The Summer Sun Celebration was important for a variety of reasons. It was the day of the solstice, when the light touches the earth the longest. The sun stands still.
It was also, as far as the ponies of Equestria knew, the birthday of Princess Celestia. That they celebrated this was no surprise--rulers had grand celebrations of their own births and accomplishments all the time, and beloved ones could look forward to an adoring crowd eager to shower them in accolade. How the ponies of Equestria celebrated was only surprising to those who had not spent much time in the country at all.
Presents. Common presents. From the farmers of the southern frontier and the grim, determined ponies of the northern expanse to the highest of High Canterlot’s noble houses, ponies all over Equestria gave her gifts. They varied wildly. Cakes. Books. Artifacts ancient and modern. Scuplture. The occasional exotic pet.
Paintings.
Celestia sipped her tea in silence, still sitting where she had sat all morning. Still examining that which she had been examining all the while. Here it was, on canvas and mounted upon an easel in her study, a day early for the festivities and taunting her with its message.
It was not a golden sunrise--that had been the first surprising thing. Like biting into a chocolate you expected to have no filling and find your mouth filled with sweet strawberry taste. It was not of any morning she had ever seen, nor was had it any thing to do with the traditional sort of iconography she had come to expect of her little ponies.
When the door opened, she did not shift her eyes from it. “Good afternoon, Luna,” she said, smiling. “How are you? I would ask how you slept, but…”
She’d sent a runner an hour ago to Luna’s hoofmaidens, knowing that her dear little sister would be up sometime. If you wanted somepony to come to you, you didn’t chase them down yourself. No, you found the ponies whose job it was to keep their lives in order and you worked through them. Always worked. Secretaries were the fulcrum of the world.
“Yes, it is an old joke now,” Luna said, rolling her eyes. Celestia saw this because Luna cross in front of the painting, yawning. Having crossed the unwavering gaze, Luna stopped and followed it.
“Oh. The Summer Sun Celebration?” She asked. “Some things do not change, no matter what.”
Luna chuckled to herself before yawning again. “Is there tea left?” She asked, rubbing at her eyes.
Celestia nodded, not speaking, and Luna left through the side door to her private chambers. After a moment, she returned with a steaming cup and a content, just-woke-up smile on her face. Her magic adjusted the chair in front of Celestia’s desk to be slightly closer and then the Princess of the Night sat upon it without an ounce of regality. And Celestia kept looking at the painting.
So Luna did too, after a moment or so and a few careful sips. “It’s rather lovely. Whichever of the Houses sent it outdid themselves this year,” she said.
“It was anonymous,” Celestia said, her voice strange. “No name, not immediately traceable. None of my attendants have any recollection of who brought it. None of the art galleries reported selling such a painting--one of them openly admitted he wanted to buy it from me.”
Luna raised an eyebrow. “A secret artistic admirer?”
There had been a few, hadn’t there? Celestia allowed herself a moment to remember one of them.
“Perhaps,” Celestia replied. “I am wondering what to do about it?”
“Do?” Luna licked her lips. She tried her tea again. She preferred coffee, but the tea was warm and mostly pleasant and so it would do. “I wasn’t aware one had to partake of any particular course of action in regards to the existence of art.”
Celestia smirked, but it did not reach her eyes. “Chuckle if you must, but it weighs on me. I am not sure why, either.”
“So it is anonymous, and safe, I assume?” At Celestia’s nod, Luna continued. “Then what’s the problem? It is a mystery, a curiosity. Surely you can appreciate a bit of mystery, dearest Celestia.”
“I’ve not much experience with them,” Celestia replied, tightly. “But no, it’s not that. It’s... “ she sighed. “When you write a letter or say something, do you expect an answer?”
“Well, of course, ‘twould be rude not to answer my direct address,” Luna said. She frowned. “But a gift need not be reciprocated, especially if it is unmarked. One could argue that the lack of a name attached would even encourage you to let the matter lie.”
“Perhaps.”
They kept looking. Luna’s tail swished. She tried to take another sip and then blew on the liquid for a moment. Tea. She couldn’t stand it with milk, which was unfortunate. Harder to get it down to a reasonable, enjoyable temperature. But even too hot to drink, it was a good distraction. Tea provides a stop-gap for thought.
Luna waited. Even in exile, she waited on Celestia--ponies were always waiting on Celestia.
“To not answer would be to answer, that’s the problem,” Celestia said at last.
“What would you answer?”
“That… well, that’s another problem. The painting is lovely,” she said, her voice weak. “I mean… goodness.” She paused. “You know, it is almost identical to the Sunny Skies.”
Luna sipped at her tea and hummed something like affirmation.
“It’s of the same make, the same caravel shape. The same flag, even, though a bright sun and a bold silver moon is hardly that difficult to copy.”
Luna nodded, dumbly.
Celestia continued. Her eyes did not leave the painting, and yet she saw her sister very well. Live millenia, and you’ll learn that you notice everything by default after the first two thousand years. The long lived eye learns.
“In fact,” she continued to muse, “I rather think that it is the good ship Sunny Skies, first officer.”
“Mate. First mate.” Luna frowned. “Officer always seemed far too…” She waved her hoof.
“Official.”
“Boring,” Luna countered. “Stuffy. Static.”
“Mm. Mercurial, you are,” Celestia said with a little smile. “I think it is the Skies. Now, who would know about our old ship? More ponies than you’d know, but how many of them have a talent for painting?”
Luna looked away, at something in the corner. Something very small, very important, and obviously there.
“It’s good you arrived. I was actually going to send for you again,” Celestia murmured. “Hadn’t decided yet.”
Luna didn’t answer at first. She fidgeted. “Celestia… Sister, is it truly that burdensome a gift?”
“Burdensome is perhaps the wrong word,” replied the light of Equestria slowly, hesitantly, as if she were a slugabed groaning over the prospect of school. “But it will do. It is burdensome. I promised to always be honest.” As she watched Luna wilt slightly, she sighed. “But that does not mean it brings me no joy. I miss my ship. I miss the days when I was free to come and go, and when my responsibilities were light. I saw this waiting for me in my study, set up by my hoofmaiden Morning Glory and… well, she meant well. She told me that it was so lovely and that it would be just the best way to wake up. Verbatim,” she added. With every word, she grew a little faster in the explaining. “You see, I was taken by it immediately. It reminded me of the smell of the salty air, and the feel of it in my mane, and I let my Glory recede for just a moment. We never burned brightly aboard the good ship Sunny Skies.”
“Aye,” Luna said softly. “We were shorter, too,” she added.
Celestia snickered. “You were. And are.”
Luna rose to the bait like a drowning pony, plowing right along into an escape of laughter. “Not everyone can have such brittle features. Some of us were born to rule the fields of sport and battle, sister mine!”
Celestia let her mirth slip back into a gentle afterglow of remembered joy. “It was a good morning,” she said. “It was a good thing to see on this day. I’ve never liked the day before the solstice. The solstice, I have my ponies. The days before are longer and longer, and my comfort does not adjust in response.”
Luna stirred. “Why did you say nothing, Celestia? For surely, I might have provided some succor--”
But Celestia shook her head. “No, probably not. Though I know you would have tried,” she added. “Tried with all of your not-so-inconsiderable heart. And I love you for it.”
There was a pause. This one was longer. Luna no longer looked at the painting. Celestia’s eyes were pointing at it but not really seeing it. They were trying to not see each other.
To not act is to act. This was the lesson of Luna’s fall. It was a lesson she had learned over and over and over again, in ways both painful and joyous, in times both chaotic and dull. She had learned it upon that very ship now portrayed. If you couldn’t choose between fighting the sea or finding a beach and safety, the sea chose for you.
A curious detail: the ship’s crew was above deck, tending to the sails. She saw herself at the helm, smiling. She saw Luna and a pegasus working side by side as the good ship Sunny Skies lumbered into an unseen port. The pegasus looked familiar… but who? She wasn’t sure. Briefly, she wondered if that was important.
“I suppose someone could have… asked you for help,” Celestia said at last.
Luna’s eyes were elsewhere. “Yes, a pony could have requested our aid and memory.”
“The pony who gave this to me must love me greatly,” Celestia said, softly as could be. “In one way or another. This is exquisite. It reminds me of your own--”
She had misstepped. Luna shuddered. “I… I am needed,” she said. “I should be preparing for my own court.”
Celestia swallowed. She could keep pushing. She could have some sort of confirmation of what she thought. Yet, she knew that some things broke when you pressed a hoof upon them. So she bit her lip, and said nothing for a moment as Luna stood and finished her tea hurriedly.
“You’ll burn your tongue,” she said.
“It is a small matter.” With that, Luna said farewell. She left Celestia alone with the gift and a feeling of guilt as the Princess of the Day decided whether or not she had guessed correctly.
“So… so it was in her study?” Fluttershy asked.
“Yes,” Luna said, with a tight nod. She sipped, again, at tea. Fluttershy had insisted, and to be fair Luna was not opposed. It helped the telling, in fact. Her pauses and stumblings were easily disguised as natural things.
The Summer Sun Celebration had been wonderful. She had delayed her own sleeping in order to witness it, and had shared a quiet, intimate moment with her sister. The day had left her feeling both worse than before, and yet also… more at ease. Perhaps it was inevitability.
“And she… she didn’t figure it out.” Fluttershy fidgeted. “That it was…”
“She never suspected you,” Luna replied with a comforting, warm smile. It was the warmest she could muster. “Not even for a moment. I noticed you put a simulcrum of yourself working upon the lines alongside myself,” she added. “I thought it was a nice touch. I rather enjoyed it.”
“It wasn’t that close to looking like me,” Fluttershy insisted, face flushing slightly. “Oh goodness… I’m so happy she enjoyed it. I just wish I had the courage to send it with a name attached…”
Luna sighed. “Courage comes often in small steps, my dearest friend.”
She looked down at the dark tea in her cup, and it reflected a poor image of herself up at her.
When she looked up, Fluttershy looked off into space, paling. “Oh… Oh goodness, I had a dreadful thought.”
Luna was instantly alert. “What would that be?”
“By sending it… without a name, do you think I gave myself away? Not me, but…”
“You worry to fall into the archetype of the shy admirer,” Luna said with a sudden detachment.
“Yes… Oh…”
“Fear not,” replied the Matron of All Nights with ease. “Fear not, for though I believe she understood exactly that, it is not as if you had lied. She does not know who it was from.”
“I just… I just wanted to give her something that would show how much I a-admired her,” Fluttershy said, looking down. Some of the birds that were constantly flitting in and out of Fluttershy’s house sang their songs, but both the ponies in the room ignored the melodies. Fluttershy looked to her own thoughts, inside her own self. Luna looked straight at her. “She’s so gentle, so kind… she cares so much about every pony. I know it’s silly, and that’s why I could never tell the girls. But I’m so glad I could tell you.” She looked up briefly and smiled.
Fluttershy considered her gift. Luna considered her own gift, given also in secret but not anonymously.
“Thank you,” Fluttershy said. “Thank you for being such a wonderful friend to me, Princess.”
“Just Luna,” was the reply, given automatically without feeling. “Just Luna between us,” she added with a bit more force. She smiled back. “I am honored to bear your secret for so long as it is yours also to bear. You will not tell her?”
“Do you think I should?”
Luna’s gift was a miserable thing. It had been opened already and its packaging thrown aside.
“I do,” she said, and only by a miracle did none of her bitterness well up and escape into her voice.
“Telling a princess I think I’m in love with her…” Fluttershy chuckled sadly. “How ridiculous.”
“Not so,” Luna said.
Fluttershy smiled at her. “You’re too kind. Thank you.”
“Of course.”
“Maybe I’ll have the courage to say something. Eventually.”
Luna nodded stiffly. “And I shall be there to aid you, every step of the way. Your confession shall come to pass within the moon’s auspices,” she said, echoing without thought the formulas of another time. “And under its blessing you will surely conquer.”
Fluttershy giggled. “It sounds so dramatic.”
“Sometimes, love is,” Luna said. She felt sick. But Fluttershy smiled and it pushed away the misery that froze her gut. “I think love is most often a gift,” she said, and raised the cup to her lips. Fluttershy did not notice that they trembled--but she could be forgiven, with her dreamy eyes elsewhere. Her gift had been received, as far as she knew, with warmth and gratitude.
Luna understood gifts. Gifts were perilous things, and the best of things. In her day, they had been a matter of savage honor at times. A gift was really packaging oneself into a box and handing that box to some other pony, to do with you as they would.
Fluttershy gushed. It hurt. But her own gift she had right before her--a much simpler gift than Celestia had been given, a much simpler one than Luna had in turn given Fluttershy when she let her sister for a moment believe a lie. The gift she received was only her beloved’s happiness.
Luna found that simple gifts were the best sort.
Author's Note
Publishing this while I wait for Final Fantasy XIV to update.
Hope you enjoyed. No more flowery words--I've been told a few too many times that I'm bullshitting/chewing the scenery, so I'll just leave you a nice video link.
