Warriors AU: The Darkest Hour

Chapter 7

A raw, damp cold pushed its way through Sandstar's fur as he padded through Tallpines. The sky was heavy with gray cloud and seemed undecided between sending rain or snow onto the forest. Here, where the ravages of the fire had been worst, ash still covered the ground, and the few plants that had begun to grow back had shriveled again with the coming of leaf-bare.

It was the day after his announcement to the Clan, and Sandstar had left his new deputy in charge of the camp while he patrolled the border alone. He wanted some time by himself, to get used to being leader and to think about what lay ahead. Sometimes he felt he would burst with the pride of being chosen by Starclan to lead Thunderclan, but he also knew it would not be easy. Grief for Oakstar was a dull ache that would stay with him forever. And he was afraid of what Goldenstar might do next. Sandstar could not be comforted, as the other cats were, by the absence of any traces of Shadowclan in their territory. He knew Goldenstar would not rest until he had brought his enemy down—and news that Sandstar was now the leader of Thunderclan would only fuel the fires of his revenge.

Sandstar emerged from the trees near Twolegplace and looked up at Olive's fence to see if his sister had ventured out of her Twoleg nest. But there was no sign of her, and when he drank in the air he caught only a faint scent. Padding along the edge of the trees, Sandstar came to a part of the first he rarely visited, and recognized the Twoleg nest where he himself had lived as a kittypet, so many moons ago. Overcome by curiosity, he darted across the stretch of open ground at the edge of the trees and leaped to the top of the fence.

Memories of playing there as a kit flooded over him as he looked down at the stretch of grass bordered by Twoleg plants. There was a more recent memory, too, of coming here to find catnip when Oakstar was ill with greencough. Sandstar could see the clump of catnip now from where he was sitting, and smell its tempting scent.

A flicker of movement from the nest caught his gaze, and he saw one of his old Twolegs pass by the window and disappear again. Sandstar suddenly wondered how his Twolegs had felt when he left them to live in the forest. He hoped they hadn't worried about him. They had cared for him well, in the way that Twolegs tried to, and Sandstar knew he would always be grateful. He would have liked to tell them how happy he was in the forest, and how he was fulfilling the destiny Starclan had laid out for him, but he knew there was no way he could make Twolegs understand.

He was bunching his muscles, ready to leap down into the forest, when something black and white moved in the next garden. Glancing down, he saw Dottie, his old friend from his kittypet days. She looked as plump as ever, with a contented expression on her broad face. She was talking to a handsome brown tabby tom, a stranger to Sandstar; their mews reached him but they were too far away for him to make out the words.

He almost jumped down to say hello, until he remembered that they would probably be frightened by the sight of a ruffian like himself. Not long after coming to the forest, Sandstar had met Dottie in the woods, and nearly scared the life out of her before his friend recognized him. The life he led now was worlds away from theirs.

The sound of a door opening roused Sandstar from his thoughts, and he edged along the fence into the shelter of a holly bush as one of his old Twolegs came out of the house and called. At once the handsome brown tabby meowed good-bye to Dottie and scrambled under the fence that divided the gardens. He ran up to the Twoleg, who scooped him up and stroked him before carrying him indoors, purring loudly.

He's their new kittypet! Sandstar thought. The closing of the door stirred a pang of envy in him, just for a heartbeat. The little tabby would have no need to catch his prey before he could eat; he would have a warm place to sleep, and no risk of dying in battle or from one of the many dangers that beset the forest cats. He would have the friendship of Dottie and other kittypets, and the care of his Twolegs—everything that Sandstar had turned his back on to live as a Clan cat in the forest.