“Why are you asking me?” the human said. I think that one’s name was “Mary,” but I’ve had a bit too much to drink at the party, and now the memory of yesterday was more like the morning haze of tomorrow. “As far as I know, ponies are the only creatures in the universe to have those.”
Yes, that’s Mary. I remember the smell. Mary smells of some kind of lavender perfume, while the other human smells of that stuff they sell to those who think that a fire hazard is better than forgetting to feed your fireflies. I think it’s called kerosene.
I was chilling on my favorite park bench with a smoothie, and right there, on the other end of the bench, Mary was fending off an attack of Cutie Mark Crusaders, poor thing. They’re well on their way to becoming the next legendary adorable town menace, right after Pinkie. But Pinkie isn’t anywhere as destructive as three little fillies can be, so that will be the end of my hometown. Ah, such is life…
“Zecora’s a zebra, she has a cutie mark!” Apple Bloom countered.
“Oh?” the human grinned back, sensing an opening to divert some of the pressure away. “Did you ask her what it means?”
Sweetie Belle furrowed her brows, squeezed her eyes shut, and recited, “It represents the embodiment of a cosmogonic sacrament, the emergence of cosmos out of the primordial amorphousness, and the subsequent ontogenesis.” Oh my, they grow up so fast!
“Something lame like that,” Scootaloo commented, “She somehow made that rhyme, I have no idea how, because I can’t even repeat that, that was kinda cool. But the version Sweetie says is lame.”
“And ah say most of these arn’t even words,” Apple Bloom stated.
Sweetie Belle glared at her friends. “It’s not lame, and they so are!”
I’d better bail the human out before the children have a fight over something stupid. Or before Mary discovers a method to hypnotize the fillies and eat their brains with lettuce and a glass of orange juice. “Hey, girls. So you’re crusaders, right?” I asked.
“Cutie Mark Crusaders, ayup!” Apple Bloom proclaimed.
“So what’s your theme song?” I prodded.
“Ummm… do we need one?” Sweetie Belle asked.
“Yes,” I insisted, “All crusaders should have a theme song. It’s in the rules.” Rules I just made up, but it is!
Scootaloo stared at me like I just told her to eat a lemon. “There are rules?”
Bon-Bon keeps telling me I’m good with children. Let’s see just how good. “More like guidelines,” I corrected myself, “but wouldn’t it be lame not to have a theme song?”
Aha! The three fillies huddled together and started whispering amongst themselves. I didn’t quite hear what they said, and wasn’t even sure they were on the right track after hearing the words “piano,” “flugelhorn” and “pineapple” in what should have been the same sentence, but eventually, Scootaloo’s head popped up.
“We’ll get back to you on that, miss Lyra,” she said with a wide mischievous grin, and the Crusaders ran off simultaneously in three different directions without even saying goodbye, but chorusing instead, “CUTIE MARK CRUSADERS SONG COMPOSERS!”
Oh sweet Celestia, what have I done.
Mary slumped back onto the bench, a very obvious expression of relief on her face. “Thank you.”
I smiled at her. “Don’t mention it, that’s what friends are for,” I said. The word “friends” sent a faint, barely perceptible twitch across her face, like a nervous tick. I wonder if I managed to say something wrong.
“Wait,” she said suddenly, looking me over in detail. “Your full name is Lyra Heartstrings, right?” she inquired, leaning slightly in my direction.
“The one and only, yes,” I confirmed, and then immediately put my hoof to my mouth. “Sh-h-h-h-h,” I whispered. “There’s a heartsong about to start!”
Mary froze, scanning the park with her eyes like a hawk, which looks kinda creepy when the eyes don’t quite move in the same direction. But even her senses eventually picked up the music of harmony, as a melody reached us from somewhere in the direction of the park fountain.
There is a mare in Canterlot
They call the Rising Sun
She loves all ponies in this world
Of them I am but one…
An unfamiliar gray unicorn stallion with silver coins for his cutie mark – one of the endless Canterlot ponies coming over for a country weekend, I think – was singing a heartfelt sad blues song. There’s no chorus or dancing spots on this one, it’s a solo…
Mary jumped up, clearly intent to walk in the direction of the fountain. Damn it! I immediately grabbed her by the arm, whispering, “It’s very impolite to intercept a heartsong, even little fillies know that! If you can’t join in, just stay quiet!”
“You don’t get it!” Mary whispered loudly, sitting back, “I’ve scoured all of New Orleans for…”
“No, you don’t get it,” I interrupted her. “It’s a song of unrequited love for Princess Celestia!”
“I understand that much,” Mary hissed, “I just really want to know where he heard it!”
“Nowhere, it’s a heartsong!” I replied.
That finally shut her up. She folded her arms on her chest, quietly listening and fidgeting as the song went on.
Oh mother, tell your children
Not to go where I have gone
Don’t waste your youth and energy
While chasing for the Sun.
“I think I need to ask you to explain,” Mary said slightly louder, as the song started winding down.
I gave the stallion a few more seconds to relax and walk off, his head held low. I hope he has a friend nearby, he needs one. A stranger like me wouldn’t be much help… Only when he finally was out of earshot, I turned back to Mary, “Don’t you know what a heartsong is? Really?”
“Well, I can guess what it is. Actually, I was kind of wondering whether they’re real or not…”
Hu-u-uh?!
“But humans tend not to sing except as part of an arranged performance. There might be human worlds like that, somewhere, but I was convinced it’s just a narrative device…” Mary explained. “Back home, improvising a whole song is pretty much unheard of. How does this work, anyway?”
The mind boggles. “Uh…” I stammered out. It’s like explaining this to a four year old, but at least I can use bigger words. “When somepony needs to express enough emotion to start a heartsong, you can feel it, you just need to learn to recognize it. It will often offer you to join, especially if it’s your friend or somepony you like singing. Some ponies are more harmonic than others, and can lead a bigger chorus, but it happens to everypony eventually. If it’s really important, you can even have a duet with somepony in the next town over.”
“Gr-r-reat,” Mary sighed, rolling the “r” like a bowling ball. “So where does the melody come from? And who plays it?”
“Part of the magic of harmony,” I explained. Seriously, what kind of a world these humans live in anyway? “If there are musicians around who can play, they might, and it will be better. But harmony will provide, even if you’re alone.”
Mary slumped back on the bench and glanced at me with a pouty face. “There’s a song in my world, it’s called ‘House of the Rising Sun,’” she started. “The lyrics make no sense, there are at least seven different interpretations of why the singer is supposed to be so sad. They’ve been changed around a lot. Every generation feels compelled to record their own, updated version, which usually makes even less sense.” Mary chuckled. “There was a time I really wanted to track down where it actually came from…”
“Sounds like a heartsong to me,” I affirmed. “One that outlived the pony… er… human who sang it first. Most heartsongs never repeat, but some return for a reprise, and some live on. Definitely a heartsong.” Is it just me, or does she simply not believe in harmony? Br-r-r-r, chilling. I’ve had characters who don’t, I didn’t think such people could actually exist. Or is it that her world is really so sad, that it has to repeat the same heartsong forever like a scream of pain?… Actually, that’s even more chilling.
“I’m pretty sure it doesn’t work quite this way back home,” Mary stated, raising a finger. “That’s why it’s so interesting to find the exact same melody here.”
“Heartsong lore isn’t something you learn from books,” I smirked. “You just pick it up as you go along. You learn something new and wonderful every day if you keep your ears open. Today, I learned that heartsongs can cross worlds.”
“I wonder…” she said, looking at me curiously. “Is what you just told me common or specialized knowledge?”
“I don’t get to explain it often,” I replied. “But I’m a lyricist. Most ponies can get by without, but I have to understand these things.”
“…Don’t you mean ‘lyrist?’” Mary asked.
“I can play guitar, a bit, and I’ve dabbled in playing a violin, that doesn’t make me a lyrist. What gave you that idea?” I wondered. That was an understatement of the year, too. “Dabbled” should really be “destroyed three violins trying to make them play what I wanted,” the first one all the way back in school.
“Your cutie mark,” Mary said, glancing down at my flank.
I looked at it myself. Is there something wrong with my cutie mark?… It took me a few seconds to understand her thought process. “…I keep forgetting that you’re not a pony…” I sighed, “Ponies whose special talent has to do with music normally have a musical notation symbol for their cutie mark. Hardly anypony even plays a lyre anymore. It is a symbol of poetry.” I said.
Mary slapped her face with her palm in sudden realization. “Well, damn!” Looks like she knew that.
“I’m best at long epics,” I explained, “but you can’t really make a living with those in this day and age, so I write for Bridleway musicals. Just don’t tell anypony,” I winked at her, “most of them still think I’m a struggling poet, and I kind of like not being stalked by pegarazzi. It’s sort of a secret.”
“Is it really a good idea to tell me that, then?” Mary asked, making a faint smirk.
“Well, at least I’m sure that if a reporter meets you, I won’t be their story,” I grinned back. “Visitors from another world are by far the bigger news.”
“Oh, don’t remind me…” Mary muttered, progressively twisting her smirk into a frown.
I really wanted to tell her about the wedding to cheer her up. That would be news so big, that newspapers would obsess over it for at least half a year afterwards, which would surely make us both sufficiently uninteresting. But Cadance asked to keep it quiet, so I had to make an effort to keep my mouth shut. Something about Shining Armor still not having told his sister, who lives in Ponyville… Yeah, I’m a bit of a gossip, so sue me.
Wait, no, please don’t sue me, that would be both public and expensive.
“How fine a picture now I see,” somepony said from behind my back. “My friend, my neighbor friend-to-be.”
“Oh, hello, Zecora,” was what I said out loud instead, turning to her with a friendly smile. “I take it you haven’t met Mary yet.”
Zecora addressed Mary in her most enigmatic voice, as if she were delivering a prophecy, “Hello, well met, and other greetings. This is a most auspicious meeting.” While Mary was wondering how to react to that, Zecora turned to me instead. “Your poems ring, as usual, true,” she said, reaching into her saddlebag for what had to be the envelope with my manuscript. “The Return of Nightmare” – mostly written based on Pinkie’s version of the story, except the parts that I was present for myself, which wasn’t much. The variation told by Rainbow Dash has been growing in the number of fights ever since she started telling it, and by now consists of little else, so it wasn’t much use. “I knew the verse was strong with you.”
As I took the envelope, in the corner of my eye, I noticed Mary’s face subtly twitch again. “Thanks,” I said, blushing. How did Zecora find out that “Apple Colt Webber” is my pen name, I’ll never know, and getting her to explain anything complicated unambiguously is… well, difficult. The language of poetry is descriptive, but rarely precise. She seemed to imply she recognized my style. Why she liked my poems better than the musicals, when the only one she knew was “The Ballad of King Grover,” which honestly isn’t that good, if at all, I’ll never know either. But I definitely appreciate the praise of a zebra who can rhyme in a foreign language without spending hours agonizing over every line.
“I was sure Pinkie would invite you for the welcome party, Zecora,” Mary said. “It honestly surprised me she didn’t.”
“She tried, as Pinkie wont to do,” Zecora explained. “Please do not see a slight to you, but parties aren’t my cup of tea. For which I’d rather invite thee.”
I actually suspect that this is part of her whole mysterious shaman shtick. With all that being a zebra, that is, looking like the craziest pony you ever saw, it’s a perfectly natural fit as far as pony eyes are concerned. She’s been a hoot with the children on Nightmare Night and just about every other town function, ever since Cherilee first talked her into it. And I know for a fact that she’s running a quiet market for discreet folk medical services, particularly ones you feel embarrassed about… I’m not supposed to know that quite a few ponies make regular visits to her shack, but being a gossip works both ways. They’re all lucky you can’t get Fluttershy to talk even under threat of tickle torture.
“I’d be delighted, assuming I can even find your home,” Mary smiled.
“There is a trick, a secret sign. You need to walk a hidden line,” Zecora started. “Before we go, I must avail. I’m here to pick up my mail.”
“Which is exactly where I was planning to go next, by the way, I need a newspaper subscription…” Mary commented, standing up and looking at me with a polite smile. “It’s been very nice talking to you, Lyra.”
“See you around, girls,” I grinned, watching them walk off in the direction of the post office and listening to the receding lines of dialogue.
“Pardon me for asking, but what is your native land really called – Zebrica or Zebrabwe?”
“With either name you’re doomed to fail. From Zebriopia I hail.”
I suddenly felt that awkward premonition that something worthy of an epic poem is about to happen in the near future… I can almost hear the noises of a theater, the audience slowly filling the seats, the musicians tuning their instruments, muffled coughs of stage crew in the wings, the faint hum of lighting tech’s magic, and me, arguing with the director and peeking out from behind the curtain.
I wonder why.