Shining Armor has spent all day introducing new guards to their jobs, showing their habitat, making them familiar with the palace... He was not able to accomplish more today, but he knew he would be spending the next weeks, nay, months introducing new guards and teaching them to stand still and all that stuff. The Changeling assault has seriously left its marks, both on me and in the rows of our men he thought.

He was tired and exhausted, but he knew, Cadence would fuel him up again with her love. She never gets tired comforting me, giving some of her strength to me, expects me with food, carries me when I am to tired to walk. And that even when we barely get to see each other during the day because of my duties...

His thoughts trailed off, returned to the day he had just finished with, returned to the pegasus twins that had shown the best results and had been working so hard to reach the level of dependability the older guards had achieved through many years in one day!

They had failed to do so, of course, but they got a lot further than the others. Eventually they had begged him to allow them spend the night as additional guard among the veterans guarding his room and he had agreed after much pleading.
Speaking - or thinking - of his room, he just had reached the doors of the chamber he and his wife were inhabiting. He tried to focus the magic to trigger the safety mechanism that would open only for a few important ponies, but he was too tired to concentrate properly.

Before the unicorn guards could help him, the doors flew open and a pink alicorn ran out and gave him a passionate kiss in front of all the guards. The two new pegasi looked surprised for a moment but quickly regained stance, while the veterans remained staring straight ahead. The youngsters took position next to the unicorn guards that did not even blink at being joined.

The Knight, now imbued with some power and clarity again, gave one last order to the veterans:
"Take care of the youngsters, answer any question, make them comfortable at the job. No need to be all straight tonight, remember the first time you stood guard and do what you think is right."

The addressed guards gave a swift nods and immediately their stances relaxed. They turned to the newbies and examined them, while the knight and his royal companion closed the doors behind them. Shining took a deep breath and shook of the days trouble, then turned at his wife.

"Your eyes are glistening, what's up?"

She smiled and looked at him for a moment. After a few seconds her own impatience broke the silent duel and she said:

"I am pregnant"

He looked at her with incomprehensible joy, jaw half dropped, then pulled her in a tight hug, taking care not to squeeze his going-to-be child. They both cried little tears of joy in their close embrace. A few minutes later they departed and Cadence noticed a serious look on her husbands face.

"Dear, what bothers you?"

He looked in thought for a moment, then sighed.

"I have much work to do. The attack of the changelings ripped big holes in our lines. Training, selecting, introducing new guards will consume me the next months, if not more. And since the general of the armies of Equestria was drained all out by his "wife", 'Tia asked me to observe the regeneration of the army as well. That's what bothers me, because I will have no time for you and my child then. You will probably not have the strength to care for the child all on your own, and when I return from work I will be weak and tired too.”

They sat there in silence for a minute until Cadence's face brightened up again suddenly.

“I could go to your sister. She will love the chance to write an essay on how alicorns educate their children and will check on all her books to make sure we don't make any mistake. Other than that, she will be able to help me if I can't stand anymore and you can ask Celestia or Luna for help. Twi is your family, I am sure she will love to care for her nephew or niece almost as good as you could. And the magic of harmony pulsing in her will do no harm to the child.”

“And I will be able to visit you frequently. Celestia gave me my very own chariot to travel with, It will take a few minutes to visit Ponyville with it.”

Said, done, they decided to do so and a few weeks later the child was born – an adorable unicorn colt – and Shining took a day off to enjoy the view of his son and comfort his wife. Luna had agreed to stay up during the day and do his work in his stead, but the next day he had to get back to work again. Cadence traveled to Ponyville and Twilight, that had already been informed by Celestia, readily fetched them from the train station.

On the way back, Twilight carried her young nephew, that was sleeping peacefully. She had been reading two books about how to properly carry a sleeping newborn, with special attention on unicorn colts. None of them had any information on how to deal with unicorns that were the son of a crystal alicorn, not even on sons of regular alicorns or just alicorns at all, apparently they did not have that much children. She just hoped she did it right and since the little colt did not stir at all in the magic grip she held him before her with she assumed she made no mistakes.

She was buried in conversation with Cadence on how alicorns treat their children and how it was different from earth ponies, unicorns and pegasi (all of whom Twilight had spent the time since the announce of pregnancy reading up on) in a way that it basically was a combination off all three of them and soon they had reached the tree library Twilight was living in.

“And you alicorns usually take several decades or centuries to get your cutie mark?”

“Compared to the many millenia we live thereafter it is a small amount of time. That would be like you getting your cutie
mark a month after birth. Why do you ask? Is it of any relevance or what?”
Twilight pushed open the door and answered:

“I read that, if for example the parents are unicorn and pegasus, and the child is unicorn, it may carry a little bit of the pegasus heritage inside causing it to be able – again, this is just an example – to walk on clouds maybe, or understand the wing language, maybe even reproducing a magic aura similar to those and thus making pegasi around sense their feelings as if they were judging by wings. This are the most extreme cases though, usually it has no effect at all.”

She paused and looked at the room she had prepared for the princess and her no less royal offspring. It was not exactly adapted for a princess but that was all she could do for now. Cadence interrupted her thoughts as she asked:

“What exactly do you aim for?”

“I mean his alicorn heritage may cause him to get his cutie mark much later than unicorns usually do while still not making him live forever. He could be halfway through his life until he finds his special talent. On the other hand, he could get it at the age unicorns do and still maybe live forever – I was not able to find specific literature on alicorns, you are just to rare..” She said, almost apologizing.

Cadence had already unpacked her bags and went back to the main library room. She checked the shelves quickly and took a book on magically checking the traces of magic in somepony else body and held it up to Twilight.

“What.. oh. I have read it once, but I fear I will be able to remember all of the techniques... right, I could read them. Still, I don't think I will be able to do the spells on him without disturbing his royal sleep...”

“Twilight, just do it. If he should wake up, I will comfort him. If he needs more sleep , he will just go back to retrieving some.”

“Still, I don't know if I can do it, I have never tried before... And I doubt I will be able to identify alicorn traces and interpret
what they do...”

“If you want to be sure, try me first” said Cadence, slightly annoyed “You will find four auras in me, pegasus, earth and unicorn you can easily recognize, the fourth will be alicorn. The second half of the book has interpretation guides, so you can look that up.”

“But I don't know, what if I harm you ins...”

“This is a royal order!”

Twilight bit her lip and quickly memorized all the details of the basic spell she would need before going into the basics of the detailed spells. Her horn lit up and she closed her eyes, focused on her former foal-sitter and felt the magic flow through her forehead-appendix as she cast the spell.

She slowly began to feel something... there was something very familiar to her, as she had this type of magic herself.
Then there was the aura reigning over all of sweet apple acres, apparently the inherent power of earth ponies.
Third was the magic aura she had imitated for the cloud-walking spell.

Last she felt an aura totally unknown to her... She examined each of the auras with the detail spells in order to be able to find traces of them in her nephew later. She paid extra attention to the alicorn aura, while simultaneously a quill hovered in front of her, writing down everything she found out. It had the part of very special talents, that appeared later, the eternal life, the increased power in spell-casting, the increased senses and last the ability to see and sense things you can't see with the normal eyes, like viewing magic connections and lingering spells, sense the true alignment of their surroundings.

There was much more, but the vast abilities alicorns truly posses made Twilight mentally stumble and lose concentration before she could find out more. She secretly wished her nephew had all of them, but that would be to great to be true...

But with the princess of Love as mother, everything could be true. What if her strong love for her husband had printed off on him and given him a little hint of alicorn magic, enough to influence the child? After all she had often given of her own strength to him and that might have an impact on things.

She shut her jaw and turned to the sleeping prince. She took another look at the instructions, just to be sure, and another to make sure she had seen everything the last look, then another to double check. Finally she seemed satisfied and inhaled deeply. Another quick look at the 'Please remember' box and she decided she was ready.

Again she focused her magic and suppressed the urge to check another time. Delving into the power auras of the sleeping prince she first hit upon the unicorn magic. Was it because she knew them best that she always found them first? Probably, but she did not want to research that question for now, she had better things to do. The unicorn aura had all the traits unicorns normally have, even the rare ones of very good inherent levitation and teleport and the extremely rare ability to teleport others. This one had to be trained in order to get precise, but still, he had it.

Next she sensed a little trace of earth pony, not much but enough to have an impact on his strength. She found a trace of pegasus too, who would have guessed, resulting in cloud-walking abilities and a lighter weight.Stronger muscles, lighter weight, this colt is going to be great at physical activities. If he is going to train his dexterity too, he will be even greater... I need to tell that Cadence

Finally, Twilight found what she had initially been looking for: Alicorn magic, the one she was least familiar with. She found the increased physical senses and the increased magic power – This colt is going to be a very powerful caster... – and last the immortality.

She retreated to her own body again, her quill having written down everything she had seen inside this young prince. Royals seem to be born to have a great fate... Except Prince Blueblood. She slightly shuddered at the memory, but quickly caught herself and looked at Cadence, who was just reading the notes.

Author's Note

This is my first submitted chapter, and the first time I can think of I actually tried to write something. Any criticism, positive and negative, will be appreciated. Just please no trolling or cussing.