A half moon hung limply in the night’s sky, its sorry eyes observing the creatures below as they ended their day’s work and settled to sleep. The howling wind seemed to echo the snores of courageous warriors by the way it ruffled the bushes. Fallen warriors of StarClan emerged one by one as specks of golden light, looking down on the cats they sought to protect. This night was particularly peaceful – peculiarly peaceful. Reason being, this was a time of dark forces and terrible danger. StarClan tried to smile down on the Clans, but when havoc was erupting, all they could muster was a faint sparkle, which illuminated the horror beneath.

A large pile of bones was in the spotlight of the moon’s tiny rays that turned the pile a blood red. Crowfood was strewn everywhere; remains of a plump mouse that a warrior had selfishly left to rot; a vole that had recently died, not from a warrior’s claw, but from the reek of death that delimited this whole area; a blackbird that a warrior had meant to eat, but after ripping it’s feather’s off, found maggots crawling inside, eating at the blackbird savagely.

From a bed of reeds, two burning fires emerged. After a moment’s hesitation, the fires were given a body – the body of a large, strong dark tabby tom, with a scar slicing his nose. He strode with confidence across the junkyard, before stopping outside a shadow-filled cave. He looked around suspiciously, and when convinced he was not being spied on, he padded into the cave and the shadow’s engulfed his body.

Inside the den was a light-brown tabby she-cat, curled in a bed of moss. A wriggling ball of fur writhed in the curve of the she-cats body like a maggot. At the sound of someone entering the den, the she-cat’s head spun round to reveal ice-cold blue eyes, fear filling them at first, but when she saw the newcomer, the fear was replaced with fierce malice.

“How are they?” growled the newcomer, sounding uninterested.

“She, Tigerstar! The rest of them died, remember?” snapped the she-cat.

Tigerstar snorted, and took a step forward. The she-cat went on.

“She’s ill. She’ll die like the rest of them unless Runningnose sees to her.”

“Runningnose needn’t get involved. StarClan told me that this fur ball would be able to fight off the deadliest threat!”

“She’s just a kit! I can’t watch her suffer, even if she is your hellspawn!”

“Silence!” Tigerstar yowled, loud enough to wake the whole of the Clans. “If she won’t live, kill her. Maybe StarClan meant another kit, not this one.”

Without waiting for an answer, Tigerstar turned and strode out of the den, his head swaying from side to side angrily. The she-cat hissed silently and turned her head around, beginning to lick the tabby ball of fur vigorously. She wouldn’t kill her kit, even if the father were a vicious, egotistic brute. No. She had another idea on her mind. She stood, grabbing the kit by the scruff – the kit protested with piercing pitiful squeals – and padded softly and slowly up to the den entrance. She listened for a moment, checking that none of the Clan was awake. When she was certain, she ran out of the den, past the bloodcurdling bonehill, and out of the clearing completely. Her orbs were full of woe at what she was being forced to do, but if it kept her kit alive, she would do it.