Erin Hunter - The Fourth Apprentice

“We wouldn’t ask you to,” Lionblaze responded, though he felt a twinge of regret. Woody would be a valuable ally to have on their side.

“Okay, let’s hunt now,” Toadfoot suggested. “Then we’ll get some rest until nightfall.”

“But don’t go off alone,” Lionblaze warned. “And if you see a beaver, yowl to warn the rest of us.”

He padded into the woods with Dovepaw at his side, and he halted after a few tail-lengths to taste the air. “I can’t scent anything except beavers,” he complained.

“Same here,” Dovepaw meowed. “Look at this.” She stopped in front of a large pile of mud mixed with twigs and grass. Large paw prints were set into the dried mud. “I wonder what it’s for?”

Lionblaze padded up and gave it a cautious sniff, recoiling a pace or two at the strong reek of musky, fishy beaver scent. “Maybe it’s a scent marker,” he guessed. “If we get farther away from it, we might be able to pick up some prey.”

To his relief, the beaver scent faded as they stalked farther into the woods and left the last of the felled trees behind. Lionblaze began to recognize the familiar scents of mouse and squirrel. Hearing a scuffling sound from underneath a bush, he pinpointed a mouse and glided up to it, careful to set his paws down lightly. The mouse tried to dart off at the last moment, but Lionblaze trapped it under his paw and killed it with a bite to the back of the neck.

“I’ve got one, too!” Dovepaw announced, trotting up with a mouse in her jaws.

Lionblaze scraped earth over the fresh-kill. “The hunting is much better here,” he commented, pleased that they had found prey so quickly. “I suppose it’s because the water is so near.”

It didn’t take much longer for him to catch a squirrel and Dovepaw to track down a couple more mice.

“I never knew hunting could be this easy,” she mumbled around her mouthful of fresh-kill as they carried the prey back to the stream.

Lionblaze realized that Dovepaw had still been a kit when the drought began. She’d never known what it was like to hunt when there was plenty of prey. “It’ll be like this in the forest once we bring the water back,” he promised.

Back in the undergrowth above the pool, they found that the other cats had all hunted well, and for once the patrol was full-fed when they settled down to sleep until nightfall.

“I’ll keep watch,” Dovepaw offered. Her eyes were wide and her whiskers quivered.

“No, you need to rest,” Lionblaze told her. “ I’ll keep watch.”

“But I don’t think I’ll be able to sleep,” Dovepaw protested in a whisper, glancing at the rest of the patrol to make sure they couldn’t overhear. “I can still hear the beavers, gnawing and scraping…”

“Then block your senses like you did before,” Lionblaze told her. “We know the beavers are here now, so we don’t need you to be on the alert all the time.” When she still looked unconvinced, he bent his head and gave her ear an approving lick. “You’ve done well, Dovepaw. You were right! The stream has been blocked by brown animals-and we can do something about that. When we defeat the beavers and release the water, the Clans will owe everything to you.”

Dovepaw sighed. “I hope that’s going to happen.” Without arguing anymore she curled up; after a few moments Lionblaze realized she was asleep.

Wind ruffled the surface of the pool, sending clouds scudding across the waning moon. The woods were dappled with light and shadow as the patrol crept down to the water’s edge.

Lionblaze halted at the edge of the pool; the dam looked even bigger and more threatening in the darkness, blotting out the stars behind the topmost logs. His belly churned. StarClan, are you with us now? Do you even walk these skies? He scanned the bank carefully in both directions and tasted the air, but he could see nothing moving, and the beaver scent clinging to everything was no help in telling him whether the beavers themselves were anywhere around. With any luck, they’re all asleep in that mudpile upstream .

“Right,” he whispered as the other cats gathered around him. “Dovepaw and I will cross the stream with Whitetail and Sedgewhisker. The rest of you stay on this side.”

Toadfoot gave him a curt nod.

“We climb up onto the dam and pull the logs down,” Lionblaze went on. “If the beavers try to stop us, we fight.”

“Yes!” Tigerheart hissed, his eyes gleaming pale in the moonlight.

“Okay, let’s go,” Lionblaze mewed. He padded down to the bottom of the dry streambed and up the other side, with half of the patrol following closely. Now that the waiting was over, his worries had faded, replaced by a hard resolution. This is the night when we get our water back!

Once across the stream, Whitetail let out a yowl. It was answered by another yowl from Toadfoot on the far bank.

“Now!” Lionblaze growled.

He bounded down the slope and sprang onto the dam. A heartbeat later his paws skidded from under him and he slithered halfway down the pile of logs, barely saving himself from falling into the pool. Beside him, Dovepaw had slipped down to a lower branch; Lionblaze leaned over, grabbed her scruff, and hauled her up again.

“Be careful!” he gasped as he recovered his balance. “These logs are slippery.”

He realized something that he hadn’t noticed before: The beavers had gnawed all the bark off the tree trunks, leaving the shiny pale wood exposed. Whitetail was edging along one long trunk, setting her paws one in front of the other in a straight line and digging her claws in, while Sedgewhisker tried to jump, dislodged one log, and managed to scramble out of the way before it swept her into the pool.

Yowls and furious growling from the other side told Lionblaze that the rest of the cats were having the same trouble. How can we destroy the dam if we can’t even move around on it?

He and Dovepaw were struggling to drag one log out of the pile when Lionblaze heard a splashing sound, followed by the heavy padding of paws. Every hair on his pelt lifted with horror as two beavers lurched up in front of him, their blackberry eyes and curved teeth gleaming in the moonlight.

“Oh, no…” Dovepaw muttered.

Lionblaze let out a yowl and hurled himself at the nearest beaver, slashing at its side as he sprang past it. To his dismay, his claws glanced harmlessly off its pelt, which felt thick and greasy, like mud. As he spun around, he saw both beavers heading for Dovepaw; the apprentice faced them bravely, leaping into the air as they rushed at her. She landed on the shoulders of the leader and cuffed him over the head and ears, but the beaver ignored her. Tossing its head, it shook her off as if she were a fly, sending her crashing into the logs.

The beavers slithered up to the top of the dam where Whitetail and Sedgewhisker were waiting, outlined against the sky. The she-cats’ backs were arched and their fur was bristling as they let out caterwauls of defiance.

Lionblaze checked that Dovepaw was unhurt and left her scrambling to her paws while he flung himself back into the battle. When he reached the top of the dam, he saw one beaver swing on its forepaws and deal a massive blow to Sedgewhisker with its tail. The WindClan warrior let out a shocked yowl as she fell backward. In her fall she brushed against Whitetail, who sank her claws into the nearest log so she didn’t follow her Clanmate.

Peering down into the darkness, Lionblaze spotted Sedgewhisker lying on the dry streambed below. She was moving, so he guessed she was just stunned; there was no time to go check. As he whirled to face the beavers again, Whitetail clambered up and stood at his side.

“Fox dung, I’ve torn a claw,” she muttered.