For Tarnish, it was good to be home. He was glad to see his sisters in law, his mother in law, and his father in law. He had somehow survived being mobbed by them, and he had hugged each of them in turn to return their affection. But now, he only had eyes for one pony, the pony he was madly in love with.

“Pebble!” Striding through the living room of the stone cottage that he and Maud shared, Tarnish plucked Pebble from the teat she was suckling on and lifted her up so he could lavish her with his affection.

Maud, laying on a large cushion covered with a quilt, watched as Pebble became annoyed, and her ears perked when the filly inhaled. No squall seemed forthcoming though, as Pebble relented when she saw her daddy, though she looked very grumpy about being interrupted while she was being fed.

Outside, a blizzard howled and sent chunks of ice and snow to pound against the windows. Inside, it was warm, comfortably so, and a crackling fire burned in the grate. Tarnish flopped down on the floor beside the cushion where Maud lay, and he cradled Pebble in his forelegs. He looked down at her while she looked up at him, and overcome with happiness, he pressed his muzzle down against her barrel.

“How you doing, Maud?” Tarnish asked.

“Wishing I was healed up from birth,” Maud replied. “Did you get it?”

“Yeah, we got it.” Tarnish gave his wife a nod. “The snowflake gem, the supposed key for the legendary city of Skyreach. Had to steal it though and there was a lot of trouble. I got shot in the ass.”

“Don’t you dare swear here at home,” Maud warned, “Mama will wash your dirty mouth out with soap if she hears you and I won’t do anything to stop her. I might even help.”

“Sorry.” Looking sheepish, Tarnish nuzzled Pebble, rubbing the side of his muzzle against her neck, which caused her little stubby legs to kick. After a few precious moments, he lifted his head, stretched out his neck, and gave Maud a smooch, which Maud returned with equal enthusiasm.

“I almost got sacrificed to Collie Ma, after I let myself get caught on purpose,” Tarnish said in conversational tones as he passed Pebble back to Maud, so the little filly could continue nursing. “And I picked a fight with an army of Thuggees too. It was great.”

“You left home and had all of that fun without me.” Maud turned her sleepy stare upon Tarnish as Pebble returned to nursing, and Maud’s tail thumped against the quilt covered cushion. “Serves you right, getting shot in the… plot.”

Crawling on his belly, Tarnish scooted a little closer to Maud, so that he might kiss her again, and much to his surprise, she grabbed him around the neck with her forelegs. She hauled him in without effort, and this time, a more passionate, intimate kiss was exchanged. When Maud pulled away, Tarnish was breathless.

“Tarnish… when do you plan to leave?” Maud asked, and there was a quaver in her voice that only those who knew her best would be able to detect.

“Soon,” Tarnish replied, now looking downcast as he huffed and puffed from the kiss. “As soon as possible, actually. “Doctor Caballeron had the snowflake gem looked at by a couple of crazy cultist priests… unicorns… bad sorts… Daring Do is worried that they might be able to duplicate the gem somehow, and figure out where to go.”

“You can’t let that happen,” Maud said as her ears pivoted forwards, towards her husband. “I’ve been talking to some ponies I know from the university. Something bad is in Skyreach, or so they think, something best left forgotten, and you can’t let Doctor Caballeron have it, if it exists.”

“After talking to Princess Celestia, I’m inclined to agree. She don’t want us going. She knows something, she probably knows quite a bit, but she’s not talking. It’s really upsetting for her, that’s for certain.” Wrinkles appeared on Tarnish’s face as his gaze fell on Pebble, who was still suckling and looking bored. “Right now, the snowflake gem is with Twilight Sparkle and she’s going to use all of that fancy divination magic of hers on it to see what she can learn.”

An anniversary clock on the mantle ticked away the time as the logs in the fire crackled. The sounds of Pebble suckling ceased and the little filly went still, curled up against her mother’s stomach with her head resting on the inside of Maud’s thigh. Her ears angled forwards, Maud stared into her husband’s eyes for several long seconds, glad that he was home.

“The bed is cold without you,” Maud said in softened deadpan. “Fix some tea, Tarnish, your amulet is looking a little darker than it should be, and then come to bed with me.”

“Actually, I’m a little hungry.”

“Mama stocked our little fridge with food because she knew that we would want some private time together when you got home.” Maud blinked once, twice, and on the third time, the corners of her mouth twitched. “I got scared, Tarnish. I even panicked. I had a rough couple of days where it got so bad that Limestone and Marble had to come and stay with me and sleep with me. Tarnish”—Maud sucked in a deep breath so she could say what she needed to say—“you take a lot of unnecessary risks. I understand that you have a career now and this is the life that you have chosen… I respect that. But you’re brazen, and you take some very unnecessary risks.”

“Yeah, I reckon I do,” Tarnish confessed as he rose up to his hooves and stood. “We both take risks. That’s what we do.”

“But I’m not there to help you manage those risks,” Maud said as she stared at Tarnish. “And you… you do some stupid, stupid stuff when I’m not there to keep you balanced.”

“Maybe I do,” Tarnish admitted as he retreated into the kitchen. “Maud, are we fighting?”

“I don’t know, are we? Is there something to fight about?”

“I feel like you’re scolding me.”

“I am, Tarnish… I am. I’m probably going to lecture you at some point. Tarnish, adventuring is fine, that’s what we do. But you, you’re a father now, as well as being my husband. You need to manage risks better… and not pick fights with a Thuggee army, or whatever it is that you did. I need for you to come home. Pebble needs for you to come home. Tarnish, we have powerful enemies now. Princess Celestia has left a contingent of her elite guards here on the Rock Farm—”

“Yeah, the guards and I talked when Miss Yearling dropped me off.”

“—and we need to start being more careful.” Maud stared at her husband while he began to prepare his tea, her head turning to follow his every move. “I’m the cautious and level headed one and you… you’re the reckless one. We work well together, but you’re going off without me and that worries me a bit.”

“Vinyl is coming with us.”

“That doesn’t reassure me one bit, Vinyl is every bit as bad as you. She makes Octavia want to pull out her mane, and now I understand Octavia’s frustrations a whole lot better.”

“I get it, okay? I’m young, hot-headed, and irresponsible!”

“Yes, yes you are, and it makes me feel better to hear you say it.”

“I’m with Miss Yearling—”

“And you don’t listen to her at all,” Maud said, her voice growing just a tiny bit louder. “She is your boss, Tarnish. Because of her, you get a paycheck and we can square away our bills. Adventuring is expensive, Tarnish, and so is taking responsibility for your actions and the collateral damage that you do.”

“Collateral damage.” Tarnish rolled his eyes and snorted. “Okay, so a few things exploded all around me during that big kerfuffle in Manehattan—”

“Tarnish, you pushed a pony with a knapsack full of dynamite down an elevator shaft.”

“He was trying to kill me!” Tarnish’s voice was loud enough that it caused Pebble to open her eyes, and she lifted her head away from her mother’s warm, fuzzy thigh. “They never did find his body.” Tarnish shook his head and looked a bit dismayed. “I swear, if he comes back and tries to kill me again, even more stuff is going to explode.”

Rolling her own eyes, Maud let out a wickering sigh of exasperation.

“I can’t help that things tend to escalate all around me,” Tarnish said to his wife, and his ears went limp when she turned away from him to look at the clock on the mantle. “Okay, so maybe I do do things that make everything worse, but when stuff is happening, I tend to live in the moment and not think about consequences. I just focus on surviving because I want to come home and be with you… even if coming home means getting a lecture from you.”

“Don’t you dare turn this around on me,” Maud said in a voice of cold iron. She sniffed, glared at Tarnish for a second, picked up Pebble by the nape of her neck, and after getting up from her cushion, she walked away to the bedroom with Pebble held in her teeth.

Gritting his teeth, Tarnish bit back a flood of angry curses as he stood in his kitchen, fuming.

Author's Notes:

I'm sorry...