A Crystal Facade

by bahatumay

Chapter 1

My name is Princess Mi Amore Cadenza, and I am a terrible pony.

I don't mean to be, of course. I never meant to be. But I am.

I can almost hear the protests now. Twilight Sparkle, for example. She would have been the staunchest defender of my character. I spread love everywhere I go. That's what I do, isn't it? Yes; but that's not what my cutie mark actually means.

I have emotional magic. I can change ponies’ feelings; and by that, I mean I can manipulate them. I can drudge up the love that has been buried away under the stress of daily life and bring it to the surface; that's what I'm most known for. I can find the happiness under the layers and layers of life experience and the sadness and disappointment that brings, and pull it to the surface. I can suppress the crushing fear that wells up in a colt trying to ask out a cute filly for the first time. I can bring out the joy of motherhood that can be squelched under the curse that is postpartum depression.

I can quench happiness. I can raise up sadness and depression so powerful I can sap a pony of the will to live right before my very eyes. I can suppress exhilaration; I can make that first wedding night's consummation feel like a burdensome chore. I can force a stallion to lust after another stallion, with his wife and foals standing nearby.

And I can do it without my victims even noticing my influence.

Celestia understood my power. She took me quite literally under her wing. She taught me what was right and wrong, the importance of feelings and how important it was that each pony discover those feelings for themselves. They had to know the bitter to know the sweet, she said, and I would be doing them a grave disfavor by forcing them to feel only one or the other. She provided a safe haven for me. And, all things considered, she succeeded.

I grew up a well-adjusted mare. I worked as a foalsitter and learned responsibility and bits management, as well as how to lead and guide. I learned decorum, but also how and when to loosen up; learned how to present myself as a princess of Equestria; and, most importantly, I learned how to win a cake-eating contest (the secret is to start with a dry cake with not much frosting or sugar, so as to not get your taste buds overloaded or gummed up, so to speak. After a slice or two of pound cake and bundt cake, you can go for the heavier cakes without worry).

Perhaps best of all, I married a fine stallion. That's a personal point of pride for me (if I can still claim any pride, that is). I've never used my emotion magic on Shining Armor. His sister, yes, I’ll confess to that; but never him. Everything he's felt for me and about me has been completely, one hundred percent real.

It's too bad he fell in love with the mask. The good Cadence. The pure Cadence. The kind Cadence.

For a long time, I thought I really was that Cadence. Honestly, I did. But then something happened that none of us could expect.

The Crystal Empire returned.

* * *

Cadence stepped lightly off the train. Her shoed hooves clinked against the crystal with a distinctly familiar sound. She cracked a smile and glanced around. “So this is the Crystal Empire,” she murmured. “It's pretty.”

Shining Armor, levitating their bags behind him, chuckled as he approached. “It's certainly shiny,” he said. “Very crystally.” He poked at one of the many crystal growths jutting out of the ground and grinned at her.

The bustle seemed to slow down. Cadence looked forward and realized that the crystal ponies were looking at her. They seemed to be getting darker progressively as she stared. Their expressions looked familiar. They looked at her with nervous apprehension. Fear. Hints of terror.

No. Cadence shook her head. She knew she needed to make a good first impression if she were going to rule this empire. She stepped forward. “Citizens of the Crystal Empire,” she started. “I am Princess Mi Amore Cadenza, and this is my husband, Prince Shining Armor. We come not as tyrants, but deliverers and guides. I have seen the former glory of the Crystal Empire, and I know you too want to see those glorious times return, when the Crystal Empire was the jewel of all of Equestria.”

Cadence nodded as she finished, clearly thinking she was doing a good job; but the crystal ponies certainly didn't think so. They seemed to be darkening and shaking with fear; but strangely enough, they seemed to be looking at something behind her.

“Uh, Cadence?”

Cadence glanced back at her husband and where he was looking, and gasped. A thick, black cloud billowed out across the snowy plains, and a cold chill ran up my back. Black crystals, dark crystals, cropped up, shooting out of the ground.

The crystal ponies turned and ran, screaming.

Shining Armor stepped up, just as he always did. He raised his head and lifted his horn, and a shimmering shield formed around the Empire. The clouds neared… and bumped against it. Sparks flew as it tried and failed to breach his powerful shield.

The cloud seemed to pull back and scowl at the shield. It tried to ram the shield again, sending more sparks flying, but Shining Armor's spell held firm. It growled—Cadence would swear that it growled—and it sank back into the ground, leaving behind only a few black, spiky crystals standing at odd angles to show it had ever been there.

Cadence looked at Shining Armor, and he looked back triumphantly at her. Her confidence buoyed, she glanced back at the crystal ponies who had not fled, and they looked back at her with even greater fear in their eyes. Clearly, there was more going on here than just an odd cloud.

“Sombra,” Shining Armor murmured darkly by way of explanation. “Former tyrant king Celestia warned me about. Looks like he's not as dead as we'd hoped.”

Cadence looked up at the crystal ponies and she could swear she could taste their fear. She knew what she had to do. She stepped forward once more and lit her horn. “Citizens of the Crystal Empire,” she repeated, now in the Royal Canterlot Voice. It looked as though she were using a voice amplification spell, but she was actually disguising her emotion magic. Slowly, gently, she suppressed their fear, so gently they wouldn’t have noticed her influence. She was disturbed to find that there was no joy for her to pull up, so she redoubled her suppression efforts. “We come as deliverers,” she repeated, “but we want to be considered your friends. I swear by my horn and my wings, we come in peace.”

* * *

That wasn't entirely wrong, I don't think. I mean, I use that same technique on foals, too. Luna has a picture album full of pictures of her holding crying foals and various looks of discomfort on their parents' faces.

No. Wait. It's Celestia. Celestia maintains that album. Apparently, her first speech as a Diarch of Equestria was answered not with stomps and cheers and praises, but an awkward silence… broken only by a single foal crying. Luna teased her about that, and it… well… how should I put it? somewhat went on from there.

I, however, have never had that happen. Every picture of me has been with a smiling, giggling, happy foal. I've also never had a crying foal interrupt my plays or music performances. And if I can suppress the discomfort of a foal who has filled his diaper to capacity, I can do anything.

I wonder if that was my fatal flaw. Pride.

But I digress. It was harmless. I mean, I just suppressed a bit of fear; and let’s be honest, isn’t that something every mother does? Comfort their foals and shush their fears? My subjects were just like foals to me. When we first started holding court, at times the crystal ponies would be too afraid to even enter, or they'd come crawling along the ground, grovelling as if afraid I'd act like Sombra and kill them for tiny mistakes, or even just for looking at me wrong.

I hate grovelling.

I figured out an easy solution: keep suppressing the fear. Everywhere I went, I suppressed the fear the crystal ponies had. Suddenly, they could have a normal conversation with me.

And, of course, rumors spread like wildfire. It was said that just being in the presence of the new princess was calming, and I had ponies coming to court for no other reason than to see me and maybe get a kind word, which I was always happy to give. I loved the crystal ponies. That emotion was real.

Shining Armor, of course, disagreed. He said that my presence was more arousing than anything else. But that's neither here nor there.

The problem with my solution was it became a habit. Suppression became a daily thing for me; and, like any exercise, I grew stronger daily without even realizing it. Like with any magic spell, less effort was needed for the same effect; but I kept the same amount of effort into the spell. I was busy! It slipped my mind. There was a lot going on and a lot to keep track of as we rebuilt a new empire from rubble. I mean, a lot had changed technology-wise in a thousand years. To be honest, I just never gave it a second thought.

Pretty soon, new things started cropping up in the Empire. Guard recruitment jumped to record high levels. Skydiving became a thing. Spelunking in ancient, unsafe crystal caves became popular. Ponies even started to attempt to tame the polaris that lived nearby into giant, story-and-a-half tall pets.

I didn't really notice any of that, though. I did notice, however, when they had ignored the threat of attack until nearly the day of. I only heard about it on an off-hoofed comment by the head of castle security. Pretty sure he took a spear to the kidney that day.

They say that the more pure something is, the more satisfying it is to corrupt; and I believe that to be true. The Crystal Empire, supposed to be the epicenter of happiness and peace, was the focus of many attacks. Most were deterred by a show of power (turns out most other races don’t have an equivalent to an alicorn princess); but one army managed to penetrate our defenses.

And this time, we weren't prepared. Nopony was. Because who wants to train for war when you can climb Mount Neverest without extra oxygen?

* * *

Shining Armor grunted as he blocked the swing of a spear with the hilt of his own, then spun it around to deliver a punishing retaliatory blow to the attacking griffon’s head with the point. His helmet absorbed most of it, but it dented under his attack, disorienting the griffon. He swung the point around once more, and grimaced as blood spurted out from the griffon’s neck. No matter how much training he had, that was a sight he would never quite get used to.

“I thought griffons weren’t the vengeful type?” he joked--joking! In the middle of the battlefield!--as he brought his spear back up into a defensive stance.

“I guess you get a few brittle crystals in every formation,” Cadence cracked right back. Her mirth faded somewhat as she realized that their army was getting routed. Crystal ponies charged fearlessly in, leaving themselves wide open to body strikes that left them dead and dying on the ground, their oddly crystalline blood splattering everywhere.

This wasn’t right. Something was wrong.

Cadence dropped her shield, but kept her horn lit. She pulled up righteous indignation, with a hint of anger. “You’re fighting for your families!” she shouted. “They’re fighting for power and for a king; but you’re fighting for your lives! Your foals’ lives! They need you! Stand!”

It didn’t seem to work; the crystal ponies still fearlessly charged. Cadence grimaced as one particularly brave one threw down his weapon to use the weapons nature had given him, his teeth and his hooves, and took a claw to his jugular for his stupidity.

Any way she looked at it, they were losing. What else could go wrong? she thought as she parried a set of claws herself.

This was, of course, a very wrong thing to say.

Cadence’s ears pinned as she heard a familiar cry. Her heart stopped. ‘Shining...’

She looked over, and sure enough, Shining Armor was on the ground. Blood shone brightly against his white coat. More blood than she had ever before seen.

“Shining!” Cadence screamed. She teleported over and cast a little shield around both of them, sending the griffon flying backwards from the impact as the shield grew. Angry thoughts swirled in her head as she saw the blood pooling and she tried to press a hoof against his wound to staunch the bleeding. Why hadn’t I done that before? How could I have failed to take care of him?

It wasn’t in his nature to accept it, though. Deep down, she knew that. She had always known that. Princess or no, he had always treated her with the highest respect and had never tried to coast along using her station for his advantage. He had always been one to defend others, regardless of his own safety. He had never hid behind her, even if she did have the greater raw attacking power. It just wasn’t his nature.

Never before had she hated him for it.

Shining Armor looked at her and gave her a weak smile, but it was more pained than reassuring. He knew it then, but Cadence wordlessly shook her head, refusing to accept it. Gritting her teeth, she leaned down and lit her horn, and cast a healing spell. His wounds sealed themselves together, the muscles reformed, his fur even regrew before her very eyes, so powerful was the healing magic she was channelling.

But he had lost too much blood. He raised a shaky hoof, blindly, awkwardly reaching for her face. He managed to brush it against her cheek once, and the ghost of a real smile flickered across his face before his eyes fluttered closed for the last time.

* * *

I screamed. Loudly. I remember that. I shrieked until my vocal chords ached. I howled my pain to the skies and soaked his motionless chest in my tears as I chanted a desperate but futile mantra, begging it to not be so.

Not that there’s anything wrong with that, of course. Denial is a very valid way to start the grieving process.

The only problem with denial is that soon afterwards comes anger. And there’s nothing so fearsome as an angry alicorn.

I don’t recall how long it took, or how many of my crystal ponies died while I grieved. Eventually, I grit my teeth; my eyes ached but try as I might I had no more tears to cry. Power swelled up inside of me. Power that felt awfully, terribly familiar.

And there I made my fatal mistake. I mean, I guess it was a mistake. I mean… I did it, and I willingly chose to do it, so it must have always been a part of me. I just… my facade finally shattered; but so easily. I was not the mask I thought I was.

Maybe, somewhere, deep down inside, I’d just always wanted to be a tyrant.

* * *

Griffons let out triumphant war cries as the princess of the Crystal Empire lowered her shield. Cadence stood up, eyes downcast, but her breathing was heavy and unsteady. Even the most fearless of crystal ponies felt their hearts skip a beat at her expression as she lifted her head and spread her wings in challenge.

And then the crystal ponies felt primal fear as dark purple and green magic exploded into existence around Cadence’s horn.

For now, she was no longer suppressing fear.

She was welcoming it.

Cadence reached out indiscriminately and pulled up fear in both the crystal ponies and the griffons; on anyone with the misfortune of being in her range. She pulled up terror. She pulled up feelings of inadequacy, remembered from when she was a young filly that had suddenly had the role of ‘princess’ thrust upon her. She pulled up the distrust of magic, making the ponies shy away and put the griffons on edge.

And she pulled up anger, just enough to make them desperate.

One griffon charged, just as Cadence had expected. A black crystal shot up from the ground, impaling him right through the stomach, before retreating back into the ground. He tried to scream, but the crystal had perforated his diaphragm, and though he struggled for breath, he could do nothing but suffocate as Cadence watched impassively.

Another charged. With casual indifference, Cadence raised another crystal, this one hitting him under the chin and snapping his neck backwards. For the third griffon she raised two crystals in an X-formation, barely skimming the griffon’s feathers, and then she brought them down, encasing him entirely in purple and black crystals. He scratched, then hammered desperately at his crystal prison, but to no effect; and he quickly ran out of air.

Cadence strode forward, not caring at all that her web of fear had caused her army to darken and flee. There was only one thought on her mind, which was solidified as she encased a griffon’s hind paws in black crystal, held him up with her magic, and then lifted his own spear with a hoof so she could personally and physically run it through his body.

Revenge.

* * *

We… I routed them, once I embraced my destiny and accepted the dark magic. Oh, they fled. Many fled; but I followed. None could escape me.

Their frozen bodies are still there, I think. I just left them there, like little trophies or momentos. All but one, that is. I erected a nice little memorial for their leader. I don’t even remember his name now; the only words I inscribed on the stand were 'take heed, all ye who would conquer this land', in my best calligraphy, of course. I made a pink stand that looked a little bit like a giant picture frame, and encased each of his paws in one corner, holding him up. I encased his heart (still beating when I removed it; isn’t the body fascinating?) in a small crystal belljar there on the bottom, perched atop a little crystal spike, standing in the air between his lion paws. I even sucked all the air out of it so his heart would remain there, pristine, untouched by time.

And underneath, as a signature to my warning, I engraved my cutie mark, so all would know who had done it.

That's when it all started. Once you taste it, once you feel the dark magic's power, you crave more. And, like I said, I couldn’t help it. It was my destiny.

It just took a little time for it to truly take hold.

Comments

[Hobbestc]

Well, this is brutal. I like it.

[ponepony]

I can quench happiness. I can raise up sadness and depression so powerful I can sap a pony of the will to live right before my very eyes. I can suppress exhilaration; I can make that first wedding night's consummation feel like a burdensome chore. I can force a stallion to lust after another stallion, with his wife and foals standing nearby.

While it doesn't happen in the story, but I would be very interested in reading Cadance do this.