Will of Steel

by WojakWriter

2. A Short Walk

The next two days almost seem to last a lifetime for me. Every ache seemed to carry through the days, every night spent waking up a dozen times or more.

I couldn't wash away my thoughts with hard work, no matter how I had tried to. Memories of the war now passed, dozens of victories, a steady string of defeats, brothers in arms dead and dying, blood drying on my hands, face, legs.

My old scars ached in sympathy with my body and thoughts, adding another level of discomfort to my already mounting unease.

A constant, tinny ringing echoed in my ears and half the time I hadn't responded to Applejack hadn't been out of willful ignorance.

I had been considering what I would do when I actually got to meet up with the few humans I knew were around this town still.

After all, I only actually knew two of them, the rest were people I didn't know and wouldn't get to know. There wasn’t enough time in the day to socialize much.

And what did Applejack even mean about the Solstice being 'important' to humans?

It wasn't until I’d risen that morning that an explanation had dawned on me with the morning sun. Tor, it had to be his doing. He had a way with words and with his hands, even if his English was terrible. Torlund was smart, he could’ve weaseled us a little something.

Before I left for town, Applejack had warned me to be back before the dawn tomorrow and to expect a boatload of work to make up for the day. I felt a dull pulse of pain through my aching shoulders, but had nodded when she finished. No use talking back.

And with that I was free for the day. Well, free as I could be stranded in an alien land and surrounded by creatures I’d once fought against.

It was a fair walk into town, and the sun had fully risen once I finally wandered among the thatched roofs of Ponyville.

I spent some time simply watching the bustle of the town, ponies going about their business, a few with humans in tow behind their masters. My lips twitched at the sight, it still rubbed me the wrong way to see a human so… docile. Like a good little dog.

But I didn’t brood for long before a familiar giant made his way over to me. Torlund, the giant man in question, wore a broad smile on his thickly bearded face and holds his arms open wide to me.

”Anonymous, my friend, how long has it been?”

A rhetorical question of course, we both knew how long it had been.

A year, it's been a year since I’d actually seen him in the flesh. Longer since we’d last talked.

The two of us shared a tight embrace and he let out a thunderous laugh, drawing a few wandering eyes.

He slapped my shoulder and stepped back, his grin not faltering the slightest bit.

“What's the matter, young man? Catbird got your tongue?”

I smiled at the joke, but shook my head slowly before rolling up my right sleeve of my ragged hemp shirt and turning the ventral of my arm to face him. Or more importantly, the jagged, black runes written on it.

He sucked in a breath through clenched teeth, his smile shrinking into a tight line across his face as he saw the runes.

”So you were serious about that, eh? No matter, you'll still be handy. Come on then, boy, we still have preparations to make!”

He wrapped his thick and muscled arm around my shoulders and practically dragged me along with him, off to who knows where.

Tor had always been a strange fellow, even in the relatively short time I knew him. A Norwegian Jaeger before, he had been in team sent along to establish the bridgehead in the Gryphon Empire.

He'd been the medic with the Norwegian contribution, and even they thought he was strange.

A devoted pagan, almost neurotically so. His hands were adorned with twisting, eternal knots and runes that you hadn't been able to read.

Always chanting in a strange tongue, to his weapon, his medical supplies, to anyone who would stick around after a conversation played out.

I hadn't got along with him until...

Tor's overly loud voice broke my train of thought before it could carry on towards the fog of memory.

”So is that orange one still working you like a dog? You're so tense my friend, ought to come by the spa sometime!”

That's right, Tor had somehow been selected for work at the local spa. Apparently he had been a massage therapist before joining the military.

What a joke life was sometimes. One day you were killing ponies and all manner of other animals in the snowy mountains, and the next you were working for them in their own little cities.

”Ah, but I suppose she wouldn't like you to be away from the farm too often. Just what did you have to do to get today anyhow?”

He wiggled his eyebrows at me, still smiling broadly.

I only laughed and shrugged my shoulders, taking it in stride. In all honesty, I’m still not truly sure why she had gave me a day off, even with the promise of catch-up work.

I perked up when I finally noticed that we were leaving the town behind for the outskirts of the forest, and I gave Tor a questioning look.

He only shook his head without answering, his face growing more serious as he stared at the rough path ahead.

The Everfree, he's taking me into the goddamn witch wood itself.

In a low, severe voice, he speaks up while we walk

”You know, we still must keep our traditions alive here, Anonymous. Even as I did back home, so to must I here. But it's no longer my own soul I must watch, but all of you who stand as I do. It took a great deal of bargaining, badgering, begging to get this one day.”

*He paused a moment while we walked, stopping me with him as he spoke in a conspiratorial whisper.*

“These ponies, they don't think as we do, we're barbarians with shiny toys to them. You cannot imagine the lengths to which I went to ensure we would have at least a single day for us and ours.”

Something in the tone of his voice sends goosebumps rising on my arms. Sure, the ponies didn't treat us the best, but it was easy to understand why.

They probably would have been treated much the same by us if they had not had living goddesses and literal magic on their side. But clearly, Tor wasn't as accepting of the lot he'd been dealt. Again, I could understand his aversion to essentially being a slave. I shared in that sentiment of anger.

But he was a good man, more than evidenced by his efforts with this... whatever it was.

I had a feeling, a little flickering flame of excitement in my gut, about what it could be. There were only so many things that happened on a Solstice, after all. And only one really made sense to me, Tor, and the others in our expeditionary unit that had wound up as indentured servants in the general Ponyville area.

Blót