Thunder And Shadow

“Near the Thunderpath?” Twigpaw blinked. She’d never seen a Thunderpath before—not that she could remember, any way. The noise and sm ell m ade her shrink back. Monsters roared along it, the sun flashing on their shiny pelts.

“Yes.” Alderpaw frowned.

Ivy pool and Fernsong paced the top of the slope, their pelts twitching nervously. “Should we go down there?”

“Of course!” Twigpaw flattened her ears against the sound of the Thunderpath and padded forward. “I want to see the nest.” She’d heard how Alderpaw and Needletail had plucked her and Violetpaw from a nest hidden in the shadows. Perhaps som e trace of her mother’s scent lingered there, a trace they could track.

Ivy pool hesitated.

Fernsong looked at her. “We’ve come this far,” he meowed. “We might as well go all the way.”

“But the m onsters.” Ivy pool stared at them nervously. “What if they leave the path?”

Fernsong whisked his tail. “They never leave the path,” he meowed. “Monsters m ay be big and loud, but they are bee-brained.”

Twigpaw flicked her tail. Warriors weren’t supposed to be scared. She hurried forward, her heart quickening as she scanned the slope for som e sign of a nest.

Alderpaw hurried to catch up to her. “We have to go underneath it.”

“Underneath?” Twigpaw looked at him, shocked.

“There’s a tunnel. It’s not very —” The sound of the m onsters drowned his mew.

Twigpaw could feel their heat as they neared. She raised her voice. “Where’s the entrance?”

Alderpaw scanned the edge of the Thunderpath, frowning for a m om ent. Then he nodded toward a sm all shadowy hollow where the side of the Thunderpath dropped into a ditch. “There it is.”

Excitem ent surged in Twigpaw’s belly. She broke into a run. Ignoring the acrid wind from the m onsters, which tore through her fur, she leaped into the ditch. Pebbles lined it, j abbing her paws.

She hurried along it until she reached the shadowy hollow. A huge m onster scream ed past. She screwed up her eyes as grit spray ed her.

Alderpaw landed beside her. Leaning over her, he shielded her as another m onster streaked past.

Paw steps crunched behind them. Ivy pool and Fernsong were hurry ing along the ditch toward them.

“Is this it?” Ivy pool blinked at the hole in the side of the ditch. Sm ooth, dark sticks crisscrossed it.

Twigpaw peered between them. The scent of dank stone and sour water filled her nose. She sniffed nervously, straining to see through the darkness. As her eyes grew accustom ed to the gloom, she could see twigs littering the bottom of the tunnel. Water pooled there, gleam ing as it stretched into the distance. Pale light showed at the far end. Som ething skittered there. A rat?

Alderpaw crouched close beside her. “Are you okay?”

“Yes.” Twigpaw swallowed. She realized that her pelt was bristling as she struggled to remember this place. Was this really where her mother had left them? Sadness twisted her heart.

What a terrible place for a nursery. She thought of the bramble den back at camp, where countless queens had raised litters in warmth and safety. What had driven her mother to this? She stuck her head between the sticks and squeezed through them.

Foul-sm elling water soaked her paws. The skittering paw steps sounded again, echoing along the stone walls of the tunnel. Picking her way am ong the debris, Twigpaw sniffed. She tried desperately to sm ell som e trace of her mother through the stench, but nothing rem ained except the scent of m onsters and rats.

Alderpaw squeezed after her, while Fernsong and Ivy pool crouched at the opening, their eyes wide as they peered through.

“The nest must have been washed away,” Alderpaw guessed.

Twigpaw blinked at him through the darkness. Sorrow tugged at her heart. “Why did she leave us here?”

“Surely she had no choice.” Alderpaw’s eyes glinted in the shadows.

Twigpaw glanced around. “I see why you took us now.” Suddenly she understood that Alderpaw couldn’t have left her and Violetpaw here. If cold or hunger hadn’t killed them, rats might have. But hope still pricked her heart. “I wonder where she went.”

Without waiting for a response, she pushed past Alderpaw and slid back through the crisscrossed sticks. Flattening her ears against the m onsters’ roars, she glanced along the ditch. She tried to im agine what her mother had been thinking when she left the nest. She must have gone looking for food. Had she gotten lost? Had she forgotten her way back to the tunnel? Twigpaw nosed past Ivy pool and Fernsong and headed along the ditch. She clim bed onto the slope and toward a swath of long grass. Mice would be there, right? Her mother might have followed this path, guessing the sam e.

“Twigpaw!” Ivy pool called after her.

Twigpaw glanced back.

The silver-and-white she-cat was hurry ing after her, Fernsong and Alderpaw on her heels.

“Wait for us.” She caught up to her, puffing.

“I have to figure out where m y mother went,” Twigpaw mewed urgently.