The Sword in the Stone: Courage to be King

by Flutters Is Shy

7 -A Certain Skunk Scent

Foolish filly.
Big Macintosh scrubbed at his sisters hide, working the tomato bath between every hair. She reeked of skunk, and this was the same treatment Granny Smith had given him in the past. He had prepared the wash in two large wooden tubs, and secured a few old brushes he had been meaning to throw away. While he scrubbed away at his protesting sister, the travelers helped wash the stench from Scootaloo and Sweetiebelle. He thought it good interaction, this "Cutie Mark Crusader" club, but it had some downsides. Some very distasteful downsides.

"Agh, no, ah can wash myself!" Applebloom yelled, pushing futilely at the probing brush clamped in Bic Mac's mouth. "Yeh got it in mah eyes, stop, stop!" Holding both her forelegs defensively over her head, Big Mac found himself forced to stop.

"If you don't scrub it out while you can, the smell will linger, you know." This was uttered by the young earth pony, as he carefully brushed at Sweetiebelles coat. He hadn't looked very hardy to Bic Macintosh, but he had a head of knowledge about him that Big Macintosh agreed fully with. His fillyfriend wasn't looking very happy with him though, pouting as she was and sulking in the shade of the barn.

"Eeyup." He wanted to get the point across to his sister, but at the moment he couldn't come up with anything more eloquent than what the colt had said. So a simple 'what he said is right, eeyup' would have to do.

The old unicorn had started whisking the watery pulp around the tubs, covering more area much to the protests of the fillies contained within. Magic always seemed to make things worse, no matter its convenience. Big Macintosh remembered of several instants of magic on the farm. Most of them involved Twilight Sparkle. Trying to cheat during the Winter Wrap up. Bruising almost half an orchard when his sister had worked herself almost into a coma. The whole "want it need it" fiasco. Magic certainly had its advantages, but at times it could prove disastrous.

"Old timer, if you don't get that brush out of my face, I'm gonna break it!" Scootaloo had gotten worked up at the unicorn, and was facing off against a persistent levitating brush. It moved seemingly of its own will, and dodged around her attempts to avoid it. Curbing another of her cry's of protest, it scrubbed furiously at her mane, while pushing her head under the surface of the tomato wash multiple times. Finally escaping by upturning the tub, she raced away while the brush followed in close pursuit.

Drawing the laughs of his sister and Sweetiebelle, Big Macintosh watched as the unicorn blanched, and tried to stop his enchanted brush. Finally stopping it (by YELLING at it to stop, what eccentricities next?), the unicorn righted the tub and trotted towards him.

"I wouldn't suppose you would have any more tomato paste? I seem to have spilled my portion."

Big Macintosh knew they didn't have any more. He had already used 8 cans, and diluted them as is with water. He decided to tell the old unicorn as such.

"Nope."

Seeing the old unicorns face fall with incomprehension, Big Macintosh knew he had to elaborate, and detail the fact that they had no more. Maybe even enunciate that it would mean a lot to him if he went back into town to "borrow" a can or two from somepony he knew had some. Like that Mare Twilight Sparkle. He'd been there with his sister the other day, and remembered her complaining to the young lizard colt about how they had too many. What a coincidence. Big Mac opened his mouth, and-

"Might be able to borrow a couple from the library. Go check for me?" Oh well, good enough.

-~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~-

Great. One of her critical care patients had just gotten up and walked out of the hospital. She had ordered strict bed rest, but did anypony ever listen to her? Nooooooo. She had left him under the care of a gosh darned alicorn princess, what more could she do to keep her patients satiated?!!?

"Nurse Gauze!" she snapped at the nurse unfortunate enough to cross her path.

"Y...yes nurse Redheart?" Poor mare, if she kept scaring her like this, she might never grow a proper spine. Redheart started walking again, and motioned for her unlucky co-worker to follow.

"I...look, I need to go out and retrieve a patient. Find Doctor Tourniquet and inform him that I'll possibly be gone for the afternoon, hopefully not that long though. Got that?" She drilled a gaze into Nurse Gauze, unfortunately forcing her to avert her gaze. She really needed to work on that. Bad enough everypony in her care were scared stiff by her, she couldn't have her coworkers falling to the same fate.

"Yes ma'am." Gauze replied glibly, noticeably avoiding her eyes. By now, they had reached the main entrance, and Nurse Redheart stopped and turned to properly address her further

"Good, I want the bed in room 713 replaced with a model that has leg restraints. If that daft old stallion wont stay put willingly-" She threw open the front doors thematically, "Then he'll just have to suffer the consequences."

"Who? Hopefully not an elderly unicorn being treated for manticore poison?"

Nurse Redheart started, turning towards the voice. Standing on the steps right outside the front door was no other than princess Celestia!

"I....er....well...." Great. Just great. The one patient that goes and runs off, and he turns out to be somepony of importance to the princess of the sun. Fantastic. How the heck was she supposed to deal with this? "...Yes. That would be the very pony in question, your majesty." It wasn't every day one talked to one of the princesses, and Redheart was determined to not have this conversation end badly.

"The patient decided to wander off, your majesty. I sent miss Sparkle and miss Pie out to look for him about an hour ago, but decided recently that it was my duty to safely see him back personally. Especially since they haven't come back yet." Redheart huffed. It wasn't in her nature to lay the blame on others, but she hadn't done anything wrong!

Celestia laughed, and gave nurse Redheart a warm smile. "I think there's something a bit...more going on, am I right?"

Nurse Redheart blushed, her stance so easily broken. "I.....I've never had a patient simply...walk out on me, your majesty." She looked back at Gauze, whose gaze had been flicking between the two. She let out a low sigh, and continued. "I...my apologies your majesty, I almost forsake my duties based on but a simply matter of pride. If you will excuse me?"

Celestia nodded, a warm smile drawn across her face. With a flick of her tail, nurse Redheart turned, and clopped back to the main desk. With a few scant words to the stallion behind the desk, she returned shortly with a thin manila folder clasped in her teeth.
"Milady..." She uttered, from around the folder. She found the folder magically lifted from her mouth, and it flipped open in front of her.

"This is... the patients file?" Celestia asked, giving her a questioning look from over the top of the folder.

"Yes. As you'll see in the notes section-" Celestia flipped past a few pages, finding the page in question."I noted that the patient showed signs of unusual recuperation. In my personal opinion, he should have been catatonic for at least a week. The poison alone should have kept him in bed for almost a month. In fact, for a pony of his advanced age, by all accounts he should have died." Gauze cringed, while death wasn't something that was unknown, it wasn't a common enough occurrence for her to be desensitized to it.

Celestia continued on, seeming not to notice Gauze's discomfort. "And this here-" she turned the folder, showing a page with several photos paperclipped to it, "You are certain this is the one you, ahem, 'lost'?" Redheart took a closer look, and certain enough, it was the stallion that had gone "missing". "And these three?" She pointed to three other pictures, upon which a colt and filly were shown with looks of apprehension stamped upon their faces.

"Oh, those are the two foals that were found traveling with him. They were unharmed, aside from a couple scrapes each. They seem to have...gone missing along with him." Celestia nodded, then smiled as she tucked the folder under a wing.

"And the...colt...nothing...out of the ordinary? Anything at all?" She looked expectantly at Nurseheart, probing for an answer.

"No...he seemed to be perfectly healthy for an earth pony colt of his age. Aside from not talking, but in my opinion that was simply nerves, seeing a loved one in bad health is always stressful."

"Well then, I think I'll hold onto this, if you don't mind. I'll also make sure this gentelmane and his charges return safely. Thank you for your help, miss Redheart." With this, she turned and left down the path. Nurse Gauze turned to nurse Redheart and excitedly started to yammer on about royal visitors and such.

"Get your head out of the clouds nurse Gauze, we have work to do." With a flip of her tail she went back to her rounds, the nonsense of gallivanting across Ponyville in search of her wayward patient behind her.

-~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~-

Big Macintosh had gotten the stink out of Appleblooms coat as well as he could. They both went to work on Scootaloo, with Arthur still working on Sweetiebelle. Big Macintosh had given Merlin as good directions as he could, and it didn't sound like that hard of a place to find. Only building growing out of a tree in the whole town.

"So, you guys are visiting? Are you from far away? Do you have flying competitions where you're fro-AAGH- don't pull so dang hard!" Scootaloo was interrupted by a sharp tug on her mane, where a tangle decided to grab onto the brush and not let go. Big Macintosh gave a slight disapproving look to Applebloom, who was now trying to untangle it as best she could.

Arthur slid a glance at Guinevere, who by now had dozed off in the shade of the barn atop a bale of hay. Her chest rose and dipped with each breath, and Arthur was glad to see her at peace. He was startled by a sudden jerk from underneath his hoof, and the brush he had been holding(How he was able to "grip" anything with a shear surface -such as his hoof- he couldn't fathom, but grabbing was still instinctual and worked perfectly fine.) as Sweetiebelle turned to look at him. Arthur realized they all were looking at him, and he struggled to form a reply.

"I'm just on a trip with my uncle, Merlin. And my friend Guinevere. We're from..." Arthur stopped, suddenly worried. if they had to have altered names, should they also hide where they came from? Oh, if only Merlin was here, he would know what to say. "I don't exactly know where we are in relation to home. Merlin used a magical item to transport us here..."Arthur trailed off, suddenly struck with an acute sense of homesickness. It quickly passed, and Arthur continued. "And...well, we don't have any flyers-"Arthur was careful to not elaborate on the subject, but this still drew a questioning glance from Scootaloo. "-we're...kinda rural. Nothing but normal ponies." All ponies present let out an audible gasp, and Arthur knew he had chosen a poor selection words.

"Normal? What the hay is that supposed to mean?" Scootaloo stated, standing up with two hoofs set on the rim of the tub.

"Yeah, whats wrong with unicorns?"Sweetiebelle had turned in the tub, giving Arthur a pitying look. Arthur looked and saw Scootaloo giving a look of indignation. Arthur didn't know for what purpose they were giving him these looks. It was all very confusing, and he didn't have the foggiest on how to resolve it. A sharp contrast, Big Macintosh and Applebloom were only looking slightly confused at the turn of events.

"That sucks, being a pegasus must totally blow there!" Scootaloo threw her forelegs up, letting them fall back into the tomato wash with loud and messy plop. This caused Big Macintosh and Applebloom to get splashed with pulpy water, much to their squawking protests.

"Besides the obvious bigot-ism of teaching that an earth pony is "normal" and that the others aren't normal, there has to be some good to this place. Right?" Sweetiebelle said, bobbing her head in a fashion that proved difficult to follow with the brush. "I mean, you have your uncle, right? I bet he teaches you all kind of magic!"

"That would be perfect if he was a unicorn, wouldn't it?" Scootaloo snidely said to Sweetiebelle, causing her face to fall with confusion before her rebuttal.

"He is a unicorn. Duh!" She waved a hoof at Arthurs forehead, drawing puzzled glances from all present.

"Sweetebelle, he's a pegasus. look at his wings!"

"He don't have neither o' those, what you both think yer talkin about?"

"Eeyup."

This went back and forth for several sentences, before they all fell silent, looking off behind Arthur.

"Hello there. You wouldn't happen to know where I can find your guardian, would you?"

Arthur noticed a glow coming from behind him. Even in the mid-afternoon sun, it was strong enough to cast light far beyond where the voice had come from. He turned from the tub and saw a most magnificent sight. Standing-no, floating!- on the road was a pony larger than even Big Macintosh, a full head taller! Her mane and tail billowed out behind her, and were laced with many hues. Her wings swept up and down, keeping her golden gilded hoof coverings from the ground for several seconds before she landed. She clasped the wings to her sides, and Arthur was struck by a sudden sense of wonder. Her coat was a bright pearl white, and he saw a horn protruding from her brow as well.

"Another...alicorn?"

She smiled, and the look on her face told Arthur that his situation was about to become much, much more interesting.

-~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~-

Author's Note:

You would not believe how many times I left "unicorn" as "unicron" until my spell checking.
New title card, yay~ Go check the description for a link to his page, his art reminds me of the visual style for Secret of Kells, of which he has a copious amount of art of.And yes. I know that sentence was horrible in its grammar and structure. I stand by it. Go check it out!

And...yeah, it doesn't fit this story "perfectly", but that's my own fault for neglecting to provide story privy details, like the fact that Arthur doesn't have a cutie mark, or that squirrel girl is a pony. I feel really bad about that. Completely my fault for dropping the ball on that one.

Comments

[Sarge1995]

Very good work, my friend! I'm looking forward to seeing Merlin and Celestia speaking in the next chapter...something tells me they have very interesting prior history together.

[SuperPinkBrony12]

Well Merlin, Celestia found you. No use in trying to run away, whatever it is you did to attract her attention you'd best be prepared to face the consequences.

[Flutters Is Shy]

4170057
Hasnt found him yet, only got "the youngins"

[Snow123]

Lol oh, plot thickens!!

[xbox432]

Heh, looks like being politically correct is even a problem in Equestria. I'm reeealy curious now to see what will happen once Merling and Celestia meet.

[Flutters Is Shy]

4170168
Inb4 I take 10k more words (about 7 or 6 more chapters), getting to it.
"Oh hey Merlin."
"Oh, howdy there, hows it going?"
and yes.spike. spike because only he has facial hair in the emotes.

[Honeytongue]

Awesome chapter as usual.

[Flutters Is Shy]

4170204
Loving the new profile pic!~

[Honeytongue]

4170210
Yeah, Totally.
Almost as much as my new avatar. (you like?)

[Flutters Is Shy]

4170237
Yeth~

[nighters]

does celestia have a habits of keeping grudge's and old wounds? cause this seem over board for looking for merlin bad luck I say.

[Kenshinryuu]

EEWWW skunk

I can't wait to see how things go now that Celestia has found Arthur and Guinevere. I can't see her blaming them for whatever Merlin did the last time he was in Equestria, but I highly recommend she gets rid of the skunk smell. Nobody likes that.

And it appears Arthur isn't quite as normal as he thought Little Alicorn running around with a sword... nice.

[More Dakka]

31.media.tumblr.com/tumblr_m5wil1Bx9u1qbaj4uo1_500.jpg

[Flutters Is Shy]

4170744
I stand by my choice of story title~

[ArcaneVisions]

OOH, its getting interesting, cant wait for the next chapter.

[shenadri]

4170885 i wanna apologize, i have said that i help ya, but the college catch up with me, im sosososo sorry i didnt send you the things i get wrong from the last chapter...

[Kenshinryuu]

4170885 Don't get me wrong, I like the idea of him being an Alicorn. Especially since he didn't realize it. I can just see DT and SS trying to recruit him to their little clique and Arthur giving them the cold shoulder to hang with the CMC.

[Boss_Hoss1]

Normally, i would point out that Arthur would have no experience with skunk smell and it's removal since mephits are severely lacking in Europe, but this is Di$ney Europe we are talking about, after all. D-E seems to be all-inclusive no matter geographic boundaries, and has raccoons, so why not skunks?
-And there is the possibility of parts of the wizard duel cropped out for being too gross, or lessons of the wart too gross for inclusion...
"Wart! Wart! Nonono boy! Get your bear nose away from that skunk! *PSHHHHHT!* "Oh noooo....Warrrrt! *sigh* Archemedies, go to my bag and get the tomato juice. Otherwise we'll be waiting four centuries for Columbus to bring it..."

[The dragon hunter]

This chapter was really good, I like the cameo of the haunted brush.
Mmm, magical chameleon filter, interesting...

[PrincessOfTheEnd]

*sigh* the likelihood of seeing a new chapter considering the amount of time since this was posted is small...

[Flutters Is Shy]

4704507
I'm working on it, I swear!