Being of Two Minds

by cosmofur

Time Passes, hearts mend.

Gentle Breeze was gone. Red Wood just kept thinking over and over to himself “Where is she? Where is she?” The long day seemed to stretch forever. All he could see was the red splashes. All he could smell was the iron rust smell of blood. There was no body, nothing to hold onto. He wandered from room to room, then from inside to out to the edge of the forest, seeing nothing, feeling too much and too little. Other ponies were there, saying things to him that went unheeded, like ghosts in a fog. At one point a neighbor mare took his new born son from him to nursed, Red Wood hardly noticed.

The town sheriff and then later royal guards had come to inspect the scene. The evidence seemed to show that Gentle Breeze had given birth in the bedroom, but something attacked the house, perhaps attracted by the smell of the birth fluids, claw marks seemed to indicate it was a bear or perhaps an unusually large timber wolf, but none of the marks were clear enough to tell what. Gentle Breeze had apparently just enough time to hide the newborn colt in a dresser draw, before in her weakened state she was dragged away. There was too many bloody red puddles to have any hope she survived the attack.

As the sheriff did his initial investigation, Red Wood just followed the law pony around his house holding the newborn colt in his hoofs, unable to process what he was seeing. There was something more to this than a simple animal attack, Red Wood knew the sheriff and guards had found something that shook them up, but when he demanded to be shown what it was, they wouldn't let him see it. The sheriff refused to look Red Wood in the eye, and with dreadful numbness he realized it must have been evidence of Gentle Breezes final moments, and they were doing him a favor shielding him from the horrid details. He never learned exactly what it was but they took the evidence away to Canterlot in an armored wagon.

A day later Red Wood got a personal letter from Princess Celestia offering her consolations. The princess seemed to be taking personal interest in what the press was calling the 'Coltsdale tragedy' At the royal courts expense, a company of guards were assigned to the town for the rest of the year. For months guards patrolled the area, but there were no more attacks.

The fire that burned in Red Wood’s heart sputtered and nearly failed that night. Only a spark of life reminded, almost all his joy was sucked away from him, almost all, but he had a son now, and coldly he knew his responsibilities and took them seriously. There was hardly any laughter and light in their little house now and Red Wood found himself crying himself to sleep more often than his little foal.

His son had a red brown coat with a green mane, and like all ponies could stand and walk right away. He seemed unusually sturdy and stable right from the beginning. He reminded Red Wood of Gentle Breeze’s favorite tree, so after the traditional eighteen days of mourning he was named Banyan.

When Red Woods looked at the little colt he saw Gentle Breeze’s purple blue eyes and slowly, ever so slowly, that little spark of life that remained in his heart was fanned. Red Woods would rarely laugh or even smile, but Banyan started doing enough laughing for both of them.

It wasn't the life he had wanted, he so wanted his Gentle Breeze back. For Banyan's first several years, small things like first lost baby tooth, first time drinking an oat shake, first day of preschool were tainted with melancholy.

They always celebrated Banyan's birthdays a week early, because Red Wood didn't think he could hold a happy birthday party on the same anniversary as Gentle Breeze’s lose. On his fifth one Banyan was starting to become more aware of the world around him, and asked Red Wood. “Daddy? Why are you crying?” when the young colt caught Red Wood dripping tears on to his birthday cake as he used his horn to light the candles.

Speechless Red Wood couldn't answer Banyan, it was then he realized his own sadness if left uncontrolled would hurt his son and it wasn't fair to Banyan and Gentle Breeze’s memory. It took time, not months, but years passed and Banyan was such a happy foal that Red Wood’s frozen heart started soften and to once again he could see there were good things to look forward to.

Red Woods had to work very hard as a single parent to take care of Banyan, but in the greater scheme of things, it was Banyan who took care of Red Wood’s broken heart.

Banyan and Red Wood continued to live in the quiet cottage, the pale of death slowly faded, and somehow they just continued. After a year or so, Red Wood even tried dating some of the local mares, some of them already long time friends and wet nurses for Banyan. While nothing romantic developed, Banyan gained a number of ‘aunts’ who made sure the little colt was well fed, got plenty of hugs and bedtime stories.

Most influential was Bottle Gentian, a blue coated earth pony, who seemed to practically live with the two bachelor colts. She had been one of the first mares Red Wood had tried to date, and they got along with quite well, they even went to bed together on their third date. And that night, they just … slept. After a few more failed dates, they agreed that they would ‘just be friends’ which in most cases mean they would go their separate ways, but in this case they truly became close if platonic friends.

Time passed, not swiftly, for Red Wood, the main measure was not the days or months, but rather inches and baby teeth as Banyan grew, from foal into a preteen colt. Indeed hardly anything changed in Red Wood’s life until Banyan reached his tenth birthday.

Six days after the traditional informal party, and the evening before his Banyan's real birth-date, Red Wood received an unexpected letter. The Mayor brought it over late in the afternoon puffing a bit having galloped the short distance from the town hall.

“Red!” the Mayor puffed, “urgent letter for you! It came directly from Canterlot, came by dragon fire directly to my office!” He handed over the envelope, which was both sealed with wax and had an ‘urgent’ red ribbon. “It has to be from the Princess!” Mayor added.

Looking at the envelope, Red Wood had no idea what to expect, he had only once before gotten a royal letter, and that was the consolation letter from Celestia all those years ago. Carefully he broke the seal and read over the short note, he read it twice, trying to make sense of it.

All the note said was,

To our dear subject Red Wood of Coltsdale. We have long thought the danger your family faced years ago had passed, but new evidence has come to light. We are sending a flight of Pegasus guards to escort you and your family to Canterlot. They should arrive at your location tomorrow, please be ready to depart with them. We will also have audience with you tonight to explain the danger personally.

The note wasn't signed, but the royal seal on the letter left no doubt about the letter’s origin.

There was no further explanation about what the princess wanted to meet about in the letter and no mention of either time or place for the meeting. He quickly looked out the window, half expecting the Princess to come flying down any moment. After about 2 minutes of genuflecting to nothing, he chuckled to himself, clearly the Princess didn't know exactly when she would arrive and had told him to be prepared for her for whenever she came.

For the rest of the afternoon, Red Wood puttered around in his workshop, stopping to look out the window every few minutes, but there was no sign of anyone coming. Stopping only to make sure Banyon got to bed on time.

The colt dutifully complained he was too old to be tucked in but this had become just another part of their nightly ritual, and Red Wood ignored the complaint as he kissed the colt on his forehead and tucked his Daring Do doll, ahem, action figure next to Banyan.

Red Wood returned to sitting on the porch and watched the darkening sky, waiting for any sign of the princesses. For a while the Mayor stayed with him, but as it evening fell, he excused himself with a promise to come by in the morning to help greet the guards. As the lights of the town one by one blinked off as ponies went to bed, Red Wood realized there just wasn't any point to waiting any more, they weren't coming, at least not this night.

He cleaned up the dishes from dinner then headed to bed, sliding into ‘his’ side of the large bed, even after ten years, he never slept in the middle, or Celestia forbid, ‘her’ side of the bed. Red Wood didn't even think about it anymore, it was just long time habit. His head hit the pillow and almost immediately he started to dream.

It was an odd dreams, not really a nightmare but something was clearly off like seeing through a camera held at odd angle. He was dreaming of being in bed, and strangely Gentle Breeze was laying next to him. Strange, because after the first few years, dreams of Gentle Breeze had become painfully rare. She was just laying there, quietly sleeping next to him, they way she used to. He wanted to reach out, touch her, like they used to. No, not to make out, or for sex, no just to hold her. But he couldn't move. All he could do was watch her breath.

Then she shifted, turning towards him, her eyes were closed and she had a half smile on her muzzle, she looked happy. Red Wood starting to smile back at her, then he realized something was wrong. Her horn, it wasn't there! There was a flat smooth stub in its place. Something had cut off her horn, not broken off, no it clearly had been cut.

Red Wood felt like he was going to throw up. Horns were sensitive, the pain alone from breaking their horn had killed more than one unicorn. Here was his Gentle Breeze seemingly happy but with that horrible scare! Red Wood pulled away, slipping off the dream bed and suddenly falling.

As he fell away, Gentle Breeze opened her eyes and jumped at him, in that brief second she looked dangerous, more like a predator than a pony.

Then her expression changed, her hide changed to a dark blue, she suddenly had her horn back, along with a pair of … wings?