//------------------------------// // Chapter 23: Grown with Love. // Story: A Demon's Second Chance // by Perfectly Insane //------------------------------// The Canterlot Royal Garden prospered with flora; most of which were varieties of flowers. Some I recognized from around my village like Daisies, Lilies, and Tulips. Thankfully, no one had thought to plant Buttercups. The guards escorted me there without saying a lot to me. I tried to memorize as much of the castles’ layout as I could along the way, finding that the majority of it was similar and left few distinctions; It was easiest to just keep my eyes locked on the windows and use the outside as a reference point.  They let me wander around by myself, Brash and Luster standing right outside the entrance. Despite the garden’s sheer size, it was distinctly empty for the moment. A gardener or two were present, but otherwise the area was barren; well, aside from the abundance of animals among the plants and trees. The few ponies there did little more than give me a brief glance, then went back to their own patch of plants.  Judging from how well separated and maintained everything was, the royal’s made sure to take care of everything here; I could even make out some plaques with names and descriptions of them, few of which I’d heard of.  It didn’t take long to spot Cadance, standing out as the only pink Alicorn in front of a patch of rose; whose colors made me halt for a moment. Red, pink, white, even blue and orange; was it normal for them to be so many different colors? They were arranged in such a pattern that it actually somewhat resembled a rainbow if looked at from a certain angle.  Cadance was humming something to herself, holding a watering can in her hands rather than with her magic. I tentatively approached her, trying to decide whether I should say something or just wait until she was done. That decision was made for me the moment I stepped into talking distance; her wings sprang out to her sides as her entire body shuddered. She dropped the watering can, barely managing to catch it with her magic. Cadance must have lost control in that instance, crushing the can as whatever water was left splashed onto the roses.  I stood with bated breath, taking a step back. If I stayed quiet long enough, I could probably sneak away before she- “Chara,” Cadance’s voice trembled, not moving an inch other than using her magic to slowly place whatever was left of the poor tin on the ground. “I’m glad you came.” Her body language conveyed the complete opposite; arms hugging her sides as she pressed her legs together. Her wings flinched as she tried to lower them to no avail. Despite the remains of the watering can already being on the ground, the magic around her horn remained.  “I don’t think you are.” I whispered, just loud enough to hear.  “No, really, I am! I just,” she slowly turned to me, taking breaths with such effort that it was concerning. “Have been feeling sick recently.”  Cadance couldn’t look me in the eyes for more than a few seconds. Her crooked smile was obviously forced and getting worse the longer she tried to hold it.  “You seemed fine before I got here.” I adjusted my sleeve. “Is it how I look? Or,” I trailed off. “What I did?”  “No, it’s,” Cadance furrowed her eyebrows, tightly clenching her fists. “Has anypony told you what I’m the princess of?”  I shook my head. She flinched, biting her lip and squinting her eyes in concentration. With her magic, she plucked one of the roses, twirling it in the air. “It's Love; as broad as that may sound.”  “Love?” “Yes; romantic, platonic, familial. If it’s a kind of love, I can sense it. It’s like,” I couldn’t tell if she was doing so intentionally, but she began to pick some of the roses with her magic; one of each color. “The feeling you get when the sun first shines on you in the morning, but inside. I wish I could put it into words better than that, or just demonstrate. Sadly, it doesn’t work that way.”  She frowned, eyes momentarily glazing over as her mind went somewhere else. “I can look at somepony and tell you if they love anyone; if the pony they’re with is a relative, a friend, or a lover. I could tell Shining liked me by just being around him, not that he was good at hiding it in the first place.” She chuckled, some of the rigidness in her body loosening ever so slightly. “It has its downsides, and I’m still learning, but I am thankful for it.” “And,” I didn’t want to ask. The moment she mentioned that she’s the princess of Love, I knew exactly why she suddenly became so bothered when I was around. Nevertheless, I didn’t want to stand in absolute silence either. “What do you feel from me?” “I,” Cadance swallowed, opening and closing her mouth as she shook her head. The surrounding animals had started to approach, albeit tentatively. Most of them were ones I had seen before; a few different birds and some rabbits. “Don’t know how to put it. You just feel,” she grimaced “wrong.” “Wrong?” I echoed. I didn’t quite understand what she meant, but I didn’t think I could get a better answer than that. “Then, I guess that makes it impossible for us to get along; or for you to ever trust me.”  “Not at all.” She shook her head, taking a step closer to me; failing to hide the faltering of her smile. “I won’t lie to you and say it doesn’t bother me. But, I can tell it’s not something you’re doing on purpose. I can learn to tolerate it, really. Chara,” Cadance’s gaze lowered to my chest, right where my pendant was. With extreme delicacy, the roses were placed back with the others; inserted into the ground like they’d never been plucked. “There’s a lot of love in you aside from that; especially for that necklace. And,” her pupils dilated for a fraction of a second, head tilting as her lips pressed together. “A partner? Not quite. Huh, Twilight didn’t mention that in her letters.”  “Can you,” I crossed my arms, shrinking under her gaze. “Please stop? I don’t like being analyzed like this,” I turned away, noticing how one of the rabbits looked fairly close to Angel. “Or stared at.”  “Oh, sorry. I didn’t mean to talk out loud, it's a habit I picked up.” she said with an awkward chuckle. “Believe me, it’d be great if I could just turn it off. I’ll try to stop.” Cadance followed my line of sight, smirking as her wings flickered. “Do you like animals?”  I nodded, rubbing my pendant as I cracked it open; the words ‘Best Friends Forever’ were still engraved on the inside.  “Well, the animals here are a lot more shy than anything you’d have met at Fluttershy’s. There’s a story about that, actually. That’s for another time, though.” Cadence extended her arm, whistling a sharp tune as one of the birds perked its head. It flew forward, landing on the tip of her finger. “This is Coliquary; a brave little bird that approached me when I first came here. We’ve been friends since, although it took a few days of getting comfortable with each other before there was any trust. He was terrified of me, until he learned that I had no intention to hurt him.” “If you’re trying to use the bird as a metaphor for me, you’re not being subtle about it.”  “Oh, I wasn’t trying to be; subtlety is Celestia’s specialty, not mine.” Coliquary chirped at her, stretching out its wings and leaning forward. Cadance quietly gasped, using her magic to lift a small bag of bird feed that sat beside the roses. She poured it into her free hand, letting the bird eat it. “Do you not want to be my friend?”  “Well,” I closed the pendant, raising it and placing it inside of my shirt rather than the outside. “I don’t know. Why do you? I feel wrong to you, don’t I? And,” I closed my eyes. “You know why I’m here.”  “I do.” Cadance grimaced, giving me a sideways glance. “Chara, I’m going to ask you something, and I need you to look me in the eyes and answer me honestly. I like to think of myself as a good judge of character, but I’m not a lie detector. So I’m trusting your word here.” I clenched my hands, gripping my shoulder tighter than I intended to; only to remember Celestia had healed me and that there was no soreness left. “Ok.”  Coliquary finished, giving another chirp and flapping back towards his bird friends. Cadance’s smile, while somewhat forced, had dropped. Other than a negligible downturn of her lips, her face was blank as she stared into my eyes. The sounds of the animals were drowned out by the harrowing silence of tension. “Did you kill those diamond dogs because you truly believed it was the only way to save Fluttershy and the others?”  Her violet orbs peered into me with discernible emotion and detail. I thought back to the rock farm, as I had many times before. Of course, I’d considered other options. Telling Twilight everything, or trying to convince them to just stay in the house might have worked eventually. I wasn’t a fool though, it would have taken an impossible to know amount of resets. It would have involved watching them die again and again, followed by my own death.  Eventually, it wouldn’t have bothered me at all; I would have come to expect it. The idea of becoming desensitized like that was terrifying though. It would bring me a step closer to understanding, and inevitably becoming, Frisk. “Yes.”  Cadance squinted, bending forward and getting closer to me than I’d like. My chest tightened with anxiety as I struggled to maintain eye contact, which fortunately didn’t last long as she let out a relieved sigh and straightened her posture. “Alright, I believe you.”  “Huh?” I blurted out. “Just like that? You’re not going to ask me to explain?”  “Would you actually give me one if I asked?”  I bit my tongue, sharply inhaling as I hung my head.  “I thought so. Auntie Celestia told us to trust her to handle that, and Luna and I agreed that’s for the best. Otherwise, I don’t think there’s anything more to say about it.” Cadance walked away from me, her body language getting more relaxed the farther she got. “Don’t you get lonely being the only human in Equestria?”  “Not really. Humans,” I caught myself, remembering that I was supposed to have amnesia. “I’ve never met any, so it’s hard to miss what I don’t remember having.” I tried, and failed, to hide the hint of disdain that tainted my voice. If Cadance noticed, she didn’t react.  “I see,” Cadance bent down, offering a carrot to the bunny I had been staring at earlier. “Are you still interested in romance?”  “Romance?” my mind went black for a moment as I tried to recall when I expressed any interest in it; taking a few moments for the conversation with Twilight to hit me. That had felt like so long ago. “Sorta. Why are you asking? Twilight already told you everything.” “She only gave summaries when it came to you; bullet points more often than not.” She said with a chuckle, waving the carrot at the bunny. It hopped just a little closer, eyes darting between the carrot and the pink alicorn holding it. “Besides, while I love Twilight, that mare can be a terrible judge of character sometimes. I prefer to get to know others myself.”  “Oh.” I started walking towards Cadance, who did a poor job of hiding how suddenly she gripped the carrot and clenched her jaw. “I read a few romance books, and I couldn’t understand what made romance different from friendship; I still really don’t.”  “What do you not understand? I can try to explain.”  “Well, what makes it different from just being friends? I get that they do certain things that normal friends don’t, but is that really it?” “You’ve never-well no; I suppose you wouldn’t know if you had.” Cadence cut herself off, mumbling something just under her breath. The bunny took its first cautious bite of the carrot, chewing while still standing on their back legs. “In a way, you’re kind of right; romantic partners aren’t that different from friends. If you ask me, it's actually better to start off as friends in the first place.  Although, when it comes to what makes them different,” she hummed, reaching forward with her wing and petting the rabbit. It tensed up, but didn’t back away. “You’re with someone, right? Or want to be with someone? It feels like somewhere in between.”  “I think so.” Admittedly, Dark and I didn’t really acknowledge our relationship outside of the first ‘date;’ and even that was done with uncertainty. “We’ve hung out a couple of times, and he’s let me sleep in his bed; we just haven’t really done anything like in the books.” “You don’t have to do anything like in those books, Chara.” she exhaled. “I’m as much a hopeless romantic as any mare my age, but a lot of them set expectations for what a relationship is. On top of that, everyp-person has their own pace; you don’t have to feel like you have to do certain things with them after however long you’ve been together, either.” “Alright.” I said, my head jerking back at the abruptly serious drop in her voice.  “Sorry, I didn’t mean to go on a tangent like that.” She whispered, gently picking up the bunny and getting to her feet. It didn’t resist, yet didn’t look entirely comfortable in her hold either. “Romance means a lot to me. While I can try my best to explain it to you, a lot of it is tied to how you feel. So,” the rabbit was stiff, which didn’t seem to impede it from nibbling on the carrot in its arms. “How do you feel about him?”  “He’s nice, I don’t mind spending time with him.”  “But do you want to spend more time with him?” “I,” Did I? I didn’t really think about him often; mostly only when my mind drifted to astronomy. Of course, I didn’t really know him that well yet. Should I have gone over more often? Not that I really had the chance even if I wanted to. “Don’t know.”  “You got into a relationship and you’re not even sure if you want to spend time with your partner? I hope you didn’t start dating him just because you wanted to know what romance is like. That’d be pretty selfish of you.” While not in the same motherly tone as Fluttershy, the hairs on the back of my neck stood straight regardless. “I know, and I’m not, really. I just don’t know what else to say.”  “That’s ok. You’re trying, and I can’t ask for more than that. I’d be happy to talk to you about romance if you like.” She approached me, dragging her hooves as she held the bunny. “Do you like bunnies, Chara? I saw you eyeing this cute little girl earlier.”  The bunny glanced up at me, pupils widening as she looked me up and down. Her coat was white like Angel’s, but not as bright white or pure; Along with having brown eyes instead of black. Otherwise, she could completely pass as Angel.  “I do. One of Fluttershy’s rabbit’s is named Angel, that rabbit looks like him.”  “I can’t bring Angel here, and I’m not saying that you should use these animals as a replacement, but,” she put out the bunny towards me, gesturing for me to take it from her. “May I offer you a bunny in these trying times?” “Uh,” my hands hung tightly against my chest, staring right back in the beady yet adorable eyes of the small animal. “Ok.”  I avoided touching Cadance as I took her, holding her in the cusp of my arm like I did any of the other small animals. She was soft and warm, heart beating so fast I couldn’t count them. My finger trembled as I traced the edges of her ear, which luckily calmed her down. A light warmth began to overtake the anxiety in me, albeit gradually.  It was relaxing to feel her become less scared of me, leaning into me as I spoiled her with affection. However, it felt wrong to do it with another rabbit; almost like I was cheating on Angel or something. “Thanks, but,” I placed her back on the ground, trying to ignore the sting from her dejected disappointment. “It’s not the same.”  “I understand. Hmm,” Cadance tapped her finger against her chin, staring off into the distance and then bringing her attention back to me. “Say, would you like to hear how Shining and I met? That might help you understand more about romance.”  “Alright, I guess.” “Ok, so-” she sat on the ground, flexing her wings as she cleared her throat. “Before he was the captain of the royal guard, he was a total nerd; adorkable, actually.”  I didn’t know what that meant, but I knew better than to interrupt someone in the middle of a story. I followed suit, resting on the ground as the rabbit hopped away. ------ Afterwards, Cadance and I parted ways. Things got awkward; well, more awkward. I left her to her flowers, most of the animals having left or only watching from a distance.  “So, how were things?”  The guards were escorting me to The Royal Archives after I told them Celestia gave me permission, choosing not to mention the part where they have to make a list of everything I check out. We had been walking for five minutes when Brash slowed down, walking by my side while Luster seemed much less interested.  “Alright, I suppose.” I answered with a dismissive shrug. “I’m pretty sure we’re on better terms now, she’s just uncomfortable around me. There was a lot of tense silence and switching between subjects, but she was trying.” “Huh, that’s odd. Princess Cadance usually gets along with everyone; it’s wonky for her to not be at least civil with someone.”  “I agree.” Luster added with an over the shoulder glance. “We’re not supposed to ask you what you did to come here, but is it related to that? That would make at least some sense.”  “Yeah.” I answered as I tried to make myself smaller, gluing my eyes to the ground. “She wants to try to be friends anyway.”  “That sounds about right; I don’t think Princess Cadance could stand it if someone disliked her; Shining’s one lucky stallion to have a mare as caring as her.”  “Captain Armor’s pretty lucky in general, honestly: Married to Cadance, one of the best unicorns at defensive magic in years, Twilight fricking Sparkle’s brother on top of it all. If it wasn’t for the wedding, I would have thought the guy was perfect.” “Wait, Shining is Twilight’s brother?” I interrupted Brash. “Cadance mentioned that she used to babysit Twilight, but not that her husband was related to Twilight.”  “Oh yeah, total lovebirds since they met. The only thing preventing them spending as much time together as they want is probably the whole stuff going on with The C-”  “Brash!”  Luster shouted, causing her to jump off the ground as her wings shot out.  “You know we’re not allowed to talk about that outside of the guards.” “Yeah, but come on! There’s no way Chara’s-”  “No exceptions.” We stopped moving as they shared a stare. Brash rolled her eyes, retracting her wings and landing back on the ground before she continued walking again. “Anyway; Chara, would you like to play the Random Fact game?”  “Random Fact game?”  “Yeah, it’s simple!” she went to put an arm around me, flinching right before making contact and pulling back. “Just state random facts and we’ll talk about them. Like, uhm, did you know you’re supposed to eat the banana with the peel?”  “Really?” I asked as I tilted my head; the near rubbery husk of yellow peel coming to mind. “Isn’t there wood in the peel?” “Only at the bottom! You’d notice it before you bit down on it, anyway. Apparently, they’re super nutritious to eat, and can even make it easier to sleep from what I’ve heard.”  “Believe it or not, oranges are the same way.” Luster added, though this time not keeping her head forward. “The peels are actually more nutritious than the slices in a lot of ways, good for preventing a lot of diseases too. Honestly, if you looked into it you’d probably find a lot of fruits are meant to be eaten as a whole, even if some parts of it taste gross.”  “Huh.” I rubbed my hand down my pants leg, trying to think of anything that might be interesting. “Did you know that snails sometimes flip their digestive system as they mature?”  “Snails?” Brash asked with a raise of her eyebrow. “The little slimy things with shells? That’s weird, why do they do that?”  “I don’t know. It was a pretty short book, only really mentioning the facts but not elaborating; some of them were just jokes.”  “What book?” Luster inquired. “Seventy-two Snail Facts.” I answered reflexively, having read that book so many times I could list each fact in order. Luster’s eyebrows pulled together as she lifted her chin.  “Sounds like a book for foals.”  “It is. I just,” I felt my ears get warm as I blushed. “didn’t have a lot else to read there.”  “Speaking of reading,” Brash spoke up. “Did Princess Celestia say anything else about The Royal Archives? I’m still surprised you convinced her to give you permission.” “I mean, I just told her I liked to read in my free time. There wasn’t really any convincing to do. However,” I hesitated, trying to look at anywhere but Brash. “She did tell me that you two are supposed to keep a list about what books I check out.” “Ugh, of course.” She groaned. “More paperwork, great.”  “I assume she wants them to be detailed, right? Book names, authors, edition, what section they were found in. All that,” Luster closed her eyes and let out a sigh. “Wonderful stuff.”  “She didn’t mention that.” I slumped, absentmindedly playing with the chain of my necklace. If I had known they really hated paperwork this much, I wouldn’t have asked in the first place; I didn’t want to be more of a burden. “I’m sorry about the extra work. I’ll just pick two or three to make it easier.” “Nah, don’t worry about it.” Brash retorted with a dismissive wave of her wing. “Paperwork comes with the job; can’t kick flank all the time. Unless you’re an Element of Harmony anyways.”  “We’re here.”  Luster nodded at the guards who were waiting, opening the door and gesturing for us to come in. There were rows of books and scrolls, all separated in their own aisles and categories. The air was dry and cold, though not so much so to be distracting. A giant hourglass sat in the center, right under a skylight that worked as the primary light source.  “This is,” I walked forward, reading the various signs. “A lot bigger than Golden Oak.” “I’d hope so. This is where all of Princess Celestia’s students go to get their sources for papers, articles for their thesis, or to just read through if they have a question on magic. Ponyville’s just kind of…there.” Luster stated, watching Brash as she spread her wings and floated above us. “What Lust said. Honestly, if it wasn’t for the fact that we’re not allowed to take you outside the castle, I’d tell you not to even bother here. The Canterlot Library is way less boring.” “You’re just saying that because they have pop-up books.” “Hey!” Brash flew up to Luster, pouting as she hovered right in front of her. “Somepony worked very hard to make sure those pop-ups fit perfectly in the books and did a good job of it; you don’t have to be a foal to appreciate them.”  Luster was doing a very poor job of hiding her smirk. “Yeah, yeah. Well, there’s no pop-up books here. I doubt any of them even have pictures that aren’t diagrams or models.” she wandered over to a random section, picking out a bunch of random books with her magic. Skimming their titles and putting them back similar to how Twilight would when she was looking for a specific one.  “Here, Chara. I’d recommend checking this one out first and keeping it with you as long as you're here; it’ll help.”  She dropped a sizable book into my hands, which read Equestrian And You: How To Expand Your Vocabulary In A Thousand Ways. The Mareum-Withers Dictionary. I opened the first page, skimming through the index and glossary. “A dictionary?” I asked as I closed it and glanced up at Luster. “What would I need this for?”  “Well, the books in public libraries are usually pretty easy to understand, since they have the average pony in mind. These ones though,” she gestured to the books surrounding us, of which Brash was reading through them quickly and getting more frustrated with each one. “Are specifically for research papers, studying science to progress it, experiments to test hypotheses, stuff like that. If you’re going to read anything here, they’re going to use a lot of words you wouldn’t find in the average book.”  “Oh,” I held the book under my arm, making a mental note to bring my backpack next time. “Then thanks. I think I’ll only get a book or two on astronomy, so it shouldn’t be too bad.”  “Ha, good luck with that. I actually knew a few ponies wh-”  “What the heck is this?” Brash suddenly asked out loud, turning a book upside down as pages began to flip out. “Ten pages just for a diagram? More book means less book I guess.” “Brash,” Luster used her magic to press Brash’s wings together and carefully bring her to the ground before gently placing the book back with the rest. “Stop looking for pop-up books here, there aren’t any. Come on, I’ll help you find a book about Mythology or something.”  “Ok, coolio.”  “Oh Celestia, please don’t start saying that again.”  They turned a corner, chatting about something called a ‘harpy’; with mostly Brash explaining how ‘epic’ she thought they were: it made me smile just a bit. I started walking through the aisles, seeing more names for sections that I didn’t recognize then I’d like before finally coming to the astronomy section. A lot of it was scrolls with just lines and lines of numbers next to letters. Each with a name on it, some of them were extremely familiar, but I couldn’t place from where. The majority of them were old, having left noticeable outlines where I took them out. Maybe they were measurements of some kind? What I did skim mentioned that astronomers spent much of their career measuring the movements of comets or asteroids, though I’m not sure why they’d be here and not in an observatory somewhere.  Thankfully, actual books were nearby, Organized alphabetically and by last name. This made it easy to find one titled ‘Introduction To Astronomy: The Godless Sky.’ I paused for a second, then had to double-check that I read that title correctly.  “Did you pick out something already?” Luster asked as she turned the corner, squinting her eyes as she read the book I’d picked. “Oh, that’s-you know what? Yeah, that’s a great choice for a first experience with astronomy literature.” “It’s not my first experience, actually. My partner works at an observatory and lended me a couple of books; I just haven’t had the time to get past the first couple of pages.”  “Partner?” Luster asked as she blinked. “Is that why you’re interested in astronomy? They got you into it?”  “Uhm, no I was interested in it beforehand.” I couldn’t meet her eyes, trying to come up with some way to shift the subject to something else. Luster was perceptive; the moment I started telling her about myself, she’d start poking holes in my excuses and that’d make things a lot harder than they needed to be. “So, how do I actually check these out?”  “Just two?” she inquired as I held them under my arm. “You could get more, it's really not that big of a deal for us to make a list of what you check out. I’ll be doing all of it anyway, my work-study was pretty much writing citations for students when they sucked at it themselves, and Brash is Brash; she’s great at memorizing stuff she has to read when she knows its important, but anything she writes is about as organized as a last minute cutie-ceanera.”  I awkwardly laughed, trying to hide the fact that I had no idea what that was. “Yeah. Like I mentioned before: I already have three books I haven’t been able to read through, so this should keep me busy for a bit.”  “Alright.” she responded with a shrug, turning around right as Brash flew around the corner holding a handful of books. “Lust! Oh, Chara’s got her book? Neat. Let’s check out then, I can’t wait to figure out how to integrate this into O&O! Oh! Don’t forget we need to pick up food on the way back.”  “Yep.”  Brash zoomed to the front, holding the books with her wing as she wrote something on a piece of paper sitting on the desk; eyes darting between the books and the paper. Luster turned around and began walking towards her, gesturing for me to follow.  “What do you want to eat? We can get pretty much whatever you like: Hayburgers, actual burgers, pretty decent milkshakes. The chef here is superb with potato stuff so I’d recommend something with that.” “Wait, actual burgers? I thought ponies were herbivores?”  “We are, usually. I mean, we don’t mind using animal products like milk, but most ponies can’t stand the thought of eating one. A few of the guards around here have tried it and gotten a taste for it, plus a lot of delegates eat meat on occasion. Not into it myself, I don’t mind if you want some though.”  Fluttershy didn’t mention that, not that I asked her that much about ponies. Maybe I should have, or just tried to learn more about her in general. Looking back on it, I really didn’t spend that much time with her. What did I really even know about her? That she was kind, good with animals, and an Element of Harmony. Really, that was about it.  I should have done a lot of things.  “Chara?” Brash got up in my face, tilting her head in concern. I jumped back, gasping a bit louder than I would have liked. “You kind of just dazed off there. Do you have choice paralysis or something? I could just pick your food for you if you want.”  “Yeah, ok.” I murmured, placing the books on the shelf and holding them to my chest for a moment as I tried to hide how heavily I was breathing. “I just put the names of the books on this?” “Mhm. Lust and I will look at it after you do and make a list later.”  “Alright.”  The trip back to my room was quiet; mostly because Brash apparently couldn’t wait to read her books until then and was reading as we walked. Luster had to pull it out of her grip and remind her to get me food as soon as we passed a hallway, which she did with urgent swiftness; shooting down and turning the corner so fast it caused a breeze.  Luster was watching me more than before, and wasn’t even trying to hide it. Of course, it’s possible she was the whole time and I’m only just now paying more attention to it. I should be getting more relaxed the longer I’m here, instead I’m just more paranoid. Nothing's  gone wrong exactly: all three princesses have been more patient than I deserve, and Celestia in particular has been very lenient. Free food, free home, more books than I can ask for.  And I’m struggling to appreciate any of it.  I sat the food Brash brought me on the nightstand: a bowl of macaroni and cheese, vanilla milkshake, and some chips. They left as soon as I thanked them. Well, Luster did; Brash bumped into a wall while reading a book, then left.  “Ok, where to start?” I asked myself as I sat on the bed, rubbing my eyes and placing the books in front of me. I looked my little literary horde over, crossing my legs and placing the bowl between them. The dictionary was actually the smallest, though I suspected that was because it was compact and had much smaller pages.  Should I start with the books Dark gave me? I’d already begun on one and gotten a few pages in, though that was right before everything happened and I now barely remember any of it; I might as well start from the beginning.  Then again, one of the books was an introduction, so reading it first should help me understand the others. I opened it and started with the first chapter, pausing it as I took the first bite of my food; it was so warm and blended perfectly with the cheese. It could honestly be one of the best non-deserts I’ve put in my mouth. After the first two pages, I had to check the title again.  “Why is this talking about philosophy?” I asked no one as I flipped through the further pages, finding that pretty much the entire chapter was talking about various philosophers that had studied the night sky and how the ponies of their times thought about them. The next chapter was more of the same, though focusing on the specific ideologies those philosophers had rather than who they were.  I likely should have expected this since it was an introduction; but I assumed it to be a history of famous astronomers and how they forwarded the study. Then again, maybe it was focusing on the philosophers because they were the closest thing to astronomers? Or, at least the earliest contributors to it.  One of the pillows fit snuggly behind my back as I leaned into it, deciding to skip ahead to a chapter that talked about something more recent. Unfortunately, like Luster warned, a lot of the terms that were being used were foreign to me: ‘Empirical data, synastry, natal charts?’  I sighed, leaning forward and grabbing the dictionary. At least this’ll keep me distracted.  ______________________ It was becoming a habit for me to just doze off, and not one I was fond of; I blame the milkshake. Once I drank it, I felt super sluggish, but kept reading. I swore I only blinked a few times and suddenly the sun was gone and I was being jolted awake by a knock at my window. As I got reoriented Luna politely opened the balcony door, thankfully not choosing to dramatically make an entrance with her magic.  “Good evening, Chara. I was hoping you’d-” she dropped her gaze to the book on my lap. “Ah, the study of the stars, yes? I can assure you no amount of words can express the beauty of them.” I closed it, placing it on a pile in the bed with the rest. “It doesn’t talk about the stars as much as you think it would.” I added as I got to my feet, smacking my cheeks to get rid of the grogginess and fix whatever parts of my hair got stuck to my face. “Are we going outside again?” “Sadly, not tonight. There is something I’d like to show you, in fact. Tell me,” she walked towards the door with a noticeable bounce in her stop, smiling as she opened the door with her magic. “How do you feel about crowds?”  Uh oh.