Warriors: The Prophecy of Stream

Chapter 1: The Prophecy of Stream

Pelt-piercing screeches rang through the air, a cold wind threatening to pull the dark trees overhead to the ground. Two figures ran, side by side, leaping across large boulders and the wet ground. The thudding of more paw-steps followed them, yet no cat was in sight.

"Hurry!" One of the running cats yowled, a she-cat with icy blue eyes. Fear sparked like electricity between the two cats. The pursuing paw-steps growing louder.

"Echobreeze, where are we?" The smaller cat responded, hissing beneath her breath as her paw twisted on a moldy vine. She turned to her mentor and saw the same expression of fear expressed on her grey and white speckled face.

"The Dark Forest, Moonpaw, we are in the Dark Forest." Moonpaw's blood turned cold as she once again focused on her pale paws, turning an eery green in the dim light. "Why?"

Her mentor glanced backwards briefly, still dodging between the dark trees that seemed to appear suddenly out of the shadows, "I don't know."

Both she-cats continued running, all the while hearing the paw-steps pursuing them growing furiously louder and closer. It wasn't until Echobreeze's silvery pelt vanished from Moonpaw's view for a heartbeat that the young apprentice felt claws pierce her skin. Pain like fire shot through Moonpaw's back, blinding her as the invisible figure pinned her to the soggy ground. Breath that stung like mouse bile filled her nostrils, and she heard a chilling voice whisper, "You think you can escape, Windclan dung?" The attacker's scent was slowly growing familiar. "It's a pity though, you won't have long to run away soon." Moonpaw thrashed on the cold ground, trying to throw the attacker off, when suddenly the weight was lifted and Moonpaw found herself lying beside Echobreeze, their noses a mouse-length from the Moonpool.

She sat up quickly, looking around the stony area for her attacker, but instead found herself face to face with another familiar, but kinder, set of eyes.

"Fawnwater?" Echobreeze's quiet voice echoed across the still water of the Moonpool, her blue eyes wide with shock and emotion and she shook the effects of the haunting chase from her pelt.

A beautiful she-cat stood before them, her long, golden and tan fur brimmed with stars. Her green eyes seemed aged with wisdom, though she looked barely older than Moonpaw, and she had a row of scars across her muzzle. "Yes, Echobreeze. It's me." The Starclan warrior bowed her head, her ears pressed down as she looked up at the two medicine cats. Forest green met ice blue as Fawnwater and Echobreeze looked at each other. Moonpaw suddenly realized who this cat was.

"You were Sunstar's mate, weren't you?" Moonpaw had remembered hearing stories of the beautiful queen who disappeared during a patrol that was attacked by rogues. Every cat in Windclan knew of her bravery and kindness to others, even those born long after her disappearance, like Moonpaw. Sunstar had spent moons desperately trying to mind his lost mate, even more so when the medicine cat at the time, Hollowroot, had told the newly made leader that she had been expecting kits. No cat ever found out what happened to the queen, and the whole clan had mourned with their leader.

"And my sister." Echobreeze's voice was cold, barely loud enough to be heard above the wind.

Moonpaw glanced from one she-cat to the other, and realized what had made Fawnwater familiar. Both she-cats, though now long different in age, shared the same lean features and long silky fur and narrow face.

Fawnwater looked away from her sister, and seemed to shrink down into the earth. "I-im so sorry Echobreeze."

"Sorry?!" Echobreeze seemed to explode after a heartbeats silence. "You were missing for so long, we looked for you for moons! You couldn't have left a sign or, or come visit me once you joined Starclan, or something!" Her anger shocked Moonpaw, who had only ever seen her mentor calm and steady.

Fawnwater seemed to shake her head to get her thoughts together, then stood tall and proud before her bristling  sister. Her voice was slow and calm, though wavered with moons of unspoken emotion. "I know. And I really am sorry. " She closed her eyes, and when she opened them she looked instead at Moonpaw. "But I am not here to make amends, or talk about where i've been. I have a prophecy."

Moonpaw pricked her ears in interest, though Echobreeze still had anger like fire come from her pelt, and wouldn't look away from the glimmering water beside the cats. Moonpaw's wise mentor seemed to be in shock, but if Fawnwater had come with a prophecy it needed to be heard. "What is the prophecy?"

"A forgotten water will drown the clans, beware the stream with the sun on its back."

Moonpaw blinked in confusion. "What does that mean? The clans will drown? How do we stop this stream?" She looked from Fawnwater to Echobreeze, though the star-clan warrior just shook her head sadly and her mentor still looked away.

"I know not what it means, Moonpaw, I am only here to deliver the prophecy to you. I cannot tell you how to defeat this threat either, but in time, you will know." Fawnwater looked at her sister, and took a step closer. "Please Echobreeze, I didn't mean to hurt you, or Sunstar, or anybody."

Echobreeze closed her eyes, and suddenly didn't seem to be the wise, strong mentor that Moonpaw knew her as. "How long?" she asked quietly.

"What?" Fawnwater questioned, her ears perked.

"How long have you been in Starclan? How long have you been able to visit me? To let me know what happened?" Echobreeze looked at her sister, and her shoulders shook with a sob that broke Moonpaw's heart.

Fawnwater flinched with grief, then pressed her muzzle to her sister's, who stiffened at her warm touch. "Too long, dear sister. Far too long. I just never knew how to tell you."

Echobreeze relaxed slightly, and pressed her head to her sister's cheek. "I missed you so so much. I was so scared, and so alone. And you were expecting kits-" Echobreeze's eyes widened and she took a step back. "The kits! What happened? Did you have them? Oh, it was moons ago, they would be full warriors by now!"

Fawnwater flicked her tail in signal, and two small shapes appeared behind her. The two kits walked forward, barely looking older than just a couple moons, and touched noses with the grief-stricken Echobreeze.

"This is Poppy," Fawnwater touched her tail gently to the head of the smaller kit, a she-cat black as the night. "Like Poppywillow, our mother." She then touched her other kit, a golden tom with dark stripes. "Sun. Like Sunstar." Grief filled the queen's eyes as she said her mate's name. "I didn't want to give them warrior names, because I knew they would never train as  Windclan cats, but I wanted them to know where they came from."

Echobreeze looked at the two kits, her kin, with wide eyes. Without looking away she mewed, "Why did you leave?"

But Fawnwater just shook her head. "In time, I will tell dear sister." She drew her tail tightly around her kits, and turned slowly to place her paw in the Moonpool's still surface. Her touch barely rippled the water, and as it stilled Moonpaw could see a figure walking, barely recognizable as a cat though the leaves. Hints of a pale pelt caught a dim sunlight. "I had another son, and he lived." Fawnwater looked sadly at the figure in the water. "He survived while we did not. I know he travels the lands now, but I hope one day he will return to Windclan. I never had the time to teach him about Starclan, so I cannot visit him. But I pray he will find his way home."

Moonpaw looked once more at the mysterious figure before it disappeared into the water again. She couldn't dare speak after the weight of all she had witnessed hung in the air.

The three she-cats stood in silence as the two Starclan kits faded into the night. Fawnwater looked once more at the Windclan medicine cats. "And I apologize for you waking in the Dark Forest, they must have known I would be sharing with you a prophecy, and would try to stop it."

Suddenly Moonpaw remembered her attacker, and her back seemed to hurt again. "Who was that chasing us? I recognized him."

Fawnwater started to fade, and Echobreeze widened her eyes in shock as she realized her sister would be leaving again so soon. "His name is Blackwasp, Sunstar's father."

And as quickly as she appeared, Fawnfeather faded away, leaving Echobreeze leaping towards empty air, her yowl of pain and anger echoing across the Moonpool.