Sweetie Belle turned and saw a house in the distance.

"That looks respectable," she thought. "I wonder if they'll be able to give me directions."

Suddenly, a woman came running out of the woods and Sweetie Belle followed her. The woman rapped loudly at the door with her knuckles and it was opened by another woman.

Both women, Sweetie Belle noticed, were dressed in lavish gowns and had powdered wigs that curled all over their heads. One of them (the one she had followed) had a rainbow wig and wore a blue gown while the other had a light pink wig and was dressed in green.

The woman in blue with the rainbow wig produced a giant letter from under her arm and handed it to the other.

"For the Princess. An invitation from the Queen to play croquet," she said in a solemn tone.

"From the Queen. An invitation for the Princess to play croquet," the woman in the pink wig and green gown repeated in the same solemn tone, only slightly changing the order of the words.

"An invitation to play croquet, from the Queen, for the Princess," the woman in the rainbow wig replied.

The woman in green blinked and said, "I've got the gist."

"You're sure?" the woman in the rainbow wig asked.

"Yes, it's an invitation from the Queen for the Princess to play croquet," she said.

"I wouldn't put it quite like that, but it'll have to do I suppose,"

And the woman in the rainbow wig walked back into the woods.

When Sweetie Belle approached the house, she saw that the woman in the green gown was sitting on a chair away from the door and staring up at the sky.

Sweetie Belle went timidly up to the door and rang the bell.

When no one answered her, she tried knocking.

"It's no good you knocking like that," said the woman in green.

"Why not?" Sweetie Belle asked.

"Two good reasons: one, because I'm on the same side of the door as you,"

"Oh, yes,"

"Two: they're making so much noise inside that no one can hear you,"

Indeed, there was a commotion going on within – a constant howling and sneezing, and every now and then a great crash, as if a dish had been broken to pieces.

"How am I supposed to get inside?" she asked the lady in green.

"That is the question. The problem. You might even say the conundrum or riddle," she replied cryptically. "There might be some sense in your knocking if we had a door between us. I could go and get a spare door... but that would take too long. On the other hand, if you were inside the house, you could knock, and I could let you out."

She then got up from the chair and proceeded to demonstrate knocking on the door.

"'Knock, knock!' 'This way out, Miss,'" she said with a low curtsey.

"But I don't want to go out," Sweetie Belle said. "I want to go in."

"Of course," the lady in green remarked before she sat down again. "But if you did want to go out, it would be much easier. Meanwhile, I am going to sit here until tomorrow—"

At that moment, the door of the house opened and a large plate came flying out, straight at the woman's head. It completely missed and broke to pieces against the wall behind her.

"—or the next day, perhaps," she continued, exactly as if nothing had happened. "Or even for a whole week. Then I can come back by popular demand..."

"But how am I supposed to get inside?" Sweetie Belle repeated. "I need to ask for directions."

"'Will you ever get in?' is the question you should be asking," the woman in green said. "I am going to sit here for days, thinking about it, and singing, 'Coming Through the Rye.'" Then she began humming. "Dee da dada dar dee dar da dar dee dar dee dar dum..."

It was, no doubt. But Sweetie Belle didn't like to be told so.

"It's really sad how everyone argues around here," she thought.

Even this woman seemed to enjoy it. Granted, she was a bit more passive in her arguments, but they were still arguments.

"It's no use talking to you," Sweetie Belle told her. "I'll just have to do it myself."

"That's the spirit!" the woman exclaimed.

And Sweetie Belle opened the door and went in.

The door led into a large kitchen, which was full of smoke from one end to the other. The Princess, who looked an awful lot like Cadence, was sitting on a three-legged stool in the middle, nursing a baby boy that, oddly enough, looked very much like Flurry Heart; while the cooks were leaning over the stove, stirring in a large pot which seemed to be full of soup.

"There is way too much pepper in that soup!" Sweetie Belle thought.

There was certainly too much of it in the air. Even the Princess sneezed occasionally. As for the baby, it was alternating between sneezing and howling without a moment's pause. The only creatures in the kitchen that weren't sneezing where the cooks, and a large creature with a horse's mane, a deer antler, a blue goat horn, a snake-like tongue, a white goat beard, the right arm of a lion, the left claw of an eagle, the right leg of a green dragon, the left leg of a horse, one batwing, one Pegasus wing, and the tail of a red dragon with a tuft of white fur on the end of it; which was lying on a shelf above the stove and grinning from ear to ear.

"Please, could you tell me why that creature is grinning at me like that?" Sweetie Belle asked, a little timidly, for she was not sure whether it was good manners for her to speak first in the presence of a Princess.

"He's a Draconequus," said the Princess. "Draconequuses always grin! Isn't that so, Piggy?" she addressed her baby, who violently sneezed.

"I didn't know that Draconequuses always grinned," Sweetie Belle said. "In fact, I didn't know that Draconequuses could grin."

"They all can," the Princess said. "And most of them do."

"I don't know of any that do," Sweetie Belle said very politely.

"Well you don't know much then, do you?" the Princess asked. "Isn't that so, Piggy?"

Sweetie Belle didn't like the tone of her remark.

"Are you really a Princess?" Sweetie Belle asked.

"Every inch! And then some!"

It was then that the cooks started throwing everything within their reach at the Princess and the baby – the plates came first, followed by a shower of other dishes, and finally a teacup.

The Princess took no notice of them, even when two of them hit her; and the baby was howling so much already that it was impossible to say whether the blows hurt it or not.

"Be careful!'" Sweetie Belle cried as the teacup flew close by the baby. "You almost hit his poor little nose!"

"Nonsense! He can already play 'Three Blind Mice' on his nose-flute," The baby stopped howling long enough for the Princess to ask, "What do you want, little miss?"

"I want to know how to get into the garden,"

"Oh, now you're talking! But I prefer singing to talking, don't you? Let's have a song!"

And with that, she began nursing her child again, singing a sort of lullaby to it as she did so, and giving it a violent shake at the end of every line.

Speak roughly to your little boy,

And beat him when he sneezes;

He only does it to annoy,

Because he knows it teases.

While the cooks and the baby "sang" the chorus (which sounded like nothing but the baby crying, "Whaa! Whaa! Whaa!"), the Princess started tossing the baby up and down, and the poor little thing howled.

I speak severely to my boy,

I beat him when he sneezes;

For he can thoroughly enjoy

The pepper when he pleases!

"Here! You nurse it for a bit!" the Princess said to Sweetie Belle as she flung the baby at her. "I've got an appointment. Can't wait!"

And she hurried out of the room.

Sweetie Belle caught the baby and carried it out of the house.

"I best get you out of here," she said. "They're sure to kill you."

The cook threw a frying pan at her as she went, but it just missed her.

When Sweetie Belle exited the house, she passed the lady in green, who was still sitting and staring up at the sky.

"I thought you wanted to go in," she said.

"I've been in, now I'm coming out!" Sweetie Belle snapped in reply.

The lady in green kept watching the sky and said, "Life is so complicated."

---

"You mustn't grunt like that," Sweetie Belle told the baby. "You sound as if you've turned into a pig."

The baby grunted again and Sweetie Belle looked at its face to see what was the matter with it. Then she gasped in alarm.

"You have turned into a pig! I best let you go,"

So, she set the little creature down, and felt quite relieved to see it trot away quietly into the wood.

"When he grows up he will make a very ugly man," she thought to herself, "or a very handsome pig."

She stood up and looked around and saw that she was at a crossroads.

"Which way should I go?" she thought. "Which path should I take?"

She was startled when she heard a voice singing a little song. And the song went like this:

'Twas brillig, and the slithy toves

Did gyre and gimble in the wabe:

All mimsy were the borogoves,

And the mome raths outgrabe.

Sweetie Belle looked up and saw the Draconequus sitting on a bough of a tree a few yards off, and he grinned when he locked eyes with her.

He looked good-natured, she thought. Still, he had very long claws and a great many teeth, so she felt that he ought to be treated with respect.

"Discord," she began, as she did not know whether he would like the name. He grinned a little wider. "Can you tell me which way I ought to go?"

"Well, that depends a great deal on where you want to get to," Discord replied.

"I don't much care where—"

"Then it doesn't matter which way you go," said Discord.

"—so long as I get somewhere," Sweetie Belle added.

"Oh, you're sure to do that," Discord told her, "if you only walk long enough."

"Okay. The beautiful garden!"

"Why do you want to go there?" Discord asked.

"It looks safe,"

"Sometimes some things that look safe turn out nasty. And some things that look nasty turn out safe. That's immoral,"

Sweetie Belle felt that this could not be denied.

"Oh, by the way, in case you're still curious," Discord added, "he went that way."

"Who did?" Sweetie Belle asked.

"The white rabbit,"

"He did?"

"He did what?"

"Went that way?"

"Who did?"

"The white rabbit,"

"What rabbit?"

"Didn't you just say-oh, never mind!" she exclaimed as she turned her back on him.

"Can you stand on your head?" he asked her.

Sweetie Belle turned to look at Discord again and saw that he had separated his head from the rest of his body and was literally standing on it.

"Oh!" she huffed in exasperation.

She felt this was getting nowhere, so she thought it would be as well to introduce another subject of conversation.

"What sort of people live around here?" she asked.

"Well, a Hatter named Pinkie Pie lives over there. Follow my right paw," he said as he pointed in one direction.

As Sweetie Belle looked up to where Discord was pointing, he vanished and reappeared standing on a branch of a neighboring tree.

"And a gentleman called, 'Sandwich,' nicknamed 'Cheese,' lives there," he said, pointing in the other direction. "They're probably having some kind of party. Visit either, or both, if you like: they're both mad."

"But I don't want to meet mad people,"

"Oh, but you can't help that. Most everyone's mad here. They're mad, you're mad, and it's only by chance and careful planning if you're not,"

"How do you know I'm mad?"

"You must be. Or you wouldn't have come here. So, to reiterate, how do I know you're mad? Because you're here! And everyone here is mad!" he laughed. "You may have noticed that I'm not all there myself."

He vanished again. Sweetie Belle was not very surprised (she was getting used to strange things happening). While she was still looking at the branch he had been standing on, he suddenly appeared again, this time reclining on a hammock made of clouds that hung between two trees.

"I went to a Hunt Ball once, I didn't like it. Terrible people. They all started hunting me!"

"Life must be hard for you," Sweetie Belle answered very quietly, as if the Draconequus had come back in a natural way.

"Yeah, but I grin and bear it," he replied. "By-the-by, what became of the Princess's baby? I'd nearly forgotten to ask."

"It turned into a pig,"

"I knew it would," Discord said as he vanished again. "It's the same with crows and moor-hens."

While Sweetie Belle was looking at the place where Discord had been, he suddenly reappeared again. This time, hanging upside down, by his tail, from a branch on yet another tree.

"Did you say 'pig' or 'fig'?" he asked. "Because I know you didn't say 'wig'. So, which was it?"

"I said 'pig'," Sweetie Belle replied. "And I wish you wouldn't keep appearing and disappearing so suddenly, you're making me very dizzy!"

"So, sorry," he apologized. "Is this better?"

This time, he vanished quite slowly, beginning with the end of his tail, and ending with the grin, which remained some time after the rest of him had gone.

Sweetie Belle waited a little, half-expecting to see him again, but he did not reappear, and after a minute or two she walked on in the direction in which the Pink Hatter was said to live.

She hadn't gone much farther before she came in sight of the house of the Pink Hatter. At first, she thought it wasn't the right house, because from the distance it looked like a loaf of bread, or maybe a cake.

"Discord was right. They are having a party. I wonder if they'd mind if I joined them?"