Prologue
Pine Breeze was a unique foal at first. She wasn’t adventurous at first; she tended to cling to her father’s, Chief Dust Storm, side wherever she went. Her mother, River Dancer, died a year after she was born from an unknown disease.
When she was old enough to understand her language, she was fascinated with the outdoors, namely what lay beyond the horizons of her tribal grounds. As she grew into a more rambunctious filly, she pressed further and further outside and into the forest, until one day…
“Wooooow” Pine Breeze exclaimed. “I’ve never been able to make it past this boulder before; the medicine mare is always facing this way outside her hut.”
Kicking a rock here and there, Pine approached a sizeable cliff. Peering down, she saw that there were no soft landings, the wind from the forest pushing the leaves away from the cliff.
Her curiousity still insatiable, Pine slowly trudged down the somewhat steep cliff, managing to catch flat rocks jutting from the side on her hooves.
“Wait, why am I doing this again?” she questioned as she looked at her wings. Although Pine was far from an expert flyer like her mother, she used her wings occasionally when she was trying to get somewhere fast.
As she reached the bottom, she peered around and saw nothing but the seemingly endless woods. Hearing unfamiliar noises coming from ahead of her, Pine began to get nervous. (Maybe I should head back; this seems like a good end of the trail for me) she thought.
But suddenly, Pine hears explosions and sounds of fighting, and they seem to be coming from…the village! Taking off as fast as she could, she made it back to the village, and the sight before her made her worst fears come true.
Strange stallions wielding knives and what almost seem to be blowpipes with handles were keeping most of the adults at bay, while others that had ropes and chains were chasing younger mares as well as fillies and colts.
Feeling that she should hide, she dove into the medicine mare’s tent. The mare, Willow, was stashed away inside her medicine closet, leaving bottles and potions scattered all across the tent floor.
Hiding underneath the bed, Pine’s mind began racing. (What do these ponies want from us? Why are they herding everyone?) Suddenly, she heard voices from the outside.
“You sure you want us to check for stragglers? Seems like we got a pretty penny in the wagon already” a pony with a southern drawl spoke aloud.
“Yes you heard me right; these savages didn’t put up much of a fight, so I think we can afford to be a little greedy.” This pony had a very gruff, but demanding presence to his voice.
He must be the leader, Pine had surmised. Hearing the tent walls flung open, she heard two ponies step inside. Being the curious filly that she was, she quickly poked her head out to see what these guys looked like.
The smaller of the two, was a slightly lanky stallion with a wavey orange mane and an earth brown coat.
“Uh, I don’t see anybody, looks deserted” the bigger one bellowed. This one was big, and pretty muscular. He had a deep red mane, short to the point his hair looked like it was in spikes. His coat however, seemed to contrast yet meld, being a dull navy blue.
“Yeah, I’d have to agree with ya, except for one thang” Lanky exclaimed.
“Whats that?” Spike asked inquisitively.
“See all these bottles and potions everywhere? These guys seemed like they ran a pretty orderly little village here, so it’s strange there’d be such a mess”. Lanky said as he was examing the contents on the floor, while working his way towards the cabinet.
(Oh no)! Pine was trembling, and her involuntary fear mechanics kicked in, causing her wings to flare and tip the bed she was underneath over.
Right as Lanky was about to open the cabinet, he was startled by the sound of the bed, and both Spike and Lanky looked over to see the cause of the noise.
“Well, well, well… look what we have here? Some brave little filly thought she could hide through the raid” Both the stallions rushed to the filly, lassoing a rope around her neck. “
“Uggh” Pine struggled. “What raid? Why are you doing this to us?” Lanky and Spike were impressed.
“Wow” they spoke in unison. “Even the little ones know how to speak” Pine wasn’t impressed by their compliment.
“I learned how to talk in school, now please tell me what’s going on?!?” she exclaimed.
“Heh, they even teach these little runts.” Lanky said.
“I’ll try to make it easy for you to understand girly. We’re gonna take you away from here, and give you away to someone else.”
Pine began to stutter. “Wh-who are y-you giving us t-to?” Cuffing her, both stallions led her out of the tent, leaving the terrified Willow still in the cabinet.
“We don’t know, and sorry to be frank, but we don’t care neither.” Lanky stated.
Spike chimed “Well, maybe we care a little, we like the ones who pay big.” Pine gulped, as she saw the wagon full of her friends, each one chained to the side of the carriage and sporting some form of lasso around their bodies.
“NOOOOO” the Chief screamed. “PLEASE TAKE ME! I WON’T CAUSE ANY PROBLEMS, JUST DON’T TAKE MY BABY!” Pine began to tear and tried to squirm her way out of the rope-hold.
“DADDY!” Pine wailed.
“So this is your daughter eh? That makes this much easier.” The gruff sounding pony proclaimed from behind Pine.
This pony was as menacing-looking as he sounded, his coat a dark grey with an even darker mane. His face sported multiple scars, and his smile showed signs of slight decay, albeit a golden tooth here and there.
“We will be taking these foals, they will serve as our ticket to the good life. You older ponies won’t last long for the possible buyers that might become available, so we’ll leave you to fester.
“However…” Gruff snatched Pine off the ground. “If you try to stop us as we are leaving, I promise you that this one” dangling Pine, “won’t make it past that point.” Pine gasped. She knew her father would come up with a plan, to get her back if he couldn’t stop them. Dust Storm scowled at Gruff, admitting defeat.
“Excellent! Glad to see you see it my way” Gruff boasted, while sporting a non-chalant smile. Carrying Pine over to the front of his Carriage, he tossed her onto the floor of the passenger side, right in front of a grizzly looking pony.
“Sayonara savages!” Gruff exclaimed, hopping into the driver’s seat. The two bulky stallions heading the coach nodded and began to take off.
Pine shot up from the front to catch a fleeting glimpse of her father running towards her, before slowly losing sight of him altogether. “Daddy…” Pine cried as the wagon sped out of the village.
END OF PROLOGUE