Myths and Birthrights: The Archive

Myths and Birthrights

By Tundara

Part One: Awakening and Arrivals

Chapter Five: The Morning After

The first thing Twilight became aware of was the headache. It was larger than the entire Canterlot Royal Archives and the Manehattan Regional library combined. Groaning about the roaches scuttling between the floorboards, Twilight rolled off her bed and onto an equally pained Luna. The Princess of the Moon let out a thousand year old oath as Twilight fell on her.

“P-princess Luna?” Twilight stuttered, her thoughts too muddled with pain, sleep, and the last lingering traces of Moonshine Wine. “What... How... Where did,” Twilight’s voice hitched as a particularly strong throb of pain struck and Twilight found her stomach making an unpleasant series of twists and knots.

Holding back a cry, Twilight turned and dashed into the bathroom, where she proceeded to empty what little contents her stomach held into the waiting toilet. Twilight hovered over the porcelain seat for what felt like hours, sparkling mane streaming into her eyes and a dull wet sheen of sweat making her coat feel terrible. When her insides finally stopped rebelling, Twilight slipped into the shower and washed away the feeling of dirt and shame.

As she stood in the shower, her mind wandered back to the previous day and evening. It all seemed like a dream. She wouldn’t have believed that any of the events had happened, if not for the wings. The corner of Twilight’s face twitch with annoyance as a wing lashed out and knocked all her shampoos and conditioners off a ledge.

It was going to take some time getting used to having two new appendages, Twilight knew, but that didn’t stop her from groaning every time a wing did something she didn’t intend. At least her magic hadn’t changed... Except her pool had gotten bigger.

“Huh?” Twilight muttered her eyes closed as she lathered her mane, as the realization about her magic pool struck her.

Being able to sense and ‘see’ your magic pool was crucial and second nature to most magical creatures. It was just smart and good management for unicorns to keep tabs on their magical reserves. The most basic lessons in magical kindergarten were learning to see the magic pool and avoid magical exhaustion. Twilight was in the habit of checking her reserves every time she closed her eyes. With the headache and the few fragments of memory floating up in her thoughts, Twilight expected her magic pool to have been around the seventy percent mark. Instead, she couldn’t even see a bottom to her pool.

No, Twilight corrected, it wasn’t that her pool had no bottom; rather it connected to other pools through spidery threads. Along the threads Twilight could feel the ebb and flow of magic as it flowed both to and from her pool. Biting on her lower lip, Twilight took one of the thickest threads and began to follow it. After a few moments lights began to spring up from a backdrop of endless black. Through both sets of vision, gazing on her pool, and her new Alicorn senses, Twilight could see the threads connecting to the stars.

Mistress, you’re back, came the jubilant call of hundreds of voices.

Twilight flicked an ear and ‘looked’, her eyes still closed to avoid getting shampoo in them, towards the source of the voices. High above Twilight could sense dozens of stars watching her. The sensation made her skin crawl a little.

“Gah, do you girls have no sense of privacy?” Twilight snapped, her eyes opening. “Ow!” Twilight slammed her eyes closed again as shampoo stung her vision.

We were worried, admitted Polaris. We knew you arrived there just fine, but got concerned you might overshoot your return.

You mean ‘you’, Hun, laughed Brachium, You should have seen Polaris, Mistress. She was all, ‘Oh dear and woe is us, we gone and done it now. She ain’t our mistress more than five minutes and we be catapulting her across time.’

Twilight could see through her closed eyes, the roof of her home, and blue morning sky, Polaris take on a deep pink blush.

I said nothing like that. Polaris pouted, the star wriggling back and forth a little like a foal with her hoof caught in the cookie jar.

Uh-huh, no, you were far worse. I thought we’d have to get Sirius to calm you down, honey, ‘scept she’s off Moon knows where.

Twilight ears perked up, flicking a little spray of water.

“What do you mean? Sirius is missing?” The first hint of panic was already creeping into her voice. Only one thought circulated in her head, ‘I’ve already lost one of the stars, and she’s the brightest star of them all! I am the worst Alicorn ever.’

You’re not the worst alicorn ever. Regulus scoffed. That honour goes to—

Ah, ah, ah, spoilers! That’s between the mistress and—

A sharp knock on the door, followed by Luna’s voice, brought Twilight back down to Equestria with a whump, landing in a soggy mess in the bottom of the shower.

“Twilight, are you alright in there? I heard you talking to somepony.”

“Um, yeah,” Twilight called through the door as she stepped out of the shower, grabbing a towel with her magic. “I was just talking with a few of the stars.”

Luna was silent for a few moments, than asked carefully, “They were still awake?”

“Yes?” Twilight hesitantly replied, then turned her attention back to the stars, “You were awake, right?”

Some of us are always awake, just as night shrouds half the sky at all times. Polaris hedged. But if you mean were those whom just greeted you awake, no, we were sleeping.

And quite soundly at that, might I add, snorted Regulus, the star gaining a chorus of agreement and support from her sisters. If there is nothing more, I would love to get some sleep. The sun can get rather cranky, especially with the stunt we pulled yesterday. Best to let her calm down some.

“Twilight?”

“Um, yes, sorry, just talking to the stars,” Twilight giggled, liking the sound of those words.

Talking to the stars, her stars. She wasn’t so sure how it worked. Each was clearly an individual, with her own thoughts and motives, yet tied to her. Twilight would ask Luna and Celestia about it when she got a chance. They were both tied to the moon and sun respectively; maybe they could give her some more guidance. Luna had given her a little bit, then the whole Wish thing had happened and... Twilight knitted her brows together trying to think about the previous evening as she swung the door open.

Calling it a fuzzy blur was an understatement. She could clearly remember hearing Celestia’s voice echoing among the stars, then a rush followed by a fall, waking in a tent, and then... the most wonderful taste. But events quickly grew disheveled and confused. For instance, Twilight kept thinking that Celestia had spent the evening talking in middle equestrian, which was foolish. Luna had spoken in middle equestrian for a while after her return, but three years of speech therapy and living among modern ponies had softened her archaic vocabulary and syntax.

Twilight came out of her thought as she looked on the Princess of the Night. Luna had a thin smile touching her lips, like she knew something that Twilight didn’t. Which was more than true, Twilight internally grumbled. Luna was two thousand years old, counting her exile, and knew many things Twilight could barely begin to comprehend.

What really bothered Twilight was how spry and refreshed Luna looked. Twilight could swear that Luna had been there with that wonderful, wonderful drink. She had no right to look so pleasant when Twilight felt like another anvil had just landed on her head.

Twilight opened her mouth to say as much, then snapped it shut before asking instead, “Luna, I don’t understand. If I am the Stars, then why are each also individuals?”

“Didn’t we explain this last night?” Luna tilted her head to one said, a perplexed frown on her face for a moment before it was broken by a light laugh. “No, I believe we were well into the third bottle of Moonshine Wine by that point.

"Think of yourself not so much ‘the Stars’ themselves, but rather as their caretaker. They are part of you yes, and you them, but you are also separate as well. The sun and moon existed long before either Celestia or I, but both said they felt completed and whole after our births. I don’t think there is a good way to explain it, but it is something that I am sure you can already feel on an instinctual level.”

Twilight thought over Luna’s explanation, and knew it was right. It’d be nearly impossible to explain to the girls, you had to experience it. ‘Maybe this is what a Hydra feels like,’ Twilight thought with a slight chuckle, ‘a Hydra with over six thousand heads.’ Except, Twilight was in charge and responsible for the stars, while each head of a Hydra was theoretically equal. No pony was certain as studying Hydras wasn’t something any pony had thought to do in a long time. The last pony to try didn’t survive long enough to share her findings.

Pushing the thoughts back to be analyzed later, Twilight followed Luna out into the library’s main room. There they found over a dozen ponies strewn about in sleeping bags or on couches and cushions. All Twilight’s friends, family, the CMC, and a pony Twilight vaguely recalled from Canterlot were in various states of sleep. A couple blinked open sleep encrusted eyes, while others, namely Pinkie Pie, lay on their backs, legs splayed and snoring softly.

“Twilight, you’re awake,” Cadence stated with a smile from where she lay, a wing wrapped around  small sleeping bundle, then to Luna she added in a slightly cold tone, “Good morning, mother.”

“Morning, heart of my night,” Luna responded, her voice both hurt and hopeful, but was cut short as Cadence gave her head a sharp shake and disapproving not-glare to Luna.

The tension between the two princesses hung like mist clinging in the air. Cadence had been a constant in Twilight’s life, almost like another mother, and Twilight knew her to have a gentle and forgiving spirit. What had happened to cause Cadence to be unable to forgive her own mother? Then again, maybe it as better Twilight didn’t know. Nightmare Moon had been brushed out of history for a reason. Though it did make Twilight ponder what other events or ponies had been deliberately hidden or altered by Celestia and Cadence.

Clearing her throat, Luna brought Twilight out of her thoughts, asking, “Who do you have there?”

Twilight was startled to see and feel the glowing energy beside Cadence. It felt similar to the two princesses, but unrefined or undirected. Hunting and seeking a purpose it knew was almost within its grasp but would slip through its hooves if it tried to grab a hold. Gingerly, Cadence withdrew her wing, and Twilight got her first look at Tyr. Twilight’s mouth fell open, and if it had been possible, or if she was Pinkie, it would have hit the floor and bounced beneath a bookshelf.

“So, they are fillies?” Luna asked, her proud voice making other ponies stir. “Or is it just this one? I do not feel the presence of the other two, so?”

“Auntie Tia has gone back to Canterlot to see if she can locate the others, and that smoke-thing that attacked the two of you,” Cadence said, her wing again covering Tyr.

“’Others’? Who or what are you talking about?” Twilight tried to keep her voice down, but still managed to disturb Fluttershy and Applejack.

“Whatever y’all are jabbering about, could you keep it down? Some ponies are trying to sleep.” Applejack rolled over as she grumbled, throwing a hoof over Fluttershy’s withers before pulling the startled Pegasus close like she was a stuffed toy. Fluttershy gave a little whimper, but didn’t struggle against Applejack. After a couple moments, Applejack’s head shot up, “Hey, wait, yer back?”

Twilight quickly found a pair of powerful legs wrapped around her neck.

“Landsakes, where’d you two go off to? Pinkie and Cadence told us about that smoke-thing, and how Peewee saved y’all, then Celestia said you had to go somewhere or some such.” Applejack gave Twilight a single tight squeeze, before pushing the alicorn back a little to get a good look at her. “Wow Twi,” Applejack breathed, her eyes fixated on Twilight’s mane, occasionally flickering to Twilight’s new wings. “I don’t think I really believed it till now. You really are an Alicorn and Princess.”

Before Twilight could fully form a response, the most obvious being, ‘Yes, now please let me have some space,’ Twilight felt three more bodies wrap themselves around her as excited voices began demanding answers or just babbling. Loudest of the four was Pinkie Pie.

“Oh, wowie! This is so neat. I knew it was going to be neat, but this is like super-duper-extra neat-o-rific! Ooo, your mane is so sparkly. Twilight Sparkle with the sparkling mane, Heh, he, he.” Pinkie’s voice dropped in pitch as the party pony dunked her head into Twilight’s mane. “This is like swimming in spearmint!” Pinkie giggled, pulling her head from Twilight’s mane.

Cheeks burning a deep red, Twilight tried to calm her friends while fighting for breath. She wondered for a moment if it was possible for an alicorn to suffocate. It certainly must be possible. She had flesh and bones, had to sleep still, and all the rest, so she certainly needed to breath.

“Girls, um, girls, I think your crushing her,” Fluttershy murmured, poking both Applejack and Pinkie on the flank in an attempt to gain their attention.

Sighing, Luna’s horn lit with magic, the four mares that had piled atop Twilight lifting up in a soft silvery-blue glow. Eyes spinning, Twilight choked out a brief ‘thank you’, before climbing back to her hooves and giving each of her friends a more sedate hug. With all the commotion, everypony had woken, and Twilight found herself in her brother’s hooves, then her fathers, and then she was in front of Velvet.

“Mother,” Twilight said stiffly. Thoughts drifting back to the hazy events of the previous night, or the night a thousand years ago depending on point of view, and watching Celestia and Luna make amends, Twilight felt much of the sharp anger burning in her breast fade a little. She was still hurt, but her body didn’t tense and she managed to lean forward and give Velvet an awkward embrace. She didn’t know if things could go back to the way they had been, but Twilight knew better than to hold onto that anger and pain.

“I’m sorry I can’t tell you the things you wish to know,” Velvet whispered as she gently stroked Twilight’s mane in the same manner as when Twilight had been a filly and had crawled into Velvet’s lap after a bad dream.

“It’s okay, I think I understand,” Twilight responded, tears pooling in her eyes but not running down her cheeks. “I mean, a Geas is a pretty extreme measure, and I think I am madder that I can’t really be mad because of it.”

For a few moments Velvet’s mouth opened and closed like a fish gasping on a dock. Giving up on trying to word what she wanted to say, Velvet gave Twilight another hug, then said, “I never wanted to see you hurt, my little star. Though, I guess you aren’t just my little star now, are you?”

“Well, from what I gather I’m not really—“

“Yeah, yeah, mystical alicorn stuff,” Dash interrupted, waving a dismissive hoof before jabbing Twilight in the chest. “Okay, spread ‘em. I want to see what we’re going to be working with.”

Twilight blinked a couple times, and thought she did rather well when she came out with a very intelligent response of, “Huh?”

“Your wings. As your best friend I claim rights and dibsies on teaching you how to fly.” Dash puffed out her chest, then a momentary look of worry crossed her face. “You didn’t get magical knowledge of how to fly, did you?”

“I... uh, I’m not sure?” Twilight offered, rubbing the back of her head while she looked to Cadence and Luna.

“Don’t look at me,” Cadence said with a half-grin, “I was raised as a Pegasus. Even then my mother was having me tutored in the other races magic, even if I couldn’t use them yet.”

Blushing furiously, though it was hard to see with her dark coat, Luna said, “I wasn’t exactly in what one could call a good frame of mind at the time. To answer your question; no, you don’t gain sudden magical knowledge of all your magic. Much like I’ve been teaching you how to access and use your Alicorn Awareness, you’ll have to learn how to use Earth and Pegasi magic. You’ve progressed remarkably fast so far. I never expected you to answer a Wish on your first night and take us back in time a thousand years. That was a pleasant surprise.”

“Wait,” Spike piped up from where he and the Cutie Mark Crusaders sat. “You went back in time a thousand years?”

There was a general murmur of surprise and confusion from the gathered ponies, and a few awed gasps from the younger ponies. It was Twilight’s turn to blush as she grumbled, “I wasn’t trying to answer it or anything. I just heard it, got curious, and one thing lead to another.”

“You can answer Wishes?” three voice filled with innocent hope said as one.

Twilight’s eyes grew wide as the three crusaders appeared directly in front of her and grinning up at her with the broadest smiles imaginable. Pinkie Pie would have had difficulty wearing a smile like the ones the crusaders sent up at Twilight. And the eyes! They were like six obsidian orbs that spoke and pleaded without the need of sound. Twilight felt a stab of absolutely wretchedness, and she had yet to crush their young hope.

Thankfully, she was saved having to be the one to destroy the crusaders’ unspoken idea by Luna.

“I’m afraid Wishes don’t work in the way you believe. You’d have to wish upon a falling star. Then your need or desire would have to be strong enough that the other stars could hear it. And then a star, or stars, would have to take it and hold onto your wish until they shared it with Twilight. I only ever granted four wishes during the many centuries that I watched over the stars.”

Twilight took back her silent thanks to Luna a moment later as the full weight and guilt of the crusaders’ crushed ideas crashed into her.

“You mean you can’t grant us our wish to have our cutie marks?” Sweetie Belle sniffled.

‘Those three should be classified as non-lethal weapons,’ Twilight thought to herself as she prepared to support Luna.

Again, she was saved through timely intervention.

“Now, girls, what have Applejack and I told you time and time again?” Rarity gave her sister a long disapproving glower.

“We’ll get our marks eventually, we just have to be patient,” the three intoned together.

“That’s right. Ain’t nothing that can make a cutie mark come before it’s time.”

“Besides, trying to force a wish can be very dangerous.” Luna said, her tone terse and grave. “I tried to force a wish once. The results were corrupted and twisted.”

“Okay, forcing wishes are bad.” Dash interjected, rolling a hoof in a ‘let’s get this going’ motion, “Now, Twilight, can you please spread your wings?”

“Alright, fine, if it makes you happy Dash.”

It took Twilight several attempts to figure out how to move the new muscles. Her wings kept twitching or shooting out to then flump onto the floor. Eyes scrunched shut, Twilight finally heard the gathered ponies gasp as she flared her new wings. Twilight herself didn’t look, too afraid that if she did she’d lose control again. Similarly it took her a few false attempts to close her wings again.

“Okay, yeah, that is a lot of wing to work with,” Dash said, her eyes already going distant as dreams and images of racing one of her best friends danced in her head.

“’A lot to work with’? Dash, those wings are simply, and you will all have to forgive me here, but they are divine. Why, the way they flow, and the shading of the tips.” It was Rarity’s turn to descend into her imagination as dresses, fabrics, and colour schemes began to take shape before her vision.

“So, does this mean you’re a princess now, Twilight?” Apple Bloom asked, her question sending a stab of panic deep into Twilight’s already anxious chest.

Twilight was going to deny it on the spot. Her? A Princess? That was a ludicrous notion if ever she had heard one. She knew hardly anything about the law or Equestria’s government, despite spending half her life living in the palace as Celestia’s protégé. All her training had been in magic, theoretical magic, controlling magic, and the history of magic. Sure, she was a voracious reader, but even Twilight found reading the tomes on law to be duller than watching paint dry.

Beyond that, Equestria was a Diarchy, which meant it had two rulers. Cadence wasn’t strictly speaking a princess of Equestria, but rather the small princessipality of the Crystal City and its few outlying towns and villages. In practice, it acted like a province of Equestria, the close ties between Cadence and Celestia, not to mention Cadence spending the bulk of her time in Canterlot and not the land she technically ruled, only further muddied perceptions. The Crystal City didn’t even have any ambassadors in Canterlot. Why bother when the head of ‘state’ spent all but one week in the year in Equestria’s capitol?

Before Luna’s return, Twilight had sometimes wondered why Equestria was called a diarchy when it was ruled by only a single princess. She had thought the question answered when she’d uncovered the legend of Nightmare Moon. Just another technical hold-over from a bygone time.

All these thoughts rampaged across Twilight’s mind in the blink of an eye, and she was still beaten to the kick, though not in the manner she expected.

“Why would she want to be a princess? She’s a Goddess.” Tyr’s small head poked out from beneath Cadence’s wing, a perplexed look pinching her brows.

“That is precisely why it is better to be a princess.” Cadence chuckled. “Even as a Princess, ponies will pray to you. In the last few minutes I’ve heard almost a dozen prayers in my name asking for blessings in a pony’s love life. Imagine how many more that would be if I was the Goddess Cadence, rather than just Princess Cadence.”

“Wait, are you saying every time we say your name you can hear us?” Comet Chaser asked, looking a little green as his mind invariably went back to every time he’d used one of the princesses names, some in rather compromising situations.

“Not precisely. And not just hear, but also see. But it has to be a prayer. You can say our names until you’re blue in the face and it won’t do anything. But if you pray, then we can ‘look in’ and listen briefly to the pony.”

“Twilight, did you know about this?” Rarity asked, a tremor of concern in her voice.

“Well, yeah,” Twilight blinked a few times, taken aback by the frightened and scandalized looks all her friends and father were giving her. “It was one of my first lessons with Celestia, I, uh, had a habit of praying while studying. Celestia described it as ‘distracting’ and ‘cute’.” Her cheeks burning hot enough that water would vanish on contact, Twilight quickly said, “Celestia taught me to only pray if I was in trouble.”

“It was the same when I used to foalsit you,” Cadence said, a mischievous twinkle in her eyes. “The difference, however, is what we can do about prayers.”

“Come again? Ain’t a prayer a prayer?”

“Yes,” Luna chuckled. “But remember there are three types of Alicorn, much as there are three types of pony.”

“I’m getting so confused right now,” Applejack muttered, rubbing her temples with her hooves. “What do you mean there are three types of Alicorn?”

“You didn’t know?” Luna arched a brow following it with a sigh. “Now I’m starting to get who knows what confused. I have an idea. Twilight, you should explain what you’ve learned to your friends.”

Twilight face brightened considerably at the prospect of giving a lecture. It was not a look shared by her friends.

“Okay, well, you know that Celestia and Luna are the Sun and Moon, respectively, I am the Stars and Cadence is Love, right?” Slow nods. “Well, we,” here Twilight indicated Luna and herself, “Are Physical Alicorns. It means we govern and are bound to something in the world itself. Cadence is an Emotional Alicorn. She is tied into the emotional field created by ponies and other sapient life. Love isn’t a thing like the sun, moon, or stars, but it is a real force or energy present in the world. Just being near Cadence causes the love you feel to be stronger, which in turn makes her more powerful, as the more love there is the stronger Cadence becomes. It creates a positive feed-back loop of sorts. Cadence has lived so long in Canterlot that it’s a little surprising the Changelings didn’t attack the city sooner.

“Now, if you pray to Cadence, the prayer has to be in some way about Love, and if it is she can exert an amount of influence on the pony or ponies praying. This is different with Physicals. We can see and listen in, but since our powers are tied directly into something that actually exists, there isn’t a whole lot we could do other than show up. Understand?”

Applejack and the other Elements of Harmony all shared a long considering look, then as one shook their heads.  Giving an exasperated snort, Twilight tried to think of a new way to explain it to her friends. Rainbow Dash waved her off, the Pegasus giving a little chuckle.

“I think we all get it that if we ‘pray’ to you, you’ll be able to spy and eavesdrop on us.”

“Oh my, and if everypony always thought of you as a Goddess, and they could get your attention with prayers... How does Celestia manage with so many ponies praying to her every day?” Fluttershy gave a sympathetic shiver as she thought about hearing the voices of hundreds or thousands of ponies all the time.

Luna gave a light chuckle. “You learn to tune it out and listen for the important voices, like Twilight’s or those of the Elements of Harmony.”

“There’s something else I been meaning to ask,” Applejack shifted uncomfortably. “Pinkie told us all about that smoke thing—.”

“Puff the Smokey Alicorn,” Pinkie interjected a knowing grin on her face.

“And how it almost got Twilight yesterday,” Applejack continued without even looking at her friend, used to Pinkie’s ways.” But why’d it run off when Peewee attacked it, and what did it want?”

“I-uh, don’t know,” Twilight admitted, shifting her attention to Luna, hoping for an answer herself.

“This is conjecture, but I believe it has to do with the nature of the... Puff the Smokey Alicorn,” Luna said, her voice faltering for a moment as she received a significant look from Pinkie. “Phoenixes are closely attuned to the sun, just like a Stellar Beast such as an Ursa Minor is attuned to the stars or the Werefolk are to the moon.”

“Werefolk? As in Werewolves? Like in Daring Do and the Temple of the Moon?”

“Yes, exactly like in that piece of pulp fiction,” Luna deadpanned, staring down an almost prancing with excitement Rainbow Dash. Gesturing to where Peewee and Owlowiscious sat watching the group of ponies, Luna continued, “Moving on, given that Peewee managed to drive away Puff, I’d wager the smoke is attuned to either moon or star magic, most likely the later given Puff’s interest in Twilight. She’ll be like a beacon to creatures and monsters attuned to star magic.”

“More of them will come looking for me?” Twilight gulped. Her mind drifted back to the Ursa Minor and the damage its short rampage had caused to the small town. She could sometime still hear its roars or smell its fetid breath when she closed her eyes to go to sleep. It had always amazed her how easily she had managed to calm and contain the beast. Now she knew at least partially why.

“Some might,” Cadence laughed, “When I first Awakened a group of Nymphs came out of the Everfree to find me.”

That caused a short spat of laughter among the adults who were aware of Nymphs and the kind of ‘love’ they followed. The youngsters all just looked at the adults like they were a bit mad.

A little perturbed that her question about Twilight being a princess still hadn’t really been answered, Apple Bloom repeated it.

“Well, that is up to Twilight,” Cadence laughed, her clear voice making the assembled ponies smile as a wave of warmth washed over them. Shining slid a little closer to his wife, gently nuzzling her while Comet threw a leg around Velvet and pulled her tight against his chest. “Auntie and I have been getting things ready just in case. I believe the coronation could be held as early as next week.”

Twilight sat considering everything. Her life, her future, what ponies would expect from her as an Alicorn, all of it circled through her thoughts. There would be confusion and worry by many almost certainly. In many ways, being a princess would solve a lot of problems, and Twilight couldn’t deny that a part of her had always dreamed and wanted to be a princess. But now the possibility wasn’t just real, it was staring her in the face, Twilight felt a hitch of uncertainty in her belly.

Either way, everything was ending. It would be impossible to go on living the life of a simple country librarian who on occasion went out and saved the nation or world. Even her title as Countess of the Everfree paled in comparison to the offer before her. The nobles wouldn’t be able to ignore her any longer. But that was true regardless. She was in some manner related to Princess Celestia and Princess Luna, either as a sister or as a cousin, if she understood Luna correctly from their brief conversation on the subject before Twilight had noticed the Wish.

They could attempt to hide the truth, but all it would take would be a single slip by Twilight and it would all come crashing down. A cover story about the stars’ display had probably already been prepared, assuming Celestia had anticipated the stars gathering above Ponyville in broad daylight. On top of that was the tiny issue that Twilight wouldn’t age. Eventually, she’d have to leave Ponyville, and a part of her asked, ‘Why postpone and fight the inevitable when it is something you’ve always wanted’?

“Yes, Apple Bloom,” Twilight said, lowering herself so she was eye to eye with the young farm filly. “I’m going to be a Princess.”