Selene Embers

by AFanaticRabbit

Chapter 2: Theory

The first thing Luna did the following morning was bury her muzzle into an encyclopedia. While there weren’t a great many, and they lacked in details, Star Swirl’s penned collection was a great place to start for any new study subject, as much as Luna loathed to admit it.

It was also rather light on the details of dreams and sleep.

What it did have were preliminary notes on nations to the south. Sparse city states in jungles and deserts and savannah, and mentions of Pegasi and their unique magics of the region they were often reluctant to share.

Later, Luna hurried back and forth, scouring the shelves of the castle’s impressive library for anything on pegasi. She skipped over military strategy and tactics and instead focused on treatises and tomes on their magic. She was already passingly familiar with most given her heritage, but she could always check.

When she had scanned them all, finding only books on flight and weather and more strategy and tactics, she turned at last to the folktales and fairy tales of the pegasi in a desperate last bid to find anything at all.

She spent hours devouring the words in her chosen selection as the sun rose over the horizon. With the great library’s doors open, the beams of light came in through the windows of the corridor and bathed Luna in warmth. She lifted her head, a blush creeping across her cheeks, then spared a few moments to look to the west and do her duty of lowering the moon in turn.

She didn’t turn back immediately. Instead she looked at the distant, fading twilight, the last specks of stars fading away to the growing pink and blue of the day. A sigh passed her lips, and she turned back east and nearly caught a mouthful of beard.

“Why are you up so early?” Star Swirl asked. He wasn’t in fact close enough Luna could taste him, but despite his age and diminutive stature, he still filled the room before her. “You’re normally still in bed by this hour.”

“I…” Luna swallowed, caught off guard by her teacher. He always had a way of making her feel like a schoolfilly, even if he was now her subject. “I was simply curious and wanted to do some reading on…” She glanced at her current book, lifting the cover to check the topic and author. “...Astor and the Platinum Sword, and Other Assorted Fairy Tales by Ser… Oh, hm. Must be a pseudonym.”

She grimaced inwardly when Star Swirl’s first response was to raise an eyebrow. “Even as a full grown mare and a ruler, you are an odd child,” he said a moment later. Luna’s shoulders relaxed, and he chuckled at her. “That doesn’t explain the rest of these books. I know somepony bit by a research bugbear when I see it. Out with it.”

Luna’s shoulders tensed again and she chewed on her lip. Thus far she had escaped his ire with her recent nightly escapades, but something nagged at her. She wasn’t sure what she needed: a name, a subject, something to work with.

Luna sighed and shut her book. “I have been practicing dream magic,” she said simply.

Star Swirl remained quiet and looked away. From his squinted eyes and the way he stroked his beard, she assumed he was looking inward, not to a specific aisle.

“That is not a subject I am familiar with,” said Star Swirl. “Certainly not one I have written about. However did you discover it?”

“By chance,” said Luna. “The same way Sister and I discovered our talent for the sun and moon, in a way. I’ve come to the conclusion it is part of my duty, my destiny.” Star Swirl turned to her, silent and patient, giving her space to talk. She looked aside, thinking over her next words. “I can enter the dreams of sleeping ponies. I can chase away their fears. I know not what that means down the road, but it feels right.”

“You mean you have already put it to use?” asked Star Swirl. Luna nodded, and he chuckled again. “Well, it seems some of my lessons have sunk in after all, and it sounds to me as if you have been doing this for some time. I shan’t ask why you have kept it from me, but why you have chosen now to begin studying it.”

Luna’s cheeks burned as she pictured the mare from the night before, but she kept herself steady with a deep breath that she kept hidden with years of practice. She reckoned Star Swirl noticed it anyway. “I am not the only one capable of it. I encountered another pony, a pegasus mare of peach colour. I thought mayhaps there would be references to such magic in pegasi folklore—”

“Somnambula,” Star Swirl said, and Luna shut her jaw with a click of her teeth.

“Pardon?”

Star Swirl chuckled again, waving a hoof at Luna. “An acquaintance of mine, former or current advisor of Prince Hisan to the south though I can’t remember which. Green mane and… Was it violet or rose-colored eyes?”

“Violet,” Luna muttered. “And she spoke the language, seemingly she was from the region…”

Star Swirl nodded. “While I can’t be entirely certain, It stands like it was her you met.” He hummed, and resumed stroking his beard. “It’s a wonder she never shared it with me, but perhaps you were right to assume it is something only pegasi—and alicorns—can do.” A low, gurgling noise made Star Swirl frown. “That is something to ponder over on a full stomach. Will you join me, Luna?”

“No.” Luna shook her head and rose to her hooves. “I think I will do some further reading. Did Somnambula”—the name made her tongue tingle, and she failed to hide a smile—”put much to paper?”

Star Swirl paused for a moment, then nodded. “You know my system. Nine-hundred-twenty and onward.” He then checked the pile of books once more before turning around. “I suggest you check section two-hundred for philosophy and dreams too. She never wrote anything on the subject, but it might help.”

Luna’s smile wobbled, and she nodded in return. “Thank you, Star Swirl. Enjoy your breakfast.” With that, she turned and disappeared further into the library, tasting the name on her tongue and lips and leaving Star Swirl to tend to his stomach alone.

Much of the rest of Luna’s day went by in a blur. Knowing the name of the ember she had chased kept Luna busy enough now she had her words to bury herself beneath. While it was frustrating that the books did not focus on magic itself, she found the words therein enrapturing.

They were an overview of Somnambula’s life, as an advisor and nightly warden of Prince Hisan and what those duties entailed, and even an overview of her time in a group of adventurers alongside Star Swirl.

At some point during her reading, she had missed Star Swirl leaving on some important errand. At some point a servant brought her food unprompted, which led to the pony scampering off as Luna glowered at them, though she was grateful for the fruit and bread. At some point Celestia had interrupted Luna to remind her of her public duty, and Luna complied, apologising profusely to her sister.

Eventually Luna caught herself staring at a candle, the light of which she had been reading by for the past hour or so. She slowly blinked and held back a yawn, then tried to resume her reading. A moment later, she was staring at the candle again, and again she tried to continue reading. The third time she blinked, the candle was replaced with a grinning, peach coated mare.

Luna grinned. “Somnambula.”

Somnambula chuckled, and Luna enjoyed the saccharine noise.

“I hadn’t expected you to learn my name so soon, little moth,” Somnambula said as she sat back. While Luna recognised they were still in the library, the door behind Somnambula opened straight to the everfree rather than to a corridor.

“I am afraid Star Swirl had to spoil that for me.” Luna stood up and stretched her back and wings, before bowing her head and shoulders. “I must apologise for also spoiling thy secret to him.”

Somnambula made a gesture and a rude sound, waving Luna off with a hoof. “That stallion has a million secrets of his own, and I know half of them. I only kept this from him because he hadn’t asked, though I suppose I ought to expect a letter from him in the near future.”

Luna rolled her eyes as she sat back down, but she retained her smile and laughed. The two sat there for a few moments, looking to one another, while the sounds of the night, of chirping crickets and distant owl calls, drifted through the library. Loathe as she was to do it, Luna broke that quiet with an inward breath, and Somnambula broke it with words.

“You’re about to ask how I came so quick,” said Somnambula. Luna paused, then shut her mouth and nodded. “Well, that’s a simple answer: You are so bright here, not that you would know it.”

Luna raised an eyebrow. “Whatever do you mean?”

“You are like a child, so curious and proud about some new concept you’ve grasped so firmly.” Somnambula laughed and rested her head in her hooves, squishing up her cheeks. “It is adorable.”

Somnambula straightened herself again. “But to answer, I’ll present another question: what did I look like when we first met?”

An image of a tiny, distant mote flitted through Luna’s mind. “Like a fire’s ember, sailing through the sky. Yet… ‘Twere small, exactly like an ember. I could have mistaken thou for a star.”

Somnambula nodded. “Indeed. Many dreamwalkers—not that we are many—appear exactly so. We are small, inobtrusive, like the spirits of a flame. But you are an incredibly bright little star. It was simple enough to find your light and follow it, even as it winked in and out.”

A moment passed, then Luna groaned and dropped her head on the table with a thud. “Stars above, I fell asleep in the library.”

Somnambula’s expression flattened. “Is that a bad thing?”

“It is not proper,” Luna answered, bringing her head back up. “I am a monarch, not some child. I cannot wait for my parents or servants to carry me to my chambers; that is my own responsibility.”

Somnambula snorted, and Luna frowned. “Maybe I could come tuck you in, little moth.”

Luna’s cheeks burned and the urge to headbutt the table grew inside of her. “Why do you keep calling me that?”

Somnambula didn’t answer. She just stood, looking to the night behind her. “That is the Everfree Forest, no?”

After a pause, Luna nodded. “Yes,” she said. “The castle is situated within.”.

Somnambula started toward the door. “Come. I haven’t been to the Everfree in some time.”

Luna tilted her head. “This Everfree is not real.”

“Maybe,” said Somnambula, “but your memories are. I want to see what you think of this wild spit of land.” Somnambula lifted off the ground and drifted backward, beaming at Luna. In spite of the darkness, she was like a light leaving the library, and Luna felt compelled to follow.

The difference in the air between the library and the night beyond was striking. Luna knew it ought to be colder as they were passing into autumn, but the breeze was refreshing, not chilling. Below her the forest blurred into dim, barely visible greens and browns, a thick rooftop of leaves and branches, but here and there she spotted breaks where the road led to and through a nearby village. None of it made much real sense, and as she skirted the trees, she caught missing details, trees simply blurring together like a lazy brush stroke.

She looked up at the night sky, and was met with a different view. The stars were all exactly where she expected them, while the moon hung high and unnaturally large. More brush strokes painted the firmament as a colourful wash of blues and purples, some streaks light enough it looked as though the painter had splashed milk across the canvas. It was inaccurate, in a way, but more real than the real night sky. Every now and then shooting stars skimmed the atmosphere above and it all drew her eyes to the one pink star whizzing ahead of her in the treetops, in the direction of Mount Avalon.

It occurred to Luna as she flew that she wasn’t simply dreaming. She was experiencing it as a place, somewhere she could visit, and vague references to lucid dreamers in the denser, more boring books of the day came to mind.

She grinned as an idea formed, and a moment later that distant mountain was now touching the Everfree. The two mares approached the peak, though Somnambula appeared to falter, allowing Luna to catch up to her, then pass to the mountaintop where she settled. It wasn’t flat, but it was stable enough Luna felt confident standing there, waiting for Somnambula to follow.

When the pegasus landed, she had eyes only for Luna, staring up at her with what the princess assumed was wonder. It tickled a part of her brain, and she held her head a little higher, smug at the unspoken praise.

“That was impressive,” said Somnambula a moment later, her cheer returning to her face.

Luna nodded and politely bowed her head, before angling it differently to look down toward a town beneath. White stone and colourful rooftops bordered narrow streets that were practically carved into the mountainside, while the odd buildings to the outskirts were made of the same solid grey as the mountain itself. Somnambula followed her gaze, and the pair sat down on the cool rock.

“That is Canterlot, no?” asked Somnambula, and Luna nodded again.

“High on the side of a mountain with only one road in and out of the town. Safe and secure and easy to defend.” Luna glanced at Somnambula, who playfully stuck out her tongue.

“So that is what sits in your pretty head other than me? Strategy and tactics?”

With a laugh, Luna threw back her head. “It takes up a lot, but no. Not now, I suppose.” She sighed and pointed to the roads with a hoof, drawing a straight line from the start of the town to its largest building, a keep with rounded cap roofs. A few lights and dots wandered the larger road. “I also happen to think the town is rather pretty, especially at night. It is quiet, but not silent, with ponies still walking the streets even now.”

“They enjoy your night.” Somnambula stood and placed herself before Luna, and the princess found herself looking anywhere but at the mare.

“‘Tis not my night.” A hoof gently turned Luna’s head to look at Somnambula, into her violet eyes. It left Luna’s cheek feeling fuzzy.

“The night may have been around before you, but it is yours now to bring, to watch over and to care for.”

Luna leaned forward, pressing Somnambula’s hoof into her cheek. She brought her height into her movement, placing herself just above Somnambula while still sitting on her haunches. No breath was felt, no scents to pick up on, but Luna felt the pure presence of Somnambula in front of her. The warmth without heat, a tantalising light.

“I am glad to now have someone to share it with,” Luna said at last, breaking the silence.