Vengeance is a Dish Best Served Cold
Passion is a Dish Best Served Hot
I glared at the murderer reading peacefully in the park from over my menu. Yesterday, it had been a picnic. The day before that it had been a pet play date. Laughing? Smiling? Books and games? Murderers didn’t deserve those, and Twilight Sparkle was a murderer of the worst kind.
She killed ponies’ hopes and dreams.
“Everything I ever worked for… gone.” My jaw ached from grinding my teeth. “Princess of Friendship? Hah! My friends all hate me now because of her. I’ll make her pay if it’s the last thing I do….”
“Something to accompany your brooding, madame?” The waiter was back. My sweet, vengeful muttering could wait.
“Something cold.” I shoved the menu over to them. “I don’t care what.”
“As you wish.” The waiter bowed. “And would you care for anything, Princess?”
“Coffee, black, if you please. The strongest you have. I have much to discuss with Miss Glimmer here.” There was an alicorn at my table that hadn’t been there a second ago.
Not. Good.
I teleported reflexively, and the world around me shattered. With a start, I jolted up from my bed in the Ponyville Inn; I panted, sweat trickling down my muzzle.
“Just a dream…. J-just a dream.” I hugged myself. “They haven’t found me yet.” I got up to double and triple check the wards. “They haven’t found me yet….” I frowned. “And they won’t—not until it’s too late.” Getting back in bed, I glowered at the ceiling as I counted the number of ways I would make Twilight Sparkle pay.
“Maybe tomorrow I’ll charm her waiters to spit in her food again.” I closed my eyes and cast a sleep spell on myself, not even pretending to waste time getting back to sleep.
The scene of Twilight grovelling at my hooves was too good to be real, but I intended to savor every second of it. I wasn’t even sure what my scheme had been. She was crying, though, and it was deliciou—
The dream shattered to be replaced with an eerily familiar restaurant.
“Hello again, Starlight Glimmer.”
“Oh, you have got to be bucking kidding me. You were real!” I instantly primed my horn, my body shaking for two completely different reasons.
“Yes, I was real, and it was rather rude of you to leave before I got my coffee.”
“Screw you and your coffee! I was having a great dream until you brought me back here!” I snorted. “What do you even want?!”
Luna sipped her foul, black sludge silently for a few moments.
“Well?!”
She took another infuriating sip.
“You here to rub your cutie mark in my face like your little lavender lapdog did?!”
A frown marred her regal visage. “Peace, Starlight Glimmer. For now, I wish you no harm. I have merely come to warn you that I have walked the path you now tread; there is nary a more slippery slope.”
“Oh, ha dee ha-ha.” I rolled my eyes. “Like a princess could understand somepony like me. Your cutie marks basically hoofed you the world on a silver platter.”
“I understand much more than you think.” Princess Luna's eyes narrowed. “One does not simply succumb to the Nightmare guilt free. I know quite well what it means to crave vengeance.”
“Well then, you’ve clearly forgotten; it isn’t exactly eternal night nowadays.” I pushed my seat back and began to walk away. “I’m going to burn her life to the ground, her friendships and books included!”
“There is still time, Starlight. If you turn yourself in, we’ll—”
“You’ll what?!” I quickly turned the other way when I found my table right around the corner of the intersection I was about to take. “Toss me in a dungeon?! No thanks!”
“We can help you, Starlight Glimmer!” The table and Luna persisted no matter where I went.
“Hah! If you really wanted to help, you’d be plotting here with me! You have just as much reason to hate her as me!”
The table stopped following me when I said that, but I didn’t stop moving. No. A couple blocks away, I actually broke into a canter, dodging and weaving through the alleys of Canterlot.
Wait. Canterlot?
I skidded to a stop and peeked out into the streets to see I was indeed in Canterlot. The ponies were trotting with upturned snouts, the buildings all gleamed with a bit of gold, and that Discord-damned school of Sunburst’s stood and taunted me in the distance. Just looking at it made the sky darken and fill with the rumble of thunder.
“Such an odd choice.”
I jumped and spun around to find Princess Luna behind me. “Gah! Will you just leave me alone?!”
“No.”
Sipping slowly from the coffee levitating beside her, Princess Luna gazed at me from over her cup until it was empty. After emptying it, she crushed it, tossing the styrofoam over her withers and igniting it before it could hit the ground.
“I told you: I have walked this path before, and I refuse to see it walked again. You are not alone, Starlight Glimmer, even if you think you are. You think I cannot understand your pain? Then show me.” She waved her hoof towards the school in the distance—the only bit of the dream cast in shadows and darkness. “What Nightmare haunts you here?”
“Hmph!” I tossed my mane back with a snort. “What kind of problem wouldn’t I have with it? Celestia’s Oh-so-gifted School for Arrogant Snots?! Hah! It represents just about everything wrong with cutie marks!”
“That is not what I—”
When I stomped the ground, the dream trembled. “It snatches up ponies from their homes—separating friends and family from each other—and for what?! To give even more of an edge to ponies who already have everything they need?! What gives anypony the right to do that?!”
“Starlight Glimmer, calm yourself or you’ll—”
“If everypony was equal, nopony would need to go to that Discord-damned school! Nopony would want to go!” The world was cracking and my vision was blurring. “Maybe then I wouldn’t have been left alone!”
“—shatter your dream to pieces.”
Lightning flashed and thunder rumbled as fragments of dreamspace and rain cut into me beneath the now overcast sky. The wind was drowning out the rest of Princess Luna’s voice as I glared at the school that now towered above me. Her hoof briefly landed on my withers, but I just shrugged it off like the dead weight the princesses were.
“Arrrrrrgh! Stupid Sunburst!”
As I screamed, I stomped the ground once more and cracks starting running through it. My horn blazed to life, and I ripped the entire school off its foundation to force it into an itty-bitty teeny-tiny pebble I could crush beneath my hooves.
And by the stars did it feel so good.
“Serves you right!” I didn’t even feel the rest of Canterlot breaking apart as I stomped on the school-made-pebble over and over and over again, and I laughed as I fell to the base of mountain.
“Serves. You. Right!”
I woke up rather violently as I fell to the floor in a heap—the first of many things that day that made me question my resolve. The hot water was out in the bathroom from some ditzy mailmare crashing into a hydrant. My conditioner bottle was a splat on the wall from the cold shock, and I slipped on some soap getting out. Then, breakfast was soggy when I finally made it downstairs, and the rain started almost the instant I finally made it out to go hunting Twilight Sparkle.
Topping it all off, after several hours of unsuccessful searching, I found out the putrid purple princess was gone. She went all the way to Canterlot to give a series of speeches at that damned school—because of course she was an alumni—and she wouldn’t be back for another couple of days.
Despicable.
Drip-dropping my way back to the inn, I shambled through the door, crawled up the stairs, and threw myself through the door back into my bed. Pillow met face, and I screamed into it until my throat was sore.
It wasn’t enough.
I pulled back to start pummeling the pillow with hooves until the innkeep rang the bell for dinner. Only then did I get up and cast a few spells to make me appear flawless once more. Running a hoof through my mane, I tossed it back and looked in the mirror.
I was… passable at best…. There was nothing to be done for my bloodshot eyes or snotty nose, though, so I sighed and headed towards the door.
Maybe everypony would think it was just allergies.
No? No. Why did I even let myself hope that?
At least it got me a free meal…. The food was about the only thing to like here, as loath as I was to admit it. The muffins back home were just too… yeah…. Our food had always been something I couldn’t fix no matter how hard I tried.
Celestia, I missed those muffins.
I trudged back up the stairs to slip into bed, sniffling myself to sleep. Even in my dreams, I just wanted to cry the night away, and I did so. I buried my head right into my soft, blue pillow, and I kept my warm, downy blanket wrapped around me while—
“Tell me who this Sunburst is, Starlight Glimmer.”
I froze, not even daring to breathe as my mind connected the dots.
“Starlight?”
“Gah!” I immediately teleported from beneath Princess Luna’s wing and across the room. “What are you doing?!”
Her smile was small and hesitant. “I was… comforting you? Please forgive me. Many of the foals I help need more than just advice; I acted without thinking.”
“I am not a foal.” I grounded my teeth together.
“No, you are not….” Her smile solidified. “Although, you certainly have the temperment of one.”
“I do not!” Stomping my hoof, I turned around in a huff. “Where did you even take me, anyways? This room is so edgy it feels like I’m being stabbed with a rusty spoon.”
“Is this not your old foalhood bedroom?” She turned her head and looked about. “I found you here as a filly, crying your eyes out.”
Suddenly, the floor was much more fascinating as I realized it was indeed my bedroom. “No….”
“There is nothing to be ashamed of here.” Princess Luna cupped my chin in her magic and forced me to look up and see her frown. “I have found plenty of ponies in much more embarrassing situations, my sister and Twilight Sparkle included.”
“Yeah… right….” I couldn’t work up the will to snort and shrug her off. She’d already seen me at my weakest. What was the point?
“Starlight, please….” Luna shifted on my bed and the spring screeched in protest. “I’m trying to help you here. Who is Sunburst?”
“He’s—” I bit back my first response when I heard the giggling of a pair of foals from the window. “He’s nopony….”
“If he was actually nopony, I’d doubt you’d have reason to bawl your eyes out in here.”
“I wasn’t bawling; I was sniffling!” I ground my teeth together. “Today I—” I clamped my mouth shut before I could spill my location. If she didn’t know it, already…. “Look, you caught me on a bad day, that’s all.”
She gave an uncertain smile. “Yes, I would assume you’d have a lot of those as a fugitive on the run.”
“Some are worse than others….” I muttered, kicking one of the many plastic skulls strewn about before sighing and sitting on the edge of the bed as far from the princess as I could.
“Sunburst was my only friend growing up, okay?” I cast my gaze over the kite he’d given me—hanging from the ceiling. “He abandoned me to go to that self-entitled school of your sister’s when he got his cutie mark, and left me to rot at home all alone.”
“And you did not follow him?” Luna’s eyebrow arched.
“Hah! That’s rich! You know how many bits that uptight, elitist dump costs?!” I shook my head. “Sunburst was always the smarter of us. He found the spells. I just made the magic happen. When he got in on a full scholarship for all the studying he did, all I got was a string of rejection letters. So… he got to go off, and I was left behind.”
“I see….” The princess’s frown turned into a scowl. “I will have to do something about that.”
“Good luck with that.” I snorted. “The school board is nothing but a bunch of nobles who think think themselves better than everypony else because of the royal lineage stamped on their butts.”
Princess Luna blinked. “You’ve met them?”
“I did get in to their undergraduate program eventually.” I gave a bitter laugh. “I spent years homeschooling myself to get in, but by then Sunburst was gone, and I had to suffer through four years of Tartarus alone.”
There was a crack in the distance, and the dream shuddered.
“He never wrote. He never visited. He didn’t even have the decency to wait for me!” I snarled, grabbing a random bit of junk to crush into a little tiny ball with several thousand tons of pure telekinetic force. “He just blazed on ahead, and left me behind, graduating before I even managed to catch up!” I looked down at my hoofwork to see the remains of my kite.
“And it was all because his cutie mark made him a little smarter than me….”
I shook my head, grimacing as I threw the wreckage over my shoulder. “Are you happy now, Princess? I poured my bleeding heart out.”
I jumped off the bed and stomped to the window to glower at the colt and filly playing happily in the yard below. “Problem solved. Go home. I’m nice and seething now—perfect for planning my revenge.”
“The problem is not solved, Starlight Glimmer. You must not let this fester. I understand that—”
“No. You. Don’t!” Wood cracked and metal screeched as I slammed the window and shut the curtains so hard the rod holding them up ripped its way off the wall. “Nopony gets it! Ever! I learned that the hard way when your purple pill paid me a visit, so just go and bother somepony else!” My glare could’ve melted steel. “You aren’t helping me like this.”
There was silence for a time, and then the bedsprings creaked.
“As you wish, Starlight Glimmer.” Princess Luna bowed her head. “Before I take my leave, however, I wish for you to consider something.”
“What could you possibly say to change my mind?” A vein popped in my forehead.
“The worst part of always being in Celestia’s shadow wasn’t how everypony else loved her more than me.” Princess Luna’s sigh could crush a mountain. “I did not fall to the Nightmare because nopony loved me; I fell because their love for Celestia made her leave me behind.”
Her smile was faint but firm. “My domain is the realm of the silent and mysterious; the night is meant to be a place of solitude and contemplation. Ponies rest their heads so they can frolic in their dreams, and there they reflect upon the day before. Such peace was its own reward.”
“Get to your point before I jump out the window.”
“Everypony needs at least one friend, Starlight Glimmer—even all-powerful alicorns.” Princess Luna’s smile fractured. “Every day, more and more ponies flocked to my sister to worship the ground she walked on. Every night, she had less and less time for me. I was just as powerful, just as important, and just as much their rightful ruler.
“And yet they still stole her from me: all because she ruled the day.”
“Huh….” For the first time in weeks, my furrowed brow relaxed.
“Indeed.” Her smile returned. “Now, I must be on my way, but I shall return to you on the morrow.”
“What?! Wait! I didn’t say you could—”
For the second morning in a row, I fell to the floor as I woke. Several drops fell on me from leaks in the ceiling as the rain continued to hammer down outside, but I had a far, far bigger problem on my hooves.
“Buck me to the moon, why won’t she just leave me alone?”
It took several hours of pacing to decide it was safe to sleep that night.
The bed was soft and springy, while the blankets were warm and cozy. Only the thought of the alicorn waiting in my dreams kept me tossing and turning, and it was well past midnight by the time I managed to drift off.
“Hello again, Starlight Glimmer.”
No. No pleasantries. Straight to business.
“Do you or do you not know where I am in the real world?” I glowered from across a familiar table in Ponyville.
“I could make a guess.” The princess’ smile didn’t falter. “But I doubt sending the guards would do any good.”
“No, it wouldn’t; you would send Twilight Sparkle instead.” I furrowed my brow. “And then you’d all find out exactly how much you’ve underestimated me.”
“Oh, trust me. I don’t underestimate you in the least.” Luna ruffled her wings and glanced through the menu. “That’s exactly the reason why my sister and Twilight will not be knocking on your door any time soon.”
“You honestly expect me to believe you’re going to sit and do nothing to stop me?” I arched a brow.
“Of course not. That would be silly.” Princess Luna flashed me a smile so white I almost didn’t think it was faked. “It is merely foalish to confront you in the real Ponyville when I can meet with you here. I have no doubt you would do something rash.”
“Confront me?” I smirked. “Rash? Hah! You don’t know half of what I’m capable of, Princess. I’m not the one who would be doing something rash with that plan.”
“Such is the reason we are here and not in the waking world.” Luna levitated a menu over to me. “Now sit and relax. I have already told you that I come in peace.”
“I am sit… ting?” I looked down to see I had resumed my infernal pacing.
“Lovely to have you again, madams. May I suggest a wine or do you still need a moment?”
“Gah!” Horn primed, I jumped back into and toppled completely over my seat as a waiter coughed from the formerly empty spot behind me.
“We are still deciding, sir.” Princess Luna giggled as I fell to the ground with a thump, and waved the soon-to-be-newt waiter away.
“Give me something cold.” I simmered with the menu over my face for a few seconds before climbing back into my seat and throwing it at him. “Anything will do. I don’t care what. Give me ice if you have to.”
Luna snorted as she simply hoofed him her menu rather than pelting him with it. “I suppose I shall take the same. Make it something sweet, though.”
“As you wish.” The waiter bowed his head, leaving us alone again.
“I bet you got a kick out of that, didn’t you?” My glower was easily matched by her smirk.
“Quite.” And now the blasted princess was tittering, her mouth behind her hoof. “I only wish I had thought to do that myself. It seems your subconscious is already two steps ahead of us, dear Starlight.”
“Whatever.” I schooled my scowl as best I could. Don’t question it. She was the Princess of Dreams. “What do you want? I already gave you my sob story.”
“I wish to help you.”
“Sure you do.” I rolled my eyes. “I’ll believe that when you hoof me Twilight Sparkle on a silver platter.”
The doors to the restaurant burst open as our waiter wheeled out a massive cart with a sparkling silver platter. I gave Luna a look as it was rolled over to us and the cover was lifted to reveal—
A pair of massive meal sized sundaes and a milkshake with a pair of bendy straws.
“Ha. Ha.” I tried to melt the Princess with my eyes.
“And, the garnish!” A tiny gummy Twilight Sparkle figurine was placed atop each sundae.
“No, really. You’re hilarious, Princess.” I took great satisfaction in drowning the piece of candy as this time my eyes actually did melt the object of my ire. Soon there was nothing but a bubbly mess of melted ice cream and sugar—little Twilight’s not-so-imaginary screams cutting off as her lungs filled with chocolate and caramel.
Best. Sundae. Ever.
“Now stop distracting me, and tell me what you want.”
“I want nothing more than to be your friend, Starlight Glimmer.” Luna was being much more traditional with her own sundae. “And I pray that it will be enough to pull you back from the dark path you now tread.”
“You want to be my friend?” I snorted.
“Yes.” She nodded. “Perhaps in time you may reciprocate, but I will settle for what trust I can get.”
“You mean absolutely none?”
“See, you say that, and yet I don’t believe you’ve brooded even once today.” Her teeth seemed almost pointed.
“It doesn’t change anything.” I grabbed the milkshake and tossed the second straw aside. “Twilight Sparkle must pay.”
“So you admit that I just might understand you?”
“I never said you did.”
“You never said I didn’t either.”
My eye twitched.
“Fine! Maybe you do understand! But your head really is in the stars if you think that means anything.” My eyes narrowed. “Ponies have given me that load of horseapples before.”
“We shall see.” The princess finished the last of her ice cream and licked some chocolate and caramel from her lips. “Now—my good mare—what would you like to do?”
“Should I assume killing, maiming, and injuring Twilight Sparkle is off the table?” Thunder rumbled through skies as clear as day as I gave one last glare at the puddle of goop that had been my sundae.
“Yes.”
“What about doing all three at once?”
“No.”
“And we can’t just… just… burn all her books in front of her one by one?”
“Do you derive some sort of sexual pleasure from this?” There was a ghost of a smile in her frown. “I didn’t know you felt that way about her.”
“Arrrrrrgh!” I pulled at my mane for a moment or two before magicing it back in place and putting on my most winning smile. “Well, friend, what do you want to do then?”
“Hrmm….” Princess Luna put her hoof to her chin. “How about a movie?”
“A movie? Really? That’s—”
“Your check, madames.” A piece of paper was slid between us.
“I’ve got it.” Luna quickly levitated it towards her. Her eyes started trailing down it, and her face turned red, then green, and finally settled on white as she hit the total figure.
“Oh, come on. It can’t be… that… expensive?” I took the check to scan it only to quickly drop it to the floor. “What the buck was in that ice cream?!”
“It’s made of the stuff of dreams,” Luna muttered as she conjured an empty coin purse. “Well, then…” She glanced at me. “I don’t suppose you could pay for this? Your subconscious apparently doesn’t like me bending the rules.”
“Gee, I wonder why?” I rolled my eyes. “We can just put it on Twilight’s tab. That’s what I do in the real world—” I shifted my glare back to the receipt. “—where the prices don’t make you contemplate arson.”
“You put all your expenses on Twilight’s—” Princess Luna snorted for a second before bursting into laughter. “That’s just awful of you! I need to pull that on Celly now!”
“It is awful. Isn’t it?” I grinned like a shark as I wrote the check.
“Well, I will most certainly pay you back for this in the real world.” She finally composed herself and bowed her head. “I do not forget my debts—real or imagined.”
“That sounds incredibly easy for me to abuse.” I stalked out of the restaurant and took a right towards Twilight’s favorite movie theater.
She ruffled her wings, that frustratingly small regal smile returning as she followed me out the door.
“Perhaps it is, perhaps it isn’t. Either way, I have faith you shan’t be doing so.”
“So what do you think of the movie so far?” Luna leaned in to whisper to me even with the rest of the theater empty.
The steady stream of popcorn flying in my mouth paused as I slurped from my mega-gulp. My eyes remained glued to the documentary, however, watching as Double Diamond led a town meeting.
Part of me was screaming to teleport out of the theater; another part was screaming to burn it down.
And yet…
Double Diamond was smiling in a way I hadn’t seen in a long, long time. Everypony was smiling. Everypony was talking. Everypony was laughing. They were all so… so happy…. Even with their cutie marks, they looked happier than they’d ever looked when I led them.
The knife in my heart twisted as Twilight Sparkle stepped onto the stage among applause, shaking Diamond’s hoof as he gave her the key to the city. The key to my home. The key to my friends. The key to—
There was a nudge from Princess Luna.
“Why are you showing me this?” My voice came out raw and choked. “I thought you said you understood?”
“Are you saying I don’t?”
There was silence save for the movie and the sounds of me fidgeting in my chair.
“They made this documentary for you, Starlight.” A hoof was set on my withers. “They made it to reach out to you.”
“You mean to rub everything I lost right in my face.” There was a crack as I gripped the edge of my seat.
“Have you heard a single word denouncing you so far?” Luna’s hoof began to gently rub into my back.
“No…. I haven’t….” My vision was getting blurry as the town meeting lead into a celebratory picnic. Every family had brought one dish or another. Sugar Belle had brought her whole store. Pies, cakes, cookies, bear claws; she had everything but the kitchen sink.
And that included the muffins.
Nopony ate them, but they were there—right next to an empty seat.
“They miss you as much as you miss them.” Luna slipped her wing around me, and I broke, burying my muzzle into her chest as I cried. “Please…. Turn yourself in so we can reunite you, Starlight Glimmer. I do not want you to suffer loneliness as I did.”
”I can’t do that, and you know it….” A single knife in my heart was nothing compared to the hundreds of daggers burrowed in there by Twilight Sparkle.
“You can if you try.” Luna’s wing squeezed me. “It is not too late to—”
“Shut. Up.” I shoved a hoof in her mouth. “Just shut up and let me have this, because you’re wrong. I can’t go back to them—not without getting my revenge.”
It was Luna’s turn to be silent as I kept crying until I woke up.
The documentary was real.
I checked—just in case it had all been a trick to get me to turn myself in—and it sent another knife into my chest knowing Princess Luna had not lied. I couldn’t go back, though. I couldn’t turn myself in.
Twilight Sparkle was like a hundred crows upon my hopes and dreams, and she needed to face justice first.
This fact was burned into my soul, and for the next few nights, I did nothing but research several books I’d been able to raid from Twilight’s castle in her absence. I dreamed of good and proper vengeance—no sign of any meddlesome princess to be seen—but I could not shake the feeling she was watching. There were more than a few times my hackles rose right before I did what needed to be done, my ear flicking to the sound of a sigh that was not there.
And that made me hesitate.
It was infuriating, and every time it happened, I poured myself into my studies twice as hard the following day. If she wanted to say something, she should just say it, not— not—
With a slam, I shut my latest book, climbing into bed with a growl.
“Stupid princess….”
“Are you truly that far gone…?”
I floated in an endless star-filled void, but it wasn’t too hard to figure out who was talking. I twisted about to look for her, yet there was nopony as far as the eye could see.
“Yes, Princess. I am.” I glared into the nothingness, brow furrowed deeply. There was a tiny sniffle in the darkness, and that only served to make me scowl even more. “You more than anypony else know why.”
“I… I thought nopony else understood you?”
“I was wrong about that.” I gritted my teeth. “But it doesn’t change anything. I can’t go back home now.” Closing my eyes, I blew out a long, painful breath. “I can only barely stand the thought of facing you.”
A lengthy pause filled the darkness.
“I suppose that makes my duty to be your friend more important than ever….”
“I guess it does.” As the sniffling stopped, I forcibly relaxed my face. “I’m always so angry nowadays, Princess. I‘m tired of feeling nothing but hate. I’m tired of it, but I just. Can’t. Stop. Everytime I close my eyes, I see Twilight Sparkle’s face.”
“It was like that for me in the days before the Nightmare, too….” The princess finally seeped out of the shadows, and I found another reason to make Twilight Sparkle pay. “And please, call me Luna.”
“Luna….” I looked from her puffy eyes to her disheveled wings and seethed at the fact that I had already made my new friend cry.
“Let it go, Starlight….”
Oh, buck! She’s hugging me again! What do I do? What do I do?!
“Let your anger go…. Dreams are meant to be full of happiness and laughter. I will not stay you your vengeance in the light of day, but here in the heart of your own endless night…” She held firm. “…you must rest your weary soul.”
She pulled me through… somewhere… and we were suddenly in a field of flowers.
“Come, my friend.” Her smile was weak and wavy. “Let us forget what awaits in the waking world and frolic the night away.”
I hesitated for only a moment. When her face started to fall, I made my choice.
“Tag, you’re it!”
I booped her snoot before running off into the distance, the smell of crushed flowers and grass sending a heady feeling through me. Laughter filled the air a few seconds later as Luna gave chase, and for the first time in a long time, I genuinely smiled.
“Sunburst and I used to love playing chess.” I moved my knight forward to take Luna’s bishop. “He was a natural at it. I only beat him once—the first time we played after my dad showed me the game. It took him a week to blow through all the books on it in the Hollow Shades library, and after that I never even stood a chance.”
“Really?” Luna moved her rook, and I backed my knight away before she could swing in to take it. “Personally, I find that hard to believe. You play very well for somepony still in their first half-century.”
“Ha!” I waved a hoof over the board. “Don’t play with me, Luna. You’ve been toying with me just like Sunburst always did. I know a lost match when I see one.”
“And yet you continue to fight.” Luna brought her prince down upon another hole in my pawn’s defenses.
“I’m not just going to roll over and die, princess.” I snorted, rolling my eyes as I moved my knight again to threaten her away. “At this point, I’ve got nothing left but to see how many of your pieces I can take before you finish me off.”
“Vengeful to a fault, as always.” Luna chuckled before catapulting her prince even deeper into my pieces to devastate my last castle.
Horseapples.
“And I thought I told you to call me Luna.” She smirked as I looked over the board for a way out of my impending doom.
“It was a lowercase p, princess.” I furrowed my brow. “You know, like a nickname?”
Luna blinked as I charged my last bishop into her lines, all pretense of defending myself vanishing. “Oh…. Well, if that is what you wish.” Her prince took another piece, passing on the chance to checkmate me.
“It is.” I gritted my teeth as I took another of her pieces, and I ground them as she took another of mine. “Are you really gonna pull this with me?”
“Does it not make you happy?”
“Not when you just give it to me.”
“I think it has little to do with me giving you your vengeance.” Her smile lessened.
“And I thought we agreed not to push this.”
“We did…” she sighed, standing up to trot out of the cafe we’d been sitting in. “Perhaps we should do something else, then?”
Wha— Huh?! B-b-but we couldn’t just end the game here! She hadn’t won yet! I hadn’t taken as many of her pieces out as I could.
“Are you coming, Starlight?” Luna poked back in as rain began to fall outside, pouting at me as her long, wet mane dripped stardust and sparkles onto the floor.
“But— I— You— Finish it!”
“No.” Her smile was soft yet firm. “It wasn’t making you happy. Let’s go play in the rain instead.”
“I hate rain.” I glowered at her, and the storm picked up in intensity.
“Then I shall make you not hate it.” Luna giggled, tugging me out of my chair by the ear.
“Luna!”
“I thought I was your princess?”
“Princess!”
“We shall be soaking wet, together!”
“I’d rather not!”
“But it shall be glorious!”
“Alright, fine!” I waved her off and conjured a raincoat and a hat. “Just let me have a second or two to prepare myself." She finally stopped trying to rip my ear off and waited until I was ready. The instant I was, though—
“Onwards!”
—I caught the tail end of a splash as she stampeded back outside.
“I swear, there are times she’s nothing but a foal in a grown mare’s body,” I grumbled, wrapping my rubber shield tight around me.
“Am I not allowed to have fun?”
I jumped a good two meters high, spinning to find Luna sitting by the cafe’s roaring fire and sipping tea. Staring for a minute or two, I finally settled on a simple question.
“How?”
“Tis a dream, Starlight Glimmer.” Luna smirked. “You can be in two places at the same time if you try hard enough.”
“So not fair….” I glanced at the door to check on the Luna outside as she twirled around a lamppost, singing merrily in the rain.
“Fie!” The Luna by the fire rolled her eyes. “As if life is fair. Go and enjoy your romp in the rain. I will be here when you get back, waiting with a warm wing and a hot cup of darjeeling."
“Make it something stronger.” I glared at the storm outside.
“A warm wing and a hot cup of mead, then!” The tea was instantly gone—replaced by a flagon—while the cafe seamlessly morphed into a tavern and bar. “Barkeep! A keg of your finest on my sister’s tab!”
Rolling my eyes, I stomped outside to find a grinning Luna waiting for me. “Let’s get this over with, prince—”
An enormous splash drowned out both my words and my lungs, leaving me sputtering towards the impishly grinning Luna. My rain gear sagged under the weight of the remaining water; small puddles in my hat sloshed as I took a series of deep breaths.
“Luna?”
“Yes, Starlight?”
“Run.”
And then she was gone in a flash of moonlight, giggling like a school filly as I leveled every raindrop and spare puddle in a hundred meters on her location. Her retaliation was just as swift and brutal. Water pellets pwupped relentlessly through the air at me from all angles; fast as lightning and hard as steel, they quickly ripped my protection to tatters.
I ran through the streets as I pursued my quarry, Luna always managing to cut line of sight just before I could fire back. From Manehatten to Las Pegasus, I chased her through hurricane force winds; we’d have made it back, too, if she hadn’t turned down a wrong alley in Baltimare.
Now she was cornered like a rat as I stalked forward with my teeth gleaming in the shadows.
“Oh, priiiiincess~”
“Yes, Starlight?” Luna’s smirk only faltered a little when her horn sparked and no teleportation carried her away.
“Dodge this!”
What little light remained was eaten by the tsunami I’d been lugging behind me since our visit to the west coast. I could just see Luna’s eyes widen by the light of her horn as she futilely attempted to escape me; it was priceless! I burned that moment of victory in my mind as the mountainous wall of water descended to crash into us full force and carry us out to sea.
When I finally righted myself on the ocean floor—the eddies and currents finally settling enough for me to catch my bearings—I blinked to find myself in an exact underwater replica of Ponyville. The bar we’d long left behind stood open and inviting, and I hesitantly walked inside to find Luna as dry as a desert rose.
“Buck you.” I made sure to shake myself off in her general direction. “That’s cheating.”
“So is use of lethal force.” She tittered, raising her wing for me to sit under. “You’re very lucky that this is a dream.”
“Collateral damage is bound to happen when you’re taking on an alicorn.” I took the tankard she offered me in my aura and gingerly sipped from it.
“Oh, really?” For a moment, Luna’s wing tightened around me. “Well, I do hope you’re taking that into due consideration while planning your vengeance on Twilight. It would pain me greatly to have to banish you to the moon after everything is said and done.”
“Please.” I snorted. “You can threaten that all you want, but I don’t care; I know you’d visit.”
“Indeed, I would….” Luna’s smile wavered. “Humor me, though, and promise you’ll try and keep your monstrous rampage to a minimum.”
I stared into the depths of my cup for a minute or two before sighing. “No promises that ponies won’t get caught in the crossfire, but I’ll try and keep it clean.” I frowned. “Although, that kind of puts me back at square one…. This would be so much easier if she just never grew wings.”
“Alas, dear Starlight, you’ll find those wings are well earned. Few ponies exemplify the elements as much as Twilight Sparkle. Did you know she and her friends were chosen from the instant they got their marks?” Luna hit the tap on the keg behind her to pour herself another mug. “Six simultaneous cutie marks born under the light of a sonic rainboom. Twas truly a miracle.”
“You make it sound like Equestria would crumble without her.” I rolled my eyes. “Nopony is that important, princess—not even you.”
“Perhaps.” It was Luna’s turn to stare into her cup. “But I can safely say I would most likely not be here right now if not for her.”
“Shut up and stop being mopey.” I snorted, leaning in slightly as she shivered. “You’re way better than Twilight Sparkle. That Nightmare was toast with or without her.”
“If you say so….”
“I said stop it!” Flicking her with a bit of telekinesis, I floated my empty mug over to her. “Now get me something with a stronger kick so we can drown our sorrows with the good ol’ burn of whiskey and rage.”
“Heh….” Luna’s smile grew as I scowled at her. “As you wish, milady.”
“I have something I need to show you.”
Not even half lucid from the hesitant nudge Luna gave me, I was left floundering for a few seconds when she teleported us to the top of a Discord-damned mountain. Somepony—maybe me, maybe Luna—yelped as I tripped over a rock and tumbled over the edge. Her aura quickly grabbed me, pulling me back before I could dash myself on the rocks below.
Well, I assumed it was more rocks. I couldn’t really see them in the dark.
“A little more warning would have been nice.” Grumbling for grumbling’s sake was a good balm for what had almost been a very violent wake up call.
“Forgive me, Starlight.” The moon itself turned red. “I let my excitement get the best of me.”
“You, princess, excited? I never thought I’d see the day.” I rolled my eyes. “What do you want?”
“Well, I… umm… what do you see, Starlight Glimmer?” Luna gestured into the distance.
“Uh….” The countryside was nothing but silhouettes and shadows; all I could see was the outlines of the world below us, the heavens above us, and Luna—face flush with cold as she looked at the ground beneath my hooves with an infinitesimal smile.
“To be honest, I can’t really see anything.”
There was a huff, then a giggle, and finally outright laughing. “Fair enough, I suppose. This isn’t my favorite stargazing for nothing.” She shook her head, grabbing my chin and lifting it. “But you’re not looking the right direction. What do you see?”
“How would I know?!” I snorted. “It’s not my sky, princess. Just tell me what I’m looking for!”
“Three degrees off of the north star.”
I squinted for a moment. “Yeah, still not seeing it. You’re lucky I know where the north star even is.”
Her smile fractured for a moment, and—
“Wait.”
But it held.
“Are there more stars there than before?”
And it mended.
“There are! There’s a ring of like, twenty stars all around it! I don’t remember those from when Sunburst and I—” I bit my lip. Hard. “I don’t remember those….”
The smile shrank again. “I made sure they could only be seen on a picture perfect night. Very few have ever seen them with the naked eye.”
I blinked. “Why?”
She squirmed. “The conditions must be just right for—”
“No. Why did you make them so hard to see? And why are you showing me this?” I kept my eyes locked on the glimmering lights.
“Well…” she hesitated. “I… don’t like most ponies seeing them. They are for nopony but me and my closest friends.”
I was silent for a few moments.
“And I’m one of your closest friends?”
“If you want to be.” Luna pointed up a faint, wavery, little blue speck within the ring. “That one is yours, if you want it. I made it just for you and your eyes only.”
“I— I don’t know what to say. Luna, I—” The face of a stupid, smiling, purple alicorn crossed my mind. “Please tell me Twilight Sparkle doesn’t have one of these….”
“She has one, but she has never seen it.” Luna chuckled. “I have yet to think of a way to tell her that does not end up with pictures of my private life published in every astronomy journal on Equis.”
“I’ll take what I can get, I guess.” It was hard not to scowl, but I managed it. “Do you… think you could give me some astronomy lessons? I had a few as a foal, but…” I trailed off at the memories.
“If that is what you wish, milady.” Luna’s smile had never been brighter.
“What did I say about calling me that?” My brow instantly furrowed.
“You said I could only call you that over Twilight Sparkle’s cold, dead body.”
“Aaaaaaaand?”
“And what?” She smirked. “I told you I have my ways.”
“Liar.” I couldn’t help but smile.
“You never know. I could have had the real Twilight replaced by a changeling.”
“Double liar.” Yet still, my smile grew. “There’s not an evil bone in your body.”
“Only because of ponies like you and Twilight.”
“And there you go ruining the moment, princess.”
Time passed, and I was happy—if only in my dreams; it’s too bad nothing good is meant to last.
“Discord saw you earlier today.”
I froze for a moment before I looked up from the book I was reading. Luna’s face was torn, and she opened and closed her mouth a few times as she looked for what to say.
“I— I had to tell Celestia about what we’ve been doing just to stop her from sending the guard. She thinks I’m reforming you.” Her ears fell. “I couldn’t bear to tell her the truth.”
“Luna….”
“Yes, yes, I know…” she sighed. “I just wish I could actually help you.”
“But you do help me.” I rose off of my cushion to trot through the moondust to Luna. When she wouldn’t lift her wing for me, I buried my way into her side, looking up and into her eyes so she could see the truth in them.
“You see that ball of dirt?” I gestured at the planet above us. “Right now, I can count on one hoof the number of ponies that live on it who understand what I’m going through.” I poked her in the side. “I have one friend on all of Equis, and that’s you.”
Luna blushed, scuffing the lunar ground beneath us with one hoof. “If I was really your friend, I wouldn’t just ignore your suffering.”
“Well, you could always help me like I originally asked.” I smirked. “You want to serve me Twilight Sparkle on a silver platter?”
Silence answered me.
“Luna?”
I leaned in to poke her again, only for the dream world to suddenly crack apart. I woke with a gasp as every ward I’d set started blaring like a brass band. Either an army or a princess was coming for me, and I had to get out of here fast.
I teleported hard and fast to my fallback point in the Everfree Forest—an old watch tower, far and removed from the ruins of the previous capital. It might creak and groan and look as if a small breeze would knock it down, but it was safe and isolated from whatever threat was incoming on my room.
“Buuuuuuuck….” Curling into a ball on the ruined and dusty nearby cot, I shivered in the cold until sleep reclaimed me.
“Oh, thank goodness, you're safe!”
I was shocked into lucidity by Luna tackling me to the ground.
“When Celestia said she could only trace you to somewhere in the Everfree—”
“Wait. Wait. Wait. Wait. Wait! So that was Celestia?! Did you know she was going to do that?!” A vein twitched dangerously on my temple as I instantly pushed myself back.
“What?!” Luna reared back. “No! Why would you even— I would never! She told me she would trust my judgement! Had I known what she was planning, I would have warned you!”
“Oh, you would have, would you?!” My teeth were grinding loud enough to wake the dead.
“Yes, I would have!”
“Why?!”
“Because I don’t want to lose you!” I was rocked backwards from the volume of Luna’s voice. “Please! Don’t do anything rash! I can talk to Celestia and sort this out!”
She took a step forward, and I took a step back. The silence between us could have engulfed all of Equis, but my scowl spoke volumes across it.
“Starlight….”
“Let’s just agree to not talk about it, alright?” It took a few deep breaths, but I finally spoke without the risk of blowing up.
With an immense act of will, I brought myself closer to Luna and reconjured the book I had been reading. She hesitated, opening her mouth to say something, but my glare quickly clicked her mouth shut. Instead, she merely wrapped a wing around me as we settled to the ground.
The dream shifted and wavered into a cozy room with a crackling fireplace set into the wall. A painting of the most incredible landscape hung over the mantle—the night sky so full of life it seemed like it was about to pour right out of the canvas—while several shelves filled with scrolls and astronomy tools lined the walls.
Was this… was this Luna’s room?
By the stars, it was. It had to be. The bed we were on was softer than clouds and I could catch a glimpse of the silhouette of a few Canterlonian spires through the balcony window.
It was… honestly a step down from the mountaintop and the moon.
Warm, though. Safe.
Luna’s face was nothing but furrows as her wing held me tighter than ever before, her eyes looking at everywhere but me. When I finally let my guard down enough to lean into her side, she almost jumped, her head quickly turning towards the door—bound with so many locks and chains even Celestia would have a hard time bucking it down—before she looked down at me with a smile that would do Our Town proud.
Clearly, I was not the only paranoid one here tonight.
I scooted closer to her as I opened my book to continue reading, but the words just swam in front of me. I could feel my heart racing right beside Luna’s, and the cold from the real world seemed to trickle in as I shivered under her wing.
We didn’t talk; we couldn’t talk—it’d break the calm before the storm. The next few nights were full of nothing but silence, and I had no plans of breaking it anytime soon.
As long as it didn’t break, Luna wouldn’t have to leave me.
Between the hurricane force winds, the freezing rain, and the distant roars of a pissed off ursa on the hunt, I was too busy retreating to the Castle of the Two Sisters to cuss out the universe and everything in it.
I did have time to curse that bucking bridge, though. Damn thing almost killed me when the rickety thing decided to break with me halfway across it. If it hadn’t been for a lucky teleport, I’d be a pancake on the bottom of the gorge.
Or spliced. I could have been spliced, but I was trying not to think of that or the fact that the trees looked like they wouldn’t mind taking a bite or two out of me.
At least I was a little safer in the castle. It was old and decrepit; the halls were cold and dusty; spiders the size of my head hung in cobwebs that looked like they’d been old when my dad had been sucking his hoof. I hated it, and I hated that my life had driven me here, but I was just a little warmer and just a little drier, so I focused all that anger inwards towards the one who really deserved it.
Twilight. Motherbucking. Sparkle.
It was like she was here, in the flesh, taunting me with all the parts of the castle she had refurbished. I couldn’t use them—it was too risky—but they all but sang to me with how clean she’d left them.
That obsessive-compulsive piece of—
“Starlight?”
What was that?!
“Starlight!”
There was a gasp, and I spun as fast as I could. My horn blazed to life as I prepared to make whoever had found me out a smear on the wall, and—
“Luna?” I stopped as quickly as I started, collapsing onto my haunches with a whimper. “Is— Is that you?” I looked around me. “Is this a dream? Was… was today just one giant nightmare of how things can still get worse if the universe really tries?”
“No, Starlight, this isn’t a dream…. I needed some space from Canterlot after my sister tried to ambush you, and I was hoping you might—” She bit her lip. “What happened?”
“This forest hates me! That’s what happened! This forest hates me! Celestia hates me! My friends hate me! At the rate things are going, I’m pretty sure you’ll be hating me by the end of the night!”
“I could never hate you…” Luna started to take a step forward only to stop when I shuffled back. “…no matter what you do.”
“I don’t believe you….” My ears wilted.
“Come with me, then, and I’ll show you.” She held out her hoof, her voice soft but firm.
I reached out only to pause an inch away from happiness. “You promise?”
“I promise.” Luna’s smile was ten times more comforting than that hollow hack Princess Celestia always wore when I saw her and Twilight from afar.
With a deep breath, I took Luna’s hoof, and surrendered myself to her mercy. She led me well into the refurbished sections—deep into the belly of the beast—taking me through the throne room and into her tower, all the way up the stairs to her other personal room.
And it was an exact replica of the room she’d taken me to in my dreams, right down to each and every lock placed on the door.
“Rest now, Starlight Glimmer, for you will be safe here.” Luna led me to the bed. “Not even my sister would dare to impede on us here.”
“Oh my gosh. It’s just as wonderful as it was in the dreamscape….” I sank into the covers. “What the hay is your mattress made of?”
“Liquid starlight.” Luna smirked. “As far as I know, I’m the only one who can make it; not even Celly has a bed like mine.”
“And you were jealous of her?”
“Tis one of the few things that made her green with envy towards me, rather than the other way around.” Luna giggled from the bedside, but she didn’t join me in heaven. “Now, close your eyes and sleep.” She ran a hoof through my mane. “I have hidden here long enough. I must go and have a long chat with my sister about just what you really need.”
With a flash of light, she was gone, and I sighed. My eyes barely stayed open as I pulled myself up to give the door a good hard look.
She hadn’t locked it. I wasn’t a prisoner. I could run.
I snorted at the thought and let my magic take hold of the many tumblers, locks, and chains, sealing my fate with a series of synchronized chinks.
The next morning, I woke to the sound of humming and the sight of Luna scrunching her face at me.
“What the buck are you doing?” I asked, not sure if if I should move while her brush worked its way over the newly added easel.
“Painting you.” Her schrunchy face didn’t bat an eye.
“I can see that, princess. I meant what are you doing painting me?”
She waited a few strokes to respond. “My sister… asked me what I saw in you.”
“I don’t think she meant that literal—”
“If words were not enough to show her why I became the Nightmare, then they most certainly won’t be enough here.” Luna frowned. “My only hope lies in showing her.”
A few more minutes passed as I took care not to move. “Can I see it?”
“If you wish.” She smiled, her next stroke making a little flourish. “I am almost done.”
Almost, was a relevant term, but in this case it literally meant I only needed to wait for a few last minute touch ups. Luna hefted the finished product up, eyeing it critically before she nodded in approval.
I couldn’t help but hold my breath when she flipped it around.
“This… is how you see me?”
I was curled on the bed—a weak and frail mare, a shell of my former self—while a shadowy figure eyed me hungrily from just outside the balcony. She had a fang-filled smile, but there was no mistaking that mane and tail, nor the fiery hatred in her eyes.
My Nightmare was my own.
Still, the moon shone down on me through the window, gentle and caressing. If not for the Nightmare casting its shadow upon me, I might have looked… peaceful….
“I do not look that weak.” Why did it take effort to work up a scowl?
“Ah, see, I knew you’d say that.” Luna lifted up another canvas. “That’s why this one is yours.”
This time, when she flipped it over, I gasped, because a goddess was smirking back at me. Subtle curves flowed like water across the canvas; perfect confidence burned like little stars in her laughing eyes; it was like I was looking into a mirror but perfection was looking back.
“Thank you.” There was nothing else to say as she passed it to me, and I looked a few moments longer before reluctantly putting it down. “I think… I think I’ll be going to go back to bed now.”
“If that is what you wish.” Luna nodded. “I am off to talk with Celestia again; one way or another, she is going to see I am right this time.”
Lost in thought, I barely noticed as she teleported away.
“My sister is a frosting-guzzling whorse who can’t understand a damn thing when it really matters!”
For once, I was not the one crying when I became aware of myself in the dreamscape.
“She didn’t believe you, did she.” I frowned.
“No, she didn’t.”
“You’re going to choose her.”
“No, I won’t.”
“Yes, you will!” I snarled, conjuring a stone wall from the ground to slam my hoof into it. “You’ll pick her just like the others picked Twi—”
Luna’s lips met mine, short circuiting both my rage and my train of thought.
“Bwah-huh?” I stumbled back, falling to the ground and staring up at her incomprehensibly. “W-what was that for?!”
“You were starting to rant.” Luna gave a ghost of a smile.
“So?! I think I deserve it after—”
Her lips met mine again.
“Will you stop—”
And again.
“What the buck, Luna?!”
“I can’t help it; you’re cute when you’re angry.” She laughed.
“You’ve gone insane!” I took a step back.
“No.” She took a step forward, the dream shrinking how much space I had to run as the world flaked apart around me. “I’m showing you exactly why I would never choose Celestia over you.”
“I’m insane, then!” I continued retreating. “This is all just a dream! The real Luna wouldn’t have—”
She cut me off with another kiss.
“Sweet me, you are so dense sometimes, Starlight. Just shut up and accept what I wish to give!”
“But— But when?! Where?! How?! Why?!” I teetered on the edge of the dream with Luna smiling at me.
“You said it yourself, Starlight.” Damn it, don’t cry like that! “I can count on one hoof the number of ponies who truly understand what it was like to become the Nightmare. Not even Celestia understands just how consuming my need for revenge was.”
I tried to take another step backwards, only to have what was left of the dream behind me crumble into the void. There was only the two of us left—floating on the little island that was my hopes and dreams.
“The only way you’ll learn that there are ponies who care—that their are ponies who really and truly love you—is if you plunge into the Nightmare head first and come out on the other side like I did.” Her smile wavered, and a piece of dream beneath me collapsed. “This is a mistake you need to make, Starlight Glimmer, and you need to make it alone.”
What?!
“No!” Desperately flailing, I managed to cling to the dirt at Luna’s hooves. I cast my gaze up at her, but all deceit had been banished from those pools of lunar light. “Maybe—” The ground crumbled more and I scrambled to keep hold. “Maybe I don’t want revenge if it means losing somepony else!”
Even as I said it, I knew it was a lie. When I closed my eyes, I still saw Twilight. I still saw the village. I saw myself losing everything.
And it was happening again.
The world flashed red and there was rage. So. Much. Rage.
“Arrrrrrrrgh!” I screamed incoherently as I scrambled to keep hold, tears streaming down my cheeks. “It’s not fair! It’s not fair! It’s. Not. Fair! You’re leaving me because of her! It’s all because of her! It wouldn’t even surprise me if Sunburst was her fault too! I’m going to make sure she’s alone and friendless if it’s the last thing I do! You hear me?! I don’t need you to do that! I don’t need anypony!”
“Do what you must, Starlight Glimmer; I will be waiting for you on the other side.” Luna smiled at me as the last of the dreamscape crumbling beneath us and I plummeted, screaming into the Nightmare that was the waking world.
We reached out to each other one last time, barely managing to touch as I fell.
And in the abyss, I heard her.
Waking with a muffled sob, I buried my head into my pillow and pulled my downy blanket tighter around me. I screamed into the soft, fluffy blue until my throat was sore and my head was ringing, but nothing blocked the pain.
“Why does this keep happening to me?” My voice was so hoarse I could barely whimper. “Alone… again.” I shivered.
“I will always be here, Starlight Glimmer.”
I froze as the blanket shifted of its own accord, too afraid to look up at the face I knew would be there. As Luna’s hoof met my chin, though, I couldn’t find the will to resist as she tilted my head up to look into her eyes.
“Never forget: all Starlight is my treasure.”
My response caught in my throat as I closed my eyes to once again see Twilight Sparkle. Rage replaced my anguish in a heartbeat, yet my anger withered just as fast when I opened my eyes to see she had tears to match my own.
With a sniffle, I shut out the world and leaned in, just to see what it was like.
For the briefest of moments, my lips met hers, and there was a fire that burned just as hot as my hatred of Twilight Sparkle burned cold. For the tiniest time, that scheming, manipulative homewrecker didn’t matter.
And I found happiness in the waking world, short as it may have been.
As I pulled away from her and slipped out of bed, she didn’t try to pull me back. She didn’t have to.
However the world burned—I would never stop dreaming of her.
Author's Note
Well, this was an incredibly hard prompt to work with. Shipping a villain and a princess during a canon time the villain is evil while sticking to canon as close as possibly? And only 15000 words to sell such a complex relationship? Talk about tough, especially since shipping a princess with a villain like that and staying canon basically means the romance has to end in tragedy.
I think I did pretty well, though.
