Book 1 - The Behemoth came to Canterlot

by Equimorto

Heart Over Matter

Celestia clung to Luna's body in a puddle of her sister's blood, unable to even see it through the tears in her eyes, barely able to still breathe through her sobbing. She held her tight, Luna's wound against her naked chest, Luna's head over her shoulder. If she'd still had a mane long enough, it would have been mingling with Luna's own, though it too was quickly losing its shine and flow and dulling to plain locks bound by gravity.

Celestia reached into her heart. She did not know what would happen, and by then she didn't care. It was her only hope of something, and she threw herself towards it with no regards. She had refused to even acknowledge it was there within herself, refused to ever attempt to discover its nature. She'd done it out of fear, and for the same reasons she'd passed her powers to Twilight and let herself be captured by Nightmare Moon. Her days as a warrior were over. She did not wish to fight anymore.

For all she'd known, the coil within her could be a weapon. A great weapon, as much as she did not consider herself a great pony she was certainly not going to deny certain definitions of the term fit her. Maybe not morally or qualitatively, but she knew she was great in many things, as meaningless as those were to her. And she'd known since the first moment she'd sensed it that the thing inside her, the one that felt like it was wrapped around her heart, was powerful. And she'd been afraid, afraid of even trying to use it. Afraid of hurting others more than she already had. Afraid of mistakes she couldn't fix.

None of that even entered her mind as she went to reach for it, clutching Luna's dying body. Not the way she knew she could be risking the destruction of the entire city, or her own death, or worse and more twisted things she could not even conceive. Not the way she's sworn off approaching a power she'd seen so alien and removed from what was natural, in such a high concentration. None of it was even a ghost of an idea in her mind. There was only pain and desperation moving her. If she'd become aware of those facts she wouldn't have cared, but in her state she did not even think about them. She did not think at all. She just acted, doing the only thing that could give her even a shred of hope.

Celestia reached into her heart, and everything she found there she poured out towards her sister. And she prayed it would work, without even knowing what she was praying to. Maybe to Harmony, maybe to Chaos, maybe to the creature in Canterlot that had wrought so much devastation upon their lives and yet cursed and gifted her with the only thing that gave her a spark of hope to hold on to in that moment. A glow like amber spread from her chest to Luna's, and Celestia prayed for her through her sobs and tears.