Starlight

Chapter 10

Leafpaw and Cinderpelt had found a rocky overhang at the back of the stone hollow.

“This won’t do permanently,” Cinderpelt warned. “We need a proper cave with walls to store our supplies, like the one we had in the forest. But it’ll be okay for tonight.”

Leafpaw crept in after her mentor and found a dry place at the back for the horsetail stems she had carried from the marsh.

“Get a good night’s rest,” Cinderpelt advised her, settling down and tucking her nose under her tail. “There’ll be plenty to do in the morning.”

Leafpaw knew she wouldn’t be able to close her eyes until she had asked the question that ran icy claws along her spine.

“Cinderpelt? D-do you think this is the right place for us?” she mewed bravely. “Is this really where StarClan meant us to be?”

Cinderpelt yawned. “We’ll know that when StarClan’s ready to tell us. Now stop worrying and go to sleep.” She pushed her nose further into her tail, and her breathing became slow and even as she drifted off.

Leafpaw did not find sleep so easy to come by. She sat beneath the overhang with her paws tucked under her, gazing into the shadow-filled hollow. StarClan, where are you? she begged silently. But only one or two lonely stars glimmered from the cloudy sky, and Leafpaw felt as if her warrior ancestors were too far away to watch over her Clan tonight.

She must have dozed at last, because she opened her eyes to find she was dreaming. She was standing on a dark sweep of hillside, looking down at the glitter of Silverpelt reflected in the shiny black lake. The island should have been a thicker patch of shadow against the water, but instead it shone with moonlight, each tree picked out in a shaft of silver. Leafpaw felt as if the place were calling to her, as if there were more she needed to learn about it. But we can’t go there, she reminded herself. Not every cat can swim like RiverClan.

A breeze picked up, whispering over the star-filled lake and ruffling Leafpaw’s fur. She felt a surge of hope run through her, even though the voices of her warrior ancestors remained silent. But Leafpaw was not afraid. They had been silent before on the long journey through the mountains, and she had learned that sometimes the only thing a cat could rely on was the strength that lay within. Everything would be all right if she and the others made it so. They would make their camp here; they would explore every part of the woods until they knew the good places for prey, for water and bedding, the spots where each healing herb grew, and the places where they could play and relax in the sun. It seemed strange and daunting now, but eventually it would be their home.

Pawstep by pawstep, they would make it happen.

As she stood gazing down at the lake, Leafpaw realized that the surface of the water was changing. The glitter of starlight faded and the water turned steadily redder, until waves of scarlet lapped against the shore. Leafpaw looked up in surprise, but the sky was as dark as before, so this couldn’t be a reflection of sunrise. The water seemed thick and slow-moving, surging lazily over the pebbles—and in that instant, Leafpaw knew that it wasn’t water at all. The lake was filled with blood, fed by streams that ran like gaping wounds.

Another gust of wind buffeted Leafpaw’s fur, hot and dusty this time, bringing with it the stench of crow-food.

Shaking with terror, she heard a voice speak clearly in her mind: Before there is peace, blood will spill blood, and the lake will run red.

“Cinderpelt! Cinderpelt!”

Leafpaw woke with a jump. It was still dark. Sorreltail was peering under the rocky overhang, anxiously calling Cinderpelt’s name. Somewhere in the hollow, the eerie yowl of a cat in pain tore the quiet of the night.

“What is it? What’s happening?” Leafpaw asked, scrambling up and prodding Cinderpelt in the flank.

“It’s Mousefur,” mewed Sorreltail. “She says she has a pain in her belly.”

“I’ll come,” Cinderpelt meowed, getting to her paws.

“If Mousefur has bellyache, we need water mint or juniper berries,” Leafpaw told her. “There were masses of them at the other end of the lake. Do you want me to fetch some?”

Her mentor looked serious. “It would be better to find a supply nearby, but if we need them before daylight, then you’ll have to go back.”

They followed Sorreltail across the hollow to the clump of ferns where Mousefur had made her nest, stumbling over stones in the darkness. Leafpaw tasted the air in an attempt to discover if any of the herbs they needed were growing nearby, but it was impossible to make out the special scents among so many, and against the overwhelming scent of cats.

When she and Cinderpelt reached Mousefur, the brown warrior was lying on her side, her body twisted with pain, her jaws gaping as she let out another anguished yowl.

“Mousefur, listen to me.” Cinderpelt crouched down beside her. “Do you know what caused this? Have you eaten any crow-food?”

Mousefur blinked eyes glazed with pain. “Crow-food?

No,” she rasped. “Do you think I’m mousebrained? My belly…” Her words trailed off into another yowl.

A horrible suspicion forced itself into Leafpaw’s mind.

Beckoning Cinderpelt aside, she murmured, “Mousefur must have drunk some of the water Mothwing found. I think it might have been tainted. It smelled bad, and when she showed me the pool she got it from, there was a dead rabbit in there.”

Cinderpelt let out an exasperated sigh. “And she didn’t think to… Well, no point in going into that.”

“What are we going to do?” Leafpaw asked anxiously.

Cinderpelt turned to Sorreltail. “Do you know if any other cat drank the water?”

Sorreltail shook her head.

“Goldenflower and Longtail might have,” Cinderpelt went on. “Check it out, would you, Sorreltail?”

The tortoiseshell warrior nodded and vanished into the darkness.

“Try to lie still, Mousefur,” Cinderpelt urged. “Let me feel your belly.” She patted gently with her paw. To Leafpaw, the brown warrior’s stomach looked unnaturally distended.

“Haven’t you got some herbs I could take?” Mousefur fretted.

Cinderpelt shook her head. “We haven’t had time to look for any yet.”

Mousefur opened her mouth to say something else, then retched and began to vomit.

“That could be a good sign,” Cinderpelt meowed to Leafpaw. “At least she’s getting rid of the poison.”

Leafpaw nodded, feeling utterly helpless. Mousefur was suffering because the medicine cats could do nothing without their stock of herbs. “We’ll have to find more supplies as soon as it’s light,” she mewed. “Especially water mint and juniper berries. I’ll take some to the other Clans, in case they drank the water too.”

Cinderpelt’s blue eyes widened in surprise, and Leafpaw winced. She had become too used to thinking of all four Clans as one, with shared problems and shared solutions. It seemed natural to help them if she thought their elders might be suffering the same thing as Mousefur. But now that the boundaries between them were being reestablished, was she being disloyal to her own Clan?

“We should check on WindClan at least,” she added persuasively. “Their cats are the weakest, so they’ll be in the most danger.”

Cinderpelt nodded. “You can go in the morning, but you’d better take a warrior with you. We’ll speak to Firestar as soon as we can. Well?” she prompted, as Sorreltail reappeared.

“Goldenflower says she had a bellyache, but she’s been sick, and it isn’t too bad now,” the tortoiseshell warrior reported. “Longtail is asleep, and he looks okay, so I didn’t wake him.”

“Thanks,” meowed Cinderpelt. “Longtail’s younger, of course, so he should be stronger. I’ll have a word with him when he wakes.”

“Mothwing meant to be kind,” Leafpaw murmured. She didn’t want her friend to get into trouble for not noticing the rabbit at the bottom of the pool.

To Leafpaw’s relief, Cinderpelt didn’t seem to blame Mothwing too much. “I know. Any cat can make a mistake.”

Then the medicine cat’s eyes darkened and she went on: “But Mothwing would be the first to admit she has much less experience than the other medicine cats, and no mentor to guide her now that Mudfur is dead. I hope for RiverClan’s sake that she doesn’t make this sort of mistake too often.

She’ll need all the help StarClan can give her, that’s for sure.”

Weak after her vomiting, but more comfortable, Mousefur managed to sleep. Sorreltail stayed to keep an eye on her, with instructions from Cinderpelt to fetch her if the pain returned. The sky was already turning gray behind the trees at the top of the cliff, and though Leafpaw felt exhausted there was no point in going back to the makeshift den. As soon as the light grew stronger, she and Cinderpelt went to look for Firestar.

A wind had sprung up, rattling the leafless branches and tearing the clouds into ragged strips, but the undergrowth sheltered by the ring of stone hardly stirred. A gleam of pale sunlight slanted into the hollow, leaving the foot of the cliff in shadow but striking a gentle warmth into the ferns by the entrance. The cats that hadn’t been disturbed by Mousefur’s illness awoke to a far different place from the dark and unwelcoming hollow of the night before. Leafpaw heard them call cheerfully to one another, and spotted Birchkit emerging from a bramble thicket to pounce on a dead leaf.

The sight of the kit playing just as he had done back in the forest, before the prey vanished and they were dulled by starvation, made Leafpaw’s heart lift, and she offered silent thanks to StarClan. She forced the terrifying bloodstained prophecy from her dream to the back of her mind, and told herself that this must be the right place for ThunderClan to settle.

They found Firestar in an open space near the center of the hollow; he had already gathered some of his warriors around him.

“We need to get out there right away and mark our boundaries,” Leafpaw heard Dustpelt meow as they approached. “If we don’t, WindClan and ShadowClan will claim all the woodland—and the prey—before you can say mouse.”

“We need to explore the territory as well,” Sandstorm pointed out. “For all we know, these woods could be crawling with foxes and badgers.”

“Not to mention hawks,” Thornclaw added.

Sandstorm murmured agreement. “I’ll see to the hunting patrols, if you like,” she meowed to Firestar.

The Clan leader gave her a grateful nod. “Thanks, that would be great.” Leafpaw felt a little stab of pride to think that her mother was one of the best hunters in the Clan.

Dustpelt flicked his ears. “I’ll take charge of guarding the camp—I don’t like the look of that entrance gap. I’ll get the apprentices and see what we can do with some thorns.”

“And I’ll take care of the boundary patrols,” Brambleclaw offered.

“That’s a huge job,” Firestar warned, “especially as we don’t even know where the boundaries are going to be yet.

Brackenfur, will you and Brambleclaw do that together?”

The two warriors nodded.

“Cloudtail, I want you to take a patrol and work outward from the camp,” the Clan leader ordered. “Report back on anything you think I should know about. It’s not just the boundaries we need to think about—I want to know what’s inside them, too.” Cloudtail agreed with a wave of his tail.

“What about me?” Thornclaw asked.

Cinderpelt limped forward. “Excuse me, Thornclaw.

Firestar, we have a problem.” She quickly told him about Mousefur’s bellyache. “I want to go out and find the right herbs,” she explained, “and then take some to WindClan. All the Clans could have drunk the water, but WindClan is weakest, so they’re most at risk.”

Firestar thought for a moment before he replied. His expression was hard to read, and Leafpaw wondered if he was reluctant to spend time and energy helping another Clan now that they were establishing their new territories.

“We can’t leave WindClan to suffer if there’s something we can do,” Cinderpelt urged.

“All the medicine cats know how to treat bellyache,” Firestar reminded her. “But you’re right, Cinderpelt: WindClan have been through enough, and it’s the kits and elders who’ll suffer. Thornclaw can go with you.”

“Thanks. I’ll just check on Mousefur and the others, and then we’ll go.”

Leafpaw followed Cinderpelt back to Mousefur’s nest.

The brown warrior was asleep, with Sorreltail dozing beside her. Longtail and Goldenflower had joined them; Goldenflower was asleep too, but Longtail raised his head as they approached and pricked his ears toward them as if he could see as clearly as ever.

“Hi, Cinderpelt, Leafpaw,” he greeted them; Leafpaw knew he had recognized them by their scent, but it didn’t stop a thorn-sharp claw of sympathy raking through her.

Sorreltail blinked her eyes open and scrambled to her paws. “I think everything’s fine,” she meowed. “Mousefur’s been asleep ever since you left.”

“Her scent is almost back to normal,” Longtail added.

“Goldenflower’s, too, but I think she drank less of the water to start with.”

Cinderpelt bent her head over Mousefur and then Goldenflower, sniffed them, and listened to their breathing.

“They’ll be okay now,” she meowed, straightening. “You might as well go, Sorreltail. You’ll be needed on one of the patrols. Thanks for staying with Mousefur.”

The young warrior raced off, waving her tail at Leafpaw as she passed.

“What about you, Longtail?” Cinderpelt prompted. “Did you have a bellyache as well?”

“A bit,” mewed the blind warrior. “Sorreltail said it was the water Mothwing gave us. I thought it smelled a bit odd, but when a medicine cat gives it to you—”

“Mistakes happen,” Cinderpelt meowed. “Leafpaw and I are going to look for herbs to restock our supplies in case any other cats show the same symptoms.”

“Good luck,” Longtail meowed. There was a wistful note in his voice, as if he would have liked to come with them to explore the new territory.

The medicine cats went back to the center of the camp, where the warriors were dividing up their patrols. Leafpaw spotted Brambleclaw heading purposefully toward Squirrelflight, but before he reached her, Ashfur bounded over.

“Hey, Squirrelflight!” he meowed. “Sandstorm says she wants you for the hunting patrol.”

“Sure,” Squirrelflight replied.

There was a look of mingled frustration and disappointment in Brambleclaw’s eyes as he watched her pad away, but he didn’t try to stop her. Leafpaw sighed. There was definitely something wrong between the tabby warrior and her sister, though she had no idea what it was.

“Wake up.” Cinderpelt prodded her in the side.

“Thornclaw’s ready. Let’s go.”

Leafpaw’s paws tingled with excitement as they headed for the gap in the rock wall. Dustpelt was giving orders to Spiderpaw and Whitepaw about clearing unwanted thorns from the camp to build a barrier. “I don’t want so much as a mouse to get in and out,” he meowed.

“What, not even cats?” Spiderpaw asked cheekily, waving his tail.

Dustpelt sighed. “We’ll leave a tunnel, mousebrain.”

Leafpaw pushed her way into a patch of ferns, which looked less prickly than the bramble bushes next to it, and paused in the middle, breathing in the strong green scent around her. On the other side, beyond the gap that led into the stone hollow, the unknown forest lay waiting.

No—ThunderClan’s new territory lay waiting.