Trial and Error

by Kiernan

Chapter 4: The Shrouded One

Chapter 4: The shrouded one

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Donning his cape to hide his flank, Akaitora set off to the town, a list of the mare's daily chores rolled up and placed in one of the pockets. Why he had chosen to take all this on himself, he would never know. At least now he had an assistant, albeit, one who was locked in a cage. At bare minimum, she could provide conversation, supposing she would speak up, of course. He really should have scouted out the area for a better subject, but, he had what he needed.

It was nearly dawn when she finally fell back asleep, and he left without a sound. He had begun to like this mare, all prejudice aside. Pulling the list out and looking over it in the early morning sunlight, he sighed. How could one pony, especially a carefree pegasus, have so much to do?

It took merely minutes to reach his destination, but he walked on past it, deep in thought. 'What sort of story am I going to have to use if someone asks about...' Her name. He had completely forgotten to ask for her name! 'Stupid, stupid, stupid!' he cursed at himself, planting a hoof repeatedly in his forehead.

In his distracted moment, he had walked right through a door he hadn't intended to, at which point he realized he had gone too far. "Sir," started a mango-colored stallion, "We're not open yet."

"Sorry, just wasn't watching where I was going, I guess." He turned to leave, and walked right into another pony. Shaking his head, he apologized and helped her back up, immediately recognizing her from the day before. Before she could say anything, he galloped out, trying to find his way back to the cottage.

"Wait!" yelled the violet unicorn, galloping off after him. She had a hoofful of questions to ask him, about his strange behaviour yesterday. She followed him all the way to the very-well-known-to-her cottage, then barred the gate with her magic. Despite this, he simply hopped over the fence and into the yard, skidding to a stop atop an earth bridge. The Violet unicorn slowed her pace down to a trot as she approached.

"Can I help you with something?" he asked, noticing that the mare before him was out of breath. She held up her hoof, panting heavily. She flopped down onto the ground, and looked up.

"How... Were you able... to run... this far... from Sugarcube Corner... and not... run out of breath...?" She panted, confused at how full of vigor he was, for such a thin pony.

"That's an easy one, he said, pulling out the list, and walking off to begin his first task. "I simply cast an energy absorbing spell. You see," he explained, arriving at the chicken coop. "Most of the time, energy is sapped from other ponies. However, if you first cast a spell-reflective aura around yourself, then reverse the polarity of the spell, which would sap your own energy and feed it into you, creating a loop effect, which alone does nothing, then the spell would reflect off of your body, which would also cause the energy to be repelled from your body, you instead draw back any lost energy as you lose it, creating a neverending flow of energy that is added at the exact moment it is lost. A simple task, really."

The violet mare, now sitting upright, and now having caught her breath, looked astounded for a moment, then facehoofed. "Why didn't I think of that!? It makes perfect sense!" she shouted.

Akaitora breathed a sigh of relief. he had worried that his short rant had sailed right over her head. He had that effect on ponies. The chickens now fed, he moved on to the next task on the list: squirrels and rabbits. he walked over to the small cluster of trees, the lavender mare now following him.

"Next question: Why are you doing Fluttershy's chores for her?"

The question caught him off guard. He had forgotten to come up with a story. 'Think, brain, think!' "Uh, well... She kinda... asked me to." He answered, not entirely a lie. "See, she had to... leave town." Also not entirely a lie.

"Oh? Where did she go?" asked the mare. He knew she meant well in this, but this one had to be either a lie, or he would have to distract her. He pretended to have difficulty with getting the food to the squirrels, going for the latter of the two. A purple aura surrounded the acorns, though, and the squirrels were fed with no problem. "Where did she go?" the mare asked again, more sternly. There was no backing out now.

"Uh, I believe she said something about visiting relatives, something like that. She didn't give an exact location. Somewhere between towns maybe?" he guessed. He knew that if he went broad with his answer, then it was possible to have a piece of the truth slip out unintentinally. Seers did it all the time.

But the mare grew ever more suspicious of him. "How exactly do you know Fluttershy again?

Comments

[Elkhorse]

Nice as it is but it seems a tad unfocused, but I will track it regardless as I know for a fact you can only improve.

[Kiernan]

77232 it is a bit unfocused. The point of beginning a story is to bring it into focus. Plus this is my first major project, so there's that. But I am going somewhere. and to see that somewhere, you need to look at the entire horizon, not just the one point to focus on. Plus, if you focus too early, your path is set out and you can't very well vary from that path without tearing a big hole in the story. Some people write like that, I guess. Some people will write a story set on the one point they wish to achieve, and build to that point. It makes for a more linear, but well focused story. I would much rather choose my path as I go, and let it lead me where it will.

But alas, I'm rambling again.

[SunStone]

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