Author's Notes:

Another chapter in the same sort of vein as the prior one, only with Shining and Cadance this time. They’re finally getting back home in the next chapter, but in this one, Cadance has some cute moments with the baby.

Same warning as last time is in effect, just so you know.

Despite her desire to return to Fetish with Spike and her daughter, the moment they arrived at the Crystal Palace and Cadance saw Lilac she insisted they stay for a few days, the pink alicorn even going as far as to insist on finding late Hearth’s Warming gifts for the filly. Shining Armor was less enthusiastic, seeing the filly caused a short resurgence of bad memories from when Flurry was that age.

Much like Luna, Cadance had the desire to play with the filly. Shining admitted it was nice to see his wife playing with a foal again, but the fact she was still 5 or so months out from having another baby worried him. The last time Cadance got strange cravings brought on by pregnancy she was eating crystal berries in rye bread with spray cheese and raw cilantro at least twice a week. And that was her least unusual craving, several of her other cravings were so bizarre he kept trying to suppress them the moment they began surfacing again.

“What sort of cravings did she have during her pregnancy,” inquired Shining, he desperately wanted to change what his mind was focussing on.

“Most of my Cravings centered around gemstones, we needed to find a substitute,” said Daring, “after a few experiments, with a bit of help from the Pie sisters, we found that extra hard rock candy seemed to do the trick. This big lug,” she gestured to Spike, “made me a variety of treats at his shop to those basic specs. It started as a few excuses to have me at his place of work during my pregnancy but it turned out quite a few of the residents really liked them as well. I have a feeling once the community is officially opened to the public he’ll have a pretty good business going.”

“I also think the way she eats is adorable,” said Spike, “I know we didn’t ask before, did Flurry explain what she needed to?”

“I found it amusing,” said Cadance, she then gestured to Shining, “he froze up for a half hour at the news our little filly swings both ways.”

“I’m pretty sure the whole reason she even signed up for the job was to explore her sexuality without either of you interfering,” said Spike, “especially since she’s been dating several different ponies around town the past few months.”

“And Shining is a little sour about it,” said Cadance, “he wants to try intimidating anypony she decides to date. But really, I couldn’t really care so long as she genuinely has feelings for them and they’re treating her properly. Which I don’t see as being much of a problem, especially since we all signed off on the current residents.”

“That was before I learned my little filly was going to get ‘experimental’ during her stay,” said Shining with annoyance.

The rest of the group laughed, which prompted Lilac to let out an adorable giggle fit that ended when her parents stopped laughing. Shining wasn’t amused, mostly because his wife now had some backup with playfully teasing him. It also didn’t help that his new niece was incredibly young and highly impressionable, with the kind of parents you both worried about and wished you knew at the same time.

Daring and Spike were more than suitable parents, more so when it came to Spike, but at the same time, their ideas of what was acceptable for a young child were a bit off kilter in Shining’s assessment. Daring made contact with an ancient dragon fertility deity, willingly made it so that she would get knocked up by Spike, and basically set up an elaborate plan to have an entirely new town that has governance over to make sure her baby has a safe environment to grow up in.

Of course, Shining knew that was a bit too much of an extreme line of that, but it still seemed that way. Daring had all confirmed that thought process when she said she planned to have the family she missed out on. It wasn’t that she was giving up on her sister, she regularly asked how the investigation regarding her was progressing, she just decided to do something that was in service of the memory of her family.

“So, when are you going to head down to Melody Brook?”

“We figured we go on down there after she’s four or five months old,” said Spike, “and I’m sorry your parents didn’t get a chance to meet her yet. It was just lousy timing; they wanted to spend the season with Twilight this year.”

“While we spent it all with Celestia and Luna,” said Daring, “if Night Light and Velvet had been there we would have been more than happy to share our welcome news with them.”

“I would have thought she would be more pegasus-like,” said Shining, “given the tribe her mother is.”

“I guess I have more unicorn in me than I thought,” said Daring, “I’m sure the next one will be more like a pegasus.”

“I heard about your plans for more foals,” said Cadance, “when will you start on that?”

“Once she’s four or five,” said Spike, “you know just starting school so we can indulge in personal time without her potentially ruining the moment.”

“Yes, well, we didn’t have that luxury,” said Shining, “we had to invest in private tutors from outside the Crystal Empire for most of Flurry’s formal schooling, anypony from the Crystal Empire kind of just...they basically stalled the whole education system to accommodate Flurry, often to the detriment of every other pony. It got so bad we almost called in Twilight to act as her teacher a few times.”

“That bad? I have a feeling it might be a bit worse for us,” said Spike, “she’s the first recorded case of a dragon and pony having offspring in Equestria’s history. Probably will cause more of an uproar than Flurry being born an alicorn.”

“On the plus side,” said Cadance, “Twilight and Starlight managed to get a few spell nodes up and running back where you’re going.”

“But I have a feeling we need more to strengthen the defenses,” said Spike.

“Yes,” said Daring, “but most of the materials that make the nodes as effective as they do are exceedingly rare, it’ll take time to negotiate enough for our needs. If we’re lucky, it’ll all be resolved in a decade or so and we can get to work on the rest of the nodes.”