Chapter 4

Leafkit stared at the lifeless kit. "Swiftkit.." The words were stuck on her tongue. Beside her was Rosekit, basically paralyzed at the sight. The whole clan sat in silence as the gray kit's fur swayed in the soft wind. Suddenly a voice broke through. "What happened here?!" Leafkit spun around. A black kit, who looked like she hadn't slept in days, stood right outside the medicine den. "Shadowkit?!" Leafkit meowed surprised. "Yeah?" Shadowkit mewed, confusion displayed on her face as she tilted her head a bit. "Thank Starclan you're okay! I thought you would've ended up like Swiftkit!" Leafkit exclaimed sorrowfully. Shadowkit's eyes widened. "W-what do you mean end up like Swiftkit?" She stammered. Leafkit's eyes darkened and she looked down and muttered something. "What?" Meowed Shadowkit; she gently pushed her way through the grieving cats and stopped cold in her tracks. "N-no.." Shadowkit stuttered as her legs started wobbling. As if her head became the weight of a boulder, she collapsed to the ground and collapsed to the ground, sniffling and grieving for her littermate.

As the whole clan grieved for Swiftkit, Berrywhisker carried Shadowkit out of her den and to the nursery. Leafkit padded after her. "U-uh.. Berrywhisker?" Berrywhisker looked at Leafkit out of the corner of her eye and set Shadowkit down on some moss bedding. "Yes, what is it, Leafkit?" she replied. Leafkit kneaded the ground with her paws. "D-do you think I could be-become the medicine cat apprentice someday cause I received a message fro-from Starclan?" Berrywhisker looked off into the distance. "Well.. you are almost 6 moons.. and you'll be made an apprentice soon.." Berrywhisker thought long and hard. "Maybe. No promises though, so don't get your hopes up." Leafkit was still happy cause it wasn't a no; but that happiness soon faded when she realized that Shadowkit had a better chance at becoming the medicine cat apprentice than her.

Leafkit padded into the nursery and felt alone. Cold and sorrowful without Swiftkit. She then noticed that Rockkit was nowhere to be seen and began to get worried. She went to her mother's den and notified her that Rockkit had been missing for a while. She wailed in grief. "Oh, great Starclan not another kit!" Redstar called out. "Applepelt!" The young deputy bounded over "Yes Redstar?" He mewed. Redstar's eyes were filled with worry. "Can you set up a search patrol? Rockkit is missing!" Applepelt nodded quickly and gathered up Cherryear, Bloodclaw, Raventail, Fawnfoot, and Maplefur. "We need to go out and search for Rockkit, can you guys look for him? Leafkit told me that he has been gone for a while." The five cats nodded quickly. Just then, there were thunderclouds rumbling in the distance. "And we need to be quick before his scent washes away." Applepelt added quickly. Leafkit watched as the patrol left and decided to finally settle down. She couldn't seem to fall asleep though, not without the comfort of knowing her last two siblings would be alright. She padded over to the medicine cat den and saw Berrywhisker placing down fresh moss bedding. "Berrywhisker I can't sleep.." Muttered Leafkit. "None of us can." Replied the cream colored she-cat, who had been categorizing some herbs that Shadowkit had knocked down. "Thank Starclan that Shadowkit woke up, I started losing hope." Berrywhisker added in a calm voice. Today is the worst day in my life, Leafkit thought to herself. Nothing was going her way. At least Shadowkit is still here, the brown kit thought, with pictures of Swiftkit flashing through her mind. He was alive just this morning! Leafkit didn't know what to do. Suddenly, her eyes started to grow heavy, and before she could notice it, she drifted into sleep.

The figure of a beautiful gray cat came into her view the moment Leafkit opened her eyes, or, she thought she opened her eyes. The cat had stars in her fur, and Leafkit realized at once that she was being visited by Starclan, again! Leafkit stared at the she-cat, her mind blank for a second. "Hello Leafkit!" The cat yowled in a cheery voice. How could she be so happy after what had happened? Leafkit thought. The cat suddenly had a sad expression on her face. "Aww.. I know what you're thinking, kit. I can only assure you that he's safe in Starclan now." Leafkit didn't feel any better. He'll never be a warrior now… Leafkit sighed. "Everything's going wrong. Swiftkit just… died, and now Rockkit could be dead too!" Her voice turned into a yowl. Leafkit poured all her worries onto this strange warrior. The warrior's nose lightly tapped her shoulder. "Rockkit is fine." "H-how would you know." Leafkit sniffed, her nose stuffy. "Come with me, child." The gray warrior stepped away and walked to a puddle nearby. "Come on!" The cheerfulness came back to her eyes. Leafkit stepped up to the puddle, confused. "Ready?" The warrior asked not taking her eyes off the pool of water. "Ready for wha—?!" Leafkit panicked as the warrior pushed her into the water. Leafkit sank not knowing how deep the water was. She tried screaming for help but water just rushed up her nose. Suddenly she saw the bright blue eyes of the she-cat. Water filled Leafkit's mouth as she tried to howl for help. Suddenly the eyes disappeared and felt a tug on the fur on her neck. It pulled her upwards until Leafkit was lifted out of the water. She was in some sort of cave. It was warm and moist in the cave, and had sandstone walls and floors around a crystal clear pool of water, flowing under a curtain of lichen covering the source of the water. The cave seemed to go on at the other side of the lichen, and from the opposite direction there was a small tunnel leading outside. Leafkit saw that the entrance of the tunnel had a lot of plants and bushes in front of it so she didn't wonder why no one had ever found it. Suddenly, Leafkit heard a sneezy from the other side of the lichen curtain. She imitated a fighting position as best as she could from what she had seen the apprentices do, and slowly inched forward with her mouth open, trying to smell what animal was making the noise. She moved forward walking along the little bridge-like path that was right along the wall. Leafkit bent down as quietly as she could and slowly started lifting the lichen to pass through. After she went through, she saw what was on the other side, and looking bewildered she started examining her surroundings. There was a small waterfall flowing from rock to rock and finally flowing in the crystal blue pool of water. There were all kinds of herbs and plants growing on the different levels of rocks that were sticking out of the wall. There was catnip and marigold, horseradish and burdock, borage and poppy's, there was even a good supply of cobwebs in one corner of the cave. It was a medicine cat's heaven in that cave, there were almost all the herbs anyone could think of, and there was even a thick carpet of grass and moss on the floor. A cat could definitely live here, and from the plants on the caves tunnel entrance it seemed to be in Sunclan territory. Most of the walls were covered with lichen, but when Leafkit went to see if there where other entrances, she found that the places that were covered with lichen all had large holes in the wall about a fox-length in width, all leading to a smaller less impressive cave with a little tunnel leading into each of them. Leafkit wondered where the tunnels were heading, because all the plants at the entrances looked different, but one thing for sure, they weren't visible unless you paid great attention to the plants. Overall all the caves were quite nice, but the main one was the most impressive, and since there were so many entrances the cave had already been found by someone else. The cat that had found this space was sitting in the middle of this small grassy paradise, a tomkit, a small cream colored kit, was laying down fast asleep. This cat was none other than Rockkit, Leafkit's brother. Happy that her brother was safe, she slowly started waking up to the warm summer rays, except, they weren't warm. In all the trouble with her siblings, Leafkit had forgotten that the end of leafbare was finally only a moon away. Newleaf would finally come.