Sisterhooves Campfire Spooky Story Club

"Are you sure we're going the right way?" Sweetie Belle nagged Rarity; the two of them slowly trotted through the cool, murky autumn night between the trees of Sweet Apple Acres. The fallen leaves crunched loudly beneath their hooves with each step.

"Of course I'm sure, Sweetie Belle!" Rarity insisted. "Look, over there!" She pointed a hoof into the distance at the inviting orange glow of a small bonfire. Their breaths became visible in the cool night air as they hurried their way over to where Applejack and Apple Bloom sat in wait.

Just as Rarity and Sweetie Belle arrived Rainbow Dash came swooping down with Scootaloo on her back. Landing beside the fire, Scootaloo hopped off of Rainbow Dash's back and the two exchanged a strike of their front hooves together.

"We win!" Rainbow Dash and Scootaloo exclaimed as Rarity and Sweetie Belle arrived shortly after.

"Must you make a competition out of everything?" Rarity rolled her eyes as all six ponies settled down around the fire, paired off by kin.

"Well the reason we brought ya'll out here was Apple Bloom and I got to talkin' and it seems with every pony working two jobs these days the six of us rarely get to go camping anymore." Applejack began to explain.

"So we're camping out in the orchard?" Rainbow Dash crossed her front hooves and pitched her head up. "Lame!"

"Well not quite. I just thought it could be fun if the six of us could get together and tell tales by this here campfire every week." Applejack continued.

"Spooky stories!" Apple Bloom chimed in excitedly.

"Welcome to this first here meetin' of the Sisterhooves Campfire Spooky Story Club!" The other five stared in awe as Applejack cast some powder off of her hoof into the fire, causing it to flare up momentarily.

"I came up with the title!" Apple Bloom boasted.

"Just in case no pony else has a story I came up with just the story to kick things off!" Applejack crept closer to the warm fire.

"Are you sure you don't have one about your mane turning grey?" Sweetie Belle teased, looking over at Rarity. The other four ponies chuckled but Rarity didn't look amused.

"Oh but I do. But it's about so much more than that!" Rarity warned ominously as her horn glowed, illuminating her face, as she leaned away into the darkness.

"Well let's hear it!" Applejack called out excitedly. "I s'pose mine could always wait 'til next week."

"This story is about a misguided filly who didn't understand the importance of beauty." Rarity began to narrate as she glared at Sweetie Belle. "A filly named Sweetie Belle." Sweetie Belle rolled her eyes as Rarity mentioned her name. "The story begins right out here, on a night like this, in this very orchard!" Rarity's horn glowed and she gave out a sinister laugh as the fire momentarily crackled with all different colors- the others stared attentively. "Submitted for the approval of the Sisterhooves Campfire Spooky Story Club I call this story; The Tale of the Shadow-Gardener."

"Wait up every pony!" Sweetie Belle called out as she trotted after Apple Bloom and Scootaloo toward the far end of the orchard. Wildlife called out in the darkness of the night as they reached a log that had fallen, now bridging the gap, across a stream separating the orchard from the outskirts of the Everfree Forest. The others halted as they reached the log allowing Sweetie Belle to catch up.

"Ever since this tree fell I've been seein' a strange light out this way at night." Apple Bloom explained.

"We're on the case!" Scootaloo scampered excitedly across the log and disappeared on the other side where the pale moon light didn't fall.

"But Applejack told us to stay up in your room! We're in so much trouble if she finds we snuck out!" Sweetie Belle protested.

"We'll be safe if we stick together!" Apple Bloom patted her hoof against Sweetie Belle's horn. "Plus you can light the way!"

"I guess." Sweetie Belle sighed and illuminated her horn, following Apple Bloom to join Scootaloo on the other side.

"Hey look!" Scootaloo called their attention. Under the illumination of Sweetie Belle's horn the three could see a path heading deeper into the woods.

The woods around the path became silent as they crept onward. The path was dotted with small, crudely stacked, cairns along it's sides. They came to a stop as they reached a larger cairn in the shape of a pony in the middle of the path. There was a faintly glowing stone at the top, which seemed to be constantly changing colors. There were no trees to be illuminated beyond the cairn but the sound of a mare humming an eerie melody could be heard. The three fillies looked at each other and trembled in fear.

"What is this?" Scootaloo reached for the glowing stone.

"Don't touch that. It could be dangerous!" Apple Bloom snapped as she batted Scootaloo's hoof away.

"H-hello? Is any pony there?" Sweetie Belle trembled. She held her horn closer to the cairn for a better look and accidentally knocked the glowing stone to the ground. The humming stopped as the stone began to emit a dying flicker. "Oops."

The fillies all took a step back and their hearts surged with dread as a brilliant light illuminated from deep within the clearing and started slowly coming towards them. As the light drew closer they could see that it wasn't a clearing; but the trees were black and featureless like shadows as the light passed behind them. Drawing closer yet, the light was coming from the horn of a unicorn mare, equally dark and featureless; other than her smokey grey mane and her head was of the same light emanating from her horn. Shadows crept across the ground and circled around the fillies.

"We're sorry miss. It was an accident!" Apple Bloom pleaded, stepping forward to protect the group.

"It took me thousands of years to gather all of that beauty." The mare spoke with an ominous calmness and matter-of-fact as she stepped out of the shadows and started eyeing the three fillies over, stopping at Sweetie Belle. "But your mane is perfect. Just one lock of it can keep the stone from dying-out." She explained as the light became sharp as a razor and reached toward Sweetie Belle.

All three fillies were frozen with terror until the silence was broken by the nearby howl of timberwolves. As the mare looked toward the direction of the sound the creep of shadows barring the fillies path crept back towards her.

"Run!" Sweetie Belle screamed as she turned and began running. Apple Bloom and Scootaloo followed. The mare began to pursue them with her shadowy creep in tow. Sweetie Belle was the first to scramble across the log. She stopped and looked back when the other two didn't follow. The mare stood at the other end, the pony shaped cairn now sat just on the other side of the log and Apple Bloom and Scootaloo were stuck, motionless, on top of the creep of shadows. The colorful stone on top of the cairn flickered one last breath of light and then went dim.

"Fools! Now I will have to start over." The mare's voice now boomed with anger.

The color from Apple Bloom and Scootaloo slowly faded until they were black and featureless like a shadow. Sweetie Belle's heart pounded as she ran back towards the farm house where Applejack waited outside.

"I thought ah told ya fillies not to go playin' in the orchard at night!" Applejack lectured. She waited for the other two to come running behind her. She noted the dread on Sweetie Belle's face as the other two failed to follow. "Where are the others?" She asked in a panic. Sweetie Belle was now catatonic.

It took a while for Applejack to get an explanation out of Sweetie Belle. By the time Applejack gathered the rest of the Mane 6 and Spike to form a search party the sun began to peak over the horizon. Sweetie Belle lead every pony to the log bridge at the edge of the orchard.

"Well, where is it?" Rainbow Dash demanded as she fluttered over the log. Absent from the other side were the stone cairns and the path.

"What are you playin' at Sweetie Belle? Ma' Sister's missin' and I don't see no shadow mare, or rocks, or a path." Applejack was equally upset.

"You believe me, don't you, Rarity?" Sweetie Belle begged. Rarity simply looked down and sighed in response.

"I've never heard of magic like this." Twilight looked over at Sweetie Belle, watching her face droop in disappointment. "But I'll head to Canterlot, there might be something in the archives about this." She offered.

"I'll get our things ready!" Spike exclaimed.

"No Spike, we can use an extra pair of wings for the search." Twilight explained.

"Got it!" Spike showed off his wings proudly.

The search was as exhausting as it was fruitless. After hours of searching the sky turned orange with the approach of sunset and every pony retreated back to the farm house. Applejack and Rainbow Dash could no longer hide their skepticism of Sweetie Belle's tale.

"Can I retrace my steps one last time?" Sweetie Belle begged.

"Darling, It's getting late out." Rarity protested.

"I'll go with you!" Spike eagerly volunteered.

"Outta' the question!" Applejack shouted. "It's timberwolf season, it ain't safe out there at night!"

"Why don't you come too, Fluttershy?" Spike nudged at Fluttershy with his claw as she cowered at the suggestion. "You could use your stare if we encounter any timberwolves."

"Well I can't leave Sweetie Belle on her own!" Rarity stepped up.

"Well I'm staying right here with Applejack until Twilight gets back from Canterlot!" Rainbow Dash scowled at the group that had assembled.

Sweetie Belle, Fluttershy, Rarity and Spike all headed back to the fallen log. With a flutter of his wings Spike swiftly landed on the other side of the stream. The sun was quickly racing below the Horizon.

"So this is where the pile of stones was?" Spike inquired.

"Right where you're standing now!" Sweetie Belle shouted across the stream.

"Then why's it over here?" Fluttershy asked meekly. As the last light of day faded the cairn was now on the Sweet Apple Acres side of the log.

"Spike!" Rarity gasped, staring across the stream. Spike was now trapped, motionless, atop a consuming blackness on the other side. Rarity ran toward the log but quickly halted as the shadowy mare emerged from the cairn and began humming her eerie melody.

"Rarity, no!" Sweetie Belle called out as she rushed over. Fluttershy backed away, cowering.

Rarity burst toward the shadowy mare as she reached Spike but became frozen as she stepped onto the shadowy creep surrounding the scene.

"We have to go!" Sweetie Belle pushed her front hoof against Fluttershy's side to get her attention.

With the cairn now on the Sweet Apple Acres side of the stream the moonlight no longer reached the ground, bathing the orchard in pitch darkness. Sweetie Belle and Fluttershy scrambled from tree-to-tree but had lost all sense of direction. Sweetie Belle's horn could only illuminate so far and it just acted as a beacon for the shadowy mare.

"Stay close to me!" Sweetie Belle whispered to Fluttershy.

"Okay." Fluttershy acknowledged in a trembling voice, letting out a gasp when Sweetie Belle's horn stopped glowing.

The duo crept as quietly as they could toward the distant lights of the farm house. The shadowy mare wandered about, humming her eerie tune. Just the same as her pony victims she would now absorb the light from each of the trees she passed by, leaving a shadowy facsimile in their place. They tried to keep ahead of the light cast by the shadowy mare's horn but she too slowly made her way toward the farm house.

The mare halted her advance as the sound of timberwolves yipping and howling in the distance started to draw nearer. Fluttershy and Sweetie Belle peaked out from behind a tree to watch as a pack of timberwolves converged on the shadowy mare. The mare seemed afraid of them as she assumed a defensive posture as they surrounded her, remaining outside the shadowy creep that followed in her wake. One-by-one, though, she was able to lure them into the shadows where they became frozen still. She began to drain the light out of one of them.

"Leave them alone!" Fluttershy shouted defensively as she jumped out from behind the tree.

"Fluttershy, no!" Sweetie Belle cried.

"Save yourself!" Fluttershy ordered.

Sweetie Belle took off running toward the farm house, looking back only to see Fluttershy replaced by a shadow.

"Where's the others!?" Rainbow Dash demanded as Sweetie Belle came running up.

"Not them too!" Applejack yelled.

"I figured it out. She comes at night!" Sweetie Belle cried.

"I don't think so." Rainbow Dash objected as she and Applejack grabbed Sweetie Belle and dragged her over to the barn.

"Darn strange coincidence. Two attacks and you are the only survivor of both." Applejack lectured as she shoved Sweetie Belle into the barn; she and Rainbow Dash barred the door.

"Why won't you believe me? She's coming this way." Sweetie Belle's muffled pleas sounded from behind the door.

"How do we know you're really Sweetie Belle?" Applejack quizzed.

"What's that?" Sweetie Belle heard Rainbow Dash whispering loudly to Applejack from outside the barn.

The shadowy mare's eerie melody began to fill the night air. Sweetie Belle hunkered down behind a bail of hay as the confrontation between Applejack, Rainbow Dash and the shadowy mare sounded out; they fought with determination but it wasn't long until the only noise that remained was the humming of the eerie melody. Sweetie Belle pressed her hooves over her eyes as she heard the shadowy mare wander about, searching all over the farm for her, but exhaustion soon took it's toll.

"Sweetie Belle? Applejack? Rarity?" Twilight's voice woke Sweetie Belle up. She could see rays of daylight coming in between the gaps in the walls of the barn.

"I'm in here!" Sweetie Belle called out and with a surge of magic Twilight came bursting through the barn door.

"You're alright!" Twilight shouted with relief, the two ran up to each other and met with a hug.

"She took every pony else." Sweetie Belle cried.

"I found something in the archives. That mare is the Shadow-Gardener. Over a thousand years ago she used to be a regular pony like you or I." Twilight began to explain.

"What happened to her?"

"She was part of one of two rival families of noble unicorns. One day, by chance, she met a handsome stallion from the rival family and they both fell instantly in love with each other and they decided they would secretly wed; but their families found out a month before the day of their wedding and this only deepened the feud and a war now seemed inevitable. The mare and the stallion proposed to their families that if they could both prove their love was both powerful and true that they should allow the wedding to go forward and bring peace between both families; and their families agreed.

The mare was a renowned gardener so she used her magic to transfer all of her beauty into a single seed and released it into the wind; that it should grow into the most beautiful flower wherever it landed. The stallion was a renowned adventurer so he proposed that he would follow the winds and bring the flower back to his bride-to-be by the day of the wedding.

Days passed; and then weeks. The mare waited anxiously and became stricken with grief when the day of the wedding came with no word from her husband-to-be. Not only was her love gone but so, too, was her beauty and she refused to be seen in the day time. Her grief soon became a curse and she began to drain the beauty and the light from everything around her, leaving a pall of shadows in her wake, as she searched the lands for her flower and her husband-to-be. Starswirl the Bearded cornered her in the Everfree Forest and used his magic to seal her in the cairn. You must have broken the seal when you disturbed it."

"Well what can we do?" Sweetie Belle looked down and sighed.

"I can re-cast the containment spell but we have to somehow convince her to give back the ponies she has taken."

Twilight Sparkle and Sweetie Belle found the cairn, now outside the barn. They reassembled it on the other side of the stream and waited for the sun to go down again. As the Shadow-Gardener emerged Twilight quickly froze her in place with a blast of magic.

"Fools!" She hissed as she attempted to writhe free from the spell.

"We want our friends back!" Twilight demanded.

"Their beauty is mine now. Their light is mine." The Shadow-Gardener began to cast a counter-spell against Twilight's magic and the two struggled.

"Wait! You said you wanted a lock of my mane. You can have it all. Give me my friends back and I'll give you everything!" Sweetie Belle pleaded.

"Everything?" the Shadow-Gardener asked.

"Yes, please just give us every pony back!"

Electricity crackled as the Shadow-Gardener dispersed into a tempest. The missing ponies all appeared on the other side of the fallen log. The pall of shadows blocking the moonlight retreated back into the cairn. Twilight Sparkle quickly cast the containment spell. Twilight Sparkle and Sweetie Belle turned around and looked at the others as they came running up.

"I'm sorry we didn't believe you, sugar cube." Applejack apologized.

"Sweetie Belle!" Apple Bloom and Scootaloo cried out together as they ran up and hugged Sweetie Belle.

"It's strange. You offered her your mane and she didn't take it." Twilight Sparkle noted as she eyed Sweetie Belle over.

"Perhaps she was just moved by her generosity, darling." Rarity suggested.

"Perhaps." Twilight Sparkle raised her hoof to her chin in contemplation. "I made a few changes to Starswirl's containment spell so I don't think she'll be bothering anypony again for a long time." She boasted.

"Sweetie Belle headed back across the fallen log with the others. As she went along she hummed an eerie tune." Rarity narrated. "But her shadow did not follow. It simply retreated back into the cairn. It wasn't Sweetie Belle going back with the others because she offered the Shadow-Gardener everything and everything is what she took. Sweetie Belle could only watch in terror from inside the cairn but Twilight's spell was too powerful. She was now doomed to wander the Everfree Forest for eternity. The end."

"Well that's just silly!" Sweetie Belle protested. "Of course I'm still me."

"How do we know for sure?" Rarity laughed maniacally, leaning back into the darkness of the night with her horn illuminating her face.

"Wait, I don't get it!" Scootaloo interjected. "Is the lesson of the story supposed to be that generosity is bad?"

"Not every story has to have a lesson!" Apple Bloom piped in.

"Not bad for something you clearly made up as you were going along." Rainbow Dash teased.

"Well it's sure gettin' late." Applejack said as she kicked some dirt onto the fire, extinguishing it.

"Wait, shouldn't we sing campfire songs now?" Sweetie Belle asked.

"What's the matter, ya too scared to sleep?" Applejack chuckled.

"Of course I'm not scared. But maybe the others are." Sweetie Belle crossed her front hooves and huffed. The others laughed.