Cool night air whispered through Jaypaw’s fur. Up above, he knew the half moon would be floating in a clear sky. His mentor, Leafpool, padded beside him, following the stream that divided WindClan’s territory from ThunderClan’s.
Jaypaw’s belly was churning with anticipation. Would Rock speak to him at the Moonpool? The thought that he might encounter only the cats of StarClan made his tail twitch with impatience. StarClan wasn’t important, after all.
They were only Clan cats who had moved on to a different place. The prophecy had said he would have the power of the stars in his paws. That must mean that he would be more powerful than StarClan, so why should he waste time walking with them in his dreams?
He needed to go further back, to find the ancient cats who had once gathered at the Moonpool. They must be the truly powerful cats, who would help him find his destiny.
It’s Lionpaw’s and Hollypaw’s destiny, too. Jaypaw did his best to ignore the small voice niggling at the back of his mind. His brother and sister would have to find their own source of power. He had been chosen to be a medicine cat, so this must be the right way for him alone.
“Leafpool, wait for us!”
The distant call came from WindClan territory. Leafpool halted, and Jaypaw waited by her side. Tasting the air, he picked up the scents of three cats: Barkface and Kestrelpaw, and Willowpaw, who must have met up with the WindClan cats on her way from RiverClan.
“Where’s Mothwing?” Leafpool asked anxiously as the other medicine cats caught up. “She’s not ill, is she?”
“No, she’s fine,” Willowpaw replied. “But Beechfur has an infected beesting, so Mothwing thought she’d better stay in camp and look after him.”
Huh! Jaypaw thought. And hedgehogs fly! He could guess why Mothwing wasn’t with her apprentice. The infected warrior was just an excuse. Mothwing didn’t have any connection with StarClan. She must have decided that she could get a good night’s sleep in her own den instead of trekking all the way up to the Moonpool to have it there.
“Hello, Jaypaw,” Willowpaw mewed. Her voice was cool and polite.
“Hi, Willowpaw.” Okay, I know you don’t like me. I’m not all that besotted with you, either.
“Hi, Jaypaw.” Kestrelpaw sounded more friendly. “How’s the prey running in ThunderClan?”
“Fine, thanks,” Jaypaw replied.
Before he had to think of anything else to say, he caught the strong ShadowClan scent of another cat bounding up behind them.
“I thought I’d missed you,” Littlecloud panted.
“We would have waited for you,” Leafpool mewed.
The cats set off for the Moonpool. Jaypaw felt Kestrelpaw padding along at his side. “Hey, Jaypaw,” he began, “what’s it like, being blind?”
Well, you can’t see, mouse-brain! Jaypaw felt his neck fur bristling at the stupid question. “Everything’s dark. But I can hear and scent okay, so that’s how I find my way around.”
“That’s really tough.”
The other apprentice’s sympathy made Jaypaw flex his claws. From the sound of his voice and the whisper of his paws on the moorland turf, he had a pretty good idea where Kestrelpaw’s ear was. How would you like it slashed, huh?
“I manage,” he retorted.
Quickening his pace, he caught up to Littlecloud; his paws itched to run on ahead but that would draw too much attention to the fact that he walked here in his dreams—when he could see. He couldn’t wait to get to the Moonpool.
But after he had paced down the spiral track, feeling his paws slip into the paw prints of those long-ago cats, after he had touched his nose to the water and settled himself comfortably, Jaypaw found it hard to sleep. All around the pool he could hear the other cats’ breathing sink into the rhythmic patterns of dream-sleep, while he stayed obstinately awake.
“Come on,” he muttered. “What’s the matter with you?”
For once he didn’t want to enter the others’ dreams. He wanted a dream of his own: to wake underneath the hill, in the tunnels where he had met Rock and Fallen Leaves. If he didn’t manage it now, it would be a whole moon before he had another chance to visit the Moonpool.
He closed his eyes, willing sleep to come, but he could still feel the damp rock under his paws and hear the sound of the waterfall and the breathing of the cats around him.
Stretching his jaws in a yawn, he opened his eyes again. His fur prickled with excitement as he realized that he could see.
Instantly his ears twitched in frustration. He wasn’t in the underground cave. Instead, he had never left the Moonpool.
He could see the curled-up bodies of his companions and reflected starlight glimmering in the water.
“Now what?” he demanded.
A quiet voice spoke behind him. “You wanted to speak with me?”
Jaypaw spun around, almost tripping over his own paws.
Rock stood in front of him. His long, twisted claws scraped on the bare rock. Here in the open, out of the shadows of his cave, his bare skin looked raw and painful, and his bulging eyes glowed silver in his disfigured face. With an unexpected quiver of fear, Jaypaw wondered if Rock could see him or if he only sensed his presence.
“Why did you stop talking to me?” Jaypaw asked. “I tried and tried, but you wouldn’t answer.”
Rock dismissed the question with a flick of his ratlike tail.
“I’m here now,” he rasped. “Say what you have to say.”
“Are you part of StarClan?”
Rock blinked. “No. I share tongues with the ones who came before.”
“You mean the cats like Fallen Leaves, who went into the tunnels to prove themselves?”
“No.” Rock’s voice grated like shifting stones. “More ancient even than those.”
“Then where did they come from?” Jaypaw meowed, exasperated. “Is there a set of ancestors who are older than all the others? Did we all come from them—Fallen Leaves’s cats, and the Tribe cats, and the Clans?”
Rock turned his silver gaze on Jaypaw. “There will always be stories older than any cat remembers,” he rumbled.
That’s not an answer! “Then where did you come from?”
The old cat stood silent for many heartbeats, staring out across the Moonpool as if he could look back across the abyss of time that separated Jaypaw from those ancient cats.
“You will find your answers in the mountains,” he murmured at last. “Though they may not be the ones you most want to hear.”
“What do you mean? Tell me now!” Jaypaw insisted.
But Rock was beginning to fade. The patches of reflected moonlight on his skin, the silver gleam of his bulging eyes, thinned out like mist until Jaypaw could see nothing but the shimmer of starlight on rock and water. He shivered in a sudden cold breeze.
“Come back!” he yowled.
There was no reply. The starshine faded, and scents of tree and bracken filled his mouth. He was standing in a dusky forest, in the midst of fern and grasses. Moonlight dappled the ground as it shone through gaps in the branches above his head. The air was warm, full of the tempting scents of prey.
Just ahead of him, Leafpool was following a narrow path that wound between clumps of bracken. She paused and glanced back over her shoulder. “I wondered if you’d join me,” she mewed.
Jaypaw was about to reply when the bushes just ahead of Leafpool rustled and a group of StarClan cats burst out into the open. Jaypaw spotted prey scurrying away from their claws.
A blue-furred she-cat halted briefly to mew, “Greetings, Leafpool.” Leafpool dipped her head, but the she-cat bounded onward before she could speak. Another cat, a powerful white tom, gave Jaypaw a friendly flick over the ear with his tail as he sped past.