Les's were-hare drove

Les’s were-hare drove is a group of were-hares who take shelter on land offered by Duncan and repay him by providing extra security. Their presence initially looks like a secretive, potentially violent army, but Les clarifies that the group is wintering there, not preparing for war. The drove’s role is practical as well as protective: it helps guard Duncan’s cabin, escorts Ava’s party, and becomes associated with the effort to draw Venus away from her secure base.

Identity and Wintering Arrangement

The drove’s presence in Duncan’s woods first raises suspicion. After a large group escorts Ava, Lock, and Ezra toward the house, most of its members disperse back into the trees, while Sid and a few others remain as guards. The speed and secrecy of their departure leave Ava and Lock wondering whether Duncan is building an army and why so many violent, guarded people are moving through his woods. At that point, the drove’s purpose is not yet clear to them.

Les supplies the explanation: the group needed somewhere to winter, and Duncan offered them a place. In return, they act as extra security. The arrangement is therefore a reciprocal one, joining shelter to protection rather than placing the drove under Duncan’s command as a military force. Les directly rejects the idea that they are an army and denies that they took Cade, addressing two suspicions that have shaped Ava’s reading of their presence.

Reputation and Self-Description

The drove’s members understand that other weres misread them. Sid objects to the assumption that a hare-shifting group must be gentle and cute, distinguishing hares from domesticated rabbits. Les adds that outsiders also overlook the drove’s members’ human side, even as humans themselves can be predators. Their defense counters the reduction of the group to a harmless animal image: the members are neither pets nor a force whose nature can be inferred from their animal form alone.

That exchange gives context to the contrast between the drove’s reputation and its actual position. Their ability to move unseen among the trees and their readiness to serve as security can look threatening, but their stated reason for being there is the need for a winter refuge. The drove’s explanation does not make its members passive. Rather, it presents protection as work they undertake in return for a place to stay, while insisting that their presence should not be mistaken for an invasion or an attempt to seize someone.

Protection at Duncan’s Cabin

The group’s security role is visible in the way it manages access to Duncan’s house. Sid and several others stay with the arriving party as guards, at least until everyone reaches the house. Their presence continues the protection Duncan has arranged around his refuge, even as their armed or intimidating appearance fuels Ava’s initial uncertainty. Duncan himself explains that he offered Ava sanctuary because he knows her and believes she is not there to kill him; Les’s account makes clear that the drove is also part of the practical security surrounding that sanctuary.

The drove remains present in the household after the first escort. When Ava returns to Duncan’s cabin, some of Les’s group are scattered around the room, including a child curled on the rug by the fireplace. The scene places the group within the everyday life of the refuge, not merely at its guarded perimeter. At the same time, Ava’s anger at Duncan’s apparent absorption in whittling shows how the drove’s host and the protection around him are entangled with her larger crisis: she resents Duncan for his perceived part in the danger that has separated her from Cade, even while relying on the shelter and security his arrangement provides.

Escort and Strategic Role

When Ava’s party decides to seek help from the Portsmouth Council, Duncan agrees to call ahead and arrange a meeting. Ikka and Sid are assigned to accompany the group and drive them there in a van. The drove’s contribution thus extends beyond keeping watch at Duncan’s cabin: its members provide transport and an escort for a risky approach to outside authority. Les also gives Ava a large bag of food for the trip, explaining that the group eats a great deal and that Duncan believes Ava’s condition means she needs to eat a lot as well. The detail connects the drove’s hospitality to the practical needs of the travelers, rather than treating protection as a purely martial service.

The Council visit becomes part of a plan to expose Venus to danger. Ikka explains that the group already expected the Council not to help. The purpose of making Ava’s whereabouts known is to ensure that someone working for Venus passes the information along. Ikka describes the tactic through the image of a hare in its warren: Venus is being drawn out of a safe place and toward a position where she can be attacked. The plan depends on controlling what Venus learns and where she expects to find Ava, turning an unsuccessful appeal into bait.

Injury and Significance

The drive’s protective role carries physical costs. After the plan’s dangerous events, Ikka drives while Ava presses what remains of Sid’s shirt against his shoulder in an effort to stop his bleeding. Olive has lost consciousness from pain and lies in Lock’s arms, while Ezra holds her hand and tries to comfort her. Sid says that he can heal, but doubts that the force or substance causing the injury will make that easy. The scene shifts the drove from a watchful presence in Duncan’s woods to people exposed to the same immediate violence as the rest of Ava’s party.

Across these episodes, the drove’s identity is defined by both its own account and the suspicion it provokes. It is a community seeking winter shelter, a security detail protecting Duncan’s refuge, and a source of transport and support in Ava’s effort to reach the Council and lure Venus out. The gap between the first impression of a hidden army and Les’s description of an exchange of shelter for security underscores how quickly unfamiliar weres can be mistaken for a threat. Their actions make the drove more than background to Duncan’s sanctuary: it is one of the means by which that sanctuary is maintained, and one of the groups drawn into the cost of Ava’s resistance.