"Twilight!" Umbra hurried to Twilight, who seemed to hold a burned something. "Is that gonna help?" It was a book with a hole in it.
Twilight surrendered the book without a fight. "Not like this, it won't." She huffed with a frown. "I need to assemble the spell that was in it. I was... thinking I'd do it from memory."
Umbra flipped through a few singed pages. The book would not be of much use. "But did you get a good look at it?"
"Barely." Twilight sighed as a new scroll appeared next to her. "But I have to try my best!"
"Well, forget that. Prepare for shadow magic!" She waggled her hooves in the air as bits of green and purple gathered around them with the promise of her power. "Permission to try my best?"
Twilight nervously shuffled, but a glance outside at her mentor and sister failing the battle against winter was hint enough. "Please be careful."
"On it!" Umbra lacked dream magic, despite her soft pleads and her best bat eyelashes. The best she could do was wash Twilight's mind in shadow and hope for the best. She plunged Twilight into a self-reflective purple. "The book." Which was floating in Umbra's power. "It was whole, and you had it."
"I had it." Twilight sounded a bit spaced out in that state, gazing off into the distance. "It had the answer. I just had to cast it."
"To cast it." Umbra smiled proudly. "To do that, you need a copy."
"A copy, yes..." She started working her stylus over the free scroll by her, jotting out a copy of the spell bit by bit. "A copy is always a good idea."
"Such a good idea." Umbra couldn't dive into memories or peer at thoughts. She had never learned those tricks, but getting Twilight to think the right way seemed to do the job. "You're going great."
"I'm happy to hear that." Despite the numbing rays washing over her, Twilight smiled at the praise. "A copy." She held up the copy of the destroyed spell. "Now I can... Wait... It's broken."
Umbra broke the field of magic. "It is broken, but look, a copy!"
"A copy! Woah... I feel like I'm caught in a rut there." Twilight shook herself out, but her eyes were on that spell. "With this, we should be able to put the heart back together. Are you feeling better?"
"Not even slightly." Umbra waved it off. "But if we don't fix it, we all lose, so here I am."
Twilight bounded off with her new spell and a plan in her eyes. Umbra sank to her haunches with a hoof against her head. "I helped..." She staggered after Twilight after a moment of just existing. "Huh." The thought tickled her. She could try to put the heart back herself. Crystals! She loved crystals! But she could imagine all the ways it could go wrong if she tried. Putting out a field of 'think about this' shadow magic was one thing. Actually making a bunch of crystals into a heart shape with complete precision? Eh...
Twilight was with Cadance. They were trying to put the crystal together. Manipulating it felt like bits of sharp glass were moving around. She could see Cadance flinching but doing her best. The heart fell, still broken. The spell just wasn't working. "Anything I can do?" Umbra hurried on the scene as best she could. "I know magic."
"We may need you." Twilight raised a hoof to her chin. "But I don't think we can do this like—"
Starlight hurried on to the scene with Spike and Sunburst. "Here he is!"
Sunburst hurried on to the broken artifact, speaking without words for a moment. "Hmm, well, if we..." He looked over the spell Twilight and Cadance had tried. "Ah, hum... but then..." He turned in place with a frown. "Of course!"
Umbra walked up to Twilight and Starlight's sides. "He's an expert on this? I knew he had a few books."
Starlight threw a hoof with a loud pfft. "He's totally an expert. He went to Celestia's school."
"And failed," noted Sunburst in the middle of his frantic calculations. "But we can... Yes, of course." He waved at the mash of crystal bits. "We need more power, and we have it right here. Hold it together." The ponies seemed confused. "Literally, hold the heart together. Perform the crystalling. At its apex, we finish the spell and fix the heart."
Sunburst moved to Umbra's side. "They'll have to fetch the crystal ponies. I hear we took them towards the train."
Umbra's eyes widened. "Wow... They must... What's going on?" She rubbed at the throbbing ache in her head. "I want to help, but my accuracy isn't top notch. What can I do?"
"We can use your magic. When they grab the crystal." He waved at the many bits. "Just do your best to hold it. Let them use your magic."
"Use my magic, got it!" Umbra snapped a salute. "Also, you know Starlight? Awesome! The note sharing just got better."
Sunburst inclined his head. "Huh? Um, yes, I know Starlight. I didn't know that was important to you."
"She's Twilight's student." Umbra poked at Sunburst as if that was an obvious thing to know. "I want all her spells. I'll share! It's fair that way, right? I want to share spell tips!"
Sunburst smiled awkwardly. "I'd be glad to give some 'spell tips' as soon as this emergency is over."
Umbra shook herself out with an angry growl with too many sharp teeth. "I feel... better, a little." Sure, her head still felt like it wanted to come flying apart, but she was in one piece for the moment. "Ready..."
Cadance lifted the crystal first, with Shining and Twilight adding their magic to hold it steady. Umbra reached out but didn't attempt pressing her magic to mash it together. "Just lend some power." Umbra made contact and let her magic spread over the broken crystal. She could feel Twilight's magic pulling it into place. She just had to push and trust that Twilight would set it properly. "Just push..."
For all the drama and chaos, the crystal ponies were happy to give their life to the new princess. They bowed in reverence and the magic flowed powerfully into the crystal. As the crystalling reached some point only Sunburst seemed to notice, he clapped the last sliver into place. The heart pulsed, and the world cracked in a new way.
Umbra reached up to click her head into place as the ponies clapped and cheered. The clouds were drawing back. When had the clouds gotten there? Umbra had managed to sleep walk past most of that, but she could see them withdrawing and it all made sense looking back. "Are the sisters alright?"
"We are fine." Celestia and Luna were there. Celestia was the one that spoke, reaching out a wing to brush Umbra in a greeting of sorts. "You look better."
"I feel better." Umbra danced from hoof to hoof, feeling like a renewed pony. "Cadance, Shining?" The two were busy facing the crowd of admirers and had no time to deal with Umbra. "Right, silly me." She shook her head with a soft snort. "Emergency over! I barely got to help, boo... Next one! I'll help a lot more with the next horror that comes knocking." She did not know what she was singing up for.
Not that this stopped her from smiling at Sunburst and Starlight. "I hear you two know each other?" She thrust a hoof at Sunburst. "He gave me my first shadow spell book. Twilight taught me how to read magic, but without that book, I woulda been so lost." She threw a hoof wide. "Do you have any idea how hard it is to find shadow spells?"
Starlight laughed slowly in a strained sort of way. "Easier or harder than a spell to snatch a bunch of ponies' cutie marks?"
Umbra blinked at that explanation. "Wait what?" She leaned in closer to Starlight. "Do we have a shared dark background? Tell me more!"
Sunburst laughed with a single joyful noise. "Starlight, meet Umbra. Umbra is a shadow crystal wizard that looks a lot like a pony that terrorized the entire countryside before she made it a point to show us that shadows can be nice, too."
Umbra stroke a dynamic pose. "That's me, the local shadow wizard." She waggled her brows. "So what's this about stealing cutie marks? Is that shadow magic?"
Starlight waved that away with her cheeks on fire. "No! No... Thankfully not." She cleared her throat into a raised hoof. "I enjoy taking spells and tinkering with them. I was a... There I was confused, and did some not nice things... Things nopony should celebrate at all." She listed to the side. "Sorry."
"Don't be sorry." Umbra set a hoof on Starlight's shoulder. "It sounds like you've gotten better, which is good. So now it's in the past, where it belongs. So about spells! I hear you like them. I like them." She curled her hooves at herself. "I hear you play with them which has like 120% of my attention. Tell me you know anything about shadows!"
"There you are." Twilight joined them with a bright smile of a disaster avoided, Spike atop her back. "Starlight, say goodbye to your friends. We should try to get back as soon as possible."
Umbra twirled fast enough to catch Twilight by the shoulder with a hoof, basically punching her. "You are going nowhere with the other wizard! You were ready to run away with another wizard?! we haven't even caught up yet." She waved wildly between herself and Twilight. "And that's already unacceptable! You're gonna take her too?!"
Twilight recoiled, rubbing where Umbra had thumped Twilight so firmly. "Umbra, calm yourself."
"This isn't the time for calm." Umbra sank to her haunches. "But I am sorry for hitting you. That's wrong... But you tweaked me out." Her energy had clearly returned to her. "I have two wizards in front of me, tantalizingly close, and you want to run away? Why? Do I stink that badly?"
Spike leaned forward from atop Twilight, sniffing. "Don't smell bad to me."
Starlight applied a hoof to her face. "Twilight just likes plans, and it was her plan to head home as soon as the crystalling was over."
"Which it is." Twilight angled her head at where the crystalling was clearly a success. "Oh." She went quiet.
Princess Celestia was approaching alongside Luna and Cadance. Cadance was in the lead, heading towards Sunburst directly. "Since we couldn't have finished this without you, we wanted to name you the official crystaller of Flurry Heart."
Sunburst's ears danced. "Oh, um... if any royal foals appear, I'll be glad to help. Hopefully, next time, there will be less excitement involved."
Cadance inclined her head at him. "I would hope for that too." She held out her little foal for him. "Say hello."
The two met with cheerful noises. "Now what's this I hear?"
Twilight shied back. "I was getting ready to go. We've already been in your mane too long and past schedule."
Cadance raised a brow. "Our parents haven't even arrived yet. You're going nowhere."
"But..."
Umbra grinned with triumph as she threw a leg over Twilight and pulled her closer. "Sounds like we have time to go over some magic." With her other arm, she snagged the foal-laden crystaller. "So much magic to go over!" She casually offered Flurry Heart a fresh bottle with a wing. She smiled as Flurry accepted it eagerly. "That might be a bad habit."
Starlight inclined her head. "Huh... Sounds like you have just as many tales to share with me as I have with you. Twilight, since you're stuck here a little while, I'm going to study with some friends. Old—" She hugged Sunburst warmly with one hoof. "—And new." She hugged her new, maybe friend closer with the other hoof, the three linked.