The Second Sister

by Novella Paperback

Of Those Thousand Years

1000 YEARS LATER

"Did you hear what happened?"

"The Princess was alive the whole time?"

"It wasn't just an old mares tale after all! Nightmare Moon was released from the moon, that's what I heard."

"Nightmare Moon escaped and tried to kill everypony in Ponyville!"

All throughout Canterlot Castle the ponies seemed to be talking of nothing else. The Summer Sun Celebration had been cancelled because the infamous Nightmare Moon had escaped to bring darkness upon the land. Apparently a mixed group of ponies had found the long lost elements of harmony and "defeated" her.

What a laugh. How did no one know the actual legend? Didn't anypony read anymore?

Well, no. One pony had known. The purple unicorn from Ponyville has known instantly who she was. Besides that one Mare though, it seemed that her history was lost with the sands of time. The second she had set hoof down in Canterlot she'd begun hearing the whisperes about the evil things she'd done and tried to do. What was almost laughable however, was how few ponies actually knew that it was she who was Nightmare Moon. Oh that would change with time of course, but as of now it seemed that the masses thought Princess Luna and Nightmare Moon to be two different mares entirely.

She would not be surprised if the whole of Equestria knew the similarities before nightfall.

"Sister," The soft spoken voice beside her pulled Princess Lunas thoughts outward again and she looked up at her radiant sister. Gone were the soft locks of predawn pink, and now a flowing rainbow of color shone with her magical power. She looked every bit the powerful ruler that Equestia had longed for.

"I am sorry." Luna lowered her head just so. "I was lost in my thoughts."

Celestia opened one wing and enfolded the younger sister into it. "Yes," she replied, lowering her head as well so it was nearer to her sisters. "I could tell. You looked so anguished. Let's go inside, there's much we need to discuss and you need to rest after." Her other wing rose and the elder princess stood upright and lead the way from their chariot along the path that lead to the castle. She seemed oblivious to the gawking and whispering that exploded around them. Luna wished that she too was blind and deaf to it.

---

The rugs were all different. And the tapestries too, they were different than they had been. There were now only two stained glass windows out of the entire hall that she could recognize. Where had that vase come from? That throne didn't used to be there, it was in a different room before. None of these guards were the same, even their armor was different. The very air she breathed seemed different than it had been before her banishment, it seemed less crisp. The pillars were different colors on top of it all. It seemed that everything she had knows was now gone and changed, oh what a depressing thought.

"Luna please. I need you to focus on what I'm saying to you."

"Huh? Oh!" Luna snapped to attention as her sister sat before her in the royal throne. Without it's right hand mate to accompany it where she used to sit, Luna found herself standing awkwardly on the stairs. "I am sorry." She apologized. It seemed to be all she was able to do any longer.

"I know things are overwhelming." Celestia soothed as she sat down. "But you need to focus. Things are different and a lot of time has passed. We will both have to work diligently during this growing season so that the harvest in Fall will be a full success but you still need to understand the situation on which it stands. You have been gone for a thousand years my sister, Equestria is no longer as simple as it used to be."

"I -I know Sister." Luna replied haltingly. They had once been on near equal footing, but now she was intimidated by the other alicorn. Celestia had grown in size as her power multiplied. She had with wisdom from over a thousand years of ruling the kingdom to call upon. While she, the younger, was back to her original size, no bigger than an average pony. Her horn had shrunk from the effects of the Elements of Harmony and now, dwarfed by her older, larger, smarter and much, MUCH more beloved sister, she had never felt more insignificant. "I have a lot to learn of this new Equestria... I understand."

Celestia nodded her regal head and her horn lit with a golden glow and for a moment Luna didn't understand why she was using her magic. Then, a small crown lifted out of a gold jewel encrusted case beside her and floated towards the small mare. It was so black that each glint of light had hues of blueish purple skittering across the surface and it was polished like the most precious of stones. "I have been saving this for you, Luna. For when you came back to me. I can only hope that you forgive me for what I've done to you, and that you understand why it had to be done." The crown that she was currently wearing was much cruder. Similar to color and design, it was smaller and the blueish purple was just a different stone that was fitted to curve around the outer edge of it. Her smaller crown was lifted from it's place and the new lovely piece of jewelry touched down behind Luna's horn, lighter than a feather despite it's thick stone appearance. "You will always be a princess, Luna, and my sister. It is far past time that you are treated as such."

Luna lifted a hoof before she could stop herself, feeling the smooth surface of the crown atop her head, and she watched in shocked awe as Celestia stood and a golden glow enveloped two rods on either side of the throne. With a nod of her head, Celestia had unraveled two banners and the younger princess gasped as the blue cloth unrolled down along the length of the wall. One one, a three stood under a rolling sky with a sun at the top. The other held the five different elemental designs, fire, air, earth, and water with what she could only amuse was magic at the bottom. Both banners were only covered in shades of blue, Luna's royal color.

"Oh...sister." Luna whispered as she looked back and forth between their designs. "Thank you."

"Come here Luna." Celestia side stepped once and smiled as she sat on the left side of the wide throne. "Sit with me now. We have much to talk about. As sister."

With an abundance of gratitude, Luna resumed up the stairs and sat beside her sister on the throne, and for the first time in a thousand years, she didn't feel alone any longer. She hadn't known how much she missed her sisters gentle comfort until then, and now that she was receiving it as she was, she knew that she never wanted to give it up for a foolish endeavor again.

Which brought forth the painful memory she had tried to repress. Her last memory before her banishment was completed was of a small golden mare striving to save her from her fate. She had known the crime that Luna had committed and even still, she had risked her own safety to try and rescue her from the Elements magic. The memory was so painful for her that her eyes closed and she burrowed closer to her sisters warmth. "Tia." She inquired in just a whisper.

"What is it, my sister?" Celestia looked down at the smaller alicorn and frowned at the expression on pain on her face. "Luna, what is the matter?" She slid her wing around the younger pony, hoping to offer her more comfort from her thoughts.

"The mare... Starsing. She has died?" She didn't know why she was asking. She herself had seen the pony's death, albeit it had been almost too hazy to watch from her vantage point.

"Oh, Luna." Celestia's sad response was the answer she had feared.

"I knew. Of course I knew... but I had to ask, sister. She was so good to me that night. She was so understanding." Luna shook her head and exhaled a pained breath. "Did she have a happy life? Please Celestia tell me that she had at least that. I need to know that she was not alone the whole of her existence." She opened her eyes and looked up at her sister imploringly.

Celestia hesitated, searching her sisters face. This small mare truly had meant sometime to her, she wasn't sure why, but it was obviously that Luna needed to know this. "She never married." She said honestly. "But she was not alone her entire life. She became chief of the kitchen staff and she made a name for herself as one of the most talented chefs in all of Equestria."

"But what she happy." Luna whispered.

"That, we may never know." Celestia replied apologetically.

---

Didn't anypony know that a library was not a place for gossiping? It was a place for reading and frankly, she was getting tired of the blatant inconsistencies and lies that they were spewing like it was going out of style. Nightmare Moon killed Princess Luna. Nightmare Moon USED to be Princess Luna and now they were both dead. Princess Luna tried to kill Celestia after turning back from Nightmare Moon and, her personal favorite idiocy, Nightmare Moon was actually Celestia the whole time and Luna was never really banished, she was in hiding.

Shaking her head, the unicorn librarian resumed her duties of re-shelving dozens of books at once from her desk near the front of the large three story room. Didn't anypony read any more... That is, read things BESIDES cheesy vampire pony series and bad romances centered around fillies and colts? Why did nopony read the classics any longer? Moby Dick by Herman Mareville. Buckleberry Finn or even Romeo and Muliet by William Saddlespier. Those were what ponied should be reading these days, not....not ... Fifty Manes of Grey. Ugh.

Alas, it wasn't up to her to save the declining literary tastes of the community. All she had to do was make sure that the written word was here, safe and sound for anypony who came along with the desire to open one up.

She sighed as the last book slid into place and smiled at a job well done. Two hundred books back in place before lunch, what a great start to the day. Well, granted most of those books were only out of place because she'd been reading them (hence the blue half open book as a cutie mark on her flank) but still, they were all back and she was proud of herself.

The Canterlot Royal Librarian used her forest green colored magic to right the crooked papers and name plate that read "Novella Paperback; Librarian" on her desk That done, she then again used it to fix her mane, which had gotten pretty rustled in her mad shelving spree. Her purple and raspberry striped locks fell back into place with some magical prodding and soon the mare was as good as new. She rubbed her hooves together, then began her patrol around the room to make sure everything was in it's place.

Little did the small light golden colored mare know, things would soon be thrown out of order. And one pony wouldn't be able to fix it on her own. It would take at least . . . two.

Author's Note:

And the meeting shall happen in chapter three. Promise. ^.^