Chapter 4: The Princess of Friendship and Books
“Man, this place looks even bigger up close,” Gilda commented while she, Natalya, Rainbow, and Pinkie stood right outside of the crystal tree castle.
It had been a bit of a trip, considering that Sweet Apple Acres and the castle were on opposite sides of Ponyville. While they had to walk, since Pinkie did not have an oven emergency to pull her away this time, Natalya at least got a chance to see what Ponyville’s residents were like. Many of the ponies they passed along the way gave them a wave or said hello, which Pinkie was sure to reciprocate in kind. It felt like everyone knew everyone. The open friendliness of the ponies was a stark contrast to the gruffness of griffons.
Up close, the castle was even more impressive and shinier. A few golden steps led up to a tall double door of the same color. The base of the castle was made up of dark-purple crystals which gradually shifted to white and light-blue as they climbed up. Purple towers rose out of the middle of the crystalline trunk with a great balcony on one side and even more rooms on the other. On the very top of the castle was a large crystal star that seemed to sparkle in the sunlight. While not as grand as the one in the Crystal Empire, Ponyville’s castle was still impressive in its own way.
However, Natalya was more interested in the sun that was setting. With a sigh, she had to concede that there was no chance of getting in any training after whatever business Gilda and the ponies had within the castle was over.
“So how did this place get built so fast?” Gilda asked. “It hasn’t been that long since I last visited, and I’m pretty sure I would have noticed a giant crystal tree.”
“Um, magic?” Rainbow offered.
Gilda rolled her eyes. “Of course… So, this princess, um, Twilight Sparkle, was it? She’s a friend of yours, right?”
“She’s one of our best friends!” Pinkie informed. “She’s really smart, and she can also do all sorts of cool magic stuff that nopony else can!”
“So, she’s like some princess of magic then?” Natalya asked, unable to recall anything about Twilight from the Equestria Games, probably because she paid little attention to anything but her aerial race.
“Nope, friendship.”
Natalya slowly blinked. “You’re kidding…”
“Nope!”
Natalya turned to Rainbow. “She’s kidding, right?”
Rainbow snickered and shook her head.
“You ponies are weird… What’s next? Oh wait, don’t tell me, this is the Castle of Friendship…”
“Wow, how did you know?” Pinkie asked.
“Wait… I was just…” Natalya groaned and slapped a claw into her face. “Oh, for crying out…” She let the claw slip down her face and took a deep breath. “Okay, whatever. Are there any special princess rules I need to know?” Regardless of being a princess of something as lame as friendship, Twilight was still a princess, and Natalya knew that she had to tread a bit more carefully.
“Nah,” Rainbow replied. “Twilight is cool and not into all of that formal stuff. In fact, she would prefer that you treat her more like a regular pony.” Her eyes narrowed at Natalya. “But that doesn’t mean you can be a jerk to her, got it?”
“Yeah, yeah… I know…” Natalya acknowledged with a dismissive wave of her claw. “Don’t worry, getting on the bad side of a princess is not something I plan to do.”
The group walked up the steps, and Rainbow knocked on one of the doors with her hoof. Shortly afterwards, the door opened to reveal a short, purple dragon with green ridges on his back.
“Hi, Spike!” Pinkie cried out before anyone else could say or do anything. She waved enthusiastically at the dragon despite being only a few steps away from him.
“Uh, hey, Pinkie, and hey to you too, Rainbow,” the dragon greeted. “What’s up? You girls usually don’t knock.”
“Yeah, but we have some guests here that Twilight should meet,” Rainbow explained, her left wing unfolding to wave at the griffons. “Thought it would be a better to give you a little bit of a heads up in case you and Twilight need a moment to prepare.”
“Well, we got nothing really going on today, and I bet Twilight will be glad to meet your friends.” Spike smiled at the griffons. “Hey there, I’m Spike, number one assistant of Princess Twilight.”
“Hey, you’re that dragon from the Equestria Games, aren’t you?” Natalya asked, recalling where she had seen Spike before.
Spike stood up straighter with a smug grin. “Yep! You remember hearing about all the awesome hero stuff I did or how I melted that giant chunk of ice that was about to squish everypony?”
“No, I remember how epic it was when you totally messed up the anthem after the aerial relay race,” Natalya corrected. Spike’s blunder had entertained her enough to momentarily make her forget about her loss to Rainbow.
Spike’s smirk was completely wiped off his face, and he hunched over with a loud, depressed moan. “Oh… Right…”
“Natalya!” Rainbow and Gilda angrily shouted from both sides.
Remembering that she was talking to the princess’s personal assistant, Natalya hastily added, “Er, what I meant was that it was totally cool that you were able to push through the whole anthem, even though it was obvious that you didn’t know the words and had like thousands of ponies watching you. That takes guts. You sure caught my attention.”
Spike stood back up a bit and eyed Natalya warily. “Really?”
“Yeah, totally.” Natalya glanced at the others. “Right, guys?”
“Oh yeah. So brave. Best song ever!” Rainbow, Gilda, and Pinkie all nodded and murmured in agreement.
“Huh, I never thought of it that way. Guess I was sort of cool because I didn’t break down or run away. Still, it would’ve been nice if I could’ve not embarrassed myself in front of so many ponies. Regardless, thanks for the pep talk.” Spike shrugged and then started pushing the door wide open. “Anyway, why don’t you all come in?”
“Twilight is just reading in the library, as usual,” Spike explained while the ponies and griffons moved into the castle. “Just wait one moment while I go get her.” After closing the door, he hurried toward the staircase on the opposite side of the entrance and headed up to the second floor.
The first thing Natalya could not help but note once she was inside was that there were a lot of doors. Every hallway she could see were filled with doors, and in many places, they were so bunched together that she guessed that some rooms had at least three or four entrances. With each door bearing the same exact green and white checker pattern, Natalya could only imagine how difficult it would be to find a specific room.
Many of the walls had large outlines of stuff like clouds, trees, and mountains. Maroon carpets with simple white patterns stretched through each hall, and there were a couple of tapestries hanging from the second floor walkways. Aside from the overpopulation of doors, the place was not overbearingly fancy like Natalya expected from a pony princess.
“Hello there. It’s always nice to meet somepony new. I’m Twilight Sparkle,” a mare’s voice called out from the stairs.
Natalya turned to see Twilight descending the stairs with Spike right behind her. Twilight was a purple alicorn with a dark-blue mane with streaks of magenta and violet running through its middle. Curiously, Natalya noticed that Twilight wore no crown or any other form of accessory, something that set her apart from the other princesses Natalya saw during the Equestria Games.
“Twilight, meet our friend!” Pinkie instructed while she literally pushed Gilda toward the alicorn. “This is Gilda!”
“Oh, Gilda, it’s so nice to finally meet you,” Twilight replied, giving the griffon a warm smile. “Rainbow and Pinkie have been talking a lot about you since they came back from Griffonstone, and I never got the chance to meet you when you first came to Ponyville.”
Gilda rubbed the back of her neck sheepishly. “Yeah, considering how I was back then, that’s probably a good thing. Regardless, it’s an honor to meet you, Princess Twilight.”
Twilight’s smile wavered for one second, and she shook her head. “Just Twilight is fine. There’s no need for titles. Just think of me as like any other pony here in Ponyville. So what brings you to Ponyville?”
Gilda pointed to Natalya, who was standing by herself halfway down the hall since Rainbow had moved to Gilda’s side. “Her, actually. Natalya over there needed me to guide her here so that she could race Rainbow. While I’m here though, I’m looking forward to spending some time with my friends, and Pinkie is even going to teach me a bunch of baking stuff.”
“Ah yes, Pinkie did mention you were a bit of a baker. If she’s going to teach you some of her recipes, I’m sure that all of Griffonstone will be lining up for your creations when you go back.”
“That’s the plan!”
“Well, good luck with your baking, and I hope you enjoy your stay in Ponyville.”
“Thanks, Twilight.”
Twilight turned her attention to Natalya and Rainbow. “Now, I’m guessing you two already raced, given the fact that I’m still reshelving all the books that were knocked down by the Sonic Rainboom.”
Rainbow winced. “Yeah… Sorry about that, Twilight.”
“You don’t have to apologize, Rainbow,” Spike stated. “She likes reshelving.”
Twilight sighed dreamily and let out a wistful sigh. “Yeah, I do…”
Rainbow cleared her throat. “Yeah, before we lose you to another one of your weird book fantasies again…” She then waved a hoof at Natalya, beckoning the griffon to come over. “Natalya, introduce yourself, nicely.”
Resisting the urge to roll her eyes, Natalya briefly raised a claw in a nonchalant wave. “Sup, I’m Natalya.”
“Hi there, Natalya,” Twilight greeted, unfazed by the griffon’s curt introduction. “I remember you from the Equestria Games. You were an amazing flyer.”
Natalya opened her beak, but stopped and blinked. “Uh, thanks.” She had gotten a few similar compliments back in Griffonstone, but this was the first time she heard it in a sincere tone.
“So how did your race with Rainbow go? Did you have fun?”
Natalya glared at Rainbow, ready to retort if the pegasus was going to brag again. To her surprise, Rainbow kept her mouth shut and only gave her a roll of her eyes.
“Er, I guess from the look of things, Rainbow won,” Twilight guessed, her gaze shifting back and forth between the racers.
“Yeah, she did,” Natalya begrudgingly admitted.
“That’s not a surprise.” Twilight shrank back at the sudden venomous glare Natalya shot at her. “Er, w-what I meant was that the probability that Rainbow won was extremely high, given the fact that she was able to use her Sonic Rainboom.”
Natalya huffed. “Yeah, I was there. That Sonic Rainboom clinched the race for her, so that’s why I intend to learn it myself.”
Rainbow responded with a loud sigh of annoyance, earning her yet another scowl from Natalya.
Twilight’s eyes widened with surprise. “Oh, you want to learn how to do the Sonic Rainboom?”
“Of course. The Sonic Rainboom will easily make me the best flyer.” Natalya’s eyebrow went up. “What? Is there a problem?”
Twilight shook her head. “No, no. Not really, anyway. It’s just that Rainbow is the only pony that can pull off a Sonic Rainboom, and I haven’t heard of anypony else being able to do anything that comes close to it. I don’t think anypony really understand how it works.”
“So what? You’re telling me to give up or something?” Natalya asked in a harsh tone.
“N-no, of course not. I’m just saying that we don’t know a lot about the Sonic Rainboom, so who knows if it’s something that can be replicated by others.”
“That’s pretty much what I told her, but she refuses to listen,” Rainbow said with a scoff. “It’s not going to happen.”
“Oh, don’t worry, I’ll make it happen,” Natalya shot back.
“Well, I guess there’s no harm in trying,” Twilight remarked. “But Natalya, you do have to understand that it’s likely going to be a difficult process.”
“You think that’s going to scare me? I’m no stranger to hard work and training. I’m fully prepared to do whatever it takes to learn the Sonic Rainboom.”
“Well, I can see how determined you are with this matter, so I wish you the best in your endeavor.” Twilight turned to Rainbow. “So you’re going to help her, Rainbow?”
Eyeing Natalya warily, Rainbow replied, “Yeah, I promised her, but only if she continues to behave. I’ll tell you what she did earlier another time, but the gist is that she’s really getting on my nerves.”
“Just give it some time, Rainbow. Your first impressions of each other might not be the greatest, but that doesn’t mean you two can’t change things. I’m sure that you and Natalya will warm up to each other over time, and maybe even become friends.”
“That’s what I told her!” Pinkie happily remarked.
“Yeah, yeah, whatever,” Rainbow grumbled.
Natalya kept her beak shut. While she wanted to say she was not interested in making friends, those words probably would earn her a stay in some sort of friendship jail cell.
When no one said anything for a few seconds, Pinkie put on a big grin and pushed Gilda forward again. “So, Twilight, there’s another reason Dashie and I thought it would be a good idea for Gilda to meet you. Gilda is trying to spread friendship in Griffonstone, so with you being the Princess of Friendship and all, you ought to have all sorts of tips for her!”
“That’s a great idea, girls!” Twilight cheered with an eager smile. “I would be happy to help!”
“Wait, that’s why we’re here?” Gilda asked, her gaze shifting between the three ponies.
“Well, of course we wanted you to meet another one of our friends, but I think Twilight can really help you, Gilda,” said Rainbow, placing a forehoof on Gilda’s shoulder. “After all, you are kind of still new to this whole friendship thing, and there’s no better expert than Twilight.”
“I guess that’s true.” Gilda shrugged and nodded at Twilight. “Alright, I wouldn’t mind getting a few tips.”
“Excellent!” Twilight’s horn pulsed with a magenta glow, and a stack of books almost as tall as her appeared by her side with a burst of light. “And don’t worry, I've got all sorts of notes and reports that could help you out!”
Gilda pointed at the stack of books with a shaky talon and wide eyes. “Th-those are all the stuff you have on friendship?”
“Oh no, of course not.” Twilight smiled innocently, eliciting a sigh of relief from Gilda. “That’s just the introduction.”
Gilda’s eyes grew even wider, as though they, as well as the rest of the griffon, wanted to escape the impending literature. “Oh crud…”
“I’m so excited! I get to teach and help bring friendship to the griffons! We've got so much work to do, Gilda!”
Gilda slowly backed away as Twilight’s face started to twist into a maniacal grin. “M-maybe some other time. It’s getting late, so Natalya and I need to find a place to stay for the night.”
“Oh, I suppose…” Twilight paused, sat down on her haunches, and started tapping her chin in thought. “Unless…” She gasped and happily clapped her forehooves together a couple of times. “I got a great idea! Why don’t you and Gilda stay here for the duration of your visit? That way, we’ll have plenty of time to teach you more about friendship!”
Gilda balked. “Here? In the castle? With you?”
“Of course. With just me and Spike living here, we have plenty of rooms available.”
Gilda glanced around nervously. “Uh, that’s really nice of you, Twilight, but you don’t have to do that for us.”
“Speak for yourself,” Natalya interrupted. “Need I remind you whose bits are funding this trip?”
“Just go with it!” Gilda hissed.
Natalya smirked at Gilda before saying to Twilight, “Staying here sounds cool to us.”
“Splendid! Now, come on, Gilda! We've got a whole night of studying to do!” Twilight cheerfully stated.
Instead of following Twilight, Gilda bolted in the opposite direction, only to squawk when her entire body was engulfed in Twilight’s magic and was lifted into the air.
“Oh, don’t be that way, Gilda. I know learning something new can sometimes be a bit intimidating, but I promise you that everything’s going to be alright,” Twilight said in a soothing tone and winked.
“No! Put me down! I hate studying!” Gilda cried out while she was dragged through the air behind Twilight. “Help!”
Natalya, Rainbow, Pinkie, and Spike all watched Twilight disappear up the stairs, listening to Gilda’s cries grow quieter and quieter.
“So, it kind of feels like we threw Gilda under the carriage,” Natalya remarked when they could no longer hear Gilda.
“That’s because you did,” Spike pointed out.
“Yeah, we did,” Rainbow repeated with a chuckle. “But she’ll be fine. Twilight might be an egghead that might be a bit, uh, much with her lectures and lessons, but I think she’s smart enough to not overdo things.”
Spike grinned. “Wanna bet?”
“I have to read all of those?!” Gilda’s voice suddenly boomed through the halls.
Rainbow blinked. “Uh, maybe Gilda is going to have to do a bit more work than I thought.”
“I’M GOING TO GET YOU ALL FOR THIS!”
Rainbow promptly yawned loudly. “Oh, would you look at that? I must be getting tired. I should be heading home now, see ya!” she said while backing toward the entrance. As soon as she finished speaking, she threw open the front entrance and shot off into the sky.
Pinkie pronked her way toward the entrance as well, but the carefree smile she wore told how she did not have a sudden urge to leave like Rainbow. “I should get back to help the Cakes. I promised to help clean up Sugarcube Corner tonight.” With a hearty wave, she bellowed, “Bye, Spike! Bye, Natalya! Make sure to say bye to Twilight and Gilda for me too as well! I’ll see you all tomorrow!”
“So, do all your friends always act this weird?” Natalya asked when she was left alone with the dragon.
“Not always, but it does feel like at least one of them has some sort of episode once a week,” Spike answered with a shrug. “Takes a bit to get used to, but hey, at least they keep things interesting.”
“No surprise there.”
“Anyway, I guess I should show you to your room, assuming you’re still staying despite them,” Spike said, pointing a claw upstairs to where Gilda was presumably being held prisoner.
Natalya shrugged. “Yeah, I’m not worried about her. Lead on, dude.”
Natalya was guided upstairs and unsurprisingly, there were many more of the same doors as downstairs. Despite them all looking the same, Spike guided Natalya to a room without any trouble.
“So here’s your room,” Spike said as he opened one of the many carbon-copy doors.
The room was actually pretty standard with a bed and night stand on one side while a desk and dresser stood on the other. Opposite to the door was a glass door leading outside to a small balcony with just enough room for a pegasi or griffon to land or fly away from.
The suite Natalya stayed in during the Equestria Games was actually bigger and fancier than this room, but since there were no guards in the castle and Twilight seemed to be more of a bookworm than a princess, it was actually pretty fitting.
“This should do just fine,” Natalya remarked, still scanning the room.
“Alright, cool. I’m going to check up on Gilda and Twilight to see how they are doing. If I’m lucky, I can convince Twilight to keep things simple, for Gilda’s sake. If you need anything, let me or Twilight know, okay?”
Natalya nodded. “Yeah, sure.”
As soon as Spike exited the room and closed the door behind him, Natalya went straight for the bed. With no one around to watch her, she let out a long, weary sigh. Today had been exhausting. The flight to Ponyville, the race with Rainbow, and then going all around town to meet ponies had really tired her out.
Thinking about the day’s events and what was most likely going to be a hectic schedule in the upcoming days, one question popped up into her mind.
“What have I gotten myself into?”
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seems good so far. get tracked m8
but…friendship is magic…
My money's on Friendship Kindergarten.
…is she gonna loot the Friendship Castle Room? She is, isn't she.
Nice bit of character development there. For whatever reason, Natalya has at some time learned to think quickly to smooth ruffled feathers. She might have a future in sales or politics.
The most subtle fourth wall break I've ever seen. Kudos!
That gave me a really weird image of Twilight and her books, does she sleep with them?
Well, at least Natalya seems intimidated enough by Twilight's title. That'll probably keep her from getting hot talons with all the crystal and jewelry and books all over the place
. That said, if she can survive Gilda's revenge once the two meet up in the morning again.
Oh, natalya, natalya.
Clearly you are not wise in the ways of friendshipping.
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