> Welcome to Equestria!  The second part of the Origin of the Rom.
>  by De Writer
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

> Chapter 1 : Welcome to Equestria!
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------


The second part of the Origin of the Rom



I was awakened by Nore gently nuzzling me behind the ear and a donkey like me has BIG ears! She was still beside me, snuggled up close. That was an amazingly good feeling for an old donkey like me.

She saw that I was waking up and whispered in my ear, “Good morning, Love. Welcome to the land of the living. You were sleeping like the Dead.”

I took a deep breath and slowly realized that I had forgotten to breathe during the night. Again. To cover my embarrassment at being caught, I double checked that I was still casting a shadow and replied, “I see that you wore your headstall, your Freedom, you call it? All night.”

Nore stated Firmly, “I will never take off my Freedom, except to clean it or to replace it. Being Freeborn, you might find it hard to understand that none of us can be comfortable without wearing something on our heads.

“We all wore the headstalls of the Slaveborn from the day that we were foaled. The bit and lead-ring ruled us for our whole lives until you set us free. The Freedom has no thing left by which another can rule our lives again but it leaves us the comfort of having a stall on our heads as we have since foaling.”

She shuddered all over for a moment. “Being without a Master is hard. There has always been a Master for us, before. When we were cast out, due to the famine and drought, being Masterless was worse for us than the hunger and thirst.”

I nodded thoughtfully. “I remember how, out there in the desert, on the first day that we met, you all tried to give yourselves to me, simply because I was, in your eyes, Freeborn.”

Nore stroked my neck with the side of her head and pointed out, “There was more to it than just that, Marchhare, my love. You chose the lives of a band of cast out slaves over the very substantial profit of gold that you would have had by passing us by and trading your food and water to the Godolphin’s Court. We saw what you were giving up to save us. We wanted to give you something too. All that we had was ourselves.”

I returned the nuzzling as I told her, “I was giving it to you as a gift. I wanted nothing from it but to save you, if I could.”

Nore’s eyes teared a bit as she answered, “You turned down our gift of ourselves most gracefully. You insisted on pulling the caravan. When some of us were too weak to walk, you pulled us in it too. Then we realized that you were not eating or drinking your share to be sure that we got to safety. We finally realized how important our lives and freedom were to you.

“At the last, Dear, you were too starved and thirsting to go on. You found that shady ledge and laid down. We saw you di … take your nap. Then we truly understood that to you, our freedom was worth anything, even life itself.

“We did go on without you.” She sniffled, “It broke my heart to leave you there, but at least it was the gateway to the Lake of Paradise. I wanted to stay by your side then, but you did say that you hoped that the Lake would be many years away for me.

“We found Sha Ja Shehan, the Spring of Salvation, that saved us all, just where you told us it would be. There, we rested and tried to do the best that we could of our skills to honor the Gift of Freedom that you bought us at such a cost.”

I flicked an ear in amusement and inquired, “Cost? Taking a nap and waking up feeling good is a cost? Catching up to you and being treated like royalty is a cost? You proposing to me and us getting married is a cost?

“If that is your idea of cost, I don’t think that I ever want to stop paying it.”

Soberly, Nore replied, “To rejoin us you turned your back on something wonderful. You may not remember it, but you did.”

I rejoined, “It could not have been that wonderful if it did not have you, and I mean both you and the rest in it.”

Quietly she answered, “If you had found us only a little later, Love, we would have been there with you. Saving us, even with your not eating your share, was a near thing.”

I stretched and changed the topic. “Not eating? We need to remedy that. Let’s get up and rustle up some breakfast.”

Rom, sitting quietly at a distance, said, “We have already made breakfast, Marchhare. It is waiting on you and Nore.”

Getting up, I remarked, “See what I mean about getting the royal treatment? Breakfast is ready and I did not have to make it!”

Nore whickerd her amusement and joined me. The others had found yet another new recipe for the Ka'Chek flour ground from the travel cakes that they had already made of nettle, sorrel and clovers. They were thin flat sheets of dough. The basic sheet was rolled around several different fillings. I was especially fond of the ones made with berries in the filling. To wash them down, a hot, dark infusion like a strong tea was present in quantity.

The huge ancient trees of the Sunset Mountain highlands surrounded the glade where we now were camped. I caught the others, all of them, giving the trees almost reverent stares from time to time. It slowly dawned on me that the trees, glades, meadows and pools of this pass came pretty close to their notion of the Lake of Paradise.

It was Sando who gave that a voice. “This Equestria of yours, Marchhare, is amazing to us. No place in the Godolphin’s lands or the deserts about them is like this at all.” He sort of nickered in an embarrassed way and went on, “What need of a Paradise after we die when we have this, here and now?”

I was paying more attention to the cloud formations moving in overhead. I knew that the Cloudsdale Weather Authority was going to put a good deal of rain, both surplus from other projects, and planned water storage in these mountains. To those who understand such things, those clouds were an impressive feat of engineering.

I took the moment to point them out to my friends. “See how the clouds swirl in what looks like long rolls? Each of those is a transportation vortex. The swirling not only moves the clouds where the guiding pegassi want it to go, it keeps the rain from falling. When the cloud vortex gets where they want it, they can adjust it to let the rain fall exactly where and at the rate that they want.”

Rom looked up at the clouds in wonder. “I see FIVE of those vortexes. Is that right? Those clouds are actually being moved by those flying ponies that you told us of? Amazing.”

It was Sando who suggested, “It is a pity that they cannot spare some for Gyptia. They could save so many lives if they could.”

I observed, “True. That would be an international diplomacy thing, though. The Princesses would need to order it and before they could, they would need the approval of Gyptia and the Godolphin. Such things often take a long time and are complicated to do.”

Looking up at the clouds, Nore observed, “I have never seen clouds so thick and heavy looking. Will they let the rain fall all at once?”

I laughed gently. “No, Dear. This much water would cause floods down the mountains and out onto the plains. The pegassi controlling it all will drop the rain slowly over a period of weeks, so that it will soak in and be stored in the ground and plants here in the mountains. That way, the water will come out to the farming lands slowly, exactly when and how they want it for the best crop management.”

Phappa, the big brown blacksmith with a white blanket spotted with darker brown, pointed, “I see them! There they are! The flying ponies! They look almost like birds from here!”

Sarel, the dappled gray weaver of the group pointed to something else. “Look at that! There is a small tendril from the bottom of the space between the second and third vortexes headed our way! It has four of the flying ponies guiding it!”

They were getting close enough to recognize. They were Ground Nest and his gang of vandals. Their tendril was spinning opposite to the transportation vortexes. The gang of them like to cut open expensive wagon covers on donkey traders’ carts and drench the trade goods. They think it’s funny. Being one of those traders, I don’t.

I called, “We have rain coming in! Rig the caravan for rain!”
	
	
> Chapter 2 : Rain!
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

The horses of the band leaped to the task and had the newly made rain flies out and set well before the cloud got here. As the rain began to pound on our cover, the whole band got out flutes, drums and lyres. I was afraid that they were going to try dancing in the small dry space that we had. Nope. Songs.

Gyptian is a melodious language already. The songs had a sweet, almost plaintive wailing quality, truly lovely to hear.

We were rudely interrupted by voices from above. “Foul Ground Pounders!” was about the mildest epithet.

Nore let her voice trail off and then leaned to where lungs trained by a lifetime of trills could shout back up, “Look, Love! Feather Dusters! Can we pluck them?”

That caused a flurry of panicked fluttering as pegassi tried to get out of possible unicorn magic’s reach!

Nore, grinning at her return prank, rejoined the songs.

The rain was going on long enough and heavy enough that I was beginning to wonder about it. The canyon complex that we were in came out at the Red Branch Notch. The new irrigation dam there was not done and not ready for a water load yet.

Several hours into the downpour, Nore stopped singing again. She took up one of the awning poles that we had made of very dense wood. Silently as a specter, she slipped out into the rain.

There was a loud thwap! It was followed by the sound of something hitting the muddy ground outside. Stepping out, I saw that the rain was slowly abating. Flopping in the mud was a furious Ground Nest! There was a knife laying in the grass a little way off. As he attempted to rise each time, Nore fouled him with the pole and kept him down.

Maina, our excellent wheelwright and profane horse, observed, “This is a pegasus? It looks like a mud mop to me!” Glancing about at the severely soaked glade, she added, “This pony seems to be as bad as the wheels that ponies make!”

As she saw the knife, Sarel dashed around to the other side of the wagon.

She came back with drooping steps. “He ruined it, The other fly is slashed badly. Three days of work destroyed.”

She turned a gaze onto the pegasus that was so venomous that he should have bloated up and died on the spot. Instead he crowed, “Then all you gotta do is put in another three days and you got it took care of!”

He was trying to get to his feet to take off. Nore tangled him with the pole and face planted him in the mud again. Firmly she rejoined, “NO! You shall pay for your harm or fix it yourself!”

He reared his head up and snapped, “YOU fix it! Little thread, couple of stitches and it good as new!”

We were joined by a voice from the air. “No, Ground Nest, it is not that easy. A watertight seam is expensive to do.”

A gray pegasus mare with a yellow mane and tail fluttered down to a soft landing beside the one that Nore was keeping grounded.

She did a double take when she saw me. “Marchhare! What are you doing here? Last that I heard you were taking food and water to Gyptia! How did that work out!”

“Pretty well, Sunbreak. I see that you are supervising this delivery.”

He face fell. “This idiot and his three buddies have turned it into a disaster. The entire crew is working to contain the damage.”

I said sympathetically, “I saw a left hand vortex used to poit this bit of cloud over us. Don’t tell me that it got away from them. How bad is it?”

Sunbreak actually put her face into her hooves and wept. “It didn’t ‘get away’ from them. They abandoned the vortex. Positve feedback from it drained and destroyed our transportation vortices. We lost over a third of this entire 600 square mile, two week slow soak into this single canyon complex in under three hours! Just down from here, it dumped 8 feet of water in that tiny bit of time!”

Ground Nest sassed, “So what? You wanted the water in the mountains, you got water in the mountains! Big deal!”

I turned to him and said softly, “Yes, Ground Nest. A VERY big deal. That much water can’t be absorbed. It has to come out into the farmlands below as a flood. At the least, fields and orchards will be destroyed.”

Sunbreak said brokenly, “We are still getting damage reports. I don’t know how bad the disaster is, yet.”

Ground Nest sneered, “Disaster? How so? It’s just a bit of extra water.”

Sunbreak snapped, “We Were supposed to keep ALL rainfall out of this canyon complex! There is dam UNDER CONSTRUCTION down there! The Red Branch Project is not ready for any water load yet!”

An all red pegasus came flying in at flank speed. His landing was messy from haste. He gave Sunbreak a thick sheaf of papers. “This is an incomplete, preliminary assessment, Supervisor. We have not found any reports of deaths, only six known injuries and one missing foal.

“The worst downstream damage came when the nearly finished Red Branch Irrigation Project dam failed. It overtopped at the incomplete north end. The whole dam was completely full because of the flood. It failed in under three minutes. The irrigation channels under construction spread the flood into Hay Market village and the farms around it.

Down the Red Branch, the wash overflowed the low pass in Morton’s Hills and destroyed a major farm on the other side.

“The missing foal is from that farm. He was a pegasus, just past fluttering. Gone without a trace.”

Sunbreak took a deep, shuddering breath and asked, “What of all the streamside farms down the Red Branch?”

“Looks from the aerial survey to be between 70 and 90 percent loss, so far. Could be worse when final figures come in.”

“What about the town of Haulmarket?”

“They lost some commons and a few fields. They were built high enough up to be spared the worst of it.”

Sunbreak studied the papers and said, “Thank you, Stafford. How is the situation in the delivery? Are we going to have to break it up or can we salvage any of the water?”

“We have transport vortices numbers 1, 4 and 5 under control but they have lost from thirty to fifty percent of moisture. It looks as if number 3 will have to be given up as a total.

“Acting on your order, we have sent to Cloudsdale for a hydrological expert to assess the situation in both the delivery clouds and the intended delivery zones.”

Nore, Rom and the others were looking in awe at Sunbreak and Stafford. They had never seen such beings up close, except for Ground Nest.

Rom quietly asked, “If I am hearing correctly about this sad disaster, you have a huge amount of clouds with water that you may have to dispose of. Is that correct?”

Sunbreak nodded sadly.

Rom suggested gently, “You could save many lives and do much good with that water if you could get it to the Godolphin’s land of Gyptia. They have a deadly drought and famine there.”

To our surprise, Sunbreak made some notes. “I can promise nothing, Sir. I will suggest it. Such a decision will be up to the Princesses.”

Weeping again, she said, “I hope that we can do that. I would treasure knowing that some good came of this terrible mess.”

Ground Nest actually was listening, at least a little. He fastened on the Red Branch Dam first. “Wait up. Something’s wrong here. Red Branch Dam is, like, maybe twenty miles south of here. This here water shoulda gone down way north and west of the dam.”

I stuck a hoof up his rump, as the crude ones say. “I hauled provisions for the survey teams when Cloudsdale did the hydrological studies for the Red Branch Project. That is how I met Sunbreak, Heroine of South Peak Gryphon War, again. Back then, she was still recovering from some of the wounds that she got.

“What made the Red Branch Dam so attractive to build is this canyon complex. It is officially known as the Maze. For a span of over fifty miles, all of the interconnected canyons come out at one place. The Red Branch Notch.

“According to the reports that Sunbreak just got, the dam filled. That means that seven canyons, all over a mile wide filled up to a hundred and seventy feet deep. They all fed into the Red Branch canyon. It is over fifteen miles long, with an average depth of one hundred and eighty five feet.

“The wonder is that the unfinished dam lasted long enough to fill. Once it started to fail, it only took three minutes with that mass of water behind it. Congratulations, Ground Nest! You and your cohorts have just created the largest flood from a broken dam in Equestrian history!”

Turning to Sunbreak I asked, “We are going to need to get these wagons down this complex to Riten’s notch and go over there to get down to the flats and the Royal Roads. Can you have that scouted for us? Everything that Rom’s band saved from their old lives is in these wagons.”

Sunbreak nodded soberly. “I will have that done Marchhare. You will need to bide here a while. I fear that we have higher priorities, just now.”

I agreed. “We will need to move a little. We will have better foraging down at Rollmire marsh. We will set up our camp there.”

Showing that she really did not miss much of anything, she asked, “I saw the slashed rain fly when I came in. What is the damage cost, Marchhare? I will see that it is taken care of by the Hydrological Authority. Even if they were disobeying direct orders, those four were working for us.”

I gestured for her to follow me. We both looked over the slashes in the rain fly. Suddenly, Sunbreak reached up and felt the fabric. She checked my new sashes too. “What is this? I have never seen a fabric like this. How expensive is it?”

“This? Gyptian Broadweave. The secret of the fiber comes from Gyptia. I know that Sarel spent four days preparing the threads and setting up the loom. The weaving took another three days. I think that it can be sewed tight again. No idea if Sarel has enough supplies to make another.”

Sunbreak nodded soberly. “I will asses the damage as four golden bits.”

I agreed. “We were planning to sell some bolt stock at three gold, five per ell. The ell is how the Gyptians measure the cloth. It is pretty close to our cloth yards and meters.”

She made a wry face. “That idiot Ground Nest just tried to tell me that this flood is all YOUR fault, Marchhare. If you weren’t there, they wouldn’t have tried the prank. What did he mean, 'it never went like this before’?”

“Oh, Ground Nest and his gang like to prank the donkeys that trade around the whole Red Branch District. Same stunt that he tried here. Gather a few clouds, fly down and slash the wagon covers and drop a bunch of rain on our trade goods to mess them up.

“He has driven most of the donkey cart traders out of the whole Red Branch District.”

Sunbreak whistled softly in astonishment. “That is going to hurt the district almost as much as the flood. I know that a lot of ponies look down on you donkeys but without your network of small trade and seed deliveries, most farms would be in far worse shape, if they survived at all.”

“I know that. I quit myself because there was no profit left after Ground Nest’s assorted pranks. I got the Gyptian famine tip from a friend of mine and took a few loads that way instead. Made out quite well. On my last trip, I met these good horses who had lost their livelihoods to the drought and famine. They were starving so I brought them here .

“Our plan is to earn a bit of coin from fairs, get some land and settle down somewhere.

“Seeing my wife’s reaction to Ground Nest, here, I think that we will look for something FAR AWAY from where he used to live.”

Sunbreak nodded sagely. “I can understand that, Marchhare … Wait! Did the old bachelor just say WIFE?”

Nore smiled and stood proud. “I have that honor. By the traditions of our kind, I asked to be by his side and he has agreed. We all celebrated it and so it was done. I am the wife of Marchhare, the Ghost Who Guides.”

Sunbreak watched with horror as Ground Nest squalled, “He ain’t no ghost! He’s a worthless donkey!” He drove a powerful forehoof strike at my head, his whole weight behind it.
	
	
> Chapter 3 : You Missed!  Or did you?
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

His hoof passed through my head like it was air. With his weight in the strike, he overbalanced and fell splat on his face in the mud. Again.

I hopped onto his neck to hold him down. “You missed, Ground Nest. Good thing too. Hitting an old donkey that hard could have killed him. Not even you rurals can overlook cold-blooded murder. Especially not with so many witnesses, including your work supervisor, Sunbreak.”

“I did not miss!” Suddenly what he said penetrated into his otherwise empty skull. “You didn’t dodge! You ain’t there!” He tried to get up. My weight prevented him from rising but he raised his rear enough for Nore to buck him between the hind legs. Hard.

Suddenly I did not need to hold him down any longer. He was curled around the pain in his private parts.

I noticed that Rom was conferencing with Sunbreak. I overheard, “He says it was just a nap.”

She came back over to us. Unsympathetically she directed, “Get up. You are going to go with the next damage survey team. If you try to leave or disobey any order at all, you will placed under arrest or have criminal wanted bulletins formally posted over all of Equestria. You are going to see, first hoof, what you and your stupid buddies did.”

They left, Ground Nest flying a bit unsteadily.

Rom quietly told me, “We are now packing for our move to the next place, Marchhare. I hope that you do not mind too much, but I did tell your friend Sunbreak about your nap.”

“I am aware of it, my friend. Let us get things together. We should be able to get about half way there before darkness falls.”

The way was not too bad. The real damage from the flood was going to be further down. The awestruck horses of Rom’s band camped among the roots of some of Equestria’s oldest and biggest trees.

I was not even surprised at what they did. First, they scouted the area for anything that might be useful in some way. Then they set up the cooking gear and turned out a truly terrific feed from what they brought and found.

And they danced. They got out their instruments, hoofed me a set of their drums and began. The ancient trees echoed the sweet wail of their music as the dances and songs began.

Nore led off with a solo dance, while the others both played and began a chanted narration. It was soon to become a favorite dance for me. Shehan Ja Rom. The Salvation of the Rom.

It ended to the sound of trills whose echoes chased each other about the giant trees.

Fire light glowed and flashed off the brilliantly dyed fabrics of the sashes of the dancing mares and stallions. Sando and Rom took their turns. Nore dragged me out to make a fool of myself in front of the rest. It was fun, too! Even if I am a tangle hoof of a dancer.

The next day, as Nore and I scouted the way ahead for the wagons, we began to find some early signs of the massive rainfall.

Wide eyed, Nore pointed incredulously. “How could such a thing fall? That branch is the size a tree!”

I observed, “A tree from Gyptia, yes. Here? A biggish branch. See the scar up there on that trunk? That is where it came from.”

She stared. Her jaw dropped almost as far as that branch had!

We got the whole caravan through to the meadow without incident. The spring there, which was normally quiet and small, was roaring up in a steady gush about two feet high. At least the water was clean. The creek that it fed was pretty foul down about a quarter mile more.

While the rest set up camp to await Sunbreak’s return, Nore and I continued to clear the way that we knew would be needed.

The brush and tree lined banks were washed away. Boulders, some quite large, were sitting up in the stream and on exposed rock that had been covered by proper stream banks. Sand and gravel was built up on the downstream sides of many of them.

Many trees that had not been washed away were down, roots ripped from the saturated earth. Far more were leaning at dangerous and crazy angles. Few were left standing straight and tall.

It looked like some wondrous castle after being looted by barbarians. Not a bad analogy, come to think.

Nore saw my sad survey of the ruined forest and let me think for quite some time. At last, as she assisted with the removal of yet another trunk in the way of the wagons that would follow us, she said softly, “I am so sorry. This must have been amazingly beautiful when you came up over the pass to save us. It is still a wonder to me but it had to be far more amazing then.”

“It was. I did not pay it proper attention when I came through. I wish that I had. Sometimes you have to lose something to really appreciate what it was that you had.”

I stopped. Blinked a few times, then said, “Dear, I came this way planning to sell food to the Godolphin’s Court in Gyptia.”

Nore booped me gently on the old schnozzle. “That may have been your plan but you changed it. I am young, not stupid. When you found us in the desert, you were two days away from your earlier and successful route. Something or somehorse guided you to us. Some wonderful thing.

“I noticed it at once when we rejoined your old track. That was when your uncertainty vanished. We made far better time because you were returning by a way that you knew.”

We did not stop working while Nore told me how very poorly I had deceived her. It was a relief, in a way. There was less to hide from my very perceptive wife. Together we heaved another tangled mass of broken branches and destroyed brush out of the way. Getting the wagons through here was going to be a nightmare but one that we could manage.

It was an utter shock when we came to the end of the trees. The overly sodden soil had collapsed in a huge pair of landslides, one on each side of the canyon.

Nore stared in disbelief. “The land fell. That I grasp, sort of.” She whimpered as she went on, “The water took it all but the largest stones, I think. Is that really what happened? I do not see any of the big trees left. Did trees so huge really get washed away, just like that?”

I sympathized, “Yes, Dear, that is exactly what happened.” I sort of curled in on myself around the hurt that I felt. Unlike Nore, I remembered the cathedral like forest. The tremendous amount and variety of life. I knew what was lost.

In her practical way, Nore observed, “At least we have gravel in plenty to level the worst spots. See it there in big sort of wedges behind the boulders?”

“Yes, my dear, I do see it. Good thinking there. This bedrock is not terribly smooth. We can make the way easier when the time comes to move on.” We took the time to try her idea on a few of the worst hollows in the exposed rock.

As we began to shift the gravel, I noticed something. Glints of yellow. Small nuggets of it. I showed one to Nore, who as a young slave, had never seen raw gold. She was intrigued. She was also observant.

“I see more, Marchhare, my husband. Some of it is very tiny. How can we gather such small bits of the gold?”

“I know of some arts for that, Nore, my dear. We need to go back to the camp. We will need to make a few things, fortunately, we do have the means to do so.”

Going back up the way that we had scouted and cleared, we found a few more minor problem spots. While pausing to fix one of them, Nore observed, “You do not seem to be in much of a hurry. What about the gold?”

I shrugged, “It is not too likely that others will happen on to it. They are more concerned with all of the downstream damage, out in the farm lands. If we seem in a rush or concerned about it, we could draw the very attention that we want to avoid.”

Working together to lift another small trunk out of the way, to give the wagons of the caravan an easier route, Nore nodded. “I see it now. It would be easy to draw the attention of the surveying crews and lose all, the same way that we lost the wells back in Gyptia.”

Soon we were back to the camp. Some of the horses were happily immersed in the bog, rooting out iron rich root nodules. Phapa was directing the proper laying of a charcoal burn to get a good quality charcoal out of it. It was the same hive of happy activity that I had come to expect of them.

Rom looked up from stacking wood chunks under Phapa’s direction and observed with a sideways smile, “You are back sooner than we expected. Is something wrong? More specifically, worse than we expected?”

I looked to Nore and nodded. She explained, “We were shifting some gravel to fill low spots in the flood bared rock. The gravel we used came from the downstream sides of large boulders that the flood left behind. There was more than just gravel. We found some gold mixed with the sand and gravel behind at least some of the boulders.”

I observed, “The damage surveys for this area are already done. We have several days before we can expect to hear from Sunbreak. We need to make up some simple devices to get as much of the gold as we can before they return.

“We need some dishes of wood or the like, with roughened bottoms. As we swirl sand and such with water, the gold, being heavy, will stay behind. Another device is a long box with riffles along the bottom that will catch the gold as water washes the sand and gravel away.”

Malit, dripping mud from her marsh wading, trotted up, while we were talking and she nodded, “If you guide my work, I can make the box and sand washing dishes.”

She frowned only a little as she stared up at the empty sky, “We need things that we can hide or explain easily, if the pegassi return unexpectedly.”

I had to agree. “Well thought of, Malit. We will put our tailings, as they call the cleaned rock and sand, into the bad spots in the way that we are preparing. We will say that Princess Luna’s Manual of Road Building and Maintenance says to use washed gravel. That is true, by the way.”

It took Malit and Maina several hours to get things made as well as I knew how to make them.

It was actually three days before Sunbreak and some of the weather hydrology survey team did return. A much subdued Ground Nest accompanied them.

His tears had run out long ago. Not his guilt. Shuddering, he told me, “T'wan’t supposed to go like that. We thought it was just a prank.

“Only meant for a tiny bit to dampen your camp. We thought that vortex thingy would just stop when we let it go. 'Stead, it grew huge. It drained and ruined the whole delivery of a year’s water into just these few canyons.

“It filed the Red Branch dam before it was ready. When the Red Branch dam went, the flood, I never even dreamed of anything so bad. When it come downstream it overtopped the low notch in Morton’s Hills. It come across the hills twenty feet deep and washed away my daddy’s whole farm. The big barn and everything in it gone entire.

“Our farm house is over half gone. My brother was home and he still missing. Gray Feather was only just past fluttering. We still looking for him but his room at the stair top is gone…” He broke down and dry sobbed.

Sunbreak shook her head. “His bravado and 'someone else’s fault’ foolishness broke when he saw what was left of his home. His dad’s orchards are basically gone. Maybe ten or fifteen percent of the trees can be saved. All of the fields are a total loss. They either washed away or got covered by a ghastly mix of mud, washed out branches, trunks and brush.”

I sort of shuddered. “Hawkward had twenty years of his life in the building up of Morton Swale Farm. What is he going to do now?”

Shaking her yellow mane, Sunbreak said, “He has not thought so far. He is still in shock.”

Nore bluntly asked me, “Can the friend or whatever guided you to us in the desert, find the missing foal? Ground Nest here may deserve all that happens to him for this mess, but no foal, even his brother, deserves to die if he still lives.”

Quietly I looked about and down at my hooves. “Not sure that I can, Nore. The one that you want me to get in touch with is called the Exile. I know him, yes. Sometimes he leaves me notes. Sometimes I leave him notes. Doesn’t always work. I can try, I guess.”

“I will need some of your paper, ink and a brush to write with. We will leave the note inside our caravan. If we are fortunate, the Exile, De Writer, will answer it.”

That quickly, I had brush, inkstone, and paper. I wrote:

“De Writer, my friend, I have a problem that I want your help with. The young pegasus, Gray Feather, from Morton’s Swale Farm has gone missing since the Red Branch flood. Can you please give us any assistance in finding him, alive, if he still is, or his body if he is not. Signed, Marchhare.”

We put the note, brush and ink into my wagon, my caravan, as the others insisted on calling both the group of wagons and the single wagons in the group.

“All that we can do now, my friends, is wait. When he finds the note, De Writer will knock on the inside of the door. He will be gone before we can open it or see him.” I walked off a short way and sat in some nice shade.

Even with over a thousand years of practice, dopelganging is trickier than I like. De Writer (that is really me, Marchhare is a disguise) is forever trapped in the absolute instant of the present. That is a moving mathematical point.

What others see and react to is but a shadow cast on time. I can be Anywhere that the absolute instant of the present exists. Instantly. I can spend a tiny fraction of a second here, then there. Each one is actually a single point. To any observer, if the time spent between the two places is short enough, it appears that there are TWO of me. An illusion. But at times a truly useful one. Like now.

Inside the caravan I produced the Orb of the Ages from its hiding place in time itself. It can see only the past but it can be really near past if needed. This was easy. Days past.

Muttering, “The Future is Forbidden,” to activate the Orb, I homed in on Morton’s Swale Farmhouse, just before the flood hit. Gray Feather saw it coming, wrecking the barn. He fled in terror. Not far, though. He managed to flutter high enough to reach the attic at the end of the ruined house that was still standing.

He was too frozen by terror to respond at all. Severely hungry and thirsty, he was still huddled in his hiding place. I quickly brushed a note in Gyptian on the same sheet as the question. I put the Orb of the Ages safely back into its hiding place in time. I knocked on the door and returned to myself, out in the shade.

I looked up alertly as the sound of the knock reached us. I let the others answer the knock. I saw my dear Nore give me a very curious look before she joined the others.

Ground Nest made a grab for the paper. His face clouded and he started to wad it up. “Just trash! Some damn scribble of ink! No proper words at all!”

Sunbreak stopped him. “These horses are from a different and far away land. Maybe they can read what is there. Do not be so quick to ruin things that you do not understand, like major cloud systems with water transportation and delivery vortexes.”

Ground Nest looked like he had been slapped. Indignantly, he demanded, “You ain’t going to ever let me forget that mistake, are you?”

Coldly, Sunbreak retorted, “It was NOT a MISTAKE! It was a DIRECT ORDER VIOLATION! And NO. No pegasus or any other pony is EVER going to forget it! It is already being prepared as lessons for both kingdom and Cloudsdale schools. This was a history making disaster that would have been easily avoided except for simple stupidity and selfishness.”

He took the wadded up paper and sourly said, “Can anypony here read this shit?”

Nore snagged the paper, smoothing it back out. She snorted indignantly, “NO. No PONY here can read it. That old donkey over there can read it. I can read it. Every HORSE of this band can read it.

“You behave worse than a pony made wheel. Tell me WHY we should bother to read it for YOU.”
	
> Chapter 4 : The Saving of Gray Feather
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------


Before he could speak, I stuck a hoof into the proceedings. “I will tell you why it should be read, Nore, my dear. If it was for Ground Nest alone, I would not bother at all. When you suggested that the Exile search for Gray Feather, that was well done. For Gray Feather, not Ground Nest. And that is why we should read the paper.

“Is Gray Feather even alive? Until we read it, we will not even know that. For the colt, read it. Find out for us where he is, dead or alive.”

Nodding, she said, “Thank you for guiding my steps when I was in the wrong, my dear husband, our Ghost Who Guides. The paper says:

'My good friend, the colt that you seek is still living. If he receives no help, he will die sometime tomorrow of thirst and starvation. He fled the flood by going up and to the far end of the house. He is in the furthest attic corner of the standing part of the ruin. He is silenced by the fear of the flood that Ground Nest unleashed, destroying the only home that he has ever known.'”

Nore looked up, tears in her eyes. “I am sorry for my outburst. You were most ill behaved is all that I may say in my defense. We will give you a flask of good spring water and some baked rations that we make for travel. They are compact but nourishing.”

Malit brought Ground nest a fine flask of wood so dense that it was black. It was heavy with water. She added a wrapped package of clover/sweet sorrel biscuits.

“Take these and go, Ground Nest. Save your brother. Remember this, too. Wherever we of Rom’s band go, or wherever we settle, you have no welcome at all.” She turned her back to him. Nore turned her back as well. All of the rest of the band followed suit. Nodding agreement, I did too.

We heard the flutter of wings as Ground Nest left. Turning about, we gave Sunbreak and her crew a warm welcome and tea with nettle/sorrel baked biscuits.

Showing how little she missed, Sunbreak asked, “I see that you are washing the gravel that you are filling up low spots and holes in the bedrock downstream. Why bother with washing it?”

I replied seriously, “Princess Luna wrote the standards for Equestrian road building. She says that washed gravel is what should be used. From long experience with her Royal Roads and the ones built by others, I have to agree that she knows best.”

Sunbreak nodded acceptance and conversation went to the problems between here and Riten’s notch, where I planned on our leaving the Maze and getting down to the flats and the Royal Road system.

Taking me aside to stroll while sipping our excellent tea, Sunbreak quietly asked, “So, how much gold are your pon … horses, finding?”

“Umm, a substantial amount. No way to be sure, yet. Both purity and proper weights can’t be checked until I get back to where I can find jeweler’s equipment. Since I have been this way before, I have to guess that this lode was uncovered by the flooding.”

“That reminds me, Marchhare,” Sunbreak giggled, “I have the golden bits for the damage to your rain awning. When the Weather Authority heard how it happened, they settled on the spot!”

She hoofed over four golden bits, which I took.

“I have a different question for you, old friend. You seem unchanged from when I first met you, at Stone Ridge. How old are you?”

“I really don’t know, Sunbreak. I am elderly, is all that I can say. When I was born, nobody kept records of the births, marriages or deaths of donkeys. Most places still won’t, in spite of the Edict of Equality. Goes for goats too.”

Sadly, she nodded, “I know. We, the whole Wing of us, put you in for a Celestian Courage medal after you saved all fifteen survivors at Stone Ridge where the Gryphons caught us on the ground. It was rejected because 'donkeys don’t have any guts.’

“We did appeal it to the Princesses but I never heard what happened from then on. We were too busy with the closing actions of the South Peak War.”

I put a hoof on her foreleg. “I did get it. Luna found the application and appeal in some trash. She and Celestia were furious at the way that it had been handled. Five officers were broken in rank because of it. A Royal Guards Pegasus was dispatched to deliver the medal and benefice.”

Sunbreak said softly, “That is good. I will never forget your courage in coming to our rescue, braving a Gryphon Aerial attack to get our injured a wagon and pull us out.”

I noticed Nore, not far off, looking somewhat surprised but nodding to herself.

With the knowledge of our way assured, even a map provided by Sunbreak, we set out for Riten’s notch. Oh, yes. And a nice poke of gold. It was easiest to work our way downstream on the bare washed bedrock. That gave us many excuses to pause and “wash gravel” to fill holes and make our way easier.

We did have to work our way around a few pools behind big log jams. As we came to yet another, I saw Rom standing near to the dangerous tangle of trunks, broken and whole, shattered limbs, brush and debris. He was shaking his head.

“Marchhare, my friend, how could water do such a thing as this? In Gyptia we had to battle for any drop, whether for drink or crop. Here, it can run wild and destroy all in its path.”

“If it helps, Rom, my friend, I have never seen such a thing as this in all of my years. I think that this was the worst flood of recorded Equestrian history.”

We struggled to get the whole caravan around the end of the tangle, going as high up the canyon side as we dared and digging more or less level places into the dangerously sodden soil to keep the caravans from tipping over.

Sando’s care with design came to the fore on the many downslopes. Long levers, driving shorter ones, set the brakes firmly against the iron of the wheel tires and kept all of our loads manageable. Not easy, but manageable.

It took us three days of brutal labor to reach Riten’s notch.

Staring up the slope, Sarel said, “THIS is the easy way out of here?”

I nodded, glumly. “Afraid so. Both the river course and road are so badly ruined with mud from here down, that we could never get through. Here, the brush and roots of smaller trees have held the soil. We can use this slope safely, if not easily.”

Sarel looked thoughtfully at the slope and ducked into the caravan that was now hers and Rom’s. She came out with a length of bright yellow cloth. She carefully ripped it into set of streamers.

She hoofed them to Nore and I. “If we are going to climb that slope with our caravans, we need to mark our route carefully for the turning places and safe resting spots.”

Nore, Rom and I began the tedious work of setting the flags to mark our route. Nore pointed quietly up slope to where a pegasus was tree roosting.

I nodded quietly. “I see our little spy. Ground Nest is back and he is watching us. That means that he is seeing if he can plan some other 'little prank.’ I am sure that you know what I mean.”

Nore looked like she was chewing sour-grass. “He makes me glad that I am a Horse, not a pony. I wish that more were like that nice Sunbreak.

“I am curious about those marks that some paint on their flanks. Why do they do that?”

“Um, they don’t, sweet love. When a pony finds what it is that they are truly meant to do, the mark appears by itself. There have been horses from other Desert Kingdoms who visited Canterlot, so I am told. None of them ever had such a mark.”

Carefully cutting away some small brush but leaving the roots to hold soil, Nore observed acidly, “Ground Nest must not be any good at anything. His flank is plain!”

Sando and Rom, gathering the cut brush and small trees to finish clearing the road, giggled at her remark. Down where the caravan of wagons awaited safe passage, we saw Malit and Sarel giggling when they heard it while Rom and Sando dropped of the latest load of road clearings.

The way that we were clearing and flagging was dangerously narrow but the best that we could manage. The way cleared to the top, we returned for our caravan.

Sparing a glance upward, I got a shock. There was a formation of pegassi flying overhead. I recognized the search formation from too many past wars. I could see Sunbreak flying Observation Leadership. Sun was glinting and flashing from pegasus flying armor. That was not a good sign. Worse, the formation was working Riten’s Notch. Something really serious was up.

We started up the marked safe route, really leaning hard into the harnesses. We were all keeping our brake control lines tight to lock the brakes at any trace of a slip or other problem.

A panting Nore was counting our cadence, “Lean left, lean right! Heave! Lean left! Look! He’s out of the tree! What? Our safety flags! He is stealing them!”

It was true. As bad as that was, what followed was worse, for me. From high up came the call, “Target acquired! Fire at will!”

That was followed instantly by the hard driven snap and rattle of Equestrian Military Heavy Aerial Crossbows! Feathers blasting away from his right wing and some fragments of feathers from his left, Ground Nest swerved out of control and slammed into the steep hillside! He tumbled down the slope, scattering fragments of wing pinions and our safety flags.

Wasting not a second, Nore heaved our brake line full tight and called back down the line, “Brake Hard! Hold position! Our marker flags have been ripped out! Brake and Hold!”

She secured our brake line tight to the whipple staff and cried out to me, “GO! I will hold here! Save him if you can!”

I was ahead of her on this. I was already released from the double tree and running to catch Ground Nest. In the Wars that I have been in, saving the enemy fallen was as important as saving our own. This was no different. Ambulance duty is ambulance duty.

I managed to stop his tumble. It took no skill to see that he was in a bad way. Both wings were out of action. Not only feathers had been hit. He had broken bones in both wings. Deep lacerations in all of his flight systems spoke of worse injuries inside. He had two hits in his neck and four body/flank hits as well.

I was grabbing our flags to stanch wounds for transport. Nore appeared beside me with more cloths and clean water. Ground Nest, for once, was silent. He was unconscious. Touching his injuries, he twitched and moved some. I pointed out a spot on his neck. “Inside there, Nore, you will feel something like a cord. Very gently, pinch it. When he no longer moves, we can deal with his wounds.”

As we worked I told Nore, “Treat his broken bones as a new form of wood. Mend them together as well as you can, I will pull on them to get them as straight as possible.”

We got visitors. Sunbreak and part of her team had landed all about us with a light clank of armor. She cautioned the others, “Marchhare is a qualified medic. He did ambulance service in the South Peak Gryphon War. Let him do whatever he can for the prisoner.”

While we were working over the fallen Ground Nest, I heard the creaking of a wagon getting under way. Rom, Sando, and Phapa had hitched onto our wagon, setting the harness and trees differently than for just Nore and I. The three of them, got our caravan up to the switchback fairly easily, in spite of its size. They returned and another caravan was got up the grade. We were still working to save the idiot when they had the last of the caravans up to the safer parking of the turnabout.

When we had done what we could, I returned Ground Nest to Sunbreak. Mildly, knowing that this many military effectives do not wind up under the command of a retired Recon in Force officer without good reason, I asked, “What did Ground Nest do this time?”

Soberly, Sunbreak replied, “He escaped while being given a trial under the Royal Wing. There is already a Nationally Posted reward for his capture dead or alive. Brace yourselves. Two thousand five hundred golden bits. Given free of all taxation, local, district, County, or Royal.”

I whistled. That was easily ten years income for any ordinary pony of Equestria.

I looked up at Sunbreak and asked, “Will you be sharing the reward with your troops?”

“Legally, Marchhare, none of us can claim the reward. They are regular on duty military and may be decorated with a benefice but cannot gain any other reward. I am on detached duty, serving as an officer. The same is true of me. The reward is for you and your wife alone.”

I blinked. Little trading donkey dreams are made of gold like that. I turned to Nore, “Dear, these cannot get the reward that they have earned in protecting us. It is legal for us to give each of them up to ten golden bits in return for their service. Can we do that for them?”

Nore looked about at the armed and armored wing that had just saved us from a real disaster. She nodded slowly, “If their own land cannot reward them for such service,” she paused and looked compassionately at the still unconscious Ground Nest, “then we should do for them what we can.

“Only one stipulation shall I place upon the balance of the reward. Share it equally among the band. We have all suffered at the hooves of Ground Nest.”

Sunbreak pointed out to her troops, “We are going to get a unit citation for this capture. It comes with a benefice of five golden bits for each of you. From the generosity of these strangers to our land, we are getting ten more each. Any problems with that?”

One, who had been looking at me and my wonderful friends with disdain, thought for a moment and offered, “Sir, you seem to lead these foreigners. Upon thought, though often leaving out that you are a donkey, I have heard of your courage and medic skills from the South Peak Gryphon War. Is there something that we can do for you while we are here?”

Nore immediately replied, “Thank you, Sir. We do need some help. Ground nest ripped away most of the safety flags marking our route from here to the top. If you can position your, po … pegassi along the safe path that we show you, we should be able to reach the top of the notch before nightfall.”

Sunbreak replied, “Done. Vard, that was a fine suggestion, worthy of a note in the record. You shall have it. Detail four to provide emergency medical transport of the prisoner. The rest of you, serve these, um, horses as they request it. You are allowed to accept both rations and water from them if offered. Knowing Marchhare, it will be.”

Nore picked her way up the switchback traverse, positioning the troopers with care. Staring down the notch to the rocky floor of the canyon below, one commented, “Even with markers, bringing wagons like these up this grade? That would be a long tumble to a total wreck if you slipped any at all. Some pony could easily get killed. You ponies got guts, give you that.”

Nore politely said, “We are doing what we must to get to your wonderful land of Equestria. We are but plain horses from Gyptia. We have not your pony kinds and sorts. Pegassi can be wonderful, as you do prove.”

He swelled visibly under her acceptance of his praise and the gentle correction. The troopers did serve better than mere flags.

We all heard Maina scream. Malit frantically called, “You can’t stop it, Love! Let it go! I don’t want to lose you too!” The outboard wheel of their caravan found a soft spot and the wagon was starting to overbalance. Maina was heaving for all that she was worth, trying to save their new home on wheels. Malit would not abandon her mate. Both they and the caravan were being pulled over.

Four pegassi hit the side of the caravan, up high and were driving to stop it with all the power of their wings. They slowed the tipping, calling out, “We can’t hold it long! Save yourselves! Drop the hitch!”
	
> Chapter 5 : To the Top of Riten's Notch!
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------


Sunbreak and the one that she had named Vard dove at the tipping caravan, trailing grapnels on ropes. They managed to catch the roof edge and swooped in to the hillside, landing hard. They looped the lines around stout brush and heaved, bracing all hooves against the load.

The wagon stopped tipping. For the moment, they all, working together had it. Sunbreak called, “Hitch back up as fast as you can and haul to the hillside, away from the soft edge!”

Maina and Malit hitched in more quickly than any of us expected. Maina called cadence, “Lean right! Lean left! Haul right! Haul straight! Haul right! Straight! Right!”

To the roaring of pegassi wings driving hard, the creak of rope and harness, the heavy wagon moved slowly back to safer pathway. As soon as it was secure, Maina hauled the brake line tight to keep the wagon from shifting while the pegassi got clear. Sunbreak and Vard got their lines free of the brush that anchored them and removed the grapnels from the wagon.

Malit and Maina both had chests heaving from exertion. They were crying with relief at the saving of their precious home. We let them have a few moments to recover.

Sunbreak repositioned her road watchers and we got things going again. To distract them from the recent event, Nore began to sing loudly in Gyptian. The song had a strong cadence in one scale and a matching harmony in the other. It was also pretty profane, if you understand Gyptian. It was exactly what Maina needed. To judge from the rest of the band, they needed it too.

The sun was almost setting when our last caravan made it to the top of the notch. We invited, “Join us for the night. There will be water, herbal tea and good food!”

I added, “I served in the South Peak War. I know how bad those Mil Rations are! I promise you better food than you will get if you try risking a night flight back to your camp. Besides, watching these friends of mine dance and hearing them sing is worth it alone. Trust me on that.”

Malit and Maina took over the cook fire and started to grind some of our travel food patties into a flour. The troopers, flight gear set aside, watched with fascination.

“Isn’t it a pain to grind those? We can eat our rations straight,” asked one, with the insignia of a field cook.

Maina looked up blankly. Her grasp of Equestrian was still weak. Malit got the drift of it though. “We can eat these as is, Sir. Here, try one.” She hoofed him one of the baked patties and a bit of honey.

Eyes wide, the cook exclaimed, “These are good! Why aren’t our rations like this?”

Snickering, I retorted, “They are supplied by the lowest bidder. As long as they don’t poison you, the Brass doesn’t care!”

The whole group laughed, but many got thoughtful looks as they tasted bits of the patties that I went ahead and hoofed out, saying, “Down payment on dinner. Let the mares do their thing. They want to thank you properly for saving their wagon and everything that they need for making a living, not to mention that it is their home for now.”

While Malit and Maina were cooking and brewing up a big pot of tea, Sando and Rom got out a flute, drums, and a lyre which they gave to Phapa. The exotic music of Gyptia resounded from the Equestrian hills.

Nore began to dance.

All but the flute playing members of Rom’s band, even the ones cooking, began to chant in Gyptian.

Nore danced the Shehan Ja Rom for them.

That was followed by Sarel’s swirling sashes as she danced. Several of the watching troopers suddenly got it.

“Look at that dance! She is telling how we saved the wagon today!”

When Malit and Maina circulated among the troops with cups of tea and piles of sweet buns, the realities of military life asserted themselves.

Sunbreak called, “Line up. Let them serve, don’t mob them!” Tasting some of the sweet buns she added thoughtfully, “Perhaps I was hasty in saying don’t mob them! These are better than anything that I have ever got at a fair!”

Privately agreeing with Sunbreak, I pondered the possibility that we had found by accident, the means to make good bits at a fair. I knew, from my earlier life as Marchhare the Trader, exactly where and when all of the fairs within fifty miles were.

The Red Branch flood, as huge as it was, did not wipe out all the communities with fairs. Counting the gold that we had found up in the pass, we did not have enough to buy the land, build our homes, shops and settle down to a quiet life. The reward would likely change that but we did not have it yet.

I prefer to not count wealth that is not in hoof.

I was right about the troops. All twenty, counting Sunbreak, had a great time.

Breakfast was equally fine. Tea and batter cakes wrapped about berry preserves filled every pony there. Through a mouthful of batter cake, Vard declared, “If ever you need more help from the Equestrian Aerial Armor, just ask. If I have any say, you will get the help at once.”

Not every step of a journey is an adventure. The far side of the Notch was a long gentle slope. It was well wooded and we found some more useful and/or tasty things to add to our store.

We came out of the woods at a well tended Royal Road wayside. Rom stared in near disbelief. He said, “They have solidly mortared fire places and free wood to burn? How come nohorse steals the wood?” Feeling the solid footing under the grass, he stared down at what was, to him, a wonder. “How can there be such grass over ground that is firm underhoof for the pulling of our caravan?”

I laughed, but gently. “Rom, I did tell you that the Princess Luna spent two hundred years figuring these things out. Her title as High Commissioner of Equestrian Roads is not simply a title. She worked, in harness or by the magic of her own horn to learn how to create many sorts of roads, each suited to different purposes and kinds of land. She paid equal attention to the waysides for the convenience of the dray ponies who use the roads. See? Just over there, is a ready supply of clean water. Even the spacing and kinds of trees give both shade and shelter in bad weather.”

Sando was not paying attention to that. He was marveling at the road itself. “Marchhare, how is this road made? This is no mere layer of gravel. It is somehow locked in place.”

“That is right, Sando. First, the way is prepared by digging down to solid sub soil. Heavy larger stone is laid for a foundation and small rock poured and packed about it to half its depth. Smaller but still substantial cobbles then cover the foundation and also get half covered with locking gravel. This top surface is laid over that base and solidly packed. After that, the road is watched closely for ruts, holes or other problems and they are fixed promptly.

Maina observed, “These Royal Roads are a true marvel of this land of Equestria, if the rest of the system is as good as this.”

Casting a practiced eye at the road, I commented, “Most is better than this. This has had only indifferent maintenance. You will see.” In unwitting prophecy, I added, “We are going to be using these roads a lot for a while.”

We took the time to fix a nice meal before hitting the road.

Nore did little happy-skippy dance steps while pulling beside me. “It almost feels like the caravan is floating!” she exulted. “These roads are amazing!”

I was making for Haulmarket. They had a fair scheduled and I was guessing that it was still going to be put on. The town only lost a bit of commons and a few fields. They were going to need the income of the fair for cleanup, if nothing else.

It was not long before we found the first fair notice posted on a wayside note board. Haulmarket fair was still on and only two days of Pulling away.

Just outside of the town, we came to the fair turnoff. The pony there to steer exhibitors to the fairground nearly had an attack when he saw Rom’s band. Even my dear Nore, the smallest of the horses, was big enough that he had to look up to talk to her.

To his credit, he only asked the proper information and steered us down the correct way.

The layout director took one look at us and suggested, “You say you gonna do traditional dances and stuff? Go set up down there at the end of the midway. Make a big cul-de-sac ring out of your booths. You can do your dances in the middle of it.”

We parked the caravans in an open ring. Rom directed, “We can just put out the rain flys for booth roofs. Malit, do we have enough boards to set up counters? Nore, you are so good with boxes, can you make us some safe cash boxes?”

Things that we had were swiftly set up. Rom politely asked the fair set up director, “We have heard that you have flood damaged commons. There are trees and such washed onto it. We have need of some boards which we can split out of the flood wrack. We could also set up a big charcoal burn to help you clear the area for future use. Would that be acceptable?”

The director shrugged, “Don’t see why not, but anything to do with the commons has to go through the Council. I can’t say either way.”

Council Pony Foulip declared, “Big charcoal burn? That would be worth lots of bits! You keep your claw hooves out of that commons! We will let it by contracts and make us good money!”

He sent a pony around selling cheap boards for counters and such. Maina took one look at them and snickered, “Those are the sort of wood that you work from? No wonder your wheels are so bad!”

Malit and Nore, with Sarel’s help, solved the problem of booth parts by picking tall, overgrown grasses from both commons and fairground. Nore worked it over into fine woodlike boards, both light and strong.

Nore, pointing proudly at our beautifully appointed booths and said, “It was lucky for us, really, that the pony selling lumber for making booths had such shoddy wood. It made us look at using grass-wood, like we do for instruments and caravan sides and tops! Our booths look better than any of the others that are set up so far!”

Glancing up the Midway, I nodded. “That is certainly true! It looks like we are ready for tomorrow’s fair. What is for dinner?”

Like a conjurer doing a trick, Nore and Sando produced trays with an array of sweet nettle and clover buns. They had three dipping sauces for them. Along side, to complete things was a perfectly huge pot of tea!

We were all gathered around eating our sweet buns and drinking the tea when Council Pony Foulip strode up self-importantly and declared, “Fair don’t open till tomorrow! You can’t go selling that stuff yet!”
	
	
> Chapter 6 : Unfair Fair
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

Maina looked up at him and said, “Sell what? Ordinary food like this? This is just our dinner. It is better than a pony made wheel but not much. What we sell for the fair will be good!”

I could see his mouth watering at our dinner. “No, Foulip. You may not have any of our dinner. Go home to eat, make your own, or buy your dinner from a restaurant. As you pointed out, earlier, we can’t sell it yet and you have been rude.

“Royal Road Law allows us privacy in our camp, which this is until fair opening tomorrow.”

We finished up with the food. The mares broke out the instruments. We had THREE lyres now. Nore had managed to slip another one past my scrutiny. This one was pretty big. It had a deeper, sweeter voice than any of the others, so far. There were several sorts and sizes of flutes to work with too.

The regular evening dancing and singing began.

Shortly, I noticed something. We had watchers. Ponies were gathered all about, where they could hear and see. They were drawn by the loud trills, exotic music, and the brilliant sashes swirling in the firelight.

If it was an omen of things to come, it was good one. The day of the fair dawned clear and fine. Nore, Malit and Sarel took the center of our cul-de-sac with Rom and Sando playing flute and lyre.

I was busy at the snack booth. I set out straight nettle and other baked travel rations, with dipping sauces. I ground nettle cake flour and Phapa helped to shape and bake the dough. Maina was busy making up toppings and tea. Nore had made up a lot of her paper like stuff into cone shaped cups for tea.

Business was brisk. That is putting it mildly. We had to open a second chest of travel rations well before noon! The mares were taking turns at single dances, so that they could rest.

Nore was resting in the food booth to be close to me. I liked that too, truth be told. I watched her serve a cup to a cute little filly with bows in her mane and forelock.

A big pony hoof struck the cup from the filly’s grip! Foulip demanded, “You gets your snacks up at my booth. Got spring water and my secret recipe hay twists!”

The filly started to cry, “Don’t have no coppers left! You spilt my drink! You owes me my drink!”

Nore, face grim, reached out and touched Foulip’s shoulder lightly. He squalled in pain as his hoof dangled uselessly.

I gave my wife an amazed look. A constable charged up.

Foulip started to yap, “Arrest that … thing! She assaulted me! Look at my leg! I done nothing to her and she attack me!”

The constable was not entirely stupid, to my delight. He asked Nore, “Ma'am, what did happen here?”

Foulip cut across, “I told you! Now haul her off!”

He turned and slapped manacles onto Foulip. “Sir, I will arrest you if I have another interruption while I am asking my questions.”

Nore, nodded at the constable’s action and said, “What happened was a violation of fair rules. Unless I misunderstood what they are. It is an offense to interfere with the trade of other booths, exhibits or performers. He assaulted the little filly here, knocking her fresh bought drink from her hooves. He tried to send her away from our booth. It looked like he was about to physically strike her. To defend the young one, I used the Gyptian Death Touch on his shoulder. You came to investigate.”

“Gyptian Death Touch? Is he going to be OK?”

“He will be fine, Constable. He will recover in about an hour. If I wanted to kill him I would have touched him near his heart or up higher on his neck.”

The constable crouched down to be on the filly’s level and asked, “Did it happen the way that she told me or the way that other pony told me?”

Blubbering a bit, she replied, “He spilled my tea drink. He say I got to buy water from him but I got no more copper.”

The constable nodded and told her, “I am sorry about your drink. I am going to take him away. It is all that I am allowed to do.”

Nore waited until the constable led away the limping and protesting Foulip.

Nore quietly poured another, bigger cup of tea and hoofed it to the filly. “Here, little one. See all these things on the board? Help yourself to any two of them. If you want to, use the dip sauces there at the end. If anypony asks you where you got them, tell them that you got them here.”

It was a much happier filly who left the booth.

Nore went out for her turn at dancing. The tune was a complex one, using two different flutes, all three of our lyres at different points and Sarel playing drums. The crowd was thick about her.

As Nore’s set came to an end, there was a regular shower of coins tossed to her. Panting just slightly she gathered up the coins and came back to the booth to count up. The next set was just starting to get underway.

The constable returned. “Foulip and all the other merchants are saying that you are stealing their customers. That is a violation of fair rules.” He hoofed over an Unfair Practice complaint. It really was signed by all the other fair merchants. Glancing up the midway, I noticed some of them pointing our way and laughing.

Nore looked up from counting the different kinds of coins in her take and replied mildly, “All that we have done is here, at the very end of your … midway, do you call it? I am sorry, but your language is new to me.

“Foulip is not the only pony with a booth to actively try stopping ponies from coming to US. We have done nothing of the sort.”

I pointed up the busy midway. “Take a look, constable. Is that busier than the usual Summer Fair? Looks so to me. Looks more like a big Autumn Harvest Fair. This in spite of the flood that has done so much damage.

“They have made a complaint. Loss has to be documented. Town has tax records on all of them. Do a forced count up to document their losses.

“As a matter of curiosity, since you had to close Foulip’s booth, what was his count up? Last summer, he was crowing like a rooster with two sunrises about making seven gold, nine and six. Most he ever made on a Summer Fair.”

The constable said wryly, “He had fifteen gold, five and nine.”

I pointed out, “Right. Some interference. In less than a half day, he had MORE than twice his BEST TOTAL Summer Fair take.

“Still, there is an easy test for whether we are helping or interfering.”

I turned to my lovely young wife and admired her beautiful chestnut coat for a moment before saying, “Nore, put out our baking fires. Please get Rom. Tell him that we are going to pack and leave immediately. Other vendors have made a complaint. We are moving to the wayside just out of town, to the south.”

The constable blinked. “Just like that? Giving up without protest?”

I batted my big donkey eyelashes at him and said with a grin, “I expect a BIG PROTEST! Just not from us. Look at the overall crowd behavior. When they come in, they make a beeline for our encampment and booths. Then they work their way back up the midway, shopping up everything from snacks to new plows.

“I am just pulling out our exotic attraction in compliance with THEIR complaint. The other merchants can then reap the benefits of the unusually large attendance without our interference.”

The constable nodded thoughtfully. “I am sorry that the others are being so greedy. I have been overhearing their chatter about how much they are making. I wish you well.”

“Thank you, Constable. We wish you well, too.”

Rom came over and I explained what we were doing. His question was amusing. “Do your laws and rules allow us to sell and dance at the wayside?”

The constable nodded sourly, “Yes. You can do that. The road and waysides are Royal property and it is within Crowns Law. You will forfeit your space fees if you leave.”

Rom stepped over to the musicians and our current dancer first. Then he went around to our booths. Quietly, our little merchandise got packed away. Sales boards and booth parts were being carefully put into storage in our caravans.



Nore continued to sell our stock of Ka'chek based snacks but made no more. Shortly the last of the tea was sold. The pots and pans were getting cleaned and stowed between customers.

An orange coated customer asked plaintively, “What’s going on? We came because we heard about the music and dancing! The neat snacks and all!”

Nore smiled sadly at the complaining orange pony and pointed up the midway. “They complained that we are taking their trade. By the agreement that allows us to be here, we must reach a settlement with them or leave. We have done no thing wrong and do not wish to give them any of our coins. We are moving to the southern wayside, outside of town.”

She paused a moment and gave him a broad grin. “You might tell the others that you meet where we are going to be. We should be set up by early afternoon. I can promise that there will be more of our dancing, music, snacks and handicrafts.”

He nodded sourly. Nore hoofed over two of the Ka'cheks and pointed to the dips. “Thank you for your understanding of our predicament. There is not much of the sauces left. Help yourself to them.”

While we were putting up the rainflys a frowning group of pastel ponies tromped down our way. The very ponies who had signed the complaint. “What is this nonsense! You can’t just leave like this! You signed in for the whole fair!”

I gave them a saccharine smile and said, “Yes, we can leave. There was a formal complaint about taking your trade. Our only alternatives are to reach a settlement with you all, giving you some of OUR earnings, or leave. We are complying with the complaint and leaving.

“The town gets the whole balance of our fees in lieu of tax. That is in the fair contract terms.”

“You don’t get it, Marchhare! The crowd is already thinning out! Word is all over that your damned dancing horses are leaving! Ponies are turning away even before they get to the fairground.”

Pinching my nostrils shut as if at a vile odor, I replied, “How is that OUR problem? We have been formally requested to stop our unfair practices or leave. Our only practices were music, dancing, snack sales, and handicraft sales, which we registered when we arrived. Stopping them means doing nothing. In compliance with the complaint, which YOU ALL SIGNED, we are leaving.

“You have the entire remaining trade of this whole Summer Fair to yourselves. Much good may it do you!”

Nore gave the whole greedy bunch a sad look and said softly, “We had hoped for a better welcome to Equestria than this. It appears that you are more like Ground Nest than the goodness of Sunbreak or even the constable here. I am sorry.”

I turned my back on them and continued to fold up our rainfly awning with Nore’s help. One unicorn in the group started pulling our folds apart with his magic. The whole bunch were snickering at the prank.

Without warning, Nore lunged under the visible line of his magic and touched his foreleg at the shoulder joint. He screamed and fell on his face in the dirt of the midway. He was struggling to rise, calling, “My leg’s on fire! It hurts!”

The constable was watching unsympathetically and did not interfere.

I mildly admonished, “You need to be careful with that Gyptian Death Touch, dear. Two inches over would have killed him.”

As we refolded the awning, Nore, who is a quick study, replied, “I know that. That is why I did not hit him two inches over.” She gave me a steely eyed stare and added firmly, “You should not say such things in front of hostile hor … ponies. I am the one with a SASH OF ART in Death Touch.”

We stowed the neatly folded awning and secured our hitch.

The others were all ready to go, so Rom called cadence, “Ready for the Road! Lean Left! Lean Right! Pull left! Pull right! Pull, Pull!” We were underway, all in step. Our finest colorful sashes flashing in the sun were making a great show as our whole caravan got moving. A substantial number of ponies followed us.

We reached the Royal Road and turned south. I was totally floored by what I saw. There was a big parade of ponies following us.


–THE END–