I was woken up by a loud, musical sound. All of the men there were lined up in many rows. Some man was giving announcements when I heard him say something.
"Warriors from the Kateri tribe are coming up fast." He said looking at the man in charge, the one who broke me.
"How many?" The man in charge asked, starting to pace.
"10 to 12" he said. They did care about me! I wanted to ask about something but I knew they wouldn't understand.
"Send out 20 men, they don't have their prize warhorse with them. They won't be as strong. Right after these announcements take the horse over to me." the man in charge said and then immediately left.
The other man started back up with other announcements. None mattered to me so I turned back around and paced around. After a few minutes a tall man came and got me. He tied the rope on my 'halter' (the rope around my face.)
He walked my to a square, wooden, human house. The man who broke me came out of the wooden slab called a door. I finally got to see him clearly. His mane was brown and long for a human. His lip was also really hairy. His pelt was blue with pieces of gold on his chest.
He looked me over, felt my back and my stomach, and inspected my face closely.
"Get her branded, if we show those savages who's boss they might leave." Said the man with the hairy lip. The tall man took me over to a really fat man with shiny things. I was roped in between two tree trunks. The fat man started to use the shiny things to cute off my mane.
"No! Don't do that! We need her like that, just brand her!" yelled the man in charge. With that comment the fat man laid off and lucky for me he only cut off a little bit of my hair so it wasn't too noticeable.
The man got a glowing rod and he spun it around. I had no idea how that little rod changed my life. He pressed the wide part against my skin and it burned. I couldn't escape though, I bucked and kicked but it still stung. He took it off but it felt worse I looked at it and I had the two letters, U and S on my coat. I neighed as loud as I could for help.
"Take her back." Said the fat man. The guy with the rope started to bring me back to my enclosure but the mustache guy interrupted him.
"I'll take her." He smirked. I neighed with rejection but that didn't stop him. He tied me to a post and called a meeting.
"I need 30 of our men on horse's in ten minutes. I don't care if you have to ride a mare, just do it." He yelled to the rows of men. The men scattered to find horses and to get them ready for whatever was going on. In ten minutes there were 30 men on top of 30 horses and then there was that black stallion. The man untied me from the post and to the black stallion. I rolled my eyes as he looked at me.
"Troops, we are going to the Kateri tribe." The men whooped and hollered. Were they taking me home? "Let's head out."
The giant wooden boards opened to let us out. The burn I had on my shoulder hurt even more when we walked.
"So," the black stallion started to talk to me. I just snorted at his effort; I was going home, I didn't need his pity or lust. As we walked, the sun started to go down. We walked a little bit before we stopped for the night.
The men tied us up on a fallen log while they made a fire and food. I was tied up between a brown mare and the black stallion. We at the little grass that was on the floor before someone said something to me.
"You know they aren't taking you home, right?" said the mare.
"What? Of coarse they are!" I tossed my head with reject.
"No. They are taking you there as bait. They are going to let you off rope and when your tribe comes out they are going to kill them." The mare responded. "I used to be a Native American horse, a Crow horse to be exact. They did the same thing to me. That burn you have on you means you belong to the army forever. They will never let you go!"
"My tribe will come for me." I wouldn't let what one mare said scare me out of my hope. I slowly fell asleep, dreaming of running with Strong Night.
I woke up before everyone else, and decided to try to free myself. I pulled, yanked, tugged and about everything else you could imagine. It was use less but there was one thing I didn't think of. I snatched the rope into my mouth and started to chew. The rope didn't taste very good but I didn't care, this was my ticket home.
The bond finally broke and with no hesitance I ran. I sprinted where my instincts told me, the burn hurt but I didn't care. I would look behind me periodically but no one had followed me.