Firestar’s Quest

Sorrelpaw, the smallest of the apprentices, lurched into the clearing on three legs, holding out her forepaw. “Look, Cinderpelt!”

The medicine cat bent her head to examine the paw.

Firestar could see that a thorn was driven deep into the pad.

“Honestly, Sorrelpaw,” Cinderpelt mewed, “from the noise you were making I thought a fox must have bitten your paw off. It’s only a thorn.”

“But it hurts!” the apprentice protested, her amber eyes wide.

Cinderpelt tutted. “Lie down and hold your paw out.”

Firestar watched as the medicine cat expertly gripped the shank of the thorn in her teeth and tugged it out. A gush of blood followed it.

“It’s bleeding!” Sorrelpaw exclaimed.

“So it is,” Cinderpelt agreed calmly. “Give it a good lick.”

“Every cat picks up thorns now and again,” Firestar told the apprentice as her tongue rasped busily across her pad.

“You’ll probably pick up a good many more before you’re an elder.”

“I know.” Sorrelpaw sprang to her paws again. “Thanks, Cinderpelt. It’s fine now, so I’ll go back to the others. We’re training in the sandy hollow.” Her eyes shone and she flexed her claws. “Sandstorm’s going to show me how to fight foxes!”

Without waiting for a response she charged off down the fern tunnel.

Cinderpelt’s blue eyes gleamed. “Sandstorm’s got her paws full with that one,” she commented.

“You’ve got your paws full yourself,” meowed Firestar. “Is it always this busy?”

“Busy is good,” Cinderpelt replied. “Just as long as there’s no blood being spilled. It’s great, being able to use my skills to care for my Clan.”

Her eyes shone with enthusiasm, and once again Firestar was reminded of the apprentice she had been. What a warrior she would have made! But her accident had diverted all her energy, like a clear, sparkling stream, into the path of a medicine cat.

“Okay, Firestar,” she prompted. “You’re busy too, so you haven’t come here just to gossip. What can I do for you?”

Twitching her ears for Firestar to follow her, she made her way to the cleft in the rock and began to put away the remaining stems of borage. Firestar sat beside her, suddenly reluctant to tell any cat about the strange visions he had seen.

“I’ve been having these dreams…”

Cinderpelt shot him a swift glance; usually only medicine cats received dreams from StarClan, but she had learned long ago that their warrior ancestors came to Firestar too.

“It wasn’t a dream from StarClan,” Firestar went on. “At least, I don’t think it was.” He described the mist-shrouded moorland where the desperate wailing of cats had surrounded him. He couldn’t bring himself to tell Cinderpelt about the pale gray cat he had seen in the ravine when he was awake, or the reflection in the puddle and the cats struggling in the river. They could be explained away too easily: odd cloud formations, tricks of the light, or the pattern of starlight in the dark water.

Cinderpelt finished tidying the herbs and came to sit beside him, her eyes thoughtful. “You’ve had this dream twice?”

“That’s right.”

“Then I think it’s more than a tough bit of fresh-kill stuck in your belly.” She blinked several times and added, “That many cats could only belong to a Clan… and you’re sure it wasn’t WindClan?”

“Positive. The moor wasn’t anywhere in WindClan territory, I’m sure of it, and I didn’t recognize any of the voices.

Besides, there’s been no report of trouble in WindClan.”

Cinderpelt nodded. “And none in any of the other Clans, either. Do you think you’re remembering the battle with BloodClan?”

“No, Cinderpelt, what I heard wasn’t battle yowling. It was cats wailing as if something was terribly wrong.” Firestar shuddered. “I wanted to help them, but I didn’t know what to do.”

Cinderpelt brushed her tail across his shoulder. “I could give you some poppyseed,” she suggested. “At least that would give you a good night’s sleep.”

“Thanks, but no. It’s not sleep I want. It’s an explanation.”

Cinderpelt didn’t look surprised. “That’s something I can’t give you, not right now,” she meowed. “But I’ll let you know if StarClan show me anything. And be sure to come and tell me if you have any more dreams.”

Firestar wasn’t certain he wanted to do that. Cinderpelt had enough to keep her busy without worrying about him.

“I’m probably making a fuss about nothing,” he told her. “I’m sure the dreams will go away if I stop thinking about them.”

He hadn’t managed to convince himself, and as he padded away through the fern tunnel with the medicine cat’s pale blue gaze following him, he was sure that he hadn’t convinced Cinderpelt, either.

On the second night after his talk with Cinderpelt, Firestar had the dream again. He stood on the pathless moorland, straining to make out the blurred shapes that were all around him, yet never close enough to see clearly.

“What do you want?” he called. “What can I do to help you?”

But there was no reply. Firestar was beginning to feel as if he were doomed to stumble across this mist-shrouded moor forever, calling out to cats who could not or would not hear him.