“Don’t fall in!” warned a voice behind Graywing. “All this damp weather is bound to bring coughs and stiff joints, so we need our medicine cat!”
111
Graywing turned to see a sleek tortoiseshell she-cat padding over the stones toward her. “Don’t worry, Brindleclaw. I have no intention of going for a swim today.”
A ginger tom slid out of the reeds behind Brindleclaw. He scowled at the flooded river. “We’ll be living off voles for a while,” he predicted. “We can’t risk any of our warriors trying to catch fish in that.”
Brindleclaw nodded. “I’ll warn the hunting patrols to stay well clear of the river until the level has gone down. Perhaps you could take a patrol into the fields, Foxwhisker?”
The ginger warrior grunted in agreement.
Graywing jumped down from the rock. “I need to see if my supply of mallow has survived the floods. I’ll see you back at the camp.”
Brindleclaw opened her mouth to reply, then stopped, staring straight past Graywing with a look of horror in her eyes. Graywing spun around. Three tiny fluffy shapes were clinging to the side of the gorge on the WindClan side, their hind legs dangling over the foaming water below.
“Great StarClan!” snarled Foxwhisker. “What on earth do those kits think they’re doing?”
Brindleclaw was already running along the bank toward the mouth of the gorge. “It doesn’t matter what they’re doing!” she called over her shoulder. “They’re going to fall!”
As she spoke, one of the kits lost its grip on the rocks and fell like a ripe apple into the river. There was a high-pitched squeal from one of its denmates, and another bundle plunged down into the water.
Graywing felt as if her paws were frozen to the ground; the only thing she could do was watch as the third kit fell. It was impossible to see where they landed; any little splashes were swallowed up in the foam as the river burst out of the narrow canyon.
“Come on!” Brindleclaw yowled. “We have to help them!” She reached the end of the open river and raced down the shore to where the water exploded out of the gorge.
“Stop!” Graywing screeched. Her paws suddenly let go of their grip on the stones and she tore after Brindleclaw with Foxwhisker on her heels. “You can’t go in!”
Brindleclaw stared at her. “What do you mean? Those kits will drown if we don’t get them out!”
Graywing felt a pain in her chest as if she had just swallowed a boulder. “They’re probably dead already,” she forced herself to say.
“We can’t risk our own lives trying to save them. Besides, they are
WindClan kits. They are not ours to save.”
Beside them, there was a tiny squeak from the waves, and a paw the size of a blackberry shot above the surface before disappearing again.
“They’re not dead!” Brindleclaw gasped. She bunched her haunches, ready to leap into the water, but Graywing took hold of her scruff with her teeth.
“I can’t let you do this!” she choked through thick tortoiseshell fur. “StarClan made me medicine cat to serve RiverClan, not risk my Clanmates’ lives to help other Clans.”
Brindleclaw wrenched herself free and glared at Graywing. “How can you watch those kits drown without doing anything? What kind of a medicine cat are you?”
“One that is loyal to her Clan above all else,” Graywing murmured. The pain in her chest swelled until she couldn’t breathe, and her vision blurred.
“Graywing is right,” meowed Foxwhisker. “It would have been madness to risk the life of a RiverClan warrior to save cats from another Clan. Come on, Brindleclaw.”
The two warriors crunched away over the stones. Graywing let her legs crumple beneath her until she was slumped on the pebbles, feeling them hard and cold through her pelt. The only thing she could think of was the pitiful cry from the river as the kit had been swept away.
Ivystar, the RiverClan leader, was shocked to hear about the WindClan kits, but agreed that Graywing had been right not to let Brindleclaw jump in. She studied her medicine cat closely as Graywing stood before her with her head bowed. “It wasn’t your fault those kits fell in,” Ivystar murmured. “I’m sure they were told over and over to stay away from the gorge.”
Graywing shook her head. “Their poor mother. Such a terrible loss for their Clan.”
“And it could have been a terrible loss for RiverClan, too, if Brindleclaw had gone in after them,” Ivystar pointed out. “Now go get some rest. I’ll tell the patrols to keep an eye out for your mallow plants.”
Graywing walked slowly to her den. Two RiverClan kits, Wildkit and Minnowkit, bounced around her.
“Did you really see those kits drown?”
“Were they all wet and horrid looking?”
“Did their eyes fall out?”
“Wildkit! Minnowkit! Stop asking such horrible questions!” their mother scolded from the nursery. “Come back here at once!”
Graywing didn’t look up. She padded to her nest and curled up with her nose under her tail. It’s not my fault that those kits died.
So why do I feel so guilty?
When Graywing opened her eyes, moonlight flooded her den and the camp was still and quiet. She sat up, shocked that she’d slept for so long. The reeds that shielded her den rattled, and she heard a soft murmur from the clearing. Wondering if a cat had been taken ill, Graywing slipped out of her nest and pushed her way through the reeds. Three cats stood in the center of the camp, their fur frosted by the dazzling white light.
“Who are you?” Graywing stammered. These weren’t
RiverClan warriors, and she didn’t recognize them from Gatherings. She wondered how they had managed to get all the way into the camp without being challenged.
The tallest of the strangers, hard-muscled beneath his brown tabby coat, dipped his head. “Greetings, Graywing,” he meowed.
“My name is Runningstorm of WindClan. This is Wolfheart”—he nodded to the elegant gray she-cat beside him—“and our leader, Smallstar.”
The third cat, whose tiny frame was covered in sleek black-and-white fur, looked at Graywing. His blue eyes were friendly as he mewed, “We have traveled far to see you.”
Graywing looked from one cat to the other. “I don’t understand. Has something happened to Fallowstar?”
Smallstar shook his head. “Fallowstar is fine. We are the cats who would have been.”
Graywing stared at them in horror. The image of three terrified bundles, falling one by one into the churning river, filled her eyes. “You are the kits who drowned,” she whispered.
Wolfheart bent her head. “That is so. Come, we have something to show you.”
She turned and led the way across the clearing toward the nursery. Graywing followed without having to tell her paws what to do; they seemed to be carrying her on their own.
Runningstorm nosed aside the bramble that was draped across the entrance to the nursery, protecting the precious cats inside. “Look,” he urged Graywing.
Oh, StarClan, let our kits be all right, Graywing prayed as she poked her head inside. Had the WindClan kits returned to punish her by hurting the youngest RiverClan cats?
The den smelled warm and milky, and enough moonlight filtered through the branches for Graywing to see Hayberry curled around Wildkit and Minnowkit, who snuffled gently in their sleep. Hayberry’s flank rose and fell in time with her kits’ breathing, and although her eyelids flickered when Graywing looked at her, she didn’t stir.