Per the princess of the sun’s promise, the great giver of light eventually did complete its circuit across the heavens and set in the west. Once more darkness had enveloped the land. The ambassadors had gone back to their cities and pointed out the beauty that the sun had shown to all of the ponies of Equestria. But now the loss of light brought them sadness. They slept through the night; missing dearly the great circle which had opened their eyes. But they did not lose faith in their princess. The whole of the country slept with the hope that the sun would rise again soon.
Celestia was proven to be no liar after about twelve hours had passed. Once more, the sun breached the horizon line; displaying the beautiful hues that it had the morning before. On that day, after enjoying the sunrise, the ambassadors went once again to Canterlot to speak to their princess. She welcomed them again happily and graciously; holding the same demeanor as before. This time they were less afraid, but they had still not become used to either the intensity of the light in the throne room at midday or the naturally imposing nature of a goddess.
Yet once more, Onyx braved the challenge of addressing the kind princess. “Princess Celestia, you are a good ruler, and we thank you very much for bestowing upon us this, your gift, the sun, and we know that you promised that it would leave us and return. We thank you once more for being faithful to your promise. But though we are very pleased with what you have given us so far, and though we do not wish to ask too much of you, we regret to say that we are grieving because it is pitch black at night. Without the fires as in the days of Discord, we feel not only disturbed but afraid. Is it possible that you could raise the sun to its height, and leave it there that we may be able to see for all time?”
The gentle goddess answered him with her musical voice. “I have heard your troubles before you even brought them to me. I have seen them from afar. Before I laid my head down for rest last night I agonized over your discontent. Though I must tell you that there are errors in your plan. I cannot simply leave the sun in its place. If I left it still, it would warm up the earth to an unbearable temperature. Though it may seem harsh, the night is necessary for you.”
“Then could you provide a lesser light for when the sun has left us, so that we could at least make our way back to our homes without stumbling over a rocky pathway?”
The princess frowned weakly for a moment. “Unfortunately, after the sun sets, the country is no longer mine. Though you have not yet bowed in her presence, you must not forget that you have pledged your loyalty also to another princess. That is why you do not call me ‘queen.’ As long as the sun is making its journey over the sky, Equestria is my domain. But when the darkness arrives, the realm comes under Princess Luna’s jurisdiction. The night is her domain. I can do nothing until the sun rises again.”
At this, Onyx asked, “Who is this co-ruler? We have not seen her. Why does she not share this throne room with you?”
“Princess Luna is my sister who helped free you from the oppression of the tyrant. She rules with the same authority that I do, but she is enthroned in another tower in the palace. If you desire to bring your troubles before her, I am sure that she will be more than glad to receive you.” And with that, the ambassadors gave thanks to the Princess and offered her a tribute of twenty bales of hay from each of their cities. The total number of bales that was offered to her was one hundred. And though Celestia did not wish to take the tribute, she did not wish to offend them either and accepted their gift.
Then the sun princess summoned one of her guards. Like the others they had seen, he was a fine specimen. From the unknown land in which she once dwelled, Celestia had brought with her almost eugenic guards of olympian strength and build, whom she commanded in the war against Discord. His coat was white and unblemished and his eyes were the purest blue. His wings were large and powerful. All his muscles bulged and his stature seemed imposing at a height of four feet and three inches. His golden armor covered his mane, but that was compensated for by a plume of hair on his helmet.
She instructed him to lead them to the throne room of Princess Luna. So the guard led them out of The Tower of the Sun, which in old Equestrian is called Minas Anor, and he and the ambassadors stepped into the large circular room at the base of the palace. This room was carved into the mountain and was lit up with many torches. It was undecorated; having nothing but unpolished stone walls and eleven wooden doors. The door that they had exited from had a carving of the sun on it. On their right was the door that led to the hallway to the outside. The nine other doors supposedly lead to the nine other towers of the palace.
The guard opened the door to their direct right which had a carving of the moon on it (though the ambassadors did not know what it was), and motioned for them to follow. So they began to ascend Minas Ithil, which is Old Equestrian for “The Tower of the Moon.” Unlike Minas Anor, the spiral staircase leading up was much more compact and they had to climb it one by one. It was also quite dark as it had no windows, and only a torch above them every ten stairs or so. On the walls of the staircase were many strange symbols which made them uneasy. There were also words scrawled in an unintelligible language.
Under normal circumstances, they would have become quite nervous because of the ominous décor, but it was not long before weariness took precedence over worry. The stairway seemed to go on forever. They climbed up and up for longer than most of them could bear. Within minutes they were breathing heavily. At one point, the eldest ambassador, Clandestine Colloquy, asked the guard, who himself seemed to be showing signs of fatigue, “Goodness, how far does this go up?”
After huffing once, the guard answered in a gruff voice, “Minas Ithil is the highest tower in the palace. I think I remember Princess Celestia saying that it’s a thousand feet tall.”
The older pony made a sputtering sound. “What?” he asked as he nearly tripped on the stairs. “But the base of the palace alone is at eight thousand feet! It must be as high as the clouds.” The others expressed their surprise as well. Yet despite this realization, they continued to climb. Finally, two hours after sunset, they reached the top of the narrow, winding staircase of the tower.
The guard pushed open the door and they walked into a chamber with doors made of steel. The entire room was dim as well and covered mostly in darkness and shadow. The only light came from torches above the frames of the three doors in front of them and above the one they had entered through. A voice suddenly spoke up from out of nowhere, which caused the delegates to jump. “For what reason have you come to Minas Ithil unsummoned?”
The guard answered in the direction of the voice that was shrouded in darkness. “Princess Celestia asks that Princess Luna would grant an audience to these ambassadors from the cities surrounding the city.”
The grim voice countered, “Have you any proof of this?” The guard took out the parchment that Celestia had given to him and placed it on the ground a yard on front of where he stood and backed up. Then the ambassadors were shocked to see another guard walk out of the shadows and into the dim light. Yet this stallion was different from the guards that could be seen on the lower levels of the palace; serving Princess Celestia. This one’s coat was dark grey and his eyes were yellow and bestial. His armor was not golden, but purple and had a webbed crest upon his breastplate. Most noticeable were his bat-like wings which awkwardly protruded from his sides as though they had been poorly grafted on by some mad scientist. He gazed at the piece of parchment which Celestia’s guard left open for him. After a moment of his feral eyes passing over the inscription on the document, he backed again into the darkness.
For a moment nothing happened and Onyx was about to say something, but then they heard the sound of the guard's horseshoe banging upon the steel door in a rhythmic pattern. They heard ten knocks, and then there was silence. After a moment, a muffled squeal of metal grinding against metal could be heard from the outside the room. The door then opened with a gust of the cool nighttime air of winter. The voice of the grey guard was heard again. “Hurry in. The princess doesn’t have all night.” All of them, wishing to see the end of their mission, obeyed. But the darkness-enshrouded voice spoke again. He addressed their escort. “We will see to them from here. You may return to your mistress.” Their guard repented and started down the stairs.
This made them all quite nervous (more so than before) and they stopped for a moment; not wishing to walk straight forward, blindly into the darkness. The grim guard raised his voice. “Move along. You don’t want her to get upset with you.” Thus realizing that they should heed the command of the guard, they reluctantly stepped into the darkness, and away from the comforting torchlight. As each walked forward, they realized that had passed the threshold of the door when the temperature changed. They could feel a breeze and they assumed that they were outdoors. Yet it was too dark to tell. They could hear the sound of thick fabric ruffling in the wind close by them.
When nothing happened, they continued on walking down the dark path before them. Yet before they were able to go very far, they heard another voice. This one though was not grim. It was imperious, and terrible. It was also cold and unfamiliar unlike any equine tongue that had heard before. “Halt ye who enter hither! Take not one step further towards my throne. Why doth ye see it fit to cut short our solitude?” The voice was delivered in a shout and they all began to tremble at its power. When they said nothing, suddenly a flash of lightning illuminated the room accompanied by a clap of thunder and another shout of “Speak!”
What they had seen for a split second was enough to traumatize even they, who had braved for years the horrors that Discord had imposed on them. Before them was a huge alicorn. One the same size as the sun princess. Yet this one was covered in fur which was black like the night. She had blue eyes which had slits rather than pupils. And they only needed that split second to notice her massive, dark, outstretched wings and long, sharp horn. The abrupt sighting caused Onyx to become weak in the loins. Clandestine, being quite alarmed himself, spoke in a single breath. “We came to ask for your help!”
At this, they saw a glow appear in the place where the creature had been. Then suddenly torches around the room were lit, and the throne room was suddenly bright enough to see. The ceiling and roof were made up of two disks of stone separated by columns. The ceiling had a hole in it and the black heavens could be seen. Between the columns were sheets of translucent fabric through which one could see the night sky. Each of them gasped as they saw the mistress of Minas Ithil again.
Princess Luna sat enthroned in the back of the circular room. She was dressed in stately attire and wore a black tiara with a sapphire at its center, and a matching neck ring. The ambassadors shrank low as her piercing eyes bore into them; The eyes could discern everything about them. Nothing of them was hidden from their gaze. She folded her imposing wings and revealed a tail which flowed like Celestia’s. Though something caught their eyes when they gazed upon her tale and also noticed her mane. Looking at the mane and tale of the princess of the moon at that time was like staring into an abyss of darkness, the emptiness of space. It did not so much appear as though she had hair, but instead a void extending from her neck and backside. Yet they did not have so long to inquire into the nature of the wonder; for she spoke again forcefully. “Ye art our faithful subjects. Ask whatever ye desire of us and it shall be thine.”
Perhaps if they had been less afraid, Clandestine would have asked for more. But this was not the case and trembling, he simply said, “My princess, we come humbly before you on behalf of the small towns of Fillydelphia, Manehatten, Detrot, Baltimare, and Prancesylvania, with a grievance: We regret to say that the night is far too dark for us to see on our way home without the ever burning fires as in the days of the tyrant. Because of this, we often stumble and injure ourselves; having no light. We came to Princess Celestia and asked her if she could help us, and she sent us to you.”
At this, the fearful monarch seemed to be annoyed. “Cursed be my sister for harboring secret design from Us. We foresee not what intentions she holdeth, though we know that she hath sent ye hither in vain. Leave our chamber at once!”
The old stallion looked up at his princess in horror. “But your highness, we must-”
“AWAY WITH YOU!” She shouted with more force than she had been using. This command accompanied yet another flash of lightning and a thunderclap. All of them fled; rushing out of the throne room and all the way down the many winding stairs of Minas Ithil. When they reached the main chamber leading to the ten towers they were almost completely exhausted.
They began to ask each other in between gasps, “What must we do now?” But no one could give an answer. They were all at a loss for what to do. They surely could not return to the princess of the moon. Nor could the princess of the sun help them at all. She had already done what she could. After they had caught their breath, they continued to think for another hour. Finally, they gave up, being able to conceive no solution, and agreed to return home. So soberly they stepped through the eleventh door of the room which would lead to the outside. Glumly, they trudged through the hallways which led to the palace doors. And reaching the exit, despondently they stepped through the gates of the palace and began to descend down the stairs of the mountain leading to the city.
Yet as they looked forward from the height they were at, their sadness turned into surprise. In the sky, in the same place where she sun should have been if it were the same hour as in the day, there was a thin crescent. Nor was the crescent dim, but it was pure white and shined brightly; giving a little, silvery-blue light which lit their path. At this time, they knew Princess Luna had been faithful to her word (that they would be given anything they asked for). Seeing this, they were overjoyed, and although they did not understand why the princess had sent them away in that fashion, they saw that she had solved their problem in part. The crescent was not nearly as bright as the sun, but it was sufficient. So they ran down the steps of the mountain and around through the seven levels of the city of Canterlot. Then they bid each other a quick farewell and rushed to their respective towns to tell their ponies of this light. It was morning by the time they all arrived, but many had seen it across the world as they had the sun.
Now before they had reached their destinations, Princess Celestia walked out onto the balcony of Minas Anor. From atop this balcony located just outside of her bedchamber, one could view the entire kingdom of Equestria. It was there that she looked out at the dividing line where heaven meets earth. And her horn glowed with the olympian power of a goddess as she bent down in preparation to complete her daily task. Summoning this energy and molding it into a force with which she controlled space and time, she leapt up from her kneeling position. Her wings spread out to their extent; letting herself hover in the air for a moment as she gazed at her handiwork: Along with her body, the sun had broken through the barrier and risen up a few degrees into the sky. The momentum with which it was travelling would carry it unimpeded all day until it completed its circuit.
No sooner had she touched the ground; finishing the ritual, and accomplishing the most sacred of her duties to her subjects, did she see a flash of lightning and energy before her in the form of a sphere. The flash lasted for less than a second and disappeared; leaving Princess Luna in the place of the light. And seeing her sister, Celestia happily greeted Luna. “Good morning Luna. It’s good to see you're still up. I thought that you would have gone to bed after seeing the moon set.”
The black princess strode to directly face her sister. And being in no mood for pleasantries, said, “What design do you withhold from me sister?”
Frowning, the sun bringer asked, “What do you mean Luna? Have I done something to make you believe that I would plot against you?”
“You sent those ambassadors to me last night, knowing full well that what they desired was already there for them. ‘Why?’ I ask you. Why would you have them trek all the way up Minas Ithil to ask me to create the moon when its phases would begin on that night without fail?”
Celestia relaxed. “Ah, is that what this is about? I just thought that you needed to get to know your subjects. And them not knowing that you control the moon tells me that you haven’t spoken a word to them since you began your reign. I wouldn’t be surprised either if they haven’t declared their allegiance to you in person. Did you treat them well?”
Luna scoffed. “So you did not trust me to perform my duties on my own? As for them, I sent them out of my sight as soon as I realized that you were planning something.”
This caused the monarch of the day to place her hoof on her face and sigh. “Luna, you have to realize that you need to build up a good public image with your subjects. And missing out on opportunities like this is not the way to do it. You love them don’t you?”
Night’s mistress raised her voice. “Would I have fought unceasingly for nine years against their oppressor if I did not?”
Using a soothing voice so as to not enrage her sister, she answered. “No, no you wouldn’t. And I know that you love them just as much as I do and would gladly put yourself at risk once more for their sake. But you have to show it too. Actions speak louder than words, but if no one is sure what those actions represent, then they could be fruitless or even detrimental.”
Luna responded, “True sister, but our subjects must fear us as well as know that we love them. Should we make ourselves appear weak and easy to manipulate, our posts even as servants will be nothing.”
Celestia saw where this was going. This was quickly going to turn into an argument in which neither side would come out a victor. Realizing that any further attempts to convince Luna otherwise would waste her time, she turned to her bedroom. “Do what you will, Luna, but I warn you, if you keep that attitude up, you’ll only end up being a lonely tyrant.” So saying this, the two broke off. Luna retired to Minas Ithil, and Celestia went and sat on the throne of Minas Anor to attend matters of state.