I have known you. More than anypony or anything else in this vast universe, I have known you.
You have known me. You expected me to be like this and I expected you. Could I call it a betrayal? Could you? We knew what would happen. We felt the twist of the knife well before even the steel that made its blade had materialized in the cosmos. I knew what would happen. Why, then, do I dream of fire? Why do I dream of your eyes alone, your face wreathed in flame?
You seem so sad in my dreams.
Do I seem sad in yours?
I would think I must. Anguish follows me still, haunting these crystalline halls. I suspect Anguish has replaced the spectre of Death for they both know Death shall never claim me. The sun will see me taken back into her roiling inferno before anything else in this world or the next.
I have been tracing this spiral ever since I was aware of its nature. I have seen our mutual descent, albeit through different eyes, dozens of times. Did I think about it then? Did I ever try to stop it? I cannot know. There are some parts of this infinite past that remain hidden from me. I will search for them when you go. I will know every part of us that time has tried to obfuscate. I promise you that.
I hold onto you, gripping your trembling frame with what’s left of my strength. We’re both spent; exhausted. Days spent awake, searching for a cure. A remedy. A knife. You suggested the last one. Insisted that if She could not be dealt with through kindness then you would see her cut out like a tumor. Like one cuts around so much rot.
Perhaps that is why She returns, time and time again. You are so, so cruel to yourself. I’ve seen the scars, I’ve seen the blood pool in your shoes and speckle your bedclothes. It hurts to see but I cannot blame you. There are nights that I lie awake and think, my heart devoid of dreaming; I think about what it would be like to be me without Her. What it would be like to be us.
We could still live together. We could still love and be loved. You would still fly and I would still practice magic and nothing else would be demanded of us. I would love you like the sun loves a flower and you would love me like the moon loves the ocean. We would still dance as celestial bodies do, round and round and round, but that’s where the playacting would stop. We could’ve just been ponies.
You threaten to smother this world in darkness. You say, not entirely incorrect, that it deserves as much for the way it’s treated us. The way it’s treated you.
I say that I’d sooner see it burnt to a crisp than smothered. You seem aghast. I chuckle and stroke your mane. I feel it too, little moon; I hear Her just as much as you. The little ponies did not choose this fate for us, however. That decision was made well before their time. I do not resent them for needing shepherds. I do not resent them needing a scale to meter out the good and bad in equal parts.
Just as I do not resent you, beloved. This spiral is not of your choosing. This darkness that even now clouds your vision and poisons your speech is not what you want. When you come back I promise to stop it. I will scrub it out, if I must bleed myself empty to do so then I will. I will never allow this to happen again. If I must see us both consumed in fire to accomplish this then I will make it so.
There is no pain great enough to stop me from loving you, sister. ☉