Dead silence reigned at the table as both of them stared at the bizarre creature stretched out on the divan and calmly sipping from a cup of tea that never seemed to diminish. After a moment, he put the cup down and looked between them.
“The answer to your first question is no. The answer to your second is, I felt like it and it’s quite appropriate to the setting. The answer to your third is, full avatar; I’d use my ordinary voice, but it seems to distract you poor one-headed creatures.” He picked the cup back up and resumed sipping it. “I don’t suppose I could trouble you for a bracer, my dear? Perhaps something… light and apple, if you have it.”
“I’ve been saving an excellent north-coastal Touchstone schnapps for distinguished company,” she offered with a polite smile. “I also picked up a delicious, full-bodied apple wine last I was in Auric.”
“You are an angel and a lady,” he informed her with unfeigned warmth. “Which begs the question of why… this was allowed through your door.” He continued, pointing at the minister. “Francois here is a large step down from your typical company.”
He just barely bit back an angrier retort. “Fronck-Kais, my lord.”
“Excuse me?” Pitiless alien eyes totally out of place on that otherwise comical body locked on him, displaying irises that were three distinct bands of color instead of the ordinary uniform coloration. Eerily, the bands of bright green, ice blue, and intense gold constantly changed places with one another, as the deadly being using the creature as a willing puppet regarded him with the disconcerting focus of a predator licking its chops over helpless prey.
He swallowed. “I said, Fronck-Kais, my…”
“Not your lord,” The Discord-appearing entity interrupted with a low growl. “Not your anything, except perhaps master. What do you mean coming here and engaging in the Game without my leave? You are mine, Evil, and have been since I tore your chains from the lifeless husk of your former master. It is only reverence for the laws of this Game that stay my claws; there will be a reckoning, Francois, and I guarantee that you shan’t enjoy it.”
He swallowed again, his mouth dry, but was saved from having to figure out a response by his hostess’ return with a jeweled flask. “I allowed him through my door because he offered a lawful challenge and I began the Game because he offered a legitimate wager. Granted his presumption offended, and still offends, me but I’ve been well-taught to seize even the slightest chance to profit from a situation.”
His lion paw reached up and patted her head with definite affection; somehow, the gesture didn’t seem at all condescending although Franck wasn’t sure of why it didn’t. “You’ve been a good student, Kaiya, and you are a hostess of outstanding virtue if you can tolerate this in your home. May I have leave to examine your game?”
“The minor intellectual exercise of reading the beginning of the game from its middle is to be your intended payment for your courtesy in mediating this Game,” Kaiya replied, unsealing the flask and pouring a touch of the fragrant liquor into his cup. “I’d be glad to furnish other payments and amusements if it fails to satisfy.”
“That won’t be necessary,” he assured her with a sip. “Mmm… unsealing one of your delicious collection on my behalf is more than enough to settle any debts between us. And this is certainly a delectable one, my dear. The Touchstone?”
“Yes,” she confirmed, finishing off her tea in a single gulp then replacing it with a generous shot of the schnapps. “I’m told that it uses the purified mash from arid tambootie berries infused with ordinary root.”
He grinned widely as he stretched out the eagle claw, the board splitting into three and two of them rising into the air to reveal all the pieces. “You’re set to place Touchstone under your patronage as well then. This is good; Touchstone has withered under the incompetent touch of Darkness for far too long. As if you needed it, Lady Aon, you have my blessing in this.”
Fronck-Kais cleared his throat as politely as he could; the glares from the Light and the Dark made him swallow and hunch his shoulders, looking away rather than try to meet those predatory eyes.
“Terribly rude creature, isn’t he?”
“He is, but he has a fair point,” Kaiya responded. “As important as our business is, I’m here to be a player and you’ve come to act as our mediator, Lord Trilychi. It’s not as if the matter of Touchstone will be turned one way or the other in the span of a few mortal months.”
“That is true,” Trilychi agreed, leaning closer to examine the game boards, moving his lion paw to hover over the figure representing wrath and watchfulness. Fronck watched with interest as the figure reverted backwards to the human in a trenchcoat and tall hat carrying an upraised gun and a scroll. He looked thoughtfully at the reverted figure before moving on, the figurine resuming its previous shape. He did the same with the “ministry” figurine before moving on to the “Handmaiden” and here, he stopped and looked genuinely surprised.
“My dear Kaiya… I seem to be perceiving a partly-realized multiple-tier Zenos Gambit,” he mentioned, giving her a curious look. “May I ask what the partial realization is?”
“His ‘wrath and watchfulness’ sent a klesae against one of the Six, Rainbow Dash. My Handmaiden mauled the klesae… and took the only measure she could to save Rainbow’s life.” Kaiya replied, smiling broadly. “As I knew she would, knowing her the way I do.”
He gave a short bark of delighted laughter. “Kaiya, you devious little voop! Undoing the risk of a high-risk strategy by rigging the second-tier rules in your favor is a move equal to, well, me. I’m very impressed, my dear, and that’s difficult to do.”
She smiled. “To be fair, Lord Trilychi, I’m not playing the game against someone of your caliber so my achievement is not nearly as impressive as it might otherwise be.”
He snorted and waved this off. “Don’t sell yourself short, Archangel. You have unique advantages that you crafted with your own cunning and nature, and those advantages are clearly responsible for the achievement, not the ignorance of Francois here.”
“Oh, good, you remembered that I’m here.” Fronck-Kais tried to keep the biting sarcasm out of his tone but the severe looks he got from the two others told him that he’d failed. Frowning, he pressed on. “I know you think very poorly of my intelligence but I would expect that ones of your high ranks had become capable of at least pretending to observe the basic courtesies. Phlyaxis was better-treated by the lot of you and he was a Slayer! Your Sargeas gave a more polite hearing to distolvers and Dark keeps a close eye on them lest they randomly decide to start genocide for their amusement. The casual condescension and puerile contempt grows tiresome.”
“What do you know? Francois grew a backbone,” Trilychi sneered. “I like it, makes him more…”
“No, wait, he has a point,” Kaiya sighed. “Weaver knows he deserves the mockery but constantly taunting an accepted guest, however little I like that guest, is inappropriate.”
Trilychi rolled his eyes. “I always forget how much silly things like ‘propriety’ annoy me until I run up against them. However… your realm, your rules, and the schnapps makes up for many a tiny irritant.”
“You’re growing milder in your old age, my Lord,” she teased lightly.
“No, simply more accepting of the fact that if I mean to embrace ‘good’ for the furtherance of my own schemes, there are certain… prices to pay,” he sighed, taking a long draw from his cup. “Well, what are you waiting for? Give me something to mediate before I set Francois on fire for my own entertainment.”
“You know, according to the Pinkie Pie Laws of Parties, a New Dragon Party requires at least two cakes, six party games, twenty guests, and roughly twenty weights of gems,” Pinkamena informed Spite as they trotted through the streets of Canterlot. “I get that we can’t throw you a party because you don’t want to be seen by everypony but still… I’ve got a reputation.”
“If you keep trotting along, trotting along mind you, without doing anything insane and reality-defying, your reputation will be shot anyway,” Spite retorted dryly. “I’m not complaining, mind you, but I’m still trying to understand how… well, you could be the mare under the mental patient.”
Pinkamena sighed tiredly. “Element of Laughter, Spite. By its nature, laughter is joy bubbling over, unrestrained by anything at all. I’m naturally joy bubbling over with no restraint, not even the restraint of reality. How could you know me by my full given name, and yet not know the most important thing of all?”
“Because I had to rely on a source of information that is dry, technical… and, to be frank, regards the goal of spreading laughter with silliness and parties to be proof that you are a pathetic specimen.”
Pinkamena laughed, the honest statement of Trilychi’s probable opinion on Pinkie not bothering her in the slightest, at least not visibly. “Well, he sounds like a real Grumpy McGrumpypants. I’ve got a party for that, you know, and I can totally turn that frown upside down. Lessee… um, party cannon, six cakes, fifteen party games, at least one gallon of hot sauce… yes, yes I’ve got a party for that.”
“How… do you get all those supplies?”
Pinkie gave her a reality-defying grin. “Silly Spite… you don’t ask about the party supplies. The party supplies just are. It’s like how the butterfly fluttering its wings will cause a typoon in Manehattan if the wind is southerly on a blue moon. Speaking of such, how can a moon be blue? I’ve seen an orange moon and a white moon and a moon with a mare in it and a moon that’s made of cheese and one that’s turned to blood so the stars can…” She paused. “No, that still hasn’t happened, never mind. Anyway, I’ve seen a blue moon before but not a yellow one.”
Spite stared at her before laughing softly. “I think you’re the happiest creature I’ve ever met by far, Pinkie Pie.”
“All part of the Laughter!” Pinkie beamed at her. “Speaking of such, can I throw you a party after you no longer need to be all sneaky and stealthy and mysterious? Please, pretty please, with cupcake?”
“I’m not sure about the cupcake…”
“Not sure about the cupcake?” Pinkie gasped. “But… but… cupcake!” Before Spite could think about it, defend herself, or figure out how Pinkie Pie came to be holding a cupcake when she hadn’t been before, a whole cupcake had been stuffed into her mouth. “See?”
Spite stopped and blinked, chewing thoughtfully on the diabetes-inducing treat and licking her chops to take care of any frosting. “Actually, I do. I have no idea how ‘cupcake’ constitutes an argument, but it somehow makes perfect sense.”
“Nonsense has a way o’ makin’ perfect sense when Pinkie’s involved, sugarcube,” Applejack offered, grinning. “An’ ya missed a spot on yer chin.”
“Thanks.” Spite snaked her tongue out and caught the stray bit of frosting. “I’m sort of surprised that I can just stroll down the streets of your capital looking like this and nopony seems to regard it as out of the ordinary.”
All seven of them stopped almost as one and looked at her. “Spite, you do realize that there’re dragons here, right?” Twilight asked. “I mean, my research assistant is a young dragon named Spike. There’s a vast stretch of land north of Equestria that make up the various territories of the dragons. We even maintain diplomatic relations with them.”
Spite blinked, genuinely taken-aback. “That… sort of explains why you asked who I was instead of what I was…”
“And you didn’t pick up anything from the fact that Pinkie Pie has a type of party for welcoming new dragons?”
“She’s Pinkie Pie,” Spite pointed out.
“Good point…”
“At any rate, darling, dragons are quite common although they tend to be… rather rude creatures,” Rarity supplied. “Granted, you seem an unusual breed of dragon—ours don’t have manes, you see—but unless a pony looked closely, you fit right in.”
Spite chuckled ruefully. “Fit right in… I never thought I’d hear that phrase related to being a dragon. I’m used to being an oddity, even in places where dragons are an ordinary part of society and life.”
“What kinds of places?”
“Oh, Touchstone, Tirror, Lychais… lots of places, really.” She furrowed her brow in memory. “Touchstone was… not the most pleasant place to be until it got sorted out. But in the end, all was well and I actually borrowed my public name from one of the dragonesses there. Sweet girl, a little scarred, but I’ve rarely seen a more joyful mother.”
“Um… Touchstone?” Twilight asked tentatively.
“You’re familiar with the theory of multiple worlds?”
“Yes.”
“Not just a theory. There’s lots of them, thousands at last count. This particular one, the one where we’re walking around right now, is commonly called ‘Sol Selune’ in recognition of the fact that it’s two greatest powers are sisters who manage the sun and the moon.” Spite smiled a little. “Touchstone is another one and it was… is, quite different. It’s primary inhabitants are creatures called ‘humans’, a bipedal, primate species distinct for their unusual mastery of toolmaking. The dragons there are commonly called ‘glass’ dragons, because they’re naturally extremely difficult to see with the naked eye, appearing to be made of glass that can be seen through clearly.”
“Why’d it need t’ get sorted out?” Applejack asked.
“Because early on, someone interfered,” Spite replied grimly. “Manipulated the births so that dragons with violet-edged scales, called purple-tips, would always be born twins—and neuters. Manipulated the society of the dragons so that they believed that the purple-tips were portents of legend—but that more than one living purple-tip would spell disaster. Cracked the barrier between the physical world and a plane of pure magical energy, called the Aethir, so that the most common food-plant would be almost toxic with magical energy—and then saw to it that the natural magic of the dragons withered and replaced with a virtual addiction to the berries of the tambootie.”
She paused to take in the stunned looks around her then concluded. “Whoever did it—and there is no doubt that it was deliberate—had an evil purpose and justice demanded recompense. So my queen’s friend, the one who sent me here, took advantage of the chaos that sprung from the Thousand-Year Crusade of a great warlord whose conquests spanned hundreds, if not thousands, of worlds. She commissioned the help of one of her mate’s friends to intervene and restore what was taken from Touchstone by the malice of the unknown manipulator.”
She smiled. “And one of the two purple-tips who was saved by the intervention, named Amethyst, lent me the name of her human shape—don’t ask, she’s never explained and I’ve never asked—because for the time being, she’s remaining in her natural shape to raise her children. Her brood is the first generation of dragons who were never poisoned with tambootie or with the malicious belief that a purple-tip drakling must be murdered to keep the world safe.”
“He sounds far worse than the Guardian,” Twilight said quietly.
“Guardian?”
“It’s what he called himself,” she replied. “Mom thinks he was the eventual corruption of a being called ‘Order’, counterpart to another called ‘Discord’.”
“They sound like two halves of the trouble coin,” Spite commented. “One dangerously singlemindedly obsessed with absolute control, the other combining Pinkie’s ability to break the rules of reality with a total lack of self-control. How bad of a monster was he?”
“He killed, or caused to be killed, lots of ponies,” Rarity said, her accent slightly diminished by the sadness in her voice. “Friends of ours, friends of others, families… and Rainbow Dash’s dearest friend, a griffin named Gilda.”
“That bad, huh?” Spite sighed. “But yet, the unknown manipulator in Touchstone was much more of a monster, for he ensured that every mother of every purple-tipped pair would suffer horrible soul-deep agony as she was forced to kill her own child by a lie. Oh, I wish I could get my claws on him…”
“What wouldja do?” Dawn asked curiously.
Spite smiled tightly. “Nothing I’d tell you six about. Not until much later, and not until you know me much better. Suffice it to say, I’m very pleasant and warm towards you but towards evil things, I’m the very definition of a monster.”
“Meaning…?”
“Meaning, it’s none of your bucking business, Dawn,” Spite retorted evenly. “The things I’ve done that I’m not proud of, and the things I’m proud of doing but would make you think less of me, are my affair. I’ll tell you all, probably, eventually, but my past changes nothing about my good intentions towards you.”
Several minutes after passed in silence, each pony alone with her thoughts, before Fluttershy trotted up to walk at Spite’s side. “I’m… sorry I asked the wolves to tell me about who else they were watching,” she said quietly, her eyes averted.
Spite turned to look curiously at the shy pegasus before turning back to watch the keep grow gradually larger on the horizon. “Why are you sorry, Fluttershy?”
“Well… b... because she escaped and… and it got Rainbow… hurt…” Her voice trailed off into a near whisper at the end. She squeaked with surprise as Spite lowered a wing to drape gently over her.
“As I told the wolves, they were right to be honest with the soft-kind wingpony,” she replied warmly. “You did no wrong, Fluttershy, and you bear absolutely none of the blame for what happened to Rainbow. It was Lashaal, and not you, that did evil to your friend. Evil is never the fault of the innocent, however the evil try to pretend that it is so. Rainbow is safe, little pegasus, and will awaken and be back to her old self.” She put on an exaggerated grimace. “On second thought, perhaps I should keep her asleep a little longer…”
Fluttershy giggled a little. “You don’t mean that.”
“I’m a stranger to you. How can you be sure?”
“Because the wolves said so,” Fluttershy informed her matter-of-factly. “They didn’t just call you ‘hunter’ but ‘sister-hunter’. I… I know that pack, Spite… they don’t trust that easily. They don’t call strangers… family unless they… unless the stranger smells right. I mean… seems like they… they’d be a good part of the pack. Loyal to the pack.”
Spite smiled. “I’m flattered by the sentiment. I try to be a good friend to the wolves I meet, for they’re invaluable friends; as I said to Twilight, I could cross this entire world and keep no watch if I had a pack of wolves at my flanks as I went.”
Fluttershy gave her a small smile of appreciation as they got within sight of the castle gates. Spite paused and looked back at Twilight. “Any advice? I doubt the guards will be pleased to have a strange dragon bigger than them wander up to the castle and ask to come inside.”
Twilight laughed. “Spite, my mom’s the Princess. I might hate getting called ‘princess’ and ‘lady’ all the time, and getting bowed to like I’m special or something, but there’re times when it’s really useful.”
Spite smiled gratefully to her as they reached the guards. Before she could say anything, both immediately inclined their heads in Twilight and Dawn’s directions.
“Lady Twilight, La…”
“Call me ‘lady’ and I’ll plant an unladylike hoof up your tailhole,” Dawn informed him with the casualness of somepony commenting on the weather.
“…um…” The guard looked lost. “…Dawn?”
Dawn grinned. “Good boy. Now imitate a statue.”
He visibly ignored this and looked at Twilight. “Lady Twilight, your mother’s with the consul-general of the Griffin Provinces. You didn’t hear this from me, but I think she’d enjoy having her daughters accidentally come into the throne room.”
Spite felt a little shiver go through her. “The Griffin Provinces, you say?”
The guard turned and looked at her. “And you are…?”
“Carrying a letter of introduction from my own monarch to be presented to Princess Celestia herself,” Spite replied smoothly. “But you can call me Myrilandel.”
The other guard looked steadily at her before nodding once. “Can you vouch for this dragon, Lady Twilight?”
“Without reservation.”
“Then I bid you welcome to Canterlot, capital of Equestria,” the guard said politely, nodding to Spite respectfully.
“It’s my joy and honor to be here,” Spite smiled sincerely. “It’s a beautiful city, fully reflective of the nature of its rulers.”
Both guards let the corners of their mouths upturn just slightly before stepping aside and waving the party through.
“Does anypony else think it’s a coincidence that Lashaal goes to the Provinces and by the time we get to Canterlot, the griffins are agitated enough that Princess Celestia wants to be rescued from their ambassador?” Spite asked as they got out of earshot of the front gate.
She looked around at the seven expressions, every one a version of expecting the worst. She sighed and shook her head. “I didn’t think so.”
><><
“…furthermore, griffin citizens are clearly not safe in Equestria, despite Your Majesty’s earnest assertions otherwise,” the consul concluded, drawing himself up haughtily and purposefully displaying his very carefully-preened “wig” of thick white feathers.
Princess Celestia hung her head, closing her eyes a moment to find her unflappable royal calm, before taking a deep breath and meeting the consul-general’s eyes with her ordinary air of quiet assurance. “I feel it incumbent on me to point out, Consul Halia, that the entire affair of the self-proclaimed Guardian was an extremely unusual situation,” she said with a touch of firmness, trying not to let exasperation creep into her tone. It was the second day that this circular argument had been going on, and it was slowly beginning to exhaust even her considerable reserves of patience and understanding. Moreover, the issue had been settled until the agitated consul had arrived, and blindsided her with a return to a conversation she had thought ended nearly six months ago. The abruptness was extremely strange to her but she knew, from long experience, that it’d be fruitless to try to extract the information from the griffin. Seaponies had their odd hourly rituals, dragons their gargantuan egos (not wholly unearned, she admitted to herself), and griffins loved to carry on for literal days before zeroing in on their purpose, which was usually something minor that they were incredibly easygoing and reasonable about. Thus, it was typically best to let a griffin exhaust his blathering, politely pretending to listen all the while, until it was time for the business at hoof. Knowing this, however, didn’t make it any easier to tolerate the ranting from the unusually pretentious leoavian.
“Even more unusual was his apparent ability to revive four alicorns who had died thousands of years ago and use them as his weapons,” she continued. “Have you heard cause to complain of the well-being of your citizens in Equestria prior to the incident?”
“We’d not heard of such a cause but clearly, there was such a cause and it wasn’t reported,” he returned. “In fact, during the entire incident, no one was told of the happening in Equestria. No one was warned that they should take shelter in their home nations. If we had but…”
Celestia sighed and turned him out, recognizing the beginning of another long tirade as she let her eyes drift around the room, looking for some way, any way, to escape. At that precise moment, the doors to the throne room opened and in trotted six young mares that Celestia knew all too well, followed by a black-scaled dragon she’d never seen before. The matter of the dragon quickly slipped into irrelevance as her eyes found and fixed on the lavender alicorn and deeper violet earth pony that were leading the gaggle. She beamed happily and, unconscious of the fact that the consul was still talking, started down from her throne.
“Twilight! Dawn!” She exclaimed, trotting around the taken-aback griffin and unhesitatingly embracing her two daughters.
“Hi Mom,” Twilight replied, nuzzling into her mother’s embrace with daughterly affection.
“Hey there, Mum,” Dawn greeted, leaning into the hug, relaxing comfortably.
“What’re you doing here?” Celestia asked them, releasing them and turning her eyes to the rest of the ponies, including them in the question.
“We’ve got an… issue,” Twilight admitted, gesturing towards the dragon behind them who was watching politely, although smiling lightly at the scene of Celestia hugging her daughters against her.
“Family issues, your Majesty?” The consul inquired with a surprising amount of politeness given that the arrival of the mares had interrupted him.
“It seems so,” Celestia admitted, turning to him. “I wish to…”
“I understand completely, Your Highness,” he interrupted. “We can continue the matter tomorrow.” He inclined his head to Twilight as he walked out. At the door, he turned and looked over his shoulder with an expression of mild irritation. “…when I expect we shall have no further interruptions.”
“Self-important buzzard,” Dawn snorted as soon as the door closed behind the miffed griffin.
Celestia sighed, but smiled at her less couth daughter. “Yes, but he’s a very important self-important buzzard, dear. Ambassadors, or consuls in his case, generally are. I just wish I knew why he was so agitated over this issue; I thought it was settled months ago.”
“What issue, yer Highness?” Applejack asked. “Uh, Ah mean, Princess Celestia, ma’am.”
Celestia laughed softly and smiled warmly to the orange farmpony. “Applejack, I’m not offended if you’re informal with me. All six of the Elements are already close to my heart, for you gave my sister back to me and now, I’m your friend’s mother as well. Don’t feel that you need to bow and scrape before me; it makes me uncomfortable when other of the common ponies do it and I don’t want you doing it as well. But the issue seems to be a question of the safety of griffin citizens in Equestria.”
Almost as one, they blinked at her. “Ah know they were awful sore at Gilda gettin’ killed bein’ especially heroic but Ah thought they’d made peace with it. Yanno, buried her with honors, sung her praises, an’ acknowledged that ya’ll couldn’t be properly blamed.”
“I had believed the same,” Celestia admitted, letting Dawn and Twilight go with a light maternal nuzzle. “But then, their consul-general arrived two days ago to revive the issue. Which is a bit… unusual but hardly…”
“Are you sure it’s him?” The dragoness inquired in a pleasantly exotic voice.
Celestia blinked, taken aback, then looked harder at the dragon. “Excuse me?”
“I asked, are you certain that the griffin is the consul-general?” She repeated.
“It’s related to the issue we need to talk to you about, Mom,” Twilight interjected before Celestia could ask. “Is Luna… I mean, Aunt Luna awake yet?”
Celestia chuckled. “Still getting used to calling her ‘aunt’, dear?”
“It’s… still a hard adjustment,” Twilight admitted, coloring a little. “I mean, it’s much easier with you because you’ve always been like a mother to me but Aunt Luna is…”
“…a cute piece of flank…”
Twilight’s coloration went a beet red. “Dawn! No, and no, and… and… no! She’s your aunt! She’s my aunt! No, no, no, and… no!”
“Methinks thou doth protest too much, sister dear,” Dawn grinned widely.
Celestia wasn’t sure how it was possible, but Twilight seemed to blush even harder at the jab. “You know how I was starting to like you? That was before I learned you were evil.”
“Sticks and stones!” Dawn replied in a sing-song, laughing.
Celestia smiled and learned down to her blushing and befuddled daughter. “I’d stop while you’re ahead, dear,” she murmured, giving the lavender alicorn a gentle motherly kiss on her forehead. “I have a sister just like her and believe me, protesting just encourages them.”
Twilight gave her a look of desperate gratitude. “What I was going to say is, ever since that first Nightmare Night, I’d always thought of Aunt Luna as a friend and maybe even a really close friend and then, I find out she’s my aunt. It’s sort of hard to go from ‘potential best friend’ to ‘aunt’.”
Celestia nuzzled her. “I’m sure she won’t mind if you slip up and think of her as a friend, Twilight. I know it’d make her very happy.”
“Would you send for her then?” The dragoness asked. “What I have to say is something that both Princesses need to hear.”
Celestia studied the strange dragon, noting that her head was smooth and of an unusual grace… and that she had a mane, something she never remembered seeing on a dragon before. Her eyes were amethyst and full of the grave, heavy burden of experience that was eerily familiar—it was the look she saw in the mirror each morning, and in the eyes of her deceptively young-looking sister. She had the feeling that the unnamed dragoness was studying her in kind and after a moment, a smile spread over her features, an approving smile of someone who was pleased with what they saw.
“Will you send for Luna, Princess Celestia?” She repeated, but more quietly.
“Yes.” She looked at the side of the throne room door, where she knew a guard would be because it was where a guard always was. “Please convey my apologies to my sister and my request that she come to the throne room.”
“Your Majesty,” he acknowledged before the solid visage of one of the royal guards, his armor glimmering in the light, flashed across the slightly-open door.
“If you would be so kind, I think this matter requires privacy, Guards,” she commented to the ever-present Throne Guard, who immediately bowed their heads and obediently disappeared out the door, joining their fellow who’d heard her request and was already leaving his post. The guards taken care of, Celestia turned back to the young mares and their draconic companion. “Who are you?”
“Outside of the company of your daughters, the Elements, and your sister, you may call me Myrilandel.” The dragoness reached back and into a small leather case that had simply seemed to materialize at her side from thin air. She drew out a tightly-rolled scroll, sealed with a wax stamp that looked like two dragons entwined in an almost intimate way, and offered it to her. “As to my actual name, I bear a letter of introduction from my queen for your eyes and the eyes of your sister.”
Celestia was taken-aback by the gesture; she could barely remember being presented with a formal letter of introduction and the tradition had gone out of style hundreds of years ago. After a moment of surprise, however, she accepted the letter and carefully broke the seal, unrolling it. The hoofwriting was exquisite, elegant, slender, and flowing in an almost callighraphy fashion although Celestia sensed that the writer wasn’t putting on airs or trying to impress, but wrote with the same elegant precision all the time.
“To Their Majesties, Princess Celestia and Princess Luna, Bearers of Sun and Moon respectively, I send sincerest greetings and wishes of best health upon Their Majesties, and beg to present to them and all their court this, my Handmaiden,” the letter read. “She is most beloved to my heart, as a sister and family to me, and most trusted of all my servants. She is my hand in this, and my voice to Your Ears on matters of the most signal and grave importance. I have required of her to be shield to Your Daughters and Nieces, and then to be hunter of evil things that have lately stirred in the very shadows of your kingdom. It is my most earnest pleasure to commit into your service Spite, and would beg your indulgence, to treat her with trust and with kindness and consideration.
Signed, yours in the pursuit of those things most good and the protection of those things most loved,
Amarra Drae’thul, Sixth in the Helles.”
Celestia looked over the edge of the scroll to see that the dragoness, Spite apparently, was looking at her with an expression of genuine pride, seeming to have at least some idea of what the letter said and aware that the signer, this “Amarra Drae’thul”, had praised her effusively. She paused, weighing her options. “I can tell that your queen adores you quite a bit, Spite, and I feel I ought to be honored to meet you. But… I don’t know this Amarra Drae’thul.”
“Neither of us expected that you would, Your Highness,” Spite replied pleasantly. “But it seemed proper to her that she treat you with the same respect she would to any other sovereign of royal lineage, and send along a formal epistle expressing her well wishes and introducing me to you in a formal manner.”
Celestia smiled warmly to the dragoness. “Then I’m honored by your thoughtfulness, even if it was not necessary. I’m perfectly happy to receive strangers informally and familiarly with little more than the expressed confidence of somepony I trust. For example, either of my daughters.”
“She’s been nothing but considerate and honest with us, Mom,” Twilight offered. “And she saved Rainbow’s life.”
Celestia felt a surge of alarm shoot through her. “Rainbow Dash?”
“Only Rainbow we know, Mum.”
“What…” Celestia shook her head. “Is she alright?”
“She’ll live, Your Majesty, although the form of her living is beyond my ability to predict,” Spite answered. “The monster my quarry unleashed on her gnawed at her very soul and wounded it very deeply. I took the only measure I could, and it certainly saved her life and her sanity, but it was a crude, battlefield measure that is only used when there’s no other choice. She’s very strong, Princess, and her soul is also very strong, the very picture of undying Loyalty, so what I did for her cannot alter who she is or take away her virtues, or her personal merits. But the precise effects cannot be known until it’s safe to wake her from the regenerative sleep I laid on her.”
“Your quarry?”
“Yes,” Spite confirmed. “I’ll explain when your sister arrives so…”
“I’m here,” Luna interrupted, folding her wings down as she came in from the balcony, smiling warmly to her two nieces. “And happy to see that my nieces have come to visit.”
“Hey there, Auntie Luna,” Dawn said cheerfully.
“Hi Luna,” Twilight added with a touch of shyness. “I mean, Aunt…”
“Luna’s fine, Twilight,” the royal blue alicorn assured her with a chuckle. “I’m still getting used to it too.” She looked over at Spite. “Good afternoon, Spite. Are you well?”
Both Spite and Celestia gave her similar looks of blank surprise. “Sister, you… know her?”
Luna grinned at the surprised looks and reached out a hoof, lightly poking Celestia in the side. “Princess of the moon and night, Tia.”
“Oh, right.” Celestia gave her a sheepish smile.
Luna covered her muzzle with a hoof and giggled, giving her sister a mischievous and teasing look before she sobered, looking over at Spite. “Although I admit that I don’t actually know why I’m so familiar with you. Your presence and existence touches my night but you’re obviously alive.”
“Night encompasses darkness and I’m aligned to the Darkness, even if it’s a much gentler and more virtuous Darkness than normal,” Spite replied. “Although I’m just as surprised as you are that my existence touches on your night.”
“Aligned to darkness?” Celestia repeated, frowning.
“Yes, Darkness,” Spite confirmed with a nod. “There’s a strong strain of Light in me as well—it’s why I could wield Light-infused flame against the klesae—but my primary affiliation is Darkness. It’s… confusing, I know.”
“More than you know,” Celestia told her, frowning more heavily. “I don’t understand much of what you just said. You use ‘darkness’ as if it’s a… faction, I suppose, and ‘light’ the same way. And what’s a klesae?”
Spite blinked and suddenly looked very sheepish, reaching a paw up and rubbing the back of her head in a distinctly embarrassed-looking way. “Yes… I… suppose that would require some explanation. Simply put, at least as far as my understanding goes, there are two fundamental forces of creation in the wider universe, that of Light and that of Dark. Both are creative forces, infusing things with life and virtue in their own way although they’re technically opposites in the way that ordinary light and dark are. The division is more in the tendencies of the two forces: Darkness tends to be more unrestrained, creative, and chaotic and Light tends to be more orderly, rule-bound, and rationalistic.”
“Like us, Sister,” Luna added, nodding at the explanation. “You’re much better at legalistic things and making good, reasonable laws for Equestria…”
“…and you’re the more artistic and creative and, frankly, a bit more chaotic,” Celestia nodded, smiling affectionately at her sister.
“Yes,” Spite confirmed. “The two forces are unusually powerful when wielded against one another although the strongest powers that represent them tend to be very closely-aligned, much like Your Majesties have the love of family between you although you loosely represent opposite ends of the Light/Dark spectrum. But as my Queen puts it, the forces are black and white but individuals are grey; there…”
“…is no such thing as someone who’s all Dark or all Light cuz even Dark people have some rules and even Light people are creative and emotional.” Pinkie offered.
“Well, yes…” Spite replied, smiling appreciatively at the pink earth pony with a mane straighter than it had been moments ago.
“Then I got a question: does that mean I’m sorta Dark?”
“I… suppose…”
“But I can still keep the coat color, right? Because this is a really cool color and if it went away I’d be all like ‘waaah, I wanna be pink’ and then I’d have to get berries and squish them all over me and then I’d be all red and then ponies would be all like ‘aaah, Pinkie is murdered’ and then they’d be all sad and it’d be the end of parties.” Pinkie grabbed Spite’s face and stared into the surprised dragoness’ eyes. “The party… must… go… on!”
“Party can never die,” Spite intoned with as serious an expression as somepony could manage with Pinkie’s face mashed against their own.
“Party can never die,” Pinkie agreed solemnly, letting her go.
There was silence for a long moment while Spite combed through her mane where Pinkie had gripped it and the rest of the ponies that had watched tried to figure out just what to say before the dragoness looked up at the two Princesses. “So, with that out of the way, I have a few things to explain to Your Majesties, for I fear that my quarry slipping my grasp means that Equestria is no longer the only kingdom in danger.”