Shattered Sky

Shadows were gathering beneath the trees, and Twigpaw could barely force one paw in front of another. There seemed to be no end to the forest, and whenever she caught a glimpse of the sun, it was crisscrossed with branches. It was impossible to get a clear view.

Twigpaw was beginning to despair when the trees ahead of her started to thin out. A fresh spark of hope gave her the determination to bound forward, then thrust her way through a dense bank of ferns and break out into the open. The sky ahead of her was a blaze of scarlet, but the sun had already vanished.

I’ve failed, Twigpaw thought, letting out a murmur of dismay.

Then she realized that in the direction of the sunset the ground fell away sharply into a rocky cliff. Scampering up to the edge, she was just in time to see the sun, a huge red circle, before it dipped below the horizon of the plain below. Twigpaw stood staring until the last of it sank out of sight and the red trail in the sky began to fade.

So I did what the gray tom said. Now what?

Twigpaw turned around, gazing back through the trees and across the swell of moorland where she had emerged. There was no sign of any cats, and when she tasted the air, she couldn’t pick up the faintest trace of cat scent.

It was just a stupid dream, she thought miserably, collapsing in a heap. She was no closer to finding her father than when she’d left ThunderClan, and now she had no more ideas.

It’s time to give up. I’ll sleep now, and when I wake up, I’ll try to figure out a way to get home.

She was curling up in the shelter of a rock, wrapping her tail over her nose, when she spotted something moving through the bushes at the bottom of the cliff. A gray flash. Is it…?

New energy seemed to flow into Twigpaw’s body as she rose to her paws again and began scrambling down the cliff face toward the place where she had seen the movement. Soon she came to a wide ledge overlooking a shallow valley with a stream at the bottom. And beside the stream…

Twigpaw let out a loud meow of delight. Cats! So many cats, making their camp. Her gaze devoured them; she could hardly believe what she was seeing. That’s him—the gray flash I saw moving though the bushes. I don’t think he’s the tom I saw in my dream. But he looks just like me! Her paws skimmed the rocks as she hurled herself down the rest of the cliff, so eager to meet her kin that she never thought she might be in danger of falling.

At the sound of Twigpaw’s meow the cats looked up at her and began to crowd together defensively. For the first time, Twigpaw could see how skinny and bedraggled they looked… even worse off than she was herself.

Among them was a small white she-cat whose belly was so swollen that she must be close to kitting. A larger tabby tom stood protectively beside her. Twigpaw noticed three young cats, too, about her own age, staring at her with a mixture of fear and curiosity.

The cat who looked like her spotted her at last, and his eyes grew huge. “Who are you?” he asked, at the same moment as one of the others demanded suspiciously, “What do you want?”

“I’m sorry,” Twigpaw apologized, skidding to a halt. She was hardly able to contain the excitement that was rushing through her from ears to tail-tip. “I didn’t mean to scare you. I think I may know who you are. Are you SkyClan?”

The cats exchanged sad glances. “We are what remains of SkyClan,” one of them told Twigpaw.

A brown-and-cream tabby she-cat stepped forward and dipped her head to Twigpaw. Though she was as thin and weary-looking as her Clanmates, she held herself with dignity, and her voice was strong as she spoke. “We have been on a long journey, faced great hardship, and lost many friends,” she meowed. “But yes, we are SkyClan. How do you know?”

“I come from ThunderClan,” Twigpaw replied eagerly. “My name is Twigpaw.”

As soon as she mentioned her Clan, astonished exclamations rose from the cats around her. They exchanged excited glances, their suspicion and uncertainty vanishing.

“You come from ThunderClan? We know about ThunderClan!” one of them exclaimed. “We’ve been searching for you for moons and moons!”

Twigpaw blinked as suddenly the cats crowded around her, their words tumbling over each other in their eagerness.

“Echosong had a vision!” one of them was saying. “She said the fire had burned out, but we should find the spark that remains!”

The brown-and-cream tabby let out a purr. “We knew the fire had to be Firestar!” She paused, her eyes rounding with sadness. “But is it true, has he died?”

Other cats broke in before Twigpaw could answer the question, crowding around her until she almost felt she couldn’t breathe.