“What are they doing in there?” groused Sonata. “This is totes taking forever!”
“It’s only been forty-five minutes,” murmured Feather Duster, hearing the worry underneath Sonata’s complaining. To her mild surprise, it was a worry she found herself sharing, knowing that not too long ago she would have been hoping that something awful had happened to Lex, rather than dreading the prospect the way she was now. “I’m sure Mast-, I mean, Prince Legis knows what he’s doing.”
“What he’s doing is probably her, after how she practically threw herself at him like that,” muttered Aria, her voice thick with anger rather than her usual prurience.
“For realsies?” Sonata’s eyebrows rose at Aria’s accusation, glancing between her sister and the closed door in disbelief. “I didn’t think she sounded hot for him at all.”
“That’s ‘cause you’re an idiot,” snapped Aria, before adopting a woebegone expression and putting one hoof to her brow. “‘Everything I am,’” she moaned, doing a passable imitation of Rarity, “’all of me, yours in exchange for your promise.’” Snorting, she dropped the act, looking disgusted. “She might as well have wagged her tail in his face and said ‘give it to me, baby.’”
Stuffed Shirt bit his lip, looking like he desperately wanted this conversation to be over. “Yes, well, that’s all the more reason for us to wait patiently then. No one likes being interrupted when they’re…in flagrante delicto.”
Sonata shot the stallion a baffled look. “Huh? Lex isn’t in a fragrant delectable anything. He’s getting it on with whatshername.” Ignoring Stuffed Shirt’s cringing, she turned back toward her sister. “And why’s that such a bad thing? I thought you got a kick out of him finding a new girl that we could all play with.”
Aria waved a hoof at the closed door. “In case you haven’t noticed, we’re not all playing with her! We’re not even close enough to hear what’s going on!”
Sonata wilted a little at that, her ears folding back. “Oh yeah.”
When Lex had sent them away, he’d ordered them to wait outside of the guest suite altogether, rather than simply exiting the study. While that only added one extra room between them – the entrance to the suite emerging into the living area, which the study branched off from – that was enough to completely muffle whatever they were doing, regardless of how intently someone might try to eavesdrop. Sonata could personally testify to that.
“And now that dewy-eyed little nag is getting her claws in him,” growled Aria. “All the cute girls here, and he just has to go for one of the least trustworthy!”
Feather Duster opened her mouth, closed it, and then licked her lips before finally deciding to give voice to her thoughts. “I thought she seemed sincere,” she admitted.
Aria rounded on the maid immediately. “I don’t care if she was sincere!” she snarled. “So she lost her boy toy! Boo freakin’ hoo! I care that her friends tried to kill Lex twice in the last two days! Three times, in fact, since that Starlight chick is part of her little clique now!”
“The terms of the duel specifically prohibited killing,” noted Stuffed Shirt. “I’m sure Princess Twilight would have abided by them had things not gone His Highness’s way.”
“What’re you, dense?” sneered Aria. “She would have bumped him off and then just said it was an accident or something. Ruining lives is what Twilight Sparkle does.” She glared at the door to the suite, as though trying to melt it with her gaze. “And now Lex is in there topping one of her best friends, so I’m sure we won’t be seeing her anymore after this.”
Her disgusted pronouncement was punctuated by her plunking her bottom down in exasperation, sulking. An awkward silence fell, and lasted for almost a full minute before Aria let out a slow breath, her anger fading as she looked at Sonata again. “We need to ask him.”
The younger Siren’s reaction was one of total confusion, giving Aria a blank look. “Huh? Ask who what?”
Had their relationship been the same as it was, Sonata’s inability to follow a simple change in subject would have provoked a storm of insults from Aria. As it was, she came very close to slipping back into old habits anyway, her patience eroded by how Lex was getting involved with one of those dangerous mares when he was already so hurt. But she managed to hold her tongue, recalling the warmth she’d felt toward Sonata earlier that morning, when she’d still been basking in the realization that she loved her sister.
Taking a deep breath, she tried again. “Lex,” she said slowly. “Remember what we talked about last night, before Cloudbank healed him? After we talked about Blondie leaving?”
She could almost see Sonata winding back the conversation in her head, her eyes turning vacant – more than usual, at any rate – and her lips moving slightly as she replayed the relevant portions of last night in her mind. Finally, her eyes lit up. “Ohhh! You want to ask him about that!” A moment later, she seemed to realize what she was saying, an uncertain look crossing her face. “I dunno, isn’t that kind of a big deal? I mean, a lot of stuff’s going on already, with the duel and becoming a prince and now that lady with the diamonds on her butt.”
“That’s exactly why we should ask him now,” pressed Aria, ignoring the quizzical looks she was getting from Feather Duster and Stuffed Shirt. “There’s always something going on. If he’s not fighting dragons or monsters or crazy princesses then he’s taking meetings about loans or teaching those kids or something else. The sooner we put this on his plate, the sooner he’ll get to it.”
“Hmm.” Glancing upward, Sonata turned that thought over for a few seconds before grinning and clopping her fore-hooves together. “Sounds good to me!”
“So glad you approve,” muttered Aria, but there was no heat in her voice. At least until she looked at the entrance to the suite again, scowling. “Now if he would just hurry up and finish with-”
A light blue aura appearing around the doorknob cut her off, the door swinging open a moment later to reveal a pair of unicorns.
“Oh my!” Blinking as she took in the sight of everyone clustered around the entrance, Rarity managed a flustered smile. “I, ah, hope we didn’t keep you all waiting for too long?”
“Not at all, madam,” offered Stuffed Shirt, standing at attention as he gave her a polite nod. “We were simply remaining at the ready in case His Highness needed-”
“So were you guys doin’ it or what?” blurted Sonata.
Grimacing, Lex shot her a look. “That’s enough, Sonata.”
“What?” whined the Siren. “Aria said you were!”
Her cheeks coloring, Rarity gave her mane a toss. “Really now, darling. There’s nothing more lowbrow than interrogating a lady about her-, can I help you?”
Her question, laced with indignation, was directed toward Aria, who’d moved forward until her face was within an inch of Rarity’s, causing the unicorn to recoil. “Plenty of perfume,” murmured the Siren suspiciously, “and minty-fresh breath.” Squeezing past the other mare, she turned around, examining Rarity from the back. “…I can’t tell,” she huffed a moment later. “It’d be white on white.”
Sputtering in embarrassment, Rarity flattened her tail over her rump protectively, but Lex spoke up before she could voice her outrage. “Both of you, back off!” he growled, glaring at each sister in turn, and while they both frowned, they knew better than to push the issue.
Satisfied that they’d let the matter drop, Lex turned his attention back to Rarity. “I want to emphasize again that this won’t be a quick process. Even preliminary findings will take some time to compile, and there’s no guarantee of anything.”
“I understand,” nodded Rarity. “And I’m grateful all the same.” Hesitating, she glanced at Sonata and Aria again before leaning in closer to Lex, planting a kiss on his cheek. “Thank you,” she murmured, her voice so soft it was almost a whisper.
Lex’s only response to her show of gratitude was a grunt, before looking at Feather Duster. “Escort our guest out, and arrange for transportation to take her back to the train platform. After that, find Thermal Draft and tell her I want to speak to her.”
Feather Duster bowed immediately. “As you wish, Sire. Miss Rarity? This way please.” Smiling politely, she gestured toward the unicorn mare’s travel bag. “I can take your luggage if you’d like.”
“Oh, thank you darling,” nodded Rarity, before her own smile took on a sharper edge as she glanced back at Aria. “I am feeling rather sore.”
“Y-” A look from Lex silenced her before she could voice a retort, leaving her fuming as Rarity was led down the hallway and around a corner, vanishing from sight.
Sonata, having missed the meaning of Rarity’s parting words entirely, frowned in confusion. “What do you want Drafty for?”
“I’m opening an investigation into the disappearance of Long Road,” answered Lex as he turned and headed back toward the study, the other three following him. “To that end, I want somepony to go to Trottingham and start gathering data on what happened there.”
“Thermal Draft’s one of those ponies you sent to their deaths a few weeks back, right?” Aria’s voice was silky sweet as she flung herself into a nearby chair, shooting Lex a phony smile in response to the glare he gave her then; he could make her stop asking about what he’d done with Rarity, but he couldn’t make her like it. “What makes her such a good choice for researching your new sweetheart’s dead donkey? Other than the fact that she has experience with not being alive, I mean.”
Halfway to his desk, Lex stopped in mid-motion at that, his eyes shining vividly as he slowly turned to look at her. “You’re treading into very dangerous territory, Aria.”
“Says the guy who just banged one of Twilight Sparkle’s-”
She couldn’t finish as Sonata’s hoof covered her mouth. “You really want him super-mad before we ask him what you said we should ask him?” she whispered, giving Aria an incredulous look.
Batting her sister’s hoof away, Aria’s expression was beyond sour, but by some miracle she didn’t argue the point. Instead, she looked between the pleading expression on Sonata’s face and the icy expression on Lex’s before turning toward the latter pony and sighing. “I shouldn’t have said that,” she muttered, dropping her gaze to the ground as she idly shuffled her hoof. “Sorry.”
Her eyebrows rising, Sonata sidled up to Lex, still keeping her voice at a whisper. “That’s, like, one for the record books! Aria never says she’s sorry!”
Lex seemed to consider that for a moment before turning his back on both of them, completing the journey to his desk in silence. It was only after he sat down – his eyes changing back to normal, the sight precipitating two soft sighs of relief – that he spoke. “To answer your question, I want Thermal Draft to do this because everypony else I trust already has tasks. Cloudbank will be working with me to develop the Night Mare’s formal doctrine. C. Shells and her crew are needed to keep facilitating commerce with Tall Tale. Garden Gate is serving as a troubleshooter. River will be assisting me with the Las Pegasus delegation. The Night Mare’s Knights are too young to be sent on a trip without supervision. Feather Duster’s contract doesn’t include this kind of investigative work. And I want you two here where I can keep you out of trouble.” A dirty look from him made Aria wince and Sonata grin sheepishly. “That leaves her.”
Moving into the place at Lex’s left that Feather Duster had held before, Stuffed Shirt leaned forward. “Shall I send a letter to Throw Rug instructing her to prepare your Trottingham residence for a guest, Sire?”
“Yes,” replied Lex after a moment’s consideration. “But she won’t be arriving immediately. I’ll dispatch her after the loan has been secured and the payments begin arriving.”
Stuffed Shirt nodded, scribbling a note down. “Very good, Your Highness.”
“Great!” cheered Sonata. “So, um, now that’s all taken care of, can we talk about something?” She glanced at Stuffed Shirt then before looking back at Lex. “Just the three of us?”
One brow raising, Lex nodded at the stallion, who bowed and left the room, closing the door behind him.
Taking a breath, Sonata gave Aria a nudge, the other Siren still looking shamefaced as she stood up. Slowly, the two of them approached Lex, moving with the shared precision of a millennium of dancing together as they circled his desk from opposite directions. It was only when they were within hooves' reach of him that they stopped, slowly sinking down until they were both kneeling on each side of his chair.
“Lex,” began Sonata, smiling up at him. “Meeting you has been the best thing that’s ever happened to us.”
“You rescued us,” continued Aria, “you’ve protected us, and you’ve taken care of us.”
“But more than that, after a thousand years, you’ve given us what we wanted most of all.”
“We thought it was to be adored, but we know better now.”
Leaning forward in perfect synchronicity, both mares took one of his hooves in theirs. “We wanted to be loved,” they chorused.
“We didn’t realize it before we met you,” confessed Sonata. “But now we know that’s what we were looking for all along.”
“We kept getting in our own way before,” admitted Aria. “We were always able to use our magic to take control of anyone we wanted, which meant we never really felt anything for them.”
“But we couldn’t do that to you.”
“Your magic is stronger than ours.”
“Strong enough that you could have defeated us and never looked back.”
“Or used us and then abandoned us.”
“But instead,” they continued, once again speaking in unison, “you chose to love us.”
“When you did that,” breathed Sonata, “there was nothing we could do but love you back.”
“And that,” purred Aria, “brought us closer together as sisters.”
“We’re both happier than we’ve ever been…”
“…or ever known we could be…”
“…because of you.”
“Which is why we want to ask you for something now.”
“Something that will make us, all of us, happier still.”
“Our one and only wish that’s still unfulfilled.”
Both of them stopped then, and it took Lex a moment to realize that they needed to be prompted. “Tell me.” Although he knew they hadn't used their magic, in that moment he found himself enthralled by the two of them, seized by a fierce urge to grant their desire, whatever it was. “Tell me so that I can make it happen.”
The two Sirens shared a smile before turning their adoring gazes back to him.
“We want you to find our sister, Adagio, and bring her home.”
“And we want you to make her fall in love with you the same way you did us.”