Prologue: Days Gone By
The halls of Canterlot Castle were a bit more empty than usual for the post-lunchtime lull, and Twilight found aside from the guard or odd courier that ran to and fro dressed in palace livery, the palace seemed next to deserted. She supposed, that might have been because of the mare she was with at the moment. It was a realization that made Twilight shake her head in disappointment at her fellow ponies.
Standing a head taller than most stallions, Princess Luna’s imposing figure and her midnight mane was only half the reason that so few of the Equestrian populace would stand in her presence. What drove most of the ponies from her was the reputation that Luna had procured over the past thousand years. For centuries, the foals of Equestria had been told stories of Nightmare Moon, and how she would come down and gobble them up if they didn’t finish their dinner, chores, homework and whatnot. The fact that Nightmare Moon was a factual being, and not some bedtime story like the headless horse actually made such stories linger into adulthood and cause some problems for the socially inexperienced mare upon her return from banishment.
The other problem was that the truth of the moon goddess wasn’t far from the myth. While she would certainly never attack the children of Equestria for not finishing their assigned tasks, Luna was very abrasive and domineering when in public. But then, when her duties involved sentencing ponies for crimes, defending Equestria during the hours between dawn and dusk, as well as removing the mental anguish of the populace while they slept, one needed a thick coat to survive the wear and tear.
It was also why Twilight Sparkle found herself able to be a bit more direct with her than she would with Princess Celestia; aside from the fact that her mentor had been more of an untouchable god figure for most of Twilight's life, while Luna's dealing with the unicorn had first been as an alicorn that appeared more foal then mare, followed by an encounter with her sobbing in despair on Nightmare Night. It made her seem all too...normal. “Princess Luna…what’re you doing up so early? It’s barely past one in the afternoon.”
“Why everypony thinks I sleep all day, I’ll never understand. Six hours is enough for normal ponies, so why not me as well?” the goddess said as she shook her head before looking over to Twilight. “Now Twi, since Tia is busy, um...I belive she is meeting with the Duke of Appleloosa at the moment. So, I shall be happy to cover this week’s curriculum. How are things going between you and Rainbow?”
Twilight resisted the urge to sink in on herself at being called a nickname by royalty. Ever since becoming Rainbow’s teacher, Luna had apparently decided that Twilight had entered some inner circle that allowed her to see a different facet of the alicorns and allow for an extreme amount of familiarity as far as the princesses were concerned. While nothing really had changed between her and Cadence, and things had returned to normal with Rainbow, Luna and Celestia were a but more…teasing, Twilight supposed.
“It’s going…about the same as last week,” Twilight admitted as she thought of her pupil’s studies and their lackluster speed of improvement. “Rainbow is still having trouble moving anything smaller than a pony with her magic. She keeps overcharging the field and…well, I’ve had to pull a lot of things out of my walls so they could heal. Thank you for the eternal re-growth spell by the way. I think Rainbow would have managed to bring the library down a second time if it didn’t patch itself up these days.” It also helped the new town library had a permanently fresh pine scent, despite the fact that it was in no way, shape, genus of form, a pine tree.
The explanation got a loud laugh from Luna. “Ah, I was the same when I was first learning to use my horn. So many of my dolls went flying over half of Equestria,” she said, laughting a moment at some ancient memory before continuing. “And your lessons?”
“Very good,” Twilight replied in her best Unicornian before switching back to modern Equish. “Well, the spoken word at any rate, written is a little bit harder. I managed to get Dash to teach me by reading Daring Do books, and having her read out loud while I performed an transcription spell and followed along. Then I have to go over it all again in the written word since that’s what I’m really needing to learn.”
The memory of those nights filled Twilight’s mind for a moment, and she found herself thinking back to their last session. She and Rainbow had been on the unicorn’s bed with the book between them and Twilight’s journal for transcriptions off to the side as magic made it follow along with Dash’s words. The alicorn’s larger than average wing had been dropped across body to generate a blanket of warm air around her to create a perfect atmosphere, while Twilight found her head resting on the larger mare’s forelegs since her knowledge of the old language had long since gotten to the point where she didn’t need to read along in Equish to help understand the meaning behind the words.
“And the smile?”
Twilight opened her half-laden eyes and found herself back in the castle, standing in the middle of a hallway that felt much too cold all of a sudden. “Smile?” she asked.
Another giggle came from Luna’s mouth, and the alicorn of the night gave Twilight a knowing smirk that the unicorn had seen on Celestia’s mouth all too often as of late when it came time to deliver Rainbow’s weekly progress report. “Well if she can’t fully control her telekinesis yet, there’s no need to move onto the more complicated spells. So, just continue to work with her until she can move something as small as a bit without tossing it with enough force to break the sound barrier.
“Is there anything you require of me, little Twily?”
She could at least stick to Twi, the unicorn bemoaned. Twily was what her older brother called her. “I would like to take a look into the archives again. Something that Rainbow Dash asked me about last week has been bugging me.”
“Oh? Pray tell,” Luna said. “Mayhap I could shed some light on this problem.”
Twilight couldn’t help but smirk. “Now who’s needing language lessons?”
In response, Luna rolled her eyes. “I will admit, full mystery of thy modern vernacular continues to elude me and I doth find myself slipping when excitement ignites a fire within my breast. Now, what hath our dearest niece proposed to thee Twilight?”
“Last week, Rainbow asked me about something called the…Crystallum Imperium, I think it was,” the unicorn said before stopping. “But I’ve looked around and, I’ve never found any mention of a Crystal Empire in my library’s history section…or Canterlot’s for that matter.”
Luna let out a groan. “Ah yes…that is a bit of a sore subject for Tia and I,” she mumbled. “And as you’ve noticed, sore subjects tend to become…forgotten when we’re around. Ponies recognize when we don’t want to discuss things, and such information tends to just fall out of use. The oddity causes me no end of grief after returning from my absence. I’m still trying to find cooks able to make me a decent moon pie.”
The fact that the princess wanted it forgotten did stir a bit of doubt in Twilight’s mind whether she should even be talking about it, but Rainbow had asked, so… “What is it?”
“When Andromeda fled north with her supporters, she put together her own little kingdom in the frozen wastes, beyond the sight of what consisted of Equestria at the time,” Luna explained. “Using her expertise in magic, she created a race of constructs that would eventually be come to known as crystal ponies to serve as her labor force and eventually, rule over.”
Twilight frowned at the oddity of the explanation. “So…she what? Made a bunch of magical dolls to play with?”
“Our sister was mad, but quite knowledgeable in the ways of magic Twilight,” Luna told her. “If you were to ever meet a crystal pony, I guarantee you would not believe it to be some kind of tinker toy. After her creations and several other magics Andromeda thought up failed to meet their designed purpose, she turned to inventing Necromancy.”
Not wanting to get off track, Twilight had to force herself not to ask the half a dozen questions Luna’s explanation brought into the unicorn’s mind and bit her tongue as a reminder to stay on task. “So what happened to it? The kingdom, I mean.”
The question turned Luna’s mood somber. “After we dealt with Andromeda, Tia and I couldn’t simply leave the place unattended to,” she began. “The Empire’s capital city was actually a giant magic amplification matrix Andromeda designed to try and face an unleashed alicorn on equal terms. So we left it in the hands of our most trusted noble house to act as our stewards. However, the last unicorn to hold the empire became hungry for more than what was his and delved into my eldest sister's dark arts in an attempt to seize power over all Equestria. He managed to link himself to the array and gain control of its magic. So my sister and I banished him into the dark abyss. What we hadn’t counted on was the fact that his link to Tambelon dragged it with him.
“The crystal ponies were the single good thing our sister managed to create with her magic Twilight Sparkle, the only bit of her legacy that wasn’t tainted by darkness, and in our foolishness, we destroyed it.”
With the story finished, Twilight found a particularly interesting piece of floor to stare at. "Sorry to bring something so painful up."
“Old news,” Luna replied, just tossing her depressed mood out the window. “Pray tell, what else have you and my dear niece been up to since the two of you returned to Ponyville?”
“Well,” Twilight began before taking a moment to gather her thoughts. Since she had no idea just how much Luna read of the letters to Celestia, the purple unicorn thought it best to try and play it safe by just going over everything. “Well, I suppose you know about the so-called dragon attack on Ponyville…I honestly don’t know what we would have done if Rainbow hadn’t been there to pin Spike down with those cloud chains long enough for Princess Celestia to come and…how does that work anyway? I didn’t know clouds could be made solid enough to do something like that. Rainbow couldn’t even explain how it worked.”
Luna giggled at the question. “Ah unicorns, always doing the impossible, but when another tribe comes along and gives magic as an explanation, they cry foul,” she commented before looking over to Twilight. “It’s a pegasus thing. You’d have to have wings to understand.”
For a moment, Twilight thought to follow that little statement with another regarding something that had been bugging her since her meeting with Celestia in the spa’s massage room. The princess had hinted that it might be possible for Twilight to gain her own status as an alicorn. However, she had not mentioned it since.
Although the trait of modesty had been handed to her by Celestia in every lesson since becoming her student, the debacle that sprang from Twilight attempting to foster such beliefs on Rainbow had the unicorn doubting whether or not such ideals were so absolute as she had believed them to be. But at the same time, addressing her teacher for guidance about such an issue seemed a great deal…out of line.
“Please tell me that was not the last eventful thing that transpired in you little hamlet Twilight Sparkle,” Luna said, bringing Twilight’s thoughts to an end.
The unicorn smiled, and shook her head. “No,” she replied before continuing on. “Well, of course we came here for the Hearts Warming Eve play and had dinner at the castle. Then…um…a few weeks after spring started, Applejack took part in the Grand Equestrian Rodeo. It’s funny, you know…everypony always concentrated on how Rainbow Dash always seemed to place too much of an importance on competing and her boasting, but nopony had guessed the reason Applejack didn’t come home was because she didn’t get a single blue ribbon and was too ashamed for not being able to fulfill her promise to donate money for our new town hall.”
After taking a breath, Twilight paused in thought again and tapped a hoof to her chin. “Let’s see…then there were those thieves.”
Luna’s eyes narrowed at the description. “Thieves?”
“Oh, a pair of ponies named Flim and Flam showed up with a machine that was powered by magic that made cider at the start of Cider Season in Ponyville. But they stole some of Applejack’s apples to do it, and Rainbow arrested them for it,” Twilight explained halfheartedly. “Umm…let’s see…then there was…oh, Fluttershy took some assertiveness training recently…it didn’t work out too well.”
Once again, Luna’s reaction to the news wasn’t what Twilight had been expecting. She simply chuckled. “Well, that is pleasant to hear. The pony who taught me how to speak in the modern vernacular becoming aggressive…it is not a pleasant thought.”
This time, it was Twilight who frowned at the comment. Wait a minute, I never said Fluttershy became…does she already know everything that’s happened in Ponyville? For a moment, she even wondered if this was all some sort of test, but that was more Celestia’s style than Luna’s. Something Twilight had learned of their differing personalities since her instruction of Rainbow Dash began.
However, Twilight left the question unasked, and just continued on. It wasn’t her place to ask questions of a princess after all. “Then there was my little…time travel incident, and well…we got Princess Celestia’s request for an update on Rainbow’s education when Spike was participating in the dragon migration and…I already told you why we’re late.”
“I…see,” Luna said before her own expression shifted to one of thought. “Something else…ah yes! What did you two do for…what was the name of that holiday again? The one that celebrates love.”
“Hearts and Hooves Day?”
“Yes!” the princess exclaimed before looking back at Twilight with a grin on her face. “That is it. Tell me, did you have any…romantic rendezvous with a special somepony?”
Twilight’s face shifted into an expression of confusion to match the discombobulated thoughts running through her mind at Luna’s question. Why would anypony be interested in her? She was just an advanced magical student living in a library with a below average physique and social skills that were just now beginning to bud. “No…why would I?”
In an instant, Luna’s expression turned from an excited smirk with a twinkle of mischief in her eyes to flabbergasted disappointment. “You can’t be serious,” she deadpanned, putting on an emotionless mask that Twilight has seen all of the alicorn’s use at one point or another.
The question made Twilight feel a bit like somepony had poked her heart with a tiny needle for a moment. In all honesty, it would have been nice if somepony had taken a bit of an interest in her, but her logical mind quickly quashed that line of thought. With her friends, teaching, and the studies of ancient magic the princess had been sending her lately, Twilight just didn’t have time for another relationship on top of everything that was already going on in her life.
Still, a tiny little bit of her mind mumbled, still it would have been nice to be offered something like that…even if I had to turn them down.
“Well…just where is my niece anyway?” the Goddess of the Moon asked.
Out of all the stupid, snooty, stuck-up nobles in Canterlot, Rainbow Dash was in the house of the one she hated the least. Fancy Pants was throwing a party to celebrate the midpoint of Spring, and Rainbow Dash had to come because Rarity had wanted to come, and Rainbow had promised Rarity to accompany her to all the big social events for a year in payment for skipping out on her own coronation. After all, if Rarity could drag the newest princess to parties, then she would be invited to all of them.
The real reason for Rainbow’s actions was because she could still remember the look on the poor mare’s face the first day Rainbow had become an alicorn and scared her friends half to death. It was something that she still found herself thinking about nearly every day to help her stay in control of herself. Even though her bonding with the sky had created a place for her power to be channeled to so that no more mana storms would be made from a foolish temper tantrum, her emotions still had a very real effect on the weather around her.
As usual, the white fashionista was mingling with the crowd. She was talking to some gray earth pony with shades that Rainbow thought looked familiar. Soon, Rarity would give a signal to Rainbow for the princess to come over and join in on the conversation for a few minutes, then be on her way before she could put her hoof in her mouth. It was their best method to make Rarity be seen as the important mare Dash knew her to be without the princess messing it up.
It all would have been at least a little bearable if not for the sparkling black dress that Rarity had designed for her. The tiny…thing did little more than cover her marehood, and sparkled from all the sequins that turned Rainbow’s dress into a cloth version of Luna’s mane. It was the reason Rainbow had left it in Canterlot as her super emergency backup party dress instead of wearing it after the mare had made the thing.
“Ah finally, somepony who knows how to hold a good conversation while trying not to look down their muzzles at everything they’re talking about.”
The alicorn looked away from her friend, and over to the unusually tall unicorn that was standing beside her. Fleur was the mare of the house and another one of the Canterlot elite that Rainbow Dash didn’t feel like bucking on general principal.
Rainbow looked over to the unicorn that could actually manage to look her in the eyes without craning her neck up thanks to some eastern country blood. “Lady Fleur…or is it High Lady? I keep forgetting the way nobility is supposed to be these days.” In truth, it didn’t interest her much; although Rainbow did know that Fleur’s husband was just a step below enlightened royalty like Cadence.
Fleur looked over to the princess, genuine curiosity showing in her eyes instead of just the false interest that Rainbow had come to expect from the unicorns around the city. “Just Lady. How did that used to work, exactly?” she asked.
“Be burned if I know,” Rainbow confessed. “I just remembered the more words a pony had in front of their names back in the old days, the more important they were. You should have heard what they used to call Mom.”
The lady giggled the alicorn with a tiny laugh before moving in a little too close to comfort for Rainbow to whisper in the ear of the goddess. “By the way, have you heard the latest gossip? Apparently, Blueblood has decided to try his hand in the office of foreign affairs.”
The news made Rainbow let out a groan. Although she had done her best to forget about the pompous peacock, Blueblood usually was a topic of conversation at least once a week when she came to eat dinner with Celestia and Luna. Apparently, the fool was running himself ragged trying to regain his royal title, doing everything he could try. For the first two months, the idiot threw himself into magical study, getting so far into the subject even Celestia was impressed with his enthusiasm. Only, he failed to produce any meaningful results with all his training, showing everypony the mark on his flank was most certainly not given out for magic.
Blueblood’s involvement with the foreign affairs office was a little unsettling though. There, he could actually cause from real problems that didn’t involve blowing himself up. “So which group can I be expecting a war from? The Dragon Tribes, or the Griffin Empire?”
Fleur laughed. “The birds. He did want to try the dragons first though…but apparently, got halfway to where they were supposed to migrate to in the badlands before coming to his senses one day and running home. Personally, I think it’s the smartest thing he’s done. The lizards would have probably eaten him.”
And I could have been there to watch…buck. “If only,” Rainbow mumbled before realizing her little slip.
Although she had gotten better at it the past few weeks, her memories still brought some problems. While her Aeromancy and hoofwriting had improved drastically, once she had learned to stop writing in two dead languages whenever her mind wandered too much that is, her sense of humor and a few mannerisms had been affected by a dead pony from a time when Equestria hadn’t been such a nice place to live. A few comments that were simply made as a joke involving violence against other ponies had caused some stir early on in Dash's princess days, giving her a bit of a bad reputation.
However, a second later, Rainbow realized that the line of fatalist humor had been participated in by the unicorn next to her without any nervousness or a startled gasp. She narrowed her eyes at the other pony, who smirked in response. The expression also held a bit of danger in her eyes.
“Saddle Arabian, huh?” Rainbow mumbled. “With the name, I would have guessed you were from Prance.”
“My mother had several flings with a dozen or so unicorn tourists,” Fleur answered cryptically. “Premarital sex between a stallion and a mare isn’t so frowned upon back home as it is here.”
Rainbow looked back over to Rarity for a moment to see she hadn’t called the princess over yet, then turned to regard the tall unicorn again. “So how did you and Fancy Pants meet? I don’t think I’ve heard that story.”
The question brought a dreamy look on Fleur’s face, as she was obviously remembering happy times. “Oh, nothing you wouldn’t find in your average storybook romance I suppose,” she said with a blissful sigh. “It was back when he still worked for the foreign affairs office as an ambassador. I was assigned to be his liaison, create a physiological profile, see if we could find a way to exploit him…the usual way things work over there.
“Of course that actually involved getting to know him, acting like his friend and then going on…dates,” she continued before reaching up to tap her horn. “This thing may have made me useful, but I was hardly popular among my peers. There was also the question of if being a unicorn made me more loyal to my father’s homeland than my mother’s.”
Rainbow was able to quickly fill in the rest. “And because of that, you weren’t all that attached to the place, so you decided to run away with him to Equestria after getting to know him for a bit. Changed your name too, I’m guessing.” A moment of silence passed between the two before Rainbow thought of something else to ask. “So, they do that herding thing over there?”
“Oh yes…to both. I even stayed in Prance for a year to help with the whole cover. Even earned a cuite mark while I was there,” she said before turning to show I off. “I was over thirty, but…better late than never I suppose.”
That bit of news got a laugh from Rainbow Dash. “I should bring you by Ponyville sometime, there’s this filly whose been running around with her friends trying to earn one by doing everything they can as fast as they can, but haven’t stumbled on their thing yet. Although, I don’t know if it’ll give her hope, or freak her out it took a pony thirty years to get one.”
“About that Highness,” Fleur said a bit more reserved than she was a moment ago. “With all the social events your friend is dragging you to, Princess Celestia believes you might do with a bit of…refinement training.”
Oh hay no, Rainbow bemoaned. “Look, you’re part of that whole inner circle thing, right? You know I’ve already had all that junk.”
Fleur nodded. “Which is why it is so out of date. I swear, it’s like Luna’s return all over again. So the princess believes that a refresh course is in order. I’ll be…taking a vacation in Ponyville next week. I hope we can spend some time together.”
Translation, Rainbow thought to herself. Come with me to get worked like a diamond dog or I’ll tell Mother on you.
“…swell,” she mumbled while wondering just what the hay was Celestia thinking.
Celestia sat in her almost empty throne room as she looked down at the diagram placed on the table before her, doing her best not to let the nervousness show. From what she could see, her agents had made a complete mess of the situation and with the deadline for decisions quickly approaching, all of her efforts and months of planning were about to come toppling down. If that were allowed to happen, the effects would be felt throughout all Equestria for a generation to come!
In a moment of weakness, Celestia thought of handing her royal duties over to another in order to focus all her attentions on the task at hand, but a few moments of consideration made the goddess throw that idea out as well. Luna’s style of rule was still a bit too archaic for modern times, Aurora wanted nothing to do with the crown, and Cadence couldn’t have such a duty placed upon her at this time.
So, once again, Celestia found herself needing to bear all the burdens alone.
“Okay let’s see…if I repositioned the guards here…no,” she mumbled to herself. “Should I hold the Wonderbolts back until afterwards? But if I do that…hmm, perhaps I should call in Rainbow Dash to fulfill that task.”
The sound of a throat clearing made the goddess look up from the numerous papers before her and turn her attention to her adviser Kibitz. “I know I scheduled more time for this session today,” Celestia told the pony with the pocket watch chain hanging from his fine suit.
“Princess, not to doubt your methods or anything, but…they do have professionals for these things,” he told her. “Perhaps you should be hiring one of them.”
Celestia fixed the stallion with a glare. “I have already had to run off three party ponies, two catering services, five different bands along with ten decorators! It has become quite obvious that if I hope to get anything done properly for my dear niece’s wedding, then I will have to be planning it all myself!”
The declaration had Kibitz giving her a flat look. “Highness, might I remind you the last…social event you planned?”
“As I remember, Princess Cadence’s last birthday party went quite well,” Celestia said, a little confused.
“That isn’t the event I speak of Highness…although, if memory serves…wasn’t the cake and oeuvres an emergency rush job because you forgot the princess was allergic to seaweed?”
With her minor slip-up of a tiny problem pointed out, Celestia shrugged. Even divinity wasn’t perfect. But if Kibitz wasn’t talking about that little incident, then… “Ah yes, the celebration to announce her engagement!”
Once again, her adviser shook his head. “No Highness…although, I don’t think Shinning Armor has quite forgotten about the fact that none of the guests on his half of the list appeared and…did he not have to endure his little sister’s wrath shortly after your adopted daughter’s ascension for not even hearing about their engagement until then?”
Celestia cleared her throat and looked away. “Yes, well…the mail is not the most reliable means of communication,” she mumbled.
“I thought that Twilight Sparkle possesses a dragon bound to your magic that allows you to communicate with her in moments,” her adviser said. “But, that was not the event to which I was referring.”
The point had the goddesses’ ire growing quickly, and she glared at her timekeeper of an adviser with a dissatisfied frown. “And just what event were you referring to? Pray tell?”
Kibitz apparently picked up on Celestia’s mood, and coughed while looking away. “A-Actually, Highness, I was speaking of the…party, you quickly threw together to announce your adopted daughter’s presence as an alicorn to the Canterlot nobility. I do…um…believe that almost ended with Princess Rainbow going mad and drowning all life in Equestria.”
The room was silent for a good ten seconds as Celestia reigned in her anger to keep from striking the stallion in front of her dead. The accusation of insanity and using one’s alicorn nature to end life by abusing the mantel of their domain was something that struck a little too close to home for even Celestia’s self control to handle.
As the temperature in the room began to rise, Kibitz didn’t even seem to notice how close to being fired in more ways than one he was…
…when the door suddenly burst open and Luna came storming in. “Sister! There is a matter of grave importance that we would speak of you with, post haste!”
With the arrival of Luna, and her slip back into the ancient vernacular of Equish, Celestia managed to push her blazing anger aside for the moment. “What is the trouble Luna?”
“Our dearest niece is…” she paused for a moment, then looked down at the papers scattered on the table in front of Celestia. After studying them for a second, Luna let out a scream of absolute terror and flew a quarter of the way to the ceiling in fright. “Thou dost plan another wedding sister? Hads’t thou completely taken leave of thy senses?”
Celestia frowned at Luna’s antics. “Luna, there is nothing wrong with my abilities to plan social events,” she told her. “Just because there have been some minor…hiccups in the past does not mean I am cursed or something!” The appearance of Rainbow Dash as her reborn daughter than their time together since her emergence had cured Celestia of that foolish notion.
“Well…I suppose as long as another group of shadow magic ponies posing as stage actors for the after party’s festivities do not manage to infiltrate the palace to attempt an abduction of Cadence like with what happened at Aurora’s nuptial, things should be alright,” Luna relented.
In response, Celestia groaned. “Yes Luna. I sincerely doubt we shall again be attacked by ninjas. Now, what was this dire news that you’ve come to inform me of?”