TRIXIE: A Hearth's Warming Eve Carol

by SupaSupaBadTrulyMadMoves

Tale of the Phantasm

Trixie trudged through the snow, bracing herself against the cold, inefficiently protected by her cheap and worn-out clothing, her coat being blown back by the wind.

Her destination was a decayed old house, all of its color gone, now peeling and gray. She opened the front gate, a spiky padlocked door of black iron, with her magic, and slowly and carefully made her way up the rocky garden path. The garden in question was just as neglected as the house, and was overgrown all over the house and the path, the trees so thick that they turned the cloudy late afternoon into night.

Going up the stairs to her front door, Trixie crossed paths with her housekeeper, Zecora. Her striped coat and frilly uniform were all in shades of gray, which fit well with the dreary appearance of the house, though Zecora herself was refined and clean, while the house was in disrepair beyond all hope.

"Good evening, Miss Trixie," said Zecora. "I'm finished for tonight. Now I shall return home, if that's quite all right."

Trixie rolled her eyes at the maid's tendency to speak in verse. "Yes, Zecora. I'll be seeing you in the morning, at the crack of dawn as always, don't you dare expect any concessions due to it being Hearth's Warming Eve. Not a thing changes."

"And on that friendly note, I'll take my leave," Zecora said dryly. "To you, a merry…" She stopped as Trixie glared at her. "Never mind then," she muttered, passing Trixie and softly padding down the path.

Trixie sighed and turned toward her front door, readying her horn to open it. She glanced absently at her door knocker and froze in fear.

What once had been a plain and unadorned wooden knocker now displayed a sleeping, eagle-like face.

"Gilda?" Trixie gasped.

Gilda's face was glowing an eerie white-blue, and was translucent. The feathers that made up her bangs were flowing as if she was underwater. As Trixie stared in bewilderment at this impossible phenomenon, the apparition opened its eyes and glared at her harshly.

Trixie exclaimed and jumped backward in terror. She averted her eyes for a split second, and when she looked back at the knocker it was its normal self again.

"Erm, Zecora?" Trixie called.

Zecora turned around. "Yes, Miss Trixie?"

"Do you… notice anything strange about this door knocker?"

The maid frowned deeply and inspected the door. "Naught but the usual wood and stone," she replied. "Will that be all? Can I go home?"

"…Yes," Trixie said slowly, not daring to take her eyes off the door. "Yes, of course."

Trixie stared for a long time, faintly aware of Zecora leaving the premises. It was a heavy minute before she finally applied her magic to the door, opening it.

She stepped inside her home's spacious entry room. Just ahead of her was the massively broad flight of stairs leading up to her bedroom, but she only saw it for a second before she closed the door behind herself, leaving the room in pitch darkness.

Before her eyes adjusted, Trixie could have sworn that she saw a huge black hearse at the top of the stairs, pulled by six gray pegasus stallions with bat wings and yellow cat eyes. The sinister pegasi galloped down the stairs and rushed at Trixie, passing her on either side. Trixie, frozen in fear and bewilderment, flinched lightly as the hearse seemed about to collide with her.

But the great black carriage passed right through her, and she felt nothing more than a chill wind, and was left blind once again. It was a few more seconds before she was able to actually see in the darkness.

"Must have had some bad parsley at lunch," Trixie said shakily to herself. She started up the stairs, not bothering to pick up a candle or even light the tip of her horn, making her way through the house in darkness as she always did, trying to assure herself that all was as normal.

~0~0~0~

Several hours later, long after the city outside had gone still and silent, Trixie closed her bedroom door and locked it tightly, now dressed in her pale blue nightgown and cap. She stood in front of the fireplace and used her magic to light a pale pink fire, the flames tiny and low, barely illuminating anything, and then sat down in one of the large chairs near the fireplace and started eating a bowl of cold porridge.

Her fireplace was carved with illustrations of scenes from tales of the holy scriptures. Princess Celestia and her sister turning an armored unicorn king into shadow; another of the two of them attacking a serpentine creature seemingly mashed together from parts of different animals, freezing it in stone. Across the top, Celestia's foe was the sister herself, armored and with sinister-looking eyes, and Celestia was sealing her within the moon.

"Hooey," Trixie said to herself. "All of it, just a load of hooey…"

She took a bite of her porridge and choked on it in alarm as a doorbell rang out of nowhere. The ring was deafening, and seemed to shake the walls and floors with its resonance. It was only as that single chilling note started fading away that Trixie remembered she didn't even have a doorbell.

She barely had an instant to comprehend this before she heard her front door swing open violently with a loud bang. Following this were heavy and slow footsteps, accompanied by the jangling of heavy bits of metal, and something immense scraping along the ground.

Trixie was absolutely frozen in fear for the almost full minute it took for these sounds to make their way up the stairs and down the hallway to her bedroom. When her door slowly unlocked from the outside, she dropped her bowl of porridge and shrank into her chair, as if trying to blend in with it.

The doorknob turned, and Trixie's little pink fire fizzled out. As the door burst open, the fire flared back to life, a roaring flame of eerie blue-white, and a similarly glowing figure stood in the doorway.

It was a large and tall creature, hunched over and dressed in a heavy white cloak, a hood pulled down low over its face. It was floating a few inches off the ground, but its large wings were chained to its body. Out of its huge billowing sleeves came a pair of talons, each grasping yet another chain.

Trixie's eyes were drawn to the chains, which wrapped around the apparition's arms, legs, and torso. They dragged along the ground far, far behind the mysterious figure. The length of the chains were comprised not only of links but also of padlocks and keys, heavy locked boxes and metal purses.

The thing and its chains were transparent, the walls and floors visible behind it. It hovered there in place, its shrouded head seeming to stare directly and intensely at Trixie, who was curled up and quivering in fear.

"Trixie," said the specter.

"Y-yes?" Trixie replied in a squeaky voice.

"I've been wanting to speak with you for a long, long time," the specter said emotionlessly.

"You have?" Trixie peeped. "…Do we know each other?"

"Trixie… it's me, Gilda."

The ghost lifted its talons and lowered its hood. There was Gilda's face, just as it had appeared on Trixie's knocker. She was thinner than she had been in life, her eyes sunken, her face lined deeply.

"Ah," Trixie said stiffly. "So it is."

Gilda grinned wryly. "So, gonna offer your old business partner a seat?"

"Oh. Um… yes, by all means. Have a seat." She nodded to her other chair.

The ghostly form of Gilda gently sank to the ground on all fours, and slowly walked across the room, pulling the huge length of chain along behind her. She stood in front of the fireplace, gathering up as much of the chain as she could into a single clump, then floated back up into the air and settled down in the chair opposite Trixie's.

"So… how have you been?" Trixie said nervously.

"Oh… sucky," Gilda said dispassionately. "Been on the move, nonstop."

"Travelling, the past seven years?"

"Yeah, seeing the world," Gilda said bitterly. "Seeing everything… travelling with the winds, never getting to sit still, just having to watch everything. Constantly on the move—not easy to do with all these chains on me, let me tell you."

"…Huh," said Trixie. "How about that?"

Gilda smiled. "You're trying to convince yourself that you're dreaming, aren't you?"

"I'm obviously dreaming," Trixie said firmly. "This isn't possible. I've had a fever as of late, and obviously it's giving me bad dreams. I just have to wait out this dreadful nightmare until it's over."

Gilda grinned deviously. "You're gonna be waiting a while for that, Trixie."

Trixie shivered.

"Yeah, I chill you to the bone, don't I?" Gilda taunted. "Just my presence, it shakes you down to your very soul. You think your mind could make up that feeling?" She leaned toward Trixie. "This is the real deal, partner," she said gravely. She grabbed clawfuls of her chains, rattling and jangling them loudly, staring at Trixie all the while with an eerily focused, unblinking stare.

"What are you doing?" Trixie said in alarm, her voice rising to a high pitch. "Why have you come here? Why are you bursting in and walking around in my house seven years after you died, Gilda?"

Gilda stared at her chains introspectively, rolling two links between her fingers. "The soul…" she said slowly, "is a social creature. The soul has the need to go out and be among its fellow souls. To learn… and grow… and share and turn to happiness…" She sighed. "And if the soul doesn't do that during life… it's condemned to get it done for all time after death. To walk among the souls of the earth, see all their pinpoints of light, to witness what it might have known… but is doomed not to know." She dropped her face into her talons.

"…And the chains?" Trixie said cautiously.

Gilda lifted her head and smirked wickedly at Trixie. "What, this old thing? I forged this chain myself." She started pulling it, displaying one link at a time, occasionally showing off a lockbox or a ring of keys. "For every act of lameness, another link, forged and girded, for me to carry. Every soul bears a chain… you know, seven years ago, the day I died, your chain was just as long and heavy as this one right here. You've kept working on it ever since…" Her menacing grin became broader and more sinister by the second. "Just imagine. Imagine the weight your soul is carrying right now. Oh, that is something to think about…"

Trixie shivered. "Gilda… please don't say such unsettling things. I thought you were my friend."

Gilda held a talon over her head, swinging a short length of chain in a circle. She flung the ghostly chain at Trixie, and it wrapped around the unicorn's neck, for Gilda to pull her closer.

"I am your friend," Gilda said coldly. "That's why I'm here. I don't know how or why I'm finally able to visit you in a shape you can understand, to speak with you and touch you… but I can. At last, I can pass along my warning."

"Warning?" Trixie whispered.

The ghost started floating up to the ceiling, her endless chain dangling beneath. "All our time together, it was said that you and I were kindred spirits. Why don't you take a look at my spirit and think about what that means for yours." She spread her arms, quivering with the weight and exhaustion, and sent Trixie a piercing glare.

"I… I just…" Trixie stammered, almost choking on the chain. "Surely you haven't come here from the grave… just to tell me I'm doomed just like you? Can't you offer me some reassurance?"

Gilda blinked slowly. "Oh, I would… I would. But there's nothing I can say. Nothing… nothing." She stared off into space. "Nothing."

After a few more seconds of contemplation, she swooped down on Trixie and lifted her up by the chains around her throat.

"Do you realize how much I missed?" Gilda wailed, her chains rattling as she shook Trixie back and forth. "Do you have any idea how great and awesome the world is, and all its people? I never did! I never stepped outside our counting house! And now I've passed into eternity and I have to watch everything I didn't get to see when I was alive. I can see it, but it's not mine! I can't have it! Because I wasted my life, squelched it away, and now it's gone. It's all gone." She dropped Trixie back into the chair, and Trixie spluttered as the chain tightened around her.

"But… you didn't waste your life," Trixie protested. "You were so good at business and economics. You built yourself a fortune out of nothing. That's not a waste!"

Gilda snorted and started laughing, sinking back into her seat.

"What?" Trixie demanded in horror.

"You talking about me, or about you?" Gilda chuckled.

Trixie slouched nervously and didn't answer. Gilda yanked on the chain still attached to Trixie, and Trixie braced herself in preparation for another hard tug on her throat, but instead the chain magically unwrapped itself and fell to the ground along with all the rest of Gilda's burden.

"Business," Gilda scoffed. "Business doesn't heal the heart of its scars, or bond the heart to that of other creatures. What I did with my career… that was no kind of life. Didn't amount to anything at all against the life I could have had." She sighed, and flung some of the chains over her shoulder absently. "Why did I do it, Trixie? Why did I spend all the time in my precious life with my eyes only on my paperwork and my mind only on the next two bits I could rub together? If I'd just looked out the window once, and seen the wide world around me, I… things might have been different."

Trixie was silent, and eyed the spirit with increasing unease. Eventually, she got up out of her seat and approached Gilda, lifting a hoof to offer a comforting touch.

Before she could, Gilda's talon shot out and gripped her forearm tightly. Trixie cried out in pain at the alarming pressure as the ghostly griffon's claw squeezed her harder and harder.

"My time here is almost over," Gilda said, in the same blank, emotionless voice as when she had first entered. "Listen to me carefully. I will tell you how you might escape what has happened to me."

"You told me—agh!—you told me there was no reassurance you could offer," said Trixie.

"And there isn't. Words are cheap. They won't change anything. But I've arranged for something that might speak to you more strongly."

Trixie sobbed, partly out of emotion but mostly from the pain. "That you would go to all this trouble to save me… I thank you. Tell me what I must do!"

Gilda let go of Trixie and started floating in a circle around her. "First comes the part where an old friend visits and warns you about the torment that lies across the veil," said the ghost. "Actually, that's the part we're doing right now, so we're a bit ahead of schedule."

"Yes," said Trixie, rubbing her pained forearm with her other hoof. "Go on."

"After that… comes the haunting."

Trixie froze. "…Isn't that also the part we're doing right now?"

"Who, me?" Gilda chuckled. "No… no. Me, I'm just a ghost. You will be haunted by an ancient spirit, something powerful and incomprehensible, who will start you on your journey. When that's done, a second spirit will come. Then a third."

Trixie gulped. "And… when should I expect them?"

"Oh, they'll be coming to you whenever they damn well want to," Gilda whispered smugly in Trixie's ear. "These are eldritch creatures who answer to nopony."

"I… I can't, Gilda," Trixie said shakily. "Just being haunted by you is nearly killing me. And what you're talking about sounds like something mortals were not meant to know. I won't be able to handle this."

"It's the only way to change your path," Gilda deadpanned.

Trixie shook her head. "It's not worth it."

"It is, and the arrangements have already been made, so suck it up."

Trixie glared. "I… no. I refuse." Her horn lit up, and she shot a burst of fireworks at the specter.

The explosion blinded Trixie, and when it cleared, Gilda's ghost was looking, in mild surprise, at a huge hole blown through her chest. As Trixie watched in horror, the hole mended itself, and Gilda was whole again, and looking up at Trixie with another malicious smirk.

"Oh, Trixie…" Gilda said in amusement. "Why would you do such a thing? You just had to make this happen the hard way, didn't you? Let me show you how that goes."

Trixie's eyes widened as Gilda lunged at her, the ghost's body colliding with hers and sending them both crashing through the window, flying far through the air and tumbling into the streets along with a mess of shattered glass.

Trixie moaned weakly in pain, laying on her side on the cobblestones. Though dazed and almost losing consciousness, she was quickly sobered by a sound like a whirling blade. Gilda was floating over her, starting to once again spin her chain around and around over her head.

"No, no, no…" Trixie said frantically.

Gilda swung her chain at Trixie, who rolled out of the way; the chain left scuff marks in the street. Trixie stood up and ran, but the ghost pursued, wielding a length of chain in each hand, slashing at Trixie again and again. Trixie looked over her shoulder and shot a powerful blast of magical energy as she ran, which singed the specter down to the bone, but new skin and feathers quickly grew back over her grisly exposed skull.

Trixie rounded a corner at the end of the block before Gilda managed to hook a chain around one of her hind hooves. With a tug of the chain, Trixie was flat on her belly. She flipped herself over just in time to see Gilda grab her and deliver a two-footed kick to her chest, sending her flying in an arc before landing hard face-down in the streets.

Gilda glided over to Trixie and pulled her up by the chin, forcing her to look out at the streets. "Are you seeing this?" she whispered. "Trixie, do you see what I see?"

Trixie gasped. The streets were teeming with ghosts, the ghosts of all sorts of creatures, wandering back and forth, wailing and moaning in agonized sorrow. All glowed blue just like Gilda, all were shrouded in white cloaks, and all bore heavy burdens.

A stern-faced earth pony stallion with thick eyebrows and a stubbly beard bore a gold ring around his neck, and dragged along a chain of other rings, each one a different size. He walked along at a slow pace, looking resigned and tired. A tall and graceful unicorn stallion was covered in roses, their thorns digging into his flesh, and smothered in what appeared to be hot cake frosting. This ghost spun through the air, shrieking in panic as he continually tried in vain to shake off the thorns and the sticky goo.

Trixie took particular note of one ghost. "Is that Suri?" she exclaimed in surprise.

In the direction Trixie was looking so intently, a homeless mare dressed in rags and tatters sat on the curb, holding an infant foal in equally-ratty swaddling clothes. These were the only flesh-and-blood beings on the street besides Trixie herself, and the mare was staring at Trixie with a bewildered expression. She clearly had no perception of any of the ghosts, including the one who was circling her frantically, trying to catch her attention—the ghost Trixie had recognized.

"Why can't I help you?" wailed the ghost, a mare restrained by a straitjacket made of a dazzling purple fabric. "I know I did wrong before, but I just want to make you feel better, mkay? Please notice me and let me ease your suffering!"

Trixie frowned deeply and looked up. "Gilda, what is…?" She cried out in surprise as she realized Gilda was rising far off into the sky.

"The time has come for me to move on!" Gilda called to her. "Your visit from the three spirits has already been set in motion. This is for your own good, Trixie. It's your one and only last chance. Don't blow this for yourself!"

"Gilda!" Trixie cried, but the ghostly griffon had already disappeared among the other tortured souls and the stars above.

Trixie stood alone, shivering in the cold winter's night in just her nightgown, a cold that seemed heightened by the dozens and dozens of spirits sailing all around. One spirit in particular, when it rounded the corner, made her blood run even colder. It was a massive sea serpent with a voluminous hairstyle and mustache, wrapped in anchors and wrecking balls.

"Oh, what a world!" the ghost sobbed. "What a world!"

Clutching his heart, the serpent spun and thrashed, hurling his body to the ground, and Trixie screamed and squeezed her eyes shut as she realized the gargantuan monster was going to crush her beneath its coils.

Nothing happened, and all the wailing and moaning suddenly went silent. Trixie opened her eyes, and found that she was completely alone in the dark and quiet streets. Even the mare with the baby had disappeared from the curb.

The absolute silence stung Trixie's ears as much as the freezing air did. There wasn't even the sound of wind. As Trixie looked around in confusion, trying to make sense of something, she happened to glance up at the full moon. The crater formation on the moon's surface, shaped vaguely like a unicorn's head… simply vanished, leaving the moon an orb of pure white. Trixie stepped backward, dumbfounded.

She was so transfixed by the moon, easily the most confusing thing she had seen this night, that she didn't notice the cloud of eerie purple smoke rising behind her back. The smoke solidified into a towering black alicorn with sharp-edged wings, clad in periwinkle armor. Her mane and tail consisted of the flowing purple smoke, and as she opened her purple-rimmed eyes, her pupils narrowed into catlike slits.

Slowly and silently, this frightening creature stepped up to Trixie, her fanged mouth coming up to Trixie's ear. "What has captured your attention so fully?" she whispered.

Trixie shrieked and whirled around, her jaw going slack and her neck craning up to look at the huge and otherworldly mare.

"Eyeing the moon, are we?" she said casually. "I can understand that…" The stranger grinned. "After all these centuries it still looks good."

"Are you…" Trixie began, unable to believe the words she was saying. "You're Nightmare Moon."

"Am I?" she said in genuine surprise. She examined herself. "Oh… yes, I suppose I am. I've been dormant and imprisoned for so long… I had almost forgotten…"

"…Are you here to bring about eternal night?" Trixie said in horror.

Nightmare Moon smirked. "No… no, not this night. This night I'm here for you, poor doomed Trixie."

"You are the spirit who was to visit me?" Trixie said slowly.

"Indeed," said Nightmare Moon. "This evening I am to guide you through Hearth's Warming Eves of the past."

"The past?" Trixie muttered. "You mean… the distant past, when the holiday was born?"

"No," said Nightmare Moon. "Your past."

Trixie recoiled, her eyes wide in horror, much to Nightmare Moon's amusement.

"Take my hoof," said the ancient spirit, holding it out to Trixie.

"I… I don't know if I want…" Trixie muttered.

"You'll take my hoof, and you'll see what I was called to show you," Nightmare Moon commanded. "Do it now."

Trixie slowly and shakily reached up, placing her hoof atop that of the enormous alicorn.

The moment she did, the light and the air seemed to bend together, forming a tunnel of space and energy which sucked Trixie and the spirit through some interminable distance, passing through miles and days in the blink of an eye.

Author's Note:

Looking back after all this time, one of my favorite parts of this story was taking all the words of Jacob Marley and turning them into something Gilda might say, though I didn't go crazy with that apart from the use of the word "lameness". After that... I was determined to shake things up once in a while, and I felt like, well... if Scrooge was a magic-user of some sort, he would totally engage in a fight with Marley's ghost. An awesome action sequence makes everything better.

Another cool thing - really, this is probably my favorite chapter as far as spicy ideas I had - I pondered the fact that lockboxes are a feature of Marley's chains, reflecting his money-hoarding lifestyle, and I thought about what kind of things other sinners might have in their chains. So I plucked out a couple of antagonists and gave them something karmic to carry around. But then, of course, the ghosts seem to have a "what a world!" mentality, so I couldn't resist bringing in Steven Magnet. Hehe.

Comments

[jamlamin]

Much better dynamic, here in Chapter 2! It now feels like a pony story; the fursuits are gone!

There was a single error that I noticed

Her striped coat and frilly uniform were all in shades of gray, which fit well with the dreary appearance of the house, though Zecora herself was refined and clean, while the house was in disrepair beyond all hope.

This is a run-on sentence, and that "while" is not supposed to be there.

Her striped coat and frilly uniform were all in shades of gray, which fit well with the dreary appearance of the house. However, although the house was in disrepair beyond all hope, Zecora herself was refined and clean.

feels a bit better, but the whole rehashing the house's state thing seems unnecessary to me.
Great job! Have a like... and a recommendation.