I felt fit to roast. I had already drunk a streamful of water and had just sweated every last drop of water out. Or at least that was what I thought. It was a hot day and the heat was perfectly unreasonable. Each time you moved the air threatened to send a sweltering inferno of heat against you. It was the middle of summer, a few hours after noon and hot enough to melt metal – that last bit my opinion. There was a saying that went that said if you set a flat stone in the sun and cracked an egg on it the egg would fry. For that reason and a few others, I stayed in the shade. Black fur like mine soaked up heat like a sponge soaked up water. I envied Mattia, with her white fur and patience enough to wait out the heat. She had a perfect shady spot in a small thicket, covered by trees. When I crawled in and asked Mattia her opinion on the heat, all she said was, "I'm hot and I have a headache. Go away please." I went and sprawled beneath an oak tree, feeling tired, bored, hot, sweaty, and very annoyed with everything. Heat did that to you.There was nothing to do. I thought about stuff I could do. Maybe I could go and grab Mattia and ram her nose into a tree. Or skulk around and find the archer's secret hideout, then howl a stricken wail and ruin someone's perfect shot. Or fall over a waterfall to my death, or sink myself in a bog.I pictured Lilac's face when she couldn't find me after I sunk myself. Hah, Jeliah Blackfury had vanished off the face off the earth and not even Mattia would be able to find me! The only problem was that I wouldn't be able to view their faces, or even better, show up casually and announce I had just been out fishing. But of course, I could haunt them. That would be fun. I could scare Lilac out of her socks when my ghost came back to haunt her! Yeah, that would be my death-long ambition: scare Lilac out of her socks. Of course, I didn't know if Lilac had socks, so... My death-long ambition: scare Lilac out of her skin. Hah!A drop of sweat slid down the fur on the back of my neck. I felt the back of my neck with my paw and shuddered as I felt it. It felt like I had taken a swim, it was so damp!Now that was an idea. I could go swimming! A nice swim would cool me off. The stream was a little northeast of here. Mattia, when I went to tell her where I was going, was asleep. I ripped a piece of bark from a tree and scribbled a note to her on it. I watched Mattia for a second, tempted to jump on her and ram her nose into the ground, but I stopped. That wouldn't be nice. I turned quickly and slunk from the thicket.The stream was clear and seemed to be made of melted ice. The water was slick and cold as ice and clear as the cloudless sky above. I raced over and jumped in, glad for a chance to swim. "Aaawwiiieieeee!" I sprang out of the water like a torpedo. It had frozen my toes off! I slicked the water from my fur and cautiously inched into the water. Inch by inch I slid in, the heat finally overcoming me and forcing me into the cool shallows of the stream. Once in, the water was great. I splashed and swam with increasing delight, much against my natural water-hating nature, diving and flipping like an otter.When I got out of the stream the heat didn't seem quite as oppressive. I knew how to defeat the heat and keep cool. Hey, that rhymed. Defeat the heat! Defeat the heat!I sprawled beneath the shade of a tall broad tree next to the stream and curled up. The heat was drying out my fur really fast, but I was still cool. When I woke up again I would take another swim and go back to camp. Suddenly I heard a soft crunching sound as a footpaw crushed a few blade of brittle dry grass.Whirling around, I found myself face to face with a tall wolf. His fur was a deep red, with a little gray around his neck, tail, and paws. At the moment he was in the process of jumping at me.I hardly had time to move. I didn't even have a chance to draw my dagger before he knocked me over and pinned me flat to the ground. With an angry squall of surprise and rage, I bunched my legs together and ripped upwards at him. He must have been used to those kinds of reactions, because he arched coolly to the side, out of the range of my flailing feet. I swiped at his face with my front paw and caught him across the muzzle. He didn't even give a yelp, only stared at me coldly with blood dampening his muzzle. I flipped over and was just about to gain my feet when the red wolf lunged and smashed me back down. He pinned me tightly to the ground. "If you're one of the Sentinels say so." His voice was pleasant and his eyes were ice. Not thinking in a straight line, I snapped the one thing I shouldn't have snapped. "Yeah. Who are you?" With a snarl, the wolf snatched up a heavy fist-sized rock off to his right, ignoring my question completely. "Thanks for telling me. All the Sentinels are going to die. They're led by Lilac Blacktip! that daughter of three-legged newts. You might as well be the first to die." He swung the rock at my head. I tried to block him but everything burst into static gray and black and red.Even through my dizziness, I knew what I should do. I bowed my legs close into my body and drove them upwards. I felt my feet contact with his belly and a great weight fall off me. Surprisingly, it was quite easy. Instead of having to push him off me, my claws did all the work. He got off himself, raging.My senses returned. I flipped over and crouched on all four paws. With a hiss I lunged forward and tackled him. He was ready though, even if not fully ready, and slashed me across the face with a dagger he had pulled from out of the blue. I screamed, letting his out of my grip. The wolf retaliated ferociously, attacking me savagely with the dagger. I did my best to defend myself but it was kick for cut and slash for bite. I was doing all the kicking and the biting, and biting is no match for slashing. It got to be too much. With a yowl, I fled the stream area into the woods.I could hear him laughing as he watched me. "Run, cat, run! I'll be on your tail soon, better get going!" The insult stung me like a wasp. I was ready to turn back on him when I thought better of it and ran.I think I ran for about a quarter mile when I stopped, panting. I began walking, wondering how much time I had spent away from camp. I had better get back to camp and report to Lilac. Making an educated guess at the general direction of camp, I began loping off.I was halfway to the camp when I heard a twig snap off to my left. I froze and cursed silently. The red wolf! My head whipped around to face the direction of the snap. There was a tall shadowy doglike figure standing there. It was partly concealed by a bunch of leaves and brush and I couldn't see exactly who it was, but I had no desire to meet anyone else at the moment. I began backing away, not exactly wanting to meet the red wolf again, or anyone else except Mattia or Lilac, and snapped a twig under my foot. The tall shadow turned and asked warily, "Who is it?" With a silent gasp, I turned and bolted. I never knew why I did. I could have easily stayed hidden and the wolf would have missed me completely. It was foolish to bolt, but know that I was going I was going. My feet moved by themselves, dashing away. The shadow dog whirled and sprinted after me, almost as fast as I was going. Fear was on my side and helped me along. Suddenly I saw Mattia's thicket ahead and raced for it. I was thinking clearly, not panicking now, and knew if I could get there the shadow dog would follow me no further. I stopped crashing and started flashing. I heard the shadow figure behind me, racing along with me. I was almost at Mattia's thicket with about a hundred paces to go when I tripped and flew through the air. I felt my ankle twist painfully and knew it was either sprained or broken. I waited in apprehension for the shadow dog to catch me. It knew where I was and was going for me. I coiled into a ball, letting my broken ankle flop limply on the ground. My bunched muscles pulled as tight as they would go as I got ready to spring at whoever was chasing me. My good leg would propel me from the ground and I would land on the intruder and rake his face to shreds while Mattia came to help. At that moment the shadow figure showed through the leaves. A snarl rose from my throat, I let the coils loose and flew upwards. Suddenly I saw the intruder's face and stopped dead in mid-air, skidding slightly as I landed on the ground on three limbs. I stared at the shadow figure in amazement. "Bren?" She looked as surprised as I was. Her whole body was tensed and she was breathing quickly. I glared at her, feeling annoyed now that I knew the danger was over. "Why were you chasing me?" I snapped, standing up. I swayed slightly as I kept my broken ankle in midair. Mattia had heard the ruckus and was coming over. Bren glanced at the approaching white hare before staring back at me. "I thought you were someone intruding or something," she snapped back, her body relaxing slightly. "I thought you might have been a Sentinel except none of the Sentinels bolts like that when they hear me. What were you thinking? You could have at least told me who you were." She was getting annoyed too, I could tell. "I thought you were the red wolf," I snapped back. Mattia was there suddenly. "What's all this about?" she asked, puzzled. I noticed her fur was damp and matted with sweat. The heat was crazy today! "Bren was chasing me," I told her simply. "I thought she was the red wolf. "Bren didn't offer her side of the mix up but waited for Mattia to say something. The albino hare studied me, her head tilting slightly to one side in slight puzzlement. Then, "What red wolf, and why are you dangling one foot in the air?" "Red wolf that almost killed me and wants to kill Lilac and the rest of the Sentinels," I explained quickly. And the most important news: "My ankle's broken.”I never knew what happened then. I don't really know how it happened or why it happened. Suddenly I felt the air grow thick, black and heavy. I swayed generously and almost toppled over and Mattia split into three creatures, all three staring at me with anxious surprise. I told her with a confused look on my face, "Hold still, you're going all over the place..." Suddenly a wave of dizziness struck at me. I think it was the heat combined with my head wounds. I staggered, stopped by the sudden dizziness that penetrated and flooded my head. I managed to gasp once before the black swallowed me whole. I felt myself drop to the ground to Bren's sharp exclamation. And then it went black and still and silent.The next thing I knew, I was in the infirmary. Creatures, healers, were bustling around, whispering. It was early morning, very early. Faint yellow light came in through the windows, making the entire infirmary gleam yellow. It was still hot. Sick sweaty heavy humid heat that made me choke. And I wasn't the only one in there, too. Lilac was scuttling around too. She saw me wake up."Jeliah?" she asked. "What? Am I sick?" I said groggily. "Sort of," Lilac said quickly. But she wanted to get to the point. "Did the red wolf have any other, er, minions, hanging around him?" Such a direct question... "Not that I saw," I answered."Tell me everything that happened," Lilac told me. So I started reciting my whole adventure. Lilac quizzed me a little afterwards, laughed at the part about me thinking about ramming Mattia's nose into the ground, said be glad I didn't do it Mattia might have not rescued me from Bren, and complimented me on my swimming. She gave me a few sweet-tasting leaves to chew and told me to go to sleep. So I decided to obey the great healer and dropped off.It was midday when I woke again. My ankle had swelled to twice its regular size and was purple and black. How could Lilac like the color purple? To me it was the most disgusting color in the world - for now.Someone had kindly left a few honey rolls by my bed. I ate them, silently thanking the creature who had left them, and burrowed beneath the blankets. My happiness was instantly forgotten as my ankle reminded me of its status. I cursed it, snarled inwardly at my helplessness, and dove farther underneath the blankets in an effort to defeat it, cursing again as I felt a bolt of pain emanate from my evil ankle. Grrrrrrr. I dozed off lightly, swimming through the worlds of consciousness and unconsciousness. I was tired even though I had been sleeping for a long time. Finally I felt sleep overtake me. The heat became cool, I felt myself started to float, relaxed and comfortable as the pain in my evil ankle fade away. Oh, sing of praises of Sleep, glorious Sleep! Perfect, wondrous... fabulous... sleeeeppp...I woke again. It was night and very dark. The infirmary was hot and the air weighed on me. Everything was silent, too silent, and still, too still. Something was wrong. Darkness closed in on me, leering at me. Suddenly faces popped up at the windows, all ferrets - big ferrets and ugly ferrets and evil-looking ferrets. They all had some sort of weapon, but there were lots of archers. Suddenly I was sitting up in the bed staring at them with eyes as huge as moons. They all glared back, impassive and grim and evil. Suddenly Mattia staggered into the room. She was hideous. Her ears were rags, one eye completely covered with blood, and her feet slashed and cut. Her white fur was caked with dirt and blood. Her green tunic was purple with blood and her face was bloated. I opened my mouth to scream at the horrific sight, but no sound came. All the ferrets turned to stare at the hare.Suddenly Lilac raced into the room and grabbed Mattia as the albino hare reeled and started to drop to the floor. Lilac was in an even worse condition than Mattia. She could barely keep her feet, much less hold up Mattia. Suddenly both hares crumbled to the floor, bleeding all over. The ferrets at the windows all raised their bows and daggers and slings. They were all aiming at Mattia and Lilac. At that moment I ran from the room, unable to bear it, to the clearing beyond the infirmary outside. I stared over at the camp. It had turned into a battlefield. Strongpaw was in one area, beset by twelve ferrets. He was downing them as quickly as they came, but there were a few archers at his sides, just beyond the range of his sword, and they were shooting him repeatedly. Finally the badger slumped, dead. A group of archers were dead, lying trampled and bloody in the middle of the field. Welfo the otter was quickly downing ferrets but she forgot to duck one arrow coming from her left. She released a gurgle and dropped dead.An arrow whistled past my ear and I darted into the infirmary, forgetting the drama inside. As I skidded in the doorway, the ferrets at the windows released their weapons. Lilac gave a jerk as seven arrows and two daggers hit her at the same time. She gave a scream and lay still. Mattia tried to crawl away, but two arrows caught her in the chest, another one lanced through her neck, two daggers buried themselves in her side, and countless stones bounced off her, knocking her flat. They were dead within seconds. The ferrets came in through the windows, leering at me. They prowled toward me, intent on killing me! Lilac and Mattia were trodden carelessly underfoot, ignored and forgotten.Then the ferrets were all around me. Swords, daggers, spears, all were raised in the event of killing me! Then the weapons all plunged towards me.And everything went black and I screamed.I woke up. I was sitting up in bed, screaming my lungs out. I had been asleep. It was all a dream! I fell backwards in the infirmary bed and sighed with...I sat up like a bolt and stared out of the windows with eyes as big and round as moons. Torches flared outside and someone screamed but the scream was cut short. It might have been frightening, except that the screams were everywhere. There were screams of hate, screams of pain, screams of evil laughter and screams of death. I caught sight of a mouse falling to the ground, impaled on a ferret's spear. So the battle wasn't just a scary nightmare, not just a frightening dream? The last one had been a dream, but this was -- real? I checked the scene again. Yes...THE NIGHTMARE WAS REAL!!!I gave up on thinking. I gave up on breathing. I stopped everything I was thinking and doing and staggered out of bed, hopping and lurching to the window. I wanted to prove to myself that it still just a nightmare, not real! Once I got to the window and looked out, I would yell, "It's just a dream!" and everything would stop and float away into mist.So I went to the window and yelled, "It's all just a dream!" No one heard me, no one cared. Nothing floated away into mist. It was real! I screamed again, wordless this time, screaming in fear and horror.The outside clearing had been turned into battlefield. Strongpaw was in the process of downing a ferret. He was doing fine and looked like he was enjoying himself. Bren Sprackenwulf had a terrifying red light in her eyes and was making ferret mincemeat – very finely chopped mincemeat. But for every three wounds she inflicted on the ferrets she got one wound back. But the foxwolf was jabbing and hacking away without mind of the blows raining on her. Good old Bren.It struck me. Where was the red wolf? He was the leader! He was the one that had started all this! I searched the battlefield with angry eyes. Where was he? At that moment I spotted him. He was fighting Lilac and Lilac was having a hard time, I could tell. But Falcir the Silent was in there helping her. He was roaring like crazy and fighting even crazier. The red wolf had a sword and a spear and was using his sword mostly, dealing ferocious slashes and stabs. It was stab for slash and kick for cut. Lilac was doing all the kicking, good old Lilac.I looked around for a weapon of some type. All the arrows in the room were useless with a bow. I saw something by the doorway and hobbled over.The doorway revealed a horrific sight. Mattia lay crumpled on the small steps up to the infirmary. I dropped the arrows and gave a small scream. Mattia was coughing out her last breaths. My stomach gave a lurch and I had to hold onto the doorway to keep my swaying form still and my food down. Mattia! I slumped down onto the step beside her. Mattia stared at me, her eyes rolling. She managed to fasten her gaze on me. The ferrets had finally gotten to her. "Je-" coughs "Jeliah?" I nodded to tell her I was listening, unable to speak. Mattia tried to smile, but only her eyes completed the task. "Tell Lilac bye for me" she started coughing. I stared at Mattia, but the hare only smiled with her eyes. She kept on smiling until her eyelids drooped and closed. She began twitching slowly and relaxed completely. I swallowed hard once, glanced at Mattia's face, and began edging the dagger from her paw. The hare opened her eyes slightly, released the dagger, and said, "Yeah, you can have it, won't need it anyway." She rested a second before saying, "Tell Treebreeze to manage to scouts. Tell Lilac to cry lots over me. Can't die proper... without having someone... bawl their heads off for me." She gasped out the last bit of sentence and went limp, completely limp. Her breathing slowed to a barely visible intake of air and her head lolled to one side. I stood up, shaking. As soon as I got my balance under control, I took a look at Mattia. The hare looked liked she was sleeping and was slipping farther into the smooth embrace of death. I choked back a sob and fled from her body. I limped onto the battlefield, feeling like a boulder had fallen on my foot, my ankle was in such agony, and looked around. There was only one thing I had stepped onto the battlefield for and I was either going to get it or lose it, but I was going to fight as much as I could to get it. I don't need to say it, every reader here knows I was going for the death of the red wolf.I whipped over the field with my eyes, searching madly. Finally I found the red wolf.Lilac and the wolf were battling madly. To my horror, Falcir was dead. The otter was almost beheaded, with a huge cut right through his neck. His whole neck was red and his eyes were turned back in his head. I felt sick and turned to Lilac, knowing I probably wouldn't see anything less horrifying. The hare looked worn and tired. She was moving much slower than the wolf. The red wolf had a triumphant red light in his eyes as he pushed forward, making Lilac back up. Suddenly Lilac crashed forward at him, throwing all her remaining strength into a daunting barrage of attacks. The red wolf backed up a pace and Lilac took it, raking at him with all her might. With a bound the red wolf leapt backwards two paces for room and as Lilac charged him, he kicked at her. The hare was too late to see it. The blow hit her in the knee and she staggered once before she fell.I aimed carefully with dagger. It was now or never! Suddenly a brainwave struck me and I didn't fire. I suppose I was being rather rash, but I did it anyway. The red wolf had Lilac down on the ground and he was ready to kill her with a spear. I yelled at the red wolf, "Hey now, you wolf! Doncha have sense enough to be polite to your betters? When I catch you you're gonna get the tanning of your life, young pup!" I liked the insult and put on my best "Mama Rabbit" face, frowning and yelling in something akin to righteous anger. The red wolf had been ready to impale Lilac through the heart on his spear when I yelled at him and ruined his concentration. The spear shot through her shoulder. Lilac gave a scream and a jerk before she went limp. I don't know if she was dead, but I knew that I was dead meat."You!" The red wolf whirled towards me, jerking the spear from Lilac's shoulder. He must have thought he had killed her because he didn't stab at her again. Tears came to my eyes as I thought of Lilac, but even so I looked daggers at the red wolf, thinking I should throw him my best daggerious look because in fifteen seconds I would probably never do daggeristic looks again. He raised his spear, ready to throw. I raised the dagger and prepared to hurl. I threw, hoping against hope that I would hit him. He dodged by the dagger, faster than him, got his right in the shoulder. Hah! He wouldn't be able to throw his spear now... where was the spear?Suddenly a lightning bolt struck my shoulder and hurled me against the ground. A scream ripped from my throat just as the spear was ripping into my shoulder. Suddenly the red wolf loomed over me. He was as mad as an army of wasps and just as dangerous. He yanked the spear from my shoulder. A lightning bolt struck my shoulder again and I screamed again, tearing the air with sound as I writhed. Through red-flecked vision I saw the red wolf raise his weapon and the spear sped towards my chest. There wouldn't be any missing this time. It was all over.A few inches before the spear hit my chest it veered away and slammed into the ground near my head. As I wondered why in the world he had missed me, a red steel blade emerged from the red wolf's chest. He touched the blade for a second, his eyes showing plain confusion and half-turned, trying to see who had killed him, but he never made it. Without a sound he fell forward and collapsed in a dead heap. In the space where he had been I saw Bren Sprackenwulf standing proudly and holding a saber, red to the hilt.Then I heard screams. They were all dim and distant, as though in a dream, but from the way Bren looked over her shoulder, so proudly, I knew that the screams were from the ferrets. The ferrets were leaving the Sentinels.Bren Sprackenwulf was the perfect picture of a bloody triumph, I thought. Blood caked her fur and dripped over her eye. There was a large slash across her forehead and her one ear was almost ripped to rags, her tunic was torn, and her muzzle was wet with dark thick blood. The dripping red saber was still held into front of her, in the same position as when she had killed the wolf. She stood there, wobbly but victorious, staring at the red wolf with a triumphant look on her face. She turned to look at me and flashed me a red smile. I could see her start to sway, rocking back and forth as the last strength drained from her body. As my vision dimmed from pain and finally went out, the last picture I had seen was Bren, standing above the red wolf like a world conqueror. She was a heroine. I never saw her fall forward, dead.* * *I woke slowly. I was in the infirmary and there was someone hovering over me. I moved away a little to get a better look at the creature and felt my ankle try to kill me. I let out a yelp and was immediately reprimanded. "Don’t do that," Lilac told me sharply. With a shout of joy I disobeyed her and flipped to a sitting position and grabbed her round the neck. My ankle went insane and told me it was going to kill me if it was the last thing it did, but I didn't mind."You're alive!" I squealed, trying to throttle Lilac. She stayed hugged for a few seconds before pulling away. She was grinning."I'm alive, even though I don't feel like kicking at the moment." I grinned. "I feel like kicking! Happy enough to explode actually!" Lilac grinned. "Then explode. That way I won't have to put up with your chattering." I pulled a face. "Lilac!" She grinned. "Saw-ree!" I grinned back at her and she grinned back. We looked at each other for a second and then I said, "I wish Mattia was here." Lilac's grin fell to the floor. "And Bren." Her gaze dropped to the blanket. "Bren died?" I asked, startled. Lilac nodded, still staring at that oh-so-interesting design on the blanket. My gaze fell too. Suddenly our happy mood was gone. I gazed back up at Lilac, who seemed completely absorbed in the blanket. "Lilac?" "What, Jeliah?" I could hear the shake in Lilac's voice and assumed she was crying a little. I tried to reassure her that everything was okay."At least Bren and Mattia died helping the Sentinels. There is nothing to cry about. Right now Bren and Mattia will be laughing her head off because you're bawling over them. Nothing to cry about."Suddenly to my surprise, Lilac looked up at me and patted my head. Tears were starting to roll down her face, but she was smiling."You know what... you're right." I began to make up more stories on what Mattia and Bren would do in Dark Forest and Lilac went right along with me. My throat wasn't sore or dry in the least and I was quite happy, making up stories about Mattia and Bren.I kept on weaving yarns until finally Lilac flashed me a smile and said, "That's good, Jeliah. We can't have too much sadness around here." I stopped talking and smiled back. "Well, life has to go on," I told Lilac. She nodded. "Let's hope that it does. No one can mourn too long. But I have an idea. Leave me alone for three days just so I can bawl my head off over Mattia and Bren." Her smile grew wider. "Can't have too much laughter, we might forget them completely. So... just leave me along for a few days, k?" I nodded. "I make it so hard for you to be miserable, right?" She started laughing, "Right Jeliah, right, right!"
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