Sometimes the Sun is Cold
Princess Celestia was enjoying a warm cup of tea in the Royal Gardens. A few exotic songbirds flitted around her, and she couldn’t quite identify them. She made a mental note to ask the head gardener when next they met.
Celestia looked around furtively and sighed happily when she was certain nopony was around. She was rather deep in the private section of the garden, but it was a rare thing indeed for her to be truly alone, so it was always worth checking first. Carefully she slipped off her tiara and torc and set them carefully on a nearby pillow in the secluded patio. She stretched her legs and neck and shifted on her own lounging pillow. She flexed her wings and took a deep drink of her tea, it was almost boiling hot. She made a soft murr of contentment. The warm rays of her namesake lulled her into a deeper comfort, and she took one last very unregal gulp of her tea before stretching out on her pillow. It has been far too long since I’ve done this. She thought happily as she fell into a doze.
A hoofful of minutes passed before she heard a light hoofbeat approaching her from behind. It was clearly too light to be an adult pony. Celestia smiled to herself, only one young pony knew this was her favorite spot to be alone in the gardens. After a few moments the pony started to hesitate before stopping altogether a few hooves from her. Silence reigned for nearly a minute as Celestia struggled to hold in laughter as she imagined her pupil’s face split between the desire to wake her mentor, confusion at finding her in such a position, and fear of disturbing her rest.
Eventually, she heard the pony turn around and start to walk away, evidently trying to be quieter considering the slow, awkward steps. Celestia sprung up suddenly, and silently, and flared her wings to frame her body against the backdrop of the evening Sun, then she spoke with her regally amused voice, “Unless something has changed during my nap, it is still customary for my subjects to bow before leaving my presence, Twilight.”
Said unicorn nearly tripped over herself at Celestia’s voice and yelped as she caught herself, then, with all the grace of her fourteen years old body, or lack thereof, she made an about face, actually tripped over herself, and wound up in a pile at her mentor’s hooves. She quickly crawled into a proper bow and apologized, shaky, “I’m s-sorry Princess Celes-tia!” Her voice cracked on the last syllable and Celestia could see her face instantly transition from purple to scarlet.
Celestia immediately felt guilty, and maybe just a little bit amused, or, well, maybe a lot amused, but still mostly guilty, and brought the filly in for a hug with one of her wings. Nuzzling the petrified filly she apologized, “It’s alright Twilight, I was merely teasing you.”
After a few moments, Twilight returned the nuzzle sheepishly and looked up to Celestia before quickly averting her eyes. She took a deep breath, Cadance’s technique, Celestia noted, and spoke up with a minimally shaking voice, “O-oh, I’m sorry Princess, I just, um, I didn’t want to disturb you, but my question with the, I mean, uh, I can I-” She looked up at Celestia again and turned away just as swiftly as before, stepping away from her suddenly, “I can come back later, or another time, a later time, but maybe not later because it’s already evening, so I guess I mean earlier, but a later earlier not an earlier earlier, because I can’t time travel, uh, ugh!” Twilight stomped her hoof in frustration at her inability to speak, then quickly looked to the Princess and sheepishly smiled, before once again looking away almost immediately. “What I, I mean to say is that I can talk to you later, Princess, it was a silly question anyway, and-”
Celestia, who had been observing Twilight trip over her own tongue with growing worry, cut in, “Twilight, please take a moment to calm down. You haven’t disturbed me in the slightest; I’m always happy to spend time with you. And I’m perfectly happy to answer any question from you, my most faithful student.” Celestia smiled at her warmly.
Twilight slumped her shoulders and sighed in defeat, she made to look up at Celestia, but stopped herself just before her gaze reached the alicorn’s face, “Would you believe me if I told you I’ve forgotten my question, Princess?”
Celestia’s smiled sagged sadly, not that Twilight could see it, and she responded softly, “No, I don’t believe I would, but I won’t force you to ask it Twilight. I would, however, invite you to share a cup of tea with me.”
Twilight nodded hurriedly, she made to respond but her voice cracked and she had to clear her throat, “If you’d like me to, Princess.” And she walked over to one of the lounging pillows surrounding the low patio table that held one of Celestia’s personal tea trays. Celestia noted sadly that Twilight sat on the other side of the table, not next to her.
Celestia started heating the teakettle with her magic as she wondered what had Twilight walking on eggshells around her. I thought we were making a lot of progress. She was foregoing my title at our private dinner just two nights ago. Harmony’s sake, we had a conversation about mane styles just a week ago! And now she’s acting like one wrong move and I’ll throw her in the dungeon. Unbidden, the face of another filly entered her mind, a face she hadn’t seen in a very long time, the face of the first pony she had failed, and her thoughts fell into a very dark, and familiar place.
The whistle of the teakettle broke her dour trip down memory lane and she made an effort to smile as she poured the boiling water into two cups. As good as she was at faking her emotions, probably the best in the world, she was certain her current attempt would be hard pressed to fool a blind mare. All the better Twilight was avoiding looking at Celestia like the sight of her would strike her blind.
Celestia unceremoniously dropped a tea bag into each cup of boiling water without even checking what brew they were. She stared into the darkening liquid and became lost in what was approaching a millenium of regret.
Seconds turned into a minute. Then five. Then ten.
Celestia felt alone. Helpless against this cancerous silence that was surely going to take another student from her. Another friend. Another sister.
A tear fell into her tea.
“I lied earlier, Princess.” Twilight spoke up softly as the tea waves from Celestia’s tear hit the edges of her cup. Celestia looked up, afraid, and hopeful, that Twilight had seen her cry, but she was staring at her own tea. “I didn’t forget my question. It’s hard for me to ask it, but I’m not entirely sure why, and that scares me even more. I might be afraid I’ll sound silly, or I might be scared of your answer.”
Celestia waited for Twilight to continue. When she did not, Celestia closed her eyes and took a deep, but silent breath, I can do this. Focus on the now, focus on Twilight. She spoke in her regal and matronly voice, it was so opposed to how she was feeling it made her sick, “I promise you, Twilight, whatever it is you have to ask I will not be upset and I will not think you’re silly.”
Twilight made to look at Celestia’s face, stopped, took a deep breath, and finally brought her head up to look Celestia in the eyes, “Are you a god?” Her face was mixed between fear, confusion, and awe.
Celestia took a sip of her tea as she pondered how to respond. It certainly wasn’t the worst question Twilight could have asked, but neither was it an easy one. Thousands of memories related to that word, that g-word, flashed through her mind. Some of them happy, most of them not. The tea was a little salty and far too cold. “I’m not upset at all Twilight, it’s a perfectly understandable question, but might I first ask what brought it about?”
Twilight nodded absently and took a sip of her own tea, wincing from the heat when it hit her lips. She quickly applied a simple cooling spell and took another sip, “I was studying ancient pegasus mythology this morning when I happened upon a description of a ‘white goddess with hooves like mountains, a horn like the Sun, and wings like all the winds of the world’ and a depiction of a white alicorn. Then, I realized that book was actually one of my checkouts from the restricted section of the Royal Archives and not Dew Feather’s compendium of pre-Equestrian pegasus mythology. It was only seven hundred years old. It was a prayer book with a collection of hymns. Hymns about you. P-prayers to you.” Twilight snapped out of her recollection and remembered she was looking into the face of a maybe god and winced like the whole kettle of boiling water had been dumped on her, she looked away. “A-and t-then I realized we don’t have any gods. M-modern ponies, I mean. It’s so obvious, but I’ve never realized it, none of my history books ever even hinted at it. The gryphons have gods they worship, so do the diamond dogs, the zebras and buffalo are shamanistic, and the list goes on. I-I checked every book on theology and mythology I could get my hooves on, and every other species has gods or spirits, or, or, or something! But we don’t. And I realized, i-it’s because we h-have You.” Twilight looked up to her with fear, and reverence.
Celestia took another sip of her tea, still cold she noted as she reapplied a heating spell, and nodded. Granting ponies full access to checkout whatever books they wanted from the restricted section of the archives was not something she did frivolously, but not out of fear of dark magic run amok or truly horrible knowledge come to light. The truly dangerous stuff was kept in the forbidden section, and the truly dangerous stuff was stored in the ancient library of her own mind. The restricted section of the Royal Archives was where she put information that led to annoying questions, annoying questions with potentially dangerous answers.
But to truly learn you have to ask annoying questions, and sometimes you have to get dangerous answers.
Celestia was certain Twilight had already convinced herself Celestia was a god. Twilight had always hero worshiped her, Celestia knew. Things like that were sometimes unavoidable. But with the way Twilight was looking at her now? Celestia was afraid she was going to be asked to bless the tea.
Which made it all the worse that she wasn’t even sure of the answer herself. After a long moment Celestia spoke carefully, “It depends on what you mean by g-, well, by that word. I didn’t create the world from my tears. The Sun didn’t sprout from my horn. And I certainly didn’t birth sixty of each sex of each tribe to start ponykind. All things ascribed to me at one point or another.” Celestia tried to smirk with amusement, but the memories kept the corners of her mouth down. Twilight looked at her incredulously, but rapt. “I’m not perfect. I’m not omnipotent. I’m not omniscient.” If only I were...
Celestia finished her cup and immediately poured herself another. “But I am old. Immortal. Sitting on a golden throne in a city in the sky. Unchanging, unending. With the magic of all the tribes, and then some. And, you may not know, just about every culture had their own Sun god or spirit, until I came along. Nowadays, the movements of the heavens are more political than religious.”
Celestia glanced over to her Sun, now nearing the western horizon. Yet another thing that set her apart from her ponies, she could stare at her Sun with her naked eyes without pain or damage. She remembered the first time she raised the Sun, she had certainly felt like a god then. I was certainly as arrogant as one. Sometimes she still felt like a god when she touched the Sun with her mind and her magic, but that always evaporated when she had to move on to the Moon. “There are entire volumes of books written about why I am or am not a deity. Ponies used to fight over that question, sometimes violently. Thousands of ponies have dedicated their entire lives to understanding me and my supposed divinity. I think there used to be a temple to me right where we’re sitting, or maybe it was in the north wing of the gardens.”
Twilight looked around slowly, eyes wide with wonder, imagining, no doubt, just what a temple to the living Goddess of the Sun would look like. If she’s envisioning a garish amount of gold and tacky marble statues then she’s right.
“But very few of them ever asked what I thought about myself. They were far too busy ‘interpreting’ me, arguing about me, asking me for blessings, blaming me for earthquakes and blights, and building shrines and temples to me. Never asked me for my input on those, either. But I was young, a newly minted monarch, full of pride and enjoying my upgrade in status from homeless, wandering adventurer to royalty, so I let my subjects think what they wanted. As monarch I got blamed for plenty already, what was a little more? And if they wanted to lavish me with more praise and gifts on top of what I already got from my political position, well I wasn’t jumping to my hooves to tell them no.” Celestia tried again to smile, she got a little closer now that Twilight looked a little less reverent and a little more scholastically fascinated, but she didn’t quite get there.
“W-what happened then? I mean, why don’t ponies worship you now?” Twilight spoke up for the first time in quite a while.
Celestia did manage a smile this time, Sometimes I think they still do, Twilight. You all just call me Princess instead of calling me divine. “After about four hundred years I was sick of it, so I outlawed it.” She took another sip of tea, it was actually boiling from the heating spell she’d been applying, but it was still too cold. It’s amazing how you can wrap up so much history, so much fighting, so many memories in one sentence.
Twilight looked even more dumbfounded and amazed, “W-wow. None of my history books ever mentioned that, but, uh, I guess they wouldn’t if you, well…” Celestia knew Twilight didn’t approve of the way she repressed some knowledge, Twilight was a classic scholar in that way, and it was one of the young unicorn’s very rare critiques of her mentor, not that she’d ever voice it out loud of course. If you knew of even half of what I’ve destroyed…
“Indeed. There are several histories of the period buried deep in the restricted section somewhere, you’re free to read them of course. One of them is even written by me, under a pen name. I’d be very interested to see if you can figure out which one it is.” She winked at Twilight, who looked positively giddy at the prospect. Celestia smiled widely.
“I’ll do my best, Princess!” Twilight accepted the challenge eagerly, but then she looked away again, pensive. “But, you never did answer my original question.” Realizing how blunt of an accusation that was Twilight scrambled, “I don’t mean that you didn’t answer it! Just that, you, uh, I couldn’t quite unders-”
“I evaded the question you mean?” Celestia chuckled when Twilight blushed and sheepishly nodded, “I did, didn’t I? I guess sometimes I act my age and ramble on like an old mare. You asked a simple question and I started giving you a history lesson.” Celestia took another sip of tea. She hummed happily as its warmth hit her.
After several long seconds it became clear Celestia wasn’t going to continue and Twilight started to fidget, “Uh, s-so, what’s the answer?”
Celestia snapped out of her tea appreciation, “Hmm? Oh, I don’t know.”
Twilight stared at her, mouth agape, and Celestia couldn’t help but laugh, Twilight was unfazed by it, or rather, she was already as fazed as she could get so it didn’t faze her any more. “You don’t know!?” Twilight yelled, incredulous. Then, she clamped her hooves over her mouth and looked terrified.
Celestia laughed again and swallowed the rest of her tea in one swig, the gratifying warmth made her ruffle her wings happily, “Nope. I saw logic on both sides of the argument. I never really felt like I measured up to godhood myself, but that didn’t stop ponies from worshiping me. Eventually, I realized the whole thing was a meaningless debate. I am what I am and I am who I am. Maybe some ponies look at me and see a deity, maybe some of them just see me, maybe there’s no difference.” Celestia winked conspiratorially. “Plus, I’ve never seen another a god and I’ve certainly never been invited to any deities only events, maybe it’s because I’m not a god. Maybe it’s because there are no gods. Eventually, I came to believe the latter, and that was basically the last straw. After that I decided to outlaw worshiping me. Having ponies worship an atheist was just a little too ironic for my tastes!” Celestia laughed deeply, half at the absurdity and half in pain.
Twilight couldn’t see the latter and found herself laughing at the former. After several seconds of uncontrollable laughing Twilight managed to get herself under control, “S-so, hahaha, I guess, I guess, ahem, you’re…”
Twilight interrupted herself to finish her tea and Celestia finished her thought for her, “I’m Princess Celestia.”
Twilight finished her tea and smiled at the warmth, “Well, I was going to say you’re what ponies need you to be.”
Celestia smiled indulgently at the compliment and hid the pain from the millions of memories that disagreed, “I try to be.”
Then she reached out to the Moon to bring it up for the night. I try to be.
When she was done she found Twilight was looking at her with awe, and reverence, but with warmth too.
Celestia smiled at that.
She brought her teacup to her mouth but found that it was empty. It was probably cold anyway.
She put her regalia back on and got up to leave the garden. Twilight sidled up next to her. Princess Celestia held Twilight with a wing and the filly nuzzled into her, she felt cold.
That was the problem with the Sun, everything else felt cold to it.
Sometimes Princess Celestia hated the Sun.
“And I’m sure I’ll find your book by the weekend, Princess Celestia. I think I know what to look for.” Princess Celestia looked down at the smiling teenage filly poking her head out from under a giant white wing.
“And what are you going to look for, my little pony?” Celestia smiled warmly at her student.
“Warmth.” And Twilight ducked her head back inside her mentor’s wing and nuzzled into her side, she felt warm this time.
That was the greatness of the Sun, everything it loved it gave warmth.
Sometimes Princess Celestia loved the Sun.
Author's Note
Howdy everpony! 
Hope you enjoyed this little one shot. I wrote it in about two hours last night when the idea wouldn't get out of my head and edited it this morning, so hopefully you didn't spot too many errors!
I plan on having an update to my story, Twi-Light, out by this Saturday and hopefully more regular updates from then on out. Also, hopefully more one shots and shorter stories like this one.
Thanks for your time, dear reader! 
