Twilight Sparkle arranged her notes neatly, and, upon due reflection, weighted down all the loose sheets of paper. She was familiar with the methods of the Moon Princess, and, especially, with Luna's love of drama. She sat back, reading over the Biographical Dictionary regarding some of Starlight Glimmer's kin. Many were high achievers: scholars and scientists and soldiers and statesponies.
We are a distinguished Clan, Twilight thought, with perhaps some vanity. She was not feeling all that harshly self-critical at present; her experience Masking as Starlight Glimmer having left her with a revulsion against doing just that. It's a lot to live up to, of course. Was that part of the stress that broke you, Starlight? she wondered. Did you feel that you were not good enough for the role to which you had been born? Twilight had herself felt that, more than once in her life.
It only gets harder the higher one rises, Twilight thought. From ace student to national heroine to Alicorn Princess. Increasing freedom to choose one's own actions, yes, but the constraints of duty and morality, the expectations of others and of oneself, these bind one more tightly than mere obedience to orders one did not issue oneself. Having to do what is right is harder than having to do what one is told. Choosing the right path can be hard, and if one errs the guilt and the shame belong to oneself alone. She briefly considered Celestia, and felt a pang of sadness. Authority is a lonely burden, Most Beloved Teacher, and you've borne it, alone, for so many centuries.
And you, Starlight. From ace student to criminal warlock to cult leader. You made your own decisions, you tried to choose your own path. You imagined yourself the Hero, not the Monster, of your own tale. Which, I suppose, would make Celestia to you the Evil Overlord, and I the Monster in your tale.
Your dream was shattered by your Monster, by me. What will you do, now?
She wondered how she might understand, might predict Starlight's actions, without falling into the trap of Masking her and Becoming the Mask that was Starlight. There seemed no clear and safe path to understanding.
Her musings were interrupted by the apparition.
The shadows in the corner of the room combined into a swirl of spacetime, which with an eerie howling and spray of cold wind coalesced into a dark equine shape, a big beautiful blue Alicorn standing there poised with wings outstretched.
"Princess Luna!" said Twilight delightedly. "I'm so glad to see you." She looked at the dispersing mists. "New teleportation spell?"
"A very old one," said Luna. "It needs darkness from which to manifest, and 'tis less efficient than the version thou dost use, but I like me the effect in the emergence. I did modify it long ago from the blinking of the Undying Unicorns."
"It's very impressive," said Twilight, smiling at Celestia's Sister. She looked down at her desk. Her papers were all in place, secured by the paperweights she had wisely placed upon them. Luna liked dramatic entrances, which often resulted in short-lived but intense gusts of wind. It was a character trait Twilight had first noticed in Nightmare Moon, though she refrained from bringing that up to Luna for the obvious reasons.
"Thankee," replied Luna, stepping forward and smiling down at her. "Twilight, dear friend, how dost thou fare? I read thy missive and am concern-ed."
"What," asked Twilight, "about that spell I accidentally cast on myself? The Masking?" She forced her face to keep what she hoped was a cheerful smile, even laughed a bit. "Heh, it was scary for a moment, but I'm fine now."
"I am right glad that thou didst take no lasting harm, there," Luna said, relaxing slightly. "Maskings were Flutter-Pony mind magics, which they used to attune themselves with the life they tended. After the Twisting, the Changelings adapted them to reinforce their masquerades, so that they might assume more perfect semblances of Pony identities. They learned to think like the Ponies they imitated." Luna's deep blue eyes peered solemnly into Twilight's own. "The danger, of course, is that the Masker may become confused between the Mask and her own true identity. Emotions and ideas may seep from the Mask into the Core personality. The Changelings call this 'Split-Mind,' and it is a hazard for their best Infiltrators, for those plunge most deeply into their guises. If it goes too far, the Infiltrator may become what she imitates --"
"Sky's stragglers!" interjected Twilight excitedly. Then, abashed by her own bad manners. "Sorry. I was just thinking -- they mimicked Ponies to carry out the invasion of Canterlot, but they wound up joining Equestria."
"Indeed," said Luna, nodding. "Most of them not trained Infiltrators, but they knew some basic Masking. They found Equestria's free and varied society more lovely than their regimented and dreary Hives. And even more so Nictis, who was lost in Equestria long before the invasion, and thus had to maintain a Mask for many years."
"Yes," said Twilight. "Didn't she eventually become really friendly with that inventor fellow, Spark Wheel?"
"More than merely friendly," answered Luna. "They fell in love. They are betrothed."
"Oh," said Twilight. "I didn't notice that."
"Thou art not always the first to notice such things, dear friend," Luna said, smiling fondly.
"Hey!" objected Twilight. "Usually it's Rarity who points that out to me!" She frowned. "Or Applejack ... sometimes Pinkie ... or even Spike ... I suppose I really am a bit oblivious to that sort of thing, sometimes ..."
"Also," Luna added, "Nictis is male. His drone shape is his true form."
"Oh," said Twilight again. "I guess I didn't notice that either." She thought a moment. "In my defense, non-Royal Changelings of both sexes all look rather alike to me. They have very similar muzzle shapes, and they keep all the -- um, vulnerable -- parts within those carapaces."
"'Tis more obvious if one doth widen one's visual spectrum," Luna explained, "as most of their coloration is outside the normal Pony visual range. Also, the Changeling females, even of the sterile castes, have slightly wider hips; while the drones do sport a slight swelling on the underside of their bellies, exactly where a Pony stallion of one of the Three Kinds would keep his ..." she stopped for a second, thought a moment, her eyes dancing with mischief "... vulnerable parts, as thou didst so aptly describe them. For the good reason that the drones do in fact have those parts in there, under the carapace, which can open at times appropriate to their usage." Her eyes twinkled. "Though I suspect thou wilt see any Changeling drone wince, if one of thy obvious power describeth them to him in terms of their vulnerability."
Twilight blushed hotly, but also found herself smiling. Long ago, Luna had been Laughter; her sense of humor was sometimes rough and bawdy by the standards of Twilight Sparkle, product of a more refined later civilization, but it was genuine and good-natured. As the years had passed since Luna's Return, the Moon Princess seemed to be gradually unfolding, revealing her brighter face as her confidence and power returned. More and more, Twilight found herself really enjoying Luna's company -- especially in moments when Twilight herself felt uncertain or vulnerable. Luna refreshed her.
Then, she realized another implication of what Luna had told her.
"Wait," Twilight said, "I didn't know Spark Wheel was ..."
"He probably wasn't, not originally," Luna explained. "He met Nictis when the Changeling was in female form, and their love lasted despite the revelation that the Unicorn mare Meadow Song was in truth a Changeling male." She looked at Twilight with a certain intensity. "Love -- true love -- can sometimes be that strong."
"Heh," said Twilight. "I suppose." She could not meet Luna's gaze now. She strongly suspected her response sounded at least as pathetic and inadequate to Luna as it did to herself. Twilight knew that Luna deserved a better reply from her, and also that she could not give her one, for the very good reason that Twilight did not know what she herself wanted.
She fully grasped the reason why the tale of Nictis and Spark Wheel had made such an impression on the Moon Princess. In a past life, over four thousand years ago in a long-fallen advanced technological civilization, Luna had been the mortal Earth Pony scientist and engineer Moondreamer Finemare; and Twilight herself had been the space pilot Dusk Skyshine -- a stallion, and Moondreamer's beloved husband.
Luna could remember this clearly. Twilight couldn't. Only -- sometimes Twilight felt flashes of familiarity, when she heard about the Age of Wonders in which Moondreamer and Dusk had lived, and loved. And -- though Twilight did not normally feel romantic stirrings toward mares -- she found Luna to be strangely fascinating, to be beautiful and exciting, in ways she did not toward any other female. Or, really, toward any other male Pony -- the only other entity toward whom she felt this way was a Humanoid stallion, denizen of an entirely different worldline. And she thought she liked Luna better.
For over a year now, Luna had been slowly, patiently and very respectfully courting her. Twilight was somewhat oblivious to love, but not that oblivious. That was the reason, Twilight knew, why Luna sent her those warm letters, why Luna liked to spend long evenings in conversation with her, sometimes even embrace her with her wings, but never going beyond what could be interpreted as simple affection. Twilight knew that, though Luna had strong sexual morals, she was not really all that romantically shy.
But Luna was strangely shy with her. And Twilight thought she knew why as well.
Luna wasn't sure either; neither about her own feelings, nor Twilight's. The last thing Luna would want to do would be to drive Twilight away by an ill-considered advance; she at least again had the friendship of the one who had been Dusk Skyshine, and feared to lose it. Twilight wasn't actually that easy to drive away, but Luna couldn't be sure of that. So she moved very, very slowly.
And neither of them had ever made love to a mare. In Twilight's case, she'd never made love to anypony, but she had grown up assuming herself heterosexual, having occasional crushes on colts or stallions, and none (until now) on fillies or mares. Luna knew she was heterosexual: she was no wanton (in her own words) but she had dwelt fifteen centuries on the Earth in her current incarnation, and during those fifteen centuries had by her own admission taken a couple of dozen stallions as lovers.
What if they tried to make love, and in the process only revolted each other? Could they face one another as friends, afterward? Twilight had heard of sophisticated members of Canterlot Society who went through their circle of friends in just such a fashion, but she did not imagine herself to be that sort of mare. When she finally decided to make love, she wanted it to be a love that lasted; and she very much did not want to lose Luna's friendship. Paradoxically, the strength of her love for Luna as a friend was an additional inhibition against attempting to be her lover. Which was, Twilight supposed, not the healthiest approach to love, but then what normal approach to love covered two heterosexual mares who loved one another due to the fact that in a past life one of them had been a stallion?
Twilight was of course less certain about Luna's feelings in the matter. But she had come to know her fairly well over the years since Luna's liberation from the Nightmare, and even better in the almost year and a half since Luna had vouchsafed to her the tale of Moondreamer and Dusk Skyshine, and she could make some educated guesses. She knew that Luna valued her friendship greatly; that though Luna was very sexually-experienced by mortal standards, she had cared deeply for the stallions she had taken for lovers, that she was in that respect far more like Twilight herself than like those in the various Fast Sets. Logically, Luna would also be afraid of souring their friendship through a failed love affair, and this would be her motive for moving very slowly.
Thus, they did not close completely, but instead orbited each other rapidly -- rather like the binary neutron stars about which Luna had once told Twilight during an exciting and fascinating intimate late-night conversation about astrophysics -- afraid that should they actually make physical contact the consequences would be cataclysmic. Not a perfect simile, Twilight knew, but an entirely appropriate one, given that Luna was the Incarnation of the Cosmic Concept of Gravity. So it would do.
"Pardon me," said Luna, ears drooping sadly. "I presume too much, and should not, given that thou dost still heal from thy struggle with Starlight Glimmer."
"Heh," said Twilight, smiling reassuringly. "I wasn't really wounded. Things got only a little bit physical, and at most I took a few bruises -- nothing serious."
"I did not mean physical harm," said Luna. She fixed Twilight in the gaze of her big blue eyes.
"Why -- what do you mean --" stammered Twilight, cringing back slightly. "What kind of harm --"
"I am thy friend," said Luna, "but, unlike thine other friends, I do not look to thee for leadership. I read thy report. I know thou wert under the warlock's power as well, just as were they. I know what it is like to have strictures laid upon one's very soul. I know what it is like to be in command, to be forced to stifle one's fears, one's pain, for the cause that one must not say or do anything that will demoralize those who look to one for leadership. Whatever we once were or are or may someday be to one another, I am thy friend, I always will be thy friend, and I ken what thou hast suffered, what thou doth suffer." She leaned her neck forward slightly, ears up and gently smiling. "Twilight Sparkle, I care for thee, and I am here for thee. Thou may unburden thyself to me, safely and freely."
"I -- " Twilight began. Her voice choked off; her vision blurred in what she realized to her alarm were welling tears. "I ..." she tried to begin again, but found herself entirely incapable of coherent speech.
Luna waited patiently, saying nothing. Her wings twitched slightly open.
Twilight burst out in tears and practically flung herself into Luna's chest, burying her face in the hair of her coat, drinking in the comforting warmth and scent and solidity that was Luna Selena Nyx. She was crying into her coat, she must be soaking the Moon Princess in her tears, but she couldn't control herself. She had been holding this in for so long, she'd had to be strong for so long; once the dam had broken there was no containing the flood.
Luna's wings embraced Twilight, drawing the smaller Alicorn in to a warm hug. Luna's neck came around and she stroked her cheek against Twilight's, gently kissed her head, careful to remain clear of her lips and the more intimate parts of Twilight's own neck. Twilight could tell that what she was offering now was comfort, friendship, and an absolutely pure love: she was grateful to Luna for restraining her own more carnal impulses. Right now, all Twilight wanted was the shelter that Luna offered against a dangerous world.
Twilight sobbed unashamedly, or perhaps in great shame: she was supposed to be an adult, an exemplar of the Lights, a Princess of Equestria, but right now she was reduced to the level of a frightened little filly. She had been feeling like this all along, at many moments in her ordeal in Our Town, but she had known she had to stay strong, to keep up the spirits of the others, so every time she had felt like this she had resolutely shoved it back down behind high ears and stiff lips, as the saying went. And now, it was all coming out, all at once.
If what Luna thought about them was true, they had been lovers, mates, spouses in an age before known history; their reunion in the ruined Castle of the Two Pony Sisters had been the workings of Destiny (and the culmination of a certain tricky Most Beloved Teacher's millennial plan). If that were true, then in a sense Luna was closer to her even than Twilight's own parents, and perhaps Luna was the one Pony before whom Twilight need never be ashamed.
Twilight was not certain of her own logic there, but right now it didn't matter: Luna was there for her, and that was all that mattered. Twilight wanted to say these things to Luna, she wanted to say a lot of things to Luna. First, though, she had to finish crying. She did so, for a while. They lay down together, Luna holding her, and some time passed.
Luna seemed to understand Twilight's need to express her sorrow, and she in turn said nothing particularly coherent, at least not in Equestrian, beyond "Hush," and "it's all right," accompanied by firmer hugs, at Twilight's most extreme outbursts. Once she called Twilight leofling, which Twilight was pretty sure meant something like "beloved" or "darling" in a pre-Harmony version of Equestrian, and once she cupped Twilight's face in her wings, looked deeply into her eyes, and said, very tenderly, ek ann ther, a phrase which sounded vaguely Nhorse and whose meaning Twilight did not know and at the time did not want to ask.
Finally, Twilight was calm enough once more to engage in coherent speech. She gently detached herself from Luna, looked soberly into her eyes, and said "Thank you."
Luna nodded. "Thou art always well come into mine own life, Twilight Sparkle." There may have been some tears on her face as well, or they might have been Twilight's.
"I was helpless," Twilight said. "That's what bothers me the most. I'd lost -- Starlight had taken my power, my Talent, everything that made me special. Even my mind was muzzy -- I felt like I was trying to think through cotton wads, does that make sense to you?"
Luna nodded again. "'Tis difficult to be cast down from a height of power," she said. "One learns things about one's own self. That is why the Concepts sometimes Incarnate themselves in weak or ordinary forms, to learn what the Universe looks like to common life. Indeed, even we Alicorns are weak and ordinary compared to the Concepts."
"It was more than that," Twilight said. "I was weak and under the hooves of my enemy. And all my friends were there with me. You might think that their presence made it more bearable, and in one sense it did -- but in another, it was worse. Because it was bad enough that I was vulnerable -- that Starlight could have done anything to me: killed me, tortured me, humiliated me in horrible ways. What was worse is that she could have done that to my friends."
"I ken that right well," said Luna. "I have always found friends among those I led into battle. And always been afraid that my friends would fall in the fight. Yet always I have had to push these feelings down in battle, for if I gave way to them, if I failed to lead with all the wit and fight with all the might of which I was capable, I would be all the more likely to make mistakes, errors which might bring about the very fell fates for my friends which I feared. 'Tis the burden of command, in a larger sense of the crowns we wear. We decide, so ours is the fault if we fail."
Twilight nodded. "Yes," she agreed. "The very first time I was in real danger -- the quest for the Elements of Harmony ..."
Luna laughed. "I remember that well," she said, smiling warmly at Twilight.
"It all seemed sort of unreal to me at first, like something out of a wonder-tale," Twilight said. "Then it seemed more real than anything I'd ever experienced before. When dangers struck, everything sort of slowed down, it was very easy to make decisions, it was all very cold and clear, as if I were no longer equine, no longer an inexperienced young mare on her very first dangerous mission, but was some sort of machine that assessed threats and calculated the odds and chose the best strategy in every situation."
"I did see that," Luna said. "Even under the Nightmare's sway, I saw that thou wert brave and brilliant and utterly determined to win. I liked thee ... I admired thee ... I did not want to slay thee ... in the end, it was by thy fearless intelligence that I knew that thou wert Dusk Skyshine reborn. And when I knew that, I knew that rather than slay thee I must fight the Shadow to the bitter end. Even if t'were mine own end as well."
"I was fearless at the time," Twilight said. "Also, remember that I'd just met my friends. I liked them, but I didn't really know them yet, not until we Attuned ... that was ... I can't even put it into words." She breathed heavily, stirred by the memory.
"I know how it felt," Luna replied. "Mine own Sister and I were so Attuned, for five hundred years. Though for thee it must have been more of a revelation, as my Sister and I have always been close, and had lived as Incarnate Alicorns over a thousand years when we first found the Elements."
"Then, afterward ...," said Twilight, "... when it was all over, when we were celebrating back in Ponyville ... I was looking at my new friends, and suddenly my mind went over everything that had happened, every way it might have gone wrong. One serious mistake, at any point, and some or all of us might have died. And I'd known this, all along, intellectually, but suddenly it hit me emotionally. And ... well, it was a good thing there was a chair handy, because I practically collapsed. Hopefully, nopony noticed ..."
"I did," said Luna. "I ... well ... watched thee." She looked embarrassed.
"I know what happened," Twilight said. "I have a very strong adrenal system, but the adrenaline ran out, and suddenly I was just normal Twilight Sparkle again, a magic student who had never even been in a real brawl before, and I was remembering falling down cliffs and fighting Manticores and coming face-to-face with ... well, you, in a very bad mood. And all the fear and worry I'd been suppressing caught up with me, all at once." She essayed a wan laugh. "I'm lucky I didn't faint, right there in front of everypony."
"But thou didst not," Luna pointed out. "Thou art a truly brave mare."
"On the outside," Twilight said. "Inside ... every danger we've ever been in, every danger I've ever had to lead my friends through ... I sometimes wake up with nightmares, dreams in which I made the wrong decision, and everypony died."
"I know," said Luna. "I am sorry that I can not always aid thee with them. I have sometimes -- I have not always announced myself. I do not wish to intrude on thy privacy ..."
"You're welcome in my dreams any time," said Twilight. "Um, most of them." She blushed. "Sometimes I have, well, really private ones and ..."
Luna made an amused sound; her cheeks dimpled. "I am used to Ponies having those sorts of dreams. I have seen them for two and a half millennia. I especially do not wish to intrude on those, especially where thou art concern-ed, dear friend." She wrinkled up her muzzle. "It seems to me that I had the same conversation not too long ago with Rarity ... ah well." She looked very directly at Twilight. "The important thing is that you did make the right choices. You live, your friends live. You stand victorious. You know that."
"It was different this time, though," Twilight said. "I guess because we were captured, and then had no choice but to be inactive for two days. And -- we were only captured because I made a mistake the first time." She felt guilt well up within her. "I overestimated our abilities, my abilities. I knew that Starlight Glimmer might attack us at any moment, but I thought I was ready for it. I assumed that I could cast on her before she could summon any magic powerful enough to defeat us."
Twilight looked down, ashamed of her failure. "I was wrong," she said. "She was working-up that spell while she was still talking -- something which for a spell of that power implies tremendous mastery on her part -- and she struck me down while I was still gathering the power to stun her. "She went right through my shields; but then I hadn't summoned very powerful shields, I didn't think that some warlock hiding out in the Crystal Mountains using an artifact she barely understood could possibly be all that dangerous.
"And of course, if my assumptions had been correct, she wouldn't have been -- except that it wasn't the Staff, it was herself, and that implied she was very dangerous." Twilight looked back up into Luna's calm blue eyes. "I didn't see the clues, you see ... even though Starlight slipped up when she claimed that Meadowbrook had made nine enchanted items. It was exactly the sort of clue I should have gotten -- I'm obsessed with magical history -- but I missed the significance of what Starlight had just told me."
"Thou didst err ..." Luna began.
"And my friends paid for my mistake!" Twilight shouted in self-condemnation. She saw Luna flinch and her ears go back at the volume. "They were counting on me to notice things like that, to make the right decision ... and I didn't. I failed them! I could have gotten them all killed ... or hurt ... or driven mad ... do you know what sort of state Rarity was in? I think she was hurt more than any of us ... she was acting very strangely when we returned to Ponyville ..."
"Rarity will be safe now," Luna said, leaning forward and stroking Twilight's cheek with one wingtip. "Spike is with her. He will let her come to no harm."
For a moment, Twilight wondered what else might happen between Spike and Rarity in such a state. Then, she let go her fears: she trusted Rarity well enough, and even more so, she trusted Spike. Whatever happened would be in love; neither Dragon nor Unicorn would willingly harm one another.
"That's good," said Twilight, smiling affectionately at the thought of her Number One Assistant. "You're right -- Spike won't let anything bad happen to Rarity."
"Nor willst thou let anything bad happen to thy friends, an it be in thy power," Luna said, cupping Twilight's face in her wingtips. "Listen well, Twilight Sparkle. Thou art brave and brilliant. Thou willst do all thee might to win the day, and to keep thine own friends alive and well. And if thou failest," she said with strong emphasis, "-- as may one day happen, pray that it never does! -- know that the fault will not be thine, for thou art one of the most competent commanders I have ever known or of whom I have ever heard tell. Everypony fails sometimes, Twilight. Celestia does. I do. And thou willst, from time to time. You are only equine, my dear admirable friend, as am I and my Sister, despite our Cosmic origins. And despite thy own Cosmic nature. And even the Concepts can err. Dost thou understand?"
"Heh," said Twilight. "I think I do. I'm being too hard on myself."
"Yes," said Luna. "The difference between this time and the other times was that thou and thine friends were captured. Ye were in danger, at the mercy of the foe, for a long time. Thou hadst time for the battle-lust to die down, to reflect on thine own errors. Then thou must essay another strategem, as thou didst with Fluttershy, and then again await the moment of decision.
"It is hard," she said, her blue eyes gazing sympathetically into Twilight's, "but it is a necessary lesson thou must learn. Not all battles are over swiftly. Sometimes the cause be undecided for days or weeks or months or years, and then thou willst torture thyself with past mistakes and future fears. It will happen -- it is a pain that thou must simply learn to endure.
"I know this pain well -- it was partly this that broke me, over a thousand years ago. The temptation was great to become a Nightmare -- a creature alight with her own selfish purpose, who loved not and thus need not regret her errors, her sins -- who lived only to triumph, and recked not the cost. But that way lay self-destruction, and the destruction of all that I loved and cherished." Her eyes were full of sadness. "Seek perfection if thou will, but do not destroy thyself if thou findest merely excellence." She smiled now. "Thou art excellent, dear friend, but thou art not perfect, and in the quest for perfection, do not lose the excellence that thou hast attained."
"I ... I understand, Luna," Twilight said. "I'll try to stop blaming myself too much. To learn from my mistakes, instead of torturing myself with them."
"A good path," agreed Luna. She passed Twilight a hanky. "Now, make thyself presentable!"
Twilight blew her nose, dried her eyes, wiped away the tear-stains from her cheeks.
"Why?" Twilight asked. "What will we do now?"
"Visit my Sister, of course," replied Luna. "She desires our company."
Luna wrapped a swirl of darkness around them both, and they teleported to Canterlot.