Into The Wild

Chapter 14

The cold air chilled Firepaw’s bones as blackness wrapped itself around him. He could hear nothing, and his nostrils were filled with the musty scent of damp earth.

Out of nowhere, a brilliant ball of light flared in front of him. Firepaw ducked his head, screwing up his eyes against the glare. The light shone, dazzling coldly like a star; then it blinked out, disappearing as quickly as it had come. The darkness fell away, and Firepaw found himself in the forest. He felt comforted by the familiar smells of the woods. He breathed in the moist green scents, and calmness flowed through his body.

Without warning, a dreadful noise burst from the trees. Firepaw’s fur bristled. It was the screeching of terrified cats racing out from the bushes up ahead. Firepaw recognized their ThunderClan pelts as they fled past him. He stood rooted to the spot, unable to move. Then came great cats, huge dark warriors, their eyes glittering cruelly. They thundered toward him, pounding the earth with massive paws, their claws unsheathed. And out of the shadows, Firepaw heard a high, desperate cry filled with grief and rage. Graypaw!

Firepaw woke, horrified. His dream vanished, leaving his ears ringing and his fur standing on end. As he opened his eyes, he saw the face of Tigerclaw peering into the den. Firepaw leaped to his feet, instantly alert.

“Something wrong, Firepaw?” asked Tigerclaw.

“Just a dream,” Firepaw mumbled.

Tigerclaw gave him a curious look, then growled, “Wake the others. We leave shortly.”

Outside the den, the sky glowed with a new dawn, and dew sparkled on the ferns. It would be a warm day once the sun was up, but the early-morning dampness reminded Firepaw that the time of leaf-fall was not far off.

Firepaw, Graypaw, and Ravenpaw quickly gulped down the herbs that Spottedleaf had given them. Tigerclaw and Bluestar sat watching them, ready to leave. The rest of the camp was still asleep.

“Ugh!” complained Graypaw. “I knew they’d be bitter. Why couldn’t we eat a fat, juicy mouse instead?”

“These herbs will keep your hunger at bay longer,” answered Bluestar. “And they will make you strong. We have a long journey ahead of us.”

“Have you eaten yours already?” Firepaw asked.

“I cannot eat if I’m going to share dreams with StarClan at the Moonstone tonight,” replied Bluestar.

Firepaw felt his paws tingle when he heard these words. He was itching to begin the journey. With the dawn’s light and the familiar voices, the terror of his dream had left him. All that remained was the memory of the brilliant light, and Bluestar’s words sent a renewed thrill of excitement through him.

The five cats made their way through the gorse tunnel and out of the camp.

Lionheart was just returning with a patrol. “Safe journey,” he meowed.

Bluestar nodded. “I know I can trust you to keep the camp safe,” she answered.

Lionheart looked at Graypaw and dipped his head. “Remember,” he meowed, “you are almost a warrior. Don’t forget what I have taught you.”

Graypaw looked back at Lionheart with affection. “I will always remember, Lionheart,” he mewed, nudging his head against the tabby’s broad golden flank.

They retraced their route to Fourtrees. This was the quickest way to pass into WindClan territory. HighStones lay beyond.

As Firepaw bounded down the side of the glade toward the Great Rock, he could still smell the scents of last night’s Gathering. He followed the others through the grassy clearing and up the slope on the other side, into WindClan territory. The bushy slope became steeper as they climbed, and rockier, until the cats had to leap from boulder to boulder up the side of a craggy cliff face.

Firepaw paused when they reached the top. Ahead of them, the ground flattened out into a wide plateau. The wind blew in a steady gust that rippled the grass and bent the trees. The soil was stony, and outcroppings of bare rock dotted the landscape here and there.

The air still carried the scents of WindClan, but they were stale. Much fresher, and more alarming, were the pungent markings of ShadowClan warriors.

“All Clans are entitled to safe passage to the Moonstone, but ShadowClan seems to have no respect for the warrior code anymore, so be alert,” warned Bluestar. “We mustn’t hunt outside our territory, though. We’ll follow the warrior code, even if ShadowClan doesn’t.”

They set off across the plateau as the sun rose into the sky, following the tracks through the heather. Firepaw had grown used to living under a canopy of trees. Without their shade, his flame-colored pelt felt heavy and hot, and his back seemed to burn. He was thankful for the steady breeze blowing from the forests behind.

Suddenly Tigerclaw stopped dead. “Watch out!” he hissed. “I smell a ShadowClan patrol.”

Firepaw and the others lifted their noses, and sure enough, the scent of ShadowClan warriors traveled on the wind.

“They are upwind. They won’t know we are here if we keep moving,” meowed Bluestar. “But we must hurry. If they move ahead they’ll detect us. It’s not far to the edge of WindClan territory now.”

They moved on quickly, leaping over the rocks, pushing their way through the sweet-smelling heather. Every few steps, Firepaw sniffed the air and glanced over his shoulder, on the lookout for the ShadowClan patrol. But gradually the odor grew fainter and fainter. They must have turned back, he thought with relief.

Finally they reached the edge of the uplands. The landscape changed dramatically, shaped and altered beyond recognition by Twolegs. Wide earth tracks crisscrossed green and golden meadows, small woods dotted the land, and Twoleg nests were scattered here and there among the fields. In the distance Firepaw saw a familiar wide, gray path, and an acid tang that stung his throat drifted on the breeze.

“Is that the Thunderpath?” he asked Graypaw.

“Yes,” replied Graypaw. “It runs up from ShadowClan territory. Can you see HighStones behind it?”

Firepaw looked at the distant horizon. The land rose sharply up to a point, jagged and barren. “Do we have to cross the Thunderpath then?”

“Yep,” mewed Graypaw. His voice was strong and confident, almost cheerful, as he faced the difficult journey.

“Come on!” Bluestar meowed. She bounded forward. “We can be there by moonrise as long as we keep up the pace.”

Firepaw followed her with the others, down the hill, away from the bleak hunting grounds of WindClan and into the lush Twoleg territory.

Keeping near the hedges, the cats walked on. Once or twice Firepaw could smell prey-scent from the bushes, but Spottedleaf’s herbs had succeeded in taking the edge off his hunger. The sun was still hot on his back, even in the shadows of the hedgerows.

They skirted a Twoleg nest. It stood on a wide expanse of hard white stone, with smaller nests round the edges. Keeping low, the cats crept past the fence that surrounded the white stone. A sudden barrage of barking and snarling made them spin around.

Dogs! Firepaw’s heart missed a beat. He arched his back, fur bristling from nose to tail.

Tigerclaw peered through the fence. “It’s all right. They’re tied up!” he hissed.

Firepaw looked at the two dogs scrabbling on the stone barely ten tail-lengths away. They were nothing like the pampered pets that lived in the gardens of the Twolegplace. These creatures stared at him with wild, killing eyes. They strained at their ties and reared up on their hind legs. They growled and barked, their lips drawn back to reveal huge teeth, until the shout of an unseen Twoleg silenced them. The cats moved on.

The sun was beginning to sink by the time they reached the Thunderpath. Bluestar signaled to them to stop and wait beneath a hedge. His eyes and throat stinging from the fumes, Firepaw watched as the great monsters flashed to and fro in front of him.

“We’ll go one at a time,” meowed Tigerclaw. “Ravenpaw, you first.”

“No, Tigerclaw,” Bluestar interrupted. “I shall go first. Don’t forget, this will be the first time of crossing for the apprentices. Let them see how it is done.”

Firepaw stared at his leader as she padded to the edge of the Thunderpath and looked up and down. She waited calmly as one monster after another flew past her, ruffling her fur. Then, when the earsplitting roar paused for a moment, she raced across to the other side.

“Off you go, Ravenpaw; now you’ve seen how it’s done,” meowed Tigerclaw.

Firepaw saw Ravenpaw’s eyes widen with fear. He knew just how his friend felt. He could smell his own fear-scent. The small black cat crept forward to the edge of the road. It was quiet, but Ravenpaw hesitated.

“Go!” hissed Tigerclaw from the hedge. Firepaw saw Ravenpaw’s muscles tighten as he prepared to run. Then the ground began to tremble beneath his paws. A monster sped out of the distance and hurtled past. The black cat shrank back for a moment, then pelted over to join Bluestar. A monster coming in the other direction threw dust up where his paws had been just a heartbeat before. Firepaw felt his fur shiver and he took a deep breath to calm himself.

Graypaw was lucky. A long lull let him cross safely. Then it was Firepaw’s turn.

“Go on, then,” growled Tigerclaw. Firepaw looked from Tigerclaw to the Thunderpath, and then walked out from beneath the hedge. He waited at the edge, as Bluestar had done. A monster was rushing toward him. Firepaw looked at the approaching monster. After this one, he thought, and waited for it to pass. Suddenly his heart lurched as he realized the monster had veered off the Thunderpath and was bumping along the grass. It was heading straight for him! A Twoleg was jeering from an opening in its side. Firepaw leaped backward, claws out, battered by the storm of wind from the Twoleg monster as it roared past him only a whisker away. He crouched, trembling, in the dirt and stared as it swerved back onto the path and disappeared into the distance. Through the roaring of blood in his ears, Firepaw realized the Thunderpath was quiet again, and he raced across, running faster than he had ever done in his life.

“I thought you were fresh-kill!” cried Graypaw as Firepaw cannoned into him, almost knocking him over.

“Me too!” Firepaw gasped. He was trying to stop shaking. He turned back to watch Tigerclaw dart over the path toward them.

“Twolegs!” he spat as he arrived at their side.

“Do you want to rest before we go on?” Bluestar asked Firepaw.

Firepaw looked up. The sun was low in the sky. “No,” he answered. “I’m okay.” But he had leaped so frantically out of the monster’s way that his claws felt frayed and tender.

The cats carried on, with Bluestar in the lead. The earth was darker on this side of the Thunderpath and the grass felt coarser underpaw. As they approached the foot of HighStones, the grass gave way to bare, rocky soil, dotted with patches of heather. The land sloped up now, toward the sky. Craggy rocks topped the slope, blazing orange in the sun.

Bluestar stopped once more. She chose a sun-warmed rock to sit upon, flat and wide enough for all five cats to rest side by side.

“Look,” she meowed, tilting her nose toward the dark slope before them. “Mothermouth.”

Firepaw peered upward. The glare of the setting sun blinded him, and the slope was engulfed in shadow.

The cats waited in silence. Gradually, as the sun dropped down behind HighStones, Firepaw began to make out the cave entrance, a square black hole that yawned darkly beneath a stone archway.

“We’ll wait here until the moon is higher,” meowed Bluestar. “You should hunt if you are hungry and then get some rest.”

Firepaw was pleased to have a chance to find food. He was starving now. Graypaw clearly felt the same and leaped away into a clump of heather, following the prey-scent that was thick in the air. Firepaw and Ravenpaw followed him. Tigerclaw set off in the opposite direction, but Bluestar remained where she was. She sat still and silent, gazing unblinkingly at Mothermouth.

The three apprentices gathered plenty of fresh-kill. With Tigerclaw they crouched on the stony hillside and feasted. But in spite of their easy hunt, no cat said much, and the air still felt thick with tension and anticipation.

Afterward, the cats rested beside their leader until the warmth had seeped out of the rock on which they lay and cold black shadows reached up on all sides. Only then did Bluestar call out, “Come. It is time.”