Эрин Хантер - Fading Echoes

Jayfeather let out a long, thoughtful breath. “Do you know which Clan they’re from?”

Why hadn’t she checked that already? Dovepaw cast her senses out again, let them stretch back to the lakeshore and wreathe around the two cats still padding steadily onward. “RiverClan,” she breathed, tasting their fishy scent. She could make out the shade of their pelts: one dappled gold, one gray.

The dappled cat was smaller, a she-cat. “Mothwing.” The scent of herbs on the medicine cat’s pelt was strong.

The gray was a she-cat too, but larger, with the muscled shoulders of a seasoned warrior. “And Mistyfoot.” The RiverClan deputy.

Jayfeather nodded, his eyes clouding.

“What?” Dovepaw leaned closer.

“They’re grieving,” he murmured.

She recognized sadness in the slow, dragging steps of the RiverClan cats. But the sorrow sharpening Jayfeather’s mew told her that he could actually feel their grief as though it were his own. “What are they grieving for?”

“Leopardstar must be dead.” He sighed.

“Dead?” Dovepaw stiffened. “She’s lost all her lives?”

“She’d reached her ninth. It was just a matter of time.” Jayfeather got slowly to his paws and headed for the crack in the rock at the back of the medicine den. “Mistyfoot and Mothwing must be heading for the Moonpool,” he called over his shoulder. “So Mistyfoot can receive her nine lives.”

He disappeared into the cleft, his voice echoing from the shadows. “Now that we’re awake so early…”—reproach edged his mew—“we might as well make ourselves useful.”

Dovepaw hardly heard. Leopardstar, dead? She cast her senses far across the lake, reaching for the RiverClan camp. Images of the stricken Clan filled her mind. Cats circled restlessly around a body laid in the clearing, while others smoothed rosemary and watermint onto its spotted pelt in an attempt to hide the odor of death. A queen shooed her kits in a flurry of paws back toward the nursery.

Jayfeather emerged from the cleft carrying a bundle of herbs. “Mistyfoot will make a good leader,” he mewed, dropping the herbs and heading back to his store. “She’s fair and wise, and the other Clans respect her.” He returned with another large bundle of herbs and dropped it beside the first.

“Will Leopardstar hunt with StarClan now?”

“They will welcome such a noble warrior.” Jayfeather began to separate the leaves into smaller piles. The tang of them made Dovepaw’s nose wrinkle.

She dragged her attention back to the medicine den. “What are you doing?”

“We need to spread these herbs out to dry them.”

“But what should we do about Leopardstar?”

“Nothing.” Jayfeather pushed a clump of herbs toward her. “Rain got into the store and I don’t want them to rot,” he explained.

“Shouldn’t we tell Firestar?”

“Do you want to wake him?”

Dovepaw stared at her pile of leaves. She supposed it wouldn’t really make any difference if she waited till he was awake and out of his den.

Jayfeather was already expertly separating the leaves in his pile, laying them one by one out on the dry ground. Dovepaw began carefully peeling a wide, floppy leaf away from the clump. “Is it always the deputy who becomes leader?”

“So long as no other warrior believes they can lead the Clan better.”

Dovepaw stared at him in surprise, a leaf dangling from her paw. “Has that ever happened?”

Jayfeather nodded. “In WindClan, Onestar had to fight for his leadership.”

“Fight?” Dovepaw laid the leaf beside the others, trying to keep her paw steady. Could Clanmates really turn on one another like that?

“Mudclaw thought he’d make a better leader,” Jayfeather answered matter-of-factly. His line of drying leaves was already a tail-length long. Dovepaw tried to work faster.

“Careful!” Jayfeather warned. “If you rip them, they lose some of their healing juices.”

Dovepaw hesitated before she drew another leaf from the soggy pile. “Does it happen often?” Her belly churned. “I mean, Clanmates fighting to be leader.”

Jayfeather shook his head. “It’s rare. And if Mistyfoot is already on her way to the Moonpool, clearly no one’s challenged her.” He began to straighten the leaves Dovepaw had laid out. “Though there might have been a time when she would have been challenged.”

“When?” Dovepaw cast her senses back to the RiverClan camp, searching anxiously for any flicking tail or unsheathed claws that might suggest discontent. She found nothing, only the slow steps and drooping tails of a Clan in mourning.

“Hawkfrost.” Jayfeather half spat the name. “Mothwing’s brother.”

“Hawkfrost?” Dovepaw had heard the name in the stories that elders told about the days when the Clans first made their homes around the lake.

“He’s dead, thank StarClan.” Jayfeather didn’t look up from his work, though his paws slowed down as if memories distracted him.

“Have you seen him in StarClan?” Dovepaw asked.

“Hurry up.” Jayfeather ignored her question. “I want all these leaves laid out by the time the sun’s up, to give them enough time to dry.”

Has he seen Rippletail? she wondered, laying out a new leaf. The memory of the dead RiverClan warrior stabbed her heart.

Jayfeather padded away to the cleft and fetched a new bundle of damp leaves. “Was it Mistyfoot and Mothwing who woke you so early?”

Dovepaw looked up, blinking.

“Did they disturb your dreams?” he pressed.

Dovepaw shook her head. She didn’t want to share the dream that had broken her sleep.

“Were you dreaming of Rippletail?”

Dovepaw looked up sharply, as surprised by the gentleness in Jayfeather’s mew as she was by the question. Had he been there in her dream?

The medicine cat shook his head. “I didn’t walk in your dreams.”

Is he reading my thoughts right now? Dovepaw flinched away, but Jayfeather went on.

“I can tell that you’re troubled and I can feel your grief. It’s like a nettle in your heart, stinging any paw that tries to pluck it out.”

Dovepaw began peeling and laying out leaves as though it were the most important duty she’d ever had. She’d tried so hard to hide her feelings. What would he think of her now that he knew how soft she was? Would he be disappointed that she was one of the Three?

But Jayfeather carried on calmly separating the herbs. “You might feel as if you are responsible for his death, but you’re not,” he told her. “You have a destiny, but so does every other cat. Rippletail was always going to be part of the quest to unblock the stream. He was born with courage, and you couldn’t have succeeded without him. His death steered your path, helped you find another way to defeat the beavers. He died saving the lives of his Clanmates. StarClan led him to the battle that killed him, not you.”

Dovepaw stared deep into the medicine cat’s blue gaze. “Is that true?”

“It’s true.” He rolled a torn leaf into a tight knot and wrapped it in another. His mew grew brisk once more. “The fresh leaf’s juices will leach out and make the damaged leaf stronger,” he explained.

Dovepaw nodded without really hearing. Jayfeather had managed to touch the nettle in her heart and release its sting. For the first time since Rippletail’s death, she felt peace. Was it that simple? Should she just follow her own destiny and leave the rest to StarClan?

But one day she’d be stronger than StarClan. Lionblaze had promised her that. What then?

She sat back on her haunches. Sunshine was beginning to ripple through the trailing brambles at the cave entrance. Long lines of leaves lay drying in front of her. “Firestar will be awake by now. Should we tell him about Leopardstar?”