Sign Of The Moon

“Oh really?” Foxleap spun around to face the kittypet, ready to leap up onto the wall. “You want to prove it, kittypet?”

“No!” Squirrelflight thrust herself in front of Foxleap. “Calm down. We’re not looking for trouble.”

“But it’s a kittypet!” Foxleap protested. “I could beat it with one paw!”

“Come up here and try!” the kittypet yowled. “You’ve no business here, flea-pelts!”

“Are you going to let it talk to us like that?” Foxleap asked, outraged.

It was Jayfeather who replied. “Use the sense you were born with, Foxleap. If you get hurt, what am I supposed to do for you out here? Do we know where the nearest cobweb is? Can I find horsetail before you bleed to death?”

“But—” Foxleap was still glaring up at the kittypet.

“Ignore it. We keep moving. Now,” Squirrelflight meowed.

She turned and padded forward. Jayfeather lashed his tail, gesturing to Foxleap to follow. The young warrior obeyed, though not without a last angry hiss at the kittypet. Dove wing brought up the rear.

“Cowards!” the kittypet screeched after them. “Go away and stay away!”

Dovewing was relieved when they hurried out of earshot, but her relief vanished as Jayfeather turned to her.

“I wish you’d given us some warning,” he muttered.

“What?” Dovewing couldn’t believe he was blaming her for the encounter with the kittypet. “I don’t know this area,” she defended herself. “I can’t just listen for things up ahead, because I have to watch where I’m putting my paws!”

The medicine cat let out an annoyed growl and lapsed into sulky silence.

“I can scout ahead if you like,” Foxleap offered.

“Oh, fine.” Squirrelflight’s tone was sarcastic. “And then we arrive to find you’ve got into a fight. No thanks.”

“I won’t, honestly,” Foxleap promised.

“No.” Now Squirrelflight sounded calmer. “I trust you to obey orders, Foxleap, but it’s better if we stay together.”

The patrol walked on. Not much later, the line of a hedge crossed their path, the thorny bushes gray and bare, with grass tangled at their roots.

“We go through here,” Squirrelflight explained, “and cross the field beyond. But stay in the shelter of the hedge. It’s safer.”

Jayfeather murmured agreement. “We’re near the farm where Lionblaze and Hollyleaf had trouble with dogs,” he meowed. “Let’s keep a good lookout.” He gave Dovewing a hard gaze as he spoke.

Squirrelflight led the way along the hedge until they came to a gap between two bushes, big enough for a cat to squeeze through.

“Dovewing, you go first,” Jayfeather ordered.

“Who’s leading this patrol, Jayfeather?” Squirrelflight inquired. Turning to Dovewing, she added, “Okay, but be careful.”

Dovewing knew why Jayfeather had chosen her. She was already sending a tendril of her special senses through the hedge and into the field beyond. No dogs. But some other weird animals…oh, I know! Sheep. She remembered seeing them in the distance on her visit to WindClan. They won’t do us any harm.

Flattening herself on her belly, she crawled through the gap, feeling thorns rake through the fur on her back. Rising to her paws on the other side, she found herself facing two big white woolly animals, with sharp hooves and placid, incurious faces.

It feels strange seeing them so close, she thought. They look a bit mouse-brained.

“Dovewing?” Squirrelflight’s voice came anxiously through the hedge. “Are you okay?”

“Fine!” Dovewing replied. “You can come through.”

Jayfeather appeared next, shaking his ruffled pelt as he rose to his paws and stepped into the field. Foxleap followed him, and lastly Squirrelflight, panting as she pulled herself through the clustering thorns.

“See?” she mewed triumphantly as she straightened up. “I’m not stuck!” Then she looked disconcerted.

It’s like she was talking to a cat who isn’t here, Dovewing thought.

Shaking her head as if to clear it, Squirrelflight led the patrol along the line of the hedge. The field was huge; Dovewing couldn’t even see the other side. Everything’s so big here, she thought, suppressing a shiver. I can’t even see the edges of the sky.

Suddenly loud barking clattered into her ears. She froze, astonished for a heartbeat that the rest of the patrol were quietly plodding on. The scent of dog filled her nostrils. Then she realized that her special senses were giving her advance warning. “Dog!” she yowled. “Take cover!”

Squirrelflight whipped around, gazing across the field. “Where?”

“Over there.”

As Dovewing stretched out her tail to point, a dog appeared at the crest of a gentle rise in the middle of the field. Yapping loudly, it raced toward the cats, its tail flying and the wind ruffling its black-and-white pelt.

“Fox dung!” Squirrelflight hissed. “Dovewing, Foxleap, get Jayfeather into the hedge.”

Foxleap was already pushing Jayfeather into the bushes. Dovewing spotted a branch where the thorns weren’t quite so thick, and slid into the hedge beside Jayfeather. “Put your paws there,” she ordered, guiding him with her tail. “Now climb!”