It was one week after the events that revealed Lyra Heartstrings as a changeling that Bon Bon entered the grounds of the Golden Oaks Royal Estate and followed the path directly to the central tree. As was typical, there was a Guard stationed just outside the front door. What was atypical was the presence of two Guards on either side of the door — one pegasus and one unicorn — part of a concession made by Ponyville to Canterlot: If the Guard cohort already present ceased its biweekly section rotation and remained fully active, then a second cohort would not be sent to augment security, regardless of whether or not Princess Twilight Sparkle, Lieutenant Rye Mash, Mayor Mare, or indeed, the entire town of Ponyville felt this was necessary.
Pushing the thought aside, Bon Bon finished her walk and stopped just before the two Guards. “Corporal Shadow —” A nod to the pegasus — “Corporal Shadow —” A nod to the unicorn — “I hope the day finds you both well.”
“Well enough,” replied Blue Shadow, the pegasus, keeping his gaze firmly locked forward. “The Lieutenant’s undying idea of a gag not withstanding.”
“Mmm,” replied Bon Bon before shifting her attention to the unicorn. “I was hoping I might be able to chat with the Princess. Is she in?”
“Are you here for business?” asked Sunrise Shadow, keeping her gaze locked firmly forward.
“No.”
“Then luckily, she is,” replied Sunrise. “She would probably benefit from a break, in any case. Go on in.”
Bon Bon quirked her brow. “No security check?” she asked.
“In light of recent evidence, both the Princess and the Lieutenant have concluded that the risk of a changeling infiltration is vanishingly low,” Sunrise said. “Traffic in an out of town is being monitored and recorded carefully, and the passive detectors that have always been around the Estate will catch any personality subversions, suspect motives or residual dark magic. You live in town and no alarms have been triggered, so you’re clear.”
Giving another nod, Bon Bon approached the door, Sunrise’s magic swinging it opened, and then shut again once she was inside.
After Twilight Sparkle became a Princess, Spike the Dragon ceased to be her personal assistant; her new needs far exceeded his capability. He did, however, take to his new role as Twilight’s majordomo like a duck to water (and felt perhaps just a little bit smug that Owlowlicious had become his nighttime assistant). Of course, that didn’t mean there weren’t occasional stumbling blocks that would cause him to bury his face into his claws like he was at the moment Bon Bon entered.
“Trouble with the card catalog, Spike?” Bon Bon asked as she approached his desk. The dragon looked up with a start, and while his mood didn’t improve much, he at least didn’t set anything on fire.
“A card catalog I could deal with, but a budget shortfall is a whole different sort of animal,” he said. He glared at the documents in front of him, and then started to aggressively shuffle them into neat stacks. “It’s not even that much! Small enough that it used to be we’d just have a bake sale or put on a show or a small carnival or something but apparently that isn’t proper anymore.”
“When has decorum ever stopped Twilight from doing anything?” Bon Bon asked as she stopped at the desk.
Spike looked at her, half-lidded eyes shading a slowly simmering temper. “When I say that it would be ‘improper,’ what I mean is that it would be illegal.”
“I can see how that would be a somewhat larger hurdle.”
“Right.” Straightening done, Spike lifted the stacks up one at a time and stuffed them into a valise. “I was hoping I’d come up with a genius solution before my meeting with the Mayor, but here we are,” he said as he hopped out of his chair. “Is there anything I can help you with before I go? Your eye looks like it’s about done healing, by the way.”
“It’s still a bit tender, but nothing serious. Actually, I was hoping I could talk to Twilight for a bit. Is she in?” Bon Bon asked.
“In her office, and she’d probably be happy for a visitor. She can stop focusing on everything for a few minutes and just focus on one thing instead!” With that, Spike closed up the valise and started for the exit. “Anyway, see you around, Bon Bon.”
“Bye, Spike,” Bon Bon replied. She turned and walked to closed door off the side of the library, raising a hoof and knocking on it lightly three times and then immediately moving her hoof to the handle, pressing on it and pushing the door opened and noting the general good organization of the room. The top of the desk was not covered in mountains of documents and paperwork, although it did have three short and neatly organized stacks, which was admittedly not the image she had conjured up in her mind. Seated at the desk was, of course, Twilight Sparkle, her face buried in her hooves.
“You too?” Bon Bon asked, shutting the door behind her. The alicorn looked up with a start, and her mood did visibly improve somewhat.
“Bon Bon!”she said with a smile. “It’s —” The smile vanished — “Good… to see you? Are you here on business?”
“No.”
The smile came back. “Sun and Moon be praised, it is good to see you!”
Bon Bon quirked her brow. “What’s happening that would make it not good to see me?” she asked.
Twilight gave an exasperated groan, dropping her head onto the papers on her desk. “It’s those four idiots in detention,” she said before sitting up again. “Bad enough they were here at all and completely wrecked the nice, easy to manage Guard rotation we’ve had in place for almost two years. Mash decided that since it all happened while I was in town, and since the Guard Captain is already interfering in his cohort’s operations, he might as well go that extra step to keep his commanders happy, so he sent inquiries to everypony.
“So far, we’ve learned the earth ponies are wanted in Plevan for unlettered bounty hunting and suspicion of smuggling on top of unlettered bounty hunting in the Midland, and the Mariner’s Guild wants one of them on suspicion of piracy, so as a Crown Princess, I get to deal with that, too. The unicorn is a deserter from the Teague Provincial Militia, so he’s not my problem, but getting him back there for his court martial is, and he’s wanted in Karabir for impersonating a sheriff’s deputy, extortion, and attempting to execute a false warrant!” She emphasized this last bit by throwing her hooves in the air before returning them to her sides and resting her face against one of them. “We really ought to have some sort of national registry for these kinds of ponies. It would’ve made finding all this out a lot faster, even if it was just as much of a headache.”
“As a retired Crown Agent, I can tell you that would be an excellent idea right up until some bureaucrat decides to abuse it for political leverage,” Bon Bon replied. “Is there any good news?”
“The pegasus,” Twilight replied, lifting her head from her hoof. “Silver Script. We don’t have full reporting from all the legions yet, but so far, he has a clean record and it looks like he genuinely thought their forged letters were legitimate. He joined up with them about two weeks ago to pay off a debt, and if this ‘job’ had been real and not just a ploy by Mister Awol to be some kind of heroic changeling hunter, he would’ve cleared it. I’m really tempted to just pardon him, let him deal with his finances, and be done with it. And I guess that we were able to arrest three wanted criminals thanks to their Boarvarian fire drill is good, too.”
“Mmm,” Bon Bon replied. And then, she took a step forward. “Speaking of changelings, how was your soda with Lyra yesterday?”
“Oh.” Twilight smiled much too widely. “Well, p-pretty good, ha ha!” An instant later, she slumped down onto her desk. “It was stupid. We were just catching up, and I asked her not to wear a disguise, and everything was fine until I looked away for a second and then looked back and saw her and I just… everypony was just fine with a changeling at the shop, and then here’s good ol’ Princess Blockhead.”
Twilight folded her arms on the desk and buried her face in them. “I hate this, Bon Bon. She’s my friend and I hate that I can’t just act like a rational pony around her.”
“You’re trying, which is more than a lot of ponies would ever bother to do,” Bon Bon replied, walking casually towards and around Twilight’s desk. “And as much as I appreciate that you’re trying —” She stopped at Twilight’s side — “Lyra appreciates it even more, and I want to make sure you know that. You’ll get there.”
“That means a lot, Bon Bon,” Twilight said, glancing up from the desktop with a smile. She rose up with an exasperated frown and shook her head. “I’m a Princess. You’d think by now I’d be more confident in my own abilities.”
“Sometimes I wonder about mine. It’s all part of the equine condition,” Bon Bon said with a smile. “But when that happens, you have the rest of us here to get you back on track.”
Further conversation on the matter was forestalled when the door opened suddenly and surprised both of them. Sergeant-at-arms Sapphire Sky snapped off a crisp salute, a sealed envelope floating nearby in her magic field. “Princess, urgent communique from the Thirty-Third Battalion,” she said.
Both Twilight and Bon Bon recovered quickly enough. “Thank you, Sergeant Sky,” Twilight said as her own magic took control of the envelope and brought it to her. “If you would wait around a moment in the event I have orders to dispatch.”
“Of course, Princess,” Sky replied, stepping out of the doorway and into the room as Twilight broke the seal and began to read the letter inside. Sapphire Sky regarded Bon Bon with a nod. “Miss Bon Bon.”
“Sergeant Sky,” Bon Bon replied with a nod of her own. “I hope the day finds you well.”
“Well enough,” Sky replied. “I hope I’m not interrupting.”
Bon Bon shook her head. “I just dropped in for a few moments to say ‘hello,’ but I should be getting back to it. The candy shop in Hoofington had a surge in business that was more than they could handle, so they directed several custom orders my way.”
“Actually, I need you to stay,” Twilight said, sliding the envelope’s contents back inside as it smoothly levitated to the top of her desk. She looked to Sapphire Sky. “Sergeant, please bring the Heartstrings sisters and Driftwood here as soon as they can make time. It’s not an emergency, and however you do it, do it as discreetly as possible.”
Sapphire Sky saluted, and then left the office. Bon Bon turned to Twilight. “It’s not an emergency but you need a Guard to handle it?” she asked.
Twilight had already started pacing. “It might be nothing, but it might be something and they’re the only ones I can think to ask and —”
“Breathe.”
Twilight halted her pacing abruptly and sharply inhaled.
“And out,” Bon Bon said, approaching her. “Take a few more.”
Twilight complied, shutting her eyes and breathing more and more easily with each moment.
“Good. Now, start again,” Bon Bon said, stepping around Twilight to stand in front of her. “What’s going on?”
“Something happened in Fouta,” Twilight said, opening her eyes and looking at Bon Bon. “It concerns changelings and the Guard is already involved. It’s serious enough that I’m considering commissioning a Crown Investigator to look into it, but I wanted to get a second opinion before I did anything that drastic and I couldn’t think of any… body else to ask.”
Bon Bon quirked her brow. “Really,” she said. Twilight responded by averting her gaze to one side and towards the floor, and Bon Bon heaved a sigh. “Twilight, there’s a time to be a friend, and there’s a time to be a Princess. Given what just happened, I’m pretty sure that right now, you need to be a Princess,” Bon Bon said, drawing the alicorn’s attention back to her. “Make it an order, if you have to.”
Twilight’s cheeks colored slightly, and she gave a quick, coughing chuckle as she turned her head towards the wall. After a moment, she cleared her throat and look back to Bon Bon, her stance rigid. “Bon Bon, I don’t know which Office you were part of or how long ago, but if you know anything about this, I really, really need your help,” Twilight said.
They stood looking at each other for several seconds, until Bon Bon nodded. “As much as I can be, sure,” she said. “What’s up?”
Twilight’s let out a light sigh and gave a slight smile, tension leaving her shoulders. An instant later, her smile vanished as she drew her mouth into a neutral line, and she changed the course of several lives at once with a single question:
“Have you heard of the Prince of Ponyton?”