I trudged carefully through the rain-battered streets of Ponyville. I was on my way to Rarity’s home and shop, the Carousel Boutique. In one hand, I had a small green umbrella that shielded me adequately from the rain. In the other I clutched a freezing cold and very fresh carton of her favorite Ice Cream, Vanilla Oat Swirl. The cold against my scales and the relentlessly dreary rain matched my mood perfectly.

After opening her Canterlot Boutique along with Rarity for You in Manehattan, Rarity had begun to split her time more liberally between all three. She didn’t have to visit her two stores outside of Ponyville all the time. She did have some great managers, Sassy Saddles and Coco Pommel, taking care of business for her. But her reputation was something that Rarity fought very hard for and she did not want to be known as an aloof fashionista.

She wanted to be there for her customers. I don’t think it was just a way to drum up repeat buyers. A pony walking in to one of her boutiques was in for the personalized shopping experience of their lives if Rarity were present. That’s something that no amount of careful business planning and plotting could cover for. It helped secure her an entire room and a dozen preserved dresses in Canterlot’s fashion museum. I still visit it to this day when I’m there.

It was no surprise then, that the occasional stallion that walked in for a custom suit would find Rarity to be quite a charming personality, and available too.

There was a pattern to it all. Rarity would be in one of her stores fussing over this or that, and in would walk a very well dressed and mannered pony. He’d see Rarity approach and it was if suddenly all lights were on her, as if she were his one true destiny. It would be followed by small talk and a bit of flirting while she helped him find a suit, or would most often suggest something new and unique that she could make because she didn’t have too much of a stallion wardrobe available.

Talk about the perfect suit would end and the stallion would proceed immediately to asking Rarity what her plans were for the evening. Faced with an evening alone in her shop versus going out for a nice meal and some refined dancing with a gentlestallion, Rarity would make the obvious choice. The date almost always ended with the stallion finding Rarity to be much too independent and married to her business for his liking. I narrowed my eyes. Said stallion didn’t want an independent mare who would ignore him.

I stopped in front of Rarity’s home and looked up at the imposing purple door, shifted the ice cream around in my arm, and knocked.

The worse of the bunch, faced with such a ridiculous and self-centered dilemma, would opt for a one-night stand. Those unique dregs of pony-kind did significant damage to Rarity’s spirit. She made clothes for them, she gave freely of her special talent and her smile, she wasn’t there to “put out” for their moment of carnal pleasure. She was generous to them, and in turn, they preyed upon her generosity and her longing for a special somepony to share her life with.

Rarity opened the top half of the door and immediately I knew which kind of stallion it had been. The usual dump would get dramatics, water works, the fainting couch, and boxes upon boxes of ice cream. I took one look at her sunken tired blue eyes, lack of blue eye shadow, unkempt eye lashes and completely undone hair, and knew with the silence that greeted me that it had been the worse of the worst possible thing.

I smiled and held the carton of Vanilla Out Swirl out between us. “I brought this for you.”

She looked at the treat in my hand, then back to me. Moments of indecision past. The rain seemed to get thicker. Rarity unceremoniously yanked the ice cream from my palm with her magic. The door slammed shut, but then I heard the lock disengaging. The entire door creaked opened slightly, and out came cold, drab air.

Once more unto the breach. I thought to myself as I carefully pushed the door open and walked in. Rarity hadn’t even bothered with the lights, so the entire space was dim and shadowy. I pushed the door shut and let my eyes adjust. Our other friends had tried before to do what I was about to do, with varying degrees of success. Pinkie Pie just seemed to make it worse for some reason. Usually Apple Jack would make the call while winking at me. “I think it’s up to you again Sugar cube.” Because if anypony could bring Rarity out of her days of self-imposed post-dump exile, it wasn’t a pony at all. It was me. A dragon.

After my sight adjusted, I noted that the front room was completely clean. The fainting couch sat alone and unused in its corner. I could hear hoofsteps up the staircase, so I followed them slowly up to Rarity’s room, and entered abject chaos.

The bedroom beyond the open door was also a sewing room. To the left was an elegant four post bed, ahead was a desk and sewing machine, along with several shelves. Several mannequins stood silently throughout the room, showing off dresses and strips of fabric in various states of completeness.

The entire room was covered in all kinds of fabrics, papers with half-hazard scribblings of early dress designs, balls of yarn, bobbins of string, and pincushions with colorful pins. In the middle of it all, stood Rarity. The open carton of ice cream hovered in the air while she ate it slowly, almost methodically, with a spoon.

She turned around to see me, and then walked over to her bed, where she sat down quietly. This all was the result of Rarity trying to put past events out of her mind by busying herself with a very long and uninspiring days of sewing and stitching. Because of that, everything else suffered, including Rarity’s appearance.

I walked over to the bed and climbed up to sit beside her. Looking closer at her eyes, I could see where the mascara she had worn days ago had run down her cheeks. The blue eye shadow had been mostly hoof smudged away, but still left a faint presence around her eyes. This was the look of a mare who had given her talent, and her generosity, freely to the world, only to have one asshole come along and ask if it included the entire quesadilla. It must have hurt bad every time it happened.

I watched the profile of her muzzle as she ate and the way her mane cascaded around her ear instead of flowing around it in a curl. My heart leapt out to her like it always did.

“Wanna talk about it?” I broke the silence.

“…No.” Rarity finally answered. She shook her head and levitated another spoonful of ice cream to her mouth. Her voice seemed to croak like she hadn’t used it much in the past few days except to sob privately.

Okay. Try small talk. “You missed dinner at Applejack’s yesterday night. She invited everypony over. The apple fritters were really good.”

“Mmmhmmm” Came Rarity’s answer, a spoonful of ice cream lodged firmly in her mouth.

I switched stories. “You’re not going to believe what Twilight did while you were gone. She tried organizing her entire library chronologically, then realized, while all the books were on the floor that many of the books don’t even have a year on them! We ended up putting them all right back where they were again. Can you believe it!?” I mocked a laugh over the unpleasant experience of Twilight saying “hey, wait a minute.” At the most inconvenient time.

My laugh trailed off though at the lack of response.

I pulled a line from one of my favorite comic books. “The mothership arrives tomorrow. We’ve been told to prepare our offerings to appease the overlord.”

This time, no response. Not even a raised eyebrow at how ridiculous that sounded out in the open. I lifted my hand to my chin in thought. There had to have been some way to get Rarity to open to me. I looked around the room, and then an idea struck me.

I leapt off the bed and immediately went to work collecting items off the floor. I started with the balls of yarn farthest from Rarity.

It took only moment before Rarity locked her eyes on me. Opalescence, whom had been sleeping on the bed, now peered around Rarity, looking perplexed and a little peeved that I had woken her up from a deep cat nap. I kept at what I was doing.

“What are you doing?” Finally, a complete sentence!

I looked over at Rarity and then continued. “Picking up this mess.”

She closed her eyes with a huff, sat the carton of ice cream beside her, and then grabbed balls of yarn from my grip. They fell unceremoniously to the floor. One white ball rolled all the way to the bed where Opal pounced on it and began to disembowel it with her claws. If there’s one word of advice I’d give about Rarity, it would have been ‘do not stand between that horse and her fits of creativity.’

“It’s not a mess.” Rarity protested and got up off the bed. She approached one of the mannequins and adjusted the small red hat atop it with her magic. “I’m simply having a dreadful time figuring out what the theme will be for my fall fashion line. I was thinking of going for a Running of the Leaves affair, but I’m having awful trouble coming up with a way of combining the sleekness of athletics with the elegance of couture.

Now that I had Rarity talking, my mission was only half over. She needed to smile again. Perhaps helping her with her fashion dilemma would work. I noticed Rarity fussing with the red fabric wrapped around the barrel of one of the mannequins and approached to stand on the other side. I looked up at her. She had levitated a pincushion and was working the fabric into a shape, almost like a sculptor would with clay.

“Well.” I started. “How about dispensing with the couture and mixing it up with a line of fall sportswear. Warm and clingy for speed, but not chafy?”

“GAH!” Rarity yelled out. Several of the needles that were being held in thin air shot right into the fabric in front of her and embedded deeply into the form. She stomped away from the mannequin. “That’s just what he said during the party!”

I winced and jumped back away from the mannequin as it teetered slightly from the sudden murderous movement. Rarity had said something that piqued my curiosity. “Who’s he?”

“Swift Tailwinds!”

“Swift Tailwinds? The acrobatic pegasus that does those awesome spinning barrel rolls?” Rarity shot a glare of daggers down at me and I shrunk away.

“Harrumph. That brute! That vile! Vile…… Pegasus!.” Rarity growled. She sat the pin cushion down and stomped towards her desk where she started rifling through papers.

“He came in to my store and requested something that he could wear to some soiree in lower Manehatten where he was the guest of honor. I happened to have something that would look positively stunning on him, and he thought the idea was marvelous. I just needed to work in a few simple alterations for his wings.”

I walked towards Rarity. Swift Tailwinds was an up and coming flyer, part of an Equestrian stunt flying family. They were not the Wonderbolts, but a family that travelled around with a circus. He was so talented that both Spitfire and Rainbow Dash had tried to recruit him on multiple occasions, but his excuse was always the same. He claimed his solid dark blue mane and coat would clash with their uniform.

Rarity’s hurried paper sorting slowed. She turned to me and sat down on the stool. She then sighed and closed her eyes. “It was a black number, sleek and deliciously noir, you could barely see any creases or stitching in the fabric. He loved it, said it would make him look mysterious, which by coincidence is exactly what he was going after.” She snorted. “It did indeed make him look tall, dark, and mysterious.”

I felt a blush coming to my cheeks as my mind ran away with a fantasy. Small. Check. Dark, I could do that, so check. Mysterious? Just call me the dark mysterious drake of Ponyville. Yep.

“After I sold him the suit, he started flirting with me. He said he was confused and thought that I came with it as well. Then he asked me to the party with him, as a date and, and I couldn’t resist saying yes.”

There was wooden box of fabric nearby. I looked at it, turned it over, and then sat down on it.

Rarity’s voice came softer. Her anger from earlier had melted away. “I went with him, and had a simply marvelous time, but unfortunately I dare say I had a little too much to drink and I think he caught on to that. Miss Pommel was out of town so she let me stay at her place. As we were walking back I started to sober up, thankfully, and noticed that Swift would, he would, hang back every so often and stare, at my flank. So we, got to, Coco’s and, he, he shut the door and he…”

Tears began to flow from Rarity’s eyes as she screwed them shut tightly. Unlike most time where they washed out eye liner, these came pure and clear against her cheeks. I looked around for a strip of fabric, reached down for it, and offered it up to her, only to end up enveloped in the tightest hug that I had ever experienced in my life.

We fell from the stool and onto the floor with a thud. Papers perched on the edge of the desk fell on top of us. Her sobs came fast and heavy. She heaved every single one with short breaths as she cried. “There, there.” I whispered. “It’s okay.” Her whimpers of emotional agony vibrated into my body. I closed my eyes and tried to rock her back and forth.

“It was horrible.” She cried into my ear. I could feel her hot tears run off her cheek and onto mine. “He approached me and tried to kiss me, and asked me to bed with him that night. I refused, and he called me a tease, a harlot! He yelled and yelled, and he, tore up his suit right in front of me. He stomped on it, kicked it into my face, and then ran out.” She finished with a squeak. Rarity’s body was racked with trembling sobs as I held her close to me and rubbed my hands against her back. From behind me I could feel Opal’s head rubbing up against my tail. She could sense her mistresses distress and was helping in any way that she could.

As Rarity sobbed into my shoulder I realized that I had never seen her this emotional before in my life. The other times had a flair of dramatics in them, and it didn’t take too much effort, not counting that book that will not be named, to bring her back from despair. This time I truly didn’t have any clue what to do. And it scared me. I scrunched my face in anger against the sharp breaths that Rarity was breathing as she tried to keep herself from falling apart any more.

It was bad enough for somepony to see Rarity as just an object for them to conquer. But to then go and tear up something she put her very soul into, her own work, and to throw its remains into her face as revenge for refusing to give her body to him?! I was hoping that very moment that Swift Tailwinds, wherever that jerk was, could feel what I was imagining; ripping his wings out feather by feather, bone by bone. Yes. I would do that, and then I would go for his-

“Am I really a hideous mare?”

“What!?” I raised my voice and moved to look Rarity in the eyes. They were bloodshot and dry, from the last of the tears that were cool against the fur of her cheeks.

“That’s what he told me.”

“You…” I cupped Rarity’s cheeks in my palms and forced her to look at me. “Listen to me. You are not hideous. You are Rarity Belle, the most breathtakingly beautiful unicorn in all Equestria. You are everything from generous to talented. You’re a good friend and a pure soul. You put your heart into your work where other ponies just try for what’s in style.”

Rarity chocked back a sob and I continued.

“Swift Dickwinds is the one who’s hideous. He took advantage of you the minute he walked into your store. None of what he did was your fault and don’t you dare think otherwise.” A tear fell to my cheek, and I realized I was getting just as emotional as she.

At some point in my diatribe, a smile had begun to form along the corners of Rarity’s mouth. “S-Spike?” She sobbed.

“Yes?” I asked, and sniffled.

Rarity sniffled back, and her smile had returned. It was wavering, but it was there. She breathed out. “You’re crying. I thought Dragon’s didn’t cry.”

“Well. Most dragons don’t have a pony that they umph-” And as I was about to get that word out, the mare of my dreams enveloped me into an even tighter hug, and buried my face into the fur of her chest.

~ ~ ~

Something stirred me awake. I sucked in a breath and snorted it out as my eyes flew open. I realized where I was and stood up.

“How long was I out?” I asked the darkness, no one really. I didn’t have any way to tell; the room had no windows and the grandpony clocks weren’t talking. All I had as companions was the dark enchanted crystal in my claws and the candle in the middle of the room.

I noticed that the candle was now half the size it was when I had lit it. I remembered Twilight’s caution not to use the candle too much, because it was ancient magic and she wasn’t sure if it could be reproduced. “Stupid, stupid, stupid spike.” I swore under my breath.

I looked around at the walls, at the shadows, and while there were shadows there, they were faint and easily attributed to the crystals at the base of the candle, or the table. They didn’t waver much, for the flame itself was very steady.

I thought of blowing the candle out and calling it a wasted night. Inwardly I was starting to fear that this was indeed just some sort of foolish magic trick. Perhaps the candle could project spirits in passing, but the spirits themselves paid no attention to it. It had been a long time since that candle had been used. Perhaps the magic had worn off.

Nightmare Night had passed with midnight, but the moon should have still been high in the sky, and the pegasi had promised no clouds. Really, the walls should have been crawling with shadows. What was wrong?

My thoughts began to turn to despair as I thought of all this wasted effort, before finally turning to the image of Rarity in my head, her haunting visage. I thought of everything I wanted to say to her, and everything that would have to remain unspoken until I died, which given the lifespan of a dragon, was a very, very long time. My heart began to ache terribly.

I felt a chill against my side. It was gone almost as fast as it was there. I shivered and looked for the source, but there was none. It’s like something had passed through me.

I stood still and looked at the candle. The flame began to dance. It flickered and nearly jumped off the wick excitedly before catching it again in a desperate attempt to hold on to its perch. I was so far away from the candle I knew it couldn’t have been me.

I quietly approached the candle and kneeled to inspect it. There was something in the room with me. I just knew it. I looked around at the walls. No shadows. But, I was sure something was there. Did it have a name? Was it her?

“Rarity? Is that you?” I asked, and looked at the candle again.

The flame flickered and flashed. I held in a breath and stood up. The flame’s rhythm was hypnotic as were the angles of the crystals casting shadows against the table that danced along with it. Then another shadow emerged. It started out as a point in one of the crystals, and it grew bigger. It seemed to leap away from the table in an otherworldly fashion, against the direction of the dancing flame.

It grew across the floor before it found the wall, and then on that tableau a shadow coalesced into focus.

Given all that had happened, you’ll understand why I looked at the shadow in disbelief. Were my eyes playing tricks on me? There before me stood the shadow of a unicorn. It was at a slight angle, as if pointed towards me. I could see the tip of a horn that seemed swallowed up in a flowing mane towards its base, and four elegantly angled legs. The mane itself had an unmistakable flowing arch, and I could swear its color was shades of indigo and purple that flowed together just like that extravagant curl on either side of its face.

I slowly approached the wall, and the shadow turned, as if keeping sight of me. I stopped when I could see the entire profile, and the flowing curl of her tail. I knew that shadow was of Rarity. She was looking up at me so I kneeled. I saw an unsure hoof raise up cautiously and touch my arm. I felt a chill where the hoof connected with the shadow of my arm. It was Rarity! Oh Celestia, it was her!

“It’s been a long time.” I said to the shadow.

The shadow nodded. I sat on the floor in front of where I thought she was standing. From her shadow, I could see Rarity stepping slightly so she could be in front of me. Shen then followed suit and sat down on her haunches.

I reached out to her face and brushed the air. I could feel her presence, a mass of otherworldly chill that seemed content to steal the warmth from my body. Rarity raised a hoof and I could feel a chill on the tip of my nose where she had poked it. I did something I hadn’t done in a long time. I giggled like a little dragon.

Rarity’s shadow bounced. She was giggling too.

It had worked. The spirit candle wasn’t just a trick after all. Tears threatened to spill from my eyes. “You don’t know how much I miss you.”

I could see from the shadow that her mouth was moving, but I couldn’t hear anything. She stopped mid-sentence as she realized the same thing, then looked at the ground.

The books were just as silent about how to communicate with the dead, as if the writer knew that we’d be able to communicate with ease. Well, they were wrong. I went into this thinking that she could talk to me and I would hear her. I looked through the air as I thought of ways we could communicate. Pantomime was out, and completely silly. This wasn’t a shadow play. This is life. She’d have to use her shadow in some way, then I looked at her hoofs and had a thought.

“I know what to do.” Rarity looked up at me. “Try this. I’ll ask you questions. You stomp a hoof. One stomp for yes, two stomps for no. And, you can make any other movements you want, if you need to. Do you understand?”

A hoof stomp. ‘Yes’

“This. This is going to work!” I exclaimed.

I could see rarity laugh and make a motion that looked like she was clopping her hooves together. She was just as excited as me. After the excitement died down, I began to think of a thousand and one questions to ask, but I had only so much time to ask them in.

“Did you miss me?” I asked, to start simple.

One quick hoof stomp. ‘Yes’ She finally could answer that one.

“Are our friends all there too?”

‘Yes’

“Are they okay?”

‘Yes’

At that point all I had were yesses. I needed something that she could say no too. To make sure I could see two hoof stomps. I know it was possible but I just had to see. I thought of the very illness that took Rarity from me. Cancer.

“Are you still in pain?”

There was a pause and then, two slow hoof stomps, ‘No’ It meant she was no longer in agony, no longer tired for days on end. She was free. I felt what would possibly be the first in a long series of times that night, that a weight had just been lifted from my heart. The weight itself being those memories of Rarity tired, bedridden, as the life ebbed from her body.

“Do spirits get sick?”

‘No’

“You know, Twilight and I both miss you guys. But, you’re a spirit. You can go anywhere. Have-” A thought came to my mind. “Did you guys visit us after, you know, you died?”

‘Yes’

“I have your fire ruby. I’m keeping it safe for you. Sweetie Belle let me have it.” Rarity probably already knew that one already.

She confirmed that with a ‘yes’.

Sweetie Belle had died thirty years after Rarity, her husband Soda Pop had died a few years before his wife. They left behind a precious and precocious filly. Radiance was named in honor of her late aunt and turned out to be just as kind, loving, and generous.

“Have you seen your Niece’s Cutie Mark?”

One hoof stomp and an excited nod. ‘Yes’

I smiled. When Radiance received her Cutie Mark, we were all shocked to see a single diamond in the shape and color of the ones that graced her late aunt’s mark. She was an adventurous youth and didn’t have much time for old Spike and Twilight. But that was fine. She grew up to be the most generous and caring pony around. Her talents in helping the poor and downtrodden meant that she was true to her name and her mark. The world needed Radiance.

“Her kid takes a lot after you, you know. Twilight and I are very proud of her.” I narrowed my eyes. “Hey, you didn’t have anything to do with her Cutie Mark, did you?”

Rarity responded with a politely bashful ‘No’

Sadly, Radiance never had any children of her own, meaning Rarity’s own bloodlines ends there. But the indelible mark they left on Equestria means so much more than mere genes.

I looked at the floor. I had come in here without a real plan. This was turning out to be a polite conversation, not seeking closure with somepony I missed dearly. The first decades after Rarity’s death were tolerable. Then I had found that first book that told of a way to talk to the dead, while idly looking around the library, bored, one oppressively hot summer day. Memories of her came flooding back and the Rarity shaped hole in my heart that I brushed off as just something that made me who I was began to burn away at my sanity. The memories of Rarity made me miss her so much that I feared they’d consume me. Up until that night, where I sat there quite literally next to Rarity in spirit, I didn’t know how I would live another thousand or two years.

“I have to apologize.” I began. “I didn’t just come here to catch up. I’m the one that discovered the spirit candle, by accident.” I swept a claw around the room. “I had twilight enchant your fire ruby. I don’t know how it attracted you here or what it looks like to you now, but please understand that this is all my doing. The reason I can see your shadow is because the candle has an old magic that allows it to project your spirit. Twilight doesn’t think I should be going through with this, but by Celestia, Rarity, I need to talk to you.”

Rarity’s shadow didn’t move, prompting me to continue.

“I’ve been a mess since I found out about this candle. Lately I’ve realized how much I lost when you died, and I need closure so I can go on living. But.” I looked straight ahead at the mass of empty cold air. “You’re the only one that can help me.”

I sighed and looked at the shadow. “Do you understand what I’m saying?”

A single hoof stomp…. ‘Yes…’

Author's Note

I was originally going to have three chapters for this story but I have decided to expand it to five. I was hoping to have more by now but last week was nasty at work so I couldn't find time to sit down and continue banging on my keyboard until the weekend. This week is looking better so expect another chapter by Friday. I promise you will not have to wait long for another installment.

Thanks again to my editors, Molly Mittens and Lord Malachite. Their finishing touches are here and there in this story and I'm grateful for all their help.

Also, she will always be Coco Pommel. Fight the power!
-Pyrex