Author's Note

Just a small tidbit, because I enjoyed writing the first part.

Weeds

I lay lax in the royal gardens, charging the enchantment I had placed over its flora so that nothing would wilt during the winter. It’s what she asked of me, although how I went about it probably wasn’t what she had in mind. Most likely she had wanted me to let nature run it’s course, but I just couldn’t let any of them wilt - even for just a season.

Not that I could if I wanted to,

Because they grow like weeds.

I had actually laughed at that, when they seemed to take over the entire garden like a virus. I was forced to read a book on botany because of it.

For the first time in a long time I had to learn something.

Perhaps I’d never taken the time to read about it so that she might have a reason to stay.

So childish…

My magic stops ebbing out over the fields and I simply look outwards to its grandeur.

So they grow like weeds. Beautiful weeds. They were not hard to nurture - they required little attention at all. I didn’t have the heart to remove a single one of them despite how dense their field had gotten. Because for every petal and stem, I could pretend there was a greater part of her still here.

When she was laid to her final rest it was done surrounded in these weeds. Where she was placed with her sister, as well as Cadence.

My world should’ve died with them, but there was something in this emptiness that felt necessary. For all that talk about love… Celestia had gone through this for hundreds, perhaps thousands of years longer than I had.

How many times did she have to lay somepony to rest, only to keep trying?

That meant something to me,

For despite the pain of it all, she nurtured me like one might’ve done for a daughter. Even if there was a possibility that it would’ve ended in tragedy.

Maybe I was just another flower to her. Or maybe she had allowed her garden to become infested with weeds so that she wouldn’t feel so lonely.

Or maybe she just had so much love to give that she could see beauty even in the weeds.

…I think I’ll plant my own flowers, like she did.

Always so poetic, that mare.

In the bitter sweet nostalgia I find a small smile. “Well how about this, I’ll plant some sunflowers.” I snort. “How’s that for poetic?”

The silence sounds like a deadpan and it makes me giggle.

Yes, some sunflowers will do nicely.