Empty Pages

by Blind Gardener

Chapter: 8 Blue Blooded Vassal (skippable)

Rain pattered gently at Twilight's window in the dewy morning fog. It was not a school day. Twilight stared out the window in rapture as the sun peeked through the misty fog, scattering rainbows from every fat, slow falling raindrop. She snuggled tighter into her patchwork quilt, and let her ears and eyes relax, then sipped at Dad's Leftover Coffee, rescued from the sink after breakfast. Mom's Leftover Coffee was always black and bitter. Dad's Leftover Coffee was milky, and sweet with hints of cinnamon and chocolate. Twilight wasn't allowed to drink either, which totally wasn't fair because Shiny always had two cups every morning.

Mom and Dad had both left in a rush when something had exploded in Mom's high energy magical laboritory, rocking the city of Canterlot. Shining had also rushed off to help with the guard. Normally someone would be sitting for Twilight on a day like today, but Cadence was avoiding Canterlot and Celestia, and Twilight's other sitter couldn't make it on short notice. Mom could have put Twilight into the Celestia's care, but Mom and the Princess still fought over Twilight from time to time, albeit with honeyed words as opposed to closed hoof. Regardless Twilight was proud that she was considered responsible enough to be home alone. Even if it was really lonely.

She stuck her tongue out at an imagined stand in for her brother. No face, no body, and a not particularly defined voice, she saw her brother as an almost conceptual object of warmth, hugs, softness, a powerful pink magic haze, a shimmering shine dancing through the air like reflections from armour, a pair of strong forelegs, a musky warm scent against the nose, a hoof messing up her hair, a voice reading to her in the dark of the longest night of the year, and a nuzzling on her forehead. An image of toy swords, and baseball hats.

This was how Twilight Sparkle saw her brother. Bodies were immaterial, unimportant and, unforgivably they changed. They changed with motion and emotion, they changed with time, they changed with the shades of light, and they changed with the vagaries of the wind, rain and gravity. It was the soul of a pony that mattered, and it was the soul that Twilight remembered. In her mind she knew everything that she felt was important about everypony she knew. She wondered how it was that other ponies could tell each other in the day and twilight. Whatever mystic magics they used to see each other's souls through the changes in their forms eluded Twilight, for even a simple smile could change a pony irreconcilable to Twilight's inadequate eyes. Yet sometimes she thought she could see the flicker of their hearts, shining through their skin. Occasionally she could feel their warmth, and their beauty around her and feel that she belonged, that she was a part of them.

In the end, however, the illusion was always just that, an illusion. Like all illusions, it was broken easily enough. She sighed as she sipped at the coffee, and placed a small toy flugelhorn into Smarty Pants' arms. With her horn she reached into the aether, and began to play music upon the threads of magic flowing through the city.

Here and there throughout the city a unicorn perked their ears, listening to an aria unheard. A pegasai here or there would feel wings twirling around their wings in an invisible symphony. An earth pony would vibrate on their hoofs as though the earth was trembling to an unheeded beat.

A grey coated earth filly felt the music in her bones and sang back to it with her own cello, adding upon and improving the childishly simplistic melody into a true haunting melody. A white maned unicorn filly with violet eyes found yet another muse for her epic wubs. A green coated unicorn filly in ponyville found a mystery to solve. A blue coated illusionist finished her best magic show yet. She was seeing and feeling the magic dance around her in applause of her talent. She would spend many years trying to best herself and others to regain that sensation of magic it'self singing her praises. Any pony could spread their music into magic to create a heartsong, but Twilight, in her destiny, was a powerful amplifier of such primeval powers.

An amplifier yes, but not a skilled producer. Her childish attempt at a heartsong was only half heard by those with music in the hearts, and only half felt by those tied closely to magic. Despite the efforts of those who heard whispers of her song and tried to serenade her back, she could not hear them in return. She hummed a simple melody to herself as she took joy in simply exploring magic today, with no lesson plans and no tests. Just unstructured play.

One foal, however, had a special talent for navigation. He could find his way to, and from, anything. Right now, that stately young stripling wanted to find the pretty voice that, in his childishness, he believed to be an angel of the Princess. Surprisingly, he wasn't too far off the mark. Twilight was no messenger of a goddess, but she certainly was the student, perhaps one may even say prophet, of one.

He ambled through the remarkably purple garden and raised a blue blooded hoof to the door, and with rapt attention, he knocked. A softly startled squeak came from the finely fluted fenestra. Twilight scuttled down the stairs, tumbling a few steps at a time. Her mane was billowing behind her head in the magical currents still clinging to it from her play, her eyes flickering and sparking with power as they rattled around inside her all to small head which still echoed with the music on the winds of magic. Smarty Pants walked after her sedately, seemingly of her own free will.

Twilight yanked open the door. Her eyes glanced through the other poor foal, seeing through him, seeing to his core, his soul for once shining through his skin. A thing of maps, of stories, of legends. A thing of pride and fear. A dusty soul, aged beyond its fragile years, and bent but unbroken by the weight of the ages. But she didn't know him. It was unfair, for once she could see the soul and it was somepony she did not know. "Who is it?" her voice ringing out with an ethereal sublimation as magic spilled from her throat.

The poor little princeling, surprised by this fae appearing creature, took flight, eyes wide with elemental terror and sent scurrying away like a lamb before the wolf.

A potential friend lost before she could even meet him, of books and maps and magic like her. A potential friend as lonely and in need of a friend as she felt, now and today. The gathered thaumic blitzkin leaked from her skin diffusing harmlessly into the morning fog. The warm summer rain kindly hid her tears well.

Author's Note:

Maybe I have been reading to much of Mr number's current magnum opus. This has a very different tone than I expected to produce today. Maybe tell me what you think?

Next chapter will be in my usual style again.

While canon, much like pinkie pie the announcer, this chapter is largely skippable. It may or may not effect the plot much later.

I edited it to add some stuff with Trixie. I also accidentally hit the unpublish button just now like an idiot when trying to hit the edit button. Seriously why are those buttons directly next to each other. Lastly I have some good mood music in a link down below. (Hallelujah, KD Lang)

<< This is what I was listening to while I wrote it

Comments

[Mossflower]

This story is amazing!
I love how you portray Twilight; her viewing the world, and thus other ponies, in an extremely unique way is really one of the "perfect" flaws for her, while also going with the "omnipotent" filly image.
I didn't really like it how Celestia acted with Twi's parents however, but that was one occurrence; Celestia's being clueless off how to deal with Twilight in the beginning was kinda neat though.

I can just imagine Twilight's view of celestia, given the "mask" she wears; the only thing telling Twilight that it's Celestia is that she is the only alicorn, nothing else "shines" through.

[Sable Dawn]

I like it, it gives a (I wish to find a better word) magical vibe to the seemingly serious yet slightly humorous story.
When I first started to read this story I thought that Twilights memory problems would be at the forefront, with chapters delineating Celestia's various attempts to get around the issue spaced out between the various humour laden antics that her memory problems.
Not to say that I dislike the handling of the story or the manner in which it is written,simply that out of all the chapters so far, this is the one I like the most, okay so I enjoyed the pancake chapters as well.
On a side note, I am rather liking the idea that Blueblood has a crush on Twilight.

[blazeofheat]

<3 this story <3 you for making it and now in english, this is some beautiful description here.

[Jedi Wolf]

You have left me hungry to "see" more of how Twilight perceives the world and the ponies in it.

Your description of Blue Blood's soul also makes me want to know his character better.

[Raven]

...Damn. That. Just, that. Pure imaginitave candy right there. Gonna give me a whole new look at Twilight for the rest of this story now.

[GordonFreebrony]

"Fay" is spelled either "Fey" or, more archaicly, "fae."

[Blind Gardener]

I made a slight change to this chapter, added in Trixie. I had remembered Octavia, Lyra, and Vinyl but not Trixie. (Generally I change my chapters a lot in the day or two after publishing, you'all might want to re-read older chapters if you didn't notice before)

I had more to say about the nature of my Twilight, the nature of Celestia, and the nature of my writing, but then I deleted it and didn't post it because it would be spoilers, except the stuff about the nature of my writing which I deleted because I get too philosophical when I am sleepy.

Mood music!

For what a child would normally sing, see the "I'm afraid" song by Piglet

For what octavia might play, see Aggreive[Violin mix]

[Nataniel]

Wow this one is exceptionally good. The sudden change of tone makes wonders to this chapter.

[Philosophysics]

SO TWILIGHT HAS MAGICAL SYNTHESIA!

[The Great Derpsby]

This... this was simply beautiful. The music fit perfectly, too.

I'm with some of the others; I'd love to see Twilight interact more with Blueblood. It would actually be possible, as she has little to go from when Rarity mentions whom she wants to meet at the Gala. If she had, perhaps she would've suspected that the sheltered and lonely soul wrapped in an armor of aloofness and lordliness isn't what the brightly shining gem that is Rarity wants or needs.