Nightshade Caster had been curled up sleeping in the carriage for a few hours since they’d left Dodge Junction when he was roused from his dreams with a jolt as the carriage bucked beneath him and he launched to the side embedding his horn into the seat with the sound of tearing cloth and a thud as it hit the wood beneath.
“Dammit!”
“Sorry! Wheel hit a pothole! Ya’ll right back thar Mister Caster?” a heavily accented voice called from the front of the carriage, muffled by the walls.
“I’m good!” the unicorn responded as he tugged his head back “Oh Celestia’s a- crack- aha!” he exclaimed as he freed himself from his predicament. A furious chittering from the floor caused him to look downwards where he was greeted by a pair of baleful black orbs glaring up at him. Nightshade smiled sheepishly as he magicked the owner of the orbs, a tiny brown furred bat, up and onto the seat, the bat had been perched on his owners horn before his rather rude awakening moments before “Sorry Dusk.” his pet’s response was a disgruntled squeak as he clambered up and onto the more secure position of his owner’s back.
“Oh quit whining we’re almost there, I think.” The pony yawned as he casually covered the damage with a pillow from the opposite seat, he stopped for a moment as he noticed the mirror hanging above the opposite seat and checked himself.
He wasn’t bad looking he supposed, he was of average height his hide was black, his mane was short and swept back from his head in a deranged mess of spikes, the colour was split between black and a golden yellow tone, his tail followed much the same style as his mane. His horn (thankfully undamaged by his accident) was black and vertically narrow with edges reminiscent of a wavy bladed knife as if sompony had purposely been trying to carve it into some dagger of ceremony, his eyes were alert and roved around constantly as if attempting to absorb as many details as efficiently as they possibly could while their emerald green irises seemed to pull in observers trying to keep the pony’s full attention for more than a minute at a time, or at least that’s what they kept telling him, what nonsense.
“Oh hey, trees.” Nightshade mused at the sight of dark green forestry through the window, he couldn’t see much as a thick film of dust had caked itself onto the glass but they appeared to be moving on an overgrown trail through the woods. “Hey! Where are we?”
“Comin out the Everfree Forest now Mister, and good riddance to the darn place too.”
Indeed the heavy foliage of Equestria’s ‘haunted’ forest seemed to be lessening as sunlight began piercing the branches and sent a bright glow into the cabin forcing him to avert his eyes, blinking furiously. Nightshade took a deep breath, this was it, a new town, new shop, new ponies, new treasures, new customers and all out in here in this rising town with its own castle, it was the perfect spot for him to set up in.
He could smell the bits already….
Elsewhere,
Trixie was in a good mood, what could she say? It was a good day, she just gotten back from her latest show, it wasn’t anything huge, but it went well which is more than she could have said for a long while, all those apologies and groveling after that mess she made here in Ponyville. It had taken ages just for ponies to trust she’d turned over a new leaf, let alone actually attend her shows. The mare shuddered at the memory of her perilous Ponyville apology performance, if Starlight hadn’t….well, it didn’t bear thinking about.
But none of that mattered, what mattered was that she was back in town, she was happy, and she was going to see her good friend Starlight Glimmer. She’d already parked her caravan in the usual spot in the shadow of Twilight’s castle so it wasn’t exactly a huge distance from there to her current spot, a few feet away from the huge glittering gold doors. Trixie wasted no time trotting up the steps and knocking loudly on the doors, she waited several minutes….nothing, she knocked again, a few seconds passed when she began to just faintly hear steps approaching the door.
As the door opened Trixie balanced herself on her hind legs, flared out her cape, let out a blast of fireworks and in her dramatic stage voice exclaimed “Behold! It is I! The Grrrreeaat and Powerful-”
“Trixie?”
The mare stopped mid sentence at the sound of the distinctly male voice and sat down smiling sheepishly “Oh, hi Spike.”
The dragon yawned as he regarded her from the doorway “Hi.” An awkward silence settled for what felt like an hour, Trixie still wasn’t convinced he’d totally forgiven her for using him as a basketball during that incident with the Amulet “So….what’s up?”
Trixie perked up remembering why she was there “Oh! Right! Um, is Starlight here?”
Spike shifted from foot to foot awkwardly at the question “Um…..no, sorry.”
“Well, do you know where she is?”
At this Spike looked at her with wide apologetic eyes “She’s...in the Crystal Empire, visiting Sunburst.”
“Oh…” Trixie’s good mood deflated like an old balloon that had cooled down just a tad too much, then she looked up hopefully “But she’ll back soon right?” Hopefully? Her unruly brain added as an afterthought, only she could have chosen the day to visit her friend when that same friend was visiting her other friend so far away.
The dragon shook his head “Sorry Trixie, she won’t be back for a few days at least, now I’ve got to go Twilight’s been swamped lately and she needs my help.”
“Well...can Trixie help?”
“No no that’s fine, it’s a lot of boring paperwork, nothing you’d be interested in, just go hang out with your friends or something, goodbye!” Slam! The doors shut, leaving one very disappointed Trixie sitting on the step, with absolutely nothing to do.
The mare sighed and turned away, trudging down the steps with a pitiful look on her face “Hang out with your friends, right.” Starlight was in the Crystal Empire, Thorax was running a kingdom and Discord was….Discord! That was it! She could go over to Discord’s! Or she would….if she knew where he lived, or how to get there. Oh this hopeless, Trixie groaned internally she’d set aside her entire day to visit Ponyville, now what was she supposed to do?
“Relax Trixie.” She said covering her face with one hoof “You need to relax, it’s no big deal you just need to relax…..relax….Oh! The Spa! Why I didn’t I think of that!? I’ll take a Spa day! Oh you’re a genius Trixie!” the blue unicorn gave herself a pat on the shoulder for being the ever brilliant, wonderous, imaginative pony that she was, before galloping away humming a merry tune.
Ten minutes later…
“Closed?! ALL WEEK?” Trixie’s mouth hung open in disbelief as Lotus, the spa pony, shrugged helplessly.
“I’m so sorry darling, but we can’t open with a family of temperamental raccoons crawling through the walls, we’ve tried everything we could to get them out ourselves and Fluttershy won’t be able to get away to until this Friday, she’s very busy, running her reserve and everything. But you’ll be first on the list when she does, I promise.”
Trixie took a deep breath in, blowing the air out through the side of her mouth “No thanks, that’s fine. Everything. Is just. Fine.” And for the second time that day the unfortunate performer entered in a good mood, and left in a bad one. Walking away from the spa with her head drooping and her hat pulled low over her face she wandered through town going no direction in particular, she just walked...and walked...and walked, she walked until she reached the edge of Ponyville. She never spoke to anyone beyond quiet ‘excuse mes’ or somber ‘hellos’, what was the point? She was terrible at making friends, it pained her to say it but once again other ponies had her beat in the simplest of things...socializing. The blue mare, both literally and emotionally, sighed and turned to head back to her caravan, maybe she’d just sleep for the rest of the day, or just lie there...bored.
“Woah! Scuse me Miss! Ah didn see thar.”
Trixie looked up surprised to see a grey earth pony in a rancher’s hat smiling sheepishly in her direction, she hadn’t even heard the stallion coming, which was impressive considering he had been pulling a rickety old carriage that creaked like the world’s loosest bunch of floorboards jumbled together and given a door and some windows, speaking of which, a loud knock came from inside the cabin drawing the owner of the carriages attention who called to his passenger “This’d be the place Mister Caster! Welcome to Ponyville!”
Nightshade pushed open the door with his hoof while he magicked his things off of the floor, a pair of brown saddlebags, and a sturdy travel cloak with a high collar and hood that forsook fashionable length and cut off above his ankles so as not to trip him up when he was in a hurry and colored a brilliant emerald to match his eyes (He hadn’t really paid attention to that last detail when he bought it, it just sort of happened) which he wore over the bags. With Dusk hanging from his horn and his belongings collected he stepped out of the carriage where he was greeted by the sight of his driver’s hoof eagerly awaiting pay. Producing a pouch of bits from his saddlebags he gave it to the pony and stretched, being cooped up in that carriage for so long had really done a number on his back.
“Thanks for the ride.”
“Yer too kind Mister Caster, next time take the train, ah don wanna go through that stinkin forest anymore times than I have too.” then with a nod and a tip of his hat, the pony pulled his carriage out of the way and walked off into the woods. Nightshade watched him go for a couple seconds more before focusing his attention on his surroundings.
“Luna’s wings….well isn’t that just the biggest waste of wealth I’ve ever seen in my life, who builds a castle out of gemstones?” He’d heard the stories of course, seen it in the papers, but that didn’t lower the shock value of seeing a giant moon cursed castle of freaking gemstones! “I mean really, I could use that castle to pay for at least ten more castles of similar size, and they just sit on all of that...though on second thought...nonono, that’d be a terrible idea, oh what was I thinking, gem prices would fall through the floor and into tartarus, now that would be a waste of wealth…..although, if it’s all the same kind of gem, hmmm.”
Meanwhile a few feet away Trixie stood marveling at the distracted unicorn, he was singularly the most unusual looking pony she’d ever seen before in her life, with his wild eyes, odd looking horn (with what appeared to be a leathery pouch of some kind hanging from it), chaotic hair and his absurd amount of enthusiasm in having a conversation with apparently nopony but himself about something she didn’t quite understand he was rapidly climbing the leaderboards of her list of weirdest creatures in Equestria in a hard second below Discord himself. I should probably go, I don’t want to bother him...then again it’s not like have anything better to do, maybe I should say hi?
“Um….can I help you?” unfortunately for Trixie the stallion beat her too it, he’d noticed her presence and was now regarding her with a strange scrutiny, the mare immediately began to feel extremely uncomfortable when she realized she’d been staring at a random stranger without his knowledge, probably not the best first impression to give somepony new to town.
“Hi. I was just...I mean...Trixie wasn’t trying too…..hi.” idiot.
The stallion’s mouth quirked up into a crooked sort of smirk as he watched her splutter, great, Trixie could already hear the snickers and jibes whirling around the stallion’s head. Oh why didn’t she stay in bed this morning? She was shocked when, instead of making some cruel joke at her expense, the unicorn lowered his head and swept into a bow with one hoof over his chest in what was probably the most needlessly cordial greeting she’d ever been given. The only cordial greeting she’d ever been given come to think of it “The name is Nightshade Caster.” he introduced himself “Treasure hunter, adventurer, dealer in trinkets, valuables and curiosities both magical, mundane and everything in between. At your service.” suddenly the ‘Pouch’ unfurled itself revealing the ‘leather’ as the wings of a bat which screeched at her with a toothy smile “And that’s Dusk, don’t worry he only bites when he’s hungry.” Trixie could have sworn the little animal winked at her.
“Trixie. My name is Trixie.” she replied dimly, whether she had friends or not she still wasn’t really great when it came to actually meeting ponies, let alone a pony who seemed so extremely happy to talk to her, and the second that thought crossed her mind she scolded herself, Don’t be ridiculous who wouldn’t want to talk to me? I’m delightful. Which was the exact moment she realized somepony had been talking to her and she hadn’t been listening to a word they were saying.
“-crawling around in tombs and old ruins like I have, it’s really quite refreshing how colorful everything is here, and don’t even get me started on the northern mountains, those peaks are less hospitable than tartarus, of course that just makes it more fun. But I’m off topic, I think, yes I am, you still haven’t answered my question. I hope you’ll say yes, it’d be so cool if you said yes.” Nightshade eyed her hopefully, Dusk squeaked.
Uh oh. “Um.” Oh why not, she had no idea what she was getting into but it had to be better than sitting around feeling sorry for herself, besides there was something about this ‘Treasure Hunter’ that seemed to warrant investigation, besides, if Starlight of all mares could so easily make friends with other ponies surely someone as brilliant as herself could the same? “Yes?” this was such a bad idea.
And just like that the pony’s whole demeanor changed, that hopeful expression on his face widened to a brilliant smile and those wild eyes became just a little more focused and cheery “Great! Oh that's a relief, I was pretty sure you’d walk away the second I started talking, most of them do. I’m to weird for them, or was it that I was too normal? You can never really tell until they snap.” he shook himself “Right, not important, come on, I’ve got all kinds of stuff to show you, you’re going to love this.”
And just like that he was striding further into Ponyville beckoning and calling for her to follow him and sometimes just outright pulling her along with him. Of course, as one would expect, this sort of behaviour drew a lot of raised eyebrows and whispers from passersby, and of course Nightshade was moving too swiftly for her to keep up and listen at the same time. They passed several places familiar to her, the closed spa, Sugarcube Corner, Quills and Sofas and a dozen other places quickly making their way towards the center of town, they moved so quickly in fact that the mare didn’t realize the stallion had stopped until she ran into him. “Ouch! Careful!”
He barely even seemed to notice, though he did mutter an apology under his breath his focus was clearly on something else, they stood at the edge of the town square, a field of grass surrounded by buildings with the river running along one side and a towering building, the town hall, right smack dab in the middle. The treasure hunter’s eyes roved the buildings searching for something in particular while Trixie waited, she didn’t have to wait long however before something interesting reached her ears.
“Who’s that?” a mare’s voice, deep, snarky and self entitled, whispered not so quietly from somewhere behind Trixie who took great care to look as bored as possible.
“Don’t rightly know, a friend of Trixie’s I guess.” a deep and bored stallion’s voice responded.
“You think it’s him?”
“Who?”
“You know, the pony that bought that grubby old antique store over there, they put a sign up and remodeled everything, ‘Caster’s Curiosites’ he’s definitely not from around here.”
“Could be, why does it matter? Ponies are always moving here, nothing weird about that.”
“Look at him, he looks like he broke out of an insane asylum.”
“Hush now, you don’t know him, it’s not your place.”
“I don’t have to know him, he looks like trouble, and there's some gross thing hanging from his horn.”
“It’s just a bat Spoiled, and he’s just a pony who owns a shop, now quiet down before you start something and find out just how much trouble he really is.”
“Hmph.”
The two fell silent and Trixie became aware of somepony standing next to her, Nightshade of course, giving her strange look with a raised eyebrow “Are you okay?”
“Yes! Yes Trixie is fine! You didn’t happen to hear…?”
“What?” the stallion leaned forward eyeing her suspiciously.
“Nothing!” The performer replied hastily “Nothing at all. Must have been the wind.”
“Um...rrriiigggghhhhtt. Shop is this way, c’mon.”
“Shop? What shop?” stop it you imbecile.
“The shop, you said you wanted to come see it….you weren’t listening were you?” Caster sighed at the small shrug she responded with, his head hung “Okay, nevermind then, I was just trying to be friendly, now I dragged some random mare through town for no reason. What a great way to introduce myself.”
Trixie almost screamed out loud in frustration as the black coated pony turned away from her and began striding away dejectedly with his head bowed low, she really wasn’t very good at this whole meeting ponies thing “Nonono! Wait! Trixie would love to see the shop! She was just um, joking! Yes! Trixie was joking!” And for the second time that day the stallions attitude took a full one-eighty as he cracked a wicked smile and quickly began budging her along once more. And as Trixie was steadily pushed past the town hall through the crowds of ponies, she began to get the distinct impression she’d just been swindled.
It was going a very interesting day indeed….
Author's Note
Hope you enjoyed the story let me know what you think! This is the first mlp story I've tried my hand at and I really do value my reader's feedback in my attempts to make an actual good story that isn't riddled with mistakes so if you see something wrong or have questions just tell me. On another note I will be accepting story commissions of any kind that those of you reading may have so feel free to send requests in. Again hope you enjoyed and I look forward to posting more chapters in the future!