We left early that morning. To early for everyone except Starswirl. “I would love to be SLEEPING right now!! But Instead we’re walking through the woods at-“ Bullseye looked at the sky. “-At too early!!”
“Would you PLEASE stop complaining.” Swirl asked from the front. “I assure you I am more tired than you, so I would like a little calm for a few hours. If at all possible.” Starswirl had an irritated expression on his face. He had his horn lit, and was waving his head back and forth. It seemed to glow brighter every time he pointed it West. He turned to walk in the direction it glowed the brightest.
As we all followed him I felt a tap on my shoulder. I looked over to see Silver holding a bag out to me. I grabbed it in my magic and was surprised by the light weight of the large bag. “For you.” That was all he said before he fell to the back of the group again. I looked at the bag, then at Misty. She was under my right wing. She was still shook up. Not as bad, but she shivered every once in a while.
“-My opinion, Aloe and Honey is the best treatment for burns.” Lavender said.
“Well, yes. But that’s not counting magic. Magic is better than any natural remedy by a long shot.” Healing responded.
“But in the case your magic doesn’t work? Or there’s no unicorns?”
“Then yes, I have to agree. Honey and Aloe ARE very good remedies.” Healing responded. It was good to hear a calm conversation between two beings comparing notes. We hadn’t had much calm in the past few days.
“Can you get off of me? I’m hot.” Misty whispered from beside me. I looked over and immediately took my wing off her. Luna came running up to us and looked at Misty.
“Are you better Misty?” She asked in her cute, innocent voice. “I hope so. Other wise, who is Night gunna fly With? He likes flying a lot, and so do you!” Misty showed a small smile at that and nodded.
“Yes, I’m a little better. I just need a little rest.” Luna ran off happily to see Swirl, and likely update him on Misty’s condition. It hurt me to see the normally proud pegasus brought so low. “I’m sorry Night, I shouldn’t have let you see me like this.” I shook my head at her.
“Purrrrrrr.” I let out a comforting noise. I think.
“I just got emotional after being so close to that...thing.” She shivered again and I started to extend my wing. She shied away from me and continued. “It killed them. All the other guards. Ponies I’d known for most of my life. And the Captain...” She let out a sob and fell into me. “It ate the Captain. She was like my mother. She had always been there for me, and I couldn’t save her.” She started sobbing into my feathers. I slowed down a little and squeezed her with my wing.
“Will she be ok?” Stone asked. She and everyone else had slowed down with me and had grim expressions. I just looked at Misty. I couldn’t answer even if I HAD an answer. We all just walked slowly toward wherever we were going.
Misty had long stopped crying. Now she was just wrapped under my wing as we walked through the woods. We seemed to be endlessly walking, just trees ,trees , and more trees. We didn’t hear anything nor see anything in the woods. Just the sound of hooves and breathing. Where are we going? “Chirp!?” I called up to Starswirl, who was in deep concentration. I promptly got a scroll and ink well thrown in my face. After rubbing my sore beak, I glared at Swirl as I pulled out a feather. I'm going to be featherless at this rate. ‘Where are we going?’ I wrote down. I threw the rolled up scroll into the back of Swirl’s head.
“Hey!” He hollered back. I just looked innocently at the sky. “Darn avian.” He looked at the scroll and facehoofed. “I have NO idea. Ok? I am just following an obscure trail of magic that is miles away, and several days old, through a forest I do not know, leading to a place I do not know.” Ok then. He has no idea. “Is there anyway you can fly up and look around? That would be wonderful.” He said in a tired voice. I looked down at Misty, and she looked back up and nodded. With a sigh I took off to scout around.
As I rose up into the air, I noticed that there wasn’t much besides trees in the area. It’s was also turning dark quickly. In the coming darkness my eyes started playing tricks on me. I saw dark shapes moving in the corner of my eyes, only to see nothing when I turned to look. HA! I whipped my head to look at what I was sure was movement. Oh. Nothing. A few more minutes went by with me seeing things. HA! Oh, never mind. This cycle repeated itself as I slowly went stir crazy. I started getting twitchy as I tried to look everywhere at once. HA!! I swung around to look at a shadow. Oh, there’s not- “KEEEAAAAR!!!” I dove down as the movement kept going in the woods breaking through the tree tops, I landed on the back of a.......nothing. There was nothing. I quickly took off and frantically made my way back to the group.
I landed with a thump beside the group. The others jumped at my landing while I looked around for Swirl. “You noticed to?” Swirl asked.
“Chirp!” I nodded frantically as I jumped at every rustle of leaves.
“What? What did he notice?” Bullseye asked nervously. As Swirl started to answer, Misty interrupted him suddenly. With a barley perceptible voice, she answered Bullseye’s question.
“We’re being followed.”