“It’s really not so bad.”

The words, my words, met no reply; they became lost and echoed in the ornate scenes and gold-leaf portraits painted onto the ceiling. The only pony to hear them in this room sat directly across from me. Though she was by no means a petite mare, she seemed to be dwarfed in the fabric of her ceremonial dress. The dress made five good harvest seasons of pay look like a hoof-full of bits. A foal’s hoof-full.

Her hooves shoved fruitlessly at the rising garment again, and she practiced her smile. The smooth curling of her lips looked like a lie. The lines beside her eyes that crinkled and ran deep like a dry autumn’s field when she laughed had been brushed purposefully away.

There was only one line the mare would utter in this play. Though she had never once acted, or stood upon a stage, this unnaturally gorgeous, unrecognizable mare had a breath’s worth of words to speak into the world, and those words would drift into a field of equally unrecognizable faces, and the curtain would begin to fall, and the audience would cheer, and she hoped that those sitting in the front row wouldn’t see her legs trembling like a newborn just learning to stand.

But really, that is what she was. That is what I was, right now.

The door opened, and a stallion entered, covered head to hoof in the armor of the Unicorn guard.

“Miss?”

I nodded, stood, and pausing once to adjust the infuriating dress, walked through the door and into the long corridor. The guard closed the door behind us, and we trotted together towards the grand amphitheater. Our hoof-steps clacked against the marble floor in synch, the only sound in our otherwise silent journey through the new castle.

One line. Just one line for tonight’s show.

A magically-amplified voice faded in and out of my hearing, giving some sort of speech for the ceremony outside. Unity. Together. Eternity. I picked out a few of the words. But how large the gathered crowd had to be, to create so much noise in response! The collective cheer chattered the glass windows, vibrated along the stone and up my legs. My body responded with a shiver of its own.

I knew the reason why I was here today. I knew, and it made sense, and yet at the same time, I was walking through a dream that wasn’t my own. It was a good dream, a wonderful dream, maybe the best dream anypony had ever dreamed before. But it wasn’t my dream, it wasn’t the dream I wanted to live, and I wasn’t sure if it was a dream I would sacrifice the rest of my life for. And yet I still would. Somepony needed to.

The thumping of wood replaced the clacking of stone and I became very aware that I was on the stage. The curtain was before me, rippling lightly in the breeze, the last barrier between a destiny given and a life I would never live again.

I stole a glance to my left. It was surprising to see that the pegasus standing a few paces away was a mare. She stared fiercely into the curtain, with an upwards tilt of her jaw, the lithe muscles in her wings straining against a very similar dress to my own. We were the chosen two. This unknown pony would soon be my partner, from now until however long I would live.

A word was spoken from the side, and I looked down, watching the light slowly climbing my legs. The curtain was rising.

The audience emerged. Raucous, and wildly jubilant. They swayed like heads of wheat in a storm, cheering for a mare whose name had echoed through their minds, a name made synonymous with harmony and peace. They were putting all of their faith into the mare who belonged to that name, to end the fighting, to end the hunger, to end the sorrow that bound us tightly together for centuries.

I looked out beyond the stage. I thought of home. I thought of the harvest in the summer. Singing cicadas. Rust and sweat. Rain and dry earth. Fields of grass, swaying towards the warm and guiding sun. Calm.

The unicorn speaker turned to me.

One line.

“What name have you chosen, child?”

“I take the name Celestia, Bringer of the Sun.”