Melting Shadows

Chapter 1

~

It started a moon ago.

Mistypaw remembered every detail. Iceflower bursting through the camp entrance, pawing at her throat. Her clanmates clustering around, trying to figure out what was wrong. Kat’s expression morphing from quiet authority to shock and confusion when she realized that Iceflower couldn’t speak. The fear and shock that had kept Mistypaw rooted to the ground.

Little did everyone know that the attack was only the first of many. One by one, cats came back to camp with various ailments- everything from itching uncontrollably to losing sense of sight, smell, sound, taste, or hearing. Some got over the sicknesses. Some did not. The camp lived in fear. Each cat that had been struck with the strange sickness gave the same report- being attacked by a strange, dark-pelted rogue. --- Mistypaw jerked awake, heart racing, eyes wide. Something was terribly wrong. She could feel it in her bones. Cautiously padding out of her den, she looked around for anything suspicious. Nothing. The only thing out was a leaf, dancing around the starlit clearing. Mistypaw visibly relaxed.'' The attacks have got us all spooked. Maybe I need to stop imagining things,'' she thought.

As Mistypaw padded back inside her den, she heard something that made her fur stand on end. A low, bone-chilling yowl. She froze. Slowly turning around, she saw a scene that made cold dread settle like a stone inside her belly.

A sea of dark-pelted rogues flooded into the camp. Mistypaw barely had time to yowl “Attack!” before the camp erupted into chaos. Warriors darted around, trying their best to defend themselves against the intruders, but they were outnumbered by many. Then Mistypaw saw something that made her realize that BlogClan had no hope in trying to fend off the attackers.

The BlogClan warriors were fighting bravely, but every single time an intruder’s claw touched their skin, they would fall. Mistypaw knew. These cats were the ones responsible for the sickness that had struck so many cats in the past moon. She was distracted from her thoughts by the sight of Raggedoak trying desperately to fend off three attackers at once, and darted over to help her.

“Stay away from their claws,” she hissed.

Raggedoak nodded and changed her strategy to defensive. The two fought alongside each other for a few moments, trying hard to keep themselves safe from the deadly claws. Then, without warning, the intruders turned tail and ran out of the camp.

Cakestar leaped up to the highrock, signaling a clan meeting. The few warriors that hadn’t been struck crowded together, eager to hear what their leader would say.

“Tonight has proved one thing- we aren’t safe inside our own borders anymore,” Cakestar began. “I think the purpose of this attack was to scare us. After all, fear is an enemy’s greatest weapon. We must meet this attack with one of our own. We have to let this group of cats know that they haven’t scared us, that-”

“Cakestar, may we speak?” Mistypaw turned her head to see Wavepaw and Mistpaw gazing up at their leader. Cakestar nodded, curious.

“Well, in the fight today, we noticed that, well, these cats are too well-orchestrated to be just a band of rogues.” Wavepaw mewed.

“We noticed that their fighting strategy, it was almost like a- almost like a Clan’s.” Mistpaw finished.

“Hmm.. you’re right..” Cakestar meowed thoughtfully. Then she straightened up. “If what these apprentices say is true, then I must enforce a new rule. No cat is to be allowed outside of camp alone. We are already weak enough as it is, and I don’t want to lose more warriors. We must strengthen our boundaries. This… Clan is a bigger threat than we have ever faced before, and we must rise up to meet it once we have regained our strength.” Cakestar leaped off the highrock, signaling the meeting to be over, and Jayfrost began organizing the hunting/border patrols.

Mistypaw padded over to a small group of cats clustered around the warrior’s den. They were talking in hushed voices. “This isn’t right, living like this. Living in fear isn’t good for us,” Eagleclaw mewed.

“Exactly,” Hobbitheart answered. “If this Clan is trying to scare us, they’ve done a pretty good job.”

“Stop it. We can’t think like this,” Iceflower cut in. “StarClan will help us find a way through this. We will rise up and meet this threat, no matter how dangerous it be.” Her words lit a small flame of hope in Mistypaw’s heart.

“You’re absolutely right.” Mistypaw knew then what she was going to do. She was going to find the strange Clan and figure out what they were trying to do, regardless of whether Cakestar permitted her to leave the camp or not.