“I want a nest in the middle,” Larkkit mewed.
“Sparkpaw’s and Alderpaw’s nests are there already,” Honeykit sighed. “I can see them.”
Leafpool’s mew distracted Alderpaw from their chatter. “I hope the patrols come back soon,” she mewed. “The fresh-kill pile is empty.”
Alderpaw glanced at the bare patch of earth. Brightheart, Whitewing, and Cloudtail paced beside it. Hadn’t they brought prey back from their patrol? Perhaps they’d met Rowanstar before they had a chance to hunt. They gazed through narrowed eyes at the muscular ginger tom as he stood beside Bramblestar on the Highledge.
Jayfeather was already beside him, fur pricking along his spine.
Alderpaw followed Leafpool up the tumble of rocks and stopped.
Bramblestar’s expression was grave. “Littlecloud is dying.” He dipped his head to Leafpool. The two medicine cats had known each other a long time.
Leafpool’s eyes darkened. “Is he suffering?”
“Dawnpelt is with him now,” Rowanstar told her. “She’s giving him poppy seeds to ease his pain, but she doesn’t know what else to do.”
Leafpool flicked her tail. “If only you’d chosen a medicine-cat apprentice moons ago,” she fretted. “Littlecloud would have someone to care for him properly.”
“And ShadowClan wouldn’t be left without a medicine cat,” Jayfeather growled.
Rowanstar’s pelt ruffled. “I didn’t come here to be lectured!”
Bramblestar stepped forward. “He came here for our help, Jayfeather,” he said in a warning tone.
Alderpaw watched his father, impressed by his authority. Bramblestar clearly understood that it would do no good to rub mouse bile into ShadowClan’s wound. A gentler approach was needed. Alderpaw stepped forward hesitantly. “Can I help?” he asked softly.
Jayfeather flicked him away with his tail. “You’re not borrowing our apprentice,” he told Rowanstar tetchily.
Alderpaw bristled. Why not? You’re always complaining I get under your paws.
Rowanstar scowled. “I don’t want an apprentice. Littlecloud needs proper care.”
Alderpaw twitched his tail indignantly.
“I’ll go,” Leafpool offered.
“Thank you.” Rowanstar leaned forward. “Grassheart’s kits are due any day. Tawnypelt, Snowbird, and Dawnpelt will be able to help at her kitting, but it’s Grassheart’s first litter, and I’d prefer to have a medicine cat close by to help if there are problems.”
Alderpaw shifted his paws. It sounded strange to hear the ShadowClan leader talk with such concern about his Clanmates. After Rowanstar had snatched Violetkit from the Gathering, Alderpaw had decided the ginger tom must have no heart. Hope flickered through his fur. Had he been wrong? Perhaps Violetkit was as safe and loved in ShadowClan as Twigkit was in ThunderClan.
“I’ll fetch herbs and come as soon as I can.” Leafpool turned toward the rock tumble. She paused at the top and called over her shoulder, “Alderpaw, travel with me. I’ll need help carrying the herbs.”
“To ShadowClan’s camp?” Alderpaw blinked in surprise.
“Of course!” Leafpool whisked her tail.
Jayfeather’s pelt twitched. “Are you going to leave me to take care of the whole Clan myself?” he asked crossly.
Leafpool glanced at him, amused. “I’m sure you can handle it. But don’t worry. I’ll send Alderpaw straight home.”
Jayfeather nosed his way past Alderpaw and followed Leafpool down the rocks. “I’d better help you choose the herbs. I don’t want you leaving me with nothing but a pile of stale tansy.”
Alderpaw began to follow, but he felt Bramblestar’s tail flick against his spine. “Wait.”
Alderpaw glanced back in surprise as Bramblestar dipped his head to Rowanstar. “You should leave now. Your Clan must need you at this time. Leafpool will travel to your camp as soon as she can.”
Rowanstar nodded. “Thank you for your help,” he meowed formally. Alderpaw wondered what it had cost him to come to ThunderClan for assistance. ShadowClan cats were not known for swallowing their pride. Chin high, Rowanstar padded past Alderpaw and leaped down the tumble of rocks. He crossed the clearing, avoiding the curious gazes of Whitewing, Brightheart, and Cloudtail, and disappeared through the thorn tunnel.
Alderpaw faced Bramblestar expectantly. Why had he asked him to wait? Did he have news of Violetkit after all?
“I’m sending a patrol.” Bramblestar’s mew was soft, his gaze flicking past Alderpaw as though checking for twitching ears among the cats in the clearing below. But Whitewing and Brightheart were talking to each other, heads close. Cloudtail had followed Rowanstar out of camp, and Lilyheart and Daisy were dozing while the kits clambered along the fallen beech. Bramblestar went on: “To search for SkyClan.”
Alderpaw’s heart leaped. Thank StarClan! His quest to find SkyClan had failed. Vicious rogues had driven the long-lost Clan from their home in the gorge. He’d found one SkyClan survivor, but Darktail, the rogues’ leader, had killed him, and there was no sign of his Clanmates.
StarClan’s prophecy had been hard to understand from the beginning: Embrace what you find in the shadows, for only they can clear the sky. But it had led to the quest: Bramblestar and Sandstorm had been convinced that they must find SkyClan. Instead Alderpaw and Needlepaw had found Twigkit and Violetkit, abandoned in a shadowy tunnel. Everyone believed now that the two motherless kits would “clear the sky,” but Alderpaw couldn’t help wondering if they needed to find SkyClan after all. He wanted to finish the quest he had started. “Can I go?”
“I’m sending Squirrelflight, Lionblaze, and Cinderheart,” Bramblestar told him. “We need you here.”
“But they don’t even know SkyClan exists,” Alderpaw pointed out.
Only Firestar and Sandstorm had known the truth. Ashamed that the Clans had driven SkyClan from the forest long ago, Firestar had shared the secret only with the cat he had trusted most. But Sandstorm had told Bramblestar, and now Alderpaw, Sparkpaw, Cherryfall, and Molewhisker knew too. Surely Firestar wouldn’t want the secret spread any further?
“I told them,” Bramblestar confided. “They couldn’t search for a Clan they’d never heard of. But they’re under strict orders to keep it to themselves. As far as the rest of the Clan will know, they are going to search for Twigkit’s mother.”
Alderpaw tensed. “Then Twigkit mustn’t hear about it. I don’t want her getting her hopes up.” When he’d found Twigkit and Violetkit, they were only a few days old. No queen would abandon kits so young and helpless unless she had no choice, or was dead.
Bramblestar shifted his paws. “The Clan will be as worried as you about getting Twigkit’s hopes up unnecessarily. No cat will want to tell her anything. All Twigkit will know is that a patrol is out . . . patrolling.”
Alderpaw glanced at the top of the hollow, remembering the long journey to the gorge. “Do you think they’ll find SkyClan?”
“Only StarClan knows.” Bramblestar blinked at Alderpaw. “You’d better get back to your duties. It looks like some cat is waiting for you.”
Alderpaw glanced over his shoulder, following Bramblestar’s gaze. He expected to see Jayfeather beckoning him impatiently. Instead he saw Twigkit, shifting her paws impatiently at the edge of the clearing, her eyes fixed on him. How long had she been there? Had she overheard their conversation?
As Bramblestar turned toward his den, Alderpaw scrambled down the tumble of rocks.
Twigkit scampered across the clearing to meet him. “Leafpool says you’re going to ShadowClan.” Her eyes were bright with excitement. “Can I come?”
Alderpaw blinked at her, wishing she could. She hadn’t seen her sister since they’d been separated, half a moon ago. He wondered for a moment whether to ask Leafpool or Bramblestar for permission. Then he imagined Jayfeather scowling. Take a kit to treat a dying cat? What nonsense! He would never allow it.
“Can I?” Twigkit asked again, lifting her front paws hopefully.<
br />
“No,” Alderpaw told her regretfully. “You’re too young to leave camp.”
Sadness glistened in Twigkit’s green eyes.
“I’m sorry—” Alderpaw began. But before he could finish, Twigkit hared toward the nursery.
“Wait there!” she called to him. “I won’t be long!”
He watched her go, wondering what she was up to.
Beside the honeysuckle wall of the elders’ den, in a dip that caught the morning sun, Graystripe was washing comfrey pulp into Millie’s fur. Millie’s eyes were half-closed, pleasure showing in the slits as he worked the herb into her spine. Alderpaw dipped his head as he caught Graystripe’s eye.
Graystripe lifted his muzzle, green pulp staining his jaws. “Let me know if you need help gathering more comfrey before the frosts come,” he meowed. “I may not be fast enough for mice these days, but I can stalk herbs.”
Millie purred. “You can hunt mice as well as any warrior,” she told him.
“Why bother,” Graystripe asked, “when I can let the youngsters catch them for me?”
Twigkit squeezed out of the narrow entrance of the bramble nursery. Alderpaw could see that she was carrying a red feather between her jaws.
She trotted toward him and laid it carefully at his paws. “Will you give this to Violetkit?”
“A feather?” Alderpaw looked at it, a pang in his heart. It seemed a small offering, but Twigkit was staring at it excitedly.
“Violetkit found one before they took her away,” she told Alderpaw. “She kept it in our nest because she thought it was so pretty. This isn’t the same one. Lilyheart threw the other one away when she was clearing out the old bedding. But I found this one at the edge of the camp the other day, and I knew Violetkit would like it.” She stared at Alderpaw eagerly. “You’ll take it to her, won’t you? And tell her it’s from me?”
Guilt prickled through Alderpaw’s pelt. If it weren’t for the prophecy StarClan had shared with him, the Clans wouldn’t have squabbled over the kits. They’d still be together, not in different Clans. They could play together instead of sending feathers by messenger. At least they’re alive. Alderpaw shook out his pelt. If it weren’t for the prophecy, he and Needlepaw might never have found them, and they’d have died, alone in the wild.
He licked Twigkit fondly on the head. “Of course I’ll give it to her. And I’ll tell her that you’re thinking of her.” As Twigkit nuzzled his cheek, purring, he picked up the feather and headed toward the medicine den.
ShadowClan scent, tinged with the sharp smell of pinesap, filled Alderpaw’s nose. The bundle of herbs between his jaws was making his tongue tingle.
A ShadowClan patrol, led by Tawnypelt, met them as he and Leafpool crossed the border. Alderpaw recognized his father’s coloring among the splotches in the tortoiseshell’s mottled pelt. She was Bramblestar’s sister, and for the first time Alderpaw realized how strange it felt to have kin in another Clan. He thought of Twigkit. How much stranger it must feel when that kin was a littermate.
Tawnypelt greeted them warmly. “Thank you for coming,” she meowed, signaling with her tail to a white tom at her side. “Help carry their herbs, Stonewing.”
Leafpool laid down the parcel of herbs she had been carrying and let him take it. “Thank you.”
Alderpaw recognized Sleekpaw standing beside them. He remembered the feisty she-cat from his first Gathering. Twigkit’s feather was tickling his nose, sticking out from the wad of rolled leaves he was carrying between his jaws, and he looked hopefully at the yellow apprentice, wondering if she might offer to help carry his bundle.
Sleekpaw glanced at him haughtily and headed away between the pines.
Alderpaw sneezed.
“Let me help.” Tawnypelt took the leaves from him gently, tugging them with her teeth. The feather fluttered to the ground, and Alderpaw snatched it up quickly.
Tawnypelt and Stonewing followed Sleekpaw between the trunks. Alderpaw hesitated, glancing at the straight, evenly spaced pines. This was the first time he’d been in ShadowClan territory, and he was surprised how different it was from ThunderClan’s forest, where twisting trunks and low branches covered dips and rises, their leaves already browning and falling. In ShadowClan, the forest floor was smooth, dotted here and there with brambles and rutted occasionally with ditches, and there seemed to be no leaf-fall at all. Pines stretched into the distance, their thick canopy blocking out the sun. Countless moons’ worth of fallen needles made the ground feel springy beneath his paws.
Leafpool nudged him. “Stop staring and keep up,” she whispered. “I don’t want you getting lost.”
Alderpaw hurried forward, following Stonewing as he leaped over a fallen tree. He scrambled over the rough bark, landing clumsily as Leafpool dropped lightly beside him.
“I don’t see why we need to ask ThunderClan for help,” Sleekpaw meowed loudly.
Tawnypelt flicked her tail but didn’t reply. Stonewing continued walking. Alderpaw guessed that the herb parcels between their jaws were keeping them silent. But he wondered if they felt the same way about leading ThunderClan cats to their camp.
Leafpool sniffed. “Someone needs to take care of Littlecloud.”
“I don’t see why,” Sleekpaw retorted. “It’s not like you can cure him. He’s so old he should have joined StarClan moons ago.”
Tawnypelt halted with a growl and dropped her herb parcel. “Carry this, Sleekpaw,” she mewed sharply. “It’ll help you hold your tongue.”
Sleekpaw glowered at the ShadowClan deputy, but she took the parcel and, lifting her tail, marched on through the woods.
Tawnypelt looked apologetically at Leafpool. “Young cats don’t seem to have any respect these days.”
Young ShadowClan cats, Alderpaw thought crossly. He resented being lumped in with arrogant furballs like Sleekpaw. He remembered being shocked by how she and Needlepaw had mocked their elders at the Gathering. Perhaps that was just the way ShadowClan cats were. Needlepaw had always enjoyed breaking rules. That was why she’d left her Clan to follow him on his quest. Needlepaw. Thinking about the young she-cat made his fur tingle. He couldn’t help admiring her carefree self-assurance. Would he see her in camp? His belly tightened. He’d been sure that they had become friends on the quest, but she’d been pretty hostile at the last Gathering. What if she was as unfriendly as Sleekpaw now?
He realized the others were pulling ahead, and he broke into a run, catching up as they neared a towering wall of bramble. Tawnypelt was already disappearing through a tunnel, Stonewing at her heels. Sleekpaw pushed past Leafpool and ducked in next. Alderpaw followed Leafpool, unnerved by the heavy stench of ShadowClan.
The tunnel opened onto a clearing surrounded by thick bramble. Low branches hung over the camp, and a large rock stood at one end. He scanned the camp, wondering where the medicine den was and hoping to see Needlepaw or Violetkit. He spotted neither, but warriors moved around the edges, where scrubby grass sprouted beneath the trailing brambles. They watched him, their eyes sharp with distrust. Only one cat hurried forward to greet them. The cream-furred she-cat looked pleased to see them. “Thank StarClan you’re here,” she meowed with relief.
“Dawnpelt.” Leafpool met her gaze. “How’s Littlecloud?”
“He’s in pain, and I’ve run out of poppy seeds,” the she-cat told her.
“Don’t worry,” Leafpool told her. “We’ve brought plenty of herbs. I will ease his suffering the best I can.”
“This way.” Dawnpelt headed toward an opening in the brambles. Stonewing reached it first and dropped his bundle of herbs at the entrance.
Sleekpaw spat hers out with a snort. “These taste foul.”
Leafpool nudged her away and sniffed at the herbs, as though making sure none had been damaged. “It doesn’t matter what they taste like; it’s what they do that counts.”
“Leafpool!” A deep mew called across the clearing.
Alderpaw turned to see Crowfrost hurrying toward them, his black-a
nd-white pelt rippling in the breeze.
Rowanstar followed more slowly, his eyes dark with worry. “We need to talk to you.”
Leafpool dipped her head respectfully to the ShadowClan leader and his deputy. “I must check on Littlecloud first.”
The ShadowClan leader halted. “Of course.” He sat down and curled his tail over his paws. “We will be waiting when you’re done.”
Leafpool nodded to Alderpaw. “Come with me.” She picked up an herb bundle and disappeared inside.
Relieved to escape the stares of ShadowClan, Alderpaw followed her into the den, wrinkling his nose as the stench of sickness rolled over him.
Leafpool crouched beside Littlecloud.
Alderpaw stared at the sick medicine cat, shock pricking his paws. Littlecloud’s fur was matted, and he looked so small, curled in a nest that looked as though the bedding hadn’t been changed in a moon. His nose was pale and dry, his eyes half-closed and cloudy. He wheezed with every breath.
Carefully Alderpaw laid the feather he’d been carrying on the needle-strewn floor of the den.
As he did so, Dawnpelt padded in, her eyes shimmering with worry.
“Who’s been looking after him?” Leafpool turned on her. “His nest is filthy, and he needs water.”
Dawnpelt flinched. “I’ve been doing my best.”
“Couldn’t you have sent an apprentice for clean bedding or wet moss?” Leafpool demanded.
Dawnpelt dropped her gaze. “I’m sorry.”
Alderpaw felt a wave of sympathy for the she-cat. She looked weary and anxious. He wouldn’t have liked to have to ask an apprentice like Sleekpaw to help with mundane duties like moss gathering.
Leafpool’s gaze softened. “I’m sure you’ve done your best. But we need to get him more comfortable.”
“Should I fetch moss now?” Dawnpelt offered.
“Not yet.” Leafpool straightened. “I need to speak with Rowanstar and Crowfrost, then check on Grassheart.” She looked worried, as though she feared the queen might be as poorly cared for as Littlecloud. “Stay here until I get back.” Deftly she unwrapped the bundle of herbs and pulled out a few stalks of tansy. “Chew this into a pulp and try to get Littlecloud to swallow it. It should ease his breathing.” She shoved the tansy toward Dawnpelt, then hurried out of the den.