Cadance walked through the door to be plunged into darkness. "Hello?" Her horn began to glow almost instinctively, repelling enough darkness to see just in front of her easily. "Did something happen?"
"Princess?" Hoofsteps on crystal as a crystal mare stepped into view. "Sorry about that. We have a delicate pony trying to get some rest."
Cadance inclined her head a moment, but it did click, she started with a startled gasp. "Oh! You got the daydark working then?"
"Like a charm," reported the mare with a proud smile. "And it's a wonderful thing. I just wish we had a separate room to put it in."
Cadance glanced around the dark-enshrouded room. "This is more of a triage..." It had but a few caretaking ponies, and no private rooms. "Not ideal. How do you manage to get anything done while that's on?"
"With difficulty." She leaned forward. "How can I help you, Your Highness?"
"It's surprisingly related." Cadance straightened herself, getting her composure back in order. "The health of my people is more important than this closet of a room suggests. I want you to move to a larger wing of the castle, and I wanted somepony along to help pick the most ideal place."
"How exciting!" She began to clap her hooves together. "Alright." She glanced off into the dark a moment. "He's fast asleep, I could come along?"
"Let's be off then." Cadance looped back on herself and trotted briskly back into the lighted hallway. The medical mare popped out a moment behind her. "There you are." She could finally see who she was addressing properly, wearing a nurse's cap and a kind smile. "Will your patient be alright while we're away?"
"He's just taking a needed nap," assured the nurse. "Besides, I'm not the only one on shift today, just the first to come see you, Your Highness." She dipped her head. "Let's be off. This is quite the thrill."
"That's a good attitude." Cadance resumed leading the way. "Having a larger space is also a larger responsibility, for you all. It also means we can have a larger medical staff occupying it."
The two chatted amiably as they went off in search of the perfect place.
Umbra inclined her head down at herself, examining herself, her new self. She lacked the curves that a human woman would have, but she was not a woman. She was not a man. She was a mare, with a mare's lines instead. She reached up, placing both hooves on her short snout. To a pony, the short curved snout of a mare was one of the most obvious marks of being a female, and she had that!
She had heard, and seen, some ponies had that mixed up. Some mares had a more stalliony box of a snout, and some stallions had the curved snoot of a mare. Just like humans, people varied, but it was still a very good predictor, and one ponies used at first seeing someone. That she... matched was a point of pride. But it wasn't the only place. Umbra patted herself down lightly, feeling the muscles beneath the fur. Mares were smaller creatures, built with different lines than a stallion. She had those lines. Those lines were far less variable, overall. They were also fairly easy to spot at a distance, making them about equal and on par with the snout's shape for pegging a random new pony as male or female. She was shaped like a mare. She was a bit large, but that part was within normal boundaries.
Cadance... now she was large! Apparently an alicorn thing? Alicorns tended to drift into giants. Cadance, Luna, and Celestia were all large figures, three for three! Umbra was not an alicorn, she was just a mildly large unicorn mare.
It was still a thing that was hard to grasp. She was a mare. A real mare, a female, completely. She had each and every part one would expect such a creature to have. She moved her hooves to her chest and down under the front of her barrel, but there was nothing there but smooth muscle that flexed lightly under her probing. Ponies did not have boobs, at least not there.
Umbra was a four legged animal. She had four hooves to prove it! On a four legged animal, at least all the ones she knew of, that was more... She sent her forehooves down along her belly, curling in on herself to the point that she flopped over. There, She nudged against the right part, and its twin just across the way. She had two breasts, each a subtle little thing, crowned with a nipple.
Were they nipples? Functionally, sure, but... technically? Umbra scrunched her face, digging through the past. Horses were like cows, and cows did not have nipples, or breasts. She had two udders, with a teat each. There was some mechanical difference too, but she didn't know what they were. She never owned a horse, or a cow, so learning that difference wasn't that high on her todo list. They did, however, enjoy her clumsy exploration of them.
"Are you alright?" A knock came with the voice. Shining had arrived at her room. Of course he had, seeing as he could feel everything she was doing.
Umbra grunted with frustration. She wanted to know herself, but... Oh sheesh. She began to color vividly, realizing she was playing with parts Shining just did not have, at all. It wasn't like a human guy. A human guy would at least know what a nipple was, they had them. They knew what one being poked felt like. Poor Shining was enduring completely alien sensations, being given to him by an unthoughtful house guest.
The door exploded inwards, grabbed by her magic as she scrambled into position. "I'm so sorry!"
Shining inclined his head. "Forgive us for the last time?"
Umbra forced an awkward smile. "Forgiven! Really, sorry..."
Shining reached forward and placed a hoof right on the same spot of her snout she had placed her left hoof not long before. "It's alright. We're all in an awkward spot right now."
Umbra could see her vision go blurry a moment. Why was she crying? "You're both so... nice."
"We try to be," he laughed out. "And you're just... curious, about yourself. I would be too!"
Umbra twitched her ears curiously. "You would?"
"Sure I would." He nodded firmly. "If I woke up as something other than what I already was, I'd want to know all about it." He angled his hoof to get Umbra more under her chin, cradling her as he brought in his other hoof. "What you're doing is perfectly natural. It's just the sharing part that's awkward."
"You know... Cadance can feel this." Not that Umbra minded his touch. It was kind of nice, being held like that.
"Then it's like I can hold her from a distance." He kept his hooves right on Umbra, gently rubbing. "I hope she can feel how much I love her."
Umbra began to color all the deeper. "But it's my face your hooves are on!"
"You do have a point." He drew his hooves back. "Sorry. I wasn't trying to bother you."
"No... no..." She turned in place, just to come back to facing him. "I don't want to be why you two get into a huge fight. You two are such a perfect couple!" She skewed one ear to the side. "One thing. Just to be sure I have it right, stallions have no udders, right?"
It was Shining's turn to begin to color. "No, no we do not. That's a mare thing."
"Funny thing... What I was before, both the males and the females had them." Umbra laughed awkwardly in memory. "The female ones were larger, sure, but we both had them."
Shining squinted at the idea. "Why? Did your stallions... Why?" An alien idea, clearly rattling about in his head.
"Just how it worked out." Umbra shrugged gently. "Not everything has a 'why'. Just how the dice tumbled along the way. When you're... a little thing." She raised her hooves close together. "At least for us, you start as a girl, all of us. Then the switch is hit to turn into a guy, for half of us, but by the time someone reaches that button, the teats are already there, and it'd take effort to get rid of them, so, eh, whatever. No harm!"
"Huh." Things became quiet then, both looking at one another. "It doesn't work that way for ponies."
"Clearly now." She leaned to the left to get a peek under Shining.
Which made him turn to avoid that. "Hey. Nothing for you to see, promise."
"But you felt that... Someone touching something you never had. That must have been so weird. Sorry again!" Umbra rubbed behind her head with a little strained laugh.
"Not your first time," he noted with a less strained laugh. "The first part, you were... further back."
That got Umbra to go as red as her cheeks allowed. "Sorry!"
"We should talk." He turned as if to leave. "All three of us, when we get the chance."
"Sure, any time!" Umbra took a step as if to follow him, but he put up a hoof quickly to stop her. "But not now?"
"She's busy right now, making changes to the castle's layout or something like that. I have to get back to training the guards. You have something to do too, don't you?"
A quiet moment, but it came. "Oh! Yes. In an hour, more crystal lessons."
"Have fun with that." He was smiling, a real smile. "You're really making progress with that."
"I think it's my talent." She waved her crystal heart-clad bottom. "See, marked and everything."
"We still have to explore that a little. Good luck with your lesson." And he left her where he had found her, the door closing with a soft click.
Umbra calmed herself and instead got to practicing her crystal craft. "Gonna work on shadow later." She was no crystal wizard, and no darkness wizard. She was a crystal darkness wizard! She would practice both, and be the best magical pony girl she could be!
Shifting Prism arrived with a cheerful knocking pattern. "Good afternoon," she called. "Is my new favorite crystal crafter in?"
"Sure am!" Umbra set aside the crystal piece she had been working on. "Good to see you."
"And you!" Shifting closed the door behind her with a kick and trotted in at an energetic jog. "How are you doing?"
"Just got better." Umbra touched noses with her teacher. "They're using my daydark!"
"Daydark?" Shifting tilted head to the right.
"The staff I made." Umbra gestured in the air. "Makes things dark?"
"Oh! Right! That's great!" She began to clap with approval. "You'll have to practice other ways of holding spells, but crystals are great at it."
"What's in that?" Umbra pointed at the dangling crystal pendant around Shifting's neck. "Some amazing spell? You never showed it to me before." It had been there, dangling on Shifting prism, but so far, not used.
Of course, it could also just be bright and colorful jewelry. Not every crystal was a magic artifact. "It's personal," Shifting mumbled, half-turning away.
"Don't be nervous." Umbra circled with her, staying in front of her. "If you made it, I'm sure it's super great." She leaned in, examining the star. It had ten points. It seemed each of its points was made of a slightly different colored crystal, making the whole thing dazzling and interesting to her eyes. "It's really well made. You're so good at this!"
Shifting laughed tensely, one hoof on the ten point star, perhaps defensively. "It's not that big of a deal."
"You say that." Umbra's eyes were locked on the bauble. "But that's eleven different crystals you got to come together perfectly, and you don't have crystal shaping magic. I can just force them together, practically cheating. That you do it so well..." She leaned in closer, staring. "I can't even see the seams. It's like it's just one crystal!"
Shifting's arm folded in front of it, hiding the star partially. "It's really not..." But Umbra kept on looking at it. "Alright... I made it."
"I knew you did," giggled out Umbra. "Unless it was your teacher? Do you have a teacher with even crazier crystal skills?" She turned an ear off to the side. "I'd want to meet them some day."
Shifting giggled softly at that, setting her hooves on the ground and standing properly. "No, silly. I made it so I could..." She glanced left and right. "It's a secret. I'm not good at secrets."
"But I am." Umbra leaned in, lashes fluttering. "So any secret you tell me will be even safer, because I am a pro at them. Not a soul will hear it from me!" She crossed her heart with a hoof along with a firm nod, sure of her expert status in secrecy.
Shifting rocked left and right with thoughtful hums. "Well, yeah..."
"And we're friends," continued Umbra. "I'd trust you to keep my secrets."
"We are friends," allowed Shifting, reaching up to bat at the star lightly. "But what if it's a bad secret? Even if you're a good friend, your other friends might not like it. What then?"
Umbra's ears quivered. "I have had secrets like that... I lived that... If you tell me something in confidence, I will die with it before I talk about it with anyone you didn't tell me I can talk about it with."
Shifting jerked back at the sudden change in Umbra's tone, shifting from playful teasing to rock-firm seriousness. "Really?"
"I am not joking." Umbra crossed her hooves, seated up on her haunches. "Where I'm from, sharing secrets gets people hurt, possibly worse. You just don't do that. People hear you like telling secrets, that's your butt on the line too. Nobody wants to be around a snitch." She said the last word with a great sneer. "We have a saying, 'snitches get stiches'. You ever hear that one?"
"No." Shifting frowned in new thought. "Stitches? For their clothes?"
"For their cuts, which they're gonna get for snitching," explained Umbra. "So don't be a snitch."
Shifting shrank back at that. "Wow, you take your secrets really serious." When Umbra nodded gravely, Shifting Prism smiled. "Alright, but I'm holding you to it. It's a big secret, and you have to promise not to hate me."
Umbra blinked at that catch. "You are a pretty innocent little thing." She reached for Shifting's cheeks, smooshing them gently with a laugh. "I can't imagine what secret you have that'd make me not like you."
A rush of green flames tickled at Umbra's hooves and forelegs, and she was no longer holding a crystal bat pony, but a black insect pony with the same hopeful smile. Umbra inclined her head softly. "You have shape changing magic? Neat!"
That got Shifting to look just as confused. "Neat? I... Yeah, it is kind of neat..." She wriggled in Umbra's grip. "But ponies don't trust changelings."
"What's a changeling?"
That got a fresh giggle out of Shifting. "Oh, am I your first? Gosh, I better make a good impression then. Hi! I'm a changeling." She pointed at herself. "I was hiding as a bat pony so they didn't throw me out. This is what I really am. Ugly, huh?"
"Ugly?" Well, she wasn't as soft and fuzzy, but... "No... Different. Different, but still nice." She ran a hoof down along Shifting's back, giving her a petting. "And still my friend. It's still you, right? Shifting Prism?"
"That's me! I had another name, before... But I took this name." She thumped herself on the chest. "And I like it."
"Then it's yours." Umbra nodded with gravity. "Only you get to decide what name you want to be called. I'd be such a mega hypocrite if I complained about that. Easy for me anyway, I never knew another name to call you by." A new thought came. "Oh, how long have you been Shifting Prism? You don't technically have to tell me that."
"Years." Shifting set her hooves on Umbra, nudging her back, but keeping that contact as she returned with a rush of flames to being her crystal batpony self. "Thanks for, um... not being upset?"
"It isn't that bad." Umbra pointed to the dangling 10 point star. "What's it got to do with that though? That's pretty, but... Oh! Does it do it? Is that what lets you change shapes?" She leaned in to nose at it. "Could I change shapes with it? Lemme try!"
Shifting laughed as she danced away from the curious shadow pony. "It doesn't work that way. I can change shapes because of what I am, which is the secret, so no telling." She held up a hoof and made a loud 'shh' of a noise. "Changelings live on love... That's why ponies don't like us."
"You're a love bug?" Rather than being appalled or scared away, Umbra only seemed more amused at her friend. "Well, I must be giving you a good meal then."
Shifting licked over her lips lightly. "More of a little snack. The love we're talking about is... more like Cadance and Shining Armor, deep love, complete love, or at least..." Her cheeks began to darken. "Really hot lust, but that tastes different." She grasped her star in both her hooves, raising it. "This holds love."
"Like a battery?" That got a blink out of Shifting. Umbra tilted her head. "Nevermind, so you filled it up with love?"
"Yes!" Shifting bobbed her head rapidly. "So I don't have to hunt, or hurt anypony. So long as I have this..." She hugged her star close. "I can just be a normal pony that people aren't afraid of."
Umbra leaned in, touching noses. "I'm not afraid of you. Why would anyone be afraid of that?"
"Well..." Shifting rubbed at the side of her head. "Imagine you had a boyfriend." Umbra nodded. "You loved him very much." Umbra nodded all the harder. "But, surprise, he was one of us. We replaced him a week ago without telling you to feed on your love. Your real boyfriend was foalnapped!"
Umbra gasped with proper alarm. "That would be awful... and also something I can't imagine you doing."
"I wouldn't!" wailed Shifting. "I don't want to do that..." Only to be suddenly hugged, Umbra's arms around her in a firm grip of solidarity. "You really aren't worried?"
"You can't help what you were born as." Umbra nuzzled the tufted ear of the batpony. "I wasn't born the way I wanted to be either, and if being a batpony feels like home, then you are a batpony, end of story. What you were before, doesn't even matter."
"Crystal batpony," noted Shifting with a titter, her smile returning. "Alright, no more glum faces. Next lesson!"
With a squeal of excitement, Umbra released Shifting, and the class could begin properly.
Cadance brought down a hoof, bonking Shining on the head. "I know what you two were doing. It'd be very hard not to, seeing as I could feel your hooves pressing, and her cheeks being pressed against. Care to explain in what circumstance that would be appropriate?"
Shining rubbed the sore spot. "I was actually hoping you'd feel it."
Cadance blinked at that. "I don't want to imagine my husband staring lovingly at another mare."
"But I knew you were feeling it, it was like being able to hug you from afar."
Cadance burst into laughter. "Shiny, if you want to give me a hug, come do that. Unless I'm in the middle of a meeting, in which case I don't want to be hugged, from afar or not. Now, I know... what she was doing, hard to miss that either, which made it all the more awkward. She was... exploring herself, then you touch her like that... It makes a mare think, Shiny."
Shining pressed his hooves together. "I'm really sorry. I wasn't trying to hurt your feelings. I love you from the bottom of my heart to the top. I was trying to console her. She was feeling out of sorts, especially being caught... in that... and being reminded not to."
Cadance flipped her ears back. "I can imagine that." She huffed a loud sigh. "There is no privacy here. This is not sustainable. The status quo is... just not working." She clucked her tongue against her front teeth in a sharp clack. "Which is why, I called for help."
"Twily's back?" A big smile spread on Shining's face. "She can sort this out."
"She has other things to do," denied Cadance. "And she already helped us quite a bit. Besides, noble customs is not her specialty. I reached out to Auntie, and she sent her best." She gestured to a door just in time for it to open, permitting a unicorn mare with a light grey coat to enter with an officious look on her face. "I present, Raven Inkwell." The mare nodded. "She will solve this."
Shining scrambled to full height. "A pleasure to meet you, again, Miss Inkwell." It was far from the first time he had ever seen that mare around Celestia. "But how is she going to help? Her specialty isn't ancient artifacts."
"I told you." Cadance flicked her husband's nose with a wing. "She will tell us what we can and can not do, while remaining the proper married royal couple we are. Isn't that right?"
"Without a doubt, ma'am." Raven approached at a casual rate, no urge to trot there. "I've been reviewing what you've informed me of, cross-indexing with the customs of the area. You are both in luck and out of it, since the ponies of the Crystal Empire are wildly out of date with the customs of the rest of the world." She inclined her head at a floating clipboard. "This presents unique opportunities to address this problem."
Shining rolled a hoof a bit limply. "But if we do--"
"--Others will think oddly of it, that would be the poor luck I was referring to." Raven nodded slightly. "However, their opinion also matters significantly less if the matter is not rubbed in their faces. Most global leaders have very little interest in the goings-on of your marital life, save where they have to."
Cadance sat even as she nodded. "Auntie was right, you are exactly the right pony for this. Tell us then, what do you recommend?"
"Have you considered exiling this 'Umbra'? Distance may diminish or even eliminate the problem." Raven suggested it with a straight face, no emotion displayed.
Cadance blanched at the idea. "No! We are at least partially responsible for her. Simply sending her away would--"
"--I imagined not, but I needed to eliminate the most expedient solution first." Raven crossed one line off her list. "Do you enjoy her company?" She looked to Cadance specifically.
"Hm? She seems nice." Cadance smiled gently. "A perfectly lovely mare. She's like a filly in some ways, trying to find her place. It's endearing how authentic she is."
Raven looked to Shining, not repeating the question, out loud. Shining coughed softly. "Ah! Well... Sure! She's nice, and a good pony, despite her, um, dark origins. She really seems to want to be friends with us, and she isn't bad at all."
Raven pointed her quill at Cadance. "Being the empress of the Crystal Empire, it is entirely within your abilities to take a consort. If she is your consort, then the problem is destroyed. Simple as that." She flipped pages on her clipboard. "Throughout the history of the Crystal Empire, more then ten separate leaders have taken a consort, some while married, some while not. Concubines, they're called, usually of the opposing gender of that leader, but not always." She reached up, pulling her glasses down. "Being a concubine, her position would be inferior to you, or yours." She pointed to Cadance and Shining's equally shocked faces. "But she would thenceforth be expected to be involved in the ways you currently fear. The problem would be resolved."