Celestia had never been more disappointed in her student.
Twilight was anxious and willful, often to alarming degrees, but she'd never known her to be spiteful. But the tone she'd been taking with Spike was…
...Almost as disturbing as the tone she'd used to acknowledge her teacher's last command. Twilight needed to be disciplined, that much was clear, but 'mortal terror and boundless despair' were not what she'd been trying to instill. Perhaps she'd been too harsh. It was always hard to gauge just how firm she needed to be with Twilight. The filly was just so sensitive. Arguably more sensitive than the little hatchling she needed to attend to.
The bedroom door was wide open, doubtless flung that way by Twilight. Celestia stepped through and gently pushed it almost closed behind her with a brush of her magic.
“Spike?”
A stifled sob was the only answer she got. His basket was empty and there was no sign of disheveling on her bed itself. The only thing out of place (other than a few black footprints on the carpet) was the corner of a little blue blanket poking out from under the bed frame.
Of course.
She knelt down and ducked her head low to put herself at his level.
“Spike? You can come out. You're not in trouble.”
“You're mad,” the little dragon protested, voice thick with tears.
“I'm not mad at you, Spike.” A wisp of sunny yellow magic lifted the corner of her bedcovers. “Please come out.”
Spike was curled up with his blanket clutched so tightly in his little claws that he'd punched holes right through it. Tears sparkled on his chubby little cheeks and in his big, emerald eyes.
“Are you gonna yell?”
A twinge of regret fired off in Celestia's chest. She had overdone it.
“No, Spike. No more yelling today, I promise.”
Slowly Spike uncurled himself and crawled towards Celestia's waiting hoof. The moment he was within reach, she pulled him into a tender embrace between her forelegs.
“It's okay, Spike. You aren't in trouble.”
“Wh-what about T-Twilight?”
“She won't yell at you again, I--”
“No!” Spike pushed himself back from her chest and looked the surprised alicorn in the eye. “Is Twilight in trouble?”
“Twilight is… Yes, Spike. Twilight is in trouble.” There was no sense pretending otherwise. Spike was a child but he wasn't stupid. Lying wouldn't just be wrong, it'd be useless. “But--”
“Please don't send her away! It was all my fault!”
“Spike,” she said firmly but with great care to not raise her voice so much as a decibel, “you are not to blame for her behavior.”
“Yes I am! She's upset because I made a mess.”
“That doesn't excuse--”
She hesitated at the miserable look on Spike's face. He was convinced he'd been bad. He had made quite the mess, but it wasn't the first time. Why was this one weighing so heavily on him?
“Why don't you tell me what happened today?”
“...and that's when I thought that maybe a bath would make me warm. So I went to the bathroom and pushed over that staircase you got me so that I could get myself water, and I turned that red handle all the way over. It was way warmer than the baths you usually give me but the water kept going down the drain. I couldn't figure out how to stop it until I shoved one of those little towels in it. Water kept leaking out but it was slow so I could keep filling it back up when it got too low. That worked great because it leaked away faster than it got cold so I could keep it warm with new water all the time.”
Celestia didn't know whether to smile or sigh so she did both. That explained what she'd been told on the way over about the hot water running out.
“I musta fallen asleep because then Twilight was waking me up asking me what I was doing. She was… really upset. When she went to go answer the door I climbed down and tried to get a towel but I knocked a whole stack of them onto the floor when I slipped on the water. Twilight was real mad when she came back. She wrapped me up in a towel and carried me out into the other room to yell at me…”
Spike's voice hitched a little, like tears were starting to build up again. “She was really scared. She was angry but it was sorta scared angry. It's the angry she gets 'cause she's afraid she's let you down. You know, like the time with the portals?”
Princess and dragon both shivered a little at that memory. Celestia had decided right then and there that it would be a long time before she formally taught Twilight any portal spells. Not until she'd thoroughly mastered teleportation. By that point she'd have developed the requisite control that a portal, a far more complicated bit of magic, required. Celestia gave Spike an encouraging nuzzle to get him back on track.
“Then what happened?”
Spike swallowed hard. “She kept saying how bad things were and how much trouble she was in. Because she was supposed to watch me but I'd made a mess with all that water and my checklist and that made it look like she didn't do her best. Then you came back and told her that everything she was afraid of was true, and it was all her fault. But it was really all my fault because you asked me to be a big dragon and watch myself for a while this morning.” His frills drooped like overcooked spaghetti. “I messed up and now I'm gonna lose my best friend.”
Celestia shook her head. 'Everything she was afraid of' indeed. Spike was remarkably perceptive for such a young creature. He saw right through Twilight's tirade to the scared little filly inside. The same scared filly that tried scheme after scheme to catch her mentor's eye, each one more insane than the last. Oh, she'd tried to assign monitors to watch Twilight for signs of planning, but she'd stonewall them with silence until she was ready to unleash whatever she'd come up with.
Monitors, tutors, guards, servants, if a pony worked for her, either as Celestia the Princess or as Celestia the Headmare, Twilight saw them as a direct conduit back to her and she'd absolutely never show her teacher a project until it was perfect. She wouldn't let them into whatever thought process was leading her to pull these stunts so that they might be able to divert her or, failing that, at least warn somepony before all Tartarus broke loose.
This was why she'd held such hopes for her befriending Spike. It was a job he'd had the potential to perform admirably.
“Spike, is that why you were crying before? Were you crying because what you did made Twilight scared? And because you feel like you made her fears come true when she got in trouble?”
Spike twisted his tail in his claws and nodded miserably.
What was once a twinge when the conversation began became a full on lance. She hadn't been planning to end her mentoring of Twilight, but she had planned to keep her clear of Spike for a good long while, a plan that had just gone up in smoke. If she took Twilight away from him, Spike would assume the worst and blame himself, the repercussions of which could hurt him for a long time. It might make him reluctant to reach out to anypony else for fear of getting them in trouble, too. Or it could make him scared to take the initiative and think for himself for much the same reason.
Celestia's next question died in her throat when the clock on her mantelpiece chimed. A groan almost escaped her lips at what that meant. The Saddle-Arabians would be arriving in exactly one hour. Her meeting with them was months in the making and absolutely could not be delayed nor could she leave it to Cadance or the diplomats. She had to be there personally and had precious little time to waste.
“I think it's time for your nap.” Yellow magic shimmered to life around Spike and lifted him gently to his basket. He made an indistinct noise of protest but his eyelids drooped the moment he touched the cushion. The ability of a baby dragon to nod off regardless of the circumstances was something the thousand year old alicorn envied to no end.
“But whaddabout Twilight?” he mumbled.
“It'll be alright, Spike.” She bent her head low over the basket for an affectionate nuzzle. “Twilight will be okay.”
Soon enough Spike lost his battle against his blankets and fell asleep. Part of Celestia was loathe to leave him. That part of her wanted to just lay there on the floor next to his basket and watch over him all evening, Saddle-Arabian's be banished. She longed to drape her wing over the little dragon and hold him close so much it ached.
Were it so easy.
She stood and crept out of the room in a manner more befitting a sneaking filly than the monarch of Equestria, easing the door open and shut again with only the barest whisper of a sound. It was time for another gamble. She could only hope that Twilight wouldn't disappoint her again.
Twilight had stuck to her spot on the floor like she'd been glued down. At first it'd been fear of Celestia's anger that kept her pinned. That fear was far from gone but something new had trotted up and asked fear to scoot over so it could join in on the emotional dogpile.
Confusion.
Not confusion with Celestia's disappointment. In hindsight it made sense. She'd fought being pulled from her studies to watch Spike, which meant Spike was unsupervised and made a mess. Since she was supposed to be in charge of him that made it her fault. Why did hindsight always have to come after she messed up? Obviously it wouldn't be called hindsight if it looked forward, but foresight never seemed as useful. Maybe there was a spell to--
More important detail: 'Best friend'?
Twilight didn't have friends. Except Shining Armor and, well, did Cadance count? She didn't have friend friends. Friends that were just for being friends. Friends weren't on the curriculum, so she didn't have time for that sort of thing, surely Celestia knew that? After all, Celestia designed her curriculum so she must have.
Did Spike? That had been him talking, hadn't it? The door wasn't closed all the way so she could hear pretty much all of Celestia's and Spike's conversation well enough. It was probably eavesdropping but she'd been trying to hear what Spike was reporting about her. After all, this whole thing had obviously been a test, and Spike would have been in on it, ready to give a report to Celestia about how badly she'd failed and in what exact ways she'd failed so that Celestia could give her an accurate grade when she was sent back to magic kindergarten and forbidden from ever attending Celestia's school ever again.
But if that was all true then Spike was a lousy tester. He sounded more like an upset child than a cold, calculating judge of character. 'Best friend'?
That demanded the question: was it a test? Was it really a test meant to judge her worthiness to continue as Celestia's student or…
...or had Celestia just wanted her to foalsit Spike? Not as a student being tested, but as, well, a foalsitter. But Celestia was her teacher, surely it wasn't that simple? Cadance had told her that her time spent foalsitting was originally Celestia's idea. That could mean it was a part of her curriculum after all. So, maybe it had been meant to teach her something, but not to test something? Maybe--
The sound of the bedroom door clicking shut stopped her train of thought like a brick wall across the tracks. Celestia crossed the room calmly until she towered over Twilight once again.
“Stand up, Twilight.”
Her voice wasn't angry anymore but it also bore a striking resemblance to iron. Twilight snapped up to her hooves with terror fueled eagerness.
“You will wait here for the cleaning staff to arrive. When they do, tell them that you have been ordered to help them clean up the mess without magic. That includes levitation and remover potions. Start in the study so that you do not disturb Spike's nap. When he wakes up you are to give him the gems in the bowl on the cabinet at the end of my bed and see to any needs that he has. Otherwise, you are to remain here until I return from my meeting. We will discuss matters further then.”
“Yes, your highness,” Twilight answered quietly.
Celestia held her gaze for a moment until she broke it with a sigh.
“You've disappointed me today, Twilight, but you need to relax. I'm not dismissing you as my student.”
“You-- you're not?” The question was more squeak than words but it must have gotten the point across because Celestia answered.
“No, I'm not. We will still talk about this, but for now, at least, you can stop worrying about that.”
With that she turned away and made to leave. Twilight stayed rooted to the spot while she tried to process what she'd been told. Cleaning, no magic, nap, gems, wait, not expelled.
Not expelled?
“But… I failed.”
Celestia paused, her magic already holding the door open, and looked back at her student.
“This wasn't a test, Twilight. It was an opportunity. You have another one in your hooves right now. Don't let it slip away.”
The door swung shut behind her, leaving Twilight alone to wait and wonder what in Equestria her teacher had meant.