*It's always ShadowClan, isn't it?*
*Classes are starting back up, and between those and a fulltime workweek, I won't have much time to work on this, but I'll try to upload chapters as often as I can.*
"Yellowstar! Yellowstar!"
Freezepaw pelted through the forest toward them. Yellowstar had been leading the midday border patrol with Dapplecreek, Downtail, and Wrencatcher, to give Jaggedclaw and Acorntail a rest after their battle skirmish with the apprentices. They'd only just started scent-marking the BlackClan border, which was still fresh from the morning patrol.
Freezepaw was puffed up to twice her size; her eyes were wide, and fear-scent wafted pungent from her pelt. She wasn't running from the direction of camp.
"What is it?" Yellowstar asked. "What's wrong?"
"It's Cloudstep," Freezepaw panted. "We were gathering watermint near BlackClan… We didn't cross the border, I swear, but…"
"Take me."
"He's hurt, Yellowstar." Freezepaw's tail drooped. "I tried to—but—I tried to save him… We have to get him back to camp. I can't carry him."
Yellowstar broke into a run. "Tell me where!" she called back to Freezepaw, who was trying to keep up.
"The marshy part of the border, down that way!"
Yellowstar crashed recklessly through the forest, snagging her pelt on thorns and leaping over rocks. She could hear the border patrol running behind her. She finally came to the spot, her lungs heaving for breath: near the lake, where watermint grew on both sides of the old twoleg path, lay Cloudstep.
A BlackClan patrol stood on the other side of the border, their pelts ragged, their sides skinny.
"Weaselclaw," Yellowstar hissed, dropping by instinct into a crouch, ready for action. Weaselclaw was at the front of the BlackClan patrol, her eyes inscrutable. Yellowstar recognized Flitbird, Deepshadow, and Lynxpelt.
Cloudstep mumbled feebly. He was a mess of claw marks; his head lay at an odd angle. There were claw tufts, indeterminate brown or maybe black, between his claws. Freezepaw had plastered cobweb and moss over the wounds, but blood still seeped through.
"They…" Cloudstep wheezed.
Yellowstar felt the other FireClan cats come up beside her. She took one look from the mangled, bleeding body of her medicine cat—her old friend—to Weaselclaw and her band of foxhearts, and snarled.
"You will pay for this, Weaselclaw," she spat, arching her back. "You and all of BlackClan."
"It's Weaselstar," the she-cat mewed coldly. "And it was an accident. My cats got overzealous when he crossed the border. He was old."
"Freezepaw!" she shouted behind her—without turning, without taking her eyes off of Weaselstar.
"I—I didn't see," she said in Yellowstar's ear. "I was picking tansy over there. I heard yowling… But it was too late."
Yellowstar snarled; she reared up on her haunches, dropped back down, and scored a vicious claw mark in the dirt.
"FireClan! Take Cloudstep back to camp. You, Downtail, help me. Maybe we can save him yet."
"Good luck," Weaselstar said evenly. "Do not cross our border again."
Yellowstar picked up Cloudstep's small, black-and-white form as gently as she could and, with Downtail's help, draped him across her shoulders. He was surprisingly heavy, but she squared her shoulders and shot Weaselstar a menacing glare, held it, and turned back in the direction of camp, her ears trained behind her.
"Freezepaw, run back to camp. I know you're tired," she added, "but go as fast as you can. Get herbs ready. Make the elders help. And Dapplecreek," she added. "You help, too. You almost became a medicine cat apprentice."
"But I didn't," Dapplecreek said. "I was lousy at it—"
"Just do it." Yellowstar sighed. "Just do what you can."
Yellowstar felt like her paws were sinking in mud with every step back to camp. Cloudstep weighed her down. She felt his chest rising and falling against her back, but it seemed weak, and all about him was the metallic tang of blood. Hurry, she told herself. Hurry!
They finally arrived at camp.
Yellowstar had never seen so many cats in the medicine den; Oaktree and Birchnose put down fresh moss while Rabbitleap carried bulging waterskins; Dapplecreek hurried over to Freezepaw and disappeared into the back of the medicine den at the little white she-cat's command.
"Lay him here." Freezepaw pointed to a fresh nest. Yellowstar flattened to her belly so she could slide Cloudstep gently to the nest. Herbs, cobweb, and moss lay around him like a halo of moonlight.
Skypaw raced into the medicine den, a honeycomb dripping from her mouth. "Is this right?" she asked Freezepaw.
"Yes, good," Freezepaw said distractedly as she piled herbs together in a divot on the cave floor. "Thanks." Yellowstar watched, her whole body rigid, while Freezepaw re applied Cloudstep's dressing. She kept muttering to herself—"Horsetail, good for wounds… marigold, too… Chamomile? No, after… I don't have fresh lamb's ear. Cobweb will do… Dapplecreek?"
"I got the catmint," the tortoiseshell mewed, dropping a few dusty leaves at Freezepaw's feet.
"That's for greencough," Yellowstar said. "He doesn't have greencough."
"It will keep him from feeling this," Freezepaw said. "Dapplecreek, dribble the honey into his mouth. He's in shock." Her blue eyes flashed at Yellowstar. "I need room, Yellowstar. Please wait outside. Father, you too. Please." She turned back to her work. "Okay, Rabbitleap, that's enough waterskins. You three can wait outside, too."
Yellowstar took one last look at Cloudstep, small and mangled, his eyes open but glazed, and Freezepaw, still so young, hardly out of the nursery, working feverishly to save him. She padded out of the medicine cat, her limbs working in slow motion.
"What happened?" Paletuft came up to her side. "They're saying it was BlackClan."
Yellowstar lashed her tail. "That much is clear," she growled. "Either Lynxpelt, Deepshadow, or Weaselstar herself."
"Weaselstar?"
"Yes," Yellowstar said with a dry laugh. "The mighty suckling leader of BlackClan has decided she has no need of FireClan's aid. She can take care of things all by herself. Things like murdering my medicine cat." She lashed her tail again. "What can we do, Paletuft? If he dies…"
"Freezepaw may still save him," Paletuft said.
"She's practically a kit," Yellowstar said. "If he dies… FireClan will have no medicine cat."
"And with the Gathering tonight…"
Yellowstar snapped her head at Paletuft. "Tonight? Surely not."
Paletuft dipped her head. "I almost forgot, too."
Yellowstar swallowed a growl. "We will have to appear strong," she said. "Until, of course, we can retaliate." She glanced at the medicine den. The whole camp reeked of blood and herbs now. "For now, we can't launch an attack."
"Who should we bring?"
"The elders, Dapplecreek, Fallensnow. Thrushflight should go, if you can pry him from his kits. And one of the apprentices. You choose."
"Wrencatcher?"
"He stays," Yellowstar said. "I can only hope that's enough cats here to defend against an ambush. Jaggedclaw is one of our best fighters. And both Stormypaw and Skypaw are quick runners. Either can run to get us from the Island if there's trouble."
"You think they'd try that?" Paletuft mewed.
"It's BlackClan," Yellowstar said. "BlackClan has black hearts. They've proven that today."
Yellowstar tried to keep up a show of normalcy as the day advanced, getting colder and darker as it did. All the while she kept an ear trained at the medicine den. She sent hunting parties out with orders not to go too far from camp. She watched apprentices clean out the elder's den.
Yellowstar was standing guard at the entrance tunnel when she felt a small paw prod her shoulder softly.
She turned to find Freezepaw. The expression on her face said everything.
"I'm sorry," she mewed, looking smaller than ever. "I did everything I could." She hung her head. "But his neck was broken, I think. He hunts with StarClan now."
Yellowstar nodded. She didn't know what to say.
"Let all cats gather beneath Highledge," she said, leaping onto the rock. Before they'd even gathered, she yowled: "Cloudstep has died from his injuries."
The Clan was hushed. No exclamations of dismay, no calls for revenge. Their eyes were wide and fearful. They knew what this meant for the Clan.
"BlackClan will pay," Yellowstar mewed. "But not today. Today we sit vigil for our dear fallen Clanmate. And tonight we go to the Gathering. We go and appear strong for the other Clans, like nothing happened." She looked around the hollow. "FireClan is still the fiercest Clan there is. Even if it is grieving."
She leapt unceremoniously from Highledge and helped Downtail carry Cloudstep's body into the hollow. Yellowstar laid down and buried her nose in his fur. He had no living kin to mourn him, except, perhaps, Jaggedclaw, whose father's brother had been kin with Cloudstep's father… If she remembered correctly. No kin. But he had been all of the Clan's healer and confidant; he'd fixed their wounds and eased their pains, helped them kit, and read the signs of StarClan, even when he doubted them. And he'd been Yellowstar's friend for most of her life.
You should have been able to retire an old, grouchy cat, Yellowstar thought sadly. Pity there have been no suitable apprentices before now… You had so much to teach her.
Oh, StarClan, she wanted to yowl; how can we survive without him?
Later, she helped the elders carry Cloudstep's body to the Burial Place outside of camp. It had been a long time since it last rained, so the ground was hard and dry, making for strenuous digging. They dug until it was deep enough to deter predators. Oaktree came to scatter flowers over his body. Birchnose threw in a pretty stone he'd found in the dirt.
"May you find good hunting, swift running, and shelter where you sleep," Yellowstar murmured, pushing dirt over the grave.
The trek to the Gathering was simply painful. She'd hardly slept the night before, and today she'd pushed herself to the limit and lost a dear friend. She and her cats—Dapplecreek, Freezepaw, Stormypaw, Rabbitleap, Birchnose, and Paletuft-arrived last. "Keep the peace," she warned them. "And don't spread what happened."
CrookedClan and TallClan milled about, sharing stories, while BlackClan stood bunched together. Troutstar perched proudly on the Moontree, his pelt glossy and thick as ever. Swiftstar, skinny and old, with white flecks around her muzzle, glared at Weaselstar. The BlackClan leader just stared ahead. Yellowstar tried not to look at her as she clambered up the old, gnarled tree. Petalheart, one of CrookedClan's two medicine cats, glanced in surprise at Freezepaw.
"Where is Cloudstep?" asked Tansytail, the TallClan medicine cat.
"Cloudstep was injured in an accident," Yellowstar called down. "He is still recovering." Yellowstar's chest tightened. If only that were true.
Petalheart and Tansytail nodded, seeming satisfied; but the BlackClan medicine cat, a long-haired black cat with a pushed-in face named Nightwhisker, looked dubious.
It was a cloudy night, but the full moon still shone—for now, Yellowstar thought.
Troutstar began; he named two new warriors, Evesong and Whitefish, and a new apprentice, Silverpaw. TallClan had nothing to report; evidently the FireClan scent on their border hadn't caused any stir, and they were keeping whatever trouble they had with BlackClan to themselves.
Before Weaselstar could launch into what Yellowstar expected would be a self-congratulating sermon about driving out Scratchface and reclaiming her Clan, Yellowstar spoke up.
"We have three new apprentices," she yowled, "Stormypaw and Skypaw, and our mew medicine cat apprentice here, Freezepaw." The little white she-cat balked when the other medicine cats stared at her. "However, our medicine cat Cloudstep was tragically injured in an accident," she added, gritting her teeth so hard at the lie she thought they'd break and fall out of her mouth. "It may be a long recovery." She paused, gathering herself. "Cloudstep and I believe it best we ask the other Clans for help." Yellowstar dipped her head humbly to the others leaders, and then to their medicine cats. "Freezepaw is at a tender stage in her training, and we believe she needs a tutor now… until Cloudstep is well enough to resume."
No one spoke for a while.
"I suppose," mewed Petalheart, "I could spare Duskfeather."
Yellowstar looked at Troutstar evenly. The big gray tom frowned, seeming to consider the proposal—
"The moon!" someone shouted. Yellowstar looked up. The clouds had moved to cover it. "StarClan has spoken!"
"This Gathering is over," Weaselstar said. Yellowstar could have sworn she had a gloating snicker across her muzzle, but it was gone in a moment.
The leaders leapt from the Moontree to lead their cats back home.
StatClan, Yellowstar thought, her pelt bristling along her spine. Are you trying to destroy my Clan?