With a flourish, Trixie levitated one of the pieces of paper from her hat. She hadn’t peeked, but from the way it was folded she instantly knew who’s name she had picked without needing to open it, since she had after all done the folding – though she made a show of opening the piece of paper anyway and letting her eyes widen a little so that she could look suitably surprised. Trixie also did her best to not look at what everypony else had picked…or tried to, anyway, but she really really really wanted to know who got her. Unfortunately Lyra, Cheerilee, and Ditzy were quick to hide their own pieces of paper, and neither Carrot Top nor Raindrops had hers, so that would have to remain mostly a mystery.
C’est la vie, she thought to herself as she turned her attention back to the piece of paper in her telekinetic aura. A golden lyre stared at her – she was going to be getting something for Lyra. She brightened at that. She already had the perfect gift in mind!
“Everypony happy?” She asked as she put her hat back on her head. At a confirming nod from her friends, she adjusted her cape and turned around. “See you all tomorrow then!”
The trot away was for show, of course, since she’d be coming back in just a few minutes, once she’d confirmed that Lyra had gone off to do her own shopping for whoever she’d gotten, and so wouldn’t see Trixie’s return. Now that she was only shopping for one mare instead of five, the gramophone she’d been considering had fallen within her expanded price range. Sure, Lyra probably had one already, but you could never have too many gramophones, could you?
…could you?
Trixie stopped in her trot as she considered. Well, actually, you probably could. Lyra lived with Bon Bon above her candy store, a single-story apartment to themselves where the one gramophone they may or may not have already had, but probably did, would be more than enough to project through the whole thing. Though then again perhaps Bon Bon would like a gramophone for the store downstairs? Something to add a little ambiance?
Hmm, but then that would be a gift for Bon Bon, not Lyra.
“Zut,” Trixie cursed, though quietly, as she resumed her trot through Ponyville’s marketplace, thinking this problem over. On the other hoof, if Lyra already had a gramophone, then she would need records to play on it, non? So perhaps some records would be better. But on the third hoof, if Lyra didn’t have a gramophone and Trixie got her records, then that would basically be a waste of everypony’s time…
Aha! But, Trixie’s budget for buying something for her friend remained expanded. So, all she had to do was get Lyra a gramophone and some new records, something released recently that she probably didn’t have yet. Then Lyra would have a shiny new gramophone to play some shiny new records on, and even if she had an old gramophone, that gramophone could be moved down to Bon Bon’s Bon Bons. Or the Confectionarium. Or whatever the candy store was called this week.
Also at some point over the last several minutes the word “gramophone” had stopped seeming like a real word to Trixie, due to the repetition of it through her head.
“Stop turning into Pinkie Pie,” she said, knocking a hoof against her head. “One’s more than enough.”
With that particular conflict settled, she turned around and started heading back to the market at a leisurely pace, confident in her line of reasoning and her choice for what to get Lyra.
---
…where was the gramophone.
Trixie stared, rather intently, at the spot where the gramophone had been. It had been a rather lovely gramophone, a big wooden…case-thingy with brass bits that curled around each other nicely and into heart shapes, a wonderfully pointy needle for playing records, and a very large...gramo-thing, whatever the speaker was. She was not an expert, or even an amateur hobbyist, in the construction or details of gramophones, she just knew that she had wanted a gramophone and now there wasn’t a gramophone here.
(The word “gramophone” was starting to insist on itself in her mind, some part of Trixie noticed with a degree of worry).
“Excuse me,” Trixie said, trotting over to the store’s owner, a somewhat portly earth pony stallion with a cutie mark of a trombone. “There was a gramophone over there just a few minutes ago.”
“Sold it,” the stallion replied, “just a few minutes ago.”
Trixie put on her most sincere, beneficent of smiles. “Do you have any other gramophones?”
“Nope.”
Trixie’s next smile was still sincere, but not nearly as beneficent. “Do you know anypony who might?”
“Ah’ve got one,” the stallion said. After a moment, just as Trixie was opening her mouth, he continued. “Upstairs in mah home. S’ mine. Good gramophone, really high sound quality.”
The smile that Trixie put on now was notably lacking in sincerity and had all the natural beneficence of a hungry Lunesianan alligator. “I meant,” she said, “do you know of anypony who might have a gramophone for sale?”
The stallion thought a long moment. “Nope,” he said, though at least he had the decency to add “sorry” after a few moments.
Trixie suppressed a sigh. “Alright, fine…” she groaned as she stepped from the store and back out into the cold. Well, there went that brilliant plan, destroyed at the first touch of reality before it could even really begin. As per usual, really. But it was fine, she could think of something else for Lyra…maybe a nice hat? Lyra didn’t wear a lot of hats, but she should. Everypony liked hats. And a friend like Lyra deserved only the finest hat! Trixie grinned to herself and took off for Rarity’s Boutique, surely the finest purloiner of fashionable hats in Ponyville.
---
“How could you possibly be out of hats?” Trixie demanded.
Rarity’s eyes narrowed a little bit as she tidied up around her store, having finished up with her previous customer. Her boutique had several other ponies in it as well, all eagerly waiting their turn for her attentions. “Dame Trixie,” Rarity said in as polite a voice as she could muster, “it’s so close to Hearth's Warming it’s a genuine miracle that I have anything left at all,” she swept a hoof over her store. Indeed, the boutique was as bare as Trixie had ever seen it, many racks empty, and most ponies there to pick up commissions rather than window-shopping. Rarity nodded her head towards one particular shelf, where everything was marked down considerably. “I should say rather that I am not completely out of hats, nor indeed any article of clothing…but what’s left are…” she suppressed a slight shudder and continued in a lower voice, “last season’s styles.”
Trixie actually suppressed her own shudder at that. Broadly speaking, she prided herself as being a mare of the ponies, a pony who had come from commoner origins herself, a middle-class working family at that. Well, sort of, with her grand-père’s income as the greatest stage magician who had ever lived; nevertheless that was still work. But at the same time, she’d lived ten years in Canterlot under the tutelage of Princess Luna, and certain social mores were picked up as a result. One of them was “you do not give away last season’s styles as a gift”. You don’t even consider it.
“Fine,” Trixie said, putting a hoof to her mouth as she thought. “What are the odds that you could put something together on short notice?”
“I couldn’t possibly,” Rarity said, regret in her voice. “Between running the boutique and finishing up the last of my already-commissioned articles I’m afraid I’m rather booked through to Hearth’s Warming itself. I do apologize.”
Trixie nodded in understanding, sighing and waving as she trotted from the building, letting Rarity get back to customers she could actually help. Well, there went another plan…
“Alright, Trixie, think,” Trixie mumbled to herself as she looked about Ponyville, trying to find inspiration. “Lyra! Musician…but gramophone is out. Candy-lover…but I’m certain Bon Bon will have that covered already. Maybe a book? I’ll get her a book. Everypony reads, everypony likes books. But what kind would she like…” she didn’t want a repeat of the minor debacle of the birthday present she’d once gotten for Ditzy, a book on power-politics that as far as Trixie knew was gathering dust in Ditzy’s apartment somewhere (in Trixie’s defense, she’d only recently moved to Ponyville).
Well, regardless, the town’s library would be her next stop…
---
Trixie threw open the door to the library, eyes already looking towards where she knew Twilight Sparkle would be. “Sparkle – ”
Ponyville had two possible places to buy books: Quills and Sofas, or the Golden Oaks Library. Quills and Sofas tended to get the new releases, while the Golden Oaks Library maintained a small book shop that had both used and new books for sale to supplement the library’s budget. The usual problem was that while Twilight was a good librarian in most respects and something that Ponyville had badly needed to run and organize Golden Oaks, she was a bibliophile first and foremost, and trying to get her to actually sell a book in the library rather than simply loan it out (specifically, because of the implicit understanding that the book would be returned on time and in the same condition it left in) often involved a little cajoling and convincing.
That was not the problem Trixie faced.
No, the problem Trixie faced was that sitting by the library’s desk was not just Twilight Sparkle, brightest magical mind of her generation, foremost expert on teleportation magic on the continent, and only in Ponyville because Trixie had goaded her into committing a crime and subsequently played a role in convincing her to turn herself in, resulting in her house arrest in Ponyville.
No, there was also Vicereine Twilight Velvet, heir of the House Starlight, Descendant of the Grand Dukes of Latigo and the Royal Family of Ancient Unicornia, Vicereine of Latigo, Equestria’s largest province and one of its wealthiest.
Twilight Sparkle probably more commonly referred to her as mom, however. In the letters that she sent home to Latigo. From Ponyville. That Twilight was only in because of Trixie. Because of the previously alluded to goading thing.
All this ran through Trixie’s mind in less than second, and that was all it took to convince Trixie to turn and run. Or she started to, at least, and even made it almost half a step, but a violet light surrounded her, there was a snap-pop sound, and suddenly she was face-to-face with Twilight Velvet, held in her magical aura a few inches off the ground.
“Wow,” Twilight said, glancing between Trixie and her mother. “That was incredible, mom! Where’d you get reflexes like that?”
Velvet smiled. “The mare can leave the Night Guard, Twilie, but the Night Guard never really leaves the mare,” she said.
Oh, great, and there’s apparently that too. Is the entire House Starlight made up of overachievers? Part of Trixie’s mind asked. The other part wondered if Twilight Velvet would allow her to at least start composing her own obituary. “Um…” Trixie said aloud.
“Oh! Sorry,” Velvet said, setting Trixie down. The older unicorn laughed a little, not unlike Twilight might. “Sorry, you threw open the door and said my daughter’s name, then tried to run. Instinct kicked in. I’ll assume that I misinterpreted the situation.”
Trixie blinked a few times. “Uh…um, yes, your excellency,” Trixie’s political instincts kicked in, then mentally kicked her a few times for her phrasing. “I – I mean, not that I blame you, your excellency! Oh, and, um, let me introduce myself – wait, bowing, forgot to – ”
Trixie felt a hoof on her withers. “Mom, this is Trixie Lulamoon,” Twilight said. She’d come out from behind the desk. “Trixie, this is Twilight Velvet, my mom. Vicereine of Latigo, yadda yadda yadda.”
Velvet looked Trixie up and down. “I see,” she said. Then one eyebrow raised. “I do believe she’s not breathing.”
“Huh?” Twilight asked, looking at Trixie. Trixie looked between them, confused as well, then realized that Velvet was right and let out a breath she quite literally hadn’t realized she was holding, then waited a few moments, then was forced to hit her own chest a few times to get herself to breathe in. After a considerable amount of effort, she got her breathing under control. “Are you okay?” Twilight asked.
“F-fine,” Trixie lied. Transparently. Fortunately Twilight was never quick to spot those. “Just, um…Hearth's Warming shooooh…” she trailed off at the mention of the holiday that was centered around family and togetherness and things that Twilight couldn’t do because she was under house arrest in Ponyville.
Twilight stared in confusion as her horn lit up, a pale nimbus of lavender surrounding Trixie. “Are you okay? Your heart is racing and you’re sweating…do you have a cold?”
“That might be it.” Velvet put in. She didn’t look fooled, unlike Twilight, but was at least giving Trixie a little respite. “You’re here for Hearth's Warming shopping, then? A book for one of your friends, I’m guessing?”
Trixie nodded, remembering to breathe again. “F-for Lyra. Lyra Heartstrings. Dame Lyra Heartstrings. Element of Loyalty Dame Lyra – ”
“I know who Lyra is…” Twilight droned a little, still looking concerned for Trixie. “Um…why don’t you start looking, I’m going to go upstairs and see if I have anything for…whatever you’ve got.”
It took a moment for Trixie to register the words, and by the time she did and started to ask Twilight to please not leave her alone down here, there had already been flash-pop, and Twilight had disappeared in a burst of teleportation magic to her home in the library’s upper levels.
There was some painful silence, followed by a small amount of laughter. “Honestly, it’s a wonder my daughter walks anywhere anymore, isn’t it?” the currently most powerful pony in Ponyville asked (by political metric, anyway; Twilight Sparkle had her mother and, really, everypony beaten by a mile in terms of magical ability. Her help would have been phenomenally useful against Grogar at the end of last summer).
Trixie had no idea how to correctly respond to that. She sensed a trap in all possible answers or reactions, though she did force herself to look at Velvet. She took in a deep breath, let it out slowly, took in another, and then spoke. “Vicereine Twilight, I am so sorry for what I did last Eventime,” she said. “I’m sorry for fighting with your daughter, I’m sorry for goading her and nettling her, I’m sorry for everything. I wasn’t the pony I could have been. I’m sorry.”
Twilight Velvet did exactly the last thing that Trixie would have expected: She smiled. It wasn’t much of a smile, a tiny thing, but it was there. “Of course. I accept your apology, Dame Trixie.”
Trixie managed to keep her mouth from dropping. “Oh,” she said. “Um…thanks. Thank-you, your excellency.” She then winced, bracing herself for the other hoof to strike, as it surely would.
Velvet seemed to notice her unease, however, and shook her head. “Trixie…I was angry. Of course I was angry. I was angry with you, but I was angry with my daughter, too. But that was almost a year ago now. You shouldn’t have goaded her. She shouldn’t have leashed an Ursa Minor and brought it into town. She’s paying for her mistake now, and I’m proud of her for it, even if she won’t be in Latigo this Hearth's Warming.” She let out a long sigh, then looked back to Trixie and stood up a little straighter. “If it makes you feel more at ease, you can think of it this way. You’re her designated escort. It’s your job to make sure that my little Twilie doesn’t get up to any other trouble, and that she is comfortable in Ponyville for as long as she’s here.” Her head tilted to the side. “Can you do that?”
Trixie nodded without thinking, though once her thoughts caught up she knew it was something she would have done anyway. “Of course,” she said. “I volunteered to be Sparkle’s escort, actually, though I think Luna would have asked me to do it anyway. I owed Sparkle at least that much.”
“Then as far as I’m concerned, the matter is settled,” Velvet said, making a cutting motion with one hoof. “You won’t be getting any Hearth's Warming cards from me any time soon, but otherwise, that’s that.”
To say that was a relief for Trixie was beyond an understatement. She had…less than exemplary run-ins with Twilight’s brother and father after the whole Ursa Minor incident, Night Light in particular. Sure, she’d patched things up with both of them, but that hadn’t changed that she’d been expecting round three to begin with Velvet. Either Velvet was less emotional than her husband, though, or else enough time had passed for the wounds to heal over. Regardless, Trixie would take it –
There was a flash-pop from right beside Trixie, and Twilight reappeared, several bottles in her aura as well as two more in each hoof. “Okay, I’ve got – Trixie! Are you okay?”
Trixie looked up from where she’d landed on the floor, one hoof at her chest as her heart hammered, far too much excitement and terror and so on having happened over the past few minutes. “F-fine. I’m fine,” she said. “Do you have any books on lyres for sale?”
Twilight blinked. “Um…well, there’s a second-edition copy of Timeless Tunes for Harmonious Harps & Legendary Lyres in the store, though I haven’t read it yet so I can’t guarantee its quality…”
“How much?”
Twilight paused. “Thirty bits,” she said, taking up a slightly defensive stance.
It was an outrageous sum for what was probably a lightly-used book. “I’ll take it,” Trixie said anyway as she stood, taking off her hat to get to her bits. “I think I’ve aged more in the last five minutes than I have in the last five years…”
Twilight looked like she was about to suggest something else, something that she’d already read, and also Trixie was clearly ill and so shouldn’t really be buying books right now. But from nearby, Velvet chuckled, taking the bottles from Twilight. “Twilight, you have to sell books, even ones you haven’t read, it’s your job.”
The younger mare looked a little petulant at that for a moment, but then sighed and nodded, using telekinesis to reach across the library into its store section and pulling over a large, only slightly worn tome with a cover that depicted several lyres arrayed around a great harp. She collected the bits, wrapped the book in cloth and strike to protect it, and hoofed over the tome. She even let go after a few moments. “Maybe Lyra will let me read it,” she said.
“I’ll ask,” Trixie said, then turned to Velvet and genuflected, as was proper. “It was a pleasure meeting you, Vicereine Twilight,” she said.
Velvet lifted a hoof, giving Trixie leave to rise and leave. “The pleasure was mine, Dame Trixie.” She was quiet as Trixie went to the library’s door. “Oh, though perhaps you could stay just a few minutes, my son and husband should be arriving…”
Trixie opened the door, and found herself staring at two stallions, one with a blue coat and black mane, the other with a white coat and blue mane. They looked rather like Viceroy Night Light and Captain of the Royal Guard Shining Armor.
Or as Twilight probably referred to them, dad and big brother.
“Nope,” Trixie declared, horn glowing bright blue as she teleported, something she was singularly awful at. She ended up buried in a six-foot tall snowdrift, but it was worth it.