Lyra wandered fairly aimlessly around main castle halls. The guards kept watch on her but didn't stop her from for walking around as most of this section of castle she was allowed access to. It was getting fairly late but there was no real curfew on when ponies had to leave and she really didn't feel like going back to her dorm room.

How had she messed up this badly? Cadence was ready to end her tutelage because Lyra didn't believe fillyfooling was right. It didn't seem fair. Ponies were allowed their opinions weren't they? It wasn't like Lyra was actually capable of stopping ponies from fillyfooling she just didn't want to think about it, hear about it, and definitely not see it. She was going to have to see it though. A large part of her questioned whether Cadence's insistence on consentual voyeurism was even a healthy thing. She guessed for most ponies it would be considered really inappropriate but she was supposed to be learning about love and sex was part of that and she certainly had no sex life of her own to work with--so voyeurism with consenting ponies she guessed made some perverted sense.

Looking at scenes in stained glass windows she passed she continued to contemplate. Was she too much of a prude to be a good love magic unicorn. She had talent for it; all her professors, both princesses, and everyone else agreed. When she channeled her magic into her music playing it did things to the listeners. If there was something there between a couple, anything at all, it strengthened and fanned whatever flame of love they had. She was so proud when she got her cuttie mark years before playing her music and bringing a squabbling couple to heartfelt tears and close embrace of one another as they listened. Her music made them focus on their love for one another. And soon after ponies took notice and had her enrolled in Celestia's school. Just this past year it was decided Cadence was old enough and experienced enough with love magic that she could take a student of her own and Cadence had chosen her as her first student. Lyra had been thrilled.

Studies with Cadence had been up and down. Cadence wasn't a formally trained teacher so she had a very casual way of handling lessons. She had spent a lot of time testing Lyra on what she did with her lyre. Spent a lot of time helping Lyra learn to detect the love between ponies. Spent time teaching her support spells like the contraception spell but also spells like ones that help ponies control their anger, spells that helped ponies be able to focus more while under extreme emotion, medical spells that treat sexually transmitted disease, spells to help ease thebpain of foaling, and so much more. As of late is when it had gotten awkward with Cadence learning Lyra was a virgin and completely barren in her knowledge of sex. First the princess had tried teaching about it by book which was okay for a bit but seemed to fall short of the princess's standards. So Cadence had turned to actually trying to get Lyra to watch the princess have sex which was extremely awkward.

Overall though Lyra felt like she had been a fairly good and attentive student even if she fell a little flat on the whole sexual relations studies. Maybe she just wasn't cut out for this kind of study. Surely most ponies had to be uncomfortable with learning about sexual relations by actually observing them.

This of course was not the reason Lyra stared at her reflection in a window. This whole line of thought about whether she was cut out for being a love magic student was avoiding the fact Cadence was angry not for her failures in learning about sex but in her percieved failures in how she saw other ponies. It was a troubling line of thought. Was she a bigot? What if she grew up thinking was indeed right and her princess was just a pervert. She was tasked with considering these questions and while Lyra was not the greatest student overall in most her studies she tried to do her best for her personal mentor and her mentor wanted her to be introspective right now so here she was; questioning herself, her mentor, and what is decent and indecent.

She had to just step up and do what her mentor asked of her. She would watch these ponies make love to one another (seriously what ponies other than Princess Cadence actually enjoyed other ponies watching them do IT). She would know more of how she felt about the whole thing when it was done. It definitely wouldn't be fun though.

Her thoughts were interrupted by a strange sound in the room near her. The guard ponies in this particular section were absent either called away for some reason, changing shifts, or making rounds elsewhere. A terrible bit of security oversight for ponies so picky about checking her papers. She looked at the plaque identifying the room which identified it as simply 'Curious Collection' which was not helpful at all though she felt like it should be something that should be guarded. The security really was doing a cruddy job right now.

The sound continued and with no guards in sight Lyra decided to do something rash. She entered the room to find it was a museum of sorts with odd skeletons put together on display, strange artifacts in crystal cases, and a few other unnamable things sitting on display. It was rather easy to discover what was making the odd noise.

In the far corner stoid a mirror. It would have looked like any fancy mirror you might find in a dress shop in Canterlot or in some noble's dressing room except for the fact that thr surface of tbe mirror was glowing brightly and instead of reflecting showed a swirling vortex of every color you could imagine and a few that caused her eyes to strain to see them. Whatever this mirror was it was magical and something had activated whatever magic it possessed. Weird magical mirrors turning on suddenly was likely something she needed to inform someone about not something she should be trying to figure out herself. She had heard enough horror stories if ponies messing with magical artifacts they didn't understand to be know that much.

As she turned to leave and find a guard so someone could be informed that the mirror in the Curious Collection had somehow turned on there was a bright flash in the room followed by a large crash. Turning to see what had happened Lyra saw two unicorn mares both golden in color both with red and gold hair. One looked a few years older than the other but they had to be family with one another because they looked like.....welll mirror images of one another despite the small age difference. Sisters perhaps? The unicorns looked like they had both been ejected by the mirror which now had stopped glowing or showing a vortex instead displaying a more standard reflection.

Lyra went to aid the two but as she approached the the younger of the two started shrieking as she looked around herself. The young unicorn then looked at her hooves and started shrieking louder. Getting up and panicking she danced around on two hooves in a clumsy fashion and found herself facing the mirror. Seeing herself in the mirror she stopped cold in her tracks for a moment then promptly fainted.

"Heh. Yeah that is about how I felt when I went through the mirror to the other side."

Lyra turned to the other unicorn who had spoken. Actually paying her attention now that the younger had passed out. The older of the two was around her age perhaps a year or two older while the younger was a few years younger. So the older was somewhere between seventeen and twenty and the younger looked to be maybe thirteen or fourteen. The older of the two picked herself up to her hooves and walked to the mirror and gazed down on the younger of the two with an evil smirk.

"Sorry kiddo but can't have two Sunset Shimmers over in that world. But I'm being nice. I am leaving you here in a better world. Of course you might be getting a cold reception since I am not allowed in the castle but that is your problem not mine." The older unicorn chuckled like she had made some joke and turned back to the mirror. Lighting her horn the mirror came back to life swirling vortex and all. "Timed it just right. Less than a minute left before this thing shuts down again for thirty moons. Guess I will be seeing you again in a few years."

The unicorn then hopped in the mirror and in a few more seconds the vortex ended again showing the normal surface of a seemingly regular mirror. The mare had never even aknowledged Lyra's presence which Lyra found to be beyond rude. But the way she talked to the younger unicorn made Lyra think she really wouldn't have enjoyed the conversation much.

Lyra went over to the remaining golden unicorn and did some vasic health scans with her magic that she had learned from Cadence. There wasn't anything physically wrong with her and she seemed to be unhurt. The read on young teen mare's emotions was still a mix if shock and horror even with her passed out. Lura could only imagine that 'Sunset Shimmer' if that was the unicorn's name was having the mother of all nightmares right now.

There was a shout of alarm from the doorway. The guards had apparently finally gotten around to checking out tbis room on their patrols and had stumbled upon them. Lyra hoped this didn't look to bad with her standing her over a passed out stranger. This wasn't her fault. She was completely innocent and completely baffled by what had just occured with her shocked mind still trying to process it. She just hoped this pony was alright.

The guard called down the hallway something that caused Lyra to go from numb shock to horrified shock. " "I need all available units to the Curious Collection right away. It is Sunset Shimmer. Brings the shackles!"

SHACKLES!

Author's Note

And so the actual adventure part of the story begins.