At length, the ginger she-cat padded back out of the den, straight over to me.
"What happened?" I asked, completing my earlier question. She sighed, biting into a mouse and chewing slowly. I waited impatiently while she finished the fresh-kill, and then she spoke.
"Something happened while I was by the stream. A green tiger appeared to me."
"Darkstar?" I asked, shocked.
"No. This one looked different, and claimed to be Lighteyes, Darkstar's sister. She told me that she disliked her sister, but was under Darkstar's control. She only had a few moments before Darkstar found that she was talking to me. She told me she had a prophecy... it basically said that 'one of purple and one of change' would bring about the downfall of Darkstar. Then she was gone." She sighed, obviously deeply troubled, and her eyes changed to a deep blue color as she pondered. I realized that both her eyes and Echopaw's changed color according to their moods. It was odd how they did that.
"Why did she tell you, and not Leafsong?" I wondered. The senior medicine cat would have been the obvious choice to deliver a prophecy to. She shrugged, looking annoyed at herself for not being able to figure out the prophecy. Her eyes became tinted with sharp yellow.
"What's going on?" Faintbracken meowed, padding up to us. She was looking rather plump for the leaf-bare season, and I wondered if she'd been sneaking extras at the fresh-kill pile.
"A prophecy," Gingerspice responded in a hushed voice, and told Faintbracken what she had told me. "We don't know what it means at all," she meowed in a despairing voice.
"Well, one of purple and one of change are probably cats," proffered Faintbracken. I nodded in agreement.
"But there's no such thing as a purple cat. What about a cat that changes? It could be a cat who changes identity all the time. Or mood," I suggested, grasping at ideas.
"I guess," said Gingerspice reluctantly, "but I think that the 'purple' one and the 'change' one are related somehow. Like they're one thing that's purple for one cat and changes for another..." She trailed off into silence, eyes changing to a brooding brown as she thought.
"I'll leave you to it," said Faintbracken after a while, and she padded away, leaping into a tree and tree-jumping out of camp. I briefly wondered where she was going.
"There she is!" came a little squeak, and I turned to see Ripplekit and Lilykit trotting up to me. They were getting big, I noticed. Ripplekit was pointing to me with her tail, and Lilykit looked relieved and worried.
"Hi, Gingerspice!" she meowed excitedly, staring up at the medicine cat apprentice. Gingerspice smiled back warmly, and I drew my kits to me with my tail.
"Why'd you leave the nursery?" I scolded gently.
"It's boring in there!" Ripplekit protested, squirming out from underneath my tail. "Silverrose doesn't have any kits for us to play with yet." I smiled slightly, wondering at how kits could be so... carefree at a time like this. Maybe we should all behave like kits from time to time, I thought idly. It may make the clan a happier place.
"Well, everyone's back now. You two will be apprentices soon, I'm sure. You're both five moons tomorrow, you know." I grinned as they bounced with excitement, Lilykit looking slightly confused at the same time. Like she wasn't sure if she should be happy about that or not. Oh, boy. I stifled a sigh. Lilykit was headed off on a heartbreaking destiny, that was for sure... why hadn't I attempted to turn her away? Because I liked seeing her happy. But e wouldn't be that way much longer...
A few weeks later, it was raining. It was raining incredibly hard, and the ground was beginning to flood.
"Great," I muttered, sloshing through the muddy rainwater with a mouse clutched between my teeth. I bit into it hungrily beside the nursery, taking shelter in a rock alcove, sitting on a slightly raised patch of earth.
"It's wet," Lilykit complained, shaking her paws as she padded out to sit next to me and had to struggle through water to get there.
"If this keeps up, we my have a full-scale flood, like Waterclan did," I agreed. I hadn't been born yet duing the legendary Waterclan food, but apparently it had been deeper than a river. Everyone had had to evacuate. I shuddered. That wouldn't happen.
"Where's Ripplekit?" I asked her. She was pressing up against the rocks, glaring in annoyance at the rain around her.
"She's inside," Lilykit answered, glancing towards the entrance to the nursery.
"How about we all go inside, and I'll tell you a story," I suggested, and Lilykit brightened up almost instantly.
"'Kay!" she exclaimed excitedly, sloshing back into the nursery as fast as she could. I followed, smiling a little, and sat down while my two remaining kits settled themselves around me. I listened to the rain pounding on the well-crafted roof, and looked around.
"Once, a very long time ago, there was a great group of cats called the Sky cats," I began, telling an old elders' tale about a lone cat who had discovered Leafclan, Waterclan, Fireclan, and Shadeclan on his own through an epic journey through forests, seas, and mountains. Ripplekit and Lilykit were captivated through most of it, but by the end, they were both sound asleep. I licked both of their heads fondly before beginning to settle myself beside them, when I heard a shriek from outside.
Jolting to my feet, I rushed outside into the pounding rain to see what the commorion was. The camp was mostly empty, because all of the cats were avoiding the destructive rainfall. But lying atop a rasied hillock in the ground was Faintbracken, and her sides were heaving.
"Faintbracken!" I cried, rushing over to her. A kit lay beside her, and I watched as another kit was born. "You're having kits!" I briefly wondered who the father was before I called for the meidicine cats.
"Leafsong! Gingerspice! Faintbracken's having kits!" I cried, licking my friend's head anxiously while she shuddered in effort. A black head poked out of the medicine cat den, and I sighed in relief as Leafsong ran over with a pouch of lavendar and borage.
"You're doing fine, Faintbracken," she murmured, biting through the sacks of the kits and licking them. When she was done with that, she went back to Faintbracken. Gingerspice came hurrying over then.
"Faintbracken! You're doing okay, you're..."she trailed off as a gush of blood mingled with the flooding rainwater. "Oh, no..." Something had gone wrong. That much I could figure out. A kit emerged from Faintbracken's body, and then another. They were licked by Gingerspice while Leafsong and I watched the striped she-cat anxiously.
"It... wasn't supposed to hurt this much," Faintbracken muttered, moaning as more blood colored the surrounding water. Leafsong made her eat some lavender.
"This might help," she said without much hope. Lavender wouldn't stop the bleeding, and te holes in the she-cat coudn't be patched up until all of the kits were born. One more kit finally emerged, and I cleaned it thouroughly. When I was done and had placed it with the other kits, I looked up. Faintbracken appeared to be in the process of naming her kits.
"...and the last one... Gingerkit," she whispered faintly, smiling weakly at Gingerspice before collapsing.
"NO!" all three of us yelled at once. "Faintbracken, no," Gingerspice moaned. She buried her nose in her friend's fur, and I joined her, licking Faintbracken's shoulder one last time and remembering tree-jumping with her, going on patrols, the conversations... all gone. It couldn't be. Gingerspice had retreated into depressed silence, remaining motionless by the tabby queen's side. Leafsong was watching us sadly, head bowed slightly.
"Why, Starclan?" she howled. "Why must you bring all the misfortune you have down on us?" Lost for any more words, she sunk to the ground, despairing at having lost a patient. I knew that Leafsong rarely ever lost a patient, she was so good.
It wasn't for a while that we remembered the kits. Gingerspice looked over, about to say something, and the words froze on her lips. The kits were gone, swept away by the rising water. "No! I can't believe this!" she fumed, glaring out over the water. "How can Faintbracken and her kits be lost at the same time? It isn't fair!" she cried. I nodded sadly, scanning the water. Were there kit heads in there somewhere? I thought I spotted a black head... or was that driftwood? And, was that ginger fur there, or a leaf? It as hopeless. The whole family of Faintbracken had been wiped out.
Faintbracken's five kits have been born. The words seemed to echo around the camp. The others looked bemused, and I knew I wasn't the only one who had heard it. They said nothing, however, too overcome with grief, as was I. I retreated to the nursery gloomily, curling up around my kits carefully, trying not to get them too wet. I watched as the rain outside gradually stopped, and the floodwater soaked into the ground, and the next thing I knew, I was asleep. It was that dream again, the one where Deadheart was in the clearing, being all friendly, when all of a sudden, he bared his fangs at me and glared, becoming evil. Suddenly, he turned into Heartscorn.
"Come back to me," I pleaded with him, my eyes hopeful. He shook his head sadly, then suddenly a cat appeared beside him. It was Echopaw! She reached out a paw, placing it on his chest. Heartscorn gradually seemed to glow, until he was emitting bright light. He smiled, then abruptly vanished, taking Echopaw with him and leaving only darkness.
I woke up, panting, and saw that Lilykit was sitting in the corner of the den, eyes closed as if meditating, but I knew better. She never stopped trying to see into her brother's mind, but she told me that he now had a wall of evil around his consciousness, impossible to penetrate. Ripplekit was sleeping beside me, brow furrowed as she muttered dark things under her breath. A sudden thought struck me as I watched her sleep. Would the connection between my kits and Heartscorn, once only useful, make them evil themselves? I knew, of course, then, that this must have been what Darkstar was planning for all along: she would have all of my kits, in her own, twisted way. I fought back a wail as the truth of it all came crushing down. All this craziness with my kits, Darkclan, and now Faintbracken... it hurt to think her name.
"I can't find him." Lilykit's voice jolted me back to the nursery. She looked so depressed, slouched there in the corner. I noticed with some surprise that she and her sister were getting much bigger now, big enough to pass for apprentices. Ripplekit definitely could, but the more slight, tiny Lilykit was still on the small side. Her beautiful and unique green eyes met mine, and I smiled reassuringly at her, sighing inwardly. What would happen when they grew up?
"Mornin'," Ripplekit's sleepy voice came. "What happened last night, Mom?" she asked, eyes round. "I heard a wail, and you left. Then I fell asleep. But I just know something horrible happened..." she sighed, biting her lip. I nodded sadly, drawing the two she-kits to my side with my tail.
"Faintbracken had kits last night," I began. The two daughters gasped in unison. "No one knows who the father was," I said in answer to the question on their faces. "Anyway, something went wrong, and she died. While we were preoccupied with her death-" I winced at how indifferent that sounded, "-her kits were swept away into the flood. We don't know if they made it to land or drowned." Lilykit wailed in dismay, and Ripplekit wrapped her tail comfortingly around her sister, though her own eyes were wide in sadness and anger.
"Why does all this bad stuff happen to us?" Ripplekit demanded angrily. I sighed, licking her on the head.
"I don't know, honey... I don't know."