Fading Echoes Page 4

  Jayfeather looked at her in surprise. Why had he never thought of that? The poppy seed would reduce the pain at once while the comfrey and marigold worked on the inflammation. “That’s a great idea!”

  “It used to work on Voletooth’s shoulder.”

  “Thanks.” He spread the herbs in front of her. “There’s tansy, watermint, and feverfew here.” His mind was fizzing with curiosity. How had she felt overseeing Mistystar’s receiving her nine lives? Did she finally believe in StarClan now that she’d seen it for herself?

  As Mothwing bundled the herbs back into a wad she could carry in her jaws, Jayfeather gave his tail a casual flick. “How was Mistystar’s ceremony?”

  “Fine,” Mothwing mewed levelly. “She’s going to be a great leader. Have you got a blade of grass I can tie this bundle with?”

  The RiverClan medicine cat wasn’t giving anything away.

  Jayfeather padded to the side of the cave and plucked a long stalk of grass poking from the base of the rock wall. As he carried it back to Mothwing, he took a deep breath and probed her recent memories.

  Pale sunlight washed the Moonpool, reflecting the clear dawn sky. Jayfeather flinched at the bright images shimmering in Mothwing’s mind. He was used to the night shadows of the Moonpool. Mistystar must have been in a hurry to receive her nine lives.

  Mothwing was watching Mistystar. Jayfeather could sense the grief and disquiet of the Clan they’d left behind as the RiverClan deputy crouched at the pool, her paws tucked beneath her, nose tip dabbing the water.

  Jayfeather cocked his head. Mothwing’s sense of separation from her Clanmate felt strange. Her bond to her Clanmate was as strong as those Jayfeather felt for his own, and yet she was observing the ceremony like an outsider.

  Mistystar suddenly flinched in her sleep with a cry of pain. Mothwing jumped, anxiety jabbing her. Does it hurt? The shocked thought echoed in her mind.

  As Mistystar fell still once more, Mothwing fought the urge to creep forward and check that the RiverClan deputy was all right.

  Was something real happening to her Clanmate?

  No. Mothwing pushed away the thought.

  Yes! Jayfeather willed her to accept it. How could she not believe? She was so stubborn. And yet Jayfeather was impressed by her determination.

  They have not visited me; how can they be real? The thought burned like lightning in her mind.

  Mistystar was stirring and Mothwing approached. “Are you all right?”

  “You weren’t there!”

  Mothwing stiffened; then calmness flooded her. The discovery of her secret seemed to bring her relief. “No.” She shook her head, meeting her leader’s gaze without guilt or worry. “You will always visit StarClan alone. They don’t exist for me in the way that they do for you.”

  “You…you don’t believe in StarClan?” Mistystar’s pelt rippled with shock. “But you’ve been our medicine cat for so long! Have you never walked with StarClan in your dreams?”

  Mothwing felt the stone, cool beneath her pads, weathered by countless moons. “You have your beliefs; I have mine. The cats you see in your dreams guide you and protect you in ways that I have lived without so far. I am a good medicine cat and that has been enough to serve my Clan.”

  Mistystar gazed at her medicine cat a moment longer, then dipped her head.

  Jayfeather blinked, darkness engulfing him once more as he slid out of Mothwing’s thoughts.

  He could feel her gaze like a breeze stirring his pelt. She was watching him curiously; she had known all along that he was inside her memories, reliving the scene at the Moonpool. “You know I have no connection with them,” she reminded him. Her tail brushed the earth. “It doesn’t make me any less of a medicine cat.” She tied the grass around the bundle. “You need to understand that.” She picked up the herbs, her jaws releasing their fragrance as they closed softly around the leaves. Then she turned and padded from the den.

  Jayfeather listened to the bramble swish behind her, his paws tingling. Even without StarClan to guide and strengthen her, Mothwing was formidable. Instinctively he dipped his head to her, just as Mistystar had done. StarClan had made a wise choice after all.

  CHAPTER 3

  Jayfeather looked up as the brambles at the entrance to his den swished.

  Lionblaze poked his head through. “Mistystar and Mothwing have gone.”

  Jayfeather could feel urgency rippling beneath the golden warrior’s pelt. “What’s wrong?”

  Lionblaze hesitated.

  “Let’s go into the forest,” Jayfeather suggested.

  In answer, Lionblaze turned and headed for the camp entrance. Jayfeather let the thoughts and feelings of his Clanmates flood his mind for a moment, searching for any signs of need. All was well. Satisfied, he followed his brother out of the camp.

  Lionblaze was already pounding through the trees toward the lake. As Jayfeather caught up to him, the scent of the water bathed his tongue.

  “I can see RiverClan fishing,” Lionblaze told him.

  A cool, damp breeze rushed through the trees, sending leaves showering onto their pelts. The lake rippled and splashed below.

  “So, what’s up?” Jayfeather broached the question.

  Before Lionblaze could answer, bushes farther along the shore crackled, and Briarpaw and Bumblepaw came crashing out of the undergrowth, dragging a fat rabbit between them.

  They halted and Jayfeather could feel the happiness pulsing from their pelts. Graystripe and Millie’s kits were growing fast. They’d be warriors come leaf-bare.

  “Impressive catch,” Lionblaze praised. “Where’d you find it?”

  “It was grazing by the stream.” Bumblepaw was out of breath.

  “It was me who caught it,” Briarpaw boasted.

  “Only because I blocked its escape.” Bumblepaw’s purr rumbled deep in his throat.

  “You just happened to be in the right place at the right time,” Briarpaw retorted.

  The leaves rustled on the forest floor as the littermates fell into a mock fight, tumbling between the slender trees. Jayfeather could sense the strength beneath their pelts. Their minds were filled with green flashes from running through the woods, a mixture of prey-scent and falling leaves and their own fearless pride. A sudden, fierce gladness caught him. ThunderClan was lucky to have cats like these.

  “They’ll make great warriors,” Lionblaze whispered, echoing Jayfeather’s thoughts.

  “Yes,” Jayfeather agreed, remembering the long, anxious days he’d nursed Briarpaw and Millie through a severe bout of greencough.

  “You shouldn’t leave prey unattended!” Lionblaze called to the two young cats. “Some warrior might claim it for his own.”

  The apprentices scrambled back to them, panting.

  “Paws off!” Bumblepaw warned good-naturedly.

  “Hey!” Blossompaw’s petulant mew sounded through the trees and the tortoiseshell-and-white she-cat bounded out from the undergrowth. “I thought you were going to wait for me! Now everyone will think you caught the rabbit without me.”

  “We waited for ages,” Bumblepaw objected. “We thought you’d gone back to camp without us.”

  Blossompaw sat down. “Why would I do that?”

  “So you can moon over Toadstep some more?” Briarpaw teased.

  “I do not moon over Toadstep!” Blossompaw snapped. “Why are you being mean?”

  “Why are you being grumpy?” Bumblepaw didn’t wait for an answer. “Let’s take this rabbit to the camp. Mousewhisker is expecting me back for training.” He began dragging the rabbit through the trees. Briarpaw hurried after him, her paws skidding on the leaves as she caught hold of the fresh-kill.

  Blossompaw stomped after them, complaining, “You’re leaving me behind again!”

  Lionblaze stirred the leaves with one paw. “Did we fight that much?”

  Jayfeather felt a prick of grief, remembering the games they’d played with Hollyleaf as kits and then as ’paws. “I guess.” The breez
e tugged his fur.

  He could sense words on the tip of Lionblaze’s tongue, hesitancy on his breath. At last the golden warrior spoke. “Ivypaw stepped on a broken stick earlier.”

  Jayfeather nodded. “I put ointment on her wound.” He suddenly knew what was coming next. Ivypaw hadn’t told him that her injury had come from a stick; he might have guessed Lionblaze’s news earlier if she had.

  “It was your stick, wasn’t it?”

  Jayfeather could feel Lionblaze’s gaze prick his pelt, sharp with worry.

  “Did you break it?” Lionblaze asked softly.

  “Yes.” Guilt surged in Jayfeather’s belly. He’d had so many questions about the prophecy—he still did—but Rock would not answer him. And when the ancient cat had ignored his pleas, frustration had driven Jayfeather to fury and he’d broken the stick. With a shiver, he remembered the crack of the wood when it splintered. The scratches were destroyed forever, all connection with the cats from the past gone. The memory nearly choked him.

  “Why?” Lionblaze sounded confused.

  Jayfeather’s pelt seemed to crawl with invisible lice. He had destroyed something sacred, something he didn’t fully understand. Why? He wished with all his heart he hadn’t broken the stick. “I-I…” How could he explain?

  “I never understood why the stick was so important to you.” Lionblaze’s voice was distant; he was staring out over the lake once more. “But I know you used to go to it when you were worried or troubled.” His fur brushed Jayfeather’s as he leaned closer. “Was it a sign from StarClan?”

  If only it were that simple. “There was a time before StarClan,” Jayfeather ventured.

  Lionblaze’s fur sparked with surprise. “Before?”

  “The stick came from then.” Would Lionblaze understand? “The cats who lived here used to become sharpclaws by finding their way through the tunnels….”

  Lionblaze halted him midflow. “Sharpclaws?”

  “Like warriors.”

  “Were they a Clan?”

  Jayfeather frowned. “Not a Clan. Not then.”

  “But they had warriors?” He paced around Jayfeather.

  “Sharpclaws,” Jayfeather corrected.

  “What did the stick have to do with them?”

  “There were marks on the stick. The marks were a record of the cats who made it out of the tunnels alive and those who didn’t.” Lionblaze had to understand that. They had all been in the tunnels as apprentices—Jayfeather, Lionblaze, and Hollyleaf—when floods had swept underground. They all would have drowned if Fallen Leaves, one of the ancient cats, hadn’t shown Jayfeather the way out.

  Lionblaze stopped pacing and shuddered. “Cats died trying to become warriors?”

  Jayfeather nodded.

  “And these cats were here before us?”

  “Yes.”

  “Do they still live here?”

  “No.” Though I’ve met them. But Jayfeather wasn’t about to try to explain how he’d lived with those ancient cats, shared their food and their words, traveled back through time to learn their story, to help them leave in search of a new home. “I think some of them went to live in the mountains.”

  “Like the Tribe of Rushing Water?”

  “I think they became the Tribe of Rushing Water.”

  Lionblaze’s mind was whirling so fast Jayfeather had to block out the thoughts tumbling from his brother.

  “How did you know what the stick meant?” Lionblaze asked finally.

  “I felt it at first, and then I met Rock.” He hurried on before Lionblaze could interrupt. “Rock lived in the tunnels a long time ago. His spirit lives there still, right beneath our territory.”

  Lionblaze halted, his paws and his mind suddenly still. What was he thinking? Does he believe me?

  Tentatively, Jayfeather probed his brother’s thoughts. He didn’t like to pry in the minds of cats close to him. It felt unfair. And there were some things he didn’t want to know. But right now, Jayfeather needed to know what Lionblaze was thinking. After all, his brother had his own associations with the tunnels underground. How did he feel, knowing that the caves were not as empty as they appeared?

  Lionblaze was remembering Heathertail. He was standing in a cavern split by an underground stream and lit by a trickle of gray moonlight. Watching through his brother’s eyes, Jayfeather glanced up at the ledge where he’d first seen Rock.

  Rock wasn’t there. But Heathertail was, watching Lionblaze with blue eyes filled with affection. “I am leader of DarkClan!” she announced.

  Jayfeather felt a stab of grief pass through Lionblaze, then sensed Lionblaze shove it angrily away.

  Lionblaze’s memories held no image of Rock, yet Jayfeather could sense the ancient cat’s presence in the cavern. Furless, ugly, and blind, he kept very still as the young cats played: not judging, hardly interested, just waiting, as though the outcome were inevitable.

  “Stop that!” Lionblaze hissed. He must have guessed Jayfeather was walking through his memories.

  Jayfeather snapped back to the present. “Sorry.”

  “Heathertail and I never saw any other cats down there,” Lionblaze told him. “It was just us.”

  “They left long ago.”

  “Then why keep the scratched branch?” Lionblaze leaned closer. “Why break it?”

  Jayfeather turned away, unable to describe the rage that had made him smash the stick. The prophecy had churned in his mind for so long; he had to know what it meant. What were their powers for? Why had the Three been chosen? What was their destiny? Rock knew the answers. Jayfeather sensed it in the very core of his heart. Yet Rock had chosen to stay silent.

  Jayfeather swallowed back the frustration that had driven him to smash the stick. Anger hadn’t worked then; it wouldn’t work now.

  “Why did you break it?” Lionblaze asked again.

  Jayfeather stood up and shook out his fur. “We need to worry about what’s happening now, not what happened in the past. If we’re more powerful than the stars, then no cat can help us. We have to figure it out for ourselves.”

  “We haven’t had much luck so far.” Lionblaze padded forward to the very edge of the crest. Jayfeather followed him, the wind from the lake whisking through his ear fur so roughly that he could hardly hear Lionblaze’s next words.

  “Shouldn’t we do something?”

  “Like what?” Jayfeather raised his voice.

  “Go and look for something. Try to find out what we’re supposed to do.” Lionblaze’s mew grew louder as he turned to face him. “Instead of just waiting for things to happen.”

  Jayfeather shrugged. He didn’t know the answer. He’d shared tongues with StarClan and with ancient cats and still he was no closer to understanding anything.

  Lionblaze snorted and turned away. “I’m going back to camp.”

  Jayfeather stayed where he was, breathing the scent of the lake. An image of the stick swirled through his thoughts, its two shattered pieces drifting farther apart on the restless surface of the lake and then disappearing beneath the waves, sinking deeper and deeper, vanishing into the blackness.

  CHAPTER 4

  “No, no!” Lionblaze called to his apprentice. “If you climb up this side of the trunk I’ll see you and know you’re up there!”

  Dovepaw slithered down the bark. The oak tree was shiny with rain. Drizzle had been soaking the forest all morning, the rainclouds so low that they seemed to drag over the treetops.

  “Are you sure this is the right weather for a tree-fighting session?” Cinderheart queried. She was sitting beside her apprentice, Ivypaw. Both cats looked small, their fur plastered to their pelts.

  “It’s the best weather,” Lionblaze insisted. “If they can cling to the branches when they’re slippery, they’ll find it mouse-easy when it’s dry.”

  ThunderClan cats were the best climbers among the Clans because they hunted their prey among densely growing, thick-leaved trees; Firestar had recently decided that it was foolish not to ta
ke advantage of that skill in battle. From now on, all battle training would include tree-climbing practice, as well as techniques for attacking from among branches.

  “Now climb up again,” he instructed Dovepaw. “Imagine I’m a ShadowClan patrol.”

  Ivypaw’s whiskers twitched. “A whole one?”

  “Concentrate!” Lionblaze was in no mood for silliness. He was hungry and wet and frustrated. What did training apprentices have to do with fulfilling the prophecy? Wait, Jayfeather had said. But Lionblaze was tired of waiting.

  Cinderheart flashed Lionblaze a puzzled look. “I’ll guide them up the tree and tell them what to do,” she offered.

  Lionblaze hesitated. He didn’t like the thought of Cinderheart climbing trees after the accident that had nearly crippled her as an apprentice.

  She rolled her eyes. “We’ll be careful!” She nosed Ivypaw toward the trunk of the oak and watched her scoot up to the lowest branch. Then she nodded to Dovepaw. “You next.”

  Dovepaw darted behind the trunk. She reappeared a few moments later on a branch above his head. “Didn’t see me that time!” she called.

  He looked up, surprised by her speed. “Very good.”

  Cinderheart was scrambling after them. “This is an excellent branch for dropping from.” She peered down at Lionblaze. “If you land squarely on his shoulders, he’ll break your fall, and the surprise will give you long enough to get in a few good moves before he realizes what’s happened.”

  “Can I try it?” Ivypaw mewed eagerly.

  “I doubt if he’d be very surprised,” Dovepaw pointed out. “He’s staring straight at us.”

  “Let’s try climbing onto the next branch,” Cinderheart suggested.

  “I’ll wander around,” Lionblaze offered.

  “Concentrate on where your paws go,” Cinderheart warned the apprentices. Leaves rustled over Lionblaze’s head. “The bark’s slippery. Use your claws to grip. Watch out!”

  Too late. Ivypaw slipped from the branch with a yowl of surprise and plunged down straight onto Lionblaze.

  He staggered, hoping his broad shoulders had broken her fall. “Are you okay?”