The wind blows through the broken window depositing a new layer of snow on the floor. The creaks and groans of the old house are the only sound as the storm rages outside. A young form sits in the corner of the room clutching to its chest a small book. Simple letters had been carved into the wooden cover, though many of them had been worn away one could just make out journal scrawled in bold. The young body shivers as it looks down at the book, opening it to the first page.
Month of Harvest, Day 1
A most horrible thing has happened today, my father came to tell me we once again would have no crops to harvest. The cold has taken away the life of every seed we placed in the ground. Never in all my life have I had to harvest a single crop, and from what the older colts at school have told me I would never want to, but this means another hungry year, and another year that mother must make all my clothes, and another year my sister must go without school. My father has spent the day packing to go somewhere he refuses to tell me. He says when he comes back we’ll know what to do about the cold, the Chancellor would tell him how to fix everything. I would say I believe him, but never once have I seen a day where there wasn’t a cold wind blowing through town, at least not one I can remember. Can this really ever be fixed?
Month of Harvest, Day 7
My father was not happy when he returned. "Abandoned by our own Leaders!" He shouted at my mother from outside the house as my sister and I listened through the window we had cracked open. "I would expect this of a Pegasus, and a Unicorn deserting us is no surprise, but to think Puddinghead would be so bold as to leave us here to starve while she journeys to find a land of make believe beyond the mountains! No such place exists and when she returns empty hoofed we’ll have endured a period of anarchy for nothing!"
"Don’t you think you're overreacting a little dear? The Chancellor was chosen as our leader for a reason you know."
"And that reason was most certainly not to leave us here without governance! What if the other tribes come to demand more food? Do you think we could stand up to Pegasus raids or Unicorn magic? What do we do when what little we have is taken from us?" After hearing my father say that I was unable to listen to any more, I closed the window and sat with my sister inside the house as my father’s harsh voice rivaled the sound of the wind.
“Dad" Came the feeble voice of the shivering foal. It struggled to turn the page as its small body shook violently against the touch of the freezing air. When it was finally able to get its hoof under the page and flip it (along with another it was stuck to), the foal had to curl itself into a ball in order to keep from shivering enough to focus on the book.
Month of Harvest, Day 20
My father woke me up early today and told me I had no need to go to school, but should probably get ready to go out. He had never taken me anywhere before, so when he told me to get ready I bathed and dressed myself in a hurry. I had no sooner put on my cloak to shield me from the wind than father opened the door and ushered me outside. Although it was still very early in the morning everypony in our village seemed to be awake, and not only that, but on the move. I noticed one of my friends from school was helping to pull a cart that must have been loaded with everything in his house, his whole family struggled to force it along the path in front of us. I called out to him and he was nearly flattened by one of the wheels as he turned to respond to me.
"What are you doing?" I asked as I saw pony after pony, family after family pass by. Some of them were like my friend, pushing along great carts, but many had only the clothes on their backs. "Where is everypony going?" He opened his mouth as if to respond, but was quickly silenced when a call from his father to pull his share reminded him of his work.
"They’re leaving us child." My father told me. "If there is anypony you want to say goodbye to you better do it now because they won’t be here tomorrow." Questions buzzed around in my head, where was everypony going? Were we going to go to?
"Dad, aren’t we going with them?" I asked. My father gave me a stern glance.
"Just do as you’re told, go say goodbye to your friends then come straight home." His voice was harsh and bore me no chance of a reply. I ran from his piercing eyes and quickly caught up to my friends wagon. As I looked into his eyes and spoke a few words with him I could tell he was tired already from the weight he bore. I had not noticed it from the front of my house but he was clearly straining to pull the massive amount of things his family was taking with them.
When his father yelled at him again to pull the cart I left to find any others I knew, hoping one of them could explain to me what was going on. Everypony had a kind of sober look on their face, like wherever they were going was worse then they cared to think about. Ponies I had never seen in anything but a pleasant mood barely said good morning as they passed me by on their way out of the village.
I returned home more confused then I thought possible and found my father sitting on the little bed our family shared. My mother and sister were both sitting on the floor in front of him awaiting my arrival. When I had shut the door and was told by my mother to take a spot next to her, I obeyed and sat just as my father began to speak. (He had said nothing since I arrived and although at this point it should seem unimportant I was puzzled as to what he and my mother and sister had been doing while they waited for me gathered around like this.)
"Chancellor Puddinghead returned yesterday from her trip afar." My mother put on a smile that seemed out of place when I thought of all the ponies outside. "She has decided to relocate the Earth pony clan to a new land she calls Equestria, all Earth ponies are to follow her south with anything they wish to take." My sister interrupted him here.
"Then why didn’t you tell me to get patches her cloak?" My sister held up the little doll mother had fashioned for her birthday. Its body was made of all different kinds of scrap fabric that gave it a homely look despite the fact it was in relatively good condition.
"Because… we’re not going with them." Mother’s smile dropped.
"Dear you can’t be serious," my mother started, "what reason could we have to stay here if everypony else is moving on? We haven’t had a crop of note in years, if the Chancellor-"
"The Chancellor is no longer fit enough to lead us!" My father shouted driving my mother into silence. "She has decided to not only uproot her subjects, but also has given up our freedom in combining the three tribes. I will go nowhere with her if I have to worry about butting heads with the likes of Pegasus and Unicorns!" My father gave such a look of hate toward my mother I was afraid the veins throbbing in his forehead would burst. None of us spoke, the only sound we could hear were of the carts and ponies outside, and the ever-present wind.
"Dear, please reconsider, I’m sure she has her reasons to do this." My mother ventured in a tone so quiet I could barely hear it.
"We’re staying, that’s final."
Month of Harvest, Day 21
I walked through the now deserted streets of my village today. Nopony but my family remained here, and the quiet houses (though they had never been particularly noisy, even when they had all been full) gave a kind of dark feeling to the peaceful day. The only reason I was walking at all is because my father had told me to find anything of interest that may have been dropped the previous day by ponies as they left. I was too afraid to enter any of their houses, even though I knew they were empty, because I still somehow felt like they would be coming back.
Wherever they’re going can’t be THAT great, some of them would want to come home soon enough. At the very least my teacher and friends had to come back for school didn’t they? I found one of the schoolbooks on the side of the path along with some other things I gave to my father, until my teacher returns I guess I’ll have to teach myself, but I know she will be back eventually.
The foal had grown uncomfortable in its curled up position and opted to move itself to the bed. Taking the book in its mouth it pulled itself up, despite the bed frame’s groans of protest, and lay on its side before setting the book next to itself. There was no longer a cover to shield it from the wind as it had given the thin sheet to its father. "Why is it always so cold?" the foal said as it continued to read.
Month of Harvest, Day 25
Another group of ponies passed through the village today. I wasn’t allowed to talk to them, but from the window of our house I could see there were both Earth and Unicorn clan members. They all had this same uneasy expression, but it was much calmer than the ponies from our village had looked when they left.
I haven’t told my father this, but when they passed by I could have sworn that the wind lightened for them, almost as if their party was warming the world around them. They passed through rather quickly however and I was unable to ask if anypony else felt what I did.
My self schooling isn’t turning out as I’d hoped, it’s very hard to know what to study when you have no teacher to tell you. I asked my mom to help me but she hasn’t yet found the time to do anything but worry over where we would get food. I hope dad lets me talk to the next group of ponies to see if I can’t get some from them.
Month of Harvest, Day 27
It was very cold today, early in the morning a Pegasus family came through our village alone. They had so much stuff with them they must have been slowed down enough to lose their group. When they saw dad and me clearing snow from our yard they approached us asking if we had any food to trade with them. Dad got really mad when they asked that.
"Why should we give you Pegasus anything? Not satisfied with snowing us out now you’re off to march the Earth pony clan to extinction! Get out of my sight!" The Pegasus family gave him another plea but he wouldn’t hear it. All day after that the wind howled twice as strong as usual and we all sat shivering inside the house.
I can’t help but think dad did the wrong thing. If it had been Earth ponies in trouble he would have jumped at the opportunity, why not the other clans?
Month of Harvest, Day 28
My sister woke up with a terrible cold; she sneezes all the time and complains about her fever that is so strong none of us can keep our hooves on for more then a second without burning ourselves. Dad says she must have got it from one of the Pegasus ponies passing through but mom isn’t buying that.
I finally got up enough courage to enter some of my friend’s houses to see if they left anything worth coming back for. I thought if I found something they really liked I’d have proof they would come back. The first house I entered belonged to my best friend in all of the clans, he was one of the most well off of everypony in the village so he must have had a lot of stuff to leave behind. When I went inside, all the furniture he had left reassured me.
The bed and shelf were in the same place they had always been when I visited him before, and the table we had shared meals on was only slightly crooked. As I looked closer at everything though, I discovered just how barren everything was. All the families farming tools, books, clothes, all there little decorations and keepsakes were gone. Anything smaller than the stool in the corner had been taken.
I ran to the closest house belonging to one of my few filly friends and it was the same story there. House after house led me to the same disappointment, some of them were completely empty which made my heart jump to my throat. It really hit me when I walked home that we’re all alone here, I’m going to try and convince my dad to join the next all Earth clan party going south, I miss everypony, and my sister could use some friends to make her feel better.
The foal sneezed making its shivering body spasm accidentally knocking the book off the bed. As it went to retrieve the journal, it noticed a piece of cloth sticking out from under the bed. When the foal pulled it and the book back on the bed, it noticed the cloth was the rag its sister had used as her doll’s clothes. The foal’s eyes started to water and cold tears fell onto the book as the wind turned the pages.
Month of Blizzards, Day 3
Today I woke up feeling really cold, I wasn’t surprised as it IS winter, but it felt like I was cuddling an ice cube in my arms. When I opened my eyes I saw I had apparently wrapped my arms around my sister while I was asleep. She had gone cold during the night, unnaturally so given the fever she had had for the past month and a half. I turned around to my parents sleeping next to me and woke my mother to see if she knew had to warm her up again, but my mother just started shaking her and saying her name.
All the noise woke my father who had to pry my mother away from the bed. Mom never stopped crying as dad forced me out of bed to get some wood from behind the house. We have a lot of planks back there to fix up leaks and cracks, when I bought back enough, dad told me the news. Mom is having a hard time accepting what’s happened, she wants to believe it about as much as I do.
Everything was always cold here, especially since all the other ponies’ left to go south. It had gotten colder than it ever had before as my dad took to yelling about how when winter was over he would plant a crop so large on every farm everypony had left we wouldn’t be able to eat it all in three years let alone that year before he planted an even bigger crop. The wind seemed to blow a little harder with every angry word he said.
If my sister was cold, she was just like everything else here. Wouldn’t that mean that she was back to normal? I still kind of hope she’s going to be ok, there's always a chance.
Month of Blizzards, day 4
The ceremony was very short, we spent most of the day breaking the hard ground beside the house as we listened to mom cry. When if finally came time to say goodbye we all decided to put patches in her coffin with her, maybe she’ll be given a chance to play with her a little more where she is now.
The foal rocked back and forth on the bed as he held the rag close, forgetting completely about the journal as he tried to remember what his sister looked like. It had been so long he could only conjure a fuzzy image of her face, the way her mane fell around her eyes because she refused to brush it into place. Suddenly a knock sounded sharply against the door and the foal wiped away his tears. Getting off the bed and making his way to answer it, he brushed away some of the snow from the floor before opening the door just wide enough for his guest to enter.
Month of Planting, Day 17
I got my cutie mark today, I don’t know how I feel about it yet, I don’t think I earned it properly. The day started out like any other has for the past few months since I lost my sister. I made breakfast and fed it to mom who still refuses to leave the house and listened to dad talk about how everything was better before the clans got together.
Then out of nowhere we heard a knock on the door. My first reaction was to answer it, but before I could make it to the door I stopped myself. Who could be at the door, everypony left months ago didn’t they? My father was less fearful than me though, he barged past me and opened the door to let a cloaked pony stumble in carrying a bundle on her back.
"Thank you" the pony said, in a soft voice that revealed her to be a mare. The pony collapsed by the door and slid the little bundle off her back to hold it in her hooves.
"What are you doing here?" My father asked. "Everypony else left for the south long ago."
"So did we." Said the mare as she lowered the hood of her cloak. "My husband and I left with our son but got separated from our group. We had to live off what we found on the land, the little there was, trying to find our way to the new place our leader promised was waiting beyond the mountains. It’s been a long journey and I’ve lost all but my child, even his father had to be left behind when he died of cold in the night. When I heard your voice floating over the wind, I couldn’t help but come here, if for no other reason than to see another pony." My father took in her words and looked at the bundle she held.
"I’m sorry about the loss of your husband, my daughter also passed a few months ago." The mare nodded her head.
"It’s hard living here, I can only hope things will be better for us on the other side." She said.
"You’re a fool to try and cross the mountains then, nothing better waits over there. Puddinghead agreed to combine the clans, Pegasus and Unicorns walk among decent Earth ponies." The mare’s expression changed.
"You don’t think they should have done that?"
"Why would I want good ponies to be mixed with brutes and snobs! If they want to go searching for a new land, fine, but they won’t drag me down with them!" As my father spoke a gust of wind blew open the window.
"What was that mom!" The child said, his voice muffled by the cloth he was firmly wrapped in. My father turned to the mother who only rocked her child, shushing him, as she said nothing back. My father put on a serious face.
"Why don’t you take off that cloak miss, we can wash it for you while you rest yourself for your journey."
"I thought you didn’t want her to go across the mountains." I said, very confused.
"It’s not my choice to make, and if she went through all this just to get here she must still want to go, but there's no reason she can’t take a quick rest here, at the very least it would be good for the child." My father approached the mare as she stood and placed the child on her back again.
"No, it’s alright, I’m still really cold, I need to keep this on." The mare said as she eyed the door.
"I’m sure you’ll be fine." My dad was now almost touching noses with her as he reached out and tore the cloak off her revealing a pair of wings. I had never seen a Pegasus this close before, their wings were a lot different from what I’d heard in school. Each feather stood out yet at the same time folded perfectly on all the others. My father threw the cloak to the ground and pushed the mare against the wall. The child slipped off her back and would of hit the floor if my mother hadn’t dove off the bed to catch it.
"DAD WHAT ARE YOU DOING!" I screamed at him, I had never heard anything good about a Pegasus, but this mare was just trying to follow her friends, like I wanted to, I didn’t want dad to overreact.
"It’s because of ponies like you that were in this mess." He said to her as she tried to worm her way out from between him and the wall, never taking her eyes off her child. "You couldn’t control your own clouds and now my daughters in the ground because of ponies like you." I’d never heard that much hate in somepony’s words as when my dad said that. I was so afraid he was going to hurt her I… I threw a rock at him. More accurately I threw the rock I used to hold down my journal paper so it wouldn’t get blown around by the wind.
However my aim was completely off and the rock soared through our window generating the hideous sound of breaking glass. When my dad turned to look at the window as I stood paralyzed in fear and processed what I had just done, the mare took the temporary distraction to snatch her child from my mother and bolt for the door. My father wasn’t about to let her go however and chased her outside.
I didn’t see what happened, but my dad shouted something and was quickly answer by a sharp scream and a thud of something heavy landing in the snow. When he returned I was at a loss for words, but my mother knew exactly what she wanted to say.
"I should have gone with the children across the mountains, WE should have gone. I don’t want to know what you did to that poor filly and I don’t want to know but this is it." My mother started to cry again, and when I went to her to try and comfort her she pushed me away. "Did you even think before you acted? That was the first pony we’ve seen in months and you chased her away! I’m so sick of-" My father delivered a sharp slap to the side of my mother’s face that echoed inside my head and still haunts me as I put this to paper. My father had never hit my mother before, and I was more frightened of him then I can describe.
"That wasn’t a pony." He said as my mother fought back another wave of tears. "Don’t EVER call a Pegasus, a pony." I couldn’t stand to be there any longer, I ran outside and would have probably run until my legs refused to carry me if I hadn’t seen what I did. The mare, who just a moment ago had fled my house lay crumpled in the snow, one of her wings loosely blowing in the breeze as it was clear something had snapped it. Beside her lay her child, unmoving.
I approached the two forms, to shocked from what I’d seen so far today to realize the mother was dead until I touched her still form. The child however, released faint puffs of steam into the air as it breathed. He had been knocked unconscious when his mother fell from the sky, yet must have been saved when she took the brunt of the fall.
Before I knew what I was doing, I had picked up the child and spirited him away to one of the houses, my father no longer acted like I knew him, and I couldn’t let this child pay for his anger. When I returned home, after setting him on a bed and promising to look after him, I had my cutie mark. A purple heart of flame.
The foal closed the door behind his Pegasus friend.
"I’m cold brother." The Pegasus said.
"I know, I am too. Why don’t you come sit with me on the bed, all we have left to do is wait, so why don’t we wait together."
The Pegasus nodded, and the two foals got onto the bed beside each other, holding each other tight as they shivered against the cold.
Month of Harvest, Day 1
It has been a year since my father left to go to the summit and a year since this all began. Sometimes I wonder how different my life would be if he had stayed here with us. My father grows angrier with me every day, as he has since mother passed away and was buried next to my sister. As much as father says they both died of fever, I know to well mother died of a broken heart.
My father no longer speaks to me, when something needs to be done, he grunts and points where I need to go. Every chance I get I excuse myself outside to see the Pegasus who has taken to calling me brother. I dare not bring him but what he needs to survive, as I don’t want to let father question what I’m doing. No matter how many times I see him, I can never get over his wings, there one of the most beautiful things I’ve ever seen. He can’t fly yet, but I plan to teach him. Maybe one day he can fly us both over the mountains, away from this village.
"Do you have a blanket brother?" The Pegasus asks.
"No, if I did I would let us use it."
"I’m hungry."
"I know, I am too."
"Are… are we going to die?" The Pegasus said this with no emotion, any sadness or fear he could have had taken from him by the cold, and replaced with nothing but a face as hard as the icy world outside.
"I don’t know, but we might."
"I love you brother."
"I love you too."
Month of Harvest, Day 9
I’m the last of my family now, or the last one with a chance to live. I caught my father leaving in the middle of the night. He had packed every morsel of food and put it in a sack woven from the clothes of my mother and sister. When he saw me wake up, he stood in the doorway for a moment before speaking.
“I’m sorry I have to do this son.” When I realized what was happening I almost jumped out of bed. "I can’t live with somepony who associates with the Pegasus clan, but you’re the last bit of warmth in my heart, and if I hurt you, I won’t be able to live with myself. I’m going to head north, I’m going to walk until I can’t walk anymore or I freeze to death, but I wish you luck, because if you don’t die of starvation the colds going to take you to like it did the crops."
My dad walked out the door and would have disappeared into the night had I not called out to stop him.
"Dad" I called, and to my great surprise he turned to face me. I brought him the blanket and watched as he wrapped it around himself. "I hope you freeze slowly."
The foal had long since grown too cold to add another entry, so that was the last sentence he had to read.
"Do you think your dad will find anything up north?" the Pegasus asked.
"Only more villages like this, maybe one of them will have another pony as crazy as him and they can exchange stories about the things they left behind."
"Maybe he’ll meet a unicorn and get his head zapped off for saying the wrong thing."
"Do Unicorns do that?"
"I don’t know, but I wouldn’t be surprised."
The two foals sat side by side, as the wind became fainter and fainter to them. The foal with the flaming heart cutie mark felt himself tire, and try as he might to keep his eyes open, he knew the cold was reaching out for him.
"I’m cold," said the Pegasus
"I am too."
"If we’re going to die, I’m glad I’m going with you brother."
"I’m glad I’m with you too."
As the two foals bodies slowly stopped their shivering, and their mouths released one final puff of steam, the wind blew in a fresh layer of snow, and then, for the first time since the foals could remember, it stopped.