It’s like fighting three different cats! Gray Wing thought. He could feel his chest tightening with the effort as he struggled to get a grip on One Eye’s wildly flailing body. He had never known a cat so hard to defeat.
At last Cloud Spots and Lightning Tail darted in from either side and managed to pin One Eye down. Gray Wing stood over him, panting, while One Eye glared up at him with his malevolent yellow eye.
Gray Wing raised a paw to slash One Eye’s throat open and finish the fight. But before he could strike, he heard Thunder’s voice raised in a furious yowl.
“He’s mine!”
Thunder rushed over to One Eye, motioning Cloud Spots and Lightning Tail aside with a fierce gesture of his paw. He even waited for the rogue to regain his paws before launching himself at him.
Screeching and snarling, the two cats rolled together on the ground in a flurry of teeth and claws.
A flash of movement alerted Gray Wing and he turned in time to block Star Flower as she threw herself toward the fight. “Get back!” he spat, following up the words with a hard kick to Star
Flower’s chest. She cringed back, whimpering.
That was for Thunder, Gray Wing thought with satisfaction.
Certain that Star Flower was no longer a threat, he turned back to the battle. Everything was suddenly quiet. Thunder, Lightning Tail, and Cloud Spots were standing over One Eye’s unmoving body. His head lay at an awkward angle, his neck clearly broken.
“He’s dead,” Thunder meowed.
Star Flower let out a moan of grief and dragged herself across the ground to touch her nose to her father’s. Watching her, Gray Wing’s heart was almost touched. Almost.
“Get her away from there,” Thunder ordered, his voice cold. “She doesn’t deserve to grieve.
Drive her out!”
Chapter 26
Thunder watched in silence as Star Flower padded over to him, her brilliant green gaze pleading.
“Thunder, he’s my father,” she mewed. “Please let me say good-bye.”
Thunder felt as if everything in him was frozen, like the icy peaks Gray Wing had told him about.
“How interesting that you never mentioned that when we were together.” He let out a snort of disgusted laughter. “But then, we were never ‘together,’ were we? It was all a lie.”
Hurt flashed into Star Flower’s eyes. But it’s for her father, not for me, Thunder told himself. I feel so stupid, he thought, embarrassment flooding through him at the memory. And worst of all, he still felt something when he looked at her. It was a struggle to pretend that he no longer cared, though knowing how she had used him made it easier.
“Please listen to me, Thunder,” Star Flower went on, taking another pace toward him, so that her sweet scent wreathed around him. “I did like you, truly. Meeting you by the four trees, and calling out to you on the moor. Taking you to the secret garden… that was all my idea.”
“Like I’d believe that!” Thunder scoffed.
“It was. It was only after my father found out that I’d been spending time with you that he suggested I should use our closeness to find out what the other cats were doing.” She looked down and studied her paws. “When I left you at the secret garden, One Eye was waiting for me. He’d been listening to us, and he sent me to follow you. I hid outside your camp and listened to what you were planning.”
Thunder winced. I even heard paw steps; I thought some cat was following me! “So that’s how
One Eye came to be waiting for us beside the Thunderpath,” he meowed. “And then you showed me a plant that was nothing like the Blazing Star. It was a trick to pump me for information.”
Star Flower hung her head. “That’s true. But I told you the truth when I said that the Blazing Star is a healing herb. You have to believe that.”
“I believed every word you said,” Thunder told her. “I was… I was…”
“What?” Star Flower asked encouragingly, looking up at him again.
“Tricked,” Thunder replied, letting all the bitterness he felt seep into the one word. “And I won’t let it happen again.”
He turned his back on Star Flower, ignoring her as he saw Tall Shadow stepping forward with a commanding whisk of her tail. “Why are we standing here doing nothing?” she asked. “Now that One
Eye has been defeated, we need to get the Blazing Star.”
“You’re right,” Thunder agreed. I do believe Star Flower when she says the Blazing Star heals.
She has nothing to gain by lying now.
“I’ll lead an expedition to go across the Thunderpath to fetch it,” Tall Shadow announced briskly.
By now River Ripple and Wind Runner had padded over to where Clear Sky still lay bleeding on the grass. Cloud Spots and Dappled Pelt were bending over him, while Sparrow Fur and Owl Eyes dashed up with pawfuls of cobwebs and bunches of herbs in their jaws.
Gray Wing nodded at them, and then turned back to Tall Shadow. “And I’ll come with you,” Gray Wing added, padding up to her side.
“What about One Eye’s rogues?” Shattered Ice asked. “They could still be lurking in the forest.”
Tall Shadow swiveled her head, her gaze raking the moorland. None of the strangers One Eye had brought with him were in sight. “I doubt it,” she meowed in reply to Shattered Ice. “They ran away pretty quickly when we ambushed their leader. It’s my guess that we won’t see so much as a tail-tip.
And if I’m wrong…” She slid out her claws. “We’ll deal with them.”
“We’ll come with you,” Mouse Ear meowed, beckoning with his tail to Mud Paws. “Just in case.
It’ll feel good to do something for Holly.”
Tall Shadow dipped her head to the big tabby tom. “Thank you,” she responded, before setting off across the moor at the head of the patrol.
As she and Gray Wing headed toward the forest, Thunder felt a sudden panic at being left in charge. What am I supposed to do now? Desperately he ran after them. “Gray Wing, I need to know—” he began.
Gray Wing halted and turned toward him. “Do as your heart tells you, Thunder,” he mewed calmly. He stretched out his neck to touch noses with Thunder, his eyes warm and affectionate. “I trust you,” he added, before hurrying after Tall Shadow.
Thunder watched the older cat—almost his father—walk away. He felt a twinge of sadness at the realization that Gray Wing didn’t want to advise him anymore. But at the same time Gray Wing’s faith in him had sent new energy flowing through his body.
Thunder turned back toward Clear Sky as Sparrow Fur and Owl Eyes ran over to him with even more cobwebs. Reassured that his injured father was receiving the best care possible, Thunder took a deep breath and turned back to where Star Flower was crouching over One Eye’s body. A soft keening sound came from her. How did something so beautiful come from something so ugly? he asked himself, looking at the grotesquely sprawled limbs of the dead rogue. One Eye was ugly inside and out. But Star Flower…
Thunder paced slowly up to the golden tabby she-cat and stood beside her. “It’s time for you to leave,” he meowed quietly. “You’re not welcome among any of our groups, and if you won’t leave by yourself we’ll have to make you.”
Star Flower looked up at him, and seeing the despair in her eyes made Thunder feel as though a giant claw was piercing his heart. “Please,” she whispered, “can’t we at least bury him? Then I’ll leave you alone and never bother you again.”