[Prompt 17] Lanterns

I trotted forward with a dimly lit lantern in my mouth. A small amount of heat rising from it, to tickle my nose. “Silent, have you ever thought about causing some mischief?”  I asked. Silent seemed delighted by the question. “Have you not?” He chuckled. Even in the dead of night, I could see why they called him Silent. His hooves seemed to glide over the leaves, no sound of leaves crunching whatsoever. Whereas, I couldn’t get by without the crunch of leaves underhoof. “Whisper, do you ever wonder where our souls go when we die?” Silent asked. I looked at him a little awkwardly and stopped in my tracks. “What do you mean?” I asked, hoping that he would clarify what he meant by that. He only shook his head, “Sorry, nevermind, must just be the jitters talking.” He said, and changed the subject. “What kind of mischief do you want to get up to tonight? It’s almost halloween, I’m sure we could scare the humans.” He said, and started walking again, I followed him but made sure to keep a close eye on him this time. What jitters? Why was he scared? Why was he even remotely stressed? We had all the right to be out here anyway, our humans liked to turn us out during halloween, allowing us to go wherever our hearts please. Not fences, and no trouble for being away from the stable. Why on Earth would Silent be stressed?

“I don’t know.” I replied, waiting for an idea to pop in my mind. “Wait, you know the old crypt?” Silent said, clearly suggesting something. “Yes? But what good would a crypt do to scare the humans? It’s not like we can move it.” I replied. “Who said we had to move it?” Silent asked. I looked at Silent strangely, needing clarification. Silent stopped. “What if we brought our humans there? They always plan a midnight bareback ride on halloween night, we could set something up and take them there.” Silent suggested. I had to admit, that was a pretty damn good idea. “I like that idea. But what would scare them there?” I asked, the dim lighting from Silent’s lantern lighting up his face in an odd way. “Sugar looks like a ghost.” Silent suggested. “That’s right!” I exclaimed, my brain now running on full power. “We could set up some creepy lanterns too! And maybe spook at Sugar? They know we see ghosts, or well they think we do.” I suggested, putting my lanturn down so I could speak better. “They don’t have to know the truth, they don’t have to know that we spook just for fun, they don’t have to know we enjoy smelling the fear that comes off of them, they don’t have to know we enjoy the days off it brings” I schemed. Silent also put his lanturn on the ground. “That’s a great idea. We have three days, and three nights to pull this off. Why don’t we go to the crypt tonight to get it set up?” He asked. “Yes!” I exclaimed. As we bent down to pick up our lanterns, the small fire in them went out. Me and Silent stared at each other. There was no wind, nothing to make them blow out. “Silent?” I asked, seeing a ghostly figure a few meters from us. “Run!” Silent shouted, dropping his lanturn on the ground, it landing with a deafening boom. I dropped mine to the ground, and ran alongside him. His hooves still made little to no sound as we ran over dried leaves. 

Ahead of us, lanterns seemed to fly from the sky, the sound of their flames roaring. Silent and I came to a dead stop. “Silent?” I asked, seeing the ghostly figure come up behind us. “We are cornered.” Silent said with a hint of defeat. I looked at the lanterns, their flames didn’t seem to be contained by the walls of the lantern for some reason. It was almost as if it was magic? But it couldn’t be, magic didn’t exist, did it? The crackle and pop of the flames only indicated one thing, they were sure as hell real. 

“Who might you be?” The ghostly figure boomed. Then, started laughing? Humans popped out from behind the bushes. “Got you!” They screamed. I jumped back, before grabbing a glance at Silent. “Did they really just-” I started. “They did. They got us Whisper.” Silent sighed. “Got you!” One of the humans said, coming up to me. “And I think we got you pretty good.” She said, pleased with herself. “Wait to see how we will return the favor” I threatened. With that, she simply laughed, and the lanterns came back down to the ground, landing with a crash. She opened her hand to reveal a small, sweet treat. I took it happily, grateful for at least something. It tasted sweet, maybe some type of candy.

Silent’s person seemed to be doing the same. I nudged my human in the arm. “What do you think you’ll do to scare us?” She asked. “It wouldn’t scare you if you knew about it beforehand now would it?” I returned. She chuckled a little, and gave me a soft kiss on my pink nose.

Me and her walked side by side, her hand on my shoulder. Silent was walking next to me, his owner on the other side of him. “Let’s get you guys cleaned up, you smell disgusting.” My human laughed. I caught a whiff of Silent and gagged. “Yeah, I think they’re right.” I said, fighting for inhales of fresh sweet air. “You don’t smell any better than me.” Silent chuckled, fighting back the urge to gag. 

“I do look like a pretty good ghost.” Sugar boasted. “Yeah yeah, you got us.” Silent sighed, clearly irritated that they got us first. Me and him shared a quick look of acknowledgement, they would regret this evil scare. We chuckled for a minute, knowing what we were planning would be so much worse than this.