• Published 28th May 2021
  • 1,194 Views, 26 Comments

Sun and Daughter - brokenimage321



Luster Dawn returns home to spend Hearth's Warming with her mother--who is VERY curious to hear how her former student is doing.

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Chapter 1

“Heya Ellie, almost packed?”

Luster Dawn rolled her eyes. Almost packed. She’d been almost packed for two weeks now. No reason to wait until the last minute.

“Yes, Grace,” she said, almost-patiently. “I’m almost packed.” She shut the lid of her wheeled trunk, the lock clicking loud enough for even Grace to hear. “And done,” she said.

“Woah,” Grace replied, impressed. “Good timing.” She had the decency to wait about five seconds before she asked the question that was already hanging in the air. “Wanna help me pack?” she asked.

Luster grimaced to herself, then turned to face Grace, forcing a smile just like she’d practiced.

Grace--full name Graciela--was Luster’s young, griffon roommate at the School of Friendship. Grace, as a consequence of her own upbringing, had a thing for nicknames. Within fifteen minutes of meeting Luster, Grace had already saddled her with “El-Dee,” which morphed into “Big Elle,” which she simplified to “Ellie” before much longer. Luster had, in turn, made a point of calling her “Graciela,” putting extra edge in her voice to make it clear that she would prefer they used full-and-proper names. Or she had, at least until Amber, their Crystal Pony RA, pulled her aside and told her that Grace had complained that her roommate was creating an unnecessarily hostile living environment.

That’s what Luster assumed she’d said, at least. Amber had been much more diplomatic.

“Sorry,” Luster lied, lifting her trunk and wheeling it towards the door. “Can’t. Gotta make it to the train.”

“Aw, really?” Grace said, as irritatingly cheerful as ever. “It’s still so early! Can’t you spare just ten minutes?”

Luster very nearly sniffed in disdain. With the way she kept her half of the room, Grace was going to need a great deal more than ten minutes to get her things in order.

“Nope,” Luster lied again. “I have an early train. Got a long way to go.”

Luster had been hoping that would be enough to finally get Grace to shut up, but she just grinned wider--quite a feat for one saddled with a beak.

“Where ya goin’?” she asked. “Manehattan? Whinnyapolis? Vanhoover? Or are you gonna spend Hearth’s Warming in Mexicolt?” she added, waggling her eyebrows.

Luster actually did sniff this time. “I’m headed home,” she said, a note of disdain in her voice.

“And where’s that?”

“Bobsled,” Luster snapped, before she could stop herself.

That finally put a dent in Grace’s exuberance. “Bobsled?” she repeated. “Where’s that?”

Luster sighed to herself. “Out west,” she admitted. “Up in the mountains. Ski country.”

“Ooh!” Grace said, excitedly clapping her foreclaws together. “Ski country? Do you ski a lot, Ellie?”

Luster closed her eyes and took a deep, trembling breath. Unbidden, the words of Professor Fluttershy swam into her mind:

If you find yourself getting upset, she had said, try counting to ten. That will give you a little time to calm down and think before you do something you’re going to regret...

Luster paused, giving herself just enough time to think onetwothreefourfivesixseveneightnineTEN before continuing.

“No,” she said simply.

“Snowboard?” Grace asked insistently.

Luster, despite herself, gritted her teeth. “No,” she managed.

“Do ya go tubin’, at lea—?”

Luster whirled to face her, fire in her eyes. Grace jerked back in surprise.

“I stay at home,” she spat, “curled up by the fireplace with a nice book.” She snorted derisively. “It’s what Mom and I have always done.”

She glared at Grace, her blood boiling. Almost as a reflex, she began counting again--One, Two, Three--

“Your mom?” Grace asked curiously. “You’ve never mentioned your mom before.”

And, at that instant, Luster’s anger went out as suddenly as if she had plunged it in a bucket of ice water. No, she had very deliberately not mentioned her mother before. She had agreed--she had sworn--she wouldn’t. She had done so well all semester--and to screw it all up now—

Luster swallowed her panic, then forced a shaky smile.

“Yeah,” she said, her voice trembling. “Me and Mom. No biggie.”

Use a smile and a little slang to put other ponies at ease, Professor Pinkie Pie-Sandwich had said.

Grace cocked her head. “What about your dad?” she asked. “Does he stay inside, too?”

Luster shook her head. “I don’t have a dad,” she said.

Use honesty to gain trust. Professor Applejack.

“You don’t?” Grace asked, perplexed. “They divorced, or—?”

“Nope,” Luster said.

“But—”

Before Grace could get her question out, Luster picked up her trunk again, then pulled open the door to their dorm.

“Gotta run, Grace!” Luster called over her shoulder. “I’ll talk to you after break!”

It was almost worth it to see Grace’s expression of dismayed confusion as she slammed the door in her face.

* * *

With apologies to Professor Applejack, Luster had only been a little dishonest. Yes, she had a long way to go. Yes, she had to take the train. But the train wasn’t due to leave for at least another two hours.

Luster spent some time just wandering around Ponyville. She’d heard it had been just a little agrarian hamlet when Princess Twilight had first arrived, but she had a hard time believing it. The historical downtown section looked the same as in the history books, but the rest of the town had sprawled out into a thriving suburb, composed of the sort of deceptively small-town neighborhoods that hosted thousands of creatures at a time. Many of the residents worked at the School of Friendship, or in related industries like booksellers and mail services. Many others worked in Canterlot and commuted via the train. And some, it seemed, just wanted to live where it had happened--where Princess Twilight had grown into the mare that would one day take the throne.

As Luster made her way through town, she heaved a sigh. She had to admit that Grace wasn’t all that bad of a roommate. Sometimes, she Luster could almost forget she was there. It was just that Luster liked things a certain way, and Grace… didn’t. It had been just Luster and Mom for her entire childhood, and Mom had done a pretty good job of respecting her boundaries. To suddenly have to share a room--and to share a room with somegriff who had never even heard of boundaries in the first place--was, well, hard.

Finally, when she could delay no longer, Luster made her way to the train depot. When she arrived, there were so many other Friendship students already waiting that few of them noticed her arriving. Even fewer nodded or waved their greetings.

Exactly the way she liked it.

After Luster had finally squeezed her way onto the train, for Canterlot and Points Northward, she found it was crowded, hot, noisy, and stank of a thousand different body odors. But as the train wound its way north, stopping first at Canterlot, then turning northwest towards Fillydelphia, Chicoltgo, and Whinnyapolis, it shed more and more passengers with each stop. Finally, as the train began its climb into the mountains, Luster was alone. She just smiled to herself, snuggled deeper into her seat, and turned another page of her book.

Princess Twilight set the sun, raised it again, then let it dip down towards the horizon before the conductor called out, “Next stop, Bobsled Station! Next stop, Bobsled!”

By that point, Luster had been joined by a couple tourists, who, somehow, had decided that some time on the slopes was much more important than any mere holiday. Luster would have disliked them even if she didn’t consider herself a townie. They were too loud, and too nosy, and refused to leave ponies like her in peace. But, she thought to herself as she tucked her book away, they were the reason that Bobsled even existed, so she supposed she could tolerate them a little.

Luster was already standing by the exit as the train rolled to a stop. She stepped smartly off the train and, took a deep breath, filling her lungs with cool mountain air, heavy with the scent of snow, of woodsmoke, and the hundred other things that made Bobsled home. Then, dragging her trunk along behind her, she started her walk home.

Contrary to what the pamphlets would have you believe, Bobsled was actually a pretty small town. Most of the tourists stayed at the ski lodges, after all, and only came into town for last-minute supplies or a quick, off-resort meal. That meant that it wasn’t too much trouble for Luster to make her way home with minimal detours. Oh, it would be nice to check in on Filbert and Hazel, or get a fresh blueberry muffin or a slice of pizza at Redbrick’s, but she’d just as soon do that with Mom. She’d known most of these ponies her entire life, but Mom was always better at dealing with others.

And so, before too long, Luster found herself trotting down her street. The homes here were nice, but not extravagant; comfortable, but not ostentatious. Of course, being a fifteen-minute trot from the ski lodges meant that they were ridiculously expensive, which meant, in turn, that the ponies who lived here tended to be rather snooty--but Luster didn’t mind. She was perfectly satisfied with her own company, thank you very much.

And there, halfway up the street, was home. It was one of those places that tried to look like a log cabin, but only just concealed that it was worth more than most ponies would see in their lives. It was set far back from the road, and so had a generous yard for making snow princesses and building snowponies. Big windows looked out in all directions, most coated with a silver film to keep nosy creatures from peeking in. A cheerful little plume of smoke rose from one of the stone chimneys, and, even from here, Luster could see lights on in the kitchen.

She trotted up the three front steps, drew her house key from her saddlebags, and unlocked the front door. She pushed the door open, and, without hesitation, called out, “Mom! I’m home!”

“Sunshine!” came the joyous cry. “Come on back! I’m in the kitchen.”

Luster dropped her trunk just inside the front door and practically sprinted back to the kitchen. And there she was, just as she remembered--Mom, wearing her favorite apron, levitating a tray of steaming cookies out of the oven.

Luster lunged and wrapped her arms around her mothers’ neck. She buried her nose in Mom’s shoulder and took a deep breath, filling her nostrils with scents of baking and gardening and woodsmoke and sewing and home.

“Missed you,” she murmured.

And Celestia, ex-Princess of the Sun and Former Ruler of Equestria, wrapped her arms around her daughter in return.

“Missed you, too,” she murmured back.


Celestia was no stranger to the physical act of love. Far from it, in fact. She’d had quite a few lovers in her time: a great number of stallions, a few mares, and twice, when she’d been feeling particularly self-destructive, a dragon just into adulthood. However, despite the hundreds she had taken to bed over the years, Luster remained her first and only foal.

Her foal. The words themselves were almost beyond belief.

When Celestia took the power to move the sun for herself, the magic, for reasons unclear to her, halted certain biological processes. She stopped aging, for one; she felt exactly the same at twenty-five as she did at two-hundred and fifty. She grew tired less often, too, letting her pull a cart, march in formation, or fly across the countryside for distances that would make grown stallions tremble. Even pain seemed to have less of a hold on her: more than once, she had survived injuries that would have driven other ponies mad from the agony alone with little more than a nasty bruise.

But, despite all the positives of being Princess, there was one drawback. A single curse that, at least for her, outweighed any boon.

Princess Celestia could not bear children.