AUTHOR'S NOTE: so this site has been down for most of the week and may not be back for everyone yet. Reminder that I also post new chapters on the Fiver's Honeycomb forum (link on my profile) and on AO3.

Anyway, if you can read this, I hope you enjoy the chapter!

Chapter 274: Not Over Yet.

"He got the action, he got the motion

Oh, yeah, the boy can play

Dedication, devotion

He turnin' all the nighttime into the day"

-Dire Straits, Walk Of Life

-"I remember when I attacked my first warren. The only major casualty was my left eye. This time, I intend to keep my other eye, and all of you will hopefully keep your eyes too."

This was Woundwort's idea of a motivational speech, as he gave instructions to his owsla shortly before the battle. He instructed his owsla to go back to the top of the Down, albeit more slowly than before, taking advantage of various patches of tall grass to be harder to spot. Much to their surprise, they met absolutely no resistance along the way; no rabbits or other creatures attacked. By the time they reached the top, and gathered around the beech tree, they had not met a single outsider.

The rabbits were becoming nervous. This was not normal; it was clearly a trap of some sort. A quick glimpse into the entrance did not reveal anything suspicious, or anything at all.

-"Vervain, you go underground first," Woundwort ordered. "Once it is safe, signal us to follow; do not turn back under any circumstances."

Vervain sighed. This was obviously another scheme to get rid of him. If this really was a trap, he would be the first victim and would suffer greatly, while those who followed would be able to avoid the worst of it. Woundwort wouldn't kill him directly, but he would always assign him the most dangerous tasks until the inevitable happened. He was hungry, thirsty and tired, he had been beaten up, shouted at, shot at, and charged by a goat. He didn't have the strength to argue; he went in without questioning.

At first, there was nothing to report, but as Vervain made it deeper into the warren, he spotted a pair of eyes in the distance. They were not rabbit eyes, the shape was all wrong. The snarl that came afterwards did not come from a rabbit either. Realizing that this was elil, Vervain panicked. He turned around and ran.

-"ELIL! ELIL!" he shouted, bolting out of the entrance. Before anyone else could process his words, Bark jumped out of the hole, grabbed the nearest rabbit (who happened to be Feldspar) and snapped his neck. The first Darkhaven casualty of the day, resulting in mass panic.

-"BADGERS AREN'T DANGEROUS!" Woundwort shouted. "EVERYONE FIGHT!"

And so the battle began. Despite being larger and stronger than anyone else, Bark was outnumbered, one against hrair. She put up a valiant fight, killing a few more Darkhaveners, but she was eventually left with no choice but to retreat, to save her own life.

After exiting the warren, Vervain kept running, only stopping as he reached the bottom of the Down. He hid in a bush, hoping the badger wouldn't find him there. After a few minutes, however, he felt a paw on his neck, and assumed the worst.

-"Were you fleeing, Vervain?"

While Vervain was relieved that it wasn't the badger who had found him, Woundwort was also terrifying.

-"N-n-n-no..." Vervain started by denying, but soon came to the conclusion that there was no point in doing so; it would be safer to confess to the obvious, and hope for the best. "Yes, sir."

-"Didn't I warn you not to flee?"

-"Yes, sir."

-"Do you realize how many rabbits your incompetence has cost me?"

-"Yes, sir."

-"Stop lying! You can't know, you were hiding like a coward while the rest of us were battling that savage beast."

-"Yes, sir. Sorry, sir."

-"Hrair rabbits died because of you."

-"That's horrible, sir."

-"And believe me, nothing would bring me greater pleasure than you joining them in Inlé. But I need every rabbit I can get for today's attack."

-"Thank you, sir."

Woundwort removed his paw from Vervain's neck, allowing him to get up. The two rabbits returned to the top of the Down; Vervain did his best to look away from the corpses that Bark had left behind, as did most of the others.

-"I'm going underground," Woundwort announced. "Stay here until I give the order to invade."

Everyone else nodded, and the General vanished underground. A few minutes later, he returned, visibly angry.

-"THE WARREN IS EMPTY!"

-"Empty?" Vervain said without thinking. "But that's impossible!"

-"Are you calling me a liar?"

-"...no, sir."

-"Don't believe me? Then go see for yourself!"

The Darkhaveners ran underground, splitting in several groups to explore the various tunnels. They met again in the Honeycomb afterwards, confirming that Woundwort was telling the truth: the warren really was empty.

-"All I found was a dead doe in one of burrows, a former Efrafan," Kurai said, referring to Heather. He sounded disappointed, as if he wished that he had been the one to kill her. "But not a single living rabbit anywhere."

-"Where did they all go?" Granite asked stupidly.

-"Defeated by the outsiders, this is ridiculous! You bunch of fools! You weaklings! You morons! You...you..." Woundwort was furious; looking for someone to blame, he settled on his owsla, but he soon ran out of insults. "By the time I'm done with these outsiders, there won't be a single one of them alive!"

-"Don't worry, sir," Granite said. "It was a good effort, You can still preserve the idea, and use it on someone else. Find another warren to attack."

-"THIS WAS ALL A TRICK! IT WAS RIGGED!"

Woundwort walked from one tunnel to another, mumbling in frustration and anger. Unsure what else they could do, his owsla followed him. Until suddenly, he noticed something unusual on one of the walls.

-"Look at this. This was recently collapsed."

-"Maybe they're all hiding in a burrow on the other side," Vervain speculated...only to regret it as soon as he heard Woundwort's response.

-"Maybe they are. You dig and find out."

Woundwort did more than try to have Vervain killed: he also did his best to humiliate him, by making him do does' work. The fact was that, with Spartina having switched sides, and the Speaker having run off, there were no does available to dig; but Vervain did not see it that way, thinking only of his humiliation.

After what felt like forever, Vervain finally broke through the wall, revealing the escape tunnel. The sight left him furious: while Woundwort ordered a break from combat in honour of that traitor Campion, the outsiders fled! This was Woundwort's fault, but he knew better than to blame the General, who was already mad enough at him as it was.

-"Now we know where they went," was all he said.

-"Does this mean the war is over?" Aspen asked, doing his best not to sound cheerful.

-"Of course not, you fool!" Woundwort instantly replied. "They must be somewhere in the area. With so many of them, they must have left tracks, and they may not be able to travel quickly; we just have to follow them, and when they stop to rest, we take advantage of their distraction to attack. And kill EVERY SINGLE ONE of them."

The Darkhaveners cheered, happy to see the war would continue. Woundwort went through the tunnel, with his owsla following; upon reaching the exit, he sniffed the ground and soon found the outsiders' trail, which he began to follow.

While most of the rabbits were excited at the prospect of another battle soon, Aspen was instead feeling demoralized. Even after forcing the outsiders away from their home, Woundwort refused to end the war. Had they not suffered enough already?

Making things worse was Campion's absence: while he and Aspen had not always been able to cooperate, his death now left Aspen alone against everyone else. He looked across the crowd to see if there was someone else he could possibly approach for help; he soon spotted another rabbit who seemed just as depressed as he was.

-"Anxious about the battle?" he asked, just as anxious.

Coltsfoot was startled. He had not expected anyone except the Speaker to speak with him, but she was nowhere to be found. Since Aspen was asking, he would tell the truth.

-"Y...yes. I would rather it didn't happen. You see, the Speaker of the Past has been telling me all about the law. The current battle is against the law."

At the mention of the Speaker of the Past, Aspen cringed. He had never been able to fully understand what was up with her. Her behaviour was unusual, and Campion also seemed confused by her; as such, they hardly ever interacted. Still, if the current battle was illegal, perhaps this could be weaponized against Woundwort.

-"Did you tell anyone? I know the others like fighting, but they're probably not hardened criminals. They would care about the law."

-"I tried. Nobody listened to me."

How disappointing, Aspen thought. Unfortunately, it seemed likely that the law would also be a bust.

-"Then what can we do?" was his next question.

-"The Speaker also told me about a big human burrow."

Aspen blinked a few times, confused about this seemingly random statement.

-"Why did she tell you about that?"

-"I don't know. But everything she does is for a reason, even if that reason is beyond the understanding of us inferior rabbits."

-"Inferior?"

Aspen was insulted: was the Speaker really thinking of herself as superior to the others? Perhaps she was, since she opposed the war, but the way Coltsfoot seemed to calmly accept his own supposed inferiority was disturbing. He may not be such a good ally after all...