Hearts of Hay

by bahatumay

Chapter 1

“Nightmare Night, what a fright, give us something sweet to bite!” Pound and Pumpkin Cake chorused in unison. Pound snapped his timberwolf-esque jaw, and Pumpkin shook her head, making the legs of her spider costume shake menacingly along with it.

“Wow! Such scary costumes!” Pinkie exclaimed. She reared up and leaned over, making sure to not put too much weight on the hind leg that was currently protected by a cast, and grabbed their bags. They gleefully took them, and with no less enthusiasm, she picked up a large bunch of candy with both hooves and dumped half into each of their bags. “There! Your first candy of the night!” She grinned. “You too, Apple Bloom!” She held out another bag expectantly.

Apple Bloom, who was currently filling in for Pinkie tonight as a last-minute thing and so was only wearing her sister’s last year’s rodeo outfit, laughed lightly and held up a hoof. “Thanks, Pinkie,” she said, “but I'm not really out for candy tonight.”

Pinkie gasped dramatically and took a step backwards in horror, wobbling on her cast. “But it's Nightmare Night!” she protested, suddenly injecting her face into Apple Bloom’s personal space. “And Nightmare Night is for candy!”

Apple Bloom pulled on a smile and verbally backpedalled. “Yeah, but-”

“And you said you'd do all the things I would do as my official Nightmare Night Chaperone replacement!” Pinkie interrupted.

“Yeah! All the things!” Pumpkin added, bouncing in place, making her spider legs wave. “Like running around and pretending to be really scared of everything!”

“And trading us all the good stuff you get!” Pound said, shaking his bag in anticipation.

“It's tradition,” Pinkie sang.

Apple Bloom rolled her eyes, but obligingly took the bag, and Pinkie cheerfully dumped in another heaping hoofful of candy.

Behind them, the door opened, and their parents came out.

As the twins ran over to show their enthusiastic parents their costumes, Pinkie pulled Apple Bloom aside. “Now, here's the basic trading situation.” She whipped out a folded piece of paper that unfolded into a sizable chart that looked like two interlocking circles with different colored levels and various candy names on each level. She took a deep breath. “Pound likes peanuts but not almonds, and Pumpkin likes almonds but not peanuts. They'll trade with each other, but if you're fast, you can get some good stuff from both of them. Both like peanut butter but Pound likes it a lot more so he'll sometimes trade Pumpkin for it preemptively. Don't try to trade him for any, you won’t get any. Pumpkin likes red licorice but can't stand black licorice, Pound doesn't like either but since Pumpkin knows she’ll get it from him anyway she won't trade him much for it. Your best bet is to get a bunch of red licorice from Pound for cheap and then trade it to Pumpkin as a deal-sweetener—no pun intended—for more expensive stuff. Now-”

“Wait. I thought you were just giving them the stuff they liked and taking what they didn't,” Apple Bloom said.

Pinkie barked a laugh. “They wish,” she said darkly, her eyes narrowing. Even the room seemed to darken in the force of her intensity. “Candy trades are a serious business.”

A split second later, she and the room were back to normal so quickly it was like nothing had happened. “Anyway, Pumpkin likes fruit, apples are her favorite, but Pound thinks this night is for pure sugar, so don't even offer him any. Fruit chews, on the other hoof…”

---

The evening party had technically just barely started, but in reality, it was already in full swing. Ponies and others were dancing to the live music, playing various carnival games, and generally having a good time, but Apple Bloom was already looking forward to calling it a night. Pound and Pumpkin had sketched out the optimal path to take to hit the houses that tended to give the largest candy, and, of course, none of them were near each other, so they had run the entire way, dragging her along behind. It was no wonder Pinkie had felt she wasn’t up to this task with a broken leg. Apple Bloom wasn’t sure she was up to it, and she didn’t have any broken legs! She was certain she hadn’t been this rambunctious when she was a filly.

Thankfully, both twins had agreed to let her be the Guardian of the Candy while they went to win more candy and treats at the carnival games, so she was currently sitting at a table, sipping at a mug of cider, with three bulging bags of candy hiding under the table. The haul had been substantial. She wasn’t really looking forward to the candy trading scene afterwards. That was shaping up to be a chaotic event. Maybe she could put that back on Pinkie. It wasn’t like you needed four hooves to trade candy, right?

Actually, knowing Pinkie, she probably did use all four to trade.

With a little chuckle at that thought, she shook her head and took another sip, but then she paused as something caught her eye.

Over to the side, and nearly hidden from view in the shadows and reaches of the Everfree Forest, there stood a young filly, dressed as a scarecrow, and looking very nervous. Her whole body was covered in rough, hoof-spun burlap, and it looked very fitted and very naturally done. Even the large floppy hat she wore looked natural and hoofmade, and the necklace hanging around her neck was woven out of cornstalk leaves. Her costume had a wide-stitched mouth, slightly downturned, and she almost looked a little bit scared, hiding an enormous button eye behind the long strands of straw that served as her costume’s mane.

How did she even see out of that?

Well, it was a night for great costumes. And if she was to be Pinkie for today, she'd go all the way. She set her mug down and nonchalantly ambled over. “Great scarecrow costume,” she started, making her jump.

“Thanks,” the filly returned hesitantly. Her voice was scratchy, slightly raspy. A portion of the stitched mouth moved as she spoke; she must have used spirit gum or something to attach it to her lip. It almost looked like it was actually her mouth.

“Say, that’s a great mask,” Apple Bloom said, intrigued. “Isn't that itchy at all?”

“No,” she answered, sounding almost self-conscious, and she lifted a hoof and brushed against it. Even the bottoms of her hooves were completely covered in burlap; she’d really gone all out on her costume.

“Well, it looks great. First Nightmare Night?” Apple Bloom continued.

“S- something like that,” the filly admitted. She still looked pretty hesitant, but she seemed to be warming up to this conversation.

“Nothing wrong with that,” Apple Bloom said amicably. “You picked a good place to start. Smaller towns like Ponyville have the best Nightmare Night celebrations, and we’ve just started. You're going to love it.”

“Thanks,” she said, sounding slightly comforted.

“I’m Apple Bloom,” she introduced herself, holding out her hoof.

“Cornsilk,” the filly returned, giving her a bump.

Apple Bloom nodded, putting the pieces together in her mind. Even with the School of Friendship and Ponyville growing larger, the Everfree Forest continued to do its own thing, and most ponies were more than happy to leave it well enough alone, so most of it wasn’t explored at all. A family of corn farmers living in or near the Everfree Forest would make sense, and of course, a scarecrow would be part and parcel of farming.

She glanced down and noticed that she didn’t seem to have a bag of candy. “Did you miss the candy grab?”

“Candy grab?”

“Yeah. It’s where foals go around to different houses and get candy.”

“That sounds a little dangerous,” Cornsilk said hesitantly.

“Any other night, sure. But not tonight. That’s part of what makes this night so special,” Apple Bloom said with a grin. “Here, you can have some of mine. I have plenty.” She gestured with her head that she should follow her, and walked over back to the table. She reached for her bag and pulled out a piece of licorice, knowing that the twins would miss that least. She held it out.

Cornsilk hesitantly took it, and moved to put the whole thing in her mouth.

“No, you have to unwrap it, first,” Apple Bloom said, making the motions with her hooves. Where exactly was this foal from, that she didn’t recognize candy?

With a sheepish smile, she did so. She opened her mouth wide and fed it between the stitches, through the gap in her mask. Her ears pricked. “This is delicious,” she said, awed, and quickly shoved the rest in her mouth.

Apple Bloom couldn’t help but smile as she gave her another. She felt like she’d just opened this filly’s eyes to a whole new world of candy.

Heh. She really was being a good Pinkie tonight.

She’d just introduced her to chocolate when Pound and Pumpkin came running back, their backs laden with more sugary treasures.

“Hey, Apple Bloom! And Apple Bloom’s friend!” Pumpkin said with a grin as she dumped her haul into her bag.

Pound laughed. “Apple Bloom, you pulled a Pinkie!”

Pumpkin giggled. “That’s another unofficial Nightmare Night tradition,” she explained. “We always end up with more ponies in our group than we started with.”

“Hey, you two. This is Cornsilk. That’s Pound, that’s Pumpkin.”

“No, I’m Pumpkin,” Pound said seriously. “She’s Pound.”

“Don’t listen to him,” Pumpkin said dismissively. “He’s Poundkin, I’m Pump.”

Apple Bloom gave them a sideways look, much to the twins’ amusement (and barely-suppressed laughter).

“Hey, we gotta go,” Pound said, shaking one last fun size candy out from his timberwolf jaw. “Sugar Belle’s almost done setting up, and her cupcakes are going to be gone in no time!”

Apple Bloom cracked a smile. She totally understood that. She’d seen Sugar Belle preparing for tonight, baking batch after batch of cupcakes. She’d never seen her sister-in-law so happy—or her brother so distressed.

Pumpkin shrieked and started running, with Pound following close behind, but then she skidded to a stop. “Well, come on!” she said impatiently, gesturing with her head that Cornsilk should come along. “You want a cupcake or not?”

Hesitantly, but with her confidence quickly growing, Cornsilk jumped off the bench and followed the twins, leaving Apple Bloom with plenty of candy and a smile on her face.

Until she realized her cider mug was empty.