Alicorns get sick in weird ways.
"...l’tenant Armooor..."
I was honestly surprised to discover that alicorns get sick at all, since what we're dealing with are creatures who will outlive me by ten times and whose morning routines include the moving of entire celestial bodies.
"Coming, ma'am," I said, as I got up from the couch in the sitting room of my royal charge's guest suite. “What can I get you?"
"'nother glass of water."
"On it," I replied.
Equestria is full of tribe-specific illnesses. Earth ponies don't get the feather flu, which is expected, and I've never seen a pegasus come down with a case of the reins. But when you embody all three tribes of ponies, as my employer does, things start to get a little muddy. Is one susceptible to none of them? All of them? I made a mental note to find out more, and to perhaps work with her on curtailing some of her riskier activities. Case in point: her habit of using the municipal public baths. I get that it's a pegasus thing, and I get that she really, really enjoys it, but the concept of bathing alongside dozens of other ponies bugs me. It seems really unhygenic. Then again, maybe I'm just bugged because it's one of the few places I'm simply not permitted to directly watch over her; indecorous as this society may be, bathing remains a gender-restricted activity.
Or maybe I'm just bothered because I have an image of her rising up out of the steaming aromatic pools, her long, silken mane drenched and clinging gently to the pale pink hair of her face and get a hold of yourself, Lieutenant—
I swallowed. "Here you are. One glass of water."
A pale pink hoof emerged from the mass of fluffy comforter covering the bed and vaguely waved around. "...putit'n'm'hoof.”
I mentioned the Princess's illness in my latest report to Sergeant Thunderous, my don't-call-him-my-C.O.-actually-my-C.O. He relayed the message to Her Highness Princess Celestia, who reported back, via the Sarge, that (a) it was nothing to be concerned about and (b) that it would pass in time. I only later realized Her Highness Princess Celestia did not mention exactly how much time we were talking. On an alicorn's expanded timetable, there was no telling whether their version of a twenty-four hour bug would outlast other races' political dynasties.
I carefully levitated the water to the crook of her pastern, and it disappeared beneath the blankets. Actually, there was a lot I didn't know. Princess Cadance's symptoms were worryingly nonspecific. Her reaching for the glass with her hoof rather than using her typical telekinesis said she was still leery about using active magic. The erratic speech suggested fatigue. Then there were the...mood swings?
"...y'so good to me, l’tenant," she said, her voice thick with emotion or phlegm or both. She gave a little sniffle, something also blameable on either emotion or phlegm. "...such a good stallion." The pink hoof emerged from under the covers and flailed around randomly for a few seconds before finding my shoulder and patting me on it. "...sooo good."
"Thank you, ma'am."
"...just like that. yer'all 'please ma'am' and 'thank you ma'am' and 'don' ever run off at night without me ever again ma'am.'"
"Haranguing you is being good to you?"
"...maybe i need't," she said. "...maybe i need somepony t'keep me in line." Her Highness Princess Cadance drew a startlingly shuddery breath. "...i'been... putting this off. ...din' wanna ask you n'case you gottit wrong."
I shook my head. "Sorry, ma'am? Ask me what?"
Princess Cadance breathed in sharply, gurgling against whatever murky dampness was going on in the back of her throat. When she spoke again, it sounded quite a bit more lucid.
"Lieutenant Shining Armor, what is the meaning of love?"
I stammered for a second. "Wow. That's... a big question. May I request a little time to—"
"No! Denied! Chop-chop! From your gut!"
"Yes, ma'am," shot back my military training, without bothering to consult my conscious mind. "What, uh, was the question again?"
"What," she asked, her voice oddly clear even beneath the smothering blankets, "is the meaning of love?"
I worked this over for a minute, my mouth a hard but microscopically-twitching line. "Okay," I said. "How about this: my mother and father. I only hope I can someday love a mare, and have her love me, the way they love each other."
"What is it that they do?"
"Things... weren't always great for my mom and dad," I said, my formality slipping away under the intensely odd questioning. "Mom's sire was a crazy old stallion named Waning Daylight. Squandered most of the inheritance on that side of the family. Dad was never particularly well-off. Money was tight for them. Things had really improved by the time I was born, thank goodness, but mom says it was rough for a while. That's why mom started writing, her um, novels. To try and help make ends meet.
"Ponies fight when the belt gets tightened too much. It would have been easy for them to split up, any number of times. But they remembered the promise they made to one another. To love and to cherish always, through good times and bad. And they stuck to it. Because they had made that promise and they chose to honor it."
"No, no, no! This is getting off-track! Give me one word. What is the meaning of love?"
"...Duty?" I said, helplessly trying to boil my feelings down enough for the Princess's needs. There was quiet from beneath the bedclothes.
"A soldier's answer," she said, at last.
"Well, that makes sense," I replied.
The lump in the comforter relaxed and sunk. "...nope," it muttered. "...not it. ...was kinda hoping..."
"I'm...sorry."
"Oh, it's not your fault!" she shouted. I couldn't see them, but I could hear the tears were there. "It's all me! What kind of princess am I, anyway?"
"...Ma'am?"
"Letting myself get pushed around by that bully Sunny Smiles! She was supposed to be gone! That was supposed to be my job! D'you know she hasn't even met with me yet?"
"Yes, ma'am. Of course I do, ma'am."
"Not a word of explanation! Banish it to Tartarus, Lieutenant Armor, I am a Princess of Equestria!"
I didn't know quite what to say to that. The lump under the covers settled down again, sniffling. "Never should've thrown away m'tiara. Mistake nummer one."
"We've obviously talked about your, um, 'missing' tiara to the ponies who appear to be the local authorities. Most likely scenario is that it's lost somewhere in the Blight, all the way back down on the surface, but it may also have hit something durable. Eyes are out for it."
"...very dutiful thing to say."
"Thank you?"
"...'s not a good thing. ...y'been sitting here by my side being dutiful, an' y'need to go out an' enjoy the big, wide, wunnerful city instead."
"My job is to be at your side, ma'am."
Princess Cadance's voice began to clarify again. "What if I 'spifically ordered you to do something for me? As a Princess of Equestria?"
I fidgeted. "Well, within reason, ma'am..."
"Lieutenant Shining Armor of the Household Regiments," she intoned, "I order you to take the rest of the holiday and enjoy the city."
"Ma'am, I—"
"Do you doubt the efficacy of our gracious host's personal guard?"
I gritted my teeth. Denied the Ambassador's residence (since it was still occupied by the bafflingly obstinate H.E. Smiles), we had been rooming with Canterlot's Resident Minister, a stern and officious pegasus pony named Weather Eye. He was humorless to a fault, but he did run a tight ship. I wasn't sure I was making her appreciably safer just sitting at her bedside fetching water for her.
I spent a long, hard minute trying to cross this mental distance.
"This is really hard for you," she said. She didn’t sound in the least bit matronizing. The tone was one of respect and maybe even wonder.
"Okay. As you wish, ma'am."
"...good," she said, slumping again. "...whole city's celebrating, no reason y'shouldn't be too."
This was true. Cloudsdale came with this reputation of working seven days a week with no weekends, but with a calendar that included over a hundred civic holidays per year, it didn’t seem all that different from the “weekend” model; ponies took at least as much time off, if not more, and the schedule was that much less predictable. Today, in fact, was the festival of Venus Verticordia, which seemed to me to be a lot like good old Hearts and Hooves day back in Canterlot. Given Princess Cadance's sphere of influence, it was a terrible shame that she was laid up in bed instead of being out and about enjoying the festivities. The mere fact of thinking about that would make it hard for me to enjoy anything out there. But it was an order, after all...
"I want to state for the record that I'm doing this on the condition that you never, ever pull a stunt like that emergency midnight spa visit thing ever again."
"...'s'it look like 'm gonna hop right up an' start runnin' around cloudsdale?"
"Fair point."
The blanket-lump turned over and wadded the pillows around to a comfier configuration. "...'s cute that you think there's a record y'hafta state things for."
"Figure of speech. Get a snow-shower in the weather bath if you feel up to it. You'll feel better afterwards."
"...'kay, off you go, have fun, really do mean that."
"Just as reminder, and I'm sure nopony will fault you for it under the circumstances, but Phosphorus isn't up yet." While her Aunty Celestia is responsible for the sun and the moon, Cadance has been given journeymare responsibility for the Phosphorus, the Morningstar; though she often forgets, making it the Eveningstar on more occasions than I’d like to admit.
"...an' they're all gonna be wanting to see it, 'cause holiday." Cadance gave a deep, miserable groan. "...wish aunty could jus' do it for once."
"Wish I could do it."
"...y'do 'nuff. ...but if you rilly rilly wanna, y'can get me a treat while yer'out."
I smiled. "Will do."
Then she shooed me out of the room, and just like that, I was on holiday.
Holiday!
To a dutiful pony such as myself, the word was exhilarating and, truth to tell, a little bit frightening. Nevertheless, I began to warm to the idea. Imagine! One whole free day in the greatest city in the sky! Endless possibilities! I breezed past Sabre and Spurs, two veteran members of Weather Eye's personal guard, stopping only to give them several minutes of detailed directions on the care and feeding of Canterlot's ailing princess.
Then, head swimming with potential, I chose a direction and gave myself the reins, feeling the comforting hum of my breastcollar as hooves hit cloud. Unicorns and earth ponies were typically constrained to traveling Cloudsdale’s major thoroughfares, those made of either sufficiently-dense cloudstuff or modern gleaming white ice amalgam produced in bulk by the Cloudsdale Weather Corporation. But thanks to a gift from my favorite uncle, I wasn't limited to the typical. Uncle Sentinel's city crest, a gift for services rendered to Cloudsdale once upon a time, ensured I could walk wherever the pegasi did, without risk of plummeting to my certain death in the Blight below. There was absolutely nowhere in this city a son of House Shine couldn't—
I stopped short as my hooves encountered empty air. Before me was a hundred-meter drop to the next ledge of clouds below. The clouds were soft—they felt something like a plush foam sheet beneath my hooves—but I wasn't sure if they were that soft.
"Huh.” It hadn't been this way earlier. Up until today, heading coreward from the R.M.'s manse had been a slow, ascending trot toward the Acropolis and all its grand sights. Now it just led to an acre of plain sky.
Shrugging, I took another direction, only to find this one blocked by a brand-new unscalable wall of cumulonimbus. I felt a little stab of frustration as a tiny, cherry-red pegasus effortlessly passed me and flitted to the top of the cloud-cliff with a few easy wingbeats.
"Hey!" I called out.
The pegasus turned, peering at me from the top of the cloudbank. "Oh, hey! You've got cloud-hooves! Neat trick!"
"Yes, it's really special. Listen, what's up with the clouds here? They're new."
"Yeah!" she said, all bubbly. "Aren't they beautiful?"
"Sure are," I replied. "Why are they here?"
She blinked at me vacantly. "Why not?"
"They weren't here yesterday! This is a city, right? Shouldn't it stay, I don't know, kind of the same shape?"
"Why would it do that?"
I didn't really have an answer for her. With a little shrug and a giggle, she vanished off to what I presumed was a long, aggressively-public bath, leaving me stuck at the bottom of a huge white mess of clouds.
Turned out there were places in this city a son of House Shine couldn't go. Lots of them, in fact. The thoroughfares leading to the Foreign Quarter were probably open, given the hundreds of unicorns and earth ponies who needed to traverse them on a daily basis, but that hardly seemed like a satisfying way to spend a day off.
No. I was not going to succumb to the path of least resistance. I had a guilt-free, duty-free day in perhaps the single most exotic, cosmopolitan city known to ponykind. This was Cloudsdale, banish it! Its docks and markets hosted representatives from all the civilized races of the world! Griffons from Griffonstone! Catfolk from Abyssinia! Diamond Dogs from... wherever the hay Diamond Dogs came from! A city where nothing was impossible and any experience could be bought for the right price! I vowed, right then and there, that—Celestia as my witness—I would not waste this day.
Four hours later, I found myself perched atop a stool in a Foreign Quarter watering-hole named "Lucky's Canterlot Pub," throwing back a series of dandelion and burdocks that were just slightly worse than, and otherwise exactly like, D&Bs that I'd been drinking in Canterlot for virtually all my life. The decor, all zinc countertops and soap-stained walls of dark wood, was indistinguishable from that found in a hundred different pubs I'd frequented elsewhere in the Equestrian Hegemony. The place reeked of bubble-stuff, and no wonder: not five stools away was a dispirited-looking brownish unicorn, alternating puffs on his bubble wand with sips of his tomato soup and bites of his grilled cheese. The bubbles didn't seem to be making him any happier; in my experience, bubbles seldom did.
"Hey, sunshine," drawled the apron-clad barkeep, a frizzy-maned green mare a few years my senior. From the four-leaf clover on her rump, I deduced that this was "Lucky," though I never asked. "Another D&B?"
"Might as well keep 'em coming," I said.
"Anything for your friend?"
I glanced at the soup-eating pony for a moment, then looked back at Presumed Lucky and frowned. "I'm sorry, who—"
"Nothing for me, thank you, love," came a clipped voice at my right ear, and with a speed common to diving birds of prey, the stool next to me was occupied by an enormous gray griffon. The enormous gray griffon, in fact. Auric Turncoat, the Princess's self-appointed lifelong protector and certified nutjob, who had been stalking us ever since Canterlot.
"Oh," I said. "It's you."
"Lieutenant Armor! Old buddy of mine. Old buddy, old pal." He gave my shoulder a companionable punch with his eagle claw. "So, what's that you're drinking? Looks awful. Like cola that's gone sick."
"Dandelion and burdock," I muttered. "Listen, Auric--"
"How cute! Not content with spending all day eating flowers, you've decided to drink them as well. You ponies are such adorably sweet little creatures, you know that?"
"I'd like to see you so glib after a plate of grilled sage in five-alarm inferno sauce."
"Point taken. Listen, I can't help but notice you're spending your leave day sitting in a disappointing little Hegemonic dive bar."
"Hey!" said Lucky.
A deep bow. "No offense, m'lady."
Lucky harrumphed and went back to cleaning glasses. I fixed Auric with my best attempt at a stink eye. "Just so you know, I haven't really been here all day."
"Good to hear! I'd hate to think of your horizons being so narrow, stallion of quality like yourself. So, tell me! What have you been up to?"
"I, um, spent a couple hours in the waiting room of the Canterlotian Embassy. Trying to get some answers."
"Time well spent, I'm sure?"
I snorted. "Ambassador Smiles is totally ensconced. She's deep in some sort of tax audit of the Weather Corporation and isn't talking to anypony. Every other government office I can find is shut tight for the holiday. Not that I've made any better progress on normal days—seriously, does anyone besides the Honorable Sunny Smiles work in this city?"
"Cuts into the partying, I think," said Auric. "Which coincidentally serves as a convenient segue to my next topic. How would you like to go to a party?"
I narrowed my eyes. "What's the catch?"
"Tut, tut. So suspicious, Lieutenant. When have I ever given you cause to doubt me?"
"Literally every single time we've interacted."
"Other than that."
"Your reputation for behaving badly on every occasion we haven't interacted. Up to and apparently including attempted regicide?"
"Set that aside as well."
"So...never?"
"Excellent! Sense at last. Come on, let's fly. Figuratively, in your case."
"Hold on," I said, digging in my hooves. "I haven't agreed to anything."
"Come on! You need some fun in that dreary old life."
"Not sure I want you, of all creatures, telling me what 'fun' is."
"So that's a tentative 'no.'"
"No! Or—yes!"
"Well, then, let me be a bit more persuasive." Auric leaned in; his eyes began to glint. "You absolutely will accompany me to a party because you are getting far too comfortable living in extremely close quarters with young Mi Amore for my liking. You are going to interest yourself in other young mares your age, like a normal, healthy pony stallion. You are meddling in the affairs of immortals, Lieutenant Armor. It does not suit you. And if you continue in this vein, I will strongly consider showing you, in extremely unpleasant detail, what the precise limits of mortal existence are."
"Are you threatening me?"
"Does it sound like I'm threatening you?"
"Yes!"
Auric clucked his tongue at me. "You see? Paranoid delusions. Clearly, you're both overworked and overtired. You know what I find really relaxing?"
"A part—"
"A party!" He stared at me silently, awaiting my reply.
"What is your deal, anyway? Jealousy?"
"Jealousy! Perish the thought. I merely want you to feel happy and fulfilled with every area of your life. At least, those areas of your life not involving your entanglement with the Princess."
"I'm not a romantic rival, Auric. If all you're doing is trying to get me to back off, you're wasting your effort. Go ahead and woo her. I'm sure you'll just sweep her off her hooves."
"Look at these accusations of ulterior motive. Can't a griffon of a certain age invite his 'bro pal' to a gay little soirée for one evening? Please, Lieutenant. Don't make me beg. It's undignified."
I gave a heavy sigh, then threw back the rest of my newly refilled D&B. The intent was to look cool and stallionish, but the effect was slightly marred by my coughing on the fizz. I spent about fifteen seconds snorting and trying to clear my sinuses and then stared at him again.
"Fine. We're doing this."
"Wonderful!"
"But only because you're a complete ass dead-set on ruining my vacation day if I don't. You're way too much work."
"Success by any means. That's always been my motto! In war and life equally." He threw a wing chummily across my withers.
"And never call me your 'bro pal' ever again."
"I've stricken it from my vocabulary."
"I'm going to regret this."
"Undoubtedly. Now come on. Let's have you some fun."
Two hours later, I was...
...all right, I'll admit it. I was having fun. Cloudsdale might not have had the most dedicated workforce or the most comprehensible civic engineering plan, but I had to grudgingly admit that they really knew how to party. Either that, or Auric merely knew how to pick them. The griffon had whisked me away to the far end of Cloudsdale, to a great ballroom constructed of rosy cumulus and packed snow. The late afternoon sun cut sharp angles across the dance floor and shattered into a million pieces against a brilliant chandelier made entirely of icicles. In the center of the room, bright pink punch flowed freely from an ice-block fountain and drained into a basin filled with lemon slices before being drawn back up and tossed into the air once more. A trio of pegasus lyrists filled the room with gentle music from a raised platform near one end of the room. And last but most certainly not least, I'll just say it: the place was full of mares. Mares are a thing that many stallions like.
Pegasus mares are curious creatures. We saw a lot of them in the Legion, of course. Not as curved or refined as their earth and unicorn cousins; a little wiry, a little brash. The wings are the big attraction, of course. I will not lie; I am a huge fan of a mare with a healthy set of wings. One sometimes wishes one could have the best of all three worlds...
"Penny for your thoughts, Lieutenant?"
I turned to face the pony on my left. The mares here weren't all pegasi. If I'd heard the name right over the noise when we first met, this was Cocoa, a soft, dark brown earth-triber with an even darker brown mane. A glance at her flank would probably remove all doubt—obviously the only reason I'd tried to steal a glance—but a slinky little party dress concealed all.
I flashed my best soldier's grin. "Is that what they're worth?" My quip got the desired reaction: a deep, husky chuckle that sent shivers along my spine.
"Now, Cocoa," came a delicate, refined voice from my other side. "Do not monopolize the Lieutenant's attention."
I turned right. This one was undoubtedly Champagne; her blazer left her distinctive mark fetchingly bare. Champagne was the very picture of Canterlot elegance. Prim, poised, perfect. Her accent had just the faintest glimmer of Pfrench around the edges.
"Why shouldn't I, sugar?" said Cocoa, snuggling in tightly to me. "I think there's enough stallion here for two."
"Ladies," I said, glancing down at Cocoa, "I want to stress first and foremost that I'm having a great time right now. That having been said, I was given the impression this was some kind of, um, office party?"
"Oh, it is," said Cocoa. "It absolutely is. The Weather Corporation always throws the best parties. Wouldn't you agree, Champagne?"
"The best," she affirmed, delicately plucking a flute of fizzing liquor from a passing tray and bringing it to her lips in one smooth motion.
I gave a quick scan of the room. "I guess what I'm asking is: are there any bosses we should be steering clear of?"
Cocoa laughed, and it was a divine sound, deep and throaty. She bopped me on the nose with one hoof. "Aren't you sweet? You're wondering if there's anypony here we shouldn't be making fools of ourselves around?"
"Well, yeah," I said. And then, more smoothly, I answered, "It's such a lovely night. I couldn't bear to think that any regrets would come of it."
"Well, don't you worry, hon. I'm the Administrative Assistant to the Deputy Operations Manager of the Quality Assurance Department, and he's been on a skiing trip for the past three months."
"Lots of accrued leave," I said.
"Not a bit. It's all billable. On the books, it's an 'extended analysis of snow granularity conditions in the Foal range.' I don't think he'll be showing up here any time soon."
"And I," said Champagne, "am my own supervisor. It is one of the perks of being a Chief Pressure Inducer Executive."
"I don't know what that is," I admitted.
"Nopony does, sugar," said Cocoa, with a grin.
"Absolutely untrue," sniffed Champagne. "I am solely in charge of a vital stretch of cloud transmission corridor, and must be constantly on the watch for hitches in the laminar flow."
"She watches a pipe to make sure nothing gets jammed in it."
"It's important work."
"Mm hm," Cocoa said, rolling her eyes. "And how often does a cloud actually get jammed in there?"
"The risk is constant!"
"She reads fashion magazines most of the time," Cocoa confided. "Last time you had a jam was when?"
"Shortly before Hearth's Warming," Champagne said. "But had I not been there to fix it, it would have been just awful."
"It sounds like important work," I said, diplomatically.
"Oh, you're too kind. It is not important, of course. A well-trained rabbit could do my job. But if the C.W.C. thinks it is vital, and they think it is worth paying me for, who am I to judge? I am trying to set up a, how do you say it, stable life position. A place I could bring a foal into."
"Champagne, honey, let's not go into that right now."
"I'm serious!" she said, her levitating wineglass punctuating her points. "Ponies with families seem so happy. Like they have so much to live for. You don't have a family, do you, Lieutenant?"
"Dad and Mom. My father is an archivist and my mother is, um, a novelist. One baby sister."
"How adorable!"
"She is," I admitted.
"They sound like lovely people. I'd like to meet them someday—"
"Reel it back, honey," said Cocoa, physically positioning herself between Champagne and me with a little grin. "She gets like this after a drink or two."
"I do," said Champagne, sighing. "I very much do."
"Champagne here is always on the prowl for a, how do you always put it?"
"A stallion of quality," said Champagne. "Even breathed a supplication or two to your employer, the famous young Princess Cadance. Do you think she hears it when ponies do that?"
"I'm not sure it works that way."
"Well, it is worth trying, at least, no?" Champagne inclined her head toward the ceiling. "Princess of Love, hear the cry of this lonely heart!"
"Shake it off, honey," said Cocoa. "Let's not waste the night."
"Yes," said Champagne. "There is too much fun to be had in this city to waste it on care."
A waiter passed with a tray of asparagus puffs, one of which I snagged in my aura. Celestia above—actually a little below, come think, given our altitude—what a situation. The liquor was flowing, the food was exquisite, the music was divine, and here I was with a fetching mare at each shoulder...
...and all I could think about was Princess Cadance, huddled beneath a coverlet. Banish it all to Tartarus. It wasn't supposed to be this way. Auric certainly believed that it wasn't supposed to be this way.
"Hey, I was being serious before," said Cocoa, looking up at me. "Penny for those thoughts. You're wound tighter than kite string."
"Crowds," I lied, smoothly. "They make me a little nervous."
"I can think of several cures you and I could enact for that," said Champagne. "It is the feast of Venus, after all. The celebration of all things Love." Champagne's horn ignited and I felt a tiny tickling bloom of telekinesis working its way across my shoulders. Startled, I glanced over at her, but she wasn't making eye contact. Her eyes were fixed, innocently, on her drink.
The little tease. Anypony else in this room seeing Champagne's hornglow would just write it off as her lifting her glass, which gave her free rein to toy with the hair under my breastcollar.
Anypony except Cocoa, that is. I saw the earth mare take note of her partner playing hornsie with me. She snuggled in defensively, tossing Champagne a sharp glance. "You and us, sugar," she said.
"Yes, of course, this is what I meant." Champagne gave me a playful, hidden pinch. "We and you could definitely remove ourselves from this crowd and head somewhere more... private?"
"The three of us," Cocoa confirmed.
"Why not? It is not something we have tried before. Perhaps it will be interesting? Diverting, at least?"
I felt a burn in my gut. Yes. This was exactly what I needed. "Well," I said, tossing back the last of my drink. "I can't complain about the party, but leaving is starting to sound like an excellent idea."
"What are we waiting for?" said Cocoa, snatching one last vol-au-vent from a low-flying pegasus attendant. "After you, Lieutenant?"
I led our little procession out onto a broad portico of clouds with an amazing view of the shockingly clear icy-blue sky. As I departed, a mare at each shoulder, I caught a glimpse of Auric, entertaining guests over by one of the enormous wing-shaped ice sculptures. He gave me a claw sign with an upstretched digit of some kind, but I wasn't super familiar with the weird signaling codes of creatures with articulated digits. I assumed it was encouraging. After all, the griffon was getting exactly what he wanted. I was getting exactly what I wanted. Should want. Had always wanted. A situation just such as this had led to one of the most mind-blowing nights of my young adult life, and I should have been champing at the bit for the opportunity to experience it again. All we needed was a pegasus to add to the mix—
"I have a wicked little idea," remarked Champagne. "I saw a darling little waitress in there who looked like she was just about to come off shift. How about we intercept her as she flits out..."
Cocoa tutted. "You're incorrigible, sugar."
"This implies I have some need of correction."
My mouth went dry. This was it. I was being offered the Trifecta. The evergreen goal of stallions all across the land. And I was—
—about to turn it down.
"Ladies," I said, in my most gallant tones, "I wish you all the best with your plan. I'm sure it means you'll have a lovely evening tonight."
Cocoa frowned. "You cutting out on us, honey? Don't let Champagne scare you off."
I lifted her hoof and gave it the smallest of kisses. "The fault is with neither of you. My thoughts must, alas, remain on my duties." This was roughly, basically true. "Never fear, I will escort you to your homes first."
"Who says we are going 'home,' Lieutenant? The night is still quite young." Champagne smiled playfully at me. "Time for many adventures."
I clenched my jaw. "I am so very, very sorry, ladies," I said, and it was one of the truest things I've uttered.
"Well, then," said Cocoa. "More mare for us, huh? Shame you can't come, Lieutenant."
"Yes, it would have been grand," said Champagne. "Ah, well, perhaps other opportunities will wander your way. Bonsoir, Lieutenant Armor." And with that, she and Cocoa ducked back into the party, giggling. "Perhaps two pegasi," I heard Champagne suggest, before her voice was lost to the crowd.
I stared after them for a full minute. Then I kicked at a loose bit of cumulus-fluff along the side of the amalgamate roadway leading up to the festhall. It went "paff" and dissipated into threads of mist.
I turned tail and walked into the gathering dusk.
In Cloudsdale, if you walk, you walk down.
As soon as you leave the roads and start treading on cloudbank proper, you are faced with what seems like a vast, open world to explore. The reality is a little more complicated. Truth is, even with enchanted hooves, the cloud mass simply isn't built for pedestrian traffic. Once you're off the roadway, you are often faced with the choice between a relatively doable four-foot drop and an undignified four-foot clamber-up. Folks with wings can go either way without so much as a thought; we without, not so much.
Gradually, unnoticeably, almost without actual conscious choice on my part, I worked my way downward. Down past the gleaming structures of the Acropolis, past the forums, past the bustling agora, past the looming walls of the titanic racetracks and arenas, down, down, down.
Down to, for lack of a better word, the bad side of town.
Pegasus ponies are a bit like birds; they may not be beholden by gravity, but their waste certainly is. Also, like many birds, they can be a bit sloppy. Let's say you're a pegasus, and you've finished the best part of your apple, and suddenly you're challenged to a pickup race by one of your peers/rivals (the distinction between these two categories is not overly marked in this city). Obviously, you toss what's left, and by miracle of gravity, it disappears. Problem solved.
...except it doesn't disappear. It falls until it hits a lower surface, or a slightly denser layer of structural cloud. If it falls through that, it becomes part of the Blight, the acres-wide trail of soil and garbage and shed feathers that collects on the surface of the land beneath Cloudsdale wherever it drifts. If it doesn't get that far, it collects here, in the Stratus District.
The clouds were grayer here, and felt slushy and damp underneath me. Occasionally, the impact of my passing hooves would trigger a low, susurrant rumble of thunder. As in the upper city, colorful pegasi flitting everywhere were a constant sight; but here, there was less carefree joyousness to their demeanor. Not that they were sluggish or listless; far from it, in fact. But the general demeanor was bored hooliganism rather than happy industry. The amalgam of the surrounding buildings was wind-pocked and decaying for lack of maintenance, and the shops became seedier and more disrespectable the lower I got.
And that was how I found myself at the Swan's Dive, a flat, beleaguered old cloud-structure at the lower rim of the central mass of the city. The Swan's Dive was...
Okay, let's not mince words. The Swan's Dive was a tog joint. It didn't look quite the same as the places to which I used to venture out with my friends in the Legion (there were more trapezes here, for one thing), but at its heart it was exactly the same as any other tog joint you'd find in the seedy quarter of any major city in the Hegemony. It was a place where nubile young fillies put on really attractive clothes for the entertainment of lovestruck colts and lonely stallions everywhere.
Sweet Celestia, some of those party dresses they wear were just so frilly. It was indecent enough that I hated myself after five minutes, which I think was kind of the point. Rock—or cloud—bottom was a very relaxing place to be. There was only so much further you could fall.
Unless you were a misplaced and obligatorily pedestrian unicorn, and you literally could fall many hundred meters more to Equestria's surface and, yeah, that’s where the metaphor breaks down.
So there I was, throwing back another D&B, in the midst of a serious blood sugar headache. If I squinted, I could see the just-barely-legal filly on stage in front of me, slowly donning a ruffled birthday dress to the throaty cheers of the stallions (and a few mares) sharing the room with me. There was a cake involved. It was all very tawdry.
What in Tartarus am I doing here? I thought, as the mare on the stage got busy using a party swoopfoomer for an absolutely unintended purpose. My one day off, and this was how I was spending it? At the very least, I should really be shopping for some kind of treat, instead. After all, I had promised the Princess—
...and that's when she appeared in front of me. Princess Mi Amore Cadenza herself.
I startled. I choked on my drink. My telekinesis fizzled out, and the bottle fell to the table in front of me with a loud clattering noise. Why is she—? How is she—?
I realized my mistake a half a second later and felt pretty foalish about it. This was obviously not the Princess, who was presumably still sick in bed back up at Weather Eye's estate. Even a rudimentary inspection revealed that the candyfloss pink of her coat was largely achieved with powder and the horn was just a clever prosthetic. The crown was a really quality replica of Mi Amore Cadenza's court tiara from Canterlot, but aside from that, she was completely undressed.
With an unsettled feeling in my stomach, I realized that—given the nature of this place—that was about to change. With a sly wink to the hollering, turbulent crowd, "Princess Cadance" effortlessly caught a gold-glimmering bundle of gala wear tossed to her from offstage. As the crowd's intensity reached a fever pitch, she carefully and luxuriously slid on a pair of heeled golden boots. Then, tantalizingly, she began pulling on the chemise...
It was degrading. It was depraved. It was disgusting. To my own horror and shame, I found I was desperate to see more.
But.
I am a military stallion. If there's one thing being in the Legion taught me, other than the really creative use of toilet paper, it was self-mastery through willpower. Yes, I was desperate to see more, but I'd successfully wrestled desperation to the ground many times before. This was obviously no place for me, so I resolved to quietly finish my drink, turn hock, and find somewhere marginally less degrading to spend the rest of this horrible pegasus holiday.
I clambered up on stage.
"Look at yourselves!" I shouted, as the little pink togger's eyes went wide. "You're just sitting here being all salacious at some fantasy version of Her Royal Highness Mi Amore Cadenza! One of the last alicorn princesses we have left! Don't you think—"
"Off the stage!" shouted a raspy voice from below, making its way through the crowd from the door. The bouncer, probably. I'd seen her on the way in; an iron-hard sun-colored young mare, with the cutie mark of a stylized phoenix and an etched-in sneer that belonged on a far older face. My impromptu performance had just become an extremely limited engagement.
"Don't you think she deserves a little respect?" I shouted. "Love's one of the driving forces of the world!"
A snigger from the crowd. I wheeled about. "I heard that!" I shouted. "I know what you're thinking! Ha, ha, love, seems totally 'legit' to pay tribute with naughty stage shows, right? Well, I've got something to say! Love's more than just sex and romance and...stuff!" I reached up and grabbed the tiara from the head of the half-clothed dancer, who was edging her way off the stage. "You know what this crown symbolizes?"
"Hey!" shouted the bouncer. "Hooves off the talent, scumsucker!"
"This crown symbolizes...I mean, this crown is..."
This crown was heavy, was what it was. Seriously, amazingly heavy. Much more than costume jewelry had any right to be.
I faltered, glanced at it. The round purple sapphire at the tip of the little trefoil glittered at me expensively.
My jaw dropped open, just at the moment that the mare from the door roundhoused me to the back of the neck. I collapsed like a sack of turnips and, for a moment, knew no more.
Light returned slowly.
"Hrgh," I said, rolling over. Mistake. A sharp pain at the base of my skull flared up. I gently returned it to its previous position on the armrest of a fraying, overstuffed couch. Somewhere backstage at the tog joint, probably; if I strained, I could catch a glimpse of the performance lights somewhere nearby, and the atmosphere was still heavy with the smell of cake.
"Good," said a familiar raspy voice from somewhere uncomfortably nearby. The bouncer, the one who'd sucker-kicked me. "You're conscious. I called in the gentlecolt who sometimes checks over the girls. He said you'd be just fine with a shot of healing talent. Glad I didn't waste my bits on dragging you into the clinic. Doctors work cheap, but 'cheap' is relative."
"I need to talk to you," I said.
"I was afraid you'd say that. I've been sitting here rehearsing my speech this whole time, to be honest, so let's get to it. Yes, I know who you are. No, I didn't know who you were when I booted you in the head. Thought you were just some random crazy off the street, didn't realize you were the lictor of a visiting dignitary."
"'Lictor'?"
"Do you call yourself her lictor? Is that just a pegasus thing?"
"I think it's a pegasus thing," I said. "Listen, could you talk a little slower? My head really hurts."
"Sorry, fella. Got a lot of ground to cover. Listen up: we absolutely don't want any trouble with the Acropolis down here. We've had our full share already. So the girls and I have passed the hat around, and I'm sure it's not much, but if you're willing to just forget that the last hour ever happened, you can have the whole purse, tax-free."
"We need to talk about the tiara—"
"Take it," the mare said. "We didn't know what it was, honest. We found it amongst a bunch of other trash that drifted down from the better quarters. Thought it was some fancy costume jewelry, that we could use it for the girls once we cleaned it up a little."
"It's one of the Crown Jewels of Equestria," I said, trying to sit up. My headache still throbbed, but had started playing a little nicer with my skull, so I figured it was worth the gamble. I achieved limited success.
"Figured it was something like that, the way your eyes bugged out. We thought at the time if it was really something valuable, people with high-flyin' armor like your own self is wearing would start kicking doors in. When that didn’t happen, we just kinda kept it. Like I said, no harm, no foul, right? Easy enough to just take your bits and be on your way."
"Why do you keep trying to bribe me? I'm not going to press charges."
The young mare stared back at me as we both struggled to understand each other. "Press charges with who?"
"Like, report you. To the Guard."
The mare gave a quick, amused snort. "Yeah, don't I wish."
"'Don't you wish' what?"
"Cloudsdale doesn't have much of a Guard. Just a bunch of private police squads doing the will of the higher-ups. You really are new to the city, huh?"
"Guilty as charged. As I guess you could tell."
"Justice around here comes from the lictors. We tread on anypony's hooves from the better half of the city, we get their private brute squads coming down here to wreck our stuff and generally be mean to us. That's how they keep the criminal element in line. Also, the unsavory sorts of honest ponies who just happen to've been foaled a little lower on the cloud."
"I'm not going to report you to the Princess. And even if I did, I can absolutely guarantee you that no brute squads would be dispatched at her command. I'm pretty sure I'm the only brute she has, come to think."
"Huh," said the mare. "How does she stop ponies from walking all over her?"
"Good question," I said. "Listen, we really got started on the wrong hoof. If anypony should be apologizing around here, it's me. Let's start over." I extended my hoof. "Lieutenant Shining Armor of the Canterlot Household Regiments."
"Spitfire," said the mare, taking me up on the shake. "Of the absolutely nothing."
"Pleasure," I said. "For the record, I'm sorry for scaring your girls."
"They've seen worse. Believe me. Pleasure workers walk a really thin line."
"Spitfire," I said, finally managing to upright myself properly, "you have a really depressing job."
"Eh," she said. "It's not so bad. Worse today because it's the Festival of Verticordia. Lot of lonely ponies in this city whispering desperate little love-prayers and then giving up and coming to places like this. I expect you're the last pony I'd need to tell all this, though."
"Why?"
She blinked. "I thought the Alicorn of Love heard the prayers of all desperate hearts."
"That's the second time I've heard that tonight. I'm really not sure it works that way."
Spitfire sat a little forward on her chair. "What does she actually do on days like this?"
"Well, right now, she's laid up in bed snotting."
She snorted, then laughed. "Can hardly believe that."
"Alicorns get sick too. They aren't all that different from you or me."
"This is your boss. One of two immortal god-ponies in existence. Moves planets."
"A planet. Small one." I held my hooves together in a tiny pinch to convey the relative smallness of the entire planet of Phosphorus. "This all sounds suspiciously like shop talk, though. I'm supposed to be on holiday today."
"Ah. So, making a fool of yourself leaping to your boss's defense was..."
"Strictly in an amateur capacity, yes."
"Well, then. I guess you're not going to be able to bill the Tiara for what's coming next."
A tiny icicle of dread appeared in my gut, and it must have showed on my face, because Spitfire gave a spasmodic laugh, pointing at me with one hoof. "You're cute when you're scared," she said. "Relax. All's I'm saying is, I need some reimbursement for the bits I spent patching you up."
"From the injury you gave me."
"The one I wouldn't've had to have given you had you not leapt up on stage like a crazy pony."
"Okay, got me there. I'm just giving you chaff, anyway. I'm glad to make things right." I went fishing for my purse.
"Put that thing away. For now, at least. You can whip it out again when it comes time to pay for the food."
"...Food?"
"Yeah, hotshot," Spitfire said. "You're taking me to dinner."
"Then she lunges at me. Knocks me flat. Stomps me into the road. Then she tells me, in no uncertain terms, that I'm nothing but a tool for Princess Celestia to keep tabs on her."
Spitfire valiantly attempted to swallow her mouthful of cacio e pepe, which was difficult on account of the fact that she was laughing at me. "Kinda true though, right?"
"It wasn't true at the time," I protested. "Being assigned to her personal guard—"
"As her entire personal guard, all by yourself, I heard."
"It was hard enough to get her to accept one," I admitted. "We're probably lucky to have gotten that."
"'We'?" said Spitfire, a smirk playing at the corners of her muzzle.
"Equestria as a whole," I hastily added. "That mare is a national treasure, and this city doesn't exactly seem like a steady place."
"Eh, it's all right," Spitfire replied, knocking back a shot of something strong and lemony. It made my eyes water from clear across the table. "Sure, it's a huge mess of a town where the strong prey on the weak, where nopony seems to have an actual job, and where real social problems are dealt with by throwing food and public spectacles at the problem..."
"...but?"
"I just realized there's no 'but,'" said Spitfire. "You're right, this city stinks." She tossed back a second shot.
"You could, I don't know, leave?"
A quick, sharp bark of a laugh. "And go where, hotshot?"
"Canterlot.” She snorted so hard in response that it devolved into a coughing fit. "I'm serious," I said.
"Lot of tog joints in the capital? You proud, upright Hegemony colts have a secret nasty side, then?"
"We've got our share," I said, select images from a couple of particularly wild nights flickering across the screen of my memory. "You seem like a mare with more potential than that, though. You could do more with your life."
"Like what?"
"The Guard," I said, automatically. "The E.U.P. and don't you dare snort at me again."
"Yeah, I don't think so."
"Why not? Free clothes, free grub, lots of standing in one place, and if you climb high enough in the ranks you can make a career of yelling at other ponies."
"Lots of following orders, though."
"Says the mare who was just now complaining about nopony around here having a job to do."
Her eyes narrowed at me. She rolled an empty shot glass back and forth between her hooves.
"Yeah, okay. Considering."
"Good," I said, taking up a forkful of pasta in my aura. "You seem like a good pony."
"Yeah, well, I try," Spitfire said, in a grudging tone.
"That's all any of us can do." I decisively chewed on a mouthful of food.
"Uh huh," said Spitfire. "Listen, are you gay?"
I nearly spat out a mouthful of food (also decisively). "What?"
"Are. You. Gay?"
"No!" I exclaimed. "I mean, no, I’m not, and I didn’t yell there because I'm offended, I’m just a little taken aback, and I want to make it absolutely clear that—"
"Relax. Simple question."
"No. No, I'm not. Why do you ask?"
"Because I've been flicking you with my tail for the past twenty minutes and you haven't noticed once."
I felt my face flush. "Oh," I said.
"I mean, it's all right and all. I don't claim to be the cutest little pony around here. But usually when I get a little forward I can at least spark a reaction from your average stallion if they're into mares at all."
"I swear to you that I am in fact into mares, Spitfire."
"Then you're a brick wall. Or some kind of force-field or something."
"Barrier enchantments are my specialty."
"There we go. So 'Shining Armor' isn't just a clever name."
"You're saying nothing can penetrate me?"
"Well, you just aggressively denied being gay, didn't you?"
We looked at each other for a moment. Then we broke out laughing, her before me, but only by a fraction of a second.
"I get it, I get it. I'm not your type."
My laugh trailed off. I toyed with my pasta, twirling it around my fork a few more times than was strictly necessary.
“It’s not you,” I said, eventually. "I just don't think I have a 'type,’ is all.”
"Everypony has a type, Shining Armor. I'm not talking about mares you want to mash into the sheets. You can be an absolute celibate and still have a type. You meet somepony who fulfills you, who lifts you up, who makes you want to be better, you've met your type."
"It sounds like you're talking about falling in love."
"Yeah, not so sure. Living in this city for a while burns you out on the concept of 'love.'"
"But we're talking about the same thing, aren't we? Quacks like a duck, right?"
"Huh," she said, noodling around with her last few bits of, well, noodles.
"Spitfire," I said, "What does 'love' mean to you? One word."
"Betterment."
I rolled the word over in my mind. "I wonder if that's what she's looking for."
"Who?"
"My employer. She asked me what the 'meaning of love' was earlier today."
"Quizzing you?"
"Maybe. Maybe not. It sounded kind of like she didn't know herself."
"If the Alicorn of Love doesn't know what love is," said Spitfire, "then we really are screwed."
"Yeah," I said.
A pause.
"Or perhaps 'penetrated,'" I added, soberly.
We laughed until we couldn't breathe.
"So, here it is. Home sweet home."
I took in the lumpy mass of residential cloud before me, barely illuminated by starlight in the gathering darkness. There were bits of it that looked like it'd been salvaged from a much larger and grander cloud structure, a hint of fluting column or carved pediment here and there. But the place looked sturdy and well-kept, and had the sort of cleanliness that suggested that nothing here was left to waste. Spitfire had clearly made good use of absolutely every discarded thing that had fallen to her altitude, and for a moment this fact alone made my heart hurt a little.
"I know it ain't much—"
"It's great, Spitfire," I said, meaning it.
"It used to have rainbows and stuff until they rerouted the viaducts. I guess they use all the rainbow the C.W.C. can put out up in the hoity-toity sectors."
I thought a bit guiltily of the Princess's weather-bath, rainbow readily available on-tap. "Yeah," I said, noncommittally.
"I'd invite you in, but—"
"I think I'd better go. The holiday’ll be over soon. Duty calls."
"I figured, yeah,” said Spitfire. “Listen, I know nothing's ever going to come of this. You clearly don't feel that way about me."
"It's not that," I protested.
"But it is that," Spitfire said. "It is exactly that. But that's beside the point. I know nothing's ever going to come of it, but I really enjoyed dinner anyway. And if you ever decide to go slumming in our neighborhood again, I'd love a repeat. I'll pay next time."
"I'll hold you to that."
"Unless I go temporarily crazy and hop ship to Canterlot. Like you said. Put on a uniform and get my mane cut. Then when your assignment here ends, we can be mess-hall buddies."
I grinned a little. "I’ll hold you to that, too."
An awkward silence ensued.
"Well," Spitfire said. "It's been real, Lieutenant Armor."
"I'd say 'authentic,' but yes."
"Heh," she said. She grabbed my hoof and shook it, hard.
"Take care of yourself," she said, meeting my gaze for a moment. Then, with a halfhearted spin and a flurry of feathers, she vanished inside. Once again, I was alone in Cloudsdale, with nothing to do. Somehow, the prospect of time away from work didn’t seem as exciting as it had this morning.
I turned to go, but hadn't made it a half a furlong into the night city when I heard a voice from over my shoulder. Polished and clipped, but forceful, like a stainless-steel broadsword. I recognized it immediately.
"So! That looked like it went well!" said Auric Turncoat.
I turned back around. "So, you've graduated to eavesdropping now."
"You wound me, Shining Armor," Auric Turncoat said, holding a claw lightly to his breast. "I was in no way 'eavesdropping.' I was merely intentionally lurking, just out of sight, listening to your conversation in an attempt to learn tidbits of interest about your personal life."
I stared at him for a moment, trying to work this out. "So, what, you're going to tell me that it's because clouds don't have eaves?"
"Exactly, dear boy! When you reach my age, technicalities like that are all that keep the wheels turning."
"I have no idea what you're even saying."
"And you don't have to. Let's talk about someone other than myself, as agonizing a chore as that might be. Let's talk about you and that fetching little dish you found, quite without my direct assistance, I should add."
"She's not a 'dish,'" I said, trudging along. "She's a pony with a lot of potential and not a lot of room to grow. Like a flower in bad soil."
"Sounds like you have a lot of affection toward her," said Auric, bobbing along behind me. "When's the next date?"
"We didn't set one."
"You didn't set one?" Auric frowned. "Lieutenant, I don't mean to intrude overmuch on your business, but are you certain that's the best way to develop this relationship?"
"We're not developing a relationship!" I shouted, rounding on him.
"Pardon?"
"We! Are not! Developing! A relationship!"
"Shining Armor, are you gay?"
"No!"
"Because, obviously, I'm not going to judge—"
"I'm not gay would everyone please shut up about—"
"Because I can think of two rational explanations why you are not inside that hovel, at this very minute, splitting an excruciatingly cheap cider with that mare and stealing admiring glances at her symbol-bedecked hindquarters. Number one would be that you are utterly, completely, hilariously gay. Absolute tree-full-of-monkeys territory. And number two would be that—"
Auric hit me with a savage body check, knocking me to the cloud stratum. As I struggled to right myself, I found the griffon towering over me. His yellow eyes blazed.
"Number two," he rasped, "would be that you are carrying a torch for a mare whom I have made clear is under my protection."
My horn ignited. Auric let out a startled grunt as I seized him in my telekinetic field and smashed him into a wall. It was a cloud wall; it could have been worse.
"Princess Mi Amore Cadenza is under my protection," I said, pressing him into the cloudstuff. "I am her lictor, her personal enforcer. My actions carry the weight of the Royal Guard of Canterlot and are backed by the Voice of the Mountain herself, Celestia Sol Invicta. Do not bucking cross me, Auric."
I snorted in his ear to punctuate my threat.
Auric let out a huff. "This is charming," he said, his voice muffled by the wall. "Really, it is. I expect that now you're going to go trotting back up to the Resident Minister's place and report a well-spent holiday. Then you're going to present her with a Hearts and Hooves Day gift, a little treat you found at the Festival of Venus. What do you get for the mare who has everything? Why, one of the unique and irreplaceable Crown Jewels of Equestria, of course! Surprise, Princess! It's your tiara! The one you always regretted throwing away! I've fetched it back for you, like the good little paramour-slash-retriever that I am."
I increased the pressure on my aura because I had nothing clever to say in response. It was, of course, exactly what I'd been planning on doing.
"No rebuttals? Somewhere close to the mark, I expect."
"And what if somepony were to do exactly that? What then?"
"I would advise said pony," said Auric, "that he had no concept what it means to be one of the undying. That by engaging in this utterly selfish act of courtship, he was treating her to sixty years of pleasant bathwater marriage followed by a literal eternity of loss and grief. I have experienced this, Lieutenant Armor, and I have no wish to see the Princess do so."
I relaxed my pressure on Auric's form. He pulled himself back from the wall, immediately straightening his ruffled feathers.
"That's the difference between us, Shining Armor. I would spare Cadance that pain, and you would not. Because you don't care."
"I care for the Princess more than you know."
Auric gave a short, coughing laugh. "Oh, I doubt that. You have no comprehension what it is to care about us."
"Stop saying 'us' about the two of you. Princess Cadance isn't some kind of washed-up strung-out should've-died-a-long-time-ago vampire bird. She's a mare. A pony. Like me."
"You think she's like you?"
"Yes! That's what I'm—"
"You really think she's like you? An acceptable peer for you to bright-eyed-ly woo?"
My mouth moved practically without conscious impulse. "Why in Tartarus not?" I said, and I was startled at the words.
Auric regarded me with an even glare. "All right. Then go back to the Resident Minister's house. Right now. Not when your mandated holiday expires."
"The Princess is sick. I’m sure the last thing she wants is to summon up the strength for a disciplinary lecture about me cutting my holiday short."
Auric chuckled. “‘Sick.’ Certainly. Let’s go with that.”
"You're trying to tell me she's lying about her condition?"
"I am saying that it is merely the first stage of something much, much larger. Something she herself doesn't yet comprehend, because she's never been in this situation before. Never had an entire city to call her own."
"You're not making any sense."
"I don't need to explain it to you. Go home, right now, and see for yourself the mare you've had the naked audacity to begin to fall in love with."
"Fine," I said. I gave Auric a final, decisive shove and turned my head toward home, or at least the place that passed for it in this strange, stupid, frustrating city.
I wasn't sure how I'd even find the route, but one thing I absolutely would not do was give Auric the satisfaction of seeing me ask for help.
I located the tiara in my saddlebags, made sure it was secure. Gripping it tightly in my hornglow, I began trudging up.
I knew something was wrong when I saw the lights flickering in the window.
Against the midnight blues of the Resident Minister's manse, the crackling red and white illumination stood out like a series of lightning strikes. Auric's rather ominous pronouncements from the alley, which hadn't exactly stopped running through my mind in the first place, began doing so with renewed vigor. The air smelled of ozone and burning roses. I rushed up to the two lictors I had left in charge of watching over the Princess. They had apparently taken up position at the outer stairwell door.
"Sabre! Spurs! What in Tartarus is going on here?"
Sabre snapped to attention, as was his wont. Spurs elected instead to stare anxiously at the peculiar phenomenon that had taken hold of the guest wing of R.M. Weather Eye's manor, as was his.
"Sir!" Sabre fairly shouted. "We were busy tending to the Princess, as ordered, sir!"
"Fetching her lemonade an' such," said Spurs, glancing back at me for a moment before fixing his eyes once more on the window.
"Everything we could possibly have been asked to do, sir! Things were proceeding quite swimmingly for a great while, with nothing to report, and it could be said that our actions were a roaring success!"
"I don't need background! What happened?"
"Well, sir," said Sabre. "Begging pardon, sir. Your charge, the Princess, sir. She—"
"She exploded, Mr. Armor," said Spurs.
"She what?"
"Not 'exploded' as such, sir!" Sabre hastily added. "Not in such a way that there were any, well—"
"—little bits of princess everywhere or nothin'," Spurs said.
"Perish the thought!" said Sabre. "Celestia below and slightly to my left forbid it! But it was like—"
"It was pink," said Spurs, with haunted eyes. "Pink like the end of all things."
"We've been keeping a perimeter at a safe distance, sir! And a fine perimeter it is, I don't mind telling you! You could never ask two stallions to establish a finer perimeter than Spurs and I have here!"
"Inasmuch as two individual ponies can form a proper perimeter," Spurs admitted.
"We've sealed all relevant exits!"
"Shoved a divan right up against the door, we did."
"Also, we have appropriately alerted the household and relevant members of the surrounding public!"
"Via panicked screaming."
"I don't mind saying, sir, we were very loud indeed, thus making our screams all the more effective!"
"Okay," I said. "Fine work in a strange and obviously stressful situation, gentlecolts."
Sabre stiffened. "Thank you, sir!" he said, raising his hoof in an elaborate salute.
"The next thing I need from you is help moving that divan that you so skillfully maneuvered in front of the door."
"Yes, sir!" said Sabre. "Er, why, if I may ask, sir?"
"Because I need to go in there and check on the Princess."
Sabre rolled this over for a moment, then nodded sharply.
"Of course, sir. It is your funeral, sir."
Spurs nodded in agreement. "Your pretty pink candy-colored funeral," he said.
Everything was floating.
The bed, the blankets, the cut-glass lamps, the wardrobe, the vanity; every single item in the room not physically attached to the walls hung suspended in the air, drifting lazily like individual soap bubbles in the mind-bending fuchsia radiance. Whenever two of them drifted too close together, there was a flash of white and a sharp crackle, and they caromed away from each other on new courses.
This was all secondary to my area of primary concern, because there was something else floating in the room: H.R.H. Cadance herself.
The Princess hovered in an exultant posture, her head thrown back, back arched, wings achingly stretched, hooves wide. Her eyes flared an incandescent white, emitting cones of piercing light which penetrated the atmosphere of coiling pink. Her mane snapped like a banner in sharp wind. She was the very image of an angel, of the old and terrifying variety.
And, the whispers. Stars above, the whispers.
They ran like rivers through the room; faint, hissing, practically-visible curling lines of sound. One snaked too close to my ear, and as it passed, I heard a stranger’s voice:
...can i never find a stallion who'll stay more than one night the problem has to be me doesn't it but what am i doing wrong what's wrong with me...
And another:
...perfectly nice colt but the mares don't like nice colts they like the bad boys so they come crying to me when they're hurt and i give them my shoulder but then they go right back to...
And still another:
...never the same she always used to love this day we'd go to the theater and afterward we'd split a malted what am i supposed to do now what am i supposed to do without her...
And then, it wasn’t a stranger at all, but the prim and refined voice of Champagne:
...et après tout après tout demain je serai seule…
Cocoa...
...wish i could be the thing that fills that hole in your heart sugar but it’s never me and it’ll never be me no matter how…
And finally, raspy little Spitfire…
...just like that another one slips through your hooves thought maybe i stood a chance there for a second but it just goes to show you come on way too strong for the colts but what else am i supposed to do…
And then all at once, bursting my eardrums like a too-near thunderclap:
PRINCESS CADANCE IF YOU'RE OUT THERE IF YOU CAN HEAR ME
The Princess's lips parted. "I can hear you," she whispered, hoarsely. "I can hear all of you..."
"Cadance," I breathed.
She whipped around like a viper, and I tamped down the urge to flee, to leave this place and never return, oaths and promises be banished. The white glare of the Princess's eyes drilled into me. "Shining Armor!" she cried out. I could not tell if it was a plea, or a warning, or perhaps both.
"I'm here," I said, steadily.
"I can hear them Shining Armor I can hear them and I don't know what to do—"
"We'll figure something out," I said. "We'll get help."
"Nopony can help!" she screamed, and the mirror of her vanity cracked straight in two. "I thought you could help! I thought you might know my answer! But you're just as wrong as everypony else and it's not your fault but I wanted it to be you and now you aren't and I don't know what to do—"
"Princess!" I cried out, my voice barely rising above the room’s howling tempest. "Your Highness. Cadance. I—I don’t know what’s happening. But whatever it is, whatever happens, I’m here. Do you understand me? I will be here.”
A moment of peace seemed to find her and she settled down upon the bed, which in turn settled down upon the floor. The pinkness of the room faded slightly, to a level that only somewhat made you want to claw out your own eyes.
“Do you promise?” she said, her voice heartbreakingly childlike.
“Yes.”
"Tomorrow will be better, Lieutenant.”
“Yes. Yes it will be. We’ll sit down together, figure this out, and make sure whatever it is never hurts you again. Whatever this is, you’re stronger than it.”
“I don’t trust myself.”
“Trust me. Trust my faith in you.”
There came a moment’s pause.
“Okay,” she said.
"Get some rest. If you need me, I'll be in the sitting room. Right outside the door.” I squared my jaw. "I'm not leaving you."
“Thank you, Lieutenant.”
“You’re welcome.” I reached into my saddlebag, plucked her trefoil tiara of office, set it gently upon the most upright and least-floating piece of furniture I could find, and then left the room, closing the door behind me.
When I turned back around, Auric Turncoat was in the sitting room of the guest suite, having thrown himself upon the divan that Sabre and Spurs had used as a barricade. I could not have been in the Princess's bedchamber for more than a hoofful of minutes, but his posture was one of idle, postprandial languor, as though he'd been settled in there for an hour or more. Through some miracle, he had located a measure of brandy in all the chaos and was swirling it about in a gleaming glass snifter.
He struck a match and lit a candle, and despite myself I was immediately grateful for the normal, non-eldritch light.
"So," said Auric. "How did that go for you?"
"How did you get in here?" I asked, settling down onto a cushion, hoping and praying the griffon didn't see me shaking.
"I'm quite stealthy when I need to be," he said. "And those poor stallions at the door are literally driven to distraction. They aren't in a good state to be noticing anything at all, much less a creature who's trying not to be seen. You're avoiding my question. How'd that go for you?"
"She seemed grateful for the gift," I said.
"Liar," said Auric. "But you're such a terrible one, I can hardly take offense."
"Listen, what...are we dealing with in there?"
"An alicorn, Lieutenant." He chuckled, but it was hard to imagine any humor in it. "Haven't we covered this point already?"
"Yes, I know. But what—"
"Dear Princess Cadance has been experiencing a breakthrough, of sorts. She's always felt the love of the world, but now she feels in charge of it, and she’s just been struck with the full force of an entire city full of ponies with love on the brain. Love, or the lack thereof."
"Was she right? Will it get better tomorrow?"
Auric sat up on the divan. "And if it isn't?" he asked, sharply. "What then?"
"I—" I stammered.
"What if it's like this forever? Or maybe even for half a century, hardly a blip in our reckoning, but a for-all-practical-purposes 'forever' to you?"
"I—don't know," I said.
"Exactly," said Auric, easing back down. "You know nothing, Shining Armor. At least you admit it, now. You see how much easier this would have been if you'd have made the effort to be sweet on those two lovely party mares? Or that spirited young bouncer?"
"I may not know the meaning of love," I said, "but I'm pretty sure it's not supposed to be 'easy.'"
"That may be the closest you've been to correct all day."
"The maelstrom in there. She's feeling things she's never felt before. All the love in Cloudsdale, and all the pain from love's lack, or love's loss. It's overwhelming her because she doesn't understand it."
"Just so," said Auric.
“You knew! And you just left her! You spent the entire evening bothering me instead of trying to help—”
“Nothing is wrong with her!” Auric shouted. “Everything is working as expected! This is what life is for creatures of her kind! The only actual concern here is the upstart ruffian trying to set her on an inevitable course for heartbreak, and I am dealing with that crisis the way I see fit! How dare you presume to suggest I have somehow failed in protecting her?”
"How in Equestria are you helping her by trying to shield her from any experience that might break her heart? Aren't you making this worse? Wouldn't a Princess Cadance who has loved, and lost, and loved again, be better able to understand her role in the universe?"
Auric stiffened. We locked eyes for a moment. The griffon broke first, but it was a near thing. He paused, considering his brandy, swirling it around a couple of times in the glass.
"This is all an obvious pretext to get me to leave you alone as you romantically pursue the filly I've been watching for nigh-on a millennium."
I felt a lump in my throat, and swallowed it away. "I don't think I'm the pony she wants. I think she's looking for a pony who can answer this question she has, somepony who can help her understand what love is. She asked me earlier today, and I think I blew it."
"Ah," said Auric. I hated the note of satisfaction in his voice.
"There is somepony out there for her, somewhere," I continued. "I can feel it in my gut. And you're not doing the world any favors by taking that pony, or griffon, or whoever, and threatening them with immense bodily harm just to shield her from pain. Can we at least agree that you're not going to do that?"
"I don't easily bind myself with promises."
"Do it for her," I said. "Do it for Cadance."
There was a moment where the entire world seemed to balance on the edge of a knife.
"Oh, well, all right," said Auric, the old flitting tone creeping back into his voice. "We're all stuck here suffering, might as well spread the pain around a little. A burden shared is a burden halved, right?"
"Are we? All suffering, I mean?"
"Why, certainly," said Auric. "You're suffering because you'll never have the alicorn of your dreams. She's suffering because the cosmos has elected to make her an adorable little suffering-sponge. And me, I'm..."
Auric fell silent.
"Well," he said, at last, finishing the last of his brandy and preparing himself another. After a moment of thought, he retrieved a second snifter and poured another dram, setting the glass absentmindedly on the counter. "Never you mind. Suffice it to say that we're all a little damaged by love."
"On the way here, on the airship, you told me you knew her mother, a long time ago. All this time I thought you saw me as a rival for her affections, sort of an ‘immortals should stick together’ kind of thing. But that's not it at all. This is your twisted-up version of a doting father's 'have her home by nine' speech. Isn't it?"
Auric was silent.
"Isn't it?"
"Well?" shouted Auric, throwing his claws wide. "Who else is going to do it? Her father was barking mad, and is also, let's not forget, dead as a stone. Her mother died in childbirth. Her adoptive aunt is an utter lunatic who would incidentally be quite offended by my use of that specific term to describe her, for reasons that she's turned into a secret of state. The closest thing Mi Amore had to a parent was a literal order of nuns, who cared less about raising her and more about hermetically insulating her from the outside world."
"But isn't that exactly what you're doing? Right now?"
Auric gestured at me with one claw. His beak opened and closed, several times.
"Fine," said Auric. "Fine, fine, fine, you've made your point, fine."
"Good. So, you're not going to murder me?"
A pause, then, “No.”
"And you're not going to murder the next young noblecolt who comes around plying her with gifts and affection?"
"Only if he mistreats her. And then, all bets are off."
"If he mistreats her," I said, "you will have to get in line."
"Very spirited, Lieutenant."
"I prefer to think of it as 'dutiful,'" I said.
Auric looked about the sitting room as the clock on the mantel clicked on toward midnight and the light from the other room began to fade. Eventually, he nudged the second snifter in my direction. "Drink?" he said.
"Not while I'm on duty."
"Thankfully for you, you're still on holiday. For sixty more seconds, at least."
"You play a strong rhetorical game," I said, accepting the glass. "Happy Festival of Venus."
"To you as well," said Auric.
And then we drank.