Riderless horse
Sherlock sat impatiently near the bridge. Where was Stark? The clock had stuck three half an hour ago; he was late. Shouting from down the street caught Sherlocks attention. He stood up and looked around the corner, there were three men gathered around a dark bay horse. It was in full tack, but had no rider. Sherlock’s breath caught in his throat. The horse was Hydrid, one of Watson’s horses, furthermore the one Stark had been riding. Sherlock got back on his horse and approached the men sarrownding the horse.
“Excuse me gentlemen that is one of my horses,” He said calmly.
“Well ye auta take better note uh where ya lettim run. He almos’ plowed over dem ladies over der,” One of the men spoke up, “Her’, take em, and don’ be letten im run rampant no more.”
Sherlock nodded and took the reins from the man. He turned his horse around and headed back out of the city. He suspected Stark had gotten lost in the woods.
He rode down the country road keeping his eyes out for where he had gotten back on the road. He would have to track his tracks back to where they split up, and then track Stark’s tracks, and he needed to do all of this quickly before the sun went back down.
It didn’t take him long to find where he had gotten on the road, from there it was easy finding the horse tracks in the snow. He soon found where they had split up. He gave his horse a kick, and they cantered through the woods following Stark’s trail. The trail led out of the woods, and into a huge field. He followed the tracks up a hill, and when he came to the rise of the hill he discovered Stark.
Stark was sitting happily on top of the robot, which was laying with its face buried in the ground. There was a long metal spike sticking through its head. Stark looked up.
“I was wondering how long it would take for you to show up,” Stark said, he looked a little dazed.
“Are you alright?” Sherlock asked, trying to pinpoint what exactly might be wrong.
“Perfectly fine,” Stark assured him, “Just a little tired.”
“Well that's understandable. Neither of us slept last night.”
“Yeah,” Stark laughed a little.
“What happened to the metal thing?”
“Oh, right him. Let’s just say it’s not fun fighting a metal dude without weapons, and its really not fun when he pulls out a metal spike. I can’t tell you how many times I almost got impaled.”
Sherlock raised an eyebrow. Starks nonchalant manner of mentioning almost getting impaled surprised him.
“I am glad you survived.”
“Yeah, me too,” Stark said getting to his feet, “I see brought my horse. Thank you.”
“So you have a plan?” Sherlock asked.
“Well sleep would be nice, and also finding somewhere to store this thing would be nice,” Stark said giving the robot a kick.
“Shall we go back to Watson’s?”
“That seems like the best option,” Stark agreed.