For the first time in weeks, it was not Honeydew’s gentle touch waking me, but a stern shake. “W-wha? Kalypso?” I muttered, blinded by the rising sun
“Of course.” The seer said impatiently as she pulled my to my legs. “I need-”
“Honeydew!” I exclaimed as the events of last night rushed to the forefront of my foggy mind. “Is he-”
“He is not bleeding anymore.” Kalypso assured me, but her reserved tone chilled me to my bones.
“But is he-”
“Shhhh!” she hissed, pointing her hoof to where Honeydew was sleeping uneasily, his belly inches from a pointy rock, which I assumed was there to prevent him from accidentally rolling onto his bandaged leg. “I want to change his bandages.” Kalypso whispered. “But I don’t… know much about treating wounds. You put some kind of dirt on his bandages?”
“Ashes.” I nodded. “It kills bacteria in the wound.” At her baffled look, I clarified: “It may stop him from getting sick.” But with a bite this deep, and what I suspected was at least a minor case of blood loss, sickness was still a serious concern. And considering the technological prowess of the breezies, an infection might end horribly… If I could beat my younger self for not choosing healing magic as a subject, I think I would give myself a concussion or two! “I just wish I could do more…”
“You’ve done plenty, starting with keeping him from being mauled on the spot.” Kalypso stated, poking her hoof roughly against my chest. “You chased off a rat, for Frinjiòns sake!”
“Well… yeah,” I muttered. “But-”
“No, I’m not hearing it.” Kalypso sharply cut me off. “The only butt will be yours over there, we’re changing his bandages now.”
Her commanding tone did what the logic of her words couldn’t. They ripped me out of my thoughts and into action, as I measured the remaining silky fabric. “There’s only enough for one more.” I worriedly informed her. “What will we do tomorrow?”
“Wash the first one.” she muttered as she gently stretched out Honeydew’s leg, shuddering as he grunted in his sleep. . I couldn’t help but follow the movement of Kalypso’s hooves as she began to unwrap, even as my stomach turned at the prospect of seeing the wounds that had caused this! I swallowed, feeling my throat tighten at the thought.
Kalypso looked up, meeting my eyes with an understanding look. “Bring me some morning dew.”
My wordless glance simply couldn’t get across me relieved thankfulness, but it was all I could give before bolting away to climb up a grass stem at the opposite side of the camp, momentarily relishing as the sunlight warmed my coat.
When I came back, shivering as both of my feelers were enveloped by bubbles of cool water, I was met with an agonized howl. Honeydew had woken up and was in the process of being pushed back to the ground by Kalypso, the bloody bandages piled on the ground next to them.
“Sorry!” I heard Kalypso exclaim as she looked up to me. “I-I hoped we could do it while he slept.”
“D-do what?” he muttered, blinking against the sunlight.
“We’ll have to clean out your wounds.” My resolve nearly crumbled as I saw the dread in his eyes. “B-be strong, Honeydew.” It was all I could say as I gave Kalypso a meaningful look, and she put a bag over his head.
“It will hurt less when you cannot see.” she informed him. Honeydew shivered as we reached for his leg.
It was… not as bad as I’d feared. Although my stomach lurched when I saw his flesh part in the damage the rat’s incisors had inflicted, there was no sign of infection. It looked… meaty, red, yet strangely dry, it reminded me of the raw steak I’d once seen in a griffon cooking book. I used to think it looked nicely colorful!
Honeydew gasped as Kalypso gently spread the edges of his wound. Swallowing the enormous lump in my throat, I lowered my antennae, letting the water sink into his wound, prompting him to let out a wild curse.
“You’ll be fine…” I tried to tell him, gently repeating the process. There were other spots where teeth had punctured his flesh, but none of them were as deep or painful as the gouging holes. Still, he showed no sign of infection and the was no sign of further bleeding. It seemed that the ashes had worked. And if he got a lot of rest, I believed he could be back on his hooves in no time!
No time being a week or two, my brain added, and my optimistic smile turned into a frown as I tried to just focus on washing the wounds.
Honeydew groaned, sweat dripping off his face despite the cool temperature. With a worried glance, I pressed a hoof to his forehead… it felt hot, but was it fever-hot or just regular-hot? I’d never been able to tell. “How do you feel?” I whispered.
“Tired.” he forced between clenched teeth. “Can you make it quicker?”
I gave him a sympathetic look as I drew my antennae from the dark red to black-ish scab surrounding the puncture wounds. “Already done.” I whispered as I gestured for Kalypso hold his leg in place while I wrapped it in the new bandages. I just hoped it would heal without the stitches I was sure it needed. Although neither me nor Kalypso were in any way qualified to perform that operation…
Honeydew let out a huge breath as we finished, then promptly inspected his bandages with distress. “How long until we’ll move?”
“Honeydew,” I snapped. “You can’t fly on your own-”
“I know.” he interrupted me calmly, yet with a grimace as he moved his limp. “I just wanted to know how long.”
“Oh… right.” I deflated, before giving Kalypso an inquisitive glance. “Uhm… at least a few days, I think?” I glanced to Kalypso. She caught my look and sighed.
“I don’t know either, Twilight. Two or three days until he should move again? That’s what it’d be if we were with the clan.”
Honeydew nodded, looking somehow both relieved and exasperated. “We could’ve been there in two days from now.” he whispered in an odd tone.
“Yeah, well, that’s not happening.” I said decisively as I stepped around the two. Honeydew gave a faint nod, but Kalypso’s forehead furrowed, as if she was deep in thought. “You don’t think we should go, do you?”
“He… needs a healer.” she said slowly, her ear flicking as she frowned. “I wouldn’t know how to deal with him getting worse. Do you?”
“But he can’t fly like this!” I protested.
“Well, I don’t need my leg in order to fly-” Honeydew threw in, but my angry glare made his jaw clench.
“You’re not in a condition to travel, in any way!”
“He may not be in a condition to stay here, either!” Kalypso countered, approaching me face to face. “We may be able to hold out here, thanks to the food you brought, but it’s far from safe. What if it gets really cold? What if the rat shows up again, or some other predator?”
“I can light a fire again!”
“For days?” Kalypso crossed her forehooves, then held her hoof out to the surrounding area in a sweeping motion. “Can you make a fire with wet fuel?” Her confrontational expression faltered for a second as she whispered: “Can you?”
“No…” I admitted, biting my lip as I stared at our empty firepit. If it rained again before tonight, we wouldn’t have a fire. Sure, we could use sizzlegrass, but that might not protect us from a rat. Maybe I could keep watch in my alicorn form, but I’d probably use up our supplies in a single night. Plus, the tiny stalk of sizzlegrass would not be enough to warm me, not by far. So if it rained…
With a hiss, I let go of my breath. “Well, what’s your alternative?” I asked, a little more aggressively than I’d intended. “That we ignore his wound and let him just fly for two more days?”
“It’s a risk.” Kalypso said, biting her lip. “We can hold him up so he’ll have an easier time, but it might still hurt him. What do you think?” she asked Honeydew, who looked conflicted, before giving me a questioning gaze.
What? My brain reeled. Why is it my decision now? I bit my lip as I tried to weigh two unknowns against another, gazing from Honeydew to Kalypso. My eyes slowly came to rest on her. “Have you seen something?”
She closed her eyes, frowning deeply. “Maybe.” she admitted after a while.
“Then what do you think?”
“I-” Taking a sharp breath, she shook her head. “I told you my visions aren’t reliable. I didn’t see the rat coming!” A haunted look crossed her face. “At least… I don’t think I did.”
“Please, just tell me honestly what you think?” I asked, trying to smile encouragingly.
“I don’t know what I’m thinking, I-” She closed her eyes, then pointed her hoof out to a spot between the trees. “I think we should go. But I’m not sure-”
“I believe in you.” I said earnestly as I scurried around our resting spot, packing up the used bandage before splitting Honeydew’s load of supplies between mine and Kalypso’s.
“Well, then we can only hope we don’t regret it.” Kalypso sighed. Maybe she believed it was too quiet to hear it. But it didn’t matter.
I hadn’t paid too much mind to the beliefs of the breezies, seeing them as curiosities, at best. Maybe, at times, even as superstition. But… hadn’t there been signs that it was more than that? Superstition didn’t explain Kalypso’s future sight. Or how she’d conjured up that wind when praying to Styrktarmadr, if that had been her doing.
And speaking of that deity...spirit, one comment of Honeydew had haunted my mind over the past night. Styrktarmadr is the spirit of all finders. Good findings reward those in his favor, while those without… are more likely to be found. Was it not a strange happenstance, that when I’d interrupted a ritual to the spirit’s honor, we had been found by something?
Of course, empirical evidence, this was not. With a sample size of one, It could easily be chalked up to coincidence. And still, if it was true, then I might have inadvertently placed Honeydew in danger. The thought was enough to make me flinch and gaze to where he was flying behind us, his legs dangling loosely under him, instead of being tucked close to his body. “Ask for a break when you need it.” I cautioned him for the umpteenth time, my brows deeply furrowed. Seeing him struggle was… disconcerting. And I hated it.
Kalypso flew ahead, wearing an expression of deep concentration, though every now and again, she let out a frustrated huff. I supposed that searching for random inclinations and feelings was making it even harder to separate imagination from foresight… unless it was all imagination, of course.
With a grunt, I pushed that niggling doubt out of my head. I’d decided to trust Kalypso. I was in the breezie world, after all. Everything was possible. I may have hurt Honeydew with my pony-like naivete. But right now, I was a breezie, living among breezies.
Maybe it was time for a bit of faith.
After a little while, however, faith was starting to wane. Honeydew had now requested three breaks in just under an hour, and now he was once again looking tired and exhausted. I closed in on him. He looked weak enough that a sudden gust of wind could knock him off course.
“Kalypso, we need to stop for today!” I demanded. Honeydew did not protest, which only increased my worry. “Kalypso!”
“Just a bit longer.” she insisted, her antennae lighting up.
“If it’s just a vision-” I shouted. Following her when both decisions seemed equally terrible was one thing, but to push Honeydew to his limit when we could be resting-
“It’s not a vision.” Kalypso exclaimed and, to my surprise, started to grin. “I can hear voices!”
“You were right!” I gasped, then cleared my throat as I realized I’d sounded way more surprised than I’d planned to. “Sorry.” I tried to apologize, but Kalypso gave me an irritated look as her hoof made a brisk, cutting gesture. Immediately, I shut my mouth, glancing at Honeydew, who was already watching out carefully, his teeth clenched.
A moment later, I could also hear them. The voices were loud, almost exuberant. Had they no worries of what could hear them? They were definitely speaking breezish, though…
On a low-hanging branch, four young-looking breezies were scattered haphazardly around a small pile of what looked like strangely-white beans. One who seemingly used one such bean as a pillow shielded his eyes before pointing up to us. The breezies jumped up from their resting places just as we landed on their branch, at a bit of a distance. Honeydew immediately broke to the ground, huffing as sweat pooled on his forehead.
“Who are you?” One of the breezies shouted as I hurriedly helped Honeydew lean against a diverging branch.
“Are you from the Highbreeze-clan?” Kalypso asked behind my back. “We’re in desperate need of your help, one of us is injured!”
“Y-yes, we’re highbreeze.” The lead breezie stuttered, seemingly a bit overwhelmed. “Who is injured?”
“He is!” I shouted, resisting the impulse to push Honeydew’s hoof upward for all to see, and instead simply pointed at it.
“How did this happen?” He exclaimed as he pushed past Kalypso to get a closer look.
“A rat attacked us.” I said, unwilling to back away as he kneeled down before Honeydew to observe the bandages.
“A rat, sure, and you got away from that.” One of the actually smirked, prompting Kalypso to whirl around.
“That’s what happened.” She hissed, shooting him a hit glare.
“Of course-” the breezie mare began to drawl, but then came to a rapid stop as she met Kalypso’s gaze. “Your eyes! Bright Leaf, Europa, look at her!”
At that, the other breezies gathered around Kalypso, staring into her two-colored eyes while the seer ground her teeth. “He needs help, not me!” She shouted, pointing her hoof at Honeydew.
As if rising from a dream, the others blinked, before they rapidly nodded. “We’ve got some remedies with us,” the one called Bright Leaf informed us, while the others began to hurriedly pack away those bean-like things. “But our healer is back with our clan. If we hurry, we could be there by tomorrow.”
“W-won’t that disrupt your gathering trip?” I asked, dumbfounded. I’d hoped for hep, but this showed more willingness than I’d anticipated.
“That stuff?” He shook his hoof carelessly at the supplies. “We don’t really need it. We can go as soon as Hippe comes back.” With that, he took hold of the two mares in their group, leading them off… somewhere. A bit overwhelmed by their sudden helpfulness, I turned back to Honeydew. For some reason, he did not look happy at the attention he got. Instead, he actually wore a scowl as he glared at the Highbreeze-breezies’ preparations. It did not fit him at all to show so little gratitude.
“What’s going on?” I whispered to him. “We’re here, they’ll take us to their clan.”
“Great.” Honeydew said, breathing out through clenched teeth. “But why it had to be me…”
Something about his voice told me he wasn’t talking about his injury. His voice was seething with an anger that felt… older.
“Why?” I whispered, lowering my voice even further.
“It’s personal-” He said, but was interrupted by a new voice, emerging from our right.
A tall, teal-colored breezie mare was gliding towards the branch, eyes widened as she stared right at us. “Honeydew?” her voice was weak, as if she couldn’t believe what she was seeing. Then, her eyes trailed down to his bandage. “You’re hurt!” she exclaimed, landing right next to us, forcing me to back away as she surged toward him-
“STAY BACK!” Honeydew shouted, jabbing his healthy hoof at the breezie so that she had to skid to a halt. His heavy breathing, coupled with his sweaty mane clinging to his face gave him a mad appearance as he glared at the larger breezie.
“I’m sorry, Honey-” She tried to say, but he shook his head.
“Save it for later. Right now I’m in no mood to speak to you.”
“Honeydew, we’re here to trade with her clan, right? Don’t antagonize them when you need their help!” I whispered into his ear, but he only gave me a vexed glance.
“You don’t understand.” He took a deep breath, then pointed his hoof at the teal mare. “Twilight, meet my sister, Hippe.”