On Wings of White

by Princess OtakuGeek

New Locale

Author's Note:

Fun Tidbit:

Males swans are cobs. Females are pens. Just so you aren't confused. Also, sorry I didn't specify how Blueblood pushed Twilight's buttons. Cause I don't know how. So it's free game for speculation.

The first thing Blueblood registered was the massive pain in his head. It was less piercing than before and had been ruduced to a dull throb. It still hurt and Bloodblood lay there a moment with his eyes shut as he let the pain recede enough for him to think straight and take stock of himself. The next thing he noticed was one of his hind hoofs. It didn't hurt as bad as his head, but judging by the feeling he guessed that it had at least been twisted. He'd have to stay off it for at least a week. Other than that, there were various minor cuts and bruises all over his body.

With his assessment of his faculties complete, Blueblood cracked open his eyes and blinked rapidly to clear them. The first thing he saw was a canopy of apple trees. At first he thought they were wild apple trees, judging by how they grew. But their apples were too fat to be anything but domesticated apple trees. It was like someone had taken domestic apple trees, planted them, then let them do what ever while taking care of them.

Blueblood frowned at the gaps and broken branches in the trees above him and surmised that this was where he landed. He recalled seeing someone before passing and briefly wondered why he hadn't been moved to a more comfortable spot. Preferably indoors. Slowly, he turned his head to see a neat pile of apples next to his head. It wasn't exactly an hors d'oeuvres, but he was too hungry to argue. He tried to push himself to a sitting position, but his head spun and he fell back down. He then concentrated on his horn, but felt nothing.

'Come on, it's just a basic levitation spell. You've been doing those since you were a colt. Come on come on.' Still nothing.

Blueblood reached up to tap his horn, only to feel his hoof pass through thin air. Confused, he felt around the space where his horn was supposed to be, his panic beginning to mount. Finally his hoof made contact with a half inch nub covered in cloth. The whole world seemed to stop as his recent headache suddenly made sense. When he'd landed, he'd not only twisted his ankle, but had also effectively snapped off his horn.

He was on the brink of screaming when some force plunged his face into the ground just in time for his panicked screams to be muffled. It didn't take long for his screams to peter off.

'Okay. Okay. Calm down Blueblood. It's not the end of the world. Horns grown back in a year or two. Give or take a few months. Oh there is no way I can show my face in court like this. Or anywhere else for that matter. I'd much rather stay here. Wherever here is......hang on, what the heck is on my head?'

No sooner had that registered, than he felt the sudden release of weight from the back of his head. Immediately he lifted his head up to once more scan his surroundings. It wasn't long before Blueblood found himself face to face with a swan. Judging by the thick powerful neck and large size, it was most definitely a cob. As they stared at each other, Blueblood noticed something different. He'd seen many swans in his lifetime, but he'd never seen a swan's eyes glitter with such intelligence. As the cob stepped off him, Blueblood suddenly realized that he'd been the one to shove his muzzle in the dirt.

The cob waddled over to a nest nearby that he'd missed. Though now that he saw it, Blueblood wondered how he'd missed it. It was much too big to be a swan's nest. In fact, he suspected it was big enough to make a comfortable bed for a full grown stallion with room to spare. Yet the swan casually waddled over and partially dropped from his sight line. Before Blueblood could ponder as to why a swan would need such a big nest however, he felt something nudge his side. Looking down he saw that one of the apples had rolled towards him. Remembering his hunger, he greedily chomped down on the apple and it quickly disappeared.

No sooner had he finished than another apple rolled towards him. This pattern repeated itself nine more times and it wasn't till he finished his last apple that he finally wondered how these apples were rolling towards him. Looking up he spotted another swan. Smaller and definitely female sitting beside the pile of apples. She lowered her head and using her beak gently nudged an apple in his direction. With his hunger satisfied, he didn't eat as greedily as before. As he munched at a more moderate pace, he glanced up to gauge what time it was. Judging by how high the sun was, it was already noon. Suddenly his head began to sway as his eyelids drooped.

'Must've lost a lot of blood.' He thought dizzily.

Before he could pass out however, a sharp jab to his flank brought him to awareness. The perpetrator, the cob from earlier. And judging by the look in his eyes, he wanted him to do something. As his eyelids drooped again, there was another sharp jab, this time to his chest. The cob then gave a deafening call and spread his wings up in a gesture that could be translated as 'get off your lazy flank!' Even though he would normally question this, Blueblood complied without question, though it made him wince to put weight on his bad foot. The cob then grasped his mane in his beak and with a gentle tug led him to the unusually large nest.

As per his suspicions, the nest was indeed big enough to hold a full grown stallion. Once he'd stepped into the nest, he practically melted into it. Even if only to get off his bad foot. He almost fit into the nest with plenty of room to spare. Almost like it had been designed for a bigger stallion. Despite appearances, it was very comfortable. Firm, but still very soft, downy and warm. In no time, he was out like a light.

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Over the course of a couple weeks, Prince Blueblood quickly fell into a rhythm of sorts. His hoof was healing rather well, though he was still confined to the nest. What he found incredibly odd was his hosts. The first two swans he'd met were the most constant of his companions. The pen would often visit him and would act much like a worried mother, fussing over his injuries and feeding him apples she'd plucked from the trees. And every morning he awoke to find his horn dressing changed. Oddly enough, Blueblood found himself growing fond her and whenever she left he found himself looking forward to her next visit.

The cob was an odd one. Blueblood had watched him wander among the trees as though he were examining them. Sometimes he would observe him doing strange yet oddly familiar things to the trees. It took him a few days to figure out that the swan was actually tending to the trees like an apple farmer. He'd once observed apple farmers work their fields when his dad had taken him to one of his apple farms back when he was a colt.

'How about that?' He thought amusedly once the piece had slipped into place. 'A swan apple farmer.' The idea was almost absurd yet some part of Blueblood told him it made sense. And so, since he lacked a name, Blueblood came to recognize him as Swan Apple Farmer or Apple for short.

Apple and Nurse, his name for the pen, weren't the only swans to visit. The second day here, he'd woken up to an unusually large swan examining him. His first thought was that it was a cob. However, further investigation revealed it to be a pen. And judging by the way the others acted around her, she was obviously someone they respected greatly. After she finished examining him, the pen gave what Blueblood assumed was a call of approval. After that, the visitors poured in.

For three days after that, Blueblood would be visited by several groups of three or four swans a day. They'd quickly trickled out however and now hardly anyone came which was just fine with Blueblood as he spent much of his time resting.

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Normally Blueblood would be asleep roughly around sunset, but this time was different. He had no idea why, but Apple and Nurse hadn't been letting him sleep. Every time he showed signs of nodding off, either Nurse or Apple would prod him awake. And due to how tired he was, the prince was quickly becoming bruised and annoyed.

"You know I'm more bruises than pony by now." He grumbled irately to them as the sun passed the horizon and darkness began to creep in. "This better be very important."

Of course, neither of the swans answered as they never did. Instead the pen lept from her position on the edge of the nest. She raised her wings like she was planning on flying and stared up at the sky as the moon came into view. The cob mirrored her movements. For a moment it seemed like nothing was going to happen and his time had been wasted. That is, until he noticed it. It was small enough that he almost thought the was some form of hallucination, but nope. There it was. The two swans were glowing.

At first he thought it was the moon reflecting light from their feathers, but when the light grew he scrapped that idea. Then, to his eternal shock the swans began to change. Their forms seemed to warp and grow. Legs became longer and stronger. Wings stretched and grew as feathers retracted. Necks shrank and grew thicker. Heads grew larger and rounder as beaks melted into muzzles and ears sprouted along with manes and tails. Soon the newcomers stopped glowing and Blueblood found himself gawking at a unicorn mare and earthpony stallion. The stallion shot him a mischievous grin.

"Oh I can garentee you it's important." He chortled.

At that moment, Blueblood did the one the thing any grown stallion would do in his position. He started screaming like a foal.

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"I imagine you'll want an explanation." The mare said a little awkwardly.

Blueblood only nodded, not trusting himself to say anything. After screaming for a full five minutes, a strike to the back of his head sent him flying into the side of the nest. Once he'd cleared the stars from his head and calmed down reasonably, he got a good look at his hosts. The mare now in front of him was a unicorn with a pristine white coat and a lavender and sky blue mane swirled together with some sparse bits of white. Wait. That isn't white mane. Those are white feathers. In fact, now that he looked at her, he could see feathers intermingling with fur. The stallion was an earthpony with a brown coat and pitch black mane. So his white feathers stuck out like a sore hoof. Only his were in a larger quantity than his companion.

"Well, why don't we start with introductions." The mare said when Blueblood didn't say anything. "I'm Diamond Star." 'Diamond Star? That sounds familiar.' "And this is my friend, Steady Hoof." The stallion nodded acknowledgement.

"Blueblood." He finally blurted out in introduction.

"Pleased to meet you." Steady Hoof rumbled in a deep voice as he held out a hoof. As he gingerly shook the offered hoof, he tried to place the larger stallion's accent. He hadn't heard something like it before and some part of him told him that it was old. Suddenly he remembered where he'd heard the mare's name before.

"Hey, aren't you that daughter of a minor noble that disappeared six months ago?" Diamond nodded, abashed. Blueblood gave that a moment's thought before finally speaking. "So you're a swan now." He immediately felt like facehoofing at his intelligent reply.

"Sort of."

"Sort of?" An awkward silence reigned as Diamond Star averted her gaze at his question. Steady Hoof moved towards her and laid a hoof on her withers in a comforting gesture. Diamond looked up at him before taking a deep breath to steady herself.

"It's part of our curse." She spoke hesitantly, suggesting that this was a very sensitive topic. "During the day we're swans. At night we revert to our pony forms."

"Oh. Really." Blueblood slurred as his exhaustion and shock made him sway on his hooves. "Well that's okay." He was out cold before he hit the nest.

✴✴✴✴✴✴

The next morning things went back to normal for the two swans the prince now knew as Diamond and Steady. For the duration of that day, Blueblood felt awkward interest as he watched the two go about their day. The next day, he napped most of the time so he would be able to talk with his new friends. And so began a new routine that spanned roughly a week and a half. During the night, Steady Hoof would take care of the trees as well as he could without tools. Most of the time they didn't really talk. But once in a while he would strike a conversation.

"Soooo." Blueblood drawled, drawing the attention of the other pony. "I don't think I've ever heard an accent like yours."

Steady Hoof nodded. "I had an interesting foalhood."

"How interesting?"

Steady paused a moment as though wondering if he should tell. "My pa was a noble." He finally answered. Blueblood cocked his head in interest.

"Do tell." Steady shot him a piercing look. Blueblood returned with his own challenging stare. After a minute of staring, Steady Hoof turned away. There was a pause before he continued.

"Pa wanted me to follow in his hoofsteps as head of our house." He said. "Trained me in all sorts of social etiquette and politics. I didn't share his ambitions. It just didn't feel right ta me. I'd often sneak out to work the fields we owned with the other earth ponies." Steady cracked a small grin. "You can probably imagine how he reacted when I earned my cutiemark." Steady Hoof's cutiemark wasn't the sort you'd see on any noble. In the pale moonlight, Blueblood could see his cutiemark, the image of an apple with a star. Blueblood still wasn't sure what it meant exactly, but he could still see the earthpony's point.

"I can probably imagine." Now that he knew a bit about Steady Hoof, he could now understand why his accent had seemed odd to him. It sounded like a combination of an old version of a southern accent and more refined old Equesh. "So, what noble house were you from?"

"House Puddinghead." Had he been standing, Blueblood would've tripped over his own hooves in shock. As it was however, he was still plenty floored in his seat. While the three main noble houses hadn't technically fallen, over the centuries they'd been spread out so thin that very few could claim direct lineage to any of the three leaders. Blueblood himself being one.

"Uh. Um. You wouldn't mind running that by me once more would you?"

Steady Hoof smiled, clearly enjoying Blueblood's shock. "I am a direct relation of Chancellor Puddinghead herself." He clarified. "Her grandson, to be exact."

Up until then Blueblood didn't know it was possible to feel such shock. He sat there with a blank look as he did the math in his head. It didn't take long for him to come up with a number.

"B-but that would make you roughly a thousand years old."

Steady quirked an eyebrow. "Your point?"

Five minutes later, Diamond arrived with what fabric she could get to find Steady Hoof going about his night as usual. Prince Blueblood on the other hoof however was sitting so still he could've been a statue, his pupils dialated to the size of pinpricks as they stared straight ahead blankly. Diamond poked his side only to receive no response. He was officially broken.

"What in Equestria happened?" She asked the other stallion in the area.

"We talked." He said with a small smirk.

When Prince Blueblood finally returned to his senses, he found that his splint had been removed and Diamond was securing a strip of cloth around his horn. A pang of sadness rang through him at the very thought of his precious horn. He almost didn't notice when she finished and sat nearby to wait for him to notice.

"So I don't need my splint anymore." He asked, eager to turn his thoughts away from....other things. Diamond of course, noticed this and tactfully assisted in his chosen distraction.

"Not anymore." She answered gently. "Your hoof can support your weight now, so I figured I'd introduce you to the rest of the flock tomorrow. There's sompony whose been eager to meet you."

"Well I guess that means I'll have to get as much rest as possible." He said weakly and they descended into an awkward silence.

"Blueblood?" Diamond finally said.

"Hmm?"

"Well, um, well I figured you might want to know that it's safe to remove your bandages now that there isn't any threat of infection."

A tense silence ensued as Diamond waited for him to answer. Since there was no threat of infection anymore, Blueblood guessed that she'd tied the fabric around the horn out of tact.

"Thanks for letting me know." Blueblood finally said. "I'll think about it." Blueblood then curled up so he could get a headstart on his nap. It still didn't stop the smallest tear from squeezing itself from the corner of his eye and roll down his cheek.