or how songs can bring love to those that need it
Cloudsdale was a great town, you might even call it an equal to Canterlot. The city was quite spacious as adding new clouds was pretty easy. The town was both an attractive tourist spot and it had it’s focus on athletic events that regularly made it even more popular. Cloudsdales world famous flight school even was visited by other flying species at times!
One thing it was lacking though was a designated lift. Since some items were too heavy to transport by wing power or even movers trucks carried by pegasi, another solution had to be found. Items like the bigger metal parts for their rainbow machines or the odd wood furniture a pegasus insisted on living in were too heavy otherwise. Sure, it was easy to harden the clouds with weather magic and a trick or two to handle the weight but you couldn’t make them float upwards then.
For this reason, the town Land Sink was founded. It was a little town near the lake Cloudsdale was stationed above. Land Sink was connected to the railway system and even though not too many ponies visited the little town, there always was business with the supplies being brought up to the city above them.
It was a cold day in Land Sink, close to Hearths Warming Eve. The wind was blowing harshly and it had snowed recently. Chrysalis staggered alone into the edge of town. Carefully looking for a hiding place, the queen hid herself to try and do her best to thaw and shake any remaining snow off her and out of her many holes.
She was weakened a lot by the weather and couldn’t even shift in this forsaken cold! Angrily the Changeling started out to shout but gradually forced herself to mumble remembering her place of hiding,
“Stupid Canterlot, stupid Cadence, Stupid Twilight! Why did they ruin my perfect plan? I just wanted to feed my hive and they just had to throw me out! Hell, they even spread the whole hive all over the land! I hope they can survive without me.”
After a while though, Chrysalis was hungry, terribly so. A bug could only go for so long without food. There was hibernation but no changeling tried that unless they were absolutely sure to be safe. Which she wasn’t here. It was even more important for a queen to be well fed since she was a lot harder to replace for the hive than a drone. The love-shield that had thrown them all out of town had been unable to provide any of them with any food and the princess had wandered about in the cold wilderness until she had found the nearest town.
She had crept along and had hypnotised ponies, which thankfully still worked, until she had a big scarf and some leather for her feet as any snow that crept in the holes there could give her a terrible cold.
Chrysalis was trying to beg for some scraps of love with a little song she had overheard when young. The queen wasn’t the best of singers but if she just got a bit of energy and was able to transform, then she was able to get enough energy to move on searching for her hive.
It was an old, slow song about the night of Hearth’s Warming Eve, though it never really mentioned it. Chrysalis had only remembered the song since it always brought a spark of love into the ponies that listened to it and fed her in this manner. She settled down in a badly light corner as deep into the town she dared to sneak and snuggled into the scarf as much as possible to hide holes and ward off the cold.
Then she began to sing:
“Silent Night, Holy Night
All is calm, all is bright
Round yon foal, mare and filly
Listen to messages of amity
Spread merriness and cheer,
Spread merriness and cheer.”
After her first, weak verse, some of the few ponies passing by filled her with the slightest amount of love at singing that song for them. Emboldened and strengthened, she sang a little bit louder.
“Silent Night, Holy Night
Coldness wanes, sunlight brights
Windigo leaves and everything’s right
Now all the tribes enjoy delight
Friendship has saved us all,
Friendship has saved us all.”
Now she had started to form a small crowd which would be bad in most situations but they enjoyed the song too much to really pay her notice. Together with some of the ponies they sang the last verse loud and clear.
“Silent Night, Holy Night
Hatches buried, an end to the fight
The founders’ wish to unite
Brought forth a shaft of light
Magic of Friendship is born,
Magic of Friendship is born.”
With a subtle touch of magic, Chrysalis hid the holes of her body, shifted her eyes to be closer to that of a pony and let her crown disappear from searching eyes. The polite clapping and stomping for her performance had filled Chrysalis with more than enough magic for that already.
Though she was smiling prettily at the other ponies, she smirked an evil smile inside. Those ponies were fools! Just a little song and they literally fed one of their biggest predators and largest threats with enough love to prey on them! Suppressing a cackle, she excused herself and went on through the town and smiled and greeted all the other ponies alike.
All the accumulated spirit of the upcoming Hearth’s Warming Eve fed Chrysalis more than enough. Maybe she’d let this town live until after the holidays? They were supposed to be the most content just afterwards as she had heard. Content meant that there were happy to spread love without any provocation!
Getting some proper boots by some way too generous merchant, she skipped merrily out of town in search of her hive. Humming the tune of the song that had once again saved her flank, Chrysalis set out into the cold night again. Somehow though it seemed brighter than it did when she arrived.