Our main character's story begins on a warm spring day. Birds chirp outside, the sun shines bright, and flowers are in bloom. Inside the wide white doors Filly Delphia Hospital, a foal is being born. A nervous stallion paces the hallway, frantic at the sounds of his wife's cries of pain. This stallion is soon to be a father, and he prays to sweet Celestia that his beloved's labor goes well. He runs a stone-gray hoof over his frizzy halo of reddish hair, and yawns in anxiety.
He peeks his head through the door frame of the hospital room. The father-to-be steps to the bedside of his wife, and grasps her hoof in his. Her creamy and delicate skin glistens with sweat from the hard work of childbirth, her golden and lilac locks untamed and in a mess. The contracting mare's vivid green eyes are tired and weary from her labor. She looks up with those vivid green eyes and meets the rosy-hued optics of her husband.
"Lavi, darling..." the stallion coos to his exhausted wife, smiling warmly. "You're doing great. You'll be just fine, I promise." His words are gentle, and he desperately hope that they are true.
"Sir." One of the nurses speaks up, her voice firm and wry. "It's been almost five hours and the head of the foal has yet to show. We might have to put her on painkillers and proceed with a C Section. There's too much blood."
The worried stallion dares not look past the blanket obscuring view past his wife's midsection. He knows that the nurse knows what she's talking about.
"Please, ma'am. You've just got to keep her alive. Can you do that?" He pleads, pinkish eyes wide with concern.
"We can try," the nurse offers, and calls more assistants over.
"Listen, Lavender." The stallion turns to his wife. "Sweetheart, you're bleeding very badly. Soon you won't have the faintest idea of what's going on, because of the medication. But please, hang in there. For me; for our child!"
"Copper..." The poor mare's voice is raspy and shaky. "I love you."
As the nurses urge him out of the room to proceed with the operation, Copper Key locks eyes with Lavish Lavender once more. He does not know it at that exact moment, but it is the last time he will ever look into those eyes- alive, at least- again.
Beeeeep. That droning flat note, the line going flat on the heart monitor, ends his world. His wife, his beautiful and young love, is dead. Copper's jaw drops in horror, the whites of his eyes showing as he peers into the doorway. Tears gather into his eyes when he sees the blood, the flat green line on the monitor, and Lavender's limp body growing cold on the hospital bed.
He does not hear the cries of a wailing foal; if he does, he ignores it. For he does not care that a beautiful little filly was born just now. All he cares about is his beloved wife.
"You!" He practically roars, trying to struggle past the arms of nurses barricading him from the baby. "You killed her! You little monster! I hate you! I wish you'd never been conceived!" The harsh words roll from his mouth as he spews with anger and grief.
Of course, the newborn does not know the meaning of these words, but the loudness of his voice causes her to cry harder nonetheless. She has been washed and swaddled in a fluffy pink blanket, stats taken and shots received. Her eyes are sealed tightly, her pale gray face wrinkled into an upset scour. Her pink tongue lolls out as she opens her mouth to release another wail.
Copper Key is removed from the room, as his violent outrage has caused an upset. He is told to wait until he can calm down and sign the papers for his new daughter. He angrily pouts in the hallway. He does not want to sign the papers. He does not want the child who killed his wife. But something causes him to stride in with an icy calm and sign the birth certificate. He will keep the filly, because he knows his wife would have it so. He also gives the baby the name Lavender had dreamed of naming a little girl. He picks up the pen between his teeth and scribbles the name onto the document:
Marigold Valley