Chapter 12: Twas a Beautiful Night

Princess Luna and I headed down to the guest wing to show my room I will be sleeping tonight. She walked to a door and led me into my room. "This is thy room for the night. Hope it is to thou's liking."

"This room is too much. Thank you for the hospitality."

"You're welcome. We shall take our leave."

"Where are you going?"

"We must get ready for night court."

"Do ponies come and discuss their problems with you?"

"Sadly none have come. We think they are still afraid of us because we were Nightmare Moon."

"That might be true. Give the ponies some time to get to know the real you. How about tonight, during night court, I will help you with bringing your speaking up to the current times. Would you like that?"

"But doesn't thou need thy sleep for tomorrow?"

"Oh, I will get my sleep also. I will just let my clone do it." I quickly performed the jutsu and another me showed up.

"Thou duplication is very impressive. We don't see any flaws."

"There shouldn't be. Typically a clone jutsu is just an illusion can't do much but distract your opponent. I can create shadow clones. They are physical copies. It does not matter who is the original. If anyone of me either releases the jutsu on their own or gets killed by the opponent, the other will still be me."

"We are impressed by how powerful that jutsu is. Which of thou will come with us?"

"I will!" One of me shouted faster than the other.

"Nuts, looks like I get to sleep then." The other me said.

He goes and hops into bed while the other one follows out of the room with Princess Luna. We made our way back to the throne room. Once inside, she made her way to the throne and sat on it. I went and stood at the bottom and then kneeled to her.

"Good evening Princess Luna. Would it please the court if you allow me the honor of teaching you the modern ways of speaking?" I said as I looked up to her.

She let out a slight chuckle, but quickly regains her composer. "Thou may Swift Blaze on two conditions." She said.

"Name them your Highness."

"First, thou shall do so in thy pony form to not scare any subject."

"I will Princess Luna."

"Second, thou shall call us Luna." She said with a smile on her face.

"As you wish, Luna." I said as I stood up and then transformed to my pony form.

We spent the first part of the night on volume control. We went over to know when to use the booming Canterlot Voice, how to talk in royal events, and how she can talk when with her friends. The next part of the night was to get her to stop referring her as 'we' instead of 'I'. That one is going to take a couple sessions to break the habit. The last thing we covered was some new ways of saying things to allow her to understand modern speaking.

"I think that will do tonight Luna. We have made some good progress." I said.

"We, I mean I, wish to thank you in helping me." Princess Luna said.

"You're welcome."

"Tell me Blaze, why are you helping me? Everypony else fears me for what I did as Nightmare Moon."

"It's true I know what happened based upon the first episodes of the show and I can somewhat relate."

"How's that?"

"You see, you felt lonely because no pony did anything during the night. They worked and played in the daylight and slept under the moon. You did not get any recognition for the nights you brought. Honestly, you had a tantrum that made you change into Nightmare Moon. It is sad you were punished by being sent to the moon for 1,000 years. But I am happy the Elements of Harmony brought you back to yourself." Princess Luna started to shed a tear from recalling those events.

"For me, I was lonely for a while because no wanted to be my friend when I was younger. During school time, I was picked last at games and told to sit on the sidelines. I ate by myself during lunches, did projects by myself, and came to and from school by myself. I was in a very sad state. Then one day, I was on my computer play games online when one of the people I played found out we went to the same school. We scheduled to meet the next day. Turns out he was the classmate I sat next to. We talked for a while and found out we had several things in common. Soon I made more friends and started to smile again. I realized you can make friends in the unlikeliest of places and always talk to your friends when you are sad about something." She shed another tear for hearing my story.

"So Luna, I would like to offer my friendship to you and that you are never alone. If you need somepony to talk to, I will be available as I am up late most nights meditating. The calm nights help me with it."

"You (sniff) want me to be (sniff) your friend? We, I, don't know what to say but, yes. I would love to accept your friendship. Now, you said you like my nights because they help you meditate?" She said with a smile and happy tears forming on her face.

"I don't like them, I love them. The nights here are more beautiful than on my world. With all the advances in technology, the city lights blocked out from seeing the stars at night. Even in the countryside, they still affect the view. Here, I see so many beautiful stars and constellations that I just want to spend each night staring at them. I can see that they get their beauty from you."

All of a sudden, Luna dived from the throne and flew into me. She gave me a big hug and several kisses. "OH, THANK YOU BLAZE! YOU ARE THE FIRST TO LIKE MY NIGHTS!" Luna said in the Royal Canterlot Voice next to my head.

OWW MY EARS! My ears started to ring from being too close. "Princess Luna." I said painfully. She looked at me with wonder in her eyes. "Please lower the volume. I think you might have popped my ear drums."

"Oh I am so sorry Blaze!" Princess Luna said in a whisper volume. "Do you want me to use my magic to heal them?"

"It's alright Luna. Just need a quick meditation to stop the ringing and speed up the healing." I sat down and went to a focused meditative state on healing. A few minutes later, I exited and stood back up. "See Luna, all better. I think you can make up for it by inviting me to the garden and show me the beautiful night sky."

"Blaze, would you honor me in taking you to the garden to stare at the stars and the moon?" Princess Luna asked in a joyful tone.

"The honor is all mines."

We left the throne room and made our way to the garden. The guards that were posted outside the room put on a confused look on their faces. I can imagine they are thinking where did that pony come from and where did the other creature go. I looked behind me as we are walking down the hallway and noticed they were following us. Hmm, they are just doing their job. Let's hope they don't ruin the night.

We made it to the garden and began to walk slowly through it. Everything was so quiet and peaceful. The guards stayed at the entrance to the garden, but were still keeping an eye on me. Luna then started to tell me about each constellation that could be seen and what it stood for. Each one was more impressive than the last one she talked about. We soon reached the entrance of the garden again and made our way back to the throne room.

"Thank you Luna for showing and explaining the constellations that is in your sky."

"No no, thank you Blaze for telling me how much you appreciate my nights."

"If you would excuse me, I think I shall return to my room and join the other me. Need to get ready to start the training exercise I do before dawn."

"You exercise before dawn? What for?"

"I do it to keep my body in shape and in tune so I am ready for anything."

"Very well. You have my permission to use the training grounds to do your morning exercise in. If you can, please don't get into any fights with the Royal Guards."

"As you wish Luna."

I released the clone jutsu and disappeared from Luna's presence.