Every year since Luna's return, the western wing of the palace was emptied of staff for the night of the lunar eclipse. The Princess of the Night walked down the gallery among abandoned guard posts and undusted statuary. She frowned when she saw a pony standing by the engraved golden doors at the end of the hall. A blue silken robe embroidered with silver stars covered the colt's lean white body.

He bowed as she approached, offering a crystal vial in his outstretched hoof. "I've asked the servants to let me prepare your tincture tonight, Princess" he said.

The top of his head almost reached her withers by then, but the sleeves of his robe still dragged on the floor. "My dearest student, Pipsqueak," she said, "why are you not outside, enjoying the celebration with the other foals?" She took the vial, the black liquid sloshing inside.

"I want to help you. I want to prove I'm ready."

"You prepared my nightshade," she said. "You are already a stallion."

"I want to go with you."

"You are not ready yet, my student." She raised a hoof to his face and traced the outline of his chin, still covered in soft coltish whiskers, but already settling into a sharp square shape. "You learned much, you walked with me through many nights, but you are still too young for this."

He leaned forward slightly, his skin brushing against the soft of her hoof. "Do you remember how old I was when you first took me on a walk?"

"Ten, and you almost died when we found a nightmare in that flower seller's dream," she said. "Do you remember?"

"I remember drinking the nightshade, saying the words, and falling into the swirling colors. I remember the dog with the smoking fur and glowing eyes big as saucers. You kicked me into a bush of roses that shattered like porcelain. It jumped on you and sunk its claws into your coat even as you choked its throat with your magic. I closed my eyes, but I remember the sound, like supple bark torn from a tree, as you banished it back to the Moon."

"Were you not afraid?"

She tried to feel any tremor on his face or see anything in his eyes that remained of that little colt who accepted her mentorship on the spot and then cried on his first night in the palace, hugging his mother's blanket while thunder cracked outside. But he looked her straight in the eyes and all Luna saw was her own face, wrinkled, sweaty, regretful.

"My faithful student, Pipsqueak," she said, taking away her hoof, "You could follow me anywhere, but not into this dream, not when the Moon is in eclipse."

"You said the same to me the year I first walked with you. You told me you would go in alone, and in the morning I could see the pain in your eyes," he said. "Why? She couldn't help herself, and you can't save yourself either. If you take all the pain on yourself, would she be happier?"

"It is so because you are my student, but you are your mother's and father's son, and I gave them my word that I would protect you. Were you only my own—"

He jumped, embracing her neck with his short legs. She held him to her chest tightly and closed her tearful eyes.

"Go, I will be fine." She kissed him on the brown spot behind his ear and let go. "Prepare your tincture and incantations; tomorrow night, we walk together."

He nodded, holding his jaw tense so she wouldn't see how his throat jumped when he sobbed. She walked past him, brushing her wing against his side. The door closed behind her with a soft click.

The balcony door was open, letting inside a warm breeze and the pale light of the shadowed moon. Celestia slept in her bed, her shivers sending ripples through her ethereal hair. The silk blanket lay crumpled over the cushion left for Luna, and she covered her sister with it before sitting down.

"He's right, I cannot help you," she said, pulling out the stopper on the crystal vial. "A thousand years, a thousand nights of the same nightmare, and you couldn't help yourself. How can I hope to save myself?" She smiled as the pungent smell snaked into her head. "Thankfully, he is growing up fast."

She drank the nightshade, said the words, and fell into the swirling colors.