//------------------------------// // Chapter 7 // Story: Shadowy Love // by FinnPony //------------------------------// Shadowy Love By FinnPony Chapter 7 Twilight Sparkle’s room was dark. All the windows were covered by curtains, except the one in front of Twilight Sparkle’s desk. Twilight herself was quivering under three quilts, her quiet sobbing only thing that could be heard in the room. She was rather upset with Sombra. She tried so hard to be as nice and hospitable towards him, and all he did was mock her friends, and then her. Twilight knew that she shouldn’t be so surprised by all that, but somehow she was. For a moment it had looked like Sombra was actually behaving quite nicely… Who was she trying to fool here? Sombra had only been under reformation for a couple of days . Surely he wouldn’t have changed his ways so quickly, so why was Twilight so sad about it? She sniffed under her blankets and dried her eyes on her pillow. She hugged it afterwards. Really, why was she so sad about it? Maybe in some way she thought that Sombra’s words had some truth behind them after all. Why hadn’t the princesses informed her about their plans for bringing Sombra back? It wasn’t like them to keep such things to themselves. After all, they were all equal with each other. Weren’t they? “We are...” Twilight sobbed and buried her face into her pillow. She sniffed before lifting her face from the pillow. What if Sombra was actually right about what he was telling her? A deep depression filled her mind as the fear of being outcast brewing in her head. She quickly threw the blanket away and jumped to the floor. She quickly made her way to her desk in front of a window where she could see the whole of Ponyville. The sights weren’t the reason why she sat in front of her desk though. Her horn started to glow, illuminating the desk and giving her enough light to work in. She pulled a parchment and a quill from a drawer in the table, and started to write. “Dear Princesses. I have been thinking, and I have grown really unsure about my status as a princess. Why wasn’t I informed about the plans for bringing Sombra back? Why? I believe you had your reasons, but could you at least tell me why I wasn’t there when my brother, sister-in-law and my fellow princesses were in danger? I know I am probably just overreacting and I might sound a bit like a foal when I say this, but I feel like I am not being equal with you. Is it because of my age? Or I am just being worried about nothing again… I don’t know. Please answer as soon as possible. This is driving me crazy. Twilight Sparkle.” Twilight had calmed down a bit. She wasn’t crying anymore, and felt better after writing the letter. She looked at it for a moment, before snickering to herself. What was she even thinking when she wrote it? It wouldn’t be first time she had overreacted from nothing. Still, while she looked at the letter, she started to feel the uneasiness drifting back to her. She wondered if she should still send it. Maybe she would get some answer, and work everything out with the princesses. Twilight frowned. She would send the letter. She had a reason to do so. It wasn’t fair if the other princesses kept things like Sombra returning from her. She thought for a moment longer, before wrapping the parchment into a roll and sealing it with hot wax and a royal seal. She then took the parchment and started to trot towards her room’s door. As silently as she could, she opened the door and peeked into the corridor. She saw the guards standing in front of Sombra’s room. She felt a bit angry as the day’s events flooded back into her mind. She pushed them away though, and quietly walked towards nearby room. There was ‘Spike’ written onto the door. She looked at the letter for a moment, before sighing and opening the door. She stepped in and was greeted by a smell of sulfur. She saw the teenage dragon slumping on his bed, all his pillows and blanket on the floor. He snored loudly, and every time he exhaled, a small green fire escaped from his mouth. The sight made Twilight smile, thinking how it was possible that he hasn’t burned down his bed yet. But now she had to wake him up. “Spike,” she called and walked next to his bed. When she didn’t get Spike’s attention, she called a bit louder, “Spike!” Spike murmured and grunted couple of times before muttering, “Five more minutes mom…” Twilight frowned. She was about to shake him up, but got an idea as Spike continued to snore. She smirked and lifted the parchment over Spike’s snout with her magic. She bit her lower lip in anticipation, and as Spike exhaled again, the green fire caught the parchment, immediately vanishing it into the flames. Twilight smiled happily, only for her expression to drop quickly after. She had actually sent the letter to the princesses. A slight panic started to seize her again. What would the other princesses think about her letter? What if they had a good reason not to tell her? Oh, what had she done!? With that Twilight let out a little squeak and rushed of the room, slamming the door shut after her. “Huh?” Spike asked as he woke up from something. He took a quick look around himself, but saw nopony. With a shrug his head fell back to the pillow. * * * Twilight Sparkle’s eyes opened. She didn’t find her surroundings troubling in any way. Not even the fact that she was a small filly version of herself, sitting inside a sandbox that drifted in emptiness seemed to cause any confusion in her. She giggled happily and grabbed a small shovel and bucket with her magic. She started filling the bucket with sand, flapping her wings happily. Suddenly she heard giggling from behind her. She turned around and saw all the other princesses in the other side of the sandbox, building an exact copy of Canterlot out of sand. They were also in their filly forms. Celestia’s mane was pink and her body was a bit chubby. Luna’s mane was light blue and she smiled broadly. Cadence’s mane was tied on a ponytail, and there were cute freckles around her muzzle. Twilight let out a high pitched gasp of delight. She then looked at her own work of art, a bucket full of sand. She liked the other princesses work better. Twilight rose to her small legs and started to wobble towards the others princesses, letting out a small giggles. She sat down right behind the others, waiting for them to notice her. “Celly!” she called out, earning the filly Celestia’s attention. Celestia turned to look at Twilight for a second, before rolling her eyes and turning back towards the sandcastle. Twilight looked confusedly at her, before turning towards Luna. “Woona?” she asked in her quiet voice, giving a small smile towards the blue filly. She too just glanced towards her, not paying any more attention to her. Twilight was getting really frustrated from not getting to play with them. She gave one last small whimper towards Cadence, who didn’t even turn to look at her. Twilight shifted on her place for a moment, before deciding that she would just go and join their fun. She rose up and walked towards the castle with plans to start building the Star Swirl the Bearded wing of archives, but as soon as Celestia noticed her approaching, she outstretched her rear leg, holding small Twilight away from the castle. Twilight whimpered and tried to push forward, only making Celestia more and more annoyed by her. Suddenly Twilight was wrapped in Celestia’s golden magical grasp, being pushed away from the three princesses and their castle. Filly Twilight whimpered sadly, trying to push forward. She couldn’t, Celestia was too strong. after a while Twilight stopped trying and slumped down to the sand with a sad pout on her face. The three other princesses calmly continued building their sandcastle. Twilight was laying on the ground, tears starting to roll down her cheeks. She buried her head into her forelegs, now sobbing and sniffing loudly. “Begone!” a loud voice suddenly commanded, the sandbox, three filly princesses and their mighty sandcastle turning into a smoke and fading away. Twilight opened her eyes and noticed that she was now a grown up alicorn like she should have been. Suddenly the things that had happened just a moment ago seemed weird and rather amusing in their own, disturbing way. “Luna?” Twilight asked, now knowing that she was in a dream. Soon the princess of night walked from behind an invisible curtain in all her glory. The stars in Luna’s dark blue mane glimmered with white light. Twilight felt kinda embarrassed in front of Luna. She had clearly followed her dream, that had been a bit… childish. “Twilight Sparkle, are you alright?” Luna asked with concern in her voice. Twilight nodded shyly before answering, “I am. My dignity just got a little hurt right now.” Luna gave her a confused look, before understanding that she meant the dream she had been seeing. Luna smiled warmly and said, “Don’t be embarrassed by your dreams Twilight. You should see the dreams that my sister sometimes sees.” Twilight chuckled a bit, but then Luna continued, “But what I saw was rather disturbing. Is that how you really feel right now Twilight. Do you really mean what you wrote in that letter?” “Oh… Yeah, the letter,” Twilight mumbled, nervously scratching the back of her head. She then looked Luna in the eyes, seeing how worried she looked. Twilight drooped her ears and nodded. “Twilight,” Luna said slowly, sitting down. “I know how you feel actually.” “What?” Twilight asked and sat next to her. Luna sighed and said, “When I came back from the moon, there was a period of time when I didn’t do anything else than lifted the moon to the sky. Celestia kept me away from the politics and such. She didn’t trust me at the time.” Twilight’s eyes went wide and she asked, “Celestia doesn’t trust me!?” “No no no!” Luna quickly calmed her down, lifting a hoof on her shoulder. “I just said that I know how you feel. Us not telling you about Sombra’s return has nothing to do with us not trusting you.” “Then what was it about?” Twilight asked, clearly confused. Luna was looking troubled. She was quiet for a moment, before saying, “Celestia cares about you Twilight.” Twilight frowned. Of course Celestia cares about her. Twilight cares about Celestia too. Luna seemed to know what she was thinking, and added, “It’s more than just that. She cares about you like a…. mother cares about her foal.” “What!?” Twilight gasped, her cheeks turning red. Luna nodded and continued, “I tried to convince her to take you with us, down into the dungeons when we brought Sombra back, but she disagreed strongly. She said that she wanted you to stay in Ponyville, in case something happened... But I sensed that she wanted to keep you away from him.” “That doesn’t sound like Celestia to me,” Twilight said a bit uncertainly. “And she let Sombra come with me to Ponyville.” After a long sigh Luna said, looking a bit sad, “You can’t even imagine how nervous she was when you told her about your plans to take Sombra to Ponyville with you. I have never seen anypony drink so much coffee before... She hasn’t been quite herself after you became a princess. She was a great teacher, but then she turned into a …” “Overprotective mother…” Twilight ended her sentence. She was staring in front of her, starting to outline the situation. “Yes.” Luna said. “She says that you are the best thing that has happened to our nation since the fall of… Nightmare Moon… She doesn’t want you to get in danger.” Luna seemed to go back into old times in her head. She was silent and stared in front of her with emotionless look on her face. After a while she broke away from her trance and said,”The letter you sent to her made her quite upset.” “I’m sorry to hear that,” Twilight said, still a bit confused by the situation she was in. She was talking with Luna in her dream about Celestia being overprotective towards her. It was something that didn’t happen everyday. Or night. “We talked about it for a while,” Luna continued, “She didn’t take it easily when I told her to ease up on you.” “I have never seen that side of her,” Twilight admitted. Luna nodded and said, sounding almost sad, “I have. It was before I turned into Nightmare Moon. She looked at me like she now looks at you.” “I’m sorry,” Twilight said and gave Luna an apologetic look. Luna chuckled sadly and said, “Don’t be. It was me who turned into Nightmare Moon.” There was an awkward moment between them, before Luna seemed to remember something. Her horn glowed and soon a letter appeared in front of her. She gave it to Twilight and said, “It’s from Celestia. She wishes that you read it when you wake up.” “When do I wake up?” Twilight asked. Luna just smirked and said, “Just open your eyes Twilight.” * * * Twilight Sparkle woke up with a gasp. The sun was already up and it peered through the window in front of her desk. Twilight yawned and stretched her wings and neck, before slowly slipping away from under the blankets. As she did, a letter dropped onto the floor. Twilight stared at the letter with her mouth open for a second, before her dreams flooded back to her. She felt heat rising to her cheeks again as she remembered Luna telling her about Celestia’s affection towards her. She quickly levitated the letter in front of her and opened it, revealing a quickly made letter with few lines only. “Dear Twilight. I believe Luna has told you everything already. She can be a real pain in a royal hiney sometimes… But she is right. You are a princess now, and deserve to have the same responsibilities as all of us. It caused be great shame in me to realize how you felt. I could write everything on my mind right now into this paper, but it doesn’t have enough space to tell you how I feel. I would like to see you in person, so we can make everything right. I hope to hear from you soon. Celestia. P.S. Good luck with Sombra, don’t be too soft on him. I truly trust that you can handle him by yourself.” Twilight smiled when she read the letter. Everything seemed to be falling into their right places now. She was still a bit uncomfortable about Celestia’s newfound affection towards her, but now that she knew that Sombra’s words weren’t true, she had nothing to worry about. A smirk appeared onto her face when she read the part that encouraged her not to be ‘too soft on him’. “That’s not going to be a problem,” she said to herself smugly, deciding to give Sombra his first lesson.