The door slammed behind me after Blueblood and I walked into the cottage. The ferocity behind the door did make menvery aware not to tick Blueblood off.
"Sorry about that, you want a cider?" Blueblood called out as he walked directly into the kitchen.
"What?"
"A cider, a light alcoholic drink made from apples. You want some?"
"Excuse me?"
"Please tell me they have apples where you come from. Or alcohol for that matter."
"Hold on a moment," I said waving my arms around, "Tell me, what is going on here?"
"I am asking if you want a drink. So yes or no?"
"No, I want you to tell me what this is all about!" Now I was getting quite agitated.
"Are you talking about that infernal beast thing? Sorry just needed to keep up appearances."
"Wait, was that what that was all about? Appearances? What the hell for?"
He walked back into the room with two bottles of what I assumed was cider and sat down on the sofa. He then beckoned me to take a seat as well and placed one of the bottles onto a table sitting beside one of the chairs. After uncapping his bottle and taking a long pull he started to explain things.
"What do you know of Equestrian politics?"
"I know that you are ruled over by a group of four alicorn princesses, but that is all. What does this have to do with you being a dickbag?"
"Heh, dickbag, I'll have to remember that for later." he muttered to himself. "Well you see that isn't even as true as it would make you assume. While there are the four princesses that rule Equestria, they don't rule all of it. Not strictly at least. They have their hooves in international accords and matters of defense. While every city has their own ruling body that sets legislature for their individual regions. For example we have a mayor of Ponyville despite the princesses."
"You still haven't explained why you are an utter douchesnozzel."
"Getting there, getting there. While most cities have an electoral system for their government, Canterlot, the capital, is commanded by an aristocratic senate. Every major house gets one representative and if any other house wants to join they have to go through a long and tedious application process that normally gets turned down. As you can see this is a very exclusive system. As such those with large amounts of power tend to keep it for very long times.
"The Blueblood house not only is one of the longest houses to be in this senate, but it is also one of the few houses that can choose to ban or bring in another house on its own. As that goes that gives alot of power to my house.
"And that would be alot on its own, but I also have the privilege of being in the top five most wealthy non-ruling families. Last but not least I have a greater connection to Princess Celestia than almost anyone else."
"So what does that mean, you have a large cheque book?"
"It means I have a giant target on my back. And I plan not to get a bolt in my back, so I need some safety measures. The princesses all have their incredible magic, and I have a facade of a dickbag as you call it. It makes anyone who wants to make a move on me either too frightened that I will levy all my resources to smite them, or view me as too ignorant to be any threat."
"A defense mechanism, that's why you have one of the worst reputations around?"
"You got it."
"Then why tell me all of this? Doesn't this ruin your reputation?"
He leaned back and good an incredibly long pull of the cider, almost finishing it. He then leaned forward and said, "I just spent twelve hours on a train after spending three days trying to secure an apple whiskey deal from Appleloosa. At this point I just want to sit back and relax. Besides, Auntie wants me to watch you and help you acclimatize for who knows how long and it would be alot easier we had each others trust." He ended with passing me the other cider.
Wow, that stuff was good, nice and sweet with a bit of tartness to top it off. It was quite a few minutes of us setting there before I broke the silence. "So Blue, how much do you know of Celestia?"
"Absolutely tons. Why didn't you meet her?" he wondered.
"Well I saw her, but she kind of knocked me out." I said rubbing the back of my head.
"What did you do?!" He asked incredibly alarmed.
"Nothing, literally. She walked in, said she needed to speak with me and her passive magic knocked me out."
"That's strange. What caused it?"
"Magical sensitivity."
"Odd. Anyway, the easiest way to explain her would be a large mother for a pack of dogs. She is incredibly caring and affectionate most of the time, but the moment you put her foals in danger. I would never want to be on the other side of her when she is angry I tell you that."
"What of the other princesses."
"Well the second eldest is Celestia's sister, Luna. While Celestia is akin to a dog, Luna is much closer to a cat. She has a much harder time coming out of her shell then her sister and is alot more likely to become skittish and run off if too many people approach her. However it is said that she is much closer to those she knows then one would expect.
"Next after that is Cadence. She is the oddest case of the princesses that is for certain. You see she isn't really even a princess of Equestria, she rules over the Crystal Empire to the north. She is often called the princess of love, and rightly so. She has a habit of being able to temper down even the harshest of situations. Of any of the princesses she is the one I would want by my side while brokering a trade agreement.
"And finally we have Twilight, whom if I was informed correctly you haven't made the best of impressions on."
"Yeah, well she kind of lit me on fire."
"And how on earth did she do that. Wait let me guess."
"Magical sensitivity." we both said at the same time.
"Of course. Well I really don't think she did that on purpose. If she did want to hurt you she would probably be alot more creative about it. And when it comes to being a ruler I have no idea what she will be doing, she only ascended recently. Well I've answered your question now why don't you answer one of mine, what do you know about your magical sensitivity?"
"Well not much. I thought that it would be fairly straight forward at first. Can't make contact with magic or suffer burns, but is countered by granting me a healing factor. I thought that would be alright, but then I got more symptoms. If I am even around too much magic it can cause me to pass out. Even that wasn't too bad, just meant that I had to live more akin to a hermit to avoid passing out while moving my fridge.
"But them there is the, I have no idea what to call it, darkfire? Sure let's go with that. I have only done it once, but it was scary. That amount of power, the raw force. It was uncontrollable. And if it were just a blast wave that would be one thing, but it's not. It leaves behind indigo flames that touches everything but burns nothing. It looks demonic. I have no idea what caused it, I have no idea how to stop it, and worst of all, I don't know what will happen if I can't control it."
"Well I guess that is just something we will have to work on." Blueblood said before standing up.
"What do you mean?" How the hell am I supposed to control something like that?
"Well to control it we need to recreate it. Come on, I know of a nice isolated spot that we can work on it."
"No way, I am not doing that again!" I said standing up and pushing away from him.
"Listen, James. If we don't work on you controlling your darkfire, someone is just going to get hurt when it goes off. Now I'm not going to force you, but I think it is for the best if we do this now rather than later."
I stood there crossed between two options. On the one hand I could just ignore the darkfire, but who knows who will get hurt if it goes off again. On the other hand if I work on controlling it, the darkfire could become even more powerful. If it becomes more powerful I have no idea what we would do.
"I guess you are right, Blue."
"Of course I am. Now follow me before it gets too late and everypony is wondering around."
Once more into the breach I guess.