“How do you feel now?”
“A lot better,” sighed Pillowcase, the look on his face one of deep relief before he smiled again. “Thank you so much, Your Highness. I didn’t even realize I was feeling so…so…I’m not even sure what the word is. It wasn’t like being fatigued. More like…like I had weights on all over. None of them were very heavy, but it was just enough that I felt sort of…impaired? Does that make sense?”
Cadance nodded. “One of the blessings Lashtada’s given me is the ability to bring the recently departed back to life, but even though it only works if the soul is willing to return, it’s still extremely hard on the subject. Reentering this life can be almost as stressful as leaving it, and it puts a strain on the soul’s connection to the body.” The words sounded almost rote, and Shining Armor knew that she was reciting one of the lessons she’d learned about how Lashtada’s magic worked. But a moment later Cadance’s tone regained its usual playful element, the corners of her lips turning upward. “Fortunately, another of her blessings is the ability to remove that strain. You should be completely restored now.”
“Oh Pillow, that’s wonderful!” Trotting over, Cozy threw her forelegs around her husband, squeezing him tightly as she nuzzled him.
Aisle’s response wasn’t quite so affectionate, but his smile was genuine as he held out a hoof. “Congratulations on recovering.”
Pillow grinned in return as he touched his hoof to Aisle’s. “Thank you both.” Closing his eyes, he spent a long moment nuzzling Cozy before opening them again. “I want you to know how much I appreciate everything you two went through to bring me back.”
Cozy planted a soft kiss on his cheek. “I love you, Pillow. There’s nothing I wouldn’t do for you.”
Aisle, however, looked a little shamefaced, rubbing the back of his neck. “You don’t need to thank me. I didn’t have Cozy’s faith that everything would actually work out. I was just putting it on for her sake.”
“Which is exactly what I needed,” pointed out Cozy. Leaving Pillow’s side, she went over and nuzzled Aisle. “You kept me going when I would have given up, and that’s what got us here.” She reached up with a hoof, caressing his cheek as she turned him to look at her and planted a kiss on his lips. “You saved me, and that was what made me able to keep trying to save Pillow. You’re the reason we’re all here right now.”
“She’s right,” smiled Pillow, his face showing not even the slightest hint of upset at the sight of his wife kissing another stallion. Quite the contrary, he went over and cuddled against Cozy’s other side. “You had strength, Cozy had faith, and you both had love. That’s how you made it here. That’s why I’m alive right now. And that’s why I want to spend the rest of my life making the two of you as happy as I can.”
Silent throughout the exchange, Shining Armor surreptitiously glanced at his wife. Sure enough, she was watching the three ponies with a look of contentment on her face. The sight eased a knot of tension that he’d had in his stomach since last night; talking about the tragedy they’d suffered during the elemental bleeds was part of the healing process, he knew, but he hated the way it always left Cadance morose afterward. Last night had been no exception, and Cadance had still been depressed when they’d finally gone to bed. Although she’d been somewhat more animated when they’d woken up this morning, it was only now – meeting with Cozy, Aisle, and Pillow in their guest room – that she looked like she was back to her usual self.
Hopefully that’s a sign of how the rest of the day will go, he wished silently. Breakfast had been a subdued affair, and not just because of Cadance’s lingering regret. The fact that the guards had nothing to report with regard to the fugitive ponies wasn’t a good sign, he knew. The longer they went without catching them, the more likely it was that they’d find a way out of the city, if they hadn’t already. Especially since the various aircrafts around the city wouldn’t wait much longer before they started business as usual again, despite his written requests that they wait. But at least if they’re gone, they’re not a threat to Cadance, he decided, sneaking another look at her.
Except she was already looking back at him, and the playful gleam in her eye made it clear that she knew that he was worrying over her. Unable to muster a response, he settled for giving her his most roguish grin and shrugging, earning a snort of laughter from her. Stepping forward, she gave him a playful nudge with her wing as she looked at the trio still cuddling in front of her. “Alright, so, which of you is next?”
Drawn out of the little world they’d been in, all three earth ponies – two crystal and one not – blinked. “Sorry?” asked Aisle. “Next?”
Cadance raised a brow. “I restored the vitality that Pillowcase lost, but you and Cozy are still cursed, aren’t you?”
Aisle’s eyes widened. “Oh yeah! I completely forgot!” Nervous excitement was written all over his face as he stepped forward. “You can remove our curses, right?”
“I can try,” cautioned Cadance. “The blessing that I used on Pillowcase should be able to remove the curses placed on you, but this isn’t the same as healing a wound. Dark magic won’t just sit back and let itself be removed so easily.”
The three ponies glanced at each other at that, uncertain looks on their faces. Nor were they the only ones, with Shining Armor stepping forward so he was facing his wife. “Cadance, is this dangerous?”
Fortunately, she shook her head. “I don’t think so, but if this Lex Legis pony is as strong as what we’ve heard, it might be difficult.”
“I know you can do it, Your Highness!” Cozy took a step forward, her hoof rising to touch the holy symbol around her neck. “Lex might be a powerful wizard, but you’re Lashtada’s representative here on Equestria! There’s no way his malice could be stronger than your love!”
Shining Armor wanted to believe the same thing, but while he hadn’t sat down with Cozy and her stallions last night to ask them about what Vanhoover and the pony now in charge of it were like, he had heard a little bit from Cadance this morning. One of the tidbits she’d shared was the troubling revelation that Lex Legis apparently had his own goddess, one who sounded like Nightmare Moon’s evil twin. Given that Lex himself sounded like a reborn King Sombra, it hadn’t been heartening news, and while Shining Armor believed in the strength of his wife and her goddess, he wasn’t eager to put them to the test like this.
Aisle, however, looked nervous for a different reason. “Wait, so if you can’t get rid of them, then we’ll have to live with these curses forever?”
“She will.” Pillow’s voice was filled with quiet confidence. “We’ve made it this far already. Our destiny is to be happy together. I’m absolutely certain of it.”
“So am I,” smiled Cadance. “So, which of you will go first?”
“Definitely Aisle,” replied Cozy immediately, backing up enough to get behind Aisle and nudge him forward.
“Hey!” he yelped. “Why me?!”
The protest was enough to make Cozy stop, giving him a frown. “Because your curse is worse than mine, that’s why. You shouldn’t have to live with it any more than you already have.”
Realizing he’d misjudged why she’d volunteered him, Aisle flushed bright red. “O-oh. Thanks. But, um, are you sure you don’t want to go first, then? I mean, I don’t want you to suffer any more than you already have.”
“Trust me,” stage-whispered Pillow. “You don’t want to fight her when it comes to her securing someone else’s comfort.” He nodded his head at Cozy’s cutie mark, giving Aisle a pointed look.
“I…okay.” His ears folding back, Aisle stopped resisting, letting Cozy usher him forward. “I’m ready when you are,” he gulped as he stood in front of Cadance. A moment later he asked in a small voice. “Will this hurt very much?”
Unable to help herself, Cadance giggled. “I think you’ll be fine. Now, just close your eyes and try to relax. I’ll handle everything else.”
Waiting until Aisle had done as she’d asked, Cadance knelt down, almost touching her nose to the floor as she closed her eyes. She remained like that for several seconds, before standing up suddenly, her eyes snapping open to reveal them glowing bright white, blotting out her irises and pupils. “Lashtada,” she called softly, her voice reverential. “Restore this soul so that their love might once again fully flourish.” Her prayer completed, she reached out and pressed a hoof to Aisle’s chest.
It was the same procedure that she’d performed twice just a few minutes previous to refresh Pillowcase. But both of those times had ended with Cadance lightly touching the crystal stallion and immediately proclaiming success. This time would prove different.
The instant she touched Aisle’s body, Cadance tensed up, a grunt escaping her lips. Concerned, Shining Armor took a step forward. “Cadance…?” he called worriedly. “What’s happening?”
“It’s…fighting me…” she murmured. Biting his lip, Aisle kept his eyes closed, not moving. Cadance, for her part, shuddered, and another pained grunt escaped her lips. Even as everypony watched, her body began to sink down, as though a huge weight had settled on her back. Even so, she kept her hoof on Aisle’s chest, breathing heavily. “I think…I think maybe I can…almost…!”
A second later she gave a sharp cry and suddenly stumbled backward, the white light fading from her eyes as she reeled. But she’d barely started to flail when Shining Armor’s telekinesis wrapped around her, arresting her momentum and setting her down safely as he ran up to her. “Cadance! Are you alright?”
“I’m fine,” she panted. “It didn’t hurt me, I was just surprised. It was a lot stronger than I thought it would be.”
Aisle – having opened his eyes when Cadance was hurled away from him – gulped, having turned pale. “I don’t suppose there’s any way that yelping and suddenly being knocked backward means you did it, right?”
“I’m sorry, no.” Sweating lightly now, Cadance stepped back up to Aisle. “But I want to try again. I think this time I might be able to do it.”
Shining Armor didn’t try to hide how worried he felt this time. “Are you sure this is a good idea? What if this is some sort of trap? What if this Lex guy cursed these ponies because he wanted them to come here? Maybe those curses can, I don’t know, jump from them to whoever’s trying to get rid of them?” He had no idea if that was possible or not; that kind of magical knowledge was Twily’s special talent, not his. But if there was even a chance…
Cadance, however, didn’t seem worried. “It didn’t feel like that. Just the opposite, it was pushing me away, trying to stop me from removing it from Aisle. I don’t think it’s a danger to me.”
Although not entirely convinced, Shining Armor could already hear the decision to try again in his wife’s voice. Sighing, he gently stepped back, knowing that he couldn’t overrule her on this. “Alright. Just please don’t push yourself too hard.” He knew that, unlike the spells Lashtada had granted Cadance, the blessings were more direct, requiring that Cadance use her alicorn magic to properly make use of them. She couldn’t utilize them otherwise, but doing so put stress on her body, even if no more than a light workout. So it was with a frown as he watched Cadance recite the incantation again before pressing her hoof to Aisle’s chest a second time.
Again her muscles strained as she groaned. But this time she dug her hooves in, gritting her teeth as she fought to remain upright against whatever force was bearing down on her. “Just…a little more…” she panted. “Almost there…almost…THERE!” As soon as the word left her lips, there was a tremendous cracking sound, as though a hundred wooden boards had split all at once, and Aisle gave a gasp, stumbling backwards before falling over.
Cadance slumped to the ground, rolling onto her back as she tried to steady her breathing. Shining Armor was by her side immediately, but his concern was mollified as he saw that his wife was smiling. “I did it,” she announced wearily.
“I knew you could,” he smiled back. A quick glance at Aisle showed Cozy and Pillow helping him up, the earth stallion stumbling over to grab a plate off the nearby table and press it between his back legs modestly even as he grinned, making it plain that Cadance’s declaration of victory was well-founded.
The sight was enough to earn a chuckle from Shining Armor. “But how about we take a break before you try that with Cozy, okay?”
Ten minutes later, Cozy’s curse had been removed as well. It had been more difficult than Aisle’s, requiring no less than three attempts, but Cadance had ultimately triumphed. Although it had left her surprisingly exhausted, she was still on her hooves, performing one last rite for the ponies in front of her. It wasn't glamorous by any means, but they hadn't wanted to wait any longer, saying that they'd go through with the more ornate ceremony once they got back to the Crystal Empire. Cadance had been more than happy to oblige them, smiling as she finished her pronouncement.
"Then, by the power invested in me by Lashtada, I do hereby declare you mare and colt! You may kiss the bride."
Aisle needed no further prompting, pressing his lips to Cozy's.
tap?
Well, at least we know that alicorns can dispel Lex's curses...provided they've got the necessary spell and are backed up by a deity or have sufficient magic to dispel it on their own but if Cadence's condition after dispelling them is of any indication, any attempt by Celestia or Luna doing the same could exhaust them severely if Lex's initial assessment of Celestia's magic is accurate, perhaps to the point of fainting?
9568826 Huh, that's an odd error. Either way, it's fixed now.
Lex's curses are strong, but Cadance at least has the power necessary to remove them, though it was quite clearly an uphill battle for her. Given how Lex noted that Celestia's magical capabilities were inferior to his own, this would seem to indicate that he's correct in that assessment (if we hold that Cadance isn't as strong as Celestia)...or does it? Of course, Cadance is also able to use the blessings that Lashtada gave her, whereas the Royal Sisters don't have any such augmentations, though Luna might have something to show for trying to become a god. Of course, I suspect that neither alicorn would be concerned with trying to undo Lex's spells in the middle of a fight as they would be with trying to defeat him directly.
Should it be 'aircrafts' here? Aircraft can easily used as a plural, and sounds less awkward to me.
Wonder how Shining will feel when he finds out those he are worried about are long gone, through his security cordons?
Cadence vs Lex? Lex wins, but Cadence Deity calls? Cadence Wins, on minor curses? Things are getting heated.
9569002 Isn't it "aircrafts" already?
9569081
Probably more relieved than anything. We know that he's more worried about Cadance's safety than anything else, and not having murderers in the city (even if they are reformed) is probably going to help with that. Besides, they know that they're going back to Vanhoover, so it's not like this is going to be an unsolved case.
One looming fight with alicorn princesses at a time.
9569357
Ah, oops. Shouldn't it be 'Aircraft'.
9569359 I think that having the "s" at the end sounds more correct. "The various aircrafts around the city" sounds more correct than "the various aircraft around the city."
Lex is a nazi.
He beleives ponies are the better race and all other races are lesser.
all of lex thoughts are his justifications to make himself look better so he can get the power he craves.
LEX MUST BE PUNISHED.
Celestia's dream of the future is accurate because LEX has been heading that way for the whole story. You need to have him give up the idea of him ruling everything.
He is evil because he helps ponies in order to rule them, while the princesses rule ponies in order to help them.
9569551 Strictly speaking, depending on the criteria you use to measure, that's not an inaccurate statement. The different races we see in Equestria all have different physical/magical capabilities. Now, attaching qualitative measures to those is a dubious area, but there are other areas of moral judgment that can be reasonably made. Hence why Twilight herself acknowledges that ponies have a superior moral culture in School Daze - Part 1 (season eight, episode one):
9569560 Lex wants power, but that's not an immoral end unto itself. It's how someone acquires it and what they do with it that matters. In Lex's case, even if he really does want to revolutionize Equestria's government because he can't figure out how else to make a contribution to his homeland (and because he can't justify his existence without making such a contribution), he knows that makes his grand ambitions seem petty, and so he buries that reasoning deep inside, essentially punishing himself for not being able to live up to his own lofty standards. But none of that makes what he's doing wrong.
9569567 Strictly speaking, we don't know the circumstances of what Celestia saw in her dream. Hence the unfolding mystery of how and why things turn out that way. Right now, it doesn't look like some sort of premeditated attack on Lex's part, but we're still not sure.
As for his helping ponies in order to rule them, that doesn't invalidate the quality of the help; a moral action remains moral regardless of the intention or reasoning of the person performing it. Feeding someone who's starving still alleviates their suffering regardless of whether you did it out of altruism or a desire to look good. And of course, in Lex's case he wants to rule not as an end unto itself, but because if he does he can provide even more help to even more people; he's not going to be sitting on a throne being fanned with a giant palm leaf while Sonata feeds him grapes (though she might find that idea amusing). Likewise, the idea that the princesses rule in order to help ponies isn't wrong...but their idea of "help" is largely "set an example" combined with some minor head of state actions and local activism. Actual governance on the (inter)national level is very rare that we've seen in the series.
Very cool. Did you roll caster level checks for Cadance?
So now Aisle and Pillow are both married to Cozy, but not each other. That will be an interesting dynamic. I wonder if they plan to return to Vanhoofer. I certainly wouldn't blame them for just going back to the Crystal Empire and living there, it's what I would do. But if they do return, the news that Cadance can and will remove curses that Lex put on people should be very interesting news.
9569856
Actually, yes. Well, sort of. I sat down and figured out the DC she was trying to beat, and compared it to the bonus she had on her check in order to figure out what she would need to roll on a d20, and what percentage chance of success that translates into. My initial thought was that she'd need to make enough attempts to hit the statistical average (i.e. if she only had a 25% chance of success, have her make four attempts before breaking through), but while that would have worked great if she was only removing one curse, it felt a little artificial for having her require the exact average number of attempts when removing two separate curses. So I had one of the attempts vary a little bit in terms of how successful her caster level checks were.
I'm thinking of posting Cadance's stats here in the next week or so. They're all written, and I haven't made a blog update in quite some time, and while that would give some potential spoilers into what she can do in future chapters, I'd like to showcase more of the mechanical side of what's happening in this story.
Believe it or not, I actually put a lot of thought into whether or not to have the three of them be in a situation where they were all married to each other (i.e. each of them has two spouses) or to have Cozy have two husbands but only have Aisle and Pillow have one wife. I eventually went with the latter decision; if Pillow and Aisle eventually want to marry each other as well, they'll have to do that separately.
I had initially planned on having the chapter touch on those issues (and a few others) more directly, but it would have inflated the word count too much. Two thousand words simply aren't very many, and while I don't mind going somewhat over, it's too easy for things to become too inflated. That's another reason why it often takes so long for this story to progress.
My suspicion is that they have no intention of going back to Vanhoover, probably ever. Aisle might have grown up there, but as he noted previously, it no longer feels like home to him, and Cozy and Pillow probably have no good memories of the place (save for meeting Aisle). Of course, that doesn't mean that circumstances won't draw them back...
9569919 I look forward to Cadance the Healbot's stats. Sounds like Cozy is the Bill Paxton here.
I wonder if Cozy is a family name. It's a shame that this story is set pre-School of Friendship era, I wonder how Cozy Glow would do in Vanhoover right now.
9569932 I've never seen that show, but I have heard of it. In this case, you have to wonder what the social implications of Cozy's polygamous (actually, polyandrous) marriage will be. Given that she's doing this with the personal backing of one of the princesses, it seems like it might have an outsized effect, at least in the Crystal Empire. I'd originally planned for there to be a scene of Shining Armor sitting down with Pillow and asking him how he could be okay with knowing that someone else is going to be doing his wife on a regular basis. Unfortunately, it had to be cut for space; maybe it'll turn up in a future chapter?
As for Cozy Glow...it's impossible to say. We barely know her motivation as it is ("acquire power" via expanding her social influence seems to be it; that's actually pretty close to the basic conception of what power is, i.e. the ability to deliberately influence people in a desired manner, where the scope of power is measured by how many people you can so influence), but with no backstory to her, there's no way of knowing why that's important to her to begin with, nor how she grew to be so good at dissembling. As it is, we can't even say for certain whether or not she was already evil when we first met her in Marks for Effort (season eight, episode twelve), making her a rather difficult character to get a handle on, at least to my mind.
As for Cadance's stats, well...needless to say, she's built with Eclipse.
9569624
Yeah but the princesses have walked the walk while lex has just been saying he will do it. He has been shown to be able to justify breaking his word.
9572311 Their level of civic engagement could be greater, is Lex's point, and it's not one that's without merit. While he hasn't had much time to take action, he's done quite a bit with the resources available to him. As for him "justifying breaking his word," I'm not sure what you mean there. Can you point to a specific example?