Endless winter

The light of the rising sun was slowly climbing up the orange mare’s fur. When thed  cold wind blew softly through al window onto Applejack’s rear hooves, she opened her eyes and suddenly closed them once the light reached her head.

“Where am ah?” She asked herself, looking around. The dusk’s light moved higher and showed the woody walls around Applejack, which noticed that she was lying on a slightl bed. This room was small and without furnitures except for her bed. The mare’s eyes were scanning the walls until they stopped on the small window in front of her.

“Where am ah?” She repeated the question before getting up. The orange hooves clattered on the wooden boards, which creaked as the mare stood.

“Where a’e the doors?” Applejack was asking herself, again looking around.

“There ya a’e!” She wshispered as she spotted wooden doors to her left.

“Niet...Ja….uwituz… en…” someone’s muted voice came from the closed doors as Applejack was getting closer.

“Wolves?” she thought, as she stood near the exit. The voices were clear enough for recognizing who was behind the wooden barrier.

“Daszkin!” someone’s yelled before talking quietly.

“Was that Wolfrim?” the thought flew through the pony’s head. Applejack put a hoof on the handle and pulled it. The loud click killed the conversation.

“Applejack?!” the black wolf, called Daszkin, jumped to the pony and hugged her as Applejack came into the room.

“I was worried about you. You were out for four days,” his hug was getting tighter.

“A’right, a’right. Ah’m fine, now let me go. You gonna strangle me,”Applejack felt herself getting dizzy.

“Oh, Ja sorria, ” the black wolf release the pony.

“Good to see you ,” Wolfrim smiled as Applejack raised her head, cathing her breath, but he didn’t go to his friend. He was standing near the table in the middle of the room. Applejack couldn’t see it earlier, because Daszkin blocked her view.

In front of the grey wolf stood wolf with the yellow tail.

“Sasza?” Applejack asked, smiling. “I hope that you didn’t burn a forest down when I was out?”

“Fortunately no,” Greenish blue eyed wolf smiled back.

“Where are we?” The earth pony asked, looking at Daszkin, who came back to the table.

“It’s our place, where we make plans,” the black wolf said, raising his paw.

“What plans?” Applejack looked unsurely at her friends.

“Combat plans, etc.” Sasza asnwered showing the maps on the table.

Applejack got closer to take a look at them.

“Combat plans? Who are you fighting with?” the mare looked at the papers spread on the tabletop.

“Well, with everything,” Sasa answered, but he wasn’t sure that his answer was clear enough.

“Look, you must know something about our home,”  the yellow tailed wolf came closer to the mare.

“What is it?” she look at him with curiousity.

Sasza took a map of North Region and made a big circle around it.

“North Region is one, big battlefield. Our herd fights with other herds, with Sanitens on the East and Mountains Dogs,” he was putting his paw in sequence: on the land on the right of North Region, and the mountains on the North.

“Don’t forget about humans. They still have two big cities and a capital city,” said Daszkin, pointing at three dots on the map.

“But Misiula and Coal said that they took Grave town, and Linberg,” Sasza said with suprise, and pointed at two dots.

“Yes, because they took them, but humans pulled them back, again!” Wolfrim hit the table furiously.

“Hey, calm down,” said Applejack while raising her hooves.

“You don’t understand. Those two cities were moving from hand to hand almost five times. Everytime we take very big casualties. I won’t send more wolves,” Daszkin said firmly.

“We need to capture their capital city. When we take it, we will destroy their HQ there, and humanity will break down,” Wolfrim was looking at the map thoughtfully

“So, why didn’t ya take it?” asked Applejack, looking at the wolves curiously.

“Are you kidding me? It’s the biggest fortress in the North Region. They will kill us before we would reach the walls,” Sasza looked at the pony with a terrified expression.

“T’is fortress can’t be as dangerous as ya say. Maybe it has some weak spots which you could use?” Applejack looked at her friends before moving her gaze to the table.

Oh mah… so many maps. I wish Twilight would be here, The pony thought while looking at the pieces of yellow paper.

Wolfrim looked at the pony with spark of… anger?

“This fortress has no weak points,” he said hitting the table and looking at Daszkin.

“Why is she try to giving me orders? he whispered to him.

“She is our friend. Szto the hell is wrong with you?” the black wolf hissed and looked at Applejack which was focusing on the map of the fortress.

“Whelp, indeed it’s ah pretty big construction,” the pony was looking at the plans of the dome built into a big mountain. From above, everything looked like a big triangle.

“The Misty Mountain” she read quietly the letters on the top of the yellow tattered paper.

Sasza began to shake when he heard those words.

“A’e ya al’right?” Applejack asked, looking at the wolf.

“Yeah, I’m fine. I-I just thought about our scouts who died when they tried to make this map,” he said, putting his paw on his head.

“Any ideas, Appy?” Daszkin asked,  looking at the pony with curiousity.

“Maybe you could try to capture those towers in the corners,” Applejack said, putting the map down and pointing at the white dots on the corners of the triangle.

Daszkin shook his head.

“Niet, we have already tried it”.

“Maybe digging a tunnel?” the pony asked, but she already knew the answer.

“Niet, we tried it too. Humans build concrete walls under the fortress” Daszkin’s answer dispelled every doubts.

“Open assault won’t be good idea either, don’t ya think?” Applejack still gazed at the map, looking for something that could be use to break those walls.

“Siege?” she asked desperately.

“We don’t have time and supplies for this. We need to capture the Misty Mountain as soon as possible,” Daszkin took a deep breath.

Suddenly, Appplejack spotted something near the right tower. A small, black line that ran from the right corner.

“What this is?” she asked, pointing at the anomaly.

“Szto?” Sasza leaned toward. “Ja ni wiżu szto to,” he said, gazing at the black small line.