Fall of Efrafa - The Warren of Snares Narrative

This narrative is taken from the 16-page booklet included with the Warren of Snares box set released by Fall of Efrafa. Scans were provided by reddit user urbangeneticist. I have transcribed these scans, making occasional edits in grammar/capitalization but for the most part leaving it formatted as written. The scans can be found currently at the following URL: https://www.dropbox.com/s/4ipo5okktlrudmm/WarrenOfSnares.pdf?dl=0 . It includes lyrics and credits for the albums.
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Introduction:

The story behind Fall of Efrafa is based loosely upon the mythological and political ideology within the classic novel "Watership Down" by Richard Adams. It is an adaptation, a simply story borrowing from the narrative, vocabulary and various characters within the original text, adapted to form a story about the rise and fall of a society.

I am not an author, and I hope that my words do not damage or take anything away from the source material. As an interpretation my personal opinions may differ greatly from Adams' work. Our ideologies within the band are clear and may indeed clash, but I felt that this tale of freedom, the liberation of a people, was much more than a book about rabbits. Its sheer longevity as a classic work of fiction is proof of this, giving a voice to the other animals we share this planet with, and if anything I hope we draw new attention to this novel and his other work.

Within these pages I have written a short story to shed a little light on our interpretation. The trilogy is cyclical, yet runs backwards, beginning here with the tale presented in our final record, Inlé.

-Alex

Dictionary:

Tharn- struck with fear
Lapine - rabbit
Homba - Fox
Yonil - Hedgehog
Frith - Deity
Inlé - Personification of Death
El ehrairah - Christ like figure
Hrududu - Motor vehicles
Owslafa - Warren Police


Story:

We stood in tharn at the foot of the pillars, upon the clods of parched cold earth, torn outwards, as though these great shards had dug their way out of the frigid sediment below. Eldritch pylons of grey and white lined the changing demarcations of land, and for the Lapine, it was nothing less than an omen. The sky hung low and jaundiced, hugging at the horizon, erasing a sense of ground and sky. It would snow soon, yet the pillars would remain, like fingers they clawed at the sky, baying for their next meal. We dared not comprehend them, yet feared them all the same. The cold would not break, as evening turned to early morning, sentry guards approached and stations were rotated, wearily we returned to the warren, glancing back at the ominous forms, muscles stiff, trudging towards the soothing sounds of home.

The rhythmic thud of a hundred feet upon the warm interiors of the great hall resounded like a heartbeat, the warren breathed through atrophied lungs, drawing breath into the logic starved brain at the apex. Scars like stigmata were etched upon his face, the gnarled embittered silhouette hung before us all, his one-eyed stare violating the thoughts of his entire congregation.
We sat in ragged rows, before his great altar, in our minds we knew his morality, we hid these ideas deep, but our gaze was drawn and caught by the prophet prince, and our thoughts betrayed us. Woundwort, ruler of the Owsla, High Priest and Leader of the warren. He chose his movements and words wisely. Many generations before, Owsla was a name bestowed upon the guardians of the warren, a name that carried weight, responsibility. Woundwort felt the strength in the name would galvanize the people. And he bestowed it upon all, accompanied by his own personal symbol of authority, claiming it would bring us together, but we knew the gouged claw marks he left in our flesh, as he dug those filthy nails into us, that he was simply marking territory.

We all carry these scars now. Our own demarcation.

The females were infertile. At first we thought it was the white death. But the sprawling maw of the warren cared little for the reasons, starved of the life blood it beckoned for. Our numbers depleted, forcing us to take on more labour. In secret places we spoke of an end of the Owsla. At first these words were spoken as though that end we sought was the gradual death of our culture, as we grew old, as generations were not born, our society would grind to a halt. But the phrase mutated, it took on new meanings. An end to the Owsla was imbued with a sense of hope- We were never given much choice in our actions. Woundwort committed our entire warren to unwavering worship and prayer. He sought an answer in Lord Frith, in the blackmonger of Inlé and El ehrairah. Our crops began to wither. Our food was never plentiful, rationed by our police, the Owslafa, but now the Hraka which fertilized the soil seemed poisoned, it no longer held the nutrients so needed. This was oddly befitting, as our own faith waned.

We knelt in prayer, hands held against our emaciated chests, groveling in the dirt, the chastity of our thoughts continued to falter, the eyes of our leader blighted with cataracts. With every failed crop, every sterile female, the questions fell on deaf ears. Our holy words went unheeded. Hasty and unconscionable decisions met with little opposition, as sentry guards held back the jeers of those who opposed the rule. They were sent out in droves to search for new females, to take from other warrens what was not theirs to take, but we stayed silent. Unknown faces strewn with tears were marched into the empty sections of the burrow, the fit and healthy males were sent in after and given orders to mate. The cries could be heard like the heartbeat, every wall, every corridor resounded with our guilt.
Word came that the Yonil had left the forests that bordered the warren. Few words were ever shared with their kind, a solitary people, their armoured bodies, a thousand shafts like needles hid sullen, gentle faces. They spoke of the fevered cries of great animals moving to the north, whose roar could be heard from every corner of the Downs. They spoke of creatures burning the trees, and of the pillars, of the hundreds of salt pillars driven into the earth, of bizarre runes and glyphs upon them, unknown markings which smelt acrid, and very wrong. We took these words to our Leader, pleaded for him to listen. He submitted, his words almost gentle. He hushed us and promised an answer to this threat.

The great hall was filled with restless Lapine, the Owsla congregated in droves, ready to hear the charge. The Owslafa hurried us in and stood like sentinels at the entrances. Woundwort appeared in the archway of his chamber, hands held out. “My people,” he spoke, bowing and mewing as he ascended the raised mound. “My people are dying! Our females, they cannot breed. Our soil is dead. And now a new challenge, a new and fearful threat. What can we do to quell these, these evils which dare to wipe us out?” There was a cry, an empowered murmur, for a moment we felt at a cross roads.

“But my people already know why this has happened. We have forgotten our way. So many of you have questioned the word of our Lord. When he told me to send out our dear guardians to bring us women, to bring us the seed of our renewal, many of you questioned his word. When he has asked us for our unquestioning faith, many of you have questioned him. Your actions may resemble prayer, but if your thoughts are not with us, if you blaspheme with ignorance, then the answer from our lord will be nothing more than what we deserve. I call you here and ask for your prayers, I ask for your love to be poured into me, and through me into our Lord Frith, for I am the conduit, the light and the way.”

The anger was palpable. It was felt like a crested wave in the hall, spilling out dissension, a barrage of cries. We filed out in silence, seething and gritted teeth lay the way for knowing looks and glances of rebellion. It was in these hours, that we knitted our opposition to the General.

There were those who had always opposed Woundwort. When the warren was founded, our forefathers crafted myth which lay as foundations for our knowledge to stand strong upon. As the descendent of these founders, Hazelrah had propagated the seeds, his fables of the first Regent, Prince Rainbow, who had spread the ideas of a free people, words that brought hope, the notions that were now silenced with lengthy punishment, chained beneath the ground.

But these convictions were leaked in songs and phrases and thoughts. He spoke of a time without the oppression of the God trinity, when these characters were mere stories to tell children, of the simple ways of our past. The story of El ehrairah, why our kind was blessed with strong legs, keen ears. These tales gave us no insight into how we came to be, yet ideas spawned the need for knowledge in our children. When these stories changed, when the orthodox rule of Woundwort gave credence to these myths, made the sun our god and told us he would watch us always, even in the night, when the black one, Inlé, the death bringer gazed down disguised as the moon – these tales became truths. Our lessons were forbidden, replaced with the teachings of Woundwort, a self proclaimed prophet. He ruled with bile and hatred, we simply gave in to his words. That is how he came to rule, yet dissent was never quelled.

By the time he was freed, Hazelrah was old and dying, he had little strength left to guide us, and did not want the position of authority. He gave us what we needed – the words to stir the people, the words to empower. On the fifth cycle we took him above ground and led him to the quiet hills, where he closed his fragile eyes and spoke of what he saw – the miasma of dark, and the eyes ever watching, his fleeting words enticing the black one, his majesty of cold, to come take him, to join the eternal Owsla. We laid offerings to Hazel, the delicate flowers of the Downs, of food, and tomes that we cherished. He left us, yet his presence was felt forever.

We returned to the warren, ascending the slopes that crescent our home. As we approached, black shapes loomed at the foot of the entrance. We lay low, awaiting the presence to come in to the light. Their ruddy fur was unmistakable, tongues slathered as they darted to and fro. Homba. Homba kill Lapine for food. We waited as they circled the warren. At last we walked the few remaining feet and confronted the red furs. “Why are you here? The laws prohibit such actions! You cannot hunt here!” We spoke with a strength we had not felt before.
“We are not here to hunt, we are here to talk. The Yonil and Lendri are leaving the forests, traveling away from here. They speak of this threat, they call it Efrafa.”

“Efrafa?” It was a word known to us, it was the name for the bipeds, the massing warrens that we ignored. They sometimes killed us when they rode their Hrududu, great roaring creatures that moved but did not live. But the efrafa had rarely strayed on to our land, they let their dogs free and sometimes they killed our kind, but these were their ways.
“The Efrafa don’t stray from their warrens, why now?”
The Homba shook their heads. “Their warrens grow, they care little for the land. They breed like flies. The Homba who choose to dwell near their warrens say that these Efrafa do not know or respect the laws of the Downs. They say the Efrafa kill Homba, they poison the earth. They cut down great swaths of trees, and build stinking warrens. They say that the pillars we see, the pillars marked with strange symbols – these are signs that the Efrafa will come, come here and build. They will kill you all.”

The warren heaved with chatter. The soil shook loose as hordes of Lapine scattered throughout the winding corridors, proclaiming the encroachment of the Efrafa. We steeled ourselves and held meetings in the lowest levels of the burrow, exchanging desires. We shared a common goal, for all Lapine to be treated as equals. We gained the ear of a few Owslafa, those who had defied orders, who had turned away when asked to take what was not theirs. We gave them the orders they sought. To go out into the forest, to confront all Elil, to ask them to forfeit their hunting to save the lives of their families.

In the darkest hours, where the Elil ruled, the Owslafa negotiated the steep banks of the river, along the rough hewn rocks, watching for phosphoresce eyes in the scrub. They glared out in the moonlight, a constellation of hungry onlookers. They taunted these proud warriors, lapine of the house of Woundwort, daring to challenge his rule. But they respected this turn of events, and feared the Efrafa. It was in the face of this fear that a union was formed.
As plans were drawn, we took to the woods and found a fallen tree, we stripped it of bark and cut at it, carving a carapace, a receptacle. We dragged it from the writhing thickets, Twenty of us were pallbearers, twenty astride were mourners. We carried it on to the thoroughfare that ran to the mouth of the warren. Those who had risen to feed saw us coming and asked “What is that you carry here?” and we said “We carry the body of Frith, for he has died.” Our mock prayers seemed to stir sincerity in those who did not understand our metaphor. “Our king is dead?” they said with stricken faces. “Yes!” we proclaimed, “The king is dead! The king is dead! We killed him so that we can be free, and now we turn our attention upon the prince, the one who defiled our virtue, who took our rights, who disfigured our love.”

They snarled at us, and clawed at us with angry desperate limbs, they swayed and groaned and fell about the floor, wailing “Our king is dead! How could you do this?” We did not retaliate, we hugged their shaking bodies and kissed their heads, we spoke sweet nothings, we told them of the lie of god, that the sun was there for warmth and light and nothing more. Some listened, some took these words as comfort. But many ran from us, descended the corridors and gathered in the great hall, where Woundwort dwelled.

The coffin was placed upon the ground and we dug at the earth to create a fitting grave. Those who had understood our words joined us, clawing at roots, lifting great stones so that we could place this token below, and cover it for all time, until it rotted down and left our memory. But for many our act had taken our fight too far, they agreed with our principle, to liberate those who had been made examples of, those who could not speak up. But to defile their god was a crime. We left them to weep at our performance, the zealots to practice silent vigils, to mourn this passing. The warren lay before us. Collectively we made our final greatest act of defiance. On our flanks lay the marking of Woundwort, three scars. We lifted sharpened implements, placed sticks in our mouths, bit down, and cut at the flesh, removing the scar tissue. We bled, the cuts were deep, we stemmed the flow and with this pain found renewed vigor.
The worn, ancient fortification of the Owsla was barren. We entered and cradled the weapons of our freedom. The inner sanctum of the General was steeped in darkness, little light made it this far. Those loyal to him stood as a barrier. They cursed at our act of treason. Our retorts were barbed. We taunted them with accusation of rape, of murder. Woundwort remained stoic.

We called out, “If Hazel had been leader, we would have had a fighting chance. We would have a thriving warren, where all are equal, where we do not bow before false gods, where our females hold the same sway as males, where we share the responsibility, not pray for answers that will never come. The Efrafa will be our undoing. The problems that have plagued our people – the illness that has left us unable to breed, that makes our hraka unfit for the plants, this could have been treated with knowledge, not the will of your god. And now we are faced with an enemy we cannot hope to defeat, with our numbers so depleted. What say you oh leader, oh false prophet?”

Woundwort hesitated. His one good eye pierced us all with the same cold unforgiving malice as before. He smiled “Little children, so much to learn! I have given you all that I am, and this is how you repay me? Kill them all!” he exclaimed. But the trust was fractured. The Owslafa glanced from the papal throne to their own brothers and sisters.

“But General, these are the people, they are the children of Frith, we do not kill our own?”

“KILL THEM ALL!”
The Owslafa dropped their arms, and walked away from their posts. They stood alongside us and lowered their heads. Some made silent prayers of forgiveness, most were just silent. We moved as one towards he who had promised so much, yet given nothing. We tore him apart, limb from limb, like the Elil we feared. We cut his flesh and fed from him, cracked his bones and drained the marrow.

With our hunger sated we carried his remains out of the warren and covered them with earth. We were joined by our families and encircled the burial. Some spat at the ground, others placed offerings. An air of doubt fell about the populace, stricken faces looked to one another for guidance, and in turn to those who had dethroned the prophet prince. A woeful penumbra grew around us, it cloyed at us, lay thick and heavy in us. We recognized it and cowered from it. There was something in the dark, shrouded teeth and claw. It choked us closer together, forced us to confront that which we feared. From the shadow, Homba, Ledri, accompanied by the Owslafa.

They walked together.

In the days that followed, we made a truce with all Elil. They would hunt outside the boundaries of the Downs, to allow our population to recover. We sent out parties to other warrens to spread the message that Woundwort was dead. Many warrens refused to cooperate until their females were returned. We agreed, and some fragile treatise were formed. Food was gathered and given to the sick. We carried many to the river and let them bathe, nursing infected wounds with remedies forbidden by Woundwort. The females were not infertile, simply exhausted. The expansion of the warren and the presence of the Owslafa was abandoned, and replaced with the spirit of community, where tasks were chosen by the people. We dared to forge hope for the first time in an age, yet our efforts were in vain.

The Homba could cover greater distance than Lapine, and were able to scout the farthest corners of the Downs. Huge areas of trees had been cleared and the Efrafa had begun construction of enormous citadels. They moved steadily, carving great tracks in the land. Their pillars would rise from the earth frequently, and we would soon come to fear the safety of our very home. It became clear that their quarry was us, that they would stain the land with their ways. We gathered our numbers and declared war upon the Efrafa.
The frost had not subsided since the first Efrafan pillar had reared its shadow over us, proclaiming their presence upon our land. The snow had fallen days before, leaving a slurry of freezing water and glassy ice which made our slow trek towards the division of land very difficult. In so little time, the Efrafa had brought their Hrududu, the silent animals, for on to the Downs, leaving them to sleep in the dark. The morning light had only now begun to crown on the horizon, casting a warming haze upon our withered bodies. The entire warren now crouched in the grass, a few hundred Elil circled from above and on the ground, averting their gaze from those they designated food, to those they deemed an enemy.
We waited, until the Efrafa awoke their stinking animals, driving them on to the hard cold earth they lay upon the Downs. We cursed them as they approached, their skin bright fluorescent colours, their heads covered with bizarre fluorescent head dresses. We called out to them, bayed for their blood. But they did not understand us, they did not even notice us. The Elil encircled and approached. The Efrafa seemed to notice them. Their faces were of bafflement, words poured from their vacant mouths, words we could not comprehend. “Here, Charlie, come look at all these bloody animals!”

We glanced at one another for the word. A shroud of fog lay low on the hard earth, clotting around our eyes and ears. We strained in the ether, and from it came the clarion call; the word was given by all, shrill and piercing and we charged out, biting and gnawing at the great silent animals, skin was hard like stone and we felt no blood flow. We struck at the Efrafa, we heard their cries, it fueled us. The Homba charged the dogs, savage wounds in flesh, great gobbets of bloody matter were strewn about the unfinished warren, the bemused cries of the Efrafa as the Downs descended upon them, the flurry of feathers and claws in eyes, the screech of a thousand winged elil, a cascade of hraka, of bile. Bones cracked under Efrafan feet, the skulls of our kin so easily shattered, bodies flung against the stone edifice of the silence entities, calmed into submission by these apes. We knew not what they wrought, we could not understand their words, but we knew we would not win. As skin flayed from bone, our fates were sealed.

A few of us dragged ourselves away from the fight, regrouping to watch our brethren crushed by the waking groans of these massive steaming animals, whose feet rotated inorganically, rolling over the dead and dying.

We looked down upon the battlefield. Amongst the debris of our families, the remaining Efrafa had hidden inside the mouth of a cave. They peered out of sheets of ice, their faces obscured by reflecting glare. Homba stalked between the piles of bodies that lay strewn upon the ground. Some fed on the corpses, and we shielded our eyes. We cursed the sun for this sight, asked for the night to fall. But it did not come. We turned to one another and quelled thoughts of despair.

We sought refuge in our tattered commune, the last of us, limbs stricken with weeping wounds. We gathered our anguish and found what little hope we had left, focused it to a needle point, the coalescing thoughts of all who had died for us massed within us, and in that moment we were everyone, every female born into chastity, every fallen friend, in our own eyes. The last vestiges of the Owsla assailed, a hundred gnashing jaws, a hundred febrile minds, and in our naïve, brittle skulls, we saw the fall of the Efrafa.
Winged Elil carried this last charge on the wind and took it to the four corners of the Downs. They had watched fires rage across the foundations of the Efrafan warren. They had seen the wicked flames lick the blood of the great unnatural beasts we knew as Hrududu, saw it burn with fury. For months it lay unfinished, and soon the Downs reclaimed it, saplings writhed, anchored roots in toiled earth. Water collected on impenetrable stone, seeding pools for new life to inhabit.

Of our people, few survived the charge. The Owsla, disparate, broken, hauled its carcass from the bracken and scrubland and formed a Matriarch, under the guidance of a daughter of Hazelrah. They took what they could salvage and left the sanctuary of our ancestral home, seeking refuge elsewhere.

Our warren was empty, but our hearts remained full.