Эрин Хантер - Shattered Sky

Alderheart couldn’t hide his anxiety and grief at Twigpaw’s question, and decided that he couldn’t lie to her. I tried that with Violetpaw, and look how well that worked.

“I don’t know where Violetpaw is right now,” he admitted. “It looks like Darktail took her and Needletail out of the RiverClan camp—”

“What?” Twigpaw interrupted. “Why was Darktail in the RiverClan camp?”

“Darktail and his rogues raided RiverClan and drove the Clan out. We just got back from attacking the rogues and taking back the territory.”

“So why isn’t Violetpaw with you?” Twigpaw asked, deep anxiety in her voice.

“Before we arrived, Darktail took her and Needletail out of the camp to punish them, and no cat knows what happened to them after that.”

Twigpaw’s eyes stretched wide with horror, and Hawkwing’s gaze was full of concern. “But why would he punish Violetpaw?” Twigpaw demanded. “What had she done? Why didn’t some cat help her? And why—”

“Twigpaw, it’s all so complicated—” Alderheart was beginning, when to his relief Bramblestar padded up, with Rowanstar and Mistystar beside him.

“Greetings,” Bramblestar meowed, introducing himself and the other Clan leaders. “This is a momentous day for the Clans. I never expected to see SkyClan here, reunited with the rest of us.”

“SkyClan never expected it either.” A brown-and-cream tabby she-cat joined Hawkwing and gave the leaders a respectful nod. “I am Leafstar, leader of SkyClan. We have come a long way to find you.”

More cats were gathering around to listen to the leaders, and Alderheart began to hear uneasy murmurs arising from the crowd.

“Another Clan? What does this mean?”

“Surely there are too many cats in the forest now?”

“Where are they all going to live?”

Bramblestar glanced around sternly, as if he wanted to quell the unwelcoming comments, but before he could speak, Jayfeather stepped forward, gazing at the newcomers with his sightless blue eyes.

“What’s the point of twittering like a nestful of blackbirds?” he demanded. “It’s obvious what we need to do.”

“It might be obvious to you, Jayfeather,” Bramblestar meowed.

Jayfeather gave a disdainful sniff. “If you weren’t Clan leader, Bramblestar, I’d call you a mouse-brain. We must seek the advice of StarClan.”

A stiff breeze blew into Alderheart’s face as he toiled up the last slope toward the Moonpool. Clouds were scudding across the sky where the warriors of StarClan were beginning to appear.

Ahead of Alderheart, Leafpool and Jayfeather scrambled from rock to rock, while Mothwing and Willowshine were just behind him. Puddleshine, once again ShadowClan’s medicine cat, brought up the rear.

I wish Kestrelflight could be with us, too, Alderheart thought sadly. But there’s no point even trying to fetch him from WindClan.

Thrusting his way through the bushes that surrounded the hollow, Alderheart began to follow the spiral path down to the water. His paws slipped easily into the paw marks left there by the ancient cats so many seasons ago.

The moon was only a thin claw-scratch; the water that poured out from the rocks, and the pool below, was dark except for the glimmer of starshine. Alderheart felt the hairs on his pelt rise at how strange and mysterious it seemed without the glow of reflected moonlight they saw at the regular half-moon meetings.

As he and his fellow medicine cats crouched at the water’s edge, Alderheart wondered what message the spirits of his warrior ancestors would have for them. He closed his eyes and touched his nose to the surface of the pool, barely biting back a yowl as the chill raced through him from nose to tail-tip.

When Alderheart opened his eyes, he seemed to be still in the hollow beside the pool, but now the surface of the water blazed with reflected light. He raised his head to see that the sides of the hollow were lined with glittering spirit cats, their pelts frosted with starlight and their eyes glowing like countless small moons. He took in a long, awestruck breath.

This is wonderful! he thought, relief bursting in on him like the sun appearing from behind a cloud. StarClan has barely appeared to any of us since they gave us the prophecy moons ago.

He waited confidently for the spirit cats to speak. After the long, horrible misadventure with Darktail and his rogues, the Clan cats had finally found SkyClan… Now they had to learn how to “clear the sky.”

Leafpool was the first to speak, rising eagerly to her paws. “They’re here, finally—we’ve found SkyClan! Are they ‘what you find in the shadows’?”

At the opposite side of the pool, a flame-colored tom also rose; Alderheart recognized Firestar. “They are,” he replied. “But there is more to be done.”

Alderheart glanced around at the other medicine cats. How strange for us all to be here together! He saw the same eagerness reflected in their eyes as they gazed at Firestar.

“What more should we do?” Leafpool meowed. “We found what lies in the shadows—the missing Clan. Sky Clan! Now how do we clear the sky?”

“Not every Clan is present,” Firestar pointed out. “This was about restoring all five Clans, as it was long ago—long before I came to the forest. SkyClan has no medicine cat, but another Clan is missing from our group, too…”

The starry cats began to fade from Alderheart’s sight. As the light died, he and the other medicine cats exchanged uneasy glances.

Mothwing, who had been absent from the vision, looked on curiously. “What happened?”

As quickly as he could, Alderheart explained what they’d seen and heard.

“Of course , ” murmured Mothwing, her eyes widening with recognition.

“I guess we know what we must do… ,” Jayfeather mewed reluctantly.

Twigpaw lay stretched on the ground outside the apprentices’ den, leaning into the warmth of her father’s pelt. Hawkwing was telling her all about SkyClan, about their life in the gorge and their journey to find the other Clans, in much more detail than had been possible while they were still traveling.

I don’t think I’ll ever get tired of listening to his voice, Twigpaw thought. It’s great to be back home, and it’s even better now that I have kin.

It was very early in the morning, a day after SkyClan had reached the ThunderClan camp. The sun had not yet risen, though rosy tints in the sky showed where it would appear. A breeze carried cool, fresh scents into the camp.

The day before, the clearing had been filled with bustle. Before leaving for the Moonpool and their meeting with StarClan, the medicine cats had tended to the RiverClan prisoners and the cats who had been wounded in the battle.

The SkyClan cats had been invited to share the fresh-kill pile, while Daisy guided Tinycloud into the nursery to rest and recover her strength while she waited for her kits to be born.

“Thank StarClan!” Tinycloud had exclaimed. “I think I have a whole Clan in here, and they’re all practicing their fighting moves!”

Now, the camp was peaceful. As soon as the sky began to pale toward dawn, Bramblestar and the other leaders had taken a patrol of uninjured RiverClan warriors, along with a few volunteers from the other Clans, to survey the damage in RiverClan territory and begin the task of rebuilding. Squirrelflight, left in charge of the camp, had sent out the border and hunting patrols, so that the hollow was much less crowded than it normally was these days. It’s almost like there’s just one Clan living here again, Twigpaw thought.