Two and a half days passed.
My mother worked upon my father, by dint of feminine wiles about whose details it obscurely discomfited me to think, for all that I was already almost a mare by the reckoning of my era, and I knew at least in theory the way of a mare with a stallion. All I can say is -- 'tis different when 'tis thine own dam and sire, and thou knowest she seduces him, and why. It maketh little sense in formal logic -- but naytheless is true.
Mostly, I just tried to stay out of their way, the more so when -- let me say simply that the signs of their loving were so blatant obvious that I should have known that part of it, even had I not been there when Mitta told me she would spread her sweet snares for Grey Hoof. The way they talked together, the way they looked at each other -- and, some times, they forgot to bathe after. 'Twas most disturbing to me, but I had not the heart to say aught by way of complaint, when they were mine own parents, and so plain in love.
Luckily for me, Starlet did.
I have so far said little in detail of mine own half-sister, have I? And ye have ne'er met her.
She is a tall slim mare, three years my senior, with a pure white coat and a dark reddish-orange mane that is full and lustrous and curls cutely at the ends, so that a stallion might want to stare at and stroke it, as one stallion in particular does. And she moves with a dancer's grace, and runs fleetly when she wishes, as she might to urge a stallion to chase her, though there is one stallion in particular whom she is glad to let catch her. And toward that stallion her orange eyes flash with promises.
So she is lovely, and was happy enough in that last year of our lives, for Roneo did love her as she did him. And they still do love each other well, these past thousand and five years, though they no longer be so happy, for now they ne'er can wed nor bring forth foals.
Why not?
Dear Snails, dost thou remember when I said that I could not kiss a Pony, lest I lose control of mine own powers, and begin to drain his life? Well, the same is true between us Wraiths. When we touch one another with strong feelings, our energies do clash one with the other. Each tries to drain the other, and though neither of us can be truly slain or hurt past mending when we rise the next night, 'tis not pleasant. 'Tis not pleasure.
We cannot ... Snails, even if we were so minded, I could not hug mine own father as we did that last time in mine attic chamber. We would start to hurt each other, when our hearts reached out. It has been o'er a thousand and five years ... I miss hugging him so ...
And any thing more carnal, such as what Starlet and Roneo do both desire ... 'tis not possible.
Gladstone does manage ... but he likes to hurt ... forget I spoke of this. Just know that 'twould be better for you to be slain and enthralled by any but Gladstone. Remember that, ye both.
Most special should thee remember, dear Snails. He would know thee for ... thou wouldst suffer worse than thy friend. Much worse. Trust me on this.
As for foals -- we're dead. 'Twould be quite against Nature Herself.
In any case, I do not hate Starlet. Nor have I ever hated her. 'Tis not possible to hate Starlet -- she is too dear and fetching and lovely and like a lady. And indeed, I love her well enough. She is, after all, mine own close kin -- closer kin to me than any but Grey Hoof and Mitta, and of equal close degree with Gladstone. And she is polite to me, most times. 'Tis that -- 'tis not always easy to be Starlet's little sister.
'Tis not fair to say that Starlet was spoiled. She lived no better than did I, at least until I came to the notice of my Lady, and my sister and I shared alike our small hardships and small sweetnesses in our earlier years. We were prosperous by rustic standards, but not at all by those of the City. We had, for instance, no servants, save for those we hired for harvests or parties. We -- all save Dainty in her last declining years -- did our chores and worked our lands alongside each other. 'Twas mostly a good life, but not a lazy one. None were truly spoiled.
It was more that Starlet wanted to be spoiled. And that she had her ways of getting others to coddle her as much as they could. And she wanted our affairs to be all flowery and polite and high-flown, more than they ever could be on an ordinary freeholder's farm, which is what ours was, for all that Grey Hoof was headpony of Sunney Towne.
She was, of course, jealous when I was befriended by Princess Luna. This jealousy took many forms -- strident complaint, sullen silence, and sly insinuations. The last vexed me most, for she made of the most wondrous friendship I had ever known something base, and wronged the noblest Lady who ever was with her calumnies. I fear that she drove me to outright wrath in this wise, on more than one occasion.
She also alarmed Mitta and Grey Hoof, who feared that Princess Luna would learn of this and harm Starlet. I do not think Luna would have done so to mine own sister over such foolish words, for the Moon Princess had seen and heard many terrible things in her long life, and was not so readily roused to wrath by mere prattle, even when 'twas insulting. And she loved me too much to harm my kin, while I lived.
She loved very well her own true friends. I think 'twas her inmost nature, to love, and all her fierceness was in defense of that which she loved.
But, to return to Starlet's behavior in that last week of our mortal lives ...
She, too, had noticed the lickerish manner between our father and Mitta ... and it disgusted her.
Why, I can only explain in terms of Starlet's own peculiar affectations. She had, after all, grown up in the same crowded quarters as mine own self; she was at least as aware as I that Grey Hoof and Mitta still loved each other, and enjoyed the normal delights of the marriage bed. What made me uncomfortable was that I knew full well why their long-established union had flared to sudden renewed passion.
What made this all the odder was that 'twas I who was an undesired maiden, while Starlet had a lover! Well, I do not think that Starlet had as yet allowed Roneo to have her most fully, but it was already quite plain to me that they loved each other, and that they at least lay together and hugged and kissed and otherwise did love-play when they went out in the woods together -- exactly what I had falsely implied Ravenwood and I had done before his departure.
Still, Starlet was beloved while I was solitary, and the one mine own mother thought might have meant to declare his love to me on my birthday had fled Sunney Towne before he had a chance to so do. Thus 'twas strange that I was but disturbed by my parents' amorousness, while Starlet was repulsed by it.
I think 'twas because Starlet must ever be the center of the main story, and if that story was about lovers, then she needs must be the leading lady. The fact that her co-mother loved her father, and they were unmistakably consummating this union, to put it politely, meant that Starlet's own romance threatened to be merely a sub-plot, as Starlet was still by strict definition maiden like mine own self. Starlet wanted all to attend to and envy her own success in love, not waste their time with their own wives.
Yes, put that way I suppose it does sound rather selfish of her. I am glad thou didst notice that, dear Snails.
And I have said I am no saint.
So Starlet did complain to my parents about their unseemly display of affection to all and sundry, at which Grey Hoof just laughed in the hearty way he has, and had even better when he still lived, while Mitta gave Starlet a sultry look and told her that she would understand better when she was truly a mare. And of course Starlet knew full well what Mitta meant, and it made her wroth, but she could neither out-face Mitta when Mitta wanted to make a point -- 'tis impossible, I knew that after knowing my mother but fifteen years, let alone a thousand twenty! -- nor could she complain to the village about the fact that her father was laying with his lawful wedded wife, without becoming a laughing-stock. So she fumed.
Poor Roneo was made to bear the brunt of Starlet's discontent.
Roneo -- I have mentioned him, but not yet described him. He is our cousin, and Starlet's own age. His coat is a creamy yellowish-white, his mane dark greenish-blue and rather wild, and he has intense dark blue eyes. He is a handsome stallion, I have always thought, and also a right good and friendly fellow, even kind, when not sulking over some slight from Starlet. I would not at all have minded him as mine own brother-by-marriage.
Roneo is, however, neither quick of wit nor deep of mind, and he has always been putty between Starlet's hooves. I think Starlet loves him most of all for that he will put up with her every mood and rare blame her at all for them. He had loved her for years, by the time of which I speak. We all, mine own parents included, full well expected them to speak formal betrothal very soon, or at the very least make understanding that they were to be wed.
In your day a betrothal-gift has become mere romantic custom, and betrothal itself mere words, but when I breathed, 'twas a bit more serious. See, an understanding between those greening made it acceptable for the lovers to consummate their union, especially if they were of the lower orders -- cottagers and the like -- though we were full freeholders and a bit more respectable. But an understanding was personal and only affected personal honor, d'ye ken?
No? Well, in my breathing days, each family was like unto a little Realm, and relations between families involved little treaties, to avoid them leading to little wars, the more so the greater the family. 'Twas not quite so anarchic any more, especially so near the capital as we were, but it had been quite bloody in times within memory of our folk-songs, so the customs to keep peace between families were not quite forgot. I have noticed in my unlife that customs always change more slowly than the original reasons for them.
Now we were not that great a family, save within the walls of Sunney Towne, but we were as I said respectable. And I know Starlet and Roneo had no understanding to wed, for if they had Starlet would have boasted of it to me. And mating with only an understanding would have been a risky thing for Starlet to do, and more so for Roneo, for he was poorer than us and was accepted by us only for the cause that Starlet loved him, and we all liked him.
So what Starlet and Roneo wanted, therefore, was formal betrothal. Now this needed that the couple in public declare they plighted their troth, with the consent of their parents or guardians if they were minors, and then they would exchange betrothal-gifts and share a drink together and all would cheer and tease them, and they would kiss, and dance, and thus they were betrothed.
Which was less than marriage, and 'twas not decent for them to start living together if they were freeholders or greater -- but none would gainsay what they did a-greening. Though they were expected to wed when they had the wherewithal to build or buy a house together, and then they would do so, and hold a party, and be married.
D'ye ken now?
Good.
Now, to be betrothed would be no great hardship for Starlet and Roneo -- my generous father would gladly throw such a party for the betrothal of his eldest daughter, and ask for no money payment -- save for one thing. Roneo had to give Starlet a troth-gift. And, by the nature of such a gift, Roneo had to pay for it.
Well, Snips, for the cause that if Mitta, Grey Hoof or Starlet gave Roneo the gift to give to Starlet, 'twould not be a proper trothing-gift at all. 'Twould be as if her parents were buying Starlet a husband, and a poor husband at that. Their betrothal would begin in humiliation, and hence be less firm.
And Roneo was poor.
However, he had a plan. He was and is a very hard worker -- folk said of him that he could do the work of any three normal stallions; and that was in his breathing days, now he can make magical copies of himself to aid him in his labors. And he has but scant devotion to luxury -- and much, to Starlet.
So Roneo did journey back to Pie-Towne, where he dealt with some kin he had there, who did own a rock-farm. And he worked hard, and lived frugal, for a year or two saving up money. The last of what he needed, Grey Hoof paid him for the hazards he ran on that final, fatal patrol. And, in that last week of our lives, Roneo took boat to Pie-Towne, and made his last payment, and brought back his trothing-gift for Starlet.
'Twas a fire-ruby, big and beautiful, for all that 'twas rough-formed and unfinished, even by our day's cruder standards. It had to be such, for Roneo to afford it, for while gems were not that much more rare in our day than they are in yours, 'twas much harder for us to cut and craft them than 'tis for ye today; and we had not yet the art of shaping them finely at the farm, that ye also have today. So, while to your eyes it might seem but a poor gift -- it did to Apple Bloom when she saw it, a few years past -- to ours it seemed a goodly gift, well worthy for betrothing.
Even its very roughness seemed proper. For what is betrothal but the rough start of a marriage? And 'twas a treasure whose value might increase with careful husbandry; whether further farming, or cutting or polishing. Roneo was but a simple stallion, as I have said: but his heart was pure, and, in his simplicity and purity and truth, he had hit upon a trothing-gift of absolute perfection.
So, when the period of grace for which Ravenwood had asked me was over, my mother Mitta did bruit to my father Grey Hoof the idea of making personal confession to Princess Luna, as Mitta had promised me she would do. She walked out in the woods with him, well out of town.
He did not take it well. Despite his distance from Sunney Towne, I did hear him all the way to the West Field, where Starlet and I were weeding.
We both of course did lift up our heads, perk up our ears, and stare in the direction of this demi-divine thunder; awaiting the next awesome utterance. We were disappointed in this, as no further ones came: our father had apparently resumed a more normal conversational tone.
My half-sister and I regarded each other. Starlet looked worried, for which I could not fault her, as I was very worried as well. She knew something must have gone very wrong, as did I. And the only thing worse than having thy parents too much loving one another is having thy parents too much hating one another. The former bears the risk of public embarrassment and new siblings; the latter, of a broken home.
And I, of course, was worried about something still worse than either possibility.
Starlet, faced with her fears, sought comfort by blaming her favorite usual suspect. Mine own self.
"What hast thou done?" she asked me, in a quite calm tone, as if she were accusing me of nothing more than having forgot to mix honey into our gruel. "Please, tell me thou hast not betrayed Roneo, and our father, to the Moon Princess."
So, Starlet knew of, or at least strongly did suspect, the murthers.
"I have not betrayed anypony to the Moon Princess. Nor anypony else, for that matter," I answered her. Then, for I can ne'er leave well enough alone, I added: "Nor have I slain any peddlers."
The look of shocked outrage, but not total surprise, on Starlet's face made it plain to me that she already knew something of what had passed on that patrol, and provoking it on her would have been well worth it -- had it not been for what happened in the end; the fate to which I hope my rash words did not, but fear that they did, contribute.
"How much do you know?" Starlet demanded. "What didst thy mother tell you?"
In this, Starlet confirmed to me that she knew at least some of it -- but perhaps not all -- and that she assumed it had been Mitta who had told me what happened.
"I know what I know," I answered, thus managing to be ominous, vague, and even truthful all at once -- though I was truthful only in a sense tautological. "And neither I nor my mother would ever betray Grey Hoof." That last was perfectly true: even now, my mother and I oppose Father not to harm him, but rather to save him from a fate far worse than mere death, or even undeath.
"Grey Hoof?" repeated Starlet. "Nay, I suppose thou wouldst not, since he is thine own father too. But -- Roneo?" she said urgently. "Dost thou mean to make him pay for the sins of all, to spare our father?"
I gaped in astonishment, at the unfairness of her accusation. "Roneo is least guilty of the four who went out that night," I pointed out. "Wherefore would I hold him as most?"
"For cause that the other three are our father, our half-brother, and thine own sweet-heart," Starlet promptly replied. It was clear she had been thinking on this a while. "Roneo is to thee but thy future brother-by-wedding. This be naught, in compare."
"Thou thinkest I would lie, and send an innocent Pony to the gallows, to favor mine own kin and mine own swain?" I asked. I was so wroth with Starlet that moment that I forgot to point out that Ravenwood and I had never declared any love.
Starlet laughed in my face. "Thou art indeed green," she said in scorn. "Of course thou wouldst lie to save those thou didst love, even if that lie cast innocents thou didst not love into Tartarus! Who wouldst not?"
"I would not!" I asserted angrily. "I would find a better way to ward my loved ones, than by damning the innocent!"
Starlet smiled, perhaps a bit more gently, and said "I would tell thee to never change, for thou art most wondrous innocent. But I fear thou art too innocent -- thou wouldst not last a week at Court. I have heard it to be a den vile and iniquitous." She said that last phrase with a delicate little shudder, as if it were some tasty treat to utter. "However," she continued, "I do now believe thou wouldst not betray us --"
"Thankee --" I began.
"-- for thou'rt still too simple," Starlet concluded. "As always."
"-- I think," I finished, then elaborated. "Thankee for kenning that I would not betray us. I am less glad of thy reasons for thinking thus. I am an intelligent mare, not some simple foal."
"Wait till thou'rt truly grown," replied Starlet, from the lofty height of her three years' seniority and expected betrothal. "Until you have truly become a mare -- at least mostly."
That last was extreme honesty by Starlet's standards. But then I knew too much about how things stood between her and Roneo -- from years of Starlet's boasting -- for her to pretend otherwise. Also, she had but recently come to full understanding with Roneo, which was why he now traveled to Pie-Towne for their trothing-gift -- and absent at least understanding, she would have lost rather than gained esteem by letting Roneo fully have her.
Did I look forward to it? Nay, dear Snails, I dreaded the morning after Starlet's Betrothal. Given her passion for him, I felt certain they would consummate their love. And then, I would have to listen to more of Starlet's boasting -- extensive, detailed boasting.
And I shall say no more on that.
Well, I never did grow much more. But I have thought on it, among many things, for o'er a thousand years now, and still I do not fully fathom Starlet , for all she is mine own sister. She can at times be cold and cruel, and she is often very much the cynic. And yet at other times she can be kind and warm. Her love for her family -- and her Roneo -- is very real. She at times mocks all virtue -- and yet she is loyal, and was in life faithful to her lover. She is not always nice to those she loves -- and if she does not love thee, she cares not a whit for thy fate. She is loving -- but ruthless. And selfish.
Ye should beware her. For she has no love for ye.
My mother Mitta and father Grey Hoof returned from the woods unhappy, and I no longer worried about my parents embarrassing me by unseemly affection, for now they glared at each other. Even had I not heard my father's earlier outburst, I would have known from this that their talk had not gone well.
Mitta and I conversed in private at the first opportunity to do a chore together apart from the others.
"The fool!" she almost hissed, stumbling over her words in her fury. "The arrogant, blind fool! Tells me he must be careful with policy! Policy!" She raised her right hoof and shook it in the direction of our house. "As if he were the potentate of his own little Realm, and must consider his relations with Equestria!
"He says there is no reason to confess. That nopony will miss a few strolling peddlers. That, if he confesses, he will be sent to prison. That if that happens, we will lose our charter!" My mother turned desperate, pleading eyes upon me, as if I were some Minister of State, who could somehow speak for the Realm, instead of being but one of Luna's friends -- and one of her youngest friends, at that.
I was almost swept away by my mother's flood of words. I tried to answer Mitta as best I could, to give her both my best estimate of the truth, and what comfort I might bestow within the limits of that honest estimate.
"The slaying of the peddlers may indeed escape notice, for they were but poor and humble Ponies." I said this bitterly, for I well knew that in this it was injustice for which I hoped and sought to bring about, and justice that I dreaded. In so doing I wrought wrong at a level far exceeding any foalish folly of spilled batter. I was committing the first real sin of my entire life, and I was well aware in this of mine own descent into corruption. "Unless they are missed, and somepony figures out that they were last seen in Riverbridge, and the direction of their departure from Riverbridge noted ... we may escape any hard questioning."
Mitta nodded. "If they come with but ordinary questions, we are safest to simply say we never saw the peddlers, rather than cook up some complex tale. The simpler our story, the less apt 'tis to become tangled into nonsense by contradictions. But -- what if they do suspect? What if they send in Rangers? Or the Night Watch?"
"Confess," I said simply. At my mother's look of alarm, I said: "Look, Mother, we are neither crafty bandits nor skilled spies -- and even if we were, those miscreants are often taken by the Rangers and the Night Watch. We are neither an independent state nor a rebel army. We are farmers, a settlement of farmers with a hereditary hide disease, and we have no business trying to set ourselves above the Law.
"Our only hope," I continued, "lies in the fact that the Sisters are merciful. If we confess, explain how we acted in error, fearing plague and over-reacting to resistance, the Law may go lightly with us. I will plead our case to Princess Luna. She likes me. She will be inclined to listen to my plea ... if the guilty make confession without it being forced at spear-point!
"For I tell you this," I warned my mother, "if it comes to the Rangers or the Night Watch taking Father and the others and hauling them before a Justice of the Peace, the Law will be likely be less merciful. At least, they will imprison Father for many years, and Gladstone for even longer. They will treat them as dangerous felons. Which they indeed are, an they do not see they have done wrong!"
"Grey Hoof will not confess," Mitta said. "He is firm set on his trail."
"Then," I replied, "I greatly fear that in the end he will doom us all."
My mother could make no good reply to that.
And I was of course correct in that forecast. Far righter than I deemed at the time, and far more fully would we be doomed than I could have imagined possible.