//------------------------------//
// Chapter Four - Insomnia Makes for Interesting Evenings 
// Story: The Science of Magic 
// by cammerhammer 
//------------------------------//

	



"Gaaaaaaah!" Lyra bolted out of bed, pawing at her throat with her hooves as she pulled the sheets and pillow down to the floor. Discord's magic flared, out of control, from her horn, turning the room an assortment of blinding colors as she fell towards the ceiling. The lights in the room flickered wildly before exploding.

Lyra's breathing slowly calmed and she dropped to the floor as the effects of the magic wore off. "It was just a dream. It was just a dream. It was just a dream."

She cast a glance over to the sweat-soaked sheet lying on the floor next to her and shuddered. "There's no way I'm getting back to sleep tonight." She slowly got back on her hooves, the now-familiar pain of Discord's magic lancing through her body.

Lyra nudged the door open to her suite within the Canterlot castle. She walked down the hall, trying to get control of her breathing.

"Are you alright, miss?"

"I just need to go outside for a bi—aaahh!" Lyra had to bite back a full-fledged shriek as she turned around to see a bat-winged, slit-pupiled, fanged guard cocking his head at her inquisitively.

"What's wrong? Oh, yes, the look. It's okay, miss. It's just part of being a Lunar Guard."

Lyra looked down at the guard from the pillar she had somehow managed to climb halfway. "No, it's fine. You just startled me is all."

"Uh-huh. Is there anything I can help you with?"

She slid down the pillar, coming to an abrupt stop at the bottom. "Ow... I just wanted to go outside for a bit of fresh air."

"Not sleeping well tonight?"

"You could say that."

The guard gestured behind the unicorn with a wing. "The Royal Gardens are that way. Take a right at the end of the hall, turn left at the second arch and through the door at the end. You will be on the north side of the hedge maze in the statuary area."

"Thank you Mister...?"

"Westwood, miss."

"Well, thank you Westwood."

Lyra trotted towards the garden, looking at the darkened stained-glass windows as she went. The panes told stories of fierce beasts and hard-fought battles, loss and chaos intruding upon Equestria only to be beaten back by the guardians of the realm. The princesses, ancient heroes and wielders of the Elements of Harmony were all immortalized in the windows. Without them, the world as they knew it would have been ruined many times over by beings like Ursa and Canis Majors, Discord, Nightmare Moon and many other beings that were even darker and forbidden to be acknowledged.

And she had confronted the most infamous of them all with nothing more than a musical instrument and a prayer. She could imagine what Bon Bon would say to that: "Lyra Heartstrings, did you try a lobotomy spell or did your brain merely fall out of your mouth this morning? What would possess you to attack the god of Chaos with your lyre?!"

"As if she wasn't going to kill me already for the crater I put in the yard," Lyra mumbled to herself as she magicked open the door to the gardens. She inhaled deeply, enjoying the fragrances of the flowers surrounding the statuary. She dug her hooves into the ground to feel the cool earth.

Lyra moved on, examining the statues one by one as she came across them. A soft glow caught the corner of her eye, and she turned to where Discord's statue used to be. In its place stood a small pony-like sculpture. Celestia had sat in front of the stone artwork, her traditional royal jewelry cast on the ground beside her.

I should probably leave her alone. "Are you alright, Princess?" Why did you say that? Just keep walking. Leave her alone. Why am I walking closer to her? No, don't sit down! "Why are you out here at this time of night?"

"I can't sleep tonight."

"Join the club." Lyra fidgeted nervously as she looked at the statue. She didn't remember it being here before. "Is this a new one?"

"No, my little pony. This is Discord himself."

"What?"

"Magic was very influential in Discord's appearance. When you took his magic, you took away the greatest part of him. This is what was left behind."

Lyra silently took in the morphed form of the draconequus. He stood on four legs now. The horns on his head were little more than nubs. He still had a scaly tail and mismatched legs, but they were now more pony-like in form. The wings on his back were both feathered. His fang was gone. What remained was a statue of a very frightened and small creature that looked very much like a pony, standing on a cracked and crumbling pedestal.

"Does this mean I'll become like him?"

Celestia sighed. "I don't know." The sun princess gave the downcast unicorn a small smile. "Fear not, young Heartstrings. You wouldn't have this burden if you could not carry it. I am not worried about you."

Lyra gave an uneasy smile. "Thanks for the vote of confidence." She looked at the statue again. "What happened to his stand?"

A flit of displeasure made a brief appearance on the alicorn's face. "I was going to crush his statue to rubble, but I couldn't do it. This time, though, he has reached the very limits of my tolerance for his antics. If he attempts something again, it will take much doing for him to earn any mercy from me."

Lyra cleared her throat, eager to change the subject. "So, Princess, you asked Twilight to recover your sister for you."

"And you were wondering why I couldn't go rescue my sister myself."

"Yeah."

"It's a valid question, and one with many answers. I am not comfortable sharing all my reasons with you, but I can give you one. I could not entrust my position to someone else while I am off finding my sister. Equestria needs me to be right here for the time being. Someone needs to be here to make sure order is kept."
 
"I guess that's a good reason to stay." The two mares sat next to each other, silently regarding the sculpture for a while longer.

"You are wondering why I let you volunteer to go with Twilight tomorrow."

Lyra whipped her head around to gawk at Celestia. "How did you know that?"

"I've been around for a while. You learn to pick up on what ponies are thinking." Celestia giggled and pointed a hoof at Lyra. "You should see the look on your face. Anyway, to answer your unasked question, I think it would be good for you to go along with Twilight. It's a long journey, and even longer when it is taken alone. You said you feel responsible for what happened with Luna, and you want to make it right. I can respect your motivation and I think that you might be instrumental in helping undo Luna's prison.

"Besides, you managed to give Discord a couple solid hits with your lyre. Anypony who is willing to take on a creature that outclasses them by so much is worthy of my respect. For future reference, though, you might want to come up with a plan of attack before jumping into action. I won't always be around to help you out of a tight spot."

Lyra gave an embarrassed laugh. "Thanks, I think."

"So, why can't you sleep tonight?"

"I'm still achy. It's not as bad as before, but it still hurts to do anything."

Celestia gazed at her patiently. "That's not the only reason, is it?"

"Apparently Discord decided it would be fun to mess with my dreams." Lyra groaned and rubbed her forehead at the base of her horn. "It's truly terrifying to dream that you are drowning in quicksand."

Lyra shook her head, trying to clear the images of the dream from her mind. "I swear, it feels like Discord is hanging out in my brain. It’s a little like he's rented space in my mind."

"The magic of any living entity carries an imprint of the source's personality. If you took Discord's magic potential, you most likely also absorbed a lot of his identity." Celestia's look carried a hint of worry. "Does it feel like he is fighting you internally?"

"Yeah."

"Would you like for me to try to help?"

Lyra perked up a little. "You have something you can do?"

"Yes. I don't know how well it will work, but I can give it a go." Celestia stood quickly and motioned for Lyra to follow. "Give me a second here, and..."

The gardens blinked out in a flash of yellow, replaced by a small, basement-like confine. Lyra swayed, disoriented by the teleport.

"Welcome to my magic workshop. I normally don't bring others here, but I think I can make an exception in this case."

The room had no windows. In fact, it didn't even have a door. The only openings were the air vents in the ceiling, pumping in fresh air. The walls were entirely lined with bookcases crammed full of books of all sizes. Several chests of varying sizes were placed on top of the cases. A small workbench had been wedged in between two bookcases, almost entirely covered in flasks and books full of mouth-written notes.

"Where are we?"

"We are inside Mount Chalice. Half a mile of stone sits between us and Canterlot."

"What?! How did this place get here?"

"I sneezed while teleporting about four hundred years ago and I ended up here by mistake. I decided to modify it slightly and make it my project room." Celestia magicked a robe over herself and snatched a pair of goggles from a rack holding various pieces of equipment. "It's a nice place to go when everything gets to be too much for me at the castle. Only a few ponies know this room exists, and only I know exactly where it lies within the mountain." She levitated her royal jewelry that she had brought with her and floated it into a small chest in a corner.

"Interesting... so you brought all this stuff in yourse—Hey!" Lyra cried as a trio of books whizzed from a bookcase, passing a half-hoof from her nose.

"Yes, I did. It took several years to get it completely ready, and I almost suffocated when I forgot to bore some breathing holes before working in here."

"Would you be careful with those books?" the unicorn yelped as she dodged more books that were orbiting around the princess. "Honestly, you are as bad as Twilight!"

"My apologies, Lyra. I'm not used to working around others in here." Celestia abruptly shot all the books back to their shelves, save one that she was reading. "Ah, here we go. Stand over in the center of the room, please."

"O...kay..." Lyra trotted over to the spot the solar princess gestured. "So, what are you going to do?"

Celestia slipped the goggles over her eyes as she backed up to a far corner. "I'm going to attempt to use a binding spell to nullify Discord's magic. As a side effect, you shouldn't have any more trouble with hearing Discord's thoughts. It's a bit of a long shot, but I think it will work."

"Uh, have you done this before?"

"Not this particular spell, no. I did use a variant to subdue Twilight Sparkle's magic when she first became my student, so I could teach her control. This spell is a combination binding and a booster spell to compensate for the unruly nature of Discord's magic."

"That's pretty cool. Where did you find the spell?"

"I designed it myself."

"When did you do that?"
        
"Just now."

"What?!"

"Hold still, please." As Celestia began casting the spell, Lyra had a second to wonder if she should try her luck at escaping before being enveloped in a cocoon of arcane energy.