She could hear the rushing water of the river long before she saw it. The wide dirt road she had been traveling on for the past two days led her through forests and over hills and now from what her ears told her to a river. Her journey had been slow and uneventful recently, it was back to quiet times alone just like how it was before she stumbled into Cross Way. That seemed like ages ago to her now. Her mane and tail still fell down loosely without any ties or bands to hold the ends together. She had tried using a few bendy twigs to make a tie but they always broke or popped out of place after a couple minutes so she figured she might as well just keep it natural for a while.
When she got to the river the water was much calmer than she had thought. The noise of it coming from just slightly upstream where a number of rocks sat in the middle of the river, causing the water to lap up against them. Still it seemed a fairly deep river, and murky, Applejack couldn’t really make out the bottom or if there was anything swimming in it. The width was a bit much too, she figured almost 200 feet across. Water was probably mighty cold so swimming really didn’t appeal to her right now.
It’s a good thing that the road led right to a bridge that spanned the river.
A simple but effective wooden bridge, wide enough for a carriage to cross, went over the water. The planks and boards were thick and well-weathered. Applejack could tell the craftsmanship was good, it made her think of all the work she needed to do around the farm once she got back. Building a new chicken coop would take the better part of a day. That was alright by her, keeping busy is keeping good, and she had a lot of fun when the family rebuilt the barn back at the reunion.
Besides the bridge itself there was a stand up next to it with a stallion lazily sitting on a bench in the shade beneath it. Applejack wondered what that was about but as she walked closer to the bridge she saw that a piece of rope had been strung from one side to the other, as if saying the bridge was closed off.
“Uhh… pardon me mister, but is there something wrong with the bridge?” Applejack raised an eyebrow at the rope, from what she could see the bridge looked completely fine.
“Nope. You just have to pay the toll before you can cross.”
Applejack’s eyebrows both shot up to her hair. “What? A toll just for walking across this bridge? Are you kidding me right now?”
The stallion, with his tan coat and greyish mane, stood up and fixed her with an apathetic stare. “My bridge, my rules. Pay up or shove off.” He smirked at her through gross yellow teeth.
Applejack sputtered. “What in tarnation is with you?!” Rarity would be grossly offended at such rudeness.
“What you talking about? I built the bridge, it’s only right that I collect some money for letting ponies cross over to the other side, huh? What else would you want me to do?” He indignantly replied.
“Uh, how about letting ponies pass out of the kindness of your heart?” Applejack glowered at him.
It was silent for a second.
And then all the birds in the nearby trees flew off as the Bridgekeeper raucously laughed in Applejack’s face.
“Oh… oh stop! Please, you’re gonna make me bust a gut!” The stallion was doubled over, holding his stomach while he laughed at Applejack.
Applejack at this point really wanted to just ignore him and go over the bridge anyways. But if he really did build the bridge it was his property and she didn’t have the right to just use it without his permission. Curse her respectful nature.
She groaned and shook her head. “Okay, look, I don’t have any money. Can’t you just let me pass. Please?”
He eyed her for a second. “Well how about handing over your hat? I like it.”
Applejack gasped and reached a hoof up to hold her hat down. “No way! My hat aint for sale!”
The Bridgekeeper cleared his nose and then hocked a big loogie onto the ground. “Well that’s just too bad for you then. Now if you want I got a real hankering for some peaches, there’s a little orchard up the river a bit from here. If you’d be willing to grab me some I could let you pass.”
Applejack smiled and wiped her hoof across her brow. “Woo, glad we could come to an agreement. Alright then, I’ll go grab you some of those peaches.”
She made to go walk off when he opened his mouth again. “Oh right, I forgot to mention that they won’t be ripe for another month or so, so you’re gonna have to wait a bit.” The rude and greedy stallion started snickering at her.
“Grrr.” Applejack glared and growled at him. “I’ve had it with you! You think you can just bully some pony around like this cause you made that bridge? Well not me, thank you very much but I’ll just swim across!” Applejack walked to the edge of the river and dipped one of her hooves in to test how cold the water was.
“Oh yeah, yeah, go swimming all you want.” The Bridgekeeper called out to her in a faux-polite tone. “Just be sure to say hi to the biteacuda’s for me when you do.”
Applejack stopped. Taking her hoof out of the water she turned back to him with a frown.
“Are there really biteacuda’s in this river or are you just messing with me?”
The stallion shrugged. “Who knows? Why don’t you go find out if you don’t wanna use my bridge so badly.” He started chuckling at her again.
Applejack stared flatly at him, eyes half closed with a complete “lack of cares left to give” look on her face.
“Look pal, I’m really not in the mood for something like this. I’ve been through a lot of stuff that I really would’ve preferred to avoid recently. I don’t like dealing with this kind of craziness and I just want to get home. So tell me, are there or are there not biteacuda’s in the river?” Applejack asked with full exasperation.
The Bridgekeeper’s eyes were smiling as he replied. “Could be, just cause I haven’t seen any doesn’t mean they aren’t there.”
At this point Applejack was a little bit tired.
She rubbed her eyes with her hoof and walked up to the Bridgekeeper. “Well bud, I just thought of a great way to find out if there are any in there or not.”
He raised an eyebrow at her. “Oh? And how’s that?”
Moments later he was screaming his head off as Applejack tossed him a good twenty feet over her head and right into the river. He made quite the splash. Smiling, Applejack trotted back over to the river’s edge and looked out at him as he flailed around in the water.
“Well? Any biteacuda’s in there?”
The Bridgekeeper kept flailing about like a fish out of water… Applejack realized the irony of that though. He seemed a bit too panicked to answer her question.
“Help! Help me, I can’t swim!” He was kicking his hooves about fiercely, trying to float and not get swept away.
Applejack’s hoof hit her face in annoyance. “Really now?” She rolled her eyes and jumped in after him, shuddering at the sudden sensation of the cold water. Swimming over to him she grabbed her hooves around his body and tugged, pulling him back to the side of the river. “Stop struggling already ya numskull!” An accidental elbow to the face later and Applejack had them both pulled out of the cold river.
He was breathing quite heavily as Applejack rubbed her sore nose and shook the water off her body. She took a glance at the bridge and then back to him.
“So can’t swim huh?”
“Uh… no.”
“Did you really build that bridge?”
“Um, I made the little stand and bench I use. Eheh...” He nervously rubbed the back of his neck.
To his surprise, Applejack smiled when he said that.
“Oh, that’s really good then. I was gonna feel kind of bad but if you can just rebuild it it’s not a problem.”
“What do you-” He didn’t get to say “mean” as Applejack turned and bucked him hard enough to send him flying back into the meager stand he had built. Obliterating the small structure and causing it to collapse around him.
“Woo-wee! Now I’m feeling a lot better. Like a monkey in a crate of bananas.” Applejack jumped up a few times and stretched her limbs before prancing happily onto the bridge. “Now you be good and all you hear?” She called back to the Bridgekeeper, although she wasn’t sure if he was coherent enough to hear her. “Ya see how much better things would be if you were nice to ponies?”
Finishing up her trek across the bridge Applejack took a big breath of air to enjoy her conquest of one more obstacle. As silly as it may have been. She gave herself another shake to get any remaining water off her and started walking down the road on the other side of the bridge now. The day was still young, maybe she’d find someplace to sleep or at least get some new hairbands.