As The Sun Sets

by Noobblue

Start...

Author's Note:

The next handful of chapters are going to be much more slice of life than usual, since I usually skip over it, I wanted to take the opportunity to follow through one of Cadance's days-

Cadance awoke jarringly quickly. Rather than the normal sliding from into and out of dreaming like normal, she merely blinked and then realized she was awake. A glance around the room told her it was still night, it must have been around five-am.

Not the ideal time to awake

She rolled over and nestled into Shining and closed her eyes again. There was little effort to not wake him, as Shining had mastered the soldier's skill of being asleep when one was sleeping.

Cadance lay in the warm covers of their shared bed, trying to return to sleep. The dull ache in conjunction with the comfort urging her to just go back to bed. The low hum of her mind kept her from returning to sleep, the subconscious thought having taken form and simply brought her to wakefulness. Something was keeping her up, she just didn't know what.

She frowned in dissatisfaction and rolled away from Shining, landing on the ground quietly; after a short stretch she made her way over to the bathroom, deciding to just get ready for the day, hoping that a warm shower would help clear the mental fog.

She followed all the normal procedures. Hot shower, lather rinse, she dried herself with some magic, brushed her coat down and styled her mane, preened her wings, the whole nine yards.

She let out a sigh as she stepped back out of the bathroom, still slightly damp.

Ugh, that probably only took up an hour

She looked around idly for something to do.

You could just relax

She was relaxed until she thought about it, then her restlessness filled her mind again, urging her to do something.

Shining lightly snored from their bed.

She did her best to be quiet when she walked over and gave him a quick peck on the forehead before leaving. At the door she turned her head towards him, "Promise I'll be safe." before slipping out and shutting the door behind her.

The halls were lit unlike her room, enchanted crystals hung off the walls just above head height that illuminated the hall and the crystal nature of its structures. She politely nodded to the guard pony sitting outside of her room and began making her way towards The Spire's vault.

On the way, she tried to appreciate the walls and the palace a bit more than normal, simply trying to occupy her mind with the short walk to the higher level.

Never thought this is how my life would go. Walking around trying to appreciate living in a solid crystal palace as the crystal princess.

She chuckled and mumbled, "Crazy that I got used to this."

Walking up to the vault door, she spread her magic signature over the wards, a click followed and the door unlocked just as she began pushing it open. To anypony but an Alicorn, that door would be inoperable. The vault was a repurposed monster containment room, apparently crafted by Sombra when he was in power to contain and study the creatures of the wastes, one of the freed crystal ponies had claimed that the room could potentially contain a windigo; so after scouring the thing of the dangerous magic, they'd repurposed it into a vault for all of the traps and enchanted items Sombra had produced, this was also where Starswirl's mirror was kept, off in a side room, but still here.

The room itself was a simple massive cube carved into what was once a massive gemstone, the entire room seemingly having been placed here rather than grown out of the same material as The Spire. How?

Who knows.

Cadance walked over to the plinth that contained the crown, the thing angrily writhing in a containment field Shining himself had produced. At least, that's what her senses told her. The thing had a vague air of mechanical sentience, unlike ponies, it had an intent to it. It wanted to 'escape' to bring ruin to the things that thought they could contain it. Spite, hatred, rage, and underneath was a passionate determination and a sense of superiority and arrogance.

All of the negative emotional rainbow.

She used her magic to lift the thing from the shield. The emotions in it snapped out at her in rage at her moving it, even though she'd freed the thing momentarily; that was the 'vagueness' of its intelligence. It didn't seem to understand the deeper nuance of what was going on around it.

"Hmmm. Can you understand ponish?"

The thing simply raged at her.

Cadance was here to test a theory. You see, if the thing could contain and redirect negative emotions, could it do the same for positive ones? The way Silver had talked about it implied as much.

Right? Clearing the intent is something she said right? But how.

Suddenly the crown went quiet

Uh

Its intent shifted, Cadance held the thing further away from her and gave it a sideways look, waiting for it to explode, or something equally irritating. Instead, it began whispering pain to her, promising the wrath it would incur on her enemies, it spoke of righteous fury delivered to those that irritate her.

"Huh." She half chuckled.

She hovered the thing closer to her again, "Sorry, but not today."

The thing continued posturing her, promising greatness if she'd

JUST PUT IT ON

"Yikes!" Cadance dropped it in surprise at the mental intrusion

The crown fell to the floor, clattering against the crystal where it fell silent again.

Okay, maybe not... I may need to get Silver to do this for me, I have no idea what I'm doing.

She lifted the thing up again in her aura.

Now don't do that again.

Cadance didn't want to leave yet. She wanted to make some kind of progress.

Think Cadance. Twilight's not the only genius in the family. This is emotion, your field of expertise...

The thing was filled with rage and dominance. Some twisted sense of mad arrogance backed by a willful desire of magic and determination, a dangerous mix.

But why exactly that?

The thing was always in that state, so it must have been the core of the magic.

Throw things on the wall, let's see

A well kept secret of Cadance was that long ago she'd learned how to cast using her emotions as a power source. She'd always known the difference between using emotions as motivation, and using them as power, which of course was the separation between Control and Emotion casting.

She drew upon her emotions: serenity, her sense of being at peace, a mixture of deference, the ideal of simply letting something brush past you. Following that up with a channeling medium of change and Love, a rippling cloud of black and pink magic began bubbling at the tip of her horn as blue mist the same colour as her eyes began leaking from the edges of her vision. The emotions flowed through her, and she brought them to the tip of her horn.

Then she fired it at the crown floating in her telekinesis. The thing, not capable of not consuming any emotions available to it, drank greedily of the magic that was directed at it.

Cadance watched the rippling wave of pink and black flow around the crown and eventually sink into it. The sparkling black and grey features of the crystal glowing blue for moments as the magic sank in.

There was a tinkling noise before the glowing crown turned dull.

Did it work?

She poked at it with her hoof.

It wasn't whispering or raging at her anymore.

Hmmm

She lifted it into her magic again. The dull thing hovered in front of her in silence.

Did I break it?

After a bit of poking at it with her magic, and eventually just placing the thing on her head, she figured out that she did indeed break it.

"Dang it." She hefted the thing in front of her in her hoof, "But why?" The crown gave her no answers.

Twilight would have been able to figure this out

No, it didn't break, the enchantment is just gone...

After wracking her brain for ideas, she elected to try blasting it with the same spell again. This time, the magic washed over the thing, not finding a suitable target to direct the calming magic into.

Ugh

Cadance put the crown back in its case.

At least I made it safe

She idly looked around. Looking at the cursed tomes and books, the strange crystal artefacts Sombra had produced, and eventually back to the crown.

Sorry for breaking you.

She sighed and left, hoping to find something else to do. She never heard the contentment and forgiveness from the crown as the twisting magic inside of it drove it to peace.

---

"There you are." Shining said as she re-entered their bedroom.

"Morning honey."

Shining was in the middle of brushing his mane back, "Couldn't sleep?"

"I just woke up early, wanted to get busy."

"What's wrong?"

Of course he'd notice she was a little dejected. She'd wandered over to her office, taken one look inside and then closed the door and walked off. She didn't feel hungry either. Just restless.

"I broke the crown, and there's nothing to do."

Shining stopped brushing his mane, "The crown you showed me yesterday?"

"Mhm."

Cadance walked up next to him and yoinked his brush and started styling his mane.

"You broke it?"

Cadance idly responded as she focused on getting the knots out of his hair, "I tried fill it with it's opposite nature, I'm pretty sure I just broke the enchantment, I'm not sure why though."

"What's really wrong?"

"What do you mean?"

She could tell Shining Armor rolled his eyes even though she couldn't see his face from behind him.

"You're telling me that you wandered down to the vault at the break of dawn, broke the crown after casting dark magic on it, and now you're brushing my mane. You only do that when you're really nervous. So what's up?"

"Do I really?"

"Spill it Cadance."

She slumped her shoulders. "I don't know. I'm just feeling restless this morning I guess."

Shining pulled her into a hug. She was a bit taller than him, so she had to lean into it, but it was nice nonetheless. She tried to phrase how she felt, "I'm a little upset I couldn't make the crown useful, Twilight would have been able to, and I could have just asked Silver to do it. She probably would have just done it while telling me she wouldn't." Her words only felt half right to her own ears.

"I don't know. I just feel off."

"Could it be hormones?"

Maybe

"Maybe."

"Tell you what, I've got a spare two hours before a paperwork sesh with my third. Why don't we finally get you checked out here in The Empire?"

Cadance mulled it over in her head. The timing was nice, she'd be able to go to the palace staff meeting in the morning, then meet up with Shining before she had to take open court. She thought of the soul growing just behind her stomach.

"Mmm, yes, I think I'd like that." She gave him a squeeze with her wing.

"I'll make sure to send a letter ahead to the hospital. What else is bugging you?"

"Mmmmm, nothing anymore." She pressed her muzzle up underneath his neck and took a deep breath.

The sensation cleared away the negative air that was shifting around her, the poetic thought of Shining defending her from her bad mood came to her mind, she smiled at the thought and leaned more into him.

"Honey, you're gonna knock me over."

She did that, pushing him over onto his side where she subsequently and unrelentingly cuddled him.

Husbands right? Who knew?

"Alright Cadance. Two can play at this."

"What's that-Wha-!" Cadance's inquiry was cut off as Shining magically scooped her into a blanket

"Shining!"

He pulled the now burritoed Alicorn into a tight hug from behind and projected, "Now you'll be trapped here with me forever!"

"Not if I have anything to say about it!" She struggled to flare open her wings, throwing the blanket and Shining backwards. She turned around to face the pile of husband and comforters. She stepped forwards until she was just over him

"Don't you dare."

She dared. She laid down on top of him, shifting her weight and magicking the buddle comforter into a nest. Pegasus thing.

"Cadance!"

"That's what you get." She snarked down at the stallion.

Despite his struggling and false annoyance, he began to laugh, and did his best to hug her from underneath the mess of Alicorn and blanket.

"Think I can finish brushing my mane now?"

"Yeah." Cadance got off, and moved the blanket back over to their bed, fixing it back into place. As Shining got back to fixing up his now re-tangled mane Cadance walked over and gave him a sloppy kiss on the side of his muzzle.

"Thanks."

"Anytime."

"I'm gonna go to the morning staff meeting today, what's your evening like?"

"It's up in the air after me and Whistle finish going through the work orders. I'll probably get lunch with her and then roll out the new patrol rosters. You?"

"After open court, I've got a meeting with Chance's husband."

"The House of Mirrors?" he questioned

"Mhm. Going to see if I can build up a rapport."

Shining nodded in understanding, "The funding redirection project?"

"That's right. I'm hoping to switch over half of it to stimulating the houses"

Shining nodded in understanding. It wasn't really his area of expertise.

"Think you'll be able to swing by after? Meet me in my office?"

"Yeah I can do that."

"Then I'm gonna go to that meeting, I'll go find you in the-" Cadance led

Shining answered, "The guard checkpoint, I have to be there for the training regimen presentation."

"The guard checkpoint, say in an hour?"

"Make it one and a half."

"Okay, I'll bring you breakfast." She kissed him on the cheek.

"Thanks."

She fainted turning away to leave, but then surprise glomped him from behind. He didn't fall over this time.

"Love you, you big goof."

"Love you more, My Cadance."

Her heart fluttered, "Oh you wish."

They shared a deeper kiss, and then Cadance left for real.

---

The meeting hall for the palace staff was chock full as always. The maids and several of the guard officers were piling in when she got there. That in conjunction with the head line chef for The Spire's cafeteria.

There were plenty of nods and a couple of bows of deference as she entered. She kept her smile up, waved and gestured for ponies to rise when necessary. She eventually made it through the large crystal double doors into the impromptu ballroom turned meeting hall. There were plenty of round tables and cushions and chairs. Somepony had brought donuts and drinks for the ponies who had to skip breakfast for the morning commute.

The head of palace affairs, a yellow coated, blue maned crystal stallion named Easy Morning; The head of the maid staff and Palace maintenance, Ivory, an aptly named white toned earth pony mare and somepony she didn't recognize, a pink crystal mare with a slick back pink tinted mane, stood at the raised crystal platform at the opposite end of the hall. Cadance levitated a donut from the table over to herself as she crossed the room to approach the three.

Easy noticed her approach first "Ah, good morning Princess."

"Oh!" Ivory did a short bow, "We didn't realize you'd be here this morning Princess Cadance."

Cadance took a large bite out of the glazed doughy ball floating in her magic before responding, "I've not had the time for a while, excuse me, but I don't think we've ever met before miss?"

The crystal mare held out a hoof to the approaching Princess as Cadance stepped up onto the raised platform, yet she didn't meet Cadance's gaze, maintaining a look out over the room, like she had something on her mind.

"Slick Quire, your highness. It's a pleasure."

What an odd name.

Ivory spoke, "Slick has been a great help with the recent organizational changes, she's been in charge of palace communication for the past week or two."

Cadance tilted her head, "Only two weeks? When did you get hired?"

"Around the same time" Slick said, "I helped out enough times during these meetings that I slowly got shoe-horned into the position."

That's... Completely avoiding my question... Why won't you look at me?

"Is something wrong, your highness?" Easy Morning said after noticing Cadance's frown

"No, no, sorry, I think I just swallowed a hair." Cadance returned the smile to her face, "I'll go take a seat, it's been a while since I knew what was going on in The Spire."

As Cadance was halfway down the steps off the raised platform, the oddity in Slick's name stuck out at her.

Slick Quire? Slic....

No. Oh, I swear.

She turned her head and met "Slick's" gaze as she watched Cadance walk away.

I know those eyes. What are you up to.

Slick gave her a toothy smile and waved at her from the stage.

What are you doing here... ugh, that damn mare is everywhere!

Cadance kept her internal despairing to herself and off her face. She found a cushion to park herself at a table near the front of the room just as the assortment of staff were all either finding their seats or turning their attention to the stage.

Ivory began to speak to the crowd, with Easy taking her side and 'Slick' standing a little off to the side. "Morning everypony!"

Everypony...

There were plenty of call backs of good mornings, and Ivory continued, "Last week we had very good marks for the palace maintenance, so there's little to hear from me. You all know what your operations are today from Slick," Ivory gestured to the mare in question, who nodded and began to speak

"Today we've got the normal to and fore for castle maintenance; today though I talked with, uh-" Slick glanced around through the crowd until her eyes stopped on a crystal mare who raised her hoof, "Ah there you are, everyone get a good look at Miss Stance over there, she's in charge of running palace inventory today: Food, cleaning supplies, the works; everyone without a job today make sure you find her in the foyer, and she'll be handing out assignments."

Ivory spoke again, "We've also got a couple of individual room requests from the housing relocation initiative, I put up a chart in the break room with area assignments, the plan is to get through all the requests before the weekend is over."

Easy morning spoke up, "Moving forwards, I'm sure we're all still winding down from the Gala, but we've got an upswing in tourism now that ponies are going to be looking for somewhere to spend their time. I've got several project ideas for us to get started on right away. First and foremost is the central Empire ring conversion from a housing district to the business center we've been planning. There's a sign up sheet out in the break room for anypony that wants to work on the project with some of our managers."

Slick cut in, "Keep in mind it's mostly going to be overseeing construction and renovation requests, post that, selling and managing business spaces and ponies who're looking to take up the new structures."

"Right" Easy morning nodded towards Slick, "It's a long term project, we want the ponies on it to be experienced from start to finish so they can act as the buildings' management once they're complete."

Ivory spoke up again, "Can Hard Tack, Missed Beam and Ice Storm please put your hooves up?"

There was a trio of hooves raised into the air off on a table to Cadance's side.

"They're in charge of the project management, construction and public relations respectively, find them when you get your project assignments."

Easy Morning continued, "Secondly, we want to start working on our next big internal organization project, Slick? If you would?"

"Of course." Slick took a couple of steps forwards "As you all know, the revitalization projects for fixing up The Empire were patchwork and half done. That being said, the hard work and extra hours you all put in pushed us over the edge of what we needed to mark down most projects as a success. However, as it stands, the HR division is still severely overworked because of the disorganization of our teams and the mix of ponies brought over from Canterlot and the staff from Sombra's reign mixing together with anypony who walked in off the street who had good enough ideas."

There were a couple of chuckles and elbowing of fellow associates

"So our first organizational protocol is going to be skill redistribution. Easy Morning is working with the guard division to work out a chain of command to restructure and organize the internal workings of you movers and shakers. As it stands though, we can't promote or organize our personnel without knowing on paper what your experiences and skills are. There's a massive stack of papers sitting in the break room, you can't miss them, today there's going to be an hour long extra tack onto the normal break length for everyone to complete the information inside."

"Once we have all of the details, we'll be able to know what we're working with and get our second project on the move." Easy finished.

Ivory called out, "Any questions?"

A hoof raised out, and they simply began to speak, "What kind of questions are in the leaflet?"

Ivory answered the question, instead of Slick, "Some non-invasive personal history questions, work experience boxes, 'what is your special talent', team preferences, that sort of thing."

"Are there going to be more move orders for the furniture imports?"

Ivory nervously chuckled, "Hopefully not."

"Missed Beam?" The mare in question turned to the voice in asking for her attention, "Did the renovation requests go through for that one trouble floor?"

The mare nodded, "It took some finagling, but it t'wasn't anything I couldn't handle."

Then there was silence.

Easy Morning clapped his hooves, "Alright then, everypony have a good day!"

"Now go get to work!" Ivory smiled as she spoke

The crowd of ponies began rising and dispersing, the crowd immediately building a volume as friends and team members began talking about the day and the meeting.

Cadance tracked Slick as she walked down off the stage and into the crowd. At least she tried, a couple of moments after she dipped into the crowd, Cadance lost sight of her and didn't manage to find her again.

Disgruntled horse thought noises

Cadance was one of the last ponies standing around when the room eventually cleared out, Ivory walked up to her as she began moving to leave.

"Excuse me Princess?"

"Hello again Ivory, excellent work as always."

"Thank you Princess, I had a question for you, if I may?"

"Of course."

Ivory rolled the words around in her head, "I heard that you had tasked some ponies with working on the paperwork for a school?"

Scuttlebutt travels faster than light

"I did yes." Cadance understood the subtext behind the question was and continued, "It's absolutely going to be a palace project, but it's too early to make it a public work. I'll let you, Easy, and the relevant ponies know when I have enough planned for us to really get started."

"Oh, uhm, okay. Thank you Princess." The mare's odd response to the question had Cadance raising her eyebrow, but Ivory's hasty retreat stopped Cadance from investigating. Not willing to be the last one out, Cadance followed after her with the intent to head down to the Palace kitchen to rustle up some food for her and Shining.

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