Warriors: Power Of Three 2 - Dark River (29 page)

Ahead, the river was roaring.

Lionpaw shot out behind him. “Take Swallowkit!” He thrust the kit at Jaypaw.

Jaypaw snatched her in his teeth.

“What’s he doing?” Hollypaw exploded from the tunnel with Heatherpaw and Breezepaw.

Jaypaw heard water splash as Lionpaw plunged into the river.

“Lionpaw!” he yowled, dropping Swallowkit. He strained to hear over the roaring of the water. “Can you see him?” he begged Hollypaw.

“He’s swimming!”

“He’s crazy!” Breezepaw gasped.

“I’m okay!” Lionpaw coughed as he struggled, splashing, from the far side of the river.

“How are we going to get the kits across?” Heatherpaw called.

“There’s no point!” Lionpaw yowled back. “The tunnel’s blocked!” Panic edged his mew. “The rain has washed soil into the entrance. There’s too much mud to dig through.”

“What about our tunnel?” Heatherpaw called.

Breezepaw bounded away as Lionpaw splashed back across the river.

“Blocked, too! Boulders have fallen from the roof!”

Breezepaw called from the WindClan tunnel. “It’s like a waterfall in here. We’d never get the kits up it!”

“We have to try!” Heatherpaw screeched.

“I don’t think there’s enough space at the top to get through,” Breezepaw argued. Fear made him angry. “If a kit got swept down over the rocks, it might die!”

“We have to do something,” Hollypaw yowled.

Jaypaw pressed against Fallen Leaves, trying to read his thoughts, but the young tom’s flank seemed to be fading, and Jaypaw’s shoulder passed with a shiver through the soft fur.

“Fallen Leaves?” he hissed.

“I’m sorry!” Guilt and grief hung like mist in the air.

Jaypaw suddenly felt cold where the tom’s warm body had been. Panic gripped him and time seemed to slow. For a heartbeat Jaypaw glimpsed a pair of amber eyes.

“Wait!” he called. “Come with us!”

Fallen Leaves blinked, his gaze filled with sorrow. “It’s not my time to leave,” he mewed faintly and then he was gone.

Not again!

“Are we going to die?” Sedgekit’s terrified mew rose above the torrent.

Jaypaw’s mind whirled as he tried to work out some way to escape. Water sprayed his face as the river frothed and bub-bled against the cave walls. Lionpaw pressed him back with the others until they were huddled on a narrow strip of earth, water snapping at their paws.

Help us!

Blood roared in Jaypaw’s ears.

Could StarClan hear him down here?

Suddenly, a silvery light glowed at the edge of his vision, like moonlight creeping across a night-black forest. Jaypaw looked up and saw a smooth ledge near the top of the cave. A cat was sitting there. It was the cat from his dream, with twisted claws, balding pelt, sightless bulging eyes. The cat who had sent Fallen Leaves into the tunnels to die.

The cat looked straight at Jaypaw.

Anger rose in Jaypaw’s chest. Have you come to watch us die too?

A shadow moved beneath the cat’s paws. He was rolling something toward the lip of the ledge. Something long and slender and smooth. Jaypaw’s fur stood on end. The stick from the lake!

Its markings were clear in the moonlight and, as Jaypaw stared in confusion, the cat lifted his paw and held a trembling claw over a row of scratches. Five long and three short.

Jaypaw gasped. Those scratches weren’t there before! He had counted the marks so many times he knew them by heart.

Five warriors and three kits! He means us !

Jaypaw stared, panic-stricken, into the old cat’s eyes. Are we going to die?

The cat bent his head to look at the stick before slowly lowering his claw and running it through the scratches. With a rush of hope, Jaypaw understood.

We’re going to survive!

The cat nodded.

A paw clapped him sharply on the ear. “Stop staring at nothing and help us think!” Breezepaw snarled.

The vision disappeared and Jaypaw was in darkness once more. He turned to the others, his pelt bristling with excitement. “There’s a way out of here!” he mewed. “I know it!”

“What is it, then?” Lionpaw demanded.

“I’m not sure,” Jaypaw admitted. “Let me think for a moment.”

“Thinking won’t move boulders!” Heatherpaw screeched.

“We’re trapped!”

“We could wait till the cave floods and swim up to the hole in the roof,” Hollypaw suggested.

“It’s too small to escape through,” Breezepaw growled.

“And the kits might drown!” Heatherpaw pointed out.

Jaypaw shook his head. There was something at the edge of his thoughts. An idea he could sense but not reach. The stick! It had been here in the cave. But he’d found it by the lake. How did it get out?

Water splashed at his paws. He recoiled, then froze. He pictured the river reaching up to the stick, lifting it, washing it away. Of course! The river must flow out into the lake.

“We’ll have to swim!” he cried.

“Swim where?” Lionpaw spluttered.

“The river runs into the lake. It’ll carry us there!”

“But it disappears underground!” Breezepaw hissed.

“It comes out in the lake!” Jaypaw insisted.

“We’re not RiverClan. We can’t swim!” Heatherpaw wailed.

Lionpaw pressed against Jaypaw. “Will this really work?”

“There’s no other way.”

“If you say we must do it, then we have to trust you,”

Hollypaw mewed.

“Yo u might!” Breezepaw growled.

“If we don’t do something, we’re all going to drown!”

Heatherpaw screeched.

Hollypaw kneaded the ground. “Let’s try it!”

Swallowkit squealed in terror. “I’m not going in the water!”

“We’ll hold you by your tails,” Lionpaw promised. “We won’t let go.”

“By our tails?” shrieked Thistlekit.

“If we hold you by your scruffs, we’ll swallow too much water,” Lionpaw mewed. “You’ll have to keep your head afloat by paddling with your forepaws like this.” Water spattered from his paws as he churned the air, showing the kits how to paddle.

“I’m scared,” Heatherpaw whispered.

“It’s going to be okay.” Lionpaw dropped onto four paws and pressed against the WindClan cat. Jaypaw was close enough to hear him whisper into her ear, “Our time together will be something I remember even when I’m with StarClan.”

Heatherpaw trembled. “There will be no borders between us there.”

Jaypaw blinked, startled by the emotion flooding between them. Then light flickered in his vision and he saw the old cat again.

Leave now!

He thought of all the cats who had ventured into this place; their fear and hope seemed to whisper in the air around him. The scratches on the stick had marked their fate.

Did the new lines really predict the Clan cats would survive?

He had to believe that they did.

“We have to go!” he ordered.

“Line up at the edge of the river,” Hollypaw instructed.

“Lionpaw, you take Sedgekit, I’ll take Thistlekit, Breezepaw can take Swallowkit.”

“What can I do?” Heatherpaw asked.

“Hold on to my tail,” Jaypaw mewed. “We’ll help each other.”

“Okay,” Heatherpaw agreed. He felt her take the tip of his tail lightly in her teeth.

“I’m not going!” Swallowkit’s paws splashed through the shallows as she tried to make a run for it. She shrieked as Breezepaw grabbed her and dragged her toward him through the water. “Don’t worry, Swallowkit,” he soothed. “I won’t let go. There’s no way I’m going to let you drown.”

Swallowkit whimpered but didn’t try to escape again.

“Come on,” Lionpaw urged.

Jaypaw waded through the shallows. His paws throbbed with dread as he felt the tug of the river.

“Ready?” Lionpaw mewed.

“Yes!” Hollypaw answered.

Jaypaw tensed. “Jump!”

He hurled himself into the rushing torrent. Heatherpaw tugged on his tail as the water swirled her downstream. The current dragged him under and he was lost in his dream of drowning again, choked by the tumbling water with the bodies of cats all around him and his ears filled with roaring.

Water roared in Hollypaw’s ears as the pale light of the cave faded from sight. The river dragged her into the tunnel, the current pulling her under. Her lungs screamed for air. She fought the urge to suck in water and kept her jaws firmly clamped around Thistlekit’s tail.

Rock scraped her ears and she felt air on her face as the river swirled her upward. She drew a quick breath before the river dragged her down once more.

A body brushed hers and was swept away. Thistlekit struggled, raking her nose with thorn-sharp claws. She resisted the urge to fight, trusting Jaypaw, letting the flood carry her, feeling stone graze her flanks as the water tossed her against the sides of the tunnel.

The roaring grew louder till she thought her ears would burst.

Then peace.

The current let her go and the noise died away. She strained to see through the darkness. Was that light? Bright dots sparkled in the distance. Was StarClan waiting to welcome her?

Her head swam and blackness pressed in on the edges of her consciousness. She fought her way upward, frantically seeking the surface, praying that she wouldn’t find rock above her. With a final desperate effort she pushed up and up until she thought the whole world must be water.

Suddenly, she burst through the surface of the lake, startled by the chill of the wind as it swept her face and filled her nose and ears. They had made it! She gasped and spluttered, drawing in lungful after lungful of cold, wonderful air.

Blinking water from her eyes, she saw that the dots were stars, glimmering through wind-torn clouds. The rainstorm was moving away.

Thistlekit thrashed in the water beside her, fighting to keep her head above water. Hollypaw grasped the kit with her forepaws, let go of her tail and grabbed her scruff, paddling with her hind legs to keep both their heads out of the water.

She forced herself to relax, letting the water support her and working her paws in a steady rhythm that held them afloat.

Thistlekit coughed and wheezed, trembling against her chest.

Hollypaw scanned the dark surface of the lake for the others. Joy sparked in her belly when she saw Lionpaw’s golden head bobbing a few tail-lengths away. Sedgekit was clinging to his back, eyes shining in the moonlight.

Bubbles exploded near him, and Breezepaw burst to the surface with Swallowkit.

Jaypaw? Heatherpaw? Panic started to grip Hollypaw. Had they made it? She heard splashing behind her and she twisted around, dragging Thistlekit so fast he squealed with surprise.

Jaypaw and Heatherpaw were flailing beside each other, their paws spraying water as they fought to stay afloat.

“Jaypaw!” she called.

“We’re okay!” Heatherpaw coughed.

Hollypaw swam toward them, kicking out with her hind legs, surprised to find herself swimming like a RiverClan cat.

“The shore’s over there!” She could see it not far off and, reaching Jaypaw, she nudged him toward it.

Heatherpaw was splashing toward Lionpaw. Why wasn’t the WindClan apprentice trying to help her own Clanmate?

Then she realized that Lionpaw was thrashing in the water, ducking his face under. As he came up for a breath, she saw his eyes were wild with panic.

“Sedgekit’s gone!” he yowled.

Heatherpaw dived beneath the surface. Hollypaw held her breath, treading water as Lionpaw ducked under again. Had the current dragged the kit back down into the black, bot-tomless water?

Suddenly, Heatherpaw bobbed up, Sedgekit between her jaws. The kit’s paws flapped wildly. He was alive!

Lionpaw broke the surface, his eyes lighting as he saw Sedgekit. He swam to Heatherpaw’s side and grasped the kit’s tail between his teeth, and together they headed for the shore. Hollypaw swam beside Jaypaw, casting an eye back to make sure Breezepaw was still managing. The black WindClan apprentice was pounding through the water with Swallowkit’s scruff in his jaws and his eyes fixed on the shore.

Hollypaw’s muscles burned with exhaustion, but she didn’t dare stop moving. With Thistlekit’s fur blocking her mouth, every breath was a struggle, but she kept her gaze pinned on the shoreline and pushed on. At last, she felt pebbles graze her hind paws and, reaching down, touched the bottom with a forepaw. Thank you, StarClan!

Wading from the water, she dropped Thistlekit in the shallows and stood panting for a moment, struggling to get her breath back. Heatherpaw and Lionpaw already lay farther up the shore, their flanks heaving while Sedgekit crouched beside them, vomiting water onto the pebbles.

Pebbles clacked behind her as Jaypaw followed her out of the lake.

“How did you know it would carry us into the lake?”

Hollypaw gasped.

“It . . . it made sense,” Jaypaw mewed between coughs. He splashed onto the beach, and Thistlekit stumbled after him.

Breezepaw was struggling out of the shallows a few foxtails along the shore. Swallowkit dangled from his jaws, her paws flailing as she fought to be put down.

“We’re all safe!” Hollypaw breathed. She padded to Lionpaw and Heatherpaw, her trembling paws slipping on the wet pebbles. “Are you two okay?”

Lionpaw lifted his head. “Only half-drowned.”

A purr burst from Heatherpaw. She flicked Lionpaw with her dripping tail and got to her paws. “We’d better get the kits back to camp.”

Hollypaw glanced up the beach. Brambles and ferns crowded the shoreline, the forest dark behind them. This was ThunderClan territory. “Let’s take them to Leafpool,” she suggested. “It’s nearer and we need to make sure they’re okay.” Sedgekit was still coughing up water. Thistlekit had collapsed beside him, and though her eyes were open, her breathing was rapid.

“Hollypaw’s right.” Jaypaw joined them. “They need treat-ment for shock.”

Swallowkit hurried toward them, Breezepaw at her side.

“That was the horriblest thing I ever did!” She shook the water from her fur.

“You wait till you taste Leafpool’s medicine,” Jaypaw warned.

Breezepaw’s eyes glittered with suspicion. “Leafpool?”

“The ThunderClan camp’s closest,” Heatherpaw told him.

“We should get them treated.”

Breezepaw stared at Swallowkit. There was blood on her fur where the rocks had scoured her pelt. “Okay,” he agreed.