Changeling Heart and the New Moon
chapter twenty
Chrysalis blasted away her disguise as she entered the hotel. She didn’t slow at all for the little ponies as she stormed through them, ignoring them entirely. There were more of them now, with a few unicorns shuffled into the mix as well, though she couldn’t care less. One of the gruff earth ponies - either braver or dumber than the rest - stood before her, barring her way.
“You weren’t to leave your escort - hey! I’m talking to you!”
The Queen didn’t even slow. She shoved her way past the impetuous pony, lifting him in her magic. She didn’t look back to snigger at the splashes as she dropped him into the fountain. Any other day she would have relished it, but as it was only Chrysalis’ brisk walk kept her from shivering, and it certainly wasn’t from cold.
“Your majesty, we won’t abide this behaviour,” growled another guard. Taking a deep breath, she stilled and turned, fighting to keep her muscles still. The armoured ponies shifted from their easy stances to a more ready group.
“Get over yourselves, little ponies, because I don’t have time for your self-importance. This turns into a fight and by the holes in my hooves I’ll make sure you know it. Say whatever you feel you need to say to your little commander, or your princess, or whatever, because I am here and the walls aren’t crumbling yet. Be happy with that. Now drag that sorry heap from the water and go back to doing whatever it was you were doing. Any questions? No? Good. Get to it.” They weren’t worth her focus, and Chrysalis turned away with a fight in her step that sounded the stairs - taken three at a time under her immense stride - with an angry, rhythmic stomp.
The wide doors of the next floor gave way to the stares of guards lining every door. Despite the added security, several doors were opened, and changelings moved about the rooms freely. The two races made oil and water seem on friendly terms, the way they avoided one another. The Queen slipped... wiggled, and twisted her way through the nearest door into one of the lesser rooms.
One changeling rested on the bed; another was reading a book. She called the first to see to her scrapes and magical singes. The changeling jumped to it without excitement or delay. Chrysalis shuddered with sensation as the familiar substance smeared across a scorch; Shining Armour had not spared her his wrath.
The scar on her leg had only just seemed to settle into an ashen black when she’d gone and got herself roughed up again. Chrysalis grimaced. Despite the consequences, it was good to see ponies with some fight in them.
Chrysalis finally began to relax. Her worries, her fears weren’t gone. Not at all, not after Luna had done...had been whatever that thing was. She had time to think though, time to react. Part of her heart urged the Queen on, to drag the monster alicorn out and have it out with her there and then, but the majority pleaded caution. There might be a time and there might be a place for that, but not here, not now.
“This whole thing is one big screw-up,” she said with black humour. She called softly to the changeling with the book, who set it aside, not bothering to mark his page at all.
“You. In an hour, find a way out, and get in touch with as many of the others as you can find. Tell them that I say to find out everything they can about our little moon.” Chrysalis shuddered as another scorch found a soothing touch at last. “Looks like I’ve trusted her too much. Should Luna even trust herself?” the Queen mused. She blinked back into the moment.
“Oh, and warn them that the ponies are starting to figure out their heads from their backsides. They’re starting to get their defenses in order. If the guards here aren’t entirely foals, they might even think try to put in a spell of some sort in here before long.” Not that they’d get much of anything from that. Changelings weren’t chatty creatures. Listening in would give the ponies a whole lot of nothing.
Chrysalis stared out the window, glancing down upon a little slice of Canterlot. The lights of windows were just beginning to shine brighter than the vestiges of day, like precursors of the stars yet to show themselves.
“They’re going to be a pain, when they’re all brought up to speed.” The Queen smiled. “Could be riots. Protests. Wouldn’t we just hate to stir that up with paranoia and conflict? I mean, our good guard ponies have enough work cut out for them dealing with us. How would they guard a city from its own ponies?” The male before her stared severely, waiting on his Queen with an angry silence.
“Which one were you again?”
“Beetle, my Queen,” he grumbled. She paused for thought.
“Are you now? You have the night to do my bidding. Be back before dawn.” For the first time since Chrysalis entered the room, something other than displeasure ruled the male’s face.
“What of...that lost one?” The room stilled, even the changeling attending upon the Queen’s hurts. Chrysalis’ gaze returned to the window, but her ambition had been set aside for something else.
“No. Her name is Surreal, I know you know it. She’s not lost. Not yet.” She sighed, and turned away once more. “Don’t waste your time looking for her. She doesn’t want to be found, at least not by us. You won’t find her, but I know where to look. I will find her.” The room fell silent once more, and the Queen glared as she nudged the little changeling that had been tending to her side.
“What are you waiting on? Get back to it.”
Luna was alone in thought when the anointed time came upon her. There was nothing, at least, nothing of this world to tell her that it was time, but the truth of it shone through her. In the darkness, Luna’s horn lit with a pale eminence. The light of the world drained away, revealing the stars. First a speckle, and then in all their shimmering thousands.
The moon smiled down upon her, happy to be adrift once more in its sea of sparkling lights. For a time Luna stayed as she was, and smiled.
Now was as good a time as any, and full of calm purpose, the night princess left her moonlit chambers for the more conventional lights of the throne room.
If any guard was surprised to see her, to the last they hid it well, as they did with all thought and emotion. Her throne, with the softness of velvet, was most welcoming.
“Let it be known that we are holding court, for as long as we see fit. Let any who would speak with us step forward.” Her voice resounded through the chamber, dancing around pillars and across the walls. The gentle echoes of it rolled back across the alicorn, and she reveled in her use of the royal pronoun. If there was ever a time for it in these days, this was it.
She wasn’t sure what to expect. Would they come in droves, worried and full of questions, or would there be few, afraid of her and her nocturn ways? Maybe none would come forward at all, and that too was okay. Like with Celestia and the dinner ritual, Luna was here, now, ready to meet their subjects halfway, doing her honest best. Whether they availed of her or not, that was entirely their choice.
The thing about the thrones were that they were essentially glorified seats. Sitting in them for any amount of time taught a mare patience as much as anything, so when the first five minutes passed in quiet, Luna took no particular slight from it. Again, they would come, or they would not.
Then, by ones and twos, cautious ponies trickled in. There wasn’t as much satisfaction in it as Luna might have expected, but she smiled and carried on.
She wondered how many of them were reporters of some form or another, always with an ear to the ground, scrambling out of house and home to pry for exclusive information. Luna, for her part, was curt and courteous with them, but short. Yes, talks were ongoing. No, she wouldn’t reveal the changelings’ location at this time.
This wasn’t an interview, nor did Luna descend into one. She shooed one pony along only to be faced by an almost identical set of questions, until they and the answers blurred together. Luna did not expect the morning papers to be kind to her, but again, didn’t particularly care for the masses’ opinion of her as much as she had.
Her thoughts took an entirely different turn when the next two ponies were ushered forwards. The first was a faded green earth pony who stumbled over herself and her words. The other, however, with a coat like carnations, stared to the princess with hungry, magenta eyes.
It was amazing, really, the way the nopony, not the guards, not the attendants or the welcomed public seemed to panic at Luna’s pounding heartbeat. Surely they must be hearing it, the way it beat against her chest, her ribs, her lungs.
Surreal. Here. A changeling. Here. In her court, and did no other pony know better? The creature stood, intense, still and staring. It was the green mare who spoke.
“Your...your majesty. My name is Brussel Sprout... I’m the matron at Sprout’s Orphanage, and umm, oh, this is Surreal, who works with us sometimes...”
Luna’s throat tightened. She should have the guards seize both ponies without delay, but for the life of her she didn’t want to betray the changeling’s trust, weird as it was. The princess hardly trusted her voice, dreading what it might let slip.
“Go on,” she managed to say.
“Well...there’s not a whole lot to it, if I can be straight with you. Er, highness.” Brussel Sprout drew a deep, whistling breath and stood straighter. “We want you to come visit us. The foals, I mean. The help and I were talking about it. It’d fill their little hearts with joy, something like that. They’ve been sidelined by life. They could use some special attention for once.”
She spoke in a silken voice. “A fine idea, of course. I will contact you as soon as I am able. It shall be a good thing for all.” Luna smiled, but it was one that never quite reached her eyes, locked on Surreal as they were. What they said, quite clearly, were this: I am going to catch you and put you in a cage and we are going to have a long discussion until somebody tells me what is going on with you changelings.
As quickly as that, the meeting ended, Brussel Sprout uttering her elation and thanks, while Surreal shuddered with relief and followed her out. Luna was left wondering what madness had to have seeped into that creature’s head to have walked - all but alone - into the heart of a stronghold filled with ponies all too eager to bind her - Luna among them, for different reasons.
Was she that desperate for the alicorn’s contact? Or - Luna thought grimly - did the changeling doubt that the princess would do a simple, good thing enough to practically scream out her clue. Here I am, come find me!
With a sickening certainty, Luna felt that had the pink pony-thing not presented itself, the princess would have brushed aside Sprout’s simple request with an even simpler refusal, more callous and unthinking than malicious, but to the same effect.
Selfish, selfish, selfish. The word tossed and turned through her, singing a litany of disapproval. So much for a fine, happy evening.
And then the doors slammed open with perfect dramatic timing, shocking the alicorn back into attentiveness.
“Captain Shining Armor? Explain yourself!” Indeed it was he, striding across the floor, flanked on either side by wary ponies, all bereft of armor. Not one of the guards on duty stepped up to challenge the display - if anything they stood up straighter, all the more proud of their position and duty. It was then that Luna truly realized which way their loyalties lay, and the truth of it stung her like a lance of frost. If they had to choose a side, it would not be hers. In her own court, she was alone.
“We’re here to petition you, as any of the thrones’ subjects can.”
“For what?”
“For you to submit yourself to a full thaumatalogical biopsy and peacefully remove yourself from the throne until it can be determined that you really are the princess Luna, and that if you are, the changelings haven’t worked some evil on you. I will not be made a fool of a second time.”
Luna stood and flared her wings. “You cannot possibly expect me to consent to such a thing! The very idea is absurd.” Only clenching his teeth together stopped the good captain from shouting in turn.
“No, your highness. What is absurd is that you can sit here and preside like a princess not half a day after shielding that beast from justice. You say this is about diplomacy? About peace? That is not what we saw in the gardens!” Luna trembled as she stood to her full height, her wings flared out to their utmost extent.
“You attacked unprovoked!”
“She is the Queen of changelings. The Queen. Of. Changelings. Anything less than caging her is an open invitation to let disaster walk free. Have you forgotten what that means, what that is? Or have you been coerced?” He let the question hang before her, like a noose.
“Get out of my sight!” The ponies cowed away at the force of her voice, all save Shining. The echoes roared, then slowed and crawled away to die in the corners. Only as the last shivered and ceased to be, warped into something well different from Luna’s own voice, did the captain turn to lead his coterie away.
“This isn’t over, princess. This will go to Celestia herself. One way or another, we will have truth and justice. Will you be ready when they come for you?”
On that ominous note he left, and the court descended into stormy silence. Luna closed her eyes, forcing herself to just breath. Breathing, that was key. When she felt she could speak without shattering windows, she did.
“Court is adjourned.” It was all she said as she turned and left to her chambers, taking refuge in her fury.