Mercury's Misadventures In Author Land

by Mercury Zero

A Time For Music

Octavia didn’t know why she found it so beautiful. By all rights, the cello was hideous. It seemed to be carved awkwardly out of a loose scrap of pure ebony. It was clearly bent, but Octavia had enough of an eye over the years of being an expert cellist to know that it doesn’t affect the sound in the places where it was bent. It might affect her hoof ‘fingering’, but that was already the best in all the land, so it didn’t matter much to her.

What mattered most, was that it attracted her so. It shined, and something about the way it caught the light resonated deep in her soul.

As she stepped closer to it, she felt something akin to fear rising up in her chest. The kind of nervousness that tells you you’re doing something dangerous, but it was a good danger, like leaning in to take a first kiss, or your lover whispering sweetly in your ear that he loves you.

“I’ll buy it. I want it. How much?” she asked, almost unaware of her own words. Her hoof came in contact with the strings, and ran down them slowly. It made a soft whining noise that put a sweet smile on Octavia’s face.

“Ah, you want that one, do you? It’s not often that somepony likes that one. It’s actually been returned, several times, even by the ones who bought it. Are you certain.”

Octavia leaned in toward the cello, ignoring the words of the shopkeeper as much as she could without being rude. She nearly drew her lips all the way toward one of the strings, to see how it would feel against them, but, with a warming of her cheeks, she backed away and cleared her throat.

“I’m sure… I’m certain, yes. Uh… Yes, but I need to try it first. Do you have a bow? I… I need a bow.”

The shopkeeper tilted his head, and leaned around Octavia. He looked at the hideous contraption, and back, blinking. He thought for a moment about just how lost with affection this earth pony seemed, staring at his most revolting clearance item. “Sure. Right. Just one second.”

When he returned with the bow, Octavia hungrily stnatched it from his hoof, prompting him to balk at the strange behavior from the gray mare. “I rosined it up for you.” She wasn’t listening. “Ma’am?”

Octavia drew in toward the cello, and stepped behind it, rearing onto her hind hooves, and giving it a gentle caress. Her chest was heaving now. She started to tremble as she rose her bow. The anticipation swelled within her as she set it upon the strings. Her muscles flexed and burned with a feeling of terrified excitement. She parted her jaw and leaned in toward the tuning knobs, and slowly drew a tremulous, vibrato note.

The shopkeaper yelped with fear as a whirling whisp of fire wrapped itself around the bow, and flowed across Octavia’s foreleg, leaping casually to lick at the nearby table.

“Ma’am! You’re on fire!” he screamed, backing away so fast that he tipped over an entire row of cellos.

Octavia’s voice was deep. It sounded unnatural, like a cacophony of roaring and plucking musical strings. “We know.”

With a terrible blast, the store ripped itself apart. Flames blasted through the windows as they blew apart from the change in air pressure. Wood splintered and cracked as the building twisted and writhed. Chunks of sturdy wood ripped themselves from the structure’s support beams, and swirled in the air around Octavia, igniting with terrifying rushes of flame.

A pounding shock annihilated the structure down to tiny splinters.

From the ashes, Octavia stepped forward into the cobblestone street, and laughed.