The Grand Market was a very different place in the evening. Gone were the vegetable stalls and bulky everyday items. The booksellers were closed, as one might expect. The little cafes were still open, but they served items more suited to leisurely meals, rather than the grab-and-go food of the daylight hours. There were more jewelers and many merchants that sold candles and beautiful pierced metal lanterns. Luxuries rather than necessities seemed to be the main focus, and everypony moved at a much more relaxed pace.

I bought a fruit sherbert at a little cart and stood eating it and taking in the sights, sounds, and smells. There was magic all around me, of course. Most was of the mundane sort that enhanced or eased the use of some trivial object, but there were a few little ripples that promised something more intriguing.

I finished my sherbert and wandered off toward one of the strongest traces, opening my magical perception until I could feel the presence of the mechanisms of earth and firmament. The silk-and-ribbon-draped stall that attracted me was decorated with innumerable variations on the theme of hearts, and there were several signs tacked to the poles supporting the silk canopy that read, "Love Potions" in various languages.

The proprietors were two beautiful Saddle Arabian mares, dressed in superb woven halters and brocade saddles, all of which were positively dripping with fine jewelry. They nickered a welcome as I approached, and greeted me in flawless Equuish.

"Good evening, gracious lady! What brings you to our humble shop?" said the first.

"Surely, a mare as amazingly beautiful as yourself cannot be in need of our wares!" said the second.

My magical disguise had not been designed to enhance my appearance in any way, and made me look quite thick through the barrel in order to compensate for the physical bulk of my wings. I knew for a fact that I was covered in dust and that the sweaty utility vest I wore did nothing to improve my looks, but this sort of unbelievable flattery was as common as a "hello" in Zanzebra.

I certainly didn't need any of their potions, but I was interested in the product in an academic way, so I chatted with the mares for a while. They described the effects in glowing hyperbolic language that was unfortunately short on details. I bought one called "The Dawn of Passion" with the intent of analyzing it later and gave it a little pulse of probing magic as I was putting it away in a pocket of my vest.

The magic was familiar. I couldn't place it at first, but it wasn't the sort that Zecora commonly used or that I had encountered in the few days we had been in Stone Town. It also gave me an immediate negative reaction.

I scanned the stall again, fully opening my magical sight, and everything fell into place.

I suppose my shock must have been entirely obvious to the faux Saddle Arabians, because they both went wide-eyed and stiff with surprise and fear. One took a step backwards, and I knew they were seconds away from fleeing.

"I won't give you away," I said quietly.

They glanced at each other and one said, "No. You won't."

I reflexively brought up a small shield spell before my conscious mind was aware I was being attacked. The bottle that one of the changelings threw at me shattered on the bubble of force and burst into greenish dripping fire.

There were gasps and cries of alarm from the nearby crowd. I inverted the shield, encapsulating the fire, and then hardened and expanded it quickly. The lowering of pressure and temperature extinguished the roiling green flames, but the sight of a suddenly appearing fire transforming into a large hovering sphere of smoke was far from a calming one and the crowd around the stall edged toward panic.

I flung the shield and the black, oily smoke it contained upward into the darkening sky. When it had gotten a dozen furlongs of height, I dismissed the shield. The inrush of air made a loud pop, and the smoke burst out into a ragged star shape that slowly dispersed on the wind.

"Magic show!" I said, improvising like mad in the trade pidgin I had only just learned. "Tonight big show here! Come, all-time! See Great and Powerful Trixie! Bring big money, yes!"

The panicked expressions of most of the crowd turned to disgust and not a little anger.

"Stupid pony!" a water buffalo bellowed into my face before stomping off.

When I could turn my attention to the love potion booth again it was, of course, empty. I opened my magical sense as much as possible, but the changelings had both speed and the confusing magical chaos of the market in their favor. I couldn't trace them.

But I could rummage through what they had left behind.

I made my way behind the market stalls, and when I found a little niche that afforded me privacy, I removed my disguise amulet and cast a spell that made me into a pretty fair copy of one of the Saddle Arabian mares. I returned to the stall, ignoring some inquisitive glances from the merchants to either side, and began to slowly, thoroughly, and unobtrusively ransack the place.

I had just stuffed a promising-looking bundle of papers into my vest when I had my first customer. He was a rather scrawny zebra, barely more than a colt, nervously gripping a coin pouch in his teeth.

"We are closed, now," I said in Zebrish.

He set the pouch down on the counter and pulled it open. "But you promised! Look. I have brought the money, as you asked!" There were a great many gold coins inside.

"Yes," I said, thinking frantically, "but I… I am a liar! You are a fool and I only used you to… to further my scheme to overthrow the Caliph! Ha ha!"[1]
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[1] I don't think I pulled of the evil laugh as well as I might have, but I certainly proved that reading pulp adventure novels could be educational in a very useful way.
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The young zebra gasped and backed away. Then he darted forward again and snatched up his money. He ran off trying to call for the guards.

"Don't shout with your mouth full!" I called after him.

I hurriedly gathered up a couple of other items, broke the rest of the bottles in the shop, and backed out of the stall. As soon as possible, I resumed my Blackmane disguise and headed back to the mooring tower. There was no time to try to expose the changelings, even if I could get the local authorities to believe me. But I had wrecked their cover identities, and I would have to be satisfied with that for the moment.

In the street that led to the tower, just before the big stone customs house, a zebra mare stepped into my path and bowed slightly.

I was alert and brought up my magic immediately. It was a changeling, but the bow puzzled me and I held back for a moment.

"Pardon me, Your Majesty," she said softly in Equuish, "May I speak with you for a moment?"

I expanded my magical sense and scanned the surrounding buildings and streets. There were no other changelings within my range, so the encounter was unlikely to be the prelude to an ambush. I nevertheless readied a teleport spell and held the penultimate configuration in my mind before I replied.

"Why did you call me that?"

"I was curious about a pony that could penetrate a changeling disguise. I observed you changing your form in the market after you scared off the love peddlers, and recognized you, Princess."

"I see. And you aren't… with those other changelings?"

"No, ma'am." She grinned. "I was keeping track of their activities for my queen. My next report will be a very interesting one, I think."

Things began to click into place. "You're one of Csharreee's."

She nodded. "I am honored to serve Her Most Glorious Majesty."

"Well, you know who I am. Could you tell me your name?"

"Khaatarrekket, ma'am."

Yikes! "I… I'm not sure I can pronounce that correctly. Would you mind if I just called you 'Ket' for now?"

"Not at all, ma'am."

"Well then, Ket, if this isn't an ambush or something along those lines, what did you want to talk to me about?"

"Your amusing stunt in the market has caused more uproar than I think you know. The Zanzebrans aren't fools. They know about changelings, so they will be doing a very thorough search of the city for individuals of my kind. Unfortunately, they've got zebras who are very good at that sort of thing."

I could see where this was going. "And you think they might not believe that you weren't involved in whatever those other two were up to?"

"Attempting to overthrow the Caliph, I think you said?" Her smile was just a bit infectious. "It really doesn't matter, because the waganga won't bother to ask questions if they catch me."

"And you want a quick way out of town, is that it?" I suppressed my urge to grin back at her and reminded myself that she was a shape-changing agent of a foreign government, spying in a foreign land. Not exactly the sort of person I felt safe trusting aboard my airship.

She sensed my hesitation. "The next ship scheduled to leave port after yours will be two days from now. Without your help, there's a good chance I will be dead by tomorrow night."

I frowned. No, there was no way I could justify leaving her to be killed, but I didn't like feeling I had been maneuvered into helping her escape.

"Her Majesty has always spoken very highly of you…"

"Yes, yes, of course I'll take you," I grumbled. "But, when we get aboard and somewhere private, you're going to drop your disguise, and if your eye color doesn't match Csharreee's, I'm throwing you overboard." I pushed past her, ignoring her words of thanks, and trotted for the mooring tower.

Ket made a special effort to be useful and friendly on the run north for Saddle Arabia. She resumed her zebra disguise and only the girls were aware that she was a changeling. It made most of them uneasy at first, and only Pinkie Pie really relaxed around her. Ket assured me she would be able to last out the voyage without (mis)using any of my crew for "food," but it turned out that she got a fair bit of nourishment from an unexpected source.

Sailing over land was more difficult than over the ocean but Fluttershy wanted to do it as much as possible. To "get to know Nebula better," she said. We were in no great hurry, and it was good experience for me as well, so I agreed. According to Lee Helm, we made pretty fair time. Rainbow Dash helped out by scouting ahead for thermals and crosswinds between naps. There was always a mongoose, parrot, monkey, iguana, or somesuch on Fluttershy's shoulder when she was at the wheel, but her menagerie was so large that they really needed somepony else to help take care of them. Ket was the one who volunteered.

She fed and groomed them. She spent quite a bit of time playing with each of them. She gave them attention and affection, and they couldn't help but return it.

"I reckon, if the critters like her, she can't be that bad," Applejack said as she watched a mongoose play hide-and-seek through the faux zebra's bristly mane.

When I asked Ket to elaborate on her mission in Zebrica, she flat-out refused. She was deferential and polite about it, but she was adamant. "If I receive orders from Queen Csharreee to give you that information, I will do so without hesitation. But until then, I cannot do so in good conscience. I'm sure you understand."

I was a bit miffed at being lectured about espionage ethics by a shape-changing parasite, but as Khaatarrekket[2] was an agent of the good changeling queen, and I couldn't help but admire her for sticking to her principles, I accepted it with as much grace as possible.
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[2] It took me over an hour of practice to be able to say her name correctly. "Khaa-tar-REK-ket", said about as fast and "clicky" as I could manage, seemed to satisfy her.
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Almost every evening, after the crew finished their supper and the night watch had taken over, ponies would gather on the main deck to play music, sing, and swap stories.

Ket just sat and watched the party for the first two nights, but on the third night she joined in. During a spirited rendition of "Cider Before Breakfast," she rose, stepped onto the hatch cover, and began to tap out a matching rhythm with her hooves. She started with her fore hooves, and then brought in her rear ones in syncopation. The hatch acted like a drum and amplified her hoof falls so that I could feel the beat all the way up on the quarterdeck. The crew were delighted and the musicians ran through the song twice. Then they demanded that Ket drum for several more songs, until she finally had to sit down and rest.

Each night thereafter she joined in, and sometimes told humorous stories of life in Zanzebra as well. She was very convincing, and if I hadn't known better, I would never have suspected that she wasn't a real Zebrican native.

One night after the party broke up, I pulled her aside and had a quiet word with her.

"The crew have gotten very fond of you," I said.

"Yes, that is so," she agreed. "They are a very nice and welcoming group of ponies."

"I would be convinced that you've become friends with some of them, except for one thing."

Ket lost her slight, pleasant smile. I suppose my tone of voice gave me away. "Captain?"

"I know what effect friendship has on changelings, and you aren't having any trouble holding your disguise at all. Do you understand why that worries me a bit?"

Ket gave a sharp exhalation in relief. "Ah, yes. I understand your concern. I do truly think of myself as a friend to many of your crew, and the reason I am not subsumed is that I carry a charm against the effect." Her grin returned. "I will make a Pinkie Promise of my truthfulness, if that will ease your mind."

"What?" I had once promised Chrysalis to look into creating such a spell, but she had decided to do without my help. "Who developed that charm?"

Ket hesitated, no doubt weighing her perceived duty to her queen.

"Nevermind," I said. "Just tell me one thing. Does Chrysalis know about this spell?"

Ket nodded. "All of the false queen's agents in Zebrica carry such charms, though I don't know why they bother. They are not friendly sorts."

That brought up another question, and as long as Ket was being forthcoming, I continued my questioning. "All her agents? Does she have that many on this side of the ocean? The last time I checked, Chrysalis had less than a hundred followers left."

Khaatarrekket frowned and looked away. I thought for a moment she wasn't going to answer, but then she turned back to me, licked her lips and said, "Then, you must be unaware of the new hive Chrysalis has created beneath the Smokey Mountains."

Author's Notes:

Yes, Twilight sunk Trixie's Zebrican tour before it could even get started!

Thanks to PresentPerfect, Princess Woona, and statoose for editing and pre-reading!