Shadow nickered and stamped his forehoof on the ground, impatiently. The herd was moving slowly today.
Shadow shook his black mane and tail. He twitched his shoulder under his winter-grey coat and lowered his head to scratch it on his leg. He and his herd had just come out from their winter place and needed to be constantly on the move to find grass. Swishing his tail and snorting, Shadow trotted back to the hill. Why were they moving so slowly? Angel never moved this slowly unless something was wrong.
Angel was the head mare. She normally led the herd while Shadow scouted ahead. She had a flaming-red mane and tail, and a pure white coat to contrast it. Her temper was normally calm and collected, as opposed to Shadow, who was normally impulsive and somewhat reckless.
She was not looking at Shadow. Her head was up, nostrils flared, smelling the wind. Shadow shook his mane and trotted down the hill, curious to know what she smelled. Raising his own nose to smell the wind, he discovered nothing. Snorting, he trotted through the herd to find the head stallion.
Sand stepped in his path, ears back; he wanted to know what was going on. Shore was standing behind him. Sand and Shore were work horses that joined the herd a while ago. Their muscles rippled underneath their sandy-colored coats. Both manes were even lighter, though Sand was the bigger of the two since he was a stallion. He stomped his heavy forehoof and the fuzz near his hoof jostled at the movement. Shadow put his ears back in irritation and Sand repeated the action. Shadow trotted past, ignoring Sand.
A giant stallion named Storm stood near the head stallion, both of them smelling the wind. It blew in Shadow’s face and he half-reared in enjoyment. The head stallion snorted at him with his ears flat in annoyance. Shadow came down and glanced around. Seeing something on the horizon, his ears went up in attention and he trotted forward a few steps. As silhouettes came over the hill, Shadow saw what it was - humans.
Immediately Shadow’s ears flattened on his head. He hated humans. He hated everything about them; the things they used to take his kind and those that lowered themselves to be controlled by humans. He snorted and began to charge forward. The head stallion nickered to Storm, glancing at Shadow, and then took off into the herd.
Storm bolted after Shadow and slid to a stop in front of him, making him stop in his tracks. Shadow, ears still flat, snorted and began to turn when a loud sound shot through the air. A second later, they heard a horse scream in the herd.
Storm turned and saw that it was his filly, Snowflake. Blood stained her leg and she was on the ground. The rest of the herd jostled around; the loud noise scared them. The head stallion trumped his voice and calmed them down.
He began to canter around the herd, rounding them up. Making noises in his throat, he prepared the rest of the herd to run. He was about to run and fight the intruders, when he noticed that Shadow was already willing to fight them. He was stirred even more to fight. The head stallion turned and began nipping at a few to back them up, running the front few into the rest of them forming a ripple among the herd. He then neighed to Shadow. When he turned, the head stallion reared. This let Shadow know that the head stallion was leaving him to fight.
As the humans came closer, the loud noise came again and the ground in front of Shadow seemed to explode. Shadow turned, reared in anger and charged the humans. Storm looked back at the head stallion and saw that he was watching Shadow. Storm shook his head, snorting. He then charged after Shadow.
Charging toward the humans with his head down and his ears flattened, Shadow attacked the horse in the front of the human group. He slammed into the horse and bit him on the neck. That horse backed off quickly.
The loud noise came again. Shadow hardly noticed. He attacked the next horse in his sight. He reared at the horse. He struck out with his forehooves in order to scare the horse. A rope tightened around Shadows neck. He immidetly kicked. Whirling around, he reared and struck the horse in front of him. This caught the head stallion’s attention.
Pulling back and tightening the rope, he reared. Storm thundered through, grabbing the rope in his mouth. He clamped down. The momentum of his gallop and the pressure the he put on the rope snapped it in two. He reared in the center of the horses, scaring them. The horses backed up and the riders backed them up. Some reared as well. Storm hit two of the horses in front of him. Three others fled.
Shadow rammed one horse in front of him. He kicked at the one behind him. He saw one human holding something that reflected the sun; a gun. Flattening his ears in disgust, Shadow charged the rider with the gun. He grabbed cloth in his mouth and hurled the rider to the ground. He pulled the gun from the human’s hands and threw it. The head stallion snorted in approval and stomped.
Faced with a horse that was enraged, the rider decided to run. There was one horse left standing in the field with Shadow and Storm. Shadow flattened his ears at this horse. The sound thundered. The human had retrieved his gun and was pointing it at Shadow. Sand pounded past them and charged the human, who quickly ran away. Sand snorted and whinnied after him.
Storm cantered back to the herd to check on his filly. Sand trotted back. Shadow walked back, his ears still flattened. The stray horse began to walk next to Shadow, but Shadow turned on him and nipped at his neck. He forced the stray horse to stay away.
The head stallion soon led the herd into a grassy valley where Snowflake could recover. The rest of them could eat the sparse grass that was there. They would have to move soon in order to keep from starving. It would do for now, though. He was about to get to the top of the valley to keep watch, but he saw that Shadow was already up there. The head stallion turned and went back to the herd, glancing every once in a while back to where Shadow stood.
Angel, looking up at the top of the valley, saw the silhouette of Shadow. She glanced back toward the herd and walked up to Shadow. She touched his neck with her nose, gently, as a thank-you for fighting. He turned for a moment to touch her on the face, and then went back to watching. His ears moved back and forth, listening.
Looking at his sides, Angel noticed marks on his sides. They were spur marks. More marks of humans appeared at the edges of his mouth. A bit had dug into his mouth a long time ago. The scars showed that the one that rode Shadow so long ago made his mouth and sides bleed.
Angel turned to go. Shadow snorted and shook his head. Pawing the ground slightly, he asked Angel to stay. She turned back around and rested her neck on his for a minute. Maybe, she thought, just maybe he would be able to forgive them. Maybe one day. Looking again at the scars, she thought that, if that day ever came, it would be far into the future.