The Princess of Love stared into what she had always expected to be a nearly perfect reflection of herself, only to find the differences between the expectations of who she was going to become and who she was.
Princess Mi Amore Cadenza, or as she preferred, Princess Cadence, examined every brush stroke and paint blotch on the portrait of her ancestor. Princess Cadence had always wondered what her ancestor looked like, but because all the remaining paintings and history books related to Princess Amore had been sealed away to prevent any creature from braving the storm of the Frozen North to pillage the Crystal Empire, she had never had the chance to see or read anything about the secret third princess. But now, history was laid bare before her, and she was finally able to see the mare who built an Empire based on the most powerful emotion in all of the universe.
But, now that she was in the epicenter of the love filled Empire, all Princess Cadence could feel was subdued optimism and a prevalent sense of worry radiating off of the crystal ponies who had escorted her and her husband, along with their small group of thesteral guards, into the Crystal Castle. The love radiating through the walls of the Crystal Castle was tainted by a stain of fear and distrust, a majority of which was pointed directly at her. Being a pony who was usually revered by thousands, the Princess of Love wasn’t used to sensing ponies who felt unease and discomfort towards her, and could only choose to ignore them.
At first, their apprehension towards her was insignificantly small, buried under mountains of hope and joy that filled their spirits and minds. But, after one sentence, all of their glee and hopefulness had soured, turning into an ocean of mistrust and dread. She wasn’t certain how not knowing where “Dream Valley” was cause for alarm, but apparently, she had broken a terrible taboo by not knowing the geography of a place that was lost to time for over a thousand years.
Not that I’m bitter or anything. She bitterly thought. Princess Cadence had already made a fool of herself when she attempted to mimic her aunt’s speech, but to make matters worse she somehow earned their ire with one simple question.
For a short moment, she had wondered if they would have reacted the same way if she had been Princess Amore. However, Princess Cadence had known better than to compare herself to others, and chased away her negative thoughts with a little sound she had been taught when she was a foal, and eventually taught when she was a foal-sitter. Princess Cadence knew that she would never be Princess Amore, but she would be cursed if she didn’t try her hardest to be the best version of herself that she could be.
Once she was done looking at the painting of her ancestor, Cadence trotted back to inform the castle’s Royal Advisor that she was ready to continue their tour.
“Now, ahead of us is the dining hall, where the palace’s staff and guard eat their meals for breakfast, lunch, and dinner. Would you like to have something to eat while we wait for your meeting with Lord Skeletor, your majesty?” Emerald Secret asked with a well practiced smile.
“That sounds lovely, Mrs. Secret. Is there any chance Lord Skeletor would be willing to join us as well?” She asked, even though she already knew the answer.
Despite having a chance to meet with a well-known princess, at least by modern standards, Skeletor had refused and stated that they would meet at a time and place of his choosing. While such a demand would be normal for royalty, she knew that Skeletor wasn’t a real member of any royal family, he was a creature who had claimed to kill Sombra and that was all. Skeletor wasn’t a king or a hero, he was simply a liar with a silver tongue that had managed to find himself on a throne.
The claim that he had slain Sombra with his hands had been too ludicrous to believe, it was about as likely as the goddess of chaos singing about love and harmony. What was more, was that the description that the guards had given to her was far too strange to be true.
The rumors about him insulting Eris didn’t sound too farfetched at that moment when the guards described him to her, though the more plausible answer for their description of Skeletor was illusionary magic. Illusions for changing a creature’s appearance weren’t too uncommon for unicorns, some even used it to hide their horns so they could perform tricks while disguising themselves as average earth ponies or pegasi.
Illusion spells were also heavily used by home invaders and thieves who could make themselves practically invisible, leading many mages to work hundreds of hours to create security measures against illusion spells and other types of tricky magic. While those countermeasures weren’t effective at revealing changelings, they were still good enough to prevent criminals from using magic to teleport into other ponies’ homes and robbing them blind with an invisibility spell.
Compared to the security of a modern-day house in a town like Ponyville, the security for the Crystal Castle, and the Empire as a whole, was sufficiently lacking. A single unicorn would be able to rob the Crystal Empire blind if they managed to teleport into the Empire’s vault. The most defensive spell she had seen in the castle so far had been nothing more than an average sound muffling spell that could have been easily dispelled by a dog whistle or some other high pitch noise.
“Lord” Skeletor was not a demon, not a hero, and he was certainly no king. To Cadence, he was nothing more than a pitiful liar who stole the credit from the creature who had actually succeeded in dethroning King Sombra.
“I’m sorry, your majesty, but that’s unlikely,” Emerald answered. “You’ll be able to see his lordship in due time.”
“Of course, I look forward to it. By the way, could you tell me more about Lord Skeletor as we trot? I’d like to know about how great he is,” she forced out with sweet words. “Maybe you could tell me about any laws he passed during his rule. I’d like to know what kind of leader he is before I meet him.”
In truth, she only wanted to make sure that she could fix any problems Skeletor created during his temporary reign, seeing as how the Empire would belong to her and Shining Armor after their meeting.
After the invasion of Canterlot from the changeling swarm and her imprisonment inside the deep labyrinths underneath the mountain that Canterlot rested on, Cadence spent a great deal of her time studying and learning as much as she could about illusionary spells. Similarly to the sound muffling spell that he had placed on his door, any illusionary spell he had used could easily be broken with an above average flash spell. The sudden blinding light would cause everyone’s vision to reset, allowing them to see the pony hiding inside his fake monster. And, if it were a stronger illusion spell, she would need to cast a quick dizziness spell so that the unicorn or ruva's focus on their fake appearance would falter, once again allowing their true identity to be exposed.
Once he was exposed as a fraud and manipulator, Cadence and Shining Armor would be able to take the reins of the Crystal Empire and turn it back into the bastion of love that it had been millennia ago.
“Certainly, your highness. I suppose it would only be right to discuss the holiday he created.”
A holiday all about that egotist, no doubt. He probably called it something like Saint Skeletor D—
“He decided that the day of the Crystal Fair each year would become Amore Memory Day,” Emerald began to explain as several of Cadence’s expectations of Skeletor were broken. “Although it wasn’t his first act as lord, it was one of his most impactful. Not even a day later, he decided to pass a law allowing marriage between gay ponies.”
“He passed a law that made it so ponies had to be happy if they wanted to get married?”
“Not happy, your highness, ‘gay’. Apparently, that word has different connotation where Lord Skeletor is from, and is used to describe two ponies of the same gender being as intimate as married couples. After the Crystal Fair and the celebration of Amore Memory Day, he proclaimed to the Empire that the laws preventing marriages between two stallions or two mares was a plot devised by Sombra. According to Skeletor, Sombra had taken the form of a deity sent by Faust and lied to our princess, claiming that laws against gay marriage were a judgment passed by our benevolent goddess.”
“Really? Interesting…” Cadence said as she began to listen more carefully to Emerald’s words.
She wasn’t ignorant to think that her ancestor was the perfect princess that did no wrong. It was a different time for Princess Amore, and she had been working off of a flawed understanding of magic just like most ponies were in those days. Many ponies did things that, if done in the modern day, would have been heavily frowned upon or even attacked. But they lived in a different time, where the prying eyes of future generations held no influence or sway over their decisions.
Instead of telling the Empire the truth, that Princess Amore had flaws and believed in a misguided understanding of magic, Skeletor chose to create an elaborate lie that would paint Princess Amore as a virtuous saint who was deceived by a Timberwolf against tree bark. She wasn’t sure how praising her ancestor helped Skeletor, but she was certain that there had to have been a self-serving reason behind his deceit.
“He and Copper Plate, our Master of the Archives, poured over the marriage laws for quite some time and agreed to rescind and keep a few laws,” Emerald continued as she led Cadence and her group to the dining hall.
“Has he passed any… controversial or questionable laws during his rule? You’re his Royal Advisor, have you had to put your hoof down at any time?”
“I’m not at liberty to question or undermine any of Lord Skeletor’s decisions, my role is simply to advise him if I believe something should be done differently. While he and Copper Plate were looking at our laws, he relied on her input to come to any final decision.”
“So, Copper Plate advised him at that time. Is there a chance I could speak with them today as well?”
“That could be arranged if you’re willing to take a detour to the medical ward of the castle. She had an accident and has been relieved of her royal duties until she can make a full recovery.”
“Oh, was she hurt?”
“Yes, but she'll be better soon. There was a problem with her back leg and she’s been told to rest it, I’m not entirely sure when she’ll be able to return to her duties but I'm certain that she would appreciate meeting with you. That reminds me, your majesty, I’ve been meaning to ask you something, if that’s alright with you.”
“By all means, ask,” Cadence replied.
“Thank you, your majesty. I was just curious about how long do your and his majesty plan to stay in the Crystal Empire. I’m sure all of the other crystal ponies in the Empire are eager to know too, so would you mind telling us how long you’ll grace us with your presence?”
Forever. Cadence thought to herself, purposefully keeping that answer from the Royal Advisor until she exposed Lord Skeletor as a lying unicorn or ruva.
“We’re planning to stay here for some time. Once my husband and I meet with Lord Skeletor, we’ll be able to discuss our living arrangements. Also, I noticed that you also only mentioned that the crystal ponies would like to know how long we’ll be staying. Wouldn’t the thestrals and ruvas in the Empire also like to know as well?” She asked.
The moment her question passed her lips, Cadence could feel an immense sense of sadness wafting off of Emerald and the crystal pony guards escorting her.
“There are no more ruvas or thestrals in the Crystal Empire, the only ones who survived are those who managed to escape and find refuge in Dream Valley,” Emerald explained in a somber tone before she wore a gentle and hopeful smile on her muzzle to deliver some thread of hope that could guide her through the darkness of her pain. “But, I’m certain that those who managed to flee will return to the Empire soon, just as your escorts have.”
Cadence glanced at her guards for a brief moment with confusion written plainly on her face before an immediate and worrying answer came to her mind. With how often Lord Skeletor had lied to her future subjects, it wasn’t odd to think that he had told them a terrible lie that would crush their spirits. She could only pray to Faust that Skeletor hadn’t kept the truth from them when he arrived in the Empire.
“Emerald, I know this may be an odd question… But what year do you think it is right now?”
A high-pitched beep rang in Star Burst’s ear as she stealthily snuck through the castle corridors, sticking to the shadows whenever she was presented the opportunity to hide herself in the corners of the tall ceilings.
Thanks to a small enchantment placed on her body armor, the thestral was able to slip away from their tour guide and use a special magic enchantment detection device to search the castle for any of Sombra’s remaining evil enchantments. The device, a small rectangular box made of plastic and fiber glass that hung around her neck by a loose string, was a modified bomb spell detector.
Instead of being used to detect high amounts of time related enchantments and explosive spells, such as compacted fireworks spells and so on, the device around her neck had been calibrated to search for large sources of dark magic.
The device was designed to release high frequency beeps that only thestrals and lycanthropes could hear, and the high-pitched beeps would become more intense the closer it came to a source of powerful dark magic. Star Burst wasn’t completely sure how the device could tell if a spell or enchantment was powered either by a unicorn midbrain or the shards of others’ souls, but she knew that it worked and that was all that mattered.
General Camisole had eloquently surmised Star’s mission as, “magic with second brain: good, magic with souls: bad, listen for irritating beeps, and get rid of bad magic."
The still unnamed device was designed to search for any spells or enchantments powered by souls since Sombra had primarily used dark magic during his reign over the Crystal Empire. It only made sense that whatever ancient item was preventing Princess Luna from entering the dreams of the ponies who lived in the Empire had to have been powered by dark magic. Once the artifact was properly disposed of, Princess Luna would be able to frolic through their dreams with ease and use her special talents with therapeutic magical spells to ease their minds and help their spirits heal. Everypony would celebrate, they'd probably sing a song, and then Star Burst would diligently wait for her next assignment with the silent hope that she could earn a promotion that she could rub in Camisole’s muzzle.
With that plan set firmly in her mind, Star Burst continued to listen to the small device as she flew through the halls of the luxurious castle. Her white flectan fur coat and the subsequent notice-me-not enchantment placed on it allowed the thestral guard to navigate the halls without much issue. The only problem was when the device led her to a pair of large doors that were being guarded by a pair of crystal pony guards.
The oversized doors were far too large and heavy for her to discreetly open by herself, and the fact that she had little to no idea what laid behind them made her hesitant to tempt fate by trying to sneak past the guards. Still, the device around her neck had led her to that obstacle for a reason, so she would have to get through those doors eventually.
After diving through an open window that she had passed by earlier, she gently glided around the castle walls in the hopes of finding a way into the room behind the stationed guards. If it turned out that the only way to get into the room was through the guarded doors, then it would be a simple matter of reporting it back to the princess later once she dethroned Skeletor and gained complete control of the small Empire. At that point, there would be no need for secretly sneaking through the castle, which would have actually been a little disappointing for her since this would likely be the only time she could use her skills of espionage to sneak into a castle.
How many mares can say they snuck into a castle and got rewarded for it? She gleefully thought to herself as she successfully managed to find a window into the room that the device had led her to.
With no curtains to hide behind or any windows high enough to perch on safely, Star Burst gently hovered outside the window by lightly flapping her wings as she looked inside. Her eyes barely peeked over the ledge of the large windows as she peered into the room.
The first thing that her eyes latched onto was the, for lack of a better word at that moment, thing that was perched on the throne. It was as if the pages of a foal’s book parted at the spine to allow a fictional monster to wrench itself free from its paper prison to enter reality. It was both furless and scale-less with only a navy-blue cloak and several armored plates to cover it’s sensitive and naked blue skin. The creature’s face had been completely torn off, leaving only the remnants of a primate like skull to serve as the monster’s head.
It didn’t take Star Burst too long, once she got over her initial shock, to realize that she was staring at Lord Skeletor.
The image she painted in her mind at the guard’s words paled in comparison to the creature she saw at that moment. A being that could only exist in the borders of Eris’ fraying sanity had managed to claim the Crystal Empire’s throne as its own and deceived the crystal ponies into believing that it was a real monster.
Star Burst took some comfort in the knowledge that the thing sitting on the crystal throne was nothing more than an illusion created by a unicorn. Unfortunately, the fact that there was an illusion that radiated dark magic meant that the unicorn who was controlling it was powerful enough to keep up the illusion while keeping themselves hidden, possibly using an invisibility spell and silencer spell to conceal themselves.
The slowly rising pitch of the device around Star Burst’s neck forced her to lower the volume for a moment as she silently observed the illusion. She found it incredibly strange for the unicorn caster to keep up the illusion inside the barren throne room. Whoever the caster was, they were talented enough to keep their illusion animate even in its idle state on the throne. Most unicorn illusionists would take the opportunity to only show a stationary image that didn’t require them to focus on animating their puppet, but the illusion that occupied the throne was animated with great detail. The fabric that covered its body fell naturally into place and didn’t sink into the illusion’s skin, the steady rise and fall of the illusion’s shoulders perfectly mimicked the steady breathing of a real creature, and the unicorn had even taken the initiative to create a fake shadow for the creature.
She could see how the unicorn had so thoroughly deceived the crystal ponies into thinking that their creation was a real monster, but she couldn’t understand why they went through such great efforts to deceive the crystal ponies. Why pretend to be an otherworldly monster when they could claim all the fame and glory of Sombra’s defeat as a unicorn? Why go through the effort of maintaining an illusion in an empty room? And, most confusing of all, why use dark magic to create the illusion when they could rely on their own magic without tearing apart pieces of their own, or others’, souls.
Her silent questions were stopped for a moment as the sound of screeching hinges drew her attention to the throne room doors. She watched as two guards trotted into the throne room and took note that their armor didn’t bear the skeletal themed accents that adorned the armor of the guards outside the throne room or the ones that escorted Star Burst and her company to the castle. Instead, their armor was a deep purple color that was bare of any noticeable decorations.
The guards both bowed before the illusion, prompting the fake monster to acknowledge their presence as it stared down at them.
“Have you delivered my orders?” The illusion asked the two guards.
“Yes, Lord Skeletor. Crumb Catcher and Avid Value should be here after they’ve completed their task,” one of the guards answered.
“Perfect. We must be prepared to receive the prince and princess when they come to meet with me. I’m sure the’ll be quite surprised by what we’ve prepared for them. I thank you both for your diligent work.”
“It’s an honor to serve you, Lord Skeletor,” the two guards stated in unison.
“Uh, yes, I appreciate your loyalty to the Empire’s wellbeing. Anyway, I’m going to leave for a moment, make sure no one comes in here without my express permission,” he ordered.
The two guards nodded in acknowledgement to the illusion’s demands before they took their positions at the throne room doors. For a moment, Star Burst thought to leave and report back to Princess Cadence and Prince Shining Armor about what she had seen, but the slowly rising pitch of the dark magic detecting device gave her a brief pause. Her eyes were glued onto the illusion as it pulled out a scepter that had been hidden from her view earlier. A deep green color ensnared the ram skull on the scepter and released a spike in dark magic to create an oval orange portal in the middle of the throne room.
The portal’s sudden appearance caused the device around her neck to scream out in agony at the rising levels of dark magic in the throne room, which in turn caused Star Burst to release a pain filled howl as the device stabbed her ears with a horrific screech. Her loud cry echoed through the walls of the throne room, instantly catching the attention of the two guards and the illusionary monster. The moment her eyes locked with the monster, she felt his magical aura latch onto her like a vicious predator before he violently pulled her into the throne room.
The device screamed with all it’s power as his telekinetic grip wrapped around her body, ensnaring her in too much dark magic that the device threatened to deafen her with its high-pitched whine. She could barely notice the aura around her body tighten as the pain in her ears began to flare with enough force to make her head spin.
Before she knew it, her muzzle was only a foot away from the skeletal face of the Empire’s biggest liar.
“Who are you?!” The illusion demanded as the device continued to assault her ears. Skeletor’s voice barely rose above the high pitch that only Star Burst could hear.
Tears threatened to spill from her eyes as the device continued to torment her, but once she felt the magical aura surrounding her body fade, her hooves instantly flew to the device around her neck and tore it off before she smashed it against the crystal floor. As the ringing in her ears slowly died down, she could swear that she heard something that sounded like, “cards offender,” but in hindsight was probably “guards, apprehend her.”
Without much delay, the guards who had been standing watch at the doors were pinning her to the floor. Star Burst struggled to free herself from the combined weight of two guards in heavy armor, but her efforts to push them off were in vain, she had been left completely defenseless after the onslaught of noise attacked her ears. Her vision was still blurred by the splitting headache that tore through her skull and the ringing in her ears refused to let her mind recuperate.
“… What is this?…” She heard Skeletor ask over the ringing in her ears. Her vision was blurred by the tears that struggled to spill from her eyes, but she could see that the illusion was holding the remains of the device in its clawed hand.
Star didn’t piece together the implications of what she saw immediately but, after a few moments of allowing her mind to process what she had witnessed, a daunting thought appeared in the back of her mind. What should have been an illusion, an intangible mess of colors with no real mass, was holding a solid object without any visible telekinesis around it.
“What the buck?” She muttered.
The safety of her previous assumptions slowly cracked under the weight of her newfound fears until the comfortable space she had built inside her mind shattered before the demonic creature. She had felt a certain sense of security when she thought her opponent was a unicorn that was well versed in illusionary magic, but any sense of superiority or confidence that she had was buried under a flood of realization and worry.
The skull headed monster slowly knelt down to meet her eye. The dark pits of his eye sockets became more prominent as the eyes hidden in the shadows of his skull peered into her own. The fangs of his upper jaw became more prominent, as if they had been filed down to become sharp blades that could tear into her flesh. At that moment, Star Burst greatly feared for her life.
She watched as the edges of his jaw shifted ever-so-slightly to act as a makeshift pair of lips, forming shapes for his words to be carried out of his skull. “Who are you?”
Star Burst briefly struggled to decide if she should answer the monster or not, her mind was alit with furious fears and panicked questions that gnawed at her sense of rationality. Too many questions and doubts flew through her mind as she eyed the broken tracker in his hand, a hand that could lash out and wrap around her throat at a moment’s notice.
While she studied every detail of his appearance to fuel the nightmares that would later plague her mind, one of the guards grew impatient with her long pause of silence and began to make his agitation known. “Answer our lord, criminal!” The guard demanded.
She felt the hooves of the guard dig deeper into the membrane of her pinned wing, grinding it between his armored hoof and the hard crystal floor. A hiss of pain escaped through her clenched teeth as she endured the guard’s attempts to force her to comply with the monster.
Star Burst resisted the heavy urge to tell the stallion to shove something unpleasant up his behind, and was greatly surprised that her silence was rewarded by the intervention of the demonic creature.
“Hey, hey! Stop that, she’s already pinned down, there’s no need to begin hurting her,” Skeletor chastised.
“I-I’m sorry my lord,” the guard apologized as he shifted his weight off of Star Burst’s wing.
Skeletor gave the guard a silent nod before he turned his attention back to Star Burst to begin his interrogation. “Now, ma’am, I would appreciate it if you told me who you were and what you’re doing here.”
Star Burst briefly hesitated before she answered him, weighing the options of her words and actions on her tongue.
“Lieutenant Star Burst of the lunar guards, my comrades and I were being led through a tour of the castle when I accidentally got separated. I flew around the castle to stretch my wings for a bit when I passed by that window,” Star said, with a tilt of her head towards the aforementioned window.
“So, that explains how you got here. But that doesn’t explain this thing,” Skeletor stated as he gently shook the remains of the shattered device in his hand. “What is this, and where did you get it?”
“… That’s a new type of compass.”
“Bullshit. You expect me to believe that? If that’s it, then why did you smash it, because it wasn’t pointing north? I’m not an idiot, so don’t treat me like one. Now, what is this, and where did you get it?”
“… It’s a magic detection device set to track certain traces of magic, and it was hurting my ears too much. It’s just a standard issue piece of equipment for members of the Equestrian guard.”
“Standard issue, Nye-heh? Really? To have something so… advanced while the Empire is still struggling to make paper… Interesting… Let her stand. I want to get a better look at her, ‘standard issued’ equipment,” he ordered the guards who were restraining her.
With an impressive speed, Star Burst soon found herself back on her hooves with the two guards pressing into her sides to restrict her wings. In spite of this, she gave her wings an experimental nudge to see if there was any chance of still escaping, but their heavy armor-plated barrels prevented her gaining more than a few hairs of an inch.
Skeletor took his time as he circled her and the pair of guards, silently drinking in everything that his eye sockets latched onto. Star Burst felt the hairs of her ears stand on edge as Skeletor’s gaze traveled across her body, as if he was measuring up a stalk of corn at a market stand. His words were carefully measured as he spoke, and held a hint of disbelief and mild humor that hid the great curiosity that raged in his mind.
“I’ve seen these ‘standard issue’ items before, camouflaged body armor, bullet proof helmets, snow goggles, and plastic. Even this smashed magic tracker, thing, could be considered a glorified Geiger counter. I’ve seen them, touched them, and used most of them before, and I know that these can only be made by someone not of your… Kingdom. So tell me, who was the person that designed this compass and your body armor?”
Per Son? What the buck is a Per, and why does he think a Per’s son made my equipment? She wondered.
As she thought about how to answer his odd question, the monster drew closer to her and crouched to down until his skull was only a foot away from her own muzzle. “There’s a human in your kingdom, isn’t there?” Skeletor demanded. “If there’s a human out there, I wish to know about them. So, what do you know about them?”
“I’m not at liberty to confirm or deny if there’s a human in our kingdom,” Star replied as she silently wondered how the son of a “Per” was related to a “human.”
“… Fair enough,” Skeletor openly scoffed as he rose back up to pace around the thesteral guard once more. “I’ll simply ask your prince and princess later. If there is a human in your kingdom, I will find a way to speak with him or her.”
Feeling tempted to dig for any information she could sink her teeth into, Star Burst decided to turn the tables of their interrogation and ask Skeletor a question so that she could both buy time for herself and gather intelligence for Equestria’s princesses.
“Does it have anything to do with ‘A-Mare-ial’?” Star asked, using the name of his alleged home to pry for more details about what he was after.
“America,” Skeletor instantly corrected. “… You know about America… Then, you must have a human in your kingdom. What are they like, did they say anything about how they got to your kingdom?”
“That information isn’t privy to the public, sir. Not even I know,” she lied once more. With each second that passed in their conversation, the demonic creature would unknowingly reveal something useful for Star Burst to take note of.
“Then tell me something that is ‘privy’. How long have they been in your kingdom, how old are they, tell me something,” he demanded as he once again stopped in front of her.
“They’ve been in Equestria for several months now and I’m not sure how old they are.”
“…Alright. What other inventions has that person shared with you?”
“Once again, I’m not at liberty to divulge information that—”
“Enough, I get it, ‘It’s classified’ or whatever. Can you at least tell me their name?” He asked, keeping his voice more neutral than he had during his previous questions.
It only took Star Burst a second to think of a name that worked for several species despite their race, gender, or position. If she were anywhere else, perhaps she would have slightly struggled to find a name that matched her criteria, but it was hard to forget the most common name among all species when she was literally surrounded by it.
“Crystal,” she finally answered, choosing a vague name that could work for anything from a pet puppy to an exotic dragon, and it was also a name that could be given to either colts or fillies.
“Crystal…” Skeletor quietly repeated before he turned away from the thestral guard to sit on the large obsidian throne. “Crystal, Crystal, Crystal… Well, I can’t wait to meet with her then. Hopefully, she and I can find a solution to our shared… problem. Now, your prince and princess, why have they come to the Empire completely unannounced?”
“They came here to… Make sure Sombra was dealt with.”
“So, they aren’t his acquaintances?”
“Buck no,” she said without any restraint. “Why would you even say that?”
“Because, ma’am, I’m just trying to piece together this odd puzzle before me. Two ponies from another kingdom came to the Empire without an army, without any warning, and without knowing that Sombra was already dead. I… Just wanted to assure myself that we could all get along. I’ve even gone through the efforts of preparing gifts for your prince and princess so that we could begin to form good relationships between the Crystal Empire and your kingdom. Speaking of which, would you be so kind as to tell me where they hail from?”
Star Burst resisted the desire to blurt out a question, and ask Skeletor if he had never heard of Princess Cadence or Prince Shining Armor before. Anypony, heck, any creature would know that they were from Canterlot, only the most ill-informed shut-in wouldn’t know about them. She couldn’t help but wonder is he really didn’t know who they were or if he was simply acting like a naive fool to lower her guard?
“They’re from Canterlot, the capital of Equestria,” she answered.
“… Canterlot… Canter… Oh, sweet Jesus,” he muttered as he pinched the space between his eye-sockets. “And here I thought, Amethyst avenue and Sapphire square were bad puns… Well, pun names aside, you said that they came from… ‘Canterlot’ to make sure that Sombra is dead, correct?”
“Yes.”
“Well, that’s wonderful. Since you accidentally lost your group, you should wait here for your prince and princess to arrive. I’m sure they’ll be elated to know that you’ve gone above and beyond the call of duty to leave a favorable impression of them to me before I even met them. So, won’t you stay here and wait patiently for them?”
It didn’t take even a moment for Star Burst to see through his thinly veiled words. Essentially, she was forced into a precarious situation where any attempt to escape would reflect on how he would react to Princess Cadence and Prince Armor when they arrived. Though she didn’t really care what the questionably undead monster thought of them, she did feel compelled to oblige his offer, and hopefully find a way to learn more about him in the short time she had before the others would arrive at the throne room. Her conversation with him had already revealed more than he could have imagined, and in a situation where one is faced with the unknown, knowledge would always be a great tool to combat the risks of possible surprises.
“Thank you for the offer, sir, I’ll gladly accept it.”
“Excellent. Guards, release her and return to your posts at the door. My head of staff and royal treasurer should join us shortly, so I hope you won’t mind indulging in a few more questions over tea, Lieutenant Burst. I'd love to hear more about the person residing in your wonderful kingdom."
"Of course, sir, but I can only tell you so much," Star Burst agreed as she prepared for a silent battle of information and deceitful words.