It is the witching hour, my friend
Despite Gilda’s wish, neither her or the filly were getting back to sleep anytime soon. That, and breakfast wasn’t for a while either, so it was just them for now. So the griffon figured, why not? On the bright side, Diamond Tiara did offer to make some tea so that’s something at least.
Thankfully for the Gilda, it seemed the filly was more embarrassed from that “being a griffons daughter” thing. She still felt awkward enough though.
“Sorry again, really,” Tiara said as she put the kettle on the coffee table in the Fluttershy’s living room. Gilda was on the couch, wishing the filly would drop the subject. “I’m mean, that was totally bizarro. I know, right?” She paused to see the griffon was filling her cup. “Um, sugar?”
“I’m good with bitter,” Gilda replied as she filled. The kid nodded and filled her own afterward and sat down on the couch as well.
“So, um, we're cool, right?” Diamond added to her embarrassing story. “You won’t tell anyone about that dream thing if I don’t, right?”
“Whatever,” Gilda said with a sigh. “You seriously don’t have a mom, kid?” she asked.
“Long story…” Tiara answered as she looked down. “But since then it’s been just me, my dad, and Silver Spoon.”
“You know?” Gilda began, as she lifted a cup again. “I just realized this, but how’s your dad doing exactly?” She figured she may as well ask.
“He’s still conscious, just really hurt,” Diamond said somberly as she drank. “They told me he won’t be out for a while.” She paused for a moment. “I really wanted to talk to him, but they said he needed his rest.”
“You got plans to visit him?” Gilda asked.
“Yeah, duh,” Diamond Tiara said, annoyed on the stupid question. “Plus, I don’t want to spend my Hearth's Warming is some hospital.” she sighed. “And...I want him to get his rest too.” Tiara held her cup for a bit, looking a bit down. She then looked back to Gilda. “How about you? What’s up your family? Anything cool, miss G?”
“Mom’s a high court griffon, dear to the empress,” Gilda answered in summary. “Dad’s an elite general, and my brother’s kind of a failure.” She shrugged. “Pretty simple, I guess.”
“Your mom’s a noble?!” Diamond said with wide eyed surprise. “Seriously? You?” She pointed a hoof, about laughed in surprise.
“Yep,” Gilda continued, enjoying the shock she caused immensely. “They were pretty busy, so it was just me and Ed most of the time when we were little.” She shrugged a bit with a smile. Unlike her recent history, Gilda’s past felt much more fun. “Then again, he seemed to wimp out a bunch, even back then. So dad just seemed to faceclaw whenever he was around. Remember mom was...girly I guess.”
“Girly you guess?” Tiara chuckled back as she drank.
“I was closer to my dad,” Gilda replied with a sheepish grin. “He was awesome to me! I saw him break solid iron with his beak!” That memory was a fun one. “He even told me the crocodile lord, Gustave, wishes he could bite that hard!”
“Gustave?” Diamond asked with an odd look. “The baker?”
“It’s a common name,” Gilda said with a chuckle. “Kind of funny, huh?”
“Did your dad have more to him than breaking stuff and war stories?” Diamond rolled her eyes. “Maybe some war treaty signing, or some epic speech?”
“Nope,” Gilda explained, as the foal listened drinking her tea. “He made it cool though. He once told me how he beat a tiger, claw to paw by himself. Freaking awesome!”
“You sure he wasn’t a nut?” Tiara asked, pouring another cup for herself.
“What’s that supposed to mean?” Gilda asked back, just a bit offended.
“You just told me he broke iron in his beak,” Diamond Tiara explained. “Did ya dare him to or something? Why’d he even do that?”
“Nah, did it himself,” Gilda answered, then she took a drink from her cup. “Some other griffon called him an old war hawk, so he just did that. Even called the other guy a weenie, before telling him one of his war stories.”
“I read something about some of the older military griffin's tend to be...off.” said Tiara cautiously. “Even daddy told me how somethings…”
“Cause people to break down?” Gilda said. Judging by the look of shock on the kids face, the filly may well have seen it somewhere herself. “Yeah, I remember times he seemed really in that hunting stuff…like it was all he thought about.” Gilda looked back and her cup, then back at Diamond. “Guess he wanted those glory days of old, huh? Last war was before I was even born.”
“W-well…” Tiara muttered, snapping herself out of something she seemed to recall. Then adding sugar to her tea again. “Maybe he was trying too hard?”
“Could be,” Gilda said as she reminisced. “He was even trying to bring back worship of the Storm Eagle, an old griffon war god.”
“War god?” Diamond said with a groan. “Seriously? He’s way into that war stuff. Like it’s all he thinks about.”
“Well, it was worshiped back in the day.” Gilda continued. “They even reported a few miracles from it in the history books.” She shrugged. “But after we met with ponykind, I guess a lot of other griffons just figured a war god wasn’t so cool anymore.”
“Duh,” Tiara added like it was clear as day. “What’s it going to do when there isn’t wars to fight? Just like you dad it….um…” She stopped when she saw Gilda looked ponderous with a frown. “Uh….” she said nervously. “Just saying?”
“I got the point.” Gilda grumbled and sighed. “But what’s a griffon got to do when there isn’t any battles?”
It was quiet for a moment, seeing as the foal might have been scared she pressed the wrong button, but the griffon remembered something.
Gilda figured now was a safe time to ask as the kid was drinking her sweet tea.
“Did you think anymore on that party thing today?” Gilda asked the filly, hoping to stop the foal from prying about more of her past.
“Why were you friends with Rainbow Dash?” Diamond Tiara changed the subject back. “She’s been getting along lame enough with Scootaloo.” The griffon tried not to get mad. She just put her cup on the table, re-filled it, and sighed.
“One, we were friends with me thinking she was the only awesome pony in Equestria,” Gilda held up a talon as she spoke. “Two, we stopped being friends long before I socked her through a door.” Another talon. “And three, what’s that got to do with anything?” she finished with a third talon.
“So you agree she’s lame, right?” Diamond added looking stoic, and Gilda grumbled and grit her teeth. “The Apples are lame too for your information.”
“Maybe,” Gilda replied offhand. “But it’s still not cool.”
“What isn’t cool?” Tiara asked back.
“Being like this, duh,” Gilda answered, moving her claw. “Being miserable, and talking about how great things were before things got crummy stuck by ourselves.”
“But you're a griffon,” Diamond stated the obvious. “You got all kinds of stuff, so what does Dash matter anyway? Daddy even told me that griffons have the best gold mines and an army that even Equestria’s elites find intriguing. So what’s your problem?”
“Ok,” Gilda decided to play this game. “First you ponies are a race with stupid magical powers, and apparently all the cool adventures now.”
“And you griffons are a bunch of greedy, angry birds,” Diamond said with a sarcastic look. “With inflated egos.” Now Diamond was playing it.
“While ponies are a bunch mental cases, and worshiped by people just as crazy as them.” Gilda contributed.
The two of them were looking each other in the eye with a angry look for that moment, before bursting into laughter. Few would know why, maybe they were just sick of their own people?
Gilda let out a deep breath. “It still don’t mean we feel happy at the end of the day, huh?” she added with a groan.
Diamond let out a breath of her own. “Yeah, you got a point,” she sighed looking down. “I don’t want to be stuck alone on Hearth’s Warming either.”
“Can you at least take her up on it?" Gilda asked as she returned to drinking her tea. “You don’t need to be more miserable right now by yourself.”
“What about you?” Diamond asked back to the griffon. "What will you do for Hearth's Warming?"
“I’m not even sure about me right now,” Gilda replied with a sad shrug. “From stuff feeling better, then worse, then better, then even more worse...I got doubts about lots of stuff.” Gilda took another drink with a sigh. “You ever feel like other ponies are just jerking you around?”
“Totally,” Tiara said, taking her own drink. “Are Griffons better than that?”
“Heh,” Gilda had a bit of a laugh. “Maybe not. Then again, they seem more direct on crud for one. Less wordy, hard core too. They’d call Cloudsdale a bunch of horse flies without spines.” Diamond had a laugh and Gilda smiled for a bit as well. “Don’t get your hopes up kid. They’d just as likely call you a ground walker.”
Diamond huffed. “So, what?” she said. “That make you different, better maybe?”
“Ground walker,” Gilda replied jokingly. The filly, despite her angry look, found it hard not to laugh. “Let’s just say I’ve had too much time to think on stuff. I got sick of it all, ya know?”
“Is that why you came back here?” Tiara asked as she refilled her cup again. “Because you got sick of things where you were?”
“Nah, something worse,” Gilda replied with a painful look. “Like, a lot worse.”
“Like that mad pony?” Tiara asked quietly.
“Part of it.” Gilda replied.
There was a pause as they just drank. Diamond looked like she still wanted to speak, and likely unsure what to say. Gilda, for obvious reasons, knew this was going to get old to her. This casual stuff was annoying. Plus, she didn’t want to get attached to a girly pony that couldn't fly.
“How about your brother?” Diamond asked next. “I never had siblings. How lame was he?”
“As far as dad knew, a lot.” Gilda answered the filly. “He was a wuss who ran from danger,” she added. “He was cool, I guess, in the end. Kind of supportive to me when I was down in some crud.”
“Really?” Tiara said with some surprise. “Was he younger or older?”
“Older, and that annoyed dad.” Gilda replied with a sigh. “Old Gregor wanted a son to make a mark on the world, ‘not some money bin swimmer’ he said.” The kid seemed to understand what that meant, hopefully. “Me, he had high hopes for me. And they were safe bet too! I was kicking butt and takin names back in the day. Well, for a while at least…” Gilda mumbled the last bit.
“My dad so real supportive to me too!” Tiara said, her enjoyment to saying it didn’t notice the griffon’s growing grumpiness. “And I can’t wait to show him what I can do with my business sense.” She paused for a bit. “Do you feel, like we're kind of alike in a cool way?”
“That what annoys me,” Gilda said under her breath.
“What?” Diamond Tiara said as if she didn’t hear that.
“Nevermind,” Gilda added, as she absently filled her cup again. Then, from the corner of her eye, she saw movement upstairs. Three little ponies ducked away as she turned her head.
“What is…?” Tiara noticed them too and was clearly not happy about it. “Get lost, blank flanks! This isn’t any of your business!” she yelled up to them.
Gilda did not want to ponder the doom coming if those three started getting mouthy about this “buddy buddy” thing that was going on here.
“Makes sense she’d be friends with a jerk like you!” yelled Scootaloo from hiding.
“Na ya’ll stop it Scootaloo,“ said Apple Bloom next. “I reckon she means well.”
Gilda, however was having none of it. “Go back to bed!” she told them. “It too early for…”
The griffon then saw Fluttershy was behind the foals, and she had been there for awhile too it seemed.
The lot of them trotted down as Gilda looked on in shocked silence.
“I’m…really glad you two are bonding so well!” Shy said with somewhat shocked pride.
Gilda had a frown now, she looked to Diamond Tiara who gave a soft smile to her. Gilda looked back to Fluttershy, still with a frown.
“When’s breakfast?” she asked.