Author's Note

The only note I am going to put at the top. I hope.

Hello, everyone.
I am writing this with the goal to improve my English, I speak Spanish, and my writing skills.
The only QA this two chapters have is my own.
With that said, I hope this is of your liking.
Tell me what you think and, If you want, leave a review in the comments.

Bye.

14-11-2015: I accidentally liked this story, while browsing on my tablet. Sorry about that.
18-12-2015: Deleted some commas. Deleted some words. Fixed formatting issues.
20-12-2015: Deleted two more commas.

The Princess's Student

Three days. She has been reading for three days, sitting in front of an old desk she had levitated near a bookcase, locked inside the demolished remains of the library.

The big hole in the roof, that extended from left to right, allowed the shiny yellow orb that orbited the place to illuminate the room.

Rays of light hit her face, forcing the pony to slowly open her eyes. Covering her mouth with a hoof, she left a soft yawn, while stretching her other leg. With the ritual complete, the pony’s mind gradually began to function.

The first thing she noticed was the puddle of drool on the desk. The second thing she noticed was a notepad with a series of records about farming that slowly turned into gibberish. The third thing she noticed was a tray with a cup of coffee, some sandwiches and some napkins.

The puddle brought a red tint to her cheeks.

The horn on her head glowed magenta, so did the napkins. Rising from the tray, they made their way to the drool, landed on it and began to absorb it. After making sure that all of her saliva was removed, she threw the papers, now wet, to the trash bin next to the desk.

The gibberish made her grunt.

“I must have fallen asleep,” she said to no one.

Picking the notepad with a hoof, the unicorn began to flip the sheets, searching for more incomprehensible writings. Luckily for her, it appeared that only half of the last page was useless. Letting a sigh of relief, she placed the notepad back to its place.

Her stomach growled.

Focusing her attention on the food, she began to levitate one of the sandwiches to her mouth. At first, she gave it a shy bite. Once she savoured and swallowed the piece, however, the pony threw self-control out of the window and started to eat more larger, messier portions.

She was hungry, darn it!

Next, her morning coffee. Wrapped in her magic, she gave the cup, that had moved next to her mouth, a tentative sip. It was cold. Disgruntled, she forced the liquid down her throat.

Never again.

Rising from the chair, she began to walk down the aisle, two sandwiches following her steps.

Books. There were books to the left. There were books to the right. And there were some on the floor. Keeping her head glued to the ground, she took special care not to step on them.

During normal circumstances, she would pick them up and put them back on their respective bookcases. But she was grumpy, still hungry and, frankly, since there were only two beings living in the castle at the moment, no one would damage them more than they already are... she, at least. Her assistant might not care.

Speaking of him, he might had been keeping his distance from the library, she supposed, in fear of being tasked with cleaning the mess. Or in fear of her. She tended to do creepy things when she went loco.

Anyhow, both of them would clean this mess, in a later time.

Stopping in her tracks, she placed a hoof on her head and started to massage it. A list. She needed one, not only to organize her thoughts, but to bring a little of normalcy to the situation. With how hectic things has been lately, it slipped her mind.

She let out a little laugh. “That’s a first.”

There has been a lot of first lately. It needed to stop.

Inspecting the room to know where she was, she caught her reflection in a mirror, hanging on the wall, next to the library’s entrance.

It has been her assistant’s idea to put it there. “Just because,” he had told her. Now she know why.

Big black circles under tired purple eyes, a dirty mane with straws of hair poking around here and there and some stains of mud coating her body saluted her.

“Hilarious,” she snorted. “I don’t need to see my reflection to know I look like a mess, Spike”. Of course, sometimes she needed to be remembered to take a break.

And fine, it was funny. She could appreciate it, since it seemed to lighten the mood around a little.

“Look at you. All messy and dirty and tired and anxious and...” Her eyes began to glitter. She was sad again.

Darn, that came out of nowhere.

A blink. No more tears.

“No crying. The Princess is counting on you. Spike is counting on you.” She pointed a hoof to the mirror, every sentence bringing her body closer. “You are Twilight Sparkle. You are Celestia’s prized student. You. Will. Fix. This.”

Right then, first things first… She saw the sandwiches floating behind her

Well, breakfast first. And a piece of paper next.

She really needed that list. Things would be easier, if she had a more organized mindset. And a clue about what she was suppose to do.

They have the Elements of Harmony. Or rather, six rocks that refused to cooperate. Also, books. Lots of books. With no order whatsoever. Getting any kind of useful information about the Elements would be a herculean task. A task she would have to do alone.

Enough with the pessimistic thinking! Things were bad, but they could be worse.

They had a sun, at least, or a cheap imitation of it. And with time, plus her notes, she would devise some sort of farming project, using the surrounding land. Not a very thought through plan, but she needed a starting point, and this was as good as she was going to get, for the time being. Plus, it gave her something to focus on.

Anyway, a stable food source was necessary. The rations Spike had brought with him would not last forever and going to Ponyville to get aliment was too risky. Sadly, at least a few trips were necessary. They required materials, tools, seeds and more provisions. Getting to the point where they could harvest their work would take time.

Separating herself from the mirror, Twilight resumed her walking. To the kitchen, she commanded her legs. Or rather, the messy front-yard.

They hadn’t explored the castle enough to know where every room was.

And for Celestia’s sake, this place was a labyrinth. Secret passages, stairs that, she swore, reset themselves just to annoy her, doors that refused to open, trying to led her Faust knows where... It was madness!

She made her way through what looked like the castle’s main hall, in direction to the exit. Behind her, two surprisingly undamaged banners hanging from the ceiling.

They depicted two winged unicorns. Alicorns, if you will. The one on the left, a dark shade of blue, with a waning crescent moon in a starry night above her. The one on the right, a snowy mane with a bright sun overhead.

This was the Castle of the Two Sisters. A fact that, to her surprise, had lost relevancy fairly quickly.

Eternal night tended to do that.

Just some steps in front of the entrance, she found a makeshift fire, made of a series of rocks arranged in a circle and branches of different thickness acting as fuel. A burned, metal grid inside of it, too.

Her assistant might had been here before.

Circling the heat source, she spoke, “don’t let fire unattended, Spike.”

Where could he be? Exploring, maybe? That ought to entertain him a little. As grown up as her assistant claimed to be, he was still very much a kid.

Looking around, she found a kettle, sitting on a log, a modest distance away from the fire. Additionally, water bottles, coffee, bread... basically, a breakfast building-blocks.

Remembering she had brought food with her, she ate one of the sandwiches that had been faithfully following her. The last one with the coffee.

The kettle lighted up purple and started to float to the fire, dropping down carefully on the metal grid. Above it, water began to pour inside of it.

She sat near the fire, her back to the entrance.

Her head turned to the left, warming her cheek. After a few seconds, it turned to the right. The motion was repeated for a while.

On the corner of her eyes, she saw her assistant opening the doors. He had a pouch to his left, its string on his right shoulder.

“Good morning, Spike,” she called him. “Thanks for breakfast.”

“Morning, Twilight,” He responded, waving one of his claws. “No problem.”

“Mind telling me why did you left the fire unattended? I am not angry.”

He let out a worried, little laugh. “I went looking for you.” He scratched the back of his head. “Something happened, though: A door trapped me inside one of the rooms near the tower.” His cheeks turned red. “I freaked out and it let me go.”

Spike found himself wrapped in a hug. After a moment, his brain caught up with the situation and he returned the gesture.

“That must have been scary.” She smiled at him. “I am happy you are fine.”

Spike responded her with a warm smile. “You know? I still got to the library. I brought you this.” Rummaging his bag, he extracted her notepad, a feather and some ink.

“Thanks, Spike.”

Spike broke the hug, saluted her and sat down near the fire, inspecting the kettle.

Approaching him, Twilight sat down next to her assistant and began to write.

Finally she would start that darn list.