//------------------------------//
// Chapter Twelve: A Very Special Letter 
// Story: Seven Ponies, Seven Trials, Seven Loves 
// by Lieutenant Bubbles 
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Part 2 
Chapter Twelve: A very Special Letter

Authors Note:  This Chapter takes place both before and after Chapter Thirteen. The Final part of this chapter takes place after the events in chapter thirteen, so please don’t be too confused with the timeline……. I’m already lost enough.

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Twilight was pacing back and forth in the main room of the library. She’d just seen yet another unfamiliar pony, and from what Spike had told her, he wasn’t from Ponyville originally. If he was another one like Phantom, from another world, she couldn’t mention it to Celestia, or she’d try and send him home again too, and if he was, and he was somepony’s soul mate, then she would have been responsible for one of her friends losing their true love. That wasn’t something she could do easily. And even if she didn’t mention this new pony in a letter now, Celestia was bound to find out. 

Twilight wished that she could write to her Sister-in-Law for advice. When it came to love, Princess Cadence was the authority, but unfortunately Princess Cadence and Twilight’s brother were on vacation, and had left very clear instructions that they were not to be bothered until they came back. She couldn’t go to any of her friends in Ponyville for advice, since she’d cast the spell with most of them their advice would be prejudiced, and she didn’t want the rest of them to find out. That left only one solution. She’d have to take matters into her own hooves.

She would have called for Spike to write the letter for her, but she remembered just how much he’d been crushing on Rarity. She didn’t think that he should have his hopes raised. While she’d always be pulling for him, she knew just how little a chance the little dragon stood with Rarity. Besides, he’d been sulking ever since he and that girl dragon broke up last month. Perhaps it was for the best that she writes the letter herself.

For hours she wrote, the stack of crumpled papers at her side growing ever higher. Every mistake was painstakingly corrected, and if there were too many, she just started over. Finally, as the morning sun started shining in through the windows, she felt that she had finished. She called for spike to come down.

“Spike, I need you to send this to the Princess. It’s very important.”

“Now, but it’s so early, and I haven’t even had breakfast yet,” Spike whined.

“Yes, now Spike. I promise we’ll go out for breakfast this mor-or-orning,” Twilight said through a huge yawn.  They’d go out for a nice breakfast, and then she would come home and go to bed. Spike jumped happily, and with a long tongue of green flame sent the letter winging its magical way to Celestia.

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Princess Celestia and her sister Luna were sitting at their breakfast table in Canterlot Castle, enjoying a simple breakfast for once. Celestia looked over at her sister and marveled at how much she’d grown up since she returned from her banishment to the moon. In fact, Celestia was a little envious of Luna these days, as next week Luna would be going to Ponyville for a couple weeks to get to know the young stallion she adopted better. As Luna embarked on the adventure of starting her own real family, Celestia would once again be left with the boring day to day menial tasks of running Equestria. She was mid thought as the letter from twilight appeared in front of her and was saved from landing in her morning juice only by her quick magical reflexes. She tore the seal off and read it immediately, worried that something was wrong. She never got a letter from Twilight this early in the day.

Dear Princess Celestia,

It has taken me a while to finally write this letter to you, but because of what happened a couple of weeks ago, I decided that I had to.

My friends and I have for some time been unhappy being as single as we are. We’ve dated all sorts of stallions but none of them were right for us at all, and one night while doing some research on an obscure spell from Starswirl the Bearded, I stumbled across what I thought would be the solution to all our problems.

This spell, as contrived and complicated as it was, seemed to be made especially for us, right down to its mention of a sonic rainboom. I brought it to my friends, and we cast the spell. Nothing went wrong, except for Ditzy Doo accidentally crashing into Rainbow Dash as she flew. We hoped that we would then soon be meeting our perfect stallions.

But as I did more research into the spell, and the surrounding effects, the gravity of the spell began to weigh on me. While the spell is designed to find our perfect match, it does not just seek out ponies from Equestria, it finds the one being in the entire universe that is perfect for us, and will change them to our form.

The one pony, Phantom, which you have already met is one such case. After Fluttershy nearly lost him, I worried that if any 
other stallions meant for us were from another world, they would have to meet similar requirements. I know that you would find out if any were sooner or later, and I don’t think that I could bear it if I was at all responsible for one of my friends losing their true love.

I’ve attached a copy of the spell we performed to the letter so that you can see what it was that we did. I’m sorry that we didn’t tell you right away. I had never dreamed that what almost happened with Phantom could have even been a possibility. 
So, I wrote this letter, hoping to appeal to your sense of mercy and justice, and to beg of you not to banish any of the ponies that may become the special one for me or any of my friends;  At least not unless they do something horrible.

Your faithful student, 

Twilight Sparkle.

P.S. Please don’t banish me to the moon. 

Celestia chucked a little bit at the post script and moved on to read the second page. She had barely finished the first 
paragraph of the spell before she looked over at Luna with a frown. She recognized the spell and had thought that all copies of that spell were destroyed long ago. It seemed a few copies had been missed in that purge.

“Luna, it seems we might have a bit of a problem…” As Celestia explained to her sister what had happened, Luna’s mood seemed to darken a little and they both looked out the window to the statue garden and the rather oddly shaped Draconiquis that stood in the center.

“Do you think that it would be terribly troublesome for you to keep an eye out while you are in Ponyville?” Celestia’s voice was deadly serious.

“As always, I will guard the realm.” Luna’s voice was slipping back into the Canterlot standard of a thousand years ago, showing just how much she was disturbed by the news. Celestia started working on a response to Twilight. She had to tell her student what she could without revealing her terrible secret.

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It was late that evening, and Twilight stumbled exhaustedly back into the Library. She’d almost forgotten that she’d agreed to help Applejack with the harvest that day. She was lucky that she’d been able to get a nap in before Spike woke her up yelling about her schedule. That alone had been odd, but she’d rushed right over to Sweet Apple Acres to help with the harvest.

When she got home, there was a scroll from Celestia and a note from Spike sitting on the massive Ironwood table in the main room. Spike’s note simply said that he was over helping Rarity, and that he’d probably be home late and not to worry. It was Celestia’s scroll that was a bit more complicated.

 My most faithful student, Twilight:

I must admit that I am surprised that you cast that particular spell without more study, however I realize that you are still a young pony and prone to mistakes. I am glad that you decided to come forward and tell me what you had done of your own free will. 

I can promise that I will not immediately banish any new pony to Equestria as a result of the spell, however for the sake of the realm, I will ask that you notify me of any that do arrive. The problem with that spell, and the reason I ordered it destroyed a great many years ago is that if a pony is too general in what they wish for, then almost anything could happen. Imagine how horrible it would be if somepony with the temperament of Chrysalis or Discord was to be brought into Equestria and go unnoticed. 

So it is for the good of the realm that I will observe these new ponies, but for the love I bear you all, I will let these ponies remain. I will however offer a word of caution. Even if I do not banish these ponies, you will all run the risk of losing them. One of the downsides to the spell is that there was supposed to be a test of their commitment to each other that did not quite go as planned. The test is instead of the worthiness of the pony brought in by the spell to remain with the one they will or do love. If they fail that test, there is nothing that I could do without breaking my own laws to let them remain.

I wish you the best of luck.

Princess Celestia. 

Twilight let out a silent sigh of relief. At least she wouldn’t have to worry about the Princess taking any of the ponies away, but there was still the matter of these trials to work on. That would mean more research into the fundamental nature of the spell, and learning as much as she could about these new ponies.  Twilight yawned loudly, and decided that she could start that research in the morning. She walked up the stairs, heading to bed, and already wondering what kind of things could happen now as a result of that spell. She hadn’t thought that the consequences could be that serious.