On the Sisters · 9:49pm May 19th, 2020
Celestia and Luna are always a complex topic, they're central to the entirety of Equestria's story, from start to finish. There's definitely a temptation to flanderize them in one way or another, either as nigh-infallible deities, or as the authors of nearly all of Equestria's ills. At the risk of sounding presumptuous, I wanted to do my best to give them real, distinct characters from the ground up, with as few assumptions as possible. I never want to simply say "this happened", nothing is ever done for no reason at all.
That's a guiding point in all of my thinking really, I want to know the why of the situation, not just the what.
So then, to write and understand the sisters I took the basic facts of the show and walked backwards from there in an attempt to discover the mares who would become the princesses. Now, some things I'll leave out, such as the specifics of their cutie mark epiphanies, as I'll probably want that for a nice dramatic reveal in an actual story. (God willing) But the rest of their personal history, well they've never made any particular secret of that, so I feel comfortable sharing it out.
To start with, they were unicorns in old Unicornia. I chose to discard the natural-born alicorn bit, as an entire hidden community creates more narrative problems than it solves. Likewise, Starswirl simply finding them under a cabbage leaf creates the kind of questions that I don't like in a story. So, unicorns.
As to why they were unicorns specifically, well I just can't see how an earth pony or a Pegasus would get a mark in raising the sun or moon. They grew up orphans, living on the margins with Celestia essentially raising Luna while working odd jobs here and there for a bit of extra copper. They ate a lot of grass to make ends meet.
They became alicorns in the same incident that earned them their marks, at the height of the windigo-winter. This contributed a large part to their survival, earth pony hardiness and pegasus resistance to exposure got them through the diaspora and into Equestria with the rest of the unicorn refugees.
Now, as mentioned in the last blog, Celestia and Luna were not immediately hailed as princesses over the new pony nation. In fact it was a little while before anyone even knew they were anything but another pair of unicorns. While they weren't exactly ashamed of their new wings, they were worried that their unicorn fellows might not take it all that well. Fortunately cloaks and shawls were much in evidence back in those frosty days.
It all came out one day in Paradise Valley when Celestia was minding a group of young children as they collected greenery for forage. A boar came out of the woods and attacked them, and Celestia told them to run for help as she distracted it. To the surprise of the rescuers, the "unicorn" mare had managed to put up a respectable fight, and her cloak/shawl had gotten ripped up in the process. She hadn't plowed it through a tree or anything, but she'd given better than she'd got, and all while forgetting about her magic.
An artist would like to paint a bright picture of the future princess standing triumphant, but really she was quite bedraggled. Mane full of dirt, green all up one side where she was thrown on the grass, a nasty bruising cut on the other where the thing nearly gored her, feathers askew, and a confused look on her face when the boar suddenly abandoned the fight and ran off.
And after that, well, the rest is history.
I'd do a section for each princess, but I just realized how extraordinarily long that would make this. So, separate blogs, one for each of them. Questions and commentary are, as always, welcome.
Cool
I do wonder why Celestia forgot about her magic in that fight, if she grew up a unicorn, but still, interesting. :)
5265808
Well at that point in time she was still in the mindset of a young twenty-something unicorn mare. She didn't really know any magic beyond telekinesis, and out in the middle of a grassy field there's not much to grab. So in the heat of the moment she basically defaulted to the old pony standby of kicking it in the face.
5265814
That and I don’t think a teenager knows a lot of battle magic
5265814
Ah, thanks!
5265815
Well, it depends on the world and circumstances, I think.
5265845
You're welcome! And yes, it really does depend on circumstances. While ponies in this particular world are no strangers to violence, as a young mare in a backwater village Celestia had precisely no opportunities to learn any sort of combative magic.
5265860
And thanks again. :)
I like the natural born Alicorn bit, but this is good!
I wonder how they would have reacted to the massive boost in power (strength and magic) that came with their ascension? Would take some getting used to I imagine.
5530613
It was more a sideways expansion to their capabilities, (a knack for finding greenery and the obvious acquisition of wings) than any great surge of power. They were only as gifted as any other pair of pegasus or earth pony fillies would be at that age, the power has crept up over the centuries.
5530634
That makes a lot of sense, Alicorns grow stronger with the passing of time.
5530678
Indeed. Most ponies do in fact, but most ponies also find a limit or at least find themselves limited by age.
Except for Starswirl, but he was a very strange outlier.
5530692
So much magic in Starswirl being the reason methinks
5530696
After the third century or so people just kind of decided he was too cussed stubborn to die. Eventually vanished around the same time the Pillars did, but nobody really believed that he actually died. Mainly because his tower still insists on being the tallest thing on Mount Canterhorn, even millennia later.
5530697
