Chapter 11: You Didn't Lie

I nodded, I think any cat could have caught that baby mouse... I let her have her few seconds of pride though.

"Great job! You'll be a great hunter some day!" I said to her. She smiled and then walked over to me with her tiny little mouse. She looked so happy it just put such a big smile on my face. Even though it was a small one, she had still caught it, that was the important part of all of that encounter.

"Some day I might be like you!" She said to me. It gave me another smile. I was happy that she was thinking great things about me. But I definitely was not the best hunter out there. I had just learned to hunt, like her just a few days ago.

"I just caught my first one a few days ago... You might be even better than me." I said back to her. She looked at me all happy and it made me feel great inside. She then began to eat her mouse and I could tell right away that she loved in more than to vole.

"Oh yes... This is amazing, way better than the wet food I used to get! I used to think that was the best thing in the world!" She said to me. I still had never eaten wet food, but I had a pretty good idea of what it was at this point. I waited for her to finish the rest of her mouse before we then began to head off.

It was already nearing the night time and soon we would have to lower our heads in some branch to catch some sleep. I was already feeling a bit tired, mainly from last night, but also because of today as well. It had been a bit of a tough day, trying to teach Mint to hunt even more, but at the same time we had been walking non stop for the past couple of days, it was really beginning to wear down on my legs.

"Mint, lets walk a little bit more, then lets get some sleep for the night, I am so tired." I said to her. Another reason why I was super tired was, for some reason when I had those dreams, it almost seemed like I got no sort of sleep.

"Awwww... Okay." Mint responded to me. I looked at her thankfully and then we continued walking in the direction of the sun. She looked tired as well so I was pretty sure that wasn't the only reason she had said yes.

I also didn't want to have any coyotes and wolves on us like the past couple of nights. I had nearly thought that I was going to die for the past couple of days. The coyotes looked huge and scary, Tristan had told me that the wolves were about 5 times bigger.

I used to think that he was joking and could be no bigger than a cat. A lot of the stories he used to tell me seemed like fiction. But once I saw the coyotes the other night I knew that he was not joking. They looked even bigger than what Tristan had told me and he was known to over exaggerate.

But I had heard the wolves walking next to us the other night. They sounded huge, even bigger than those big dogs that lived next door. They seemed like they were faster than those as well. The last few nights I had seen the worst of all the worlds.

The sun had then began to set in the horizon and I then began to look for a place to stay the night. The trees we were around right now didn't really have any thick branches and were high up. Tristan used to tell me about those, he called them pine trees. They weren't anywhere near where we lived but I believed in the stories he had told me about those.

Those weren't scary stories so I was fine with those being real. If we couldn't find a nice branch to sit in, we would most likely need to find some sort of hole that we could hide in for the night.

I definitely did not want to be sleeping in the normal part of the ground. You never know if you run into some sort of coyotes or wolfpack.

The last 3 of 6 nights I had been out there, all the things that had happened had all been the worst. And the 2 nights that weren't bad I was inside of something or on a branch that I could hide on.

"There's no branches for us to hide in, lets go find a pit or something okay?" I said to her. She nodded and then we began looking for a pit. The area we were in did not seem like a place for rabbits nest however.

I then saw something from not too far away. It looked like some sort of cave. Tristan used to tell me about those as well, he used to say they were where wolves liked to stay and hide during the day time.

This didn't look like it was that sort of cave however. And it seemed like something was trying to tell me to go into the cave. But Tristan had also told me to not go anywhere near caves if I was ever out here.

Maybe it was just something in my head, trying to tell me to do something that would get us both killed. But it just seemed so real...

"Mint, lets go into that cave over there." I said to Mint, she looked back at me a bit confused. She must have never heard of a cave before. Which would make sense, she had told me she had never gone beyond the line of sight of her neighborhood.

"That big rock place over there? That place just looks scary!" She said and then she began to shiver. I pushed up against her, I was a bit scared as well but something we telling me inside my head that I needed to go in there.

It wasn't just my head, it seemed like Squirrelflight was telling me to, but at the same time Squirrelflight wasn't saying anything inside my head. And if the cave was really bad then wouldn't she tell me that it was?

"Mint, just trust me... There's something I have needed to tell you for a while. Once we get in there I will explain all of it to you. But it is somewhere safe for us for the night." I said to her. She looked at me and then began to nod. I was happy that she believed in me and also trusted me at the same time.

We began to head into the cave and I was looking around. It was already dark so we would have to try this out no matter what, there was nowhere for us to hide. I couldn't see a thing, and it kind of scared me, I almost wanted to go back out there and just test my luck.

But I couldn't there was just something inside my head that was telling me that I was going down the right path. We continued down the path and I then was beginning to here Mint begin to whimper from behind me. I looked back at her not seeing any light at all.

"Moon, can we just go back? This place is really scaring me." She said to me. I looked at her, or rather the direction her sound was coming from and shook my head. I knew she couldn't see it though and I felt a little dumb.

"It is scaring me to, but just trust me... Something is telling me that we are going down the right path... I will tell you all about it in just a little bit." I said to her. She groaned a little bit but we continued walking down the narrow tunnel.

After I while I began to get even more scared. What if we didn't find our way back? This place seemed like it was huge and I wasn't sure if we had gone down several paths.

Suddenly I saw a bit of light from not to far away. The room looked huge, the light was fairly small, it seemed like it was just the moon standing in from afar.

I nodded to Mint and we went towards the rock in the middle of the room. We stood beside it and then began to rest a little bit. I knew that she was about to ask what I had been seeing that was so important. So I just began to tell her before she asked.

"Alright Mint, so I have seen cats in my dreams... I don't know if they are dead cats or what they really are. But they are the reason that I am going on this quest in the first place. They want me to do something, but I am not too sure what it is. Just believe me please, I don't want to do this alone." I said to her. She looked at me and narrowed her eyes a bit confused. I hoped that she didn't think I was crazy and run back to her house in the morning. I wouldn't blame her I wouldn't believe that if someone told me that before. But now that it had actually happened to me, I just wasn't sure how to explain it to her.

"I believe you Moon, it just seems a bit weird because, the only dreams I had ever had were about animals and walking around my place." She said back to me. It suddenly gave me a good idea of how to explain in all to her to where she might believe me a little bit more.

"I had those types of dreams too. Until the night before I got thrown out of my house." I said to her. She looked at me a bit sad but then nodded for me to continue the story. "They came into my dream and told me I needed to rebuild some clans... They are the ones that taught me how to hunt. That's why I believe that the might be real cats, or at least used to."

I thought it was a good explanation, she was still looking at me a bit confused, but after a few moments she then vegan to gradually nod back at me, I just wasn't too sure if she actually fully believed what I was saying.

"I believe you, it just seems a bit crazy. But lets get a bit of sleep, I lied earlier, I am really tired..." She said to me, and then she began to groan. I nodded back at her and then began to lower my eyes and put my head down. The place seemed safe enough, I was thankful for the cats of the dead. They had saved us yet again. I would be starving, probably dead near my old house... Squirrelflight was the one that taught me how to jump over the fence in the first place. I felt a little bad for even thinking of staying with Owl. I wish that he would have followed me on this quest. But I respected his decision.

Suddenly there was a huge beam of light that came out of nowhere. Mint jumped up from her spot a bit scared as if something was about to attack us. The light was so bright I had to blink my eyes a few times before I could actually look at it.

It looked beautiful, everything about it was just so amazing, the light, the rock it was the greatest thing that I had ever seen.

"Wow!" Me and Mint said at the exact same time. I looked at the rock and then sat back down again. Mint headed back towards me and pushed her body against mine. Everything about this situation was amazing... I was with the cat that I loved and I was seeing the most amazing thing that I had ever seen in my life.

"Is this what the cats were telling you about? I believe you now..." She said to me. I nodded to her, I couldn't speak words about this situation that we were in right now. It wasn't necessarily them but they were guiding me somewhere in my head to come over hear.

"Sleep Moon." Said Squirrelflight from right beside me. Mint gasped, she could see her too, I wasn't crazy! This Mint the the quest that I was going on was 100% real! It instantly made me about 50 times better about the situation we were in.

"Wow, you are so beautiful! What are those stars on your pelt! They are amazing!" Mint said to her. It almost seemed like she thought that the cat was alive and perfectly normal.

"Thank you young one, sleep for now... Someday soon you both will find out what the star mean..." She said to me. I nodded and then we both lowered our body to fall asleep. I fell asleep very fast, I was so tired and it felt like there was a trance that made me fall asleep as well.

I woke up in the normal forest of where I used to see Squirrelflight. This type I did not see her anywhere. And did not smell her scent anywhere nearby. I walked around for a little bit hoping I coule catch a mouse or a vole.

Suddenly I saw a few cats in a small little clearing. I did not recognize any of them but I went towards them anyways. They didn't look like evil cats and they were just sitting there having a normal conversation.

"Hi! Im Moon!" I said to them. They didn't even look in my direction or pretend like they heard me. It upset me a little bit that they were ignoring me. I hissed at them but it almost seemed like they did not hear me at all.

Suddenly I saw a cat begin to walk over to my left. This cat had stars on its fur, the other cats did not. I looked at him and he nodded at me but then began heading towards him.

"Hello! I am Jayfeather..." The cat said to them. They hopped up looking a bit scared but then they lowered their bodies. He looked back at me. "This is Moon... You will be meeting him soon..."

The cats seemed perfectly fine like they had seen this guy several times. I had never seen any of the cats anywhere nearby in my life. "Your parents used to be a part of a clan when they were really young. He is the one that will rebuild them."

They turned around and this time they actually saw me. I looked at them and then nodded. They nodded back at me, at least I now knew that these were real cats for sure and I wasn't just having these crazy dreams.

"Hello Moon! I can't wait to meet you!" The smaller cat said to me. I smiled and then moved a little bit closer towards them. "Also, how come your pelt isn't star looking like Jayfeathers is?"

"That is for him to figure out and tell you on your own!" Jayfeather told them. They both nodded to him and then looked back at me. They then looked a bit confused and looked behind me.

I turned around and saw Mint from behind me. Now she would surely have to believe me about when I told her about the dreams I was having! She looked at me a bit confused.

"That is Moon's mate Mint!" Jayfeather said to them. They nodded and then greeted her a hello. I wanted to say something about her being my mate but I didn't say something, because I did actually really like Mint.

"Wow... That is crazy! This is awesome Moon!" She said to me. I nodded and then smiled to her. Now she would definitely believe me for sure. I felt so much better about myself now that I wasn't crazy and another cat that I knew was coming into my dreams and seeing what I saw.

Jayfeather nodded to me and then pulled me aside. Mint had begun talking to the other cats and I could see them nodding to her from not to far away.

"Moon, tomorrow I am going to have to teach you something. In the clans we had a thing called the medicine cats. Once every half moon they would go and meet up at the moonpool." He said to me. I nodded and then let him finish what he was going to tell me. "You will need to teach several others these things. You will be good enough for hunting for a while, but something is going to happen in the next few days..."

"What is it?" I said to him. He had been silent for a few moments and was still silent even after I had asked him a question. It basically told me that something bad was about to happen to me.

"Im not too sure... But I am hear to train you a few ways of being a medicine cat. You must teach the ones that come with you, and then from there on we will teach them." He said to me. I nodded and then he smiled at me. He then began to disappear as the cats usually did signifying that the dream was about to end.

I looked over to Mint and the cats with her were beginning to disappear as well. She looked around a bit scared and a bit confused at the same time.

"Its okay Mint, this just means that the dream is about to be over for us!" I said to her. She nodded at me and then she began to fade as well.

I closed my eyes for a few seconds, waiting for me to wake up... But I didn't I opened them real quick again, and then I saw something scary, it looked like the badgers that Tristan used to tell me about, it jumped towards me and I jumped backwards a bit scared. But then all of the sudden the dream began fading away...

I opened my eyes to see Mint looking at me a bit befuddled. I looked back at her.

"Wow Moon! That was crazy! I believed you! You didn't lie!"