An Eastern Equestrian Hearth's Warming

by Elkia Deerling

Chapter 4

CHAPTER FOUR

Night fell, the stars started twinkling high above, and the moon did its best to shine through the forest canopy. It was already late in the evening, and the moon aimed its rays directly against the west-side of the tree trunks, making them glimmer ghostly in the darkness. A chilly wind rushed through the entire forest, and dark clouds hung above, foreboding a heavy snowfall. Sure enough, the first white flecks of frozen rain dwindled down, acting as if there wasn’t enough snow on the ground already. Here and there, a few stray animals skittered around, desperate to find a hideout in time before either the upcoming snowstorm or before the nightly predators would surprise them. There was a scratching squirrel, a roaming fox, and an eagle high above, letting out a savage screech to accompany the symphony of the storm with an extra melodic layer.

A tickling, a heavy breath, and Rivet opened his eyes. He gasped loudly like he was about to drown.

I’m alive!

He jerked his head up, but saw only the green roof. A pain like crackling fire raced through his head, and Rivet winched. Intending to rub his sore scalp to somehow ease the flames inside, Rivet tried to lift his hoof. What the hay?!

A rope ensnared him all around his body, and he realized he was tied to a massive pine. Slowly, his ability to think returned to his groggy mind. Rivet tried to look down, perhaps even wanting to bite through the rope surrounding him, but found that a second rope, wrapped around his neck, secured his head tightly to the tree. As Rivet shuffled a bit, he felt an agonizing scorch on his legs and neck, like a whip had struck him a dozen times. Despite the pain, he shuffled a bit more, but the only thing Rivet accomplished was noticing how stiff his back was against the solid wood. He gritted his teeth, almost regretting returning to the conscious world. How long have I been like this?

A shift of shadows made Rivet look up, ignoring the rope digging in his neck. Evening? Then he noticed the moon. No. Late at night.

Rivet turned his head in a less painful position, trying his best to think about what happened before he woke up. A small snowflake touched down on his nose, followed by a few more on his head, like they tried to put out the fire inside of it. Rivet shivered, but the cold had a calming effect on his brain. Suddenly his pupils grew small, as the slideshow of events unfolded before his eyes.

“Carbide!”

Rivet said it out loud, but not with any tone of anger or vengeance. He remembered everything: the journey, the gold, the argument. Slowly, Rivet let the events sink in a second time, thinking them over as carefully as his beaten-up head allowed.

He knocked me unconscious, or did he want to—Rivet swallowed, feeling the pressure of the rope against his Adam’s apple—did he want to kill me? No. He would never do that. Another gust of wind made Rivet shiver. But then why has he done this to me?

Rivet’s ears flattened and he felt his muscles weaken. I don’t understand. We were friends! Best friends! Despite the cold, his eyes started burning, and a small, warm teardrop dripped to the snow. How could this happen? But the moment that question appeared in Rivet’s mind, it was accompanied by the answer. The gold. It is all about the gold. Rivet Punch wanted to flick the upcoming tears away, but couldn’t do so. How can gold make a pony do such a thing? His shoulders twitched with a sob, and a pain shot through his body—but Rivet didn’t care. How can gold make a pony betray his best friend? A few more sobs, and a few more tears. Then I don’t want it anymore. I rather have a good friend than all the riches in the rocks of Equestria.

Rivet let his head hang low; with this revelation came a sudden tiredness. He didn’t fight it anymore, and cried softly, occasionally whispering things through his sobs and tears with a weak voice. A cloud blocked all the light, and Rivet became enveloped in hopelessness and darkness. The wind began blowing harder, and the snowflakes patted against his face like icy sandpaper. Soon enough, a small snowy hill formed against the tree and the desperate stallion tied to it, slowly engulfing him in a cold tomb.

Rivet didn’t have enough energy to move, and soon he stopped trembling as well. Only shards of thoughts flowed through his mind as hypothermia kicked in. He saw the smiling faces of his friends at the town bar. He saw the thatched roofs of the village with the warm light through the windows. He saw the cave, glittering with gold; although that memory vanished quickly, as if the freezing stallion had any strength left to choose his own last thoughts. He saw Carbide Lamplight and his mine.

Finally, Rivet Punch saw the loving faces of his family: his wife and his two daughters.

“I’m sorry,” he whispered, and then he closed his eyes for the last time.

* *

Haze.

Whirling wisps.

White in darkness.

Smoke without a fire.

Floating blanket on the land.

Mist.

* *

Mist!

Rivet’s eyes shot open. The small snowy coffin crumbled as he shuddered. “Silnyy!”

The wind whooshed around the two animals, yet somehow unable to blow away the mist on the snowy ground. The bear stepped closer, raised one of her claws, and cut both ropes in one vicious rake. The tree shivered and Rivet fell forward, finding no strength or feeling in his frozen legs.

“Stand up, you fool!” the bear roared through the howling blizzard. But Rivet Punch either couldn’t hear her, or wasn’t able to stand up at all. Every part of him hurt, every movement he tried to make backfired on his entire body. With all the will of the world, he struggled, but it was in vain.

Silnyy sighed, stepped towards the stallion, and bit his yellow tail. With a mouthful of stiff, frozen horse hair, the bear dragged Rivet Punch away like he was a freshly caught prey. But Rivet Punch didn’t even notice that anymore, as he had lost consciousness once more.

* *

“I’m never doing this again,” Silnyy mumbled to herself, as she sat with her back to the stallion and the fire. Her massive body almost covered the whole entrance of the cave they were in, as she stared outside at the twinkling stars and the untamable snowstorm. Why is he taking so long? He should be warm by now! she thought, frowning with annoyance. Of course Rivet would survive; Silnyy wasn’t done yet.

The bear tried to relax and use the waiting time to think. She looked out over the frozen landscape but found it hard to get her thoughts in line. How can one think when one has a view of a beautiful land like this? she contemplated. And for the first time in weeks, a relaxed smile curled around her heavy brown lips.

Suddenly, a rock fell right off the wall and landed next to the bear, shattering her concentration. Silnyy’s head snapped around, and her heavy claw blew the rock to smithereens. She growled, “I’ve waited long enough, for forest’s sake! I’m waking that pony up!”

But when she turned around, Silnyy saw the stallion already standing on his legs, although a bit unsteadily.

“Silnyy,” Rivet said with a trembling voice. “Am I… dead?”

The bear shuffled on her paws. “No time for stupid questions. Don’t ask anything more about it.”

Rivet Punch did a few wobbly steps towards his savior. “But… how did I get here and—“

“Grabbed your tail, dragged you here and lit a fire,” Silnyy interrupted, frowning with annoyance again. This takes so long.

“How can bears light fires?” Rivet didn’t know why that random question popped up in his mind, but he was in the mood for some answers. Anything that would clarify the events of the past hours.

“I JUST DID!” Silnyy burst out in a growl. “Don’t ask anything more about it!”

The force of the growl made Rivet wobble and fall to his haunches on the rocky floor. He raised his head and looked around the cave, revealing vicious marks on his neck. “Where are we? Is this your own lair?”

“Finally a good question, pony!” Silnyy said with some relief. “And no. This is not my cave. It is yours.”

“Mine?”

The bear sighed, ending in a grunt. “The cave with the gold I gave you. The one your ‘friend’ took from you!”

“Carbide,” Rivet whispered.

“Yes. That scrawny little creature who robbed you of all your riches.”

“He didn’t do that!” Rivet said, his heart feeling as if the fire had warmed it too.

“Oh, yes he did. And he knocked you on the head as well—with one of those lampposts, if I saw it correctly.”

“I don’t believe you!” Rivet called out, his voice a little croaky of thirst.

“I have seen it with my own bear-eyes.”

“My friend would never do such a thing!”

“Oh, really?” The bear smirked. “Then how do you explain this!” She stepped aside and waved one of her massive paws around the cave.

It was indeed the gold cave, although the word ‘gold’ should have been omitted. There wasn’t a single crumb of the shiny metal left. Ordinary gray rocks in all shapes and sizes littered the cave floor, sometimes smashed into dust. The cave looked much bigger with all of the gold removed, and Rivet Punch could even spot the burnt-out carbide lamps, some of which had been knocked down. A few hoofsteps ahead lay a couple of pickaxes with blunted tips, lying there as if somepony had left in a hurry and had forgotten about them—or simply didn’t care about sharpening them again. Mingled with Silnyy’s pawprints were shallow hoofprints, arranged in a way which looked like somepony had performed a crazy dance, or had otherwise moved around with haste and ecstasy.

All signs pointed towards the obvious, and Rivet couldn’t deny this striking picture any longer. Slowly he lowered his head; his ears drooped down. Despite his dry pupils, a few tears soon shone on his cheeks.

“Argh! Don’t cry!” Silnyy roared, making Rivet jump. “You’re a grown-up stallion, for forest’s sake!”

Rivet turned around, ignoring the grumpy bear. “He betrayed me,” he whispered through shaking breaths.

But Silnyy was getting really tired of this. She shifted and roared, “But it wasn’t only Richskaya’s fault!”

Rivet snapped his head back. “How do you know Carby’s family n—“

“DON’T ASK ANYTHING MORE ABOUT IT!”

Stumbling backwards, Rivet found the end of the cave as he crashed into it. He grunted in pain and slumped down.

Slowly Silnyy advanced, her tiny eyes glittering like gold.

Somehow Rivet felt a surge of adrenaline flowing through his body. The roaring bear walking right at him, the primal feeling of being a cornered prey, or maybe just the desire to ask questions made Rivet frown instead of fear, and he opened his mouth. “So if you watched the whole thing with your own eyes, then why didn’t you do anything?”

Rivet expected a roar, a bite, or a claw to the face. But instead, Silnyy stopped right before him and smiled an odd smile. “I could ask you the same thing.”

“Huh?”

“Alright.” Silnyy cleared her throat, as if she was going to lecture a class of baby bears. “Let me ask you another question: why did you save my little son?”

“Eh…” was all the stallion could bring out, as he was still trembling with a cocktail of fear and adrenaline.

“Why did you risk your life to save a baby grizzly bear which you’ve never seen before, which you have never known before, and which would never thank you in any way?”

Once again an ‘eh…’ escaped Rivet’s mouth, but that was it.

“Come on, pony! Think!” Silnyy’s smile disappeared and she took a step forward again—a rock cracked under her claws.

His courage left Rivet, and he cowered in fear.

Silnyy sighed. “Because, Rivet Punch Macintoshky, you care about life; about every living thing, no matter how big or small, how dangerous or innocent. My son told me how you mere pinned the eagle to a tree while you could have killed it with ease—I know how good you are at baskethoof.”

That little detail made Rivet feel like a sliver of courage seeped back into him. He felt the urge to ask how Silnyy knew that, but kept quiet, as he guessed she wasn’t done yet.

Rivet was right, and the bear continued. “You find life more important than riches. You find many things more important than riches: friends, family, work—which is good. Although friends, family and work are only little things, and life is the basis; the beginning of everything, of every bond you will forge.” Silnyy paused, and breathed a long, heavy breath. “Take the forest, for example. The life flows through it in the form of trees and animals, but if there would be no life, there would only be lifeless rocks. Gold, perhaps, but that too, is lifeless.”

Rivet nodded.

“Life must come. Seeds must be planted, eggs must hatch, animals must love. The forest is life, and life makes a forest.”

Rivet nodded again, pretending to understand.

The grizzly stared at him intently, and the stallion found himself unable to shift his gaze away. It was as if Silnyy’s golden eyes saw straight through him, browsing through his memories and through the very fragments of his soul, plucking them like balalaika strings. “But,” she said, “there are limits to life. There can not only be life; there must also be death.”

Rivet Punch swallowed, his throat grating.

“It is the cycle of predator versus prey. Some animals must be killed to feed others. They cannot help it; it is the way of nature. Nature is cruel, and a harsh teacher: killing off the weak to promote the strong.”

Silnyy blinked, Rivet did so simultaneously, unable to control his eyes.

“You are strong, pony,” Silnyy said in an easy, monotonous voice. “Strong of body, but not of mind. Sometimes you have to FIGHT in order to survive. Sometimes purely for yourself, sometimes for someone else, and sometimes to defend what is yours.”

Slowly Rivet’s mouth opened, working hard to form words in response. “But I—“

“Was surprised? Don’t care about the gold? Wanted to preserve my friendship?” Silnyy finished for him. “You have seen bar brawls break out a thousand times, knowing each time when to quietly shuffle to the door—you can feel those moments coming. You don’t care about the gold?”—the bear tilted her head—“maybe… But you care about the other villagers, right? You wanted to use the gold to help them.”

“H-how do—“

“Don’t ask anything more about it! You must realize that the gold is important, why would I give it to you otherwise?”

“I-I don’t—“

“And you wanted to preserve your friendship? Ha!” Silnyy’s voice went back to normal for a second. She spat on the ground, breaking eye contact and allowing Rivet to blink and shake his head. “That tunnel rat doesn’t deserve your friendship!”

Then a sudden burst of energy flowed through Rivet punch; he was free from the stare. “Hey! Carbide is my friend, you know, and—“

But Silnyy threw her head back up and pierced Rivet’s gaze again. “Friend? You don’t even know everything about him!”

“Do you?” Rivet said back, still feeling the energy build up.

“That’s not the point!” the grizzly growled. She stomped her paw like a sledgehammer on the floor. “If you knew Richskaya so well, then why did you not have the strength to do anything against him?”

It was like a new courage flowed through Rivet Punch’s body. Something he had rarely felt before; something he rarely needed. He blinked hard, although the grizzly didn’t allow him to. He saw the bear’s lip twitch in a moment of hesitation. “Why did you not do anything, if you really saw everything Carbide did?”

Silnyy’s lip twitched once more, and suddenly she let Rivet go, threw her head in the direction of the cave entrance, and turned her enormous body around. A primal roar exploded from the grizzly’s maw, refusing to echo as it pierced through the very rocks themselves. Rivet covered his ears and curled up in a ball as the sound waves threatened to crush his skull.

“BECAUSE THAT IS NOT MY PURPOSE!” Silnyy roared.

The stallion was just about to ask what she meant by that when Silnyy turned around and charged right at him. What have I done? Flashed through Rivet’s mind, but he stood firm, refusing to let this grumpy bear get the better of him. He wouldn’t go down without a fight.

Silnyy almost closed the gap between them, her eyes gleaming with rage. Then she ducked, and before Rivet punch realized what was going on, he flew in the air, bounced against the roof of the cave, and landed on the bear’s back with a grunt of pain. Silnyy dashed out of the cave, carrying the big stallion as if he weighed nothing. Rivet was still bedazzled and unsure what was happening, but when he saw Silnyy tilt over the edge of the ridge and looked down for a split-second at the steep drop, he bit into the hairy bear-pelt, holding on for dear life.

With an avalanche of rocks and dirt behind her, the grizzly bear slid off the ridge and the slope until she was almost down to level ground. She jumped, falling the last few meters, and landed on the forest floor, the snow catching her fall. Silnyy paid no heed to the vicious snowstorm, which was still going strong. The wind howled and screamed amongst the trees, which waved their branches madly. It looked like they tried to stop the bear from going any further, or perhaps they were encouraging her, or begging for assistance against the natural disaster which tortured them.

On her back, Rivet Punch closed his eyes against the sharp wind. He wished he was able to retract his ears, as the wind and the snow lashed at them mercilessly. Snowflakes smacked into his face, and he couldn’t see where they were going or what was happening. The only things Rivet noticed were the rough bouncing of the bear, and the scent of the pine trees—he reckoned they were in the forest again.

The stallion wrapped his forehooves around the massive body of his mount, feeling the enormous muscles contract; the engines which powered the steamboat. The cold, which had struck him like a slamming door when he exited the warm cave, cooled his body down and soon Rivet Punch found himself able to think a little.

Like a diesel-powered plowing machine, Silnyy broke through the snow and continued the mad dash through the forest. Occasionally a small piece of shrub or a larger hedge came in her way, but was quickly annihilated by a sweeping claw.

Rivet let go of the bear-hairs with his mouth. “What are you doing?!” He shouted through the roaring wind.

“Something I should have done much sooner. And you too!” Silnyy roared back, having no trouble communicating through the noise.

Rivet coughed; his throat was still hoarse. “What?”

“You talk too much. Just sit still!”

Rivet didn’t understand that sentence either, but he saw no way to say anything more—his throat was killing him and the howling became louder. Suddenly, Rivet realized it was not only the wind which howled—the howling of wolves joined in.

Silnyy’s body bounced up and down, and the forest rushed by before the stallion’s eyes. There was no way of knowing where they were going, or how long they had been going already. Together they waltzed through the snow, Silnyy’s heavy footfalls making quick work of everything beneath it. Rivet Punch pressed the side of his head against the warm bear fur, occasionally switching to cover both ears against the snow. The dark-blue and white blur of the forest whisked past them. Rivet Punch noticed a long trail of little red dots lighting up inside of it. He smiled through frost-bitten lips, realizing what they were and where Silnyy and he were going. The stones.

But then a blood-curdling howl made Rivet shiver and almost lose his grip. Grasping frantically, he steadied himself and looked left and right. Both sides of the forest had the red dots, and they were bouncing up and down. Now Rivet saw what they were: predatory eyes. “Wolves!” he yelled.

“Turn around!” Silnyy roared.

“What?”

“You have to help me with this one. We can’t lose any more time!”

One pair of red lights diverted and materialized out of the blur of the forest. A long shape jumped at Rivet Punch, going for the kill. The red stallion’s eyes were quicker. He felt a burst of adrenaline, turned around, and bucked with his hind legs. A high yelp resounded, and a rain of sticks and thorns rained down on Rivet. Tundra timber-wolves!

Two shadows approached from the sides, but didn’t realize horses have their eyes on the sides of their head. Rivet spread his legs and kicked those wolves into oblivion as well.

One timber wolf realized where the danger came from and jumped high, going for the legs. Rivet wasn’t quick enough, and the wolf clamped itself on his legs. Rivet screamed in pain as he felt the razor-sharp teeth dig into his flesh. Out of reflex, he swung his leg up. The wolf let go, flew through the air, and landed in the snow. Shaking its head, the beast was just about to consider itself lucky the snow cushioned his fall when Silnyy swept the wolf aside, breaking him in a thousand pieces.

Now the string of red eyes slowed down on either side. Rivet snapped his head to the left and the right, frantically trying to see what the hunters were going to do next. Slowly the two red ribbons converged right behind the bear.

“Hold them off!” the stallion heard behind him.

Then the clouds shifted, and the moonlight dared to peek through its covers, indubitably wanting to watch the finale of this wicked chase.

Through winter-cold eyes, Rivet saw the red eyes merge into the shape of a complete pack of tundra timber-wolves: a dozen, maybe more. They snarled, winched at the light, and gave a cruel grin. Bouncing up and down through the mist, the wolves ran their wooden lungs out of their bodies, occasionally turning their heads left and right, discussing how they were going to catch their prey—or preys. Take one, get another one for free.

In a flash of thought, Rivet realized just how much murderous rage streamed from those red eyes. The things Silnyy had said to him in the cave came to mind. The wolves had to be very hungry and desperate for food to go hunt a bear. But of course, they had the numbers.

Their thorn-covered snouts came in closer and closer. Rivet saw the powerful puffs of breath thickening the mist below, and the eyes shining, filled with bloodlust. They are going to jump. All at once!

Silnyy’s heavy breaths came shorter and shallower now. She was getting exhausted. The rhythm of the pawsteps grew slower.

The ribbon of wood and eyes advanced even faster. Rivet felt the bear slowing down. “What are you doing?!” He yelled, finally breaking through the noise of the storm.

But Silnyy didn’t answer. She cast a quick glance behind and saw what she expected—she knew the hunting practices of the forest animals well enough. Silnyy closed her eyes, and tried to think about everything she could do. Her pace slowed down even more as her concentration waned.

I’m sorry to bring you into this.

Breaking the rhythmic breathing, Silnyy gathered all the frosty air she could, and let out a mighty and desperate roar.

The timber wolves rattled from the force and lost some ground in the shock. But then they realized that barking dogs don’t bite—barking dogs are desperate. Roaring bears don’t bite—roaring bears are close to giving up. So they thought. Soon they caught up again. They were close enough that one of them looked up and gazed Rivet straight in the eyes.

The stallion looked back, not afraid. The roar hadn’t even scared him. Instead, Rivet felt like he got something back which he had lost; or something he had suppressed: A feeling of rage, battle-readiness, bloodlust even. Something primal awakened inside of him, just like the moment when Silnyy charged right at him. Rivet Punch steeled himself for whatever would come. A last stand. His hide wouldn’t sell cheap.

A shape shot overhead and scuttled through the line of wolves. A strange cry resounded. In a haze of brown shadow, the shape zig-zagged through the regiment of wolves, breaking the orderly line. It was small, but not long like the wolves, more rounded. Its shape betrayed its speed. Then the shadow reached the frontline hunters, and Rivet saw who it was: Silnyy’s cub.

“Zhizn!” Silnyy roared.

That was all she needed to say. The little bear knew what to do. He zigzagged back with an incredible speed. The wolves slowed down and then stopped altogether, confused about what was interrupting their hunt. Rivet Punch saw them running in circles, congregating, and then bolting after the cub. They found prey easier to catch: young and inexperienced. The wolves became smaller and smaller, and then vanished out of sight.

Rivet wasn’t sure what he’d just seen, but he knew Silnyy and he would be safe for a while.

“Will your son be ok?” Rivet asked through the wind.

Silnyy took a quick peek behind, then raised her voice. “Yes. He’ll be alright!”

“Are you sure?”

“Yes! Don’t ask anything more about it!”

The grizzly picked up the pace again, noticing the trees around. They began to retreat, and the wind howled less. Silnyy let out a tired sigh. Almost there.

Then suddenly, there were no trees anymore. A wide, chilled landscape opened before her, a little too open. The bear looked left and right, and when she didn’t see any creature, she headed straight for the path. It wasn’t hard at all to find it; for it was marked by hoofsteps and a deep wagon trail.