inconvenient infatuations
Twilight Sparkle.
Almost universally loved, a beacon of moonlight on the darkest of days. A scholar by nature. She was drawn to what she did not understand. Knowledge, and sometimes lack thereof, fueled her choices and her ambitions.
Fancy Pants seemed to think he understood everything. It got on her nerves more than anything.
"Princess," he started, in that measured tone that he always did.
They'd met in one of the private conference rooms to discuss arrangements for a charity ball. All proceeds would go towards funding for Equestrian schools, and Twilight was very passionate about everything being just right.
Normally, she would've called Minuette or Pinkie Pie, but high stakes, high society events were his thing, and she'd respect letting him lead the charge.
She just wished he wasn't so fucking annoying about it.
"You can't possibly expect to let the children and their families attend."
"And why not? It's an event for their benefit."
The levelheaded, kind tone had been ditched about half an hour into their session. Not that it mattered, Fancy was more than aware of what Twilight was like behind the crown, having run in the same circles as Shining Armor and Cadance a few years ago.
"The revenue is for the children. The event itself is for high ranking individuals of Canterlot. Unless the children are eating braised, fermented phoenix eggs, they'll be out of place."
Twilight's muzzle contorted in disgust. "They're serving phoenix eggs?"
"Not currently. And they certainly won't be if we let the uncultured little fillies of the public run rampant throughout the castle."
She rolled her eyes. For someone as understanding and charmed by the unrefined mystique of the middle and lower classes, he was often blindly elitist.
"My ball, my rules. The children are invited."
He huffed. "You're being unreasonable. It'll be harder to manage with them there."
His accent scratched an itch in her brain. He was so worked up over this. Something coiled around Twilight's heart and refused to let go as he ran a hoof through his coiffed mane.
"Are you even listening?"
She grinned. "No."
He frowned. "How professional."
A silence settled over them as Fancy cleaned his monocle lens with a handkerchief.
"How's Fleur?"
She didn't know why she asked—she didn't care to know about the mare that lay in her place when she wasn't there.
His wife, she reminded herself.
He met her stare seriously. "She's...ah...good. We're good. Together."
Twilight cleared her throat. "Good."
"...Good."
She couldn't help but stare again. He was nice to look at, even in the most uncomfortable situations.
He stepped closer to her—he wasn't all that much taller with her frequently occuring growth spurts, but she could still look up at him through her lashes.
The poor stallion looked as though he were wrestling with an untamable beast.
He ducked his head down, mouth against her neck. Twilight breathed him in.
"I'll see you at the ball, Princess."
She tried to ground herself as he pulled away, but his absence was dizzying.
Married, married, married.
Her stomach turned. Every moment with him felt like an out of body experience. There was no control with him—she was eating out of his hooves, hopelessly.
Even after the grand doors closed, the alicorn sat alone, collecting her (impure) thoughts.
Fancy Pants.
A stallion of many facets. His opinions never went unheard. Mare and colt alike clung to his every word like sap on trees. The world thrived around his every desire. To be in his presence was an honor. To be in his inner circle, a blessing. The most important pony in Canterlot high society, by far.
It sucked.
When somepony wasn't trying to claw their way into his good graces, they were silently resenting him.
Not that he minded the latter all that much—there was a certain hilarity to watching ponies get worked up over his feigned ignorance and sustained disdain towards them.
It felt like a game, almost.
He stared down at his wife, Fleur de Lis, as she fixated over his tie. Though he was perfectly capable, she insisted on tying it for him at the start of their days.
This too, felt like a game. A mandatory, unskippable cut scene in an unreleased cinema version.
Once, it had been endearing, cute even. His heart would melt at the sight of it, the feel of her magic tickling his neck. He'd inhale her perfume and sway with the hums of her voice.
"Stand still, would you?"
Now he simply grit his teeth. It was no longer an act of service or display of affection. It was a means for control. He hated to be controlled.
"I'm standing as still as I can," he grunted, stepping back. "If it's such a bother, I'm more than capable of tying it myself."
"Nonsense," Fleur asserted, stepping towards him again. "I can't trust you to tie it right."
"I tied my tie just fine before I met you."
She raised a brow, but didn't contest his point.
"You've had me tie it the same way for all eleven years of our marriage. Don't rock the boat now."
To outsiders, Fleur de Lis was the ideal wife. Everyone wanted her, or to be her. Educated, wealthy, stunning. She'd been featured on magazine covers her whole life, and she'd never heard the word 'no.'
In their youth, she was adorably submissive and clingy.
But marriage had hardened her. Like her husband, her voice would not go unheard. Now she buzzed in his ear as though she were a gnat in the sweltering heat of an Equestrian summer.
Fancy conceded. It was either that, or another fight, and he wasn't in the mood.
He made haste in putting as much distance between himself and that vulture as possible while she admired her work.
Fleur all but rolled her eyes as she brushed her mane in front of her vanity. "Will I be seeing you for dinner?"
"Don't expect me. Princess Twilight is having a charity ball to raise scholarship funds for the magic school students."
She nodded curtly. "How kind of her."
"Kind to the recipients, dear. Not to those of us who have to help make it happen."
She hummed idly. He stared at the stranger before him and swallowed the urge to ask when exactly the spark had been snuffed out.
"I'm off."
"Don't bicker with the princess. Again."
He didn't bicker with her. Sure they disagreed when it came to planning elite events, but there was no true animosity.
Princess Twilight (or just Twilight, as she told everyone in the castle to refer to her as, like they were personal friends, or something) fell short of her native Canterlot genes. She was all hoedown and casual outings. It was as if she'd grown up in Ponyville.
Fancy vaguely remembered her in childhood, her older brother and his future wife, only a year younger, running around in his circles, but never getting too personal. She was so starkly different from them that it didn't even register half the time.
The unicorn shook his head. Why was he thinking about it to this extent? He didn't even have to see her for a few more hours.
She'd been in his thoughts frequently, as of late. Be it her laugh, her curious eyes, or her coat, dark flashes of Twilight greeted him behind his eyelids.
Her tears on the days when her emotions couldn't be contained—her vulnerability. The bite in her voice when she thought he was wrong.
The softness of her fur against his hooves; the erratic rise and fall of her chest. The gratitude she expressed as she worked through her first royal panic attack.
Stop it.
Clearing his mind, he tended to his daily rounds as a socialite and let the monotony carry him forward.
The gala was a smashing success—Golden Gavel had organized a wonderfully successful auction. Reluctantly, he forked the proceeds over to the pool for students' tuition. And despite Fancy's initial concerns, the children's joy only livened the atmosphere of the event further.
Twilight had sent him a smirk from all the way across the ballroom, and he couldn't help but smile back, cheeks warm.
As he exited the ballroom (slightly inebriated), a crown appeared in this peripheral.
"That didn't seem all that hard to manage."
The gloating had started. He hated that it only made him smile wider.
"Hush."
"No, I don't think I will. Or would that be too unreasonable of me?"
His heart skipped a beat.
"I suppose you win this round," he said, stopping to face her. She studied his face like she was solving a puzzle. For a mare that never stopped talking, she only ever seemed to keep her thoughts to herself once the formalities were shed.
He stared into her large, amethyst eyes. Completely vexed by the sight of her, Fancy struggled to breathe for a moment or two.
Twilight had always been a rather gorgeous individual—it was hard not to be, with parents like hers. Their lineage only delivered beautiful sons and daughters, and she was no exception. She'd grown from the bookish little filly that dangled off her brother's forelegs and into her own person. Her own, extremely alluring, person.
Her eyes dared him. And he couldn't let her win. Not again.
The stallion leaned down and met her mouth with his own. She grinned and kissed back.
A nagging voice urged him to move, to call it off. But the smell of her sultry citrine perfume kept him tethered to her, led him up to a private castle suite, and discarded any type of self preservation he'd carried prior.
He wanted control, but he wanted to know just how far she could push him just as much.
A breath. A moan. A whimper.
He was far more expressive than she'd imagined. Not that she'd thought about it. That often.
He was on her mind more than what seemed naturally possible.
A kiss to the neck. A bite. Her breath drew in quick.
It felt like an experiment of sorts, drawing conclusions as the night progressed. His mustache scratched against her muzzle. It was surprisingly pleasant.
She wanted to swallow him whole—tongue against tongue and body to body couldn't possibly be enough. Not when his hooves traversed her body like that. Not when he made those noises. Not when he pulled back and looked at her in that way.
It was like he was trying to undress her beyond her skin. Take a peek at her flesh, graze her bones and leave her for dead.
He was so handsome. It would feel corny to admit at any other time, if she weren't so caught up in the feeling of being marveled. Treated like a trophy.
It felt surreal. He licked the side of her face. She didn't flinch away.
She tried to say his name, but all that she could manage was an incoherent whimper that ended with a desperate please.
He obliged, and she did not fight him for control.
But she could only relinquish control for so long.
She stared at the ceiling, listening to his breaths. He was just as awake as she was, all his limbs secluded. Separate from hers.
She rolled over and pressed her mouth to his back, leaving a trail of kisses down his spine. He shuddered.
Twilight's mind was more than clear now. She knew what was a bad idea, and what wasn't. But she wanted this more than she knew anything, and proceeded without caution.
"We're not done."
Her eyes were blazing as he turned to face her.
"Is that so?"
She said nothing.
"Then take the reigns," he continued. "If you can handle it."
When she woke, his limbs were wrapped around her. For heaven's sake, she was being spooned.
He was pleasantly warm—Twilight ran cold by nature. She tried to find a simile for it, but her brain was addled and mushy. She couldn't think. She could only breathe him in.
Part of her wanted to talk, and the rest of her liked being held. She liked how he pressed his chin on top of her head, how he rubbed her back. She vaguely wondered if he'd done this with Fleur de Lis. Jealously coiled in a corner of her stomach.
How was she this attached already? To a stallion she was sure she couldn't stand—a married man—somepony she didn't even know all that well.
But Twilight wanted to know him. She was the ambitious type. She wanted him, and all he had to offer.
Her heart rate picked up as he whispered to her.
"Princess," he said, nervously. Scared to speak freely and shatter the moment.
She knew.
"This... cannot happen again."
"I know." She burrowed into him.
He sighed and pulled her closer.
But it would.