Outcasts

Chapter six

The lie seemed to have worked. Nobody questioned it and they settled down for the night, safely in the cover of reeds.

                “Has everybody had enough to eat?” Fox heard Storm ask over the hustle of cats getting ready to sleep. He was so tired that he didn’t hear their response. Just as he was drifting off to sleep, Bianco came and sat next to him and he looked unsettled.

                “What’s wrong?” Fox asked him drowsily and forced himself to sit upright. Bianco was looking at something distant as he answered.

                “I’m not used to living with so many cats.” He said quietly. Fox nodded in understanding.

                “Neither.” He said. He followed Bianco gaze and found that it landed on Daisy.

                “The only contact I have had with cats, is my parents and they died when I was quite small. I had to look after myself on the barn.” Bianco continued.

                “I never knew my dad. My mother looked after Amber, my brother and me until my owner decided to chose her over us and we were abandoned. Everything that we know is months of experience, but we never interacted with other cats either, except for Storm of course.” Fox said. Bianco gave Fox a blank expression.

                “My mate was killed by my owner. He treated us like dirt and when she got caught stealing food...” Bianco paused and he turned to look at Daisy again. “I couldn’t look after her. I failed once and I don’t want to do it again.” Fox could see the pain in his face and didn’t dare to ask about his mate.

                “You weren’t asked to look after Daisy. We all have to look out for each other now. That’s the reason we joined together.” Bianco sighed and heaved himself to his paws.

                “I know it had to do with Gale, but what happened to your brother?” He asked before leaving. Fox felt his eyes cloud with grief.

                “Let’s just say that it was my fault he isn’t here.” Fox replied. Bianco didn’t say anything for a moment and looked deep into Fox’s eyes.

                “I guess we have something in common.” He said simply and walked over to Daisy. She welcomed him and as soon as he sat down, Soot was on top of him, followed by Petal. Surely Bianco wouldn’t have been the cause for his mate’s death. Unless she wasn’t getting fed, which still wouldn’t have been his fault. Fox felt a wave of new exhaustion, bear down on him and he closed his eyes and went to sleep.

Fox woke to find that half his body was submerged in water and he couldn’t feel his legs and his paws. He looked around to see the same disgust on Storm’s face as he stirred. Fox jumped up, ignoring the fact that his legs were numb and started to wake up the group.

                “Wake up! Come on Angel, the river has overflown.” Fox said as he nudged Angel till she woke up. She opened her eyes into little slits and when she noticed that she was in water, she jumped up.

                “How did this happen without us noticing?” She asked.

                “Must have happened slowly overnight.” Fox answered. Angel nodded and helped wake up the rest. They moved up to higher ground that overlooked the once dry land.

                “What do we do now?” Bandit asked. The overflown river would make it impossible to cross safely.

                “The only thing we can do, we have to travel over the cliffs.” Fox said and looked at the treacherous rocks that led to the mountains.

                “How are we going to do that without falling to our deaths?” Scar asked.

                “Maybe we could wait until the river level lowers enough to cross.” Angel suggested.

                “We don’t have enough time, unless you want the humans to find and kill us, or we could wait for Gale to bring her big pack of cats to kill us.” Scar asked rhetorically. Angel hissed and turned her back to him.

                “Are you sure there’s no other way?” Amber whispered to Fox.

                “Unless you’re strong enough to swim against that kind of current, there is no other way.” Fox said.

                “Good thing we didn’t use that island.” Jellicle said and pointed towards the submerged island. All that was left of it were the tops of the pine trees sticking out of the water.

                “I guess we had better get moving.” Fox said and headed towards the cliffs.