Chapter Two: The Garden of Eden 

When I arrive at Zecora’s hut, I find her napping outside in a hammock made of vines and felled branches. My breath catches at the sight of her sleeping frame. She is lying on her side, her striped body naked and exposed in the morning light, her forelegs dangling, her thighs stacked—one lying atop the other and partially shielding the pink of her femininity from view. A slight inhalation inflates her chest, and then an easy release of air flattens it again. The steady rising and falling of her chest transfixes me. I stand there watching her sleep for longer than I mean to.

Zecora and I fell in love three years ago on the bold expanse of a wild Appleloosian plain, far removed from the settler ponies and their towns and orchards. She was visiting buffalo country on some manner of spiritual retreat, as was I, and it wasn’t long before infatuation snared us in its net. We lived together among the buffalo tribes for nearly two years, learning the ways of their culture by day and making love under the stars by night.

I still remember the Zecora of those hallowed days lived freely among the thunder beasts. I remember the color that flowered in her cheeks on the afternoon we ran with the buffalo through their scared stampeding grounds, our hooves stomping memories into the dry soil. I remember how her tail flagged in the air as she ran, and the springtime twinkle that lit her eyes and made them glow. I remember how our moods took on the vibrant energy of the surrounding stampeding herd, that hard-charging river of brown and black fur that rolled across the dust-covered land.

And I remember the feeling of discovery that blossomed between Zecora and I. I had known her for many months primary to that day, but after our run with the buffalo something new and potent had begun stirring in me, and in Zecora as well. That was the day we became lovers.

Today I pray we will be able to remain friends.

Zecora stirs as I climb into the hammock and lie down beside her. Her eyes blink open and she welcomes me with a rhyme, a simple two-stanza couplet, her voice rich and melodious.

"It is very good to see you as well," I say.

Questions fill her cheeks and spill from her mouth in great, cascading cataracts. I haven’t seen Zecora in a year, but she interrogates me as if I have been gone for ages, asking why I left and where I have been. Dollops of worry and anger splash about in her torrent of words. She seems upset, but I pay her mood little mind, focusing instead on her beautiful muzzle and her musical voice.

I have always loved zebras. They speak as poets write, and their magic is the old magic—the word magic—spoken and chanted and rhymed and rarely written down. Zecora’s magic is especially strong. The music of her homeland is in her voice—the recusant drum and the heretic howl and the muted clop, clop, clop, of pagan hooves trampling tall grass as they dance their sacred rain dances, and their sun dances, and their wind dances.

Zecora believes there are gods living in all things. She believes that nothing born of nature or equine, of soil or hoof, is truly inanimate. And she thinks me foolish for worshiping Luna. She says true gods do not want for the comforts of mortals, and that Luna and her sister are not worthy of praise.

But I know better. Zecora is jealous of my mother.

“Must you question me so ruthlessly?” I say with a friendly laugh, interrupting her downpour of worried rhymes. “You speak as if we are husband and wife.”

Zecora rolls atop me and rests her head on my chest, listening to my heartbeat, as she often does. She mumbles something about us being ‘out of sync’, and the revelation makes her frown.

“Come now, we both knew this day was fast approaching,” I say, petting her head.

Zecora sits up and utters a reverberant rhyme, a weighty four-stanza poem about a heartsick zebra and a foolish pegasus and a cruel, manipulative goddess.

“Bitterness does not suite you, Zecora. You wear it poorly.” I cup her chin and draw her mouth to mine, pecking her lips. The kiss is fleeting but intimate. It begs another.

Our mouths meet again, lips parted this time, and Zecora rolls her tongue against mine, filling my cheeks with her tenderness. It’s a long, loving, aching kiss, and when it ends a better mood finds Zecora, and she smiles with the accepting poise of one who has been bested fairly. A new poem graces her lips, a charming and easy sonnet, crafted on the spot and with the deftness of a master wordsmith. The rhyme scheme spins itself from nothing, a beauteous and simple “a” then “b” then “a” then “b” again, skillfully worded and set to an unwavering iambic rhythm.

The poem is about us—about our days on the Appleloosian plains, our heated religious debates, our midnight trysts, our fights (of which there were many), and our inevitable end. With the last line of her poem, Zecora poses a weighty question. She asks me if I ever truly loved her.  

“Of course.” I say, stroking her cheek. “Our time may have been short, but brevity cannot cheapen a thing as grand as love. My heart has been yours since the first day I stumbled into your company. Part of it is still yours now…if you would have it.”

Zecora shies away, and with a single heart-wrenching stanza, she accuses me of using her.

At the accusation, something like anger washes over me. “Never.”

I roll Zecora onto her back and straddle her hips. She tries to shy away again, but I cup her chin and coax her with a sprinkling of fragile kisses that fall upon her face. Her neck. Her shoulders. She resists at first, but eventually passion sweeps her up in its gale and carries her gaze back to mine. Her eyes fix on my mouth, and then her lips do the same. We kiss again, and without uttering a single word, Zecora pleads with me to take her one final time.

I oblige her, happily.

Love makes a fool of my Zecora. She mashes her body against mine as if wishing to fuse with me, trying to make one of two by means of some complex romantic algorithm, some science of sweat-stained bodies and yearning sexes, some alchemy of intertwining heartstrings.

In the throes of our final coupling, I suppose love makes a fool of me as well. The hammock rocks as I take Zecora anyway I please: slow and gentle at first, like a newlywed husband claiming his wife’s virginity, and then hard and fast, pounding away at her swollen sex the way brutish stallions pound away at whores. Whimpers fall from her mouth, lighter than specks of dust, and ride the morning breeze up to my ears, and then beyond, sailing for the treetops, then for the clouds, then the heavens—like prayers, like hymns, like rapturous noises meant for divine ears.

And then it ends. With a grunt, a moan, and a satisfied sigh, it ends. With my climax comes the haunting knowledge that somewhere Princess Cadenza is laughing. I’ve heard it said she is a haughty goddess of love and lust, and that she laughs when fools come under her spell.

Our lovemaking at an end, Zecora and I lie in each other’s forelegs for several minutes, listening to the birds of spring trill their happy tunes. Eventually, Zecora reminds me that I never answered her questions about where I have been for the past year.

“You wouldn’t like the answers, I’m afraid,” I say. “Yours is such a pure and innocent soul, Zecora. I wouldn’t sully it with talk with my harrowing journeys.”

Zecora curls her lip in frustration at my evasiveness, but elects not press the issue further. Instead, she pillows her head atop my chest and falls asleep to the steady thumping of my heartbeat. I let her sleep for nearly an hour, periodically stroking her mane while I entertain myself with happy memories of our time together.

Time slows to crawl here in the bosom of Lady Everfree. The thought of trading this lush forest for a stuffy, grey city fills me with a sense of quiet dread. I’ve never felt at home in cities. They make me restless. Even my home in Canterlot, splendid as it was, never filled me with same sense of peace and belonging that I feel now, tucked away in Lady Everfree’s womb. She’s been like a mother to me, this forest, and I will miss her as dearly.

After what feels like nearly two hours, Zecora wakes up. She asks me how many hours have gone by and why I didn’t wake her sooner.

“Not many,” I respond, “and you looked so peaceful, I... Apologies, I couldn’t bring myself to wake you.”

We talk about nothing in particular for a few minutes. She tells about her friends that live in the little town just outside of Lady Everfree. I have never met any of these friends of hers, but Zecora worries about them constantly. She says a great tragedy has befallen them, and that none of them will ever be the same.

“Change is not always so bad,” I say, doing my best to sound reassuring.

Then, not wanting to needlessly drag things out, I climb down from Zecora’s hammock and tell her that I’m leaving on a dangerous mission…and that I’ll need my potions. A fleck of concern mars expression, and I find myself loving her for it. She responds with a sad sigh and tells me that my saddlebag full of vials is inside her hut. I hurry inside and retrieve it.

Before I depart, Zecora crafts yet another sonnet. This one is warning. She claims that I rely too heavily on my potions, and she promises dire consequences should I fail to temper my use of them.

“Thank you for your concern,” I say, bowing humbly before my former beloved. “I will be very careful.”

Zecora climbs down as well. We share one final parting kiss; then I fasten my bag about my torso and wish Zecora a bittersweet goodbye.

As I fly away from Lady Everfree’s nurturing bosom, I make the mistake of chancing a backwards glance. I see Zecora standing on her doorstep, waving at me, and before I float beyond the treetops, I’m struck by a sudden moment of clarity.

This could be enough, says a voice from a dark corner of my mind. This forest, Zecora…it could be enough. You could make a happy life here.

I shake my head and chase away the distracting thought. The ocean tide in my chest rises, and I feel the moon nestled in mother’s eyes pull at me. Even now, it pulls at me. Even in daylight, beneath the sun and the cloudless sky.

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I fly north toward Appleloosa in hopes of restocking my supply of Reds. I have many potions that serve many different needs, the most powerful of which are the Blues and the Reds. Both are simple enhancement potions: the Blues enhance my mind, and the Reds do the same for my body. Out of concern for my wellbeing, Zecora pours out my Reds at every presented opportunity, and over the years I have learned to stop leaving them in her care. They have…detrimental side effects, the Reds; and while I find Zecora’s habit of destroying them inconvenient, some part of me is grateful to be the recipient of such earnest concern.

Zecora created the potions herself, years ago while we were still living among the buffalo. During those days, I was stricken by the terrible malady of insomnia, and was in the process of scouring Equestria for a cure when I came upon Chief Thunderhooves and his tribe. His shamans offered me aid, but their magics had no lasting effects on my condition. This was in the early days of my retreat with the buffalo, and I knew little of Zecora then—only that she and I shared a mutual interest in the dreamscape, and in the spiritual undertakings of a mind at rest.

I sought Zecora’s help after the shamans had failed me. She studied my condition for several months, hardly sleeping herself as we wrestled with the conundrum of my insomnia. She picked my brain for some clue that might lead her to the problem’s root cause, questioning me about my past, my parents, my interests, my aspirations, my fears… She even used drugs and hypnosis to lull me into more open and vulnerable states of mind.

It began as purely procedural, this probing of my identity, but as the whole of me unfolded before Zecora, it soon transformed into a kind of furtive flirting. Her methods grew more…intimate, and I exposed myself to greater and greater degrees of vulnerability, until eventually I grew addicted to the sensation of lying bare and prone in Zecora’s capable hooves. I felt safe with her. She was kind and nurturing, and I knew in my heart that she would never hurt me.

After a week of this flirting, I grew more aggressive in my romantic pursuit of Zecora, and she in turn grew more uncomfortable. At one point, she tried to explain away my attraction to her. She claimed that I was looking for a parental figure, not love, and that I had confused my desire to be fawned over with my desire for her. That was the first time she ever accused me of using her, though, she assured me it was no fault of my own.

On the very same night of her accusation, and after an exceedingly personal secession of hypnotic therapy, Zecora and I left our teepee and gallivanted deep into the wild plains, intoxicated by budding arousal and the smoke of burning herbs. Later, we made love for the first time under the stars. I remember the half-moon was exceptionally bright that night, and I wondered if Luna was watching me through eyes narrow with envy. The thought overjoyed me in a cruel way.

Zecora moaned my name throughout the midnight hours. Her poetry was sloppy then, more passion than skill, but that was the moment I fell in love with her voice. We kept up like this for the next few weeks: working on my condition by day and sneaking off to the plains after dark. I spent many a wakeful evening sitting at Zecora’s side after a bout of tender sex, enamored by her sleeping frame. She slept with the innocence of a child. It was a dreamless, guiltless, holy kind of rest, and I loved and envied her for it.

Our relationship grew complicated when one night I, while making love to Zecora, I accidently called her mother. Had it been Luna’s name I moaned, I don’t know how Zecora would have responded. But it wasn't a name I breathed into Zecora’s ear that night. It was the word, plain and simple: Mother.

I was mortified. Completely and utterly crushed. I thought this would surely mark the end of what I had with Zecora. Instead, it marked the beginning. Conflict watered our relationship and our loved bloomed. My unexpected admission of…sexual anxiety confirmed Zecora’s theory of emotional transference. She had found her clue. The next morning, Zecora prepared the first of what would be many potions. I drank it and slept for the first time it what had seemed like ages.

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The roar of a rumbling train breaks the afternoon silence. I watch it chug along the tracks, passing Appleloosa as it turns east toward Dodge City. Then I aim my gaze at the myriad of sun-bathed browns and greens that make up both the plains and the rustic farm town far below.

Searing sun rays beat down on my back, a harsh reminder from Celestia that her day is not meant for my kind. If there is one thing I’ve always hated about Appleloosa, it’s the weather. Regardless of the season, it always feels like summer during the day and winter at night, and it took me months to grow accustomed to the dramatic shifts in temperature.

Before flying into the heart of buffalo territory, I head to the western-most edge of the plains, where I come upon a wide river. I leave my saddlebag on the bank and wade out into the cool, slow-moving current. A relieved sigh escapes me, and once again I find myself thinking of Zecora. We spent many a lazy afternoon lounging along the bank of this river, talking about nothing as we laid in each other’s forelegs and watched the clouds drift by overhead. I remember how she used to rest her head atop my chest and listen to my heartbeat; and how she recited poems about us being in perfect harmony—with each other and with this majestic land as well.

This place still reeks of her. The echoes of her touch still reside in the cool caress of the rolling current, and her voice—her rhyme—it still hangs about in the river-chilled air.

“Oh, if only I could hold you one last time,” I think aloud, the words coming to mind free of inhibition and carrying a strong need to be spoken. “If only I could hold this place one last time—this great green sweep of dreamscape, where the trees turn to torches with the morning light in their leaves, and the rivers flow with water as silver as coins. This beautiful place where striking flowers grow, with petals as fragile as farewell kisses and stems more delicate than a departing lover's promise to write, to stay in touch, to visit again. This dry place where a breath of arid air brings thirst to the lips and reminds a stallion of his own mortality. This simple place where a pony can be free—no—better—where he can be fool, ignorant to the complexities of his own society, of that civilization his brothers and sisters build up and fawn over daily.

“And what use is all that ‘society’ and ‘civilianization’, what purpose does it serve? For how can a stallion think with so many walls and ceilings and bars and closed windows trapping his thoughts? How can he breathe through the smog of industry? How can he move freely through the shoulder-to-shoulder bustle of overpopulation? And how can he scream in agony or whoop with joy if there are so many present to hear, to judge?

“No,” I think aloud with a dejected headshake, “it is better to live in the wilds, among the mystics and the spirits they conjure. Better to trade a ceiling for a naked sky. To wash in rivers rather than in tubs. To run free and graze and dance and love…”

I wade back to the bank and shake myself dry as a dog would. Then, feeling refreshed and at peace, I lie down beside my bag and stare up at nothing in particular.

Then a somber sigh escapes me.

“…But you are not for me, are you silver river? You are of born of the sun, a blessed gift from aunt Celestia, and there is nothing in your waters for a deserter such as I: one born in the white mountain tops only too willing tramp through the valley of the shadow of death. A dove turned bat...and for what? For love?”

A harsh laugh rumbles up my throat.

“Yes, yes…anything—anything at all for love.” I close my eyes and the beginnings of a knowing smile grace my lips. “Blackness for love—”

“—And blood and death as well...” says a familiar voice, completing my sentence. My eyes snap open, and I peer up at the face of a pegasus stallion that I haven't seen in ages.