Something dripped on Rabbit’s face, or at least he thought it dripped. Rabbit wiped mud off his face and glanced up at a figure outlined in the night rain. The figure sat in the rain with his back towards Rabbit and then the figure turned around, revealing Snow Leopard’s agile body with his finger against his pursed snout in a shush signal. Snow Leopard then pointed to a red-sealed envelope in front of Rabbit’s feet and when Rabbit picked up the letter, Snow Leopard fox-walked towards Rabbit and sat down silently.

Snow Leopard peeped around the corner to check if the Red Guard still slept, and again he stared directly at Rabbit and made a shush signal. Snow Leopard pointed to the envelope and Rabbit picked it up, noticing that a perfect cut had been made at the left side.

Rabbit dumped the letter out, and sheepishly looked up, whispering, “I can’t read.”

Snow Leopard took the letter and envelope from Rabbit’s hands and folded the letter away. As Snow Leopard placed the letter safely in Rabbit’s tunic, underneath the chest plate, he pointed in the direction of the village the army passed through and mimed reading. Before Snow Leopard left he pointed the Red Guard and shook his head.

Snow Leopard then disappeared into the night like a ninja. Rabbit stayed awake and wondering for another couple of minutes before falling asleep.

Upon waking up, Rabbit and the Red Guard jumped on their horses and headed towards the village. After the rain of last night, the sky cleared and the sun shone. There was, however, a huge pillar of smoke coming from the direction of the village. This pillar erupted into the sky endlessly, furling and curling in a tower of dark smoke.

The villagers were all in a mob of about twenty people outside of the burning village and the sobs and cries of women and children could be heard as Rabbit and the Red Guard clopped forward on their horses. Rabbit’s hands directed the horse’s reins off the road and to the left where the horse shimmied and swayed when it stopped beside the poor villagers. The Red Guard crossed his arms.

Rabbit dismounted and said, “Do you need any help?”

A fear grew in the villager’s eyes. They backed away like Rabbit was another brutish soldier who would beat their already bruised bodies.

Rabbit reached out his hand, in a gentle manner and stuttered, “N… No,”

One old man with a straw hat on his head used his cane as support as he stepped forward. He had a shaky voice and was clearly the eldest in the group, “How long until you completely lose your mind, young one?”

“I won’t. I’m, uh, cured.” Rabbit awkwardly smiled, but the villagers weren’t used to his real smile so they all assumed it was a genuine smile.

“They sure are making fast progress these days. Well I suppose I should tell you our situation before telling you what we need.” The old man walked closer to Rabbit and stared in his eyes as he told his story, “I started this village on my own, so everyone here is my family. After a raid last night, we are out of supplies and because our houses and carts were burnt down we have no way to fully prepare for the winter. We plan on moving around the country and begging for a place to stay before we begin work again in the spring. We have already sent our only available knight to bring horses and supplies back for us so that we can leave, but we need an herb for our bandaged knights that will ease their pain.” The old man pointed to a group of wounded knights, stripped of their armor, whom the mob had been crying around.

“I can help bring the herb. What does it look like?”

“Unless you know the lay of the land, I’m afraid it will be a difficult herb to find. I was afraid to send young Diasha because of all the fighting that’s going on, but perhaps you could take her.”

A young girl of around ten years had the old man’s tunic in her white knuckled fist. She had light hair and wore a satchel around her tunic belt. She also avoided Rabbit’s eyes.

“Do you think she wants to go with me?”

“Of course she does. You’ll have to take off that incredible armor of yours though.

Rabbit smiled for real as he removed his helm and chest plate and said, “I’ll leave this here with you as a sign of good faith.”

“And let me talk to Diasha and her mother.”

As Rabbit removed his chest plate he felt a steel grip on the top of his skull, between his ears, which was the Red Guards hand, and the Red Guard stared coldly at him through his wicked, silver helm. The Red Guard pointed off in the direction of the Fieldon army with a lingering finger.

Rabbit looked back towards the villagers and saw the eldest knelt down talking to Diasha and her mother. Diasha was nodding bravely, and the eldest had a hand on the mother’s shoulder in a reassuring manner.

Finally, Rabbit turned back to the Red Guard and said, “No, the Fieldon army doesn’t need me around for its pillaging anyway.

The Red Guard shook his head led his horse towards the distant bush.

Rabbit moved towards the eldest villager and confirmed, “I can look after her while she finds the herbs.”

“Thank you, sir knight.” The eldest villager had his hand on Diasha’s back and said, “Mount up and please be back by nightfall.”

Rabbit smiled and mounted the horse, and Diasha was placed behind him on the saddle.

“You’ll want to go south first.” The eldest said, “Diasha will point you the rest of the way.”

With a smile and a nod, Rabbit said, “Be back soon” and took off down the southern road.

Aside from the mountains to the west, the ground was green and flat with large patches of woodland areas. It was nice riding with Diasha. Rabbit felt like he was protecting her. When Rabbit tried to speak to her, however, she could only respond in a foreign language, and now they couldn’t really communicate at all. Instead, Rabbit planned on being as gentlemanly as possible in order to win the young girl’s trust. The two made great time and eventually came to a stream which passed through a forest where Diasha demanded Rabbit stop by repeating a strange word, thon.

Diasha struggled to be let down. Rabbit called “whoa” to the horse and as soon as it stopped Diasha jumped down and ran along the stream, prodding and sifting through the bushes.

Rabbit bent down beside her and asked, “What are you looking for?” The girl didn’t respond and was searching intently for the herb. Rabbit then decided to look for any herb that could possibly do the trick. Rabbit found some strange plants, but mostly they were leafy green things and actual flowers, he picked some of each just in case.

While searching through the forest, the sun shone through the leaves and left small patches of sunshine which felt warm all over Rabbit’s body. Rabbit closed his eyes for a time and then he heard the girl bounding up to him. She had this yellow flower in her hand with a white stem and she was waving it around, and on her waist, Rabbit noticed the large satchel overflowing with the flowers.

Rabbit smiled and when the girl pretended to take a bite of the flower and pretended to doze off in the grass, Rabbit though, something that makes you doze-off. Could this have been the same substance Doctor Worchester used to make Rabbit feel sleepy when he was still in Castle Bestia?

The girl woke up suddenly and dashed about laughing and waving the flower she which she pretended to eat, and then Rabbit noticed an odd sound. This sound was a thumping, but frequent thumping like a tapping, but loud tapping like a stampeding. Rabbit grabbed little Diasha close to him and looked to the stream where the stampeding sound was coming from.

The horse spooked and ran away before Rabbit could even think of catching it.

A huge formation of were-bears appeared out of the forest from across the stream, and they were charging, each one on all fours sprinting madly.

Rabbit blinked for a second thinking, “I found the survivors from the mountain pass battle.”