There was a long silence after he had finished speaking, in which Jayfeather almost thought he could hear his own heart beating.

“If you know so much,” Leafpool mewed at last, “then do you know what happens next?”

“No.” Jayfeather felt a strong sensation that there was something else Leafpool wanted to say to him, but she kept silent. He thought about entering her mind to find out what it was, but he didn’t quite dare. He didn’t like the idea of what he might discover.

“You have to help your littermates,” Leafpool told him, her voice sharp and urgent. “You must learn to live with this, for the sake of the Clan.”

You’ve got no right to tell us what we must do. But Jayfeather did not speak the thought aloud. Part of what the medicine cat said was true. Sooner or later, they all had to find a way forward.

“Please,” Leafpool mewed, and there was a note of desperation in her voice. “Find Lionblaze and Hollyleaf, before anything else happens.”

Is there anything else that could go wrong? Jayfeather wondered. But he nodded and backed out of the den. Leafpool was scared for her kits—all three of them—just as she had always been when trouble came to the Clan.

He scanned the clearing until he located Lionblaze approaching the fresh-kill pile with a mouthful of prey. Jayfeather bounded over to him. “Leave that and come with me,” he meowed, jerking his head. “We have to talk.”

Jayfeather could feel Lionblaze’s confusion, but his brother didn’t protest, just dropped his prey on the pile and padded beside him toward the camp entrance.

“Where’s Hollyleaf?” Jayfeather asked. The sense of approaching disaster loomed even closer as he realized that this new knowledge would hurt her hardest of all. The warrior code means so much to her!

“I’ve no idea,” Lionblaze replied. “I think she left camp, but I haven’t seen her since the end of the vigil.”

“We have to find her,” Jayfeather mewed as they emerged from the tunnel into the forest. “She…she’s found out something that could upset her.”

“What?”

“I’ll tell you when we find Hollyleaf.” Jayfeather lifted his head to taste the air, searching for a trace of their sister’s scent.

“Tell me now,” Lionblaze insisted. “Haven’t there been enough secrets? Even the three of us hardly seem to talk anymore.”

Jayfeather turned to face him. “Leafpool is our mother.”

He sensed shock like a bolt of lightning flashing through his brother. “I don’t believe it!” Lionblaze gasped. “She’s a medicine cat. It’s impossible!”

“You’d better start believing it,” Jayfeather mewed bleakly. “She told me so herself. And we have to decide what we’re going to do about it.”

After a long search through the forest, trying to follow confusing traces of their sister’s scent, they discovered Hollyleaf at the top of the mossy bank that sloped down toward the lake. Jayfeather sensed her tension as soon as he bounded up to her. “Hollyleaf, we need to talk,” he meowed.