Chapter 16
Nothing had been said after the good-mornings a couple of minutes ago. There were only Tia and Lulu sitting on the bed, blankets over their shoulders, staring at Chryssi. Lulu's expression was a curious mix of confusion and indignation. Tia was smiling.
Tia, Chryssi decided, was scary.
The tweeting of birds from outside filled the uncomfortable silence. Something had to be done. Chryssi pulled a bit on her blanket and said, "Uhm…"
"You got wings." It was a statement of fact Lulu proclaimed to the world, devoid of any kind of emotion that wasn't a faint undertone of confusion. She pointed with her hoof and repeated, "You got wings. You didn't have wings when we left. Now you have them."
Tia never stopped smiling. She nodded and said,"Yes, she has wings." This aroma was more complex. There was excitement, anticipation, creativity.
Chryssi blinked. The last one was unexpected, both because she understood it and because it seemed strangely out of place considering Lulu's reaction. Somewhere in the depths of her mind, frantic activity kicked off, scouring her memories to look for similar situations, for something familiar. It didn't take her too long to remember. She had tasted it quite often before, even if she had never understood all the facets.
It was the taste of Tia getting ideas and forging plans.
"How? When?" Lulu threw her forelegs up. "Why didn't you tell us sooner?"
"You were sleeping yesterday when you arrived. And then Donna Copper Horn brought you to bed, and then we cuddled, and then it was today." That was a nice distraction. Chryssi liked it. It was a bit too soon for an adventure, and Lulu was still confused. Adventures with a confused Lulu tended to get longer punishments.
Tia leaned forward. "Do they work? Can you fly?"
"Kinda. I get up, and then I change direction, and then I crash and break things." Chryssi scratched the back of her head. "Garvino and Ginevra said I'm not allowed to fly alone until I get enough lessons from them. I didn't get any lessons for now because there was too much to do before the Flock left. So I can't really truly fly."
"Oh, well, we can–"
Lulu's hoof clamped down on Tia's mouth. The younger sibling pointed her other hoof at Chryssi and said, "Useless prattle later! How did you get wings?"
"I wanted my honey-bread."
That didn't seem the answer they wanted. Tia's eyebrow rose, while Lulu simply regarded Chryssi with a flat look before saying, "If that was it, I would have, like, a dozen pair of wings, and Tia twice as many. And they would all be ugly like her."
This got Lulu a bonk on the back of her head she gallantly ignored, her eyes still focused on Chryssi. Right, context. Master Sottile often talked about it, and Ginvera said something similar about stories, but with different words. She needed to explain more about the whole situation, letting them know all the nuances and the important parts. She could do this. "I wanted my honey-bread and couldn't get it without flying." That should have covered everything.
According to Lulu's twitching, it didn't.
Tia snickered, then pulled away Lulu's hoof and said, "Tell us the stuff that happened before you got wings. Like, what was happening, what did you do. You know, stuff."
"Oh, yeah, I can do that. So, Gerte had given me this honey-bread bun after the dinner and I was about to eat it when Geno stole it and ran away–"
Lulu waved her forelegs, "Who's Gerte? And who's Geno?"
Chryssi started considering if the interruption deserved taking offense or if it didn't count because it wasn't the Wind Whispering anymore, when Tia said, "Gerte is Ginevra's mom, don't you remember? We met her, like, a lot of summers ago." She turned to Chryssi. "But I can't remember Geno."
She would ask Ginevra later about the being offended part. Or maybe Garvino. It wasn't important right now, anyway. "Geno is this griffon who is as big as me and he–"
"A colt! I knew it! Can't trust them." Tia grabbed Chryssi by her shoulders and, looking her straight in the eyes, asked, "Did you do the thing we taught you to show who's in charge?"
After the second interruption, being offended seemed more and more the right choice. Still, she wasn't completely sure about it, nor about what being offended exactly entailed, so she would give it a pass for now. "Uh, I did it, but then Fidelis said that you shouldn't show you will do stuff if you don't want to do it."
Tia nodded. "Yeah, he's right. Which means you did it, right?"
"Uhm, I didn't want to eat him. And everybody always says I shouldn't bite people."
There was again the nodding on Tia's part. "All true. But colts aren't people, so they don't count."
It happened quite often that there were some hidden meanings in words that Chryssi missed. She rarely knew when that was the case, and it all usually led to some kind of confusion, occasionally a little fire, and always some lengthy explanation followed by an evening of reflection. This, on the other hoof, was one of the rare times she was acutely aware that there was some fundamental piece of knowledge she was missing. She looked over Tia's shoulder to Lulu, hoping some help could come from there. What she got was a shrug. "I think… I think that Geno was people. He was–"
"No, they are vicious. Believe me, I know. They throw mud at you. They push you in the river when you're not looking. They get the last piece of bread because they are the big earth ponies that have to work in the field and you are the useless little unicorn sister."
Lulu leaned forward and added, "They also try to get your alms because they are bigger and stronger."
"Yeah, that too, I guess." Tia put a hoof under Chryssi's chin and moved her head to look again right into her eyes. "They are treacherous, mean things. You can't trust them."
"But…He…Geno was nice. We played, and he told me stories, and he taught me how to dance and–"
Lulu almost shot forward and grabbed Chryssi, pulling her away from Tia. "Wait a moment, you danced? Like, he danced with you? And you liked it?"
The whole situation was starting to get creepy. Chryssi glanced towards the door. Closed. The window would probably be a better one. Breaking through it would earn her a scolding, but that started to seem an acceptable price. "Er, yes?"
Lulu's head whipped around and she looked at her sister. "Do you know what that means?"
"What? He's a colt, what else is there to it?"
"No, you got it wrong." Lulu grinned, and once again Chryssi considered a dive for the window. "He's not a colt. He's Chryssi's love!"
Luna felt breakfast was a good time to get some order in one's ideas and to forge plans. Food helped, and if one didn't talk too much the adults didn't become immediately suspicious. Not that they had any intention of doing anything bad–Luna was deeply convinced of the righteousness of their cause–but for some reason, they became all fidgety and started hovering over one and those were hardly ideal conditions for work.
Luna had kept one ear to the conversations while she was eating and thinking. They would probably need some peace and the freedom granted by being alone to do things properly, so knowing what the others had to do and where they would be was useful knowledge. It was also nice to know to whom to run in case things caught fire. Not that she planned on it happening, but then she almost never did and then there were flames anyway. It was one of the many, many injustices of life.
And so with a head full of half-formed ideas and some escape routes, Luna gathered the others in the hayloft. Chryssi seemed eager and curious, Tia on the other hoof was a bit more on the perplexed side. It would be a slightly more difficult sell than Luna expected, but nothing she couldn't do. Fate was on her side, after all. She took a deep breath, and said, "So, Chryssi found her love, which promotes Geno from colt to important. Tia, no more plans for smiting him."
Tia blew her a half-hearted raspberry before saying, "I don't know. Seems iffy, if you ask me. I'm still for striking first, just to be sure."
"No, it's a pretty clear case." Luna began to march back and forth in front of the other two, underlining each point with a stomp. "They meet and the first thing they do is a fight for dominance. Then they get to know each other. Then there is some misunderstanding that risks driving them apart–"
"He stole Chryssi's honey-bread. I don't think that's a misunderstanding, that's him being a colt."
Chryssi raised her hoof, then turned to Tia. "But you steal stuff from Lulu all the time, and she does the same to you."
"Not the same thing." Tia waved her hoof. "We are sisters and that's normal. It all works according to ancient sisterhood rules."
"That's true." When Tia was right, it was only gracious to recognize it. Luna continued, "Not the issue here, though. You see, he may have been a colt, but he then gave it back and apologized. That makes it a misunderstanding or at most an early conflict. Clear Sky is pretty clear on this, He does it all the time in his comedies too. Anyway, there was this thing where they risked being driven apart, and then he apologized. And now the most important thing. They danced together and he taught Chryssi how to dance. And she liked it, right?"
It wasn't the humble thing to do, but Luna felt she deserved to be smug when Chryssi nodded. "Yeah, it was a lot of fun and… and it was weird too. I didn't feel like that before."
Luna was grinning so much it almost hurt. She had figured it all out, she was right. "See? Love. Perfect. And now we have two lovers far away from each other and their families who will try to stop it."
"Wait a moment." Tia scratched her head. "Gonna admit that it all seems pretty clear, but that part about the families? I don't think that works. I mean, if they are in love I don't think Master Sottile or Donna Copper Horn would be against it. And if the other griffins are like Garvino and Ginevra then I doubt they would be that much against it. I mean–" She grabbed Chryssi and held her up."–look how cute she is."
That was an unexpected problem. Luna stopped her pacing and stared at the ground. Could it be that this was some different kind of story? Could it be that… She shuddered. Could it be that it wasn't really love? All the other elements were in place. Maybe she should see it as an Old Unicornian story. No, they were boring, it couldn't be. Chryssi deserved better. She was a mysterious being that–
"Hah! I knew it." Luna pointed a hoof at Chryssi. "Are you, perchance, a lost princess?"
Chryssi squirmed in Tia's forelegs. "What? Why?"
Tia turned her around and looked over her. "Well, I kinda found you in the forest, and you seemed lost, and your past is a mystery. It could be, you know?"
"I don't know. I think I'm not. I mean, Master Sottile would know if I was." Chryssi's wing fluttered.
That was adorable. No, there was no way this wasn't a love story, Luna was certain of it. "Well, I think there’s a good chance you are something like the princess of a long lost kingdom or from some hidden reign over the sea nobody had heard of. Anyway, I'm certain that your blood-family would be against you and Geno being together, which makes you star-crossed lovers and us the helpers who care for her and will help her defy fate."
Tia looked at Chryssi, then Luna, and then seemed to examine Chryssi once more. She seemed lost in thought, and the tension was starting to become unbearable when she finally said, "You are right, it's a pretty clear case. So, what should we do to reunite her with her love?"
Now that spring had properly begun the days were becoming longer and filled with light. The sun shone brighter, hugging the world in a warm embrace. Birds had returned and were building up their families and filling the air with songs. Tender leaves sprouted from trees, grass covered the meadows in a soft emerald carpet. Bees buzzed among flowers, and the wind laughed in the woods, enticing young fillies to run with it and live new adventures. The earth was waking up, and every living creature was celebrating it by living in full.
Which made going over scrolls in Master Sottile's studio even more of a chore.
Celestia sighed and looked out of the window. It wasn't that she didn't like to read. The lack of anything else to do during the last, lean winter and, she supposed, her cutie mark had her discover the pleasure of learning. She had begun to understand what drove Master Sottile, and she had become more curious about a lot of things she had found boring before. Even her magic had improved.
And yet it all seemed like heavy chains in light of the beautiful day outside.
Not that it could be helped. Lulu was right, they needed to know more about the details of putting star-crossed lovers together, and everybody had to do their part for them to have a chance at success. Which meant she had to return to her scroll about the wedding of the Satrap of Keyreya and the Duchess of Igeharra. She was almost through half of it, and there had yet to appear a pirate, a monster, or anything else that wasn't some kind of noble. She still had some faint hope for a decent fight, but that too was waning. If she at least knew where Keyreya and Igeharra were maybe she could at least understand why sometimes some of the characters were offended.
Three sentences later she decided that if Chryssi's love fate was related to this stuff, then they would all be better off without it. She rolled the scroll up and put it to the side, then looked over to Chryssi who was intently going over some scrolls of her own. "Hey, Chryssi, how is it going?"
Chryssi put a hoof on the scroll and said, "Great. I read a lot of different things. I don't get it." Smiling, she returned to her reading.
Celestia blinked, then shook her head and turned to Lulu. Her sister was sitting amid a circle of different scrolls, a couple of books, and a pile of parchments. Somehow she was reading furiously. How she was managing to make that adjective the right one for such a tranquil activity was a mystery for Celestia, yet she made it work.
She wasn't sure if she should really disturb her sister. She seemed so immersed in her research that it would have been a shame pulling her out of it. Maybe Celestia should simply return to her own reading, about a complicated wedding, offended nobles, old, senseless traditions, and no pirates.
"Hey, Lulu, how are things going for you?" That had been an easy choice.
The eyes that met Celestia were almost shining with an inner fire. Suddenly a lot of the weird things she had read about the fervor of sacred duties and honor and all those other things that were very important in some distant way made sense. Lulu was burning with rightful purpose as she said, "I got wonderful news! There's nothing like Chryssi in these books."
"Well, we knew that. I'm not sure why that's wonderful." Celestia tapped her chin. "Or why that's news."
Lulu stood up and shook her head. "You don't get it. She isn't like any of the tribes, she isn't a donkey, she isn't a griffon–"
"But I wanna be a griffon."
"Maybe later, Chryssi." Lulu waved her hoof. "I also checked the stories about magic-folk. I know Master Sottile told us it was all silly nonsense, but I wanted to be sure, and she isn't of them too, so we avoided a tragedy. I looked through all the things, and there's nothing like Chryssi's fateful love with Geno." Lulu smiled. A bit too much, in Celestia's opinion. "That means there are no rules! We can make it the best possible thing and put together all the stuff we like that matches at least a bit and leave out all the boring things."
Celestia looked down at the scroll in front of her. At what were unicorns and some more unicorns–although it was never really said explicitly–fussing on and on about stuff she couldn't care about if she tried. "Can there be pirates?"
"I don't see why not." Lulu hopped over to Chryssi and scooped her up. It was a bit awkward, Chryssi wasn't that much smaller than Lulu, but she made it work. "Did you hear, Chryssi? Your love's gonna have pirates."
As far as Celestia was concerned, there really wasn't a choice to be made at all. She rolled up her scroll and said, "Let's do this."
As far as she could remember, Chryssi had been confused by the way others behaved. It had happened often enough that she considered it the way things were, some kind of rule governing the world. Somebody would do or say something. Chryssi wouldn't understand, but would try to do her best anyway. Then something would happen that would reveal some hidden rules or limits, and those would help her ask the right kind of questions, which would lead her to understand at least a bit of what was going on.
She suspected it wasn't necessarily the way it worked for others, as they almost always seemed to know exactly what they were doing, but then she had also accepted that she was different.
As she observed Tia and Lulu pulling up a wooden board to the mezzanine of the hayloft to add it to other boards hanging from the ceiling, it dawned on her how long it had been since the evolution of a situation had followed the path from confusing to more confusing to downright cryptic instead of the one leading to understanding. She had dutifully read the things Lulu and Tia had given her, even if she had been very slow in doing it and hadn't known what a quarter of the words meant. She hadn't understood why any of the ponies in there did the things they did. That was expected. And yet she was sure that nothing in there had been talking about suspended walkways, gangplanks, and weird jars they had borrowed from Willowbark's laboratory.
Maybe it was hidden behind those metaphor things that lurked in the parchments, ready to jump out on an unsuspecting filly and mess up their attempts to cautiously get meaning out of stupid, written words. A shudder ran down Chryssi's back. She really, really hoped that this thing Tia and Lulu were putting up wasn't a giant metaphor ready to gobble her up.
A crash pulled her back to the here and now. The board had fallen and Tia was helping Lulu get out from a tangle of ropes.
Chryssi stood up and went to pick up the fallen board. "Uhm, can I help?"
"No!" Lulu cried out while kicking a nefarious bundle of hemp that was trying to ensnare her. Her hoof caught in it, and she said one of those things that tended to get one grounded for a long time if Donna Copper Horn or Meadowsweet were around to hear it. "This is your training. You can't know how it works, otherwise it won't help."
"Lulu, she will know after the first time she does it." Tia grabbed some of the ropes with her magic and started pulling at them. "If she helps us it won't change much. And stop moving!"
"But…I planned it all out and–stupid rope! Leave me alone!–I mean, I have it all prepared." Lulu pointed at a frame filled with clay in the corner. "That's a lot of work."
"And Chryssi will discover it when she's ready, but can't she at least help uswith that green stuff to keep the boards in place?"
Chryssi nodded. "I can do that. I helped Fidelis at the Wind Whispering, and it was full of things I didn't know too."
The last length of rope uncurled from around Lulu's fetlock and she stepped back to glare at the ropes. Then she eyed the pile of boards still on the floor and sighed. "Alright, you can help us. But no peeking at my work."
"Finally. Come on, Chryssi, there's a lot to do and I think I saw some decent hay you can chew on."
It took half of an eternity with lunch in the middle to finish the preparations to Lulu's satisfaction. The result was breathtaking. The hayloft, once simply an empty building with the remnants of the hay that had brought them through the winter, was now filled with passages, hanging ropes, suspended walkways, flowing curtains, and promises of adventure.
While Chryssi was admiring their work, Lulu entered the hayloft with Radish on her back. "Yes, that's gonna work. Not perfect, but I think it will suffice for now."
Radish oohed as he looked around, then said, "Pwetty!"
Tia followed through with a sack floating behind her. "Yes, Radish, it is. And we are gonna have a lot of fun together, but to play with us you'll have to do as we say. Can you do that?"
Radish bubbled while Lulu sat him down on an upturned bucket. "Good, then listen now to Tia while I explain to Chryssi what she has to do."
"Tia!"
Lulu smiled, then turned to Chryssi, grabbed her, and pulled her into a corner. "Good, we should have everything now. We told Radish it's a game because he is still a foal, but this is serious. Your future depends on it."
That it was important was something Chryssi had already suspected, but this made it clear to what extent. She nodded and said, "I'm listening."
"Good, now here is what you'll have to do…"
Chryssi crept along the bulwarks of the fortress of evil. The note they had sent her mocked her, told her Geno was kept chained in the dungeons and challenged her to come and get him. She would, but not by assaulting the place frontally as they expected. No, she would sneak in like Tia had taught her to do, and surprise them during the banquet and have a great, defiant speech.
Below her, there was lava, which was something like very hot stones that kill you if you touch them. Carefully she put one hoof in front of the other, the narrow bridge on which she was balancing barely wide enough for her.
She had to do it. Geno was waiting in a cage for her, and who knew what the evil warlock would do to him if she couldn't save him.
Her hoof slipped. She cried out, opened her wings, and frantically whirred them. The only effect seemed to be that she fell even faster to her death.
From the side Lulu cried out, "Again!"
The two pirate queens stood in front of her, evil grins on their faces, their weapons drawn. All around the sails hung from the ceiling, ready to catch the wind and enslave it, while far below monsters were waiting in the dark, the gangplank under Chryssi's hoof the only thing separating her from falling in the horrid pit.
Chryssi pulled her sword out and said, "Free Geno or you shall taste my wrath."
The queens looked at her, then Black Beauty, Sovereign of the Night, made some weird gesture with her hoof and mouthed something.
Right, the missing line. Chryssi stood on her back legs and posed dramatically. "For I have the power of love at my side."
From far behind, where he sat captured in a wicker basket, Geno cried, "Chryssi, help!" And then broke down in giggles.
White Star, the Blade of the Day, laughed. "Hah! You shall never get him back. This will be your end, and I shall be the one defeating you."
"No, I shall foil your plan, Chrysalis. And the Night shall Reign Supreme!" Black Beauty flourished with her sword, hit White Star on the head, and swore.
Long shadows danced between the banners and the cobwebs, the flames in the brazier crackling and laughing evilly at the command of their even more evil magic mistresses, the Twin Witches.
There was a lot of evil around today.
"Chryssi, fight!"
The darker witch hissed, "Hush, you have to say that later." She turned around and raised her head, glaring down at Chryssi from her upturned basket. "You dared to come here, in our evil lair of wickedness. You are brave, but also foolish. Our magic shall finally defeat you." She turned her head and whispered, "Now, say the thing."
From the confines of his prison of thorns and magic Geno cried, "Chryssi, fight!"
All around Chryssi the spirits and demons prepared for their strike against her. The Twin Witches were pulling out the foul powders powering their magic. The halls of the lair almost sang with potential and with eagerness to tell the epic tale of the Battle for Love. Chryssi pulled out her sword, grinning. She was starting to get it.
"Prepare for horror and nightmares!" the bright witch said while she put her hoof in a jar covered in weird and menacing symbols. She hesitated, then leaned towards the dark witch and whispered, "Uhm, how much powder should we use?"
"Give me that. You have to be generous."
The green cloud still hung heavily all around the hayloft, heavy smoke still lazily pouring out of the door and the window to gather in an indolent approximation of an oversized puddle. The smell was penetrating, sharp, and seemed pretty convinced about its chances of staying there for a long time.
Copper Horn sighed and plucked another feather from Radish's mane. She could still hear Meadowsweet chewing out Celestia and Luna around the corner. Until a short time ago it had been Willowbark, but then he had to get ingredients to keep whatever it was they had done in the shack in check.
Usually the scolding should have been her job. She was good at it, it was a role that fitted her. But this time, in the light of what had happened during the Wind Whispering, it had become important to understand exactly what had happened. Which meant she would have to break the weakest link of the chain.
Radish giggled and babbled something.
Well, the weakest link capable of giving a halfway coherent account. And that link was currently sitting in front of her, a jute sack laying on her back and bound around her neck like a cape, a collection of sticks held with a rope around her mid-section, and eyes that had been fixated on the ground for the last ten minutes.
Copper Horn removed another feather, this one bound to her mane with a thin thread. "Where did you get all the feathers?"
"Uhm…"
"You aren't in trouble for those, but I'm curious and I may have to put them back."
"I–" Chrysalis' hoof scraped on the ground.
"We will discover it anyway, but we'll have to clean up here, so if you could save us that work it would be nice."
"Ginevra's room. They were laying around." Chrysalis glanced up and flicked her tongue.
Tasting emotions tended to make a lot of things people said less effective. Bluffing and lying could be easily detected, and posturing would be next to useless. Luckily Copper Horn didn't need anything like that. She frowned, and Chrysalis looked down again. "Well, that's good. We'll talk later about when it is appropriate to enter someone's room without permission, but for now let's put this issue aside. Care to explain why there were all these feathers on Radish?"
And again the uneasy silence.
"You are all grounded for a while, and additional punishments for this mess will be decided based on how angry Willowbark and Meadowsweet will be after they assess how long cleaning up will take and how much of the old hay is ruined. You really can't get into any more trouble than you already are in, believe me. The only thing you can do by telling me everything I want to know is maybe to lessen that punishment for you and for your friends." Copper Horn sighed. "Now, I know those two, and I'm sure there is more than simply fooling around behind all this. You put a lot of work into all this, so please, what was this all about?"
Chrysalis' tongue flicked out for an instant. For all that it bothered Copper Horn, she tried to focus on the intention behind her words.
Apparently, that was enough. "Radish has the feathers because he was Geno."
In her arms, Radish nodded and said, "Imma Geno. Imma griffon."
Copper Horn patted Radish on the head, then continued to remove the smaller feathers still between the hairs. "Geno was that little griffon you met at the Wind Whispering, right?" She waited for the nod, then continued. "And why did you masquerade little Radish here as Geno?"
"Because I had to train to learn to save him from evil dungeons, and from evil volcanoes, and from evil pirates who aren't that evil, and from evil witches. Who are different from good and awesome witches." Chrysalis glanced over to the corner where Millet's voice seemed to have taken over to let Meadowsweet rest a bit. "Tia and Lulu want to be the good and awesome witches. And pirate queens. They pretended as if they were evil just to help me out. They don't want–"
A finger on Chrysalis' lips interrupted the flow of words. Copper Horn smiled a bit and said, "I understand, don't worry. That they played the evil witches won't be held against them. Now, I get the gist of it. What I don't understand yet is why you have to learn to save him again and again from all those evil things."
"Oh, that? It's because I'm a lost princess and I love him and have to be ready for my family being against our love."
It took Copper Horn a couple of heart-beats to untangle her thoughts from the jumbled up heap they had become after crashing into what, at this point, should have been an expected bit of weirdness. "You are? Out of the game? Are you sure?"
Chrysalis nodded. "Yes, they will come for me, and they won't be happy at all. And then they will try to keep all of you away and separate me from my love. And I will have to flee and hide, and then save Geno."
The idea of facing grown versions of Chrysalis as adversaries sent a shudder down Copper Horn's back. And then she examined the whole thing again. "Chrysalis, how do you know all that?"
"Lulu told me. She has done a lot of research and said that it was crystal clear." There was so much conviction in Chrysalis voice that for a moment Copper Horn almost believed it. Almost.
"That is a very interesting idea, and I will talk with her about it. You also said you loved Geno, and that was why your family is going to be angry, right?"
"Not the only reason. They will also be angry because I'm with you and not with nobles, and then my uncle will be angry because I will be in the way for his plans for the throne. But it will be mostly because I love Geno."
The last feather came out of Radish's mane, and he swatted it as Copper Horn rolled it between her fingers. "Yes, I can see how that could happen." She sighed. "Do you know what love is?"
Chrysalis nodded. "It's when you care for someone very much, and when you dance with them, and when you save them and then you smooch them." She tapped her chin. "Oh, and smooching is like biting but not really because you are careful to not use the teeth and to not rip off pieces from the other." She glanced up to Copper Horn, bit her lip, then whispered, "I don't really get smooching, but Lulu said I'll get it after I save Geno."
"I think Luna's research wasn't as complete as she thought." Copper Horn passed a hand over her eyes and murmured, "I hoped we had time, but Meadowsweet is gonna have to explain a couple of things to them."
A small gasp brought Copper Horn's attention back to Chrysalis. "Lulu was wrong? I–Are you sure?"
Copper Horn took a long look at Chrysalis. There she sat, big eyes, vicious fangs, a crooked horn, gossamer wings. She was a mockery of something so important Copper Horn's entire new life was built around it. And yet that small creature was every day more like a foal, earnest almost to a fault, curious, bizarre, with an aura of dread and danger that everybody except Celestia and Luna felt. An aura everybody else had become used to.
As those thoughts whirled through Copper Horn's head, Chrysalis shrank back.
A foal that, despite everything else, had never done anything bad to anybody. Who showed surprising restraint considering who she had elected as her role-models. Who was almost fanatically devoted to two fillies Copper Horn loved. She sighed. "She wasn't wrong on all points, just maybe a bit misled by… I think we can say they'll need a more rounded vision of it all. As for love, well, do you care for Luna and Celestia?"
There was some hesitation, but then Chrysalis nodded.
"And would you dance with them? Would you save them if they were in danger?"
Chrysalis tilted her head. "I don't think Pirate Witch Queens need saving."
Despite everything, Copper Horn couldn’t avoid giggling. "Well yes, they usually don't. But if they needed it, would you do it?"
Chrysalis froze mid-nod, she formed a silent o with her mouth, then said, "I love Lulu and Tia too! Can I love more than one?" Suddenly her wings began to vibrate. "Am I doing it wrong? In the scrolls when somebody loved more than one the ugly stuff happened. I don't want ugly stuff to happen!"
That wasn't exactly what Copper Horn had hoped for. She reached out and patted Chrysalis on the head. "You did nothing wrong, little one. You see, love is a very important word that means a lot of different things. There are many, many different kinds of love, and I think you got a bit confused. It's alright, everybody gets confused by it."
"Oh." Chrysalis’ wings calmed down and she leaned into Copper Horn's hand. "It's one of those sandstone words again." She flinched back and covered her mouth with her hooves. "Sorry."
"Don't worry. For once, you might be right. It's a sandstone word and it causes a lot of trouble and a lot of wonderful things. And it gets only more complicated when you grow up. For the moment, think only about how you care for your friends and enjoy that kind of love. It is important, and it is the foundation of a lot of the other kinds. It is good that you feel it, and you should care for it and keep it well and alive. About the other kinds of love, well, we will talk about them when you have grown up a bit. Right now, I think it would just make a mess of what you know."
Chrysalis blinked a couple of times, her hooves still over her mouth, then nodded and stood up. "Yes, Donna Copper Horn."
From around the corner Meadowsweet had started again with the scolding. Chrysalis winced, then asked, "Does–If everyone gets confused and all that, does that mean we won't be punished?"
"Hah, no, you are still all grounded. Getting things from Willowbark's laboratory was stupid and reckless regardless of the reason you did it. And the damage to the hayloft is still there so you won't get out from it." Copper Horn stood up, Radish laughing at the sudden increase in height. "But maybe we are at fault too, for not having explained certain things in time. Come on, let's see if you'll get to leave the house before next equinox."
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Oh, you've done it now...
Gad damnit Luna
wow I forgot about this gem.
Welp, this shows clearly that Cadance was needed, badly, if the best substitute was Luna.
... Griffin Chryssie confirmed in the future.
Well, she still has a lot to learn, but she's doing pretty good for someone who has to start from not even having a body and coming from a world with different laws of every single thing.
Also, d'awwww.
And Radish is just d'awwww to the max. "Imma griffon!" XD
Given what we know about Chryssi's mother, Lulu may not be that far off.
"a dozen pair of wings"
"a dozen pairs of wings"?
"I could be, you know?"
"It could be, you know?"?
Very nice. :D
Snuggles will help. Snuggles always helps.
lol
Absolutely. Frickin’. Adorable.
I really wanna see fanart of a fully grown Chrysalis in a stand off with the pair of pirate - witch - queens, contrasted with an image of the kids playing pretend. It would look super dope.
Me through most of this chapter: Luna STAHP
Me at the end of the chapter: Adorable abomination needs a hug.
`
Yeah. Your INSIDE. Om nom nom nom nom!
All in all chryssi was ADORABLE! Lulu and tia were silly too.
Oh gods this was TOTES ADORBS TO INFINITY
I so need more of those three shenanigans
These kids are all superbly adorable. Luna, though, has clearly decided to use Wisdom as her dump stat, in favor of AWESOME.
Foreshadowing.
Awwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwww
That's all, that sums it up.
This is... probably the second best chapter.
OH MY GOD THE CUTENESS OVEROAD I PROBABLY DIED DURING THIS BY SO MUCH CUTE BUT WHO’S TO SAY?
Glad to see Chryssi remembered Tia's advice all those thousands of years later...
Considering the laws of this existence barely apply to Chrysalis, she has shown an awful lot of restraint. She has also come a long way in her acting, but I get the feeling she still loves the campy stuff.
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Having dreams is important. I wanna be a wrote when I grow up
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Luna was great in her role. She got a bit miffed once she returned and had seen one of her aspects had been given out.
"What do you mean? Since when can you have romance without a battle to the death above an endless chasm?"
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Glad to remind you of it
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"So, if you squint hard and chant the invocations of Xanthari backwards, you got it kind of right. But there are good news too..."
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I aim to please
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That they do. And knowing it is important wisdom.
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That would make a great cover too.
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The world is a stage, so once you are there it's only right to chew the scenery. Chryssi never lost what she acquired in her formative years, which is a need for dramatic entrances and possibly over the topo monologues.
Celestia is the same, but she can't do it as often as she would like.
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Fixed. Thank you!
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You're welcome!
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Changelings are a treasure chest of possibilities and ideas, and I quite liked the old design too. I admit that some variations of the new Changelings are starting to grow on me, but I generally preferred them before the change, at least from the aesthetic point of view.
Man, Celestia has a History with colts. Or maybe just older brothers. Luna too, though to a lesser extent.
With a very loose definition of Princess, maybe.
They need Cadance for this, and they're a thousand plus years early.
Actually, speaking of Cadance, this is vaguely feeling like what we know happens at the wedding eventually.
Figures that it would end up like this.
Well, you know, all of this except for the Geno part may well end up being true. Hell, maybe even the Geno part.
I wonder how well a griffin could actually teach Chrysi in regards to flight. Their wings use entirely different propulsion methods and create very different shapes in regards to air currents.
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Why should they mess with a classic? I mean, they had a lot of time to polish the whole idea.
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There are some common sense things that are universal.
"Don't crash."
*Wobbly flight that ends in a cloud of debris and broken boards*
"See? That thing, don't do it again."
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So basically the equivalent of “Stop drowning.” as a swimming lesson.
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It's the griffon way. It worked with all the adults.
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And how many little broken bodies did it not work with in the less caring flocks?
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Black humor aside, Griffins are mostly nomadic and with strong cultural differences between flocks. Nomadic life is hard and it doesn't forgive. Many flocks care for the little ones and tend to have hidden safeties to avoid the worst. Others are more spartan and with a grim outlook on life in general. Things will change in the coming millennia, societies will evolve, and some of the more barbaric traditions will wane.
And that was all for the daily dump of headcanon, which should probably end somewhere else and not in the comments...
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Fair enough, although with the state of what we've seen of the Gryphons in the show, I honestly wonder if they still have holidays and festivals or if nobirdy can be bothered to do the work when others will get the "rewards" for free...
It kind of gave me the idea of Chrysalis, so old and ancient, and travelled to see all of these forgotten customs, using her changelings to keep these old traditions alive...
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I actually have some ideas about it but am not yet sure where I will show them off. Maybe another story, maybe a blog post.
I love everything about this paragraph
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This is why the english language needs words like "eros", "familia" and "agape" to differentiate these types of things. But those words don't fit well with the way english sentence structure works.
This story feels a lot like a breakdown of how strange society is when you really look at it.
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And yet that confusion allows wonderful misunderstandings. English may sometimes not be a great language for communicating certain subtleties, but for writing mix-ups? Top choice.
Hey I found something for Geno. He may find it useful later
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That could be quite useful. Mostly because, if it ever comes to something, the whole bees and flowers thing becomes a lot more complicated.
I thought the last chapter was peak hilarity, but congratulations, you bested yourself. Also I see now where future Chrysalis gets her love of romantic action drama XD
Needs a spacey space here~ And clearly somegriffon needs to clean up their room of feathers more often than they are.