Author Note: Well, well. Getting closer to the end aren't we...
Chapter 29: Sootclaw's Story/Rogues in the Woods
Larkheart squeezed her glassy blue eyes shut as she buried her muzzle in Sparrowflight's fur.
"What if we don't find him?" she whispered.
Sparrowflight swallowed his honesty. "Your father's got to be somewhere."
The two warriors huddled together as if braving a leaf-bare storm as they trudged through the woods in search of Thrushclaw.
"Father?" wailed Larkheart, her voice quavering with each syllable. "Father!"
To his horror, Sparrowflight saw his mate's eyes dart upwards for a heartbeat.
The tabby tom twined his tail with Larkheart's in an effort to comfort her. "He...I...He's out there somewhere, I know it. He...wouldn't leave forever without telling you goodbye."
This only seemed to make Larkheart more distressed.
Suddenly, a gruff figure pounced out of the shadows at the two cats.
They found themselves facing a silver tabby tom.
Sparrowflight's fur bristled and he immediately dropped into a crouch, unsheathing his claws. "Rogue!" he hissed. "Get off our territory, now!"
Seemingly out of nowhere, a stout tortoiseshell-and-white she-cat plodded around her mate and stretched her neck to face Larkheart. "It would do you good to listen," she snarled. Her voice lowered to a whisper. "We've something to tell you about your father!"
Larkheart's eyes flew open; for a moment it seemed as if the whole of the brilliant blue sky was contained in them. She glanced warily at Sparrowflight, who then glared at the two rogues.
"We'll escort you to Fourtrees," he growled. "You'll tell us there."
The tom smirked in response. "We will do what we like."
Sparrowflight's flaming amber eyes were intense enough to scorch the two rogues had they been close enough. "I know you..."
"Ah!" chuckled the tom. "I forget where we met! Was it not at the barn down the Thunderpath?"
Sparrowflight's eyes narrowed to blazing slits.
"Where that cat did that puke," continued the rogue gleefully, "which then splattered all over his mate!"
"Go away, Sootclaw!" seethed Sparrowflight, baring his teeth in the silver tabby's face. "Do you think I don't know who you are?"
"He's not fooled!" gasped Applefoot. Turning to her mate, she hissed menacingly in his face. "Told you so! Show Sparrowflight what you've come her to show. Tell the cat what you know!"
Sparrowflight gave a disgusted huff. "When I look at you, I remember Rainsong," he sighed, turning his face away from the two rogues. "She was more than you deserved; you gave her birth! But now she is with StarClan, and happier, I hope, than here in the forest!"
Applefoot scowled. Sootclaw let out an exaggerated wail and hung his head, as a disapproving Sparrowflight and Larkheart looked on.
The silver tabby waved his tail. "So it goes," he murmured. "StarClan knows life has dealt me some terrible blows!"
Applefoot scootched up close to Sparrowflight and prodded him with her paw. "You've got skills and a heart," she mewed. "You could give us a bit of a start! We can prove, plain as day, your mate's father is not what you think!"
Larkheart frowned and turned to Sparrowflight.
Sootclaw purred. "There's a tale I could tell!"
"Information we're willing to sell!" added Applefoot.
"There's a cat that he slew," hissed Sootclaw to a disbelieving Larkheart and Sparrowflight. "I saw the corpse clear as I'm seeing you!"
Sparrowflight snorted.
"What I tell you is true!" insisted Sootclaw, keeping his chin held high.
Applefoot then gave her muzzle a little shake. "Pity to disturb you at a day like this." With a teasing smirk she added, "But a bite of fresh-kill surely wouldn't come amiss!"
"In StarClan's name, say what you have to say!" growled Sparrowflight, flexing his claws.
Sootclaw chuckled. "But first, you pay."
Sparrowflight glanced at his mate, unsure of what to do. Nodding to him, Larkheart took off, returning moments later with a squirrel dangling from her jaws. She deposited it at Sootclaw's paws and waited with a smug expression on her face.
"What I saw clear as light:..." Sootclaw murmured dramatically, "...Thrushclaw in the forest one night! Had this corpse on his back, some tom he had killed in a vicious attack!"
Larkheart looked as if she had swallowed an incredibly tough bit of crow-food.
"I was there," Sootclaw continued rather condescendingly. "Never fear! Even found me this fine souvenir."
With a grand flourish, the silver rogue dragged a scruffy scrap of fur from underneath the bush. "I tore this off of the corpse," he mewed proudly.
Sparrowflight ignored him, pawing intently at the fur. Suddenly, a fleeting moment of realization lit his eyes up brighter than the most brilliant sunrise.
"I know this..." he murmured. Turning to Sootclaw with an astonished glare, he meowed, "This is mine!"
Sootclaw drew his face back in a quizzical expression.
"This is surely an omen from StarClan!" Sparrowflight gasped.
"One thing more," Sootclaw added mischievously. "Mark this well! This was the night that the barricades fell..."
Sparrowflight stared at the grass beneath his paws. "Then it's true...then I'm right! Thrushclaw was my savior that night!"
"As for you," Sparrowflight growled at Sootclaw, "take this too! StarClan, forgive the things that we do!" The young warrior aimed all of his energy at Sootclaw. With one vicious swipe he left a searing scar on the rogue's nose bridge, sending him staggering backwards onto Applefoot.
"Where is Thrushclaw?" demanded Sparrowflight, baring his teeth in Sootclaw's dazed face.
The silver rogue gave a faint cough and wheezed, "Fourtrees..."
The young tabby lifted his chin in satisfaction. "Off our territory," he hissed.
Those three words sent the rogues skittering off, chasing them all the way out of the ThunderClan warriors' sight.
Sparrowflight whipped up a cloud a fury as he scampered around past his mate. "Come, my love," he mewed enthusiastically. "Come, Larkheart! This day's blessings are not over yet..."
. . .
Sootclaw snickered as he watched the two Clan cats bolting through the forest.
"Ain't it a laugh!" he murmured to Applefoot. "Ain't it a treat? Dancing along here among the trees!"
Applefoot agreed, arching her back in a long stretch on ThunderClan territory.
"Here comes a warrior, there goes a rogue!" he laughed, remembering his days as a warrior before he was exiled from his Clan. "This one's a kittypet, but what can you do?"
"Clans at my paws, Clans in the dust," mewed Applefoot, tipping her head from side to side while basking in Kestrelstar's weakness, which allowed her and her mate to come and go on ThunderClan territory as they pleased. "And here's me, hunting with ThunderClan!"
"Rogue in the forest," added Sootclaw with a mockingly superior air. "Master of the hunt! Life is easy pickings if you grab your chance!"
Applefoot was laughing at the Clans' sense of honor. "Everywhere you go, obedient warriors," she chided. "Doing what is decent to please StarClan! Sharing tongues with deceased cats...praying for 'omens' they'll send!"
"But we're the ones who take it!" cackled Sootclaw. "We're the ones who make it in the end! Watch the warriors fight, watch 'em till they drop!"
"Keep your wits about you and you'll stand on top," mewed Applefoot as she puffed her chest fur out, clearly proud of her and her mate's swindling ways.
"Masters of the forest always get their share!" declared Sootclaw. "Clear away the barricades and we're still here!"
The two rogues skipped along, dancing gleefully on other cats' grass. "We know where the wind is blowing...fresh-kill is the stuff we smell! And when we're fat and happy, mouse dung! Won't we see their ragged shells!"
Sootclaw and Applefoot's chuckling howls harmonized with each other as the rogues kept on roguing on and on, to an end no cats, not even StarClan, would ever dare to sneak a peek at.
Author Note: *buries face in hands* AWWWMYGARFFL only one chapter left...! Eeeek, I love this so much, I don't want to think about it!
