Firestar’s green gaze rested on Squirrelpaw, and she forced herself not to duck away. “Did you have this dream too?” he asked.
“No,” she confessed. “But I had to . . . I wanted to go. . . .” She searched for the words to explain why she left, but she did not want to tell Firestar that she had been trying to escape their quarrel. She fell silent, hanging her head.
“I’m glad she came with us!” Brambleclaw burst out. “She was equal to any of the warriors!”
After what seemed like nine lifetimes, Firestar nodded. “Carry on, Brambleclaw.”
“We headed towards the sun-drown-place, thanks to Ravenpaw’s help. He’d heard about the place of endless water from other rogue cats.”
“It was such a long way,” Squirrelpaw put in. “We thought we were lost so many times.”
“Ravenpaw told us which direction to go, but we didn’t know exactly how to get there,” Brambleclaw explained. “But StarClan had sent us, so we had to keep going.”
“Even though we didn’t know why they had sent us,” Squirrelpaw added.
Brambleclaw flexed his claws, making a tiny scraping sound on the hard floor. “We were only trying to do our duty to the Clan,” he murmured.
“A loner helped us through Twolegplace,” Squirrelpaw went on, remembering Purdy’s rather erratic sense of direction.
“And eventually we came to the sun-drown-place. It was like nothing we’d seen before,” Brambleclaw mewed. “High sandy cliffs with caves underneath, and dark blue water for as far as any cat could see, endlessly washing up and down the shore. The crashing water frightened us at first, it was so loud.”
“Then Brambleclaw fell in. I rescued him, but we were in a cave, and then we found Midnight.” Squirrelpaw’s words tumbled out incoherently.
“What do you mean, you ‘found midnight’?” Dustpelt demanded.
Brambleclaw shuffled his paws. “Midnight is a badger,” he meowed at last. “StarClan wanted us to find her because she could tell us what StarClan wanted us to know.”
“And what did she tell you?” Firestar’s ears twitched as he spoke.
“That the Twolegs would destroy the whole forest and leave us to starve,” Squirrelpaw mewed, her heart suddenly hammering as hard as the first time she had heard Midnight’s warning.
“She told us to lead you away from the forest and find a new home,” Brambleclaw added.
“New home?” Sandstorm stared at him in disbelief.
“So we should leave the forest just because a badger we’ve never heard of thinks it would be a good idea?” Dustpelt meowed.
Squirrelpaw closed her eyes. Was ThunderClan going to ignore Midnight’s warning? Had their journey and Feathertail’s death been for nothing?
“And did she say how we should find this place?” Grey-stripe sat up and leaned closer, the tip of his tail twitching.
Midnight’s words echoed in Squirrelpaw’s mind once more and she found herself repeating them out loud. “‘You will not be without a guide’—that’s what she said. ‘When return, stand on Great Rock when Silverpelt shines above. A dying warrior the way will show.’”
“Have you been to the Great Rock yet to look for this sign?” Firestar asked.
Brambleclaw shook his head. “We were going to meet there tomorrow with Tawnypelt, Stormfur, and Crowpaw. We were going to bring our leaders, if we could persuade them to come . . .”
“Are you going to go?” Mousefur flattened her ears.
“Nothing would keep me away,” Firestar replied.
Dustpelt stared wide-eyed at his leader. “You’re not actually thinking of taking the Clan out of the forest, are you?”
“Right now, I don’t know what I’m going to do,” Firestar admitted. “But I’m not sure the Clan can survive leaf-bare.” He met Dustpelt’s stare, and for a moment Squirrelpaw saw his eyes flash. “I cannot let my Clan suffer if there’s anything I can do to prevent it. We cannot ignore this message, however it came to us. It may be our only hope of survival. If there is a sign, I want to see it for myself.”
He straightened and looked at Brambleclaw. “Tomorrow, I will go with you to Fourtrees.”
CHAPTER 5
“Sasha!” Mistyfoot called again. “Is that you?”
There was no reply.
Leafpaw pressed her muzzle against the web and peered out. She had heard of Sasha many times, and was curious to see the rogue she-cat who had taken Tigerstar as her mate and given birth to Mothwing and Hawkfrost while staying with RiverClan. But in the half-light of the wooden nest, she could only just make out Sasha’s tawny pelt huddled at the back of the cage the Twoleg had just brought in.
“Sasha, are you OK?” Mistyfoot called more urgently.
“Give her time to recover,” Cody advised. “The new ones are always quiet.”
“I don’t need time to recover,” came a furious hiss. “How dare they put me in here? If I could get out, I’d rip that Twoleg to shreds!”
“What were you doing in the forest?” Mistyfoot asked.
“I wanted to see my kits,” Sasha replied. “I had heard about the Twolegs destroying the forest, and I wanted to make sure they were safe.”
“I saw Mothwing not long ago!” Leafpaw mewed. “She was fine. She’s going to be a medicine cat.”
“Who’s that speaking?” Sasha called.
“I’m Leafpaw, ThunderClan’s apprentice medicine cat,” Leafpaw told her. “I’m friends with Mothwing.”
“Do you know Hawkfrost too?” Sasha demanded. “Is he safe?”
Leafpaw did not answer. Her paws prickled as she pictured Sasha’s other kit. He had an icy-blue gaze like the sky in leaf-bare, and his shoulders were as broad and powerful as those of a warrior of twice his age and experience. Last time Leafpaw had met him, he had threatened to drag Sorreltail back to the RiverClan camp because she had strayed across the border by mistake. Luckily, Mothwing had persuaded him to let Sorreltail go.
Mistyfoot called from her cage, “Hawkfrost was fine when I saw him last.”
“Thank goodness,” Sasha breathed.
The relief in her voice surprised Leafpaw. “She sounds as worried as a Clan queen would be!” she whispered to Cody through the web that separated them.
“Of course.” Cody had been listening quietly to the exchange. “She’s talking about her kits—she’s a she-cat just like any other, after all.”
“But she gave them away to be raised in RiverClan!” Leafpaw exclaimed, almost forgetting to keep her voice low.
“Why didn’t she let her own Clan raise them?” Cody sounded puzzled.
“Sasha’s not a Clan cat,” Leafpaw explained. “She’s a rogue.”
“That’s right, call me names just because I choose not to live among the rest of you,” Sasha growled, overhearing. “Not that I care, as long as my kits are safe.”
“I’m sorry,” Cody apologised. “This is such a small nest it’s hard not to get involved.” She glanced sideways at the cage next to hers where a tattered black rogue crouched without giving any sign that he had heard their conversation. “With some cats, at least,” she added pointedly. Leafpaw knew that Cody had been trying to befriend the black tom but had not managed to get any answer from him except his name—Coal.
“You’re a kittypet, aren’t you?” Sasha asked Cody bluntly. “You sound too polite for a rogue, and you look too fat to be a Clan cat.”
Leafpaw saw Cody bristle. “Cody’s a friend!” she mewed, leaping to her defence.
“I didn’t say she wasn’t,” Sasha meowed. “I’m just trying to work out who’s who in this place.”
Mistyfoot explained: “They’re mostly rogues, but there are a few other forest cats here.” Gorsetail, Brightheart, and Cloudtail meowed greetings as Mistyfoot went on, “Cody’s the only kittypet, as far as we know.”
“Have any of you worked out a way to escape from this foxhole?” Sasha asked.
“Not yet,” Mistyfoot admitted.
“Even StarClan ha
sn’t given us a clue,” Leafpaw added.
“StarClan!” In the shadows, she saw Sasha curl her lip. “Do you Clan cats still believe in that nonsense after what’s happened to the forest?”
“Of course we do!” Leafpaw hissed.
“Well, say a prayer for me, little one,” Sasha sighed unexpectedly. “I think we’re all going to need as much help as we can get.”
Sunhigh passed, and the tepid warmth of the afternoon sun began to fade.
“Here comes the Twoleg again,” Cody called to the other cats.
Over the distant grumbling of the Twoleg monsters, Leafpaw heard footsteps outside and instinctively crouched at the back of her cage. The nest door opened and the Twoleg came in carrying the food pellets.
“There’s no way you’ll persuade that Twoleg to let us out of here by purring at it,” Leafpaw whispered to Cody as the Twoleg began opening the cages and putting in more food.
“I guess not,” Cody shrugged. “But it won’t hurt to make him trust me.”
As she spoke a hiss exploded from the cage next to her. The Twoleg leaped backward from Coal’s open door. Blood trickled down its forepaw as it stamped around the nest, spitting in rage. Leafpaw strained to see Coal through Cody’s cage. She could just make out his shadowy outline as he flattened himself against the floor. The blood pulsed in her ears as she glanced over her shoulder at the Twoleg. It had stopped screeching and was staring menacingly at Coal. Suddenly, with a vicious cry, it thrust its paw back into the cage, and Leafpaw heard the tom screech in pain. Muttering, the Twoleg slammed the door shut.
Leafpaw shuddered. What had the Twoleg done?
When the Twoleg opened Cody’s door and tipped pellets into her pot, the kittypet shied away. She was not purring at it now.
As soon as the Twoleg had gone, Leafpaw yowled, “Are you OK, Coal?”
A muffled groan came from the cage beyond Cody’s. “That stinking Twoleg!”
Leafpaw sniffed the air and smelled the warm tang of blood.
“It looks bad,” Cody whispered to Leafpaw. “There’s blood on the floor of his cage.”
“Where are you hurt?” Leafpaw asked Coal.
“I’ve cut my leg,” replied the rogue. “That badger-pawed Twoleg shoved me against something sharp.”
Leafpaw thought quickly. What did Cinderpelt use to stop bleeding? “Can any cat reach a cobweb?” she called. “Come on; we have to help him!”
“There’s one near me,” answered Gorsetail. “I think I can reach it. Hang on.”
Peering down, Leafpaw saw Gorsetail’s tawny paw reach out from a cage below her. A large cobweb stretched from the floor of the nest to the top of his cage. He reached toward it, squeezing his foreleg through the hole in the side of his cage. Finally he managed to plunge his paw into the thick tangle and drag it down. Twisting his foreleg round, Gorsetail held the cobweb as far up towards Leafpaw as he could.
Leafpaw flattened herself against the cage and pushed her paw through the shiny floor. It scraped against her fur but she clenched her teeth and forced her leg through a little more until she could take the wad of sticky cobweb from Gorsetail. She pulled it quickly into her cage and then began passing it to Cody. “Give him this!” she urged, squeezing the last pieces of cobweb through with her paws.
Cody nodded, unable to talk because she was holding a wad of cobweb in her mouth. As she dragged it into her cage, some of it stuck to the sides of the hole, wasting a few of the precious threads.
“Be careful!” Leafpaw gasped.
The voice of a rogue beneath them called anxiously up. “There’s blood dripping through the top of my cage! That cat’s badly hurt.”
Leafpaw’s heart beat faster. “Coal! Are you OK?”
“It won’t stop bleeding,” Coal replied, his voice trembling.
“Take the cobweb from Cody!” Leafpaw ordered. “Press it against the wound for as long as you can.”
She heard Cody breathing hard as the kittypet passed the cobweb through to the next cage, followed by the sound of Coal’s paws scrabbling on the blood-soaked floor.
“Don’t panic, Coal!” she mewed. “Just press the cobweb on to the wound.”
“It’s already soaked with blood!” Coal panted.
“That’s OK,” Leafpaw reassured him. “It’ll still stop any more blood coming. Just hold it in place!”
She waited. Silence gripped the nest. Leafpaw’s head began to spin, and she forced herself to take slow, deep breaths.
“Is he OK?” Brightheart called after a while.
“The blood’s stopped dripping on me!” reported the rogue from underneath Coal’s cage.
“Coal?” Leafpaw called. “How is it?”
A ragged sigh came from Coal’s cage. “That’s better,” he murmured. “It didn’t even sting.”
Leafpaw felt a rush of relief. “Keep the cobweb there for a bit longer,” she told him. “Then you can give the cut a gentle lick to clean it. Not too fierce—you don’t want it to start bleeding again.”
“Well done, Leafpaw,” Cody whispered from her cage.
Leafpaw blinked. For the first time since she had been captured, she didn’t feel entirely helpless. Closing her eyes, she sent a prayer of thanks to StarClan. She had never helped a rogue before, but she knew her warrior ancestors would approve. Loyalty to one Clan alone was no longer the way to survive.
She realised her belly was growling with hunger. She might as well follow Cody’s advice and keep her strength up. Trying not to breathe in the horrible stench, she nibbled at a few of the foul pellets the Twoleg had left. I suppose I should be grateful for the easy meal, she thought as she forced herself to crunch the dry morsels.
“These are disgusting,” she muttered.
“Not the best I’ve tasted,” agreed Cody. “My housefolk tried to give me something similar once, but I soon let them know what I thought, and they never gave them to me again.”
Leafpaw nearly choked with surprise. “You can make your Twolegs do what you want?”
“They’re not so hard to train,” Cody mewed. She sat up and began washing her paws.
Sasha called across the nest, “Can you train the mongrel that hurt Coal to be gentler?”
“I doubt it,” Cody answered. “These workfolk are nothing like my housefolk.”
Leafpaw saw Brightheart’s face appear behind the mesh of her cage. The ginger patches on her white fur looked almost black in the dim light, and it was impossible to see that one side of her face had been terribly scarred by a dog attack many moons ago. “What do you think they’re going to do with us?” she whispered.
“Perhaps they’re going to turn us into kittypets?” Leafpaw suggested. Much as she disliked the idea, at least that might give them a chance to escape and return to the Clan.
There was a snort from Sasha’s cage. “I don’t think so,” she rasped. “We’re hardly the sort of fluffy, pampered cats that Twolegs go for.”
Leafpaw glanced at Cody, hoping she wouldn’t take offense, but to her surprise the kittypet was nodding.
“Sasha’s right,” she agreed. “These folk don’t care about cats—Clan, rogue, or kittypet. Trust me, I know the sort of—what do you call them? Twolegs?—that make good housefolk. These just want to get rid of us.”
Leafpaw tried to swallow, but her mouth had suddenly become too dry, and the pellets she had eaten seemed to be lodged halfway down her throat. Trying not to bring them up again, she lapped a few mouthfuls of slimy water. She fought the urge to curl up in the back of her cage and lose herself in dreams. She could not rely on StarClan to get her out of this place. She had faith that her warrior ancestors were watching the destruction of the forest, but her instincts told her they were powerless against Twoleg cruelty; it was her own wits she would have to rely on now. She had to find a way to escape. She couldn’t let Cody or her Clanmates down.
She remembered Gorsetail stretching his paw out of his cage to reach the cobweb. “Cody,” she mewed. “You told me you
tried reaching the catch that keeps the cage locked.”
“Yes, but I couldn’t get a grip on it,” Cody confirmed.
“What about the rest of you?” Leafpaw called out to the other cats. “Can anyone undo his catch?”
“Mine’s too stiff,” replied Gorsetail.
“My web is ripped,” Cloudtail reported. “I can almost get two paws out, but I can’t reach the catch.”
“You’re all wasting your time,” Sasha growled. “Face it, there’s no way out of here.”
Outside, the noise of the Twoleg monsters rumbled on, making the nest shudder. Leafpaw couldn’t believe there was no way out of the nest, whatever Sasha thought. If she gave up, there would be no hope left at all. As she listened to the Twolegs calling gruffly to one another in the growing dusk outside, she reached through the web at the front of her cage and began to claw at the catch that held it closed.
CHAPTER 6
The waning moon cast just enough light through the leafless branches to make the forest glow with eerie silver. Frost traced the outline of the dying ferns as Squirrelpaw padded through the trees beside Brambleclaw.
“It’ll be cold at Fourtrees,” she fretted, hoping that her sister was warm, wherever she was.
“But at least it’s clear,” Brambleclaw answered in a low voice. “Silverpelt will be shining.”
They were following Firestar and Cinderpelt through the forest. The pace was slower than the two younger cats had been used to on their long journey, but Cinderpelt was still struggling to keep up. Cold and hunger had made her limp worse than usual.
“If there is a sign,” Squirrelpaw wondered out loud, “how long do you think it’ll be before we go?” She wanted a chance to find her sister before the Clans left the forest.
“I don’t know,” Brambleclaw replied. “You saw what happened last night. Firestar can’t force the Clan to leave. He’s bound by the warrior code as much as any cat, and even though he’s our leader, he has to obey the will of the Clan.”
Squirrelpaw’s belly tightened as she remembered the Clan’s reaction. Beneath the stars, huddled against the icy wind that whipped the rock, Firestar had told them the message she and Brambleclaw had brought back from StarClan. A shocked cry had rippled around the gathered cats.