Twilight rushed into the throne room as fast as her hooves could carry her. “Princess Celestia, Princess Luna!” she called as she ran. “What’s wrong? I came as fast as I could!”

Celestia addressed her gravely. “Princess Twilight, thank you for coming. I fear we may have been lost without you.”

“Indeed,” Luna said. “Love is spreading throughout all of Equestria.”

Twilight slowed to a premature halt. “Wait... Isn’t that a good thing?”

Luna shook her head. “There can always be too much of a good thing.”

With her hoof, Celestia pointed to the back corner of the throne room, a place that hadn’t drawn Twilight’s attention until now. “Cadance has already taken our Royal Guards.”

In that corner was a huge pile of Royal Guards – stallion, mare, and everything in between. A literal fuckpile. It was hard to make sense of it all, through all the awkwardly placed limbs and bodies. The fuckpile leaked all sorts of unspeakable fluids onto the throne room floor, and it still writhed a little from the efforts of the few Guards who still had enough stamina left to keep doggedly going at it.

Twilight gulped. She was no blushing virgin, but she was not accustomed to such indiscriminate debauchery. “Princess Cadance did this? I see...” It only took a moment’s thought to come up with a solution. “I should get my friends! With the power of friendship, we’ll—”

Celestia pressed her hoof on a particular tile of the floor. It depressed like a button, then gave way to an opening trap door, allowing a crystal ball on a pedestal to rise out of the floor. Dreading what she might see, Twilight looked into it.

She needn’t have worried. It was only a view of her castle in Ponyville, currently empty-looking. No motion there.

It did make her scrunch up her face a little, though. “Hey... You can spy on us anytime you want?”

“I only use it for the most noble of purposes,” Celestia assured her. Luna snorted a little, which drew Celestia’s momentary ire. “You have little room to speak concerning the privacy of Equestria’s ponies, oh Princess of Watching Ponies’ Dreams.”

“Shall we instead focus on this more pressing matter?” Luna suggested.

“Yes. Let’s.” Celestia turned back toward the crystal ball. “Now, where are they...?”

“My friends!” Twilight all but shouted. “Are they there? Are they okay?”

Various scenes flashed by in the ball’s depths, but they never showed the ponies Twilight wanted to see. Celestia looked up at her. “This scrying spell is powerful, but it can only be targeted on physical locations, not ponies. Do you know where they would be this time of day?”

Twilight thought for a moment. “The spa! Fluttershy and Rarity always always have their spa day this time of the week. They’ve got to be there!”

The view in the crystal ball shifted. One empty massage room, empty lobby, empty sauna ... hot tub!

“There they are!” Twilight shouted, forgetting herself. “They’re...” Her eyes went wide as she truly realized what they were doing. “Oh... Oh no...”

Rarity and Fluttershy were sitting on the edge of the hot tub, their hind legs dangling into the water as they passionately made out with each other, as if they just couldn't get enough of each other’s lips and tongues, not to mention their hooves roaming all over one another’s bodies. And down below them … there were Aloe and Lotus, present and accounted for: each of them with her muzzle nestled close between one her friend’s legs, making out with their nether lips just as passionately as the kiss above them.

“I take it this is not usual behavior for them?” Celestia prompted.

“No!” Twilight shook her head as if trying to clear the vision, but it stayed there in the crystal ball. “I... I don’t really know about Fluttershy. She’s very private about it. But I know Rarity is straight as straight can be.”

“Much to Applejack’s dismay,” Luna quipped.

Twilight stared at her. “Applejack dreams about Rarity?”

Luna chuffed out a little laugh. “You should see the dreams she has about Rainbow Dash.”

Twilight was already learning far more than she’d ever really wanted to. In a strange way, it made her gain a new respect for the things Luna had to see every night. “Does... Does she dream about me?”

Suddenly, Luna made as if to look entirely noble and regal. “It would not be proper of us to say.”

“Focus!” Celestia insisted. “This is why we three must act quickly and decisively, before even more love spreads and Cadance gains more power. Only alicorns such as ourselves have any chance of resisting Cadance’s love magic.”

Twilight shook her head, rubbing her face with one hoof. “Why would she do this? Are we sure it was her?”

“We observed her vanquishing of the Royal Guard ourselves, before our very eyes.” Luna sounded a little rattled by the experience. “We still have not managed to interest any of them in anything other than … what they are currently doing.”

Celestia nodded. “She was different. Her coat has gone nearly black, and her colors have changed. But it was most certainly her.”

“But...” Twilight’s jaw dropped. “But that sounds like...” She glanced over at Luna. “Um... Never mind.”

“No, you are correct,” Luna insisted quietly. “It reminds me very much of when I was in the clutches of the Nightmare.”

“Nightmare Cadance...” Celestia grimaced with the distaste of those words. “Sadly, it seems that it can happen even to the best of us.”

Twilight firmly refused to think of what ‘Nightmare Twilight’ might look like. She had a feeling that she’d been all too close to finding out on more than one occasion. If it weren’t for the help of her seemingly incorruptible mentor... She shook herself. There was a problem! They needed a solution! “How are we even going to find her? She could be anywhere.”

“She will find us,” Luna said with confidence.

“What? How?”

“My sister is right,” Celestia said firmly. “We are her greatest threat. If we strike against what she holds most dear, she will have no choice but to defend against us.”

“What she holds most dear...” It came to Twilight instantly. “My brother!”

“Exactly,” Luna confirmed. “We must make for the Crystal Empire at once!”

* * *

Things were not any better at the train station.

“She has already been here,” Celestia proclaimed unnecessarily. Twilight herself could see that, given all the trysting ponies surrounding them and, most concerningly, the train conductor busy getting his limp and spent cock sucked by Fleur De Lis. Two more ponies – a mare and a stallion passenger – were going at each other as he licked them both.

“What about the engineers?” Twilight suggested. “They’re the only ones we really need in order to get to the Crystal Empire.”

“Taken as well, I’m afraid.” Luna pointed.

And there they were, two stallions in what was left of railway engineer uniforms, holding each other in a front-to-back position, sixty-nining each other with great enthusiasm.

Twilight tried to ignore the moans and fleshy, squishy sounds of being surrounded by ponies in the throes of erotic passion. It wasn’t easy. She also worked to ignore the slight heat growing under her tail. No – she would not allow herself to be drawn into this! Was all this even necessary? “Can’t we just fly there?”

“It’s too far and too cold.” Celestia gave an involuntary shiver. “It would take weeks. That’s just time we don’t have to spare.”

Luna stared at the train. “I do not suppose that either of you understand how to operate one of these modern contraptions?”

“Sister, we’ve had trains for hundreds of years. They’re hardly modern.”

“Well, I have had trains for less than ten years...” Luna squinted at it. “I still have my suspicions about their use of dark magic.”

“Sister, I told you, they work by burning coal, which in some fashion—”

“I don’t know how to run a train yet,” Twilight said, daring to interrupt the elder alicorn. They couldn’t afford the time a bickering match between the sisters might take. She grinned as she let the suspense build slightly. “But I just happened to spend last summer placing teleportation keys on every book in my library. Hold on a moment...”

She sent her magic touch riffling through the many volumes remotely, found the right target, and brought it to herself with a flash of teleportation.

Celestia picked it up from where it had landed on the platform. Luckily not in one of the many assorted puddles of sexual fluids present there. “Train Driving for Dummies...” She looked over at her sister. “See – I told you Princess Twilight would be must helpful in our quest!”

“I did not doubt that,” Luna said, peering at the book. “I do, however wonder if it is a slight against our intelligence. Was Train Driving for Intelligent and Popular Princesses not available?”

“As a matter of fact,” Twilight said, “it was not.”

“Come along, you two.” Celestia was already trotting toward the front of the train, carrying the book in her magic.

* * *

“Okay... ‘Chapter Three: Preparing the Engine’.” Twilight sighed. “I still think we could use those first two chapters of safety precautions and introduction...”

Celestia looked pleadingly. “There will be time enough for that when we are in motion. Come now, we already agreed to skip the first two chapters.”

“By two to one vote,” Twilight said sourly. Come on. Celestia had been the one who taught her about doing things by the book. And now she wanted to skip what might very well end up being the most important chapters? She shook her head. Whatever. Time to get reading. “Alright then... Princess Celestia, can you pull that big lever on the left? And Princess Luna, I need you to turn that wheel on the right counterclockwise until the gauge above it moves its needle into the green section.”

“Dark magic,” Luna muttered under her breath as she moved to adjust the wheel.

Steam began to hiss.

“It’s working!” Celestia said with actual glee in her voice. “It’s working!”

Twilight grinned in triumph. “Great! Now we need to shove plenty of coal into the furnace grate there, and check the water level...”

* * *

The three alicorns snuck into the entrance gates of the Crystal Palace … though, honestly, there probably wasn’t much need for stealth. The streets of the Crystal Empire had been little more than a giant orgy, and the Crystal Guards at the palace had been too busy having their way with a lovely group of crystal mares to bother stopping the three of them – or even acknowledging their presence.

It was uncanny, Twilight thought, just how obsessed with sex they’d all become. She steadfastly ignored the effects it was having on her own body. Just a natural reaction to seeing everything around her, of course. Nothing to be concerned about. It wasn’t as if she was suddenly going to just give in and go squeeze herself underneath one of those Crystal Guards just because she felt a little tingling heat under her tail. That would just be ridiculous. She was better than that.

They reached the throne room without incident, without even being noticed. All three of them stopped just outside the massive crystalline doors.

“You think he’s here?” Luna asked, a little dubiously.

Celestia sighed. “He wasn’t anywhere else, not in his quarters, nor any of his other usual haunts. If Nightmare Cadance wanted him kept safe, this would be the safest place.”

“Unless she’s already figured out our plan and hidden him away somewhere,” Twilight added.

“Well, if that is the case, then we may not be able to locate him. We’ll need a new plan. But first, we should check the throne room.”

Luna stepped forward and put her hoof to the door, but did not yet open it. “And if Nightmare Cadance – as you named her – is here … have we a plan?”

Celestia shook her head. “Attempt to subdue her. Do our best to resist her love magic. What else is there to do?”

Staring ahead at the door, Twilight quietly said, “I hope he’s okay...”

“Come,” Celestia said. “Our time is limited.”

Luna opened just one of the two huge doors for them … and the moment they came inside, Twilight just knew something was terribly wrong.

Not that it had taken any great leap of intuition, though. The main thing that clued her in was the sight of Shining Armor. He sat on the throne, his hind legs splayed out in front of him and his cock – Twilight tried not to think about how sumptuously big and perfect it looked – standing straight up in front of him. He stroked it with both hooves, ceaselessly repeating Cadance’s name to himself.

She had hoped that Nightmare Cadance – the name started to seem more and more appropriate now – would have spared her brother at least. But no. It seemed that nopony in Equestria was safe from her.

“Does this seem too easy?” Luna said, carefully approaching the throne.

Celestia was close behind her. “She has gone mad with the power of love. She isn’t thinking clearly.”

Twilight was the last in line behind them. She wasn’t sure how close she wanted to get to her brother when he was like this. She didn’t know what he would do. Worse, the wasn’t sure what she might do. “I have a bad feeling about this,” she muttered. “Almost like it’s...”

The door slammed behind them.

“A trap?” A harsh giggle came from behind.

That voice! It was recognizably Cadance’s, but it was just … off somehow. Unhinged. A twinge of desperation in it.

Slowly, dreading what she might see, she turned.

Barely in time! A love laser already beamed toward her – she barely managed to get a shield in place fast enough.

Cadance’s magic was strong now! Twilight could barely hold against it. Her hasty shield was unrefined, drawing too much magical power from her for the good it was doing. If she was alone, she wouldn’t have been able to hold it.

Thankfully, she wasn’t alone. It was scarcely a moment later before Celestia stepped in front of her, blocking the beam with a new, brightly glowing shield … a type of shielding spell Twilight had never even seen before. Amazing!

Luna came around the other side, launching a counterattack that forced Cadance to cease her beam and put up shields of her own.

It seemed that Cadance was not without her tricks, though. Even as she kept her shielding spell up, a strange new spell twisted its way up her horn. It flashed up from the tip, then began to spread like a wisp of smoke. Only … it didn’t thin as it spread, as it grew to fill the huge throne room.

“What is this?” Luna shouted over the sound of her own magic beams spattering over Cadance’s shield.

“I don’t know,” Celestia shouted back. “But put up the best shields you have!”

Twilight did exactly what her mentor said, enacting practically every shield spell she knew, all at once.

It wasn’t enough. The strange, mist-like magic Cadance had cast suffused right through all the shields, as if slipping through cracks between them. Despite all the countermeasures she tried to enact, a little of it still got through to her.

Most of it had been blocked by the ‘ethereal wind’ spell she’d tried in desperation as the mist was about to touch her. That had worked, but a tiny portion of Nightmare Cadance’s magic had touched her.

Even that little touch! She was nearly overwhelmed by the effects of it. Her fur stood on end, her tail flipped up over her back, and beneath it, her pussy was winking like mad. Drips of wetness ran down her hind legs, and she already felt a deep, yearning emptiness inside her.

If she’d been hit by any more of it, she wasn’t sure she would have been able to resist. As it was, she was keenly aware of Shining Armor’s presence behind her. She could still just barely hear him saying Cadance’s name. Was he … was he looking at her, though? She didn’t dare look away from Nightmare Cadance to check, but she thought she could feel his eyes on her, taking in the sight of her desperately winking pussy.

Oh, she and him had fooled around before, exploring as foals do. But it had never gone beyond a few tentative touches. Was that a regret of hers? Had she wished there had been more? Had he? To think of him back there, stroking himself as the stared at her completely exposed vulva... What if Nightmare Cadance did succeed? Did that mean that Shining and her would be left together, both overwhelmed with love magic and unable to restrain the slightest impulse toward expressing forbidden desire in the most carnal way possible?

No! She had to focus! She couldn’t let that happen – no matter how much her body wanted her to. She had to be strong! For Equestria!

Thankfully, Celestia and Luna seemed to be doing a little better than her. The two of them were sticking very close together now, merging their shields while they launched attacks against Nightmare Cadance. They’d obviously gotten a little of the spell themselves – their tails were up and they were winking – but perhaps they were better able to control themselves with centuries of experience, and the arousal hadn’t crippled them to quite the degree it hat affected Twilight herself.

Emboldened by the other alicorns’ resolve, Twilight redoubled her efforts at control, managing to launch a few counterattacks of her own against Nightmare Cadance. Nothing major, but it would help weaken her shields, and anything that served to distract her as Celestia and Luna advanced on her would be all for the better. She didn’t have to let her buried lusts control her. She could handle this!

The other two alicorns were drawing close now. Nearly close enough to lunge at Nightmare Cadance. “You cannot overpower us with your magic as you have the rest of Equestria,” Celestia said firmly.

Luna was right there with her, beginning to grin slightly. Yes! They were winning! “Surrender now, Cadance, and we will be merciful!”

Nightmare Cadance, however, didn’t look worried in the slightest. She practically gloated over them as if she’d already won. “Oh, did you think I would be depending on your mercy?” She let out another shrill little cackle. “No … I don’t think so. I think I’d rather have your love instead!”

She charged up another magical attack, flinging it toward the sisters, but it deflected off their shields easily. Twilight used the moment of distraction to launch a piercing attack of her own – one that very nearly succeeded in tearing through Nightmare Cadance’s shields.

“You will not have our love!” Celestia shouted in near-triumph. “Together, we’re too powerful for you!”

“Don’t you think I planned for that?” The mirth in Nightmare Cadance’s voice gave all of them pause. She smiled sweetly and then stepped on a particular spot on the floor.

An opening in the crystal appeared beneath Celestia and Luna – right where Nightmare Cadance had lured them to. Unprepared for a non-magical attack like this, both sisters suddenly dropped down through the trap door, neither of them able to bring their wings to bear before the door slammed shut again above them.

“Celestia! Luna!” Twilight shouted, running for the spot. But the door was closed, and there was no sign of the other princesses. She spun toward Cadance, raising renewed shields, and she snarled. “What have you done to them?”

“I’ve only given them what each of them has needed for hundreds of years now. Trust me, they’ll thank me for it later.”

Twilight took one menacing step closer. At least she hoped it would be menacing. The way her tail was raised high behind her back may have ruined the effect. “I want them back right now, do you hear me?”

“Oh, you’ll get them back soon enough. First, though, I have my own plans for you.”

“Not on your life!” Twilight darted forward, lunging to take Nightmare Cadance off-guard.

She only stepped slightly to the side, though … onto another hidden panel in the floor. Twilight’s lunge carried her straight down a deep shaft. She only just barely unfurled her wings fast enough to avoid crashing into the floor below. And just as she began to fly back upward … the door slammed shut.

Author's Note

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