CHAPTER 7
In the Forest
A few hours had passed since the three of us had fled the destroyed convoy, although we had no idea where we were or where we were going, Vapor, Dust, and I had managed to find a small clearing in the forest, where we had sit down to rest. We all sat there panting, “that…is probably…the most I’ve run…in my entire…life” Vapor said as she held a hoof to her chest and breathed rapidly, Dust simply chuckled as he breathed in slowly, before standing up, “well…now you know how I feel” he said as he stood up and cleared his throat, and began walking around, examining our surrounding’s.
As he did Vapor and I finally caught our breath’s and began looking around with him, “well, where are we?” I asked, looking around, Dust glanced at me and chuckled, unfolding his wings he flew up over the tree’s and looked around, and Vapor and I exchanged confused looks, but watched as he flew down to us. “Well, were not far from the mountains, north should be in that direction” he said pointing to his left, Vapor looked at him in confusion. “How did you know that?” she asked, he smiled and stepped next to her, pointing up into the sky, “you see that star? The one that’s slightly brighter than the others, it’s the north star, I’ve studied the night sky before, my uncle lived in Spring Wood, he owned a small book store, and he would occasionally lend me books of all sorts, so I know a lot of things” he said, as he they turned to each other, and in a moment they froze.
As I noticed this, I groaned and walked away, while Dust simply smiled at her, “well, that’s…that’s very interesting, what else do you know?” she asked, with a smile on her face, which much to my surprise, was something I was used to, since she walked around town with that same smile plastered on her face. Before he could answer I spoke up, “hey you two, hate to spoil your moment here, but we should probably find something to start a fire with” I said as I walked away, Dust calmly cleared his throat, “yes, Vapor, help me get some small branches’ from the tree, Frost, you make a small pit for the fire” he said as the two of them flapped up and disappeared into the tree line.
________________________________________
Not long after they left, Vapor ad Dust returned and dropped two small piles of branches’, and immediately started stacking them together, but we quickly realized that none of us had any matches, to start the fire with. Dust looked around and groaned, “well…this presents a problem, we have nothing to start a fire” he said looking around, but then he looked over at me, and a smile grew on his face, “hey frost, What kind of spells do you know?” he asked.
The question caught me slightly off guard, but he posed a good question, all my life I never really had need to expand my spell repertoire, other than the simple telekinesis and levitation spells I knew for work and other stuff. I thought for a moment of what to say, rubbing the back of my head, “well, um…honestly, I don’t know that many spells, just some simple telekinesis, I don’t think I can be of much help” I said as my ears flattened down. Dust merely chuckled, “well, there’s always a first time, either you give it a shot, or we freeze to death and get eaten by a large animal” he said with a smug smile.
Despite his unnecessary joke, I knew he was simply trying to encourage me to try, but I still wasn’t sure, although I did appreciate the effort, but I knew I should give it a shot. After a brief hesitation, I sat up and walked over to the small sire pit, lowering my head and pointing my horn at the pile of wood, I closed my eyes and focused my magic. Although I couldn’t see for myself, I could tell that my horn was starting to glow, taking a deep breath as I closed my eyes tighter, I could feel the smallest bit of sweat form on my forehead, and in a brief flash, a small bolt shot from my horn, and ignited the pile on fire.
“Not bad Frost, I may not use magic, but I can easily tell that you need practice” he said with a smug smile, I glared angrily at him as I stood up, and I could hear Vapor snickering behind me. After I took a deep breath and relished in my accomplishment, I knew that Dust was right, I would need to train more, but that would be a discussion for another time.
At that moment, we heard a loud rustling in the tree’s behind us, and all our head’s snapped in that direction, watching as the rustling continued, and in a brief flash, something dark flew at us, but it seemed too small to be a Pegasus, and it didn’t seem to have hooves, as the shadow moved into the other tree’s, we heard a loud clamping sound, and a shrill squawk, as the shadow fell from the second tree, and into a small bush. The three of us all exchanged confused expressions, but we turned and slowly walked over to the bush, which was giving off a little rustling, as we approached, I looked at the other’s and they all motioned for me to check it out, I rolled my eyes and slowly approached the bush, with the two pegasi flanking me.
With a slow hoof, I spread the bush apart and peeked in, and much to our surprise, it wasn’t a stealthy attacker, or a Pegasus at all, but nothing more than a hawk, which was tied up in a trap, a large rope tied around its wings, preventing it from flying off. We all gave off sighs of relief, as we looked a little closer, only to receive a threatening squawk from the hawk, making us all step back, I turned to the others. “Well, it’s just a helpless animal caught in a trap, poor girl” I said with a smile, Dust smiled back, “that’s t just any animal, that’s an Everfree black-tailed hawk, not exactly your common find, they live deep in the forest, their very territorial” he said, as the hawk continued to struggle with the trap, gnawing at the rope’s with its sharp beak. Vapor gave off an annoyed sigh and returned to the fire, while I took a step closer, but not without the bird giving me an angry glare.
“Shh, it’s okay, I’m going to help you, hold still” I said as my horn lit up, and my bluish aura, slowly enveloped the knot around the rope, the haw stopped picking at it, and looked at me in a quizzical fashion, obviously wondering why I was helping it, but I knew I couldn’t leave a defenseless animal like that, especially not to some hunter who would most likely stuff it and hang it on a wall. As I fumbled with the knot, I quickly undid it and stepped back, giving the hawk space to finish the job, she quickly tore the rest away, and flapped her wings proudly, before looking at me with interest, “your welcome” I said in a kindly tone, the bird squawked at me, and flapped it’s wing, and flew up into a nearby tree, and perched there, continuing to watch me, “a little thank you would be nice” I said with a chuckle as I walked back to the fire and joined the other’s. Now I could finally get a better look at her, she had a black tail, with black wings, accompanied by a silver coat, with what appeared to be white spot all across its face and neck.
________________________________________
Not long had passed since we arrived, and we were all gathered around the fire, talking about our next move, but also finding time, to get to know each other better. “So Frost, what’s your plan after we get out of here?” Dust asked me, I looked at him and then gazed into the fire, “well, probably back home, get back to work, and try to put all of this behind me” I said, Vapor simply gave a disgusted sigh and rolled her eyes, while Dust merely nodded. “What about you?” I asked him, he looked confused for a moment, and leaned forward, rubbing his chin with his hoof, “honestly? Not entirely sure, I wasn’t counting on being an escaped fugitive, I’ll probably…go off to Manehatten, try to find my uncle, and settle with him for a while at least, then get back on my hooves and live my life, simple as that” he said and leaned back, and we continued talking about various things, with Dust even telling us about some of his misadventure’s when he was younger.
But as we talked and laughed, I couldn’t explain why, but my mind solely drifted back to the attacker at the convoy, the way her eyes widened in confusion when she saw the medallion, and I felt my hoof slowly grasp on to it, and even further still, my mind further wondered to the words Midnight Star spoke to me, about the storm coming, I couldn’t explain it, but my gut told me that things were only going to get worse. I was taken from those thoughts by Dust, “hey Frost, you okay? You spaced out for a bit there” he said with a bit of concern on his face, I shook off the strange feeling I felt and smiled at him, but before I could speak, there was a low grumbling, at first we tough it came from around the forest, but then we realized it was only our stomach’s reminding us that we hadn’t eaten in hours, Dust laughed and sat back, “oh yeah, neither of us have eaten in hours, Frost you’re the only one who has a bag, I don’t mean to be nosey, but do you have any food in there?” he asked, I perked up and looked into my bag, and sighed with relief as I pulled out three small hay sandwiches’ my mother must have secretly placed in my bag before I left.
I smiled and silently thanked her, before I passed the small meals out, each of them gratefully taking them and eating them, as we ate our meals, we heard a loud squawk and the flapping of wings, and as we all turned our heads, we saw the same hawk fly down near us, and turn to me, quizzically eyeballing my sandwich. The other two merely laughed as I watched as the hawk slowly inched closer to me, giving off small chirps, “well, looks like you made a new friend” Vapor said with a chuckle, as the hawk slowly inched forward, I looked at my sandwich, and slowly pulled off a small bit, and tossed it towards her. The hawk inspected it for a moment, but quickly picked it up and swallowed it down, only causing Vapor and Dust to laugh harder.
After eating what I had given her, the hawk chirped happily and hoped over to me, almost landing at my side, still eyeballing my food with a hungry glare, as it did, I slowly and gently raised my hoof towards her, as she was still entranced by my food, my hoof made contact with her feathers, and she immediately reeled back, and gave me a warning look, but I quickly broke off another small piece, and offered it to her on my hoof. She walked towards me, and then quickly gobbled the food down, as she ate, I moved my hoof back and tried to pet her again, she glanced up at me again, but much to all our surprise, she slowly inched toward my hoof, and with my breath caught in my mouth, hoping there wouldn’t be any sudden loud noises to freak he out and claw me to piece’s, she rubbed up against my hoof.
I quickly found myself gently petting her, slowly feeding her more piece’s to appease her, the other’s looked at with surprise, even dust had his mouth open at this, Vapor was the first to break the silence, “what? You going to keep it now?” she asked with a smug smile, I glance over at her and smiled myself, quickly turning back to the bird who was chirping lightly as I stroked her feather’s, “maybe, I’ve never had a pet before, I think I’ll name her…Winter. How does that sound, girl?” I asked her, she looked at me and squawked, and took another bit.
Now it was Dust’s turns to speak, “well…I am honestly surprised, I never thought you could get anywhere that close to them, without them tearing your eyes out, and she looks young too, just old enough to be away from her first nest” he said, as I continued to pet her more. I chuckled lightly as I continued to feed the both of us, “yeah…well, I suppose things could be worse” I said with a smile. But, as if fate was watching me with an amused and mischievous smile, everything changed. We head a large stick snap, and our head’s instantly snapped towards the direction, but just as we were about to stand up, the bird squawked and nabbed the rest of my sandwich and fly off into the nearest tree, just as I was about to say something, a bright flash came from t bushes’, and blinded us, we heard the rumbling of hooves and the cocking of guns, we all covered our eyes, but a menacing voice boomed out, “you are trespassing in Night Ranger territory, what is your business here?” a deep male voice boomed, the light vanished and we quickly found ourselves surrounded my ponies of all races, many of which were pointing rifles and pistols at us, while other’s had sword’s drawn and pointed in our direction, we all looked around and gulped nervously.
Dust quickly turned to me, with an annoyed look on his face, “oh you just had to say that, didn’t you?” he said with an angry glare, I just turned and looked at the armed ponies surrounding us, and gave off a nervous chuckle, because I knew the night was about to take a more interesting turn.