Years in the Heart

Some seven hundred years ago...

"Willow that tickles!" The filly screamed in laughter as her friend turned into the tickle monster. "Stop it, please!" She couldn't stop laughing.

"But Dahlia, yoo luk so cute wen ya laff." Willow stopped a little disappointed.

The two sat in the middle of the vast Everfree plains. The grass waved in the wind. A few small trees were scattered across the field. They were young trees, that someday would grow into a forest. But not yet...

"Willow, if I keep laughing, I won't be able to hear your sweet voice." Dahlia smiled at her friend who was smiling back.

"It not as sweeet as yur voyse. I wish mi voyse wuz nomal lik yurs." The smile fell away from his face. "The udder colts coll me stupid."

"Don't listen to them! You aren't stupid Willow, really. You just can't talk right." Dahlia hugged Willow. "Better?"

"Yah, behher." Willow mumbled past Dahlia's pink mane. He stroked the pale yellow fur that covered her leg. "Tank yoo."

Dahlia released Willow from the hug. Her turquoise eyes shined as a question creeped up on her mind. "Will?" She often called him that. Usually it meant she was being serious.

"Jyes?" Willow wondered what his best friend in the whole wide world was about to ask him.

"Will, do you think I'm pretty?" Dahlia asked. "Because, I heard some if the other fillies call me ugly."

"Wut!?" Willow was shocked.

"They said my fur was urine colored, and I heard one of the fillies' moms say my hair was hideous." Her eyes began to water.

Willow wiped her tears away with one of his wings. "Dey jus jellus."

"Jealous?" She whimpered.

"Jyes. Dey jus jellus they doan has furr brite as da sun. An, yur hair iz pritty." He smiled. "Lik peenk rowzes."

"You really mean that?" Dahlia blushed.

“Dahlia, yoo ar da prittyest fillee, I evor seen.” Willow giggled a bit when he saw Dahlia blush. “An, I lik yoo.”

“What?” Dahlia couldn’t believe her little ears. “You like me?”

The bashful little Willow nodded as he grinned his charming little grin. “I wanned ta giv ya sumthin.” Willow got closer. “My mudder toll me yoo giv dese ta ponees ya luv.” Willow leaned in and pecked Dahlia on the cheek. “An, I tink I luv yoo.”

Dahlia couldn’t hide her face which was swarming with a celestial pink blush. “Willow? Can I tell you something?”

“Aneethin.” He shuffled closer to Dahlia.

Dahlia smiled, and gave him a longer kiss on the cheek. She whispered into Willow’s ear. “I love you too.”

The two friends embraced as they learned about their affection for one another. They laid back in the grass of the Everfree, and looked up. They watched the shape shifting clouds roll by like ships across a sky blue ocean. Starswirl, the resident wizard, had just appeared there out of thin air. He watched Willow, his son, lay next to his best friend in the whole wide world. They were so innocent. Starswirl hummed to himself. He found it funny that the two could never know at this time how far their love would go. They both were on a set path that would tear them apart, and ultimately bring them back together again. But now, they could enjoy each others’ company. Here they could wait until the brewing storms were ready to strike.

“I promise you Willow. The both of you will have each other in the end.” He spoke only to himself. Starswirl knew his son would be alright. He knew Dahlia would be alright. Their names may be changed to Arctic and Fluttershy, but their love would remain the same, enduring. Their love would endure beyond the end. Trials would test them, but it would make their love stronger. Their love was the purest kind. It was innocent love. This love would be drowned. When you hold a bonzire tree underwater, its fire cannot stunt its growth. It grows bigger. Like the small bonzire trees that Starswirl had made so long ago, their love would emerge from the waters having grown to a greater feat of magic.

Friendship is magic, as the old saying goes. Starswirl never considered it to be magic. He believed it was just a willpower that could feed magic. He only believed his son and his love made it because the magic already inside of them was strong enough. He didn’t know…

It was their friendship that would make them live on. Their friendship was a special one. There is no word that can comprehend the true essence of what they had, but the word that comes the closest is love. Love is a part of friendship, which if harnessed can achieve wonders.

Wonders…

Friends become close friends,

Close friends get married,

they have children,

their children grow up, and

those children follow their parents’ path

they find friends and, well you know.

...wonders.

The wonders of what friendships can bring. Oh praise them, remember them, cherish the memories of those wonders.

Never forget what may come from the years in the heart...

THE BEGINNING, never the end.