ALLEGIANCES

THUNDERCLAN

LEADER: Molestar (Montague) – Large black tom

DEPUTY: Shadefire (Romeo) – Handsome flame colored tabby tom with one black paw

Apprentice, Badgerpaw

MEDICINE CAT: Pinefoot (Friar Lawrence) Hefty tabby tom

Apprentice, Briarpaw

WARRIORS: Flamebird (Lady Montague) – Ginger she-cat

Birchclaw (Benvolio) – Gray, white, and black spotted tom with blue eyes

Apprentice, Adderpaw

Mottledpelt (Mercutio) – Reddish tom with mottled black splotches

Roseleaf (Rosaline) – Pretty tortoiseshell she-cat

APPRENTICES: Briarpaw (Friar John) – Small dusky tom

Badgerpaw (Balthasar) – Small white tom with distinctive black stripes

Adderpaw (Abraham) – Pale tabby tom

RIVERCLAN

LEADER: Acornstar (Capulet) – Solid brown tom

DEPUTY: Ripplestone (Paris) – Handsome long haired gray tom with striking green eyes

Apprentice, Patchpaw

WARRIORS: Shimmerpool (Juliet) – Beautiful silvery white she-cat with deep blue eyes

Blossomlight (Lady Capulet) – White she-cat

Apprentice, Scorchpaw

Darkfang (Tybalt) – Sleek dark tabby with yellow eyes

Apprentice, Gorsepaw

APPRENTICES: Palepaw (Peter) – Pale reddish tom

Scorchpaw (Sampson) - Dark brown tabby tom with reddish flecks

Gorsepaw (Gregory) – Tabby tom with a long haired white belly

QUEENS: Aspenleaf (Nurse) – Cream colored tabby she-cat

WINDCLAN

Emberstar (The Prince) – Large marbled tom with amber eyes

As the Clans withdrew from the sun-warmed rocks, they left behind them bloodstained grass and russet boulders. Strewn across the ground were clumps of fur, grisly reminders of the battle. While RiverClan retreated into the river and their territory of willows and reeds beyond, a steady stream of ThunderClan warriors plodded and limped into the trees.

It felt as if every hair on Birchclaw's pelt ached, not that there was much left; he felt that if Darkfang had pulled out any more fur he'd look like an eel.

The forest itself seemed like a mystery to Birchclaw; nothing was real. He felt as if the trees and rocks could dissolve into mist within a moment. A vast, unnatural silence covered everything. With the rational part of his mind Birchclaw realized that all the prey had been scared away by the ferocity of the battle, but still numb with shock it seemed that StarClan was somehow giving them a sign, through this noiseless world.

Birchclaw began to pad heavily back towards camp, following his fellow warriors, but the burn of piercing amber eyes on his shoulder gave him pause. He turned to the sight of Molestar standing at the edge of the trees, signaling to him with his tail. Flamebird stood beside the black-pelted leader, blood pouring heavily from a nasty nick in her ear, and she held up one paw, as if a claw had been snagged. Molestar himself was smeared and stained crimson, but Birchclaw knew that much of the blood was not his own.

When Birchclaw reached them, Molestar sighed heavily. Clumsily he sat, and drew his thick-pelted tail over his bloodstained paws.

"Who started this old fight up again?" he mumbled wearily. "Speak, nephew. Were you here when it began?"

Birchclaw closed his eyes, remembering how it had begun. A simple skirmish became a battle for blood, he thought bitterly. Swallowing down his resent, he meowed, "Some RiverClan apprentices, and some of ours, they were fighting just before I arrived. I was hunting, and when I saw them I ran to part them. And at that instant came that fox-hearted Darkfang, with his claws sharpened and battle-ready..." Again he had to force his claws to stay sheathed; he found his weary paws sudden itching for another fight. "And then he attacked me. As we were trading blows, soon came more and more patrols from both Clans. Till WindClan came, of course, which parted us all."

Flamebird groaned softly. "Oh, where is Shadefire?" she mewed anxiously. "Did you see him today? I'm quite glad he was not at this battle."

Birchclaw nodded slightly. "Firebird, a little while before the sun rose, a troubled mind drove my paws to a hunt, and underneath the Great Sycamore, I saw your son. I went towards him, but he was aware of me and stole into the woods.

And I thought he must be feeling the same way I was, wanting to be alone yet tired of my own company. Birchclaw shook away the dismal thought. His own personal turmoil was something he had to deal with himself.

"I thought he must be avoiding me," Birchclaw continued.And I gladly shunned Shadefire, who gladly fled from me. With his ears he flicked away the bleak thought. "And so I kept to myself," he finished vaguely.

Molestar exhaled, but Birchclaw could not tell if it was out of relief or distress. "He is quite... distraught," Molestar admitted, his tufted ears pressing despondently against his head. Birchclaw knew about that; many mornings he had been seen with eyes glistening like fresh morning's dew. He sighed so often and so deeply that Birchclaw felt that he could make a whole storm cloud out of sighs.

"And," continued Molestar dismally, "at every sunrise, away from the light steals my unhappy son. Alone in the warrior's den he hides, cowering in his nest, locking the daylight out and making himself a fake night." Molestar's gaze swept suddenly over the bloodstained Sunningrocks, scanning the dark river with a dullness in his eyes that sent shivers down Birchclaw's spine.

"Dark and ominous must this temper of his prove, unless..." He looked pointedly at Birchclaw. "Unless someone smart can fix it."

Birchclaw could sense the desperation in Molestar's voice, and he suppressed a sigh. His own inner turmoil would have to wait. Shadefire, after all, was destined to become leader, and it was dangerous for him to become so uninvolved in his Clan's affairs.

"My noble uncle," Birchclaw meowed. "Do you know the cause?

"I neither know it, nor will he tell me."

"Have you done everything you could to make him tell you?"

"I've tried myself, and many other warriors as well. But he keeps his thoughts to himself – I cannot say how true a friend he is to himself, but he to himself he does keep his secrets close, far from discovery. If we could learn from where his sorrows grow, we would quite willingly give him every cure for it we knew.

Another scent wafted towards them on the dry breeze, and Birchclaw tipped his head. A moment later, Birchclaw spotted a shadowed figure, obscured by fronds of bracken about three fox-lengths away. A flash of flame-colored fur sparkled in the watery greenleaf light.

"Look, here he comes," Birchclaw whispered. He gave Molestar a quick, respectful nod. "Please, step aside. I'll know his grievance, or I'll be quite denied."

"I hope you'll be lucky enough by staying to hear the true story – come, Flamebird, let's go." Molestar gave her forehead a fond lick, and she gave a hoarse purr in return as he offered her his broad shoulder. Holding up one of her forepaws, Flamebird leaned against him and hopped her way clumsily into the forest. They passed through a group of slender birch trees and then disappeared from view.

Shadefire stepped from the shadows into the shaft of sunlight piercing the thick treetops. His muscles rippled and rolled beneath a thick, ginger tabby pelt. His eyes gleamed passionately, bright and observant. His left forepaw stepped upon the foliage, colored jet black. He was, as Birchclaw could only grudgingly admit, a handsome specimen.

"Good morning, cousin," he meowed, padding over to his friend and brushing his own tail along Shadefire's flame-colored spine.

An expression of puzzlement swarmed across Shadefire's face. "Is it really so early?"

"Not even sunhigh."

Shadefire sat, as though defeated in some way, though he lifted his glistening eyes to the sky. "Oh!" he meowed. "Time goes so slowly when you're sad. Was that my father who left from here so fast?"

"It was," Birchclaw confirmed. "What sadness lengthens your days?"

Shadefire now hung his head, and suddenly seemed fascinated with his paws. "I don't have the thing that makes time go quickly," he muttered.

Birchclaw flicked his ears. A sliver of amusement warmed his heart, but he tried to retain a serious composure. "You're in love?"

"Out," answered Shadefire dully.

Birchclaw shook his head, confused. "Out of love?" he mewed questioningly.

"Out ofher favor," Shadefire meowed dryly, "while I'm in love with her.

Birchclaw licked his friend's ear comfortingly. "It's sad," Birchclaw sighed, "that love, so gentle looking, should be so tyrannous and rough in truth."

"It's sad that love, which should be blind, can still, without eyes, bend your will!" His answer had begun as a retort but trailed off in passive silence. He lifted his pure black paw and licked it, but aimlessly. Then he stood and began to pad off, back towards Sunningrocks. Birchclaw scrambled after him.

"Shall we hunt?-" Shadefire's question stopped short as he peered out at Sunningrocks from the brambles.

The heat of the air had quickly done away with the dew, and the blood had dried on the rocks, turning them a ghastly scarlet. A blazing sun shone glaringly in a copper sky. No breeze rustled the reeds, and only the scent of blood and illness welcomed them. Shadefire shuddered in horror and closed his eyes, turning his head away as if ashamed.

"Oh, StarClan!" he whimpered. "What fight happened here?"

Birchclaw opened his mouth, but Shadefire drew a thick-furred tail over his muzzle. "Don't tell me. I know already. This battle has much to do with hate but more with love. Oh brawling love! Oh loving hate! Oh, love that comes from nothing! Oh, sorrowful happiness, oh serious vanity! Misshapen chaos made from beautiful things! It is a feather and a rock, bright and yet smoke, cold and yet fire, sick and yet healthy, awake and yet asleep; it is everything but what it is! This is the love I feel, though no one loves me back. Are you laughing?"

It was true; by the time Shadefire had begun talking about "brawling love" Birchclaw was suppressing the onslaught of laughter building up in his throat like a tangle of brambles. Birchclaw tried to keep his nose from twitching. "No, cousin, I'd rather weep."

Shadefire turned about swiftly, concern bright in his eyes. "Birchclaw, for what?"

Birchclaw flattened his ears, slightly startled at the intensity of Shadefire's gaze. "At your own sorrow."

Shadefire sighed again, and Birchclaw prepared himself to hear another lengthy speech. "Why, such is love's way. My griefs lie heavy in my heart, to which, your own sorrows you will add. You add more grief to mine, which is already too much. Love is a smoke made from lover's sighs; when it is purged, a fire sparkles in lover's eyes; Being vexed, a lake is formed with loving tears. What else is love? A guarded madness, a restrained impudence, and a tart sweetness. Farewell, my cousin."

Somehow, Shadefire's oration was no longer so amusing; Birchclaw could see his heart was mourning deeply, for reasons Birchclaw himself could not quite comprehend. Shadefire turned away, his eyes bright, but with anguish rather than any sort of lightheartedness. Birchclaw could bear it no longer.

Thistles and thorns, what am I getting into? Birchclaw shook his head clear of doubt and quickly trotted over to his friend. "Wait!" he meowed. "I will go along with you." Birchclaw hoped he looked stern. "And if you just leave me, you do me wrong."

"Furball." Shadefire closed his eyes. "I have lost myself. I am not here. This is not Shadefire. He's away somewhere." His tail thudded onto the ground, and a tiny plume of dust erupted aroun it.

Birchclaw moaned inwardly. A mouse on the moor could've heard his tail drop! "Tell me, in your sadness, who it is that you love," Birchclaw mewed guardedly.

Shadefire groaned. Please don't, Birchclaw thought. "A sick cat cannot be told, in his sadness, to speak his last words; that is quite ill advised for someone so ill. In sadness, cousin, I do love... a she-cat."

Birchclaw stifled his urge to laugh. "I kind of guessed that already."

"Good job," Shadefire muttered sarcastically. Then angst seemed to permeate his eyes again. "And she's beautiful, the one I love."

"Those who are beautiful, cousin, are taken the fastest."

"Not exactly." Birchclaw tipped his head to one side and listened. "She'll not be smitten. She's as witty as StarClan, but well armed with chastity from love's weak childish ways; she isn't charmed. She won't listening to my many loving words, nor accept being looked at with loving eyes, nor allow me to grant her gifts of prey and pretty stones. Oh, she is rich in beauty, yet poor, because when she joins StarClan her beauty will die with her.

Birchclaw rolled his eyes. He thought Shadefire was being silly; if a she-cat didn't want to take a mate, that was her choice. But now to Shadefire it seemed like the end of the world was coming. "Then she has sworn that she will be chaste?"

Shadefire's voice rose to a quiet wail. "She has, and in doing so, creates huge waste! For beauty, made meaningless with her severity, cuts beauty off from the generations that could have been! She is too lovely and too wise to merit StarClan's blessing by making me despair. She has sworn off love, and that vow has left me living yet dead, living only to tell you now.

Shadefire had always been painfully overdramatic, but now this bee-brained misery made Birchclaw worry, a habit which he probably did far too much of. In fact, he considered himself less of a "warrior" and more of a "worrier."

"Take my advice," Birchclaw suggested. "Forget about her."

Shadefire eyed him dryly. "Oh, teach me how I should forget to think!" he yelped.

"Do it by giving freedom to you eyes," he mewed. "Examine other beauties." Of which there are plenty.

"That will only make me think of how much more exquisite she is!" he yowled angrily. "Beautiful she-cats often hide their faces, and let us think of how lovely they are beyond the shadows. He who becomes blind cannot forget the once precious treasure of his eyesight. Now show me a really stunning she-cat; her beauty serves as but a reminder of where I may see someone far more enchanting. Farewell. You cannot teach me to forget.

Birchclaw shook his head. If there was anything he liked, it was a challenge; it made him forget about his own troubles.

"I'll prove you wrong," he meowed. Shadefire was trudging unhurriedly into the trees, branches crunching loudly beneath heavy paws. Birchclaw stalked beside him. "Oh, I'll prove you wrong, or else I'll die in debt."