When Sunny and her friends wake up to find the Crystal Brighthouse buried in drifts of an unexpected snow, they gather around the fireplace and tell tales of their Wishday, Wishentine, or Wishiehoof traditions.
Inspired by Campfire Tales.
When Sunny and her friends wake up to find the Crystal Brighthouse buried in drifts of an unexpected snow, they gather around the fireplace and tell tales of their Wishday, Wishentine, or Wishiehoof traditions. Be prepared for lots of holiday fluff and an insane desire for coca.
Sunny groaned and, without opening her eyes, grabbed her pillow and slammed it on top of her head in an attempt to block out the sound, but Izzy was, as usual, relentless.
“PONIES! WAKE UP!”
“Izzy…” Zipp moaned, the only one of them to lift her head and look blearily at the unicorn who was currently bouncing around the room. “It’s, like, six in the morning.” She looked over at the clock for confirmation, and was startled to see it reading 4:37. “Izzy, it’s four thirty in the morning. Whatever it is, I’m sure it can wait.” She flopped back onto her bed and tried her best to get back to sleep. Needless to say, she failed.
“But it’s snowing!” Izzy announced, leaping over to the windows and pulling them open. None of her friends moved. The unicorn sighed and ran over to Sunny. “It’s snowing! Come on, Sunny, you’ve got to see this!”
“Not right now, Izzy,” Sunny mumbled from underneath her pillow. She waved one of her hooves in the general direction she was hearing Izzy’s voice coming from. “Not right now…”
“But you said that it never snows in Maretime Bay!” Izzy reminded her, grabbing Sunny’s pillow with both hooves and yanking it off of her friend’s head. Sunny shot up in bed, looking around wildly until she saw Izzy holding the pillow above her head, a triumphant look on her face. Sunny tried in vain to snatch it back, but Izzy kept moving it out of her reach. “Come on, Sunny, just come look!” Izzy dropped the pillow and ran back over to the window. “It’s so beautiful!”
“Ugh, what time is it?” Pipp mumbled as she finally sat up in bed, pushing her face mask up so that she could see what was going on.
“Four thirty-nine,” Zipp mumbled, staring at the clock, her eyes half closed in exhaustion.
“And it’s snowing!” Izzy squealed, bouncing on the tips of her hooves and dancing around the room again.
“Yippee,” Zipp said unenthusiastically, pulling her blanket over her head.
“No, you ponies aren’t getting it,” Izzy continued to say, dashing over to her corner of the room and grabbing her hat and scarves and hoof warmers. “There’s snow outside! And the snow won’t wait for the sun, and neither will I! Come on, ponies, let’s go play!”
Izzy zoomed out of the room, leaving the doors open, and down one of the ramps, skidding to a halt just outside the front doors. The enthusiastic unicorn flung the doors open, and had barely a moment to register the fact that all she saw was white before a wall of snow collapsed on top of her. She poked her head out of the pile of snow and shook it off of her head as her friends came down the stairs. Now that they were awake, there was no chance of them possibly getting back to sleep.
“Looks like a lot of snow,” Sunny said wryly, walking up beside Izzy in the mound of flakes and shutting the door before any more snow could fall on them.
Zipp flew up to one of the windows and peeked out. “Hey, I can see out here!” she called down. “Only… it looks like it’s at ground level.” And, indeed, when she looked out, she could see an expanse of snow
“The snow buried us alive!” Pipp shrieked, flapping her wings in a panic. She started taking huge, ‘calming’ breaths, and Zipp flew beside her and started patting her sister on the back comfortingly.
“It’s okay, ponies!” Izzy said cheerfully, hopping out of the pile of snow and lighting up her horn as she grinned at her friends. “I’ll get rid of this snow in no time!”
“Izzy, NO!” Sunny cried as Izzy opened the doors again. A wave of snow started to tumble down on them, and Sunny pushed Izzy out of the way. Her cutie mark began to glow as Sunny grew wings and a golden horn, and she created a golden force field that pushed the snow out the door where it wouldn’t get them. Zipp slammed the doors shut and landed beside Sunny as she changed back into an earth pony.
“New rule,” Sunny panted. “Don’t open the door.”
“But what are we going to do, Sunny?” Pipp panicked, pulling out her phone and frantically tapping as the small hoof held device made beeping sounds. “All of this snow is blocking my signal, and there’s no way to get out - or to get help! We’re trapped… FOREVER!”
“Oh, pony baloney, I’m sure somepony will get us out of here in no time,” Sunny said cheerfully, walking over to her pegasus friend and putting her arm around her shoulders. “In the meantime, I officially declare today a snow day! Come on, ponies, let’s tell stories around the fire! I’ll make us some cocoa and cookies, and we’ll have some fun inside.”
“Come to think of it, how did we get this much snow in Maretime Bay in the first place?” Zipp asked to nopony in particular, rubbing her chin as she thought about it. “You said that you never got this much snow before, Sunny.”
Izzy swallowed and smiled nervously. She wasn’t completely sure, but she remembered having a dream about Wishiehoof in Bridlewood, and about the Wishing Tree. She didn’t remember the specifics of the dream, but she did remember going around to every single unicorn in Bridlewood and telling them “Frosty Shivers”, the standard unicorn greeting for the holiday. Only this past Wishiehoof, Izzy and her friends had discovered that it wasn’t just a greeting, but a really old weather spell that was causing the blizzard that day.
But, surely, that was just a coincidence…
Ten minutes later, there was a fire roaring in the fireplace, a fresh batch of cookies was sitting on a plate, and each of the four ponies had steaming cups of hot chocolate in front of them. Izzy had set up a massive blanket fort, and Sunny turned off all the lights and took out the flashlight.
“Who wants to tell the first story?” she asked, looking around.
“Ooo, I think I might have one,” Pipp said slowly, a sly grin spreading across her face. “It’s the first Wishentine that I can remember, and that year, Zipp got-”
“Nope!” Her older sister put her hooves over her ears. “La la la, can’t hear you, Pipp! There is no way I am letting you tell that story.”
Pipp grabbed the flashlight from Sunny and turned it on, holding it underneath her chin so that it illuminated her face from under. “It all started on a snowy day, a lot like this one, in fact,” she began. “Every year…”
“One of our Wishentine traditions growing up was that, each night, we would hang up cloud stockings over the fireplace the night before, and when we came down the next morning, they were filled with presents. The story that we were always told was that, while we were sleeping, the three Spirits of Wishentine Past, Present, and Future, would see if we had been good that year, and if we deserved presents. If we weren’t good, then all we would find in our stockings were bricks.”
“Bricks?” Izzy asked, sitting up and tilting her head curiously. “Why would you get bricks?” Her eyes suddenly glazed over, and she sighed contentedly. “Oh, the things I could do with a few good bricks…”
“Izzy!” Pipp reprimanded, batting the unicorn with her wing. “Bricks are bad! They’re so heavy that they’ll weigh us down, and then we’ll never fly!” Beside her, Zipp nodded solemnly.
“Anyways,” Pipp continued, resuming the story after giving Izzy one last glare, adjusting the flashlight, “ponies were always careful to be good growing up, so that when they grew up, they might be able to fly. But sometimes ponies weren’t as careful as they should be.” She threw a meaningful look at Zipp, who was intentionally looking anywhere but her sister. “And when those ponies wake up on Wishentine morning and find nothing but bricks in their cloud stockings-”
“La la la, can’t hear you!” Zipp said loudly, clapping her hooves over her ears again.
Pipp laughed and pulled out her phone. She started scrolling through her videos and dozens of selfies before she came to a stop on a specific clip. She pressed play and held it out for her friends to see. Izzy and Sunny leaned in eagerly.
In it, a younger Zipp was standing by a fireplace decorated with the symbol of the Zephyr Heights royal family and boughs of evergreen trees, decorated with deep ruby bulbs that twinkled in the soft firelight. Hanging on the top of the fireplace were three massive socks made out of a fluffy white yarn that looked like it was made of clouds. They were sagging from the weight of the objects inside of them, and on the outside, stitched in bright gold thread, the ponies could see the names of Zipp, Pipp, and Queen Haven, whose face was outside of the frame because the video was being taken by a much younger Pipp.
Haven reached up and took down Zipp’s stocking and handed it to the filly, who eagerly dug into it. Her gleeful expression quickly shifted to shock as she pulled out a solid red brick, dusted with dirt.
The Pipp in the video let out a little giggle, and Zipp turned towards her sister, her cheeks turning red. “Pipp did it!” she shrieked. “She did it, it was her fault! She switched our stockings!”
The filly launched herself at her younger sister, and the camera tumbled for a few seconds as a scuffle was heard off screen. The camera faced up at the ceiling before Haven’s face blocked it. The queen of Zephyr Heights sighed and shook her head, smiling as she reached down and stopped the video.
“I stand by my judgment,” Zipp said now, folding her arms and lifting her head haughtily. “That was completely uncalled for and definitely undeserved.”
“I agree,” Pipp said solemnly. “You attacking me and blaming me for your actions was indeed undeserved and uncalled for.”
“What? No! I mean that I had bricks in my cloud stocking,” Zipp corrected. “I specifically remember it being your fault, Pipp.”
“Um… no,” Pipp said, rolling her eyes and sliding her phone under her wing again. “That was all because of you. That was your fault, Zipp. I had nothing to do with it.”
“Ooo,” Izzy said cheerfully, looking back and forth between the two sisters. “What happened?”
Zipp opened her mouth to answer, but Pipp beat her to it. “The day before,” she said, her eyes sparkling with excitement, “Mom was walking Zipp and me through all of the basics of our fake flying, and we were supposed to practice. It was one of the first times we ever did that, because Mom wanted us to do it at the Wishentine Royal Carousel Concert the next day. But Zipp thought that it would be like real flying, and she crashed into me while I was livestreaming and got us all tangled up in those wires. It took an hour to get us back down!” Pipp sniffed woefully. “And when we did, my mane was so frizzy that it took another hour to fix it again. Not to mention that my hoof polish was chipped. And everypony saw it happen…” She sighed, dramatically fighting back tears in her eyes. “It took me forever to forgive her. But I decided that, because it was so close to Wishentine, that I would find the goodness in my heart to look past the cruel mistakes that we have made.”
Zipp rolled her eyes at her sister’s over dramatic performance. “No,” she said through clenched teeth, “that is not what happened. What happened was that I slipped because Pipp was distracting me, and I was completely out of control when I crashed into her. It was not my fault. I couldn’t have stopped it even if I wanted to. Which Pipp should know, since she was the one who set it all up in the first place!”
Pipp gasped and scoffed. “I what? Zipp, you have no idea what you were talking about. I did nothing wrong. I swear, I was minding my own business on the ground while Mom was teaching you all about it, and you crashed into me! I had nothing to do with it.”
“Yeah, right! You rigged the wires,” Zipp said, standing up and stomping her hooves agitatedly. “I investigated afterwards! You had just gotten your hooves done that morning, and there was a bit of golden hoof polish on some of the controls.” She glared at her sister, and Pipp gulped.
“Um… I didn’t have hoof polish on,” she stammered.
“Yeah you did, Pipp! You said so,” Izzy cheerfully reminded her. “Remember? You said that you were angry that you got your hoof polish chipped when Zipp crashed into you!”
Pipp bit her lip. “Oh, really? I forgot I said that,” she said with a nervous laugh. “Well, actually I did have hoof polish on, and it was really pretty, but I didn’t get it done that day, Zipp, so there is no way that whatever you saw came from me. It was probably one of the ponies who manned the controls-”
“You got your hooves done that morning, and I know because before you did, you got mad at me,” Zipp started before Pipp interrupted her.
“All right, fine! I admit, I did rig the wires a little bit. But that was only because you stole my cell phone again, Zipp! I was looking everywhere for it, and I was freaking out, because I had promised the Pippsqueaks a new livestream of my flight practice, and they would be so disappointed if I let them down!”
“I stole your phone because you’re always on it, Pipp!” Zipp said, sitting down again and grabbing one of the pillows. She looked down at it and traced her hoof across it as she said, “We were growing apart and getting so different, and I missed the days that we were friends, Pipp. I got scared. You were my best friend, and I felt like I was losing you. So I took your phone so that you wouldn’t have any choice but to spend time with me, and it could be like the old days. I’m sorry I did that, but it’s the truth.” She sighed. “All I really wanted for Wishentine that year was for us to be friends again.”
“Zipp… you could have told me,” Pipp said, placing her hoof on her sister’s shoulder. “But… I’m sorry, too. Sometimes I can get a little… carried away, I guess. I forget that there are ponies outside of the social world. But I was so excited for Wishentine, because I would get to spend it with my Pippsqueaks, too! It felt like it would be extra special for me. And whenever you act like those things don’t matter to you… it feels like I don’t matter to you. So I’m sorry, too.” She smiled at her sister. “I guess wishes do come true?”
Zipp grinned. “Yeah. Even though that was, like, five years ago. But I still think that I did not deserve to get a brick in my cloud stocking-”
Pipp’s eyes widened, and she cleared her throat. “Oh! Yes. Uh, huh. Definitely. Yup, totally agree with you there, sis, one hundred, uh, one hundred percent, yup.” She swallowed forcefully and smiled warily at her sister. “Totally…”
“Pipp?” Zipp stood up, flaring her wings. “What do you know about that?”
“Nothing!” the younger pegasus shrieked, spreading her wings and leaping into the air so that Zipp couldn’t reach her. “Nothing, like I said, total coincidence, I had nothing to do with that, totally didn’t swap it out-” She clapped her hooves over her mouth like she hadn’t meant to say anything. She took one look at Zipp’s face and flew off through the Brighthouse.
“Pipp Petals, when I find out what you did-” Zipp roared and leaped into the air as well, flapping her wings and taking off after her sister.
Sunny sighed as the two sisters chased each other around the Brighthouse, Pipp shrieking every time Zipp got close to her. Sunny picked up the flashlight that had been left, abandoned, on one of the cushions, and turned it off as she stood up and stretched. She calmly trotted into the kitchen and pulled a fresh batch of cookies out of the oven and set them on the top of the burners, the delicious smells wafting up and through the room.
“Fresh cookies!” she called out, and Izzy, Pipp, and Zipp all flew into the room, their eyes wide and their mouths watering as Sunny divided the treats among the four of them before they returned to their pillow fort by the fireplace.
“So!” Sunny said cheerfully as she sat down, picking up the flashlight once more and turning it on again. She passed it to Izzy, saying, “Here, Izzy, why don’t you tell us a little bit about the unicorns’ Wishiehoof traditions in Bridlewood?”
“Oh, I would love to!” the purple unicorn said cheerfully, but she batted the flashlight aside. Without telling any of her friends what she was doing, Izzy dashed upstairs and back in under a second, returning with a bright glowing crystal in her hooves, which she held instead. “It’s jinxy to talk about Wishiehoof without the special Wishiefhoof crystal!” she explained when her friends gave her confused looks.
“Really?” Sunny gasped, leaning forward to peer at the crystal in Izzy’s hooves. “How does it work? Is it magic, or is it just a-” She broke off before she called it a “silly unicorn superstition”. She knew that, while other ponies might view the unicorns beliefs and traditions as a bit overly complicated when there was really nothing to be afraid of, the inhabitants of Bridlewood thought that they were very important indeed - every single one of the three dozen or so that she knew of.
“I should warn you, though,” Izzy said seriously, looking around at all her friends. “If I want to tell you everything that there is to know about Wishiehoof, there might be some jinxies against some of them. That’s what this crystal is here for - it protects against the jinxies.” She grinned and stroked the crystal fondly.
“Oh, boy,” Zipp sighed, her head falling into her hooves. Out of all of them, Zipp found it the hardest to tolerate the unicorn superstitions. She believed in science and rules, and none of the beliefs of the unicorns seemed to follow any of those things.
Izzy cleared her throat, and all light disappeared except for the cool, blue light coming from the crystal. “It all began a long, long time ago…”
“Wishiehoof is a day of fun, friendship, and frolicking - we are very serious about our frolicking. But it’s also a day… of secrets. Wishiehoof lasts for the Twelve Days of Secret Keeping, which has been a Bridlewood tradition for ages. If you tell a single secret during Wishiehoof, the secret jinxies will curse you so that you can never speak again.
“What?” Pipp looked shocked. “If you tell a single secret, you can never talk again?”
Izzy shook her head solemnly. “Never ever. I haven’t seen it happen - I don’t think it’s happened to anypony in generations. But it almost happened to me.”
“Oh, come on, Izzy,” Zipp scoffed. “There isn’t really a jinx that will curse you to never talk-”
“It was time for Secret Canter,” Izzy continued, her voice low and dramatic. The blue light coming from the crystal seemed hypnotizingly bright. “We were gathering in the town square to draw names to create our gifts over the twelve days of Wishiehoof. On the last day, when we place our ornaments on the Wishing Tree, we place our presents along the bottom of the tree, and at the end of the day, we all open them together.
Her voice, if possible, got even lower, almost to below a whisper. “I… got…” She bit her lip, looking around carefully as if the jinxes were listening in.
“Izzy, relax,” Zipp said leisurely, “you can tell us your secret. It’s not like we’re going to-”
“ALPHABITTLE! I got Alphabittle!” Izzy burst out, covering her ears with her hooves and screwing her eyes shut like she was committing something treasonous. She gasped and shoved her hooves in her mouth for a few tense moments as she looked around. She took a deep breath before continuing. “And I had no idea what to get him! I mean, Alphabittle’s kind of mysterious - he likes games, but games are really hard to make in just a few days, so I was stuck!”
“What did you do, Izzy?” Sunny asked. “Did you ask Alphabittle what he liked?”
“I tried!” she wailed, throwing her hooves in the air dejectedly. “But we have to be careful during Secret Canter - if the pony you make your gift for guesses who made it, you get jinxed! I had to be very inconspicuous.
“I went to the Crystal Tea Room and started talking to everypony, asking them all what they would want for Wishiehoof, if they could have anything. And it seemed to work - I got lots of answers from other ponies that probably would have helped other ponies that needed ideas for their Secret Canter. But when I got to Alphabittle, I asked him what he wanted more than anything, and he said, ‘Something I can always win.’”
“Yeesh,” Pipp said, shaking her head. “That’s… excessive.”
“But not at all unlike him,” Sunny said thoughtfully, tapping her chin as she looked off into space. Her face suddenly lit up with an idea. “OH! Did you make him that Just Prance game?”
Izzy laughed nervously. “Um, nope! Not… not this year, heh, heh! Nope, totally not me.” She tried to give Sunny a confident smile that came off more nervous than anything. Izzy cleared her throat and continued with the story. “Anyways. So I was stumped again, and I went back to my house to brainstorm. I went to all the crystal lighting ceremonies - of course, we didn’t have magic, so we had to wrap lights around the crystals so that they looked like they were lit up.” She giggled. “It was my idea.” She looked proud.
“But the twelve days of Wishiehoof were going by fast, and I was so worried about Alphabittle’s present that I forgot to make my hoofmade ornament, or knit my Wishiehoof scarf! I could have just bought them, but Auntie Buttons says that things are always better when they’re hoofmade, like there’s a kind of magic in them. So it would be jinxy to do that!” She sighed dramatically. “I didn’t have any other choice. I had to go talk to Alphabittle.”
“Oh, no, Izzy…” Sunny said, putting her hoof on her friend’s.
“But…” Pipp glanced sideways at her sister. “What about the jinx?”
Izzy sniffed and lifted her head nobelly. “I would rather give Alphabittle a good Wishiehoof than ever speak again. It was a sacrifice I was willing to make.”
“Wow, Izzy,” Zipp said, sounding impressed.
“But you can talk,” Sunny said, sounding a bit confused. “Did the jinx not work?”
“Nope! Even better,” Izzy said, her face lighting up. “On my way to the Crystal Tea Room, I passed one of the crystals, and I saw how beautiful it was all lit up. And then I thought about how it had been my idea to use the lights, and that we could see the crystals lit up for the first time in generations. Then I heard Auntie Buttons telling me that I had so much creativity, and that I should go out and use it. I had to make Alphabittle a gift, something so creative and special that nopony would ever guess who had made it, and he would be happy, because he would always be able to win it. At least, if he practiced hard enough.” She laughed, but her friends stared at her.
“So… Izzy,” Sunny said after a brief pause, “what did you make for Alphabittle?”
“Yeah!” Zipp said, sitting forward and munching on a cookie. “Was it something big and crazy-”
“Or sparkly and glittery!” Pipp interrupted, sighing as she thought about all the sparkly presents she had gotten for Wishentine in the past.
“Those are the same thing,” Zipp told her, rolling her eyes.
“They are not-” Pipp started to say, but cut herself off, working her jaw furiously as she glared at her sister.
“Come on, tell us, Izzy!” Sunny begged.
“Okay, okay, I’ll tell you!” the unicorn laughed. “I made him his cube. You know, the one that moves and has the different colors on the sides, and you have to match them up? I didn’t know that the earth ponies already had something like that, though,” she added sheepishly. “But I do know that Alphabittle loved it! And it came with an instruction manual, written by yours truly.” Izzy took a little bow and grinned.
“But the best part is that I didn’t even get jinxed! Alphabittle loved it so much that he didn’t even bother to guess who had given it to him - he just started playing with it!” Izzy sighed contentedly. “It made me so happy to know that I had made him so happy, you know?”
“I do know, Izzy,” Sunny said quietly. “And that was such a great story! Bridlewood’s traditions are always so fun to hear about-”
“Ahem,” Pipp said, pretending to look offended. “What about our traditions, Sunny?”
“Oh, I didn’t mean-” Sunny started to say, but was interrupted by a sudden sound that sounded like a giant creature thudding towards the Brighthouse. “Do you hear that?”
They all paused and tilted their heads to listen, and they all knew what Sunny was referring to.
“M-maybe it’s just some ponies coming to help get us out?” Pipp suggested, waving her phone in the air, but still unable to get a signal.
“It sounds like it’s coming from-” Sunny started just as the doors began to shake. All four ponies ran into the center of the room, Pipp trembling and trying to hide behind her sister, Izzy’s horn sparking nervously. Sunny glowed with a bright golden light as she grew a pair of wings and a sparkling golden horn, spreading her wings to protect her friends and lighting up her horn, trying to think of what it could possibly be.
The doors suddenly burst open, releasing a pile of snow that slid into the room, coming to a stop inches from Sunny’s hooves. Pipp yelped and ducked out of sight again, Zipp moaned, and Izzy sighed, shaking her head slowly.
“Huh. Not what I was expecting.” Sunny took a cautious step forward, inspecting the pile, when it began to shake, and all four ponies backed away.
“What is it?” Pipp asked, her voice going up several octaves from fear. “Is it some kind of snowpony monster? Like in that old Wishentine story?”
Zipp rolled her eyes. “That’s just a story, Pipp-”
A figure suddenly burst up from the pile of snow, completely covered in the stuff, stumbling along as it tried to extract itself from the mound. It had four legs and two heads, one on top of the other, with dangerous glowing eyes that shone fiercely in the dim light. Sunny, Izzy, Zipp, and Pipp all screamed and grabbed hold of each other as the snow monster took a shaky step forward towards them. One of its heads opened its mouth and exhaled a massive burst of purple and blue fire-
“Ponies?”
One of the heads shook off the melting snow, reached up, and plucked the baby dragon off of his head.
“What are you doing here?” Sunny asked as the sheriff brushed the snow off of Sparky and set the baby dragon on his back. “How did you get here?”
“Sparky helped,” Hitch said, patting the dragon on the head. “I saw all the snow up on the hill and figured you guys were trapped inside, so I decided to heroically rescue - I mean, assist you in getting out. Sparky helped blast through the snow with his fire, though I did most of the work.” He puffed out his chest so that his sheriff badge gleamed. “You may now present me with your undying gratitude and thanks.”
Zipp smirked. “Thank you sooo much, sheriff,” she said teasingly, and Hitch glared at her. “But actually, we don’t really need saving. We were just telling stories about our Wishentine - I mean, Wishiehoof - I mean, Wishday - winter holiday traditions,” she finally settled on.
Hitch turned back to the door, where the tunnel that he and Sparky had dug was completely caved in and filled with snow. He sighed and set Sparky down, where the baby dragon promptly ran up to Izzy and hugged her hoof. “I guess we’ll have to stay a bit, too,” he said, looking around. “I don’t think anypony’s going to be getting through this snow anytime soon.”
“Great!” Sunny said cheerfully, a smile lighting up her face. “Hitch, why don’t you and Sparky warm up, and Izzy, Zipp, and I will see if we can do anything about this snow?” She gestured to the massive pile that had come through the doorway.
Izzy and Sunny lit up their horns, creating a forcefield that was pushing the mound of snow back through the doorway, and Zipp hovered overhead, beating her wings as hard as she could to push it further. As soon as it was outside, Zipp slammed the door, and all three ponies slumped against it, breathing heavily.
Meanwhile, Sparky was running around the living room area, jumping on the couch and throwing pillows as he laughed, occasionally letting out bursts of fire that would transform the stockings hanging along the fireplace into cupcakes that he would turn back once Hitch gave him his trademarked ‘sheriff look’. Pipp was lounging under one of the tents, melodramatically waving her phone in the air. She looked at Hitch from where she was lying down, so the sheriff looked upside down to her.
“What’s going on out there, Hitch?” she asked, her hooves falling to her side. “I can’t get a signal, so I’ve been trapped with absolutely no news and it’s driving me crazy.”
“Not much,” he said, shrugging. “There’s a decent amount of snow on the ground, but nothing like up here. We’ve got ponies working on the streets, but school’s been canceled and everypony’s been advised to stay inside…”
Pipp blew a frustrated breath. “Any idea why it’s snowing so much?”
“No clue,” he said earnestly. “Maybe one of the unicorns was trying a weather spell and it went wrong or something.”
As he spoke, Sunny, Izzy, and Zipp came back over, and at the mention of unicorns trying a weather spell that went rogue, Izzy went red in the face and averted her eyes. “Honestly, what’s wrong with a little snow?” she asked, grabbing her crystal as she sat down and hugging it tight.
“Oh, there’s nothing wrong with a little snow, Izzy,” Hitch said passionately. Sparky sat in his lap, cuddling his stuffed crab and shaking it so that the bell inside rang gently. “In fact, I’ve been wanting snow since I was a little filly…” His eyes got a dreamy look in them.
“Me, too,” Sunny agreed, standing up and trotting off into the kitchen. “But no matter how many times we wished… Well, snow never came.”
“Until now,” Zipp unnecessarily pointed out, nodding at the windows, which were completely dark from the snow outside.
Sunny laughed. “Right, until now,” she added, walking back over with a tray of hot chocolate carefully balanced on her hoof, along with a plate of cookies. “Hot chocolate, anypony? I think I’ve still got some jumbo marshmallows in the cupboard somewhere…” She set the tray down and wandered off, muttering to herself and frowning at the pantry. “Now, where were they?”
“Oh, don’t worry about it, Sunny,” Hitch said, waving his hoof dismissively. “We don’t need marshmallows, right, guys?” When Zipp and Pipp nodded, he cleared his throat and added, “Right, Izzy?”
“Hm?” The unicorn looked up from her steaming mug and blinked a few times. “Oh, yes, I agree,” she said, though everypony knew that she had no idea what she was agreeing to.
Hitch sighed contentedly. “This reminds me of spending Wishday with Grandma Figgy when I was a foal,” he said fondly, staring off into space. “Every Wishday was the exact same… We would tell stories by the fire, drink coca, and build gingerbread houses. Then we would open presents… I remember that Grandma Figgy would always get me exactly what I wanted, even if I didn’t know it myself. But it was always so hard to get the perfect present for her. I would spend weeks before searching for the perfect gift. It had to be just right…”
“Really?” Izzy tilted her head, surprised. “But you always know what to get for us.”
Hitch’s mouth quirked into a smile. “Yeah, well, that was a skill that was earned through many years of hard work and tedious efforts to read ponies and figure out what they would really like for Wishday-”
“He’s exaggerating,” Sunny whispered to Zipp, who snickered.
Hitch scowled at Sunny. “Anyway,” he continued through clenched teeth, “one year, I decided that I was going to find that perfect gift for Grandma Figgy - or suffer the consequences.” He put his hoof over his heart and lifted his head as he looked out into space, clearly experiencing some delusions of grandeur with his heroic actions. His friends all giggled quietly, and Hitch tried to ignore them.
“I searched high… and I searched low.” He stood up and began waving his hooves around animatedly as he dramatically told the story. “I asked all her closest friends for gift ideas, and prowled the market every day with every single bit I had managed to scrooge up. I asked her to tell me story after story, trying to see if I could find out what one of her favorite things was from the tales that she always tells. I even asked her flat-out asked her what she wanted for Wishday, if she could have anything she wanted. But all I ever got from her was, ‘Oh, nothing, dear. I have everything I could ever want.’” He gave his friends all an exasperated look. “See what I mean?”
“Guess you were stumped, then,” Zipp snickered, hiding her smile behind her mug as she sipped hot chocolate.
“I was!” Hitch said indignantly. “Wishday was only two days away, and I hadn’t figured out a gift yet!” He took a deep breath to compose himself. “And so, I thought about the only piece of advice Grandma Figgy had ever given to me about Wishday gifts: the best gifts that we give are the gifts that come from a place of love.”
Izzy sniffed and wiped her eyes. “Beautiful,” she said softly.
“I know, right?” Hitch replied while the rest of his friends rolled their eyes. “I thought so, too. Grandma Figgy has always done so much for me. She always knew how to make me appreciate myself and what I had, and it was because of her that I finally got the courage to become a sheriff. I would never be where I am now if it wasn’t for her. And it was then that I realized what the perfect gift for her was.”
“What was it, Hitch?” Sunny asked.
Hitch sighed and cuddled Sparky close to him. “A mirror,” he said. “It seemed so simple, and yet, it was so perfect. Grandma Figgy was always helping me realize so much about myself, so I wanted to help her realize something unique and amazing about herself, like she had done for me. I was returning a long-overdue favor.”
“That’s really sweet, Hitch!” Pipp said, and her sister rolled her eyes. “What did Grandma Figgy think?”
“She loved it,” Hitch beamed. “Said it was the best present she had ever received on a Wishday. She hung it up on her wall in her room, and as far as I know, it’s still there.”
“What a great story, Hitch,” Sunny said meaningfully, setting down her mug and standing up to stretch. “It’s been great to hear about all of your guys’ holiday traditions - I feel like it’s really helping to bring us together! And I like to hear about how you guys celebrate your holidays, too! It’s so different from mine, but they all have one thing in common - we celebrate them with friends and family who love us. And we like to bring joy to other ponies during the holidays, which is what I think they’re really all about!”
“What’s your holiday story, Sunny?” Izzy asked, tossing a cookie into the air and catching it in her mouth.
“Oh! Well, I wasn’t really planning on telling one,” Sunny said, a bit flustered.
“Aw, come on, Sunny,” Zipp teased, “we all told one.”
“Yeah, Sunny!” Pipp said enthusiastically.
Sunny sighed and curled up back under the blanket tent again. “All right. Here’s the story of the best Winter Wishday I ever had…”
“It was when I was just a filly, back when I still celebrated Wishday with my dad. We didn’t have many fancy traditions - just exchanging gifts under the Wishing Star that night.”
“Is this another present story?” Zipp asked, groaning. “About how you had to find the perfect gift and no matter how hard you tried you just couldn’t find it?”
“HEY! Finding the perfect gift is important!” Izzy retorted, and Hitch nodded along with her. The unicorn dropped her voice to a whisper and continued, “If you don’t you get jinxies. I remember when somepony got a gift that wasn’t perfect, they-”
“Izzy! This is Sunny’s storytime,” Pipp reprimanded, frowning at her friend.
“Oops! Sorry, Sunny,” Izzy apologized.
“It’s okay, Izzy,” Sunny promised. “But, anyways, this was the last Wishday that I celebrated with my father before… before he… you know…” She cleared her throat. “It was our last Wishday together, and I’ll never forget it. We had just finished exchanging gifts under the Wishing Star, and I remember that he got me a stuffed dragon toy, and it instantly became my favorite. I remember holding it in my lap when I was sitting next to him, and I asked to hear a story.
“‘A story?’ he said. ‘Well, once upon a time, there was a very special unicorn-’
“‘Not that story, Dad,’ I told him. ‘A new story. A Wishday story. Please?’”
Sunny sighed contentedly as the memories rushed back to her. “I remember his eyes sparkling, just like they always do when he’s about to tell a story. ‘A Wishday story?’ I remember him saying, his voice teasing. ‘Well, there aren’t many of those.’
“‘There must be one,’ I said. ‘You always know the stories that they don’t tell us in school.’
“He laughed at that, and hugged me closer. ‘Well,’ he said, ‘you’re right about that, my little pony.’ He thought for a bit more before saying, ‘How would you like to hear the story of the Wishing Star?’”
“The story of the Wishing Star?” Hitch said, looking confused. “But everypony knows that story. There’s a scientific explanation for it now - it’s really just a comet that has this weird orbit, so it only appears in the sky on the night of Winter Wishday. Something about the colder air of wintertime and the heat of the comet creates that rainbow light. For ages, ponies have thought that it provides wishes if you wish on it, but nowadays, ponies only do it for the sake of tradition. The Wishing Star doesn’t really grant wishes, but ponies decided to have a party whenever the Star did appear, where they exchanged gifts and tried to make others’ wishes come true themselves. And that’s how Wishday got its name.”
“Hey, we have something like that, too!” Pipp piped up. “One of the old Wishentine stories that we were told as fillies was about a pony who wanted to make other ponies happy, but the snow and cold that alway came around Wishentine was too much for most ponies. One year, the snow was so bad that ponies were trapped inside their homes, so he delivered gifts to ponies all across the city in the dead of night and brought everypony their gifts. Nopony knows who it was, but it inspired our tradition of giving our Wishentine gifts for each other in secret.”
Izzy gasped. “Amazing! There’s a Wishiehoof story just like that!” she exclaimed. “A story about a super bad snowstorm that was going to freeze everything, and all of ponykind with it. But Wishiehoof legend goes to say that a very special unicorn was born during Wishiehoof who would save us from that storm… and they did. They cast a magic spell through the crystals that would keep Bridlewood safe from such a storm again, and that after they did so, ponies celebrated by giving them gifts of all sorts. But the unicorn wouldn’t accept the presents knowing that they came from fellow unicorns, so they had to be given in secret on the last day of Wishiehoof!” She gasped. “Wait! Does this mean that all of our holidays are connected?”
“Maybe,” Zipp said, munching on a cookie. “We may never know.”
“My dad did,” Sunny said quietly, looking down at her hooves. “That was the story that he told me, actually. The true story of Wishday - of Wishiehoof, too, and Wishentine.” She looked at each of her friends as she said their tribe’s holiday. She closed her eyes as she remembered the tale that he told her.
“Once upon a time, long, long ago, ponies were separated as they were now. Their hatred for each other was so cold that it created creatures of wind and snow that cursed the land, making it freeze over and trapping everypony in a devastating, eternal winter. Ponies only grew more angry at each other, and the storm only worsened. Eventually, the leaders of the tribes decided that they needed to go find a new land to call home, because everywhere was so frozen.”
“But that’s silly!” Izzy interrupted, looking confused. “Why couldn’t ponies just get along, and the snowstorm would go away? That’s much easier than finding a new land!” Sparky cooed in agreement, and Izzy lifted the baby dragon into her lap, where he curled up contentedly.
“Why didn’t ponies get along before?” Zipp asked, brushing cookie crumbs off her hooves. “We don’t know. We may never know, really.”
Sunny cleared her throat, and all ponies diverted their attention back to her as she continued the story. “The leaders of the three pony tribes set off in all different directions, searching for the perfect land to call home. But by coincidence, or perhaps by fate, they all ended up in the same place. Naturally, they began arguing with each other over which tribe should have the land, and unintentionally brought the winter storm to the new land as well.
“The leaders and their number-twos took shelter in a cave together - the only shelter they could find - in an attempt to wait out the storm. But as the leaders continued to fight with each other, the ice inside their hearts froze each leader in place and threatened to consume the entire cave! Luckily, the tribes’ number-twos came together and realized that, no matter what kind of pony you were, they were all ponies, and that it was just silly to keep fighting like this. The warmth and friendship that they created was enough to dispel the winter storm entirely and eventually thaw the ice on their leaders! The three tribes then united and came together to form a new land in which they could live together harmoniously - Equestria! The day that they put their differences aside and worked together became known as Hearth’s Warming Eve and was celebrated by ponies across Equestria in celebration of ponykind coming together all those moons ago, and standing as a reminder of how important it was to remain friends.
“But… the harmony didn’t last. Ponykind eventually separated again, and instead of generating a freezing winter storm, ponies lost all of their magic as a consequence of their actions. Hearth’s Warming Eve was lost to history, but ponies found new reasons to celebrate when winter came around, usually centered around some kind of wish. My dad thinks that it used to be because they all secretly wish that they could have their magic back, and that ponies could be friends again, but weren’t sure how to do it. As life went on, ponies stopped thinking about the reasoning behind their holidays too much and forgot that they ever came from ponies working together once.”
“Wow, Sunny,” Pipp said as the story came to a close, a sleepy look in her eyes, “that was a really good story. Your dad told you that?”
Sunny grinned. “Yup! And I think he would have told me more, but I think I fell asleep.” She looked a bit sheepish. “Anyway, I still have the toy that he gave me that Wishday, and I remember that story every time I see it.”
“You never told me that story,” Hitch said. “You always tell me all of the stories that your dad tells you.”
“Well, frankly, I thought I should convince you of the other stories’ truth before I told you any others,” Sunny said lightly, standing up and stretching. “And in any case, we still have to find a way to get out of here-”
“Wait! I’ve got it!” Izzy suddenly said excitedly, sitting up as an idea came to her. “Everypony, we need to work together to get out of here! Like the ponies in Sunny’s story!”
“Really, Iz?” Zipp asked, tilting her head at the unicorn as Izzy bounced to her hooves ran over to Sunny. “I don’t think that’s going to work-”
“Well, we have to try something, don’t we?” Izzy huffed as she grabbed Sunny and Hitch’s hooves, holding them in her own as she shut her eyes and turned her face towards the ceiling in reverence. “Oh, great spirits of unicorn past, have mercy on us here below! Grant us freedom and help us escape this frozen prison-”
“Uh, Izzy? What are you doing?” Pipp asked, looking a bit concerned as she reluctantly sat up and held hooves with Zipp and Hitch. Zipp sighed and grabbed Sunny’s hoof, completing the circle.
“Come on, ponies!” Izzy said excitedly. “Wish us out of here!”
All five ponies (and Sparky) shut their eyes in concentration as they thought of the snow melting away, of trotting down the path to Maretime Bay in the glorious sunshine… together.
After several failed attempts, Sunny sighed and opened her eyes, looking around at each of her friends. As she did, she realized something. “I don’t need to wish for anything more,” she said aloud, all of her friends looking up, startled, as she did so. “Because I have all of you! My best friends in the whole world. There isn’t anything more that I need.”
“Aw, me, too, Sunny!” Pipp said brightly.
“Ditto, sis,” Zipp laughed.
“Totally!” Izzy grinned, squeezing Sunny’s hoof.
“Well, I wouldn’t say nothing else,” Hitch started to say, but when his friends all said “HITCH!”, he conceded and stammered, “I mean, yes! Definitely. You guys are the best friends I’ve ever had.”
Sunny smiled as all of her friends warmed her heart.
Up above, the Unity Crystals began to glow brighter and strangely… pink? before they exploded into a massive blast of warm air that pushed away all of the snow trapping the ponies inside the Brighthouse and sending it swirling away where it would never trap anypony again.
“Woohoo!” Zipp cried as she flung open the doors and spread her wings, flying out into the sunshine with a massive grin on her face, her sister right behind her. Hitch leaped out the door, laughing as Sparky ran down the path towards Maretime Bay as fast as his little dragon legs could take him. Izzy cried, “Wait up, Sparky!” and began to chase after him.
Sunny grinned and looked up at the top of the Brighthouse… and paused.
“Sunny?” Hitch looked back when he realized that his friend wasn’t following him and the rest of their friends back to Maretime Bay. “Are you okay?”
“Hm?” Sunny looked over at him, jerking out of a trance. “Oh, yes, sorry, Hitch. I’m fine.”
But she could have sworn, just for a minute, that she saw a glowing pink fire in the shape of a heart dancing at the top of the Brighthouse…
Opaline growled and slammed her hoof down on the floor of her castle. The image of the Crystal Brighthouse sank back into her pool as the alicorn whirled around and stormed back to her throne in a rage.
“How in Equestria did they manage to get free?” she snarled to the only other pony in the room - a pitifyingly small, quiet, and anxious unicorn named Misty. Misty winced as Opaline turned her rage on her, trying to become one with the wall. So far, it wasn’t working. “There’s no way they should have been able to get rid of all that snow so fast! What other kind of powers do they have?”
Misty swallowed, having no answer, and Opaline scoffed.
“Of course, now that I’ve seen that… I can’t help but wonder what else these ponies can do.” A new idea grew in Opaline’s mind, and she smiled. “I bet those ponies haven’t even realized their full potential yet. Well, I’m not a brainless snail like them. I’ll figure it out for myself, so that I know exactly what I’ll be taking from them.”
Uh, oh, Misty thought as she thought of Sunny and Izzy and Zipp and Pipp and Hitch and poor Sparky in Maretime Bay. They really didn’t deserve to be on the receiving end of Opaline’s ambition…
Opaline stared into her pool, a cruel smile coming to her lips.
“It won’t be much longer, little ponies,” she whispered softly. “Soon, everything you have will be mine.”