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Radagast the Brown scooped up the small rabbit from the forest floor. “Oh, look at you.” He felt his heart sting with a pang of sympathy as he got a clearer look at the scratches that ran down the length of the creature. “Let’s get you inside, yeah?” And he wasted no time rushing the rabbit to his home, cradling it in his hands and holding it gently but firmly against his chest as he went.
Once he arrived, he closed the door behind him and lightly set the rabbit down on his table, gently petting it as he looked down at it with an empathetic, bittersweet gaze. Radagast pulled up a chair and rested himself on it. He pet it with long strokes, from the top of its head down to its back. As he had this moment alone with the creature, with his fingers deliberately dodging its scars, he began to do some thinking. Those little paws with their little nails… perfectly fit the size and width of those scars. He gasped at the realization.
“You… you did this to yourself??” He could hardly get the words out, he was so caught off guard. After a few seconds of incoherent stammering, he finally uttered out, “Why?” But he knew the rabbit couldn’t answer him, so he searched desperately for an answer in the dark eyes it had closed a minute ago.
“You poor, poor thing.” Radagast cooed, realizing now that this situation was more complicated than he had initially thought. This had layers. This poor rabbit probably suffered some kind of mental ailment, something beyond Radagast’s control.
But he’d be damned if he wasn’t going to make an effort to help ease its pain.
“Listen to me, alright?” He began, not wanting to make it feel forced to open its resting eyes, but still wanting his words to get through to it. “I-I don’t know what you’re going through…” His voice strained through these words. This was not a situation he encountered often, and it broke his heart to see proof that a creature so lovely purposefully inflicted pain upon itself. But he had to keep it together. For the rabbit. “...but you don’t deserve physical pain for whatever you’re suffering through. I’m- I’m sure your mind is… hard on you enough, little rabbit. You don’t have to resort to…” He struggled to say it. “To… to hurting yourself.” He paused. “You’re a precious being, you are. You don’t deserve pain.”
Radagast’s eyes stung from newly welled-up tears. After he wiped them with his fingerless gloves, he bent down and pressed a gentle kiss onto the rabbit’s head, neatly between its ears. “You’re such a beautiful creature…” His hand went back to petting it with long strokes yet again. “You shouldn’t be hurting yourself. Rabbits are such lovely creatures. You should be grazing on fresh plants, drinking fresh water. Playing with friends and basking in the warmth of the sunlight. Resting in a familiar, comforting burrow. Now, I’m not sure what ails you, you little gift of nature you, but… no matter what it is, you don’t deserve to have scars on you for it. Especially not… self-inflicted ones.” He sighs, saddened.
He paused. “You’re safe here. With me.”
He paused again. He pets the rabbit a few more times before withdrawing his hand.
“Now, let’s get these scars of yours cleaned up, shall we?”