From stone to grass, soil. Florenza feels it in her hooves from the sudden teleport. Her hometown's early morning hustling and bustling hoofsteps and chatter, vanished, replaced by melodious harmonies of birds perched on ancient trees’ branches.
One second, she was talking to a familiar yet surprising face, hoping to sell her more of her precious and prized sunflowers she's grown all her life—the next, she's far from home in an alien forest, almost alone.
For answers, she looks to her teleporter: Celestia, clad in plain yellow robe, unfazed.
The former princess peers past a few trees, looks behind her as hooves step on newly-dewed grass. “I ask if you can keep this place clean, you and others who are more than willing to care for this sacred place—to let it flourish with the prettiest of flowers you can find.”
Florenza’s rubbernecking head takes in the forest’s plenty of bushes, flowers, little animals running around. A bird lands on her brown mane and staring curiously at her sunflower cutie mark. “I can do that, especially for a pony who’s served us well for such a long time… but why do you call this sacred? I don’t see much here other than a good forest.”
Celestia nods, knowing, before departing the copse of trees.
Ahead of her, an opening. A circle of no trees, a circle where the sun shines like a huge spotlight. A wide swath of open, untouched grass, of cool air and birds flying around to welcome the two visitors to this holy site.
A tombstone lies in the center.
Hoof to her mouth, a shocked Florenza trots on three legs, approaching the sign of death. She tunes out the too-happy birdsongs. A closer look, the deceased’s cutie mark etched on stone—
“Star Swirl… the Bearded?”
Celestia nods again.
Inches away from the stone, she goes, “We had the funeral here last night. Not much was said given the extraordinary circumstances of his being here in the first place. He and the Pillars… it is a miracle that they’ve made it to this time. Thus, our appreciation was better left unsaid. Our actions, hopefully, spoke louder than words.”
Said actions still speak at the foot of the stone. Books, scrolls, his hat and cloak enchanted by a spell to ward off dust and dirt for many years to come.
A few flowers.
“We have not announced his death, though we’ve notified Princess Twilight. She will make it public tomorrow once it’s been decided what to do with his possessions.”
In silence, those actions—these gifts—speak on, accompanied by a morning breeze and the tweeting of birds farther off.
“So… which of these did you give him?”
A hoof gesturing towards the gifts, retracts. “I did not give him anything. Not back then. But after some thought, there was something...“
And out of her saddlebag, a flower. A sunflower.
Florenza’s eyes widen in surprise. “The sunflower you paid for back in the Royal Flower Contest a few days ago!”
But Celestia pays her no heed as she levitates the sunflower to the ground, surrounding it with soil. A touch of her hoof to release Earth pony magic, binding the sunflower to the ground, rooting it there as if this forest were its home.
The sunflower still stares at Celestia all that time, now raising its head as she stands up from her tiny act of gardening.
“B-but… so it’s not true what they say, that you don’t like sunflowers?” A blush, a scratch at the back of her golden head. “I’m sorry if that was… um, you were a princess, after all.”
A regal chuckle is the first part of her answer. “There is truth to the rumor. They used to scare me so much, yes, following me around since I was a filly. Sadly, I ended up hating it for darker reasons, especially after I had to banish my own sister and ponies gave me sunflowers but not a single flower that Luna loved...”
She shakes her head, sparkly mane flapping in slow motion. “Over a thousand years, mistakes and regrets pile up. No doubt my sins have haunted me for so long. Even the sins of others, I recall in vivid detail.
“But sooner or later, I have come to realize: is not the sun the bringer of the new day, the harbinger of something new—a chance to begin again and to do good?”
She stoops down again, gracing the sunflower with her head. The former princess, the sun mare herself—
She pats the flower on the petals.
It responds by continuing to stare at the solar pony, without understanding.
“And so, in a thing I used to despise, something good shall reign. I shall rise to give it good meaning, a good symbol. It is childish of me to be enslaved to a bunch of happy flowers, after all, and I shall begin in an outrageous way: that even in death—“ points to the tomb then to the lonely sunflower “—there can be life.”
And she turns to Florenza, hoof to chest, to impart something from the bottom of her heart. “And that is why you are here. The rest of the Pillars will not live forever, and all of them choose not to do so. They’ve all expressed a desire to be buried here with him, and maybe more of Equestria’s modern heroes shall be buried here as well when their time comes.
“But I do not want this to be just a place of death. I want this to be a place of life, hence the flowers. The tombs shall only be the center. From this and beyond, there shall be flowers, a garden, fountains, a gazebo or two—so that we do not just remember their deaths but also the life they’ve given us.”
Florenza nods at that, heartwarming sorrow piercing her heart, sniffling now, wiping tears away. “That’s... that’s good... it’s all good, I believe so... and I think I can assemble a troupe of ponies from my place for starters and we can grow from there. I assume you want sunflowers with them, too, right?”
Celestia turns away, nodding and saying yes to everything.
But she stops, locking eyes with that fatal stone.
“Florenza, do you know someone who can make two cenotaphs?”
The florist cocks her head to the side. “A cenotaph?”
“A tomb, a memorial, for somepony whose body is not there.”
And Florenza blinks, taken aback. “But who would they be for? Who else died recently?”
Celestia still locks eyes with that stone, hiding from Florenza her watery eyes as she stares into the sun and beyond. “Oh, they did not die recently. It was a long, long time ago...”
The couple do not care for anything back home. Not now, not in this new morning in fields of gold where no one can see nor bother them.
They just told the town, the council of sun-raising unicorns and the mayor and everypony else of importance that they need time to think, to reflect, before making any decision on their newborn children.
Mother caresses her twin daughters—different and not identical twins, already a curiosity unheard of among the lands. She now both curses and blesses herself for watching the council raise the sun together, of having her offspring be close enough to such deep pools of magic that they sprouted something new, somehow moved the sun and moon on their own to usher in this same new morning.
Alicorns. Or pegacorns. The name doesn’t matter. All Mother was told was that they were the three tribes in one. A miracle. Divine.
Father had a strong enough hoof to draw the line. “It is useless to act in haste!” he said to everypony asking him to hurry to the capital so Equestria’s leaders can deliberate on this miracle. “What you will do with our foals this week will save or doom us all, so shut your mouths and leave us alone!”
Nopony bothered them from then on, but nopony expected them to just backtrack a little and retreat in some nearby wheat field.
The family now trot through the fields. It was getting too itchy for the foals, and they were about to cry. Mother hushes them as she holds the foals with her hoof while Father leads the way.
A field of flowers, a little garden; natural or pony-made, they do not know. To the foals, it does not matter for they stretch their hooves out to the pretty plants, enamored by the pretty petals. And hungry.
Father picks some flowers and crushes them in a bowl he brought along, crushing them into foal-edible mush. “Ah,” and he takes off two flowers by the stem, one by one. “Here is... another sign. I know the augurs gave the two of them daffodils and lilies to consecrate their births, but considering what’s happened this morning...”
Mother picks them up, holding them close. Feels their soft petals as her foals stretch their hooves out to these new playthings. “A sunflower to symbolize the day’s vitality and a lavender to aid in one’s slumber. How... appropriate. This is no mere coincidence, is it?”
The foals finally wrest the flowers from her grasp, toying with the petals, sucking on the stems, trying to eat the stem but failing for lack of teeth.
She looks on, unaware of one foal already smelling of lavenders, already yawning though it is just morning. The other, curiously then delightfully giggling at how it looks at her like her parents do as she throws the plant high into the air, watching it fall down gracefully like a feather, that flower always facing her wherever it falls.
“Sun and moon,” Father says. “I guess that settles our naming dispute, then?” A cleared throat later, “Shall we name them Sunflower and Lavender? Single words as well, fit for ponies that are clearly uncommon.”
Mother smiles, too, yet—“They raised the sun and lowered the moon. Flowers won’t be enough for them.”
“Then what shall we name them?”
With a soft sun-blessed smile, she rests her eyes upon her offspring.
“We name them after the sun and moon, after the cosmos themselves.”
“The cosmos themselves?” He gazes upward, beholding the baby blue sky in all its innocent magnificence. “The celestial, the lunar...”
Mother snuggles her foals, cuddling them with her muzzle. In one fell swoop, she pulls Father closer into a one tight family hug, their foals cooing and cackling at this affection.
“We don’t know what’s in store for you, Celestia and Luna, but... if Harmony has made you alicorns, then she shall take you to places untold. May Harmony protect you, and may she bless you over all your days and nights.”
For a moment, holding onto sunflower and lavender, onto each other, Celestia and Luna understand.