It's not easy to go back to your life after a thousand years of insanity and exile. It's not easy for Luna to even leave her room. All the same, there's a special somepony that Luna desperately wants to get closer to, and that's worth facing the outside for. All she has to do is get up the nerve to talk to her.

Trixie will not pay the increased rent on her storage unit.

Princess Cadance, just like everypony else, needs some time of leisure from her many duties. While Shining Armor is taking care of their daughter, Cadance enjoys her lone trips to the nearby Nephrite Forest, where she can be away from all of her burdens and obligations for at least a short while.

She was simply destined to get mugged eventually, wasn’t she? Why not by somepony who takes his job very seriously.

Also available in Mandarin Chinese (translation by keplebletbett) and Spanish (translation by SPANIARD KIWI).

Every week around the same time, Skywrite the pegasus leaves his little cottage in the woods to “pick up groceries,” and every week around the same time, Petalgrown the pegasus welcomes him home with a few hours of cuddling and his favorite dinner on the table. Of course, not everything here is as it seems. For one thing, there’s the dinner. French fried potatoes? Who’s ever heard of such a thing!? For another thing, there’s the way Sky looks at his hooves sometimes, as if trying to will something else to be there. Also, as a footnote, Petalgrown is one of the hundreds of changelings thrown free of Canterlot during the failed invasion attempt, and has been living off Skywrite’s strange, fiery love ever since.

As time goes on and questions about the strange, loving pegasus start piling up, she grows determined to discover the truth behind the pony she finds herself growing more and more intrigued with. Of course, it could be something even crazier than “love-sucking, shape-changing bug-pony,” but that’s just speculation. After all, there’s no way a pony could ever hide such a strange secret from a creature born of secrets, right? Why, it would take something very unpony-like to pull that off, wouldn’t it?

Winter Break has come to Canterlot High. But Sunset Shimmer has no one to spend it with, as her friends are otherwise occupied. Rather than spend the time alone, she decides to travel to Equestria to enjoy Hearth's Warming with her friend Twilight Sparkle.

After the craziness of the Battle of the Bands and the general stress of the holidays, Sunset is looking forward to the peace and quiet of Equestria, where ponies never have to worry about wacky hijinks or impending magical catastrophes.

At least, that's how Sunset remembers it.

Cover art done by the amazing NixWorld

Sunset Shimmer wants to become an alicorn more than anything - it's the entire reason why she's Princess Celestia's student. But she's run out of ways to research it and Princess Celestia has blocked her at every turn.

Fortunately for her, there's a new Princess on the block - Cadance. One who's already ascended. One who knows personally and intimately how she did it.

To get her to talk, Sunset will do anything. Even if it means pretending to like - really like - the Pink Pony Of Passion.

Cover art by daOtterGuy.

Featured 8/28/2021-08/30/2021! (And basically every update date after that.)

Now with a TVTropes page thanks to ZanarNaryon!

Disturbances in the magic of Equestria causes rifts between worlds. One unlucky hiker stumbles into one such rift and finds themself in a new body and in a new world.

For years, Twilight Sparkle and Queen Chrysalis have been at each other's throats. Both have experienced victory over the other, and both have experienced defeat. Out of all the creatures in Equestria, none despise each other the way the pony Princess and changeling Queen do. They seemed destined to remain locked in battle forever, or at least until one is finally dead at the hooves of the other. The cruel insults, the vicious loathing, and the powerful spells that have passed back and forth between them at each meeting have become the stuff of legend.

Imagine Twilight's surprise when she finds out changelings consider this dating.

And now they're married.

***

Sequel: Pony Courtship Rituals

***

Some beautiful fanart of the end of chapter three was done by Dmann892; you can see it here.

More awesome fanart, this time from chapter one.

Now with a TvTropes page (obligatory TvTropes warning goes here).

If you want a Russian translation, you can find it here.

There is now a reading of the story on Youtube, which starts here.

Dear Diary,
Looking back, a scientific, step-by-step plan is completely ineffective for social situations (Note to self: don't do them, ever). Inviting Princess Luna to a Pinkie Pie Hearth's Warming party, with a checklist of steps in your head, was an awful idea. There are too many variables that a checklist cannot prepare for, such as an entrancing outfit. The plan resulted in a spectacular failure of when awkward meets anxious.
For future use, a spreadsheet might be better.
- TS

A super-duper, awesomely-wonderful, amazing podcast review of this fic can be found here by Lapis Lazuli and Inky J! Seriously, they're great. <3
More Awesomeness! Doom Pie has done a super-duper reading for this fic! Thank you so much!

Cover art courtesy of the wonderful lovelyneckbeard, which can be found here.

It's Nightmare Night, and Luna is visiting Ponyville again. The mayor tasks Twilight with guiding and helping Luna around Ponyville and making sure the Princess has a good stay. Though Luna comes to Ponyville with a proposition for Twilight.