Princess Celestia had been called by the guards of the castle, as a last resort of sorts.

Word about the princess crying had spread faster than any other gossip or rumor told before inside the walls of Canterlot Castle. It was astonishing news after all.
Princess Luna had never been seen crying in all the time after her return, and the fact that she was considered a pony-eating fiend a couple of years before made it even more surprising for every pony in the castle.

The reason for her tears was different for every pony that contributed to keeping the gossip alive and appealing. For the chefs of the castle she was crying out of pain. They believed it was because of a wound on her face. The maids of the castle on the other hoof believed it was due to an unrequited love, and that the pony the princess was interested in was no other than Princess Twilight. Word among the soldiers and workers was that she was crying out of solitude.
Like those there were many other things ponies in the castle believed were the cause for the princess' sadness.

A large crowd of Luna's guards had gathered in front of her bed chambers mumbling and talking among themselves, wondering about the condition of the princess, and pondering and discussing possible remedies for each and every cause thrown around in their conversations.

Already from afar Princess Celestia could see the sea of helmets, wings and horns gathering in front of her sister's room. She heard them talk about healthy food, aesthetic surgery, and even some very detailed plans for a romantic dinner between her and Twilight. The princess laughed mentally. It was really amusing to hear what the guards were willing to do in order to prevent the tears of the moon princess. It was almost a shame she had to stop all that.

Celestia cleared her throat and the mumbling ceased instantly. The unorganized crowd of armor-clad soldiers suddenly made a path for her. The soldiers stood firm against the walls of the hallway, with their heads lowered and one of their hooves raised slightly from the ground.

The sentence was one, but their voices many. The princess was somewhat impressed by the discipline and coordination of her sister's corps. Calmly she walked through the path opened to her towards a single soldier at her sister's door, one she had seen knocking on it a few moments ago.

The stallion was already past his best age, she could tell by the white streaks in his mane and the many lines on his face. But his body was still strong and his expression was that of one that is always ready for a fight.

"There is no need for apologies, General Graitax.
As her sister, I'm also worried about Luna's condition.
Although I must say that I don't believe that a single one of the reasons for my sister's tears that I have heard on my way here is correct."

There was a massive blush on the cheeks of every soldier standing on the hallway, Graitax included.

"I-is that so, Princess? Forgive us for letting rumors get the best of us.
I am sure that you know the exact reason for the princess' situation."

The princess knocked on the door of her sister softly. No pony around her made a single sound.

Celestia waited for her sister's response, but there was none. She knocked once more.

"...please princess Celestia, tell princess Luna that if she's concerned about the wound on her face, there's nothing worry about.
Roselax, the stallion over there, is the heir of a renown family of doctors, being him the only one that choose duty over tradition.
I am more than sure that he'll be able to heal the wound without leaving the slightest trace behind."

Graitax pointed at an unicorn soldier among the lines. The unicorn simply nodded with his head as to let the princess know where he was.

The princess of the sun made a gesture with her hoof negating that possibility. There was no way that "scratch", as Luna had called it earlier today, was the reason for all this.

"Could it be an internal pain instead, princess? Because, Nikoleif here knows much about..."

Graitax had already turned in order to point at another soldier, but Celestia quickly interrupted him.

-"I don't honestly believe any sort of internal or external pain would be enough to bring my sister to tears, general Graitax.
I think you know her as good as I do to know that."

"Certainly, Princess. Princess Luna is tough, made of a different kind wood than any of us. But I just couldn't discount the possibility that easily."

In that moment for some reason Celestia couldn't even begin to guess, General Graitax's expression changed. He seemed somehow flustered, embarrassed about what he was going to say.

With a well disguised face of surprise Celestia saw how the cheeks of the old stallion and those of the soldiers under his command glowed red, brighter than before. Their embarrassment was so evident she could almost hear the steam coming out of their ears.

"E...Even if it is not something we should concern ourselves with, seeing all the suffering this matter brings to our princess, we can at least find a way to help her in this situation."

The old stallion didn't call a name that time. Instead, one of the soldiers broke silently the lines and approached them while keeping a stoic expression. Once he was in front of the princess he lowered his head as supposed to.

"This young lad here is Liebarz. He is our love expert.
His dates are peerless; his hook-ups are always a perfect match. He is as good as he is ruthless. A dreaded foe in the matters of the heart, I must admit.
I am sure he'll be more than capable to advice Princess Luna to come up with a fool proof strategy to conquer the heart of Princess Twi...I mean, the heart of whoever Princess Luna is interested at the time."

Liebarz raised his head and hit on his metallic breastplate with one of his hooves.

"Please leave it to me, Princess. I'll make sure princess Luna finds happiness no matter the consequences!"

Celestia knew then that if she left things like that, things would get beyond anyone's control in a matter of hours.
The concern her sister's soldiers felt towards their commander was out of the scale, to the point where it was almost harmful.
Not only that but there was something inside her chest that told her very clearly that Liebarz could make Luna and Twilight the perfect couple by the end of the week even if they had never felt anything for each other. There was something in his cold eyes that screamed to her that he was incredibly good at matching ponies, almost deadly so.

Graitax stopped in the middle of his sentence, distracted by something that had been slid down Luna's door at Celestia's hooves. On the floor laid a piece of parchment with few scribbles on it. Using her magic Celestia picked up the note before Graitax could see it's contents and read it in silence.

-"It'd seem so Graitax. Apparently my sister doesn't want to be bothered right now."

Taking the piece of paper away from her sight, Celestia looked at the old general in the eye as to make sure the soldiers of Luna's guard understood.

Graitax lowered his head, as did the other dozens of armored stallions and mares standing along the hallway.
The sun princess sighed and with a look of resignation at the soldiers' worried expressions spoke once more.

The old stallion raised his head in a blink of an eye, expecting the orders of his liege.

"Luna would like to put you in charge of the night watch for tonight. She expects nothing but perfection while accomplishing this mission."

-"Do not worry my princess! There shall be on this night no invader or threat that could endanger any citizen within our borders!
Luna's Guard, formation!!"

With a deafening sound, caused by the simultaneous movement all the soldiers, stallions and mares alike took their positions in a often practiced formation. Their eyes were set in the pony before them, waiting for the order to march. The old general gave a respectful nod to the princess, while thanking her for her help once more and turned towards his subordinates.

"As you heard princess Luna has placed her trust on us for tonight. We are to guard the night on our own.
Let us not betray the princess' expectations of us. To our patrol stations!"

The thunderous affirmation of the soldiers filled the cold air of the castle's hallways. The unicorns, Pegasi and earth ponies in black armor trotted down the corridors towards their respective posts as if they were marching to the battlefield; something a bit exaggerated, according to the princess.

Celestia turned once more towards her sisters' door and attempted to reach to her.

"Oh, Luna...I know your soldiers are hard to command sometimes. But they truly care about you. I don't see why you'd treat them like this."

The princess of the sun spoke softly at the wooden door of her sister, but it felt like talking to an iron wall, one she couldn't hope to tear down with even her strongest magic.
On the other side Luna remained quiet, with feather and parchment enveloped in her magic grasp.
A second note slid down the door. It was for Celestia as well, but the contents were different.

The blue alicorn saw the shadow of her sister on the floor go away. The sound of her hoof steps became fainter with each second until there was nothing more than silence on the other side of the door. Slowly she walked towards her bed and let herself fall on top of it and into a deep slumber. She hoped it'd make her forget, but all it did was make her remember.

****************************************

From her bed Luna could see on the other side of her room's window a blue bird chirping at her mate from inside their nest.
If Luna remembered well, the male bird's name was Cecil while the female bird was called Rose. She had named them after the protagonists of a fantastic story her father had read to her once before. Yes, she named them, but that was a long time ago. There was no way it could be the same birds. She remembered well the day she saw them for the last time.

As if the world around her was hurt by her statement, the shapes around her became hazy for an instant, but returned to their solid appearance right afterwards.
A dream, huh? Things would make sense then. It would explain the childish pattern on her bed sheets, the stuffed dolls at her side, and the two birds outside.

Princess Luna was in her old room, in the old castle, located in the heart of what later was going to be known as the Everfree forest.
She sat wrapped in thick and soft bed sheets filled with feathers, with a bad morning mane and half opened eyes.

Slowly she took a look around her old room. The dolls, the curtains, her closet, and wooden desk, things she had literally not seen in over a thousand years looked as if they had been bought yesterday. The polish of the wood and the silvery and golden metallic decorations of the furniture sparkled under the gentle rays of the sun.
It was a scene from over a thousand years ago, copied to the slightest detail. There were just a couple of blurry spots and a few objects that changed form or even disappeared from time to time, but it was inevitable. Dreams are not peerless.

She stared in silence at her old things trying to find the source of her dream in vain. If one wanted to gain control over the chaotic mess dreams are, it was best to pinpoint the dream's origins. But for the life of her she didn't see the connections in her dream. It was just a repetition of a moment in time.

Luna wiggled herself free of her bed sheets. Her mother used to tuck her in bed so tightly that wiggling was the only way she could get out of them the next morning. She remembered telling her to stop doing it at some point. She didn't need it. Her mother stopped doing it, then they became distant.

Like every morning a millenia ago Celestia and Cadence had barged into her room without knocking. How she hated that.
Luckily there was a time when they too stopped coming to her room.

It was strange for the princess of the moon to see them small like that again.
Among the three Luna was the second tallest, with Cadence being the third and Celestia, of course, being the tallest of them all.
The color of her sister's mane was pink, like cadence's. They didn't have the different streaks of other colors that would appear later once they found their cutie marks.

Luna couldn't help but notice how much her sister had changed with the years. Celestia looks always elegant and stoic, in control, aware of the effects her persona could have on her subjects. It almost gives others the sensation she is surrounded by a tranquil aura that demands respect from anypony, but at the same time gives them peace, quite different to the mare that stood now in front of her.
Young Celestia could be described with a single word, energetic. She gave the impression she was overflowing with energy. But it wasn't like she was hyper active, buzzing and jumping around the room. It was more like she didn't understand the word of feeling down, or being lazy.

Cadence, on the other hoof, was more reserved, even laid back. She usually walked behind one of them agreeing most of the time with their games because she didn't want to be left alone. It was surely because of her reasons for coming then to the Castle.

Sombra's revolt...Ponies that knew her today wouldn't even begin to imagine how hard her childhood was.

"We have just a few minutes before the bell rings for breakfast. So let's play something quick here.
I'll wrap myself in Luna's blankets and you'll help me out, alright, Cadence?"

She didn't say anything. As the master of dreams she knew nothing good would come from humoring her the dream's inhabitants.

Luna jumped off her bed onto the floor without saying a word. Both Celestia and Cadence followed her with their eyes, asking her about her mood, or if she was feeling alright.

On her way out the future moon princess saw herself in a long oval mirror decorated with silver that she used to have. Small and weak, it was all she could think about when looking at her reflection. Her horn was not long enough to cast powerful magic like Celestia's, and her wings were so feeble that it was impossible to float for more than one or two minutes at a time, something Cadence could do already. Without a doubt this was the moment of her life when she was the most vulnerable, both physically and mentally. Certainly something she wouldn't like to live through again.

To spend time there with Cadence and Celestia would not be of any use for her. It was better to continue looking for the source of her dream. She grabbed the door's knob in her hoof and left the room.
As soon as the door closed behind her, from inside the room came the sound of shattering glass and twisting metal. She did not turn back though. This was merely a dream, there were no real consequences to whatever happened in it. Celestia and Cadence would surely appear again later without a single scratch. This was nothing more than a way of the dream to catch her attention.

For what seemed to be hours she walked down the same corridors and hallways she did as a young mare. Events in the castle occurred in a disorganized manner at every corner. Servants, maids and guards from eons ago trotted busy around the castle, bowing down politely, greeting her whenever they saw her.

"Oh, princess! Are you going to your morning practices? Please don't give up. I see you are getting better with each passing day."

"Useless banter"

The mirages of long dead ponies talking to her somehow irritated her. With every minute that she spent inside the old castle something inside her seemed to grow. She became more restless, more desperate to find already the cause for her dream in order to put an end to the charade.

"Oh, princess, are you feeling hungry? Please head to the main hall, we are about to serve breakfast."

-"Princess, you are late. The queen and the other princesses are already waiting for you at the entrace."

"Princess, are you doing night patrol on your own? Please head to your chambers. This is no time for a young lady to be wandering about."

Events and time mixed with one another endlessly. Sunlight and moonlight streamed through the windows of the same corridor at the same time. Weather was not different. At times she saw ponies wrapped in thick clothing shaking the snow from their backs, and one second afterwards they were fanning themselves, complaining about the summer heat.

Her pace gradually picked up with each room that proved to be a dead end until it turned into an full trot.
The castle's kitchen had held no clue to finding the dream's source. It was the same in the armory, the outer wall, the alchemy laboratories and the towers.

None of the rooms of the castle was of any help to her. It was as if the dream were a museum of memories, thrilled and satisfied by having them repeat the golden ages of the now destroyed castle over and over again, without trying to include her too much in the story that was playing out.
That was already bad enough, but there was something that made the fruitless experience even worse.

"Oh, princess...! It is not often we see you at the castle's library. Are you looking for something in special?"

"If you are looking for something to help you in your lessons, I would recommend you this section here..."

"Or are you looking for something to entertain yourself with? If so, I could suggest you some comedies."

"Oh! I know. There's one book I'm sure will interest you. It was somewhere around here..."

What did they truly know about her? Nothing, that's what. They'd never live long enough to know. Nobody would.

"Ah! I remember. Sagard took it. Come to think of it, he wanted to show it to you.
I'm sure he's waiting for you at the...
Ehm...Princess?"

Little Luna had become awfully quiet after the young librarian, a caramel colored stallion with glasses and red mane, had mentioned Spike's former name.

Suddenly the attitude of the princess changed. Her restlessness had disappeared and it had been replaced by a cold calm.

The librarian came closer, worried by the fact that the princess had suddenly grown so unusually quiet.

Surprised a little by the words of the princess, the librarian took a step back and straightened himself up.

"Yes, yes...Swift Feather. You were always re-shelving, cleaning and organizing every section of the library.
There was no book you couldn't find here and always had good recommendations of different topics for me and my sister. You were a good friend of ours."

The earth pony hid the embarrassment clearly displayed on his face behind the back of his hooves.

"Oh, princess, I'm not worthy of such praise. It is just my duty as a librarian. Besides we are still friends, right?"

A gust of wind blew inside the library when the princess finished her statement. As if blown like dust by such a wind the body of the librarian disintegrated and the warm light that bathed the wood of the shelves turned into the cold and eerie glow of the moonlight.
The thousands of books that stood next to each other in the shelves began to age and darken, while on the shelves themselves vines with thorns began to grow at an accelerated rate, covering them all.

The windows in the room shattered and the metallic hoof railings rusted and twisted themselves producing a metallic, painful scream.
The world trembled, the dream began to become unstable, just like Luna had wanted it to.
It was her plan to know the world in the dream it was not real. That was another way to get out of any dream.
But she still refused to wake up.
Apparently the dream needed a bigger shock than just this to collapse.

She made sure to defy the reality in every and each room she had been in before.
Unlike before Luna talked to everypony she encountered. But their meetings had a tragic ending. She kept telling them how and when they died.
One by one the dream ponies disintegrated at the mention of their ultimate fate. Soon there was nobody but Luna standing in the empty halls. The wind whistled lonely through the spaces of the broken glass of the windows, picking up dust from the floor and creating short lived whirlwinds.

The world trembled, the walls of the old castle broke shook violently, creating big cracks in the structure every time one of the ponies in the dream vanished. But the dream refused to end. It seemed to hang onto something, a memory around which everything revolved and Luna still couldn't find.

The old castle was enveloped in the pale light of the moon with wild vines growing through the fissures of the rock, while the branches of the trees outside thew macabre shadows on the stone floor. It was now exactly like the castle in the real world, the one that had been swallowed by the untamed forest, desolated and in ruins. But what was missing? What could the dream be surviving on?

Luna began to think of all the places she had been to, hoping to find out the one spot she had missed.

A familiar voice called the princess' name from the other end of the hallway.
Luna turned around and saw the late queen approach her. The queen was shocked by the condition her castle was in. But she was even more surprised by seeing her daughter stand in the middle of the devastation.

To meet her mother again was something Luna wasn't prepared for. It was especially hard for her now that she had opted for the disruption of the dream's reality. It meant that she also had to take care of her mother as well.

The queen looked at the desolation the structure was submerged in with clear sadness in her face. After all, even if for Luna this was a dream, for the dream itself was an undeniable reality.

Would that be the face she'd have made if she had known?
Would have she looked disappointed?

For the first time the dream showed Luna something that could affect her.
The destruction of the old castle in the middle of the forest was something she was responsible of. It was there that she turned into Nightmare moon over a thousand years ago. It was their battlefield.

Luna continued looking at her mother's face trying to figure out what to do.
She felt like apologizing for everything she had caused, but at the same time she didn't need to, at least not to a dream of her.

The queen called her name and came closer. With each step she made forward, Luna made a step back, keeping her at a distance while she continued thinking.

It was confusing, even for the princess of the night. Something inside her wanted to talk to her mother and explain what just happened, but that nameless feeling was countered by a logical thought that repeated in Luna's head that the one in front of her was not her mother. It was just an illusion. The dream was using her image as a mechanism of defense. It wanted to keep living and that's why it had chosen something Luna was not strong enough to destroy.
But the dream was wrong. Luna could do it. She was about to do it.

"That is right. You...you are not really her.
"My mother left us already. The same day my sister was crowned as the new regent of Equestria, was the same day I saw her for the last time."

Like with the other inhabitants of her dream, the late queen was disintegrated by a gust of wind, leaving nothing but dust behind.

There had been nothing different this time. The process was exactly the same as the other times she had made a dream inhabitant disappear, but Luna felt different.

With each time she caused the disintegration of one of the other ponies in her dream, a sensation of power grew inside her. Power that dulled her sensibility and numbed her feelings.

She could feel herself become stronger after each passing, feeling less sadness or regret with each parting witnessed.

But when she saw her the image of her mother vanish, there was a pang inside her chest.

Not the disappearance of her mother, that was natural. What caused pain in the princess was the fact that she still felt hurt by the loss of others. Something she believed she had become immune to thanks to all the deaths she had seen over the years.

Dozens of years, hundreds of years, thousands of years believing she had overcome it proven wrong in an instant. The feelings that had been sealed inside her began to boil and expand, threatening to overflow her.
Luna bit her teeth together tightly. She wouldn't let it...she wouldn't let it. She could feel the tears form in her eyes, but she wouldn't shed a single one of them. Luna tried to muffled the sadness inside her with pure anger and stubbornness. But it was futile. Her tears fell on the stone floor one after the other, and Luna let her rage free.

Lightning and thunder roared while violent and stormy winds ate away at the remaining ruins of the castle, blowing around the dust left, turning into a dark sandstorm that swallowed the world around her.
Luna felt her body grow larger, even larger than it actually was in the real world. And as her body grew so did her powers, but no matter how strong she became, the dream still seemed stronger.

The sandstorm the dream had turned into was dark, cold, loud and apparently endless.
The princess flew around inside the maelstrom she had caused, looking for the elusive dream's source; looking for the way out of such a horrible place. She yelled and cursed. She ordered the dream to show its core to her. But nothing happened, nothing at all.

"And what if the dream never ends? What if this never stops?
No...no...that can't be...
We...we must wake up. We have to return to the real world.
This isn't a dream...it's a nightmare!!"

Luna was about to fall in despair when she saw a squarish shape in the distance, a door.

At top speed she flew towards it. She was about to put an end to all of that. Finally she'd return to the real world.

The door opened and revealed a rose garden, the inner garden of the old Castle, the only place she didn't go to before.
This place was the only one unaffected by the desolation she had brought upon the dream. Here there was still moon and sunlight, and the leaves of the trees and the petals of the flowers were still green and filled with color.

In the garden there were two figures. One of them was her, albeit a lot younger. She wore a blue dress with frills and a silver tiara decorated on top with a crescent moon. The other figure was Sagard's, the little purple dragon that once was her sister's and her assistant.
Both were in front of a table made of stone, looking at a silver orb placed right in the middle of it.
Sagard held a big, old-looking book in his hands, while Luna concentrated only at the orb on the table.

The young version of herself looked at the dragon, clearly doubting that whatever they were going to do would be a success.
Doubt was something the princess didn't show often. Doubt meant weakness and weakness was something the princess had always striven to get herself rid off. But she didn't felt weak around him then. It was the only one she could show her weakest sides. After all it was with him that she practiced in order to become stronger.

"Maybe it will, maybe it won't. But that doesn't mean we shouldn't try, Princess."

It was an everyday thing that Luna practiced with Sagard early in the morning.
What they practiced was different every time. Sometimes Sagard helped her with her magic lessons, some others he helped her to polish her manners or her speech.
To wake up early everyday in order to attend their practices was hard, but she didn't mind it.
Back then the day just didn't feel right if she skipped practice. For her it was like losing a war on purpose or giving up halfway in an adventure. Besides, if Sagard was around practicing was fun.

Young Luna closed her eyes took the orb between her hooves, while Sagard watched attentively towards the moon.

Luna remembered that exercise well. It was visualization training. It is impossible to use magic without visualization and at the time it was impossible to her to imagine herself moving something as massive as the moon around the sky with little effort.

The exercise consisted in using the orb to trick the mind. Luna was overwhelmed by the size of the moon. She couldn't conceive in her head the idea of controlling it. But if she concentrated on the small orb between her hooves, if she made herself believe that she held the moon in her hooves, that is was nothing larger than a ball, she should overcome that mental burden and do with the moon as she pleased.

The events she saw before were based on events that truly occurred, but this one was nothing more than a construction, a fake memory.

It was harder for her to get rid of the dream about her mother than to get rid of this. This didn't even affect her. After all, she knew this was not what happened. That visualization exercise was something she did on her own, many years after Sagard had disappeared.
She alone found the book in the library. She did the exercises on her own. And finally she was able to control the moon, all on her own, without Sagard's help.

She advanced towards the two of them slowly and spoke loud enough to make sure both of them could hear her.

"This is a lie.
I did this on my own.
Sagard had already disappeared by the time I started doing this."

Finally she heard the dream's core shatter like frail glass. The imagery around her vanished and the shape before her began to fade away like those before it.

Luna closed her eyes invaded by a distorted joy brought by this last disappearance.

Yes, yes...it didn't hurt. It didn't hurt as much. The loss of her mother had broken the armor she had wore for centuries, but Sagard's loss had not eve scratched it. Ah, it felt so good to know it, to know that she wouldn't be hurt again by it. Once more she felt a tear roll down her cheek, but she was fine with it. It'd be the last she would shed for somepony else.

The moon princess then just waited for the dream to end. She expected to wake up any moment in her bed the day afterwards to never talk or think about this anymore. But it was taking the dream awfully long to end.
She opened her eyes and saw the cracks in the space around her grow gradually, but she also saw something else: Sagard.

It was strange. It was not supposed to be like that. Dreams don't fade away progressively. They usually just end, and next thing you know you are in your bed, having a hard time trying to remember what they were about.

"Why, why won't you go away already?
I don't feel like wasting my time with phantoms like you!

Her words were harsh, spoken out of anger in a hurry, with the only purpose of causing as much damage as possible.

The little dragon kept doing his reverence in silence while the Princess continued to lash out at him.

Seeing him there, taking all her hate without any kind of retaliation just infuriated Luna more. It was as if the dream wanted her to be the bad guy, when it clearly wasn't so. It wanted to make her feel bad, sour her victory over her pain.

Unable to keep herself in control she charged at the dragon, decided to make it vanish by force if she had to. But as soon as her hooves came into contact with the dragon, she stopped.

Luna froze. She held Sagard in the air, grabbing him by the shoulders, but was unable to do anything else to him besides that.

Her eyes remained set on the little dragon's while she tried to force with great effort her words out of her chest.
Sagard, one of Spike's past lives remained quiet, just looking at her.

The little dragon remained quiet for several seconds while the dream around them crumbled. Then he just whispered a single sentence to the princess.

After the words left his mouth, there were a couple of instants that the princess' face showed no emotion besides shock and confusion. But it quickly turned back into rage.

"Your apologies? Your apologies!?
You apologize to me!?
Are you mocking me, Sagard!!
Is that what you were trying to do from the beginning, make me look like the bad guy?"

Luna felt drained. The rage that had been fueling her just seconds ago disappeared, and in its place there was nothing but a sour sensation in her stomach.
She released him from his grasp and he, without any surface to fall on, just floated in front of her with his head lowered, and obviously depressed.

Both of them remained silent, unable to say anything to each other.
The little dragon wanted to greet her; he wanted to hug her, to tell her he had missed her and that he was glad to see her again. It had been ages since he had seen his princess, the real one, not the one he dreamed about, the one he didn't leave behind. But judging by Luna's expression those statements would have only made the situation even worse. Luna looked like she was hurting.
And indeed she was.

The dream was not hers. To know that was like having a dagger stuck in her chest. No matter what she did or thought, it hurt, and it was impossible to ignore.
It was one of the most horrible things she had done in her life.

Dreams are unique. Luna knows for a fact that everypony dreams something only once. Some may say they have the same dream every night, but it is not so. What happened in the dream may be similar, but it is not exactly the same. The perception of the world around oneself changes every day if just a little, and dreams are born from the conception one has about the world, about what happened in it, or what one believes will or could happen in the future.
So, to reveal the ultimate fate of the ponies he knew meant that Sagard would never again dream of that. Not in the same way at least. If for some reason his subconscious drifted to the memories of this castle again, he would no longer see it in its former glory, but in the ruined state she had made sure to show him. He would not find the servants, nor the guards, nor her mother, or even that young version of herself.

Luna turned around, unable to say anything more than those words. The princess of the moon walked slowly on a non-existing path towards a non-specific point inside the dark sandstorm that surrounded them.
Somehow this dream had been nothing more than a bad experience to her. She was exhausted. Ironically she wanted to wake up in order to get some rest from all this.

The dragon kept calling her, asking her to please wait. But seeing that she'd not listen to his words, he opted for a more drastic method. He jumped at her from behind, falling on her back, wrapping his arms around her barrel as tight as he could.

At the sensation of Sagard's weight on her back the princess of the night, in the roughest manner, began to kick around, trying to get rid of him.

Grabbing himself from the dark fur of the princess, the little dragon managed to spout a couple of words.

There was great strength behind each of the princesses bucks. It felt like one of her kicks could easily break a boulder. It was scary, but the dragon just kept tightening his grip.

With each of her violent movements the mare felt a pain that tore through her skin, getting deeper and deeper inside her.

-"That can't be princess! You know for a fact that this Sagard always keeps his claws short!"

The answer to that question was something she didn't know. All she knew was that it hurt her. To have him that close hurt her.
Once more she felt herself crying.

The heaves and huffs of the mare mixed themselves with her wet sobs, while she kept trying to buck the dragon off.
Luna was obviously not going to stop.
The strength of the dragon waned. Neither he, nor Spike had much longer. It was better to put the time he still had to good use.

-"What are you saying? Huff...
Do you think I'd let my teeth rot just because there's nobody around telling me to brush them?
Hah...!"

"Princess, you surely have grown. I can't even wrap my arms around you anymore."

The hands of the dragon grew numb. He could no longer distinguish the touch of Luna's fur in his hands. Sagard continued inquiring about his princess Life, while he still could.

At least she felt the weight of the disappear from her back. She had surely successfully sent him flying far away with one of her bucks.
Luna turned around, expecting to meet face to face the little insolent dragon that had caused her so much pain.
Half of his body was missing and the other half was turning slowly into dust.

Sagard was disappearing like Luna wished. She saw him in silence, angry, but still crying.

-"D-don't misunderstand. I am not crying because of you disappearing.
It was your claws. I told you, you were hurting me with those."

"My princess, you know well that can't be.
Please, don't deceive yourself for the sake of running away from pain.
At the end all you will do is hurt yourself more."

-"Then...make some true friends...
Don't be afraid of bonding with others...just because you are going to lose them later..."

The dragon disappeared completely. The words he had managed to speak out before fading were nothing more than a faint echo in Luna's head.

"I am not afraid of bonding with others! I'll...*sob*...I'll show you I am not...afraid of losing anypony anymore."

-"That's...great my princess.
This Sagard...is really happy.
Also...don't bother worrying about this dream...
I'll surely have better ones now that I know how much you have grown...and how much you have changed..."

The moon princess woke up in her bed with a jump. Yelling at somepony that no other could see.
Outside the castle the dark clouds of the storm made it impossible to see. Bolts of lightning flashed in the distance, while thunder roared loudly.

Quickly she turned around and looked at her back. She had expected to see the marks left by the claws of the dragon on her back. But there was nothing there. Her fur was clear from every mark, or sign of having been touched.
Somehow it was disappointing.

Silently the princess let herself fall on her bed. She didn't feel like sleeping, but she didn't feel like doing anything else either.
Luna tried to make herself comfortable among her pillows, but all of them were wet. She had cried in her sleep.

Good bye, Spike (Main story)

by Zweiterversuch

Chapter 6: If I see you in my dreams...