Chapter 1: Dawn and Patrol
The amber light of morning filtered through the fronds of bracken arching above us. I watched the beams as they danced in the light breeze, feeling my heart pounding. Today was the day.
Today was the day I'd leave my clan behind.
Today was the day I'd meet the best friend I would ever have.
Today was the day I'd begin to learn the fate of my AshClan.
Today was the day I'd set off on the journey of my life.
Of course, I had no idea. If I had, would I have had the heart to do it? Would I have been brave enough to get up out my nest if I knew it would all end in tears? Was I strong enough to face that? Am I?
My only clue to the stirring of fate was that I was awake so early—or was it my dream that had awakened me?—because I only woke up early when I was excited about the day. I didn't realize this, of course, but now that I look back at it, it's just so blaringly obvious.
I stared at the sunlight until Smokepaw prodded me in the side.
"Hey, sleeping beauty," he mewed in a hoarse whisper. "Dawn patrol."
"Coming," I sighed, painfully aware of my pulse pounding in my leg. Everything was in vivid, like I was living the last few seconds of my life. I desperately hoped they weren't, though if I was going on the dawn patrol with Smokepaw, my final seconds might not have been too far off.
I stumbled into camp, looking around like I'd never seen the place. It was a hollow in the woods, surrounded by trees, shrubs, ferns, and a whole lot of thorns on three sides and a high stone cliff face on the other. The only way in was to climb a boulder which stood over the camp on a low slope, hollowed out at the bottom for Ridgestar.
Against the other side of camp, there were a few shallow dips in the stone with bushes growing in front of them, reinforced with thorns and branches as dens for the rest of us. A huge hollow oak tree with low, sweeping branches stood tall, its canopy reaching out to the edges of camp. The elders say our hollow was once a riverbed, but the river dried in a great fire, from where a lion was born.
We are the lion's descendants, apparently, along with the leopard and tiger. The tiger was born from the shadows of night, and the leopard from the sunlight in the branches above. They lived in harmony in our riverbed, but as the twolegs came and made the forest small and swarmed the mountains that tower above us, we grew small to adapt to the changing winds. That's where we AshClan come from. I just hoped our camp didn't decide to become a river again.
That's what the elders said, anyway. A friend of mine was always telling me its just myths and superstition, and that we were just cats. Not big 'legendary warriors' padding around killing each other.
Fortunately.
Anyway, I followed Smokepaw, towards the Oak, where the fresh-kill was kept in the hollow part. As it was an early morning, there were rarely any tasty catches leftover from the day before. Today, however, there was a rabbit sitting under the usual squirrels and sparrows. I saw it... then realized I was walking behind Smokepaw.
A cultivated, high-class twit, he was a dark gray tom with blue eyes the color of the sky. Son of the leader and deputy, he strutted around camp like he owned it, shedding snide remarks and insults like fur. Unfortunately for his rapidly inflating head, and our sanity, he was fast and talented and smart and witty. He always had something to say.
Unfortunately.
He bent over and took a mouse. Then, with an amused glance over his shoulder, Smokepaw trotted across camp to sit with his father, who happened to also be my mentor. I watched him go with my mouth hanging open.
About then I should've noticed something was up—Smokepaw hadn't taken the rabbit. Well, I hadn't eaten since dawn the day before, so...
I picked it up, and carried it to the overhang where the apprentices usually ate. Smokepaw and I were the only ones awake, and he was over with Stagfrost, the deputy, so I was alone. I chewed slowly on it, watching Smokepaw. He turned his head and looked at me, smirked, and turned back to his father. I saw his jaws move as he told my mentor something, about me and unflattering, no doubt.
I sighed and took another bite of the rabbit, knowing at least that Stagfrost wouldn't think any less of me. I was his apprentice, after all.
Strict and tough, he trained me hard, offering little praise and few words. But this was the most effective way to train me, because it always made me try harder, try and prove to Stagfrost that I was every bit as good as he tried to make me. After about three moons, however, I was a bit hurt by his silence and annoyed by his lack of any praise whatsoever.
I chewed and thought about what we were going to do on the dawn patrol. Would we go along the twolegplace border? That made me remember my dream the night before—what had the cat said? The brightest star and the black paw... and something about a blood river, which didn't sound so good. And—
"Pebblepaw!" said a voice from above me.
I jerked my head up to see Stagfrost towering over me. I mustered, with difficulty, my most innocent look. What did I do this time? I thought.
"Pebblepaw, I thought I trained you better than this!" Stagfrost mewed, unnecessarily loud, in my opinion, looking remarkably affronted for something that his son must have told him about me. I stopped chewing. "You cannot eat until the clan has!" Oh. "At the very least take a humble amount of fresh-kill, and not the largest in the pile!"
"Fox dung," I muttered under my breath. "No, Stagfrost, see, I haven't eaten since yesterday, at dawn about, and I was about to—"
"I suggest you deliver that rabbit to the elders immediately," Stagfrost went on, ignoring me. Eternal question of the day: why the heck does Stagfrost never talk, then start talking a whole lot, not listening, and using vocabulary the size of Smokepaw's mouth (in other words, unnecessarily humongous)? The world may never know.
Seething slightly, I glared at Smokepaw, who was smirking at me from across the hollow, then at Stagfrost, for taking his side! Whatever happened to clan over kin?!
"Yes, sir," I muttered. Even though they were being loathsome, I couldn't help but feel a bit abashed, and slightly stupid(er than usual). I should've known Smokepaw was up to something, and that I wasn't supposed to take the huge rabbit. "But won't the elders... not... want to get... woken up?" I added stupidly, wondering if that even made grammatical sense.
"Then you can leave it at their den entrance," Stagfrost mewed over his shoulder, already walking away. "Get going."
I watched him go, seething slightly more. I couldn't have asked for a better teacher, but at least I could've asked for one with a heart.
