called down to Thornclaw, “Divide the fish between Ferncloud and the elders,” before turning back towards the overhang.
As Squirrelpaw slipped beneath the jutting rock, she saw that it reached back further than she had expected. Smooth rock shielded the sides of the cave, but a chill wind swirled through the opening, stirring the jumbled scents of many cats. Her heart ached for the order and comfort of the old camp, and she closed her eyes, wishing that when she opened them again, she would see the thickly laced branches of the apprentices’ den around her instead of cold, hard stone.
“All the warriors share this den,” Dustpelt murmured in her ear, as if he had guessed what she was thinking. “There are not as many suitable sleeping places here.”
Squirrelpaw opened her eyes and looked around the hollow with rage pulsing through her paws. Twolegs had driven her Clan to this! The least she could do was lead them to a place of safety, where there would be proper sleeping places and enough fresh-kill for all the cats.
“At least there’s a little shelter,” muttered Sandstorm, although her fluffed-up fur suggested she was chilled to the bone.
Firestar sat near the back of the hollow. Sandstorm and Greystripe settled on either side of him. The ThunderClan deputy was hunched over in his private misery; Cinderpelt sat beside him, concern clouding her eyes.
“Now,” Firestar began, curling his tail over his paws. “Tell me everything from the beginning.”
Squirrelpaw felt the questioning eyes of her Clanmates burn into her pelt. Brambleclaw swept his tail along her flank before facing Firestar.
“StarClan visited me in a dream and told me to go to the sun-drown-place,” he explained. “I-I didn’t know if I should believe it at first, but StarClan sent the same dream to a cat from each of the other Clans: Crowpaw of WindClan, Feathertail of RiverClan, and Tawnypelt of ShadowClan.”
Firestar tipped his head to one side as Brambleclaw went on. “We were all told to make the journey to hear what Midnight told us.”
“What midnight told you?” Dustpelt echoed, bemused.
Firestar’s green gaze rested on Squirrelpaw, and she forced herself not to duck away. “Did you have this dream too?” he asked.
“No,” she confessed. “But I had to . . . I wanted to go. . . .” She searched for the words to explain why she left, but she did not want to tell Firestar that she had been trying to escape their quarrel. She fell silent, hanging her head.
“I’m glad she came with us!” Brambleclaw burst out. “She was equal to any of the warriors!”
After what seemed like nine lifetimes, Firestar nodded. “Carry on, Brambleclaw.”
“We headed towards the sun-drown-place, thanks to Ravenpaw’s help. He’d heard about the place of endless water from other rogue cats.”
“It was such a long way,” Squirrelpaw put in. “We thought we were lost so many times.”
“Ravenpaw told us which direction to go, but we didn’t know exactly how to get there,” Brambleclaw explained. “But StarClan had sent us, so we had to keep going.”
“Even though we didn’t know why they had sent us,” Squirrelpaw added.
Brambleclaw flexed his claws, making a tiny scraping sound on the hard floor. “We were only trying to do our duty to the Clan,” he murmured.
“A loner helped us through Twolegplace,” Squirrelpaw went on, remembering Purdy’s rather erratic sense of direction.
“And eventually we came to the sun-drown-place. It was like nothing we’d seen before,” Brambleclaw mewed. “High sandy cliffs with caves underneath, and dark blue water for as far as any cat could see, endlessly washing up and down the shore. The crashing water frightened us at first, it was so loud.”
“Then Brambleclaw fell in. I rescued him, but we were in a cave, and then we found Midnight.” Squirrelpaw’s words tumbled out incoherently.
“What do you mean, you ‘found midnight’?” Dustpelt demanded.
Brambleclaw shuffled his paws. “Midnight is a badger,” he meowed at last. “StarClan wanted us to find her because she could tell us what StarClan wanted us to know.”
“And what did she tell you?” Firestar’s ears twitched as he spoke.
“That the Twolegs would destroy the whole forest and leave us to starve,” Squirrelpaw mewed, her heart suddenly hammering as hard as the first time she had heard Midnight’s warning.
“She told us to lead you away from the forest and find a new home,” Brambleclaw added.
“New home?” Sandstorm stared at him in disbelief.
“So we should leave the forest just because a badger we’ve never heard of thinks it would be a good idea?” Dustpelt meowed.
Squirrelpaw closed her eyes. Was ThunderClan going to ignore Midnight’s warning? Had their journey and Feathertail’s death been for nothing?
“And did she say how we should find this place?” Grey-stripe sat up and leaned closer, the tip of his tail twitching.
Midnight’s words echoed in Squirrelpaw’s mind once more and she found herself repeating them out loud. “‘You will not be without a guide’—that’s what she said. ‘When return, stand on Great Rock when Silverpelt shines above. A dying warrior the way will show.’”
“Have you been to the Great Rock yet to look for this sign?” Firestar asked.
Brambleclaw shook his head. “We were going to meet there tomorrow with Tawnypelt, Stormfur, and Crowpaw. We were going to bring our leaders, if we could persuade them to come . . .”
“Are you going to go?” Mousefur flattened her ears.
“Nothing would keep me away,” Firestar replied.
Dustpelt stared wide-eyed at his leader. “You’re not actually thinking of taking the Clan out of the forest, are you?”
“Right now, I don’t know what I’m going to do,” Firestar admitted. “But I’m not sure the Clan can survive leaf-bare.” He met Dustpelt’s stare, and for a moment Squirrelpaw saw his eyes flash. “I cannot let my Clan suffer if there’s anything I can do to prevent it. We cannot ignore this message, however it came to us. It may be our only hope of survival. If there is a sign, I want to see it for myself.”
He straightened and looked at Brambleclaw. “Tomorrow, I will go with you to Fourtrees.”
“Sasha!” Mistyfoot called again. “Is that you?”
There was no reply.
Leafpaw pressed her muzzle against the web and peered out. She had heard of Sasha many times, and was curious to see the rogue she-cat who had taken Tigerstar as her mate and given birth to
