Эрин Хантер - Crowfeather's Trial

Every hair on his pelt prickled with apprehension as he bounded lightly across the stepping stones and onto ThunderClan territory.

If the ThunderClan cats find me here, after what happened yesterday, he thought, then I’ll really be in trouble. Still, it would be worth it, if he could bring Nightcloud home.

It was too early for the dawn patrol, but Crowfeather stayed alert in case there was a cat or two out for some night hunting. He slid furtively through the undergrowth, shivering as the frosty grass scraped along his pelt. He reached the tunnel entrance where he and Breezepelt had met the ThunderClan cats, but he couldn’t pick up even the faintest trace of Nightcloud there.

His belly was churning as he moved on to where he thought he could find another entrance. He didn’t know this territory well, and every heartbeat that passed made him fear that an unexpected ThunderClan patrol would find him.

The first birds were beginning to twitter as Crowfeather approached the next tunnel entrance, low down between a couple of rocks that jutted out of the forest floor. There he stopped, quivering. A tail-length from the nearest boulder he picked up a scent: faded and stale, but unmistakably Nightcloud’s.

She was here.

Hope sprang up inside Crowfeather at finding proof that Nightcloud had left the tunnels alive, that the stoats hadn’t killed her. Breezepelt was right. She is a fierce warrior. . . .

Then he saw a smear of blood on the rock. No!

She was wounded, then . . . but how badly? If she escaped from the tunnels, why didn’t she come home? For a moment Crowfeather wondered whether it had something to do with the way he and Nightcloud had argued, then gave his head a dismissive shake.

It’s not always about you, mouse-brain! he chided himself. Nightcloud is far too loyal to leave her Clan over an argument with you—she doesn’t even like you.

Forgetting all about possible ThunderClan patrols, Crowfeather put his nose to the ground and began to follow Nightcloud’s scent. It veered in the direction of the WindClan border, but from here she had a long way to go. With every paw step Crowfeather was afraid that he would find her body, but although he spotted more traces of blood, the scent trail did not disappear.

Then Crowfeather came to a shallow dip in the ground, with a pool of water at the bottom surrounded by ferns. Nightcloud’s scent led down toward the water; flattened and broken grass stems suggested that she had fallen or slid down. He traced her path through the ferns, guessing that she must have been desperate for a drink of water. Maybe she was still there, waiting for her Clan to come find her!

But as Crowfeather reached the water’s edge, his remaining hope vanished. A flattened patch among the plants that overhung the pool told him where Nightcloud must have lain down. Blood had soaked into the ground and was clotted on the fern fronds. And Nightcloud’s scent was almost drowned by the mingled smells around the pool: the faint, stale tang of dog and Twolegs, and the overwhelming reek of fox.

Crowfeather shivered. Did the fox get her? That’s most likely. She would have already been injured, perhaps too exhausted to fight it off. He pictured the black she-cat, weak and wounded, her glossy fur matted with blood, turning on the fox with her teeth bared and her claws out, using the last of her strength in a desperate attempt to escape its cruel fangs.

She was so brave. . . . She wouldn’t be easy prey.

Crowfeather bent his head to the flattened patch of plants and breathed in Nightcloud’s scent. He felt a sharp pain in his chest, as if every thorn in the forest were digging into him. She was a loyal WindClan warrior. We’re not too far into ThunderClan territory . . . she would have known where she was. If she were alive, she would have done whatever it took to get back to camp. Oh, Nightcloud . . .

He realized that while he and Nightcloud had never loved each other as mates were meant to, he cared about her more than he had ever admitted. He admired her strength and her loyalty, and the way she had always protected Breezepelt. Crowfeather knew now that he had never appreciated what a good mother she had been.

I wish I’d told her that . . . but now it’s too late. She’s gone.

CHAPTER 9

Crowfeather sat at the edge of the warriors’ den, forcing himself to choke down a vole. Memories of his terrible discovery earlier that morning—the blood-soaked nest in the ferns, and the stink of fox that tainted the air around the pool—took away the last traces of his appetite. But he made himself eat because he knew he would need all his strength for what he had to do now.

Nightcloud is surely dead. . . . How am I going to tell Breezepelt?

On his way back to camp, Crowfeather, still stunned by his discovery, had almost forgotten that he was trespassing on a rival Clan’s territory. Heading for the border stream, he had thrust his way through a bank of ferns and emerged into the open to see a ThunderClan patrol padding through the undergrowth a couple of fox-lengths away from him. Fox dung!

Quickly he withdrew into the ferns and crouched there, peering out, convinced that at any moment his scent would give him away, and that this time he would be brought to Bramblestar. And Onestar will have my head. Then, to his relief, he noticed that all four cats were loaded with prey. Hardly daring to breathe, he prayed to StarClan that the scent of the fresh-kill would mask his own, just long enough for the patrol to pass him without realizing he was there.

He was in luck—they walked by close enough that they ruffled the fern fronds where he was hiding, but didn’t spot him, didn’t scent him. Crowfeather had stayed there for many heartbeats, shaking from ears to tail-tip, until he felt fit to go on.

When Crowfeather returned to camp, he was almost relieved that Breezepelt was nowhere to be found. For a few moments, at least, he could delay the inevitable. How am I going to tell him his mother is dead? Now Crowfeather spotted him stalking back into camp with a rabbit dangling from his jaws. Heathertail and Harespring were with him, also laden with prey.

Crowfeather’s gaze followed Breezepelt as he padded across the camp and deposited his prey on the fresh-kill pile. His belly churned as he tried to decide what he would say to his son.

I can’t put it off any longer. . . .

When Breezepelt had dropped his prey, he turned immediately to Heathertail. Crowfeather was close enough to overhear their conversation.

“You have to help me,” Breezepelt meowed urgently. “I’m not asking you to go back into the tunnels, just show me how to figure out the layout. I’m going down there again to find Nightcloud, and no cat is going to stop me!”

“But, Breezepelt—” Heathertail began.

While Breezepelt was speaking, Crowfeather had bounded over to join the two younger cats, and now he interrupted whatever Heathertail had been about to say.

“That won’t be necessary,” he mewed gently in response to Breezepelt.

Pain tore at him like a badger’s claw as he saw the hope flaring in his son’s eyes.

“You mean you went? You found her?” Breezepelt asked.

Crowfeather sought the right words, but for a moment all he could do was let his head droop, shaking it sadly. “I couldn’t sleep last night,” he began at last, “so I went out and looked for Nightcloud again at the ThunderClan end of the tunnels. But I didn’t find her. I caught her scent and followed it to a clearing with a pool. Her blood was on the ground, and there was a terrible reek of fox. I think . . . Breezepelt, I think a fox may have taken her.”