edges. "It will be warmer at the center of the focus and cooler outside the focus, your highness." As she spoke, her concentration lapsed and the lens thickened, the focus shrinking to a pinpoint, which smoked and then burst into flame.
"Oops!" She doused the paper with the water lens, blushing. "Sorry, your highness. As you see, we would have to be very careful about keeping the lens properly focused."
"Clover, that is a very clever idea! Well done! Archmagister, what would be required for this solution to be effected, and how many acres could be warmed?"
"Your highness, initial estimates would require us to have one thousand unicorns working for six hours in order to move the water into the air before sunrise each night to form and stabilize the lens, and then about five hundred unicorns working in shifts keeping the lens airborne and in position until sunset. It would be easier to drop the lens in the west and reform it in the east than to move it back and keep it airborne. The first year we should be able to raise the average daily temperature by fifteen degrees over an area of twenty thousand acres, which will cover all of Unicornia as well as the earth pony freeholds. By the third year, we will no longer be able to warm the freeholds, but that gives them two more years of survival, after which we hope they would establish farms in your demesne and fallow lands held by the nobility. After five years, we will no longer be able to raise the temperature within Unicornia over a large enough area to make a difference, but that gives us four more years to develop a permanent solution."
"That's an awful lot of labor, Archmagister. A third of our workforce will be dedicated to this project! Is there any way to make this more efficient?"
"Your highness?" Celestia broke in politely. "There is already quite a bit of moisture in the atmosphere. Perhaps if the pegasi condensed atmospheric vapor, that could reduce the amount of time needed to form and stabilize the lens, freeing up those unicorns to work on the long-term solution as well as supportive economic activity." The Grand Archmage pursed her lips and nodded thoughtfully.
"That would give the pegasi a role, which is both a good and a bad thing. They can be a fractious lot, but if they felt they had a part in the solution, well then, at least they'd be inside of the tent pissing out, rather than the other way around." Celestia's and Clover's eyes widened at princess' analogy, but they said nothing. "Clover, for your suggestion, I grant you pardon and release from your sentence, if Celestia accedes to such, being the victim of your conspiracy." Celestia nodded immediately, so Platinum went on. "So be it. It is our decree that Clover be granted full and complete pardon. Archmagister, you shall form the project team immediately. It is our will that all of your requests be honored without question. You have free access to our treasury. No unicorns will be exempted from service to the solar lensing project save those who are too young, old, ill or crippled to be of aid, as well as those actively serving in our military. That includes the nobility, Archmagister. If you get any arguments, refer them to us and they shall be set aright."
"Your highness, we shall begin planning immediately, but we will need to start coordinating with the pegasi as soon as possible. We should also tell the earth pony freeholders that we will not be able to support their farms for more than two more years. That may not go over well at all; it is possible we will not be believed." Dream Charmer curtsied and returned to the cluster of desks, taking Clover with her, speaking in a highly animated fashion.
Princess Platinum turned her head to Celestia. "Tell me, child. Do you know the cloudwalking spell?"