“I hope you will,” Sharpclaw replied calmly. “My job will be done then.”
“I think that’s enough battle training for today.” Firestar rose to his paws. “Sharpclaw, when Sparrowpaw gets back from hunting patrol, I thought you and Leafdapple could give the two apprentices an assessment.”
“What’s that?” Cherrypaw asked curiously.
“Your mentor gives you a task,” Firestar explained.
“Usually to go and hunt in a particular place. Then they fol-3 8 4
low you and see how you get on, but you won’t see them. In ThunderClan every apprentice—”
He broke off at the sound of pawsteps dashing along the gorge, and a cat yowling his name. Spinning around, he caught sight of Sparrowpaw, his tabby fur bristling and his amber eyes wide with fear.
“We’ve been attacked!” He gasped. “Patchfoot’s hurt.”
“Show me,” Firestar snapped.
Sparrowpaw turned and raced back down the gorge; Firestar followed, with Sharpclaw and Cherrypaw hard on his paws.
When he rounded the curve and passed the Rockpile, Firestar saw Shortwhisker and Sandstorm dragging Patchfoot down the lowest part of the trail to lay him in the shade of the cliff. His head hung limply and his tail dragged in the sand; blood dripped from a wound in his shoulder. Firestar’s belly lurched.
When he padded up to Patchfoot’s side he saw that his chest was heaving with rapid, shallow breaths. His eyes were open, filled with pain and fear.
“What happened?” Firestar asked, turning to Sandstorm.
Sandstorm rested her tail reassuringly on Patchfoot’s uninjured shoulder. “Don’t worry,” she mewed. “We’ll fix you up as good as new.” Giving her attention to Firestar, she went on, “We were attacked by rats outside the abandoned Twoleg barn.”
“More rats than you’ve ever seen in your life!” Shortwhisker gasped. His fur was still fluffed out with shock.
Icy claws pricked Firestar’s spine. “I knew there was something wrong with that place,” he meowed.
“We fought them off,” Sandstorm continued, “but two of them jumped on Patchfoot.”
“You’re wounded yourself,” Firestar pointed out, noticing a patch of fur matted with blood on her side.
Sandstorm twitched her ears. “That’s nothing. I’ll see to it when I’ve done what I can for Patchfoot.”
By this time, more of the cats had appeared: Leafdapple came down from the warriors’ den, while Petal and Rainfur, who had been playing with their kits a little way downriver, padded up and gazed anxiously at the wounded warrior.
“Will he die?” Petal’s voice quavered.
“Not if I can help it,” Sandstorm replied. “Cherrypaw, go to the Whispering Cave and get me some moss. Sparrowpaw, you go into some of the unused caves and bring me as many cobwebs as you can find.”
Sparrowpaw’s whiskers quivered with surprise. “Cobwebs?”
“To stop the bleeding.” Sandstorm flicked her tail at him.
“Hurry!”
Once the two apprentices had scurried off, Firestar and Leafdapple picked up Patchfoot and carried him to the lowest cave, which Skywatcher had told them once belonged to the Clan’s medicine cat. There was a large outer cave with some scrapes in the floor, and a smaller, deeper cave beyond it that would have been the medicine cat’s den. In a niche in the rock Sandstorm had discovered a few ancient, crumbled leaves, and the scent of sweet herbs seemed to hang in the air.
Patchfoot let out a groan when his Clanmates moved him, and by the time they laid him down in the medicine cat’s cave he had lost consciousness.
“Do you think you can help him?” Firestar asked.
Sandstorm’s green eyes were anxious. “I don’t know. I can stop the bleeding with cobwebs, but I’m worried the wounds will get infected. Cinderpelt would use marigold or horsetail, but I don’t know where they grow around here.”
“I do.” The voice was Petal’s; the pale gray cat had followed them and was looking in through the cave entrance. “There’s marigold in my Twoleg’s garden.”
Sandstorm spun around, hope gleaming in her green eyes.
“Can you get some?”
Petal flattened her ears; Firestar could see that she was trembling. “How… how important is it?”
“Very,” Sandstorm replied.
Petal straightened her shoulders. “Then I’ll go fetch some.”
“Oh, no, you won’t.” Rainfur appeared beside Petal. “I’ll go.
I know where the marigold grows.” He gave Petal’s ear a lick.
“You look after the kits, and I’ll be back before you know it.”
“That would be great,” Firestar meowed.
Rainfur darted off, and Firestar padded over to Petal.
“Thanks for offering, but you shouldn’t have to go back to that Twoleg nest again.”
Petal looked up at him, her eyes wide with guilt.
“Sometimes I think I should have stayed with my Twoleg,” she murmured. “But I can’t bear even to think about him.”
“You don’t have to,” Firestar told her. “You’re safe here.”
Petal dipped her head and went out, calling to her kits.
Sandstorm crouched down beside Patchfoot and began to clean the blood from his shoulder wound with strong rasps of her tongue. Firestar watched her for a couple of heartbeats, then went back outside, passing Cherrypaw as she entered with a huge bundle of moss.
The rest of the Clan was gathered around Shortwhisker, listening to his account of the rat attack. “And then they poured out of the barn as thick as a river!” he meowed. “You couldn’t see the ground for rats.”
“That’s enough.” Firestar stepped forward and silenced the tabby warrior with a flick of his tail. The Clan was shocked enough by Patchfoot’s injuries without hearing exaggerated stories of how he came by them. “I’ve dealt with rats before,” he went on. “They’re nasty creatures, but a strong patrol of cats can beat them. Sharpclaw, you can come with me. And Cherrypaw…” He waved the apprentice over as she reappeared from the medicine cat’s cave. “We’ll go and check this out for ourselves.”
“Aren’t you glad you practiced those fighting moves?”
Sharpclaw muttered to his apprentice.
Cherrypaw’s only reply was an enthusiastic wave of her tail; her eyes were gleaming with excitement.
“Leafdapple, you’re in charge of the camp while we’re away.
If I were you, I would get all the kits inside the nursery with Clovertail, and then guard the entrance. Just in case.”
The tabby she-cat dipped her head. “Don’t worry, Firestar.
We’ll be fine.” She bounded off to round up the kits.
Firestar took a last look at the camp, then led the way up the stony trails to the top of the cliff. There was no scent of rats here, just the hot reek of Patchfoot’s blood, but he ordered the patrol to keep silent, and crept as stealthily as he could through the undergrowth and across the scrubland toward the Twoleg barn.
Long before he reached it he began to pick up a strong rat scent, and as he and his patrol drew closer the sense of a malevolent force, of cold eyes watching him from the shadows, swept over him again. Firestar shivered to the roots of his pelt.
Rats!
That was what he had sensed in the undergrowth downstream. Rats whose hatred of cats spilled out like a dark, poisonous river. He was surprised at the strength of that hatred, and how focused it was. The rats he had met before had been vicious, but not like this, purposeful and cunning.
Everything was quiet as the SkyClan patrol approached the shiny fence that surrounded the barn. The ragged holes in the walls seemed to stare at them, but except for the scent there was no sign of a rat.