Author's Note

Posting next week's chapter early, as promised. Now, i'm off to Sasquatch country to find Bighoof! (Uh, if i don't make it back alive, "The End". If i do make it back, there will be a bit more.)

63-Twilight & Tension

Twilight stalked grumpily through Canterlot Castle. Celestia’s tacit acknowledgment of the surreptitious medical treatment she had experienced neither answered all of her questions nor appeased her anger. The wrongness of it, and the lack of explanation further aggravated her sense of outrage. Twilight found her resolve to silently accept what had been done to her was slipping. But perhaps she could set the matter aside for now. The reckoning would come eventually. For now, best to avoid her Highness Celestia and focus on the task at hoof.

Another fortnight of hard research had not even begun to unravel the barrier keeping her away from that which she desired, him whom she desired. After four weeks, she should have had some results. It didn’t help her mood that many of the tomes she must needs consult were housed in the same castle as the pony she least wanted to see right now.

“Princess, you have a black eye!” Twilight blurted in surprise.

She had nearly collided with Celestia at an intersection of hallways – so much for avoidance.

“I do?” the diarch chuckled, “heh, I guess I probably do.”

Celestia was grinning – she was even more luminous than usual. How irritating.

“And there are splinters in your mane!”

“Lets go find some coffee! Maybe I can get you to cast Minor Heal on my eye before Taj’ wakes up.”

And maybe Twilight might be receptive to the full apology Celestia had on the tip of her tongue. A wonderful night with her yak, and now an opportunity to clear things up and explain the roots of her mistake to Twilight. Who could ask for more?

“Are you okay your Highness?”

“As good as I’ve been in decades.”

Celestia felt like the corners of her smile were in danger of meeting at the back of her head.

“In that case,” Twilight declared archly, “I will resume being mad at you since for some reason my lover is stuck on another world instead of bucking me hornfirst through the furniture.” She turned, stomping as she paced back down the hallway the way she had come.

“But, Twilight—” Celestia called after her.

“Good morning, Princess.” Twilight’s back radiated icy rage.

Celestia frowned now; being at odds with her star pupil did not sit well with her. Afterglow ruined, she went in search of caffeine and a discreet healer.

—

The pale coated mare at the far end of the hallway watched intently. Waiting between two statues she was practically invisible to the two princesses. She had hoped Twilight would walk past her in moment; instead the the violet mage had retreated back towards the royal library – a place the waiting mare did not have access.

And what had the two alicorns argued about? It was too far away to hear, but their body language spoke volumes. Something was not sitting well between them.

Perhaps this was an opportunity.

—

Celestia’s black eye was healed, but she was still frowning when she returned to her chambers.

“Coffee incoming, my Prince,” she prodded Tajrahaz gently in the haunch. “Wakey, wakey.”

He blinked awake where he lay amid the wreckage of an armoire which had succumbed to their enthusiastic lovemaking.

“My lady? I was hoping for a rematch, but your bearing informs me otherwise.”

“You were wonderful last night,” she said and kissed his cheek as he rose, “or was it this morning? I’ve just had a little tiff with the pony I hope will succeed me one day. It has put a damper on my mood, but I still–” rather than complete the sentence she turned to kiss him again. But Tajrahaz was too quick – he dodged and licked the side of her face with his broad, wet, tongue.

“Still what, o Princess of ponies?” he murmured, lips pressed against the side of her face.

The most powerful mortal entity on the planet was almost demure when she answered.

“Still love you,” she said, “even though I am currently upset by Twilight’s behavior. She is not entirely to blame, I made a terrible mistake, trying to protect her when she was young.”

Her face reddened as the yak prince gently nibbled and tugged at her ear.

“Look at me now!” she laughed merrily, “blushing like a wee filly in her second century…”

Still the prince nibbled and nuzzled her. Without moving his lips from her, he had sidled around to stand as if he might mount again should she prove amicable to the thought.

“Look,” she repeated, “look and behold what effect you have on the mighty Celestia! Remember this moment always, nopony can take it from us.”

“I’d like you to remember this next moment, by your leave, Princess.”

He was quite ready.

“No-no-no-no, I hear a coffee trolley in the hall. I have wonderfully discreet domestic staff, but let us not shock them unduly.”

The prince sighed theatrically.

“Loyal and dependable staff are a treasure, and worthy of respect. Must I then release your most puissant ear?” he mumbled with his lips still delicately holding said body part.

“Only until they leave, dear.” A deferential knock sounded and the door began to open. “Look, croissants. And redberry jam from your homeland.”

Stepping to the cart, Tajrahaz nodded an amiable dismissal to the servant; she bowed placidly out of the royal presences.

“You like redberry, my pony?” he asked as he set cups on saucers.

“I love it. My Twilight introduced me to it. We do not always find it easy to get this far from Yakkul, but she always takes redberry when she can get it. Are you having coffee, my prince? I recommend it, considering the amount of sleep we got.”

“Chocolate, love. None of that bitter pony-brew for me if you please.”

“Oh! So sorry dear, I didn’t think to ask that they send any up…”

Prince Tajrahaz was already pouring himself hot chocolate from the second of the two china pots on the trolley.

“Wonderful beyond measure, indeed, your staff are.” And how quickly they had adapted to the royal suite’s new resident! “How will you take your coffee?”

“Two sugar, two cream, please. You can hardly call that bitter, my sweet.”

“Heh.” He stirred, and offered Celestia her coffee. “What caused you this conflict with your would-be heir unapparent?”

Now her Highness sighed wistfully.

“The same matter I told you of, this lover of hers and the convolutions that led to their meeting.”

“Will he really destroy everything? In the scryer’s words, it is Equestria alone in peril or the whole world?”

“I do not know of a certainty. The best that I can hope for is that she will defeat my spell and I will give her the crown and he will be a strong pillar at her side. But there are other courses where the river of time may yet flow. On the darkest of these he may hold Equestria’s fate in his hooves and on that day two Alicorns will taste death. You know I would willingly die for Equestria. But who else is doomed that day? I will not bargain Twilight’s life, nor my sister’s. Nor may I risk Equestria’s fate in the hooves of one I am not utterly sure of. The one who will stand true beside her is supposed to be separated from her for almost two hooffuls years. She may already be close to breaking my spell; yet it has been only short weeks.”

“These matters are surely all of a tangle, my love.”

“What will her parents say, that I have allowed her to become so entangled?” The Princess wore a pained expression at the thought of another necessary confession. They surely assumed that the medication was halted once the danger passed – a perfectly reasonable assumption. She didn’t even need for them to complain: she knew that she had let them down in her guardianship of Twilight. “I was meant to be her mentor, not to push her into courting destruction.”

“I should like to meet this fellow, someday.” Tajrahaz rubbed his chin idly; there was no longer a beard there to tug at.

“My spells notwithstanding, I am sure you will get the chance. I do not believe the dark abyss will swallow this one. Do you wish to judge him for yourself? Or perhaps to thank him?”

“Probably both.”

“I will try again to speak to her this evening. If she will only hear me, perhaps ill will be averted. If she but waits, all changes. Seven short years, for the sake of Equestria, is it too much to ask?”

—

By evening, Twilight was on her way back to Ponyville. She would take a few days to work the fruits of her latest research, her notes from the lore housed in Canterlot Castle, into a cohesive theory of how a high level inter-dimensional barrier spell might be structured. And the note begging her to meet after sun-down only increased her resolve to leave the capitol.