"Is something wrong?" he called.

It was Millie who replied. "She's getting sores on her belly from the damp bedding. Bramblestar, you have to do something!"

"I'll be okay," Briarlight muttered. "Don't fuss!"

"Jayfeather?" Bramblestar glanced toward his medicine cat. "What do you think?"

Jayfeather padded up to Briarlight. "Why didn't you tell me you were getting sores?" he asked brusquely.

Briarlight looked at her paws. "I didn't want to bother you."

"StarClan help us!" Jayfeather puffed out a sigh. "What do you think a medicine cat is for?" To Bramblestar he added, "I'll examine her sores and find her some herbs, but Millie is right. Sleeping on stone and wet bedding won't do Briarlight any good at all."

Before Bramblestar could respond, a squeal sounded from the tunnel entrance. He glanced over his shoulder to see that Minty had appeared with Amberpaw.

"Oh, wow!" the kittypet exclaimed, her blue eyes round with shock. "That cat has no legs!"

Stupid furball, Bramblestar thought, as Briarlight shrank with embarra.s.sment.

"Of course she's got legs," Amberpaw mewed, brisk and sensible. "The back ones don't work, that's all."

"And she's still alive?" Minty asked. "Don't you have to feed her and stuff?"

"Yes, we catch prey for her," Amberpaw replied. "What do you take us for? She's our Clanmate! Do you think we wouldn't help her?"

Minty gave Briarlight a fascinated glance. "You're not really wild at all, then," she murmured.

"Yes, we are," Amberpaw meowed with a decisive flick of her tail. "Wild's not the same as savage."

Bramblestar gave the apprentice a nod of approval. He still couldn't see any answer to the problem of the wet bedding, and hoped that something would occur to him on patrol. It would be a relief to get away from the makeshift camp for a while.

"Dovewing," he began, beckoning to the cat nearest him. "I want you to come with me to patrol the ShadowClan border."

"Sure," Dovewing mewed. "I need some exercise to take the stiffness out of my legs."

"Let's take the two older apprentices," Bramblestar suggested. "They've missed out on a lot of training lately. And their mentors, of course."

"I'll round them up." Dovewing padded into the tunnel with a whisk of her tail. Moments later she reappeared with Poppyfrost and b.u.mblestripe, Lilypaw and Seedpaw bouncing with antic.i.p.ation behind their mentors.

"We're really going to patrol the ShadowClan border?" Seedpaw chirped.

Bramblestar nodded. "What's left of it. And there might be dangers we're not used to, so both of you need to be sensible and not go dashing off."

"We won't," Lilypaw promised.

Bramblestar led the patrol along the ridge toward ShadowClan, setting scent markers at the edge of the territory until they reached the border stream. Swollen by the heavy rain, it had burst its banks and become a brown, churning torrent as it rolled toward the lake. Pausing to taste the air, Bramblestar realized that he could only pick up faint traces of ShadowClan scent. "They haven't renewed their scent markers since yesterday," he mewed.

"We haven't renewed ours yet, either," Poppyfrost pointed out. "There's not much point in all this wet," she added with a shiver.

"No cat will try to cross this stream, that's for sure," b.u.mblestripe agreed.

"Still, I think we will go on leaving markers," Bramblestar decided. "The apprentices can practice setting them."

"Yes!" Lilypaw jumped into the air. "We'll feel like real warriors."

Gradually they worked their way downstream, finding new places to set the markers at the edge of the water. The boundary was farther into ThunderClan territory than it used to be, thanks to the flooded stream.

"I hope ShadowClan doesn't think we're giving them more territory when the floods go down," b.u.mblestripe murmured.

"If they do, they'll soon find out they're wrong," Bramblestar responded grimly.

A thin drizzle began to fall, soaking their pelts and striking a chill right through to their bones. Apart from the patter of droplets, the forest was silent. Bramblestar felt his neck fur begin to rise at the strangeness of pushing through the drenched undergrowth, under dripping trees, and finding no trace of prey or any other cats. Even the birds had stopped singing.

The apprentices, who had been scampering a few paw steps ahead, slithered to a halt.

"Wow, look at that!" Lilypaw exclaimed.

Bramblestar trotted forward to join the young cats. They had reached the edge of the flooded lake. The water stretched in front of them in an endless silver pool, with the tops of trees poking out of it.

"The water's risen above the old Thunderpath," Seedpaw meowed. "That's more fox-lengths from the lake than I can count!"

Lilypaw was blinking unhappily as she gazed out over the flood.

"What's the matter?" Seedpaw asked.

"I was thinking of all the drowned prey," Lilypaw mewed. "How are we going to find enough to eat?"

"That's easy!" Seedpaw replied. "We'll have to expand our territory over the other side of the ridge."

Bramblestar stared at the golden-brown cat in astonishment. Could this be the answer to the shortage of prey? It had never occurred to him to hunt anywhere but in the remains of their own territory.

"You know, Seedpaw could be right," Dovewing murmured.

"I don't know. . . ." Bramblestar felt that as leader he had to be more cautious. "It's a big paw step, to consider changing our boundaries."

"But we'd be unchallenged if we hunted beyond the ridge," b.u.mblestripe pointed out. "No other cats live there."

Poppyfrost's tail twitched. "There would be foxes and badgers. We had enough trouble with them when ThunderClan first made its territory here. Can we take on that kind of challenge when we're in this state?" she added, gesturing with her tail at their skinny bodies and sodden pelts.

"We could always start with hunting patrols," Bramblestar mewed, beginning to be intrigued by the prospect of more prey. "We don't need to mark out a whole territory."

While they were talking, the apprentices had been running along the water's edge, half-thrilled and half-fearful as they gazed out at the surging water.

"Look!" Lilypaw let out a squeak. "It's the Stick of Fallen Warriors!"

Bramblestar looked where she was pointing and spotted the stick that Jayfeather had marked with scratches as a memorial to the cats who had died in the Great Battle. It was half-floating, half-submerged in the floodwater, wedged among the branches of an oak tree.

"We have to get it!" Seedpaw exclaimed.

Both young cats were poised to plunge into the lake; Bramblestar reached them just in time to block their path.

"Stop!" he ordered. "It's far too dangerous to swim in the floodwater!"

"But the stick . . ." Seedpaw protested. "It's important!"

"And it will still be there when the water goes down," Poppyfrost meowed firmly. "Now come away from the edge."

She and b.u.mblestripe herded their apprentices away from the sucking edge of the floodwater, and turned back toward the camp.

"Hey!" b.u.mblestripe halted, looking back. "I can see a fish, swimming among the trees."

Bramblestar spotted it too, a swift, silver glimmer among the drowned leaves. For a heartbeat he wondered if they should try to catch it. No, he decided. We're all wet enough.

"We'll try hunting beyond the ridge," he told the others as they plodded over the muddy ground. "That was a good idea, Seedpaw."

Seedpaw puffed out her chest. "Please let me come on the patrol!" she begged.

"No," b.u.mblestripe replied. "Only experienced warriors should go beyond the boundaries." Glancing at Bramblestar, who nodded in agreement, he added, "There could be other cats hunting there because of the flood, as well as badgers and foxes."

"But I'm a great hunter!" Seedpaw insisted. "I can pounce really well. Watch!"

She leaped into the air and landed with her front claws sunk deep into a clump of soggy moss. "I caught it!" she yowled. But when she tried to step back and withdraw her claws, the moss was so wet that it clung to her fur and she couldn't get it off. "This is yucky!" she complained as she shook her paws.

"Keep still," Lilypaw mewed, padding up to her sister and stripping off the moss with careful sc.r.a.pes of her claws. "Honestly, Seedpaw, sometimes you're such a stupid furball."

Seedpaw blinked in embarra.s.sment and her tail drooped.

"But you're right, that was a great pounce," Dovewing put in. "And b.u.mblestripe tells me you're an awesome hunter. Maybe you'd like to show me some of your skills?"

Seedpaw brightened up a little. "I know you're only trying to make me feel better," she mewed. "And hoping I won't think about hunting over the ridge anymore. But sure, I'll show you if you want."

"Thanks, that would be great," Dovewing responded, with a hint of amus.e.m.e.nt.

As the patrol moved off again, b.u.mblestripe padded alongside Dovewing. "That was kind," he murmured, brushing his muzzle against the she-cat's shoulder. "Thanks, Dovewing."

"I like working with the apprentices," Dovewing purred.

"I can't wait for us to have our own kits," b.u.mblestripe went on. "I know you'll be a great mother."

To Bramblestar's surprise, Dovewing stepped away from her mate. "There's plenty of time for that," she mewed. "We need to deal with the flood first."

b.u.mblestripe flattened his ears. "Right, okay," he murmured, but Bramblestar wondered if Dovewing had seen the hurt look in his eyes. Were things all right between them?

CHAPTER 13.

The rain stopped, but the clouds didn't clear, so it was impossible to tell when it was sunhigh. But when the sky seemed brightest overhead, Bramblestar gathered the cats together to share the meager prey the hunters had brought back.

"I can't stand biting through soggy fur," Cloudtail complained, prodding the limp body of a mouse with his front paw. "What I wouldn't give to be tucking in to a nice juicy vole, back in the hollow in the sunshine!"

"Well, wet mouse is all you're going to get," his mate, Brightheart, told him. "You'll have to make the best of it."

Cloudtail grunted, and began to eat in small, fastidious bites.

Bramblestar noticed that Minty had emerged from the tunnel with Millie and the younger apprentices. She was staring in dismay at the sparrow Amberpaw put in front of her.

"I'm so hungry!" she moaned. "But eating that . . . it's yucky!"

Amberpaw rolled her eyes.

"Just try it," Millie coaxed the kittypet, her tone sympathetic. "You might find you like it." As Minty gave her a disbelieving glance, she continued, "I remember the first time I ate wild prey. It was a bit of a shock, after Twoleg food! But I wouldn't want to go back to eating that dry stuff now."

Minty gave the sparrow a wary sniff. "It's covered in feathers. I can't eat those."

"Bite down hard, like this." Amberpaw demonstrated with her own blackbird. "You can spit the feathers out after."

Minty shuddered, but sank her teeth into the sparrow as Amberpaw had demonstrated. Bramblestar saw her gulp down the mouthful with a stunned expression and a feather stuck to her nose.

At least she's eating, he thought.

"The hunting was poor today," he commented to Squirrelflight, who was sharing a vole with him. "Seedpaw suggested sending a patrol outside the territory."

Squirrelflight blinked in surprise, then nodded. "It might be worth a try."

"I'll go," Thornclaw meowed instantly, looking up from the scrawny rabbit he was sharing with Brackenfur, Cherryfall, and Blossomfall. "Anything to stop my belly rumbling."

"Count me in too," Brackenfur added.

"And me," Blossomfall mewed. "It sounds like a great idea."

"Thanks." Bramblestar felt proud of his Clanmates for volunteering so quickly to go into unknown and possibly dangerous territory. "I'll come with you."

"Bramblestar . . ." Squirrelflight gave him a nudge, and motioned with her ears for him to move out of earshot of the others. "You need to rest," she went on when she was sure that they couldn't be overheard. "You can't do every patrol. I'll go instead."

"But you've already hunted today," Bramblestar objected.

"And you did the ShadowClan border patrol." Squirrelflight's tail-tip was twitching, though she kept her voice low. "And yesterday you trekked all the way over to RiverClan and risked your life rescuing that kittypet."

"So?" Bramblestar began to feel frustrated. "I'm fine. It's not a problem."

"It'll be a problem for the rest of us if our Clan leader collapses from exhaustion."