Author's Note
This idea wouldn't leave me alone so now y'all have a sequel.
[Revised 9/5/2020 for printing.]
[Revised ending for printing on 12/3/2020]
Merry Munchies
"Are you sure we don't need to go over this again?" Shiny asked me, pulling his toque closer over his ears. Light snowflakes fell around us as we strolled through the streets of Canterlot.
"Pretty sure, yah." I adjusted my wings to make it easier to carry the package on my back. It wasn't that I sucked at levitation, but having to levitate such precious cargo across most of Canterlot until we reached Shiny's house? That would tire me out, and it was Hearth's Warming Day, which was no day to get tired. It was a time for cheer, family, ugly sweater competitions, and spiking the holiday eggnog.
Gods, I love eggnog. I can't even remember how many times I've asked Auntie to have an eggnog fountain at her holiday parties and dances instead of a chocolate one. She could even bless it, and that way the eggnog would be goddess-blessed. Who could refuse such powerful eggnog?
Auntie, apparently. She just nods and says something super diplomatic and gets away every time. In the end, her parties end up their usual fare... not bad, but they blend together sometime. She needs something chaotic in her life.
Shining cleared his throat and re-tied his scarf. He wasn't wearing his lieutenant's armor because of the holidays and instead had donned a parka. "I just don't want anything to go wrong, Cady. This is so important... and I want to show everypony how nice you are."
He smiles and I smile back, and we're simply two ponies walking through the snow on Hearth's Warming Day, happy and in love. The faint sound of somepony's gramophone escaping their house on an otherwise quiet Hearth's Warming only adds to the beauty of today.
"Shiny, I'm sure it'll be fine. I'm nothing like your last marefriend," I said with a silly wink before flicking a snow-dusted curl out of my face.
Shiny pales. "Oh gods, I blame you as my wing mare for ever setting me up with her in the first place."
"You're dating your former wingmare, Shiny."
Shining Armor inhales and looks upwards as if requesting some kind of all-powerful interference or blaming something beyond his control for his fate. If it were me making that kind of spaced-out face, there'd be an entirely different set of questions and everypony would figure out what time of the week it is pretty quickly.
"Well played, Cady."
I readjust my wings again so my warm cargo doesn't fall. I guess that being born a pegasus makes it easier to trust my wings instead of my horn. Wings have always been a part of me, but the horn was a new addition at fourteen that no health class in the history of any school in Equestria — and probably even beyond that — could explain. "Gosh, just 'cause I'm a princess doesn't mean I'm trying to arrange for you to love me. Didn't ponies stop doing that, like, before Discord or something?"
Shining snorted and nodded for me to catch up since I was a few paces behind. "Cadance, I don't know what you're smoking today — because you better not be — but has Princess Celestia been teaching you history?"
"Yeah, of course," I say, hurrying forward as much as my gift will let me. "I'm the one with access to a couple other of those boring, dusty archives and all the junk in there. Did you know that most of the resources in the Tribal Section and the Pre-Equestrian sections haven't been glimpsed by anypony other than Princess Celestia since the city of Canterlot was built? Even I'm not allowed in those rooms until I'm officially coronated."
"Okay, Cady, but you know most ponies believe that arranged marriages were a myth? Or that they were just among the nobles? I can't really see ponies doing things like that, but there are also many ponies who think they're nothing more than a breezie tale—"
"—like the Mare in the Moon, yeah. But you don't understand — Princess Celestia mentioned them to me once or twice... or something... and she was alive then, y'know? I think we were talking about how courtly love has evolved over the ages and—"
Shining grins. "You're such a romantic."
"I'm the Princess of Love," I say with faux stuffiness. "It is my job."
He snorts again and nudges me slightly. "So what's in the box? You've got that thing sealed up pretty tight."
"It's a surprise," I say, steadying myself, "and I sealed it with magic to practice a new set of spells Auntie Celestia has been teaching me. They're pretty hard, but I think the whole lesser alicorn thing... it's hard to explain, but I think it makes grasping and working with magic easier? There's just so much of it, though, and I have to learn everything from scratch and get used to adjusting to something that others are born with. The whole deal is pretty overwhelming, yo. Imagine having to look at everything in a new way because of the magic it might involve, then and having to study things you never cared about before — or things you overlooked... it's a mess!"
I finish with an awkward giggle.
"Gods, it's no wonder that Twiliy asks me to check her magic homework instead of you."
"Hey! It's because I was born a pegasus, isn't it?"
Shining laughs. I can't scowl to save my life, but I'm trying! "Yes, actually. Princess Celestia's homework is certainly something else... and having her do classes with students at her school, along with the full workload of lessons about my special status? It's like Twily's some sort of machine, at least, if she can get half of that stuff. I mean, I guess her Faithful Student homework is probably somewhere around my level."
I mouth 'racist' in his direction and pretended to look offended.
"Cady?" Concern spreads across Shining's face. "Are you alright? You look like you really need to use a bathroom."
"I'm fine~!" I say, breaking into another round of giggling.
Shining joins in too, but not before placing a short kiss on my cheek as we continue our way down the idyllic winter streets of Canterlot. Shining's house is pretty far from the castle. By Canterlot standards, he's from a completely average middle-class family. By most other standards, they're a regular family that's upper middle class — living in Canterlot without arcane or artisan jobs, a unique business, or something extravagant, and being able to send their firstborn to military school takes a lot of hard work and inheritance money. Shiny's uncle, who died before I moved here, sure saw that Shiny was able to pursue his dreams.
"Good," he says, still smiling like a goofball, "because today is Hearth's Warming, and we're going to have fun..."
He looked around, with an almost suspicious look that caused my ears to prick forward with the sense that every teenage filly knows: detecting when somepony is going to say something secret!
"...But are you sure," he whispered, "that we shouldn't review things one more time?"
I looked at him with the closest thing I could manage to a flat stare.
Shining Armor looked back at me, smiling sheepishly.
"Okay..." I groaned. "Let's see: don't mention the whole stoner thing, especially not again. Your parents' names are Twilight Velvet and Nightlight."
I tugged at the thick, itchy collar of my sweater with my magic. It was a suitably ugly thing, thick and woolly, with glow in the dark thread woven in with garish orange stripes against an equally garish shade of blue-green that couldn't be described as anything other than an eyesore.
"Cady you already know that—"
I hold up a forehoof momentarily. "I'm reviewing, remember?"
"You're reviewing too much, Cady. I think you've got this."
I pause to adjust my mane, which was braided and swept up in a halo. Auntie thought it was nice, so I let her braid my mane and do this to me. I know it's odd, but for a goddess whose age even history doesn't seem to remember, she's weirdly good with mane-braiding. While it was nice of her, I think I'll be unbraiding it once we get to Shiny's. Having my flowing curls tamed is starting to become scary, and the red ribbon trimmed with little gold suns that Auntie wove in feels like a triumph against my beloved mane.
Next, I shoot Shining a stink eye. "Are you sure that there's nothing else I need to know?"
His ears prick forward and his blue eyes scan the streets. We're nearly there. "Well, Twily's not going to be there."
"Really? Why?"
Shining Armor trotted a little faster; the cold was getting to him. "Mom and Dad don't like how she still won't talk with anypony other than the Princess. She doesn't really speak to this group of fillies that Celestia has arranged for her to work with on all her lessons that are held at the School For Gifted Unicorns. I haven't seen it myself, but from what they tell me, she doesn't talk to anypony about anything she isn't told to — or something like that."
As an extrovert, I can't really relate, but I started foalsitting Twilight before Princess Celestia knew who she was other than 'a filly Cadance foalsat'. She was homeschooled and almost completely unable to function socially in a public academy — which she ended up being pulled from so she could be homeschooled in the first place. She was extremely anxious about everything, has a weird loathing of disarray, and enjoys sorting things. I've caught and helped her with re-shelving books over and over again when she's nervous, as well as aided her with simply arranging things to meet her satisfaction. For most foalsitters, a filly that was almost afraid of them during their first sitting with them would be a huge turn-off, but I managed. In the end, I'm the only one that broke through her shell and was able to handle her burnouts.
Since passing the exam and becoming Auntie's student, she's gotten better... but still isn't quite the same. She's a nice kid, but something is always off when she talks with ponies. I've observed it when I've taken her to the park before. It's like there's something that compels her to be on the fringe of social groups, and she's always rejected. Her mother said that their family doctor said Twily can't read facial expressions — my lilting voice is a blessing to them, since little Twily always knows what I mean by the tone.
Poor Twilight. Shiny and I can't be with her forever, and she has a somewhat hard time thinking for herself, but I can't understand why somepony who seems so normal would have a hard time making friends. She's always doing the right thing and never gets into any serious trouble. She'll do anything anypony who isn't her peer tells her to: me, Shiny, her parents, teachers, and the Princess. She's a good listener and wouldn't say anything bad about somepony.
"Where is she then? Did she get in trouble?" I really hope that Twilight doesn't have to miss out on Hearth's Warming... I'm sure she's gotten some great presents, and I wouldn't want to see her unable to open them.
Shining shakes his head, ears pricked excitedly for familiar noises. We were so close! I couldn't hide my excitement for much longer; there was a spring in my step! "She was allowed to open some of her presents early, and couldn't resist. One thing she got was a really nice science kit from Mom and Dad, and, well, we all 'suggested'—" he winked, "—that she have a special Hearth's Warming slumber party with Moondancer, and she can bring her new presents and snacks instead of being around the — as my mother aptly put it — 'boring grown-ups'."
"Ohmigosh! She's having her first sleepover and with a friend?" I nearly jumped in place. "That's such great news! By the time I was her age, I was a slumber party queen!"
Shining winced a little. "...We had to talk to her for an hour before we were able to get her to want to go... and I'm not sure if she actually wanted to, since me trying to tell her about all the new things she can do with her science kit if she had somepony else to share it with was what really got her to go... science, Cady. Twily chose science instead of friendship."
"That's still good, right?" I said, trying to look on the bright side. "Maybe she'll make a friend this time? And, isn't Moondancer the quiet filly that likes to emulate Twi? The little white unicorn with the most obvious, adorable schoolfilly crush ever?!" I squealed and looked to Shiny, who nodded in confirmation before we made the last familiar turn and stopped in front of an even more familiar house.
Shining Armor and I exchanged smiles and a small kiss. He lit his horn and adjusted the package on my back for me, to keep the box from slipping.
"Ready?"
"Ready!" I nodded and watched as he pulled a key from under his toque like a complete dork, and levitating it to the door.
We were almost attacked by a cheerful Nightlight and Twilight Velvet who both had on wide smiles that had to be magicked like that to stay on their face.
"Hello, sweetie!" Twilight Velvet said to Shining Armor, who pawed the foyer floor a bit awkwardly, a silly smile on his face as he looked at the last of the mailbox before the winter-y world outside was sealed away with the closing of the door.
She turned to me, her and Nightlight delivering a dual-but-not-in-sync call of 'Happy Hearth's Warming, Cadance'.
I returned their grins as much as I could and hurt my cheeks because my face couldn't stretch quite like that. It had to be magic. Yup, it just had to be. "Happy Hearth's Warming, yo!"
Finally, I decided to light my horn as we walked into the dining room of the ever-tidy home of Twilight Velvet and Nightlight.
I swear, if it weren't for a few of Shiny's things or Twilight's occasional books and stacks and rows of this or that, it wouldn't look like any young ponies lived here. Only a few board games that had been left out, a misplaced book, and a cluster of recently unwrapped Hearth's Warming presents showed any signs of non-adult life.
Sky blue aura had grown steadier over the few years I'd had the horn, but a tingling sensation at the base of my skull still persisted. I wonder if that would ever go away.
Carefully, I levitated the cardboard box tied with cord and pulsing with a faint glow that shone best outside of the sun's direct light. I set it on the table. I charged my horn again as everypony still looked on — Nightlight was asking Shiny something and everypony seemed distracted. The box glowed with a brighter sky blue. I gasped a little at the energy I was expending. Magic was still something I could be rough with, especially on some of the subtler spells. I have to do so much cramming on magical studies if I'm to learn anywhere near what a unicorn my age should know... and beyond that since I am a princess.
The aura dimmed entirely, and the box was finally unsealed. A warm, sweet, almost humid smell wafted from the box.
Twilight Velvet picked up on the new aroma among the other smells of Hearth's Warming that were already present in various parts of the house: cinnamon, custard, pine, and a multitude of other scents the already had my mouth watering a little.
"Cadance, dear, what did you bring?"
I looked at the box, and so did Shiny, suddenly curious to exactly what I brought. I flipped the lid open and smiled broadly, showing my culinary masterpiece off to everypony.
"Brownies!" I exclaimed cheerily, hoping I could still make dinner work. That's when I realized I shouldn't have wrapped the Hearth's Warming brownies the same way I did my personal ones. 'Cause now I had no idea which batch I had brought with me.
