The Kiss of Immortal Love

~ II ~

The World from Her Tower

Spike had seen the spire a thousand times throughout his years. It was always his beacon home was near, more than the castle or changing scenery. It wasn't a difference between creatures. Beat and ponies alike bore their teeth at him.

What had captured him about the spire was the telescope carved into its round ceiling, aimed at the heavens. It reflected something more of him. Peace and curiosity. It always betokened him, for one reason or another.

But now was the day he was able to visit it.

He lurked through the castle to the dismay of the guards. Upon reaching the swirling staircase upward, he was forced to open the door again, going up and up, the chamber tight and becoming tighter. Near the top, he had to squeeze himself through, a small wooden door now in his way.

And he opened it into a new world.

The offset was a face to space and splendour within the cavity of the spire—broad and around with curved walls towering above. Woodenness shelves were the walls and the colours spines of books were its bricks. There was a ladder on wheels raising to the narrow platform serving as a round pathway.

On the ceiling were the works of magic and mathematics. Ropes and wooden planks were serving as a way to explore what was above. The distinctions of stars and cosmos accentuated numbers and equations. The work of genuine curiosity about the natural beauty of the world.

And the middle of it all sat his curiosity. There was the chamber of the telescope greatly round as if to fit many inside. Below it was a chair and a lever, allowing the thing to swerve around. Looking up, he could barely see the night sky in the slit curved around the end of the scope.

Spike didn't know the feelings washing over him, shaking his head to push them away, never trusting in the fluttering of his heart. In seeing the strewn papers across the floor, one had stuck underneath his foot, which he lifted to his chest. In peeling the parchment, his eyes struggled to read the text. Elegant cursive in a language he barely understood.

The page slipped between his digits. Without knowing why, his claw went to his blade, feeling the handle—gripping it. All of this would be taken away from the one who lived here. Squeezing the sword, that would be the very thing to take the mare away from such a sacred place.

But nothing could be done about it.

For what must be done, must be done, or else.

The phantom arm ached again. It floated before him, shaking to the right, a lone digit pointing to the wall of books. Something felt wrong and he didn't know why. In walking over to it, the shelf was sectioned into volumes of purple.

One of them was light green.

He pulled the book out and his dull eyes remained the same through the slots on his mask. The cover was of a dragon tremendous and big, though anointment by little text to the parts of its body. Spike glanced to the top-right, seeing the light green spines there. He shuffled over, not needing the ladder, placing the book back in there.

Until something else caught him.

The text on the spine, regardless of the volumes, began with the same letter. C. The books around it, though the same shade, started with V. Panicking, he quickly pulled the book back and shuffled to the left. He struggled to push the book back in. The ones before were tightly pressed together and, lacking another claw to hold them apart. He raised his knee to hold the right one back.

It slid into place. He bowed and sighed, and the tension in his chest stopped expanding. That was until his gaze flicked to the book head back by his knee. In lowering that, she saw its letter, a fat D.

Spike whimpered.

He pulled back the first book and then that one, returning to the ones of violet and, drawing a digit on its top in a sharp pull—lowered his claw to catch its fall on the stack. Staring at the spines, he tried working out the puzzle. What was the secret to this organization?

"Can I help you with something?"

Spike never sputtered of filched or anything of the sort, but it became easier to do around her. His spine tittered upward and the charge surged out. The books flew from his claw, caught quickly by it again, another by his raised foot, the third by his phantom claw.

There was a dull thud seconds later from that third one.

"Relax! I didn't mean to surprise you." From off to the side was where the mare appeared, slowly and elegantly, around the gold of the telescope. Her mane was long though its back puffed into a ponytail. Bangs still shielded her eyes. What peeked from beneath their brim was brimming with magenta. "Probably shouldn't have scared you like that. My name is Twilight Sparkle. And you're Spike, right?"

The dragon kept with his leg raised into the air, claw out the same, fighting to maintain a constant balance to his body. He nodded, deep and slow, the thundering of his heart, creating harder breathes to breathe.

"Were you... were you trying to organize my books for me?" She strode to before and below him, the softness of her muzzle brushing his hip. His body warmed, concentrating in his face. Possibly a defect to the tightness of the mask. "That's sweet of you! But I don't think you'll find much luck in that regard."

Spike's only reply was to swallow, then lifting his leg and flicking the book into the air—catching it with his foot. From there, he slid the book back into place, cautiously, as if fearing for an explosion.

One that never came.

"For a knight of such regard... you're a bit goofy, aren't you?" Twilight covered a hoof over her muzzle, laughing, her eyes closing sweetly. The dragon swallowed again, chest constriction, all still without knowing why. "Oh! I hope that comment wasn't offensive! I really do think you're cool. There's so many stories I've heard about you!"

Spike wondered if his face was worried beneath the mask.

"But please." Her hoof fell from her muzzle with grace even for a minuscule movement. "Place that book wherever you please. I'm a little bit indecisive when it comes to personal changes. Not many ponies to debate the merits of different organization styles, you know?"

Her smile then dropped. "But do you think that one can go with the other violet ones? Since you placed the previous one with its shade, it makes sense to keep consistent with that, don't you think?"

Spike did as he was told, carefully, still fearful of an unknown.

"But wait." Twilight's muzzle glanced around the majestic mass of the room; his expression drowning into worry. "This place isn't going to be for me anymore, right? It'll be for the next student or whomever else decides to stay here. Or maybe the area will be opened to the public."

Spike wasn't sure of his expression beneath the mask anymore.

"Then it makes sense to go with the most common system known to ponies, which is either to go by the last name of the author." She nodded her head and closed her eyes in a look of total assurance. "Some ponies—foolish ones, at least—are convinced we should go, alphabetically, by the title of the story."

Not knowing what to do, but in feeling he should be doing something, the dragon plucked out more books. Lifting his foot, he pulled two onto its top—balancing them. From there, his claw swapped through the space, pulling the remainders into a stack atop his claw. He glanced at the spines on the ones on his feet. Top started with A.

"Couldn't you imagine the drastic contrast between authors and genres and countless titles starting with the?" Twilight shook her head while the dragon kicked up the book to the top of a stack. He then threw the whole thing up, the bottom book falling to his foot. B. "It's much better to go for the author's last name for the sake of having their books together. It'll look better and we search more for writers than we do stories."

Spike blinked. The top book started with an A, but the last name was a D. He slid it forward and caught it onto his foot again. The book beneath ended with an A. It was a struggle but, in leaning back and tilting right—the book slid onto the shelf.

"Only problem is writers don't always write in a field so, even if bunch their works together, you'll have romance next to science." Twilight opened her mouth and her tongue limped out. "Something about that feels yucky on my taste buds. So maybe pure apathetically isn't good for the masses. Perhaps keeping that way, but doing so within a section of a genre, is the way to do it?"

Spike kicked two books onto his stack, leaving on on his foot, a couple kissing, last name S. Top left shelf revealed a slot and, in the dimness of the space, the cover of the book behind was two mares kissing. The dragon liked the idea of that very much... as well as the last name being R.

Taking the book between his toes, his leg arched into the air, straining the muscles as kinks popped from within. At this apex, the bottom barely met the shelf as he sole pushed it into place.

"But doesn't it all look so ugly to you? Purple and green and lime side by side." Twilight wiggled a hoof into the air, nodding. "Colour assortment is the first impulsive to what grabs our eyes and completes the appearance of a place. It's the best looking structure and system, aesthetically speaking."

Her muzzle dipped, and her narrowed eyes searched across the floor, looking not for something external, but rather, the hope of discovering something within. She muttered to herself but, thanks to his excellent hearing from nights in the wild, sleeping alone, he picked up her voice. "If you could build a system around what looks nice, then you have the best of both worlds. Even if it's just for yourself."

But then everything stopped. Twilight's tail went limp in a curve across the floor, her hoof dropping and mumbles ceasing. Something terrible overtook her in sudden sadness. The spark of curiosity—regardless of its absurdity—was a bright light after all.

"But I suppose none of this matters now, does it, for the ponies that come next? I could never find a way to make this room into my home... but it feels like I came close to it a few times, y' know." Her eyes weren't set on him. Only gazing at the floor, inching up slowly, lost to another world. "I've seen the world and the universe itself from here. Not all of it. But enough to get a sense of everything."

Spike spotted the desk over to his side, walking over it and sliding the books onto it. He turned around to the sitting mare gazing at him, or rather, the sword strung to the side of his hip. She didn't seem scared by it. Merely a sombre fascination.

"All of these books have given me glimpses into times of the different parts of the world, its history and its stories, findings and inventions and discovering." Twilight's eyes had become shiny from the film of water washing across them. They lifted on his body. "I could tell you nearly any tidbit about the lands we are about to see. B-But unlike me, you've actually been there. You've experienced the things I've only heard about."

Twilight smiled with wobbly lips. "I-I s-suppose... in being informed of my duty... I... I was rather glad in finally being allowed to get away. To not be locked within this castle and visit all those places I wished to explore."

Any excitement in her face, the few iotas, died away. "Regardless of the journey, the beginning and the ending of the same, aren't they? One locked room to another." The edge of her hoof lifted from the floor, pressing, sinking into the plushness of her lips. "All because of the gift these bear. All this fighting. The threat of war. Never in history has one been started over the matter of a kiss."

Her shoulders slummed into her body and she looked like a mare needing to be hugged. "Or to whom it belonged to."

Twilight whipped her head from her dejected state, gazing into the dragon's eyes, their intensity infusing into his own. For even though his eyes were dull, they reflected the burning glow of her own. Embers scattering within his irises.

"I must grant the kind of dragons with the kiss of immortal love, giving his life cause to live one. It was destined that I would be with a dragon, and the turning of events is fate revealing itself. And she has chosen the king as my love to be."

And she kept staring at him, needing to prove something, in the existence of reality, witnessed by another. Things said and felt in the mind and body aren't true or real to the world. Not until acted and showed and proven to another.

"I won't let these lands fall and others die for the sake of a simple kiss and an eternal gift." Twilight nodded without lower her eyes. "No matter what happens, regardless of the feelings and thoughts and everything I've come to know—I will find a way to defeat the selfishness within me. There must be a way to fall in love with a dragon, so the gift of my kiss will be true, granting immortal life to the king ought to bring us all peace."

And to the intensity of expression of the unfortunate princess, she was met to the stoic expression of the dragon's mask. His eyes reflected their glow and nothing more. No greater spark or the sounding of a syllable. Only that bowed before turning to the door, pulling it open, gesturing a claw into it.

The mare stomped forward in her determination... stopping before the final step, closing her eyes and swallowing... fighting herself. Losing herself to weakness, she stole a last glance at the library. Nothing more could be mustered. Twilight fled down the steps at once.

Spike turned to follow her... but was beckoned by the books on the desk. There was another, smaller and bound in leather. An inkpot and a quill sat next to it. Feeling its importance, and seeking to learn how to read, the dragon slipped it into the pocket of his coat—next to the blossom of rebirth.