CinderStar's Broken Family

Chapter 1 ~ Life And Death

~SkyStar's POV~
I remember that horrible day...

My name is SkyStar. I am the leader of ThunderClan, one of the warrior clans in the forest, by the lake. Now, where should I start this..? Oh, yes... of course.

I remember the day perfectly. I was in the nursery, heavily pregnant with my own litter of kits. My sister, DawnHeart, was giving birth that exact day. The clan was so happy, but they weren't after what had happened. The one thing I remember most clearly that day was her yowels of pain... the scent of blood draining out the usual sweet milky scent from the nursery... my sister was indeed giving birth, but it was going so wrong...

PaisleyPool, our medicine cat, was scampering around as quickly as her small legs could carry her, from the nursery to the medicine den, back to the nursery... over and over... then I saw it... the one, tiny bundle of dark chocolate brown and cinnamon fur... the small kit was covered in DawnHeart's blood, but I ignored that, as I began to quickly lick the small bundle to have it start breathing...

When the young kit had began to breathe, DawnHeart's yowels of pain stopped, replaced by a gagging sound... I saw her cough up mouth-fulls of blood, before she lay limply on the ground in the nursery... I could see another small bundle of fur halfway out of her, but it showed no signs of life, and DawnHeart's belly was still full with kits...

I had chosen to sleep in my own den beneath the high-ledge that night... I couldn't stay in the nursery any longer... my own sister had died giving birth to her kits, and only one made it, and was alive... as I was coming close to having my own litter as well, I was able to nurse my sisters only kit... hoping it would survive... SmallTail, DawnHeart's mate and the kits father, stayed with me all night. He comforted me, as he grieved over the loss of his mate, as he also wanted to make sure that his one kit survived...

"It's a she-kit..." I barely spoke out to SmallTail, hoping to break the horrible silence between us. SmallTail flicked his ears, to assure me that he heard, and after what felt like seasons, he raised his head. "She's my only kit..." he barely choked out. "CinderKit is her name..."

The night felt like it went on forever...

All that was heard outside in the clearing, was the scuffling of paws, as the ThunderClan cats sat in silent vigil for their lost clanmate, for my sister...

I felt something curl up between my front paws... as I looked down at them, sat CinderKit. She had bright, blue eyes. As they stared up at me, and they slowly closed, as the small kit curled up between my paws and slept...

Yes... I remember that day...

It's one I won't forget...