To Keep Light in Eternal Darkness

by scifipony

Rating: teen
Tags: Adventure, Princess Celestia, Slice of Life, Commander Hurricane, Princess Luna, Drama, Smart Cookie, My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic
Length: 7413

Blue Moon is a blue orphan earth pony foal with a crescent moon cutie mark. Her talent for moving the moon interferes with day and night. Her life is about to change; when it means meeting a scary fire unicorn, she worries it's not for the better.

Feature boxed on Feb 28, 2024.

Blue Moon is a deep blue orphan earth pony foal with a crescent moon cutie mark in a splotch of blank paint. Her talent for moving the moon interferes with day and night—favoring the night, of course. Ponies in power have begun to notice. Her life working as a ward of a workhouse/orphanage is about to change. When it means meeting a scary white fire unicorn, she worries it's not for the better.

The story takes place during the Princesses Platinum area, months after the original story. It is decades before the battle between the sisters, and years before the founding of Equestria. It is marked [Teen] because of an orphanage out of Oliver Twist. I am publishing as three chapters. They will all be published within this week.

Whilst this story is a continuation of To Bring Light to Eternal Darkness, it can be read standalone. It was supposed to be the first chapter in a sequel to the original story, but that didn't happen. It's been modified to be a short novelette. It may seem like it ends on a cliffhanger, but think of it as sparking your imagination to think about a much more interesting history for the royal sisters and Equestria.

If the story gets sufficient likes and comments, I'll consider extending it.

Published 2024-02-27 04:30:00 UTC
Last updated 2024-03-02 22:40:06 UTC

1 — Blue Moon

Author's Note

To Keep Light in Eternal Darkness was supposed the first chapter of the sequel to To Bring Light to Eternal Darkness. Sadly, it is not. It works very well as a standalone novelette, however. It lights the imagination of what could have been for the unicorn Sunny Daze—Celestia before she was given the name Celestia to confuse Queen Platinum—and the deep blue earth pony who would become Luna. I had planned this as a full-length novel, with Luna being the first to earn her wings (and horn). Problem is, I just couldn't wrap a plot around all I'd imagined might happen.

These three chapters, of which this is the first, say so much about the character of the Royal Sisters by itself, it deserved to be published. So, here it is. The remaining two will be published all in the week.

To be clear, I am open to collaboration. You would have to write chapters and help plot the story. PM me.

If you like the story, comment and like it. If I feel the enthusiasm, it might spur me into extending the story!

1 — Blue Moon

I am not sure what hurts worse, starving or being forced to work to eat. I suppose starvation but, as I write this from the perspective of many years later, I realize that I was abandoned by my parents at the workhouse at such a young age that I remembered naught but the monotony of work, those times I felt truly frightened, and the rare occasions I found true happiness.

Since you've insisted I tell my story, I think I'll retell the tale when everything changed.

I was a big filly for my age, always, which was why the workmares always kept me bridled when outside. Probably. With these long legs, I ran as fast as the wind. As an earth pony back then, I had the endurance and strength to easily run away, not that I'd ever wanted to. I worked; I got my hay twice a day; what worries? I did as told and didn't have to suffer the other foals around me trying to trip me or poke me or cow me—or taunting me about my cutie mark.

"Bean stalk legs, are you a lunatic?" That was from the older foals who had learned the big words. The younger ones used the word 'crazy'. Even at my age, I had learned both words.

Stupid cutie mark! I'd gotten mine before I could remember much, while I slept in the wheat-hull-stuffed nailed-together wooden box the workhouse called a cradle. I'd realized the moon, which peered in through a window open to the summer night breeze, was my only friend. That's my theory of how I got it, anyway, based on how many times I remembered staring out a window at that beautiful eternal orb. Explain my cutie mark being a crescent moon in a big black sky of black ink, otherwise?

Doing as told and not playing meant that the workmares left me alone to work through the night. That suited me fine, even if that meant I worked outside summer and winter, tethered in the yard—rains and blizzards excepted. Remember, I was an earth pony. I endured the abuse weather heaped upon me because that meant the workmares left me alone with my friend. I could talk with her and nobody would look at me strangely. Done with my night-long tasks, I'd spend the early morning learning my letters and numbers with the other foals—only because King Veridi Pace required it of every foal—before sleeping until late afternoon while the other foals toiled.

That fateful afternoon, a dry breeze drove flights of colorful fallen leaves to swirl into the air to crinkle and hiss. Autumn smells lifted my spirits. I trotted through a field of ripening corn, the insects going buzz-buzz, leading a workmare behind me as I searched. The green forest of tall stalks rustled and pattered around me.

I won't describe this workmare, or any of them, because I had no interest in them and don't remember them other than this-one might slap me if I didn't hold my head right when she bridled me, or that-one might tug my bridle if I went too slow. I avoided that potential problem today by quickly dragging her so she trailed behind me as I searched.

Then I spotted a swooping shadow and that caught my attention.

I'd learned the word Babeloin early because it was the name of the kingdom in which we lived. Though ours was a fair and temperate land of earth ponies, other tribes lived here. As far as pegasi went, I'd learned as little as I had to about Far Fan, a snotty green pegasus colt who'd liked to pick fights; he'd been wing-clipped so that he had to mind like the rest of us foals. As a consequence, I'd not seen many pegasi actually fly.

My ears flicked as I looked around. A road ran along side the farm toward Town. To see, I had to cross rows and shoulder through scratchy stalks, dragging the workmare behind me. When I found what I wanted to see, I had to look into the westering sun to see the winged pony swoop and land beside another.

A giant amongst ponies she was, considering how she dwarfed her fluttering companion. The mare wore an all-enveloping black cloak that left her very subtly pink muzzle exposed, but as the blue pegasus pointed down the corn rows at me with a wing, the giant startled. Her hood slid back. Her long pointed spiral horn to my naive eyes looked—because of the obvious spiral—screwed painfully into her forehead.

I stopped and gawked.

The workmare trotted ahead of me and in a few heartbeats, jerked my reins—which slapped my face with the cheekpieces and clicked the bit against my front teeth. My cheeks burnt with embarrassment that I'd let that-one get pleasure from controlling me. Deep inside, I imagined myself rearing, tearing the lead from her teeth where she clamped them, and knocking her over. Forgotten recollections why that was bad kept it from surfacing from thought to action. I trotted across the rows, leaving the outlanders behind.

They had to be outlanders.

Ponies rarely wore clothes except in the depths of winter and pegasi hated unicorns so the two rarely congregated. It took another jerk on my bridle for me to concentrate on the task at hoof.

Finding moonstones.

From storybooks teachers read us while we learned our letters, I'd learned that gems grew best in fertile fields. They attracted dragons, so farms liked the ponies that could dig them up, if for no other reason than to spare their plows because dragon migrations were rare. They paid bits to the workhouse. That paid for my hay and kept my tummy full.

In the same manner that I felt the moon's location below the horizon, where she hid from that bully that burned in the sky, the sun, I sensed the moon's tears of fear and sorrow where they condensed into gems in the soil....

My breath caught in my throat as my heart skipped a beat. "Prithee, wait," I said, pawing the ground.

My heart felt the heat radiated by the tear of fear before I revealed a bright ruby and rainbow moonstone encrusted by grey rock. A milky tear of sorrow would appeared a somber aquamarine or blue, and would have radiated melancholy.

Overhead, a whoosh made me look up as the workmare at my hooves scooped the stone into her saddlebag. A sky-blue pegasus floated midair ten pony-lengths above, or rather hovered as her wings slowly flapped. She made me think of a tear of fear—her brightly colored mane and tail of blew in the wind. Red, yellow, green, blue, and purple. I'd never seen hair so lovely. She studied me, amber eyes pausing on my flank, before she zipped away, leaving a rainbow streak as an after image.

The workmare jerked me back into motion.

Coincidentally, it wasn't minutes later that the sun sunk below the horizon. Moments earlier, I'd heard a loud distant whinny that struck me as forlorn, an maybe a whoosh of a bonfire flare up—but standing in a field of cornstalks that played and clattered in the wind, I might have been mistaken.

The sun had recently gone to bed early with unnerving regularity. As long as I could remember, and at that point in my life I had only six total years, the sun or moon would hang on the horizon for days without setting or rising, until the land became unbearably hot or painted in frost that would endanger the fields.

When happenstance meant a long enduring night, I reveled in my friend's happy visage shining blue-white down upon me. With my encouragement and earnest prayers, I helped her stay in the sky. We fought together against the sun's rising until the last possible moment.

Night made my heart sing. The dark starry perfection under the gaze of the moon left the land looking blue, the way I'd come to believe the world ought to look. Crazy were the ponies that slept by night. They missed a peaceful beauty I witnessed daily.

"Blue Moon!" shouted the workmare when I got lost in thought again and hadn't moved when she jerked the lead. "We're going home. You want to eat, don't you?"

She tugged again. I followed.

She led down the road in the hastening twilight. I prayed for the moon to rise. In my head I told her there was naught to fear. The sun was gone. The stars were so pretty. I felt the moon in my heart. It took little coaxing; she rose full and bright and gleaming.

The farm was far from town and the workhouse, thus the true dark had long since fallen.

"The other brats are a-bed," the workmare said as she went directly to the farthest point in the yard and tethered me to the stake beside my tools. She shrugged from under her full saddle bags and left.

I stood staring at the workhouse, the earth-bermed building nestled within and surrounding the dozen grown-together oak trees that comprised its girth. The long grass and weeds that covered its roof waved in the light breeze. Dark. Silent.

Cold.

Alone. Forgotten...

I had had no fear she'd forget my dinner. None. I swear. I stood there unmoving because my stomach growled and complained; standing made it more bearable.

She returned after a long while to clank down a tin pail of hay. I smelled the garlic and onions of her dinner on her breath when she asked, "What are you waiting for?"

As I worked, I thought about the startled unicorn giant and the astonishing rainbow-maned pegasus. Unlike all the other brats, I had steel horseshoes. I used them to hammer away the rock surrounding the moonstones I'd gathered, so they would have no chance to rust. I'd wedge a raw moonstone in a vise of boulders and by the moonlight I'd judge my strike.

Chip, chip, bang!

I'd laboriously break away the stone from the gem and thus shine my shoes, both fore and hind. When done with the load, I'd throw the raw gems in one of the tumblers with course grit and oily water and peddle the set of them, with finer and finer grit, the rest of the night, listening to the contents slushing and clunking. That left time to wonder what it would feel like to fly through the sky, to be a pegasus, free to fly wherever curiosity led me.

Foalish. One had to work to be fed, but a filly could wonder.

That white unicorn giant: With long legs like I had, would I grow up as tall as she? When the rare family toured the workhouse planning to adopt, every single pony mistook me for a teen—before a workmare would shoo too-curious-me away because nopony wanted a foal as gangly or as sullen as I.

Had the unicorn mare had that problem growing up? Being unwanted? Being unwantedly different?

Certainly she had, though as brilliantly white as she was, she probably also had an off-putting way-too-sunny disposition. It explained the clothes—to hide within!

The moon sank to the horizon as it always did. The opposite horizon brightened, tinged orange as I dumped the contents of my fourth-day tumbler. The smooth gems. Clean and bright, I dug out the tears of sorrow, which glowed a wane milky blue. Allowed to soak in a night of moonlight and wrapped in a dark rag, the gems would glow when revealed, providing light to read by for days. The tears of the moon's sorrow solidified to form the blue ones. The red-tinted tears of fear required soaking in a day of sun to glow.

Thinking of the sun made me look to the sky. The moon wobbled suddenly.

I fell to my knees and prayed to her to steady herself. Strength streamed up from my legs and into my heart where it formed a hidden glow. I prayed with all my heart that she should hold fast and not be pulled from the sky she feared to depart. I let my prayers stream toward her to strengthen her resolve and steadfastness. The world did not need another daytime, not yet. Autumn was young and warm. My moon need not fear the sun, or sorrow for having been thrust into the heavens, alone. I tried to hold the sun at bay, too, by praying that she wait, that she find impediments in her path. I rose and stomped my hooves, willing my strength forward. The bully shalt not revel this day, I thought. I told her, I told the sun, I am the moon's mighty friend and today thou shalt not rise!

And that day, the sun did not rise.

2 — Fire Sun

My moonstones lit the polished wood chamber in which we foals, and others known to be brats, gathered to learn our letters and numbers. My tummy pleasantly full with hay sprinkled with last week's oats, I watched a workmare chalk words on the big black slate on the wall with a tap-tap-tap. I stood at a table in the back because I could see over all but the eldest and my eyes were good. That meant I didn't have to worry about a brat pranking me by pulling my tail or throwing mud in my mane while I concentrated on learning a new word or something about how the world worked.

Being at the back had an occasional disadvantage. Another workmare opened the door at the front of the room. "Blue Moon, come hither."

The foals giggled and sniggered as I walked past them all. A spit ball hit my cutie mark, but I clamped down and refused to buck or even acknowledge I'd been hit.

What bother!

I followed down a hall of newly-lit candles toward the front entrance. I was missing the one interesting thing in my day, for what? To be told to tumble my stones better? To be paddled for not concentrating last evening when searching for moonstones? That last made me shudder.

When I turned the corner behind the workmare, I froze.

Outlanders.

I'd had heard about... the salon. Few ponies were adopted, but when one was, they visited the salon. Satiny lounge pillows of red and green filled it along with tables and a six arm candelabra. Fat wide white candles burned brightly, dispelling the darkness. They smelled of what I'd later learn was sandalwood. Moreover, the white unicorn giant reclined on the cushions; her horn glowed a warm lemon yellow, adding brightly to the candles, but not glaringly. She lit every nook of the room, all the way to the high gnarled ceiling, everything except, ominously, for the mote of darkness directly behind her. Her pegasus companion, also a mare, hovered lazily in the air. Both had magic, not simply the obvious in the unicorn's light, but in that the winged-pony beat the air with little more effort than a fan, but it kept her aloft. If not magic, what? For a moment it fascinated me.

"Blue Moon. Come. Now."

As I trotted up, the unicorn remarked in a sweet, clear voice, "Hurricane, you were right! She is a tall filly."

I understood voices and how they could lie. Nopony adopted the gangly ones. I stepped within the threshold of the salon and knelt on the wood floor, looking down. My eyes burned suddenly and I blinked away incipient tears. Had I actually hoped? And if so, why?

"Yes, but look at her cutie mark."

The light cast by the horn light shifted behind my eyelids.

"Remarkable. She's a painted pony with a crescent moon in a sea of night. Seer would go crazy over the iconography, but she's an earth pony. Not a unicorn. She has no magic."

"Tell Smart Cookie that! I dare you," Hurricane said.

"B-but flying ponies must have magic—" I said, looking up at the unicorn, feeling she had somehow read my train of thought. Why couldn't earth ponies, then?

My gaze stuck at her eyes. They were violet and they sparkled, seemingly with delight. Her mane drew my attention, though. Where the hood of her cloak revealed it, it was startlingly pink, but with a green streak. Though all the windows were closed to the early dawn light outside, her mane flowed ever-so-slightly as if there were a breeze, and there wasn't any. The candle flames burned steadily and smokelessly. I looked back to her face; I saw dark circles under her eyes, which reminded me I was tired, also, after a long night.

I finished, "—How can such slowly moving wings otherwise hold them up then?"

The workmare stomped a hoof. "Mind," she said.

I looked to my hooves.

The unicorn said, "Please, ma'am. We want to hear who Blue Moon is, not who you want her to be."

The workmare stiffened; hard to miss in my peripheral vision. "You are outlanders. I do not think you understand. You stand here, letting this foal think you might adopt her, but I seriously doubt adoption is your intention at all. Neither of you are earth ponies, let alone Babeloin citizens. The cost of the approvals from town elders won't be trivial, and from the looks of you two, I'm not sure that it isn't because you haven't brought your husbands so much you simply are not married. As outlanders, the workhouse shall require proof."

The pegasus settled onto her verdigrised bronze horseshoes with a clatter. Her eyes narrowed to the look a workmare got before throttling a misbehaving brat.

The unicorn touched her on her withers.

Hurricane looked at the hoof, then her companion's face. "Celestia?"

The unicorn shook her head before reaching into her cloak. She produced a golden coin on a hoof.

The workmare stepped forward and said, "Two."

Pocketing the bits, the workmare walked out of the room. "If the outlanders scare or worry you, call out." The door latched behind her.

The unicorn for her immense size, didn't look that old—maybe in her late teens? The pegasus looked much older, maybe the age of my mother would have had, had I known her.

Both smiled at me. Adults never smiled at me. It felt...

Disconcerting.

"How old are you?" Celestia asked.

"About six?"

"You don't know?" asked Hurricane, astounded.

I shook my head.

Celestia said, "Six? With a cutie mark? I'd not have guessed a day under ten, at least, with her stature." She studied me. "Do you like the moon?"

"I adore her."

The pair inhaled simultaneously. They looked each other in the eye as if what I had said had meant something special. Their gazes locked, Celestia said, "The magic in the potions Smart Cookie mixes have to come from somewhere. That somewhere could be somepony, not simply the plants and detritus the earth pony uses."

"From Smart Cookie?" Hurricane asked and looked at me. "Anypony can learn to use an amulet, and so, yeah, that makes sense..." She looked back at her companion. "I'm beginning to wish you'd had more time to study magic at the Collegiate before Queen Platinum sent us to follow your lead."

The pegasus stepped closer; I stood in response. I scented metal and sweat, and a hint of lavender. Muzzle to muzzle, she asked, "Can you do magic?" Amber eyes blinked at me as an eyebrow rose. She had had oats for breakfast. I smelled that rare treat, butter.

Wealth.

My heart instantly sank. I was no unicorn. Yet again, that hope thing had risen inside, and it wasn't fair that that the monster tore at me. But then I had a thought: "Celestia said, 'Has no magic' not 'do magic'," I pointed out. "Do you 'do magic?'"

Hurricane backed off, nodding to Celestia. "She has a point."

"She does, indeed." To me: "Blue Moon is a pretty name."

"I chose it myself."

"You did?"

"Uh, huh. I had no name so everypony called me Blue because that's what color I am, but I didn't like that."

"Yeah. It's lame. Like somepony calling me Rainbow."

"When I learned the moon was called The Moon, I insisted foals call me Blue Moon until they did." I stuck out my chest proudly.

"You said you 'adore' the moon. Do you know the phases of the moon?"

"I do. New, waxing crescent, first quarter, waxing gibbous, full, waning gibbous, last quarter, waning crescent, new. I watch her all night."

"All night?"

"I work at night..." I paused to yawn. I knew most ponies slept at night, but I'd already put my hoof in my mouth, so I continued with a cough, saying, "and I watch her. She's my friend. I know all her moods."

"Her moods?"

"Mostly, she's sad," I said.

Celestia's breath caught and I think I froze. She unfolded herself, stepped off the pillows, then folded down in front of me. It was from her that the sandalwood perfume wafted, not from the candles. Her violet eyes looked into mine and she blinked. She tossed her head, which caused the point of her horn to arc frighteningly by my left ear. That released much of her very long mane. It settled like a cloud to the ground, but, like a grounded cloud—like a fog—it seemed to have a life of its own, writhing gently, though the room had no draughts. I found myself staring.

"How do you know?"

"I know." I tapped my chest with a hoof, feeling the percussion in my heart. "I know."

"Where is she?"

I pointed instantly, for, even inside, I knew exactly where the moon rested. It wasn't a simple opposite the bright part of the dawn a brat might have chosen. I knew this.

Celestia's eyes momentarily unfocused as she thought, then she nodded. I knew her next question.

I said, "I pray to her and pray with her. I gather her tears. I love the nights we spend together and wish they could last forever. When I can, I protect her from that bully of a sun. She fears the sun and I know why."

"Why?" Celestia and Hurricane asked in unison.

"The sun overwhelms her, blinds her. Most ponies are happy to play in the sunlit day, but sleep through her night. Who wants to be lonely—?"

I gasped and stopped talking. I was talking about myself! I wasn't like most ponies. I was totally talking myself out of being adopted; I wasn't normal. I was gangly and gawky and sullen; worse, I stayed up all night.

I sighed deeply and turned for the door.

Celestia stopped me with a hoof. "Don't go."

"You don't want me. You can't want me."

"Nopony should be unwanted."

"Do you know how many foals live here?" I cried.

I turned with more force, but now she had me with two hooves, and for a moment it turned into a hug. But I was gangly and gawky and appeared fragile. She pulled back, but I no longer turned away. I felt a warmth surging through me from where I'd felt her forelegs around my side and neck.

I stood blinking again. Stupid tears! A waste of salt. It would probably have helped my chances had they showered down that moment.

All I did was blink.

Celestia said, "Blue Moon. Perhaps we could pray together for the moon? She must be weary after such a long night's work, being full all night and shining from all the way in the crystal sphere to illuminate the wide wide world. It's time for her to go to bed. Like you, I gather. You do look sleepy."

I yawned. "A 'ittle bit."

"May I lay my horn on your forehead."

I evaluated the end of the spiral. It looked sharp. "Not the pointy bit."

"I'll be careful."

"All right."

It resembled slightly translucent carved alabaster and felt warm after it pushed down my mane. I felt and listened for the moon. In moments, I sensed her presence the same way (but differently) that I would know a workmare or another foal shared the room: Breathing. Change of sound. Echos. Warmth. Incidental movement.

The moon noticed, like when I knew somepony glared at me.

I began to pray. I won't bore you with the what, because it's like a lullaby or the babble you share with a foal too young to know what you say, or a song a nightingale shares with it's cohort to say "I'm here. Let's be friends." Also, it's personal, so I shan't say more.

Celestia's horn warmed, making me tingle all over. The faint tinkle, like the wind chimes the head master kept in his window, grew. It smelled like pepper and crinkling autumn leaves. The moon's cool strength rose through my hooves to fill my heart.

It startled me when I felt our breathing synchronized. Maybe our hearts beat in time, too.

After much prayer, and some cajoling, the tension left the sky as the moon sunk below the horizon. Surprisingly, I also felt the sun move. I jerked but didn't act. The warmth that filled the room and radiated from her horn mirrored the contentment of my friend—

My eyes fluttered open. The unicorn giant trembled as she unfolded herself and rose to her full towering height, all the time whispering, "No, no, no. I can control it. I can..."

I stepped back until my flank pressed against the door.

Her horn filled with a brilliant orange-red. This wasn't the pleasant light of her horn from before. The angry glow heated the room like hot coal in a fireplace. I smelled the scorched smell I sometimes smelled passing where the older foals toiled with steam irons in the laundry.

Between her magic, and Hurricane's deft tugs and pulls with her teeth and her wings, they tore off her cloak and flung it aside. Little flames, like oil on-fire dripped down Celestia's horn to her head and neck, and spread, trying to engulf her body, but not consuming her! She breathed rapidly and deeply, straining, I think to stop the terrifying spread. Her eyes turned from violet to violent orange as if becoming windows to a furnace inside.

The flames burnt but left no smoke. They crackled and hissed, though, like from a log in the fireplace.

Hurricane took no chances. She flung the pillows toward the walls and slid the table aside. "Okay, okay. Maybe it would be better just to do it and get it over with?"

"Right," the fire unicorn agreed, turning toward the dawn, her eyes closed.

I stood there, watching, horrified and fascinated. Magic.

She faced the sun as accurately as I had pointed out the moon. She reared, which pressed her horn to the ceiling momentarily, and pedaled her legs. Of a sudden, I felt a familiar pull. Her mane and tail lofted, beating against her neck and flank in a non-existent wind that could only be unseen magic. It flowed from the earth and billowed by me and into her heart instead of mine, then through her horn in the direction of the sun.

It was what I had done this morning with the moon, nowhere as violently. It was what I had minutes prior done with the moon together with Celestia, but on a terrifying scale.

Day broke and the sun rose.

Celestia had a cutie mark: A yellow sun blazed on her white flank.

Tears streamed from my eyes and dripped down my cheeks. Tears of fear. They had to be. Each moonstone-like drop doubtlessly reflected the red from her sun and her fire.

Celestia's fiery magic ceased. It vanished in a blink along with most of the heat. It had lofted not only her mane and tail, but levitated her whole body. She settled to her hooves. Hurricane leaned into her, steadying her. I sensed the pegasus' professionalism as she rapidly dressed the recovering giant in the cloak while kicking the pillows back into place. She'd accomplished that, and begun pushing the table back, as I felt with a rear hoof for the door pull.

I studied the small scorch mark on the ceiling. The interior wood of the living tree had knots and rings, gnarled elbows and swirls of brown; it wouldn't be noticeable until pointed out.

I pulled open the door.

Hurricane said, "She's the one?"

Celestia answered, "She's the one."

As I backed from the room, the workmare bumped me aside as she walked in.

I staggered, but kept on backing, my hide cooling with sudden sweat, ticking nervously.

This unicorn had the mark of the sun on her flank.

This unicorn was the one I sensed in my prayers, the one that forced the moon from the sky when she was afraid to leave, again and again.

This unicorn was the one who raised the sun.

I kept on backing until I reached the corner, then crept around it.

I nevertheless heard the unicorn say, "We are definitely adopting Blue Moon."

"Is that so? Bring your husbands next time."

3 — Valuable

I galloped past the letters and numbers room all the way to the dormitory. It lay empty, and brightly sunlit. Many three-high bunk beds littered the area, but alcoves in the trunk of the tree held beds. I had taken the one the farthest from the lavatory and the baths, the least wanted, and the one most shadowed. I liked it that way, shadowed, and despite it being small, I folded myself comfortably inside. Many were the times I'd hidden there, using my steel-shod hooves to defend my domain.

Today, the distance from the salon mattered.

From what I'd learned from the adoption of Red Flash and Bugsy and Sun Prancer and Talon, it wasn't the foal that chose. It mattered not if they liked their new parents. Nopony would have turned down a family, even if that family were something from a cautionary storybook. It hadn't stopped Sun Prancer from leaving though she thought her new father wanted her only for the bits he thought she'd make him, using her talents beguiling trees to fruit in all seasons.

Hurricane seemed nice, though hard-edged. Not her a servant. Maybe she protected Celestia?

Celestia... She seemed nice. Even kind. But she terrified me.

She was the one that fought to take control of the moon against the moon's will. She now knew I was the pony that thwarted her.

Not good. Verily. Not good

Celestia loved the daylight. Ponies worked and played in the sunlight and slept in the night. I loved the night.

I covered my head with a pillow, as if I could block out my worries the way I could block out sun or sound. Eventually, I slept, where a unicorn of celestial dimensions, engulfed fire, brought daybreak after daybreak. I sat upon the moon, isolated, alone, but also on fire—a fire that oddly never burnt nor consumed me, but surrounded me in a red and orange flickering glow.

Nopony woke me until mid-afternoon.

That surprised me, but, as I ate my pail of hay, then walked to the Lemon Woods to search for moonstones, I reasoned it out. Neither Hurricane nor Celestia were married. Becoming married would take time. It might prove impossible. The unicorn mare was too big for any stallion to master, and while I'd seen a few dozen unicorns—Carmine Lake Township here lay only a league from Unicornia—none exceeded the height of an earth pony stallion. Had she frightened all her suitors away?

Quite possibly.

Knowing mine enemy, helped, forsooth! I could make it easy or I could make it hard to move the moon, quite possibly better now having seen her demonstrate her power in my sight. I knew what Celestia's magic felt like, but for all her fiery strength—and it had to have been her that had made the sun move regularly as of the last few months—she was the one with the solar cutie mark and I was the one with the lunar one.

The lunar one. Verily.

I swallowed deeply and stood blinking in tingly revelation. When the workmare jerked my bridle, I reflexively jerked it loose. I'd heard cutie marks meant something about what you were good at doing. I understood, now. Mine had to do with my friendship with the moon.

I felt warm all over...

...until the workmare whipped me with the end of the reins with a snap.

I reared and spun, jerking the straps again from her teeth, wrenching her neck at the same time. I shouted, "You want to bruise me or mark me? How many bits will you lose if you ruin my looks and scare the outlanders away?"

The workmare stepped back, eyes wide. She looked at my stinging flank and huffed. "Prithee, you want to eat?"

"I do."

"Then you work."

"I shall. Willingly."

"All right, then."

Tellingly, she never held my lead again—as if she had ever needed to in the first place!

Two days, four days, then six passed without a visit. I would not have gotten word were there to have been negotiations, I was just the foal, but certainly I would have been taunted by the brats even if there had been more than nary a rumor.

Nothing.

Perhaps my stubbornness was to blame.

I'd prayed diligently with the moon. We'd had three days of sunlight and two of night. I gauged the moon's mood. That was all that mattered as far as I was concerned.

It left me feeling guilty, as if I'd been caught misbehaving, like when a workmare purposely let something hang over my head and left me wondering whether I'd be paddled or not. I thought about Celestia—and the terrifying monster that had briefly consumed her in flame. I separated the two ponies in my mind. Celestia and... Daybreaker. I could see that Celestia was nice, not fiery. Daybreaker was an aura of magic. It made total sense flames would try to consume a pony that dealt with... the sun. Celestia had treated her friend—companion, associate... whatever—with respect.

Me, she'd treated kindly.

In storybooks, day and night shared. Twelve hours each, if the stories were to be believed. I believed and tried not to believe for my friend's sake. I felt guilty about it, I think, having to balance the two thoughts.

And maybe for becoming frightened by Celestia.

And possibly for having not even said good-bye.

If I understood a'right, it had been a mare's age since day and night broke, became long, became irregular.

If Celestia was the one suddenly fixing it...

If I was getting in the way of it...

I thought about many things as my moonstones tumbled.

On the seventh day, a workmare opened the door to the letters and numbers room. I trotted to the door before she called my name. I got this big goofy smile on my face. That shocked the brats into silence, and painted an envious expression on the faces of the foals.

My heart sang. I was going to be adopted!

My life would change. I did not know how. I did not know if it would be better, but it would be different. My new mother might be the opposite of me in something very essential, but, in singular very essential talent, we would understand one another very well.

I wouldn't be digging moonstones ever again.

When I turned the corner behind the workmare, I froze.

The door to the salon lay open to a room flooded with morning sunshine, but instead of a giant Celestia and a hovering pegasus named Hurricane, I saw a rugged looking earth pony stallion. He could have been a work horse, for his coloring was what was called wild. He was a dun white, with brown spots large and small. He kept his white mane trimmed to a hoof-length, but had a brown tail tied into a bun.

An outlander—his well-tooled belts and bandoleers and multi-flapped saddlebags stated this clearly. Vials and canisters of various sizes stuck out, all corked and sealed with wax, all positioned such that he could reach them with his teeth or tap one free with a hoof.

Potions.

I might be young, but I was plenty smart. I knew who he was before the workmare said, "Go thither, Blue Moon."

As I stepped inside, the big stallion nodded at me. "I am Smart Cookie. It's nice to meet you."

"Are you Celestia's husband?" I asked.

He chuckled. "No, I'm not. I met her precisely because she refused to marry her betrothed, though the friend that told me about you thinks she might yet marry him. And,"he waved a hoof, "no horn. She's not my type, nor me hers."

"You're not her friend, then?"

"Oh, we are friends, but we have different things that we feel important to act upon. Different agendas, let's say... Step closer. Let me see your cutie mark. Yes, indeed: a crescent moon. And we both know why."

"I don't think I like you."

He sighed. "Does that make a difference?"

I realized he'd asked it about both of us. I looked to the workmare who just looked at him, expressionless.

He looked to me. His brown eyes twinkled, but I couldn't figure out why. I answered, "I'm an earth pony and you are an earth pony."

He reached down with his muzzle and grabbed a vial from the bandolier that looped down from his right shoulder. With the tap of a hoof, he uncorked it and inhaled a shimmering mist that rose into the air before corking it again. The vial flew toward his chest and twisted itself into a tight loop on the bandolier. He gestured and a stained scroll flew out of his saddlebags and unfurled with a hiss. I could smell a moldy old book smell. Lines of green and yellow and blue resolved into a map. A long stick flew to his hoof and he pointed with it by gesturing in the air as he preceded to speak.

"This is Babeloin; this is Unicornia; this and this are from and to where the pegasai's cloud mountains migrate; this is the rebel earth pony territories referred to as Lesser Unicornia. Queen Platinum wants to control the entire map, and then the world. Her dynasty is descended from an evil king who tried but failed to do just that. Some say Crystal Hoof broke the heavens. The pegasi are in an uncomfortable alliance with the queen because she controls their food basket."

I understood working to eat, at least.

He finished with, "And Celestia works for Queen Platinum."

The workmare said, "Which makes Blue Moon valuable?"

Smart Cookie rolled his eyes toward the ceiling and sighed. With exaggerated slowness, the map furled up, before it and the pointing stick packed themselves. There had been a smokey brown glow centered on his forehead. I noticed it when it winked out.

My eyes lingered on the ceiling. It was scorched.

Celestia worked for a queen who wanted to control the world.

Again, I felt like backing away. But then the words just spoken sunk in.

My...

talent...

was...

valuable.

So would be Celestia's...

The stallion pulled a heavy looking tie-string purse from his saddlebags. The mud-stained grey thing was so stuffed that I could see the bits trying to push through.

The workmare turned over her outstretched hoof and pointed at the table. The purse clinked loudly.

All gold. Gold coins last week. Gold coins now.

The workmare said, "Two."

"Just so you understand, it was you who said that Blue Moon was valuable. Knowing that you harbored her once might also be valuable... information."

"All right, then."

He turned to me. "Look, Blue Moon. I come from Unicornia where if you aren't a unicorn, you aren't anypony. Most earth ponies there are earth grubbers who can't own their own land. Sure, I'm rare in that I'm an earth pony who can do magic, and there are plenty of good-hearted unicorns. Celestia might be the best of their tribe. But doing magic doesn't make me their equal. You and I, and my friends— Together, we can do something about that. You are an earth pony."

"I am. And I only have six years."

He grinned. "You study the adults around you carefully, I see. Good! You're asking whether you're old enough to make this choice. Inside, you've probably made yours and will be mad if what you get isn't what you chose. You are not old enough to make this choice for yourself because you don't understand it."

In my later years, I would very much have agreed, but I bristled and felt the fur on my spine rise at what I knew was true, and had forced him to say.

He continued, "Nevertheless. Regardless of what I know to be true, and what I've told you is true—Blue Moon, will you consent for me to adopt you?"

I started blinking. A question. Voiced. Even if it were a lie. That hope thing, become certainty. My throat closed up and I could barely breathe. Tears, neither of sorrow nor of fear, leaked down my cheeks and into my mouth. I startled myself by wiping at the salty things furiously.

Nevertheless.

I liked that word, nevertheless.

Nevertheless, I nodded. Consenting gave me power that I would not have had when he would have adopted me whether I liked it or not. I looked up at the scorch on the ceiling and thought about evil queens and those tricked into doing their bidding.

Aloud, I said, "Yes."

Smart Cookie smiled and nodded back. He said, "Apprentice Drover, may I sign the adoption papers?"

"Follow me to the Head Master's office."

"Daughter?" he said, pointing ahead of him with his nose.

I nevertheless followed behind the adults. I knew one thing, suddenly. I wasn't Celestia's enemy. I couldn't be. We were very different...

...but very much the same. Maybe even sisters.

I was going to have to save her from an evil queen—to save myself.

Author's Note

I hope you liked that taste of Luna and Celestia from their foalhood during the Platinum era. It is referred to in many of my other stories. In Ms. Glimmer and the Do-Nothing Prince, this Hurricane Stormchaser's armor plays a role. In Celestia and the Battle for Sunset, Celestia talks about their era, too.

Please ask questions. I'll answer. I might influence me into extending the story with new adventures. It is a time of inequality and upheavals that lead to the establishment of Equestria. The Windigoes are in the near future. Sombra is alive in their era and closer than you might presume. Celestia gets married, but she doesn't talk about that time, normally. You've met Smart Cookie, but the other Hearths Warming Eve tale ponies live during this time. Lots to write about, like how Luna became so militant. Yeah, and don't forget a certain unicorn and earth pony have yet to earn their wings.

Please leave comments. Please up vote (like) the story, too. It helps with visibility. If I feel enough people are interested, I'm more likely to add content!

Mostly, though, I hope you liked the story and will read others of mine.