Chapter 10
The instant Hawkpaw touched her nose to the pool, the world went dark. She felt as though she was drifting through a strange world, slowly falling. Everything was black, and when she tried to move her limbs, it didn't work. Then, suddenly, everything brightened, and Hawk felt fresh snow underpaw.
Hawkpaw whirled around, exhilaration pounding in her muscles. The snowy landscape stretched as far as the eye could see, and Hawkpaw felt comfort wash over her like a warm breeze.
Then, the screeching began.
Suddenly, cats exploded into the snowy clearing, claws unsheathed, eyes narrowed to slits. Hawkpaw shivered where she was, although no cold probed into her pelt.
Each one of the cats had no special abilities, yet, as Hawkpaw narrowed her eyes she could make out several that bore striking resemblances to FalconClan cats that she had seen before.
A black she-cat swung a blow at a russet tom, that sent him crumpling to the ground. Nighthaze! Hawkpaw knew that smirk anywhere.
Then, there were deep rumbling sounds. All the cats instantly stopped fighting, looking around in confusion. Suddenly, the ground gave way and swallowed them whole. Hawkpaw fell too, until she was once more in darkness.
Though this time she wasn't alone. In the blackness that swarmed around Hawkpaw, she saw faint outlines of a cat's face flicker into view. Gradually, the light brightened, forming eyes, ears, and whiskers. Hawkpaw expected the light to stop once she could fully see the face, but it kept on expanding, until it made her eyes burn.
In a sudden explosion of light, Hawkpaw found herself flung backwards from where she was, suspended in darkness. She twisted through the air, paws flailing for something to grab onto. She scrunched her eyes tight shut as the bright light surrounded her.
"Open your eyes, my child."
Hawkpaw shivered as she heard a voice. It came from somewhere inside her head. The voice sounded loving, yet there was a certain authority in it that made Hawkpaw blink open her eyes.
Lights dazzled all around her. Bright white colours fizzed, and speckles of pale blues, reds, yellows and greens surrounded Hawkpaw. The stars!
"That is right, small kit. You are among the stars."
Hawkpaw blinked in confusion, looking for the speaker of the voice. Oddly enough, there was no cat to be found in the bright landscape.
Hawkpaw opened her jaws to speak.
"Why am I here?"
Her voice sounded very small, yet it echoed around. It was almost as though the stars were spreading the question she had asked as far as the distant galaxies. Hawkpaw shivered as she stared at her dark grey paws. Is this normal? She wondered.
In response to her question, a grave voice boomed. "You are our last resort. Even we do not know what will happen next, although we knew we needed a cat from outside the clans to save the disease that spreads inside."
"What disease?" Hawkpaw glanced over her shoulder, searching for the speaker who was talking to her.
There was no response to her latest question. For several heartbeats, Hawkpaw wondered if the stars had left her in the empty white landscape. Suddenly, a voice spoke, although this time the speaker's voice had a much rougher edge to it.
"Are you ready to become a warrior?"
Hawkpaw glanced over her shoulder, from where she was suspended in space. She shuddered at the thought of what was about to happen next. She found herself nodding, grim determination in her voice when she spoke.
"I am ready."
"Then we will give some of our last reserves to helping you, little kit." The voice suddenly sounded very vulnerable. "In hopes that you will save the living from the coming threat."
Suddenly, a massive paw four times the size of Hawkpaw reached out for her. It was fast, and she hardly had time to flinch before she was suddenly inside a massive fist of light.
Two glowing lights came towards Hawkpaw, before resting on her shoulder blades. She twisted around in awe filled terror as the clamped onto her shoulder blades. Instinct told her to jerk away, but Hawkpaw couldn't.
The light spread throughout her body, until Hawk herself was glowing. Then, from the root of the two lights, feathers began to unfurl.
They started out as a dark, dark blue, but the longer the wings got, the brighter the blue of the wings was. Hawkpaw watched in captivated awe, as the last of the feathers grew on to her back.
I have wings!
Then, there was a cracking sound. Hawkpaw blinked, heart suddenly jolting her chest as the light that was glowing from her body abruptly vanished. Then, the light of the starry world disappeared too.
Hawkpaw was falling in black darkness, faster and faster. She tried to fan out her wings, but she was going too fast. Panic spread throughout Hawkpaw, when suddenly, everything went dark.
"Hawkpaw! Hawkpaw!"
The dark grey she-cat blinked open her eyes slowly. She still felt as though she was drifting through the fragmented haze that had just encompassed her. Gradually, Hawkpaw's senses grew more and more alert.
She was laying down, head right beside the star-speckled pool. Glancing upwards, she saw that the sky had darkened to night, with stars glinting far away. Closer to her, she could see the four rock shapes of the cats watching her protectively.
Hawkpaw glanced down at her paws, and moved them slowly. They were nearly numb with cold. In fact, there was a weight on her back, almost as though she had slept and snow had piled on top of her.
"Hawkpaw! You have wings!"
Hawkpaw whirled around as Smokepaw yowled joyfully in her ear. Now on her paws, Hawk swayed unsteadily, and Smokepaw had to dart in to save her from falling into the Starlight Pool.
"Er, thanks." Hawkpaw gasped. "Sorry, I'm usually not this clumsy." Then she turned, and her blue locked with Smokepaw's wide amber ones. "Hold on, did you say wings?!"
As Smokepaw nodded brightly, Hawkpaw twisted her head around to see the extra weight on her back. Sure enough, two blue feathered wings were folded together neatly on either side of her flank.
Looking farther up, Hawkpaw saw the four spirit cat statues behind her. All of them seemed to be looking down on her. Were you the ones I talked to? Hawk glanced at the largest statue, the one Smokepaw had called the 'Great Mother.'
"How was it? Was it super cool? I bet it was super cool. I've only received one vague cryptic prophecy spitting nonsense! I bet you saw real cats, right?!"
Smokepaw was speaking a million miles an hour, and while Hawkpaw wanted to collapse into the ground and sleep.
"Calm yourself, Smokepaw. The new apprentice must be exhausted."
Hawkpaw glanced up to see Duskfang descending elegantly from the sky above. He fanned out his wings before gliding down on a smooth stone right beside Smokepaw. Hawkpaw glanced back at her own wings, still trying to figure out how to even move them. Will I be as graceful as Duskfang one day? She wondered.
Duskfang deposited several scrawny voles that he'd been carrying beside Hawkpaw and Smokepaw. Hawkpaw glanced up at him as he began calmly preening his feathers.
"What?" He grunted. "Eat the prey, get some energy, and then we'll find a way to get home safely."
Hawkpaw bit into the flesh of the vole, surprised at how starving she was. Beside her, Smokepaw munched happily on a vole. Her eyes were bright. Hawkpaw wondered why Smokepaw had opened up to her so much over their journey. Perhaps it had something to do with the near death experience of the CometClan battle.
Once all the prey was gone, Duskfang turned back to Hawkpaw. He eyed her wings sceptically.
"Considering you have no clue how to use your wings," he meowed at length. "And I don't think I could carry you all the way home, perhaps we should take the long way."
Smokepaw let out a groan, but she was quickly silenced by the withering glare the clan deputy sent her. Hawkpaw found herself nodding eagerly. Maybe I'll see Adder again, she thought. Then I can start my new life in peace, knowing that my mother is okay.
"Alright, follow me."
Duskfang suddenly got to his paws, and made his way off into the snowy landscape at a brisk pace. Hawkpaw looked at her wings uneasily, wondering if the extra weight would make her unsteady, or bring her down. Her legs also felt different, as though she had had more changes in her body than just new wings.
"Come on!"
Smokepaw bounded off after Duskfang, and Hawkpaw took a deep breath. She tentatively put one paw into the ground, and then another. Gradually, Hawkpaw got her balance, and made her way slowly towards Duskfang. She still felt like a lopsided badger.
The journey brought Hawkpaw closer and closer to her past home, and with each pawstep, she expected to encounter one of her old family members. Their scents were all around here, and Hawkpaw felt her chest ache at how her mother's smell was different and strange. Part of her wanted to run away, although from whom Hawkpaw wasn't sure
Each pawstep made Hawkpaw's heart race faster and faster. Memories bubbled in her chest of hunting with Eagle, playing with Mountain, and chasing Wolf, all in location she had passed.
Hawkpaw never managed to catch up with Duskfang and his brisk pace, but she managed to keep him mostly within eyesight. Every so often, he would wait, tail lashing irritably for her to get closer.
He was doing that right now, and Smokepaw was waiting too. Hawkpaw would have kept going, but suddenly, a sharp scent made her nostrils flare.
She had been on high alert, knowing that she was extremely close to the den where Adder's colony slept. She scented blood.
Lifting her chin in the direction where Adder's colony was, Hawkpaw tasted the air. The scent of blood strengthened. Hawkpaw's heart suddenly pounded in her chest. She forgot everything, and bolted towards the little den on the horizon.
"Hawkpaw! Get back to me!" Duskfang screeched, but Hawkpaw hardly paid her any attention.
Adder? Bolt? Swipe? Mountain? Images of all her former colony's cats laying as motionless as the dead FalconClan warrior flashed into Hawkpaw's made, jagged and splintery.
The den was within a tail length when Hawkpaw stopped dead in her tracks. She had been right. What lay before her, made Hawkpaw's chest flip over painfully in her chest.
"Hawkpaw! What is the meaning of-"
Duskfang's yowl dried in his throat the moment he saw exactly what Hawkpaw did. Smokepaw had bounded up beside them, but Hawkpaw barely paid them any attention.
Blood and feathers or several colours were scattered just outside the clearing, and at the centre of it was scattered scraps of torn fur from all of her family.
"Oh StarClan!"
Hawkpaw felt her lips curl back in a snarl as she turned to face the two cats standing beside her. She backed away from them, bunched her muscles and unsheathed her claws, ready to fight.