"—a kit." The she-cat finished, a purr of laughter in her meow.

The little kit jumped up, shaking the sand from her pelt. She spat out even more sand, ignoring the grains still stuck to her tongue, and flew around to meet the eyes of five visibly relaxed cats. There was now a sense of amusement surrounding them.

She hissed at them in contempt, furious that they seemed to be mocking her. She was still a threat! She could still –

"Kit," the she-cat meowed, her eyes soft. "we mean no harm. We only –"

She pounced again, straight into Dusktail's paw…again. She bounced back, frustrated, her fur bristling and her ears low. She hissed as fiercely as she could, but even to her it sounded more like a squeak. She finally plumped down into the sand, sitting as high as she cold hold her chin, wrapping her tail around herself with as much dignity as she could muster. Her teeth scraped the remaining sand from her tongue.

Four of the five foreigners were holding back laughter. The remaining cat, Dusktail, incidentally the cat she chose to attack, just looked annoyed and uncomfortable. The little kit could tell the salty air and the sound of cresting, crashing waves were not soothing to him as they were to her.

"What is your name?" the same she-cat asked kindly as the kit licked her chest a few times with the little pride she had left.

But the little kit froze at her question. Her name? She bobbed her head down, as if looking for the answer in the sand.

"What are you called?" she prompted again. The other cats were silent, watching the kit with traces of great interest.

"We do not have names here," she mewed carefully, trying to recall what her mam told her about names, before she had passed away. "We have no use for them! We hunt alone, sleep alone, and fight alone. Names are silly when you have nobody to talk to."

The amusement dropped from their manner, quickly replaced by shock. She had the attention of all five cats now.

"No names?" Rabbitfoot rasped. "How can that be?"

"Exactly as I told you." The kit felt her body stiffening as she tried to maintain her elongated posture. She fought hard not to relax it, feeling her muscles quiver with effort. "And maybe it's a good thing, or I could be stuck with a silly name like Rabbitfoot!"

Silence followed the little kit's challenging words. She still had not forgiven the tom for defeating her so quickly. Obviously she had struck a cord, because moment after moment, the world around her seemed to get as silent as these cats.

Dusktail suddenly turned from her, facing Rabbitfoot with bristling fur. "This is the path StarClan has chosen for us? If a kit can't even maintain some sort of respect, what can we expect of her predecessors? Of cats with no names?" He turned once more, facing the other black tom, the one who had not spoken yet. "What say you, Midnightfoot? You and Dawnpelt have been very quiet, Twilightfur leading us forward…out of the ordinary." He added brazenly, his eyes flickering to the other she-cat.

Midnightfoot opened his mouth to speak, and then closed it again, as if he was rethinking his judgment of the situation. The black she-cat called Dawnpelt spoke instead, staring at the little kit with impossibly green eyes that almost outdid the she-kits' own intense green color.

"StarClan has chosen us for this task for a reason," Dawnpelt mewed, blinking her eyes as if accepting something she would otherwise be uncertain about without this "StarClan." "Perhaps the nameless cats are another sign of how desperately they need union."

Midnightfoot was still observing the kit with silent thoughts. It was Dawnpelt's eyes that made her look deep into Midnightfoot's own; his were a pool of darkness, the night sky coloring them itself, even in its absence.

Rabbitfoot mewed in agreement. "We made it here on the will of StarClan. You have a destiny to unfold, and it all begins here." She answered as if the matter was settled. The little kit was still completely uncertain of what exactly these words pertained to, but knew these cats were not here by accident. And great change would soon follow.

She felt an off sense of calm and clarity, the sun beginning to set, casting long shadows from the dune they were hidden behind. The kit now mewed hastily, sensing adventure in her path. "I can show you the Clifflands. I can –"

Duskpelt let out a huffing mrrow of laughter. "A kit," he guffawed. At her. "A kit is not the cat we seek."

"A disrespectful one at that," Rabbitfoot muttered under her breath.

"I can!" the little kit mewed indignantly. "I know where cat's hide, and where prey does, too. I know where you will be welcome and where you will not be. I can show you!"

The cats were silent as they processed her words. Twilightfur was searching her as well, her eyes ice-blue, like the water at the very bottom of a wave as it crested over. Suddenly, the little kit was very aware of the grass-green, ice-blue, night-dark and clay-brown eyes observing her.

"Are we really considering following a kit around uncharted land?" Duskpelt finally meowed impatiently, thrashing his tail, sending a small cloud of dust over Rabbitfoot. She coughed, loudly, swatting at his tail.

"Watch it, you great furball!" her coughing finally residing, finding her voice back. "My lungs are not use to this grainy sand! I don't fancy the idea of trekking through all these new terrains, either. This is your decision, and yours alone." She finished, her eyes sweeping the backs of the four cats with odd white paws. They didn't protest, but looked sad, as if they could foretell a sad omen.

The kit kneaded the ground impatiently, never-minding their sudden downcast stares. She sat wracking her brain for another reason why she should be allowed this great adventure. Slowly, a thought trickled in, making her quiver with excitement. She tried to level her voice before meowing, at solemnly as she could, "I could take you to the herb cat."

This peaked the interest of Midnightfoot. "The herb cat?" he meowed quickly, standing up on all four paws. His back paw was the white one, on the side closest to the cliff, pointing away from the ocean.

The little kit held back a purr of success. "Yes, the herb cat." She said mysteriously. "She can tell you everything that I can't! She knows all of the cats!"

The other three cats stood up at once, obviously now eager to attend to the little kit. "Is she far from here?" Twilightfur questioned. Her white paw was the front one, the one that faced the ocean. The little kit quickly noticed that Duskpelt's white foot was in the back as well, but facing the ocean, like Twilightfur's. Dawntail's white foot was in the front, facing the cliff.

It was very strange, the kit thought, that all four cats were almost exactly the same, but so different – and not just their white paws, or their luminous eyes. The sun was beginning to set now, the air cooling quite quickly. The sun wouldn't burn her raw paws now, or the strangers'.

"Not at all," the kit spoke quickly, wanting to leave before they changed their mind. "Do you see the path that leads up the cliff, down the beach?" she flicked her tail toward a grassy, bushy strip of land that led up the cliff many fox-lengths away, a crescent beginning in the sand and ending at the top of the cliff. "Her den is tucked into the cliff, on the inside of the Cliffpath. That way her herbs don't dry out in the sun. She is called "pearl."'

The cats peered in the direction her tail pointed, over their shoulders and over many brushy bushes. Duskpelt whipped to stare at the little kit hardly. "I thought you cats did not use names?"

The kit shook her head impatiently. "The herb cat is special. She takes care of us, and in return, we bring her silver and white pearls that wash up on the beach, or ones we can bust out of the oysters. She takes that name because she is the only cat that you need to know! Else you should die. She knows remedies for many of the bad things around here." The little kit shook, picturing the long, bracken-colored snakes that sometimes appeared in the Saltmarsh.

The cats looked at one another, as if searching for answers without asking the questions. Finally, Twilightfur nodded. She spoke carefully, assessing the little kit with her icy eyes. "Please take us to her, kit. We would very much appreciate your guidance."

The little kit had to refrain from rolling her eyes at the formality at which Twilightfur accepted the little kit's offer. The little kit understood they were probably trying to subdue her; she was use to being unwelcome. The little kit was one of the only cats brave enough – or stupid enough, some cats would say – to venture off of the beach and explore the prairie and oak scrubs above. She was the only one curious enough to venture close to the Bigfall, and play on the Steppingstones, before she was chased off.

The kit bounced to her paws, shaking her backside with excitement. Her whiskers quivered. "This way!" she beckoned them with her tail as she took a leap toward the herb cat's den. "Come on!" she added impatiently, seeing their hesitation at they glanced at Rabbitfoot.

"And you're sure you cannot make it?" Twilightfur asked wearily. The little kit sensed the unease among all four cats as they kneaded the sand, going from looking like dangerous strangers to lost kits.

The old cat, with great difficulty, it seemed to the little kit, rose onto her four paws. At first, she thought the old cat decided to come, and the little kit had to hide a groan. She wanted to go now. She was sure Rabbitfoot would move about as fast as a snail.

But she did not rise to follow. Instead, she touched her nose to each of the cat's foreheads, her eyes closed. "I'm sure." She rasped, stepping back to the warm pile of sand she had been laying in. "I enjoy the warmth of the shaded sand. And besides. You know all the stories, and have more than enough brains to pass them here, where you are needed. I was to lead you to this grand, new territory, and guide you to exploration. I am not meant to be a part of the exploration. My purpose has been served."

Dawntail approached the cat with a drooping head and tail, touching noses with her once more. The little kit wondered why they were making this goodbye such a big deal. The old cat wasn't encroaching on anyone's nest, nor was she close to the Snakeroot-tree's. She would be fine there; for a while, at least.

"May StarClan light your path," the old cat murmured, laying down and wrapping her tail around herself in a final sort of way. The little kit felt a twinge of sadness at the term. She didn't have any idea what the old cat was implying, of course, but it seemed a little too final. It rang through her heart with tiny pulsations, making the little kit glance in the cloudless sky, as if the answer was somewhere near the moon.

"And yours." Midnightfoot nodded his head. Even in all the darkness that seemed to surround the cat, his surly, thick-skinned demeanor, the little kit sensed an emotion she couldn't name in his goodbye. It made the kit feel that this was an ending of something rather important.

But as the four cats with strange white paws and burning eyes approached her, now ready to follow her on a path she had known so well, she felt a change. The path didn't seem so familiar now, though visibly nothing had changed. It seemed new, as unknown as the foreign cats she began to led through the sand brush.

"We need something to call you by, kit." Twilightfur commented, a hollowness in her voice as they lead away from Rabbitfoot. "You need a name."

The kit kept walking through the sand. She walked with ease, and since the four cats in her new companionship struggled with learning how to walk through it without spraying sand everywhere or slipping, their pace was matched despite short legs and small paws. She thought for a moment, thinking of her reflection in the pool near the Littlefall, and of the seaweed that washed on the shore overnight.

"Green." She mewed with confidence in her proclamation. "You may call me Green."

She watched Twilightfur nod, Dawntail dipping her head as well. "Greenkit." Twilightfur amended, and Greenkit did not contradict her. Greenkit. That she was.

Midnightfoot looked on, observing the scene unfolding before them with a practiced eye. Duskpelt walked on as well, withholding a hiss as his paws sank in the sand. They padded onwards in silence.

As they did, Greenkit sensed the biggest adventure her mind could imagine, bigger than the beach, bigger than the entirety of the Clifflands. She led the cats into a new beginning, with her new name, and with sand her mouth.

And so it began.