The class stood in the main street of Ponyville. They cut a most interesting figure, all standing shoulder to shoulder, their necks craning as they stared upward.

"Whoa," Frosty muttered. "Now that is one big tree."

"Oh, it's nothing much but we call it home," Spike chuckled.

The tree in question was, in fact, the Golden Oaks library. Or what had once been the library. After Twilight's ascension, coronation and what constituted a rather large explosion, the Princesses had brought their money and magic to bear and transformed the small town library... or what was left of it.... into something far more appropriate to a royal dwelling place. A seed from the Tree of Harmony, magically accelerated growth and a bag of acorns had transformed the single building tree into an enormous, redwood-sized titan several hundred feet around and two or three stories high. Once the trunks had grown together into one solid mass, the inside had been hollowed out and formed into the new, greatly expanded Golden Oaks library, while up in the branches an enormous ornate treehouse-- more of a tree mansion, or perhaps a tree palace-- had been assembled. Gleaming crystal and living oak twined together, forming towers and balustrades; enormous boughs of dark green and hanging blossoms of glowing crystal sparkled in the dappled sunshine. It looked like what the Cutie Mark Crusader clubhouse wanted to be when it grew up, Willow thought.

"This is actually the Palace of Friendship, home of Ponyville's own Princess Twilight Sparkle," Cheerilee said, waving her hoof grandiosely at the tree-mansion. "The upper stories are the actual royal dwelling, but the entire lower trunk is dedicated to the Ponyville library... which, thanks to Princess Twilight, is now the third largest library in Equestria."

"Or fourth, depending on whether Nyx has turned her library books back in this week," Pipsqueak quipped. Nyx blew a cheerful raspberry at him while the class laughed.

"As a special treat, Princess Twilight herself will be giving us a tour of the castle and of the library, showing us all the new facilities they installed from the Crystal Empire!" Cheerilee said. "Now, let's all stay together... remember who your Field Trip Buddy is..."

"Better stick close, Nyx," Bright Eyes chuckled.

"Yeah," Spike snarked. "You wouldn't want to get lost in your own living room."

The other kids giggled; Nyx blew him another raspberry. "Yuch, say it, don't spray it," Spike said, pretending to wipe his face.

The front doors opened and Twilight Sparkle stepped out. "Hello, everypony," she said, smiling at the class. "I'm so glad you could all come today. You'll be some of the very first ponies to see some of the new library features!" She stood aside, opening the front door wide. "Come on in everypony..."

The class filed in through the wide double doors. Only a handful of them didn't find themselves gaping in awe all over again.

This was a far cry from the Golden Oaks library of old. The first floor alone was a vast circular space large enough to have held the old library entire, leaves, branches and all. There were windows and frosted skylights letting in the light of day. Hundreds of shelves of books lined the walls and filled the floorspace, and sofly glowing lanterns were everywhere, providing soothing reading light even in the most intimate nooks and corners. There were tons of overstuffed chairs and cushions as well, and tables for reading.

What most caught the eye however was the engraving work. An elegant network of lines, etched to look like vines and leaves, ran up and along the shelves, joining the intricate pattern etched into the ceiling. If you looked close you could see lines glowed faintly with leaf-green light. As the students watched, a flock (there was no other word for it) of books floated down the aisles, following the glowing green vines and shelving themselves one by one. They "oooh"ed, impressed. "What you're looking at here," Twilight said, "Is the book sorting and shelving system. It was invented in the Crystal Empire about a year or two ago..." she tapped a hoof on some of the flowery decorative lines. "Though as you can see we've added a few decorative flourishes of our own. Thanks to this, we now can find, pull and reshelve any book in the library-- well, so long as it's properly tagged and listed in our card catalog."

"Neat!" was Snips' verdict.

"You think that's neat? You ain't seen nuthin' yet," Princess Twilight joked. She trotted over to a nearby kiosk. In the little cubby-desk was a book stand with a mirror, a stylus and a crystal ball. "This is a library interface," she said. "It lets you read the books without even taking them off the shelves." She levitated the stylus and quickly wrote out a couple of words on the mirror. The words glowed on the glass briefly, then faded. The reflection in the mirror suddenly was replaced by what looked like a paper scroll, covered with densely packed writing. at the top were the words "241 RESULTS." "This is our search engine," Twilight explained. "You write a word or a phrase on the mirror with the stylus, and it searches through all the books in the library for examples." She pointed to the glowing lines running up the wall from the kiosk; the children could see little pulses running up and down, zipping along the grooves up to the ceiling and across the room and back again. Twilight ran her hoof down one side of the mirror frame; the mirror-image scroll rolled up and down, revealing more lines of writing. "And when you see a selection that looks like what you want, you just tap it twice with the stylus, like this--" the image in the mirror turned into a page in an open book. "And you can read the page it came from!" She tapped an arrow embossed in the bottom of the frame, making the mirror-book flip back and forth through its pages.

The crystal ball beside her suddenly showed a book, rotating silently in space. "And this," she pointed to the crystal ball, "Shows the book you're reading. If you decide you want to check it out, just tap the top of the globe like so--" she tapped it with her hoof. there was a sound like a buzzer. "Oops. We normally have three copies of each book, but I guess the other two are already checked out. Let's try the next one..." She tapped the top of the mirror frame, going back to the list of 'hits,' then picked another entry. This time when she tapped on the globe, there was a 'ding" and the glowing line going up the wall doubled in brightness. There was a whooshing noise from somewhere in the library, and a book suddenly came flying through the air, chasing the brightened line back to the kiosk. It hit the end of the line and dropped, landing on the desk with a thunk. "And there you have it!" Twilight finished, looking pleased. "Now if you want to finish reading it at home, you just take the book up to the desk and check it out."

"Cool," was several foal's opinion. "Yeah, that's neat," Truffle said.

"Yeah, it's too bad you can't just take the mirror home," Snails said. "Then you could just leave the book here and read whatever you want."

Twilight raised a hoof and started to speak. She froze with her jaw hanging open, her eyes slowly glazing over. "That's.... but then you couldn't check out... but you wouldn't NEED to check out, so.... no no wait, you'd need miles and miles of runic lines etched everywhere... but... wait, Amethyst's Magic Mirror Modification... that could possibly--" She turned around and yelled. "SPIKE! I NEED YOU TO TAKE--" she realized she was shouting in the middle of a library--- for an assistant who was standing right there. Angry shushing noises echoed among the stacks. She tittered in embarrassment. "Aheh. Sorry. Force of habit."

Spike looked over at Cheerilee. "You mind me covering this?" He had the air of longsuffering patience one normally found in hired help.

Cheerilee looked uncertain, but Twilight interrupted. "No no no, this is a school outing for you--"

"To my own house," Spike pointed out dryly.

"Don't be difficult, Spike. Daffodil!" Twilight shouted. More shushing noises from among the stacks answered her. "Oh shush yourself, darn it," Twilight grumbled.

A moment later a short stack of books came fluttering over the shelves. The books parted to reveal a tiny blonde flutterpony with gold and purple wings hovering behind them. her curly antennae were fizzing with sparks as she levitated the books over to a shelf. "Phew!" she said. "That never gets any easier. Yes, you needed me, your highness?"

"Yes, Daffodil. Take down a note." A quill and scroll appeared in midair; Daffodil took the quill in her magic. "New side project for library system: portable access mirrors for use at home. I'll need you to pull up these volumes..." she rattled off a quick list of magical tomes; Daffodil nodded and carefully wrote them down. "Just set them at my desk, I'll get back to them. Now where were we?"

Twilight looked back at the school group. Her gaze happened to fall on Frosty, spotting his wispy mane floating above the group, and her focus promptly shifted. "Oh, that reminds me--- you must be Frosty, yes?" Frosty nodded, careful not to say anything that might set off the garrulous lecture-ready princess again. "Do tell your mother thank-you for that copy of Windigo lore she gave us. It's full of such marvelous insights! You must be very proud to come from such a rich cultural background."

Frosty's mouth twisted. "Yeah. Something like that," he muttered.

Princess Twilight beamed. "In fact it's going to be a centerpiece of the upcoming Foal's Fair 'Peoples around the World' library exhibition!" she went on. "Oh, it's going to be fascinating. The things we've already learned have changed the story of Hearth's Warming so much---!"

For some reason the gathering of colts and fillies looked less than enthused. A hoof went up. "Yes?" Twilight asked.

"Princeth Twilight," Twist said, "My Aunt Bon Bon told me to give you a methage."

"And what is it?" Twilight asked, puzzled.

"Could you pleathe not 'fix' any more holidayth?" the redheaded filly said. "After you and Nyxth and the Princetheth changed Hearthwarming and Nightmare Night all around, our candy thaleth have been a meth. If you go fixing Heartth and Hooveth, uth candy salethponieth won't know which end ith up!"

The crowd of children giggled; Twilight looked miffed. "I'll try and keep it in mind," she said drolly. "But anyway... I'm planning on giving a lecture on Equestrian pre-modern history and Windigo culture at the Foal's Fair... perhaps our young half-windigo could say a few words then, maybe answer some questions--"

"I'd rather not..." Frosty said through clenched teeth.

Twilight blinked. "Why not?"

You could see Frosty trying to think up a good lie. "MY... uh, My Mom probably wouldn't want..."

"Oh I'm sure once I ask her she'll like the idea," Twilight Sparkle said, dismissing the thought with a cheerful hoof wave. "In fact I'll be speaking to her later; I'll just bring up the idea to her then. SPI-- oh right, aheh-- Daffodil, make a memo for me to bring it up at the PTA meeting tomorrow afternoon!"

"Got it, Princess."

"Oh, now where were we...?" Twilight trotted off through the stacks, the foals trailing behind. Willow hung back. He saw Frosty just standing there, flat-hoofed. The windigo colt finally made a sound like "rrrARGH" and stomped off after the others, frosty hoofprints trailing behind him and a small angry looking snow-cloud hovering over his head.

Willow really didn't understand his new classmate.

The tour took the better part of an hour, with Twilight showing them the ins and outs of the expanded library and even taking them on a short tour of the mansion up in the upper branches. Not, much to Nyx's obvious relief, any of the private quarters (she'd confess later to not having cleaned her room in a week.) Then it was back down to the library, with each student allowed to check out two books (cheers) with the expectation of a book report on each by next Friday (groans.)

By the time everyone checked out, it was the end of the school day and the start of the weekend. Cheerilee dismissed them; they managed to restrain their whoops of joy until they all tumbled out the front door of the library. Almost immediately the heat smote them down; it was like walking into an oven. Immediately every pegasus began fanning his or her wings, trying to stir up a breeze. "Waugh!" Flitter said, adding her own buzzing insect wings to the effort. "The air conditioning inside just makes it seem worse!"

"Ugh, ahm up for a dunk in the lake," Applebloom said, trying to stand in Scootaloo's wing-breeze.

"Well, enjoy your mill pond, you lot," Diamond Tiara said. "We're having a pool party at my place... invite only. Come on, everypony." Everypony meaning the handful of fillies and colts in Diamond Tiara's inner circle. Since Ponyville had begun expanding and more upper-crust ponies had begun moving to Ponyville to be near Princess Twilight and Princess Luna, DT had been quick to glom onto several snootier colts and fillies now filling out Cheerilee's class. They peeled away from the rest, about four or five fillies and two colts, and trotted off after Diamond Tiara and Silver Spoon, giggling and chattering amongst themselves-- and more than one tipping their nose up at the others.

"Well there they go," Applebloom said, a trifle disgustedly. "All buzzing away after their lil Queen Bee."

"No wonder being around her gives me hives," Flitter snarked.

"Well she doesn't know a thing," Sweetiebelle said, waving a hoof and tossing her mane. "Everypony knows that all the faaaaaahshionable ponies are down by the lake these days. Isn't that right, Doubloon?"

Doubloon was magically hoisted in the air, water cart(1) and all, by Nyx, Snips and Snails. "You got that right," she said to the crowd. "It's that time again, everypony-- beach party at my place!" Cheers went up at that... and a few razzes.

"Like it could be anywhere else," somepony said. "Your family lives in the lake!"

"Well excuuuuuse me," Doubloon sniffed in mock outrage. "If you don't want to cool off on my front yard with the water sprays and my Mom's island punch I'm sure every pony else will..." Enthusiastic agreement went up. "Well come on, everypony--" she pointed with a hoof in the direction of the lake. "To the beach!" The foals cheered and everyone began trotting in the direction Doubloon was pointing.

Just then Frosty came trundling out the library door, bundled up in his freezer-bag suit. He'd apparently gotten Twilight to give his ice bags a magical freeze-boost; the lining of his snowsuit was hemmed with frost. "Hey, where's everypony going?" he asked.

Scootaloo, Truffle and Twist, and a few of the other students surrounded him. "We're all going to the beach!" Scootaloo said. "Come on, Frosty!"

"The beach??" Frosty said. "But--"

"Don't worry, it's cool," Scootaloo said. "Literally. Haha!"

"Yeah. The lake ith thtill nithe and cold. And Doubloon hath water fountainth that thpray in the air and keep everypony cool," Twist  said. "And her mom maketh thith deliciouth fruit punch for everypony--"

"But--"

"Yeah, c'mon, you'll love it!" Truffle said. Against all Frosty's protests, he found himself quite literally herded along after the others.

This could only end well.

1) just a little red wagon filled with water and wet towels to wrap herself in.