It took Twilight and her crew of volunteers a week to get the area of the palace cleared, before even the restoration work could take place. The Everfree was reluctant to let the ruins go, but they persisted, hacking back the woody tendrils and snaking vines until the whole castle and its surrounding area was revealed. It was hard, dirty work, and Twilight had many reasons by the end of it to be thankful for the Princess' enchanted armor, not to mention her steady, calming presence. Twilight made good use of the armor's amplification spell, and used her voice in tandem with Princess Luna's to frighten out the birds and animals before they cleared the woods and brush away, but their powerful voices drew the attention of some of the less savory things of the forest.

Twilight was overseeing the unraveling of another case of cockatrice petrification, with Fluttershy calmly explaining to the bewildered serpent that it would do well to look elsewhere for things to turn to rock, and should jolly well turn the rest of the ponies it'd turned to stone back into ponies, when Trixie came running up, “YES TR-... Sorry Trixie,” Twilight apologized as she turned down the amplification spell again, “What's up?”

Trixie bowed, as she always did in front of other changelings lately, to Twilight's minor embarrassment, then she grinned at the purple unicorn, “We got the baths running again, Twilight! The big communal ones that is, come on!” She started back towards the reconstruction site at a bouncy trot, positively brimming with excitement. Twilight hesitated, looking back at the changelings and ponies coming out of their petrification, and got a friendly wave-off from Fluttershy, who was tending to their disorientation with all the kindness befitting her element.

Twilight nodded to her, and trotted after Trixie, who had kept talking as if Twilight had immediately followed, “And we were able to preserve and repair all the sculptural elements in the baths,” she sighed happily, Trixie had found a new love for archaeology recently, and was forever trying to restore the ruins to their past glory, despite her long sessions with Twilight in planning the new expansions, “They're so beautiful Twilight, but of course it took ages and ages to clean all the muck out of the engravings and that, but we were able to renew the cleanliness enchantments on the stonework, and, oh!” Trixie jumped as she almost ran into Princess Luna, who was staring at the communal baths with an odd look. She jumped at the exclamation and whirled, her mane flaring out around her like a cloak of stars, but when she saw Twilight, her expression cleared. For a moment the purple unicorn could have sworn the Princess looked embarrassed, with just the slightest trace of a blush dusting her dark cheeks.

“Did you come by to see the baths, Princess?” Trixie asked, bowing, “We've only just gotten them cleaned up, but the deep hot springs beneath the castle should be filling them up right about...” Trixie waited for it, clearly enjoying the moment, while a rumbling gently vibrated the ground beneath Twilight's hooves, “Now!” And suddenly a hissing rush of sound started emanating from the baths, to a general cheer of the surrounding work crews, who had worked hard to clean and restore the elegant baths.

The baths were divided into four immense marble pools, open to the sky, which had three tiers around the edge for varying depths, the deepest of which would completely immerse even a pony of Celestia's stature. Now they steamed as they filled with hot, clean water that, to Twilight's mild surprise, didn't smell like hot springs at all. Twilight advanced to the edge to examine the carvings, which were intricate and carried the intangible weight of great age and deep enchantment. Trixie and Luna advanced as well, with the former continuing to talk about the baths, “We figured getting the baths done was a high priority since it would take a lot of work and would help keep ponies and changelings clean without needing to go off-site. We added a few things of course, mainly to the piping, which was mostly lead,” she shuddered a little, then walked over to the edge of the pool, where she indicated the subtle current swirling around the filled pools, “We moved the outtake and intake for the pools, so the water would always be moving and constantly refreshed, and there are little places in between the carvings for ponies to put their soap and things.”

“Where does the water exit?” Twilight asked curiously, with a little concern, she hardly wanted bathwater getting into the water supply, but a part of her knew Trixie would have thought of that. The blue unicorn changeling had come a long way from skulking about in hotel rooms with Twilight's mail. She had filled out some more, now that she was eating properly and not traveling, her mane was properly brushed, though it still looked a little like a paintbrush, especially in the morning. She was, Twilight had heard, entertaining a few stallions when she had the time, the thought of which made her only slightly jealous, though she was for the most part happy the blue unicorn had come so far out of her shell.

Twilight was also keeping a curious eye on the Princess, who was still a little tense, though not red in the face anymore. The Princess had been almost constantly by Twilight's side through the whole reconstruction, and this was the first time she'd seen her show the slightest bit of embarrassment. The Princess had been very... Close, in a physical sense, with little to no sense of personal space, even going so far as to pull a very puzzled Twilight into bed with her for cuddling when she, Luna, slept, though their sleep schedules were so different this was a rare occurrence. Celestia later confided in her student, after a bemused letter, that Luna had always been rather clingy when she slept, which led Twilight to buying the Princess a very large pillow as a substitute. Seeing the Princess embarrassed was something of a calendar event, then, and Twilight privately wondered what could have set her off when she was interrupted by Trixie's answer.

“Why it runs through a second filtration spell matrix we have set up and from there it goes neatly back into the river.” Trixie said brightly. She gestured to the pools, which were almost obscured in steam, “You can't see it now, but there are drains in the bottom and along the sides which are equipped with a modified Sorting Spell, which we actually folded into the metal, along with Eternity Spells, to make sure they last. Now, who wants to-” Trixie was cut off by a brilliant flare of light from off to the north, followed by a pained howl and a sizzling crack noise.

Twilight and Luna instantly teleported to the scene, right into the middle of a melee. The stench of blood and burnt fur almost gagged Twilight as she took in the scene. A half a dozen changelings huddled together, fighting off what seemed to be easily double their number in Wolves of the Beast. The snarling, lupine forms were trying to penetrate the ring of defenders with a brutal fury, and Twilight could dimly see injured ponies in the middle, protected by the hooves and spells of the defending ponies and changelings. Several wolves were down, at least three of them were on fire, thrashing about in mortal agony, while one had simply had its head exploded, as if by a great, directed heat.

Twilight launched two of the wolf-things far away, and froze another two in mid-air long enough for the defenders to knock them senseless. Her magic lashed out, stunning and disorienting the Pack left and right, but the survivors kept coming, as if some whip were driving them forward. Twice she saw one with a broken leg try to bring down an earth pony, who was able to stomp the creature's head only after Twilight deflected some of the incoming attacks with shield spells that sent up harmless sparks when the twisted lupine creature attempted to reach for the defenders.

A defender went down in the ring from a particularly clever wolf-creature's thrown rock, and Twilight peered through the gap to gauge the strength of the surviving wounded. There, standing atop the pile of injured in the middle of the defenders, Twilight saw her squire, covered in blood, deflecting projectiles with her little shield spell now that the wolves had picked up that little tactic, though she looked ready to pass out on her hooves. The filly was deflecting the projectiles and reaching claws now, rather than blocking them, using the minimal amount of effort to keep the injured safe. Twilight had no idea what spell had drained the filly so, but she knew she had to do something or Luminous' tenuous defense would fail.

Twilight ran straight for the group and recklessly teleported into the middle of the melee, catching a claw meant for one of the defending changelings on her armor, which stopped the blow so completely the claw snapped, causing the wolf-creature to howl in pain, only to be hit by a tranquilizing spell from Princess Luna, sending it instantly into unconsciousness, shortly before three separate spells from the defenders managed to rip it in two, splattering Twilight in gore. Shocked, Twilight called back to the defenders, “Sleep spells only! Disable, don't kill!” However, Twilight's presence on the battlefield seemed to sap the fight from the attackers, who turned their assault into a retreat, as Twilight and Luna put them to sleep one by one, until at last the last one broke and ran for the forest.

One of the defenders, a pegasus made of ice whose glittering coat sparkled with the ruddy frost of frozen blood, went to follow the wolf-creature, but Twilight held him back with her telekinetic grip. “Hold, they're leaving,” she ordered calmly.

“Let me go!” The pegasus, Icebell, Twilight remembered, snarled back at the purple unicorn, caught up in his fury, “We can't just let them leave, they'll be back, they-”

“Icebell,” Twilight said sternly, her tone alone startling him into making eye contact with her, “Icebell, they're beaten. It's over,”

“But they-”

“Icebell,” Twilight said more calmly, her voice a little sad now, “Icebell please, no more bloodshed.” The pegasus desisted after a few more moments, but Twilight could tell he was still fuming inside. She turned her gaze to the wounded, where her squire was looking over the injuries of those who had been caught by the claws and teeth of the Pack.

As Twilight's gaze caught hers, Luminous saluted, “Dame Twilight Sparkle, I report ten wounded, one seriously so, no losses.” The filly's voice was outwardly calm, but Twilight could see the slight jitter in her hooves of one who is struggling to remain upright, and she caught a tension in her squire's tone. She continued on regardless, her mismatched eyes fixed on Twilight's, as if using that tentative connection to hold herself up, “I was heading to the northern restoration group to receive a report on their progress, only to find them in the middle of a battle with the wolf-creatures...” Luminous closed her eyes for a moment, her strength flagging for the barest of instants before she recovered, “I set off a flare spell to blind the... The creatures,” Luminous swayed again, but stubbornly continued her report, “Not all of them were dazzled so I tightened the beam of light and... Well...” She gestured to the wolf missing half a head, and the others that had been on fire, now dead, “I had intended to only blind it but I... I overdid it, I... I killed it... Them...” She started to tremble now, and Twilight stepped forward to catch her squire in a gentle telekinetic grip, before she could fall on one of the injured ponies, unconscious.

Twilight looked to Princess Luna, whose brows were raised in surprise as she stepped up nearby, “I think, Princess,” Twilight said softly, “it's time I stepped up my squire's training.” She didn't mention, though she was privately concerned by the slight purple shine she had noticed in Luminous's blue eye. She set that thought aside for now, set Luminous on her back and started directing the remaining defenders to alert the outer guard posts and send for more ponies to take the place of their wounded fellows. Trixie arrived shortly with a full squad of medical ponies, and Twilight left her in charge of the stabilization of that area, and asked her to reorganize the work crews to focus their efforts on the outer walls, to help prevent any future attacks.

The sleeping wolves were tied up and, with the help of some rather unhappy pegasi, released deep in the forest, where they ran off, but not without a few curious backwards glances.

Twilight walked through the reconstruction crews and the hurrying guard ponies with the Princess in silence, her mind whirling as she considered all the possibilities. If she hadn't simply imagined the shimmer in her squire's eye, the increase in the filly's raw power alone was moderately unsettling. The other defenders had elaborated on Luminous's version of events, describing how the filly had summoned a hair-thin beam of light that sliced through the ranks of the wolves like a hot knife through ice cream. She brought the filly to the infirmary with the other wounded, and left instructions that she be treated for magical and physical exhaustion.

She had almost forgotten the presence of the Princess, until the larger alicorn stepped up beside her, looking over the filly with a frown, “She is young to see such as this.” Twilight jumped at the sound of the Princess's voice, but she appeared not to notice, “I wonder what my sister was thinking, assigning her to thee... Though perhaps I judge her unwisely,” Princess Luna turned to Twilight with a slight smile, “She is, I estimate, full of deeper strength than any can yet know, I see her becoming great, if neither her will nor courage is broken.”

Twilight nodded, and after a moment, she and the Princess stepped out of the infirmary. She nodded to the ponies she came across, wondering at their nervousness, and the occasional looks of awe until the Princess said to her softly, “I realize it is... Badass, I think the modern term is, but do you really intend to go the rest of the day with your face and armor splattered with blood?”

Twilight blinked, and was suddenly aware of the stickiness across her face and down the side of her neck, from where the wolf had splattered when it had been torn in half. She walked over to the newly finished baths and looked at her reflection in the lightly steaming water, only to shrink back at the pony reflected there.

Her face was covered in blood from her coronet of dark iron down to her jaw on her left side, while the right side of her face was clean, but there was a strange violet glow in her eyes that matched the vibrant fire that flowed from her mane and tail. She looked like a figure from one of her history books, the ones in the dark, forgotten sections of the library of Canterlot, where they detailed the less harmonious parts of Equestria's history. She felt the Princess nudge her gently, shaking her from her thoughts, “Go on, Dame Twilight Sparkle, to thy quarters. In the absence of thine squire, I shall help thee from thy armor.” The Princess flushed a little as she considered the alternative implications of that offer, but Twilight seemed not to take it for anything besides an innocent offer. Luna wasn't sure if she was happy about that or not, to her surprise, but quashed the questions for the moment and led Twilight back to her quarters in silence.