Alicorn Switcheroo
Chapter 6
Several tense minutes later, Twilight paused just outside the door that led to the large commons area where petitioners to the courts would wait their turn to speak before the Princesses. Normally, the room was a vast echo chamber of quiet murmurs as the petitioners spoke in small groups, or mumbled rehearsed speeches to themselves. Today though, the doors barely held back the roar of many voices speaking over one another with the occasional shout piercing through the rumble.
With her ears held back, Twilight looked down at Celestia, grinning nervously. “Okay...so, you stay out of sight back here. I’ll go out and try to calm them down. Hopefully, seeing an alicorn with a crown will be enough to get them to chill out and go home?”
“I hope it is, Twilight.” Celestia reared up onto her back hooves , her forehooves braced on Twilight’s barrel. She lowered her voice, smiling up at her former student. “You can do this. Keep calm, keep your voice level but authoritative. Suggest what they can do, but leave them little ground to argue around it.”
“So,” Twilight smirked, “pretend to be you?”
“If that helps, yes.” Celestia returned Twilight’s smile and patted her cheek. “If anypony can do this right now, it is you, Twilight Sparkle.”
Nodding, more to herself than the pony in front of her, Twilight gathered herself. Horns crafted from the tusks of some great monster blew out the summoning call for the hordes of viking ponies in her imagination. A real monster, the pony public, awaited her and if she was going to protect her Princess, she was going to need all their tiny metal shields and pikes. In her mind, the roar of thousands of tiny hooves rose up to meet the roar coming from the commons.
Twilight winked at Celestia and pushed the door open, her head held high and her best impression of the Princess’ ‘everything is going to be alright’ smile plastered firmly on her lips. The noise level dropped immediately as the gathered rabble of nobel ponies took notice of her entrance, their jaws going slack and hanging open while Twilight took her place at the head of the great chamber. Even the guards, normally stoic and impassive, were staring in open mouthed shock at the purple alicorn.
Twilight cleared her throat and the mass of ponies suddenly came back to life with a hundreds of them murmuring some form of ‘Twilicorn’ under their breath. She wasn’t going to let them form up into competing groups like they had at the gates earlier, so she spread her wings out to their fullest and clopped her hoof against the tile floor. “My fellow ponies, please listen up. I am here to ease your concerns about this mornings...er...unique situations.”
The guards around her snapped to attention, responding to her position and alicorn nature that same way they would to Celestia. Twilight knew, once this was over, she was going to be fielding a lot of uncomfortable questions. “There is still an...evolving investigation going on into what caused this. The Princesses and I have everything under control and apologize for any inconveniences this has caused you. Rest assured that courts will reopen tomorrow on schedule. It is my suggestion that you each return home to inform your families that everything is in hoof and return tomorrow morning for your business with the Princesses.”
“Um…” One stallion near the front raised his hoof. “Where are the Princesses?”
“Why are you an alicorn now?”
“Do you represent the New World Order or the Old World Order?”
“Can you validate my carriage parking?”
Twilight’s wings drooped, her regal impersonation of Celestia fracturing slightly. “Uh...the Princesses are...uh...busy with the investigation. My...er...appearance is merely the side effect of a mis-cast spell and is completely cosmetic! I am in no way a mystical entity! So really...I can’t be said to represent either Orders, their theoretical existence notwithstanding!” She swallowed roughly. “Parking validation is handled by the castle staff at the front grates or near the overflow parking area ...uh… wewillnotbetakingenyfurtherquestionsatthistimethankyouandhaveaniceday!”
She widened her smile and waved at the crowd just as her mentor had on hundreds of similar addresses and leaned down to whisper to the guards near her. “The Princess has ordered a castle lockdown for the day. Get these ponies out of here as orderly as possible.”
“Ma’am!” The lead guard snapped a quick salute, but looked up at the crown on Twilight’s head before lowering his voice to whisper back. “I assume we’ll be getting official word down from the actual Princesses as soon as this ‘evolving investigation’ is done?”
Twilight nodded a bit sheepishly. “Uh...yes. Things are just hectic right now and Princess Celestia sent me to take care of this and make sure everypony was a safe distance away...you know, just in case. The castle’s in no danger! I think…”
The guard snorted, the helmet making it hard to read his expression, but he saluted again and then turned to the other guards. Order were barked out and in almost no time, the crowd of grumbling nobles began to filter out of the commons and back toward the main gates of Canterlot castle.
Except the lone earth pony mare that needed her parking in the overflow area validated. She stood there, grim determination in her eyes and her jaw set. She pulled a slip of paper out from behind her ear and held it up. “I still need my parking validated.”
“Uh…” Twilight cast a furtive toward the exit where Princess Celestia was waiting for her. “We’re not taking anymore questions, thank you.”
“It wasn’t a question.” The mare stomped her hoof for emphasis. A few of the stragglers from the main group turned at the sound, watching the stand-off at the foot of the throne.
Twilight fidgeted. She didn’t want to dally any longer than absolutely needed. Some random scullery maid could discover the Princess at any moment, but then again, the pony wasn’t incorrect. She swallowed again, her forehead starting to bead with sweat. “Ok, fine!”
Twilight meant to reach out with her magic, taking the slip and using the Princess’ quill and inks in the throne’s side table to sign off on it. Really, that’s what she meant to do. But her hair had different ideas, the flowing mana whipping out a thin pseudopod that cackled with more of the pink lightning. It touched the parking ticket with a crack of thunder that knocked the mare back a step. When the pony looked up, the ticket was smoldering in her hoof, a purple glowing arcane rune imprinted on it.
The mare—and every other pony still in the room—cowered, wide eyes on the smoke that was curling up from her validation. She turned a nervous smile Twilight’s way. “Th-thanks, Princess Twilight.”
Twilight flinched, grimacing and trying to physically haul her mane back to herself. It only reluctantly obeyed. “Not a Princess! But...um...you’re welcome. Now, if you’d all please leave, the Princesses and I have some investigating to do!”
She didn’t have to tell them twice. In moments, Twilight found herself alone in the throne room. She headed back toward the exit as soon as the doors closed behind the last pony, bursting through it at a run and collapsing into a hyperventilating heap on the other side. Celestia was at her side a moment later.
“In and out, like we practiced. Slow, deep breathes.” Celestia laid a hoof on Twilight’s back, smoothing her coat between Twilight’s new wings. If her new form was a simple transmutation, it was a superior quality spell than a garden variety polymorph. The muscles under her hoof felt strong and firm. Twilight’s coat was remarkably soft. “You did very well out there, Twilight.”
“B-but! I was s-so awkward!” Twilight gulped down air, tears starting to roll down her cheeks. “And m-my hair did th-that thing again! I swear I’m not an alicorn...” She choked back a sob and looked up into Celestia’s eyes. “I’m sorry for being like this.”
Celestia cupped Twilight’s chin, lifting her student’s muzzle gently. With her new size, it actually took both of her hooves to hold the whole thing. Thanks to Twilight’s new mass, her student’s lips were particularly eye catching where the purple faded to a light pink followed by blindingly white teeth and the faintest hint of red tongue. Celestia unabashedly watched Twilight breathe for a few seconds before returning the look Twilight was giving her.
“You don’t have to be sorry, Twilight; you did amazingly well considering the circumstances.” Celestia smiled and squeezed Twilight’s cheeks like a proud parent. “I dare say, once we get all this resolved, that Luna will have competition for who covers for me when I want to take a vacation.”
“A vacation!?” Twilight’s eyebrows shot up, her irises shrinking to points. “You can’t take a vacation! I can’t do this for a few minutes, let alone a week!”
“A week?” Celestia snorted, wrinkling her nose as she fought to keep her face serious. “Do you know how many sick days I’ve accrued over a thousand years of uninterrupted rule? If I could honestly tear myself away from the courts at all, I’d take more than a week at the beach, I assure you, dear Twilight.”
“Technically, sick days as a concept wasn’t even introduced until just before my parents were born.” Twilight smiled, enjoying the way Celestia’s simple aside and the hooves holding her were pulling her mind away from the cosmic terror that was being an actual princess. “So I doubt you have more than a year or two, if you did cash them in. Can you imagine the panic that would cause?”
“Yours, or everypony else’s?” Celestia giggled and reluctantly released Twilight’s cheeks. She dropped back to all four hooves and rocked to gently bump against the larger mare’s shoulder. “I’m sure it would be quite the spectacle to start with, but after a while...I think princesshood would grow on you. You do look so cute in a crown.”
“Not as cute as you do!” Twilight grinned, bumping back against Celestia. Her more considerable bulk rocking the Princess back a step. “I could never pull off the whole chest piece and crown the way you do. I’d look so silly in full regalia.”
“I’d disagree.” Celestia held her head high, hoof over her heart. “I have a very fond memory of you trying it on many years ago, right after you started schooling here. You were. The. Cutest. Thing.” Her smile twisted into a playful smirk, reaching out to shove Twilight, though her efforts barely budged the false alicorn.
“I was four at the time!”
“Still adorable!”
“I was statistically average in appearance!”
“Don’t be so hard on yourself, you were so cute I could have just eaten you up!”
Twilight huffed and made to stand. She might be sort of pretty. She’d received more than a few compliments in the few years she’d been in Ponyville. She’d even been labeled as such by several of the other parents at the last class play she’d participated in as a foal, but to hear the Princess of all ponies call her cute was too much. Sure, she could be a worrywort at times. A little high strung. But the Princess shouldn’t have to say something like that just to try and make her feel better about herself.
Twilight lifted herself up, opening her mouth to retort.
Celestia leaned in, the memory of the time Twilight had spilled ink on herself and tracked it all over her personal chambers looking for a way to remove it, fresh on her lips. The first syllable of Twilight’s name was barely past her teeth when those firm purple lips she’d so admired a moment ago came into contact with hers. She locked up, hooves digging into the castle’s runner carpeting to hold strong.
Twilight… Celestia swallowed her words, the memory of that long ago foalhood washed away by the touch, the press of lips against each other. The mare she’d spent decades of her life helping to grow overwhelmed all of her senses and that moment of playful ribbing was instantly transformed into something very different. She wasn’t entirely sure why she did so, but Celestia let herself be pushed back—not that she had much choice against the forces at play—and tilted her head, opening her mouth a little wider to invite a curious tongue.
Twilight slammed on the brakes in a half-crouch, her eyes wide again and staring right into those limpid pools the Princess swore were organic and not some masterpiece of artifice. She’d intended to rise and miscalculated, forgot to account for her and Celestia’s new dimensions. She forgot to account for how amazing soft Celestia’s lips were, how good she smelled, how wonderful the scandalous thought of being this close to the Princess made her feel, and a million other variables. Once again, she’d somehow managed to step her hoof right into it, in front of the pony she she least wanted to see her fail.
Except this time, it was with my mouth, not my hoof. The Princess wouldn’t kiss my hoof. That would be weird... The mental image splashed across her mind of the Princess doing just that. Daintily taking her hoof and leaving a small trail of kisses up her foreleg, inching closer and closer to her barrel.
In her mind, one of the vikings looked up from the rubble of her fallen emotional walls and the pile of rationalizations brought low through the application of tiny imagined axe to tiny imagined skull. In the far distance, the mental winds shifted and a low call issued forth from the darkness.
“The beast...it calls. Just as we defeated the Hun-Gar from before, just as we felled the trees of Wingboner Wood, so too shall this beastly urge be quelled.”
“We’ll probably need to chop more of that wood in a minute.” Another of the Twilight vikings turned toward the vast emptiness of the mindscape that led, apparently, to all other areas of the body. Some part of the imagination that had kept this whole metaphor going, was starting to freeze up along with the rest of Twilight’s senses.
“Well, of course.” The first viking let her widdle axe fall on another rationalization’s imaginary skull. “It’s not like we’re barbarians. Ready the longships! The Li-bi-Do rises!”
With a collective groan, the horde of little pony vikings turned and trampled their way back aboard their blood cell longships, bound for the south seas.
Twilight barely managed to process the silly viking thing when the rest of her brain forced a hard re-set and she unlocked. She jerked back and away from Celestia, skittering awkwardly backward, legs and wings akimbo. “S-s-s-sorry! My bad! I-I was too close!”
“Twilight! I’m so sorry, that was my fault entirely!” Celestia jerked back as well, falling hard into a seated position. “I was too close!”
Celestia put her hooves to her muzzle, licking her lips. She could still taste Twilight’s sweetness. It wasn’t a kiss. It was an accident. A simple...fortunate...accident. Now just...tell her that. She opened her mouth, but the words died in her throat. It was an accident, but she wasn’t sorry for it. She wasn’t sorry for the experience, either having it or giving it. She liked it.
Celestia wanted more of it.
Twilight clambered fully upright, forcing her wings in close to her body. She hugged herself with them, keeping them from popping out again and showing her mentor just how much their brief touch affected her. She couldn’t let the Princess see her be any more inappropriate or incapable of handling herself. Celestia trusted her. Had entrusted her with the safety of all of Equestria more than once. Failing this hard was unacceptable.
She set her jaw, grinding her teeth hard enough to hear them creak against the pressure. Failing stopped here. She had a case to solve. A wrong to make right. But first she needed to keep more wrongs from happening. Twilight snorted forcefully, standing tall over the fallen Princess.
“We have to find Pinkie Pie.”
Celestia nodded slowly, her eyes downcast. Do we really? Finding the missing pony was a smart thing to do. Another step in the process of righting the status quo. But for the life of her, she felt like it was a step she didn’t want to take. Wild though this whole experience was turning out to be, she couldn’t deny how it was affecting her. She felt alive. She felt challenged. She felt free in a way she hadn’t even realised was possible. Most importantly, she felt closer to Twilight than ever before.
She didn’t want this to come to an end before… Celestia blinked. Before what? What do I want? She looked up at Twilight, her breath catching at how regal her former student had become. Twilight’s form was a slim version of herself in purple hues and streamlined shapes, mana-mane whipping and curling like a candle flame in a breeze. She already knew Twilight was pretty, but like this, the mare was striking in ways usually reserved for top models or actresses.
Celestia bit her traitorous tongue before it could blurt out what it suddenly knew her heart wanted, covering herself by standing back up. “Y-yes...let us find Miss Pie…”
“Rose petals?”
“Check.”
“Wine?”
“Check.”
“Mood lighting?”
Luna fired up her horn and tugged the heavy drapes on the windows a little tighter together. With the early morning sun blocked and the candles around them lit, the ambient light did lend itself well to a romantic atmosphere. “Check.”
“Then we’re all ready and set!” Pinkie Pie clapped her hooves together, spinning in place like a ballet dancer. She jumped at the end of her revolution and landed with a bounce next to the Princess. “We’ve outdone ourselves this time! This time...this time...there will be makeouts!”
Luna grinned. Pinkie’s enthusiasm was infectious, and she too had high hopes their efforts wouldn’t be in vain this time. If she could just get her sister to see the truth of things between herself and Twilight, then all of this would turn out worthwhile. She glanced at Pinkie, watching the mare double check everything. Pinkie was a happy, carefree soul, but oddly impassioned about these so-called ‘alicorn level’ romantic gestures.
While they had set up this location to tempt her sister toward such things, Pinkie had rambled on constantly, spinning a rich fantasy tale of love and lusts, always involving an alicorn or two. Frequently, the pony would insert herself into the fantasy—or a poor disguised avatar—to join in on the fun. Luna had cringed the first time, but the more she listened to Pinkie’s stream of fantasy, the more she could see how much Pinkie seemed to want it to be more than just fiction.
Luna tilted her head, watching Pinkie’s mane bob erratically while rose petals were adjusted minisculely. “Miss Pie...er...Pinkie? May I ask thee a question?”
“Sure!” Pinkie nosed one last petal into position and spun around to stand at attention. She even saluted. “Shoot at will! But don’t hit him, that’d be mean! Just kinda shoot around Will.”
“Er…” Luna’s smile twitched at the edges. For all that she enjoyed spending time with Pinkie, the pony was still something of a mystery to her. “I merely wished to ask you about this alicorn fixation that so vexes you.”
“Is that all?” Pinkie rolled her eyes and blew a raspberry. “I like ‘em!”
“Like them?”
“Yepper-roonie!” Pinkie giggled and sat back on her dock, sticking out her elbows to pantomime wings while her mane pointed out from her head like a horn. “I like how alicorns look! All the best parts of pegasus, earth ponies and unicorns combined! I like the idea of alicorns! All that power, all that beauty, and all that stamina!”
Luna raised an eyebrow at the way Pinkie’s brows were wagging at her. “Eh...yes? I’m not certain I follow?”
Pinkie wiggled her eyebrows faster, clicking her tongue and leering. Luna, however, continued to look perplexed. After a moment more, Pinkie gave up and threw up her hooves. “Ugh, c’mon, Princess! I like alicorns like some ponies like blonde manes, or thick girthy horns! I shouldn’t have to spell this out!”
“Oh. I see. So, it is a preference? Does that not limit your options for courtship?”
“It’s not like I have to have an alicorn...it’s just I’d like one, ya know?” Pinkie sighed, deflating a bit and gazing at her hooves. “I mean, that’d be cool and all now that there is a new alicorn out there...but Twi’s my bud, my amigo, my compadre. And mates before mates and all that. So if I can get her set up with the alicorn she loves, then it’s sort of like getting one myself, right?”
She smiled up at Luna, blinking rapidly until the Princess of the Night swam back into focus again. “But hey! Let’s not get distracted! By my calculations, Twilight and Tiny-lestia should be done at court and getting all the ponies to calm down. They’re super good at that stuff, and Twilight loves being eeeeefficent!” Pinkie sprang to her hooves and flashed to the window, peeking out into the mid-morning light. “Any minute now, they’ll come strolling along looking for me, cuz they’re smartypants ponies and will know to check places like this!”
Luna frowned, reaching out a hoof after Pinkie. She let it fall silently back to her side and looked around them again. They were in the archive tower, the one Twilight herself called home before transferring to Ponyville. Knowing Pinkie’s reputation for oddity, she didn’t press why this location was the one Pinkie was sure they would need to construct their surprise, but it made a sort of sense if they were expecting her sister and Twilight to make logical illogical conclusions.
“Any minute now…”
“Fair Pinkie...I understand helping my sister and Twilight be open with each other is a well intentioned duty you take, but where doth that leave you?”
“I said: any minute now...”
Pinkie ignored her, bouncing in place at the window. Luna frowned harder, well intentions or not, it seemed a shame that a pony should do so much and never expect to be rewarded justly. “Pinkie, perhaps—”
“They’re here! Quick, to battle stations!”
“—I, wait, what?” Luna blinked in shock, a whoosh of air escaping her lungs as Pinkie turned into a blur and lifted her up over a shoulder on the way to their secured hiding position.
“Your old room? Why would Pinkie be here of all places?”
Twilight came to a halt in the courtyard, a few paces away from the door to the archival tower where the Royal Library stored the less popular books and the ‘Twilight Collection’ of books she’d more or less permanently borrowed as a foal. In reality, the collection became more like an extension of the library and she its personal, unofficial, librarian. The care and stewardship of written knowledge was in her blood just as much as magic, and the door gave her another wave of happy nostalgia.
“We’ve already searched the logical places, and we’ve not located Pinkie.”
“We haven’t searched all the logical locations yet, Twilight.” Celestia tsk’ed and gestured across the courtyard toward the entrance of the castle kitchens area. “We have not, for example, checked the kitchens. I know Miss Pie is quite the fan of sweets. Would it not make sense to check there?”
“Which is exactly why we’re not going to check there.” Twilight smirked. “It’s logical. It makes sense. We are hunting a Pinkie Pie, sense and logic are immaterial.”
“Er...I suppose that does…” Celestia coughed into her hoof to hide her grin. “...make a kind of sense.”
Twilight chuckled under her breath, stepping up to the door and pushing it up with a wing. They weren’t a match for her magic, but she was finding the fake appendages to be useful even without flying. They were surprisingly dexterous and sensitive to touch. She could feel tiny shifts in the air around her in a way that made the space immediately around her more alive. It was like suddenly having new eyes, or new ears, or maybe a sense of smell like Spike’s. It was certainly hard to describe, even if she knew of the terms for it the pegasus used, experiencing it herself was nothing like what she’d ever imagined.
The tower was dark, the short flight of stairs that led up to the main level seeped in shadows. Above her, Twilight could see dim lighting coming from the landing, and she could smell the tangy, acrid scent of the slow burn candles she used to favor for nights spent muzzle deep in a book. Everything about the location seemed to want to take her down memory lane, to go over the years she put toward her self-education and magical practice.
“It’s been years since I moved in here.”
“Seven years, four months and three days.”
Twilight blinked and looked down at Celestia. “Do you remember the exact minute too?”
“No.” Celestia arched an eyebrow and smirked back at Twilight. I’m not obsessed or anything. Who do you think I am, Twilight?
“I was in my mid teens then.” Twilight sniffed, her voice low. “So much has changed since then. I miss this place sometimes. The simplicity of it.”
“Is that all?” Celestia pushed onward, taking the first few steps. Memories bombarded her from left and right without a moment’s rest. Twilight moving in, moving out, stocking her first pile of books, polishing the hourglass, knocking over her telescope, snuggling with Spike at night, running to meet her at the top of the stairs over and over and over. Twilight was everywhere in the tower.
That was why she hadn’t stepped hoof inside it for quite some time.
Celestia stopped halfway up the stairs, a spot of softness under her hoof. She looked down at it, the morning sun from the doorway giving her enough lighting to make out a vibrant red shade. Next to it was another splotch of color, and then another on the next stair up, more and more as her eyes climbed. She squinted at them, her mind struggling with what she was seeing. When it hit her, she looked back at Twilight.
“No, that’s not all I miss.” Twilight scoffed, stepping forward to let the door close behind her and cut off the rest of the world. She smiled at Celestia, her mentor poised on the steps like some model mid-photoshoot. “I miss a lot of things. I love the library. I love Ponyville and the friends I made. But this will always be home for me. Here with you.” Twilight coughed. “At the castle! With you and all the rest of...the...er...of the castle…”
You are the smoothest unicorn in all of Equestria, Twilight ‘Hoof-in-Mouth’ Sparkle. What did I just say about not failing in front of her? Don’t make me imagine more silly viking metaphors!
Twilight grinned, unsure of whether or not she sounded sane to either herself or Celestia. “Heh...um...I…”
“Twilight, it’s okay.” Celestia held up a hoof, halting Twilight. “You can tell me you missed me. I missed you too. You aren’t the only one with a lot of good memories attached to this place.” She smiled, more to herself than not, looking down at the red petals under her hooves. “To be honest, I have a lot of mixed feelings about being in here.”
“Why is that?” Twilight shifted her wings, settling her feathers. The ghostly feeling of each move Celestia made, here in close proximity, played over them, tickled her senses and added a depth, a solidness to the mare that mere sight and sound alone failed to convey. She could feel Celestia, right down to the small twitches of muscle just under the skin that signaled when Celestia was about to move. Did she feel this from me all the time? Every day, right next to her, my every move playing across her feathers? Did she feel every word I spoke like I’m feeling hers?
Each word that left Celestia’s mouth was like its own tiny caress. The Princess not only sounded beautiful, she felt beautiful too. Twilight loosened her wings, letting them relax and her feathers spread slightly to catch every draft and breeze.
Celestia chewed her lip. She wanted to choose her words carefully, even as she she was working through her feelings and that was not so simply done when dealing with something—somepony—so close and important to her. “It has been a few years since I was last here. A week before I sent you to Ponyville, if I remember correctly.”
“You were answering some questions I had about emotional variables on certain forms of spells.”
Celestia nodded. “Of course you remember what happened after that. Ponyville. Luna’s subsequent return. During my capture I had a lot of time to reflect on those events and what pushed me to send you to Ponyville.” She paused, glancing down again at the petal by her hoof. “Getting you to make friends was my motivation, and a good tactical call in hindsight.”
“You don’t have to apologize for sending me to meet some of the greatest ponies I could ever imagine to be my friends, Celestia.” Twilight stepped closer, hoof on the first step. “You’ve already done that in dozens of little ways over the years.”
The Princess’s eyes widened, a hint of color blooming on her cheeks. “You noticed that?”
Twilight shrugged, a small smile playing on her lips.
“I wish I could say I’m not surprised.” Celestia shook her head and took another step, leading the way with her tail tucked tight against her dock. “Even after all these years, your intelligence and deduction floor me at times, Twilight. But...a part of the reason I never came back to the archive was the memories of you. The emotions I unconsciously attached to this place. Nostalgia is a powerful thing at my age.”
“It affects much younger ponies too.” Twilight followed behind Celestia slowly, letting her mentor remain ahead of her. It felt right, normal even. She’d be lying to herself if she didn’t acknowledge the view it granted her as well. She could see the tension on Celestia’s legs. Twilight wondered what sort of nostalgia bomb was going off in the other mare’s mind even as she was awash with memories of the past. Every time Celestia had paid her a visit, the way it felt to be a special pony to the most special pony in the world.
“I can imagine. For me, this place is you, Twilight. I know you only spent a few actual years here, but they were important, formative years. It was where you grew up, where you became the pony you are now.” Celestia giggled. “Minus the wings of course.”
“So what you’re saying is that you didn’t want to remember the past?”
“No.” Celestia shook her head. “I am saying, Twilight, is that I didn’t want to remember you as a foal. A filly that triggered my misplaced maternal instinct more times than I could count.” She stopped at the top of the stairs and looked back at Twilight’s face. “I wanted to think of you as a grown mare that was smart and capable, kind and beautiful. I didn’t want to sit in my ivory tower and feel like the nest was empty again. I wanted to face the future you were living, not my past that you made so much more colorful.”
Twilight felt like her heart was trying to escape her chest via her throat. It was hard to breathe, hard to swallow. The Princess was only a few steps away, the top of a metaphorical mountain she had been climbing for most of her life. Their accidental contact outside the throne room loomed large in her mind. All it would take was a slight lean, rocking forward gently and she could experience it again. Celestia was right there, open, unguarded in a way she’d rarely seen the Princess. From the sound of it, Celestia liked what she’d become. Liked the pony she was and it was not merely their current circumstances that made it seem like they were getting even closer than before.
Twilight licked the back of her lips, the thought of actually kissing the Princess consuming her mind. She could do it. It would be easy. Celestia...might even like it too. All she needed to do was get the rest of her body to obey a nigh heretical command. The tongue seemed ready, the lips too, her whole mouth in fact was reporting in and voting a very loud ‘go for it!’ Her heart was sold on the idea, but her legs just didn’t seem to want to comply.
Et tu, hooves? Her left rear hoof started to budge, quivering in place, if not outright refusing to move. She leaned forward by a hair, trying to force her limbs into motion when Celestia started to turn away.
“Twilight?”
No! So close!
“I don’t think you were wrong about checking for Pinkie Pie here.” Celestia raised an eyebrow at the lit candles. “Somepony has been here recently.”
Twilight grumbled under her breath, when her center of gravity finally inched forward to move her hooves along of fall face first into the stairs. She was so close to actually making a move, but she’d frozen up, failed. Again. It was beginning to get tiresome.
She trotted the rest of the way up the short flight of stairs, turning to scan the room as her head rose above the landing. Just as Celestia said, somepony had been in her old room. Everything was just where she’d left it years ago, though it seemed whoever had set up things had also seen fit to dust and put fresh sheets on her bed before summarily covering it with rose petals. That same somepony had even left a pail of ice with what looked like a dark bottle of wine.
“Wine this early in the day?” Twilight rolled her eyes, stopping behind Celestia. “C’mon Pinkie...this is a bit much.”
“Do you think she set up that picnic earlier?”
Twilight nodded. “No doubt. Pinkie has a...thing...for alicorn romance. I guess she wants to try and trigger something between us.”
Which will never happen if I keep freezing up whenever Celestia says anything that could be even vaguely construed as a compliment towards me. But...thanks for trying, Pinkie. Twilight added silently, biting her lip. They still needed to find her friend, but now that they were here, she wanted to linger a bit.
“Well…” Celestia looked back over her shoulder at Twilight, “...it would a shame to let such a setup go to waste, wouldn’t you say?” She smile and walked deeper into the room, her heart jumping into overdrive at her own boldness. She knew they had things to do, issues to resolve, but she also wanted to stay here, with Twilight and explore the feeling that she was finally allowing herself.
Celestia came to halt next to the iced pail and the wine, her magic gripping the bottle. She frowned at the effort, and pushed against the floor with her hooves for more leverage until the bottle slid free of its ice cube grave. She giggled, her frown flipping to a triumphant smile as she rotated it around to read the label. Hmmm...this is one of Luna’s. So this is where she’s been hiding at.
Twilight remained at the landing, watching Celestia, processing the Princess’ question while her tiny internal vikings fought a losing battle against her basest urge. She knew she loved this mare, knew she wanted to kiss her, hold her, but so much of her mind still railed against the very idea of Celestia returning such feelings. It was all she could do to keep from falling into a drooling, stuttering mess.
Celestia reached down with her hoof and lifted a pair of fluted glasses. “It is a bit early for wine, but this is from a good year. You don’t just find bottles like this just lying around, Twilight.”
“Is that one of Luna’s?” Twilight squinted at the bottle, blocking Celestia from her vision. “So she’s in on this too?”
“It would seem so.”
Twilight shook her head, taking advantage of her self-distraction to move into the room proper. If she didn’t look at the figure of gorgeousness, she could function. If she just ignored the implication of Celestia’s words, she could think and move.
“Twilight.”
Please don’t. I don’t want to feel like this while you’re teasing me. I don’t want to fail in front of you again because...because I… Twilight swallowed. She could even finish the thought.
“Twilight...please.”
Twilight closed her eyes, focusing on her breathing.
“Look at me, please, Twilight.”
Celestia sounded pained. Worried. Twilight wished she could close her ears too. She tried to fight it. At least, in her defense, she tried. But she couldn’t keep it up. Her ears swiveled toward the Princess and her eyes opened a tiny amount. “I’m s-sor—!”
Lips touched her cheek. It was no accidental movement. One moment Celestia was standing there next to her, the next she leaned over, those lovely eyes of hers soft and welcoming as Celestia left a peck on Twilight’s cheek.
“No apologies, we are long past that now. Help me open this bottle, Twilight. My strength hasn’t returned enough for it.” Celestia held up the wine in her aura, turning the cork toward her former student. “I think we can let Pinkie Pie go for now. If she hasn’t told anypony of this except my sister, then I doubt we have anything to worry about from her.”
“But…”
“Open it, please.” Celestia smiled warmly. “It’s also high time we had a frank discussion between us. Not as teacher and student, nor as a leader and subject. But as equals. Two mares that have long danced around the elephant in the room.”
“Which elephant?” Twilight sagged, the tension in her shoulders and back going limp. She knew which elephant, of course, but couldn’t she hold on to it just a little longer? Did they really have to put the last nail in the coffin, so to speak? Sure, the feeling made her weak, made her fail, but she liked it.
Twilight’s horn fired up and she popped the cork from the bottle with a tiny flick of her head. Vapor hissed from the opened wine, quickly forming into a light mist. The flower scent around them took on a tart sharpness with the addition of the wine and it tickled her nose in a pleasant way.
Celestia wasted no time in pouring two glasses of the dark liquid, and passed one to Twilight. “Us.”
“What about us?” Twilight took her glass mechanically, her gaze fixed on the floor. “What is there to say that hasn’t been said before?”
“How about the truth?” Celestia stomped a hoof against the floor, forcing Twilight to look up at her in surprise. “We are both adults, Twilight. We both have feelings...at least...I assume we do. Feeling for each other? All this back and forth, all this ‘is she or isn’t she?’ is weighing on me. I thought I could keep it in. Keep it to myself forever, let us go on as we have for years now. But all this...today’s strangeness? It’s brought the subject into sharp relief for me.”
“Wait wait wait!” Twilight blinked, falling into a seated position. “Are… are you actually saying you have feelings for me? Like...ro-ro-romantic feelings?” The glass in her magic grip started to shake. “This isn’t some sort of fever dream, is it?”
“If it is, I don’t want to wake up yet.”
“But I thought I was the only one that felt that way!” Twilight looked down at the glass she was holding, as if she was seeing it for the first time, and tossed half of it down her throat like a shot. The tangy sweetness made her eyes water and she coughed raggedly, gasping for breath a moment later. “Ugh...that went down better in my head than it really did.”
“Wine is meant to be savored, Twilight.” Celestia smiled and took a seat, lifting her glass to her nose and breathing in the aroma before taking a light sip. She made a show of it, watching Twilight watch her through the tears. “Mmm...yes, a good year indeed.”
“Oh enough about the wine!” Twilight coughed again, harder and wiped her eyes with the back of her hoof. “Us. That’s what you said. Our feelings. For each other.”
“Yes.”
“I thought...I thought you were going to tell me that it couldn’t be. That it wasn’t something we could actually have. I’ve been kicking my heart in to keep from making a move on you! And now...now you tell me that I didn’t have to do that?”
“I never wanted you to do that at all, Twilight!” Celestia reached out, touching Twilight’s shoulder. “I’ve been much the same, and now we have an opportunity. I’ve been burying my feelings for so long, telling myself that it was something we could never have, not properly. That our positions, our ages, or whatever, were in the way.”
“You’ve thought about this?” Twilight swallowed hard. “I mean...yeah...those things certainly could get in the way.”
“Luna told me I was being silly.”
“Luna knew?!” Twilight groaned, eyeing her drink and wondering if another coughing fit would be worth throwing back the rest just to make a point.
The Princess nodded, taking another pull from her glass. “She did. We spoke of it more than a few times. But I always deflected her suggestions about just being honest with you. I realize now how stupid I was being. Funny how it takes something extreme like this to put the simplest thing into perspective, hmm?”
“Tell me about it.” Twilight sighed and took a careful sip this time. Under the tanginess, she could detect a whole bouquet of flavors and accents. Perhaps this really was a good vintage. “So…”
“Hmmm.”
Twilight turned her head a little, eyeing the Princess as Celestia eyed her back. “Now what?”
Celestia shot her former student a flat look for a second before she started to laugh. It started out as a quiet giggle, but grew to a full on belly laugh in a few breaths. She tilted backwards, falling onto her back amid the rose petals and spaced out candles, pink mane spilling out around her.
Twilight gawked at the smaller mare, her cheeks starting to burn. She cast a glance back at her half-empty glass, one eyebrow raised. How much alcohol is in this? She certainly didn’t feel drunk, not that she was any expert on the sensation, but she wondered if the spell that was affecting them didn’t also lower alcohol tolerance.
Twilight set her glass aside and settled on to her belly next to Celestia. She lowered her voice, looking down at her former teacher fondly. It felt...strange, to be above the Princess, but a good sort of strange. “Are you drunk?”
Celestia smiled, chuckling softly. “Hardly. Though...I must admit it has been over twelve hundred years since I was last verifiably inebriated, and I am much smaller...so who’s to say?” Her voice lowered, matching Twilight’s bare whisper. “Why do you ask?”
“I’ve never seen you like this.” Twilight lowered her head, searching Celestia’s eyes with her own. “Have I ever told you that you have the most beautiful laugh? I could listen to it for hours.”
“I do?” Celestia laughed again, the feeling bubbling up from her chest and out her mouth. “I’ve always thought I sounded something like a braying mule when I laughed too hard.”
“No…” Twilight folded her legs under her chin and rested her head on her wrists, “...it sounds like some beautiful, golden windchime. To me, at least. I love all of your different laughs.”
Celestia turned,resting her cheek against Twilight’s hoof. “Is that all?”
“No.”
“What else do you love?”
Twilight slowly let the wind escape from her lungs, drawing in another deep breath through her nose. Her heart pounded steady beats in her chest, like a viking war drum, calming the last of the butterflies in her core. For all the was wrong in the world and her life at the moment, this was right. She felt at peace.
Twilight looked into those eyes once more and willingly gave up her soul.
Celestia closed her eyes and felt Twilight’s soft muzzle against hers, felt those beautiful mulberry lips on her own. She let herself go, tilting her head and opening her mouth. The first brush of contact was incredibly gentle, exploring each other in a way their previous accident hadn’t allowed for. She could feel the way Twilight’s lips moved, each soft swell and supple valley to them, the way they grazed across her own. Twilight’s sweet taste, tinted by the wine, teased at her tongue.
Time slowed, dragging the sensations out to the breaking point and focusing her entire being on this one moment. Twilight plucked at her bottom lip, sucking on it for a moment before letting it go, never breaking their contact. Celestia opened her mouth a little more, her hooves going up and around the larger alicorn’s neck. This time, she was met with that curious tongue, the flavor of Twilight growing stronger on her taste buds. The pony overwhelmed her senses, filling her and holding her in everything that was Twilight Sparkle.
It was like she was in the ocean, right at the edge where she could feel the enormity of it. The depth, the breadth of that endless back and forth of waves that could carry her away. Her lips were the only thing tethering her safety. They held on for dear life as her breath was taken from her.
Twilight’s vikings stood in awe, mouths hanging open in the golden glow that was filling the imaginary void. A glorious dawn was rising before them and washing away the shadows, the rationalizations, Wingboner Woods, and every other location this small part of Twilight’s psyche has conjured. The tiny medieval ponies cheered, their purpose served and existence capped with a metaphorically appropriate end. Surely, true viking ponies of the past would smile to know some random pony would spend inordinate amounts of imagination on scale replicas of them to help her deal with her problems only for them to die in the blaze of a passion like no other.
It was a good end indeed.
Twilight relaxed, sliding a hoof behind Celestia’s head and holding the mare close. The time for freezing up was past. Now was the time for action and she was going to act. To live. She was going to make sure she kissed Celestia like she’d always imagined in the darkest recesses of her book forts when no pony could see or hear her. She was going to kiss Celestia like the Princess had never been kissed before.
Her body felt like a live wire, charged with arcane electricity, every nerve ending at maximum sensitivity. Thanks again to her new feathers, she could feel Celestia’s presence just as much as she could feel the mare’s lips and hooves. She could feel the rise and fall of Celestia’s chest and she matched it. In and out in tandem, merging her own presence with the Princess’ until they were one.
Twilight’s wings loosened at her sides, lifting up over them both. She wasn’t entirely certain why, but she wanted to do something with them. The kiss was pulling out urges she couldn’t firmly name and categorize. She wanted to take Celestia and do something, but the logical centers of her mind that would analyze those urges and tell her what to do were similarly being wiped out as her imaginary vikings had been.
So Twilight let it go, let her body do what it wanted. Her wings joined her hooves in supporting Celestia, holding her closer and wrapping herself around the presence she felt. It was indescribably intimate, and what little mental processes her had left briefly wondered if this was something pegasus ponies did together? Feeling each other without touching each other, their feathers turning their entire bodies into hypersensitive hooves?
Even that thought was washed away a moment later when the tip of her tongue found Celestia’s. The taste hit her like a thunderclap, but it paled to the blinding explosion going off behind her eyes at the feeling. They touched, lightly at first, hesitantly, as if scared to be the first to make a move. That lasted only a heartbeat, however, as Twilight took the lead and began to fence with Celestia, their tongues darting back and forth, parrying each other only to counter-riposte again and again.
The kiss became heated and contested, remaining soft and loving, but it took on a hunger that neither mare could deny any longer. Twilight pushed. Celestia gave ground, her back arching to press more of her body against Twilight’s.
“While I appreciate the effort to search Celestia’s tonsils, dear Twilight, I somehow doubt my missing magic is down her throat.”
Twilight let go of Celestia, gasping down a lungful of air, and looked up at the floating draconequus with wide eyes.
Discord smiled, twirling his goatee with a claw. “Good show of initiative, though. You’ll have this whole ‘alicorn princess’ thing down in no time.” The Spirit of Chaos dropped his mismatched hindlegs to the floor with the dull squeak of a clown’s nose. “Unfortunately, I don’t have time to wait for that. I need my magic back!”
There was a puff of smoke and Discord was dressed in a polka dotted hospital gown, his tail sticking out the back and shivering. “I’m sick, Twilight! Less of a draconequus! Look at me, I’m just wasting away!”
Celestia rolled her eyes, still laying on her back. “Oh please, Discord. Your magic fluctuates all the time, it’s one of the very hallmarks of chaos magic! How do you know you are not simply at some low-ebb?”
“I’m not some sort of tidally locked body of magical water, Celestia.” Discord scoffed, turning his flimsy hospital robe around and wearing it like a cape. It even began to flutter in some unfelt breeze. “I deserve more respect than that. It’s good I came to check in on you two anyway, at this rate you’re never going to find it! I was going to suggest splitting up.”
“Nooooo!”
Discord blinked, his billowing cape freezing in place as one of the larger storage chests near the edge of the room started to bounce and rattle. Its movements became increasingly energetic, and the chest started to walk its way toward the group.
When it got closer, the rattling halted for a moment before the top burst open and Pinkie Pie shot out of the chest, Princess Luna holding on to the pink blur of dear life. Pinkie landed in front of Discord and reared up on her hind hooves. “Discooooooorrrdd! Stop getting in the way of my alicorn-level makeouts! They were actually doing it this time too! You keep getting in the way and being a total...a total…”
Pinkie knitted her brow in thought, her eyes shifting back and forth. Finally she turned and looked at the Princess still clinging to her, speaking in a low tone. “Hey, Luna, what’s the mare equivalent of a cockblock?”
“Er…” Luna swallowed nervously. “Clitoference?”
The earth pony snorted gleefully and then whipped back around to fix Discord with an unhinged glare. “You’re being a total clitoference guy! Don’t be that guy!”
“I wholeheartedly agree.” Celestia crossed her hooves over her chest, her glare at Discord was considerably more measured, but no less intense. “Stop being a hypochondriac, I’m sure you will survive until the missing magic is found. We were in the middle of something, you know.”
“It didn’t look important to me.”
“Well it was important to us. Please understand.”
“What I understand is that I am missing something important to me, and you aren’t treating the situation with the proper amount respect someone like moi deserves.”
“Stop stopping the kisses!”
“ENOUGH!” Twilight slammed both hooves into the floorboards, her wings flaring out. The sudden motion generated a miniature whirlwind in the room, blowing out the candles and sending the rose petals flying. The archive, behind the heavy curtains, plunged into darkness.
Before anypony—or Discord—could breathe, the gloom was pushed away by the amethyst bonfire of Twilight’s mana mane and the searing glow coming from her eyes. Discord’s whimsical paper gown vanished in a flash of purple arcane fire an instant before Twilight’s mane rushed forward and wrapped itself around the spirit and yanked him to his knees in front of her. “I. Have. Had. Enough. You will not dismiss what Princess Celestia has told you and belittle what she thinks is important. You talk about respect but show none. It is you that should be apologizing, Discord.”
Discord leaned back as best her could in Twilight’s grip, the pupils of his yellow eyes shrinking fearfully. He glanced down at the hair holding him for a second and then did a double take, leaving him with two heads. “Well well well...I always knew you were capable of a lot of things, Twilight...but theft? Not even I would have guessed that.”
“Huh?” The glow in Twilight’s eyes sputtered, flicking on and off for a moment before fading out completely. “What are you talking about?”
“This!” Discord’s second head morphed into a paw and he lifted up a pawful of amethyst mana cackling with pink lightning. Another Discord appeared outside Twilight’s grip and took it from the original, so he could hold it with both forelimbs. “This is my chaos magic!”
Everypony in the room stood in shocked silence, staring at the glowing mane before erupting with shouts and questions. Twilight rejected Discord’s accusations. Celestia asked how chaos magic could even be stolen. Pinkie demanded a do-over for her OTP’s makeout session.
Quietly, in the rear of the room, there was the smallest noise a clearing throat could make. Nonetheless, it drew every eye. Princess Luna’s nervous grin started to shake. “Um...I know how this happened…”