That night, Braeburn was quiet as he lay in his new room. Dinner had been late and simple, with all sorts of questions from Apple Bloom that nopony’d wanted to go into too much detail about. She’d been lucky, dodging most of the ugliness of the day out with her friends. Those couple of hours Braeburn had spent with them in the clubhouse answering questions about being a settler had been… fun, actually.

Just visitin’ for a spell… been ages since Ah got t’spend any real time with Mac an’ Applejack….

Simple little lies, and he was pretty sure that the three fillies had seen straight through them. Applejack had given him something to think about, something that’d had him distracted all day long. And now he was looking straight at it.

It was a simple enough device, really. A strap-on carved out of applewood, with all the care of a master craftsman, sanded smooth and lacquered up to keep it from splintering. He had two or three just like it back home, for those flings who weren’t satisfied with ‘creativity’ and weren’t experienced (or discerning) enough to realize that certain organs ought to be a bit warmer when you first touched them.

Well… not just like it. Not according to Applejack.

Ah’ve seen toys like that before, Cous, reckon Ah’ve got bigger back home, he’d joked when she showed it to him.

Not like this, Braeburn, she’d told him seriously. Twi… Princess Twilight, that is… she made this for me when Ah asked if there might be any way t’help you an’Mac.

Y’told her about me? Braeburn hadn’t seen it, but judging by Applejack’s quick reaction, he was sure the look of hurt and betrayal on his face matched what he’d felt at that moment.

Ah only told her it was a mare who didn’t like bein’ a mare, wanted t’be a stallion, Applejack had sworn. She weren’t so keen on the idea at first, but… well, Ah guess once she got herself some wings, she realized what it must feel like, bein’ born somethin’ an’ suddenly knowin’ you were s’posed t’be somethin’ else. Ah was gonna give this to you at Hearth's Warming but... well, since y'all're here, might as well git it over with. She’d scuffed her hoof sheepishly against the floor.

So… what’s it do?

What do you think it does, Braeburn? All y’got t’do is take it, put it on, an’ say….

“From inside to out, mistakes be undone,” Braeburn whispered, having already donned the enchanted toy while reminiscing. “If mah destiny’s true, mind and body become one!” He squeezed his eyes tightly shut, and waited for some sort of bright light, heavenly music, a twisting and cracking sound in his pelvis, anything that might indicate alicorn magic being unleashed. When nothing happened, he almost felt worse, looking down and expecting to see that nothing had happened.

Instead, he saw a perfectly normal, respectable specimen of stallionhood between his legs, dangling from a perfectly natural sheath. Not huge, but not especially small either, just… normal. No sparkling, no lights, no… nothing. Nothing to indicate it was magical, nothing to suggest it wasn’t a part of the pony it was attached to.

Braeburn had never wanted so badly to run out, jump a line of royal guards, and kiss a Princess in his life!

Instead, Braeburn carefully sat down on his bed, looking down at the new organ between his legs. He licked his suddenly-dry lips, almost afraid to touch it for fear it would disappear in magical smoke, or that he’d wake up and realize he was dreaming. He had just about overcome his fears, telling himself that if a Princess had made this, it would work as it was meant to, when the door to his room opened.

“Brae?” Macintosh asked, sticking his head in through the door. “Mind talk –“ Braeburn’s heart leapt into his throat as Mac’s jaw dropped when he saw the mottled orange-and-black stallion’s member dangling between his cousin’s legs.

“Y’like it?” Braeburn asked weakly. “Applejack says a friend of hers made it for me… for us” he added, trying to swallow the burgeoning panic that Mac wouldn’t be interested in him anymore. He’d never told Mac that he’d had a stallion’s heart even that first fumbling time they’d made love as a colt and a filly. Hadn’t told Mac until afterwards, and never thought that it might make Mac think he’d ‘broken’ him somehow, like Applejack had suggested earlier.

Hadn’t thought, until just now, that maybe Applejack hadn’t known her brother as well as she’d thought. That maybe now that the outside matched the inside, the big stallion’s carefully preserved love for a confused little filly might not be able to survive when presented with a newly-minted stallion.

“Ah’m sorry, Mac, Ah just had t’use it, Ah had t’try,” he started to ramble, squeezing his eyes shut to hide the tears that were forming. He wouldn’t trade actually being a stallion for anything… but if there was something that could make him consider it, it would be losing Mac. He kept trying to explain, each attempt shorter and more jumbled than the last, until he felt Mac’s strong forelegs on his shoulders.

“Braeburn,” Macintosh said seriously, nuzzling his nose. “Look at me.”

Hesitantly, Braeburn opened his eyes a crack. They flew wide open when Mac leaned in and kissed him hotly, plunging his tongue into the cowpony’s startled muzzle with hunger Braeburn had almost forgotten existed.

Almost, but not completely. Braeburn started kissing back, his tongue dueling with Mac’s as he felt a stirring that was somehow familiar and utterly alien at the same time between his thighs. When the two stallions’ lips parted, Mac looked down between them with a grin. When his bright green eyes came back up to meet Braeburn’s, they were practically sparkling.

“This ain’t a bad thing,” Mac promised, sinking down and taking Braeburn’s stiffening cock-head in his mouth. The smaller cowpony sat bolt upright, gasping with shock at the sudden intensity of the sensation.

“No it ain’t,” he breathed, quickly losing the capacity for coherent words, or thoughts for that matter, as Mac started working his tongue and muzzle up and down the sensitive, ramrod-stiff meat.

Mac, for his part, was in heaven. Nopony’d ever guessed it, even the ones who had known about he and Caramel, but he’d loved doing this ever since he’d first tried it out. He pressed his forelegs onto either side of Braeburn’s legs, taking his musky cock into his mouth and deep back to his throat. He looked up into Braeburn’s eyes, and saw the same eyes looking down at him that he’d seen so very, very long ago….

Their eyes met, Braeburn’s shocked at the pleasure her slightly older cousin had just introduced her to. Mac’s shone back up at him, practically radiating how much he loved sharing this sort of pleasure with the pony he loved. Braeburn’s hooves slid along Mac’s mane, helping to haphazardly guide the more experienced stallion to the ways that helped give him the most pleasure. Macintosh’s tongue curled around, exploring tender, untouched flesh, drinking in the scent and taste of pure, untouched pleasure and wonder.

Now, just as it had been so long ago, it didn’t take long. Mac may not have been the most experienced teenager around, but he’d been good enough to do the job with an inexperienced filly just come out of her first heat. Tonight, he had plenty more experience, and it was all being focused on a colt who, for all he’d slept with half the single mares in Appleoosa, might as well have been a virgin for all his ability to resist the inevitable. When Mac sank down to the root, burying his nose against Braeburn’s new sheath and taking his flare barely into his throat, he might as well have popped the cork off a shaken bottle of cider.

Braeburn gasped wordlessly as he erupted into Macintosh’s muzzle. Thick spurts of hot, creamy, faintly apple-flavored stallion-seed flowed down Mac’s throat as though it had been made for the job. The older stallion held his breath as best as he could as he felt Braeburn’s flare pulsing just inside the top of his throat, stretching it in that unique blend of pleasure and pain that only pushing his body’s limits to bring his lover to climax could give him. When Braeburn finally collapsed onto the bed, Mac crawled up into it with him, the frame creaking slightly at the extra weight while the two stallions snuggled.

“No wonder y’couldn’t do much after that first time,” Braeburn murmured, stunned and drained by the experience. He kissed Mac languidly, pressing his tongue into the bigger stallion’s mouth, tasting his own seed in Mac’s mouth.

“Oh sweet Celestia,” he moaned. “Can’t believe this is real.”

“If’n you’d like, Ah kin pinch ya an’ see if you wake up,” Mac teased lightly. Braeburn smirked up at him, and gave his nose a playful lick.

“Gimme a few minutes Mac, an’ you can do a lot more’n’that!” He promised with the wickedest grin Macintosh had ever seen, on stallion or mare.

“Reckon Ah like that idea just fine,” Mac rumbled, leaning in for another kiss as he settled into what would hopefully be the first of a great many nights with the stallion he’d loved since the day they’d met.

Author's Note

And there we go! Some smut to pay off those poor souls who muddled through my thriller/drama/whatchamacallit!

In case it wasn't obvious, I was experimenting with slipping back and forth between times in Braeburn's head during the sex scene; a technique worth putting some more development into?