Ñaco hadn’t been let outside to play since his father and grandfather had headed off to Monte Rey, looking for help. None of the foals had been let out at all, in fact, unless it was with their parents. His mother Seda de Maíz hadn’t really been able to explain why to him – she just looked sad and scared at the same time whenever he tried to ask – but Ñaco knew that this was something important, so he hadn’t pushed it, instead focusing on doing his chores around their small home, or out in the fields (staying near to his mother the whole time, of course) and not making trouble for his worried mother.
When not attending his chores, he spent most of the time at his home’s window, looking in at the town. The adult ponies there mostly seemed to be doing the same things they did every day, but a tent had been set up just beyond the limits of the town. Smoke occasionally came from within it, and at night Ñaco thought he could hear chanting in a strange language. The town’s newest resident, the zebra Zecora, was hard at work on something while Ñaco’s father and grandfather looked for help from Monte Rey for the problem with King Longhorn. So far she had been the only pony who seemed to do anything. Everypony had their own ideas, but nopony could agree on any of them. Ñaco himself thought that running to Monte Rey, the whole town asking for help or taking shelter there, was the best idea, but apparently it wasn’t for reasons that nopony had really adequately explained to him.
It was when the town’s bell rang one evening that the routine of the past few days was finally broken. Ñaco and his mother had been out in the fields tending to the latest crop of maize when it happened. They didn’t hear shouting or panic from the village, so assumed that it must have been a town gathering, somepony having finally decided what to do with King Longhorn. So Ñaco and Seda made their way into town to see what the plan was.
By the time they got there, with the sun low over the horizon, all eighty ponies that made up the village seemed to have gathered around the town’s bell tower. Seda and Ñaco had to push a little to see what the commotion was, though the ponies parted a little for them. They learned why when they got to the front of the crowd.
“¡Papá!” Ñaco exclaimed when he saw his father, and galloped up to him. His mother was right behind him, and the two nuzzled the returning Tallo, and soon after Mazorca as well.
Seda began peppering Tallo and Mazorca with questions, but Ñaco’s eyes were drawn to the other ponies who had come with the two of them, framed as they were by the light of the sunset. His mouth dropped open at the size of one of the ponies, a huge stallion, bigger than any in town, who’s red coat barely hid the powerful, toned, hard muscles the stallion had clearly spent his life working on. Very nearly as impressive was the golden-coated stallion who stood alongside the red one, not as large or as outright powerful as the other looked, but who’s every movement seemed full of confidence and surety and who was wearing and easy smile that put Ñaco instantly at ease, removing all the worry of the past few days.
There was also another, older stallion, three mares, a small buffalo cow and a…tree?...but Ñaco found it hard to look away from the first two ponies he had noticed. He swallowed a little as he walked up to the big red one. “Ho…¡Hola!” he said. “¡Me llamo Ñaco! ¿Como te llamas?”
The stallion looked down at him, even as he unhooked the harness he wore from the cart that the apple tree was attached to. “Big Mac,” he provided, then pointed to the other ponies with him. “Y, Braeburn, Applejack, Fetter Keys, Ditzy Doo, Carrot Top, y Little Strongheart.” His voice had an Equestrian drawl to it, not dissimilar to what King Longhorn’s had possessed, but the stallion – Big Mac – didn’t fill Ñaco with nearly the same nervousness. Or at least not the same kind of nervousness.
A number of the other foals in town were coming up now, clustering around the strange new beings – now that Ñaco thought about it, the first to come to the town in years and years, as long as one didn’t count King Longhorn and his band – wanting to get to know them. It wasn’t long before the adults of the village joined in as well. Ditzy Doo’s wings were a major attraction, as the village contained no pegasi and hadn’t for generations. Carrot Top’s own orange tresses got her a fair amount of attention too, for looking almost like she’d just gotten them professionally done despite having spent days on the prairie. Most of the other foals crowded around Fetter Keys, wanting to look at his shiny Marshal’s badge, while one of the more rambunctious foals, Atole, actually tried to climb up onto Little Strongheart to look at the feathers she wore in her headband, something the buffalo cow allowed with a laugh.
The adults were more focused on Applejack, Braeburn, and Big Mac. The mare of the trio had asked where the town kept its water, wanting to slake the thirst of the tree that they had brought to town, while Braeburn and Big Mac took turns introducing their group to everypony around.
“Un momento,” Ñaco’s mother said at length, after the initial excitement of meeting new beings had faded. “Se suponía que debías encontrar armas. ¿Dónde están?”
Mazorca looked a little nervous, but Ñaco’s father only smiled. “No necesitamos armas,” Tallo said. “¡Tenemos héroes!”
---
“He just called us heroes,” Carrot Top provided for Ditzy Doo, the only one in the group who couldn’t speak Caballerian. “Said they didn’t need weapons since we’re here.”
Ditzy grinned nervously at that, then let out a slight yelp when she felt somepony tugging on one of her wings. Glancing, she found a foal that was too young to know better biting one of her primary feathers. Carrot Top and the foal’s father were there in a moment, and after a little cajoling were able to get the foal to let go, the father apologizing profusely. Ditzy waved it off, though she did raise her wings high to prevent a repeat in case any of the other foals were bitey. “I think I’m the only pegasus in town,” she noted.
Carrot Top nodded; she hadn’t noticed any unicorns, either. The ponies here must have farmed the old-fashioned way, relying on the natural weather and, if Carrot Top had to guess, an underground aquifer for their water, since it didn’t look like it rained very often here if the dust was any indication. She started a little when one of the mares of the town poked a hoof at the gilt necklace around her throat. “Es hermoso…¿de dónde es?” She asked in Caballerian.
Carrot Top glanced down a bit, though her own snout got in the way of actually looking at the necklace as she touched it. “Oh, um…es el Elemento de Generosidad.”
The mare’s eyes widened at Carrot Top’s words, and suddenly the rest of the crowd grew very quiet – save the one foal that was still climbing on top of Little Strongheart, anyway. Several hushed whispers and looks of amazement were rapidly focused on Carrot Top, along with Ditzy Doo once the ponies realizes how similar one of Ditzy’s own necklaces was to Carrot Top’s.
“¿Los Elementos?” Somepony asked. “Los Elementos de Armonía?”
Carrot Top glanced to Ditzy, who looked back with a nervous expression that matched the earth pony’s own. “¿Sí…?” Ditzy ventured.
There was another moment’s pause, then the town erupted into hoof stomps and loud, exultant cheers that could probably be heard all the way to Ciudad de Fresas. “¡Lucharon contra Corona!” Exclaimed one pony.
“¡Y dos dragones!” Added another.
“¡Encontraron Andalantis!”
“¡Detenido un ejército de muertos vivientes!”
“¡Golpeó a Catrina en la cara!”
“Wait, what?” Carrot Top asked. “Who’s Catrina – waagh!” She didn’t get any answers, just an increasing swarm of ecstatic ponies surging forward to shake her hoof or embrace her and Ditzy. It was too much for the latter, who beat her wings and took to the air to get space, and Carrot Top felt more than a little jealousy for the pegasus’ wings at the moment. The Caballeros were only held back from all but running her over in their enthusiasm when Big Mac, Applejack, and Mazorca and Tallo stepped in to help extract Carrot Top from the crowd and hold it back.
The Caballeros settled down after a moment, looking a little sheepish as Ditzy joined Carrot Top back on the ground, Carrot Top using one hoof to help guide her down while she tried to keep a wary eye on herd of ponies. “That’s…new,” the earth pony said. “We don’t get treated like this in Equestria, or even back in Caballeria proper…”
“Town of mares an’ stallions at the end of their ropes just had the next best thing t’ Princess Luna show up offerin’ t’ help,” Fetter Keys noted as he sauntered up to the two mares. He nodded to the Caballeros, who were talking amongst themselves again, smiling and laughing and looking confident, a confidence that grew with each glance Ditzy and Carrot Top, and to the rest of the herd that had cantered into town as well. “Y’all just set some high standards t’ meet…but y’all just rekindled their hopes somethin’ fierce, too.”
Carrot Top and Ditzy glanced to each other at that, then back to the Caballeros. “Oh,” Carrot Top observed, suddenly feeling very self-conscious. “W-well, um…better get to work, then. We shouldn’t just stand around, right? We have to get ready for King Longhorn.”
“Eeyup,” Fetter Keys agreed. He trotted over to Mazorca and Tallo, telling them as such. Mazorca waved a hoof in the air, getting the attention of the Caballeros, then explained the basics of the current plan to them as Applejack had explained it to everypony else: that the seven of them were there to help, but that they expected the village to pitch in too. Every able-bodied mare and stallion had to be formed into a militia, and would get training from Fetter Keys, Big Mac, and Braeburn. Applejack would work with Mazorca and some of the others in the village to work on its defenses, try and find a way to turn the flat and open plain into an advantage rather than a liability. Little Strongheart and Ditzy Doo would be serving as scouts, keeping their eyes open for the Cattle Rustlers; on hearing this, Ditzy immediately took off, looking to gather whatever stray clouds could be found to set up a lookout post for herself high in the air (something that got a lot of gasps and oohs and ahs from the Caballeros).
As for Carrot Top, she would be set up at Chicha’s saloon, since the distillery that the saloon had for making corn alcohol was the closest thing the village had to an alchemy lab. Carrot Top was going to be the Caballeros’ ace in the hole against the Cattle Rustlers, the alchemical concoctions she could brew up something that, along with the superior numbers of Caballeros, would work to not just tilt the coming fight in their favor, but perhaps make it so much so that King Longhorn was decide that the village was not worth the trouble in the first place.
Carrot Top steeled herself at the thought of having so many ponies relying on her. She’d never been anypony’s ace in the hole before, but she intended to rise to the challenge. She adjusted the saddlebags on her back, then asked the nearest Caballero where the saloon was so that she could start getting set up. The stallion led her on to one of the larger buildings in town and took her inside, where she encountered what actually, for the first time coming to the Mild West, looked like a disreputable saloon, though probably just because of the omnipresent dust. Most of the tables had been repaired a dozen times, and the place lacked booths or chairs; one had better be comfortable with just sitting on the floor. The wall behind the bar was well-stocked, at least, and a yellow-coated, white-maned earth pony was sitting behind it, talking to Zecora. Despite the disreputable look of the place, though, it still seemed cozy enough –
Carrot Top froze and did a double-take, and confirmed that yes, sitting at the bar was Zecora the zebra, minion of Corona. Zecora herself had glanced to the door when it opened, and also froze when her eyes met Carrot Top’s.
“Oh,” the stallion with Carrot Top said in Equestrian. “Have you two met?”
Some part of Carrot Top wanted to cry out for help; another part of Carrot Top wanted to tell the stallion that yes, the two had met a few times before, then demand what Zecora was doing here. It was very surprising to most in the room, then, when Carrot Top did neither of those things and instead found herself leaping straight for the zebra, front hooves outstretched and letting out what she guessed was a battle cry.
Zecora didn’t miss a beat herself, rolling backwards from the bar and away from Carrot Top. She came up on her hind hooves, while her forehooves now gripped the hook-ended staff that she’d had back in Tambelon, which had been lying across the bar. Zecora could use the hook to help her throw potions and vials, but Carrot Top didn’t see any on the zebra. So she charged forward, shucking her own saddlebags and their contents as she did and ducking under a jab from the staff, coming up alongside Zecora, spinning around, and trying to buck the zebra in her chest.
But Zecora remained quick and dodged away from the attempted blow. Carrot Top didn’t slow down, trying to keep close so that Zecora’s staff would be more of a liability than an asset, something she’d learned from Raindrops and Cheerilee. The zebra for her part caught on quickly and dropped it, trying to buck herself. She was more successful than Carrot Top had been, catching the mare in a glancing blow across the jaw that had Carrot Top seeing stars, but the earth pony reacted quickly, cantering backwards and using one hind hoof to kick the staff away and out of Zecora’s reach.
The zebra hadn’t gone for her staff, however – Zecora had dashed for the rear entrance to the saloon. Carrot Top let out another cry and chased after her, ignoring the shouting in Caballerian behind her as she skidded in the dusty ground out back. She found herself looking at a rather large cloth awning set up near a large pot, in which sat a green bubbling liquid. A makeshift shelf had been set up as well, full of mostly-empty vials, while a nearby table held a host of crushed flowers, dried leaves, and stranger ingredients.
Zecora had picked up one of the full vials, full of something red. Carrot Top’s eyes widened as she recognized it from Tambelon and dashed back into the saloon just as Zecora threw the vial. It crashed and shattered where the earth pony had been, and an angry red smoke began to rise; the smoke would cause burns on pony flesh, Carrot Top remembered. She had meanwhile reached her own saddlebags – still ignoring the shouting in Caballerian – and quickly pulled out a few choice ingredients, poured them into a clay pot, shook it a bit, and then threw it outside. The pot landed in the middle of the red cloud and burst, a green smoke rising where the red had been, negating the alchemical concoction quickly – within moments, the air was clear again.
“Two can play that game, Zecora!” Carrot Top shouted – to her own surprise – as she dug back down into her saddlebags and pulled out a vial she had pre-mixed in case of trouble on the journey here from bandits or ornery monsters. In a flash, Carrot Top was back outside. She spotted Zecora quickly, who had readied another grenade and threw it at the same time that Carrot Top threw her own.
Zecora hadn’t been expecting Carrot Top to be armed, while Carrot Top had needed a moment to spot Zecora, aim, and throw; thus, neither managed to avoid the other’s grenade. Carrot Top’s aim was true as her vial struck Zecora across her flank; as soon as the contents of the vial were exposed to air, the concoction actually exploded into green, sticky goop with a size that far exceeded what the size of the vial had suggested. Zecora’s entire rear end was coated in the goop, which latched on stubbornly to the ground and held her in place.
Unfortunately, Zecora’s aim had been just as good, and her throwing leg had been struck by Zecora’s own vial. And the exact same concoction came splashing out of it, a green sticky goop that spread across Carrot Top’s leg, chest, neck, and flank and anchored the earth pony to the ground.
Carrot Top was unarmed; she tried to pull herself away, but couldn’t. She glanced at Zecora in worry, but found that Zecora was no better off than her, latched too far away from any of her own alchemical grenades to throw another one.
It was only after several seconds of both equines struggling that the others in the village finally started to appear, some coming from around the saloon, others heading through it. Carrot Top looked to each of them. “Stay back, everypony!” she called out, then remembered the potential language barrier and switched to Caballerian. “Stay back! You’ll get stuck too!”
“What’s going on?” Mazorca, who’d come through the saloon, asked, sticking to Equestrian. He looked between Carrot Top and Zecora. “Why were you two fighting?”
Carrot Top started to respond, but Zecora spoke up. “There is a history between the Elements and me,” she said, still struggling against the goop that held her fast. She settled down after a moment when he saw she wasn’t getting loose, and closed her eyes. “I might have known I would be tracked to the Mild West, although their timing is far from the best.”
“We didn’t even know you were here!” Carrot Top objected as she settled down herself, knowing the goop would lose its potency in just a few minutes. Then her eyes widened as she looked to Mazorca, realizing what he’d implied. “Wait, you did?!”
“Yes,” Mazorca informed her. “Señorita Zecora is the one who helped convince us that to defeat King Longhorn, we must get weapons. She is the reason that Tallo and I went to Monte Rey for help, and she agreed to help us as well.” His head tilted to the side. “Didn’t I mention that?”
---
Ditzy Doo was sitting very still and keeping both eyes on Zecora. Zecora, for her own part, was sitting within the saloon in a strange pose with her hind legs crossed and forelegs held up, a position that even Ditzy’s double-jointed-everywhere friend Lyra would surely have found uncomfortable. The zebra’s eyes were closed, but her ears were upright and attentive, so she was definitely paying attention to what happened around her.
The conversation – between Mazorca, who seemed to more-or-less be the village’s leader, and Applejack and Carrot Top – was entirely in Caballerian, so Ditzy couldn’t follow it. So she settled on glaring, even if Zecora wasn’t paying attention to her. Ditzy was good at glaring, even if it made her eyes hurt to keep them focused on a single thing. It came with being a mother – a stern look was sometimes better than a spoken word when one’s foal was misbehaving.
One of Zecora’s eyes opened, then the zebra jumped when she saw the look on Ditzy’s face. She settled down after a moment, however. “So, Dame Ditzy Doo, what is it I can do for you?”
“Tell me why you’re here,” Ditzy responded immediately. “What’s Corona planning? You have to be here because of her. Does she have something to do with King Longhorn?”
Zecora chuckled at that. “Queen Celestia seeks to rule a nation; to ally with Longhorn would be far beneath her station. And while I came to the Mild West on a quest for my queen, my being here was most unforeseen. I made a mistake I wish to amend, once that is done, my time in this village will end.”
She still rhymed everything she said, apparently. Ditzy’s eyes narrowed. “I’m not sure I can trust a single thing you say. The very first time I met you, you tried to get me eaten by sirens. Three sirens, actually.” One of Ditzy’s eyes was beginning to hurt quite a bit from keeping them both so focused, but she did her best to ignore it. “You’re the one who put a curse on Ponyville. Never showed up to make amends for that, either.”
Zecora nodded, not denying anything. “I do apologize for my actions once upon a time…I have no desire to commit a crime. But I must be at Celestia’s side – the path I have seen cannot be denied.”
Apologize. She was just saying sorry for almost getting Ditzy and her friends eaten by sirens…and yet, inscrutable as Ditzy knew from experience Zecora could be at times, her apology really did seem genuine. As well, Ditzy also couldn’t forget that Zecora and Lyra had briefly been imprisoned by the demon ram Grogar back on Tambelon, and had worked together to escape his prison. But…
Ditzy shook her head and closed her eyes, as much to give them a break as in consternation. “Look,” she said. “Applejack and Carrot Top aren’t going to want to set aside what happened – ”
“We’re going to set aside what’s happened,” Carrot Top interrupted as she and Applejack trotted over.
Zecora burst out laughing, while Ditzy’s wings flared high at that as she spun to turn her glare on her earth pony friend. “What?”
Carrot Top froze mid-step at the look Ditzy gave her. “We don’t have a choice!” She insisted. “Zecora’s been helping out the village, brewing up a storm of alchemical potions with what she had on-hoof to help them against King Longhorn. The villagers trust her. And she really was the one who suggested they go get help!”
“An’ much as Ah might have a bone or two t’ pick with her,” Applejack said, glaring at the zebra, “we plain don’t have the pony-power needed t’ be puttin’ her under arrest right now an’ guardin’ her.”
That made sense, as much as Ditzy hated to admit it. She turned around to look to Zecora. “But afterwards,” she said, “she’s going back to Equestria, with us, under arrest, right? She can join the beings we arrest out here from the Cattle Rustlers?”
“Goes without sayin’,” Applejack confirmed.
Zecora looked like she was suppressing a chuckle. “Listen to you talking so bold…Zecora has proven she is not so easy to hold.” She tapped her hooves on the ground three times – reminding Ditzy of the three times in the past that Zecora had been captured by somepony and yet managed to escape. She held up her hooves before anypony could object. “But as I said, I must make amends to these folk, and so I swear the trust you place in me will not be broke.”
“You also have to tell us why you’re out here,” Carrot Top insisted.
Zecora took a moment to gather her thoughts before responding. “If it helps to bring about trust, then telling the truth is surely a must. I sought a library lost through a magical fold – the archive of Tambelon known as Spellhold. When the two alicorns fought the lich Grogar, the library was accidentally sent somewhere quite far. I searched and searched the great seas of sand, but in the end I found naught but King Longhorn’s band. The King Longhorn I met wore a pleasant façade, but I quickly learned how it all was a fraud.” She looked to the three ponies pointedly. “I had a life before following the eldest alicorn, and my homeland has suffered from the likes of Longhorn. I aided his band without knowing its goal, and even young Zecora would have been less of a foal. So now I aid the Caballeros how I can, as a younger me could not aid her clan.”
The three ponies looked between each other. “So…” Carrot Top ventured, “you came out here looking for this Spellhold, couldn’t find it. You met Longhorn and accidentally helped him. Now you feel bad about it and want to help the Caballeros.”
Zecora nodded.
“Now wouldn’t that have been easier t’ say?” Applejack asked.
The zebra’s eyes narrowed at little at that, though she didn’t respond. Ditzy, meanwhile, noticed that Carrot Top either hadn’t noticed, or hadn’t mentioned, how Zecora had said something about her own clan falling victim to bandits like Longhorn – and how a younger Zecora hadn’t been able to help her people. There was something personal, or almost personal, tied up in this for the zebra.
The pegasus breathed in deeply, then let out a long sigh. “Okay,” she said. “If there’s something we’ve learned since Tambelon, it’s that Corona…somehow…can be trusted. She keeps her word. We’re going to have to trust that’s rubbed off onto you as well.”
“In the forest of Everfree I gave no word to keep,” Zecora objected, “but I give it now if it will help you sleep.”
“None of us are turnin’ in yet,” Applejack pointed out.
“She rhymes everything she says, there’s going to be some hyperbole in there,” Carrot Top said.
Ditzy and Zecora couldn’t keep from glancing at one another, each having an identical look on their face: this is going to be a long truce. Zecora pressed on. “I swear to you, Elements of Harmony, that on this matter I will perform no treachery, not to you or any of your friends. Peace shall reign until I have made amends.”
“Darn right it will,” Applejack said. “Okay, then. Let’s get t’ work.”