"They aren't coming now?" Cadance read and reread the letters that had come. "Okay, now I am confused… oh, another one?"

"Yes, Your Highness." A pegasus crystal mare trotted over, reaching to lift the third rushed letter for the day. "Here."

"This isn't from mom…" Cadance gave the mailmare a smile as she opened the letter. "Twilight…"

Shining Armor was in the kitchen, making her wife some lunch. She had just put the whipped cream on the cherries that she knew her Cadie adored when the drone working with her jerked once and then flopped to the floor with a silly grin on their snout. "Deathly Stare?" Shining knew what she was seeing, changelings tended to act this way when the Princess of Love felt her element a little too strongly.

Grabbing the barely-finished desert in her magic, Shining galloped down the hall in search of Cadance and, finally found her in her study. "What's happened?"

"Twilight had her foals!" Cadance, somehow, bounced across the room and halted just before a partially terrified Shining. "What's the matter?"

"I'm an uncle…" Shining almost dropped the plate but a pink glow wrapped it as Cadance took her absolute favorite treat from her wife.

"Auntie, dear." Cadance used the little tiny fork to gather some up and sample it. The cream was whipped to perfection and the cherries glazed in a sweet sauce. "This is divine!"

Shining shook off her shock but couldn't stop from smiling. "They are doing well?" Of course they were doing well, her wife wouldn't have felt the way she obviously was if there was bad news.

"They are, the letter was sent by magic. Your parents are not going to be coming for the wedding for a week. Twilight… Velvet that is," Cadance's grin didn't dip one millimeter at the confusion of having two Twilights in the family, "said she will be staying for a week to help get your sister settled."

"Twily is a mother… my little sister!" Shining closed her eyes and took a deep breath. Cadance couldn't help but giggle at the excited little whinny that came from her wife. "What?"

"That is at least ten times cuter as a mare, you know." Cadance scooped up another few cherries, loaded with cream, and offered it to Shining. "Should we visit them?"

Shining slowly took the sweet desert from the fork and closed her eyes. "Deathly really is amazing in the kitchen. How long was he hiding here as our cook?"

"He was in the Crystal Empire when it was frozen." Cadance took a tiny bite more. "Poor thing woke with no hive and no queen to guide him." She sighed at how good the food was. "Still, he seems to be adjusting, how are the cooking staff handling it?" Cadance had taken more delight in her wife's new interest in more than just the guards.

"He was how I knew something had happened. You overfed him and he passed out in bliss, if his expression was anything to go by." Shining opened her mouth dutifully for the next mouthful. It didn't take much to clear her mouth enough to continue. "But you aren't asking that. Deathly has the respect of everypony who works with him. I think the poor guy was so relieved he could finally use his horn to help prepare food that nopony could think to intrude on him. Then there is that attitude, they are certainly his kitchens, none would dare to dispute that in his presence. I think we should recognize him with a title."

Cadance nodded, having thought much the same. "I like that idea. Duke? Knight? Knighting always seemed like a fun thing to do, we could have a special sword made for him, shaped like a soup ladle." Her Shiny's giggles only inspired Cadance more. "Yes, a knight. But no ladle, he has only ever had our interests at heart."

"He thinks you are his queen, is why." Shining managed to stop giggling, looking at his wife with a devotion that he suspected the drone shared, just Deathly's was less romantic and more honorable. "You hadn't noticed?" Cadance's shocked look, then shaking her head to Shining's question betrayed her emotions.

"I can't be a queen, we already have one of those here!" Gesturing out the window, Cadance waved a wing. "He really thinks that?" Shining nodded. "Okay, then I will have to be the one to knight him, all the pomp and ceremony, but let's surprise him a little."

Deathly finally managed to rouse from his stupor, unable to hide the smile. His princess always did that to him, he could no more hold back her love when it came in a wave than he could command the ocean's tide to keep its distance.

Getting his hooves under him, the drone looked at the table. The plate was gone and a note lay in its place.

Deathly, there will be a big ceremony this evening for one important guest. Please do your best work, they are ever so special to me. Cadance.

Floating the letter closer, Deathly brushed the calligraphy with a hoof. "Cadance." The deep sigh he gave was certainly not for love, not in the traditional sense. "The best princess, for sure." He took two deep breaths, readying his throat. "Spry! Magenta! We have work!"

The bellow summoned two mares who were in the room and staring intently at Deathly. The stallion was content, his cooks, his kitchen, would never disappoint.

Cadance and Shining were in their main hall, a table had been set up with their seats on one side and a single one on the other. Three entrees had been laid out and the two mares sampled no more than a sip of the soup each and nodded to each other. "Fetch our chef." Both said it at once, working hard to hide their mirth behind stoic masks.

Deathly heard the words, passed to him by one of the maids. "Master Stare, the princesses require your company at the table." She gave a worried look to Deathly, one that conveyed that it likely wasn't in good cheer that he was summoned.

Doffing his adorably puffy hat, setting his apron aside, the changeling trotted out of the kitchen and through to the main hall. He saw that one of the seats at the table was still empty and felt puzzled. Walking carefully up to the table, moving to one side, Deathly bowed his head. "Your Highnesses, is something amiss?"

"Yes, something is gravely wrong. Our guest is here but he has not taken his seat." Cadance tilted her head just a fraction, seeing the panic on the cook's face turn to confusion.

"Sit down, Deathly." Shining gestured with a wing to the chair, secretly happy she had mastered that little trick.

Deathly looked at the chair as if it was afire and he was unsure if he would let himself burn for them. "Your… Your Highness?"

"Deathly, you are our guest tonight. Please sit." Cadance poked Shining in the side for not making things obvious enough. "We need to discuss your presence here and why you will be staying."

The changeling climbed onto the seat, looking down at the soup one of his cooks had made. Of course he knew just what it tasted like, he trusted his cooks, but nothing was set before the princesses at the royal table that he did not test. He carefully spooned some up, looking at his two rulers to make sure he wasn't doing anything wrong. It was exquisite, of course, potato and leek, simple, but always a favorite.

"Before the… before the exile, you were here for your queen?" Cadance knew it wasn't really a question, and the drone nodded to show he knew it too. "But you stayed and, eventually, revealed yourself to us."

"After your wedding, I was terrified." Deathly looked down at the soup. "I thought for sure your guards would find me, that you would exile me."

"You didn't know what would happen, and yet you still ran the kitchen, you still prepared our food. Then we found out you were a changeling and, finally, you came to us about it." Cadance spooned some more of the soup up, not wanting to waste the hard work. Besides, it was delicious.

Deathly's head jerked up and he stared with his big blue eyes. "You knew?"

"When the crystal heart activated, one of the guard spotted you, without your disguise. It was lucky you still wore your apron and that hat." Cadance stopped talking for a little while, enjoying the soup far too much to waste it.

Shining, having had more time without needing to use her mouth, finished her soup quickly and took up the conversation. "When you came to us, confided in us, we were quite delighted, our trust was justified. You understand it wasn't easy, for either of us." Shining gestured to her wife, who was practically gushing in delight over the soup. "We made a decree about it, in fact." A scroll floated up from beside Shining.

All three knew the decree, it announced Deathly as a pony and under Cadance's protection. The changeling nodded, looking at the scroll; it was the embodiment of his princess' will in the matter. Which was why he froze when Shining tore it in half.

"We don't need it anymore. Deathly, before our main course is brought out, my wife has… well, once she is done with your soup, she has something important to do." Shining grinned to Cadance, watching her spoon up every last drop of the soup.

Confused at where this was going, Deathly felt only love flow from Cadance, it was reassuring and comforting, but then she was the princess of it, it wasn't like she would suddenly stop.

Cadance got the last of the soup from her bowl and stood up, levitating out a long blade from under the table. Even the guards gasped, such weapons were not common, and besides a pole-arm was superior for most guard-work. "Kneel before me, Deathly Stare." Cadance's voice was strong with the aura of command that only a princess could muster.

He was scared and worried, Deathly climbed from his seat and approached Cadance. Was this it for him? He dropped to his belly, completely, before the mare he felt, deep in his heart, was his queen.

"Deathly Stare, I knight thee." Cadance brought the blade down carefully, tapping the chitinous shoulders of the drone, once, twice, then a third time. "Rise, Sir Stare."

Amazement crowded out all other emotions, until love took its place. Deathly stood up and looked at Cadance with tear filled eyes. "Your Highness?"

"This is yours. We need ponies who will guard us, even from hunger and bad cooking." Cadance floated the blade, hilt first, toward Deathly, who claimed it and slid it into the cover that Shining had levitated over.

Deathly looked at the weapon, pulling it in to his side. "My Que-" He froze, shock on his face as he almost used the wrong title.

"You can call her that, it's okay." Shining walked over beside Cadance, spreading a wing over her shoulders.

"My Queen." Deathly bowed his head. "We really should sit down, the main course will get cold." Not the royal couple, and certainly not the guards, could keep a straight face at the comment and all three ponies took their seats as more food was brought out. Deathly had never felt so complete before, even when a changeling was his queen.

"You don't have to stay!" Gel protested but, in his heart, he appreciated the sentiment.

"Silly, we can marry in a week, but taking care of my daughter is important. I understand there are two of you to help, rather than the normal one. But that doesn't mean I can't give you all the most important gift. A few more days of normal sleep." Twilight Velvet would not be dissuaded in this.

"Well, Ah definitely appreciate it." Applejack held out her hoof and got a bump back from Twilight. "And you're, technically, our mother-in-law, so we aren't allowed to argue with ya. Are we, Gel?"

"So easily defeated. Relax Gel," Night slung a foreleg over the changeling prince's shoulders, "you will get used to it. Now, let's go check in on Twily, you will not be able to do that enough, you know. Just make sure to always do it quietly, waking a young foal from sleep is a sin."

Camaraderie was high between the two and Gel followed Night, at least until the unicorn declared himself lost. "I don't get it, wasn't her bedroom in this hall?"

"No, pops, this is where the library is." Gel opened a door to reveal the huge library. "Don't worry, that is an easy mistake to make with Twi." Both stallions chuckled at the joke. "Look, she even has a pillow hidden under that desk over there, I made her get a few blankets too, winter can be chilly and a mare trapped in her reading won't leave the library to fetch such things."

"We had to do much the same at home. You know she wasn't even off milk before she fell asleep on a book for the first time?" Night looked around the room he knew was truly his daughter's domain. "I told Twi… my wife that is, that it was a sign. She agreed, of course."

"But don't worry, as if the library would be far from our bedroom." Gel led the way out and down to the next room, opening the door to see Twilight resting on the bed, her eyes open and watching over two sleeping foals. The sight stole all sense from the changeling, he approached quiet as he could and sat down beside the bed, leaning forward and resting his snout beside Twilight's.

Night was about to close the door and leave when Applejack gave him an apologetic look and slipped past. Glancing back at the family his daughter had built and become a part of, Night shed a few tears of happiness before leaving them.

Author's Note

Twice. Damn these ponies, they had me crying happy tears twice while writing this. You will likely be able to guess each time it happened.

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