The winter wind blew crisp and clear, encouraging ponies to sleep snugly in the stone fortress’ warmth.
During the decades since Discord’s fall, other speaking folk had also established their own cultures and rulerships across the world. Lately, some of them had finally reached out to Equestria. Granted, they had been cautious in their approaches. Tales were still being told of the end of the Age of Chaos, and what had been witnessed that day. And while younger folk outside Equestria plainly saw such stories as wild exaggeration, their leaders still viewed the alicorns with trepidation.
Well, except for the dragons, of course. They feared and welcomed no one.
Meanwhile, the sisters had continued to rule over ponykind. Reluctantly at first, but it was vastly better than the alternative. The castle, after all, had begun construction as a temple; the Equestrian nobility as priests.
But that was all history. Tonight, all was quiet within the Castle of the Two Sisters. All was well. The ponies within and without all shared a deep and peaceful sleep, secure beneath the banner of the duarchs who guarded and guided them, in day and in night.
Well, almost all.
Standing alone on the balcony of her chambers, Celestia looked out into the night. As the years had gone by, Luna had continued adding occasional new stars to the empty sky. If she kept this up, one day the sky might be filled with them. Celestia had asked her once, what they were for. But Luna had simply smiled and winked, saying, Secret things.
Celestia smiled a little at the memory. They were beautiful, whatever they were for. Like jewels, scattered across a dome of velvet.
“Sister?”
Celestia turned, frowning in puzzlement. “Luna? What is’t? Is all well?”
“Well enow for dreamers,” Luna said as she stepped to her. “Yet something vexes thee, I think.”
“How so?”
Luna gave an exasperated sigh. “Oh, Tia! Save thy caution for those who know thee less.” Luna embraced her with her wings and arms, nuzzling her fiercely. “Always do I respect thy privacy. Yet, e’en from afar I can see thy dreams are troubled.”
Celestia hesitated for only the briefest of moments, then returned the embrace, burying her muzzle in her sister’s mane.
“Yea,” she whispered. “But there is nothing to be done. Thus, there is little sense in speaking of it.”
Luna pulled back only enough to meet her dearest’s eyes. “Yet, I love thee and would help,” she said softly. “Wilt thou confide in me?”
Celestia smiled despite herself, her wings and withers trembling somewhat.
“I…” she started, then sighed gratefully. “Yea. I will.”
Several moments passed while Celestia struggled how to begin. Finally, she asked, “Luna, how many ponies yet live who can remember Discord’s fall?”
Luna shrugged. “A few. Most who were old enough to recall have died by now, I think.”
“Yea. And yet here we stand, growing stronger with every passing year. Each season changes us less and less, as though time were slowing for us alone. Meanwhile, we are venerated by those who know us from legend, held up too high on thrones of blue stone. And e’en so, our subjects need us, and insist we remain.
“And I know thou art lonely, though thou hides it well.” She sighed. “As am I, though not in the same fashion. But I know the distance betwixt thee and other ponies saddens thee, and I have no solution to grant thee.”
Luna shrugged. “Thou offered me a disguise once, to make friends incognito.”
“And thou wast right to refuse it,” Celestia nodded. “How should they be friends, if they know thee not? And so it remains, we are trapped within our roles here!”
Separating herself from Luna, she walked to the balcony’s railing. From here she could see the civilization of Equestria on one side, the wildness of the Everfree on the other.
“Once, we were isolated by chaos,” she went on. “Now, in these gentler times, we are secluded by order. An’ again: more an’ more, with each passing year. Old ways pass e’en as new ways are invented, and yet we and we alone remain. Is’t ever our fate, to be thus severed from our kind? To see other ponies in joy with family, with friendships… yet e’er be denied ourselves, seeing such joys alway dangled out of reach?”
Luna shrugged. “We could leave any time. A bond severed hurts less than one that’s kept poorly joined.”
Celestia gave her a sharp look. “An’ be worshiped as gods in our mystery? Have great wars declared in our names? Fie, never would I have such!”
“Nor I,” Luna agreed. “My point is that ‘tis by our wills that we remain here, whate’er the reason, at least ‘till others are chosen. And we have one another for solace till then.”
Then she gave her sister a knowing smile. “But come now. These are old regrets. What else plagues thee so?”
“I…” Celestia looked down.
Luna frowned, stepping closer. “Sister?”
“Oh, Luna, I…” Still looking down, the elder sister blinked back tears. A few of them struck the floor before she finally sighed, “I am afraid.”
Luna looked at her sister, mystified. “Afraid? Dear heart, of what?”
Celestia sighed again. “Over fifty years have passed since chaos fell. Foes have been faced, scores settled. Rulings made. Families established, lands claimed and brought to order. Seasons established, laws written, traditions made.”
Now she raised her head to look at Luna, her eyes haunted.
“And I remember all of them, Luna. All of them! Every last one! Not just the events, but who said what, down to their names and the engravings on their cloak clasps.” She swallowed, then went on, “I can recite the name of every guard who hath e’er served before us, every servant, every member of staff. Every noble, their families, and the details of every petition e’er brought before me.”
“But, thy memory hath always been a wonder—”
But Celestia shook her head violently. “Luna, I’m frightened! I don’t know how long I can keep on like this!”
For a moment, Luna was at a loss. “What? I don’t…”
Celestia’s voice shook as she went on, “Oh, I’m fine enough for now… but sooth, how long? How long, ‘till the weight of memory crushes me? Till time’s waves drag me down, and drown my mind, as they have so many others?”
Luna pulled her close again, squeezing with all her might.
“How many monsters have we faced?” Celestia asked into her sister’s mane, her breathing becoming more rapid, more desperate. “How many ancient beasts did we flee as children or fight as adults, who were driven mad by the passage of time?”
Luna stroked her sister’s mane. “Shhhh…”
“I can tell thee the exact number! And their names! And their colours, and what they said, and how they moved, and how they sounded, and what deeds they did and when they did them…!”
“Tia, ‘tis alright. I am with thee.”
“’Tis not alright!” Celestia insisted. “Eight days ago, there were two ponies before me in court. They had the same names as two stallions we slew, you and I, before chaos fell. Their child looked exactly like a childhood playmate of mine, an’ her name was an anagram for a friend of our mother’s I met but once, before thou wast born.”
“Tia…”
But Celestia only stared at her sister with a sudden intensity, trembling. “Luna... promise me—”
“Nay,” Luna interrupted, embracing her sister fiercely again, kissing Celestia’s forehead below her horn. “Say it not! Thou art my Tia! We shall find a way, always!”
But Celestia only shook her head again. “But we cannot say ‘always!’ Not anymore!” she cried. “Not when so much time stretches before us! Let other ponies speak thus, an’ for them ‘tis but a well-meant fiction! Something said to court another, or pledge a short life’s service. But for us…”
Her voice trailed off. For a time, Luna simply held her, waiting for her older sibling’s fear to subside. Eventually, Celestia’s tears slowed, the two sisters holding one another in the silver moonlight.
“Luna?” Celestia’s voice was soft, uncertain.
“Mmm?”
“Dost remember long ago, when ye were a child, an’ spake of joining completely with shadow?”
Luna’s eyes snapped wide open, but otherwise she did not move. “Yea,” she said cautiously.
“I pray thee, tell me truly. Did I…” She swallowed, then said, “Did I wrong thee that day?”
For a moment, Luna said nothing. All her life, she had looked upon her older sister as a mare of endless confidence and strength. It was more than a little frightening, hearing Tia so afraid.
But, she was silent only for a moment. She’d always had shadows of her own, and Tia had aided her against them many times in their lives. On the one eve that her fay needed her in kind, Luna would not be found wanting.
“Sometimes I look at the sun, and I think how easy it would be,” Celestia was saying. “If I were in the heart of it, I think I could just dissolve into it. I could just be part of something beautiful, something that gives warmth, and life…”
“Nay, my dear one,” Luna said. “Never have I regretted that day.”
Celestia relaxed slightly.
“Please,” the younger sister went on, hugging her tightly, “don’t leave me.”
Celestia hugged her back, but said nothing.
For a time, there was only the two of them and the wind blowing through the trees’ bare branches.
“I have no regrets of that day, ‘tis true,” Luna mused at last. “But, there is one thing that I do regret now. And that is having waited so long to give thee thy gift.”
Celestia pulled back again, looking at her younger sister in puzzlement.
“Gift? Hearth’s Warming is yet weeks away…”
Luna nodded. “And thus I waited. But I should not have, I think. At the time, I had simply thought of it as a useful option. Yet had I but known of thy pain, I would have offered it at once. Wilt thou bide a moment?”
Her curiosity overtaking both fear and confusion, Celestia nodded.
Luna released her completely, vanishing in a burst of azure light. She reappeared a few moments later holding a small box of spruce in the glow of her magic.
“I was going to wrap it,” she said, looking at the box she held. “But on reflection, Hearth’s Warming can wait. This cannot.”
Celestia looked at the small box, turning her head first one way, then another. It had no hinges, no keyhole, no clear sign of how best to open it.
“What is it?” she asked, intrigued. “A puzzle box?”
Luna shook her head. “’Tis forgetfulness.”
Slowly, Celestia stared at her sister.
“What?”
“Forgetfulness,” Luna repeated. “The spell within shall seek and obliterate whate’er memory – or memories – within thyself thou might desire.”
“But… how didst thou…”
Luna shrugged. “Not easily, I grant. But long have I studied how dreams are forgotten upon the waking.” Then, with a little pride, she added, “Thus, taking mine observations, I researched the spell, carefully as I might. This is the result.”
“Carefully indeed.” Celestia tapped the box with keen interest. “However didst thou test it?”
“Does it matter? Here is a key to thy dilemma.” Luna smiled. “Forget what thou wilt, when thou wilt. Be no longer haunted by the little things, mistakes, or unpleasant events. Keep only agreeable memories and important things, and let the rest forever dissolve into nothingness.”
For a moment, Celestia reached out to the box. Then, she lowered her hoof again with a sigh.
“I cannot,” she said.
“Cannot?” Luna asked, eyebrow upraised. “How so?”
“I cannot do this,” Celestia said again. “’Tis a noble gift, and I cherish the gesture and thy efforts. But… what future choices might I make wrongly, again and again, without the knowledge of my mistakes?”
“Ah. For a moment I’d feared I had miscast the thing, somehow,” Luna nodded. “If ‘tis thy own choosing, then all is well. But still, if thou seeks to keep wisdom, why not destroy only those memories which distress thee?”
Celestia asked, “Yet, what I have learned from those pains, would that not also fade?”
Luna reluctantly nodded again. “Well, in sooth, yes… but then, lose thou only those memories which are of no import. Keep only what has value.”
But Celestia shook her head. “But how would I know? Knowledge that seems inconsequential today might save lives a year from now. How could I rule wisely or well, constantly tearing holes in the fabric of my own recollection?”
“Well, then,” said Luna, offering the box again. “Mayhap thou shouldst simply keep it. Just in case.”
Again, Celestia shook her head. “An’ then, how would I know I had not used it before? How many times might I lessen my own mind, day after day, never realizing what I had already done? How would I know to stop? How would I know I had e’en started? How would I know what I had given up, and what I had not? I couldn’t.”
“Mmm,” Luna nodded. “Then it sounds as if thou hast made up thy mind.”
“I have. Hast e’er offered this to me before?”
Luna gave a slight smile. “Never. My word on my soul.”
Celestia nodded. “Good. In that much, at least, I can know I am constant.” She took in a long, slow breath, then released it again. “I think thy gesture is the true gift this night, my fay.” She turned, re-entering her chambers again. “Prithee, let us destroy the box and all it contains.”
“Gladly,” Luna nodded as she followed her. “An’ ne’er to make another, I think. I note thou seems in better cheer, though.”
Celestia nodded, considering. “In sooth, I am. Is’t not strange?”
“Nay,” the Lady of Dreams said happily. “For what is the truest difference betwixt one’s chambers and a prison cell?”
Celestia thought for a moment, then she smiled as well. “Choice,” she said.
“Indeed.” Luna took the box, still held in her magic, and tossed it into the fireplace.
The two watched contentedly, lying side by side on the fine woven rug, as the flames devoured the small wooden box.
“Well,” said Luna, rising at last. “I must away. The dreamers will have need of me. But, happy early Hearth’s Warming, my fay.”
“And to thee, my fay,” Celestia replied. “One question, before thou goest?”
Luna waited, head cocked to one side.
“Was there ever truly a spell within the box?”
Luna gave her a teasing smile. “Does it really matter?” she asked.
Celestia smiled back. “Nay,” she said. “It doesn’t.”
Luna winked at her beloved sister, and was gone in a flash of blue.
Celestia continued smiling for a moment, considering all that had just transpired. Then, she went back to the balcony, spread her wings out, and soared upward into the nighttime air. If she was going to continue gathering an eternity of memories, well, she would just make as many of them as beautiful and as joyful as she could. She would make a treasure trove of her life. A collection of jewels from her experiences. A palace of her memories.
She rode the winds higher and higher into the sky, dancing among her sister’s stars.
Author's Note
.
.
.
.
.
.
This timeline continues in Biography of a Tyrant.
And, of course, the seminal story that starts it all begins here.