//Un//marked

// chapter 24 //

    Her dreams were dark and her footsteps heavy. Everywhere she looked there was only that same, impenetrable darkness. She moved through it at as if pushing against a water current, taking one step forward and feeling herself pushed back two. Nothing existed but her and the darkness.

    Then, out of nowhere, came a voice, cold as night. "You're one of us now," it said, and a piercing pain hit her shoulders, then her chest, and finally her stomach. She cried out, the pain flames burning her from the inside out.

    "No! I'm not one of you!" Her voice echoed around her – one of you, one of you, one of you. The darkness, unfaltering, pressed in on her.

    When she woke her mouth still tasted of blood.

    "Are you done thrashing?" a disgruntled Beetlepaw asked. Yet, her voice was missing its usual bite, kinder than Lightpaw remembered it.

    "Have some water," Charlie said, flicking his tail at a round object sitting on the floor.

    Despite the heaviness she felt, Lightpaw forced herself to her paws. The body of the tom had been removed from the room but his blood, dark and crusted over, remained. She averted her eyes quickly, bile suddenly hitting her throat. The water did little to remove its taste.

    "Some freshkill for you too," Minerva said, eyeing the dead rat between them. "I doubt you've ever had dry food so I took the liberty of hunting it down."

    Lightpaw's stomach growled but the thought of eating made her want to retch. She took a tentative bite, motioning for Beetlepaw to join her. Her littermate dug in without protest.

    "Thank you," Lightpaw said, finishing her meal after the third small bite. Her stomach roiled and her chest felt constricted. Beetlepaw echoed her thanks with a mouthful of rat still in her jaws.

    "Where are you off to now?" Pearl asked curiously. Her kit slept peacefully, her mother's fluffy tail curled around her.

    Lightpaw did not respond right away. She sat numb, unsure of where her paws should be taking her. What was her mission? Her purpose? What things would she have to do in order to fulfill them? She sheathed and unsheathed her claws, the memory of fur and flesh between them all too fresh.

    "We need to find the rebels," Beetlepaw replied for her. "They're our only remaining kin now that DarkClan has cast us out."

    Charlie and Minerva exchanged a look, as if considering their options. Finally, Minerva heaved a sigh and Charlie practically beamed.

    "I can take you as far as the lake where they train and hunt," Charlie said. "But from there you must find your own way."

    "That's very kind of you," Beetlepaw purred, finishing off the last of the rat. Lightpaw nodded mutely in agreement, forcing herself to look anywhere but at the blood stains.

    "I suppose there's not much use sitting around and waiting," the tabby tom continued. "Perhaps we should be off soon?"

    The blood on the floor was too prominent for Lightpaw to look away any longer. The events of the previous night flashed before her eyes – the pain in her shoulders as the tom pinned her down; the fear as she saw him nearing Beetlepaw, ready to kill; the warmth of his blood in her jaws before the cold limpness of his body took over.

    "Lightpaw?" Beetlepaw's voice had that harsh ring to it again.

    "We should leave as soon as possible," Lightpaw managed to croak out.

    "That's what I thought too," Beetlepaw said, her usual smugness ringing through.

    //