Twilight blinked as Rivet drained the last of his mug, looking up at him. "That's how you got into your construction? Why didn't you just retire? I'm sure it was a lot of bits?"
He wrapped his hooves around the empty mug, thinking as he stared down into it. Twilight looked over at her own half-full glass before she made a face and took another drink of the astonishingly still cold drink.
"By the sun, I think I'm getting used to it," she murmured darkly before taking another drink.
"It felt wrong," Rivet said. Twilight started writing again but paused and laid her quill down on the page. "It felt like I'd taken somethin' that weren't mine, right? So I wanted to use it to give something back, and my brother was already deep into the building work. It felt righ' to go into something that requires some good, hard work with your hooves, yeah?"
Twilight looked across from her at the stallion smiling into his mug before giving her own small smile.
"I think I understand," she said, leaning back from her notes and casting a drying spell on the ink. Looking across the table, she sighed before reaching over and grabbing her mug, downing the dark brew in two drinks and shuddering.
"Thanks," she said, smiling over at him. "I think I understand now. It's a good tale." She glanced down at the pages. "Do you mind if I share them?"
Chuckling, Rivet nodded. "Sure, Miss Twilight. Feel free to share it with any creature you want."
Afterward
Twilight sighed, leaning back from the massive planning table in Canterlot Castle. She twisted her neck and sighed as the two cracks released some of the tension.
"So, are we talking extension or another whole storage building?" she asked the group. Watching them all discuss between themselves, she fluffed her large wings and worked some of the sweat from her wingpits.
"I think an extension will cover the needs very well, Princess," one of her advisors said, a white-coated blond that only passingly reminded her of his grandfather.
"Very well. Will the usual contractor do?"
Every creature around the table nodded at each other, and Twilight called out a name.
Walking in the door came a stallion with a caramel coat and a light brown mane. No wrinkles showed beneath his horn, and his wings were still uncolored and wide, with no graying visible.
"Looking good, Rivet," Twilight said, smiling at their now-old joke.
He smiled back and murmured, "An' you, Miss Twilight, are still as pretty as ye ever was."