Chapter 249: The Last Evening.
"The magic held within my heart will stop the foe whose mind is dark. A friend will give his life tonight and stop running to win the fight."
-BlazeRabbit, Tales of the Lord Frith Owsla
Early that evening, Holly went to check up on the progress above ground; he was pleased with what he saw. Hrair boulders had been excavated and were ready to be rolled away when needed. All the entrances were filled in, apart from the main one just under the beech tree, and the emergency exit leading far away. The trench around the warren was deep enough for rabbits to stand guard unnoticed. He had heard from Blackberry that she had obtained a large supply of healing herbs. It appeared that the warren was as ready as it would ever be.
-"You've all done well," he told the rabbits still at work. "You're all relieved of duty until Woundwort arrives."
Bigwig, however, did not share this assessment.
-"We could use more traps and defences, they need to keep working as long as they can, we may not have much longer before Woundwort arrives."
-"If they're too tired to fight him, he will win," Holly retorted. "They need to rest."
-"This may be the last night of our lives..." Hawkbit said softly.
-"It won't be, if we're ready when Woundwort shows up," Bigwig said, recognizing Holly's logic. "Those of you who do NOT feel the need to rest just yet, come with me, so we can prepare some more surprises for our enemies."
-"We should make the most of the time we have left," Bluebell suggested. "At Marli-rah we sometimes..."
-"We're not doing that," Blackberry said firmly, anticipating what Bluebell was going to say.
-"I wasn't going to suggest that, but we can still learn from it. We should probably spend the limited time we have with our loved ones."
It was around that moment that Spartina arrived above ground, having slept for the entire afternoon. Once she arrived, the first thing she noticed was a large badger climbing the Down. Unaware that this was Bark, and that Hannah was sitting on her back, she readied her battle pose. She was about to pounce, but Bigwig held her back.
-"That's Bark, she's perfectly harmless," he clarified, not wanting a bloody battle to occur.
-"Hannah tell me big war coming up," the badger said.
-"Yes..." Spartina said, slightly confused as to how the Watership Down rabbits had become friends with a badger, traditionally elil. "We were wondering if you could help us with the fighting..."
-"Bark like to fight!" With that, she ripped some bark off a nearby tree.
-"What's all this about, Hannah?" Bigwig asked.
-"I heard ye needed help with digging, so I got ye the help ye need with the moles. Oof, and Bark could also be useful so, I brought 'er too."
-"Good job, Hannah!"
-"Oof! When even Bigwig praises ye, ye know ye did good."
Bluebell's suggestion proved to be very popular. Hazel and Fiver had decided to spend the evening together, but they also wanted their respective mates (and, in Hazel's case, his kittens) to be present. Primrose also wanted to be with her sister, and Hyzenthlay asked Thethuthinnang and Holly to come too. The kittens had also requested the presence of their junior owsla captain Pipkin, who in turn wished for Nyreem's presence. This led to a total of thirteen rabbits in one small burrow; it was rather cramped.
For most of the evening, the rabbits did not speak; they remained close together, enjoying each other's presence.
Following Blackberry's departure, Lady May spent the afternoon alone in the burrow; it was very boring. It was only shortly past sunset that Clover finally arrived. Lady May's first words, predictably, were another insult:
-"Are you Clover? Ugh, took you long enough to get here."
Clover also remembered her prior encounter with Lady May, when she was still in the hutch. She quickly decided that she would not be as patient as Blackberry had been.
-"I see you haven't changed," she said in annoyance. "Why should I bother trying to befriend someone with such a nasty attitude, when I already have friends and a mate who treat me with respect?"
As Clover got ready to hop back out, Lady May was faced with instant regret. Not because she realized that she had been rude, but because she would once again be alone.
-"Wait! I'm...I'm sorry..."
-"That's a start."
If Lady May could manage that, there was hope for her, Clover thought, as she lied down in a corner of the burrow.
-"I hear Spartina brought you here from Darkhaven?"
-"She did," Lady May confirmed. "Darkhaven would be a nice place, if it weren't for all the fighting, Kurai, and everything else."
-"Kurai?" Clover knew about Woundwort, Campion and Vervain, of course, but Kurai was one name she had not heard before.
-"He's a total creep. He tried to kill me a few times. I tried telling the others, but nobody believed me."
Clover was not surprised by this revelation. Considering how obnoxious Lady May could be, and how the Darkhaveners thrived on violence, the fact that someone had tried to kill her was to be expected. She was lucky to have survived these murder attempts.
-"Not to worry, I doubt anyone would be willing to go that far here. You may survive for many seasons."
The two rabbits fell silent; it soon dawned on Lady May that she had no idea how to hold a polite conversation. Clover had also run out of things to say; it was only once she got ready to leave again that Lady May thought of something:
-"Blackberry said that I would have to stay here and others would have to bring me food, but wouldn't it be easier if others carried me out?"
-"Maybe, but it won't be me," was Clover's response. "I'll get an owsla officer to carry you."
That officer turned out to be captain Broom. Clover found him alone in his burrow: he had been unable to find anyone willing to listen to his tales of old Redstone. He was pleased to hear that someone needed his help, and he did not complain as he carried Lady May above ground. The doe did not complain either: as much as she hated being transported on someone's back, it was preferable to the alternative, staying in that same boring burrow for days.
Once dropped off in front of the beech tree, she took a bite of grass. It was very bland, compared to the flayrah she had enjoyed in the past, but it was much better than the "grass" she had to eat in Darkhaven after she was banned from the flayrah chamber. Considering how hungry she was, it would have to do.
-"This warren is...not so bad," she said. It was more than just the food: the burrows, while still rough compared to her past life, were still far ahead of what Darkhaven offered.
-"Glad you're enjoying things here, I suppose," was Clover's response.
Lady May looked up at the sky; it was cloudy, but she could still make out the faint shape of the moon, far away.
"Thanks a lot, Campion. Sorry about you getting killed," she whispered.
-"What was that?" Clover asked.
-"Campion helped me escape. I didn't get the opportunity to thank him at the time, so I'm doing it now. I'm looking at the moon because that's where dead rabbits go according to your beliefs, right? Obviously it's a lot of nonsense, the moon is nothing but a barren, airless wasteland, nobody lives there apart from the hrududil that humans sent there. But I have to at least pretend to believe if I'm going to be living here, right?"
-"Campion's dead!?" Clover asked in shock.
-"Of everything I just said, that's the detail that catches your attention?" Lady May, tired of being nice, returned to her previous rude behaviour. "Didn't Spartina tell you? Of course that fool is dead, like all overrated heroes."
-"That's highly unfortunate," captain Broom said. "The battle hasn't even started yet and we already have one casualty. You know, this reminds me..."
Sensing another boring Redstone story, Clover hopped away, planning to share the tragic news regarding Campion. Lady May, unable to follow her, was forced to stay there and listen to the elderly captain's ramblings. There was nobody around her she could ask to carry her back to her burrow, except captain Broom himself, and he was too busy talking.
Captain Broom continued rambling for at least a full hour, until he completed his story.
-"You know, I think this is the first time someone actually listened to the end," he said once he was finished. "I like you."
-"Yes, it was...fascinating..." It really wasn't, but Lady May didn't want to risk antagonizing him, as she still relied on him for transportation. "Can you take me to my burrow now?"
-"This is ridiculous. Everyone cannot possibly be that tired."
To Bigwig's great annoyance, only one rabbit had volunteered to help him: Spartina. She appreciated Bluebell's idea of spending time with loved ones, they deserved it after working all day, but of course, that was not enough for Bigwig. She had volunteered because she felt it would be the best of both worlds: she would be able to spend time with him after being apart for a while, and she would also be productive.
A short distance from the Down, the two rabbits were gathering moss, leaves and branches, and piling them all over the crack caused by the recent earthquake. The goal was to hide it from casual observers; some unsuspecting Darkhaveners would step onto the fake ground, believing it to be solid, only to fall to the bottom of the pit. While it might not kill them, it should still incapacitate some of them, at least temporarily.
-"This is way too predictable," Bigwig said. "They already know about this trench, they will just avoid it."
Spartina dropped the twigs she was holding.
-"Perhaps we could also dig some additional traps across the area," she suggested. "It would be harder for the Darkhaveners to find their locations."
-"That's a good idea...in theory. But remember: there are only two of us. We'll never have enough time to do this."
-"We could recruit someone else to help us."
-"But they're all busy resting! Like Holly said, if we push them too far, they will be too fired to fight when Woundwort arrives."
-"The rabbits may be resting, but remember the creatures that Hannah brought along. Some of them may be able to help."