Beside her, Quick Water whimpered. “What’s happening?” In the pool, SkyClan’s territory was being torn apart. Twolegs and their yellow monsters were felling trees and digging great gaping holes into the earth. “Our territory is gone… .” She sounded dazed.
Their view changed. A group of cats was setting out from the ruined territory, heading not toward Highstones but off into strange lands. It really isn’t a good territory by Highstones, Shadowstar thought. I guess they couldn’t settle there. “But where is Skystar?” she asked. The tom leading the cats had Skystar’s pale gray fur, but it was splotched with cloud-like white spots. And he was small and lithe, not long-legged and broad like the SkyClan leader. But there was something familiar about his determined stride, and the tilt to his ears. “Is he … kin of Skystar?” she wondered.
“I don’t recognize any of those cats,” Quick Water said. “What’s going on? They’re not SkyClan.”
“They are SkyClan,” Gray Wing corrected her. “Generations on, but kin to the SkyClan you knew. The Twolegs won’t take your territory now, but they will someday, and SkyClan will have to find a new home.” His voice was sad. “The rest of the Clans will follow them, in time.”
Uncertainty ran through Shadowstar. “So every Clan will leave the forest?” she asked. “I thought I could save ShadowClan—but nothing I did mattered at all.”
Gray Wing raised his head to look at her, his golden eyes full of affection. “Of course it mattered,” he said warmly. “Even so many generations on, they remember you. ShadowClan survives. And all the Clans will uphold the warrior code, knowing it’s what makes them Clan cats.”
Quick Water swished her tail. “So what?” she yowled, sounding heartbroken. “I betrayed all the Clans to save SkyClan’s home, and they’re still going to have to leave! They’ll be lost without the other Clans.”
Shadowstar stroked her tail across Quick Water’s back, trying wordlessly to comfort her.
“No,” Gray Wing said. “Look.” The scene shifted. It was somewhere else now—a lake with open land around it—but there were cats there, hunting and patrolling their borders, sharing tongues and lazing in the sun together. There were thin black cats slinking through shadows, and broad-shouldered ginger cats climbing trees, and rangy thin brown cats chasing rabbits, and sleek gray cats swimming after fish. She didn’t know any of these cats, but she recognized them: Clan cats. Warriors.
And, coming toward them, walking wearily, but with the same proud tilt to their ears as Skystar had, and as the cat who had led SkyClan from the forest had: another Clan.
“They come back,” Shadowstar breathed.
Gray Wing nodded. “Even apart, the Clans survive. They remember the code, and they look after their Clanmates. And they’ll be united again.”
Another black cat was walking toward them. Moon Shadow. Shadowstar raised her tail to gesture to her brother, feeling suddenly light and free. All the fear she’d carried, fear of her own final death and of what it meant for ShadowClan, was gone now.
The Clans would survive. Their traditions would be passed down for generations of kin, StarClan watching over them all.
I did everything I could, she thought, and it meant something: ShadowClan will go on. My lives have been truly worthwhile.
Excerpt from Warriors: The Broken Code #1: Lost Stars
Chapter 1
Shadowpaw craned his neck over his back, straining to groom the hard-to-reach spot at the base of his tail. He had just managed to give his fur a few vigorous licks when he heard paw steps approaching. He looked up to see his father, Tigerstar, and his mother, Dovewing, their pelts brushing as they gazed down at him with pride and joy shining in their eyes.
“What is it?” he asked, sitting up and giving his pelt a shake.
“We just came to see you off,” Tigerstar responded, while Dovewing gave her son’s ears a quick, affectionate lick.
Shadowpaw’s fur prickled with embarrassment. Like I haven’t been to the Moonpool before, he thought. They’re still treating me as if I’m a kit in the nursery!
He was sure that his parents hadn’t made such a fuss when his littermates, Pouncestep and Lightleap, had been warrior apprentices. I guess it’s because I’m going to be a medicine cat… . Or maybe because of the seizures he’d had since he was a kit. He knew his parents still worried about him, even though it had been a while since his last upsetting vision. They’re probably hoping that with some training from the other medicine cats, I’ll learn to control my visions once and for all … and I can be normal.
Shadowpaw wanted that, too.
“The snow must be really deep up on the moors,” Dovewing mewed. “Make sure you watch where you’re putting your paws.”
Shadowpaw wriggled his shoulders, praying that none of his Clanmates were listening. “I will,” he promised, glancing toward the medicine cats’ den in the hope of seeing his mentor, Puddleshine, emerge. But there was no sign of him yet.
To his relief, Tigerstar gave Dovewing a nudge and they both moved off toward the Clan leader’s den. Shadowpaw rubbed one paw hastily across his face and bounded across the camp to see what was keeping Puddleshine.
Intent on finding his mentor, Shadowpaw barely noticed the patrol trekking toward the fresh-kill pile, prey dangling from their jaws. He skidded to a halt just in time to avoid colliding with Cloverfoot, the Clan deputy.
“Shadowpaw!” she exclaimed around the shrew she was carrying. “You nearly knocked me off my paws.”
“Sorry, Cloverfoot,” Shadowpaw meowed, dipping his head respectfully.
Cloverfoot let out a snort, half annoyed, half amused. “Apprentices!”
Shadowpaw tried to hide his irritation. He was an apprentice, yes, but an old one—medicine cat apprentices’ training lasted longer than warriors’. His littermates were full warriors already. But he knew his parents would want him to respect the deputy.
Cloverfoot padded on, followed by Strikestone, Yarrowleaf, and Blazefire. Though they were all carrying prey, they had only one or two pieces each, and what little they had managed to catch was undersized and scrawny.
“I can’t remember a leaf-bare as cold as this,” Yarrowleaf complained as she dropped a blackbird on the fresh-kill pile.
Strikestone nodded, shivering as he fluffed out his brown tabby pelt. “No wonder there’s no prey. They’re all hiding down their holes, and I can’t blame them.”
As Shadowpaw moved on, out of earshot, he couldn’t help noticing how pitifully small the fresh-kill pile was, and he tried to ignore his own growling belly. He could hardly remember his first leaf-bare, when he’d been a tiny kit, so he didn’t know if the older cats were right and the weather was unusually cold.
I only know I don’t like it, he grumbled to himself as he picked his way through the icy slush that covered the ground of the camp. My paws are so cold I think they’ll drop off. I can’t wait for newleaf!
Puddleshine ducked out of the entrance to the medicine cats’ den as Shadowpaw approached. “Good, you’re ready,” he meowed. “We’d better hurry, or we’ll be late.” As he led the way toward the camp entrance, he added, “I’ve been checking our herb stores, and they’re getting dangerously low.”