“Spike, stop running in the halls! It’s improper!”

“Come on, Twilight, what’s the worst that could happen? These halls are HUGE!”

Spike’s voice echoes throughout the large crystalline hallway. He is correct in his observation, too. The Crystal Castle, while not quite as colossal as Canterlot Castle, is very big. The beautiful, reflective walls also serve to make the space seem larger than it really is, and they bathe the whole space in gorgeous light and good vibes.

“Be that as it may, it’s no excuse to act immature in a space of such historical significance!”

Spike quickly darts around a corner, forcing Twilight to follow him. She catches up almost immediately, a fact that she appreciates as she struggles to catch her breath. Of course, Spike wouldn’t have stopped were it not for the grand wooden door preventing his advance. Said door is much smaller than the hall surrounding it, and the ceiling dips down to reach it starting at the corner he turned. Having visited the Crystal Castle before, he knows exactly what lies beyond that door.

“Don’t act like you’re not excited about the rooms, Twilight. They’re massive, and they come fully stocked with all the gems you could ever eat!”

“I think that’s just your room, Spike,” Twilight says with a chuckle. “Cadance told me the staff is always eager to please.”

“Well, duh. I am a hero around here.”

“Careful. If you don’t watch it, not even these tall ceilings will be able to contain that ego of yours.”

“Let a dragon have some fun.”

“Hmhm, I’m sure you’ll have plenty of fun once you reach your–”

Before Twilight can finish her thought, the door before the two of them bursts open with enough force to make them recoil. On the other side of the door are two ponies. The one responsible for throwing the door open is a blue stallion wearing the typical purple armor indicative of the Crystal Empire’s Royal Guard. Next to him is a purple unicorn mare, her jade-colored mane covering half of her face. Her cute facial features combined with the pristine maid outfit adorning her body make her a picture-perfect servant of the castle.

And both look ready to panic.

“L-Lady Twilight Sparkle!” the guard exclaims. Immediately, his attention shifts to Spike. “O-oh! Great and Honorable Spike the Brave and Glorious! W-welcome to the Crystal Castle!”

“Th-thank you?” Twilight tilts her head at the stallion. His eyes are wide and shaky, and there is sweat clearly forming on his brow. Meanwhile, the mare next to him is shaking like a leaf. “Is everything okay?”

“O-of course! Everything is…” The stallion glances at the maid next to him, then into the hallway behind him. After a moment, he takes a deep breath. “N-no. We have a… a bit of a situation on our hooves.”

“What’s wrong?”

“Well, it’s Prince Anon. Twinkle Tourmaline here was cleaning the living quarters, when she–”

“He’s dead!” the mare exclaims.

“Wh-what?!”

Twilight and Spike reel back in shock as the mare looks at them with pleading eyes.

“P-please, follow me!”

Through the wooden door, the halls get much smaller. After ascending a number of stairs, the crystal corridors lead to a long, winding hall that ultimately makes a large circle. Most of the rooms on the outer side of the circle are bedrooms belonging to the royal family and their honored guests. Meanwhile, the inner rooms consist of things like a dining room, a kitchen, and a bathroom on each end of the circle. The royal bedchambers themselves are marked with a grand set of gold-trimmed double doors, and it’s not far from these doors that they find Anon.

His body is unmistakable. Being the only human in Equestria, as well as the husband to Princess Cadance, he’s difficult to miss. His large stature is spread across the floor. He’s lying face down, with his left hand at his side and his right hand held palm-down in front of him. He’s wearing a baggy t-shirt and some sweatpants, both of which appear to be ripped and torn in many places. Relative to the rest of the circular corridor, his body is just barely out of sight of the royal bedchambers themselves.

“What happened here?”

“W-we don’t know!” the maid exclaims. “I was just cleaning the bedrooms one at a time when I saw him lying there. I-I don’t know how long he’s been here!”

“Where’s Cadance?!”

“She told us that she was going out to do some shopping,” the guard responds. “There are a couple of guardsponies with her, but she made no mention of the prince. I can only assume she doesn’t know he’s here.”

“This is awful!” the maid cries. “If her highness sees him like this, she’ll be devastated! And if Princess Cadance gets that distraught–!”

“The Crystal Heart will lose its magic,” Twilight adds. Her brow furrowed, she brings a hoof to her chin. Since entering the hallway, she hasn’t taken her eyes off of Anon. “We need to figure out what happened here. Fast.”

“Uhh, Twilight? Shouldn’t we leave this to the police?”

“Hold on.” With a curious hum, Twilight kneels down next to Anon. She places a hoof on his wrist, then his neck. Finally, she leans in close such that her ear is right next to his head. After a moment, said ear twitches. With a resolute expression, she nods to herself and stands back up. “He’s not dead.”

“He’s not?!”

“Nope. In fact, his breathing is steady. That said, considering the condition he’s in, I’d say it’s safe to assume he’s been assaulted.”

“That’s awful!” Spike cries. “Who would do that to Anon?! I mean, yeah, he can be a bit of a jerk sometimes, but he’s so funny, and he’s never steered Cadance wrong!”

“Indeed. Motive is a factor we need to consider.” With a flash of Twilight’s horn, a pipe appears out of seemingly nowhere. She takes a puff of it, causing bubbles to float out of one end. Clearly, the pipe is cosmetic only. “And right now, we only have two suspects.”

“Huh? What suspects?”

“Isn’t it obvious? The only two ponies that were in the corridor before us.” Twilight looks up at the guard and the maid, both of whom look back with wide, shaky eyes. “Twinkle Tourmaline, was it?”

“Y-yes?”

“What is your relationship with Anon?”

“O-oh, I don’t really interact with him much. He always seemed so nice, but… well… I-I’m just a maid, Lady Twilight. It’s not my place to speak with him like you do.”

“Surely you clean after him?”

“O-of course I do. That’s my job, after all.”

“And?”

“...A-and?”

“How do you feel about that job of yours? Ever have any trouble?”

“N-no! I’m proud to serve the royal family!”

“Even though you haven’t known them for that long?” At those words, Twinkle looks away. Being a Crystal Pony, she lived in the Crystal Empire long before Cadance and Anon arrived. Most embraced the two of them with a smile and gave them a warm welcome, but not everypony was so welcoming. “...Hm. Now, then. What’s your name, good sir?”

“M-me?” The stallion awkwardly clears his throat. “H-Hired Hoof, milady.”

“Hired Hoof?”

“Indeed. I used to be a part of Princess Luna’s guard, but I volunteered to be transferred to the Crystal Empire in service of Princess Cadance.”

“Why?”

“Well, I’ve always felt a call to go where I’m needed most. The Crystal Empire desperately needed some fresh faces to help get it back on its hooves, and I thought I could assist in doing just that.”

“Why become a guardspony specifically, then? Surely there was greater need for laborers and the sort.”

“W-well, I’ve always felt indebted to the royals of Equestria. My father served Princess Celestia, and I continued his legacy serving Princess Luna.”

“Why didn’t your loyalty to Luna beat out your desire to help the Empire, then? Why transfer to Cadance’s service”

“Th-that’s…” The stallion’s face begins to turn a deep shade of red as he turns away. “P-Princess Cadance is a lovely mare, that’s all.”

“A crush, then.” The stallion freezes at Twilight’s matter-of-fact tone, but he says nothing. Twilight sighs before turning to her assistant. “Spike?”

“Way ahead of you.” Sure enough, the ever-prepared dragon has produced a notebook from seemingly nowhere and has been taking extensive notes on both the state of Anon’s not-dead body and the testimonies of the two suspects. “What now?”

“Now, we examine the body.” With a wave of her hoof, Twilight motions for the suspects to move out of the way. They eagerly oblige, giving her ample access to Anon’s unconscious form on the floor. “First and foremost, his injuries.”

“He looks pretty beat up.”

“Extremely,” Twilight adds. Her horn glows purple as she gingerly twists and moves his body, carefully inspecting every bit of his skin not covered by clothing. Even then, the numerous tears and rips leave much of his chest, stomach, and back exposed. “Someone did a number on him. I don’t think there’s an inch of his body without some kind of bruise or scratch.” She gently tilts his head before letting out a quiet hmph noise. “And there’s a big one right on his forehead. I’d say this is probably the one that knocked him out.”

“So there was a struggle?”

“Most likely. And despite his injuries, there’s basically no blood aside from trace amounts from those scratches. He was definitely… hm?” Twilight tilts her head yet again as she notices something on his neck. With her horn aglow once more, she pulls his collar down just enough to expose a strange marking. “Someone bit him.”

“Dang. So it wasn’t just a struggle, it was a real fight.”

“A desperate one. Though, if Anon was the one getting bit, it almost seems like–”

“He was the attacker?”

“We can’t rule out the possibility.”

“B-but if he was the aggressor, why would these two hide that from us?”

Twilight briefly looks up at the stallion and mare, her eyes narrowing slightly.

“Interesting observation, Spike. Though, there’s one more thing that makes this even stranger.”

“And that is?”

“He’s dehydrated. Unnaturally so.”

“How can you tell?”

“Sunken features. Extremely chapped lips. A general lack of color and moisture across his body. The poor guy has been drained so much that I can almost guarantee a spell of some sort caused it.”

“So the attacker was a unicorn?”

“I’d almost guarantee it,” she responds, causing Spike to stare at the trembling unicorn maid with scrutiny. Twilight takes a deep breath, and for a brief moment, she appears lost in thought. She makes a move to stand up, but the sound of something cracking beneath her causes her to freeze. Slowly, she looks down. “...Glass.”

“What?”

“There’s glass here.” Twilight takes a step back. Sure enough, close to where she had been standing next to his body, several shards of glass are strewn haphazardly on the floor. Moving his body one last time, she notices several more shards underneath him, a few of which are embedded into his skin. Not enough to cause serious damage, but definitely enough to cause a lot of pain when he eventually wakes up. Twilight sighs. “If I had more time, I’d reconstruct whatever shape this glass used to be in.”

“Hey, how long do you think we have until Cadance gets back?”

“Not much longer, I’d imagine.” The guardspony shuffles in place before rolling his shoulders uncomfortably. “C-can I say something?”

“Go ahead,” Twilight responds with obvious suspicion in her voice.

“I’m not much of a detective, but isn’t it awfully warm in here?”

Everyone present takes a moment to drink in the atmosphere. One by one, they each notice the same thing the guardspony did. It’s warm. It’s very warm. While the castle is normally kept at a comfortable temperature, it almost feels like a furnace has been going somewhere nearby. In the Crystal Empire, a land surrounded by snow, this is very unusual.

And yet, as Twilight closes her eyes and focuses on the air around her, she feels something else among the heat. It’s a tiny bit of cool air amidst the sea of warmth, like a gentle breeze being stifled by something larger.

Opening her eyes, she finds her attention drawn to a tiny nearby window. It’s small and perfectly circular, not meant to do much more than provide a bit of natural light to the corridor. And yet, as she walks up to it to get a closer look, she notices that its hinges are undone. There’s a tiny crack in the window allowing the cold outside air to pour in. With a curious tilt of her head, she attempts to open the window fully. However, as soon as she does so, she’s forced to duck as the window swings open with great force. The hinges force the window to snap back into place, and the window closes itself once again.

“Well, that explains why the heat hasn’t dissipated, at least.”

“Uggggh, all this stuff is hurting my head,” Spike groans. “None of this makes any sense! Glass? Bite marks? Hot hallways? Confused suspects? What’s next, the world’s worst possible timing by Cadance?”

“Hello, everypony! How are we all doing today?”

Twilight lightly smacks Spike with the side of her hoof. Yeah, he deserved that.

Everyone finally turns away from the crime scene just in time to see Cadance round the corner to greet them. She holds a bouquet of roses and what looks to be a brand new bright-red tie in one hoof, both clutched carefully against her chest.

“What’s going on?”

Twilight’s pipe magically bamfs out of existence as she and Spike quickly move to block her view of her unconscious husband, fake smiles plastered across their faces all the while.

“Haha, nothing, Cadence! It’s good to see you! Wh-what have you got there?”

“Hm? Oh, these? They’re a gift for Nonny. He was a real trooper last night, and my husband deserves only the best!”

“He was a–”

“Trooper?” Spike and Twilight ask simultaneously.

“Y-yeah. Embarrassing as it is to say, last night was… was…” Cadance’s voice drifts off as she finally notices the scene behind her dear friends. She leans to one side to look around Twilight, and although she leans in tandem with her to try to continue blocking the view, there is little she can do when Cadance teleports behind her to be at her husband’s side. “Nonny!”

Everyone else winces in unison as Cadance falls to the floor. Panic spreads across her face before she speaks up again.

“What happened to him?!”

“W-we don’t know yet,” Twilight admits. “We were trying to figure that out before you got here.”

For a moment, the corridor is silent. Everyone present waits with bated breath to see how Cadance reacts, dreading the possibility that said reaction might mean the end of the Crystal Empire as they know it.

Finally, she speaks.

“Nonny, honey. Why are you sleeping on the floor?”

Unsurprisingly, there is no response. Cadance lets out a deep sigh before leaning forward. Twilight blinks as the alicorn places a kiss on her husband’s forehead, only for his eyes to immediately shoot open.

The room is breathless. Everyone watches in shock as Anon groans and begins to shuffle on the ground. He places his palms on the floor and tries to lift himself up, only to let out a pained grunt as he loses his grip. Cadance barely catches him before he can fall onto the glass shards below, and with her help he is slowly brought to his knees. He winces in pain as he plucks the few stray glass shards still lodged in his chest out of his skin, but once the last one is out, he lets out a sigh of relief.

“Hi, honey.”

“Good morning, sleepyhead.”

Cadance nuzzles up against her husband and begins peppering his neck and cheek with kisses. He laughs at the display of affection, but his cheeks start to turn rosy as he sees the small crowd gathered around him.

“What’s going on?”

“That’s what we want to ask you,” Twilight responds sternly. “We found you unconscious right where you are. You look like you had the snot beaten out of you.”

“I do?” Anon looks down at himself with confusion. “Oh.” After a moment, he turns his attention to the hall around him, his eyes eventually settling on the small window. “Ohhhhhhhhhhhhh.”

“You sound like you have something to say.”

“Yeah, but before I do… Miss Tourmaline, could you fetch me some water? I’m REALLY thirsty.”

“Right away!” True to her word, the mare zips off at near Rainbow Dash speeds before returning just as quickly with a pitcher of water. “Here you are, your highness.”

“Thanks.” In a manner bordering on obscene, Anon chugs the entire pitcher in a matter of seconds. As he does so, the color seems to return to his body and the light begins to return to his eyes. He hands the pitcher back before turning around to face Twilight and Spike properly. “That’s much better. Anyway, I was totally parched this morning and wanted to refill my water glass. It didn’t feel right bothering any of the castle staff that early in the day, so I decided to just bring my glass to the bathroom and fill it like a normal person.”

“And?”

“Well, our bedroom and this entire corridor was really really hot thanks to Cadance last night, so I tried to open a window to let some air in. Last thing I remember was my head hurting really, really bad.”

“...Wait. You… you were knocked unconscious by a window?”

“It does look that way, yes.”

“But that doesn’t explain anything!” Spike shouts. “Why are you so beat up? Why are your clothes torn? Why were you so dehydrated? Who bit you?”

“And what do you mean it was hot ‘thanks to Cadance?’”

Both royals suddenly fall silent, their faces simultaneously going beet red. After awkwardly clearing her throat, Cadance is the one to respond first.

“W-well… Twilight, you know about us mares and our natural cycles.” Cadance’s voice is lighter and pitched higher than normal. In a manner wholly unlike her, she appears so embarrassed she’s barely able to speak. “I just so happen to have a lovely husband willing to help me through those cycles, that’s all.”

“...I don’t get it,” Spike responds flatly.

“Cadance.” Twilight’s voice is stern and steady as she narrows her eyes at the alicorn princess. “Are you telling me that you did this to Anon? Because… you were in heat?”

“That’s… the long and short of it, yes.”

“Sweet Celestia, how does that even happen?! I don’t even want to think about what goes on in your bedroom!”

“I’ll tell you what happens, Twilight,” Anon says with a suddenly cocky demeanor. “Cady here is a fucking ANIMAL. Girl knows how to party!”

“N-Nonny, please.”

“Seriously, she’s an absolute FREAK. We were like two lions battling for dominance in there!”

“Nonny–”

“Normally she’s all meek and submissive, but when she goes into heat, her eyes get all heart-shaped and the whole room gets really stinking hot and she gets really hot and she just goes and goes and goes until–”

“NONNY!”

“Well, until I’m so dehydrated that I dry up like a raisin. Hence, the glass of water.”

Cadance hides her face in her hooves as Anon finishes his explanation.

“I can never look anypony in the eyes ever again.”

“Come on, Cady. That was a compliment!”

Without removing her face from her hooves, she gives her husband a shockingly powerful swat with one of her wings. Caught off guard, he stumbles backwards into the shut window. The force of his head knocks it off its hinges, allowing the window to swing open with immense strength yet again. One loud SLAM later and Anon is spread out across the ground in an all-too-familiar fashion.

“N-Nonny?!”

“Your highness!” the guardspony and maid exclaim in tandem.

As the three of them attend to the freshly-knocked-out human, Twilight finds her eyes becoming half-lidded against her will. She lets out a deep, disappointed sigh and turns away from the commotion, prompting Spike to do the same.

“Twilight?”

“Come on, Spike.”

“Where are we going?”

“Home. I’ve had enough of the Crystal Empire for one day.”

“B-but my geeeeeeeeems!”

As the pair walk away, the sound of their steps is drowned out by Cadance trying desperately to wake up her poor, beaten husband.

And unknown to them, Anon dreams of it all happening again.

Author's Note

It came to me in a dream.