Valentine

That night, all of Pretty Clouds’s boarders were sitting in the big dining room’s tables of the main building, respectfully listening to the Governess’ lecture that came before every meal, and paying special attention to this one; it was the meal of Heart’s Warming Eve. The venerable mare reminded them how, long ago, the three main races of ponies had put their differences aside and had started living in harmony, in a cycle that their distant parents still perpetrated today, and in which each individual, especially unicorns like them, found some benefit.

"… And let us all remember that without the Pegasi, the food we have here would not exist, and that without the Earth Ponies, it would never have arrived here on this table; and that her Majesty Princess Celestia, goddess of the Sun, be forever thanked for lifting every morning the day star that brings life and warmth upon all of Equestria. Glory to her!"

"Glory to her!" mumbled some fervent fillies, and forty soup spoons simultaneously met forty china plates.

Valentine looked at her plate and saw without a surprise that it was full of nettle-potato soup, and started eating without paying further attention to the rest of the table; next to her, Misty had done the same. There wasn’t a meal in Pretty Clouds where the boarders didn’t eat nettles prepared in any way possible; the reason cited was that is was a luxurious meal that was way better than the usual armful of lucerne the lowest classes of the Equestrian society were satisfied with, and that Pretty Clouds boarding school did its best to offer the most decent food possible to its numerous boarders. Few of those suspected that in reality, it was above all because eating nettles made the coat glossy and its owner incredibly presentable and desirable. Valentine loudly sucked up the content of her spoon and absently listened to the conversation that had started near Misty.

"Say, Misty," muttered Twilight Twinkle. "What is yellow, green and clueless?"

Suspicious, her friend hesitated, and first made sure that there was no risk before answering. "Uh, I don’t know?"

"Come closer," whispered the mare in an almost inaudible voice in in her ear. "I’ll go again : what is yellow, green and clueless?"

"I don…"

"YOUR HEAD!" yelled Twilight Twinkle, grabbing Misty’s neck before plunging her muzzle into the hot soup bowl, triggering a mocking hilarity among her court.

"Twilight…!" protested Valentine, before interrupting herself when she glanced at Misty, who was slowly lifting her head up. For a second, her friend’s iris had turned… incandescent? Had she really seen that?

Twilight Twinkle stood up straight behind Misty and looked Valentine up and down. "No doubt that you’ve got something to say, Valentine Sluthooves?"

"Let… let it drop," sighed Misty, wiping her face with a napkin. "Thanks for your help, but I should be able to endure that alone."

Valentine didn’t know what to say; the best was to get back to her own business, she thought. Twilight Twinkle did the same. After all, playtime was over. She swapped her plate with one of her most docile friends’, and started finishing her meal, totally oblivious to the fact that if the level of inhibition of her new scapegoat had lowered only a bit, Misty would have used her spoon to send her aggressor’s right eye into the middle of the stock.

"… calm, composed, according to the Governess, she knows how to clean and cook, how to receive orders and obey without making a fuss… If you’re looking for a wife for your son, this one would perfectly suit, and the charges for her maintenance and her education ‘only’ add up to eighteen thousand bits."

"You’re right, dear friend, but see, something is bothering me with this one, those are the cutie marks… Those theatre masks are so vulgar, and I doubt that my son will agree to be seen with a street entertainer. Do you happen to know if they can be… removed?"

The headmaster of Pretty Clouds’ boarding school, a fat pony who was going grey, was used to deal with the most famous, the richest and the most eccentric of Canterlot. He shook his head. "Alas, your Highness, you know as well as me that they appear during adolescence and that it is very hard to control them… But you seem to look for something prestigious. Would you maybe want to leaf through our catalogue of first rate fillies without appearance flaws, the one we usually keep for the families of royal blood?"

"My soon has reached his majority, and he spends his whole time into his appartements, writing meaningless poems - poetry! - instead of developing his social relations," explained the Baron of the Square of the Meadow of the Ashen Tower and client of the boarding school, "and he is putting the honour of all of lineage at stake! I want this Heart’s Warming Eve to mark a turning point for him and I want him to finally become somebody, so show me the best you’ve got… I’m ready to pay whatever price is necessary."

A few minutes later, the two ponies were leafing through the pages decorated with illuminations of the catalogue called ‘imperial’, one of them bluntly shouting with admiration and with fright too when seeing the space reserved to the accomodation and education fees, and the other one commenting as they went along; then they reached the last pages and the Baron of the Square of the Meadow of the Ashen Tower stopped and stared at one page, staring into space. It was Valentine’s page.

"Ah, Valentine Plot, excellent choice!" began the headmaster. "Ninety six thousand bits, but her coat and her cutie mark will assure anyone a royal aspect…"

"Not that one," his prestigious client interrupted. "The one before, tell me about her!"

The headmaster raised his eyebrows. "Whistle Wishes? She is fine too, but she is a rebel, she is untamable, she is not what you are looking for for your…"

"Let us forget about my son, he is a good-for-nothing," the Baron cut him. "This stature, this presence this… power in her eyes! This is exactly what I was looking for, without being aware of it. She looks like… a queen! And her cutie mark is an empty coat of arms. A rebel, you say? See, I have never really relied on my son to succeed to me. It’s her, and no one else, that I need!"

The headmaster put his hooves together and took his sweetest and most hypocrite voice. "If this filly is the one you are looking for, Baron sir, be assured that we will do what it takes to send her at your home as fast as possible, with a quality service that only a renowned house like ours could offer."

The headmaster had now seen his client to the door; the Baron kept on saying that he was going to make the arrangements to welcome his new guest, that it was marvelous and that he was going to talk about Pretty Clouds to everyone he knew. Now the headmaster was behind his desk, absently going through the ‘imperial’ catalogue, thinking about the one hundred and four thousand bits that had just entered his pockets that afternoon. It was time to light a good cigar. He threw the brochure upon a pile of unsorted letters, various bills, letters for the boarders and a letter without a stamp on which was written in huge capital letters :

To the headmaster

URGENT

From the Governess.

Sunday came. But that Sunday was not a mere holiday. It was also a day of departure, as were all the others last Sundays of the month. All the fillies of the boarding school old enough to be married waited for this day with a mixture of fright and excitation; indeed, few of them really knew the outside world and none the company of a stallion. Of course, they had been taught all the good manners of a mare of high society, and the nights of insomnia at the dormitory and the stories under the sheet had given them an insight of love life. Yet it was only a bunch of theories, and starting practice would be rough.

Everything was done in order to make the ordeal less painful, and lies had a dominant place, for the ‘buying’ process was barely evoked and most fillies naively thought that they had been remarked for their nobility and their beauty by some prince charming, and that they would marry out of love above all. The staff maintained those illusions, but it was far from reality; if the young stallions were also tortured by their teen instincts and were firstly delighted to finally know the joys of copulation, the durability of the marriage only depended on chance. Most of the time, the two matches deserted and each one went to squander their money and whisper sweet nothings in somebody else’s ear while seeing to perpetrate the lineage at the very least.

Nobody was a fool and nobody cared, for it was the way of things in Canterlot; the only strong ties were those of money, and in the end, everyone had benefit from it.

But let’s get back to our fillies. Valentine and Misty had chosen to go for a walk around the huge boarding school’s garden, wearing padded ankle boots and thick wool saddles and scarves. It was cold of course, but it might have been their last day together and they wanted to spend it in private, without any stupid filly to taunt or brutalize them. This ritual repeated each month; they saw to wake up before any other filly, who were too lazy to wake up early on a holiday, exited discreetly to be sure not to be followed, and strolled for two hours in the middle of trees, animals and flowers. They had their breakfast in the bare nature, enjoying lucerne still wet with dew, then digested lying on the grass, talking about everything and nothing, mentioning their common memories and their expectations for the future. But that time, Valentine had decided that things would be a little different.

Valentine knew two things for sure. Firstly, her life here was coming to an end. Through the years, she had become a splendid filly and with a regal appearance, and it was only a matter or weeks before she would be chosen by a rich stallion, and at that moment, she could finally flee to find her beloved. On the opposite, Misty would stay here longer, and even maybe sold at a discount to a penny-pinching or incautious pony. Furthermore, she felt bad for having violently attacked her friend during a fight of which, Valentine Plot, was the sole responsible. She didn’t want to leave a bad impression of herself to her childhood friend, and that was why this little trip had to be unforgettable, if she were to leave the boarding school.

She took a deep breath and rolled on her side, thus pressing against Misty.

"Oh! Valentine… but what are you… Mph!" She didn’t have time to end her sentence, interrupted by Valentine’s mouth against hers. Uncertain at first, Misty passionately gave the kiss back, caressing her back with her feverish hooves. Then, breathless, they moved away from each other, still connected by a thin trickle of saliva.

"Does that… does that mean that you are my girlfriend now?" asked Misty, reddening.

Valentine shook her head, tenderly kissed her forehead and whispered in her ear : "It’s just to make it up to you. And also because I want you to always remember me."

Then she stuck her tongue out, went up along her friend’s forehead until she had reached the base of her horn. Misty jumped a bit, her body shaken with an electric shock. The wet hoop that made Valentine’s lips went down along her horn, and she could not prevent herself from sending her hooves into the air, hitting Valentine’s genitals with her knees. She grunted in an unrefined way while Valentine was speeding up, finding a rhythm.

Then she heard a whine that wasn’t hers. Misty jumped and lift her head up violently, sending her horn at the bottom of Valentine’s throat, who let out a suffocated rumbling and got her mouth off of the horn before vomiting her breakfast onto the grass. Indifferent to her friend’s distress, Misty sprang on a close bush and directly landed upon a pink filly who, caught red-hoofed, didn’t even get the occasion to try to escape.

"Aaaaaaaah! Don’t kill me!" yelled the filly.

"Pinchy!" roared Misty, mad with rage and shame. "What the heck are you doing here?" She glanced at her friend, who was spitting the last wastes of her stomach, and she suddenly fest terribly guilty.

"I was just… snif… trying tu put an end to my sorrow into loneliness… snif… and I heard you and…" Pinchy’s lips started shaking, and she broke out into tears.

Misty sighed. Of course. Barely hidden by a bush, it was bound to happen. Well, it was better that it was her than Twilight Twinkle, or worse, the Governess. She left Pinchy and came crouching near Valentine, who glared at her, and Misty could only avert her gaze, embarrassed. The three unicorns stayed here for a moment, silent, stricken with shame and desperate to have their moment of privacy spoiled that way.

Misty broke the silence and pretended to pay attention to the annoying pink filly. "So, what makes you sad to the point of wandering around alone in the cold?"

Pinchy sighed and hung her head low. "All those fillies in the dormitory only talk about their future princes charming and… and I know that I won’t find any because… snif… I’m ugly and I don’t know how to behave myself and…" She sniffed for the thousand time and fought not to cry. "… and I miss my mum even if it’s her fault I’m like that and…"

Valentine was listening with growing interest. She had indeed heard the staff talk about a unicorn wasn’t pure-blooded, enrolled into the boarding school by her aunt, a poor earth pony of Ponyville, and it was even said that that unicorn suffered from the defects induced by the alcoholism of her commoner of a mother, who had disappeared in mysterious circumstances. A poor excuse for a pony, and it had to ruin the magical moment she had meant to share with Misty. Really…

Far off, a bell rang. Sick at heart, the three fillies left the garden, ready to undergo the terrible hardship that were the departures.