Somepony was here.
It had been so long since she had encountered another pony that she was a little starstruck as he hobbled inside. At least, she thought it was a stallion. She wasn’t sure how mares and stallions were supposed to look anymore. Sure, she knew she was a mare, or at least had been, but she hadn’t seen herself in years, so her judgment was lacking. In any case, a pony was here, and she had no idea what to do about it.
The pony had shoved open the front door and crawled inside, trailing blood behind them from their hobbled leg. The howling sound of timberwolves came from outside, and the pony limped as fast as they could go up the rotten stairs and into a bedroom.
She watched in silence, her form invisible to the naked eye and her hooves made no sound as she trotted around the pony, examining them from all angles. The pony was wearing a set of simple clothes: Blue denim overalls that had a large tear down one leg, a white shirt that was now covered in dirt and blood, a large straw hat, and a pair of bent spectacles. The pony might be a farmer, judging strictly by the clothes, but she wasn’t sure she knew what a farmer looked like anymore.
“How queer,” she said.
The pony looked around in a panic. “Hello? Is anypony here?”
She jumped and scuttled back a few steps.
Had the pony heard her? Animals ignored her, but that might have been because they’re animals and didn’t care what ponies say. She hadn’t tried to speak to anypony in a very long time.
“I need help, please! Somepony?” The pony struggled to stand and stuck their head out the door, looking down the stairs and the hall.
The sound of timberwolves barking and howling got closer, and the pony ducked back inside the bedroom. The pony tried to shut the door, but it was jammed on some fallen debris from the roof, so they just ducked behind it and cowered, shivering in silence.
She observed the pony panicking for a minute, but couldn’t quite figure out what was wrong. The pony was scared of something, and seemed to think somepony was around. She was here, of course, so the pony was right, but something about that seemed odd, and she wasn’t sure what.
Timberwolf noises drew her attention, they were almost at the door.
“Oh! Of course!” she exclaimed.
She trotted down the stairs with ease, skipping most of the steps by leaping down, and slammed the door shut right as the timberwolves arrived. They had smelled the trail of blood and were intent on reaching its source. They scratched at the derelict door and stuck their noses in the broken windows. They couldn’t fit, and this was her house, so she could hold the doors with more strength than they could bring to bear. Despite their efforts, they couldn’t get inside and with one last snort of frustration they gave up.
She peeked out the window to check that they were truly gone, then loped back upstairs to check on her guest. The pony had exhausted themselves in their panic and had passed out on the dirty carpet behind the door in a small pool of their own blood. She was sure that was bad, but she wasn’t sure what to do about it. She reached out to pick them up and found that her hooves passed right through.
“Oh! Well that’s even more queer. Are you a ghooooost?” she asked the sleeping pony.
She got no response, but brought over a filthy blanket and dropped it on top of them. Then she shut the door and wandered around her house as she was wont to do. At times like these time passed in a blur for her. She thought about nothing at all and just wandered without a care in the world, spending all her time just looking, seeing, and wondering.
She was brought out of her mindless reverie by sounds coming from her house in the early morning hours. She raced back inside to see what was going on, only to find that there was a pony at the top of the stairs!
“What are you doing in my house?” she yelled.
The pony at the top of the stairs scanned the building from the landing. “Hello? Somepony brought me a blanket last night. I’m sorry for invading your house, but I was being chased by timberwolves. I’ll just, leave this here on the banister and be on my way. Thank you again,” the pony said.
She thought for a moment. Somepony had brought the pony a blanket… Oh! That was her! She had even driven off the timberwolves!
“Well you’re welcome. What were you doing in the woods so far from home, anyway?” she asked.
The pony didn’t respond. They just draped the blanket over the banister, then began limping down the stairs. They headed for the front door, intent on leaving.
“Hey!” She ran over and slammed the door. “I still don’t know why you’re here! Answer me!”
The pony jumped when she slammed the door, and looked around, frantic. The pony shivered as she yelled.
“I’m sorry! I was leaving! Why do you want me to stay?” the pony said.
She noticed the pony was looking everywhere but at her. The pony’s eyes were flicking up to the top of the stairs, the doorway to the living room and the bedrooms, even toward the kitchen and the bathroom, but never at her.
“Weird. Are you blind?” she asked.
The pony quivered and pulled at the door, trying to open it. “Look, I can hear you whispering, but I can’t understand you. I’m really sorry for trespassing, just let me go, please. I’ll, I’ll come back to pay my respects! I promise!”
Respects? That hit a chord she hadn’t felt in a very long time. Nopony had paid respects to her for years, but it was important, and she didn’t know why. She opened the door and let the pony leave. She hoped they’d come back.
She didn’t know how much time passed before she saw a pony again. Time passed in a muzzy blur for her, but sometime later she was sitting at a broken window staring at nothing when a pony came to her house carrying flowers. The forest was dark, but even in the muted light of the forest, she could tell they were beautiful. The pony placed them on the doorstep, uttered a short prayer to Celestia, and bowed at the bottom step.
“Thank you for saving my life. I’m sorry it took me so long to return,” the pony said.
Oh! She remembered this pony! They had stumbled in after being attacked by timberwolves, bleeding and scared. Had she saved them? She must have. They were alive. She could see no trace of injury, but she remembered the pony being injured. How long had it been? She moved away from her window and crept downstairs to the front door. Her house creaked around her as she moved, rustling the remaining furniture and kicking up a small amount of dust. She opened the front door, and the pony backed away.
“Hello? Uh, I’ll assume you’re there. Doors don’t just open by themselves. I just-uh, wanted to thank you an-and pay my respects!” the pony said.
“Well thank you very much. Your respect is appreciated,” she said.
When she spoke, a chilly and powerful wind blew from her mouth, buffeting the pony and sending the flowers rolling away from her house. The shutters that remained on her house rattled in their hinges. She clapped a hoof over her mouth and the wind stopped as abruptly as it had begun.
To the pony’s credit he or she did not run away. The pony picked up the flowers and moved back up to the porch of the house. They looked up at the open front door with a fearful gaze, placed the flowers on the top step, then hustled backward.
“I hope they are to your liking. After that night my dad always told me that I needed to repay Tikbalang for saving me. I kept putting it off and putting it off,” The pony said. “My mother said she kept it at bay with her charms, but after my dad died she stopped making them, and I’ve had nothing but bad luck since. The orchard is experiencing a lot of trouble, and my mom says my lack of thanks is the cause.” The pony took a deep breath. “So here I am. I’m sorry again for taking so long.”
Tikbalang? Was that her name? She was pretty sure that wasn’t it, but then, she hadn’t thought about her name for a very long time. She looked at the pony below her at the bottom of the steps. He was male, she was sure of that now. He had a small beard, and he was wearing dingy overalls, a plaid shirt, and a weather-worn straw hat. He was very stocky in build, but he still had spectacles on that looked far too small for his face.
Tikbalang, as she decided to refer to herself, placed a hoof on the flowers to keep them from blowing away. “Thank you. I do not mind that it took you so long. Please, make yourself at home.”
The cold wind blew again when she spoke, but she managed to hold the flowers in place. The stallion below watched the flowers withstand the wind and a small and thankful smile crossed his face.
He bowed again, deeper this time. “Thank you Tikbalang. I’m happy to have pleased you with this gift. I’ll take this information to my family, and I hope you’ll give us good luck in the harvest.”
He turned away, bowing multiple times as he went, and she smiled as she watched him go.
She tried to pick up the flowers he had left, but couldn’t grip them, and only succeeded in rolling them about. She decided to leave them there and just look at them.
Time passed again. Her flowers wilted in an amount of time she couldn’t fathom, and when the snow came and disappeared, not a single trace of them remained. Her house was cold, but she didn’t feel it. It snowed, but it didn’t touch her. Her house creaked, but she held it up, even under the weight of winter.
One cold and blustery day during the snowfall, she was once again staring at nothing out of an upstairs window when she saw a pony approaching her house. The pony looked up with a hoof over their eyes and jumped back, startled. The pony was looking at her window, and she stared back, their eyes meeting. The pony started to turn away, but squared their shoulders and continued their approach. The pony stood in front of her house, just at the bottom of the front porch steps.
“Tikbalang please, I beseech you! My younger sister has become lost in your forest, and I’ve been searching for two days! You let me go even after I trespassed, and you gave us a good harvest!” He was looking up at her window as he yelled, focusing on her face. “If she has wronged you I will make it right! If you will allow it, I will come back and with these two hooves, I will repair your home! Just please let my sister go!”
Oh, it was this stallion again. He was confused, wasn’t he? This wasn’t her forest, was it? She didn’t remember much about herself, but she would notice if she was controlling the forest, surely. She was able to leave her house, but she didn’t see much need to do so. But still, if he would repair her house, that was worth some trouble. Her house was in dire need of repair.
She walked downstairs, opened her front door, and galloped past the stallion off into the woods at all speed, a blizzard blowing up behind her as she went. Tikbalang blew between the trees, over logs, under bushes, and across frozen ponds. The branches rustled and trees swayed in the wind of her passing as she hunted for a pony in the deep, dark corridors of a forest blanketed in white. She passed by what looked like a village in her search, lights glowing from windows even this early in the afternoon. Nearby, she traveled through a series of trees that were arranged in neat rows. These were things she didn’t remember seeing before in her forest. She wondered about them for a brief moment, but galloped on her way.
Night in the forest of Hollow Shades always came early. The canopy hid the forest floor from the light, even in the summer months. Winter wasn’t any better, with the snow adding to the sameness of the forest, showing nothing but white in all directions a pony could look. It wasn’t until after night fell that Tikbalang found a lone pony, stumbling through the darkness near the mountains south of Hollow Shades.
She trotted closer to the lost pony, and the ever-present wind at her hooves blew around the mare, causing her to cover her face. Tikbalang could see that she had a lantern at her side, but it had gone out, leaving her in darkness. Tikbalang tried to put a hoof on her, but it passed through the mare. She pulled back in thought as the mare shivered in the dark. She needed some way to show her where to go.
Tikbalang thought about ways to make herself known. For some strange reason ponies didn’t seem to see her, and every time she opened her mouth, a cold wind blew over her, muffling her voice. She didn’t want to cause the mare any further discomfort, but how else could she show the mare the way?
It was then she remembered a trick she had used a long time ago. She lifted up a hoof, and blew on it. A chilly breeze passed through the forest, and a cold blue flame appeared on the tip of her hoof, burning with unnatural light. Tikbalang reached back and placed it on her withers, where it burned without consuming anything, a point of light in the snowy landscape surrounding the two ponies.
The mare fixated on the light, calling out for help. “Hello? Can you help me? Hello? Anypony?”
Tikbalang didn’t respond, not wanting to cause her further discomfort, but instead blew a soft and chilly breeze toward her, then started walking toward the town.
The mare stayed where she was for a moment, then scrambled through the snowdrifts, following Tikbalang. “Wait! Don’t go! Please, I’m lost!”
Tikbalang walked along on top of the snow, weaving in and out of the trees just ahead of the lost mare. She kept up as best she could, but Tikbalang could see she was already exhausted. The poor mare’s energy was failing, and pushing through the heavy drifts was sapping her strength. They had only made it halfway to the town when the mare toppled over, shivering.
“Get up,” Tikbalang whispered, blowing a cold wind over her.
The mare couldn’t pull herself up, though she tried. She had been lost for far too long, and it had taken its toll on her. She wasn’t going to be able to save herself anymore.
Tikbalang looked at her one more time, then galloped away, a frozen wind in the night. She wove through the trees until she saw the lights of the town. Once there, she stood just outside the lights of their fires and the warmth of their community. She understood implicitly that she was unwelcome inside, and couldn’t enter even if she wanted to. But she could make herself known.
Tikbalang inhaled nothing, and blew. She sent an icy wind passing over the town, rattling windows and shaking doors in their hinges. A large fire built in the town square flickered but was undeterred from burning hot in the night. She saw a few ponies who were out and about stop in their tracks, but they didn’t stop for long, only sparing the wind a passing glance.
She blew again, sending cold winds through the alleys and over the rooftops, snow falling from the trees grown high above them, shaking those houses built in those same trees where some flying ponies lived. She blew again, and finally she started to hear some commotion.
“It’s unnatural I tell you. Something out there is angry!” a pony yelled.
She had their attention, at least. She blew again, and again, and again, until the commotion had filled the entire town. Finally, she saw a lone pony come galloping down the streets toward the forest where the wind originated from. The pony left the safety of the town, a lantern at their side, until they came to the edge of the wild woods and saw Tikbalang’s blue flame, floating in the dark.
“Tikbalang? Is that you? Have you found my sister?” The stallion asked.
Tikbalang did not respond, but trotted away into the woods. The stallion looked down at his lantern, then back at her flame, and extinguished his own light, following hers into the utter blackness of the woods.
She led him straight to the copse where his sister had collapsed, waiting next to her prone and snow-covered form. He scrambled up to her, clutching her to himself. He held a hoof up to her forehead and exhaled in relief.
“She’s alive! Thank Celestia!” he exclaimed. “And thank you, Tikbalang. She would be lost if it were not for you. I will keep my promise come the spring. Thank you again!”
He lit his lantern, hefted his sister onto his back, and followed his tracks back to town, leaving Tikbalang alone in the dark forest once more.
Tikbalang watched him leave, and when he was gone she stood there for some time. She extinguished her ghost-light and looked at his tracks, watching them disappear under a fresh coat of snow. When morning arrived, she realized she had been standing there thinking about nothing again. She turned to head home, her passage creating a small breeze that rustled the branches as she went.
Once she arrived she looked around at the derelict building she lived in. That stallion had promised to come fix it. That was important to her, but she wasn’t sure why. She lived here, sure, but there must have been a reason she lived here. There must have been a reason why other ponies couldn’t see her and she couldn’t touch them. Something important that she had forgotten.
She looked at the paintings on the walls, faded with time, and scoured by the elements that passed through the windows. She couldn’t make out many features on many of them, but she wondered if she was one of them. She couldn’t remember her own name or what she looked like. She had a new name at least.
“Tikbalang,” she said to herself.
It was an acceptable name. She didn’t have anything else to go by, so Tikbalang was good enough for now. Maybe she could find her own name while her house was being restored. He had better do a good job.
She reached out a hoof and touched the end of the banister, then looked at the paintings again and reached out to touch one of them. Her hoof met damp canvas, and she felt the oil paint under her hoof as she rubbed the portrait. She could touch things in her house, and interact with them, but outside it was a lot harder, and sometimes impossible. Why was that? Was she the ghost? No. That was ridiculous. She’d know, surely.