One Love's Night
I never knew the stars could look like this. I am among them, in the sky, and they're bigger than I thought the were. Some of them are at least twice my size. The star Luna brought down for Mary was apparently shrunk so that her blessing could be performed. They're… immaculate. Some of them do glow in colors, some of them are pure white… but all of them are beyond words.
Luna. I call out to her, my thoughts are words and my words are soundless.
Knights. Compared to my soft nearly silent thought-voice, hers is a big, booming resonating sound that seems like a song. Do you like it, my love?
Like it? How could such tiny words express the way this feels? I never knew the stars could be this… breathtaking. My little voice whispers. I hear Luna laugh softly.
Indeed they are. I rarely fly with them anymore, I save this for special occasions. I never got to take you before, well, our adventure began so I thought it was long overdue that you meet them this way. Oh, look, come here, this is Mary's star… She waves me over, her star-spotted coat twinkling as much as any other star in this sky. The cream colored star she is near glows with a familiar sort of personality.
This.. this isn't Mary herself, is it? I ask, though I know that's not actually possible.
No. But this star has chosen to take in a bit of her, you could say. They respect her, you see, and thus imitates her.
They? Have they no gender? I look at the softly glowing orb, about my size.
Not all. This one is without, and is quite happy. Luna nuzzles the star in question, and to my eyes it appears that it nuzzles back. Would you like to speak with them?
Yes.
Then place a hoof upon their side. I do as I am told, and the heart of the star fills my mind, speaking without words, barely comprehensible even though the meaning, the intent, fills my mind. This is perhaps the clearest most perfect communication and I can barely conceive of it as it is occurring. I am left with the impression of a smile as they release me.
Amazing, Luna. They are.. magnificent. I have such small words to describe the majesty, it feels such a shame.
Hardly so magnificent as you, my dear. She says, flirting.
Oh you! I am pale in comparison to these wonderful beings. Such kindness, such care, such inner peace and compassion… I cannot be all that they are. I say, wrapping an ethereal wing around her. You, on the other hoof, are as they are. Incomprehensible, incomparable, a glorious light where there would otherwise be darkness.
My dear, we must agree to disagree because I hold you above all else and it would seem that the reverse is true as well. Luna smiles, and pecks my cheek. Sadly, we must be going. It takes far too long to acclimate to breathing again that I fear we must go now or be late to break fast. She laments, and begins her descent. I'm still not sure how I got used to not breathing so fast, but I worry that getting used to breathing again will be difficult. Luna says it's uncomfortable.
We fall a short distance, then hit the magical barrier that divides us from the earth. It's easy to leave and hard to get to- one must teleport inside the barrier on the stars' side,but one must only touch the barrier to leave, put thousands of miles above the earth. As we reappear above the earth, our lungs begin to whine. The stars protect us from needing air, our lungs became still and our heartbeats slowed to an almost standstill. Up there one might be truly immortal- all hurt, injury, need is cast aside by the stars' immaculate light. The stars taught Luna how to heal when she was a child, and their power is her power.
Now, I feel the ache of my lungs. They are not used to going unused, and they are angry now that I suddenly need them again. And unfortunately the air is thin up here, and thus I need more breaths to feel okay. For a moment I let myself tumble down, a little uncomfortable in my barrel, but once the air comes easier I extend my wings and glide down, taking in the night sky with relieved breaths. I look around, feeling Luna is near but I don't see her.
She pops out of nowhere, landing on top of me. For a second my wings are unhappy with her additional weight, but I hold us steady in the sky. She rubs her cheek against mine.
"And here I thought we would take a dive." She says.
"You underestimate me, my love. I could lift the world itself if you asked me to, so your dainty self is no struggle to me." I say back.
"Your flirting is incessant, Knights, are we not as close as two ponies can be?"
"Should I stop speaking the honest thoughts of my mind when they're relevant?" I ask, seriously. She is quiet for a moment, but I can feel her smile before she speaks, cheeks still pressed together.
"No, no, I do rather like your compliments."
"Then I will continue to do so." For a while we simply glide, slowly falling back to earth. Though our calm conversation would make it appear otherwise, our breathing is still a bit labored, even as we descend into more oxygen-rich atmosphere. We watch from high above the horizon as Celestia's sun rises. The beams of light stretch far and wide, dusting the world in beautiful gold. I chuckle, and turn us so we can bid the moon farewell. As it's silver face ducks behind the earth, it too sends out beams of light, and an imitation of dust peruses the sky above the edge of the planet. "Marvelous.." I say under my breath. Luna is dozing off on my shoulder, however, so I quiet down.
She's been working so hard lately. Even though she can, in essence, turn off her need to sleep, she still needs to sleep to visit the Dreaming and take care of ponies who need her. I'd go with her if I could, but as I understand it the Dreaming will only take one Champion at a time, and there's no such thing as a guest pass when it comes to metaphysical responsibilities. So, as somepony who has turned off their need to sleep, I will watch Luna as she rests, write my silly poetry, and take care of what business I can. As Prince of the Sky, I have few duties. While I am still technically Luna's General, Maclura basically runs the Lunar Guard now. I can now approve, deny, even write laws into existence, but there seems to be no need for me in that area. Celestia still receive the brunt of petitions, with Luna receiving about half as much, usually because those individuals believe she will be more receptive to their ideas. I receive none myself, but I do swindle some from Luna. When she asks me to, that is.
It is also now my duty to at least in part look after weather, which Luna has been helping me with. My technical understanding of it is almost perfect now, though I can still not implement many of its techniques myself. It is confounding- though Celestia is beginning to think that as a pegasus alicorn I take after their father, who was in tune with the earth, plants and animals, hence his very name. But that makes little sense to me, because pegasi are in tune with elements of the sky, like Celestia and Luna's mother and they themselves seem to align to. Earth ponies follow after their father, and unicorns fit with their god-tier example, Discord, pre-insanity that is. Celestia and Luna were not very close with their other 'uncle', who represented Earth Ponies, so it's hard to say where else the comparisons match and fail to match. From what little they remember and what they know now, he was not like his counterparts.
Still, neither of them know and I cannot guess why we don't match up; surely if we use magic the same way we ought to be able to use the same magic, yes? Even now that I've ascended, however, I struggle to use anything more than basic cloud-manipulation, which is at least a start to 'typical' pegasus magic. While it seems that any pony of any race could learn to utilize spells and magic of another, alicorns are supposedly able to do it with ease- something I seem to dispute.
I softly shake my head. At least I can help with weather on paper. That's where I'm needed, if anywhere.
Among my other duties, I am now a dignitary, and have already held multiple discussions between the Equestrians and dignitaries and politicians of other races and countries. My favorite people are the giraffes, who come from a continent just south of Prance. They are tall, elegant, and kind. Their people of magic are simultaneously their leaders, and preach compassion and giving of the self- something that is similarly embedded in our own history and culture, though our sprawling population has led to something of a decline in such traits recently. I hope to fix that in the future, though I haven't a clue how to start, besides, I don't know, holding press conferences asking the people of our nation to be kind, which seems silly. For now I simply act on all the kindness I can, to everypony and everyone I meet.
It takes a half hour of simple, sustained gliding to reach the ground, but even then I lift us up with telekinesis so that I do not jostle Luna by landing. I take her straight to our room, laying her down as softly as I can. She is peaceful in sleep- something I am very grateful for. Some days she is tormented by others' nightmares, and has to fight, sometimes literally, to overcome them for the sake of their very creators. It is terrible to have to watch her suffer on behalf of our people but be able to do nothing to help her through it.
Today, however, she, the nation, and I are blessed to be without such terrors, and all seems restful. I pull myself up to my desk, readying the quill I fashioned from my own feather. Soon letters and words and melodies are flowing onto the paper, parchment ordered to be specially made like it was in my first life. The yellowish, thick pages smell and feel familiar, reminding me of times long, long gone. It makes it easy to recall those old days, to document it even. There are many nights where the poetic words failed me and so instead I wrote of my first life. Twilight seems to think that a biography would be therapeutic for me and an interesting addition to the knowledge of the world.
I smile at the thought of Twilight and her friends. This spring she became Princess Twilight Sparkle, finally earning her wings and crown like Celestia had planned. Though Celestia will hear none of it, Luna believes that Twilight and her friends are the living incarnations of the very elements they bear- and I subscribe to that idea. It was what made her so uncomfortable leaving Twilight alone to save the Crystal Empire. But Luna put her faith in Twilight, who used to be Magic alone, and let her go without interfering. And what success she had! While not everything went the way she expected, justice prevailed and those who deserved it got a happy ending.
I chuckle. It is not unlike what had happened just weeks prior, at the wedding between the now sovereigns of the Crystal Empire. Luna and I were on high alert with the mysterious threat, and were unable to attend the ceremony, but in truth I was rather tired, directing the Lunar Guard across Equestria searching for any clue to whom our enemies were. If things had gone according to the changelings' plan, we would have been in prime position for total takeover, with half the Royal Guard spread so thin across the nation and two alicorns flying to and fro to manage it.
In any case, Celestia retells the event well- her student knew something was wrong and tried to show it but her plans to do so failed, almost leading to disaster. But again, everything turned out well, considering. The wedding was hosted for real and Luna and I still didn't attend, as we were resting up from our helter-skelter past few days, but we were able to give them our blessing before we became totally useless.
It was so funny, my first time getting to meet the secret alicorn Cadence and Shining as her new Prince, and I was barely able to form coherent sentences. Shining Armor knew me from Alexander though we have never talked much, and I'm sure he told Cadence Luna and I's story- it must have been so strange to see me acting like a dopey child up past his bedtime. From the haze I remember, they thanked us for our blessing, laughed politely at my sloppy salute, and told us to get the hell in bed because we looked a tired mess. I don't doubt we were a terror to behold.
Luna, Celestia and I have been giving the pair advise on how to run a kingdom, though Cadence already had training from Celestia, as they both knew she would one day become the Crystal Princess. It's more like if there's anything unusual we step in and help them through it, though the only truly difficult thing thus far has been finding a replacement for Shining here. Until we can find somepony suitable enough to step in until Alexander's new reincarnation is found and is of course of age, Shining is technically in charge of both the Solar Guard and the standing army of the Crystal Empire.
As it is now, he has to take a train back to Canterlot every week or so to make sure everything's running as it should be. I help where I can, but legally I'm not allowed to interfere with another General's faction much more than tattle on them if they're not doing their drills right. It's rough, I'm sure.
With the past couple of weeks we've been dealing with Discord, getting him used to rules and such. For all that he understands about the world as it inherently is, he seems to have lost all knowledge of what it's like to be among people, ponies, society, and all it's various rules too. In part, I think that's a good thing, because old-time social constructs were often backwards and dumb, but a lot of times it's led to uncomfortable confrontations and explanations on why things are wrong and how other things are right. I've grown increasingly frustrated with him, because he likes to harp on his 'practical prank'.
I growl into my paper. I try to let it go; he's trying, and that's got to be good enough for me. It's so hard, though. I thought that after watching him and not trying to kill him then, I'd be fine now, but now that I'm interacting with him, it's so much harder to not overreact than I thought. The way he enunciates things, sometimes, sets me back to that moment, him laughing in our faces as he left his corrupted, alienated niece with her near-dead guard and faithful beloved, hoping for them to fight each other to the death. And I can't stand it. I cannot, for the life of me, bear knowing that he, in full consciousness, did that to me and Luna. It infuriates me that he doesn't even regret it, or pretend to!
There is a puff of smoke and the sound of short-lived flame. I look at my quill, and find that I made it explode with my anger. I toss it out. There's a few of them in the trash from the past few weeks. I open my desk, and pull out another quill. It's lucky that I drop primaries so damn often or I'd have to go out and buy quills. Not that anything is actually wrong with that, but I'm rather proud of my homemade quills. It's cool. I shrug away the anger of Discord and losing another pen and go back to writing. Soon the swerves and curls of the letters return to a swishing, loving flow that passes the dull day away.
As the clock strikes seven in the evening, Luna rouses, stretching on the bed. I turn to greet her but quickly turn back around. I hadn't notice, my nose being to the paper, but she's laying a little.. awkwardly. I didn't know what to do so I panicked and looked away.
"Good evening, my love.." Luna says sleepily from the bed. I don't know what to say with the, uh, afterimage in my mind still. Luna shifts and seems to realize the situation. I feel slight embarrassment come through our connection. I clear my throat and try to return to normal.
"Good evening, Luna, dear one." Though I mean it, always will I mean it, it seems to fall flat in the awkward atmosphere of the room. Unsure of what to do, afraid to meet her eyes, I half turn in my chair towards the bed. "Sleep well?"
"Ah, yes. I am feeling most refreshed, and I aided many ponies in their strange.. predicaments." She chuckles a bit at that, perhaps finding similarities between those things she solves in the night and what we are currently wading through. "Knights?" She seems pensive, worried.
"Yes?"
"Do you worry that we have not progressed to more… intimate methods of expressing our love?" I blink at that, eyebrows shooting up. Honestly, I had been bit worried that Luna would one night ask that of me, and I do not know what I would have done or said.
"I.. I wouldn't say 'worried'. It has certainly crossed my mind.. if you'd ever, well.." I scratch the side of my face with my wing, trying to hide behind it for a second. ".. because I don't know how well I'd do.. th-that is, n-not as an act- I-I'm sure I'd do well enough, b-but, oh gods." I just shove my hoof in my mouth, unsure of where this sudden anxiety and embarrassment is coming from.
"Perhaps you are unsure if you, as an individual… w-want that?" Luna supplies.
"Y-" I remove my hoof from my face in surprise at the accuracy. "Yes, exactly. How.."
"Well you see, I sometimes have to help ponies with dreams along those lines and, well, many times it crosses my mind that if you, hmm, ever wanted to, I wasn't sure if I could comply." She admits, relief and nervous feelings both flooding my head. "But I love you and I would try to go through with that if it would make you happy or show my love for you better. But it seems we are once again feeling and thinking the same thing, are we not?" She smiles, the awkwardness being washed out by understanding and connection.
"It would appear so." I say. I remove myself from the chair, and hop into the bed. "I always thought that if you asked I could, uh, perform, I guess, but honestly I have no need, no desire for such, as my own pony. Not that you aren't very attractive, my dear."
"I think I understand." Luna's smile grows more relaxed and natural. We always feel best just talking- why didn't I present this problem to her sooner, or she to me? Oh, who knows. The problem is solved now, it seems. "In so much as I find you attractive, beautiful, even, I do not find myself 'desiring' you in the traditional sense. I only wish to fill each night with your hoof in mine, our wing beats together filling the sky, a stolen kiss in court.." She giggles at that last thing, and I can't help but let out a laugh as well. Maclura and Jasmine are equally guilty of such but there are less eyes on them than us. The rush of adrenaline from sneaking something so scandalous in so serious a climate is exhilarating. I also think it's hilarious to wonder what some ponies might try to do or say if we were caught. We're a Princess and a Prince- are they going to tattle on us to Celestia?
We sit in silence for a few minutes before we both feel ready to get ready for the night. We have no court tonight, but there is probably fresh paperwork to be done. Luna slips on her regalia, and I put on mine. Luna had ringlets of the same dark metal as her regalia made for me, in the fashion of the Zebra if I'm remembering cultures right. Traditionally Princes who marry into royalty don't get regalia, and Luna and I are not married in any sense other than our immaculate bond, and I don't have the same ruling capacity than Luna or Celestia do, so I am not a Prince by title, not quite, but Luna deemed it necessary that I have something to wear to show I'm royal. Other than the stars in my mane and underwing, that is.
And besides the curling circlets that have carved moon and stars in them, I have a crown. No gemstone, only the cool, blue-tinted metal with a crescent moon in waxing phase on the forehead, where it rests against my temples, sometimes hidden by my hair. I look.. majestic. I am unsure how else to describe it.
If I had seen myself as I am now when I was younger I would have thought I was staring at a god born from the sky itself.. but I know I'm not. I am a humble pony who through the truth of their heart became something a little bit more.
Luna, as ever, looks marvelous. The dark turquoise of her eyes, the radiant stars in her ever-dancing mane and tail, the sweet blue of her coat.. always so beautiful.
A stray thought makes me wonder what we'd look like together..
"Good gods, what if we want children?" I ask. Luna is surprised at this, then takes a moment to think about it.
"I suppose if and when we desire a child we can review whether or not we wish to, ah, personally conceive this child. If not there is always adoption, and sadly there are always foals to adopt. I'm sure any of them would be ecstatic at having a family in general, let alone having royalty as family."
"How could we ever choose? If there's so many foals out there in need and deserving of a family, how could we ever morally choose just one, or even two?" I whine, suddenly concerned.
"Hush. I suppose need would be a good place to start on choosing. Not many orphanages are in need of funding or space, but we could start with those few that are, and make choices from there. I suppose.. we would know."
"Yes, yes, I think you're right." I say, letting myself relax. "Say, how much money do I make again?"
"You are allotted a few thousands of bits each week. I forget the exact number. It is ridiculously and outrageously large when computed to a full year's salary." Luna giggles. "You earn almost as much as me."
"You are more important than me, so it's fitting that you're the breadwinner here." I tease her.
"You hush that thought, you enormous goof." She teases right back. "Why do you ask?"
"I know you've got a large amount of your pay already set up to automatically feed into charities; why haven't I done that yet? I think the children are a worthy cause, and a much better use of my bits than them sitting, unused, gathering dust."
"You haven't spent any of it? Goodness it must be the size of a dragon's hoard by now!"
"When did I start earning this ridiculous pay?"
"Before I officially gave you your title… it's been months." Luna says, almost gawking. "You have quite a lot to donate, I think. So much so that you may need to think of other things to donate to if you are going to spend so little."
"Maybe we should just talk to whomever does our budgeting and have, I don't know, eighty percent of my pay be set up for such things anyway?" Luna shakes her head.
"There is an old, old law that states the royals must be given a certain percentage of the country's overall earnings, depending on the number of royals and ranking, of course. It would be frivolous to give all four of us more than ten percent each. I believe we now all earn around four percent, with you and twilight earning something more like three and a half percent. Anyway, rerouting that money would break that law. Tis why I have my own allowance set up for weekly donations to top off whatever charities are in need of funding, and whatever is left is put in a saving account."
"What on earth for would you need a saving account for?"
"You never know when the king of all dragons decides he doesn't have enough damnable gold. I should hope we would never need to gift such an ungodly amount of gold to a dragon again, but just in case we now have an emergency fund."
"Cool." I say, honestly impressed. "Wait, again?" Luna growls.
"Before you were born the first time, the then-king of all dragons heard of the rising power of our nation, and decided it was a good idea to threaten us. We were recently crowned, only a century or so into our reign, and did not wish to have a war so soon in our history. Celestia and I had recently discovered a mine rich with gold, and since it had not yet been figured into the nations earnings, we gave it to her."
"Her? Oh yes, 'king' is a genderless word to dragons. Continue."
"That is about all of it. It was ludicrous, though. It took two days of magically shoving earth and melting gold into travel-ready amounts for this dragon to take with her. We took a small bit of vengeance by throwing it all at her when we were done collecting all, though. The agreement was that we would give her all that gold, so we really gave it to her." She smirks, devilishly.
"And that didn't piss her off?" I ask.
"Oh no, it most certainly did. But she got her gold and I suppose that was enough for her. She sunk right down into the earth, an ocean of gold flowing behind her. Celestia has not heard from her or any other dragon claiming to be authority in a long time. We have no idea if she's alive or even the king anymore."
"I hope she's just living it up with all that gold, having a grand old time, and never wanting anything more than to live with that gold." I nod, being sincere but phrasing and toning it like a sarcastic jerk. Luna sticks her tongue out at me, and I reply in kind.
"Oh my gods, you're actually flirting over this?" An annoying voice interrupts us. I feel my face sink into a grimace.
"What do you want, Discord?" I ask as civilly as I can.
"I'd like to enjoy raiding the royal kitchen without running into you flirtatious children. Eeeuuuck." Discord makes a gagging face.
"Raiding the kitchen?" Luna asks with a flat tone and a raised eyebrow.
"Did I say raiding the kitchen? Ohoho, I meant with the bug spray, you know." He pulls an oddly dimensional spray bottle out from behind him, suddenly wearing a full body suit. The enormous black and red bottle does indeed say 'raid' on it, with a picture of a dead ant on it. I recoil mentally at that.
"You know we can just ask them to leave, right? They're pests but they can't help it, and they usually do what they're asked." I say, still a bit disturbed at how easily he disregards life.
"Really?" He asks, surprised.
"Yes, really." I respond.
"Did you honestly not know we have the ability to communicate with the creatures of the low earth?" Luna asks, looking up at him. He shrugs, vaguely wagging his arms around in a gesture I take to mean 'no'. "Well now you do, and I shall have to ask you to inform the head chef if you find problems with the kitchen and pest creatures. They will surely know what to do in such a situation." Discord nods at that, something suspiciously like guilt running across his face. He looks a lot like a child like that… As one thought turns into another I start laughing, all too loud, the sound filling up the hallway.
"Knights?" Luna reaches out to me, "What is so humorous?"
"I just.. I just thought… we could adopt Discord!" I sputter out and immediately go back to laughing. The idea is so ludicrous, so silly, so maniacally strange that I could not help but laugh. As I lose my bearing and fall over laughing, literally, I hear Luna's soft peals of laughter burst out as well, and they soon turn to hysterical heaving as she fails to breathe, eventually collapsing next to me.
We laugh for so long that Discord dumps his stolen ice cream on us, but the tantrum-like behavior only serves to carry the joke along. A puff of smoke, the smell of burnt toast, and he's gone. To me it's like he stomped away to his room, and when Luna gets the joke from my mind the laughter starts again.
The moon is almost late to rise that night.
