Эрин Хантер - Fading Echoes

Jayfeather shook his head.

“I didn’t think so.” Squirrelflight’s voice grew calm. “Littlecloud’s patient died. It doesn’t mean Briarpaw will.”

“We can feed her and help her move to keep her healthy,” Jayfeather put in. “If we keep her active, she stands a good chance of beating this.”

Millie’s breath was coming in quick gasps. “She’ll recover?”

“Her legs won’t,” Jayfeather meowed gently. “But she doesn’t have to die.”

Squirrelflight’s tail swished the air. “We need to keep her as active as we can, so that her chest stays clear. If we can do that, she’ll be okay.”

“Okay?” Millie sobbed. “She’ll never hunt. She’ll never be a warrior! She’ll never have kits!”

Graystripe bounded into camp. “What’s happening?” He skidded to a halt at Millie’s side.

“Our poor kit!” Millie buried her muzzle in his shoulder.

The trailing brambles at the entrance to the den swished. “Briarpaw can hear you!” Brightheart hissed. “I think you should come in, Jayfeather, and explain to her exactly what’s happening.”

Squirrelflight’s nose brushed his cheek. “I’ll look after Millie and Graystripe,” she told him.

Heart heavy as a stone, Jayfeather padded into his den. He settled beside Briarpaw’s nest. Panic was flooding in waves from the young cat.

“I’m never going to walk again, am I?”

Jayfeather rested his muzzle on her trembling head. “No,” he whispered. “I’m so sorry.”

“StarClan honors your courage and spirit.” Firestar touched his muzzle to Briarpaw’s head. Watching, Dovepaw felt a surge of excitement.

“I name you Briarlight.”

Bumblestripe and Blossomfall, already named, were the first to start the cheering for ThunderClan’s newest warrior.

“Briarlight, Briarlight!”

The voices of the Clan shook the chilly air and rang up through the hollow into a clear blue sky. Millie and Graystripe pressed against each other, their proud gazes sharpened with grief.

Briarlight shifted her forepaws, propping herself higher, raising her chin. Dovepaw tried not to look at her hind legs, splayed uselessly behind her.

It had been a quarter moon since the tree fell. Dovepaw was weary, like the rest of her Clan. The work of clearing the camp of debris on top of the regular patrols had left every cat exhausted. And with each shortening day, prey was starting to grow leaner and scarcer.

Dovepaw longed for a good night’s sleep. She had been plagued by terrible dreams. If only she’d given more warning, then Longtail might have been saved and Briarlight would be scampering around her littermates right now. A dream had woken Dovepaw only last night: the tree splintering into the clearing yet again, a trapped cat wailing.

Ivypaw!

In every dream it was Ivypaw who was trapped underneath the beech tree, not Briarlight; and in every dream Dovepaw struggled in vain to reach her sister.

“Dovepaw?” Whitewing’s mew brought her back. “Are you all right?”

Dovepaw shook herself. “I’m just glad Briarlight’s got her warrior name.”

“She’s a warrior at heart,” Whitewing murmured.

It was true. Briarlight had never stopped fighting for a moment. Jayfeather had devised exercises to keep her chest clear and strengthen her forelegs. And Briarlight never missed a chance to practice them: stretching and twisting, reaching out with her forepaws until she trembled with the effort and her pelt grew matted. The past few days she’d insisted on fetching her own food from the fresh-kill pile, though her Clanmates often tripped over one another trying to be the first to carry the tastiest morsel to her nest in the medicine den.

“I’ll get my own,” Briarlight had told Cherrykit, who had tried to give her own meal to the injured young cat.

Cherrykit had stared with round eyes at Briarlight as she hauled herself with her forepaws across to the fresh-kill pile.

“Look, Molekit!” Cherrykit had called. “She’s doing it herself!”

Molekit had come running. “Go, Briarlight!” he cheered.

Dovepaw secretly thought the two kits and Jayfeather had been Briarlight’s greatest allies; they alone accepted her entirely as she was now. Millie’s gaze was still clouded with grief, and pity flashed in every warrior’s eyes when they saw the young cat hauling herself across the camp. Mousefur could not even look at Briarlight. She still blamed herself for the tragedy that had killed her best friend and crippled the young warrior.

In spite of their horror, most of the Clan was getting used to Briarlight’s injury. They no longer stared with startled eyes at the medicine den when she wailed and yowled under Jayfeather’s instruction.

“It’ll keep your chest clear,” he’d encouraged. “Yowl your head off if you have to. Your Clanmates won’t mind.”

The treatment seemed to be working. Briarlight’s hind legs were no better, but her fur was sleek, her eyes brighter each day, and her forelegs as strong as any warrior’s.

They didn’t even tremble now as Molekit clawed his way up the newest warrior’s pelt and balanced on her shoulders. “Briarlight!” he cheered.

Millie nosed him off crossly. “Be careful!”

“It’s okay,” Briarlight insisted. “I bet I can carry both of them.”

“Really?” Cherrykit’s eyes sparkled.

“Don’t you dare!” Millie warned the kits.

Graystripe softly pushed his mate away. “Let them have some fun.”

“We’ll be warriors, too, soon!” Molekit bundled his sister over in a surprise attack.

“You’re not even apprentices!” Briarlight teased.

Dovepaw gazed at her old denmate. How could she act so cheerful?

Whitewing leaned forward and licked her daughter’s ear. “Don’t forget, we’re gathering moss for the new elders’ den.”

How could she forget? For days, she’d been helping to weave the honeysuckle around what was left of the beech branches where the old den had stood. The new den was spacious and strong. Purdy and Mousefur would move in as soon as the new nests were built.

She gazed around the camp, accustomed now to its new shape. The warriors’ den was lost for good, crushed by the trunk. But the thick boughs of the beech, which arched over half the clearing and pressed against one side of the hollow, gave plenty of new shelter. There were plans to shape a brand-new warriors’ den around the thickest of them; rescued branches had already been stacked, ready for construction to begin. The nursery looked safer than a badgers’ set, enclosed in a thick tangle of roots that had been woven where possible to form a protective shell around the old bramble bush.

“Come on.” Whitewing flicked Dovepaw’s flank with her tail-tip. She beckoned to Toadstep and Rosepetal. “Are you ready?”

The two warriors trotted to meet them.

“Where’s Ivypaw?” Dovepaw glanced around the clearing, and spotted her sister slipping in from the dirtplace tunnel.

“I’m coming!” Ivypaw bounded across the clearing. “See you later, Briarlight!” she called cheerfully.

Briarlight had lain down in a spot of weak sunshine, while Molekit and Cherrykit clambered over her. She lifted her head and purred at Ivypaw. “Can’t you take these two with you?”

“I’m afraid you’re stuck with them for another moon yet,” Ivypaw joked.

“Hey!” Molekit objected. “We’d come if we could!”

Ivypaw bounded to a halt beside Toadstep. “A dawdling cat gathers no moss,” she teased the black-and-white tom.