"It will be alright, Fallenbreeze." Rowanlily presses her chocolate brown fur against mine, and I inhale her soft, beautiful scent, trying to forget everything that will happen, to convince myself that everything will be fine.

But I don't. I can't.

The sun is nearing the horizon, and nothing has changed.

My heart thumps in my chest, and I could almost believe that ShadowClan could hear it at the other side of the forest. Normally, I would make a stupid joke about it, to reassure my sister. But this is not normal. And it is not Rowanlily who needs to be reassured.

Everything I thought I knew.

Lies.

I stand abruptly, startling the long-furred tabby beside me. "I'll be back soon," I say shortly, barely registering the hurt in my sister's golden eyes. I always liked to think of them as golden, rather than yellow. Yellow seemed a bit plain for a warrior as patient, kind and caring as my sister.

But that's not relevant. It doesn't make a difference to the fire burning in my soul, the flames that are licking my heart, hissing and spitting until the ashes fall to rest in the hollow space inside me.

I thought I was finally whole. I thought I could live happily ever after, like in the elders' tales I used to love so much. I thought I would at least be able to appreciate six moons of peace. But it turns out I will never have the chance.

Everything I thought I knew.

Lies.

I race through the forest at a speed I have never ran before. My fur is whipped behind me, and I can hear the wind whistling through my ears. I can feel the terror, the exaltation, whenever I swerve away from the trunk of a sturdy oak or scrabble at the side of a swift river, pulling myself up just as the soft earth crumbles into the foam below. My eyes are like fiery coals; burning almost as fiercely as the pain inside.

I don't care how far I run. I don't care how I'm going to get back. I don't care.

There is nothing left to care about. Not anymore.

Everything I thought I knew.

Lies.

But the worst thing is that I can't run from it. I can't hide. I can't shove it away in a corner of my mind and forget about the scars that will never heal.

It will follow me forever. The scars will not stop bleeding. It doesn't matter what I do, where I run, however had I fight, battle the despair that envelops me in a soft cloud full of voices, I will not be able to escape.

"She's a liar." His voice is shaking, and to everyone but me, his sorrow and fear seems utterly real. I, my sister, and maybe our medicine cat, Brackencloud, are the only cats to doubt his word. "She nearly killed me! I just managed to escape and pin her down before she performed the killing blow." That's all it is to him. A performance. He shudders - or at least that's what I remember, because despair doesn't like me to see.

"We'll trial her. Tonight." Froststar's voice is grim and her eyes gaze at me in sorrow. She thinks I've betrayed her. Not the other way around. She is soft and reassuring when she meows, "I'm sorry, Shadewhisper. I trusted her." And I'm never trusting you, I think. Never again.

Then it's my brother. "You'd do this to me, Fallenbreeze!" he yowls, his claws unsheathed and his eyes blazing, the same shade of gold as the only cat who stands beside me. "Betray me, and the whole of ThunderClan? I loved you!" His yowl of sorrow nearly breaks my heart, but I still can't forgive him. He didn't ever doubt Shadewhisper's word. Only my own.

I break free of the despair, clawing at the air as if that will make it disappear. But it still suffocates me, making sure that every breath I take reminds me of what I have lost and what I can never take back.

And the pain. It hurts. It feels like someone has cut me open and is carelessly ripping out my heart. It's agony, and I don't think I'll ever complain of anything else again. But there are no herbs that can heal the ache of a broken heart.

Only him. And he's torn my heart apart so much that even he cannot put it back again.

I will remember today for the rest of my life. And for the rest of my life, I will want - no, I will need, need so much I could kill - to forget it. He doesn't love me. He never did. He tried to kill me. And when I escaped from the claws of death, my clan believed him.

No. Not my clan. Not anymore.

I was pinned down - blood seeped from the marks he had already left, but it gushed from where his claws dug into me. I let out a desperate yowl, but there was no point. The battle had been won.

I gazed into his merciless, crystal eyes, and saw nothing there. Nothing but cruelty and greed.

I had been blinded. Blinded by irrevocable love. And the strange thing was that I still loved him in that moment, although I could never forgive him for what he had tried to do.

Everything I thought I knew.

Lies.

It was my sister that saved me - she chased a mouse into the clearing, pinning if down with a quick blow to the neck, then glanced up, frozen in shock.

It all happened quickly after that.

Shadewhisper raced away, though I couldn't quite register why - I was still in just about as much shock as my sister. The pain increased to about five times as much, and I looked into Rowanlily's golden orbs and uttered four words. "We need to run."

When I raced back into the clearing, there were no yowls of terror and surprise. Bluetail winced at my bloody wounds, but her eyes were cold.

Then I saw him, and I knew why.

I had seen him lie before. His word was always trusted, and he never forgot. He never left a loophole in his words. They would exile me. He would kill me, if it could be done without everyone noticing, and they wouldn't care. His word would be compared with mine and Rowanlily's, and the winner was obvious. No one would even bother to think.

Dread filled my heart. As if I had a heart left. As if I wasn't already broken, torn beyond repair.

He had got there first.

When I stop, it isn't because of my hunger, or my thirst. It isn't my pain or my grief, nor because I am exhausted beyond measure. It's because I bash into a tree.

Stupid birch. I'm still my same old clumsy self, then. At least I hadn't crashed into something harder, like a beech, or an oak. My injuries already sting as it is, although the agony from my heart has numbed that so much I can barely feel the pain.

I look around, and taste the air. I've left the four clans behind, although not by much. I never believed any cat could run that fast, but I did. If only my heart had been whole. That would have been the best thing I had ever done in my life.

A strange silence echoes around me. It feels as if I've just watched my life crash and burn, and now it's done, I'm looking at what I can salvage from the wreck I have become. What pieces of my heart that have a chance of fitting back together - what parts of my soul won't be in agony for the rest of eternity.

I see nothing.

I need to go back to ThunderClan. Froststar will hold a trial for me tonight. No one doubts the outcome, not even her. She will be fair - I know that without doubt - but if I leave forever, even my own sister may start to believe in my guilt.

My mate - I shudder as I think the word - would have told a story that fit in perfectly with her own. That, if I didn't return, Rowanlily would begin to believe, too.

And I can see a vision - Shadewhisper, standing on the highrock, dripping with blood but yowling in triumph, as if he is not seeing the warriors beneath him, dead and mangled, bloody and torn. As if he is not just the monster I believe he is, but one that is worse, if that is possible. And then I see Froststar and Lightningfoot's rotting bodies, lying at the entrance to his den, and I don't doubt that he is.

A monster is in the forest.

And only I can stop him.

Still, I lie beside the tree, watching as the colours of the sunset spread across the sky. Pink, orange, red - glowing with a light that almost gives me hope. I don't understand how such beauty can exist in a world so harsh and cruel.

When the sun has fully set, I promise myself, I will go. I will face my clan, and they will know the truth. But I don't believe it. I can't trust anyone anymore.

Not even myself.


So, my first chapter of my first story!

What do you think? Do you like it? Is it good? Bad? Do you have any questions?

Does it make sense? Does it end well? Should I have done something differently?

Please review and/or favourite and/or follow! You don't know what it means to me...

...probably.