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The First Time You See Her
Part Six
Jeffrey C. Wells
www.scrivnarium.net
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Another garden. Another princess. The exact same sky.
Night is falling over Canterlot Castle's impressive sculpture garden, and, as always, she herself is the sole reason it is doing so. Princess of the Sun, Long-Term Sublessor of the Moon, Voice of the Mountain, Princess Regnant of Equestria, Defender of Canterlot, et cetera, et cetera. A list of titles as long as your foreleg, but, in the end, only one truly matters: her name, Celestia Sol Invicta. Splendid and white and all forlorn, like a giant mopey wedding cake on four hooves.
She has been ushering forth the evening for so long now that she barely reacts to the drain of manipulating an astronomical object so cold, so pale, so lifeless, so foreign to her. It was never a role she desired; it is definitely not what her cutie mark is telling her. The sun gives back to Celestia. Even after the most recalcitrant of dawns, she can stand on her balcony and let the golden light of a job well done wash over her, let herself be born anew in its flame in the manner of her beloved pet phoenix.
Not so with the moon. The moon takes from her and gives nothing in return. Its shifting patterns of black and white ceased to be intriguing hundreds of years ago, and now it is nothing more than a dull, painful burden. Her horn aches every evening on the moving of it, and every night, she feels a fragment of herself trickle away.
It will not be long now.
Yes. Whatever the millennium might bring, it is, at the very least, close. Celestia is not unlike a marathon runner feeling her treacherous legs begin to cramp within sight of the finish line. Just twelve years left, twelve years out of a thousand. She can hardly believe that she's had the strength to endure nine whole centuries as the last mare standing of a once-proud tribe. There was a particularly dark time in the seven hundreds when she pondered letting herself dissolve into the fabric of Eohippus, just as Sterling had, just as Lily had. It would have been so easy for her to follow the rest of her tribe into oblivion.
Most of the rest of her tribe, that is. Some had chosen, or had been dealt, different fates. Poor luckless Ladybird and her innocent love-child Chrysalis, who survived the fall of Corazón in the south only to meet their end at the hooves of the dark usurper of some distant northern empire. Queen Arborvitae, her own mother, who became one with her beloved Tree and now spoke no more. And Luna—
—well. Best not think of Luna. Best not think of any of them, in fact. Best just sit here in the present, enjoying the tranquil beauty of her sculpture garden and communing with the one remaining creature in Equestria who could possibly be considered her peer.
Me.
Oh, I'm sorry. Did you really think this was going to be one of those "third-pony omniscient" narratives?
Oopsie.
I envision you sitting there, fidgeting, with a perplexed expression on your face. "Wait, now," you are doubtless saying to yourself. "If Sir Narrator isn't actually omniscient, how can he presume to tell me what's going on in old Sun-Butt's head?"
The answer is simple, you adorable little scamp. Firstly, I do happen to be a little bit omniscient. Secondly, and even more important than that, she tells me everything. I am the only sapient being to whom she opens up, because I can never, ever spill her secrets. It's not that I wouldn't like to. It's that I simply cannot, because I am a lump of inert, petrified matter, frozen in the middle of a laugh I no longer feel. Celestia and I have certainly had our differences in the past, but she talks to me; and what she doesn't say, I extrapolate. I know this mare. I know her well enough that I can hold entire conversations with her without her even being involved. I know her like no other pony in this big, wide world does.
But... you're not here to read about me. So let's just go back to pretending I am a simple narrator and watch Celestia for a bit. The Solar Princess has cleared her schedule for the day, kindly requesting her staff to not bother her unless it is quote-unquote "important." She has been standing here in the garden ever since the dawn, waiting for the Morningstar to rise. When it finally does, twelve hours late, she lets out a breath she hadn't realized she'd been holding.
Cadance is on her way, and Celestia is—once again—all alone.
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The first time Celestia saw Principessa Mi Amore di Abbazia Cadenza wandering the alicorn plane of Eohippus, the metaphorical ink of her cutie mark not yet even dry, Celestia did not actually see the younger princess at all. To the Sun Princess's eyes, Cadance's downy pink coat was one hundred percent midnight blue. Whether Celestia admitted it or not, Cadance was undoubtedly and without question a miniature Woona, a cosmic do-over, one last chance to get it right. She took the young princess under her wing, far away from the fortress full of earth ponies (and the one very bitter unicorn witch) who could not possibly understand the unique challenges involved in raising a foal of the alicorn tribe.
A few years later, Celestia realized that she herself did not understand these challenges either.
Celestia, who called herself "aunt," tried to be both sister and mother to the young princess alternately. To make certain that Mi Amore did not fall to pride and darkness as Luna had, she inculcated her with humility and acceptance, little realizing that this was like trying to extinguish a river by mistaking it for a fire and throwing water at it. Where Cadance needed ambition, she was taught endurance; where she needed decisiveness, she was taught restraint. What could have been a powerful and bright-burning alicorn heart was reduced to a muddy, smoldering caldera of waffling politeness and self-doubt completely bereft of agency, and all the while Celestia stood helplessly by, unable to understand what had gone wrong.
It was almost a relief to Celestia when the acts of adolescent rebellion started showing up, culminating just last month in Cadance's reckless flight north to the Crystal Mountains, and that was when Celestia finally realized how seriously she had cocked it up. Cadance was not Luna. Nor was she the promised Champion of Friendship who was to hold back Luna's darkness come the millennium. Cadance was Cadance, no more and no less, and just like every alicorn who had ever lived, she needed a thing to call her own...
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...and she is wrenched back to the present by one of those "important" interruptions. Just as well. Let's watch as Celestia's meditations are thrown out of whack. It'll be fun; or at least, a tepid fun-like substitute, which is all I survive on nowadays.
Unfortunately for all of us, this interruption seems pretty justified. No hope of seeing those white feathers ruffle, no hope of seeing the Sun Princess struggle to plaster over her real, earthy, delicious irritation with a fabricated mask of distant joy. No, this really does seem to be a critical issue. It takes the form of a little green-maned pegasus courier, running Tartarus-for-leather as though on instruction to stop for no one and nopony. She carries a bag around her neck, which eventually is seen to contain a single scroll case marked with the seal of Canterlot's Household Regiments. Celestia bids the courier wait as she breaks the seal and reads the letter, fortunately suspending it in her aura at such an angle that I can join in. It's from a Master Sergeant Thunderous, and the subject of the letter is... of some interest to me.
Apparently, according to Princess Cadance's military retainer, the Princess is being tailed by a griffon matching the description of one Auric Turncoat, former pastry chef to the Griffoni Royal court and all-around rogue of the highest order. His "rap sheet" alarmingly features the word "regicide" in several places, and not all instances of the word are mitigated by an accompanying "attempted." Furthermore, the creature seems to have actually waited out several consecutive life sentences in Equestria after a direct physical assault on Celestia herself with a blunt object (a two-ton boulder, which—you have to admit—technically fits the description), emerging from the dungeons many years later none the worse for wear.
It's a mystery to all, except to Celestia and me. We are probably the only ones who remember the boulder incident. I, for one, found it hilarious. Wonderful job, Auric. At the time, it almost made me want to forgive you.
At any rate. In his letter, Thunderous (reasonably) concludes that Auric represents an obvious and immediate danger to Princess Cadance, and requests that a contubernium of Her Highness's finest be dispatched to either take care of the threat or at least bring the headstrong Princess of Love back under Canterlot's protection.
Celestia predictably reads the whole letter twice over, just to make certain she is not missing anything. She then denies Thunderous's request with an infuriatingly brief reply: "Auric Turncoat is of the least possible concern to us." It's beautiful. I wish I could see the sergeant's face when he reads it.
She then pens a somewhat more in-depth response to Lieutenant Armor for immediate delivery to the Equestrian embassy in Cloudsdale, which is less fun of her. For both letters, she uses my plinth as a makeshift writing-desk. This sort of thing gets a little humiliating. It makes me want to break free from this stone, snap my claws and give the Solar Princess the body of a big white honking goose for a day. It would do her so much good to have that damnable false dignity stripped away, at least for a little while. But alas, it is not to be, and I must content myself with imaginings.
Celestia seals the letters, then places them in the keeping of the courier and dispatches her. The pegasus is swiftly lost to the evening sky, and Celestia returns to gazing at the Morningstar.
Then she addresses me.
"One of yours, one of mine," she murmurs. "Cadance will be all right, won't she? Vassals of the both of us, watching over her?"
While Lieutenant Armor is most certainly "one of yours," I think, I'm somewhat less certain that Auric Turncoat is "one of mine."
Celestia smirks at me slightly, cocking her head. "'While Lieutenant Armor is most certainly "one of yours,"'" she says, mimicking my voice (and in doing so impressively mandating the use of double-imbedded quotation marks), "'I'm somewhat less certain that Auric Turncoat is "one of mine."'"
Let's be clear about this: there's no magic here. Celestia cannot hear me speak. Nopony can. She simply knows me well enough that she can hold entire conversations with me without my even being involved. She knows me like no other pony in this big, wide world does. I don't particularly like it when she accurately puts words in my mouth, because I used to pride myself on my unpredictability. Apparently, spending a heaping thousand years as a stone statue will chip away at your capacity for randomness. Who'd have thunk?
So here we are the both of us, alone together, dying a little each day, waiting on an end to our torments. Celestia has twelve years left. I don't know how many I have; it will largely depend on the outcome of Celestia's struggle, I think. For the moment, at least, we are kindred spirits. The difference is that, unlike me, Celestia doesn't have to be alone and bored.
In a moment, she will look up again at the Morningstar and understand this, and then she will decide to try something new. She will realize that she is a poor sister and an ever poorer mother, and that the only thing she does well at all is teach...
"The only thing I do well at all," she says, "is teach."
Bingo. There is no joy in the prediction, only a sense of dull conclusion.
"I don't need another of my tribe. I don't need a sister, or a daughter. I need a protégée." She feels elevated by this realization and then subsequently transfixed by the sight of Cadance's Morningstar glittering (inappropriately) in the night sky before her. The pieces begin to click into place. Surely this glimmering evening light, this twilight-sparkle, as it were, is the sign she's been waiting for, the metaphysical beacon that will guide her where all other divinations have failed.
She calls up the headmaster of her School for Gifted Unicorns and has him produce for her the Freshmare honor roll. The old stallion does so without hesitation, heedless of the hour. He knows that his liege is a capricious old nag, and that it is sometimes best to leave the questions to his students. When the books are opened for Celestia's perusal, her heart sings a bit as she sees the name right at the top of the Princess's List. Yes. Exactly right.
"Sunset Shimmer." Perfect. A perfect fit.
Celestia closes the book and dismisses the headmaster, her course at last clear. The Sun Princess has spent forty years trying to transform Cadance into something she is not, and has failed at every turn. There have been many joys in these years, of course, and tears as well. But always, beneath it all, that undercurrent of frustration.
The frustration is gone now. The coiled spring in her belly, tensed now for decades, at last relaxes. Cadance is finally free to be her own mare. After hundreds upon hundreds of years of diminishment, the alicorn tribe has finally grown by one.
It is a good feeling.
Celestia stands there, bathed in the light of the Morningstar, and in that moment, she sees Princess Cadance for the first time.