Allegiances - The Nightlanders
Bone (unknown) - Unknown
Jay (20 moons) - Slim light blue-grey she-cat with darker ears and blue eyes
Grizzly (45 moons) - Large, muscular long-haired dark brown tom with a scarred muzzle, huge paws, and orange eyes
Shred (37 moons) - Thin dull grey-brown tom with tabby stripes, a shredded, crooked tail and wary orange-yellow eyes
Red (30 moons) - Strong dark reddish brown tom with dark paws and bright amber eyes
Storm (28 moons) - Green-eyed smoky grey tom with patterns around face
Tundra (23 moons) - Dark golden she-cat with darker splotches, white toes, and dark green eyes
Swift (19 moons) - Silver-and-white tabby she-cat with cold blue eyes
Heather (18 moons) - Sandy-ginger she-cat with a darker face, darker front paws and back toes
Bandit (16 moons) - Small white tom with black patches, black patterns around eyes, a bushy white tail and yellow eyes
Tiger (14 moons) - Broad-shouldered dark ginger tom with tabby stripes, yellow-green eyes and a scar on left eye
Sting (12 moons) - Striped golden tom with white ears, a white muzzle and white underbelly
Wolf (11 moons) - Sturdy dark blue-grey tom with a darker overcoat and ears, and bright amber eyes
Sleet (11 moons) - Thin, lithe white tom with light grey flecks, a light grey tail and pale blue eyes
Moth (10 moons) - Tortoiseshell-and-white she-cat with a small, wiry build and light green eyes
Brave (6 moons) - Energetic black tom with icy blue eyes
Zally (4 moons) - Lithe light ginger tabby she-cat with blue-green eyes
Cola (3 moons) - Cream-colored she-cat with a brown face, brown ears and brown tail
Cinder (26 moons) - Amber-eyed ash-grey tabby she-cat with no tail
Twig (19 moons) - Gaunt light brown tom with black markings, orange eyes and a missing front leg
Chapter One
Wolf
A cold silvery claw-moon glinted overhead in the inky night like a black cat staring down through slitted eyes. The metallic stench of blood and musty air of rotten corpses should have been normal to us by now. We were racing against ourselves in a bare forest of skeletons.
"Wolf!"
I heard my teammate calling out to me, a shrill screech that seemed to rattle the bone-like branches and send chills down my spine. The word echoed through the dead trees, surrounding me as my paws hit the frozen ground hard with every step I took. A piercing leaf-fall wind slapped against my fur and face as I sprinted as fast as I could, marking the end of this season, marking the end of the fiery colors and the beginning of something much colder. I could hear the wind's moans and groans in the distance while the stars above died away.
"The enemy is heading toward the stream near the border," a steady voice surprisingly close to me suddenly said. I whipped my head around and saw a slightly larger she-cat running beside me, her dark golden pelt splotched with shadows and the dim glow of the moon.
"Got it, Tundra," I breathed back, my words coming out in tired pants, but I tried my best to suppress that exhaustion. True survivors like us don't give up.
"Grizzly is on their trail already. I'm going to round them from the south side," Tundra continued, her warm breath sending small clouds of fog clashing into the frigid air. I realized mine did too.
"Where is Sleet?" I asked, wondering about the fourth cat who came with us, narrowing my eyes as raw adrenaline pumped through my veins. Despite being on the run for who-knows-how-long by now, I suddenly felt lighter, stronger, instead of weighed down by my aching muscles.
I heard Tundra give a quiet scoff. It was hushed, as if she didn't want me to hear, but I caught it.
"Who knows? He disappeared a little while ago, and I haven't seen him since." The splotched golden she-cat leaped forward with a sudden burst of speed and began to outrun me. Her figure started fading into the blackness bit by bit, until even her tail-tip finally vanished.
I saw the stream growing nearer and nearer in the distance, and I knew I was close. The enemies were supposed to be here. But no water, not even ice, glimmered white and silver off the stream's surface, because by now the snaking dip into the earth was completely dry.
Sleet couldn't kill anyone anyway, I knew, thinking of the skinny grey-and-white tomcat. He was the same age as me, 11 moons — although most of us didn't bother to keep count — and undoubtedly I was the closest to him out of the whole gang. Even though I knew he trusted us more than anything, that suspicious, wary look in his pale blue eyes could probably never be warm and open again.
At the exact moment I started to slow down and the dry stream grew closer, a shape quickly flew by, just close enough to me to lightly brush my flank as it bolted by in the darkness, and I caught sight of a ginger tabby pelt. Gathering the last of my energy and forcing myself to keep running although everything inside me screamed to stop, I finally saw them. Catching sight of a familiar, large, muscular long-haired tom, I knew that was Grizzly. I could recognize the distinctive, massive-pawed brown cat anywhere. He was one of the best fighters of our gang, and could easily take down even skilled cats with strength alone. Sleet and Tundra, however, were nowhere to be seen.
The enemy Clan's three warriors were scattered along the edge of the stream. Grizzly was cornering a ginger tom, likely the one I saw a few moments ago. A light brown tabby was pacing a bit further down the stream, while a snowy white she-cat stood beside him.
"Wolf, trap those mange-pelts! Don't let them get away!" a low, gruff growl sounded loud and clear. I followed Grizzly's orders and unsheathed my claws, feeling the grip of the earth better as I advanced toward the brown tabby tom and the white she-cat. As my gaze flickered between them and Grizzly one last time, I heard a loud crack that split the air and the temperature seemed to drop all of a sudden. The stench of blood leaked into the night as deep crimson splattered all over the ground, and I knew Grizzly had killed the ginger cat.
The two enemies were a bit bigger, likely older, but that wouldn't stop me. I was one of the younger ones in my gang, yet we were trained and pushed beyond our limits from the very start. We were fighters, we were survivors. We were much stronger and much more skilled than any weak Clan cats who dared call themselves warriors. We weren't blinded by emotions and stories. All we sought was the raw truth, no matter how bloody or gruesome or unfair. That was us. The Nightlanders.
The brown tabby glared down at me as he stepped in front of his Clanmate protectively, his fangs bared in a hateful snarl. I could see his lime-colored eyes blazing with so much anger that it seemed I felt the fire burn into my flesh. The she-cat's sunset-orange eyes had no anger, no revengeful hatred. In fact, they lacked everything I expected. They were so hollow and stretched wide that I almost flinched. It was as if all life had suddenly been drained out, and all that was left was raw, empty shock. Then I realized she was frozen, staring grief-stricken at the bloody, lifeless body of the ginger cat, her Clanmate.
Was death so surprising to these cats? I wondered vaguely with a lingering thought, but before it could grow into something deeper, a paw knocked me to the side and I felt my head slam against the bulging roots of a tree. A few light scratch marks ran across my cheek. I quickly recovered and launched myself at the brown tabby, mentally scolding myself for wasting time with distracting thoughts in battle. This should never happen. Now my goal was to kill them.
The she-cat pounced on top of me and I felt her claws dig into my back, but before any serious damage could be done, I quickly flipped over and slammed her down into the ground with my claws in a skilled movement. The tabby tom charged into my side and bowled me over, as I reluctantly had to release the she-cat and focused on him. He put his weight on me and tried to hold me down, but as he raised a paw ready to attack, I swiftly slid out from under him, hooked a paw around his hind leg and flipped him down. However I soon realized he was faster than I thought. He recovered and stood up again quite quickly too, his flaming green eyes still locked on me. I heard the heavy, low thump of big paws thudding against the earth, and I clenched my teeth as the massive dark brown tom neared.
"Grizzly, hold down the tom," I yowled over to him while dodging an attack. "I'll take care of the other one."
Grizzly sent me a gruff snort-like sound, the stubborn noise of his approval as he caught the tom's head with one of his large paws and slammed his skull into the ground. I tried to find Sleet and Tundra, but the two still haven't arrived. I figured Tundra was farther down the line following the stream, but I haven't seen Sleet even once.
It was only me against the she-cat now. I eyed her as she stood about a fox-length away. Her ears were flattened, her white fur was fluffed up to make her look bigger than she actually was, and her fangs were bared in a snarl. But enduring so many ages of lying and being lied to, we could detect lies and see through masks as easily as we could breathe. I felt her fear give off strongly like the darkness that pulsed through the sky.
"Why…" the she-cat started in a hushed, cracking voice, and I narrowed my eyes warily, flexing my claws. She cleared her throat and began in a stronger voice, "Why do you insist on attacking us?"
I almost scoffed aloud and I pressed my claws deeper into the cold, hard ground to suppress my urge to end her right then, uninterested in what she had to say. "Why? Because you trespassed. We don't like strangers on our turf."
I could tell that answer was hardly enough, but I wouldn't waste time with a conversation at a time like this. I scowled to myself, itching to finish this.
"You cats — the ones who call yourselves Nightlanders — have been terrorizing us, attacking us for as long as I can remember," she continued, her voice flat. She spat out the word "Nightlanders" like it was poison on her tongue. She was staring at the ground and made no move or even sign of considering to lunge herself at me. I flexed my claws and kept my guard up.
"You'll trespass onto our land and steal everything we have, harm and even kill our cats when we did nothing to you, and for what reason?" By now her eyes were no longer emotionless. They were blazing and furious, and I thought I saw the glint of tears lining her fiery orbs. "For your own plain amusement," she hissed out, colder than ice.
I felt the heat rising inside me, and all I wanted to do was end her life. "You are the ones who are weak!" I yowled out, voice rising unintentionally with the anger that was building up.
The she-cat didn't even flinch and straightened up a bit. "No, you are the weak ones. You'll never understand what it means to have family, what it means to truly be alive. All Nightlanders are, are emotionless, cold-blooded walking skeletons."
I lashed my tail. "Don't you dare take the name of Nightlanders in vain!"
At that, I launched myself at her, paws outstretched and claws unsheathed. I bowled her over and without hesitating, dug my claws into her flank, feeling the blood leak out slowly, staining the dry leaves underneath us scarlet. She hissed and squirmed beneath me, flailing and struggling to get out of my grip until her claws lashed me across the face and ears. It was nothing serious, didn't even make me wince. If this was what so many moons of training and fighting had taught them, they weren't even worthy of fighting against a rat.
I pressed her down deeper into the ground, one paw against her throat. I could feel her suffocating beneath me, gasping for the air that wouldn't come.
I'm going to kill her. I'm going to kill her.
But despite everything I've learned, everything I've seen, I knew this was going to be my first kill. I had experience in battling, I knew how to strike the best moves for the most damage, and I knew how to lash back even when cornered or held down. But I've never actually taken a cat's life.
I didn't care, though. With one last frustrated yowl, I raised a paw and slashed down on her face with sharpened claws as hard as I could. Tufts of white fur drifted down and adorned the dull pebbles and dry leaves on the ground. Crimson slowly seeped into the earth and made it a much darker color. The fun was over. I aimed at her throat.
But I didn't get to finish what I started.
Something suddenly lunged into my side and I felt my back collide with a large boulder that jutted out of the ground. I rolled over and sprang up, scowling in fury when I realized with a start that the she-cat was gone by the time I had stood up. Her ghostly white figure against the pale mist and coal-black night vanished in a staggering jog. All that was left was a snaking line of scarlet brushed against the dirt.
I spun around, expecting to see the light brown tom, that no-good Clanmate of hers, risking his life to protect her. But that wasn't it. Hunched over a few tail-lengths away, pale blue eyes staring at the ground with guilt and some emotion I couldn't place, and blood streaking his specked pelt, was Sleet.
My eyes grew wide.
"Sleet…" I stepped forward cautiously. The thin tomcat didn't look up. "Sleet, how could you?"
My only answer was the bone-chilling wind against the last leaves of leaf-fall.
"I was so close!" I didn't realize my voice was rising in frustration by now, and everything escalated. I wasn't usually like this. But somehow all my anger had built up and I couldn't control what spurted out of my mouth. "That was going to be my first kill! Do you know how important our pride and power is to us, as Nightlanders? No, of course you don't. You'll never truly be one of us. A soft-hearted weakling like you shouldn't even be here!"
The air suddenly grew deathly silent, and I felt like I'd just been clawed in the face. A wave of remorse flooded over me. I stared at Sleet, who was trembling a bit now. The small tom clenched his teeth.
"No, Sleet, I didn't mean to." I sighed and shut my eyes, stepping a bit closer. My voice dropped into a hushed tone. "You know I didn't mean to."
Sleet forced a small, crooked smile and shuffled his paws. I knew that smile wasn't genuine. "That's fine. It was my fault, after all."
I took a deep breath and forced all the anger out of my body. It seemed as if all the negative emotions swirled away in a mist, and all that was left inside of me was peaceful, calm coldness. Everything was too quiet. I stepped closer to Sleet and glanced at him. I just noticed a long, thin scar trailing from his lower neck to his shoulder. It must've been new.
"You still can't," I stated simply, but I was sure he knew what I meant. I saw him narrow his eyes, and his light blue orbs darkened. "You still can't kill, can you?"
There was no answer. Perhaps I was a bit too straightforward or harsh to my friend, but we were raised like that. It was a habit. We didn't sugarcoat things we said. And Sleet still wasn't completely one of us, no matter how hard either of us tried to deny it.
All of a sudden, the sound of bones cracking and bodies slamming registered to us and drifted through the air like a chilling haze. I pricked my ears and waited. Beside me, Sleet was still looking down, becoming tense. A blood-curdling shriek ensued.
"He's dead. That enemy tom, he's dead," Sleet muttered, slowly standing up. I nodded numbly and suddenly felt a bit of a throbbing sting in my right ear. There must've been a nick from the fight.
The first light of dawn seeped into the sky and trickled down, a pinkish-orange glow tinted violet, and I noticed the clouds again. They were a dim golden. It was perhaps the first time I really noticed the sunrise. Sleet held his head higher as the colors reflected into his eyes. His breaths relaxed, and I may not have admitted it, but mine did as well. I let go of all the burdens for just one heartbeat, because I trusted Grizzly and Tundra and I knew they were going to be okay.
I shook off any lingering feelings or thoughts I had and grinned down at Sleet, helping him up as, behind us, the sun started igniting a brilliant sky.
"Come on, let's go back home."