Teaser of Ch. 7 Part 2 · 4:34am Sep 7th, 2021
No, I'm not dead. Still struggling to write, but I've made a fair bit of progress these last few days. Here's a glimpse at what I hope to release in the next week or so. As usual, this is not the final product.
As large as the Ambassador was, there had only ever been a few places Shining had seen Cadance on board. Most of the time she was in her quarters, or barring that, on the deck, watching her little ponies. He’d never seen her near the mess hall, much less inside it; yet here she was, sitting alone at an ornate table in the middle of an empty space where previously rows of tables had been, pouring over a book as she stirred a cup of tea. If she had heard them enter, she hadn’t bothered showing it. He couldn’t see anybody else there besides the three of them, but Shining still felt watchful eyes on him.
Looking around the room, he felt slightly unnerved by it all; between the relative emptiness and the unnatural quiet, it was far too similar to a cavern for his tastes. “So, I just go over there?”
“Yes.” He could hear the derision in her voice. “That is why you are here, after all.”
He pursed his lips and bit back a snappy response. “Yes, well, thank you.”
“Do not thank me. I am merely following the Princess’s request.” She paused for a moment. “As you should be.”
“Well, thanks anyways.”
He took a breath, held it for a second, and began to walk across the room towards Cadance. Don’t trip, don’t trip, don’t trip. As he approached, Cadance’s ear twitched, and she turned around in her seat. When she saw who was approaching, her eyes lit up as she smiled.
“There you are! I was beginning to wonder if the doctor had been a little too optimistic about your recovery. How are you feeling?”
Shining Armor came to a halt several steps away. He bowed respectfully, but couldn’t help but smile back. “Much better, thank you. I’m sorry I wasn’t here sooner. I went to take a quick shower-”
“-And ended up taking a little longer than you expected.” Cadance said with a grin, her eyes twinkling with amusement. “An hour grooming, and you could not find time to put on any cologne? We really need to work on your routine.”
He lifted his head and cocked an eyebrow. “Is this a date?”
“No.”
“Then why would I need to wear perfume?”
Cadance rolled her eyes. “Cologne isn’t perfume, Shining. It’s an olfactory advertisement for single stallions. Honestly, does no one take courtship seriously anymore?”
Shining’s smile faded. “Well, when I’m looking to get back into dating, I’ll keep that in mind.”
There was an awkward pause as Cadence realized what she had said. Her hoof covered her mouth, and she blushed in embarrassment. “I‘m sorry, I didn't’ mean to-”
“It’s fine, Cadance. Let’s just pretend you never mentioned it. Okay?”
She nodded once. “Very well.”
He took a deep breath. “So, what's all this?” he asked as he walked around her and sat down in the chair opposite her.
“Your final exam.”
He sat a little straighter. “Oh. Of course,” he said pleasantly. Internally, though, he chided himself for not realizing what was going on sooner. He eyed the crockery laid out in front of Cadance. Whoever had set the table had gone all out, with the full complement of saucers for the food dishes laid out in the traditional Roaman fashion. Be nice if there was some actual food to go with them.
Cadance clapped her hooves twice, and half dozen servants suddenly appeared next to them carrying a plethora of Zebra dishes. Before he knew it, they had laid out an array of colorful (if somewhat small) salads. Instinctively he started to reach out with his magic for a fork before recalling that Zebras didn’t use cutlery like the high-society unicorns of Canterlot. Instead, they ate out of bowls the way earth ponies often did. He smiled to himself as he thought of how his mother had chided him for doing so when he was young. “Little colts who don’t use their horns to eat proper don’t learn magic” she'd say, usually as she was wiping oatmeal off his muzzle.
Jokes on you, mom. Turns out I was eating like a prince the whole time.
He selected one of the dishes and gave it a little tug with his magic, tugging it over to him. He was about to empty its contents into a larger, deeper bowl in front of him when Cadance gave a little cough. He looked up at her to see a slight frown on her face. Without taking her eyes off him, she reached out and took one of the bowls in booth hooves, then tipped it slightly and gently poured the salad into her own bowl. He felt heat rush to his face, but maintained composure and followed suit, being careful to get every piece of the salad into the dish. When he looked back up, he was relieved to see her smile had returned. She lifted her tea cup and took a sip, then placed it back on the table.
“Excellent. Now, perhaps we could start by you telling me everything you know about King Heffer the Cloven?”
So began the longest, most intensive verbal test that Shining Armor would ever take in his life. Cadance was relentless in her questioning, from geography, to politics, to simple table manners which were acted out over a highly formalized seven-course meal. Everything they had ever discussed, no matter how briefly, was quizzed for a flaw in his knowledge. When the last crumbs of desert had been devoured, and every topic thoroughly exhausted, his command of all things Roaman had almost impressed her.
Almost.
Shining Armor groaned as he massaged his temples. Hours of questioning had given him a throbbing headache. Worse still had been the injury to his pride. In his week of studying, he’d convinced himself that he knew everything there was to know about Roam; A few hours with Cadance had shown him the error in that.
She still sat across from him, now surrounded by a pile of books and scrolls that had been produced over the course of the dinner. The way she had taken notes on his answers made him feel like a school-colt, giving a presentation in front of the class, only far worse.
"So... How bad did I do?"
“Not as bad as you seem to think." She jotted a few more notes down, then set both pen and paper down and poured the last of the tea from her teapot into her cup. “Admittedly, you are lacking in a few important subjects, but given the situation I think we can work with this.”
Shining Armor ceased his massaging and looked up at her, feeling ever so slightly less crestfallen. “What subjects?”
“Well, for starters, your grasp on current events is not what I hoped it would be, given how we are living one of the most significant political moments in Roams’s history. Knowledge about important political figures is all over the place, you kept confusing historical individuals for current ones. On the other hoof, you know the history of the Empire backwards and forwards, and your geography was impeccable.
"As far as etiquette is concerned, your skills are… passable, though we will want to continue to work on them. As long as you don’t talk to anyone too important for a little while, we should avoid any international incidents.”
Shining tilted his head. “I guess that’s... good?”
“Like I said, passable.” She turned and looked at Velvet, who had been the only other pony visible in the room the entire time. There were others, hidden behind privacy illusions for the duration of his interrogation, but they had only shown themselves to provide food and drink as Cadance had requested them in turn. “Velvet, would you be a dear and refill this for me?”
“Of course, your Highness.”
She turned and trotted back towards where the kitchen would be, if not for the illusion blocking their view. After a few steps she suddenly cross some invisible line and vanished. With the mare gone, Cadance refocused her attention on him. “I know you are eager to rejoin the bodyguard, but perhaps you would like to sit and rest a moment?”
Shining Armor imagined he heard a hint of eagerness in her voice, but dismissed it. He was feeling a bit tired from hours of discussion and questions. Besides, who was he to reject the generosity of a Princess?
“They’ve made it over a week without me-" he shrugged, "-they can wait a few minutes more.”
She smiled at him, and he returned it instinctively. Cadance had always had a smile that could light up a dark room, or in his case, a black mood. He'd been seeing it more often recently. Why, he didn’t know, but he wasn't about to start complaining about it now.
“It’s been a little while since we spoke last,” she said calmly. “I’m very sorry about that. Preparing for our arrival has taken up quite a bit of time. Between that and…. Other considerations, I wasn’t able to pay a visit.”
“And by "other considerations", you mean-“
“Not feeding the rumor mill, yes," she said with a nod.
His smile faded. “My apologies for the role Storm played in starting those rumors, your Highness. It will not happen again on my watch.”
Cadance chuckled lightly. “Don’t make promises others can’t keep, Shining.” She took a sip of her tea. “While it is unfortunate that it happened, it wasn’t surprising to hear that talk about us had started.”
Shining Armor blinked. “I’m sorry, what?”
Cadance gestured to herself. “Shining, I am the Princess of Love. Everypony I spend a lot of time with comes under scrutiny as a potential paramour. Guards, servants, friends, one magazine even claimed I was having an affair with Celestia! Can you imagine?”
I can now… Stars Above...
She stuck her tongue out in disgust. “I mean, we’ve been close for decades, and certainly she’s always doted on me, but still. She’s like a second mother to me.” She noticed his glazed-over expression and cocked her head. “Are you alright?”
Shining’s attention snapped away from the pair of Princesses in his mind to the one sitting before him. “Uh, yeah, gross,” he said quickly. “I can’t believe anybody would publish that.”
“You’d be surprised how often that sort of thing happens. One of my hobbies is reviewing literature for Canterlot Daily, under a pseudonym of course. A lot of erotic fiction features a thinly veiled reference to me or Celestia as the main love interest.” Her nose scrunched in annoyance. “Honestly, they could at least try to be subtle about it.”
Shining Armor stared at her in shock. “And you allow them to depict you that way?”
“It’s the way things are,” she said with a shrug. “You get used to it after a while. All that to say, the fact is that because we spend a lot of time together, even though you are my guard, rumors were bound to spring up around us eventually.”
“That doesn’t really help much.”
“Consider it a tidbit of wisdom from someone with a longer perspective.”
“A bit of elderly advice, eh?”
She stuck her tongue out at him. “That one’s coming out of your grade.”
“Worth it.”
Whatever retort she had planned was drowned out by the crackle of the magical speakers coming to life.
Also, would anyone be interested in prereading/editing chapters?
It's looking good!