Chapter Fourteen

‘I’m sorry, Bloodpaw.’ Strange how such words somehow reached and filtered into the soul of the young ginger. Running throughout the night non-stop, and well into the late morning now, Bloodpaw had pushed himself far beyond what the body could handle. Pelt that had once been glistening like rich blood, was now a dull shell of its past glory. Riddled with scratches and cuts that were barely scabbing over, eyes that were shrunken from forcing himself to stay awake, muscles and bones heavily sore; he was in bad shape. Yet nothing compared to how torn his mind was.

Nothing had made sense to him, and Bloodpaw deeply regretted running away without hearing Pinebolt explain himself. How could he though? They lied to him. He lied to him, and Bloodpaw was foolish into thinking he was one of them. With the sun  beating upon the landscape, fresh green fauna becoming less and less surreal, everything had burned into the past for him. He didn’t see everything as beautiful as he once did. Grass would eventually start rising until it was up to his calves, trees that had been in abundance; now started to give way to old abandoned twolegs nests.

He was definitely far away from any nearby clan from the lake territories. It was here that the young ginger finally collapsed next to a large bale of hay that hid him from view and gave him respite from the sun. Pads on his paws worn and torn from how much he’d ran, stiffened at every painful twitch he made. Bloodpaw couldn’t even open his eyes fully, and everything seemed blurred from how much he’d cried. And the hunger, oh the hunger that gnawed on his insides was unbearable; yet he had no strength in him to hunt. Was he worthy of hunting now that he was no longer part of a clan? Could he still pray to Starclan….no forget about Starclan. Forget about Shadowclan. 

Every clan could just go bite themselves for all he cared. “Oh my poor little Bloodpaw.” Mewled a voice that ran like soft honey through his mind, caressing his thoughts gently as though it was trying to heal his broken mind. “You’ve been hit with a truth that you were not ready yet. A cruelty that I put on your soul and scarred it without knowing it would be like this.

I don’t have any words to tell you how deeply sorry I am. But, you need to go back to them. You are much safer there than you are by yourself. My poor little kit. How I wished I was still alive to protect you from all these secrets.” Bloodpaw could’ve sworn he was imagining this all in his head. Yet, he didn’t stop the words from running through him. Even if he tried pushing it aside angrily, they still wrapped around him in its embrace. It was all a lie, much like the rest of the lies that had come spilling out of their mouths.

“That’s right.” A different voice that sounded so familiar to him said as it began to fight off the first voice. “They lied to you for moons, you already know they had no problems doing so. Protection? Don’t make me laugh. Protection from what exactly? What’s out there that needs us being protected? Oh that’s right, NOTHING! You weren’t protecting us. If you wanted to protect us, then why didn’t you have them tell the truth from the start? Why didn’t you stay alive?! ANSWER ME!!”

Eyes starting to close slowly, Bloodpaw’s vision began to darken as he felt his body beginning to shut down on itself. ‘Seems death has finally found me. Take me away then. Take me from all the lies, secrets, the agony of being without parents. The pain of being truly alone no matter how hard I tried to find my place. I don’t care any more. Just take me.’ As his eyes were inches away from shutting, Bloodpaw could’ve sworn he saw a pair of paws entering his darkening vision. Just on the fringe, but they looked solid enough. 

Before losing consciousness, Bloodpaw could’ve sworn he heard someone talking to him. Yet, he was too weak to care about it all, and finally closed his eyes.