Too different, exactly the same
Well away from Ponyville and Canterlot, down the road south from there, was the little hamlet of Schwarzwald, consisting mostly of ponies of Kleinpferd ancestry, making it a very interesting variation on the Equestrian standard.
Just a bit away from the town proper was a two-story wooden house, constructed ages ago, but patched up into a passable homestead, with a garden, a lawn and small obstacle course for flyers. It was completely unpainted, the debris which did not interrupt the growth of food remained on the ground, and no personal touches like ornaments or cheerful welcome mats decorated the exterior.
Wings flapped quickly in landing mode, Gilda the bald eagle griffin slowly making a graceful landing before the home. She reared up a little, to allow her passenger to slide off. It was Trixie, still wearing her threadbare cape and hat. Gilda stood up proudly and indicated the house. “Here it is. Great, isn’t it? Two floors, all mine. I got a great deal on it because none of those losers in town wanted to do any hard work to fix it up.”
“Well, I see you’re still working on it. At least the roof seems solid and it’s still warm enough to not need all the walls sealed.” Trixie looked upon the house with a critical eye, noticing every little spot still in need of repair, or which could use the touch of a caring hoof. “Then the paint and trinkets will come, of course. Right?”
“Uhh, this is it, dude. It was kinda ramshackle before. So I fixed up the problems, got the roof in shape and built myself a training ground. Gotta stay in shape. That’s kinda how I make my bits.” Gilda’s face fell from swollen pride to a kind of wounded dignity.
Trixie critically eyed the building for a while longer. But she didn’t seem to be judging. She more seemed to be… planning something. “Like I told you back at that little hole-in-the-wall… a griffin’s aerie sounded lovely. And now that I’m here, it seems livable.”
“Yeeeah… Don’t be so enthusiastic.” Gilda opened the door for Trixie, looking at the unicorn mare with an uncertain expression. She barely knew this mare. Her heart stung from all that had happened. And she just rolled right over for the first mare that could beat her to a standstill. Rebound relationships. ‘Sure, Dash was a long, long time ago, and she told me she was with that new mare. No uncertain terms. I’ve been bouncing a lot. One useless mare to useless mare. Pegasi, unicorns, even earth ponies. Talented, magical, strong. Doesn’t matter how good they are. It never lasts. They hate my attitude, my house, my feathers, something… What am I thinking? This mare is just another one. Good as she is, she’s just another mare.’
Trixie cast her eyes around the inside of the home as well. The place was practically gutted. The support structures were still in place but the walls had been mostly taken down, creating a giant room with open everything, save for the kitchen, which she could see consisted of only a refrigerator and a wood burning stove. There wasn’t much in the way of furniture, just a giant nest in the middle of the living/dining room piled up with pillows. Beyond that was a hallway with a (thankfully) enclosed bathroom, and a large bedroom left exposed without its door. At the very end of the hall were the stairs to the second floor. To Trixie’s relief the ceiling was completely intact, keeping the place as two distinct stories.
“Oh my, that’s a very big nest. Must be very cozy as single occupancy.” It was all so overwhelming. She knew families that didn’t have homes this big! She had been IN a family that didn’t have a home this big. And all that space was suffering under griffon talons, kept in habitable shape, but no further. ‘Well, I can respect how hard of a species they are. Strong, noble, and those hens are kind of cute. Oh but this can’t be allowed to stand. No touch of personality, no style or flash. And this house doesn’t even move! What a disgrace. If this hen is going to be just right for me then she needs to shape up.’ “But haven’t you ever considered a bed? Maybe a couch. How about pictures and some rugs?”
“That’s not how we do things in the Kingdom…” Gilda began.
“Well! This is not the Kingdom! This is the Principality of Equestria. You have chosen to live here, you work here, you pay in bits and now you have brought the great and powerful Trixie to your home. And while I will live in a griffin’s aerie, I will not accept this kind of surrendered mediocrity. I need flash! Color! Beauty! Style above substance.”
“HEY!” Gilda was in Trixie’s face right away, feeling personally stung and insulted, her very griffinness maligned. “This is how we do it because it’s a hard life in the Kingdom. Even for the powerful clans like mine, we still work with what we have and we’re screeching HAPPY about it. We save that flash and style for the prissy types that can’t tell when it’s better to save your shillings for an emergency or for some quick repairs. We NEED substance over style because we live in a hard land that gives us all we need to live.”
Trixie was momentarily stunned, because she was suddenly confronted, most clearly, that she was with a total stranger. She had even skipped the awkward dating phase of the relationship. A grand battle, a kiss, and that was it. She assumed that was how griffins did it; it seemed to flow so naturally. Surely she could appreciate it but that wasn’t quite how it was supposed to work. “A powerful clan, you say? I had no idea. Besides Gilda… what is your name?”
Given a chance to flaunt herself, Gilda straightened up, showing all of her height and grandeur. “Gilda sen Electra O’Bald, first of first, and proud of it.”
A heavy silence hung in the air, neither woman moving or speaking. Gilda finally opened her eyes to see Trixie standing there, looking at her with an unchanged expression. “Well, it’s a nice name I guess. A bit long but...”
“Nice? NICE?!” Her eyes went a bit wide and red, disbelief falling into her expression. “What are you talking about? Don’t you see the wonder of it? The pride it gives me? You should respect it!”
“What? Why should I respect it? It’s just a name. I don’t even know what it means.”
Gilda calmed down slowly, panting a little bit. That’s right. Ponies barely knew anything about griffins. The social conventions were a mystery. “It means I am Gilda, daughter of Electra, of the Bald Clan, firstborn of my father’s first hen. By the primogenital law it means I would inherit all his property, unless he passed me over though some trickery to let my idiot brother have it. Second of first but he’s the male…” After a moment of additional calming and beak-grinding she sighed. “And the High King is part of the Bald Clan, which means our clan members have great advantages and usually very good positions. My father was a diplomat to Equestria. I was born there, but we moved here. They moved back. I didn’t. I was… sort of hung up on a few things.”
“Why would your brother be more likely to…”
“Because he has a penis.” The reply was curt, hurt, disgusted, as though she’d had to explain it more than once before, and had found the perfect way of saying everything with as few words as possible.
“You mean that matters?”
“We’re not like you ponies. We don’t have full gender equality. Things aren’t as bad as before but tradition is pretty strong. Why do you think I’m here? They don’t think much of Egg Grabbers. That’s what they call Filly Foolers back in the kingdom, and no, it’s not a compliment like it is here. It’s actually disgusting but I’m not gonna talk about it.”
“Wow, I never knew…” Trixie went silent for a while. “Did you want to know my name?”
“Aren’t you just Trixie? I thought you ponies had really simple names. Unless your name really IS “The Great and Powerful Trixie” in which case you can forget about me calling you that.”
“No, no. My name is actually…” Trixie leaped to her rear hooves, rearing up proudly. Her horn glowed under her hat, summoning up a shower of sparkles and a small, cape-lifting breeze. “Trrrrrrrrixie Lulamoon!”
Gilda remained looking unimpressed, watching the sparkles fade and the cape drop. “Ok. Trixie Lulamoon. I can work with that.”
The mare scoffed and looked aside with her snout in the air. “How can you be so insolent? Don’t you know a proud and noble Roani name when you hear one?”
“’Roani’? You mean you’re a gypsy?”
“Don’t use that word! Never say that again!” Trixie suddenly turned on Gilda and lit her horn, shoving the griffiness away with a show of surprising force.
“Hey! Watch it! Don’t you shove me around! This is MY aerie. You don’t like what I say here then you can just get the SQUAWK out of here!”
“Don’t you ever call me that again!” Trixie’s horn was still lit, her teeth were gritted and there were tears at the corners of her eyes.
Gilda bared her claws, beak grinding. She was back in fighting mode. She’d been there all her life. Ponies disrespecting her, testing her, trying her patience and making light of her. They were always against her… except here. The mare wasn’t trying to beat on her or beat her. She was angry. This was one of those parts of the relationship she had never been too good at. She was always too willing to scrap. Tears never moved her before… so why now? Her talons went down and she strolled forward, very slowly. “Hey, come on. It’s ok dude.”
Trixie shifted back, as though she was afraid. She hit the wall and kept backing, shuffling on the floor as Gilda approached. “You don’t know what it means. You don’t know what it feels like. You’re an alien here, but you can’t take it seriously. You KNOW you’re different. If ponies don’t like you, you can blame it on being a griffin. When they yell at you, when they accuse you of being a criminal, when you have to run out of town with just the clothes on your back and your caravan on fire because they threw torches at you IT DOESN’T HURT AS MUCH BECAUSE YOU’RE NOT A PONY!”
Gilda staggered back a short way, but rushed forward again, taking up the mare in her arms. She held on, in spite of the struggles, and didn’t react when magical forces pushed at her, pulled on her and attempted to zap her. There wasn’t enough concentration to properly power the magical effects. “I didn’t know…”
Trixie stopped trying to fight Gilda off, and ceased her attempts at holding back her tears, pressing into the comforting warmth of the griffiness’ feathers, seeking her stability. “They hated us! Their own kind and they never trusted us because we were Roani! Called us drifters, thieves, scum. Gypsies.”
Gilda stroked her talons slowly down Trixie’s back. Their moods were like two pendulums. They swung so far back and forth every time something happened. Maybe they were perfect for each other. They’d make each other stable if they could just get in synch. “Hey, Lulamoon…” One talon drifted gingerly under Trixie’s chin, drawing her face up, showing her teary eyes and bitten lower lip. “I’m an Egg Grabber. My own kind thinks I sneak into aeries at night and stick my claws into hens to pull out their eggs since I can’t have my own. We were both born wrong according to where we lived. Squawk them. I came here, where they don’t care about me kissing a mare.”
“But where…” Trixie began, before she was silenced by Gilda’s kiss.
The touch was short, but passionate, ending with trailing of tongue over the mare’s lips. “I don’t care if you’re Roani. That doesn’t mean anything to me. And if anypony wants to get stupid, I’ll teach them a lesson.”
Trixie rubbed her tear-stained face on Gilda’s feathers, sighing a little. “You know that Roani are nomads, and they live out of their caravans, stopping just long enough to perform and earn some money, right?”
The griffiness looked down, confused by yet another quick change in attitude from one of them. “Yea?”
“We have nothing but our things and our caravans. We need their substance to keep the elements out and our bodies safe. But because it’s all we have we never think about them. So we make them full of STYLE! To brighten our lives. Trinkets and tidbits, paintings and decorations and all the little touches to make the dull world bright when we have nothing else to make us feel good.”
Gilda tapped her chin softly, the hen smiling a bit. “I guess that makes sense. Now that there’s two of us here I suppose we can work on making the place a little more… bright.”
“It needs a little personality. Watch and learn.” The magical mare concentrated, a fog of magic shimmering over a discarded plank of wood. With a flash and a clatter it fell to the ground, reshaped into a wide sign with five rounded points. Carved into the surface were the words, Do Not Disturb.
Gilda gave a soft laugh and picked it up, running her talons over it. “I guess I know what you want. I’ll go put it outside. It’s a nice first piece.”
While Gilda did as she said, Trixie looked around, picturing what she could do with the place. And all the while, she kept forcing down a thought, something her mother had always told her. ‘Gadje Gadjensa, Roa Roaensa‘. ‘Gadje with Gadje, Roa with Roa‘. “That’s not how things worked out, daj. Dakidaj and phuridaj forgive me. But I think this is better than what you wanted…” The unicorn whispered softly to herself, a sad smile on her face.
“I don’t think we’ll be very productive for the rest of today. So let’s try and learn some more about each other. Ever seen a griffin’s flank before?” Gilda gave the most loving leer she could manage, and filled her gruff voice with huge quantities of mirth.
“Never. But I can’t wait to see it.” Her blue paramour smiled, leaving the sadness behind for other days. She trotted over slowly, dropping her hat and cloak along the way. When she arrived she snuggled up against the stocky hen and whispered to her, “Kamaù tut.”
“Mm, what’s that?”
With her horn glowing, and sending soft waves of massaging caresses over the hen’s body, Trixie replied, “It’s Roani. It means, ‘I love you.’”
The End
