I'm too old to be afraid of the things that used to scare me when I was a kit. I know that monsters don't exist and I also know that wolves don't live in these parts. Whenever I used to cry about being scared, my dad would come into the Nursery and ask me what he was scared of.
I would then recite everything that scared me, dogs, rats, the Loch Ness Monster, other clan cats, famine, hunger, sickness ... and dad would keep shaking his head until I ran out of things that scared me. Then he would lean in and whisper, "You know what I'm scared of, Fishkit?" he would then say, his yellow eyes that were so like mine gleaming like little stars, "I'm scared of nothing"
What scares me now is a fear of the unknown. Especially after the leader and deputy's deaths. The forest that is so welcoming in the day seems foreboding and ominous during the night time hours. Stormheart and I were the only creatures that stirred. We made our way through the bracken filled undergrowth of ThunderClan territory, emerging at a clearing near the bank of the lake.
We turned left and silently made our way to ShadowClan territory. The noises of the day was what I was used to. To me, silence was the chatter of birds, wind in the trees and the babbling of a river. To me, a scene being completely quiet meant no cat talking. To me, stillness was the occasional ripple in a lake. But to the night, silence meant silence. No breeze through the trees, no bird song, no water flowing, nothing. It was almost as if the thrum of life had vanished, like Stormheart and I were the two sole beings left on the planet.
"Bravery is by far the kindest word for stupidity," my old mentor once told me, "Being scared of something does not make you a lesser cat, for there is no courage without fear"
My entire life, I have held those words of wisdom dear to my heart. Every single step I take, his words ring in my ear. His disembodied voice is solace, solace from the silence of the night.
An ear-splitting snap of a twig being broken filled the forest. Both Stormheart and I jump in fright.
"Wha- what was that?" I practically squeal, my already high pitched voice raised an octave or two in fright
"I'm sure it was nothing" said Stormheart, trying to keep a brave face, but I could see that he was frightened out of his wits as well.
We were incredibly wary for the entire next leg of our journey. In fact, "wary" seems like a bit of an understatement. We were nearly jumping out of our skins. When a large crow suddenly flew over our heads, cawing like a nutcase, I screamed.
"Sh!" said Stormheart, even though his fur was ruffled and his eyes wide, "Do you want to get caught? You made enough noise to wake the dead!"
Instantly, I thought of Russetflight and Ghoststar and how they had met their fate this time last night. A tremor of pure terror leapt down my spine. "God, Stormheart, I wish you hadn't said that" My ears suddenly pricked up. "Hey, Stormheart, do you hear that?"
He frowned and lifted his ears up a little higher. Suddenly he gave a jolt of surprise. "Yes, yes I do"
In the not too far off distance, there was the sound of paw steps. Not mouse paw steps, not dog paw steps, these definitely came from a cat. We both turned around, very slowly. A pair of glowing, amber eyes were just visible, watching us through the reeds and coming closer.
No courage without fear, I should have been telling myself, but instead my mind was numb. There was no doubt we were faced with a killer, faced with the same fate that met Russetflight and Ghoststar. They would find our mauled bodies tomorrow. After tonight, there would be two less cats on this planet; us.
"Show yourself!" I quivered.
Suddenly, there was a thud as the cat jumped out from behind the reeds and landed in front of us.
"Browntail!" both me and Stormheart yowled at once.
"I was listening to you guys talking about how you were going to steal some prey," he said, "And I wanted to come"
"You didn't have to follow us, geez" vented Stormheart, "We thought you were the murderer!"
"Yeah, why didn't you just ask if you could come?" I chipped in
Browntail looked embarrassed and shuffled his paws. "I … I knew you would just run off on your own even if I had asked"
We both looked at each other, feeling slightly guilty. This was true. The number of times we had done such in the past was uncountable.
"Fine," Stormheart said finally, "You can come with us. But next time, just ask us, okay?"
His amber eyes brightened as he nodded gleefully. "Yes, I'll do that"
"But no talking. We're nearly on ShadowClan territory. I don't know about you, but I don't really know exactly where their camp is. I don't want to start a war, just because you were being loud, okay?" Stormheart glared down at Browntail harshly.
He opened his mouth to respond and then shut it again, and nodded.
We continued to ShadowClan in silence. When we reached the tall, dense fir trees that signified the territory of ShadowClan, we split up, planning to meet back in two hours with whatever we could catch. I headed over to a clump of rocks and crouched behind them.
I waited for about 10-20 minutes for a little antechinus to scurry onto the rock. It looked left and right, but didn't see me in my hiding place. I crept closer, keeping my body low to the floor. When the little rodent was least suspecting, I leaped onto the rock, grabbed the creature in my jaws and bit down onto it. From what I could see, it was dead, but the silly little rodents have a knack of pretending to be dead so their predator would put them down and the cheeky blight would run away, very much alive. I put it on the ground, but was prepared for its retaliation. Sure enough, it attempted to escape, but I merely grabbed it in my jaws again and repeated the process. Sure enough, it was dead a second bite around.
We met back at the border as planned. As well as the antechinus, I had caught a small bird, a mouse and two frogs. I could barely fit them all in my mouth, and had to tie the antechinus and the mouse's tails together so I could carry them easier. Stormheart and Browntail both had their mouths full with prey as well, and it was in victory that we made our way back to the camp.
The sun was peeping over the horizon when we got back, its rays of golden light splitting the darkness in half. Again, the forest came to life with various birds and the cats. The sound had returned. Even though I was tired, and my paws weary, we were victorious in our mission and we had lived, we had survived the night.
We were greeted by Ocelotfur, who said he had been worried when the three of them were reported missing. The other warriors rose from their den and exclaimed in delight when they saw the food. Stormheart, Browntail and I were treated like heroes, our brave actions had undoubtedly saved a few cats from starvation.