“Sol didn’t cause any trouble at first,” Jingo began. “He kept to himself and stayed out of kittypet territory.”

“He was the first cat to find this abandoned Twoleg den,” Hussar put in. “He started inviting other cats to live here with him—cats without housefolk of their own, to start with.”

“He said he wanted to keep us all safe,” Speckle mewed, creeping a bit closer to the edge of the soft boulder.

Pod snorted. “More likely he wanted us to do things for him. Lazy lump. He had an easy life here.”

“That’s not fair!” Speckle protested. “We’re safer here than wandering about in the open, sleeping under bushes.”

“So what happened next?” Brambleclaw prompted, before Pod could continue the argument.

“More and more cats joined him here.” Jingo took up the story again. “I lived with housefolk then, but I liked the sound of what Sol was doing, so I came to give it a try.”

“I joined soon after her,” Hussar added. “I liked the freedom. I could come and go without waiting for my housefolk to let me in and out.”

“And catching our own prey was better than eating that dry Twoleg food,” meowed Jingo.

“But why did the Twolegs let you stay?” Brackenfur asked curiously. “Don’t they want this nest?”

“Obviously not,” Hussar replied with a shrug.

“Twoleg kits used to come here now and again,” Jingo explained. “They never tried to chase us out, though, and they don’t come anymore.”

“Sol told us what to do if adult Twolegs came,” Speckle explained. “There’s a dark space right at the top of the nest, with a pointed roof. Sol told us to hide up there.”

“They did come once or twice.” Fritz spoke for the first time. “So we all hid.”

“And the Twolegs never found us,” Speckle added proudly.

Even though he had good reasons for not trusting Sol, Lionblaze realized that what he had done here wasn’t all bad. The cats had shelter here and support from one another. He wasn’t sure why kittypets would want to come, but it was certainly better for loners than trying to survive in the open through the harsh moons of leaf-bare. It was like a Twolegplace version of a Clan.

“So what went wrong?” he meowed.

“Can’t you guess?” Jingo replied bleakly. “The dogs found us. They couldn’t get in here, because most of them are too big to get through that narrow gap at the entrance.”

“A little one pushed his way in, once.” Hussar extended his claws, the beginnings of a snarl in his throat. “He didn’t try it twice.”

“But they lay in wait for us whenever we came out,” Fritz continued with a shudder. “And then they chased us.”

“Clumsy, oafish brutes!” The tip of Pod’s tail twitched.

“If we did manage to hunt, they stole our prey,” Jingo continued. “And they killed Flower.” Her eyes clouded with sorrow and guilt. “She was a beautiful young cat. Her housefolk had the den next to mine, and I persuaded her to come here.”