'When the violence causes silence,
We must be mistaken.'

'Zombie' - The Cranberries

¢нαρтєя ѕιχ: єη¢συηтєя

If she strained her ears she could make out the chattering coming from the gathered Clans as they mingled on the island in the soft rays of a dawning sun. Being able to hear them made her feel a little safer as she trailed cautiously after the supposedly 'missing' PhoenixClan tom. Her skin warmed under her fur as her thoughts drifted back a little. He'd said her eyes were pretty. No one had ever said her eyes were pretty. If anyone ever mentioned her looks it was only to point out the similarities between her and her mother. She couldn't really see how they looked that similar. Sure they were both orange but her mother was brighter and had white spots. She on the other paw was a paler shade with only a white paw and tail. Then again they both had green eyes…

A faint scowl formed on her muzzle. She wished others would stop comparing her to her mother, the great deputy of CedarClan that had managed to pull together a crumbling Clan whilst dealing with the death of her mate and the knowledge that she was expecting kits. How could anyone live up to that!? Especially her, the shy daughter of a Game of Blood survivor and Clan deputy, that hardly spoke and made eye contact with no one else other than the ground.

Curiously, she allowed her eyes to wander over the well-built tom's physique. He was handsome, she'd give him that much, but probably arrogant and over confident as well. Most handsome toms were. Her eyes paused on the circular birthmark on his shoulder that was identical to hers. He showed his off as if it was a scar he was proud of whereas she spent a while every morning making sure her fur covered it. Sometimes her birthmark would burn, she wondered if his did the same.

During her study of Eaglestrike, Littleflame hadn't noticed the blue-furred tom that had jumped down from a tree. When his paws thudded against the ground she jumped, looked up and then took quite a few retreating steps back. "W-Who's that?" she silently cursed her awkward stutter as she spoke.

"Rainpatch," the blue-furred tom replied with a crooked smile. "And you are?"

"Littleflame…from CedarClan," she replied quietly.

The tom nodded and then looked at Eaglestrike, "is she?"

"Yes. Look at her shoulder."

Rainpatch padded a little closer and Littleflame shrunk a little closer to the ground. She hated being so darn shy and awkward around other cats. "May I?" he asked whilst indicating to her shoulder with his tail. When she nodded in reply he pushed the fur out of the way, smiling brightly when he spotted the circular birthmark. Littleflame opened her mouth a little breathing in the tom's scent. It smelled of open air and salt. WaveClan, she told herself, explains his slightly fishy breath.

"Welcome to the group, Littleflame!" the WaveClan tom chirped happily with yet another smile that reached well into his pale green eyes. "I'm from WaveClan, by the way."

Sudden realisation pricked at Littleflame as she remembered Stormwhisker mentioned Rainpatch's disappearance from WaveClan. "I know," she replied cautiously, "why aren't you with your Clan?"

Rainpatch altered his position so that she could see the same circular scar on his shoulder. "Duty calls; this thing was like a beacon to the others!"

Others? Dread filled Littleflame. How many more were there? She didn't do well with large crowds, especially large crowds that might demand to know everything about her. "Ho-How many more of you are there?"

"Two," Eaglestrike answered. "There's no need to be frightened. We're not going to hurt you. You're part of our group now, that makes us responsible for your safety. Nothing'll harm you with strong toms like us guarding you!"

She couldn't help but smile a little.

"Have you found her yet?" another voice, one that Littleflame didn't recognise, asked from the paling shadows.

A startlingly familiar she-cat trotted into view, shaking out drops of water from her red-flecked fur, vivid green eyes flashing into the pale darkness. Horror crept up Littleflame's spine as fear grasped her in icy claws choking her slightly. She shrunk even further back as Tornheart sat down beside Eaglestrike and flicked him with her tail. "Well? Have you?" she asked again.

"I can't believe I fell for such a stupid trick!" Littleflame suddenly hissed, her stutter vanishing underneath her anger, "and I can't believe you'd think I'd join Crimson's army so willingly! Is it because I look weak? Because I can guarantee you that I'm not. Maybe I should just tell your Clans that you've abandoned them to join the enemy so they can stop mourning over you and start hating you instead."

"So you have found her." Tornheart shrugged off Littleflame's outburst in favour of studying the newest Chosen with a careful gaze. When she was done studying she looked up to meet the CedarClanner's frightened eyes. "There's no need to be afraid of me. I'm not here to recruit you for Crimson's army; in fact I'm here to help you and the Clans. You see, I was given a prophecy about a moon ago that told me of five Chosen cats that had been paw-picked to save the Clans. I was told to find them by looking for a circular scar on their shoulder. You have that scar. That makes you one of the Chosen, like these two."

Littleflame felt most of her anger ebb away to be replaced with confusion and utter surprise. Her? Chosen to save the Clans? Why? She was nothing special. She wasn't some super fighter or amazing hunter. She didn't have any powers. She was just an average CedarClan warrior that was socially awkward and had few friends.

"Me?" she replied meekly, "paw-picked to save the Clans? How?"

"By killing Crimson of course," Tornheart purred. The others chuckled. Littleflame felt her pelt heat up. How was she supposed to know how they were going to save the Clans!? As far as she was concerned Crimson was immortal and being immortal meant you couldn't be killed.

"How do I know you're not lying? You're not exactly the most believable cats around right now. You betrayed my Clan, remember? Lured them back to their camp to be massacred like rats. You murdered your mother in cold blood, let that Jinx cat kill kits, allowed Crimson to slaughter our leader and brainwash our deputy at the time. Firestrike talks about you all the time, you know? Talks about the times when you were a CedarClan apprentice, playing with your sister without a care in the world, swimming in Lily Pond with her, Thornfoot and Brightpaw. She hates what you've become, I'd know, I'm her daughter," Littleflame seethed. Her anger had come surging back. Who did Tornheart think she was to just randomly return to the Clans and decide to help them? Why now? Why not earlier when Crimson was still tearing the Clans apart!?

During her little speech Tornheart's ears had flattened bit by bit until they were pinned against her skull, her lip had curled and her pelt had bristled. Her eyes began to glow dark green as her magic lashed out, using her raging emotions to slice a branch off a nearby tree. "I was brainwashed when I did those things!" she thundered and pounced at Littleflame, knocking the small warrior off her paws. A clawed paw pressed against the CedarClanner's throat and she choked back a shrill cry for help.

Out of the corner of her eye she could see Rainpatch holding a struggling Eaglestrike back before her eyes were forced to look back at Tornheart's enraged face.

"You think I don't regret the things I've done? You think I enjoyed surfacing from my brainwashed state of mind for a few heartbeats only to look down and see my mother's bloodied body at my paws? You think I don't regret killing my own mother!? All the things I've done I regret doing. There isn't a day goes by where I don't wish I could go back in time and stop myself from believing Crimson's lies. But I can't. So I stand before you, on the very island where I betrayed everyone, with a chance for you and the others to rebuild what I helped destroy. If you still think I'm lying, Littleflame of CedarClan, then you can turn around and go straight back to your Clan and watch as the world around you drowns in darkness." Tornheart lifted her paw, releasing Littleflame, and reined her magic back in.

Littleflame took a deep gasping breath, trying desperately to control the fear that was threatening to overwhelm her at any moment. A reddish brown paw helped her up and she glanced out of the corner of her eye to see Eaglestrike's concerned gaze fixed on her. "I..I apologise for the things I said," she hesitated slightly, "and I hope you still want me to be a Chosen."

"Of course we do," Eaglestrike rumbled quickly. "You were chosen to be a Chosen." He grinned at her and she couldn't help but smile slightly back.

"Let's go find Icepetal. I need to bind you all together and I can't do that with her absent," Tornheart ordered.

Rainpatch rolled his eyes and then gasped in pain as an angry red claw mark appeared on his cheek, spilling a few drops of blood. He fearfully looked up at Tornheart but she was already dashing off into the lightening forest. "She's in trouble!" she called back.

The two toms exchanged a quick look before racing off after the black she-cat. Littleflame had no other choice but to dart after them, swiftly dodging around trees and leaping over ditches in the ground. Hadn't Icepetal been the she-cat SnowClan had exiled? Was she a Chosen too? She bit her bottom lip in thought as she caught up with the toms. They'd certainly make an odd group, a respected warrior from PhoenixClan, the cheerful tom from WaveClan, an exiled she-cat with rogue blood from SnowClan and her, a shy, average warrior from CedarClan. What set them apart from any other cats apart from their birthmarks?

Her ears picked up a stray sound on the wind. Focusing on where it came from she began to pick up the sounds of fighting – hissing and snarling – from the direction they were running. She swerved around a thick tree and nearly ran straight into the dull fur of one of Crimson's soldiers. Instinct kicked in and she, without so much of a falter in her step – launched herself at the soldier, latching on with sharp claws that gouged into skin and drew scarlet blood.

The soldier bucked violently, throwing Littleflame to the ground, but losing a rather large chunk of skin on both soldiers. It ignored the torrents of blood rushing from its shoulders and swiped at Littleflame's exposed stomach. She screeched, kicking up at the soldier with her hind legs. A crack met her ears when her hind legs came into contact with the soldier's chin and it fell back onto its haunches with a dazed expression. As the soldier attempted to surface from its daze Littleflame rolled onto her paws, wincing as the wound on her stomach stung. Looking quickly around she found that everyone else was locked in battle with soldiers. Fear crept up her spine when she heard the soldier behind her stumbling clumsily to its paws. She hated fighting because she wasn't overly good at it.

Whirling around she ducked under a clumsy swipe and slipped under its belly, raking her claws through its soft belly flesh. No cry of pain came from the soldier's jaw. Instead it dropped all its weight on top of Littleflame's haunches, trapping her with its larger body. Littleflame swore to herself. That was a risky move to do and she'd paid for it. The wound on her belly was now throbbing painfully as it was pressed against the ground. She whimpered quietly and clawed desperately at the ground trying to pull herself out from under the soldier. It looked at her over its shoulder with those terrifying yellow eyes and pulled back its lips to reveal stained teeth. She shuddered.

She was trapped.

That was until the weight pressing her down abruptly lifted as a white blur slammed into the soldier's side, tackling it into the side of a tree. Littleflame pulled herself shakily to her paws, pausing to watch a white she-cat bite down on the soldier's muzzle whilst she sunk her claws deep into its flank. The white she-cat appeared to be a rather violent fighter to Littleflame.

A screech pulled her from her thoughts and she snapped her head around to see Rainpatch on his back with a soldier pinning him down, claws advancing dangerously close to his neck. The CedarClan warrior pounced on the soldier, allowing Rainpatch to wriggle out from under it. A quick kick sent the surprised soldier tumbling to the ground where Rainpatch then reared up on his hind legs and brought his forelegs crashing down on the soldier's flank, crushing its ribcage with a sickly snapping sound.

He looked up at her, "thanks for saving me then. I thought he'd got me for sure."

"No problem. You wou-" Littleflame's sentence remained unfinished as she slumped to the ground with a quiet mewl of pain. Blood leaked onto the ground from the wound on her stomach. I didn't think it was that bad, she thought to herself as stars danced before her vision. Her eyelids fluttered closed but she forced them back open. The pain was steadily growing as the strength in her muscles steadily decreased. Her head met the ground with a thud.

"Littleflame!?"

She recognised Eaglestrike's voice. She'd probably recognise it anywhere, that was the kind of effect he seemed to be having on her. Butterflies danced in her heart when she felt him press his nose against her cheek but they were soon lost as another wave of pain crashed over her. She cried out and felt the PhoenixClan tom stiffen. "Can you hear me, Littleflame!?"

"Yes…" she breathed weakly.

"Don't die on me! We need you, Littleflame. You can't die!"

Littleflame felt her body sag as darkness encroached on her vision. "I'm not going anywhere," she whispered before sinking into unconsciousness.

"Tornheart!" Eaglestrike shouted as he shifted Littleflame's body so that he could look at her bloodied stomach. The wound was deep and still dripping blood. "You need to heal her before she loses too much blood!"

"I'm a little busy at the moment!" came Tornheart's reply.

He looked over at her to see her crouched over Icepetal's fallen body. The white she-cat was hardly white anymore. Her fur was mostly stained scarlet and from where Eaglestrike was it looked like most of it was her own. "Dammit," he cursed quietly before raising her voice, "will she live!?"

"Yes, Icepetal will live but she'll carry the scars of this battle for a long time. My healing spell can only do so much. Rainpatch, would you mind cleaning the blood from her fur? She might freak out a little if she wakes up and finds herself covered in blood," Tornheart asked as she rose to her paws and padded over to Littleflame's body.

Rainpatch nodded from where he sat behind Icepetal, bending his head to begin lapping the blood from her white fur.

"Both she-cats knocked out in the same fight? They must've been fighting tough opponents," Eaglestrike murmured to Tornheart as the she-cat inspected Littleflame's gaping wound.

"Icepetal's lucky my Binding Spell worked so well otherwise we might have found a completely different scene. She's lucky to have survived a surprise attack by five soldiers and has her fighting skill to thank for being alive. Littleflame on the other paw…her fighting needs some work if she's to survive this journey," Tornheart replied. Her eyes glowed green signalising her use of magic. She muttered strange words, closed her eyes, opened them and then smiled. "Littleflame will also live."

Eaglestrike let out a long sigh. "I'll teach her how to fight. How come I didn't get cut like Rainpatch did?"

"Rainpatch and Icepetal's bond is a lot stronger compared to that of you and her. The stronger the bond the better a Binding Spell works. Those two are good friends, good enough friends that when my spell realised how much danger Icepetal was in it made sure we knew by allowing Rainpatch to receive one of the wounds Icepetal received."

"Oh. That makes sense," he mumbled. To him it actually made no sense at all. He hadn't believed in magic until he met Tornheart and he still wasn't really sure if he did.

"I don't expect you to understand everything about my magic," Tornheart laughed. "Would you mind gently moving Littleflame over to where Icepetal is? I might as well bind you all together whilst they are knocked out."

"Can you do that spell with them being unconscious?" Eaglestrike questioned as he gently picked Littleflame up by her scruff, raising his head until only her haunches dragged along the ground. He dragged her slowly over to where Icepetal had fallen and then laid her back down. His heart warmed a little to know that Littleflame would survive.

"Of course I can. In fact it makes no difference if a cat is awake or asleep," Tornheart replied as she fiddled with Icepetal's bound paw so that it was touching one of Littleflame's. Rainpatch put his next to Icepetal's and then Eaglestrike finished off the circle with his own bound paw.

He watched curiously as Tornheart did her spell quicker than usual, spying the signs of exhaustion within the she-cat's green eyes. Apparently magic drained energy from its user. His nose wrinkled at the smell of burning fur and skin. It was a scent he wasn't accustomed to at all.

"We'll be stuck here for most of the day I expect," Rainpatch spoke up as he went back to grooming the blood from Icepetal's fur.

"Indeed we will," Tornheart muttered. "I had wanted to use today to find the final Chosen. Then tomorrow I come with you up the mountains and show you where to head before making my way back here to be present for Crimson when she arrives but now tomorrow is looking like it'll be a rough day for all of us."

Eaglestrike arched a brow. "What do you mean by a rough day?"

"These two," she pointed to Littleflame and Icepetal with her tail, "will be sore tomorrow which will no doubt make Icepetal extremely grumpy and trekking through RogueClan's boggy territory isn't going to help her mood either. We'll also have to hurry. If Crimson manages to catch any of you tomorrow night then the world is doomed." She sighed tiredly and curled up in a small ball, tail flicked over her nose. "Stand watch, will you?"

He watched as her eyes fluttered closed and her breathing evened out. It seemed that Tornheart's mind was never at rest, constantly worrying about Crimson, the Clans, the Chosen, her magic and herself.

As he watched the sun cease its rising only a quarter of the way into the sky he promised himself that he'd do everything he could to make sure the Clans knew what Tornheart had done for them when they returned from their journey.

AN: Icepetal's a little kitty fighting machine.

-нυηтєя