Coffee, tea, and exotic juice from the far north-eastern end of the griffonic ranges had arrived in enormous urns. Bread - still hot from the palace’s ovens - had been laid out. Papers were shuffled, no less than a dozen personal assistants and attaches milled about, and at some point amid the mayhem the Sun actually rose as well.
Raven barely noticed when it did.
Soon after the last candles were quietly snuffed out, Twilight Sparkle arrived; a steaming mug floated before her, and while Twilight had always been an early-riser, and almost thirty eyes pondered the deep bags beneath her eyes and the implications thereof.
The doors slammed shut behind her, and fifteen ponies - Twilight now included - settled into pillowed couches.
“Right,” Twilight said curtly, “I’ve got no more than an hour before I have to greet the day’s responsibilities. What we’re going to talk about is of absolute secrecy. And if somepony doesn’t refill my cup right now, I might just keel over and- ah, thank you, Folio.”
“Of course, Your Highness,” said the young earth pony - only just a few weeks on this council - and flinched when Twilight frowned sharply.
“Don’t,” she said, “it’s not your fault, Folio. It’s - actually kind of mine. I have - a very large problem. A very sensitive problem. It’s why I woke up each of you and asked you dig down into those dusty depths and find out exactly how the paths of fealty and rulership flow in Equestria. You see…”
Twilight took a deep breath, rustled her wings nervously, and hissed.
“...I am an illegal usurper to Equestria’s government.”
A feather could have fallen in the council chamber, and all would have heard it. A feather did, in fact, fall, and fourteen heads swiveled to stare at the one who’d loosed it. The fifteenth paused, mid-preen, and murmured a tiny apology before retreating again behind his wings.
On the far side of the table, another pony stirred. “I presume, Your Highness,” boomed an ancient, scarred unicorn, robust in size and voice for that typically slight tribe, “that since you have seen fit to raise us from our beds at such unholy hours this morn, that this is indeed no prank.”
“No, Sir Breeching,” Twilight said, and all heads quickly turned back as their ruler reclaimed their attention. “This is not a prank, a joke, or - I can say with some certainty - a mistake. It began with an encounter I had in court. Some of you might have heard about it - the ‘triumviratist’ who managed to gain access to my open hours. After that, I had a talk with Raven Inkwell, and she said-”
“Pardon, Your Highness,” Raven said, “perhaps it would be simply better to bring us to this very-significant point?”
“Oh,” Twilight nodded, cheeks coloring, “Yes. Sorry. Um. Well, I spent nearly eight hours last night going through the archives, and… they’re right. As best as I can tell, the triumviratists are right.”
The silence that followed ought, in Raven’s opinion, to have been broken by a sputtering cough or gasp of surprise. Even another feather taking its leave from its host would have been welcome. Instead, it was merely stony and utter silence that greeted them. Twilight, unfortunately, took that as granting permission to continue:
“Not only is there no actual document in the archives transferring the lawful authority to rule Equestria from the joint government of the three tribes to the Royal Sisters, but I can’t even find any references to any agreement, any treaty, any anything existing at all. As far as I can tell, it just... did. According to all actual law on the books, neither Celestia, Luna, or I should be allowed to actually rule Equestria. And before anypony asks, yes, I did actually work that fast. Seven hours is a long time for me. I know those archives inside and out, I can teleport, and I can teleport things to me. Plus I left tow archivists still down there, digging around, and he knows those archives almost as much as I do, and-”
“I think we understand, Princess,” Raven murmured quietly. More heads bobbed in agreement.
“Right. Sorry. You know how I get - wordy. When I’m stressed. Which I am. Because…”
This time, Twilight stopped herself. She paused, shook her head, and swallowed.
Folio raised a hoof.
“Go ahead Folio?”
“Um, Princess,” the young colt stuttered out, “w-why aren’t any of your friends here? You t-talk to them a lot when you’ve g-got a really hard problem. B-But none of them are here. Is there, um, a reason why they’re not here?”
“Yes, Folio,” Twilight sighed, “there is a reason. A few reasons, even. First: My friends might be the bulwark I weigh my decisions against, the - the living encyclopedias of experiences I turn to for my knowledge of friendship. But you know about Equestria’s government. They - well, Applejack sort of does, because she’s a landsmare. She’s even attended a few of the meetings of the realms’ steaders. But they don’t know about the nation’s government. I don’t-”
Twilight stopped, swallowed, and took a long, slow, deep breath.
“-I need your help. You’re my appointed ministers. The Evening Council. Yes, Folio?”
The colt dropped his hoof for a third time. “Um. So, we’re all here by your appointment. You chose us, everypony in this room. Well, some of us were Celestia, and Noctilucent was Luna’s, but… we’re all under the authority of one of you three. So - if you say the Triumviratists are right and everypony who’s ruled Equestria in the last thousand years is an i-i-illegal usurper - aren’t we - um-”
“Illegally appointed?” finished a well-dressed mare on the opposite side of the table finished for him.
“Yes, Folio, Amberglass, you are,” Twilight said. “That’s actually the second reason I’ve brought all of you together. Not my friends - not the friendship council. Because this impacts you way, way more directly. If I set aside the crown tomorrow, my friends would still be my friends. Maybe even-” Another sharp halt, hard swallow, and slow breath. “So I thought the best way to start is - let’s see what we do have. I assume Raven organized you all?”
“Yes, Your Highness,” Raven said with a curt nod.
“Good. Let’s get started. Who’s first?”
A pegasus, young and limber and bedecked with an iron peytral that marked him as one of the pegasus Polemarchos class of ruler-commanders raised his hoof. “Perhaps some good news to begin, Your Highness?” he purred, an accent giving his voice a lilting twist. “Regardless of what other oaths they swore, I have confirmed that the legions of Cloudsdale, Derechos, Molnigt, and Old Pegasopolis also affirmed Her Royal Highness Luna as their first and highest commander. She, in turn, has passed this title to you. Since, in theory, the cities are always governed by an officer of the Guard, regardless of what words are written, this means you will have our obedience and that of those who serve us.”
“One-third to start with isn’t bad, Halazi, but I don’t think I’m going to get that lucky twice,” Twilight murmured.
Next to the colt, another mare nodded. “You would be unfortunately right, Your Highness. The authority of the Greater and Lesser Senates of the old Earth Pony states was eventually transferred to the modern parliament. The good news for you is that the parliament has blunted hooves - it may kick weakly, but cannot demand anything from you.”
“And the bad news?” Twilight asked tentatively.
“There is no evidence any Chancellor of the Earthkin ceded individual power to the Sisters. And that means all the powers of the old Greater and Lesser senates…”
“...now would fall directly to them. I understand.” Twilight shook her head, lighting her horn to shift a few papers about before her. “What about the smaller populations - the Griffons of the Isles, for instance?”
Raven spoke up this time, tapping her hoof twice on the table. “The Treaty of Sunken Rock still stands. They don’t consider themselves Equestrian subjects anyhow, merely agree to follow all relevant Equestrian law so long as we allow them to roost there still. Who Equestria is ruled by is irrelevant; unless you are planning to write a writ of expulsion, they won’t be trouble.”
Twilight snorted. “If I were the kind of ruler who did that, Raven, I don’t think I’d deserve to be ruler much longer. Noctilucent, what about Thestralkind?”
All eyes turned to the table’s obvious representative, who coughed discreetly and shuffled her webbed wings. “By oath alone, My Princess, you are safe.” Her accent twisted the words, forcing ears to twist towards her to interpret them - Hyoo arrh sayf-ah, she said. “Luna herself appeared to the free families after your coronation, and invoked us to obey your word as we would obey hers. But, My Princess, there is - difficulty.”
“I know,” Twilight sighed, her tail swishing with her words.
Halazi raised an eyebrow, turning towards Noctilucent. “Is there now, Your Highness? I hadn’t heard of this.”
Noctilucent squirmed, opening her mouth to begin speaking - only to close it as her slit eyes winced at the words which would have come from it. Twilight stepped in instead:
“A lot of Thestrals… don’t like me. They’re not happy about me. I’m - just a replacement. An interloper, maybe. The Princess of Equestria, but I’m not Luna. Never Luna.”
The word ‘usurper’ remained pointedly unspoken.
“They can’t speak up against you without undermining Luna’s own legitimacy,” Raven said, waving a quill about to gesture around the table. “If they deny that you have the right to rule, then they’re hurting their own monarch.”
“You think through this question backwards, Miss Inkwell,” Noctilucent said, fringed ears twitching. “This matter only questions Her Majesty Luna’s governance of Equestria, not the free families. You presume Those of Note would see to support it because you support it, but in truth it is a matter many chiefs and chiefesses of the free families have little regard for at all - and less desire to extend their efforts in defense of Her Highness Twilight Sparkle. And if they do not speak, they undermine nothing.”
A sour expression planted itself on several muzzles around the table. “We pegasi ceded our rulership to Their Highnesses,” Halazi said sharply. “Why can the ‘free families’ of the Thestrals not?”
Twilight raised a hoof as Noctilucent winced and opened her mouth, a retort obviously already on her lips. “Don’t. We don’t need another argument here. We’re taking stock, not dividing ourselves,” Twilight said.
Halazi’s tail snapped flat and a puff was blown from flared nostrils, but his mouth closed without issuing any further argument. His eyes, on the other hand, spoke plenty. Noctilucent hissed softly, pointedly un-equine dentition on full display, and looked away.
Twilight sighed.
From across the room, Sir Breeching spoke up: “The Crystal Empire, Your Highness? I can’t help but notice we are missing any representatives of that esteemed state.”
“Ah,” Twilight sighed, tapping her hoof on the table, hoping her relief at the lifeline he’d thrown her wasn’t so clearly visible. “I sent a message this morning, and they responded just after Sun-raising. Princess Mi Amore Cadenza and Prince-Consort Shining Armor could board a train in a matter of hours-”
One immensely bushy eyebrow, a rarity among ponies, raised itself on Sir Breeching’s face. “...not teleporting here, for a matter so serious?”
Twilight shook her head. “Neither of them can teleport that kind of distance. I didn’t want to have them use anypony else’s services and risk tipping this off. And…”
Shining Armor can’t fly. I’ve always wondered if he hated that. Like he’s holding Cadance back. He’s never said anything, but -
It was Cadance who sent the message that they could arrange a train, not Shining Armor. She made the choice, not him.
“...and they could be here within a few days, maybe just a couple if the rail lines can be cleared.”
“It hardly matters,” Amberglass murmured, tapping her quill lightly on the scroll before her. ‘They’re in the same predicament as Her Highness Twilight. Prince-Consort Shining Armor would even lose his military rank. He used to be a part of the Royal Solar Guards Division; now he’s part of the Diamantene Guard. Neither of those would exist if Alicorns have no proper authority.”
“And even aside from that,” Twilight said, “this is Cadence we’re talking about here. Celestia was her ‘aunt’, but she might as well have been her adoptive mother. Cadence won’t hesitate to swear authority to her again, and the ponies of the Empire - crystal or otherwise - will back her with all their hearts whether or not there’s some signature on a treaty.”
“A point that would rile the triumviratists to no end,” Raven added with a slight smile.
“Right,” Twilight scratched off another line on her list. “Next, then. Duchy of Maretonia?”
“Safe. They joined Equestria after Unification, and their treaty was with Their Highnesses directly.”
“Hive Heterocera?”
A low snort. “What do you think, Your Highness? Absolutely with us. As far as they’re concerned, Equestria as it exists is their best hope for survival.”
“Hive Coccinellus?”
Folio winced. “N-Not sure, Your Highness. They’re officially still bound to Canterlot’s throne directly - which would mean you. But you know, since the plague, they’re…”
“Not fond of me?” Twilight said softly.
“I-I didn’t mean-” Folio sputtered.
“It’s okay,” Twilight said softly, her face crinkling into what she hoped was a reassuring smile to the young stallion. “We’re being honest here. Hive Coccinellus might very well denounce me out of pure spite.”
Because you failed them too.
Gave them the sickness. Left them starving.
Because you’re not a real ruler.
“Nothing that we can do about it now. What about…”
Around the table Twilight went - giving a name, getting an answer. A sigh of relief here, a wince of regret there.
“...and last but not least: Sir Breeching, what about the old Unicorn tribal authority? I seem to remember that Platinum’s line is still actually in existence?”
“It is,” Sir Breeching rumbled, “by writ of the treaty which unified the three tribes, in fact. A term of the treaty was - is, as it still stands today - that so long as a direct descendant of Platinum exists, they will hold royal title and some minor frivolous responsibilities. King Bullion demanded it.”
“And if Celestia and Luna’s authority were void, all power would revert to the current recognized descendant,” Raven added.
Sir Breeching nodded. “Which is where our problem exists. We know who the current recognized descendant is.”
“Who?” Twilight asked.
Breeching answered.
The room, collectively, winced. A few chairs even seemed to groan in support of the sentiment.
“I think,” Twilight declared after a painfully leaden silence, “that I would rather be an illegal, tyrannical, oppressive dictator than let Prince Blueblood try his hoof at actually running anything more than a garden party, let alone a nation.”
“Hear, hear!” Halazi cheered, rapping his hoof on the table.
“An admirable spirit,” Amberglass sniffed, reapplying a spot of makeup lost amid violent wince, “but still, our point remains. If the Sisters never properly took authority of the nation, then the power structures of two of our three tribes could be against Princess Twilight Sparkle. Against us.”
A rather more somber quiet followed that declaration, until interrupted by a low scraping.
“How,” Halazi said tartly, “could this have happened? It is well-known that the triumvirate ceded authority to the Great Sisters following the terror of the Maddened Years. Did nobody think to write it so?”
Amberglass snorted, a flick of one ear the only sign of any inner perturbation. “No. It is well known that the Royal Sisters took the reins of the nation following the maddened years. What little remained of the triumvirate was hardly in a position to object.”
“The annals of the Pegasi Legions are quite clear about who we swore-”
Her hoof slammed to the table, cutting off Halazi. “Your annals are about who you swore oaths to. Not others’ oaths!”
“She’s right,” Sir Breeching rumbled. “The land was a - a riot of chaos. Discord himself may have been rendered to stone, but the wounds he scarred this land with still bled.”
Twilight nodded her agreement. “I’ve read the few documents we have dating from those times. It’s difficult to tell who was accurately describing those times, and who was just entirely insane.”
“Or both,” Noctilucent purred. “Her Majesty Princess Luna has told us of these times too. We were oft-protected by her favor. Others were… not so blessed. Insanity, it is said, was the most sane reaction.”
“Exactly! It’s - it’s possible that’s how it might always have been. Individual groups being approached separately. Just trying to hold everything together. Pulling them along to survive day to day, until…”
Her words petered out, leaving a freshly heavy silence behind them.
‘I…” Raven paused, her hoof dragging nervously across the top of the table.
“It’s okay, Raven,” Twilight smiled. “I’m tired, not angry. You can tell me.”
“I’ve just been thinking about this,” Raven said slowly, “and it’s been occurring to me that there’s one easy way, one very simple answer, to fixing this whole situation. But you haven’t suggested anypony try it. You haven’t even brought it up. So I have to think there’s a reason why, but…”
“You want me to send a message to Princess Celestia or Princss Luna, to ask them.”
Raven winced again at the heavy, knowing tone laden by the eternal weight of sadness rather than the typical eager tones of Twilight’s voice. In fact, the wince seemed to run from pony to pony around the table - though perhaps, Twilight thought, that was her imagination.
“You aren’t even Equestria’s real ruler anyway.”
“I…” Raven sputtered.
“You don’t have to hide it, Raven,” Twilight said quietly. She looked around the table to each waiting face in turn, then let her gaze wander to the window, staring distantly out towards the horizon. “None of you do. I know. Like Raven said. It’s the obvious thing to do.”
“Then why…?” Folio ventured cautiously.
“I don’t know where they are,” Twilight whispered, and Raven felt as if the whole room drew to a sudden stillness that squeezed in on her.
“You don’t - they’re not -”
“No. They left their new home without a word many moons ago. I’ve been trying to keep an ear out for them, but they keep moving. Keeping quiet. Almost like they’re hiding from me.” Twilight shuddered, her vast wings twitching and mane not so much seeming to flow as writhe. “They’re doing something, I’m sure of it. Spike’s magic still delivers letters. But - where are they going? Why does it demand they just had to go away without even a letter? And why - why can’t they tell me?”
They haven’t told me.
Why don't they trust me?
The same realization rebounded through the room. Ears fell, tails clamped to rumps, and somepony whinnied. Raven sat herself sharply, mouth working furiously. All except Sir Breeching, who carefully drew his glasses from his muzzle and wordlessly began to polish the thick lenses.
“Sir Breeching!” Halazi snapped, rounding on the elderly unicorn. “Did you know of this? Why did you not tell anyone>”
“I am Her Highness’ master of spies-” Sir Breeching carefully re-seated the glasses on his muzzle, pointedly refusing to meet Halazi’s narrow-eyed gaze. “-and because I am Her Highness’ master of spies. Discretion is our first rule, not an afterthought!”
“I… surely… doesn’t anypony else in Equestria know-”
“Everypony - everycreature - seems to assume they’re just off seeing the world. Exploring. Relaxing. Goofing off, even.” Twilight’s voice was shaking now, mirroring the tremble in her feathers. “But they’re gone and I can’t even ask them anything, and I don’t know what to do-”
“Twilight. Stop.”
Two words was all it took to bring Twilight’s rambles to a halt - two words delivered with the reliable firmness of a mare who’d seen such rambles many times before and had known on a level perhaps more instinctual than intellectual exactly what was happening. Twilight did stop, though, and instead gave Raven a look of sheer shock.
It took Raven, in turn, a moment to realize that not only Twilight’s gaze but every pair of eyes in the room was now squarely fixed on her. Muzzle falling, she seemed to shrink back into her seat. “...forgive me. Um. If I might - if we want - to - you should -”
“Raven,” Twilight said gently, “It’s okay. Say what you were going to say. I won’t be angry; you know me.”
“It’s not - a polite thing to say, Princess.”
“I can deal with ‘not polite’. It’s the least of my worries right now.”
Raven drew a sharp breath, heaving herself back up. “Sometimes, Your Highness, I look at you and just see the same adorable little filly I saw trot in at Celestia’s fetlocks all those decades ago. I know you aren’t her anymore. You’re our Princess now. But you are driving yourself into a panic, just like that little filly, and that won’t help one bit. You need to calm down, take a step back, and look at the bigger picture. So Their Highnesses aren’t here to just answer this right now - so what? You have us. We will find an answer.”
A low chuckle ran around the table, merriment layered over a nervous undercurrent. At least until Twilight laughed as well, a more carefree chuckle which stripped away the awkwardness of the moment. “You’re right. We should all - all keep trying to go on with the day. I have to. I’m almost out of time here; in just a few minutes, I’ll have to go out there and face everypony.”
“Yes, Princess,” Raven murmured, and several other heads around the table bobbed in agreement.
“We’ll - we’ll re-convene later. Or maybe tomorrow, if today is difficult. But - thank you. All of you.” Twilight gave a smile to each pony at the table - a thin, wan, and troubled smile, but a smile all the same. “You’re right. I do have you. Sometimes I still need to be reminded of that. I’m able to do this - all of this - because of you. I couldn’t without you. In a moment like this… I need you. I need everypony I can get. Because I think it’s going to be a bad day.”
It was not a bad day.
Nor had it been kind enough to be an easy day either.
It was, in all respects that Twilight could measure, a merely average day - which still meant that by the time sun was lowered and her official duties were done for the day, her head still ached and muscles screamed their exhaustion. It still meant that it was the kind of day that left her curled up in her personal waiting room with a warm cup of coffee (much preferring the bitter, livelier drink to Celestia’s teas).
Tea might have been better for the meditation, but all of Celestia’s lessons on breathing were still failing to make headway against the storm of thoughts swirling in her head. So coffee it was; at least if she was awake a few hours longer, something more might get done.
If there’s anything left I can do.
A knock at her office door pulled Twilight’s attention from her introspection (moping, if she was being honest with herself). “Enter!”
Raven Inkwell, her mane tied back and still somehow looking even more exhausted than Twilight felt, peered around the doorframe. “May I speak with you for a moment, Your Highness? In private?”
“Sure, Raven. Come in, please.”
At least then I won’t be alone with the nagging echo in the back of my head.
Can you even be alone when you’re like that…? Nevermind.
“Would you like some coffee? I don’t have any tea ready, I’m afraid.”
“Neither,” Raven said, settling on her haunches before the desk. “I need to be asleep in just a little while, and those drinks do nothing but keep me manic for hours on end.”
Twilight chuckled softly, nodding in understanding. “I don’t think I’ll be sleeping just yet.”
“Still thinking about - the problem?”
“Yes,” Twilight said, far more softly. “I kept thinking another one of - them was going to just pop out of a shadow or something and throw an accusing hoof in my face.”
Raven nodded, sucking in a deep breath to draw herself up. “About that - I wanted to apologize, Your Highness.At the meeting today, I - I spoke up over you. Lectured you. I shouldn’t have.”
“Nonsense, Raven. You did what I needed. I wasn’t lying back there; what I said about only being able to rule because of all of your help is absolutely true.”
“Neither did I lie,” Raven sighed. “Sometimes I do still see that little filly walking around still. Only now that filly has golden shoes, a crown, wings, and a mane of magic as well.”
Twilight winced; Raven tilted her head. “Sometimes, I still feel like that filly too.”
“She was a cute filly, so that’s not too bad.”
“Oh, and I’m not cute now?” Twilight grinned.
“No,” Raven replied with just as much a smirk, “You’re not. You’re beautiful now. Gorgeous, even. You look just like her-”
“You aren’t even Equestria’s real ruler anyway.”
Twilight just barely suppressed the tremor that ran through her.
Raven continued without stopping. “-and I’ll bet you have no shortage of suitors trying to get through those doors.”
“At least I don’t go hide in the bookshelves anymore when someone does come looking for me.”
“Oh, dear!” Raven laughed, “I do remember that one time. When you were so terrified of dealing with the Gifted School’s board of-”
She halted, noting the sharpness of the color creeping into Twilight’s cheeks, and simply let her gentle smile say the rest for her.
“But I did manage to make it, in the end,” Twilight said softly. “I pulled myself together. Did it right. Because I was able to get everypony’s help, and I was too deaf to realize that might mean they wanted to be friends. That is what is different about this time. Now I know about friendship, but I can’t see a way out of this.”
“That’s exactly what is the same about this, Twilight Sparkle. I don’t know why you are so terrified about some… some minor detail from centuries past. Maybe it isn’t my place to know.”
Rising again, she moved to Twilight’s side and raised a leg - her fetlocks tinged with silver - to touch the far larger mare’s shoulder. “If the trust of an old secretary means anything, I trust you’re more than a scared filly. I trust you can solve this. I trust that one day, long after I’m gone, when you’re centuries older, faced down much greater crises, have had many, many students, and all of that sort of thing, you’ll be able to look back on this and laugh about how silly it was to be scared about little things like this. I trust you, Princess. We all do.”
“I won’t,” Twilight said with a shake of her head.
“You will. Because in the end - in the end this is small things. So you might be an ‘unlawful usurper’ to the throne - so what? Ruling isn’t just about all the laws. It’s about doing what’s right first. Celestia governed us just fine, and believe me, she did not always follow the exact letter of the law. She led us through war and famine and plague, and some distant day you’ll be able to do the same thing.”
“I wish that were true. But the more I think about it, the more I feel like-” Twilight cut off, the words suddenly failing to come forth like a stream abruptly run dry.
In their absence, Raven’s eyes fell. Her tail flicked, nose twitched, and Twilight waited for the thought to make its way through her head.
“In my years serving Her Highness,” she said slowly, “I learned a few things which I swore not to speak of unless absolutely needed. And I mean swore - true bind-oaths, sealed by my gift of magic and Celestias’. I cannot speak those things unless I think it’s right.”
Twilight exerted an unspeakable force to not question the nature of such oaths.
“...Princess Twilight Sparkle, if you truly believe this is that important, not to you but to Equestria, then I might be able to tell you something.”
“I do,” Twilight said softly, “I swear it. For all Equestria, not just me.”
Raven nodded jerkily. She drew a deep, shaky breath, and to Twilight’s stark alarm her eyes rolled firmly back into her head.
“South of Witherrun brook, in the Falabella Forest, there is a house. It rests near a turn in the brook, east to north. It belongs to the Sisters,” Raven intoned. She swayed on her hooves, horn seeming to buzz with a low energy that wasn’t yet a full halo of proper magic. “There is a powerful enchantment on it; unless you are told of the place’s existence it slips from your mind. Princess Luna’s doing, I believe. If neither of the Sisters can be found somewhere else, they may be there.”
A heartbeat passed, and with a shudder, Raven straightened. She shook herself out with unusual vigor, neat bun nearly coming undone, and huffed.
“Raven-” Twilight said, but the other mare shook her head with rather more steadiness.
“I’m fine, Princess. It’s fine. I had to focus on it to convince the magic I needed those words.”
Twilight frowned, her tail slashing, but nodded.
“If I were to go somewhere for a little while,” she eventually said softly, “to get some advice on this, would you and the rest of the council be able to keep things running here while I’m gone, Raven? Just for a few days?”
“You know very well the council is intended to do just that. In case there’s some great matter of Harmony that you have to see galloped down and caught,” Raven said.
“Then please. It might - it should only be a few days. I’ll keep sending messages by the semaphore if anything changes.”
“Where are you going, your Highness?”
Standing and shaking herself out, Twilight Sparkle turned and smiled softly to Raven. “First, to that house you mentioned. If the Sisters aren’t there-” I can’t get my hopes to far up. “-then maybe some others. Aren’t friends for advice?”