Previous Chapters
Close
Episode 1: Two Souls3,025 words
Episode 2: Fabulous Misadventure2,385 words
Episode 3: Spiteful Witchcraft2,267 words

Episode 3: Spiteful Witchcraft

Author's Note:

DISCLAIMER: If you want to understand what is going on here, you need to have read AppleWitch first!

Diamond Tiara was in the mall to get herself a new outfit. Was about time for a new style, she thought, and my old clothes don’t fit anymore, anyway.

Her first stop was the sportswear store Scootaloo had recommended.

She found a sweatshirt that caught her attention. Hot pink, long sleeves, with two black stripes on the sides… Spoiled would hate seeing me in that… It’s absolutely perfect! She grabbed one and went to the fitting room, but it wasn’t quite big enough. Two sizes bigger, then. Granny’s pie is just too good to resist.

Then she grabbed a pair of dark grey walking boots, paid, left the store, and changed into it in a restroom.

Now I only need a skirt or something… Where’s that store Sweetie Belle told me about…

No, that’s too short… And that’s so long that I’d step on it all the time…

She put the neon green skirt away again and looked at a light grey one on another shelf. A bit longer than the knee… Oh, who’s that? Diamond noticed a white haired girl with blue, starred eyes watching her. I guess I got a bit carried away… Eh, might as well get a second opinion. She turned to her spectator, held the skirt to her waist and asked, “Hey, what do you think?”

The girl tilted her head. “Hm… I mean, it’s cute, but it's not really fitting for your arc, don’t you think?”

Arc? Diamond wondered, Does she mean my figure?

“Why don’t you try the store over there—” the girl pointed at the far end of the mall “—They have really awesome combat skirts.”

“I’ll give it a try, thanks.”

Diamond looked at the name of the store the girl had recommended. ‘SnowRose Amory’... Never thought I’d ever go into a larp store to buy clothes…

Diamond entered the store, and was overwhelmed by the interior design. She looked around, slowly taking a few steps further into the store. The floor was made from old, dark wood, the second floor was supported by wooden pillars in a lighter colour, the lights looked like medieval lanterns, and the walls were made from crude stone. And I thought the CMC is insistent about their aesthetic.

A store clerk approached her. “Good day, and welcome to our humble store!”

“Um… hello.”

“Is this thee first visit here, fair maiden?”

“It is,” Diamond said, with a grin, “But I’m not a fair maiden. I happen to be a witch.”

“Ah, terribly sorry for the mistake,” the clerk said without breaking character, “In what magical endeavour may I assist thee?”

“I’m looking for combat skirts.”

“Then thou have come to the right place. Follow me.”

The clerk lead her through the store, passing all sorts of garments, armours, and weapons before reaching their destination. Diamond looked through the stock, eventually picking a wide, ankle length black skirt with four slits going up to her knee. Stylish and practical, exactly what I need.

She left the store, her old outfit stuffed in a bag, and took the bus back to Sweet Apple Acres. While sitting on the bench in the back, she thought, Today’s the big day, it's finally happening! Ah never would have thought that’s possible nine months ago, but a lot has happened since then…

Sleeping on a mattress on the ground isn’t too horrible, but I won’t miss it, Diamond thought, At least Applebloom doesn’t snore… She looked at her watch. Oh for the love of—five minutes to six? She sighed and turned around again.

Five minutes later, her alarm forced her to wake up. She turned it off quickly, but not quickly enough to not disrupt Applebloom, who, still half asleep, tried hitting her own alarm clock. “Sorry, Ah must have forgotten to turn that thing off…”

“No, that was mine, actually,” Diamond said while getting dressed.

“Wha…” Applebloom opened her eyes just enough to glance at the clock. “Diamond,” she said without getting up, “Its summer break, there’s no chores, we can sleep as long as we want… why the hell did you set an alarm?”

“I want to train.”

Applebloom set herself up on her bed, with a severe case of bed hair. “You want to do what now?”

“Train. Get stronger. I’ll just carry a bolder around, or something like that.”

“You have no idea how that works, right?”

“I’ll figure it out,” Diamond said confidently.

“You’ll break yer back,” Applebloom responded matter-of-factly.

“Well, thanks for the warning. Just go back to sleep, I’ll go train.”

Applebloom looked at her reaching for the doorknob before saying, “Alright, fine, Ah’ll come with ya. But just for an hour.”

“Thanks.”

“Yer welcome. Now get out.”

Diamond was waiting outside when Applebloom came out. “Again, thank you, I really appreciate that you—”

“Yeah, yeah, you’re welcome. Now tell me why you want to do this.”

She crossed her arms and looked around, shifting her weight from one leg to the other. “Well, you see, I want to be able to help around the farm, while I’m here, and I figured it would be better if I do it when I’m not bothering anyone else…” She turned to Applebloom. She’s not buying it… or she’s just tired… Diamond let her arms drop down, sighed and said, “Alright, I admit, I want to spite my mother, ok? She always harped on muscular girls for being too brutish, and I just want to stick it too her that she can’t control me anymore.”

Applebloom lifted an eyebrow.

Diamond hesitated for a moment before adding, “and if she slaps me again, I want to be strong enough to slap her back.”

“Fair enough. Now let’s get this over with.”

Diamond suddenly pulled Applebloom in for a hug. “Thank you! Just... thank you for helping me.”

“Ah'm way too tired for this," Applebloom said, “let me go.”

“Oh, sorry.” She took a step back, then grinned from anticipation. “So, what should I lift?”

“Diamond, Ah’m not even sure if ya have muscles in those noodles you call arms. I’m not gonna let you lift anything before Ah’m sure that you have some endurance.”

“You could have said that nicer,” Diamond said, the grin disappearing from her face.

“Ah could have gone back to sleep, too.”

With a sigh of defeat, Diamond said, “Fine, what do you think I should do, then?”

“We’ll jog to the clubhouse, without stopping, to warm up.”

They both stood there in silence for a minute before Applebloom said, “Come on, you need to give the pace. ”

“Oh, right, sorry,” Diamond said flustered. She started to jog away, but only came a few steps.

“Hey, Diamond,” Applebloom said.

Diamond stopped and turned to Applebloom, who gestured to her right and said, “The clubhouse would be that way.”

After a few more wrong turns, they arrived at the clubhouse. “Congrats, ya made it,” Applebloom said.

Diamond had to lean on the wall to stay on her feet, and tried to get her breathing under control.

“Ya should have gone a bit slower, though.”

“Oh, you… think… so…” Diamond replied between breaths.

“See it as lesson one. Don’t overestimate yourself.”

“Next time… tell me… before I… kill myself.”

“You survived, didn’t ya? But if you want to stop for now and continue later…”

“No, don’t worry. My muscles may be burning—” She pushed herself away from the wall and gave Applebloom a look of pure determination “—but my spite is burning stronger. Ya won’t get rid of me so easily.”

“Good, because now we have to do the same thing back.”

The way back took longer, but Diamond didn’t overwork herself to the point of collapsing this time around. “What now?”

“I’m… not sure,” Applebloom admitted, “I never really trained just to train, ya know? Just working on the farm is enough to stay in shape.”

“But I don’t have the luxury of spending years gradually building up muscles.”

“Ah know… Ah think I might have an idea.” She walked over to the barn, Diamond following her.

“And what?”

“We could use a carrying pole as a barbell, and buckets as weights. It’s exhausting to carry buckets full of apples around all day, so it should do the trick.”

She found what she was looking for, and put the pole with two empty buckets on Diamonds shoulders.

“Isn’t that a bit too light,” Diamond asked.

“Hm… wait a minute.” Applebloom walked back into the barn and came back with two bags full of apples. “Those are five kilos each,” she said while putting them into the buckets, “that ain’t much, but should be enough for the beginning. Now, do squats.”

Eventually, Applebloom looked at her phone. “Would ya look at that, the hour is over.”

“Already?” Diamond set the buckets on the ground, sighing from being free of the weight. “Didn’t seem like that long to me.”

“But it was. Ah’ll go back to bed. And ya should as well.”

“I think I—” she was cut off by a yawn “—Okay, yeah, you’re right.”

They went back to Applebloom’s room. Diamond looked at her mattress on the floor. “It would be nice to have a proper bed,” she thought out loud.

“Just grab your pillow and blanket, and hop in,” Applebloom said while pulling her stuff to one side of the bed.

“Really?”

“Sure, why not. It’s big enough for two, and not really that different from a slumber party. Just stay on your side, or I’ll kick you out of the bed.”

I’ll remember to not wake her up again.

The bus arrived at Diamond’s stop, so she got up and walked the now very familiar path from Sweet Apple Acres to the CMC’s clubhouse in no time. The others weren’t there yet, but Diamond had a lot to prepare, anyway.

She looked through the jars on the shelves, her eyes stopping on one with a single red pebble in it. Still enough there, good. Would have been a hassle to get one in time, otherwise.

Then she picked up a basket and sickle, and went into the forest to gather the other ingredients.

First on her list was foxglove. Okay, where did the book say that stuff grows… partial sunlight to deep shade, and basically everywhere in or around forests… very helpful. Wait, it’s also supposed to grow in moors! Bloom told me about a small patch of it. It’s… that way.

Diamond knew that she had reached her destination when the ground turned into rubber. She yelled, “What in tarnation,” while fighting for balance. Waving her arms around, she just so managed to prevent herself from falling to the ground.

“Okay,” she said to herself, “that’s not normal. Thank goodness I didn’t ruin the skirt on the first day.” Taking another step forward caused more waves to go through the ground. “Hm… what if…”

She jumped as high as she could. Even the trees wiggled around when she landed. “How does this work? You know what? That doesn’t matter right now.” She searched the area and eventually found foxglove, harvested a handful of plants, and put them in her basket.

On her way to the Apple-Pear-Tree, Diamond happened to come across the last item on her list, belladonna. Well, that was easy, but I ain’t complaining about it.

She harvested enough of the plant for her potion, and soon arrived at the tree. She had no problems climbing trees anymore, so she climbed up to the top, cut off a part of the mistletoe, and made it safely down to the ground in less time than it had taken her to just get up the first time around.

Back at the clubhouse, she lifted the cauldron off the fireplace and put a small pot on it. Then she filled it with water and started a fire to get it boiling.

She took the red stone and grinded it to dust in a mortar.

The CMC arrived shortly later. Applebloom, wearing her witch hat, was the first to say something. “Did ya find everything?”

“Yeah, wasn’t too hard.”

Scootaloo said, “That shirt is from the shop I told you about, right?”

“It is, yes. Thanks for recommending it.” Diamond turned to Sweetie Belle. “I couldn’t find something in the one you told me about, though.”

Sweetie Belle looked at Diamonds new outfit for a moment before saying, “Still looks good. If Applebloom gives you her hat, you’ll even look like a witch. I like it.”

“Me too,” Scootaloo said.

“Me three!” Applebloom followed Sweetie’s suggestion and put the hat on Diamonds head. “A fully-fledged Diamond-Witch.”

“Well, almost,” Diamond said with a little blush, “I still have to pass my cauldronation.”

“Right, Ah almost forgot. Whatcha makin’?”

Diamond grinned. “You’ll see in a moment.”

She threw all ingredients into the now boiling water, and said, “With the help of the tree of Apple and Pear, I will change forever the colour of my hair.” The potion turned deep black.

“A hair dye potion? Well, colour me surprised,” Applebloom said.

“Is it supposed to be black?” Sweetie Belle asked.

“I’m not sure.” Diamond filled the potion into a flask. “Ah thought it’d turn into the colour I want my hair to be, but it didn’t really say anything about that in the spellbook.”

“Ya can try another potion, if ya don’t want to risk it.”

“I know I could, buuuuut…” Diamond downed the potion. Her hair first turned dark black, then completely white, and then stopped at green. “It worked!”

“You wanted green hair?” Scootaloo asked.

“I did. Applegreen, to be exact.”

313 views

Previous Chapters