For the next little while, I began to learn how to do my job more and more, with me splitting myself up to cover multiple deaths that were happening at once while exploring the alicorn kingdom now that I could do so without having to worry about money, food, class or anything like that.

“You were exploring the alicorn kingdom?” Twilight asked, tilting her head while looking at Helheim. “I thought she-”

“Lady Helheim,” both Fall and Causality interjected, causing Helheim to roll her eyes that she formed for that sole purpose.

“I mean, Lady Helheim didn’t want to be known so…”

“Back then, I had more trust in my Reapers to behave themselves so I allowed them to be in the mortal realm,” she said with Fall looking off to the side recluntently.

Twilight licked her lips, seemingly understanding the situation enough that she didn’t have to ask for more details.

As I was saying, I took the time to really explore the world that I never got to know. It was amazing how many fancy parties I got to observe now that I didn’t look like a starving poor colt and I was really settling to my new life with Causality, George and my fellow Reapers helping out. As well as Lady Helheim, of course.

I was walking with George, the Reaper of Griffons, down a street while he was telling me about some of his past clients and how to handle large crowds of souls that were still hostile to each other when we hit a massive crowd of bodies that blocked the main street. Normally, we would have to push and fight our way to front if we were mortals but as who we are, we just made the crowds part for us using some of our gifts that make mortals skittish around death. Within a few seconds we were at the front of the crowd, just behind some of the guards that were holding everyone back. Even though George was a Reaper, he still got some suspicious looks as he was a griffon.

Craning our heads out as to see what had every-

“Hey, what does he look like?” Rainbow Dash asked, causing everypony in the room to groan. “What? I’m curious.” She said defensively.

Helheim snorted before replying, “Like a griffon. Eagle Vulture head, body like a puma. Fairly big for his body type. And much better looking in death than the half-starved state he spent most of his life in. Great guy, but terrible hunter. I do hope he is happy with his paradise.”

Rainbow Dash blinked and shrugged. “Cool, thanks.”

“Can I continue, now?” Fall sniped loudly, causing the mare to wince a bit.

We were craning our necks out to see what caught everyone’s attention when the crowd began to really push forwards with the guards pushing them back.

“Look, Fall,” George said to me, with neither of us worried about being overheard. “Look at their livery.”

I leaned forwards and began to see beyond the markings of the royal family. I could see additional and personal liveries in place on their uniforms; such as the scale of the king or the Crossed Sabers of the queen, but the sun and moon were new to me.

“Yeah, I do-” I froze as I saw both the king and queen in one carriage with their daughters in the next one behind them. The younger one was Luna; I knew that much back then even when I was alive. She was a dark coated filly, like midnight blue dark and looked completely bored.

Of course what caught my eye was Celestia; she was so beautiful even then. I remember that moment perfectly well; she was sitting on a velvet cushion next to her sister. Her coat was a striking white colour, dazzling in the morning day with a flowing pink mane that sparkled like jewels and when her eyes flicked past me, I felt my legs go limp.

It took me a bit before I realized that George was snickering loudly as he led me away from the front line of the crowd. “What, what’s so funny?”

“Nothing kid, absolutely nothing,” he grinned, clicking his beak. “Just going to guess that you never saw a mare when you were alive, did ya?”

I snorted and bumped my side into his. “Of course I did,” I said, rolling my eyes. “There were those who ran the workers hut during the time I worked at Lord Apple’s farms and there was the-”

“Wait, did yah just say Lor’ Apple,” Applejack suddenly spoke up. “As in, an alicorn who was part of mah family?”

Fall nodded. “A lot of ponies nowadays have relatives in the old alicorn kingdom. Your family was no exception. In fact, I...” his raised hoof hovered where it was, his face suddenly sad before he dropped the limb to the floor with a loud clop before he cleared his throat. “Never mind, let me continue.”

What was I saying? Oh yeah.

“And there was Lord... I don’t remember, who had several mares running the kitchen and-”

“That’s not what I meant, kid,” George said, rolling his eyes at me as he fluffed his feathers. “I meant one that was your own age.” He turned his to the side before adding in. “Your own mortal age when you were alive, of course.”

I blinked, my ears tilting to the side as I thought of it. “Not really, I mean there were a few that did exist but they were just as busy as me working in the fields.”

He let out a sigh, shaking his head at me. “Before Freya or Causality gets involved; just going to guess you were never in love, were you?”

“Well, no,” I admitted. “Never really had the opportunity. I was always busy working, just trying to get by.” I then stopped and looked at him as what he said kicked into my head. “Wait what? Me and her. Come on, I mean sure, she’s absolutely stunning and any colt would be lovestruck by her but I don’t have a chance with her!”

“Oh, and why’s that?” George asked him with a grin on his face, sitting down.

“Because I’m me and she’s her?” I said, pointing out the obvious.

“You mean you’re an Adjunct to a Power and she’s a daughter of a Power?” he said, waving his talon as if to encourage me to say more.

“Well yes but still, she’s all that,” I tilted my head towards the procession of the royal family and then gestured to myself. “And I’m…” I trailed off, looking at the dirt and grime and was acutely aware of how… not poor, per say but underprivileged I was when I was alive. How nothing I was and how low that made me feel.

“You’re what?” George prompted me, snapping me back into focus.

“I’m not, George,” I said, my body drooping a bit.

“Kid, need I remind you that you’re not that anymore?” George said, slapping my arm. “You’re in better shape than you ever were, you’ll stay that way until the end of all existence, and you’ve got a position of power and responsibility now that you’ll have until it’s time for you to retire.”

“I know, I know,” I said, shaking my head.” But still...”

“So why don’t you griff up and see her?”

“She’s still royalty, and I’m… well, I was a civilian,” I shot back. “How would it look to the rest of the ponies around here if some random guy came out of the crowd to talk to her? Not to mention that the guards would probably assume I was a threat and jump me and then the whole nature of who I am would get out and cause a massive incident or something.”

“Then don’t be an idiot about it,” George snappeed. “Your talent is growing stuff. Get a job there and see if you can get chance to meet her.”

“I don’t know, sounds kinda wrong to me,” I said, shaking my head. “False pretence and all that. Besides, I don’t know if Lady Helheim would approve of it.”

“She doesn’t care all that much as long as we keep to our tasks.” George countered, shaking his head. “In fact, it would show how much you’ve come if you could continue to handle all the differents souls you need to collect while keeping a cover life here.”

“You really think Lady Helheim would approve of this?”

“Yes, I would,” Lady Helheim said, causing both of us to jump in surprise. She was accompanied by...

“Hey Fall, you okay?” Causality asked with concern, placing her claw and hoof on Fall’s shoulders.

“I’m okay, it’s just been a very long time since I last thought of him.” Fall replied with Helheim looking incredibly angry for a moment, the expression on her face so dark that it cowed anyone from speaking up.

Lady Helheim and hewere standing front of me. Kelvik smiled at me and I smiled at hm. Back then, we were very close friends, a reflection of how the alicorns and the centaur kingdoms were close to each other. Anyway, Lady Helheim gestured towards him. “Kelvik works openly with the royal family of the centaur kingdom, mostly with Prince Tirek and his brother Scorpan.”

Jaws dropped all over the room at that.

So did a few copies of Jaws, and Fluttershy looked at Discord, who did his best to look innocent. “What? You know I can’t resist a good pun!”

Fluttershy shook her head in amusement. “Oh, Discord…”

“You give us a bad name, Discord,” Causality grumbled at him.

“At least this time it was a harmless prank,” Twilight interjected as she levitated the books off to the side, clearly planning to look at them more closely later. “Still, Kelvik worked directly with Tirek? How…”

“Tirek had lusted for power from a young age, even before he caught Kelvik’s eye,” Helheim put in from where she was manifesting. “He learned of a hermit who called himself Sendak the Elder, who taught him some dark skills and later figured out how to steal pony magic; he was the one who showed Tirek how to do so as well.”

“Then… this Sendak, he’s the reason Tirek came to Equestria and tried to steal our magic all those years ago?” Twilight looked aghast. “Please tell me we don’t have to worry about him escaping and causing trouble for us too.”

“It is my fault for being too trusting back then that I did not investigate the then Lord of Magic’s concerns about Tirek as Kelvik assured me the centaurs were, for the most part, interested only in peace,” Helheim said. “King Vorak, in particular. He strongly disapproved of Tirek’s ambitions when he learned about them and ordered Sendak imprisoned for his crimes against the pony kingdoms; the hermit reportedly died in the mines not long after, but by then it was too late to stop what had been set in motion. If more had been done…”

Twilight’s eyes darted from Helheim to Fall Harvest who was glowering angrily, pawing deep grooves into the floor and any further questions she had died as it seemed to be only enraging him further.

“I see,” she said quietly. “Go on then.”

Right. Well, that was before I knew what kind of person he really was, so at the time I was willing to gladly accept his advice and follow in his hoofsteps.

“I feel it would do you good to learn how to work the mortals and addressing this absent area of your knowledge would be very beneficial,” Helheim told me. “So I want you to go the castle, and explain that you are a young gardener that is seeking employment.”

I flinched as a wave of information was put into my head; all the necessary information that I would need to say to the guards had just been provided by Lady Helheim. While I wasn’t all that confident in this plan, I would never argue with Lady Helheim and-

“HA!” Helheim laughed loudly before she coughed and waved Fall on.

As I was saying, I would never argue with Lady Helheim and trust her decisions without question. So I bowed my head and made my way to the castle to get a job.