The lower halls of Canterlot castle were silent, save for the steady rhythm of Twilight's hooves clacking against the cool marble floor. The sun had climbed above the horizon only minutes ago, leading Twilight to believe that she and Celestia were currently the only ponies awake throughout the entirety of the magnificent structure. This wasn't true, of course. Guards patrolled the halls regularly and their hoofsteps could occasionally be heard reverberating from some far-off corridor, but at night these guards would patrol the upper floors of the castle as the Princesses slept. As such, most of them wouldn't descend to the lower levels of the castle this early, which suited Twilight just fine, it gave her time to think.

'I need answers, especially about Calamity, and the Princess... and Spike.' The mention of her surrogate brother still hurt, stirring up leftover vestiges of sorrow and anger deep within her. She shook the sadness away, but held onto the fury. Now she marched purposefully towards the statue garden, 'I will have the answers. I will know the truth. I will-' As she rounded the corner her thought processes stopped dead along with her movement.

Princess Celestia stood only a meter away, a pleasantly surprised smile gracing her features, "Twilight! What brings you to the castle this early?"

Twilight gave her brain a jump-start and spluttered out the first answer that came to mind, "Uh, I umm... The library! Yeah, I was just erm... heading to the library so I could erm... read... books..."

Celestia seemed more concerned than unconvinced, "Have you been sleeping well, Twilight? I was sure Luna's spell would have worked..."

Twilight considered this then nodded frantically, "Y-Yes Princess, I've been sleeping just fine. I, erm, well you know, it's just an early morning for me I guess..."

Celestia gave her an inquisitive look for a moment before leaning forwards and nuzzling her gently, "Luna tells me something is troubling you. I won't pry, but if you ever have to talk to anyone my offer still stands, Twilight. I will always be there if you need me." She gave the unicorn a reassuring smile, "I would love to stay and chat, but I must prepare for day court. Later, perhaps?"

Twilight simply nodded slowly, giving the Princess her best attempt at a smile as said Princess trotted past her. She released a breath she didn't know she was holding and relaxed. Just as she was about to set off again, the sound of hoofsteps behind her ceased, "Oh, and Twilight?" The unicorn wheeled around to see that her mentor had not turned, but a playful edge had seeped into her voice, "Stay out of the restricted archives, okay?" With that she continued on down the hall, leaving behind a nervous and bewildered Twilight.

After taking a moment to relax yet again Twilight released an almighty sigh of relief, "Why was that so difficult!?" she questioned nopony in particular. As if in response, a single memory bounced to the forefront of her mind, 'I want to tell you the truth... about Celestia.' She scrunched her eyes shut in irritation, "Damn it, Discord!" she hissed under her breath before setting off towards the statue garden once again.

Twilight sat on her haunches before the statue and took a deep breath before closing her eyes. Surely enough, after a few seconds she and Discord stood once again in the darkness. "Thank you for returning, Twilight Sparkle. I see you're expecting the answers I promised you. I won't keep you waiting. We left off at how I didn't summon Calamity, I believe?" Twilight gave a curt nod, "Then allow me to elaborate. You see, influencing anything beyond the proximity of this statue is nearly impossible. Even contacting you in your dreams was difficult despite the castle being right next to me. No, the reason Calamity arrived in this world is because he followed me, as he has been since we were separated all those centuries ago; tearing through dimension after dimension to get here."

"Why?"

"To free me. The reason he was banished was due to my imprisonment. Without me a lot of chaos reverted back to harmony almost instantaneously. He couldn't hold onto the rapidly diminishing chaos energies. Were he to fight the Princesses in such a state he would have been obliterated."

"So then how did he get here? Last time I checked, chaos wasn't exactly rife until after he came along."

"You're not going to like this, Twilight Sparkle, but it seemed like he'd caused a fair amount of chaos before he arrived here. Stocking up on chaos, if you will. If his old habits are anything to go by, I'm guessing he looked like a tangled mess of mangled corpses?"

Twilight shuddered at the memory, "Yes. How do you know this anyway? I thought you didn't have any influence outside of this place!?"

"I don't, but Calamity and I shared a sort of link. To a limited degree, we could sense the other's thoughts, birds of a feather you could say. And when that feather is chaos, strange things happen, even I don't know exactly how it worked, but it did. And before you ask, no, I don't feel the link any more. If I had to take a guess, I'd say that he's putting all his energy into recovering. Being on the receiving end of uncontrolled chaos magic is never fun."

Twilight reared back defensively, "Y-You know about that!?"

"Of course I do! I could sense the energies released from here! Why the sudden apprehension?" Then it clicked, "You? You're serious?" Twilight was trying to decide whether to be ashamed or defensive of her actions, her face an odd mixture of the two. She wasn't prepared for Discord's response, "Well... That would explain a lot... I can't imagine that was fun for you, either..."

The two simply stood in awkward silence for almost a minute. Discord couldn't help but admire that she had fully manipulated chaos magic without any training, even if her emotions had done most of the work. Twilight on the other hoof, had expected to be mocked, or at least a joke made at her expense at the revelation. She hadn't expected Discord to be sympathetic to her plight in the slightest. Though neither would admit it, each felt a small measure of respect for the other.

Discord coughed to break the silence before speaking, "But anyway, creating a dimensional rift large enough for a being the size of Calamity to step through requires a huge expanse of relatively flat land. Now, to reach me as quickly as possible Calamity should have created a rift somewhere in the mountain beneath Canterlot; some of the caverns inside are colossal." Twilight nodded, recalling her meeting with the real Cadence before the wedding, "But something stopped him. It seems that Canterlot has some sort of magical shield around it. Naturally, Calamity resorted to using the closest available expanse of land instead once he realised this."

Twilight stood petrified by the implications of what Discord had just said, "So, wait... You mean... everything that happened..."

"Could have been avoided. Ponyville would never have been in any danger if not for that shield." he spoke as if he were stating a commonly known fact. Twilight was fighting tears back as best she could when Discord next spoke, "I haven't lied to you yet, Twilight Sparkle, and I won't start now. I don't believe Celestia would ever have raised the shield with such a purpose in mind. However, it strikes me as odd that Calamity didn't find anywhere closer than Ponyville. It's almost as if he had to find a gap in a larger shield... If anything, I don't believe what happened was caused on purpose, but by negligence on Celestia's part..."

Twilight let the tears fall, she didn't sob aloud though, she had cried enough over the past month and she was sick of it, "Negligence..." her eyes were fixated on the darkness beneath her hooves, "All those ponies... My little brother... They all died because of her NEGLIGENCE!?"

Discord did nothing as Twilight fumed. It was only when she calmed herself that Discord spoke again, "The only way you will ever know for sure is if you ask her yourself, Twilight Sparkle. That is simply what I believe. I understand that you're very angry, so I'm going to make you an offer now, while there's still time."

Twilight immediately shot him a withering look, "That's it, isn't it!? You attack me when I'm at my weakest! Use my weakness to make me fall for your deceit!"

Discord shook his head solemnly, "No." Twilight prepared to accuse him again, but he cut her off prematurely, "Listen to me! I'm offering you the chance to leave. The anger you feel now is trivial compared to what you'll experience if you stay, and hear what I have to say."

"This is some sort of mind game, isn't it!? You want me to stay, don't you!? Oh, you're so smart! Lord Discord has fooled us all again everypony!" Sarcasm dripped from every word. Discord's face remained passive - albeit with great effort on his part, "Make your choice, Twilight Sparkle, or I'll make it for you and end the spell now. It's tiring to maintain if you haven't already figured that out."

"What happened to 'telling me everything', huh!? Fine, you know what? I'm staying, I bet it's all just a bluff isn't it!?" Discord shook his head at the infuriated unicorn and spoke,

"Take a few minutes to calm yourself. This is going to be hard to take." Twilight huffed, determined to prove him wrong, but after a few minutes some of the initial childish anger evaporated. She was still angry, but the spite was almost completely gone.

With an exasperated sigh she spoke, "I'm sorry. I'm really angry at the moment, and I took it out on you just now. That was wrong. You've told me no lies yet, I should try to be fair with you... Though in retrospect you could've phrased that better."

Discord nodded, "Point taken. Are you ready?"

Twilight nodded, "As ready as I'll ever be, I guess..."

He inhaled slowly, "After what you said yesterday, about your little brother, I put two and two together. The dragon involved, that was Spike, wasn't it?" A short nod. "And my guess is that Celestia cast a spell on him to mature him enough to fight?"

Twilight's voice was hollow, speaking of a memory she wished she could forget, "No. Luna was the one to cast it, but Celestia told her to, yes..."

Discord sighed before continuing, "As you might have guessed, that particular spell was an ageing spell, not a growth spell. That was how Spike developed all the characteristics of a full-grown dragon, yes?" Another nod. "If my assumptions are correct, there is only one spell powerful enough to grow a dragon to full maturity whilst avoiding their inevitable wyrmsleep. I know this is difficult for you to recall, but I must know. Did the spell cause Spike a lot of pain?" Barely suppressed tears, and a series of rapid nods followed.

Discord shook his head sadly and waited for the unicorn to compose herself. It took a while, but eventually she looked up at him, wiping the tears away, "G-Go on..."

"The spell used on Spike - the Senescentis Transpositus - is forbidden."

"W-What?"

"The tome containing it was locked away in the Canterlot archives long ago, and with good reason. I trust you understand how basic growth in ponies and animals works? In essence, a creature's cells must divide in order for it to grow and mature. However, these cells can only divide a certain number of times. This determines - along with other factors - the animal's lifespan. Now, the spell used on Spike does exactly that, it accelerates cell division at a ridiculous rate, the result being almost instantaneous growth. The problem lies in what happens afterwards. The spell would eventually have faded, as all spells do, and when that one fades, the divided cells cannot be rejuvenated. It effectively halves the lifespan of the target." Twilight was speechless, her mouth opening and closing rapidly as if she were trying to say something.

Discord waited patiently and eventually she managed to croak out, "C-Celestia told Luna t-to do that t-to Spike? D-Did she know?"

"I could lie, and tell you that she didn't to make you feel better, Twilight Sparkle. But yes, she did know. It's right there in the book. I know, because I was there when it was written over a millennium ago."

Twilight was at a complete loss for words. Only a weak, "Why?" escaped her lips.

Discord's expression grew even more grave as he continued, "That, however, was not the reason the book was archived. The real reason that the spell is forbidden is that, upon ceasing, the subject will revert back to their original age, and along the way horrific damage occurs. Broken bones, disfigurements, tumours, haemorrhages, lacerations, organ failure and everything in between. The last time it was worked out, the spell has an eighty-six percent instant mortality rate upon ceasing, and none of the survivors lived anywhere near as long as a few years afterwards due to the complications that ensued. In short, by having Luna cast that spell on Spike, Celestia sentenced him to death.

Twilight stood, trembling, staring off into nothingness. She had given up on suppressing her sobs now, they racked her body violently as she cried out, "IT'S NOT TRUE! YOU CAN'T BE SERIOUS! YOU'RE LYING DISCORD!"

The draconequus spoke as calmly as possible, but it was difficult. As she was, she reminded him very much of a yellow pegasus in much the same state four months ago, and the unfamiliar pain in his chest was back again, "I'm sorry, Twilight Sparkle. I speak the truth."

"BUT WHY!? IT CAN'T BE TRUE! WHY WOULD CELESTIA..."

"CELESTIA!" Fury welled within the mare, and Discord could've sworn that her eyes flashed red for just a moment.

Then he realised what was about to happen, "Twilight Sparkle! I know what you're thinking! Don't do it! She-" His voice cut out into nothing as she forced her eyes open. Jumping to her hooves and hastily wiping away any tears that hadn't fallen into the veritable puddle below, the mare galloped off towards the throne chamber with blazing speed.

She was gone by the time Discord had released the spell to look for her. Realising what was about to happen, and that he would get the blame for it once the unicorn inevitably told the Princess everything, only one thought occurred to him.

'Oh, shit...'