In the Sun's Shadow

Chapter 2: Resolute

Castle Aurora

One Week After Tirek's Defeat

Twilight

"No, no no, Dimensional Teleportation by Starswirl the Bearded goes in the Magic section, not the Science section!" Twilight admonished, pointing out to the flustered unicorn stallion the proper section that was one of the most prominent parts of her new personal library inside Castle Aurora.

"But doesn't it fall under the science genre?" He asked, his ears folding against his head at her rebuke.

"Sort of," Twilight sighed, "but it was written by a unicorn wizard and has numerous spells for magical use, therefore it files under magic."

"Yes of course, sorry your highness." And with that, the stallion scurried off to place the book.

Twilight smiled and started browsing, trotting past tall crystal bookshelves that were being filled with books old and new. She made sure to not blunder into the other ponies that were helping her place all her new books. Celestia had lived up to her promise and more, for not only did the new castle's library contain all of the old tomes from the Royal Sister's ruined castle, but the sun princess had also added books from the Canterlot Archives and even Starswirl's Athenaeum to the already enormous piles of books. With all the new literature, Twilight had needed help filing them as there were far too many for her and Spike to do alone quickly, and the citizens of Ponyville were all too happy to help her with it.

The castle's library was a beautiful piece of masonry and architecture, it was cylindrical in shape and rose up to be seven stories tall. Twilight could fly up through the middle of the library to each floor as there was an atrium in the center that spanned all seven floors. A golden chandelier with glowing yellow crystals hung in the center of the library atrium, descending from the mural on the ceiling that depicted a map of Equestria. Columns and stain-glassed windows littered the walls on all seven floors, light from the outside pouring in to brighten up the newly-filled bookshelves.

Skipping almost merrily through the library, Twilight came across her number one assistant, Spike the Dragon, who was staring up through the atrium with wide eyes. A week ago he had been very sad and depressed about the old library, but over time he had become excited about the castle, especially since he was getting his own room. Twilight thought Spike looked rather concerned though upon closer inspection, and her suspicions were confirmed as he walked slowly up to her with an almost fearful gleam in his eyes. Hesitantly, he looked up at Twilight and shuffled his feet nervously.

"Hey—uh—Twilight?" he asked timidly.

"What is it Spike?"

"I've been thinking..."

"Yes?"

"This castle is rather...big."

"I did notice."

"We're not going to...you know...have to clean up all of it by ourselves? I mean, the other princesses have servants in their castles, so you're going to have some too right?" He looked absolutely horrified at the prospect of the two of them cleaning the whole castle by themselves, but Twilight chuckled and rubbed his scaly head with a hoof affectionately.

"Don't be silly Spike, we don't need servants."

"B—b—but it's so huge! It'll take weeks to clean the whole thing once! And that's on top of filing your books, cooking, researching, and your royal duties! How are we suppose—"

Spike couldn't continue on as Twilight had stuck a hoof to his mouth, silencing the panicked drake.

Twilight shook her head a little, berating herself mentally for not explaining to him earlier.