Trixie made the return through the cavern, and then through the long sandstone corridor. All the way there, she felt as if her body was light, lighter than even the few times she was briefly able to hover while self-levitating. The experience she had just went through had been heavy, but having gone through it, Trixie now felt transient. Throughout the walk, she was floating on the world underneath her hooves.
In no time at all, she returned to the throne room.
An odd sight greeted her: unlike before, where most of her companions had been seated at the back of the room, with only Noire beside her close to the Empress, all five of her fellow ponies were now sitting around in a semi-circle close to the Empress, with Iceheart at the centre. It seemed that in the time since Trixie had gone on her trip for self-discovery that her friends had been engaged by the Empress to sit for a chat.
The Empress was the first to notice Trixie, though she did not turn in her seat. “I see you have returned. How was your journey?”
“I found myself...at peace,” Trixie said vaguely. As the Empress would have known what the Pool of Reflections was about, she expected that to be a decisive enough statement.
A soft hum was what Trixie got in return as she trotted around to the front of the dais to face her friends. “Trixie!” came the uniform cry from her friends, each with varying degrees of happiness to see her back again, and a little bit of affection from the red-furred pegasus among their numbers.
“What happened back there, Trixie?,” Stonehenge rumbled in his deep voice.
“I—hmm...may I?” Trixie asked, looking back at the Empress.
“You may,” said the Empress, right before she descended into another coughing fit.
“Mother. I think it is time for your feeding.”
Larynx stepped forward again, having stood as solid and stone-faced as the changeling guards. Trixie noted uneasily that except for rotating on guard whenever she or Noire had moved around, they were in the exact same position as when she had first entered this room several hours ago. They were true professionals.
Trixie opened her mouth to explain what had happened down there, only to break off as Larynx moved forward towards the Empress and pressed his mouth against hers. Intuitively, Trixie knew what it was. Her father had very occasionally shared his love energy with her mother, turning it physical and sharing it via a kiss. There was another method for changelings to transfer energy, one that required no contact and was entirely platonic, but her father had been entirely romantic.
However, this was no romance. Instead, Larynx was feeding the Empress.
The effects were quick. Some of the splotches on the Empress’ carapace became less noticeable, and the black parts started to shine. Her hair was just a little brighter, and she perked up, slightly more energetic than she had been. Even her breathing became steadier, more moderated.
As Larynx moved away, the Empress answered the unspoken question. “Long have I lived, ever since the time of the Windigos. I have survived the reign of Discord. I have watched your pony kingdoms rise and fall and rise again, and I can truthfully call your pony princesses my juniors. But it has cost me. Though the mind remembers, the body cannot keep up. My daughter Queens may go through trials, but they are nonetheless cruel. Why else would they give unto me the title of Empress and keep me alive when I, a cripple, cannot even feed anymore, requiring my Voice to sustain me? Even my eyesight and hearing have steadily declined these last few years. Soon, I will be confined to merely my tongue, which has yet to fail me, but even then I need a Voice. I faced the Windigos, yet I am not allowed to face death.”
Trixie clenched her teeth. Somehow, it hadn’t hit home until that moment just how truly old the Empress was. Sure, she had lived over a thousand years, but Trixie had not even heard the Empress talk much of her past. However, seeing her be fed by another, like a common foal instead of a mare, was more decisive than the Empress’ mere appearance. The older crone was less a changeling than she was a husk that continued to be inhabited by an old soul.
“But enough of that. Yes. You may tell your friends what happened down there.”
The unicorn mare sighed. She wanted so desperately to ask the Empress now for the secrets of what the hybrids could do, as she had promised, but the elder was right. Instead, Trixie turned back to face her five friends, who had clustered together after being sprawled out. “Again, what happened, Trixie?,” Stonehenge asked, his golden-yellow eyes showing both concern and curiosity.
“It was...a mysterious thing,” Trixie began. She swallowed as she figured out a way to explain the truth of what had occurred. “There is a pool down there, perhaps big enough to be called a pond, but a pool nonetheless. When you approach it, your reflection in the water takes a physical form.”
“It what?” Red Wings asked in a surprised outburst.
“It takes physical form,” Trixie repeated herself. “The other me, I called her ‘Altrix’, she said that it was the ‘Pool of Reflections’. I think it was less a pool and more a magical artifact, maybe an ether sink, or a connection of leylines perhaps, but the pool had...gained sentience after a sort? Altrix said the pool, it turns your reflection back at you. It makes you face yourself, all that you are, both your good qualities and your bad.”
“Trixie...the Amulet?” Noire asked, attempting to tiptoe around the sensitive subject.
Trixie nodded. “Yes, the Amulet. Even four years later, I still feel a taint on my soul from those days. It’s no longer as potent as it was, but there is still some of it clinging to me. Like, the best way I can describe it as really is grease that you can’t get out of your fur, no matter what. Altrix, the pool, they forced into the open all the nasty truths and secrets that I’ve been hiding from for my whole life.”
Stonehenge shuddered. “That sounds like it was an awful experience.”
She answered his shudder with her own shiver. “It was,” Trixie admitted. “Yet, it was also...liberating? I needed it. It was cleansing. It was deeply personal, and Altrix didn’t care to go easy on me. Easy wasn’t what I needed. If she had gone easy on me, I would never have achieved the epiphany I needed. Every excuse I came up with, she threw right back in my face and trampled it until I was stripped of the layers of lies I’ve built to protect myself over the years. It...it...it hurts. I don’t think we’re meant to be called out that way. We build up lies that we tell ourselves so all our failings, our shortcomings don't keep us awake at night. Altrix used it to hurt, before she used it to make me heal. But it’s still painful, thinking about what she did.”
“I see,” said Stonehenge. It was clear that the subject of what had happened down at the Pool of Reflections, while profound, was deep enough that pressing Trixie would be like attempting to soothe a wildcat with no mind but for its own pain.
“I can see why the changeling Queens go down there, to a one, before they are allowed to rule, though,” said Trixie. “I...do not quite like Queen Chrysalis, but she must have gone down there. She would have been required to face herself, too.”
“Yes. All of my daughters and granddaughters who wish to take over a hive must come here and go down to the Pool of Reflection,” the Empress added from behind her. “Not all of them come out for the better. Those who are able to adjust are those who are fit to rule. Those who cannot may return down there, but only a few have persevered through their first thrashing and worked up the courage to go a second time.”
“Perhaps those few have the greatest strength of will,” Trixie murmured. She couldn’t imagine going to see her shadow once more, so shortly after having already been metaphorically skinned.
“Would it be worth each of us going down there as well, then? I know I still have my own hang-ups from Sombra’s reign,” Iceheart said.
“No!,” Trixie barked, before backing off, pressing a hoof against her chest and letting her heart rate slow down after the sudden spike. Taking a few breaths, she said, “Well, maybe. If the Empress is willing.” Trixie said this with her back still to the Empress.
“Not all ponies would require it. After all, not every pony seeks to become an alicorn.”
Trixie spun around so quick she could have sworn she broke her neck. “Wha—how did you—”
The Empress cut her off. “It is a foolish sentiment, but an ambitious one. However, I already fought one monster in my day. I would not set upon this world another one in the form of a broken mare with too much power.”
“How, how did you…?”
“Wait, what? What is she talking about, Trixie?” Red Wings asked, taken off-guard by the way the conversation had suddenly gone. Trixie wants to become an alicorn? What is the Empress talking about? Wait, she’s not denying it. She...really?
Trixie narrowed her eyes. “The Pool of Reflections, were you—”
“Spying? Of course not. I would never spy on a ritual as sacred as confronting oneself down there. But I have ways of knowing,” said the Empress, cooly regarding Trixie before casting her gaze over the rest of the ponies. “What your pony friend has kept secret for so long is her burning desire to become an alicorn.”
“Are you serious? Oh gosh, you are,” said Windspeaker. Trixie felt fortunate that he did not feel hurt, merely shocked.
The other ponies attempted to chime in, but the Empress cut them off, her voice suddenly strong and her form no longer weak as she managed to stand up on her front two hooves for the first time. “Yes. Your friend Trixie kept it hidden well. Never once did she voice it out loud, or write it down. If she had, no doubt the Living Wind would have told you.”
“Bwah?!” Windspeaker himself was taken by surprise. “How do you know about the Living Wind?”
The Empress sniffed. “I never did, right until you walked into my cave. Such an interesting aspect of the forces of creation. I am glad to know that I am nearing the end of my lifespan yet can still learn new things. It is a good thing the Living Wind cannot read me. I did not take to secluding myself to Colt Springs only for a pony with an ability of freak birth to be able to eavesdrop on me.”
Windspeaker never told her about the Living Wind while I was down there? Trixie thought. Then how does she know about it? Wait. I thought it was just silly fantasy, but could she—
“It really is just silly fantasy. I am no more a mind-reader than your pegasus colt still has one wing.”
“Urk.” Red Wing reeled as the Empress casually mentioned her knowledge of his past deformity. Aside from Iceheart, none of them had talked freely of their histories to the changeling. How does she know these things so easily?
The ponies had stood up, warily backing away as the Empress suddenly revealed profound knowledge of all of them. The Empress laughed. It was a light, jovial thing. “You think I am attempting to divide and conquer the six of you. Nothing could be further from the truth.”
“Then—explain!” Noire demanded, though she kept a close eye on Trixie at the same time from her periphery view.
“For a thousand years and more, I have travelled the world, and settled here in Colt Springs,” said the Empress. “In that time, I met countless ponies, gryphons, minotaurs, donkeys, and a hundred other species. Changelings are the ultimate empaths, able to sense the emotions of others, but I have lived longer than any other.” Sensing she had an enraptured audience, the Empress continued. “It would only make sense that, with time, I would become more experienced. I began to differentiate between platonic love, romantic love, familial love, the love of a crush, and the thousand other varieties of love. I could tell the hundred strains of joy, and the many shades of anger. Before I knew it, I could tell what creatures were thinking, not just feeling, based on the unique confluence of emotions that each of them had.”
She turned on Stonehenge. “You regret the fifty years that you have lost while in stone. The potential love you had at the time has since aged and passed, all without a chance to confess. Your parents are gone, and so are most of those you called friends. The world has passed you by, and you decided to leave to have a chance to get to grips with it, but you fear that what you really have done is to run away from what was once a home, but which now hurts you every second you were staying there.”
Stonehenge sputtered and choked. His large size was of no use in protecting him against the Empress’ accusations. That they were all too true rocked him to the core, and for the first time in years he felt like a colt being reprimanded by his dam again.
The Empress turned on Red Wings next. “You feel bitter at all those who used to be your friends, but you wonder if it was they who forsook you when you lost your wing, or if it was you who forsook them. You felt like a pathetic mongrel as you wandered from town to town, getting drunk far too many nights to count so you could forget the pain, and eventually having to be on the run from the law on top of that. Even as you regained your wing, you wonder if your new friends would forsake you too if somehow you lost your wing again and could not get it back. Even if you could explain the regrown wing, you feel too much shame to be able to return home and reunite with family, friends and neighbors alike.”
This time the pegasus felt his world shatter. Red-furred ears drooping as low as they could go, Red Wings couldn’t offer anything more up in defense than a soft, instinctive growl. A phantom pain emanated from his left wing, and Red folded it over his head partly to reassure himself it was still there, and partly to hide himself from the Empress’ words.
“You are actually a well-adjusted one,” the Empress said as she spun to face Iceheart next. “But you still have your fears and hang-ups. You wonder how much good you might have been able to do if you had fought King Sombra, even though you know you would have been outclassed. You feel you are a coward, allowing yourself to be effectively exiled into a fortress away from the Crystal Empire, all while leaving your sister and former friends behind to be enslaved by the Witch King. Even Sombra’s corruption as a colt is something you think you could have prevented, no matter that he was just one of a thousand faces in the background to you before his fall from grace and rise to power. You look at me especially as a face of fellow resistance against the Windigos and think you could have, should have been able to do better.”
Iceheart took the harsh remarks on the snout remarkably well. The purple-furred mare merely bowed her head. Though the effect was less than the two stallions beside her, Iceheart still felt her heart stir in turmoil. It took all her control to keep the hot tears in her eyes unshed.
“You scold yourself every day for not being more proactive with the Living Wind,” the Empress next said to Windspeaker. “Every time you know about injustice being done through the wind’s currents, you tell yourself ‘I could have done something to prevent this, I could be doing something still to prevent it’. Yet very rarely have you acted, only doing so when it involves minimum effort, wishing only to enjoy as best you can the rest of your days in this world before you fade away into the wind. You despise your timidity, and were it not for the appearance of a cure you would have gone to the grave hating this world for bringing you into it with such a curse, hating even the Living Wind that was your only companion for so long.”
Windspeaker trembled, his blue eyes losing focus as he zoned in and out of the world around him. It was a decisive takedown of his entire life. It was clear to him that the Empress of All Changelings deserved both title and reputation, if she was able to read him so thoroughly in a mere few hours. Even the rage he felt in his heart would be easily deciphered by her, if the Empress’ words about being so great an empath that she could effectively read minds was true.
“As for you.” Finally, the Empress turned to Noire. The batpony pre-emptively had her ears up against her head and her wings tucked in, already expecting harsh words. “You have felt that you were too passive your entire life, always reacting, never acting. You are not even certain that you truly wanted to be a guard, but were just following in your father’s hoofsteps. You believe you always took what your father was for granted, and only now that he is dead do you want to harness your heritage to pay tribute to his memory. You hate the way you ran away from home, and how you hid away far away from Canterlot for several months. Even when you returned, you slunk in under cover of darkness as another pony entirely. You never asked your mother tough questions when you did, because you were scared that she would hate you.”
Even though Noire had braced herself, it was not enough. Midway through the Empress’ words, she had already started sobbing. It had not helped that she was the last of the five that the Empress had turned on. Because Noire herself could sense emotions, she was already primed by the catatonic reactions of her four pony friends.
It was havoc. It was as if the Empress had become the Pool of Reflections herself, tearing each of the ponies apart in a methodical manner, exposing them more than they had been willing to open up to one another.
At the centre of all it was Trixie. The psychic assault on her five friends was magnified by the fact that they were her friends, and all the emotional training in the world could not deaden her empathic sense to this.
“Stop! Please, stop! Why are you doing this?!” Trixie pleaded, but she was unable to do more than that. She had her hooves around her head, instinctively trying to block off her ears from all the noise, but there was no noise, it was all empathic signal that no amount of blocking her ears would ever prevent. The emotional anguish continued to cascade, building up like a waterfall of sorrow created by tearing down the mental dams created by five ponies over their lifetimes. It was like a migraine to her, but even worse. For the first time, Trixie truly began to detest the gift she had inherited from her father.
The Empress looked on, not showing a hint of apology on her hard expression. “So you truly are a daughter of a changeling.”
Trixie was unable to reply to that, sobbing from the pain. Hot tears were dripping out from her eyes, blinding her. Once more, she was down on the ground, her limbs having given out at some point.
“Many centuries ago, I gave a blessing to one of my many sons who loved a pony mare to go and woo, then finally wed her. To my surprise, they managed to have a foal. I thought it was impossible,” the Empress said. Her words were so soft Trixie nearly missed them underneath all her own noise. “When I investigated, I found it was not to be a one-off, as the couple had two more foals. However, at the time, I was also dismayed to find that it would take a great deal of energy for conception, more than would be practical for our races to ever truly interbreed. That none of my daughters could reproduce with a pony without using still more of their hive’s power nipped that idea in the bud. Only if we went out into the open and received love and generosity from all ponies could it ever be possible.”
“But the existence of you half-breeds always lingered at the back of my mind. Several of you were born every generation. When I tracked their descendents down the ages, I saw a few interesting things. Ponies who would occasionally be able to use magic from a tribe not their own, which every new crop of half-breeds refined until the methods your fathers taught to you to use it were tried-and-true. Nearly all were strong empaths, many who would often go into healing professions as a result of their sympathy for others in pain.”
By now, Trixie was beginning to gain some normalcy over herself. It helped that the Empress had stopped talking her friends down. While she was the Pool of Reflections writ large in a changeling, being as savage and cruel as Altrix ever had been, she was far more brief in it than the ordeal the Pool had been. Though the initial onslaught had been rough, the Empress had quickly backed off. With her friends getting over the mental trauma, short as it had been, Trixie was in turn able to listen to what the Empress was saying.
“But what always struck me was that many ponies would eventually suffer in their old age,” revealed the Empress. “Ponies are not changelings. They cannot feel emotions over a lifetime without suffering from it, because they were never born with the mental conditioning we were. Most only showed small effects of this exposure rotting away at their minds, but some of your ilk were eventually deeply disturbed.” She paused, taking a deep breath, before finally the Empress sat back down, curling up on her throne. “It is good to see the both of you are not that strongly affected.”
Trixie nearly sputtered. Her mind rushed to a conclusion. “This was a test?!” She asked, feeling undignified. Everything that the Empress had just put her friends though was all merely to test Trixie and Noire’s empathic reactions? “You put my friends through all this just for a test?!”
“It would be no worse than if they were to go down to the Pool of Reflections.”
The unicorn grit her teeth even more. Trixie felt the pain from the splitting headache she had just suffered, that was still there but lessening, metamorphose into a growing anger. She wanted to throw an outburst, but curiosity won out over anger. “Why?” Trixie asked firmly, pawing the ground with her hoof as she got up.
“I told you before. I will not unleash a pony out into the world with too much power and too little wholeness of will and spirit.”
Trixie bit her lip. “I would never—”
“Yet again you deny a truth. You picked up the Alicorn Amulet once already. Who is to say you will not similarly fall temptation again? You may think you have morals, but I have seen all too easily how that can be overridden by temptations and corruption. You can ask your friend Iceheart about King Sombra.”
This time, Trixie bit her tongue instead of her lip. She realised what the issue was. The Empress was being hyperlogical. But she either did not consider the ramifications of the hurt she had committed, or she had and simply did not care.
“The ends justified the means.”
There she goes again, doing that, Trixie thought, her muzzle scrunching up in anger and annoyance. An extreme talent for being able to interpret the thoughts of others through their emotions. How many years did she have to practice that for?
“Over fifteen hundred.”
Arrgh, and again. No wonder she compares herself to the Pool of Reflections, she’s both as nasty and as good as Altrix was. Wait. The Pool of Reflections. Something about that isn’t...she’s smiling. Why? No. If she’s been effectively able to read our minds since we first got here, she’s probably been manipulating us ever since we first got here. But...wait, she sent me down to the Pool of Reflections first.
“You wanted me to go down to the Pool and face myself first, didn’t you?” Trixie accused the Empress, and she knew she was right when the Empress hadn’t cut her off in mid-thought. “You could have simply torn into me when we first came in. Maybe you would have had to wait a few minutes to do whatever it is you do however it is you do it, but I would have been susceptible to it. Instead, you let me go down there. When I came back up, anything words you said to me personally would have been ineffective when my clone already did it.”
The Empress reared her head back and laughed. It was an oddly peaceful laugh, one that didn’t send her off in a coughing fit. “How right you are, my little pony.”
I knew it! Trixie thought in satisfaction. It was the first victory of any sort since the Empress had caught her off-guard in this mental battle. Wait, what is she...doing…?
“Mother! What are you—”
“Away, Larynx,” said the Empress as she lifted a hoof, dangling it precociously over the edge of her dais. Timidly, awkwardly, she lowered the hoof until it made contact with the first stair coming down from the stone dais. With a halting breath, she lifted her other front limb, and moved it down the next step.
It was one of the most pitiful sights Trixie had ever seen. The Empress had just put on a display of dominance, cowing all six of them into submission with mere words. Now, it was the reverse as she attempted to move on her own. Trixie had known it before, but seeing the old crone attempt to move, it was sad to know that potentially the sharpest mind the mare had ever seen in her short lifetime was in a body that was just so fragile. Already, the shine in the Empress' carapace that had been brought about briefly from her feeding was beginning to dull. Her lack of depth perception from having only one working eye was obvious with every step she made. The changeling’s torso was so skinny, and her tail had been cropped off to a nub. Even the holes in her limbs, trademark to the changeling race, looked as if they were wasted away.
After several minutes, the Empress made her way down the few short steps of the dais, and then walked up to Trixie. Perhaps she had been as tall as Queen Chrysalis was when she was older, but now the Empress was just a touch shorter than Trixie herself. Nonetheless, she did not look up, forcing Trixie to look down to meet her eyes. Even now, the former leader of the changelings had her pride.
“I am Anfang. I am the progenitor of the changelings.”
“Anfang.” Trixie rolled the name around on her tongue. It was not a changeling name that she knew of. Then again, Trixie doubted any changeling would name his or her offspring the same name as the Empress. Still, Anfang had been courteous to at last give her name, so she would do the same. Giving a slight curtsy, she said, “I am Trixie Lulamoon. My birth name is Bellatrix Midsummer, but that is not who I am.”
“Greetings, Trixie, daughter of Wooden Chisel and September.” Anfang rose a hoof, and it took Trixie a moment to realise what it meant.
They shook hooves.
“You’ve always wanted ponies and changelings to be able to co-exist peacefully, haven’t you, Anfang?”
“I am the Empress of All Changelings,” said Anfang as she lowered her hoof. “My daughters may have given that title to me to mock my fall from grace as my body declined to this decrepit husk you see now, but I accord my new title a great deal of respect. It means that I am responsible for all changelings, not just the ones who live in the hive underneath Colt Springs. For many years, I have been concerned about my race’s future as we become further and further secluded from the hearts of others, especially after my foolish daughter Chrysalis’ actions in invading Canterlot. When you entered the hive and came here, Trixie, you delivered unto me the greatest gift I could possibly have received, if only you could survive the trial of the Pool of Reflections. When you did, I knew you were the pony I needed. Become an alicorn, and with your strength and wisdom, you can bridge the great chasm that has opened up between my people and all other races, but especially the ponies.”
Trixie’s eyes widened. “Then—”
“All of this was a test, yes. But it was not guaranteed to be a success. More than the risk of you becoming another King Sombra, you are the daughter of a changeling and a pony. Were you to change into a tyrant like him and ponies found out of your heritage, my race would be even more ostracised than it was before. Any half-breeds such as you would be hunted to extinction by those who are driven by fear more than rationality.”
Trixie swallowed back an enormous lump that had formed in her throat at that thought. If she had failed...Trixie hated to think about the possibility of others like her being killed merely for what they were. Changelings like her father proved that ponies and changelings could live together, but one moment of giving into temptation could have torn that potential future asunder forever.
“Your reflection told you that merely being a healer of others would not be enough of a reason to become an alicorn. I cannot disagree. Even I, who have lived ages, am not of the same divine status as an alicorn. But if you become one and use the chance to heal not just others, but the relations between two entire races, that will be enough.”
Closing her eyes, Trixie briefly meditated, breathing in and out. I never had a chance to fight, did I? Ever since I came in, both Altrix and the Empress have helped to guide me so far.
“We have,” said the Empress, smiling.
“Then I’ll do it,” Trixie said, at last committing to her decision, ending the conflict that had been stirring in her heart for several weeks. “I will become an alicorn, and use my new status to bring us all together. Not just changelings and ponies, but changelings and every other race.”
“A noble sentiment, then,” said Anfang, before she frowned. “But the Alicorns are not just merely a step above a unicorn, a pegasus, or an Earth pony. They are partially divine. No matter how great your magic is, a mere illusion cannot capture something of the divine on its own. To emulate the divine, you must first understand it. As I interpret your powers, you will never be able to ascend on your own. There is a limit to what magic can by itself. You must have an alicorn right in front of you to be able to.”
Trixie felt like she had just been slugged in the barrel, letting out a visible ‘oof’. “Right in front of me? You mean, I have to actually be next to one of the Princesses to ascend?”
“Your true skill only shines when you are in great conflict. Only when you have been driven to help another pony have you been able to advance in leaps and bounds. So will it be the same. You cannot merely walk up to a Princess and use your magic. You could ask them for help, and do it on peaceful terms, but I know them. They cannot abide a pony that they have not had their hooves on for their entire lives ascending. Even if there are two new Princesses that I have never met, I know they would not be where they are without the sisters coaxing them into it, and slowly bringing them into the ideal of absolute stability. It would be doubly so impossible were they to find out you had a changeling father. No. You must somehow get an alicorn to fight you. Only when their divine presence is in front of you can you copy their sheer being and trick existence into believing you are the same as she. It will take you coming to blows with an alicorn merely once...no, maybe two times, to become one yourself if you execute your magic perfectly.”
“Twice?!” Trixie yelped. “No, even once would already be enough. How could I possibly face any of them? I might have learned how to make the field of magic I specialised in do things I never imagined possible, but I am no battle mage. The most I’ve ever fought in my life with magic was when I,” she paused to swallow, before continuing, “When I wore the Alicorn Amulet.”
Anfang looked at her for the first time with concern. “Your path is fraught with hazards, pony of the crescent moon and wand. I cannot be certain if merely once will be enough, so you should make certain to have a fallback plan, though the Princesses will be aware of you as a threat to their hegemon after your first attempt. I am no alicorn myself, after all. Though I am strong, old, and wise, I am no more celestial a being then the worms that crawl in the dirt. Still, the longer you can prolong your first conflict, the better a chance you have of ascension.”
“That doesn’t answer my question!,” protested Trixie. “I am no fighter, no matter how much magic I have learned.”
“We will help you,” Anfang said, reassuring the younger mare. “My daughter, the Queen of this Hive, listens to me in most things, the only one of my many children along with Larynx who have made sure to provide for me even as I grew old. You may not be strong now, but you may remain here in Colt Springs, both on the surface and in the Hive, so long as you require. I have a thousand years of knowledge of what the true abilities of half-breeds, hybrids, can become. It will not be a lifetime of training, but I am certain between tailoring your illusions to help in battle and what we can teach you, it will be enough.”
Trixie bowed her head. She still wasn’t certain.
“But enough of that. While I hope you will do a marvelous job, that is all in the future. For now, you should talk to your friends.”
Her heart thumped, as Trixie turned around and faced her five dearest comrades, the ponies she had met and gathered in her journey leaving from Whinnychester and eventually coming here to Colt Springs. They all had varying emotions on their face, but to a one, none of them felt angry towards her. Her heart thumped some more, but this time Trixie was happy, instead of nervous.
She turned back to face Anfang. “What about them, then? If I am to face an alicorn, I would not want them to be left behind if they will join me.”
“We will provide them with training, too. Though we are not ponies, many of my sons and daughters have spent years among the ponies, learning their secrets and skills. Three of you are already experienced in battle. Between the six of you, and your many talents, I am certain you can find a way.”
Trixie bowed her head again, accepting the Empress of All Changelings’ words. It felt like their conversation was almost at an end. Then, she had a thought.
She looked up to Anfang to see if the elder mare would interrupt her and answer her or deny her question before Trixie could even ask it, but Anfang merely nodded. Trixie breathed in, then said, “The way you talked earlier about granting your son permission to love a pony mare, and the way you seem to want for ponies and changelings to be able to live together...did you ever love a stallion, Anfang?”
Anfang held her head low as well, a soft smile on her face, eyes closed. Then she raised her head back up, opening her one good eye. The peaceful, content expression remained. “Of course. Who do you think Colt Springs was named after?”
Trixie nearly jumped at that answer. It was unexpected, yet it felt so true.
You truly are full of surprises, aren’t you, Anfang? Trixie thought to herself as the Empress turned around to move up. But one thing still bothered Trixie. With my power, couldn’t I—
“No.”
Trixie let out a small ‘eep’, flushing. Being reprimanded felt like she had been caught with a hoof in the cookie jar when she had just been a filly.
“Time is a force to be respected. Even if you usurp the heavens, I would still not ask you to conquer time for me,” said Anfang, her back to Trixie. “I may be old, but that is the normal consequence of all living things. Even those who claim immortality, such as the sisters, must die someday. Besides, were I to be made young once more by the power of your illusion, I would fear my own potential. If already I can effectively read the minds of any who come before me, I would not be able to trust myself going back out into the world. There will be others, no doubt, who will plead with you to do the same for them in the future. You will have to think carefully before renewing one’s youth other than perhaps your own. What is old cannot be made anew, even if the flesh appears to be so. Make your father proud.”
With that, the Empress at last crawled back onto her dais. It was an epic struggle for her, perhaps even more than coming down, but the Empress was a strange creature of pride and wisdom. Trixie considered herself blessed to have met Anfang, even if she had been cruel with the way she had torn into her friends. But what did she mean about making my father proud? Does she even know about that…?
My friends, right, Trixie remembered as her train of thought changed tracks. For however long she continued to stay in Colt Springs, Trixie was certain she would continue hearing Anfang’s wisdom. However, there were still five others that she would have to talk with and convince.
Turning around, Trixie walked back towards her five friends.
“So you want to become an alicorn,” Red Wings stated, wasting no time.
“Yes,” Trixie confirmed.
Iceheart narrowed her eyes. “But why?”
“It…” Trixie struggled to answer to her friend. In front of the Pool of Reflections and in front of Anfang, she had been able to reply, but to Iceheart, it was an entirely different thing. “It is many things. I want to continue helping others, but I remember those other patients at the Centre for Mysterious Magical Maladies that I could not. As the Empress says, I would be able to finally help my father's people get along with my mother's people. And, well..."
“Trixie,” Iceheart said in a warning tone, cutting Trixie off before she could gather her wits and carry on. “I grew up in the Crystal Empire with a colt named Sombra, and was witness to his fall into darkness. I watched as King Sombra took over, and was powerless to stop him. I will not stand for another tyrant to rise, one that I know I may actually be able to prevent.”
“Iceheart,” Windspeaker tried to say, only to be interrupted as well.
“No. I cannot help but feel this whole affair is foolishness. I heard what you and the Empress talked about, but I am unconvinced. You can heal individuals well enough as it is now, just as you managed with Windspeaker. Why can you not build up a reputation as a grand magician capable of healing any injury, then reveal yourself as a magical hybrid? Perhaps you may have to lie a little in the process, but I am certain ponies would be better able to accept changelings if they see what the offspring of one is capable of with her magic.”
Trixie sucked in her breath. It appeared one of her friends was resolute to hound Trixie about her desire. This was why she had not revealed it sooner, but now, Trixie had no choice but to answer.
Stonehenge spoke before Trixie could stand up before up for herself. “Iceheart, I do not think Trixie would simply rashly decide she wants to become an alicorn. She has a noble heart. If her conviction is strong, then surely she—”
“Quiet, Stonehenge,” Iceheart reprimanded the large stallion, making him clench his teeth and narrow his golden eyes. “I will not mock you for your accomplishments, for they are great ones. But you never lived under King Sombra like I have. None of you have. I would be remiss to simply stand by and watch as Trixie loses herself to several subsequent choices and always going ‘it is for the greatest good’, while it is never enough to whet her own appetite.”
“Y-you truly think so little of me?,” Trixie asked, ears splayed back as she thought she was seeing one of her friends turn on her.
Iceheart snorted. “Think little of you? Hardly. I have journeyed with you, Trixie. I know your heart almost as well as my own. It is for your heart that I express my concern. I cannot stop you wholesale from committing folly, but I can discourage you from doing so.”
“Oh,” said Trixie, feeling better with that answer. “But no, I do not think of it as folly. Deep down, perhaps I do want power. Altrix, my reflection that is, the clone that greeted me down there at the Pool of Reflections, she...she laid my life bare to me. But she also made me realise something.”
“What is that?” Iceheart sharply asked.
“The first time I thought about it was when I cured Stonehenge of his petrification,” Trixie replied, taking a brief nod at the grey-furred stallion in question. His eyes widened in surprise at finding out his time as a statue was the genesis for her ambition. “I thought it was more of, ‘This is something I was able to do that Princess Celestia could not, and did not think she could do at this point in time’. That I was somehow better than her in at least one marginal way. But I was looking at it the wrong way then. I have achieved greatness in attempting to solve a problem that each pony I have met on the road has had. Were I to become an alicorn, there is perhaps no illness I cannot heal.”
“So you say,” Iceheart said, still regarding her cooly. Frowning, she stared at Windspeaker and Stonehenge. “I assume neither of you truly have an issue with what Trixie has said, do you?”
“Well…” Windspeaker fidgeted under his glare, feeling for once like the protagonist of many of the stories he had read where a colt was torn between two fillies, or a filly torn between two colts. He worked up his courage, and said, “Yes. I am a little bit upset Trixie did not confide in us, but if I did not know even through the wind, then it must have been something she has really been quiet about, if she did not even mention it to herself in private.”
Trixie felt a little bit disturbed at that. Had she talked in her sleep even once, Windspeaker would have known about it.
“My feelings are the same as Windspeaker’s,” Stonehenge intoned. “Well, minus the part about having the Living Wind to know almost everything about anypony.”
Windspeaker just let out a huff at the teasing.
“I won’t even ask you, Red, no offense,” Iceheart said. It was a taciturn dismissal, but everypony knew about his crush by now.
“None taken,” Red Wings answered. He had been focused on keeping his wings tight to his side. Had he not, Red Wings suspected they might have flown open as part of a fight-or-flight reflex. Iceheart was playing hardball, and though he wished to defend Trixie, he knew Iceheart was right. This was not a conversation he could reasonably be asked to take part in due to his bias.
“Then what about you, Noire?,” Iceheart asked, turning to the last of the group.
“Erm, um,” stuttered the batpony. Noire had realised Iceheart would eventually question her, but still felt herself wilt under the Crystal pony’s tough look. Even though she had been a soldier herself, Noire would easily admit her career as a guardspony had been nothing in comparison to Iceheart’s.
Noire scrunched her nose in intense concentration. “I spent several months with Trixie in Whinnychester before she helped me gain a second skin,” Noire began, then squeezed her eyelids shut as she realised how morbid that description sounded. “Er, a new appearance. I’ve know Trixie to be lazy, and selfish, and sometimes just a total slob.”
“Gee, thanks for the vote of confidence,” said Trixie, inciting snorts from the stallions. Still, Trixie's own heart was tense at Noire’s words and Iceheart’s resoluteness.
“Sorry, sorry! But, um. Throughout that whole time, while Trixie was attempting to better her magic, she never once was truly concerned with getting power. Trixie had a hang-up about leaving town following learning of Wooden Chisel’s death, but she managed to help herself at the same time she helped me out. Trixie just isn’t the sort of pony to really think about things like getting stronger for getting stronger’s sake. We chatted into the wee hours of the morning many nights, sitting by her fireplace, up until and past when the last embers died out. I know of the Alicorn Amulet event. I also know it was when she fell into the lowest point in her life, after working on a rock farm for many months, that Trixie finally snapped and went and put the stupid thing on. So long as even one of us remains her friend, I know Trixie will never fall like that again.”
It was a speech from the heart, and Noire exhaled deeply after finishing. The marble-coloured batpony put a hoof up against her chest, no doubt to feel her own rapid heartbeat. Trixie found herself speechless at Noire’s words. She hung her head. Though Trixie smiled, she could feel tears welling up. Noire’s were simple words, but they had been beautiful words. Thank you, Noire, New Moon. I wonder what you think of all this, Anfang?
“Very well,” Iceheart said at last, assenting to the rest of the group. It seemed that Noire’s words had been enough to convince her as well. She turned to face Trixie again, blue eyes meeting violet. “I trust you with my life, Trixie. You are more charismatic than I. I have led a thousand. You lead merely five, but our loyalty to you I think is absolute. It is still not something I like the notion of, you becoming an alicorn, but so long as you are willing to confide to us in the future and listen to me, not just hear me out but truly listen, I will follow you down whatever foolish road you wish to take us. Even if it is into Tartarus itself.”
“Iceheart…” Trixie bowed her head. “Thank you very much. Thank you so, so much.”
“You can thank me by never letting your heart turn as dark as Sombra’s did.”
Slowly, each pony looked one another in the eyes. What had started as a fellowship of two in the rural village of Whinnychester had added on one pony after another, until suddenly they felt complete, like a whole group. They had just gotten past a moment that could have fractured them whole. Trixie, Noire, Iceheart, Red Wings, Stonehenge and Windspeaker all knew that they could have just been irreparably separated. Even the loss of just one of them would have been like the loss of all of them. Instead, they had pulled through. Right now, their camaraderie had never been stronger.
The six put their hooves together. They shook hooves.
When they at last broke apart their hoofshake, Trixie turned back to face the Empress, once more sitting on her dais. Colt Springs was a pleasant enough place to live, but Trixie knew the next while was going to be long and arduous as the six prepared for their showdown. They would have to spend many nights talking to one another about the holes in their hearts the Empress had exposed with her powerful psychic assaults, reconciling their regrets with the present. Though they still needed the training to fight a battle, in her heart of hearts, Trixie knew both she and her friends were all ready. Was this what Princess Twilight Sparkle felt when she first activated the Elements of Harmony with her dearest friends? Trixie wondered.
“Anfang, we’re ready.”
It was a different group of ponies who left Colt Springs six months later than when they had arrived.
“To ascend, I must force Princess Twilight Sparkle into a confrontation,” Trixie said as she floated along the ground under perpetual self-levitation, reiterating the plan they had developed and rehashed many times in the half-year since the Empress had first hosted them. There was no question about which alicorn Princess that Trixie would face off against. Trixie didn’t believe in destiny, but it was only fitting that she would fight the one who had been responsible for two of three major upheavals in Trixie’s life. “It won’t be any little incident that will get her to fight me, but I can’t just ask her to duel me. I won’t commit anything immoral to get her to come to me.”
“For that, you need the Alicorn Amulet,” Red Wings said, reaffirming their plan. He had since gotten used to flying again, reducing the little bit of flab around his primaries that had resulted from being ground-bound for so long. A changeling therapist had broken him of his psychological inhibitions from sharp turns, developed over years of simply not having a left wing and losing the instinct to use it.
“Indeed. If there’s one thing I know the guard treats seriously, it will be the pursuit of those who seek out dark magic artifacts. If you steal the Alicorn Amulet back from the zebra who lives in the Everfree, and she passes it on, there will be an army on you soon enough. From what I know of Princess Twilight, both of her history with you and the Amulet and the Everfree being so close to her own castle, she shall surely join the chase as well,” agreed Noire. Having been a former guard who had kept up her exercise, her appearance had changed little since first coming to Colt Springs. However, though she looked a batpony with a wiry frame and velvety wings, Noire now possessed many tricks than just mere flight. Learning both Earth pony and unicorn magic, she could throw a spell followed by summoning a rock with her hooves followed by flapping her wings and sending out a compressed burst of air meant to bludgeon. Nopony would be able to see all her tricks. Noire had gone a long way from asking Trixie for help with magic that normally only unicorns could use, all the way in back in Whinnychester.
“We will need to hide out in the Everfree Forest afterwards, at the Castle of the Two Sisters. We have lots of time to make it our home and scout out to learn the area before the Amulet is stolen. When the Princess falls upon us with Equestria’s finest, they will fall into a trap months in the making,” said Windspeaker. The months had been fine to him. Gone was the scrawny unicorn who had barely been able to walk out of Room 512 at the Centre for Mysterious Magical Maladies. In its place was a strong stallion of stout stature, confident in both his mind and body. Though Windspeaker’s normal magic was still below par for a unicorn, he had made leaps and gains, and he had become more familiar with the capabilities of his lifelong companion. “The Living Wind tells me that the Castle is a safe place for us to go. Perhaps we can fix it up a little when we are there for the battle that shall come.”
“Hmm, the Castle of the Two Sisters. It has been a thousand years since I have seen it. I fear that it will have become decrepit and run-down since. The image I still have in my head is of a radiant and shining fortress that brought hopes to the hearts of ponies both close and afar.” Iceheart tilted her head curiously. “Perhaps it shall do that again when it becomes the birthplace of a new Princess.” Iceheart had changed little since she first entered Colt Springs, her budding romance with Windspeaker aside. She was still a fighter through and through, and had merely refined her technique. Though she had agreed to Trixie’s plan initially, Iceheart had at last fully warmed up to it in the last few months, bonding more thoroughly with everypony else.
Stonehenge brought up the rear. “It feels weird. I would have never thought I was in history in the making when I fought as part of The Wall, yet I became a permanent fixture of the town’s character for fifty years. Now I find myself thrust into another conflict, this time a rebellion against my entire nation. Well, maybe a rebellion is too strong of a word. Truly, were it not for how blasphemous it still seems, this would merely be us helping a friend reach her fullest potential. Do not regret the path you have taken, Trixie. We are your friends, as I have said. It would be remiss of me to shirk my own choices and walk away now.” The enormous stallion had somehow managed to grow another hoof-length while in training, as he engaged in mock battles with several of the changeling guards at once on a daily basis. Through meditation and careful cultivation of his own magic, Stonehenge’s body had become even more of a literal wall.
Trixie smiled at her dearest friends and the words of support they had given her. Then she smirked. She let the haughty arrogance that had once been her downfall come back up to the front, but her words were all in jest. “The Great and Powerful Trixie will put on the greatest show Equestria has ever seen. It would not do for her act to be brought by a subpar group of performers. Come, ponies! We challenge this staid society before us, to show them that they need not fear aspiring to break their limits! We will bring ponies and changelings back together, and reconcile them for once and forever. It may yet end in ruin, but who dares, wins! Let us march, my little ponies!”
There was a great challenge in front of the six ponies who had been brought together by a single mare daring to wander out into the world and pioneer her power to an unheard-of extreme. They would all answer that challenge with gusto.
The Living Wind howled.