Death was never pleasant, and the Goddess of Death was painfully aware of it.

She didn’t understand why her sister had instilled fear of death into every living creature, rather than simply making them see it was not an end, but simply another phase — one that Luna tried very hard at making a pleasant one for every being she greeted into her castle.

It was inevitable, after all.

New generations had to come, and as such, the old ones had to leave. Fighting death was akin to trying to stop the sun from setting and the moon from rising.

She couldn’t be blamed for being cold sometimes, could she? Who wouldn’t when the first time ponies saw her, so many of them looked at her with fear, as if she were planning on hurting them or worse.

She always greeted them in the throne room.

Luna's throne room was not like her sister's. It was not outside, where she could watch over the ponies residing in the Lower Realm. Her throne room was hidden away inside the realm's massive castle, beyond the millions of corridors housing individual rooms for every creature that had died since the beginning of time.

It was a small throne room, where the magic coated ceiling acted as a window to the Goddess's night sky. It was there or in her private garden that she spent most of her days.

"Hoo-wee, that mare sure is takin' her sweet time."

Sitting atop her throne, the Goddess of Death glanced over at her cloaked reaper, staring her down with a humorless glare. It wasn't until Applejack glanced towards her that Luna looked away, making it a point to show her dissatisfaction.

"And I'm sure it ain't because this Rarity mare don't want to meet you, Your Grace," she added, and Luna needn't look to know her emissary was equally frowning at her.

"I am sure, as well," Luna said. "I am sure she will be different than every single other creature ever to meet me, and I am sure you will magically sprout wings as well, Applejack."

Applejack sighed. "I ain't going over your nonsense speak again, Your Grace."

"I am not speaking nonsense!" Luna continued, turning to Applejack. "You have seen them! How they look at me as if I were a monster! And even after living here for countless centuries, they still continue doing so! I do not choose to bring them here! I am not allowed the same luxuries as Celestia, who does as she pleases!"

Applejack stomped her hoof against the floor. "Now Lady Luna, bearin' a grudge against Lady Celestia won't help you none! Besides, she might be usin' her own mirror to look at us, and you wouldn't want to go and hurt her feelings, would you?"

“It would be a fitting punishment for spying on us,” Luna replied, in no mood to hold her tongue.

And yet, even so, she sighed and hunched her shoulders. She never liked speaking ill of her sister, but sometimes it was hard not to feel resentment towards the Goddess everypony adored. What would she give to be adored like her.

"And you're forgettin' Fluttershy did the reaping, Your Grace. That mare loves you so darn much, I'm sure she's gotten this Rarity pony mighty excited to meet ya'," Applejack encouraged. "Though I reckon you'd give off a better impression if your scythe wasn't hangin' above your throne like it's gonna chop somepony's noggin off."

Luna pursed her lips, and with a flash of her horn, the scythe disappeared.

"I tire of waiting," she announced, slouching in her throne, ears flopping down. "I am starting to believe it would not be such a loss if I were to delegate my greeting duties to you two."

"What? So you can sit in your garden and find out how much food you can stuff yourself with?"

Immediately Luna straightened up, voice booming. "We do not eat all day, Appleja—"

The loud creaking of doors interrupted her indignant protest, and so did Luna turn towards the end of the throne room. Fluttershy came in first, no longer wearing her cloak's hood nor her blue blindfold.

"Here we are," she said, pushing the door as far back as she could. "Come in."

Luna watched quietly as Fluttershy stepped away, and a silver coated mare trotted in after her. Though ponies could chose their appearance in the Lower Realm, Rarity the unicorn looked like a radiant mare not because she disliked her elderly appearance, but because she hadn't had the luxury of living long enough to reach it.

Most mares hid themselves behind their mane, but Rarity insistently tucked her long, purple locks behind her ear, and though she moved slowly, her gaze resting on the starry ceiling, Luna saw no fear in her, no worry or nervousness. She saw fascination.

"Goodness, this is absolutely gorgeous!" she exclaimed, stopping to stare at the stars. "I don't think I've ever seen a night so clear!"

"Rarity, will you follow me, please?"

Finally, Rarity turned to the throne in the distance, and in her gaze Luna now saw curiosity. Her lips curved into a circle, and she glanced to Fluttershy, waiting for the pegasus to continue trotting before doing the same, eyes set on Luna. As she approached, Luna straightened herself, trying as best she could to wipe the humorless expression off her face.

"Lady Luna," Fluttershy said when reaching the throne, bowing down.

Rarity immediately followed suit, her eyes still fixed on the Goddess. The intensity of her gaze was unlike any Luna had seen in a very long time, and the same could be said of her azure eyes. They were absolutely mesmerizing, like looking into a pair of sapphires.

"Rise," Luna commanded, and so did Fluttershy and Rarity obey. "We welcome you to the Lower Realm, Rarity."

"Oh, thank you, Your Grace," Rarity said at once, before Luna could continue her traditional and well-rehearsed speech. "It's admittedly a tad too sombre for my tastes, but it certainly does have its charm. I had been led to believe ponies who took their own life away were taken to a much more ghastly place, but Lady Fluttershy has explained that is not the case?"

Luna blinked at first, unsure of how to respond. She'd gotten interrupted before, mostly by ponies eager to scream at her for "killing them", but the only other pony ever to have interrupted to speak calmly and rationally seemed just as shocked by Rarity as Luna did.

"Well, you can't say this ain't better than what you hoped for," Applejack whispered.

Truthfully, Luna wasn't sure what she had hoped for, but she'd never expected to be faced with a pony so unconcerned regarding her own suicide.

"Life is a precious gift from my sister, little pony!" Luna said, trying to look as intimidating as she could. "What right have you to reject her gift in such a reprehensible way?!"

Rarity's expression darkened. "I beg your pardon, Your Grace, but considering the fate that awaited me, life was not a luxury I'd have much longer regardless, and I'd much rather my death be at my own hooves than at somepony else's. Love truly is a deathly thing, is it not?"

"So, you do not fear me, little pony?"

Rarity seemed surprised by the question "Fear you?" she repeated, tilting her head and placing a hoof against her chest, eyelashes fluttering. "Why, Lady Luna, how could I fear you when simply the mere idea of you has left me breathless?"

Luna blinked, drawing back and feeling her cheeks heat up. Many times had she heard the old saying of ponies flirting with death, but this mare was taking it to entirely new levels.

"I think we better start with the tour," Applejack said, filling in for her employer's stunned silence. She smiled to Fluttershy, gesturing to Rarity all the meanwhile. "You takin' care of it, Shy?"

But before the pegasus could reply, Rarity did.

"Might I be so bold as to request for Lady Luna to accompany us?" Rarity asked, and again the Goddess's eyes widened. This outspoken mare had no care for upheld traditions, and for Luna it was as insolent as it was fascinating.

Fluttershy glanced at Luna. "Uhm, I don't..."

"This is her castle, is it not?" Rarity continued, smiling at the alicorn. "Who else to understand and know it better than its sovereign creator?"

Truthfully, Luna didn't know what came over her. She would think about it for days, weeks to come, about what in Rarity's gaze willed the alicorn to do as she pleased. Eventually, she'd come to the conclusion that it was her entrancing diamond like eyes.

"Very well," Luna said, getting off her throne.

"What?!" her reapers gasped, stepping back and regarding Rarity with both fear and deep respect.

Rarity seemed pleased by the reply, as though she expected Luna to agree. She stepped back, and only when Luna trotted past her did she follow, the other two reapers trailing behind if only to witness this entirely new event.

As they made their way out of the throne room and into the hallways of the castle, Luna found she quite enjoyed explaining the inner machinations of her abode. Though she hated the word, Luna could only describe it as heavenly, to have somepony finally admire her duties.

The castle, she explained, was organic, alive even, and it was incalculably immense. It had to be, for it held a room for every single creature that had died since the dawn of time. The castle itself was connected to the reapers, and the moment a soul was in a reaper's grasp, the castle immediately created a new room filled with replicas of items that would make the pony happy.

It would make them feel at home.

"Does that mean I have a room now?" Rarity asked, stepping behind Luna into the gardens.

"You sure do, but findin' it's gonna be like a needle in a haystack," Applejack replied. "Spent nearly a week looking for Sweet Tart's room last week."

Rarity laughed, and it was like wind chimes, a relaxing sound unlike anything Luna had heard. She liked that laugh, she wanted to hear more of it, and she found that, more than anything, she wanted to be the cause of it.

"Forgive her indiscretion," she said, frowning at her reaper. "I assure you we are mostly competent."

And Rarity laughed again, though it was softer, kinder, like when endeared by something a loved one has said. But love was not something ponies felt towards the Goddess of Death, and though she was most certain Rarity was simply being kind, it still made the alicorn feel at ease, feel so comfortable pretending somepony other than her reapers enjoyed her presence.

Because her ponies did not.

The castle gardens were usually bustling with life, sounds, voices and laughter. Luna always saw it from her hazy mirror, and though she wished to join, she never did. And yet, now that she was in her beautiful gardens, when she realized it was unnaturally quiet, she briefly glanced around to find fear.

Dozens of ponies watched her in silence, the terrible entity that had stopped their life and now stopped their leisurely activities in the garden. Foals cowered behind older ponies, and older ponies simply stood in place, too fearful of Luna to leave. Her joy drained away, her happiness faded, and she herself wanted to flee, go back to her private garden, go back to where nopony resented her.

Instead, she smiled at them.

She pushed a smile, because all she had ever wanted was to welcome them into her home. She turned her sight back to Rarity, intent on continuing the conversation as best she could, but her heart fell when she noticed the mare looking at the others.

Would she too suddenly look back at the Goddess with hate in her eyes?

Rarity didn't look at Luna yet. Instead, she gazed up to the night sky, the thousands of stars shining above. "It's simply divine, isn't it?" she said, and once more, to great relief, Luna heard no anger in her voice. "Those stars… Did you create them, Lady Luna?"

Luna nodded, looking up to her sky, anything to force her eyes away from the ponies. "I had not much to do the first few dozen years when my realm was empty. I had to find some way to amuse myself."

Rarity giggled, and the ponies were forgotten to Luna. Nothing but that laugh remained.

"All the beautiful stories poets have written on the creation of stars, from souls of the departed to tears of foals, and they actually exist because somepony didn't have anything better to do," she said. "How dreadfully anticlimactic."

Rarity looked around again, to the wary ponies, and was it odd for the Goddess to think Rarity was beautiful even with a furrowed brow? But this beauty inspired the Goddess, invited her to risk all and shed her defenses, because how could a pony so beautiful be anything but kind?

She leaned down, so only Rarity could hear, or her reapers if they so wished, and she whispered, "They do not like me."

She wasn't sure, exactly, why she'd said it, and what she expected of it. But it felt nice, it felt freeing to say it, to tell somepony other than her reapers, to… to wish that maybe somepony from outside would sympathize with her for once.

Rarity was quiet for a moment. "Your Grace," she said, finally, her gaze set on the stars once again, and her voice was loud and clear, as if she wanted all to hear. "If you created the stars, does that mean you could rearrange them into any shape?"

Luna was taken aback by the change of topic. She felt offended, almost, that the unicorn did not care for her plight. But a question had been asked, and so she would answer.

"Yes, but I need not. My stars are fine where they are," she replied with a scoff. Unlike Celestia, who sometimes created the most unseemingly of ponies, Luna's every action and choice was filled with divine beauty.

"So, you could rearrange them into the shape of a cat, perhaps?" Rarity asked, and Luna scoffed again.

"A cat?"

Rarity turned to the Goddess. "Yes. I thought maybe you could, but..." she drifted off, and Luna knew when she was being challenged.

"Of course I can," she replied.

She turned to her stars, her horn aglow, and with as much ease as brushing a paintbrush on canvas, she moved the stars from their place until they'd formed the shape of a lovely cat stretching after a nap.

The deed done, she looked down, intent on boasting about her skills, but instead… Instead, she realized she was no longer the target of ponies hateful gazes, and they'd all turned their sights to the stars.

"Oh! How beautiful! It reminds me of my darling Opal," Rarity noted, a smile gracing her lips. She looked back to Luna and asked, still speaking loudly, "Might I see a bird now, please, your Grace?"

And Luna complied, because what else could one do faced with such a polite request? She looked to her cat, to this Opal, and her horn aglow she moved the stars again, shaping them into a hummingbird drinking nectar from a flower.

Her reward was Rarity's laugh, and it distraction enough from everything else. She wanted to keep satisfying this unicorn's silly requests, but before she could inquire what else Rarity would like, she felt something tug at her foreleg.

She looked down, and if she had a heart, it would have stopped at the sight of a little filly, Rose Flower. Rose winced when Luna spotted her, but she didn't leave. She didn't leave, and Luna would have excitedly pointed this out to her reapers had she not been too shocked.

The first foal to ever address her.

"L-Lady Luna?" Rose asked, gulping down, obviously trying to be brave. "Can I ask for something too, please?"

Luna didn't know what to do. She didn't know how to react, and as she most often did in times like those, she turned to her reapers. They too seemed shocked, Applejack's mouth nearly hanging open, while Fluttershy simply covered her mouth with her hoof, eyes wide.

Luna turned to the other ponies, and though they'd returned their gaze towards her, it no longer bore anger. No… No, they only seemed to be watching, waiting to see what the Goddess would do.

When she set her sights to Rarity, the unicorn simply kept smiling.

"Lady Luna!" Fluttershy whispered, apparently having gathered herself.

When Luna turned to her, the reaper gestured towards the filly, and quickly did Luna awkwardly lower herself to speak with her. Rose stepped back a few paces when she did so, but she seemed to relax, no longer faced with an imposing adult.

"What would you like, my little pony?"

Rose gasped. Had she not been expecting a positive reply?

"Uhm—! I… I… M-Maybe a puppy, please?"

Immediately Luna rose, and she took great care with her new design. She wanted nothing but the best for Rose Flower, and so it would be done. She created the most adorable puppy she could conceive, its tail wagging high as it cuddled up to a filly quite like Rose Flower.

Rose giggled in delight, clapping her hooves, and when Luna took in the sight, a smile pushed itself onto her lips. No, not a smile, but a delighted grin, which vanished when another pony spoke up.

"Lady Luna?"

She turned around, and now a stallion had approached her. Silver Locks, who'd been in the Lower Realm for so long, and who didn't seem as fearful as Rose had been.

"May I ask for a lion, please?"

And Luna complied, and something changed in the Lower Realm.

It changed because a mare approached and asked for a flower, then a colt timidly requested a toy guard, and so on and so forth. Pony after pony approached to ask, and they laughed at each other's requests, and invited others to approach. Even the reapers joined in, with Fluttershy gasping at a beautiful rabbit, and Applejack proudly staring at the universe's largest starry apple.

And then a crowed had gathered around her, more ponies near her than in all of her life, and they smiled at her. They gazed at her, not with hate or anger, but with newfound appreciation, because perhaps now they would no longer see her as their death, but their kind ruler.

And in her joy, Luna turned to Rarity to find her grinning.

"Goodness, Your Grace," she said, and her diamond eyes shone, "I thought you said they didn't like you?"