The Pearl and the Princess

Magic blazed through the streets of Canterlot, lighting up each block a different hue. The Storm Creatures were strong and there were hundreds of them in the city by this point. But the Pillars had created the Tree of Harmony. While Mistmane concentrated on a shield spell powerful enough to protect their entire group, Starswirl and Starlight blasted back their attackers. Somnabula flew high above, diving down to occasionally slam her hooves into a Storm Creature's head, while Rockhoof charged into the thick of it, sending enemies flying with a fling of his shovel.

Stygian followed behind, unlocking cages and manacles and helping the weary and wounded to safety.

As they paused their ascent to allow him to evacuate more of the locals, Starlight eyed the zeppelins which ominously hovered above. They were equipped with cannons, the likes of which would be able to blow most of Canterlot off the mountain. While they were making good time, they were also quickly losing the element of surprise. They needed to get to the college and rally its inhabitants if they wanted to avoid casualties.

"Lilly-livered cowards!" Rockhoof shouted after his fleeing opponents.

Starlight looked the way he was facing and saw that the Storm Creatures ahead had constructed a wall of occupied cages. Her eyes locked on one particular cage, containing Applejack and Rarity's sisters, and that poor little pegasus who followed Rainbow Dash around like a puppy.

All three of them were clinging to each other, terrified and sobbing. And these creatures, which were so strong and mighty...were hiding behind them.

Starlight's teeth ground together. Then she bolted out of the protection of the shield, using her telekinesis to scoop up each cage in the barrier and lift them out of the reach of the Storm Creatures. The creatures must have anticipated that she would be unable to levitate the cages and protect herself simultaneously, because they began launching all manner of debris at her. Some threw their spears, each metal pole three times the length of a full-grown stallion, and each sending gravel flying when they embedded in the cobblestones. Others picked up carts, trash cans and even unused cages and lobbed them in the direction of her and those she'd sought to rescue.

The artillery was blown apart mid-air with a few blasts from Starswirl, and while Somnabula rescued the captured ponies within the cages, Rockhoof intercepted the charging Storm Creatures with an old Ponish battlecry. Starlight lowered the cage containing the Cutie Mark Crusaders and carefully sliced the lock in half. As the three fillies leaped from its confines, she held them close, feeling their tiny bodies shaking against hers.

"Starlight, you saved us!"

"Where's Applejack? Is-is she alright?"

"Yeah, and what about Rarity?"

"Your sisters are fine." Starlight lied. "You need to get to someplace safe." With that, she gestured for them to follow Stygian and the other rescued ponies, using her telekinesis to lightly push them towards the retreating crowd.

The three exchanged glances and looked back at her and she could tell that they didn't believe her. They were too perceptive for their own good.

Then a Storm Creature which had not participated in the dogpile currently happening to Rockhoof stomped towards Starlight, spear at the ready. She used her telekinesis to slap him with the spiked top of the cage which the fillies had just escaped from.

"Go. Now!" She ordered, continuing to use the cage to bludgeon the creature across the face.

As the three disappeared from sight, Starlight was too busy to pushing back their assaulters to notice the light dusting of snow beginning to blanket the city.

The Storm King cackled as the massive orb in his hand glowed brightly. Then pink and golden smoke swirled out of it and surrounded the ponies protecting the staff. Even as blasts of magic came firing out of the cloud of multicolored mist, Shining Armor could see the silhouettes of his mother and his former teachers...changing.

Vaulting over the shifting miasma of magic, The Storm King scooped up the staff and grinned as he turned to stare gleefully at his latest victims. Hooves had been replaced with flippers and lungs with gills. Now Twilight Velvet and a dozen others flopped about on the stone floor of the chamber, unable to stand or breathe.

"No!" Shining's eyes were briefly drawn from the torturous wheezing of his mother's horribly mutated form to the unicorn beneath him by her voice. A voice that refused to be mistaken, even as her illusory visage dropped, revealing a lavender changeling with glittering navy wings.

A familiar raspberry glow appeared around The Pearl and around the changeling's horn, yanking it from the Storm King's grasp with the strength of an Alicorn who was able to raise mountains. The orb flew over to the two of them and hung in the air, the changeling's form shifted again. He didn't look at her though, he already knew what form she would take.

"Shining it's me! Please we have to get the staff and use it on the princesses. It's the only way!"

Shining glanced into his sister's eyes; his confusion too profound to contemplate action at the moment.

The Storm King on the other hand, just laughed. "I should have known that Tempest would never have it in her to betray me." Then he stabbed the staff back into the depression in the ground, the whole room lighting up as he drew the remaining magic from the Celestia and Luna.

Shining Armor no longer atop her, Twilight grabbed the orb and pointed it first at their mother and her asphyxiating companions. The same golden and pink smoke encircled them, and the gasping quieted. Then she pointed the orb at The Storm King and the same smoke began to enshroud him.

"Bye bye ponies..." He snarled, swinging the staff and releasing a torrent of sight-searing electricity.

It was pure instinct. Shining Armor had no idea if the released magic was strong enough to kill an alicorn or a changeling or whatever it was that Twilight had become. But he did know that he was her big brother. It was his job to protect her. And he knew that he was not going to lose her too.

As the massive lightning bolt made contact with his leaping form, he was propelled backwards into his sister and the two of them crashed hard through the stone wall and went tumbling out onto the balcony beyond.

They had long since settled into roles.

Rarity, unable to perform the usual stress couture, instead used her horn to arrange the shells and pebbles which littered the floor of the cell. She watched them twirl above her horn, until she'd finally exhausted her reserves of mana and was forced to stare at them blankly.

Pinkie sat in the center of the enclosure, dragging her flipper through the sand lackadaisically. Occasionally, she would create something sensical, like a heart or a peace symbol. But each drawing was quickly brushed away as soon as it was finished, leaving a cloud of sand to hang in the water and eventually settle.

Rainbow Dash lay in the corner, unmoving. Applejack and Fluttershy sat on either side of her, occasionally giving her a light squeeze or a soft nuzzle in an ineffectual attempt to rouse her from her stupor.

Spike rested his spherical form in the sand at the edge of the cell, staring out of the coral bars into the unlit waters beyond.

"Come now, Garbunckle, are you really going to wait in this oubliette and allow the Squizard to win?"

Spike jumped up out the sand and turned to stare at the draconequus hanging in the water a few feet above. "Discord? Wha-how long have you been here?"

The Lord of Havoc and Bringer of Madness smirked and pulled out a beach chair, which he promptly stuck in the sand. "Oh, not long. I was baking a cake, I had this wonderful idea that if I made a really terrible one and then presented it to Twilight during her Friendship Festival, she wouldn't be able to refuse to eat it. And then she'd learn a lesson about being honest with her friends, even if they are primordial deities of chaos. Anyway, I popped back to Ponyville to borrow one of Fluttershy's wooden spoons and I noticed that Angel Bunny and all his little friends hadn't been fed." He turned to grin as Fluttershy shot up from her seat, with a look of horror. "Don't worry, I made sure they were all taken care of." Discord reassured. "But it made me think that you must be out adventuring again, and that it must be a particularly important quest, because normally you would never leave without feeding the animals." Discord said. "So, I started jumping around Equestria, trying to find you and wouldn't you know, I find you here, packed like sardines."

"Uh, how are you talking right now?" Applejack asked, standing up and moving towards him.

"Oh, don't worry about that. I don't need air to pass through my lungs to speak." He said, his whole body shifting and transforming into a multicolored octopus. "Still, I am very disappointed in you, Fluttershy. Playing merpony and not inviting me along."

"Discord, Canterlot has been invaded and Princess Celestia was turned to stone and Twilight stole a magic pearl and now we have to get back to her before she does something terrible!" Fluttershy said, grabbing one of his arms with her flippers.

He sighed. "Yes, I suppose this all has rather gotten out of hand..."

"Wait...you mean you knew about the invasion?" Rainbow Dash said, flying up next to Fluttershy. "You knew that we were under attack and you didn't do anything?"

Discord shifted back to his normal, absurd form and rolled his eyes. "I thought that I would let you solve it for yourself. I can't very well go around saving Equestria every time it's in danger. Then you ponies would come to rely on me...instead of yourselves."

"You mean you could have just fixed everything days ago?!" Spike demanded, swimming over to the other side of the draconequus.

"Well, not everything..." Discord admitted. "I've never turned someone from stone to not stone before...if I could do you think I would have allowed myself to remain trapped for so long?"

He shrugged. "I thought you all would learn a valuable lesson about believing in yourselves and then once you'd defeated the bad guy, you'd throw a big party. If I had interceded sooner, you never would have inspired that dapper Abyssian to be kind or those downtrodden parrots to quit their jobs." He laughed a little. "You never would have learned how terrible the outside world was and you never would have saved hippogriff's kingdom."

"Stop smiling you fiend!" Rarity demanded, using her telekinesis to launch a couple shells haphazardly at Discord, both of which entirely lost momentum before they neared him and instead drifted slowly to the sandy floor. "This is situation is not amusing!" Her eyes lowered. "Besides, we haven't saved any creature. Only made things worse."

Discord smiled, almost kindly. "I apologize, I'm getting ahead of myself. If I hadn't waited until now, you never will end up saving the entire hippogriff's kingdom. There, happy now?"

"You mean it was a good thing that Twilight took that Pearl?" Pinkie asked. She seemed the least re-energized by his appearance.

"What? Oh, goodness no! The raw chaos of evolution is not something to mess around with, even for an experienced alicorn." He said, tugging at his beard. "Now, let's get you all out of here."

He was met with a series of angry stares and sighed. "Look, you can all be absolutely furious with me for the rest of your lives...after we save Equestria from being turned into a frozen wasteland, alright?"

The proposition was met with silence, and Discord snapped the claws on his lion's paw, causing the door to the cell to transform into bubbles.

"What did you do to the guards?" Applejack demanded.

"Now, Applejack, do you really think I would hurt two defenseless hippogriff guards just because they locked up my only friends?" He asked with a grin.

When there was no response, he rolled his eyes. "Oh please, right now they and every other hippogriff between here and the shoreline are participating in a musical number about the joys of sub-nautical living. The chaos magic will wear off as soon as Ieave. Now, can we pleeeease go already? If my perception of the time-space continuum is correct, Twilight is at the moment, minutes away from committing the biggest mistake of her life."

They had made it to the gates of the School For Gifted Unicorns when the bombardment began. The three zeppelins which Tempest had arrived with, along with the much larger one which the Storm King had flown in on, all began firing down onto Starlight and the Pillars, with total disregard for the lives of the unconscious Storm Creatures surrounding them.

The sound was deafening, the crack of dozens of cannons going off at once. It was followed by the thought-shattering crash of cannonballs, each bigger than Starlight, tearing through nearby buildings. Soon, the freezing air was thick with smoke and her nostrils were filled with sulfur. She and the Pillars did the best to protect themselves, but there were too many cannonballs and each one was too powerful for them to all be deflected. In a matter of seconds, their group lay scattered across the cobblestones, tossed about like rag dolls by the impact of the artillery.

Starlight had just regained conciousness, although she was unable to hear anything but the ringing in her ears, when she saw it. At first, she thought it was a blast of magic, emerging from the rooftop of the school and rocketing up in the direction of the closest airship. Then it exploded and she recognized the bright colors and the speed with which they dissipated.

They were fireworks. They were Trixie's fireworks! And she was firing them right into the hulls of the ships, filling the air with bright colors and hazy smoke trails. Trixie was obscuring the aim of the whatever grenadiers lay inside and drawing their fire toward the protected school.

Starlight grabbed Somnabula and hoisted her to her hooves, yelling for her to get inside the school. Starlight was unsure if the pegasus could hear her, when she herself couldn't. But she didn't wait to find out, quickly using her magic to levitate the still unconscious members of the Pillars and take them with her.

The smell of ozone and burnt hair filled the air as the Storm King marched out through the hole produced by Twilight and Shining Armor's exit, the Staff still crackling in his grasp.

"Well, that was pretty stupid, wasn't it?" He asked with a smile, as he bent down next to the tangled mess of Twilight and Shining Armor's forms, the two pressed together beneath a pile of rubble, although Shining Armor was the only one who'd been rendered insensate.

Twilight glared up at him, as she struggled to get her muscles to work, to get her magic to push her free of the weight crushing down on her. She could feel her brother's burnt body pressed up against her. She could feel his heartbeat where their ribcages touched. She could feel it slowing. Her horn spasmed, desperate to conjure a spell to free her from the detritus and save her brother's life.

Then The Storm King fired his staff again and her vision went white with pain.

When she woke up again, she could hear his voice echoing from within. He was laughing and bragging, while he tossed unicorns around like dolls with his newly gained power. She didn't focus on the words though, or the flashes of magic from inside. She focused instead on the form beside her. She was in so much agony and everything had become so cold. But deep inside, she knew...

Her brother's heart was no longer beating. Summoning all the magic she had, she threw the pile of rubble off and turned him over, quickly putting her hooves on his chest and pumping to force air into his lungs. It was no good though. Even the shock of magic she sent through him, to try to startle his heart back into function.

The attack from the Storm King had shattered his ribcage. The push through the stone wall had snapped his spine. And the heat of the blast had cooked his flesh and reduced his internal organs to a charred slurry. He was dead. And there was no bringing him back.

Her vision blurred with tears, before she even realized she'd started crying. All she could do was stare at the expression on his face. He'd died horrifically. Why did he look so peaceful?

She buried her head in the scorched hair of his chest. If this was a story, the kind she'd read when she was little, then her tears might have done something other than wet the corpse in her hooves.

Sorrow was replaced with something else. It wasn't her fault. None of this was her fault. It was HIS. HE had attacked her homeland. HE had imprisoned her mentors and enslaved her people. HE had driven her into exile and had his goons hunt her and her friends across the world. And now...now HE had taken her brother from her.

Sound returned to her. The boom of cannon fire reducing the Canterlot skyline to splinters. The cackles of the power mad villain in the hall beyond. Then came sensation. The warmth quickly fleeing Shining Armor's body. The snow which had so quickly coated her and her brother, and which was so biting that her hooves ached to touch it.

She didn't care. Nor did she notice that the wind had picked up around the castle, a frigid gale which was beginning to blow the airships off course. Her horn glowed and the Pearl rolled out from underneath a piece of stone, stopping at her side. Slowly, she wrapped her forelegs around it. She understood now. The alterations she had used it for, even the Storm King's cruel transmogrification of her mother. All of it...it was just a taste of the actual power contained within the Pearl. It was weapon of old, the kind which had been used at the dawn of time, in the conflict between Alicorns and Draconequuses. Like the Tree of Harmony, it was a primordial entity, containing a power of its own which refused to be ignored.

And which longed to be used.

Pink and gold mist began to circle around her, quickly hiding the crumpled body of her brother from sight. Not that she was looking at him. The tears which had been rolling down her cheeks froze, and she heard finally, the wintery whinnying of the windigos in her ears. She didn't care. She let the unbridled hatred consume her, just as the power of the Pearl subsumed her pathetic, purple pony body, replacing it with something much, much more battle-ready.

The cannonballs thundered against the outside of the protection spell. Even with Starlight and Starswirl pouring all the magic they had into it, it was only a matter of time before the spell, already weak from days of existence, shattered. Then the cannons would hit their targets. The roof would come down and they would all be buried in the rubble of their own sanctuary.

Starlight could hear the cries of the refugees, trapped inside with them. The young and the injured, forced to listen to those terrible rumbling sounds as they waited for death. There was no escape this time. They had done all they could. She tried to reassure herself, that at the very least, they had freed hundreds of ponies on their way through the city. But it didn't work. There was no great, untapped lake of courage brimming within her. No inspiration in the thought that others would carry on the fight.

There was nothing but fear, as she realized she was about to die. She glanced over at Night-Light and Starswirl, both of whom were perspiring, and the latter of which looked about ready to collapse. Her eyes drew across the other Pillars, who were working to get the refugees inside the school into the basement, in hopes of getting them out of harm's way. It wasn't enough though. There were too many ponies spread out across the dorms and not enough level-headed guardians to steer the crowds. Besides, she'd seen the basement when she and Trixie and Shining Armor had been searching for a way to remove the Miserable Malachite. It wasn't big enough. There wouldn't be enough room. And even if they could stuff all those creatures into such a tight spot, they wouldn't be able to dig themselves out of the mounds of plaster and stone when the school collapsed.

They were all going to die and there was nothing she could do about it.

She locked eyes with Trixie. She had saved their lives, but she'd only given them a few more minutes in the end. Starlight smiled anyway. They had tried their best. All of them. They had done everything they could.

She didn't want to die. But she was pretty sure she didn't have a choice at this point.

Then Somnabula lifted a hoof and pointed out one of the big windows. "It's Magnus! He's back!" She cheered.

It took Starlight a second to remember what exactly that meant. Even if Magnus was one of the Pillars of Equestria, he wouldn't be able to take out four zeppelins on his own. Then she remembered Stygian's plan and saw the brightness coming through the window. The thundering of the cannon fire was replaced with a much louder cracking sound, followed by a dull roar.

The barrier dropped and ponies of all sizes moved to the windows to gaze up at their salvation.

Dragons. Hundreds of them, filled the air. And the fire spewed from their mouths had made contact with the canvas exteriors of the airships, as well as the powder rooms deep in the hold. The zeppelins had exploded, their balloons ripped apart and their decks engulfed in orange and blue flames. Hope soared within Starlight and then plummeted, as she watched the four conflagrations slowly descend toward the city. The rime spattered wind was driving each towering inferno toward the mountain side and the swarm of multicolored dragons who, being dragons, had flamed first and thought second, could do naught but witness as each flaming time bomb neared Canterlot's remaining structures.

Twilight Velvet struggled in the grip of the Storm King, her forehooves shoving against his fingers, even as they tightened around her throat. Her back legs kicked wildly, over the bodies of her fallen comrades, as the satyr lifted the staff so that the glowing tip poked into her exposed stomach.

"C'mon, give up." He told her. "All your friends have been defeated. There's nothing to fight for anymore." He stepped over the Professor of Alchemy, his tail sweeping a chunk of stone to the side. Then he swung her down to be eye to eye with Celestia's horrified expression. "And all your leaders are statues, anyway."

She stared at her reflection in the surface of the sleek black crystal encasing the princess and closed her eyes. All she could do now was pray that Shining Armor and Twilight were alright.

"Not all of them."

The Storm King turned, and Velvet opened her eyes, just as something massive and purple collided with the Storm King. While one claw prevented her from striking the floor of the chamber, another grabbed the arm with which the Storm King wielded his staff. Velvet watched as the six fingered claw, which seemed to have an eye between the bones of its knuckles, clenched and then yanked. The Storm King let out a cry and then the staff flew from his hand, caught by something that was a mixture of a snake's tail and a scorpion's barb. Then the immense, winged monstrosity rolled her gently onto her feet and flew upward, dragging the screaming form of the Storm King behind it, as it smashed through the roof of the palace and disappeared into the freezing cyclone above.

"Well, it's a good thing we left when we did, isn't it?" Discord said, as Applejack, Fluttershy, Rarity, Pinkie Pie, Rainbow Dash and Spike, now returned to their regular forms and teleported onto the rooftop of the Canterlot palace, stared up in horror at the burning zeppelins set to crash into their capital.

"Relax...I'll take care of it!" Discord said, his tail transforming into a fire hose and a fire brigade helmet appearing atop his mismatched horns. "You go save Twilight from herself again."

Just as he flew off in the direction of the dragons desperately trying to slow the descent of the ruined airships, they were drawn out of their shock by blood curdling scream from the other side of the roof. They jumped to action, unable to do anything but follow the sound. Between the skin-blistering wind and the slippery ice forming over the shingles at their hooves, it took them several minutes to make it safely to the other side of the twirling weathervane.

The sight which greeted them was unexpected. A massive creature, covered in scales and plated discs of hard bone, lay crouched over a terrified and bloodied satyr. In one hand, it held a familiar glowing pearl. In the other, it held a staff from which purple lightning streaked out, crackling across the surface of the sky. On each hand and on each ankle, a massive yellow eye flickered, each shielded from the raging blizzard by a film of translucent skin.

Tendrils swung from the back of the creature, each one covered in barbed suction cups and each tapering off into a glowing jellyfish stinger. Meanwhile, two sets of thick and leathery wings extended from either side of the writhing fleshy growths, each covered in a porcupine like spines. As the multiple eyes caught sight of their shivering group, the head turned and they all stared into the massive black eyes of a skull which appeared to share the features of a bat, a crocodile and a rhino.

The creature let out a hideous shriek, loud enough to be heard over the screeching wind and the crackling fires of the zeppelins. Then it used its wings to spring up into the air, dragging the screaming yeti behind it with one claw. The group watched as the chimeric monstrosity circled above. Then the massive horn extending from its nose glowed with familiar magic and as it dropped its prey, a blast of magic struck him in the abdomen and punched him through the roof of the castle.

Then the monster held its wings tight to its stomach and dived through the hole the satyr's falling form had caused, turning the thrones of Celestia and Luna to rubble and crushing him into the stone floor.

"It's Twilight..." Spike said, too low to be heard over the wind. With that, he dove through the hole, barely hearing the cries of his companions as he landed on one of the tapestries and using his claws slowed his descent enough to land on both feet.

"TWILIGHT!" He yelled, running around her circumference and noticing each lower eye trailing him as he did. As he reached the front of her form, he saw that she was snarling at the half-conscious satyr, tusks protruding from her fangy maw.

"You have to stop!" Spike pleaded.

Twilight didn't even look at him. Her tail lashed out, the lower portion of it, which was thankfully not glistening with venom, wrapping around his tiny form and holding him back as she continued to hiss into the face of the Storm King.

"Twilight! Let go of him this instant!" Rarity yelled, as if talking to a dog. She leaped down into the chamber and attempted to use her magic to try to tug Spike free of the tail.

Twilight brought the non-spine covered underside of wing down on Rarity, pinning her to the ground and muffling her attempts to intervene.

"Get off her!" Rainbow Dash shouted, slamming into Twilight's cart-sized skull and pounding against the bone plates protecting her face with her hooves. "I don't know what you did to yourself! But you have to stop!"

Twilight ignored the attacks, grabbing the Storm Kind with a prehensile tongue and launching him across the chamber and into a pillar. As he crashed through it, she lashed out with one of her tendrils, pinning Rainbow's wings to her sides and holding her far out of reach of doing any damage.

"LET GO OF THEM!" Pinkie slammed into the top of Twilight's skull, her magic managing to crack the boney protuberances protecting Twilight's head. "We're your friends, you're not supposed to treat us like this!"

Twilight twisted her head like an owl, causing Pinkie to fall prone and then wrapped a claw around her, holding her gently, even as she continued to pound on against Twilight's claw with her hooves. Then, bringing her friends along, she stalked toward the Storm King. He glanced back at her with fear in his bright blue eyes, as he propelled himself across the floor with one arm, his broken, double-jointed legs dragging uselessly behind him.

"Please Twilight...whatever is wrong with you, we can fix it..." Fluttershy said, slowly descending in front of her maw. "I know that you don't want to do this...I know that you're better than this...please, let us help you."

Twilight snapped her clawed feet free of the ice which had begun to seal her to the floor of the chamber and let out a bellow which reverberated through the entire castle. Then she lifted the staff in one claw and Fluttershy felt herself encased in a magical bubble. She cried out but found the force field was entirely soundproof. Tears sprung to her eyes as she pounded on the inside of the protective spell, as Twilight stomped past, moving right up to the desperately whining and blubbering Storm King.

"He took somepony from ya, didn't he?"

Twilight paused, her jaws inches from the Storm King's prone and cowering form. Then she shifted, her many eyes squinting and glowering at the Earth Pony in the Stetson who had landed in the rubble of the thrones. She let out a low growl, warning that she would restrain Applejack as well if she attempted to stop her.

"Well, ahm I right?" Applejack asked, stepping forward anyway. "He took somepony and now you're so angry that you don't want to listen to reason, do ya?"

Twilight's massive eyes widened, and she let out another howl, the kind which would have sent a pack of timberwolves running.

"Twilight...it's the first time you ever lost anypony, ain't it?" Applejack asked, stepping closer.

Twilight regarded her for a moment and then turned back to the Storm King.

"Killing him won't bring them back, whoever they were..." Applejack said, tears in her eyes. "Trust me, Twilight...Ah know what it's like to think that everythin' bad that happens is yer fault. And that if ya don't fix it, then you'll let every creature down. Ah know...Ah know what it's like to lose the people closest to ya..." She closed her eyes and hung her head. "I'm not gonna fight you, Twilight...but Ah don't want to lose ya, either. If ya do this...he won't just have taken somepony from ya...he'll have taken you too. You're better than this...Ah know you are."

Twilight continued to growl lowly for a moment. Then all the fight went out of her limbs. Slowly, she freed each creature she'd restrained, easing them to the floor. Bitter and tearful looks covered the faces of her friends, but she wasn't looking at them. Her eyes were all on the Storm King.

"Ah know it's not fair..." Applejack said, walking up to the side of Twilight's tank-like chest, as ice formed around her claws once more. "Ah know that...because of the windigos...because yer a princess...you aren't allowed to be angry, like you should be. Ah just wanted to let you know...how sorry Ah am."

With that, she hugged the side of Twilight, her orange form dwarfed by the tank-sized aberration which she had just watched immobilize her friends without blinking.

Twilight glared at The Storm King, the ice coalescing around her legs growing opaquer by the second. It was getting colder too, colder than ice could be in reality. It was as icy as the hatred in her chest, the hate which she knew the storm surrounding the palace was now feeding off.

She was not just a princess. She was the Princess of Friendship. Just like how Cadence embodied love across all of Equestria, she embodied all the friendship. And she knew then, that if she gave into hate, if she killed this monster who had defiled her land with his presence, she knew that in the hearts of ponies everywhere, friendship would die.

And the windigos would win.

She hung her head, and her claw manipulated The Pearl one last time. Her friends, all still hanging back except for Applejack, watched as her form shifted. Claws retracted; limbs disappeared. Wings folded into her back and teeth changed from sharp and thick to flat and wide.

She was left what she had always been. A pony. With two wings and a horn. She continued to hold the Pearl and the Staff, unlimited power in each hoof, as Applejack continued to hug her around her center.

"Let it out sugarcube...go ahead..." Applejack said, lightly patting Twilight on the back as the princess continued the sobbing she'd begun out on the balcony.

Slowly, Spike picked himself up and ran over to Twilight, wrapping himself around one of her legs. Fluttershy approached her tentatively and then sprinted forward to hug her opposite Applejack. Pinkie Pie watched and then looked down at her hooves, which had managed to draw blood thanks to her repeated strikes against Twilight's armored hide. Then she dashed over and almost knocked over the rest of the group in her own show of affection.

Only Rarity and Rainbow Dash hung back, watching Twilight tremble and listening to her faint sobbing echo through the ruined castle hall. Rarity looked conflicted and glanced at Rainbow Dash for guidance. But Rainbow just shook her head and darted up and out of the hole in the ceiling. Rarity watched her go and then dropped her gaze to the once polished floor of the palace, now cracked and soot stained. She felt tears start to come to her own eyes but quickly wiped them away with her hoof. This wasn't about her.

And she wasn't interested in their affections anyway. It wouldn't solve anything.

They had won the battle. They had saved Equestria.

But everything was still broken.