The Heir of Winter

Heir of Winter

Chapter 6

Living Space

I didn’t have to explain anything to them. Luna's loud announcement was heard well enough to everyone in the other room; ponies in the next few rooms over included. So, now, I was being ogled at by the rest of the fillies, colts and parents thereof by simple proxy of being Luna's new student. And while I didn’t entirely mind the attention, mainly because I wasn’t expecting it to happen either, some of the nobility were already trying to get into my good graces with their children in hopes it would get them closer to their lunar princess of the night.

Some of the nobility was nice about it and left me be, while others seemed outright pushy about it. I even ended up with a marriage proposal of all things, from a single stallion parent trying to get me together with their son who happened to be the same soot ridden colt I ran into earlier.

Flicker Flare was the colt's name, he was a young unicorn colt that had a bit of an arrogant streak with the prying eyes of nobility; fiery personality and a coat of mane and fur just the same. And from the conversation I had with them he seemed nice enough on the surface despite their self bolstering nature. Though who knows if that idea would hold any water down the line when we all grew up in the later years of our schooling. For all I knew he was just acting nice for his fathers appearances to the other nobles.

But, since Luna still had to watch over the rest of the proceedings with the other school candidates, she had to see herself back to the testing room while I myself elected to sit back with Cheerilee to wait for Locket to be done with her exam. Thankful that all the pestering of the nobles and other parents with their kids had finally calmed down after she left.

I was hoping she would get in to be honest. She seemed to have a good enough life at home despite her parents not being in the picture. But there’s always those little details that make you wish that they had just a bit more to look forward to.

“Think she’ll get in?” I asked Cheerilee with concern. Looking over to the door to the examination room I had just left not too long ago.

“I think she’ll be better than fine. She has a strong head on her shoulders for somepony her age. Honestly, it reminds me a bit of Twilight to see her so engrossed in simple learning.” Cheerilee answers, looking the same direction I was while smiling at her own remark.

Weirdly enough, we found that we didn’t have to wait all that long for Locket to come walking back out the room with a gleaming smile running ear to ear with Luna herself following directly behind her.

Luna had a very confused look on her face from what was, by my count, only ten minutes of the test having gone by as she sat herself outside the door as she closed it behind herself. “Tests will be temporarily delayed from continuing for some time as the test in question, by some means of masterful expertise, has been entirely dismantled by Locket Spring. Whom, I have chosen to be a SECOND student of mine alongside Wispy.” Luna says with a warm smile to the room as she gestures to Locket.

“I certainly was not expecting you to take the entire puzzle box apart rather than go through the enchantments as all the others before you had.” Lunas says while looking down to Locket.

Locket simply looks back up at her with that same gleaming smile and says, ”My sister makes boxes like those all the time! Deconstruction is the best way to learn construction as she would say!”

Luna chuckles, ”Then I’ll certainly have to look into buying one of her puzzle boxes one of these days ! I would certainly learn a thing or two from her craftsmanship if you're used to puzzles like the one I made.”

Locket somehow smiles even wider than before as she sits herself down next to me; she most definitely had her entire year made with Luna's comment.

Luna then turns her attention back to the room as a whole, ”Now then! As our ability to resume the examination is currently hindered and in need of being put back together, all those that have already passed the exams may follow Professor Gold Wright to the school faculties to be shone into your rooms as you most definitely wish to retire for the time being. As for Whispy and Locket, you will follow me to your own living space, as it lay elsewhere on our grounds.” She says, gesturing to the named Professor and to Locket and me.

I turn my gaze over to Cheerilee,”Guess this is where we part ways for now.” I say, honestly feeling a bit sad to leave her care after all she had done for me.

The teacher scoots herself closer to me and wraps her front legs around me in a hug, ”Good luck Wispy. It was good to know you, despite it only being for a short while. I hope whatever it is life has in store for you finds you in good tidings.” She says warmly while also looking over to Locket Spring. Her words more than likely meant for her as well.

Shortly after, we said our goodbyes to each other and followed Luna down the castle hallways. I still had to admire the craftsmanship of the castle itself despite having looked it over multiple times in the waiting line. “I wonder how long it took these ponies to build this place. They certainly know their craft one way or the other, just by seeing that puzzle box Luna made.”, I thought to myself as we passed by what looked to be an outdoor garden that was in the middle of being trimmed by a pony wearing overalls. They waved as we passed by before going back to their work.

“I suppose at this point the both of you may be wondering where it is that I’m taking you?” Luna chimed in, breaking me away from the garden scenery.

“You could say that. Though I admit that the castle grounds offer quite the distraction.” I answered while looking over to Locket, who seemed more distracted than I was and hadn’t seemed to have heard Luna's question.

“Truely, they are a sight to behold to ponies that live farther away from Canterlot and even to a fair few living inside its very walls; My sister had a good taste for its construction while I was away.” Luna says with a slight sigh, “Though, it pains me to admit, it could use some remodeling in some places that are less commonly used. There’s a mighty few places none of the nobles even know about, much less myself even. I have not had the opportunity to explore the grounds of my own volition for quite some time.” She huffs, seemingly annoyed at the idea.

“I take it you don’t have much time to yourself?” I ask, honestly curious about Luna's life.

“You would be right in stating that, though not in the way you may think.” She smiles before stopping in front of a door we had just nearly passed by. Causing Locket to walk face first into my rear end from our abrupt stop.

“Sorry. Got distracted.” She says before realizing why we had stopped, “Oh! Right. Our rooms!”

Lunas nods to us both before taking two silver keys out from her mane, “My sister told me that Twilight had her own entire observatory to herself in her time under her wing when she was still being taught at school. So I took the liberty to have something set up ahead of time in case I did find somepony to give tutelage to.” She says while unlocking the door for us, opening it up to show us to our new living space.

The inside was all made of different shades of wood, unlike the stone castle itself, yet seemed to all fit together without plainly standing out against each other. This main room we all walked into seemed to be the main living space for the company we would have over with us, those being teachers and friends, most likely, as there were sofas and tables with chairs cleanly placed in the round room. Bookcases filled to the brim were across the sides, along with an unlit fireplace made of some kind of dark marble sitting off next to what seemed to be a reading area.

From the right, we could see a well kept bedroom with a pair of chests that were more than likely meant for our belongings. Along with a dresser for clothing much to my own surprise; I guess even in a world of talking equines they still had reasons to have clothes.

On the left side of the main room was what seemed to be a study lab that seemed to have an unusual shine to it, like it had been cleaned so well that you could see your own reflection from down the hall.

Luna seemed to take notice of the look I was giving it, ”Ah, yes. I should tell the both of you that the chemistry room is aptly enchanted to keep both you and the room itself out of harm's way. And that it is, in fact, quite fireproof.” She says while gesturing to several glowing gemstones sewn into the walls, “ As for the other rooms, they are kept clean by the castle maids for the most part. They will knock and ask to be allowed entrance if one of the two of you are present in your dwelling. If neither of you are here, they will simply tidy as they have in the past; you need not worry about your personal effects, your bedroom is yours to clean as you see fit.” She finishes before sitting down onto one of the sofas. Chances are she wasn’t going to have time to relax later.

I sat down on the sofa opposite of her, “Certainly glad to have a roof over my head and a place to learn. Though I do want to ask. Just what is it that you plan to tutor us with?” I asked, wondering if Luna had thought that far ahead with her plans.

“That is the main question in the air, isn’t it.” Luna says with a slight sigh before looking to the both of us and the room around, “Truth be told, this entire ‘being a teacher’ role is a rather sudden one for me. But, I digress, classes for school don’t actually start until this next weekend to give time for both student and parent to prepare for the many months ahead.” She adds, now looking over to one of the bookcases to levitate a seemingly random book from its shelf to her.

Locket tapped her chin in thought, having not taken to sitting and had been walking around the rooms on her own, “I’m sure you’ll think of something; sage advice or otherwise.” She says with a smile to Luna.

“Yes. I’m sure you’re right. If not I wouldn’t make a good teacher to the both of you, would I?” Luna says, returning her smile before standing up from the sofa and walking towards the front door, “Though on that notion. Sadly, I do not have time for idle chat, I have prior duties to attend and a schedule to both keep and amend for the future. Keeping the both of you in mind, of course.” Luna adds, giving us both a nod before she leaves us to ourselves and exits our newly gifted home away from home.

I look over to Locket with a smirk, “Guess that leaves the two of us then.” I say, getting myself up off the sofa as well.

Locket on the other hand gives me a bit of a sad look before saying, “About that….” She starts, rubbing a hoof on the back of her head, “I left my luggage with my sister back at the train station.” She says, giving a light hearted laugh before heading to the door as well, “I’ll be back, hopefully won’t take me all that long to lug it back here.” Locket then opens up the door and leaves herself, making me the sole pony in the room.

“So much for the company.” I mutter to myself. While not entirely opposed to being alone now that I had my own place to stay, I had been rather enjoying having others around to talk with. Now with them out of the way I had my own thoughts to turn back to, again; I wasn’t looking too forward to that.

I found myself walking into the bedroom, putting the books I had borrowed on the desk next to a single bed. Shortly after I noticed there was a second bedroom just next to mine, “Don’t recall seeing an extra bedroom…… weird.” I tell myself, slightly off put by its sudden arrival. I chalked it up to magic being at play. And, with all the things I had both seen and done today, that was going to have to be my one and only guess.

I sat on the bed in my own claimed room, thinking about the past, present and future. I still had no answers on how I found myself on Equestria, let alone why I was a pony rather than a human being. Or how it was I learned to use magic so quickly despite it being my first time using it to my knowledge. Or how I was able to walk around in this body so easily despite it not being the one I had been born with.

“There has to be a reason I’m here…. Right?” I asked myself aloud, “I mean. I’m certain I wouldn’t have just fallen asleep in the woods and woken up in the same woods but as a different species entirely without cause.” I went back and forth in my head with this question for a while before coming to a simple answer to give myself, “I could just put it to some type of magic that brought me here. But what kind of magic would be that powerful to tear across dimensions, change my race and alter my brain chemistry to be able to use it easily?”

That question held firm in my head, though I had no way to answer my ‘why am I here’ dilemma. I still figured I would find out eventually. I had time on my side now that I had a place to learn and I’m sure as hell going to abuse it to my best ability.

That brings me to my thoughts of the future. I knew I was here and not dreaming. But now my question was; for how long would I be on Equestria as a unicorn filly? Days? Months? Years even? Again, no good answers. All I could do was mentally and physically prepare myself for the unknowable future ahead. If I was going to be here for as long as I was starting to think, I was going to have to leave my old way of life behind and get used to an entirely separate world then I grew up knowing. And, while I did have my dream knowledge, I knew that knowledge wasn’t going to last long.

I flopped over and rested my head on the bed's pillow, letting out a long and exasperated sigh. “Well, you’re sure in for it now aren't you. Stuck in a fillies body for who knows how long, young all over again, in school all over again. List goes on and on.” I rubbed my eyes with my hooves, honestly feeling a bit downtrodden.

I sighed again and shook my head, forcing myself to get off the bed and walk back into the main living room. I didn’t really have much of a plan of what I was going to do in the future but the least I could do was prepare for it as I walked over to the bookcase to scan over its contents.

The thought of just how much knowledge of the world I had was a bit of a pressing issue now that I started thinking about it, “Guess I’ll start with history, knowing my luck they’re going to test me on that in school and I am sorely lacking in that department.” I lament as I pick up an equally as fundamental book for my future as it would be for school simply and aptly called, “Equestrian History”

Now, as much as I would love to tell you the fine details of what seemed to be over a thousand years worth of knowledge pertaining to this world's history. I’m going to save you the trouble and skim over the details to the best of my ability; that and Locket came back with her belongings while I was in the middle of reading this book, so I didn’t really get to read it all to begin with.

Note, I’m pretty sure I ended up reading most of this in an old man's voice; mostly to keep history entertaining.

Equestrian History - The Tribes of Equestria

Quite some time ago, in the very beginning of our known world, we were not the united tribes that we are today. In fact, we were often at war with each other and the world itself. You could call it a manner of foalish pride that we fought as much as we did in those days, maybe even a simple lack of knowledge and unity to better our fellow pony. But there was a reason for it much like many things in our world of magic.

Land, being one of the main factors, was something fought for by nearly every known race to pony kind.

Earth ponies needed solid ground under their hooves in order to grow their crops as well as to keep their foals safe from the wilds of the currently untamed world. For back then many creatures were hostile to us as a whole. Hydras, Thessle-Wyrms, dire varieties of many of the currently known Everfree forest creatures and worse. Dragons were also a pressing problem, as their fire rendered all to ash in its wake; mind you that the dragons of today are not nearly as bad as they used to be and we actually have peaceful relations with them as I’m writing this.

But I digress. Earth Pony life was much harder than the other two races of pony kind of that time but they were none the worse for it. Earth Ponies are a hearty bunch and back then they often fought and won against all odds opposing them with pure willpower and strength alone. Nowadays you can find their ancient craft being put to use in nearly all our houses, tools and plumbing, as their durability has neigh no equal.

Moving on to the Pegasi. Records show they were a bolsterish bunch, often fighting against even their own and had a brain as arrogant as a dragon's hoard was vast. But, once again there was a reason for this. As it turns out, their arrogance was warranted to a very high degree as they were masters of the sky itself; they still are to this day, just not as arrogant as they used to be.

More often than not the Pegasi of those times would control the weather in giant mobile thunderheads they used as their home, as both a means of protection and war, as their clouds required a vast amount of water to function without breaking down. This often meant that they had little to no choices but to fight over water supplies with the other races down below, lest they go homeless and their yet to be able to fly foals would plummet to the ground. It’s very easy to see why they fought so hard for supplies and it often makes me wonder why it took so long for the tribes to unite.

Now, the tricky bunch. Unicorns were something of a rare oddity in the beginning days as far as our current records show, often picking the most unusual of places to live in solitude to have their families. But again, this was within reason.

Magic was something of an unknown back then, even to the unicorns. Untamed and wild, it fought against the wills of all creatures who stood before it, often slaying them outright or turning them into something more and less… often called A Creature of Chaos.

Unicorns however, did not fear the ramifications of their learning of the world's secrets. But rather fought tooth and hoof over their homes, other races be damned for getting in their way. Very often then not, Earth Pony tribes would be forced to move from their land if a Unicorn found the area to be of use in their study. Pegasi fared no better, as water was often used or even tainted by accident from a Unicorn's failed study. This brings a saying often used by the Unicorns of the past, “Knowledge is a poison best used by the wise. And only used in moderation.”

“Who would have thought war was that prevalent back then.” I lament while helping Locket unpack her bags. I had elected to talk to her about it, wondering what she knew about history; though mostly to help fill in the gaps of history other ponies would think me to know. Likely anyone here would think it strange for a pony to not know something seemingly everyone else does.

“You’re telling me! There’s a reason why we have Hearth's Warming every year. It’s so everypony remembers the meaning behind the ending of war in Equestria and why we're united as we are today.” She says, putting a few odds and ends into her own room; she also found it strange that we missed the second bedroom, she too chose to ignore the why behind it just as I did earlier.

“So in the end everypony found it better to unify then be apart from each other. Personally it seems silly they even fought to begin with, we’re all ponies in the end aren't we? Sure there’s different types of us, but we’re all the same base race in the end.” I said, now closing the book.

Locket scratched the back of her head at my comment before sitting herself onto her own bed, likely thinking it over in her head before saying, “You know, you have a point. I get they all had reasons to fight over the land we live in now. But what I don’t get is why their relations to each other were so bad to begin with. I have yet to read anything about the past tribes personal relations to each other tribal group.”

“No clue about it either. I’ve never really looked into history this deep before to be honest with you. It’s always been something I never really bothered to look into simply because I figured, past is past. But this really does bring the old saying of ‘history is doomed to repeat itself’ to light.” I say while looking back down at the book I had been reading, “If somepony doesn’t learn about their race's past then they're likely to start it all over again. Racism sucks, enough said.” I add, recalling back to when I was on Earth. These ponies definitely don’t need that kind of problem here. Ever.

Shortly after our short talk over the past history of Equestiras tribes I ended up heading to my own room to think, though mostly to give Locket her own time to study on her own since she said they had some things to catch up on before classes started. Convenient for me considering where I was, I had a lot to figure out and not much time to get myself situated into school life. For the second time in my life no less, none too happy about that, though it’s not like I have many other choices.

I sat myself onto the bed in my newly gifted room with a soft thump, being more tired from the day then I figured I rightly should have been. Likely it was the stress of nearly being a homeless filly in a nation I knew next to nothing about, to simply being a filly in a nation I knew little about catching up to me. I’d gone through quite a bit in just a day and a half, partially learning how my magic works and somehow getting into a school meant for gifted children all the while ending up a student to one of the most important figure heads in Equestria as a whole. A lot to say the least.

Regardless, I still had far too much to do to allow myself rest just yet. I had to study just the same as Locket did, and more books than I likely would ever like to read at once sitting on the desk next to me like a testament to saying ‘Guess what filly man! You get to go to school again!’. Far too true in every statement.

Book reading was what I ended up doing all the way to dusk, doing my best to catch myself up on past and current events. There were some other texts I got myself into, like how to measure your personal mana reserves as to avoid burning yourself out; something I didn’t know was a thing before that point. There was also their periodic table of elements I was curious about, as when I was on Earth I had a fairly large collection of rocks and other gemstones.

Their range of elements was truly jaw dropping to say the least, leaps and strides over the hundred eighteen Earth had by far. I took it to the fact that this world had magic as an element in of itself, it could easily make any normal material into something it could have never likely had been on earth. Much like the old takes of dwarves and their Mithril and Adamantium ores, both of those were existent in this world much to my surprise. And so many more elements I would have never had the names for, like one being called Thaumium; being apparently very dense in mana but also being highly volatile. Truthfully I lost count of Equestrias elements once I hit over the hundred fifty marker. Truly astounding to think about in the future, it made me wonder what other strange uses they had in this kind of world.

But, as time passed, I eventually forced myself to retire to bed as I eventually saw the moon shining through the window. I looked at the grandfather clock in the other room only to realize it was 2AM in the morning. Old habits die hard it seems, I always did go to bed this late even back on Earth. So with a soft yawn and some discomfort from being unused to a bed, as I had always preferred to sleep on the floor for some unknown reason to my family, I slowly found myself falling asleep.

I personally hoped I would find myself back on Earth when I woke up the next morning, though I didn’t hold much hope for it. I was likely stuck here whether I liked it or not, as I had already slept once before only to find myself still here despite thinking this was all just one long dream.

A unicorn filly was likely all I would find myself to be.