The Plainest Principle

by Ice Star

Rating: teen
Tags: My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic, Twilight Sparkle, Princess Celestia, Romance
Length: 1544

Twilight learns something that she feels could change the relationship she has with her wife, but Celestia might have a lesson to teach her.

Twilight learns something that she feels could change the relationship she has with her wife, but Celestia might have a lesson to teach her.

Cover art by MagnaLuna. Reading by Lotus Moon.

Published 2017-11-12 21:10:06 UTC
Last updated 2017-11-12 21:10:06 UTC

No Homework Required!

The summer sun beat down on Twilight's exposed muzzle. She didn't care. Her dorky bangs, a reminder of a youth spent in Ponyville as unicorn and a young princess. That youth was over, and though she treasured the precious memories of friends long past, she was centuries old and still behaving like she was twenty right now.

She really should stop moping.

Sighing, Twilight Sparkle flicked one of her floppy purple ears in a vain and bored attempt to dislodge her crown. She used to not like wearing it, but now it was stuck to her like the star topper of a Hearth's Warming tree. But right now? She didn't want to wear it.

It didn't fall. Another failure to the name of Princess Twilight Sparkle.

Groaning, Twilight blinked her tired eyes. They felt like they were being fried by the noonday sun, as bright as the mare who raised it.

At the thought of her wife, Twilight's expression soured. She'd spent so much time trying to find a solution and...

"Pff," she blew at her purple mane and rustled her feathers sadly. She should go find Celestia, and go talk to her. Sure, they didn't have a fight... Twilight didn't think it was a fight, but Celestia looked so sad when Twilight ran off, and just watched...

She really had an outburst like that, didn't she? Centuries pass and she still was like a child. Luna certainly never really stopped treating her like one, and there were still times when Cadance's foalsitter streak showed.

Of every probable reaction Twilight envisioned herself having, that had been the most probable. Her research had been dismissed, proven useless by a mare who was always so, so patient and...

"Twilight?" a gentle voice asked, but there was no surprise in the words of this mare. Even her concern was walled up behind calm compassion that bled into every syllable.

"Yes," Twilight mumbled. "You found me, Princess Twilight Sparkle, Steward of Harmony and Friendship..."

"Hiding out in her old bedroom tower?" Celestia's voice contained a reproach and a smile. "Do you want to talk?"

How could simple kindness back Twilight into a verbal corner every time something less than stellar happened? Twilight knew. All she had to do was graduate from Celestia's prized student to being a 'junior princess'. And after that? Celestia's loving, if nerdy, and as Luna put it 'nutty' wife, stressed, smiling, and Celestia's favorite smart cookie.

She really wasn't ever going to live down that nickname. For a mare as smart as most ponies thought she was, Celestia killed her with kindness every time. How Luna could escape such verbal clutches was a mystery.

"I guess I could..." Twilight would've said more if she hadn't felt one of Celestia's soft, white wings wrap around her.

"You don't need to tear yourself up over this, Twilight," Celestia whispered, attempting to nuzzle Twilight's frown away. It didn't work this time. No giggles or smiles from Twilight.

"But this is serious. Our whole lives will be affected by this, watching everypony else..."

"Have foals," Celestia supplied, voice hushed and rose eyes worried as she looked down at Twilight, who shied under her wife's wing more in a silly attempt to hide from the taller and more graceful mare beside her.

"Didn't you ever want to have more?" Twilight asked quietly, ducking under a few feathers and recalling Celestia's talks of her past relationships with other mares and stallions. One of the ones with the latter had resulted in Prince Blueblood's ancestor.

"My other wives and I would often adopt, Twilight," Celestia murmured. She still looked directly at Twilight, who detected her concern more acutely. "And we had surrogates other times."

Twilight loved that soft serene voice that was so unlike her own. "I know... but I always wanted..."

A gold-clad forehoof silenced her gently. "I know, love."

"...And there's no magic in the world that can give us foals... none. Celly, do you know how crushing that is... to research for years and see the limits of what magic can do and... and... to learn that we can never have our own foals together?"

"Twilight," said Celestia, her voice calm and steady, "magic will do nothing now, and it never will. No mortal invention or surgical procedure could give us foals either. We are two mares, and we have always been two mares, Twilight. Every same-sex couple knows the same feeling you do..." Celestia's pauses and shakes her head to clear something from her mind, "No, they don't know the same feeling because you get to confirm everything yourself with research, but those ponies don't. No foals we have will ever have our blood, you knew this when you married me didn't you?"

Twilight was quiet for a long time. "I thought that maybe..."

"Twilight," Celestia said, hushing her again, "spells are not just whim, magic is not a machine, dead and your plaything. It is not science, but beyond it. Magic is not your reality gap or the bridge to your every desire, nor is it limitless. Have you truly forgotten something something so plain in your studying frenzy?"

Blushing sheepishly behind white feathers, Twilight licked the roof of her mouth, as though tracing out the rough draft of a reply. "Well... yes."

Knowingly, Celestia arched one of her eyebrows. "And?"

Finally, Twilight emerged from the cocoon that was Celestia's wings. "Is that my lesson then? 'Some things are impossible.'"

Before Celestia could reply, Twilight gave the larger mare a quick peck on the cheek.

"Your Faithful Wife," she signed a comma by substituting it with a boop on Celestia's white muzzle, "Twilight Sparkle."

When she was done, Celestia's patient smile hadn't faded. "No, Twilight, that isn't what I wanted to teach you, but I do have something I want to show you."

Now, that had Twilight's attention. Centuries of marriage to a mare as calm and collected as a solitary meadow had revealed many of her secrets, but not all of them. She quietly stood up and watched as Celestia lit her horn, encasing both in a teleportation spell of golden aura, the sparkling coat of magic shining around the both of them before the two mares winked out, and Twilight's old tower and balcony vanished-

-only for Twilight to reappear, blinking and slightly confused next to Celestia, who was unfazed and had a small twinkle in her ancient, ageless eyes.

They were on one of the main balconies overlooking a section of the castle grounds. It was the same one Twilight was introduced to Equestria as an alicorn on, and she used it almost every day, as did the rest of Equestria's royalty.

"Why are we here?" Twilight asked, looking around quickly, purple eyes scanning the balcony for any sign of a trick, but apparently oblivious to what Celestia wanted to show her, because Celestia raised a hoof to her muzzle... and chuckled into it.

"I think it is about time to introduce you to our children, Twilight."

Letting loose a surprise whinny, Twilight's eyes widened and she jerked her posture into something straighter, causing her bangs to bounce. "What?! Foals? We have foals? Foals that I didn't know about after centuries of marriage to you? Celly, what are you playing at?"

An almost impish smile danced across Celestia's muzzle, faint and fleeting. "Oh, Twilight you know some of them very well, but if you would like to be a better mother, then I suppose it is about time I introduced you to them, hmm?"

Unsure of what to say, Twilight nodded. "Y-Yes, alright then. Foals. As in multiple. And I didn't know about any of them..."

Twilight's ramblings only made Celestia smile before she nudged Twilight with one of her wings and guided the younger mare over to the balcony's edge, and gestured for her to peer over with the motion of a forehoof.

"What do you see, Twilight?" Celestia prompted when it became clear that Twilight's suspicious, puzzled looks at the castle grounds down below were only going to increase in how confused she appeared.

"The gardeners working on the floral arrangements for the garden party tomorrow?"

Celestia waved cheerily to one of them, not caring that the ponies were too busy to notice the princesses chatting casually far above them.

"How silly you are, Twilight!" Celestia laughed lightly. "These ponies are indeed our gardeners, but they are our children as well!"

Blinking, Twilight let the idea dawn on her. "You mean... Luna, Cadance, and you have had this secret philosophy on the ponies of Equestria and I was let in on it only now?"

Celestia waved a hoof. "No, no. Just me..." she paused, letting the words hang in the air, "...and hopefully you too."

Oh.

Oh.

Ducking her head slightly, Twilight joined Celestia and let her wife wrap a wing around her in a warm embrace.

"I do too, she said softly, ears pricked forward to catch the whistles of garden-ponies, hoofsteps, and birdsong, eyes eagerly assessing their activities."

Celestia smiled, leaning down once to kiss Twilight softly on the top of her head.

Author's Note

Just a short fluff thing I thought up a while ago, but never had the chance to write.