I face-palmed to keep from growling. “Twilight, please pay attention!” She sat at her desk in her Canterlot ivory tower bedroom, caught between tallying receipts, sorting autographed delegate photographs, and trying to choose between the five gowns I had laid on the bed for the dead-dog Summit after-party.
The problem was, Princess Cadance was leaving right now and I needed Twilight to listen. Best case, I'd snag Twilight a copy of her sister-in-law's Grow Crystals spell, which would be awesome and tasty. Worst case, she might ground me for accusing Cadance of having psychological problems. No, worse than that, I wouldn’t be able to go and the Crystal Empire would fall and it would be my fault for not insisting hard enough. “Twilight!” I whined.
“Yes, Spike?” She looked bleary-eyed at me. The pink I-Heart-Princesses coffee mug on the desk had stopped steaming long ago.
I rolled my eyes. “Twilight, can I please go with Cadance to visit the Crystal Faire?”
“Well, she is going to be really busy–”
“And I’m a great assistant, Twilight. You’ve already said you’re going to be hermitting in the Canterlot archives for a week and sleeping in a lot, and I can assist her getting the faire running since you can't.”
“I don’t know. She’s kind of frantic and in a hurry.”
“That’s the point. Let me help her. And, I’m also a hero in the Crystal Empire and this is the one-year anniversary.”
She chuckled. “The real reason–” She raised a hoof to stop me, nodding. “–and a good reason, as your bravery did save the crystal ponies and that makes it important that you help them power up the heart. So… if I say, yes, you’re going to have to behave yourself and be as good as you’ve been these last three days of the summit.”
“I Pinkie Promise.”
She smiled. “I should hope so!” She stood and embraced me. “I remember when you were just hatched and you’ve grown up so much. It’s hard to be away from you. I will miss you.”
“Me, too.” I said. To prevent an argument, I decided not to mention that she smelled like she hadn’t bathed since the summit began, because, well, she hadn’t–since the help Cadance had promised in running the summit had never materialized. I just did not buy the “You’re just so much more competent than I am, Twilight,” remark, considering the it was Cadance who ran an empire. Twilight looked exhausted.
I fidgeted and she let go. “I promise I’ll write,” I said, “Gotta go!” I grabbed my hoofball player hall-of-fame backpack and dashed out the door and ran down the spiral stairs and ran across the courtyard. By this time, I had to put my hands on my knees huffing out of breath, and still had to get through the portcullis, through the ten blocks of downtown Canterlot, and finally to the train depot.
I bounded up the platform stairs just in time to hear a double-blast from the great silver crystal locomotive. With complete disrespect for the law of inertia, the Crystal Empire Special rocketed down the track, the mineral cars gleaming in the late afternoon sun. Within twenty seconds, I saw my last glimpse of the ruby caboose. I glanced at the clock over the ticket booth, and it read 4:47.
“Horse apples!”
A clerk sat behind teller bars, folding schedules. I asked, “Wasn’t that train scheduled for 5PM?”
“PPT,” he said... and answering my glare, added, “Pony Princess Time. They loaded their entourage and departed. Going to have a red-light waiting for the 5:30 out of Ponyville, but someone was in a high dander.”
“Twilight’s sister-in-law.”
A black hoof pushed up glasses to mauve eyes. He blinked, noticing I was a dragon. “Their conductor didn’t count right, I presume?” He was a white earth pony with a black mohawk mane.
“When’s the next train to the Crystal Empire?”
“The next express is at 3.”
“Tonight?”
“Tomorrow afternoon.”
“I have to get there to help with the Crystal Faire.”
“You’re Princess Twilight’s assistant? The one that broke the water main?
“Don’t believe everything you hear,” I said, drumming my fingers.
“Ah, yes.” He busied himself with a half-dozen multifold schedules, writing with a pencil in his mouth on a pad. “If you’re willing to take a sleeper to Horseshoe Bay, you can catch an express there and arrive mid-afternoon. Three trains, starting with the 5:30 Twilight Express.”
I locked eyes with his. He wasn’t making a joke, which is how I found myself woken from a nap past lunch time the next day. A stallion with a Manehatten accent complained bitterly. At first sight, I thought it was Dash, but this one had a yellow mane with a single red stripe. “I have business in the Crystal Empire.”
“Travel CE inbound is restricted today," said a crystal pony wearing the chocolate-brown woolen coat and ushanka worn by the Crystal Empire constabulary. The hat's ear-flaps were folded up. This far north, the snow from Dash's Snowstorm-of-the Century hadn't yet melted. I wiped the sleep from my eyes, watching his nudge blue business-pony out of the car with a hoof. “We have accommodations at a three-star hotel, Cinder's Famous Meal-bag vouchers included.”
“Why did she get to stay?” Brilliant blue pegasus eyes stared through the window at the green earth pony who sat nervously looking out the opposite window from her bench seat.
A hoof tapped lightly, though authoritatively, on my shoulder. “You, too, sir. Please disembark.”
Another crystal pony officer smiled. I smiled. “What?”
“Travel into the Crystal Empire is restricted. You'll be able to continue your journey in two days.”
“But I have to be at the Crystal Faire.”
“That can’t be helped.” Though resembling tasty looking dark purple tourmaline, he looked brawny enough to enforce his orders.
“But—but, I’m Princess Twilight’s assistant, you know, Princess Cadance’s sister-in-law’s assistant?”
“Yes? You still need to—”
“Aw, come on. Do you know who I am? I’m here to help Princess Cadance. I missed the Crystal Empire Special yesterday.”
“That's unfortunate,” the returning officer said, a topaz pony, if anything, more brawny than the first.
“I’m the dragon who saved the Crystal Empire from King Sombra a year ago tomorrow.”
“Yeah, Bowstring, I saw that. That’s him,” the topaz pony said.
“Is he?” Bowstring asked, squinting.
I said, “How many dragons have you seen? And I’m here to help the Crystal Princess, personally.”
Topaz said, “The princess won’t be happy if she’s expecting him.”
“But, our orders—”
“Yeah, and he missed her train. I think we can trust this little guy.”
Bowstring grabbed papers from his saddlebags. “Well, then, put your signature here, Sergeant Shingle. You can be responsible for this decision.”
I gave him two thumbs up as he signed. Ten minutes later, my shock wore off as the train chugged northward through an increasingly snowy wasteland. I hadn’t asked why the Crystal Empire had restricted travel before the guards disembarked. When I walked to the front of the coach and said “Hi!”, the green mare pointedly refused to look away from the window.
I walked forward through the train. Less than a third of the passengers remained. Most where crystal ponies, and four were earth ponies; no pegasi, no unicorns. A straw color stallion with a frizzy white mane read the Manehatten Post Dispatch as I sat next to him.
“So, did anybody tell you why travel is restricted?”
He breathed in deeply and snapped open the business section. “I’m delivering medicines; they weren’t keeping me out, though if I had a choice, I would have turned around.” Another deep breath and magenta eyes regarded me. “No, they did not say.”
An elderly emerald green crystal pony moved up from three rows behind. “You’re Spike, the Brave and Glorious, are you not?”
I smiled, but she wasn’t smiling in return. “In my memory—our memory—it was little more than a year ago that Sombra ruled the empire. Ponies followed his orders, you know. This makes me flash back to those days.” She shuddered.
“They didn’t say why travel was restricted?”
“No. It's a bad omen for tomorrow’s Crystal Faire.”
Nopony on the train knew, including the steward and the conductor. With growing disquiet, I sat silently with a couple dozen other unhappy ponies, listening to the rhythmic clacking of the wheels against the track. Living with Twilight made it easy to forget that most ponies did not like unexpected change and were skittish by nature.
The next surprise happened at the Crystal Empire train station. Police awaited the train, and while they only nodded at the disembarking passengers, when I happened to glance back after having left the station, I realized the train staff were being escorted from the train. Having read the train schedule in my boredom, I knew the Express was not a dead-ender.
Did the train have a mechanical problem? Part of me wanted that, but the part of me that loved The Power Ponies and other comics, and had too much experience with reality mirroring fantasy—thanks to Twilight—began to worry that the Crystal Empire was under some sort of attack. It could explain Cadance’s behavior.
At least I knew where I could get answers.
Both Rarity and I found the city of the crystal ponies fascinating, but for different reasons. She loved sparkle, symmetry, and style, and this had it all. Each building had been carved from quarried quartz and similarly hard semi-precious stones, in many cases out of single enormous crystals, or at the very least a system of interconnected ones. The actual mineral determined if a building was a prism with smooth facets, a collection of cubes, an almost book-like conglomeration of mica sheets, or a round tower-like column. Walking in the afternoon sunlight, I had to shield my eyes walking by a delicatessen beaming ruby light, past the library emitting emerald rays, and around a bank’s blue dappled shadow. The city had a beauty and perfection only possible thanks to nature. For me, walking through the city felt like the closest thing to a dragon supermarket.
The looming pyramidal spire of the Crystal Castle was unlike other structures. Twilight told me engineers had built it from metal and sheathed it in a myriad smaller crystals. It represented all the city and all it’s semi-transparent but very precious ponies. As I entered Circle Way, which surrounded the castle, I found a shockingly small Crystal Faire.
A year ago, Twilight and her friends, together with two-dozen crystal ponies, had constructed a make-shift faire in the better part of a day. The hardest part had been building the tourney stands for jousting, but fortunately I had read a medieval pony knight series of comics and could guide them. What I viewed consisted of school bleachers and chalked lines. A scattering of rag-tag booths barely filled the remaining area. If there would be a petting zoo, I saw no evidence.
So not only hadn’t Cadance helped out with the Grand Equestria Pony Summit, she hadn't promoted the Crystal Faire either. It seemed obvious to me that there was indeed some threat, and the last thing anypony needed was a place for somepony threatening to hide.
As I approached the crystal heart spinning lazily below the castle, I began to wonder if I felt personally threatened. True, it was unlikely a pony could damage a dragon, but it would certainly hurt. The pale turquoise Crystal Heart spun lazily, levitating between two crystal pincers. As I did a 270 around it and headed for the grand palace entrance, I noticed it spun significantly slower than during the Equestria Games.
Two guards stood at attention, but moved their spears to block my way. The left one said, “Sorry, Oh Spike, the Brave and Glorious. You may not pass.” The azurite ponies, with almost matching topaz manes, wore brass armor.
“I’m here to help Cadance— the Princess.”
“Even so.”
I held my arms out, taking in the meager Crystal Faire. “I am certainly no threat.”
“I would not presume to disparage. We have orders, young sir.”
I sighed, adjusting my backpack, which was beginning dig into my hide. “Can you ask the Princess. Twilight sent me to assist her,” I said, raising an eyebrow. Okay, I fudged that a little.
“When we are relieved, or somepony is allowed to pass, I will send word.”
I hissed a word a teenage dragon had taught me during the dragon migration. “I’ll just wander around for—”
“—about an hour,” the guard said and smiled. They raised their spears as I turned away, shaking my head.
I wandered the booths; many looked weathered and familiar from last year. Vendors had salvaged them from the trampling mob after Sombra’s onslaught. An aquamarine mare with a morganite and topaz mane who used a hammer to knock together awning poles for a basket-weaving booth that might have served as a vegetable stall earlier in the week, judging by the smell. I said, “The preparations for the Faire seem pretty meager, not that you aren’t doing a bang-up job.”
She spat the hammer onto a table beside a sheaf of whicker straw. “I suppose the Crystal Princess will bring out the exhibits, fences, and booths she promised after the Equestria Games. She has magic and the palace guard to help. Too bad the stadium is closed for repairs.” She sighed. “It is kind of meager. Not what I imagined.” She opened her mouth, reaching for her hammer.
“Did you know police are restricting travel into the city?”
“Really.” She paused, squinting and looking away as she thought. An errant ray from the setting sun set her mane sparkling. “Hmm, I haven’t seen a pegasus or a unicorn for a while.” She shrugged. “Got to finish before dark.”
Her hammer echoed as I walked into the city. Everypony agreed, Cadance was late with her contribution but would likely make up for it. They also agreed, now that I pointed it out, that they had seen only crystal ponies the last few days.
I sat at a wrought iron table outside a cafe where, for a couple bits, I nursed a warm mug of cinnamon cocoa and grazed a porcelain bowl full of tasty salted crystal chips, probably leftover building materials since gems were nothing special in the empire. Ponies trot by. I sipped and munched.
An azurite guard galloped up. “The Crystal Princess wants to see you at once!”
I smiled and polished a claw on my chest.
However, in the audience hall, Cadance glared down from her throne and said sharply, “What are you doing here?” The way she cocked her eyebrows felt incredibly intimidating.
“I’m here to assist you.”
“Is that the real reason?” She stood and descended, one imposing step at a time. Her nose twitched as she came closer, preceded by her distinctive lavender perfume.
Well, it really wasn’t, but I couldn’t quite tell her that she was acting strangely, kind of like how she was acting, suddenly, again. “I-I- Uh, Twilight sent me—”
“Oh, did she? Perhaps you were enjoying being so indispensable that you thought you could demonstrate it to me, also, to make up for the beginning of the summit?”
“I—No!” I waved a leg nervously in front of me as she stalked to within inches from my face. Her nose twitched again. When I stepped back, she stepped forward.
“Uh, huh. Not just a little bit?” She moved her right eye even closer.
I know she was a princess and all, but this felt incredibly rude. “No. Not at all. What I wanted—”
I couldn’t finish because she inhaled sharply twice and sneezed wetly into my eyes.
I yelled, rolled backwards, and fell, scrabbling to get distance, then wildly wiped my face. “Oh, grody!”
And she stepped close again. “Well. Guess I’m allergic.” As I shrank away and my sight cleared again, she added, “Just in case, an anti-contagion spell.” She pointed her horn, which now glowed the same pale turquoise as her cutie mark, and I found myself encased in a momentary aura. I shivered with a sudden chill.
“Thanks, I think.”
“Uh-huh. ‘I really did want to help, but…’”
“Yes, but—”
I blinked. We were completely alone. “Where’s Shining Armor?” The pair were inseparable, or had been. She had attended the Summit alone; Shining would certainly have wanted the opportunity to also visit his parents. Another oddity.
She blinked, her eyebrows wrinkled in unexpected consternation. “In Griffonstone, on an economic mission. You wanted blah-blah, but…?”
Though she displayed Queen Chrysalis' predatory grin, her magic had been a proper turquoise, not dark green; she wasn’t a changeling. Her violet eyes burned into me. I sputtered, “It was that spell you did. Growing crystals. I wanted to be helpful so that you’d consider teaching Twilight.”
“Ah, dragon greed?” She turned away. “Doesn’t matter. It’s going to take time to convince me that you’ve matured enough to help in my empire—after nearly drowning me thanks of your lack of self-control.”
Oh, and there was the rub, wasn’t it? She saw I had stopped the trimming of the trees. She had seen that I had stopped the repair of the water main. If Cadance had been aware of the public works as Twilight had apparently been, since both had been on the summit planning schedule thanks to Fancy Pants having made it part of the Canterlot's summit planning, why hadn’t Cadance intervened? And now that I thought about it, why hadn’t she stepped in to mediate the disputes instead of letting ponies visit Twilight’s ivory tower? It suddenly seemed suspicious that the trees had fallen just right to break the water main. They could have fallen any direction but in. Any direction…
I made fists and squared my back. “Why haven’t you completed preparations for the Crystal Faire, if you don’t need assistance?”
She froze , shivering with anger. Even facing away, I saw her jaw tense. In a near whisper, she said, “That's. My. Decision.”
My feet turned icy. Twilight would be pissed if I were wrong, but Cadance’s answers didn't add up. “Why did you prevent pegasi and unicorns from traveling into the Crystal Empire?”
She turned. For an instant her glare could have melted lead. She might have burst into pink flames and it would not have surprised me. The next instant, the anger and tension disappeared. She said levelly, and arguably in a more frightening manner, “I am the Princess and you are nothing.”
Cadance might be strong-willed, sometimes shrill if contradicted, but she never put anypony down. I backed up quickly. “Okay. I think… I think I’m going to go write something.”
She smiled… evilly. “You go do that. Ask Twilight what she thinks, but don’t expect sympathy from her in this.”
Oookay. I thought about my rapid packing and wasn’t sure if I had brought writing supplies.
Before I could open my mouth, Cadance added, “The royal scriptorium is two floors down. Rear exit behind the throne to the stairs, left at the bottom and it’s the third door.” She ascended the thrown and sat.
I could take a hint.
As I found the crystal staircase, I heard Cadance clop loudly twice and heard the rattle of metal plate armor. I swiftly descended and found the door open to the scriptorium. Every thing from white note paper to golden parchment and scrolls lined the shelves. A half-dozen standing desks sat by the windows through which streamed moonlight. Pens, red and black ink, blotters, and drying sand filled bowls and jars. Gold gilt manuscripts covered the wall with the pride of the scribes. As I walked to the back to shake up a lantern of glow bugs, I heard rapid hoof beats outside. What?
The door slammed in my face. A key snicked in the lock, and no pushing the curlicue lever opened it.
I smiled.
“Good try, Princess Crazy Pants.” I opened an inkwell and swiftly penned a letter to Celestia, detailing everything. I even demonstrated my maturity by not giving my opinions or conclusions. The evidence spoke for itself. I found some sealing wax, ribbon, and a bureaucratic heart-shape seal.
Time to melt the wax.
I inhaled... and blew smoke. Smoke?
Each try, smoke. It was lighting the Equestria Games torch all over again!
In fact, my throat felt cold.
The same cold I felt when Cadance cast her anti-contagion spell. Because she absolutely had to sneeze on me, didn’t she? And then hadn’t sneezed again.
She'd done it on purpose. “Oh, come on!”
Which meant she planned to make sure I couldn’t send letters, then got me mad enough that I would go to write one despite fearing what Twilight might think. Which meant—
She kept pegasi from entering the Crystal Empire because they could fly back and warn ponies if something happened. She had made sure Twilight would change her mind about attending the Crystal Faire.
So why wasn't she promoting the event if she was hogging the spotlight? That one stumped me, big time. Deep down it felt wrong, as wrong as Shining being missing, too.
I had to escape. One look out the window gave me vertigo. Then I thought of the key to Twilight’s room, the one we had not used the night Sunset Shimmer stole the crown. It had a single bit with a few notches; it hadn’t looked very secure. I glanced at my claws, which glinted in the moonlight. Secret agent Spike to the rescue.
Well, the lock was complicated, but my claws were sharp, as unbreakable as adamantine, and I had all night. It only took hours.
Knowing the trick, I locked the door behind me. And now, here I was, in the hall with no plan. Even if I got out, where could I run to? I'd seen no unicorns in the city. Were there any, could or would any remove an alicorn spell at well-past midnight? Who 'd believe my story?
Shining Armor would. Intuition insisted he had to be in the castle.
I heard hooves. With few windows, darkness ruled the corridor, but to my dragon eyes, everything looked ashen gray. I kept ahead of the light and quietly ascended the stairs to the apartment level. Patrols were almost non-existent, perhaps because the Princess had locked up the castle. I crept carefully. I would not make a Humdrum blunder. In a pinch, I had proven I could come through.
I noticed a brightening, and discovered a sliver of light escaping an almost closed door around the corner. Coming closer, I heard muttering. At the door, I smelled lavender and felt the spines on my neck separate in a sense of deja vu.
“Is it ready? Is it ready?”
I heard muttering like a spell and someone shifting, sitting on the floor. I waited a bit and heard more unintelligible muttering.
I lightly pushed the door. The well balanced slab glided open a couple inches. A gold-shod pink foreleg waved, then paged through a book so old the parchment had not only dried and cracked in places, but looked heavily discolored by olive and black rosettes of mold. I saw a set of yellow saddle bags with Cadance’s gold-bordered crystal heart cutie mark on the latch flaps.
“You must be ready soon or it will be too late.” Something crystalline struck the wood floor and rolled into view.
A black crystal prism.
I must have gasped. A turquoise aura enveloped the prism and dashed it into the messenger-style saddle bag as the Princess stood. But she didn’t scream.
I was already already moving as silently as I could when she said, firmly, “Identify yourself.” She gave it three seconds for a staff member to answer before shrieking, “Guards! Guards!”
I heard the door crash open as I slid around the corner. From behind me and beyond Cadance’s chamber, a guard ran in full plate, making enough noise to mask the sound of a stampede down the main street of Appleloosa. I ran. Unfortunately, and at the same time fortunately, another guard with a headlight appeared in the direction I was going. As I had done when Twilight had invaded the Canterlot archives looking for the Starswirl the Bearded wing, I jumped at a column and with the aid of rough facets and tough tapestry, I climbed up to a cross beam before the guard galloped by.
I say fortunately, because another guard rushed up the stairs. Between them, they must have been the full muster. After I heard Cadance yelling instructions, I slid down the column and went down as many flights of stairs as I could, as quietly as I could, despite sweating and shaking badly. That I had left my backpack in the scriptorium helped. That I had locked the room, made it less likely I’d be found missing. And maybe it would be all chalked up to princess nervousness about tomorrow’s Crystal Faire.
Why did Cadance have one of King Sombra’s dark crystals? I hid in the doorway of a particularly dark corridor and shivered. So far as I knew, none of the Crystal Ponies grew crystals. They mined them in the Crystal Mountains.
I shivered again. I knew of only one pony who knew how to grow crystals.
“King Sombra,” I hissed.
I felt tired to my bones, but too frightened to consider sleep. After an hour with no general hue and cry breaking out, I explored the lowest levels of the castle, sometimes feeling my way through the dark. I encountered no patrols, which felt remarkable in itself.
Having made of rounds of the three lower floors, I explored the rooms. One door opened on a stairway, descending into one of the three castle legs that didn't exit at ground level.
At the bottom, I found a room and a locked door with a two-inch opening at the bottom. Inside, a stallion snored.
Because of the spiral stair and the upper closed door, no cries for help could escape. I had found the dungeon!
“Shining?” I hissed, then hissed louder.
I heard a loud snork followed by a cough, “Wha— Do you have to torment me at all hours?”
I whispered, “Shining Armor. It’s me, Spike.”
“Spike.” He dashed to the door and by the sound of it pressed his ear against the crack at the bottom. “Do you have the key?”
“Key? Wait.” I scoured the room, the stair, and the room by the upper door, and returned. “No key, but I think I can pick the lock.” I set at it with my claws.
“The Crystal Heart. Is it still spinning?”
“It was this afternoon.”
“Good, good. Has the Crystal Faire taken place?”
“That’s tomorrow.”
“No!”
“And Cadance has made no preparation for it.”
“No, no, no,” he said, and got up. His hooves resounded as he paced. “A steward said she and Twilight explored Sombra’s castle together a few months back. She wouldn’t say, but I think she brought a book or something out.”
“A book and something. A black prism.”
“How could I be so stupid?” he said, and moaned.
“Say, why can’t you just open door with your magic?”
A white horn stuck out from under the door. One black crystal prism, the size of an acorn, stuck out near the end. “I can’t see it. What is it?”
“One of the crystals King Sombra shot your horn with when we escaped in the snow storm.”
“You have to work quickly.”
“I going as fast as I can.”
That said, by the time the lock clicked open, the sky had lightened enough with the impending dawn that I could see color—a hint of orange and blue, thanks to a skylight.
Shining burst out, ready to rush into battle.
I said the obvious, “You have no magic. How are you going to fight an alicorn?”
That gave him pause, but he then said with the same verve his sister had once shown, saying “I have no idea!” He took a deep breath, “Smartly, I hope.”
I told him where I had last seen Cadance as we mounted the stairs. We climbed to the fourth level to get to the grand staircase that exited the castle. In the waxing dawn, we would have to sneak past guards to find the staircase to her apartment. Suddenly, a strong lavender scent stabbed deeply into my sinuses.
Shining Armor puffed up. “My dear wife,” he said and trotted into the main entry hall.
Cadance had passed, not more than a minute or so ago, heading down to the outside were the Crystal Heart spun. At one year since the crystal ponies powered it up, it was at its nadir of power. “The heart!”
Shining nodded as he cantered rapidly toward the startled guard at the top of the stair. The rose-quartz stallion roared, “You may not pass!”
“I’m Shining Armor, you foal! Get out of my way.”
The guard leveled his spear. “By order of the Princess—”
Shining kicked the spear aside and head butted the guard into the wall, and was down the stairs like an avalanche, me following him. Below, I heard hoof beats, and a muffled voice that said, “Who ever it is, don’t let them pass!”
Cadance.
No non-magical pony could stand in Shining’s way, however. He did't even slow, galloping down the last set of steps before charging the azurite twins. He took a slice from a spear across the ribs, but bowled over the left talkative one and with a swinging buck flipped the silent one the opposite direction.
Outside, the black prism launched itself out of Cadance’s saddle bag enveloped in turquoise magic as she rounded on the opposite side of the slowly rotating heart. It spun once every two seconds, reflecting the first ray of sunlight like a lighthouse.
Shining charged, me behind him.
Cadance growled, her voice cracking, ramping up to a shriek. “Work! Work! You’ve got to work, now!” Under Shining’s pumping legs, I saw her violet irises turn a pulsing red color as a purple magic started flooding from the whites of her eyes, which themselves now glowed green. In a second, huge billows of black mist sprouted around her, like King Sombra’s clouds, which had engulfed the land outside’s Cadance’s magic shield during the attack last year. Her magic changed from turquoise to hot furnace red. She yelled, “Yes!” and dove for the Crystal Heart.
She dodged her husband, managing to strike the Crystal Heart with the prism before he struck her flank.
The vitreous collision caused a clank. The turquoise magic crystal rang, making such a tortured noise that sounded like glass about to burst into a thousand shards. The heart stopped spinning as if it had hit an immovable object. It dropped to the ground.
The black prism having been shocked out of Cadance’s magic grip, kept its momentum, shooting upward. Cadance, still enveloped in dark magic, spun thanks to Shining’s missed tackle. The prism struck the upper pincer, the ceiling, and came down in my direction.
Shining skidded, legs behind him, chin on the ground to a halt beyond Cadance. He jumped to his feet, but before he could fully turn to face her, she yelled, “It belongs to me!” A colorful array of crystal fingers grew instantly from the roadway to form a jail that required a sledgehammer or magic to break.
That didn’t stop Shining. He bucked and a clang resounded.
A handful of crystal ponies, perhaps preparing the Faire or taking their morning walks, screamed. That masked the charge of the azurite twins almost long enough. A gout of red force slashed them both, knocking them aside.
The black prism landed at my feet, and I grabbed it.
“That. Is. Mine!” yelled Cadance, a splash of magic fire knocking me away.
Fire.
Right. Dragon who swam in lava speaking. Piffle.
She grabbed me in her magic and though I faced away from her, I could feel her starting to tug the prism from my grasp. What to do?
It had fallen from a height of a number of stories. I could not break it.
Oddly, it occurred to me that it smelled like licorice, so I took a bite, crunching off the upper fifth of the prism. Ooo. Very strong, smokey, deeply anise licorice.
“No!” she shrieked, as if I had bitten her nose instead. Something grabbed and whirled me like a top, but I managed to jam the whole prism in my mouth as I spun head over heals, held horizontally.
I did the only thing I could do. I chewed.
And swallowed.
I fell to the ground. Breath knocked out of me, I spun and slid into the bottom pincer with a bang. When nothing further attacked, I tried to stand, but even with a hand on the crystalline cone, my world continued spinning.
And suddenly I felt very, very sick.
I heard Cadance. “What? Shining? Spike? Not—not a nightmare.” She tried to stand, the dark mist dissipating like fog burning off in bright sunlight, her eyes returning to their normal violet. She fell while I slid to my belly. The cramps raged inside as if the shards of the prism actively shredded my insides.
The crystal jail around shining shattered under the influence of hind hooves and turquoise magic. Meanwhile, I managed to kneel, a fiery acid building in my throat as gas pressure caused horrible cramps.
Suddenly, a turquoise aura enveloped me, but I was in too much agony to care. Then something clicked in my throat, like flint against steel.
I vomited a hot torrent that I thought would rend my neck from my body. The black slurry splashed onto the roadway engulfed a brilliant green gout of flame. The liquid boiled into grey-brown smoke as the solid melted into a glowing red glassy slag.
Dragon breath can be nasty, was the last thought I had before I passed out.
I don’t know how long I was unconscious; perhaps the doctors used potions to keep me under until I fully healed. When I awoke I felt like a new dragon, though I was not at all hungry. From the smell of me, I probably could have done with, at very least, a seven hour bubble bath, preferably with boiling water. Acid, brimstone, copper; only attractive if you weren’t a pony. Lavender scent made me open my eyes.
Princess Cadance waited. She immediately gathered my right claw between her front hooves. “I’m so very, very sorry.” Well, despite a real shiner and a bandaged flank, she looked like her bad-ass self again, and every bit the proper pink prissy princess of the empire. She smiled.
I said, “Sombra artifacts are not to be trifled with.”
Shining came up beside her, his horn pristine white again, dressed in his red princely uniform. “Isn’t that the truth. Twilight had told her not to touch, by the way.”
We chatted a few minutes, at which point I realized my back hurt from lay in bed and I slipped over the side. Both looked shocked, but I told them I was a young dragon and that they ought to be envious.
Shining motioned to an attendant who scurried rapidly away. “In that case, if you’re feeling up to it, we have something to show you.”
I shrugged. Cadance moved slowly due to her injuries, and Shining limped, but soon we descended the grand staircase. No doubt, the Crystal Faire was in full swing. I remembered the corn on the cob and felt my appetite grudgingly return. It took quite awhile, but when we made it to the bottom, the azurite twins bowed and made way.
I could see the Crystal Heart spinning at easily five revs a second, almost a humming blur. My heart rose into my throat. I made that possible, stubborn me. Tears welled as I stopped to gaze in shear awe. Of course, no boy dragon could be seen crying in public. I breathed in deeply.
It was then that Shining Armor used my trademark phrase, saying, “Aw, come on!” Two hooves shoved me forcibly into stumbling into the sub-castle courtyard. I almost made it half-way to the heart before I came up short.
I froze and turned to face outward.
Loud crystal flugelhorns blared a sudden heraldry. Everywhere I turned, thousands of crystal ponies cheered, with thousands more flooding in from the city, having heeded Shining’s summons. In waves, they went down on one knee, every color of mineral in the rainbow, from tourmaline to ruby, incredibly bright and sparkling in the noonday sun.
Then they began shouting my name.
Shining armor ruffled my crest with his hoof. “That’s three times in one year, kid. You’re getting close to Twi’s record, now.”
The floodgates broke and tears washed down my cheeks.
Author's Note
This followup of Princess Spike and Fiendship is Magic: Sombra Rex makes the assumption there are no unicorn or pegasus crystal ponies. My research showed some, but I remain unconvinced that they were more than reused crowd ponies and were intended to make a statement of canon.
Sins of the Writer
1) Too many words, in general, and in many sentences.
2) In retrospect, I think Spike wasn't childish enough.
3) Thanks to Fluttercheer: The canon spelling of the Princess' name is Cadance, not Cadence (a musical term for pace). Drat, auto-correct. Fixed.
Lessons Learned
Once you have an idea, set a deadline and write to meet it. I am surprised I could finish this story. I started with an Equestria Daily WTG prompt about Spike wanting to take advantage of Cadance's crystal spell and thought hard about how not-nice Cadance was at the summit. What if she had something of Sombra's that she and Twilight found in the comic. I wrote, "Spike worries Cadance is acting a bit odd. When he goes to find out why, he quickly realizes he was right and the 'why' could change the Crystal Empire forever," and began writing.
I expected about 2000 words, certainly not 6000+. If I did not have to publish immediately, I'd probably cut out everything up to Spike's arrival in the Crystal Empire. That said, I still like the story and hope you like it, too.
Critique Requested
Should you decide to critique, please tell me what you thought I said or meant citing specific sections so I can compare with what I thought or meant. I will give no excuses and just say, thank you!
Edit: Removed: "Well, swallowing Inspiration Manifestation had not broken the spell, so—" I had thought it weak when I wrote it, though funny, and a good callback. Not so much any more. @Fluttercheer.
