Understand the night, Nightingale thought, and you understand her. But she was as vast as the field on which the stars danced and bright as a single candle in a pitch-black room. To love her was a mystery and a thrill. Like dancing with your eyes closed, spinning and spinning, wild and foolish and alive, tumbling until you hit something and cried out in surprise and fell breathlessly to the bed, where she waited, where she always waited. Twilight was insatiable. Every day ending day. Giving way to night.
Nightingale thought she knew her well. But the night was old and Nightingale was young. There was always more to learn when it came to Twilight.
In the bedchambers, princess Twilight lay draped over her lover Nightingale. The flame from a single candle on the bedside table lit the room. It reached out to the corners longingly for purchase, but darkness persisted in the eaves where the light dared not climb.
Twilight had her back to the candle, so Nightingale only saw the silhouette of her face and her glowing purple eyes.
The color was deep. She liked deep. It made her feel deeper just to experience it.
“If you were a book, I’d study you,” Nightingale said.
Twilight snorted.
“No, really. Call me a good noodle, cuz I would read that book all day. I’d go to college and study it. I’d get a PhD in Twilight.”
The covers shuddered as she giggled. “Stop,” she said. She sounded tired. Her voice lilted a certain way when she was about to fall asleep.
“I’m not just trying to go another round. I need you to know I’m being serious.”
“I know you are.” Twilight’s hoof found hers. They lingered for a moment, interlocked. “We could go another round.”
“I’m tired,” Nightingale lied. “And I want you to talk to me until I fall asleep.”
“Okay.” Twilight shifted from her side to her back. An unspoken cue to cuddle. Nightingale obliged. “What do you want me to talk about?”
“I dunno. Anything.”
Twilight’s voice wasn’t deep, but in its own way it was really, really deep. Deep as dark was dark. And when she was tired, smokey and crackly and warm. Lots of things going on. Deep.
“I could recite tax codes. I would need to light another candle so I could see the parchment, though.”
Nightingale squeezed herself tighter around Twilight. “I got a better one.”
“Shoot.”
“Of all your best friends, who was your best best friend?”
The flame on the single candle flickered. The shadows jumped in surprise.
Twilight considered the question for a long time. Finally, she said, “It wouldn’t be fair to ask such a personal question if you didn’t answer it first.”
“Personal? Strain that big brain of yours and remember what we just did on this bed like fifteen minutes ago.”
Twilight wiggled her hips and giggled. Pure dragonfire. “Really. I’m not answering until you answer first.”
“You’ve got like sixteen hundred years on me. Your answer is gonna be way better than mine.”
“No it’s not,” Twilight sang.
“Ugh. Fine. You’re my best best friend. You already knew that.”
“Mmm, I had an inkling.”
“That’s not fair though."
Twilight considered the ceiling. Her eyes moved, like the shadows above them were forming memories. “When I was your age, I had the elements of harmony. Those were my first friends, so they were obviously very special to me.”
“But if you had to pick one.”
“I wouldn’t.”
“Not fair.”
“Fair.” Twilight smiled. Even in near-darkness it shone. “Of all the friends I had in my younger years, six of them stood out among the rest. Trying to pick just one would be insane. We were one at times. Connected by harmony. Is that good enough?”
Nightingale lingered on the thought. “What was it like being one with another pony?”
“It was like ego-death,” Twilight said. Nightingale leaned in, aching for more, but Twilight left it at that and settled into the silence once more.
Nightingale was hoping for something more romantic to work with. But when Twilight was finished with something, her silence took on a distinct tone. There was Twilight listening patiently. There was Twilight ruminating. And then there was Twilight ending the conversation and going for the candle.
Nightingale wrapped herself around her lover. “Do you love me?”
“More than anyone else,” Twilight said, and blew out the candle.
Darkness enveloped them.
Morning tip-toed into the room. By the time it woke Nightingale, Twilight had already disappeared. Court called each morning at five o’clock. Nightingale’s meager position as a desk clerk in the Canterlot Archives didn’t require her to be up until eight.
Pastel light played across the room. Each massive segment of wall and floor and ceiling caught it at a slightly different angle, casting so many shades of lavender. The sky outside the window still retained some of its liquid-dark contrast. A few shadows lingered in the high ceiling.
Nightingale pulled herself up and trudged downstairs to make breakfast. As she whisked herself soft-scrambled eggs with black pepper and parsley, a few uncomfortable thoughts wormed their way into her head.
She had reading to do today at the archives. It was about Twilight.
She wasn’t looking forward to it.
The book in question was really a series of books, as they usually were for someone whose talents lay in the realm of the reference section.
It started with a cookbook. One on one hundred and one different ways to scramble eggs (of which soft-scrambled was her current favorite). That book led her to the archive’s small cooking section, where she found a book on vegetable-growing methods. She picked that one out, too. When she skimmed through it, she realized she didn’t actually want to plant any of her own vegetables, so she put the book back and exchanged it for a book of fast recipes by a journalist, whose selling point for the book was that they were a journalist and not a cook, so if they could do it in their hectic journalist’s schedule then so could you. And she found the recipes were definitely quick, though that came usually at the cost of flavor and texture and consistency, and usually ended with cigarettes to kill whatever hunger was left. So she put that book back and found a biography on the journalist who wrote it, a gonzo character with a penchant to jump into the middle of dangerous crime syndicates and political upheavals for the sake of getting the raw story. In the beginning chapter, the author listed all the horrible things which have happened to journalists in the previous five hundred years prior to the book’s publication. Topping that list, among the usual suspects of murder and blackmail, was being memory-wiped by a princess over a story whose implications had been so severe the princess had felt justified destroying a piece of somepony’s mind over it. Nightingale didn’t believe that was how memory-wiping spells actually worked, so she found a book on advanced-level neuromagic as well as a history of journalistic abuse. The magic book was more of a textbook, making it useless to a magical novice like her, and the other book proved equally useless. Although the story of a journalist getting their mind wiped over a story was well-traveled, it wasn’t useful as a point of reference because once your mind was wiped, you had no recollection of your mind being wiped and therefore couldn’t confirm whether or not your mind had just been wiped. The logic was circular. Nightingale hated circular logic. She put the book back with extreme prejudice and dug into an unabridged history of Princess Celestia’s time in power, which had its own fair share of scandals but no mind wiping. Same with Luna (her crimes were arguably worse than mind wiping, at least for a time). Twilight Sparkle’s first five hundred years in power, the next book in the series said, had a marked decline in scandals. Nightingale beamed with admiration, until she turned the page over. On the other side, the book admitted to just one minor public scandal, worthy of entry in this book not because of its significance in its own time but for its president in historical context, when princesses like Celestia and Luna would take multiple politically-motivated marriages, wives and husbands alike, in keeping with polyamorous norms. Cut to Twilight's time, and she apparently embraced the recent cultural shift towards casual datingand had been alleged to keep especially close company with one of the elements of harmony in particular, though which one of the elements it was couldn’t be said for sure. One inspired journalist actually snuck into the crystal castle looking for the scoop. No one is certain what they saw within those walls, but when the journalist turned up a few days later they had no recollection of ever having entered the castle in the first place, or how they turned up where they did, or why all their film had been ripped from their camera and saturated with light, ruining the images forever.
In this manor, Nightingale stumbled upon a lie.
Twilight always said she had never taken a lover before.
That night, the shadows in the bedchambers were especially long. The single bedside candle illuminated the bare silhouette of princess Twilight. Her eyes glowed, deep and purple.
“Remember when I said, ‘if you were a book, I’d study you’?”
“How could I forget?”
“Did I ever tell you I actually did once?”
Twilight’s eyes flashed amusement.
“For our first date,” Nightingale continued, “I read a history textbook on your ascension and first five hundred years in power.”
“Do you think I'd find that hot?"
“I took notes.”
Twilight groaned.
“I was doing a little digging in the reference section today.”
“Yeah? What did you find?”
Nightingale sprung the trap. She put some distance between herself and Twilight and clutched a pillow to her chest. “I think I found your old lover.”
The shadows leaned in expectantly. Twilight’s face was shrouded in shadows, save the faint light in her eyes. “What do you mean?”
“Who was your best friend? What did you say last night?”
“You’re my best friend, Nightingale.”
“You said the elements of harmony, right?”
“Yes.”
“And in this book I found, you picked one over the others. One of them was your lover.”
“I--” The shadows leapt again. Twilight’s eyes went from the curtain to the covers to Nightingale--then right back to the covers. “That’s insulting to my friends’ legacies.”
“Is it true?”
For too long, the only sound came from the faint rustle of the wind outside and the ambient energy playing through the castle.
Finally, Twilight spoke. “It’s unlike you to believe in unverified rumors.”
“You said I was your first.”
“You are.”
“Twilight--”
“Does it really bother you?”
“A little.”
“Okay, fine. I admit. You’re not my first. I had another love fifteen hundred years ago. It was wonderful, and then she died. It was the most horrible thing I’ve ever experienced, but I spent the next fifteen hundred years moving on.” She slid closer. Always evading. Always stationary. The night was so many things. What was she now? “How many lifetimes has it been? Would you allow me one short moment of happiness every two millenia?”
“Twilight.”
“Would you do that for me?” Twilight paused suddenly, her eyes no longer glowing so much as burning. “I’m serious.”
Nightingale paused. Words came and went. She settled on nothing instead.
Twilight filled the silence. "It took me fifteen lifetimes to get over the first one. Then I chose you. Do you understand?”
Always more to learn. How to turn a word into a hammer. How to turn a black piece of paper into the endless bounds of space. How to turn a centuries-old lie into a declaration of love.
This timeline was way beyond Nightingale's comprehension. Way beyond deep. She could hurt her lover's feelings and fight it, but hadn't she accomplished that already? All the fight was fleeing this fight, leaving Nightingale with an empty feeling that felt less like deep and more like dark. To darkness when the lights go out.
“I don’t think I understand,” said Nightingale.
“You're my best friend,” Twilight said quietly.
So many more questions lost to that eyes-closed spinning and spinning, that perfect weightless heavy sensation. But one in particular begged to be asked.
“Was it the pink one?”
“She had a name,” Twilight said softly. “You should know the names. Everyone learns the names.”
“In grade school.”
Twilight despaired into her pillow. “I’m so old...” she muttered.
“So it wasn’t Pinkie Pie?”
“No,” Twilight said tersely.
“I just want to know. Do you even remember?”
“Of course I do.”
That was a bridge too far. Nightingale walked it back, like she was so good at doing. “I just want to know.”
“Do you really?”
“Uh. Yes?”
“You want me to say an old lover’s name in our bed?”
Nightingale nodded. Curiosity had her in its grip. She had to know.
Twilight sighed. Then she leaned across the table and whispered a name into Nightingale’s ear, softly as the setting sun.
Nightingale’s face twisted in confusion, much to her lover’s satisfaction. The younger lover tried to formulate a thought, and eventually settled on, “That... wasn’t the one I was expecting.”
“Does it make you feel any better knowing that little detail?”
“No.”
“Do you wish I could take it back?”
“Kinda.”
“I won’t take it back.” Twilight puffed out her chest. “You’re not as lucky as that camerapony I zapped.”
“So you did zap them.”
“There’s a very important lesson to be learned here.”
“Yeesh.” Deep. Lessons for everything. Insatiably Twilight. Hungry to teach. Except Nightingale wasn’t too keen on learning anything more at the moment. “How about we forget I asked?”
Twilight smirked. “You’ll have to stew in your lesson. You deserve it.”
Nightingale groaned.
“Or...” The sheets parted effortlessly around Twilight as she closed the gap between herself and Nightingale. The pillow disappeared, and Nightingale wondered if it had ever even been there at all. Twilight leaned in and whispered in that low whispery voice she pulled out only on special occasions, “I could make you forget.”
The candle flickered. Nightingale's thoughts dissolved.
The night went on.
