And so over the mountain we went. Slaves were chained in groups of ten to twenty. We faced forward, never looked back, never uttered a word, and didn't stop for any reason - for fear of death. On we toiled, heaving our rusted chains across the barren rocks. Away and away. The quiet breeze and the whistle of the wind upon the rocks, and the beating sun heated our iron restraints. My bindings were heavy, and uncomfortable. So heavy, many beasts collapsed after only a few hours - and where killed by the guards. The sentinels then tossed the bodies aside, or rolled them into ravines and gorges. The links bit my wrists and ankles. I still feel the sore calluses they made. The rusted iron painted red rings around where they cut, of flesh and flaking metal. To make it worst, mine were imbued with runic magic - it burned in the vicious wound like salt. Racked with pain, I had no choice but to continue, and soon the pain faded to a terrible itch.

Being a phooka, I was selected as the lead slave. Ahead of all the rest I went. Accustomed to hardship, I never faltered in step, nor did I grow tired from exhaustion. Marching all night, my nocturnal vision aided the column's advance. Of course, as I was the lead, I had the benefit of no collar restraint. All those behind me wore wretched yokes, witch prodded them in their movement. If a slave's head lowered, the yoke spiked their chest; and if he turned his head, the yoke bit and clamped the neck. I truly felt sorry for them. Especially on steam gradients, when they had too look up. The yokes bit into their exposed backs.

I thought I was alone in sorrow, but there on the mountain I leaned of Empathy. Suffering brought me tears of understanding. My heart was filled, despite the emptiness in my body.

By the time our convoy neared the top, my linkage had lost over half of its original members. With me in front, there was a mountain troll behind me, and, to my surprise, a kelpie behind the troll. Devilish in nature, kelpies appear all white, with the exception of their sky blue eyes. Skin smooth as a seals, it's deathly cold to the touch. Of course, this kelpie was a shadow of his former self. The white skin was splotched and scarring, sullied with dirt and grime. The troll was no better of. His face was torn, almost beyond cognition. His back was lashed heavily, and callused from salt rubs. His fore teeth had been pulled by force, leaving his jaw permanently slanted. My disgruntled chain mates fortunately had no problem with me. We had a rhythm going. We were all in step. It helped pull the chain across the rocks. More importantly it kept the linkage from catching, if it did we would all fall over, and I feared not having the strength to get back up.

Red in appearance, our changeling masters where quite an annoyance. Constantly prodding and hissing at us in their slimy tongue. If it hadn't been for the mystical restrains, I would have crushed their measly bodies into the mountainside, and ejected the remains into the chasm below. They looked like fire ants, spiked and armored in their crimson chitin. They carried spears and sabers crafted from a blued steel, and their armor was a scaly bronze plate mail. They hovered over the lines, watching those below, seeking out the weak. When a beast fell from exhaustion, the beast was slain. But it was not a mercy killing. It was a vicious beating to death, a reminder to those remaining, strong incentive to keep moving no matter what.

Before the final climb, up and over the top, our group was show brief mercy. The remaining 97 slaves, I included, where allowed one nights rest. Well, it really was not a full night. We slept maybe for five to six hours, and then trudged on. When we awoke, the accursed collars where removed and discarded into the chasm below. Our linkage was magically extended - for what reason I was soon the learn.

The climb before us was just that - a climb. Nearly strait up, the series narrow foot holds lead up a towering escarpment. We new then why the Changelings had given us rest, and relinquishment from grievance. We needed it. Climbing would have been impossible with the collars and short irons.

Up an up we went. Like rancid buzzards, changeling guards hovered nearby, simple watching; never helping. Our struggle was our own. I certainly had no trouble tackling the climb. My claws gripped the rock face easily. As for my kelpie companion, he had a greater degree of difficulty. His oily body would caused slippage in his grip. I am certain the water horse would have fallen to a certain death, if not for the troll. Alone, it would have been impossible for me to have held the kelpie's weight. Fortunately, the troll's barbaric strength kept the kelpie alive. Normally trolls are quite ferocious, even when not provoked.

For whatever reason, this one had no problem with his close proximity to us. He didn't mind catching the kelpie, and never muttered an utterance of complaint. In fact, the big guy even carried the kelpie half way to the top. Perhaps the troll was being nice under threat of death, or maybe he just didn't want dead weight on his hands. Whatever the reason, his question-less cooperation saved our hides. It was oddly comforting to know that at least somebeast was looking out for my hide. Come to think of it, without my good vision he wouldn't have survived. Perhaps he was just as confiding in me? I would never know. The question stays with me to this day, how I befriended that noble savage of the mountains.

We didn't climb the whole way in one attempt. Rather, several would be taken. Using advantage of nearby outcroppings, we rested after a two hour climb. At night, without the heat of the sun, the mountain face was blasted by bone chilling gales. It was here, our little group worked silently to stay alive. Unlike the changelings whom wore fire amulets, the slaves had no protection from the elements. So we... we... cuddled.

Don't take it like that!

The troll faced the leeward side, resting his head on me like a living pillow. This allowed our champion to regain his strength lost to hauling our bodies, and it gave me a wind shield. The kelpie would sleep against the troll, protecting him form the wind. Kelpies have remarkable resistance for cold, so he didn't mind in the slightest. In fact, the kelpie had the most conformable position of all. Resting against the troll's fatty side, he had a drastically softer surface to rest on than the hard rock below me. Fortunately we slept full nights on the climb. For obvious reasons, the others could not blindly follow me at night.

After three days of climbing we reached the top. Seeing the crest, my heart leapt for joy! It bounced between the ribs, and I could feel its pump in my side. Reaching the top, I thought it would burst. Before us was a flat plane which cut round the final bend to the other side. As we rounded a narrow passage, wind blasted through the gap. For several seconds I was blinded by the flow of air, but then! Oh sweet Sól!

The land beyond was remarkable.

Words cannot describe the beauty of the land beyond the mountains. Never was a place more fertile or lush. A garden of unimaginable beauty, my words fail me. Towering trees touched the heavens, and roaring river rapids irrigated the garden that was beyond. But the view was short lived. We now had to climb down the other side.

In an effort to save time, I will skip describing our decent. I assure you, the climb down was just as arduous - if not more so.

...

The lush green forest sprang up at the foot hills. We left the barren mountains with sullied bodies. I thanked Sól for my deliverance. My strength had long since left me, my mind was but a phantom adrift on a still ocean. The ghostly, emaciated bodies of the slaves drifted across the land like a nightmare out of madbeast's dream. As we loped our links through that spectacular wood, the clinking echoed in the beauty. It anguished in the trees, and disturbed sweet bird song. I felt ashamed to disturb the picturesque scene.

We where enveloped by greenery. It was above, aside, and below. The low chains caught in the brush sometimes, so the going was slow. Escape, the idea had crossed my mind. Unfortunately I didn't have neither strength, nor will for it. My mates seemed even less inclined. Especially the kelpie. He began to slow and stumble. Our climb had worn him to the bone, he was thin as a rod. The poor beast slowed over a period of three days. His links fell out of sink, which was an annoyance, but still. I felt a deep sorrow plummeting within me. It left my head, and sunk down towards my stomach, where it felt like a stone. I wanted to cry out to the poor bastard, but I couldn't.

When the water horse stumbled for the last time, I felt a sickening tension in the chain, dragging of the body. It dragged, and dragged, and dragged. Oh, how it pulled along! Thumping like a horror it rolled and slumped. My mouth too dry to scream, my stomach to empty to throw up. My eyes to dry to cry. My face was devoid of all expression. I had lost it long ago on the trail. My mind burned with anguish for my fallen comrade. Finally, I had enough. I could not allow my friend's honor to tarnish. Where was dignity?!

With throat unslaked and with black lips baked, I could nor laugh nor wail. Through utter drought how dumb I stood! I bit my arm, I sucked the blood, and cried, "Cut him loose! Cut him loose already!"

My anguish echoed through the woods like a scream from Tartarus.

I was thrown to the ground. My head hit a stone and the world blurred. Swarming like vultures on a carcass, the changeling guards enveloped me and struck. Vicious was the pummeling. Half dead already, they where determined to expend what remained of me. I had lost all hope. I had seen it all before and it didn't turn out well. The bastards were laughing, like they'd been waiting for it the whole time. Laying there in the mud and filth, I just waited for eternal sleep to pass over me. A long rest after a sorrowful, pointless journey. I could see just beyond the gate of the dark forest that awaited me. I could see Sharowdon, Aelius, and Father Tree standing there hand in hand, as if to greet me there. Through the darkness, some thing was pulling me. I was dragged along, delivered from the beating. No more did the strikes meet my raw flesh.

It was the troll!

Laying on the ground defenseless, I stared up at him. The mountain troll, Lord of Hills and Gullies, pulled me towards him with furious vigor by my leg chain. I could see it in his eyes. His tortured orbs teared with a blazing fire, he was turning to blood rage. The anger had built, and built until it could build no more; and it was about to come toppling down on our foes.

Ponies today have no respect for trolls, but I do. Despite outward appearances, and seemingly rude mannerisms, they are fiercely loyal friends.

The troll pulled me, delivered me from certain death at the cruel hooves of the murderous.

He broke his cuffs - the ones he had slowly filed down on the mountain rocks, and eroded with urine.

I learned right there an then, an angry troll in contested ground is not to be bucked with.

Despite their prodding of spears, and slashing of swords, the puny changeling blades could not pierce the madbeast's hide. Upon realizing the troll was invincible, the guards attempted to flee - only to die with their backs turned. After wrenching up portion of a fallen tree, he hurled the missile with all force. The immense red wood, ten times my size, bashed and bludgeoned the insidious mob. Bodies rag dolled with the dynamo's strike. The guards where strewn about, all dead; a shattered carnage in the mud.

More came and more died. The guards could not stop, much less stagger the beastly King of Peaks and Chasms. In righteous rage, he seized each one by one and broke them. Cracking heads like eggs; and stomping bones like twigs, the troll gave a barbaric display. Pounding his chest with blood soaked hands, the troll laid waste to the onslaught. Slapping foes aside like mosquitoes, the beast's crushing blows bent bodies, and broke blades. Thundering away, the woods echoed his throws, and death blows. A smile came to my face as I passed out. I viewed shadows coming to the trolls aid. Again, a great sleep took me. Down, down, down I sank into rest. My body lay in the soothing warm mud, as the leafy green canopy faded to and emerald haze, and then to black. I had no dreams.

I was living one.

Author's Note

Hope you guys enjoyed the latest chapter!

Boy did that troll turn out to be something, or what?

Thanks for reading!