**OLD** Valley Cats: Of Sky and Stone 1- Daughters and Darkness

Chapter Thirty-One

Fireflies cast their lights on the leaves of the forest, glowing an ambient yellow against the thick trees of the ForestClan territory. Twistertail admired then but dared not to stray away from the patrol. A single thought slipped into her mind as she shifted her focus ahead. Are there fireflies on the island?

 Further along, Sandystar had disappeared over the dunes, followed quickly by her deputy Cardinalheart and the junior healer Sagepool. Twistertail soon padded over the sand, eager to be among the first of the ForestClan cats to attend this gathering. To her left, she could see the GroveClan cats emerging from the strip of land between ForestClan and MireClan. 

 Twistertail once again turned back to the ForestClan patrol. Brightspirit, Squirrelstrike, and Lilyspring were the three warriors chosen to be representatives. Finchpaw and Pumpkinpaw also accompanied them, with Sprucefall trailing behind. The elder had fought in the raid on MireClan, but Sagepool had warned about the lingering symptoms of his bout of frostcough that had caused Twistertail and Brightspirit to attend their first gathering.

 Just that evening, the healer had cautioned about the old tom putting his lungs through too much stress, but unfortunately, his cough had returned. Even though Sprucefall was desperately trying to hide it, the old tom was struggling to hike uphill into the clearing.

 Twistertail put her focus on the other warriors, which made up most of the crowd. There were cats from only WoodClan and ConiferClan, but the clearing seemed to buzz with energy under the light of the full moon. Twistertail followed Mousefall through the loosely gathered cats, picking up whispers of an attack on MireClan and theories as to why Hazelshade, or Hazelstar,  was sitting on the leaders' perch.

 "Wha- Brightpaw? It's been moons!" A distinctive ConiferClan she-cat bounced forwards from the unfamiliar cats, greeting her brother enthusiastically. 

 "Oriolepaw! You've grown!" the white tom chirped. "And also, it's Brightspirit now. I'm a warrior."

 "No way. I became a warrior, too! I'm Orioleflight now, and Wrenpaw's called Wrenwing now." Orioleflight 

 Brightspirit flicked his tail towards his sister. "She's Twistertail now." 

 Orioleflight tilted her head oddly. "Why?"

 "Why what?" Twistertail snapped suddenly, sounding way more irritated than she actually was.

 "Well, Brightspirit is obviously named after his mother. But why is your name Twistertail? And why not Twisterspirit or Twisterclaw, after your personality?"

 "What personality?"

 "You know. Your personality."

 Twistertail startled at a sudden tail laying over her shoulder. She whirled around to see a familiar dark brown she-cat smiling welcomingly at her. "Twistertail, then. Have we met? I'm Lemmingleap, and that's my brother Adderlash bragging to all the she-cats." the new GroveClan warrior said warmly.

 "That's a wild coincidence. Have all of us become warriors?" Lemmingleap looked around at Brightspirit and Orioleflight.

 "No. Gillpaw and Finpaw are still apprentices, but Shrewsight and Volewhisker became warriors early. Which is weird, because they've been training for longer than you two." Orioleflight hitched her head at Twistertail and Brightspirit.

 "That is weird. We trained for a few moons more than you guys. Why'd you become warriors?" Lemmingleap took her tail off of Twistertail's back and studied the siblings.

 "Because we're awesome." Brightspirit said, as if it were obvious. "After just five moons of training, we were sent into the heart of a battle for our warriors' assessments."