Into The Wild

Firepaw stared at his leader as she padded to the edge of the Thunderpath and looked up and down. She waited calmly as one monster after another flew past her, ruffling her fur. Then, when the earsplitting roar paused for a moment, she raced across to the other side.

“Off you go, Ravenpaw; now you’ve seen how it’s done,” meowed Tigerclaw.

Firepaw saw Ravenpaw’s eyes widen with fear. He knew just how his friend felt. He could smell his own fear-scent. The small black cat crept forward to the edge of the road. It was quiet, but Ravenpaw hesitated.

“Go!” hissed Tigerclaw from the hedge. Firepaw saw Ravenpaw’s muscles tighten as he prepared to run. Then the ground began to tremble beneath his paws. A monster sped out of the distance and hurtled past. The black cat shrank back for a moment, then pelted over to join Bluestar. A monster coming in the other direction threw dust up where his paws had been just a heartbeat before. Firepaw felt his fur shiver and he took a deep breath to calm himself.

Graypaw was lucky. A long lull let him cross safely. Then it was Firepaw’s turn.

“Go on, then,” growled Tigerclaw. Firepaw looked from Tigerclaw to the Thunderpath, and then walked out from beneath the hedge. He waited at the edge, as Bluestar had done. A monster was rushing toward him. Firepaw looked at the approaching monster. After this one, he thought, and waited for it to pass. Suddenly his heart lurched as he realized the monster had veered off the Thunderpath and was bumping along the grass. It was heading straight for him! A Twoleg was jeering from an opening in its side. Firepaw leaped backward, claws out, battered by the storm of wind from the Twoleg monster as it roared past him only a whisker away. He crouched, trembling, in the dirt and stared as it swerved back onto the path and disappeared into the distance. Through the roaring of blood in his ears, Firepaw realized the Thunderpath was quiet again, and he raced across, running faster than he had ever done in his life.

“I thought you were fresh-kill!” cried Graypaw as Firepaw cannoned into him, almost knocking him over.

“Me too!” Firepaw gasped. He was trying to stop shaking. He turned back to watch Tigerclaw dart over the path toward them.

“Twolegs!” he spat as he arrived at their side.

“Do you want to rest before we go on?” Bluestar asked Firepaw.

Firepaw looked up. The sun was low in the sky. “No,” he answered. “I’m okay.” But he had leaped so frantically out of the monster’s way that his claws felt frayed and tender.

The cats carried on, with Bluestar in the lead. The earth was darker on this side of the Thunderpath and the grass felt coarser underpaw. As they approached the foot of HighStones, the grass gave way to bare, rocky soil, dotted with patches of heather. The land sloped up now, toward the sky. Craggy rocks topped the slope, blazing orange in the sun.

Bluestar stopped once more. She chose a sun-warmed rock to sit upon, flat and wide enough for all five cats to rest side by side.

“Look,” she meowed, tilting her nose toward the dark slope before them. “Mothermouth.”

Firepaw peered upward. The glare of the setting sun blinded him, and the slope was engulfed in shadow.

The cats waited in silence. Gradually, as the sun dropped down behind HighStones, Firepaw began to make out the cave entrance, a square black hole that yawned darkly beneath a stone archway.

“We’ll wait here until the moon is higher,” meowed Bluestar. “You should hunt if you are hungry and then get some rest.”

Firepaw was pleased to have a chance to find food. He was starving now. Graypaw clearly felt the same and leaped away into a clump of heather, following the prey-scent that was thick in the air. Firepaw and Ravenpaw followed him. Tigerclaw set off in the opposite direction, but Bluestar remained where she was. She sat still and silent, gazing unblinkingly at Mothermouth.

The three apprentices gathered plenty of fresh-kill. With Tigerclaw they crouched on the stony hillside and feasted. But in spite of their easy hunt, no cat said much, and the air still felt thick with tension and anticipation.

Afterward, the cats rested beside their leader until the warmth had seeped out of the rock on which they lay and cold black shadows reached up on all sides. Only then did Bluestar call out, “Come. It is time.”

CHAPTER 15

Bluestar stood and began to pad toward Mothermouth. Tigerclaw walked beside her, matching her strides step for step.

“Come on, Ravenpaw!” called Graypaw. Ravenpaw was still sitting on the rock, staring up at the rocks. At Graypaw’s mew, he stood and began to follow slowly. Firepaw realized his friend had hardly said a word the whole journey. Is he just worried about ShadowClan, or is there something else troubling him? Firepaw wondered.