Midnight

Chapter 18

“We’re running short of celandine.” Cinderpelt poked her head out of the cleft in the rock. “I’ve used nearly all of it to soothe Longtail’s eyes. Do you think you could go out and get some more?”

Leafpaw looked up from the daisy leaves she was chewing into a paste. “Sure,” she meowed, spitting out the last scraps.

“This is just about ready. Do you want me to take it along to Speckletail?”

“No, I’d better check on her myself. Her joints have been aching badly since the weather turned so damp.” Cinderpelt came out of her den and let out a purr of approval as she nosed the chewed-up leaves. “That’s fine. Off you go—and take a warrior with you. The best celandine grows near Fourtrees, along the RiverClan border, and RiverClan aren’t happy that WindClan are still coming down to drink at the river.”

Leafpaw was surprised. “Still? But there’s been so much rain—they must have water of their own by now.”

Cinderpelt shrugged. “Try telling that to WindClan.”

Leafpaw put the news out of her mind as she brushed through the fern tunnel into the main clearing. That quarrel had nothing to do with ThunderClan, and most of her thoughts were taken up with anxiety about Squirrelpaw and Brambleclaw. The sun had risen four times since she saw them leave. Her private sense of Squirrelpaw told her that her sister was still alive, but she knew nothing about where they were or what they were doing.

She had not eaten that morning, so she padded across to the fresh-kill pile, where Sorreltail was finishing off a vole.

“Hi.” The young tortoiseshell warrior flicked her tail in greeting as Leafpaw chose a mouse for herself and settled down to eat.

Leafpaw returned her greeting. “Sorreltail,” she asked, “are you busy this morning?”

“No.” Sorreltail gulped down the last of her vole and sat up, swiping her tongue appreciatively around her jaws. “Did you want something?”

“Cinderpelt has asked me to go up toward Fourtrees, by the RiverClan border, to collect some celandine. She said I should take a warrior with me.”

“Oh, yes!” Sorreltail sprang to her paws, excitement gleaming in her amber eyes. “In case WindClan accidentally stray into our territory, yes? Just let them try!”

Leafpaw laughed and quickly ate the rest of her mouse.

“Right, I’m ready. Let’s go!”

As they approached the end of the gorse tunnel, Firestar appeared, followed by Brackenfur and Rainwhisker. Leafpaw felt a thorn stabbing at her heart when she looked at her father; his head was down and his tail drooping, and even his flame-colored pelt seemed dull.

“Nothing?” Sorreltail asked him quietly; Leafpaw realized that she knew exactly what their leader had been doing.

Firestar shook his head. “Not a trace of them. No scent, no pawmarks, nothing. They’ve gone.”

“They must have left the territory days ago,” Brackenfur meowed somberly. “I don’t think there’s any point in sending out more patrols to look for them.”

“You’re right, Brackenfur.” Firestar let out a heavy sigh.

“They’re in the paws of StarClan now.”

Leafpaw pressed her muzzle against his side, and his tail curled around to brush her ears before he padded off across the clearing. Leafpaw saw Sandstorm meet him at the base of the Highrock, and the two cats went off together toward Firestar’s den.

Guilt swept over her as she remembered how much she was hiding—most of all, the certainty that Squirrelpaw was safe, though far from ThunderClan territory—and every hair on her pelt prickled so much that it seemed impossible that no other cat noticed as she followed Sorreltail out of the camp.

As the sun rose higher the morning mists cleared away; the day promised to be hot, although the red-gold leaves on the trees showed that leaf-fall had taken over the forest. Leafpaw and Sorreltail headed toward Fourtrees. The medicine cat apprentice purred with satisfaction as she watched Sorreltail dashing ahead to investigate every bush and hollow that they passed. There was no sign of the shoulder injury that had kept Sorreltail from her warrior ceremony for so long, and no trace of bitterness that she had waited twice as long as other apprentices to receive her warrior name. Though she was older than Leafpaw, she still had all the joyful energy of a kit.

As they drew close to the RiverClan border, Leafpaw heard the soft rush of the river, and caught glimpses of it sparkling through the undergrowth at the edge of the trees.

She found huge clumps of celandine where Cinderpelt had suggested, and settled down to bite off as many stems as she could carry.

“I can take some too,” Sorreltail offered, glancing back as she padded up to the border. “Yuck—RiverClan scent marks!

They make my fur curl.”

She stood gazing out over the slope that led down to the river, while Leafpaw got on with her task. It was almost finished when she heard her friend calling to her.

“Come and look at this!”

Bounding to Sorreltail’s side, Leafpaw looked down the slope to see a large group of WindClan cats gathered beside the water to drink. She recognized Tallstar and Firestar’s friend Onewhisker among them.

“They are still drinking at the river!” she exclaimed.

“And look at that.” Sorreltail pointed with her tail to where a RiverClan patrol was crossing the Twoleg bridge. “If you ask me, there’s going to be trouble.”

Mistyfoot was at the head of the patrol; she had brought with her the new warrior Hawkfrost and an older cat Leafpaw did not know, a tom with a black pelt. They padded down the slope and stopped a few foxlengths away from the WindClan cats. Mistyfoot called out something, but she was too far away for Leafpaw to hear what she said.

Sorreltail’s tail twitched. “I wish we could get a bit closer!”

“I think crossing the border would be a really bad idea,” Leafpaw mewed nervously.

“Oh, I know that. It looks like it could be interesting, that’s all.” She sounded resigned, as if the thought of helping RiverClan settle their border dispute had appealed to her.

By now, Mistyfoot’s fur was bristling furiously, her tail fluffed out to twice its size. Tallstar left his Clan mate and came closer to talk to her. Hawkfrost said something urgently to the RiverClan deputy, but she shook her head and he took a pace back, looking angry.

Eventually Tallstar returned to his Clan mates, who finished drinking and set out for their own territory. They took their time; it looked to Leafpaw as if they were leaving because they had finished, not because Mistyfoot had ordered them off. Several of the WindClan cats hissed at the RiverClan patrol as they passed, and Leafpaw could tell that Mistyfoot had her work cut out holding back her two companions from a fight. They were badly outnumbered—Leafpaw could only guess how frustrated Mistyfoot must feel that she couldn’t enforce her territory boundaries, thanks to the agreement at the last Gathering.

When the WindClan cats had vanished in the direction of Fourtrees, Mistyfoot gathered her patrol together to lead them down beside the river. Impulsively, Leafpaw called out to her; the RiverClan deputy turned and spotted her, and after a heartbeat’s hesitation padded up the slope to join her and Sorreltail on the border.

“Hello, there,” she meowed. “How’s the prey running with you?”

“Fine, thank you,” Leafpaw replied. She flashed a warning glance at Sorreltail, thinking it would be as well not to mention the confrontation with WindClan they had just witnessed. “Is all well in RiverClan?”

Mistyfoot inclined her head. “Yes, everything’s fine, except…” She paused and then went on: “Have you seen anything of Stormfur and Feathertail? They disappeared from our territory four dawns ago. No cat has seen them since.”

“We tracked them as far as Fourtrees, but of course we couldn’t search on other Clans’ territories,” Hawkfrost added, coming up in time to hear what his deputy was saying.

The black warrior stayed where he was, keeping watch beside the riverbank.

Hawkfrost dipped his head courteously to Leafpaw and Sorreltail. He was a powerful tabby with a glossy dark pelt, and for a heartbeat Leafpaw thought he reminded her of some cat she had seen before—but no other cat in the forest had such icy, piercing blue eyes.

“What do you mean?” she asked. “Feathertail and Stormfur have left RiverClan?”

“Yes.” Mistyfoot’s eyes were troubled. “We thought they must have decided to go to ThunderClan to be with their father.”

Leafpaw shook her head. “We haven’t seen them.”

“But we’ve lost cats too!” Sorreltail exclaimed, lashing her tail eagerly. “And… yes, that was four dawns ago.”

“What?” Mistyfoot stared at her in disbelief. “Which cats?”

“Brambleclaw and Squirrelpaw,” Leafpaw replied, wincing.

She wished Sorreltail hadn’t blurted that out; her instinct had been to keep their disappearance secret from other Clans, but there was no taking the words back now.

“Is something taking them away?” Mistyfoot spoke almost to herself. “Some predator?” She shuddered. “I remember those dogs…”

“No, I’m sure that’s not what has happened.” Leafpaw wanted to reassure her without giving away the secret that only she knew. “If it was a fox or a badger, there would be traces. Scent, droppings… something.”

The RiverClan deputy still looked doubtful, but Sorreltail’s eyes brightened.

“If they all decided to leave the forest, perhaps they’ve gone together,” she suggested.

Mistyfoot looked even more confused. “I know Feathertail and Stormfur sometimes felt the Clan still blamed them for having a father in RiverClan,” she meowed. “And Brambleclaw has to bear the burden of being Tigerstar’s son.

But Squirrelpaw… What reason could there be for her to leave her home?”

Only the fire-and-tiger prophecy, Leafpaw thought, and then remembered that Squirrelpaw herself had no knowledge of it—only what must have seemed to be unfair criticism from their father. It was the prophecy in Brambleclaw’s dream that had sent Squirrelpaw on her journey. But for now Leafpaw could say nothing about either prophecy.

“Perhaps other Clans have lost cats too,” Hawkfrost meowed. “We should try to find out. They might know more than we do.”

“True,” Mistyfoot agreed. Casting a grim look back toward the bank where the WindClan cats had gathered to drink, she added, “It will be easy enough to ask WindClan. But no cat will be able to speak to ShadowClan until the Gathering.”

“That’s not long now,” Leafpaw remarked.

“Are you sure it will be easy to speak with WindClan?”

Sorreltail ventured boldly, as if she were challenging Mistyfoot to admit that WindClan still drank freely inside RiverClan borders.

Mistyfoot drew back a pace, suddenly taller and with eyes like cold fire. From anxiously sharing her worries with Leafpaw, she had become the RiverClan deputy again, guarding her Clan’s weaknesses. “I suppose you saw what happened,” she hissed. “Tallstar has broken the spirit of his agreement with Leopardstar. She allowed them to come down to the river only because they had no water in their own territory, and he knows it.”

“We should drive them off!” Hawkfrost’s voice was hard, and his pale blue eyes stared stonily in the direction where the WindClan cats had disappeared.

“You know Leopardstar has forbidden that.” Mistyfoot’s tone suggested she had gone over this argument before. “She says that she’ll keep her word no matter what Tallstar does.”

Hawkfrost bowed his head in agreement, but Leafpaw noticed that his claws flexed in and out as if he itched to rake them over the pelts of the cats who had invaded his Clan’s territory. Forest-born or not, he was growing into a formidable warrior, she reflected, as exceptional in his way as his sister, Mothwing.

“Say hi to Mothwing for me,” she mewed to him, and with a sudden thought darted back to the clumps of celandine.

Grabbing up a few of the stems she had bitten off, she hurried back and dropped them at Hawkfrost’s paws. “She might like to have those,” she told him. “Cinderpelt uses it to help cats with weak eyes. I think it grows much better on our side of the border.”

“Thank you,” Hawkfrost replied with a nod of gratitude.

“We’d better be on our way,” meowed Mistyfoot. “Leafpaw, tell your father about Stormfur and Feathertail, and ask him to let us know if he hears anything.”

“Yes, Mistyfoot, I will.”

Guilt swept over Leafpaw yet again as she watched the RiverClan patrol pad away upriver. She felt again the burden of being the only cat to know about both prophecies—one that had sent Brambleclaw and Squirrelpaw on a journey who knew where, and one that left Firestar convinced they would be involved in the destruction of his Clan—and yet her knowledge was not enough. StarClan had not chosen to tell her about the destiny of the forest, and Leafpaw did not feel that even the full moon, shining down on the next Gathering, would shed much light on her dark questions.

By the time Leafpaw and Sorreltail returned to camp, loaded with celandine, it was almost sunhigh.

“We’d better report to Firestar,” Sorreltail meowed when they had taken the herbs to Cinderpelt. “He’ll want to know about those missing RiverClan cats.”

Leafpaw nodded and led the way to her father’s den beneath the Highrock. The clearing was full of cats enjoying the last heat of early leaf-fall. Spiderpaw and Whitepaw were sprawled in the shade of the ferns that sheltered their den, while Cloudtail and Brightheart shared tongues in a patch of sunlight. Ferncloud was sitting outside the nursery with Dustpelt beside her, watching their kits as they played together.

A wave of sadness swept over Leafpaw. It was almost as if Brambleclaw and Squirrelpaw had never been part of ThunderClan, as if they had sunk out of sight as a drowning cat might sink in the river, the waters closing over its head.

The feeling ebbed a little when they reached Firestar’s den and called out to him. Leafpaw heard his voice telling them to enter, and she brushed past the curtain of lichen to see him curled up in his nest; Graystripe was sitting next to him, and the anxiety in the eyes of both cats was enough to reassure Leafpaw that her sister and Brambleclaw had not been forgotten.

“We’ve brought news,” Sorreltail meowed immediately, and poured out what Mistyfoot had told them about Feathertail and Stormfur going missing.

Firestar’s and Graystripe’s eyes narrowed, and the deputy sprang to his paws as if he wanted to dash out and look for his missing children right away.

“If a fox has taken them I’ll track it down and flay its skin!” he snarled.

Firestar remained in his nest, but he unsheathed his claws as if he were sinking them into the pelt of whatever had stolen his daughter. “Surely the dogs can’t have come back?” he muttered. “We couldn’t have to deal with them more than once in a lifetime?”

“No, there’s no sign of that,” Leafpaw reassured him.

“Feathertail and Stormfur must have gone with Brambleclaw and Squirrelpaw, and that… that suggests they had a reason for leaving.” She tried desperately to think how much information she could give to the anxious fathers without revealing that she knew more than she was supposed to. So far she had kept her Moonstone vision of the traveling cats even from her mentor, Cinderpelt, but now she knew she would have to reveal it. She was not breaking her promise, she told herself; she would not betray anything of what Brambleclaw and Squirrelpaw had told her when they met in the forest.

“Firestar,” she went on hesitantly, “you know how close I am to Squirrelpaw? Well, sometimes I can tell what she’s doing, even when she’s a long way away.”

Firestar’s eyes opened wide in amazement. “That’s impossible!” He gasped. “I always knew you were close, but this…”

“It’s true, I promise. When I went to the Moonstone, StarClan gave me a vision of her,” Leafpaw went on. “She was safe, and there were other cats with her.” She met her father’s intense gaze, and saw how much he wanted to believe her.

“Squirrelpaw is alive,” she finished, “and the others must be with her. Four cats together will be safer than two.”

Firestar blinked, bewildered. “May StarClan grant you’re right.”

Graystripe’s amber eyes remained full of fear and uncertainty. “Even if that’s true, why did they leave without telling us where they were going, or why?” he meowed. “If Stormfur and Feathertail had a problem, why didn’t they come to me first?”

“We think the other Clans might have lost cats too,” Sorreltail meowed. “We should ask them.”

Firestar and Graystripe exchanged a glance. “Perhaps,” mewed Firestar; Leafpaw could tell how hard he was struggling to sound decisive, to act like a Clan leader instead of a desperately worried father. “The next Gathering is only a few days away.”

“StarClan keep them all safe!” Graystripe added fervently.

Leafpaw suspected that he had little faith in his prayer; he knew well enough the dangers that stalked outside the forest.

As she left her father’s den, she felt the burden of her knowledge weighing even more heavily on her. She was the only cat in the forest who had heard that there were two prophecies, and knew what each of them said.

But I’m only an apprentice, she told herself anxiously. I know them by accident, not because our warrior ancestors chose to tell me themselves. What do StarClan expect me to do?

Leafpaw found it hard to sleep that night, fidgeting in her bed of ferns while Silverpelt glittered coldly above her. She longed to know what was happening to the journeying cats, but she could think of no way to find out.

When she finally drifted into unconsciousness, she found herself in some dim place, racing panic-stricken among the trunks of shadowy trees.

“Squirrelpaw! Squirrelpaw!” She gasped.

She was answered only by the hoot of an owl and the bark of a fox. Death panted hard on her paws, drawing closer with every footfall, and for all her twisting and turning, Leafpaw knew that there was no escape.