Spirit's Journey

Chapter 51- Spirit: Cold Snow

I shivered as I looked down the sloping rocks, my ear-tips freezing in the wind. The time of Cold-paws had gotten worse, and I could only hope that it would ease up during our travels.

The dream was a constant reminder that there was always difficulties ahead, and that whatever I was doing, I was doing something wrong. The cheetah hadn't visited again but each night I went to sleep I lay down hoping for answers, because me and Midnight were nowhere closer to the truth. Often while hunting we'd sniffed among the rocks for signs of dogs or humans as well as prey, but so far nothing had turned up but a round metal thing we'd found buried in the light snow.

I felt bad for Diamond, who was not a full grown cat and didn't have any thick layer of fur to keep her warm- even tottering on someone's shoulders she would shiver. Hannah's feeble attempts to make her warmer didn't help, but chilled the little cat even more. I desperately hoped she would survive.

Hunting was proven to be the worst thing out in the mountains, especially when Fallan wouldn't even try in the cold snow and Hannah and Blaze acted as if they were always tired. Sure, we all were, but that was no excuse; and when I'd tried to explain it, Hannah had turned on me with an eruption of anger. Whether mine and the pretty cheetah's relationship would be repaired, I didn't know. But what I did was that her and Blaze grew closer every day, and never left each other's side. Now Hannah slept curled up close to the blotched cheetah's pelt at night, with Diamond (obviously) and Midnight and Aspen did the same with me.

"No, Fallan! Go sleep over there next to Storm," I'd heard my long lost sister say one day, right after we'd stopped to sleep for the night. Hannah had snapped at Fallan for asking to sleep next to her, leaving Fallan to sulk while dragging her paws a tail-length away from Storm and flopping down in a cold exhaustion.

Of course I was going to ask Fallan if she wanted to come join me, Midnight and Aspen- but the cheetah had already curled her tail over her nose and fallen asleep. I'd felt a pinch in my heart from seeing how small and frail the cheetah looked that night.

"Spirit," Midnight meowed to me, so I pulled my head to the right. Midnight's black fuzzy head looked small against the whiteness of the snow all around.

"It veers into two ways," she said over the quiet whistle of wind. I peered close to realize that further on, our trail veered sharply to the right down pointy rock-hard stone, or to the left with slippery snow and a winding trail that might cause any cat to loose balance and slide down the slope. Plus, there was no telling which parts were safe or uneven because the snow was covering everything. Thankfully it was no so deep that even Diamond could walk in it without much struggle.

"Why not go over it?" Storm meowed, volunteering his idea. My fur bristled at the thought of going straight up the mountain, which we had directly been avoiding so far. I craned my neck, feeling at least a small surge of relief from the fact that the mountain was not that high- almost just like a tall hill.

"There might be caves to shelter in," Aspen commented, who had come to stand beside us.

My thoughts took me back to the cluster of rocks we'd sheltered under the other night. Hannah, Blaze and me had almost gotten into a heated debate over who should be allowed to sleep inside of the warm, snow-ridden and wind-blocked hole. In the end, every cat but Diamond and Fallan had slept outside, but there'd been room for two more cheetahs if they'd slept curled up close together. Blaze had thrown a glare my way after that, surprising me. The tom had never shown me any open hostility until that moment. Now, I often avoided his gaze but let my thoughts drift back to the night in the trees.

"Oh, and, by the way, you're really pretty," he'd said without any shyness, balancing on the branch in front of me.

"I've been wanting to tell you that for awhile."