This is the last of the chapters I wrote the other night. Hopefully I can get one or two more over the next week: Dawn

Chapter 65 – The Battle

It only took Sissy and Emily a few minutes to clean the filly in the clear water, and Sissy insisted she would be called Pinky. Jason watched with interest, going into the clean pool to wash some of the muck off himself. Stone and Rayla had already headed off to the ford to meet the centaur attack. After Pinky was dried off, the two girls also headed off towards the ford, but Pinky and Jason just stared at each other, the filly looking down at the youth, who was more than a foot shorter.

After an uncomfortably long minute the filly reached down and took Jason’s hand and led him away, not to the ford, but to a small glade.

Meanwhile, at the ford Stone found the centaurs attempting to cross. The fairies were out in force, grouping and attacking the front centaurs. Stone was glad to see one of the beasts that had pushed the filly off the cliff get stung by a fairie stick and fall to the ground. He had pulled Pate and went into battle mode, rushing into the middle of the ford and swinging the singing sword left and right. He sliced through the human torso of the second beast that had pushed the filly.

He killed dozens in the first few minutes and saw nearly 100 get arrows from Rayla. Finally he saw Jason appear, with a strange smirk on his face. “Aim for the horse parts,” the youth called out so both his parents could hear. He was riding on Pinky’s back and would lean forward to stab at the hindquarters of passing centaurs with his knife.

Stone had noticed something strange. When he killed a centaur, the beast disappeared with a small pop and Stone felt a small rush of magic into Pate. If he had cut into the forepart of the animal, a Kithren appeared with similar wounds. But if his blow cut the rear, horse parts, then after the pop sound a Kithren appeared, dazed but unwounded. Both male and female Kithrens were lying on the field, not trying at all to harm either side.

Rayla had noticed the same thing and started aiming her arrows at the hindquarters of the centaurs. You might think that an arrow into the hindparts of the massive animals would not stop them, but it did, and the same pop and magic rush that Stone felt and the centaur turning into a Kithren man or woman. Rayla heard the pop, but didn’t feel the magic that flowed into Pate.

The battle lasted nearly five hours. Finally, the Centaurs retreated. Pate boasted that she had killed 1043, while Jason’s blade claimed a number of 832. Rayla wasn’t counting, but said Arthur had, and he claimed she had killed 1345. Wrk said that her people had killed another 1000 but had suffered nearly 3000 losses, more than half their army.

Stone mentally calculated 4100 centaurs had died, which meant that the crowd of beasts on the far side of the river still was over 5000. A second wave would probably break through, as the remaining fairies were exhausted, with many unable to fly. Stone and his family might be able to put up a fight for a while. Stone had drawn magic from the earth and shared it out to Rayla and Jason. As a result, they were tired, but not exhausted.

As they tried to get their breath, Jason saw Emily and Sissy on the battlefield. Emily was helping lead dazed Kithrens out of the water and onto the shore. There were several thousand of them. And Sissy was gathering up the spent fairies that had fallen and could no longer fly and carrying them to the rear, where it seemed that the reserve fairies were trying to help them recover their strength. Sissy made countless trips from the ford back to copse, carrying as many as a dozen fairies at a time.

Stone looked at the enemy on a ridge on the other side of the river, trying to figure out a strategy that would enable him to defeat them. Then, to his surprise, he heard, or more accurately felt, a series of magic pops like those that had occurred when a centaur was killed and turned back into a Kithren. He realized that he was not physically hearing the pops: it wasonly an effect of magic fleeing the defeated beasts. Looking at the ridge he saw thousands of centaurs disappearing with the pops. About a thousand more of the unchanged beasts rode away to east, and then dazed Kithrens started to stand up on the ridge. A rush of magic came towards Pate, alarming Stone. But the magic was wild, and quickly flowed into Pate’s tame blade.

“I think we have beaten them,” Stone announced to Rayla who still had Wrk nestled in her hiding spot.

“Thank the Goddess,” the little fairie said. “I will send the news to the queen, princess, and the others. Many are unable to speak until they get a boost of magical energy from the pretty ones. But they have all fallen in love with the girl who carried them to safety and want to bless her.”

“What happened to the beasts?” Stone asked. “They still had enough left to win. But they all just died on that ridge, or at least transformed back to Kithrens.”

“We never knew how the magician created the centaurs,” Wrk said. “But it is apparent now that they were Kithrens transformed into beasts. When they were wounded the magic broke and they returned to their original state. The magic went wild, and it has seemed to flow into you, and your sword. Look at how you sparkle with wild magic. Perhaps the wizard had lost enough centaurs, and enough power, that he could not control so many.”

Stone looked at Pate and saw the same sparkling as when he had slain the dragon. He also saw that his arms sparkled far more intensely then they had before. He pointed his arm at the copse with the fairies and sent out a weak charge of magic. He heard Wrk gasp.

“All the fairies are recovered,” she said in amazement. “Your magic is even more powerful than that of the pretty ones.”

Stone then played a weak charge across the Kithrens that Emily had brought out of the water, and those on the ridge, who were slowly making their way to the ford. You could see eyes widen as they felt refreshed by the magic after having been enslaved by it for so long.

Kalosun was on a hill near the ford, preaching, and the crowd gathered around him. He spoke for two hours and then finally worked his way through the crowd to come to Stone. “They appreciate what you have done for them, but they are hungry. They had not eaten in weeks. The magician fed him through his spells, but it is not like real food. Can we feed them?”

“We have fish,” Rayla said. “I don’t know if it will feed 4,000 though.”

“It will be a start. Lead them down to the beach and set up some fires for them to cook the fish. One of the sailors said the catch had been 3000, so there should be at least a half fish for each of them. While you are doing that, I will make some plans with the fairies.

Stone went to the copse and requested to talk to the queen or the princess. Soon both were hovering in front of him, no longer feeling the need for an armed escort. Stone asked if the Kithrens could stay and detected serious resistance. They were reluctant to refuse Stone’s request after all the family had done for them, but they didn’t want outsiders on their land.

“What about the lands on the other side of the ford?” Stone asked. He saw relief on the faces of the two rulers. They could deal with friendly Kithrens providing a buffer from the wizard.

As soon as the parley was over, Stone started to send bursts of magic into the air, with small fireworks bursting in the evening dusk. But most of the magic he stored up went into the cinders that fell to the earth. In Westport he had made the gardens especially fruitful. Now the cinders landed on barren. stony earth, causing it to sprout and turn green. Gardens appeared that would be able to feed people, as well as fully grown trees and copses. He continued feeding magic into the air until he felt he had none left.

The next morning Kalosun prayed to the people again and explained that they were to go into the newly green areas and build houses and create communities. Many men said they wanted to be fishermen: the little food they had eaten the night before was so tasty. There was very little left for the morning. But Kalo promised that they would find food soon after crossing the ford. Stone had created some major gardens a few miles in that would provide them fruit and vegetables until they got to the places they wanted to settle in.

Many of the Kithrens were in couples already where a married couple had been transformed together. In many other cases people had paired up as they ate dinner the night before and more couples were formed as the people moved slowly across the ford. By noon the last of the transformed Kithrens were across and Stone’s family ate a quiet meal, having skipped breakfast so they wouldn’t be rudely eating in front of people who had none.

After the meal a swarm of fairies had appeared. Wrk was in the front of them, and explained that they had a gift for Sissy, who had helped so many during and after the battle. The swarm contained over 200 fairies, both those the girl had helped and their friends. The swarm descended on the girl’s face, and she giggled with glee at the fairies touching her skin.

About 15 minutes later, though, she let out a scream and ran to Rayla, planting her face into the woman’s ample bosom, sobbing: “It hurts. It hurts.”

She was in that position for about an hour, sobbing hard at first, and then letting up as the fairies hovered about with concern on their faces. Finally, she raised her head and announced: “It doesn’t hurt any more. I feel different inside my head though.” Amazingly she no longer had mongoloid eyes. In fact, she was quite pretty now.

Wrk explained. “The swarm cured your brain. The pain you felt was from having so many thoughts and ideas in your head at one time. It hurt because you were used to having only one at a time. It took an hour or so for your brain to mature enough to deal with it. Now everything anyone had every taught you is there in your brain, waiting for you to use it.”

“That is a wonderful gift, and probably more than I deserve,” she said. She even sounded different. The lisp was gone, and her words seemed more measured and wiser. She carefully put her hand out and Wrk landed on it. In the past she would have squealed with glee having a fairie on her hand, but she merely smiled and carried the small woman over to Rayla, easing her into her resting place.

During the days following the battle Jason and Pinky had disappeared from time to time. When they came back, the youth had an odd smirk on his face. It was Rayla who eventually worked it all out.

“Jason, have you been having sex with that beast?” she demanded.

“She is not a beast. She is a girl. Mostly,” Jason retorted. His failure to deny Rayla’s claim answered her clearly.

“Not by the rear, I hope,” Rayla retorted.

“Of course not,” Jason said. “She is a girl in front. Doug might want to take her the other way, but then I would have to kill him.”

“Your affair stops now!” Rayla said.

“No it doesn’t,” her son replied. “I love her, and I am 15 now, which is adult. You cannot tell me I can’t. I will leave if you don’t want us, but we will go together.”

Rayla sighed. Her boy was grown up and had the right. Then Sissy spoke: “I think a part of the problem is that Pinky’s female parts are nude, and that bothers your mother, Jason. I think I can sew her something to wear up front, and that will make you mother feel she is more of a girl, like you do. Will you wear clothes, Pinky?”

“I will try,” the filly said. It was about the same time the next day when the first fitting occurred. Sissy had created a bra and a blouse for Pinky. There was a problem because the garment could not wrap entirely around her torso due to her thick mane of pink hair running down the center of her back. Sissy took an idea from the bra, which worked well. The blouse had five straps at different places, and these could be weaved through the mane to hold the blouse on.

The skirt below was more of a loincloth, although it covered her front sex, and wrapped around with straps at the top and the bottom, under her horse torso.

“It looks wonderful,” Pinky gushed with pleasure.

“It does look more respectful,” Rayla admitted. She still was not a fan of the filly, but she would rather accept her than lose her son.

“I will make several more,” Sissy said. “This was much more challenging than the way I used to clothe my dolls, but now I seem to have the ability to design anything.”

It was three days later that Wrk announced the next boon for the family. Apparently the unicorns had agreed that the three women of the family were all pure enough to meet with the magical animals. Wrk warned that they should not attempt to touch the pretty ones, and they all agreed, even the newly wise Sissy. The fairie accompanied Rayla to translate.

A swarm of about 100 fairies accompanied them into the woods to a small, apparently empty, clearing. All three realized that they were being watched by hidden eyes. Suddenly Emily gasped. A gorgeous horse, not much bigger than a pony, but with the classical lines of a horse, appeared. It had a 14-inch long silver horn coming out from its forehead. The fur was completely silver in color, matching the color of the metal of the horn.

After that brave unicorn saw and felt nothing to fear from the women, others started to appear. Soon 19 were standing in a semi-circle. Wrk spoke: “Emily, you have been granted permission to touch one,” and the girl walked up and rubbed the animal’s shoulder. It seemed to like it, making a purring sound in its throat.

Next Sissy was given a chance, with the same result. Rayla held back, feeling she was not pure enough to handle the animals, and happy just to see them.

Wrk spoke: “Now you Rayla. They know what you did for them in the battle and want to reward you. It helps that they seem to enjoy being petted. That is not something we can do for them.”

Rayla moved forward and petted one of the unicorns with a longer horn. She felt a tingle, similar to what she felt with Stone. Was this why only the pure could normally touch them, She tried to suppress the emotion.