The next couple of day passed on uneventfully. The sun was mostly shining and the weather was warm, and prey was decent. The third day however, it started to rain again. Ravenpaw was taking shelter under a bush, since she had finally retrieved some of her pride again.
if only the rain would stop. She thought with a small sigh. There's no way I'm going out in this weather but... I want to keep moving.
Ever since she had started her personal journey to nowhere Ravenpaw had itched to keep moving. Whenever she stopped for too long she started to feel trapped, even though she knew she could leave whenever she wanted too. A thought struck her.
Is this how Falconblaze felt? Is this how Hawkpaw came to feel too? Then dread washed over her. If NightClan are gone... Does that mean they are gone too?!
Ravenpaw stood up a little too fast and her head started to spin. It didn't help when she hit her head either on a branch from the bush.
"Fox dung!" she hissed through gritted teeth. She waited a few moments for the pain to stop, then peeked out from under the bush. The rain was easing off so she decided she could keep going. The mud splashed around her paws, but Ravenpaw figured some dirt wouldn't kill her. She felt better now than since the day she discovered NightClan was gone. It still ached in her heart when she thought about her family, but it felt more like a past ache now.
She had been walking for a while and the rain had stopped completely when she heard a low wailing coming from somewhere up ahead. Curiosity pricked inside her belly and she crept forwards until she found the source.
A ring of bushes surrounded a small clearing. Slanted sunlight filtered through the trees and dappled the ground with strange patterns. In the far edge a pale brown she-cat crouched miserably, streaks of mud rumpling her pretty coat. Low wails of sadness and misery escaped her, and Ravenpaw sensed her distressed feelings even from the other side of the bushes. Ravenpaw wanted to walk up to the she-cat, ask what the problem was, until she saw the limp body of a tiny gray kit at her paws.
Oh my... Poor cat! She lost her kit!
The she-cat raised her muzzle to the sky and an eerie wail sounded. The she-cat was very thin, maybe even sick. She stumbled forward again, her pale brown paws slipping in the mud, as she tried to revive her kit.
"No...! No! Please, my kit! No!" she whimpered and nudged the lifeless scrap. After a moment she collapsed on the ground and kept still. Cautiously, Ravenpaw stepped out of her hiding place and up to the two cats. She only needed to glance at the kit to see it was gone. Then she walked over to the mother. Ravenpaw whimpered, tried to rouse the she-cat. But her eyes were glazed and sightless. Dead.
All the courage and life lust she had built up over the past days disappeared immediately, collapsed into ruins.
Death... So much death. It's everywhere, it's too much! Ravenpaw backed off and panic gripped her heart. As she turned and fled she was once again running blind. Her whole world had yet again been crushed beneath her paws.
Ravenpaw ran until she was out of the forest. She leaped over a river, swam through a larger one. She raced across a small field until she reached a dark pine forest. There she found a small bush where she lay down and curled her tail over her nose. She was cold, hungry, and exhausted. Slowly, sleep took over, her necklace soft across her chest, as if trying to warm the ball of ice that had settled in her heart.
____________________________________________________________________________________
Ravenpaw woke up in a place she never thought she'd go to again. At least not so soon. After everything that had happened to her, after the world had let her down, she decided to stop believing in StarClan. If her warrior ancestors really did exist and look after her, how could they let this happen? They would have stopped it, because no matter what she did it wasn't enough to punish her like that, taking away her home, her friends, her family... Would StarClan really take away a whole Clan to teach one cat a lesson? Ravenpaw doubted it. If StarClan was that cruel, they weren't worth believing in.
And now she was lying in a patch of lush grass whilst the sun beat down on her with a pleasing warmth. She stood up and looked around. She was lying in a small clearing surrounded by bushes and trees. They looked so thick that she didn't think it was possible to walk through them! But then she heard some bushes rustle and saw Goldenheart, her old medicine cat appear! All her anger melted away to joy. Despite everything, she couldn't bring herself to be mad at this cat.
"Ravenpaw." Goldenheart purred. "It's lovely to see you again." Her eyes were warm and kind like they had always been. The whole Clan had been grief stricken when their precious medicine cat had died from a fox attack when she was out gathering herbs. Dreamstar had even stopped eating for half a moon and wouldn't move from her nest! In the end though, the rest of the Clan had managed to get a new medicine cat apprentice.
"Goldenheart, why am I here?" Ravenpaw asks and walks closer. "Did I die?"
But Goldenheart shook her head.
"No dear. Not yet. I am here to tell you to stay alive." she mewed softly. Anger and raw grief seared through Ravenpaw's heart.
"WHAT? NO! Why would I want to go back? There is nothing left for me there. But if I die, if I give up, the pain will be gone... Right?" what started as a yowl quickly weakened to a begging whimper. Sorrow filled Goldenheart's eyes too, and they stood in silence for a moment.
"I'm sorry Ravenpaw. But NightClan isn't here." she whispered, bowing her head.
"What? How? Aren't they dead? They must be! If they were still alive they would have taken me with them." Ravenpaw felt like a tree fell over her. NightClan wasn't gone? They left her? Goldenheart shrugs her shoulders.
"We don't know. Everything was fine, when suddenly our vision of the forest was obscured. Flames engulfed everything for a moment and when it disappeared the forest had burned down and you were the only one left. But they didn't come here to StarClan. They just.... Vanished."
The medicine cat suddenly looked old and tired. Ravenpaw realized that Goldenheart had been with NightClan even longer than her, and that herself wasn't the only grieving cat.
"I'm sorry Goldenheart. I didn't mean to-" she began.
"No, no. It's not your fault dear. I'm sorry, I know this is hard for you. But there is a reason you must go back!" Goldenheart insisted. Ravenpaw tilted her head, letting her friend explain.
"NightClan can't have just disappeared on its own, something must have caused it. You have to figure out who is behind all this and stop them! Go to the mountains, I can feel evil radiating from that place like warmth from the sun. It will be a tough journey, but you can definitely make it. Use your brain, use the raven within you, and you will be fine."
Ravenpaw closed her eyes as Goldenheart spoke. She was surprised to find the medicine cat's voice fading and opened her eyes but saw nothing but darkness. She looked around frantically.
"Goldenheart? Where are you?" she called, but no one answered. She crouched down low and winced as voices suddenly exploded inside her head. Wails and yowls of terror shot through her ears. The heat was unbearable, but she couldn't get away from it!
Help me! I'm burning! she gasped and tried to utter the words, but found that she couldn't speak. What's going on? Where are you? Let me help! she tried to speak again, talk to the screeches inside her head. I can't stand it anymore! She thought hard, wanting out of this doom.
"HELP ME!" she finally gained the power of speech again, and grasped onto it like it was all she had. Something glinted in the darkness and she stumbled over to it blindly. She collapsed next to it and felt it with her paws. My necklace? she thought.
Then she heard another sound, so faint she had barely heard it before, but growing stronger. The caw of a raven? she thought. Soon the sound was so loud it drowned out all the wails. She looked down on the claw again. It's a raven's claw? The necklace started to glow. Dimly, but definitely glowing. It lifted of the ground and looped itself around her neck. Suddenly it tightened and Ravenpaw gasped in surprise. She tried to claw it off, but the ivy vines she had used were suddenly as strong as rock.
YOU CAN TAKE IT OFF WHEN YOUR TASK IS COMPLETED. UNTIL THEN, LET IT BE A REMINDER OF YOUR DESTINY.
There was a flash of light through the darkness, and Ravenpaw felt like she was dragged towards it. She stood up carefully, a little wobbly on her paws, and gingerly stepped towards it. Then another step, and another. She kept walking until she was right in front of it. With a final step she was sucked into the vortex of light, letting it swallow her and take her back to the living world.
