Where To Go From Here [C]

The Moonlit Creek. One of Bubblebeam's favorite areas in the territory. To be brought here with her brother, just to spend time, seemed to good to be true... and so she couldn't help the burgeoning suspicion in the very pit of her stomach. She ought to have been happy to spend time with him--and she was! He hardly talked to her anymore; most of her family members were often too busy these days. Being medicine cat was a hard job, she knew, but she'd missed him. She'd missed him. Normally she would chatter his ear off, ask all kinds of questions about herbs and patients and how he'd been doing. But after the war... after the deaths... the somber air that surrounded all of SkyClan was just impossible to shake. It seemed to be weighing down on Hemlockfox, too. Or was there a different reason for the worry deep inside those blue eyes of his? She never knew. She used to know what he was thinking all the time, but... she just couldn't read him anymore. The realization felt like swallowing a stone. Heavy; uncomfortable.

At least the territory was better than camp, marginally. Less lingering scent of blood. Less worry of interruption. She ought to have been more scared when she was out, worried about an enemy patrol... but she wasn't, for some reason. The stifling air of "home" was more unbearable than anything else. So Bubblebeam tried to push down the emptiness and uncomfortable realizations she'd been having and enjoy the gentle, quiet, freezing leaf-bare breeze. But finally, when they got further, Hemlockfox turned to her. His worry was still palpable, thick in the air around them. No... was worry the right word?

Why did he sound so resigned? She should have been happy to hear those words. How long had it been since she'd heard someone say that word, "love?" It felt as if the air around her was constricting, squeezing tighter. Bubblebeam spoke past the sudden dryness of her throat. "I love you too, Bearbear. Always have. But, what's... what's this about?" His next words didn't inspire confidence either. Calling her strong only soured the bile rising past her tongue further. Strong? She was anything but. She was weak, and that must have been why Sunfire had been ignoring her. She hated battle. She hid from her own father when he snarled and raged. But... what was this? She couldn't help but frown, feeling her brow furrow, feeling her pelt prickle in a mixture of trepidation and concern. "Angry? When have I ever been angry with you? Why would... why do you say that?" It was so odd to see him like this. Fear joined the waves of worry rolling off of his pelt.

No, that wasn't right. It wasn't worry. It was guilt.

But what on earth would he have to feel guilty about? This could mean nothing good. Bubblebeam almost wanted to turn back around and forget that he'd ever invited her out here--but no, she was tired of being useless. She was tired of knowing nothing. Her back straightened in resolve, despite the churning of her stomach. "Bear... Hemlock. Tell me."

Bubblebeam was prepared for him to speak--but she wasn't prepared for him to come closer, to rest his head on hers in a gesture of brotherly closeness. How long had it been since they'd spoken like this--since she'd even been this physically near him? How bad was what he had to say, that he felt the need to do this? She bit her tongue to brace herself, but she couldn't help instinctively leaning into Hemlockfox. He was so sturdy, so strong. Surely they wouldn't grow apart. Whatever it was he had to say... they could deal with it together, couldn't they? She just had to hope. She just had to stay silent and hope.

Then... he spoke.

What he said at first just sounded like words, disconnected from any kind of meaning. Prophecy. Birdstar. ...WindClan?

But then, as they fell into sentences and pierced through her ears, she felt her stomach plummet. Shock made her fur prickle uncomfortably. "You... you're leaving?" she whispered, disbelief heavy in her voice. The words didn't sound real, even saying them aloud. All that time they struggled to stay together--journeying to the lake and back, finding Ploverpaw, dealing with the war--and now he had to leave? He'd said other things, too. He'd mentioned details, caveats, but she couldn't focus on a single one of them. She stepped back, seeking his gaze for any hint of explanation. This couldn't be a joke, could it? He had a sick sense of humor if it was. "You really have to go? All the way to WindClan? That's... We don't even share a border with them. You'd be so far. Just because StarClan said so? And Birdstar was okay with this? Was she the only one you told? No, you told Sunfire and he doesn't even care? How could he not care? Are his new kits all he needs now? Wait, how long ago did you find this out? Have you known this whole time and that's why you aren't talking to me anymore? Why just tell me know? Does Gramma Wolfblossom know? Is there any way you can just stay?" The questions fell from her tongue, thick and fast and without stopping, in some semblance of how they used to when she was younger. Except now each one left answerless stabbed harshly at the softness in her chest. None of them were even that important, were they, if the answer to everything was that Hemlockfox was leaving her.

Though she tried to stay strong, Bubblebeam felt the corners of her eyes start to sting. Before she could stop them, tears started to roll down the corners of her cheeks. At least Sunfire wasn't here to see how weak she was being. But she couldn't help herself. Her siblings, one of the few reasons she even got out of her nest in the morning any more, leaving her. "You can't be serious. I mean, you've never joked before. But that's what you came to say? The first time you really talk to me in moons and you say you're leaving? That--that can't be it. That can't be it. Please say that's not just it. I know things are bad here, but as long as I was with you and Plover and Sorrel I could make it work. How am I supposed to make it work if you're gone?" The tears fell a little bit faster now, and she couldn't quite stop them. She couldn't even feel that mad at Hemlockfox even though she should have been, even though that was what he had been worried about. He had told her not to be angry. But she wasn't angry; she was devastated. "Is that it? Is that all you wanted to say? You're just--you're just going to leave me? Leave us?" Crying wasn't going to help. She knew that. Frustrated with her hiccuping words, with the whole situation, she lashed her tail behind her. But what was she supposed to say to this? She couldn't say anything else. She just locked her eyes with Hemlockfox, pleading with him to say something, anything--some kind of solution to this. She couldn't be without her siblings. Not anymore. Not after Ploverpaw. Not after the war.

Don't be angry. She wasn't angry. She was... lost. Her entire world fallen down in pieces around her paws, the last dead brown leaf drifting from a tree. She'd held on so long, and for this? For this? For one of the few things she still had to be taken away? Bubblebeam hated crying. The way that damp tear-tracks formed through her soft fur, trickling down and dripping off of her chin into the soft fur of her chest. The sniffling breaths she had to take in order to force back the choking need to sob. The way it made her scar sting when the salt met its claw-curve. More than anything, the way it reinforced everything wrong with her. Her weakness--her softness--her lack of ability to control herself. Even worse was when she blinked her eyes free, tried to see through her swimming vision, she saw the look on Hemlockfox's face. Even as upset as she was, she never wanted to be the cause of her brother's pain. But the way his jaw tightened was her fault. The way his ears pinned slightly back was her fault.

Even in his sadness, Hemlockfox was angry. Usually she'd never understood his rage at the world--but this time, he was justified. The stars were trying to rip apart what little family bonds the two of them had left. Forgotten by their father, long-since abandoned by their mother, the ties of brother and sister were all that was left. She'd clung to them with all the energy in her tired limbs, but to feel them slip away was more than she could bear. And apparently, Hemlockfox felt the same. In her moments of whirling shock and anguish, she'd been so caught up in her own feelings to think about his. Now she noticed the fury in his voice that held a deeper devastation, one echoed in the screaming recesses of her own hollowed heart. He didn't want this. Of course he didn't. Neither of them did. None of them did. Stars, stars... what would Sorrel and Plover think? No. She shoved that thought out of her mind. That would only make things worse.

Though the tears would not stop no matter what she did, she did manage to quiet herself and listen. Listen to Hemlockfox's words, let them cut through the cascading agony, hold onto them out of a desperate hope that any of them could help. The panic in his eyes shot through her like a physical pain, reminding her once again that her overreaction had caused this. He still loved her. He hadn't kept it from her because he'd forgotten, like Sunfire--he had simply been afraid. Of course he had; who wouldn't be afraid when the stars tore them away from their home no matter what? Some other emotion--still painful, but less so--cut through the foggy mess of her mind. Love. Before she could stop herself, Bubblebeam stepped forward. She pressed her forehead to her brother's in a gesture of affection and solidarity. Careful not to let her tears dampen his pelt, but showing him with the words she could not muster that she loved him. She loved him and stars, that was why it hurt so badly. "It's okay. Hemlock, it's okay. I'm not mad. I still love you." Shakily she managed to breathe out reassurances, past the tightening of her throat. "I understand. Okay? I'm here now."

"StarClan may not let me come back, but I would do anything to keep us all together. If not in SkyClan, then in WindClan."

Those words stuck out among the rest. Around the terrified platitudes and pleading, Hemlockfox's declaration of care and determination. The one thing that managed to stop the way that the seams around her heart were beginning to pull apart. Anything to keep them together. Anything to keep them together. Dimly, Bubblebeam realized that she felt the same. SkyClan came second to her family--they always had. Once she'd naively believed that the two could remain at equal priorities, or that one was synonymous with the other, but that wasn't the case any longer. Not after the war. Not after everything. Was she willing to leave--to go to a completely different Clan, on the opposite side of the forest, where she'd be hated and maligned by most cats and not have any of their skills or traditions, to make all of her Clanmates and her grandmother and her friends hate her forever just to be with her family?

Yes. And a thousand times over.

The tears had not stopped, but they were no longer as frantic, as quickly flowing. A strange, slow contemplation took hold of Bubblebeam through her crying and worry and devastation, spreading through her with a similar effect to when Mintglade had tossed a wall of snow at her, and cold had gotten under the fur of her scruff. It didn't get rid of the way her chest ached or the way her head spun, but it did remove a little bit of the shakiness from her voice when she spoke. "I'll follow you. I'll follow you anywhere. It doesn't matter what Sunfire thinks--" when had been the last time she'd called him Dad?--"and it doesn't matter what Wolfblossom thinks. If they can't find a way to keep you here... then I'll find a way to go with you. Plover and Sorrel, too, I'm sure. We can't be separated--not again." It was true. Saying it aloud, she felt the truth of it all the way down to her bones. Out of all the things in this world, nothing meant more than her siblings. She loved her uncle and grandmother; she loved climbing trees; she loved Honeydew and even Mintglade despite how strange things were and stars, what about Thymelight, what would she say?... but there was nothing more important, nothing under the sun but her brother and her sisters. They were all she had. They were all she had. "I'll go with you," she repeated solemnly. Even as the water leaked from the corners of her eyes, tracing her scar, she kept Hemlockfox's gaze. "If... if I can. And if not, I... I don't know what I'll do. But I can't live without you."