I had returned to my room. Soft went back to whatever his daily needs were, and Easy served as a support when I wanted one. She was good-natured about it, walking right by my side so I could rest a hand on her back as we navigated the halls. "Here we are," she noted, willing the door open. "Now get to bed, Princess' orders and all that."

"There he is!" came a familiar voice. Water Lily hurried inside just after us, her eyes set on me. "I expected you in the library, sir. Why are you walking around? Please, lay down."

It seemed all the mares wanted me to lay down. Who was I to argue it? Not like I wanted to stand on that injured leg. "Do you know what's happening?" I flopped onto the soft bed, wincing softly at the movement of my leg as I got into position.

"Only that you were stabbed! That can be very serious." She reared up, bits of herbs and a few bottles floating up out of her dress in an impressive collection of things. "As a trained apothecarian, they chose me to see to your injuries." Her eyes wandered over me, settling onto the clothed injury. "Can you take that off?"

My pants? I saw Easy snickering, but also knew ponies were nudists as often as not. She was laughing at my discomfort, not anything that would actually be revealed. Water certainly had seen it before... "Can we close the door at least?"

"Oh, of course." The door shut quickly, but did not slam, in her magic. "If it hurts, I can do it."

"I can take it off myself." I hooked my thumbs into my beltline and soon had things loosened. I pulled it down even if it hurt to move things over the injury. I wasn't bad enough to accept help just getting my pants off.

"It could have been worse," gently spoke Water with a little smile. "At least they didn't put marks on your skin."

Fur covered or not, skin was involved! "I don't feel lucky, except the part where I'm around to complain about it."

She hopped up suddenly, her things floating around her. She was right between my legs, gently feeling where the spear had bit into me. "You poor thing. You don't deserve this kind of treatment. Let's start with a cleansing." A bottle lowered from the cloud of others and she began to pour it on--Dear god! "Does that hurt?" I imagine my expression gave it away, but I didn't shout.

"It'll be over soon." She worked it around the injury carefully before she re-stopped the bottle and held up a hoof, another bottle moving to it. "This one will help you heal faster and without as many nasty scars."

Was it Aloe? I could distantly smell it. I heard that stuff actually worked after scientific prodding. One of the few folk remedies that passed the acid te-- Ow. It still hurt to have it rubbed in, however gently she did it. I was sure she was being as careful as she could be, but that didn't mean it was painless. Still, I decided, I could have been far worse. She was soon wrapping gauze around my leg, softly tisking.

"I hope they punish the bad pony that did this to you. This just isn't right."

I thought back to which of them did that. It wasn't the captain. "I don't think punishing him more than what he gets for being involved is really needed." It was a 'following orders' situation, as lousy as an excuse as it was, I could imagine what stories he might have said to convince them I was a dangerous threat to Equestria.

The fact that they had submitted quickly when told to go await judgment was a plus in my book. Now the captain, he deserves everything he had coming... "Thanks for the first aid."

Water was looking at my pants, which were floating in her magic. "Torn and stained. I'll get right on that." She hopped down off the bed, her various herbs and bottles hiding themselves within her maid's uniform. "Don't you even worry about it."

I tried to stand up after her, but my leg was quick to remind me why that was a bad idea and I flopped back onto my ass with a soft hiss.

She looked over her shoulder at me. "You are to stay here. I'll be back once I pass this to another maid to clean and tailor and I'll bring some food for you both."

Easy snickered as Water left. "This is one of the few times maids get to give orders, when they're taking care of a sick person."

"I'm not sick." I slapped my good knee. "I want to know what's going on. Are things resolved?"

Easy perked an ear. "Not sure I could answer that for you, or anyone else, unless Celestia comes walking through the door there with answers." She glanced at the door as if that were a possibility. "No such luck..." She put her hooves on the bed beside me, reared up with her face close to mine. "For now, relax. You're at least getting room and board for your 'noble service.'"

There were other things... "I imagine Soft is reporting in about now."

"Mmm? Oh yeah." She hopped up, sitting down on her haunches beside me. "I didn't see that coming. Say, uh, boss, how's that treating you?" She waved a hoof at where skin transitioned to fur and downwards along my equine legs. "I know I give you grief sometimes, but I'm not trying to be mean. You alright?"

What had prompted that? "Thankfully whatever adjustment was involved didn't make walking normally out of the question." If I had been thrown forward on all fours, that would be a whole new, terrible, thing. Just imagining walking on two hooves and my hands like an awkward... thing... ugh. "I have to say, right now, being stabbed ranks higher on the 'things that make my body not the way I want it' meter."

"Can't argue that." She went quiet a moment. "Sorry. I mean... I tried to fight them, and you go and get stabbed anyway." She rubbed her forehooves together softly. "So, you know, sorry."

Was she feeling guilty? I hadn't expected it out of her. I reached for her, but she wasn't the kind of pony to idly accept a pet, shying away. "It wasn't your fault. If you hadn't been there, things could have gone a lot worse than they had." I didn't want to imagine what would have happened if it was just me against three armed guards. The best I could have hoped for was running past them, and spears are pretty good at stopping that from happening easily.

"Hey, I thought I was going to be a magician." She wobbled a hoof before rising up onto them. "Instead, I'm a manager, and a fighter. I didn't expect that last one especially..."

"I didn't expect a lot of what I've run into so far." I looked to the closed door. It struck me that I was still pantsless, with nothing covering unseemly things. Not that Easy seemed to care. "Do you still want to build?"

Suddenly her hooves were on my shoulders. She was reared up behind me, sliding her hooves past my shoulders until she fell on me, her head just beide mine. "That's what I signed up for. I mean, I won't build stuff, but I'll help you tell other people how to build something. We'll be an amazing building duo, right?"

I hadn't asked to get a mare as an ornament, but I smiled despite the surprise of it. "We'll get to it. If this... really is resolved, then things can start to heal."

"Why don't we start with the basics?" She bumped her head against mine. "That garbage pile of a city is no place to build great things in, I say."

She had a point, I thought to myself. "We'll talk to Celestia as soon as we can, see if we can't get those things handled. There's not a lot of reason we can't start our project while that's underway though. Not like she'll put us in charge of all sanitation."

She snorted, close enough that I could see how her nostrils flared in the motion. "You jinxed it. Now that's exactly what she'll do. I hope you're ready to be the Grand High Janitor of Canterlot, long may you reign."

I reached up and pushed her face off to the side. "There would be worse fates, but I think I can do more than that, given the chance."

She reared back and nipped at my hand, holding it without it hurting in a display of care and precision. "Like what? What other marvels do you have in that funny shaped head of yours that you're waiting to spring on us innocent little ponies?"

Still didn't know how ponies spoke with their mouths full. When I tugged at my hand, she let it go and I set it back at my side and a little back, propping me up on the bed. "There are more things than I can count, but I have to be realistic. Some of the things I'd really like require other things you don't have, and those require still other things, and other things for those too."

She reared up, pulling her hooves off of me and coming own on all fours, circling to my side once more. "What kind of kingdom do you come from? What sorts of things are you so used to, that..." She rolled a hoof. "Name one, just one thing, and tell me why we couldn't do it."

Why not something simple? "We have light whenever we want it, powered by electricity. Do you know what electricity is?"

"Oh, sure." Her horn began to crackle and jump with the stuff. "I can make that. I can make light too. What's so special there?"

I pointed up at my head with my other hand. "You'll note a lack of a horn. This is light anyone can use, without magic. We can summon and banish it with barely a gesture." I made a motion as if flicking on a light switch, then turning it back off. "It requires that the electricity be generated first. To do that requires a plentiful supply of different metals to create the generator, then to create the connections from the generator to wherever you wanted the power. If you don't insulate the connections--"

"--They get cold?" she interrupted with a guess.

"They might do that, but the problem is more that the electricity can escape. They can be wasted along the way, not to mention hurt animals or people who were too close. You have to have them insulated and usually either raised high or buried under the ground to try and avoid that. No one wants to get shocked." I gestured high and low as I talked, explaining the situation as best as I could.

"Alright, so you have electricity--" Her horn sparked for emphasis. "--and you put them in big cables. Does that work?" She looked around the room suddenly and reached a hoof towards a butter knife that had been discarded before. It zipped over to her, wrapped in her magic. "Let's try!" She pressed one end of the knife against her horn and reached up a hoof to hold the other end. Her magic faded from the knife. "If I can..." Her horn lit up, sparking. The spark jumped right down the knife and into her hoof and she yelped, dropping her hoof and the knife at the same time. "That hurts!"

I had to smile. That had been a painful but very practical lesson in the nature of electricity. "Electricity follows the path of least resistance. Air resists electricity, but metal does not, or does so a lot less, so it went through it, then through your hoof, and down to the ground, which is where it wants to be."

She was shaking her jolted hoof. "Is that what it feels like? Now I feel a little bad zapping those guards..."

Author's Notes:

Suddenly, a lesson on how things work. Educational!

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