“I don’t think you realise how strong you are, my niece.”
“Well, how can I not compare myself to you, Auntie? You are the goddess of the very sun itself.”
“And you are the goddess of love, Cadence. Love is more powerful than reason, than magic, than any force in this world. In comparison, the sun seems like a poor prize.”
I was twelve years old, and from my skull there had erupted a fluted appendage of pure alicorn. Blood poured down past my temples. It matted my hair and pooled in my eyes. But the pain of a rapidly growing form, or stronger wings, or a horn pushing its way through bone is nothing compared to the sheer force of magic that lit every single nerve ending on fire. I was being immolated in the heart of the sun.
I could feel the heat of the sun itself.
I could hear the sun.
I heard her voice soothing me, cutting through the roar of pure arcane fury that rent flesh from my bones only for it to regrow instantly.
“Calm yourself, little one.”
And, as if all the magic in the world simply obeyed her without question, I did. The lights blinding me subsided, my form settled, I stopped levitating. For the first time in minutes, I could see properly.
And what I saw was my bedroom, scorched and bleached from the heat and lights. My parents were in the doorway, cowering and tearful, hiding behind the perfect, immaculate form of the princess.
She studied me, and though I could see the deep thought in her eyes, it never overwhelmed the kindness, the compassion.
Everyone in the whole world loved Celestia. I had always known that. And now?
Now I could feel it.
I could feel the love my parents had for me, selfless and overwhelming. The absolute willingness that they would have had to die for me without a second thought. I could feel the love the princess had for me. Something more distant and austere, but still with her characteristic warmth.
“Princess Celestia?” I spluttered, at once somehow feeling more shocked at her appearance than at what had just happened to me, “When did you get here?”
“When one feels a magical surge like this, holding court feels trite in comparison. I came from Canterlot as soon as I could. You’ve been like this for several hours, your parents tell me.” she replied. My knees felt weak, and I had to sit down. Several hours?
It had felt like no time at all.
“Tell me, my dear, when this happened to you, what were you doing at the time?” she asked, and I racked my brains for a second.
When the answer came to me, I chewed my lip, a reluctance to meet her eye betraying childish embarrassment. It felt ridiculous to admit to the princess of the sun. I had always assumed she came into this world in the screaming oblivion of the heart of a comet from the sun itself. That she was borne of fire and supernovae. A being, no… a goddess of pure light and heat.
I looked up at my new horn and somehow felt so very small in comparison.
“Well… I was reading a romance novel and I just… I could really feel how much the characters loved each other. It felt like something I could reach out and touch. Princess I... I can feel how much you all love me now.”
And the princess of the sun laughed like it was the best news she’d ever heard.
I was thirty seven years old, and I was being wracked by an agony I couldn’t have ever fathomed. And yet just like that day, twenty-five years ago, I could barely even feel it.
Just like then, my body was being burned by a magic greater than even I could ever comprehend. Every nerve-ending lit with fires hotter than the heart of the sun.
Love.
Because the pain of childbirth was nothing at all compared to the sweet, hot inferno of the love that had overwhelmed me. It was the strongest anaesthetic imaginable. I couldn’t feel a thing. Like I was born for this, like the sudden and total comprehension of something previously only glimpsed in a half-forgotten dream.
And after the doctors pulled her from me, slick in whatever amniotic leavings that had been her shelter, and handed her into my waiting hooves, I stared at her enraptured and enchanted.
I didn’t care for the way they frantically ran around, babbling about how she had both wings and a horn. I didn’t care about any of it. Because my whole adult life I had felt so much love. I had felt the love ponies had for each other, I had felt the love all of them had for me, I had felt the love I had for my husband.
But this?
I could have never imagined a love like this.
She was perfect.
And when they took her from me, just before unconsciousness overwhelmed my exhausted body, the last thing I saw was the sight of her eyes gently opening. She hadn’t even cried.
And later that evening when I finally awoke, and some strength had returned to me, I pulled up my aching body and wandered over to the cot in which she slept. And I stared at her for so long that time seemed to lose meaning.
I knew time couldn’t touch love.
And I stared.
And I stared.
And I stared.
And then I started to back away shakingly, a hoof coming to my gawking, open mouth.
And then fell to the ground.
And then I vomited down my chest as the doctors ran in to tend to me, before losing consciousness once more.
I was twenty-two years old, and I was taking tea with my auntie.
That term confused some ponies. Why did I refer to her like that when we shared no blood relation at all? The truth was actually quite mundane. My whole situation had been a novelty to say the least. There hadn’t been an alicorn born as I had been in, well…
Ever.
Celestia had come into this world in much the way I had always dreamed. A primordial force of nature, shattering the surface of the planet, mayhem made into the chorus of angels. A true fallen star, a gift from the sun itself to a mud-slick, painfully mortal world. I had come in after reading a particularly engaging romance novel. And, worse still, it hadn’t even been the most engaging one I had read at that point in my life.
Celestia always said she preferred my origin story to hers. Much more down to earth, she would remark.
I chose to not point out the irony of that statement.
So, the term ‘auntie’ had become favoured in all the confusion. Not quite a parent, but more than a friend, too. A mentor, of sorts. A family member.
“I’ve been thinking about what we talked about last time, dear Auntie.”
“Oh yes?” she replied in that particular way of hers. Curious, but subtle. It prompted ponies to elaborate, to show their work. Celestia was a teacher through and through. We all were her students in some way or another.
“I’m not sure I can say I believe you, about the sun being a poor prize in comparison to love.”
“And why’s that?”
“If you were to simply leave the moon in the sky one day, and never bring the sun back, then all of Equestria would perish. The plants would cease to grow, children would freeze in their beds. You literally hold all life in your hoof, Auntie.”
“That’s a bit of a grim way of putting it, Cadence,” she replied, frowning, “Power shouldn’t be thought of like that. It’s not about the power to destroy.”
“Believe me, I don’t want the power to destroy, and I know you don’t either... and yet," I began, taking a sip of my tea and feeling silly for emulating her even now, "That is power, is it not? Alicorns are supposed to be strong. Something imperious and godlike, beyond mortal comprehension. That’s how you are. Sometimes I feel like I could never measure up to the power that allows the whole world to live.”
“And what of love, Cadence?” she countered, “My sun gives the firmament the base components for life. It allows life as a concept. But life in isolation? Without joy, without art, without beauty? Love is what makes all of these things possible. My domain makes life possible, but yours? Yours makes life worthwhile. Love is greater than everything. Than life or death, than even time.”
My ear flicked at her last point. I chewed my lip. I had been nervous to bring this up, but it felt like there wouldn’t be a better opportunity than now.
“How so? About time?”
“You can feel love, correct? You can sense it as other ponies can light and sound. Can you not feel the love they still have for those who have left us? Their family, friends, those ponies like Clover the Clever and Starswirl, to whom we all owe so much? Their love lives on, and ensures no-one ever dies.”
“I’m not sure I agree with you,” I replied, and she cocked an eyebrow.
“I mean, sure, that kind of love exists. I can feel that love,” I continued, “But… I don’t know. It’s hard to explain to someone who can’t feel it like I can. It’s like... I think love lingers forever, but I think it’s separate from time. I can feel the love ponies have for their family who’ve died. But… I can also feel the love they had for them when they were alive. Like it’s still around… sometimes I feel like I can…”
“Yes, dear Niece?” she prompted, leaning forward in her seat. I couldn’t remember the last time I’d seen her so enraptured.
“That little purple unicorn I see in your classes sometimes, how is her schooling going?”
“Twilight Sparkle? She’s doing very well, one of the most promising students I’ve had for a long time,” she replied, her tone curious.
“It’s just… Sometimes I wonder whether it works the other way, too. Like it’s not just the love that ponies have inspired in their life that I can feel, but that I can feel the love they will inspire. When I look at that little unicorn. I can feel love for her unlike I’ve ever really felt before. Like the love ponies have for you, auntie. And I’m sure a filly of that age couldn’t have done much at this point in her life to earn it… yet.
“I agree with you, that love is greater than even time itself. But sometimes I wonder how much greater. I wonder whether the history of us is already written in the love we’ll make. And whether I might be the only pony who can read it.”
Celestia sat back, looking stunned. Her mouth opened and closed a few times, but before she could say anything her alarm went off, signalling her need to return to work.
“We’ll take tea again next week, dear Niece, and discuss these ideas more... and thank you for telling me about Twilight Sparkle. I will keep a closer eye on her from now on.”
I am thirty eight years old. My birthday was only a week ago, three weeks after Flurry’s. Her very first birthday, the most literal the term would ever be. I was sad when it happened. I felt like my daughter would face so many challenges in her life. I didn’t know how I felt that our birthdays were so close to each other. I didn’t want her to feel she was overshadowed by me.
And, in my lonelier moments at night, I feared being overshadowed by her, too.
My heart ached as I looked over her sleeping form. She looked like an angel. She was an angel. She couldn’t have been anything else. Her soft cheeks and warm expressive eyes. The way she delicately babbled in her sleep. The way she shrieked with joy when Shining would come home from work and play with her. The way she cried for that snail teddy.
There was nothing but goodness in her. Not one single other thing.
And yet...
Once, a long time ago, at one of our tea dates, I had asked Celestia a question. Because, while she called them tea dates, we both knew that they were lessons same as all her other students had. I had asked her whether she could feel dark, as she did light. Whether she could sense the absence of her domain the same as she could sense its presence.
She had said she couldn’t, and I had just nodded and carried on drinking tea.
And while she didn’t press the matter, I always worried she knew why I had asked.
Because while Celestia couldn’t feel the dark like she could the light, I could feel hate.
In some ways, I could feel it stronger than I could love. It was a ugly, bitter, spiteful emotion. Corpulent and selfish, nothing but badness in it. Not one single other thing.
The history of us was already written in the love we’ll make. I had known that for so long now, because I was the only pony who could read it.
I stroked my baby daughter’s cheek, and pushed down the vomit as I read her story once more. I sensed the hate she’d inspire. The furious, burning hate that outshone every bit of love I’d ever felt. The intensity of it made the love for Celestia and Twilight seem like nothing. It eclipsed it like a distant star versus the sun itself.
My daughter’s story was to be despised with a ferocity I could have never imagined to have even existed by every single living pony the world over. It was already written.
I wondered to myself what Flurry could ever do to make this her story. To be so reviled that the hate for her could dominate the story of love for centuries to come. Would she be a despot the likes of which the world had never seen? Would she enslave and murder and pillage? Would she kill those that ponies loved the most? Maybe she’d have myself and Celestia and Twilight and Luna crucified and flayed living, along with the elements? Then gleefully eat our flesh before an aghast nation?
Maybe it wouldn’t be anything so active, maybe my daughter would simply be such a pitiful, cowardly failure as to let evil ravage this world and do nothing, revelling in her own sickening weakness as beasts spilled from the gates of Tartarus and ate the populace alive.
Whatever the reason, I could feel that hatred for Flurry, and I knew beyond doubt that my daughter would be a monster the likes of which the world had ever imagined. Action of inaction, evil or apathy. It didn't matter.
Her story was already written in the hate she’d make. All of our stories were, and for the first time I hated the fact I was the only pony that could read it.
But like that day, four weeks ago, or twenty-six years ago, I couldn’t even feel the furious blinding pain of the hatred for her. My body was being drowned by something more powerful than I could ever fathom.
Love.
I was the sovereign, and caregiver, to everyone in this country. And as such, I knew it was my duty to make it so my daughter could never do the unimaginable evil that would write her name in such virulent bile and blood and roaring, sulfurous hatred.
Were I the caregiver to the whole world that my auntie was, I'd have cared not for my own drives. I'd have smothered her here and now, hardened to the act with the sort of drive and serene, poetic self-sacrifice that only mother could fathom.
But love was greater than reason, greater than time, greater than anything in this world. I knew that better than anyone. And I knew that I could no more harm Flurry as much as I could stop my heart from beating. No matter what she may become, no matter what her story said.
Because the love I felt for her was more overwhelming than any other sensation conceivable. More than my guilt, or fear. More than the hatred of every other pony in the entire world. My story was already written, same as everyone, and I knew exactly what I was going to do.
So once again, I stroked my daughter’s cheek. And then I slowly crept from the room and shut the door, leaving her to sleep through the night in peace.
