Long Shadows

The cats were vanishing one by one into the darkness. None of them had noticed that Jaypaw was gone. Jaypaw stood rigid for a moment, then gave his pelt a shake. “Okay, let’s go,” he muttered.

Rock led the way behind the boulder, where the narrow entrance to a tunnel opened up. The old cat squeezed his way inside and beckoned with his tail for Jaypaw to follow.

The tunnel was utterly dark; Jaypaw guided himself by the sound of Rock’s paw steps as they padded through the silent blackness. Cool air told him where other tunnels branched off, but Rock led him straight down into the hill. Jaypaw pricked his ears, alert for any sound of Fallen Leaves, but there was no sign of the lost cat. How long before he realized that the cats aboveground had gone? Would he know at once how many moons he would have to wait in the empty darkness, until cats returned to the lake? Jaypaw shuddered, hoping Fallen Leaves would have no idea of what lay ahead.

At last the tunnel began to slope upward again. The sound of Rock’s paw steps faded, but now Jaypaw could smell moss and leaves again, the damp scents of the forest. Soon he found himself stepping into open air with the familiar scents of ThunderClan swirling around him. He was blind again, but he knew exactly where he was.

Slowly he picked his way down the paths that led to the stone hollow. Had he found the answers he was looking for?

Had he really been one of the cats that lived here once? And had those cats left to form the Tribe of Rushing Water? Was that where the prophecy came from?

At the last moment, when he could already taste the scent of the stone hollow, he veered away and headed for the lake.

A soft breeze had sprung up; the broken twittering of birds overhead told him that dawn was approaching. Reaching the lakeshore, Jaypaw padded across the soft grass and found the stick hidden under tree roots on the bank. He pulled it out and ran his paws over the scratch marks, as he had done so often before.

This time the scratches spoke to him clearly: Names and images of the sharpclaws filled his mind, and he could remember many of them from meeting them face-to-face.

Jagged Lightning, Cloudy Sun, Shy Fawn, Owl Feather…

They walked beside him at the Moonpool because he was one of them, the one cat who had returned to where they had lived long, long ago. Is that what makes me more powerful than StarClan?

Jaypaw wondered if Lionblaze and Hollyleaf must have been part of the ancient Clan, too, even though he hadn’t met them in the past. He drew his paws down the stick again and a vision flashed into his mind: three cats standing together on the ridge, with the rising moon behind them and their shadows stretching out, vast and black, across the silver lake.

Three cats, kin of Firestar’s kin, with the power of the stars in their paws. And now Jaypaw could understand how they belonged together, even after the lapse of so many, many seasons.

“We have come back,” he murmured. “The three have come home.”

Chapter 19

Lionblaze woke to the sound of coughing. For a moment he burrowed deeper into the moss, trying to remember the last time he’d had a good night’s sleep. His dreams were filled with Tigerstar, taunting him about his power, sneering at him for being revolted by the sight of Heatherpaw’s blood-soaked body. And when he wasn’t asleep, the warriors’ den was filled with choking, spluttering cats battling greencough. Then he stiffened. The sick cats had all gone to the Twoleg nest with Firestar! There shouldn’t be any coughing now.

Raising his head, Lionblaze saw Spiderleg in his nest a couple of tail-lengths away, his body shaken by another fit of coughing.

Oh, no! Firestar’s idea hasn’t worked.

“Spiderleg,” he meowed, “you’d better get along to Leafpool. She’ll give you something for the cough, and then you can join the others in the Twoleg nest.”

“Don’t tell me what to do,” the older warrior snapped. “I’ve just got a bit of moss in my throat, that’s all.”

Even in the dim light of the warriors’ den, Lionblaze could see that Spiderleg’s eyes were glazed with fever. “I don’t think so.”

At the same moment Brambleclaw raised his head from his nest nearer the center of the den. “Spiderleg, you’re ill. You know how fast the sickness spreads. Go and see Leafpool now.

Lionblaze, go with him.”

“Sure.” Lionblaze hauled himself out of his nest and gave his pelt a quick grooming.

Spiderleg rose to his paws with an exaggerated sigh that ended in another bout of coughing. He pushed his way into the clearing, and Lionblaze followed, padding a few paw steps behind him as they headed for the medicine cats’ den. The chill of dawn still lay over the camp, and shadows crowded thickly around the sides of the hollow. A moisture-laden breeze held the promise of rain later.

Before they reached the den, Daisy came bounding over from the nursery. “Spiderleg, what’s the matter?” she fretted.