//------------------------------//
// The Burden of Rule 
// Story: Mother of the Moon 
// by Noble Thought 
//------------------------------//

	Outside, Luna leaned against the railing, her forehooves tapping back and forth between two of the stone supports. The stars above marched their steady, predictable path across the sky.
 
Inside, Celestia lay next to Shining Light and watched her. The rare moment of close companionship with the father of her foal was at once touching and painful. Even with them hidden by darkened glass, there were still small proprieties that had to be observed. Shining Light did have duties of his own, and he had to at least have an alibi were his absence questioned.
 
“Shining Light, could you please see to the changing of the guard?” She didn’t want to ask him to leave, but if the shift change was coming and a guard not loyal to her were outside, scandal would be the least of her worries. There were enough whispers about her circling the pompous parties and quiet salt rooms of the rich and powerful. At least she had friends enough in those same rooms that the rumors reached her. Counting them as friends was probably not wise, but she had little choice.
 
“Of course.” Shining Light knew it as well as she did.
 
It was hard, letting him go, maybe to leave her chambers completely. But it was a necessary subterfuge. Rumors they might have been, but rumors could ruin a reputation as quickly as the truth. That the rumors were mostly true made no difference. It was for Luna’s sake, not her own, that she had to remain a sister.
 
She heard the click and snick of locks and bolts and relaxed. The sounds came from inside the room. She risked a glance, and saw his horn flicker and go out, the bolts on her door latched once more. Faintly, she heard the sound of humming from outside, a quiet tune that barely reached her ears.
 
“Velvet Shield is outside, and I’m ‘patrolling the grounds.’“ He sighed, ears lowered and glanced back at the door.
 
“How is her limp these days?”
 
“Getting better. Or worse. It depends on when I ask. She’s happy for the sedentary guard posts, but I think she misses the long patrols and the hard nights.”
 
Sometimes very hard. The unspoken thought lingered between them.
 
Celestia’s mind roamed back briefly to those hard marches by day and the uncertain safety of darkness at night. In those early days of the war, she’d been there alongside them, the Rising Star, apprentice to the great Star Swirl the Bearded, archunicorn of Cantercourt. But those days were long gone. She would likely never get to, or be forced to, endure such hardship again.
 
Shining Light’s muffled hoofsteps on the plush rug stopped too far from her.
 
Celestia brought herself back to the present and looked outside again at their daughter, then up at the sky.
 
Pegasi guards, not wearing the gold-trimmed, white barding of her personal guard, wove a tight perimeter patrol over the walls of the castle. Half of them would be eyes and ears for the Solarium, the other half for their own family, or city, spymasters.
 
“I hate this.” She looked aside to Shining and stretched a wing out to coax him closer, then guided him to her side, sidestep by sidestep until she could tuck the wing comfortably over his back.
 
“I know.” He drew down her muzzle with a gentle spell and kissed her, light, chaste, and lingering just long enough to rekindle the ember in her heart.
 
She broke away first and rubbed nose to nose before looking back at their daughter. Celestia would have given nearly everything back if she could just live a life of quiet peace with her daughter. But she could not, nor would she waste regrets. Nor would she abandon the ponies who looked to her for something so selfish.
 
“Do you regret anything?” The words slipped out of her mouth. This road again.
 
“Not one thing.” He bumped against her side. “Well, I do regret this morning’s coffee.” He made a face. “Honey Mead Hill makes great mead. But their coffee tastes like muddy water.”
 
“Heretic. Long live tea and ale!”
 
They shared a laugh that faded away too quickly, leaving the uncomfortable silence behind again.
 
“I wish I could hang it all and start over.” She looked out the window and nodded to Luna, prancing in a circle and singing something that Celestia couldn’t hear. She wanted to. “Just you and me and her, living a simple life. None of this.” She lifted her wings and looked to the mannequin standing in its corner, bedecked with the royal regalia. “Or any of that.” Though, the robes of office had assisted with masking her pregnancy. Perhaps she could learn to like them, given that they had made Luna’s birth more of a surprise, and allowed the mystery of her heritage to go mostly uncommented on. Not in public forums, anyway.
 
“I don’t wish that.” He sighed and leaned harder against her. “Do you remember when you were standing atop the hill in the shadow of the old temple? Just before you went wherever it was that you went?”
 
“I do.” She tightened her wing around him as the memories of the night when she’d been visited in her dreams and woken to face the future resurfaced to haunt her again. Shining Light had stood second watch.
 
It had been a hard night, and not just because of the rogue thunderstorm. Camping so close to where she’d been born, so close to where all of the things she’d known as a filly had been taken away in the sweeping rush of flood waters.
 
Apple Hollow, or what used to be Apple Hollow, was little more than another part of the plains by then. The memorial stone standing in the empty field where the town square had been was covered over with vines. Little else remained of the town: foundations, a stubborn bit of wall, a pile of rubble overgrown with grasses.
 
The ruins of the old temple to the Celestials still stood atop the high hill where a young Winter Rose had sheltered with the few survivors of the catastrophe. Its pillars had withstood centuries of neglect and another twenty years hadn’t done them any more harm than letting the grass creep in, slowly turning the pocked marble floor to gravel.
 
She’d found Shining Light standing in the lee of a pillar, sheltered from sight and driving rain. He turned to her as she approached, and they’d shared a light kiss.
 
She came back to the present and looked down at Shining Light. Twenty years had changed him significantly, but she could still see the once eager city guard turned somber soldier there.
 
“Do you remember what you told me?”
 
“Of course.” He was going to say it anyway. It was an old song and dance, that not quite argument, well rehearsed. She already knew where it would end.
 
“You told me that you would give your life to save the land. Well, you are.” He lifted the crown from its mannequin with a spell and settled it atop her head. “You are giving your life to make sure the land that we both love continues. You meant that you would die for it, but I want you to live for it.”
 
“It’s not easy.” She took the crown off and stared at the golden, jewel crusted shackle. She recognized it for what it was. She nevertheless set it back atop her head. Shackle or no, it was necessary.
 
“Nopony ever said it would be.”
 
They held close to each other while watching their daughter wait for the right time. Luna glanced back, almost directly at them, several times, but the magically darkened windows kept them hidden from her. Celestia wanted so much to walk out and raise the sun with her daughter, to just toss away the trappings of state, let the gossipmongers feast, let the rumors multiply like parasprites. Even if Luna thought she was her sister, it would have to be enough just to be close.
 
“She’d understand, you know.”
 
“Which? That I’m her mother, or the reason I’ve hidden it from her?”
 
“If you went out to teach her. It’s what a sister would do, and that’s what you do, isn’t it? You are a guide and teacher. That’s why you took your name, Celestia.”
 
“Don’t call me that. Not in private.” She rolled her eyes to catch a glimpse of the golden burden on her head. “I fell in love with you when I was still Summer Dawn. I’d still like to be your warm Summer, like I used to be.”
 
He sighed, shook his head, and smiled up at her. “I did fall in love with you then, but I fell in love with all of you. Who you were, who you are, and who you will become. My point still stands in any case. If I could change one thing about the way the war ended, I would have asked you to marry me the moment you set hoof within earshot.”
 
“I would have said yes.”
 
“I know.” He sighed, smile slipping away. He nodded to their daughter again. “She would understand why you haven’t told her. She has to know how much you love her. She already looks up to you as a sister. How far is it to...”
 
She glanced at him when he didn’t finish the thought. “It’s a long way from sister to mother, Shining.”
 
He grunted, but didn’t belabor the point, and only looked at her.
 
Outside, her child was sprawled out on her back, waiting for the right moment to raise the sun. Her hoof traced wide circles in the air, and Celestia recognized, in part, the forms of the spell she cast every morning. Pride warred with the ache in her heart.
 
A flight of pegasi passed by in the distance, a different group making a slow circuit of the castle walls.
 
“The heavens only know what they’ll think of her out there alone right now. The Solarium will be breaking fast with conjecture this morning. I can almost hear them now, prattling.” she sighed and shook her head.
 
Shining Light glanced at her, then at the pegasi in the distance. “That’s an interesting way of putting it.” He chuckled. “I wonder how much of a breakfast they’ll have with me being here.”
 
“Not much, I’m sure. How often do you ‘go on patrol’ and are nowhere to be found? For how long? That bread’s gone stale years ago.”
 
“It may be stale, but any soldier knows that you just need a little stew to make it palatable again.” Sighing, he tapped the ground. “Why would they worry about her, though? She’s your ‘sister.’ Doesn’t being family grant her some sort of exception?”
 
“Maybe. Maybe not.” That was the heart of her worry. “When their spies report back, what will they think? She’s almost nine, Shining.” Just saying it felt unbelievable. Not that long ago, she had been a newborn foal nestled under her wing. “Still sleeping in her sister’s bed to keep away the monsters, probably.”
 
“She’s still just a foal, Summer.”
 
“A foal? In appearance, yes, but half the nation thinks she’s a Celestial, ageless, wise beyond the appearance of age.” She snorted. “Most of them think that I never was Summer Dawn. Celestials aren’t supposed to fear anything. Celestials are meant to be perfect representations of the element they represent.” She snorted again and scraped at the rug with a hoof. “If they only knew the truth.”
 
“There may be some truth to that, Summer. But I didn’t fall in love with Celestia, Element of Hope.” His hoof settled atop hers, stopping its restless motion. “I fell in love with Summer Dawn, a strong willed mare who wouldn’t let the darkness catch hold of her heart the way it did for so many others. You brought hope to those around you just by being you, and there was nothing divine about you then.” He made a show of craning his neck to nibble under the crease between cheek and neck. “The only things that are different about you now are that you got a little taller, and grew some wings.”
 
She grunted noncommittally. “Not the only things.”
 
There was always the issue of her apparent immortality, something he always glossed over with a joke and a smile. Shining Light was showing all of his forty years while she still appeared to be in her forties, despite being nearly sixty.
 
She’d not aged a day in the almost twenty years since she returned from the ethereal place where the Celestials had given her the choices of futures: personal peace and happiness, or happiness and peace for her people. She would still have made the same choice, knowing what she did.
 
Seeming to sense her darker mood, he leaned against her, but let her think. That was the best thing about him: he didn’t try to fill silences with inane babble. Well, not the best thing. She nipped his torn ear, then tucked his head under her chin, holding him close. No, immortality wasn’t what she feared.
 
She’d come to terms with Shining Light’s death long ago. She’d thought him dead more than once during the war. Losing him would hurt, more than she wanted it to, but that pain was already familiar, and she refused to let it color the time she had left with him.
 
Harder to come to terms with was the political situation that kept her from openly being a doting sister. Worse, the potential for unrest that kept her from acknowledging Luna as her daughter. She did what she could to fulfill both the role of sister and mother, but she only had the one chance to get it right.
 
Have I been a good sister?
 
Outside, Luna was bobbing her head to the tune of the moon’s parting song, her horn glowing as she completed the spell of farewell on her own.
 
Summer’s heart soared with pride, and she wanted so much to rush out and scoop her up to show her how proud she was. Worry cropped up, dimming the glow of pride in her heart.
 
Have I been a good mother?
 
His hoof found hers again. She couldn’t quite recall how many times he’d sat beside her, watching an empty balcony before the sunrise, her thinking those exact thoughts. The old song and dance, the old not quite argument, ended almost as it always did.
 
“Of course you have, Summer. You’ve done the best you could.”
 
“Have I? She barely knows me.” Her smile, already waning, slipped away.
 
“She knows you. Probably better than you think. She’s a sneaky filly, and she understands secrets. She’ll understand that you were protecting her.”
 
Silence fell again, but like a warm blanket. Outside, Luna stilled her hoof waving and appeared to nap, but the little flutters of her wings and tail told Celestia otherwise. For long minutes, they watched her, and the ache in Celestia’s heart only grew stronger the longer she stood there.
 
Shining Light’s body under her wing told a similar story. Small sighs too quiet for her to hear, the way his shoulders tensed, then relaxed and tensed again.
 
“I should go.” Shining Light stood and shook his head. “I’d rather not give the Solarium anything more to eat, even if it is just stale bread. The more I am ‘on patrol’ without anypony else seeing me...” He let the implication hang in the air.
 
She didn’t let go of her hold on him completely, but her wing loosened over his back. The heat of him close felt good against its cup, but he was right. The more he waited, the more likely it was that somepony would come looking for him.
 
“Thank you for spending the morning with me, Shining.”
 
He smiled and looked up at her, then nodded back to Luna, still laying out on the balcony. “I would like, just once, to hear her call me dad.” He sighed. “It’s selfish, I know.”
 
“Not selfish. You’re her father, Shining. Every father should be able to love their children.” Tears blurred her vision. “You’re a Celestial’s damned hero, Shining. You’ve more than earned the right to be a little selfish.”
 
He shook his head. “Heroes don’t get to be selfish. I’d rather just be Shining Light, captain of the Royal Guard. Then I can be selfish.” He stood and made his way to the door, but stopped before he opened it. “You’re not a hero either, Summer. You’re the mare I love.”
 
“Shining...”
 
“I’m tired of the subterfuge, Summer, but I know why we need to do it.”
 
“Do we? Completely?” She stood and turned to face him. “You’re right. I’m not a hero. I want to be selfish. I want to hold my daughter close and never let her go. I want to announce to the world that she’s ours.”
 
He whispered something to Velvet Shield, then stepped back inside, closing the door and relocking it.
 
Outside, Velvet Shield began to hum a jaunty tune that Celestia could have sworn came from a bawdy ballad she’d heard too long ago.
 
“I thought, with the castle getting close to waking up, maybe we could use a little more privacy.” He nodded towards the door, a flush in his ears. “I wish she’d chosen something other than Star Swirl’s favorite drinking song.”
 
“So that’s where I remember it from.” She laughed and met him again in front of the bank of windows. Luna was stirring again on the balcony, kicking her hind legs. The sun would have to come up soon.
 
In a more serious tone, she continued. “We need to talk about this. Because you’re right, Shining. It’s not just selfishness, though. Imagine if the truth were to come out later. The damage that it would do to Luna. She might never speak to me again.” She shook her head and sat, but didn’t offer a wing for him again.
 
He sat beside her and leaned up close. “I’d rather she not face that. If one of your enemies in the Solarium got a hold of your foal book—”
 
“They won’t.”
 
“If they did,” he continued in a still calm voice, “half the nation would stand with you, and the other half would be cheering because they love you. You may be well insulated against the opinion of the common pony up here, but we guards are not. I get free drinks at the tavern most nights because I’m the captain of Celestia’s guard. You mean more to the common pony than I think you realize.”
 
“It’s not the common pony I’m worried about. They don’t control the flow of trade or handle relations with our neighbors. The members of the Solarium do. I hate that I had to make that concession, but at the time it was the only way. They would have demanded that I marry from within their ranks if I hadn’t given them more power, and used my marriage as a bridle with which to guide my actions. And that, aside from personal feelings, would have only divided the nation more.”
 
He grunted and shook his head. “I’m glad you’re the princess and not me. I was there for half the negotiations and I still barely grasp the reasons for half of what you gave them.”
 
She laughed. “You would make a very odd looking princess, Shining.”
 
He laughed with her, but quieted quickly with a glance at the door. Velvet’s humming had shifted to singing badly off key, and some of the very ribald lyrics began to filter through the door. As soon as their laughter died down and stayed quiet, the singing returned to humming.
 
“What would change, if we were to tell her? Could we be more open? With her, at least.” Shining nodded towards Luna.
 
“They would latch onto the change in behavior and put us under even more scrutiny. Even if we were perfectly behaved, lies are easy to manufacture and with the right seasoning they taste like the truth to any who willingly dines at their table.”
 
“Who would dine with them? You have a lot of clout.”
 
“The cities that look to me as their sovereign wouldn’t. But those who listen to members of the Solarium would gladly pay for a feast of lies.” Shaking her head, Summer sighed. “Trade would begin to suffer, old feuds between cities would get scraped open. I’m afraid that might only be the beginning.”
 
“And this is why I hate politics.”
 
“It’s necessary.”
 
“Are they, though?” He shook his head. “Forgive a soldier his bluntness, but they seem to do more harm than good.”
 
She shook her head. Not all of them were that bad. Some were sympathetic, but she’d bucked tradition clean out the window, along with a goodly portion of their sovereignty. Those old families, the ones with hooves cannon deep in wealth and power, hadn’t liked it one bit.
 
But it’d been necessary. Half the nation had been devastated, populations decimated or worse by famine and disease, crops burned or spoilt. By contrast, the eldritch horrors had done relatively little direct damage. She’d cajoled, rallied, promised, and sacrificed to bring the nation together.
 
But never threatened.
 
“They are necessary. Everything was. Our history is so twisted, Shining. All the way back to the founding and beyond.” She swept her free wing through the space in front of her. “Ties between families lay like a gryphon’s net, knotted all together and ready to trap any who blunder the wrong direction. It’s a part of our strength, those ties, but also our weakness.”
 
Shining Light sat silent, looking at his daughter. He didn’t reply to her immediately, and she was glad for that. Blunt soldier he might be sometimes, but he was not without his brains.
 
“I know you’re right,” he said finally. “I know it because when I look at her, I can feel the tie between us. It might be shallower for them, but no less important for that.” He fell silent again and stroked her hoof with his. “Sometimes, when she sneaks into the barracks, I just want to treat her like a daughter, and not as a curious filly who captured the heart of an old soldier. The veterans would understand. Half of them as much as know I’m her father. But the new guards wouldn’t. It’d be across the city faster than a pegasus with her tail on fire.”
 
“Rumor.”
 
“Gospel truth, to hear the common pony talk. There would be rejoicing in the streets, ponies declaring a national holiday, and my hoof would wear down to a nub for all the hoof bumps. Oh, scoff all you want, but I’d be in a cart for a month, unable to walk. Just the guards alone would spend a week congratulating my ‘new’ fatherhood status.”
 
Summer laughed and tapped his hoof. “As much as I value the common pony and the guards, they are not the ones holding the purse strings for the kingdom, or the keys to the border. Nor are they the ones I am worried about accepting us as a family.”
 
“Family.” Shining Light smiled and leaned against her. “I would like that. I know, it’s selfish. But I want her to know I’m her father. I want to be able to show my affection for her without reserve. I want to be selfish and treat her like a proper father should.”
 
“I know. So do I. We still need to tell her first.” Summer glanced outside where Luna was just starting to focus on the horizon. “Celestials only know how she’ll take it.”
 
“She loves you. Focus on how much you love her, not on how much it hurt to keep it from her.” He set his hoof atop hers and leaned in close. “Are we really going to tell her?”
 
Celestia chewed her lip, and looked aside. A lot of uncertainties remained, more than she cared to think about, but she finally nodded. “She deserves to know, outside of our own desires.” Worry lingered, gnawing at her. “I’m scared, Shining. What if she doesn’t accept me as her mother?” She leaned into him, her wing sliding more around him.
 
“She will. She already loves you so much. You didn’t hear her out there when she asked me to distract you. Summer, she would be ecstatic. Daughters can be closer to their mothers than sisters can. Don’t you think she would love to be closer to you?”
 
And so would I. “But not in public. The Solarium would have a feast of supposition and rumor after this.” She caught herself going down the same train of thought again, the same path of arguments that would inevitably lead back to this same situation. Instead she stamped a hoof, and snorted. “I say let them feast. Let them choke on it. They daren’t do more than prattle and sashay around what they want to say without proof.”
 
She stood up and looked down at Shining Light. “I’m going to tell her. And you’re going to be there with me.”
 
But first, there was the sun to raise, and a daughter to raise it with.
 
Then, her daughter had a father and mother to greet for the first time.