Princess Luna ran her brush along the canvas before her, adding new waves of purple to her painting. A smile wiggled its way onto her face as she did, causing her to flourish the brush with an added air of giddiness.
She hummed softly to herself and felt a cool breeze brush past her legs. Luna shivered. That was the one downside to painting on her balcony, it was always so gusty.
But, gustiness aside, it was still the best place for her to paint. That was due, in no small part, to the lighting. With the sun just above her, she couldn’t ask for a better venue to create.
Speaking of the sun...
Shifting her gaze upward, Luna was delighted to learn the sun was still enjoying its perch in the sky. Her eyes darted across the castle to the balcony opposite hers and saw no sign of her sister.
Excellent, she still had some time left.
Glancing back to her canvas, she paled. Her mutinous magic had decided while she wasn’t looking it would be a good idea to run the brush across the canvas. Now a wide purple band stretched across her painting, invading the navy blue patterns she’d worked so hard to create.
Too much purple? She thought, taking a step back to inspect her work. Gods above, yes.
Luna tapped her chin and tried to find the best way to remedy this travesty. Right now, everything contrasted in a way that made her sick. Her two main colors weren’t blending right. It brought down the overall saturation of the painting. Everything was flat-toned, lacking a single focal point and even her shading looked distorted.
...Okay, so Luna didn’t know what any of that actually meant. She was no art critic after all. But even she understood that the painting before her had too much purple! And with her deadline approaching, too much purple might as well have been the return of Tirek.
She stopped tapping her chin and noticed a growing dampness. With a blink, she looked down to see she’d been using the tip of the brush this whole time. Giving her mirror a quick glance, Luna saw the new splash of color she had so artfully decided to add to her coat and groaned.
Freaking purple.
About to turn away, the corner of her eyes held fast on her reflection and she turned back for a second eyeful. Scrutinizing her chin a little more, Luna thought she might have to retract her groan. This shade of purple actually went well with her coat color. Maybe even well enough to save her artwork.
She focused back on the painting, picturing her own colors meshing with those on the canvas.
“Yes…” she murmured to herself. The brush found it’s way back onto her palette. “That could work.” It was an idea so crazy, so insane, so off the wall—
Oh, who was she kidding? It was a safe choice. As much as she had improved over the last few months, Luna couldn’t deny that she wasn’t much of a risk taker when it came to her paintings.
She laced her brush with sky blue first, thinking a lighter first coat followed by a darker overcoat would help it pop more. Her brush nudged its way into place and she gently, carefully, began painting again.
“Princess Luna?”
“Ah!” The shock of having the sanctity of her silence invaded caused her magic to flicker and send her brush scurrying across the page. Luna winced and dropped the brush at once, but the damage had already been done.
A long, thin streak of sky blue curved across her painting, like a knife cutting into a perfect cake and not being gentle in the way it forced a slice off.
Everything was ruined.
“Uh… Luna?”
Sighing, Luna turned away from the disaster in front of her to face her interloper: Twilight Sparkle.
“Hello, Twilight,” Luna said, masking her disappointment like a champ. A champ who’d just had their birthday cake ruined. “What brings you to my chambers?”
Twilight wrapped something in a lavender aura and lifted it up for Luna to see. A book.
Of course.
“I just wanted to return this to you,” Twilight explained as Luna left the balcony to meet her fellow princess in the main room. “Thanks for letting me borrow it. I had a blast learning about nighttime cartography!”
Had it been anypony else, that sentence would have been dripping with enough sarcasm to fill a bathtub, but it was Twilight, so one could assume anything she said about books could be taken with complete sincerity.
“You’re most welcome, Twilight. I’m glad you enjoyed it.” Luna gave a smile that didn’t quite reach her eyes.
Oh yeah, masking that disappointment all right.
“Is something wrong?” Twilight asked, somehow able to see through Luna’s award-winning performance.
“Tis nothing,” Luna slipped back into her old speaking habits, a sure sign to anypony that knew her that she was being defensive.
“Was it the book?” Twilight asked, jumping to conclusions already. “Did I not return it on time?”
“Nay, I am no librarian.” Luna coughed into her hoof. Stupid Old Speech, how does Tia manage to not use it everyday?
“Then what is it? You can tell me.”
Luna sighed. No use arguing at this point; if Twilight had sniffed out a problem she wasn’t going to rest until she’d exhausted every option in an attempt to fix it. She took a step to the side, revealing the ‘artwork’ she’d left back on the balcony.
“I ruined my painting.”
“What?” Twilight’s gaze shifted from Luna to the portrait across the room. She trotted forward for a better view and saw the insult to the world of art Luna had tried to hide. “Oh…” She turned back to Luna. “I didn’t know you painted.”
“I’ve picked it up in my free time. I needed something to do when I’m waiting for my sister to start lowering the sun.”
“Oh, okay.” Twilight looked back to the painting. Barring the one blue streak, it was pretty obvious what it was supposed to be. “You were trying to paint the night sky?”
Luna nodded. “Yes. I always try to picture how I’m going to make the night’s sky look before I raise the moon. Painting’s given me an easy way to visualize it.”
Twilight furrowed her brow. “You paint that every day? Wouldn’t it get boring after a while?”
“How so?”
“It’s just…” Twilight struggled to find her words, trying to not offend Luna by accidentally saying her night looked boring. “It’s just the same every night, right? How many paintings of the same sky do you have?”
Luna’s eyes darted over to her closet door, knowing the tidal wave of canvases that were waiting on the other side. “A… A few.” She shook her head. “However, it’s not the same sky every time.”
“It isn’t?” Twilight raised an eyebrow.
A twinge of disappointment hit Luna; she’d hoped an aspiring astronomer like Twilight would’ve figured it out by now. “I’ve made subtle changes to it every night since my return, be it correcting imperfections or just fooling around a little.”
“Really? But I’d never noticed…” Twilight pressed her lips together. “Well, I guess I haven’t been stargazing a lot lately.”
“Probably not,” Luna agreed.
“So why only subtle changes?” Twilight asked. “I’m sure lots of ponies would love looking at the night sky more often if you did something big, or dramatic.”
“I could do that, but if I rearrange too many stars—” She nudged her head to the book Twilight had left on her bed. “—What would become of nighttime cartography? So many ponies rely on my stars for navigation, so I have to be careful about which changes I make. Though I do have fun with it every now and again.”
“Really? Like what?”
Luna gave it some thought. “Well… for my sister’s birthday last year, I made a new constellation just for her.”
“What was it?”
Luna grinned. “A slice of chocolate cake.”
Twilight snorted. “No.”
Luna’s grin reached her ears. “Yes.”
“You’re terrible,” Twilight snickered. “You know she’s on a diet.”
She finally joined in Twilight’s laughter. “Hehe… yeah…” The joy left as soon as it came. “It does get a little boring though, only making inconsequential changes nopony ever catches. In truth, I’ve had more fun with the paintings than I’ve had with my own night recently.”
“Really?” Twilight turned back to the canvas, noting the blue streak once more. “I…I’m sorry I ruined this one.”
Luna felt the remorse in her tone and gave Twilight a pat on the back. “Don’t feel bad, it’s only a single painting after all.”
“Can you fix it?”
Luna looked up and out the balcony at the sky. In the tower across the castle, she could see Celestia step out onto her own balcony, horn alight. Only a few moments went by before the sun slowly began its descent.
“I could,” Luna admitted. “But not in time to raise the moon. And then, why bother? No need to visualize the night sky after it has been made.”
“I guess so.” Twilight’s eyes lingered on the painting once more. “You know, it’s too bad there isn’t one of those in the night sky. Then your painting would be perfect!”
“Yeah, it would,” Luna murmured. It’s a shame I can’t just throw a bright blue line into the night sky… unless…
“Well, I guess I’ll get out of your mane,” Twilight said, turning to the door. “I’d hate to interfere with the raising of the moon.”
“Thanks.” Luna paused in thought as Twilight walked to the door. “Oh, and thank you for returning my book!”
“You’re welcome,” Twilight said as she disappeared.
Luna turned back to her painting, her magic withdrawing the brush from the floor. She took another look at the blue brush stroke, then back up to the sky. As the sun continued to set, it bathed the sky in oranges and pinks, preparing for the soon dark of night.
I wonder if I could put a blue streak up there. Luna tapped her hoof on the floor. Tia paints the sunset with so many colors. I’m sure I can use a few extra for night time.
Of course, it couldn’t be just a single blue streak. That felt so… incomplete. Luna scooped up her palette and drove her brush into one of the more seldom used colors: green.
She flung across the page, not worrying about symmetry, or color balance, or anything like that. Her painting was already ‘ruined’, so why not have a little fun with it?
Halfway through, Luna decided that just random streaks in the sky would be stupid on their own. So she filled it in.
Running her brush from the streaks to the top of the canvas, Luna painted lightly, giving off the feeling of transparency. The streaks took a new shape and they now appeared to be flowing in the night air. Like shimmering silk fluttering on a clothesline.
Hmm… Night Silk… that’s a good name for this.
Giddy, Luna giggled a little. This was actually kind of fun! All she was doing was tossing a splash of color into the mix, but it somehow made her night look all the more stunning. She finished by flinging flecks of gold around, making the Night Silk have a special sparkle to it.
Perfect. Luna stepped back to admire her work. She noticed that the sun was beginning to dip below the horizon, meaning she needed to start raising the moon.
A brief moment of panic hit Luna as she realized she hadn’t put any thought into how this was going to work, but that wasn’t about to stop her. The night sky was her true canvas; on it, she could paint anything.
She lit up her horn, taking hold of the moon. It was time for the real art to begin.
Twilight appeared in her living room with a bright flash of magic. It had been too late to take the train home from Canterlot and there was no way she was risking flying the in dark when she could barely fly well in the day time. No, teleportation had been the best option. Despite the strain such a long distance jump placed on her.
Wobbly, Twilight aimed for the nearest couch and flopped onto it with perfect accuracy. She closed her eyes, thinking she might just fall asleep here tonight. That was regal right? A princess sleeping on the couch?
Nah, it would be okay.
Sighing, Twilight relaxed her body and started drifting off to dreamland.
“Twilight! Hey, Twilight!”
Groaning, Twilight opened her eyes as Spike ran into the room. “Yeah?”
“Have you seen it yet?” Spike asked.
“Seen what?” Came her sluggish reply.
“The sky, it’s… I can’t even explain it. Come look!”
He darted over to the nearest window and all but shoved his head out, beckoning Twilight to follow suit.
As she pried herself up from the couch, Twilight found herself concerned. Was something wrong with the night sky? She hoped that messing up Luna’s painting hadn’t been the cause for this.
Trotting over to the window, Twilight yawned and peeked outside.
Then she rubbed her eyes and looked again.
The sky was… stunning. Sheets of vibrant light danced across the horizon like curtains of greens and blues. They reached out far and wide, rippling in the air as they shimmered over.
Twilight saw ponies leaving their homes and looking up at the marvel, unsure of what it meant or if it even meant anything.
Gaping, Twilight wondered if Luna had turned that single streak that had ruined her painting into… this. Surveying the sky, she noticed the rays of lights all seemed to point to one spot in the sky, a single constellation. There wasn’t a doubt in Twilight’s mind that this constellation was as new as the lights around it, and she also didn’t doubt it was just for her.
