//------------------------------//
// Chapter VIII 
// Story: The Prince and the Workhorse 
// by fellstorm 
//------------------------------//


The Prince and the Workhorse


Part VIII


… So therefore, a wise princess knows that it is best to be both loved and feared. On the question as to which is more preferable, then it is better to be loved, for love is more important than power.

-Niccola Machiafilly
The Princess (La Principessa)

Big Macintosh galloped as fast as he could on three horseshoes, but it was still eight forty by the time he arrived, panting and foaming with sweat, at the door of the Library. He stood and caught his breath before nudging the door open with his forehoof and looking around inside.
Twilight wasn’t in the central room, but she couldn’t be far. The floor was stacked high with books and papers while a blackboard had been set up at the back of the room. The board bore the header “Intro to Friendship. Instructor: Twilight Sparkle” in blue chalk across the top.
Big Mac trotted in and examined the stacks of books. They all had titles like A Brief History of Friendship (Hayking), The Friendship Gene (Hamare) and Pony, all too Pony (Neightchze). He lifted a hefty volume with his magic and flipped through the pages; crammed full of indecipherable diagrams and matrices. He sighed. Big Mac had pictured his “friendship lessons” with Twilight featuring a little less theory and more practice, but that was the price of getting involved with a pony of letters. 
He heard hoofsteps from the other room and looked up from a dog-eared copy of Ponytics (Aristrottle) to see Twilight canter in, levitating another tall stack of books ahead of her. Upon seeing him, she narrowed her eyes and dropped the stack on the table with a resounding “thump.”
“I was beginning to think you weren’t showing up, your highness,” she frowned “and what happened to your mane?”
Big Mac hung his head. Twilight clucked her tongue.
Come on, you’re supposed to be a prince, remember? Big Mac chided himself.
“My apologies, m’lady,” said Big Mac.
“MM hmm. Lesson one was going to be a brief historical summary of friendship from the Paleopony Period up to the Modern era, but maybe it would be better to start with something simpler, like punctuality.”
“As you wish.” 
Big Mac followed her over to the blackboard. Twilight straightened a stack of papers and peeled a sheet from the top, which she levitated over to him.
“That’s the course syllabus. As you can see, we should already be discussing the Preclassical contributions of Thomas Equinas and his influence on the works of Clover the Clever!”
Big Macintosh blinked. The page might as well have been written in Ancient Pegasellic.
“Are you getting all this?” asked Twilight.
“Nnope.”
Twilight sighed. This was going to be a long morning for both of them.
“Alright, well, maybe if we work through lunch, we can make up for lost time,” she said as she turned to the blackboard.
The lesson would have to wait a little longer. Twilight had no sooner raised the chalk to the board than the library door swung open and Rainbow Dash trotted in.
“Twiliiiight! You in?” she called.
Twilight turned around.
“Yes, Rainbow, I’m right here.”
“Oh, sorry Twilight, guess I was distracted by this handsome hunk of unicorn meat, am I right?”
Big Mac and Twilight both raised an eyebrow.
“We were just in the middle of a lesson, Rainbow,” said Twilight “Is something up?”
Rainbow Dash looked around, nonchalant.
“Oh, not much. I was just wondering if you had a copy of the latest issue of Hard Stallions. I can’t find mine anywhere! I’ve looked all over.”
“Um… Never heard of it. Check in the periodicals section, I guess?”
Rainbow Dash glanced over at the periodicals section and then conked a hoof to her forehead.
“Oh, wow, silly me! Here’s my copy! Under my wing the whole time!” she declared too loudly to nopony in particular. She reached under her wing and pulled out the magazine with a theatric flourish.
“Well, I’m glad that’s sorted out…” said Twilight.
“I guess I’m gonna read it now!”
“Okay…”
Rainbow Dash pushed up between Twilight and Big Mac and flopped the spring issue of Hard Stallions on the ground in front of them. The magazine delivered exactly what it promised; mostly pictures of burly colts lifting or pulling heavy objects while sporting massive erections. Big Mac flinched away and uttered a silent prayer that Blueblood hadn’t done a photo shoot for them.
“Ugh! Rainbow Dash! That’s disgusting! What’s gotten into you!?”
“I wish it were one of these studs, right? Or maybe Prince Hunk over here,” Rainbow winked at Big Mac and clicked her teeth.
“Get out of here!” Twilight snatched the magazine, rolled it up and jammed it back under Rainbow Dash’s wing. She pointed her hoof at the door.
“Alright, jeez,” huffed Rainbow Dash “You need to get laid.”
Rainbow strode out with her nose in the air and Twilight slammed the door after her. Big Mac hoped Twilight couldn’t see him blush. Twilight hoped the same thing about Big Macintosh.
There was a pregnant pause as the two ponies processed what just happened.
Twilight broke the tension.
“I’m so sorry; Rainbow Dash isn’t normally like that…” she trailed off, lost in thought.
Idea!
“Which brings us to our first practical assignment!” she announced, “Recognizing when a friend is behaving strangely and finding out why!”
Big Mac nodded. It sounded a lot more fun than what was on the syllabus.
“Follow me; we’re going on an expedition!” Twilight disappeared up the stairs to her room. Big Mac placed a hesitant hoof on the bottom step and looked up the stairwell. The stairs curved around so that the top steps were out of sight. He heard Twilight moving around on the floor above.
“You coming?” she called.
“Eeyup…” he whispered to himself and started up the stairs.
Twilight’s room smelled like lilac potpourri and books. He heard rummaging above him and saw that the room was split into two levels, with Twilight’s bed and bathroom occupying a small loft overlooking a circular living space that more or less took up the top half of the tree. Everything was straight and fastidiously tidy, only her study area bore any signs that somepony lived there. Her table was loaded with pages of notes, stacked neatly by category. A binder, halfway through the process of being tabbed out, lay open on the desk.
Twilight looked over the edge of the loft.
“I need you up here, please.”
Big Mac trotted up the stairs that hugged the wall up to the loft. He tread carefully through the bathroom. He’d been to other ponies’ houses on repair jobs and Mares’ bathrooms always made him feel awkward. Everything was so fluffy. A purple hair dryer rested on the sink, plugged into the magical outlet that gathered electricity from the lightning rod up on top of the tree. There was a little jar of cotton swabs next to a toothbrush resting in a cup on the shelf under the mirror. The bathmat was poofy and pink. Big Mac was thankful there weren’t any feminine products lying out.
As Big Macintosh exited Twilight’s bathroom through the other side, a pair of saddlebags arced over his head and settled themselves across his back.
“If you’re going to be my protégé, that means you’re going to assist me in my research, and that means carrying the bags,” Twilight explained. She let out a small squee of delight and rubbed her hooves together.
“This is so exciting!” she squealed again “I have a protégé! I have somepony I can introduce as my protégé!”
“What about Spike?” asked Big Mac.
Twilight waved her hoof at the idea.
“Spike is a good friend and assistant, but he’s not exactly the academic type. At least he comes in handy as a gofer.”
“A gopher?” Why Twilight would want Spike to act like a garden pest was beyond Big Macintosh.
“Yeah, you know: ‘go fer this’ and ‘go fer that.’ Like right now he’s at the printers getting my lecture notes copied for tomorrow.”
Big Mac nodded and tried not to let his disappointment show. Tomorrow didn’t sound too promising.
“That is if we can get to the bottom of Rainbow’s problem today, of course. Depending on what’s wrong, it might take two or three days to reach a satisfactory conclusion… Here, take this…”
Twilight levitated a copy of Kaplan & Saddle’s Comprehensive Textbook of Psychiatry in his face. Big Mac looked at it and waited for it to float into his bag. It just hung there.
Twilight cleared her throat.
“Um, Blueblood? Put this in the bag, please?”
Big Mac blinked.
Oh! Right!
He reached out with his magic and enveloped the book. For a moment, his magical field overlapped with hers and there was a discharge of ozone. Big Mac could feel her touch on the book, like the echo of a song lingering on the wind. Though they were several feet apart, for the barest instant, they seemed so close as to almost share the same space. Twilight felt something, too and he saw her flick her ears. She cleared her throat with a small “ahem” and went back to gathering supplies. She dropped the rest of her study materials; a notebook, quill, some parchment and a small pair of glasses into the saddlebags without waiting for Big Mac to take them.
“We’re probably going to need snacks, too,” said Twilight, edging around Big Mac and trotting back downstairs. Big Mac paused a few seconds before following. He was feeling just a little lightheaded.

***
Twilight had to stop and lean against the refrigerator before opening it. What was all that about? An unfamiliar warmth suffused her body and it felt like she was having trouble keeping her hooves on the ground. Could she be sick? If Blueblood weren’t here, she’d go back upstairs and take her temperature, but there was no time for that right now. Besides, what she was feeling was probably just concern for Rainbow Dash…
Twilight opened the fridge and stuck her face inside. She rested her chin on the shelf and took a few deep breaths.

***
Blueblood was enjoying a luxurious morning at Sweet Apple Acres. Tombs had taken the liberty of heating some water for a bath. The large, wooden washtub behind the barn wasn’t much when compared to the multi-head, thermostatically controlled, high-pressure shower system (with Vibroluxe massage!) the Prince enjoyed back at the palace but, as Tombs poured another pitcher of warm water over his head and scrubbed his back, he could honestly say he had no complaints. After his bath, Tombs cleaned the mud out of Blueblood’s hooves and trimmed his fetlocks so that they weren’t quite so unruly. After that, it was a massage to get all the kinks out from the previous day (plus a few more that Big Mac had apparently been carrying around for ages). By the time Applejack came in from the fields for lunch, he felt like a new colt.
“Big Macintosh, whut are you doin’?” asked Applejack through the screen door as she washed her hooves under the hoof-operated pump outside.
Blueblood was sitting in the middle of the kitchen floor, wrapped in a barber gown while Tombs attempted to style his unruly mane.
“Oh! Uh…-good afternoon… sis,” said Blueblood.
Tombs spoke up.
“If you’ll pardon the liberty, miss Applejack, I had the time and the inclination, so I offered to trim mister Macintosh’s mane. Mister Macintosh seemed amicable to the offer and it’s the least I can do to repay your kind hospitality.”
“Uh huh…” said Applejack “Well it’s not so much that… I wus just surprised Big Mac hadn’t left for town yet. Ah know Ah told him to take it easy and all, but I was really hopin’ he could get up to the apple stand today.”
“Of course mister Macintosh has been eager to depart for some time. The delay is of course my fault.”
“’Taint nuthin’, just as long as he gets up there…” Applejack went over to the icebox and opened it with her teeth “What th-”
She pulled a large bowl of potato salad out of the icebox and set it on the table. There was a note on top that read “Miss Applejack.”
Applejack looked over at Tombs.
“Did you make this for me?”
“Yes ma’m. If you’ll forgive the liberty, I felt it would be a welcome treat after a long morning out in the fields.”
Applejack’s hard expression melted a little.
“Well… that’s mighty kind of ya,” she said.
“There is also lemonade chilling on the top shelf, ma’m.”
“Thank you kindly mister Tombs, Ah’m amazed you went t’ all this trouble,” said Applejack, peeling the cling wrap from the top of the bowl and digging into the potato salad with vigor.
“Big Mac, just make sure yer up in town once you finish yer manecut, y’hear?” said Applejack between mouthfuls of potato salad.
“Eeyop.”

***
Blueblood and Tombs made a brisk pace up into town, well, as brisk as they could considering Blueblood was also hitched up to the cart bearing that day’s load of apples.
“I say, I was rather hoping to get the day off, what?” said Blueblood, puffing a little from the weight of the cart. Big Macintosh’s body was no stranger to hard work by any means, but Blueblood was, and he had a much lower threshold for exhaustion.
“I expect, sire that, considering the heavy workload that necessarily comes with owning and operating a farm the size of Sweet Apple Acres, spending the afternoon working at the market is the closest thing to a day off one can afford.”
“Ugh. Oh well, I feel invigorated by this morning’s rest. I expect I can survive an afternoon of honest toil…”
Even beneath a coat of soil and sweat, Big Macintosh’s rugged physique and stoic manner had always turned quite a few heads among the mares of Ponyville. Now, Blueblood, neatly trimmed and sporting his princely swagger, was turning quite a few more. A small procession of distracted mares had begun to gather behind the pair as they made their way to the center of town. The fact hadn’t escaped Blueblood and he winked at a small gaggle of fillies as he passed, eliciting a collective sigh and excited whispering.
“You know, Tombs, I think we’re going to do a pretty brisk business today.”
“I expect so, sire, provided we can keep our minds on our work…”
“Oh of course, of course…” Blueblood said absentmindedly, looking over his shoulder. The parade of mares stopped in their tracks and pretended to be busy with other things.
Blueblood and Tombs set up the cart. Blueblood was surprised at the ease with which he could move the heavy bushels of apples. A glimmer of the strength contained in his new body was beginning to show through.
A small crowd had already formed by the time Blueblood finished pushing the last bushel into place, and there was some jostling among the mares for who would go first. On the fringes of the square, jealous colts observed the kerfuffle with darkened eyes.
A chipper filly named SeaSwirl finally boiled up from the crowd and won the first spot in line. She dropped her bits on the stand and grabbed her apples with an effervescent giggle before darting off at a quick canter.
Most of the mares just lined up to buy apples, but a few lingered and stole a few moments of conversation with Blueblood before the rest of the line grew impatient. Big Mac had never (or rarely) spoken more than two words at a stretch to any of them, and the new, talkative Big Macintosh was a curiosity in itself. Tombs ended up handling more and more of the actual transactions.
“So, Big Mac, how’s it going on the farm?” asked Junebug, giving her butter yellow curls a flirtatious toss.
“Oh, it’s splendid. I plowed a field yesterday,” said Blueblood, leaning forward.
Junebug giggled.
“Oh, really? I bet it was hard.”
“Very hard.”
“And hot…”
“Oh, positively steamy…”
Junebug giggled again. The pony behind her nudged her flank and she scowled.
“Alright! Jeez-ow,” she huffed before turning back to Blueblood “I guess we can catch up later.”
She flicked her tail under his nose and trotted back out into the square. She hadn’t even bought any apples.
“I say, Tombs, this is quite fun,” said Blueblood. Tombs was busy making change for the next pony in line.
“It’s gratifying that sire is enjoying himself,” answered Tombs, taking an empty bushel down off the applecart and hefting up a new one.
Another mare sauntered up to the stand. Blueblood couldn’t help but lick his lips. She looked as delicious as an ice cream sundae. Her yellow coat shined in the afternoon sun, multicolored hair clips were scattered throughout her luscious tricolored mane, giving the distinct impression of sprinkles on Neapolitan ice cream.
“Hello there,” greeted Blueblood, warmly “What’s your name?”
“Um, Banana Split,” she answered, slightly taken aback that he didn’t remember her.
“I should have guessed. How many apples for you today?”
“Oh, well actually I’m not here for apples…” she pawed at the ground.
“Oh? Well how else can I help you today?” Blueblood raised an eyebrow.
“Well, the freezer at the Ice Cream Shop is on the fritz again, and since it was you that fixed it last time, I was hoping you could stop by today and take a look.”
“Oh, of course! Say no more! I shall pop over there straightaway.”
“Ahem,” Tombs cleared his throat.
“Yes, what is it, Tombs?” asked Blueblood, an edge of impatience in his voice.
“I hesitate to remind sir that he didn’t bring his toolbox with him, and that attempting to repair the young lady’s freezer might be a futile effort without it.”
“Well there can’t be any harm in taking a look, Tombs,” Blueblood scoffed.
“And my daddy’s got a toolbox. I’m sure he wouldn’t mind if you borrowed it,” offered Banana Split.
Blueblood faltered.
“Um, is your father at the shop right now?” he asked.
“Oh, no. He’s taking my little brother Lickety Split to the dentist today. It’s just me, minding the shop… alone. And then the freezer broke and the ice cream is going to melt and I just don’t know what to do!” she sniffled a little too theatrically.
Tombs stepped forward.
“While I sympathize with ma’m’s predicament, today might not be the best-”
“Pish and tosh, Tombs!” interrupted Blueblood “The poor girl is obviously distraught. I see no harm in going to take a look.”
“Very good, sir,” Tombs took a deep breath turned back to the apple stand where several more fillies demanded attention.
Blueblood placed a comforting hoof on Banana Split’s shoulder.
“Now, let’s see if we can’t sort you out,” he said as she guided him back to the Ice Cream shop.

End of Part Eight
To be continued…