In the two moons since she had started training in the Dark Forest with Tigerstar and Hawkfrost, Hollyleaf had settled into a new daily routine. For the first few sessions, they had met at night, with her slipping out of the tunnels to sleep in the forest so she could dream of the Dark Forest. But the two of them also had a number of Clan cats to train, and those trainees could only train at night because of their warrior duties. On the other hand, Hollyleaf had the freedom to sleep anytime, especially since she never seemed to wake up from her training sessions feeling any more rested than when she had first closed her eyes. And it seemed easier to excuse slipping away for a few hours every couple of days to Breezepelt than needing to sleep outside in the cold constantly.

So every two or three days, she would make up some lie about why she was going out into the forest, and she would find a secluded place to sleep. Initially, she had trained every day, but she had started to feel bad leaving Breezepelt alone so much, so she had shifted to only coming every couple of days. This irritated her new mentors, and they constantly urged her to attend more frequently, but given that they could only reach her when she was asleep outside of the tunnels, there was really nothing they could do.

In only two moons, she had learned as much as she had learned in her entire six moons as an apprentice. Between Hawkfrost and Tigerstar, her mentors had been members of three Clans. She supposed that including Breezepelt, she had now had the opportunity to learn fighting techniques from all four Clans.

They taught her ShadowClan and RiverClan fighting techniques, which she found fascinating. Although the four Clans weren't so different in terms of their lifestyles, they had vastly different mentalities towards fighting. WindClan relied on their superior speed, taking advantage of their smaller size to dodge attacks and catch their enemies off guard. ThunderClan taught much more head-on techniques, striking hard and fighting relentlessly. ShadowClan's attacks often relied on trickery, making your opponent think you were going to do one thing while instead doing another. And RiverClan, often the best fed of all four Clans, used their heavier frames to shove other cats around.

Most cats only ever had the opportunity to learn to fight from one Clan. But now, she was learning skills perfected by all four.

Tigerstar and Hawkfrost's training also differed greatly from what she was used to because they always fought with their claws unsheathed, just like in a real battle.

"Why should you train one way and battle another?" Hawkfrost had asked rhetorically. He had a point. The first time she was in a real battle, she had been shocked by how different from training it felt. Even though her Clan was being attacked, she still felt bad hurting their attackers. Of course, that wasn't an issue she would have again. There was already blood on her paws. But it still felt useful to practice more authentically.

It was hard getting used to at first- in her first training session, she found herself reflexively cutting her blows short, hesitating to draw blood. But Tigerstar had made his anger at her reluctance quite clear.

"Never hesitate!" he had snapped, cuffing her upside the head. "Your enemies will not hesitate to end you. You must be willing to do the same." So she had taken his words to heart, and now she did not hesitate.

The downside of this training method was, as she realized quickly and to her horror, her injuries sustained in the Dark Forest came with her to the waking world. She had told herself her first time there that they couldn't hurt her because she was only dreaming. She now knew this was false. They absolutely could harm her in her dreams. And they did.

She had gotten used to hiding injuries from Breezepelt, though she had had a couple close calls where he had noticed a new scratch and she had had to make up a story about walking into a bramble bush or some such thing. The lies didn't feel that convincing, but she supposed they were much more believable than the idea that she had been secretly training in her sleep with dead cats.

She hadn't just learned new fighting techniques from her new mentors. She had also learned information. As soon as she had learned they were training Clan cats, including ThunderClan, she had demanded to know who. She was surprised by how many of her former Clanmates were involved. Birchfall, Mousewhisker, and Thornclaw were all active members of the Dark Forest. So was Blossomfall, who had been just a little kit when Hollyleaf had left ThunderClan. Now she was all grown up, and old enough to be learning to kill.

But the ThunderClan warrior they seemed the proudest of was Ivypool, Dovepaw's sister, who they had met in the tunnels as an apprentice. Hawkfrost bragged about how well she was doing, and how dedicated she was to the cause. Apparently he had mentored her himself, and she was already surpassing many of the older warriors.

It wasn't surprising to Hollyleaf that Ivypool would have joined. She must have spent her whole life trying to compete with her littermate with powers from StarClan. Hollyleaf could relate to that feeling herself. If the Dark Forest had promised to make her into a better warrior than her sister, of course she would have taken the opportunity.

She wished she could talk to Ivypool- she suspected she may have a lot in common with the young warrior. But of course she couldn't. If Ivypool learned she was alive, she would tell the rest of ThunderClan, and the whole Clan would be after her for killing Ashfur. She had to keep the fact that she had survived a secret.

Though that morning, as she curled up in the hollow tree she had made into her nest to fall asleep, she thought that maybe all she had now was secrets. Secrets from her Clan. Secrets from her family. Secrets from Breezepelt. Even secrets from the Dark Forest. There was no cat alive or dead who knew every part of her. And that felt almost too lonely to bear.

It felt like only a moment had passed when she blinked awake into the familiar gloom of the Dark Forest. It seemed that even during the day, it was never truly light there. Just as there was no moon or stars, there was also no sun. No matter what time of day she visited, it was lit by a mysterious light coming through the bare trees that seemed to have no actual source. She wondered if somehow the always-prevalent fog was creating the light? Or maybe there truly was no source and this was just how it was here.

When she opened her eyes, Hawkfrost and Tigerstar were standing over her, waiting.

"Good, you're finally here," meowed Hawkfrost impatiently, nudging her with his paw to get her to stand up.

"Hello to you too," she grumbled, pulling herself to her feet. Sometimes they were in a talkative mood, bragging about how well their work with the other trainees was going, but clearly today was not one of those days.

"We want to work on a new technique," Tigerstar told her. "We've been working on it with the rest of the trainees, and, well… some of them are learning it better than others. But I have no doubt you'll be able to handle it." She nodded, heart beating faster. As much as she tried to convince herself she didn't care about Tigerstar's opinion of her, she couldn't help but bask in his praise whenever he gave it.

She nodded. "Okay, show me," she meowed.

"Right," began Tigerstar. "So, this move is usually used when fighting badgers. But it works just as well against cats. When you're facing an opponent, they expect you to strike them from the front. The last thing they expect is for you to suddenly be at their back. So, you're going to leap over your opponent, turn on your back legs, and, while turning, rake your claws on the opponent's back. Then, while they're still figuring out where you came from, you sink your teeth into your opponent's leg, hard, and don't let go."

Hollyleaf nodded along as he spoke. She could see why cats had struggled to learn this one. It was several steps in a row, and each would have to be executed to perfection in order to be successful. Undershoot on your jump, become unbalanced on the spin, or fail to hit their back before they turn, and you would be harming yourself more than your opponent. Fortunately, Hollyleaf had always been good at learning sequences of moves. This would be no exception.

"Did you follow all that?" asked Tigerstar impatiently.

"Yes," she meowed determinedly.

"Great," he meowed. "Then why don't you try it out on Hawkfrost? Of course, this is different from a real battle, because he knows what you're going to do, but in a real battle, you need to take advantage of the fact that your enemy won't. Strike hard and fast- the element of surprise will be your greatest asset."

She nodded again, and turned to face Hawkfrost. He smirked at her, looking more excited for the fight than she would have preferred.

She took a breath to steady herself, and then bunched her legs under her, gathering her strength, and leaped. As soon as she was in the air, she realized she had mistimed her jump a bit- she should have taken a few steps closer to Hawkfrost before jumping to make sure she could clear his body. Instead, she crashed into his back in a very ungraceful manner, and her side hit the ground. Before she had a chance to get back up, he had whirled around and raked his claws across her flank.

She let out a yelp, jumping to her feet and retreating backwards a few steps.

"You call that a jump?" Harkfrost taunted. "I've seen RiverClan kits jump farther than that. Try it again."

Gritting her teeth and trying to ignore the stinging in her side, she broke into a run, bounding forward a few steps before throwing her body into the air again. This time, she cleared his body with ease, landing lightly a tail's-length from his rear legs. Before even taking a moment to breathe, she pulled her weight onto her hind legs and spun around to face him.

She wasn't fast enough. As she raised her claws to rake them across his back, Hawkfrost was already turning. Her claws found nothing but air, and a hard blow from one of Hawkfrost's massive paws knocked her to the ground.

"Better," he meowed. "But not good enough. Again."

They ran the drill again and again and again, until she had finally perfected the movements, and a few more times after that. Her flank hadn't stopped bleeding from her first attempt though, and she was starting to feel light-headed from the blood loss. She was just about to tell them she needed a break, when she heard Tigerstar's voice.

"Okay, that's enough," he called. He had chimed in every now and then to offer feedback, but for the most part he had just sat there and let Hawkfrost throw her around. "I think we've gotten all out of today we're going to get," he declared. "Keep working on this sequence. See if you can get that… WindClan cat to practice with you."

Tigerstar knew Breezepelt's name. She had said it to him often enough that she knew this was true. He just seemed to have a deliberate lack of interest in learning it. He had made his feelings on WindClan quite clear during their time together- he thought they were all cowardly, all weak. He didn't seem to respect any of the WindClan trainees they had. It made her wonder how honest he had been when he told her he didn't care that she was half-WindClan.

But whatever. As long as he was training her, she didn't care what he thought about her blood.

A few moments later, she was blinking awake again in the snowy forest. Looking down, she realized to her horror that the snow all around her was stained red with blood. She needed to get some cobwebs right away to stop the bleeding.

She knew had a stash of them in her makeshift medicine den underground, and she slowly began to trod back to the tunnel entrance. Great StarClan, I'm tired, she thought. She had to keep going. If she passed out here, she might never wake up again.

She had just about made it back to the tunnels when she saw Breezepelt. He was right in front of the tunnel entrance, sniffing around. Her heart sank. She had managed to conceal her injuries from him thus far, but she was leaving a trail of blood now. How could she explain where she had been?

And at that moment, Breezepelt looked up and his eyes met hers.

"Hey!" he called. "What have you been up to?" She opened her mouth to respond, to tell one of her usual lies, when suddenly his eyes went to the ground below her, and the blood that was spilling out onto the snow, and he gasped. "Oh, StarClan, what happened to you?" he asked, eyes wide. "Did something attack you? Hold on, let me run and get cobwebs." Before waiting for a response, he turned and darted into the tunnels. At least she had another moment to come up with a lie. But what could have caused these wounds other than another cat?

It would have to have been a large animal, like a dog or a fox or a badger, she was deciding, when he came dashing out of the tunnels with a mouth full of cobwebs and leaves. Careening to a stop in front of her, he spat the herbs at her feet.

"I couldn't remember which ones were for infection or what, so I just grabbed all the ones I thought might be useful," he explained breathlessly.

As she explained which herbs would be useful to him for the dozenth time, he set to work carefully pressing cobwebs into her wound.

She found herself grateful for his presence. As much as she dreaded having to explain the wound to him… it was nice to have someone else take care of her for once. It reminded her of when she was still in ThunderClan and she got injured. She would visit Jayfeather in the medicine den, and for a moment, his usually prickly persona would wash away and be replaced by care and concern. Prickly care and concern, but still. He really was a good medicine cat- much better than she would have been if she hadn't decided to switch to warrior training.

Breezepelt was… less skilled, but still, it was sweet that he was helping. And it was certainly easier having him help her than if she had tried to treat her own wounds.

She was beginning to hope he had somehow forgotten about his curiosity over what had happened, when he finally spoke again.

"Hollyleaf, what happened to you?" he demanded. "These are some big wounds. Something with big claws must have left them."

"It was… it was a dog," she stammered. She really should have come up with a more complete story. "I was by ThunderClan territory, and I saw a dog that looked angry, and well… Maybe I should have left it alone, but I was scared it would cross into the border and hurt ThunderClan cats. I could never forgive myself if one of my Clanmates got hurt by it when I could have prevented it. So… I tried to drive it off myself. It ran off, but it hurt me pretty bad in the process." She hated having to lie to Breezepelt, especially since he had been her only real friend for so long, but what was she supposed to tell him? Yeah, I got hurt training in my sleep with a couple of dead cats who tried to take over the Clans. Don't worry about it.

Breezepelt's eyes were wide with alarm. "Hollyleaf, you shouldn't have tried to fight it off alone. You could have found me! I would have helped you!"

She sighed. It was actually really sweet he wanted to help, but he couldn't help her fight a dog that didn't exist. "I know," she meowed. "You're right. I should have." A moment went by before Breezepelt spoke again.

"Where do you go all day?" he meowed finally. "You always have some explanation, but they never seem genuine. You said you were by the ThunderClan border- is that where you go? Back to spy on ThunderClan?"

Her heart dropped. She had been worried he would see through her lies eventually, but she hadn't thought about what she would say when it happened. Maybe his guess was a plausible explanation, though.

"Yes," she meowed, thinking fast. "Yes I just… miss my Clanmates so much. I've been going to ThunderClan to keep an eye on them. I know it seems silly, but it makes me feel like I'm still a part of the Clan. I get to know what's going on with them- like those apprentices we met, Ivypaw and Dovepaw, are warriors now! And it makes me feel… less sad about leaving."

Breezepelt nodded. She knew he had never been as close with his Clanmates as she had been with hers. But she hoped he would still believe she had missed her Clanmates so badly she had risked being caught to see them. And she really was learning about her old Clanmates, from Tigerstar and Hawkfrost, so she would be able to pass information along and keep up the lie.

"That makes sense," he meowed finally. "I mean, I still don't really understand you. You said yourself that your Clanmates would cast you out if you came back. So I don't get why you still care so much about them! But if that's how you want to spend your days, that's your choice. Just don't expect me to come with you."

"I won't," she meowed gratefully. "Thank you for understanding. And for helping me with my wound." And for being my friend, she added privately. But Breezepelt hated sentimental stuff like that, so she kept it to herself.

"Well, if I have to hear you blathering on about herbs all the time, I might as well use them once in a while," he teased.

"I do not blather on!" she exclaimed indignantly. "We don't have a medicine cat. Knowing this stuff is important."

His eyes sparkled mischievously, and she realized he had just been joking. Stupid furball, she thought affectionately.

She was surprised by how much she genuinely enjoyed Breezepelt's company. Part of her wanted to leave the Dark Forest for good and just spend the rest of her life hanging out here with him. But that wasn't who she was. For better or worse, she would never be content with a simple life. She had to help her Clan.

Whatever it took.