Staring at the ragged brown tom, Leafstar wondered if he was speaking from his own experiences. Her pelt itched all over with curiosity, but she knew this wasn’t the right time or place to question him. Besides, he would never give me a straight answer.
“I think Stick is right,” Sharpclaw meowed. “We need to give the Twoleg a taste of his own medicine, and make him as scared of cats as Shrewtooth is scared of him.”
“So we won’t actually attack the Twoleg?” Leafstar checked.
Sharpclaw looked grim. “Oh, we attack him all right—we’ll make him think his worst fears are coming true, that the cats he once tortured have come back to seek revenge. But we won’t get close enough for him to touch us, and that way we’ll keep ourselves safe. Stick is right, cats don’t fight Twolegs, and never will.” He shot a glance at Shrewtooth, who seemed to have shrunk even further into his pelt. “But there are ways to hurt that don’t leave scars.”
Leafstar narrowed her eyes. Was it possible to scare the Twoleg into leaving cats alone without risking their own pelts? “Tell us what you think we could do,” she invited Sharpclaw.
Leaping down from the Rockpile, she joined her deputy on the flattened sand. The rest of the Clan gathered around, huddling in the shelter of the boulders as the wind rose, sending clouds scudding across the sky.
Sharpclaw stretched out one claw and drew lines in the dust in front of him. “Here’s the clearing, and this is the Twoleg nest,” he began as he sketched the shapes. “And this is where we’ll start…”
Chapter 21
Leafstar woke as a paw prodded her in the side. “Leafstar! Leafstar, wake up!”
It was Sharpclaw’s voice. Leafstar opened her eyes and blinked at him as he stood over her, one paw raised to prod her again.
“What’s the matter?” she muttered, scrambling out of her nest. “Are we being attacked?”
“No, but we have to go now,” Sharpclaw hissed. When Leafstar stared at him, puzzled, he added, “To the Twoleg’s nest, to give him a fright he won’t forget.”
“No.” Leafstar shook her head. “We agreed to attack tomorrow night, as long as the weather was better.”
“But the clouds have cleared. Look!” Sharpclaw backed away to the entrance to the den, and stood on the trail outside, his shape outlined against an almost full moon. He waved his tail at a sky glittering with the warriors of Silverpelt. “You couldn’t hope for a better night than this.”
“But the kittypets have gone home,” Leafstar argued. “They promised to stay tomorrow night and help with the attack. We can’t leave them out again, not when they were so upset about the fight against the rats.”
Sharpclaw twitched his tail impatiently. “That’s their problem. This is the best night for attacking. We need as much light as possible.”
Leafstar twitched her nose. “I suppose you’re right,” she admitted reluctantly.
But as she shook moss out of her fur and headed down the trail into the gorge, she couldn’t shake off a nagging sense of guilt. She could imagine the shock and disappointment on the faces of the daylight-warriors when they heard that the attack had taken place without them. What am I going to say to them? And will Billystorm think that I lied to him?
Sharpclaw ran nimbly across the face of the cliff to rouse the warriors in their den, then led the way down to the river. Leafstar joined them near the foot of the Rockpile. The moon cast black shadows across the cliffs and turned the surface of the river to bubbling silver; every rock and tree stood out sharply against the wash of pale light. Sharpclaw was right. This is a good night to attack. But deep inside, she still knew that this wasn’t right.
Though no cat had called them, Sagepaw and Mintpaw burst out of their den and raced down to join the warriors.
“Are you going now?” Mintpaw panted, her eyes gleaming. “I want to come, too!”
“And me,” Sagepaw added. “I want to teach that Twoleg a lesson, after what he did to our mother.”
“Mintpaw, you can certainly come,” Leafstar replied. “But I’m not sure about you, Sagepaw. It’s a long way. Will your leg hold out?”
“My leg is fine now!” the apprentice insisted.
“Echosong, what do you think?” Leafstar asked the medicine cat, who had padded up in time to hear the discussion.
Echosong twitched her ears. “I know how much this means to Sagepaw…” she began hesitantly. “I suppose he can go,” she mewed at last. “But keep an eye on him, Leafstar, and if he starts limping, then take him out of the action.”
Leafstar nodded. “I’ll do that. And Sagepaw,” she added sternly, “if I tell you to back off, you do it. No arguments, okay?”
“I’ll keep an eye on him, too,” Petalnose promised, shouldering her way through the throng of cats to stand beside her kits.
“You’re sure you want to come?” Leafstar meowed, faintly surprised that the she-cat would be willing to return to the den where she had been a prisoner for so long.
“You need me,” Petalnose replied steadily. “I know that Twoleg and his nest better than any cat.”
“True.” Leafstar dipped her head in approval.
“I’ll come, too,” a shaky voice meowed.
Leafstar spun around to see Shrewtooth, who had crept up behind Echosong, a black shadow in the night. He was trembling, but there was determination in his gaze.
“Thanks, Shrewtooth, but there’s no need,” Leafstar responded. Great StarClan! What if he panics like he did this morning?
“But I want to. I don’t want to be a coward anymore.”
“No cat will call you a coward,” Leafstar promised. “But we don’t need every cat to come. Patchfoot is going to stay behind to guard the camp, but he can’t do it alone. What if the rats attacked Clovertail and Fallowfern and the kits?”
“Leafstar’s right,” Sharpclaw added, with more sympathy for the young black tom than Leafstar had expected. “Guarding the camp is the most important job there is. We trust you, Shrewtooth.”
The young warrior blinked and stood a little straighter. “Okay, Sharpclaw. I won’t let you down.”
“I know you won’t,” Sharpclaw told him.
With a grateful glance at her deputy, Leafstar gathered the rest of her Clan together and led them over the Rockpile and up to the top of the cliff on the far side of the gorge. She noticed that all four newcomers had joined the patrol without any more protest, though they padded along in a tight group at the rear, their tension clear in the swift glances they cast from side to side, and the bristling of their fur.
What secrets are they hiding?
The wind had dropped and the night was warm and still. The only sounds were the soft paw steps of her Clanmates and the swish of ferns and grass as they brushed against well-groomed fur. It would be a good night for a hunt, Leafstar thought, not looking forward to what was coming.
As the SkyClan warriors crept across the border, Leafstar noticed that Petalnose was trembling. Slipping through the ferns to her side, she touched her nose briefly to the gray cat’s ear. “If it gets too bad, you can go back,” she murmured.
Petalnose shook her head. “I can do this, Leafstar,” she vowed.
Leafstar padded alongside her to bolster her courage as they headed for the Twoleg den. Did ThunderClan ever fight Twolegs? she asked herself, wondering whether their starry ancestors were watching from the sky. I should have asked Echosong if she had a sign from StarClan about this attack, she thought with a stab of concern. But wouldn’t Echosong have told her? If StarClan was silent, perhaps it meant that they were happy for SkyClan to make their own decision. Leafstar flicked her tail in frustration. Why did it always feel as if she was leading her Clan in the dark? All the stars in the sky didn’t seem to give enough light to see where the future lay.