it’s so important,” Squirrelpaw persisted. “They must come!”
“We can try,” Brambleclaw decided. “Squirrelpaw’s right. This might be the best way to share the news.”
“OK,” Crowpaw meowed. “We’ll meet at Fourtrees tomorrow night, with or without our leaders.”
“Fourtrees!” Webfoot’s growl made Squirrelpaw jump. The WindClan warrior had obviously overheard their conversation. She felt a stab of guilt, although she knew there was no disloyalty to their Clans in what they were planning—quite the opposite, in fact. But Webfoot seemed to have other fears on his mind.
“You can’t meet at Fourtrees. There’s nothing left of it!” he spat.
Squirrelpaw felt her blood chill.
“What do you mean?” Tawnypelt demanded.
“All the Clans watched the Twolegs destroy it two moonrises ago, when we arrived for the Gathering. The Twolegs and their monsters cut down every one of the oaks.”
“They cut down the oaks?” Squirrelpaw echoed.
“That’s what I said,” growled Webfoot. “If you’re mouse-brained enough to go there, you’ll see for yourself.”
Squirrelpaw’s fierce desire to return home, to see her Clan and father and mother and sister, washed over her again like a wave, and her paws twitched with the urge to run back to the forest. The others seemed to share her feeling; Brambleclaw’s gaze hardened, and Stormfur kneaded the ground impatiently with his paws.
Crowpaw glanced at his Clanmates and then back at his friends. “Good luck,” he meowed quietly. “I still think we should meet there tomorrow night, even if the oaks have gone.” When Brambleclaw and Stormfur nodded, he turned and followed Webfoot into the heather.
As the WindClan cats disappeared from sight, Brambleclaw scented the air. “Let’s go,” he ordered. “We’re heading over the old badger set towards the river, Tawnypelt, but I think you should stay with us till we reach the WindClan border.”
“But it would be quicker if I head straight towards the Thunderpath,” Tawnypelt argued.
“It will be safer if we keep together till we’re off the moorland,” Stormfur meowed. “You don’t want to be caught alone on WindClan territory.”
“I’m not scared of WindClan,” Tawnypelt hissed. “Judging by those warriors, they’re hardly battle-fit.”
“We mustn’t do anything to provoke them,” Brambleclaw warned. “No cat knows yet where we’ve been, or what we have to tell them.”
“And we don’t know what the Twolegs have done here,” Stormfur added. “If we run into any of their monsters, we’ll be better off together.”
Tawnypelt gazed intently at her companions for a moment, then nodded.
Squirrelpaw blinked with relief. She did not want to say goodbye to another friend just yet.
Brambleclaw charged away over the moor, and the three other cats followed close behind. As they raced across the grass, the weak leaf-fall sunshine scarcely warmed the fur on Squirrelpaw’s back. They ran in silence, and she felt their mood darken as though a cloud had covered the sky. Ever since leaving the mountains, they had concentrated on nothing but reaching the forest, all equally desperate to return home. Squirrelpaw was beginning to think it might have been easier to keep travelling, to journey forever through unfamiliar territory, rather than face the responsibility of having to tell the Clans that they would have to leave their homes or else face a terrible death. But there was still the sign of the dying warrior to come—they had to see this through.
The reek of Twoleg monsters stung her nostrils as they approached the border. There was no sign of any prey: no birds in the sky and no scent of rabbits among the gorse. WindClan had never been an easy territory to hunt in, but there had always been traces of prey on the breeze or in the sandy soil. Even the buzzards, which often hovered over the wide stretch of moorland, were gone.
The four cats reached the crest of a rise, and Squirrelpaw swallowed hard, fighting the urge to retch as the tang of monsters grew stronger. Taking a deep breath, she forced herself to look down the slope. A whole slice of land had been carved out of the moorland, brown and grey and broken instead of the smooth green expanse that had been there when the cats began their journey. In the distance, Twoleg monsters growled across the ground, chewing the earth with their heavy paws to leave a trail of useless mud.
Trembling, Squirrelpaw whispered, “No wonder WindClan moved to the rabbit warrens! The Twolegs must have destroyed their camp.”
“They’ve destroyed everything,” Brambleclaw breathed.
“Let’s get out of here,” Tawnypelt hissed. Squirrelpaw heard anger in her voice, and saw her long, hooked claws sink into the grass.
Brambleclaw continued to stare at the ravaged landscape. “I can’t believe how much they’ve destroyed.”
Squirrelpaw’s throat tightened. Seeing Brambleclaw’s misery was almost as bad as looking at the ruined moor. “Come on,” she urged. “We have to get home and find out what has happened to our Clans.”
He nodded. Squirrelpaw saw him brace his shoulders as if he were literally carrying the weight of the message they had to take to their Clan. Without saying anything else, he headed down the slope, keeping well away from the Twoleg monsters, and together the cats picked their way across the swath of churned-up ground. Squirrelpaw was grateful for the cold night that had set the mud hard; if it rained, this would turn into a clogging brown river, enough to swallow kits and suck at the bellies of the longest-legged warriors.
When they reached the WindClan border where the land swept down to the forest, Tawnypelt paused. “I’ll leave you here,” she meowed. Her voice was calm but her eyes betrayed her sadness. “We’ll meet at Fourtrees tomorrow, whatever the Twolegs have done,” she promised.
“Good luck with Blackstar,” Brambleclaw meowed, rubbing his muzzle along his sister’s cheek.
“I don’t need luck,” she replied grimly. “I will do whatever it takes to persuade Blackstar to come with me. Our quest isn’t over yet. We have to keep going for the sake of our Clans.”
Squirrelpaw felt a renewed burst of energy as the tortoiseshell warrior pelted away toward the ShadowClan border. “And we’ll persuade Firestar!” she called after her.
The grass grew softer under their paws as Brambleclaw, Squirrelpaw, and Stormfur approached the RiverClan border; soon Squirrelpaw could scent the markers and hear the distant thundering of water in the gorge. RiverClan territory lay on the other side, and just beyond the gorge there was a Twoleg bridge that would take Stormfur across the river to his camp.
Brambleclaw paused as if he expected Stormfur to leave them there, but Stormfur just looked into his eyes. “I’m coming with you to the ThunderClan camp,” he meowed quietly.
“Coming with us? Why?” Squirrelpaw exclaimed.
“I want to tell my father about Feathertail,” he replied.
“But we can tell him,” she offered,
