Dear Princess Twilight Sparkle,

I forgot, originally, how the exchange actually occurred. Everything was flowing back to me smoothly, but when I started to delve into the more detailed parts, my memory just wasn't able to keep up. Why, I asked myself, do I keep forgetting?

Is it because I'm old?

Some half-baked spell is blocking my memory?

Or do I just want to forget about Luna?

I don't know, but the only way to reignite the memories was to revisit the old castle once again. It's been about a month since my previous visit, and it looks just as it did on the exterior as it did 1,000 years ago.

The exterior was as far as I got, though, before the memories kicked back in. All I had to do was stand in front of the large double doors that held my story inside.

The moon hung directly above me. It was midnight.

The caretaker of the moon was separated from me only by a pair of wooden doors and a cold, dark hallway.

I glanced behind me, and down the stone staircase at the ground below. Every pony that had previously lived in the castle watched tensely as I prepared to take more ponies out of it.

I pushed open the wooden door with a hoof and peeked through into the hallway and scanned around for any traps.

There were none.

I stepped into the hallway and trotted down to the throne room. The carpet that lay on the ground did nothing to muffle my steps as I trotted past the vacant rooms. Every noise echoed off the walls, and yet that didn't faze me.

Nothing was fazing me much at this point. I was too tired.

I was able to function though. With a little help from Glowing Sera, I learned a spell that would wake me back up anytime I got too sleepy. I didn't have to deal with constantly fighting sleep, but holding it off until later was going to curse me once everything was said and done.

As I neared the end of the hallway, the throne room grew closer, its harbinger a warm light and the sound of hoofsteps pacing back and forth.

I stepped into the throne room, and all eyes turned toward me.

There were three pairs: Glowing Sera's, the male guard's, and Luna's. Or maybe four; I couldn't decide who Luna was at the moment.

"Is it finished?" Luna asked. She slowed down her pacing to a stop in front of the window facing the monument.

I stared into her eyes. I looked closely. They weren't able to focus well enough from so far a distance.

"Yes, half of it. Look out the window."

As Luna moved to the window facing the mountainside, I faced Glowing Sera. She must have switched out of her golem body and moved back into her original one. As usual, she didn't seem that worried about the situation. She pushed back a lock of golden hair out of her eye and flashed me a smile.

The guard, on the other hand, was still nervous. Although he had stopped shivering profusely, he was sweating a good amount. Whether from fright or from the heat of the lamp next to him, I wasn't able to tell. He had taken off his armor, which I would have done too. It was heavy, rough, and not very practical when you actually had to fight. He matted back his brown hair so it stuck to his azure coat.

And back I glanced at Luna. She was still staring out the window, closely examining our monument.

"Hmm."

"Hmm what?" I asked.

She turned around and stared at me. "You can't tell a lie, right sister?"

Could she tell? Had we done so poor of a job using illusion magic that she saw straight through our plan?

"I'd like to think I'm an honest person, yes."

"So tell me," she began with a grin, "is that monument real? It seems like you finished it awfully quick. How long has it been, about four hours?"

I quickly glanced back at Glowing Sera. Her smile had faded, and she started fidgeting nervously.

Honesty was something I was lacking that night. When your whole plan is to swindle somepony, you can't just flip around and admit it to their face.

And then I felt a jingle in my saddlebag. It sounded like two shards hitting against each other.

Two Elements of Harmony, giving me a curt reminder, Don't forget about us!

At the sound of the jingle Glowing Sera jumped slightly. She tilted her head and frowned, don't do it.

"Do you remember when we were kids, Luna, and we went to the creek by our house one night?"

Luna thought about it for a few seconds before nodding, "Yes. We only went once. What about it?"

"Do you remember what happened the morning afterwards?"

"I . . . I think you blamed everything on me. Even though you planned it, and you told me what to do the whole time."

"You're right."

I had no idea where I was going, but I was going to follow it to the end.

"You're stalling." Luna accused, "Tell me: is the monument real? Yes or no?"

"I learned a few things that night. The first, although simple enough, was that the night was very pretty. I think you were more infatuated with it than I was. That's not very surprising, considering how things turned out."

Luna was frowning. Glowing Sera was looking at me concernedly, and the guard was rubbing his hooves through his hair in confusion.

"Yes or no?" Luna repeated.

"The second thing I learned was that bugs don't like me at all. I don't see you ever having problems with mosquitoes but anytime I go for a walk I run into some, and then I have to go back to the castle and get checked for malaria. You're lucky."

"Answer my question!" Luna snapped. She had taken on a predatory pose, and seemed ready to pounce at any moment.

"The final thing I learned was that lying is really useful. It makes things way easier on small things that nopony cares about. A little fib never hurts. I felt bad, though, when I saw you take the beating for everything that night. Still, I continued to lie, as it was easier and you didn't seem to mind—"

"YES OR NO?" She commanded.

"Yes! It's fake! Do you think we can do that in such a short amount of time, in the middle of the night at that? What's gotten into you?"

I was fuming.

She was fuming.

The guard was gawking at us.

Glowing Sera was staring silently out the window.

And the room was silent.

I may not have looked it, but I was hating myself a lot at that moment. I had wasted the night's work, had my sister ready to (as far as I knew) kill me, and everypony waiting outside had no doubt heard me give away the whole plan.

Everything could still be okay, though. I just needed a twinkle in the air. If the element appeared, it was worth it.

I waited, silent. No one had dared to make a sound, and I could hear Luna and I huffing out air. There was a strange relief to facing up against her; it made everything simple. Whatever she was, I was against it. That was clear to me and her.

I broke eye contact with Luna and looked into the air, waiting. Nothing had appeared yet. No elements, no escape.

Luna straightened out of her fighting stance. I did the same, but we both cautiously kept our distance.

"Thank you for your honesty, sister." She wasn't smiling, and her tone was monotonous.

I stared into her eyes again. Nothing had changed. They were Luna's eyes.

She was scanning my eyes as well. Could I say the same for myself?

"How tired are you, sister?" She smirked.

I saw her game. It was simple enough: be truthful with each question I answer.

"Very tired."

"How did you all learn an illusion spell so fast?"

"She taught us." I pointed a hoof at Glowing Sera.

"Were you planning to trick me?"

"Yes."

"Did you think it would work?"

"I was hoping it would."

"Are you trying to overthrow me?"

"No."

"Are you trying to overthrow me?"

"No."

If she was going to barrage me with questions, I could respond with some of my own.

"What's gotten into you, Luna? Is something wrong?"

"Nothing is wrong with me. How about you?"

"I feel fine. Why would you want us to build a monument?"

"I . . ."

She paused.

"I'm not going to say."

"Then let us go."

"No."

"Why not? If you don't have a reason for it, we don't need to build it, and the three of us are wasting our time."

As Luna thought, I scanned the ground once again for a shard. Nothing caught my eye.

Glowing Sera was still staring out the window at the faux monument. Her horn was glowing, and she was concentrating on something.

She caught my glance and motioned her hoof in a twirl, hurry up.

"Yes or no, Luna?"

"N—"

She grinned malevolently.

"Oh, what the Tartarus. Go on ahead."

We all were shocked. The guard let out a sigh of relief, and I furrowed my brow in confusion.

"What are you planning, sister?"

She stared directly into my eyes.

"Nothing you can prevent."

I turned around to face the guard and Glowing and said, "Come on. Let's go."

They both followed behind me as I stepped out of the warm light into the cold hallway.

As we walked down, Glowing Sera caught up with me, and through gritted teeth said, "The illusion is about to drop. Once it goes, all of the frame will fall with it. I've been holding it up, but I can't do it much longer."

We walked faster.

I turned back around for one final glance at Luna. She caught my eye, before keeling over and wincing similarly to how the night started.

She threw her head up and pierced a look of fury into me.

I turned around and didn't look back.

At the end of the hallway loomed the two wooden double doors. I pushed one forward and opened up to see the crowd below in a similar state as I left them.

We stepped out at the top of the staircase.

I opened my mouth to speak. "My ponies of Equestri—"

A shattering crack rippled through the air.

All eyes turned toward the monument. The illusion had fallen away so it was just a wooden frame.

A wooden frame that snapped under its own weight.

As the planks, stones, and clouds toppled over one another into a pile of earth and dust, I reopened the door and listened into the castle hallway.

Luna didn't make a sound.

Once the monument was finished crumbling, I closed the door and faced the crowd again.

"Go set up a campfire. Get some rest, and we'll work more tomorrow."

They agreed and cantered off to different areas across the forest. I looked at the guard next to me.

"You should go with them. It's been a stressful night."

He nodded and went down the staircase to a group of ponies who offered kind words and comforting acknowledgements.

I turned to Glowing Sera, but she cut me off before I could speak.

"What were you trying back there, just giving everything away?"

"I was hoping for another element. Honesty."

She raised her hooves in the air. "Well, there isn't one. Look how great you did. If Luna wasn't planning something else, we'd be back to square one."

I nodded. "You're right. I was trying to force The Elements to appear. They don't want to, for me at least. It was foolish, and putting everything into jeopardy for a hunch was even worse."

"Well," she sighed, "at least you're honest about that. Let's go find a campsite. There's got to be one group that'll let us join."

She started down the stairs, and I followed.

Until a twinkle shined in the air.

A shard fell onto the staircase with a clink.

On closer examination, it was orange, and radiated large wafts of magic from its center.

"You've got to be kidding me."

-Princess Celestia

Author's Note

Well, I can't say where we are chapter-wise or how far we are on the word count in total, but I can say that we're around the halfway point for the story right now.

Get ready for some more twists and turns and I hope you enjoyed reading!