Letters to the Princess

It was a slow death. Cancer. Creeping through the body inch by inch, stealing the vitality and the life. Blue eyes grew dull, purple hair turned brittle. White fur turned greyer, and skin hung slack on a wasted frame. Rarity was dying, and Cozy Glow was dying with her.

“Heal her.” The savings of a lifetime thrown down in the dirt before doctors, healers, magic-weavers of every kind. Every treatment, every thread of hope, Cozy clung to until it snapped. “Heal her.”

“Let me help, Cozy.” The desperate plea of a mare still in love.

“Leave us alone, Flurry.” The cold, cancerous retort of a mare with no love left to give.

“If you would just let me be there for you—”

“I don’t need your help.” It slipped out before she could stop it. The old walls, the old anger. Just me and Mama, Mama and me. Don’t need anyone else. Just us.

The sorrowful drooping wings of a princess defeated. The flapping of wings that faded into the empty sky around the mountain cabin where Rarity began her life with Cozy Glow. Where she would end it.

Cozy went back inside, shutting the door firmly behind her. Waited one long second for the tears to stop stinging her eyes. Two. Three. But every second felt like a betrayal, a second she should be spending with the one person who truly understood.

She returned to the emaciated figure in the bed. “I’m back, Mama.”

The weak stirring of fading breath. “My darling.”

“Yes, Mama.”

“Who was that?”

“No one, Mama. No one important.”

The blue eyes wander, losing their focus. “Always…always remember, my darling, no matter what other ponies think of you…or what you think they think…you are better.”

“I know I’m better,” said Cozy, with a horrible little attempt at a laugh. “Isn’t that part of the problem? I’m pretty sure egomania is one of the many things mixed into my cocktail of diagnoses.”

Rarity smiled weakly at the joke. She always understood Cozy’s humour. “That’s my…funny girl.”

Her eyes slipped shut — sleep, or the end, Cozy was always afraid to guess. Instead of trying, she leaned forward and nestled her head into Rarity’s shoulder, careful not to jostle her.

They slept.

“Cozy Glow, let us pass.”

Twilight Sparkle's imperious tone set Cozy's teeth on edge as much as it always had. One word from her and Cozy was thirteen again, freshly unfrozen and locked in a cell, getting another sanctimonious sermon on friendship and its virtues drummed into her, with the knowledge that once she refused to listen she would be refrozen for another year.

She stood in the doorway of their little cottage like she owned it. Like she owned all Equestria and everypony in it.

“You are not coming anywhere near my mother,” Cozy said flatly.

“I have a cure.”

“You do not.”

“The next best thing, then.” Twilight Sparkle paused. Pulled in a breath. As though she knew exactly how her proposal was about to be received. “We want to turn her to stone.”

Cozy Glow stood rigid, feeling again the wait of the silica on her flesh, the crystals in her lungs. The immobility that crept up on you until it weighed you down, until you were frozen, your eyes seeing but unseeing, your limbs traitors, your mind the only frenzied thing left.

“It buys us time,” Twilight Sparkle said, her four sycophants ranged behind her. “Time to find a cure. Sunburst is pursuing several avenues of research but he needs more time.”

Finally, Cozy’s voice returned to her. “Are you joking?” Cozy snarled. “You did that to me. I’ve told you I was conscious every minute of every day. And you want to do that to her? You're even more of a monster than I thought.”

Twilight Sparkle paled, just a little. “I think I have a new addition to the spell that will fix that.”

“And did you test it? Or is my mother your guinea pig?”

“I — there was nopony we could test it on.” Twilight sounded defensive now. “And there’s no time. We have to act now.”

She was right about one thing. Cozy had to act now, before this demon could take even the dignity of a peaceful death from her mother.

With a feeling of delicious release, Cozy launched herself at her oldest enemy. And without even a flick of her horn, Twilight Sparkle cast a spell and locked Cozy in place mid-leap. Hooves outstretched, teeth bared, ears flattened - caught in a glowing field of pink magic and utterly immobilised.

“Don't...don't hurt her…” Rarity said from inside. Weakly raising a hoof as though she could protect her daughter. As though any mortal could do anything when a princess took it into her head to alter the course of their lives.

“I won’t," Twilight said shortly. “But we're here for you, Rarity.”

Her magic reached out, cradling Cozy’s mother. No, no, Cozy screamed, but it was only inside her head. Like always, all her screams were locked inside. They vanished, and Cozy collapsed. All her training, all her years of work and toil and sacrifice - and she was once again reduced to nothing by a single spark from a unicorn's horn.

Magic. Magic. Friendship and magic. The twin curses of Cozy Glow's life.