Thirteen
The first, and as it seemed, the longest part of the trot was one long, slow, murderous slope. Spike grew tired fast. He didn't have a burden, but he had shorter legs and less stamina. Than Vigg, at least.
Saga soon sweated so much her jacket was drenched. She panted hard and breathed heavily, and not in the way considered good by writers of saucy fiction. She strained against the weight of the sleigh, and after a while her hooves started to slip on the snow. It was questionable whether the fact that the path had been used made walking easier - it was easier to step on flat ground than in deep snow, but the trod path was also much more slippy.
Vigg certainly noticed a few tugs in the harness but didn't say anything until Saga actually slipped, fell and almost made him fall as well.
"Hey!" he shouted angrily. "Watch your step!"
Saga wheezed as she tried to get up.
"Well sorry for falling!" she snapped back. "We can't all be as perfect as you, Your Highness!" She struggled to get up and gasped for air.
Vigg turned his head towards her and was going to make an angry comment of his own, but somehow stopped and stared at her as she struggled. Then he turned to Spike.
"Spike! Block the ackja so it doesn't decide to go back to Sarvvik without us," he said. Spike started to comply, a little anxious whether he did it right.
"What are you doing?" asked Saga angrily.
"Getting out of the harness so I can help you" he said, about to do just that.
"I don't need help, I am fine," she said.
He remained half-strapped in as she struggled.
"You know, I think..." he started to say but her glare shut him up. He looked at Spike. Spike slowly nodded.
"Saga?" he asked.
"Yes?!" she snapped, now half-upright.
"Can we make a break now?" Spike pleaded.
"I don't need a break" she murmured.
"But I do!" said Spike, happy it was in no way a lie. "My feet are tired and there is snow in my boots and I am hungry!"
"Oh," said Saga. "Sorry!" she added sheepishly. She wriggled out of the harness, then she and Vigg stepped over to Spike and they turned the sleigh ninety degrees so it would stay put.
As Saga trampled up a place to lie on the snow - Spike the weak Southron had brought a blanket, but even city deer like Saga lay on the ground on a picnic - Vigg dug out a packet of sandwiches and a thermos from the ackja, tugging its covering open with his teeth.
"So many huge boulders spread in the middle of the forest" said Spike and gestured with his paw.
"They say they were thrown by stalus," said Saga. "At Sarvvik, I mean."
"Stalu?" said Spike. "I have heard that..."
"Probably in your comic," said Vigg and poured coffee for himself and Saga and cocoa for Spike. "A stalu is an troll. Or a giant, in this case. Because real stalus couldn't throw rocks like that, they're much smaller."
"Oh yeah," said Spike "Stallo the Frost Giant! He's in Sampo's origin story, Wolker the Wizard sends him to attack Canterlot!"
"What are you talking about?" said Saga. "And where do the rocks come from, then?"
"Sampo is a comic about a reindeer hero," said Spike.
"Well, the ice elementals of Joukulvakt, erh, poop out rocks after they have eaten the landscape, and there must have been lots of them down here in ancient times. I mean, all the rocks have moss on them, and that takes centuries to grow..." said Vigg.
"Comics!" said Saga a bit dismissively. "And you don't know how big stalu used to be. Maybe all the really big ones got killed!"
"Not as big as in fairy tales anyway," protested Vigg. "Or comic books. The one Spike talks about is as big as a skyscraper."
"Why not?" asked Spike and Saga in chorus.
"My ancestors fought stalus," said Vigg. "They would have been paste had they been literal giants, and they were big boasters so they would have not hesitated to say they had fought something as big as a skyscraper who threw boulders as pebbles. They are just big hulking savages."
"Who eat reindeer!" added Saga. "Like this! Omnomnomnom!" and she masticated on her sandwich. The others shook their heads.
Saga giggled, then she cleaned her muzzle and started digging in her jacket's pockets. Just as she found what she was looking for, she swore to herself, stopped and sighed.
"...what?" asked Spike.
"Oh nothing," she said with some irritation.
Spike looked at her quizzically, Vigg followed suit. She sighed.
"I was gonna light a cigarette, but realized it was stupid," she said.
"That's a very weird time to quit smoking," said Vigg.
"Well, you can if you want," said Spike. "I mean, I think it's kinda icky, but dragons are immune to tobacco anyway."
Saga laughed. "I should have said it was because of that, shouldn't I?" she said and laughed again. "But I am being selfish. A cig would be nice, but I am panting badly enough as it is, and I know it gets worse after a smoke," she explained.
She then took a second cup of coffee as "replacement poison" as she called it, while the others finished their food.
As they strapped themselves into the sleigh's harness, Vigg leaned a little closer to Saga.
“Please, miss Saga... tell me when you get tired. It does not make it easier for us others if you keep trotting until you fall over” he said.
Saga glared at him.
“You don't think I can make this journey, is it?” she said.
Vigg sighed.
“No, but I can't see you when I take the lead, so I won't notice when it gets hard for you, and you are a heavy smoker who doesn't spend most of their free time on the track or the slope, so it's no shame if you don't have my stamina and have to stop earlier,” he said.
Saga muttered a bit and fumed.
“Look, you can't impress me this way, and you don't need to impress Spike, since you already know more than the dragonling,” he said.
Saga muttered again.
“What did you say?” said Vigg.
Saga sighed.
“I said I'm not trying to impress you. Or Spike – although I like the little guy already,” she said and smiled. “I guess I am trying to impress myself.”
“What... how?” Vigg said, confused.
“I was always ashamed to be a city deer, OK?” she said. “Look, Your Highness, I'll tell you when my lungs give out, OK?”
Vigg nodded.
“OK,” he said.
“Are we leaving soon or what?” shouted Spike from up ahead. “It looks like we're almost up there!”
“Don't be too sure, Spike!” Vigg shouted. “Distances can play trick on your eyes up here!”
“We have mountains in Equestria too!” Spike shouted down to him.
“Let's get going!” Vigg told Saga.
Up a mountain.
Down a mountain, a-half-a-way.
Sharp turning south,
In between hills.
In through a forest,
across a lake...
“It's the forest part that troubles me,” said Vigg.
“This looks like a forest to me,” said Spike.
“Yeah, but there is no way this forest stretches down to a lake. Just look at how the trees grow!” Vigg said with irritation. “Not to mention how the ground slopes!”
“It's the snowing part that troubles me,” said Saga. “As in, there is more and more of it.”
“That should be no trouble,” mumbled Vigg. “We should be by the hut before it becomes too much. It can't be far...”
“Twilight and I did check the weather report at the palace, and it said it would be clear,” said Spike. “She said she was jealous that I would see the northern lights.”
“Spike, you know the weather report fails sometimes, right?” said Vigg with some irritation. “This is nothing strange!”
Spike frowned.
“Calm down, Your Highness,” said Saga. “He's Equestrian, they magick up their weather by pegasus!”
“Yeah,” said Spike “if the weather report is wrong at home it's because Rainbow Dash overslept or something...”
“Who?” said Saga and Vigg.
“Just a friend of Twilight's that's a weathermare,” said Spike and pulled his jacket closer. “And an Element of Harmony.”
“Is she the girl who flies faster than light and rides a grand air elemental?” asked Saga with some interest.
“Not really, but yeah, that's her,” said Spike. And she must never know what reindeer think of her, or we will never hear the end of it, he thought.
“She's just a weathermare?” said Saga. “Isn't that a job like road sweeper or something?”
“Well, the current Elements of Harmony are a village librarian, a weathermare, a veterinarian, a farmer, a seamstress and a Pinkie Pie,” said Spike. “It's not like it's really that glamorous a gig. Mostly.”
“Pinkiepie?” said Saga, puzzled. “What's a pinkiepie?”
“Lots of ponies would like an answer, but Twilight has said it falls under Things Ponies Were Not Meant To Know. If you want something more thinkable, she seems to be a baker's apprentice,” said Spike nonchalantly.
“I think it is this way,” said Vigg. “This must be the way to the lake, we have been walking to far in the other direction,” he explained as he pointed in a direction 90 degrees from the one they were going.
“Well, you're the expert,” said Saga and looked at the sky worriedly. What worried her was that she couldn't see it at all, the snowfall had started to be that heavy.
Spike was reminded of a painting he had seen once when he was little. Twilight's parents had taken them to a museum, and Spike had been riding on the shoulders of Twilight's father. The painting had been of some ponies in a snowstorm. It had been very well made, and Spike had tried to figure out if it was really a TV screen, since the snowflakes seemed to move of their own accord. Twilight had stopped him.
“About this painting,” said Twilight's father, “there is a story. You see how real it looks?”
Both little Twilight and even smaller Spike had nodded.
“Well, the painter who made it said it wasn't. She said she had been in real snowstorms like this, and if you stand as close as the viewer – that's us – do to those ponies, you will not see them. Because there is that snow. But she painted them like this anyway so you should see what happens,” he explained.
Spike had then bopped the painting with his little paw anyway, and got a scolding. Perhaps that was why he remembered the painting.
Right now reality was unrealistic, because it hadn't quite reached the stage where you couldn't see the guy in front you. It probably would, however.
“Vigg!” Saga shouted. “Your Highness!”
Vigg plowed on.
“Vigg!” shouted Spike who trod besides the ackja now, being too slow to run up front any longer.
Vigg finally turned his head.
“Yes?” he shouted.
“Vigg, we have to stop!” shouted Saga.
Vigg shook his head, but it wasn't visible in the snowstorm, so he shouted again. “No! We have to carry on! We have to reach the hut!”
“Vigg, we have to stop and make camp!” shouted Saga. “We can't carry on like this!”
“I know where we are!” he answered. “Look, I know orientation and you don't, sorry, OK?”
“I am lost so often I know when I'm lost! Besides, this is what you do in a snowstorm! You take cover!” Saga shouted back.
“We need to get to the hut!” Vigg shouted back.
“I'm cold! And tired!” shouted Spike.
“You have to stay cold and tired until we get to the hut!” shouted Vigg angrily.
“But we have stuff to make camp in a snowstorm!” said Spike. “You told me so when we packed!”
“The kid is right, Your Highness!” said an exasperated Saga. “Make a bivouac now is less dangerous than walking aimlessly in the storm! It's not dangerous at all, in fact! And you all but ordered me to say when I needed to stop! If we go on now, we die, so we really need to stop!” She was now quite hoarse, her voice tarred enough to crack easily.
“Look, we have to go to the hut AND THAT IS FINAL!” Vigg shouted.
Spike was shocked. Saga just looked at him, frowned and sighed.
“Fine. We will follow you and die gloriously for the honor of the great Snow Prince, Vigg the Ice-breaker! When Spring comes, we will be wondrous ice sculptures!” she shouted back. “Citizens of the great Snow Prince – strike a pose!”
And she reared up and, through a wonderful feat of balance, kept standing in a “woe is me!” pose, her left front hoof against her forehead.
Spike and Vigg stared. Then Spike leaned over dramatically and covered his face with his pawns, his visage contorted into horror. And stood still as the snow howled around them.
Vigg continued to stare at his companions, full of anger, breathing heavily, and felt it pump out of him until he fell over laughing.
Neither Spike nor Saga could keep their balance and followed their leader in falling over they as well, giggling, Saga at the same time crying.
“I'm so sorry,” said Vigg when he rose up. “I'm so sorry for being a complete jerk.”
Saga suddenly jumped up and hugged him.
“It's OK,” she said. “Just find us shelter!”
They held like that just long enough to let Spike join in the hug, then they untangled themselves from the harness and each other. Vigg cleared his throat.
“OK. There is too little snow, actually, to make a pure snow shelter. But I have a tarpaulin in the ackja and the ackja itself gives shelter. We'd still be better off with some boulders or something... I guess there would be some if we walked up here...” he said and pointed to the right off their former path.
The others looked at him.
“Just a small bit, if we don't find anything, we just rig up the ackja and the tarpaulin, cover it with snow for warmth, fix a breathing tube, and settle down, OK? There's three of us, including someone who breathes fire, if we just take shelter from the storm it will be OK,” he said.
The others nodded, and everyone started pulling the sleigh in the direction Vigg pointed. They got the wind in the face now, which made it a bit harder.
Suddenly Vigg started to sniff in the air.
“Do you smell it?!” he shouted.
Saga and Spike shook their heads.
“Smoker!” shouted Saga.
“Different kind of smoker!” shouted Spike.
“That's what it is – it smells like smoke!” Vigg shouted. “There might be deer here! Somedeer who can help us, maybe inside a tent or hut!”
The others brightened at that and they wandered a while longer than planned, when Vigg stopped.
“Tracks!” he shouted and bent down to examine them.
He remained down for a bit, trying to shelter his face with his hoof, then he gave up a shriek and shied back.
“What's going on?” shouted Saga.
“We have to go back!” he shouted. “Or carry on, anything but stay!”
“What?!” shouted Spike.
“Have you gone completely mental!” Saga shouted. “I don't care whether that is wolf or bear, we must find shelter!”
“They aren't – look at them!” Vigg moved aside and let Saga and Spike see them. “Look at the size of them!”
Saga shrieked as well.
“Those... that can't be! It's too close to... to Sarvvik! They shouldn't be like anywhere close to civilisation” she stammered and pointed to one big footprint.
Really big. A cloven-hoofed print, as from a giant reindeer.
“What are you talking about?” shouted Spike. “What on earth is that track from? Bighoof?”
Saga and Vigg shook their heads, their faces fearful.
“They have to be stalu tracks,” said Vigg. “Nothing else leaves that kind of track.”
“This is really dangerous, Spike,” said Saga and actually pulled Spike close to her, peering into the snowstorm around them. “This must be troll country!”
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<i>And she must never know what reindeer think of her, or we will never hear the end of it.</i>
Ahahahahaaaa, it's funny because it's true!
Great chapter, you are great at capturing the essence of the surroundings, like the snowstorm. I also loved how Saga and Spike broke the tension with their dramatic "ice sculpture" poses.
“Yeah,” said Spike “if the weather report is wrong at home it's because Rainbow Dash overslept or something...”
“Who?” said Saga and Vigg.
“Just a friend of Twilight's that's a weathermare,” said Spike and pulled his jacket closer. “And an Element of Harmony.”
“Is she the girl who flies faster than light and rides a grand air elemental?” asked Saga with some interest.
“Not really, but yeah, that's her,” said Spike. And she must never know what reindeer think of her, or we will never hear the end of it, he thought.
“She's just a weathermare?” said Saga. “Isn't that a job like road sweeper or something?”
“Well, the current Elements of Harmony are a village librarian, a weathermare, a veterinarian, a farmer, a seamstress and a Pinkie Pie,” said Spike. “It's not like it's really that glamorous a gig. Mostly.”
“Pinkiepie?” said Saga, puzzled. “What's a pinkiepie?”
“Lots of ponies would like an answer, but Twilight has said it falls under Things Ponies Were Not Meant To Know. If you want something more thinkable, she seems to be a baker's apprentice,” said Spike nonchalantly.
Another passage that has even more firmly cemented me into place as a fan of this story.
I dunno how I ever allowed my attention to be sucked away from this story before finishing it. It's gold. Absolutely marvelous.
913578
After all, I don't have that many! I hope you will read on and like what you see, and if not please tell me so I learn something from it!
I'm glad to have made another fan.
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Well, to be sure, there are a few grammatical errors every now and then in the characters' dialogue, and both Twilight and Spike seem to use a lot less contractions than Princess Luna does sometimes, but I can overlook that for the sake of just enjoying the story.
Also, I dunno if you remember, but I asked a while back if I could use some of your headcanon. I haven't used any as of yet because I was unsure, but I'm writing a character's bio, and one of her strengths is that she's multi-lingual. Is it okay if I use Poatsi as the name for the reindeer language?
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It is perfectly OK. In fact, I answered that already, it is comment 394 for this fiction... I don't know why you didn't get it... it might depend on how you answer to a comment, in the chapter or just at the end of all comments... In any case, I said:
I have some things which hasn't come up in the story and it is not likely they will. I can send them to you in a note if you want, and you can just discard anything you dislike.
as an answer to your
Thanks so much! I've been trying for so long to formulate some zebra headcanon, but it hasn't produced many good results yet. I'll definitely remember to credit you whenever I use any of your terms and such.
The Caribou tribes of northern Equestria don't speak Poatsi, but they do speak a cervine language. Poatsi is not a big language, so knowing it means you either have some special connection to Tarandroland, or that you are quite a scholar.
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That's the thing, though. She's not from Equestria. She's a gryphon from one of the Gryphon Strongholds of my own headcanon. I figured that since she traveled all over with her parents' merchant caravan in her cubhood, she had to pick up some of the languages they had to speak to negotiate trades. I think they'd have to have traveled to the North at some point, and that could be where she began to pick up at least some of the language.
Also, I wanted to keep as close to.actual gryphon folklore as possible, so I gave her that scholarly hunger for knowledge. She loves to learn about other cultures.
I applaud your description of Rainbow Dash from the view of the reindeer and Spike's rebuttal.
And he is right, she must never hear of it.
Damn it, its 3:40 in the morning, I've got to get up in like 5 hours, and I'm only on chapter thirteen. WHY CRUEL WORLD.
Nice Hunter Thompson callback on the last sentence.
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It wasn't deliberate, I'm afraid - I didn't see it until it was pointed out by you!
Well stuff me in a red suit and call me Santa Clause; Old Man Winter is on the offensive!