Warriors Super Edition: Yellowfang’s Secret (25 page)

When she recovered, panting and blinking, she saw Hal’s body lying limp on the ground with a great gush of scarlet blood flowing from his throat, staining the snow. “You killed him!” she gasped, staring in horror.

“He should have left when he had the chance,” Raggedpelt snarled.

“But he was your father!” Yellowfang protested.

Raggedpelt turned to face her. Yellowfang could see her own horror reflected in his eyes, but his voice was cold. “He was nothing but a useless kittypet.”

Before Yellowfang could say more, new cat scent drifted over her. Russetpaw and Boulder emerged through the trees along with Frogtail and Deerleap.

“What’s going on?” Boulder demanded.

“Marmalade and the kittypets are attacking our camp,” Yellowfang explained. “They think we’re keeping you as prisoners.”

As she spoke, Russetpaw spotted Hal’s body and bounded forward to stand over him, looking down at him in dismay. “What happened?” she gasped, her voice shaking.

“He tried to attack Yellowfang,” Raggedpelt replied. “I had no choice.”

Russetpaw and Boulder exchanged a horrified glance. Yellowfang opened her jaws to contradict Raggedpelt’s lie, then picked up his amber glare and knew there was nothing she could say that wouldn’t make everything worse.

“But the warrior code says …” Boulder began.

“This cat wasn’t part of the warrior code,” Raggedpelt interrupted. “Now come back to camp and tell the rest of these wretched cats that you don’t need rescuing.”

He set off toward the camp at a run. Boulder hesitated for a moment, then followed. Frogtail and Deerleap bounded after them.

Russetpaw remained standing over Hal’s body, gazing down at him with grief in her eyes.

Yellowfang padded up to her and gave her a gentle nudge. “We have to go.”

“He was my father,” Russetpaw whispered.

Oh, StarClan
. Yellowfang hoped that the young she-cat never learned that Hal was Raggedpelt’s father too.
At least there are other broad-shouldered dark tabbies in the Clan who Russetpaw might assume to be Raggedpelt’s father
.

Yellowfang gave Russetpaw another nudge and padded beside her until they reached the camp. Looking around, Yellowfang saw that although one or two skirmishes were still going on, most of the kittypets had surrendered. Clan cats stood over them, their flanks heaving and blood dripping from their scratches.

Cedarstar was standing in the center of the clearing. “Here are Russetpaw and Boulder.” His eyes gleamed as he beckoned the two young cats with his tail. “Let them step forward.”

Russetpaw and Boulder padded up to their Clan leader, a mixture of embarrassment and horror in their faces as they looked around at the battle-torn cats.

Cedarstar angled his ears toward Marmalade. “Tell this cat why you are here,” he commanded.

“We wanted to see what life was like in the forest,” Boulder began, raising his head confidently. “And we think it’s good.”

“We chose to stay,” Russetpaw added, ducking her head at Marmalade. “They’re not keeping us prisoners.”

Marmalade’s mouth fell open.

Pixie bounded up to his side, her eyes wide with astonishment. “How can you prefer to live with these wild, cruel creatures?” she demanded. “We came to rescue you!”

“Cruel?” There was an edge to Cedarstar’s voice. “We aren’t the cats who attacked. If you had come here peacefully and
asked,
there would have been no need for bloodshed.”

“It was Hal’s idea,” Marmalade admitted. “He refused to give up on you, Red. Where is he, by the way?” he added, glancing around.

“He’s dead,” Russetpaw choked out.

Marmalade and Pixie exchanged a horrified glance. Yellowfang heard a gasp from Featherstorm, too. Glancing at her, she saw nothing that suggested grief or shock in her expression, but Yellowfang guessed that the she-cat was not as indifferent as she liked to pretend.

“He had to die,” Raggedpelt growled. “He was attacking Yellowfang.”

“You may take his body away,” Cedarstar told Marmalade. “Leave our territory and stay out of it. We have treated you gently this time, believe me.”

Marmalade let out an angry hiss, but he turned to leave.

Pixie padded up to Russetpaw and Boulder. “If you ever change your mind, you’ll always be welcome to come back.”

“Thank you,” Boulder replied, dipping his head. “But we’re warriors now.”

Pixie shook her head sadly. “Hal paid for this with his life,” she mewed. “And it was all for nothing.”

“He was very brave,” Russetpaw murmured, her eyes still full of grief. “We won’t forget him, I promise.”

Yellowfang looked around for Raggedpelt, who had retreated to lurk at the edge of the clearing.
I bet there’s one cat who’ll try his hardest to forget him,
she thought.

Yellowfang crept across the marsh, her
pads sore from treading on rock-hard mud and ice-rimmed tussocks of grass. Though the snow had melted, the air was still bitterly cold, and Yellowfang’s breath puffed out in a cloud. Reeds poked up at the edge of frozen pools, the rattle of their feathery tops the only thing that broke the silence. There was no sound or scent of prey.

A moon had passed since the kittypet attack, and though the Clan cats’ wounds had healed, their strength hadn’t returned. It seemed as if leaf-bare would go on forever. Every cat was hungry all the time. Yellowfang could feel the bones jutting through her fur, and she couldn’t sleep at night because she felt the pangs of hunger in the bellies of her Clanmates.

We hunt all the time, day and night
.
And we still can’t find enough to eat. What’s going to happen to us?

She paused, watching Raggedpelt, who was padding along softly a few tail-lengths ahead of her. After a moment he stopped, his ears pricked to listen. Yellowfang slid toward him, following his gaze to a clump of grass about halfway between them. As she drew closer she heard a faint scratching among the brittle stems, and picked up the scent of a shrew.

Raggedpelt signaled to Yellowfang with his tail, then leaped at the clump of grass, swiping it with his forepaws. The shrew panicked and scuttled into the open, heading straight for Yellowfang. She dropped swiftly into the hunter’s crouch, but as she pounced one of her hind paws slipped on a patch of ice and she stumbled, landing awkwardly a tail-length away from her prey. Raggedpelt bounded forward, but he was too late. The shrew darted off, taking refuge in a tangle of scrubby thorns.

“Fox dung!” the tabby tom snarled. “Yellowfang, if that’s the best you can do, you’d better go back to camp.”

“Don’t be ridiculous,” Yellowfang snapped back at him. “Have you never lost a piece of prey? You know we have to keep hunting.”

Raggedpelt snorted, but said no more. As he and Yellowfang turned back toward the trees, Russetpaw and her mentor, Featherstorm, emerged from the shadow of the branches, heading toward the camp. Yellowfang bounded forward to meet them; as she drew closer she saw that Russetpaw was carrying a crow, her ears sticking up from behind a jumble of black feathers.

“You’ve managed to catch something!” Yellowfang meowed. “That’s great! There’s not so much as a mouse stirring out on the marshes.”

“Russetpaw found it,” Featherstorm responded, with an approving look at her apprentice.

Russetpaw’s eyes shone with pride, though Yellowfang noticed that Raggedpelt was bristling with a scowl on his face.

“The Clan will be pleased,” Yellowfang mewed, walking away. “We’ll see you later.” When Featherstorm and her apprentice were out of earshot, she turned to Raggedpelt. “There’s nothing wrong with Featherstorm praising Russetpaw. She deserved it.”

Raggedpelt sniffed. “That crow was a mangy old thing,” he muttered.

Impatience welled up inside Yellowfang and she let it spill over. “I’ve had enough of the way you always treat Russetpaw like a heap of mouse droppings,” she hissed. “It’s not her fault that Hal was her father, too. You have to find a way to deal with it. She’s not just your Clanmate, she’s your sister!”

Raggedpelt halted and stared at her. Too late, Yellowfang remembered that on the night of the battle he had headed for the camp with Boulder before Russetpaw had revealed that she was Hal’s daughter.

So? It won’t hurt him to face up to the truth
.

“Don’t ever say that again!” Raggedpelt growled with a lash of his tail. “I have no father. Russetpaw is nothing to me.” He turned his back on her, then glanced over his shoulder to add, “You’re lucky I was there to defend you when he started to attack. You didn’t stand a chance.”

Yellowfang felt her neck fur rise in shock.
That’s not how it happened!
But she knew there was no point in trying to make Raggedpelt see reason. He was too desperate to distance himself from Twolegplace and the cats who lived there.

Raggedpelt began to stalk away, then stopped, angling his ears toward a nearby clump of reeds. Easing her way around the stalks, Yellowfang spotted a blackbird pecking at the ground with its back to her. Paw step by paw step she crept up on it, while Raggedpelt edged forward on the other side.

StarClan! Don’t let me miss this one
. Yellowfang prayed as she dropped into a crouch. Leaping forward, she felt her claws sink into the bird as it fluttered up, then went limp between her paws.

“Great catch!” Raggedpelt exclaimed, padding up. His eyes gleamed; his bad temper had vanished. He bent to sniff the prey, then added, “I wonder when we’ll get our first apprentices. We must be ready to be mentors by now.”

“Sure we are,” Yellowfang responded. “But it might be a while. There’s only Cloudkit in the nursery.”

Raggedpelt nodded. “I want us to be mentors together.” He fixed his warm amber gaze on Yellowfang. “Wouldn’t it be great if I was leader and you were my deputy?” He paused, and Yellowfang caught a flash of uncertainty in his eyes. “That is, if you want to be with me,” he added.

Yellowfang blinked up at his handsome face and troubled eyes. She wished he could always be open to her like this, that he could curb his temper and his occasional obstinate silences. But what must it have been like, growing up without knowing who his father was? And then to discover that his father was a kittypet who wanted nothing to do with him? If Raggedpelt was angry sometimes, or reluctant to talk, wasn’t that understandable? “Of course I want to be with you,” she whispered.

Raggedpelt gave her ear a quick lick. “I’m glad. Now let’s take your prey back to camp,” he mewed.

Several cats clustered around them as Yellowfang dropped her blackbird onto the pitifully small fresh-kill pile.

“Good job, Yellowfang,” Deerleap murmured, making Yellowfang feel warm with pride at the praise from her former mentor. A few more cats congratulated her, too, though she noticed that others turned away with disappointed sniffs.

“Just a scrawny blackbird,” she heard Foxheart complain. “What use is that to any cat?”

Yellowfang ignored her. Since she had entered the camp a strange feeling was creeping over her: a tingling beneath her pelt, as if she was hot and cold at the same time.
What’s the matter with me now?

Leaving the cats beside the fresh-kill pile, Yellowfang tried to figure out where the feeling was coming from. Her paws carried her to the elders’ den; thrusting her head inside she saw Littlebird tossing restlessly in her nest. Her eyes were glazed and she was muttering something under her breath.