Tales from the Froggy Bottom

It was months gone by before old Pear Field would hear from his sons again.  It was familiar news.  Hard and Vinegar were in jail after a night of brawlin’, and with a heavy heart old Pearfield left little Dumpling to mind the farm while he once again paid for his son’s misdeeds.  Little Pear Dumpling dutifully tended the farm and wished her brothers would mend their wicked ways.

Pear Cider came to the farm with honey on his tongue, speaking’ poisoned words of forgiveness and reconciliation.  His sister was overjoyed to see this sudden change in her brother.  Of course she would walk with him though the orchard and show him the workings of the farm.  She was so happy that at least one of her brothers was coming back.  It would be the last walk of her short life.

They found little Dumpling three days later in the near edges of the froggy bottom.  Her little skull was cleanly crushed by pony hooves and her tiny body was… violated in a way no foal should ever be.  We all knew what had happened.  There was talk of a trial, but there weren’t no witnesses and couldn’t nopony prove nuthin’.  And there were many, too many, who just couldn’t, or wouldn’t, believe that any pony could do such a thing to their own sister.  And that was the start of the feud.  We never intended no ill on Old Pearfield, but the Cider Boys… well we our ways of finding justice back in them days.

Cider Vinegar was found hanging from a tree in the family orchard.  Old Pear Field said it was suicide.  Poor colt just couldn’t live with the grief of what happened to his sister.  He just up and hung ‘himself.  Nopony ever really asked questions about it.  Nopony but the grave-digger was there to see the dirt fall on his unmarked grave.

Hard Cider was found trampled to death behind the local tavern.  Like his sister, everypony knew what happened.  And like his sister nopony could prove nuthin’.  Unlike his sister, very few ponies was at all motivated to try and find proof of anything to begin with.  It was a bad end to a bad pony, and those of us that washed his blood from our hooves didn’t lose no sleep over it.

Pear Cider found himself to be the last brother standing in a town where everypony either wanted him dead, or at best didn’t give two damns if he died.  He was always the clever one though, so he kept himself alive for a little while anyway.

Old Pearfield had lost all reason by then.  He cut down every pear tree in the orchard and salted the earth so wouldn’t nuthin’ never row on that land again.  Then he took every single bit out of the bank and buried it in mason jars in a secret place in the swamp where he had laid his daughter to rest.  He then soaked the earth itself in kerosene so thoroughly that no living thing would ever thrive in earth that kept his daughter from him.

In time desperation drove the last of the Cider brothers back to his father’s house, now little more than a broken shack.  He had to get out of town, and he needed money to do it.  He knew his father had buried every bit with his sister, but he didn’t know where she was buried.  So he came to his father like he had come to his sister before, honey on his tongue and lies in his mouth.  HE told the old stallion how he was soon to his dying day, cause it was only a matter of time before he met Apple family justice.  And there weren’t no lie in that.  Pear Dumpling had been an Apple, in all but name but we were keen to see the the end of Pear Cider.

He’d made peace with his fate he said, all he wanted was to see his poor sister’s grave, to repent his sins to her before he turned himself over to the authorities and confessed.  Whatever fate the law gave him was surely kinder than the vigilante justice he faced now.  And Old Pearfield believed his son because he so desperately WANTED to believe him.  He desperately needed to believe that there was some spot of remorse left in this devil-pony he had once called “son”.

So he walked into the swamp with his son to his daughter’s grave.  I suppose you done guessed by now that he never came back.  Pear Cider dug about in the ground until he found the spot where his father had buried the jars of bits. By the time he’d gathered the money in a makeshift sac fashioned from his own shirt. Celestia had long lowered the sun.  And so Pear Cider struck  match to light his lantern.

They say Tartarus itself opened up to claim Pear Cider damned and wicked soul.  An I believe it to this day.  I could see the conflagration from sweet Apple acres.  It cast a pillar of fire that seemed to touch the night sky itself.  Now some Unicorns from canterlot came around and they “theorized” that it must have been some kind of gas pocket mixed with all the kerosene, but that didn’t do nothing to explain the sound that everypony heard for miles.  The sound of the cruelest laughter carried on the voice of an innocent filly.

Them unicorns can say what they will, but Pear Dumpling took her vengeance that day and Pear Cider was dragged away to Tartarus like the monster he was.  There’s a spot out past Carvers creek where it all happened.  It’s been fifty years ago, and to this day the earth is still scorched and barren.  And on certain nights when the moon is right, you can look through the trees from the road and see the glow of a bonfire.  If you listen close you can hear the voice of a stallion screaming, and you can hear a little filly laughing cruelly.  And if you’re brave enough to go closer you can see the shadows of tartarus through the trees, and smell the brimstone and burning flesh of Pear Cider torment.