Эрин Хантер - The Apprentice's Quest

“Good-bye, Alderpaw.” Needlepaw gave him a friendly swipe around the ear with her tail. “I’ll be seeing you.”

Alderpaw wasn’t sure if he was looking forward to that or not.

The half-moon shed a bright light over the forest as Jayfeather, Leafpool, and Alderpaw trekked alongside the stream that separated ThunderClan from WindClan. Alderpaw felt every hair in his pelt rise as they crossed a set of ThunderClan scent markers, and he realized that they were leaving behind not just their own territory, but the territories of all the Clans, and setting off into the unexplored hills.

“Is it much farther?” he panted.

“Oh, yes, we’ve a long way to go yet,” Jayfeather told him.

Alderpaw sighed, half excited and half afraid. They had left the sheltering trees behind, and now rolling moorland stretched away in all directions, bare except for clumps of gorse, or reeds growing around a pool.

“How did the medicine cats know to come up here to the Moonpool?” Alderpaw asked.

“Actually, I was the cat who found it.”

Leafpool sounded slightly embarrassed.

“Spottedleaf—she was a ThunderClan medicine cat many seasons ago, when Firestar first came to the forest—came from StarClan to show me the way.”

“Wow, that means you’re really special!”

Alderpaw mewed admiringly.

Leafpool ducked her head. “Not at all. Just the right cat in the right place. Besides, lots of cats gathered at the Moonpool before the Clans ever came to the lake.”

“Will we meet them?” Alderpaw blinked nervously.

“You may meet them in StarClan,” Leafpool replied. “But they left this place many, many seasons ago.”

Alderpaw shivered. “That’s weird.”

The journey to the Moonpool seemed to take forever. Then, scrambling up a steep slope, Alderpaw began to realize that he could hear the sound of falling water from somewhere up ahead.

“We’re almost there,” Leafpool told him.

Leafpool kept climbing upward, and Alderpaw padded after her. Jayfeather brought up the rear; glancing back to make sure he was okay, Alderpaw was impressed to notice how he set down his paws instinctively in the right places. It was as though he knew this path so well that he didn’t need to see it.

Before they reached the top of the slope, Alderpaw heard a yowling cry coming from some way behind them. He paused and looked back to see all the other medicine cats, tiny in the distance, making their way along the path.

“We’ll wait for them,” Leafpool mewed, standing at Alderpaw’s shoulder.

As the other cats drew closer, Alderpaw could pick out each one and recognize them.

Kestrelflight, the mottled gray tom from WindClan, was in the lead. Mothwing followed him, with her apprentice, Willowshine, beside her. Last of all came Littlecloud; the old tom was obviously finding the climb strenuous, and he stood panting when he reached the place where Alderpaw and the others were waiting.

“Greetings,” Mothwing meowed, dipping her head politely, then giving Alderpaw a curious glance. “Who is this, Leafpool?”

“This is Alderpaw,” Leafpool replied. “He’s our new apprentice.”

A murmur of surprise came from the other medicine cats.

“Really?”

Kestrelflight responded. “I should have thought the last thing ThunderClan needed was another medicine cat!”

“We don’t question the will of StarClan,” Leafpool replied levelly, while Jayfeather flicked his whiskers irritably.

Alderpaw tried not to feel intimidated. It helped when Willowshine gave him a kind look and mewed, “I’m sure there can never be too many cats taking care of their Clan.”

Littlecloud said nothing, though Alderpaw thought he was looking slightly envious. I hope StarClan sends him an apprentice soon.

“Are we doing this, or are we just going to stand here all night?” Jayfeather asked testily.

He moved into the lead, springing confidently up the last part of the slope.

At the top a thick line of bushes barred their path. Jayfeather and Leafpool pushed their way through without hesitating. Alderpaw paused for a moment, then struggled through the stiff branches, pausing to shake his pelt when he emerged on the other side. Then he looked up, and he drew in his breath in a soundless gasp of astonishment.

In front of the line of bushes the ground dropped away into a deep hollow. A spring of water gushed from the rocks opposite, plunging down through moss and fern into a pool. The surface of the water glittered with the broken reflections of moon and stars. Alderpaw thought he had never seen anything so beautiful.

“It’s amazing, isn’t it?” Willowshine murmured, emerging from the bushes at his side. “I’ll never forget the first time I saw it.

And it still takes my breath away.”

Leafpool and Jayfeather had already begun to pad down the spiraling path that led to the pool. Alderpaw followed them, awestruck as his paws slid into the impressions made by those ancient cats so long ago. His pelt tingled.

The ancient cats, who had left… many, many seasons ago…

The other medicine cats followed him down the path and gathered at the edge of the pool.

Leafpool beckoned Alderpaw to come and stand beside her. “Alderpaw,” she meowed, “is it your wish to share the deepest knowledge of StarClan as a ThunderClan medicine cat?”

This is it, Alderpaw thought. “It is,” he replied, his voice sounding as if a claw were scratching his throat.

Leafpool gazed up at the stars, her amber eyes glowing like small fires in the night.

“Warriors of StarClan,” she began, “I present to you this apprentice. He has chosen the path of a medicine cat. Grant him your wisdom and insight so that he may understand your ways and heal his Clan in accordance with your will.”

Alderpaw stood there blinking, aware that something tremendous was happening. He almost thought he could see the assembly of starry warriors, seated around him on the slopes of the hollow. Then Leafpool touched his shoulder with her tail.

“Crouch down beside the water, lap a few drops, and then touch the surface with your nose,” she instructed.

As Alderpaw obeyed, he could see the other medicine cats around the Moonpool, their noses lowering to the water. It felt icy cold when he lapped it, and when he touched his nose to it, he thought that an icicle was stabbing him to the heart. Biting back a yowl, he closed his eyes and waited.

Alderpaw wasn’t aware of the passing of time, but he found himself walking alongside a shallow, sparkling stream with no clear idea of how he had gotten there. Lush vegetation grew on the banks, and the air was full of rich scents.

Alderpaw wondered if he should be afraid, but he felt too peaceful, and he wandered on, enjoying the warmth of the sun on his pelt.

After a little while, he saw that a large tom with a flame-colored pelt was walking along beside him. “Greetings,” the tom said. “I’m so happy to finally meet one of Squirrelflight’s kits.”

Alderpaw’s belly lurched as he realized that this must be Firestar, his mother’s famous father, who died in the Great Battle before he and his sister were born. Alderpaw would have expected to be overcome with shyness in the presence of such an awesome cat, but instead he felt at ease with him right away. There was something about Firestar that seemed oddly familiar.

Is this the same cat that I had that weird dream about?

“Come,” Firestar meowed, leading Alderpaw farther along the stream until they reached a place where the water spread out into a pool. Firestar motioned to Alderpaw to stand right on the edge. “Look into the water,” he instructed.

At first all Alderpaw could see was the pebbly bottom of the pool, and a few tiny fish darting here and there. Then the water and the pebbles seem to dissolve, and he found himself staring down into a deep gorge, with a river edged by bare, sandy rocks. Cats were moving here and there among the rocks, gathering into a ragged circle with one cat in the middle.