Dark River

“We have to try!” Heatherpaw screeched.

“I don’t think there’s enough space at the top to get through,” Breezepaw argued. Fear made him angry. “If a kit got swept down over the rocks, it might die!”

“We have to do something,” Hollypaw yowled.

Jaypaw pressed against Fallen Leaves, trying to read his thoughts, but the young tom’s flank seemed to be fading, and Jaypaw’s shoulder passed with a shiver through the soft fur.

“Fallen Leaves?” he hissed.

“I’m sorry!” Guilt and grief hung like mist in the air.

Jaypaw suddenly felt cold where the tom’s warm body had been. Panic gripped him and time seemed to slow. For a heartbeat Jaypaw glimpsed a pair of amber eyes.

“Wait!” he called. “Come with us!”

Fallen Leaves blinked, his gaze filled with sorrow. “It’s not my time to leave,” he mewed faintly and then he was gone.

Not again!

“Are we going to die?” Sedgekit’s terrified mew rose above the torrent.

Jaypaw’s mind whirled as he tried to work out some way to escape. Water sprayed his face as the river frothed and bub-bled against the cave walls. Lionpaw pressed him back with the others until they were huddled on a narrow strip of earth, water snapping at their paws.

Help us!

Blood roared in Jaypaw’s ears.

Could StarClan hear him down here?

Suddenly, a silvery light glowed at the edge of his vision, like moonlight creeping across a night-black forest. Jaypaw looked up and saw a smooth ledge near the top of the cave. A cat was sitting there. It was the cat from his dream, with twisted claws, balding pelt, sightless bulging eyes. The cat who had sent Fallen Leaves into the tunnels to die.

The cat looked straight at Jaypaw.

Anger rose in Jaypaw’s chest. Have you come to watch us die too?

A shadow moved beneath the cat’s paws. He was rolling something toward the lip of the ledge. Something long and slender and smooth. Jaypaw’s fur stood on end. The stick from the lake!

Its markings were clear in the moonlight and, as Jaypaw stared in confusion, the cat lifted his paw and held a trembling claw over a row of scratches. Five long and three short.

Jaypaw gasped. Those scratches weren’t there before! He had counted the marks so many times he knew them by heart.

Five warriors and three kits! He means us !

Jaypaw stared, panic-stricken, into the old cat’s eyes. Are we going to die?

The cat bent his head to look at the stick before slowly lowering his claw and running it through the scratches. With a rush of hope, Jaypaw understood.

We’re going to survive!

The cat nodded.

A paw clapped him sharply on the ear. “Stop staring at nothing and help us think!” Breezepaw snarled.

The vision disappeared and Jaypaw was in darkness once more. He turned to the others, his pelt bristling with excitement. “There’s a way out of here!” he mewed. “I know it!”

“What is it, then?” Lionpaw demanded.

“I’m not sure,” Jaypaw admitted. “Let me think for a moment.”

“Thinking won’t move boulders!” Heatherpaw screeched.

“We’re trapped!”

“We could wait till the cave floods and swim up to the hole in the roof,” Hollypaw suggested.

“It’s too small to escape through,” Breezepaw growled.

“And the kits might drown!” Heatherpaw pointed out.

Jaypaw shook his head. There was something at the edge of his thoughts. An idea he could sense but not reach. The stick! It had been here in the cave. But he’d found it by the lake. How did it get out?

Water splashed at his paws. He recoiled, then froze. He pictured the river reaching up to the stick, lifting it, washing it away. Of course! The river must flow out into the lake.

“We’ll have to swim!” he cried.

“Swim where?” Lionpaw spluttered.

“The river runs into the lake. It’ll carry us there!”

“But it disappears underground!” Breezepaw hissed.

“It comes out in the lake!” Jaypaw insisted.

“We’re not RiverClan. We can’t swim!” Heatherpaw wailed.

Lionpaw pressed against Jaypaw. “Will this really work?”

“There’s no other way.”

“If you say we must do it, then we have to trust you,” Hollypaw mewed.

“Yo u might!” Breezepaw growled.

“If we don’t do something, we’re all going to drown!”

Heatherpaw screeched.

Hollypaw kneaded the ground. “Let’s try it!”

Swallowkit squealed in terror. “I’m not going in the water!”

“We’ll hold you by your tails,” Lionpaw promised. “We won’t let go.”

“By our tails?” shrieked Thistlekit.

“If we hold you by your scruffs, we’ll swallow too much water,” Lionpaw mewed. “You’ll have to keep your head afloat by paddling with your forepaws like this.” Water spattered from his paws as he churned the air, showing the kits how to paddle.

“I’m scared,” Heatherpaw whispered.

“It’s going to be okay.” Lionpaw dropped onto four paws and pressed against the WindClan cat. Jaypaw was close enough to hear him whisper into her ear, “Our time together will be something I remember even when I’m with StarClan.”

Heatherpaw trembled. “There will be no borders between us there.”