Graystripe’s amber eyes remained full of fear and uncertainty. “Even if that’s true, why did they leave without telling us where they were going, or why?” he meowed. “If Stormfur and Feathertail had a problem, why didn’t they come to me first?”
“We think the other Clans might have lost cats too,” Sorreltail meowed. “We should ask them.”
Firestar and Graystripe exchanged a glance. “Perhaps,” mewed Firestar; Leafpaw could tell how hard he was struggling to sound decisive, to act like a Clan leader instead of a desperately worried father. “The next Gathering is only a few days away.”
“StarClan keep them all safe!” Graystripe added fervently.
Leafpaw suspected that he had little faith in his prayer; he knew well enough the dangers that stalked outside the forest.
As she left her father’s den, she felt the burden of her knowledge weighing even more heavily on her. She was the only cat in the forest who had heard that there were two prophecies, and knew what each of them said.
But I’m only an apprentice, she told herself anxiously. I know them by accident, not because our warrior ancestors chose to tell me themselves. What do StarClan expect me to do?
Leafpaw found it hard to sleep that night, fidgeting in her bed of ferns while Silverpelt glittered coldly above her. She longed to know what was happening to the journeying cats, but she could think of no way to find out.
When she finally drifted into unconsciousness, she found herself in some dim place, racing panic-stricken among the trunks of shadowy trees.
“Squirrelpaw! Squirrelpaw!” She gasped.
She was answered only by the hoot of an owl and the bark of a fox. Death panted hard on her paws, drawing closer with every footfall, and for all her twisting and turning, Leafpaw knew that there was no escape.
Chapter 19
Brambleclaw raced panic-stricken among the trees, bolting back and forth in a frantic effort to escape. Behind him he could hear the throaty bark of the dog that had leaped out from a thicket as he and his companions reached the wood. Glancing back, he saw the lean black shape crash through a clump of bracken, its tongue lolling. He could almost feel its sharp white teeth meeting in his pelt.
“StarClan help us!” Feathertail gasped as she dashed beside him.
They had fallen behind the other cats, though Brambleclaw heard a yowl of terror coming from somewhere just ahead.
“Dodge!” he called. “Try to lose it!”
The dog barked again, and from farther off Brambleclaw heard a Twoleg shouting. He lost sight of his pursuer, and he slowed down as a wave of relief swept over him; the creature must have gone back to its Twoleg.
Then he heard the dog’s snuffling breath, and it shot out from behind a fallen tree trunk. For a heartbeat Brambleclaw stared into eyes like flames. Whirling around, he fled through the trees as the barking started up again.
Confused by fear, he remembered how Firestar and the other cats of ThunderClan had led the dog pack through the forest until they fell into the gorge and drowned. But how could he and his friends lead this dog away, here in unknown territory?
“Climb trees!” he yowled, hoping his friends could hear him above the fierce barking that sounded louder than ever.
He glanced upward as he ran, but every tree seemed to have a smooth trunk with no low-growing branches. He could not stop and search; the beast would be on him at once.
Had it already caught one of the others? Was he about to find one of his companions terribly injured like Brightheart, or worse, dead?
His breath was rasping in his throat and his paws burned with every step; he knew he could not keep up this pace for much longer. Then a voice hissed at him from somewhere above his head. “Up here—quick!”
Brambleclaw skidded to a halt beside a tree that was covered with ivy. A pair of eyes gleamed down at him. In the same heartbeat the dog crashed through a tangle of briars behind him. With a terrified yowl, Brambleclaw launched himself upward, clawing frantically at the ivy stems. They gave way under his weight, and for a heart-stopping moment he swung helplessly; the dog leaped up and he heard the snap of its teeth and felt hot breath on his fur.
Then he managed to sink his claws into a stronger ivy stem and hauled himself upward again. Squirrelpaw appeared below, shot past the nose of the dog, and clawed her way up the tree, overtaking Brambleclaw to crouch shivering on a branch. Brambleclaw scrambled up beside her.
He spotted Stormfur and Tawnypelt clinging to another branch just above his head, and Crowpaw scrabbled his way up to join them from the other side of the trunk.
“Feathertail!” gasped Brambleclaw. “Where’s Feathertail?”
The dog was on its hind legs at the bottom of the tree, less than a foxlength below him. Its claws tore at the ivy while it snarled furiously, drool spilling out of its jaws. The sound of the Twoleg shouting came again, but a long way off.
Then Brambleclaw noticed Feathertail crouching in the briars just behind the dog, staring out in terror. If she tried to run for the safety of the tree, the dog would cut her off. How long, Brambleclaw wondered, before it scented her?
Suddenly he heard Crowpaw spit furiously. “Fox dung! I’ve had enough of this.” The WindClan apprentice hurled himself out of the tree, narrowly missing the dog, and hit the ground just beyond it. The dog spun around and gave chase, its paws scrabbling on the dry leaves. While it was distracted, Feathertail bolted out of the briars and across the clearing to make a desperate leap for a thin branch that swung alarmingly under her weight.
“Crowpaw!” Brambleclaw yowled.
The gray-black tom had vanished into the bushes.
Brambleclaw could hear the dog crashing about, barking wildly, and the shouts of the Twoleg growing closer. Then Crowpaw appeared again, his belly close to the ground as he ran all-out for the tree. The dog was panting just behind him. Brambleclaw squeezed his eyes tight shut and opened them again in time to see Crowpaw take a flying jump and dig his claws into the ivy.
At the same moment the Twoleg lumbered into the clearing and made a dive for the dog’s collar. He was red-faced and yelling furiously. The dog dodged to one side, but the Twoleg managed to grab it and clip a lead onto its collar. The dog’s barks changed to whining as it was dragged away, clawing the grass and leaf mold as it struggled to return to its prey.
“Thank you, Crowpaw!” Feathertail gasped, still clinging to the swaying branch. “You saved my life!”
“Yes, you did,” meowed Brambleclaw. “Well-done.”
Crowpaw scrambled higher until he reached the branch beside Brambleclaw and Squirrelpaw. “Big brute,” he muttered, looking embarrassed. “Tripped over its own paws.”
Feathertail’s blue eyes were fixed on him, huge as moons with shock. “It would have caught me for sure if you hadn’t come to help me,” she whispered.
As Brambleclaw’s fear ebbed, he remembered for the first time the voice that had called him up into the tree. It wasn’t one of the Clan cats. Looking up again, he saw a pair of eyes gleaming from the leaves a little way above his head. Then the leaves rustled and an unfamiliar cat emerged.
It was a tabby tom, old and plump with rumpled fur that looked as if he never bothered to groom himself. His move-ments were slow and careful as he clambered down the tree to join the six journeying cats.
“Well,” he rasped. “You’re a fine bunch, an’ no mistake. Don’t you know that that dog runs loose every day, ’round about sunrise?”
“How would we know that?” Tawnypelt spat. “We’ve never been here before.”
The tom blinked at her. “No need to get so snippy. You’ll know another time, won’t you? Get out o’ the way then.”