They Never Knew

by SilverEyedWolf


Twilight Learns a New Spell

I entered the library, wearing a new bunch of loaner clothes I’d received from the tailor after she’d measured me for a uniform, as well as a whole new wardrobe of my own. At my heavy insistence, the tailor had agreed to make all clothes dark, earthy colors. I’d still refused her offering of shoes, and the stone felt nice and cool on my feet.
Pulling at the white cotton shirt, once again trying to get it to sit a little differently on my shoulders, I walked up to the desk that the young librarian sat behind. “I was told that you could point me to the Starswirl section of the library?” She looked me over, then waved me away. “No one gets in there without the princess’s permission,” she said dismissively.
I put my hand into my pocket, the guard from earlier having prepared me for this. I took out the badge Morris had given me and put it on the counter, speaking the words my escort had taught me all recruits should know by heart, “For no glory, for honor only, I fight for my country, for my family, and for my princess. Through the power of the Royal Guard, I command you to tell me the location I desire.”
The librarian’s back straightened and her eyes flashed. “Down the second row to my left, to the very back, will be a door made of black walnut wood. Breath the princess’s name on the wood, and it will open.” She reached forward, grabbing my shirt and pulling my face so close to hers I could count the black flecks in her tawny eyes. “And if you ever use the Guard’s Oath on me again, I will skin you for a coat, dragon.”
She pushed me away, and glared at me as I hurried down the specified isle. I reached the wall and looked down both ways, realizing the woman hadn’t told me where on the wall the door was. I sighed heavily, and a panel on the wall in front of me shifted slightly. I jumped a bit, not expecting it, then went in closer for a better look. The panel snapped to its original position, and I smiled.
I walked right up to the door and breathed, “Celestia.” The panel flung open, hitting me in the face. I rocked back, seeing little black dots dance across my vision, and I could have sworn I heard quiet laughter from the front of the library. I put my hand to my forehead, muttering obscenities and cursing my bad luck for getting the vengeful librarian, and headed into the hallway kept secret by the trap door in the wall.
Two guards immediately pulled their wands. I held up the badge and yelled, “My life for the princess!” They lowered their wands, keeping them drawn, and one of them beckoned me down the hall. I walked slowly, and offered the badge as soon as I got within arm length. The guard that had beckoned me took the item and ran his wand over it, illuminating it with a blue-gold light.
“I’m so sorry sir,” he immediately apologized, hurriedly handing back the badge as though it burned him. “I didn’t recognize you, I must have missed your coronation…”
“What coronation?” I asked, surprised.
The two guards shared a look, and then looked back to me. “I only got this badge this morning, borrowing it from a good man named Morris,” I explained. “I’ve yet to get my own uniform, much less badges.” The two’s eyes widened, then their faces broke into grins and one said, “Ya’ speakin’ o’ tha’ same man who ‘ad the balls to come on’ta Celestia ‘erself an’ live to tell ‘is tale?” I burst out laughing and nodded vigorously. “One and the same, friend.”
They shared a smile and a low five between themselves, then reached over and yanked at the double doors almost hidden in the wall. “I’ll assume that the princess’s student is a friend of yours? She’s been reading here all morning.” The man’s face drew downward and he said, “Get that badge back to Morris as soon as you get your own. It shows rank beyond your stature, and it might lead to some… deadly confusion. Get you own, give his back, and always remember; Our lives for the princess’s.”
I copied his movement as he saluted, then bowed to him and moved through the doorway into a bright, spacious area with padded chairs and desks littered haphazardly around. I heard frantic rustling from one of the shelves, and I walked down it to investigate.
Expecting to find a young woman riffling through dusty tomes, I instead found her holding a glowing palm over a book as she flipped through the pages with her other hand, eyes radiating a soft purple light. The hair on the back of my neck stood up and my gut jerked, feeling as though they had dropped through the floor.
“Twilight?” She twitched, as though I had slapped her, and then she grinned, a wide, manic smile. “SpikeI’vebeenREADINGreadingsomuchbutit’sSOSLOWsoIlookedforaspellto
helpmealongandIFOUNDONEandit’shelpedmesomuchI’VELEARNEDSOMANYNEW…”
I interrupted her with a slap, soft but firm, on her cheek. She sputtered for a second, then the glow faded from her eyes and hand.
“Spike?” She seemed to ask, wearily. “I was reading this spell out loud…” I nodded, and hushed her. “You need to eat, you’ve used too much magic. C’mon honey, let’s get you some food.” She smiled and nodded, and I helped her to her feet. “We’ll get one of those nice guards to point us to the kitchen.”
I put her arm around my neck and wrapped my free arm around her back, using the other to study the both of us against the bookcases. “Did you bring anything in here with you?” Twilight looked around uncertainly, then pointed to a pale wooden wand near an empty slot in a shelf. I snagged it and shoved it in Twilight’s wand holster.
We walked slowly out of the library, Twilight refusing all help that didn’t come from me, and walked to the nearest dining room, which happened to be the guard’s dining room. I flashed Morris’s badge at the guard near the door as he started over to us, then sat Twilight down at the nearest chair. “My friend over did it with a new spell, she needs some food.”
The guard smiled and nodded. “I think we all know how that feels. Tell the chef over there and he’ll set you right.” I nodded, thanking him, and as I headed over to the kitchen I heard him ask, “So what spell was it, sweetie?” She muttered, “I don’t know, one to help me read faster is all I know…”
I was out of earshot for the guard’s reaction, but he was frowning when I returned with the toast, eggs, and pancakes. I set them down in front of the girl, and I smiled as I heard her stomach gurgle. The guard pulled me over as she began to tuck into her food. “Who is that girl? She described the spell, and what she said she did… I don’t think even I could use a spell so advanced, and I’ve studied for years.”
“Well, it wasn’t so much her using the spell as the spell using her,” I said hesitantly. “I’m not an expert, but it didn’t seem so much like she was in control.” The guard nodded, saying, “That’s how it goes sometimes, with the big spells like that. Where did she even find such a spell?”
I sighed, thinking of how best to describe the entire situation. I turned to Twilight, who was roughly halfway through the food and recovering her color nicely. “Twilight, did you happen to keep that letter? The one to get you through the guards?” She reached into her pocket and handed me a carefully folded sheet of paper, which I unfolded and handed over to the guard. As he read, his face got blanker and smoother, losing any sign of emotion. He folded the sheet carefully and handed it back to Twilight, who pushed it back into her pocket. She also pushed the plates away, leaving a piece of toast and a pancake.
“Is it that frightening, what that says inside?” I asked the guard. He looked me in the eye, keeping his face a slate. “That’s one of the princess’s letters, a special kind she likes to write that changes for every person reading it at different times. She speaks very highly of you two, and quite… extensively on what happens if anything happens to either of you two.”
“If she was that concerned about my safety, I don’t think she would have named me a member of her Royal services.” He nodded, saying, “Yeah, she mentioned making you member of her personal guard, the first full-timer in… well, since the last ones died some time ago.”
I looked at him, surprised. “I’m to be with Celestia all the time?” The guard shrugged. “Kind of, it’s more like she summons you whenever she wants you around, but you can also go see her whenever you wish… it was a really complicated system, which is why she never chose another when her last one died.”
He blushed slightly and added in, “Plus, well, rumors abound and such…”
I looked at him, surprised. “Surely not among the guards?” I asked, a little surprised at the sharpness of my words. He paled and bowed, saying quickly, “Of course not sir, mostly among nobles and housewives, people who had nothing to do besides make up these rumors.”
I nodded to myself, then frowned at him. “Why sir? You’ve surely been around longer than I?” He straightened and nodded slowly. “Yes, but you rank much higher than I do…” I shook my head. “That doesn’t make sense. Do I have power to issue orders?” The man hesitantly nodded. “Then use your wand to get this about. Make sure no-one thinks they’re below me just because of some rank I know nothing about. I’m no higher than any other man I serve with until I’ve earned it.”
He frowned unhappily, but still repeated what I’d said into his wand-tip. He held it to his ear and waited for the confirmation, then nodded to me. “It’s done.”
“Thank you.” I looked over to Twilight, who was pouring over the letter again. “Twilight, I think it’s time we went and found Celestia.” She looked up at me, wide-eyed. “Do you think she’d be okay with us not waiting? Maybe we should wait until she summons us?’ I looked over at the guard and asked, “Do you happen to know if she’s awake? And where she’s located if she is?”
He whispered into his wand again, then said, “She’s still in the garden, but she’s not asleep right now. Should I summon an escort for you?”
“Unless you want to come see the princess with us? Get someone to cover your area and you could come with us.” He shook his head and whistled around the corner. “This is my area of duty, I could get me and whoever relieved me in trouble for just wanting to see the princess.” A man came around the corner, dressed in clothes similar to mine; white cotton shirt and dark brown trousers.
“Will, could you take these two to the princess’s garden?” Will bowed and turned down the hall, walking back to the turn. He stopped there, waiting for me and Twilight. I helped her out of her chair, and with a last salute to the man who had helped us, we were on our way to the garden.
“The castle seems to have a lot of unnecessary twists and turns,” I said conversationally to Twilight. She was engrossed in the architecture of the halls, and looked down each hall we passed and didn’t go down. “I think it’s supposed to be this confusing,” she said, “Keep attackers on their toes.”
We reached a door, almost identical to the one to the courtyard, except it had an ivy vine carved into the door’s edges. Will knocked in the middle of the door, and waited. After a second or so, the door opened and Will bowed, saying, “This is your destination. Whistle should you need any assistance.” We thanked him and stepped through the door, into the bright sunlight of midday afternoon.
Celestia sat on a blanket in the middle of the garden, sipping out of a cup. All around her were different kinds of flowers, multicolored and healthy. There was a small stream that ran through the middle, and several different species of trees grew on the other side. Celestia turned and smiled at us, looking much less tired than she had when I’d left her last night.
We joined her, and she motioned to the blanket. “Please, join me.” Twilight sat immediately, blushing lightly and staring intently at the stream that passed the flowers and wound gently to the wall. I sat next to her, on the grass. She looked at me and said, “Plenty of blanket free, Spike.”
“He’s never felt the grass before honey, let him enjoy it,” Celestia said, smiling and patting her on the shoulder. Twilight flushed a bit, then took off her own shoes and ran her feet through the grass. Celestia laughed out loud, then copied her, tossing her plain white flats on the grass. We all sat there, comfortably silent and enjoying the cool feeling on our feet.
“Twilight almost got herself into some trouble this morning,” I told Celestia, looking up into a deep blue sky, sun hiding behind a patch of clouds that stayed conveniently still.
“Oh?” asked Celestia. “What exactly happened?”
Twilight had blushed at my sentence, and was bright red now. “I was reading a book, hoping it could help me read more books faster… It was called ‘Words can Flow like Rivers’, or something like that. It had a spell it said could help, but I had some trouble figuring out how I would pronounce it, so I tried sounding it out like I did when I was little. It didn’t occur to me that just reading it out loud would actually cast it…”
Celestia looked Twilight over worriedly, but I waved at Twilight. “Twilight’s fine Celestia, just used way too much magic in too short of time. We got her some breakfast and she perked up just fine.” The princess nodded, then asked, “So, what do you remember reading?”
“Mostly theory, what magic is and where it comes from,” she said, excited all of a sudden. “I read at least four conflicting theories, all of them fascinating in their own ways… Mysterious objects from space, living energy borrowed from the world and returned, our own life force… So very many thoughts from so many people…”
Celestia laughed and patted Twilight on her head. “Anything else? More spells?” Twilight shook her head, and Celestia nodded. “Be careful with that reading spell, and make sure to use it only when Spike or I am around, and some food on back-up wouldn’t hurt.”
Twilight turned wide eyes to Celestia. “So, I can still use the spell? You’re not mad at me?”
Celestia laughed and nodded. “Of course I’m not mad at you, you learned a multitude of things of your own volition, and you didn’t hurt yourself too much doing it. Just enough to know to be careful next time, but not too much to never use the spell again. Why would I be mad at you for that?”
Twilight blushed at the princess’s praises, and plucked three pieces of grass from the ground, weaving them into a small braid. Celestia smiled and grabbed her hair. “Would you like to do that to me instead? My hair gets in my way quite often, and I’m sure a braid would help.”
Twilight reached out and gently stroked the princess’s hair, letting it run through her fingers like a waterfall. “Are you sure? Your hair is so beautiful, I’d hate to damage it in any way…” She slowly began to weave three large chunks of the princess’s hair together, gently tugging the braid tighter into itself.
The princess closed her eyes, and we three sat in silence for a while, enjoying the sun and birdsong. I leaned back, staring up to the sky and feeling the grass on my back. My eyes closed themselves, and I felt so very warm and comfortable. For a while, I slept.