Octavia seemed to have her confidence shaken and Tarnish understood how that felt. On the walk back towards camp, she had mentioned how she had let them down, not once, but twice. Tarnish had tried to reassure her that they would have all succumbed to the fear sooner or later, but Octavia didn’t seem to acknowledge what he had to say.

She was still riding on his back, clinging to him, sniffling against his neck, her body was limp and droopy. Tarnish didn’t like seeing Octavia with her confidence shaken, not at all. It unnerved him. He was supposed to be the one with the fragile confidence, not her, and she was one of the pick-me-up ponies. She knew what to say, what to do, how to fix things when they all fell down.

As he walked, he figured that for confident ponies, ponies like Octavia, moments like these were probably even harder to recover from. She was used to riding the crest of success, she was used to having the adoration of her fans, she was used to always doing the right thing. So, those occasional tumbles might hurt her more. When Tarnish couldn’t figure out what to do, his lower lip protruded.

Now, he was feeling his own confidence sag, as he couldn’t seem to help his friend.

Sometimes, he hated being how he was. He wondered if Maud, beneath her stony exteriour, ever had her confidence shaken. She was the rock. She always managed to just sit out a situation and come out okay. Glancing at Maud, he felt inspired. He had an idea. Was it a good idea? A bad one? Octavia was sad, down in the dumps, and sniffling into the back of his neck. It was time for drastic measures. It was time… to be… Tarnished Teapot.

“Hey Maud…”

“What?”

“When we get back to camp, I need your help with something.”

“What?”

Maud could always be counted on to be his straight-pony. Tarnish grinned. “I want to broaden my horizons a bit. Think you could tutor me in a bit of math?”

“What?” Maud stopped in place, turned her head, and looked up at Tarnish.

“Well, I want to be well rounded. I thought you could give me a little help understanding math—”

“Why?”

At least Maud didn’t say ‘what’ again. Her monosyllabic responses were so very her.

“Well, Maud, I wanted to find out how many times sixteen can go into twenty…” Tarnish had primed the joke grenade, allowed it to cook for a moment, and then he had tossed it. Now, he had to wait.

Much to his shock, he saw Maud react. One eyebrow raised, a slow, steady movement, like bread dough rising or a glacier creeping down the side of a mountain. She was staring at him, her eyebrow rising like the morning sun, and Tarnish saw something glittering in her eyes.

On his back, Octavia started squirming and he could feel her shaking as she giggled. Vinyl stopped in place, bit down on her lip, and made a face like she was eating lemons. Tarnish didn’t see it though, as he was staring into Maud’s eyes.

“Hah,” Maud gasped in a voice as slow and as thick as molasses. “Ah… hah… hah…”

As Octavia clutched his neck, he felt something wet against his skin. The pony on his back whimpered, let out a strange sound, and sniggered with her face pressed into his skin. He realised that Octavia was crying with laughter. Something broke within Octavia and her chortling became guffaws that almost tipped poor Tarnish over.

“My sides ache,” Maud deadpanned as the corners of her mouth twitched in a most peculiar way. She extended a foreleg, reached up, and touched Tarnish on the chin. “One and a quarter.”

When Maud spoke, Vinyl lost it and fell over into the grass as if she had been struck. Octavia slid off of Tarnish back, fell down into the grass with a noisy plop, and crawled over to where Vinyl lay. Both mares clung to one another as they laughed like madponies.

The laughter drove away the lingering fear. Pinkie Pie would have approved.

Feeling pleased with himself, Tarnish felt his own confidence soaring. “Hey, I’ll give you the best one and a quarter you’ve ever had in your whole life.” As he spoke, he saw Maud’s nostrils flaring, and it excited him.

“You… you’ve earned yourself some happy husband hugs.” Maud’s eyebrow was still rising. She flicked her tail, shifted her weight from her left hooves to her right hooves, and took a step closer to Tarnish. “I’m so glad that I found you…”

Much to his surprise, Tarnish found himself in a rather emotional state as he looked down into Maud’s eyes. He loved her more than words could say. She was the most perfect, beautiful thing in his life. And all he had to do to earn her affection was to be himself.

“D'aww, you two are so adorable sometimes!” Octavia’s voice was full of its usual confidence and poise again. She crushed Vinyl in her embrace, and the unicorn’s eyes bulged in their sockets. “Oh, that’s so cute, I just have to squeeze something!”

Hunched over, Octavia scribbled down the music in her head. Maud was studying a topographical map of the area, and her face held an expression of bored concentration, a look that was unique to Maud. Tarnish was now at the mercy of Vinyl Scratch, who had decided that a lesson in magic was in order.

Today, your telekinesis worked just fine. After Tarnish read the words, Vinyl wiped them from her slate and then wrote a few more down. You didn’t think about it, you just did it. Well, that much was true, he didn’t think about it, he just grabbed and got out. A wrinkle appeared on his muzzle as he concentrated upon his lesson.

The words were wiped away from the slate and Vinyl busied herself with writing more. She wrote smaller letters this time, trying to fit more in the limited space. You reacted with reflex, trying to protect what you love. Don’t deny it, Mister Fancy Mathematics.

A blazing blush toasted Tarnish’s face and he let out a nervous coltish giggle as Vinyl continued communicating.

Unicorns have done incredible feats of magic protecting those they love. Vinyl wiped away the words after giving Tarnish a chance to read them. Earth ponies have super strength and pegasi have displayed super speed.

Tarnish found that he could keep up just fine.

Reflexive magic is good. Magic should be something you just do, when the situation demands. If you have to think about it too much—having ran out of space, Vinyl gave Tarnish a chance to read and then wiped her slate clean—those precious seconds can lead to the demise of yourself and your loved ones.

He raised an eyebrow, wondering where Vinyl was going with this.

So, when you do magic, I want you to think about how much you love Maud. After a moment’s pause, Vinyl cleaned the words away and added, Or you can think about Octavia and I. What do we mean to you as friends?

Deep furrows appeared on Tarnish’s forehead, below his horn.

This is conditioning. When you do magic, you will automatically think of Maud. Vinyl’s face pinched in concentration as she went on. You will think of your friends. What we mean to you. And your magic will be backed with emotion. That’s my secret.

He nodded.

Associating your magic with emotion can be dangerous though. A look of concern appeared on Vinyl’s face. Like anything else reckless or dangerous, temper it with wisdom. It’s not bad, but it can be dangerous. Vinyl leaned forwards and peered into Tarnish’s eyes. Some ponies will tell you that this is wrong and magic should be done without emotion.

“Is it wrong?” Tarnish asked.

Vinyl did not reply right away. She sat there, rubbing her chin, looking thoughtful, and then she scribbled down a few words. I say to use what you need to to survive. Use rage. Use anger. Use emotion. Use passion. When she saw that Tarnish had read her words, she wiped them away and wrote more. Survival and protecting those you love is never wrong.

“What would Princess Celestia have to say on the subject?” Tarnish felt a nagging sense of worry and curiousity.

Princess Celestia isn’t in some scary cave trying to protect those she loves! Something flashed in Vinyl’s eyes and the corner of her mouth pulled down. There is classroom magic and there is real world magic. Magic has risks. It’s dangerous. Deal with it.

“Vinyl, I’m saying this as your friend, but… you have some anger issues, don’t you?”

Eyes narrowing into slits, Vinyl’s chalk squealed against the slate. You have no idea.

“I wasn’t judging, just trying to understand,” Tarnish said, trying to smooth over Vinyl’s ruffled exteriour.

Extending her hoof, Vinyl pointed at Octavia, who seemed oblivious to everything around as she was writing down her music. She is my everything. She is all I have. She is my reason for living. The corner of Vinyl’s eye twitched as she wrote down more words. I would burn down everything to keep her safe. Passion, not calm, is the source of my magic.

Hearing Vinyl’s words, a shiver ran down Tarnish’s spine. He turned his head around to look over at Maud. He thought about how much she meant to him. After a few seconds of staring at her, he turned to look at Vinyl. “Okay, I’m in. Teach me how to tap into my passion. How do we keep our wives safe? The world is not the place that I thought it was. It’s a lot worse. I’m just some hick unicorn from a small town and the world is not the place I thought it was. After Dodge City, after… after seeing those diamond dogs and what they did to Trixie… after learning what they did to their own, I’ve learned some harsh lessons.”

Vinyl gave Tarnish a solemn nod. She held up her slate. Passion tempered with wisdom. There is strength in rage, but also in gentleness.

Moving his head up and down, Tarnish agreed.

We must remember that we have to live with our wives. We don’t want them angry with us for torching everything. One of Vinyl’s ears twitched and the little unicorn mare’s face relaxed into a smile. Thanks for looking after Octavia, by the way.

“Oh, don’t mention it,” Tarnish replied as he read Vinyl’s words.

And me. Vinyl waggled her eyebrows. Okay, time to burn stuff. Fire spells 101.

The dead wood blazed. For Tarnish, it wasn’t so different than thinking about making boiling water. The burning, flickering flames reflected in his eyes, making him look dangerous and menacing. The waves of heat caused his mane to billow and blow black from his face. After about a half an hour or so of practice, he was able to cast a much improved version of the Ignitus Infernus spell. Instead of a tiny poof of flame to light candles and campfires, he could now summon an enormous gout of flames to ignite, well, almost anything. He also had an understanding of the Combustus Tyrannica spell, a spell that would allow him to seize control over fires already burning. He needed a lot of practice though to match Vinyl, who could create constructs of flame that could run around for a minute or more, not needing fuel.

The flames before him flickered, suffocated, and died. There was no sense in burning down the forest. Vinyl had a cool, calm, and collected expression upon her face as she smothered the flames. Tarnish realised that she wasn’t even wearing her fancy horn ring that gave her exceptional fire mastery.

He was envious of Vinyl’s ease with magic, but also grateful that she was teaching him. She was a good teacher, and she put things in terms that he understood. She broke everything down to simple thought exercises, rather than confusing jargon and arcano-babble that was found in books. With her, he was learning. He understood thought exercises and magic by association. Arcano-babble, not so much. He had read over the chapter on Ignitus Infernus a hundred times or more and never understood much of it. It was all complicated words, Twilight Sparkle words, words that he just couldn’t grasp or comprehend.

But he got it now. Vinyl was good. So very good. She had sorted him out in just a half an hour and now, he was confident in his ability to set things on fire, if he needed to. Not that he wanted to. He prefered steam.

Now we get food. Vinyl held up her slate and waved it at Tarnish.

Nodding, he agreed. He was starving.

Author's Notes:

- Only Sombra deals in absolutes!

- That's an absolute!

- ...

- Why do I feel that I've just joined the space program?