> Practice Makes Perfect > by Magical_Mystery_Mare2 > -------------------------------------------------------------------------- > Chapter 1 A normal seeming Nightmare Night > -------------------------------------------------------------------------- Celestia had been planning fro Twilight to ascend for a while now, and was keeping a close eye on the situation all morning. Scrying spells were useful like that. Celestia had long ago developed her own personal variation of scrying spell that showed an image hovering in mid air, and visible only to her. As such Celestia didn't see a plate of cake sitting on the floor near the top of a set of stairs. SLICC. CATHUMP. ABUMP BUMP BUMP. The sound of Celestia falling down the stairs echoed loudly for several seconds. And then the shouting started. Guards rushing to and fro, surrounding Celestia in case this is part of an attack. One guard checking for a pulse, several running to a nearby hospital to summon a doctor. A maid steps out of the nearby loo to see what all the fuss is about. They look at the cake smeared stairs, down to where Celestia is lying surround by bits of broken plate. Ashen faced and trembling, the maid looks back to where they put the cake down just a minute ago. Alicorns are extremely tough, there is no way that a fall down a flight of stairs can seriously injure them. However ponies tend to make a fuss. Celestia wanted to tell everyone that she had had half a mountain dropped on her in the battle with Drognar the terrible, and she had bucked and blasted trough 50 meters of solid rock to rejoin the fight. Now a dozen doctors were fussing around her, trying to test for every conceivable ailment and treat quite a few. Celestia didn't need any doctors right now, let alone a dozen, but personally treating a princess looks really good on a CV and is a great boast at parties. She'd tell them to all go away, just as soon as they stopped inspecting her teeth for chips, and shut up long enough to get a word in edgeways. Now one of them had snuck a horn brace on her while she was distracted trying to get them to stop examining between her hind legs in more detail. Her horn hadn't been so much as scratched when a 300 ton Great Wyrm Dragon had shattered several teeth on it. It certainly didn't need horn brace. A good, high quality, well made horn brace is quite a sturdy thing. Celestia could easily overpower it of course, doing so would tale less than a percent of the magic she used each day to raise the sun. Well alright, the sun contains 1030 kg, and to raise it at the reasonably fast rate ponies expected the sun to rise at, she had to accelerate it to nearly half the speed of light with her telekinesis. The amount of energy needed to shatter a horn brace was utterly utterly minute. Shatter the brace and send pieces of horn restraint flying across the room fast enough to injure all the non-alicorns present. Oh whatever. Luna could raise the moon and lower the sun. Surely Twilight couldn't cause much trouble on her first day with wings. " ... from all of us together, there is magic without end" Twilight cast. A brilliant light shot from her horn onto herself, and she disappeared in a burst of light. Twilight found herself surrounded by a strange white void. The pearlescent glow looking kind of, but not quite, like fairy lights in fog. Twilight started to think, tracing through the spell diagram in her mind to figure out where she was and how to leave. She needn't have bothered as 10 seconds later she found herself in a glowing ball of light drifting towards the ground in Ponyville town square. She had wings. When she had given Rarity wings for the visit to Cloudsdale, the spellbook had said that the wings were made out of dew because that would last longer than purely conjured wings. But these wings had taken a fair bit more magic than that spell, so they would probably last at least a couple of days. She gave them an experimental flap, and was lifted a couple of hooves off the ground before landing on her plot with a bump. Ouch. Actually it didn't really hurt, that was slightly odd? Anyway, it was late. She better get to bed. It was going to be a busy day tomorrow. Being a hirehorn was common among moderately skilled unicorns. The usual practice was to put a list of spells you could cast, and the price you charged, outside your door. It was a good way for unicorns to get some magic practice and make a bit of money on the side. When living in the castle, Celestia had encouraged Twilight to draw up a list of spells she could do, and post it outside her bedroom. Celestia said it was to get extra practice and help out, but most of the reason was to get that lavender muzzle out of a book and interacting with other ponies. And so Twilight got interrupted a couple of times a day, mostly by maids looking for cleaning or repair spells. And various paperwork related spells. Given her generous royal stipend, she didn't feel a need to charge for this. Oh she put prices on the list, exorbitant ones, but that was just for ponies like Blueblood. So when Twilight had moved to Ponyville, she had put up a list of spells she knew, and not bothered to charge for any of them. Including some advanced manticore repelling spells around Zecora's hut, which was why Zecora was so keen to give her free potions. It was a good way to make friends with ponies in the community. Rarity had been the closest Ponyville had had to a hirehorn and she was actually quite relieved ponies were no longer interrupting her when she was making dresses. Twilight woke up and saw a purple wing draped over her. She remembered that she had cast a spell that granted temporary wings the night before. Today was nightmare night and she had plenty of work to do preparing. Actually, here wings were still here, weren't they. So the spell had to last at least 8 hours. Probably longer. That spell might be good as part of a nightmare night costume. She chalked it up on the board in front of the library. First order of the day, helping Applejack prepare the apple bobbing. GROWL. Ok, breakfast, then helping Applejack. Munching on a slice of toast, Twilight set off for Sweet apple acres. "Nice wings Twi" commented AppleJack. "Sure, their from that spell last night, at a guess I'd say they will probably last a couple of days." Replied Twilight. "Well ah was thinking ah dressing as a griffon fer Nightmare Night, but ma cardboard wings aren't very good. Ya couldn't cast that spell on me could ya?" Twilight warned Applejack not to fly to any height she didn't want to fall from, and then cast the spell. With a flash, Applejack disappeared. About 10 seconds later, just long enough for Twilight to start panicking slightly, a glowing ball of orange light appeared and drifted to the ground. Applejack stood there sprouting wings and a horn. "That's interesting, " Twilight noted, "You have a horn as well. The spell must force you to temporarily take the form of an Alicorn, similar to that spell that temporarily turns ponies into breezies. " "You can't mention that spell" interjected Pinkie Pie, appearing from behind a nearby tree, "The author can't remember if that episode has happened yet". "Stop breaking the 4th wall Pinkie" muttered Twilight. Pinkie vanished behind the tree again. "Well what am I going to do with my new horn" grumbled Applejack. "Griffins don't have horns." "Oh that's easy, just say your a horned griffin, or if no one gets the joke, just wear your hat." responded Twilight. Twilight finished helping Applejack out, using her magic to clean out and fix a couple of old half barrels. Twilight walked back into town with Applejack, Twilight levitating the barrels and Applejack pulling the cart that had apples for bobbing and all the stuff needed to make toffee apples. There napping on a square above the town square was Rainbow dash. "Rainbow" Twilight shouted, "Can you come down here and shake a few clouds over these barrels?" "Sure Twi" Rainbow yawned, "Hey AJ, where you get that cool horn?" "Twi's got some fancy spell" Applejack replied. "Me next, I want to go as Nightmare Moon!" exclaimed Rainbow. Twilight cast the spell on Rainbow Dash. That was definitely easier than last time, she must be getting practised with this spell. The ball of crackling blue and rainbow coloured light drifted down to reveal Rainbow now had a horn. Rainbow felt his forehead with a hoof, checking that she did indeed have a horn. "This will last all night, right?" she asked? "I think so" replied Twilight. Twilight wandered back to the library. Already there were a couple of ponies standing looking at the board. "Hi Merry Flowers, Hi Sandy Shores, what are you two waiting for?" questioned Twilight. "That wing spell, I want to dress as a wonderbolt for tonight." replied Merry. "Same, except I want to dress as a bat pony" said Sandy Shores. Twilight gave them the standard warning about not flying to any height you wouldn't want to fall from. She mentioned that the spell would give them a horn as well, updating the chalk board while she remembered. Then she cast the spell on both of them. Over the next few hours, Twilight tried to get a bit of tidying done, and once again reshelve the library. But every time she was just getting started, another pony would knock on her door asking for wings and/or a horn. She didn't mind, she insisted to herself. She might not be getting any shelving done but she was helping lots of ponies with their nightmare night costume. Pinkie Pie came in, looking for Twilight to cast that spell on her. Pinkies tail was flicking back and forth, her left ear was flipping up and down and her right eye was spinning round and round. Apparently a giant doozy was coming, but it was a good doozy. Whatever. Twilight had given up trying to understand Pinkie, and apparently this was a good thing, so why worry about it. Nightmare night came and Twilight generally enjoyed herself. She'd gone bobbing for apples, got lost in a spooky maize maze and sampled a lot of different sweets. Her dragon costume had worked well enough, thrown together to make use of her new wings as it was. Celestia smiled. She had finally been able to remove the horn brace. Sure, there were bits of horn brace embedded in the walls and ceiling, but that bathroom needed redecorating anyway. She had finally cast that scrying spell, and what did she see. Her favourite student, Twilight Sparkle. And whatsmore her student was showing all the wisdom and humility she could have hoped for. Turned into an immortal, neigh all powerful goddess just yesterday. And yet she showed no signs of lording it over other ponies. She wasn't demanding any pony bow down and worship her. She also wasn't panicking and wearing a trench in the library. She was just bobbing for apples with her friends. Almost like deep down she still thought of herself as a normal pony. While it was somewhat dark, and the costumes hid a lot, she couldn't help noticing a lot of horns and wings in the background. She thought Ponyville was a mostly earthpony settlement. Twilight hadn't decided that earth ponies were unworthy of her presence, had she? No wait, that griffon was Applejack. Celestia knew Applejack was an earthpony. Applejack had done a really good job on her costume. Those wings looked very realistic. > Chapter 2 Too many Princesses > -------------------------------------------------------------------------- Twilight woke up on the day after Nightmare Night. Her wings were still there. That's interesting. The spell was staring to last longer than she expected. If her wings didn't vanish in a couple of day's, she would ask Celestia how long it lasted. Maybe she could ask other readers of the Mathemagical Monthly how the spell worked. The Mathemagical monthly was a venue for high quality mathematical and magical discussion. While enchanted communicating journals had been around for a while, the publication took it a step further. Behind all the articles there was a comment section. A range of leading scholars were sent Expert versions, where anything they wrote would be copied to all the other journals for everypony else to see. Having written several articles for them, Twilight of course had access to the Expert version. Twilight wrote up a short description of how to cast the spell, and what it seemed to do. Asking if anyone else knew more (or could investigate) how it worked. She checked over the note for spelling errors before carefully copying it into her copy of the latest issue of the Mathemagical Monthly journal. A few seconds later a magical glow indicated it had been copied into every issue across Equestria. Actually, now might be a good time to do some more experiments on that spell herself, while she waited for replies. The best way to start would probably be to cast it on somepony with a thaumospectroscope running in the background. Maybe she would take a few other measurements as well. Twilight started pulling several complicated looking pieces of equipment out of cardboard boxes in the basement. The journal vibrated slightly. That was quick. Somepony in Vanhoofer had already tested the spell and written up a few ideas about how it might work. Professor Thaumic Line had a theory that the spell would take more energy to cast on Earth ponies than on Pegesi or Unicorns, on account of having to conjure both wings and a horn. He proposed an experiment whereby he would cast the spell on 100 ponies of each race, and measure the magic used. Celestia had managed to cancel court for a week, and had ordered the royal chariot to be readied. She was going to visit Ponyville to see the newest Alicorn. And explain the basics of Alicorn magic, abilities and Twilights position as Equestria's newest princess. Celestia pondered. For nearly 1000 years she had been the only Alicorn in Equestria, and then just a few decades ago Cadence had ascended. Just two years ago her own sister had finally returned from the moon, and now Twilight had ascended as well. Alicorns were certainly arriving thick and fast these days. Celestia wondered how Equestria would change in the centuries hence, with so many Alicorns. Four of them, and given the way things were going, there seemed like a distinct possibility of more. Maybe Shining Armour would make a good Alicorn in a few years... Berry Cherry came into the library. "Hey Berry," Twilight asked, "could I cast that wings and horn spell on you while I take some measurements with this equipment here?" "I know you said it was dangerous to fly on conjured wings, but yours have lasted till today, haven't they? You didn't cast the spell again? And I'll fly low and only over Ponyville lake. Please. PLEEEASE. Can I?" Pleaded Berry. "Um, I suppose so" hesitated Twilight, "So long as you actually fly low." "I'd bring a towel if I were you" she remarked. Twilight turned on several pieces of equipment. Dials started spinning, something started beeping, and several pens started drawing tracks on paper. Twilight cast the spell and Berry Cherry once disappeared into the spell like usual. Princess Celestia hadn't sent any warning of her arrival ahead through spike. A surprise visit was always the best way to see what was actually happening. As Celestia got close to Ponyville, a strange cherry red light appeared in the sky. Briefly perplexed, Celestia watched the ball of light descend to form a mare with wings and a horn. Had Twilight really ascended another pony, after only two days of being an Alicorn herself, without even consulting her for advice? Who even was this mysterious new Alicorn? Professor Thaumic Line had managed to get his experiment set up pretty quickly, all things considered. He had a chalk board with "ponies of all races needed to test temporary wings and horn spell. 10 bits per participant" on the sidewalk. He had an assistant taking down the ponies weight, height, age, name, race and cutie mark. As well as giving the warning about not flying on conjured wings. While he tested magic levels and cast the new spell himself, recording the energy use as he did. He had even nipped down to the photocopier room, and made 400 slips of paper with the spell formula on it. Participants liked to know what had been cast on them and most ponies couldn't remember a whole spell formula from one glance. Thaumic Line's office was near the centre of the Manehatten university campus. There were always plenty of students around looking to earn a few bits, or for the novelty of having a fun and unusual spell cast on them. There was a fair bit of giggling from a couple of the unicorn students in the queue. He suspected they were only here to learn this new spell and prank their friends with it. Never mind. Let the students have their harmless fun. It wasn't like he could tell them off just for giggling. He should have finished gathering all of his data by tomorrow mid morning if he kept this pace up. He had heard legends of course of a strange world of bipedal apes that lived on the other side of the mirror. A world where researchers had to wrestle with red tape for months before they could begin the simplest experiment. He was very glad he didn't live in that world, if the rumours were true it was a wonder any if research got done at all. Celestia's chariot landed in Ponyville and she stepped out towards this strange new Alicorn. Celestia was surprised certainly, but she had much experience in falling back on regal formalities whatever her emotional state. And the formalities here said to ... "Greetings to Equestria's newest princess " Celestia bowed with reverence. "May I enquire as to your name?". "My N-Name is Berry Cherry, and I'm n-not a p-princess" came a hesitant reply. Twilight left the library to see Celestia ... CELESTIA of all ponies bowing to Berry Cherry. Twilight's muzzle scraped the ground in a bow. "Princess Celestia, How good to see you, what are you doing here, I haven't even got ready for you, checklist. I checklist ... "Twilight panicked. Celestia knew where she was with panicking students. "Princess Twilight Sparkle and Princess Berry Cherry. " She calmly stated despite her swirling emotions under the surface "Lets have a cup of tea and sit in the library, we have much to discuss."