Twilight cracked one eye open to see the first rays of sunlight streaming into her room. Despite the excitement of the previous night, she had woken up at her usual time. She had a library to run, after all, and that meant keeping regular hours. Still, she allowed herself a few minutes to wallow lazily in half-wakefulness before she had to make herself ready for the new day. It was an indulgence she afforded herself far too infrequently.

One eye still closed, the lavender mare passed a foreleg through a sunbeam, turning the limb to inspect her hoof with an idle curiosity. Hoof. Hoof was a funny word, wasn’t it? Hi, hoof. She waved the hoof in the bright patch, giggling to herself as she imagined the sun’s light as the patient and loving gaze of its caretaker. Hoof, meet Celestia. She’s my teacher. She’s the best pony in the whole world.

In her imagination, her teacher smiled indulgently and gently reminded her that there could soon be ponies here wanting to read or check out books, and that she should probably get up so they wouldn’t be disappointed. She scoffed. Nopony ever came to the library before noon. Still, she supposed she should get around to waking up all the way anyway.

She sat up in bed, rubbing the sleep out of her eyes, and sniffed the air. Was that coffee she smelled? Spike must already have put some on for her. He was such a good assistant. Her horn glowed slightly as she fumbled around mentally for the source of the smell. There! With a soft flash of light, a steaming mug appeared between her hooves, and she inhaled deeply.

“My coffee!” An indignant exclamation from downstairs interrupted the unicorn’s reverie.

Twilight blinked. Was that Rarity? She opened her door and trotted down the stairs, the mug floating behind her. “Rarity? What brings you here so early?”

The white unicorn was standing in front of one of the three mirrors Twilight had left in the main room, apparently inspecting her mane, but she turned away from her reflection as soon as she heard her friend’s voice. “Checking on you, dear. You seemed a bit preoccupied at the party last night, and I wanted to make sure everything was alright.”

Twilight giggled. “Yeah, I guess I was sort of only half there at the party, huh? But don’t worry, Rarity. Everything is fine. Great, actually. And the party was tons of fun. Uh, sorry about your coffee.” She floated the still-steaming mug over to her friend with a sheepish grin.

“Think nothing of it.” The other unicorn dismissed the apology with a wave of her hoof. “I’m the one who should be apologizing to you, imposing on yourself and your dear assistant, but since I was here anyway, I just had to have a cup of that wonderful vanilla bean blend you got from Canterlot.”

“Oh, it's no problem at all! Actually, I’m just happy to have a fellow coffee enthusiast to share it with. The others just don’t have the taste for it that you and I do.” Twilight looked thoughtful as she remembered the package that was delivered the previous night. “And actually, I think my special order finally arrived. Caramel hazelnut!” She bounced on her hooves a bit with excitement. “One moment...”

The purple mare’s horn glowed for a moment, and the package appeared between them. Taking a second to actually inspect it, however, turned her excitement into perplexity. Rather than the uniformly brown, machine-wrapped packaging and the simple logo she expected to see from her coffee supplier, this was actually a generic overnight shipping box. Its address label was mouth- or horn-written in a flowing calligraphic script, and a blob of deep blue wax imprinted with an unusual seal stood out against the otherwise plain package. It took Twilight a long moment of thinking before she recognized the complex insignia on the wax.

“Princess Luna!” the unicorn exclaimed in surprise. She pulled the box open with her magic, slivers of force neatly cutting through the strips of packing tape that sealed it. “But what would she be sending me?”

Inside the box were two items. The majority of the space was taken up by a thick book with a simple, dark red cover, which depicted two stylized rearing ponies facing one another. On top of it was a letter written in the same flowing script that she now realized was the Night Princess’s hornwriting. Rarity politely returned her attention to the mirrors, a gesture which made Twilight giggle softly.

“Oh Rarity, you’re allowed to read it. Princess Luna is your friend too, you know!”

“Ah, well, if you’re sure it’s not private,” the white unicorn conceded. “I just thought, what with you being so close to the Princesses...” The other mare trailed off.

“I’m sure,” Twilight agreed. “There’s nothing between myself and the Princesses that I can’t share with my friends.” She was, inexplicably, reminded of Dash’s friendly jab at the party. “Nothing,” the unicorn reiterated firmly. “Now, let’s see what it says.” She lifted the letter, smiling to herself as she began to read. Princess Luna had clearly taken her suggestions about modernizing her speech to heart, and it showed in her writing.

To my dearest friend Twilight Sparkle,

Firstly, I must apologize for the long silence in our correspondence. As you know, our encounter on Nightmare Night inspired me to attempt to reacquaint myself with the ponies who I ostensibly rule over. As such, I have been devoting a large portion of my waking hours to participating in my sister’s Day Court, as well as catching up on the “softer” literature available in our library. You might not know this, but I was quite the connoisseur of fiction in my younger centuries. I find that it gives me insights into pony nature that are normally hidden from me by the masks of royalty.

This brings me, as you may have guessed, to the reason for this letter. When you gave me the tour of your library, I could not help but notice that it contained almost exclusively reference books, histories, and adventure stories. While I certainly cannot hold you at fault for your commendable scholarly pursuits, and have also been greatly enjoying the many adventures of Daring Do, I found myself thinking that your selection could use a bit more variety. In addition to providing you with an interesting change of pace, it might help draw the interest of more of the townsponies to your library, a problem which I recall you mentioning several times in previous letters.

Enclosed is one of my personal favorites, a romance called The Prim Rose of Palomino Vale. It is a story which I first read many centuries ago, but I believe that its quality has stood the test of time. Strangely, it seems that other ponies disagree, as I had to extend my search to a most disreputable-looking bookshop in Lower Canterlot to find a recent printing. Nonetheless, I have faith that you will enjoy it. I have also taken the liberty of composing a list of similar material that you may be interested in. It can be found on the back of this scroll.

Yours in friendship,

Luna

Twilight let out a breath as she reached the bottom of the parchment. The Princess was improving, but she was still more than a bit on the wordy side. She glanced over at her friend to see her eyeing the red-bound book with no small amount of curiosity. “Is something wrong, Rarity?” The other unicorn jumped slightly.

“O-oh, no, it’s just that I’ve never seen a hardcov- I mean, I’ve never seen this... particular book before,” the mare stammered. “N-not that I would expect to know about every romance out there, of course. It’s perfectly natural that there would some I hadn’t heard of, many even, I...”

“Relax, Rarity,” Twilight giggled. “We all know you’ve read just about every romance that’s ever been printed. So did you like this one?” She lifted up the tome and opened to the first page curiously, then jumped as Rarity’s magic pushed the book shut again.

“Oh, n-no, it’s awful!” the flustered unicorn said quickly. “I’m quite sure that you’d absolutely hate it. It’s not your type of story at all.”

“Er, alright. Still, I wouldn’t be a very good friend if I didn’t at least give it a try.” Twilight looked askance at her friend. “Is everything alright, Rarity? You’re acting strange all of a sudden.”

“Of course, dear, it’s just that... why do you have all these mirrors, anyway?” Twilight could detect a frantic subject change as well as the next pony, but she let it go, not wanting to pry too hard into whatever was bothering the other unicorn. “I can understand your wanting to liven up the place a bit, but their positioning really leaves something to be desired.”

“Oh, well um, it’s...” The lavender unicorn cast about for a moment, then on a sudden inspiration, grabbed a recently-shelved book from nearby. “Feng Shui! I was trying to, um, spread around the qi.” She fixed her friend with a wide, hopeful smile. Rarity arched an eyebrow, but dropped the subject.

“Well, anyway, I’m glad to see that you’re... quite yourself, Twilight, but I had better be going. It will be time to open the boutique soon.”

“Of course! Thank you so much for stopping by, Rarity.”

The two unicorns exchanged a few more slightly awkward pleasantries, then Rarity made her exit. Twilight settled down at her desk, setting down the book and summoning her quill, ink, and parchment.

“Let’s see. Today’s shopping day, so I’ll need to make a trip to the market. I promised Rarity last night I’d model some of her new Canterlot fashion line for her. I should probably figure out where that coffee shipment is...” The lavender unicorn hummed to herself as she worked on enumerating her tasks for the day, her rapidly-moving quill surrounded by a purple aura. Within a few minutes she had completed the list, and she set it aside and turned to do the one thing she hadn’t written down.

The three mirrors stood in the center of her library, evidence of the powerful magic she had cast the previous day. That wouldn’t do at all. Rarity was right about them being an eyesore, anyway. She’d have to move them somewhere else. Of course, that meant she’d have to set them back up before she could perform her spell again. She had so much to do today, and the red-bound novel on her desk called to her with the irresistible siren song of unread text...

Alerted by the sound of a spell being cast, Spike came out of the kitchen to find Twilight surrounded by glowing diamond dust.

“Aw, not again...”

Twilight Sparkle stepped into one of the trio of mirrors. Twilight Sparkle and Twilight Sparkle stepped out the other side. The runes faded, then disappeared. The twin unicorns turned to each other.

“I’ll read the book?”

“And I’ll take care of today’s to-do list.”

The two mares grinned at each other, put their right hooves together in a high-hoof, then turned to the mirrors.

“But first, let’s get these down to the basement.”

The sun was already setting by the time Twilight checked off the last item on her list. Apparently her special order of coffee had been misdelivered to Fillysburg by the Canterlot post office, and it would be several days before it arrived. It was a real shame, too, because she really needed some right now. She was absolutely exhausted from the day’s adventures.

She didn’t mind having to be the one to go out and do the day’s work. She was technically also at home reading her new book, after all. Plus, it had been a fun day. She had to admit that, despite her general disinclination toward fashion, she did like dressing up once in a while, so she’d honestly enjoyed herself at Rarity’s boutique. A visit to Fluttershy’s cottage had turned out very interesting when she discovered that her pegasus friend was in possession of a hitherto unknown subspecies of flying squirrel. Even the trip to the market had become more exciting than anticipated when a certain trio of young fillies picked that day to try for their “parkour” cutie marks. Twilight smiled slightly at the memory. The three fillies had been just fine after they were untangled from the mess of canvas they’d found themselves in.

As she trotted toward her front door, she noticed that the light was on in her room. She must have moved up there after regular library hours had ended, to enjoy the book in the comfort of her bed. It must have been as good as Princess Luna said, then. Her smile turned into a grin, but that quickly faded as she opened the door and met a haggard-looking Spike.

“Twilight, thank Celestia you’re here!” the little dragon cried, throwing himself onto the ground at her hooves. “She, I mean you, haven’t... uh hasn’t... her... or I guess it’s your room... argh! Help!”

Twilight gently levitated her frazzled assistant over to his bed. “Easy, Spike. I’ll take care of it. And you mean, ‘The other you hasn’t come out of your room,’ right?” Spike nodded miserably.

“Since lunch. She skipped dinner entirely.”

“Alright. You just get some sleep, okay? It’s past your bedtime.” The unicorn gently took Spike’s blanket in her teeth and drew it up over the little dragon, and he nodded again, yawning widely.

“Thanks, Twilight. I don’t know what I’d have done if you hadn’t come back.”

Twilight giggled. “Good thing there are two of me then, huh?” But her assistant had already fallen asleep. She shrugged and lifted her saddlebags off, setting them aside before she trotted up the stairs. Her door was locked, so she took the extra key she kept under the nearby bookshelf and quietly let herself in, then relocked it behind her.

Her room was surprisingly warm, and completely silent, except for her soft breathing and that of the other lavender unicorn. Her twin was sitting on the small bed, her back to her, apparently not having noticed her yet. The book lay open in front of her, about three quarters finished. A soft purple glow blossomed around the book, and the silence was broken by the gentle hiss of paper against paper as a page turned. Twilight crossed the room and peered over the other unicorn’s shoulder to get a closer look.

Then she did take within her thee full lengthe of hys loins, which were as she notedd previously of as great girth as hys muscles, which flex’d and rippl’d as he began to-

Twilight blinked and took a step back, as if to distance herself from what she had just read. The sound startled her twin, who froze, eyes going wide and pupils contracting in shock. The other unicorn’s head whipped around, horn already glowing with a spell, before she realized that it was herself.

“O-oh. Hi...”

“Uh, heheh, hi. Didn’t mean to sneak up on you.” Twilight gave herself a reassuring grin, which the other seemed to accept, relaxing and releasing the magic she had been holding. “So, the book...”

“The book,” her twin agreed.

“It’s very...”

“Very.”

She motioned for the other mare to move over to make room for her, and settled down beside her after she complied. She quickly scanned through the rest of the page, and confirmed her initial suspicions.

“It’s awful.”

“Yeah. It really is.”

“Some of it can be attributed to the archaic grammar and spelling conventions, or the lack thereof...”

“...but some of it is just awful.”

Twilight looked over to her twin with a mischievous grin. The other unicorn returned it. Ending the spell could wait.

The light coming from the room on the second floor of the library didn’t go out until the early hours of the morning. From within came hushed whispers, giggles, snorts, occasional bursts of outright laughter, and the soft sound of pages turning.