He ran. Swift as a wolf, grasses and low tree limbs brushed his feathered haunches, his tail helping him make sharp turns as he dodged animal dens, his thick hair brushing relaying the air currents as his nose told him of their portent.
The door was perhaps a way for the small armies to travel back home for supplies, or maybe the sergal would only pass through to other, more meat filled lands. There were ponies, and the ponies put up a fight but between the taboo breaking pegasi and the general lack of population density, it was not, he didn't believe, ideal hunting grounds for them.
But they hunted here, and now he hunted them under thickening clouds and thicker forest canopies. Despite the brush of air, the whoosh of underbrush, he could hear their camp. Forty strong; they might not have scouts this far out. Or those unfortunate nine might have been the brash cadre of scouts for this half of their encampment. That would likely put them at forty one precisely and there was a bigger army farther along.
He ran swiftly to the outskirts, and walked through the cages.
Rainbow Dash's hooves were cracked from striking at the cage. The wires were stronger than steel as near as she could tell since as thin as they were, she should have at least been able to bend them when she stood on one edge and bucked her other end, putting all her weight on one tiny wire.
Instead she had bruised her hooves, and she'd seen a desperate pony try to run through the wire and lost his front leg entirely. The smell of blood seemed to trigger a feeding frenzy in her captors as if they were land sharks of some form.
And not a one of them spoke English! She kicked again with a back hoof out of pure frustration but immediately regretted it. She'd been trying this for at least two days though her memory of it was starting to get hazy.
From across the aisle came a tired out voice. "Sugar stop yer strugglin' it ain't worked in all this time and I want to sleep a spell. Before they's eat me, I mean." An orange mare limped out of her makeshift bedroll, her bedraggled tail missing it's scrunchie. She walked to her watering troff and sipped on the slime the captors put there.
"I'm not gonna BE eaten Applejack. The next time they open my cage to feed me. Well I assume if they're keeping us for amusement they'll feed us and then I'll" Her voice trailed off, as she instinctively flapped her wings, and remembered for the thousandth time she was no longer the fastest flier in Equestria. Or any flier at all, no offense towards her friend the Earth pony.
Applejack sighed and wished her friend the best of luck with that course of action, then winced as she tried to turn around to tuck back into the forgotten pile of fabrics that had been dumped in her cage. There was enough to cover most of the mare but it looked to Dash like a crime-scene blanket to cover the body before the coroner could OK it's removal.
But no time for vain imaginings now as she needed a real plan. There was a guard coming her way now. Gray hairs from the waist up, every last one faded from black roots to white tips, leaving it unclear whether to call it dark, or light gray. The feathers were a pale blue aquamarine and she couldn't see how much any of it darkened on his back. Or her, they didn't seem to look much different to Rainbow Dash.
His white face was agitatedly casting about for something to look at. Something distant, not in this aisle of diversionaries. But he had come from the center of the camp and if he kept going at his brisk pace he'd just be out of camp, nothing to look at or kill or anything for a long ways. Even the wild animals of the forest shunned this crowd, and no wonder considering what they did here.
Dash tried to gauge her muscle readiness. How hard could she kick, how high? She'd have to buck something fierce to reach his 'nads but there couldn't be any other way. He was alone, no worries about a repeat of last night's party. Her legs were still sore from the forced dancing but she hadn't lost a hoof like Applejack. Not yet.
The monster stopped, to tower over her. Excellent! Now to guess if he wanted fear or bravado. Subtlety was not her strong suit so she just blurted out "Make a painting out of your own blood and excrement you malformed griffin." but said it with as much reverence as she could muster. They didn't have a clue what she said anyway so what did it matter?
It's facial expression was unchanged, but it replied with that scratchy voice they all had. "You are blue."
Smooth move, ex-lax she thought to herself. "Thank you captain obvious. Or is it lieutenant? You don't wear any insignia so I can't tell. Were you going to feed your exotic dancers or am I supposed to eat my own hooves here?" Too late she thought of Applejack, and realized how wrong a suggestion that was.
"You should know that is not un-asked for, of prisoners. To extend their life by consuming their own body for the crowd." He lifted those flat, angular ears up off his skull and pointed his nose to one side, not quite to the center of camp. "Tonight they are with the diamond dogs, poor things." Looking back at her battered form he started to say "You should be a pegasus" Then saw her back. The stumps where here beautiful wings no longer sat.
He frowned. She had never seen pity or compassion or anything like it but this one frowned before speaking again. "That is what I saw. That is why you still live, Rainbow Dash. You amuse their leader."
There was a rapid wrinkling of fabrics across the aisle as Applejack leapt up as well as she was able. "How in the HAY do you know her name? Who are you mister fancy pants?"
A grin. Slightly malicious Dash thought; this was the monster she was expected. Maybe he just thought pants were funny. But his words were not filled with malice. "Jack Chipple. I was at your farm two days ago. I wore a shorter form, with pale orange feathers and deep blue fur." Here the thing ... she couldn't make out the name, exactly. Stack? Stack Simple looked back at her injured back with pity.
It made planning to kill him a lot harder. "Applejack you know this creep?"
She about dropped to her belly before replying. "I know the creep he described. Never met this one before. Nad, I think that one's name is. Good hearted fellow if a little strange." She tried to make eye contact but he was still looking at Dash. Purple eyes looked deep into yellow eyes as the orange mare asked "Can you spring us outta here? Cain't offer ya much but I guess we got learned how to do a strip tease, whetever'n hay that is."
Having not yet looked away, Stack spoke. "Your wings are yet on the fetish wall of the chief, or general or whatever she is. I have now the magic to reattach them but I need a few things, time and your wings primarily."
He straightened now, turning to Applejack, his tail swishing slowly as he spoke again. "I will take you, but you must needs wait. At sundown, or if I am truly lucky, earlier." His claws glowed a pale white, not unlike the purple of Twilight's magic usage. Dash had never heard of one of these things casting, let alone with claws instead of a horn.
Their water dishes overflowed, fresh water pushing most of the slime out, getting everything ... well, slimy. But there was water now. Again he looked at Rainbow Dash, and said "Wait and live. If your captors come, be what they want, and live. Rainbow Dash, I want to return your wings. But it will not be as soon as you wish. Wait and trust that I mean well. Do nothing until I return."
I want to return your wings The words reverberated in her tiny pony skull like the sunlight when Celestia was freed from Nightmare Moon's curse. She could be the fastest flier in Equestria again.
There was a flash of blue and gray, and too late to call out she realized he was running the wrong way. Out of camp, not back the way he came. She tried to call out but realized she was too weak.
Applejack had just finished slurping down the drinkable water when she called to her friend. "Ah said he's good folk. Might strange in the head but you can see what his brothers is like. Reckon I'd be a right mess if I had them for my cousins at picnic time." She pointed to the center of camp with her head.
Feeling defeated she sipped carefully at the less-slimy trough, then curled up for a nap. Naps, she could do. I want to return your wings She slept in fits & starts, though.
And they never did feed her.
It was a long time of napping. She could hear the squeals of diamond dogs, the raucous laughter of the captors. She tried not to think of what it meant. About sundown a pack of blue furred wolves with sky blue feathers wandered down their aisle, staggering like they were drunk. They pointed, and they shook each other, but they didn't take the prisoners out of their cages.
Dash nearly succumbed to dry heaves when she realized their normally pale off-white faces were red, turning brown from a messy meal recently eaten. Unbidden, images came to her of the three other ponies already on this aisle when AJ and herself were brought here. There had been what for those ponies was a last party of debauchery and inappropriateness. It had devolved into eating the ponies out, and not in a sexual way.
Wait, and live. I want to return your wings
Steeling herself, she said silently that if Nightmare Moon could bide her time a thousand years, Rainbow Dash would be no weaker. She would bide a thousand seconds.
Of course, Nightmare Moon was sort of destroyed to make way for Luna, but that didn't seem very relevant right now.
Either the three were due back, or just got bored, but they wandered outside the camp ... about twenty feet further, and took a leak right in the middle of the pathway. Definitely drunk, as they were comparing streams and distances as near as she could make out.
Applejack grunted, and looked away. "Buncha low life cretins with too much cider in 'em. Don't even look 'em in the eye sugar they don't want nothing but to cause trouble."
Dash thought to herself that pretty much described the whole camp but once these three finished they meandered back in to camp without seeing the ponies any further.
About two minutes passed, and just as she was thinking the moon was started to seem a mite late, another of the sergals strode confidently down the aisle. He was carrying a flat, blue bundle and now had a belt, with what for them was a shortsword, flopping loose from his left hip.
He held his hand up, and the claws glowed with a sickly light. The two cages fell open, and he laid the bundle on the ground where Dash could examine it. Tied together were her wings, looking a little the worse for wear. In fact they were already missing enough feathers she expected that had they been attached at that very second she would not fly again for two or three weeks, perhaps more.
Tears in her eyes she suddenly thought maybe it was another of their cruel jokes. She looked into those yellow eyes as hard as she could, and asked "You know I can't just grab one in each hoof and flap them, right? You're going to attach them to the stupid stumps these idiots made of the fastest"
She couldn't finish. Tears overwhelmed her, and Applejack jumped and hobbled to bury her face in Dash's mane, and they cried together.
"Rainbow Dash, I have the magic to reattach them. You will recover and fly, but it will not be here, and I will not tell you it will be tonight. I will not joke about your wings, Rainbow Dash."
It was kind of hard to understand him through the combined sobbing of two abused mares but she was pretty sure he said he wasn't joking about the wings part. Applejack leaned up enough to whisper hoarsely through Dash's bright mane "Did y'all find a spare hoof lyin' around? Don't rightly have to be orange tho that'd make it mine. Sorta missing one these past days."
The tall misborn griffin leaned over, and examined Applejack's left hind, and where it ended a few inches too early. Sitting back to a squatting position he sighed. "I can repair this in time. But you for sure will not walk normally for a month, or perhaps a year."
Now his head snapped towards the center of town. The light was failing but she could swear his eyes turned black, just for a few blinks. He held up his right paw, hand, whatever, and as the claws glowed, he grabbed at the air towards camp. There was a distant thump, just out of sight from where he had pointed.
Turning again to the ponies he said "Rainbow Dash, I must ask an uncomfortable thing. Will you do this for me?"
It's possible he was going to specify in a timely manner what the request was but having no one else to unload on, she lost it. Trying to keep her voice down she screamed in a whisper, "Uncomfortable is watching a pony be eaten alive. Uncomfortable is having your defining bodily feature ripped off and made into a macabre bedroom accessory. I've had it up to my ears in uncomfortable and I'd lose my lunch over the un-comfort I've had if only some lame misborn would give me a freaking lunch to lose. What in the hay are you going to ask NOW that qualifies for uncomfortable after watching them stick a lit cigarette into applejack's mouth and making her extinguish it on her own, still wet hoof like it was a fancy ashtray?"
Unperturbed at her outburst, his claws again glowed, and she felt Applejack give a start as the spell grabbed hold of her. Not a full levitation spell but he hefted the orange mare over his narrow shoulders, and seemed in control of his baggage. "I would ask you, Rainbow Dash, to carry your wings to Ponyville, where I may seek the spells to reattach them. Can canter at full speed for an hour? That we may camp out of smell this night."
Oh. Sheepishly, she picked up the flat, blue parcel in her mouth. Not uncomfortable so much as awkward to carry. And embarrassing as all get out but bearable after a fashion. His words still echoed like an avalanche, cascading through her thoughts. I want to return your wings "Thay the wud." she said around her parcel.
Standing now, he spared a little extra magic to light the ground in front of him. Only a little ways, but she should be able to avoid tripping on what she saw appear in that light. "Then, Rainbow Dash. Run."