Chapter 8: Surprises

   Loki woke up as the sun shined over her face, it seems she forgot to close the curtains, yesterday she was admiring the city it wasn’t as impressive or advanced as many of the cities that she saw in other worlds but it was nice and simple, sometimes is good to just relax and not have to deal with your problems, to other this may be her punishment, a exile from the Golden Realm, but to her it was a nice, and hopefully, long vacation.

    Of course that does not mean that she won’t be enacting a few of her plans, but that's is a concern for another day.

    As she got up and stood in front of the mirror brushing her mane and tail, she could do it with magic but she like the feeling of a brush on her mane, once done she put on her crown and did a few poses, feeling that something wasn’t right, a quick flash of shimmering green light later and Loki was back at being a stallion, she, now a he, felt like being male today.

    As he finished changing, he heard the knock on the door.

    “You may enter,” said Loki in voice a little louder than normal for the guards to hear.

    The door was open revealing the same guards from yesterday, they seem to have learned their lesson as they walked into the room.

    “The princesses requested your presence for breakfast and today at afternoon Princess Luna will accompany you in a visit to the neighboring town of Ponyville to meet Princess Celestia’s star student,” announced the mare.

    “At least you delivered the message, now you can gawk at me to your heart's content,” said Loki not even bothering to look at them or stop posing in front of the mirror.

    “So how do I look?” asked Loki.

    The guards were trying to keep a straight face as he was getting ready and it was proving very difficult.

    “You look amazing your majesty,” said the stallion.

    “Indeed I do, so let's go then,” said Loki as he turned and stared to walk to the dining room being followed by the guards.

    They manage to get there without incident or interruptions but unknown to him a surprise was waiting for him inside the room.

    As he entered the room he spotted his granddaughters but what surprised him was the presence of Blueblood, as he sat he kept his eyes on the prince.

    “Why is he where?” asked Loki.

    “Well grandm-, I mean grandfather, Prince Blueblood wanted to apologise for his behavior from yesterday,” answered Celestia.

    “And why should I accept the insincere apologies of a petty noble?” asked Loki.

    “Grandfather, at least hear what he has to say,” pleaded Luna knowing the true Blueblood under his mask of pettiness he uses to deal with the nobles trying to take advantage of his status as a prince.

    “Very well but be warned I am the God of Lies and if you are not 100% honest I will know,” said Loki turning his attention his step-great-(insert many great here)-grandnephew.

    “Weren’t you a mare yesterday?” asked Blueblood.

    Loki just raised an eyebrow silently asking how he knew, Loki was he meet him when he was a stallion before breakfast.

    “I saw you as a mare before dinner so I wasn’t sure if really was you,” Blueblood answered the silent question.

    “I do not conform myself with labels such as gender I do and am what I feel like,” Loki answered Blueblood previous question.

    “I am truly sorry for the way I behave yesterday I just assumed that you are another one of those ponies that want to take advantage of my position, I thought that you were trying to meet .e by ‘accidentally’ bumping into me so I just did what I usually do but when you ignored me it felt like an insult and I had a reputation to keep, sometimes it’s difficult to remember that the unbearably arrogant and petty prince is not the real me but how my late mother expected me to behave, the only ones I ever open up to are aunt Celestia, aunt Luna when she got back from the moon, cousin Cadence when she was adopted into the royal family and Twilight Sparkle who never cared for the opinions of nobles,” confessed Blueblood before bowing and continuing, “they had nothing to gain from me so I felt that they could get to know the real me, when I discovered who you are I was devastated because I may have ruined the chance to have another true friend, friends that were more of a family than my late parents that raised me.”

    Blueblood looked at Loki hopefully, he never had many friend even while growing up, any friends he made would either try to take advantage of his status when they found out who he was or were shunned by his fellow nobles, both children and adults alike, by saying that “it isn’t befitting of a prince to associate himself with those that didn’t have a noble lineage”, needless to say that he was a very lonely foal and it would have been worst if wasn’t for Celestia being there to comfort him in his time of need.

    “I can tell you are being honest both with me and with yourself,” said Loki as his eyes softened as he remembered his own childhood how Odin was “too busy to spend time with him” either ruling or teaching Thor how to rule and failing on that task as Thor would rather be gallivanting around with his friends then learn how to be a king, how his other brothers didn’t even try to befriend him with the exceptions of Thor and Balder, Thor would just drag him in his adventures even when he didn’t want to go and Balder was to set on the ideas and values of the Æsir so he never could be 100% honest with him, his only source of comfort was his adopted mother.

    Even now he looked at the memory of his mother smiling, proud of him when did a spell, with fondness but him learning magic just made him a disappointment in the eyes of others, soon this disappointment became disdain and his fellow asgardian no longer wanted to be close to the “treacherous prince”, now he no longer cares for their opinions or standards.

    “I accept your apologies, come sit with us for breakfast,” offered Loki to Blueblood.

    Celestia and Luna looked the scene with a smile, happy that they were getting along, there certainly was more to their grandfather than meet the eyes but it is to be expected as is vastly older than anypony alive.

    They made small talk, got to know each other better and ate a good meal and for the first time in eons Loki almost felt what was like to have a family again.

Ponyville, this morning few minutes after Celestia raised the sun

    Twilight woke up not long ago with the sunrise, as she set on her usual place while Spike, who was more of a morning person, in this case dragon, than Twilight, put a cup of coffee on the table in front of her.

    As she drank the hot coffee she came out of her “morning zombie mode”.

    “Thank you Spike, nothing better to start a day than a cup of you special coffee,” said Twilight.

    “Oh, you making me blush,” said Spike a little embarrassed.

    “That just the truth, I have a good feeling about today,” said Twilight before adding, “especially with the day we had yesterday, with your greed growth, rampaging and all that.”

    “Yeah, let not about it,” said Spike before burping a scroll with Celestia’s mark and saying, “look Twilight a letter from Princess Celestia.”

    “What does it say? Oh I am so excited what new assignment she has for us?” asked aloud.

    “Dear Twilight, today Luna will be accompanying our grandmother/grandfather in a visit to Ponyville to meet you and your friends and to learn more about the lives of our subjects. Please do not worry this visit since it isn’t a official one, it’s just a visit from a friend. Regrettably I won’t be able to go as I have attend court that I have postpone for the last two days, have fun. Signed Princess Celestia,” read Spike.

    “Why did you think she wrote ‘grandmother/grandfather’?” asked Spike as he inspected the letter.

    “It must be the one that arrived on the second beam of light that night,” said Twilight before realizing what was on the rest of the letter, “and they are coming to visit, TODAY!!!”

    “This will mess with my schedule, and I need to tell everypony to prepare for a royal visit and then I will have to org-” started Twilight before she started to hyperventilate.

    “Twilight calm down the princess said that it’s a casual visit just tell your friends and act normally,” advised Spike making Twilight calm down as she listened.

    “You are right Spike my friends will know what to do, it is just a casual visit there is nothing to worry about,” said Twilight agreeing with Spike on the first half of her phrase and the latter half to herself before adding, still talking to herself nervously, “What could go wrong?”

    Spike looked at her unkempt mane and twitching eye and it didn’t inspired confidence.

    “Yeah, what could go wrong?” Spike said deadpan tone.

Near Ponyville, just past noon

    Flying toward Ponyville on a golden chariot being pulled by two pegasi, are two alicorns, Loki and Luna, both of them were admiring the scenery, Loki more so than Luna since it’s his first visit.

    “It was very kind of Celestia to lend her chariot, it’s better suited for traveling during the day than mine,” said Luna.

    “Why do we have to fly on this chariot when we have perfectly functional wings?” asked Loki.

    “Well it is customary to escort royalty,” said Luna.

    “Tell me about it, I have been in so many worlds, saw so many civilizations but leaders always have to deal with escorts, sometime it’s fine to just stretch your wings,” said Loki.

    “That may be so but I think it’s sweet that our subjects want to help us in whatever way they can,” said Luna.

    *Sigh* “Sometimes I forget that you ponies have a very strong sense of community and herd mentality,” said Loki.

    “You speak of it as if this is something bad,” commented Luna.

    “It isn’t but my mind works differently, on Asgard I was a loner and on that place the only sense of camaraderie comes from drinking, feasting and singing about the epic battles you fought and the maidens you bedded or in the case of the shieldmaidens how many head they took,” said Loki before adding, “I always preferred the way of the light elves, discussing you scholarly pursuits over a fine dinner,*sigh*, just another reason that I never fitted among asgardians.”

    “I suppose different species have different ways to bond and express themselves,” commented Luna nervously.

    “You have no idea how weird the universe can be,” said Loki in a very serious tone.

    Not long after that the chariot started to land and soon after they arrived in Ponyville and as they got off the chariot ponies saw a new alicorn and started to talk, the photographers took pictures, and reporters started to write on their notebook, by tomorrow all of Equestria will know of this new alicorn.

    They walked toward a house build in a tree and by the time they arrived there they gathered quite a crowd of curious onlookers, noticing them Luna turned to address to crowd.

    “Citizens of Ponyville there is no need to come and greet us personally we are just visiting the elements, you can go back to your daily routine,” said Luna in a very loud voice, but not Royal Canterlot Voice level though.

    “Eh, we are wandering who is the new alicorn?” asked a pony in the front.

    “He is not new, he is just visiting Equestria and he is my grandfather,” said Luna with her normal voice to the now quiet crowd.

    *GASP*

    They were frozen with wide eyes and jaws dropped, it’s not everyday they hear that.

    It took a few minutes for them to recover and return to their routine, had it been anywhere else in Equestria it would have taken longer but with Ponyville’s craziness they kinda got more used to the seemingly ludicrous situations such as meeting the grandparent of the centuries old princess, the fact that Pinkie Pie lived here didn’t help.

    “Could you wait here for a moment?” asked Luna.

    “Why?” asked Loki.

    “Twilight can be a bit overzealous when a royal visit is concerned, I just need to make sure everything is alright,” said Luna.

    “Very well,” said Loki as he conjured a bench in the shade of Golden Oak Library, summoned one of the books from his vast collection and started reading.

    Not too far from the library we find a trio of adventurous fillies walking the street.

    “Maybe we should ask Twilight for help I mean you sprained your hoof pretty badly when we tried get our cutie marks on bowling” said Scootaloo to Sweetie Belle who was limping.

    “Hey is that a alicorn?” said Apple Bloom.

    They approached Loki, when they got closer Loki heard their hooves hitting the ground.

    Loki looked away from the book to the trio of fillies, noticing the that the white one was limping, avoiding putting the too much weight on the right foreleg, when they got close enough they just keep staring at him in awe, more specific alternating between his horn and wings, he sent the book back to his pocket dimension.

    “Can I help you, little ones?” asked Loki.