Because It's Not As If Anything Could Possibly Go Wrong
She watched as nimble teeth snatched the plate away from her and did her best not to sigh, for that was the guaranteed way to take out the entire table in one go.
Cadance often had trouble finishing her meals, or at least in finishing the same dish. Enchanted one-way windows set within the official dining room allowed nervous chefs to watch as she tasted, chewed, considered the flavors she had just been presented -- or gave off any appearance of same, because if she was talking to Shining and made the basic mistake of briefly frowning at something he'd just said while she had a mouthful of what was no longer about to be her dinner, they would notice. And inevitably, they would assume it was something they had done -- or rather, prepared -- and rush forth to snatch the offending plate out from under her snout before it could do any more damage. There were times when it was genuinely difficult not to bolt her food, at least until she remembered what had happened the first (and so far, only) time she'd had a coughing fit from eating too fast, and it had taken hours to talk all of the trembling cooks out of their hiding places. The two who had preemptively locked themselves in the dungeon had eventually been left there until morning, mostly because all parties involved had finally fallen asleep.
She'd started sneaking into the kitchens before the staff could arrive, snatching enough portable snacks to get through the day. She suspected this wasn't making them feel any better about things either.
In this case, her mistake had been basic: a questioning look which had been meant for her husband -- but she'd been regarding her fourth serving of the evening at the time, offhoofedly wondering exactly what was happening to all the removed portions, and hadn't brought her gaze fully up in time. But the desperate waiters had a knack for quickly getting out of the room, and so by the time she did look up, the view was clear.
"Multiple attempts to get into the palace?"
He nodded. "Nothing forced or invasive, from what they said, and... honestly, they didn't say much beyond that we had multiple attempts. Every one happened when we had nothing but locals on the gate, and... they're nervous today, more so than usual. It wasn't hard to guess why. They're thinking about tomorrow. But it's the first time that's happened: somepony just kept coming by, trying to get in to see you, and by the time I found out..." He carefully looked away from his food, and only then risked the sigh. "They're not used to the idea of a ruler who would want to see visitors. With Sombra, there were always ponies who'd been -- summoned, yes." And they both knew that in many cases, he meant dragged. "The concept of somepony voluntarily trying to come in... that's new, and the only way they could think to react was by blocking access, over and over. Looking back, they probably thought they were saving that pony from themselves. I'll have a talk with them about proper visiting hours first thing tomorrow and see if I can get a few actual details about who kept dropping by, after they've had a good night's sleep to calm down a little. They were so shaken, they kept losing their nouns. Half the words out of their mouths were 'thing.'"
And with her focus still on the brightest of all possible futures, she primarily paid attention to what she felt were the important parts. "Thinking about tomorrow?" That with a small smile.
"Yes," Shining cautiously said. "And I know what you want to happen, but -- I don't know what's going to."
"You give yours a place to vent," she pointed out. "Being able to complain is a crucial part of training. You've always said that." The fifth dish arrived.
"Yeah," he eventually agreed. "And that place is with each other. They all complain about me in the barracks, where it's safe, and that's just another part of the bonding experience. It doesn't happen to my snout."
She frowned. The fifth dish vanished, and the fast-departing aroma told her it had been kumquats. She loved kumquats. "It still applies, doesn't it? I'm giving them a safe place, when they never had one before."
"But they always had each other," he pointed out.
"And now they have me," she smiled.
"I still got there first," was his automatic response, and then they both worked on their food, while it was still there.
After they each managed to get through most of a plate, and Cadance had finished her coffee (because the kitchen staff had quickly figured out that no matter what happened, nopony touched Cadance's coffee -- or really wanted to), he grinned at her. "At least I'm out of it."
Her eyes twinkled. "Out of what?" she teased in that special tone, the one which let him know just who the joke was truly on.
He was starting to pale a little: always hard to pick up under his fur, but they'd known each other for a long time. "The criticism," he reluctantly tried. "I mean, I'm not a crystal pony." He spotted her smile: speech accelerated. "The Decree was meant for the citizens of the Empire, and I'm still legally an Equestrian -- Katydid, seriously, you can't expect, there's no way you can possibly be asking me to --"
"-- I'm sorry, Captain," she teased, planting her left forehoof under her chin, "but when it came to a direct Decree from your Princess, exactly which part of 'everypony in the Empire' did you not understand?"
His eyes went down, mostly because his neck had joined his knees in harmonic involuntary bend. Two plates vanished.
"Oh," he said, and the accompanying expression took out the drink he very badly needed.
"Exactly," Cadance smiled. "Tomorrow's going to be very interesting, don't you think?"
"...yes."
Merrily, "I might just make sure to be right next to you when the chimes go off. I'm sure you've been saving up things for years. There may even be a few lingering bits of unvoiced honesty from our very first date, especially remembering how that went..."
He was staring directly at his plate, or at least where plates were now phasing in and out in a continual panicked stream. "Starting at nine tomorrow, you said?"
"Oh, so you did hear some of it..."
He took a deep breath. "I'll be ready."
[/hr]
Cadance woke up, yawned, instinctively stretched out all four legs and both wings in the practiced gesture of somepony who both liked to get the kinks out of her muscles first thing in the morning and still wasn't quite used to having another pony in the bed, one who frequently got pushed around by her casual efforts.
No limb hit anything. Or anypony.
It didn't fully sink in until the end of the stretch. And then she got up, checked the bathroom, wandered down to the kitchens as crystal ponies who seemed even more nervous than usual (occupied with thoughts of their upcoming words, most likely) did their best not to look at her, eventually flew out over the training area, peeked into the barracks...
And after she'd burnt off most of an hour in exercising that portion of futility, she called for a secretary, and somehow wound up with Lapis again. She was starting to believe the mare was sleeping in one of the closets.
I should have checked the closets.
"What... what is your desire, Princess?" the shivering pony said, sending blue-tinged rainbows all over the throne room. "It may be early, but please know that we all stand ready to serve you at any hour, any at all, even -- after nine..."
Cadance sighed -- then spotted the instant increase in the vibration rate. "It's not you, Lapis. Please, take a breath -- no, more slowly than that -- yes, you can take more than one... all right. I need you to send some of the Guards out. They are to do their best to find and bring a pony back to the castle, without hurting him in any way." She immediately reconsidered that last part. "At least no more than anypony would get hurt during a normal training exercise." Because it wasn't as if the target wouldn't resist, and forbidding her Guards to strike back at all would just about guarantee a loss.
The little secretary swallowed back most of the gasp. "What -- what did he do? Do you need... I know the laboratory is gone, but if there's anything you -- any rooms you were thinking about, we got the garlic scent out of the dungeon, or homes, we could clear out a home if you need the extra space --"
Nine. It ends starting at nine.
"No, none of that, " Cadance hastily tried (and failed) to reassure the mare. "They're just bringing him in." Which would admittedly be the single biggest test of their training to date, but when she figured for sheer numbers... "So yes, they're looking for a stallion. Equestrian. I can't give you mane and coat colors because he'll have changed those already, but it hasn't been that long since he did that, so he's going to reek of fresh fur dye -- right, you have no idea what that smells like: I'll find some so the Guards can get a sample. Also, he's likely going to be wearing a hat. Which gives them an advantage, because he'll have to get it off before he can try casting anything, and that should give them a chance to get a restraint on him -- do they know what a restraint is?" Actually, it wasn't as if Sombra would have wanted his subjects to know about means of stopping unicorn magic, so if the newest Guards hadn't reached that point in their training... "I'll go find a restraint... Also, he'll definitely be wearing pants, to cover his mark, because the dye would have evaporated from that at the moment he tried to hide it. So that leaves him with pants to cover his very recognizable mark, which, in the event that you catch him with his pants down, is a shield with three stars above it --"
Lapis gasped. "-- we're looking for -- your spouse? What did -- what did he do?"
"-- and if all else fails, look for his luggage, because he'll have taken supplies and there's only one thing he would try to carry them in. It's an olive-green double saddlebag, four worn brown back straps, and the carrying portions are more of a duffel shape than anything else. I know he took it with him. He takes it everywhere he goes and hides it after arrival, mostly because he's afraid that if I get too much time to look for it without him interrupting, I'm going to destroy it, or wash it, which just might have the same effect once the dirt finally stops holding it together. They should always be able to find him by that stupid luggage. And since they know his workings and tricks by now, it'll be a good way to find out if they can get around them, plus it'll challenge them on tactical aspects..." She sighed. "He really couldn't have assigned them a better test himself. And he may wind up being proud of the results. After he stops cursing. So yes. You're sending them out to find my husband. Immediately. And while a few of them are checking the closets, have several others gallop directly to the train station and if he's not there, keep at least two Guards posted in that area for the rest of the day."
"But --" Lapis looked as if she was on the verge of another faint. "-- why?"
Cadance allowed herself the brief indulgence of closing her eyes, sighed again.
"Because in the face of what he's seeing as a temporary threat which he can't combat, my husband," she wearily said, "is very predictably military."
There's no point in scouting.
He's afraid to attack.
And that just leaves retreat.
[/hr]
Shining hadn't been hauled in yet -- but it didn't matter. She could glare at her husband any time she wanted to, especially if he made the mistake of sounding a false internal all clear at one second past nine in the evening. It didn't matter because nine in the morning was less than a minute away, and she was pacing away the final near-eternal bit of wait in the royal bedroom. Less than a minute until the crystal ponies would be honest with her.
She'd done some things to prepare, and was more or less confident that all of them could be undone with a few hours of work.
Cadance smiled to herself, and briefly, dearly wished she had been able to direct it at another. But... it didn't matter, other than in the little fight -- it would only be a little one -- they were assuredly going to have later. It was all about the Empire now, about the ponies of the Empire, and the release that would come when the valve was finally turned.
A glance at the clock was quickly followed by fighting the urge to have her field force the smallest sweep line ahead.
Ten. Nine. Eight...
They had freed the Empire, all of them together.
Five. Four. Three.
And now it was time to free the ponies.
Zero.
The chimes went off.
Her field coated the bedroom door, pushed it open, and Cadance stepped out.
Jasper, the native Guard-in-training who had been posted into the hallway with explicit orders to stay there until ten, jumped.
He looked at her. Then he saw her.
"Princess!" and the word was instantly accompanied by sweat. "I --"
His jaw slammed shut. Muscles tightened, trembled. Eyes sought the nearest wall and found only her reflection, which didn't help.
She smiled at him. "Was there something you wanted to say, Jasper?"
"I..." It was like watching a colt during that first trip to the dentist, only the battle was being waged to stop anything from exiting his mouth. "I..."
Carefully, "...yes?"
"I... have a status update on the search for the Captain..."
"Oh, of course," Cadance smiled. Well, it's not as if every possible sentence can be critical -- or can it? "And given that my orders both created the search and directed the means by which it would be conducted -- what do you think of it so far?"
"...well..." He seemed to be experiencing certain difficulties in his lifestyle, especially the parts which centered around breathing. "...since we haven't found him yet, our... ability to interpret your orders... might be lacking... but I'm just a rookie, I'm not even good enough to join the search, I probably wouldn't be here at all if the strong candidates hadn't gone out to look for the Captain --"
She was trying not to groan, and it took an effort to make her words gentle. "Jasper?"
"...Princess?"
"What are you doing?"
"...speaking to you. Honestly. And critically." The sweat was coming faster now. "About myself. Because I'm no good as a Guard, I know it, the Captain keeps me for extra lessons after all the others have gone back to the barracks and I know that's nothing to do with any potential, it's because I'm just that bad at my job. I'm not suitable to stand in your palace, in this hallway, in the Empire. I -- I should just leave. Immediately. I'm sorry, Princess..."
And with that, he demonstrated some of that personally-unperceived potential, because it was a rare pony who could instantly transition from being a vibrating near-statue in heavy armor to moving in full gallop (also in heavy armor), sounding a one-pony orchestra of panic all the way down the hall --
-- right up until the moment the blue field surrounded him, raised him a few crucial hoof-heights from the crystal floor, performed a half-rotation, and gently brought him back.
She kept him at that height as he floated in front of her. She wanted him to have eye contact, along with easier sight lines for what had a chance to turn into a literal critical mass.
"Jasper," she gently said. "That's not really how I meant the Decree." Was another trip to the Ear necessary? No -- well, maybe. But not unless she absolutely had to. There was a chance he would be an isolated case. "This is about talking to me. About me. And I'd appreciate it if you would talk to me now. Please? And to make it easier at the start, I'm giving you a one-sentence Decree exemption for the answer to my next question: how is the search going?"
It took him a while to muster himself for that one, long enough that Cadance began to question her initial decision on having things run for a mere twelve hours. "We haven't found him yet, and I'm sorry about that, and I'm sure the fault is in the way we're following orders and not the orders themselves in any way, and I know that once we truly apply ourselves to the directives you've given, which would have worked instantly if more trained ponies were following them, but that lack is in our own ability to learn and not any teaching the Captain has given us, and we're very sorry, all of us are, even and especially the ponies who aren't here right now, and we'll all try to do better --"
She let it go on until the commas began to look like the shovels which were digging Jasper in deeper with every run-on clause. "Jasper."
He stopped. She decided to treat that as the end of the sentence, if only because letting it go on any longer would have meant losing additional minutes to checking the record books.
"You're looking at me right now, right?" she politely inquired.
He risked a nod.
"So... what do you think of the way I look today?"
Visible, fearful thought.
"You're..."
Hopefully, "Yes?"
"...pink."
Some of the frustration made it through. "Pink."
And in a surge of words, "Yes! You're pink! You're the pinkest thing imaginable! And that's bad, because after seeing you, nothing else can truly look pink in my eyes again! You've ruined all other experiences of pink for me, because the only place I can go to see the real and true and finest pink in all the world is right here in the palace, so I'm very glad I work here even though I really shouldn't be a Guard at all, just... because..."
He'd finally noticed the way she was looking at him.
"...it... means there's still one chance in all the world for me to appreciate the only pony in the world whose fur is the shade all pink... should be?"
I will not stomp a forehoof. I won't.
Well, at the very least, she wasn't Luna. Cadance firmly believed that if Luna had been on the receiving end of this, there already would have been thunder, and it would have served as the opening bell for all the future rounds. But Cadance was still exactly herself, and that meant she took a patient breath, levitated the rookie Guard a little higher, then politely said "So what do you think of my mane?"
He instantly tried to look away. She gently adjusted the position of his neck.
"Your... mane."
"Yes."
Terrified eyes slowly went over every last tangle, knot, splay, twist, and capital-letter-almost-required nightmare which she'd spent forty minutes carefully working into her hair.
"You shouldn't go outside with it."
Cadance's eyes went wide and bright. "Go on!"
"Because after seeing that, no mare would ever be able to live with her own mane again. And an Empire full of bald mares... actually, that could be a look, couldn't it? Is there something you wanted to do with the shaved hair? If the budget is still looking for something new we could all sell as an export, we could start weaving it into wigs, and of course it's a self-renewing supply..."
[/hr]
Her right forehoof slammed into the Ear, and the ringing from the impact was almost enough to block out the echoes of centuries-distant screams.
"Pardon me, everypony," Cadance carefully said, setting off a barrage of apologetic interruption from every wall in the Empire. "I'm sorry to interrupt your day, especially two days running. But I feel I have to clarify yesterday's Decree. I didn't mean that anypony was supposed to use any chance they had to speak with me for criticizing themselves. If that's what any of you were thinking of, then please discard those speeches immediately. I've heard them. Twelve of them, which I think is more than enough for the day." Jasper hadn't been enough of a representative sample. The cleaning, polishing, repair, and facet maintenance ponies had wound up being overkill, especially in the myriad ways they verbally tried to take themselves out. "Also, I'm not looking for hindkicked compliments. I don't want to hear anything else about how I'm too beautiful for the Empire, or too perfect for the world, or any other superlative which might somehow go beyond that." And it wasn't as if the staff she'd encountered while she moved towards the broadcast room hadn't tried. "This is about honest criticism, directed towards me, and nothing more. Everypony needs to understand that. I just wanted to offer you all the opportunity to --"
-- and how many other ponies are going to have a chance to express themselves?
They avoid the palace. That's what the remnants of their memories tell them to do. If you don't work here, then if you're summoned, it's because you did something wrong. And if you do work here, then... you just have more to be afraid of, because any mistake is that much easier to spot. Ponies are afraid to approach the palace: it's why we wound up having to do most of the hiring at the main library. They're afraid to approach...
...me.
Whoever tried to come and see me yesterday was the first.
Maybe -- somepony getting an early start?
Somepony out there can do this. They have to. This has to work. I've turned the valve and somewhere at the other end, there's a pony waiting to vent...
She realized she'd been silent for too long. That the Empire was waiting on her next word, and would do nothing else until it came.
"-- you'll see," she quietly concluded, and took her hoof away from the Ear.
If I stay in here, it's just going to be the staff, and the Cabinet at the budget meeting later. Nopony else. Certainly not her husband if he managed to stay ahead of his own rookies for the entire crucial period. There's too much to fear from approaching the palace: even with the chance to vent waiting within, a lot of ponies might not be able to do it.
Which leaves one easy answer, doesn't it?
Then there would be no looming palace to revive lingering terrors within immobile shadows. And no Guards either: they were just something else for the crystal ponies to be nervous around. (And she went through a single moment of internal dark humor, considering that anypony who saw her alone and yelled a battle cry before attacking her would be offering the most honest criticism of all.)
The Empire won't come to the Princess. And as the title sounded in her mind, her horn ignited, her field's corona reached out and surrounded crown and regalia, lifted them away from her body before flinging them into the nearest corner.
So I'll just go to the Empire.
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Damn it, this crappy story updated.
... Seriously though, thank heavens.
You updated? Are... are you okay? just kidding, it's great to see that you updated this and everything else as well
I knew this would be updated again one day and I'm glad I kept tracking it. Nice chapter, I am looking forward to the next update
Time between hitting the Update column and the first fresh downvote: call it seventy seconds, give or take. As always, the speed reading is the truly impressive aspect.
Y'know, if we had a single absolute story ratings total instead of a pair of red & green tallies, I could have called this Post Negative Numbers Only.
...actually, that really feels like more of a Luna story.
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One of the (mostly unspoken) quasi-promises I made in setting up my Patreon page was that I would clear out part of the @#$% queue. So Stupid Direction-Face concluded. A Mark Of Appeal updated. And now this has a fresh chapter, and will have another one by the end of Wednesday, allowing for my local time zone and the possibility of computer self-destruct. (For sponsors who haven't seen the Patreon post yet: the two new May chapters on this story represent one, and only one, charge.) After that, I hope to be closing out the month by updating another one which has been sitting untouched for a while -- the holiday weekend may hinder that -- and then June will begin with my reaching about as far back as I can go.
I just wish I'd been able to add Equestron's cover art for this update -- but the link came up dead.
Now the question becomes how long it'll take before Will gives up on what is surely a lost cause.
I congratulate you on Shining Armour's immensely wise tactical cowardice, Its the absolute best way that could have turned out.
Damn, Steven Universe has ruined me for gem names because Lapis and Jasper in this chapter had me giggling a little bit. I'm very excited to see this update though!
Today was a good day for me on fimfiction. First I won the feature box, and then my most anticipated story updated, and a suggestion I made way back when made it into the chapter. Thank you for this
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Y'know you have to pay income tax on that.
(I was holding off on all blog-link assist credits until the Author's Note on the last chapter. Sorry 'bout that.)
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No worries.
(That's technically a negative.)
This story is bad because after reading it no story will ever read as good as this one did!
Oh hey, this updated. It sucked even more than the first chapter. Also, to the author, I hope you get diarrhea. Write a few more chapters so I can insult you some more!
"Post negative comments only"
Okay you fucking piece of worthless shit. I’ll have you know I graduated top of my class in the Navy Seals, and I’ve been involved in numerous secret raids on Al-Qaeda, and I have over 300 confirmed kills. I am trained in guerrilla warfare and I’m the top sniper in the entire US armed forces. You are nothing to me but just another target. I will wipe you the fuck out with precision the likes of which has never been seen before on this Earth, mark my fucking words. You think you can get away with posting this shit to me over the Internet? Think again, fucker. As we speak I am contacting my secret network of spies across the USA and your IP is being traced right now so you better prepare for the storm, maggot. The storm that wipes out the pathetic little thing you call your life. You’re fucking dead, kid. I can be anywhere, anytime, and I can kill you in over seven hundred ways, and that’s just with my bare hands. Not only am I extensively trained in unarmed combat, but I have access to the entire arsenal of the United States Marine Corps and I will use it to its full extent to wipe your miserable ass off the face of the continent, you little shit. If only you could have known what unholy retribution your little “clever” story was about to bring down upon you, maybe you would have held your fucking tongue. But you couldn’t, you didn’t, and now you’re paying the price, you goddamn idiot. I will shit fury all over you and you will drown in it. You’re fucking dead, kiddo.
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All that and his father works at Nintendo.
You watch poop happen.
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Write f***ing faster, produce more of this shitty drivel for our consumption, you horse-word peddling SOB
Electrons.
Negatrons.
Oh boy. Will tried to warn you, Cadance. I just hope when a crystal pony's head explodes, the shrapnel isn't too sharp.
Still, it seems like the Ear could be used for something more constructive... at least on the surface. It's not like she can just tell her citizens that they don't have to be afraid anymore; the wounds run too deep.
Also, it appears that Shining anticipated Cadance's expectations about his retreat, given how the guards can't find anyone matching his description. After all, he likely knows her as well as she knows him.
Definitely looking forward to the next part of the madness.
Challenge accepted!
Chatoyance is still writing in our fandom, Celestia's Relaxing Vacation is still updating, and young people use curse words!
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If you find that offensive, then why did you ask me to watch you write your first drafts?
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That's a new one. What's it about, other than the title-obvious?
*searches*
...huh. No results. That probably means it's a Mature story, and I have the filter set to Off by default. I'll just turn it on long enough to look again.
*ibids*
And there it is! That's... a really interesting upvote to downvote ratio. Let me just look at the full story description...
...oh.
Oh. Um...
...that's a... really detailed long description.
And it's also long.
Seriously long.
...maybe the author just did that as a joke. Seriously, who doesn't have to resist the urge to go with a shock concept every once in a while? There's eleven other stories in the catalog, and I'm pretty certain that the one I first saw isn't setting the trend. So let's just go over to the main Stories page, and --
...
-- so I was horribly wrong.
...I'm gonna go take a shower.
Okay m8!
Negative Comments Only
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Allow me to offer the appropiate visuals to what you're feeling right now
I'm not at all sad to see this updating!
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I think I've read that before. Is that copied from someone else?
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Your mother was a hamster and your father smelt of elderberries.
Update again, or I shall taunt you a second time!
Fortunately, spotting typos might count as negative. You made mistakes in your work!
"a one-pony of panic"
Was there meant to be something between "pony" and "of"?
"right now, ,and we'll"
Extra comma?
Come on, Cadance. You know there's another way your husband could try to avoid this battle:
Seek sanctuary with allies.
You should go see if that Pegasus officer of his knows anything. You know, that Flash dude. He's not a Crystal Pony. It would make sense for Shining to hide with one of the few underlings he know won't fall apart and reveal everything in sheer terror at your presence.
Really, that's just common sense.
Dude, updates! Awesome, thanks man!
Now that's interesting. Is her preference for coffee something I'd missed before, or new?
In the spirit . . . you've got an extra comma there before the "and."
....Challenge not refused.
I won't say that this story isn't perfect.
I won't either abstain to comment on Shining cowardice , which wasn't too bad, considering he didn't have any choice about what not to say.
I also won't stay silent about the fact that constructive does not means purely not positive , a fact they do not seem to remember. Not commiting to anything would not be too bad for a start.
And so I do not have anything more to say.
This updated instead of Triptych!
About time youHow fucking dare you write another chapter of thisgreat storyuseless drivel. Never have my eyes been morepleasedinsulted to read something. I amlooking forwardabhorred by the thought of future updates, and hopeyou carry on writing thisdelete this immediately and leave this website to rethink your life choices.It updated! YAAAAY!
Oh Cadence, you poor nieve fool! You never, ever, ever tell you spouse to tell you exactly what they think of you, it cannot possibly end well for either of you.
Shining Armour has done the most marriage saving thing possible by hoofing it.
Feo Takahari likes it, it must be bad.
Seriously though, what a cuck.
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It really does. Why are you not writing that story instead of this story?
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I'd say: 1) Because this story, and other unfinished products seriously need completion.
and
2) I'm already behind on the timeline thread. Since I haven't had anyone give updates onto the new stories in the timeline since the last time I had a full account of what went where. We don't need more awesome stories in the already behind the times timeline.
But yes, A Luna story like that would be pretty cool.
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The downvote to upvote ratio is nowhere near bad. Heck you have 97% positive (upvote) to 3% negative (downvote). That's quite the accomplishment. Heck, Mark of Appeal has 97% positive as well.
Cadence, in regards to your kitchen staff, you should just tell them that their taking the food AWAY before you can even take ONE BITE is what is making you upset at them. That they very few you've been able to taste have all been excellent and you are upset that you were unable to finish. Tell them that if you are actually, truly, genuinely displeased with any food they serve, YOU will tell them. Otherwise, once a plate of food is put upon the table, the servers will NOT touch it again unless directly ordered to.
I believe Celestia and Luna had to make a similar decree during the first century of their reign.
Conversely, I'm surprised Shining Armor didn't think to put up a shield around the dining table and himself and Cadence after the meal was served so that the plates could not be taken away. OR that Shining and Cadence didn't think to ask Celestia if they could borrow some of the staff from her castle to teach the staff in theirs the modern way of doing things. Perhaps if the Crystal Ponies got such lessons from their non crystal 'cousins', they'd drop that last shackle of Sombra from their minds all the faster.
Corrections offered with malice, as title decrees. ;)
Duffel
She should know better than to try to separate him from the one that's taken him through his life until her.
Ha!
Hah! That's a fun metaphor.
Maybe the pony seeking entrance is one of Iron Will's staff?
She's trying to force this disaster to happen, and by Harmony, it's going to oblige her.
I literally dropped my phone on my face and proceeded to laugh until tears ran down. How can one word be this hilarious?
Does Cadance know my wife?
I'll tell you one other thing Shining took: his boots! I don't care how ratty they look; they're finally broken in so leave them be!