Chapter Six
There was a basic lesson in unicorn magic pertaining to the use of ones aura as a means of extending ones body. It was just about the lowest level trick any unicorn could learn, and the most useful. Unicorns of almost any talent level could do it, with varying levels of precision, but the trick itself was universal. It let a pony reach out and grab things with magic, or manipulate objects, lift things, use tools, all manner of intricately detailed tasks usually reserved for creatures like dragons that had hands. With concentration and control, a unicorn could control many objects at once. Three, four, maybe even five if she was particularly talented. More if the action was as simple and basic as lifting something and putting it down somewhere else. Twilight could remember the first time she learned it, having taught herself from a book of beginning spells, straining and struggling to turn the simple parchment pages until it became second-nature to her. Getting that little page to turn felt like she'd won a marathon.
Twilight sparkle let the energy of the element of Magic course through her as she stepped off the Pegasus-drawn chariot on the Palace's receiving platform. It was like being plugged into a waterfall. Torrents of energy rushed through her body like waves, making the hairs down her flanks stand on end and sending shimmers of white glazing across her eyes. She toyed with the power, teasing it, testing it, feeling out its reactions as she had the entire trip over. She'd never before considered the Element as anything beyond a cog in the larger machine of Harmony, but what Luna had said stuck out in her mind.
You earned that crown, Twilight. Its yours by right.
Twilight Sparkle was tentatively sure she could lift every pony in Canterlott off their hooves, and fold them into cute little origami boxes.
She had no intention of doing so, of course. She had no intention of any aggression at all. But she wanted to feel prepared. She wanted to be in such a form that she could not be ignored, or dismissed, or avoided. She had never confronted Celestia about anything that landed on such personal levels relating to the Princess's past, and she wanted to be absolutely sure there was no chance of the beautiful white mare telling her to drop the issue. She felt, now, that she had that certainty.
She ascended the staircase leading up to the palace gates. They were closed now, the main ones always were once night fell, and it had been dark for almost an hour when Twilight arrived in Canterlott, but the Palace Staff had an entrance to the side that was always open. It was flanked by two proud Equestrian Guard, the royal protectors of the Princess. Twilight knew most of the Palace's guardponies, and was on reasonably good terms with the majority. Naturally, today had to be the exception.
“Sparkle.”
“Phillip. I'm here to see Princess Celestia.”
“No visitation after dark, Sparkle, you know that. Unless you've got documentation?”
Twilight's eyes narrowed. Phillip wasn’t a particularly bad pony, he was just...proud. A proud palace guard from a very long line of proud palace guards that had served Celestia for generations. Not a single one of them had ever seen a major conflict, but they none the less treated every pony who wandered up to them as a potential threat to Equestria.
“I have special dispensation from Celestia, Phillip. You know that.”
The larger stallion snorted, “That doesn’t give you permission to disturb the Princess whenever you get scared of monsters under the bed, little pony. Unless you have a very, very good reason, you're waiting until morning.”
Twilight grit her teeth, and somewhere above Phillip's head, a stone block in the palace facade cracked in half like it had been struck by some mighty hammer. While the cause couldn't be traced back to Twilight herself by any visual means, the pebbles at her hooves were dancing and popping.
“Phillip.”
The new voice caused the guards to turn around and bow their heads, and Twilight to take a breath and compose herself. Princess Celestia was walking up through the hallway, tall and blindingly beautiful even in the dim light. Her astral mane and perfect white hair made one wince slightly when they first beheld her. It was like catching a glimpse of the sun. She walked up behind the guards and looked down at Twilight, then up at the damaged slab in the wall. She smiled a small, knowing smile, laced with a sort of inner sadness, as though she'd seen a problem coming and hadn’t done anything to stop it, and addressed her guards.
“Let her through, Phillip.”
“But..Princess-”
Celestia chuckled. “Phillip, if you had three full companies of ponies just like you, you might be able to stop Twilight Sparkle from walking through this door. As you don't, and I hate waking the palace staff to clean up messes, I suggest you step aside.” she gave him a wink, “And to be honest, I'd still put my bets on her. You called her names a few years back, and I thiiiiink she remembers.”
Phillip looked positively crushed, and Twilight felt a renewed admiration for her teacher. While Celestia had always been supportive, she was a strong proponent of not letting one's ego get away with them. The result was that her public reassurance of Twilight's magical advancement had been somewhat absent over the years. The guards obediently stepped aside and Twilight through, and she didn't look at them as she passed. The fact of the matter was Celestia had likely just saved her from doing something incredibly stupid, and that wasn’t lost on Twilight. She took a breath, calmed her nerves, and reminded herself that she wasn’t here to start a problem.
“Thank you,” she said, looking up at Celestia. She'd decided that starting the conversation on a lighter foot might help diffuse things a little, “He's always been a little high strung.”
“I almost feel bad for stopping him,” Celestia mused, “this may have been the first and last time he had to stand up against a genuine threat to the palace.”
Twilight was taken aback, and immediately felt ashamed of having arrived at her teacher's doorstep wearing the magical equivalent to an army on her forehead. Celestia put a wing over her and leaned down. “I was kidding, child. I know you aren't here to harm me. Its me who feels ashamed.” Twilight looked up at Celestia as she brought her head back up, keeping pace with her as they reentered the main hall and ascended the staircase that lead to where Celestia normally sat. “If there is anything I regret when it comes to your education,” she continues, “Its that the first time you had to come to me with something that truly mattered to you, you felt the need to do so with a security blanket.” She sighed, “It doesn’t speak highly about my approachability as a mentor”.
Twilight smiled a bit. “It might not speak very highly about my judgment as a student, either,” she admits, “but I wanted...to make sure I had your attention.”
“You always do, little one,” Celestia assured her, “but I understand what you mean. This time is...a little different.” she nods up toward the curtain at the back of the throne room. “Come with me. You went through a lot of effort and of turmoil to make sure I would give you the answers you're looking for. You've never let me down. I'll see if I can't do you the same courtesy.”
Twilight had been in the castle's inner chambers before. She'd even been in the Princess's bedroom once when she was little and Celestia was showing her around. She'd loved that. Celestia showed her little dolls she said made her happy to look at, and let Twilight bounce around on her massive bed. She would've killed for a bed like that. Or at least begged profusely. It was big enough for at least three ponies Celestia's size. “Perks of royalty,” Celestia had said with a wink, when Twilight had asked why she had it. The memory seemed so long ago.
“She didn't lie to you,” Celestia said as they walked down the empty corridors toward the deeper chambers of the palace. Her luminescent mane glinted beautiful patterns off the reflective marble walls and made the hallway feel like a kaleidoscope. “About any of it.”
“You know what she said?” Twilight asked, and the princess nodded.
“I know her. She didn't lie to you.” The answer was direct, and rather nonnegotiable. Twilight had expected it, she didn't think Luna had been deceiving her, but to have it so flatly confirmed took some of the momentum out of her stride. She'd rather expected to have had to drag that out of Celestia, rather than to have it volunteered. Twilight chose her next statement carefully, as she was particularly concerned about the answer.
“What happens to me now?” She asked, looking up at the larger mare. “You've tailored everything, every last little detail, to result in me and my friends to accomplish this...pre destined...stellar...SOMETHING of a task, and now its done. A thousand years of planning and its over. What now?” Twilight had stopped walking, and Celestia turned to face her.
“What do you want to do now?” She asked.
“I don't know!” Twilight exclaimed in exasperation. The real frustration was coming out now, the root of her concern with this particular issue. “If..if everything can be so..so exact and precise and perfect, if you can measure pony's LIVES like little lines on a chalk board, then what happens at the end of the board? Is it OVER now? Am I just...sort of...useless? Have I played my part and now I-”
“Twilight.”
“Huh?”
“Shut up.”
Twilight Sparkle blinked in shock, and Celestia smiled and laughed. “Little one, you let yourself get into such frenzy’s its amazing you haven’t outright exploded by now.”
“And exploded again,” Twilight whimpered.
“Pardon?”
“Nothing. Its something Pinkie said.”
“That's ridiculous, you can't explode twice.” Celestia kneeled down on the floor in front of Twilight and smiled at her. “You are not useless, Twilight Sparkle. Nor have you ever been a puppet on my strings. What Luna said is true, I have laid the foundation for your advancement. I cant even count the amount of variables I've covered trying to make sure that I got you and everyone else right. But there wasn’t anything magical about it.”
Twilight blinked. “How...how can there not be anything magical about it?”
Celestia put her horn to Twilight's forehead affectionately. “Think, Twilight. When your parents bought you your first magic book, why did they do it?”
“To...try and get me interested in magic?”
“And when you showed an aptitude, did they encourage that?”
Twilight nodded. “They brought me to private lessons, and eventually to the magic school here, where I met you.”
“Why?”
“I...Because they wanted me to succeed?” Twilight ventured. Celestia nodded.
“Because they had a mission for their little fillie. They wanted her to be the best she could be, and they knew a path to accomplish that goal, so they put you on it, encouraged you when you went forward, scolded you when you went sideways, and reinforced you when you fell backward.” Celestia sat upright and gave a small, knowing smile that betrayed the long centuries of experience she had hiding behind her perfect features. “I have had a mission for a thousand years, Twilight. I wanted to save the pony that made all this possible. I wanted to give her the life she was denied. So I found the right ponies, and I set them on the right paths, and I gave them pushes when they needed it. I don't have a child, Twilight. I have an entire race I've chosen to parent.” she gives a little laugh, “as a result, the uh...shall we say 'details' of responsible parenting vary a little.”
Twilight sat in stunned silence. “I..sort of thought it was more dramatic than that.”
Celestia laughed out loud, a rich, cheerful laugh that made Twilight smile in spite of herself. “Luna didn't lie, little one, but she is the creature she is. Sometimes the dark can make things seem a little more...dramatic...than they actually are.” she gets up off the floor and stands. “Come with me, I want to show you something.”
Twilight was muddling over Celestia's explanation as they continued down the corridors. “To answer your question, Twilight,” Celestia said, “What you do is, and has always been, your choice to make. Im not the master of your fate, no matter how much I may seem it. If you choose to get up tomorrow and eat nothing but muffins all day, that's up to you. If you choose instead to get up and burn all of Ponyville in balefire until nothing but ash remains, that too is up to you.” she smiled and nudged twilight playfully with her wing, “between the two, I suggest the former. Im fond of Ponyville.”
Twilight laughed, at least for a moment. “Princess...”
“Hmm?”
Twilight looked up, “You seem so willing to explain the whole uh...targeted upbringing situation to me now that Ive kinda found out about it...why didn't you tell me the truth about Nightmare moon and Discord after we fought him?”
Celestia looked downcast for a moment. “Reluctance. Fear, maybe.” she glanced at her student, “I do get frightened, Twilight. More often than I'd like to admit. I think ive been frightened for the last thousand years.”
“You were worried it wouldn't work.”
“Terrified would be more accurate,” Celestia admitted. “I don't know if you could understand, fully, in the lifetime of one little pony, just how much of a gamble that battle one year ago on a ruined hunk of stone really was. I bet a thousand years of hope on you, Twilight, and you came through for me.” she sniffed a bit, “I think I didn't tell you because I realized that when you found out, when you really appreciated what had happened, you'd know as well as I know that there is no...possible way...I can thank you enough.” Celestia looked apologetic, even a little teary eyed, and Twilight realized she recognized the look. She'd seen it one year ago when the princess held her sister close for the first time in a thousand years. A sort of shaky, almost disbelieving realization that some massive threshold had been crossed, and a new sort of life was beginning. Then, it had been a reuniting with her sister. Now, it was a quintessential shift in the relationship between teacher and student. More, it was the ultimate release of a thousand years of planning, and the dismissal of the lead role to go on to other stages.
“I am in your debt in a way that transcends lifetimes, Twilight. I really...have no idea how to balance that scale.” Twilight hadn't spoken since Celestia's admission, finding no words to say that could accurately convey how she felt. She'd just walked on, in silence, listening.
They had arrived at a doorway down a hall Twilight hadn't seen before. The door itself was large enough for Celestia, but not flashily adorned. It had large iron-wrought hinges and massive, gnarled wooden slabs as its primary construction, and positively radiated ancient design. There was no part of it that echoed the palace walls' ornate construction or delicate inlaid filigree. Looking closely in the dim light, Twilight could see deep gouges in the thick wood. Hoof prints, from ironclad hooves slamming repeatedly into its unyielding bulk.
“Where...are we?” Twilight asked, looking up at the princess.
“The beginning.” Celestia responded, and for a moment, Twilight could see Luna's face echoed in Celestia's posture.