Following the trail to the emptied warren, I saw that I had a multitude of regular rabbits following me in the shadows. Some of them would occasionally hop out in front of me and glare. I assumed they were looking to intimidate me, but none of them even came close to giving off the presence of the regular purple eyed rabbits, let alone that old monster. One of the best examples I have ever come across of how size doesn’t matter, I really don’t think even Gaian and I together could take him in a fight. So all I could do was be grateful he seemed to recognize guest rights, and that he was okay with letting me get freshened up before our meeting instead of slapping me down and dragging me off by the ear.
I could only think that he, both needed us omnivores for some other task and was hoping that trading for the flowers was his way of buttering us up to help him, rather than simply claiming them as fait accompli through strength of arms. My son had gotten into martial arts, as he had started getting into his teen years. At first, when he was younger it had been a chore to make him go. We ended up joining several mcdojo’s before finally finding one that seemed to stick. The sensei in charge had a presence like that of the old rabbit. He had only been a little older than me, but he was a retired navy seal, and you could just tell that absolutely nothing you could do would matter if you started a fight with him… not that I ever had the slightest inclination to do so.
I had been pleased at the time by the increase in my son’s discipline and now was really regretting not joining the adult classes. I had been too embarrassed at the time with my overweight status and had always kept telling myself that as soon as I had gotten into better shape on my own, that would be the time that I would join. Now that I was finding myself in a fantasy world armed with Iron Age weapons, all I could do was double down and focus on trying to improve as swiftly as possible. Which meant that I was going to have to try and make a deal for my share of the herbs that Gaian had hopefully brought back.
Getting closer to where the bunnies let us camp, I could hear a rabbit’s shrill screaming coming from that direction. Trusting in the bear to handle the situation without my help, I just continued on at my sedate pace rather than rushing to his defense. When I came to the clearing, I saw that all of the rabbits that we had escorted on our herb heist were gathered in a semi-circle behind their chosen spokeshare. Most of them were lying down with their own piles of herbs in front of them, while a few were behind the ringleader as he confronted the massive bear who had my bucket sitting on the ground in front of him.
Looking at the picture in front of me, I couldn’t help but laugh at the absurdity of an eight-pound rabbit screaming at a five-hundred pound black bear. Although looking at him more closely, I couldn’t help but wonder if he had put on some more weight himself. Not in a bad way, if anything he was looking a little leaner than he had before, but part of me was wondering if he was hitting another growth spurt in this new environment. Before I could follow up on that thought and look down to examine my own self, the indignant rabbit was in front of me in a flash and screaming at me, with his back up just a short few hops behind him.
Ignoring him for the moment, I went over to the log that had been replenished with water in our absence, while giving the bear a wave of acknowledgment. I was happy that he had made a clean escape from the ensuing goblins. Lying my shield and spear down, I was anxious to get a drink. With my bucket in use, I was stuck with dipping my head into the crisp, cool water. Just lowering my mouth in at first, I drank until I was full. Once my stomach was full, I dipped my whole head in, scrubbing my face, and rinsing my hair with my hands feeling a pain of regret at my lost soap. I didn’t know how they did it, but I could only assume that Gaian had his own drink since he had returned, and yet the water was cool and clear and gave no indication that he had fouled the water.
Taking my boots and socks off next, I thought about rinsing them out in the log but decided to hold off until I had a better idea of how they were refreshing the water. Laying my socks over my boots, I looked at my feet, checking them for any damage that my lacking replacement socks might have caused. Finding them just wrinkled, but unbloodied, I resolved to go the rest of the day barefoot to let them dry out. Lifting up my shirt next, I saw that my right side still had a sizeable bruise, but at least the pain was still muted and my ribs weren’t feeling like they wanted to poke out of my skin.
After checking myself over, I thought about addressing the increasingly shrill monster that was hopping circles around me in an effort to force me to acknowledge him. But instead, I ignored him and focused on feeding my hunger to further cement his place in the upcoming negotiations. I ignored the root vegetables and instead started picking up a couple of the spicy pear plums. I slowly savored the way they continuously moved from the different taste profiles before ending up with that last bit of clean sweetness at the end. Wondering if they would taste the same if I dried them for later, I resolved to spend the next couple of days laying in a supply for after our eviction.
With no other tasks to use to continue putting off the annoying rabbit, I finally turned to look at him and said, “What do you want short stuff?”
Apparently able to grasp my insult without the bear’s translating services. He hopped over to where the bucket was and stared at it intently, in an obvious gesture that he wanted his share. Never one to welch on a debt, I had no problem with giving him his due, I had merely taken my time so that I could impress upon him that I wasn’t one to be taken advantage of either.
Taking the bucket from in front of the bear, I sat down and gestured for the hare to stand across from me. Dumping the bucket out in front of us, I had my knife out in a flash as he jumped forward in an eagerness to make off with the loot. At his quick dart back, I asked the bear to make sure he knew we would be dividing everything evenly. “You are going to divide the herbs into two piles,” I told the rabbit. “And then I am going to pick which pile I want, so your best bet is to make them as even as possible so you don’t lose out.”
I could tell he was unhappy with my offer, no doubt he had been hoping to screw the ignorant monkey by giving me the trash while taking the treasure for himself. Watching him add to one pile and then the other, it looked like he was too afraid that I might accidentally figure out the valuable pile, taking two similar herbs he would split them between the two piles before going back for more.
When he finished, I let my hand hover over one pile before switching to holding it over its opposite, hoping to elicit a reaction from my opponent as to which one might have a slightly higher value. The bunny was no poker player, as he started vibrating excitedly when I switched to the second pile. Going back to the first I claimed it for my own to the leporidae’s ears drooping in disappointment. Taking a second so that he could understand I had gotten the better of him, I pushed it forward instead. Asking the bear to tell him that I would always reward my allies well and to keep it in mind for if we needed to plan another adventure before our time here was done.
Pulling back my own pile, the rabbit started jumping around excitedly, doing flips in the air. Asking him if he needed my help to transport the massive amount of goods he had just gained, he instead declined. Calling over some of the gathered crowd of regular rabbits that hadn’t gone on the raid, they quickly gathered everything up and disappeared into the surrounding woods. Gathering up my share into the empty bucket, I sat down cross legged and waited for the inevitable summons to my upcoming confrontation with the rabbit elders. I doubted it would go anywhere near as smoothly.
I was surprised when the summons didn’t come for several hours. Looking up to where the edges of the planet started diving into the horizon I had been thinking that they would be putting the meeting off until tomorrow. As big as the celestial body was, we no doubt still had around two hours until true nightfall, but the waiting hadn’t done anything to calm my nerves. Wondering if this was retaliation for how I had treated the younger generation, I did my best to keep my worries from my mind as I walked next to the softly padding bear as a purple eyed rabbit escorted us to our meeting.
I considered the fact that maybe the exalted beast was doing me an honor by admitting me into his presence. I decided that on going in, I was going to do my best to negotiate on more information. Starting with trying to gain my own magic, I would settle with a basic understanding of how the world worked as a secondary prize. As we came to a clearing that was surrounded by elders. They all looked to be channeling their power into a round stone globe in the center of the clearing.
Surrounding the stone globe that was glowing with a haze of purple energy that was being driven into it, compressing into several of the runes that were carved into the stone dais that the pedestal was the center of. They were glowing a softer version of the same shade of purple, but getting brighter by the minute. Deciding that perhaps thinking they needed to play power games with me was a lot of hubris on my part. I realized that instead, they had just been too busy preparing this ritual. With no sign on their part that they were ready to address me right now, I gave a shallow bow in a martial style to the head elder, who ignored me while maintaining his focus on the task at hand.
Not feeling insulted in the slightest, I merely stepped to the side and knelt down on the ground, sitting back on my heels, while the bear lowered his bulk down beside me. After sitting still for what I estimated to be fifteen minutes, I regretted taking the position I had started in, as I began to feel my feet and calves going numb. Trying to shift myself subtly, I started moving into a lotus position when the low humming that was accompanying the power transfer came to an abrupt ending.
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Seeing the Head hare staring at me, I realized they were waiting for me. With no other helpful indicators forthcoming, I stood up slowly and approached the dais, looking out for any indication I was about to cause a scene by breaking one of their taboos. I hoped that they would stop me before I kicked off an interspecies war with some unknowing transgression.
After I reached the stonework, I waited for more instructions, rather than risk doing something stupid. Finally fed up with the monkey not falling into his trap, the head rabbit, bounded up in two giant leaps and pointed one of his front paws to the glowing stone before jumping back to his original spot. Finally receiving some clear orders, I still couldn’t help but hesitate before slowly reaching out to lay my palm on the glowing stone.
Expecting to be shocked, I was surprised when my palm made contact and I only felt the smooth coolness of a regular stone. Looking back up to the rabbit elder to gain a better understanding of what I might be doing wrong, I couldn’t help but let out a gasp as I saw that the surrounding grass and woods had disappeared. Instead, I found myself standing in an endless purple fog. Intellectually, I doubted that this was some kind of nefarious plan to capture me. But with my being trapped for ages frozen in the ball that brought me here still so fresh of a wound, I had to stop myself from starting to hyperventilate. Focusing on my breathing, I told myself over and over that everything was going to be okay and I wasn’t being taken on another adventure.
Saying the serenity prayer in my mind on repeat, I focused on trying to drop into the breathing pattern that I had found so useful. But for once I found that I couldn’t get into it. I was either going too fast on one part or too slow on the next, but whatever my problem I couldn’t keep my breathing steady. I kept wanting to hyperventilate as I felt myself having to force my body not to start panicking. After what seemed to be an eternity, but in reality was more likely only a couple of minutes, the rabbit elder eventually appeared in front of me.
“Hello young human,” he greeted me softly in English. “We are grateful for your help in raiding the monster faction. We will of course honor the remainder of our truce, but need to have a better understanding of what you intend to do here. Before deciding on how we will continue to deal with you.”
Mouth agape, and mind frozen, I couldn’t help but blurt out my question, despite knowing the answer in my heart. “How are you speaking English!?” I asked loudly.
When he gave a confused look he replied, “I do not know of this English that you refer to. But no, I am not speaking in the common ally tongue. This globe, while a specialty of the illusion rabbits, the lesser versions are fairly common out in the wilder world, have you truly never used one before?”
Not wanting to give away my extraterrestrial origins, I instead decided to plead poverty, while trying to say as little as possible that might give away my lie. “No, I grew up in a small village away from here. It was wiped out in a goblin raid last year while I was out gathering in the forest. When I returned, everyone I had ever known was gone. I have been traveling and scrounging on my own ever since. I met my friend just a short time ago when we ran across a troll at the same time. We had to ally to defeat it and have decided to stick together for the time being.” I quickly came up with a basic lie that mixed in mostly truth so I hoped would pass muster.
“Hmmmmm, yes.” He replied, “The goblins are one of the worst scourges of monster kind, their ravenous hunger and ability to endlessly propagate more than make up for their weak stature.” Continuing he added. “They’re having a home territory here merely added to the problem. Luckily for us, they don’t have any of the stronger versions of their kind spawning at this location. Even the weakest tribe has kept us in a rough stalemate for ages since the Home came into being there.”
Hearing an emphasis on the word home both times, I wondered if that was the word he meant to be using. Trying to give away as little of my lack of knowledge as I could, I probed carefully. “How is this allowing us to communicate, I fear that I might be misunderstanding some of what you are trying to tell me.”
“I feared that would be the case,” The elder said in reply, “We normally use this as a method of training our younger generations before they are inducted into the clan’s signature powers. It is supposed to be for showing and letting them try to experiment before they undergo the transformation ritual to augment their cores.” The rabbit stated before adding on, “When we are able to power it, it normally doubles the success rate.”
Sensing he was about to have a big ask coming for the expenditure of power, I sought to preempt him. “I was hoping to gift my share of the gathered herbs to you in exchange for instruction in magic. I am coming to find more and more that my elders wanted nothing to do with it. I am not even sure that I know anything of the basics.” I continued on with my deception, “I was told we were exiled several generations ago for some sin of our founder. As our elder generations continued to pass, we have continuously lost knowledge, so much so that I had almost nothing to pass on to my own children.
Trying to focus on the fact that everything I had just said was true if you just stretched the statement out far enough. With all of the stories of shamanistic magic among of forefathers on earth which we indeed had very little knowledge of anymore. I tried my best to give off an earnest and honest energy.
Whether it was because it was a common story or he instead that he believed my words, he nodded along. “A shame, but I’ve heard that it happens sometimes. He must have been fairly weak if he had passed after only a couple of generations. I myself have made the circuit of the moons. But when my contracted partner died in battle, I was given the choice by an Eldar to continue on to the Greatest or return here to raise up and train subsequent generations to battle for knowledge and eventually join the battle in the outer reaches. I can only assume from the lack of rewards I was promised, that of all the offspring I have spawned and sent out so far, none have made it to the great defense yet.”
Confused, I thought about trying to stay silent and hope for him to continue, but my inner nature got the best of me and my hamster shot out a question hoping to return to the nature of magic. “All of that is beyond me, I was only ever a simple carpenter without even the most basic of magic spells to my name. Never having been told anything, I didn’t even know the reason that we retreated to the caves for a couple of weeks every five years. I can only assume that some knowledge of the dragon was maintained by the elders and hidden from us.”
“Shameful,” the rabbit spat out. “That the great protector should be hidden from those he guards.”
“Great protector?” I said as I wasn’t able to keep confusion out of my tone. “Then why did he send down the rain of fire to destroy my camp?”
“He was no doubt offended by the waste, you had gathered many cores, and rather than using them or offering them back up to the world, you continued to hold on to them. I know the races of light tend towards avarice, but really, most know to send them back to their home when the dragon times come.” The elder said like it was the most obvious thing in the world.
Sighing, I again tried to direct our conversation back towards helping me gain a magical power of my own. “It truly was a crime what our elders did to us. I would happily give up my share of the spoils so you can increase the power of your clan, if you would be able to share with me any scraps that you might have to increase my own meager power.” I offered shamelessly.
“Would that I could young human, but the ways of the neutral animal factions are completely different from both the factions of allies and monsters. My own contract was to an elf and I couldn’t begin to tell you how he might have differed in growing as compared to a human.” The elder stated. “And I fear our time in this illusion is growing short.”
Cursing in my mind as to how I had only gained more questions than answers, I decided to throw myself on his mercy. “I will give up all the herbs for whatever answers you can give me. I feel like I am a newborn on this world, despite my apparent age. If you want me to take one of your offspring with me, I would be happy to do that if that is your demand.” I begged.
“I would have given you the information anyway, for the favor you did in dealing fairly with my many time’s great grandson. But you can only have one contracted companion and you have already chosen yours. As I have stated the races of neutral beasts are different from yours and the monster breeds. We grow by consuming natural energies, we are placed onto our chosen level by the Eldar, and except for a chosen few allowed to protect our warrens, once you have consumed enough natural energies, you have to move on or starve when you outgrow your home.”
Continuing on he continued to explain. “From what my bond told me, you and the monster races grow through combat and conquering the homes of your enemies. How he gained his initial magic he never shared with me. But as I was bound to him, we both grew from our slaughter of the monster races. I would gladly have bound my grandson to you, but you are already bound to the ursid and you may only have one unless you have specialized in bonds, have you?”
With no idea and not wanting to be found out, I replied. “No, I have no idea how we became bonded, but I don’t think that I have specialized in that.” As a question shot into my mind, I had to ask. “So are the hogs bonded to the goblins then, why would the pigs choose to do that?”
“Maybe one or two of them,” the elder explained. “But it is most likely they have a farm and train them up from the infant stage to obey them. I really have never looked into it as it is beyond the purview I am permitted on this level. While our neighbors are rather noisy and occasionally manage to kill one of the younger generations. Overall they are one of the easiest of the monster races to have been stationed by, and certainly dumber than the races of light, I’m sure I would have a much smaller herd had I been gifted a home of them for a neighbor.”
“I thought you would have been happy to bond one of your younger generation to me?” I exclaimed.
“Yes, you. You have proven your friendship and not hunted us. Do you really think if a village of humans was placed nearby they wouldn’t try hunting us for food?” The rabbit asked. “It is the way of the world, and we would feed the bones of the fallen to strengthen the warren, but there would no doubt be many more lost if we were given a stronger whetstone than goblins to blood ourselves on.”
As the purple fog around us started flashing, the rabbit stated to me. “In return for your share of the herbs, you can stay here a week. We have strong reeds that we can give you so that weave another container to carry your supplies, and I will also send one of my elders with you if you want to venture on another foray into the Goblin Woods. He can bring back two of the swine for you to harvest for supplies so that you don’t get caught dragging them back on your return trip. But he can’t interfere in your fights, your life and death are in your own hands. That is the best deal I can offer you.”
Convinced I wasn’t going to get a better offer even if I might be getting robbed blind. I had no way of using the flowers and being able to harvest two pigs for food would put me in a fairly safe spot for when they kicked me out. Nodding I nevertheless felt the need to add. “Okay, but I will need a supply of salt and two more logs of water.” At the elder’s nod of agreement, the mist faded away and I found myself standing once again with my palm on a now gray rock.