Once Upon a Time in the Frozen North, there lived a Queen named Ametrine.
She was a kind Queen who ruled fairly, making sure the small hive beneath her wings was cared for.
Her castle was ice and snow, safe and hidden, but near enough to a settlement to feed.
Her changelings were happy, adapted to survive the frigid winds and icy downpours.
One day, disaster struck. The nearest settlement collapsed, unable to withstand wind and hail and abandonment, and the hive's food source was lost.
While their hive offered protection, it also forced isolation—without a food source, they would have to move to survive.
Ametrine had heard the legends the ponies of the settlement had whispered about, an Empire, not just surviving, but thriving in the North.
Ametrine made a choice.
She ordered her hive to scavenge from the settlement’s remains—fabrics for protecting themselves and their young, and scraps of materials for sleds, to take everything that they held dear with them.
The hive left their home, with their people, their belongings, and their history upon their backs and sleds, and set out into the Frozen North.
They marched, keeping close in the day, and arranging the sleds and larger fabrics into shelters in the night.
For a time, their efforts worked, keeping them safe and warm and together through their journey.
It would not last—the Frozen North does not yield easily; it takes and takes until those who try to claim it are gone, and Ametrine’s hive was no different.
The nymphs grew restless, the fabrics tore under icy assault, and the elderly began to grow ill.
Just as Ametrine thought her poor, tiny hive was going to shatter, she saw it.
A gleaming, crystalline city in the distance, ringed in clear plains and farms. Even upon an icy hill, far from the center, waves of love and joy swept over the hive.
Ametrine wept knowing that, while there was much to do, her people had hope.
The group that entered the Empire was small and ragged, and the Crystal Ponies could scarcely contain their wonder.
Ametrine sought the Empress, ruler of the Crystal Empire, told her of their plight, and begged her to let her people stay.
"Please, Your Highness," Ametrine said, "we are worn, our elderly grow ill, our young cannot bear to journey further, and our eggs are barely protected from the cold."
For a time, the Empress was quiet. She saw the fatigue of the Queen and her group, saw the pain in her eyes, and decided.
She, too, was a kind ruler.
She would give Ametrine and her hive a place to stay in her Empire, and would share every care she could for those in need.
The Empress also explained the waves of emotion.
"The Crystal Heart powers the Empire, and keeps it safe. As long as it does not interrupt that, you and your hive can feed freely from the emotion it spreads."
Once more, Ametrine wept, thanking the Empress again and again before she returned to her hive to share the good news.
From then on, Ametrine and her hive lived safely amongst the Crystal Empire.
Together, as one people, they lived Happily Ever After.
Chrysanthemum carefully shut the old storybook with a warm smile. Once more, she had been asked to read it to her child—’no longer a nymph’, now a teenager—to help sleep come.
The old Queen shook her head with a small laugh. Her nymph always fell asleep right at the end, and read through the whole story again in the morning, anyway.
Chrysanthemum brushed a lock of teal hair out of her nymph's face as time had proven several times, she had a habit of chewing it in her sleep. "Sleep well, my Prince," she whispered.
"I love you dearly, and I know you'll do great things, Chrysalis."
Written May 18, 2023