A Squire's Tail

by BBkat

Chapter Four

The three pegasi shared a confused look; laughter like this was most assuredly not what they had been expecting. Chase was nearly doubled over by now, chest heaving with laughter. Not cold mocking laughter, but genuine laughter of someone who’d just heard a joke.

Tears of laughter stung as his eyes and Chase had to wipe his eyes to clear his vision before he could bring himself to stop laughing.

“What’s so funny?” asked Sky Fire.

“Me, a noble? You thought I, was a noble?” asked Chase, grinning stupidly as he looked up at them, fighting back laughter. He didn’t even feel insulted anymore, just highly amused. “Oh that’s rich.” He shook his head, wiping his eyes clean as his laughter subsided. “Please, I might have a horn, but I am not a noble of any kind, far from it. I’m the son of a smith and a florist. Sure my dad sometimes makes armour or weapons for guards if he’s commissioned to, but he’s not a noble. Not that I’m aware of at any rate.”

The pegasi shifted uncomfortably, unsure what to say or do now, suddenly everything seemed really, really stupid.

“And more to the point, nobles all seem to have a thing with pure blood lines and I certainly would fail there,” continued Chase. “And I don’t think pure unicorn on one side and pure pegasus on the other really counts.”

This seemed to snap them out of their shock and bringing forth a sputtered ‘wait what?’ from at least one of them.

“What did you say?” asked Sky Fire, eyes wide.

“I’m half pegasus?” Chase never made a big secret or big deal of his parentage, more than willing to tell anyone should they ask. He had no reason to keep it a secret; he just didn’t go around announcing it everyone either so unless he was asked no one would know. “On my mother’s side, she’s a pegasus. Hell they thought I was going to be one as well. Obviously enough, they were wrong.”

There was a sigh as Thundermane face hoofed, shaking his head in exasperation. “This is ridiculous. You two are officially the biggest boneheads in the world and I can’t even remember how we’re friends.”

“Because it was the only way we’d have made it through flight camp?” suggested one.

“That’s probably true.” He looked between Chase and his friends momentarily. “I think you two owe him a few apologies.”

They lowered their heads, looking uncomfortably between each other, as if silently asking ‘do we have to?’ Thundermane cleared his throat to get their attention and gestured to Chase, he was waiting.

“W-we’re sorry,” mumbled Sky Fire.

“I guess we just jumped to conclusions, instead of giving you a chance. We’ve had so many bad experiences that we didn’t want to risk it,” said Cloud Runner. He looked up at Chase, taking a step forward and extending his hoof to Chase. “Maybe we could, have a do over? I think we all got on with the wrong hoof.”

Chase regarded him for a moment before shaking his hoof. “Alright, I think we can manage that.” He suddenly winced, bowing his head as the pounding started again. He groaned and rubbed his head; the headache wasn’t quite as gone as he’d thought it was. “Damn, I thought it was gone. Dumb headache.”

“You going to be ok?” asked Thundermane.

“Give me a moment, my horn’s giving me a headache again. It should fade.”

“Is it really that bad?” asked Cloud Runner.

Chase nodded, “Oh yeah. Imagine if you twisted or sprained your wing right at the elbow. I don’t have any wings but I imagine that sort of thing would hurt a lot. Plus you wouldn’t be able to use it till it heals or you’d make it worse,” explained Chase. “That would be what it’s like. It sucks.”

Cloud Runner winced at the description, drawing his wings closer to his sides, “Yeah that would hurt. I take it the book you were sleeping on is for studying then?”

Chase nodded, “I can’t join regular practice so once the group breaks up I get to go study these so I won’t fall behind, hopefully.”

“Well since you’re up, why don’t we get something to eat?” asked Thundermane. “Food sometimes helps when I have a headache.”

“I guess I am a little hungry, I did miss lunch,” said Chase. “I do have one question though, is my dampener really that noticeable?”

They all nodded, almost in unison. “Yeah it’s easy enough to see. Is that a bad thing?”

“I’d rather not draw attention to it. It’s weird looking and it singles me out for being injured. It’d be like if you had a brace on your wing or something. Everypony’s going to figure out sooner or later why I’m not going to practice, I’d just rather it be later.” Chase sighed, “Any of you got a mirror or something shiny I can use?”

“A mirror?”

“I want to try and fix my mane and see if I can hide this ugly thing,” he huffed. “It’s not a vanity thing, not like that anyways.” He could hear them snickering slightly at the mention of needing a mirror to fix his appearance.

Eventually Chase had to use the bathroom mirror, none of his roommates had what he needed. He sighed as he fluffed around his forelock, trying to obscure the magic inhibitor as much as he could without looking like a doofus. It was an unattractive looking thing, a couple inches tall that wrapped around the base of his horn. The only saving grace was that it was white, the same colour as his horn, so for the most part it was camouflaged.

“Ah guess this’ll have to do,” he huffed, taking one last look at himself in the mirror. It wasn’t perfect, but he’d rearranged part of his forelock to hide the majority of his anti-magic device. With that he turned and trotted out of the bathroom. “I wonder what there is to eat, I’m hungry.”

---

Eating presented Chase with a whole new set of challenges. First he needed to carry his tray of food to a table, without dropping it and spilling everything on the floor, a tray that included a glass full of liquid as well as his food. He looked around a few times, watching how everyone else carried their items without magic. The pegasi simply flew so they could easily carry it in both hooves. That didn’t help him at all; he didn’t have any wings to speak of.

“I guess I’m doing this the three legged way,” he thought, carefully balancing it on one bent leg as he walked, pausing every now and then to adjust it and keep it from wobbling.

The other three pegasi were already seated at a table and with their trays of food. Chase wasn’t sure he’d really call them friends at this point, though he was more than willing to give them a second chance now that they’d cleared the air of the giant misunderstanding.

Rather unceremoniously he dropped his tray onto the table before taking a seat as well, resting his chin on an empty space with a sigh. Having claws like a griffon or dragon would make this so much easier for sure.

“I’m never going to survive,” he groaned.

“I dunno, we survive just fine without a magical forehead doo-hickey,” teased Thundermane. Chase was pretty sure he was doing it on purpose now.

“Yeah but you do have wings. I need to keep all four hooves on the ground or I fall over or drop everything,” said Chase, lifting his head. “And that’s when things start to get difficult, trying to walk on three legs.”

“Well you’re going to have to figure out some way,” said Cloud Runner. “I mean, what else are you going to do? Hire somepony to carry things for you?”

This elicited a few snickers, even from Chase. “Tempting but no. That would get expensive anyways. I’d rather spend my bits on other things.”

Eating wasn’t as difficult; he just pushed aside the cutlery and dug right into his salad, muzzle first, much to the amusement of his tablemates. It was like grazing, only in a bowl. And returning the dishes was just a matter of carrying it in his teeth back to the tables where the dirty dishes and trays were gathered.

In the dorm room there wasn’t much that he needed to do that couldn’t easily be done without magic, except for perhaps putting on his saddlebags. For that he was going to need to suck up his pride and ask for some help, unless he wanted to struggle putting it on the way he had earlier.

---

He stuffed the books under the bed as he flopped down that evening; despite his earlier nap he was beat. Chase sighed as he rolled onto his side; it had been a while since he’d had a chance to hang out with Wish. He’d just been so busy and so tired after training recently there hadn’t been the time.

“I hope she’s not too upset with me,” he thought. “Maybe since I’m not going to be training as much I can catch her in the evening at some point.”

He doubted they’d be able to hang out for very long, he’d get in trouble if he were up and out of bed past lights out. Maybe he could convince her to be up sometime in the day, he doubted she’d be in too much trouble if she stopped by to visit during the day, when most ponies were awake.

“Not tonight though, tonight I sleep.” He burrowed under the covers, head sinking into the pillow with a peaceful sigh as he made himself comfortable. His roommates were already asleep, snoring soundly from their bunks.

They’d been worked just as hard, flying laps and laps and through obstacle courses all day. He’d heard them groaning afterwards about sore wings and being to tired to fly. They’d gone right to bed after dinner, falling asleep within minutes of one another. Chase was still awake though, using light from a small lamp to read till he got tired and went to bed as well, stuffing the books under the bed.

Burrowing into the covers and pillow he drifted off to sleep to the soft sound of chirping crickets outside.

---

Breakfast was just as tricky to manage, trying to balance a bowl of warm oatmeal and a glass of juice without dropping it all over the floor. A salad could be swept off the floor easily; oatmeal and orange juice would be a slushy, sticky mess. Eating was just as awkward, trying to balance a spoon between his hooves proving to be more difficult that he assumed. And sticking his muzzle right in, the way he’d eaten his salad, would just prove to be an utter mess. Then trying to pickup the glass without dropping it or crushing it between his hooves so he could take the medicine he’d been given. How anypony did this without magic or wings he had no idea. Even as he ate he heard his bunkmates snickering in amusement from beside him, they at least could use their wings to hold the spoons.

“Oh hush it you hyenas, you try eating this with your hooves. I’ll be lucky if I manage to finish this before we have to be outside in fields,” he grumbled, ears flicked back in annoyance.

“At least you can still fight and warm up with us,” said Thundermane. “You’d be a rather useless trainee if you couldn’t even do that.”

Chase snorted, “Hush up, or I might ‘accidentally’ buck you in the face during practice,” he said, making the air quote with his hooves.

“Only if you can catch me, which I doubt. I can easily get away from you.”

“That sounds like a challenge if ever I heard one,” said Chase, setting his spoon down in his bowl. He was definitely going to have to consider having something other than oatmeal for breakfast till he could use magic again.

Thundermane smirked, “Oh really? And here I thought unicorns weren’t competitive, sounds like you’re raring for a race.”

“In case you haven’t noticed there isn’t much else I can do at the moment,” said Chase. “And for the record I can definitely race you.”

---

“I should definitely not be racing.” After five of his ten laps, Chase was seriously regretting his earlier challenge with Thundermane. He was so amped up that he completely forgot to pace himself, and now he was paying for it. And to make things worse, Thundermane was already ahead of him by a lap and showing no signs of slowing. The pegasus was a lot faster than he’d originally thought he was. Chase panted, slowing himself a bit so he didn’t drop to the ground in an exhausted heap. His legs were sore and beginning to ache, and if he stopped now he was only going to end up with more laps.

“What’s the matter, getting tired?” grinned Cloud Runner, trotting alongside him.

“Shut-shut up,” panted Chase. “I just, need to catch my breath, that’s all. If this were an actual race and not laps I could totally win.”

The blue pegasus just laughed, tossing his head back with a snort.

“No talking recruits, you’re supposed to be running laps not socializing. What does this look like, a family picnic?” barked the captain.

Chase gulped, that stallion seemed to see and hear everything; especially the things nopony wanted him to see or hear. It was as bad as having a parent around. There was a chorus of ‘yessir!’ and everyone continued on running in silence.

Chase clenched his teeth as he ran, trying to pace himself and make up for his earlier blunder of exerting himself too much too soon. He could feel sweat rolling down his neck and back, soaking his coat and sticking his mane to his neck and forehead.

“Ugh, I’m going to need a nice long shower after this,” he thought as he rounded the corner, clearing another lap.

By the time he joined the rest of the group for a breather before the rest of their warm ups started in the field, his legs were shaking and he could barely stay on all four hooves.

“This was such a bad idea,” he hissed to Thundermane as he collapsed next to him. “How did you talk me into this?”

“If I recall, you talked yourself into this buster, couldn’t back down from a challenge.”

“I will so get even with you, you bum.”

The grey pegasus snickered, “Damn you are winded, was that really the best you could come up with?”

“Ahh shaddup.”

---

He managed to get through the rest of the warm-ups with no problem once he caught his breath and wasn’t about to fall on his face. There were a few odd looks shot his way, he guessed they could see the horn ring even more now that his mane was flattened by his sweat. As the groups broke off, Bronze Shield dismissed him, saying he should return to his bunk to study. Even though Chase was sure he could easily sneak off and out of the palace, something in the back of his mind told him that the captain would find out. That stallion knew everything and Chase was pretty sure he had ways of finding out anything he needed.

Wiping his brow he trotted back towards the barracks to grab a shower before going to study. He’d never be able to concentrate being all sweaty and sore. Plus he stank something awful and he was sure his roommates wouldn't like it if he stank the place up.

Chase grabbed a towel from his room and made his way to the showers. They were predictably empty and, while Chase had no problem showering with the other colts, he was glad to be alone for once.

The knob squeaked slightly as he twisted it on, cool water rushing free from the showerhead. Chase tilted his head back, letting the water splash on his face and run down his neck. It was like a cool, gentle rain, only without the uncomfortable dampness and chill it brought. Shaking his head he reached out again and turned the warm water tap, sending heated water to mix with the chilly shower water.

Chase sighed, the warm water felt so relaxing on his sore, aching muscles. It was a nice feeling and for a few moments he just stood there, head tilted back as he let the refreshing water drum against his skin and trickle over his body.

Lowering his head he shook it before reaching for the bar of soap to wash himself down with, at least he could get rid of the stink. Or he tried, more than once he found himself grasping around as the soap slipped from his grasp and slid across the wet tile floor, something he was having a difficult time keeping his footing on. And trying to reach everywhere to wash himself was equally as tricky, both because of his lack of magic and the wet, slippery soap.

Eventually he just washed what he could reach and scrubbed his mane before rinsing himself off.

He twisted the knobs to turn the water off, the sound of the shower fading away as he walked out and retrieved his towel from the bench he’s left it on. He buried his face into it, rubbing vigorously to dry himself off before tossing it over his shoulders and heading back to the dorm room.

The air felt pleasantly cool on his dampened coat, a welcoming relief from how he’d been feeling earlier. “I could get used to this.”

Author's Note:

Sorry about the delay, work just sapped up so much time and energy from me. Even though I have a buffer I had no drive to proofread/edit and get a chapter up.
But here's a new (sorta fillerish) chapter.