//------------------------------// // 17 - Celebrations - Early // Story: If Chaos prevails... // by The Marshmallow //------------------------------// At every confident step forward her perfect flank waddled seductively, at every blink, her impossibly long lashes danced lasciviously. Then the way she barely noticeably licked her upper lip added a further hint of danger and intrigue. The Princess of Love was certainly living up to her name; Twilight found herself blushing already, and love magic didn't even figure in the equation yet. But behind her sheepish, slightly embarrassed smile, the gears in Twilight's mind were grinding fast, trying to figure out the best course of action. And even if usually her analytic and strategic skills were matched by few, now she was having a really hard time doing that. Cadence was early. And she was right in front of her. Not only their intel, which suggested she would come to the backstage only after the show (and probably didn't account for the possibility she would be bored, or just impatient to see the bride), proved clearly wrong; the Princess herself was one of the greatest potential threats the resistance had identified. Her level of skill was mostly unknown, as she had received for years private, secretive lessons by Discord himself. But at the very least, she had enough magic in her to be certainly perceived by the Draconeequs was she to unleash it all. It didn't take a great mind But now Twilight realized she was taking too long to answer, and that waiting any more would go far beyond a reasonable 'being startled by meeting a famous somepony', veering dangerously towards 'being desperate because you have something to hide'. "Y-your highness", the unicorn stuttered, quickly, and then lowered her head to the ground. It would seem a fairly natural reaction, and besides showing a reasonable amount of respect towards royalty, it also managed to completely hide her face from view. This gave her a little bit more time, and the possibility to focus more on thinking and less on keeping her face straight; her fake smile had never been as difficult to keep. Something in her 'alicorn-ness' But, luckily, she had an answer prepared already "I'm miss Rarity's assistant, and I was bringing this wardrobe back to her carriage since she doesn't need the clothes inside anymore" She had managed not to stutter, and to tell the whole thing without making mistakes. That was enough confidence to convince most, and trying to look up slightly she could already see the two guards accompanying the princess (a very well built, muscular white pegasus and a sleeker but just as imposing light blue earth pony) relax a little bit, and be ready to move on. Cadence was not. "No need to be so formal, my little pony!" She giggled slightly while she stood just two meters from the unicorn. She was just pointing her eyes straight to Twilight, and while the latter could barely see the Alicorn's upper body, she would have sworn she could feel the intensity of her gaze on her skin. And so Twilight was frozen; incapable of deciding if the best course of action would be a surprise attack, hoping to conclude the whole thing in a matter of seconds, or trying to run away while having to constantly keep the wardrobe in the grasp of her levitation spell. Neither seemed realistic. "Also, you can raise your head" Her tone, sweet on the surface but firm and menacing, was soon followed by the sensation of an unbelievable amount of magic surrounding Twilight's muzzle, slowly pushing her head upwards. The princess was showing off her large, alicorn-sized pool of magic, with the intention of putting the unicorn under further pressure, reminding who was in charge, terrorizing her, having her surrender. And the guards immediately tensed, feeling the threat even on themselves and then trying to understand what their master was up to. But Twilight? After recovering from the initial surprise, she simply thought 'Is that it?' Sure, the amount of magic she was feeling was second only to Celestia, but the control over it? In her perspective, it seemed that of a foal. To be fair, it was still well above average for a pony, but she could easily think of half a dozen pony just in the resistance which, despite having obviously less magical power, were much more skilled with it, and with no little pride she was sure that Sunset or her would be able to overpower her reasonably easily. So much for the mysterious lessons from the King, which clearly focused on very different topics. The princess' action did, therefore, backfire, as the unicorn was now even more confident than before. If it came to it, she thought she had a real chance to deal with her quickly, especially with a surprise attack. But such a circumstance would obviously be noticed by Discord, therefore critically reducing the time she would have to escape. Also, he would be able to easily identify the lingering magic after a teleport, following her, meaning that escaping would be borderline impossible... And now she realized it was doing that again. Her mind wandering off was not helping, although her eyes and her smile still pointed to the princess certainly was. "You know, I had heard about fashion statements..." That was a nonsequitur blurted by the princess, which caught Twilight certainly off guard. She didn't like the pinch of irony she could already perceive in it, nor the way the guards were slowly getting closer, observing the lavander mare with much more care. They still weren't especially suspicious, just confused, but that could easily change soon. "But I never thought I should have taken the phrase literally." Twilight looked around her, quickly, gauging the guards' reactions. They were as confused as her, which meant it was neither a secret message to them nor an in-joke. The fact she seemed amused at her own reference, though, made it clear to twilight that there was some kind of deeper meaning. A witty one even. What was Twilight not realizing, what was she forgetting? Since after a few moments nothing had come to her mind, she realized how pointless it would be to spend more time on that. She just had to relax and be ready to react at whatever it was going to be thrown at her (metaphorically or not, she still didn't know). "What do you mean, your highness?" Twilight smiled wavered for a moment seeing the fake one on Cadence's muzzle become slightly larger, and almost fell apart at her even more fake short outburst of delicate laughter (which was, by the way, very seductive too): "Why else would you put a silencing spell on a wardrobe?" Oh yeah, the whole alicorn's magical attunement thing. In twilight's defence, the fact the princess realized so easily, without Twilight noticing any scanning spell, meant she was extremely talented at that, or possibly very well trained. That certainly complicated thing, and so did the fact that in a moment the guards completely changed asset. Their centre of gravity lower, their chin closer to the body, their slightly flexed legs ready to jump towards the unicorn. The outlook wasn't good, and Cadence's voice seemed now much more serious. Sweet, as always, but oddly intimidating. This only helped to reinforce the general concept: "Would you mind opening it?" And Twilight knew it was time to act, and to act quickly.