Dawn

“Not the best I’ve tasted,” agreed Cody. “My housefolk tried to give me something similar once, but I soon let them know what I thought, and they never gave them to me again.”

Leafpaw nearly choked with surprise. “You can make your Twolegs do what you want?”

“They’re not so hard to train,” Cody mewed. She sat up and began washing her paws.

Sasha called across the nest, “Can you train the mongrel that hurt Coal to be gentler?”

“I doubt it,” Cody answered. “These workfolk are nothing like my housefolk.”

Leafpaw saw Brightheart’s face appear behind the mesh of her cage. The ginger patches on her white fur looked almost black in the dim light, and it was impossible to see that one side of her face had been terribly scarred by a dog attack many moons ago. “What do you think they’re going to do with us?” she whispered.

“Perhaps they’re going to turn us into kittypets?” Leafpaw suggested. Much as she disliked the idea, at least that might give them a chance to escape and return to the Clan.

There was a snort from Sasha’s cage. “I don’t think so,” she rasped. “We’re hardly the sort of fluffy, pampered cats that Twolegs go for.”

Leafpaw glanced at Cody, hoping she wouldn’t take offense, but to her surprise the kittypet was nodding.

“Sasha’s right,” she agreed. “These folk don’t care about cats—Clan, rogue, or kittypet. Trust me, I know the sort of—what do you call them? Twolegs?—that make good housefolk.

These just want to get rid of us.”

Leafpaw tried to swallow, but her mouth had suddenly become too dry, and the pellets she had eaten seemed to be lodged halfway down her throat. Trying not to bring them up again, she lapped a few mouthfuls of slimy water. She fought the urge to curl up in the back of her cage and lose herself in dreams. She could not rely on StarClan to get her out of this place. She had faith that her warrior ancestors were watching the destruction of the forest, but her instincts told her they were powerless against Twoleg cruelty; it was her own wits she would have to rely on now. She had to find a way to escape. She couldn’t let Cody or her Clanmates down.

She remembered Gorsetail stretching his paw out of his cage to reach the cobweb. “Cody,” she mewed. “You told me you tried reaching the catch that keeps the cage locked.”

“Yes, but I couldn’t get a grip on it,” Cody confirmed.

“What about the rest of you?” Leafpaw called out to the other cats. “Can anyone undo his catch?”

“Mine’s too stiff,” replied Gorsetail.

“My web is ripped,” Cloudtail reported. “I can almost get two paws out, but I can’t reach the catch.”

“You’re all wasting your time,” Sasha growled. “Face it, there’s no way out of here.”

Outside, the noise of the Twoleg monsters rumbled on, making the nest shudder. Leafpaw couldn’t believe there was no way out of the nest, whatever Sasha thought. If she gave up, there would be no hope left at all. As she listened to the Twolegs calling gruffly to one another in the growing dusk outside, she reached through the web at the front of her cage and began to claw at the catch that held it closed.

Chapter 6

The waning moon cast just enough light through the leafless branches to make the forest glow with eerie silver. Frost traced the outline of the dying ferns as Squirrelpaw padded through the trees beside Brambleclaw.

“It’ll be cold at Fourtrees,” she fretted, hoping that her sister was warm, wherever she was.

“But at least it’s clear,” Brambleclaw answered in a low voice. “Silverpelt will be shining.”

They were following Firestar and Cinderpelt through the forest. The pace was slower than the two younger cats had been used to on their long journey, but Cinderpelt was still struggling to keep up. Cold and hunger had made her limp worse than usual.

“If there is a sign,” Squirrelpaw wondered out loud, “how long do you think it’ll be before we go?” She wanted a chance to find her sister before the Clans left the forest.

“I don’t know,” Brambleclaw replied. “You saw what happened last night. Firestar can’t force the Clan to leave. He’s bound by the warrior code as much as any cat, and even though he’s our leader, he has to obey the will of the Clan.”

Squirrelpaw’s belly tightened as she remembered the Clan’s reaction. Beneath the stars, huddled against the icy wind that whipped the rock, Firestar had told them the message she and Brambleclaw had brought back from StarClan.

A shocked cry had rippled around the gathered cats.

“We can’t leave the forest!” Frostfur had wailed. “We’ll all die.”

“We’ll die if we stay!” Sorreltail had pointed out.

“But this is our home.” Speckletail’s rasping mew had cracked as she’d raised her voice.

At least Shrewpaw had sounded eager. “When are we going?” he’d asked.

But the memory of Hollykit’s piteous mew made Squirrelpaw’s pelt prickle even now. “We don’t have to go, do we?” the kit had cried.