//------------------------------// // Chapter 66 // Story: Unshaken // by The 24th Pegasus //------------------------------// Stay for Dinner: 11 Votes After a moment to consider the offer (and a moment to realize just how thirsty she’d gotten during the flight over), Kestrel shrugged her wings. “Aw, shoot, why not,” she said, leaning back a bit and relaxing some. “I weren’t gonna meet up with my friends ‘til after dinnertime anyhow. If you’re offerin’ beer, then I might as well hang ‘round a bit.” Slip Knot smiled back at her, obviously pleased. “Excellent! We can share a drink and a few stories while we wait for Fallow and the others to come back.” He gestured in Crosstie’s direction. “Go get us some beers, Cross. I hope we still have some lyin’ around.” “We should,” was all Crosstie said as he stood up and trotted away from the fire. Kestrel watched him go for a moment before turning back to Slip Knot and Sweet Tea, the latter of which still watched her with marked suspicion. Sighing Kestrel shook her head. “If I’d wanted to kill you all and steal your things, ma’am, I’d have done it by now.” Sweet Tea scowled back at her. “Brutish, ain’t you?” “On the contrary, I think she’s proven to be quite the opposite,” Slip Knot said. The mare harrumphed and stood up. “I’m gonna start preparin’ dinner,” she said, walking away from the fire. “Fallow and the others are like to be hungry when they get back. Best to have somethin’ waitin’ for ‘em.” Kestrel and Slip Knot watched her go, at least until the stallion shook his head. “Pardon my wife of mine,” he said. “She ain’t real friendly ‘round strangers.” “Why’s that?” Kestrel asked him. “Strangers do you wrong before?” “In a sense…” Slip Knot trailed off as Crosstie returned to them, four beers at the ready. He gave one each to Kestrel and Slip Knot, only to look around in confusion. “Where’d Ma go?” he asked. “Off to prepare dinner. Sit,” Slip Knot said, and Crosstie took his place at his side. The three ponies took their beers in hoof (or wing) and raised them to their lips. Though the ale was hardly as refreshing as water, it was still liquid, and so slaked Kestrel’s thirst for the time being. After taking a few gulps, she set it aside and wiped her lips on the back of her fetlock. “Fine ale,” she said. “I’m usually more of a whiskey mare than beer, but whiskey ain’t quite as refreshing after a flight.” “I can imagine. Must get hot up there under the sun,” Slip Knot said. “It’s cooler than the ground,” Kestrel said. “The heat ain’t got nothin’ to stick to. If the sun’s on your back, though, it don’t matter all that much in the end.” Slip Knot hummed in understanding, and the three ponies spent a few minutes watching the fire and sipping on their beers in silence. It only ended when Kestrel once again tried to needle her way to the heart of the matter. “You mentioned you ain’t that welcome in towns,” she said, idly reading the label on the bottle between her hooves. “Why’s that?” “Ma’s right,” Crosstie said, snickering. “You sure is nosey.” “Why don’t you go first?” Slip Knot countered, smiling easily at Kestrel. When the pegasus raised an eyebrow, he simply shrugged back at her. “Sweet Tea’s a good judge of character, and Crosstie’s right; you dress like you always got trouble behind you. Which is funny, ‘cause bounty hunters are always lookin’ for the trouble in front of ‘em.” When Kestrel only met his accusation with hard silence, the stallion took a sip from his beer and offered her a disarming smile. “If you’re worried that we’d turn you over to the authorities, don’t be. They never was kind to us, so we don’t see no love for ‘em.” After a moment to think, Kestrel shrugged. “I ain’t gonna give you my real name ‘til I know you better,” she said. “But you can call me Raptor for the time bein’. You ain’t gonna find that name on any wanted posters ‘round town. Maybe the face, but not the name. And before you ask, I ain’t ever killed a pony who weren’t tryin’ to kill me first.” Crosstie’s bemused mirth faded into mild concern. “Guess you’re tougher than I would’ve give you credit for,” he said, watching her carefully, as if she was about to spring up and shoot him down at the drop of a hat. “So why are you wanted, then?” “I stole from too many ponies askin’ to be stole from,” Kestrel said. “Rich ponies like the Apple Family or Miss Belle. The government and the military, too. Them ponies ain’t gonna miss what I’ve taken, but the ponies that count on me? We needed it a lot more than them.” Her eyes narrowed on Slip Knot. “So, there’s mine. How ‘bout yours?” After a moment, Slip Knot nodded. “Fair’s fair,” he said, taking a few more gulps from his beer and tossing the empty bottle aside. “We’re all runaways of some sort,” he said, and Kestrel raised an eyebrow in response. “Not in the strictest sense,” Slip Knot elaborated. “But the ponies that fall in with Fallow? We’ve had our share gettin’ kicked around by ponies above us. Sweet Tea, Crosstie, and me? We had a little farm on some land east of here. It was my daddy’s land, and his daddy’s before him, and his before him, and so on. Well, turns out there was gold under that land—black gold. You know the kind I’m talkin’ about.” Kestrel nodded along. “Oil barons’ll kill for what they think should be theirs,” she said. “Don’t matter none who has the land in the first place.” “Right.” Slip Knot’s eyes fell to the ground, staring through the dirt under his hooves to some distant place and memory. “This stallion, I don’t remember his name, he tried for months to get me to move off our land. Tried to buy it off me, tried to convince me the land was worthless, tried to steal the deed even. But my family’s owned that land forever, so I weren’t about to give it up. Then… well, I guess he ran outta patience.” The stallion’s face grew dark, and Crosstie’s along with it. “Some of his goons came one night and torched the fields, torched the barn, torched the silos. Burnt everythin’ down. The law didn’t help us none ‘cause he probably paid ‘em off or somethin’. Said they’d look into who dunnit, and then we never heard boo ‘bout it again. It didn’t matter, though. Without the harvest, without our tools, we couldn’t keep the farm anymore. It ruined us. And when the bank closed it down and auctioned off the land, who do you think got it on the cheap?” “I’m… sorry,” Kestrel said, offering the stallion and his son her sympathies. “Well, thank you for what it’s worth.” Slip Knot gazed somewhere over her shoulder. “We met Fallow shortly after that. He took us in, gave us food and a tent to put over our heads. He never once asked us to follow him, but we did anyway, just like the others. He attracts ponies like us. Gives us hope that there’s somethin’ still worth livin’ for, fightin’ for. Every one of us was a proud pony once, ‘til we had everythin’ we owned taken from us. Fallow’s the only one who gave somethin’ back.” Distant voices drawing nearer perked Kestrel’s ears, and she glanced over her shoulder in that direction. Soon enough, a procession of stallions and mares, some carrying rifles, others carrying burlap bags, began to make their way into the camp. And at their head was an older pony, maybe fifty-some years old, with a face that reminded Kestrel of a grandfather’s. The dull brown horn protruding from his head was split, and though bags hung under his eyes, the pale gold discs seemed bright with energy and purpose. “There he is,” Slip Knot said, standing up and motioning for Kestrel to do the same. “C’mon over. Fallow’ll want to meet you.” Already committed to dinner, Kestrel saw no reason to refuse. [NO POLL FOR THIS CHAPTER]