What a long day... thank the Gods there was that trooper! A most convenient excuse for us to disappear.
With such thoughts on her mind, Luna crashed in her bed with the elegance of a falling tree. The impact sent all the four corners of the bed-sheet flying, catapulting every other object into the air - pillows, fancy moon-laced horseshoes flew in every direction. Even her crown was sent flying; then all the objects clattered loudly once they touched down on the floor.
Luna didn't care about those belongings; she so absolutely didn't care. A lengthy sleep was the mighty Princess of the Night's sole desire.
This is ridiculous! When did we grow so reliant on carnal pleasures? she seethed as she rolled around, grabbing her pillow with her magic, dragging it back to the bed. Wasting eight hours for this every day... ugh, the mind boggles.
Squeezing her head with the pillow, Luna closed her burning eyes and breathed in deeply.
Objectively thinking, she had been quite successful. The issue with Discord had been kept under the lid for now. One of the Palace Guard would surely spill the beans before too long, but that still left her with a week or two before all hell broke loose. Celestia's problems had been settled as well - though the solution greatly reminded Luna of how panicking parents handled the loss of their foal's pet, returning from the pet shop mere moments before said foal arrived back home.
Look! That duckling isn't dead. It was just... uh, sleeping, yes! Also, he kinda' answers to a different name now. Didn't you know? Ducks are funny like that.
Pulling the pillow tighter, Luna grumbled at her over-active imagination. All she had done was find a practical solution, nothing more. Celestia needed a student and Trixie longed for that very position... a match truly made in heaven.
"GAH!" Luna yelled, slamming the pillow against the wall. "So why do we feel so upset about that farce?!"
"Because you were forced to make use of us."
The skin on her forehead wrinkling, Luna turned her eyes at the direction of the voice. A grey mare was standing there, staring at her with a nonchalant expression.
"Objectively thinking, you have won on both tactical and strategic levels. Your sister will be content for a good forty years or so... while your own plan advances in the background." Paradox said in her usual flat tone. "But all these victories came at the cost of relying on our help once again. And, as far as your objectives go, that is a loss. You broke the rules... or rather, you were forced to. Again."
Paradox paused for a moment whilst she adjusted her glasses.
"Frankly speaking, I would be surprised if you were not upset."
Her head bouncing a little as she dropped it back on the bed, Luna stared at the ceiling without actually looking at anything.
"Right... your power. Anything we should be aware of...?" she asked somewhat absent-mindedly, her mind already back to preparing for sleep.
"Trixie Lulamoon had been attending to the Canterlot Academy for a few years." Paradox settled next to Luna's bed, recounting the gist of the false memories that she had created. "She had been what you would call a freak genius. She was recruited for her talent, but didn't fit in and dropped out shortly after passing the early exams."
Yawning and rubbing her sore eyes, Luna nodded curtly. That sounded easy enough. Getting some official papers from the Academy posed no problems.
"Anything else?" she asked, her voice so raspy that she was almost rattling.
"Nothing that requires immediate action on your end. I made Trixie remember a few lessons in court etiquette - but please don't expect a complete change of character. I did try to keep the alternations subtle." Paradox disappeared from Luna's view, sliding so low where the edge of the bed obscured her. "Ah- yes, one more thing. Trixie will remember having met you during her years in the Academy. She promised to pass Origin to you, even if that is the last thing she does in her life."
Hiding her face beneath her legs, Luna pulled her mouth to a pained grin. That factual and calculated manipulation didn't sit right with her.
But, on the other hoof, it did gain her another servant - and without shedding blood or causing any pain either. She simply had to be patient and let time do its part. Ponies didn't live that long; few made it past one hundred. Especially if they were Celestia's students. Mortals getting roped in the same hazardous jobs as the princesses themselves faced - that was never going to work out well.
It was strange, finally benefiting from all those senseless losses. It made her feel uneasy - complicit, even.
We wonder who will calm our dreams, she exhaled and slipped into sleep.
Luna couldn't help but wonder how many times she had seen that very same place - and yet, it looked different every time she had entered a mind.
A field made of sugar, surrounded by trees made of candy. An endless night at the roulette table, with the ball always falling into the right spot. A date where everything goes without a hitch.
A reality where hopes became law, forcing the cold probabilities into submission.
Dreamland.
It was a little ironic that to the Princess of the Night, that field of limitless possibilities was nothing more than useful tool. She had no need, nor any desire to conjure far-fetched scenarios. She had lived long enough to see more outlandish things than anypony was capable of imagining; so why would she waste her precious thoughts on subpar forgeries?
Where most ponies wasted their minds to chase fleeting desires, she used it for much more beneficial purposes.
Floating in the middle of endless darkness, she closed her eyes and breathed in deeply. Dreams were easy to mold; all it took was focus. She visualised a desire and popped her eyes open-
She was standing in a library. It wasn't vast, nor fancy; an eight-by-eight metre room, only adorned by an old table and three shelves full of books. There was no door, nor any window; the light was solely provided by the torches hanging from the walls, all the shadows dancing to their yellowish flickering.
The room may have looked like a prison at first glance, but it was quite the opposite in fact. It was a perfectly distilled version of a contemplative princess' desires, stripped of everything superfluous.
Her hooves clanging loudly on the cobblestone floor, Luna walked to the nearest shelf and dragged a tome off. She didn't need to put any effort into picking one out; she always wound up with the right one anyway; dreams worked like that.
She placed the dull-red tone onto the table and cracked it open. She then took a quill with her magic, dipped it in the thick, black ink... and began scribbling.
There were so many things to note down, and the day only lasted so long.
"Origin; a servant currently in Trixie Lulamoon's service." Luna mumbled absentmindedly. The ink-stained quill was balancing rather precariously on her nose, only staying put because she dreamt it so. "So he was the servant able to create objects... our predictions were correct after all."
Reaching out with her magic, she yanked another book to the table. She tore it open without a shred of care; the pages had barely settled down when her eyes were already running back and forth the lines of immaculately written text. It took her a few seconds, but she did manage to locate the part she sought.
"With this, we know everything of every servant now. Haa, if only we were this knowledgeable the first time we met this green gryphon..."
That fact couldn't be helped, of course. The fated encounter which took place during her visit to Saddle Arabia... the one where she bumped into Prince Darius and his trusted gryphon servant. Were she just a little bit more certain on the game's finer points back then, she could have lured Origin to Equestria a lot sooner. But that scene had happened almost nine hundred years ago. She wasn't quite so ready to break the game as she was now. It took over six hundred years of research and planning to-
Slamming the book closed, Luna wrinkled her eyebrows at the realisation.
We actually met that gryphon nine hundred years ago!
That... could become a problem. She had to ask Trixie to make Origin keep silent about that encounter.
Were the gryphon to blabber too much, we would need to answer many uncomfortable questions.
It didn't seem like a difficult request, to be honest. She had much more valuable cards in her hooves; all she needed to do was offer a pact of mutual silence to Trixie.
Exhaling loudly with a wry smile to herself, Luna couldn't see Celestia's newest student declining the offer. After all, just how would Celestia react were she to realise that the fateful scroll was a fake? That the scroll sending her true student to a suicidal mission was but a perfect forgery, created on the order of the pony who longed to take that spot for herself?
Luna was certain that her sister's student wouldn't dare to try and find that one out. Trixie would do anything to keep her spot at Celestia's side, after all. Even disregarding the lengths that unicorn had gone to achieve the title, the brainwashing she had received had also made sure of that.
Using her magic to scribble a few lines into the open book, Luna felt quite satisfied with her progress. Such was the power of knowledge! Celestia may have been the mentor of this student, but in the end, it was Luna calling all the shots. All with just a little forethought.
Her chance to savour her newest success was cut short. A loud gong rang out; nightfall was approaching and the dream had to end. Luna didn't feel sad about having to wake up, though; as much as the dreams helped her to organize her thoughts, she really preferred taking actions in actual reality.
Her dream-library falling apart around her, Luna gave an earnest grin to the realisation - that in a few more decades, the 'game' plaguing Equestria was nothing more than a toothless beast. Even as she was yanked back to the physical reality, she couldn't help but savour that taste.
The taste of a millennia-old plan finally coming together.
"These baguettes are great! You should try some!" Trixie mumbled, spitting crumbs all over the table. The platter in front of her promptly took it to the air, shedding crumbles all over the floor.
Luna watched the scene in utter disapproval. It wasn't proper to rummage with the food on the table, especially when other ponies were also present. Not that she was intending to eat any of those chocolate-filled baguettes either way; she had only come to grab a light meal before her half-day of rule began.
No, she was angered by the simple lack of civility. It was a matter of principle.
...and besides, Celestia didn't like those chocolate baguettes anyway. Both immortal sisters had grown tired of such mundane foods many lifetimes ago-
"Why, thank you!" Celestia took three slices, giving Trixie a warm smile in the process. "Now that you mention, they do look lovely."
Wha- Luna blinked, utterly flabbergasted. Who are you and what have you done to our Sister?
She kept staring, even after the white alicorn had already began chewing on the baguettes. It was such a surreal sight! Celestia faced the same hardships she had - being so utterly fed up with the usual flavours that she had rather skipped meals than to endure them.
To see her sister actually enjoy ordinary bread, chocolate-filled or not...
Picking up the spoon she had dropped when her magic had lost focus, Luna stirred her tea absentmindedly.
"Mm-hmm! It's the best. Crunchy and full of chocolate!" Trixie chomped on a baguette, chewing with loud crunching noises.
Grinding her teeth, Luna couldn't keep herself any longer.
"Manners!" she thundered and slammed her hoof on the white table-cloth, almost turning her teacup over. "Have you not been taught manners?! For if that is the case, we will gladly take it upon ourselves to educate you!"
Trixie flinched back, so quickly that she almost fell backwards, a half baguette still sticking out of her mouth.
"Say that one more time!" hissed a voice from the right. Glancing there, Luna saw a green gryphon leaving the cover of a large ceremonial armour.
We were wondering where you went, she smirked at the figure. She had only noticed Lust when she had entered the room earlier; she hadn't taken Trixie to have the caution to make her servant stay hidden. Which means that the gryphon hid on his own volition.
...you do not like watching us eat together, do you.
"I hear you're the kind to carefully pick her words." Origin paced closer slowly, snarling all the way. "Don't hold back now! If you want a fight, I'm ready to give you one... you accursed demon of the north!"
By when she came to, Luna found her ears hugging her neck so tightly as if they were glued there. She was also staring wide-eyed... and stuttering as she repeatedly tried to squeeze out a faltering 'what'.
There was no reason to be insulted. The demon of the north - it was actually a flattering title, considering the origin. The Saddle-Arabians used to call her such, figuring that a pony who wouldn't age nor die could only be a supernatural force.
Hearing that old praise again had left Luna shocked, though. She wasn't expecting the gryphon to blurt out something that obvious so soon.
How could we explain that one? she gaped with her mouth hanging open. Saddle-Arabia barely existed a thousand years ago! The leaders of a fledgling country wouldn't have bothered giving the rulers of a nearby empire such double-edged titles. Squeezing her head with her hooves, Luna raced to come up with an explanation that would pass muster.
That darn gryphon just HAD to speak up with 'Tia nearby...!
"ORIHIHN!" Trixie screamed with her mouth full of food. She quickly realised the error, though. She first wanted to put the half-chewed baguette back onto her plate, but changed her mind after some hesitation... and then she began chewing very quickly instead.
There was no reason to hurry; Origin stopped moving as soon as the harsh words sounded, giving his own master a stern glare instead.
A couple of loud breaths, and Luna felt her nervousness ebbing. That was close - that was too close. She had to-
Something poked her in the back of her head, banging her forehead against the table. Hot liquid splashed into her face; her nose landed square in her own teacup.
"That was not very nice of you!" she heard Celestia growl. "Trixie is my student, and my students can eat in any way they like! If you can not deal with that... well, there are many dining halls in this palace! I am quite sure that we can dine separately for a while."
The hot tea burning the tip of her nose, Luna gave her empty teacup a weary glance. She had just woken up, and this day was already getting a little too much for her. She had been the victim of two unreasonable situations, all the span of twenty seconds; and both times because someone had acted in a way she hadn't considered.
Talking of which...
Squinting to her left, she paid the sour-faced white alicorn a puzzled glance.
You seem to be a bit... overprotective of this student, Sister.
For a pony who had sent her previous students on tasks such as 'stop the rampaging monster while I watch from afar', bashing skulls because of stern remarks felt out of character. Not that Luna wanted to complain; in her rush to defend Trixie, Celestia seemed to have forgotten about Origin's remark, all the twelve Gods be thanked.
"Right, right... we are sorry." Luna mumbled. She had to hold a brief pause; the teacup fell off her nose and rolled away as she spoke. "Would you mind letting us go now?"
The magical force holding her down disappeared right away, but Luna didn't get up. She hissed and rubbed the back of her neck. It was nothing but a light bruise, but hurt regardless - mostly on the virtue of being so unexpected.
"Ha! That's what you get for scolding the greatest magician in Equestr-" Trixie cackled, only to be swatted over the head. "-ow!"
"My students also need to know proper manners," Celestia huffed, then waved the rolled-up newspaper at Luna. "But it is up to me how to teach them, is that understood?"
Pushing herself up from the table, Luna stretched her neck and decided that she hadn't seen her sister act so strangely for a long, long while. However, a solution to that mystery was unlikely at the dinner table.
"Sure thing," she shrugged and righted her teacup instead of wasting more thoughts on the matter.
"It's what you could call... an unintended side-effect," Lust swiped his leg at the sky. He turned his paw around and glanced at it curiously, as if he had truly expected to a snatch a star or two.
"Side-effect of what?" Luna squinted, then closed her eyes when the wind swept her mane in her face. She was standing on the balcony of the highest tower. The view was nothing short of breathtaking, but as no other towers rose that high, there was nothing to block the wind either.
The answer took a while. The white lion reached out at the starry sky again, his blue eyes lost in the million sparkling lights above.
Oh for the Gods' sake...
"Was this your power's side-effect?" Luna broke the brief silence. "Lust, we understand your reluctance to answer. We asked you not to harm Sister... and yet you have done so anyway."
"Sure you did! Never stopped you from asking favours of me again and again either, though." The white lion snickered and clenched the claws on his paw. "Stop acting the fool, Luna. Both of us know there's a price for invoking emotions in ponies' heads... taking the shortcut to spending years' of effort."
Setting her head onto the buttress, Luna gave a grimace. How could she not? That phrase reminded her of what the game master had said. It wasn't much - only one singular sentence, but delivered in such a gleeful tone that it had always remained in her head.
Every cheat has its price.
She sighed wearily, then forced herself to ask the question.
"So did Sister take a liking to Trixie... because we have made Trixie like her?"
"Every force creates counter-force... that much remains true, even if we bend the rules a little." Lust gazed at his empty paw, then dropped his leg next to him. "My honey didn't even know of what I had done, so she wouldn't even know of what had happened to her. That would make her more... susceptible than usual. The downside of acting independently, I suppose."
Her chin resting on the cold stone, Luna gave that word a wry smile. Susceptible; such a careful term for a lion who normally didn't care much for subtlety. She had no way of knowing, but she had a feeling that vulnerable was what Lust had been meaning to say. That word would have painted their actions in quite dark colours, though. They weren't meaning to harm anypony.
And yet...
Luna could feel the muscles in her face twist.
This god-forsaken game...!
"Be more careful next time," she hissed through her clenched teeth. "Make her crave bananas or something!"
"The heart goes where the heart wills... if I had perfect control over my backlash, I wouldn't be calling it a side-effect, right?" Lust growled and swiped the few loose strands of white mane off his face. The wind didn't mess his mane at all; the perk of a ghostly body. "Still, while this has never happened before... I suppose it was bound to happen sometime. I did tell you we have been pushing our luck, didn't I?"
A wave of freak wind rushed around the tower, battering at the window-shades, tearing at Luna's wings and mane. Loud whistling filled her ears, the noise of air rushing by; then, as suddenly as it went berserk, the air calmed down, and the night resumed to be peaceful.
"Besides, this one didn't even come from the blue. I can see the reasons for it." Lust rolled his head lazily, taking a pause until Luna looked back at him. "See, I think my honey wanted things to turn out this way."
Luna didn't even attempt to conceal her surprise at the claim.
"We doubt that. Sister has already suffered so much grief over mortals already," she shook her head, keeping one eye closed lest her mane tickled it. Immortal or not, those things still hurt. "Why would she want to grow so attached to another one now?"
The face of the white lion took a much more sombre shade.
"Atonement," he rattled. "This is her way of making up for sending that poor student to free Discord. Can't tell whether she wants to appease that pony or her own conscience, though."
"Atonement...!" whispered Luna, her gaze shooting past the white lion, lost into the far distance. "But..."
"But?"
Luna blinked and recomposed herself, turning her teal eyes to the white lion proper.
"That pony is nothing but a counterfeit! A swindler! She probably manufactured that scroll with Origin!" she hissed, her eyes burning with righteous anger. She was fine with a loafer tagging her sister along, but only so long as no harm came out of the deal. Having Celestia develop strong feelings on the matter was not within her calculations. "Actually, since she had that scroll done... it means she had prepared. She..."
Luna trailed off, thousands of invisible icy appendages binding her mouth shut; a very uncomfortable realisation was dawning on her.
That pony arranged to get the previous student out of her way!
And she, the Princess of the Night, had rewarded that scum with giving her exactly what she had desired. No, even more; with Celestia being as she was, it was nigh impossible to remove that counterfeiter.
Counterfeiter... no. Those do not hurt anypony. This one is an assassin.
Luna could feel her control over her emotions slipping. The veins bulged in her neck and on her face; she could hear her heart beat in her ears. To think she would so casually commit such a grave mistake! The first time she had met such a driven bastard in ages, and the first thing she did was elevating that psychopath straight to her inner circle!
Her mane dancing in the strengthening wind, Luna felt her rage disappear, the fires completely doused as she took a better look at the situation.
Willing to obliterate another for a mere title... we have not seen such a driven mortal for a long while indeed.
"Should have told my honey about this story earlier. It's a little late now... she wouldn't believe us. She's too riled up about having her 'student' back." Lust scratched his face with his sharp claws. "Though you do have the power to correct that, don't you?"
"Memories are not something to carelessly toy with," Luna wondered aloud - and quite absent-mindedly. She was thinking a few steps ahead of the subject. "Were we to make Sister remember a chat on this subject, we would leave her quite confused. Indeed - had she known of this, how could have she taken a liking to Trixie in the first place?"
"Is that even a problem? Just make her remember having had arguments as well." Lust raised his eyebrow. "Make the two hate each other, too. See, it's that easy."
"That frightening easiness is precisely why we abhor making use of you lot!" Luna shuddered. She flared her wings, flapped them a few times - rearranging the feathers in the process - and folded them back to her side. "No... what is done is done. We accept our mistakes, not seek to undo them. Were we always resetting the world at the slightest misstep, not even a single day would ever pass."
Lust gave a sour grimace, then nodded heartily.
"Your call... highness."
The sudden switch to formal didn't escape Luna's notice but she didn't really care what the servant thought of her.
"Indeed it is." She stared the lion in the eyes. "So tell us, Lust... how deeply is Trixie loyal to our sister?"
The query seemed to catch Lust off-guard. He blinked silently, his whole face twisting in surprise... then he began to giggle. Then to openly laugh, finally hollering so loudly that it hurt Luna's ears.
"BWAHAH! Is that even a question?!" he grinned, all his sharp teeth showing. "You should know better than to doubt me. She's as loyal as any can get. To a fault, you could say!"
A dark frown ran across Luna's face. While the answer was technically the best she could hope for, she didn't really like the cheerful glee with which Lust explained his brainwashing.
"Then there is no problem," she said and turned away from the lion, gazing at the many lights of Canterlot.
So Trixie was willing to get rid of ponies and scam the Princesses to get this title... and she is practically a zealot now, only caring for Sister's whims...
While frightening at first, that combination seemed more and more convenient the more Luna had thought about it.
"Huh? No problem?! Weren't you saying that she's a heartless bastard, less than a minute ago?" Lust complained from the background. "Why would you want somepony like that around? Somepony as dangerous as a... poisonous snake, let's say!?"
Staring at the distant lights as the gathering wind played with her mane, Luna rejected that concern with a dark grin.
"Because she is our snake now."
"No, it's only because you're the best mentor ever."
"No, it is only because you are so talented."
"Nuh-huh! Trixie bets you could make any pony this good."
"Only if they are as talented as you are!"
Lying on a couch not far away, Luna was cringing in silence, pondering on the ways she could prevent herself from hearing all that nonsense. Perhaps if she had grabbed a sword from the display and used it to stab herself in the head...
That wasn't one of her better ideas, of course.
Those blades were ceremonial, and would sooner bend than cause serious injury. And even if they worked, she would still heal in a few hours, and then be invited to listen to the heartwarming discussion once again. Probably in a room with no swords on the walls.
It was hard to believe that she had been putting up with that kind of ridiculousness for three days already. It helped that she considered it a sort of atonement; as she had been the instigator of all this insanity, the least she could do was suffer along with them.
Even if she was the only one visibly suffering.
"Trixie knows how to settle this one, then!" Trixie purred, fiddling in place as the white comb ran down her mane again and again. "We are simply the best. Both of us."
"Of course we are, silly." Celestia giggled, carefully pulling the comb towards the ground.
Keep talking like that and we are going to require a bucket. Luna rolled her eyes in the background. She had expected that using servants would land her in some uneasy situations, but that kind of concentrated, nauseating sappiness was way beyond her worst nightmare.
Still, her sister seemed to be enjoying herself. Which, while rather surprising, had left Luna with no choice - she bore the torture in utter resignation.
At least she wasn't suffering alone. Sneaking a glance at the guards at the door, she had to muffle a snicker. One colt was cringing so visibly that his spear shook; the other one bore the scene better, but only because he had fallen asleep long ago.
The brief smile vanished from Luna's face. It was a new low, but she envied that colt. If only she had such an easy way out! But falling asleep right before she had to raise the moon...
Yeah, Sister would never fall for that.
Though, with all the attention she had been receiving since the arrival of Trixie...
We could probably sleep all day and not be noticed by anypony, Luna rubbed her temple. Well, maybe the commoners. Some might complain about the night being missing...
She groaned and buried her head beneath her hooves.
Who are we kidding? Most ponies hate our beautiful night. All of our subjects would gladly welcome a never-ending day, the foolish lot of them.
Her horn flaring with blue aura, Luna dragged a pillow over to her and squeezed it over her head rather unceremoniously. The idea itself was sound, but a thin layer of feathers couldn't fully block the outside world.
"Trixie had no idea how she survived for all this time with you, princess!"
Clenching her teeth and smothering her head further into the couch, Luna wondered how long she would survive this new sort of lunacy. She readied herself to count the seconds, despite knowing that Celestia and her newest student wouldn't go to sleep for a while yet. Going by the new usual, she was stuck listening to them for at least an hour or so longer.
One incredibly long hour, Luna sighed internally.
But then fate lent her a hoof, and she was saved by the most unlikely happenstance.
Loud knocking rang out from the door, and a pony in a deep baritone spoke, his voice muffled by the door in the way.
"Sorry to disturb milady, but we have a situation on our hooves. If you would spare us a second..."
Not giving anypony else a chance to respond, Luna sprang up like a released coil, accidentally throwing the pillow all the way across the room.
"We are on this one!" she yelled, completely ignoring the bewildered blinks Celestia and Trixie were giving her. It didn't matter who was there or why. It could have been the acting captain of the Guard, looking for somepony to calm a raging volcano - but as long as it offered an early escape from the never-ending stream of compliments, Luna would gladly to volunteer to anything. She leaped off the bed and glided to the door, her magic tearing it open just as she touched down. Her momentum was so great that a few of her wing-feathers came loose and drifted past her, into the empty corridor in front.
What the... Luna blinked at the white tiles of the empty corridor. We could have sworn there was a pony talking just now.
"So who is it, Luna?" came Celestia's voice from behind. "What is this 'situation' about?"
"We have no idea, Sister." Luna peeked out the door, turning her head left and then to the right, scanning the deserted corridor. "Maybe it is about our guards disappearing... oh?"
She flinched and smacked herself in the face.
There were two scrolls rolling around on the floor - and two quivering ears sticking out from behind a potted plant on the right.
One of the scrolls hovering in front of her nose, Luna frowned and pursed her lips. It was an unpleasant surprise, Viscount Flash Freeze was requesting assistance; it seemed his prized heirloom had been taken by thieves. An amulet very close to his heart, the message read; but Luna knew what that really meant. She knew of the ice-demon that resided within that amulet. For the viscount to lose an artefact of such power...
She stopped reading the letter and lifted her eyes, her gaze resting on the empty corridor.
Hmm... so maybe it was not Discord who made Celestia's old student forgotten?
That did seem like a possibility. The windigo in the amulet had the power to erase memories, after all - and it always seemed strange that Discord would lower himself to going after singular ponies. Of course, ordinary servants couldn't make other servants forget about things... but Luna knew better than consider the rules of the game absolute. They could be subverted - just at a hefty price.
She sighed wearily and put the scroll away. Ordinary mortals couldn't help with this case, that was for certain. She would still need to assign a few investigators anyway; there were expectations she had to meet. Having a few Guards snoop around would also remind Flash Freeze about the consequences of being so incompetent. To lose that amulet...
With uneasy feelings weighing on her heart, Luna grabbed the other message. The wax seal broke with a faint click and the scroll unfurled, dangling freely in the air, its top held by her blue magic. Luna began reading, then quickly cocked her head to the side, dumbfounded.
A pony had maybe gone missing in Ponyville. The caretaker of the library was nowhere to be seen - but the sender of the message seemed unsure whether there was one in the first place.
Lowering the paper, Luna wondered whether fate was playing a trick on her. Ponies vanishing into thin air did happen time to time; curiosity and cats always had complicated relationships. But to have a librarian disappear so completely that nopony was sure if she had existed in the first place...
That felt suspicious.
Humming idly to herself and paying minimal attention to the still-hiding messenger, Luna picked both scrolls up and walked away, pondering if the odd cases had anything to do with Celestia's disappearing student.
Things rarely happened for no reason, after all.
The road twisted left and right, its end disappearing in the distance, both its sides adorned by doors as far as the eye could see. Luna was familiar with that junction; sorting through dreams and solving the problems therein was part of her job description.
She had seen a lot of... things that way. It certainly helped broadening her views on the desires of her subjects - but time to time, she couldn't help but miss the bliss of ignorance.
Pacing slowly down the dreamroad, Luna silently pondered which door to pick. It shouldn't have mattered; those doors didn't really lead anywhere. As long as she strongly believed that she was entering the right mind, any door would have worked. The whole scene was but an illusion - the way her mind coped with representing the dreams of all ponies.
But since the mind works in peculiar ways, Luna could never believe in the doors until she had walked long enough.
Strange habits die hard.
Stopping in front of one of the many nondescript doors, Luna pushed on the knob with her magic. The door creaked but opened without fail. She walked in - and promptly found herself in a fancy spa. She failed to recognize the exact scenery; either because of her never having had seen the original, or because of this dream being inaccurate. It seemed like a quite authentic replica, though; fairly usual white buildings surrounded the Princess of the Night, her hooves clacking on cheap ceramic tiles as she walked.
Such down-to-Equestria dreams were a welcoming break from the constant barrage of candy-houses and whatnot.
The trek among the white-painted walls had lead Luna to a huge pool. And what a pool that one was! Almost a small lake, really... and welcomingly empty, too. Wrinkling her eyebrows at the clear water, Luna ran her gaze along the calm blue surface; then she took off, headed towards the singular pony in the middle.
Even though she understood that this was nothing but raw imagination, she didn't want to ruin anypony's dream by walking on water. She had long learnt to be careful when it came to mortals.
The tiny figure in the pool grew in size she approached, becoming more and more like a proper yellow pegasus. Instead of splashing down directly at the pony, Luna opted to announce her presence by circling around a few times - and then drop into the water right next to the colt.
The water was a pleasant surprise. It was cold and somewhat full of chlorine, just like a real pool would.
Such adherence to realism! Luna thought and rubbed her burning eyes.
"Why hello, your grace!" the colt next to her giggled. "What do I owe this visit to? I thought you only came to troubled ponies' dreams."
"Are you saying that we are not welcome here?" Luna squinted at the yellow pony, raising her eyebrow.
The colt gave her a sly smirk.
"On the contrary!" he chuckled and quickly yanked his head higher, before his mouth flooded with water. "Do allow me to wonder what made me important enough for visit, though!"
"We are not snooping on your dreams on a regular basis, if that is what you are worried about." Luna rolled her bloodshot eyes. "We came because of the request you submitted."
"Request...?" the yellow colt blinked. He looked quite stupefied - but something clicked in his mind and he slapped himself over the head. "Ah, right! The request! The case of the missing librarian."
Bending the rules of the dream to make herself effortlessly float, Luna gave a slow nod.
That case, indeed.
"I never thought you'd react so fast," the colt laughed and turned around, floating with his face towards the sky. "I sure never thought I'd be interrogated this way, either."
"Would you rather have us be cliché and pull the chariot out?" Luna frowned.
"Oh no, no! Explaining my case in a swimming pool sure beats chatting in the barracks!" the colt laughed. He drifted lazily along the surface, moving as the currents dragged him. "What could I say, though? All I know is that we have a library with nopony taking care of it! ...which, frankly speaking, is totally weirding me out."
You are acting quite familiar with us, Luna frowned at the casual style. She allowed the offence to slide, though; it didn't seem proper, lecturing commoners inside their own fantasies.
"So the library had been vacant for the last several years?" She returned her attention to the case instead. "It is not in disrepair, we suppose."
"Well... the place is fine actually, but only because Spike has been taking care of it," the colt sighed. "Now, just how he managed to keep up on his own, on the other hoof... I mean, he's basically a foal - I mean, er, hatchling."
The cold water splashing against her neck, Luna wondered why the name twisted the gears in her head. She remembered Spike - he was a young dragon who lived in the Golden Oak, basically running the library on his own. He would also act as a relay whenever Celestia had to send mails to-
Luna jolted and stared in front of her with glassy eyes. All those mails...
Just whom did Celestia send those to?
"Put together all the files you have on the case," Luna snapped her gaze back to the colt. "Do so in a hurry, too. We shall look into the case tomorrow morning."
"Tomorrow morning...!" the stallion gasped as the lazy waves rocked him around. "Your Grace, that's an incredibly tight deadline! Even if I worked through the night and sent everything with the fastest pegasus at hoof, it would still barely cut it!"
"In that case we advise that you stop lazing around," Luna chuckled wryly. Then she used her powers and cancelled the dream straight away, waking both her own self and the other pony up.
Knock.
Luna snapped her ears to the door. Apparently somepony was trying to enter her room; a fairly unusual circumstance. It was shortly before dawn, and with most of the Palace sleeping sound, there were few who would-
Knock!
Rolling her eyes, Luna set the thick tome aside and put her reading glasses on the table. She took a step away - and then hastily returned to place a bookmark on the open page. She didn't want to go through the entirety of the common law again.
Knock-knock-knock!
Glaring at the door for a moment, Luna closed her eyes and sighed deeply.
Thank the twelve Gods that such insistent ponies rarely came to see her.
"WE ARE COMING!" she yelled, hoping that this was enough to calm the numbskull on the other side of the door. She leaped through her room and landed at the door; her hooves had barely slowed her down by the time her magic was pulling the door open.
The visitor turned out to be a pegasus. A pretty worn down one, too; he kept his head low and panted shallowly, his wings dangling at his side, flaking feathers onto the floor.
A first in a long time, Luna was at a loss for words. She raised an eyebrows and wondered, but nothing came to mind.
"Hello... the sarge... sends this..." the pegasus wheezed, blazing past almost all parts of a proper conversation. He didn't wait for any answers either; he simply pulled on the latch at his side, unlocking his saddlebags and crashing them to the floor.
Ah, finally. The case of that librarian!
"Thank you," she gave the messenger a nod. No wonder he was so tired! He must have been racing all the way from Ponyville to Canterlot. "Would you care-"
The messenger didn't allow the princess to make any offer. He gave a short nod and turned away, scampering off at a languished pace, probably off to take a nap in a quiet spot.
Luna wasn't exactly heartbroken over the silent rejection. She grabbed the discarded saddlebags and returned to her room, shutting the doors behind her.
"Excuse me your Highness, but there are some matters requiring your attention."
Luna pulled on the crown, lowering it until it covered her eyes.
"We are busy, Kibitz."
Kibitz wasn't deterred by such an absent-minded dismissal.
"Your Highness, I understand that you find the additional workload disconcerting. However, with Princess Celestia devoting so much time to her student, there is little choice but to delegate some of her tasks to you," he explained slowly and calmly.
Luna scoffed at the tone - and the whole situation in general. She felt like as if she had been sent back to school, listening to her tutor lecture her over mundane matters she was already familiar with... robbing her of time she needed for the important things, such as finally finishing the report on Ponyville's missing librarian.
On the other hoof, she couldn't tell Kibitz just why she was so busy - and if she were to simply reject the advisor, she wouldn't be painting herself in good colours. She did have an image to maintain, especially nowadays. Few would voice it aloud, but Luna knew: she was still being watched.
She couldn't truly disagree with the reasoning behind the suspicions either. The Nightmare Moon debacle was no joke.
There was no choice; she had to compromise.
"We suppose that we can spare some time in a half hour or so," she glanced at the advisor, then motioned at the papers on her desk. "We must settle this matter first. It is rather urgent."
"As you wish, Highness." Kibitz gave her a token bow, then turned around and walked out of the room. "I shall begin the preparations, then. Please do not take longer than thirty minutes, Highness! The schedule is already quite tight."
The door creaked and closed with a faint thud. Finally left on her own, Luna's first reaction was to frown mightily; that ever-important schedule was starting to get on her nerves. Then she grabbed a quill and began scribbling with haste.
She may have not known the Ponyville case inside-out, but she had already learnt enough to make a decision. She had to put things in motion before she was dragged for another never-ending string of protocol events.
"So you are sleeping during work time."
The sergeant let out a whine and buried his face into his hooves. Then he shooed the other ponies away - aside from the two who were fanning him with oversized palm branches.
"Such a clichéd dream, too," Luna carried her gaze around, further emphasizing her disapproval with a little shake of her head. "After last time, we had higher expectations of you."
"Like it's my fault I was up all night," the sergeant dragged his yellow hooves down his face. "I don't mean anything bad, your Grace, but... are these visits going to be a regular thing now?"
"Many would welcome such attention," Luna glanced at the yellow pegasus.
"Maybe more would get it if you didn't get bogged down with one pony," the sergeant groaned. He quickly realised his error - and made a noise that was the mixture of a hiccup and a yelp. "I mean... your Grace can do as your Grace sees fit, of course."
A dry smirk on her face, Luna allowed the remark and the inept apology to both slide. There was no reason to further antagonize her underling - especially since she may need to rely on him in the future.
"We have taken a look at your findings." She began pacing around the yellow pegasus. A few dossiers started to follow her, appearing out of thin air. "We have to admit: we have never ever been more thoroughly confused."
The yellow pegasus winced as the dossiers exploded into a thousand of floating paper pages. The ponies holding the palm branches saw it wiser to flee - a quite rational reaction, especially for ponies that only existed in a dream.
"Nothing in these matches up," Luna made the papers dance around herself and the sergeant. "Not even the financial records. For all we can see here, the Golden Oak should have gone bankrupt years ago."
"...not to mention ponies taking out books and then returning them all on their own. I don't know about you... r Grace, but I bet most ponies wouldn't be that orderly," the sergeant chuckled wryly. "Anyhow, I guess now you can see why I asked for your help in the case!"
Luna gave the pegasus a glare - one which he couldn't seem to understand at first.
"...uh, I mean, your Grace!" he realised the mistake with noticeable delay. "Anyway, I bet this library is nothing but a cover-up for something larger!"
Allowing herself a grimace, Luna enjoyed the irony in how clueless yet correct that assumption was. She also wondered what the good sergeant would have done had he known what kind of a conspiracy he poked at.
"We did notice something in your report," she snapped a paper from the floating whirlpool. "It says here that you had interrogated the nearby citizens, as part of the investigation."
The sergeant seemed a little confused at the remark.
"Sure I did. It's standard procedure, your Grace."
"Indeed it is. Very well done," Luna gave the pegasus a curt nod. "One thing caught our eye, however. It says here that three ponies had seen a cyan unicorn exit the library shortly after midnight, a few days ago."
"Umm... well yeah. They did say that. Not sure if I would rely on that lead, though." The sergeant rubbed his chin. His frown hinted at very little good news to follow. "I mean, I'm not sure which is weirder - that a pony would grab books at midnight, or that a bunch of others would spend their night staring at a library. Heh."
Humming loudly, Luna nodded again. That was a sound doubt. She did, however, know of a detail the sergeant was not privy to: that the whole ruckus with Celestia's former student had happened on that very night. She had personally altered the records in Canterlot to make Trixie's sudden appearance less suspicious, so she was absolutely certain when the switch had taken place.
After going through the records of the Golden Oak, Luna had no doubts that she had stumbled over the trail of the missing student. She felt very pleased at the initial results; she was certain that while he had been involved, Discord wasn't the culprit this time. Whoever had committed the crime was an amateur; a being as powerful as Discord, but one lacking in thought and reasoning.
Were the culprit at all smart, she would have known that simply erasing somepony from history wasn't a good way to cover anything up. It left a highly visible trail, like a path of broken grass in an otherwise intact meadow. All Luna had to do was to find and follow the disjointed oddities.
"We would like to talk to that midnight-library pony - in person," she ordered. The whirlwind of papers had stopped at the same moment; the cloud of papers lazily floated mid-air, slowly descending towards the ground.
"Is that an order for capture?" the sergeant raised his eyebrows. "I understand that this order is coming from you, but uh... I don't think anypony will believe me if I tell them I got messages in my dreams."
"We are well aware of that. The necessary papers were signed last night, and are en route to you already." Luna turned slightly, staring the yellow pegasus in the eyes. "We expect you to send that cyan unicorn our way with the earliest train tomorrow."
"As you wish, your Grace. However... that's still a tall order." The sergeant scratched his head. "We have no formal charge and she could resist."
"We can assure you, Sergeant: our word is as good as any charge can get," Luna chuckled wryly. "Bind her in chains if you must! You have our permission. One way or an other, we want that pony in Canterlot by the next sunset."
"Affirmative!" the sergeant saluted. "I'll set my colts after Lyra as soon as I, uh... well, wake up. She'll be on the train by the time your order is here."
Luna twitched her ears. She had heard of that name before, but she couldn't remember anything serious connected to it. That usually meant that the pony in question was one of the useless riff-raff hanging around Canterlot.
"Lyra... huh." She pondered aloud, holding a hoof to her nose. She mused like that for a little while, then turned her teal eyes to the pegasus. "How would you know that?"
"She's a registered threat. We took her in a few weeks ago, after she went berserk during the changeling attack." The sergeant rubbed the back of his neck. "I mean, I've no proof it's her... but she's cyan and she's unicorn, so that matches nicely with the eyewitnesses. And she's registered as trouble. All the little dots connect to her."
"She went berserk? Against the changelings?" Luna raised her eyebrows. She tried to imagine a regular pony beating up changelings, but the idea felt off to her. For all their faults, aggression was hardly an issue with ponies.
"Weird, ain't it? I think that she's a little nuts." The sergeant drew circles next to his temple. "She was beating up some royal when we found her... somepony who looks just like Queen Chrysalis. Thank Celestia that alicorn only looks like Chrysalis, or else we'd have some real fancy trouble on our hooves. A commoner beating up a queen...!"
Lyra hummed faintly. Chrysalis... she was certain that she knew all the royals of the world. That name didn't seem to come to her, however. Did we forget?
She shook her head. She knew she wasn't so scatterbrained.
So were we made to forget?
That seemed to be the case. Exactly the same way as everypony had forgotten about Celestia's student.
That similarity couldn't have been a coincidence in itself. But to have that Lyra-someone emerge from the Golden Oak on the same night that Celestia's student had also disappeared...
So it is Lyra. Ho-hum... Lyra, Lyra, Lyra. You are either a foolish master, or a completely careless one. Luna smirked at the picture coming together. We have no reason to complain, though... you have nicely put yourself in our net.
"Very well!" she thundered, pointing a hoof at the sergeant. "Bring that Lyra to us right away!"