A Day Without Light

"OM NOM NOM NOM."  I happily munched on the food that was offered.  From olives to Ice cream, everything was at my disposal.  I was lost in the bliss brought upon by a good meal.  As I finish my third sandwich, I sit up and realize all the ponies that were near me were staring.  "Sorry."  I quickly mumble before continuing onto my fourth sandwich.  "These are just some of the best sandwiches that I have ever had."

The students around me nod at this, remembering their first reaction to the academy's food.  "You were not the only pony who has done that you know."  Everyone looks at the small purple unicorn off to my right.  "Oh, i'm sorry, I didn't introduce myself.  My name is shadow."  I could tell instantly that this unicorn was in fact princess Luna in disguise.  "I never caught your name though."

"Oh," I quickly sputter out.  "My name is Dusk, its nice to meet you.  I just got here."  I meet her eye and she quickly winks at me.  I look to the other students at the table, "What are all your names?"  As the other students introduce themselves, I catch a smirk on 'Shadows' face.  It looked like she was trying to hold back a laugh.  I didn't know it at the time, but I was talking to some of the senior students in the academy.

The older unicorn from my test approaches the table.  "Hello Dusk."  Everypony around me stares, wondering why one of the most experienced teachers is talking to me.  "I will be your main teacher this year, others call me Sir, but you can call me Nightshade."  It looked as if the other students minds were about to break.  The stunned looks on their face making 'Shadow' burst out into laughter.  "Have a nice night Dusk."  The ponies keep looking at me with inquisitive looks on their faces, as if they wanted me to answer a question.

"What?"  I ask.  Not understanding why they were all staring.  I continued to eat my sandwich, god these were good.

"Sir just asked you to call him by his real name."  Said a small white unicorn to my left.  This was quickly followed by a loud gasp of almost everypony in the hall.  "What makes you so special."  At this, everypony in the hall had their attention on me and my response.

"I really don't know, but I think that 'Shadow' may."  I look to my right just fast enough to see her trying to creep out of the hall.  To little success.  "Shadow, why don't you tell them what your idea is."  She turns around with a nervous look on her face.  Damn, Luna sure was a good actor.

"Um, I heard that he was the..."  The rest could not be heard as her voice became even quieter.  I looked at her, and saw a mischievous look in her eyes.  I was going to regret this.  "I heard that he was the personal student of Princess Luna herself."  An ear shattering gasp escaped the lips of all in the hall, except the teachers.  I attempted to hide under my table... It didn't work.

'I heard that you like embarrassing ponies,'  I heard in my head.  I tried even harder to disappear into the floor, amazingly, it doesn't work.  A thought comes to my mind and I quickly try to cast a light bending spell around me.  I start concentrating, and the shadows seem to surround me.  In this magical darkness I attempt to teleport away.  'Oh you aren't getting out of this that easily.'  The shadows around me disappear, and I am left standing in the middle of the aisle.  Everyponies eyes are on me.

"Is it true, are you really the princes's student?"  The white unicorn from earlier asks, a smile on her face.  Her look one of hope and happiness.

I sigh, "Yes."  As soon as the words leave my lips the room erupts into noise as discussions begin and questions are asked.  I attempt to make my escape to find out my legs can't move. 'LUNA!'  A small chuckle is heard in my mind as the feast continues on, with a whole new topic of conversation.

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"And that is why magic works the way it does."  Nightshade finishes off his lesson to the sound of applause.  I applaud as well, however I already knew this due to my large amount reading I did before going to the academy.  I look to my left and see 'Shadow' right next to me.  She notices this and smiles, an innocent smile that simply shows that she is pleased.  "Dusk, why don't you show what you know."  Once again, the attention is on me.  I step up onto the podium, my legs feeling numb.

"Sir?"  I ask as I step onto the podium.  He looks at me with a dumbfound look.

"You had a smirk upon your face the entire lesson, show us why you were smirking.  Prove me wrong."  The classroom falls deathly silent at this.  It was unheard of for a teacher to call on a student.

"Well, your point on magic being concentrated on friendship and love was something that I was wondering about.  I mean, through experience, our magic becomes stronger in times of need, and when we are angry, our magical aura changes color."  I hear a chuckle leave his lips, but he does not stop me.  "I also learned that some spells, especially ones that work with shadows, involve the use of hate, whether it be hate of a situation, or the hate of a person."  A smile appears on his face.  "Thusly, I believe that freemane's use of the term 'Black' Magic, is one that only applies to the way it works.  It behaves differently than normal magic, and it uses different feelings than normal magic."  A large smile appears on his face as I finish off the small speech.

"Well your ideas are certainly interesting.  However I believe that you should talk to Shadow about black magic, as she is well versed in it."  At this the room looks to where Shadow was to only see a her fade into the shadows and appear standing at the front of the class.  A look of fear appears on everyponies faces, black magic was frowned upon as it was dangerous.  "That will conclude our lesson today students, you may be on your way."

'Meet me in the training room'  Shadow disappears into the darkness and fades away.  I quickly teleport over to it to meet Luna for my lessons.

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As I arrive I see that there is a crowd of ponies practicing with their magic.  Off to the right side of the room is Shadow, who seems to be meditating.  As I approach, the other ponies in the room go quiet, almost as if they feared for my safety.  Shadow looks to me and stands up.  "The ring, lets see how much you already know."  She does her weird shadow teleport, and appears in the dueling ring.  I approach and she states the rules.  "You may only use black magic, and you may not cause lasting harm on the opponent."  At my confirmation that I understood, she lowers herself into a ready stance, almost as if she was ready to pounce.

The instant I start readying a spell, she disapears into the shadows.  I quickly follow by casting a similar spell, casting the ring into darkness.  I can still see somehow, and I am not caught by surprise when a bolt of darkness comes soaring towards me.  I easily dodge and cast a spell, making dark tentacles burst out of my body.  A look of shock appears on Shadows face.  The tentacles arc towards her, however she hastily creates a shield of light that surrounds her.  The shadows start hacking away at it, I knew I had lost at this moment.  Her shield of light was to strong for me to break.  I called the shadows back and removed the shadow that had covered us during the fight.  "You win."  I say loud enough for everypony in the room to hear.  I walk out of the ring and I notice everypony is cowering, trying to get as far away from the ring as possible.  As I leave the ring, everyone moves out of my way, trying to avoid me as if I was a plague.

"You fought well, but you need to learn more."  Shadow says as she walks out of the ring.  Everyone gasps as they notice there was a few small cuts on her legs and back.  "You even nicked me a few times, no pony has ever done that before."  She walks by me and leaves the room, everypony stares at me... again.  Why am I always the center of attention?

"That was amazing, I have never seen someone even get close to hurting her before."  The small white unicorn that sat at my table during breakfast said to me.  "Oh, i'v never told you my name, have I?"  At seeing me shake my head, she continues on.  "Well, my name is Moonshine, I mainly work in healing magic.  Although, it seems like you have found your calling."  She motions at my flank and I look back at it, wondering if there was anything on it.  And there sitting right in the center of my flank, is a cutie mark.

A grin pops onto my face as I see what it is.  It looks like the general yin-yang symbol, however it involves half of it being light, and the other half being dark.  I could see the dark side represented the night, as there were stars and the moon on it.  But the light side eluded me.  "Hmm, I wonder what it means?"  I said thoughtfully, hoping that some unknown pony would answer my question.  "I can see the night, but what is the other side?"  I mumble to myself.

"Yo, Dusk, lets go,"  Shadow yells from down the hall.  I quickly run up to tell her the good news, forgetting for a second that she was princess Luna.  As I ran, I hoped that some thing from out History could tell me what this means.