//------------------------------//
// Chapter 6 - A Binding Promise After All 
// Story: Second Chances, Many Changes 
// by ASGeek2012 
//------------------------------//

"Here we are," said Twilight in a cheerful voice as she trotted ahead of me into the chamber.

Night had just fallen, and rather fast. One moment the sun was still suspended above the horizon in apparent perpetual sunset, and a few minutes later, not only had the sun completely set, the moon had risen and the stars were out. It was certainly a gorgeous night sky, stars far more brilliant than even the darkest moonless night on Earth, but it struck me as odd just the same.

The chamber I stepped into was located at one of the lower levels of the castle. It appeared to be a workroom of sorts, with devices powered by a combination of electricity and magic whose workings I could not fathom. Shelves were lined with scrolls, yellowed parchments, and thick books. Crystals of various colors were suspended inside glass containers.

Twilight turned to face me. "So all I want to do now is a quick scan of your pendant and ensure it has no obvious dangerous magicks associated with it. If it is indeed safe, I will return it to you."

"And if you think it's not safe?"

"It will remain here under a protective shield, and I will not move it anywhere without first telling you."

I had to trust her. I really had no choice. "Um, all right. What do you want me to do?"

Twilight trotted up to a pedestal in the center of the chamber. "Please place your pendant here, and then move back to the cushion just behind you. That should place you at a safe distance in case anything happens."

I fumbled with the pendant a little less this time. I was finally getting used to using my hooves. I had the pendant off in less than a minute. Despite the trust I was trying to develop with her, I still hesitated before placing the pendant on the pedestal.

"Thank you," said Twilight. "I know this is difficult for you. I promise to be as gentle as possible with it."

I nodded and retreated to the cushion, which seemed a mile away. I sat on my haunches and tried not to look anxious.

Twilight lighted her horn. "I can already tell I was right that this is infused with magic."

"I honestly never knew it was," I said.

"You must have been unfortunate enough to be around those who simply were not at all sensitive to outside magic."

Yeah, about six billion of them. "I guess so."

The pendant itself began to glow, but not quite in the same way as when it was levitated. I flicked my tail nervously as I watched.

"Hmm," Twilight murmured. The glow brightened. "Well, good news is, whatever magic is contained within, it's very stable. This has to have been made by a very accomplished mage. So that eliminates the chance of random misfires."

"What about this Starswirl pony you talked about?" I asked.

"Oh, this could very well be one of his," Twilight said, the excitement in her voice evident. "Yes, there indeed is something about this pattern of enchantment that reminds me of his work on using thaumic matrices to store and manipulate unusual forms of energy."

I nodded, but I truly had no idea what she was talking about. All I knew of its origins was some vague reference by my mother to it being handed down through a few generations. She had revealed that only after I had pressed her about it one day for whatever reason. Given how cheap the pendant looked -- well, at least back on Earth -- I had never really believed her. I had assumed it was just a fib to make the pendant have more intrinsic value to the young child that I had been.

Twilight slowly stepped around the pedestal, her horn flickering a moment before growing bright again. "Oh, that's curious! It has an anti-tampering mechanism, and a very strong one."

"Um ... is that good?"

"In terms of unwanted magical discharge by simply handling it or even casting random spells at it, yes, indeed. Unfortunately it will make determining its exact purpose a little harder."

Twilight appeared to concentrate, the glow from her horn growing brighter and dimmer in seemingly no particular pattern. "Now this is very odd."

So much for the "quick scan" she had originally stated. "What's wrong?"

"I am finding no means to activate the magic within. Most artifacts have a specific trigger, you see, whether it be a spoken word, a gesture, inserting it into something else, and so on. I can find no indication of a trigger."

"Well, could that be good? I mean, nopony can activate it by accident, so it's still safe."

"But it's strange, don't you think?"

"Um, I guess?"

"Why would a magical artifact be created like this with no means to activate it?"

I had no idea, and I really didn't care. I was growing worried, as the more Twilight spoke, the more she sounded like a little kid on Christmas morning working her way around to the giant present in the back.

Then again, should I have been worried? It was not like she was going to try to activate it and see what happened. That would be like incanting a potentially powerful spell without knowing what it did first. Surely she was smart enough not to do that.

Twilight paused and lowered her head slightly. "Wait ... I think ... yes, some part of this is designed to draw in energy of some sort. Perhaps I can follow that path to see the internal structure."

Or, then again ...

"That is exactly its purpose. Yes, I can see the thaumic matrix. Classic Starswirl technique! This is amazing! This is truly a previously undiscovered artifact of his! But what kind of energy does it store? The leyline anchors are most unusual."

The pendant was starting to glow brighter than her horn. "Um, Twilight, do you really think you--"

"I almost have it ... I can almost see it ..."

The pendant glowed brighter still and began vibrating. "Twilight??"

"Just a little further and ... and ... OH!!"

The glow on her horn died with a sizzling snap, and she was suddenly thrown backwards. She fell on her back with a loud thump.

"Twilight!" I cried, bolting to my hooves and galloping over to her. "Are you all right?!"

Twilight struggled to right herself. "I was pushed back!" she said in a voice of both shock and amazement. "Something pushed me back!"

"Well, you said it had an anti-tamper thing on it, right?" I said as she righted herself. Smoke still wafted from her horn, the tip of which glowed incendiary red. "Twilight, y-your horn, it's--"

She licked a fore-hoof and pressed it to her horn. The glow disappeared with a brief sizzle. "Just some mana blowback. I'll be fine in a minute or two. And, no, this was not a mere anti-tamper spell. My magic was forcibly pushed out of the artifact. It must have something to do with the function of the artifact itself."

I swallowed. "But ... i-it's safe, right?"

Twilight looked at me. "I'm sorry?"

"You said if it's safe, I could have it back."

"Oh, yes, of course, but ... well, whatever this is, it's potentially very powerful."

"But it's safe."

Twilight sighed. "With regards to your safety as to the magic contained inside the artifact, yes. But if it is this powerful, wearing it will make you a target."

"I thought you and the other princesses could protect me. Has that changed?"

"Well, no, of course not."

"Then I think maybe you just want the excuse to keep studying this thing, and I'll never get it back."

Yeah, I was telling off a princess. Maybe it would turn out to be the stupidest thing I had ever done, but I was upset. I didn't always think when I was emotional.

Because if I had been thinking, I would have realized that Twilight had a point. Wearing that pendant now would be like hanging a gold bar around my neck and taking a stroll in a crime-ridden neighborhood back home. The gold bar was inherently safe, but it made me a target for theft, and not every thief cared whether their victims lived or not.

Yet it made the emotional impact of parting from it no less.

My mother was the one who first gave it to me, back when I was five and her fashion industry was going through a very tough time. She knew it was cheap -- her vague claims later that it was some sort of heirloom notwithstanding -- and hoped I would not notice. It wouldn't have mattered if I had. I saw it as a symbol of her love for me, and that was all that mattered.

I gave that pendant to Michelle when I was thirteen shortly after my mother's death from a drug overdose. I was so very distraught at the time. Michelle helped me like no other friend ever had. I gave her that pendant as a sign of that friendship. She knew it was inherently a worthless trinket, but she also knew how much it meant to me. She almost refused to accept it.

Then it came back to me after she died.

"Even if you leave the artifact down here--" Twilight began.

"Pendant!" I cried. "It's not some exotic magical artifact to me. It's a pendant, an important keepsake."

"I'm sorry," Twilight said in a soft voice. "Even if you leave the pendant down here, it is still yours. I will not give it to anypony else. I can put it under a powerful protection spell, stronger than the holding spell they used in the hospital. In fact ..." She smiled. "... I'll go further. I'll make you a Pinkie Promise."

I blinked. "A Pinkie ... Promise?"

"It's hard to break. It has magic even I don't understand. So, I pledge that this pendant will remain yours and will not be given to anypony else. Cross my heart, hope to fly, stick a cupcake in my eye."

I couldn't help it. I giggled.

Twilight turned to the pedestal. "Let's see, horn recovered?" She levitated the pendant back to the center of the pedestal. "Good. Now then ..."

Her horn glowed, and a half-sphere of energy formed over the pedestal. "There. About the only pony who can get past that is Princess Celestia."

I nodded and managed a small smile. "Thank you." I reached up with a hoof to where the pendant once rested against my chest. "It will feel funny being without it."

"I do hope I can return it to you, perhaps after the summit is over and the immediate danger has passed," said Twilight. "Now, I have one more thing I need to do, and you can head back to your room."

"Oh?"

"I'm sorry to do this, but it's necessary given what happened. I want to cast a spell that will reveal whether you are a changeling or not."

My eyes widened. "But I'm not--!"

"I know you're not," Twilight said quickly. "But we're doing this on everypony. I'll be casting it on my friends as well. It's a precaution only, and I don't want to be seen as playing favorites."

Was that why Applejack was always looking at me funny? And why Rainbow Dash was initially suspicious of me? I guess if it allayed their fears, it was worth it. "A-all right. Will this hurt?"

Twilight smiled as she stepped back. "Not at all, but it may tingle a little. Now, hold still."

She charged her horn. I indeed felt a vague pins-and-needles sensation start at my hooves and sweep upwards. Where the spell touched me, a dark shadow lay over that part of my body. The black was covered in many tiny purple sparkles, like glitter on dark velvet. Scattered among them, however, were a few red sparkles. They followed no pattern, just a random crimson point here and there.

When she was done, Twilight paused, looking thoughtful.

"S-something wrong?" I asked.

"Let me do that again."

Once more she swept the spell over me. Once more I saw lots of purple sparkles with some scattered red.

"Well?" I asked.

Twilight smiled. "You're not a changeling, but we already knew that. Sorry, had to adjust my magic a bit. It's a relatively new spell, and I'm still working out some of the kinks. Here, let me take you back to your room."

While I was grateful to know I was really a pony (how ironic is that) I could not help but feel like something else had just happened that Twilight had not expected.





After I returned to my room and Twilight was away, I made another attempt to figure out how to use my horn. Maybe Twilight had been right all along and the pendant was interfering with my magic.

I used a pillow from the bed, figuring if it got flung across the room, at least it wouldn't break anything. After getting nothing but sparks from my horn in the first few attempts, I managed to knock it to the floor in a random direction. I tried to lift it back up to the bed, but all it did was quiver a bit. When I pushed harder like I had in the hospital, a seam burst, and feathers went flying.

I sighed and shoved the damaged pillow and escaped feathers under the bed with my hooves. Since the doctor had said my horn was healthy, that meant only one thing: I needed somepony to actually teach me how to do this.

I probably should not have tried it when I was already so tired, but it was the only time when I was sure Twilight would be too busy to check on me. She had told me she needed to host a meeting that evening. I had responded that I was going to read for a bit and then head on to sleep.

I did not get much further in the Daring Do book before I felt too drowsy to continue as the excitement of the day and my ill-timed magic-wielding attempt caught up with me. My mane suddenly felt odd, like something had fallen into it, but I assumed I was just tired and my perceptions were wonky.

Thoughts of sleep flew from my head when I was jolted back to full alertness by the sound of a distant, thunderous crash.

My heart thumped, and my hoof automatically reached for the pendant that was not there, which itself caused another spike of panic before I remembered leaving it Twilight's lab. I debated as to whether to investigate the noise. Technically nopony told me I had to stay in my room or that certain parts of the castle were off limits to me.

Curiosity got the best of me, and I ventured out of my room. The clopping of my hooves echoed rather eerily through the empty hall. My mother had lived in a mansion during the heyday of her career, but it had been nowhere near this big. Once I got to the end of the guest hall, I realized I did not quite remember from which direction Spike had led me.

I tried anyway, figuring so long as I kept the layout in my head enough to get back to my room, I would not get lost. This became a moot point when I heard a sharp, shrill scream.

I took off at full gallop, though my attempt to follow a straight line path to where I thought the scream had originated was thwarted by the convoluted layout of the castle. I blundered into a dining hall, a kitchen, and a library before winding up in a lobby before a set of tall doors. I heard faint, muffled voices from beyond them.

I trotted up to the doors and raised a fore-hoof to knock but hesitated. I instead turned my head and pressed my ear to one of them.

"--will just get evasive or defensive," said a voice I thought was Rarity. "I suspect the same would be true in this case as well."

"But she's more mature than that, isn't she?" came Fluttershy's voice.

Twilight's voice followed. "Still, I think Rarity has a point. Let's not put her on the spot. We'll wait for now and--"

I pulled my ear from the door and took a step back, my heart hammering. I tried not to assume the worst, that they were talking about me. I should not have been listening in on their private matters, anyway. If Twilight had wanted me at that meeting, she would have said so.

I was about to turn away when the doors burst open. "Oh, hello!" said a smiling Pinkie Pie.

I stared. Her pink fur and hair were splotched with powdery white.

Twilight appeared beside her. "Oh, um, hi," she said, clearly not expecting to see me. "Is there something wrong? Did you need something?"

"Um ... I just ... s-sorry, I heard something like a crash and then a scream, and ..."

I trailed off, my eyes widening. Fluttershy had appeared, her coat also splotched with white. She had something sticking out of her mane. It was a little plushie unicorn that looked like, well, me. My jaw dropped when Rarity appeared. Why in God's name was she dressed in a frilly green maid outfit, her mane and tail done into tight buns?

And that white powder looked like ... flour??

"Uh ..." I said as my brain sputtered. "What ... why ...??"

Rarity sighed as she trotted forward. "Pay no mind to all this, darling. We, ah, had an unexpected incident at the meeting. And, yes, I know, this outfit clashes horribly with my hair. And these awful frills!" She shivered violently. "So last season. It was not exactly my choice."

I nodded slowly. I glanced past her and caught a glimpse of a grumbling Spike as he used a broom to sweep up more flour on the floor of the chamber beyond. I only just caught sight of what looked like a large, round table and some high-backed chairs arranged around it before Applejack and Rainbow Dash appeared and blocked the view.

All six of them were here for this meeting? Were they all on some sort of community council or town board? I would hardly think a princess would be running something so mundane.

"Everything is okay," said Fluttershy. "That was very kind of you to check on us."

This was one of those cases where I both wanted and did not want to know what had happened at that meeting. For all I knew, this apparent strangeness was part of some odd Equestrian cultural practice, and it would be best if I did not express too much ignorance.

Then again, whatever had happened could have been magic-related, given Twilight's propensity for pushing her curiosity a little too far, if the incident with the pendant was typical for her.

I forced a small smile. "Well, so long as everypony is okay, I can just head back to my--"

Pinkie Pie suddenly surged forward. "Oo, you have a surprise for us?" she said with an eager smile.

"Huh? What to you mean?"

She giggled. "You're hiding something!"

My heart raced. "I'm not!"

"Oh, yes, you aaaare!" Pinkie sang. "It's right there in your mane. What is it? Did you bring us some goodies to eat?"

I just stared at her. By now she had drawn the curiosity of the others. I raised a hoof to my mane. "Really, I have no idea what ... you ..." My eyes widened as my hoof touched something small and solid buried in my curls.

"Come on, let's see it!" Pinkie chirped as she reached her own hoof to my mane and plucked something out of it. "Aw, it's just a pendant."

Twilight gasped. "Wait, what?!"

I was just as shocked. Hanging from Pinkie's hoof by the chain was my pendant.

"But we had left that in the lab!" Twilight said.

"I know!" I cried. "I-I didn't take it back! I didn't go anywhere near the lab after we left!"

"I believe you."

"Please, you have to ... um ... you do?"

Twilight took the pendant from Pinkie in her magic. "Just to be safe, I had placed an additional spell on the pedestal to warn me if anypony attempted to take the artifact. Since it never triggered, the artifact -- I'm sorry, the pendant -- must have returned itself to you." She looked at me. "Do you ever recall that happening before?"

I was going to answer in the negative until I remembered once when I was a child, about a year after my mother had first given it to me. I had gone on a trip with her and had accidentally left the pendant at home. The maid even confirmed over the phone that it was right there on my dresser. The next morning, I found it in my luggage. My mother had reprimanded the maid for being so badly mistaken, but the maid swore that she had seen it.

"Maybe once," I said. "But at the time I thought I was mistaken about leaving it at home."

"What does this mean, Twi?" Applejack asked.

"It means this has some sort of rather powerful binding magic associated with it," said Twilight. "As long as this filly is considered the pendant's owner, it cannot be separated from her."

I swallowed hard. "You mean, I can't get rid of it even if I tried?"

"Binding magic like this can be broken only if you willingly give up ownership of the pendant to another," Twilight said. "Then it likely becomes bound to them in turn."

"So that's what the changeling was trying to do?" Rainbow asked.

"Yes, the changeling was trying to frighten her into willingly giving it up."

"It almost worked," I said in a small voice.

"Didn't ya say the changelin' tried ta snatch it while she was Nurse Redheart?" said Applejack. "Don't make sense if it woulda jus' come right back to her."

"Maybe I was mistaken about that," I said. "It was hard to tell."

"Or the changeling didn't know about the binding magic at the time," said Twilight. She turned towards me. "If you still want me to keep this separated from you, the only way I can do it is if you willingly give it up to me. There's no other way. Maybe with a great deal of time and research I can find a way to break the binding magic, but not anytime soon."

I stared at the pendant. As much danger as it now represented, I still found it hard to give up, especially to somepony who I only just started to get to know. Maybe I could more easily give it to somepony like Fluttershy or even Rarity, but if that would put them in danger, I couldn't live with myself if something happened to them.

I already felt responsible for Michelle's death. I didn't want another on my conscience.

"I think I know what your answer is," Twilight said softly.

I swallowed and nodded. She gently fit the chain around my neck, and I heard a faint click.

"The clasp closed by itself," said Twilight. "It definitely still wants to belong to you."

Fluttershy drew near and gave me a hug. "It's okay, Twilight won't let anything happen to you."

"Twi, are ya sure there ain't nothin' else ya can do?" Applejack said.

"Not really, not before the summit," said Twilight.

"An' there ain't no other way to break this here bindin' magic ya were talkin' about?"

Twilight paused a long moment. "There is only one other way it can be broken," she said in a somber voice. "And that's with the death of the pony it's bound to."

The other ponies gasped. I felt my blood turn to ice.

"She won't let that happen!" Fluttershy said, her voice quavering despite its conviction.

"Certainly not!" Rarity said as she stepped before me. "You can count on Twilight. She has always come through for all of us."

"An' we all try to come through fer her," said Applejack. "We'll help any way we can."

"Yeah, we won't let that flying bag of ugly touch a single hair on your mane!" Rainbow Dash said.

I would have been more touched by this outpouring of support if I were still not feeling guilty over what I was still keeping from them. I again debated as to whether to tell them or not. Would they be so keen on helping me if they knew I was not really one of them?

Like in the alley, I was still a coward. I decided to wait a little longer. Get past this damn summit and the immediate danger -- like Twilight had said earlier -- and then we could talk when my life was not riding on their continued good nature.

Michelle, you likely never intended to put me through all this trouble, but I still hope it will be worth it in the end.