The Darkest Hour (Warriors 2)

Firestar hesitated. “Yes, if you see her,” he meowed. “Get her side of the story. Then we’ll decide what to do.”

“Thanks, Firestar!” Bramblepaw’s eyes shone with relief.

Firestar slipped down the bank to the stepping-stones with his warriors behind him. As he led the way across he kept alert for movement on the opposite side of the river, but he saw nothing. There had not even been a RiverClan patrol, though by now the sun was well above the horizon.

Reaching the far bank, Firestar turned upriver toward the RiverClan camp. Before he reached it he came to the stream that led to the clearing of the Bonehill. A shudder ran through him as he remembered the last time he had been here. The reek of crowfood was fainter now, but the scent of many cats came to him on the breeze. Firestar recognized the mingled scent of TigerClan, once so ominous but now almost familiar compared with the stench of BloodClan.

“I think they must be in the clearing by the Bonehill,” he mewed over his shoulder. “Some of them, at least. We’ll go and see—Graystripe, keep a lookout.”

Graystripe fell back as Firestar followed the stream, creeping quietly through the reeds until he came to the edge of the clearing. Peering out, he saw that the Bonehill was already beginning to crumble so that it looked like nothing more than a heap of rubbish. The stream was no longer choked with rotting prey, and there was a small heap of fresh-kill, as if cats had begun to establish a new camp.

Several warriors were huddled in the clearing, with ungroomed fur and dull, staring eyes. Firestar was surprised to see cats from both RiverClan and ShadowClan. He had expected to find only ShadowClan warriors setting up a camp here while RiverClan occupied their old camp on the island upriver.

Leopardstar was crouched at the foot of the Bonehill. She was gazing straight in front of her, and Firestar thought she must have seen him, but she gave no sign. The ShadowClan deputy, Blackfoot, lay close by. As his initial surprise ebbed, Firestar felt relieved that he would be able to deal straightaway with Leopardstar, who was obviously trying to rule both Clans.

He glanced back at Sandstorm. “What’s wrong with them?” he murmured. He would almost have believed that the warriors were sick, but there was no taint of sickness in the air.

Sandstorm shook her head helplessly, and Firestar turned back to the clearing. He had come here looking for a fighting force, but these cats appeared to be half-dead. Still, there was no sense in going back. Signaling with his tail for his own cats to follow, he stepped into the clearing.

No cat challenged him, although one or two of the warriors raised their heads and gave him an incurious stare. With a glance at Firestar, Bramblepaw slipped away to look for Tawnypaw.

Leopardstar struggled to her paws. “Firestar.” Her voice rasped, as if she had not used it in many days. “What do you want?”

“To talk to you,” Firestar replied. “Leopardstar, what’s going on here? What’s the matter with you all? Why aren’t you in your old camp?”

Leopardstar held his gaze for a long moment. “I am the sole leader of TigerClan now,” she meowed at last, a spark of pride returning to her dull eyes.

“The old RiverClan camp is too small to hold both Clan s. We let the queens and kits and the elders stay there, with some warriors to guard them.” She let out a spurt of mocking laughter. “But what’s the point? BloodClan will slaughter us all.”

“You mustn’t think like that,” he urged the RiverClan leader. “If we all stand together, we can drive out BloodClan.”

A wild light shone in Leopardstar’s eyes. “You mouse-brained fool!” she spat. “Drive out BloodClan? How do you think you’re going to do that? Tigerstar was the Greatest warrior this forest has ever seen, and you saw what Scourge did to him.”

“I know,” Firestar replied steadily, hiding the shiver of sheer dread that ran through him. “But Tigerstar faced Scourge alone. We can join together as one to fight him so that afterward we can be four Clans again, according to the warrior code.”

A sneering look crossed Leopardstar’s face and she made no reply.

“What will you do, then?” Firestar asked. “Leave the forest?”

Leopardstar hesitated, tossing her head from side to side as if the effort of talking to Firestar irritated her. “I sent a scouting party to look for places to stay beyond Highstones,” she admitted. “But we have young kits, and two of our elders are ill. Not every cat can go, and the ones that stay will die.”

“They don’t have to die,” Firestar promised her desperately. “ThunderClan and WindClan are going to fight. Stand with us.”

He expected further mockery, but Leopardstar was looking at him more intently now. Nearby, Blackfoot scrambled to his paws and padded over to stand beside her. As he faced the ThunderClan cats Firestar heard a low snarl from Graystripe did, and saw his friend begin to flex his claws. He gave the gray warrior a warning flick with his tail; he loathed Blackfoot just as much as Graystripe did, but for now they would have to be allies in order to face an even greater enemy.

“Are you mouse-brained?” the ShadowClan deputy growled. “You can’t seriously be thinking of joining these fools? They’re not strong enough to tackle BloodClan. They’ll get us all torn apart.”

Leopardstar gave him a cold look, and Firestar realized with a sudden burst of hope that she didn’t like Blackfoot any more than he did. Stonefur, who had died under the black-and-white warrior’s claws, had been her trusted deputy.

“I am leader here, Blackfoot,” she pointed out. “I make the decisions. And I’m not ready to give up yet—not if there’s a chance of driving out BloodClan. All right,” she meowed, facing Firestar again. “What’s your plan?”

Firestar wished he had some clever trick to offer, some way of driving out BloodClan that wouldn’t risk the lives of every cat in the forest. But there was no trick; the path to victory, if there were one, would be hard and painful.

“At dawn tomorrow,” he replied, “ThunderClan and WindClan will meet BloodClan at Fourtrees. If ShadowClan and RiverClan join us, we’ll be twice as strong.”

“And will you lead us?” asked Leopardstar. Reluctantly she added, “I haven’t the strength now to take my cats into battle.”

Firestar blinked in surprise. He had expected Leopardstar to demand authority over the other Clans. He wasn’t at all sure that he himself was strong enough to take on the leadership in her place, but he could see that he had no choice.

“If that is your wish, then yes, I will,” he replied.

“Lead us?” The voice, harsh with mockery, came from behind Firestar. “A kittypet? Are you out of your mind, Leopardstar?”

Firestar turned, knowing what he would see. Darkstripe was thrusting his way through the little group of his former Clan mates.

Firestar stared at him. In ThunderClan, Darkstripe had always been sleek; now his black-striped coat was dull, as if he had stopped caring for it. He looked gaunt, and the tip of his tail twitched nervously. Only the cold hostility in his eyes was famil

iar, and the insolence with which he looked Firestar up and down as he came to a stop in front of the leaders.

“Darkstripe.” Firestar acknowledged him with a nod. Though he could never truly pity the dark warrior, he felt a pang to see how haunted he looked, his eyes empty, as if he were already being punished for betraying his birth Clan.

Leopardstar stepped forward. “Darkstripe, this isn’t your decision,” she meowed.

“We should kill you or drive you out,” Darkstripe snarled at Firestar. “You turned Scourge against Tigerstar. It’s your fault he died.”

“My fault?” Firestar gasped in astonishment. The dark tabby’s eyes burned with hatred, and Firestar knew that in his own way Darkstripe was grieving for the dead leader. Now that Tigerstar was dead, Darkstripe was utterly alone. “No, Darkstripe. It was Tigerstar’s own fault. If he hadn’t brought BloodClan into the forest, none of this would have happened.”

“And how did it happen?” Graystripe broke in. “That’s what I’d like to know. What was Tigerstar thinking of? Didn’t he see what he was letting loose in the forest?”

“He thought it was for the best.” Leopardstar tried to d e f end Tigerstar, though her words sounded hollow. “He believed the forest cats would be safer if they all joined together under his leadership, and he thought BloodClan would convince you he was right.”

A snort of contempt came from Graystripe, but Leopardstar ignored it. Instead, she flicked her tail and another cat came up—a skinny gray tom with a ragged ear. Firestar recognized him as Boulder, one of the rogue cats Tigerstar had taken into ShadowClan.

“Boulder, tell Firestar what happened,” Leopardstar ordered.

The ShadowClan warrior looked thin and tired as he met Firestar’s gaze. “I belonged to BloodClan once,” he confessed. “I left many moons ago, but Tigerstar knew about my past. He asked me to take him into Twolegplace because he needed more cats to make sure ShadowClan controlled the forest.” He glanced down at his paws, his ears twitching uncomfortably. “I…I tried to tell Tigerstar that Scourge was dangerous, but neither of us imagined what he could do. Tigerstar offered Scourge a share of the forest if he would bring his cats to help him fight. He thought that once he’d made all the other Clans join TigerClan he could get rid of BloodClan.”