The old tavern creaked when ponies trotted across its wooden floor, but their boisterous sounds of merriment drowned out its moans of old age. The Steam Donkey had been in the same spot since Ponyville’s pioneer days, and while it had never been the classiest of places (even less so now that tea houses were the pony public’s gathering place of choice), the clientele were not bothered by its reputation.

Berry Punch watched the jenny come up from the cellar with a bottle of her favored beverage – Pinot noir. Barringcoat, a descendant of the donkey family who founded the tavern, placed the wine on the badly tarnished mahogany bar.

“Here you go, Berry. Fresh and properly chilled.”

“Thanks. Put it on my tab.”

“As always!”

Berry Punch turned her head sideways and bit the neck of the bottle, lifting it up. She swung around from the bar, the wine held horizontally in her mouth, and smacked a unicorn mare’s lowball onto the floor.

“Thorry,” Berry said.

The drenched mare, her horn flashing in anger as the remains of her sazerac changed her light blue coat into a gross blotch, whinnied her anger. “Sorry doesn’t cut it! You need to watch where you’re going!”

“I’ll get you a new drink,” Barringcoat said. “On the house.”

The mare’s brain was a factory of wounded pride as she stared at Berry’s backside receding into the distance. “I’m talking to you, plummy! You come back and apologize!”

“Thbbt dnnd arghhbt,” Berry Punch said. She let out a filly-like giggle as her lips were tickled by the glass bottle vibrating with her voice.

“What did you call me?” The mare’s horn flashed orange, but her concentration was interrupted by Barringcoat’s hoof touching her shoulder.

“Don’t fight her.”

The mare jerked her body away from Barringcoat’s hoof, her face caked with disgust. “Since when have you banned fighting, huh?”

“I haven’t,” Barringcoat said, a crack entering her soothing voice due to dark feelings about the mare’s reaction to her touch. “But you’re trying to fight a Drunken Hoof master. Fight her, and you’ll just end up feeling depressed and slightly violated. Let me get you a towel and a new drink.”

The mention of Berry Punch’s martial arts mastery – and in an art that was disharmonious! – was a quick-acting antidote to her poisoned thoughts. Besides, that mare did say “sorry”, didn’t she?

“Well... a new drink would be nice.”

“I’ll get right on it,” Barringcoat said. She tossed the mare a towel before preparing her new drink.

Berry Punch approached her table, where Amethyst Star, Junebug, and Red Harvest (Golden Harvest’s cousin visiting from Cloudsdale), sat in wait. Red Harvest was a dirt brown pegasus stallion with a peach mane. He was a holder of a rare abstract cutie mark, his being an odd assortment of rectangles of many shapes and angles jammed into each other, longer horizontally than it was vertically, with one end tapering off into a triangle. His cutie mark was as black as shadow.

Berry Punch interrupted the conversation they were having by nuzzling each member of the group in greeting.

“Could you at least put the bottle down before doing that?” Amethyst Star said, as she dodged the Pinot noir when Berry tuned to nuzzle a surprised (because they had only met each other once before) Red Harvest.

Berry sat down on the thick and soft rug, which would have been considered an outright luxury in the early days of the tavern. Steam Donkey originally served earth ponies that came in sweaty and dirty from hard work, earth ponies who wanted some good liquor before heading home to attack their tiredness with sleep. Dirty, sweating bodies sprawling over rugs would make for ridiculous cleaning bills, so only hard wood met bottoms in the old days. The floor was cedar for that antiseptic touch.

Junebug had already drained her pear cider, and her mug was coated with a pale yellow film. Amethyst Star kept a bottle of brandy at the bar, and was sharing some with Red Harvest, who carefully used his hooves to manipulate the snifter. He was skilled at wing manipulation, but Amethyst Star told him that brandy was great when warmed by hooves.

Junebug eyed Berry Punch. “Did you forget your glass?”

Berry Punch pulled out the cork with her teeth, pointedly let it drop on the table in Amethyst’s direction, and took a long swig of her wine.

“Never mind.”

“At least let it aerate,” Amethyst Star said, as she magically swirled the brandy in her snifter. Red Harvest noticed that she didn’t use her hooves, and wondered if he had been taken for a sucker.

“Takes too long. Got places to do, things to drink.” Berry Punch turned her half-cocked smile toward Junebug. “I was interrupting something interesting.”

“Yeah, let’s hear the rest of this,” Amethyst Star said to Junebug.

“W-well, I was pulling out the weeds when I saw him,” Junebug said. “I mean, he came right up to me and started helping out! I was so scared! He had those c-claws out, and when he spoke I’d catch a glimpse of his fangs... I mean, I know he won’t hurt anypony, but goodness he gives me a fright!”

Red Harvest waited to see if the mares had anything to add before speaking. “He is intimidating,” he said. “He usually sits down or folds his legs when he talks to us.”

“Oh, Mr. Lero did that for me, but I kept feeling like he was going to p-pounce.” She sighed. “I wish I could stop being afraid of him. He’s very kind. But every time he comes near, I just want to run away, ya know?”

Amethyst snorted. “He’s not scary at all.”

“Well, you have unicorn magic to protect you.”

“It’s not that. I can’t be scared of ugly.”

Red Harvest was trying to figure out how to voice a disagreement when Berry Punch said, “He’s different, so you think he’s ugly.”

“Sure he’s different... did you finish your bottle already?”

“No,” Berry Punch said. She tipped the bottle over and a drop came out. “See?” She leaned over and licked the drop from the table. “Now it’s finished.”

“That was gross, Berry,” Junebug said.

“But yeah,” Berry Punch said. “He’s not ugly, just different. You know, with the walking around on two legs, and the cat eyes, and the scales and fire.”

“Oh, ha, ha,” Amethyst said, toneless. “You heard Junebug say ‘Lero’, so don’t pretend she was talking about Spike.”

“I’m pretending you’re in Tartarus right now.”

“As I was saying, I think he’s ugly,” Amethyst said, with a challenging glare tossed at Berry Punch. “With that flat face, and weird looking muzzle with the nostrils underneath.”

“I bet he can smell his breath easier,” Berry Punch said.

“How can he see anything with those tiny eyes? And he’s virtually hairless! I mean, you can see that pinkish skin, like a plucked chicken. And what are those ears for? They don’t even move!”

“They hold his face together,” Berry Punch said. “You take one off and the other falls out like a broken doorknob. Then you have to put the pieces of his head back together and affix the doorknobs back. I mean, the ears.”

“W-what?” Red Harvest said. “Um...”

“Pay her no mind,” Amethyst said. “Her filter doesn’t work.”

That’s hardly an explanation at all, Red Harvest thought.

“I don’t think he’s ugly,” Junebug said.

“I don’t either,” Red Harvest said, watching for reactions. “His face has sort of a gentle look to it, to me. I mean, he’s really different, like Berry Punch said, but there’s a sort of exotic handsomeness to his features, you know?”

“Heh. That’s a polite way of saying weird-looking,” Amethyst said. “You know, it’s fitting he herds with the two skinniest mares in Ponyville. No stallion in his right mind would take those two, so they settle for an ape. Ha!”

“You know what’s funny, is that there’s kind of a historical precedent for it,” Junebug said, trying to remember her ancient history lessons. “Bucephalus the Great tamed a pony-eating gorilla. It even accompanied him on his battles as a war-ape. I can’t remember its name, though.”

Amethyst Star snorted. “I’d hardly compare those nags to Bucephalus the Great.”

“Yeah,” Red Harvest said with a nervous laugh. “Those are some flat flanks. Lyra’s pretty good looking, though.”

“She’s alluring, sure,” Amethyst said. “She’s just weird. Like I said, fitting.”

Lyra straddled Lero’s lap, her body pressed against his, front to front, her front legs arced over his muscular shoulders. His knees were bent and pressed against her back while he held her with his arms. Her rear legs were bent at the hock as she pressed them against his back. She was slightly taller than him this way, and she looked down into his half lidded eyes, their mouths parted as they shared one breath, bodies close from the position they had maintained since penetration twenty minutes ago. The only proof of any sort of exertion was the gentle perspiration coating their bodies.

Lyra had been overjoyed at how quickly Lero had taken to this position, something she had only ever been able to successfully do with mares. She had dolphin-style sex with stallions before, of course (Lyra had more sexual experience than her three herdmates combined), but it was extremely difficult for a stallion to maintain this upright position, sitting on his rump while a mare balanced in his lap - not to mention no stallion could last as long as her Lero.

His unique body allowed him to wrap his limbs around Lyra with ease, which was fitting for a position where the point was physical closeness. When Lero was able to wrap both legs and arms around her and press her close, Lyra felt as if she was being enveloped and taken into him. He could reach her horn, too, but Lyra didn’t want that distraction right now, and Lero complied.

Their breath increased together, and their bodies trembled like petals touched by a gentle breeze. They had not broken their mutual stare, as even their eyelids synchronized blinks. There was one heartbeat with both bodies pressed together, senses attuned to hot breath and rushing blood, senses so enveloped with each other that neither heard Rainbow Dash’s derisive comment from the doorway about how boring it was to watch, and how could anypony even like having sex that long without moving. They didn’t hear Twilight shush her, either.

Their heart rate increased, and Lyra knew it was coming soon, when she’d have to leave her stallion. Unlike Rainbow Dash, orgasm wasn’t her favorite part of sex – it was the intimacy, the point after penetration, when she could revel in her stallion and let the pleasure and love overtake her. A climax was exactly what it meant – the end of the closeness.

“Not that I don’t like it when he makes me come,” she had explained to Rainbow Dash. She loved it, and she loved it because she knew how it made Lero feel. It was important that he be able to induce these reactions from his mares, and who was she to deny that?

So they approached climax, and when neither could tell when Lero began and Lyra ended, they came together. Lero, encased in living electric silk, trembled as he ejaculated. His trembling was Lyra’s, and her climax joined his and gripped her body, released, and gripped again, constantly, her breathing now gasps of pleasure, his breathing interrupted with those quiet moans he made. The end, she thought (the first thought she was aware of having), as the last bit of semen erupted inside her. But another beginning will be here, and then, the best part – the middle.

(Once, when she was trying to vocalize her feelings, Lero called the middle that she was so fond of stretching until it felt like forever, “the big long now”. Lyra thought it a hilarious turn of phrase, and decided to keep it.)

Lero slowly lay on his back, and only when he was completely supine did Lyra disengage. She rolled onto her side of his bed and rested her head on that wonderful shoulder of his. A trail of their fluids leading from her vagina traveled across her belly and ended at his penis, made shiny by the lantern-light reflecting their fluids coating its surface.

The three mares had their own specific post-coital rituals – Rainbow Dash liked to talk and cuddle, while Twilight sometimes couldn’t help but fall asleep, though she wanted to “compare notes” when she awoke. Lyra’s ritual was one of simple contemplation, more feelings than thoughts, of her mate.

Lero’s arm pulled around Lyra’s upper barrel, and let his hand be caught in her hooves. Such an amazing device, Lyra thought, feeling his soft flesh that served as organic clothing for the surprising strength contained in those fingers. Her horn flared and her magic touched his hand. It was like he was touching her magic, that ethereal part not just of her body, but of her spirit, and she let out a pleased sigh at the feeling of closeness.

She spread each finger apart like a web, and used her magic to manipulate joints like simple gears. She moved his fingers together and spread them out, glancing up at Lero’s smile. She grinned hugely before closing the fingers into a fist and opening them up again. She let go with her magic but held on with her hooves. She moved his hand toward her muzzle and kissed the tips, gentle and slow like she was paying homage to a holy object. Lero trailed his fingertips from her muzzle toward her ear, letting his palm touch her cheek. She held his arm with both hooves and let out a sigh, thick with pleasure and love.

“Lyra’s mean,” Berry Punch said. “She won’t fight me.”

“Good,” Amethyst said, slapping her hoof on the table. “I hope you never get to fight anypony ever again, for as long as you live.”

“I challenged her to a fight, and she looked like she wanted to throw up.”

“I can’t imagine that,” Junebug said. “She’s always so calm.”

“And how in the world do you expect to beat her?” Amethyst said. “She’s a Still Way grandmaster! You’re only a master in some… some mindless flailing cooked up by a draconequus.”

“That’s a myth,” Berry Punch said. “I’m actually a grandmaster.”

“Oh, congratulations,” Junebug said, patting Red Harvest on his withers to calm his mental whiplash. “When did this happen?”

“Last week. Passed the final test.” Berry Punch smiled warmly, filling Junebug and Red Harvest with happiness and pride, and Amethyst with suspicion. “I had to read these letters that kept getting smaller and smaller.”

“That’s an eye exam, dummy.”

“Well, I passed it. Now I’m a grandmaster.”

Amethyst Star sighed, and refilled her snifter with brandy.

“You know, we better be careful,” Berry Punch said. “I mean, talking about Lero and his mares. Our newly crowned Princess is in that herd, and we don’t need to be murmuring against the state.” She made a spectacle of looking at neighboring tables, as if sorting out spying ears connected to tattling tongues.

“Yeah, yeah,” Amethyst said. “I have nothing against our esteemed Princess Twilight Sparkle.”

"Except…” Berry Punch said, leaning in close with a salacious look.

The corner of Amethyst’s lip got quite a workout that night, lifting itself in scorn against Berry Punch. She ignored the inappropriateness of Berry’s expression, and pushed Berry’s face away with her magic.

“Except nothing,” Amythyst said. “She’s a clumsy introverted nerd, and I have nothing against her at all.”

The table laughed with a secret, dangerous thrill that came with mocking sovereignty.

“I’m surprised her flanks are so flat with what little exercise she gets,” Red said, reveling in the spike of excitement of speaking irreverently against the crown.

Berry leaned in with conspiratorial looks. “How does she fly?”

“Adequate, actually,” Red said. “Rainbow Dash taught her well. She used to fly like she was falling all the time. She’ll never be in the Wonderbolts, though.”

“She just gets to tell them what to do,” Amethyst said.

“Jealousy?” Berry said.

Amethyst snorted. “Not likely, just an observation.”

“She has a really pretty coat and mane,” Junebug said, by way of concession. She glanced around the table.

Red Harvest nodded. “It’s unique, certainly.”

“Oh, don’t be traitoring the cause with your half-mule praise,” Berry Punch said. “We’re all going to hang now, and we don’t need you nasty snitches getting cold necks.”

Junebug smiled. “We aren’t doing anything wrong.”

“We’re just establishing what an unusual herd they are,” Amethyst said. “Nothing wrong with that.”

“It’s okay, girls,” Lyra said in a low, husky voice. “You can come in.”

Rainbow Dash virtually cannonballed the bed as she landed on all-fours next to Lero. “It’s about time! I didn’t want to break up your communing or anything.” Lyra grinned at Dash’s choice of words. Dash winked at her before lowering her head to kiss Lero, who said, “Pardon me a second, Dash.”

He turned to kiss Lyra and whispered in her ear, “I love you, Horny.”

Lyra smiled. “I love you, Fingers. I’m required by law to make you prove it as much as possible, though.”

Lero smiled at her as he returned to kiss Rainbow Dash, making sure not to disturb Lyra as she virtually cocooned into her stallion’s shoulder. He still held her around her upper barrel, and she turned on her side so she could stick her nose on his neck and just drown in his scent. Rainbow Dash plopped down on Lero’s other side.

Twilight Sparkle stood at the foot of the bed, eyes following an indeterminable spot between Lero and Lyra. Her pursed lips caused Lero to laugh. “Twilight, go ahead.”

“Thanks!” Twilight said. She hopped out of bed with a flap of her wings, landing a little hard on her front legs as her rear bowed up. She let out a gasp before settling down properly, and glanced back with fearful look, expecting Dash to make fun of her dismount.

Dash was indeed smiling mischievously. “You really know how to stick a landing, Twilight.”

Twilight did a poor job pretending not to have heard Dash, as she couldn’t silence an angry snort. She trotted into the bathroom and returned, her magic holding a wet washcloth. Her fastidious nature sometimes clashed with their love-making. Sex, after all, could be pretty messy, and while Twilight wasn’t grossed out by its natural by-products, she wasn’t exactly an ally of them, either.

She used the cloth to wipe Lero’s belly and genitals (Lero grunting a bit at the touch, as his refraction period hadn’t yet ended). Lyra only raised a brow when the wet cloth swiped across her vulva. Rainbow couldn’t help but watch this ceremony with a mischievous grin, and Twilight was doing her best to ignore it.

“You know, you could try getting that spot out of the sheet,” Dash said, pointing a newly made love puddle with her hoof. “But it’d still leave a stain.” Lero tossed a long-suffering gaze at Rainbow’s never-ending harassment of Twilight when she displayed the more eccentric aspects of her personality. Dash only thrust her chin out like a parody of smugness.

Twilight, busy rubbing the washcloth against the stain on the sheet, stopped and smiled at Rainbow Dash. “You’re right, Dash!”

“Well of course I’m – whoa!” Dash found herself lifted into the air, Lyra and Lero along with her. Dash flailed her wings uselessly. “Put me down, Twilight!”

With an effortless use of her magic, Twilight stripped the sheets from the mattress, balled them up, and moved them to the washing room. New sheets came in, dark blue and fresh, and Twilight unfolded them and quickly made up the bed. Lero and Lyra were gently placed on the clean sheets while Twilight simply released Dash from her magic.

Dash managed to right herself before landing face first into the floor. “Twilight, you know I hate that! Quit grabbing me with your magic!”

Twilight hopped on the bed and took the unclaimed position next to Lero, letting one wing drape over his body. She liked touching him with her wings every time she had the chance, although it led to some embarrassing situations – there were some things pegasus ponies didn’t do in public, and a red-faced Dash had to explain them to the newly crowned alicorn princess.

Dash hopped onto the bed and lay across Lero’s legs. She was irritated that Twilight had taken her place, but had to admire her method of doing it. “You know, Twilight, you could have just asked me to let you have that place. You didn’t have to toss me around with magic.”

“It’s more fun this way, though,” Twilight said with a prim smile full of fake demureness. Dash only grinned while thinking, I’ll get you back.

“Dash,” Lero warned. Dash smiled genuine. Gosh, he knows me so well. The feeling of comfort and contentment, like a distant memory (distant to the point of believing instead of remembering) of being held by loving parents in infancy, enveloped her and she spread her wings around her herdmates. This met with some surprise from the other two mares, followed with happiness. It was a wonderful occasion when Dash showed her herd sisters physical affection.

“How’s your purple reign going?” Lero asked Twilight with a wink. She huffed.

“Oh, don’t get me started! Everything is so slow! Wrapped up in papers signed in triplicate, and indexed, and debriefed… urgh, I just want to use my magic to get things done, but it’s against-” Twilight sat up and lifted her hooves in the air in a monstrous approximation of scare quotes, and sarcastically finished, “-the Rules of Order!”

“Let me help you,” Lero said. “I could serve as a gopher if you need me.” Twilight leaned in to nuzzle him.

“That may not be necessary. Princess Celestia will be back soon. Besides, there’s a lot of intrigue and, well, apple-polishing going on, and I’d hate for you – any of you – to have to face that before I know what traps are there. I really miss you guys, though. I think about you all the time.” Twilight giggled shyly. “You know, when I was introduced to my throne, my first thought was, ‘My throne is Lero’s lap.’”

Rainbow Dash snorted a laugh. “I bet your wings get stiff all the time, being around the royal guard.”

“Of course not,” Twilight huffed. “I grew up with the royal guard. They don’t have some weird sexual hold over me like they do you.”

Lero’s free hand, rubbing against Twilight’s neck, had worked its way down toward the muscle in her wings. Twilight shivered as her wings slowly rose to attention – even in getting stiff, she was slower and more leisurely than Dash. She looked at Lero with surprise and growing lust.

“Um, are you ready so soon?” She said this with a slight blush that made Dash laugh. As long as we’ve been together, and after all the things we’ve done with each other, she still blushes like a school-filly. Her laugh stopped as she noticed Lero’s penis returning to its former tumescence.

“Huh,” she said. “Did you take a stamina potion or something?”

“No,” Lero said. “Just really heated tonight, I guess.”

With her eyes still closed, Lyra leaned toward his ear and whispered, “You don’t have to prove anything to us.” Lero jerked his head at Lyra, who partially opened her eyes in acknowledgement. “It’s not like that,” he whispered back. “I miss Twilight.” Lyra smiled and scooted away from his arm so he’d have another weapon in the war to please his mares. He grabbed Twilight and pulled her on top, her yelp silenced by his gentle lips meeting with hers. One hand rested on that sensitive spot between her wings while the other began working the base of her horn.

Twilight jerked her head away before the point of going completely cross-eyed. “Wait,” she said. Her horn glowed as the all-important silencing spell enclosed Lero’s house, a spell she cast ever since receiving complaints from his neighbors about how loud she could get. She moved back underneath Lero’s hand and kissed him again.

The tavern had grown boozy, warm, and loud. Amethyst let the brandy seep into her as she continued her story about Rainbow Dash.

“So I just tapped it against the fountain," Amethyst said to snickering. "She was able to open it, and wanted to know how amazing I thought she was."

“I bet you turned her down with that respectful manner of yours.”

Amethyst shot a glance at Berry Punch. “She was being annoying.”

“She can be really full of herself,” Junebug said with a nod. “Really boastful.”

“She seems to be better,” Red Harvest said. “I remember in Cloudsdale when she tried to come on to a guy. She just blurted out of the blue, ‘I like you. Let’s get together.’”

Amethyst Star laughed. “’Get together’? Ha! Like she’s too much of a filly to say, ‘Let’s rut.’”

Red Harvest ducked his head. “Well, he turned her down, and she just said ‘Your loss’ before flying off.”

“I wonder how she hooked up with Lero, then,” Amethyst said. She changed her voice to be full of gravel. “’Listen, no stallion in his right mind would ever want a skinny and garish mare like me, and no mare would ever want some hairless monkey like you, so how about we cut our losses and get together.’” Her laughed died down as she saw the disapproving stare Junebug had for her.

“That’s really mean, Amethyst,” Junebug said. “You don’t need to be so mocking and cruel.”

“That was pretty mean,” Berry Punch said, trying to stick her hoof into the opening of the empty bottle.

Amethyst let out an exasperated sigh. “Seriously? After everything we’ve talked about, that’s what gets you upset.”

“I’m upset too,” Berry Punch said. She managed to create enough friction between the tip of her hoof and the opening of the bottle to lift it in the air. It fell onto the table and rolled onto the floor, where it broke with a loud crash.

“Look,” Amethyst said, ignoring Berry’s mess. “I’m a bad pony-”

Junebug took Amethyst’s hoof in her own. “No you’re not!”

“I am. I’m full of this idiotic, pointless anger against my fellow ponies. Coming here is the best way I have to vent and let out all this… these stupid feelings, okay? You two are the best friends I have, and I trust you not to, uh, judge me too harshly.”

“We don’t at all,” Junebug said, tapping Amethyst’s hoof before letting go.

“I do,” Berry Punch said. “I judge you all day long.”

“Um, have you thought about getting help?” Red Harvest said. He shrunk back from Amethyst’s questioning gaze.

“I do get help,” she said. “This is my treatment, talking to you guys. Dr. Flem Matic suggested that I should talk about my feelings to ponies I trust in an atmosphere I’m comfortable in. This is it.”

“That was my treatment,” Berry said, pointing at the remains of her broken Pinot noir bottle as it was carried away by one of Barringcoat’s younger relatives. A fresh bottle was sitting in front of her.

“Berry, do you have anything interesting to add besides your stupid jokes?”

“Just my masterful presence,” Berry said. She bit the cork out of the new bottle and spat it on the table. “Grandmasterful presence. You know, this conversation started off about Lero before we started talking about his mares.”

“You steered it that way,” Amethyst said.

“Sure, but what do you guys think about Lero as a person? I mean, not his looks or anything, but his personality.”

Amethyst’s eyes narrowed as she contemplated the horror that was Berry Punch. “Why do you care, Berry? You trying to start something?”

“Just asking questions.”

“Uh-huh. So, how about you tell us what you think, first?”

Berry Punch shrugged. “Meh. Now it’s your turn.”

“Lero’s annoying,” Amethyst said, ignoring Berry and returning her attention to her other two table mates. “You know that pony that tries so hard to fit it, but just doesn’t, and you wish he’d go away? That’s Lero.”

“H-he’s nice,” Junebug said. “I think I already said that. I don’t know him that well to have an opinion. I do wish he wasn’t so, you know, pushy.”

“He gives great massages, though,” Berry Punch said.

“I couldn’t stand letting him touch me,” Amethyst said. “Those fingers remind me of wiggling snakes.”

Junebug shivered. “Oooh, d-don’t say that!”

“I get massages from him, too,” Red Harvest said, as he pawed at the table. “I have one scheduled for tomorrow, which is why I’m in town. He can make it feel really soft, but then there’s real strength in those fingers. Sometimes I have to take a nap afterward.” Red Harvest realized his wings fluffed, and he quickly pushed them to his side. He trailed off, hoping the mares would continue the conversation without him.

Amethyst Star cocked an eyebrow at him, and quickly peeked under the table. Red Harvest crossed his hind legs, but it was too late.

“You’re attracted to him?” Amethyst Star said, more as an accusation than a question. Red Harvest ducked his head.

“He’s… he’s intriguing. So kind and concerned, you know? Even wise. It’s easy to be attracted to him.”

Berry Punch idly spun her empty bottle with her hoof. No one remembered seeing her drink it. “And he has nice flanks.”

Red Harvest was overcome with a dreamy stare and a longing sigh. “He has wonderful flanks.” His reverie was invaded by Amethyst’s barely hidden look of disgust. His ears flattened as he lowered his head. “I’m sorry.”

“No, no, it’s alright,” Amethyst said, massaging the space between her closed eyes as she waved her other hoof at Red Harvest. “I have no right to react that way. I mean, just because I think he’s ugly doesn’t mean everypony else feels the same way. I’m sorry.”

“Thank you,” Red said. He surveyed the mares – Junebug looked at him with polite interest, while Berry Punch arched an eyebrow and thought secret thoughts against her empty bottle. Amethyst had finished rubbing her face and stared, open-eyed, at Red.

He cleared his throat. “It’s not just physical attraction,” he said, as if still trying to placate Amethyst’s feelings. “I like his personality and viewpoints. He’s so strong-willed, definitely for a stallion. I mean, he makes decisions for himself. He isn’t afraid of what... other ponies think of him.”

Berry Punch laughed. “‘Other ponies’, huh? Sounds like coded language for ‘other mares’. So, he’s going around putting revolutionary ideas in stallions’ heads? About equality with mares? Well, we’ll just have to put that little social revolution down really quick.”

“I didn’t mean like that!”

“Don’t mind Berry Punch,” Junebug said.

“That bears repeating,” Amethyst said, launching a scornful stare at Berry. “Don’t take seriously anything she says. We aren’t medieval mares who think a stallion’s place is in the fields or the bedroom. You speak your mind here.”

“Thank you,” Red said with a nod of his head.

Berry Punch grinned. “You gonna try to stable with Lero, Red? Because I know you don’t want to join that herd.”

“Well, no. He, uh… he’s not into stallions. At all.”

“Really?” Junebug said. “He’s that bent?”

“Very much so.”

“That’s one unusual herd. Rainbow Dash is bent, too. Against mares.”

“Rainbow won’t fight me either,” Berry Punch said. “Said she had an image to maintain.”

Twilight Sparkle moaned and collapsed onto the heavily breathing Lero.

“Can’t… wow,” she said between pants. Her wings receded and she lazily folded them in. Rainbow Dash moved so Twilight could roll onto empty space.

Dash and Lyra had lain next to Lero, having watched the proceedings. They knew Twilight enjoyed an audience, and Dash wondered if exhibitionism was Twilight’s secret kink (it was – Princess Luna, to her regret, had discovered that one night when she mistakenly dove into a red smoky haze she thought was a nightmare. “She even had our dream-images applaud at the end,” she had told her sister. “Why are you laughing at this?”). Dash had absolutely no complaints. She loved watching the expressions that played across her lovers faces when they had sex. Lero’s stony glint and the concentration he wore, and Twilight’s expressions that lingered at the border when ecstasy became overpowering, especially when her horn was manipulated at the same time. Seeing the tears run down her cheeks as those long, loud moans erupted from her made Rainbow heated enough that she wondered if she herself could climax without even being touched.

Rainbow Dash smiled at Twilight as she drifted off into sleep, the tip of her tongue poking out of the side of her contented smile. Lero smiled at her sleeping form and leaned over to give her a kiss on her muzzle, causing Twilight to let out a happy sigh. Dash’s eyes moved over to Lero, and she was shocked to find him still hard.

“Dude.”

“Didn’t come,” Lero said. “I guess my, uh, second wind lasts a lot longer.”

“Twilight comes faster than she used to,” Dash said, licking her lips. “I mean, since you can play with her horns and wings. Um, would you like me to, you know…”

Lero smiled. “Yeah,” he said. “I won’t be able to do anything, though. Worn out. Won’t last long.” He sat up. “Let me, uh, clean up.”

Rainbow Dash stood over him and pushed him back down. “No,” she said, with a greedy grin. “No time to waste, right?”

Lero’s eyebrows shot up. “Wow. I didn’t expect that.”

“Hot, huh?”

“Yeah. You don’t mind, um, Twilight still being on me?”

“Nope! She’s my mare, right? So why would I mind?”

“I’d like to point out that I got wiped off,” Lyra said, curled up while watching the proceedings. Dash stuck her tongue out at her, which prompted a lazy, vampish grin from Lyra.

Dash looked back at Lero with a hungry look, and stalked toward him until she was standing over him, looking directly into his eyes. She relished the lust and excitement in Lero’s face, though she could see how exhausted he was. She decided not to tease him, and plopped herself onto him.

Lero’s body jerked, and he grabbed Dash’s hips with both hands as her wings snapped to attention. The shocked look on his face showed he wasn’t kidding when he said he wasn’t going to last much longer.

Immediately Dash began thrusting her hips, taking in Lero to the hilt with one thrust and raising right up to the glans with the second. She knew his length by heart, and no longer had to have a practice run to get acclimated. Oh it felt so wonderful, so delicious, feeling him in her like this, like the last piece of a puzzle that just fit perfectly.

She was familiar enough with the secret topography of his body to know that he was going to come at any second, and to know she wouldn’t be able to follow even though she was racing as fast as she could. Wait, is he still fighting it?

“Lero,” she gasped, “Let-whoa!”

Grabbing her back and pulling her on his body, Lero flipped over and was on top of Dash, kissing her lips, using his legs instead of his hips to thrust. Lyra dodged her stiff wing, though the other one had slapped the rump of the sleeping Twilight, who muttered “Dash” in her sleep, with a smile.

Dash knew why he had done this – he was on top of her, holding her down. The sensation of being trapped really turned her on. Tears escaped her eyes as she wrapped her legs around his body, holding on to him so she could keep rotating her hips in time with his thrusts. This wonderful stallion loved her so much that he was letting himself face discomfort because he wanted her to come at the same time, because he wanted to give her pleasure more than he wanted to feel it. She was rooting for him, really, not because she wanted to climax with him – though she really did, oh goddess yes – but because she wanted him to win.

His hand reached up, grabbed Rainbow Dash’s mane, and pulled.

Dash gasped as a starfield of pleasure shot though her. Almost there, but she felt his body shudder and knew he wasn’t going to make it.

In the space of time between when his semen shot into Dash, but right before it landed, Lero bit Dash’s throat and growled.

Dash’s rear legs bucked as her orgasm hit her hard. She could feel his teeth against her throat, sharp teeth – a predator’s teeth! – his semen washing her insides, and she swirled into pure thudding pleasure. For the first time, she let out a vocal squeak that made even Lyra’s jaw drop. She thrust hard against him as her orgasm faded. He collapsed on her when he was done, panting heavily.

She laughed when it was over, a laugh of quiet joy. “You won,” she said, rubbing the back of his head with her hoof. “I can’t even tell you how much I love you right now.”

Lero rolled onto his side and looked at her with a tired, but satisfied smile. Lyra pressed up against his back and sighed.

“I love you, Dash,” Lero said. “I can always tell you.” He reached out a shaky hand and wiped the tears away from her eyes. Dash sniffled, and kissed the side of his hand as it went away.

Hooves thudded the ground as Lyra rolled out of bed. “I’m getting some water so you don’t get dehydrated.”

Lero rolled onto his back. “Thank you, Lyra.”

“And some painkillers,” Lyra said, trotting toward the kitchen. “Because you’re going to be very, very sore.”

Rainbow Dash peered at Lero. He was sweaty, sure, but his breathing was labored and she could read pain in his features.

“Dude!” she said, leaning in to get a closer look. “What’s wrong?”

“Nothing, Love, just overexerted myself,” he said. He forced a weak smile. “Don’t worry about it.”

Dash watched his face. “Lero. Don’t hurt yourself trying to make us happy. ‘Cuz that doesn’t make us happy at all.”

Lero reached up and played with a lock of her hair. Dash let her wing trail across his body while her hoof trailed across his chest. She didn’t want the physical contact to stop. “Sorry,” he said. “Didn’t mean to worry you.”

Lyra came back with a glass of water and a small yellow pill. “You can thank Zecora when you feel better,” Lyra said, as Lero took the pill and drank the water. “She’s quite the apothecary.”

Lyra cuddled back next to Lero, and the three eventually joined Twilight in the domain of sleep.

“I wonder why he always wears shoes on his rear claws,” Amethyst said. “Bottom claws? Whatever.”

“He does wear clothes all the time, doesn’t he?” Junebug said. “I wonder if he has a terrible deformity he’s hiding from us. He really goes out of his way not to offend us, doesn’t he?”

“He looks normal to me,” Berry Punch said. “I watched him swimming at the pond out there on the woods, showing his mares how he does it. He took all of his clothes off to swim. I didn’t see anything wrong with him.”

“I didn’t know he could swim,” Junebug said.

“He looks perfectly normal?” Amethyst said. “All things considered, I mean.”

“Perfectly normal,” Berry Punch said. Her face scrunched in thought. “Well, he doesn’t have a sheath.”

Junebug gasped and covered her hoof with her mouth. “Oh no, did it get torn off?”

“It looked more like he was born without one. His penis was just hanging out there.”

Amethyst took one last sip of her brandy, and magiced the empty snifter back to the table. “So if there’s nothing wrong with him, then why does he wear clothes all the time?”

No one at the table could come up with an explanation.

Last call was announced, and the group decided to hit home. Amethyst returned her half empty bottle of Brandy to the bar. Berry Punch and Amethyst traveled down the alley toward Amethyst’s house. June Bug and Red Harvest left together.

“Think she’ll get some action tonight?” Berry Punch said.

“Not really our business,” Amethyst Star sniffed. She broached a subject she had been dreading. “You heading straight home tonight?”

“Nope,” Berry said. She looked quietly worried. “There’s something wrong there, and I’m not comfortable going there.”

“I was wondering what was going on,” Amethyst said. “I saw you sleeping on a bench one morning. What’s the deal?”

Berry Punch shrugged, a trick Amethyst always wondered about. How does she shrug while walking? “Doesn’t matter. You wouldn’t believe me.”

“Try me.”

“While I was gone to take the final test to become a grandmaster, somepony broke into my house and replaced everything with an exact duplicate.”

Amethyst Star couldn’t stop the burst of laughter at Berry’s ridiculous fear. Her laughter dissolved into confused chuckling, as Berry wore a serious look.

“You- you really believe that happened?”

“I know it did. I didn’t bother filing a report, before you ask. This isn’t something that could be solved by police, though. I suspect malicious presence.”

Their hooves clopped against the cobblestone walkway, echoing through the alley. Their shadows played against brick walls, cast by the moon and lantern light. The whispered sounds of the tavern crowd died behind them as the ponies carried out their plans to crawl into their beds – or other ponies’ beds.

“What are you going to do about it?”

“Keep researching, I guess. I don’t want to get anyone else involved with it.”

Amethyst sighed. That stubborn earth pony temperament. “How about you stay at my place tonight?”

Berry smiled. “No thanks. Your herd hates me. Don’t worry Ames, I can handle it.”

“This is where I get off,” Amethyst said, standing in front of her house. “I’m serious Berry, get help if you think this is real.”

“Sure. Don’t tell anyone, okay?”

They hugged before Berry went her way.

Berry Punch swung her rear leg out and balanced in the water fountain as she chanted her mantra.

“Our nada who art in nada, nada be thy name.”

Berry Punch displayed the technique that made Drunken Hoof the most physically difficult (and some argued the most worthless) of the pony martial arts – its bipedal forms.

“Thy kingdom nada, thy will be nada in nada as it is in nada.”

She jumped from her hind legs, twirling in the air, slinging her body about like an equine missile as she splashed in the water.

“Give us this nada our daily nada.”

A learned Drunken Hoof practitioner twisting and turning in the air was an impressive sight to see. Most of the students thought so when they passed that level.

“Don’t even try using those forms for fighting,” her sifu, a pegasus mare named Long Goodbye, said to Berry’s class when they had made adept. “They’re completely worthless.”

“Then why did we go through all that pain?” A pegasus stallion asked. “I dislocated my shoulder trying to learn those forms!”

“It’s important that the Drunken Hoof practitioner learn the meaning of pain and futility.”

After most of the class abandoned the kwoon, though not before loud screaming, promises of arson, and threats of lawsuits, did grandmaster Long Goodbye survey the remaining students.

“Good,” she said. “Now we can continue the training, and you’ll learn the true meaning of Drunken Hoof.”

“When do we get to the drunk part?” Berry Punch asked.

“I think you’re already there,” Long Goodbye said with a sniff.

“Nada us our nada as we nada our nadas.” Berry Punch balanced on her hind legs and stretched the left one forward, as one front hoof swung at the limit of equine movement. Her front legs were splayed as if she was holding a bowl. “Nada us not into nada but deliver us from nada; pues nada.”

“How did you come up with your mantra?” Long Goodbye asked.

“I didn’t,” Berry Punch said. “It just came into my head.”

“That’s the same thing, isn’t it?”

Berry Punch grabbed a piece of paper from her sifu’s desk, and clutched a quill between two hooves, hastily drawing an earth pony before pushing it onto her desk.

“Who is this?”

“It’s Swing Sway. Actually, don’t worry about it. It’s a metaphor about what happened to me. See how someone put a picture on your desk, but it didn’t originate from the desk? That’s how it is with that mantra. Someone else came up with it and put it into my head.”

“I see.” Long Goodbye studied the drawing with obvious disgust. “That’s an excessive way to show your point, though.”

“He’s throwing up and pooping at the same time.”

“Yeah, I see that.” Long Goodbye said. She flipped the paper over and gasped in shock. “This is Swing Sway’s advancement form!”

“I hate that guy,” Berry Punch said.

Shortly afterwards, Berry Punch realized the mantra showed up in her head at the exact same time Lero made his appearance in the Everfree Forest. It was an uncomfortable coincidence.

Berry Punch then ended her mantra with the phrase that had made Long Goodbye think the whole thing was a vicious satire of Still Way philosophy; “Hail nothing full of nothing, nothing is with thee.” Her final form was standing with her rear legs crossed, as her front legs were arranged as if she was playing a flute.

Berry slowly lowered herself to all fours.

“Why the hay am I in the water fountain?”

...

Lero woke up shortly afterwards, Dash’s snoring not being conducive to good sleep. He slowly sat up in bed and wondered how the other two could sleep through it. With some careful maneuvering so as not to disturb his herd, Lero brought himself to the window, split the curtains, and opened the window to the fresh night air. The fantasy land of Ponyville met his sight, along with the night sky, beautiful and clear like a happy memory, and the large pale moon hanging above, bright like a comforting beacon for distant dreams.

Lero wasn’t particularly religious, but sometimes he couldn’t help but feel as if he had fallen into some prelapsarian world, where these innocent and childlike ponies had never partaken of the fruit, and were never driven out of Eden. He knew it was false, of course – a cursory survey of Equestrian history, with its violent tribal clashes and poor treatment of stallions, put that idea to rest. His own troubles with the Honey bunch didn’t do much to further that theory, either. Still, he couldn’t help but feel a quiet awe at this wondrous land and these amazing ponies, where magic was real and myths were common history. It could be overpowering at times.

He turned towards his sleeping mares and smiled. They helped him get through it.

He turned his glance back toward the window and was met with a riot of pink as Pinkie Pie took an aimless midnight stroll. He grabbed part of the curtain and covered himself. Sure, she had seen him naked plenty of times – he was still trying to figure out how she squirted herself out of his showerhead – but old habits die hard.

“Hi, Pinkie.”

“Hi there Lero zero schmero!” Pinkie said, waving her hoof frantically. “Letting the stank out?”

“...getting some fresh air, Pinkie.”

“Me too! I just love a little midnight stroll! Mmm-mm!” She inhaled deeply. “Think you and the ladies could come by for breakfast tomorrow morning? I mean, this morning? Later this morning? I’ll make that black bean arepas you like so much!”

“That sounds great, Pinkie. I’ll see you there.”

“Great! Have a great sleep... Leeerroo!” Her winking leer crossed over from perverted to absurd, and then she made her way back to Sugarcube Corner. Lero couldn’t help but smile as he closed the curtains. He left the window open. Fresh air would be nice, he thought. He needed to get back to bed anyway, as he had massage duty tomorrow with a visiting stallion from Cloudsdale, the one with the oddest, most out-of-place cutie mark he had ever seen – a tommy gun.

He made his way back to his bed and crawled between his mares, settling in and holding Dash like a stuffed teddy bear. He could virtually see her smile. As he drifted off to sleep, his last thought was wondering if he actually saw Berry Punch sleeping in the fountain.