Study Night
In the fading light of the evening, a purple unicorn filly squinted at a book of spells, rapidly flipping pages, a faint glow emanating from her horn. She was perched on a tasseled velvet pillow beside the wide windows of the palace library's loft, surrounded by a stack of books, a cup of tea, a few spare quills, and a pile of parchment scrolls. A half-finished plate of sweet ginger cookies made earlier in the evening by the palace chefs lay forgotten on a nearby table, and behind the table a collection of soft cushions and blankets rested piled against the glass window. The filly’s attention was focused solely on the thick green book hovering in front of her; all other concerns had been pushed from her mind by the importance of this task.
Twilight Sparkle read a page, and then another, and then magically tossed the book over her shoulder with a growl of annoyance, but thought better of that and caught the precious volume before it hit the ground. She couldn't risk damaging the Princess's valuable collection! Not after Celestia had chosen her as her own personal student. Twilight imagined for a moment the Princess’s reaction if she damaged a book, or didn’t learn the lesson, or even worse, failed to finish the assignment on time! She redoubled her efforts, determined not to disappoint the ruler of Equestria.
The books she had chosen soon proved to be inadequate for the task. She glanced across the room to the high gilded bookshelves that held Equestria’s greatest works on the art of magic. The shelves in the magical studies wing of the library had been built into the walls in order to leave a round open space in the center of the room. This space was often used by the unicorn students as a quiet place to study, and by the teachers as a fitting location for elite lessons. But in the evenings, it was closed to all but the palace staff and the Princess herself, and, of course, her chosen student. Few ponies, Twilight realized, had the privilege of watching the sunset through the magnificent window that was nearly an entire side of the room.
The rest of the library also contained many open spaces, but none as beautiful as this. It had been built to accommodate the alicorn Princess’s larger frame, and so was a far cry from the snug stacks of the regular Canterlot library Twilight had frequented before her induction into Celestia’s school of magic.
And Twilight loved it. The wide perch by the window put her far above the library floor, giving her a private space even when other students were in the room. Although Celestia had often suggested she study along with these ponies, Twilight preferred being alone with her books, especially when her work included special assignments from the Princess.
Twilight selected a volume from the high shelf and pulled it across the room with her magic. The heavy tome drifted into position and flipped open to a page bookmarked with a scrap of parchment. She glanced at the diagram and scrawled a few words onto a scroll, then shook her head and crossed them out. Twilight threw the scroll aside with a flick of her horn; it flew into a nearby bookshelf and then fluttered to the ground. The unicorn flipped to a second bookmarked page and stared intently at the miniscule text of a treatise on the proper use of magic. Twilight a paused to take a sip of her tea, then wrote a sentence on a fresh scroll, the floating grey quill glowing with magic as it moved across the paper.
Slowly lowering the quill, Twilight turned to the window and sighed. The late-setting summer sun slipped below the horizon in a blaze of gold and pink, making the gilded titles on the spines of the books shimmer in the last rays of light. The filly forgot her essay for a few moments to admire the Princess's work. Moments after the sunset was completed, magical lamps hung on the library walls flickered gently into life, bathing the room in a soft yellow glow, the steady motion of their silent warm flames echoing the Princess’s ever-flowing mane.
After a few minutes, the moon drifted up the dark starry sky, directed also by Celestia's magic. A pegasus pushed a lone cloud across the sky until it sat half-obscuring the moon; the pony’s dark blue coat was briefly illuminated by a silver haze of light. Twilight Sparkle smiled, comforted from her stress by the clockwork organization of Canterlot, and indeed most of Equestria. The sun and moon always rose and set on schedule. The weather was planned weeks in advance and each forecast was expertly performed by the weather pegasi exactly when and where it was needed. All the world worked on time, and so should she.
Twilight yawned, then turned back to her various books and papers and continued to write. The quill moved steadily across the paper, sometimes hanging in the air while Twilight read from a book. Slowly, the essay came together. After a while, though, the text began to blur before her eyes and she struggled to keep the quill aloft and her focus on the page. Still, she kept writing; by the time the moon had risen to its zenith she had filled nearly an entire scroll.
The unicorn set down the quill. She lifted her drooping eyes from the parchment and glanced out the window; it was past midnight. Twilight returned her gaze to her work and groaned. The essay she had written was marred by smudges and droplets of black ink, the result of her tired spellwork. She looked around for another scroll to rewrite the report, but there was no blank parchment left. Sighing, she vowed to correct the paper at the first chance she got. Twilight finally allowed her head to drop onto the soft cushion. She considered what improvements she could make in the final copy, but these thoughts were soon overtaken by sleep.
~~~
The moon had just begun its slow descent when Princess Celestia entered the library. The doors swung open silently at her magical command and closed again behind her without a sound. The guards had not reported that Twilight had returned to her room, and so the Princess had become concerned that the young unicorn was again overworking herself over an assignment. Like many of the students at the school, Twilight considered her education to be of great importance, but unlike them, she often took her lessons far too seriously. Celestia hoped that Twilight would someday have other friends than just her books.
The Princess looked around the room, her eyes finally settling on the sleeping purple form up in the loft. She quietly climbed the staircase, dimming the lamps with her magic as she walked. She reached the top of the stairs and glanced around at the scattered scrolls and books. These she tidied up with a nod of her glowing white horn, stacking the varied volumes and vanishing the obvious scrapped papers, and moving the rest of Twilight’s writing to the table. The teacup and the plate she teleported down to the palace kitchens to be washed.
Princess Celestia’s horn glowed again as she gently laid a blanket over her sleeping student. Twilight shifted slightly but didn’t wake. The Princess made a mental note to reduce the next day’s workload. Twilight should have some time to play, even if her idea of playing was sorting books or organizing her room. Perhaps some adventure novels would offer enjoyment to the young unicorn. Yes, that would do nicely, and the Princess knew just the series to show her.
Quietly, as not to wake her student, the Princess left the library. Outside the window, the moon floated steadily across the night sky.
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nice story. Interested where this is gonna go next
368150
Daring Do, and it is marked complete.
368167
lol
368150 Uhh, i think that's it.
I know... My bad
Oh geez this was adorable. And not the sugar-spun candy adorable, but the subtle, snuggling kind of adorable, which is my favorite kind. The description here is amazing, and Twilight's thoughts are perfect. Granted, some of the paragraphs need some spacing between them, and the fact that she'd be fully absorbed in a book only to toss it away one sentence later is disconcerting, but that's a minor thing.
368377
Thanks! I love cuddly-adorable too.
I'll fix that formatting error.
I think Twilight threw aside that book because it didn't have a lot of info on what she needed, maybe just one short chapter which she finished.
Nicely done. A good slice of life story hits the spot every now and then.
There are not enough stories with filly Twilight, only other one I've found is "Darkest Before Dawn". Good chapter, looking forward to more.
368201
I'm actually planning a few more chapters now that there's so much interest...
448946
Yay!
I really liked the attention to detail used to portray a rather mundane (but not in a bad way) scenario. For me, that's what slice of life is all bout, taking just the normal things that make up a life and turning it into a nice story.