A Heavy Crown

by Fullmetal Pony

Chapter 6

“Aria?” Willow called out across the field.

His voice remained calm, but he could already feel his heart thudding as he stared at the spilled contents of Aria’s saddlebag. A few pieces of shattered vinyl still clung to his hoof while the rest of the records remained scattered on the ground. The food from Flour’s was still there, as well as her coin bag. Aside from falling over, nothing was disturbed or missing. He didn’t linger long on the bag before scanning the wide field.

We couldn’t have been up for that long, he thought. Aria, where are you?

“Daddy?” Cadenza pressed her hoof onto Willow’s neck. “Where’s Mommy?”

Willow’s felt sweat forming on his brow. “I… I’m sure she’s around here somewhere.”

“Oh!” Cadenza jumped to her hooves and stood atop Willow’s back. “Maybe she went to go use the potty!”

Willow blinked at Cadenza as sweat crawled down the side of his face. Then, taking a deep breath, he glanced back at Aria’s disheveled belongings. “Let’s clean this all up and then we can meet Mommy by the restrooms, okay?”

“Uh-huh! I bet Mommy drank too much cider.” Cadenza leapt off Willow’s back, using her wings to gently glide onto the grass. She shifted her hind legs around a bit and looked at the ground. “Can I go too, Daddy?”

“Of… of course, sweetie. Let me just get everything back together.”

Maybe that is where she went, Willow thought as he quickly stuffed the records and the food back into the bag and slung it onto his back. Cadenza’s fall just put me on edge is all. Why would she leave her bag though?

“Come on, Daddy!” Cadenza said, pulling him towards the restrooms. “I wanna find Mommy!”

“Sure, sweetie.”

They moved toward the forested section of the park, Willow drawing Cadenza close to his side despite her insistence on leading. When they were under the shade, Cadenza still pouting, they stepped off the grass and onto a dirt path. Ponies strolled up and down the path, many of them walking over to a small opening in the shade.

There was a collection of food carts and three brick buildings in the circular clearing. All of them were centered around an outcropping of rocks with an artificial waterfall bubbling up from its top and trickling into a tiny lake below.As Willow neared the brick buildings, his eyes locked onto the smallest of the three. Beneath its stained glass Equestria Flag were the letters: Canterlot Park Guard Station. A withered guard with bushy eyebrows and a thick beard that obscured his features sat behind the desk inside station.

Cadenza rushed ahead of Willow, darting for one of the building with a silhouette of a mare displayed beside its entrance.

“I’ll be right back, Daddy!” she said. “I’ll look for Mommy!”

“Cadenza! Wai—”

Cadenza disappeared into the bathroom, leaving Willow on his own. Some fresh sweat dripped into his right eye, but he refused to blink. Instead, he waited.

After a few minutes, his hair began standing on edge. Slowly, he crept closer to the restroom, eyes never wavering from the entrance. His eyes narrowed and his knees bent as if he was about to launch himself into a towering thundercloud. Just as he was about to call out Cadenza’s name, he felt a light tap on his back.

Willow’s jumped into the air and spun around. The elderly guard who’d snuck up behind him brushed a bit of kicked-up dust from his jacket and long, white beard with a jittery leg before slowly lowering it back to ground.

“Can you take a few steps back, sir?” he asked. “You’re disturbing a few of the folks here.”

“I…” Willow blinked.

Nearby mares had their lips puckered in disgust while the stallions either looked elsewhere or shot him harsh glares. Willow felt his cheeks burning. Then Cadenza rushed out of the bathroom and and jumped when she saw that she was right next to him. However, after a moment, she took a few steps closer to him and smiled, all while the park’s other patrons gave a few more disapproving glances before walking away.

“Daddy! I’m all good now!” Her smile dimmed and she turned her head down. “I didn’t see Mommy though… Daddy, where is she?”

“I’m sure she’s close by.” Willow glanced up at the guard. “You haven’t seen a mare with blue eyes, a blond mane, and an alto clef cutie mark, have you?”

“Hmm.” The guard stroked his beard. “Does she look like tha—”

“Willow!

Willow spun around to see Aria marching across the dirt path straight at him with a fire in her eyes. She raced over to him and drew close to his face, giving him the full brunt of her glare.

“I go off the bathroom and you up and vanish with all my things? I was scared half to death!”

“I-I…” Willow stuttered.

“Mommy!” Cadenza shouted before adhering herself to one of Aria’s legs. “We were looking for you!”

Aria blinked down at Cadenza before a grin came to her face. “I’m sure you were. I’m just glad I was able to find some help.”

She motioned to a pegasus that trotted over and came to a stop beside the group. Her height and the definition of her muscles gave off an intimidating appearance, but it was the way her eyes seemed to look right through everything that truly sent a chill through Willow. One that was somehow familiar, though he couldn’t place from where.

“I just made a quick trip over here and came back to the field as fast as I could,” Aria explained. “I must have looked like a madmare running all around looking for you two. Luckily, Ms. Bellows told me she’d seen you go off in this direction.”

“It was nothing,” Bellows said with a small bow.

Willow shook his head a little. “I just don’t understand why we didn’t run into each other.”

“I cut through the shrubbery,” Aria said with a sigh as she traded glances with both Willow and Cadenza. “You could have flown down in case something happened to my bag, but I still wanted to get back to it as fast as possible. Not fast enough it seems.”

Willow opened his mouth to apologize but stopped when he saw that Cadenza had moved away from Aria, shaking like a leaf and her fur on end. Crouching down, Willow held out a hoof to her.

“Sweetie, are you okay?” he asked.

“I-I just got really c-cold,” she said through chattering teeth.

Willow quickly draped a wing around her and pulled her closer to his torso. “Probably just a little after-effect from flying. It happens to a bunch of trainees. Let’s get you back in the sun.”

Reaching back with one leg, Willow pulled Aria’s bag off his back and paled at the crunch of broken record pieces smushing together. Aria turned her attention from Cadenza to her bag.

“Willow?” she asked, eyes narrowing. “What was that?”

Willow felt his chest seize up.

“Mommy,” Cadenza said, “Daddy was worried about you, so h—”

“So he what?” Aria glared at Willow, sending a chill down his spine. “What did you do?”

“I…” Willow bowed his head low, scraping his chin against the ground. “I’m sorry, Aria. I couldn’t see your bag when we landed, and I was on edge… But I promise I’ll get you a new record.”

“Oh,” Aria said in a flat tone Willow couldn’t read.

He dared to glance up and was met with Aria grinning down at him. Her eyes still retained a bit of hardness though, as if made of ice.

“That’s all?” she asked. “I thought something had happened to our little princess.”

“Uh-uh!” Cadenza poked her head out from behind Willow’s wing and shook it. “Flying was really fun, mommy! Did Daddy ever let you touch a cloud?”

“Plenty of times,” said Aria.

“Shame your hoof went right through them.” Willow said as he pulled his wing from Cadenza’s grip and placed her on his back.

“Mommy can’t touch clouds?” Cadenza asked.

“No, sweetie. Unicorns ca—” Willow paused, having noticed that Cadenza’s wings had vanished and her horn was visible again. “Uh, it’s really hard to explain. I can tell you while we go back to Maestro’s.”

Cadenza grinned before letting out a big yawn. “Okay.”

Willow began to turn around, but a tap on his shoulder stopped him. Aria leaned close to him and batted her eyes.

“Willow, perhaps we should head back. It’s getting a bit late, and all this running around has left me feeling a bit exhausted.” She glanced at Cadenza, who had her head loosely draped atop Willow’s neck. “Looks like I’m not the only one.”

“Guess it has been quite the day for all of us,” said Willow. “You’re sure you don’t want to stop by Maestro’s though? I’m sure they’ve got to have at least one other copy of Hoofdel.”

“No.” Aria kept her gaze on Cadenza. “You can go back some other time.”

“Okay then.” Willow turned and bowed his head to the guard and Bellows. “Thank you again for your help.”

“It was no problem, sir,” both said in eerie unison.

Willow’s ears perked up at their response. He also noticed that, for an old pony, the guard still had as rigid a stance as Bellows did. In fact, they both would have fit right in at the castle. However, before Willow could ask either of them about it, Aria was tugging him away.

“Don’t just stand there,” she said. “We’ve got a walk and I’m about ready to pass out.”

~~~

As “Bellows” and the guard watched the family walk away, the guard’s lips turned up into a grin.

“Mission complete,” he said.

“We could have done without your theatrics,” Silent Gaze said as she spread her wings. “Now take that stupid disguise off before the real guard comes back. I’m going back to reconnaissance.”

Without another word, Silent Gaze leapt upwards and skimmed over the treeline. Soft Step shook his head for a second as his lips drew back into a tight line.

“Last time I work with her,” he said. “I’ll petition her Highness about it.”

~~~

By the time Willow and Aria reached the park’s exit, Cadenza was sound asleep. Every few minutes, Willow would glance back to check on her, but every time he did, either her horn or her wings were visible. When he was sure Cadenza was completely out, he drew closer to Aria, who had been in the lead the entire way.

“Aria, I think you were right about going back,” he said.

“Well of course I am.” Aria opened her mouth wide and yawned. “I’m nearly dead on my hooves.”

“I’m worried about Cadenza’s charm too. I don’t think it’s working right anymore.”

Aria glanced back at Cadenza and a small grin lifted one corner of her lips as she scanned the sleeping filly. For the first time since she’d met back up with Willow, the glare faded completely from her eyes, leaving them the soft, clear-skies blue Willow was used to. She barely even noticed the charm.

“Hmm...” Aria turned to Willow with a raised eyebrow and a frown. “It seems fine to me.”

“Well…” Willow pressed closer to Aria as ponies walked alongside and around them. He lifted his muzzle until his lips brushed against her ear. “It keeps turning either her horn or her wings invisible. I’m worried somepony might notice.”

Aria blinked, corked her head at him and then took another glance at Cadenza, this time truly focusing on the charm itself. Her eyes suddenly widened.. “Oh, I see what you mean. All the more reason to the pick up the pace!”

Before Willow could say anything more on the matter, Aria took the lead again. It was all Willow could do to try and keep up without jostling Cadenza out of her slumber. The growing number of ponies in the street didn’t help much either.

~~~

Despite the brisk pace Aria and Willow had taken, the edge of the sun was touching the tips of the western mountains, bathing downtown Canterlot in a slight yellow tint by the time they made it to the alley between Keen Eyes’ Jewelers and Vibrant’s Apparel. Mystic stood in the same spot he’d been in when the family had left, sans the two guards that had accompanied him. However, the clank of steel drew their attention back to the street’s entrance, where the two guards seemed to have appeared out of thin air.

“It appears you’ve had quite a day,” Mystic said with a smile.

“Yeah,” Willow said. “You didn’t stay here the whole time, did you?”

“Of course not. There was quite the sale at Baba’s Books and Curios. I’ve been wanting a few of their pricier selections to add to my own collection. Alas, Dr. Presto seems have stopped by Canterlot just to swipe the Lex Ma—”

“Can we be on our way?” Aria said, stifling another yawn with her hoof.

“Right, right.” Mystic gave his mane a scratch. “Suppose I’m just a little sore is all.”

Lighting his horn, Mystic sent up a blue disk of aura over the group that quickly spread out and took the shape of a familiar bubble. Outside its thin film of magic, the alley blurred and the noise from the street faded away to a gentle murmur.

“For security, we’ll cut through the Statue Garden this time,” Mystic explained. “The last round of visitors will be leaving when we get there, so it should be fine.”

Before anypony could reply, Mystic spun around and began marching towards the backside of the buildings. The guards followed up as well, forcing Willow and Aria to proceed onto the obscured path.

As they walked by the nobility’s estates, Willow picked up his speed to get closer to Mystic.

“Did you test that charm before you gave it to us?” Willow asked.

Mystic nearly tripped over his own hooves. After regaining his balance, he stared at Willow and snorted.

“Of course we did,” he said. “It may be a test model, but it’s a very late stage one. We’ve spent the past four years ensuring that the charm’s magic wouldn’t adversely affect its wearer.

“Why?” Mystic brow crinkled. “Did something happen?”

“I’m just worried because it keeps making either Cadenza’s wings or her horn disappear.”

Mystic almost tripped again. “What?”

“I thought maybe it was something you’d know about.”

“No, no.” Mystic shook his head. “In all our tests, only the wings ever became invisible. Just like they are now.”

Mystic looked back towards Cadenza and then to Willow again. “What do you see right now?”

“Her wings.”

Mystic pursed his lips. “I’m going to need to record this. When we get back to the castle, I’d like to run a few tests. Is that fine?”

“Nothing that’ll hurt, right?”

“Of course not.”

“Good. Thank you.” Willow backed away from Mystic and began to move back towards Aria, but then suddenly trotted up to Mystic again. “Wait, if you said only the wings disappeared how could you tell if somepony still had a horn?”

“Well, you see, the Pri—”

A loud yawn silenced Mystic. Cadenza closed her mouth and stretched out her legs. With her eyes still half-closed, she stood up and then snapped to attention just as she lost her balance and fell towards the ground.

Willow’s eyes widened, as did the two guards’, when Aria pounced off the ground with enough force to leave dents in the hard dirt. She was still out of reach. The tip of her horn sparked as Cadenza raced towards the ground.

Instead of the hard dirt, Cadenza hit a soft, absorbent aura instead. Mystic looked down on her with a small frown before floating her back onto Willow’s shoulders. At the same time, Aria skidded to a stop, just barely keeping herself from falling over her own hooves.

“Always be careful waking up. You never know where you may find yourself,” Mystic said before turning to Aria. “Sorry to alarm you. Are you alright?”

“I am now,” Aria grunted.

“Just wanted to be sure,” said Mystic. “It’s been a while since you’ve tried magic and sudden usage of damaged and dormant horns has been known cause backlash.”

Aria’s eyes went up to her horn. “I… I forgot.”

She sighed and brushed some dirt off her hooves and then glared at Willow, who was helping Cadenza get resituated on his back. He paused, taken aback by the intensity in Aria’s eyes, as if the blue in them had darkened for the briefest moment. Then she blinked and took a deep breath just as Cadenza looked in her direction.

“Huh?” Cadenza stared around before centering on Willow. “Daddy? Where are we?”

“Close to the castle, sweetie,” said Willow. “You were really tired though, so I’ve been carrying you.”

“Barely,” Aria muttered.

“I don’t remember feeling tired.” Cadenza brought a hoof to her chin. “I just remember finding Mommy and then feeling really cold.”

“How do you feel now?” Willow asked as he pressed a hoof against her forehead.

“Fine!” Cadenza flashed him a smile. It dimmed a little as she caught sight of the castle from the corner of her eye. “Are we going home already?”

“Uh-huh.” Willow gave her a wide nod.

“Then perhaps we should get going,” Aria said with a glance in Mystic’s direction.

Mystic gave her a small nod and resumed walking.

Cadenza sagged into Willow’s back and lowered her eyes. “Do we really have to go home now?”

“Yes,” Aria said. “You’re tired and so is mommy. I think we’ve done enough for the day.”

“Don’t worry, sweetie.” Willow smiled back at her. “There’ll be plenty of other times to go explore the city.”

“As long as somepony keeps up with their schoolwork,” Mystic added.

Cadenza groaned and planted her face between Willow’s shoulder blades. Willow couldn’t help but chuckle a little.

Soon, the group arrived at the castle’s moat, but instead of going straight as they’d done that morning, they took a sharp turn to the left, toward the main entrance. Groups of ponies trotted across the drawbridge every couple of minutes, all of them led by a pony holding a small Equestrian flag and wearing a light yellow vest.

Nopony went into castle though, which made it easy for the group to make their way up the right side of the drawbridge. They came to a stop at a small wooden table at the end of the drawbridge where a guard was sorting brochures and maps into drawers. He perked up as the group stopped beside him and lit up his horn.

Mystic opened up a small window in his bubble, allowing the guard to see his face. “We’ll be taking Mi Amore and her family back through the Statue Garden.”

“Understood,” said the guard, returning to work as if Mystic were still invisible. “There’s a small school group in there though.”

Mystic raised an eyebrow. “I thought they were supposed to be done an hour ago.”

“Colt got lost looking for the restroom,” the guard replied. “Wound up in the kitchens.”

Mystic sighed and resealed the bubble. “We’ll have to be a little roundabout in our path. Can you manage?”

“Yeah.” Willow hitched Cadenza up, leading her to giggle.

“Piggyback! Piggyback!” she sang.

“It should only take an extra five minutes at most.” Mystic faced forward again and marched ahead.

The group moved into the inner courtyard of the castle and then trotted to the the left before passing underneath a grand stone arch. Once through, they found themselves flanked by thick hedges that glistened with the sun’s reddening glow. Mystic and the guards kept their heads forward, but Cadenza looked around with wide eyes. She’d always stared out at the intricate pattern cut into the foliage whenever she glimpsed it from the castle’s halls. On clear days, she could even make out the faces of the statues that were scattered throughout the Garden.

Now her head swiveled around, taking in every detail from the flowers that dotted the hedges to the massive statues of ponies that towered over her. She blinked when she spotted a guard at one corner of the Garden, then burst into fresh giggles.

“Mommy, Daddy, look.” Cadenza tapped on Willow’s neck and pointed at the guard. “He looks like a statue.”

Willow looked at the guard and smiled. “He sure does.”

Aria glanced in the guard’s direction but didn’t seem to care.

Occasionally, the group would pass through an intersection amongst the hedges. Through these, Cadenza could sometimes glimpse a pony or two that were only a few years older than herself. However, just as soon as they were spotted, they would disappear behind another hedge. After a few more minutes of walking, the group turned a corner and found themselves in the center of the Garden. The open space was filled with statues bearing scrolls, flags, or just striking a dramatic pose.

One statue in particular seemed to loom over the others. Its serpentine body stood above even the hedges on a dragon leg and a donkey’s hoof, while a tufted tail coiled around the statue’s base. It had its lion’s paw placed at its chest while its griffon talons were raised high with its mismatched wings. The statue almost appeared be in the midst of a bow to a standing ovation.Cadenza had never noticed that statue from afar, but up close it sent a chill down her spine despite the guffaw on its stony, malformed face.

The statue was quickly replaced in her thoughts by a group of fillies and colts swarming into the space. A breathless mare darted after them, followed by an equally out of breath guide.

“Class!” the mare called out. “It’s time to get back to the gate! Detentions for anypony not there in five minutes!”

“For Equestria’s sake,” Mystic grumbled as he picked up the pace. “I’m going to find out whichever school these foals are from and discipline them myself.”

Fillies and colts raced around the group, but most never even came close to the edges of their bubble. The few who brushed against it would quickly turn away to explore the Garden. Cadenza watched them all with wide eyes.

“Daddy, can I go down?” she asked.

“Not now, sweetie,” Willow said as he walked faster to keep up with Mystic.

Cadenza frowned deeply and bent her head closer to Willow’s just as they passed under the serpentine statue’s shadow. “But all the other fillies and colts and running around. It looks fun! I wanna play too!”

“Later, sweetie,” Willow said with an authoritative tone. “You ca—

A flurry of sparks cut Willow off shooting out from where Mystic’s bubble had somehow caught on the statue’s paw and now flooding the bubble with a cacophony of lights and sounds. Flowers suddenly sprouted from the guards’ armor and pieces of Mystic’s and Willow’s fur turned neon pink.

A spark landed on the clasp of Cadenza’s charm and propelled it off her neck like a stone from a sling to smack straight into Aria’s chest and explode like a firecracker. Aria screamed and fell to her knees, a spasm running through her body before she finally went limp.

“Aria!” Willow screamed.

“What in Tartarus?!” Mystic yelled.

The sparks flying off the charm smashed into Mystic’s bubble, tearing through the magic that wasn’t already disturbed by the previous sparks. The charm’s explosion left smoldering holes behind that continued growing larger.

Nearby fillies and colts jumped back and fled screaming as the spell unraveled. Some of the foals farther away from the bubble were pointing at Mystic, but many more had their eyes only on Cadenza. Even the teacher was stunned into silence where before she’d been trying to get her students away from the chaos.

Mystic’s horn flared, neck straining and veins popping, but the holes in the bubble refused to close. Instead, they grew even larger as cracks raced across what remained of the bubble. Mystic’s horn flared again.

“This is Archmage Rune,” He roared in a voice that was nearly deafening. “Code Psi! I need a squad in Sec—”

Willow could only register the sound that cut off Mystic as an amplified thunderclap. The flash that accompanied it blinded him while some giant’s hammer struck him in the chest and sent him tumbling to the dirt.

He gasped and immediately looked for Cadenza, his ears ringing and spots in his eyes, only to find her slumped over one of his wings with a scraped knee on her right foreleg. Mystic lay on his back a few feet away, smoke rising from his blackened horn, and all around them were fillies and colts splayed across the ground. The few that had somehow remained conscious staggered about, crosseyed and whimpering unintelligibly. Then they began looking at Cadenza too.

And saw a little filly with both wings and a horn.

An armored leg suddenly latched around Willow’s stomach and hefted him onto the back of the nearest guard. In the chaos, a squad of them had swooped in and split into two teams. One group formed a perimeter around Cadenza and the others while the second group chucked her, Aria, and Mystic onto their backs.

The guards carrying Mystic and the family sped out of the Garden and up the stone steps that led into the castle. They quickly reached the infirmary where a nurse was filling out paperwork. At the sight of the guards, she dropped her quill and rushed over to them.

“Sir Mystic has suffered magical backlash,” the guard carrying him said. “Princess Cadenza and her mother were injured as well.”

The guard carrying Willow looked back at him. “Can you stand?”

“Y-yes,” said Willow.

He slid off the bulky guard, wobbled a bit but managed to stay upright as the guards carrying Aria and Cadenza moved towards the infirmary. He moved to follow them, but the bulkiest guard blocked his way.

“Sir,” he said, “we need to check you too.”

“Move!” Willow snorted and tried to push the guard aside. “You can check me af—”

A veil of magic enclosed Willow’s head, silencing him, and he spun around to see that the nurse’s horn was aglow. Then darkness filled his eyes and the last thing he felt were two of his legs leaving the floor.

~~~

Willow’s eyes shot open. He sprang up, heard a loud clang and stared groggily in the general direction of the sound, ears twitching wildly.. When his head cleared, he found Cadenza balled up at the foot of the bed he was on. The only thing that had kept her from being launched onto the floor was the metal board used to hang up medical charts.

“Ow,” she groaned, holding the back of her head, revealing a small bandage on her leg.

“Cadenza!” Willow had her in his hooves in a second. “Oh, thank goodness you’re okay!

“D-daddy” Cadenza coughed. “Can’t… breath.”

Willow instantly loosened his hold on her and set her down beside him. “Sorry! Sorry!”

“I’m okay.” Cadenza hacked a little. “Okay, now I’m okay.”

“That’s good, that’s good.” Just before Willow laid back, he shot back up and looked around the room. In the bed next to his was Aria. His heart stopped for the brief moment it took him to notice her chest slowly rising and falling underneath the sheets.

“She’s been sleeping even longer than you were,” said Cadenza. “Is mommy going to be okay?”

“Yeah, I’m sure she’ll b—”

“She’ll be just fine,” a nurse said as she appeared from behind a partition that blocked off the beds from other parts of the infirmaries. “Aside from a tiny booboo, you’ll all be on your way soon.”

The nurse’s face fell a little. “I just wish I could say the same for Sir Mystic. Magic backlash isn’t pleasant.”

“Oh…” Willow looked over to Aria. “But she’ll be fine?”

“Yes,” said the nurse. “Whatever hit all of you seemed to have dispersed Sir Mystic’s magic into a number of different spells. Mostly minor transfiguration, though she had the bad luck to get hit by a tranq spell. She should be up in a couple of mi—”

A cough silenced her, and all three of them shot a look at Aria’s bed. Aria coughed again, smacked her lips a little and then opened her eyes and sat straight up. For a moment, her eyes had that sharp glare to them all over again.

“Mommy!” said Cadenza.

She jumped off of Willow’s bed and raced over to Aria’s. She tried to jump up into the bed, but couldn’t reach, even with her wings flapping at her sides. Aria’s gaze softened once more, and she reached over the side of the bed to pick Cadenza up and quickly found herself locked in a tight hug.

“I was scared!” Cadenza said, burying her face in Aria’s chest. “It was like one of the bad dreams!”

“It’s alright. Everything’s fine now. No need to cry.”

“R-really?” Cadenza sniffled and turned her teary eyes up to Aria.

“Yes,” Aria replied, tightening her grip on Cadenza a little more. “Really. I’ll always be here for you.”

Willow smiled and slid off his bed. He drew closer to Aria and Cadenza and wrapped his forelegs around them.

“I’m just glad you’re both okay,” he said. “I don’t know what I’d do if either of you got hurt.”

“Well, if today is anything to go by, get in trouble with the guards a bit more,” Aria chuckled as Willow turned a little red. She then pulled a little closer and gave him a kiss on the cheek. “It means a lot for you to to say that though.”

Willow let out a chuckle of his,until something poked him in the ribs. Cadenza had one of her legs around his chest in a hug, her nose on his chest, and a worried frown smeared across her face. The hairs on the back of his neck slowly stood on end.

“Sweetie?” he asked. “Is something wrong.”

“I… I think Mommy got hurt,” she mumbled.

“Don’t be silly.” Aria tightened her hold on Cadenza. “See? I’m just as good as ever.”

“B-but…” Cadenza slowly raised up a hoof and pointed it straight at Aria’s face. “Your eyes, mommy. They’re green.”

Comments

[Bloodpool]

[Legiondude]

A changeling spy is the base! We must protect the wee Princess!

[an1979]

Silly.
Those are not the bad guys you are looking for.
Move along!

[Shachza]

The changelings are stepping up their game to be infiltrating so early. Poor Cadance.

[Backlash91]

welp ya went'n done it didn't cha? ya got me hooked, sunk, and interested in this story. I look forward to more ^^

[pahnazd]

And this is the first time that Discord has been helpful prior to his reformation.
Let's see if any one of them realizes what is really going on now!

[AetherToast]

So I am not a 100% sure why the charm exploded? Still the changelings really did some janked things, kinda balssy too, almost seems like they did no research at all because the Aria replacement didn't know anything.

[ambion]

A Heavy Crown - Review by ambion.

This review is ungodly late in its delivery. Sorry about that. [Edit: Also there's some difficulty in getting comments to post, what with these key-sign error messages that pop up.] In exhuming the original notes we found there was a request to just do chapter five, with an emphasis on grammar and narrative flow/pacing.

Well I’m tossing that metric out the window. For the best of reasons. Grammar is not my interest and doing a single chapter is a bit self-defeating.

Consider this the review where I give you what you want instead of what you asked for.

Right-o than. A Heavy Crown.

While I have a few problems with this story, I think they can all be traced back to a very simple and underlying issue:

Cadence has no agency in this story.

At least not yet, and more often than if it has to called as ‘not yet’ in story writing then it’s already ‘too late’. Her lack of agency is a problem that rears its head in several more specific forms that’ll I’ll refer back to throughout this review.

The story is, as I write this 6 chapters long and follows the upbringing of Cadence. Straight up.

The plan, I assume, is that this plot invariably leads into the present-ish day content that we’re familiar with. More or less.

Now I did rather like the opening scene of the first chapter. It really established for me in no uncertain terms that this was going to be the sort of world for poor babby Cadence where:

A) the Powers that Be will flat out isolate you from even your own parents minutes after you’re born.
B) Lie to said parents causing them no small amount of distress.
C) Question said parents in an impersonal, invasive and insensitive manner.

Those qualities really work well to inform the reader of the sort of things they can expect from the story, and to my mind it really painted an expectation of the future where Cadence is isolated, kept in the dark and dealing with a Celestia whom, while very nice still probably maneuvers her more like a playing piece than a free individual, in which case the story centres on her struggle for answers, identity, and all that good stuff.

But then the introduction keeps going. It’s too long. The testing scene didn’t really tell us anything we didn’t already know (Cadence haz teh love majeek) and the moving to the castle scene didn’t do anything for me.

The parents out-right ask if Cadence must be a princess, which sets up nicely the coming conflict of their desire for autonomy and freedom for their daughter’s best interest with the predetermination and interventionism of Celestia in Equestria’s best interest...only to suddenly start calling Cadence their little Princess after the time-skip. So I guess the parents are ok with that now?

It’s a small thing in its own right, but is symptomatic of some of the problem I’m talking about here. Also Cadence had nothing to say about being a princess one way or the other.

The Agency Problem:

There’s not much you can do with a newborn baby as a character, besides throw them around as a prop between supporting characters to establish themselves with, and maybe set up a prophecy or a juxtaposition. Hence why I feel the baby-Cadence time-skip doesn’t come soon enough.

The young Cadence doesn’t fair much better. Yes she’s adorable and all what with the waffles and pancakes, but for a story that tags itself Sad and talks about the quest for answers from magnanimous but perhaps less-than-forthcoming Celestia...

...well, it seemed like I was waiting for the actual story to get underway.

Young Cadence in the Castle never struck me as a pony who had any real concerns about her world, or a comprehension (or even tiniest, nagging impression) that something is out of sorts. And sure, it can be argued that she’s just young enough to be ignorant and care-free, but again that’s not really what this story sold itself to me the reader as.

I’d’ve enjoyed the Slice of Life style moments (Looking at you, combing hair and waffles/pancakes scene) if they’d managed to slip in some subtext or foreshadowing. Maybe a poorly dodged question about horns and wings, maybe an otherwise innocent display of Cadence’s budding power. Something, anything which shows that the anxiety about Cadence’s nature - put out of mind or not - is still very much there.

There was an opportunity to do that with the nightmare. They’re a little cliche for me, but mechanically functional so yeah okay. And sure it informs the readers that bad things are a-comin’, but the characters don’t bat an eye. They dismiss it outright. To them, everything really is fine and dandy.

It bears repeating: Cadence doesn’t really exercise any agency of her own. The OC’s to my mind were more like the protagonists than the actual main character was. So far she’s just drifted along with events, a fundamentally content and untroubled small child who has good parents, a stable environment and no troubling thoughts or observations about the world or herself in that world at all.

And that’s great, you know, for real life. Seriously now. It is. Ideal child-rearing situation.

But for a story about questions without answers and trial and error and heavy crowns atop your head and loneliness... it’s a bit off the mark. A bit pointless. A bit aimless.

Sure, the sentences were fine such that there weren’t any glaring errors (I proofread or I review, rarely both) and the family was cute for what it was, but there’s no burden on Cadence. No imperative.

Yes, there’s something interesting happening now with the changeling-swap, but who do I see going about dealing with that? Celestia. Or those two spy/guard ponies. Or Cadence’s dad. Anyone except actual Cadence for that matter.

And no, this isn’t to say I think she should suddenly find some teeny tiny plate mail and go bust down doors, obviously these such actions are what other characters are there for.

But the idea, say, that this event happened to someone she cherishes directly because of what she is and the resulting internal conflict and character-revealing thoughts and choices...I don’t know if I see that happening. Happening as the focus of the narrative. But it should. But to do it now would be a jarring change in tone, which aforementioned nagging-anxiety that’s almost-but-not-quite forgotten would have prepared the reader for. Waffles taste good, yes, and pancakes do to, but implements establishing character and conflict they are not.

SO... what do I say?

I say the story meanders a lot. Thirty Thousand words is a long, LONG time to waffle while waiting for the plot to kick in.

I say that the characters that needed the most development early on were Cadence/Celestia - because that really is the key relationship AND key conflict here. The OC’s are nice and all, but they can’t fill that actual need, and they’ve stolen a lot of figurative screentime away from the ones that can

I’d say that Cadence needs to step up and put on the I Am The Main Character Of This Story Crown already, heavy or no, and the sooner she steps up to the plate the better it’ll be for everyone. In all honesty though; the story has not made that easy to do for itself.

[StarzGecko]

This story is really great!

[DualKitsune]

Changeling. Called it. Though it did explain why Came had to be the one replaced in the wedding. She can sense changelings. Especially those who don't love.