//------------------------------// // Bridle Gossip // Story: Sparkles to Flames // by InkedTapestries //------------------------------// Twilight Sparkle was a curious filly. That curiosity drove her every action, and she’s known since she got into Luna’s School for Gifted Unicorns that she was destined to become some kind of mage, studying magic to further the world. That being said, she wasn’t happy at her new school in Ponyville. It was nice to be the de facto ‘smart kid’, but it meant that she was completely alone in her studies. She was intellectually unchallenged by the maddeningly easy worksheets that the other students seemed overwhelmed with. As far as Twilight was concerned, the only foal worth talking to was Applejack, and that was only because of her family’s deep ties to the history of the town. Unfortunately, by the time that Twilight had already completed the extra work sent to her by her professors at Luna’s school, everypony would have normally already left school, and Twilight had never had an excuse to check in with the young cowpony. The school bell rang, pulling Twilight out of her thoughts. She watched the other foals putting away the day’s papers that she’d finished hours ago. It seemed like hours, at least. Probably more like ten minutes or so. Something interrupted her now daily routine though. “Applejack? Why aren’t you getting ready to go home?” Twilight asked her desk neighbor. Usually the orange filly would be one of the second ponies out of the door, the first always seeming to be a pegasus with a rainbow mane and relaxed attitude. “I thought you liked taking care of the chores around the farm.” “Uh, yeah, s’just... T’day that zebra lady’s comin’ into town. She always swings by the farm and chats with AB ‘bout weird stuff.” Applejack explained. “Plant stuff, I guess, but it always goes over mah head.” She decided to add on before the purple unicorn could pester her with questions that she couldn’t answer. “I get the willies anytime she comes ‘round, everypony in class does. Rumor is she’ll curse ya if she’s ever provoked, so I avoid her anytime I get the chance.” “Zebra?” Twilight could swear she’d heard that word somewhere before, but couldn’t place it. “Wait, curse?” The cowpony nodded, her oversized hat falling slightly and covering her face. She sighed and pushed it back up onto her head, entirely covering her blonde mane, ponytail and all, before responding. “She just kinda showed up one day, trottin’ outa the Evermute Forest like it wasn’t anythin’ special. Folks think she’s some kinda spirit, the Evermute herself. She comes into town once a month to do her shoppin’, digs at the ground every once in a while, and trots back into the Evermute after getting supplies.” “Supplies... for..?” “Dunno. Not exactly keen t’ ask.” Well that simply wouldn’t do. This ‘zebra lady’ was completely unknown to Twilight, and what kind of a scientist would she be if she didn’t fill in this blank? “Twi? Y’okay? Ya got a kinda... manic smile.” “Quit leanin’ forward, stick close to th’ barn wall. Yer completely visible from th’ trail to the fence stickin’ out like that.” Applejack whispered. “Can’t believe I let ya rope me into this.” She grumbled to herself. Twilight practically carried the filly all the way from the schoolhouse to the farm with her magic. AJ had tried to fight back, break out of the pink glow and hide back in the classroom, but stopped because she realized that letting Twilight go alone to confront the mysterious figure could only end badly. Totally not because her attempts at escape were entirely foiled by being lifted a whole foot off the ground. The pair of fillies spied from the shadow of the Apple family barn, watching as Apple Bloom spoke with Applejack’s mystery mare. Twilight tried to commit details of the unknown mare to memory, but too much of her appearance was hidden behind a tattered, old looking cloak. The most that Twilight could make out was the color of her coat. Stark white with gray markings on her legs. Twilight thought she could spot a few glints of yellow within the mare’s hood as she turned to leave. Her eyes perhaps? Heeding AJ’s advice and ducking into the shadow of the barn wall, Twilight waited for the mare to pass. She was looking to learn about a possibly malevolent forest spirit after all, not get cursed by one. “In hindsight, it might’ve been a little bit risky to spy on her out in the open like this.” “Ya think?!” AJ scolded, struggling to keep her voice below a whisper. “Oh well. Too late to turn back now. Let’s follow her.” “Right, ‘cause that’s obviously the smartest thing we’ll do all day. Go on ahead filly, I’m right behind you.” The orange filly lied, not even bothering to watch the unicorn stalk after the cloaked zebra. Twilight immediately noticed the fib but didn’t really care. It would be far easier to follow and spy on the white and gray mare on her own. The lavender filly watched as entire crowds split to avoid the mare. She darted from shadow to shadow, struggling to keep up, having to use levitation spells on herself and objects to make an easy path. It only got worse when the pair made their way into the forest. Thorns and weeds seemed to jump into Twilight’s way whenever she seemed to catch up to the mare, as though the plant life itself were trying to hinder her efforts to study the anomalous mare. “You cannot hide forever amongst the flora. Come little foal, introduce yourself to me, Zecora.” And was succeeding it seemed. “How did you know I was here?” Twilight asked, carefully peeking out from the shrub that she was previously failing to hide behind. “Your horn glows when you cast, so I saw you quite fast.” “Glows when I cast..? Oh. A spell. Duh.” She smacked herself with a hoof, ashamed. Her masterful stealth, faulted only by the natural aura of her soon-to-be special talent. How ironic. The mystery mare laughed and lowered her hood. Her face, slightly alien to the filly, was still clearly filled with genuine amusement. Not a hint of malice seemed to be hidden among her features. Not in her white coat, cyan eyes, or her grey markings. Stripes, Twilight noted. They were perfectly symmetrical, making the idea of them being scars a lot less likely than the unicorn initially thought. Either the mare dyed her coat to somewhat match her striped mohawk mane, or they were entirely natural. One thing was suddenly made clear though. “You’re not a spirit... You’re just a pony!” The mare, Zecora, suppressed her laughter to a chuckle, taking a moment to collect herself. “I am not a pony, my little filly. To make such a claim, you are rather silly. I am a zebra, a creature to you unknown. Perhaps if you’ll allow, this truth to you can be honed?” “What do you mean by that?” Twilight questioned. Zecora opened her mouth to answer, but was cut of by a yell from behind the filly. “Twilight Sparkle! There you are! We’ve been looking for you all day! Do you have any idea how worried I was?!” Twilight heard. She didn’t even have time to turn around before she was picked up and tossed into Spike’s scaled back. Taking a moment to get her bearings, she noticed the entirety of Spike’s new friend group, all walking through a patch of knee-high blue flowers. Twilight scrunched her face. She wasn’t gone long enough to warrant this kind of reaction from her older brother, right? School only got out a few hours ago... Actually, now that Twilight thought about it, it was far darker than she thought it should be. What time was it? The filly looked up to try and see through the forest canopy. Only a few beams of deep orange light broke through the leaves. Not the golden yellow of the midday sun that she expected... A lot later than the was comfortable with, but at least there was still some sunlight left in the day. Did she lose track of time, or was the forest messing with her again? “Sorry, Spike. I didn’t think I was out that long.” “Beware! Beware, you pony folk! Those leaves of blue are not a joke!” The zebra yelled, fading off into the darkness as the group made their way out of the Evermute. “You can’t just follow strange ponies off into the Evermute. The only reason I even knew where to look for you was because Applejack got scared you were hurt and told us what you were doing. You can’t just stalk ponies, Twilight. You are so grounded.” “Zebra...” The filly mumbled to herself by way of correcting Spike. As worried she was about what her punishment would be, she was more worried about what Zecora just said. That tone change was incredibly sudden. Was that what Applejack had told her about earlier? Was she just cursed? After a night’s rest, Twilight could thoroughly confirm that she was not, in fact, cursed. No bad luck, no inexplicable pain, no evil undead monster chasing after her. Outside of her dream last night anyway, but that was pretty quickly taken care of by Luna’s night guards. At least, she thought it was. Dreams were always so hard to remember. And weird. Spike didn’t seem to have much patience that morning, not even bothering to turn on the stove when Twilight sat down. He just poured pancake batter into a pan and took a breath, letting the heat well up in his chest as he held it in, a slight glow of whatever magic that created his fire snaking its way from beneath his scales. Satisfied with the pressure, he opened his jaw, releasing a stream of emerald green... bubbles. Twilight was immediately unsure if she was still asleep or not. “Spike, did you... eat a bar of soap?” “What on earth just happened?” Spike asked, watching as the iridescent green bubbles seemed to absorb the pancake batter into themselves before floating off to Luna knows where. At least Spike seemed to be aware of the oddity, mostly confirming that they both were at least awake. Unfortunately, it also seemed to imply something else. Without warning, the library door slammed open, audibly splintering, and Scootaloo called out for Spike. “Flame! Are you okay man? Flame!” The drake and filly duo made their way out of the dining room to meet the pegasus in the main room, shocked to find most of Spike’s new friends had seemingly been mutated. Maud’s coat was no longer her regular dull gray but was a bright shade of yellow, then it shifted to a sickening shade of green as she saw Spike, then changed back to yellow once more. Apple Bloom was covered with vines, leaves and blue flowers, a pair of branches jutting out of her head like antlers, both bearing various fruits. The biggest change was clearly Zephyr. He wasn’t a pegasus anymore. He wasn’t even a pony. He wasn’t even a he, as far as Twilight could tell. Wings were replaced with blue spots, a styled mane with unreasonably long eyelashes, and his original lanky, bony figure was replaced with what looked to be several hundred pounds of fat and muscle. He couldn’t even fit through the door due to his newfound size. “I have so many questions.” Spike started. “I think I’d like to start by asking why Zephyr’s a cow... No, actually. I can’t get over the fact that you just kicked my door in.” He cringed slightly, glancing over to the pile of wood chunks that was, at one point, the bottom half of the library door. “I didn’t.” Scootaloo seethed. “I’ve been breaking things all morning. I ripped off the door to my pantry when I tried to get some cereal, crushed the cereal box, accidentally threw my bowl into a wall at mach 3, snapped off the handles on my scooter, and put a second hole in my wall with the door handle when I bumped it as I was leaving today. Maud keeps changing color, seems to be tied to how she feels, and Zeph’s been having an identity crisis since he woke up.” “Yeesh. Guess we’re all weird now. I just started breathing bubbles when I tried to get some pancakes going. Well, except for Sweetie Belle, I guess. You seem completely normal.” In response, Sweetie shook her head, backed up, and kicked the wall next to a bookshelf with what seemed to be all of her strength, her bare hooves utterly silent as they connected. A few of the tomes rattled and fell, hitting the floor with not even the slightest sound. Sweetie seemed to try and speak, but only seemed to be mouthing the words ‘I couldn’t play my piano either’. “Huh. That’s probably the eeriest thing I’ve ever seen in my life. Including the time Twilight dressed up as a ladybug for Nightmare Night.” “You’re scared of ladybugs?” Zephyr asked, voice seeming to have changed to be more feminine. “No. She is.” Spike nodded to his sister. “And she has a very active imagination. She glued hundreds of fake eyes to the spots on her costume and threw a bunch of glitter all over it. Imagine that running up to you at freaking midnight, lights off, moonlight catching every other speck of glitter and winking out as it gets closer and closer. Never screamed more in my life.” “Can we get back on topic please?” Scootaloo interrupted. “What in the world is happening to us?” “It’s a curse.” Twilight said. “That zebra, Zecora, she must be some kind of enchantress! Applejack told me about her yesterday. She must have cursed you all when you came to find me!” Apple Bloom just shook her head and sighed. “Oh great, did that silly filly get in your head, Twilight? Zecora ain’t no forest spirit, she’s just a mare. Curses are just ponytales.” She explained before mumbling to herself. “Gonna have to talk some sense into that pony when I get home.” The cursed ponies and dragon began to talk amongst themselves, ignoring Twilight’s attempts to inform them as they threw out their own ideas of what to do. It was up to Twilight to make things right, and that meant appeasing the wicked enchantress that had cursed her brother and his friends. But what could a foal do to get Zecora to undo the damage? The most valuable thing within the library were the few books on ancient magics they had, and surely a creature capable of cursing six others with her words alone already knew the most ancient magics that existed. As time passed, Twilight continued to wonder what she could offer that would work. Books? No, she must already know more than anypony, except maybe the princess. Gems? No, Spike would starve. Bits? No no no, magic, to cast or dispel, was invaluable. She’d need to do better than that to get Zecora to help. She looked around the library for something, anything, that might help. A trio of items on her brother’s desk gave her an idea. A rolled up scroll and two golden tickets, one of which he had offered her. Twilight ran through the Evermute, following the path that Zecora had taken the day before as best she could, getting her saddlebag stuck on a thorn or two every so often in her hurry, tearing it slightly more each time she tugged to pull it off. With each pause and distraction, it took a little longer to find the zebra enchantress, but it eventually came to pass. Thankfully it wasn’t late in the afternoon by the time Twilight had found the mare’s creepy hut, but it still seemed later than she thought she could expect. Wanting to waste no time, she ran up to the door and knocked, taking a minute to steady her breathing and go over what she’d say. As soon as Zecora opened the wooden door, Twi flew straight into her speech. “Miss Zecora, please please please release the dark magic that holds my brother and his friends. I know you’ll only accept the best of the best to undo the damage that has been done, so I’ve come with payment.” With that, the filly opened her torn up bags and fished around for a moment, pulling out a small golden rectangle. “A ticket to the Grand Galloping Gala. With this, you can join my brother to meet Princess Luna herself and try to learn powerful, ancient magic, like how to use the stars themselves as spell circles for any of your enchantress rituals.” Zecora’s eyes widened at the ticket, opening and closing her mouth, unable to speak. Taking a moment to process the fillies’ actions, she stepped back and beckoned for Twilight to enter the hut. She complied, dropping the golden slip on the nearest shelf as soon as she could. “I am stunned to say the least.” Zecora said, eyeing the ticket with a hint of suspicion. “Why is it that you treat me with caution, as though I am a wild beast?” “I-I just... You’re a stranger, you know? I wanted to learn from you, not chase you away with insensitivity. That, and I really want you to dispel the curse you put on my friends without getting cursed myself.” “To learn from me is no easy task. Can you handle the challenge, and do what I ask?” “Are you offering to teach me?” Twilight asked. The zebra nodded in confirmation. “Your lessons start with this; the curses you speak of are not in my power. The troubles you suffer were caused by a flower.” “A flower made my brother turn into a soap dispenser?” Again Zecora nodded. “The words I spoke the other day were a warning for you to stay away. The poison joke has adverse effects. Though not quite dangerous, they can make quite the mess.” “Poison joke?” Zecora motioned over to what appeared to be a carved up tree stump next to a bubbling cauldron. Upon it laid an open book that Twilight grabbed with her magic, floating it over to herself to read the page aloud. “Poison joke. A large blue flower that grows in places with high amounts of natural magic in the soil. This plant secretes an oily liquid from its leaves and petals, similar to that of poison ivy. The chemicals in this liquid can drastically alter the magical makeup of a creature that interacts with it, causing random, often humorous effects to those afflicted. It is best to avoid the plant altogether, but the effects can be negated if the chemicals are washed off before they can cause any damage. If the effects of the liquid have already manifested, there is a formula below that the afflicted must bathe in in order to undo the effects and flush out the tainted magic. If the ingredients are unavailable, the effects may wear off after a week or so. Huh. So you didn’t curse everyone...” “In a way I did, and for that I am sorry. I would have followed to explain, but you all seemed in a hurry.” “Nopony but you and I seem to want to be in this forest. If that poison joke stuff is common here, I can see why.” “Yes, I suppose I can see the thought. Perhaps then I should hurry and finish this pot.” “What do you mean?” “While your friends ran off to avoid my path, I knew from the start that they’d need a bath.” “Oh! You’re already making the cure? Did you know I’d come? Are you a psychic?!” Zecora laughed. “No, little Twilight. I’m simply a friend who has fought the same fight.” Twilight took a moment to process. “You... touched poison joke too?” “The effects were quite horrid, it’ll scare you to hear it, but I’ll say that there is a reason that fillies think I’m a spirit.” “Huh. Well then, what can I do to help?” Twilight asked. Zecora smiled, taking the book from the fillies’ magical grasp and leading her to the cauldron, letting the filly, her new student, mix the ingredients as she added them in, one by one. Not even an hour later, the duo returned to Ponyville and rounded up Spike and his friends, where Zecora explained to them the cause and solution to their problems.