CHAPTER 24-Believe in Me

The night was young but the moon was bright and swelling like a fruit. I stole away from the medicine cats' den, the sharp pains still lingering on my skin and making me wince as I moved, the pain that I knew would eventually heal into scars but would never leave me. They were already waiting for me there, all three of them draped in shadows with their heads outlined by the white of the moon. They were silent, waiting. I nodded to them, hoping that they wouldn't see my limp.

Wolfsong was staring back at the silent, sleeping camp. She asked me if I was as willing as this to just leave everything behind, and as she said it she took in the whole forest with a sweep of her tail, with the silent camp and the cats inside and Ashley who was still sound asleep, who would one day wake up to find that I was gone.

This was our last chance. Our one last chance to turn back and pretend none of this had ever happened. I stared back at her solid blue gaze, amazed at how much her eyes could look like water. They were a deep, penetrating blue that seemed to stare deep into mine, and for a second, I wondered if she could actually read my thoughts. They were as blue as water yet somewhere inside was a single spark of adamant flame that could make snakes recoil. There was a poem somewhere in there, I thought.

Are you sure about this?

And then I thought about the mountains and the cat who called himself the Prince like some messed up character in a messed up fairy tale, and of a lonely lynx who stood perched on the highest peak of the tallest mountain all by himself with the wind in his face and a lifetime of broken promises and scathing tones behind him.

I didn't need to say it out loud. They could tell just by looking at me. I could feel it, a sense of determination welling up beneath my skin like blood, like it was a part of me. It rushed in my veins and brought thrill and excitement, of looming mountains and unknown territories that no map could ever draw out, and I could almost taste the calling in the air and the song in my ears and I knew that they could feel it too, Wolfsong and Silverpaw and Featherpaw and if Scorchpaw were here with us instead of healing, unconscious in the medicine den, then I knew he would be thinking the same thing.

And we ran away.

I cursed under my breath, low enough for Silverpaw not to hear but for Featherpaw to cast me a sympathetic glance that was so unlike her usual splitting gaze. There was a question in her eyes. She was asking me something that they were all thinking but couldn't say. It struck me as funny that Featherpaw, the cat with a useless throat, could ask me something so easily with her face that the others couldn't bring themselves to voice out loud.

She asked me-

"No," I said, not only to her but to the rest of them who were faltering and beginning to have second thoughts. My gaze softened. "No." It suddenly seemed that I was also speaking to the dark woods and the black-cut trees who looked like thin, hooded men underneath the looming moon. It seemed that I was speaking to Ahote and the den full of spite, to Len and to the Prince a million miles away. A single word of defiance, me telling them that no, what I was doing was not for them to decide.

Featherpaw's tail twitched at my answer, unsatisfied and still asking with her eyes. But she must have seen something in mine for she turned away and kept looking. That was all we could do right now-search and taste the wind, hoping, wishing that there was someway we could bring the lynx back to us, that he wasn't as far gone as we had thought. You don't have to live like this, like an outcast-if I could see you again-

If we could actually find him, if I could still catch a glimpse of his spotted coat and his yellow-green eyes, then that alone would tell that there was still hope in a godforsaken planet as this, that a suffering person could still belong and know he was loved-

If that was so, then I could still be happy.

Beside me, Wolfsong stiffened like a deer with a hunter's gun pointed at its head. "Something moved," she whispered. Her voice was low and dangerous like the hissing of an adder. We all stilled. I held my breath. Did I hear noises or was that just my head trying to scare myself? The grass and branches moved and wavered with the shifting of the air. The snow glittered silently underneath the round, rusted moon like a million scales.

"Stay close to me," I whispered, unsheathing my claws. "Whatever happens, just stay by my side." My wounds shrieked again and I was instantly reminded of that other day with Scorchpaw and the WindClan warriors, the day that had been like any other except it had ended stained in a color as red as tulips. My cuts ached and the forest had ganged up against us so that we were only four small, insignificant children who had been caught outside beyond our curfew. The trees were like the strangers who had come to whisk us away, and I thought stupid, how stupid of me to actually come here only I didn't regret a single thing because what I was doing, what I was doing was for a lonely lynx who had spent a lifetime hoping and wishing for something that never came.

"Who's there?" a dry voice came from a black bush. I almost leaped out of my skin. Because I felt that I knew that voice. And I thought that I knew that shape that hopped out from underneath that bush, a small, round and plump thing with ears that stuck straight out of his head and long, gangling hind limbs and a twitching nose.

I groaned inwardly and straightened up. I really had no time for this.

"Stormpaw? Is that you?" he asked as he bounded closer. He perked up as he stood up on his hind legs. "Ah, glad to see you again! I thought I scented you. And you've brought your friends?" He craned his neck forward to catch a glance at my companions.

"Stormpaw?" Wolfsong asked. "Who is he?" but Silverpaw, who wouldn't even know how to keep silent even if her mouth had been glued shut, leaped up and exclaimed, "Whoa, a talking rabbit! Can we keep him, Wolfsong? Please?"

"Altas," I said firmly, glaring down at him. "Go away."

He puffed out his chest and looked almost offended. "You're always so blunt. It's been months since we've last seen each other, and the first thing you ask me to do is leave?"

"Do you know him?" Wolfsong asked me. "We're not dreaming, are we? He really can talk?"

Silverpaw crouched down until she could stare at him without stooping her neck. "Are you really a rabbit?" she asked with awe. He shuffled his feet and flattened his long ears against his head, a gleam of pride in his dark eyes. Politely, he coughed into his paw. "Why, yes," he said simply with an air of arrogance around him. "Oryctolagus cuniculus. But you may call me Atlas."

"How can you talk?"

"My dear, I am a traveler. I have been in many places, seen much, done much. I have learned the tongues of several species as well as their habits. Cat, fox, dog, sparrow, you name it."

Len. I couldn't stand here and glare at the stupid bunny all night. I had to find him. We had been here for probably over an hour, calling his name and searching for his scent but still, the trees wouldn't let us reach him.

Featherpaw nudged my shoulder insistently and I nodded back. I know. We couldn't waste any more time. "Stop talking to him, Silverpaw," I said as sternly as I could. "Don't forget why we came here." She looked up at me with wide eyes and paused for a minute, collecting her thoughts and remembering. Then she bounded to her paws and chirped, "Right! We haven't checked the ShadowClan border yet!"

"Oh, are you all searching for something?" the rabbit asked.

"Get lost," I growled, showing him my teeth and knowing the reason why he winced and backed away. "I don't have time for you. Why don't you go bother someone else?"

He tipped his head to one side, eyeing me silently. Then he answered, "You're always angry."

"And you're always an annoying roach. Let's go, Featherpaw." We turned away from him and padded deeper into the undergrowth. I expected him to call back after us or run, but I didn't hear anything moving behind me. Reluctantly, with a lot of effort, I turned my head to him. He was still there, propped on his hind legs, staring after us in the shadows with an unemotional expression on his face. But then again, rabbits didn't really have any expressions.

"What do you want?" I spat. God, couldn't he just leave already?

"You're not only angry, you're desperate. There's something you want but it's out of reach. This night is an important night for you, isn't it?" he said gently, as if talking about the weather. Nice moon, isn't it Stormpaw? A bit of a chilly breeze. Watch your step, don't trip. It made the back of my neck prickle because his tone was so soft, as soft as featherdown, so unlike my own scathing voice and he was gazing after me with large, warm brown wet eyes that glittered even in the dark.

"It's an important night," he said again. "Because this one night could either change your life forever or it could remain the same. You can either gain something or lose something tonight, and you're angry and desperate because life seems adamant in keeping you away. You're not upset at anyone or even at yourself, you're just afraid. So very, very afraid. Am I right, Stormpaw?."

I saw Len again, saw his grey coat and the black tips of his ears and a broken look in his eyes as if they reflected his heart. And every second that I was standing here could mean another mile between me and him, and it was possible that I would never see him again and he would run far away from here.

Of course I was afraid.

Atlas must know that I thought it and would never say out loud, for he hopped a few steps closer until there was only two or three feet between us. He looked up at me and I looked down at him, our gazes connected with brown against green.

"How did you know that tonight was important?" I asked him. He only chuckled. "Well you see, I've experienced the very same thing many years ago. Now, then." He rubbed his paws together. "I'm very good at finding things, if I do say so myself."

There was a silence that stretched between us. He blinked at me kindly. He didn't ask me anything, but I could feel a question lingering in the air. Would you like...? And I thought that maybe, just for this one night, I could tone my voice down a bit and pretend that boundaries didn't exist.

"Yes."

"Step lightly now. The vines are the ones you should look out for." The dumb rabbit hopped daintily over twisted brambles and snapped twigs, his ears perched upright on top of his head like some ridiculous new fashion. He stopped and waited for us to catch up to him, panting and out of breath. Silverpaw flopped down onto the grass with a tired gasp of breath and planted her face onto the ground.

Atlas furrowed his brow. "Oh come on, don't be like that. Hop on! We can't wait all night, can we?" He turned to me. "Tell them to get a move on, won't you Stormpaw?"

I stared at him and then prodded Silverpaw. "Hey."

"Mmmph," she growled. "I know, I know. Just let me rest here for a few seconds, 'kay?"

"Only a few seconds," the rabbit said sternly.

"Only for a few seconds," Wolfsong agreed.

"All of you! Take a whiff at that! You can smell that, can't you?"

"Whippee! He's nearby! He's nearby, Stormpaw! His scent is-"

"Hush, now. Lower your voice. Don't scare him away, alright?"

"Sorry, Wolfsong."

"Oi, Stormpaw! Don't just stand there looking as surprised as if you've just witnessed a miracle, you're supposed to be celebrating like Silver over here! We found him, Stormpaw."

"..."

"Stormpaw?"

"Haha, yeah. We found him."

"What are-You're crying."

"We found him. Thank StarClan, we found him."

The lynx stood stock-still in front of us with his yellow-green eyes flickering uncertainly first to the others, and then finally resting on me. His fur was matted and ungroomed and he was leaner than I last saw him, and his jaws were parted slightly as if wanting to ask something but not trusting himself to speak. I wonder what he saw in us. Four small cats and one dumb bunny. A ragtag group of misfits who had no right to butt their heads into someone else's business.

"What are you-I mean, what?" he managed to gasp out in surprise.

"Len!" Silverpaw meowed happily and was just about to charge forward to topple him over in a hug, but Wolfsong barred her way and the small apprentice blinked up at her, confused. Wolfsong nodded over at me.

I stepped forward and gave Len a reassuring smile. "Hey. It's us."

And then, all of a sudden like the morphing of spilled water into a puddle, the shocked look on his face instantly became cold, as harsh as the snow that surrounded us and I jerked back, eyes wide.

He growled low like a dog. "What are you doing here?" he spat out.

"I-we-"

"Leave me alone. I have stayed here for too long already. Just go away and let me leave in peace."

I blinked at him and furrowed my brow. "Leave? But where are you planning to go?" I was half-hoping that he'd say the mountains, but of course not. Not with the Prince roaming there. Not with Chogan.

He didn't answer me. He ran his gaze over one last time, a chilling look in his eyes that seemed nothing like his usual self. I finally began to realize, just as Wolfsong and Featherpaw and Silverpaw realized, that this creature standing in front of us was a full-grown lynx with knives for claws and teeth that could mangle bone. He was half-crouched above the snow, shoulders tensed and bunched up as if preparing to pounce, only he wasn't because he had never struck against anyone in his entire life.

"Listen to me, Len," I meowed gently. "I told Wolfsong, Silverpaw, and Featherpaw about you." He tensed, and I continued, "Let us help you."

Finally, his hackles flattened ever so slightly. After a while, he whispered, "What are you going to do?"

"Take us to the mountains." At this, he rose up again and his eyes flared up. Snarling, he growled, "I could never do that! It is dangerous there! Are you stupid?"

"Take us to the mountains," I repeated, only this time my voice wavered and I took a single step away from the bristling and snarling lynx. But I didn't run. I couldn't leave. My gaze hardened. "I know what to do. You'll lead us there and I'll talk to the Prince or whoever the heck he is. I'll take the mountains back for you. Your home. Don't you want that?"

He had stopped snarling and the fire died out so that he was staring at me with something like sadness. A lone wind reached for him and ruffled his fur, and he stood and just stared at all of us. His face softened. "I can not let you do this. But I am very grateful. Thank you." He dipped his head. "I can not let you follow me. Go back to your Clan. The road I have is much too dangerous for you to travel."

I looked at this scrawny, starving lynx and thought how in the world he could say that.

But of course he could. He had spent a life surrounded by hostility with hardly anyone he could depend on, and then the only true thing he had known-the mountains-had been ripped away from him and he was on the move again, only this time he was really on his own now. Had he ever trusted anyone besides the mountain and his brother? He hadn't. He couldn't bring himself to. Maybe he never will.

Maybe this really wasn't the most important night of my life. Maybe this whole plan was idiotic and I was being just plain stupid and I should laugh and say, 'Yeah, you're right. I shouldn't have done this' and then turn back into the den and pretend none of this had ever happened, waking up the next day with a snoring Silverpaw by my side and Featherpaw and Dewstep waiting impatiently for me to catch up to them, waiting for Scorchpaw's wounds to heal so we could train again, day after day after day after a million days.

A lonely lynx sitting with his back to the wind, in the snow.

Silverpaw said sadly, "Len."

And I told him that the forest was quiet tonight, that no one would see us anyway. I told him that he would show us the way to the mountains and we would walk together for three days. Just three days, and in that time he could decide and make up his mind whether he wanted to finish the rest of the way or go off and disappear from us forever.

Three days was enough time to think and decide, right? I asked him.

He hesitated. He was good at hesitating. And while hesitating he must have realized that it would take much more to shake us off, that we weren't going to give up on him anytime soon, and maybe he was just tired of everything and was tired of being pushed around and deciding and making choices, and so he looked at all of us in a tired, defeated way and he said-

"Fine."

These cats were all going to get themselves killed one day, Len decided. Either from chance or from life trying to teach them something or just from sheer, dumb recklessness, they would all find themselves toppling down a cliff when they should run instead of fight.

But he didn't say it out loud.

Day one. The forest had long since disappeared behind them and now they were walking underneath a sky stretched wide above an unfamiliar ground, the sky so blue it was blinding. Four cats beside him and one rabbit who could never keep still and who Stormpaw hated.

Are you sure this is the right way?

Of course it was, wasn't it? Only now, he had been away for so long that he wasn't sure. Silverpaw was romping a good ten paces in front of them, laughing and singing to the birds and even though Len wanted to sing along with her he didn't because this wasn't what they should be doing.

Featherpaw was walking at a much slower pace, taking her time and staring ahead. She didn't seem worried, but then again he couldn't possibly know what she could be thinking about behind those half-closed eyelids. Wolfsong was talking to him, trying to get him to reply back and smiling and saying, How's the weather? only he wasn't interested in anything other than thinking, Why am I doing this? I'm only endangering them. I can't let myself do this, I have to take them back to where they belong either by force or-

Cats didn't belong in mountains and neither did Len, and more than anything he wanted to chase away the uncertainty clouding his vision and just turn back already before something breaks and someone else gets hurt, but he couldn't bring himself to say it because he didn't want to see Stormpaw's hope extinguished.

They were all idiots. He meant it in the kindest way possible, but still they were idiots. Him included.

The sky turned into the moon and stars and it saddened him to think that once, a long time ago, Kateri had set him down with he and his brother and told him the story about how the stars were created.

"Nice evening, isn't it?" the rabbit greeted him warmly. Len still thought it queer that the rabbit could understand him and he the rabbit, so he didn't say anything. And it was even more stranger to see that the rabbit had a sack of something slung on his back. "Don't worry," the rabbit said. "They should all be asleep by now."

"I wouldn't bet on that," meowed Stormpaw, and they turned to see her padding toward them in the night. "You still here, Atlas? Get lost."

"You look as pretty as a picture today, my lady," the rabbit smiled as he spoke, revealing tiny white teeth. What a picture or a lady was, Len still needed time to find out, but oddly Stormpaw seemed to know.

"Tell them not to sleep out in the open," Len told her, referring to the others who lay dozing in the snow. "They could get sick." Very sick. Didn't he tell them that the journey was long and very, very dangerous? They wouldn't listen, and he found himself worrying about them all over again. They were all fools and he didn't think even Wolfsong would understand what danger meant.

"I should tell you the same thing," Stormpaw purred. "Don't sleep out in the open like this."

Len reassured her gently, "I am fine."

"I don't believe you."

Day two. Len was growing more desperate now. He flashed them a wide grin and said brightly, "Really, you do not need to be doing this. It is my own business."

"We're not leaving you until the three days are up. Then you can decide for certain what you want to do."

A word like hope flashed through his mind but he shook it away like a fly. No, no, once these cats understood that it was all pointless, they would finally leave. Len smiled at them again and meowed, "Trust me." The smile was fake.

He didn't let himself believe that these cats might be able to finally, finally set him free and show him a path that they could all take together. He didn't allow himself to believe in hopes as petty as those.

I've been hoping for a long while now, he thought. Ever since Chogan had died and Ahote and everyone else had to flee from the Prince, he had hoped that someone would come and save him and turn every upside-down thing right again. Not every wish comes true. He had found that out the hard way. And every time he had dared to hope, life would give him a reason not to again.

Silverpaw asked him if she could help catch a mouse for him. He shook his head and said no because it was easier to smile than to cry and admit everything. He asked himself just how long he could keep living like this.

"Come on, Len! Join in the fun!" Stormpaw laughed. They had come across a whole nest of squirrels, enough to satisfy all of them and keep them full for hours on end (much to the disgust of the rabbit, who said he would 'much prefer grass over a carnivorous diet').

Featherpaw tossed a squirrel in his direction and he caught it in his paw. It was a rule of the den to always let the ogama eat first, but Ahote was not here and the cats were all smiling and eating themselves sick with squirrel meat.

He wanted to tell them not to eat so fast so they'll choke and not to stuff themselves so much that they'd burst, and to save some leftover squirrels for the next day and not lap it all up at once, but he stopped himself when Stormpaw shoved the prey in his face and cried out in glee,"What are you waiting for, mouse-brain?"

He realized that they were not trying to make fun of him or make him trip and fall over. They were not snickering at him because he was useless, they were laughing freely with smiles and wide mouths just because they were happy and they had more food than they knew what to do with.

Len grinned widely in return and yelled, "Let's eat!" before diving in to inhale as much of the prey as he could swallow.

It was Atlas who finally had to snatch the rest of it away from their jaws, shrieking in disbelief, "Are you monsters? How many have you eaten? You'll burst your stomach open at a rate like this!" And it was true because Len really did feel as if he had swallowed boulders, so full he could only lie on the snow and wonder if he could probably go throw up.

"Ahhh, I've never eaten this much!" Silverpaw giggled, rolling around above his head. "Vulgar slobs," Atlas huffed. "You were all at it like wolves. Really, if I didn't know any better it'd seem that you all hadn't eaten for years!"

"Get lost, rabbit," Stormpaw groaned, her face flat on the snow, voice muffled. "It was like a party."

"Some party," Atlas sniffed, looking as stern as ever. "You're not supposed to get yourselves sick on purpose at a party."

Again, Len wondered what a party was but he found that it didn't really matter, because he felt like he would burst like an egg and he felt happy.

"You're all disgusting, rude beasts, you know that?" Atlas said.

Len smirked. "We can be worse if we feel like it."

The rabbit shook his head in disbelief and laughed.

Day three.

"You know we're doing this for you for a reason," Wolfsong tells him. Her blue eyes didn't lie, yet Len forced himself not to believe anything because nothing in the world spoke the truth, that an acorn could be so tiny one moment but as towering as an oak the next.

"Leave me alone," he said, hardening his voice on purpose so it would drive her away. One thing no other lynx knew about him was that he did know what it felt like to be angry, that he only let them push him around and yell hateful things at him because it was always so easier to cower and take it than to actually stand up to them.

He felt safe around the four cats and one rabbit because they weren't here to jeer at him and give him scornful glares, but right now all of that was forgotten.

"Believe in us," Wolfsong tells him, and something about that splits his mouth into a snarl and he just wants to grab her and hurt her because how dare she say that, didn't she know how hard it was for him to just let everything go and put every once of faith in this ragtag group of misfits? She didn't understand what he had to go through, how he had spent these long years with a bloodthirsty band of lynxes that he had called his family and father and mother. He could take care of himself perfectly fine, and he snaps at her that she should start believing in him before he could do the same to her.

She only blinks, unfazed at his outburst. "Of course I trust you. I understand that you know what you're saying. I trust that even if I leave you alone with my sister, a lynx like you wouldn't rip her apart like a dog. I trust that you can speak freely to Stormpaw. I trust that you understand Featherpaw's silence." She softens up and Len can see that she is trying hard to make him open his eyes. "But I don't trust you with yourself."

"Who exactly is the Prince?" Stormpaw asked, and the question had been nagging her for days. Len knew that she was trying to probe deeper to see if she could help in any other way.

He shrugged. "I do not really remember. It was so long ago."

"But surely you can tell me?" she pleaded. "Come on, Len."

The spark of hope ignited in him again and for just one fleeting moment, he felt that he could depend on these cats with his life. But then it was gone.

He tipped his head back and smiled at the sky and meowed joyfully, "Do not worry, Stormpaw! Maybe I can teach you how to catch a deer."

"Yay!" exclaimed Silverpaw.

There were a lot of things that Len despised including the Prince and Ahote and Kateri and most of all his poisonous own self. He had already asked the universe for so many things he could not have: Chogan, his home, a danuwari name, love in the family and a glimpse of the future. Now it would simply be too much for the universe to handle if he asked it for just one more thing.

Len hated himself for letting the lynxes pummel him. He hated that he could not catch a mouse when Chogan had caught two, and he hated that he couldn't give back his brother's life in return when his brother had done so many things for him. And he almost hated Stormpaw, Wolfsong, Silverpaw, Featherpaw, and Atlas for giving him the thing that he had shied away from all this time.

The three days were up. Len decided that no, these misfits can do anything they want but just leave me out of it because I have already given up a long time ago.

Len sobbed, Save me.

Of course, Stormpaw replied.