Bluestar's Prophecy

So! Kittypets could be dangerous. Bluefur began to understand why Pinestar had been so angry at finding her near the Twoleg fence. Jake didn’t look like he could win a fight with a mouse, but it could have just been an act to catch her off guard.

Featherwhisker trotted from the fern tunnel, his eyes bright. “Are these my escorts?” He looked Bluefur and Snowfur up and down before nodding a greeting to Sunfall.

Snowfur plucked at the ground. “Yes,” she meowed. “We’ll make sure no cat hurts you.”

The medicine cat apprentice’s whiskers twitched. “Thank you.”

“Are we going now?” Bluefur joined them.

Featherwhisker glanced at the sky. “The dew should be burned off by now.”

“Is that good?” Bluefur wondered.

“It means the sprigs will be dry when we gather them, so they won’t rot in the store.” Featherwhisker was already heading for the camp entrance.

Once in the forest, Bluefur fell in beside him while Snowfur trotted at his other flank. She scanned the trees, ears pricked for any danger. She was in charge of protecting a Clanmate.

“Is it safe?” Featherwhisker asked.

Was that a hint of a purr in his mew?

“No danger here,” Snowfur reported.

“What a relief,” meowed the medicine cat apprentice.

The forest was filled with fresh scents as they headed for the border. It was hard to resist following the prey trails, but they had a duty to perform. Bluefur wasn’t going to let anything distract her. As they passed the sandy hollow, she spotted flashes of fur moving beyond the undergrowth. Sweetpaw and Rosepaw were practicing their battle moves. She wondered what Featherwhisker had felt when he had been told that he would be spending his time as an apprentice in a medicine den rather than in the sandy hollow.

“What a shame you’re not a warrior, too,” she commented to Featherwhisker.

Featherwhisker blinked. “But I wouldn’t want to be.”

“Why not?” Snowfur was staring at the apprentice medicine cat as if he had announced he was about to grow wings.

“I prefer to help my Clanmates by healing, not fighting.”

“But don’t you wish you could hunt sometimes?” Bluefur wondered.

“Who says I don’t?” Featherwhisker suddenly darted between the snaking roots of a birch and racked his forepaws through a drift of trapped leaves. Plunging in his muzzle, he jerked back with a mouse dangling from his jaws.

Snowfur hurried forward. “That’s amazing!”

“How did you learn to hunt?” Bluefur gasped.

Featherwhisker dropped the mouse and started digging a shallow hole in the soft earth. “I don’t spend every moment gathering herbs!” He dropped the mouse in the hole and scraped the earth over it. “I’ll collect it later.” Trotting away, he headed once more for the border.

As they passed through Tallpines, the scent of Twolegplace drifted through the trees, and by the time they reached the line of ThunderClan scent markers, the smell of kittypet had grown strong. Sunfall had been right. Bluefur paused to taste the air, wondering if she would recognize Jake’s scent among the jumble of others. She wrinkled her nose. Kittypets smelled worse than RiverClan, and there were far too many of them to tell which was which.

Snowfur and Featherwhisker had padded along the border without her, and she hurried to catch up to them. “Where’s the catmint?” she called.

“Outside an abandoned Twoleg nest.” Featherwhisker’s mew sounded taut.

Bluefur tensed. “Is it dangerous?”

“Not usually.”

“You sound worried.”

“I’ll be happy when I see if the catmint has survived leaf-bare,” Featherwhisker explained. “The frosts were unusually hard.”

“What if it’s dead?” Snowfur asked.

“Then I’ll have to ask Brambleberry for supplies,” Featherwhisker told them. “There’s no other cure for greencough.”

Bluefur bristled. Even though greencough could be deadly, asking the RiverClan medicine cat for anything would be humiliating. What if RiverClan used the catmint to bargain for Sunningrocks?

A blackbird shrilled overhead. Had they alarmed it? She let Featherwhisker and Snowfur push ahead into a thick swath of ferns and scanned the area.

Something dark moved beyond the scent markers.

Bluefur froze.

A kittypet?

She squinted through the undergrowth and stiffened with surprise when she realized it was Pinestar. What was he doing out there on his own? She ducked low and watched curiously as the ThunderClan leader padded to a Twoleg fence. He seemed very relaxed. He must be totally confident that he could beat any kittypet who dared stray into his path.

He leaped up onto the fence and balanced there, staring toward the Twoleg nest. Was he looking for a fight? Perhaps he was hoping to send a message to the kittypets around there to keep out of ThunderClan territory. Should she offer to help?

No.

Bluefur remembered how angry Pinestar had been the last time he’d found her there. She didn’t want him to think she made a habit of hanging around Twolegplace. Besides, she was supposed to be guarding Featherwhisker. Treading lightly so that Pinestar wouldn’t hear her, she hurried after her Clanmates.