Sign Of The Moon

Chapter 8

Lionblaze emerged from the thorns and trotted toward the old Thunderpath at the head of his hunting patrol. Cinderheart, Birchfall, and Leafpool followed him, keeping up easily. After a gray, damp dawn, the clouds were beginning to break up, and ragged scraps of blue sky were appearing through the trees. A breeze blew into Lionblaze’s face, bringing with it the scent of prey, but he found it hard to concentrate on hunting. He was still stunned by the speed of Jayfeather’s departure, and struggling not to feel angry that he hadn’t been allowed to go, too.

“I wonder why Jayfeather has to go to the mountains,” Birchfall mewed, bounding up to pad beside Lionblaze. “Did he tell you?”

“He had a sign,” Lionblaze grunted. “Don’t forget, he’s a medicine cat.”

“I wish I could have gone,” Birchfall continued wistfully. “I was only a kit when we made the Great Journey, but it was so exciting! I’d love to go back there now that I’m a warrior.”

“I guess most of the Clan feels like that,” Cinderheart remarked, joining them. “I know I do, even though I wasn’t on the Journey.”

“There were cliffs that went down forever,” Birchfall murmured, his eyes clouded with memory. “And wind that nearly blew your fur off, and the biggest birds I’ve ever seen…”

You don’t have to go on about it, Lionblaze thought. “We’re talking too much. It’s time we started looking for prey,” he reminded them, as the walls of the abandoned Twoleg nest appeared through the leafless trees. “Why don’t we split up? Birchfall, you go with Leafpool, and I’ll hunt with Cinderheart.”

He felt a stab of sadness. If only he could walk beside her for more than just a morning patrol. For all our life, until we go to hunt with StarClan.

Birchfall led Leafpool off in the direction of the lake, while Lionblaze veered into the woods behind the Twoleg den.

“You must be worried about Jayfeather,” Cinderheart meowed as they paused on the edge of the pine trees. “But remember the prophecy: Nothing will happen to him. He’s far too important for the destiny of the Clans.”

Lionblaze didn’t want to be reminded of the prophecy, especially by Cinderheart, when that was what had come between them. “Jayfeather is an ordinary cat,” he argued, desperate for that to be true. “Just like me.”

“But you’re not ordinary, either of you!” Cinderheart protested. “You’re special and different.”

Lionblaze dug his claws into the earth, anger tensing every muscle. “Why can’t you see past that stupid prophecy to the cat I really am?” he snapped at Cinderheart. “You saw it before, so what has changed?”

“Everything,” Cinderheart replied. Her voice was full of pride and excitement. “Because I never knew who you really were. The prophecy is part of you—it was here before you were born!”

She sounds as if she has no regrets at all that we aren’t together anymore. “What about you?” he challenged. “Don’t you matter, too?”

“Of course I do.” Her excitement ebbed and Lionblaze began to sense the sorrow behind her words. “Believe me, I wish that you weren’t part of this prophecy. But you are, and we just have to live with it.”

“But—” Lionblaze tried to interrupt, but Cinderheart swept on.

“You can’t lead your Clanmates into battle worrying about a mate and kits. You’re like a medicine cat—your loyalty must be to the whole Clan, equally.”

“You could say that about any warrior,” Lionblaze retorted.

“No, because you’re one of the Three.” Cinderheart stretched out her tail as if she was going to touch his shoulder, then drew it back at the last moment. “This is the way things are.” Abruptly she turned away. “Let’s hunt.”

Lionblaze gazed helplessly after her. His heart was full of what he wanted to tell her, but the words wouldn’t come. Besides, Cinderheart had already spotted a blackbird, and had dropped into the hunter’s crouch, creeping up on it with stealthy paw steps. Suppressing a sigh, Lionblaze began working his way around to the other side of the blackbird, careful not to make a sound. The bird was intent on pecking at the moss beneath a tree, unaware of the cats closing in on it. When Cinderheart was within a couple of tail-lengths, Lionblaze let out a yowl. The blackbird fluttered up in alarm, straight into Cinderheart’s claws. She batted it out of the air and gave its neck a swift bite.

Lionblaze padded up to see Cinderheart stroking the bird’s limp brown feathers with one paw, her claws sheathed. “It’s a female,” she mewed softly. “Look, there’s moss in her beak. She must have been collecting it for her nest. And now her eggs will never be laid. She’ll never go back to her mate.”

Lionblaze blinked. He couldn’t understand why any warrior would grieve over a piece of fresh-kill. “It was a good catch,” he mewed encouragingly.

“That’s not the point.” Cinderheart was still looking down at the dead bird. “I always wanted a mate and kits,” she whispered. “But it wasn’t my destiny. Never to feel the warmth of fur…never to suckle…”

“You’ll find another mate,” Lionblaze told her, trying to comfort her even though it wrenched his heart. “You can still have kits.”

Cinderheart spun around to face him, blue flame in her eyes. “You don’t understand!” she spat. She gouged at the earth with her hind claws, burying the blackbird. “I’ll hunt alone!” Without waiting for a response from Lionblaze, she plunged away into the trees.

Lionblaze looked after her, baffled. What was all that about? Movement caught his eye and he glanced around to see Leafpool padding toward him. How much of that did she hear?

“Are you okay?” Leafpool asked gently as she drew close to him.

Lionblaze was too dazed to reawaken his old grudge against her. “Not really,” he confessed. “Things aren’t working out with Cinderheart.”

Leafpool nodded, and to his relief she didn’t ask him to explain why. He knew that he couldn’t tell her about the prophecy.

“Why don’t we look for prey beside the lake?” she suggested, turning in that direction with an inviting twitch of her tail.

Surprising himself, Lionblaze fell in beside her and they shouldered through the undergrowth together, the tang of water in the air growing stronger as they drew closer to the waterside.

“Cinderheart seems to think we have different destinies,” he meowed after a few moments. “I don’t understand her.”

“I think I do.” Leafpool blinked sympathetically. “And I really believe that she loved you—in fact, I think she still does.”

Lionblaze clawed in frustration at a tendril of bramble that snaked across their path. “Then why can’t she just be with me? Why does she have to make it all so difficult?”

Leafpool shook her head but didn’t reply. For a while they padded along together in silence. As they reached a narrow track that wound its way toward the lake, Leafpool halted, tasting the air. Lionblaze thought she had detected prey, and winced as she darted noisily to the edge of a bramble thicket.

You won’t catch anything like that!

But Leafpool was pushing dead leaves aside with one paw, to reveal three bright yellow coltsfoot flowers. “The first this season!” she exclaimed. “I’d better take these back to camp. They’ll be good for Mousefur’s cough.”

“Do you miss being a medicine cat?” Lionblaze asked, as Leafpool carefully nipped off the stems.

“With every breath I take,” she murmured.

“Then what was your destiny?” Lionblaze mewed, the words tumbling from his jaws. “I mean, if you were meant to be a medicine cat, then you wouldn’t…StarClan wouldn’t have let you and Crowfeather…”

Leafpool bowed her head. “Destiny isn’t a path that any cat follows blindly,” she meowed. “It is always a matter of choice, and sometimes the heart speaks loudest.” She paused, then added, “Deep down, I always knew what I had to do, and that’s why I came back to the Clan. Lionblaze, whatever else happens, I trust you to know the right thing to do as well. Listen to your heart, because that’s where your true destiny lies.”