Moving the Stars

Moving the Stars

Story 2

Chapter 3: Plans

By: WriteAnything

As we made our way toward Canterlot, I tried to make sense of what had just happened. While the spell was by no means impossible, her first successful attempt should have completely wiped Trixie out. Not that I was complaining, mind you. If my student could manage to pull off as many teleports as she did and still have the energy to do more, then teaching her the other spells I had planned would be much easier than I had anticipated. It was gratifying to see my girl happy and looking forward to her lessons, and as a result, it made me happy too.

We still had a small ways to go, and a few thoughts crossed my mind. Trixie didn’t know it, but my “test” was more than just fluff between her and my message to her. I had actually looked at it, and her answers made me a bit curious. The true purpose of the questions was to help me choose which spells from Starswirl’s journal I would teach her. While the teleportation spell was useful for pretty much any path a budding unicorn chose to take, not all the spells he had documented were helpful to all kinds of magic users. For example, you wouldn’t teach combat magic to an alchemist, or divination spells to a seamstress. If I was going to bring this up to Trixie, now was the best time.

Unfortunately, we entered into Canterlot City as I opened my mouth to speak, but instead of my mouth speak, my stomach chose to. My student gave me a nudge, giggling quietly. “Looks like I’m not the only one that’s hungry.”

I gave her a simple shrug, acting like it was no big deal. In all honesty, speaking to the mare about her magic over lunch was better than doing it on the way to lunch. Actually, it was less “on the way to lunch” and more “finding a place to eat”. The city had many nice restaurants, but most of the good ones didn’t open until the evening. Eventually we agreed on the Hay Hut, a local favorite. It was a gorgeous day out, so we decided take one of the outdoor tables. I made an attempt to speak to Trixie again, but this time, instead of my stomach, a waitress interrupted me.

As she spoke, I had to hide my face behind the menu; she had a Sirish accent as well, and Sirish ponies were more common as visitors in Canterlot proper, not employees. “Thank you for choosing the Hay Hut! My name is Amber Grain, and I’ll be your waitress today. If you’re ready, shall I get you started on drinks?”

I waved to Trixie as a gesture to let her choose first. She looked through the list for a moment before turning back to Amber with a smile. I have to admit, it felt really good to see her happy for a change. After she had ordered her root beer, I scanned the menu and decided to give this lass a little test. “I’ll take the Sirish Lifeblood.”

The results couldn’t have been better. “Oh ha ha, you’re so funny. One root beer and one fire cider coming up!” Amber Grain remained upbeat and perky, obviously understanding that it was an inside joke rather than an insult.

As the waitress trotted away to get out drinks, Trixie gave me a curious stare, complete with the raised brow. “Fire cider? Sirish Lifeblood? What was that about, is she a friend of yours?”

“Nah, fire cider is just a really sweet, strong cider that was first sold in Sirish markets. It’s really strong, and one swig would make most pony’s heads spin, but many say the Sirish live on it.”

The young mare rolled her eyes, chuckling at my joke. I had learned my lesson about trying to speak when expecting something, so I waited until Amber returned with our drinks. Both of us scanned through the menu, but Trixie beat me to the punch. “I’ll have the soy burger with hay fries, please.”

I was still perusing my options when the waitress was done writing, my mind still focused on how to confront my student. After a while, I just gave up and handed her my menu. “I’ll have the same.”

The mare nodded, wrote down my order, and went on her way. A second time, Trixie gave me that confused look. “Astro, is something wrong? You look like something’s on your mind.”

It took about three minutes and a heavy sigh for me to finally say something. “I’m just going to come out and say it. I did read through the answers on that test, and you’ve made me curious.” I set one hoof on my chin and waited for a reaction, but all she did was stare.

Eventually she began circling her hooves in front of her. “Okay? What about the test?”

“I’m pretty sure I told you I used the answers to determine what I was going to teach you, but you made that job quite difficult.” I actually had the test with me, so I opened it up and pointed to the questions I was focused on. “Here I asked why you wanted to learn more about magic, and you said-“

Trixie herself stopped me to read her answer, and something told me that would become a running gimmick in this conversation. “So I can be great.”

“Here it says ‘What kind of magic do you want to learn?’”

“Whatever is best for me.”

“What will you do with the magic you learn?”

“I didn’t answer that one.”

“I know.” I rolled the scroll back up and put it back where it was, scooting my chair up next to hers. “Do you see what I’m saying, Trixie? I can teach you anything I feel like, but I want you to learn spells that you will actually use. I realize that you’ve already dabbled in magic tricks, and I have no problem teaching you some pretty amazing ones. Starswirl the Bearded was quite the entertainer. And whether you believe me or not, you’re a lot like Twilight in the sense that you are not limited in what kinds of magic you can use. Your special talent is magic, so you are in charge of your own destiny.”

Trixie’s gaze shifted downward. I could only imagine what was going through her head right now. She began rubbing her front hooves together, and I set one of mine on them. “Tell you what, let’s eat first.”

Amber’s timing couldn’t have been better. She set our food on the table, the bright smile still plastered on her face. “Hope you enjoy!” At this point, I was sure all the optimism was fake as Amber skipped away. Before I could even turn back to Trixie, a large chunk of her burger was gone. My eyes widened a bit, and she stopped chewing when she saw my face.

“What? I’m hungry.” The young unicorn swallowed what she already had and began work on her fries. “Astro, you bringing up Twilight was either the best or worst possible thing you could have done.”

Talking wasn’t very easy when you were in the middle of a swig of cider, and I had a bad habit of taking huge swigs when I drank the stuff. After wiping my mouth and down a few fries, it was time to address her. “I’m assuming that means you either have an idea, or are about to tell me you want to end your enrollment.”

She nodded through another bite of the burger. Taking a bite of my own, I had to let out a loud “mmm”, this restaurant was better than I remembered. “You said I’m not that different from Twilight. Well if that’s the case, then I choose to learn what I want. That way, I don’t have to make a decision as to what to do with my life now. If I learn all kinds of magic, I’ll be prepared to do whatever I want.”

Hay fries don’t stay in your mouth too long after your jaw drops. “Trixie… that’s pretty profound coming out of you. If you don’t stop blowing my mind, I won’t have one left to teach you with!” I gave her a few proud pats on the back, accidentally causing her to spit up some of the root beer she was drinking. “Heh… sorry Trixie. I do have an idea though. If that’s really the route you want to go, I’ll let you look through that book and choose the spells you want to learn.” Before she could open her mouth, I teasingly poked a few more of her fries in it. “However, in order for me to be comfortable teaching you some of these spells, you must promise me that you won’t go showing them off.”

My words were met with a rolling of the eyes and a scoff. “Astro, do you realize who you’re speaking to? As much as I want to joke and say ‘The Great and Powerful Trixie’, I’ve learned my lesson about showboating… and cheating. You can trust me with using these powers responsibly.”

While my friend was not Sirish herself, she had been with me long enough to know our customs. A hoofshake was not just a friendly gesture, it was a sealing of a contract. Trixie knew there would be serious repercussions if she broke her promise now. “Alright then, I trust you. Once you get this teleportation spell down pat, I’ll let you begin choosing your lessons, agreed?”

She gave an assertive nod, finishing what was left of her burger before responding. “Agreed.”

I gave her a soft smile, finishing up my food as well. “Now, this will be tricky without preparation. Trixie, you’ve got tremendous endurance, and a massive well of magic. It would take a normal unicorn several steps to even begin trying some of these spells, but I think all you will need is more practice. With enough time and effort, the energy and magic these spells require will feel like nothing to you.”

Her eyes lit up at my words. She immediately hopped up from her seat, turning back towards the entrance to the city before I grabbed her. “Astro! Come on, I really want to get started again!”

“We can’t, lass.”

“Why not?”

“We have to pay for the food first.”

Trixie let out a nervous chuckle, returning to her seat. “Oh, right. I completely forgot about that.”

We weren’t going to leave until I said so, so I took the opportunity to mention something else as well. “Trixie, you really had no reason to feel the way you did. So, you failed a few of my tests, you screwed up a few spells, and things like that, but you should feel proud of yourself. You’re a quick study, as well, and I feel that you could learn this magic in a day or two if you tried.”

The eyes once again drifted down. Her voice was low and quiet, and the excitement on her face was erased. “Astro… I… we’ll need to talk about that later. It’s something personal that I don’t want to speak of out in public.”

I gave her a small nod, rising from my seat. “I understand, Trixie. We’ll talk about it tonight; for now let’s not waste any time.” We made our way inside to pay for the food, an air of tension between the two of us. Trixie never really told me much beyond what she would tell anypony else, and I wanted to change that. I assigned myself not only to being her teacher, but her friend, and had a strong desire to gain more of her trust. There was a lot about Trixie I didn’t know, but what little I did pointed to a rough foalhood. Tonight was the night I made it known that I was not only here to teach her, but to help her.

Seeing as how our stomachs were full again, I decided to give her a bit more practice. “Hey Trixie, if you want, you can try teleporting along the road. You need as much practice as you can get, and the more you work on this spell, the sooner we can move on to another.”

A bright grin stretched across her face as she did just that. The fact that she had already made my process into one seamless technique was amazing; and I found myself getting just as excited as her about beginning more lessons.

After about three teleports, she turned to me, looking as if she had stolen my trademark grin right off my face. “Hey Astro, how about a race back to the manor?”

Normally my silence was a way to say no, but this time I simply wanted to keep her in suspense. I waited for a few moments before popping up right in front of her with my own grin. “Loser cooks dinner!” With that, I gave her little time to react as I teleported a decent ways down the road and began running. Getting to the manor in the blink of an eyes would’ve been a cinch, but how fair would that have been.

Before I knew it, though, the promising mare was right on my tail. Honestly, though, I was more proud of her astounding progress than worried by her quick gap closing.  Eventually it became a battle of who could teleport the farthest in the quickest amount of time, but it made no difference. By the time we arrived at the manor, there was still no clear winner, and we were both out of breath.

I had to speak between pants as I tried to catch my breath. “You know what… I’ll cook tonight.” As the both of us made our way inside, we fell to the floor in an attempt to cool off. There was still more I wanted to say to her, but I was far too winded right now.

It took about a minute before either of us to get to the point where we could speak coherently. “That was amazing, lass. Looks like you’ve already gotten that spell down, which makes me comfortable teaching you something new right now!”

Having her stand up before me was mildly embarrassing, but I wasn’t too far behind. Though it didn’t matter, as I was on the ground again with a pair of soft, forelegs around my neck. “Oh, thank you, Astro! I just can’t wait! This is going to be just wonderful!”

Pushing her off, regardless of how little force I used, felt kind of rude, but her hugging was starting to hurt. “I’m glad to hear that, girl. I’ll grab the book, and you can flip through it while I put together a new lesson plan, alright?”

She gave me an excited nod, taking off towards the garden, allowing me to make my way back to my study.

It went without saying that I was in a hurry to get to the garden. Even after all the running and casting, I was still able to run at a decent pace. However, I noticed something strange when I retrieved Starswirl’s journal. I made a mental note to ask Astro about it, as I was positive crepe myrtles had blooming flowers this time of year. Unfortunately he was still in his study when I returned, so I decided to start looking at the spells while I waited.

There were all kinds of spells from healing spells, to combat magic, and even some magic made to change natural settings. I grabbed a quill and began to mark the ones I wanted, but after some thought I removed the ink. After all, it wasn’t Astro’s book, and we’d have to return it at some point. Instead I had Sapphire fetch me a scroll so I could write down all the ones I wanted. Pretty soon I was nearing the back of the book, and one spell in particular caught my eye. Out of all the ones I had written down, this would definitely be the most difficult to pull off. Heck, there was no guarantee Astro would even let me learn it.

Since Sapphire was still here, I decided to write a quick letter to the princess. Above all else, I did not want Astro to find out, so I made sure to request that she not reply until I sent a follow up. After it was sent, I began reading through Starswirl’s guide, and the great unicorn himself admitted to much trial and error when developing and perfecting this technique. It was an extremely complex skill, and in addition to regular lessons would probably take months to attempt. Not having Astro to help would only make it worse, but I made it my goal to learn this on my own.

Secrecy was essential, so I had the perky little dragon bring me a second scroll. This time I rewarded her with an emerald, which she scarfed down in less than a minute. With the new scroll and Sapphire’s satisfied sigh, I started jotting down notes. There was no doubt that Starswirl was an incredibly wise unicorn, but reading through his guide on this magic seriously made me doubt he believed in simplification.

“That’s quite the list you’ve got there.”

The book was closed and both scrolls were rolled up before I even realized what happened. After a few moments of heavy breathing, I turned to my mentor with the straightest face possible. “Do you have to do that every time I’m not paying attention?”

I was met with closed eyes, a satisfied smile, and a nod. “Until you learn never to let your guard down, yes I do.”

“Point taken. So what’s the new plan you cooked up?”

Given the amount of time he was gone, I expected some long, detailed schedule detailing his intentions, so the simple calendar het set down took me by surprise. “It’s simple, really. You choose the spell you want to learn, and I’ll mark it on this calendar with a specific symbol. I’ll continue to mark the days with that image until you’ve completely mastered it, and then I repeat this with a different symbol for every spell you learn. Once I’ve added three different sets of markings, I’ll test you to see how well you can transition between spells and how cleverly you combine them to produce a desire effect. How does that sound?”

Astro didn’t respond to my high-hooves very often, but it always felt good when he did. “Oh, I forgot to mention something. Have you been taking care of the crepe myrtles? The leaves are falling off.”

He raised his brow at me, turning in the direction of the garden. “That’s odd… I water them every morning. I’m sure it’s nothing I can’t take care of tomorrow and I’m sure you can’t wait to get started.”

I was eager, but not enough to tire myself any more that I already was. Instead, Astro and I spent a few hours doing other things. We checked out the bushes and mixed up a new batch of plant food for them, had another teleport race that ended in a loss for me, and we ended the day by playing a game of chess. I lost of course, and I don’t think it was possible to wipe the smirk off Astro’s face as he knocked down my king.

With an audible sigh, I rolled my eyes as it fell. “I don’t know why I keep agreeing to play you; you never lose!”

He let out a chuckle as he put the board and pieces away. “That’s because you keep me sharp.”

Even though I had just lost my 574th game of chess to Astro, I couldn’t help but smile at him. “You know, this is nice just spending time together.”

I couldn’t see his face from where he was in the kitchen, but I’m sure he was smiling too. “It really is. You know, if you want, I can give you weekends off so we can do this more.”

If things like this kept happening, then my smile would never go away. As I made my way to the dining room, I was presented with a delicious looking daffodil and daisy Panini. Of course I wanted to wait for Astro but he waved me off. “Go ahead and eat, lass.”

Who knew a day of fun could make you so hungry? The entire sandwich was gone before Astro even brought his over, and he let out another light laugh when he saw. “So, you promised you would tell me a certain something tonight, and it’s tonight.” He swallowed the chunk of his sandwich that was missing before he continued. “You know you can tell me anything.”

It took a deep breath and a few moments of confidence gathering before I could speak. “Alright Astro, I trust you. When I was just a filly, my father just up and left my mother and I. Of course my mother did her best to do right by me, and when I was old enough we moved to Canterlot and she enrolled me in a public magic school. I tried really hard, but I always ended up falling short, barely passing classes and moving up by the skin of my teeth.”

You knew you had Astro’s attention when there was unfinished food in front of him. “But one day, when I was 15 and just about to finish my third to last year, my mother died of an illness the doctors couldn’t diagnose in time. I was torn, and ran away from the school, ran away from Canterlot. I knew I had to get by somehow, so I became a traveling magician, going from town to town and doing small shows for petty change. After a year of that, I had built up a little bit of money and decided to try and finish schooling. Sadly, they didn’t let me back in.”

He let Sapphire finish his meal, a forlorn expression on his face. “And that’s when you did all you could to get into Celestia’s private school, and when she assigned me to teach you two years ago.” Scooting his chair over to me, he set both of his hooves on mine, trying to get me to raise my head. “Look at you now. You’re a beautiful, talented young mare with an entire life ahead of her. Trixie, you’re 19 now, and it’s time to leave the past behind you.”

Tears were forming in my eyes again. My forelegs were around him before I knew it, and his were around me. “Maybe, but those continued failure’s always made me feel like nothing. Astro, for the first time in a long time I feel like I can actually make something of myself, and I don’t want to go back. I don’t ever want to go back again.”

There was no holding back this time, but with Astro holding me, I no longer felt the need to. Besides, I’m sure Astro didn’t mind having a wet shoulder for a bit. “Believe me, Trixie, you won’t ever go back, I can promise you that.”

My crying first started because of the memories from my past, but as Astro spoke, and I realized exactly what he meant to me, my sadness was turned to relief. “Thank you, Astro. Thank you.”

He kept me close, really not seeming to mind that I was soaking his pretty green coat. “I’m going to do everything I can to make you a great and powerful unicorn. And no matter what, even after you graduate, I’ll always be here.”