So Be It
I was terrified, that first time...
I had been... near her, before, of course. Intimately. That was inevitable, really — don't you think? It was... well, uninteresting, I suppose, might be the word. There was a moment, I took a chance, and...
Anyways, that's not important right now. This...and everything that followed...was different.
I felt the urgent summons, in the middle of the night—awoken by the desperate tug towards the distant palace. At once, faithful as ever, I was by her side...
She had been crying. Hard. Her eyes were wild and red, her face a miserable wreck—and this is the Princess! Can you even imagine seeing her like that?
It's become familiar to me, but...well....that's the point, really. To me, and nobody else.
“Twilight, I...” she mumbled, between sobs.
I tried to smile through my mind-numbing fear. I think asked, “What is it...?”
She held my gaze, for a time...and then she told me about the arrests.
I knew, of course. Had known. Well not, knew, as I know now, but...
Equestria is a paradise, a utopia—but only because the law is the law, unquestioned and unquestionable. Unyielding—just like her. Everyone laughs when I get really, really strict and organized, but it's a habit learned long ago from someone who is organizing more than a library. So even as a girl, learning magic from her, I'd heard talk of rebels, and dissidents...the successful arrests, and the arrests that went...poorly.
I guess I always hoped she regretted them, trusted that she did...no, to be more honest, I tried not to think about it. In my heart-of-hearts, I was always secretly refusing to believe it true that anyone would stand up against her...more fool me. I didn't even think why they might do so...it seemed...
Pointless.
Why would I think otherwise? I was so happy, doing whatever she asked.
Having lived...away from her...I think I understand a little better now.
But there, confronted with her miserable confession, I was struck dumb by a little snarl of terror, which lived deep in my heart, at seeing her weak, frightened and overcome.
And I was disgusted to hear her describe...what she'd done.
It became real for me, in that moment; I let myself realize the Princess as the venal tyrant that some people...myself now included...knew her to be, remorseful though she may be about it. The thing, the vital thing, about remorse is that you feel it after you’ve done something wrong...
I stood there, unable to move, or think. She sat on a windowsill, looking over her shoulder at me through miserable, red-rimmed eyes, and...she, who had once entranced me with her immortal beauty, seemed disgusting. The thought of even looking at her...I...I wanted to scream, or throw things...
How dare you do those sorts of things! How dare you let those rumors be true! How dare you not be, secretly, a better person than everyone suspected! How dare you not be...what I wanted to believe you were...
How dare you not be that beautiful creature who had so gently welcomed the desperate passion of a young, eager me in every possible way...
But I didn't say anything foolish like that, of course. Hideous, evil, vile though she may have been to me in that moment...I understood what she had called me there for.
“It's okay,” I lied, as I put my hand on her shoulder, shuddering as she clasped it with her own.
Kissing her, putting my lips to the mouth which had just confessed to me the tyranny its owner had committed, was like licking filth.
I remember even now wanting to wretch as her tongue—that foul, disgusting tongue which had just so thoroughly and permanently tainted the love I had for the Princess—slipped into my mouth and danced with my own.
I thought of her as she had once been, to me, as she took me—firmly, if not unpleasantly. Believe me when I say that what pleasure I received from the...act...was purely physical; I cannot pretend perfect control over my own body, and she...just touching her hand is physically intense, for me.
Imagine her kiss, or her...caresses. It's...it's...intense.
In the morning I left, with her quiet thanks, and returned to the Library.
Cried, cried, cried...I felt so wrong, and...I wasn’t so detached from it, then. My body’s perfect willingness to surrender to her touch had seemed like...approval, in that moment.
Anyways.
She summoned me again, about a season later.
Very similar circumstances: The call, in the night. My teleportation and arrival, finding her staring out her window out over Equestria, the lights of Canterlot Town like little candle flames spread before her.
“I could...I could put them all out, with a wave of my hand,” she said to me, distantly, apparently fascinated by the possibility. “Total darkness, for the city. And nobody would dare complain...”
The causal malice of this statement...sickened me. But I spoke cautiously, so as not to provoke her. “If it would amuse you to do so—”
She laughed. “Amuse me! Perhaps...but...” She turned away from the view in the window and smiled at me; I believe I did a good job of smiling back, for my part. “No, Twilight. It would do nothing but cause trouble, I think. No sense doing anything...without purpose...”
I nodded vaguely, unsure of what to say.
She sighed, and...sitting there, not really looking at me, told me about the illegal press and the subversive literature and how it had all burned—
You can imagine how happy I, the librarian, was to hear about pages kissed by flame.
Ashes, ashes. That was the flavor on her as I...as that night went on. Over her whole body—perfect as it really and truly is, a paragon of feminine beauty—was the flavor of burning, the stench of charcoal. Even in the heights of passion, as she looked down on me and I...reached my peak, I could only think of fire, the stench of cinders, and words being consumed so that none would be inspired to question her by them .
I hated her. I hated her that night and I punished her for what she'd done. I was rough. I was angry.
She loved it.
And so I returned to my library with her thanks.
I...counted the books, over and over again. It seemed strange, but...I needed to.
I felt...sure, after the count. Complete.
Cleansed, perhaps.
A month, then:
“...and they fought, Twilight. They ought not have...”
I took her hands in mine and kissed them. The tears she had been weeping into them stank of blood. I wept, too; it did not wash the invisible but all-too-real stain away from her perfect hands. Even licking them, desperately, didn't. So as those hands explored me that night, I knew myself to be wet with the life’s blood of braver souls than I; when she touched...me, with them, I was almost sick, rolling off the bed, warring with nausea.
She asked if I was alright.
I almost slapped her across the face.
Some vestige of self-control managed to turn it into a rough tackle at the last second, which pleased her, but...I had impulsively lashed out, my heart secretly hoping that beautiful, noble jaw would have swung and twisted so far that her neck would have snapped. The thought of that sudden crack-pop made me...
It excited me, in that moment.
I can say that, now...but at the time my hatred for her flared, since I felt then that even the thought of harming her, punishing her for the...the...the evil, was a...corruption.
But I said nothing. Betrayed nothing of this.
A month later:
“It will all be over soon enough, once the heart of the matter is cut out...”
I bit down on her neck, hard, as I touched her, and tasted her blood. Not a heart carved from her tyrant's chest to please a rebel's fancy, perhaps, but still her vitae ran, rich and red, over that perfect alabaster skin.
A few weeks after that:
“...but the building won't be that hard to replace, I suppose...”
It wasn't, but nevertheless I was walking funny for a few days afterward.
And that following weekend:
“You, of all people, Twilight, know how dangerous that sort of spell research can be.”
So were the spells we used on each other that night, but we used them anyways.
Over, and over, and over...
And a month later. And then three days after that...then it went a whole week, before I spent four days in the palace, unseen by anyone except her. And then it was a month after that before I saw her again.
I should have stopped. I wanted to, every time, especially as our lips first met. I wanted to stop—push her away, tell her no, that I wasn't hers, that she was a tyrant and a murderer and a coward; if she sought absolution, she could find it somewhere besides between my legs.
But something in her eyes, some hunger, as she spoke of her crimes...not for me, but for something from me...
Once, I tried to resist.
Only once.
I pulled back from her embrace, and drew my lips from hers, which had so recently defiled themselves with the confession of putting yet another dissident group to flight, sometime in the distant past. The words, the rejection, the hate...it all came roaring up from inside me, like lava, burning to erupt in that face which was at once so beautiful and so hateful.
My hands, which had been resting on her magnificent chest, clenched into fists, bunching the bare gossamer gown she wore up in my fierce grasp...
I must have had such...fury...in my eyes; they seemed to throb. Maybe I was summoning magic, I don't remember clearly.
She knew. She knew she knew she knew.
If she had said anything just then, I swear that one of us would have died. But no, the Princess just wore her expression open on her face...and my will to resist...
She was terrified.
Hurt, yes. Suppressing anger, yes. Humiliated and confused, yes.
But terrified, above all of those.
I realized I could hurt her, then. I ached to hurt her, to see her face, that beautiful, radiant face screw up in anguish, be hidden from me in her hands for a moment as tears surged in those perfect eyes. I wanted this despite knowing all too well that the face that looked up from those hands would be white-hot with rage, and my death would almost certainly follow...eventually.
In that moment...I must confess...my mind flirted with the idea that this would be a sort of freedom from this hell. From going about my life, day to day, smiling with everyone else...and then going, from time to time, to be touched by her, with the hands that daily wore the iron fists to which those smiles owed absolute obedience.
But even in terror, vulnerability, she was...
Spectacularly beautiful. Even in her agony.
“I...love you,” I said.
I don't know why.
No, that's...not, that's too easy...
I know why I said it, of course; it's because...I love her. So much.
So, so much.
I always have.
I still do, even after all of this—no, because of all of this. Do you think I could hate her that much or that thoroughly, if I was not so deeply, deeply betrayed? If I wasn't torn by how much her pain moved me, despite the fact that she wept over evils she had intentionally, deliberately committed in the uttermost sobriety?
What I don't know is why I said it at the time.
I mean, do you think she was happy to hear that? She was incensed. Beside herself with fury and humiliation.
What we were doing, then...it was...it was a ritual. I realize that now. She didn't want to be loved in that moment. Nothing that had happened was about love. It was about...no, it wasn't even comfort she was looking for. It was the mental equivalent of flushing her mouth with something strong-tasting after being sick.
“How...no. No. Go, now, Twilight, before I—”
“Before you what?” I snapped. “Before you imprison me? Or burn me, too? Who will you confess the murder of Twilight Sparkle to?”
Did ice grow on the walls? I wouldn't be surprised if it had.
“My sister, perhaps—”
The desperate, careless courage of someone who no longer cares whether they live or die burned hot in me, then. “Are her kisses as sweet as mine?”
Her eyes...if looks could kill...
“Get. Out.”
I did.
I went back to the Library. Cleaned the floor, re-sorted the books, polished the table. Chores, chores, chores. Shoulders tense, mind on the job. Busy, busy...busy.
Cheerilee dropped by, chatted, took her latest book, and left.
Dash came by...she wanted something, but I didn’t have it. Oh well.
Pinkie Pie brought me a pie.
I liked it. I remember liking it. My favorite.
I think.
I lay awake that night, half-hoping, half-fearing...
Lo and behold, I felt the summons.
Her faithful student, that's me.
The lights were out. She was alone, staring out the window again; the stars shone brightly in the sky, and I assume the lights of Canterlot Town were visible too, but beautiful as the Princess is she makes a better door than window, as Pinkie says.
“Twilight,” she said to me, not turning around, “I need this.”
No, you don't, I wanted to say. I really did. I wanted to challenge her...
“Yes,” I said.
Cowardice.
“Please...just...do this for me. Accept its necessity.”
There were no more words that night.
In the morning, as the sun rose above the horizon, I was awoken by hushed words in my ear:
“It wasn’t always like this.”
As soon as I’d heard them, they were gone, as if they’d never existed. Their absence, and the look in her eyes, served as my dismissal.
True silence came the next time she called me to her. She just looked at me and...well, she was already disrobed when I arrived. In a bit of a hurry, I think; she sent me away immediately afterwards. Don't know why. Don't care. It was quick and harsh and approximately as affectionate as being slapped.
I started to believe she hated me, and I think for awhile she did, just as I nursed my own hatred for her in return. I don't claim to totally understand her, but if she's anything like I suspect, it would have been easier for her if I had provoked her into... punishing me. However that would have gone.
But in one thing, perhaps, she was correct: this had become something of a need, for her.
Things were cool between us for a long, long time; nevertheless, I attended her need faithfully whenever she required me. I heard her sins, kissed her tears away, and washed the taste of tyranny from her with... with... me.
Her lips were still putrid for speaking her sins. Her body stank of burning books and words that would forever go unread. And her hands...her hands smeared every bare inch of me in blood.
Still I went to her, and kissed those vile lips, drank deep of that reeking flesh, and was touched by those hands, crimson though they were with the lifeblood of the defiant.
But things are different, now...
“I killed them, Twilight. I killed them all.”
She wanted to hurt me with this, though she too was wounded by it. She wanted me to be repulsed, and I was; I watched her lips warp and twist around the syllables and saw nothing there I had any wish to touch.
But that had been true every time I'd been here. She was seeing what of her would drive me away...drive everyone in Equestria away, through me. That was the point of all this. I was Equestria, in the arms of its princess.
So beautiful. So hateful.
I leaned in to kiss her. She embraced me, fiercely, as she does sometimes, and I—
I stopped, and met her eyes. “Does it really have to be...so harsh?”
She choked back the reflexive “Yes”, and looked at me, uncertainty alive in her eyes, for a moment. I could tell I was treading on mental territory she had herself only recently explored. Let herself explore.
“No,” she whispered, huskily. “It need not.”
I was terrified, that first time we made love to one another.
Terrified it was a dream, terrified it was a mistake, terrified it didn't mean what I thought it meant.
Terrified it would end.
But that fear, which only in some unimportant ways was the greatest one, was the only fear she...no, we indulged.
She did not command, or dominate, or direct, or control; we were just...together. In that, it was both meaningless, and the only thing that had any meaning at all...
She surrendered to me as I surrendered to her, willingly opening herself to whatever I chose to do, even if I had drawn a knife and plunged it into her heart. For the first time since this had begun, her kisses were honey, her body sweet-smelling, and her hands left no mark on me save those I desired.
She was very quiet afterward, but eventually she looked down at me, her pale skin bright in the moonlight. “You seem a little surprised that there is any gentleness left in me, Twilight,” she said.
But of course, it was not I who was surprised.
“No,” I replied, “Just grateful.”
She smiled, taking my hand in hers and bringing it gently to her lips.
Things are different. Things are changing, in the months since that night; between us, and in Equestria. Slowly, perhaps, but...it is only beginning, after all.
I will help the tyrant bear her sins, and she, in turn, will learn to stop sinning.
I am hers, body and soul; I have never truly pretended otherwise. If she needs me to be her redemption...
Though my body is flayed, my mind torn, my heart wounded unto death...
So be it.