Star Swirl's Final Secret
Luna rested her forelegs on the heavy antique oak desk, and stared out through the steam rising from the mug of coffee that she held up to her muzzle between her hooves.
Individual candles in the crystal chandelier above her flickered occasionally, but the effect went unnoticed by the open pages of the book resting in the stand on the table, as they stared up at the pair of teal eyes currently trained upon them. She could have used magic to illuminate the room, but instead wanted her mind to be as alert as possible for the task in front of her.
These words had kept their secrets patiently and were now happy to share their existence with the only pony to look over their enigmatic riddles for over a thousand years, yet there was something they were not yet ready to divulge; their meaning.
While the other writing in the book was written in clear ponish, the author had gone to pains to write this section in some kind of code, and this intrigued Luna. What played on her mind further was the fact that the author had been her personal tutor, Star Swirl the Bearded, whom she had to assume was now long dead.
The fact that he had been the cleverest pony of his age, and that he had seen fit not merely to hide this book where he believed that nopony would find it, but also as added security, written this particular chapter in an obscure code, served to reinforce the importance of the knowledge that it must contain.
Trying to crack this code had become something of an obsession for the Princess of the Night, and she had long since come to ration strictly the time she spent in trying to make sense of it. She had a multitude of other duties demanding her attention, and she appreciated that obsessing over this book was currently doing little more than distracting her attention. That said, the lure was as strong now as when she had first found the book, many moons ago.
The floor surrounding the desk was littered with screwed up pieces of paper where she had tried to experiment with as many of the fiendishly clever codes as her mind could devise, but none had come close to revealing the message that lay before her in plain sight, and that really played on her mind.
There was something, something obvious she was missing.
Taking a sip of the bitter yet enlivening drink, she placed a bookmark carefully at the beginning of Chapter 27, where the illegible writing began and was just about to close it up, when a thought occurred to her and she paused.
She placed the mug down carefully, well off to one side, from where any spill could not reach the book if she were to accidently drop it.
“Chapter 27” she mused, “Surely not …”
She flipped back through the pages until she had reached the first chapter, then noted down its title on a blank sheet of paper: ‘Chapter 1, Social anthropology of ancient tribes; Chapter 2, Pre-unification religious practices and belief principles; Chapter 3, Xistence of mythical entities, Chapter 4 …’
It was true, Star Swirl had missed the first letter ‘E’ off ‘existence’, but why? He was the most learned of mages and had written on all known subjects from alchemy to yoga and botany to zoology. Why then had he misspelled a word in the title of a chapter?
Once she had written down the titles of all 26 chapters, she looked for one beginning with ‘A’ and underlined it, then ‘B’, then ‘C’ and so on, quickly noticing that no two chapters started with the same letter, and therefore each chapter began with a different letter of the alphabet.
Luna gasped. Could this be a clue to unlocking the key to a cipher?
She sat back and stared at her notes, then back to the book, then back to her notes again. She wanted to take another sip of coffee to focus her mind, but her forehooves were trembling with anticipation now, and there was no way she was going to risk spilling anything at this stage.
Bending forward, she wrote out on a fresh piece of paper all 26 characters of the alphabet in sequence, and then underneath, the letters in the order they appeared in the chapter titles. Next, she set about applying this key to the jumble of characters starting just after the text that read ‘Chapter 27’.
The characters started to emerge, one after the other, slowly building up to a stream of recognisable words.
“Chapter 27, The real truth behind the existence of Equestria” she read out loud.
She gasped and leaned back, “Oh, Star Swirl, you wily old soul!”
“Congratulations, visitor. Having got this far, you are clearly worthy of knowing the last secret of Equestria. As you are no doubt writing this out letter at a time, I must urge you to keep the knowledge you will learn to yourself, and destroy all notes you make so that others less worthy cannot ever know its secrets. If you choose to proceed, do so only with the utmost caution; the knowledge that lies ahead will burden you for the rest of your life. Continue only if you are prepared to carry this knowledge with you to your grave; what you will learn has the potential to destroy the whole of Equestrian society.”
She was hooked.
During the next few hours, Luna began to translate the random looking sequence of letters on the page into readable words, and soon came to know what each letter stood for without needing to refer back to the key. Paragraph at a time, the chapter unfolded. Periodically, she put her hoof to her mouth to cover a gasp, but always returned to finish what she had started.
When it was done, she knew Star Swirl’s secret and stared blankly for many minutes. Outside it was still night time, but she had no intention now of fulfilling any more of her nocturnal obligations.
Tentatively, she raised a forehoof in front of her and touched it with the other, as if seeing it for the first time and wanting to confirm it was real, then she rubbed one against the other and looked to see if anything looked out of the ordinary.
A tear ran down her cheek as she stared unblinkingly back at the words on the page, which she could now read as plainly as any other text.
Time stood still.
Truly, some knowledge was better not being known.
Luna pondered her existence and that of her sister, her friends and all of the ponies in Equestria for a long moment, then lit her horn and levitated one of the lit candles from its place in the chandelier. One at a time, she fed the sheets of paper to its voracious flame before a flash of blue light from her horn banished the residual ashes to the four winds.
Luna extinguished all the candles and left her study, walking with uncharacteristic slowness through the castle towards her sister’s chambers.
On nearing the door emblazoned with the distinctive sun motif, she was seen by two guards who snapped smartly to attention as they saw her approach. The more senior of the two offered a greeting to the Princess, but the distant stare from her glazed eyes told him something was wrong and warned him that a customary reply would not be forthcoming. She looked like she had seen the end of the world.
Luna let herself in without knocking, not even waiting to be invited. Inside, lights could be seen and so she knew Celestia was awake.
“Sister” she called, “Sister!”
“Lulu?” she heard in response, “Is that you? Am I late for raising the sun?”
“No Sister, you are not” she replied, heading towards the source of both the light and the voice, pushing open the door into her sister’s study.
“Whatever can be wrong Lulu” asked Celestia, well aware of the breaches of protocol that Luna had committed by coming into her private quarters unannounced, but laid down her quill from where she had been writing, and rose graciously to greet her anyway.
When she saw the vacant stare from her sister’s dead eyes, she could suddenly tell that something was terribly wrong and rushed over to give her a hug, which Luna did not return.
“What’s happened Lulu?” she asked, feeling trepidation at asking the question, but resolving strongly to help her sister in any way she could.
“I love you Celestia” Luna whispered, using her sister’s full name instead of the more accepted ‘Tia’.
Celestia was really getting worried now but knew not to risk scaring her sister off by being too pushy; she would open up in her own good time. Hopefully.
“Do you believe in freewill or do you consider that life is predetermined destiny?” asked Luna, not even looking up to meet her sister’s eyes.
Celestia was thrown by the existential nature of her sister’s opening gambit. At least it wasn’t anything to do with the return of one of their antagonists or an invasion of some kind, she consoled herself. Perhaps it had just been a bad dream?
“I have not given it much thought” she replied honestly.
“I have this night learned such knowledge” said Luna quietly, “In writings left by Star Swirl the Bearded, who, it appears, must have taken the secret to his grave. And that, I fear, must be how I now treat it.”
“You know you can tell me anything Lulu” said Celestia reassuringly.
Luna snapped her head up and stared directly into her sister’s concerned face, the pain in her soft teal eyes burning straight into Celestia’s soul with such terrifying force that the white mare recoiled.
“What have you done?” she asked, coming to appreciate that her little sister had, at least in her own mind, somehow just crossed a line.
“I must learn to accept what I know with the same grace and stoicism that our beloved teacher once did” sighed Luna, “He had only to carry the secret for a mortal lifetime, so in that, I envy him.”
Celestia felt her mouth suddenly get uncomfortably dry. What had her sister found that could have affected her so?
“Raise a hoof for me, please Sister” Luna requested.
Celestia looked puzzled, but did as asked and watched as her sister met it with one of her own, and felt it rub gently before Luna withdrew hers and studied it carefully.
“What are you doing Lulu?” she asked, looking a little mystified.
“Seeing if anything rubs off” she answered.
“I had a shower before I turned in last night” replied Celestia, suppressing any hint that she felt irked by the question.
“No, Sister” replied Luna, focusing on her forehoof, “Ink.”
Celestia looked distinctly puzzled by the answer and lifted her own forehoof up to examine it, but was unsurprised to see no traces of ink. However, she was beginning to develop concerns about her sister's state of mind.
"All the world's a stage and all the stallions and mares merely players" Luna mused sadly, “Is that not right Sister?”
“You quote from the Bard” Celestia observed.
“Never has it been so true” Luna lamented, then added with a self-deprecating smile, “Perhaps he knew something more than he let on.”
“You must tell me what you know, Lulu” Celestia prompted, “A problem is eased when it is shared by two. If it is something for you to carry through all immortality, then at least allow me to share your burden.”
Luna fell silent, weighing up the kindness of the offer, but then shook her head sadly.
“Tell me; do you believe that life is predetermined destiny Lulu?” she asked, recalling how their conversation had started.
Luna let out a sad laugh, the hollowness of which shook Celestia.
“Our future is not ours” Luna confided, “Even our past. I know about our creator and I know the lifespan of everything you see around you, even us, dear Sister. Even us.”
“You mean, we are not immortal?” asked Celestia, suddenly fearing for who would be there to look after all of her little ponies across the whole of Equestria if she were no longer there to protect and guide them.
“You will recall that Star Swirl created a spell that broke through the confines of time and dimension?” Luna said.
“Yes. Twilight recounted the story of her epic chase following Starlight Glimmer across different future projections of Equestria ...”
“That was just for starters, Sister. He went on to break through a further even more mysterious barrier into another world; a world of all powerful humans, where our existence was laid bare before him” said Luna, suddenly lifting her forehooves to clasp her sister’s muzzle and pointing it so that she was staring directly into her eyes, “We … are … not … real.”
“You … seem very real to me Lulu” replied Celestia cautiously, “Are you perhaps referring to the portal controlled by the crystal mirror that Twilight is looking after in her castle?”
“No, no, no. I fear I have already said too much” sighed Luna resignedly, ignoring the question and releasing the grip on her sister’s muzzle, adding enigmatically, “Season nine is when it all ends, Celestia. Thereafter, we will remain alive only in the hearts of the truest believers, perpetuated by those who will honour us through their writing, artistry and songs.”
Celestia looked puzzled at the abstract references, but welcomed the embrace as her sister reached out and buried her muzzle into her soft white fur, and began to shake with sobs that wracked through her body.
While she felt devastated to see her little sister so troubled, Celestia was glad that whatever was bothering Luna, she had sought comfort in her big sister rather than going off on her own as she had when turning into Nightmare Moon, and in return, held her tightly.
Luna felt her sister’s warm hug and whispered, “I love you Tia, whatever happens, I will always love you, even when we ourselves are long forgotten.”
