Caɾղaցe Ɱօօղ ~𝙰 𝚆𝚊𝚛𝚛𝚒𝚘𝚛𝚜 𝙵𝚊𝚗𝚏𝚒𝚌

39 🌙

Crescentpaw turned her head just in time to see the creature pursuing. It took the exact path that Hillflower had taken, as if it were following her scent.

The animal had a dark, distinctive predatory aura. As if it had no goal other than to kill them.

Which it does. The wolf's head was lowered as it sniffed along Hillflower's footfalls. It was trotting quickly, large paws skimming the grass. It looked like a young wolf.

Crescentpaw's ears flattened. She barreled her head into Oatkit's flank, shoving the tomkit into a barreling run.

"Get back to Windclan's camp! Back to the maple tree!" She snapped.

Cloverkit stumbled over her own paws.

"That's too far!" The kitten wailed pitifully, hardly looking where she was stepping.

Oatkit darted ahead of them. Crescentpaw tensed.

"There's no trees out here, Cloverkit! We have to go now."

They had waited too long. The wolf overcame them, and Crescentpaw flattened herself to the ground beside Cloverkit, trying to cover the kitten's nape with her outstretched paws.

The wolf didn't even glance at them. Its feet flung up dirt as it passed them by. The animal rounded the bend of a hill and within seconds was gone.

It's following Hillflower's trail so closely that it didn't notice us. Cloverkit trembled in the grass.

"Go now. Get to the maple tree now!" She pulled the kit up by her scruff. Cloverkit's white tail was fluffed with terror.

"By myself?" She asked, glancing around.

Crescentpaw's blood was roaring in her ears. She swiveled her head, a sense of foreboding swelling in her chest.

The apprentice twitched her tail, not sure what to do next, yet knowing she had no time to think about it.

"Yes, just go! Follow Oatkit's scent trail to the Windclan camp." She meowed firmly a few seconds later.

"I've got to see if Hillflower's okay. Go, hurry! You'll be fine."

Crescentpaw made sure that Cloverkit headed in the right direction, and quickly. Then she leaped off the path toward the wolf's scent trail. Windclan grasses blurred around her, golden-gray in the wash of shadow beneath a dim-lit sky. Twilight would fall soon.

The apprentice was perturbed. I thought we'd be lucky enough to make it back to Riverclan before a wolf showed up. I thought we'd have more warriors to deal with something like this, if it did happen.

She trudged on with oatgrass lashing against her muzzle. Hillflower can't be killed. She can't be. She's got to be okay. Crescentpaw pushed through the stems, her adrenaline growing.

Her turmoilious thoughts were cut off as she skidded into a sloping dip with gritty earth. Dark spiky plants grew from the loosened soil, strong-smelling and stiff.

Crescentpaw hurled around them and drew up short, paws faltering as she nearly slipped in blood.

Hillflower's fluffy neck-fur was a mess of torn flesh, exposing the pale pink-and-white windpipe inside. The she-cat's eyes were blank and reflectionless.

She stared up at the soft peony clouds, but Crescentpaw knew that she wasn't seeing anything while she laid there on her back.

Starclan help us...

The only other injury was a tapering trickle of blood from bite wounds in her back. The wolf had killed Hillflower and left her here.

To come back later. Very soon later. They didn't even bury her. Her pupils shrank into slits, and Crescentpaw felt her heart swell with terror.