Toby nodded softly, watching the caravan bound up towards the exit of their cave. Great feats of athleticism, they jumped from one craggy outjutting of rock to the next as if they were no further apart then a set of stairs. The heavy satchels on their back clearly didn't slow them down enough to bother them, and soon they were gone, vanishing outside the distant hole up top.
He turned to his co-ruler, Sombra. "They like."
"They like, and will pay dearly." Sombra laughed with perhaps too much pleasure in the idea of economic action. Nevermind that the ponies gladly traded with them. In his mind, it was an attack, and one he was winning. "I look forward to the news of their victory."
Toby had long ago learned not to question how one 'won' such a thing. Both sides left happy, so there was no loser. Everyone was a winner! "Week. Seven days." He repeated that last bit as if to explain the first. "We wait."
Up above, the leader of the caravan landed on all fours in the deep snow, only to bound up to standing on his hinds easily, the snow no match for his great stature, especially in that position. "Role call!" Names began to echo as tsuki landed all around him. Bucks and does, each landed and most stood up as he was doing, calling out their name and saluting with a slap of their hand against their chest as they lowered their heads as if showing off their horns.
"That's everyone, good." He turned in place and pointed. "We can't hop there, things will get damaged." As simple as Toby's speech was, the caravan leader was one of the newer generation, just at the edge. Old enough to gain a leadership position, and young enough to learn how to speak properly from the revamped educational system the tsuki were enjoying. "We walk and stay together."
And so the walking began, trudging through the snow. Their thick fur shielded them from the chill of the north. There had been a time when tsuki danced unclothed under the moon's watch, bouncing through the snow as if it were normal, which it was, for them. Clothing was new. Bipedalism was new, though their natural habits drove them to two legs when they were quarreling or lobbying for domination. It was a little thing, but it was enough to let them walk with a grace no pony could match, even if they preferred bouncing on all fours given half a chance.
His heavy ears twitched faintly, too massive to stay erect for longer than an instant. A noise he should not have heard reached him and he veered to the right, cutting off a doe. "What was that?"
She bared her bucked teeth in a smile. "Nothing," she lied nakedly, shying back half a step.
"Is that their name?" He returned the smile, less broad, less teeth on display. "Come on out, Nothing."
A little head poked free of her backpack, immature ears fully erect and wriggling. "Hello! My name isn't nothing."
"I imagined not." He reached for the little female kit and gently ran his fingers over her head. "Kits aren't supposed to be here, it's a long trip. Wouldn't you rather be back home?"
"No!" She hugged the back of her likely mother's neck firmly. "I wanna be here, with Mom!"
The larger tsuki laughed nervously. "I swear, I didn't know she had snuck in there until we had already left. Please, I'll keep an eye on her." She was a young doe, perhaps a few years younger than him, barely an adult in his eyes.
"Keep a close eye on her." His eyes were on the kit. "And you listen to your mom, alright?"
"Yuh-huh!" She slapped her little chest in a crude display of their salute. She barely had any horns to display, and it only made the gesture insufferably adorable to him.
He put her out of his mind for the moment and returned to his position at the center forward of the band, confident that he was back in knowledge of everything going on in his band.
They stopped for lunch beneath the bright sun. Despite the cold beneath them, they could feel the gentle warmth of the sun above and many sprawled out to soak up as much of it as possible as they ate and talked. Eating time was a social time and soft jokes and stories spread through the band. It was a happy time.
A sharp cry of a bird of prey had him sitting up just in time for talons to dig into his shoulder. The griffon responsible barreled into him, using speed to compete with the tsuki's greater mass and drive him into the snow. He could hear screams, some of panic, others ready to fight. He kicked up powerfully, sending the griffon attached to him free and propped into the air, but with the chunk of his shoulder that was held still firmly gripped, red lines forming from his injury.
"Attack!" he shouted. It was a keyphrase they all knew, but never had to use before. Their caravan was being assaulted, and that meant he had to defend it. It was his job. "Don't panic!" He dropped to all fours just to immediately rebound even if his shoulder ached from the intense pressure his powerful legs could create, sending him high into the air.
For just an instant, he could see it all, but he hardly had time to process what he was seeing when a griffon was closing in on him, no talons reaching out. Instead a length of hard steel glinting in that previously comforting sun. The tsuki commander lashed out a hind paw, his most powerful limb, aiming to kick the bird-cat away with bone-shattering force.
Metal met flesh and his flesh proved weaker, the sword biting right into the flesh. His howl joined that of others, woefully unprepared to deal with armed brigands.
A small kit, the doe from before, quivered beneath a pile of snow, where she had been shoved just as the fight began. Her mother had joined the battle, fighting fiercely, bravely, but they were outmatched. Before her trembling eyes, all the adults there were laid low. It was all over so quickly. The quiet was almost as bad as the sounds of fighting and hurting.
Where was her mother? Her eyes darted around, trying to get a peek of where her mother was, but all she could see were the slumped forms of what had been her friends.
One of the griffons stomped through their makeshift camp. "Take everything and anything worth having," he grunted out, waving a talon around even as they wiped their sword clean on the snow. "Help the injured, carry the dead. We leave nogriffon behind."
Stern words of agreement rose as they began grabbing the bags the tsuki were carrying not long before. They turned them inside out, taking what they decided was the most valuable and leaving the rest to lay forgotten in the snow, much like the still forms of so many of her adult friends. Tears stung at her little eyes, but she dared not move. She barely dared to breathe, lest the griffons see her.
She was certain the would see her, hear her, smell her. They would find her and she would join the rest, laying there, so still... It took some time after they were gone before movement came to her and she let out a little choked sob. Snow fell from her as she took an unsure step forward, a timid little hop. "Mom?"
She bounced from figure to figure, her tears flowing all the harder at what she saw. None of them had met a good end. "Mom?!"
There she was, fallen over another rabbit. Had she tripped, or simply fallen on top of another after she was... The little kit surged over, landing just beside her mother. "Mom, mom! Wake up." She reached up with little hands and began to shake her mother, but no matter how vigorously she tried to coax life into the doe, nothing happened. "Mom..."
That is where she was found as the sun was setting. A pegasus landed quietly, looking around with wide eyes. "What... happened?" she asked, wings fidgeting on her back. "Poor things... Who, what... what could do this?!" Her wings wings flared out as she turned. "Who's there?!"
She had heard something, but could see nothing. She began looking around slowly. "Is... somecreature--" She paused to swallow heavily. "--still here?"
The little kit watched the pegasus, looking for weapons like the ones that had hurt everyone, but the pegasus had none of those. She took a slow breath and chanced it, stepping out from under her mother's still form.
The mare turned quickly, spotting the movement, only to go still, staring at the little kit, her eyes trembling. "Oh no... oh no! No no no. You poor thing." She almost tackled the little rabbit, hugging the little kit close. "You're safe now. You're safe," she hurriedly murmured, clutching to the little one. "Nothing will hurt you, I promise... I'll take you to the other bunnies, alright?"
The kit stiffly nodded and pointed where she thought home was. "Can you help mom?"
The pegasus drew in a ragged breath. There was nocreature on that field that she could help... "Maybe we can find some help there, back in bunny land." She set the kit down and turned. "Can you get on and hold tight?"
With a thump of small feet against snow, the kit bounced right up onto the offered back and hugged tightly, perhaps a bit too tightly. She was clutching to the only living friendly creature she had. The mare offered a pained smile, unable and unwilling to even chastise the child. "I'll get you back to your people. They'll take care... of this." How, she wasn't sure, but no other ideas came to her.
The mare flew straight and true, carrying her precious cargo into the tsuki cave. It was a steep hole, basically straight down, but for a flying pegasus, no particular problem. When the tsuki saw her coming, they cheered and waved. The tsuki were a happy people, a friendly people. Who could have...
She landed lightly and tsuki approached in all directions.
Toby was there with a big smile. "Hello!" Then he saw the kit clutching to her and blinked in confusion. "How get?" He reached for the kit who shied away at first before actually looking at him. Suddenly he had the kit wrapped around his neck instead, hugging him tightly. "Hello," he greeted the kit with a silly smile. "Where mom?"
The mare coughed softly, perhaps in part due to being able to breathe properly again. "She's... hurt. Real hurt... really really hurt..." She glanced left and right. "Hurt enough that we shouldn't talk about it around her child?"
"We left her," wailed the kit suddenly. "We left them all! They're all hurt so bad. I tried to wake them up and it didn't work and then she came." She waved a paw at the mare, a moment of reprieve that didn't last before she was back to clinging to Toby. "They're all hurt! They took our things, all the things we were gonna trade!"
Sombra rose from the shadows with a deep scowl. "We were attacked? Who did it? Speak clearly, child."
"Birds, long tails." She fell from Toby, using her paws instead to pantomime wildly. "Wear metal, use metal, cut... cut..." She trembled and the tears began to flow anew. "Cut..."
A wing draped over her, the mare looking to the kit with growing concern. "Nocreature should have to see that, especially not a little one... Please tell me she has family or something?"
Murmurs began to spread through the crowd, news of the event and the surviving kit. The peaceful life of the tsukis had been shattered.