Trixie and Maud: Heart of Stone

by TheCrimsonDM

Chapter One Hundred and Ten: Bleak, Boring, and Boorish

“What in Tartarus is that?” Trixie asked, she couldn’t hide the concern in her voice.

Starfire Shine stood proudly with a strange hammer held aloft in her teal aura, the body was purple and blue, but the counter weight was a rainbow of color. A few stars stuck out, held on by strings of steel. The hammer’s head was about the size of Trixie’s head. This was no mere tool, it was a weapon.

“Oh this old thing? I call it The Hammer of Zilihoof. Honestly though, I don’t know what its real name is,” Starfire replied. “I picked it up while I was the hunt for Deep One’s awhile back. It saved my hide.”

“Zilihoof? What kind of a name is that?” Trixie asked.

Starfire ignored the question and instead focused on the train they were in. The caboose was large and empty, with Red Velvet taking up an entire bench all to herself, Trixie and Starfire had chosen to sit a few benches down. When Starfire had brought the giant hammer with them it had been questionable as to whether it would even get past the guard, but when Starfire made the thing appear to be a suitcase, Trixie realized that she was clearly out classed here.

Starfire looked up at the clock on the wall. “It’s about ti-“

The door to the cabin slid open and an old stallion walked in, his dark gray mane and his white scarf complemented his blue fur wonderfully. Even if Trixie had no interest in him personally, she could tell that this was the kind of stallion that would make other mares swoon. He gave a polite smile and bowed with a wing. “Ladies.”

Starfire leaned into Trixie’s ear and whispered. “Whatever you do, don’t trust him. He’s useful, but he’s also a sly old man.” She then stood up and took a few steps toward him. “Wind Rider, you’re a bit early.”

“I’m not troubling you am I?” He said playfully.

“Just… sit down,” She said.

He wasted no time in finding a place to sit down on the bench across from Trixie. A cold shiver ran down the length of her spine as he eyed her. She didn’t like stallions, especially not when they were interested in her. Any friendly thoughts she might have had about him had vanished. It sickened her to even think of what he might want to do, if given the chance.

“Rider, she’s not interested,” Starfire said.

He looked away from Trixie and back to her. “That’s fine, I’m not her type anyway.”

“You can tell that just from looking at her?”

“Kid, listen; I’ve been around for a long time now. I can tell when I don’t have a shot at something that I like. Alicorn or no, this mare wouldn’t be interested if I gave her the keys to Canterlot,” he said.

That got Trixie’s attention. “How did you know what I am?”

“What do you think I was looking at?” He said. “Your wings are poking out through your cloak, and alongside that horn of yours. It’s hard to imagine you would be anything but an alicorn.” He looked back at Starfire. “Tell me, Sunny. Are we smuggling an alicorn this time?”

Starfire’s eyes narrowed, her nostrils flared and her horn took on a teal glow. A ring of blue light surrounded the stallion’s neck and he was lifted helplessly up into the air. He groped at the light with his hooves as he gasped for air. Cold fear ran through Trixie’s heart as she watched helplessly.

“My name is Starfire Shine! Don’t ever call me anything else,” Starfire said with a venomous tone.

He was dropped back onto the bench where he was left coughing and wheezing. Clearly he was too old to handle such abuse. The worst part was that Trixie was now sure of it, her new companion was dangerous.

Starfire looked back to the cabin door and frowned. “I’ll be back in a few minutes.  The Wonderbolts can’t be too far behind us now.” she trotted to the door, opened it, and looked back. “You better behave yourself.” With that said, she walked through the door and disappeared.

“Sheesh, can’t an old gentlecolt get a break,” He said still rubbing at his neck. “What exactly are you two doing with her anyway?”

“We’re going after a bad stallion. When I find him, I’m putting a magic bolt through his head,” Trixie said in a low tone. “He’s the one who drove my mom insane.”

“You wouldn’t happen to be talking about Ash would you?” He asked.

Trixie glared at him. “How did you know?”

“Su- Starfire has been aiming to put him down for a few months now. Between our smuggling operations and her personal quest to destroy dark magic, we’ve crossed him a few times,” Wind Rider explained.

“Why did she choke you?” Trixie asked.

“Oh, she’s just like that when I get on her nerves. You should have seen it when I first met her, she threatened to gild me for flirting with her. When all is said and done, she’s a good mare, she just has a low tolerance for shenanigans. It also doesn’t help that I know her real name, she doesn’t like to use it while working. Keeps her family safe if nopony knows who she really is,” He explained.

“You’re using your real name. You’re the old leader of the Wonderbolts,” Trixie said.

“Yeah I am, but I can’t exactly hurt my reputation anymore than I already have. Plus I don’t have a family to worry about. Starfire on the other hoof has things to protect, and her reputation has already been damaged enough for her past sins. If it wasn’t for her obsession in destroying all things deep one related, I’d think she would be at home living a more or less normal life. I could never see myself doing something like that though,” Wind Rider said.

The doors behind Trixie slid open, and Spitfire walked through.

“Oh crap,” Trixie said.

The windows exploded from either side of the cabin, and shattered glass flew everywhere. Four more pegasi flew in through the windows. Two of them went for Trixie, but she rolled off of the bench and watched as the two collided just above her. Another one went for the sleeping Red Velvet, and the last one for Wind Rider.

Moving as quickly as she could, Trixie crawled under Wind Rider’s bench as he grappled with the pegasus that was on him. Something grabbed her rear leg. Spitfire was standing on her leg, and grinning at her.

Trixie’s horn lit up and with only a little effort she grabbed Spitfire in her telekinetic aura. Spitfire was lifted off of the ground and thrown back into two more pegasi. Trixie continued crawling under the bench, got to the other side and stood up.

“NO!” Red Velvet screamed.

A baleful red light illuminated the cabin, and something inside of Trixie twisted in glee. The pegasus that was holding the sleeping alicorn down was seized by a red aura and slammed against the ceiling, before being tossed against the far wall with enough force to rock the cabin. The door on the opposite side opened and Starfire poked her head through.

“ENOUGH!” Starfire shouted. Her horn lit up and the Wonderbolts were all covered in her teal aura. They froze in place.

Red Velvet’s horn lit up again, and Trixie knew what the mare was about to do. She was about to end the threat. A crimson beam arched out from her horn. It flew towards the paralyzed Spitfire. Trixie reached out instinctively.

A purple bubble formed around Spitfire, and the beam bounced off of it hitting the ceiling. Red Velvet glared at Trixie. Trixie hardly noticed the glare, she stared at the shield she had created in surprised shock. The spell came from her, from her own magic, from her own horn. Trixie could scarcely believe it.

“Why did you stop me? These ponies threaten to stop our mission, they need to be dealt with,” Red Velvet said bitterly.

Trixie gave her a sour look. “You already tortured me, do we really need to kill them?” Red Velvet began to open her mouth, but Trixie cut her off. “No! We do not. They are only doing what they think is right, they haven’t done anything wrong.”

“What are you two doing? We need to leave right now,” Starfire said.

Red Velvet nodded and trotted toward her. Wind Rider wasted no time in flying past his companion and out of the cabin. Trixie looked back at Spitfire, and shivered a little when she saw the fire in the mare’s eyes. There was no question, Trixie joined Starfire by the exit.

A small crackle of energy appeared over Spitfire’s head and a letter popped into existence. It fell to the ground at the Wonderbolt’s hooves. Starfire lifted it up with her magic and dragged it over to take a good look at.

“Hmm,” Starfire said. “Interesting. It would seem that they have been reassigned. I guess somepony named Trixie has gone missing.” Starfire tossed the letter at Spitfire and walked away. “Good luck with that.”

Trixie exited the cabin alongside Starfire, and together they joined the other two. The world around them hummed, and then went white. A second later the four ponies were standing in the middle of the woods as a train sped noisily along its tracks.

“Teleporting us out of the train, smart move,” Wind Rider said. He looked up. “Too bad we couldn’t have stayed inside though.”

“We would have had to leave before arriving at the next town anyway. Besides, We don’t need a train, we’re going to get our own transpiration,” Starfire said.

“You can’t mean-“ Wind Rider began.

“The Lightning Express, yes I think we need it,” Starfire said.

A single round piece of ice landed squarely on Trixie’s muzzle. The dark and cloudy sky above made her frown. “Just my luck.”

Trixie woke up from her nap and was comforted by the sight of Maud and Valiant. The train ride lasted a couple of hours as they traveled north. Going through the Canterlot tunnels caused Valiant to worry a bit, but as soon as they had exited she recovered. The train turned off the rail going to Manehattan and went instead to the Deep Dark Forest, where the sleepy little town of Hollow Shades resides.

The forest was covered in dead trees and snow, along with a thick fog that prevented Trixie from seeing anything past the tree line. With that said, she could still make out strange shapes as the train passed along. She also couldn’t ignore the fact that a gray earth pony with a bleach-white mane was making patrols up and down the cars. Maybe it was the strange white cloak he was wearing, or maybe it was the red piercing eyes he checked around for who knows what, or quite possibly the blue tattoos visible just above where the cloak met his neck, but whatever it was, Trixie didn’t like the look of him.

“Who is that?” Trixie asked Maud quietly.

“That’s the white warden. They have them on the trains and on all carts going through the Deep Dark Forest. His job is to keep us safe,” Maud explained flatly.

“Are we in danger here?” Trixie asked.

“There’s always danger out there, but nothing ever happens when there’s a warden around,” Maud said.

Trixie tried to ignore the warden for now. Instead she looked outside the windows and wondered aloud, “How many stories feature the Deep Dark Forest as a prominent place of evil?”

“As many do the Everfree forest. Little Red Riding Hoof takes place in the Everfree Forest,” Maud said.

“That’s an interesting point. We live next to a place so infamous for its dangers and yet we rarely think twice about it. Are the ponies of Hollow Shade like that as well?” Trixie questioned.

“Probably,” Maud said.

Trixie leaned against Maud’s shoulder and snuggled close. Valiant did the same on the other side. Carefully, Maud wrapped a foreleg around each one of them and held them. The rest of the train ride was quiet, the white warden passed through the cart without speaking to anypony, and once he was gone Trixie was able to fully relax. It was as though the air had lightened and she could breathe easily again.

It wasn’t too awfully long after that before they arrived in the town of Hollow Shades. It was the end of the road, and as the trio walked out of the train alongside a few bat pony stallions, it really felt like it was the middle of nowhere. Trixie was a bit disappointed that this was her destination.

Most of the town sat in the bottom of a valley. The outside of the town was designed in a large circular ring, while the middle of the town was a series of intricate roads and sparse buildings or trees. The closer to the middle the more dense the buildings until she spotted a huge mansion right in the middle of everything. Strange plant bulbs lined along the dark gray grass, only matching the dark gray trees. The buildings were also gray.

And I thought that New Slate was boring.

“Do you know where we’re going?” Trixie asked.

“Yes,” Maud said flatly.

Maud took the lead, and as Trixie and Valiant followed closely behind she noted a few things. The strange bulb plants were literally everywhere. They were almost as common as the grass. The sky looked to be in a permanent overcast, blocking out the bright rays of the sun. There were almost no ponies out, a few earth ponies and unicorns were spotted here and there, along with a couple of bat ponies. The largest group she saw was a blessing of unicorns, each with white cloaks, and most of them had silver, or white manes. They were traveling toward the woods, determined expressions on their faces, and weapons ready at their sides. If they hadn’t been so creepy looking, Trixie would have assumed that they were the town guard.

Judging by the town, they might still be.

Their path led them to a large two story building at the edge of the circular ring, built half way up the hill. It had white painted walls and a maroon-colored roof. A huge tree was connected to the side of the house, windows were built into the side of the tree, and it stood towering over the house itself. Finally Trixie saw a sign on the front door.

“Right… I almost forgot who set up our honeymoon,” Trixie said lamely.

Valiant Heart read the sign, her ear twitched, and then bounced into the air making a high pitched squeak. Of course she would be excited to stay in a library.

Maud simply knocked on the door without a word.

For nearly a minute the house was quiet as the trio stood outside. Several times Trixie had attempted to knock again, and Maud had stopped her. When the sound of hooves clip clopping behind the door was heard, Trixie perked up and smiled brightly. She wanted to make a good first impression on her host after all.

The door opened and Twilight Sparkle opened it. Or at least somepony of uncanny resemblance. If it hadn’t been for the black mane being tied into a bun, and the fact that she was indeed a unicorn, with a closed book for a cutie mark, Trixie would have accused her of being the very princess in question. The sight still made her blink, twice.

“You can read, yes? The library is closed today. We are getting things ready for a few visitors,” She said blatantly.

Trixie cleared her throat. “My name is Trixie, this is Maud, and the little one is Valiant Heart.”

The mare frowned. “Oh…” she shook her head and stepped to the side. “My apologies Princess Trixie. I lost my glasses and it’s hard for me to make out faces. Please come in.”

As they entered Trixie gave the mare a kind smile. “You are quite forgiven. Even Trixie would not hold it against you if you could not see her.”

Maud gave Trixie a warning glance.

Trixie rolled her eyes and whispered. “I’m trying out my princess voice.”

“Princesses don’t talk in third person,” Maud stated.

“I thought it would sound dignified,” Trixie said.

The door shut behind them, and for a moment Trixie was left in darkness so thick she could not see a foot in front of her. The lights flickered above them for a moment, and then stayed on. The yellow light cast from the bulb made Trixie feel more at home than she had felt the entire time being here. The light vaguely reminded her of the sun after all.

“If you would, follow me this way please,” The mare said.

“So what’s your name?” Trixie asked as politely as she could.

“Bookworm,” The mare replied. “You’ll meet Dee soon enough. We are the owners of the library, but while you are here we are also taking care of any needs you may have.”

“You really don’t need to do that,” Trixie said softly.

“I promised Princess Twilight Sparkle in person that I would do my utmost to make sure you had the best time here. I might not be so good at this whole friendship thing, but I can at least make you comfortable. Dee on the other hoof will do the rest.”

They passed several shut doors, until finally reaching the last door on the end where Bookworm unlocked it, but before she could open it. There was a larger crashing sound from somewhere on the other side. Bookworm closed her eyes shut tight and anger crossed over her features as she bitterly whispered, “Deedee.”

She quickly opened it. The large open space seemed to take up half of the building at the very least. Most of the walls were blocked by shelves, which included several doors that were barely visible on this side. This place was like a literary heaven, and it only made Trixie sad that Ponyville was still lacking a public library.

Valiant’s jaw hit the ground and her eyes threatened to pop right out of her tiny head. In all honesty Trixie couldn’t blame the filly, this library put Twilight’s private collection to shame after all.

Bookworm must have caught the filly’s look because she smiled down at her. “Do you like reading little one? You can take your time to read as much as you like here, it’s been a point of pride for me to gain such a collection over the years. I’ve wanted nothing more than to make this place a haven for my fellow eggheads since I was born. It’s my personal goal to one day make this place a library that could rival even the Crystal Kingdom’s.”

“That would take a very long time,” Maud said flatly. “The Crystal Empire’s library is the largest in Equestria.”

“Not quite,” a high pitched voice sounded from up above them. They all looked up to see a pink pony with a raven mane climbing out of the crawlspace above. Her mane was flat and straight, but cut short to her chin. She dropped from the ceiling and landed like a cat.

“What were you doing up there? And what was that racket?” Bookworm demanded.

The mare rolled her eyes. “You know that flickering light problem we’ve been having in the kitchen? Well… I just fixed it… I also sent a light fixture falling down in the first floor restroom.”

“How?” Bookworm asked.

“Bubblegum, duct tape, and plenty of caffeine,” She replied.

Bookworm opened her mouth, seemed to think about what she was doing and let out a shallow breath. “Whatever, just clean up your mess.”

A pleading noise came from Valiant along with a hard stomp of her little hooves. Everypony looked back at her to see her holding the whiteboard in between her teeth.

For a moment everypony simply stared at the filly in silence. The pink mare finally explained, “Oh, that? Well the Seeker’s Archive is far more impressive, sadly its location was lost long ago after a fight with Princess Celestia. In an attempt to keep all their knowledge safe and hidden, the Seekers of Truth wiped their own memories of where it was, but they left a series of clues just in case they ever had to go there again. It’s rumored that all knowledge in the whole wide world of Equestria is located inside there. Me and Wormy would love to see it, just once.”

Valiant’s eyes lit up and she dropped the whiteboard. She began waving her hooves about and making small noises. Trixie was still terrible at understanding what they had deemed as Val’s language, but Maud picked it up right away.

“She wants to know how to find it,” Maud interrupted.

The pink mare shrugged. “I dunno. It’s never been found, but isn’t figuring it out part of the magic?”

The filly jumped onto all fours, picked up her whiteboard and grinned. Even Trixie could interrupt that one.

“She wants to find it now,” Trixie said.

Maud nodded. “We’ll help her look.”

“Like Tartarus we will, I bet it’s surrounded by traps and monsters, and challenges that only an inquisitive and intellectually superior mind can overcome… and…” Trixie stopped herself once she noticed that Valiant was hanging onto every single word like it was candy. “I’m just making you want to go more, aren’t I?”

Valiant nodded.

“Great…”

Bookworm trotted over to the pink mare, gave her a one legged embrace and smiled. “In case you three haven’t figured it out yet, this is Dee.”

The second floor of the house was where the two mares made their life. A kitchen/dining room, a rather comfortable and large living room, followed by a couple of guest bedrooms, the one that Trixie, Maud and Valiant were staying in had its own private bathroom. Perhaps it was a quirk of having a public library for the first floor, or perhaps they simply had decent money, but either way, Trixie felt a bit intimidated by the nice house.

Dee was busy cooking dinner while Bookworm helped Valiant find a pile of books to enjoy. This had left Trixie and Maud some time alone; time that they used to enjoy a nice and exceptionally hot bath. When that was done, it was time for dinner.

Around the table, Trixie had to contend with Bookworm’s attempt to avoid looking directly at them, Valiant’s glare, and Dee’s sly smile. At least dinner was nice. Steamed vegetables, roasted peanuts, and cookies were promised for dessert.

“Hey, Trixie,” Dee said, she made a choking sound as she passed the bowl of peanuts. “Would you like some?”

Trixie raised an eyebrow, something seemed off about this, but she nodded. “Sure?”

“Good-“ Dee said.

“Dee, don’t you dare,” Bookworm warned.

Trixie levitated a few of the peanuts onto her plate. She tried one, and with just a hint of added spice, it was really tasty. Dee began giggling, and trying her hardest to stop.

“Do you, teehee, like them?” She managed to ask.

“Yes, there really good. A bit sweet, with a hint of spice, and salty too,” Trixie said with a smile. She was concerned about Dee’s mad giggling, but for the life of her could not figure out what was so funny.

“Good, haha, because, hehe, do you know what their called? “ Dee began.

Trixie shook her head.

Dee opened her mouth.

“I swear to Celestia if you finish that sentence you are sleeping on the-“ Bookworm began, but she was cut off by Dee.

“Dee’s nuts!” Dee exclaimed, before exploding into a fit of rolling laughter. She was laughing so hard that she fell out of her chair and began rolling on the floor. “Get it, hahahaha, Dee’s nuts! Bwahahaha!”

Trixie rubbed a hoof over her face slowly. “Oh my sweet Celestia. I walked right into that.”

“That’s a princess, Dee! That’s it you're on the couch tonight,” Bookworm told the laughing mare. She quickly looked over at Trixie. “Please forgive her, she’s just so childish sometimes it’s unbearable. I fear she might have something wrong with her brain.”

“The princess likes Dee’s nuts, hahaha,” Dee added, as if to prove Bookworm right.

At this point Valiant was giggling as well, and even Maud had a small smile that she was clearly trying to fight down. Trixie gave up and laughed as well, not particularly hard, because she wasn’t very amused by the joke. She actually found Deedee’s reaction quite humorous in its own right. This also gave her free reign to enact a prank on epic proportions onto Deedee. If nothing else, that was well worth it.

Besides the last thing she wanted to do was to pull a Luna and become the grumpy butt that ruined everyponies fun.

After that laughter died down, and they had finished the delectable dinner, they went into the living room. With Valiant reading an army of books, Bookworm scolding Deedee in a whispery tone in the hallway, with Deedee barely paying attention, finding it more entertaining to dig around the inside of her ear with a hoof, it left Trixie and Maud time to cuddle on the couch.

“It’s dark outside,” Maud said.

“Well duh, it’s nighttime,” Trixie said.

She watched Dee pull her hoof away from her ear, and with her other hoof she rolled some ear wax into a ball. She flicked it at Bookworm. As if to add injury to insult, Deedee said, “Ew, gross.”

Bookworm shirked, and her horn lit up. Dee’s smile turned into a frown as she turned tail and galloped away. Bookworm gave chase, screaming at her. These two looked like they had practiced, if not perfected the art of annoying each other, just enough to make others realize just how much they cared. It left Trixie wondering if Twilight and Luna ever got down to such childish antics. Probably not.

“I want to show you something,” Maud said flatly. “Both of you.”

Trixie nodded, and looked at Valiant. “Val, Maud wants to show us something.”

The filly wasn’t paying attention. Her muzzle was planted firmly into a thesaurus.

“Val!” Trixie exclaimed. That got the filly’s attention. “Maud wants to show us something outside. Come on.”

The filly got up and with a smile trotted awkwardly to Maud. Without another word Trixie lifted the filly up in her purple aura and sat her down on Maud’s back. Valiant lay down and snuggled into Maud’s back. Together the three of them walked down the staircase, past the locked door that if Trixie guessed right, lead to the tree. They exited into the Library, only to find Bookworm had Dee tied up by a red glowing string of energy, she was busy dragging Dee towards the staircase.

“Uh…” Trixie said.

“It’s fine, I am just going to have to punish her for actions,” Bookworm said nonchalantly.

Deedee grinned. “Oh no, she’s dragging me to our bedroom to punish me.” Clearly faking it, she added, “Won’t somepony please save me?”

“You brought this on yourself,” Bookworm stated as she walked past them, her face was turning a bit pink.

Deedee gave the trio a wink. “If you hear my cries of agony, please come in and save me.”

Bookworm stopped, looked back and nearly shouted, “D-don’t really. She’s just goading you. If you do hear anything, you may knock on the door and let us know that we are too loud, but please do not wonder in.”

Trixie smiled. “Don’t worry, I have no intention of doing so.” She looked down at Deedee and winked. “You brought this upon yourself you know.”

“Oh trust me, I know,” Deedee said. She licked her lips.

With their hosts retiring for the night, Trixie followed Maud and Valiant to the front door. Maud opened it up, and a soft purple glow shed over her gray fur. She walked outside, and Trixie watched as Valiant sat straight up and gasped. Trixie trotted after her, and shared her reaction.

Where before the town was nothing but gray on gray with a sprinkle of extra gray, it was now a place full of vibrant glowing colors. Glowing purple grass was dotted by golden flowers which cast their own radiance. The buildings were lit up white, along with the trees surrounding the village. Mushrooms that Trixie hadn’t noticed before now glowed bright blue and the leaves were all a shimmering blue of a similar shade. The night sky was clear with the moon casting its bright light down, and the stars shining brilliantly upon them.

Trixie had thought the town to be bleak, boring, and boorish. Now she saw that she was wrong, so utterly wrong.

It was beautiful.