When Grogar awoke from his slumber, it was so dark that he could scarcely distinguish the darkness of his own room from the darkness that lay beyond the window (Grogar, wanting to save money, had not installed any curtains to cover them). As he lay there in the dark, his eyes glanced over to his old Grandfather clock, and as he gazed upon the hands, they moved, and the clock rang out a deep, dull, hollow, melancholy One.
Light flashed up upon that instant, and Grogar covered his eyes to prevent himself from being blinded. When the light receded and became tolerable, he moved his forelegs back, and glanced upon a strange being flying before him. Flying indeed, as it looked to be a pegasus. The creature that flew before him had salmon coloured fur that distinguished it from the intense brightness of the light that surrounded it, and its mane and tail was the purest blue and turquoise. It hovered in front of him, her red eyes looking into his as if in surprise that he was there.
"Are you the spirit who's arrival was foretold to me?" asked Grogar.
"I am!" the pegasus replied, the voice confirming them to be a filly. She had a smile upon her face that was at once adorable and maniacal. "I am the ghost of Hearth's Warming Past."
"Far past?"
"Your past." The spirit paused again, and after a moment spoke. "I come for your welfare. Rise, and fly with me!"
Grogar was of a mind to tell her that he, as a ram, lacked wings, and thus could not fly. He was also ill suited to the cold, having only fur and no coat; that bed was warm, and the thermometer was reading well below freezing. He stepped slowly forward, and took her hoof. But as she began to lead him toward the window, he stopped. "I am but a mortal, and liable to fall!"
"Oh golly, you are silly!" the spirit joked. "Take but my hoof, and you shall be upheld in more than this!"
The pair passed through the wall, and into a vast tunnel of white light, before finding themselves in a thoroughfare in a town in Equestria many miles away and many Hearth's Warming's ago. The town streets were bedecked with decorations and lights, and ponies went about merry and happy, as did many other creatures who seemed merry. Before them stood a large building with many doors and windows. It was a warehouse.
"Do you know this place?" the spirit asked.
"Do I know it?" Grogar replied. "I was an apprentice here!"
They went through the wall into the warehouse, and saw upon a great platform was stood a mare, overseeing the entire room with pride. She was of brown fur, with similarly brown mane, and a grand yellow and grey hat upon her head, out of the top of which emerged a brown decoration akin to melted chocolate. Her green eyes glowed with happiness, and she wore a dress with a yellow bodice, puffed pink sleeves, and a brown skirt covering her tail, upon the back of which sat a pink bow. Had that platform been but two inches taller, she would have knocked her head against the ceiling.
Grogar's heart filled with joy. "Why! It's old Miss Puddinghead! Miss Puddinghead, alive again!"
Miss Puddinghead laughed, and adressed two figures in the crowd. "Yo ho there! Grogar! Pansy!"
In entered a much younger Grogar, followed by his fellow apprentice, a young red mare with yellow eyes, a pink and yellow mane and tail, and wore a black dress.
"No more work this Hearth's Warming night!" Miss Puddinghead called to them. "Let's have the shutters up, and have lots of room here, before anybody can say 'Nightmare Moon'!"
Clear away! There was nothing they wouldn't have cleared away with old Miss Puddinghead looking on. Every surface was cleared, every table was moved, each desk lifted out of place and stored on high, as if dismissed from public life forevermore, and the lights increased, and coal heaped upon the fire, and the room was soon as bright as a ballroom, of the sort that one would desire upon a cold winter's night.
Then in came all the workers of the warehouse. In came Mr Puddinghead, or Hurricane as he was also known. In came many of the sons and daughters of the Puddingheads, in varying degrees of competence and ineptitude respectively. In came all and everyone, the butcher, the baker, the candlestick maker, the milkmare amongst them too. In came a cellist with a black mane and grey fur. And she went up to the music stand and tuned her cello, and made an orchestra of it, and tuned like fifty stomach aches. Then appeared a DJ with white fur and blue mane, with purple shades, and made an absolute racket on her turntables.
And then, the two styles together in perfect unison, the dance began. Away the couples went, up and down and round again. Some misstepped as they danced, some went in reverse, some pushed, some pulled, new top couple emerged at the top, new couples always ending up in the wrong place, and momentarily correcting their errors, all top couples at last, and not another to help them!
And then Puddinghead and Hurricane came forth to dance together. The cellist, whose face was now the colour of an apple with the heat, proceeded to play another tune, an old classic, the 'Ballad of the Crystal Empire'. They were the top couple, there was no denying that, and those beneath them were varied and many; the foolish, the happy, those who would dance, and no power in Tartarus would deny them.
Once the clock stroke the midnight hour, the informal occasion broke up. Hurricane and Puddinghead took their stations on either side of the great door, and waved their employees out, and wished them a Happy Hearth's Warming as they did so. Grogar was so enrapped in the scene and filled with joy he jumped when the spirit spoke again. "A small matter," she said, "to make these silly folks so full of gratitude. She has spent but a few bits of your mortal money, so why think you that she deserves such praise?"
Grogar, momentarily forgetting that this was a scene from long ago, spoke of his former employer in the present tense, rather than in the past. "It is never that," he said. "She has the power to make us happy or miserable, our labour a pleasure or a toil. Her power lies in thoughts and looks, things you cannot value in coin. And what if? The happiness she gives is enough to us as if it costs a fortune."
He was then aware of the spirit looking at him intensely. "Is something the matter?" she asked.
Grogar nodded. "I should like to say a few words to Sandbar, my clerk, right now."
"Our time together is short!" the spirit said. "Quickly, we must go!"
The words were not directed at anypony, but it produced an immediate effect. For they were both suddenly observing two sheep. One was a ram, clearly Grogar, a ram in the prime of life. The other, a ewe, glanced at the ground, sadness in her face.
The old Grogar looked away. "Why this?" he asked.
"It matters little to you," the ewe said to the younger Grogar. "Another idol has displaced me, and taken hold of you."
"What idol?"
"A golden one. You fear this world too much, and I have seen your nobler passions fall off one by one until the last, gain, engrosses you."
"Why is this so?" the younger Grogar asked the ewe. "I am not changed towards you. Not at all!"
"If you were truly free, would you pick one such as myself, with no value in currency, to be with you for life eternal? No. And in knowing this, I release you from our engagement, for the love of the ram you once were."
As the sorry scene faded out, Grogar looked to the spirit, his eyes pained. "Why do you show me this? Do you delight in torturing me?"
"These are merely the shadows of what have been!" the spirit exclaimed. "They cannot be changed, so do not blame me, mister."
"Away with you!" Grogar replied. "Remove me from this place! Leave me! Haunt me no longer!"
In that moment, he was back in his room, upon his bed; beset by the difficult emotion of the night, he collapsed onto it, and sobbed himself into slumber.