Princess Celestia and Princess Luna both looked at the changeling king before them in a fair bit of shock. According to what he had just told them, his kind knew of a way to undo the effects of love being drained from ponies.
"You mean to tell us that you know of a way to heal the damaged caused by this Chrysalis and her subjects?" Celestia questioned.
Apidae took a moment to consider before giving her his answer. "We do. It's not an easy process to perform. In truth, Dionices knows more about the matter than I do, so I believe she would be the best of us to ask about that matter."
Apidae then turns to the drone. "Dionices, would you please explain the process to the princesses?" he asks her.
"Of course, your highness" she replies before clearing her throat and going into an explanation about the process of healing a creature that has been totally drained of love by a changeling.
"When changelings feed, it's not so much we're consuming the actual emotions themselves, but rather the energy tied to them. That's why those who are fed upon feel weak afterwards, but recover after some amount of time. The time usually is dependent on how much they are drained."
"When too much of that energy is taken, it can cause more harmful effects than just fatigue, as you have all seen. One of these effects is the overtaxing on the natural regenerative ability of a pony's body."
"To that end, we have developed a process that allows us to help restore a sufficient amount of love energy in the afflicted pony to a point where the ability to regenerate their own energy is no longer overtaxed."
Celestia was skeptical of what she was being told. "Exactly how does this process work?"
"Well, it's a fairly complex procedure to explain," Dionices answers, "especially for a creature that doesn't understand the fundamentals behind how our species' magic works. To simplify it as best I can, the general idea of the process is to take a portion of love energy from one creature and transfer it to another."
Luna looks sternly at Dionices. "You mean to tell me you feed on one creature to then feed it back into another?"
"...Not exactly" Dionices answers nervously. "The process is... finicky at best. In truth, we don't use it often because of disciplined feeding practices developed over the last two centuries of our king's rule. We still have the process documented and medical changelings such as myself are trained in how to perform it."
"A major problem with the process is the fact that the donor has to have strong feelings for the affected. For example, if an adult male pony was completely drained, we would need their mate or one of their offspring, as those ponies would have the strongest feelings for the affected."
Celestia nodded in understanding. "You said that this process was complex and finicky, but you also seem to have confidence that our pony physicians can learn to perform this procedure."
"It will take time before one of your doctors or medical ponies would be able to perform this procedure," Dionices informs Celestia, "but in truth, they may actually be able to perform it better than a medical changeling could."
This causes Celestia to raise an eyebrow. "Oh?"
Dionices proceeds to explain. She asks for three paper cups and a pitcher of water, which one of the castle servants provides. She then proceeds to fill one cup to almost full and then pours enough water in the second cup to just cover the bottom.
"Think of these cups as ponies" Dionices begins. "The full one is a normal pony, full of love. The second cup with barely any water in it is a pony that was completely drained of their love by a changeling."
Dionices then takes the third cup and a fork that had been set out for use with a cake. She stabs the bottom of the cup with the fork several times until the bottom is full of holes. "This cup," she emphasizes, "is a medical changeling about to perform the procedure I am willing to show your ponies."
Dionices takes the full cup and begins pouring it into the cup full of holes. Naturally, water starts running out the bottom, but the holes are small enough that the cup does get a volume of liquid into it. The changeling then stops pouring from the full cup, leaving it about half full, and then quickly pours what liquid remains in the hole-filled cup into the nearly empty cup, filling it about a third of the way.
"The victim," she says while holding up the nearly empty cup, "has received a portion of love from a donor, and with their emotional energy reserves not so heavily taxed, their bodies can heal much more quickly."
"I appreciate the demonstration of the procedure, if not the mess you made with the water" Celestia tells Dionices, who looks away nervously at the last part. "One thing I don't quite understand is why you think it's possible for us to perfect this procedure you have. After all, you said yourself that we do not have an understanding of the fundamentals of changeling magic."
"Well, it has to do with the reason it's finicky" Dionices explains. "You'll notice that the water that went into the cup with holes was leaking out the bottom. That represents the medical changeling unintentionally absorbing some of the love that is taken from the donating pony."
Luna looks rather harshly at Dionices. "Am I correct in assuming that, in order for you to perform this procedure, you must feed on a pony close to the victim?"
"Yes and no" Dionices answers. "We need to draw that energy, but it's not taken for feeding. The process used to draw the love out is done in reverse, with the affected pony being the target of said spell."
"As for what happens with the lost love? It gets absorbed by the changeling that is performing the procedure, but as I explained before, that is not intentional."
"Not intentional?!" Luna says in disbelief. "You just said that you draw out that energy as though you are feeding but actually are not, then you say that you unintentionally absorb some of the love you drain out in the transfer?!"
Taking notice of the lunar princess's rising anger, King Apidae elects to step in. "I apologize for Dionices' not quite tactful explanation of the restoration process, but she is correct in the fact that the transfer of love energy from one individual through an intermediary creature before going into another results in a portion of the energy being absorbed by the intermediary creature."
"I believe I understand now" Celestia chimes in. "Your bodies are constantly in need of love energy, so your body is absorbing it and processing it as you draw it out, regardless of whether this 'draining' is with actual intent to feed or not. Is that correct?"
Apidae nods. "Yes, that is what I am getting at."
"Then the reason we can perfect the spell is because our bodies don't require us to feed on love energy. Theoretically, we could do this procedure without love lost in the transfer."
Again, Apidae nods in confirmation.
"One other thing I must ask" Celestia says before she takes a sip of tea. "Why do you require a subject that has strong feelings for the affected?"
"When the process was first performed a few times," the king explains, "it was quickly discovered that using any pony would risk them becoming nearly as drained as the pony being restored. The only instances where this didn't happen were in cases where the ponies shared some kind of strong, love-based bond, like a husband and wife for an example."
Hearing the proper explanation, Luna eases up some from her previous mood. "I must apologize for my accusation" she says the the gathered changelings. "Hearing the particulars of this procedure, it made me think of what has happened to those of our subjects who were put into that unfortunate state. Finding out the only way to help them was to have more of our subjects be subjected to the same thing that caused the harm to the original victims in the first place is a fair bit jarring."
"Understandable," Dionices begins speaking, "and I apologize for my less than satisfactory explanation. In the future, I'll try to word it in a way that is less offensive for your subjects."
"That notion is appreciated," Celestia replies, "but I fear there may not be a way to word it that does not cause negative feelings in our subjects. Nevertheless, we shall work on this together."
The king raises an eyebrow. "So am I to understand that you accept our offer to provide you this spell and training to use it as a form of compensation for wrongs carried out against your subjects in the past by my subjects, with some of those wrongs being carried out on my orders?"
Celestia nods. "There will be more demanded of your kind, I must admit, but this will be a good foundation for us to start structuring a proper peace treaty between our two species."
Apidae smiles. "Then it shall be so. The Dragonlands Hive will educate Equestrian physicians on the technique of restoring a victim of excessive love draining as an act of compensation for past wrongs the former has committed against the latter."
"Are we in agreement, sister?" Celestia asks Luna.
"We are" Luna responds, then turns to Apidae. "Equestria accepts the proposal of the Dragonlands Hive."
"Excellent!" Apidae proclaims as he finishes his tea and places the cup back onto the saucer. The king then lets his smile fall a bit as he elects to move onto the next order of business.
"Now then, I believe we also wanted to discuss another issue that I would like considered as an act of recompense: Capturing Queen Chrysalis."