Celestia looked over the sleeping form of Twilight. It had been a week, and truth be told it had been nice.

Twilight had been chaste over the time, keeping her more lascivious proclivities to the little library in Ponyville. The one exception, at least as Celestia assumed, had been when Luna had asked to be her companion for the night and invited Twilight to her room.

Twilight had even shyly asked for permission from Celestia to spend the night, as though Celestia was her mother or something. Celestia had told her that she was a grown mare, and also temporarily a princess herself. She could spend the night with anypony she chose, although Celestia asked her not to bring too much attention to her outlandish sexual habits.

Celestia’s primary concern over Twilight was how dependent she was on other ponies. Without Shining around, she constantly checked with Celestia for permission to do various things. She’d even asked for permission to use the bathroom. When Celestia had commented on it, she’d admitted that she understood Shining enough to know what he’d approve of and wouldn’t without asking him. With Celestia, she was still unsure.

Celestia kept trying to re-enforce that Twilight didn’t need permission to do anything. If she wanted to raze a small chunk of Equestria to the ground, she could. She’d simply have to live with the consequences, which in that particular example would be quite dire.

The more time she spent with Twilight, the more her fury at Shining Armor grew. He’d taken so much independence from the mare, stifled her growth in unseen and unknowable ways while altering her tastes to fit his perverse interests. All just to twist this beautiful mare into his obedient little plaything.

Worse, Celestia’s anger at herself grew. She’d been entirely complicit in this tragedy and needlessly forgiving of Shining’s crimes for her own selfish reasons. By now, there was no way for her to correct her mistakes. She couldn’t punish Shining, and she couldn’t save Twilight’s psyche. The best she could do would be to guide and teach Twilight to a better future, as Shining claimed to be doing.

Sometimes Celestia remembered the imposing vision of Princess Twilight Sparkle, and felt sick. Was that the mare that could have been? Would that regal princess ever exist after all of Shining’s disturbing machinations? Shining claimed to want help Twilight ascend, but Celestia wasn’t following how he intended to accomplish this. At best, he’d taught Twilight to make friends.

Since they’d moved to Ponyville, almost every time Celestia had given him a task he’d shuffled it off to Twilight. For instance, she’d told him to remove a sleeping dragon, and he’d sent Twilight and her friends. Twilight hadn’t even directly solved the problem, instead relying on her shy pegasus friend.

In almost all cases, the other element bearers were the ones that actually resolved the situation. The only time Twilight herself had done something directly was that whole ursa minor fiasco, and that hadn’t been at Celestia’s request.

She’d almost been central to the changeling event last year, but nopony, not even her friends, had believed her claims that Cadence was the changeling. She hadn’t even tried to convince Celestia, but truth be told Celestia likely wouldn’t have believed her either. Ultimately, she just released Shining from Chrysalis’s spell for him and Cadence to save the day with magic. Celestia was quite sure that Shining had been caught intentionally by the changeling queen, but had no idea why he would bother if he and Cadence were just going to resolve the situation themselves.

That event was also why Cadence didn’t like talking to Celestia. Celestia had meddled again, attempting to postpone the wedding after the near changeling takeover and Cadence had proclaimed that she was interfering with true love.

Celestia still didn’t understand it. If Shining truly loved anypony besides himself, it was Twilight. She’d tried to tell Cadence as much, but Cadence would have none of it. Eventually, it led to quite the spat between them. The whole situation just felt wrong, but Celestia had no idea what to do.

She was actually glad that she’d finally accepted their marriage. The Crystal Heart had to be found by Cadence, but Shining’s presence was entirely unnecessary. Hopefully, after this little vacation Cadence would speak to her normally again. Celestia would ignore her professed feelings with Shining, and simply smile and nod when it was brought up—like a mother humoring their foal.

How Shining had fooled the Alicorn of Love was beyond Celestia, and frankly she didn’t care anymore. Cadence could take care of herself in her own domain, and Celestia should simply not interfere at this point.

Until their return, she would continue to care for Twilight. Celestia enjoyed the current arrangement far more than she should. At night, she would welcome Twilight into bed and simply hold her. Twilight would talk about her day, and Celestia would enjoy the conversation and closeness. Eventually, Twilight would fall asleep in Celestia’s hooves where Celestia would watch her sleep for a while before drifting off herself. The little mare felt delicate, like a paper statue that Celestia could break if she wasn’t careful.

Not once had Twilight tried anything untoward with Celestia.

The worst that had happened was Twilight having an erotic dream that Celestia pointedly chose to ignore, simply inviting Twilight to bathe with her in the morning. Twilight wasn’t embarrassed at her sloppy state, and likely wouldn’t have considered it a problem even had Celestia decided to comment on it.

Twilight’s odd innocence was strangely frightening. Celestia was a bit worried that Twilight might say something completely inappropriate in public, but so far it hadn’t happened. All those lessons on social interaction had payed dividends. When Twilight chose to attend court she usually stayed quiet, but during social engagements she would carefully, and usually appropriately, speak up.

Most surprisingly, Celestia had seen her turn down a potential suitor, Prince Blue Blood. He was known to be a bit of a boor, but he was still a prince descended from Princess Platinum herself. He hadn’t taken the refusal well, and had one of his usual pouting sessions after. When Celestia asked Twilight about it later that night she’d said that Blue Blood wasn’t interested in her. He was interested in getting closer to Celestia, and Twilight didn’t want to be a tool wielded against Celestia.

Celestia had felt a warm glow in her chest, and commented that Twilight’s decision was surprisingly astute, causing Twilight to snort a giggle. She claimed to be more aware of motivations than other ponies gave her credit for. Celestia had agreed that perhaps that was the case. Twilight had been the only one to identify Chrysalis, after all.

Her plan to grow close to Twilight was succeeding, but not as she’d imagined. Every day she learned something new about the mare, and in some small way her affection grew as well. For instance, she always knew that Twilight was loyal, but the depth of her loyalty was astounding. At the moment, she was loyal to Celestia and was actively working to know exactly what Celestia expected of her, while immediately fitting to meet it. The only exception was the few hours a day she spent in her library enjoying the company of the rest of Shining’s harem.

Truth be told, Celestia had never expressed displeasure at that behavior, either. She’d long ago decided that Twilight’s sexual habits were not her business unless they interfered with her in some way.

The little mare was so much more than Celestia had ever realized, and her thoughts over the young lady were in turmoil. A whirlpool of emotions surrounded Twilight in Celestia’s heart, and the whirlpool grew stronger every day. Celestia had a desire to protect Twilight. Celestia was angry with herself, and with Shining about Twilight’s misspent youth. Celestia adored Twilight’s intelligence and curiosity. Celestia was disgusted by Twilight’s hobbies. Celestia was impressed by Twilight’s ingenuity. Celestia loved simply holding Twilight.

This maelstrom of emotions surrounded one mare, eating up more of Celestia’s mind as it grew into an obsession. In the morning, she wondered how Twilight was feeling. In the afternoon, she was slightly sick as she morbidly worried about who was putting what under Twilight’s tail. In the evening, she thought about whether Twilight would like to stay up and talk, or simply fall asleep in Celestia’s hooves. After Twilight fell asleep, Celestia would watch her and wonder what she was dreaming of or simply ruminate on the mare.

Like Celestia was doing right then.

In short, Celestia was quite aware that she was falling in love. She simply didn’t know if she wanted to fight it, or even how she could.

Author's Note

Ehh, early am is another day. What am I doing?