"Who's a good boy??" Cadance ruffled her magic along Cerberus's chest, the massive three-headed dog rolling onto his back and lolling all his tongues out. "You're a good boy! Yes, you are! Yes, you are!"
The waves of love that flowed from the guardian of Tartarus were completely unlike any Cadance had ever come across, and strolling past his thumping tail into the underground prison's entrance tunnel, she almost made a mental note to ask Aunt Celestia where she'd found the creature.
But no. That would inevitably lead to questions about what Cadance had been doing in Tartarus. And those were questions Cadance wouldn't feel entirely comfortable answering...
The tunnel sloped downward, dark and roughly hewn. Her horn glowing, Cadance took careful steps, the magic-dampening properties of the place making her feel like she was wrapped in cotton and reminding her of Clover the Clever's grinning words when Cadance had visited the sorceress in the Groves Beyond a few weeks back: "Your aunts and I agreed that it wouldn't do much good if the monsters could just teleport out...."
Long minutes trudged by, the air getting warm and stale, the metallic click of her shoes the only sound. But eventually, the walls pulled away, and she found herself moving out into a vast cavern, the ceiling lost in darkness. She almost increased the power of her light just to make sure there weren't things crawling around up there, but she quickly decided that if there were, she really didn't want to know about it.
Taking a breath, then, she cast the location spell she'd put together using the treasure trove of information in the Crystal Empire's Royal Library. The pink glowing bubble of it puffed up at the end of her horn, then with the 'ping' of a tiny crystal bell, it broke free to bob in the darkness before her. Of course, magic worked so weirdly down here, Cadance could only hope that—
The bubble gave another 'ping' and began drifting to her left. Cadance almost gave a squeal of glee, but remembering where she was, she stifled it and hurried after the bubble.
It led her along the wall of the cavern for quite a while, and just when Cadance was thinking maybe something had gone wrong with the spell, one of the shadows among the rocks ahead stayed a shadow even when the edge of Cadance's light reached it: the opening of another tunnel, she realized. The little pink bubble pulled into a hover for a few seconds before it darted in, and Cadance, steeling herself, followed.
The tunnel roof was just high enough for her to enter without having to stoop, and she dimmed the light from her horn, still not sure how she wanted to do this. That she would be taking them by surprise was a given, but stomping in all ablaze with power and indignation—no matter how righteous that indignation would be—Cadance didn't think she had the stomach for that...
Several steps into the tunnel, the rocky surface changed into something softer, brownish-green, and lumpy. The slightest humming sound perked her ears, and she shuddered to remember her first time back in the Realm Between after the wedding: leaving a happily-snoozing Armie, Cadance had slipped from their honeymoon bed, the joy in her heart nearly overwhelmed by the worry and fear and anger that she'd managed to shove aside for a few wonderful hours with her beloved. Slicing the air, she'd pushed through only to be met by darkness and silence for the first time in more than a thousand years, not a single quivering buzz nor flash of green fire reaching her from the entire gigantic hive covering the hillside above her little house.
Not that she'd expected Chrysalis and the changelings to be there. And not that she'd had any sort of a plan in the unlikely event that she had found them there. But staring at the cold and lifeless hive, she'd felt fire burst into her gut. What Chrysalis had done, the sheer, unadulterated betrayal she'd committed, just the thought of it had made Cadance plant her front hoofs, fire up her horn, and very nearly blast the hive with as much heat as she could muster: it had always looked like it was made of wax, so how 'bout seeing if the whole thing would melt?
Instead, though, she'd just stood there panting till her rage had melted away. Turning then, halfway determined never to come here again, she'd returned to snuggle into Armie's strong embrace with the hope that she could forget the whole horrible millennium just past and get on with the much more pleasant life lying ahead of her.
But the Calls hadn't stopped, and she'd run herself ragged trying to take care of them while smiling and pretending that she'd been working this hard the whole thousand years. Then had come the Crystal Empire, and so worn out from the flood of Calls, Cadance had come within a hair's breadth of letting that parasite Sombra back into the world. In the end, she'd only succeeded with the help of Armie, Spike, Twilight and the other Element Bearers, and even basking in the glow of the Crystal Ponies acclaiming her their new Empress, she'd shivered, knowing what she would have to do.
Some late nights in the Empire's Royal Library had gotten her half the information she needed, a few carefully worded questions to her aunts and Clover the Clever had gotten her the rest, and now Cadance was following a pink bubble into a cavern about the size of Aunt Celestia's throne room back in Canterlot Tower. Sporadic green lightning twitched and writhed along the walls, and Cadance almost gasped to see the hundreds and hundreds of changelings slumped everywhere, their eyes barely glowing, their wings barely fluttering. And in the center, just raising her head from where it had been resting between her outstretched front legs, her ears folding back and her scent as sour to Cadance's nose as a puff of swamp gas—
She'd told herself that she was ready, and she'd put together five or six different plans for handling this situation. But seeing Chrysalis struggling to her hoofs there among her fallen legions, the dark, sticky air of Tartarus more like a liquid around them, Cadance couldn't remember a single one of those plans, couldn't push so much as a word past the solid lump of hatred that jammed itself into her throat.
"So." Chrysalis drew herself shakily to her full height. "I suppose you've come to gloat."
"Gloat?" Cadance coughed up a laugh, an explosive sort of sound like she'd been hit in the stomach. "Because that's what you'd be doing to me if your plan had worked, right? Oh, no, wait: you wouldn't be standing over me gloating!" The more she tried to control her voice, the more anger poured into it. "Because if your plan had worked, it'd be dead right now, wouldn't I??"
Wings bursting from her sides, Cadance shot across the darkness toward her, Chrysalis staring wide-eyed and stumbling back half a step. "That's why you kept goading Twilight every chance you got, isn't it??" she shouted into the face of the changeling queen. "You worked her into a frenzy against you, then sent her down into the cave where I was waiting! You figured she'd see me, think I was you, and attack me! Because you knew how sensitive she is, knew how powerful she is, and you wanted her to...to—!" Her throat squeezed shut again, and all she could do was glare.
Nothing for a long, long moment, then Chrysalis said, "Ah," her gaze dropping and her neck seeming to wilt. "So instead of coming to gloat, you...you've come to kill me."
And, oh, how Cadance wanted to. She knew just how to do it, too, had pondered various ways and knew it would be the simplest thing in the world. But— "Maybe I just wanna leave you here to waste away."
A ghostly chuckle rose from Chrysalis. "Oh, no. After what I did, you'd want to see to me personally." Her head came up, something crazy and desperate in her eyes. "Besides, with me here, you haven't any choice but to handle things yourself, do you? Or are you training that pretty little husband of yours to perform your sacred duties for you now?"
The needling jab made Cadance's wings bristle; she flared power from her horn, let it wrap like a silken scarf around the changeling's neck. "Tell me you want it, Chrys," she forced out between clenched teeth. "A quick, clean snap instead of a long, slow extinction."
Eyes rolling closed, Chrysalis swallowed so hard, Cadance could feel it through the touch of her magic. "I deserve both," Chrysalis whispered.
Just about every part of Cadance screamed in agreement. But at the same time, a small, quiet place deep inside her couldn't deny how much she'd missed the cut of Chrysalis's wit, the give-and-take of their conversations, the feel of sparring with a good-natured opponent who pulled no punches and expected no punches pulled in return. And after what had nearly happened with Sombra—
Sighing, Cadance let her power evaporate. "One problem, Chrys. You didn't actually lose the bet."
Posed like a statue, Chrysalis didn't move for a whole bucketful of heartbeats. Finally, though, her eyes squinted open, puzzlement filling her face. "I what now?"
Cadance didn't want to say it, didn't want to think about it, but looking at Chrysalis partially cringing in front of her, she knew she couldn't lie about this anymore, not to Chrysalis and not to herself. "Our contest," she said, stepping back and settling onto the wax-covered rock. "You do remember the last conversation we had, don't you?"
Chrysalis blinked. "If I recall correctly, I managed to trick you into sitting quietly in a hole in the ground while I stole your life."
"Ah." Cadance raised a hoof. "So it would surprise you, then, to learn that it wasn't a trick?"
"Uhh, pretty sure it was, Cady..."
Cadance shook her head. "You set up a perfectly legitimate choice between my view of love and yours. Turns out, though—" She had to swallow. "Turns out we were both wrong."
Even the pale, quiet buzzing that had filled the cavern earlier had stopped, all those hundreds of flickering green eyes fixed on her and Chrysalis. "OK," Chrysalis said. "Maybe it's just that I've been locked away with nothing to eat but grubs and stalactite droppings the past however long it's been, but I'm not quite catching what you're pitching here."
Taking a breath, blowing it out, taking another, Cadance began: "Because I didn't just think love would save me; I knew it would. Love was all-powerful, all-knowing, all I or anypony else would ever need, and when I settled into that cave under Canterlot Tower, I figured Armie's love for me would see right through you no matter what sort of spell you tried casting on him." She couldn't keep from closing her eyes. "Of course, that was before I sat there in the dark all alone for twenty-four hours. Another twenty-four hours, and I started thinking it would be Aunt Celestia's love for me that would be too strong for you to corrupt, or maybe Aunt Luna's. And twenty-four hours after that..."
She forced herself to focus back on Chrysalis. "It happened just like you said it would, Chrys. Love didn't come to save me. I lost the bet just as much as you did."
"Ummm..." Dumbfounded was the only word Cadance could think of for the look on Chrysalis's face. "Might be you didn't notice, Cady, but Twilight Sparkle loved you so much, she wouldn't hurt you even after I'd made her see you as nothing but a heartless monster."
More breathing, and Cadance shook her head again. "I kept trying to tell myself that. But it wasn't love that saved me down there. It was friendship."
The silence in the cavern became even more silent. "There's a difference?" Chrysalis asked.
Cadance gave a little shrug. "It surprised me, too. I mean, if I thought at all about how love related to friendship, it was that friendship was the seed from which the tree of love grew, that friendship was little and cute while love was huge and powerful. But now..." She stopped, tried to distill the thoughts she'd been having ever since the wedding. "Love is a drop of rain, and friendship is an ocean. Love is plain and simple while friendship is the most complicated and beautiful thing in the world."
"I..." Chrysalis had never looked so lost and confused. "I don't understand."
"Exactly." Cadance stood, took a step toward Chrysalis. "Love, you can understand; I mean, you eat the stuff! It's as common as air and just as straightforward—didn't you say something like that once? Love's like the gag reflex, or like the dawn and the dusk: it happens whether anypony wants it to or not. But friendship, friendship is a choice, and that's the most powerful magic there is." And knowing she was making a mistake, knowing it would snap back and smack her in the face when she least expected it, but knowing just as strongly that she had to do this, absolutely had to, Cadance reached out a front hoof. "So whaddaya say, Chrys? Can we try this again?"
If Cadance had thought the cavern was silent before, it was only because she hadn't yet heard the silence that filled the place now, Chrysalis looking like a figure carved from pure obsidian, the other changelings just darker patches in the darkness around her. "What?" Chrysalis asked after a moment.
"I need you, Chrys. And not just to help me with the Calls like you used to—though I need that more than ever, too." All the contradictions that had been slamming back and forth in Cadance's head for more than half a year came swirling out of her. "It's just...I'm the Empress of the Crystal Ponies now as well as the guardian of the Groves Beyond and the wife of the most wonderful stallion in the world, and I...I need you there with me, a pony—or not a pony, but... You! Since you know me and I can trust you to—"
"Trust me??" Chrysalis exploded from the floor, her wings and legs flailing. "Are you insane??" She jabbed a shaking front hoof into Cadance's face. "I tried to kill you and take your place! You can't trust me after that! You can't!"
"I know." It took some effort, but Cadance remained in place. "And to be honest, I did figure out a way I could manage my duties with the Crystal Ponies doing what you and your changelings used to. But—" She had to blink to clear her vision. "But I don't want to manage it without you."
Chrysalis's head was shaking so quickly, Cadance thought it was more a nervous twitch than her actually disagreeing. At least, Cadance hoped that's what it was. "I used to wonder," she went on, pushing out her final point, "why I never felt love from you even when you were looking at your hatchlings. I realize now, though, that love is much too narrow a word. But I've thought of you as my friend for centuries, Chrysalis, and I...I'd like to give our friendship another try."
For an instant, nothing. Then— An emotion flickered up from Chrysalis, an emotion that barely licked at the edges of Cadance's perceptions, an emotion she doubted she would have noticed even five years ago: not love, of course, but now that she'd begun training herself using Twilight's notes, Cadance could sense an unmistakable quiver of friendship filling the cave's dark air like a mist rising from all the changelings, the thickest concentration of it surrounding the queen herself.
"You're insane." Chrysalis whispered it this time. "But you...you really mean it, don't you?"
Cadance wiggled her still-extended hoof. "Don't leave me hanging here."
The laugh that bubbled from Chrysalis's snout was as joyous a sound as Cadance had heard in months, and when she clicked a front hoof against Cadance's, the whole cavern erupted with cheers, the changelings leaping up and down. "Of course," Chrysalis said, moving close and murmuring it into Cadance's ear, "all this warm fuzziness doesn't actually change anything. Unless you've come around to the right way of thinking completely and won't oppose us cultivating the love of living ponies any longer."
"Ah." Cadance gestured back toward the tunnel. "Come with me, and I'll gladly show you just how wrong you are."
Arching an eye ridge, Chrysalis cocked her head. "Might I remind you, Cady, that the last time you tried to prove me wrong, we both ended up sitting around in caves for varying lengths of time?"
"Trust me," Cadance said, and she gave Chrysalis as toothy a grin as she could manage.
For an instant, Chrysalis's mouth and ears a little tight, Cadance thought she might refuse. But— "And the troops?" she asked, gesturing with her head to the changelings still hopping and flipping around the cave.
Nodding, Cadance raised her voice. "We all go out together."
A smile curled big and slow across Chrysalis's muzzle. "Then by all means, my princess." She bowed. "After you."
With a laugh of her own, Cadance started for the tunnel, Chrysalis falling in beside her, and for the whole long walk back to the entrance, Cadance brought her friend up-to-date with her own adventures in the Crystal Empire and the Groves Beyond as well as everything that Twilight Sparkle and the Elements of Harmony had done to make Equestria a better place. Chrysalis made a few noises here and there, all of them nearly lost in the soft shuffle of hundreds of wings behind them, until they reached the hole in the wall that Cadance knew led to the exit. "So," Chrysalis said then, interrupting Cadance's story about all the excitement surrounding Armie's official coronation as prince, "what're we gonna do about Cerberus?"
"Good question," Cadance said with a grin.
Chrysalis didn't grin back. "Not in the mood, Cady."
"All right, it's simple." With a flap of her wings, Cadance reached the entrance to the tunnel. "I'll go first, then you. We'll stand on either side of the cave mouth, and the changelings will walk between us one by one, pass Cerberus, and fly up to the north ridge of the canyon." She looked over her shoulder. "Any more questions?"
Behind her, Chrysalis looked back with her eyes half closed, an absolute sea of changelings filling the cavern, their eyes wide and glowing green. "Just one," Chrysalis said. "Have you really gone insane?"
"Trust me." If it had just been Chrysalis, Cadance would've left it at that. But worry wafted so thickly from the other changelings, Cadance went on: "My sources tell me that since I'm the Crystal Empress and you're all with me, Cerberus will let you by. And if not, well..." She added a little luster to the light from her horn and nodded to Chrysalis, the glow of her own horn a little greener but just as strong. "Between the two of us, I'm sure we can come up with something."
A tiny smile tugged Chrysalis's snout. "I'd say being an empress agrees with you." She waved to the tunnel. "But let's go find out, shall we?"
Head erect, horn glowing, steps firm and sure, Cadance did her best to project confidence during the long climb up. She had every reason to believe this would work: Clover had been one of the architects of Tartarus, after all, so if she didn't know the ins and outs of it...
A point of light appeared in the darkness ahead, got larger and brighter and closer till Cadance came out into the late afternoon sunlight, Cerberus swinging his one awake head over to her from where he lay. She gave him her gentlest and most serene smile and moved to one side as Chrysalis scooted out, her eyes squinting and her ears down.
All Cerberus's noses twitched, his other two heads popping their eyes open, but Chrysalis took her place on the other side of the tunnel entrance so calmly, Cadance could barely smell her fear.
One changeling crept forth, and Cerberus sat up, one of his heads peeling its lips back in a silent growl. The changeling froze, only his eyes moving, bugging out and glancing back. Cadance signaled with her head that he should keep going, saw Chrysalis doing the same, and the changeling took another tentative step. Another, then another, Cerberus watching with obvious distaste, but the monster dog didn't lunge, didn't bark, didn't snap any of those formidable jaws. The changeling's ears shot up, his wings buzzed, and he took off north for the ridge of the canyon.
Very carefully not heaving a sigh of relief, Cadance looked across at Chrysalis. Something that could have been a grin twitched the other's snout, then she was gesturing to the cave mouth, a second changeling inching into the light.
One by one by one, they slid from the hole and flew north, and even though the pace increased a bit, afternoon still drifted on into evening while Cadance stood, her shoulders never quite relaxing. Finally, though, the changeling coming out said quietly, "There are no more behind me, my princess and my queen." He bowed to her, then to Chrysalis, then jumped into the darkening sky.
Cerberus had remained alert the whole time, his six eyes focused quite intently on the parade. His ears at half-mast, he cocked all three heads at Cadance as if asking her a question, and for half an instant, Cadance considered sending her magic out to rub his belly. But no. This was a more solemn moment than that. So she bowed to him instead.
One of his heads looked a little gruff, but the others nodded in return, and spreading her wings, Cadance turned to Chrysalis. "Shall we?"
The changeling queen was already hovering in place. "If it wouldn't be too much trouble," she said.
Her heart feeling lighter than it had in months, Cadance leaped upward, Chrysalis swooping right beside her, the dark mouth of Tartarus and its guardian quickly lost in the jagged shadows the setting sun threw all around the walls of the red rock canyon. To the north, though, hundreds of black dots stood out all along the top of the bluff, and as they got closer, Cadance saw they were changelings all settled among the crags, their smiling faces turned north, their eyes slitted shut and their buzz more of a hum. And there, at the far northern horizon as night came on, the Aurora flickered ever more strongly.
"What—?" Chrysalis's wings faltered before picking up even faster than before, and Cadance wanted to cheer at the expression on her friend's face, the Northern Lights reflecting in her eyes. "Cady? What am I feeling here?"
"The Heart of the Crystal Empire," Cadance said quietly, the concentrated power of the Heart stroking through her own pinions even from this distance. "See, Chrys? Things have changed."
"It's...it's..." Chrysalis shook her head, gulping the air like a pony at a pond after a long desert crossing. "I don't know what it is!"
"Really?" Cadance folded her front legs and gave a phony look of annoyance. "Maybe you're heard of a little thing called love?"
"Love?" Chrysalis shook her head again. "I've known love my whole life, Cady. This stuff here—" Her frantic panting was slowing, and she looked more like herself than she had in decades, Cadance thought. "We're gonna need another word for what this stuff is." She snapped a wide-eyed look over at Cadance. "Wait! That's the Crystal Empire?? That's the place you're in charge of now??"
Cadance nodded. "And your new home." She shrugged. "I mean, we'll still use the Realm Between as our HQ, but from now on, anytime you folks need a dose of love, you can just take a walk through the Empire's Central Plaza." Folding her front legs again, she put as stern a look on her face as she could manage. "Which means no more craziness on the Calls, got it? No fraying the mosaic and putting the webwork of love in jeopardy, right?"
Chrysalis blew a breath though her lips. "Who needs that when we can get—" She tipped back her head and spread her front legs. "This?"
Relief cascading over Cadance, she couldn't help herself; she swooped over and wrapped a hug around Chrysalis. And for the first time ever, Chrysalis hugged Cadance back, Cadance's throat closing and her eyes misting up. "You done good, Cady," she heard Chrysalis say, then more quietly: "Thank you."
Squealing, Cadance spun away into a half dozen pirouettes before doing a back flip in the gathering twilight and coming to hover once more in front of Chrysalis. "Y'know? I'd call this the beginning of a beautiful friendship!"
"Yeah, well..." Chrysalis gave her that oh-so-familiar sideways smile. "We'll see."