"I really wish I had another way to help," said Stud Muffin, still lying atop his favorite pegasus mare, no changeling.. did 'mare' apply? Whatever. Of course, with most of the others gone and Dill having no sex drive to speak of it wasn't much of a contest. "You know I love doing this with you, but I just have the feeling that there's something really important going on, and we should be doing more than, you know.. making love?"
"There is a lot going on, or there was. Right now things are pretty bad. We should find a way to gather more love if we can, but we're going to need to do more than that," she answered, suddenly much more serious than he had seen her so far.
He climbed off of her, sitting up. "Alright, well I've been giving you all I can. I don't know if there's any tricks for giving you more than that. But I'm happy to do anything I can for you."
She thought a moment. "Well, there's a couple tricks Wind Chaser let me in on, if you're willing to try them. One is that if you mate with me in my natural form, even just once, it will help you to link your love to me more purely. I know.. ponies tend to find us repulsive in our natural form, so.. I won't blame you if you don't want to. The other trick is to go out on a date, like a nice romantic time out together. If there is no deception between us, it will strengthen the pathway for love between us, and give not only an immediate increase in how much I can gain from you, but also a lasting effect as well."
"So, we go on a nice romantic date, and then finish it off somewhere private where you can finally show me what it's like to be with you with all of the illusions stripped away. Sounds romantic.. and kind of kinky. I'll admit I'm a little nervous, but I'm willing to give it a try," Stud Muffin declared.
"I can cook," Dill offered.
"Well, I do love your cooking, and maybe you could put together a lovely picnic or something, but I'm thinking maybe we should do something different just this once?" Stud Muffin pondered out loud.
"I meant.. I can get a job as a cook. Or replace one. Either way, that way I can gather love from outsiders. You need to eat and rest. Mirage is already tapping you out," Dill pointed out.
"These are all good ideas, and we should certainly gather more love before making our next move, but.. we need to do more than just feed ourselves and even the others," Mirage said. "We're going to need to perform a rescue mission. The other changelings got caught, along with the king and the others. It's down to just us, null and Mirror. Plus we need to keep some kind of watch on the egg. I guess null can watch the egg, while we go gather love. But that kind of feels wrong to me."
"It still feels weird to me how you all always seem to know what's going on. It's too bad the king is already gone. I'm tempted to take up his offer to join in just so that I'm not the only one out of the loop," Stud Muffin complained.
"It's not to late. Any of us can induct you. Though it will leave you out of commission for about a day.. well, unless we do a rush job, but those are supposed to be very painful and I don't want to put you through that," Mirage countered. "You could be a lot more helpful after you are one of us though. And it could make that date and.. after-date go more smoothly."
Stud Muffin steeled himself mentally in much the same way he had steeled himself for the jump that had ended his prior life. If he was strong enough to kill himself, surely he was strong enough for a little horrific pain? "I'll do it. Make it a rush job.. I want to be ready for that date tonight!" He said with more confidence than he honestly felt. Mirage could easily see through him with a changeling's natural empathy, but that didn't stop her from dragging him into a long, deep kiss.
"Alright," she said after breaking the kiss. "First, you need to swear your loyalty to the Itinerant King. The exact words don't matter, but this is a bond for life. So take it seriously."
Stud Muffin drew in a deep breath and looked deep into Mirage's eyes, wishing he could just swear his loyalty to her. "I swear to live my life in the service of the Itinerant King, and to give my all to protect him and his subjects, and show them all the love I can give."
Mirage nodded, blushing a little at the emotion behind it. Changelings got used to faked emotions on their own part, and misdirected emotions from others.. emotions genuinely shared with them were still a bit new. It was different.. a good different, but still hard to get used to. "Alright, now bite into my arm as hard as you can, and hold it, licking up as much of the blood as you can swallow." She held her arm before him, braced steadily in a horizontal position.
Stud balked for a bit, not prepared for something so.. bloody. Though he didn't know why, when he thought back. It was a blood oath, after all. So he bit hard into her arm, surprised that he flinched more than she did. But soon the blood was trickling into his mouth. It felt more.. oily than he imagined it should. But his resolve held and he swallowed several gulps before he could handle no more. The wounds closed up as soon as his mouth was off of her, healing swiftly.
Soon a wave of numbness flowed through his body, quite the opposite of what he was expecting, he went to comment, but he got dizzy as the fever began to burn away his thoughts and he collapsed before her.
Dill looked down at the collapsed pony. "I'll leave you two a picnic basket, then I'm looking for work," he commented impassively.
Mirror was quite happy to have Midnight Oil's presence back in his mind, especially today of all days. One of the academies of magic had sent a representative to test the unicorn students at the school for magical talent. His own abilities with the horn had increased quite a lot from being Midnight's avatar, and feeling the flow of power as she wielded it through him, but he was nervous about doing it on his own with such attention on him. It was one thing if he didn't pass their tests, as Midnight was young enough to have plenty of more opportunities in years to come. But if he did too poorly it would make it suspicious if her next test went too well. He had to be good enough for her next test to reasonably be the same pony! Or course, Mirror could take the whole week's worth of tests himself, and at least be consistent in his results.
Mirror felt terribly guilty drawing on the Kingdom's pathetic supply of love to be able to have a decent showing for himself in the test. He had managed to draw in a tiny bit himself from being friendly with Midnight's classmates, but with over a dozen changelings to feed and so few of them free to gather any love on their own, much of that was syphoned away and redistributed by their distant, trapped king.
"Class, I would like you all to give a warm welcome to Hearth Fire, of the Academy of Elements. He will be the first examiner for the unicorns hoping to seek entrance to an academy this year. The rest of you, please be polite while your classmates take this opportunity to prove themselves," the teacher said before stepping aside.
Hearth Fire was a brick red pony with a mane that was yellow near the roots, fading to brilliant red at the tips. His cutie mark depicted a welcoming looking fireplace, burning brightly. "Indeed, thank you ma'am," the unicorn told the teacher before turning to address the class. "I represent Celestia's school for gifted unicorns, one of the oldest and finest unicorn academies in the world. Indeed, we are under the direct supervision of the alicorn, Princess Celestia, who moves the very sun every day. As such, many of you will not receive invitations from us, even if you might qualify for one of the more junior academies. I encourage you all to pursue your talents as far as they will lead you, and not to give up on higher studies only because you are not yourself one of the best. Indeed, I will let you know up front: success in my test here today will only qualify you to participate in our full entrance exam suite, not grant you access immediately to our halls. So.. any who are willing to put their horns to the test, come and follow me. Don't be afraid. There is no shame in testing where you are at, even if it isn't first place."
Midnight Oil wanted to strangle him. In fact, if she had been there in person that day, she probably would have ended the day in guard custody. So perhaps it was just as well that she was already imprisoned and had to act through Mirror, who was assertive enough to keep her from getting him jailed. Even if he agreed with her sentiment. As a changeling, Mirror could sense the constant, active flow of love from Hearth Fire.. to Hearth Fire. He was amused by the thought of standing behind an empty wooden frame, living up to his namesake and stealing some of that love for himself.
Following the instructor outside, Mirror sat down. "First, I want you all to light up your horns as brightly as you can without sparking, and sustain it as long as you can, or until I say to stop."
Mirror glanced at the others. There were eight unicorns in the class, and only two had skipped out on the test. Mirror carefully matched the brightness of the third brightest of his peers, holding it perfectly steady with ease. The brightest quickly ran out of steam and winked out. The dimmest one was soon to follow, and then the one Mirror had matched started sparking and was soon eliminated. That left Mirror squarely in the middle of the pack of remaining applicants, right where he meant to be. He had even managed to keep the color a deep violet color, matching Midnight's natural glow instead of his own changeling green.
"You're dismissed as well," the unicorn said to one of the other students, leaving only three unicorns for the next round of testing.
Back in the cave, Wind Chaser started ripping love from the other prisoners, the resulting lethargy going all but unnoticed by the already weak and depressed ponies. She didn't take much; she couldn't without risking outright killing them, but it was enough to push Mirror up to a solid 'average' amount of power in anticipation of the next test.
"Next, we will be testing your power of telekinesis. Here," he gestured with a hoof at a set of weights marked with numbers from 1 to 6. "Try lifting each weight in turn. Successful applicants to our academy can generally lift a 4 with some effort, though 3s have been accepted in very rare instances."
The pony with the brightest glow managed to lift a 3 easily enough but failed to get the 4 off the ground. "You may stay for the next round," the examiner told him. The other unicorn got the 3 up as well, and was dismissed. "I'm sorry, with your combined score on the two tests you are not qualified to continue. You could easily qualify for one of the more.. open academies, so don't give up!"
Mirror swallowed, and concentrated. He had a very limited supply of love to work with, especially with the 'love cow' Stud Muffin unconscious. As he lifted each of the first two balls, it seemed almost like a struggle because he was being so careful to minimize the amount of energy going into the lift. The third ball was exactly the same struggle; his subnet, Rorrim, had realized the balls were arranged in factors of 10 and now knew the exact amount of energy needed to lift each ball.
Mirror wanted to stop, to accept defeat and conserve their remaining love. They could easily get into an easier academy which would let them keep a lower profile, and reduce the odds of Mirror being found out as a changeling. But Midnight pushed him, her force of will easily exceeding his resistance, and soon they had the fourth ball aloft. Barely. It wasn't enough to properly earn a rating of '4', but it was enough to get the examiner's attention.
Mirror collapsed on the ground, panting, exhausted and starving. But he managed to avoid losing consciousness. Someone tried to offer him a snack bar, and he munched it as a basic deception, though the food was unable to fill his needs. Still, the kingdom was able to feed him just enough to get him back on his feet, shakily, and ready to face the remaining tests.
"Excellent, now. Show me the unicorn alphabet on your horns. In reverse order!" the examiner demanded.
The remaining competitor struggled through, slipping up a bit on the order here and there as he was too used to the normal order, while Mirror himself struggled with having enough energy to be sensed as he went through the letters at a nice steady clip. For one with the Kingsblood, something as simple as reversing the order of a list of symbols was quite trivial, and even Mirror had already memorized the alphabet years ago.
And so, Mirror was left as the last applicant standing, on the verge of earning the right to take the full entrance exam to the most prestigious school in Equestria. The instructor placed an open spell book before him. "Cast this spell, safely." He said. He held a steady charge in his horn, probably preparing to disrupt the spell should it get out of control.
The spell was unlabeled, which was a cruel thing to do if it had any hope of being dangerous. But Mirror had an unfair advantage. He got Midnight Oil to switch to using null as her avatar briefly, and cast the spell where he stood, allowing a chance to see what it was before unleashing it near the other students. The spell proved to be a small, short ranged portal, opening a pair of elliptical gateways a few feet apart to allow travel between them. It was a mostly useless cantrip, as a much longer ranged version would be needed for most situations.
Knowing what they were doing, Mirror was better able to target the gateways to where they would be harmlessly demonstrated. He smoothly and accurately played the patterns through his horn and.. nothing.
There just wasn't enough love left to spare.
As Stud Muffin opened his eyes, his mind reeling with all of the new information going through it, he looked up to find that no one was paying him any attention. Dill was gone, a lovely handcrafted picnic basket left in his wake. Mirage was staring at the egg, so he did too.
Now that he bore the kingsblood, he could hear the voices of the hatchlings within. [Finally, it is time for our debut,] Alexander announced. [Prepare yourself to view our glorious being!] Gabriella concurred. Green lights began to play over the inside of the egg, shining through the membranes of the egg. A horn pierced through the material, surprisingly a white unicorn horn rather than a sharp curvy changeling horn like he would have expected. It was.. odd to him that he knew what a changeling horn should look like, not yet having seen one undisguised, but he was already rolling with the newfound storehouse of data in his blood.
Nor was that the last surprise as the tiny foal emerged before them. "Announcing Prince Alexander Gabriella Stormbringer the First," the tiny alicorn declared in a young but masculine voice. "Crown Prince of the Itinerant Kingdom, and greatest of all foals!" it announced in a more feminine voice. Shaking the egg fluids free, it turned about to show itself off from all sides. The foal appeared to be an alicorn, with a white horn and pink wings. It's main was a dark gray streaked with stark shocks of bright blue. Its fur was white and pink, in a big swirly mess of colors: one large section of each color but interwoven strangely. And from behind he could clearly see the parts of both a white male and a pink female where there surely should have been only one or the other.
The entire Kingdom was silent aside from the stream of perceptual data from the two witnesses to the rest. Finally, Wind Chaser recovered enough for a simple [Welcome, my son! My daughter? We have been waiting for you.]