Gold Vine hummed happily, her mind sitting precariously on the edge of dreams and the waking world. She felt so at ease, actually rested for the first time in months. She didn't want it to end. If she could spend all of eternity like this, she would do so with a smile on her face. She curled tighter into herself, wrapping her makeshift cloak around herself to block out the early morning sun. Her saddlebags made doing so near impossible, forcing an irate grumble out of her as she undid the clasps holding them to her barrel and putting them to better use as a pillow before she rewrapped herself. Bones made for a poor headrest, but it was better then the rock she tried to use on her first night outside of the city.

She grimaced as she felt a familiar pull, though it was different from how it was before. While it served as a guide for her the previous night, now it felt like it was trying to make her get up. It reminded her of how her mother would nudge her awake in the morning for her lessons when she was a filly. She grumbled as she instead pulled further into herself, tucking her head under her blanket in defiance. This was the best sleep she had had in days and no force in Equis was going to make her give it up any time soon.

A low rumbling from her stomach proved her wrong.

"Traitor," she frowned, staggering to her hooves.

She let out a yawn as she opened her eyes to get a better look at her surroundings. What she saw made her freeze, mouth still open long after her yawn.

Apple and pear trees surrounded her from all sides, the early morning light shining off of their dew-soaked leaves in a brilliant display. Their branches were heavy with fruit just coming into season that filled the air with a heavenly perfume that made Gold's mind spin. That was all secondary to the sight that greeted her when she turned around. Towering over her was what looked like the parents of all of the other trees around her, the two intertwined trees reaching a good five feet past the canopy of their neighbors. The sight was so enchanting that Gold almost forgot to breathe, her eyes glued to the verdant tower.

She shook her shock away as her stomach let out another groan.

"Food," she muttered to herself. "Get it, then try to figure out where I am."

A task that was easier said than done. While she was surrounded by food, all of it was far beyond her reach. Seeing no way around it, she first tried to climb one of the nearby apple trees. She found out very quickly that Earth Pony hooves worked differently from Unicorn ones, her Grabber Magic practically cementing her hooves to the tree's bark as she dragged herself up the trunk.

"Finally! A blessing in this thrice damned curse!" she grunted, a smile spread across her muzzle.

In time, she managed to crawl onto one of the tree's lowest branches. Taking a moment to catch her breath, she tried to use her new vantage point to give her an idea of where she was. More wild apple and pear trees grew around her in a roughly sixty mile radius before slowly shifting into a more organized grove of strictly apple trees. Beyond that, she could see what appeared to be a few buildings in the distance to the south. Turning towards the east, she could see a small town with the unmistakable crystal structure belonging to Princess Twilight Sparkle. The sight of the castle put a small hole in the pit of her stomach. She knew what magic could do to her and she did not want to go back to that. Just the thought of a glowing horn put a chill down her spine, her breathing turning into harsh gasps as her time in Moonstone's torture chamber came back to her.

"S-S-Stop it!" she gasped, the world slowly starting to spin as her heart pounded in her chest. "She isn't here! She can't hurt you! Y-Y-You're free!"

Little by little, her nerves started to settle as she said that.

This had been a reoccurring problem for her and an additional reason for her to leave Canterlot. Ever since she escaped Moonstone, every time she saw a Unicorn use magic she would be brought back to her torture. Even thinking about it could give her intense panic attacks if she didn't ground herself in time.

She took a shaky breath as she slowly came back to the present, her grumbling stomach reminding her why she was in a tree in the first place. Smirking, she welcomed the distraction as she looked around, careful to not look in the direction of Princess Twilight Sparkle's castle. A nice juicy apple hung just within her reach, something she was greatly pleased about as she plucked it off its branch.

She took a bite and with wide eyes froze, before she completely inhaled the fruit. After months of starvation and days of nothing, but what few blades of bland grass she could find on the road, this single apple was a gift from The Maker itself! Even the core tasted divine, a part that Gold Vine avoided like beasts did with hollowed out bones. She wasted no time grabbing another, this one tasting just as good as the last. The whole world seemed to brighten for her as she wolfed down every stray fruit she could reach. It wasn't just her gut that felt full as she ate, her magic seemed to surge as well. It filled her with energy she hadn't felt sense she was a foal, a blast of joy filling her so much that she was left a giggling loon while she climbed back down to the ground. She lost her footing at the last point and fell the remaining three feet back first with a startled yelp.

She groaned for a second, only to go back to drunkenly laughing where she laid. A dull clacking brought a small frown to her muzzle. Staggering to her hooves, she leveled a flat glare at her saddle bags.

"Oh shut up Skully," she huffed, stomping over to where her bags laid.

More dry clacking answered her, some of them sounding close to laughter as Gold Vine stuck a hoof into the bag. When she pulled her hoof back, her skull came out with it. She grimaced as she made the skull face her, her eyes narrowing as she gazed deeply into its empty sockets.

"I know its just fruit, but its the first good thing I've eaten in months! Don't ruin this for me!"

The skull rattled a bit in her hoof's grip.

Gold rolled her eyes at that and said, "Yes, yes, I know. However, just because you can't eat doesn't mean that I shouldn't enjoy my ability to. You seriously need to get over yourself."

Again the skull rattled, earning a raised brow out of the mare.

"Hold you over my head? Why would that-?"

Realization struck Gold and she gave the skull a rueful smile.

"Oh, want to be clever, eh? With that kind of attitude, I have half a mind to use you as a water cup again."

The skull rattled, earning an irate frown out of the mare.

"Do you want me to use you as a Shake Spear prop again?"

The skull was still for a moment, then slightly shook in her hoof.

A satisfied smile formed on Gold's muzzle as she nodded at the bone and said, "Good. Now, stay behaved and I'll see if I can get you polished in the way you like."

The skull rattled again, the act seemingly in an excited manner before the bone went still. Gold Vine chuckled to herself as she returned the skull to the bag with the rest of her skeleton. After everything she had been through recently, it was good to have somepony she could have a dignified conversation with. Sure, Skully was her old skull and many would question her sanity for talking to her, but the old bone was just so easy to vent to. Granted, she could be ornery at times and her puns could be a bit on the obnoxious side of comedy, but at the end of the day she was the best travel companion Gold could ask for. It was a shame that she couldn't let her out of her bag very often, but they both agreed that it was how things needed to be.

Eager to get a better lay of the land, Gold her bags under her blanket and then under a layer of fallen leaves to better hide her friend. Once she was sure her bags were properly hidden, she headed in the direction she saw the farm buildings earlier. For a couple hours, her walk was met with a silence only broken by her breathing and hoofsteps. As she expected, the more feral trees slowly gave way to more orderly looking ones the further south she traveled. Her mood remained high, each step filling her with a warm energy that she had never felt before from the very land itself.

Do Earth Ponies experience this all of the time? she mused, idly staring at a tree as she walked past it.

A loud Thwack! in the distance caught her attention, pulling her out of her musings. Curious, she moved in the direction of the sound, it repeating itself at a near predictable pattern as she did. Soon, voices accompanied the sound, brining a sense of caution to the mare as she advanced. Keeping to the shadows and making her hoofsteps as soft as she could, she followed the voices. When she found their source, a gentle smile grew on her muzzle.

She saw a family of three Earth Ponies tending to the trees. One was a massive red stallion with a short and messy orange mane and tail, a heavy yoke locked in place around his neck. The other was an orange mare with a long blond mane and tail tied at the ends, a stetson hat keeping the sun out of her eyes as she worked. The third member of the group was an energetic yellow filly with a pink bow keeping her curly red mane under control. The older pair harvested the fruit by striking the trees with their hind hooves while the filly ran about picking up any stray apples that didn't make it into the baskets. She watched them idly from the shadows, a part of her heart warmed at the sight of family cooperation. Never before had she seen Earth Ponies go about their business before. She knew that they had lives and worked, of course, but she never took a chance to see it first hoof before now. The few Earth Ponies that chose to live in Canterlot were often store owners or flower sellers, not the backbones of their tribe like this family here. As she watched them toil away, a streak of panic slowly started to settle into her gut.

This was clearly a farm, owned by the family she studied. A farm full of fruit that she had eaten without permission or payment. Her breathing started to quicken as panic filled her, memories of her fall jumping to the front of her mind.

N-No! Not again! I-I-I have taken from my betters! I'm a Mud Pony! I have no right to an Earth Pony's property!

A common misconception was that terms such as Mud Pony, Cloud Trotter, or Snub Horn were blanket slurs, when in fact they held more of an old denomination of status among the tribes. While some of the older Canterlot Noble Families still considered Unicorns to be above the other tribes, they still treated the higher ranked members of each tribe's society with a certain level of respect. This was applied to Weather Factory Pegasi and Earth Pony Farmers in addition to large business owners of the two "lesser" tribes as they provided much of what the Unicorn Nobles used in their daily lives. Gold was raised being taught that those at the bottom of the tribal social standings were not to be given such privileges. Should they try to reach above their station without earning it, severe punishments awaited them.

Her breathing turned into desperate gasps as she fell to her haunches, visions of what this could mean for her if her crimes were discovered. She felt chains on her legs and neck. She could hear drips of water on cold stone and the buzzing of flies. She could see three ponies standing over her, rage in their eyes as they pointed blades at her. She could taste her own blood on her tongue as they took turns cutting her open.

A faint scream crept past her lips as she came back to the real world, panicked breaths shooting out of her in frantic gasps.

No!, she thought frantically, shaking her head as she fell to her haunches. I can't go back to that! I can't!

She covered her head with her hooves, ears flat against her head as tears slid down her cheeks. She felt so small. So helpless. She hadn't felt like this since she was a foal and she hated it.

There has to be some way out of this, she thought, frantically wiping her tears away. Some way I can atone for my crimes.

She watched them toil away, completely unaware of the guilty party that watched them as she tried to think. It was when she saw the filly struggling to move a basket full of apples that an idea came to her. While she was not a farmer, she was at least familiar with plants. Her time studying Floramancy gave her a particular knack for tending to plants of various shapes and types. It should be a simple enough task for her to see what trees were ready for harvesting when given the chance, the particulars of how she would go about doing so would be a different beast all together. Her body was still new to her and she highly doubted it would be as simple as bucking the trees to make any progress.

"I will figure it out," she nodded, her lips pulled into a stiff frown as she watched the farmers work. "I won't go back to that. Never again."

***

The moon shined brightly in the night sky, apple trees casting long shadows under its shine as their leaves rustled in breeze. It was a calm and peaceful kind of scene, but for Gold Vine it was anything but. The mare walked as quickly as she dared, all of her training coming to bare as she used the cover of shadow to navigate the massive grove of trees. She had spent the whole day studying the farmers, getting as close as she dared to better understand the technique they used to get the apples out of the trees. She took careful note of everything from their stance to where their hooves hit the trunks. Granted, she spent more time studying the stallion than she was willing to admit, but it was purely for professional reasons.

He was a marvelous specimen though, she thought idly as she slinked further into the orchard. I wonder if that mare was his wife. She certainly has amazing luck if that is the case.

Her ears twitched at every sound, just the slightest rustling of leaves putting her on edge as she tried to find a tree ready enough to be harvested. She appraised each one like one would a collection of expensive paintings, her sharp eyes taking note of each fruit visible from ground level. It wasn't enough for the tree to be ready, it needed to also be outside of hearing range from the farm. She shuddered to think what the family would do to her if they caught her.

Soon, she found a tree that was ready for harvest that was at a safe distance from the house. Running through what she observed earlier in the day, she got into position, took careful aim, and bucked the tree. She let out a barely contained squeak of agony as a sharp pain shot through her hind legs and up her spine. She fell into the fetal position as she waited for the pain to pass, a long list of colorful phrases barely being swallowed back down. When the pain passed, she got up and tried again only to end up back on the ground again.

"W-What am I doing wrong?" she whined, staggering to her hooves. "I imitated their technique perfectly! I know I did!"

She stared up at the tree in frustration, its fruit still hanging on its branches in spite of her efforts. Refusing to surrender, she tried again and again to knock the apples off of the tree's branches. She ignored the pain, her anger and stubbornness the only things keeping her standing as she fought on. Eventually, a loud crack filled the air, her hind legs finally braking from the strain she put them through. She fought back a scream as she fell to the ground again, frustrated tears wetting the grass beneath her.

"They made this look so easy," she sniffled, her body twitching painfully as each bone popped back into place. "Is this too much for a Mud Pony to handle?"

Desperate, she turned her head towards the tree and weeping like a foal begged, "Please...help me."

For a long moment, only silence owned the scene while Gold waited for her legs to recover from her foolishness. Suddenly, she felt a pull coming from the tree, similar to the one she felt the night she found the orchard. A second later, apples fell from the tree and landed in the baskets below. Gold watched with wide eyes and a slacked jaw as this happened before relief started to settle into her.

Again, she felt the pull and staggered to her hooves. Cautiously, she approached the tree, feeling much like a foal setting hoof before their judgmental father after breaking a rule. She couldn't explain why, but she felt as though it was waiting for something. She didn't know why she did what she did next. Only that it felt like the proper thing to do at the time.

With a wide smile, she hugged the tree and sniffled out a wet, "Thank you."

The tree didn't say anything back, but she could feel it "say" you're welcome.

Author's Note

Here we go folks.