Broken Minds and Healing Hearts

Princess Luna, Mistress of the Night, had seemed to feel every moment of Twilight’s imprisonment. Twilight had been her first friend since returning from her banishment and she had felt betrayed when she discovered what the younger princess had done. Twilight had freed her and it had felt like the whole time they spent as friends had been a lie. Then Luna had felt hurt and sad that someone she had been so close to had fallen so far without giving any indication that they had changed before it was far too late. She had asked her sister many times if it was true and not just some cruel joke but Celestia had been hit just as hard if not harder at the news of what her once faithful student had done.

The Princess of the Night had not simply taken a stranger’s word for it though. Twilight was vehemently denying her guilt and professing her innocence to all who would hear and Luna felt that as a good friend she was required to at least look into the matter personally. Being a princess meant putting the needs and greater good of the nation before everything else and that required you to be unbiased and be just as hard on friends as you would strangers but that didn’t mean she had to sit back while the evidence was gathered and pass judgment.

She had personally gone to the scene to look it over herself but she had not been reassured. Twilight’s magic was potent and it covered just about everything in the room even if what she was saying was true Twilight’s magic had either erased the evidence of someone else or there had never been someone else. In one last ditch effort, mostly done out of denial, she had checked the bodies and visited the young colt Twilight had claimed to have helped. Luna, through her connection to dream magic had delved into the young colt’s mind but being in a coma was not the same thing as being asleep and the only thing Luna had found regarding the incident was Twilight standing over him and pain. It had not been a pretty picture and it had shattered whatever hope had remained in the Night Princess.

She had been so angry, felt so betrayed, both that Twilight had done something like this but also that she would lie about it as though the evidence wouldn’t reveal the truth that she had, in a fit of rage ordered the guards to try and force the truth from her by just about whatever means necessary. Only the fact that Twilight was an alicorn had saved her from being tortured to death even before the trial. Still Twilight had claimed she was innocent. Despite all the overwhelming evidence, Twilight stuck to her lie. The audacity had angered both sisters and had driven them to decide that if even now she would not be honest then there was nothing more for Twilight to say and ordered that no one was to speak to her and she was not to leave her cell for anything until her punishment was over perhaps then the former princess would remember the value of honesty.

It had all seemed to happen so quickly. Looking back on it over a hundred years later and with the new facts of the case before her she could see that the case had been too easy, that something had been wrong about it all. They had all been blinded by their emotions despite claiming to be unbiased, they had all felt betrayed and in feeling so had done the same.

Twilight had been telling the truth, she had been innocent. They had tortured and imprisoned an innocent person. SHE had done that. She had earned her banishment but Twilight, good, faithful, eager to please, Twilight had done nothing. Twilight’s loyalty had been betrayed, her honesty swallowed by lies, and her kindness met with violence. Luna knew how that felt, she had experienced the same over a thousand years ago before her banishment and it had led to the nightmare.

Luna had taken the hatred of her ponies for many years before deciding that she would force them to love her and her night. Twilight had stayed in a cell without anyone, knowing she was innocent and that she didn’t deserve their punishment and instead of being filled with hate and seeking revenge she had withdrawn into herself. Even in their betrayal Twilight had refused to fall into the darkness, to betray her betrayers. It was just another way Twilight had proven herself to be a better pony than Luna herself.

Celestia had told her what she had found what she opened Twilight’s cell and, unbelieving, Luna had decided to see the disgraced princess for herself.

She had taken the first opportunity she had to head to the room Celestia had prepared for Twilight. Surely it was all an act, Twilight could not have lost herself so badly, she was just pretending to teach the sisters a lesson. It simply couldn’t be that she had lost her once closest friend.

When she got to the room she felt slightly vindicated. The door was open and Twilight was not inside therefore there must be enough of her left to try and escape, not that Twilight was a prisoner anymore but still, both sisters had assumed she would remain in the room until told otherwise. Now she would have to look for the purple pony.

She took the direction opposite the way she came and began her search. According to Celestia, Twilight was quite frail now so she couldn’t have gone far.

The Princess of the Night had been rather fortunate in her search and had discovered the wayward princess a few hallways down but the sight had only pleased her for a moment before she really took in what she was seeing.

The pony in front of her was gaunt and frail, barely strong enough to keep herself up and walking and leaning on the wall for support. Her hair was long and dirty, knotted and matted in places and it was nothing like the precise brushed hair that it owner had meticulously brushed it into the different colors blended in the most unflattering way possible. It was her eyes though that truly cut into Luna.

Dull and lifeless and yet filled with complete terror upon seeing Luna. Twilight had been the one pony besides her sister that had never been afraid of her.

Twilight’s mouth moved and it was only Luna’s enhanced hearing that allowed her to hear the one word that kept falling from the traumatized pony’s lips. “Sorry.”

Slowly, so as not to startle the frightened mare, Luna approached. “It’s okay. You don’t need to be sorry. It’s not your fault. You didn’t do anything wrong.”

Luna’s words didn’t seem to have the desired effect though. Twilight was still scared and for every step Luna took closer Twilight shrunk further away and into herself.

By the time Luna had made it to Twilight’s side she had curled into a protective ball on the floor and still the apology fell from terrified lips. Uncertain how to proceed, Luna took a seat on the floor beside the trembling mass and continued to murmur words of reassurance, determined to wait until Twilight realized she was neither in danger nor in any sort of trouble.