Warriors AU: Forest of Secrets

Chapter 23

"Come," Oakstar ordered. She began to walk slowly across the camp toward her den, leaving Sandstorm with no choice but to follow. Once inside, she told him to sit down, and settled herself on her bedding.

"How much do you know?" she asked Sandstorm, her amber eyes searching his.

"Only that Bluefur once brought two Thunderclan kits to Riverclan," Sandstorm admitted. "He told Rippleclaw—that's the queen who suckled them—that he didn't know where they had come from."

Oakstar nodded, her gaze softening. "I knew Bluefur would stay loyal to me," she murmured. She raised her head. "He was the kits' father," she added. "Did you guess that much?"

Sandstorm shook his head. But it made sense, then, that Bluefur had been so desperate for Rippleclaw to care for the helpless kits. "What exactly happened to your kits?" he demanded, curiosity making him unguarded. "Bluefur didn't steal them, did he?"

The Clan leader's ears flicked impatiently. "Of course not." Her eyes met Sandstorm's, suddenly clouded with a pain he could not begin to imagine. "No, he didn't steal them. I gave them away."

Sandstorm stared in disbelief. There was nothing he could do but wait for the she-cat to explain.

"My warrior name was Oakheart," she began. "Like you, I wanted nothing more than to serve my Clan. Bluefur and I met at a Gathering early one leaf-bare, when we were still young and foolish. We were not mates for long. When I discovered I was to have kits, I intended to bear them for Thunderclan. No cat asked me who the father was—if a queen does not wish to tell, that is her choice."

"But then...?" Sandstorm prompted.

Oakstar's eyes were fixed on a point far away, as if she were staring into the distant past. "Then our Clan deputy, Tawnyspots, decided to retire. I knew I had a good chance of being chosen to take her place. Our medicine cat had already told me that Starclan held a great destiny for me. But I also knew the Clan would never take a queen nursing kits as deputy."

"So you gave them away?" Sandstorm could not keep the note of disbelief out of his voice. "Couldn't you have waited until they had left their nursery? Surely you could have been made deputy once the kits were old enough to care for themselves."

"It wasn't an easy decision," Oakstar told him, her voice rough with pain. "That was a bitter leaf-bare. The Clan was half-starved and I had barely enough milk to feed my kits. I knew that in Riverclan they would be well cared for. In those days the river was full of fish, and Riverclan cats never went hungry."

"But to lose them..." Sandstorm blinked at the sharpness of pain he felt in sympathy.

"Sandstorm, I don't need you to tell me how difficult my choice was. I lay awake for many nights, deciding what to do. What was best for the kits... what was best for me... and what was best for the Clan."

"There must have been other warriors ready to be deputy?" Sandstorm was still struggling to accept that Oakstar had been so ambitious that she would have given away her own kits.

Oakstar jerked her chin up defiantly. "Oh, yes. There was Snowfur. He was a fine warrior, strong and brave. But his answer to every problem was to fight. Should I have watched him be made deputy, and then leader, and let him force the Clan into unnecessary wars?" She shook her head sadly. "He died as he lived, Sandstorm, a few seasons before you came to join us, attacking a Riverclan patrol on the border. Wild and arrogant to the last. I couldn't stand by and let him destroy my Clan."

"Did you give the kits to Bluefur yourself?"

"Yes. I spoke to him at a Gathering, and he agreed to take them. So one night I crept out of the camp and took them to the Sunningrocks. Bluefur was waiting, and he took two of them across the river."