As Flurry Heart saw her home coming nearer, she flew a curve and landed in front of the gate of the castle. The moment her hooves touched the ground, she sighed. While folding in her wings and approaching the gate to open it, a smile appeared on her face. Now that she was at home, she was relieved that this strange day was finally over for her.
Flurry Heart activated her magic and slowly opened the gate, hurrying inside it as the opening was big enough. She closed it again and for a moment, she stood there and just listened to the echo of the sound the massive gate made sounding through the crystal halls. She closed her eyes and breathed in for a moment, still a smile on her lips, then she made her way up to the throne room and from there to the royal apartments. Much slower than at the morning – Flurry Heart still felt tired despite her nap on the cloud – she trotted up the stairs. Her first destination was the kitchen. Magnolia's sandwich had helped, but it still hadn't been enough to fully quench the hunger that had become accumulated since her detention began.
On her way, she met the guards she ran past at the morning when she made her way to school again. She flashed them a smile, that was quickly reciprocated, and once she had made it into the throne room, she slipped through the door on the right side without hesitation and found herself back in the corridor of the royal apartments. Her mom hadn't been in the throne room, as she usually was during this time of day, so Flurry figured she would either be in the kitchen or in the living room. As she entered the former, she saw her mom standing at the kitchen counter, seemingly already busy with preparing something for dinner.
Flurry Heart watched her mom quietly for some seconds, a warm feeling of relief coursing through her body, as she was more and more hit by the realization that the horrors of this day were over now. It was finally time to relax.
With an even bigger smile on her lips, Flurry Heart quietly unfolded her wings and took a few inches into the air, then she flew towards her mother. As she had reached her, she landed softly on her back and, simultaneously, wrapped her hooves around her mother's neck. She buried her head into her mane. While doing so, she felt like a huge weight was dropping off her heart.
“Flurry?” Cadance asked surprised as she felt the gentle embrace and saw the tiny, pink hooves emerging from behind. “Where have you been?” A slight worry was sounding in her voice.
Flurry Heart moved her head away from her mom's mane so that her voice wouldn't be muffled and began to explain what happened. “I got detention today, for three hours even.....” she said with a clear regret in her voice. “I came late to school because Mag–“ Quickly, Flurry bit on her tongue and stopped herself. The last thing she wanted after this horrific day was reminding herself on what had happened in the morning and having to talk about it again. “I mean,” she continued “Sunny and I were talking about Magnolia a lot before school started and we forgot the time over it, so we got late.”
“And so both of you got detention,” Cadance finished for her daughter, now relief in her voice.
“Mhm,” Flurry Heart lied in response and nodded, with a satisfied smile on her face.
“Three hours just for coming late once is a lot, though.” Cadance turned her head around and looked at her daughter with a strict expression. “How much late were you and Sunny?” she asked in a suspicious tone.
Now Flurry Heart grimaced and turned her head away from her mother. “Just, uh..... twenty minutes?” she admitted hesitantly.
“'Just' twenty minutes, I see.....” Cadance giggled. “Well, at least you weren't alone and you didn't have to go through so much of the math lesson you hate.”
What was supposed to lift Flurry Heart's spirits let her frown, though. “Yeah, but I had to do math the whole time during detention!” she replied, in a slightly increased voice now. “I was so bored after it that I was just flying around for a while. And then I even slept in on a–“ She stopped herself again and hesitated for a moment before she continued. “On the roof of the schoolhouse.”
“I guess this explains why it's already four in the afternoon and you only returned now.” Cadance's voice became a little stricter again. “Even with your detention you should have been at home at half past two already, Flurry.”
Flurry Heart's eyes grew wide as she heard this. “What?! I thought it's not later than three!” she exclaimed with surprise. “And I still have homework to do!”
Cadance stepped away from the counter a little, then activated her magic and hovered her daughter in front of her. “Sounds like this really wasn't your best day, was it?” She hovered Flurry closer and gave her a tight hug.
Relieved that her mom could figure this already without her having to tell all the other gruesome details of this horrible day, Flurry Heart nodded in agreement. Then she felt herself lifted across the room and put down on the stool she had been sitting on in the morning during breakfast.
“Even though you still have homework today, I think it's the best if you eat something now. You must be hungry after all these hours. I make you a sandwich.”
The new grumbling in Flurry's stomach as her mom mentioned eating answered for the little filly, yet she replied to her mother with a nod.
Cadance looked into her daughter's eyes and smirked. “Peanut butter with tomatoes?”
Feeling reminded on her earlier, creepy meeting with Magnolia on the cloud, she shook her head. “No, I just want one with normal butter,” she gave her mom a surprising answer. “I ate two sandwiches with peanut butter and tomatoes during recess today!” Flurry Heart quickly added a made-up explanation as she noticed the surprise in her mom's eyes.
“Okay then, I take care of it!” her mom said then and turned around to the counter again where she began to prepare Flurry's sandwich. As she was finished with it, she hovered it over to her daughter and took seat opposite of her.
Flurry Heart greedily took the sandwich and bit into it with passion. As she had eaten half of it, she looked over to her mom and addressed a question. “Mommy? Where is daddy?”
“Daddy is just outside showing the empire to some delegates that came all the way from Coltkata. They are actually just here for negotiations, but for some reason, they insisted on a tour through the Crystal Empire and even interrupted the talks we had. Daddy offered to guide them around, so I could take care of dinner in the meanwhile. Do you need anything from him?”
Flurry Heart shook her head, satisfied with the answer, then she continued to munch on her sandwich. There were a lot of questions she had now, like, where Coltkata was and what the negotiations were about. More important than these two questions, though, was the assignment her teacher gave her today. It had left a question in Flurry Heart's mind that was circling through her head constantly since she got the assignment.
Flurry Heart put the last bit of her sandwich into her mouth and once she had swallowed it, reached out for a glass full of milk her mom had brought her in the meanwhile. As she had emptied it with big, greedy gulps, Cadance hovered it and the plate over to the kitchen sink and began to clean up what Flurry had used during her meal.
Not hungry anymore now and with a burning curiosity, Flurry Heart turned her attention back to her mom. “Mommy, why did you and daddy call me 'Flurry Heart'”?
Cadance's eyes dilated with fright as she heard her daughter asking this question. Frantically, she turned around. “Why are you asking this?” she replied to her daughter.
Flurry Heart twitched for a second over the sudden volume in her mom's voice. “I need to know it for school,” she explained with a not low amount of surprise in her voice as the slight shock had subsided. “Why are you yelling?” she asked then.
As she looked into the curious and innocent face of her daughter, Cadance tried to compose herself. She closed her eyes, breathed in calmly and held her hoof to her chest. Then she stretched it away from her body again and breathed out at the same time. She repeated the relaxation technique three times, then she opened her eyes and looked at her daughter again, who was wearing a completely puzzled expression now.
“Is something wrong, mommy?” she asked her.
Cadance shook her head. “No, Sweetie, everything is fine. The talks with the delegates have just been hard so far, that's all.”
“Are you sure, mommy?” Flurry Heart raised an eyebrow as she noticed the still nervous tone in her mother's voice.
“Yes, I am,” Cadance replied, trying to sound as confident as possible. “I'm sorry for yelling at you. It isn't your fault that the talks don't go well.” She trotted up to her daughter and ruffled gently through her mane, who smiled and giggled in response.
“So, why did you call me 'Flurry Heart' now?” Flurry asked again as her mom had retreated her hoof. She noticed beads of sweat appearing on her mom's forehead and raised another eyebrow.
“That's a really long story, Sweetie,” Cadance began to explain while trying to keep her composure this time. “What do you need it for exactly?”
Flurry Heart shrugged. “I'm not sure. Mr. Know just said we should find it out and then tell it in front of class.”
Seeing a chance, Cadance grasped for a straw. “That sounds like a big task for so many students as there are in your class, isn't it? I'm sure it will take a few days until everypony could talk to their parents. And daddy and I thought for a very long time about how to call you. It's very complicated and will take quite some time to explain everything. When do you need to know it?”
“Tomorrow,” Flurry Heart answered swiftly.
A curse rang out in Cadance's mind. “Tomorrow.....” she repeated her daughter's word in a low voice as her face grew pale. With stiff movements, she motioned to a stool to her right and let herself slump on it.
Once more, this raised concern in Flurry Heart. “Are you alright, mommy?”
Cadance sighed, avoiding to look at her daughter. She didn't answer Flurry Heart's question and her thoughts only circled around one task. She needed to make something up and she needed to do it quickly. Not under any circumstances could she let her know the truth of what she did to the Crystal Heart years ago.
Cadance's mind raced. “What could I tell her?” she asked herself repeatedly. “'Flurry' and 'Heart'..... Maybe something with snow, just without the destruction, for 'Flurry'. And 'Heart'? Maybe something about love? No, she wouldn't believe this.....” Her brows furrowed more and more. Many ideas rushed through her head. Eventually, she decided that “Flurry” could just be a reference to the many snow that was up here around the Crystal Empire. But providing an explanation what the second part of Flurry's name was supposed to mean was exceptionally harder. Cadance continued to tax her brain for more minutes, as a light went on in her head suddenly. She knew something. It might be a kitschy explanation, but one that would work.
With a kind of relief she never felt before wash over her, she finally returned her attention to Flurry Heart again, but before she could begin to tell her this made-up story for where her name came from, her daughter spoke up to her first.
“Mommy!” she yelled and Cadance twitched. “I was calling you five times, why are you not answering?!”
Sheepishly, Cadance began to smile. She hadn't noticed that so much time had passed. For a few minutes, she had completely passed out with thinking all these thoughts, it seemed. Cadance apologized to Flurry Heart with embarrassment, then she began to explain. “So, you want to know why me and daddy called you “Flurry Heart”, right?”
A bit of the concern vanished from Flurry Heart's face, but a good amount of it remained, paired up with confusion over her mom's weird behavior and some scepticism. “Mhm,” she said taut and looked at her mom expectantly.
“Well, then let me explain.” Cadance smiled at her. Now that she had an explanation it was easy. Everything would work like a hitch, she would answer Flurry Heart's question and she would never find out the truth. With a relaxed voice, she continued. “As you know, your name consists of two parts: 'Flurry' and 'Heart'. We chose both of those for different reasons, but all of them have to do with snow.”
Cadance waited a little to increase the suspense for her daughter, yet as she couldn't see any excitement in her face, she quickly proceeded to continue.
“The first part of your name stands for the snow of the Crystal Empire. I think I never told you this, but another word for 'snowflake' is 'snow flurry'. And a few days before you were born, daddy and I saw a snowflake falling from the sky that had the shape of a heart. We still didn't know how to call you at this day, but this snowflake inspired us and so, we decided to call you 'Flurry Heart'.”
Finished with the story she had thought up in the last minutes, Cadance smiled at Flurry Heart, glad over it that she could find something that let her avoid it to tell her daughter the truth. She expected satisfaction to see in her daughter's face now, a smile maybe, but nothing of that happened. Instead, Flurry Heart was frowning.
Hoping that it was just disappointment that plagued Flurry Heart now, Cadance spoke up to her again. “I know, this isn't a very exciting story. I'm sure you expected more from your name's origin. And I'm sorry I can't offer you something better, but that's really all that is to it.”
Sporting another smile, she reached out to Flurry to ruffle through her mane again, but this time, she found the gentle gesture rejected, as Flurry Heart vehemently shoved her hoof out of the way. There was anger in Flurry's face now.
“Is something wrong?” Cadance asked her. Her voice trembled. She began to become nervous again.
Without directly addressing the question, Flurry Heart answered “Why are lying to me, mommy?”
Trying to hide her fear that once more began to rise in her, Cadance set up a pokerface to the best of her abilities. “Lying? Why would I be lying to you, Sweetie? That's all that happened when daddy and I decided for your name.”
This answer just deepened Flurry Heart's frown. “I don't believe you,” she began anew. “You said it's something that is complicated to explain, but this didn't take long. And I know that my name should describe me somehow, that's how it is for everypony, but 'Flurry Heart' doesn't describe me.”
Cadance opened her mouth for another answer, but Flurry Heart interrupted her before she could say the first word.
“And you said you and daddy saw a snowflake in the shape of a heart a few days before I was born, but how? It's impossible, the Crystal Heart doesn't let any snow into the empire!”
The more Flurry Heart had confronted her mom with those holes in her story, the more pale had her face become again. Once more she searched for an explanation for all of this, but this time, her brain only produced incoherent nonsense. Things that her smart daughter would look through again immediately, much easier than she did just now even. Cadance had to admit it, she was defeated.
“I want to know the real reason for my name!” Flurry Heart demanded now, her anger not having gotten any smaller.
Cadance looked at her daughter with sad eyes, which turned Flurry Heart's expression to a concerned one again.
“Why don't you tell me? What is wrong with my name, mommy?”
“T-There is nothing wrong with your name, Sweetie, but.....” Cadance trailed off again, struggling to find the right words. “It was true when I said that it's complicated to explain why we gave you the name 'Flurry Heart'. It just won't take long to explain it, it's only that.....” She hesitated again before she continued. “It's just that daddy and I have decided that you shouldn't know it, at least not until you are older.”
“Why?” Flurry Heart just asked. It was utter confusion that spoke out of her now.
Cadance didn't answer. Instead, she just stared at Flurry Heart, unable to tell her the truth. But when she saw the curious, demanding face of her daughter who had just uncovered her lie, she felt every defense break away and found herself unable to deny her the true story any longer.
With strong hesitation, she began. “You remember how daddy and I told you that a monster had destroyed the Crystal Heart a few days after you were born and how we could restore it?”
Flurry Heart nodded quietly.
“This story..... It isn't completely true.”
“Does this mean the Crystal Heart wasn't destroyed?” Flurry Heart asked her mom.
Sadly, Cadance shook her head. “No, it got destroyed, this is true.” She breathed in deeply before she continued. “Right after you were born, it showed that your magic was already very strong. You couldn't control it and every time you sneezed, you damaged the castle or you just shot holes into it for fun. At one point, you got upset over something and then.....”
She gulped as she saw the pupils of her daughter shrink, the sign of a realization starting to build up in her mind.
“You got upset and started to cry. Somehow, your crying created magical sound waves and those sound waves..... When they touched the Crystal Heart..... It suddenly shattered.”
Having admitted everything, Cadance just watched Flurry Heart, ready to be there for her daughter now that she knew the truth. She expected her to cry over this horrible reveal, yet nothing of this happened. Instead, Flurry Heart was frozen, her eyes big as plates now and the shock about what she had just heard written all over her face.
In an effort to calm her, Cadance continued. “We didn't tell anypony, Flurry. We knew it would bring problems, so we hid the truth, not just from you, also from every other pony in the Crystal Empire. Your daddy and I decided together with Sunburst to spread the lie that a monster managed to sneak into the Crystal Empire on the day of your Crystalling ceremony and that this monster destroyed the Crystal Heart. Nopony knows it was you, Flurry Heart. And we will continue to take care of it that nopony will find out.”
Instead of calming Flurry Heart down, her mom's words achieved the opposite, though. “T-This means I'm the monster that destroyed the Crystal Heart,” she muttered with bewilderment.
“No.” Cadance got up from her stool quickly and approached her daughter. “You are not a monster! You haven't done it on purpose, it was just your magic that you couldn't control, Flurry. We don't know why your magic was so strong already, but Sunburst gave us a spell to bring the outbursts under control. There is no danger that you could destroy the Crystal Heart again, don't worry about it!” Having finished her speech, Cadance wrapped Flurry Heart into an embrace.
For a few moments, Flurry Heart wasn't saying anything. “What should I do now, mommy?” she asked after seconds had passed. “If everypony finds out, then–“
Cadance interrupted her. “Nopony will find out! I know what to do. You won't have to tell anypony about your name, Flurry Heart.”
Surprised, the little alicorn looked at her mom. A few, tiny tears glistened in her eyes now. “How? Mr. Know will insist on it that I do. He hates me and he won't allow to make an exception for me, mommy.”
It were these words that let Cadance's face become grim for a moment, but she calmed down for the sake of her daughter immediately. Carefully, she dried her eyes, then she continued to explain. “It is me and daddy who rule over the Crystal Empire, not your teacher, Flurry Heart. I will send him a royal decree and he will have no choice but to allow you to not tell the story of your name.”
Having said that, Cadance activated her horn, concentrated on a piece of parchment and a quill in the living room and let both appear in front of her. She hovered everything down on the table and wrote the decree in quick, clear words on it. As she was done, she rolled the parchment in and called for the castle's messenger. After she had told the messenger for whom the letter was, it immediately left the castle to deliver it to the house of Austere Knowledge.
Both Flurry Heart and her mom watched from one of the kitchen's windows how the mare disappeared in one of the streets around the castle.
Flurry Heart looked up to her mom. “Are you sure it will work?”
“It will, Flurry Heart. I know that your teacher is not an easy person, but even he can't do anything against a royal decree.” Still noticing worries in Flurry Heart's face, Cadance put a hoof on her chest before she could reply more. “It's better if you get some rest. It wasn't an easy day for you and I want that you get some sleep now.”
It was only now that her mom said this that Flurry Heart noticed again how tired she still was. Finding out what she had done to the Crystal Heart let her forget her exhaustion completely, but now she could feel it again. Flurry Heart yawned and with how tired she was, she didn't struggle against it as her mom wrapped her into her magic, placed her on her back and carried her into her room.
Having arrived there, Cadance gently lied Flurry Heart down on the soft bed sheets and pulled the blanket over her.
Flurry Heart felt more calm again now, and if it was only for her tired state. “Thank you, mommy,” she spoke in a low voice.
Cadance bent over her and gave her a kiss on the forehead. “Just rest now. You will feel better when you wake up. I promise that everything will be fine tomorrow.”
She gently stroke over Flurry's mane as she noticed that Flurry Heart had fallen asleep. Quietly, she tip-hoofed out of the room, turned off the light and closed the door behind her.