Tear the Trees Apart: Maple's Vengeance

Chapter 10: Alone

Applestem took a step back. His eyes clouded and he suddenly looked weary. "Maple, I don't want to fight you," he meowed. "This isn't funny."

"I'm not giving you a choice!" Maple hissed. She bunched her hindquarters beneath her and lunged at him.

Applestem dodged away. "Just leave!" he gasped.

There was a crackle of stalks behind him and Jewel appeared. "What's going on?" Her gaze fell on Maple. "What's she doing here?"

Half-blind with fury, Maple hurled herself at the orange she-cat. "This is all your fault!" she screeched. "Applestem should've died!" She unsheathed her claws, aiming for Jewel's face.

There was a thud of paws, then silence, and a solid brown shape flashed in front of Maple. Her claws struck home, piercing fur and flesh, and a spurt of blood leaped out at her. With a grunt, Applestem dropped at her feet, blood pouring from his throat.

In the same moment, a heavy weight struck Maple from behind. Perch gripped her with his paws and bit down hard on her neck. Maple staggered forward and almost fell. Perch slid off her back. Maple could feel him trembling against her flank; then she realized that she was the one shaking. Why? I'm not frightened.

"He's dead!" Jewel shrieked, crouching beside Applestem. She stared up at Maple, her horrified eyes ringed with white. "You killed him!"

She tried to spit out the word "Good " but nothing came. Maple tried to take a step forward but her legs felt strangely heavy and her vision was blurred. Is it raining? she wondered. Something hot and wet spilled down her front legs, and there was a dull ache behind her ears. She shook her head and bright red droplets spattered the ground like tiny fallen leaves. She struggled to put one paw in front of the other. She would have to recover before trying to kill Jewel.

Jewel rose up from behind Applestem and hissed at Maple. "Don't come any closer! What you have done here is more terrible than anything a Colony cat has done before. But you have not won, Maple. Applestem will live on in his kits, and in their kits, and their kits in turn. His spirit will not die. He will be part of RiverColony forever!"

Maple swayed, feeling the soil sticky beneath her paws. She coughed, and found her voice again. "Then I will watch over all your kin and punish each one for what you did to me," she rasped. "My vengeance is not finished yet. It will never be finished!"

She lurched toward the bushes behind the willow tree. She dimly heard Perch start to follow her, but Jewel called him back. "She has done enough harm," Maple heard her mew. "Let her crawl away to die alone."

Maple forced her way through the undergrowth. She felt no pain, just a strange numbness that seemed to be spreading through her body. She reached the edge of the bushes, and the walls of the Twoleg den where she had slept on the first night of her exile loomed up in front of her, but Maple was too weak to go any farther. She slumped to the ground, feeling dirt and tiny stones grind into her blood-soaked fur. She closed her eyes, waiting for the face of Birch to appear and thank her for everything she had done.

But there was nothing behind her eyes except swirling darkness, battered by an icy wind and unbroken by even a glimmer of stars. Maple felt the first stirrings of fear. "StarColony, where are you?" she wailed into the endless night. "Where is he?"

A small furry face appeared blurrily in front of her eyes. "Birch?" Maple gasped. She tried to reach out with one paw.

"You!" exclaimed the cat. "Do you remember me? I'm Myler. We met once before."

Maple felt his nose press along her flank. "You're badly hurt," mewed the cat. "You poor thing. Come on, let's get you inside."

With surprising strength, he boosted Maple to her feet with his shoulder and guided her into the Twoleg den. He had the strength of a warrior, which she was grateful for. Maple collapsed onto a pile of hay. I have lost everything, she thought. What do I have left to live for?

There was a bustle of movement beside her and the dark tabby started dabbing at her fur with a piece of wet moss. Maple was too weary to push him away. His movements were slow and careful. She half opened one eye and saw blood flowing freely down her shoulder, pooling beneath her.

"There's too much, too much," fretted Myler. He dabbed more frantically. "Did a RiverColony cat do this to you?"

Maple closed her eye again and nodded.

The little cat sighed. "You should've stayed with me," he muttered. "You would've been safe."

Maple tried to speak but only let out a soft gurgle. I had to see Applestem pay. You don't understand.

Myler curled up beside her, hardly flinching as his fur pressed against her bloody body. "I'll stay with you," he promised. "You're safe now."

Maple unsheathed her scarlet, broken claws. "Leave me alone," she rasped, forcing herself to lift her head and glare at her companion. "I don't need anyone."

The dark tabby cat stood up and looked down at her with sadness in his eyes. "I think you are wrong," he whispered. "I was a forest cat, once. ThunderColony, actually. But my twolegs pulled me from the river and saved me. I'm safe here. No more fighting, nothing. Only happiness. I wanted to bring you with me."

His words began getting softer and softer in her mind, but she fought to stay awake. Maple tried to get up, but Myler pushed her back down.

"Do you know how it feels? To see the monster that your love becomes? I saw your kits in the nursery, our kits. I was clever, I stayed hidden. I knew what you were planning, but how could I stop you?" Myler, or Birch, paused, and stepped away from her. His eyes were cold. "I thought I knew you, Maple. But I was wrong. We were both wrong."

"Birch..." Maple was wracked with pain. She reached out to touch him with a paw, but he stepped further away. For the second time in her life, Birch turned away from her.

Maple was alone.

Sleep was dragging at her, heavier than stones, stronger than the river. She closed her eyes and watched her mind fill with churning shadows, pierced by shrieks of terror that made her jump. She realized that she could feel ground beneath her paws, cold and sodden and stinking like the river. Somehow she could walk again, strength flowing back into her limbs and her vision clearing.

She emerged into a half-lit clearing surrounded by gray tree trunks. Although she felt no fear, she was aware of being watched by unseen eyes. "Am I dead?" she meowed out loud, listening to her voice echo between the trees. "Is this StarColony?"

She looked up, but there were no stars in the thick black sky above her, not even a glimmer of silver beyond the rustling leaves. Instead, what light there was seemed to come from fleshy fungus growing on the roots of the trees, and from the slimy trunks themselves.

The Place of No Stars. She felt pure fear enter her heart.

"No... I should be in StarColony!" She yowled, spinning around furiously. "Applestem should be here instead! APPLESTEM SHOULD BE HERE INSTEAD!"

She sank to her stomach, sobbing violently into the ground.

Maple was alone.