Firestar’s Quest

He dipped his head to her. “I have brought you this far,” he murmured. “I will see you to the end of your journey.”

Touching noses with Leafdapple, he sprang to his paws. “It’s time.”

Firestar flattened himself to the ground behind a straggling gorse bush a few tail-lengths from the fence that surrounded the Twoleg barn. Everything was quiet. The barn looked deserted, the moon’s pale light reflecting from its shiny surface, the holes in its sides gaping like jaws. The only sign that it was inhabited was the sharp stink of rat and crow-food.

“I wish I knew where the rats had their nest,” Firestar muttered.

“Inside, I’d guess,” Sharpclaw slid up to him and mewed into his ear. “They’re always well hidden during the day. Our patrols have never spotted them.”

Firestar dug his claws into the ground. “I’d hoped we wouldn’t have to fight inside there.”

“It’s not like a cave,” Sparrowpaw pointed out. “It’s huge.

There’s plenty of room to get away.”

Firestar knew he was right, but the thought of trying to fight with walls around him and a roof blocking out the sky made him feel trapped and helpless. The former kittypets might see it differently, he supposed. They were used to being inside. But his own kittypet days were so far behind him, it was hard to imagine feeling like that.

“I’ll lead half the patrol inside,” Sharpclaw offered. “The rest of you can stay out here, and with any luck we’ll be able to lure the rats outside and fight in the open.”

Firestar nodded. “Good idea. I’ll come in with you.” He knew he couldn’t allow the ginger tom to go somewhere he dared not go himself.

“We want to come too,” Cherrypaw whispered.

“Okay. And Shortwhisker,” Firestar added. “The rest of you stay outside. Sandstorm, you’re in charge.”

His mate gave him a brief nod. Keeping low, his belly fur brushing the grass, Firestar led the way up to the fence and crept along it until he found the gap they had used to enter on their previous visit. He slid through with the rest of the patrol close behind.

Firestar’s pelt crawled as he surveyed the barn from close up. It loomed over his head, a shiny, unnatural Twoleg thing, with death at its heart. Were the rats aware that their enemies were only pawsteps away? He couldn’t feel the malevolent force that had been his first inkling of the rats’ presence, but he found it hard to believe that no eyes, glittering and malignant, were watching them now.

“What are we waiting for?” Sharpclaw hissed.

Firestar glanced back to check that Sandstorm and her patrol—Leafdapple, Patchfoot, Clovertail, and Rainfur—were all inside the fence. He gathered his own patrol with a wave of his tail, and crept up to the nearest gap in the barn wall. Leaping through it, he padded forward a pace or two to allow the others to follow, and looked around.

The stench of rat and crow-food was much stronger here.

His claws scraped on the hard floor, made of the same white stone that surrounded the barn on the outside, and the sound echoed eerily in the vast space. Firestar remembered Barley and Ravenpaw’s barn, made cozy with piles of hay and filled with the rustling and squeaking of mice. The bare, cold emptiness of this barn sent shudders through his fur.

On either side the barn lay in shadow, but moonlight filtering through ragged holes in the roof showed him a huge pile of Twoleg rubbish against the wall at the far end of the barn.

“The rats’ nest is probably in there,” Firestar whispered to Sharpclaw.

Sharpclaw nodded. “Let’s hope the stink of it will hide our scent.”

Firestar beckoned the rest of the patrol with his tail.

Cherrypaw and Sparrowpaw were glancing around with more curiosity than fear. Shortwhisker looked terrified, his fur fluffed out until he was twice his size, but he padded up determinedly at Firestar’s summons.

“We’re going to head for the nest,” Firestar told them.

“When the rats appear, race for the gaps and get outside.

With any luck, the rats will follow you.”

The patrol spread out into a ragged line across the barn and started to pad up to the pile of rubbish. Firestar felt horribly exposed, his heart pounding so rapidly he could hardly get his breath. Nothing moved among the rotting mounds of Twoleg stuff.

They were less than a fox-length from the pile when Firestar heard a scratching noise behind him, followed by a gasp of terror from Shortwhisker. For a heartbeat he froze, then whipped around to confront rows and rows of rats.

More rats than he had ever seen before had crept out of the shadows, covering the floor between the patrol and the gap where they had entered.

Firestar’s gaze darted over them, trying to pick out the leader, but all the sleek, dark brown bodies looked the same to him. Then a voice spoke, but the sound echoed around the bare walls of the barn so that he couldn’t tell which rat was talking.

“We killed you before. We will kill you again. You are few.

We are more.”

Sharpclaw let out a snarl of rage and leaped at the first row of rats.

“Stop!” Firestar yowled.