Bloodshed (Zombie Warrior Cats)

Chapter Thirty

Shadowflower's POV

It had been a quarter-moon since Silverstar had gotten her leader name. Though she wouldn't give me a straight answer about why we no longer asked for SoulClan's support, I trusted her to make a good decision. It twisted my gut and made me anxious at the thought of no longer having our ancestors to ask for help, but I fought to trust her.

Fireflywing was barely holding on. Day in and day out, the small kittypet would cough until she hacked up blood. Stormcloud was on the same foot with the illness, but he was a lot stronger than Fireflywing. The both of them had stayed in warm nests in my den for the past few snowy days. I had concluded that they both had whitecough aloud, but I knew very well that it was also the infection getting to them.

Padding out of the medicine den quietly, I hurried to Silverstar's new den. It had been a quarter-moon since she had seen Wildstar, but she still had not broken the news to the Clan about our disconnection to SoulClan. I guessed she knew their reactions wouldn't be good for her reputation. The only thing she mentioned was an official guard idea, our new deputy, and that we have a new Gathering Place.

I nudged the silver she-cat awake just as the sun peeked up over the horizon. With a groan, she rolled over. "What?" Silverstar growled.

"Two things, we need to send out as many hunting patrols as you can and you need to tell the Clan about your decision to no longer talk to SoulClan," I dipped my head to her and with that, I left. I heard Silverstar sigh as she sat up. Ever since she had gone to meet Wildstar, Silverstar had been different and cold. She wasn't how she was as a deputy.

She had named Crowflight our new deputy. I thought that was the best decision for right now. He was loyal, serious, strong, and trustworthy. The only problem was that he was getting old. Only I seemed to realize this, though. Crowflight was stretching outside of the warriors den, arching his back and whipping his tail back and forth. "Morning," I smiled at him as I passed by. He straightened his posture and bowed his head to me.

I sat on the hardened snow and watched the Clan quietly awaken. Slowly and surely, warriors, our only apprentice, and kits woke. Foxtuft and Tigerstripe tiredly headed into the camp to switch off with Sparkdust. Sparkdust finished her shrew then padded out with a sigh. Tigerstripe was going to be left with a huge scar on is leg but his injury was healing well.

Dreampaw showed off some of her new moves to Hollowkit - who was gazing up at her with awe - while the warriors mingled together and cleaned up themselves.

Snowfern went over to her growing daughter and tried to clean Dreampaw up but she shrugged her away. "Snowfern, I can do it by myself now," She purred, touching noses with her mother.

Snowfern looked hurt but reluctantly she only nodded, heading away to the fresh-kill pile. Hollowkit didn't even look away as Dreampaw's mother talked to her. How cute, I thought.

Crowflight stopped in the center of the clearing and called the cats forward for the morning patrols. Silverstar appeared from her den and began trotting over to her deputy. She muttered something in his ear once she came to him. Crowflight nodded and began.

"We need a lot of hunting done. Don't come back without at least one piece of prey from everyone in your patrol," He announced, "Silverstar, Mistnose, Snowfern, hunt near StreamClan's border and check it. Dreampaw and I will go the opposite way to hunt and check out the territory. There aren't many of us but we can keep this Clan up if we work hard." He finished.