Brambleclaw's Fury

Part 13

Squirrelflight was running. There was a monster behind her, chasing her, its roars growing louder. Her heart pounded in rhythm with her paws as they skimmed the ground, barely touching it. She tripped on something- a root, maybe?

But when she looked down, there was a cat laying there, covered in mud and blood. Green eyes glinted at her. Leafpool?

Squirrelflight gasped. Her pelt was matted, and sticky with dried crimson. She looked up at her, parting her jaws to say something.

"Don't let him find you..." she rasped. "He's-"

A scream cut off her words. Squirrelflight whipped around. A beast was over another cat, a sandy pale one. Mother.

Squirrelflight couldn't stop herself. She was running away again, trying to escape it all. Then a cat barreled into her.

Ashfur.

She leaped forward, burying her nose into his fur, letting her sobs consume her and choke her words.

"It's okay," he promised. "It'll be okay..."

And then he was there. Massive, looming. His paws were covered in blood, and his eyes glinted malevolently. He lunged for Ashfur, pinning him down. He slashed at him, killing him with one swift blow. Then he laughed.  A violent, vengeful laugh.

And he turned to her, softening suddenly.

"Squirrelflight," he said. "It's okay. I promise I won't hurt you." She looked at him. With her mate's blood on his claws, and a soft look in his eyes that betrayed the scratch fresh with blood on his cheek. He took a step toward her.

"I promise I won't hurt you," he repeated. And then there was a dead body beside him. Flaming orange. And then a pale yellow one, and a brown and white tabby one. And another, and another.

They kept appearing, all the while as he advanced toward her assuring her that everything was okay and that he wasn't going to hurt her.

Squirrelflight woke up screaming. She lashed out, struggling to see through her dizziness. She kicked out blindly and spun around again to face her foe. The tears were on her face, fresh ones in her eyes.

Then her vision cleared.

She was in a dark place, with shadows between the scraggly trees and thorns growing between them. There was no moonlight, and in fact, no moon overhead. A dark, ominous feeling hung over the whole place.

Her dream cleared, as she tried to sort reality from nightmare. Then there was a voice.

"I was expecting you here." She whirled around, claws unsheathed again, ready to attack. "I mean you no harm."

"Come out you coward! Fight me!" Squirrelflight declared, trying to hide the fear in her voice. If it was Bramblestar or somebody he sent to finish her off, she would die fighting. She trembled and felt the familiar pang of hunger she had felt since she had refused in the last couple of days to admit that Ashfur had brainwashed her.

"I have no intention of being a coward, nor fighting you." A shape leaped down from a scraggly tree nearby. He was black, with clear gray eyes, and looked like a rippling shadow when he moved.

"Who are you?" she hissed and hated how her voice shook as she did.

"Just a cat." She didn't respond to that.

"Do you know where you are?" he asked. 

"The Place of No Stars." He smiled weakly at her answer.