Princesses of Equestria

Chapter 1: Some Extra Hooves

The world was safe.

Life went on. The sun rose, the sun fell. Moonrise, dawn. Days passed. Then months. Then years. Then generations.

One age shifted into another. Old wounds healed. New wounds opened. Diarchy became monarchy. Equestria's first Princess sealed the second away to end the threat of eternal night. Alone Celestia ruled.

Still, life went on. Memories became legends. Some were remembered. Others were forgotten, or deliberately suppressed. Pain faded. Change came, as it always does. The land prospered. Technology advanced. Causeways became train tracks. The first electric lights switched on. Cities and towns sprang up like mushrooms. Manehattan. Applepaloosa. Ponyville.

Change came in a flood. Celestia gave her most promising student in a millennium a very important mission. Friends were made. A nightmare was fought. A banished Princess was saved, and returned to her sister. The Elements of Harmony found new bearers. Those bearers faced new enemies, learned new lessons, and taught their share too. They duelled a chaos god. Crashed a wedding. Foiled a changeling queen. Held the wedding again, without a hitch this time.

Life raced by at a breakneck gallop, bringing change with each hoof-fall. A tyrant was deposed. A chaos god was befriended. An unfinished spell was botched.

From one to another, another to one. A mark of one's destiny singled out alone, unfulfilled.

Five destinies were hopelessly tangled. Then, a miracle, born of the greatest power of all.

From all of us together, together we're friends. With the marks of our destinies made one, there is magic without end.

And that magic birthed another miracle. For first time in a lonely millennium, another unicorn became an alicorn. Plans were laid. A date was set. Invitations were sent to every corner of the realm, and received in the thousands.

Deadlines crept closer. Dresses were designed. Cakes were baked. Party cannons were loaded. A spell—the most important spell an alicorn Princess needed to know in order to preserve the world—was practiced and gotten to an acceptable standard. Still, its caster fretted. What if she wasn't ready? What if she failed? What if ...

She was told, quite kindly, to return home, clear her head, write a letter, and have a nice early sleep. Tomorrow was going to be a big day.

The Princess obeyed. She returned to Golden Oaks Library, tried clearing her head, failed dismally, and wrote a letter anyway. Then rewrote it. Then re-rewrote it. Etcetera.

The sun set. The moon rose. By midnight, the Princess wrote her thirty-fifth draft, scrapped it, wrote the thirty-sixth, and judged it barely (just barely) tolerable. At which point, she passed out.

Twilight Sparkle, bearer of the Element of Magic, newborn alicorn goddess, and future Princess of the realm, slept like a rock. An impressive feat, given that she'd faceplanted on a solid oak desk. A chilly pre-dawn breeze wafted through the upstairs window of Golden Oaks Library, ghosted along the spines of its many books, and gave Twilight's mane a ruffle.

"Nuh ... never ... fuh," she murmured, drooled a bit, and slept deeper. Her stained hooves still touched a quill and ink bottle. Between them sat a finished letter; the single fruit of a night's labor. The night's rotten fruit: three dozen unfinished letters that filled Twilight's wastepaper bin, spilled over its edges, and decorated the floorboards. Twilight even used one as a pillow.

Ding ding, ding ding!

On her bed, an alarm clock trilled out the hour: four a.m. precisely.