As she had done for hours, the princess sat alone atop her crumbling balcony, watching as small pieces of stone fell off and into the forest below. Celestia was mildly surprised that rubble was still falling, since the damage had been done half a day ago. One by one the stones fell, dropping silently into the sea of vegetation at the base of the walls. Behind her stood a broken glass door leading to what used to be her bedchambers. Across the nation, soft moonlight fell upon the ground out of a cloudless sky.
Who better to lay upon that moon than the soul of the Dark One? Celestia cringed a little and mouthed a few silent curses to the bards who had the audacity to refer to her sister that way. Who were they, to insult her so? Who were they to defile her memory in such a way? Sadly, the remaining princess realized, it mattered not who they were, nor who they thought they were. It was not her place to deal with them, and she was quite certain that ordering the imprisonment or execution of anypony who might have done it would make her no better than Lu… than Nightmare Moon.
That got Celestia thinking. A mere half a day ago, the evil thing which had possessed her sister had had a perfect opportunity to kill her. She had decided not to fight back, despite the ease with which she could have simply ended the already short-lived conflict. It would have been so easy for that thing to have killed its only real opposition, but it didn’t. Under any other circumstances, that could have meant that Luna was still in there somewhere, unwilling to murder her sister.
Yet, as the solar goddess let the cold stone chill her, she was forced to face the truth; harmony had passed its judgement, and whatever was left of Luna was found sorely lacking. Such were the ways of the new worlds they both found themselves in. Celestia sniffled, the only sound to pierce the silent summer night. A tear welled up in her eye, and try as she might to stop it, she knew that as it fell to the ground there would be no stopping the waves washing over her eyes.
For the first time in the hours since the moonrise, the princess rose from her position. It was all too much to take, especially under the veil of what should not have been her night. Turning around, her hooves took her through the motions of what she always did when stressed, guiding her by memory. They took her on a walk.
Without even thinking, she pushed aside the shattered door with her magic, walked through the still pristine bedchambers, and out the other door into the grand hallway. She didn't know where she was going. She only knew that she needed to be somewhere else. Anywhere else.
While she walked, Celestia took a moment now and then to survey what was still remaining in the castle. For the most part, the passage in which she now found herself was intact, the only visible damage being some paint peeling off the walls from too much exposure to the background residue of combat magics. Adorning the halls were massive paintings, fillyhood portraits, and other various portraits of a happy family life from so long ago. A romantic interpretation of Luna and her defeating Discord with the Elements of Harmony. The royal sisters sitting in court. The rituals of nightfall and daybreak. Unconsciously, she picked up the pace.
After about a minute of walking, the hall gave way to a looping balcony overlooking a widespread room, covered in the most expensive of red carpets and headed by a set of stairs leading to not two, but only one throne. The great hall where court was held was impressive, to be sure. Memories came flooding back into the alicorn’s mind from this room, slowly at first, then quicker and quicker as the moments went by.
“Sister, why is there only one throne in the Great Hall?”
“Because you’ve never expressed an interest in court.”
“Sister, there’s a group of citizens from the town on the edge of the forest that says they need your immediate assistance.”
“Not now, Luna. This is important.”
“May I ask what you’re working on, sister?”
“Revisions to the old tax laws.”
“Can I help?”
“This is really complicated, Luna.”
Had she really been so insensitive? Celestia remembered those moments very clearly, but hadn’t stop to think about their implications until just then. In the millennia that the two sisters had lived in the castle, Luna only held court once. Looking back, that had to have been a contributing factor in the recent crisis.
The princess broke out into a gallop. She sped around the entire balcony and fled straight down another hallway, filled with even more paintings, more memories. She ran heedlessly, her eyes shut tight, until the end of the passage, where she slammed through a large wooden door and fell to her side in the chamber beyond, weeping.
Her awareness of the nightstand she’d fallen onto wasn’t so much out of feeling it there in her numbed state of physical awareness as it was the realization that she wasn't flat on the floor, but instead sliding downward. A small, blue book dropped on her head, but she ignored it. The only remaining ruler of Equestria let herself cry. She needed to cry.
Before the first nightfall of the new era, Celestia had been forced to conduct herself calmly and patiently. Throughout the past day she had had to explain to the citizens what had happened, making sense for them of the fight they had witnessed from a distance in the royal castle. She hadn’t told them much, but what little she parted to them broke her heart every time to say. “My little ponies,” she would begin each time she came to a new group. “The horror has ended. The Nightmare is no longer, and it shall pay for the crime it has done. This, I promise you.” It had all gone just fine until one of them had to suggest a celebration to commemorate the event. The summer solstice was the next day, after all, and it would be the perfect time to give thanks to the dawning sun that had brought them all hope. That was when Celestia broke down—the very first Summer Sun Celebration.
She looked down at the little blue book when her tears finally stopped a minute or two later.. The position she found herself in was a rather uncomfortable one, with her body tilted at an mildly painful angle against the dresser. She pushed herself away and brought a foreleg up to wipe her eyes. She recognized the little book, of course—she was the one who had presented it to Luna all those years ago. She knew for a fact that her sister didn’t write in it every night—a thousand years would take up far too many pages—but sometimes, when she couldn’t sleep, Celestia would go for a walk around the castle. Sometimes, when she passed Luna’s room, she could hear her sister talking as she wrote in it. She never stayed for long, only ever long enough to smile knowing it was being used.
She lifted the diary closer to her with her magic, and caught the scent of fresh ink, signifying that it had been written in recently. Gently, she opened the it up to the first page and read the words written there.
Dear diary,
A thousand years after Celestia and I defeated Discord, a stonemason came to our home in the Everfree to thank us for it. We were both confused at first—I could see it in ‘Tia’s eyes—but he insisted that we come with him so that he might show us how grateful he was. We followed him through the forest for sometime, remaining respectfully quiet until we saw it.
The stonemason had built us a castle! Well, rather, his ancestors had started building us a castle, and he and his family had recently finished it, but that was hardly the point.
When he took us inside, Equestria’s entire Council was there, with the aids and everypony. It was such a rare sight to see them all together, I thought that ‘Tia was going to faint. We went there, we ate a grand feast with the rulers, then they named us princesses.
I’m happy, of course, but I know that we were chosen because we didn’t ask for such a role. I suppose time will tell if we were the best choices.
Celestia remembered that day. Luna had been more excited about the castle than anything. She wasn’t quite fully grown, and truthfully still a filly at heart, so the castle’s numerous dungeons and trap doors proved to be extremely entertaining for her. She was actually quite endearing as she playfully went about them. The entry was dated at roughly a thousand years ago, about three days after she had gotten the journal. A smile found its way onto Celestia’s face, knowing that her gift had been put to good use. She sighed aloud and flipped through a couple more entries, her eyes landing on one that was about five hundred years old.
Dear diary,
I worry for ‘Tia. It’s been five hundred years, and it seems like she hardly does anything but work. I know that a half a millennium is nothing in the life of an immortal, but... She was working on some kind of tax law today during one of my few waking hours of the day. I suggested that we take the day to go survey the city that’s being built up on Canterlot Mountain, but she shrugged me off. I offered to help, and her only answer was “it’s too complicated”. She thinks I’m stupid, I know it.
I’m going to offer to hold court for her sometime soon. She desperately needs a day off far more than I need the extra sleep. It’s not like there’s anypony to talk to at night anyways.
The passage went on some more about political situations she’d been researching, but Celestia’s eyes focused on the next page right next to it.
Dear diary,
That went about as well as expected—I was not up to the task. A noble and a farmer came into court today, arguing over a small portion of farmland belonged to. The farmer had been growing there for years, but this noble claimed to be lord of the land, and something about taxes I didn’t understand.
As far as I could tell, that land was all the farmer had to his name, and somepony who had never even properly seen it in his life wanted to take that away from her. I couldn’t stand to listen to it anymore. I lost my temper and shouted at the noble for wanting what he knew was not his, and in doing so, inadvertently and irreparably damaged his respect of my sister. I… I failed.
And if you’re reading this, I’m so, so sorry.
The tears did not come again, as Celestia thought they might, Nevertheless, it broke her heart to read that that was what Luna had thought. In truth, her sister was quite right about the whole situation, and it took only her own word for that noble to see it. They’d remained good friends for quite some time afterwards, too. Still undeterred, she used her magic to leaf through even more pages. The entries were becoming more and more frequent, so it was hard to sift through to the one’s that needed to be read. One, however, caught her attention. It was dated just fifty years before, and began with her name.
Dear diary,
I heard Celestia singing to herself while I was walking today, during the daylight hours. She has a beautiful voice, something I’m shocked I didn’t notice until now. It was so mesmerizing, I almost didn’t hear what she was singing.
Once did a pony who shone like the sun
Look out on her kingdom and sigh.
She smiled and said, “Surely there is nopony,
So lovely or so well beloved as I.”
I remembered. I don’t know why, but I remembered. And I ran. I ran back to my chambers and cried myself to sleep. It was an awful feeling, one I never wish to repeat.
When I woke up again, I heard a whisper in the back of my mind. I knew what it meant, of course, although I couldn’t make out the words. Like in the days of old, even before I was Her herald, somepony out there was speaking to my night.
It didn’t take me long to find her—a small filly in Canterlot, sitting outside of her house, in the dead of night, naming the stars that I had not. She called the bright one Polaris, because it always pointed towards the northern pole. She traced a group of them and named it Ursa, because it looked like a bear to her. So on and so forth. She was really quite smart for her age.
For the first time in what seemed like forever, I smiled.
And I wasn’t there to see it, Celestia thought with a rising sense of guilt. Whatever had possessed her to sing such a song had long passed. There was no reason she should be beloved, and Luna had always been far more beautiful. And now, there was nothing. A tear fell and stained the page, causing her to quickly move the book out of the path of the coming tempest. Her torture, however was not over, and she felt herself compelled to read one more entry before… before something. She turned the diary to its last passage.
Dear diary,
I don’t mind. Really, I don’t. I’m happy to stay here, in the shadows. I bring peace to the ponies of my nation, and without the sun, they have time to rest, sleep, and dream. I watch them dream. It’s nice. Some dream of love, others of adventure. Those dreams I find especially fascinating. Every night it’s something new. I am content to stand sentinel over my night.
‘Tia is content to watch over the day. And the court. And the kingdom.
I don’t mind. Really, I don’t. This is not Celestia’s fault!
There was a long break in the page, picking up again at the bottom.
I’m so, so sorry, Celestia. I’m so sorry!
Unlike the previous passages, the writing of that one was sloppy and blotched, as though it had been written in a hurry. In the large gap between the two writings, there was a small irregular dark spot. It was pretty obvious what it was, as she’d made one herself not too long ago. There was a stain of tears across the page of Luna’s diary in the middle of the entry that was dated the night before. Had she tried to stop it? Celestia knew it was her fault, but Luna didn’t. Why didn’t Luna know?
Over the course of her reading, the remaining princess had found her way towards her sister’s old balcony, even going so far as to push the door open and step outside into the chill night air without even noticing what she was doing. Her mind was too busy trying to process what she’d read. Part of her knew, because when she finished the last passage, she sat straight down onto the cold stone and dropped the journal to the ground.
Celestia stared at the moon, as she had done so many nights before—something that Luna had never known. This time, the moon stared back. The Mare in the Moon was sure to be nothing more than a formation of new craters in the moon. Not that anypony ever really looked at it—that was what had caused the whole conflict, wasn’t it? To her, however, that mare meant so much more. That mare was hope. Luna was still out there. Hopefully.
The loss of what they loved has always had a way of making ponies realize how much they loved it. Celestia had never really felt that. She never knew her parents, and therefore never really lost them. Luna was all she had had, and now Luna was gone. The loss was her fault. Celestia was convinced that, few more kind words here, another lullaby there, and it all could have been prevented.
“Lullay, Moon Princess,” she spoke into the night, knowing for absolute certain that nopony but the moon was listening. “Goodnight, sister mine. I will see you again if it takes a thousand years, that I promise.
“I can wait.”