A Filly's New Hope

by Mocha Star

Chapter 25

Tree galloped toward the town and held his breath as the house Trek was in began to lose structure and collapse. With a dramatic explosion of fire and wood she jumped out from an upstairs wall, next to an open window, with a two foals holding onto her neck and an unconscious mare across her back.

“Get them to triage, house clear, stay back!” She shouted as the walls outside began to burn. The house stopped collapsing, holding onto the last of its support as it burned. She turned to her left and looked at Tree galloping closer, then behind him.

He was nearly three quarters of the way before he saw a look of shock cross her expression and she had began to gallop to him. He looked back and paled.

A gryphon was flying, beginning a dive, for the cart. Another appeared from beside the other gryphon and froze Tree’s blood, sending chills across his body. He lost his balance and tumbled head over flank several times, stopping painfully on his left side facing the burning town and Trek galloping toward him.

“Don’t worry about me-” he shouted as she neared him.

“I’m not,” she shouted back to him gruffly as she leapt over his lying form.

Nova looked on as Tree was leapt over and sighed in relief, thinking Trek was coming to tell her it was all okay. With a shrill shriek three gryphons appeared above her, foretalons open, ready to grab her.

She screamed and turned to run away as a thump, followed by another, landed on the cart. “Up! Up! We got something from this stupid mission,” a female shouted as the wind from their wings gusted Nova to her back, toppling over herself as another landed over her.

Nova screamed again as she looked up at the natural feathers of a bird as they blended into a tiger stiripped rear. In a deep voice a male boomed over her. “Take the cart, I’ll join you in a moment with some leverage.” He flapped and took to the air and grasped Nova in his claws.

Screaming, Nova was dropped onto the tarp covering the carts goods as the last gryphon gripped the cart and helped the others carry it away. One of the others squaked and lunged to bite at something, growling she turned and spat the staff into the cart next to Nova. “Some damn Royal Guard tried to skewer me!”

“Too bad she missed,” the female in front shouted, “it’d be an improvement on your looks.”

They all shared a laugh. “It’d feel better than Rild’s staff.”

The Male growled. “You don’t complain when you get it, Klinn.”

“You’re not awake to hear it, Rild.”

“Haha! She got you again, Rild.”

“Silence, Vacca, or I’ll skewer you with a spear and feed you to your kin in a pie.”

The females fell silent, only the sound of a whimpering filly and their wings flapping filled the air around them. Vacca cleared her throat and looked behind her, into the cart. “Who’s the nibble?”

Nova whimpered and crawled toward the staff. “She’s leverage. If we don’t need her we drop her on the path. If we do,” Rild snarled, “snack.”

The dam broke and Nova curled into a little furry ball, trembling, weeping, and staring at Rild. “Rild,” Klinn sighed, “don’t tease the poor creature.”

“Hush, Klinn,” he grumbled and gave her a look.

“...Ohhh, ri~ght,” Klinn sneered and snapped her beak, “we’ll gobble you up from your tail to your hooves, so you better not make trouble.”

Nova looked over to the staff, just outside her reach and back to the gryphons looming over her. Their wings flapping made them easily several times her size, each. She nodded to Klinn silently.

Klinn looked to Rild and winked as they flew high, into the distance, in silence.

…

Nova clenched her eyes shut for nearly three minutes before her facial muscles hurt and, slowly, she peeked her right eye open. The flight was relatively quiet and bumpy, but not dangerous; at least not to a curious filly.

She uncurled herself and stretched her rear legs before she rolled to her belly and crawled toward the side panel of the cart. She struggled over something under the tarp but quickly climbed over it, using the tarp as an anchor to pull herself along.

Crawling for nearly four feet on her belly she stabilized herself and peeked over the edge. “Eeep.”

“What the… oh, it’s just the nibble. Stay from the edge; if you fall I’m not losing this haul.”

Nova gulped as she looked at the speeding ground, far below. “H-h-how, high am I?”

“Depends on how much you ate,” Vacca snorted.

“Hey,” Rild scolded her, “don’t speak of such things. A child shouldn’t know of such vices, even if it is a pony,” he sneered hungrily at Nova, who pulled her rear legs under her body.

“Klinn, she’s too close to the edge,” Vacca said, looking back for a moment, rocking the cart.

“Flog it, Vacca, don’t tip the cart! We’ll lose it all,” Kiln roared as Vacca recovered.

“Sorry, sir,” she muttered to Klinn before looking under herself. “Little… horse, thing… ahem, can you move from the edge?” she asked sweetly, “If you fall, you’d most certainly die… and then we wouldn’t be able to eat you later,” he cackled as she looked ahead.

The others laughed heartily. “Vacca, you have hope, yet.”