“I’ve told you fourteen,” Moondancer paused, counted, and continued, “sixteen times already, Trixie. I am not interested.” She turned away from the utterly frustrating filly, only to have the books balanced on her back snatched away.

“But you have all these books on game theory! There must be some game you can play with Trixie!” Trixie held the books aloft in her aura, eyes dancing from one to the next. “Just one game? Please!”

Moondancer rolled her eyes, and they fell on the book on choice games. “Okay. One game.” She held up a hoof. “But you need to get some things first.”

“What?” Trixie bounced up and down. That ridiculous wizard hat flopped over her eyes.

“One hundred bits.”

Trixie stopped bouncing. “But… That’s my allowance for…” She tapped a hoof on the ground six times, stopped, and stuck her tongue out between her teeth and started tapping her hoof again. “Six years!”

“If you want to play my game, one hundred bits. It’s in the rules.” She opened the book to the diagram. “See? One hundred. No more. No less.”

“Can’t you play another game with Trixie? Like hoofscotch! Or… or Four Square!”

“No. I don’t play those kinds of games. This game or no game.”

“Okay. It may take Trixie a little while to get the bits. Will you play after I do?”

“I will. Promise.”

Moondancer took her books back and trotted away, leaving a beaming Trixie behind her. She would forget about the game. She would.










[hr]










She found the book again. Hobble On’s treatise on cart wear and tear, and its use in game theory. It was wedged under a table leg, shoved there to keep the table from wobbling who the hay knew how many years ago. Certainly before Twilight had left.

She pulled out a sheet of paper and started to write.

“Dear Princess Twilight,”










[hr]











The sound of hooves outside her door sounded just as it had weeks before. “Trixie is here. She doesn’t know why she is here, but Twilight Sparkle was very convincing.”

“It’s alright, Trixie. Come in. Please?”

Momentarily, a pink aura surrounded the handle on the door, and Trixie stepped in. “Ah-hah! Trixie should have guessed you would be in league with Twilight Sparkle. Well, you won’t get Trixie’s secrets, either! A good magician never reveals them! Never!”

It was an effort, but Moondancer smiled and pushed out the stool opposite the table. “Do you remember a promise I made to a little filly? Oh… ten years ago?”

“Trixie admits she does not.” The mare stayed standing in the doorway. “She remembers that a devious trickster almost conned her out of a hundred—” 

A purse clinked as it settled on the far side of the table from Moondancer. “I’m sorry for tricking you like that.”

Trixie stepped farther into the house, even closing the door behind her. “Trixie is not susceptible to bribery.”

The smile on Moondancer’s face began to feel stretched too far. “It’s not a bribe.” 

Trixie made no move for the bag. “Why did you try to trick Trixie?”

“You were annoying me while I was trying to study. I had already fallen behind Twilight Sparkle.” Moondancer cleared her throat, coughed, and pushed the stool out a little more. “I shouldn’t have tricked you like that, and I’m sorry.”

The stool rocked in Trixie’s aura, moved back under the table, hesitated, and then slid back out. Trixie sat down, placing the bag of bits between them. “We have something in common.”

“Twilight told me about your… er…”

“Mistakes. Trixie made mistakes.”

“I did, too.” Moondancer tapped the book again. “I made a promise. Do you want me to teach you about Hobble On’s ultimatum game?”

“What does Trixie get out of it?”

Moondancer pointedly did not look at the bag between them. Trixie didn’t, either.

“A friend.”

Trixie gnawed on her lip. “I looked up to you, Moondancer. You were so smart, and you knew so many things. I thought you would be my big sister some day. We lived next door to each other, do you remember that?” When Moondancer nodded, she went on, “I thought we were friends.”

Moondancer reached across the table. “I’m sorry. Can I get another chance?”

“Twilight Sparkle… she gave Trixie another chance.”

She waited, her foreleg still held outstretched above the table.

Trixie reached out to touch hooves first. “Trixie accepts.”