Warriors: Storm Clouds

Prologue

She was born far too early.

     The world was still covered in snow and ice when Brookkit came into it. Her mother, Applefall, had not been prepared.

     Why? She often asked Starclan, why couldn't she have been born just one moon later? But if the starry cats had an answer, they did not speak it.

     All the nursery queens did their best to look after the too-small kit. She was a little silver tabby, with a white underbelly. But it was too cold, and often there wasn't enough fresh kill to keep Applefall's milk flowing. So in agony she had to watch her kit slowly starve to death.

     Brookkit did not know much of the world then. Her eyes were lidded shut, and her only thoughts were of the warm mass of fur that was her mother and of how hungry she was. She'd mew at her mother, begging her for milk. But Applefall would only wrap her body around her kit and nuzzle her. It was all she could do.

     Hunting patrols increased, and they searched desperately for anything they could find, even if it was crow-food. One day the clan deputy, Hawkfeather, managed to uncover a mouse den deep under the snow, and brought enough mice back to keep the clan's hunger at bay for a little while.

     "Applefall?"

     Hawkfeather's head poked through the entrance to the nursery.

     "What is it?" The golden tabby she-cat asked drowsily. "Is something wrong?"

     Normally she might have been embarrassed by his presence, but hunger and worry were the only things she had been feeling lately.

     "I've brought you two mice. We uncovered a den when out on a patrol today." His pale golden eyes flickered.

     Applefall crawled over to where the tom had dropped the mice.

     "Thank you," she murmured, then returned to her nest where her kit was sleeping.

     Hawkfeather dipped his head and left the nursery.

     "You'll be fine soon," the queen told her kit softly, "New-leaf is coming, and soon the all the streams and brooks will thaw, and prey will be plentiful. Don't you forget; new-leaf brings hope to the coldest and worst of times."