This is a ten-chapter story that I will be doing over the course of... oh, I don't know. Ten days? Probably more.
I gazed down at the light gray shape that now stood among the mist.
"Icetalon," I purred.
She stared up at me, her clear blue eyes round. "Boulder's Mark!"
"It's me," I reassured. Thin forms, lithe and stealthy, began crawling over the dark rock, stars lining their pelts. "Forestclan is here," I murmured.
"Then it can begin?" Echoecall muttered.
I loosened my muscles, the wind brushing against my shoulders. "Yes."
I began padding up to the new to-be leader. Icetalon stared up at me with fascination as I lowered my head and touched noses with her.
Memories swirled like fog. I could feel her tension.
It was the beginning of our journey. I was just a kit then, walking along with the others even though I was just a moon old.
The cold leaf-bare breeze brushed against me as I shouldered closer to my mother. "I'm hungry," I whined.
She snarled. "Keep going, or you'll end up like Ground's Dust."
"You always tell me that," I complained. "I can't catch up like this!"
That was when she pushed me. Hard.
I fell, shock running through every bone. "Mom!"
"I can't watch another one of my kits die," she muttered. "Get out of my sight."
"But-"
"It's for the best. Please!" Her voice rose in desperation. "We've been traveling for moons. Ground's Dust died. Fern's Leaf died. You're the only one left, and now you're going to die too, I can feel it." She suddenly became quiet. "I can't watch another kit die, Boulder's Mark. Now..." Something in her seemed to change, and she straightened. "You stay here. I'll go get some food, and I'll come back for you, I promise."
My eyes were round. "Promise?"
Her voice shook. "Promise."
She turned and began padding away into the darkness, and I waited.
Waited for hours on end, waiting for her familiar black fur to appear out of the dark again. But it never did.
She never came back.
"With this life, I give you love. For your kits, for your clanmates, for yourself," I whispered.
She nodded. "I promise!"
Promises...
I could well remember my mother's last word before she disappeared forever.
Promises...