When Carmine kicked the door open later that night, he was muttering fiercely to himself.
"Is there a problem?" Starswirl asked, turning away from the boiling cauldron. "I took the liberty of making tea. I find a cup always soothes me after a long day of work. Would you like some?"
"Sure," Carmine said.
Starswirl magicked some steaming tea out of the pot and into a cup, then levitated the cup over to the table.
"Now," he said, sitting at the table across from Carmine. "Tell me what's troubling you."
Carmine gave him a glare, then softened his expression. "Orrin Tin's cheating me out of my fair wages. He says he can't afford it, because of the disaster."
"Disaster? I take it you're not referring to your daughter's singing? I thought it was quite charming, myself."
Carmine shook his head. "A shaft collapsed, 'bout six months back. Some ponies got hurt, including one of Lockhorn Plenty's colts. But I know Orrin isn't hurting too bad, because he gave Diamond Joe a big fat bonus a few weeks ago for finding a new silver vein."
"I see. Does that happen often? The prejudice, I mean."
Carmine sipped his tea and nodded. "If'n you've got a horn on your head, that is." Then, he blurted out, "Two horns, that's a'right, but just one? Nope."
Starswirl, remembering the ram's head symbol he'd seen, cocked his head and murmured, "Hmm?"
Realizing what he'd said, Carmine explained, "The folks here, they still believe in the Old One. Some kind of forest spirit they hafta appease, else their crops won't grow."
"Ah, I see...."
"It's all nonsense."
"It would appear that way to us, naturally, but I'm sure many of our ways would seem just as strange to them."
Carmine stared at the ceiling. Wistfully, he said, "Our ways. Heh. Which ways are those, then? We've so many."
Leaning forward, Starswirl asked, "Carmine, why did you leave Roan?"
Carmine's face became stony. "Did something I shouldn't have. And that's the end of that discussion."
Nodding, Starswirl said, "If you wish. I am in your gracious hospitality, after all."
"You seem to be keen on sticking your nose into other ponies' business, traveler."
Starswirl thought, Ponies do not complain about a surgeon sticking his instruments into festering places if it will heal them. Why should this be any different?
"My natural curiosity is both a blessing and a curse," he said. "I must apologize again, and thank you for offering me a respite from my journey. I meet so many wonderful ponies on the way, and I am overcome with the desire to remember them all the better."
Carmine nodded in assent, then drained his tea and got up. "I'm off to bed."
"I'll clean up. It's the least I could do."
The clang of bells broke into Starswirl's dream, something about a young mare he used to know, and pulled him back to reality.
"FIRE!" somepony shouted outside.
He sat bolt upright and trotted to the window.
A blaze burned in the night, enveloping a large and well-to-do house near the center of town. Thick black smoke poured from the frame and licked the starry sky. Without a moment's hesitation, Starswirl rushed out of the mill and galloped through the panicking ponies rushing around like they themselves were on fire. He spotted a line of ponies who'd formed a bucket brigade at the well, but he didn't have time to wait. He muscled them aside, aimed his horn at the well, and willed the water to shoot up out of its mouth and arc through the sky, like he'd down earlier in the night. The wellwater rained down on the burning house and drowned the fires with a sizzle until there was nothing but wisps of smoke rising into the sky.
The townsponies, seeing the blaze had been squelched, slowly gathered at the torched house.
"You're pretty handy with that spell," a copper pony with a pickaxe cutie mark said menacingly.
Starswirl grinned broadly. "Well, it behooved me to be. Dealing with my mother's cooking for years turned out to be an excellent spur to learning how to douse fires."
The copper pony gritted his teeth violently and dug his hooves into the earth.
"Leave him," Lockhorn Plenty said. "That one ain't bright enough to make a spark, let alone a full-grown fire."
The townsponies gathered around three ponies in particular sitting on the ground and staring at the burnt house: a silver stallion with a charcoal mane, a blonde mare with a white coat, and Golden Vein.
Starswirl glanced over his shoulder at the mill, and spotted Carmine watching from his open bedroom window.
"It's alright," the silver stallion said to the townsponies. "It didn't spread much past the roof. We're alright, our livestock are alright, so....everything's alright. We can rebuild it just fine."
"It was that miller!" a mare called from the crowd. "I saw him leaving here cursing to himself earlier, I did."
"I disagree," Starswirl said loudly.
The crowd gave him a wide berth. The silver stallion, whom Starswirl guessed was Orrin Tin, walked over and looked him over from head to hoof.
"And who're you?" Tin drawled.
"My name is Starswirl, and I'm a lodger at the mill. My lodgings are in the living room, right near the front door. If he had left, I would have heard him."
"Of course he'd say that," the mare called again. "Them unicorns, they always stick together, they do!"
"If that were the case," Starswirl said to her, "why would I have put out the fire?"
"Because...." She chewed her lip. "....because we're onto your unicorn tricks, and you want to appear respectable and helpful so's we don't suspect you!" She nodded, apparently satisfied with her explanation.
"My dear mare," he said, "that's speculation, and where I come from, a claim like that must be proven with evidence. Why, the culprit could just as easily be the relative of one of the ponies injured in that mine collapse I've been told about, couldn't it?"
Orrin's wife pointed a hoof at Lockhorn Plenty. "I bet it was him!"
"You're accusin' me?!" Lockhorn snorted.
"For the past six months, you ain't quit with your lies about our mine! And you got that unicorn, that Carmine working on your farm! So's maybe it was you who did it--"
"Your husband's got 'that unicorn' working in the mines, too," Plenty snapped. "You know what, I had it up to here with you, Beryl, always flappin' your gums--!"
"Ponies, ponies!" Starswirl said, getting between them. "No need to tear yourselves apart over what could just be a simple accident."
"Listen," Orrin said, moving in front of his wife and jabbing a hoof into Starswirl's chest, "I don't give a crow's behind where it is you're from. This is our town, and we do things our way."
The crowd cheered riotously, except for Lockhorn, who gritted his teeth and glowered at Orrin.
"You may be right," Orrin Tin continued. "The proof against that miller is mighty thin, but so's the evidence he didn't do it, because all we've got is your word. So if you, that miller, or his runt daughter put one little hoof where it shouldn't be, we'll run you out of town!"
Again, the crowd cheered.
"Fair enough," Starswirl said, raising his hoof. "Would you like to shake on it? Or is that putting a hoof where it shouldn't be?"
Orrin Tin turned away in disgust. Gradually, the townsponies dispersed and went back to their homes, save the Tin family, who went off with another family. Starswirl turned to go, but looked over his shoulder at the burned house and stared in contemplation. He reached out and felt the Harmony, feeling around for disturbances where its field had been twisted by ill intent. He picked up resentment festering away, but it was by no means conclusive. For all he knew, Orrin Tin had a very unhappy marriage. He was definitely sure something had happened between Beryl Tin and Lockhorn Plenty, as love gone sour was the only way to explain the intensity of their animosity. But Starswirl couldn't sense anything especially useful, so he ambled back to the mill, where Carmine waited in the front door.
"That was a fool thing you did," he said coldly.
As Starswirl slipped past him, he replied, "We're all fools, in the grand scheme of things."