Chapter One: Dropped Stitches
Nothing made the ivory unicorn happier than making beautiful clothing for her friends. Every stitch and every thread brought her unmeasurable joy, bringing ideas to beautiful, beautiful life. After a hard day’s work she sat back to admire her latest fashion line labelled ‘Springtime Couture for Madam’.
“Now this is my best work yet, isn’t is Opal?”
The cat meowed disinterestedly and went back to cleaning herself. Rarity harrumphed and put her perfectly manicured hoof to her chin in thought ‘what will I make next?’ crossed her mind. She snapped out of her imagination as her musical doorbell rang.
“Just a second darling,”
She trotted to the door to see Twilight standing there. “Oh hello Twilight, what brings you to my boutique?” Rarity asked, tossing her curled purple mane. The alicorn smiled “I came to see if you wanted to come with me and the girls to the carnival going on at Sweet Apple Acres”. Rarity never really liked dirt or anything dirt-related, but her dear friend Applejack loved it.
“Sweet Apple Acres? Oh, but what if I get my nice clean hooves dirty? I had them manicured this morning,”
“I promise you, if you wear boots, they won’t get dirty. Besides, it’s all to raise money for a new pigsty”
Rarity sighed and her horn blazed blue, four stylish boots and one beautiful sunhat levitated to her and she put them on. “Fine, but I’d rather just watch if you don’t mind”. Twilight smiled and the two headed off in the direction of the apple orchard. As they strode past the apple sign they came to a magnificent sight.
Apple bobbing, pin the tail on the pony, caramel apples and cider stands. It. Was. Wondrous.
“My, my. Applejack does know how to raise money, doesn’t she?”
“Well Pinkie helped a little, but that’s not important. What’s important is that we’re all together,” As Twilight said this, four other mares appeared one by one and joined them. One was a pink pony with an outrageous pink mane, one was a blue mare with a prismatic mane, one was a pale yellow mare with a soft pink mane and the last was an orange mare with a blonde mane.
“So how’re y’all enjoyin the Sweet Apple Acres annual fundraiser? We all put in a little bit-a-work and this was the fruit of our labour! Heh, so to speak” Applejack said, tipping her hat. “I’m having the time of my life,” Fluttershy said with a shy smile “I just wish Angel could be here”.
“I told ya, that rabbit’s just like all the rest. Loves to eat up my crops,”
“That’s not true. Angel is a nice little bunny-rabbit, he wouldn’t hurt a fly”
“I have to agree with AJ on this one Shy, that rabbit can be trouble” Rainbow said.
“How dare you all, Angel is a nice bunny!” she said “…sorry for that awful outburst…”
Pinkie scoffed “Outburst? That’s not an outburst, this is!” then promptly began screaming and jumping around, gathering the attention of everypony at Sweet Apple Acres. Rainbow grabbed hold of the pink blur and pulled her back to the group. “Pinkie darling, I think we know what an outburst is. We don’t need you to demonstrate”.
Pinkie smiled and dashed off to the caramel apples.
“Anyway, let’s enjoy the carnival. That’s why we’re here,”
“Indeed,” Rarity smiled, glancing around the orchard until she caught sight of something that made her heart skip a beat. Twilight followed her friends gaze and asked Applejack “Who is that stallion over there?”
“Him? Oh that’s Quincey, long-time friend. He comes around every so often and helps to count up the money, Applebloom loves him. Like a big brother,” the orange mare said. Rarity couldn’t bring herself to admit that she felt so strongly about a stallion she had just laid eyes upon, it was unladylike. I MUST meet him.
She inhaled and strolled over as casually as she could manage, with butterflies in her stomach, over to ‘Quincy’. He was throwing ring-toss rings at a peg, not missing a single one, all without the help of his horn. He smiled as he hit the ring yet again, Applebloom beside him cheering and hugging his leg with pure admiration. Sweet Celestia, he is dreamy, she thought as she cleared her throat as ladylike as she could.
She tried not to let out a Fluttershy-esc squeak as he turned and looked directly at her. Here went nothing.
“H-hello… m-my name is Rarity…” she stammered, trying not to stammer as much as possible. She nearly fainted when he smiled “Oh hey, I’m Quincy. It’s nice to meet you Rarity, love the boots”. She grinned and laughed nervously “Oh these old things? Had these for ages,” she said. He chuckled “They sure don’t look old”.
“Well I do take good care of my clothing, a-and boots”. He nodded and threw another ring onto the peg, Applebloom cheering and smiling up at him with eyes sparkling. He patted the foals head and gestured for her to toddle off, which she did with a smile. “She really admires you,” Rarity said.
“I saved her from a stampede of bulls a long time ago, but I lost my magic in the process” he said sadly, tossing a ring onto the peg with his eyes closed.
“Oh my… but how?”
“The bulls came running at us full speed, and the only thing I could think of doing was making a barrier to protect us. I did, shaped it like an arrow and diverted the bovine safely… but they kept thumping against it as they ran past and it began to weaken. I couldn’t live with Applebloom getting trampled, so I used excess magic and ended up exhausting my horn… it hasn’t been producing magic ever since that day… so I’m about as magical as a stick”.
Rarity wiped away tears, afraid to ruin her mascara “I… I had no idea…”
“It’s ok, I’ve lived years without magic. It taught me that it’s not magic that makes a unicorn, it’s the unicorn that makes the real magic” Quincy smiled sadly, taking a deep breath. Trying to get off of the grim topic he looked around and saw the cider stands “Can I buy milady a drink?” he asked.
She smiled and nodded “I’d love that Quincy, I truly would”.