The Royal Nanny

The prince of the Crystal Empire almost chokes on his breakfast as he goes through the morning paper. “Everything alright, Shining?” his wife asks in a slightly concerned tone.

“No, not really. Another pony went missing." Shining Armor floats the paper over to his wife. "That’s the third pony in three weeks.”

“Okay, that is terrible," she begins skimming the article about the newly disappearance. "But missing ponies is a job for the Empire's guards,” she rationalizes.

“Maybe, but the fact that I have to learn about this through the paper-” She cuts him off, already knowing where this rant will go: “You are not a simple guard anymore.” But it does little to put his mind at ease.

She gets up and comes over to his side of the table, where she then rests one of her wings around his shoulders in an effort to comfort him. “How many times do I need to remind you," she asks softly. "You are the co-ruler of the Crystal Empire now. And as much as we want to," the heartache is audible in her voice, "we cannot afford to be bogged down with small problems.”

He looks up straight into the huge, purple eyes of the pony he loved more than anything in the world. “It is not a small problem for their families,” he says with determination.

As a mother herself, and knowing her husband well enough to know he will not give in, she offers a compromise: “How about you set up a special group of guards just for the task of finding those ponies?”

He responds with a simple smile, gets up, presses a loving kiss onto her cheek and leaves to immediately establish said special guards group.