“Ah, Miss Sparkle, just the pon- ah, dragon I was looking for,” Steelwing exclaimed, fixing the glasses hanging on her face, “My, have you grown taller? Or have these old bones shrunken already?”
Even after fifteen years of knowing Steelwing, Twilight had no idea why Steelwing’s parents decided to name a unicorn ‘Steelwing’. Her gray coat looked lighter than she last remembered and her salt and pepper mane had lightened somewhat.
“Just a little taller,” Twilight smiled, aware that if she were to flare her wings out completely, she would knock over countless shelves. She remembered when she could run around under hoof and then get yelled at for scratching the shelves. She spied the scraped-away paint that was a little higher than her shoulder. Oh boy, she used to be so small.
“So what’s Celestia got us caught up in this time?” Twilight inquired, refocusing her thoughts on the present.
Steelwing snorted, “The Princess wants our team to complete one of Starswirl The Bearded’s unfinished spells. The only problem is that we don’t exactly know what the original intent of the spell was. None of us dared to cast it without knowing what it did, and since there’s no known counterspell, it could prove disastrous,”
Twilight blinked, waited for Steelwing to declare it a joke, and when it didn’t come, sighed, smoke billowing out in clouds. Of course, Celestia would ask something like that. Half the time the ageless alicorn thought centuries ago history happened yesterday. It was an absolute wonder how she managed to keep Equestria up and running so smoothly.
Steelwing wrinkled her nose and magicked away the smoke before admitting, “We really have nothing to work with other than the original work. Which I might add that she hoofed to me without a single protection spell,”
Twilight barked out a laugh, envisioning the near heart-attack Steelwing went through, “So we have a freshly protected original work, half of a spell, and our brains,” Twilight concluded.
“As much as it pains me to admit, yes. That’s exactly what we have,” Steelwing sighed.
Without a word, Twilight went to pick up the notebook that was placed carefully on the stand. Her claws were swatted away by an irate Steelwing and sheepishly, Twilight lit her horns and brought it over.
A second later, Twilight delicately put the notebook back on the stand before whirling around incredulously, “By half a spell, you mean one sentence!?”
“No need to shout, young Twilight. I may be old, but I’m not that old,” Steelwing said belligerently.
Twilight groaned in response, “This sounds more like a cryptic prophecy than a spell. We have no idea what it does?”
Steelwing’s eyes speared her where she stood, “Do you want to cast it, Miss Sparkle?”
Twilight buried her head into her paws, “This is bullsh- Yow!”
“I will not have such crude language in my library,” Steelwing snapped, her posh Canterlot accent growing more pronounced in her annoyance and lifted her hoof from Twilight’s previously stomped-on tail, “Honestly, have you forgotten all your etiquette lessons in the few short years you’ve been down there? You don’t even say your ‘t’s correctly anymore,”
“Kinda hard with my voice. I don’t give a… I don’t care how I sound and nor do my friends,” Discreetly, Twilight tucked her tail in closer, “Sorry. Where do we start?”
Steelwing sniffed but spoke anyway, “I already have Quicksand and Copper combing the Archives. I’ve started translating the spell into different dialects of old Ponish and translating it back. You on the other hoof are just the dragon to guard this as well as thoroughly comb through the entire notebook for clues. Most of our old eyes can’t read the fine print,”
Twilight eyed the bulging notebook that could barely turn a page without ripping, “Yes, I’m certain my home is perfect for this priceless artifact,”
Steelwing’s stink eye urged her to shut up, so she nodded demurely.
“Good. Mail me the moment you find anything and don’t you dare get that notebook dirty,” Twilight gulped when Steelwing clipped the ‘t’ and nodded frantically.
“I’ll mail the whole notebook if need be,”
“By the moon, Miss Sparkle, if you burn even a single page, I will have your hide,”
The old unicorn’s eyes flashed behind her glasses when Twilight made to pick up the notebook with her claws again.
“Sorry, sorry. It’s a habit. Thumbs, ya know?” Twilight chuckled awkwardly at Steelwing’s unimpressed look.
“Celestia help me, for your student prodigy forgets she has magic,” Steelwing sighed, “Two years down with the commoners and your student forgets she comes from noble stock,”
In a very mature act, Twilight stuck her tongue out, swiped the notebook (with magic), and fled out the doors.
She made sure to yell over her shoulder, “Don’t forget about my princely brother and actual Princess sister-in-law!”
While on the flight back to Ponyville, Twilight layered so many protection wards on the book, she half expected the small thing to implode with the amount of magic saturating the papyrus. Well, at least now she could grasp it in her claws without damaging it.
When she landed on the balcony and stepped into her room, Spike’s voice issued from the main floor.
“Mom? Did you bring a bomb home? What is that?”
“It’s just a book, don’t worry. It’s really old so it needs to be protected,”
“It makes me feel like I'm standing at the top of a mountain and I’m about to fall off,” Spike’s green mane appeared at the top of the stairs, “Is that going to stay long? I don’t know how I’ll sleep with that in the house,”
Twilight frowned, well that would be an issue. If Spike felt like that, any unicorn visitor would go absolutely bonkers.
“I’ll put it in the basement, how’s that?”
“If it won’t explode,” Spike shrugged, “You’re lucky that you’re the one that put the enchantments on there. I’m about to molt,” Spike shuddered exaggeratedly.
Twilight laughed, starting to make her way down the stairs with the notebook, “You only get to joke about molting because you’ve never had one. What do you feel like for dinner?”
“Hay burgers!”
“We had them two days ago, Spike,”
“Aw, c’mon!”