There was once upon a time a mare and a stallion, which they had longed to have a child of their own. For many years the two of them had tried everything they could think of to conceive a foal. From love potions to leather and whips, even asking for “assistance” from the neighbors in town, it had seemed that nothing would work and were about to give up hope. Until, to the mare’s delight, she was finally able to get pregnant.
Months went by, and the child within her grew, and so did her random appetite. Her husband was obliged to give her whatever she wanted day or night. She may ask her husband to find a cream of ice that was kimchi flavored one day and then asks him to fetch a salad that was purely made up of tomatoes and raspberry jam. The husband had no idea what his wife would crave for next.
One day, the mare looked out of a window towards a high fence made of iron in which behind it was the most beautiful garden that she had ever seen. A place in which it was always summer, always green and healthy fruit trees, delicious vegetables, juicy berries, and strong herbs of every kind. Yet, among all of the things that were grown in this enclosed space, one thing caught her attention more than anything. A peach tree that was always ripe and plentiful of its fuzzy fruit.
The mare had desired it so much for those particular peaches that she had become physically sick and refused to eat anything.
“My dear,” begged the stallion. “You need to eat something for you and the child’s health. I’ve already bought you peaches for you to eat.”
“But I don’t want the kind you get in a can,” his wife insisted. “I’m craving for something fresher than that. Like,” she pointed out the window, “Those peaches over there.”
“Dear, listen to yourself. We’ve walked around that area before and there’s no gate to get in. Even if there was, we still don’t know who cultivates all of that.”
“Well so? You have wings for crying out loud, couldn’t you just, I don’t know, fly over and pick a few. For me?” The wife used on her husband the best convincing tool she had, her puppy face in which her eyes grew wide and nearly wet with tears. Needless to say, the stallion promised that he’ll go over there at night, just in case he might run into the owner.
So when night came, he flew over the pointy fence and into the garden to pick some of the fruit. Once he brought it home to his wife, she fell in love with it so much that she had her husband repeat this act of thievery for the next few nights.
Then about a week went by, and the stallion flew over into the garden to pick the fruit. However, before he could fly out, he suddenly felt a snag on his tail. And looking down, he found that he been caught by a horrifying looking creature. A disfigured, three-horned beast that had antlers of a moose, the beak of a bird, the eyes of a reptile, the fur of a leopard, the tail of a lion, and the hooves of a goat. To his horror, he was caught in this strange creature’s magic as it snarled at him, barking at him in a mare’s voice, “How dare you come into my garden, you thief! Do you have any idea whatsoever how long it took for those peaches to grow? Oh, I’m going to enjoy turning you into ground pony.”
“No! Wait!” the stallion cried. “Please, I have good intentions! My wife is pregnant and she just wanted to have your peaches – we didn’t know anyone was even here! Honest!”
“A pathetic excuse for you to…” the creature trailed off. She glanced between him and the tree he has stolen from. “You’ve been feeding your pregnant wife, these peaches?” He nodded. “Curious…” she mused to herself, putting a hoof underneath her beak. “I’ll tell you what, I won’t kill you.”
“Oh thank you,” the stallion sighed.
“In fact,” she grinned. “From tonight onward, you are free to give your wife as many peaches from that tree as you like. However, I’ll do both of those on one condition.”
He gulped, “If it means that I’ll be alive, name it.”
“In return for having such access to my special peach tree, the child in which your wife will bear will be mine.”
“What!”
“Oh don’t fret. I’ll keep it to my word that I’ll treat the child as much as if it were my own. I promise that I’ll be a very good mother to it. But I’m afraid of that, and your life is the price you’ll have to pay.”
Terrified, and regretfully, he agreed.
The stallion continued to give his wife her fixated craving for the special fruit for several months until the day that their colt was born. The mare gave birth to a unicorn that, to her shock and surprise, the colt had two horns upon his head, not one. But before she could process it, the creature, true to her word, came in to take the baby, name him Dyron Peach and whisked him away, much to the parent’s dismay.
The mare, so upset that her husband didn’t tell her of the deal he made with the creature, took her husband to a nearby courtroom, divorced him while collecting the collateral for selling their child to an unidentifiable creature.
What neither of them knew was that in the center of the garden was where the creature raised the colt. Up in a high tower that had no door or stairs with only a small window at the top, she stayed true to her word in which she raised Dyron, and became a good mother to him. All the while, she insisted on the colt to let his mane grow out his fine, golden hair in which she rarely trimmed. She taught him many things up in the tower, from how to cook meals from what she brought from the garden to basic magic for him to use. However, she hoped to protect him from the outside world that existed beyond the garden. Feeding him with lies of how dangerous it was beyond the boundaries of not only the tower but the land in which the creature cultivated.
Eventually, the colt’s mane had grown so long that he could wrap his hair on a hook just outside of his window and let it fall, just touching the ground below. So that at any time when the creature wanted to see her adopted child, she would cry out: “Dyron! Oh, Dyron! Let down your mane to me!” And he would unfasten his braided tresses, wound it around the hook, and let his hair fall so that his “mother” may climb up.
When Dyron had grown up to be a young stallion, he asked the creature one day: “Mother, will I ever leave the tower?”
“Oh my son,” she patted his head. “I don’t want to risk you getting hurt out there.”
“Not even to see the entire garden?”
“We’ve talked about this before, if I let you wonder about, what if you get lost? Or eat something that you’re not supposed to? Or worse, have you got mauled by a timber wolf?” She hugged him in adding, “You know that I love you too much to let any of that happen to you. Which is why you must stay up here with me, who else can defend you from ponies that could hurt you? Or from mares that will tear you apart while the stallions stomp on you until they break your bones? Please, do not ask me that again.”
Dyron promised that he wouldn’t. Until one day about two or so years later when by chance, another creature wondered his way into the enchanted garden.
On that summer morning, a Changeling, curious about these mysterious acres of land, flew over the fence to see what was in it. He wondered between the plentiful fruit trees and over the patches of trees when he spotted the tower. As he went up to it, he noticed how it was drenched in a powerful spell in which prevented him from flying up as he got closer. When he got to its base, he circled around in confusion to see that there were no doors of any kind as it was surrounded by thorn bushes, and its walls were perfectly smooth.
“Why would anyone make a tower that doesn’t have a way to get in?” the changeling asked aloud, craning his neck upward. He spotted the only window that was opened a little. “Uh, hello? Anyone here?” he called out.
In a moment the window popped open. “Hello? Who’s there?” And before the Changeling could put on a quick disguise, he spotted him. To which the first thing he asked was, “What are you, some really big bug?”
The changeling frowned, “I am not a bug!”
“Well… Mother told me that I shouldn’t talk to strangers.”
Confused, the visitor looked all around him. “What strangers? You’re the first pony I’ve seen for miles in the middle of nowhere.”
“I’m talking about you. You’re strange enough.”
“What?” he raised an eyebrow, “You’ve never seen a Changeling before?”
The window opened a little wider, “So is that what you are? I’m certain that I’ve never seen anything like you before.”
“Says the unicorn that has two horns,” the visitor deadpanned.
“What’s a unicorn?”
The Changeling blinked, “Are you being serious right now? You don’t know that you’re a unicorn?” Dyron cocked his head to the side. “Uh… never mind. Who are you anyway?”
“What do you mean?”
“Well, a name would be nice to know.”
“And why do you want to?”
“Because I’m curious why a guy like yourself is in a tower that’s smacked dab between nothing and nowhere. So I guess a good starting point is to at least learn what your name is. Look, I’ll tell you mine if you tell me yours.”
Seeing this was reasonable, the unicorn told him. “My name is Dyron Peach. And who are you?”
“Call me Sekto.”
“Huh, that’s a funny sounding name.”
“But to be fair so is Peach. I mean, isn’t that a mare’s name?”
“Is it?”
The Changeling, identified as Sekto, stared at him for a good solid minute. “Wow, you’re the textbook definition of sheltered, aren’t ya?”
“Well, I wouldn’t know. Mother would tell me about these kinds of things.”
“Is she up there with you?”
“No,” he shook his head. “She said that she was off to collect some honey and milk. I’m not sure when she’ll be back.”
“Oh… How did you get up there anyway?”
Now it was Dyron’s turn to be stumped. “I… I don’t know. I was born here I guess.”
Sekto sighed, “As much as that raises so many questions, I know that if I did ask them, we’ll be here all day.”
“Oh, I don’t mind. You seem to be nice enough… I think. You’re even pretty to look at.”
This statement stunned the Changeling. “I am?”
“Well, of course, as I said, I’ve never seen anything like you before. Your body looks something like mine but has the outside of a kind of insect. And your eyes are in a color that I’ve never seen before either. So really, I’m interested in you.”
“But that’s why I’m confused, most would take one look at me and they run away screaming.”
“Why? Are you dangerous?”
“Uh… I can be, but not often. I mean, my fangs aren’t that sharp, I can’t really fly around here for some reason, and interestingly, I’m finding myself not that hungry anymore.”
“But how can you be dangerous and not be at the same time? That’s silly.”
Sekto’s let his jaw hung for a moment or two before changing the subject. “You said you have a mother?” he nodded. “Well, how exactly can your mother go up there if there’s nothing to get up there?”
Before Dyron could answer, he spotted the creature through the trees. He knew that if his adopted mother would have seen the Changeling, she would no doubt throw him out of the garden – or worse. However, since he was the only living creature that was able to carry a conversation than his disfigured mother, he didn’t want him to go away. “Hide! Quickly!” he warned Sekto. “Mother is coming!”
The Changeling searched his surroundings and thinking quickly, he burst into green flames, leaving a stone behind, much to the unicorn’s astonishment.
“Dyron! Oh, Dyron!” he heard the creature’s voice call out. “Let down your mane to me!”
So letting his mane down wounded it around the hook and tossed it all over the side of the window. The creature climbed up the latter made out of hair all the way to the top with a basket in her aura.
Meanwhile below, the Changeling spied the mother aspire up through the window of the tower. ‘By Chrysalis’s plothole that thing is ugly!’ he thought. ‘If that thing is his mother then I hate to see what the father looks like. But then again, at least I see a way how to get up there.’
At the top, the adopted mother greeted her son, “Good news, there’s just enough honey for that peach cobbler you like.”
“Thank you mother,” Dyron took the jar and placed it by the stove. As the creature went on about how the garden was doing, the double-horned unicorn thought back to the Changeling that spoke to him and how he was able to transform himself into a rock with a flash of fire. If anything, none of the books that his mother had given him has ever once described what he saw down below. Eventually, as the creature was getting out some of the pots and pans to be placed on the stove, he asked her. “Mother, what’s a Changeling?”
The creature paused and narrowed her eyes at him. “Where did you hear that name from?”
He glanced at the little library he had and got an idea, “It’s a word I found in a book. Only it didn’t go into any detail about what it is or what it looks like. Do you know what a Changeling is?”
She huffed, “A Changeling is a creature that is much worse than ponies, son. Why they’re like vampire bats in a way, they hunt and can be crafty so that they could come close enough to suck all your love out with their sharp fangs. If anything, they are things of evil, for they will be more than willing to trick you and leave nothing but a shell of who you were behind.”
That statement turned his whole perception of his mother upside down. Because he realized, he just caught her lying to him. Why the Changeling he saw didn’t have that sharp of fangs and made it clear that he wasn’t dangerous. And this was coming from the most trusted being that he knew his mother would never, ever lie to him… would she?
Every so often, he would glance out of the window to see if that Changeling was still there in his disguise. Sure enough, every time he did so, he would find that “stone” was still there on the same spot. Every chance he took while he cooked with the creature, he made extra sure that he was still waiting down there.
After their meal and his mother climbed down, he started to pull his mane back in until he heard Sekto’s voice. “Hey uh… Dyron, would you let down your mane to me?” The unicorn paused as he peeked down at the creature that had returned to his original form.
Dyron silently debated with himself. By the looks of it, Sekto didn’t seem at all dangerous as his mother described. However, he wasn’t quite sure if the Changeling was completely safe. So he asked him, “If I do let my mane down, would you promise that you won’t hurt me?”
“Well, I don’t exactly see a reason to,” Sekto replied. “Look, as long as you don’t hit me over the head with something heavy… or stab me… or attempt to burn me… or bury me alive… or poison me… or snap my neck… or strangle me… or crush me… or give me the death touch, then we should be good.”
And so the unicorn set the knife aside as he lowered his mane so he may have the Changeling to climb up into the tower. Once he was able to climb through the window, Sekto found that the top of the spire was spacious as it had not only a kitchen, but a tiny library, a hammock, a table with two chairs, a bathtub with a sink, sketches that were pinned to the wall, a kite, a fireplace, candles, and the smell of a recently baked dessert.
“Woah… This is where you live?” Sekto asked as the unicorn lit up his horns to rebind his tresses.
“Yeah, you’re actually the very first other than Mother to come up here.” He giggled, “If anything, this is really exciting that I get to have someone else to come up to my tower.”
The Changeling raised an eyebrow, “By that you mean you don’t get any friends to visit?”
“What is that?”
“Huh?”
“Friends. I’ve never heard of that word before.”
“It’s uh…” Sekto rubbed the back of his neck. “I guess it means when you know someling else that isn’t your family, but you get along with them pretty well.” Dyron chuckled, “What’s so funny?”
“Someling, that’s another word I’ve never heard before.”
The Changeling began to look around the tower, “So you’ve really never left this place, like at all?”
Shaking his head, the unicorn responded, “Never. I don’t even know what’s beyond Mother’s garden.”
This caught Sekto’s attention, “Holy crap, are you being kept prisoner here?”
“Well… I don’t think so. Mother said that it’s for my protection. But where did you come from?”
Dyron saw his new friend’s face droop. “I… I don’t want to talk about it.”
“I mean, are you from outside of the garden?”
“Well yeah, I saw the fence not too long ago and wanted to see what was in here.” Before he could say anything else, he was suddenly picked up from the ground and he came face to face with the unicorn.
“I can’t believe it! You beyond the garden! Oh, you must tell me everything! Like-Like,” he giggled. “I don’t know what to ask first. I have so many that I don’t know where to start.”
“Okay first, put me down,” he did so. “And second, between the two of us, I should be the one to be surprised. I mean, I haven’t put on a disguise and yet, you were willing to let me come up here? Why?”
“Well… I wasn’t exactly sure at first. I asked mother what a Changeling was… only what she told me didn’t match you.”
“Really?” Sekto raised his eyebrow. “How so?”
“Well, she basically told me that Changelings were monsters, but even now, you don’t act like one. You told me your name, promised that you wouldn’t hurt me so I let you climb up.”
“Wow,” Sekto placed a hoof over his withers. “No one has done anything like that for me before.”
“Well, shame on… whoever it is that needs to be shamed. I’ve just met you and I like you already. Oh! Here,” he went over to the stove to grab a cast iron pot in which was the source of that sweet smell. “Mother and I just made this, as much as I love eating this, I can’t gulp down the rest. Here,” he took out a couple of forks. “You take half while I take the other.”
The Changeling, although he didn’t see the need to physically eat, sensed something from the young stallion. It was a mixture of tasty emotions that he was freely giving: relief, happiness, excitement, and even a hint of loving care that all made a sweet combination. However, seeing that trusting smile as he offered the fork over to him was the cherry on top of it all.
“Well…” Sekto mused as he took the fork into his own aura. “Maybe just a little bite wouldn’t hurt.”
Thus began their relationship over a semi-warm pot of peach cobbler. Day after day, the Changeling would wait for Dyron’s mother to leave the tower before he called upon the stallion to throw his mane down to him. To Sketo, there was an appeal at first to come to the tower as the unicorn with the two horns was freely giving his most positive emotions to him without tricking him in any way. And the peach loving Dyron had always looked forward to his visits. He was willing to hear about what the outside world is really like, as well to show off the latest thing he wanted to do.
For example, after Sekto had shown him that he could walk up walls, Dyron wanted to figure out how to do it too. One day the Changeling came up to find that the stallion had plunger heads that he had taped to his hooves. Of course, the first question that Sekto asked was what he was doing.
“I’m going to try to climb the walls like you.” Said he, “I’ve been trying to figure out how since last night. I’ve tried glue, tape, magic, will power, prayer, but not nails because I’m not that stupid. But this time,” Dyron held out a hoof that had the suction cup. “I think I’ve finally got it.”
“You know, when someone tells you that they drive up the walls, I didn’t mean for you to take it literally.”
“But you did,” the unicorn walked over to a wall with a pop from every step. “And it looked like fun so I’m going to try it out.”
“I don’t think that’s a good idea.”
“Just watch,” sitting on his flank, he put all four hooves on the wall and tried to push himself upward. He managed to get himself a little way before the suction couldn’t hold him before he fell right back onto his plot. “Huh, I was sure that would work.”
Sekto face hoofed, “Dyron, have you ever thought of using your mane to, I don’t know, hook around the beams above us so you can climb up the wall?”
“But that’s too easy,” he replied. “It’s a whole lot more fun to use anything other than my mane to climb.”
While the Changeling shook his head, he smirked at the unicorn’s bizarre logic.
On another day that he visited, the two-horned stallion taught Sekto how to fly a kite when the wind was blowing strongly. He taught the Changeling how to fly it by using a roped strain of his enormous mane.
“You can’t just force it Sekto,” he told him as they sat on the edge of the window. “Only the wind can do that. So don’t pull on it so much, let nature’s fart lift it into the sky.”
This made the Changeling chuckle, “Nature’s fart, okay that’s a new one.”
“When you think about that’s pretty much what wind is. It’s just nature passing gas.”
By now his friend was laughing hard, so much so that he nearly fell over. “Oh, Goddess! I’ve never heard such-” but as he was laughing, the wind allowed the kite to finally be lifted up, to be suspended in the air.
“Hey look,” the unicorn pointed out, “this is what happens when you let the kite do its own thing.” He patted him on the back. Not taking notice the chuckling, goofy grin on the Changeling’s face.
Many weeks and months went by in the garden of eternal summer, and Sekto visited the two-horned stallion every day. Sometimes they would play games like wherein the room is the Changeling. Other times they would eat one of Dyron’s newest peach creations. But sometimes they would watch silently at the setting sun. Each time they got together, their companionship slowly became richer. On days when things were happy, they shared it with each other. On days when things were depressing, the other was there to comfort the other.
Then it became clear to Sekto that the impossible had happened. Not as a crash from the heavens, but from his gradual experience did he realized something. Ever since he met this strange unicorn in the middle of nowhere, he cared about him more than anything he could think of. In Dyron’s naïve, but cheerfully weird personality, he found peace. He saw him no longer as a food source that was giving out positive emotions for nothing, he saw him as happiness in the flesh.
Eventually, one night when the two of them were alone together, Sekto asked the unicorn: “Dyron, you like me, don’t you?”
He snorted, “Well of course I do. What sort of funny question is that?”
“Well,” after taking in some deep breaths he said. “You know… I have been seeing you for… what? Over a year maybe? And uh…” he rubbed the back of his head. “Look, I’m just going to be honest with you, Dyron Peach. You’re the first one that didn’t see me as a monster. Even without my disguises, you welcomed me with open hooves and… bothered to get to know me. And yes, I did come here to soak up those positive emotions… at first.”
“But now?”
“Now…? I’ve come to realize something rather big. And… You know what? I’m not gonna bother sugar coating this.” After taking a deep breath, he looked at this strange stallion in the eye and said, “I think I’m in love with you.”
Dyron blinked, “Define ‘love.’”
“Okay. When I say that, I don’t mean the kind that you have between you and your mom. Rather the kind that I care about you. To see you be happy. To make you feel that you’re safe and heard. That I would listen to your worries and doubts you have while being able to laugh at your bizarre jokes. The kind of love that I want what’s best for you such as having a life beyond not just this room or the garden, but the world at large to show off all its colors and seasons. I want to be with you in good times and bad. And for me to show you a much deeper, physical affection then just cuddling if you allow it.”
“Physical affection?” Dyron tilted his head, “Like what?”
Without thinking twice, the Changeling took hold of his face, closed his eyes and kissed him on the lips. Warmth filled both of them that were hotter than any fire before Sekto pulled away, “I was thinking something like that.”
“Wow…” Dyron wiped the saliva from his hoof. “That was… it’s like… I mean it’s…”
His Changeling smirked, “I take it that you like it?”
He nodded, “Is that the only physical affection?”
One night of redefining the unicorn’s definition of pleasure later, the two of them awoke the next morning, entangled in Dyron’s long mane. After untying some knots and were able to get themselves free, the two of them agreed on one thing: that neither of them could live in the tower any longer.
“But how am I to get out?” the unicorn pointed out. “Mother cuts my mane a certain length so that even if I climbed down the same way as you did, it’ll only come halfway.”
Sekto hummed in thought before getting an idea. “I got it! Why not I go to a nearby town and I’ll get as much rope as I can. That way you’ll be able to climb safely all the way down.”
The two of them agreed, and with a final goodbye kiss, the Changeling went out of the garden to set his lover free.
As it so happened, that a few hours later, the creature came to the spire and called out: “Dyron! Oh, Dyron! Let down your mane for me!”
And so he undid his tresses, wound it around the hook and let it drape down for his mother to climb up. When she got to the top, the unicorn muttered. “How is it that you’re heavier than Sekto-” He covered his mouth in shock as he realized the mistake he let out.
“Sekto?” inquired his mother. “What are you talking about, my colt?”
“U-Uh… nothing mother.”
She narrowed her eyes, “Do not lie to me, child. Was someone else in this room while I was away?”
He shook his head, but he already felt the sweat coming down his forehead. “N-No. Honest.”
The creature flew into a rage, “You’re lying to me!” She clenched onto his mane. “You wicked child! What did I clearly say? You’re supposed to tell me everything! You’re never to allow any strangers in this tower! And now, you’ve disobeyed me!”
“Mother no!” Dyron pleaded. But in his adopted mother’s rage, she wrapped his mane twice in one hoof, she took out the scissors in her magic and snipped, snipped, it was cut off, the lovely golden mane now lay on the floor.
As punishment for disobedience, she cast a spell on her crying son to be teleported to a desert in which he was to remain in misery. Now with Dyron gone, the creature hatched a plan for her intruder. Later that same day, the Changeling returned with the rope as he cried out. “Dyron! Hey Dryon! Let your mane down for me!” and the mother held one end of the mane before wounding it to the hook and letting it drop.
Sekto climbed up the tower, only to get a horrific, “Surprise!” the creature screamed. The sight of seeing her there terrified the Changeling so much that he lost his grip on the hair to which he swiftly fell head first into the thorn bushes below. The creature laughed in triumph, “Ah-ha! That’ll teach you to invade my home!” but in her moment of victory, she quickly realized something rather important. “Uh… how do I get down?”
As for the Changeling, while he did survive the fall, his face was scared and his eye was pierced by one of the thorns. His face had swelled up so much that he was left to wonder and escape the garden blind. A thought came to him that the mother was expecting him, which meant that she must have gotten to Dyron first. Bring to him even more pain then he felt for his face.
With nowhere to go, Sekto had lost, feeling his way for days weeping for the loss of his beloved. Thus he roamed until he came to a desert where the unicorn with the bad manecut was sent to misery. The Changeling heard his crying and went towards it, calling for the unicorn’s name. Dyron heard his cries and went up to embrace his neck and kissed his scared face.
Once they were able to locate a town with a proper medical place to steal the ointments to ease the Changeling’s pain and swelling until he was able to see out from one of his eyes. However, they did have to make an eye patch from whatever they could find to cover out the gouging eye socket.
It is said that the two of them are still around today. Some say that they are still touring around Equestria while others say that they’ve settled in the frozen North.
And for the creature? Well since she couldn’t undo her anti-flying spell nor had enough hair to climb herself down from the tower. It is said that her body is still there to this day. As for the biological parents of Dyron, they are still happily divorced.
What? It’s a fairy tale. Not all of them have a happy ending.