Firestar's Quest (14 page)

He woke with a start to see the trees casting long black shadows across the stretch of open ground. Red light washed between them; the sun was sinking again!

Firestar scrambled up, his heart thudding in panic. He spotted Shorty, sitting under the nearest tree, his amber eyes fixed unblinkingly on him.

“Why didn't you wake me?” Firestar demanded.

“What for?” Shorty twitched his whiskers. “Don't worry; we've got plenty of time.”

Firestar bit back what he would have liked to say. If he offended this cat, he might never find Sandstorm at all.

“Come back here if your friend's not there,” Cora told him, padding up from behind. “We'll ask around and see if we can find out anything else.”

“I'll do that,” mewed Firestar. “Thanks.”

“Okay,” meowed Shorty. “Let's go.”

The brown tabby leaped over the wall and into another of the confusing passages. Trotting down to the end and around a corner, he squeezed through a gap in a wooden fence. Firestar followed and found himself behind bushes in another Twoleg garden. Night had fallen; yellow light poured from a single square hole in the wall of the Twoleg nest.

“This was the place,” Shorty murmured. “The young Twolegs live here. They caught your friend by that grass over there.”

He flicked his tail toward a clump of long grass in the middle of the garden. The stems rose for three or four tail-lengths, with plumy tops that glimmered yellow in the strange light. Keeping a cautious eye on the nest, Firestar crept into the open until he reached the clump.

He closed his eyes to concentrate better, and drew in air
over his scent glands. The powerful scent of Twoleg flowers almost swamped everything else, but Firestar could distinguish the scent of Twolegs, several different kinds of prey, and…yes! Very faint, and growing stale, but still recognizable.

“Sandstorm!” he breathed. “She was here. She's alive!”
Thank StarClan!
he thought.

Shorty bounded up to him. “Any luck?”

“Yes—yes, it's her. Which way did she go?”

Shorty pointed the stump of his tail toward the opposite fence. “Over there, into the next garden.”

Firestar raced across the grass to the fence; to his surprise Shorty kept pace with him. “You don't have to come with me,” Firestar meowed.

Shorty flicked his ears. “That's okay. I'll tag along, if you don't mind. Snowy's bound to ask me if we found your friend.”

“Thanks,” mewed Firestar. Though he didn't say so to Shorty, he was surprised that the rogues were being so helpful. He had been too quick to assume they would be his enemies.

The two cats scrambled over the next fence. Firestar thought he caught another trace of Sandstorm's scent among the clumps of flowers, but the Twoleg scents were very strong here, and there was a powerful aroma of dog. His neck fur lifted when he heard it barking from the nest.

“I've lost her trail,” he told Shorty, padding up and down in frustration.

“Let's follow the fence,” the tabby tom suggested. “We
might pick up the spot where she left.”

“Good idea.” Firestar slipped along the bottom of the fence, concealed from the Twoleg nest by thick shrubs, but there were no other signs that Sandstorm had been there, not even the imprint of a paw in the soil. He wished he had Cloudtail with him; the white tom was the best tracker in ThunderClan.

StarClan help me!
he prayed, gazing up at the glittering warriors of Silverpelt and wondering if they could see him when he was so far away from the forest.

As he lifted his head, a tuft of fur snagged on the top of the fence caught his eye, and he made out the pale ginger of Sandstorm's pelt.

He pointed with his tail. “That's where she crossed the fence. Come on, Shorty!”

But the tabby rogue was looking uneasy, his claws working in the thick leaf mold under the bushes. “There's a kittypet over there,” he meowed. “She's a good fighter, and…well, a bit short-tempered.”

Firestar couldn't believe that any kittypet could fight well enough to give him trouble. “I can handle it,” he promised.

He leaped for the fence, clawed his way to the top, and gave the tuft of fur a quick sniff. Sandstorm's scent flooded over him. The garden below him was overgrown with shrubs and a wild tangle of Twoleg flowers. Trees spread their branches over it, casting deep shadows. Firestar's paws tingled. This garden was almost like the forest; it was just the sort of place where his mate might hide.

“Sandstorm!” he called softly. “Sandstorm, are you there?”

There was no reply. Firestar dropped down into the garden and prowled through the undergrowth, his nose filled with the scents of leaves and flowers and other cats. He had lost Sandstorm's scent again, but he was sure she had to be close by. “Sandstorm!” he called again.

Just behind him a snarl broke the silence. Firestar whirled to see a tortoiseshell kittypet standing a tail-length away. Her back was arched and her teeth bared; her fur bristled, and her quivering tail was fluffed up to twice its size.

“What are you doing in my garden?” she spat.

Firestar gulped; obviously not all kittypets were lazy about defending their territory. “Look, keep your fur on,” he began. “I'm only—”

He broke off as the tortoiseshell leaped on him, hissing with rage, and bowled him off his paws.

“Shorty!” he yowled.

He battered at the tortoiseshell with his hind paws, but he still didn't have his full strength, and he couldn't throw her off. His side stung as she raked her claws down it.

“Trespasser!” she hissed in his ear.

Firestar struggled to bring his head around and sink his teeth into her neck. Then from somewhere close by he heard the furious yowl of another cat. Suddenly the tortoiseshell's weight vanished. Firestar lay limp on the ground for a couple of heartbeats, thankful that Shorty had come to his rescue.

Then he looked up and scrambled to his paws with a gasp of amazement. The newcomer wasn't Shorty at all; it was
Sandstorm! The ginger she-cat had flung the tortoiseshell to the ground; she jabbed her hind paws into the kittypet's belly and fastened her teeth into her ear. The kittypet fought furiously for a moment longer, then tore herself away and fled toward the Twoleg nest.

“Sandstorm!” Firestar panted. He stood gazing at his mate; her sides were heaving, and blood welled from scratches on her shoulder.

“Think yourself lucky I turned up in time to save your pelt!” Sandstorm hissed.

“I didn't ask you to!” Firestar flashed back. “I could have taken care of myself.”

Sandstorm's lip curled disbelievingly. “Oh, sure.”

Firestar stared at her. This wasn't how he had imagined his reunion with Sandstorm would be. “Listen—”

“Is everything okay?” Shorty interrupted; Firestar looked up to see his head popping up over the fence. “Hey! You found her!”

“No,
I
found
him,
” Sandstorm growled. She sounded as if she wished she hadn't. “I'm surprised you even bothered to look for me,” she went on to Firestar, her green eyes glittering with hostility. “After all, what's one Clanmate compared with all the nameless cats who are depending on you who knows where? Why didn't you go on looking for them, instead?”

Firestar was too worn-out to quarrel with her any more. Padding over to her, drinking in her warm, familiar scent, he murmured, “I would have searched for you forever. I would
never have gone on without you.”

Sandstorm gazed at him for a long moment. “I meant it when I said I wanted to come on this journey,” she mewed. “But I want to
share
your mission. I want to understand why you need to help this Clan, and play an equal part in finding them.”

“But StarClan sent the dream only to me—” Firestar began.

“That's not true,” Sandstorm pointed out. “What about Smudge? This Clan must be desperate for help if they would try talking to a kittypet. Surely two cats are better than one?”

Firestar rested his muzzle against hers. He remembered how he had felt when he thought he had lost her forever. Now he knew that he could never complete his journey without Sandstorm by his side.

“Excuse me for interrupting,” Shorty meowed from his perch on the fence, “but are you two going to stay down there all night?”

For a heartbeat Firestar met Sandstorm's green gaze. So much passed between them that could never be put into words. Then he tore himself away.

“Sorry,” he mewed, leaping to the top of the fence to balance beside Shorty. “Can you show us the way out of here?”

“We need to get back to the river,” Sandstorm added as she joined them.

“No problem. Follow me.”

Shorty led them back across the gardens. They crossed a small Thunderpath, quiet but lit by the glare of orange
Twoleg lights, and padded down yet another passage between two Twoleg nests.

“Not far now,” Shorty announced cheerfully.

At the end of the gardens the passage came out into a rough grassy space. Firestar lifted his muzzle as the scent of the river washed over him. He could hear the soft rush of water in the distance.

“Thank you,” he meowed to Shorty. “Thank you for everything. I'd never have found Sandstorm without your help.”

Sandstorm dipped her head. “Thanks for scaring off those Twoleg kits, too.”

The brown tabby gave his chest fur a few licks to hide his embarrassment. “Good luck.” His eyes narrowed. “I reckon you're up to something where you might need all the luck you can get.”

“You're right; we do,” Sandstorm agreed.

“I hope we might see you again someday,” Shorty meowed.

“I hope so too,” Firestar replied.

Shorty waved the stump of his tail in farewell. He stood watching at the mouth of the passage while Firestar and Sandstorm padded side by side across the tussocky grass and down to the river.

Throughout the night, Firestar and Sandstorm
traveled slowly upstream beneath a claw scratch of moon. They left behind the familiar stretch of river with the Twolegplace standing forlornly in a sea of mud, and the path that led to the deserted Twolegplace. The river shrank and flowed more swiftly, chattering over stones; a thick hedge bordered it, leaving only a narrow path for the cats to pass.

Firestar didn't feel the need to talk; it was enough to have Sandstorm back with him, padding alongside him.

At last the first traces of dawn appeared on the horizon. The sky grew milky pale, and one by one the warriors of StarClan winked out.

“Do you think we should eat now?” Firestar suggested. He didn't want Sandstorm to think he was making all the decisions. “Then we could rest for a bit.”

“What?” Sandstorm's green eyes flew wide with shock. “Rest? Eat? Are you completely mouse-brained? We should keep going.”

Firestar stared at her. “Well, if that's what you want…”

Amusement glimmered in Sandstorm's eyes, and she let
out a tiny snort of laughter. “No, you daft furball, I'm only joking. Eating's a great idea, and as for resting, I'm practically asleep on my paws!”

Flicking her ear with his tail tip, Firestar halted and stretched his jaws wide to taste the air. There was a strong scent of vole. Sandstorm angled her ears forward. “There,” she murmured.

Firestar caught sight of the creature pulling itself out of the water a couple of tail lengths farther up the bank. “If we're not careful, it'll go straight back into the river.”

“Stay there,” Sandstorm breathed.

Slinking up the side of the hedge, she passed the vole and started creeping back toward it. When she was close to it, she leaped to the edge of the river, the water splashing up around her paws. Startled, the vole dashed up the bank, straight into Firestar's paws. He killed it with a swift bite to the neck.

“That was brilliant!” he exclaimed as Sandstorm joined him, shaking her wet paws.

“Don't expect me to make a habit of it,” she replied, flicking a droplet of water crossly from her nose. “I'm not a RiverClan cat.”

As they shared the vole, the daylight grew stronger and the sun came up. The sky was blue, with only a few faint traces of cloud, high and misty. Firestar felt the warmth of the sun soaking into his fur.

“Let's find a comfortable place to sleep,” he suggested when he had finished the last mouthful of vole.

Sandstorm's only reply was a yawn.

Not much farther along the path, they discovered a soft patch of moss among the hedge roots. Sunlight shone through the branches, dappling their pelts as they curled up together. Feeling Sandstorm's tongue rasping along his neck, Firestar relaxed for what felt like the first time in days. He bent his head to his mate's, sharing tongues until sleep drifted over them both.

 

Firestar stood on the riverbank. It looked like the place where he had fallen asleep, but the hedge wasn't so tall and bushy, and there was no sign of Sandstorm. Panic clawed at him for a moment. Then he realized that he was standing at the edge of a large group of cats. Some of them were sitting at the water's edge, while others lay stretched out as if they were exhausted.

Sound gradually faded up around him, the fretful mewling of kits and wails of distress from older cats.

“How much farther?” a tabby kit was asking his mother.

“My paws are sore!” a little tortoiseshell added.

Their mother, a beautiful gray-furred queen, bent to give them both a comforting lick. “Not far now,” she promised them. “And then we'll find a nice new home.”

“I don't
want
a new home,” the tortoiseshell kit protested. “I want to go back to our camp.”

Her mother gave her ears a gentle lick. “Our camp is gone,” she mewed. “Twolegs have taken it. But we'll find a better one; you'll see.”

The anxiety in her green eyes told Firestar that she wasn't
sure she was telling her kits the truth. He followed her gaze over the cats sprawled on the bank until he spotted the gray-and-white cat he had seen so many times, who had spoken to him in Smudge's garden. He stood commandingly on the brink of the river, his head turned upstream.

“Is this the right way?” he meowed quietly.

A small tabby she-cat, sitting on the bank beside him, replied, “You're our leader, so you have to decide. I've had no signs from StarClan since we left the forest.”

“StarClan don't care about us, Fawnstep,” growled the gray-and-white cat. “If they did, they would never have let the other Clans drive us out of the forest.” He bowed his head. “All we can do is keep going until we find a place to live.”

Movement in the corner of his eye distracted Firestar. He froze as a long-furred tabby kit darted straight at him. He waited for it to spot him and raise the alarm, but it bundled past him, so close that their pelts almost brushed, and never noticed him.

Suddenly realizing that none of the cats could see him, Firestar began to pad among them. He was horrified by how thin they were, their ribs visible through dull, ungroomed pelts.

A black-and-white elder was lying on his side, his breath coming in short gasps. “I can't go any farther,” he rasped. “You'll have to go on without me.”

“Rubbish,” a ginger warrior growled. “No cat is staying behind.”

The elder closed his eyes. “We should never have left the forest.”

A brown tabby she-cat came to stand beside the ginger tom. “We'll find a good place to stay; I promise.”

“Better than the one we left,” the ginger warrior agreed, lashing his tail. “Without the other Clans to bother us. No more border raids, no more prey stealing. And especially no more Twolegs. We'll have it all to ourselves.”

The black-and-white elder let out a faint hiss. “Buzzardtail, there have always been
five
Clans in the forest.”

“Not anymore,” the ginger tom muttered.

“We'll find you some fresh-kill,” the tabby meowed, “and you'll soon feel better.” Glancing at the tom, she added, “Let's hunt.”

The two cats left their Clanmates and began to prowl up the hedge. A squirrel sat chittering in a tree that spread its branches over the riverbank; the tabby she-cat gave an enormous leap and grabbed it in strong jaws, falling back to the ground with her prey between her paws.

Firestar stared in amazement. What a catch! He had never seen a cat jump so high. At first he was surprised that the ginger tom didn't congratulate her. Then he noticed that both cats had strong, muscular back legs; jumping must have been SkyClan's special skill, just as RiverClan cats could swim well and WindClan cats could run fast after rabbits.

The hunters took their fresh-kill back to the rest of their Clan. A couple of other warriors had killed voles, but it still wasn't enough. He saw the fresh-kill being shared among the
elders and mothers with kits first, just as he would expect from cats who followed the warrior code.

When the Clan had devoured the prey in a few ravenous bites, the gray-and-white leader padded into their midst. “It's time to go on,” he meowed.

The whole Clan rose to their paws. The gray-and-white cat took the lead, heading upriver. The ginger tom and the tabby supported the black-and-white elder. As they limped past Firestar, he realized he could see river and grass through each pelt. The SkyClan cats seemed to walk one by one into a bank of pale mist, and Firestar found himself blinking awake in the sunlight under the hedge.

“I
must
help them,” he murmured aloud. “Whatever happens, SkyClan must be found.”

 

For the next three sunrises Firestar and Sandstorm journeyed on. The river grew steadily narrower, foaming around sharp gray rocks. Everywhere Firestar could see traces of the huge wave that had swept Sandstorm away: scattered branches, debris caught in the hedge, drying puddles left on the path. In the shallows under the bank, moorhens called miserably for lost chicks.

“Do you think it's much farther?” Sandstorm meowed. “If the river gets much narrower, it'll vanish altogether.”

“You're right. We should start looking for signs of SkyClan,” Firestar replied.

“What sort of signs? Border scent markings?”

Firestar shook his head. “I doubt it. That would mean
there's still a Clan protecting its territory. The SkyClan cat I spoke to said the Clan had been scattered.”

“But there must be
some
SkyClan cats left,” Sandstorm pointed out. “Otherwise what are we doing here?”

“Maybe there'll be just a few cats, trying to live by the warrior code,” Firestar suggested.

Sandstorm nodded, then sighed. “I wonder. Or maybe they don't remember who they are anymore.”

Looking ahead, Firestar saw the jagged tops of a range of hills. They didn't look as sharp and bleak as Highstones, but they were higher than WindClan's moorland. It might have looked like a refuge to a fleeing Clan who wanted to be far away from other cats and Twolegs.

The path grew sandy, staining their paws orange and stinging their eyes when a breeze picked up. The sun was still strong; Firestar and Sandstorm were glad of the shade from trees that grew along the hedge.

Firestar felt his neck fur begin to bristle as two or three Twoleg nests came into view. Was this the beginning of another Twolegplace to get lost in? The path led right past the front of the nests, and a litter of Twoleg kits were running up and down.

Sandstorm touched his shoulder with her tail tip. “Let's see if we can get around.”

She found a gap in the hedge and led the way through into a field of rough grass. The two cats padded across it, skirting the fences of Twoleg gardens, until they came to a narrow Thunderpath.

Firestar paused; the reek of monsters was faint and stale. He glanced at Sandstorm. “Do you think it's safe to cross?”

Sandstorm gave a quick glance up and down, then darted across. Firestar followed hard on her paws. On the other side was more rough grass, and it didn't take long to skirt the remaining Twoleg nests until the river came in sight again.

As they drew closer, Firestar could hear the squeals of more Twoleg kits. He let out a faint hiss of annoyance; he thought they had dodged all the Twolegs by avoiding the nests. Once he reached the path again he could see that here the river widened into a round, shallow pool. Several Twoleg kits were bouncing around in the shallows, shrieking happily and splashing one another with water. On the bank two older Twoleg females sat on pelts.

“Playing in water!” Sandstorm wrinkled her nose with disgust as she came to stand beside Firestar. “I always knew Twolegs were mad. They'll freeze to death without any hair on their pelts.”

Before she finished speaking, a louder screech came from the young Twolegs. A couple of them bounded out of the water and dashed toward Firestar and Sandstorm with their paws outstretched, sending drops of water flying.

“Run!” Firestar meowed.

The first Twoleg kit nearly grabbed him as he whisked away. Behind him, he heard a yowl from one of the older Twoleg females. Glancing back, he saw that she had risen to her paws and was calling the young Twolegs, who trailed back toward her. Still, he and Sandstorm kept running until the
river curved away and the Twoleg kits were left behind.

At last they halted, sides heaving, where an elder bush cast deep shade over the riverbank.

“I can hear something,” Sandstorm whispered.

Firestar pricked his ears. From somewhere ahead came a roaring sound like the waterfall in RiverClan territory. Cautiously he led the way around the next bend.

In front of him, water slid in a smooth curve over the top of a cliff, turning to white foam as it tumbled over jutting rocks and crashed into a pool below. The air was full of mist, splitting the sunlight into tiny dancing rainbows.

Firestar stood still for a moment, enjoying the cool spray as it soaked into his hot fur. Meanwhile Sandstorm padded up to the edge of the pool and ventured out onto an overhanging rock.

“Be careful!” Firestar called out, his heart lurching as he imagined her falling into the churning pool. “The rocks will be slippery.”

Sandstorm waved her tail to show she'd heard him; Firestar hoped she wasn't annoyed that he'd tried to warn her. A couple of heartbeats later, the ginger she-cat darted a paw down into the water; silver flashed in the air, and a fish lay wriggling on the rock. Sandstorm planted a paw on it to stop it from flopping back into the pool.

“Hey, I thought you said you weren't a RiverClan cat,” Firestar teased as he bounded up to her.

Sandstorm picked the fish up in her jaws and joined him on the bank. “The stupid creature practically came up and
begged to be caught,” she told him, dropping her prey at his paws.

ThunderClan cats didn't usually eat fish, but Firestar found the unfamiliar taste delicious as he devoured his share. Cleaning his whiskers when he had finished, he looked up at the cliff face beside the waterfall. Moss-covered rocks jutted out of it, with clumps of fern spilling over them.

“It doesn't look too hard to climb,” he mewed. “We'd better try, before the sun goes down.”

He started to claw his way up the rocks, anxiety throbbing through him as he struggled to keep his balance. The water thundered down less than a tail-length away; if they slipped into it they would be flung into the pool below. Where the rocks were bare they were slick with spray, and the moss pulled away when Firestar tried to put his weight on it. Ferns slapped him in the face, showering him with drops of water.

Dragging himself onto a flat rock, he paused for a moment to rest, his flanks heaving as he fought for breath. Looking back to check on Sandstorm, he spotted her balanced precariously on a boulder at the bottom of a sheer slab of rock.

“Are you stuck?” he called to her. “Hang on; I'll come down and help.”