When Rarity writes to Princess Celestia inquiring after how dragons age, she gets a plea for help in reply. A war is brewing, and Princess Celestia thinks Rarity's the one to stop it. Now, still completely uncertain what her feelings for Spike are or if they're even plausible, she's off to meet with his distant relatives to negotiate a truce between the dragons and the sea serpents before the world gets caught up in their destructive clash.
Unrelated to "How to Woo Your Lady" or my other fics.
Cover image generously loaned by fongsaunder at deviantart: fongsaunder.deviantart.com
Chapters (16)
Hee hee...you really cannot write anything that isn't Spike/Rarity, hm?
Not that I mind reading more stories in that vein from an author proven to be really good at it. Keep it up. 
Sounds promising. And I'm a fan of a little sparity thrown in
Nice start, looking forward to more!
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The Sparity fics she writes are awesome though! The best I've ever read on this site, it's like the author is the Sparity Queen or something.
This fic looks very promising.
I love it!
And my day is now complete. Great author, Sparity fan extraordinaire, writes another epic Sparity fic. Can't wait to bite into this. By the way when a story is unrelated to other stories but use the same characters their known as stand alones.
A man's mustache is his life. *pounds chest with fist and stares into the distance stoically*
Nervous Rarity sounds extremely cute.
I do love how Celestia was like "Screw your question! Come here! Save world!"
A Rarity centric Sparity fic is a nice change of pace, I like it.
Tracking.
850259 Hey what are you doing reading dont you have some storys to be working on?
I LOVE YOU I LOVE YOUR STORY I LOVE EVERTHING!
now I feel like pinkie pie
850509 Can't write clop with children in house and awake. Reading a everyone story though is still safe though. Anyways, I still have a duty as the contributor for the Sparity group to read everything Sparity!
850553 What? you have to read Sparity stuff? I hate you a bit I would love to have this as a job. You sir have made me a bit jelly.
850601 Well I'm not payed to do it, so job might be a bit strong of a word. But yes, ideally I have a responsibility to. One I'm shurkien on cause I'v still yet to read Of Laurels and Lace.
Wow what a great start to what will likely be another great story from you.
Can not what to see what happens next.
Keep up the great work andy can not wait until the next chapter is posted.
I can't wait to see how this plays out!
Hmm, an epic Sparity? I'm all in!
Sparity? Good. Epic Sparity? Hell ya!
Favoriting now.
But for some reason, this chapter reminds me of the metroid storyline, Metroid Zero, when samus gets a reply she didnt want and was forced to have the metroid dna put in her. I dunno why, but it feels like that.
Poor Rarity, the shit she has to do
Haha! I forgot you were on this site too! Now I don't have to worry about missing a moment more than after you post a chapter!
nice start ^^-
Has quite the quality in it, which kinda surprises me. I guess I'm used to the average, kinda rushed quality beginnings to adventure stories. I look forward to the next update.
Almost seems like a misunderstanding on Celestia's part... but I have to admit. This is one interesting story right from the start. Chapter 1 combined with the summary grabs people's attention and want's them to know more, doubly so with this pesudo cliff-hanger ending.
Rarity is obviously the protagonist of this story, with the story being completely from her view point. The fact that she is so nervous around Spike is rather cute I think, though a bit uncertain. Wouldn't Rarity be the boldest when it comes to such affairs? ... Then again, a relationship with Spike is an iffy one... Still, her eye for detail is there, as shown with the last sentence about Opal. Also, I love how you remembered Peewee, good to see the bird appearing in stories!
Ooooh~ Shiny new story from the author of my favorite Spikity fic.
And it's off to a good start too. You always write Rarity well, and I like how her inner debate mirrors the conversation within the fandom about whether or not it's a valid/appropriate pairing. Just a few days ago I was making some of those same points for how Spike's age/maturity level isn't as cut-and-dry as it would be for one of the CMC or such.
before I read I just have to say this
I just realized I've read 2 out of 4 of your stories without even realizing it was the same author, and it seems all you write are spike and rarity fics....I might need to become friends with you lol.
LMAO REALLY?? I hope theres a hopedate to this soon, because I'm already interested.
Its amazing though, they call spike a baby dragon, yet he's more mature than the 6 mane mares of the story...hell he's more mature than most ponies in ponyville. if physical appearance is the problem, than all rarity needs to do is make spike greedy again and bam full grown spike. I honestly thing spike doesnt need to practice greed, but needs to maintain a balance. Because if spike doesnt practice greed, he may stay in that baby form forever, if greed is the way a dragon matures, than he has to practice, but he needs to learn restraint.
Ooh, excellent opening!
883683 No promises, but the next chapter is coming along nicely, and I hope to have it ready within a week.
In general with this story, I'll be posting new chapters every 1-2 weeks. I can't promise extreme consistency, however, since I'm "cheating" from working on my actual novels by writing fanfiction. When I need to concentrate on my novels, fanfiction takes a backseat for a few days. So while I can't promise exactly when each chapter will be delivered, I can promise that this story is planned out and will definitely be completed...just perhaps not quite as quickly as HTWYLINES was. Hopefully my readers will be patient with me! Trust me, I could toss up a chapter right now, but it wouldn't be of high quality at all. And with this being a Rarity-centric story, low-quality just won't cut it.
"Going for perfection, here," and all that jazz.
Did you consider tying this in with "How to Woo" at all? Because I can definitely see this as a follow-up to that story.
892748 Nope. This story is its own thing. A "stand alone" piece, as I have been informed it to be called.
HTWYLINES won't have a real sequel. I don't plan on doing much beyond possibly a few one-shots as follow-ups to HTWYLINES, because I feel like that story is complete. Not everyone feels that way, but I do.
So this is a brand new story, unrelated to any of my other works. This time around, I wanted to explore Spike and Rarity's developing relationship from Rarity's side of things and also provide a true adventure for our little diva.
So there will be a different feel to this story. Not super different, but a little bit different. I'm also finding it to be more challenging to write than HTWYLINES because of some of these differences. That unfortunately means it takes longer to perfect each chapter, but I'm hoping will also mean that this new story will be highly entertaining and interesting. I guess we'll all find out together.
I've always thought that spike was of some special breed of dragon. We've seen other dragons that were bigger than spike, but not nearly as obsessed with possessions. What I figure is spike's breed is very closely related to magic. Think about it: he's hatched from his egg by magic, he's able to do the teleporting paper thing, and both times he's giagantic he both grew and regressed in the blink of an eye. I always assumed that the second time his concience basicly said "if you're going to act like a dragon you'll be one as well"... I wonder if I'm over analyzing again.
wooooooooooooooooow this is soooooooo awesomeeeeeeee as your other fics X3 !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Uh oh... Girls, you really should of kept your muzzle's out of things.
As now things have gone from bad to worse.
Oh mate you are evil for leaving it like that. Brilliant chapter. Keep up the good work.
What the-! I sense foul play here
.
Enter the dragons, stage east!
It's never easy it is. I'm curious how Spike's role in all this will play out.
dern cliffhangers! I WANT MORE XD if you don't mind
Oh....I think I know what Rarity did to get the sea serpents so enamored with her...
Well played. 
That cliffhanger will only make the wait that much worse
This was awesome, as always! Can't wait to read more
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Really? It took you that long to figure it out? I've known it ever since it was mentioned that the Sea Serpents ONLY wanted her in Chapter 1 my dear Watson!
lol, So the dragon lover has to go to the land of dragon and sea serpants to stop a war.... lmao... I'm more interested in how the author will portray the two. Will we see the never ending portroyal of dragons as vicious beasts and monster, or will we see another culture that has been wrongfully portrayed by ponies simply because they don't understand the dragon culture and are too afraid to attempt relations.
Great chapter as well as the cliff hanger you put at the end of it. Can not wait to see what Spike will do next and how in sideway this will be connected to Rarity's assignment in starting the war as I have a feeling they will meet up in the future.
As always keep up the great work, and I can not wait to read the next chapter.
I found a few minor spelling mistakes while I was reading; I'll list them here so you can make changes.
incidences > incidents
up her ally > up her alley
Woo, more backstory for Spike! And Shining Armor being friendly; that's always nice. Faust knows we don't have nearly enough of either in canon.
... Ohhh. It's the sea serpents who asked for Rarity. Damn, that actually makes much more sense- her relationship with dragonkind is rather unique, sure, but how would any dragon authorities know about it?
And the conflict over the territory at the water's edge is connected to the destruction of the Bumblebee River bridge, I'm sure... nice foreshadowing there.
art of negation > art of negotiation
... dammit, Sweetie Belle, have you learned nothing from being Gabby Gums!?
The formatting here is confusing- is "No" italicized because Rarity is saying it especially stressfully, like the "wasn't" in "No it wasn't" earlier on? Or are the italics just carried over from the internal monologue that follows?
In the first case, I would adjust the wording so as to eliminate the italics from Rarity's thoughts- change it to "Not that it would matter if she did- the older unicorn would be gone by then." or something similar.
In the second case, I would simply remove the italics from the dialogue.
... Oh dear lord what is Sweetie planning.
Holy crap, shit just got real. And a cliffhanger! Damn.
928458 Thank you!
I will fix those immediately. Serves me right for uploading after a night of barely any sleep. Good eyes!
Ouch. Why do I have the feeling this is going to hurt even worse than it already did in this chapter? Repeatedly?
One small thing: near the end, it says Rarity was "pouring through" her maps. Unless she was actually soaking them with some liquid, I believe that should be "poring over".
I will be disappointed if spike and rarity don't end up on this quest together.
Sweetie Belle... when will you ever learn...
Spike just can't catch a break.
And Sweetie never learns.
Which means escalation! Yay!
Now that I think about it, "I'm sending some guards to watch over you on your journey; they'll meet you on the far side of the Everfree freakin' Forest" is kind of a mixed message from Celestia, there. If the guards had met her in Ponyville, or even just inside the forest for secrecy's sake, this could all have been avoided... except that Rarity started walking long before they were supposed to arrive anyway, so they wouldn't have been there yet. In any case, I'll be watching the remainder of the forest sequence to see if there might have been a way to set up all the necessary plot points without resorting to the sort of thing the Trollestia interpretation is based on.
On the other hand, I'm loving Rarity's characterization. Her panicked dialogue felt almost as realistic as most of Brian Michael Bendis's dialogue, without resorting to sentence fragments (as he so often does) OR breaking character. Nicely done.
Also, to anyone reacting to the ending with "Sweetie never learns," ( 1016874 1016989 ) consider this: Rarity got a full explanation for what the girls and Spike were doing in the forest from them, but she only explained her own presence to Spike, not to her sister. Sweetie was still faced with her sister walking alone into one of the most dangerous places she knows, and still didn't even know why she was going, let alone why she felt she had to do so alone and unprotected. If that were me, and my brother was the one determined to walk into Celestia-knows-what without so much as a safety helmet, I'd chase after him too! And I am useless in a fight.
OH!!! continue?
Oh, crap.