Each branch and tussock of grass was loaded with droplets that soaked Hollypaw’s fur as she brushed past. She started to think that Brackenfur had been right, and she wouldn’t catch anything, but for once that didn’t bother her too much. She wanted to be out of the camp, and she wanted to think.
Everything seemed to be getting much more complicated.
She needed to concentrate on her training, but her mind was continually tugging her one way or the other—to the future and wondering if she could ever be Clan leader, or to the past and the traces of those ancient cats. She saw herself standing on the Highledge, calling a summons to her Clan…
Hollypaw realized she had stopped concentrating on prey.
She was just standing in the forest, getting wetter and wetter.
Flicking drops from her ears, she dived into a hole in a sandy bank and crouched there, watching the hissing screen of rain a mouse-length from her nose. Her tongue rasped over her fur in an effort to dry herself off and get warm. She froze when she heard a scuffling from farther down the hole where she was sheltering. Something big—at least as big as she was—was coming up the tunnel behind her. Stupid! she scolded herself. She had been so wet, she hadn’t bothered to check if she had the burrow to herself.
She tensed her muscles and took a gulp of air, expecting to taste fox or even worse, badger. Instead, the scent of cat flooded into her jaws. And it was a familiar scent, too. Limp with relief, Hollypaw twisted around in the entrance to the hole.
“Jaypaw! What are you doing down there?”
Her brother squeezed into the sheltered space beside her.
His pelt smelled of earth and stale fox. “Nothing,” he mumbled. “Sheltering.”
“No, you’re not!” Hollypaw was annoyed that he was so obviously lying. “Your fur is dry. You must have been here since before the rain started.” When Jaypaw didn’t reply, she added, “You’ve been trying to get down into the tunnels again, haven’t you?”
Jaypaw’s paws scuffled the sandy earth. “What if I have?”
“It’s dangerous!” Hollypaw protested. “Think what happened to Lionpaw when the roof of that badger set fell in.
And remember what it was like in the cave. We nearly drowned. And—”
“I know all that,” Jaypaw interrupted.
“You’re not acting as if you do. It’s raining hard now. The tunnels will flood again. And you just stroll down there as if you were strolling into camp! Honestly, Jaypaw, I don’t know how you can be so mouse-brained.”
“You don’t have to go on,” her brother grumbled. “Anyway, I couldn’t get in. This is just an old foxhole. It doesn’t lead anywhere.”
“But you tried.” Why couldn’t Jaypaw see the trouble he was getting into? “I don’t see what’s so special about the caves. There’s nothing down there.”
“Yes, there is!” He crouched in front of her; his blue eyes gazed up at her so intensely that Hollypaw could hardly believe he was blind. He hesitated, twitching his ears, then went on. “The ancient cats spoke to me. When I go to the Moonpool my paws slip into their paw prints. And I used to hear their voices on the wind. But since we rescued the kits, I haven’t heard them. That’s why I have to get back into the tunnels.”
Hollypaw stretched her neck forward and gave Jaypaw a sympathetic lick on his ear. She couldn’t bear to hear the sorrow in his voice; he sounded as if he had lost something precious.
Jaypaw jerked his head away. “You don’t understand.”
“Explain it to me, then.”
Jaypaw hesitated. His forepaws traced spirals in the earth.
“There were other cats in the caves,” he mewed at last.
Hollypaw was puzzled. “What do you mean?”
“Spirits of the ancient cats who lived here seasons ago.
One of them is called Fallen Leaves. He went down there in the ceremony to make him a warrior, and he never came out.
He showed me where to find the lost kits.”
Every hair on Hollypaw’s pelt rose. The ordeal in the caves had been bad enough without the thought of invisible cats watching them.
“The other cat is called Rock,” Jaypaw went on. “He’s old—I mean, really old. He was in the cave. He showed me that we would escape, and he helped me think of the way to do it.”
Hollypaw took a deep breath. Perhaps there was nothing to be afraid of. If Jaypaw was right, then neither they nor the kits would be alive if it weren’t for the help of the ancient cats.
“Why do you want to go back now?” she asked.
“I want to know why they don’t talk to me anymore,” Jaypaw mewed miserably. “Besides, they lived here once, too.
They might be able to tell us the best places to hunt or shelter.”
“We can find those things for ourselves.” Hollypaw looked out of the mouth of the burrow. The rain had stopped; above the trees ragged patches of blue were opening up as the last of the clouds scudded across the sky. Sunlight sparkled on raindrops, making the whole forest shimmer. “We should get back to camp,” she added.
“But don’t you understand?” Jaypaw’s voice rose. “It’s important, I know it is.”
For a moment Hollypaw was tempted to agree with him.
When Blackstar had mentioned the ancient cats, she too had felt their fascination. She would like to know more about them—but not enough to risk her life or Jaypaw’s.
“You’re important too,” she mewed. “Your Clan needs you, Jaypaw. You shouldn’t put yourself in danger when there’s no need.”
“All right,” Jaypaw muttered. He had a mutinous look on his face. Hollypaw stifled a sigh; she knew that look well.
Jaypaw might agree with her now, but he would go on doing exactly what he wanted. She gave him a nudge. “Let’s go.”
Jaypaw rose to his paws and shook loose earth off his pelt.
Hollypaw led the way into the open, setting down her paws carefully to avoid the worst of the wet grass.
“Hollypaw?”
She halted and glanced over her shoulder. “What?”
“You won’t tell any cat what I just told you?”
Hollypaw wasn’t sure how to reply. She wanted to go straight to Firestar or Leafpool and tell them about his crazy obsession with cats that died out long ago. If any cat could stop Jaypaw from risking his life, it would be his Clan leader or his mentor. But Jaypaw was her brother, and she would always be loyal to him first.
“No, I won’t.” She sighed. “I promise.”
“Mouse dung!” Hollypaw let out a cry of frustration as she leaped for the mouse, only to see it dart away from her claws and slip into safety down a hole. That was the second piece of prey she’d lost; she was starting to feel as if her paws didn’t belong to her anymore.
“Hollypaw, you’ve got to put your paws down lightly.”
Brackenfur never lost his temper with her, but even he was sounding impatient. “Remember that a mouse will feel your paw steps before it hears you or scents you.”
“Yes, I know,” Hollypaw mewed. That’s the first thing an apprentice learns about hunting. “I’m sorry.”
Brackenfur, Brook, and Stormfur had taken all the apprentices into the forest for a hunting session. Hollypaw wasn’t sure which of them had suggested making it into a competi-tion. Lionpaw was winning, with one of the biggest squirrels Hollypaw had ever seen, but all the others had amassed a good pile of fresh-kill. All she had managed to catch was one miserable shrew.
“Is there anything bothering you?” Brackenfur asked.
“You’re just not concentrating today.”