Letters to the Princess

Time passed. The pile of books on the ‘done’ shelf grew at almost a faster rate than the pile on the ‘read this next’ shelf. The chess set on the table by the window was set up and cleared and set up again. Game after game played as the shadow of the bars passed over the board, square by square.

And little by little, Flurry Heart began to recognise the mare who sat opposite her. The way she would stare into the distance. The way she would dodge a question with her words, while answering it with her eyes. The way she laughed. Not the hard laugh that she could wield like a weapon, aiming to cut. But the real one, that was pulled out of her almost by accident sometimes, at something Flurry said or did.

Certain things were not mentioned, of course.

Like the Empire just beyond this tower, full of ponies that hated their ruler and suffered beneath her hoof. The camp full of foals that she kept to ensure their loyalty. The way she sometimes crept into Flurry’s room in the dead of night, and whispered things, half-audible, broken things, full of regret — almost sane — but only when she was sure Flurry was asleep.

The way the Empress was spending more time here, in her castle, than she was running her Empire.

And the thing that they did not mention most of all — the fact that on the second anniversary of Flurry Heart’s imprisonment, the fragment of changeling queen’s throne had been removed from the metal welded onto Flurry’s horn. Perhaps for use elsewhere, against a different enemy…or perhaps for some other reason. Cozy Glow had to have realised that Flurry would feel its removal. That she would noticethe return of her strength, flight and magic, unfettered by the shard of simple obsidian she now bore.

But Cozy did not mention it, and so in return, Flurry did not mention the fact that she could have levelled the tower and teleported home at any point since then. That she had told her soldiers and her mother that she would not return, that day when she saved the first of the Empire’s children.

They did not talk about it, and they played their chess matches, and they pretended that Flurry Heart was still trapped. And Cozy Glow watched Flurry Heart, and Flurry Heart watched Cozy Glow.

And so, on the third anniversary of Flurry Heart’s imprisonment, when a note was slipped beneath her door, signed with an illegible scrawl instead of a signature, with only the word ‘Guard’ actually readable, Flurry Heart did not question the real origin of the note. Did not question how the note could have come, into a castle where no one came or went but Cozy Glow. How Cozy did not trust ponies enough to have them act as guards in her own home. Even Best Friend slept in a little hut outside the walls of the winter garden.

She had no trusted guards, and yet a guard claimed that he knew the location of the imprisoned foals. There was a map, with details of how to circumvent the explosive spells Best Friend had laid in the wake of the first breakout.

A blueprint of how to save the foals — Cozy's greatest weakness. Without them, she had no hostages, and without hostages, no army.

Flurry Heart could have teleported herself back to the Crystal Empire at that moment, note in tow. But she settled for teleporting the note itself, to the exact coordinates of her mother’s throne. Cadence would find it. She would understand.

Flurry had to follow her heart.