Dawnfeather is a commanding figure. As soon as I am ushered into a little camp in the shelter of a maple thicket, she strides toward us, creamy fur glowing in the light that dapples the earth. The stripes on her legs and face are a warm, dizzying contrast to the rest of her fur, which puffs out around her like a pale cloud.
Her eyes, though, hold none of the warmth her pelt suggests, and neither does her voice. "Lie to me and I will throw you to the foxes." She curls her lip and then demands, "Tell me your name and your reason for walking on my lands."
"My name is Fernstripe, and I wasn't aware whose lands I was on." Innocence is a safer path than indignance. Usually. Here, though, it seems to heighten everyone's suspicions. All around me, hidden in the shadows of bracken dens, eyes gleam like cold stars, displeased with my response. They want details. Better yet, they want proof.
Of course, I cannot tell them that I am from their distant future, nor can I provide them with any guarantee of the truth. Which means I must lie, and lie well. Before they can slit my throat for failing to meet their expectations, I expand on my story. "I came from far away, looking for the Clans. My mother raised me on tales of cats that ruled forests, until she was taken from me on the…" It hurts to use my own death this way, but it is still fresh, as are all things the monster took from me. The tale I offer them is false, but the quaver in my voice is real and raw. "Taken from me on the Thunderpath. She's dead.
"She named me after my grandfather." This is a truth.
"I thought finding the Clans would be the best way to honor her." This is a lie.
Maybe they believe me now. The watching eyes all around retreat, returning to whatever it was they were doing before. Only the ring of cats who captured me remain, and Dawnfeather, with her ice-chip eyes.
"There are no Clans," she growls. "Your mother was wrong."
Indignance. Now is the time for it, I realize. Before Dawnfeather can continue, I snap, "My mother swore on it. She promised me they were here!"
The laughter that bubbles up around me steals my breath. Cats whisper to one another and snicker between strokes of their tongue along ruffled fur. Do they sense the lie? Do they think they sense a lie? Worse, do they still believe I'm their enemy? Even Dawnfeather laughs, a mirthless, empty sound that might have been honey-sweet once. She rumbles with a humorless purr from deep in her chest, eyes half-closed with delight.
"There was a Clan. SunClan. And then Duskfrost thought she deserved to become leader even though I was already the deputy when Ripplestar died. She was jealous," Dawnfeather scoffs, "and she took half of the Clan with her, trying to get what she wanted. At least she'll get what she deserves, though." Her declaration is met with a chorus of tightly-checked cheers; underneath, the rallying cry is tired, as if everyone in the thicket has heard this promise before, as if everyone else has made such a promise, too.
It could be the oath, though. If giving Duskfrost what she deserves will protect the course of history, I may need to stay close to Dawnfeather, as close as I can be. The trouble with that, though, is that I suspect she doesn't want me here, a feeling that only grows when the sable-point tom tells her that I had a companion, a cat with fur like smoke. Immediately Dawnfeather's gaze locks onto me again with renewed hardness.
"I told you I would throw you to the foxes if you lied," she says. Her claws unsheathe and bite into the earth. "So, tell me. Where is your friend?"
I could lie, and say Cinderfoot was never there. I could tell the truth, and say he disappeared. Either way, I've left out a crucial detail; I was not alone in my journey, and everyone on Dawnfeather's lands must clearly be accounted for.
As I swallow past the lump in my throat, though, StarClan decides to answer my prayers for deliverance. Cinderfoot appears at the entrance to the thicket, little balls of catchweed clinging to his pelt. He looks like something of a ruffian, and entirely out of character as a result. I suppress a laugh at the sight of him, all bulky and tough.
"My name is Cinder. I'm Fernstripe's guide," he announces, slicing calmly through the sea of hostile cats to stand at my side. He is poise incarnate, so practiced in his moons of service as an Oathkeeper.
Dawnfeather considers him only a moment before slashing her claws across his face.
I've never heard Cinderfoot scream before, but it's a horrible noise, like the sound of a robin singing even as it's strangled. He shrieks and falls to the ground, clamping his front paws over his face, and by the time I drop to his side, he's already subsided into a high keening that leaks out from between clenched teeth. We cannot die, but we can be hurt, and he is hurt gravely.
"Put them under guard," Dawnfeather says, swiping her tongue over her paw as if she didn't just attack my mentor. "They stay there until we know they're not Duskfrost's." And with that, she stalks away, calling cats out of the undergrowth and forming a thin patrol. They stop to roll in mud as they leave, and then they are gone, leaving me to curl protectively around Cinderfoot in an effort to shield him from the rest of Dawnfeather's unfinished Clan.
The cats who found us in the forest offer no sympathy. Instead, they herd us through the thicket until we're forced into a small bracken den that will buckle in the slightest rain, the weakest breeze. The message is clear: we are their prisoners until Dawnfeather decides otherwise.
"Bring me your medicine cat!" I order them as all but two retreat. One of them is the same blur of grey that tackled me earlier, a stocky tom, while the other is a thick-furred black she-cat. The latter blinks at me and shakes her head.
"He left with Duskfrost," she says. "And then he died. No apprentice."
"Fine. Don't you have an elder who knows medicine?" I push.
The tom chimes in. "Dead by the end of leafbare without Cedarwing to help. There's no one."
Cinderfoot groans behind me, back to holding his paws over his eyes. If our captors won't find someone to help him, I'll just have to do it myself.
"Tell me what you need," I say, running my tail over his back. He flinches at my touch before leaning into it again. Blood drips down his cheek in fat red drops, and I can see the open gouges peeking out from under his toes. Dawnfeather struck him precisely, as far as I can see; she missed one eye and I dread to see what she's made of the other. "Tell me what herbs you need."
"Celandine and marigold," he grinds out. "Poppy seeds." Each word is a chore, tugging at the raw wounds on his face and releasing fresh streams of blood. I hush him after that, licking the crown of his head. He needs to save his strength for healing. For the oath. He shouldn't even have to save his strength in the first place, but that's something to focus on when he isn't at risk of infection. If Cinderfoot is indisposed, I can't do this by myself.
The cats at the mouth of the den whirl on me the moment my paw crosses the threshold, and I dig my feet in. "He needs celandine, marigold, and poppy seeds," I recite, adding, "and cobwebs as well," for good measure. The catchweed burrs still tangled in this pelt will help hold a poultice in place, provided I can get the supplies to make one at all. Given the blank stares our guards throw my way, I worry they haven't got a clue what I mean.
A new cat rescues me, though, approaching with a finch dangling from his jaws. He sets it at my feet, the first act of kindness thus far, and then he asks me to repeat myself.
"Celandine, marigold, poppy seeds, and cobwebs. Cinderf– Cinder is going to lose his eye if you don't bring them to me right now." I'm not a medicine cat, but I'm sure of it. A vicious blow like that could never leave him unscathed, and even in the afterlife, he could scar. Besides, as far as these cats are concerned, Cinderfoot and I are flesh and blood. We are as mortal as they come for all they know.
The tom squints at me as if he too fails to understand, but then he nods. He's crisp, down to the tabby lines streaking through his ginger pelt and the way that he curls his tail over his back. Moreover, he's important. The guards defer to him when he sends them for the herbs I requested, bobbing their heads and slipping from the thicket without a second glance, leaving him to watch over the den alone. I can't tell if this is arrogance, or if he knows he is the warden of two cats who will not fight their way out.
We size one another up in the silence that follows. He cranes his neck to peer around me at Cinderfoot, who has curled up with his back to the rest of the world, still whining softly into his tail. Meanwhile, I try to decide how much of an obstacle he will be.
All of the cats in Dawnfeather's group look hardy, at least, all the ones I've seen. They must be, to have survived a leafbare that stripped them of the only medicine cat in the area and their remaining elders. Yet this tom has an easy air, as if everyone around him isn't brimming with suspicion and bloodlust. In between glances from Cinderfoot and me, he smooths the fur on his chest and washes his ears with sure, confident strokes.
Then, once his fur is sufficiently clean, he says, "Dawnfeather blinded him for a reason."
My hackles raise. He says it so plainly. Cinderfoot's injury means nothing to him at all, and he could go the rest of his life without worrying about it. "Oh, so it wasn't senseless violence? I think he and I see it a little differently."
He has no reaction to the vitriol in my voice, not even a measly flick of his ears. I look for an apology, but find no trace of one. He just answers, "Your guide got away from my brother's patrol and crept into the camp without anyone noticing. She blinded him because he's dangerous." His voice lowers, like he's telling me a secret. "And dangerous scares her."
All Cinder did was give her his name and his reason for traveling with me, albeit a fake one. He didn't bluster or threaten or attack, and yet she raked her claws through his eye without hesitation. Now, her subordinate is trying to justify it to me.
Suddenly I don't care that he actually sent the other cats to retrieve the herbs, or that he brought me a finch. I pull the bird inside and leave it in the corner for later before lying down behind Cinderfoot. He trembles faintly against my body, and startles at the scrape of my tongue along his spine. I want to help ease his pain, to send him back to StarClan where he can recover in peace, but we've left the circle of stones far behind, and an oath still lies ahead. Whatever happens, he will have to make do with the herbs we are brought, and from there, we must tackle the oath together.