Warriors Fanfiction
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The following story is rated Extreme.

Prologue[]

Vinestar dodged a pounce from his new attacker, slipping away like a minnow with his lithe, narrow frame. The tip of his unnaturally long tail brushed she startled she-cat’s nose, and he considered biting it, slipping away from the battle using his viper Lovac.

No. Not here. I made a promise not to reveal it to anybody.

“This will be the last time you and your warriors fool around on Thunderclan territory with your stupid games!” coughed up the winded she-cat as she scrambled to her paws. “You may have thrown away eight lives in your reckless antics, but I will take away your ninth!”

The Windclan leader’s narrow green eyes gleamed tauntingly at her. “Ooh, I’m so scared,” he drawled. He dashed at her, a blur on the moonlit moor. An accurate swipe at her eyes sent the she-cat reeling.

Vinestar took the opportunity to observe the status of the battle he had caused. If Yewtoe had jumped more carefully of the Sky Oak he wouldn’t’ve broken his neck and the patrol wouldn’t have spotted his body, therefore he would never have been caught and this battle would have never happened!

We would have gotten away with it if you were smarter, Yewtoe! He roared silently to Starclan. It wasn’t my fault, you blubbering bee-brain!

He had trained his warriors to be quick and evasive, moving like blurs compared to the other clans’ warriors. It was a way of minimalizing casualties and confusing the enemy. Making sure to hide himself in a dip in the moor to avoid surprise attacks, he spotted Thunderclan’s leader Spottedstar limping away from the scene as flashes of fur swiped at her, disappearing as quickly as they appeared. His chest swelled with pride. They were wearing her down, and wouldn’t stop until she called the retreat command. It was a foolproof strategy.

Any second now, he prayed, kneading his claws into the ground in impatience.

“Thunderclan, retreat!” sighed a weary Spottedstar. The Windclan warriors, giddy with another victory, chased after the retreating warriors, like a wave washing over the moor.

Vinestar’s excitement was too much to contain. “Ha!” he exclaimed, leaping out of his hiding place and on to the Tallrock, where he usually called Clan meetings. “Windclan, more like Winclan!” he loudly gloated to the fleeing warriors. He was too occupied with admiring his warriors to notice a dark shape, camouflaged against the moor, streaking closer to him.

A black shape crashed into him head-on, paws outstretched in an attempt to strike. They caught his throat, and the two cats tumbled backwards into the camp, Vinestar flailing his limbs in panic. The strange cat had his limbs wrapped around Vinestar’s body, making it impossible to escape. Vinestar tried to roll around to try to loosen his attacker, but it was no use. He felt the strangest sensation as the cat flipped him up into the air, and felt the breath rush out his lungs as he hit the tough ground, pinned instantly.

Breathless, he strained his head upwards to meet his opponent’s furious expression. I recognize that face! Batsnout, Thunderclan’s deputy.

“You win,” croaked Vinestar. Without a smart comeback or dramatic one-liner, Batsnout crushed Vinestar’s throat in his jaws, and flung the lightweight cat’s body outside the camp as if he was just a piece of prey, and slunk out of camp before anyone woke up.

Vinestar helplessly watched Batsnout cross the moor. He felt he was drifting away, losing his final life. I have no regrets, he thought fondly, reflecting over the stupid things he did with his friends: Jumping backwards off of trees, attempting to swim, overdosing on herbs… It was fun and it was stupid, but he felt like he properly lived.

He spotted the spirits of other cats who died in the battle, thick-headed Pikebelly and the clueless Beaverfoot. His two closest friends.

“Come with us, Vinestar! There’s no point holding on to your last life,” chirped Beaverfoot.

“Yeah, Vinestar, just die already!” encouraged Pikebelly, before getting a hard cuff on the ear.

“Rude furball!” hissed Beaverfoot under his breath.

Pikebelly blinked a few times in confusion, then a look of horror spread across his starry face as he realised what he said. “I’m so sorry, Vinestar!” he wailed frantically. I didn’t mean it like that!”

By now Vinestar had left his body, and ignored the conversation, brooding over the last few minutes of his life. Now he had lost his viper Lovac, his leadership, all because of Batsnout! He had to pay. Vinestar would get revenge in the worst way possible.

“Let’s go,” he ordered his two friends sharply. The two cats followed him as the moor transformed into Starclan, whispering excitedly.

Vinestar’s mentor, Thicketpelt, greeted him with an unimpressed stare. “You lived longer than I thought you would,” she stated simply. She turned to Pikebelly and Beaverfoot. “Come with me. There’s something I need to explain to you now you are members of Starclan.”

Vinestar was left alone, in this world of starry cats. The first thing he had to do was find the cat who gave him his Lovac, and find out about the other possible ones.

“Harecry told me there were seven Lovacs, but one was so dangerous Starclan never grant it to a kit,” he muttered to himself as he started walking, transitioning into a run. “Harecry! Yo, buddy!”

He found Harecry sharing prey with a cat he didn’t recognise. The light brown tabby tom was the previous hawk Lovac holder, and his long flowing fur looked even more glamourous with stars in it.

Vinestar skidded to a halt in front of the couple. “Tell me about the missing Lovac,” he demanded. Harecry turned around startled.

“Welcome to Starclan, Vinestar. I didn’t expect you to use all of your nine lives so quickly.”

“What I did with my lives is none of your business, but that’s beside the point. Now answer me!”

Harecry muttered a short apology to his partner and the two toms walked off. “It’s called the Wild Dog Lovac, Dog Lovac for short. It’s so dangerous, Starclan trusted it into the paws of an ancient cat when it was last returned to our hunting grounds, and nobody knows who he is.”

Vinestar started walking at a faster pace. “What is a Dog Lovac holder like?” He noticed Harecry had stopped walking and looked visibly uncomfortable, with fidgeting paws, staring at his toes, and a quivering pelt.

“They’re pretty easy to spot: they could never be successfully groomed, so their fur is ragged, knotted, patches missing, you know the sort. An eyesore for even their own mothers. And…” he trailed off and shuddered. “What makes Dog Lovac Holders so scary and damned by Starclan is…”

“Spit it out!” spat out Vinestar.

Harecry slowly lifted his head to meet Vinestar’s impatient stare. “C-c-cannibalistic ten-de-de-dencies,” he whimpered. “As a kit, they are curious about the taste of cat flesh, and in Lovac form when they first catch a taste, there’s no stopping them! They’ll do anything, Lovac form or not, to eat cat flesh! They will slowly get driven mad by it, living around so many cats, it’s like a cat in a clan where everything is made of fresh-kill but they’re not allowed to eat!” He was cowering on the ground now, paws over his eyes. “It’s why you don’t see any previous Dog Lovacs in Starclan, they all go to the Dark Forest and they can’t help it!” he yowled in fear.

Vinestar grinned, showing rows of neat white teeth. “Perfect,” he growled. “I’ll leave you to cower like a kit. I have work to do.”

After reuniting with Beaverfoot and Pikebelly, he quickly explained his plan. “All we have to do is find who’s guarding the Dog Lovac,” he meowed slowly and quietly. He spotted Thicketpelt, a grey-blue shape watching them from afar with slits for eyes.

“What are you planning, Vinestar?” she growled. “More reckless stunts now that you have no possible chance of dying in Starclan, I expect?”

Vinestar gave large shakes of his head, doing his best to look innocent. “I wanted to know if you could tell me who’s safeguarding the Dog Lovac,” he meowed in a cheerful voice. “I want to learn more about them, as well as my friends of course. It was their idea, and they asked me to ask you because you’d listen to me since you were my mentor.”

Thicketpelt didn’t budge. “You’re plotting something in that walnut-sized brain of yours, I know it.”

“No, really, Thicketpelt!” Beaverfoot burst out. “Since Vinestar was a Lovac himself, you told us that yourself, we want to learn more about them!” He widened his eyes like a kit to try melt Thicketpelt’s stony heart.

Thicketpelt turned away, and started to walk off, sick of the trio’s shenanigans. “Even if I did know,” she said smugly, “I’m not even authorised to tell you.”

Vinestar felt tension rising in him. “Fine!” he shouted after her. “We’ll find it ourselves!”

“Maybe we could ask an elder,” Pikebelly suggested timidly. “They’re ancient cats, after all.”

Vinestar instantly switched from flat-out disappointed to as high a Red Kite. “Pikebelly, that’s the smartest thing I’ve ever heard a bee-brain like you say! All the cats who labelled you mentally retarded didn’t know squat.” He loped off, in a new high.

Elder after elder after elder, the cats found themselves going through multiple generations until they were directed to a dark red tabby with the name Poppydawn. She was so faded it was hard to tell she was even there.

“You should find Pinestar,” she beamed at the young cats. “He volunteered to take it, because he didn’t want any cats to end up like his son, something like that. Did you know, you’re the first cats to talk to me in many, many years!”

Vinestar hastily turned away and walked off. “Thanks!” he called, signalling for Pikebelly and Beaverfoot to follow him.

“Pinestar!” Vinestar screeched. His two friends echoed him, disturbing cats of every clan and ignoring the “shh!” that came from every direction.

A massive reddish-brown tom appeared in front of them. “You called?” he grunted.

Vinestar quickly composed himself. “I heard you had the, er, Dog Lovac. We’ve been searching for it for a while now.”

Pinestar studied them suspiciously. “Who told you that?”

“I think her name was Poppydawn. We want to learn about it.”

Pinestar nodded. “Well then, you’d better come with me.” He turned around, and started to walk.

Bad mistake, old timer, quipped Vinestar devilishly to himself as he spotted it: a gleaming white ball of light wrapped around by Pinestar’s tail. He reared up and batted it out of Pinestar’s grasp, quickly bent down to pick it up in his mouth and zoomed off, faster than he had ever run before. Pikebelly and Beaverfoot lumbered after him.

Knocking past a small tortoiseshell she-cat, Vinestar dived into the looking-pool and into the lake territories, falling slowly and landing gracefully in the Thunderclan camp. He felt the thuds of his two accomplices behind him, landing not-so-gracefully.

“Thunderclan?” gasped Beaverfoot, “Why Thunderclan?”

“Because,” grinned Vinestar, bouncing on his paws with excitement, “I’m going to curse Batsnout’s only kit with the Dog Lovac and curse him with the destiny of destroying Thunderclan from within!” He laughed maniacally. “Aren’t I a genius?”

Beaverfootswept his tail along the sandy ground. “How do you know he has a kit? Are you going to choose the right one?”

“Before I met up with you before explaining my plan, which I just re-explained to you now, I had a quick visit to Thunderclan’s territory, which I can do because I’m a leader and I’m in Starclan so I can go anywhere I please, and I saw a queen giving birth who mentioned Batsnout being her mate, and she has one kit, a pale brown tabby tom named Acornkit.”

He marched over to the nursery, batting the Lovac between his paws like it was a moss ball. The sky was quickly growing lighter. He spotted Acornkit, sleeping beside his parents, and eased the ball of light into his mouth.

“Batsnout will pay for what he did to me,” he snarled. “I curse you, Acornkit, with the destiny to destroy Thunderclan from within! You will grow up to hate your clanmates, and you will kill them off in Lovac form, one by one, even your family, and then your father! In fact, you’ll become so driven for cat flesh you’ll end up eating his carcass, in front of all your clanmates, and nobody will know it’s you! And the only one who can stop you is another Lovac holder!” He cackled, feeling like the supervillain featured in so many elders’ stories.

“He can do that?” questioned a puzzled Beaverfoot, blinking in surprise.

Pikebelly just shrugged. “He’s a leader, and a Starclan cat. It’s safe to say that he can do anything.”

Vinestar stepped back. “I’ll return, Acornkit,” he cooed softly. His eyes blazed maniacally. “Pikebelly, Beaverfoot, let’s go back. My work here is done.”

Chapter 1[]

Duskpaw hated kits.

They got under her paws, they were annoying with they’re squeaky voices, and becoming a queen meant six months trapped in the nursery away from warrior duties, and Duskpaw was never going to let that happen. Also, giving birth sounded disgusting… yeuch. Not to mention painful.

The first cat she told was her mother, Specklebreeze. “You’ll change your mind,” she had quipped. “All cat’s do! You’ll decide to when you find the right tom.”

“Do you think you’ll ever kill a cat?” Duskpaw had asked her mother the following day. After a shocked ‘no’, she just replied cheerfully with “You just need to find the right victim.”

She was retelling this story to Thunderclan’s elder Gorseleg, trying to distract herself from the mouse bile she was rubbing into his ticks. Gorseleg had also had no kits, and he had lived a ‘fulfilled life as one of Thunderclan’s best warriors’.

“I can’t imagine being a queen and stuck in the nursery for over six moons! It’s a good thing I’m a tom,” he croaked good-heartedly, and Duskpaw purred in amusement.

She turned her head to watch the kits playing in the clearing, uncoordinated lumps clumsily knocking each other about while warriors danced around them, cautiously trying to not get knocked over. Mouse-brains! When I was a kit, I played out of the way of warriors.

Gorseleg had started to doze off; she could hear raspy snores. Duskpaw briefly admired her handiwork, and was about to leave when she spotted something sharp edging its way towards Gorseleg’s somber sleeping face.

A snake? she fretted. Frozen, she noticed it wasn’t moving like a snake. A stick, then.

She did a small pounce on it, snapping the twig in half. She noticed the tip had been filed to a point. So, whoever did this must’ve done it on purpose! Duskpaw stormed out of the den and faced the unkempt blob that was Acornkit.

The pale brown tom stank of dirty moss, and his fur stuck up at random angles as if he’d been dragged through a bush. Duskpaw even noticed a fly buzzing around the base of his tail. That’s when she knew this cat had a problem. She couldn’t tell if his paws and underbelly were dark due to his pelt colours or grime. He looked feral, closer to a typical rogue or a wild dog than a Clan cat!

“What were you doing with that stick?” she shrieked at him.

Acornkit blinked his green eyes innocently. “I wanted to see what would happen.”

Duskpaw’s limbs twitched in anger. “You know perfectly well what would happen! You could have blinded Gorseleg! We respect our elders, or are queens these days so lazy and neglectful they don’t bother to teach their kits the basics of the warrior code?” The last part turned into a sneer, and Duskear felt more distaste towards kits. They have less brains than a rabbit!

“Acornkit!” cried out his mother, Hailwing. The silver speckled she-cat rushed over to him, enveloping the blank-faced kit in her thick tail. “Call me lazy and neglectful again!” she snarled at Duskpaw. “Acornkit was just being curious! Are you depriving my only surviving son or learning?” she eyeballed a rattled Duskpaw. “Kit-hating monster!” she yowled in anguish as she stomped off, Acornkit still wrapped in her tail.

In the commotion, Duskpaw didn’t notice her sister Curlpaw slink into camp with a patrol. “Queens are blinded when it comes to their kits,” she said flatly. “Especially since Acornkit is Batsnout and Hailwing’s last surviving kit.” She grimaced at Duskpaw’s mouse-bile covered paws. “You’d better wash that off,” she yawned. “See ya.”

Duskpaw didn’t care about her paws now. She eyed Acornkit suspiciously. That kit’s not right.

He was eating with Hailwing on the other side of camp. Duskpaw watched him take a small bite out of a thrush. He slowly raised his head to look at his mother.

“Mama, what does cat taste like? Is it good?”

Hailwing leapt back, startled. “Don’t say such gory things!” she gasped, and cuffed him around the ear.

Something IS not right with him! He’s so… sick minded! If I was Hailwing I’d abandon him far away for the foxes!

“I was just asking!” he squeaked back. “What’s so wrong about it? I bet it tastes nice! You haven’t found the right cat yet!”

This time Hailwing screeched in horror, an inhumane ear-grating noise. Every cat stopped and stared.

“Hailwing! What is it?” Batsnout asked in a concerned tone, rushing over.

Hailwing dashed behind her mate, crouching behind his large black form. “It’s Acornkit! He’s saying the most horrible things!”

Batsnout turned to Acornkit. “Acornkit, tell Hailwing what you said.”

“I just wanted to know what cat tasted like,” he whispered, hurt. “And an apprentice told me off for trying to poke an elder in the eye with a stick. Tell her I was just playing!”

It was Batsnout’s turn to look startled. “Acornkit, saying those things are wrong. It is wrong to poke elders in the eye with sticks, even if it’s an accident. I expected better from a deputy’s kit.”

Cats had started to whisper to each other now, sitting in a ring around the family.

“He can’t be Batsnout’s kit!”

“The son of a rogue, I bet!”

“Dark forces are in his head! Silverpelt doesn’t shine over him for sure.”

“Ooh, the Dark Forest maybe!”

Duskpaw had had enough. She needed some fresh air.

Chapter 2[]

The lakeshore was Duskpaw’s favorite place to go when she wanted to be alone. No kits here, and with no loud sounds of disturbance, she could finally sit with her head in the clouds.

I could really use a rabbit right now, they’re so delicious, it’ll definitely be worth trespassing on Windclan territory to get one... who’s Windclan’s new leader now that Vinestar’s dead? I never liked him anyway, not since he was found on the Sky Oak trying to commit suicide with his friends, of all things.

Then she felt an itch.

A tick? She twisted her neck and searched her back. Down there, at the base of my tail! Nope, it’s on my tail. But I can’t see it…

She brought her tail around to her face and eyed it closely. Even if my tail is itching and there’s nothing there, might as well scratch it.

She clamped her teeth onto her tail and scraped them along her thin tail.

There!

Duskpaw opened her mouth, and gave a huge chomp.

Foxdung.

She felt her bones contort and compress in excruciating ways. Her fur grew longer and thinned out into… feathers? Her teeth shrank back into her gums and was replaced by something sharp and hard. She no longer had limbs.

WHAT’S HAPPENING TO ME?

“Duskpaw!” shouted a tom’s voice. “Calm! Look in the water.”

She did as the mysterious voice told her, and saw… she leaped back harshly.

No… an owl?

She let out a sound, a screech that made her inwardly wince in pain. She tried flapping her new wings in a spastic manner, but only ended up falling on her side.

“Duskpaw! I told you to be calm!” The cat appeared in front of her, bursting out of the water. He had the same bright orange eyes as her. My kin?

He chuckled, his eyes glinting with laughter as well as his stars, just like the rest of his orange and brown tabby pelt. Starclan! But why?

“I am Smallstripe, and I am not your kin., I was Riverclan’s medicine cat. I possessed the same power as you did when I was alive, but now that I am in Starclan I don’t have it anymore and it has passed on to you. You are the current holder of the Owl Lovac, a power that gives you the power to transform into an owl just by biting your tail. The transformation will be painful, but you can transform back just by drinking the Moonpool’s water. Try flapping both wings at once, and with strength. You can get used to it with intuition.”

Duskpaw flapped her wings with all her strength, and catapulted herself into the air over the lake. Smallstripe kept up with her in long, gliding strokes as he gracefully moved in the air.

“Find balance!” he roared over the thunderous winds Duskpaw was creating. “Then try diving down and up again, and then try turning!”

Duskpaw struggled to keep both her wings in the same place, and kept lurching off to the side, and gave a desperate struggle to stay upright.

“Duskpaw!” Smallstripe yelled again, this time more frustrated.

I’m trying!

A wind caught her wings and she soared upwards again, and as she did soar, so did her confidence. She tried tilting her body to the side. Yes, I’m turning!

“Yes! Duskpaw!” Smallstripe yelled triumphantly. “Now try experimenting!”

I’m flying! I’m an owl and I’m flying! WOOOOOOOOOOOOO

After a few swoops and glides around the lake, Smallstripe’s starry form dashed in front of her. “Duskpaw, you’ve had enough. Your clanmates will be worried. Come with me to the Moonpool,” he said in a clipped tone. He wistfully looked up to the sky. “Starclan is calling me back too,” he sighed, as if talking about a mate. He shook his white head awake, then trotted off. “Just follow me, Duskpaw!” he yowled over his shoulder. They went over the forest, a starry orange and brown tabby and an owl slowly flapping after him. If anyone saw, it looked like an omen more than anything.

“Duskpaw, this is confidential information but since you’re a Lovac, it’s best you know. Not even your medicine cat knows,” he said in a hushed tone to her once they landed. “You know Windclan’s leader, Vinestar, died, right?”

Duskpaw looked at him understandingly.

“Good. I can read your eyes, Duskpaw. I spent half my life as an owl too, you know.” He chuckled. “Anyway. Vinestar, a Viper Lovac, wanted revenge on the cat who killed him, so he hunted down the most dangerous Lovac of all: The Wild Dog Lovac.”

Duskpaw pecked at the Moonpool’s water, screeching as all her body parts morphed back into a cat. Soon she was back on four limbs, and feeling safer than she ever did. “Continue,” she breathed in relief.

“Vinestar snatched it and shoved it into a kit in Thunderclan, cursing it with the destiny to destroy Thunderclan from within, unless another Lovac stopped him. Luckily, you existed.”

Duskpaw had never felt so rewarded for existing in her life. Could she live the rest of her life just like this, like some existing twolegs the elders told her about?

“You are to identify this traitor and bring him to justice when the time is right! I don’t know who gave the Owl Lovac to you, and honestly, I don’t really care." There was an awkward pause. “Duskpaw. Let’s go home."

“What a weird cat,” Duskpaw muttered to herself as she headed home.

“Duskpaw!” gasped her sister Curlpaw delightedly as she reappeared in camp. “Someone spotted an omen!” She dragged her sister to the cluster of cats gathered below the Highledge.

“Starclan don’t appear in the overworld except for special reasons,” lectured Spottedstar. “We could not identify this amcestor, but there was an owl lazily flapping after him or her."

That was me! Squealed Duskpaw inwardly, bouncy as a bunny. Curlpaw looked at her sister with a disgusted look on her face.

“Did you eat one too many rabbits that you’ve become one?” she asked flatly.

Duskear instantly stopped at her sister’s snarky remarky.

“I’m just excited about what this means for Thunderclan, that’s all,” she mewled, ears drooping. “We are the clan of heroes, after all!” She sat more upright now, her chest puffed out proudly.

I will defeat the Wild Dog, and be the greatest hero Thunderclan has ever seen!

Chapter 3[]

“Alright maggots!” roared Lionhead. “Show me your best hunter’s crouch!”

Duskpaw and three other apprentices stood in a line in the training hollow, while their mentors gathered in a huddle next to Lionhead. The senior warrior was notorious for being louder than a falling tree, and he easily intimidated any cat, even leaders.

Duskpaw quickly took another bite out of the sparrow she was eating. It sat between her forepaws, a small lump. A rabbit would be better, she sighed to herself, wistfully watching her sister being interrogated by the huge golden tom.

“Do you call that a hunter’s crouch, apprentice?” he screamed in her face, flecks of saliva spraying from his jaws like ugly bitter raindrops. When he got no response, he slammed his rock-solid head into Curlpaw’s softer skull. She crumpled to the ground grunting in pain.

Lionhead picked her head up in his teeth, and reared on two legs. “You think your strength is good enough to be a warrior, apprentice?” he bellowed, albeit muffled.

“No,” Curlpaw whimpered, and he promptly dropped her.

Duskpaw stared, her naturally wide orange eyes growing even wider. She took another chomp out of her sparrow.

“You’re wishing your mother had stillbirthed you!” Lionhead was screaming at an older apprentice Duskpaw had never tried to get to know, when his neck snapped 180 degrees to face Duskpaw’s panicked face sharply.

“Hey, you there,” he said softly, creeping towards her. “What do you think you’re doing?”

Duskpaw glanced around, still chewing, at any chance of salvation. The mentors had stopped talking and fearfully looked at Lionhead with hunched shoulders. She swallowed and took another bite out of the bird.

Lionhead thrust his head into hers. “DO YOU WANT YOUR NEW FRESH-KILL PILE TO BE THE DIRTPLACE? GIVE ME YOUR NAME NOW!"

Duskpaw went into an even bigger panic, swallowed hastily, and shouted “My name is Duskpaw, sir! I devote my heart to Thunderclan and the word of Spottedstar, sir!”

“Duskpaw, huh?” he breathed, cold breath like a blizzard rustling the fur on her face. “And what were you eating just now?” he growled. He kicked the feeble sparrow, making it tumble across and out of the hollow.

Duskpaw poked her head between her legs, then sharply back up to face Lionhead again. “A sparrow, sir! It sat there on the fresh-kill pile before training, begging to be eaten, sir!”

“The theft and breach of the warrior code, I understand. But why here, in the middle of training?”

“It was delicious, and it was getting cold, so I gave it shelter in my stomach, sir,” she replied more flatly.

Lionhead studied her for a second. “Why… I can’t comprehend,” he rasped. “Why eat that sparrow?”

Duskpaw stared at him, confused. “Uhh… are you asking me why cats eat sparrows? I’m surprised you don’t know, sir.”

By now, all cats were staring at her, jaws agape.

Duskpaw laughed nervously. And then she laughed some more, and more, and more.

o0o0o

“Damn, I thought Lionhead was going to kill sparrow-brain,” commented the older dark grey apprentice that afternoon.

“I’m right here, you know,” Duskpaw tetchily reminded him.

The three apprentices sat together after finishing their duties, with last picks of the prey pile as punishment for Duskpaw’s misbehavior that morning.

“He’d do it if there wasn’t anyone else around,” said Curlpaw, cleaning her paw. “Are you going to finish that, Beebrain – Oops, I meant Beepaw.” She stifled an amused purr and pointed to his half-finished mouse. “You barely eat anything anyway, whereas Duskpaw for example…”

“Hey, Curlpaw!” burst out Beepaw. “Do you just put others down because you’re so insecure, hiding it behind a cold attitude?”

Curlpaw looked at him distastefully. “Ew, no. You and Duskpaw are so immature anyway, just hurry up and announce that you’re having kits together,” she meowed, sneaking a sideways glance at her sister, fully aware that Duskpaw didn’t want a mate or kits. “It’s a match made in Starclan.”

“You know I’m not interested in a family!” Duskpaw protested, becoming more flustered each second. “Besides, Beepaw and I are only friends!”

“Hey, thanks for friendzoning me, sparrow-brain!” he yelled. “I was going to ask you to be my mate once we were warriors! Just kidding,” he purred, looking at Duskpaw’s horror-stricken face.

Curlpaw huffed. “You may be as fast as a bee, but your brain sure is as small as one,” she muttered, and left abruptly.

“Hey, get back here!” Beepaw yelled. “Duskpaw, make your sister nicer,” he pleaded. Duskpaw just turned to him and shrugged.

“SHey, Duckpaw!” called out Duskpaw’s mentor, Seedclaw. “Congrats on the performance in training, that was quite a riot!”

Seedclaw was the kind of cat who thrived on gossip, whether it was in Thunderclan or in another Clan. “Everyone’s raving about the owl we saw with the Starclan cat we saw yesterday; We’ve been calling it Starclan’s Owl.”

Elation filled Duskpaw as she heard herself be mentioned again. That’s me! I’m Starclan’s Owl! More like Starclan’s Spastic Owl, she grumbled, recalling her first flying session.

“There’s a half moon tonight so all the medicine cats are pumped to go, I’m sure Starclan has something to say ‘bout it. What do you think?”

Duskpaw paused and sharply exited her world of happiness and narcissism. Quick, think of a generic sentence! “I think it will bring good things to Thunderclan, like lots of prey. After all, owls are hunters,” she suggested hopefully.

Seedclaw grinned at her. “Nah, I was thinking about new kits, like your and Beepaw’s kits.” He laughed heartedly as Duskpaw leapt back. "He really admired your boldness during that training session, you know."

“Why does everyone keep going on about that?” she yelled in frustration.

Seedclaw kept up his tease. “Everyone thinks you’d make a good pair. I can just tell you have a crush on him!”

“I don’t!” Duskpaw squirmed.

“Denial is the first stage of acceptance!” Seedclaw reminded her.

WHY.

Chapter 4[]

“Vinestar. You’ve been staring obsessively into that pool.” Thicketpelt appeared next to the shabby grey tabby.

He turned to face her, his neck cricking with stiffness as he did so. “It is time,” he spat. “I have to tell Acornkit it’s time.”

Thicketpelt blinked in surprise. “You have been plotting something!” she gasped in an accusatory tone.

“What can you do about it?” he snarled venomously. “Don’t bother me, you vermin,” he told her, and dived into the starry pool and into the Thunderclan camp. He walked over to the nursery, but this time alone, like he had done six months before.

He nudged Acornkit awake, gently. I may be violent by nature, but not to the cat that I am making!

“Acornkit,” he cooed to the now-awake kit. “Come with me.”

The pale brown tabby followed blindly. Ha! Kits are so dumb.

“You’ve been wondering about what cat meat tastes like, haven’t you?” Vinestar crouched down. He doesn’t even care that I’m a Starclan cat. Odd.

“So what?” the kit retorted. He was as big as an experienced apprentice. “Just because you’re from Starclan doesn’t mean you have the power to turn me into a good cat.”

Vinestar was pleased with the kit’s attitude. “No, quite the opposite, actually,” he purred. “Your father, Batsnout, is a horrible cat. He killed me. A good deputy wouldn’t kill a cat, would he?”

“No.”

“Exactly. You’ve also had… er… curious… thoughts about cats, like wanting to hurt them, right?”

“How do you know this, stalker?” he hissed. “What does this all mean?”

“Ah.” Vinestar came closer to him. “You have the power to turn into a Wild Dog, just by biting your tale. I gave it to you. I saw your future, and I saw that your clanmates would hate you. You have the power to get revenge for your mistreatment.”

Acornkit’s eyes lit up. “Yes! As an apprentice, I’ll be allowed to go outside of camp, turn into a dog, kill the vermin that mistreated me, eat them, and turn back into… how do I do that?”

“Drink the Moonpool’s water.”

“Right.” Acornkit paced in a circle. “Nobody will know it’s me!”

Vinestar’s eyes gleamed with excitement. “You shall destroy Thunderclan from the inside!”

“And you shall mentor me. You want this as much as I do.”

Wow, for once I feel scared. This kit’s not as dumb as the others.

“And… keep in mind for another cat with a similar power. They will have the ability to turn into another animal. And that will be the only thing that will be able to defeat you. Eliminate it,” he hissed against Acornkit’s muzzle.

He turned around and padded back into the air. “I’m always watching you, Acornkit,” he reminded him. “Be good for me. Use your power frequently and make papa proud.”

o0o0o

“Let all cats old enough to hunt gather around the highledge for a clan meeting!”

“Damn it, I was supposed to have my final assessment today, but instead I have to watch some brat be apprenticed,” Duskpaw grumbled.

It’s Acornkit, the sick fox-heart.

“Acornkit, you have reached six moons and it is time for you to become an apprentice. I entrust you into your father’s paws, for he will cherish you and teach you everything he knows. From now on, until you receive your full warrior name, you shall be known as Acornpaw.”

Few cats cheered his name, and the ones that did cheered with fear and hesitation.

Duskpaw, slumped on the sandy ground, looked up bored at Acornpaw’s face. Is that a malicious glint in his eye? The huge tom was staring down at his clanmates with a subtle smug grin. He’s plotting something…

The duo walked down the highledge and out of the clearing for their first tour of the territory. After a few seconds of tension, the crowd exploded into whispers.

“How was he able to become an apprentice?”

“His father will be so soft on him!”

“All those antics in kithood, more freedom will surely lead to Thunderclan’s spoiled reputation!”

Duskpaw had endured enough. She shouldered her way over to Seedclaw, who was speaking with a few senior warriors.

“Ahem,” she said loudly over the din.

“Hm? Oh, hi, Duskpaw.” Seedclaw carried on with his chattering.

Duskpaw shouldered him hard. “My assessment?” she asked.

“Oh right, sorry guys,” he said sheepishly. “Gee, Acornpaw’s apprenticeship will be fun!” he said to himself as they exited the camp. “Now, Duskpaw, I will be watching you hunt and reporting to Spottedstar. Good luck!”

He sauntered off. He’s probably not going to watch me, she sighed.

Out of the corner of her eye she spotted a squirrel. Saliva trickled out of her mouth as she thought of eating it.

A rabbit would be better…

I've had enough of this, I’m going to Windclan.

She quickly crossed the border and faced the moor. I could use my Lovac… She glanced around for a hiding spot, and found the perfect one between two rocks. Crouching down, she bit her tail, and managed to endure the pain of her transformation without screaming. She calmed herself down and flapped herself off the ground and started to glide over the moor.

She spotted a small shape sprinting away from her shadow on the ground. She dived after it, swiftly catching it in her powerful talons and ascending back into the sky before a patrol spotted her stealing their prey.

A rabbit, my favorite, and such an easy way to get it now too!

She deposited the rabbit by her hiding place and returned to the moor to catch a few more.

o0o0o

On the other side of the forest, there was another apprentice.

And he had seen everything.

o0o0o

“Woah, Duskpaw, that’s a good haul,” marveled Seedclaw at his apprentice’s assortment. “And a few rabbits too! You must have a good sniffer to seek those bastards out.”

“I have a good nose,” Duskpaw lied nonchalantly, back in her cat form. The two cats were at the hiding place at sunhigh. “I’ll help you take this back to camp.”

“Thanks, Seedclaw.” Duskpaw picked up a rabbit. “I guess soon I’ll no longer be your apprentice.”

Seedclaw laughed. “You can guarantee that.”

Chapter 5 (CW: Gore)[]

“I now name you Duskear. Starclan honors your honesty and loyalty.”

“Duskear! Curlpoppy! Duskear! Curlpoppy! Duskear! Curlpoppy!”

Duskear’s mother, Specklebreeze, came up to her. “We should go on a walk to celebrate!” she squealed. “Me, you, and Curlpoppy of course! And my dear friend Hailwing, she’s been dying to get out of the camp she’s no longer a mother to that… thing.” She pointed her tail towards Acornpaw. The apprentice looked up sharply, intense hatred burning in his yellow eyes. “Let’s just go, honey.”

o0o0o

“Let’s go to the Sky Oak,” Duskear suggested. She broke ahead of them, enjoying the crackling of forest debris underneath her paws. She spotted the thick trunk ahead of her and lit up inside with excitement. She thought of scrambling up it like a squirrel and swinging from the branches—

Crack.

“Duskear!” Curlpoppy screamed, sounding concerned for the first time in her life. Her voice sounded distorted.

Wh... what happened?

A thick-furred paw prodded her belly. Curlpoppy.. “She crashed into a tree,” her sister huffed, back to her old self. “She’s so predictable, always with her head in the clouds.”

The two former-queens hurried to her side. “Duskear, you’re so foolish!” her mother playfully scolded.

Whoomph.

Curlpoppy and Specklebreeze screamed.

That did not sound good.

“Duskear, get up.” Curlpoppy sounded worried. She hauled Duskear to her paws and started to drag her along.

“Wha… what’s back there?” Duskear mumbled.

“Dog.” Curlpoppy stopped, panting, and then…

No.

A large shaggy paw dragged her sister backwards along the ground. Curlpoppy squealed helplessly. Then came the snap as the monster twisted her leg, blood burst out of the joint with a sickening pop, and what looked like squished deathberry juice rained from the sky. The white jagged stick that was Curlpopy’s hind leg bone poked out of the flesh, glinting in the harsh daylight.

“Run!” rasped Curlpoppy.

Duskear couldn’t move: she was frozen to the spot with her gaze upon Curlpoppy’s snapped leg.

The monster enveloped its jaws around Curlpoppy’s head. The brown and white she-cat accepted her fate silently, her head bowed in defeat.

The two rows of yellow jagged teeth came together, and Curlpoppy’s fragile skull burst open like a flea being cracked in a cat’s jaws.

Bone fragments flew out like shards of ice. Gore swamped around the monster’s shaggy paws, staining them red. Questionable red lumps floated in blood, catching the light like mice scurrying under a red blanket. Pink pieces of brain dribbled out of the monster’s jaws. Her sister’s brain.

As the monster continued to grind Curlpoppy’s decimated head between its teeth, mushing the remains up until it was an unrecognizable jumble of red liquid, pink flesh and lumps.

It was then that Duskear had seen enough. The image still fresh in her mind, she turned and ran in a random direction, any direction, so long as she could escape!

A thought came to her.

The Owl Lovac.

The monster would catch up to her sooner or later. Flying would be the only eligible option. It would mask her scent too.

Without hesitation, she bit the tip of her tail, a desperate chomp. She ignored the pain of the transformation, and frantically flapped to escape the reach of the monster.

She felt thick heavy claws rake her feathers as she elevated herself through the air.

The monster had seen her!

Duskear balanced herself and started to fly in a more controlled fashion. She looked down to see the monster was…

A dog.

A vaguely-familiar-looking dog.

She glided over the forest, in a desperate race to the Moonpool.

Dog Lovac Dog Lovac Dog Lovac Dog Lovac Dog Lovac Dog Lovac Dog Lovac Dog Lovac!

The Dog Lovac knows who I am!

Duskear landed ungracefully and plunged her head into the shallow pool, inhaling large gulps of water.

She sat alone, inwardly weeping in despair and hopelessness.

He saw me transform, he knows who I am, so he’s going to hunt me down and kill me! she screeched to herself.

And he’s coming to the Moonpool to transform back!

She loped off back to the camp, full of concern and worry for her family and Hailwing.

The dog got them too, she wailed.

She crashed into camp.

“Duskear!” gasped Seedclaw. “Where’s Curlpoppy and Specklebreeze? Hailwing too? You came crashing into camp by yourself looking like you’ve been dragged backwards through a hedge!” He paused, taking a break from his own words to look at Duskear’s frozen form. “Duskear?” he meowed softly. “Something did happen, didn’t it?” He stepped forwards to give Duskear a comforting embrace.

Her former mentor’s thick fur gave Duskear painful flashbacks of being in the nursery with her mother. She slowly broke down, wailing mournfully, drawing all cats’ attention towards her.

“Duskear, what happened?”

“Was it Darkfang?”

“Everyone!” said a gruff voice sharply. Batsnout broke up the babble of voices. “We will search for the missing cats. And if anyone finds my apprentice, I will be very grateful.” He rounded up a few nearby warriors hastily and trotted out.

Duskear barely paid any attention to Batsnout’s words. She stared at the ground, her voice hoarse from yelling. “There was a dog,” she whispered. “It came out of nowhere. It attacked Curlpoppy...” she trailed off and started to cry again.

She would never see her sister again. The games they played as kits, so inseparable and innocent. Her snarky remarks, the impression she gave off like she was indifferent to anything, teasing Duskear, cheating on assessments. A newly made warrior, only to have her life cut short in the goriest way possible…

“Come with me, Duskear,” meowed Flameheart, Thunderclan’s medicine cat. “You need rest to get over what happened to you. Time heals all wounds.”

o0o0o

Hailwing was the first to return to camp.

A huge chunk had been ripped from her side, presumably eaten. Her “intestines” as Flameheart called them adorned her body, leaking unknown pale yellow fluids that oozed off the fur and dripped onto the ground, rapidly forming a puddle. The sickening plip plip was the only sound that could be heard. Nobody dared to breathe.

Hailwing’s head barely hung onto her torso, the only thing keeping them together being a thin strip of skin. Blood continually gushed from the two separated body parts, a sickly-smelling red lake with the body floating in the middle. The two eyes merrily bobbed up and down like leaves sailing on a calm stream. A pink tail-like strand dragged after them, causing ripples in the growing lake of blood. Hailwing’s eye sockets would have been black and hollow if it weren’t for the maggots squirming animatedly inside of them, making wet squick sounds as they did so.

Not even the elders would help to bury her. It came upon the most battle-hardened warriors to carry her outside the borders. No funeral, no words, just a silent departure. An unspoken collective agreement was made to never speak of it again.

Specklebreeze was the next victim. Every limb has been separated and stripped of fur and skin, which had been strung over the nearby trees like an obscene form of decoration. The eyes had reportedly been speared on low-level branches. The bright red sticks that were Specklebreeze’s legs were hastily dropped on the ground as if they were burning branches, spattering blood over the audience who wailed in fright. The intestines as well as other organs had been scattered all over the nearby ground, and therefore collected up to bring to camp and then the burial site outside the territory. Large lumps of all shades of red and sizes lay in the center of camp as the expanding tide of blood started to lap at the cats who were at the front of the exhibit. They yelped and leaped back, startled. She was taken out to be buried by a large team of warriors, and like Hailwing, nobody ever spoke of her again.

Curlpoppy’s body was never found.

Chapter 6[]

Vinestar gaped at the clan below him, feeling unfazed by the carcass of the two cats he had ultimately killed. Why should he feel any remorse? They didn’t matter to him.

An uncanny, kit-like giggle escaped him, which turned into a squawking laugh. Weak with laughter, he flopped onto his back like the dog Alderpaw was. He convulsed on the starry plains for a while, until he was reduced to a sighing, weeping heap of mirth.

“Life is beautiful,” he sighed at the empty sky. “Soon everything will go according to plan.”

He basked in his own thoughts for a while, idly watching the sky grow dark. In this performance, he was the puppet master, and Alderpaw was the puppet king.

A bluish-grey head came into view, towering above him. Steely silver eyes drilled into him glinting with such intense fury that Vinestar thought it would make the cat’s head explode.

After a few moments of holding the furious gaze, Vinestar gave up, averted eye contact and scowled. From the corner of his eye, he could see a strained smile forming for a flicker of a second.

“Thicketpelt,” he grumbled as he rolled back on to his paws.

“That’s not a way to greet your mentor.” Thicketpelt cocked her head at him.

Vinestar retched in annoyance. “Dungface. Talk to me again once you’ve led a clan and hatched the best scheme of all time.”

The blue-grey she-cat ignored him. “I heard from Pinestar what you’ve done. It’s truly petty and disgusting, causing the deaths of innocent cats all because you let your guard down to gloat. You’re solving a petty squabble with mass murder!”

“What are you going to do?” Vinestar sneered. “Chase me down to the Dark Forest? I’d like to see you try. I’d rip out your starry throat before you could even come near me.”

Thicketpelt’s steely gaze softened into a pitiful one. “When I was mentoring you, I thought I could change you. I was foolish to think I could fix a cat who was already broken.”

Vinestar stared at her with a mixture of confusion and disgust. “Don’t spew out that profound nostalgic stuff on me,” he snarled.

Deciding that there was no reason to continue talking to a stone wall of a cat, Vinestar barged past her. “I have to talk to Acornpaw.”

“Vinestar, wait,” Thicketpelt croaked sadly, still drowning in regret and nostalgia for reasons Vinestar couldn’t comprehend.

Vinestar pulled a feaked-out face and ran faster away from her. He descended into the lake territories, swimming down towards the land until he could feel the prickly leaf-strewn ground aggravate his paws.

“I will never get used to forest territory,” he grumbled, picking his way towards the Thunderclan camp.

After hurling himself into the camp (because he was an invincible Starclan troublemaker who knew no bounds), he crept silently over the sandy floor over to the apprentices’ den.

“Acornpaw must have changed back and got back into camp without suspicion,” he mused. He craned his neck around the den’s entrance to peer inside. Acornpaw slept splayed out in the middle, while the other apprentices huddled against the wall in uncomfortable positions to be as far away from him as they could.

The pale brown tabby’s ragged fur rustled as he breathed. Every exhale was coupled with a low growl or ferocity. No wonder the other apprentices stayed away from him.

Vinestar nudged him awake tentatively. A bloodshot yellow eye snapped open, an Vinestar jumped, startled by his own creation.

The one eye glared at him in defense as the large body tensed in alertness.

“It’s me,” Vinestar squeaked. “Vinestar.”

Acornpaw collapsed. “This is the first time I’ve felt relaxed all day,” he muttered. He staggered to his paws in a lumbering fatigue. He blinked a few times, adjusting to the scenario.

He shot to attention. “Did you see it?” he asked, in a hushed marvel. “The way I attacked those she-cats? That brown and white one didn’t have a chance!”

“I was proud of you,” Vinestar purred, embracing the warmth that spread in his chest as he recollected watching the attack of earlier unfold. “So proud I can’t even put it into words.”

“And I found the Owl Lovac!” Acornpaw growled triumphantly.

Vinestar froze in horror. Invisible stones weighted down his paws. The pride in his heart turned to cold, hard dread.

“…Tell me more,” he coaxed weakly.

“Her name is Duskear. She’s a new warrior. She turned into an owl to escape me.”

Vinestar nodded slowly. “Okay.”

Acornpaw stared him straight in the eyes. “And I must kill her,” he snarled. “Nobody must stand in my way.”

Vinestar’s paralysis faded at these words. “We must ultimately kill Batsnout for what he did to me. Sick bastard of a cat shouldn’t continue to live with what he did.”

Acornpaw nodded. “He’s not my father. You are.”

Vinestar felt a weird sensation at these words, like snail slime being poured along his spine. Nobody has ever called him a father before.

“I’m your mentor,” Vinestar replied awkwardly.

Acornpaw snorted. “I do me, you do you.”

An awkward pause happened between them.

“Acornpaw, how would you feel if Duskear became your ally?”

“Huh?”

“Two Lovac holders working together to achieve our goals. An owl to attack from the air and a dog to attack from the ground. A foolproof combination.”

Acornpaw tilted his shaggy head upwards, pondering. “I suppose that would work. She’s in a bad place at the moment. Trauma. It’s easy to manipulate mental health victims.” He smirked. “And if you want to know, I ate a chunk out of my mother. Delicious. I’ll be doing to again to her rotting carcass sometime, if I can find where it’s buried.

Vinestar stared at him, slightly concerned. He understood Acornpaw wanting to eat his own mother, but his mother’s rotting body? He swallowed the puke that hopped out of his throat and onto his tongue.

“You do that then,” Vinestar replied weakly. “Just manipulate her and make her love you. After all, it's easy to manipulate traumatised women who've just lost their family,” he chuckled to himself feebly.

He turned to hastily walk away. Vinestar felt like he wouldn’t be going back there for a while.

Chapter 7[]

Acornpaw stared at the gaping black hole of the medicine den. He scraped his rough tongue against his teeth, and lit up inside as he detected a piece of flesh from his mother’s corpse, and chewed on it idly. It was no surprise he found it: he never bothered to clean his teeth.

An orange muzzle poked out of the den’s entrance. A smoky black nose twitched, and out slid Flameheart. The small ginger she-cat jumped in surprise at she saw Acornpaw towering over her.

“I’ve come to see Duskear,” Acornpaw awkwardly coughed out. Jeez. Being polite is so hard!

Flameheart’s trembling ceased. “She’s right in here,” she said in a hushed whisper. “I can’t leave her alone, so I have to supervise both of you, okay?”

Acornpaw just sniffed and shouldered her aside. Dipping his head low to fit into the entranceway, he spotted Duskear curled up in a compact ball in the corner. Her slate-grey fur had descended into anarchy: tangles, burrs and knots littered her pelt. No head could be seen because it was hidden under her paws. Every second or so she trembled.

Acornpaw gave a slight smirk. He cleared his throat, which sounded like a combination of badgers roaring and twoleg monsters.

“Duskear?” he asked, trying not to cringe at himself.

The pile of fur shifted, and two large dull amber eyes appeared. “Go away, sicko,” came the muffled croak.

Acornpaw restrained himself from scowling. “Duskear,” he gasped in mock astonishment. “I wanted to make sure you’re okay. You’ve been through a lot, and I wanted to help.”

“Liar. You’re a creep.”

Acornpaw gritted his teeth. “I saw Beepaw and Flameheart helping you earlier. I wanted to join in.”

“You don’t need to. I don’t want you here.”

Acornpaw did a fake purr of amusement, as fake as his mother’s love for him. “You can never have enough help.” He nudged her playfully. “Want me to bring you some prey? You look thin.”

Duskear raised her head and blinked slowly. “Thanks,” she mumbled. “I was getting hungry in here.”

Acornpaw made no hesitation in exiting the cramped den. He breathed out a sigh of relief.

You’ve got this, Vinestar hissed to him in his head.

Acornpaw hastily grabbed a random piece of prey from the fresh-kill pile and skidded to a halt inside the den.

“Thank you!” Duskear gasped gratefully, and began to take sluggish bites. “This is good,” she nodded between mouthfuls. “Did you catch it?”

In the dark, Acornpaw rolled his eyes at the small talk. “I did.”

“That’s great.”

A few moments of silence filled the den.

“I’m sorry about your loss,” Acornpaw grunted. “Is there anything I could do to make you feel better?”

“You could talk to me.”

Acornpaw coughed nervously.

What do I say? I need to distract her from what happened yesterday, and I want her to like me.

“Once I was out with Batsnout, my mentor by the way, and I wanted to impress him by catching a squirrel. I climbed up a tree, but lost my footing and landed on a pile of leaves. Batsnout was not pleased!” That never actually happened, but he had to take what he could get.

She purred in genuine amusement. “That’s hilarious! Tell me another, please do!”

Acornpaw was about to launch into another fabricated story, when Flamepaw tentatively stood between them.

“Acornpaw, I appreciate that you’ve done more for Duskear today than Beepaw and I have done, but she needs to rest!”

Duskear laughed from behind them. “No, no, Flameheart! Keep him here! I love him!”

Acornpaw froze. Someone loves me. Someone… actually loves me!

Flameheart looked back at Duskear with a concerned whine. “Fine. He is doing you some good,” she huffed.

Acornpaw grinned: not an evil, plotting grin like the typical villain, but the innocent grin of a kit who’s seen no evil. It was the kind of grin that set off streams of golden sunlight all throughout his body.

I could get used to this.

o0o0o

“Fool!” Vinestar spat to a stony-faced Acornpaw the following night. “Warming up to the enemy! I expected better of you!” he shrieked, foam bubbling at his mouth.

“It’s all a part of the plan!” Acornpaw protested.

Vinestar pranced around him, jabbing a paw inwards with every jibe. “I thought you were a hard-ass, Mister Doggie-Woggie! Are you coming to that wretch for love because your deadbeat mother couldn’t give you any?”

Acornpaw hung his head. “Just you wait,” he growled. “At least I’m not so small-minded that I can barely take the time to calculate three steps into the future.”

Vinestar stopped, his grey tabby pelt bristling. “Huh?”

Acornpaw leapt into him and pinned him down with precision. Vinestar struggled beneath him like a worm. Acornpaw grinned with yellow teeth as he imagined tearing into Vinestar’s starry shoulder.

“Fine, fine!” Vinestar retched. Vinestar reluctantly let him free.

“I’ll prove you wrong,” Acornpaw growled. “Don’t mock me just because you’ve never loved someone because you’ve always had your head shoved between your hindquarters!” he snarled. Acornpaw rolled back up. “Go home, you hawk-heart.”

Vinestar sulked off and climbed back into the sky until he was nothing more than a star in Silverpelt. He had become a rabbit crushed in a dog’s jaws.

Have I warmed up to her? Acornpaw wondered, staring up at the sky with fiery yellow eyes. But if I do, will we rule the forest together? The most powerful couple Starclan has ever created? If I can manipulate someone, I guess I can do anything.

He retreated to the apprentice’s den, making sure not to step over Beepaw. That’s a first, he observed silently. Maybe Duskear is influencing me. But I’ll get my claws on her too. He shuffled around, before finally falling asleep.

Chapter 8[]

Over two moons, life in the forest awakened from the dead of winter. As buds on the trees opened and blossomed, so did life in the cats’ hearts. As the sun grew warmer, so did Duskear’s mood. As the forest moved on from the creeping chill of leafbare, The Clan, as well as Duskear, moved on from the horrifying events of that day. Duskear could now walk around the territory without painful flashbacks of her sister’s screams or the sights of her death, and like always, Acornpaw was by her side. She never felt safe without him. Acornpaw would always bring her food, talk to her when she was down, and spend every possible waking moment with her, and slowly, Duskear became dependent on her, and cats started to whisper and be concerned. For Acornpaw, he grew more tender towards his clanmates, and occasionally completed his apprentice duties with a solemn attitude. While cats eagerly welcomed his change of demeanor, they always felt a pandg of worry for the overly-dependent Duskear.

Batsnout greeted his apprentice with a nod and turned to Duskear, who was pressed to Acornpaw as she usually was. “It’s not good for you to be cosying up to him,” he warned. “Rumor has it that he’s got a badger for a brain.”

“Father!” growled Acornpaw. “She needs me! I’m he only cat who’s done anything to improve her mental health.”

Duskear pressed her muzzle to Acornpaw’s shaggy neck. “Don’t be so prejudiced, Batsnout! We all need someone to love. We’ve found each other!” She stared at Acornpaw with stars in her eyes.

Acornpaw tossed one sharp gaze at his father then marched to a sheltered part of the camp. Tenderly, he rested his muzzle against Duskear’s.

“Would you still love me even if I liked to hurt cats?”

Duskear stood back, slightly shocked. “You would never do that!”

“Answer my question, Duskear.”

“A-are you saying that you’re damaged?”

Frustration briefly flashed in Acornpaw’s canary-yellow eyes, before melting down to a warm softness. “Duskear, we’re both damaged. We need each other.”

A moment of silence passed.

“Acornpaw… I love you no matter what. How could I feel anything else for you after all you’ve done for me these past two moons?”

“…I guess you’re right.” Acornpaw fell silent. The two cats silently agreed that the conversation in ended

Everyone’s saying that he’s sick and I should stay away from him… but, how can I? Duskear fretted. Flameheart said that I was walking into a fox trap of a cat… Is she right? After all the things that Acornpaw has done for me, I he juts manipulating me? But he’s so genuine…

From the corner of his eye, Acornpaw scrutinized Duskear. I let myself get soft. But it feels so good. I know Vinestar is watching my every move, and I can’t let him down. He cast his eyes to the ground worriedly. It’s fine, Acornpaw, it’s fine. We’ll complete the mission together. She loves me no matter what, so it’ll be a breeze.

Thunderclan’s newest warrior, Beesong, trotted up to them. Acornpaw narrowed his eyes. “What do you want?” he growled to the grey tom.

“I wanted to talk to Duskear,” he quivered at the feral cat looming above him.

Acornpaw bared his teeth. “Fine, but I’m not leaving her side!”

Duskear looked up at him gratefully. Acornpaw grinned smugly.

“So, Duskear, how are you getting on?” Beesong inquired hopefully.

Duskear sprang to her paws. “I’ve never felt better! Acornpaw is everything I could ever ask for!” Her grey fur glowed with ecstasy.

Beesong glanced at Acornpaw nervously. “B-but people say Acornpaw’s…”

“People don’t know Acornpaw like I do!” she retorted, anger flashing in her wide amber eyes.

Beesong stepped backwards. “O-okay,” he mumbled, hurt, and sulked off.

Duskear turned back to Acornpaw, her fur slightly ruffled. “Sorry about that.”

“It’s fine,” Acornpaw purred. “Want to get some prey? I’m feeling hungry.”

Laughing, Duskear said, “Sure! I was thinking the same thing.”

They settled down with a rabbit, far away from their clanmates. “We don’t need that kind of negativity in our lives,” Acornpaw had grumbled.

Duskear prodded the rabbit with a paw. “I used to love rabbit,” she sighed. “I can’t eat one anymore without remembering the meals I shared with my sister.”

“I’m sure Curlpoppy is watching from Starclan,” Acornpaw sympathized with her. “But you have me.”

“Yeah…” she huffed and took a small bite.

“Duskear… do you ever want kits?”

Duskear pulled a face. “No, I can’t throw away over six moons of my life tending to kits!” she scowled, wrinkling her nose.

Perfect! “Yeah, being a warrior is way better.”

She cozied up to him, purring. “That reminds me, Acornpaw, why aren’t you a warrior yet?”

Acornpaw flexed his claws and felt heat rise in his chest. “I should ask Batsnout; he says I’ve been making progress.” He remarked once the flames in his dark brown chest had died down. “I’ll go ask him now.” He stood up, and started to walk, abandoning the barely touched rabbit.

Mimicking him, Duskear walked pressed close to him.

Why does she always have to be glued to me? Acornpaw growled. He spotted Batsnout and stalked over to him.

The black tom straighetend up when he saw his son. “What is it, Acornpaw?” he asked sternly.

“When am I being made a warrior?” he asked silkily.

Batsnout’s face didn’t budge. “I’ll ask Spottedstar about it.”

Acornpaw let out an annoyed grunt as Batsnout abruptly got up and left, probably to find Spottedstar. “That’s settled, then.”

“You’re going to become a warrior!” Duskear gasped in delight.

Thrashing his tail against the ground, Acornpaw narrowed his eyes. “We don’t know for sure.”

He met Duskear’s eyes. I’ve helped you so much Duskear, and you’ve done so much for me too. But If one day I must break your heart, which very well may happen, I don’t think I could ever forgive myself. You don’t deserve this.

You don’t deserve to have your heart savaged by a dog like me.

Chapter 9[]

“And I now name you Acornstep!” announced Spottedstar uninterested. Acornstep gave her a surprisingly courteous lick on the shoulder and tumbled down the Highledge.

Duskear beamed at him. “I’m so happy for you Acornstep! We should--”

“Could you get something for me, Duskear? I’m starving and I have my vigil tonight.”

Duskear’s ears drooped. Over the past few moons something had changed in Acornstep. They were together less and less and he was always asking her to do things. Duskear had always obeyed him without question, certain that he would snap back to his old self. She huffed affectionately and trotted off the freshkill pile.

When she was almost there, Flameheart intercepted her. “You’re not well, Duskear.”

Blinking in surprise, Duskear purred banteringly. “Oh, it’s nothing…”

Flameheart thrust her black nose into her face. “Your eyes are always tired. Your tail is drooping. There’s weariness in your walk. You never want to do your warrior duties because you’re always pining after Acornstep! He’s not good for you, Duskear! Why won’t you listen to me?” The strain in her eyes was pleading in agony.

Out of the corner of her eye, she spied Acornstep staring at her intently and expectantly. Duskear slipped past Flameheart, grabbed the first piece of prey she saw and hurried over to him.

“Here you go!” she chirped.

Acornstep swiped the prey out of her mouth and scowled down at it. “I don’t like thrush,” he growled. “You should know better.” He tossed it aside.

“But I got it just for you!”

He cringed and contorted his face. “I don’t care.” He sulked away.

There MUST be something I can do to make him feel better again! she thought to herself desperately.

“Don’t go after him, Duskear.” It was Flameheart. “He just needs some time to himself. After a while he’ll be happy again.”

“Why should I believe you?” Duskear yowled dramatically.

Flameheart’s expression fell into a flat, blank stare. “Uh… because I’m a medicine cat?”

A moment of awkward silence passed.

Bowing her head in defeat, Duskear sighed. “Fine.”

“Come help me in the medicine den,” Flameheart suggested softly. “It’ll help you take your mind off things.”

As Flameheart walked across the clearing baked by the late Greenleaf sun, whispers drifted out of the clan like wisps of smoke from a fire.

“Acornstep has ruined her!” Shocked, regretful.

“She’ll become an elder early, just like Batsnout’s done. Dealing with Acornstep has wasted away both of them.” Scandalous, rumouring.

“Such a shame… a fine warrior corrupted too early.” Mournful, nostalgic.

Duskear sighed heavily, bearing the comments on her back like she was carrying a tree for each one. I can’t help but love him!

Flameheart turned around to face her, her ever-inquisitive face studying Duskear’s. “Look at what he’s done to you.” She steered Duskear towards a rain puddle that had formed the previous night. “Look long and hard,” she soothed sadly.

Duekear gasped as her face came into focus. I swear I never always looked like this!

She stared into wide lakes of dying fires, rimmed with ashy hairs formed from a life of worry and strain over… what was it over? Was it over nothing?

Her muzzle was tinged silver. It would have been pretty except it gave off the impression that her body was partway to Starclan… partway dead. She shuddered. And I’m so young too…

Her dark grey fur was dull, wiry and thin instead of the glossy, fluffy sheen it once had. Duskear choked back tears. What has happened to me?

Flameheart rested her white-tipped tail on Duskear’s back. “It wasn’t the Incident that did this to you, it was…”

“…Acornstep,” Duskear croaked.

“Do you see what he’s done to you?” Flameheart shrieked. “Now do you see? If you had only stopped this sick obsession to look at yourself!” She paused to pant frantically.

Duskear was frozen.

Flameheart slipped a few poppy seeds into the warrior’s mouth and forced her gently into a sitting position onto a worn-out moss bed.

“Try to sleep,” she muttered unhelpfully to Duskear. “From now on, just hang around me.” She slipped out of the den, revealing a flash of sunlight into the dark den before it disappeared, leaving Duskear in oblivion.

Everything… over the past few moons… was a trap… I was so foolish…

She wept in the isolating darkness.

“I’ll never be so foolish again!” she choked out aloud.

As expected, the darkness didn’t respond.

Duskear vomited out the flood of feelings and words from her aqueous heart.

“Yes, I was a fool! And from this moment on, I will belong only to myself! I will never again follow anyone else but me! I am my own being and nobody else will control me! I have a Lovac, and I will use it for good for the rest of my life!”

Her words bounced off the indistinguishable walls of the den. In the corner a glowing ball of light flickered.

A head popped out. A vaguely familiar head.

“Remember me?” it probed like a kit, its starry eyes glimmering and twinkling and flashing.

Duskear squinted. “No…”

“I’m not surprised.” It purred bashfully, as if it found its remark to be quite offensive. “I’m Smallstripe! Riverclan’s medicine cat and former owl Lovac holder! I taught you how to fly moons ago! That was quite the speech you gave there.”

“Oh!” Duskear gasped. “And thanks.”

The twinkling in Smallstripe’s eyes grew dull. “I have to tell you something. Remember the Wild Dog Lovac I told you about and that someone in the clan has it?”

“Uh huh.”

“You have to find him. There is a dog roaming this forest right now. The one that killed your family.”

Duskear froze up, about to panic, but Smallstripe hastily touched his nose to her forehead and reverted the effect.

“Deep breaths,” he meowed sternly. “You have to find him! Now!”

“Flameheart said I had to sleep!” she protested. “I don’t want to be facing a dog no my own!”

Smallstripe studied her. “You are tired,” he mumbled. “Fine. But if you wait too long, more cats are going to die.” He vanished like a wisp of smoke leaving Duskear alone.

Chapter 10[]

Somewhere in the woods, his prey was lurking.

Alderstep, who had transformed a minute ago, was streaking through the forest, his paws thrumming so fast they made a hum that wafted through the trees, only intercepted by a monotonous pant. Choirs of birds, blurred cacophonies, completed the song of mayhem Starclan was conducting for him. Today was his solo.

The sharp tang of prey hit him like a drug. He stopped, turned his head sharply: young, male, alone.

Perfect.

He switched to a stalk. His bulky, misshapen body being lugged through the undergrowth. He growled at the inconvenience: he wasn’t as slim as his prey, but he was more than twice as powerful. And in the end, that was all that mattered.

He crept closer, following the trail like a kit to moss, and then he saw him: a young grey thing in a hunter’s crouch. It twitched, sensing a dangerous presence. A fly’s drone filled the air, creating a tension which could stop his heart in anticipation.

Their eyes met. The chase began.

Acornstep launched himself forwards, but his prey scattered. It wasn’t any different from trying to swat a fly. An annoying. Pesky. Fly.

He scrambled after it, panting. The cacophony resumed: the wild orchestra struck up a merry whirlwind, fitting for a dance of predator and prey.

His eyes fixed on the twisting and turning grey blur in front of him. Endless energy filled through Acornstep. As they zigzagged through the labyrinth of trees, Acornstep began to get dizzy with the hurricane of a chase.

He grinded to a halt on large calloused paws, panting heavily. He swallowed a deep lungful of air and hacked it out. He raised his wobbling canine head. Good. His prey was frozen in fear and curiosity.

Acornstep tipped his head back, breathed in and roared, a roar that ripped off leaves and sent rodents scattering to their burrows. Like a squirrel, his prey shot up a tree.

Acornstep smirked. It was trapped, and doomed to isolation. Would he fall and break his neck, or get his leg torn off and die of blood loss? Only Acornstep could decide that.

Uncaring of the racket he was causing, Acornstep stomped over to the tree, reared up on his hind legs, and plunged his thick, ragged claws into the soft tree bark and hauled himself up.

With every movement, the tree quaked and quivered. The prey, paralyzed on its thin branch, clung to it and life itself. A large grin spread around Acornstep’s muzzle. Once he was level with his victim, he placed a paw softly on the supple branch and slammed it down, cleanly snapping off the branch. As the branch snapped off, so did the song.

Hopeless, his prey fell. As their eyes met, it mouthed something:

Acornstep.

Acornstep coldly held its melted yellow gaze full of betrayal and pain.

Then he was gone. The warm flame that briefly flickered in Acornstep’s mutated heart was extinguished. It was prey, after all. Its only purpose was to serve him.

He let himself drop, ignoring the jarring sensation in his bones as he hit the ground. He shook his fur and padded over to the distorted carcass.

He opened his wide jaws, and teared into the flesh as easily as ripping up a leaf. He savored the wave of flavors that crashed onto his tongue, reveling in the euphoria it gave him. His tongue bathed in the sweet tang of the meat, swishing it around his mouth. He wanted to enjoy as much of it as he could.

He took another bite, this time hitting the bone. He ground it between his mangy teeth, enjoying the snap, crackle and pop it made. He spat the remnants out and took another bite of the firm flesh. While chewing happily, he gazed into the ruby-red mess he had made. No… It wasn’t a mess, it was an art! It was a culmination of the flowers thrown onstage at the end of the forest’s symphony! He grinned in the twisted way that dogs do, and continued his snack.

When the hunger dissipated and the gag reflex perked up, he sat back, bloated, and decided to leave the rest for the flies. He had to go to the Moonpool now. He couldn’t abuse Duskear looking like this.

o0o0o

“Have you seen Beesong?” Acornstep asked that evening.

Duskear stiffened over the small pile of herbs she was sorting. Get away from me! she wanted to growl. She cleared her throat. “No,” she answered, trying to keep her voice restrained. “I haven’t seen him all day.” She turned her back to him and continued working. Coltsfoot: The flowers look like dandelions, with yellow or white petals. Used to treat damaged pads and eases breathing.

“Then-”

“Go away, Acornstep! I’m working!” Duskear sighed, exasperated.

“You’re not a medicine cat!” he spat. “Stop being such a mouse-heart!”

Duskear turned to him, eyes blazing with fury. “Stop harassing me, you jerk!”

“She’s right, Acornstep!” Flameheart interjected. “You should leave her alone.”

Acornstep bared his teeth at her. “This is none of your business,” he snapped. “What are you going to do about it anyway?”

“I’ll get Spottedstar,” Flameheart threatened, but shied away when Acornstep’s large solid frame loomed over her, isolating her in its shadow.

“What can she do?” he asked her quietly. “I can rip out her throat before you can even say ‘mouse’.”

Flameheart trembled. “She has many lives. You only have one.”

“Oh?” he probed. “I can wait until Starclan restores them. Or… why don’t I decapitate her and lose all those lives at once? Then it’s a true battle to the death.” Before Flameheart could debate him, he crouched down to meet her. “Why don’t you stop being a chicken and find out?”

The casual tone and tranquility in his voice was frightening; it was if he was telling a bedtime story to a kit instead of pressuring a cat into letting him decapitate a leader.

“What’s this about me?” Spottedstar inquired, bounding in from out of nowhere.

Wow, she really has good hearing, Duskear marveled.

“I want to challenge you for leadership,” shrugged Acornstep nonchalantly.

“Wh-what?” Spottedstar spluttered. “You can’t do that!”

“I am.” Acornstep stretched his legs and shook himself up. “You’d better prepare yourself or I’ll decapitate you right here where you stand.”

Cats were beginning to gather around. “Are you going to watch this?” Flameheart asked Duskear.

Duskear glanced towards the ring of bodies that encircled Acornstep’s large bulky shape and Spottedtsar’s lithe one. The two opponents were circling each other, waiting for the other to make the first move to counter it.

Duskear felt sick. But she couldn’t look away

Oh Smallstripe, please help Spottedstar, she pleaded.

Chapter 11[]

Spottedstar was the first to strike; she lunged forwards with a confident air and landed a not-so-confident swipe on Acornstep’s clumped and tangled fur.

Acornstep put out a paw to steady himself, and growled.

He didn’t even flinch! Duskear marveled.

“Someone get Batsnout!” a cat cried.

“No use,” someone else replied nonchalantly. “He’s out hunting.”

Duskear sunk her claws into the ground in frustration. “Who’s going to stop this?” she asked softly. Nobody heard her. They were too busy focused on the soon-to-be bloodbath in front of them.

Acornstep charged into the slender leader, barreling her over into the sandy ground. Spottedstar shrieked. Small droplets of blood splashed on the ground.

“Somebody help her!” Duskear cried out.

Again, no-one listened.

Viper-quick, Spottedstar leapt up and slithered away. She dived under Acornstep and rolled on her back, battering feebly at him with her hind legs.

Wincing, Acornstep pranced away. He crouched and darted forwards flat against the ground, knocking Spottedstar off her paws and sending her flying. She landed with a thud a fox-length away.

Spottedstar wobbled to her paws, but Acornstep was already storming determinedly towards her. With outstretched paws, he slammed her into the stone wall.

Cats winced groaned at the snapping sound.

“Flameheart,” help her! Duskear wailed over the groans.

Flameheart crept out of the den, trembling. “I heard the groans,” she quivered. “What’s happening!”

“Why were you cowering in there?” Duskear snapped at her, wide amber eyes frantic. “Spottedstar is going to die!”

Flameheart dipped her head in shame. “I can’t go out there… Acornstep will rip me to pieces!”

Duskear sighed and plopped herself onto the ground. “All we can do is watch, I guess?” she moped.

“Don’t even watch,” said Flameheart. “Come inside here with me until it’s over.” She gave a sick grin. “I don’t think it’ll be long anyway.”

How can she say that, being our clan’s medicine cat? Duskear gave one sad glance over her shoulder and sulked after Flameheart into the medicine den.

Acornstep slunk towards Spottedstar’s struggling body. Every pawstep he took made the ground quake. The clan looked on in anticipation.

“I’m going to take one of your lives, Spottedstar, and I’m going to do it again, and again, and again. Notice how none of your dear clanmates are trying to help you? Why is that?”

“…Do they not like you?”

“…Would they prefer to have me as a leader over you?”

“…Are they enraptured by our battle?”

He pressed a large lumpy paw on Spottedstar’s head and ground it into the dirt. Spottedstar mewled in pain.

Helpless and mewling, Acornstep grinned maliciously. Just like the kit she is. He hooked his claws into her pelt and flung her effortlessly into the center of camp. Spottedstar let out a cry of pain.

Acornstep strode to the center of camp, his tail held high, and placed his paw on her head again, but lightly.

“What do you think of your dear leader?” he roared in triumph.

“Incompetent!”

“Boring!”

“I didn’t vote for her!”

“This isn’t a democracy. Keep dreaming!”

Acornstep reared onto his hind legs. With a mighty, leonine roar he crashed onto Spottedstar’s neck, thick ragged claws unsheathed and glinting in the sunlight. Blood spurted out and cats leapt back in fascination. Acornstep prised her body and head together, creating a harsh ripping sound. The clan ‘ooh!’ed in unison. A flood of scarlet erupted on the ground. A storm of cheering rained upon the clan, and subsided.

“What do we do now?” a cat asked.

“We vote for a new leader!” a familiar voice cheered.

“No, you bee-brain!” hissed someone else. “Acornstep challenged her and succeeded. He’s the new leader!”

Flameheart’s muffled voice boomed from inside the den. “That’s not how it works! Challenges aren’t a thing. Batsnout is the new leader. Starclan can’t heal a decapitation, people! Someone go find him.”

“I’ll do it,” Acornstep quickly volunteered, and rushed into the medicine den.

Duskear braced herself as she heard him approached. “What happened?” she asked briskly.

“I-”

“Nope-nope-nope, I don’t want to know,” Duskear snapped in frustration. “I can already picture it now. What do you want? Why are you here, even?”

Acornstep shook himself slightly. “I’m… not used to positive attention. Being out there was a dream. All those cats cheering for me… it’s like a dream come true, you know? I still don’t know why they did it, they must have been in some sort of trance…” He licked his chest fur. “Anyway, come with me. I have to tell you something.” He pranced out of the den merrily and looked over his shoulder. “Come on!”

Duskear warily crept into the sunbaked camp. Cats were bunched into groups, eagerly debating amongst themselves.

Acornstep beckoned her to a shaded corner of the camp. Duskear reluctantly followed him. She stared into his wickedly glinting yellow eyes, like pus. Which is exactly what he was. A wave of uneasiness rocked in her belly.

Acornstep leant in close. “I know what you are.”

Duskear stiffened. How did he-

“I saw. I saw everything. You have a Lovac, don’t you? The owl one.”

Duskear continued to stay frozen in a foolish attempt at making him go away.

“The owl is a mighty predator. Its claimed the lived of many cats. It beats the number of dog victims, but owls are far more common, where dogs usually come once in a blue moon. Well, they came.”

Duskear was too frightened to think straight. “What are you saying exactly?” she whimpered.

Acornstep let out a quiet chuckle. “Can’t you see, Duskear? Look at my eyes, my pelt. Don’t I remind you something?” After a long silence, he shook his head then continued, “You know why I know you have a Lovac?” Duskear could see he was getting impatient. “It’s because I have one myself.” He tauntingly waved his disgustingly unkempt tail in front of his mouth.

“I have the wild dog Lovac. I am the terror plaguing this Clan. I killed your mother and sister and even my own mother. She was quite delicious. Being quite the foodie yourself, you’d love a piece of her!” He threw back his head and laughed heartily, a juxtaposition from his quiet voice before. 

“Come with me,” he hissed as cats started to look at them.

Duskear, now frozen in a mixture of shock, anger and confusion, felt the ground leave her paws as Acornstep hauled her off by her scruff. Sharp teeth dug into her and her eyes watered with the pain. She could feel blood welling up where the skin was punctured

“Extremely tender,” marveled Acornstep, pausing for a moment as he was savoring her. His hot tongue swept up the slowly oozing blood. He soon did it again, and again, and again. 

He dropped Duskear as he let out a satisfied sigh. “You and me, Duskear, we could be the greatest cats the Clan has ever seen. Owl and dog together, two of cat’s most lethal predators."

“No. I promised myself to use my power for good,” Duskear choked out. “You are a sick-minded cat. Smallstripe told me your Lovac was the most dangerous.”

Acornstep pounced on her, instantly pinning her. “Tell no-one. If you tell someone and I find out, I will kill you in your sleep. I will kill all of Thunderclan, and there is no Lovac to stop me!” He struck a heavy blow across Duskear’s throat, leaving deep gashes, and leapt off her, sprinting away in long lopes.

I must follow him, thought Duskear as she bled out. Whatever he’s planning to do, I must stop him! If only I could reach my tail…

Chapter 12[]

Duskear’s throat was on fire. Blood clogged her stubby neck fur, spreading through it until it finally crept onto the dusty forest floor. Every reluctant breath was an inferno ripping through her throat, leaving her lungs untouched. Every so often she twitched helplessly, like a dying piece of prey waiting for its spine to be snapped. She inched her tail closer towards her, each slight movement an arduous lug. Each passing moment robbed her breath away more and more, as more blood soaked the ground which she was to die on. Unless…

Her parched tongue feebly flicked against her brittle tail tip. Duskear wheezed: a gale of hope drowning out a star-blessed morning choir. With the last of her energy, as she gently embraced the tail in her weakening jaws.

I have…to get him…I am… the clan’s only… hope!

Her glazed eyes could only see the white sky above, tinted with streaks of honey from the dusk sky. She wasn’t focusing on anything, she couldn’t comprehend anything, she didn’t know anything. She was returning to the omnipresent essence of nature.

She was over.

Gently, so gently, her jaws slackened. Her head fell its minute distance to the ground like the last leaf of leaf-fall accepting the defeat of the approaching winter, colliding with the ground in a silent boom. Her tail snaked away from her, leaving her gaping at a blank sky.

Blank sky. Blank eyes. Blank mind.

For once, Duskear was satisfied with the tranquility of it all.

Maybe I should try… for once in my life.

She frailly brought her jaws together, and slightly perked up as it caught on to the nib of her tail. Any longer and she would have missed it!

An invisible force brushed her jaw. “Steady there, kiddo,” it chirped. “We don’t want you dying on the job now, do we!”

Smallstripe! Duskear’s heart lurched, and her eyes briefly came back into focus. The jolt of her teeth brutally intruding her tail sent a shock through her, briefly pulling her from the cliff edge of death.

A jarring whirlwind rioted around her. Her bones contorted into an avian skeleton. Feathers protruded from her grey fur. She gave a mighty caw and launched herself into the air. She was Starclan’s Owl, and it was time to fulfill her destiny.

After the storm had cleared, she scanned the area for Smallstripe. He had vanished. She swooped through the air, using her new eyes to locate Acornstep.

Sure enough, she found him. He was dancing along the lake shore with jaunty steps, but Duskear could see him feverishly tasting the air with his jaws, searching for Batsnout. Suddenly he switched: he dipped into a quick-paced stalk, his nose set on a trail.

Duskear dived into the treetops around her target, locking her eyes on him. Keeping a low profile to not reveal herself, she hopped from tree to tree stealthily.

There!

Acornstep had found Batsnout, who was absorbed in a vole not too far ahead. Settling herself on a branch, Duskear concentrated her senses on the duo.

Acornstep was the first to speak. “Father?”

Batsnout’s ears perked up. The vole skittered away. Batsnout whipped around sharply and recoiled in fear as he saw his son.

“Tell me about that battle with Windclan,” Acornstep inquired, sitting himself down and sweeping up dust clouds with his ragged tail. “The one where you killed that leader. I’d love to hear such a dashing tale,” he drawled.

Growling, Batsnout took a step closer. “What are you on to, you freak?”

“That’s not nice,” Acornstep tutted, flicking an ear. “That’s not how parents treat their children. Now tell me.”

Sighing, Batsnout began: “Many moons ago, Spottedstar ordered a night-time raid on the Windclan camp, because of trespassing done by the old Windclan leader, Vinestar, and some of his mousebrained cronies. Spottedstar claimed that the problem had been going undealt with for too long. So, we raided the camp.”

“What happened to Vinestar?” asked Acornstep, feigning interest.

“Oh, I killed him,” chuckled Batsnout. “The idiot was on his last life, unsurprisingly. He wasted the other eight of them falling off trees!” he purred at his own joke, but Acornstep remained stony-faced.”

Acornstep growled viciously. “Murder is wrong. Especially murdering a leader.”

“Your argument holds no water,” the black deputy scoffed. “It was for the good of the whole forest.”

“He wasn’t hurting anyone!” Acornstep protested. “He wasn’t stealing prey! He just wanted to live a fun life. And you stole that away from him.” He snarled and unsheathed his thick, mangled claws.

Batsnout snorted disinterestedly. “I guess.”

“You killed an innocent cat,” Acornstep screeched. “I must avenge him!”

A nervous guffaw escaped Batsnout’s throat. “Woah-ho-ho! Since when did you become Starclan’s prophet?”

Acornstep ignored him. He towered over the frail tom, quarantining him in shadow.

“I am the dog that killed Hailwing, Curlpoppy and Specklebreeze! I killed Beesong and Duskear! I devoured my own mother for lunch, you should have seen the chunk I ripped out of her!” he shrilled giddily, his eyes glazing over with a fetish-like frenzy.

Batsnout cowered, stepping back out of his cage of shadow. “I always thought you were capable of screwed up things but… never this!” he wailed, eyes wide with trepidation and revulsion. “Your own mother, Duskear, her family too… how could you?”

“She never loved me,” scoffed Acornstep. “And Duskear was going to be made part of my plan, but she chickened out like the she-cat she is!” He crouched back, ready to spring at his paralyzed father.

Duskear sprang up in alarm and dived into Acornstep. Cat and owl crashed in a frenzy of feathers and fur.

“You!” snarled Acornstep in a tone as bitter as herbs.

How in the name of all things avian do I fight as an owl? She panicked, cluelessly scratching at him with her hooked talons. She experimented with a lunge of the beak across Acornstep’s matted pelt, drawing a clean line of blood. He yelped and leapt back, eyeing her.

“Duskear,” he rasped. “You followed me… you fox-heart!” he screeched. He launched forward, but Duskear elevated herself in evasion.

He clumsily transformed, savaging his unkempt tail. Duskear flapped upwards to avert the outburst of energy.

“You really are the plague of the forest!” gasped Batsnout from far below. “Great Starclan, how?”

Acornstep let out a tree-shaking roar and flung himself into Batsnout, who skittered away in the nick of time.

Like a falcon, Duskear plunged down and seized Acornstep’s immense, burly body in her outstretched talons and carried him upwards with a leftover wind from the transformation.

Acornstep grunted in confusion and thrashed about to turn around and look at his captor. Duskear gripped her talons together, wincing as they pierced his thick skin.

She glanced down: huge red ruts ran down his body, scrambled innards starting to ooze out of them. She gripped tighter and felt her talons swim in a mishmash of things she didn’t even want to think about.

As her flight continued, Acornstep’s struggles grew more and more pathetic. His growls and snaps and snarls became quieter and quieter, meeker and meeker, until he fell limp. Duskear, restraining herself from looking down, lugged him to the lake and promptly dropped him. All she heard was a splash, and a far-off mention of ‘Starclan’s owl’. She exhaled a sigh of relief. The forest was at peace, but there was one more thing to tidy up.

Duskear, still an owl, promptly settled down beside a frozen Batsnout and ruffled her feathers. Smallstripe materialized from behind a tree.

“I can’t let you live,” he sighed to Batsnout pitifully.

The Thunderclan deputy didn’t respond.

Smallstripe nodded to Duskear. “Everything will be explained in Staclan,” he meowed softly, and watched as Duskear gently pinned Batsnout down and slit his throat with her beak.

Batsnout’s spirit calmly ascended from his cooling body and the two cats walked off together into the sunset, like old denmates.

Epilogue[]

“I demand an explanation,” Batsnout pleaded as soon as his paw hit the starry land.

Smallstripe kept on walking. “Not yet, old fellow: there are some cats we have to meet first.”

“Why was I killed?” he asked again. “Surely that wasn’t necessary.”

“Oh, we can’t have witnesses of Lovacs. It’s only supposed to be known to Starclan. If the living knew about it, anarchy would surely break out!”

Batsnout huffed. The directionless journey continued in silence.

“When will I see my--” Batsnout began, but was interrupted by Smallstripe’s yowl:

“There he is!”

He loped towards a silver tabby tom, who hissed at his arrival.

“Vinestar?” Batsnout gasped. “Not in the Dark Forest, I see?” He trotted over to where Smallstripe stood.

Vinestar bared his teeth. “At least I didn’t kill anyone!”

“Vinestar stole the wild dog Lovac from a Starclan cat and fed it to your son, to manipulate him into killing you,” Smallstripe explained. “Oh, and about Lovacs: there are nine of them, and Starclan gives them to a cat at birth for whatever reason. It gives them the ability to transform into another animal, depending on the Lovac.”

Batsnout nodded. “Right. So, what happens when that cat dies?”

“Their power goes back to Starclan, but they retain their unique appearance gained from the power. Acornstep still looks feral, but he acts like a normal cat. He lost the personality he had earned as a side effect of his power. You can see him now.”

Batsnout jumped. “My son? He’s here?”

As if on cue, Acornstep’s shaggy pale brown form appeared behind them.

“We had to send him here to retrieve his power. We can’t get it from the Dark Forest, we’d all be slaughtered!” Smallstripe chuckled. “Sorry, I find humor in the weirdest of things.”

“Father?” Acornstep trembled. “What have I done?”

Vinestar, Smallstripe and Batsnout turned around.

Acornstep was desperately trying to flatten his shaggy fur. His yellow eyes no longer bore a permanent vicious glint: instead they were warm and respectful. “I’m a monster,” he kept muttering. “Monster, monster, monster!” He slowly raised his head to Vinestar. “Thicketpelt told me everything. Why? Why would you do this to me?” he sobbed.

He’s ashamed of what he was, Batsnout observed. It’s as if… he’s woken up from a bad dream.

This… this is what we would have become if Vinestar had kept his petty meddling paws out of this!

“Son,” Batsnout mewed softly. “Is this what you should have been?”

“You could say that,” Smallstripe chimed in. “What a shaaaaaaaame.”

Batsnout snarled at him furiously. “You’re not my son!”

“I don’t want to be known for this,” Acornstep bawled. “You ruined me!” he shrieked, launching himself at Vinestar, who leapt out of the way.

Nodding approvingly, Smallstripe commented, “Vinestar should really be put in the Dark Forest. He’s the underlying cause of this whole dilemma. Want to chase him?” he asked, turning to Batsnout.

“How can you be so casual about this?” Batsnout replied, aghast.

The former medicine cat smirked. “Maybe, just maybe, the only thing I care about is relieving my boredom.” He sped off, startling the terrified Vinestar. Batsnout sat there, watching the two cats hunt Vinestar.

“There’s a way to make your son happy, you know,” said a gruff voice as soon as the cats disappeared over the horizon.

Batsnout jumped, and saw a large russet tom behind him, a ball of soft light between his paws.

The tom continued. “I guess I’ve got back what’s rightfully mine,” he purred. “I’m Pinestar, an old leader of Thunderclan. Vinestar and his friends stole this from me, all those moons ago.” He patted the ball affectionately. “Your son can be reincarnated. He’ll get to live the life he should have lived.”

A storm of hope stirred inside Batsnout. “You can do that?”

“I’m in Starclan. It’s fair to say that I can do anything.” In between them, a hole opened, showcasing a queen and two newborn kits. One of them looked just like Acornstep.

“That’s Ferretkit. He and his sister Dawnkit were only born this evening,” purred Pinestar. “Riverclan kits.”

Batsnout admired the two healthy kits. “So, when Acornstep comes back, he’ll be reincarnated as Ferretkit?”

“Exactly. He’ll have no recollection of his former life. He’ll have no idea who you even are, or anyone from Thunderclan. When he dies, Acornstep’s spirit will be in Ferretkit’s body. He won’t answer to the name Acornstep or recognize you, even in Starclan. Is this the price you are willing to pay?”

Batsnout’s answer was clear: “Yes. I’d do anything to give my son the life he truly deserves.”

The two toms sat watching the kits sleep peacefully until Smallstripe and Acornstep returned.

Batsnout looked up. “Son. You need the life you truly deserve.”

“Okay.” Acornstep hesitated.

“And as a result, we have decided on reincarnation!” With a flourish, he showed Acornstep and Smallstripe the newborn kits.

Smnallstripe gasped. “Hollyfur’s kits! She’s my sister, you know,” he added proudly.

“That one looks like me!” Acornstep marveled. “Am I going to be reincarnated as him?”

He’s a lot happier now that Vinestar’s gone, Batsnout beamed.

“Yes,” said Pinestar. “His name’s Ferretkit. My name’s Pinestar, though that’s not important now. It’s better if you don’t know what role I played in this.” He walked off abruptly and vanished.

Smallstripe turned to Acornstep, his eyes darkening. “You will have no recollection of your past life. You will never be Acornstep again. You will not remember who anyone in Thunderclan is anymore,” he warned. “When you end up in Starclan again, you will still be Ferretkit. Acornstep will no longer exist. Is this what you want?”

Acornstep shrugged. “It’s good enough for me.”

Smallstripe purred. “Make my sister proud.” He tugged Acornstep down through the clouds and into the lake territory.

Batsnout’s throat began to clog with tears. “I never got to tell my son goodbye,” he croaked alone. “I’ll never see him again.”

“Batsnout,” came a soft voice. “Where’s our son?”

“Hailwing,” he breathed. She was whole again, her bluish-silver fur a star-studded ocean. His Hailwing. “He’s… gone. We gave him a second chance. He was never meant to turn out the way he was.”

“Thicketpelt told me everything,” she whispered, her blue eyes clouded with pain. “Our son… did these unspeakable things…” She crumpled into sobs beside him.

Batsnout tied to nudge her heaving form up. “He’s going to be reincarnated as a Riverclan cat! He’ll no longer know who we are, but we’ll watch him! We’ll watch him develop into the cat he was meant to be! Look!” he urged. He dragged Hailwing to the vision of Ferretkit.

“Just like our son,” she murmured. “He may not know who we are anymore, but he’ll always be the son we never could have.” She purred weakly.

My son. Go make Riverclan proud. We’ll always be watching you, every step of the way.

A/N: The Aftermath[]

Vinestar is now in the Dark Forest. There will be no Dark Forest uprising in any of the Arcs!

Ferretkit and Dawnkit will feature in the Riverclan Arc, but as side characters.

Leaderless and Deputyless, Thunderclan relied on waiting for an omen to signal the new leader. It was Lionhead, the cat who screamed his head off at Duskear for eating a sparrow in Chapter 3. The new deputy is Seedclaw, Duskear's mentor.

Duskear never used her Lovac again, feeling satisfied with fulfilling her duty. She continues to hate kits and love food.

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