W15 - The Traveling Tutor and the Changeling Queen's Nephew
Week 15 - The Traveling Tutor and the Changeling Queen’s Nephew
A side-story to the Traveling Tutor series, occurring after The Traveling Tutor and the Librarian and The Traveling Tutor and the Diplomat’s Daughter in the upcoming story, The Traveling Tutor and the Royal Exam
What does a Unicorn Magic Youth Educational Specialist (Grades 0-3) do when he is requested to train the nephew of Queen Chrysalis? Improvise, of course (after panic, confusion, despair, terror and hopelessness have all been exhausted)
EqD prompt: Learning happens in all sorts of weird and wonderful ways in Equestria, as this one pony finds out.
15 - Testing, Testing, 1, 2, 3
-or-
The Traveling Tutor and the Changeling Queen’s Nephew
Green Grass had met nearly every kind of student and parent in his short but meteoric career, but today was turning out to be just a little more unusual than normal. And considering yesterday, that was saying something.
“So you want me to tutor your nephew?”
Technically, he had met the Queen of the Changelings once before, but at the time she was impersonating Princess Cadence, and doing an excellent job of it too. Despite being physically near his last meeting, this morning in the Changeling Ambassadorial suite of the Canterlot castle was a completely different experience. For starters, the sleepy queen was in all of her morning glory, wearing a comfortable tattered bathrobe and sipping on a cup of coffee with a few curlers still in her mane. The ambassador to Equestria was seated somewhat uncomfortably to her side, still wearing her pony disguise of a unicorn so intensely yellow that Green Grass caught himself trying to determine if she was a Saffron, Dandelion or even a Gold. Wedding planning was definitely going to drive him crazy at this rate, and he had barely started.
“Well, you want something from me, I want a little something back. A little quid pro for your quo as it were.” Chrysalis yawned, showing entirely too many sharp teeth for Green Grass’ comfort, before taking a rather large bite out of a maple-frosted donut. “By the way, thank you, Your Highness, for breakfast.”
Princess Luna nodded back, finishing her own small bite of the frosted concoction with a sip of coffee. “You’re welcome, Your Majesty. I’ve found Donut Joe’s a delightful establishment to visit. Perhaps we can have breakfast there tomorrow and discuss the latest negotiations in a less formal atmosphere.”
“Not the donuts, Luna.” Crystalis gestured at Green Grass with the remains of the donut. “Pale green and tubby there.” The changeling queen took a deep breath, somehow managing to make it look obscene on two different levels. “Almost like Shining Armor, but without that obstinate streak of directed violence and just a little hint of…” She trailed off with an additional sniff and a smile that raised goosebumps up and down Green Grass’ mane.
“Remember our agreement, Queen Chrysalis.” Luna sipped once from her coffee, the remainders of her donut nowhere to be seen, although there was a single crumb resting rather precariously on her doublet which gave the embroidered moon an expression somewhat resembling a monster’s eye.
“Yes, Princess.” Chrysalis took one last sniff before biting rather viciously into her donut. “We don’t interfere with your precious little ponies and you don’t…” She cocked an eyebrow at Luna, obviously daring her to complete the sentence.
Feeling a little like an ant in a battle of elephants, Green Grass cleared his throat. “I really don’t see any problems with tutoring your nephew, but it seems rather obvious the problems exist, or you would have done it already without me.”
The changeling queen’s eyes flashed a rather virulent green as she turned back to him, and Green Grass got the distinct sensation he was being viewed either on a plate or with a straw stuck out of his body somewhere. Screwing up his courage, he continued while looking her in the eyes. “It certainly can’t be his skill, or you would have thrown him to one side for another more talented. I really doubt it is some physical deformity; from what I understand of changeling culture, the weak are… removed before they grow up. That leaves something about his attitude, and since I’m a tutor of very young unicorns, he must be very young also, about the age that they get their—” Green Grass stopped cold. “No.”
“Changelings do not get cutie marks,” spat Chrysalis, splattering little bits of unchewed donut across the room and one nearby pony. “We pick our special talents when we are very young. Some of us keep a mark that resembles such, and some—” there was a flash of Royal Blue in her eyes “—prefer otherwise. My nephew is proving particularly difficult. He wants to attend Princess Celestia’s School for Gifted Unicorns.”
Green Grass managed a faint but somewhat respectful ‘oh’ of surprise that stayed below audible levels, swallowing before trying to keep his voice level. “Like Twilight?”
“No. Worse.” Chrysalis finished her coffee, taking a bite of the cup and chewing with a certain indication of transferred anger. “I suppose you might as well see.” Raising her voice, Chrysalis called out, “Peeps! You can come in now! Mumsie has talked the nice teacher into giving you lessons.”
“Yeah!” The other door to the room fairly flew open as a white unicorn colt bounded into the room, making two trips around Green Grass before skidding to a stop and looking up at him with bright blue eyes. Although he was in disguise, there was a certain something that was familiar about his two-toned blue mane and the little blue ‘cuffs’ that covered from his pastern to his hooves. Green Grass had seen that particular color scheme and cutie mark before, although Twilight Velvet’s baby book pictures of Shining Armor lacked the bright eagerness in the eyes that bespoke of a troublemaker destined to a life of lawbreaking rather than law enforcement.
“Lord Green Grass of House Chrysanthemum, I would like to introduce my nephew, Peep Sprout of the Royal House of Me.” Chrysalis unwrapped the last curler from her mane and regarded the rather stunned tutor with a roll of her eyes. “No, he’s not your soon-to-be nephew. Pity. And we tried so hard.”
Green Grass whirled in place, his jaw dropping almost to the ground. “You mean you and Shining Armor… Ew?”
“Why the disbelief?” Chrysalis rose to her hooves and walked around Green Grass, flicking him with her tail. “The process can be rather fun, at times, with the right partner. Or I suppose you already knew that.” The form of the tall changeling queen that passed behind him changed to a rather familiar purple alicorn when she emerged back into his view, only the Twilight Sparkle disguise that she wore was rather thicker in the middle.
There was a rather direct cough from Princess Luna, and Chrysalis turned with a grin. “You’re right, Lulu. He’s just adorable when he’s flustered. Does he have an older brother?”
“Peep!” blurted out Green Grass, taking a few quick breaths before concentrating on his new student. “I mean Peep Sprout. Do you have… another disguise? That one is going to be too distracting.”
“Awww! But I like this one. It takes a lot of work to get the hooves just right.”
The ambassador frowned at the little whining changeling. “Dear, you heard your teacher.”
“But mom!”
“No buts. Change right now, or else.”
With some additional grumbling, the little changeling was engulfed in flickering green fire, emerging as a rather plain tan unicorn colt with a dark green mane. “I don’t like this one,” he complained. “It’s bore-ring.”
“Boring can be good,” said Green Grass in instinctive defense of a technique he had used for years. “As a changeling, you don’t want to stand out, and trotting around like Shining Armor’s baby brother would gather more attention than Celestia in clown shoes. As a matter of fact…” He bent down and stage-whispered in the little changeling’s ear at a volume that the adults in the room could easily hear. “I’m hiding who I am right now. Can you guess what I’m hiding?”
Peep’s eyes lit up and he looked Green Grass over from his lumpy hat to his tail before starting a series of intense questions. “The vest. You’re hiding some sort of coat disease or an appleloosian ancestor that would make you look bad to the rest of the stuffy unicorns in the castle. No? You have tail extensions. No? You’re gay? Oh, wait. Mom told me who you knocked up, so that’s not it.”
A considerable number of questions later, including several that were more than a little uncomfortable, and Peep sat down with a thoughtful frown. “It has to be your horn. Otherwise, why would you cover it up with a hat.”
“No, wrong again. There’s absolutely nothing wrong with my horn, because—” Green Grass lifted his hat to show his short-cropped mane and a somewhat round and completely hornless head “—earth ponies don’t have horns.”
“No way!” Peep ran one little hoof through Green Grass’ mane, looking for perhaps a hidden horn bump or a surgical scar. “How can you be a magical tutor if you don’t have magic? Wait a minute.” He sat back and glared suspiciously at the tutor, a subdued hint of green in his bright blue eyes. “You can’t be a magic tutor if you don’t have magic.”
“Can too.” Green Grass turned his flank and pointed to his cutie mark, a small unicorn horn with a number of weak sparks around it. “It says so right there. Now, if I’m going to teach you, the first thing we’re going to need is to find out just how advanced you are with your magic. The finest unicorn minds in Equestria have put together an evaluation process that every little unicorn goes through before school, so let’s see just where you are compared to others your own age, shall we?”
~ ~ ~ * ~ ~ ~
Four hours later, a tired tutor and a disappointed student morosely reviewed a small stack of paper, comparing little penciled dots to a grading scale that had more minus signs than any small colt of any variety should see. “Well. You have a fairly high score on the ingenuity section of the testing,” started Green Grass, poking a pencil at the test results and pausing at the next step.
“I suck.” The little changeling flared a brilliant green, putting his Shining Armor disguise back on before slumping to the floor. “I couldn’t lift the test weights, I knocked all of the pegs down on the dexterity test, and I couldn’t even get the little wheel to spin. It’s a good thing you stopped before we got to the advanced tests, or I would have set something on fire.” One little hoof prodded a box labelled ‘Fourth Level Magic Tests. Caution: Flammable’ before dropping back down to the floor. “I suck,” he repeated.
The room was remarkably empty, considering Green Grass’ habit of keeping at least one older pony in the room whenever he had a student. Luna had slipped out a few minutes after the testing began with a yawn and a quiet word with Queen Chrysalis, who had put on what he had to think of as a ‘Miss Snooty Unicorn’ disguise and followed. Peep’s mother had dropped in and out of the testing with a quill hanging in her magic and a number of inky speckles as if the paperwork of the embassy had decided to gang up on her and she was engaged in a fight for survival. The silence was punctuated by a pair of rumbles, one large, one small, as two stomachs expressed their displeasure at all of the attention that was being used for purposes other than food.
“I think we’re looking at the problem from the wrong angle.” Green Grass gathered up all of the paperwork into one neat pile and tossed it into a box. “Peep, how would you like to take a walk?”
“I don’t know.” The little changeling twisted one hoof against the polished marble floor. “Mom never lets me go outside by myself.”
Green Grass raised one eyebrow. “Dressed like that? It’s no wonder. Pick another disguise and we’ll both go grab something to eat together.” He paused. “Changelings do eat, right?”
“Well, duh!” There was another flare of green magic and the familiar tan unicorn colt was standing where the little Shining Armor had been previously. “No alfalfa or bean curd though. Yeach!”
While they walked through the hallways of the castle, Green Grass mulled the difficulties the little changeling was having with magic that unicorns had easily mastered by his age. Well, most unicorns. He certainly seemed to have enough power, but was just unable to get it focused in the way he needed in order to make the spell work exactly the way it was supposed to work.
There was probably some correlation between his problem and the happy way he chatted about Shining Armor in a hero-worship rattle of facts and personality profiles that would have Green Grass’ future brother-in-law more than a little unnerved. After all, Shining Armor and Cadence had roundly defeated Queen Chrysalis, and now ruled over the Crystal Empire while protecting it with a magical artifact powered by love. To find he had groupies among the defeated changelings would probably fluster Shiny to no end.
When Green Grass broke the news to him, he fully intended on having Featherweight and his camera present. The pictures would be priceless.
Lost in his thoughts, it came as almost a complete surprise to find himself in front of the doors to the Royal Greenhouses instead of the castle cafeteria which he had intended on visiting. True, nearly everything in the cafeteria came from here, but the addition of salad dressing and sprinkles was an important part of his life, and he normally did not eat raw fruits and vegetables except when he was out in one of the small towns, such as Ponyville. Green Grass had just begun to turn and retrace his hoofsteps to where he had made a wrong turn when he spotted something.
Peep had his eyes closed and was taking a deep breath.
Opening the door instead, Green Grass motioned the little changeling colt inside and followed, the warm humidity of the green expanse feeling like a jungle to his suddenly sweating coat. They had not taken two steps inside when a huge red earth pony rumbled into view, gaining speed as he headed in their direction.
“Greenie, mon ami! What has brought you into my little slice of heaven? And what is this?” The huge Prench pony bent down and looked Peep right in the eyes, smiling in an extravagant way that displayed more pearly white teeth than any pony had a right to keep in their mouth all at once. “You have blessed Tomato with a visitor! And such a strong, handsome lad. It is not often that we in the greenhouse are honored by guests. Come! Let us introduce you to the rest of the staff!”
There was a rolling cadence to the big Prench pony’s accent that had the two of them trotting along after him even as Peep managed to say, “Actually we were going to get something to eat for lunch.”
“But of course!” Tomato stopped and waved a hoof around the thick greenery that surrounded them. “In the greenhouse, it is always time for lunch. How do you think I got this big, anyway?” He thumped his massive barrel-like chest with one hoof, giving off a noise like a bass drum. “I have grown fat and lazy down here surrounded by so much food. Here, taste this.” A sweet pea pod was stuffed into each of their mouths as Tomato stripped several more off the nearby plant and waited for them to stop chewing.
“Is good, yes? Here, have another. Or perhaps you would like some snap beans, fresh from the plant. Over here we have a tropical cherry tomato plant, one of my specialties, but as you can see, she does not have much for fruit yet.”
Green Grass faded into the background, which was fairly easy as the background was also green, keeping an eye on the big earth pony and the little changeling while they talked. Tomato had always been an endless font of information about the greenhouse contents, and now seemed to be thoroughly enjoying himself while showing Peep around.
Today’s lessons included the proper pronunciation of his name (Is Tomato, just like you expect. Toh-mah-toh.), cutie marks (Is tomato vine, just like your bean sprout. Almost make us like twins, yes?), the irrigation system (Uses only the finest water from the Canterhorn waterfalls, piped directly in here while still bubbling), and the quality of countless varieties of produce (Is good, yes?)
The heat and humidity made Green Grass hang up his jacket and hat while helping tie up tomato vines with Tomato and Peep, trying to conceal a knowing smile as the little changeling lifted heavy pots and delicate vines with far more power and control that he had displayed in the testing. There were a lot of spots on his evaluation that were going to have minus signs turned into plus signs, and probably a few that would be worth multiple plusses. It was probably a little early to be making a reservation in Celestia’s school, but by the time Peep’s mother had found them and they had managed to leave the greenhouse (You bring little Peep back tomorrow and we talk some more, mon petit ami. Tomato can see big things in your future. Mellons be ripening, and we see about picking them at absolutely the perfect peak of ripeness.) Green Grass was smiling even though previously unused muscles in his back and legs were protesting.
“So, do you think you can teach my son, Lord Green Grass?” said the changeling ambassador once the greenhouse door was closed and they were alone in the castle corridor.
“Yes and no. Just a minute,” continued Green Grass with an upraised hoof as the ambassador took a sharp breath. “I think I can help teach your son. All my special talent does is to pick out a field of study that the student finds interesting. I can encourage them down that path, but other teachers will have to teach him the specifics.”
“That doesn’t sound very useful,” said the ambassador with a scowl.
“Let’s find out from the source.” Green Grass turned to Peep Sprout and nodded. “Go ahead. Tell your mother what you learned today.”
There was a blaze of green fire and the small tan colt was replaced by a green unicorn colt the exact shade and tint of Green Grass’ coat. “I learned about a new role model!” he declared proudly.
Fighting a facehoof, Green Grass prompted, “And?”
“Oh, yeah. Plants take lots of care, lots of attention, and love to grow.”
“Good,” said Green Grass with a smile.
“And we only eat them once they’re ripe.”
“Very good,” added Green Grass.
“Just like ponies,” declared Peep Sprout with his chest puffed out and mischief dancing in his eyes.
Green Grass looked back at the ambassador, who had the grace to seem embarrassed.
“Well, it’s a start.”
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Peep Sprout is from the Alternative Universe fic Letters From a Little Princess Monster, which has a slightly different Green Grass in it than you might expect from The Traveling Tutor and the Librarian.
The Immoral of Today's Story : An educated tiger is still a tiger.
FYI: The unspoken part of Luna's agreement with Chrysalis is "Leave my ponies alone or I will spend every single waking moment of my immortal life tracking down every single changeling on or in Equestria and turning them into ashes."
For all the Green Grass's problems, he is great with kids.
4213035
I'm not entirely sure the "unspoken" part of that agreement was never spoken. In fact - I'm fairly certain I can imagine Luna saying those words in a very calm and quiet voice. The "Anti-Royal Canterlot Voice" - as it were - capable of being heard JUST as clearly when the situation warrants.
I've got this mental image of Peep, Sunny and Twilight's foal hanging out together in their teen years and causing endless... issues in Canterlot, the Aerie and in Chrysalis's hive.
"I mean, she's half Changeling anyway! She's got at least three forms that I know of and..."
"Peepy! NOT HELPING!"
Well, he's right. From a changeling's perspective, ponies are a sort of livestock. Or perhaps the psychic soil in which an essential part of the changeling diet grows. In any case, it's always a joy seeing Green do what he does best. You know, other than embarrassing himself and/or Twilight.
I'm just a little sad how quickly my immense amusement at a changeling that looks like Shining went away with 1) Chrysalis' explanation that he wasn't her and Shining's kid and 2) the remembrance that a changeling can look like whatever it wants. Still, a changeling fanboy of Shiny works pretty well too, I'd love to see his reaction.
And it seems like I'm not the only one.
Tomato is great.
Hah!
4218262 Ah, how quickly you believe the Queen of the Changelings. I understand she also has a bridge for sale...
4213150 Luna, the Incredible Hulk of the pony world. "Don't make me angry. You wouldn't like it if I got angry."
4213131 of all varieties. I'm so tempted to have Discord go up to him and say something to the effect of "Since you're so good with young children, Fluttershy and I were wondering if you would be available over the new few years for a rather unique opportunity tutoring a young pony... well, we suppose it will be a pony..."
4217896 Just wait. The Traveling Tutor and the Royal Exam is probably about a third of the way through the build process. Let me know if you want to put on your editor's hat and wade in.
(which reminds me, need to tease that in a blog posting sometime soon)
4218381 I do like bridges!
I can't wait for the next bit of The Traveling Tutor!
Peep needs to meet the Crusaders, I'm sure once they get over the fact he's a Changeling they'll bring him along on adventures.
Heehee. Lovely.
I believe "melon" should have only one "L", though, accent or no accent.
4218381
All of my yes
Sure, food is good ripe, but the best produce is generated with lots of love and care.
Chrysalis' disguise here should be named Care'n, for the name Karen, a label in Reddit for entitled ladies...
4216566 You know Clover's cutie mark is going to be an hourglass for time and dimensional traveling, right? She just needs some experience.