To Change a Heart

Chapters

Chapter 1: "Exploration"
Chapter 2: "Revelation"
Chapter 3: "Realization"
Chapter 4: "Reflection"

Chapter 1: "Exploration"

To Change a Heart
Written by The Descendant

Cover Art by Maki
Used with Permission

Chapter 1: “Exploration”

Long millennia ago was fought the War of the Witches
And of that time little is spoken
Few tales of those unhappy seasons remain
Yet some still survive
And even the princesses know
That there still dwell in the worldly sphere
Some who saw the wonders and horrors of those days

T’was during the second summer of that war
When the days seemed at their blackest
And Equestria seemed doomed to thralldom
Under Hydia and her daughters
That Celestia’s army marched to lift a siege
And Luna’s made a long retreat
And both the sisters were filled with doubt

For seven long and murderous days
Had the army of the Nightbringer
Fought the forces of the witch
And now her regiments
Thin, tired, and broken
Crossed the bridge across the River Running
And weariness sat behind their eyes

The Nightbringer seated herself
Upon the great stone at the foot of the bridge
She looked upon each regiment as they crossed
Whispering encouragement to her little ponies
As she looked upon their wounds
Tears fell from her eyes and crossed her dark coat
And the Princess Luna worried over each in turn

“How soon shall it be before all have come across?”
She asked her generals who stood nearby
“My brigade comes across now, my princess,” answered one
“See, here then are our skirmishers.”
The Nightbringer did lift her head
And stare out across the vast reach of the bridge
As pegasi lurched across and found safety nearby

The Princess Luna dared breathe easier
And welcomed the last of her troops to cross the river
And in her mind
Dared she to believe that she had found haven
And that now there would be a time of healing
For they had gained the far side of the river
And the long bridge shielded them

No sooner had she lifted her eyes
Then a flash of deep magic lifted across the darkened sky
And at its core was the power of the fiery-haired witch
And torches came alight on the far bank
For the army that Draggle lead had not quit their pursuit
And the river and bridge were now all that stood between
The Nightbringer’s ponies and the army that sought their death

Looked upon the spectacle did the alicorn and her generals
And as the night grew deeper did the river catch the hues
Of the torches that lit the far bank
The horn of the princess came alight
And her magic began to lift
For deep inside her she felt the challenge of the witch
And floated her power above the river

“Nay!” rose the voice of the princess
As a grey and terrible light shone from her eyes
And the alicorn lifted into flight
“Nay, I tell you, Draggle!
Deep are you in Equestria fair here
And no longer will I suffer
To see my ponies put to pain!”

From the far bank of the river
Came a wellspring of dark magic
The witch answering the challenge
Of the alicorn she had once known
With that Luna winged her way from the stone
And stood upon her side of the bridge
And the witch upon hers

Stretched over half of a mile did the long bridge
And made of great rocks held fast with their weight
Each laid in place long ago when Equestria was young
Before the ponies had come down the mountain
Now Luna’s magic, and that of Draggle too
Streaked over it and cascaded around it
And their armies looked on in wonder

The night came alive with color
And as the two foes
Once as close as sisters
Unleashed their magic upon one another
It snapped, hissed, and crackled through the night
Cascading as thunder that rolled along the river
And caught the armies in waves of fear and wonder

Of deeper blue and darker black than the night itself
Was the magic that lashed from the princess.
As wafts of orange fire and deeper red than blood
Was that which erupted from the witch.
And soon the earth shook beneath the force of their blows
And torrents of light and sound fell across the river
Unsettling its surface and whipping the waters

Yet concealed among all of this fury
The Nightbringer had hidden a plan and a purpose
And as she avoided the curses and magic of the witch
Her magic found the very forgotten spaces
Between the great stones which made up the bridge
And as each spell was flung out into the night
Her magic sat there among the rocks

As once there was a great moaning sound
And all eyes settled upon the two figures that stood upon the bridge
The flaming eyes of witch filled with understanding
As the alicorn’s face betrayed a great wide smirk
And as the witch wrapped herself in her magic
Escaping the oncoming wrath of the Younger Sister Sovereign
As it exploded forth from where it hid

Great and calamitous was the noise
And heard far away in sleeping villages
And on far away peaks
Those nearby shielded their ears against it
For there was the scraping of stone
And the magic of the alicorn
Broke free rock and stone from where it had long stood

Exploded forth did the substance of the ancient bridge
Flying deep into the distant army of the witch
And each stone in turn lifted from where it has sat
As Luna’s magic unmade the bridge
Casting the rock far and wide
Ripping it asunder as she cried out
So that no two stones lay upon one another

Cascaded the waters of the river
As rapids across the sundered stones
And her ponies gathered her up
The alicorn dared believe her army safe
For there would be no fording the river
And she smiled at her victory
Even as her magic lapsed

Waited Luna’s army as the night drew on
And weary soldiers laid their heads to the ground
The Nightbringer righted herself
And made for the stone nearby
Upon which she had sat when the battle began
To her side came her generals
And with them she began to speak

No sooner had she opened her mouth
Then came a noise from across the river
And all in her company
Turned to face the sound
Soon clear was the meaning
For came up now the ringing of hammers
And the turning of vast wheels

“My Lady,” spoke a pegasus
One brave enough to speed across the river
“They bring up now carts filled with boats
And great timbers of vast size
And it is for the building of pontoons
And to make a crossing
Unless I miss my guess.”

A look of shock went across Luna’s face
And once more came alive the magic of the alicorn
Which sought out the boats of the enemy
But they were hidden behind the magic of the witch
Pressed forward did the Nightbringer
But Draggle answered in turn
And Luna knew her magic spent

“We must prepare to repulse them here
On the banks of this river
Less they should make landfall
And then all Equestria should be theirs.”
Spoke the princess, her eyes falling down
For she knew little strength remained
Among her tired ponies

“Majesty,” asked her generals
“Can we not call to your sister for aide?
For our army is thin, and for seven days they have fought.”
“Nay,” answered the Nightbringer, the color leaving her face
“For her magic but keeps Reeka and Hydia in check
and her army too faces a battle
and from it we can take no hope.”

Settle then did the magic of the alicorn
Sweeping out across her tired soldiers
Settling among her little ponies
Who sat whimpering on the riverbank
They knew that with the morning
Another battle they must face
And they had not the strength for it.

Luna’s head rested against the stone
And her tears ran down it
For in her mind she saw her ponies
Dead, dying, and enslaved
Her ponies without hope, and Equestria fallen
And ever after was the stone named Graig Dargou
The Stone of Tears, upon which she heaved and sighed

As the generals watched
The Nightbringer raised her head
And from her noble lips lifted a song
Her voice lifted out across the river, the woods, and plains
And caught in the distant, ancient ears
Of one who long ago had promised
That for her, there was nothing he would not do

Spike waited at the counter of Sugar Cube Corner excitedly. The boy bounced enthusiastically as he watched the Cakes finish their preparations.

A small tower of boxes began to appear before him, and the dragon whelp did his best not to appear too eager about the treats that were hidden inside each one. It was not an easy task, and the delicious smells that rose from each box did not help.

Still, despite his obvious efforts at self-control, the memory of another time he had stood before this counter sat heavily among the thoughts of those who walked up and down the length of the shop. As she leaned forward and began placing the tightly wrapped packages upon the counter, Mrs. Cake tried her best to broach the topic.

“Are you going to be okay with these packages, deary?” she said as she placed another upon the tall stack. “Ya’ know, oh, that we don’t wanna cause ya’ any more trouble. You know, like the last cupcake we gave ya’…”

She looked down in time to see Spike’s expression deflate. As she watched, he looked to the floor and rubbed his arm. Cupcake at once realized that she had been too forward, and the mare instantly moved to apologize.

“Oh! Oh, Spike, deary, I-I didn’t mean to…” she said, her own hoof coming up to her mouth.

“Heh, no… no, I understand. That’s okay,” he said. With that he lifted his face to her again.

“Twi… Twilight has been helping me, and… and we don’t think the greed thing is gonna be permanent. It’s not really how I grow, you see. I-I’m in charge of it, now,” he said, painting certainty into his voice.

“Oh, well! That’s good! Yes… ummm, yes,” she answered, shaking her head.

The two stood there, staring at one another, creating an uneasiness that hovered around the baked goods.

“So, oh my, so… these are for Applejack, then?” she said, fighting for a thread of conversation. "There's a celebration for some family of hers, ya' said?"

“Yup!” answered Spike, returning to his more typical posture. “There’s a big party and ceremony up in Canterlot, and she couldn’t possibly bake enough on her own. Her cousin Braeburn and his friends are coming up from Appleloosa, and the princess is gonna give them all medals for founding the village!”

“Oh, that’s nice! A ceremony for those ponies who founded Appleloosa, ya' say? That’s very nice!” began Cupcake. “Ya’ know, Carrot and I go travellin’ quite a bit… or we did before the babies were born, ya’ see. We haven’t gotten out to Appleloosa but we’ve been to…”

Cupcake could be forgiven for going off on a detailed explanation of all the places that she and Carrot had gone in the years before they were finally blessed with their foals. In truth, what she really wished to do was share something with the little dragon, to try to get past recalling the problem that had begun here in their bakery.

Still, it was self-replicating diatribe. Each small recounting brought a dozen more to the surface. Cupcake, to Spike’s chagrin, seemed unable to stop.

Try as he might, Spike simply couldn’t maintain his polite attention much past her recounting of their third trip to Foalida.

As Carrot Cake emerged through the swinging doors with the last box he pieced together what was happening very quickly. Needless to say, the way that Spike sat slumped against the counter (his tongue hanging out and an expression in his eyes that seemed to denote his wish for the sweet release of death) had no small part to play in Carrot’s insight.

“Honey Bun,” Carrot began, lifting his hoof to his wife.

“… but by that time there was already a line, ya’ know, and I had to use the mare’s room…” she continued, seemingly unaware of his presence and Spike’s moan of boredom.

“Sugar Plum,” Carrot interrupted again, moving to stand beside her.

“… and Carrot was completely drenched in the sunscreen, so I grabbed a lobster that was nearby and…” she continued, her lecture unceasing as her husband fought for her attention and Spike slowly banged his head on the counter.

“Ginger Snap,” called Carrot, wheeling her about where she stood. He stared deep into her eyes, and caught her hooves in his own.

In one motion Carrot had drawn her down into a deep kiss. As Cupcake startled her eyes went wide, but soon they calmed, and soon she had settled deeper into his embrace.

After a few moments he lifted his head from her, their kiss ending with an audible note. “Cuppy,” he said as he stared down into her, earning her chuckle, “our dragon friend has got to be getting around to the station soon.”

“Oh. Oh! Yes! Of course,” said Cupcake, recovering her senses. “Oh, I did go off there a touch, didn’t I?”

She nuzzled to him for an instant, and then picked up the first package and began to pass it to Spike.

The Cakes both looked down to find him perched against the counter quite happily, leaning nonchalantly upon his hand. The whelp’s face was bright with a deep blush. He eyed the two with a large, dopey smile and pondered what he had just seen transpire between them.

“Wow,” he said, and with that the blushing couple began to load him up for his journey.

The train departed the station not long after, and the small mountain of treats that the Cakes had prepared joined those that Applejack had made at Sweet Apple Acres in a reserved spot in the baggage car.

Protected and safe, the treats passed the journey undisturbed.

The passengers in the coaches that followed along could not say the same.

“Cutie Mark Crusaders Baggage Checkers, yay!” exclaimed the three fillies in time. As items fell out of valet cases and garment bags in their wake Apple Bloom, Sweetie Belle, and Scootaloo continued their efforts to find the meaning of their existences and to reveal their elusive marks.

After about thirty different attempts, each accompanied by shouting and traipsing around the interior of the coach, the looks upon the other passengers denoted that some of them were fighting to keep from leaving marks of their own upon the fillies.

Even the Appleloosans traveling to the ceremony began to wonder if being praised by the princess and showered with lauds, boons, and baubles for their efforts to found their village were worth spending an hour on the train that wound its way up the mountainside.

Not least among those with fraying nerves were Applejack, Twilight Sparkle, and Spike.

“Twilight,” mouthed Applejack as the trio stared ahead balefully, “Im’ma just ‘bout ready to admit that bringin’ the Crusaders weren’t the best of ideas on mah part.”

Twilight stared as the Crusaders continued to search through the bags of utter strangers, the mare wincing when the contents of one businesspony’s briefcase spilled open across the floor in front of her.

“Yeah,” she said, as his entire presentation bounced off her face, “I wasn’t gonna say anything.”

A brief reign of silence came to an end as the Crusaders found yet another outlet for their curiosity.

“Cutie Mark Crusaders Brake Inspectors, yay!” came the cry of three fillies in unison.

“Apple Bloom! Don’t you dare!” cried Applejack, her eyes going wide as she realized that the girls were clambering to reach for the emergency brake cord.

After about thirty seconds the high, shrill sound of the train’s brakes lessened, and the occupants of the passenger coaches began trying to pull themselves off the floor.

Unfortunately, the forward momentum of the train continued right up to the point where it stopped inside one of the many tunnels upon the mountainside. As the ponies attempted to right themselves they were thrown into complete darkness, tumbling over one another once again.

“As Ah said,” mumbled Applejack into the dark as her rear legs dangled above her, “not mah best idea.”

“Yeah,” added Twilight, the mare attempting to determine where exactly she was as she fumbled in the dark, “I wasn’t going to say anything.”

Twilight looked around to find herself looking into a familiar set of deeply bewildered eyes, ones that shone with an emerald intensity in the dark.

“Spike?” she asked. “Am I on top of you, or are you on top of me?”

“Yes,” he replied.

After a rather grumpy conductor had picked his way the length of the train, it began its journey once more, and daylight filled the coaches.

As Applejack spoke to the Crusaders about where exactly they would be stashed for the remainder of the trip if they didn’t sit themselves down and behave, Twilight began weighing her options.

It wouldn’t do to have the ceremony interrupted by the exploits of three fillies deep in a quest of self-realization. Still, they were sweet girls most of the time… it only seemed that they became insufferable when they were up to these pursuits.

Twilight scratched her chin, her mane frizzling slightly as ways to keep the girls out of trouble began to drift around in her mind.

Her eyes settled on the seat across from her, wherein sat her loyal number one assistant.

A devious smile crossed her face, causing him to startle slightly.

“Uh oh!” he said as he lifted his hands. “That’s not good. That’s never good!”

As Applejack returned Twilight beckoned the two others to her, and whispered her plan.

“Oh, wow, ummm,” began Spike, wringing his hands together and looking to where the three fillies sat smiling with a falsified innocence at anypony who passed by, “I-I don’t know. I mean, I guess I could. B-But there’s three of them…”

“Spike,” began Twilight, cutting straight to the incentive, “if you’ll do this, we’ll do anything you like when we get back home.”

Spike stopped wringing his hands. At once his expression brightened. He looked up at Twilight, beaming at her.

“Anything?” he asked in a sweet tone.

“Anything,” she answered.

“Annnyyything?” he asked once more. Spike leaned backwards and stared up to her in a tone so sweet that passing ponies were reminded of honey and sugary breakfast cereals.

“Yes, Spike,” answered Twilight, wrinkling her nose.

“Annnyyyyything?” he asked once again in an utterly saccharine tone, leaning across his own tail. “Even… that?”

Twilight jumped in place as she realized what she’d just done. That. Oh, Celestia. Twilight bit her lower lip, and looked back at the little whelp. He was blinking at her so sweetly that sugar crystals seemed to drip from his eyes.

“Fine,” she said with a sigh, covering her face with her hoof.

“You’ve got a deal, sister!” said Spike, shaking her free hoof. “I’ll find some paper!”

As Spike bounded away Twilight’s hoof remained over her face. She could feel Applejack’s questioning glare, and she knew what was going to happen next.

“If ya’ don’t mind me asking, Twi,” spoke the earth pony in a quiet tone, “well, what was… well, that, all about?”

“You’re better off not knowing,” she said with a sigh, “Now, if you’ll excuse me, I have to figure out where I can find some reflective tape, a conductor’s hat, and some five-gauge aluminum on a moving train…”

Sweetie Belle, Apple Bloom, and Scootaloo all stood upon the station platform, staring at the less than imposing figure before them.

“So, wait,” began Sweetie Belle after a moment of indecision. “You’re our tour guide?”

“Yup!” answered Spike proudly, showing off the uniform. The girls eyed him one more time, and then looked at one another. The uniform, made out of reflective tape, wasn’t exactly the height of style, and Spike’s name etched across the conductor’s hat was oddly lopsided.

The “Spike’s Tours and Awesome Stuff” sign had come out remarkably well, though.

Still, he was a boy in uniform. The girls giggled to each other as they made that astute observation.

“No, really,” said Scootaloo as her small laughter subsided. “You’re gonna take us on a tour?”

“Yup!” repeated Spike.

“C’mon now, gals,” spoke Apple Bloom, “I know ah’d much rather do this than sit through some stuffy old ceremony… well, least ‘till the time fer’ eatin’ starts anywho.”

“It’ll be great!” began Spike, holding up the aluminum sign. “I grew up here in Canterlot, and I know all sorts of hidden passages and stuff like that, so we’re gonna see…”

“Secret passages!” came Sweetie’s excited voice. “Cutie Mark Crusa… hurgh, ughmmm, ummm…”

A rather cross stare greeted Spike as he looked into her eyes. He held her mouth shut for an instant before holding a finger in the air.

“Let’s just talk about the rules first,” he said as he released her, beckoning the other two fillies closer.

“We’re just gonna have a nice long trip through Canterlot, okay? We’ll be seeing all sorts of neat stuff, and then we’re gonna join back up with Twi and Applejack for dessert,” he said, as he regained his pose of authority.

“Oh,” he continued, rubbing his frill self-consciously, “if you try any crusading, I’m gonna bonk you with my sign…”

“What!?” answered the three in unison, rather unhappy stares meeting him as the fillies pushed into his personal space.

“Ummm, yeah, that’s the rule,” he said, looking away slightly. “Any screaming, any touching stuff, any crusading…”

He lifted the sign and made a little motion with it, waving it gently towards them.

“Heh… any of that and, well, bop!”

“You can’t go an’ bop us with that sign!” Apple Bloom protested, pressing forward so forcefully that her rear legs came off the ground, forcing Spike back another step. “If ya’ do I’ll… I’ll tell mah sister!”

Spike looked at her, to the sign, and then back at all the Crusaders.

“It… it was her idea,” he said, motioning to the sign.

“Oh,” she said in a defeated tone, and with that the fillies fell into line. Soon they were nudging him forward, pushing the whelp forward with little nuzzles that tickled him in the slightest.

“Okay!” Spike said, leaping back into his officious posture. “So… we’re walking, we’re walking!”

With that the quartet departed the station platform, off to see what sights that the city could offer them.

The young creatures squeezed along narrow passages and through hidden spots that the dragon remembered from his first years in the capital. As they went, it only became harder and harder for the three young fillies to contain their enthusiasm.

“The Old North Observatory is famed for being the newest and southernmost of the big observatories in Canterlot,” Spike said, leading the three fillies within through one of the secret ways. He smiled a bit as their jaws dropped open and they beheld the massive telescope.

“The big lens up there is so big and so concave that it can hold seventy-two boxes of Mairsy Dotes cereal!” he said. In a moment, his hand came to his head, and a remembrance flit through him. “Believe me… I tried it. Man, so many ‘I’m sorry’ letters…”

Apple Bloom seemed unmoved by his admission. Instead she had cantered over to the eyepiece, looking upon it excitedly.

“Hey! Why don’t we take a peek, see if we can’t find somethin’ out there? Whatcha say, girls? Cutie Mark Crusaders Astron…”

Bonk.

As the sign wobbled in Spike’s hand Apple Bloom took a few wobbling steps, brushing against the eyepiece and moving the whole telescope a fraction of an inch. Gathering her hoof in his hand, he led the tipsy filly and her friends from the room.

As the four creatures left they were unaware that an astronomer would come in later that night and look through that eyepiece. He will wonder why the settings are off, and then he’ll see a massive asteroid hurtling towards their tiny world. The astronomer will alert Princess Celestia. The Daybringer will then quickly direct her power and vaporize it long before it becomes an issue. So, that worked out quite well, in the end…

“This,” said Spike, helping each of the fillies out of the secret passage and into the massive space, “is the Mane Hall of Parliament!”

“Oh wow!” intoned the three fillies in turn, spinning around, prancing from one end of the podium to the other. Each took in the sight of the ornate room that was lit with vast shafts of light that fell from the towering windows.

Two janitors stood at the far end, polishing the long wooden benches, barely lifting their heads to acknowledge the youthful tour guide and his three charges.

“The National Royal Popularist Party,” he said, motioning with his free hand and lifting the sign aloft, “sit on that side. The Popular Royalist National Party sit on that side, and everybody who actually knows what they’re doing sits in the middle. The two sides yell insults at each other until it’s time for lunch, and then they all go out together and have a nice big meal.”

The fillies looked at him quizzically.

“Then, when that’s done, they come in here and say horrible things about each other until Prime Minister Fancypants,” Spike said, motioning back to the big podium, “yells at all of them to shut up. Then they all go to the pubs in the city.”

In the distance, the two janitors snickered.

“So, basically, there’s a lot of arguing and personal insults, and nothing ever gets done,” Spike intoned, “just like in any good democracy!”

“Hey!” squeaked Sweetie Belle. Her tail caught beneath his nose as she brushed along him, gathering his attention before leaping up to the podium. “We argue a lot! We can be our own political thingy… party!”

“We don’t argue a lot!” Scootaloo interrupted.

“Aw, sure we do!” corrected Apple Bloom.

“Nuh haw!” answered Scootaloo.

“Yeah haw!” countered Apple Bloom.

“Sweetie!” the two called, looking to her as their eyes came alight.

“Cutie Mark Crusaders Politici…” she began.

Bonk.

“Dwwaaarrr,” she said, reeling a bit as the sound of the sign bopping her head reverberated through the room. “Whhhaaarrrmmm, duuhhhhrrrr,” she moaned, leaning over the podium as her head swam.

“Most sensible an’ educated thing that’s been said at that podium fer’ decades,” said one of the janitors as he watched Spike gather her up and lead the other fillies back through the ductwork.

“I’d vote for her,” replied the other.

The tour guide led his charges into another space.

“These,” whispered Spike as he removed his cap, “are the Sepulchers of the Nameless Soldiers.”

Little green flames wobbled before long boxes that sat in the quiet room, and two Guardsponies held their vigil nearby.

None of the young creatures said a thing, and they stood there close together for a great long while.

The tour continued across the city.

“Here,” noted Spike, lifting each up a high ledge as they blushed at him, “is the Great Armory.”

As he pushed open a familiar vent the four went tumbling amid rows of armor, stands of swords, and racks of other weapons.

“In this place,” he said waving his arms around himself, “you’ll find some of the most enchanted weapons in Equestria! Many of these weapons are heavily cursed, some wielded by incredible creatures, and some even have powerful magic that…”

Spike startled in place, his cap spinning about on his head.

“Wow, yeah, what was I thinking bringing you here?” he said, beginning to shoo them towards the passage. “Wow, okay, yeah, everypony out…”

Scootaloo had already stuck her nose where it most certainly did not belong, and it came back out covered with a helmet.

“Ha!” she said as her voice echoed around inside, taunting Spike. She leapt up, placing her hooves across his shoulders, looking down into his eyes from behind the ornate bronze visor. “You can’t bop my head with that sign now, huh?”

Spike scowled as she rested herself upon his shoulders.

“C’mon everypony,” she said with a hint of self-satisfaction, “let’s see if we can find some more armor that fits, and then we can be Cutie Mark Crusaders Dragon Cha…”

Bop!

“Hey!” she said, as she sat in surprise, the helmet spinning from her head and clanging to the floor. “Did you just bonk my flank?!

Bop!

Spike’s face betrayed a smirk as the little pegasus went stumbling amid the racks, her legs intertwining as she stumbled along.

He gathered her up, leading the pegasus and her friends from the armory. As he did, Spike’s eyes settled across a space where a magic hammer had once rested, and after a moment of reflection he left the armory once more.

“Okay, ummm,” Spike began, looking up and down the long stretch of cobblestones as ponies went by. Soon he began scratching his head and turning to look up and down the High Street. “Ummm…” he said again, turning to face the three fillies. Despite the bopping and the bonking, it was evident that they had enjoyed their tour… and their tour guide.

“Well, I… uhhh,” he said, looking down into their bubbly expressions. “We’re kinda in a boring part of town. Joe’s is nearby, but…any-anything you guys wanna see? I mean, is there anything that…”

“The palace!” squeaked Sweetie, bounding into the air, landing before him.

“I-I don’t…”

“Yeah, the palace!” repeated Scootaloo, once more placing her foreleg over his shoulder, looking down to him.

“Hey, I-I just can’t…”

“Aww,” said Apple Bloom, sliding beside him. “We got tah’ see only ‘bout two rooms when we were here fer’ the weddin’. Can’t ya’ get us in, Spike, please?”

“Pllleeaassseee,” they said in unison, invading his personal space once more.

“Hey, l-look, I can’t just go wandering around the palace. I mean, it’s one thing to go around the city, but the palace is where all of the important stuff is…”

“… dangerous stuff too.”

As soon as he had said it he knew that it had been a mistake. The hint of danger only seemed to encourage them, and Spike gulped a bit as the three laid their heads to his chest and batted their eyes at him.

“Pllleeeaaassseee!” they cooed, bringing a bright blush to his face.

“Well, ummm,” he said, glancing away and running his hand behind his head. “I guess that there’s a few places where we can go… like, ummm, the nursery where I lived until Twilight could keep me with her. And, ummm…”

“Yay!” the Crusaders called, bouncing around him. “We’re going to the palace! We’re going to the palace! We’re going to the palace!”

“This won’t end well,” Spike moaned as he pinched the bridge of his nose.

The interior of the palace was like an onion. The deeper within one went, the older it became. To travel in the ancient crawlspaces or passages meant going that much deeper into Equestria’s history. It meant seeing architecture and building construction techniques unfold that have since been lost. It meant exploring a world that the princesses alone, it seemed, must remember.

It meant admitting that he was no longer such a little dragon. He reflected on that as he made his way up the passageways, squeezing through them and turning to help the fillies who followed.

“Oof!” he called, lifting Scootaloo from the vent, leaving the sign behind as he helped her to her hooves and then reached for Sweetie Belle.

“Where… where are we?” the pegasus asked, blinking in the darkness.

“This is a repository, one of the many where…” he began.

“A repository?!” Sweetie protested with a high squeak as her legs waved through the air. “You brought us to a junk room?”

“Well, yeah,” he said, setting her on the floor. “Ya’ know, like I said, there aren’t a lot of places I can bring ya’ in the palace without getting caught. We’ve got to start somewhere I can remember really good.”

“C’mon girls,” Apple Bloom said, sticking her head out of the vent. “I’m sure Spike knows what he’s doin’, just give ‘em a second or so…”

Spike reached to her, keeping the other two fillies in his sight until he felt her in his hands. To his surprise she gave a little squeak. He looked back to see that he hadn’t grasped her hooves, but instead his hands were against her ribs, at the ticklish spots beneath her forelegs.

The two blushed at one another as he lifted her from the vent.

“Ummm,” he said.

“Heh,” she answered.

Spike led the three fillies to the middle of the room. As he did he couldn’t help but feel that something had changed. Instead of simply being a storage room it was now laid out, and it was free of dust. It seemed recently visited as well, and all was spit and polish as it sat in the few rays of light that came in through the heavy curtains.

When he had been a little whelp this had been a place to come and hide from the Lord Protector of the Nursery, the nurses, and later even Twilight, when he had been a naughty dragon. Here he would sit on ancient thrones that no sovereign had sat in for ages and try to work up the courage to accept his punishments.

Those memories held little comfort for him, and there was even less in it as he attempted to discover why it seemed so different.

“Okay,” he said, spinning back to them, “I need to go and see if the corridors in this wing are open, so… well, don’t touch anything, okay?”

Three grinning faces met him. He was less than encouraged.

Spike fought to open the vast white doors, and he winced as something large and metallic fell as he lifted the drawbar.

With that the door came open. He looked back at the fillies, each still grinning at him with wide, manic grins. They each gave him a little wave as he moved to exit the room.

“Yeah, this won’t end well,” he sighed, slipping out into the hallway.

The Crusaders waited for Sweetie to stop waving. When she finally did they looked at one another, a realization dawning over them.

It was all of about four seconds before the call of “Cutie Mark Crusaders Treasure Hunters, yay!” filled the room, and at once the three fillies were opening drawers, diving through trunks, and exploring velvet pouches.

“Hey, check this thing out!” Scootaloo said, pursuing the crystalline sphere that rolled across the floor. As it rolled it cast illuminated words upon the floor, the room coming to life as golden letters fell from the orb.

“And the des-desig…the designate will have to make the choice…” Sweetie Belle read, trying to follow the words that bobbled around before darkening upon the carpet.

“Try it again!” she called, and Scootaloo reached forward towards the unusual device. As soon as she touched it, she withdrew her hoof.

“It’s freezing! Wow!” Scootaloo gasped. “My whole foreleg just got all icy…”

Apple Bloom watched Sweetie Belle forsake the sphere. She watched her friends move closer to one another until Scootaloo’s hoof sat between them, pressing heat back into the limb.

Her mind went back to the open drawer before her, and in one motion she grasped the velvet and pulled upon it, revealing what sat inside.

A gorget sat there, the armor a shining metal that seemed more brilliant than silver. Upon it rested a single black pendant, an oval of shining onyx that was perched perfectly upon the surface.

Apple Bloom’s eyes seemed unable to lift from it, and soon she lifted her hoof…

Spike couldn’t believe that this was the same corridor. Instead of dusty and dank it was clean and sparkling. It almost seemed that, if the thick curtains hadn’t been blocking most of the daylight, it would have shone.

He turned down the corridor, and there in the distance he could see the doors that would lead down the wide stairs to one of the principal courtyards.

Nearby there was the sound of running water, and he wondered if the windows of one of the rooms had been opened, allowing the sounds of the fountains to enter the space.

He had been about to make for those doors when a soft sound met him. He spun about, not expecting any noises apart from the distant ones that told his ears that the fillies had not listened to him whatsoever.

He pressed his ear to the door nearest him. Very gently he turned the knob, knowing full well that all that had stood in that room when he was a child was a bed frame, absent of mattress and sheets, standing alone in an empty room.

The door came open easily in his grasp, and as he stepped within all of his memories were washed away as the gentle smells of a mare and her perfumes washed over him. The room seemed alive, and he marveled at how serene the scene was.

He leapt in surprise as the sheets moved…

There, in the darkened room, a figure slept upon the bed.

Ten thousand realizations leapt through Spike… the fact that this room was now occupied, but hadn’t been when he and Twilight still lived in the city, the reason why the corridors and rooms had so many curtains, blocking out the midday sun. The insight as to why this mare was sleeping away the day broke across him.

Spike realized he was watching Procer Luna Revenio as she slept… he was in her bedroom, and in her apartments.

He slowly began to back out, realizing that if Princess Luna was here, then certain ponies were standing at the door beyond.

He began to close the door, already planning the egress of the fillies and himself, when a shock of light rumbled up the hallway.

It bowled him over, sending him tumbling against the doorframe, and flinging the doors open with a crash.

Princess Luna came awake in an instant, lifting above the bed and tossing her wings wide.

“Who calls for me by name?!” she asked, her mane flying out behind her.

Spike went scrambling across the hallway, his motion catching her attention. In a flash the princess was upon him.

Her eyes leveled upon his cap and sash.

“You! Tour Lord! I know thee! Thou art but the summoner to my sister’s designate? Why have you awoken me? Why have you called…”

Luna’s eyes flashed again, her head lifting in shock.

“I am called for yet again, but you are not… nay. Nay, he calls to me…”

Luna faced down the hallway, towards the distant room.

“Who is in my chambers?!” she yelled, turning back to Spike as he lay cowering beneath her. “Who is there?!”

“My… tour group?” he tried to answer, choking through the words.

“Guards!” called the princess, her face a mask of concern. “Guards, to me!”

At once the doors at the end of the corridor came open, and at once two massive forms came galloping up the passageway. Spike felt the warmth drain from him as the eyes of the thestrals, the night ponies, fell over him.

As they came closer a special dread fell through Spike, and at once the whelp scampered away, darting down the hallway. He felt a tug, and at once he knew that the princess had made a grab for him with her magic.

“Child!” she called. “Child, hold fast!”

Spike dove back into the repository. “What did you guys do?!” he called. “We are in so much trouble! We’re…”

Spike skidded to a halt. Before him Apple Bloom stood transfixed, her mane flowing on silvery light that lifted from a gorget in her hooves. Around her Sweetie Belle and Scootaloo tried to reach for her, each trying to lift her hooves from the black onyx that stood upon it.

Apple Bloom’s eyes were distant pinpricks, and her mouth stood open, a look of awe and fear etched up the features of the little filly.

“What did you guys do?!” Spike demanded, leaping among them, shoving the unicorn and pegasus aside. He placed his hands upon Apple Bloom’s hooves, and at once there was a shock of sound and light.

“And what are you, my child?” asked a male voice from beyond a dream.

Spike felt himself being drawn somewhere, felt something moving through him, making him aware of places deep inside his own body.

“I’m… I’m a dragon,” he answered, hearing his voice echo inside his own mind.

“A dragon, my child?” asked the voice, seeming to fall down into despair. “This simply cannot be right. No… no, I’ll not believe that she betrayed me. Does not my Luna know that there is nothing I would not do for her? Alas, already it is too late to stop. Such horrors…”

In an instant Luna and her guards had gained the door. Her eyes went wide as she saw the little filly and the dragon whelp holding the jeweled gorget.

“Nay! Nay, my lord!” she called aloud, her horn igniting. “Not these, I pray you! These are but children!”

Luna stood strong as her own light tried to reach for them. As a silvery substance lifted from the gorget the thestrals threw themselves over Scootaloo and Sweetie Belle, and the room filled with a high, resonant whine and a white flash of blinding light.

Chapter 2: "Revelation"

Chapter 2: “Revelation”

Most ponies don’t spend much time dwelling upon the race of other ponies. In a world where a unicorn can have a pegasus foal with an earth pony, or any such combination, race shrinks to a matter of course.

Still, to have two night ponies (or thestrals, as those
wish to sound more intelligent than they truly are call them) appear at a formal gathering is something not often seen.

That they were dressed in Luna’s full armor, and appeared in the middle of the day, only added to the bewilderment of those at the party.

“Oh, Celestia,” sighed Applejack, nodding to Twilight, “they’re comin’ this way, aren’t they?”

Twilight’s face scrunched up. “Yup,” she answered. It seemed, she guessed, that her number one assistant had been unable to keep the Crusaders from their antics. Too bad, if it had happened sooner, before dessert was served, she could have tried to talk him out of that.

“Oh, do not come ‘round this way…” Applejack sighed under her breath.

“Yeah, they’re coming this way,” said Twilight. “I guess our tour plan didn’t work out to well.”

As Twilight looked up the thestrals, the night guard ponies, found her. As they stood blinking in the sun, attempting to shield their eyes, they motioned to her, bowing slightly.

“Miss Twilight Sparkle, Miss Applejack,” spoke one of the guards in a chilling voice. “Your presence is requested at the palace. There has been an incident.”

Twilight snorted as she and Applejack fell in behind the two thestrals.

“I wonder how long the Crusaders are going to have to wash dishes to fix whatever they broke,” Twilight giggled, looking to Applejack with a roll of her eyes.

“Buckwheat and powdered milk!” cursed Applejack under her breath. “C’mon now, you two, tell a mare what her sister got into… ah’ll have to start thinkin’ ‘bout way o’ repaying whatever got broken.”

The two night guards slowed. They lifted their heads to one another, and then back to the two mares.

“I’m… we’re sorry, Miss Applejack,” replied the other of the two in an ephemeral voice. “We had thought that we’d imparted our meaning.”

“What… well, what do ya’ll mean?” asked the earth pony, her voice dropping as a realization seemed to sweep through her.

“Perhaps… perhaps ‘incident’,” answered the first thestral as he blinked in the sun, “wasn’t the right word. I think that perhaps… yes, ‘accident’, would have better conveyed our meaning.”

Twilight gasped as the color fell out of Applejack.

“There’s… there’s been an accident,” repeated the second thestral.

At once Applejack began to move, parting the night ponies and gaining speed as she began to pelt towards the palace.

Soon she had reached her gallop, the long strides of the earth pony speeding her across the cobblestones.

Behind her the wings of the thestrals came open, and only through flight were they able to keep up with her. Soon Twilight herself was flashing with her magic, leaping forward in wafts of her own aura to try to keep up with her friend.

Applejack was not aware of any of this.

All that she knew, as she pelted on, was that a name was escaping her lips with every exhaled breath. All that she knew as she sped past the ancient channels of water and past imposing towers to the palace beyond was that tears were in her eyes, and a name was falling from her mouth…

… that she was calling for her baby sister, and that her worry was only growing as she thundered across the cobblestones.

The song leapt from the lips of the princess
And as she lay there with her body against the rock
Her sweet voice carried on the winds
And all of the ponies nearby lifted at the song
Their hearts were filled both with joy at her tone
And the sense of longing that lifted in the words
And hovered did the words and melody above the water

Sweet was the music that rose from the lips of the alicorn
And even the army across the way
With the witch at their lead
Listened as it fell across the river, the woods, and the dale
The words carried on the night air
They flowed forth freely
And past sleeping homes untouched by the war

And yet the words and melody
Had a purpose in their cadence
And of its own accord and on her magic
Did the song seek a set of ears
That belonged to one
That had made her a sweet promise
In apology for his sins against her

In the very moment he heard the voice of the Nightbringer
Did he lift from the his self-imposed tomb
And rejoin the waking word
And with a flash of power, magic, and might
Did he speed across Equestria fair
And down the River Running
To where the voice lifted

Soon he was among them, and his power over them
And the ponies of Luna’s army
Were filled with wonder and fear at once
And many bowed before him
And others whispered Invokes of protection
For as he approached the alicorn
Most there gathered saw for the first time a draconequus

Applejack sped through the courtyard, her hooves not slowing even as she gained the grand staircase that lead to the apartments of the Younger Sister Sovereign.

The sounds of the fountains barely caught in Twilight’s ears as she watched her friend take the stairs in bounds of two and three steps at a time.

“Which way!?” she heard her call, and as she too made her way up the stairs she saw the deep concern that sat on Applejack’s face as she called to the night guards.

“We are but nigh, Honesty,” answered a voice that lifted around them. “And you should come hither.”

Applejack spun towards a room at the top of the stairs, just beyond the great alabaster doors. Luna’s voice had come from that room, and for the first time since they had been summoned apprehension seated itself across Applejack’s face. Twilight and the guards approached her, and as the unicorn stood with Applejack, Twilight saw the fear in her eyes.

Twilight ran her hoof up and down Applejack’s foreleg, giving her as much reassurance as she could. “A.J.,” Twilight said, resting her head to that of the earth pony, “whatever’s happened… I’m here. We’ll find out together, and I’m here…”

Applejack nodded without looking back to the unicorn. Her breaths were small, and it seemed to Twilight that the earth pony was preparing herself for any number of possibilities.

With Twilight next to her, and the guards following behind, Applejack stepped forward into the room.

As her eyes adjusted to the dark, Applejack searched the confines of the sitting room. There were little voices nearby, and her head spun in that direction.

The eyes of Sweetie Belle and Scootaloo lifted to her from some cushioned pillows nearby, the fillies looking withdrawn and with an air of distress hanging over them.

Her sister was not with them…

Applejack’s voice grew ragged, and her eyes swept the room. They did not have far to go, and very near the fillies a dark form moved, and pinpricks of light soon stood out upon a splendid mane.

“P-Princess?” Applejack spoke, bowing to the Nightbringer before advancing on trembling hooves. “Mah’ sister? Mah, sister, Princess? Please, please tell me that…”

Beyond the princess the familiar eyes of Spike lifted from a pile of cushions, and he looked first to Applejack, and then to Twilight, and then back down to the cushions. Twilight tried to gauge his expression as he looked down at something that lay upon the cushions, resting between himself and the fillies.

As she watched him put his hands over his mouth, Twilight sucked in a deep breath.

“Silence your fears, Applejack, you who are Honesty,” spoke the princess in a whispered tone. “Your sister is here. Alas, she has trespassed against a magic, and there is a price to be paid…”

“Applejack?” came a weak voice, lifting with a croak.

“Apple Bloom?” whispered Applejack, her voice drifting out into the room.

The fillies and little boy shifted, looking deeper into the cushions upon which they and the princess had been resting.

There, as Applejack looked on, something unraveled.

Shimmering scales caught in what little light there was in the room, and a tail whipped above the mattresses as something spun about upon the cushions.

As the young creatures stepped back a glint of light caught across reptilian eyes, and they caught Applejack in their stare.

Applejack fell to the floor as the fillies tried to come nearer the… thing, but as it slid down the cushions and upon the floor it seemed to bounce away from them.

Applejack’s mouth hung open as the creature tumbled, fell, and let out a mewling sound that was at once heartbreaking and terrifying.

“A-Ah feel so sick,” whimpered the creature, hidden as it was in the darkness at the base of the pillows. As it spun around on itself Twilight’s hoof came up to her mouth, and she recognized the tone of the voice.

“Hey… hey, don’t try to walk on your rear legs yet. Try to walk on all fours, like a pony would,” Spike called, sliding down the pillows. He lifted the creature, but it soon once more elevated itself, looking him in the eye.

“Or, okay, stand up and lean on me, then, I guess…” he said, motioning for Sweetie and Scootaloo to come help him.

Slowly they helped it forward into the shaft of light that fell from the open doorway.

There they stood with the creature, and it looked up to Applejack as it steadied itself.

“Applejack?” came the voice again.

Applejack rose to her hooves in a single breath. It was a dragon, slightly smaller than Spike… and speaking in the voice of her little sister.

“A-Applejack, it’s me, Apple Bloom,” said the little whelp, wrapping something around her clawed hands before staring to the floor once again.

“Oh, please, ya’ gotta believe me!” the dragon called aloud, spinning to where Applejack had begun to circle. Pain, confusion, and fear lifted from the little whelp in a child’s voice.

Applejack startled and took a step backwards as the creature fell forward onto all fours, seeming to scramble towards her.

It lifted itself again, tears now evident in its eyes. “Please, Sis, ya’ gotta believe me! Ah’m me! Please, Sis…”

It unwrapped its claws, lifting them up to the face of the earth pony.

Applejack gasped. There in its hands stood a familiar red ribbon.

Applejack looked upon the ribbon as it hung limp in the dragon’s claws. Her eyes lifted to the eyes of the whelp, and she looked deep into them as she sat before the creature.

There, in those tearful eyes, reflected the first time that that Applejack’s mother had brought a filly home. In those eyes were the games they had played together, and there were the times that had spent together in the orchards.

Applejack saw in those eyes the little girl whose knees she had bandaged, who she had held close while she explained why mother and father weren’t coming home…

Twilight felt the familiar brush of Spike’s clawed hand against her leg. She looked down as he rested his head against her, and together they awaited Applejack’s next move.

Applejack lifted the ribbon from the trembling hands of the girl with her teeth, placing it in her one hoof while reaching to the dragon with the other. She spun the whelp around, and with that she laid the ribbon gently around its neck.

“It-It’ll be okay, Apple Bloom. It’ll be okay, now, ya’ hear,” she said softly as she tied the ribbon into a bow. “Ah’m sure that the princess and Twilight can… Ah’m right sure they can find some way tah, to set ya’ back to normal.”

The ribbon folded and knotted, becoming the bow once more. With that, Applejack marked the dragon as her little sister. She spun her gently, and laid her head over her, pulling her deeper into her embrace.

Spike, of course, had given her his happy hugs in the past. Still, it felt foreign, the touch of these scales, and the way that the hands pulled beneath her, trying to come closer to her body.

It did not feel like her sister. She couldn’t feel her little sister.

“Oh, Apple Bloom. Oh, Apple Bloom,” began the older Apple, and with that she began to cry. As her little sister whimpered beneath her Applejack simply sat in the darkened room and cried, and cried, and cried…

“Forgive me, Majesty,” Twilight said in confusion, “but isn’t onyx usually black?”

“Indeed, for this was a shade darker than black,” Luna said, nodding over the gorget as it sat upon a stand, “a mere twenty minutes ago…”

Luna’s implication was clear.

The jewel that sat upon the gorget had been black, but now it shone there in the room with an ebony flair, the jewel drained entirely of its color.

“Princess,” Twilight asked in a whisper, “what has happened? I don’t quite get…”

“A promise was kept, Twilight Sparkle,” the Nightbringer said, not bothering to drop her voice, “one upon which I made no oath. Now the magic of that promise has draped across the filly and your summoner, the dragon Spike.”

Twilight’s eyes quickly panned back to where Spike sat with Applejack and the girls. She watched as he handed Apple Bloom off to Sweetie, the children helping their friend adjust to her new form.

Spike had been caught in the magic? What, what could that mean? Was he cursed? Enchanted? Oh, oh no!

Twilight had barely lifted her hooves towards Spike, began to prance to where her little baby dragon stood, before Luna’s powerful words drew her back.

“I pray thee, Twilight Sparkle,” she said, “fear not for your charge. His magic, the magic of his kind, has shielded him from any harm. The magic of the jewel was not dark, but it was deep, and it has already used him as it was meant to.”

“Used him?” Twilight gulped.

“Fear not, for I shall explain what I may in a moment. Here,” the princess said with a long sigh, “attend me, Twilight Sparkle. I have not worn this gorget since before most of the cities that you know were even a few houses of thatch and rough timbers…”

Luna’s magic elevated the gorget from the stand, and her magic mixed with Twilight’s as she passed it to the unicorn. Even though Luna was seated, Twilight still had to look up the long, graceful reach of her back and neck, and lift the starlit hair to place the gorget upon her sovereign.

“Come,” said Luna as she stood, her voice seeming a touch weaker. As Twilight followed, she could not help but reflect that the princess, always cold and distant, was that much moreso, as though the gorget around her neck was dragging her down not only with its weight but also with the memories that accompanied it.

As the unicorn and the alicorn rejoined the group Apple Bloom attempted to seat herself, but in the end had to drop first to all fours, and then upon the cushions.

“Ah’m, heh, Ah’m getting’ better at it,” she said, looking upon them all with a blush. “Still a bit queasy, though.”

To everyone’s surprise the princess smiled upon her briefly, but the usual austere expression soon returned to her face.

“Child,” she spoke, “I beg that you should not have long to inhabit that form, as accustomed to it as you may be becoming. Our thoughts now turn to your actual body, for we must recover it before it dies…”

The entire assemblage looked up to her in shock.

“P-Princess,” stammered Applejack, “w-what do ya’ mean? Ain’t… ain’t that her body? She’s, she’s been turned into a dragon, right? And you… yer’ gonna turn her back, ain’t ya’?”

The princess blinked. After a moment she sighed, and placed her hoof upon Apple Bloom.

“What rests here,” she said, “is but your sister’s intellect, mind, spirit, and soul. These were moved here by a spell that was meant to give a gift.”

They all looked upon her with confusion holding court over their perceptions. With another long sigh the princess stood. She continued her explanation as she slowly circled the group, the shimmering sparks of her mane dancing behind her as they turned to watch.

“The jewel t’was but portal,” she began, “one that linked the world of the living… to the one of those who are not yet dead.”

“Zombies?!” arose Spike’s voice in a high pitch of worry. As Luna’s cold countenance fell over him he shrank back down against Twilight, and the unicorn put her foreleg over him.

“Something far more divine, young master Spike,” she spoke. “In the end, what has happened is that she has gained a copy of your body, though feminine in composition, to match her soul. Her real body now awaits the inhabiting of a spirit, and if not inhabited by the break of my sister’s dawn tomorrow, then it shall die…”

There was a silence, the implications of the princess’s statement hanging around the room. Before long there was a single plaintive whine, one that grew louder as Apple Bloom stood, paced back and forth before their eyes, and then fell forward into her sister’s outstretched forelegs.

“Beg yer’ pardon, Princess,” Applejack interrupted, “but… if someone, or somethin’, does scoop up…”

Applejacks caught herself, and reeled a touch at what she was about to say.

“… if whoever it is on that side, takes up her body, or… or you and Twi can’t find it in time… then what’ll happen to Apple Bloom?”

“The filly then shall have to stay in that form for the rest of her mortal days… the mortal days of a dragon, in fact, as long as they are.” The assembly watched as Luna walked forward, her mane flying out behind her on the moonlight of her hidden charge. With a little motion she drew her hoof across the unhappy form of Apple Bloom, the little dragon looking up to her with a wobble.

“This body, it is not the one that was meant for her at her birth,” Luna said, trying her best to smile to the filly. “Nay, your earth pony magic is lost in this form, and it mixes unwell with the dragon’s magic. Are you still ill? Yes, you will be, I am afraid. I fear that you will only ever be a guest in this house… a ship traversing an ocean with no shore.”

Confusion fell over Apple Bloom’s face, and tears began to form again.

These were washed away, and a feeling of a starlit meadow and the quiet of a summer’s night washed over the little girl. Apple Bloom took an easy breath, and then looked up to realize that the princess had placed a small kiss to her cheek.

“Fear not, for I will not have my children put to grief, even though the cost will be great,” Luna said, turning towards the open space of the sitting room. “We must leave at once…”

Twilight stood, forgetting that Spike was resting against her. As he tumbled to the floor she stretched and then ignited her horn, ready to come to the aide of the Younger Sister Sovereign.

“Are you ready to leave, Honesty? Are you prepared for the journey, Applejack?” Luna spoke, the princess not turning back to the group as the words drifted over them.

Twilight froze in mid-stride. Applejack blinked, looked down to her sister, and then gently rose.

“Me, Ma’am? Ah-Ah course I’ll go, Majesty, but… well, wouldn’t Twilight be better, what with her magic and all?” asked Applejack as she began to trot to where Luna stood, a swirl of magic already enveloping her.

“Nay, for my magic alone is all that is required. We go not to a battle, but to face ancient promises and unhappy truths. He promised me, once, that there was nothing he would not do for me, and that promise I must now call upon,” Luna said as the magic became more visible.

“And besides,” Luna added, her eyes coming alight, “you are her sister… and this will require the blood of a mare.”

Applejack's steps hesitated only slightly at the revelation, but wordlessly she continued right up to the side of the princess.

The magic increased, and soon Applejack felt it all around her.

“My guards,” Luna called, alerting all in the room that the thestrals still stood nearby, their imposing forms somehow forgotten in the conversation. “Inform my sister and her courts as to what is transpiring.”

“Majesty,” asked the icy one, “what would you have us tell her?”

Luna’s magic hung heavy in the room, but at once it cast itself outward, encircling the pair. Twilight gasped as she recognized the spell. It was the very same one that the changeling queen had used on her. This was the color of Luna’s magic though, and the princess certainly seemed more saddened than afraid.

The princess’s head hung in repose as she and Applejack began to sink into the floor, presumably into the chambers of crystal far below.

“Tell her,” Luna finally answered, “that I go to murder someone who loves me.”

With that the duo swept through the marbled floor, and the spell crackled away. As the night guards bowed and departed they left two fillies, two dragons, and a confused mare looking on in wonder and horror at the statement.

The broken stones of the bridge
Reflected the moonlight
As the draconequus stood among
The army of the Nightbringer
Many where there who looked on in wonder
Among the ponies who bowed to him
For not in their lifetimes had one been seen

“My Lord Chance,” spoke Luna, her eyes lifting to him
“You did come, and I am so happy for it.”
And as she moved to bow before him
He laughed, and as the assembly gasped
He scooped her up and spun her around
And called aloud
“How could I not come at my godchild’s call?”

Luna though seemed unhappy at his touch
And as he placed her on the ground
Something of the joy came out of him
“Tell me, my Luna,” Chance asked
“Why have you called me out of my slumber?
For I have promised you anything
And you know that there is nothing you can not ask of me.”

“Godfather,” she said, “My ponies here
My children, have fought for seven long days
And I thought that I had delivered them to safety
Yet, now across the river, past the bridge I crushed
Prepares the earth mother Draggle
The witch and her army preparing boats
And pontoons for to cross the river.”

“Come the morning,” she implored
“They will come across, and the witch shields them
And my magic cannot break hers, for I am spent
I pray you, godfather, my uncle, and my lord…
My dear Chance whom I have long loved
And who sheltered my sister and me in our childhoods
Please, save my ponies, my children.”

The draconequus placed his hand beside her face
And stared into her eyes
The Nightbringer held his gaze until she no longer could
And a tear ran down her face
“My dear Luna,” spoke Chance
I did not wake after all of these centuries
To bring a tear to the face of one whom I cherish.”

“Tell me, my Moonbeam,” he said with a chuckle
Recalling the small name he called her by
“Is it the knowledge that you are awakening me just to die
Asking me to give my life to save your children
That makes you cry,
Or the memory of the admission that I made to you
The last time we were so close?”

“It is by far the former, my lord” she spoke,
“But it is not my will to lie to you
And the latter as well
That draws my tears
For though I love you, my godfather, my uncle
I still cannot love you
As you love me.”

The draconequus took a sharp breath
And then rose up
And looked across the scene
The power of the witch hung heavily across the waters
And it was equal to his own
And Chance knew that it would cost him all
To save the children of this one he loved

The incarnation of possibility and probability
Was Chance the draconequus, and among his kind
He was not nearly as powerful as Discord or Law
Or many others of his kind who had left the world
Both for good and for ill
But in the world his power had stayed
And now he used it to her gain

Lifted the draconequus a handful of grass
And into it he whispered his magic
Set into motion his power
And it drifted on the wind
And flew away
All of his power of random chances
Wafted through it and over it

The grasses disturbed a buffalo shaman far away
For he felt the magic in them
And so he lifted a signal fire
Which sent that race into a dance upon dusty fields
That lifted high into the sky
And caught around vapor
And became clouds

Those clouds raced on random gusts of wind
And they towered high, massive and grey
With their multitudes
Filling the Equestrian sky
As the magic of Chance shifted the winds his life
He poured into the clouds so that they would break
And with that began a deluge unseen since

The waters came crashing down from the sky
Sending foals scampering to the beds of their parents
For shelter in far away villages
In moments these had become massive waves
That roared down the River Running
Scouring the banks and wiping away great trees
And soon came the calamity upon the two armies

Yet, even as the torrent seemed ready to wash all away
The final drops of magic fell from the draconequus
And together with what magic remained in Luna
The two directed the waves
Upon the army of the witch
And their boats and pontoons
And these were overcome

Draggle’s magic lifted
And as a red arc it seemed to hold
But after a moment it failed her
And as the fiery haired Witch
Flashed herself and her retinue to safety
Her boats were dashed to pieces
And those in them were swept to their deaths

Cheers rose from the army that Luna had saved
And among them the moon shone brightly
And they danced and rejoiced
But soon they stopped
And approached the weeping form
Of their princess
And the dying draconequus she cradled

Applejack had never really become accustomed to magic. At least, not the visible form that her unicorn friends used so easily.

She was fine with seeing it, and was always glad for the help they offered with it, but she preferred her own earth pony magic. To have noticeable magic move through her, to have it possess her body so visibly and completely, that never really became one of her favorite pastimes.

These were the types of things she had time to ponder as she slid through the stone. As she drifted down she found herself oddly sympathetic to what being basalt felt like, what basalt wanted from its existence, and a sudden interest in basalt-related issues.

Almost too soon she felt nothing beneath her, and she went crashing to her hooves.

She felt the magic of Princess Luna passing through her, lifting her back to standing.

“Mighty obliged, Majes… oh, wow, would ya’ look at that…” she said with no small surprise.

Applejack lifted her head to see all of the beautiful crystals that surrounded her, and she could see herself and the princess reflected in their myriad surfaces.

“That there is right pretty, a right pretty thing indeed,” she said as she fell in alongside Luna. As she did she brushed up against the alicorn, attempting to hide the gesture as she tried to discern if it was the real princess or a reflection that stood there.

“Ah… Twilight told me all ‘bout these here caverns, after the weddin’ and such,” she said, hoping to break the odd look the princess was giving her. “It’s right sad to think that changelin’ knew about this here place, but that ponies seem to have gone an’ forgotten all about it…”

“That the heretic knew of these chambers disturbs us greatly,” said the princess as they began to walk, Applejack pondering why Luna had chosen that word to describe the changeling queen. She fell in a half step behind her sovereign as Luna completed her thought. “But, it seems, she knew not half of the wonders hidden here.”

As they went the princess became wordless, and her head seemed to droop.

The two walked the shimmering paths until finally turning a corner amid the bejeweled corridors.

There before Applejack rose a great brass cylinder, one that was immense in its diameter… one that rose up both high above her and plunged into the very stone at her hooves.

She was amazed that something so immense could be in a place so deep and forgotten. She studied it as they walked, trying to make heads of tails of it and why it could be there.

She stopped and placed her hoof upon the brass. To her amazement words illuminated at her touch, wafting around in a blue highlights and coming alive with accent marks that she didn’t recognize.

“What in tarnation?” she whispered under her breath, and with that she lifted her hoof once again and placed it upon the words.

At once Applejack’s mind filled with voices. Into her vision came wafting clouds, and she felt herself falling…

“My sister’s designate,” Luna began, lifting Applejack from the brass with her magic, “could not fathom what transpires beyond that brass, in the heart of the mountain, and great is her magic. I suggest you leave it be, Honesty.”

The princess turned away again, and as Applejack’s head swam she followed along, all the more confused.

The two went on silently, and as they did the mining cars and random crystalline structures were replaced with hewn rock and arches. Applejack attempted to take it all in, and wondered what it could all mean.

“Applejack,” came Luna’s voice, as cold and distant as ever, “I would like you to know that I am glad that you are here, as you are Honesty.”

As they came to a particularly large blue crystal, one with a great flat surface set into the living stone of the mountain, the two stopped and looked upon it.

“You alone among all living ponies can testify beyond doubt as to what transpires here this day, and we place our trust in you that you will keep hidden what must be hidden,” Luna said with a great long sigh, “but that you will reveal all in time.”

Luna leaned closer to the earth pony, locking her in her sight.

“When we pass through here, we will still be alive, just lesser. What would be death out here cannot harm you within, but what would be harmless out here, would be death within. I require you to listen to every one of my instructions, no matter if they scare you or not,” she said without emotion. “Do you understand me, Honesty?”

“No,” answered Applejack. “I’m as confused as all get out. I don’t get a lick o’ what’s goin’ on here and I am more than a sight scared…”

Applejack blanched, but then looked back to Luna with determination standing out sharply upon her.

“… but I will do whatever you ask of me, Princess, if it’s what’ll set mah’ sister back to herself.”

Luna studied Applejack for a long moment. A small smile went across her ancient face, and with that she lifted her hoof to the smaller pony.

“Come,” she said, “you must take hold of us as we cross through. Fear not. It will pass well, and you need not understand it all. It does not matter. Nothing truly matters…”

Applejack placed her hoof in that of the princess. The gorget upon Luna’s neck came alive, the jewel seeming to bounce in its setting. With that the two walked forward into the smooth surface of the crystal.

Applejack felt as though she had walked through a waterfall and had emerged behind it. As she lifted her hoof from Luna’s she ran her hoof through her mane reflexively, almost anticipating the feeling of water standing upon it.

There was none, and she lifted her head to follow the progress of the alicorn’s hooves.

It was a room, a chamber of some kind. It was stately but sparse, grand yet cold and without charm. It was a parody of a palace… it was as though it was abandoned, yet the lights had never been put out and the fires left burning.

“Luna?”

A male voice rose from an alcove nearby, and the two ponies spun toward where it had lifted. Luna looked to Applejack, and with a nod the earth pony fell in beside her sovereign.

Together the two walked towards the alcove, and there a tall figure sat with its back to them. Before him a small fire lay in a fireplace that stood framed by windows that looked out over nothing from beyond frayed curtains.

There was a gasp, a wheeze that lifted from where the figure sat, but not from himself.

Applejack waited as her eyes adjusted to the light, and when they finally did surprise fell over her.

It was a draconequus.

Her body tensed, and a part of her leapt into memories of what Discord had done to her, how he had snuck his will into her and shadowed her true self. She bristled at the memory and a hard expression went over her face…

“It is not whom you believe it to be,” whispered Luna, and in a motion she began to walk forward.

Applejack looked up once more, and realizations began to fall around her. This draconequus seemed much smaller than she recalled Discord being and, from behind at least, he seemed to not be made of many different parts like the other she’d seen.

No, if his silhouette didn’t hide much more, then he simply had the head of a horse and the body of a dragon, though covered with a coat of hair.

There were more whispers, and as Applejack walked forward she saw him turn to Luna.

There, in the outline of the fireplace, she saw him wrap his arms around the alicorn gently, and gather her to him.

“Come,” said Luna. “Come closer, Honesty, meet my godfather… meet Lord Chance.”

Applejack blinked a few times. She waited for the creature to lower the princess to the floor once more before trotting forward. Her hooves slowed as she passed around his side, and she removed her hat to look up to him.

The eyes of the draconequus fell over her, and his smile was deep and sincere.

At once Applejack felt the apprehension drop out of her, and she lifted her hoof as he lowered his clawed hand to her, seeming to about to kiss it in the congenial style of gentle creatures of old.

As he did, though, there was a wheeze, and then a gasp.

Applejack looked down into the lap of the creature, and what she saw there stole out her breath.

There, held close to his body, sat the familiar form of her baby sister. There was a rattling sound, and the body seemed to deflate some more, the ribs showing starkly as the air passed out of it.

Applejack’s hooves went to her mouth, muffling her cry.

Chapter 3: "Realization"

Chapter 3: “Realization”

The draconequus trembled and shook
As the magic which sat inside his ancient form
Departed from his body
He began to fade away
And as ponies gathered around him
Many shed great rolling tears
For with him died an ancient age

None shed greater tears than the Nightbringer
And she stroked his head
As the fabric of his being
Began to drift away
The tears that ran down her face
Fell into his coat
And it moved him

“My Moonbeam,” he spoke
“Do not cry for me
Did I not promise you
That there was nothing you could ask of me
That I would not give?
If this was the only gift I could give
Then I give it freely.”

“Long have I waited in my quiet tomb
To which I fled to avoid the wrath of Discord
And hidden there from my uncle
I could only listen as you grew
And you built and then reclaimed
This land for your children
And I have marveled at it.”

“Oh, my Luna,” spoke the incarnation
“You were the only thing that bound me to this world
And if I knew of any way
To remain in it
You know that I would
If only in the hope that someday
You might love me as I love you.”

“Godfather!” cried the Nightbringer
Tears streaming down her face.
“Uncle! You know I love you!
I have loved you since you first lifted me from my cradle
Since you whisked my sister and I to safety
But the love of which you speak
Is not in my heart.”

“This I know,” he replied
“But the thought of it sustained me across centuries
And you must think less of me for it
And I blame you not
I tell you, my Luna, that if there were any way
For me to stay on this side of death
I would take it.”

“In the shadow of that hope
I could last for millennia
Just always longing to be there
For you in your worry
To free you from fear
To keep you safe, happy, and warm
And whatever you desired would be yours.”

The Nightbringer’s face twisted in despair
For she knew that Chance’s love for her
Was not that of a relative for a child
But that of a man for a woman
And she could not return that love
For in her heart he was forever
The kind creature whom she had loved as a child

“Godfather, uncle!” she told him
“You know how my heart holds you
And I swear no oath
But only tell you that upon my chest
Rests an onyx made
Of the same substance of the mountain
In which my kind sleep.”

“It is your choice alone to make
My Lord, whom I love with the affections
Of the child I once was
But in that jewel
You could sleep for millennia
And awake in time
If the cost and price we are willing to pay.”

“And what is that price, my Moonbeam?”
He asked her even as he continued to decrease
“Would it be my cost or my price?
Quickly now, for my time draws near.”
She leaned over him
And told him what it would require
And the two looked to one another

With that Chance lifted his paw
And placed it upon the gorget
With that there was a great rush of wind
And the mixing of light
And magic dark and deep
And his form became as light
That was drawn within the jewel

The gorget sealed itself in a flash of deep magic
So did the princess Luna waver
And fall to her knees
For now sealed away was one of the few who loved her
And thus ended the worldly life of Chance
Last of the draconequui who were incarnate in the world
Less the demon sealed in stone in ancient Canterlot far away

Babysitting had never been one of Twilight’s key talents.

Just ask Spike.

She knew that she lacked patience, and that she had the tendency to lose a fair bit of… well, composure, when placed under certain conditions. Also, she found that foals didn’t seem to enjoy her carefully researched, richly detailed, and elaborately presented lectures on the minutiae of Equestrian history, geology, or magical composition for some odd reason…

Kids, right?

So, as Luna and Applejack had slid trough the floor her mind had instantly informed her that she was now in charge of the assembly of small creatures that were left behind.

Spike she could rely on, but having all three Crusaders in the same room at the same time had already proven what a debacle it could be.

As time passed though it quickly became obvious that, for the time being, any attempts to find their marks was far from the minds of Scootaloo and Sweetie Belle. Instead they hovered near their friend, the newly minted dragon, and kept her close.

“Any better, Apple Bloom?” asked Scootaloo as she paced her friend.

“Yeah, I guess so. Ah’m pretty dang close tah’ having the walking down, but I still feel a bit wobbly and such,” she said. At once she spun unexpectedly, and her tail lashed out behind her, knocking Scootaloo to the floor.

“Ah’m sorry!” she said, attempting to lower herself so that she could help the pegasus to her hooves. As she did her tail flicked out behind her once again. As it did she sent Sweetie Belle spinning about until the unicorn slid across the floor, and Apple Bloom herself lost her balance and flipped forward across Scootaloo as that filly tried to stand.

Moans of pain and dejection arose from the pile of young girls. As the fillies tried to right themselves, Twilight felt movement at her side. She looked down to see Spike with his face firmly planted in his own palm, and his other arm crossed in front of him. It was a firm sign of exasperation, and he shook his head slightly as he did so.

When his face lifted she saw upon him a more familiar expression, one that she knew marked the greater part of his personality. Concern hung there, and worry too... both combining as empathy that sent Spike from her side and to the distant group of girls. As he helped them to their feet and hooves he held onto Apple Bloom, steadying her as the other two fillies trotted to where Twilight lay.

The two fillies settled into the crux of Twilight’s flank, huddling near her. Twilight was at first surprised at this, but that soon passed. She was the adult in the room, and a familiar face to them, and it was to her that they came for comfort as concerns larger than what children should have to face sat around them.

“Hey, ummm, Apple Bloom?” Spike asked, placing his outstretched arms under hers. “Have you ever watched the way I walk?”

“Ya’ mean yer’ little waddle?” she said with a giggle, sending a bright blush across the face of the boy and an accompanying chorus of giggles arising from the fillies that sat near Twilight.

“Ummm, well… yeah,” he said as he rubbed the back of his head, “that.”

“Look,” he continued, looking back to the girl and drawing himself up to his full height, “what’s happening is that you’re not thinking about your tail, okay? You’ve got to use it to, like, balance yourself, ya’ know? Here, lemmee…”

To their surprise he slid around behind her, literally lifting her tail even as he kept his arm under hers. Her small yelp of surprise hadn’t even fully cleared her lips before he spoke the word “step”, and she replied with a timid lift of her clawed feet.

“Okay, good… right, okay, now you feel this back and forth?” he said as they began to walk together, she leaning less and less upon his arm as they went.

Soon he released his hold on her tail, and together they went up and down the room, Apple Bloom attempting to copy his trademark strut. As they went she began to keep a cadence with him, gaining a greater understanding of this strange body into which she had been placed.

Twilight heard another little giggle, and she looked down to see a grinning Sweetie Belle lean closer to Scootaloo. “They look like they’re dancing!” the unicorn whispered into Scootaloo’s ear, causing the pegasus to laugh aloud.

Twilight rolled her eyes gently, amused with the fillies and their little whispers. She looked to where Spike led Apple Bloom around and around the cushions. Yes, it did seem like they were dancing, the way the two little ones waddled in time.

She put her head in her hoof and stared at them.

Soon Apple Bloom had left his guidance, and Spike turned to catch her should she fall. It didn’t seem necessary, though. Soon she was bouncing along, pursuing him in something more like a chase.

The fillies cheered for Apple Bloom, and Twilight for Spike, and together all laughed as the two went around and around the pillows and cushions. Spike both tried to keep ahead of her and at the same time reached for her, ready to catch her if she fell.

“Wha… whoa!” called Spike, and with that he tripped across his own tail, sending him tipping backwards to the floor.

“Heh, well now, ain’t that a sight!” called Apple Bloom as she caught up to him. “Ya’ just gotta practice, practice, practice yer’ walkin’, Spike!”

“Now, ya’ need tah move yer’ tail just right, like me,” she said, placing one hand on her scaly hip and waving her finger in the air. However, even this little gesture was still enough to unbalance her. She too fell, landing upon the boy where he lay upon the rich carpet.

As the dragons blushed and laughed Scootaloo and Sweetie Belle stood up from Twilight’s side and moved towards them, each congratulating Apple Bloom on doing so well with laughter of their own.

The girl lifted herself and began to move towards her friends even as all their laughter filled the room.

All at once, it ended.

Apple Bloom did not stand and walk to them. Instead, for some reason, she chose to remain on all fours, skittering towards them with unmatched reptilian motions. As she looked up to them she blinked her inner eyes, and her tongue came loose, the forks splaying out before them.

Sweetie Belle and Scootaloo screamed, rearing in fright as the lizard scampered towards them.

For a long moment nothing happened, and the children just stared at one another. Sweetie and Scootaloo settled back onto their hooves, each knowing what they had done.

Twilight’s hoof was already over her mouth as she saw the expressions that fell from all four of the young creatures.

“Apple Bloom,” whispered Scootaloo, “I’m… we’re sorry, we’re so sorry…”

There was a little cough, one that was repeated and then became an unhappy sound. It dropped down into a whine that rose again as a bawl. With that Apple Bloom was crying once more, all of the progress of that afternoon and early evening washing away as fears and doubts filled her.

“Yer’ afraid of me!” she called, looking to each and then turning away. “If… if mah’ best friends are afraid o’ me, what chance do ah’ have back in Ponyville!?”

“Apple Bloom,” Sweetie squeaked, trying to rub against the dragon whelp, “it’ll be okay. If you have to stay a dragon, everything will be okay.”

“No it won’t!” called Apple Bloom again, spinning herself, seeming like she wished to sit but only raising herself up again.

Her whine was replaced with huffs of emotion as she began to run her hands across her face.

“Ah’m not gonna be any help on the farm!” she huffed, “Applejack an’ Big Mac’ll have tah carry me around forever, like Twilight does with you!”

Spike pointed at himself, surprised that one of her invectives had fallen over him.

“Ah’ll never be any good at any farm stuff, and now Ah’ll never find mah mark!” she said, turning around in her paces, deeper and deeper worry growing on her face as she huffed and puffed in many breaths, each catching in her words.

“We’ll… we’ll still be your friends,” Scootaloo said. “That won’t change, ya’ know.”

“Yeah, you… y-you say t-that!” Apple Bloom said, wringing her clawed hands together, her breathing getting quicker and quicker. “B-But you won’t want me ‘round forever! I can’t be a Crusader if I ain’t got nothin’ to crusade ‘fer!”

She spun around again, the two fillies trying to calm her as she paced, her breathing getting faster and faster, growing into a wheeze each time she exhaled.

Twilight tried to open her mouth, refute each argument with logic. The child though was beyond logic, and Apple Bloom was only falling farther and farther into her self-inflicted fears.

“Ah’ll grow too big! I’ll have tah’ stop sleepin’ in a bed! I’ll… live so long that you’ll all grow up, an I’ll still be a baby, and you’ll all get old and die! I’ll be so big that everypony’ll be scared of me! I-I’ll have to leave Ponyville! Leave all mah…”

Apple Bloom chocked, gasped, and wheezed.

“… leave mah family!”

Twilight watched Spike leap to his feet and join the fillies as they tried to calm her. She realized, in some small way, that Apple Bloom’s fears were hitting far too close to home for her little baby dragon.

What happened next reaffirmed it.

“I’ll… what, what if I get all greedy and such? What if I get like Spike when he tried to take Scootaloo’s scooter?” she whined, still gasping at tiny breaths of worry between each word. “What if ah’ turn into a monster too!?”

Monster.

Twilight watched in horror as Spike spun away from the group, stumbled, and went down on his knees.

Monster.

Twilight watched as his hands went to the side of his head, and her heart leapt to him. It was a fight he’d been fighting ever since that day, and a battle that he might have to live with for the rest of his life, through dozens of centuries, perhaps.

“Oh, Spike,” she whispered under her breath, watching as his arms folded across his stomach.

Twilight’s worries for the little boy were put aside as she began to realize that something was happening with the other dragon. Apple Bloom’s worries were only growing, and soon the filly was gulping at tiny breaths, shaking where she stood or darted.

The little girl stood there, her body trembling and her eyes starting to roll as she pulled at little breaths. “Please, stop it! Apple Bloom, please, calm down!” Scootaloo cried, trying to force the dragon to the ground.

“Apple Bloom! Stop it! Stop, Apple Bloom, you’re gonna make yourself sick!” Sweetie Belle cried as she followed her wavering friend.

“Twilight, help!” Scootaloo cried. “She’s gonna hype… hypra, hypervem… She’s gonna pass out!”

Twilight lifted herself, and her mind dashed about as she tried to think of what type of magic or basic first aid could help the child.

Before she had even taken as single step, someone else in the room had moved quickly to help the little girl.

Spike stood and wheeled about, and Twilight and the other fillies saw a flash of green go across his eyes.

Inside Spike a memory had taken hold, something he had seen earlier that very day. In his mind’s eye he saw Mrs. Cake going on and on and on about her vacations.

Inside his head Spike drew a connection between what that mare had done and what Apple Bloom was doing to herself.

With that, he dove amid the girls, the remembrance of what had happened in the bakery giving him some hope that he could help her…

Silence once more filled the room.

Twilight looked on as Sweetie Belle and Scootaloo stepped back. The little fillies calmed, and an expression of wonder and awe came over them as they parted. As they moved aside Twilight could see very clearly what Spike had done to draw Apple Bloom out of her anxiety.

Apple Bloom felt clawed hands draw across her shoulders, and she felt herself being turned even as her breaths were at the verge of making her lose consciousness.

She stared into emerald eyes that seemed alive with light, and then the breath left her body.

She gave one, two little hops, and then settled into the new feeling that drifted through her… the touch of lips to hers.

Spike held her wrists at first, forcing her to stop bounding about in fear and panic. But, slowly, he dropped them as she stopped trembling and her body met the soft feel of his lips pressed to hers. He ran his hands up and down her arms as he felt her calm… as her emotions were transmitted to him through their kiss.

After a moment he raised his head.

He found himself looking down into her, remembering that he was, in fact, just that much taller than her in her new body.

“Ummm,” he said, not lifting from her eyes. They were filled with a perfect mix of confusion, fear, and wonder as they studied his.

“Look, hey, Apple Bloom,” he said, still slowly drawing his hands up and down her arms, trying to draw whatever fear remained out of her with his touch. “I-I know about all that stuff… what you just said. It… well, it’s what I think about every day, ya’ know?”

She gave a little hop, still looking at him, not moving away. To his surprise she opened up her arms, lifting them to his reassuring touch.

“I-I just want you to know,” he said, not knowing if he should look away or keep looking or whatever in the world he should do, just knowing that it was working, that she was calming, “that, yeah, it’s okay… you aren’t the only one who’s asking those questions, ya’ know? I… well, I don’t have the answers to a lot of stuff about growing up as a dragon. But, you’re not alone, ya’ got that? If you like, I’ll help you through it, no matter how long it takes. Do you want me to help?”

To Spike’s surprise she turned out the palms of her clawed hands. Even as his fingers began to trace the inside of her arms, brushing past the inside curve of her elbows and down to her wrists and back, she held his gaze.

His head moved slightly, but her eyes followed. Spike felt her searching for the last bit of the promise, the scared little girl latching onto something she saw in him, in the only other person on the planet that could possibly understand her present fears.

“You’re gonna be okay,” he repeated as she blinked, the brilliant orange of her eyes searching through his, the little boy now struggling to make her understand his purpose as different feelings washed through him. “I promise. Your sister and the princess, they have to be back soon, and they’ll bring back your body. And…”

Twilight saw the girl startle him with a small hop. To Twilight she looked like a martyr, what with the way she held her arms held out from her side, her eyes turned up to him.

“… and even if they don’t, I’ll stay with you,” he continued. “I’ll help you learn to be a dragon, or… well, as much as I know about it. Okay? You’re safe, you’re gonna be okay. I promise.”

The little girl gave another tiny hop, her face lifting towards his. As he continued to draw his hands across the underside of her arms he tried to think of the right things to do and say.

She gave another little hop, and then lifted her nose to his.

Oh…

“Hey,” he laughed, “Apple Bloom, ya’ can start breathing again…”

With that, he lowered his head.

“You’re gonna be okay, everything’s gonna be okay…”

As his hands reached her palms she squeezed him, and at once the new and wonderful sensation of their fingers interlacing drifted through both of the little dragons.

With that Spike lifted his arms wide, drawing her closer, and with that they shared another small kiss.

Twilight looked on, her face beaming with a large smile.

There were millions of reasons, she knew, to kiss. Not all were honorable, and some petty. Some are banal or a matter of course.

But, she knew, some were truly marvelous, and worthy of being recounted and shared.

It was a child’s kiss that passed between her baby dragon and the lost little girl who inhabited a dragon’s body. It was dry, and it was awkward in both appearance and execution, and it certainly lacked anything resembling passion or other such adult entanglements.

But, it was genuine.

There were millions of reasons, Twilight knew, to share a kiss. That Spike had used his kiss to draw out the pain of another, to give Apple Bloom the comfort and solace that she desperately needed… well, that just fit with everything that she knew of her baby dragon, of her number one assistant…

… of her great little guy.

There was a single sharp breath, and as Apple Bloom stood away from Spike her face was deep in a blush… and a bashful smile.

Spike was equally as red, and he ran his clawed hand through his frills as he smiled back at her.

To Twilight, there only seemed to be one appropriate thing to do at that moment.

She giggled to herself, and then joined Scootaloo and Sweetie Belle in a rousing chorus of “Spike and Apple Bloom, sitting in a tree…”

It was not mocking, but instead simply an attempt to see just how red they could make the pair become. When the two reached a brilliant hue she giggled again and then trotted over to them, giving them an adult’s promise and reassurance that everything would be fine in the end.

Deep beneath them, and far away on a side of existence not so easily defined, a world was ending.

“My Moonbeam,” spoke Chance, lifting his paw so that Luna could lower her head into it, “you’re just as regal and beautiful as those long centuries ago when you gave me this house.”

She batted her eyes at him, resting her head upon the paws that had lifted her into trees to see into the far distance, or had made empires out of sand castles with her when she was just a foal.

This was her godfather, her uncle in name if not in flesh, and she sighed happily at the memories of a younger world and a newly built land.

“We… I,” she said, recognizing the needlessness of her usual speech in front of one of the few beings left in the world (more or less) that had stared down into her cradle. “I have not been so fair through all of those ages…”

“I know of your troubles, my Luna,” the draconequus said, lifting her head from her his paw with one finger, “and I felt so helpless, not being able to help you through them…”

The look in his eyes changed slightly.

“… that I was not there with you, when I could have comforted you.”

Luna looked up to him, and then looked away. The look in his eyes had imparted his meaning.

That was not her godfather. That was not her uncle.

A high whine arose from nearby, and both looked at one another in surprise and then down to where a set of hooves made nervous motions and a worried sound arose that had a distinctive accent to it.

Chance looked down to see Applejack anxiously dancing her hooves and looking into his lap. There resided the abandoned body of Apple Bloom, shorn of everything that made it her sister apart from the appearance.

“Forgive me, Miss Applejack,” he said, shifting his body so that he could lift the form from himself. Applejack followed closely as he gathered more pillows and laid the body upon them, near to the fire, but not too near. “When your sister emerged here, or rather her body, I was confused. At first I felt… betrayed, and I wondered if Luna had chosen this form for me out of spite. A mortal earth pony instead of an alicorn, and a young filly instead of a grown stallion… you can understand my confusion…”

Applejack arched an eyebrow. No, she genuinely had no idea.

“When I saw that the other part,” he continued, “the initiator of the spell, was not her either, but a dragon whelp… I understood. I understood that something had gone wrong, and that my millennia of waiting had come to nothing…”

A deep sadness passed over him, and he looked first to the princess. She met his eyes in an expression that Applejack couldn’t name. The draconequus turned back to Applejack, drawing the cushions closer to the little body.

“When she, or… it, arrived, it seemed so cold… so lonely,” Chance said, leaning down to examine the filly’s form. “Forgive me, but I put it on my lap, just so that it would not be so cold.”

“Naw,” said Applejack, shaking her head, “don’t even think on it too much, that was right kind of ya’. Right kind.”

He smiled over her gently, and Applejack could see that real emotions sat there, not deviousness. How very much unlike the other draconequus she had met.

“Well, it sure was nice meetin’ ya’!” said Applejack, lifting her hoof to the incarnation of probability and possibility. “Mighty obliged that you’d take care of this here for us, but we’ve gotta get back to mah sister and swap her out… so, well, Princess?”

The two ancient, seemingly immortal, and apparently divine beings stared back across the earth pony, making her drop her head in pointless embarrassment.

As it hung there, two important facts went through Applejack’s mind… two things that Luna had said earlier.

Something had been said about killing someone who loved her… and about needing the blood of a mare.

Applejack’s head came up, her eyes wide and her mouth hanging open as she realized what was about to come.

As they caught her glance, the two ancient spirits of probability and deep magic looked away from her bewildered eyes, copying the look of unease that had sat across Applejack’s face a moment earlier.

The three sat there, in that phantom chateau, before the non-existent fire. The earth pony’s mouth moved up an down, the alicorn ran the back of her hoof across her other leg, and the draconequus scratched his forehead with the thumb of his right paw… each one waiting for the other to be the one to broach the topic of the murder that all were now politely anticipating.

“You, ummm,” began Chance, before pausing again. There was polite coughing, more fumbling… more jaws moving up and down as deep realizations drifted over the owner of said mandible.

“You,” he began again, turning to face the princess, “wish to recover her body, my Luna? You wish to return the filly to the body into which she was born?”

“There is no place for her among all whom she knows and loves if she remains a dragon,” spoke Luna, walking slowly back to her godfather’s side, “and she could never be a dragon. Her magic is still in her, and it will never be at peace with the magic of the dragon’s body.”

Luna sighed, glanced away, and then continued. “They are my children, my lord, and you know that they are dear to us, my sister and I. Each of them is dear to us. Godfather, I…”

Chance chuckled.

“Godfather… heh. You know, my Luna, that there are days that I both cursed your father for giving me that title, and days which I praised him until my throat hurt.”

He lifted his paw to her again, and once more she settled her head into his hand.

“I have sinned against you, my little Moonbeam. I should have kept those words that pained you to myself, and should only have been happy that you looked upon me as your godfather, and even more dearly as your uncle. You cannot know how happy it made me that your heart only grew fonder of me, and I should have been satiated with that. Can you forgive me for wanting more? Can you forgive me for seeing you as the beautiful, radiant, wondrous creature you became and, indeed, are now, instead of the little, gangly, awkward foal whom I was entrusted to protect?”

A tear ran down Luna’s face, and his paw came up to her, wiping it away.

“You are forgiven, dear uncle, dearest godfather. Your strength preserved me, preserved my sister and I, when the world seemed lost and my kind entered the heart of the mountain, one by one. It was you who provided all of the random chances that led us to rediscover the Elements of Harmony, and in the end you chose to defy your own uncle. You hid yourself and your power to shield us from Discord’s might. It is I who sinned against you, that night beside the river. I gave you the false hope that my love for you could be something other than what it always was… and still is. I let you believe that you could rest here in that hope, just so that I could tell myself that there still was one more on this side of death that loved me. Do I have your forgiveness?”

He smiled down over her, and she lifted her head from his paw.

“My Luna,” he said with a chuckle, “be it giving my forgiveness, or giving you my life, you know that there is nothing I would not do for you.”

Applejack’s mouth finally stopped moving up and down in disbelief.

“Princess, Majesty,” she called, “there… is, ain’t there no other way?”

“If the body of thine maiden sister is to leave here,” Luna began, unintentionally sliding back into her older dialect, “then the jewel must not leave here unmarred. If the jewel is marred…”

She looked up to Chance. There upon his face stood a soft expression, one that noted a sense of… loss, longing, and perhaps just a touch of release.

“… there is no other way,” Luna whispered, falling forward. Her godfather caught her up, and held her close. “Years of my life have been consumed by that question. Even the demon Nightmare Moon spent seventeen years of her exile pondering it as I slept in my moon, and even her wisdom and cunning was not enough. No, dear Honesty, there is no other way. We cannot even offer him the body thine sister now inhabits, for we cannot bring it here if the jewel is unmarred. When your princess thought on this, all that met her was the simple fact that she had lied to one who loved her, and whom she loved, because she was afraid to let go of the comfort it brought her.”

Applejack sat and pondered these words as Chance held his goddaughter close one last time, and great long sighs escaped the lips of the alicorn.

Luna sat chanting over the jewel, readying it for the act to come.

As the music filled the room Applejack sat near the body of her little sister, watching and listening as it fought for breath with a mechanical cadence, as it seemed to inflate and deflate.

To her surprise Chance came to her and lay down beside her, a million thoughts seeming to flit through his aged mind.

“You must think me a monster, for now you know the feelings that live in my heart for your sovereign, my Luna. Do you hold it against me, that I have such feelings for one I first met when she was but a few days old?” he asked.

Applejack’s head swam for a minute at the thought of her apparently divine and seemingly immortal princess toddling about in diapers.

“I… ah reckon it ain’t mah place tah say what ya’ll ancient folk feel,” she said.

“That’s nonsense,” he said in an indignant tone. “Complete nonsense. You, Miss Applejack, are Honesty, the most recent in a long line that my magic helped the fillies whom you call your sovereigns discover, and I expect it from you.”

Applejack cleared her throat, and then spoke again. “Well, sir, nothing personal… but, yessir, it’s a touch off-puttin’.

Chance sighed, and then rolled onto his back. He blinked a few times and then spoke once more.

“When she was a child, I loved her as a child should be loved. I rejoiced in her accomplishments, and helped her learn. That her father and mother trusted in me proved me blessed, and I blessed them in return.”

He gave a great heavy sigh.

“When their world fell apart,” he said in a voice that betrayed some guilt, “I and those who they trusted fought for them. We were hunted for our belief in the little fillies. To protect them and use my magic to shield them I had to leave them. My uncle, Discord, would have found me and used my power against them.”

His eyes turned back to her.

“When they had defeated him, and I was free to see her again, it was not my little Luna who greeted me. No, Honesty, it was the strong, beautiful, radiant mare that you call your princess. She was now a powerful, full wellspring of the deep magic of the night and the moon. She was a grown mare… and I loved her as such. I’d had a change of heart, as it were, and my loved changed to suite it. Yet, to her I was still her godfather… still her uncle.”

He shrugged his shoulders.

“This must seem very trite to you, but I thank you for listening. The truth of the matter is that I’m not that much older than Luna… only a few dozen centuries or so, you know, just to float that fact out over the room, as it were.”

“Errr, yes,” said Applejack, her head swimming with all of the casual references to ancient pony history.

The two sat there, next to the incorporeal fireplace, as he summoned some marshmallows to toast out of thin air at a chance of probability on the order of billions of trillions to one.

After some silence, he spoke again.

“Tell me, Miss Applejack,” he asked, "do you believe in the Well of Souls, the afterlife of the ponies?”

“Yessir,” answered Applejack without hesitation, “believed in it since day one, as it were. All mah’ kin are there, swimmin’ in love itself as though it were water, waitin’ on all of us here tah come runnin’ down the beach and gather us up and fill us with peace forever. Yessir… yessir, Lord Chance, sir, I do…”

He was silent for a moment.

“It sounds most wonderful,” he said, glancing up to her as his head lay upon the floor and a waft of marshmallow hung from his whiskers. “That is not the fate of my kind, after death, you know.”

“No sir, I-I wasn’t aware… that your kind, well… I didn’t even know that you could die, sir,” she said. “That’s why I’m surprised that you were the one we came here to… well, ummm...”

“It’s not quite the same for us, you see, Miss Applejack,” he said with a laugh. “We are not truly mortal, but incarnations. Death to us is just losing the sense of self. It is becoming entirely the spirit of what we are. My aunts Hope and Peace float about the world now unseen, and my cousins and all my kind are now present in the world, but not able to take part in it.”

He lifted himself and looked down at her.

“That was the sin of Discord, you see,” he added. “My uncle decided to have power over this world… therefore his punishment was to be made entirely of it, to become a physical part of it, to be made stone.”

Applejack smiled to him, and he back at her, both now knowing with more than small satisfaction the part the other played in their time to seal away the demon, and keep him so sealed.

“I tell you this, because I want you to know that I hold you not responsible for what you must now do. I hold no ill will against you, or your kind. So, the next time something seems to go amiss for you, I can only ask that you not say ‘That’s some damn chance!’ and curse me for your misfortune…”

Applejack laughed unexpectedly, and his smile grew wide.

Luna’s singing stopped, and the smiles fell out of both of them.

Applejack had heard of this before, but she’d never have believed that she would someday be part of it.

She had read of the way that some unicorns chose to die in musty books in school when she was a foal. She had always thought of it as was some odd unicorn rite, that it was something only done by mighty lords and chivalrous knights when it seemed that all was lost. She’d never heard of it being done outside of storybooks…

But, here it was.

Princess Luna had her horn pressed against Applejack’s chest, the jeweled gorget standing between her hooves.

“The blood must come from nearest the heart, Honesty,” Luna said for the fourth or fifth time, repeating the phrase as though she didn’t know what else to say.

Applejack nodded for the millionth time. If it was for Apple Bloom…

“My magic will preserve you, fear not… but the blood must come from nearest the heart…”

Applejack stopped wincing. She looked down to the princess, and realized that the tormented moments were continuing because Luna was torn. The princess took two ragged breaths, and her eyes flew around the room.

“Luna?” came Chance’s voice from across the way. “Luna, there’s nothing I would not give you, you know that… even my life for that of one of your little ponies.”

Two more ragged, tormented breaths.

“Princess? Now,” breathed Applejack. “Now.”

“C’mon,” she repeated again, daring to make demands of the alicorn, “Now… now, Ma’am. C’mon now…”

Luna gave a great huff of emotion. She gave a shrill cry.

“Now!” brayed Applejack, “Do…”

A sensation of cold wafted through the earth pony. Her eyes stared off into nothing as she felt the sensation of ice being dragged slowly across her very soul. Warmth slid from her, and she knew that it was her blood leaving her.

It all would have been very majestic, even poetic… that is, if it weren’t for the screaming, flailing, crying form of the draconequus across the way.

As she felt the warmth leaving her she knew that it was falling across the jewel. She could feel it splashing about her hooves, she could hear it splattering across the gorget… but there was no pain.

Only the sounds of a draconequus in his death throes, the splatter of her own blood, and the pitiful sounds of Luna’s tears filled the room.

Soon there was a feeling of movement within her, an alien sensation of coldness slipping from her, and suddenly she felt very light on her hooves.

“Sit yourself, Applejack. Rest ye,” called Luna, literally leaping over her and making for the draconequus.

Applejack’s head swam. She took a deep gulp and looked to her chest, expecting to find a horror show awaiting her eyes.

There was nothing… not even the slightest of scratches. Her breast was as immaculate as ever. The strong muscles of the working pony stood out healthfully. Only a slight coldness rested there.

Could she have imagined it?

Applejack lifted her head, first checking on the breathing of Apple Bloom’s body, and then looking for proof that the sensation had been real.

She didn’t have to look far, and she very nearly had to use her hat to catch her own sick.

Her blood stood splattered over the floor. It was pooled over the jewel, splashed over the gorget, her own hooves… nearby pillars, distant pots…

Applejack could only blink as dizziness floated through her, and she felt the sudden need to cuddle with the vacant body of her little sister. Her eyes fell across the jewel as she brought the cushions closer. She was not surprised that it was now black.

So it was that the blood of a mere earth pony mare, filled only with the love of her sister, drowned the worldly soul of an ancient incarnation.

Applejack’s eyes closed, and she fought through the dizziness to listen as Chance’s breathing became a forced wheeze, and in her mind’s eye she could see him already fading away.

Luna’s hoof stood in his one paw, and his other drew across her face, taking away her tears as they fell one by one.

“Moonbeam,” he said as he fought for breath, “do not cry. I am not sad, and this is not the worst way I could leave this form. You know that well enough…”

“I had to help my sister kill her godmother,” she said, her voice cracking. “I held Reeka and Draggle in check as their powers mingled and all the world seemed drawn down in my sister’s light and Hydia’s darkness, as though it were the end of all things. It was outrageous fortune alone that saved us…”

“Heh, my cousin?” he gasped. “Truly, Fortune was an ass…”

The two made small laughter, looking to one another as once gain, these millennia later, she witnessed him fading away and leaving his incarnate form.

“Luna,” he said with strained breaths, “I can not leave my worldly spirit behind in peace without repeating that which my heart truly feels. Would you grant me that?”

She rested her head against his paw.

“If you had allowed me to be your lover, I would have filled your life with pleasure. You would never have known loneliness or the want of touch again in your long years,” he spoke, his magic already fading and his body beginning to become thin.

“If the magic of the jewel had worked and given me a body of your kind, then you could have called me husband, if that would have made you happy,” he said, as his voice grew weaker. “I would have given you all of that, and that much more. Foals of your own, filling your life with that joy.”

“It is not my path,” she said, her own voice catching, “and I tell you again, godfather, that is not where your throne sits in my heart.”

“I know it, my Luna, and I finally admit it to myself. It was but a dream and longing I should have kept secret, and happy alone should I have been that you had called me godfather and uncle,” he said as he tried to take a breath. It caught somewhere in his throat and he seemed unable to either to cough or exhale. His body shuddered and finally the breath fell from him in a raspy wheeze.

“Goodbye, my Luna,” he fought for each breath as she pressed herself against his chest. “Know that I love you, and that I am still in the world, but only changed. I love you, my Moonbeam, and even as such you know there is nothing I would not do for you. If you ever find yourself in dire need, do not be afraid to leave your fate to chance.”

Applejack’s eyes came open in time to see Luna reach her long, graceful neck up to him. As their lips touched the draconequus tried to lift his paw to her, but it would not answer, and fell back to the floor.

“My little Moonbeam…”

And thus ended the worldly life of Chance
Last of the draconequui who were incarnate in the world
Less the demon sealed in stone in ancient Canterlot far away

“Applejack?” rose Luna’s voice. “Are you well, child?”

Applejack didn’t know when she had fallen to sleep, but she awoke with a start. Her head immediately went to Apple Bloom’s body. It was still breathing, but the breaths were ragged and unsure. At once she began to clamber to her hooves…

“It is barely past my rising, in the world,” Luna said, her voice seeming weak and withdrawn. “Fear not for the form of thine sister, for we have ample time.”

The two mares sat there together, in the room, neither of them speaking for long moments. Applejack noticed that the room had grown colder. There was no faux fire in the fireplace, and the windows were darkened. In truth, she could not understand how there was even light enough to see.

“Applejack? Honesty? Would…” spoke the princess.

“Majesty?” answered Applejack.

“Would y-you attend to us?” the princess asked, her voice breaking as she asked it.

Applejack picked up the gorget, the iron taste of her own dry blood sitting in her mouth as she carried it to the princess. She began to try to lift it up to the princess, but as she caught the look in the eyes of her ancient sovereign she knew that was not what she was asking for.

“Oh, c’mere now,” Applejack said, letting the much vaster pony lay her head across her shoulder. So much larger was Luna that Applejack felt imposed by her weight, and the alicorn’s face reached all the way down to Applejack’s withers.

Still, she held her princess, offering what comfort she could.

“I loved him, Honesty,” Luna spoke, “and already the world seems that much darker.”

Applejack ran her hoof along the back of her sovereign, making small sounds of comfort.

After long moments Luna’s voice rose again, and it was a song. As Applejack held her she felt the magic of the alicorn rising, and as the words escaped her lips Applejack felt as though she could see the world that the princess was lamenting… as though the words written on the brass that she’d touched suddenly had meaning.

“Will you not sing with us?” asked the princess without raising her head.

“Well, ummm, forgive me, princess, but I ain’t familiar with the words,” Applejack replied.

“Of course,” sighed Luna, “forgive me. The song is much older than thine ears, and my sister usually matches my harmony. Can… pray, do you feel the melody in it?”

“Yes,” answered Applejack, “I think I kin’ put my hoof on it pretty square.”

As the princess began to sing again Applejack did her best to hum the melody that she had heard. So it was that “The Galarnad” was sung for the first time with the distinctive accent of the earth ponies keeping its cadence.

There were booming sounds in the distance.

With that they gathered up the little form of Apple Bloom’s body, and departed the house. As they did it reduced to deep magic, taking that much more out of the world, and as they slid away the secrets of old Equestria became that much more distant.

Chapter 4: "Reflection"

Chapter 4: “Reflection”

“… and then Spike taught me how tah’ breathe fire, and then we put the curtains out, and then we had a gem eatin’ race, and I got sick all over the…”

“Oh, is that all ya’ got up to?” asked Applejack with a laugh, interrupting her sister as the dragon jumped up and down in front of her.

Apple Bloom blushed and giggled. “Nope!” she answered. “Spike kissed me!”

“Did he now?” spoke Applejack. She arched an eyebrow as she fixed the little boy in a glare. Twilight felt him grab hold of her foreleg as he suddenly became very self-conscious.

“Yup! And then he went an’ did it again!” Apple Bloom laughed.

“Oh, did he now?” Applejack answered, furrowing her brow and staring at him in a more baleful tone.

Twilight jumped in surprise as she felt the unusual sensation of Spike’s hands embracing her rear legs. He pulled her tail over him as shelter from Applejack’s glower.

Twilight looked back up to Applejack, and as she did the earth pony gave a little laugh and winked back at her. It had only been for show, and to get a rise out of the little dragon.

“Gen-tle-man,” Twilight mouthed, pointing back to where the whelp still sat between her legs and under the protection of her tail.

Applejack smiled and nodded.

Luna’s bedroom felt different now that the night had come and the windows all stood free of the heavy curtains.

The assembly stood around the daybed as Luna returned from her balcony… a late raising of the moon better than none at all, it seemed. The hour was past the regular bedtime of the fillies and dragons, but not so late that the sounds of Canterlot did not drift up into the room from far below.

Luna walked over to where Twilight, Spike, Sweetie, and Scootaloo looked down at Apple Bloom as she drew her clawed hands across her own mane.

The little girl looked upon her body as it lay upon the daybed, breathing shallowly and in staggered breaths.

“It’s kinda peculiar, ain’t it?” she finally said, gathering her own hooves into her clawed hands. “This kinda feels like mah body now, and that looks kinda like a stranger.”

“But, now that I think on it,” she said, turning back to her sister and wrapping herself around her foreleg, “bein’ a dragon don’t sit right neither. I don’t feel like this… fits.”

“You have no home in that form, child,” answered Luna, “for your own magic and the magic of that race compete within you. In time, it would have grown worse, and would have erupted in sickness and a battle within you that none could see the end of.”

The princess walked past her to the form that lay upon the daybed.

“Come, child, let us bring you home.”

Apple Bloom looked up to Applejack.

“Sis, could ya’ take mah bow off?” she asked, turning her back to her sister.

“C’mere, Sugar Cube,” answered older sibling as she drew her sister closer to her. Her teeth gently pulled at the bow, tickling the dragon’s neck in the slightest, and soon it fell free.

Apple Bloom looked up and saw the princess beckoning her towards the figure that lay nearby. She spun back to Applejack and looked up to her older sister for reassurance.

“Go on now, it’ll be just fine an’ dandy,” she said, ushering her sister forward. “The princess will make everythin’ as right as rain…”

Apple Bloom took a few steps forward. When she felt herself close to where Luna stood she opened her eyes and looked up to the princess. In her mind Apple Bloom thought of all sorts of spells, enchantments, and curses that the princess might use to restore her spirit and mind to her body.

The dragon gave a single shake of worry as the dark mare looked down over her, and fear sat in her expression. Would the magic… hurt?

“Child,” Luna said, gesturing to the body that lay before them, “press thy lips to thine supine form…”

Apple Bloom looked up to the princess with several shades of confusion wafting above her.

“She wants ya’ to kiss yourself!” Scootaloo called, just the slightest hint of a giggle hidden in her voice.

Apple Bloom turned back to the princess. Luna nodded, and Apple Bloom looked to her own body once again. Her eyes flashed to Spike for a second, and the boy tilted his head, not quite understanding why she was looking at him.

“Sure has been a fair bit o’ smoochin’ going on around here today,” she said as she looked back to her own body.

“Indeed.”

All looked to Luna, and all except Applejack wondered where the defeated tone in which princess spoke had arisen.

After a moment their attention turned back to Apple Bloom, and the girl lifted herself awkwardly upon the bed.

She balanced on the edge of the bed, looked into her own face, and then lowered her lips to the form upon the bed.

There was a high whine, and soon the room was filled with a blinding white light that escaped the windows and eaves of the apartments, spilling out into the night around the city. It was visible as a shaft of visible white magic that made day erupt into the skies around the sleeping city before being consumed by the night once more…

… and with that the dragon tumbled off the bed. The head struck the carpet, and the body lay awfully still and quiet.

“Apple Bloom!” called Applejack, her voice high with fear.

Applejack stood over the dragon, nuzzling it, and the others gathered to her.

“Apple Bloom!” Applejack called again. “Apple Bloom!”

“What?” answered a familiar voice from close by.

Applejack lifted her head and looked to Luna. The princess smiled and pointed to the nearby daybed. There, amid the blankets and pillows, sat Apple Bloom. Her head wobbled, and her mane stood out in frizzled disarray…

… but it was her. It was all of her. It was her body, her mind, her intellect, and her spirit and soul.

Applejack placed the body of the dragon on the floor, and at once leapt to the bed.

All at once her hooves wrapped around her little sister, and she rubbed her head to that of the filly. The two sat there, nuzzling to one another until Applejack could no longer contain her happiness.

She lifted her sister from the bed, spun her around and around as she giggled in her forelegs.

Together they went around and around the room, the two sisters tight in each other’s embrace, happy tears streaming down their faces. Soon Applejack lowered herself to the floor, and each of the mares and fillies came closer, greeting Apple Bloom as she returned home to her own body.

As they lay there, upon the floor, Applejack lifted her sister’s mane. She carefully laced the ribbon around and around once more. Soon the bow stood out upon the familiar red locks of hair once again… marking the filly as her sister.

“How do you feel?” Twilight asked.

“Ah’m a bit wobbly,” she said as she rose from Applejack’s lap. Her hooves felt so much heavier than dragon’s feet, and for an instant she felt like she was plodding rather than trotting.

“Hey, guys?” a little voice called, but it was soon lost in the sound of Sweetie Belle and Scootaloo’s laughter. They draped themselves over their friend, and with that the Crusaders were reunited once more.

“Ummm, hey,” came the voice again, but soon it was lost once more as the fillies scampered around the room. All of the eyes were watching happily as Apple Bloom’s strength returned and all of their ears were set on her happy sounds.

“Guys!” All turned to Spike, and soon all realized that he had been calling to them. It was evident as to why he had been as well…

The whelp kneeled behind the disposed body of the little girl, his hand resting beneath the head so that it didn’t have to lie upon the floor.

The other dragon breathed in ragged, uneven breaths… breaths that were even more uneven and distressing to hear than Apple Bloom’s body had been.

“What about her… ummm, this… it?” he asked, looking from the empty shell to them and back.

Luna walked closer, and then hovered over the two dragons… the one alive and the other undead.

“The vessel’s fate is the same as what would have befallen the child,” answered Luna. “If it is not inhabited by a soul by the dawning of my sister’s sun, then it will die.”

Silence fell around the room, and the assembly looked on as Spike piteously ran his hand across the face of the empty form.

“Princess?” he asked without looking up to her. “A-Are there any souls like that? Are there any that you know of? A-Any that could fill it up?”

“There are many displaced souls in the world, and some which are female and could fill the vessel,” she said, her voice becoming cold and distant again. “But, Summoner, all of them have earned such imprisonment by their own actions or as just punishment, and none deserve the gift of such a form.”

Spike didn’t look up. Instead, after a few moments, he lowered himself to the floor and lifted the body. It hung limp as he rose to his feet with sounds of effort.

All watched as he laid the form upon the daybed, and as a long sigh escaped his lips he tried to lay it out so that it slept as peacefully as possible. All heard the ragged breaths as its struggle for air only seemed to become worse and worse…

It was long past the bedtime of the fillies. The mares had tucked them in, and a pile of fillies slept wrapped close to one another upon Luna’s bed as the adults kept their vigil all through that night.

There was no soul, no spirit, or intellect in the body that lay upon the daybed. It was just a body, shorn even of instincts and which breathed and beat its heart through magic alone.

It was just a machine. It was a machine that was falling apart as the night grew deeper and the inevitable coming of the dawn crept closer.

Still, it didn’t seem right to just leave it alone. It had been the body of a dear one, if even for a little while. So, they sat… and Spike continued to draw his hand across its arms even as its fight seemed to be waning.

Twilight looked upon him as Applejack napped, the adults sleeping in shifts.

Twilight’s heart broke as she watched him lift the hand, intertwining his fingers with that of the vessel, just as he had when Apple Bloom still lived within and he had drawn out her fear.

Twilight watched for a second. To her surprise he released the hand from his hold, as though something he thought would be there was absent… that a feeling wasn’t there that he had expected.

“Twilight?” he whispered, not wanting to wake the fillies that slept on the bed.

“Yes,” she answered, moving closer to him. He slid back into her, sitting between her forelegs. His hands traced her legs as he stared to the floor, and Twilight could sense the questions inside him.

“Twi?” he asked. “Who am I supposed to love?”

Well… interesting.

Twilight pondered the question as they sat together, watching the rise and fall of the chest of the form that fought for breath in front of them.

“Well,” she began, “who do you love now?”

“Uh, well, I love all of our friends,” he said. “Some in different, kinda… well, you know how I feel about Rarity, after all.”

Twilight chuckled.

“I love you the most, of my friends. You know that… right?” he asked, resting his head against her leg.

As Twilight’s head settled beside his she squeezed him tighter, and he gave a single happy chuckle.

The two sat together like that for a long while before the dragon spoke again.

“It’s just that…well, when Apple Bloom was in there, and there was another dragon like that around, a nice one… and a girl, it felt… funny, to be with her,” he said, trying to express himself.

“Spike,” Twilight whispered with a giggle, and a twinkle in her eye, “do you have a crush on Apple Bloom?”

“No,” he said in an even tone. “No, no I don’t. She’s my friend.” It was not the impassioned denial of a little boy caught in young love. It was a cold statement of fact.

“Oh,” answered Twilight, the twinkle in her eye crashing to the floor and shattering into millions of pieces.

“It’s… it’s just that, the funny feeling. I think it was because I was that close to a dragon,” he said. “Well… a girl, and one that wasn’t a jerk.”

He was silent for a second, but when he continued there was a shadow of pain in his voice.

“I think my body wants me to be with a dragon, when I grow up,” he said, his voice cracking as he made the admission. “B-but my heart loves my pony friends… and my mind doesn’t know what it wants…”

Twilight sensed the confusion that was floating around in his mind. She felt the way that her little baby dragon, a boy of about twelve years, was trying to grasp at the different feelings that sat within him and flew around him.

She ventured a guess that what his heart, mind, and body really wanted in this moment was to be held a little closer. As he drew him into the warmth of her body Spike began to nuzzle his face across the inside of her leg and her chest, and she knew that she had guessed right.

She measured her words, and soon she spoke, her words floating around the room, competing only with the breaths that lifted from the empty body.

“I don’t know, Spike,” she said. “Your heart is yours, not mine. I can’t tell you everything, and the truth is that we don’t get to choose who we love…”

He continued to nuzzle to her, and she looked down over him. There seemed to be little comfort for him in her words.

“There are many types of love… and sometimes we mistake love for something else. In the end, it’s who we love and how we chose how to show it to them that matters. In the end, that’s the only thing that we really leave behind… and I know that whoever ends up with this heart,” she said, placing her hoof to his chest, “will be very lucky.”

A smile grew across Spike’s face, and he blushed slightly.

“Do ya’ really think so, Twi?” he asked.

“Yes,” she replied, and with that she ran her hoof across his frills.

His lead lowered to her legs once more, and he nuzzled into her warmth.

It was now long past his bedtime, and after a few long minutes a yawn rose from him. She was just about to tell him that it was time for bed when he hopped in surprise.

“Oh no!” he said. “Twilight… I’m sorry!”

“What? Spike, what is it?” she answered as she looked down at him.

“The Crusaders! They caused trouble today! I was supposed to keep them out of trouble! My tour was supposed to keep them out of trouble! I’m sorry…”

“Well, actually,” she said, “the deal was that you’d keep them from interrupting the ceremony with their crusading antics… so, technically, you did your job.”

He looked up to her, his eyes shining in the darkened room, any tiredness seeming to have washed out of him.

“I did?” he said in an enthusiastic whisper. “So… umm, do we still get to do… that?”

“Yes,” she said, with a roll of her eyes. “A deal is a deal. When we get home, you may brush my mane and coat.”

Spike settled back into her forelegs with a self-satisfied chuckle.

“I can’t for the life of me figure out why you insist on doing that, though,” she said, her face wrinkling. “Are you thinking of becoming a hairdresser or something?”

“C’mon, Twi,” he said, leaning back against her with his hands behind his head. “You’re too pretty to go around with your hair in a tangle all the time. It would probably help if you stopped going bonkers every now and then…”

“What’s that supposed to mean?” she said, parting her front legs so that he slid to the floor in a surprised heap. She looked down into him with a glare. “And, and ‘too pretty’ for what?”

“You're too pretty not to catch the eye of a stallion, Twi,” he said, rubbing the back of his head where it had bumped the floor.

Twilight blinked in surprise.

“Your heart deserves to filled up too, ya’ know,” he said, affecting a matter-of-fact tone, “and that’s gonna be one lucky stallion who does.”

Twilight stared down into him for a long moment before scooping him back up into her embrace.

“Do you really think so, Spike?” she asked, hugging him tight.

“Yup!” answered the whelp.

Twilight hugged him close for a good long while before placing him back on the floor. As he scootched back to the space between her forelegs their conversation continued.

“I still don’t know how I feel about you combing and brushing me,” she said. “It’s kinda weird.”

“How so, Twi? We already take care of each other like that, don’t we?” he asked. “You give me baths and stuff, and I give you baths when you’re sick or hurt, like after Winter Wrap Up and the snakes and bats and hornets and sk…”

“Okay, yes,” she said, grimacing at the remembrance, “point taken. But, Spike, I don’t want you to feel responsible for me… it’s supposed to be the other way around, okay? You already do everything else for me, I don’t want you thinking of yourself as my personal beautician as well.”

Spike waved his hands through the air. “There’s nothing to it, Twi, it’s a simple and easy job, and I like knowing that I helped you be your best, ya’ know? Besides, I’m your number one assistant…

… and you know that there’s nothing I wouldn’t do for you.”

The two sat together until the day had finished, and a new one begun. It was the latest that the little dragon had stayed up since the Summer Sun Celebration. Even though he was older than the fillies, he was still a baby dragon in the end, and sleep came and claimed him as he rested in the warm space between her forelegs and body.

Twilight lifted him in the currents of her magic. Looking around she tried to find some place to rest her little charge, but only one seemed available.

Something in her paused at the idea of slipping him into the bed with the fillies, but there seemed no other place.

She wondered what the big deal was… they were all children, and friends. With that she gently lifted the girls in the same magic and deposited Spike in their midst, settling him with his head upon the pillow.

As she watched the fillies unknowingly yawned in unison, and their heads settled to the cool scales of her great little guy. Twilight wished to squeal in delight at the sight of all the little innocents cuddled so close together, but she maintained her sense of decorum.

Still, seeing Spike there, amid all those fillies… she couldn’t help but feel the slightest twinge of jealousy.

She leaned down over him, and as he slept peacefully she pressed her lips to his forehead. She watched happily as a small smile broke across his face and his sleeping grew deeper.

“Sleep tight, Spike,” she whispered, as she turned back to the daybed, “and whoever ends up finding a place in that heart, be sure to save some space for me.”

At 4:37 a.m. Twilight came awake as an awful sound filled the room.

Applejack was already awake, and as Luna came to them they looked down over the form of the empty vessel upon the daybed.

The eyes had come open as the great sucking, gasping draws of breath signaled that the magically sustained life of the body had begun its descent towards the end.

Luna’s magic wafted over the form, closing the eyes and making sure that there was nothing else that they could do for it.

The children still slept, and as alicorn and unicorn magic fell over them they were lifted from the bed and wrapped in blankets. Wordlessly the adults carried them to the patio so that the sounds of the uninhabited body’s last battle would not wake them. They placed the sleeping girls upon the wicker sofa. There was a chill, and the adults laid blankets over them to keep them warm.

Twilight returned to the bedroom to gather up the last sleeper, but instead she found him already awake, his eyes set upon the vessel.

She encouraged him to go out to the patio, to try to go back to sleep.

He asked to stay.

Applejack and Luna returned, and they asked him to go outside and keep the guards company while they watched over the sleeping girls.

He asked to stay.

Finally, as all adults must do, they told the child the truth.

They told him that they didn’t want him to see what was about to happen.

He told them that he felt responsible for what had happened.

He told them that he was old enough, and that he knew what was about to happen.

He told them that if Twilight would stay close to him, that he could do it, and that he wanted to be here, with the vessel, as the time came.

So it was, at 4:53 a.m., that as a dragon whelp held its hand, a unicorn and an earth pony looked on, and an ancient and seemingly immortal alicorn stood near, that a life that never truly was a life came to an end.

The first thing that Apple Bloom realized when she awoke was that she wasn’t in her own bed at the farm.

As white wicker met her gaze she fought to remember where she was. The second thing she realized was that this wasn’t even Princess Luna’s bed.

Where was she?

She unraveled herself from beneath what seemed like a million blankets and her still sleeping friends. Scootaloo and Sweetie Belle still slept on she leapt to the patio floor and began to trot around.

The third thing she realized was that it was dang chilly out at this time of the morning.

The filly hopped, skipped, and bucked, as she tried to generate enough heat to keep from trembling.

The fourth thing that she realized, as she looked up, was that she was directly between the two massive thestrals. The night guards looked down over her as she slowly ended her inspired dance routine.

They broke into smiles, and spoke to her in gentler tones than she remembered them using the day before.

“You have awakened,” said the ephemeral one. “Good morning.”

“G-Good morning!” she replied, trying to sound chipper as her teeth chattered.

“If you will come with me,” answered the icy one, “we will announce you to her majesty, and to your sister. They have been awake since…”

He paused, looked to his file partner, and then looked back to the filly.

“… they have been awake for quite some time.”

He turned, clicked his boots together, and began marking time. When she fell in beside him, they marched off. As she followed they crossed around the building and before the staircase leading to the courtyard.

As they went Apple Bloom saw someone familiar seated upon the stairs, and breaking her formation with the thestral she pelted off to where Spike sat.

The night guard watched her go, and with a sigh of relief he went off to inform the mares.

“Mornin’ Spike!” she said, cantering up to him. “Mind if I sit next to ya’? It’s a touch frosty…”

“Sure,” he said, leaning in to her as she settled next to him, “I don’t mind…”

The two young creatures sat there next to one another as the morning sun began to settle across them.

“It… it died, a couple of hours ago,” he stammered in a single breath. He had to take another deep one to continue talking. “The other body, that thing… the one you were, when you…”

“Oh,” she exclaimed, ending the conversation.

Luna and Applejack walked out to the top of the stairwell wordlessly. There they stood watching as the sunlight began to fill the spaces around them.

“Hey, Spike,” she said. “All of that bad stuff… the stuff that I was all worried about yesterday. Do you really worry about it every day?”

“Yeah,” he answered. “Pretty much… yeah.”

She scootched a little bit closer to him.

“I, really hope that it’s gonna be okay for you, ya’ know,” she said, watching the courtyard come alive as ponies began to walk across it. “I hope that it won’t be too scary for ya’, when ya’ have to deal with all of that…”

“Thanks,” he answered. “That means a bunch to me…”

Luna and Applejack watched on as she laid her head on his shoulder, and he laid his head to hers, the two friends sharing the comfort of their warmth and closeness.

A few more moments passed, and the sounds of the city coming awake rose to meet them as they sat upon the stairs.

“Hey, Spike?” she asked.

“Yeah?” he answered.

“When ya’ were… calmin’ me down,” she giggled, making him blush slightly, “You said some pretty nice things. Ya’ said that you’d teach me to be a dragon. Ya’ said that you’d watch over me, an’ help me… ya’ even said that you would stay with me. That was pretty nice of ya’.”

He wobbled his head, acknowledging her statement even as they still sat there together upon the stairs.

She stood, making him flail about for a second as he tried to steady himself after her abrupt departure.

Twilight, Sweetie Belle, and Scootaloo joined Luna and Applejack on the landing. There they watched as Spike recovered his balance just in time to find himself looking up into her eyes.

“Spike?” she said, looking down over him as he sat.

“Yeah?” he answered.

“That was pretty dang nice of ya’,” she said, “and I’m right thankful for it.”

With that she leaned in, smiled at him, and gave him a quick peck on the cheek.

At once he filled with a blush, one that illuminated his face as brightly as the dawning sun that filled the courtyard.

“An’ now,” she said with a giggle as she turned up the stairs, “Im’ma gonna fetch Sweetie Belle and Scootaloo an’ we’re gonna get an early start and catch up on all that crusading we missed out on yesterday!”

The crowd watched Spike place his face in his palm.

“This won’t end well,” he sighed.

“Yup, we’re gonna get ourselves right proper politicized here in this city, and we’re not gonna come out until we’re all but covered in marks o’ intrigue and electioneerin’ and the like,” she enthused, bouncing up and down the stairs.

“Don’t make me get my sign!” he called.

“We’ve got this whole royal city tah’ explore, and we’re not leavin’ ‘till…”

She leapt up to the banister of the stairwell, teetering high above the long drop to the courtyard below.

“Apple Bloom!” called Applejack in alarm. “Get down from there right now!”

“Sis!” Apple Bloom answered, just then realizing that her sister and the others stood nearby.

“I… what, whoa!” began Apple Bloom, moving at once to answer her sister and leap back to the stairs. Her hoof skid, and her forelegs spun through the air. At once she fell backwards, towards the edge of the banister and towards the courtyard far below.

As the group looked on in horror Applejack leapt for her baby sister, but it was too late. With a single cry of alarm the filly fell with a single tumble towards the courtyard below.

“Apple Bloom! App…” began Applejack as she lunged to the edge. Yet, suddenly, she stopped.

As all of the ponies and the dragon ran to her side they soon saw why.

Applejack and her sister were nose-to-nose.

The filly was perched atop an immense pile of hay, one that stood upon a massively over-filled cart.

“Howdy, folks!” called a voice far below. The owner of the cart, an older earth pony stallion in a crumpled hat, looked back up to them.

“Fortuitous thing that I just happened down this way, then, ain’t it?” he exclaimed. “Just a touch lost is all… good thing I came down this way, eh? To think what would have happen if I hadn’t gotten lost? Oh my, the poor filly woulda’ broken her neck.”

He looked up to them once more, lifted his hat in deference to Luna, and then was on his way. As Applejack lifted Apple Bloom back to the landing his cart of hay swayed lazily behind him, and he made one last statement that drifted in the morning air.

“What a thing to leave to chance…”

The assembly looked upon Applejack as her mouth hung open. There was a single knowing sigh, and as they looked to Princess Luna a single tear ran down her cheek. Soon her face broke into a smile, and she raised her head and began to sing an ancient song.

The harmony lifted around them, and soon it mixed with the deep and powerful magics that swirled upon Canterlot’s breezes.

End.