AUTHOR'S NOTE: warning, this is another dark chapter...

Chapter 284: The Execution.

"Yet, he had hoped that it would be a gentle passing, surrounded by family and friends. But no, he was going to die here, alone and uncomforted."

-Legatum, Welcome Home

Flesca was sleeping peacefully in her burrow at New Sandleford. Lying against Celandine, her former warren abandoned, she was the happiest she had ever been in her life.

But this feeling was short-lived: in the middle of the night, she was woken up by a kick in the face. Opening her eyes, she saw another rabbit standing over her, keeping her pinned to the ground.

-"What..."
-"Not a sound." The stranger, who Flesca recognized by voice as Toadflax, placed one of his paws over her mouth. "Wake him up, and you're both dead."

Flesca was unsure what Toadflax's motivations were. Still, he would probably not hesitate to carry out his threat, and the prospect of losing her mate so soon after finding him was too much to bear; therefore, she weakly nodded.

-"Follow me."

Once again, fearing for her mate's life, Flesca obeyed. Toadflax led her above ground, all the way to the field in front of the former warren of the shining wires.

-"What's this all about?" she asked.

-"You stole my warren!"

-"That snare-infested death trap?" Flesca was amused that this was the reason behind Toadflax's tantrum. "Please. I did you all a favour."

-"The snares might take the others, but not me."

-"Do you even hear yourself? You're getting to be as bad as Cowslip."

-"You take that back!" Toadflax was greatly offended by this comment.

-"Right. I'm sorry, that was confusing. I wasn't talking about the ghost, but about the actual living rabbit who decided to team up with Woundwort."

-"There was no Cowslip, and now he's gone."

Flesca sighed, as Toadflax was now speaking exactly like Cowslip used to.

-"You're deluded. You know that don't you?"

-"Maybe I am," Toadflax admitted. "But I would rather be deluded than a traitor like you."

Toadflax took a seat at the warren's main entrance, staring directly at Flesca.

-"You are charged with two heinous crimes: betrayal, and murder. How do you plead?"

-"A trial? Really?" Flesca scoffed. "I did what I had to do. I have no regrets. Since when does this warren have any laws, anyway?"

-"'I did what I had to do'," Toadflax repeated. "That sounds like a confession. You are hereby found guilty."

-"Wait what?" Toadflax's sudden verdict left Flesca worried. "Don't I get a jury?"

-"No. You get a sentence."

Toadflax quickly pounced on Flesca; his superior size left her unable to fight back. He soon lifted her off the ground, holding her tightly with his front paws. Fearing what he would do to her, the doe tried to escape, but to no avail. She tried kicking with her hind legs, but she was unable to reach anything with them. She tried lowering her head to bite the paws, but he simply raised one of his paws and held his claws against her neck, making such a move impossible.

Toadflax slowly carried Flesca over to a nearby bush. It was then that she noticed the wire, appearing as a near-perfect circle over the ground, faintly shining in the moonlight. And worst of all, Toadflax was positioning her directly towards it.

-"What are you doing!?" she yelled.

-"The sentence...is death," Toadflax coldly announced.

Flesca was terrified. Everything she had done was to obtain freedom from the wires, and now these same wires would be her end. She started kicking again, but it remained pointless, Toadflax's grip was firm.

-"I'm sorry I betrayed you!" Of course, she wasn't really sorry, nor did she consider her behaviour a betrayal, but desperate times called for desperate measures. "I'm sorry I killed Buckthorn! I won't do this again!"

-"Once is already too many."

Toadflax dropped Flesca to the ground, and immediately lied down on her back so she wouldn't get up. With one of his front paws, he started pressing against her head, bringing it ever closer to the wire. She did her best to push back in the opposite direction, but this was painful for her neck.

-"If you do this, Celandine will kill you!" she said, desperately trying to make him reconsider.

-"By the time he even notices that you're missing, I'll be long gone."

Suddenly, Toadflax gave her a powerful slap to the face. Dizzy and disoriented, she was unable to process what was going on around her; the buck had no trouble kicking her forward, sending her falling forward into the shining target. The feeling of the cold, sharp metal against her fur brought her back to reality. She tried to squeal, but the sound was cut short by the tightening wire cutting off her air supply. She kicked and twisted all around, but to no avail, the wire kept getting tighter. In the corner of her eye, she thought she saw Toadflax staring at her, and it looked as if he was smiling.

Acorn was having trouble sleeping. His new burrow was very comfortable, that was not the issue. Instead, he was too busy thinking. He had no idea what the future would bring, and that caused him great anxiety.

He found himself longing for the old life at the warren of the shining wires: at least it brought certainty. The certainty of the daily flayrah, the certainty of the farmer shooting elil and, yes, the certainty of a painful death in a wire. But at least he knew what he was facing. Now he was living in a new warren, surrounded by strangers and a murderer. Would he be able to lead a positive life? Or would the other rabbits in the warren view him and his friends with suspicion, eventually casting them out?

Suddenly, he heard what sounded like squealing, although it stopped almost instantly. Still, this left him even more worried, and these concerns were not about some nebulous future, but something much more immediate. Bolting out of the burrow, he soon bumped into Tindra; it was clear by the look on her face that she had heard it too. They also met up with Speedwell on their way above ground.

At first sight, there was nothing suspicious above ground, at least until the rabbits heard rustling coming from the direction of the old warren. Hesitantly, they approached that warren; if this was elil, then they should probably report back to the owsla of the new warren.

But it was not elil. Instead, it was Toadflax. And, in front of him, Flesca was lying on the ground, a wire around her neck. The sight was appalling; while everyone always knew that this happened in the past, it was always out of sight, out of mind. Now that they saw her kicking and twitching, they were horrified.

-"What are you doing!?" Acorn shouted.

-"Executing the murderer," Toadflax calmly replied.

-"But that's murder!"

-"She is a murderer, yes."

-"And so are you!"

-"Her crimes must not go unpunished."

-"So what's your solution? Killing the killer? Where does it end? By leaving her there, you are as bad as she is."

-"She's killing the innocent. I'm killing the guilty. We are not the same."

-"Sorry, I don't mean to interrupt," Tindra said, "but while you two are all busy talking, she's busy dying."

Indeed, Flesca's kicking had greatly slowed in just a few minutes.

-"And just what do you plan to do about it?" Toadflax said, with a hint of aggression in his voice.

Speedwell, meanwhile, was sniffing the snare.

-"All right, nobody panic," he said. "Snares can be escaped from, Celandine said he rescued several rabbits from them. How did he do it, Flesca?"

-"You fool, she's obviously in no state to talk!" Acorn called out; indeed, Flesca had started to foam at the mouth.

-"Right...so that's a bust..." Realizing the obvious, Speedwell tried to think of something else. "Let's try biting the wire."

-"Are you all seriously trying to save her?" Toadflax seemed furious. "She's a cold-blooded killer!" He turned to Acorn. "You of all rabbits should know better. You were one of her victims, after all."

-"One murder is already enough," Acorn replied. "We don't need a second one."

-"Then you'll have to fight me!" Toadflax scratched the ground, ready to fight.

This made Acorn wonder: was it really worth it to fight over this? The only time he had ever fought was when Woundwort had come; with so little experience, he had severe doubts about his chances of success, especially against a bigger rabbit than him. Besides, Flesca was a murderer, therefore her life was not worth as much as the others'. However, Celandine would not see it that way, and would likely cause trouble for everyone once he found out. Unless he too was killed, but he was innocent...

Acorn was still debating when Toadflax pounced first. This made the entire thought process moot: he would have to fight, if not for Flesca, then to save his own life. Fortunately, despite his superior size, Toadflax also had no idea what he was doing.

-"It's no good," came Speedwell's voice. "Biting the wire doesn't do anything."

-"But clawing at it won't work either!" Tindra said. "It will only tighten it even further."

-"Let me try it at another angle..."

As Acorn kept fighting Toadflax, he managed to make a lucky hit, slashing him across the nose. This proved to be fatal for Toadflax: blood was flowing through his nostrils, blocking his airway, and making him slowly suffocate. His attempts at cleaning the blood failed, as more kept flowing. He soon collapsed to the ground, motionless. Acorn, Tindra and Speedwell could only stare at him in shock.

-"Is he dead?" Tindra asked hesitatingly.

Acorn placed his paws on Toadflax's chest.

-"He's not breathing, the heartbeat is hardly there..."

-"What did you do?"

-"I don't know!" At this, Acorn started to panic. "Oh no, in my attempt at stopping a murder, I committed one myself, this is a mistake..."

-"You may not have even stopped the first murder, we're getting nowhere here!" Speedwell shouted. "I've tried everything; manipulating the wire does not help."

Leaving Toadflax to his grim fate, Acorn went to Flesca; by this point, she was practically motionless. As Speedwell had done before, he carefully sniffed the wire.

-"If not the wire, then the peg."

Tindra gently poked the peg with her paw; it moved a little, loosening the wire ever so slightly.

-"We have to dig it out," she said.

Tindra looked at her two companions; despite her instructions, they did not dig. Instead, they remained motionless, staring at Flesca and the wire.

-"What are you two waiting for?" she asked.

-"I've never dug in my life..." Acorn confessed.

-"Me neither," Speedwell added.

-"Same here, but there's always a first time! Everyone dig!"

Despite everyone's best attempts, the digging went very poorly. There was very little room around the peg, and with three rabbits trying to dig, they often accidentally clawed at each others' paws instead of the ground. It took several long minutes before they had finally dug deep enough, and the peg snapped in two. This finally allowed the wire around Flesca's neck to loosen enough for her to breathe again...but she did not. Tindra went to her and sniffed her; tears appeared in her eyes as she reached the foregone conclusion.

-"We're too late."

-"No..."

-"She's cold, she's not breathing, her neck is open. She's very, very dead."