"So, Knight Sparks, how do you like the tea?"
Celestia had proposed that we have a chat in her 'tea room'. Yes; a single room just for drinking tea. But only when a guest is present, it would just be ridiculous to have a room just for tea if you only have it for personal use, right?
But, either way, I accepted and was ushered into a rather open room in the East wing. It was a long space with a door at either end. The doors, like all in the castle, were large, purple double doors with intricate patterns carved into the wood and were adorned with curling, snaking strips of gold which wrapped about the heavy things like vines. Upon entering I had found the walls to be the same pearly marble that made up the rest of the buildings. To my right was a set of three arches, lovingly cut from the stone, which led to an East-facing balcony. It afforded a simply beautiful view of the thick forests and vibrant plains and meadows and great, rolling hills of emerald. Beyond the hills was the coast. The hills flattening out to sands which ran into a great, deep basin to hold the still waters of the cerulean oceans. Celestia told me that the Griffin Empire laid yonder, past the seas. To the North-East was the Minotaur Imperium in the mountains as well as scattered Cloven-hoof tribes. Down to the South-East, through the Badlands which were inhabited by the changeling hives, was the Red Wastes. So named for the great Drakes, Dragons and Wyverns and Wyrms that owned the mountains and deserts. The Mountains were massive spikes of reddened rock that jutted upward, t'wards the ash filled, crimson skies. The sands were glassed by dragon fire and the trees are charred and twisted and dead.
Though, according to The Princess, their Lord, John, was a very pleasant and gentlemanly fellow.
Now, though, we are sitting at the small table in the centre of the room. The breeze washes under the gaps in my armour and cools my skin. The sun is still early in it's ascent of the sky and light floods through the room.
"I must say, Princess, it is... a little sweet for my tastes, but quite delightful nonetheless." Throughout the entire ordeal I have kept my helmet on, the steel mask making me feel safer in the unfamiliar environment, only lifting the visor enough for the small, round-bottomed tea cup to reach my dry lips.
"Oh? But you haven't even added a single spoon of sugar. Perhaps there is too much milk?" She looks to my cup, peering at the dark brown, almost black liquid it contains. "O-or it's simply a kind of tea which is naturally sweet..?"
"I won't complain, Princess. As I said: it is still very good tea."
"Thank you, Sparks, I am not used to making tea myself, but, as there are no staff in the castle, I have had to flex my rather rusty skills in the kitchen." Celestia gives a light chuckle.
"Princess, there must be a more proper reason for you to invite me here than to discuss your tea." My tone is a little flat, though still brimming with gravel. I still don't know why my voice is so... It has never been before, I think. "I can take the wild guess that it has something to do with my earlier performance?"
The Princess' smile shrinks a little but doesn't disappear, "Sparks, to be quite Frank, I have never seen such ruthless or brutal efficiency. Your prowess on the battlefield is something only developed exactly there, through experience. And I very much doubt that any of my ponies could survive some of the lessons that you have learned.
"Your technique is fascinating but dangerous. You... Your style of fighting mixes patience with chronic aggressiveness and lustful brutality. Wether your foe is two feet or twenty you only focus on either striking it down before it can act, or avoiding it until you can exploit even just the tiniest weakness. You throw yourself at them with reckless abandon and tear into them like a madpony..." She shifts in her chair, the smile already gone. "I need to know if I can trust you."
I was, naturally, taken aback by the rather blunt statement.
"If you are to be allowed to walk among my ponies... I-"
The door behind Celestia opened with a creak. An unnaturally loud creak that seems to jar my very soul, shaking it to the core and tearing all reason from my mind with the kind of torture tha-
Anyway, the door went
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JLWEL6HeHK8
...
That door took a while to open.
In through the door steps a large, blue alicorn. She was not quite as tall as Celestia but was by no means any less beautiful. Her coat was a blue that reminded my of dusk, the early night and it's cool winds. Her flowing mane looked like an ethereal image of the night sky when the moon is at it's highest and the stars shine the brightest. The horn atop her head was sharp, like Celestia's but her wings were larger and her coat and feathers held more of a sheen to them while Celestia's coat was simply so white that the light made it glow and shine under the sun.
"Tia? Are you speaking to someone? And where are all the guards and serva-" Her eyes landed on me. I say, there has been a lot of interruptions, hasn't there?
The silence in the room becomes thick and heavy as the new arrival stares at me. Until it was broken by the clanking of my armour as I raised my left hand in a simple wave. "Greetings."
And then she squee'd.