Outcast

The ancient cat did not reply; instead, one of the brighter spirits spoke from farther around the pool. “Why did you bring him here?” she demanded, addressing the tabby cat who had led Jaypaw down the cliff. “He doesn’t belong with us.”

There was a murmur of agreement from some of the other cats. Their glowing eyes were hostile as their gaze raked across him. Jaypaw suppressed an impulse to make a dash for the trail that led back to the ridge.

I can walk where I like, he told himself, defiantly raising his head. I wouldn’t be here if I didn’t belong. And maybe I can do more than Stoneteller to help the Tribe…

“You need to take a message to the Tribe of Rushing Water,” he meowed. “Tell them that the Clan cats have come to help them with the trespassers.”

The ancestral spirits glanced at one another, then shook their heads. The bright she-cat who had spoken before rose to her paws. “The Tribe does not need help.”

“How can you say that?” Jaypaw gasped. “The Tribe is starving to death.”

“There is nothing we can do.” The ancestor who had led Jaypaw down from the ridge bowed his head in shame. “We have failed.”

“The mountains are not safe anymore,” another cat murmured. “We trusted them to protect us, and they have let us down.”

For a moment Jaypaw could not speak through the wave of shame and betrayal that surged from the starry cats. He struggled to shake it off and clear his mind again.

“The Tribe doesn’t have to give in so easily,” he insisted.

“They must fight to defend themselves.”

Two of the cats who bore recent wounds rose from their places and padded around the pool until they stood in front of Jaypaw. “We died in battle,” the first of them mewed, glancing down at the deep slashes along his side. “No more blood must be spilled. The Tribe does not believe in fighting.”

Jaypaw twitched his tail. “But the trespassers do. My Clanmates will help the Tribe cats, whether they want it or not.”

The other wounded cat took a pace forward, his neck fur bristling. “The only way to do that is to make the Tribe more like a Clan. And that is not what they want. It is not the way of the Tribe to fight and kill other cats.”

“Things change,” Jaypaw pointed out with a flick of his ears.

“Not always for the better,” the spirit cat retorted.

The words echoed in Jaypaw’s ears. A mist seemed to be rising from the pool, swirling around him until he couldn’t see the Tribe of Endless Hunting any longer. The mist gradually grew darker, until Jaypaw realized he was back in the cave, with Hollypaw nudging him awake.

“Come on,” she urged him. “Stoneteller has called a meeting. All the cats are gathering in the middle of the cave.”

Jaypaw scrambled groggily to his paws. The hollow in the mountains and the pool surrounded by shining cats seemed more real to him than this cave.

“Okay, keep your fur on,” he grumbled. “I’m coming.”

Tracking Hollypaw and Lionpaw by their scent, he followed them out of the sleeping hollow and across the floor of the cave. They joined the other Clan cats and found a place to sit beside them. Jaypaw shifted uncomfortably on the cold stone, the murmur of voices, Clan and Tribe, in his ears.

Suddenly the voices grew quiet. Jaypaw imagined the skinny old cat he had seen in his dreams appearing in front of the cats, perhaps leaping onto the boulder from where he had banished Stormfur. So this is it, he thought. We’re going to be made outcasts, too. I don’t suppose they’ll feed us before they throw us out, either.

“Cats of the Tribe of Rushing Water,” Stoneteller began.

“Last night I read the signs in water and starlight, and the Tribe of Endless Hunting spoke to me. They do not want us to be driven out of our mountain home, so I have decided to let the Clan cats help us.”

Jaypaw felt his mouth drop open. Stoneteller was lying!

That wasn’t what the Tribe of Endless Hunting had said at all. Stoneteller must have changed his own mind overnight, and decided to ignore his ancestors.

A babble of comment had broken out as soon as Stoneteller finished speaking. Jaypaw could hear some protests, but most cats sounded eager to hear what the Clan cats would suggest. Just as he suspected, the Tribe cats did whatever Stoneteller said. Yesterday he hadn’t wanted the Clan cats to stay, so neither did his Tribe, and today he said they should accept their help. Didn’t these cats ever think for themselves?

“Silence!” Stoneteller raised his voice. “We will listen to what Brambleclaw has to say.”

There was a brief pause; Jaypaw heard his father’s paw steps as he emerged from the group of cats and went to stand beside Stoneteller.

“What should we do first?” the Tribe’s Healer asked him.