Warriors: From Terror to Torture

Chapter seven- of hidden lies, waiting to come clean

There was silence for a moment, as the ShadowClan leader stepped into camp flanked by two cats. One was a midnight black she-cat with a splash of white on her chest. Silentpaw noticed her eyes were two different colors: one was blue, one was yellow. She guessed that was Sharpfrost, his deputy, she'd been described to her before. The warrior on his other side was a large dark tabby tom with a scar over his left eye. Silentpaw didn't know his name.

A few pelts were spiked at the sudden intrusion, but nobody attacked. After all, ShadowClan and ThunderClan were allies, and Russetstar's yowl hadn't necessarily been unfriendly. Froststar appeared, lichen swishing as he stepped out of his den under high rock. For a moment he looked bewildered, but quickly relaxed his expression and trotted over. "Russetstar! It's good to see you. Is there a problem?"

"You tell me," Russetstar replied cooly. "Two ShadowClan apprentices, Oakpaw and Sterlingpaw, were attacked by Bloodfang." Heads immediately whipped towards Silentpaw's mentor, who was washing her face.

"Is this true, Bloodfang?" Froststar asked.

Bloodfang slowly lowered her paw, looking unconcerned. "Yes. Sorry, it was hard to help myself. I'm just bored. There's no one to fight but kittypets these days. Come on. Some of you agree with me," she said, sweeping her gaze across the surrounding cats. There were a few murmurs of agreement.

"I see," Russetstar replied slowly. "Yes, this is a problem in my Clan as well." He turned towards Froststar. "We need to do something about this. I can't have your bored cats attacking mine, and vice versa."

Froststar nodded slowly. "Yes. Please, come into my den. Sharpfrost and Blackstreak can wait outside it." Russetstar gave a brisk nod in response, and followed the ThunderClan leader into his den.

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"Please, sit," Froststar said, motioning to the nest beside his that Mistfeather would sometimes sleep in. Russetstar obliged.

"We could go find WindClan. I'm sure there's a few cats left to fight," Russetstar suggested. Froststar shook his head.

"No. We don't even know where they are, they're off the dark forest's radar, there would be absolutely no point hunting for them. Even if we did find them, there should only be like five left. The battle would be over in mere heartbeats," he replied.

Russetstar nodded. "You're right, that wasn't logical. What about starting dark forest training up again?"

Froststar laughed. "How about you take that up with Sageweed."

Froststar still visited the Place of No Stars on a regular. However, it wasn't to fight, merely sit on the rock with Sageweed and watch the cats down below. Breaking into the living world was damaging to the shadowy cats. They were taking their time healing from the effects, most simply walked unresponsively through the forest. A few every day were starting to wake up from the trance, but none were in fighting shape. Sageweed was the only one who wasn't affected, she hadn't joined the massacre. She was also used to making contact with the living.

Russetstar growled softly. "Well, then, if our Clans want to fight each other, why don't they? We can have competitions at the Gathering, have a few cats fight to the death." Froststar blinked, startled. He knew the ShadowClan leader never really cared for his Clan and only enjoyed the power he held over them, but he didn't know he was willing to go that far. Well, he did let ThunderClan take ShadowClan kits. You don't stoop much lower than that.

"To the death? They'd kill each other off quickly, and everything we worked for would be for nothing. But, I like the sound of these competitions. Our warriors can fight, but not to the death. We can have a Gathering Champion, so the warriors have something to look forward too," Froststar said.