A/N: Hey everyone, I'm terribly sorry to have been gone for so long. I became a Mommy, and life has thrown some challenges my way. I'm hoping to pick this back up and finish in 2024. I have 4 chapters ready to go so watch for those coming out in the coming weeks. I hope I still have some readers. Love you all. 3
. . .
Blizzardstar was sitting close to the ex-rogue, Spider, his long tail resting protectively over the younger cat's slumped shoulders. The great white cat was muttering something into Spider's ear while the black tom faced sightlessly forward. The sight of his sunken and scarred eye sockets still gave Petalstep the chills. Plumleaf had done all she could to save Spider's life after his eyes had been injured in an attack on their camp, but his sight was unsalvageable. Infection had almost claimed the young tom several times, but he had miraculously pulled through. Now he spent his days almost as mute as he was blind in the medicine den.
Petalstep walked cautiously forwards, taking care to swish her tail on the sand to let Spider know she was there. She saw his ears perk up in her direction. Blizzardstar didn't react at all.
It took a moment of searching before Petalstep found their chaperone. Specklepaw was lounging on a tree branch a few fox-lengths away. She waved at Petalstep with her tail, who waved back. She hurried over.
"What are they doing?" she asked quietly.
"Blizzardstar is trying to get Spider to touch the water. He's too afraid. They've been at it a while now." Specklepaw whispered back.
Petalstep angled her ears at the two toms and listened hard.
"...the water would hardly cover a kit. The other shore is two tail-lengths from your paws. There are three stones jutting out of the water."
Blizzardstar was describing every detail of the stream to the blind tom in his rumbling mew.
Petalstep couldn't help but feel a rush of pride. Her father was truly a compassionate cat. Other leaders would have cast Spider out, or even had him killed, but Blizzardstar had known that sometimes a cat is only as dangerous as the ones they follow. Spider had proven himself to be as purposefully harmful as a honey bee.
As Petalstep watched, Spider reached out a tentative paw towards the water. He shook slightly, but with whispered encouragement from Blizzardstar he managed to touch the surface. He whipped his paw back almost at once, whole body cringing.
"It's cold!" He said in his thin voice.
Blizzardstar purred. Spider reached back down and let his paw hover just at the water's surface. He then leaned down and took a few hasty mouthfuls of water from the stream.
Specklepaw let out a triumphant purr and Petalstep watched on in awe. Neither she nor Plumleaf had managed to get Spider to go anywhere near the stream in the clearing. Now he was drinking from it easily.
A sudden loud alarm call from a bird caused Spider to flinch and stumble. His paw shot out to catch himself, but unfortunately there was no solid ground beneath him. Only the stream. With a strangled yelp he fell forward into the water. The water only came up to his elbow, but the damage was done. He scrambled backwards out of the stream, his pelt on end.
Petalstep jumped forward to help, but Specklepaw got there first. She wrapped her tail around the scrawny tom.
"It's alright, I'm right here," she said in a very uncharacteristically soft mew.
Spider leaned into her spotted gray fur. "Home, please," he choked.
Specklepaw nodded and helped Spider to his shaking paws. She looked at Petalstep and cocked her head in Blizzardstar's direction.
"I'll take care of him." Petalstep assured her.
Specklepaw nodded and began to lead Spider away, all the while muttering encouragement into his ear.
Once they were gone, Petalstep turned back to Blizzardstar. He was watching the spot where Spider's tail had vanished with a look of confusion on his face.
Petalstep moved forward until she was at her father's side. He blinked and looked down into her face.
"I…I didn't do that, did I?"
The uncertainty in his voice tore at Petalstep's heart. She shook her head. "He lost his balance and got spooked, that's all. You made a lot of progress with him today."
Blizzardstar still looked uncertain. He looked out over the stream and sighed. "Sometimes I wonder if I'm doing anything right at all."
"You're doing fine." Petalstep said firmly. "Doubt will only make things worse."
Blizzardstar purred. "I'm lucky to have you, Sweetsorrel."
Petalstep's blood ran cold. She closed her eyes. For a moment she had been so hopeful…
"No, wait,"
Petalstep opened her eyes to see Blizzardstar examining her closely. His blue eyes widened in shock.
"Petalkit! What are you doing outside the nursery?" He stood up and made to usher her away.
Petalstep swallowed and remembered what Plumleaf had told her.
"Try to bring him back to the present as gently as you can. Don't make it a shock."
She tried to purr. "Blizzardstar, I'm Petalstep now. Remember I told you I'd be getting my medicine cat name today?"
Blizzardstar paused, looking even more confused. His tail swished. He paid no mind to the muddy sand he picked up with the action.
"Medicine cat?" he echoed, still looking very lost. He looked around himself. His eyes flicked back and forth as if he had just realized where he was.
"I'm sorry, I don't-"
"It's okay." Petalstep said quickly. "It's getting dark, shall we head back?"
Blizzardstar looked up at the sky where warriors of StarClan were beginning to show themselves. Their light, normally comforting to Petalstep, seemed cold and far away tonight.
"Ah, yes." He said. He cleared his throat. "Where are we going back to?"
Petalstep tried to keep her voice steady. It was bad today. "The medicine den. Plumleaf wants to check on your injury."
Blizzardstar seemed to grow more comfortable at that. "Yes, I remember now. She's going to fix this memory problem of mine." He nodded to himself.
Petalstep wanted to close her eyes and wail. "Yes." her voice cracked.
"Well come on then." Blizzardstar said. "We shouldn't keep her waiting."
He strode away, luckily in the right direction. Petalstep followed more slowly. He seemed to know the way on instinct, at least for the most part. She could still see the uncertainty in his steps. They made it back without him having to ask where to go next, and Petalstep was glad to spare him the embarrassment.
Plumleaf greeted them in the medicine clearing with Blizzardstar's nightly mix of herbs. Poppy seeds for easy sleep, thyme for his anxiety, and sage to help his memory. He took them easily as he normally did. Sometimes it was a fight, but not often. He seemed to still remember that Plumleaf had his best interest at heart.
Spider was already asleep in his nest when Petalstep helped Blizzardstar settle down in his own. Early on in Blizzardstar's stay he had moved his nest close to Spider's. It had eased both of their minds considerably. As shaky as Blizzardstar's cognition was, he appeared to know that he had lost something important. He and Spider shared the pain of navigating a familiar world in a completely new way.
"Are you going to try again tonight?" Plumleaf asked quietly as Petalstep adjusted some feathers in Blizzardstar's nest.
Petalstep nodded. Maybe something had changed. Maybe now that she had the authority of a real medicine cat, things would go better.
She had little hope.
Plumleaf gathered the herbs she had been sorting and headed to her den. She paused at the entrance. "Good luck."
Petalstep gave her an appreciative nod. Then she settled down to wait for Blizzardstar to fall asleep.
It didn't take long under the influence of the poppy seeds for Blizzardstar's breathing to fall into the rhythm of sleep. Petalstep gave him a little while longer to be sure he was in a deep slumber before she got up and padded over.
She looked into his peaceful face and thought of the Blizzardstar who never came back from the battle on the mountainside. Strong. Sure. A leader the Clan could rely on.
A whole and unbroken Blizzardstar.
She settled next to him in his nest, careful not to tread on his long fur. She felt like a kit again, cuddling against her father's belly. She wanted to close her eyes and let his deep breaths soothe her to sleep, but she had a job to do.
She concentrated on matching her breathing to his, just as she had done to Hornedpaw accidentally all those moons ago when she was terrified he was going to die. She felt herself begin to separate from her body and drift towards Blizzardstar's. Gradually, her paws felt less like her own. They felt bigger, heavier. She could no longer feel her own tail or legs or flank. She felt Blizzardstar's though. He had a faint pain in his shoulder and a slight belly-ache. Too much sage probably. The stump where his left ear used to be felt strange to her. It didn't hurt, it just felt wrong.
The process hadn't been this easy the first time she did it. In fact, it had hardly been like this at all. She remembered the frantic terror of suddenly finding herself in Hornedpaw's body as he drifted closer to death. The struggling of her own heart, the fading of her own breath.
Then she had found it. The light within every living being. And she could feel it. Touch it. Hornedpaw's was fading. She had done the only thing she could think of. She used her own light to stoke his, like a fire. Hornedpaw's heart strengthened, his breaths came surer. And then she was her again.
Hornedpaw made a miraculous recovery, and Petalstep had been left to wonder what in the world she had just done.
Now, Petalstep examined Blizzardstar's light. It burned low, like it wanted to go out but couldn't. She let her own, much brighter and fiercer light touch his. Nothing happened. She shoved away her disappointment. Nothing had changed, why had she expected something different to happen?
It had been with great frustration that Petalstep had learned that her power was limited to only saving cats that were on the edge of death. She couldn't fix everyday ailments or injuries, only the gravest. And even then she was restricted. When Foxtail had grown weak and sickly with the incurable disease, wasting sickness, Petalstep had tried to save her only to be met with resistance. The night Foxtail died, she appeared in Petalstep's dreams to say that she was ready to die and that she didn't want to stay. That had been hard to accept.
There was nothing to be done for Blizzardstar tonight, as it had been for almost every night since his injury. She readied herself to go back to her own body.
Just then, something caught her attention. At the heart of Blizzardstar's light there was a speck of deepest black. Her phantom heartbeat quickened. She had never seen that before. She reached out to touch it.
Total blackness obscured her vision. Terror gripped her, and in an instant she felt that she was in her own body again, but she still couldn't see. An overwhelming feeling of being watched came over her. Shaking, she turned in the absolute darkness.
Three empty spots of light shone like faceless moons in the blackness above her head. They cast no beams of light on her. The darkness was still absolute.
Petalstep was frozen, terrified, in their presence. The feeling of being watched intensified. It bore down on her with the force of a lake-full of water crushing her spine and head. She couldn't breathe, move, or scream.
And then it was gone and she was back in Blizzardstar's nest. Back in her own body. She gasped in a ragged breath and stumbled out of the bed of moss and feathers. Blizzardstar shifted in his sleep but did not wake.
Petalstep stood in the moonlit clearing, breathing hard. Her paws shook under her and her heart was thumping painfully against her chest. Never, in any dream or waking moment, had she felt a force like that. Oppressive. Massive. Absolute.
Was it a warning? A message that she was dabbling too far into things she did not understand? She remembered Dovekit's instruction; 'do everything you can to learn about your ability'.
She couldn't stop now. Not because of this.
A stiff breeze ruffled her fur and made her shiver. Maybe she could stop for tonight, though.
After making sure that Spider and Blizzardstar were both still settled in their nests and fast asleep, Petalstep made her way to her own nest. She slipped into the mouth of the cave and used scent and touch rather than sight to guide her to her nest. Plumleaf had freshened it with new moss.
The reassuring scent of her mentor calmed Petalstep, but she lapped up a few poppy seeds to help her sleep anyway. She settled down and let the influence of the poppy seeds and her physical exhaustion drag her to sleep.
. . .
The next morning Petalstep was rudely woken by a sharp jab to the side. She hissed and opened one eye to see what was going on. To her surprise, Spider was standing by her nest. He had one paw raised in uncertainty, and looked like he was about to jab again.
"I'm awake." Petalstep reassured him. Judging by the lack of light in the den, it was still mostly dark outside. "What's going on?"
Spider shuffled his feet. "Blizzardstar just called a Clan meeting." He said.
Any dregs of sleep left Petalstep as she jumped from her nest and hurried out of the den.
"Wake Plumleaf!" she shot behind her. She didn't wait for Spider to confirm before she bounded out of earshot and through the medicine clearing entrance.
It was close to dawn. There were a few cats out in the main clearing. Faces poked out from dens entrances, confused.
Petalstep hurried past them, her eyes fixed on the Highbranch where Blizzardstar was sitting straight-backed in the gray light. He was watching the slowly emerging Clan with expectant eyes. His warriors, however, were not responding like they had in the past. They were hesitant and confused instead of ready and willing.
Petalstep didn't blame them.
She reached the Highbranch at the same time Sweetsorrel did. Petalstep cursed inwardly. Her mother shouldn't have to see this.
"Blizzardstar, what are you doing?" Sweetsorrel called up to her mate.
Blizzardstar looked down at her, bemused. "It's time for Morningkit's ceremony, don't you remember?"
Petalstep winced at the look on Sweetsorrel's face. She stepped in front of her mother and faced Blizzardstar instead.
"Blizzardstar, Plumleaf needs you in the medicine den first," she said hastily. It wasn't exactly a lie.
Blizzardstar flicked his remaining ear. "Can that wait?"
"I'm afraid not." Plumleaf had arrived. "I've had a dream. It could be about Morningkit."
Blizzardstar's eyes narrowed. "Fine." He dropped down from his perch and marched towards the medicine den, his tail twitching in annoyance. The gathered clan parted around him, watching him with unsure eyes.
Plumleaf and Sweetsorrel followed Blizzardstar. Petalstep wanted to go too, but she found herself surrounded by the anxious faces of her Clanmates.
Whiteshade stepped forward first. "When is this going to stop? Why isn't he well again yet?"
Several voices murmured their shared worries.
"Blizzardstar's illness is one of the mind." Petalstep began. Her voice shook traitorously.
"As you've said!" Honeyleaf cried. "But when will he be better?"
Petalstep swallowed hard. "I don't know if he ever will."
Honeyleaf's blue eyes stretched wide with distress. Whiteshade showed his fangs in frustration.
"We can't keep pretending that we have a leader." Talonscore growled from near the back of the group.
Several cats turned and hissed at the ginger warrior. He lifted his scarred muzzle at their anger but did not say more.
"Blizzardstar is our leader." Hawkstrike snarled.
"He doesn't act like one anymore." Elkheart said, his voice level. "Specklepaw should have been made a warrior moons ago. Quailstep's kits should be made apprentices."
"And what do you propose we do, Elkheart?" Swiftwing shot back from where he sat at Honeyleaf's side. "Force him to retire? Drive him out?"
"Of course not." Elkheart said with a dismissive flick of his tail. He turned his eyes on Whiteshade. "Our deputy should make the journey to the Moontree and see what StarClan wishes of him."
An outbreak of muttering and gasps met his words.
"That doesn't feel like a coup to you?" Morningsong growled.
Petalstep could almost smell the tension in the air like the scent of crowfood. This was getting out of control.
"Please, everyone," she began, but she was cut off once again.
"StarClan didn't tell you what to do last night, did they?" Talonscore asked her directly.
All eyes fell on her. Her belly squirmed and she grit her teeth. "No. They did not share that with me."
More muttering and arguing broke out at this.
Petalstep felt helpless. This was what Plumleaf was good at, not her. Plumleaf would know how to quell her Clanmates' fears and send them back to their nests with clear minds.
"Standing around arguing feeds no bellies." A calm voice rose above the clamor. It was Ferntail, Heronflight's mother. "The sun is almost up, and we've had no morning patrols." She turned to Whiteshade expectantly.
"Yes, right." Whiteshade stammered. "Would you lead the dawn patrol, Ferntail?"
"Yes. I'll take Honeyleaf and Morningsong." Ferntail said with a dip of her head.
Whiteshade began to give out other orders. Having something to do seemed to calm the crowd significantly, though Talonscore, Elkheart, and Hawkstrike were still giving each other disgruntled looks.
Petalstep wished she could feel relieved that the quarrel had been resolved so easily, but all she could feel was shame. Keeping the peace and reassuring her Clan was her job. She had failed on her first day after all.
Dejected and frustrated, Petalstep backed away from her Clanmates and headed for the fern tunnel. She didn't want to see the state of her father. She didn't know if she could handle that right now. All she wanted was someone to talk to. Someone who would understand her confusion and uncertainty.
She almost ran straight into Heronflight.
"Oh!" She looked up at him, flustered. She had quite forgotten he was the posted watch.
Heronflight looked down at her and then past her shoulder. "Is everything okay in there? I heard arguing."
Petalstep shook her head miserably. She told him what had happened. His face fell as she explained.
"StarClan wasn't any help?" He asked once she had finished.
Petalstep sighed. "No." She launched into that story too.
Since the battle with Cougarstar, they had consolidated all their knowledge. She knew now of Snowbreeze and the Shapeshifter, and Heronflight knew of Petalstep's healing powers. Crowfrost and Dawnheart had added their own stories to the mix, now a confusing jumble of strange happenings.
As a group they had decided to keep Crowfrost's betrayal and Slatefang's disappearance a secret from the Clan. Crowfrost had shown where his loyalties lay, and no cat could figure out what exactly had happened to Slatefang in the first place. The Clan had accepted his apparent death as one of the casualties of the war.
And so it became that the four of them, Hawkstrike, and Morningsong, had shouldered the burden of knowing more but understanding less than their Clanmates.
When Petalstep had finished delivering Dovekit's warning to Heronflight there was a moment of silence.
Petalstep noticed Heronflight's left ear twitch subtly.
"Is Snowbreeze here?" Petalstep asked reverently.
Heronflight nodded. "In a way. I can hear her. She says that she and Dovekit are working together to find out more."
Petalstep suppressed the urge to ask more of Snowbreeze. Now wasn't the time for her to bombard the spirit cat with questions about the afterlife outside of StarClan. Ever since she learned of Snowbreeze's existence she had been captivated by the implications. But now wasn't the time.
"I'm sorry about Blizzardstar." Heronflight said quietly. "It must be difficult to see him like this." He lifted his tail as if he was about to give her a gentle touch. He seemed to think better of it and curled his tail around his paws instead.
Petalstep sighed. "In some ways I feel like I've already lost him."
Heronflight flicked his gaze away from her.
Immediately Petalstep regretted her words. Heronflight's father really was dead. She should be grateful she still had some of Blizzardstar left to hold onto.
"I'm sorry." She said quickly. "It can't be worse than…" she trailed off.
Heronflight shook his head. "Don't compare your pain to mine. Falconstorm and I were never close. Just because Blizzardstar is alive doesn't mean you can't grieve."
Petalstep closed her eyes and let her emotions flow. She took a few shaky breaths. It felt good. She resisted the urge to lean her head on Heronflight's shoulder. When had he become so wise?
"We're going to figure this out." Heronflight murmured next to her.
Petalstep looked up at him. His yellow eyes were bright with intensity as he looked out into the forest.
"I hope so." She said.