What is Love?

Author’s Note: True story, this fic was going to be called “Lack of Comprehension” but I decided to go with a different song reference for the attention. Might rename it at some point.

You may have skipped the previous chapter, because it was inserted as an edit. Check, just in case.

An interesting conversation.

My student met me at the bottom of the unused Pegasus eyrie that currently served as our new visitor’s infirmary. Or perhaps not merely a visitor, if what he said was true. He had been somehow brought here, and... likely could not leave.

“Twilight, come walk with me.” I always had liked to wander around while thinking. A habit Twilight had picked up from me, maybe, though some day she would learn not to walk and read at the same time. “What do you think of Henry?”

“Oh, he seems nice enough. Maybe a bit shy.” she replied. After a pause, “maybe more than a bit. He reminds me of Fluttershy, actually.” she giggled.

How long had it been since I had been so close to another pony that I could casually walk around and bounce ideas off of them?

“What,” I asked, practiced poker face in place, “do you think about his cutie mark?”

Twilight squinted as if trying to look in the past, and then a stunned look crossed her face. “I don’t remember.” she said.

“Interesting, isn’t it?”

I looked off into the horizon, my student trotting by my side. A very long time ago I had learned to walk so that other ponies could keep up. “Your cutie mark is one of the first things a pony notices, after all. An hour after finding him in the gardens, and I realized in the middle of him telling me what his special talent was that I had either never looked, or somehow just not noticed.”

Twilight frowned the way she always did when examining a new puzzle. “That sounds like...”

I couldn’t help but interrupt with a sharp laugh, drawn from me involuntarily. My lips curled up as well, completely beyond my control. “You always were a smart one, Twilight. I hadn’t expected you to catch on for another few minutes, at least.”

Twilight couldn’t help but smile herself, blushing at the praise. She almost began skipping, in fact. “So it is... magic? Not Equestrian magic, but-”

I nodded.

Metamagic. Archmagic. Abstraction.

This was the magical land of Equestria for a reason. It had magic at its very core, in some ways perhaps could be said to be made of magic. Not the kind of magic a unicorn did with her horn, or a pegasus used to fly, or gave an earth pony their resilience, but a different, deeper kind. The land that I and my sister ruled had certain concepts embedded at its core, fundamentally deciding what reality was.

First, and oldest, was that Equestria was the land of ponies, donkeys, zebras, and their brethren. Ponies were its most numerous inhabitants, and its caretakers. Others could visit, our closest neighbors being the Griffins, east across the sea, and the dragons scattered far and wide across the planes, as all were welcome in peace, but it was, and always would be, Equestria.

The second rule was that of harmony. Equestria had before, long in the past, been just another part of the wilds, a land of the beasts were there were perhaps more ponies than in other parts, but chaotic and wild nonetheless. Discord reigned, wild ponies, griffons, dragons, and other beasts his subjects and playthings. But when ponies had learned harmony, how their differences in concert could make them stronger as a whole... it had been a small magic at first. A bit of the wilds grew safer, more tame. Other ponies flocked to the new nation of Equestria, still just a region of the wilds, but the magic grew throughout the years, culminating in the birth of myself and my sister, ex nihilo, the embodiments of what became a new plane, splintered from the wilds, where ponies depended on each other for even those things that nature had once done.

In the magical land of Equestria, the magic of harmony did not alter reality. The magic of harmony was all that was real, other magics being shadows cast by its light.

Our guest was from elsewhere, but being reshaped by the magic of Equestria, fundamentally, and even I (or perhaps I more than others) am subject to its whims. So when an outsider, a non-pony, is somehow cast into our land, nobody takes note of his cutie mark. Outsiders don’t have cutie marks. But his lack of a cutie mark should have been obvious.

“So, Princess, you talked to him about what his special talent was, and noticed a cutie mark, but there was no flash of light the way there is when a filly or colt earns their mark... so does that mean it had always been there?”

“I don’t know.”

We discussed matters some more, and as an experiment I proposed that Twilight gather her friends and go talk with Henry, but first to ask some of them what his cutie mark was. She eagerly began to run off at a gallop to comply.

“Twilight, wait.” The purple unicorn stopped and turned, looking up at me questioningly. I walked over and nuzzled her neck. “Twilight, I’m sorry.” I whispered.

Her eyes widened. “For what, Princess?”

“For doubting you. For at the very least not hearing you out. I dismissed your concerns and it almost cost us dearly, but more than that, as your mentor, and as your friend, I failed. I should have listened to what you had to say, but I made my decision on a whim, based on shallow appearances.

“Twilight Sparkle, can you forgive me?” I asked, staring into her eyes.

“Oh Princess!” she cried, jumping and nuzzling me back, “every pony makes mistakes. No pony can be perfect, and we can all learn more about friendship. Of course I can forgive you. I already have.”

We stood, leaning against each other for a moment in the shadow of the tower. After a few moments, she laughed, “Besides, I didn’t exactly present a compelling case.”

I thought back to her, hopping in circles, chanting “She’s evil!”

I couldn’t help but smile again. My faithful student always did have that effect on me.

“Maybe so, Twilight, but I should not have been so dismissive of your feelings, even if you had been wrong. Now run along and get your friends. I’m sure Pinkie at least is excited to talk to the new pony in town now that he’s had a chance to calm down.”

The Princess had left.

I looked down at my right flank. Gray fur, bold black lines making a minimalist representation of a balance scale. Had that been there before?

Well, as far as tattoos go, it seems appropriate enough. I wondered if that made my right side my ‘good side’ now, since it had a tattoo of some sort and the other didn’t.