Of course she didn’t, Hawkwing thought to himself, feeling foolish, Sandynose is her real mate. Her Pebbleshine.
At the thought of his own mate, his breath caught. Then he asked himself how he would react if Pebbleshine suddenly came back to him, alive.
Plumwillow rubbed her cheek against Sandynose’s, purring loudly enough for Hawkwing to hear it across the hollow.
Yes, it would be just like that.
“But what happened to you?” Plumwillow asked, when their first joyous reunion was over.
“Fallowfern and I were trapped in a Twoleg den,” Sandynose explained. He waved his tail, and for the first time Hawkwing noticed that Fallowfern was standing a couple of fox-lengths away.
“The stupid creatures wouldn’t let us out, and it took us a half moon or so to outwit them and get away. We went back to the gorge, but it was full of rogues, so we went into the Twolegplace to find Ebonyclaw. She told us you were heading for Barley’s barn, and we decided to follow.”
“Did you get there?” Blossomheart asked urgently as more cats crowded up to greet the newcomers. “Did you see Cherrytail and Cloudmist?”
Hawkwing waited tensely for the answer.
“Yes, and they’re both fine,” Sandynose replied. “Getting nice and fat on Barley’s mice! So then,” he continued his story, “Barley showed us the right direction, and we’ve been wandering, trying to find you, ever since.”
“But how did you?” Tinycloud asked. “We’ve traveled so far!”
“Finally we came to a lake,” Sandynose replied. “The hunting was good, so we settled there for a while. We met a kittypet—he said his name was M ax—and he told us cats had been living there for a while, so that gave us hope we would catch up to you sooner or later. And now we can’t believe our luck!” he finished, with a loving look at his mate. “Plumwillow is alive—and our kits. Oh, StarClan, can I meet them?”
Her eyes shining proudly, Plumwillow turned back to the nursery and called to her kits. They emerged drowsily into the open, and Hawkwing could recognize the uncertainty and confusion in their eyes as they gazed up at Sandynose.
“Kits, this is your father,” Plumwillow explained.
Reedkit blinked in bewilderment, glancing from Sandynose to Hawkwing and back again. “But… I thought Hawkwing was our father,” she mewed.
Plumwillow gave her chest fur a couple of embarrassed licks.
“No,” she responded. “Hawkwing has helped me look after you since you were born, and he loves you very much, but he isn’t your father. Sandynose is your father.”
Sandynose turned his head to look at Hawkwing, surprised and not entirely pleased. His eyes narrowed and the tip of his tail switched. Hawkwing’s pelt grew hot as he shared Plumwillow’s embarrassment, and his heart began to pound as he wondered what Sandynose would say.
“It’s okay,” Plumwillow meowed rapidly, before her mate could speak. “Hawkwing helped me when I had a hard time at my kitting, and he’s been a huge help with the kits ever since. He lost his mate, too, so we had lots to talk about—just as friends.”
Hawkwing nodded, feeling how weird this was, and how he wanted to make it absolutely clear to Sandynose that he hadn’t stolen his mate. And now, I’m never going to. “That’s right, just as friends,” he confirmed.
Sandynose relaxed. “Thank you, Hawkwing,” he murmured. “I can never repay you for keeping my family safe.”
“Uh… don’t mention it,” Hawkwing responded. He was trying hard to hide the hurt he felt, as he remembered all the good times he had spent with the kits, playing and telling stories and beginning to teach them all they would need to know.
There’ll be times like that again. Hawkwing tried to believe that, but he knew he was deceiving himself.
Watching the kits chatting eagerly with their real father, Hawkwing felt the truth settle over him like a weight on his chest.
It will never be the same.
By now all the cats were awake, vying to tell Sandynose about their experiences since they left the gorge. Hawkwing watched sadly as Fallowfern struggled with the news that her mate
Waspwhisker had been taken by Twolegs at the lake.
“So what’s next for the Clan?” Sandynose asked eventually.
“Do you have any idea where you’re going?”
Hawkwing remembered that Sandynose had already been lost when Echosong had her vision of the Clan living beside a lake.
Sandynose’s eyes grew wide with wonder as she told him about it.
“At first, we thought the lake where you met M ax was the place in my vision,” the medicine cat explained. “But we were wrong. Too many Twolegs came there in greenleaf, and there was nowhere left for cats to live in peace.”
“So we moved on.” Leafstar took up the story. “But we haven’t found the lake of Echosong’s vision, and now we’ve come to a… a place where a decision must be made. Some cats are losing hope, and there are still moons of leaf-bare to come. Do we keep going, or do we split up and admit that SkyClan is… dead?”
“I’m sorry, Leafstar.” Plumwillow turned to her Clan leader, hope sparkling in her eyes. “For everything I said yesterday.
Seeing Sandynose and Fallowfern again has given me a change of heart. How could we ever have found each other again if we weren’t all destined to be together?”
“That’s right,” Sagenose—who had been almost as certain as Plumwillow that SkyClan had no future—agreed. “If Sandynose and Fallowfern could find us, then there’s hope that the others who stayed by the gorge, or even the cats who were lost by the lake, might come back to us someday.” He raised his head and let out a triumphant yowl. “Long live SkyClan!”
“Long live SkyClan! Long live SkyClan!” his Clanmates chorused around him. Their eyes shone with enthusiasm and commitment, and Hawkwing felt that he was part of the strong
SkyClan that he remembered, not a ragtag band of cats who were scarcely better than rogues or loners.
Hawkwing saw the relief that flooded into Leafstar’s amber eyes. He shared it, and yet he found himself struggling with conflicting emotions.
I’m glad that SkyClan lives on. But what is my place in it now?
Hawkwing led out a hunting patrol, and returned to find
Plumwillow and Sandynose playing with the kits outside the nursery. Sandynose was tossing a ball of moss to each kit in turn, catching it when they batted it back to him.
“Hey, Hawkwing, come and join us!” he called as Hawkwing padded past.
Hawkwing deposited his prey on the fresh-kill pile, then bounded over to the nursery. All three kits leaped up as he approached, jumping on him with mock growls and battering at him with their soft paws.
“Stinky badger!” Finkit snarled. “Get out of our camp!”
“Yes,” Dewkit added. “Get out or we’ll rip your fur off!”
Hawkwing rolled over and pretended to be terrified. He caught a glimpse of Sandynose, who was looking a little hurt as he watched the game.
How would I feel, he asked himself, if I was reunited with my kits at this age? I’d be very jealous of any cat who raised them in my place.
“Sorry, kits,” he mewed, rising to his paws and shaking them off gently. “I have to go and speak to Leafstar.”
Padding away, he felt as much pain as if they had really ripped his fur off, but he knew that he was doing the right thing.
Tiny paws were prodding Hawkwing all over, and he blinked himself awake. Shaking off sleep, he realized it was still the middle of the night; in the faint light of the moon he made out Dewkit, Reedkit, and Finkit standing over him.