Shattered Streams/Part 1

Six moons ago, the Time of Jade
Crocuspaw raced into camp, breathing hard. He was followed by Slashwhisker, Jadeberry, and Yellowclaw, all moving more slowly due to the weight of a cat’s body in their mouths.

“RiverClan!” Crocuspaw wailed. “Applestar is dead!”

The camp filled with yowls of grief. “Applestar was an intelligent and loyal leader,” Slashwhisker meowed after carefully setting Applestar’s body down. “She brought our Clan into golden moons of peace and prosperity. She died very bravely, saving Jadeberry, Crocuspaw, and me from a badger. Applestar chased it off, but she died of her wounds soon after.”

“RiverClan,” Jadeberry, the deputy, called to the Clan, leaping onto the Clanrock. “I will travel to the Moonstone tonight to receive my name and nine lives. Thrushflight, will you accompany me?”

The RiverClan medicine cat stepped forward. “Yes, of course. I must talk to Gracklepaw about what to do while I’m gone.”

Jadeberry nodded her permission and the brown tom hurried off to the medicine den. “RiverClan! We must sit vigil for Applestar. Cats who are going on patrol, you will go first. I have already set the patrols,” she reminded them.

Icewater, Turtlepaw, and Streamfrost stepped forward, as well as Cloudshadow, Elmleaf, and Reednose. Snowstorm held back; she remembered she wasn’t going on patrol.

As soon as the six cats were done sharing tongues with their leader, Jadeberry called the three senior warriors, Slashwhisker, Yellowclaw, and Snowstorm, forward. Yellowclaw beckoned their apprentices to come too. Crocuspaw and Gingerpaw scampered toward Applestar’s body behind them.

As Snowstorm crouched to share tongues with her leader, she felt a sudden jolt in her body. She stiffened. What was that from? No cat was near her; they were all licking different parts of their former leader.

I must have imagined it, she dismissed it, but she couldn’t help feeling that something was not right in the Clan.