Druids and the Wooden Heart

The next day began later than usually for him. He sat up and looked around. It was noon and the sun shinned in the room. As he looked on the other side of the room, he saw that Switch already left. Spirit looked down and saw that Bite was still laying before him, sleeping. Spirit poked Bite in the back with his hoof.

Bite slowly opened his eyes and looked at Spirit. "Come Bite, let's grab some food. Switch is probably already there eating."

Bite slowly stood up and stretched his back and yawned. He scratched his ear and sat down to wait for Spirit to stand up. Spirit remembered something as he stood up and reached in his bag. He pulled out the small plant that he got from Zecora, he put the plant on the ground and nudged carefully on the back of the flower. He quickly held a phial under it and the green powder fell into the phial.

Spirit laid the phial back in his bags and grabbed a full one. "We need to plant a bigger one soon. This small version might give the powder but it produces it so slow that we will ran out of it in a few months. Maybe if we find the druids I can plant one but now let's find Switch and get something to eat." Spirit grabbed his small bag and put the phial in it.

Spirit left the compartment and walked to the head of the train, slowly followed by Bite. As they entered the next part of the train, Spirit saw one room with a counter with food and a few table with chair, a few ponies sat there and were eating. In the middle of the room Spirit saw that Switch was sitting with a group of ponies at one table and talked with them in his pony disguise Green Wing.

Spirit walked over to him. "Hey Swi... um I mean Green Wing. Good morning! Why didn't you wake me up."

A Switch saw him he waved Spirit over to him. "Oh sorry I didn't want to 'leaf' you alone." He began to laugh heavily and the ponies around him started to fake laugh. "So everypony this is my friend Spirit, with the second name Wood and his wolf friend Bite, who is made of Wood." Spirit sigh at this but Switch just ignored it. "Come Spirit let us grab some food!"

They both walked to the table with food and Spirit whispered. "Shouldn't you be more carefully you don't want to get caught!"

Switch chuckled. "Don't worry about me. I am not a druid for no reason, I can take care for myself. So how did you sleep?"

Spirit grabbed two breads and put them on a plate. "Good and don't say that you will continue with theses jokes?"

Switch chuckled again. "Don't you like my jokes? But if you don't want me to tell these joke I won't continue. So what do we eat now?" They looked at the table and there were three bowls one with salad, one with bread and one with apples.

Switch looked very disappointed at the food. "In comparison to our room is this nothing. Nah I am not hungry anyway so I go right there and wait for you." He pointed at a table in the corner. But before he walked away he whispered something to Spirit. "And remember my name is Green Wing I am a professor for changeling biology that shows you around here in Equesrtia!"

'Really? That is your disguise?' Spirit nodded and looked at Bite. "What do you want to eat?" Bite looked at the food then pointed at the bread, so took Spirit two bread and they walked after Switch and sat down at the table.

Spirit grabbed bites bread and strew the powder on it and laid it before Bite down. Then turned to Switch and started to eat his food."So ,professor, how does it works with changelings eating? My teacher told me after that day we met that they eat emotions somehow. Can you explain me more?"

Switch raised an eyebrow. "And they say I am a bad actor. But yes I can tell you more. So changelings, they can eat like a normal ponies but that doesn't restore their energy. For that they need to absorb emotions and that can be done in two ways, there are more but these are just different in small points. So the first way is the most known way where the changeling sucks all your emotions out of you and just leaves back an empty body."

Spirit felt a bit uncomfortable as he heard this but just nodded. "So you ... they can suck out emotions just like that?"

Switch shook his head. "No, not just like that ,they have to be very powerful to do that. Then there is also the second way, that is more subtle way where the changeling just absorbs the over flowing emotions. The pony doesn't feel it and it doesn't do any damage, the bad thing is that the changeling doesn't gain any energy from it and just lives from it. At last there are many ways between these both but these are just in detail different."

Spirit looked at his bread, processing the information. "That is interesting. I would say the more you know, the less you fear but that would be a lie in regard to the first half. Anyway it is always nice to learn something new!"

Switch looked amused at the window. "I bet with you that you will take that back after one week with me and my... friends."

Spirit ate a bit of his bread and chuckled. "I hope you're wrong. I really want to learn from you and I don't want to fail at my task!"

Switch rolled with his eyes. "You should relax sometimes and think of something different than your task just lay back and enjoy the trip."

Spirit winced a he heard the last word and a Switch saw this he looked closely at Spirit. "Is there something? Did I say something?"

Spirit shook his head slowly before he spoke again. "No it is nothing. It is just a habit from me, nothing more!"

Switch slowly leaned back. "If you say so. A far as I see should we be stuck in this train for at least three days or something like that. I am going to..." He stopped as he saw guards on the other side, checking the passes of the ponies in the room and now coming right towards them.

Switch quickly looked away. "Damned. I don't have my documents! I was going to get them in Canterlot, what do we do?"

Spirit looked right on the table and whispered back. "I don't know just don't draw any attention maybe they left us out."

"Hello good sirs!"

Switch looked on the ground and his expression seemed a bit angry. "Or not."

The guard looked friendly at them. "May I see your document?"

Spirit instantly pulled his ID card out. "Of course."

The guard grabbed his card and looked quickly over it and canned it with his magic. then he gave it back and turned to Switch. "Can I see your papers now?"

Switch looked a bit around. "I am Green Wing Professor for changeling biology!"

The guard shook his head. "I am sorry but I need your paper. So could you just give me the papers?"

Switch looked a bit worried to Spirit. "That is not possible because... because..."

"Bite ate them!" Spirit quickly tired to save the situation but for that he earned a angry glace from Bite. "I am sorry Bite!"

The guard looked a bit suspicious. "And how did that happened? Aren't you the one pony that told everyone how smart timberwolves are?"

Spirit got a bit nervous. "Well... yes I am but you know ... as I made the food for him I didn't saw that I threw the ID card from the professor with in it and as I realized it, it was too late and he ate it already."

"Is that so?" The guard looked at Switch and Bite who both nodded. The guard sigh. "Ok then I will make an exception but you will show your documents immediately, when you get them, at the next station! If you don't do that, you will be checked very closely and long running! And you will have to face the consequences!"

Switch quickly nodded. "Of course. I will do this instantly when I get my documents!"

The guard raised an eyebrow but nodded. "Good to know, ok then I wish you two a good rest of the day." The guard walked to the next group and checked their documents.

Switch leaned a bit forward and whispered to Spirit. "I guess we have to stop for a little longer in Canterlot than I expected but I want to get over this with that as fast as I can!"

Spirit wanted to response but Bite bumped into his side. He looked t Bite and saw that he looked a bit angry at him and Spirit felt guilty for it. "Yes I know, I am sorry. I know you one for this!"

Bite looked satisfied and ate the rest of his bread at once, Spirit also turned to the rest of his bread and finished eating it. After a while stood Spirit up. "I think I will do my meditation training now. So see you later professor."

Spirit left and walked back to their room for some time to meditated but Bite stayed a bit with Switch. After a while noticed Switch that almost every pony in the room was looking at them and Switch leaned to Bite. "Do ponies often look at you with such big eyes?" Bite looked around like he didn't saw until now and just nodded.

Switch leaned back again and looked outside the window. He turned to Bite. "I will look around if I can find anyway a cup of tea, so I leave you alone for a few moments but I guess that shouldn't be a problem." Bite nodded and so left Switch and left Bite back alone.

After a while Bite got bored and laid next to the table down. He closed his eyes and nearly drifted into sleep as he felt something on his side but as he opened his eyes it stopped. He looked to his left and was surprised to see a little filly with his parent standing there. The filly seemed insecure from Bite's movement so Bite decided to lay down again that the filly would fell more save.

After two second the filly pet Bite again and soon a big group of ponies surrendered Bite and the foals petted Bite.

Spirit meanwhile finished his meditation and wanted to find Bite for their mental exercise. A he walked in the next room he saw the big group off ponies and got a bad feeling. 'Oh no what happened?' Spirit ran to the group and made his way through the crowd to Bite. "What happen..." As he reached the middle he saw that Bite was pet by a group of foals and that their parents stood around them to watch their kids.

Spirit calmed down again and walked over to Bite. A few foals walked a bit away as they saw the strange looking pony walking to them. Spirit leaned down to Bites head."I see you having a good time Bite? You got a bit lazy the lat days! I think we should train more when we leave this train."

Spirit wanted to continue s he was interrupted by a pair of parents. "Does he belong to you?" Asked the mare while pointing at Bite.

Spirit stood up again and turned to the parent. "Yes he does and his name is Bite and he is a timberwolf."

The stallion looked very interested at Bite while the mare seemed a bit confused. "You shouldn't leave your pet alone and without a collar!"

Bites head instantly went up a he heard this and Spirit expression went a bit more serious. "I should let you know that he is not my pet, he doesn't wear a collar and if he wants to be alone or not is not my choice."

The mare seemed a bit embarrassed. "Oh I am sorry I didn't knew that."

Spirit was able to calm down again and gave them both a smile. "No problem but he just don't like to be called pet and you should know that the most animals understand more of what we say than you may think."

"Ah there you are my friend I was already wondering." Spirit turned around to see Switch holding a cup of tea with his wing.

He walked up to Bite and Spirit and smiled. "Good you see that you both had such a good time while I was searching all over this train for a good cup of tea! It seem that Bite made many friends while I was away."

Switch walked to the foals. "I am sorry everypony but Bite now needs some time to rest but don't worry we won't left till the next days when we reach Canterlot!" But the only response from the foals were a loud 'ooh'. The foal walked back to their parents and Bite stood up. A few foals stopped again as they saw how big Bite actually was.

Spirit and Switch talked a bit with the parents and the foals had a last chance to look at Bites full size. Then after ten minutes the three were finally able to leave to their room.

In the room placed Switch his cup of tea on a small table. "I must admit these wings are much better to carry things with then my normal wings." In a green flash he turned back to his changeling form and lifted the cup again with his magic. "But there is nothing better than just levitate the things I need."

Switch sipped at his tea. "So and you say I would draw attention? You two were lucky, if they would have been the right parents the whole train had stopped for a couple of hours. And I don't think that I would come around a magical scan in this situation!" Switch walked while speaking to the door and locked it with his magic.

Spirit and Bite both nodded. Switch now walked to the window and opened it a bit. "But... but this proves one thing!"

Spirit and Bite looked at each other a bit confused. Switch meanwhile sat on his bed and sipped again at his tea. "This proves that at least one of you can relax from time to time."

The all laughed for a while until Switch turned to his bags. "I have to send a message now. I am already late enough for that and if I wait even longer, I will regret it." He pulled out a stone with a rune and Spirit instantly recognized the rune. Switch saw that. "Seems familiar? Well it should be this is a rune we got from the Zebra tribes. We use it to signalize each other that we finished our task and coming back."

He activated the rune with his magic then laid the stone back again and turned to Spirit. "And if they ask, I instantly activated the rune after you said yes!"

Spirit and Bite both nodded to Switch and he sat on his bed and drank a bit of his tea then made a disgusted face. "The tea is already cold. This was a wasted of money." He threw the rest of the tea out the window.

Switch suddenly began to cough heavily, he quickly stood up again and started to search in his saddlebags and pulled out a small bottle. He opened the bottle and drank it. "I hate this."

Spirit looked at the bottle and looked in Switchs back and he could see that there were at least another ten of them. "What are these for?"

Switch followed the view from Spirit and saw that he was looking at the bottles. "They are against my coughing. My lungs are a bit damaged and this is a medicine made to stop the coughs."

"How did your lungs got damaged?"

Switch gave him a weak smile. "Let's just say somepony thought it would be a good idea to spray at me... with bug spray."

"Oh I am sorry to hear that! Is that dangerous?"

Switch nodded and sat down on his bed again. "No it is not, I just have a strong pain at my lungs and sometimes I wake up in the middle of the night but beside that, I am pretty fine."

Spirit looked a bit worried at Bite then back to Switch. "Are you sure?"

Switch smiled. "Nah that was just a joke. As long as I take my medicine it just hurt a bit and sometimes I have to cough heavily."

'Ha-ha-ha what a funny joke.' Spirit shook his head. "I don't know where there the joke is but if it doesn't bother you..."

Switch leaned back and smiled. "Oh don't worry. I live with that for so long now that I got used to it. But now I think it is late enough." Without any more words Switch turned around and turned off the light with his magic.