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A chill breeze wafted through the air, right next to the old mansion at the outskirts of Ponyville. The wind picked up flurries of snow from a nearby grave, as the house just so happened to be located right next to Ponyville's graveyard, that existed since the foundation of the quaint little town. Only a low wall built of rocks separated the eternal resting place from the mansion. The flurries got a ride around the old building on the invisible wings of the wind, past a wooden staircase on its right side, then the wind lost some of its power near a round, porthole-like window at the mansion's frontside. The flurries dropped a couple inches, then the wind grew stronger again, picked them up once more and blew them into the direction of three unicorn fillies who were approaching the mansion in the same moment.
The unicorn in the middle, with a wine-red coat and green eyes, squinted up at the porthole window and shivered. “T-That's really it? T-That's the house, Liza?” She was strapped to a cart, which she now stopped pulling to gaze at the building. Her eyes skipped over the white wooden planks and the black roof shingles. She gulped.
The filly spoken to, a confident and ambitious look coming from her purple eyes, nodded. “Yep, exactly that! Finally we're here!”
The wine-red filly flinched, gritting her teeth. “A-Are you s-sure, Liza? M-Maybe you just mixed it u-up with that nice little house over there!” She turned to the right and pointed across the street, to a lovely small cottage of a soothing, lightbrown color. A yellow pegasus filly waved at her from one of the windows and grinned.
Liza Doolots followed her hoof and frowned. “No, that's Alula's house. Come on, Ruby, you know her!”
“Y-Yeah.....” Ruby Pinch focused on the friendly filly behind the window. She did not want to look back at the scary old mansion. “I-I know.”
Liza reached out and placed a hoof around the other filly's neck, pulling her closer. “Stay calm, Ruby, it's going to be okay. Now you're safe.”
Ruby looked at her friend thankfully, a tiny smile building on her face. She leaned her head against Liza's and gave her cheek a nuzzle.
To Ruby's left, another hoof got wrapped around her neck, a purple-grey one. Ruby felt something soft gently pressing against the back of her head, then rubbing a little. “Yeah and we got your back, Ruby!”
Ruby's smile grew a little and she turned at her other friend, who looked at her with an uplifting, supportive expression in her yellow eyes. Ruby gave her a nuzzle on the cheek, too. “Thank you, Dinky,” her quiet and timid voice rang out again. She still shivered slightly.
Having finished the intimate expressions of gratitude, Ruby looked back up at the mansion. A crow was flying past it and her shivering became more intense again. “B-But..... does it really have to be here? This house looks so s-scary..... A-And did you know that the graveyard's right next to it?” Ruby's hoof shot at the graves she could see in the distance. “Why did you choose this one as our new house, Liza?”
“I knew that,” Liza answered the first question, then immediately proceeded to answer the second one. “It was cheap, that's why I chose it.” A proud grin appeared on her face. “My moms and Dinky's mom could donate a couple bits for our move, even Sparkler was able to give us something of her savings.”
A bright smile appeared on Dinky's face as she heard the name of her big sister.
“That, together with the funds you got, gave us enough money to buy a house for us. But it was only enough for a small cottage and can you imagine how much we would step on our tails in something like that?” Liza scrunched her face. “We couldn't live all three together in such a house..... but then I found this mansion!” The little filly perked up. “A mansion that stands here since Ponyville was built! Some ponies even say it was here before Ponyville even existed and that an old uni–”
“A witch!” Dinky suddenly shouted, cutting off Liza. “A witch! They say a witch used to live here, even long before the Apple Family set the foundation for Ponyville!” A huge grin was plastered all over the young unicorn's face and she bit her lower lip.
Liza shook her head, frowning slightly. “I'm sure that's just an old mare's tale, Dinky.”
“Of course!” Dinky chimed. “The tale of an old mare who was a witch!” She did not realize that she had completely missed Liza's point.
Liza sighed, while Ruby kept shivering, looking at the mansion from the corner of her eyes. “I-Is that witch still here?”
“There is no witch, Pinchy.” Seeing how scared Ruby Pinch was, Liza used the nickname she loved so much, but it did nothing to make the fear go away this time. Pulling Ruby closer, Liza looked at Dinky sternly. “Stop talking about witches now, Dinky, you scare Pinchy.”
Dinky did not seem to hear her. She stared at the mansion with glazed eyes, her mouth widely opened. “I wonder if we will find something in there. Maybe the witch left some of her things behind.” She turned at Ruby and Liza. “Imagine that, we find a secret room in there and it turns out it's the room where the witch created her spells and cooked her brews and–” She gasped. “Her cauldron! Imagine her cauldron is still in there, wouldn't it be cool to use it!”
Ruby Pinch squealed. The picture of a dark room full of spider webs, with a cauldron in the middle, dusty old books on shelves and pentacles drawn on the floor and on the walls had entered her mind.
“DINKY!” Liza hissed, now raising her voice. “Finally come down to ground level again, if Pinchy isn't going in there, all the money our families spent for this house was wasted and we have to start all over with searching for a house!”
The glazed look disappeared from Dinky's face and she gave Liza a glare. “Fine..... May the entire mansion collapse if I have fun with it.” Dinky rolled her eyes and turned away from her friends, moving her cart closer to the entrance of the old house. Her response was grouchy, but deep inside, Dinky didn't mean it like that. Some bickering between her and her best friends happened every once in a while, but it usually calmed itself down in a matter of minutes. Real fights between them were rare.
Liza and Ruby followed her silently. As they were at Dinky's side, they stopped again. The three fillies stood there motionless, their heads turned upwards. Right in front of them was the entrance to the house and they looked up steps of stairs onto a tiny porch. Unlike the rest of the mansion, the wood of the porch, the balustrade around it, the stairs and the railing weren't painted white. The pure brown of the wood greeted their eyes.
“So, do we want to head inside now?” Dinky broke the silence, eventually.
“Sure!” Liza responded, snapped out of her trance by the impatient, upbeat voice.
They untied themselves from their carts, something Ruby needed a little help with, then Liza and Dinky stepped onto the porch together. Only Ruby stayed behind, predictably. Her friends turned around, looking down at her and beckoning her to come up to them, but Ruby didn't move an inch.
“M-Maybe we can call the seller and he'll give the m-money back?” she whimpered. “We could still search for a different house.” Her lips curled upwards, the result of forcing herself to a smile.
“No chance!” Dinky protested, shock and bewilderment over the suggestion on her face. “This house is too amazing and too epic, we can't give up the opportunity to live in the house of a real–” The last word became a mumble as her lips got blocked by a turquoise hoof. Liza gave her a warning glance, then shifted her attention to Ruby.
“There isn't a need to be scared, Ruby,” she spoke, firm, but empathic. “There aren't any witches, ghosts or anything else creepy in this house. Those are only old legends, nothing more.”
Ruby turned her head away. Shyly, she looked at Liza from the corner of her eyes. “Are you sure?” Her voice was merely a whisper.
“I am sure,” Liza spoke confidently. “Old legends,” she repeated, then gave Dinky a cheeky stare, before she added “And the excessive imagination of a unicorn who read too many of them.”
Dinky's horn began to glow and Liza had to stiffle a screech as she felt a painful tug at her tail.
“But.....” Now Ruby avoided looking at the house completely. She drew little circles in the dirt with her hoof. “But why was it so cheap then? Maybe it really is haunted and that's why ponies don't want to live here.....”
“No, I'm sure it isn't,” Liza waved off the concern. “The house is cheap because many ponies believe those legends, that's all. Plus,” she pointed into the direction of the graveyard “many ponies feel uncomfortable with the thought of living right next to the dead.”
Ruby's response gave Liza the experience of how it felt when something backfired. “T-The dead?” Somehow, that there was a graveyard near her new home had only graced Ruby's mind at the edges, so far, but now it fully descended on it. “W-What if they come into the house at night?”
Liza smirked. “The dead leaving their graves at night? What, are you Noi now?” she teased her friend.
Weakly, Ruby shook her head. “No, but Noi would love to live here. I don't, though.....” Ruby turned around and began trotting back the path at the side of the house they had come from.
On the porch, Dinky and Liza sighed in unison. They ignited their horns together and a second later, Ruby found herself wrapped up by a purple and a blue aura. Combining their magical powers, Dinky and Liza pulled the third unicorn over and placed her on the porch in front of them. Ruby tried to run away, but the magic kept her tightly in place.
“Do you really want to return to her, Ruby?” Liza asked, commenting on the escape attempt.
Ruby kept squirming, trying to break free from the grip.
“Living with her again?” Liza continued. “Smelling that awful stench when you wake up at morning? Wiping away her puke several times a day? Being alone at night because she's drowning herself at the bar?”
“The yelling?” Dinky added.
Liza nodded. “Do you want having to stare into a fridge full of bottles, but without any food, again because your mother didn't bother to buy something to eat? Lying in your bed with a pillow over your head while she punches against your locked bedroom door and screams and calls you names? You want to go through all of this again, Ruby?”
Liza's speech had taken more and more effect while she talked. The last sentence made Ruby stop squirming and now she only looked down on the planks of the porch, her lower lip poking out and tiny tears in the corner of her eyes.
“No,” Ruby said quietly. She was shaking again, for a different reason this time.
The auras around her body vanished, then she was immediately embraced by her two friends. Liza wrapped her up in a tight hug and Dinky placed her hooves on Ruby's back and snuggled her head against her mane.
“It's going to be fine, Ruby,” Liza assured the scared unicorn filly. “You're out of the worst and once you lived in the house for a while, you'll see that there is nothing scary in it. And Dinky and I are always here for you.”
“Um-hm,” Dinky confirmed, keeping up the snuggles. “That's why we move in with you, after all.”
Ruby sobbed. “I'm sorry..... You left your families for me.....” Guilt stung in her heart and it made her cry.
“Because we wanted to, Ruby. You're our friend and it's great for me and Dinky if we can help you here!” Liza squeezed tighter to underline her statement.
Dinky placed a kiss on the back of Ruby's head. “And if your mother should really show up and create trouble, we'll defend you and send her away!”
Ruby sniffed. “B-But..... Aren't you missing your own parents?”
“Um-mm.” The other unicorns shook their heads at the same time. “No, because we're still here. We didn't move into a different town, or something,” Dinky explained. “And Ponyville isn't very big, we are pretty much their neighbors now!”
Ruby nodded. In a slow tempo, she retreated from Liza's hug. Dinky climbed off her back.
“Fine..... Okay,” Ruby spoke, hesitatingly. “I'll try it..... for a few days.”
“That will be enough.” Liza gave her a look of determination. “You will love it here after a few days, Ruby!” Liza patted her head, which finally caused Ruby to smile a little.
“Um-hm.” Ruby gave her a careful nod.
With Ruby's fears finally being taken care of, the trio opened the front door and stepped into the house. Their belongings stayed behind in the carts, for now. Inside, they were met with a surprise. Right behind the entrance door of the mansion, they found themselves looking at a long staircase leading to an upstairs room. It was framed by spotless white walls. A railing was fixated on the right wall. Their mouths gaped open, even Ruby's, who momentarily forgot her remaining trepidation.
“That's the entrance?” Liza raised an eyebrow. “Is there no first floor here?”
“It looks like there is none.....” Ruby said, puzzled. She began to shiver again. “But why are there windows down here then?”
To their left, Dinky beamed and her eyes grew. “That must be a secret of the witch!” she shouted. “I bet the first floor is were she did all her witchcraft and sorcery!”
“T-The witch?” Ruby's eyes shifted around in the corridor. But before she could turn around and run away, Dinky had grabbed her hoof and pulled her with her, cantering up the stairs.
“Let's check out what's up there and later, we need to find the secret trapdoor to the hidden rooms!”
Liza stayed behind and she sighed and shook her head. “What even says there are any secret rooms? If she keeps going like that, Pinchy will never stay here.....” she said, but Dinky did not hear her. She had already burst into the room at the top of the stairs, with Ruby in tow. Liza closed the door behind her, then she slowly trotted up the stairs and followed them.
She arrived next to them in a tiny foyer. They were surrounded by white doors there, one in front of them, one to the left and one to the right. All of them were closed. Despite the simple sight, Dinky looked around with sparkles in her eyes. Her mouth was widely opened from fascination.
“That's where the witch lived!” she said, matter-of-factly. Before Ruby could react with new fear or Liza scold her once more, Dinky marshed ahead and opened the door in front of them. Behind it was a small room, longish in shape, with sloped walls opposite of the door and a single window at the end of the room. It was completely empty and, as the previous owner had promised Liza, tidy and clean. To their left was a narrow door that looked like it had been hastily put together with white wooden planks. It immediately caught Dinky's attention.
“Look at this door.....” she spoke in reverence as she approached it. She let one of her forehooves glide over the wood, casting a grin at it. “This door looks mysterious, I wonder what's behind it.....” she whispered. Dinky reached for the handle and proceeded to pull it open. As she could take a look inside, though, her ears dropped. There was a tiny room behind it, barely enough for a filly to stand in, and it was completely empty. A rack was at the rear wall and it was empty, as well. Dinky groaned, disappointed.
“It's just a closet,” Lyra commented dryly, voicing the thought in Dinky's head.
“But it still looks creepy.....” Ruby whispered, turning around so that she wouldn't have to look at it anymore.
Dinky closed the door again and trotted out of the room, her hooves stomping on the old floor. She turned right and headed for the next room. Her temporarily spoiled mood got better as she opened the door and stepped inside. “Wow!” she breathed.
This room was huge! A complete contrast to the other one, except for more sloped walls, two on the left and two on the right. It had four windows, one of which was the porthole they had seen from outside. Ruby, who had entered the room with Liza in the meantime, trotted past her two friends and aimed straight for the porthole. She took a look outside, then laid down flat on her belly and smiled, marvelling at the view of Ponyville. It helped that the mansion stood on a small hill.
“Looks like Ruby finally found something that she likes in here,” Liza acknowledged with satisfaction.
“I like it, too!” Dinky voiced her agreement. “Imagine what we can do in here, the parties we can throw with that much space!”
The fillies admired the room for a couple more minutes. Then, after prying Ruby away from her favourite window, they went through the foyer again and checked out the last door. Right behind it, just one step away, they found another door, which led into a bathroom complete with toilet. The bigger discovery, however, was what was right of the bathroom door.
They had found the kitchen of the mansion. The obvious lack of a black cauldron didn't frustrate Dinky for long, as she soon got compensated by other intriguing discoveries in the room. While Dinky trotted to the other end of it, Liza approached a fridge at the wall.
“I didn't expect to find something like this left here.....” The fridge emanated a low humming and was plugged into a socket in the wall. As Liza opened it, a stream of cold air chilled her face. “Still works, too,” she said, puzzled. The oven and stove at the other wall were working, as well, which Ruby found out as she turned the buttons and heat instantly emerged from it. Before Liza could comment on this miraculous surprise, a squeal by Dinky startled her and Ruby.
“Come here, I found a trapdoor!” her excited voice shouted across the room.
Liza and Ruby came closer and found Dinky kneeling behind a corner, looking at something in the wall that indeed was a small door, situated near the floor. Like the closet door in the small room, it was painted white, but there was no handle on it, so they couldn't open it. Which only increased Dinky's interest and excitement. “I bet the mansion is full of hidden passages!”
Liza eyed the little trapdoor, intensely. “Maybe.....” she said. It was still her intent not to scare off Ruby, but the mysterious trapdoor they just found in combination with the seemingly nonexistent first floor, made her question her own doubts now. She looked away from the trapdoor and her eyes found a window next to it. Looking through it, she could see the staircase they had come up a few minutes earlier. “The architecture of this mansion is definitely unique,” she paraphrased the thoughts in her head.
Dinky got up. “Um-hm. Unique and full of charm. This mansion has so much personality!” She grinned again, her love for the old building radiating from her.
Before the three fillies left the kitchen, there was only one more room to check for them. Next to the fridge was a white, unremarkable door, almost indistinguishable from the wall. Strangely enough, this door was locked tight, as they found out when Dinky reached for the golden doorknob. She pulled and twisted and turned, but the door did not move. Dinky gave up, panting.
“That's weird.....” Ruby whimpered. “Why would the previous owner lock it? W-What's behind it?”
Liza put a hoof around her shoulders. “Don't worry about it, Pinchy. Probably just an old attic for which the key has become lost a long time ago. It's probably not more exciting than the closet we found earlier.”
“I hope you're right.....” Ruby did not dare to look at the door any longer, it gave her cold shivers.
Back in the foyer, now with all three doors opened, the fillies continued with more practical thoughts. There was one specific problem they had to solve now, which was brought up by Dinky.
“This mansion has much fewer rooms than I expected. I thought we could all have our own bedroom and a living room on top of it, but now we only have two rooms other than the kitchen, the bathroom and the foyer.”
Liza wrinkled her forehead. “Hmm..... I'm surprised, too,” she admitted. “The mansion was so cheap that I didn't ask questions and I never thought on inspecting it. I assumed there would be more than enough rooms for all of us.”
Ruby scrunched her mouth and Dinky tilted her head, both of them giving Liza doubtful glances.
“Hmm, let's see.....” Liza trotted past them and entered the small room again. “I think this one should be Ruby's room. She is the one who moves away from her mother, after all, so she should have some privacy.”
Behind her, Dinky nodded. Only Ruby didn't look happy. “Where that creepy-looking door is? I know there's nothing scary behind it, but it still looks like something is going to jump out of it at night.....” She closed her eyes and began shaking.
Liza returned. She put a hoof on Ruby's shoulder, causing her to open her eyes again. “We just put your bookshelf right in front of it. Then you won't have to see it.” Dinky joined in and put a hoof on Ruby's other shoulder.
Once more, this cast a tiny smile on Ruby's lips. The timid filly looked at her friends, from one to another. “O-Okay,” she said.
“And Dinky and I –” Liza continued, taking her hoof off Ruby and trotting into the bigger room “– we will sleep here!” She reared up on her hindlegs and stretched her arms out, pointing with them at the entirety of the room, just when Dinky and Ruby stepped inside. “It's a big enough room for both me and Dinky to sleep in here. And we even have a bit of space left in the middle!”
Dinky bounced past Liza and Ruby, to the far end of the room, next to the porthole. “I call dibs, my bed will stand here!” She kept bouncing at the spot, a little niche with a window to the right of the porthole, her blonde mane getting flung up and down.
“Good, so that's settled, my bed will be here then!” Liza trotted up to the opposite bay at the other end of the room and took position there. The wood of the floor creaked and Ruby scurried at her side, startled by the sound.
“What about the locked door in the kitchen?” Ruby whimpered, clinging to Liza's coat. “It looks scary, too.....”
Liza scrunched her face for a moment, then beamed. “Dinky and I just move the fridge in front of it and then that's covered from your sight, too.”
Dinky left her spot next to the porthole and joined her friends, signalling agreement with Liza's idea.
“O-Okay.....” Ruby looked at the floor, still slightly shivering.
“So, does all of this sound good, Pinchy? Do you think you can live here?” Liza wrapped her hooves around the shivering filly in a supportive fashion.
“Y-Yeah..... As long as you two are here, I-I think I'll manage. I really don't want to return home again.....” Ruby's eyes became dull with the last sentence.
“This is your home now, Ruby!” Dinky lifted a hoof and brushed it over her friend's mane, earning herself a grateful smile.
“Our home,” Liza added, squeezing the filly stronger.
“Um-hm.” Dinky inched closer, wrapping her hooves around the other side of Ruby's body. “And no scary witch legends or creepy trapdoors will change that!”
Now Ruby teared up, moved by the compassion. “Um-hm, you are right. With you at my side, I think I can start loving this place.” She pulled her friends closer.
Dinky and Liza leaned their heads in and began rubbing and nuzzling Ruby's face. Then the three friends sat down on the floor and a round of snuggling ensued. They had time until Derpy's moving company would bring their furniture. And it was the beginning of Ruby Pinch's new freedom. They had all the time in Equestria.
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Author's Note
Please take a few moments to write a comment and let your thoughts about the story be known. If this story gets a lot of comments, it will make a certain filly very happy. 
