> A Psalm of Life
>  by Cynewulf
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

> Our Hearts, Though Stout and Brave
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

Purely as if the universe were aware of literary and aesthetic convention, the day of the funeral was beyond simply sunny. In ironic purity, it was in fact a beautiful day, if far too hot for dark mourner’s clothes and solemn processions going anywhere. The young were in each other's forelegs, most of them whistling and flirting in the grass. The birds in the boughs of trees singing each to each in blissful ignorance of the spectacle below. They were no different, pony and bird.


Rarity refused to fidget. She refused to move in the uncomfortable seat in which she had taken up residence for the duration of this farewell. Had there been more ponies in attendance, she would have been more willing to obey the basic needs of her itching and sleeping leg, but she did not dare draw attention to herself. 


There were nine ponies attending. Twilight and Rarity sat near the back. The stallion’s wife was gone, had been since right before he died. He had no children. The Corner family had tried to come out from Canterlot, but the storms had caused flooding, and no trains were running for another week. The flooding had spared Ponyville, mercifully, but much of the countryside was not so lucky. The water had crept into the acres bit by bit, and Rarity had been there when Applejack, frantic and filthy, had been creating her dike against the deluge. They had built it higher and higher, and still it seemed to shrink and erode before the progress of the water. Rarity was no weakling. She had put her back into the dirt for the task, complaining all the while as was her prerogative, but working nonetheless.


So she blamed nopony at all for the low attendance. The town was exhausted. Spring was in the air. Last of all, the death of one middle-aged bookstore owner was not a world-shattering event. Plenty of middle-aged ponies had died of heart failure. She was willing to wager that thousands upon thousands had. Perhaps another had stopped with a wide-open mouth, gaping at the blank wall, reaching for it as Poets had reached, and then fallen to the floor to shake and then to die. Perhaps.


The service was concluded. The ponies sprinkled the warm, fertile earth on his grave and then they left. Ponyville’s resident mortician buried the stallion alone.


Twilight and Rarity ambled in the direction of home, along the winding path.


Once again, she braved the gauntlet of spring in the lovers and the picnickers. With the flooding and the gloom, a bright day was a blessing. Rarity had been hoping for one herself. Or had hoped. 


“It’s a shame, really,” she said, knowing it was unneccessary. Idly, she looked down at her hooves, watching them press the dirt. Sometimes she wished hoofsteps on the path were louder, that they could break silence so talking wasn't needed. Counting the steps from here to there could only occupy so much of the imagination. Picturing how she would leave faint, faint trails that nopony could follow could only keep her from thinking for so long.


“What is?” Twilight asked.


“The funeral. So few.”


Twilight sighed. She shrugged. “Well, it’s not exactly a competition, I suppose. Sometimes you just want a few ponies to be there for you. Why not the same in death?”


“I doubt it’s the same.” Rarity paused, and then smiled. “At least there was a princess in attendance. That’s got to count for something, right? Twilight Sparkle, Princess of Friendship.”


“Maybe,” Twilight said, and they laughed together.


They came to a fork in the path. Rarity turned to the right and headed towards home, but quickly found that she was alone. Twilight had vanished. Puzzled, she turned to find her friend staring at the sign. Rarity hadn’t even noticed it before--she had grown up here, seen the sign at the fork and the little bridge at the creek and everything there was to see around Ponyville many, many times over. None of it was quite so amazing anymore.


“Twilight, dear, are you alright?”


“Hm?”


Rarity took a step forward. “Well, you stopped. I suppose I was just concerned my musings or demeanor had dampened your own spirits.”


Twilight shook her head. “No, I was just thinking. Are you busy?”


She answered with a guffaw. “Heavens no, not with the way things are. The last thing on people’s minds right now will be buying from my boutique. Besides, I closed for the week. The flood, the funeral, my parents out of town… I just needed a break. The way business works, I don’t really need to be open as much as the bigger-city boutiques.”


Rarity trotted back to Twilight’s side. 


“It’s terrible that I know so little about things like that. Even after all this time, I'm still ignorant about much of the whats and hows of your work,” Twilight said.


Rarity pursed her lips, but she maintained her composure. She hoped that the gesture wasn’t detectable. She feared that it was. It would simply be too hard to explain.


Luckily, she was with Twilight today. Twilight seemed not to notice at all. Fluttershy would have noticed. 


Instead, Rarity smiled brightly. “Why, it’s not so bad as all that. You have concerns of your own, Twilight. Besides, there’s always time for such things. It’s not as if you’re going anywhere soon, now that you have that new castle of yours!” She chuckled a bit too loudly. “Now. What were you thinking about doing? I’m your mare.”


“I was thinking about heading down to see Applejack. I mean, if it’s okay with you. While the flood was still advancing, it wasn’t exactly a good time for small talk, but I haven’t said as much as hello to her in forever, and I miss her. I know she could use some friendship right about now.”


Rarity nodded. “I quite agree! Very wise of you.” Tutting, she began to trot down the path towards the acres, leaving Twilight to catch up. “While we have a walk, I was curious about something.”


“What about?”


“Did you know Mr. Corner?”

“Mr. Poets? Yes, I knew him.” Twilight hummed, as if in recollection. “He came by the library often, actually. We had tea sometimes, when he wasn’t busy. He was really polite, always asking me how the library was, how Spike was, what I was studying nowadays.”


Rarity nodded. “I never had a chance to know him well, actually.”


“Really?” Twilight asked. “Are you sure? He seemed to know you.”


“Well, I knew of him. We’d met, of course. It is a small town, Twilight.”


“Well, yeah,” Twilight conceded. “But… he talked about you all the time.”


Rarity sighed. Of course he had. She tried to school her facial expressions, temper her reactions as a lady must. “Well, I suppose I’d had conversations with him. We may have had tea before.”


“But… I’m confused. I thought you said you didn’t know him,” Twilight said.


Rarity’s eyes were on anything else. Everything else. The wispy remnants of the brooding clouds being driven back. The drying grass. The winding path that stretched out and curled out like a cat before her, in the shade of beech trees. 


“I knew him,” she allowed. “I am sorry. I simply misspoke. I meant that I did not know him well. I knew him in a mostly superficial way, I mean. Chats, tea, a few readings.”


Rarity paused, waiting for the words to be heard and absorbed. Twilight seemed to consider them for a moment. “I guess that makes sense,” she said at last, matching her pace to Rarity’s. “I mean, he was like an acquaintance more than a friend.”


“That’s accurate, I suppose you could say. Yes, exactly that.”


“That’s kind of sad,” Twilight said. “He really seemed to think the world of you.”


Rarity stared ahead. “Oh?”


“Yup!” Twilight kicked a pebble out of the way, and Rarity followed its trajectory carefully. “Talked about Caramel too, though. You know--”


“I know about Caramel.”


“Yeah. I didn’t know he was that serious about the whole painting thing until Mr. Corner told me about it. He had one of Caramel’s paintings in his bookstore. I saw it.” Rarity imagined that she was smiling. It would be like Twilight. She’d memorized that smile, the perfect curve of it, the divine path of teeth white as polished marble statues. “Caramel really is a great artist. He can almost do with his paint what you do with clothes.”


Rarity almost stumbled.


“What was that? I am flattered, honestly, but…”


“I mean, I’ve seen your work, Rarity! I was never into the whole fashion thing, you know,” she said ruefully, as if this were some great admission. “But every time I see a new creation come out of those doors, I want to be, a little bit. When we went with you to that last show… Oh wow.”


Rarity picked up her pace. “You liked it, then?”


“I mean, I would just see the things you made and I just felt like they were wonderful. It was like watching someone wear poetry.”


Rarity wanted to grind her teeth. “Thank you, darling,” she managed.


Twilight continued chatting. Rarity tried to focus on getting to Applejack’s house with her composure intact. 








“I really am glad y’all popped by,” Applejack said for at least the fourth time since they’d ambled through the worn gate. She deposited mugs on the rough table. “Plenty more, too. Not gonna be a big supply this year. I’ma have to save some special for Dash.” She laughed. To Rarity’s ear, it was like the rough majesty of bronze bells, loud and tired. “Reckon she’d about die on me if she heard we may not have enough for her. Told her she needs to get here sooner when a cider sale is on.”


“I’m sure she tries her best. You know how Rainbow is about the whole affair of waking up, especially early,” Rarity drawled out, trying to coax laughter like a fish gasped for the water as it dangled on the line.


Applejack laughed readily enough and drank her own cider. 


“Do you really not mind? Didn’t you say that this was from your private reserve?” Twilight asked.


“Naw, I don’t mind a bit,” Applejack said. “Y’all are family anyhow, more or less. The quality of the Apple family’s hospitality ain’t strained, an’ it won’t be while I’m here.”


“Well put,” Rarity said softly, and began to drink. She supposed cider, too, was an art of its own.


The hard cider was delicious as always, as it should be, seeing as it was the Apple family’s finest. It was sweet, and then the alcohol was a slow, simmering, comforting burn on the back of her throat. She preferred the bouquet of wine, but sometimes anything that burned would do. There was a special bit of finely aged Scotch hidden high out of the reach of curious fillies and their thankfully unmatured, budding magicks. Some days were more stressful than others. Some conversations were more stressful than others, and these things required a bit of fortification. Bourbon was, after all, another way of occupying the mind.


“You seem in far better spirits than the last time I saw you,” Rarity said, keeping the conversation going, keeping it alive and beating. “With the flood receding, have you had a chance to calculate your damages?”


Applejack sighed. “Now, here I was, all cheerful like.”


“Sorry.”


“Naw, I’m just bothering you. About mentioning it, I mean, because the damages ain’t no joke. They ain’t cripplin’, and I’m very grateful about that. I never did get a chance to thank you, did I?” Applejack, still up, trotted over and gave a surprised Rarity a great, all-encompassing hug. “It means a lot to me how hard y’all worked for me and mine, Rares, all of you. Thank you.”


“Don’t mention it,” Rarity managed, smiling despite the mild discomfort of being crushed. “After all, I know you would be there for me.”


“Definitely,” Applejack replied, and sat besides Rarity. She leaned over the other way and spat, which Rarity frowned at, but did not comment on. “At the end of the day, I'm really just glad I still have a farm to pass on to mine. A farm should be something that endures, my pa used to say.”


Twilight nudged her foreleg from across the table. "Planning on having kids anytime soon?"


"Hardly," Applejack said with a grimace that softened into a smile. "But who knows? One day, perhaps. If not, there'll be Apples to take up the torch when I let it go. An' I will let it go. I can't work this place forever. Ponies grow old and die." She paused, leaning back. "Rarity, if memory serves, there was a funeral on today."


Rarity nodded stiffly.


"You go?"


Twilight cut in. "We just got back from it. It... was a poor showing," she added, sighing. "I guess I can't blame people. Between the flooding and how bad things have been this last week, I guess I can understand why. Ponies can't be sad all the time. They have to move on."


"Yes, they do," Rarity said.


"That was Mr. Corner, right? I remember him. Didn't know him very well myself, but regardless it's always a shame when a pony goes early. You knew him, didn't you Rarity? I remember seeing you two at Sugarcube sometimes, having tea."


"That we did," Rarity said flatly, a bit too flatly. Stop talking about it, she screamed internally. Stop. Please. The dead are dead, and they're gone.


Applejack looked at her for a moment, holding her gaze for what seemed an eternity. Twilight interrupted the silent exchange. "Applejack, have you heard any news from town?"


Torn from the moment, Applejack looked to Twilight and shook her head. "Can't rightly say I have. Been a little busy, you know."


They talked--there was a lot to talk about. The town had been an exciting place recently, for good or ill. And not all of the news was bad. The flood waters were not the only story to gossip over. One of the mares from the outlying farms who had come to town while everything was swamped had given birth in town hall of all places, carried right off the wagon she’d rolled in on by Twilight’s magic. Her story had all the traits of any wildly comedic tale: a frustrated older matron, her still somehow clueless and fretting mate, a host of children to be looked after and kept from worrying their belabored mother, the logistics of delivering a child in a public building not designed for it, the curious rubbernecking civilians on the street. Twilight told it well, gesturing and doing her best to pump as much universal consternation into her impersonation of the new mother as she could.


“She didn’t,” Applejack said between laughs.


“Would I lie to you?” Twilight shot back, waving her hooves. “She just grabbed him and shook him like a ragdoll. ‘You did this to me!’”


“You made that bit up, dear,” Rarity said, on her second tall cider’s last dregs. 


Twilight stuck her tongue out. It was beyond childish--Rarity found it endearing. “You’ll never know, huh?”


“Unless I ask the mayor,” Rarity said. 


“Anyhow,” Twilight finished, calming down with a smile that lit her face. “I asked them to stay in the new castle until they can head home. I figured it was a better place for a new foal then a farm wagon.”


“Now I rode many a farm wagon as a little’un,” Applejack said.


“Well, you weren’t like newborn, were you?”


“How should I know, you big bookworm?”Applejack pushed her lightly. “That was mighty kind of you, though.”


Rarity had already begun on a third cider. “It was very generous of you,” she said. She meant it, too. Twilight had come so far, hadn't she? Upon her first arrival, Rarity had practically pressganged her into ad hoc modelling, and Twilight had gone with the flow. Passive generosity was one thing, but to actively help and shelter and share? That was improvement. Whether or not that feeling made it all the way to Twilight through the alcohol she did not know. She hoped it did. It probably did not. Even if it did, it was all adulterated smoke.


Twilight stood after a moment and stretched her wings. Rarity, feeling happily buzzed, having put the troublesome dead and her worries behind her, admired them. Not in the way she had admired others, of course, but in the way an artist admires a flower. The way that a painter notices the existence of ripples and folds in a contextless, meaningless bit of cloth, beyond mere passion. Rarity was, after all, an accomplished draughtsmare, and anyone who had been in her workshop for even a moment knew that she worked miracles with a bit of charcoal.


The afternoon had slipped away. It was not yet quite evening, but it was time to be headed home. 


They said their goodbyes--Rarity managed to finish her cider before Twilight was done hugging their mutual friend, and before she received her own embrace--and headed back down the winding country road. Behind them, Applejack waved and watched for a moment at the gate, and Rarity wondered what she thought. 


“Guess you lose one, you gain one, huh?” Rarity asked.


“I… what do you mean?”


“The old stallion.”


“Him?”


Rarity shrugged. “I suppose. It seems to be in balance. I didn’t mean all that much by it.”


“You know,” Twilight said with an uncertain tone, “the last time I saw him, he was talking about you.”


“Didn’t we already discuss this?” Rarity asked from the safety of the buzzing alcohol. “It’s really of no matter.”


Twilight leaned in slightly. And it was very slight. Rarity recognized it, and she knew that others would not have. She did not think that acknowledging this was pride; it was just the truth. She did not attach any judgement of character to observation. Twilight seemed to chew on her lip, as if reconsidering, until at last she spoke. “He seemed pretty passionate about it.”


“Well.”


“What did you two talk about?”


Rarity almost tripped. 


When she recovered it was without grace. Grace does not mix well with fermentation. Usually, Rarity remembered this. “Well, it wasn’t so much of a conversation. I mean, it was. It was technically a conversation.”


“You obviously want to talk about it. You’ve acted strangely since the funeral… you usually don’t drink that much. If you think you’re being subtle, you’re not. I mean, I’ve gotten a lot better at reading ponies, but I could have told something was up even when I was still new in town and barely knew you.”


Rarity sighed.


Once again, she noted everything and anything that was not Twilight. The sketch artist behind her eyes, the one who saw the dresses formed out of dreams, ex nihil, in the aching absences, could have drawn it all. The artist could have found paint and made the sunset into a monument more lasting than any bronze. Rarity and that artist were the same. She wanted to paint or draw or create. She wanted to watch the sun sink down behind the verdant hills to its couch of rest and know how and what it was. 


And just as quickly as the strange mood came, she crushed its skull under her perfect hooficure like one would a snake poised to strike.


“We had a discussion,” she said evenly. Twilight waited, obviously not satisfied, and so Rarity continued. “We had many discussions. He was a good stallion. He was unhappy about something I brought up, right before he died.”


“What was it? May I ask?”


“It’s really not important.”


“Yeah. I guess not.”


“You… agree then?”


“No, I’m kind of inclined to agree with you. I mean, especially now that he’s dead, it really is all moot now. The problem isn’t that the actual conversation needs to be resolved. The problem is that it is important to you.”


Rarity made a small sound of affirmation and looked back down at her hooves, leaving light trails in the dust. It bothered her. Twilight was right. The dead and their concerns were gone. Poets Corner did not breathe anymore. He did not speak. He worked no magic and sparked no lightning, arcane or otherwise. Anything he might have said was silence and everything he had said was smoke.


Rarity and Twilight walked in silence past the fork in the road, over the little bridge, and back to the fringes of town.


Rarity weighed the moment. She could simply throw off the whole question for good now. She could forget all about it, open the shop when the place had calmed down, and go on working and living. She needn’t be bothered by an old stallion’s convictions for another moment. It wasn’t as if he was there to plead a case or convince her. 


She glanced over at her friend and found Twilight looking at her with a touching concern, a warm radiating softness that framed her eyes and pulled at her lips, and Rarity sighed.


Gesturing with a nod, she set off for the boutique at a brisk pace. Twilight caught up easily on still-growing legs, almost adolescent in their imbalance. At the door to her home and business, Rarity gestured towards the showroom.


“Care to come in, Twilight? If you really want to talk, we may as well be comfortable.”







Rarity poured wine--Twilight, she noted, said nothing either way about this indulgence on top of indulgence, and for that she was grateful. She sat on her most plush couch, savoring the exquisite material and comfort of it. Say what they will of her fainting couch, the girls simply did not understand the unutterable joys of fine fabric against one’s coat.


“So. What was it about?”


“Must you rush, dear?” Rarity asked, watching the way the crimson wine clung to the sides of the glass as she swished it about.


“Sorry.”


“Oh, it’s alright. A lady is simply not ready to give up every little thing at once, you know. All good things come to those who wait. But Poets Corner and I had tea on occasion. He was, as you know, a poet of some skill.”


“I always knew that, but I haven’t read any of it, really.”


“I’ve enjoyed poetry from a young age. At first, I suppose I just wanted to be very grown up and refined. It was incredibly shallow of me, but I’m glad for it in retrospect. I actually began to genuinely like what I originally pursued out of a hollow sentiment. I found the poems of our mutual friend not that long into my time at Central College.” Rarity took a sip and sighed happily. This was not about the alcohol. It was about the relaxation, the loosening of her ropes.


“I forgot about that. Didn’t you leave?”


“Unfortunately. Money was tight, and by the time things had changed I was already an apprentice. It all worked out, as you can see. My parents have always been sorry about it, but I assure them that I am happy with how my life has gone, more or less. I mean,” she said, beaming, “what if I had made it through college and gone off somewhere else? I would have missed out on so many good things here, Twilight. So many good ponies. Ponies like you!”


And Twilight beamed back. “Thank you, Rarity.”


“It’s quite alright. But when I came back I struck up a bit of a rapport with the old fellow. I was a bit too excited to impress him at first, I’m afraid, but as I grew and calmed down we would talk on occasion.”


Rarity took another sip, savoring each exquisite note. Wine, like art, was meant to be savored and mulled over. A quick taste was fine, of course. One would never finish if every sip took five minutes to process. But wine was most truly wine when the pony drinking it stopped to notice the small incongruities, the little twists and turns, the way that they might stop before a painting in some gallery and simply gaze.


“He seems like a pony you would get along with,” Twilight offered.


“Oh, he was. His wife as well,” she added, and then paused. Her smile diminished. “Well, she seemed so." Rarity swished the wine in the glass. Not recklessly, of course, but with a little force. Too much force. The wine clung to the sides, as good wine should, fighting against gravity's inevitability. Trying to keep things from going down. It was futile. It made her sad. "They say she left without saying a word to anypony.”


“I couldn’t believe it. None at all?”


“None,” Rarity confirmed. “It is rather… dismaying. It is strange and unpleasant to be reminded that ponies can be false. The eye can only see action. It cannot see intention.”


“I can guess at it, though,” Twilight said.


“Yes, you can. But where was I? I was quite discouraged, Twilight. It was two weeks ago and the last big order from Canterlot had gone predictably south. They always do in some way or another. Usually, a spot of tea afterwards with Fluttershy, or scotch in the wee hours of the morning in celebration of victory, is enough to make it all seem worth it. It feels like winning.”


“And this time didn’t?”


“Oh, it did. I felt triumphant. I was radiant…” she faltered. “Twilight, I am a businessmare. An entrepreneur. I am no stranger to the acquisition of wealth by honest means, and I have nothing against it. But as I looked around, I noticed…”


She stopped. She took another drink and waved a hoof in the air. Twilight cocked her head.


“What?” she asked.


“Imperfection.”


Twilight snorted. “What? Rarity, you’re just a pony. I mean, I get wanting to be perfect, but--”


“You misunderstand. I am well aware of the shortcomings of magic and equine. No, these were not simple imperfections.” She stopped, and then smiled. “Imagine if you had to write the same paper a hundred times over.”


“That… it would take awhile.”


“Wouldn’t it? What else? It seems rather pointless, doesn’t it? Isn’t one enough? Maybe a few copies as needed for others. Why make copies no one will read? That no one needs?”


“I guess.”


“And it gets worse. Was the first paper--scrap that. The first dress. Was it worth making? Dresses are fragile, Twilight. They tear, they are smudged, they fail. It's not even difficult to destroy them. They don't last and I just need them to. They won't. When I die, not a single pony will really remember me or my dresses. My drawings are all simple utility, my art is here today and gone tomorrow. The only things I can make are ephemeral and pointless.”


"I don't understand.” Twilight's brow furrowed. Rarity became aware all at once of how upset she must sound to her friend, who had not asked questions. Why hadn't she? Ignorance? Had Twilight missed every clue or caught them all along and simply known that the time was not yet right? Because obviously the time to talk about what bothered her had not come, no matter how she tried to summon it with alcohol and company. 


“It’s equating two different things, I know. I’m not really sure what it is that I mean. When I quarreled with Corner, I was dismayed about art.”


Twilight seemed taken aback. “Art?”


“Specifically, my own. How pretentious of me, that I think of myself in those terms. It really is a travesty that I should do so--it’s offensive, and sometimes I feel like the real things are just too kind or too distant to the truth to tell me so. Caramel, now, is a true painter. Why, I have some of his sketches hidden away, did you know? I fancied him once in my own way. We traded little pictures, scrawled between commissions or classwork. It was quite fun, and it felt like we could make anything with nothing but a whim. I haven’t spoken to him much recently.”


“And he thought that you weren’t a fake?”


Rarity winced. “See, when it’s put that way it seems rather different.” She swallowed the rest of the wine without savoring it properly. A waste, but not a grand one. “It’s not that I am fake, Twilight, but rather that I’m just thinking about how Corner died. It’s all gone now. His poems are still on paper, and a few of his books are still in print, but even if someone reads them, there isn’t anyone on the other side of the page.”


“The words are still there,” Twilight said, hesitant.


“Yes, he has that going for him. You know what is ephemeral? Dresses. Dresses are ephemeral. I’m just sort of in a state of dismay, I suppose. About if any of it is worth anything. If what I do means anything.”


"You just said that. You don't believe that, do you? You don't really think that everypony would just forget about you and the beautiful things you make, right?"


"I don't. I know it."


Twilight said nothing. Rarity supposed there wasn’t much to say. She’d done a poor job of explaining herself, at any rate. Time ticked by slowly, inched along like a foal on her way to school. She heard the clock marking off the minutes like it always had, and ran a hoof along the couch, once again simply enjoying the way that it felt and moved when she pressed it. This really had been such a good investment. 


It was a testament to her nervous state that her mind wandered for as long as it did, and when it was called back to attention, Rarity almost jumped.


“I wish I knew something really smart to say right now,” Twilight began. Something in Rarity melted to see her so defeated. “I really don’t. Ponies need beauty. I could follow that line of argument all the way to its conclusion, but I doubt it would be all that helpful right now. I don't know.”


"They do need beauty," Rarity agreed. "They need a lot of things. It’s alright, Twilight.” As if pulled along on a string, she rose and crossed the gap between them in her little living room. She settled on the couch and fussed at Twilight’s mane. “I’m not sure there is anything to say.”


“But I feel like it's worth something. I know I love what you do. I don’t always get it, or understand why… and I don’t have much fashion sense at all on my own. But sometimes I just like that you make things. It makes me want to make things. I'm not sure what I would even make. I don't really have any creative talents, truthfully, but I still feel like... Like, just for a moment, if I wanted to, if I tried, I could make something that meant something. Sunsets don't last forever, either."


"A sunset is a grand mystery, Twilight. There is nothing mysterious about dresses. To be frank, there isn't even much awe in them. Even in the best." She hesitated. "Maybe."


Twilight shrugged. "I still like what you do. Lots of ponies do. They spend money, hard-earned money, in order to have what you make and say that they own something beautiful. They like it."


“I do as well, usually.”


Twilight turned slightly. “You sounded just then as if you didn’t anymore.”


Rarity shook her head. “If I am honest with myself, Twilight, I have had moments when I simply hated the whole dreadful creative business. But those moments were not the totality. More often than not, I enjoyed it all. The hum of the sewing machine, the feel of fabric… the scratch of my pencil late in the night.” She chuckled, and her horn lit as she fought briefly with a tangle in Twilight’s mane. “Not to mention an excuse for the consumption of coffee in near-fatal doses.”


“Heh. I get that part,” Twilight said softly. “You know, you do this a lot.”


“What?”


“I think you do it as a nervous habit. Fixing our manes. When we’re one on one. I asked Fluttershy and she says you do it to her too.”


Rarity blinked. “Oh. I hadn’t thought much about it. It seems natural to do so.” She put a hoof to her chin and thought. “I may do this because of Sweetie Belle. It was something tangible I could do when she was unhappy. I was there whenever she needed to talk, of course, or at least I try to be, but sometimes a little extra is needed. A bit of a reassurance. It always made me happy. A lady does everything with feeling, Twilight.”


“Did you read that somewhere?”


“Not everything comes out of books,” Rarity answered, grinning before she returned to her ministrations. “You know, Twilight, the more I think about it… I begin to wonder if there is an answer at all. Perhaps I am more concerned than I should be.”


“What do you mean?”


“Well,” she began, happy with her work, “I don’t know if what I do has lasting value or not. But I’m not sure it matters. I mean, I think it does, but it doesn’t matter in that there’s no way for me to find out right now. I don’t know if its worth it, creating things. I do know I love it. It makes me happy.” She stretched and then slumped back against the couch that Twilight occupied. Lazily, she looked over at her friend. “I’d rather do something than nothing. Maybe that’s enough. I enjoyed the world around me, earlier, when we were walking, and now its getting too dark to appreciate it like I did, and yet I still enjoyed it. Perhaps there is something to learn there. Probably not.”


“What did he tell you, by the way?” Twilight asked, sitting straight up. Rarity, bound by her own overweaning sense of propriety, also straightened into the perfect image of breeding. 


“Poets? Why, he told me that what I did mattered a lot. He was very vehement about it. I believe that’s part of what makes poets, their vehemence. He gathered all of the artists in this town and tried to wield us into a little clan about him. It worked, somewhat.” She hummed. “You know, perhaps I will drop by and see dear Caramel. I heard he took the old stallion’s death awfully hard." Rarity let that last word linger, considering what she would say next. "I think the old stallion would approve. In any case, he wanted me to be bold. Suggested… well.”


“What?”


“Lots of things. Told me that if I really felt this way, I should try new things. That is the most terrifying thing anypony has ever told me.”


“New things?” Twilight asked. “Like what? And why would that be so frightening?"


"Ponies want comfort, Twilight. Remember what you said to Applejack, about how the low attendance at the funeral wasn't so surprising, considering how miserable it's been in town?"


Twiight nodded. "I do remember. But change can be wonderful. I know it has been for me."


"Oh, Twilight." Rarity thought about mentioning the change she had seen in her friend, but decided to save it for some other time, when Twilight could receive it better. Or, at least, when mentioning it didn't make Rarity feel a bit embarrassed. All of this casual intimacy. Goodness.


"What new things did he mean, anyhow?" Twilight continued.


“That’s the best part,” Rarity chuckled. “He died before he told me.”


“Other kinds of art? That seems the obvious thing. I know you draw. Did he want you to do more things like that?”


“No, no I think he meant something else. I may never know. If nothing else, at least he cared. At least you cared.” Rarity rose from the couch. “I think he cared a lot. Sometimes, I don’t. But I would like to.” Then, turning, she gave Twilight the gift of a half smile, not forged or planned, but genuine. “Want to stay for dinner? I promise Sweetie Belle won’t be cooking.”