"I told ya's she would go for crumbs."
"Is no good, these are all the posh peoples, they wouldn't know a good beast, they only look for the pretty faces."
"Whadya we do then?"
"We turn the guy down."
"But sir wanted them all sold!"
"Not for nine stinking coins! That's thievery, that is. Look fellows, I've been trying to tell sir that the corrals should keep her, she would make a golden horse out mustering the left over herds. Think of the prize money if we entered the gal in rodeos or for those races across the frontier. You can win a thousand coins in those things, and let me tell you when I rode her here she was chomping at the bit to go faster the entire ride! She's worth her weight in gold and I say we'd be mad not to keep her."
"But we've got surplus horses already."
"None as good as her though, Jimmy, she's the most powerful Percheron I've ever seen. Just think how promising the foals out of her could be, if we get her with a good sire."
"That Monmouth farmer's grey?"
"Exactly! That stallion's legendary, and she will soon be too. Come on guys, you can't honestly fault her beyond her hide."
"She's got a vicious streak to her Sam, I must tell you I was happy to hear she was going. She sets me on edge when she studies you with those eyes of hers. It's like she understands what you're sayin' to her."
"She's a loaded cannon, Sam, the man who owned her before lost her to the mustangs, what's going to stop that from happening again?"
"Men, when you look back on this day, will you be happy with what you decided? Think about it fellows, it's better to take risks, than none at all. What did you 'come a muster for? It wasn't for the safety; I can tell you that, so what can you tell ye selves?"
"Well, let us think on it Sam, we're staying in the city for the next five days. We'll make our decision then."
"But the buyer will want her before then."
"We're turning him down no matter what we decided, nine coins is barely enough for a goat. This decision is about keeping her for the corrals or not. You know Sam, there is always those rodeo sales where they ride the horse after the steer before they sell, people would be jumping for her after that."
"No, I want to keep her, don't you guess get it? She's one in a million."
Many days past and no one came for her. Her rented loose box stunk of fish from the seafood market that was next to the stable yard. Oh did she hate it, and it only got worse when a new shipment of beast arrived. A load of camels, what cruelty, she despises them. Every horse does, there is just something evil and sour about those animals. The entire species. Pity on the fool who tends to them.
The Yorktown harbour was a busy place, and her time was mostly entertaining as she listening intently to the conversations and bustle of the markets and docks through the iron walls of her stall. The mothers and children, the husbands and soldiers, the town crier and the men working at their stalls.
She considered it an experience that she would not have minded much if she had been a year or so younger, but now it just infuriated her. How she hated them and their sleep breaking voices that screech worse than the owls at night. She thought the sound of the wolves starting their hunt was more calming then the slaps of the mothers as they disciplined their crying toddlers.
One of the corral men came, he patted her.
She tried to bite him.
He just a laughed at her and left.
She neighed after him about how much of a bastard he was for leaving her to stand and rage days away from her life. Pathetic man, do not try and think yourself better than me!
Only Satan is allowed to think that, and that is for the simple reason that he was.
On September 5, a battle started to froth out in the waters. The distant scream of cannons stirred her alive with memories of her own experience, running down the necks of those great animals, starring into their dark mouths. No fear, cold and knowing like the man that was perched upon her massive withers.
The town quickly fled screaming, she listened as bottles smashed and the clatter of a hundred carts all trying to be dragged to safety at the one time down the one street. The stampeding feet of the people was pounding all around her. So were the impacts of the cannons.
One of the walls further down the barn was blown away as a cannon ball fired, she heard all the screams of the horses as they were embedded with shrapnel or simply crushed.
Screams… the music of war.
It is not common practice to bother saving the animals. That usual led to the freaked out horses bolting or charging, wasting time better spent and creating unnecessary injuries.
It chilled her how level headed and undeterred she was with the threat of impending doom. All ready she could smell the beginnings of fire as the ships started to break through the defences. They were aiming for the fort that was nested in the harbour.
She was just standing there, listening to the pain filled voices of others and the disappearing stampede of people, the last just now peppering away leaving only soldiers grunting as they wrestled invaders and troops.
The sight of flames creeping under the entrance to the barn was what finally sparked her into action.
Nibbling at the lock on her door, she tried to mimic what the humans did, not a hard feat considering that the average horse could figure it out as well. Walking out of her stall she lazily plodded through the enormous barn, licking open locks for the other horses in the barn that were too panic stricken to figure it out on their own.
Even the camels, though she shuddered at herself afterwards.
The barn was starting to turn cloudy and dark, only the warm glow of the flames under the entrance doors visible through the smoke. Starting for it at a canter, she decided split second that she would have to charge it and run through the flames outside.
And as she speed closer and closer, her thoughts were not too nervous at all, it was like she had failed to fully grasp the danger she was in, even now as she lower her head and slammed into the doors with her shoulder.
What she was thinking about as she ran through the flames, the tips of her hair lighting like candles, was of how dismayed it made her that most of the horses had stayed stubbornly in their stables, confused with what was going on and seeking the safety of their stall walls rather than the hot, smoking danger of outside. There was nothing she could do for them; at least they could run if they wanted to.
Quickly she flew off about the docks, weaving through fires and on most occasions having to squeeze her eyes and lungs and charge through them. She though she saw Satan one time, outlines in orange as he too fled injured through the bombed port. But of course, he was not there, for when she re doubled in surprise he had disappeared.
Why was she seeing Satan? Why not her mother or the globe carrying human who was her one sole source of true comfort? Why not the candy stallion or members of the herd.
Herd. She had never called them family. All they were to her was an interesting turn of events, a challenge, something to test the extent of her cunning with. Damn she was a shallow fool horse.
She dived into the first glimpse of water she caught, the icy ocean drowning where she had been aflame and searing new pain into her cuts and burns. She kicked desperately alongside the shore, fighting the swirling, smashing waves of the crackling night. She never stopped until she made it out of the battling harbour. As they got further and further behind her, she dared to spare an ear and listen closely, to the last shouts of the soldiers as they loaded cannons and fought above her on the walls.
Creeping out of the ocean dripping, she struck a stride and followed the lines of the sea, certain that if only she held to the sand and followed its curves along, she would make it to the countryside and be away with it all.
From a distance she turned and watched the entire harbour dismantle into flames. She tried to block out the screams that cut through the midnight air. And it struck her then, like a blade to the fatty part of the chest, that she had been the only one to make it out.
She turned and ran, oily tears of horror and post trauma bubbling along her neck as she racing away and through Yorktown. The buildings became a blur of dark black colours as she raced, mindlessly following the cobbled, stilled arteries of the city.
She knew why she was so calm, she understood now.
She had been so scared that she had gone numb.
With Satan in the war, she was empty of fear, now alone in the cannon fire, she was filled with nothing but it.
What could make her change so much, from demon to duckling? Because Satan wasn't there? But she remembers how she had not cared for him; he had just been a spark to her riot.
Turning down an alleyway, she found a pile of hay amongst the fences and the grass, crying and heaving she took shuddering breathes.
It was because back then, she had nothing to live for, and was not afraid to die.
Now though, while the twin demons death and danger chased at her heels, she had regrets and desperate aches to do more.
She wanted to find Satan; she had wanted to live to see the granted glory of next day. She had become greedy for life, because it had started to look so much more promising than ever before.
In the next days after the battle, the lost livestock was rounded out of their city hiding spots and taken to the town square to be re-claimed.
When the carral man leapt for joy upon finding her, she couldn't help but see him in a fond light for the first time. She had never known that she was this precious to him.
"Thank the lord good gal, I thought you had burned for sure. They can't argue with this, this is god's intention plain and clear to even the blindest man. You gonna make me the richest muster alive!"
Oh, maybe not then.
But still, he was rather funny.
And she was just glad to see the granted glory of next day.