Moonrise

Chapter 12

Leafpaw shifted uneasily in a pool of moonlight and listened to the soft sighing of the wind in the oaks at Fourtrees. She and Cinderpelt were on their way to meet with the other medicine cats at Mothermouth, and already the half-moon was high in the sky.

"They're late," Cinderpelt meowed. "We're wasting moonlight."

Littlecloud, the ShadowClan medicine cat, settled himself more comfortably in a hollow in the grass. "They'll be along soon."

Cinderpelt's tail-tip twitched. "We need all the time we have at the Moonstone, especially tonight. We have to find out what we should do about the Twolegs."

Leafpaw tried to curb her own impatience with the RiverClan medicine cats, who should have met them long before now. Perhaps sharing tongues with StarClan wasn't so important to them, when their own territory hadn't been invaded by the Twoleg monsters. Everything was quiet now; the Twoleg monsters slept at night, but Leafpaw knew they were still there, squatting on the scarred ground among the trees they hadn't destroyed yet. The silence in the forest was unnatural, without the small sounds of prey that always seemed louder at night.

Her belly rumbled at the thought of prey. Cinderpelt had given her traveling herbs to quell her appetite before they set out, but they didn't help her hunger when she couldn't remember the last time they had been full-fed. All the Clan cats were suffering; lack of food had begun to weaken them so that they couldn't run as fast and catch what prey there was. With leaf-bare looming ever closer, crisping the leaves and sending them spiraling to the ground in the chill breeze, Leafpaw couldn't see what help StarClan might give.

To her embarrassment, her belly rumbled again, loud enough for the others to hear. Littlecloud shot her a sympathetic glance.

"Blackstar has sent warriors to fetch rats and crowfood from Carrionplace," he told Cinderpelt. His eyes darkened. "We haven't had any sickness yet, but it's only a matter of time."

"I hope you remember the herbs and berries I gave you when you were ill," Cinderpelt meowed.

"I've been collecting them. I know I'll need them soon."

"And tell your Clan not to touch any crowfood," Cinderpelt advised. "Fresh rats might be okay, but not carrion."

Littlecloud sighed. "I've tried, but what can I do when Blackstar gives the orders? Most of our cats are too hungry to care about what they're eating."

Just then Leafpaw caught sight of Mudfur, the RiverClan medicine cat, and his apprentice, Mothwing, climbing the slope from the river. She leaped to her paws, delighted to see her friend again, though she could not suppress a pang of envy that Mothwing looked so well fed, her long golden fur sleek with good health.

"At last!" Cinderpelt growled as the two cats came up. "I was beginning to think a fish must have jumped out of the river and swallowed you."

"Well, we're here now." Mudfur hardly paused for greetings, but led the way around the top of the hollow toward the WindClan border.

Cinderpelt and Littlecloud followed, while Leafpaw and Mothwing brought up the rear, side by side.

"I got into trouble about that fishing lesson," Leafpaw whispered. "I knew I should not have eaten your prey."

"Your leader's got no right!" Mothwing meowed indignantly. "We're medicine cats."

"Still, we shouldn't have done it," Leafpaw replied. "Medicine cats have to stick to the warrior code as much as any cat."

Mothwing just snorted. "I think I'm getting on really well," she mewed after a moment. "Mudfur taught me the herbs to use for greencough and blackcough, and the best way to get thorns out of pads. He said he'd never seen a cat do it so neatly."