Even though they live on a planet completely devoid of magic, it turns out humans are naturally gifted in it. Or at least this one is. Kinda easy to generalize when there's only one.
Even though they live on a planet completely devoid of magic, it turns out humans are naturally gifted in it. Or at least this one is. Anonymous has lived in the castle for a while now and somehow found out he can do magic. Luna offered to take him as her student and Celestia agreed, thinking it would help her sister come out of her shell a bit. Celestia regrets that decision.
At least she can't complain that things are boring.
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Story is from Celestia's POV. Tags will be added as needed.
Anthology where Anon learns a new spell every week (in universe) and does something stupid with it.
If you think of any spells you'd like Anon to learn, feel free to leave a comment or PM me.
Princess Celestia was known to all as a paragon of patience. She had sat through countless hours of day court filled with nothing but petty squabbles between nobles that didn't deserve their titles. Even when the court cases could have been settled by a five year old, she still sat and listened and helped everyone involved resolve the issues peacefully. She had been to many stressful negotiations between countries and no matter how heated the debating got, she was always the coolest head in the room. It is even rumored that when she fought the Lord of Chaos himself alongside her sister, the world spinning and warping around them, she never lost focus. She had been through so much in her time, but in the end she managed to weather it all and come out on the other side still wearing that iconic motherly smile.
What many don't know though, is that there is a being that can make the Goddess of the Sun lose her cool. One being that can truly get under her skin.
"Anonymous?"
"Yes, Sunny?"
"Could you please stop?"
"No can do, Sunbutt."
"And why is that?"
"Because Luna said I needed to practice my telekinesis."
"I understand that," Celestia said, "but why must you practice on the cake that I am currently trying to enjoy? You know they make toys for foals to practice on, right?"
Anon's answer was postponed as he once again lifted his hand from the table and pointed it in the direction of the aforementioned slice of chocolate cake. As the human visibly concentrated, a green glow began emanating from his fingertips and the same glow surrounded the frosted desert. It slowly began to hover off the plate, but it only lifted up an inch before Celestia's horn lit up and cut off the human's magical connection to the cake.
Just like with all of his previous failed attempts, Anon let out a pained hiss and yanked his hand back. The cake fell back to the plate without losing even a single sprinkle.
"Because I'm hungry," he finally said, shaking his hand in an attempt to restore feeling in his fingers.
"Then why don't you order something? You have full access to the kitchens. You could even get your own slice of cake, instead of harassing mine."
"Nope, it's gotta be yours," Anon said matter-of-factly.
"And why is that?"
The human responded after another failed attempt.
"Because I'm trying to save you from the calories in that cake. That stuff is bad for you, ya know."
"Was that a jab at my weight?" Celestia asked with an amused smirk.
"Of course not. Who would insinuate that a Princess of Equestria had big flanks? Not this guy."
Anon hissed in pain at another failed attempt.
"Oh, then what were you insinuating?"
"All I'm saying is that whoever sits on the Horselandian throne has a fat ass."
"Oh, I see. And I assume Horseland and Equestria are two totally separate nations?"
"Duh. They're totally different. There are as many differences between the two as there are people in each country."
"Really? Can you give an example of these differences?"
Another failed attempt. Anon had tried to pull a fast one, but two days of practice yielded no results when facing centuries of daily magical usage. By this point, he was clearly starting to get frustrated.
"Well, for one, a Horselandian princess would share her cake with me," he said.
"I guess it's a good thing I'm not a Horselandian then."
This time the sting from magical cutoff was more acute, causing Anon to yelp slightly.
"Has my sister taught you about magical stilling yet?" Celestia asked.
Anon sat up straighter and took on a mocking regal accent. "Magical stilling iseth the acteth of stopping the floweth of magic in another beingeth." Dropping the accent, he began speaking normally. "It's what you're doing every time I try to take your cake." He emphasized his point by making another attempt to steal the dessert, which was promptly stopped by Celestia's own magical power.
"While you are correct," she said, "I don't think she would appreciate you mocking the way she speaks. She tries hard to be understandable in what amounts to a language that is totally separate from the one she is used to."
"Before you go preaching, you try listening to her attempts at explaining abstract magical concepts in thous and royal wes. Patience only goes so far, Sunbutt."
"Oh, I fully agree on that," Celestia said as she defended her cake once again. "Has Luna told you that magical stilling can be harmful to those being stilled? If someone is stilled while casting a strong spell, the magical backlash could destroy the magical circulatory system and permanently cripple their ability to cast magic. Even being stilled while using smaller spells could theoretically harm the use of magic if done enough times in a short period of time."
"Really? Maybe you should stop stilling me, then. Wouldn't want to lose my magic so soon after getting it," Anon said nonchalantly.
He tried to take the cake before hissing in pain once again.
"Didn't you once tell me that the definition of insanity was doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results?"
"I'm here to steal your cake, not get lectured. If I wanted another one of those, I'd go wake up your sister."
Anon's fingers lit up under the table this time, away from the princess' prying eye. One of the knickknacks on the shelves behind the alicorn floated from its resting position and slammed a few times on the chamber doors before flying off to land on the bed without making a noise. What he didn't know was that Celestia could feel the flow of magic in her sensitive horn. She had to hand it to him though, he pulled off that little stunt without showing a single hint that he was the cause behind it.
"I wonder who that could be," the human said with a straight face.
"It must be one of the guards," Celestia said as she stood from her seat. She opened the door and stuck her head out to see who had 'knocked'.
Making sure Celestia couldn't see him, Anon took his chance and reached out to levitate the cake across the table to himself. Before he could concentrate on it however, the two front legs of his chair glowed in a golden aura and lifted. Anon yelped in surprise. The seat leaned backwards and dumped its human occupant onto the floor unceremoniously.
Celestia pulled her head back into the room, horn glowing for a second longer as she made her way back to her seat.
"Noone was there. They must have had the wrong room," she said, acting like nothing had changed since she'd stood up.
She picked up the fork that had come with her desert and quickly took the first bite of delicious cake, humming at the delightful taste. It was only after this that she 'realized' the room's other occupant wasn't where he should be.
"Oh, Anonymous! When did you get here?" she asked with a playful smirk.
Celestia enjoyed the relative quiet as she walked the halls of the castle. Peace and quiet were hard to come by for someone as important as a princess, especially when she wasn’t locked away in her chambers doing paperwork. She was on her way to a meeting with a minotaur diplomat, but it wasn’t scheduled to begin for another forty minutes, so she had decided to take the scenic route. To reduce the likelihood of her being disturbed, she took side hallways and less used paths. Naturally, there were plenty of guards and even a few maids or butlers wandering about, but they all just bowed and were quickly on their way.
The princess stopped by one of the many windows and opened it, allowing a breeze to come through and give her mane a reason to flutter. Celestia closed her eyes and took a deep breath of the fresh air coming from outside. She could smell the flowers from one of the many gardens around the castle. In her many years of life, she’d found that one had to enjoy the moment when they could, lest it pass them by, never to be heard from again. She desperately wanted to spread her wings and go for a flight, but she knew she couldn’t. There wasn’t enough time, and once she was up in the air she wouldn’t want to come down for quite awhile. Cursing her constantly busy schedule, she closed the window just in time for her ears to perk up at a noise.
It was just loud enough for her ears to pick up, but she couldn’t immediately tell what it was. After a second she heard it again, louder this time. It sounded like shouting. As the seconds passed the sounds of shouting grew closer and Celestia began to pick out hooffalls against the marble floor. She began in the direction of the commotion, only to pick up her pace when she heard the crash of something fragile breaking. Before she could find the source of the sounds, it found her as Anonymous careened around the corner in front of her, startling a nearby maid.
The way he moved was strange. He looked like he was skating through the halls. He looked strangely happy as he noticed Celestia and nearly failed at coming to a halt in time to greet her.
“Hey, Sunny. What’s up?”
“Anonymous, would you care to explain what all the shouting and crashing was about?”
“Sure, I’d love to, but I think it would be better if you saw for yourself. He should be right behind me.”
“Who? See what for myself?“
Before she could question further, another figure came around the corner. This one was a pony with a white coat and a blonde mane and tail. He was wearing a fancy suit and was sopping wet from head to hoof. To top it all off, both his fur coat and his suit coat had spots of dirt that had mixed with the water to leave muddy patches all over him. He took a second to gauge his surroundings before locking onto Anonymous with bloodshot eyes. He ground his teeth in anger before letting out a shout.
“There you are you filthy animal!”
Anonymous chuckled. “The only one who’s filthy here is you, Blueblood.” The raging pony charged the human, but Anonymous quickly slid behind Celestia, putting her between the two. Blueblood gave pursuit, completely ignoring that Celestia was there. Anonymous putting her between himself and his pursuer, and Blueblood giving singleminded chase created the scene of human and pony chaotically circling the goddess of the sun. No doubt it would be an amusing sight for anyone to witness.
Celestia stood dumbfounded at what was happening. It wasn’t hard to see what had happened. Clearly, Anonymous has done something to her nephew, something which he probably deserved, and she planned to find out what was going on. Watching the two circle her was starting to make her dizzy. She sighed in exasperation as she lit up her horn, and the two troublemakers were whisked into the air. She held them both in front of her and out of each other’s reach. Blueblood, in his futile attempts to to get at Anonymous, hadn’t noticed he’d been picked up and continued to shout and try to strangle the also dangling human. Anonymous, on the other hand, looked quite proud of himself, which couldn’t mean anything good. Before she could start her interrogation, however, she needed to bring her nephew back to his senses.
“Blueblood,” she called, trying to get his attention. When she got no response, she tried a little louder. “Blueblood!” Still nothing. She could already feel a migraine coming on. She was not in the mood for this. If she needed to get his attention, fine. She would get his attention. In an impressive magical display, she spread her wings as her eyes glowed white with magical power, and her perpetually flowing mane whipped around her so fervently that it caught fire for a brief moment. She put up a sound dampening field in the hallway, as to not disturb the rest of the castle, before bellowing in the royal canterlot voice. “Blueblood!”
If the sudden bright light and heatwave didn’t get his attention, the earth shattering roar of her voice did. He immediately deflated when he realized where he was and what was going on. His shouting stopped and he hung limply in her magical grip. Anonymous was not spared either, as his proud smirk was now gone and in it’s place was... well, she couldn’t exactly tell what had replaced it. He was covering his eyes from the blinding light. Just as quickly as the display had started, it had stopped. She continued in her usual motherly tone, acting as if she hadn’t just spontaneously combusted.
“Now that we’ve all calmed down, what seems to be the problem?” Neither of them spoke up. Blueblood cowered slightly when her eyes landed on him. Perhaps she’d gone a bit overboard, but it was too late to take back now. “Blueblood,” She said in a comforting manner. “Did Anonymous do something to you?”
“Hey, how come you just assume I did something?!”
Celestia’s gaze shifted to the human and she gave him a look that said “really?”
“Okay, so maybe I did something.”
“Oh auntie,” cried Blueblood. “It was horrible. Look at my suit! That mangy mutt ruined it!”
“Really, mangy mutt? You couldn’t come up with a better insult than that, you half baked product of incest?”
“How dare you-“
“Enough, you two!” Celestia stamped her hoof, causing them to quite down again. “Blueblood, continue.”
“As I was saying, I was just doing my duties as a noble-“
“Bullshit-“ Before Anonymous could finish his sentence, he found himself magically gagged.
“I will get to you, Anonymous. Blueblood, continue.”
“I was doing my duties as a noble when this mutant monkey came out of nowhere and poured his peasant drink over my head for no reason! Now my coat and suit are ruined.” He looked at the human with re-emerging contempt. “Do you have any idea how long it takes to get my mane done in the morning!?” Now it was Blueblood’s turn to be gagged.
“Okay, now let’s hear Anon’s side of the story,” Celestia said as she released the gag on Anonymous.
“Wow, Celestia. That’s pretty kinky. I didn’t you were into that sort of thing.” She shot him an unamused look and he quickly backpedaled. “Okay, okay. I get it. No joking around. I was studying material from Luna’s last lesson and I got thirsty, so I went to the kitchen to get a glass of ice water. On my way back, I caught this asshat screaming his head off at some poor butler that clearly had no idea why he was being yelled at. So I did what any reasonable person would do. I dumped my peasant juice on his head and made sure some ice cubes got caught under his shirt. The little dance he did was just adorable. The butler certainly enjoyed it.”
“That explains why he’s wet, but why is he covered in mud?”
“Well, shit-for-brains here got a little pissy after he got the ice cubes out and chased after me, so I reduced the friction on the soles of my shoes and just skated away. After he chased me for a while I got bored, so I once again did what any reasonable person would do. I reduced the friction on a patch of the floor and watched him slide face first into a wall. The impact knocked a flower vase over and it broke over his head. You should have seen the look on his face, it was priceless.”
“As was that vase, no doubt.” Celestia sighed and rubbed one of her temples. With her luck, that vase was definitely one of the few that had survived the move between castles all those centuries ago. She knew a spell that could repair items, but the spell can only rewind an objects physical state up to a minute from the present, which had already passed. A priceless artifact, gone in an instant.
Anon’s smile slipped a bit at seeing Celestia rubbing her temples. “You alright there, Sunny?”
“How dare you address her so informally!” Apparently she had released the gag spell without realizing.
“Shut up Bluebitch, the adults are talking.”
“I am fine Anonymous, I’m just trying to fight off an oncoming headache.” Celestia ignored the fuming Blueblood as well. Frankly, she didn’t want to hear anything he had to say on a good day.
“Ya know... I hear dunking your head ice water can help with that.”
Celestia deadpanned at the now smirking human, causing him to once again lose his smile.
“Sorry, that was in bad taste. Sorry about the vase too.”
“In all honesty, the average history buff would care more about that vase than I do. I’ll just donate the pieces to a museum. I'm sure that will make them happy.”
Blueblood gasped. “Aunty, how can you say something like that? He broke a priceless piece of art, and he’s getting away with it?”
“I thought I told you that the adults are talking. One more outburst like that, and I’m sending you to your room young lady,” Anon said.
Celestia ignored Anon and spoke to her nephew. “Blueblood, I would choose to leave every artifact we have in storage, if it wasn’t practically a social requirement for antiques to be strewn about the halls to show off to foreign dignitaries. With the vase being out in the open, it was only a matter of time before it got broken anyway. I’m surprised it took this long.”
“I always figured you’d be more attached to old things, Sunny. You know, considering your age and all.” She ignored the jab.
“It was just a vase Anon. If I want another one, I’ll just make another one.”
“I didn’t take you for the artsy type,” Anon seemed surprised. Even Blueblood looked interested.
“Well, “considering my age”, I’ve had many hobbies in the past. A good number of the pieces lining the halls were created by Luna and myself.”
“What kind of stuff did you make?”
“I did some pottery, I made a few pieces of music, but painting was my preferred medium. Luna tried much of the same, but she seemed to like sculpting more than anything else. A few of her pieces can be found in the gardens if you are interested.” Celestia enjoyed talking about her old hobbies. It had been over a century since she’d made anything. She’d been so busy with her duties and trying to prepare for her sister’s return that the thought of indulging in art creation had totally slipped her mind. With Luna safe and sound, maybe she could find some time to get back into painting.
“Huh, I’ll have to check that out,” Anon said. “Maybe I could get her to sculpt me.”
“A princess would never consider sculpting such a foul creature!” Blueblood shouted.
“Strike three, Bitchblood. You’re out. You better watch your back, or some hair dye might make it’s way into your shampoo.”
Blueblood gasped. “You wouldn’t!”
“Try me.”
“As much as I would love to continue this conversation, I do need to get to a meeting soon, so I don’t have time to punish you children further. Anon, apologize to Blueblood.”
“Really?”
“Yes. I’m not leaving until you do, so if you take too long, you can be the one to explain to the minotaur diplomat why I was late for our meeting.”
“Fine. I’m sorry your nephew is a narcissistic prick.”
“I’m not the one you're apologizing to, Anon.”
“Ugh, fine!” He turned to Blueblood. “I’m sorry you’re such a narcissistic prick.”
Good enough, Celestia thought. That was probably the best she would get out of him.
“Now Blueblood, you apologize to Anonymous.”
“Why should I lower myself to apologize to such a loathsome creature?”
“For the same reason I gave Anonymous. You wouldn’t like to sully my centuries old streak of being on time, would you?” Blueblood flinched. Anon smiled at the blatant manipulation. Celestia didn’t care anymore, she just wanted to be done with this situation.
“Oh course not, aunty.” Blueblood turned towards Anon hesitantly. “I’m sorry... that you smell like manure.” Before Anonymous had a chance to reply, Celestia spoke up.
“Good, now that you two are getting along, I suggest you go your separate ways. I don’t want to hear any more about this, am I understood?”
“Yes, Princess,” the both of them droned in unison. She set them back on their own hooves and feet respectively. Anon and Blueblood gave each other a glare before heading in opposite directions. Celestia watched them go, but after a second, Anonymous turned around and lit up his magic. A patch of the floor right underneath Blueblood’s hoof lit up as well, Anon no doubt toying with friction again. When Blueblood stepped on it, his hoof slid out from underneath him, causing him to face plant onto the marble floor.
Blueblood jumped up in rage, chasing Anonymous as he skated down the hall, away from Celestia. The princess sighed. She’d let the guard take care of them. She had places to be.