Fading Echoes

Lionblaze darted after them. The camp was empty apart from the elders hobbling across the clearing. He stared around the top of the hollow, wondering again which tree was falling, praying that Dovepaw had overreacted, though his gut told him she was right.

As Brightheart and Purdy steered Longtail and Mousefur through the tunnel, Firestar and Brambleclaw barged back in. Dovepaw slid in after them, her fur on end.

“Is the camp clear?” Firestar demanded.

Lionblaze nodded.

Brambleclaw darted from one den to another, poking his head in.

Dovepaw’s ears were pricked. “It’s clear,” she assured them.

“Come on, then,” Firestar ordered. “Let’s join the Clan. They’re sheltering along the gully on the way to the lake.” He glanced at Dovepaw. “You’re sure they’ll be safe there?”

Dovepaw was looking up to the top of the cliff that overhung Highledge. “It’s falling!” she whispered.

She knows which tree it is. Lionblaze followed her gaze to a tall beech that still had nearly all its leaves. He could see the danger clearly now. The wind kept tearing at the tree’s heavy branches as it began to slip from the earth and slide toward the rim of the hollow.

“Come on!” Firestar insisted. He prodded Dovepaw toward the entrance. Lionblaze ran across the clearing and followed her out, Brambleclaw and Firestar on his tail. As he ran, Lionblaze glimpsed the pelts of his Clanmates through the trees, huddling in the gully several tree-lengths from the entrance to the hollow. Then he spotted Mousefur stumbling toward him. She was trying to dodge back into the camp.

Longtail stood in her way. “Leave the mouse! We can catch another.”

“I’m not wasting prey!” Mousefur growled. “It’s an insult to StarClan!”

“Then I’ll get it!”

Before Lionblaze could stop him, Longtail had darted back through the thorn barrier.

Briarpaw raced after him, a blur of dark brown fur. “Come back! It’s not safe!”

Lionblaze slowed to a halt and spun around. He pelted after Longtail and Briarpaw. “The tree’s going to fall!” he shrieked, tearing through the thorns in time to see Longtail and Briarpaw disappear into the elders’ den. “Get out!”

His yowl was smothered by a great creaking roar from the top of the hollow. With a deafening crack, the beech toppled over the rim and hurtled down the cliff. Its branches scraped the rocky walls like claws, showering thorn-sharp stones over the camp. Lionblaze shrank back against the barrier, shards of rock raining around him, terror pulsing through him as the clearing disappeared under a storm of flailing branches. He flattened his ears against the snapping, splintering wood and watched, frozen in horror, as the honeysuckle den caved under a tangle of branches. With a wrenching crunch, the beech trunk hit the ground and split like a shattered bone.

He felt a pelt trembling next to his. Dovepaw was beside him, mouth open, eyes so wide he could see their white rims.

“Briarpaw,” she breathed.

Lionblaze charged toward the den, slithering through the tangle of branches, clambering over the ripped wood. He could hardly see the honeysuckle underneath the fallen beech. The tree was half propped against the far side of the hollow, its muddy roots reaching like talons around the nursery. Half the warriors’ den was gone, and branches obscured the entrance to the medicine den.

“Wait!”

Lionblaze halted when he heard Firestar’s yowl. He turned, balancing on the jagged end of a shattered branch.

The ThunderClan leader was clambering after him, Dovepaw following on shaky paws.

“Can you hear anything?” Firestar asked.

“No.” Lionblaze glanced at Dovepaw.

The gray apprentice shook her head. “Nothing.”

“They still might be alive.” Firestar leaped past Lionblaze and began to wriggle through the fluttering golden leaves toward the flattened den. Lionblaze struggled after him, wincing as the jagged wood scraped his pelt.

The tree creaked.

“It’s not safe!” Dovepaw’s wail sounded behind them.

Lionblaze felt the tree move around him.

“It’s slipping down the side of the hollow,” Dovepaw warned.

“I can see a shape,” Firestar called from inside the debris.

Lionblaze squirmed deeper into the snarled branches, feeling a surge of hope as a honeysuckle tendril snaked out, whipping him across the muzzle. “Who is it?”

“I can’t tell,” Firestar called back. “But I think it’s moving.”

“The whole tree’s moving!” Dovepaw shrieked. “Get out of there!”

With a groaning, scraping sigh, the beech began to slide down the wall of the hollow.

“Out!” Firestar ordered sharply.

Lionblaze hesitated. He couldn’t leave his Clanmates! He yelped as teeth clamped around his tail.

“It’s collapsing!” Dovepaw’s mew was muffled by fur as she dragged him backward and the tree shivered beneath his paws. Firestar was scrambling out beside him.

“Jump!” Dovepaw yowled.

The three cats hurled themselves onto an empty patch of ground beside the apprentices’ den. Behind them, the tree groaned and dropped down, its branches caving beneath it as crumpled into the base of the hollow.

Dovepaw let out a whimper.