"What does it taste like?"
Chrysalis glanced across the room at Twilight, raising a single slender eyebrow. "Pardon?"
"The love you eat. What's it taste like?" Twilight repeated with pensive look on her face. It was a look that Chrysalis recognized to mean that either a long discussion or argument was coming. The last time she had seen that face they'd argued strategy and tactics that would have worked better than her failed coup four years ago for upwards of an hour. Fun times, and she had a drone take down several of those "hypothetical" scenarios. Purely for later review of course.
Returning her mind to the present, Chrysalis pondered how best to answer the question. "I wouldn't know where to begin." She finally answered her. Idly flipping a page in her book, she shrugged. "It'd be impossible to describe without a common frame of reference."
"What do you mean?" Twilight asked of her. "Is it sweet? I'd think so since that's how the emotion is generally described, but then some would probably describe it as rather spicy or-"
"Twilight." Chrysalis interrupted her, ending what would have been a tangent of rapid fire deductions and considerations before it could start. Whatever end conclusion she'd have reached would have likely been wrong anyway. "Let it go. It's not something I can adequately describe to you and neither can any other changeling."
"I don't understand." Twilight frowned. As usual Twilight had a habit of moping when she couldn't find an answer to a question. "Can't you at least try?"
Chrysalis sighed, closing her book with a snap. "No, I can't." She closed her eyes to think, trying to figure out how best to explain why, inadvertently giving herself the answer. "Let us suppose for a moment that I was born blind." She turned in Twilight's general direction, her eyes remaining closed. "I had never known sight for the entirety of my existence. Only sound, taste, smell, touch, and magic were known to my mind. Follow me so far?"
Twilight nodded. When Chrysalis didn't continue and her eyes remained closed she quickly added. "Yes."
"Good." Chrysalis smiled, baring her fangs. "Now, describe the color red to me."
Chrysalis couldn't see it but she imagined that Twilight had opened her mouth to give an immediate reply only for silence to come out. Chrysalis's smile grew as she heard Twilight stumble, trying to find her words before answering quietly. "I...don't know how. Something about...roses maybe?"
"I only know the scent and perhaps the taste and texture of roses." Chrysalis countered, eyes still shut. "Do any of those things give an adequate representation of the color red?"
Silence. Chrysalis could imagine Twilight's face screwed up in thought, trying to reason out how best to describe color to a creature without eyes. When no answer came, she continued. "And now you understand the problem." Chrysalis opened her eyes, trying not to look too terribly smug about having stumped Celestia's little genius. Sadly, from Twilight's halfhearted glare, she wasn't doing a terribly good job at it. "Just as you can't describe the color red to a creature without eyes, neither can I describe the taste of love."
Twilight frowned in what appeared to be defeat, but Chrysalis could still see the little gears in Twilight's mind turning until her face brightened a bit. "But wait a minute. We both know the sense of taste!" She cried, pointing at Chrysalis. "I know what things that taste sweet, or sour, or spicy taste like. We do have a common frame of reference!"
Chrysalis shook her head. "No, Twilight, we don't." She pointed back at Twilight. "You have tactile taste but lack emotional taste. You can taste physical things like an apple or me when the mood strikes you." Twilight flushed red and Chrysalis grinned, her tongue flicking out to taste her embarrassment. "But you cannot taste things as I can. I can taste the entire emotional spectrum, from the deepest pits of despair to the highest heights of hope."
Twilight hummed in thought. "So, going back to the sight metaphor, you are like somepony who can see in color, while I'm somepony who can only see in black and white?"
"Exactly." Chrysalis smiled, wishing Twilight was a little closer so she could pet her on the head like a child. She reclined back in her chair, her grin becoming a smirk as she feigned an insufferably smug sense of superiority over a little pony like her. "And that, among other things, is why the changeling race is better then you ponies."
Twilight rolled her eyes. "Yes, truly you are the superior, oh High Queen of the Changelings." She smiled. "Which is of course why you had the great wisdom to come before me, the newest of the Equestrian Princesses and all but beg me for asylum after one of your drones botched replacing the griffon king's favored consort and the other princesses all said no." Her smile became so sweet and innocent that it could not have possibly been more phoney. "And of course such a show of weakness was but a ploy to lull me into a false sense of security before usurping my throne. Because you are always so superior to us mere pony morsels."
"Curses, found out again." Chrysalis replied, her tone laced with sarcasm. Meeting Twilight's gaze evenly for a moment, she found herself delighting in the playful edge to Twilight's voice before throwing back her head and laughing. " Mmm, I love it when you bite back, Princess."
"I learned it from watching you." Twilight smirked as she turned to leave. "I have some things that need doing. Thanks for the talk, Chrysalis."
"You too, dear." She smiled returning to her book as Twilight left the room. "Have fun."