Pipp flopped onto the pillows on the floor, happy to finally be taking a break. They'd all been working on party preparations all day, but now they'd all gathered at the Brighthouse for some well-deserved R and R. Well, Sunny wasn't relaxing, she was combing through the pegasus royal family tree that she and Zipp had brought her, but Sunny seemed to think that was fun and not homework so whatevs.
After snapping a pic of the decorations stacked on the table and sending it to her followers, Pipp turned her attention back to Sunny. The earth pony was eagerly flipping through the book, examining every page and taking notes for her own records. Pipp didn't get the hype, she'd listened to her mom go on about their royal linage enough that it had lost the mystique. Still interesting, but she wouldn't want to write a report on it.
"Wow!" Sunny gasped; face buried in the page. "So your family can be traced back to Queen Concordia?"
"Her brother, technically," Zipp shrugged. "Concordia disappeared."
"Still," Sunny said. "That makes you distantly related to a real alicorn. That's so cool!"
"I guess," Zipp shrugged again. "She's a very distant relative at this point."
Izzy hopped over to look over Sunny's shoulder. Her eyes darted around the page. "Wow, so, like, all of your royal is related? That's crazy! Totally different from unicorn royalty,"
Pipp frowned, confused. She couldn't tell if this was an Izzism or not. "Unicorn royalty aren't related?"
"Nope," Izzy confirmed, popping her 'p'. Then she paused, thinking for a moment. "Well, it's rare. It can happen. King Cephus isn't. He was just a rando from Lumina. I don't know if Prince Solstice or Princess Iridessa plan to try for the crown. We still have a while before Cephus needs to ask for an heir." Ask for an heir?
"They get to choose if they want to be the next ruler or not?" Zipp gasped, eyes wide.
"How does the line of succession work in unicorn culture, Izzy?" Sunny questioned excitedly, flipping to a fresh section of her notebook.
Izzy tilted her head. "You really don't know? Huh. I thought it was common knowledge. Well, it's super easy to understand." She grabbed a few pieces of colorful paper and snipped away at them with a flurry of scissors. Then she placed down a cave cutout with a shut door and a bunch of paper unicorns. "Unicorn kings and queens are appointed by the Choosing Cave." She slapped a bunch of glue and crystal bits onto the cave door. "Unicorns from all over gather at the cave when the gems glow signifying that a new heir or ruler is needed." Izzy used her magic to move the door out of the way and float the paper unicorns inside. "Whoever gets to the exit on the other side is the Chosen." One paper unicorn went all the way through and came out of the other side wearing a crown. The rest of the unicorns went back out the front entrance. "Easy peesy coronation day confetti squeezy." Pipp kinda got it, but there were still some holes and the whole thing was really weird.
They all had questions.
"What happens to the ponies who don't reach the exit?" Hitch worried.
"So any unicorn can become the unicorn monarch?" Pipp checked, bewildered.
"So the princes and princess are just the kids of the king and queen?" Zipp asked. "They aren't expected to take over one day?" All the royal perks but without the responsibilities? Pipp wasn't even the future queen and that sounded appealing to her.
"How does the cave choose which unicorn makes it through?" Sunny questioned, writing furiously.
Izzy answered all their questions in order. "The ponies who don't make the mark just go back out the entrance. Yep, any of age unicorn is allowed to enter the cave. Nope, princes and princesses don't usually become the next king or queen. It's a magic cave, full of tests and challenges." Izzy straightened into a regal, elegant pose and put on a posh accent. "Only the wise and pure of heart may pass all the way through the cave."
"Huh." Hitch leaned down to examine the paper replicas closer. "Earth ponies just elect a new president every decade."
"All the tribes do some things so differently," Pipp observed. They were all so similar in such big, important ways, she sometimes forgot they had differences beyond just the ability to fly or not.
"This is all so fascinating," Sunny exclaimed, flipping back to the page with Pipp's family tree on it. "I'm going to have to start a whole new research journal on governance alone. Multiple journals for all these past royals." Ugh, how could she say that so enthusiastically? This wasn't a new music video, it was schoolwork. Voluntary schoolwork.
"Ooh, how… exciting," Pipp tried to feign eagerness.
"I know!" Sunny grinned. Then she sighed, ears drooping slightly and running a hoof down the page. "It's great that your family keeps track of this stuff."
"I guess," Zipp agreed lukewarmly, rolling her wings. "It's a lot of names. It's cool to know your history though."
"History is super important," Sunny declared fervently. "Remembering ponies' stories, what they accomplished, how they lived, their mistakes and successes, why things were the way they were, it's all worth remembering. And forgetting leads to disaster."
"Sunny's a big history nerd," Hitch informed them fondly. "Though she did argue with the teacher sometimes."
"Well sometimes she was wrong," Sunny sniffed. "Dad always knew the real stories."
"Were both of your parents into this stuff or was it just your dad?" Pipp asked curiously. It was always 'my dad's study' or 'my dad's research'. Actually, come to think of it, had Sunny ever mentioned her mom? A twinge of apprehension pulsed through her. Then Hitch's wince made it clear she'd asked a painful question. She hadn't meant to! She'd just…
Sunny looked sadder than Pipp had ever seen her. "I don't even know who my mom is," she admitted.
"What?!" Zipp, Pipp, and Izzy all gasped together. There was no way! Seriously? So she'd never met her own mom?! Didn't even know her name?!
"Like, you just don't remember her or…?" Izzy asked.
"I don't remember her because I've never met her," Sunny explained forlornly. She got up and trotted over to the wall with her family photos on it. There were pictures from Sunny's foalhood all the way up to current day (a group photo the five of them had taken when Sunny moved into the new Brighthouse), but even the foal pictures only had Sunny's dad in them. No mom anywhere. "Nopony knows who she is. Nopony except dad. He always promised me I'd meet her one day, when I was older, but he never told me before he was… gone."
That was… weird. Kinda shady. Like, even if her parents had fallen out, why not at least tell her the mom's name? And why promise she could meet her one day?
"Why would he not tell you?" Zipp queried, eyes sharp in that way they got when she smelled a mystery. Pipp wanted to shove her to tell her to quit it, this was too sensitive to play detective with, but she was too far away.
"I don't know," Sunny sighed, gazing at her dad's face. "He wouldn't even tell me her name, no matter how many times I asked him." She turned back to facing the group with a chuckle. "There was a good chunk of time I thought I must be adopted. But dad promised me I wasn't. He said my mom lived far away and that when I was old enough to travel that far, we could go see her." That sort of made sense. Travel could be dangerous, especially if you left your own tribe's territory. Dragging a filly into enemy territory, or worse, unclaimed land probably wouldn't end well. But that was only if you had to go into those areas. Sunny's mom had probably just lived in another earth pony town. Why would Sunny's mom stay so far away? Why not just move to Maretime Bay? Sunny glanced at her dad's photo again. "Maybe that is where he was going on the trip he didn't make it back from."
"And she didn't, like, write or call or anything?" Pipp asked. She didn't want to say it to Sunny's face, but it sounded like Sunny's mom wasn't a great pony.
"She'd send gifts sometimes," Sunny shrugged. "Or, at least, dad told me they were from her. They never came in the mail; he always brought them himself. I do think they were from her though. They had a sort of personality to them. I could tell what kind of pony she was through those gifts. I could tell she cared." Pipp was skeptical, but again, didn't want to say it aloud.
"Are you going to try to find her now that you're older?" Izzy asked. "We could help!"
Sunny shook her head. "Maybe if I had a clue. But I have literally nothing to go on." A sad smile passed over her face. "Besides, if she were still around, I feel like she would've reached out by now. At least to figure out why dad stopped contacting her."
"We might be able to find something," Zipp suggested, hopping to her feet. "We could-"
"I don't think now's the time for that," Hitch interrupted, shifting uncomfortably in his seat.
"Yeah," Sunny nodded cheerfully, seemingly over reminiscing. "We're supposed to be getting a party ready. I know all the stuff about my mom might seem crazy to you guys, but it's been that way my whole life. Having this party go well is a way bigger deal to me,"
"If you say so," Pipp agreed, and the others nodded along. How depressing. But if a party was what Sunny wanted, that's what she'd get.