"Nightcloud, Emberfoot, Crowfeather, you're on the hunting patrol with me!" called Ashfoot, assigning the last of the morning's patrols.
Crowfeather stifled a groan at the idea of yet another patrol with his furious mate. One moon ago, he had told his mother that he and Nightcloud had hardly had a real conversation since Breezepelt had disappeared, and since then, she had been using her authority as Clan deputy to place them on patrols together as often as possible in the hopes that it would make them talk. It wasn't working, of course. Nightcloud had absolutely no interest in talking to him, and he couldn't blame her. But that wasn't stopping Ashfoot from trying.
The four cats left camp, heading up into the hills. Only Emberfoot was speaking, telling some irritating story about a rabbit he had caught the other day, but soon enough he realized no one was listening, and he shut his mouth.
Before long, Ashfoot stopped, looking around. "This is as good a spot as any," she meowed. "We'll catch more prey if we split into pairs though." Crowfeather sighed internally, knowing where this was going. He loved his mother, but sometimes he wished she didn't feel the need to meddle so much.
"Emberfoot, why don't you head this way with me?" she suggested, pointing with her tail. "And you two can go the other direction." He and Nightcloud met each other's eyes, a look of contempt passing between the two cats at being forced together again. Well, at least we agree on one thing.
The cats all muttered their agreement, and Ashfoot and Emberfoot set off down the hill. As she left, Ashfoot turned to meet Crowfeather's eyes. Talk to her, her glare ordered. Crowfeather just rolled his eyes.
Once the other cats were gone, Crowfeather and Nightcloud just stood in silence for a moment. Finally, he figured someone had to say something. "Do you want to hunt closer to the river?" he suggested. "I've been finding good prey there lately."
"Oh, you mean closer to ThunderClan?" Nightcloud asked cooly. "You would want that, wouldn't you?"
It took all the willpower Crowfeather had not to snap back at her. I have to at least try and make peace, he told himself. If only so my mother will leave me alone.
He decided ignoring her barb was the best way to avoid a fight. "Furzepelt mentioned finding a rabbit den up that way a few days ago," he meowed civilly. "It might mean there are more in the area."
Nightcloud's eyes met his for a moment, the expression flashing across her face too complex for him to decipher. Finally she shook her head.
"I don't understand how you can act like everything is normal," she meowed softly.
Crowfeather stared at her, shocked. "Normal? What do you mean, normal? Nothing is normal," he meowed.
"I mean, our son has been missing all this time, he might be dead, and you're acting like you don't care at all!" she burst out.
"How dare you say that," Crowfeather hissed. "Of course I care! He's my son too, you know."
"Well you've certainly never acted like it," Nightcloud spat. "Why would you start caring about him now?"
"I did care!" Crowfeather argued back. So much for not getting into a fight.
Nightcloud just shook her head again. "Just leave me alone, Crowfeather. Our son is gone. Everyone knows your secret. You have nothing to prove anymore by pretending you want to talk to me," she meowed, turning away from him. "I'm going to hunt near the river. Don't follow me."
Crowfeather watched her leave for a moment. Is this it, then? he wondered. Should he just… never talk to her again? No. I'm not giving up that easily.
"You know, we used to be friends!" he called after her. Back before… everything. She whirled on him, and he knew he had said the wrong thing. Again.
"I loved you, Crowfeather," she spat. "This wouldn't be so painful if that wasn't true. I loved you, for… I don't know how many moons. I think when we were apprentices, part of me knew, but when you came back from your quest, you were so confident and… And I knew then, that I loved you. And then Leafpool came along, and I lost hope. But then you came back to WindClan, and asked me to be your mate. And I wasn't a fool, Crowfeather, however much you may think me so. I knew you were just using me to prove your loyalty to WindClan. I knew you didn't love me. But I thought maybe you would love me someday, and so I said yes." He felt awful. He had just been using her to prove his loyalty. Of course it had meant so much more to her than it had to him.
"Nightcloud, I-" he began. But she wasn't finished.
"I could handle being mates with a tom who didn't love me," she meowed. "But then I saw the way you reacted when I told you I was expecting kits. I saw your fear, your disgust. And I knew I couldn't handle being mates with a tom who hated our kits."
"I never hated Breezepelt!" he exclaimed. "I was scared when I learned I was going to be a father. I wasn't ready for that, and StarClan knows my own father didn't exactly set a good example for me. But when he was born, I knew I would do anything for him. I wanted to be a good father. You never gave me a chance."
"Liar," she hissed. "You hated him. That's the reason he left. You never tried to be his father."
"Nightcloud, I did try," he insisted. "I tried playing with him, I tried taking him exploring, I tried teaching him things. But nothing I ever did with him I did right for you. I was playing too rough, it was too dangerous, he was too young. Eventually, I stopped trying. And that was my mistake. I never should let my anger with you turn into resentment for him. Never should have let my son believe his father didn't love him."
Nightcloud just shook her head. "I don't believe a word you say," she meowed. "Especially now that every cat knows about your other kits. It all makes so much sense now. Why should you care about Breezepelt when you have three more kits as backup?"
Crowfeather was shocked. All this time, she's thought I knew about Leafpool's kits? "I didn't know," he meowed. "I told you this! I was just as shocked as every other cat when Hollyleaf-"
"Liar!" hissed Nightcloud. "You're a liar and you always have been. You keep trying to make things 'right' between us, but as long as my only kit is missing, I will never stop hating you. So just leave me alone, Crowfeather." She spat his name like venom, and the sheer hatred in her voice told her it was over. Not just their time as mates– that had been over for many, many moons. But any chance he had ever had of being her friend again was gone too.
And he couldn't blame her. He had been a terrible mate, a terrible friend, and a terrible father. Although she was wrong about him having known about his other kits, just about everything else she had accused him of was true. He deserved every ounce of her hatred.
Clearly having said her part, Nightcloud turned and raced off over the hills, in the direction of RiverClan. Crowfeather watched her go.
Once she had vanished from sight, Crowfeather sighed and began to walk off in the other direction. I have to clear my head before I can face my Clanmates again, he thought.
He found himself missing his son with a sharp pang. Was he alive, out there somewhere? Was he living a better life, free of Clan responsibility and away from his parents who had let him down? Or was he dead, killed by a fox or a badger or a dog, unable to return to WindClan even if he wanted to? He had asked Kestrelflight repeatedly if he had seen Breezepelt in StarClan, and the answer had always been no. But that didn't mean he wasn't there.
He wished more than anything that he could see his Breezepelt more time. Even if he would never come back to WindClan, even if he was dead. He needed to see his son and apologize for everything he had done and failed to do.
But now he would never get the chance.
Looking around, he realized he had come up to nearly this exact same spot with Breezepelt once, when he had just been made an apprentice. Crowfeather had started going to the nursery less and less as Breezepelt had gotten older, because he couldn't stand the way Nightcloud glared at him whenever he tried to do anything with his son. But once he had become an apprentice, he had finally moved to a den without Nightcloud watching his every move like a hawk. Crowfeather had hesitated a long time before venturing into the apprentices' den to see him, but eventually decided if he didn't try one more time now to connect with his son, he never would be able to.
So one night, Crowfeather had crept into the apprentice den, being careful not to wake any of the five older apprentices, and gently nudged Breezepelt with his foot to wake him. Breezepelt had sat up, blearily blinking sleep from his eyes, and Crowfeather had whispered in his ear, "Come on. I want to show you something."
While Breezepelt had taken a moment to get himself to his feet, Crowfeather had looked around the den. Next to all of the other apprentices, it was striking how much smaller Breezepelt was. Even Heathertail, who was only one moon older, was considerably larger than him. For the first time, Crowfeather had understood his mate's fear. He's so tiny, he had thought. Anything could happen to him.
But he had shaken these fears from his mind. Breezepelt would never get stronger if he was never allowed to leave camp. And besides, Crowfeather would be there to look after him.
So he had snuck Breezepelt out of the camp, and they had come up here to the hills. There, Crowfeather had taught him about partner hunting. He had just shown the technique to Heathertail a few days prior, but Breezepelt hadn't gotten there in his training yet. Despite this, he picked up the technique like a natural.
Dashing across the plains, hunting rabbits with his son, Crowfeather had felt more alive than he'd felt since he and Leafpool had parted ways. He hadn't known how to interact with a kit, but now Breezepelt was starting to grow into someone he could enjoy spending time with. They had caught two rabbits together, and even Breezepelt had been laughing and having fun by the end.
But then Nightcloud had found out. And she had been furious. The two of them had argued, and it had escalated to the worst fight they had ever had, with both of them stooping to name-calling and nearly pulling out their claws.
"Just because you couldn't have kits with that mangy squirrel-eater in ThunderClan, that doesn't give you an excuse to put your son in danger!" Nightcloud had hissed. He could take her insulting him, but when she had insulted Leafpool, it had taken all of his self-restraint not to rip her pelt off.
And after that… he still wanted to be a father to Breezepelt. He really did. But every time he saw his son's face, he couldn't help but see Nightcloud's. He couldn't help but see the face of the she-cat who hated him so much, and hear the loathing in her voice as she accused him of hating his son.
And he had taken it out on Breezepelt. Of course it wasn't Breezepelt's fault his mother was that way, but it didn't matter. The damage was done. He hadn't realized it at the time, but all of those times he had scolded Breezepelt, or failed to praise him, he was imagining Breezepelt as a stand-in for Nightcloud, and taking out his anger at her on his son.
Nightcloud might be part of the reason Crowfeather had failed to be a good father, but he was still the one who had done the harm. And now, he would never get the chance to undo it.
While he reflected, Crowfeather walked further and further away from the WindClan camp, finding himself less and less able to face the idea of returning to that place with his mate who hated him. I'm already nearly at the Moonpool, he realized, slowing down. Scanning his surroundings, he found no notable landmarks. On his left was the stream that separated WindClan from ThunderClan, and on his right was a large pile of rocks, but there wasn't much else in sight.
As he stopped to rest a moment, he realized the pile of rocks actually had a small opening in them. Is this another entrance to the tunnels? he wondered. WindClan had had an entrance to the tunnels right on their territory that they had used to attack ThunderClan the day the sun had disappeared, but that entrance closed up the night of that fateful Gathering all those moons ago when the earth had shaken. Still, if there were entrances on both ThunderClan and WindClan territories, it stood to reason there might be more.
But as he stuck his face into the entrance to see if he could see down, he was struck by a scent that was far, far more interesting than anything he had been thinking of before. The scent didn't smell particularly of any one Clan, but it was still unmistakable to him. It was the scent he had longed to smell every day for many, many moons.
The scent in the tunnel was Breezepelt's.
Is he down there? Crowfeather wondered frantically. Has he been stuck down there this whole time? As he prepared to climb down, desperate to find his son, he realized the scent trail continued out of the tunnel too– in the very direction he had been heading. And it was fresh.
Not daring to let himself get his hopes up, still believing he must be imagining things, Crowfeather began to sprint in the direction of the Moonpool, following his son's scent trail. As he ran, he was sure the scent was getting stronger. He was getting closer.
Finally, he pushed through a pair of gorse bushes and realized he could see two dark shapes ahead of him. He opened his mouth to call out when the sleeker of the two shapes turned, and Crowfeather knew him at once.
"Breezepelt?" he meowed incredulously. It was really him. His son was here, in the flesh. Alive. He was safe and he was alive and he was here.
Before he or Breezepelt had had a chance to say anything else, the second shape turned to face him, and he froze. That's impossible, Crowfeather thought. She's dead. But, impossibly, the face staring back at him belonged to none other than Hollyleaf. His daughter.
She looked scared, though of what Crowfeather couldn't tell. I suppose when you've gone to this much trouble faking your death, you don't want any cat to discover you've been secretly alive this whole time, he thought.
It was funny. Crowfeather had spent these past moons hating Hollyleaf. After all, if she had just kept her mouth shut and let their secret be handled within the family, Crowfeather's life wouldn't have crumbled the way it had. Breezepelt would never have run away, Nightcloud would never have become so angry with him, and his Clanmates would never have started to mistrust him. But now, looking into her eyes, Crowfeather was struck by the sharp reminder that she was his kin too.
As he looked back and forth between her face and Breezepelt's, he couldn't help but notice how similar they looked. Sure, Hollyleaf was a lot fluffier and her eyes were a different color, but they had the same face. They had the same color pelt. Even their body language was the same. She's just as much my kit as Breezepelt is.
For several moments, no cat spoke. It seemed as if Hollyleaf and Breezepelt had no more idea what to say in this situation than him. But finally, Breezepelt broke the silence.
"What are you doing up here?" he meowed softly. At least there was no anger in his voice, but he didn't exactly sound happy to see Crowfeather either. Of course, he wouldn't have expected him to be.
"I was… I was hunting, and I smelled your scent by the tunnels and followed it up here. Have you been living in the tunnels this whole time?" he asked, still unable to believe the idea. It would make sense though– there was nowhere else nearby they could be without being discovered by one of their Clans. And Hollyleaf had supposedly died by being crushed by falling rocks chasing a squirrel into the tunnels. Now, it seemed she hadn't actually died, but rather found her half-brother down there.
Hollyleaf spoke then. "We have," she meowed guardedly. "But we're leaving now. We're leaving the lake for good, and you had better not try and stop us." The coolness in her tone almost frightened him.
He wanted to get through to Hollyleaf. He wanted to find out why she had faked her own death, what she had been doing all this time, and where she was planning on going. He felt like he owed it to Leafpool, who seemed like she had been beating herself up over her daughter's death ever since it had happened.
But he had to get through to Breezepelt. Because Breezepelt's disappearance was his fault. And he had to make amends.
"Breezepelt, why are you doing this?" asked Crowfeather. "You don't have to be out here alone. Please, come home." He had to convince his son to come home. He couldn't lose him again.
Breezepelt shook his head slowly, but held eye contact. "There's nothing for me in WindClan," he meowed. But he sounded unsure. Maybe he could still be convinced.
"There is," Crowfeather insisted. "Your Clanmates miss you. Your mother misses you. I miss you." Breezepelt shook his head slightly, and Crowfeather went on. "You're such an important part of WindClan, Breezepelt. Your Clan misses you."
"You don't believe that," Breezepelt meowed.
"I do," Crowfeather persisted. Desperately, he thought back on his conversation with Brambleclaw all those moons ago. Brambleclaw had brought up so many positive traits about Breezepelt that he himself had failed to see, but in the moons since that conversation, Crowfeather had thought of countless more. "You're fiercely loyal to your Clan and Clan traditions– you even worked so hard trying to bring them to the Tribe of Rushing Water! You're a brave fighter– I remember you were always willing to put your own life at risk to protect those weaker than you. And you're a strong leader, mentoring the Tribe apprentices and getting your Clanmates to follow you to try and chase the dogs away from our territory." He paused, taking a breath, and saw Breezepelt staring back at him with wide, shocked eyes. "You are so valuable to WindClan for all of those reasons, and so many more. And if you come back home, I know your Clanmates will be so excited to have you back."
He knew Breezepelt had struggled to feel valued by his Clanmates. Maybe, if he could convince his son how much he meant to his Clan, he would change his mind about running away.
He had to change his mind. Nothing had ever been more important.
So for the first time since Hollyleaf's announcement, Crowfeather found himself praying. Please, StarClan, let him come back, he prayed. I know I broke the warrior code, but you've already done so much to punish me. Please, just this once, help me. Help me get my son back.
And so while Breezepelt's eyes darted back and forth between him and Hollyleaf, looking like he was being torn in two, Crowfeather waited, and he prayed. Please, StarClan. Please bring him back to me.