//------------------------------//
// 02 — Investigating the Prince 
// Story: Ms. Glimmer and the Do-Nothing Prince 
// by scifipony 
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As we walked toward the castle entrance, Proper Step answered my question. "My father—" Celestia's Majordomo Kibitz "—says the princess spoiled His Royal Highness growing up. She felt sorry for him. Except for a rare diplomatic mission, he volunteers for no royal duties. His attitude that Equestria owes him a living grates on the princess, as does his inviting buddies to play Heart and Horseshoe cards late into the night, making a ruckus as they drink the finest apple apéritifs from her reserves."

"I could see that." I chuckled.

The guards stationed at the garden door clanked to attention. Armor rattled. Spears baring the way rose. They opened the door. 

Yesterday, in open court, I'd been openly seditious, explaining to everypony, "Celestia will continue to make the laws unless you take action to stop her." Today guards mutely welcomed in a criminal, though admittedly I'd been prompted by the outraged uproar of the audience after Celestia had announced she would pardon me of all my crimes.

So, I'd committed what most anypony would consider the worst of all, doing so while I could, getting in one last crime before the bell rang. 

My statement was true, in any case, not that anypony understood it was in their best interests to heed my advice.

Inside, the air felt refreshingly cool. Proper Step continued, "His Royal Highness' propensity to sleep in everyday irritates Her Royal Highness no end."

"Of course it does. She's up with the sun."

When I'd been a foal, Proper Step ensured I'd been awake before dawn to study or exercise, whether I liked it or not—and I had not. He wisely remained mute, despite his having watched me earlier, trotting around Sunset's gym track, levitating a textbook.

As our hooves resounded through the palace halls, I asked, "Are there scandals associated with Blueblood?"

He gave me a look, then nodded. I wasn't the innocent filly he'd helped raise under Celestia's grueling requirements. He understood I'd ridden my share of stallions. He replied, "When he came of age, the princess sent the errant prince to Horseshoe Bay to live under the tutelage of then Duke Frigate Vigilant. He returned months later, rejected in the strongest terms. Rumors were he'd broken something or somepony valuable, but the crown paid well to squelch such rumors."

"The do-nothing prince..." How did they put it in the novel I'd read about the lord living in the gothic manor? "Does he dally with the fillies?"

"I asked Father. Very rarely. Very selectively. Never for long, and with nary a rumor nor a write-up in The Inquisition."

Proper Step had set all the early editions beside the couch, their newsprint fragrant, everything from The Manehatten Times to the rumor rags. I wasn't ready to read what I had wrought and had shelved them. "The Inquisition," was an intentional clod-hoofed hint about which newspaper to read first, considering my new profession.

We approached the door to Prince Blueblood's suite. Tall, white, carved with swirls, and gilded. 

I waylaid a pink unicorn in a black and white maid's outfit dashing out of his quarters. Orange juice glasses rattled as she pushed her tray. She bowed deeply as I asked, "Can you answer a few questions about the prince?"

"Ms. Glimmer," she answered uncomfortably in a Trottingham accent. "Sorry, Mum. T'was reassigned the prince this very morn."

I blinked, surprised, as she scooted away. I respected servants enough not to scold recalcitrance. I knew the pressure they worked under, having in retrospect oppressed many as a foal, threatening their livelihood by asking for what they couldn't do.

Others also answered disturbingly. The red hoof-stallion with unlaundered white shirts balanced on his back, said, "Constant Hoof got his vacation granted last night." 

A blue pegasus guard answered, "Night Eye got reassigned to the Cloudsdale Residence and flew off last night with her husband and foals."

Nopony could answer my questions. A guard added helpfully, "He left for breakfast 15 minutes ago, with Princess Celestia."

"Not happily?" I asked. 

He coughed into a hoof. 

I didn't like that I might have to ask Celestia for answers, or confront His Royal Highness without first-hoof information about his habits or temperament. Proper Step had learned volumes about his naïve charge, me, from my hoof-maid and attendants back at Sire's Hollow. I wasn't going to be so lucky.

The double doors to the main dining hall stood thrown open, with a couple of wincing guards. Celestia, in high dudgeon, complained about the lack of cooperation by certain parties and whether those certain parties ought be sent to Saddle Arabia or, better, Yakyakistan!

I knew of the latter nation because of a buttered-tea café my fight coach treated me to in Baltimare. The tapestries on the walls had displayed crude images of true horses and hairy cattle with axe-cut wood buildings. Fantastical, but apparently real, and likely not luxurious enough for the prince. 

Shining Armor shouted back, Princess Cadance calming him.

I did not want to meet the possessive pink pony princess today. She'd eyed me yesterday with an intent to kill. She had not been amused that I'd broken his scapula, thrown a soup tureen at him that cracked his canon bone, and swept him from his hooves giving him a concussion. Twilight was responsible for his broken nose, but I'm sure she blamed me for that, too.

I approached the earth pony guard, who briefly bowed. I whispered, "Prince Blueblood's not in there, is he?"

His disdainful frown spoke volumes. He shook his head, but looked pale. A good trick for a cream-colored stallion.

"Do you know anything about him?"

"I really shouldn't say, Ms. Glimmer." He had to guard the miscreant.

"Understood. Which way did he go?"

He lifted a black hoof. "He yelled he had business and stomped off toward the Castle Way Boulevard exit."

By myself, I wouldn't find the fellow, but I had an idea. 

Back at the ivory tower, Streak, a blue pegasus with a streaked axe-crested indigo mane, flew loops around the tower in tandem with an auburn mare in brass royal guard armor. It flashed in the sun and especially coordinated nicely with her coat and dark reddish-brown mane. The circling pair reminded me of vultures. Streak waved and shot down to land with a bang on the terracotta pavers, melting agilely into a curtsy. Beyond her usual jangling gold loop earrings and facial studs, she wore the special bling she'd been dressed in yesterday.

"Your Highness—" 

I growled and jumped at her.

She fluttered out of reach, laughing and chortling until she fell over. Like Sunset, she'd become my other Canterlot friend through her displays of integrity, beyond our professional connections.

Her antics made me snort and giggle. "Yeah, funny. Don't push it."

"Yeah, Grimoire. I wouldn't want to get kicked by ya. That's how you K.O.'d Punch Drunk, a?"

I nodded. Grimoire. One of my many names, which strung together formed a sentence longer than any Equish teacher would let you get away with. Celestia had strung them together for everypony to hear. I had no business being inside the castle grounds, except in a dungeon. 

Sitting, smirking, she said, "I had to get oot of there. Spiral stairs to all the floors means nary a door; Sunset and Citron forgot that." Her face sobered, maybe remembering the kiss Citron and I shared the previous day that had made me tingle from my lips to my hindquarters. 

I'd become Sunset's good friend—I'd said that, right? And friends shared, right? 

That Sunset and Citron, the only stallion who'd ever had a crush on me, ended up spending the night together had my mind rearing. It had definitely lifted her spirits. 

I'd spent the night on a couch on the second level, with Streak faintly snoring on a cloud above me. Proper Step found himself a hidden servant's quarters in the basement near the laboratory. The ivory tower, with interior and exterior spiral staircases, was intended to house one person: Sunset. It had no doors, no privacy, and had suddenly housed a certain pair who seemed oblivious to the fact.

I wasn't. 

Oblivious, that is. 

Any time that night.

I was... Wow, really!?

The next morning, I couldn't believe I'd pushed them together after that extraordinary kiss Citron given me, prior to the pummeling I'd subsequently endured against the accursed alicorn. The thought of an awkward breakfast with Sunset and Citron— I shuddered. There was no wonder that I'd taken the first opportunity to bail!

Streak continued, "Good part, I suppose, is if they keep at it any longer, they'll be crippled for a month! They'll be easy to chase down and clobber."

Sharing. Too much sharing. I'd pushed them together, and wasn't sure of my feelings.

Streak interjected, "I talked with Firefall." She waved at the pegasus who settled at the door. "She told me that being in the guard isn't all about standing and occasionally protecting the princess. They need pegasi to haul chariots, palanquins, air-vans, and supply barges—really heavy loads," she finished excitedly. Her cutie mark was a huge wooden plow-harness with brass tack finials. It stood out perfectly colored and perfectly readable on her burnt and peeling blackened rump. The insidious mark locked her into a need to haul heavy and to haul hard—a Clydesdale earth pony born in a pegasus body. "I could join up and not have to fight the guilds back home to start a business. I'm liking what I hear."

"Well, that's good, considering—"

She waved a hoof and displayed a stern expression. "Don't worry. I've learned from you to check everything out." 

I smiled. "You do know what you are wearing is not simply loaned to you, right?"

She glanced back at the antiqued silver "rope" forged to look like dragon scales. It traced her spine and ran down her tail. It ran to the tip where it formed a spiked knob half the size of a hoof. The artifact split at her wings, forming rounded plates that hovered—actually hovered—over her shoulder bones, and spread out to her wing joints, hiding them in a cup that did not constrict movement. It continued up her neck to either side of her crested mane, widening to protect her skull, before looping around her ears, forming a fan on her forehead. "It's magic. Snaps right on and off, curling itself up like a snake. Not that dumb."

"Celestia wants you to enlist, not necessarily in the royal guard."

Streak smirked again. "Of course she does! Of all the fighting we did yesterday, I was the only one who nearly killed her. Had the border stone fallen a hoof length to the right, I'd have smashed her head or broke her neck. Not sure why that doesn't gross me out, but then she tried to blast you to cinders." She shrugged. "Must've ticked me off."

Streak had struck me out of the path of Celestia's flaming solar magic, which is why she had no hair and plenty of healing burns to the rear of her ribcage. Ticked off seemed a bit of an understatement. She was either very brave or very loyal. Her accuracy and timing proved she was in no way stupid. Well, other than that part about having worked for a crime boss and needing a pardon. I'd worked for two crime bosses now, so I wasn't casting aspersions!

"I'm awesome brave," she said, grinning ear to ear. Had I said the "brave" part out loud?

"You're wearing a national treasure, Streak."

"Ooooo," she said musically. She danced in a circle, admiring herself.

"Do you know who Hurricane Stormchaser is?"

"The most awesome pegasus ever?" She shook her head, indigo eyes locked on me. "Never heard of da grunt."

"You're wearing Commander Hurricane's armor."

"No. Flapping. Way!" She shot into the air, swooping and performing barrel rolls, the wind whistling through her feathers. Her laughing resounded across the ground, the armor extending along the leading edge of her wings, never hindering her flight. "Wow! I mean, wow! Princess! Yay! No wonder I feel lighter and so agile. And strong!" She landed again with a ground-rattling thump. "Do I get to keep it?"

"Depends on what you arrange with Celestia."

She looked down. "I suppose, a?"

"Would you like to help track somepony down for me?"

She chuckled, pointing two blue primary feathers at her indigo eyes. "Nearsighted. Doesn't wear glasses. 'Unique and special,' you called me."

"Yeah, but this pony stands out in a crowd, and you'll see bodyguards shadowing him. Remember Prince Blueblood from yesterday?"

She grinned. "Mr. Arrogant? Ya betcha."