The horseman

The camp had two entrances, a north entrance and a south entrance. As Andrew exited Rarity's tent he looked to the north entrance, he could see a group of five or so ponies standing around and talking to each other. He turned left and walked to the south entrance where Diamond Edge was waiting for him.

"Andrew" he said, raising a hoof to his head and making the gesture of tipping a hat,"Twilight drop by yet?" Andrew asked. "She's just grabbing a few other ponies, she'll be here in a minute". They stood in stood in silence for a few minutes looking around at the tents for a sign of Twilight, "there she is" Andrew said pointing.

Twilight came trotting down the dirt path, followed by three other ponies, a gray pegasus, a brown pony with a trio of horse shoes on its flank and, to Andrew's slight annoyance, the rainbow colored pegasus who had accused him in the tent.

"We'll, I got everypony" Twilight said, the gray pegasus and earth pony starred at Andrew with slightly open mouths, the rainbow pony stared coldly at Andrew once again,"what's he doing here?" She asked angrily. "He's here because he volunteered" Diamond Edge said,"and he and Twilight are going in there as a pair","but, no you can't be..." She protested. "Rainbow Dash" Diamond Edge said sternly,"Twilight and Andrew are going as a pair, you are coming with me, if you have a problem you can go back to your tent and sleep for the rest of the day".

Dash mouthed soundlessly for a few seconds , trying to come up with an argument, in the end she thought of nothing and she stayed silent,"good" Diamond Edge turned to the rest of the group,"so then, Twilight and Andrew you two will go together, Ditzy and Caramel it'll be you two together and Rainbow". He placed heavy emphasis on her name and looked at her straight in the eye's,"you'll be with me, any questions?"

No one responded,"great" he said clapping his two front hooves together,"let's go".

The ever free forest, even in broad daylight still somehow managed to be completely shrouded in shadow, the forest was in constant semi-darkness. At points it was so dark they had to squint to see where they were going. They stuck together as a group until they hit a fork in the forest path.

"Caramel" Diamond Edge called over his shoulder,"you and Ditzy can go down here". Diamond Edge handed Caramel a short sword and the two ponies descended the path. "You think that was good idea?" Andrew asked,"we're more likely to find food if spread out" he replied,"I know but, what if they run into anything?". "They're prepared" Diamond Edge said as the group headed up the path,"I've been trying to teach everypony how to handle a weapon, they can handle themselves now".

The path twisted and turned further through the forest, they encountered no monster's but no food either, eventually the path split again. "Andrew, Twi, you two can take the left path" Diamond edge handed Andrew a crossbow and nodded to him. Rainbow Dash, who had been flying above them while they walked, landed next to Diamond Edge and stomped up the right path, she looked round and cast Andrew a dark look then faced forward and carried on with Diamond Edge.

Andrew and Twilight walked in silence for several minutes, searching every nook and cranny along the way but they found nothing. Andrew yawned and rubbed his eyes, out of the corner of them he could make out Twilight staring at him. He turned his head to look back at her but quick as a flash she looked left and started poking around in some bushes looking for fruit.

He looked forward again and saw her turn her head back to him,"you may want to keep your eye's forward" Andrew said, Twilight turned her head, unfortunately she hadn't been paying attention to what was in front of her and she walked into a tree. Andrew smiled slyly to himself as Twilight trotted back next to him rubbing her muzzle.

"Sorry" she apologized,"it's just that..well, you fascinate me", Andrew gave her a confused look,"what's fascinating about me" he asked. "Well, to my knowledge nopony has seen a creature like you in Equestria for hundreds of years". "Another person was here before me?" Andrew asked, astounded,"only one other, it happened during the burning war about nine hundred years ago, you fit the description of the creature that helped fight and I just want to learn a little about you, what do you do?".

Andrew shrugged,"we..humans do a lot of the things you do, we eat we sleep, we have families and jobs","do you have a family?" Twilight asked,"I got a mom and a dad back home" Andrew said, sticking his hands in his pockets as he walked.  "Before all this I was in school, I was learning how to be an artist", "you draw?" Twilight asked, "just canvasses of forests and animals" he replied.

The two walked in silence for a few seconds, the Andrew asked,"how about you? What did you do before all this?". "I used to own the library in Ponyville" she said,"I lived there with my assistant, he's a baby dragon, I raised him since he was a hatch-ling".

"I didn't see a dragon, did this Dusk guy get him?" Andrew asked,"no" Twilight said firmly, "he was in Canterlot when we got attacked, I haven't seen him in months". "Sorry" Andrew apologized, Twilight shook her head,"I'm sure he's fine" Twilight assured him,"Canterlot is more well prepared than Ponyville to deal with an attack, I'm sure he's ok", she didn't sound sure though.

They stayed in silence, every now and then checking small clearings for food and finding nothing. Then, after about twenty minutes of walking Andrew saw Twilight's ears prick up. "Do you hear something?" Andrew asked,"yes" cried Twilight excitedly,"listen". Andrew put a hand up to his ear, it was faint but he could hear the sound of something. Something that was running and gargling, something that sounded like,"water" Andrew said looking at Twilight.

They ran down the path towards the sound of the water and near a clump of bushes they found a stream. "Thank Celestia" Twilight said putting a hoof to her forehead, Andrew bent down next to the stream,"right, got any flasks I could fill up?" Twilight opened her saddle bag and drew out three canteens,"cheers" Andrew said taking them from her,"see if there's anything else down stream", Twilight obeyed and trotted off.

Andrew filled and corked all three flasks quickly, then once they were filled he dunked his head in the water and slurped some up, he pulled his head out and shook some out of his hair. "Oh no" Twilight exclaimed, "Twilight" Andrew called, he jumped to his feet and drew the crossbow from over his shoulder.

It became apparent very quickly that Twilight wasn't in danger, she staring at a large overturned cart that hung over the stream, the cart was beaten, broken and had both back wheels missing. Lying in the water next to it was a peach colored mare with a stringy green mane, her face looked like it had been slashed by a knife and she had three broken arrows sticking out of her, one in her back leg and two through her chest. The corps looked like it had been there for days, it smelled heavily of decay. Andrew put a hand to his mouth and resisted the temptation to wretch.

"Think there's something in there?",Twilight asked, Andrew lowered his hand, "it's worth a check". He jumped into the water and put one hand on the door, he looked up at Twilight,"if something comes out blast it". Twilight nodded and her horn glowed.

Andrew turned the handle on the door and pulled it back, a pony fell from the door into the water, Andrew jumped back in surprise and Twilight fired a blast of magic, it missed Andrew and hit the door, vaporizing part of it.

They looked down at the pony, it had a navy coat and had a series of large blotchy marks all over its body, Andrew gave it a light prod with his foot, no response. He peered inside the chariot, it was empty except for a few small boxes clustered at the back. He pulled one out and brought it back to Twilight.

The crate was small and quite light, a label along the side of it read,"Orange family exports", the top of the box was nailed shut, "think you can get this open?" Andrew asked. Twilight put her horn next to the box, the screws instantly flew out from the box and Andrew Pulled the lid off. The crate was filled with an assortment of oranges, clementines and tangerines.

Twilight and Andrew both laughed a little in joy at what they saw,"are there any more?" Twilight asked excitedly,"two or three more I think". With some help from Twilight, Andrew hauled the remaining crates out from the wreck and laid them down, "this is perfect" Andrew said staring at their loot,"all this could last us weeks". "Don't get used to it" Twilight said,"we're leaving the camp tomorrow", Andrew shrugged,"still, it's just good we get to eat something".

He bent down and piled one crate on top of another,"so I'll take these two and you can use you levitation thing to take.."

snap

Andrew stopped and looked into the trees where the noise had come from, the branches were to tightly bunched together to see what it was, "probably a deer" Twilight said dismissively, Andrew nodded and turned to leave.

whoosh something red streaked past Andrews face, missing his nose by a centimeter, a second red streak flew from the forest and hit one of the boxes Twilight was levitating, upon impact it made a loud hissing noise,"under the cart!" Andrew yelled, they dropped the crates and dived into the water and under the cart.

They stayed quiet and looked out from under the the cart, out of the woods emerged a hooded pony, it wore a set of red armor with symbols woven into it, from under it's hood they could see a steely gray muzzle with a small patch of white fur under its bottom jaw. It had a belt tied around the armor to hold it in place, in the belt it carried a series of knives and daggers.

It was poking around the boxes and seeing what was in them, Andrews eyes moved from the hooded pony to the crossbow just lying on the bank of the stream, he scurried out from his hiding place and ran for the crossbow, unfortunately the pony was far quicker than him, another blast of red light came flying from under its hood at Andrew, the blast hit him in the shoulder.

He felt as though someone had thrown acid into his shoulder, he screamed in pain and staggered backwards, clutching his shoulder. The pony drew a knife from its belt and advanced on him, then Twilight came bolting out and fired a magical blast at the pony.

Andrew had never seen something move with such speed, the pony flipped over the attack and landed right in front of Twilight bringing the knife down as he landed. Twilight screamed in pain as the knife went in, Andrew suddenly spotted the crossbow just a few paces infront of him, he stomped through the water, picked it up and fired.

The cloaked pony turned but couldn't react quickly enough, the arrow flew at him and went straight through his throat. He gagged and spluttered, then he fell in the water, blood issuing from is throat and turning the water around him a deep scarlet. "Twilight" Andrew called, "Christ are you alright?". "I'm fine, I'm ok" she assured him even though Andrew could see the knife deeply embedded in her shoulder blade, blood slowly seeping out of the wound.

They heard the sound of galloping down the path and a moment later Diamond Edge appeared, holding his spear ready. "Dear Celestia" he said under his breath staring from the hooded pony in the water to the injuries on Twilight and Andrew, "what in hell happened!"

"Ambush" Andrew said clutching his burning shoulder as he walked up to him, "this guy came out of the woods and attacked us". Diamond Edge examined the body in the lake, "that's one of Dusk's soldier's, they all wear the same armor".

"Diamond, you around here?" Rainbow Dash came bursting out of the wood followed by Ditzy and Caramel, she scanned the scene and her gaze landed on Twilight who was still was still holding on to her bleeding wound. Rainbow whizzed over to Twilight and began looking her over, "you!" Rainbow yelled up at Andrew, " I knew I couldn't trust you". "Are you blind? I shot one of them!" Andrew yelled at her indicating the crossbow and the body in the water.

Caramel suddenly made a loud shushing noise,"please, don't be so loud or more'll be down here". Diamond edge nodded, "and Rainbow will you lay off him for a minute" Diamond Edge said in a loud whisper. Rainbow scowled and stayed quiet, "alright, we'll grab everything here and get you two cleaned up". They all grabbed one of the orange crates and ascended the path.

******

"My goodness, look at the state of the two of you!" Nectar was shuffling through bottles of medicine when the group entered her tent, she started fussing over Twilight and Andrew, "sit down, I'll patch you both up in a second". They sat down on two small steel chairs, Nectar turned to Diamond Edge, "I don't know how you manage it" she said putting a hoof to her head, "every time you come back I have to deal with something". "We take risks" Diamond replied, "you wouldn't believe half of what we see out in the woods", Nectar shrugged, "I suppose, I'd just like it if you stopped your ponies from getting hurt".

"I'll be more careful in the future" Diamond said giving her a small smile, he tapped a hoof against his helmet then exited the tent followed by Caramel and Ditzy. Nectar made a noise of annoyance then bent down next to Twilight. "All right dear" she said placing a hoof around the knife, "I want you to take a deep breath for me, this'll probably sting a bit". Twilight took a calm breath, then let out a gasp of pain as Nectar yanked the knife out of her. Then she put her horn next to the wound and it mended itself instantly, "there you are, good as new", Twilight stood up, thanked Nectar then left.

Nectar then looked at Andrew, "oh so it's you again is it?" Nectar asked, "fraid so" Andrew said, "well, what have you done this time?" She lent her head in and examined the wound. "Oh my" she said worriedly, "what's wrong, can't you just use your magic", "not for this I'm afraid" she said hurrying off to the medicine bottles on a table, "that wound will need a lot more than magic to be healed".

She grabbed a bottle full of cobalt blue liquid, poured some into a cloth and pressed it over the wound, a faint sizzling noise sounded from where the liquid made contact with the wound. She pulled out a roll of bandages and tied some of them around the burn, "leave that there and it should be healed in the morning, if not that probably means the wound is infected". "What happens if it is" Andrew asked, "not much we can do I'm afraid, but that's a worse case scenario, you'll be fine".

"Cheers" Andrew said standing up, "no problem, just, do something for me would you", "what?" Andrew asked. "If Diamond Edge asks you to go out again, try to be more careful, every time he brings a troop back I end up going through supplies, just try not to get hurt out there", Andrew nodded,and left the tent.

The sun was hovering directly over the camp, brilliantly golden light shining down over every inch of it. The light was so bright that Andrew squinted as he came outside. Looking around he could see Diamond Edge and Caramel wrenching the lids off the orange crates and placing them in the food tent,

Andrew walked to the guard tower, sat down and leaned against one of its legs, he took a look around the camp, some of the ponies were out talking to each other and he could see Ditzy throwing a ball to a small foal who Andrew assumed to be her daughter.

He stuffed his hands into his pockets and found something lumpy in his left one, he pulled it out and found the notebook he had taken from the tower, he opened it to the first page. He stared at it blankly for a few seconds, then back up at the camp. Then he drew out the pencil from the same pocket and began to draw.