59 - A new leg
The next day there were a few less umbrum than usual for Penny to feed and, faster and faster, the number dwindled. The mare didn't waste the time, she was focused on her study, wanting to know as many of the horn-alphabet as she could before reaching school.
"You can do it, I know you can." Stick found her partner curled up on their bed. "Many to feed today?" The changeling climbed up beside Penny and snuggled in against her.
"Luna is teaching them well, you notice how much happier they seem? I don't think my fear was feeding them too well." Penny let herself be distracted by Stick, leaning and giving her cheek a kiss.
"Mmm, you in the mood still?" Stick returned the kiss, this one striking Penny right on the lips and the pair were distracted, Penny proving to her special somepony just how in the mood she was.
After a very satisfying, for both, bout of intense snuggling, Stick was running a hoof in lazy circles on Penny's belly. "You aren't in your cycle anymore." The changeling looked almost as happy-drunk as when Cadance had fed her, but she had a whole mare to herself to keep her focus.
Penny thought on this and shrugged. "I feel how I feel. Estrus, pregnancy, whatever." She rolled to her back, depriving Stick of the side-belly to rub but giving her the whole of her deep black belly-fur to work on. "Are you going to complain?"
"No ma'am." Stick took the bait and shuffled closer, leaning her head down and laying it on the unicorn's midsection, turning so she could gaze up at Penny. "You know, before we met, I wasn't… experienced, much, either?"
Levitating a pillow under her neck, Penny propped herself so she could look down at Stick. "In some ways I gathered that. In others… you are my first, you know?"
Stick nodded, a silly-happy smile on the changeling's snout revealing the tips of her fangs. "I wish you had been mine, but I am not going to complain about that, I have you now." Lifting a hoof up, Stick met one of Penny's with a quiet clop.
"You do. Question is, what is the brutish changeling going to do to their unicorn captive?" Penny rubbed that hoof against Stick's.
"Your changeling queen is going to rest a little more, for a start." Stick drew her hoof away and leaned up to kiss the playful hoof. "Then she is going to have her way with the unicorn."
The next morning Penny looked around the usual meeting spot, there was not a single umbrum waiting for her. "The princess of the night has taken your charges. They roam dreams, finding just the right ones that shouldn't be stomped away, they feed as the dreams teach the pony within them." Dreams had flown up from behind her, landing neatly on Penny's back.
Penny grinned at how much more forward the mare was now. Being able to feed themselves, she realized, had given the umbrum much of themselves back. "Sad or happy?"
The umbrum rocked a little as Penny laid down in the soft grass. "About it? Very happy, Shadow is twice the stallion he was when he only had you to scare."
"I am sorry, I didn't realize how… distracted, he got." There was a nip to Penny's shoulder at that comment, she took it with grace.
"It's okay, and it really is better. I saw a side of him I hadn't, in over a thousand years." Dreams tucked herself down, using Penny's dark mane to partly hide in. "I confronted him about it, he really didn't realize what he was doing."
"Stallions." Penny put her feelings into the word, more about everypony than particularly the minority that is male.
"Stallions." Dreams seemed to agree. "So when are you leaving?"
Penny lifted her head a little in a jerk. "Almost forgot about all that. You are really all back on your hooves?" She felt Dreams sift through her thoughts a little, finding her fears for the future and gently nibble at them.
"We are, most of us help Princess Luna with dreams. Others are working on building a fun house like we made in the Crystal Empire. Yet others have found themselves leaving to find other ways our gifts can help ponies." Dreams didn't eat all the fear, she had discovered Penny liked to keep a little around, but she did take the edges off it for her friend.
Penny gave a sigh, even as the fear of her future had arisen, her friend reduced it. "There is an old saying, where I am from. 'A problem shared is a problem halved'." Penny channeled a little, thinking on that fear.
Dreams was able to feed more fully on this. "I could eat that all away if you wanted?" She drank in the energy, slowly wafting off Penny. It tasted better, even though it was muddied with other emotions. The umbrum had gained insight into such, fears born of the pony themselves were much tastier than ones induced by umbrum magic.
"Leave me something to worry about, but eat some more if you like. It is nice to just relax and not worry so much." Penny did just that, letting her magic flow slowly. One by one more umbrum appeared. One by one they lay down in the little field. None but Dreams drank from her, though. Penny finally came from her little daze to realize every umbrum in the town was there.
"Thank you." Dark was right in front of her, his voice warm.
"Thank you." Under piped up in her adorable voice.
It continued, each of the little ponies saying the words. Penny started to cry and the ritual paused. "She isn't sad, I can't drink from her at all anymore…" Dreams was looking around Penny's mane.
"I am so happy you are all okay…" The unicorn managed to get the words out between sobs. Dreams leaned in with her small hooves and hugged Penny. The umbrum moved together and each winged fairy-pony added themselves to the hug and, continued their thanks.
The tears couldn't last forever, Penny's eyes dried up and one by one the umbrum moved back and left. Soon only Dreams was there.
"Is this goodbye?" Penny felt the weight of her responsibility reduce, but part of her wanted to keep that yoke.
"No, this is 'see you in your dreams you delicious mare.'" Dreams hugged her tight and Penny reached up a hoof to gather the smaller pony in as well.
Penny felt the jerk of as the locomotive pulled the train into motion. She had cried more, both alone and with Stick at her side. "Don't you dare cry more. I don't care how delicious such happiness is, I hate seeing you cry, for any reason." Stick was holding an accusing hoof out and waving it at Penny.
The unicorn sniffed. "I guess I was just a little attached to them." Stick moved over and was pressed to her side. The touch of her marefriend always made Penny's emotions lift.
"You were, and it is adorable to see you having been so motherly about it." Stick nuzzled Penny's neck.
It hit the lunar pony. She had been. How had she missed this? "Motherly…"
"Yes, silly little snack, you helped bring them out into the light, you fed them until they could feed themselves."
Penny reeled at this. "I… I guess that is sort of right." She tilted her head, trying to work out how she felt about it and it came to her. Nothing bad had happened, the umbrum were on their hooves and running. "Was I a good 'mother'?"
"The best." Stick, ever the biased opinion, nibbled at Penny's neck.
"Stick! It isn't that long a trip to Canterlot." Penny's exclamation didn't echo, not in the private room they had.
The changeling pushed Penny over onto her side. "Your queen demands attention." A brush floated from Penny's saddle bags, the end stuffing into the mare's mouth just as she was going to say something. Stick watched as Penny's expression shifted gears and she slowly drew back up, leaning in and brushing at the changeling's tail. "Good filly."
Twilight had felt the changeling drink. She had spent enough time with Slow and Stick to have learned to sense that touch. "You are more gentle than the rest." Her observation had made Fast look suddenly guilty and the sensation stopped. "Oh keep on, it feels sort of nice and I told you you could."
"Okay, what is going on here princess? I am laying all my cards out right now." Fast looked flustered and more than a touch confused. "I put the moves on you, you seem to be all coy about it. Then when I had all-but given up on riding your flank you do this?"
The princess of friendship's wings flared as Fast's hoof circled and indicated the picnic. "I… I was just trying to prove something." Fast Change didn't reply, she just raised an eyebrow. "I was talking with Stick, she made me think the secret to becoming special someponies was friendship. It is my domain, I should know about this!"
Fast took a deep breath. She had given up, lost, surrendered all her schemes. "Well, of course it is. The best love is built on friendship first. Why was all this…" Fast's eyes went wide.
Twilight seemed to catch on that the changeling thought something very significant was going on.
"But… does that mean you… you want to be my special somepony?" Fast sounded as shocked as Twilight suddenly was. Both were blushing furiously as a gentle breeze caught their manes.
By the time the train pulled into Canterlot Station the pair had been up to their usual antics and their tails and manes were pristine and well cared for.
"So where do we go to sort all this school stuff out?" Stick looked around the station as they disembarked, not noticing anypony who might be expecting them.
"Maybe asking for a meeting with Celestia would be a good idea. I am sure she will want to know where her bits are going, at the very least. If not get another perspective on events." Penny looked up to the castle, remembering that this was where her new life had all begun.
"After, we need to visit the hive." Stick started following Penny, keeping more or less at her side as they wandered off the platform.
The slow amble through the city proved to the pair just how much bigger Canterlot was than their recent homes. Ponies everywhere, even a griffon or two were on the streets. Penny shifted her pace to press in against Stick.
"We are here to beg an audience with Princess Celestia." Penny stepped up to the guard at the main entrance to the castle.
"Names?" The stallion seemed partly bored but not in a way that detracted from his duty. It was just a slow day apparently.
"Penny Farthing and Stick." Stick supplied their names and the guard didn't look impressed, but it wasn't his job to judge supplicants.
"Please wait here." He turned and left them with just one guard watching them. His return had him looking a little surprised. "The princess will see you shortly."
Penny beamed at the news and followed as another guard came to take them to a room. "If you will follow me." The two mares did just that.
Their guard offered no conversation to them, the pair still excited about their recent adventures. "You said some of the umbrum left? You know what they are doing?" Stick decided that if the guard wouldn't talk, she might as well.
"One I heard about seems to want to be a sort of psychologist." Penny noticed Stick looked stumped on the word. "Someone who talks with ponies, helping them understand their feelings."
"That is neat. I guess they could help reduce a pony's fears, at the very least." Stick's observation got a nod from Penny.
They were at the room before their chat got any further and the guard gestured for them to wait inside. The room was spectacular, at least to Penny. Every inch of wall and ceiling was a mural, of the sun and happiness. It was like it was the very focus of Celestia's desires for her ponies.
"They are already inside, your highness." The words of the guard filtered in and the pair turned just as the alabaster princess made her entry.
Celestia had a smile for the pair. "It is good to have two of my ponies return." The presence of the mare almost overwhelmed Penny. Before when she had met with the ruler, she had felt a sense of being removed, of not quite being the target of her words. Not anymore.
Penny and Stick, both, lowered themselves to a knee.
"Now stop that, I am not that sort of princess and there is no one here to impress." Celestia found a small pile of pillows and set herself down on them. "I already have news of the Crystal Empire, but from two ponies of such regard I would wish to hear it again."
Getting their hooves under them and likewise finding some seating, Penny and Stick looked to each other. "Want it from the beginning, or the best news first?"
"Lets try, from the beginning." Princess Celestia's request was heralded by the sudden existence of a little cart, covered in cupcakes and deserts. "Would you like one?" A pair of plates, laden with cheesecake was already floating to the pair.
Stick, not needing to actually eat, decided to start. "I guess it started, then, with a flash of green over Canterlot..."
Stats
Page generated in 0.025 seconds
Total duration
790 users online
1,215,518 hits today, 2,054,621 yesterday
FIMFiction
My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic Fanfiction
Designed and coded by knighty & Xaquseg - © 2011-2024
Follow & Support Us
Support us
SubStar
Chat!
Discord
Follow us
Twitter
MLP: Friendship is Magic® - © 2024 Hasbro Inc.®
Fimfiction is in no way affiliated with or endorsed by Hasbro Inc.®
a vary good chapter.
I wonder ware this loving pare will go next.
Well, look at Fast Change, sneaking out of David's story and shipping with Twilight Sparkle on the sly.
Penny rubber that hoof - Penny rubbed that hoof
when you leaving - when are you leaving
themselves are much - themselves were much
stuffing in the - stuffing into the
had Fast - had made Fast
*****
Not sure if this is the end of the arc, but events seem to be rapidly wrapping up. It's been a pleasure reading this far!
Celestia clearly understands the value of hearing information straight from the source to add a layer of emotional nuance that words alone have a difficult time conveying. -- said the commentor/fan after reading and re-reading the most recent chapter to glean as much emotion and nuance as possible from the text.
Alert! Princess Twilight's adorkableness levels are off the end of the scale and still climbing!
6974019 Typos taken out for a date and shown a good time.
Yes, this is tying up loose ends from the shared arc in the Crystal Empire, things seem to be well in hoof. And I can indeed confirm Twilight is to adorkable to be believed.
6973272 David mentioned this himself a few days back when I reported on Fast and Twilight's little game.
6973234 They still have something to tie up, Penny has been ordered back to school!
6974076
school I forgot about that little bit.
6974076 About time somepony stole HIS waifu for a change.
Well Celestia doesn't want to slight her little ponies by ignoring them, right?
Keep going! ;)
"You do. Question is,
Perhapsit would be etter to say, "Tell me. I have heard news from the Crystal Empire, but not from ponies in your positions."
8253111 Thanks, cleaned it up. I promise my writing has improved since this!