Twilight's mind spun faster than Rainbow's Cloud DJ move as she plopped down on her bed. Fluttershy had just become her Special Somepony, having beaten her nerves and admit her feelings by showing something to her for her eyes alone. Had she not made a Pinkie Promise to not tell anypony about the mask or its story, she would be spilling to the rest of her friends and Princess Celestia. She had a hard time resisting the urge to start writing a letter to the Princess. Four times in the course of an hour, Pinkie had emerged from physically impossible places, glaring at her as she tried to begin writing of the story to her mentor in a friendship report. On the fifth time of Pinkie appearing, sliding out of a drawer in her desk, Twilight gave up, locking all of her parchment, ink, and quills in a floor-safe beneath her bed to prevent Pinkie from somehow appearing a sixth time.

Fluttershy, on the other hoof, was bouncing off the walls in pure and unadulterated joy. None of her animal friends were in her cottage because of the noise she was making. Ecstatic squeals of excitement and girlish giggles of glee flowed forth from the isolated cottage like music. To those who knew Fluttershy, hearing her this happy was like hearing Octavia perform the most touching of Beethooven's symphonies. To her animal friends, including Angel, the sounds were simply unbearable noise.

When Fluttershy had calmed down enough to sit in one spot for more than a minute at a time, she looked up at her mask, which she had hung back on the wall in its spot above the lavender plant. She whispered a soft prayer of thanks to her friend locked within it. Her wide smile never faltered, though her eyes let a few happy tears flow from her teal eyes. She wiped them away with a quick swipe of her hoof as she made her way to her kitchen. Once there, she set a pot of water to boil, reaching up and retrieving her box of various tea blends. She giggled again as she opened it and selected a blend that had been sealed in the top of the box between a false top and the actual top panel of the box. She closed the box again, placing it back in its usual spot on the top shelf of her highest cupboard.

As the water boiled, Fluttershy sang an incoherent melody of bubbly laughter and squeals and contented sighs. She tried to suppress her near face-splitting smile, but failed miserably, making the smile widen in defiance. Never before had she been so happy. Even when she had met her animal friends the first time when she fell to the ground, she hadn't been this full of pure joy. Admitting her feelings to Twilight and thus beginning a more-than-best-friends relationship had now taken the cake. Nothing she knew could top this feeling.

The harsh whistle of the teapot tugged her mind from its reverie, replacing fantastical flashbacks of that single moment to the physical world of reality. Her smile softened into a contented grin as she lowered the heat on her stove and poured some water into a waiting teacup. She set the carefully stashed packet of tea into the scalding water to steep, knowing full well that this cup of tea was meant for something she would tell no one about. One day, she might tell her Special Somepony about it, but that was a stretch. If that happens to her, then I'll tell her about it. Not before.

She cooled the top of the tea with a quick blow of air which dissipated the steam like a firm buck to a cloud. But the steam returned but fractions of a second later, rising up like hooves into the air defying Death. She took a quick sip, the flavors of the ingredients of the blend spreading over her tongue like butter on toast or syrup on waffles. Ginger warmly bit at her taste buds. Lavender caressed them smoothly. Citrus zest tickled them, its tang sending tingles of electricity throughout her mouth. Other, less than tasty ingredients were kept at bay by those three main ingredients, but their desired effects were less than suppressed. She inhaled deeply, her lungs filling with air as though to inflate her enough for her to float off the ground without her wings. As she released her breath, a steady pink ember emanated from her mouth and maintained itself with her breath, sparkling dimly in the unlit room. She took another sip, considerably larger since the tea had cooled down significantly. Warmth filled her chest, spreading through her without restriction. She took a gulp of the tea, now unable to feel its scalding temperature as it slid down her throat, adding to the comfortable warmth she felt in her chest. She smiled again and drank the rest of the tea in one gulp, the searing hot water pushing the warmth to her hooves and the tips of her wings. Her mane glowed as though lit by the moon, a pale light seeming to seep into the air from it. Her fur and feathers took on a similar trait from the tea, glowing palely like her friend within the mask on the wall.

She yawned, her burnt-out mind and the relaxing qualities of the tea mixing together to make that one act of fatigue. Her smile uncurled itself and walked off her face as she walked up the stairs of her tree cottage to her bedroom. She sighed placidly, moving forth to her bed. As she plopped down and curled up on it, her smile returned, laying down and curling up on her lips for a long rest through her dreams. She closed her eyes, preparing for the true purpose of the tea to kick in. She fell asleep on top of the covers, a happy smile on her face as the air around her rippled like water from the warmth she gave off and glowed with her pale luminance.

Downstairs, on the wall lined with tea-herbs growing in pots, the mask lifted itself from the wall. Beneath it, the air gathered in an attempt to be solid. It gave off a moon-like radiance, glowing pale silver and white as the creature sealed within crept back out. The Butterfly Dragon that had enchanted the mask that was its home reformed in the still early nighttime air. It's strange smile was as large as Fluttershy's was just an hour earlier, before she had drunk the tea. It made its way up the stairs to the pegasus' room, creeping in as smoothly as a snake. It closed the partially open door behind it with a flick of its long serpentine tail. It stood above its pony friend for a moment, watching her from above like a seraph assigned to protect her. It bent down slowly, touching its snout to hers as gently as a mother would to kiss her sleeping child goodnight long after they had fallen asleep. The Butterfly Dragon laid down and curled itself around Fluttershy, one of its giant wings moving to cover her. It closed its eyes, and joined the pony in her dreams.

Author's Note

I kinda just went with what I felt for this one. The first two paragraphs were easy and everything from the tea onwards were really easy and fun to write.

What's up, Flutters? What could you be hiding?

<3 DarqFox