Should Brambleclaw have forgiven Squirrelflight sooner?

He dived out of the ferns and pelted along the shore in the direction of the cry. It came again, closer but fainter, a horrible choking sound. Brambleclaw leaped across the roots of a tree and found himself face-to-face with Firestar. The ThunderClan leader lay on his side on a narrow path between close-growing ferns. His limbs jerked feebly and his eyes gazed at nothing. Foam flecked his muzzle. Around his neck, half buried in his flame-colored fur, was a thin, shiny tendril, leading to a stick driven into the earth. Firestar was caught in a fox trap!

Brambleclaw leaped forward to help him, only to be thrust aside by Hawkfrost’s powerful shoulder. “Mousebrain!” the RiverClan warrior hissed. “This is your chance, Brambleclaw. You’re deputy now. If Firestar dies, you’ll be Clan leader.”

Brambleclaw stared at him in astonishment. What is he telling me to do? Then he realized that Firestar was trying to speak. “Birchpaw told me … Blackstar waiting on our territory … Had to come alone …”

Hawkfrost’s eyes gleamed with triumph as he padded across to Firestar and bent down to whisper in his ear. “But Blackstar isn’t here. We are. You’re a fool, Firestar. You were too easy to trap.” Brambleclaw felt the ground dip beneath his paws; he couldn’t grasp the details, only that the absence of Blackstar, and the ShadowClan scent on Hawkfrost, added up to something murderously evil.

“You did this,” he said to his half brother “You arranged for Firestar to be here, where there was a fox trap waiting.”

“Of course.” Hawkfrost sounded scornful. “I did it for you.” Firestar’s sides heaved as he fought for breath. His gaze flickered from Hawkfrost to Brambleclaw and back again. Brambleclaw could see that unless he loosened the wire right away, his leader would lose a life—perhaps more. Hawkfrost stepped back. “The brave ThunderClan leader,” he sneered. “Not so powerful now, are you? Come on, Brambleclaw, finish him off.”

Brambleclaw felt as though his paws were frozen to the bare earth. Every hair on his pelt stood on end as he heard Tigerstar whispering in his ear: Kill him. No cat will know. You can be Clan leader. You can have everything you have ever wanted. He staggered as Hawkfrost gave him a vicious nudge, his tail lashing angrily. “What are you waiting for? This is what we have wanted all along, remember? Kill him now!”

Brambleclaw stared down at his Clan leader. He still couldn’t move. He knew that all he had to do was tighten the noose around Firestar’s neck, and he would lose his remaining six lives at once. His gaze met Firestar’s, where his leader lay helpless in front of him. But there was no pleading in the green eyes, only a fierce, proud question: What will you do, Brambleclaw? It’s your choice.

Brambleclaw thought of how Firestar and Tigerstar had confronted each other, time after time. Each hated the other for what they stood for, the plans they had for their Clan. But Firestar had never needed to fight Tigerstar to the death. Scourge, the vicious leader of BloodClan, whom Tigerstar himself had invited into the forest, had killed him with a single blow. This time it looked as though Tigerstar would win. Brambleclaw was aware of his father’s spirit close beside him, urging him on.

Fool! Kill him now! Closing his eyes, Brambleclaw remembered the clearing at Fourtrees, the blood pouring out onto the grass as Tigerstar lost all nine lives at once. He saw Scourge looking down at his twitching body with cold triumph. Was that what Hawkfrost and Tigerstar wanted him to become?

“Six lives …” he murmured. Six lives stood between him and the leadership of ThunderClan.

“That’s right,” Hawkfrost hissed. “This is our chance to take revenge on Firestar for our father’s death. He could have tried to stop Scourge, but he just stood there and watched Tigerstar die, over and over and over.”

Revenge? Brambleclaw wrenched his gaze from Firestar to stare at his half brother. This wasn’t about revenge. He knew very well that Tigerstar had willingly set his own paws on the path that led to his violent death. All I want is to lead my Clan, he thought. But not like this. His loyalty was not to ThunderClan alone, but to Firestar too—the cat who had mentored him, accepted him in spite of his father, and in the end had trusted him enough to make him Clan deputy. He had thought that loyalty to the Clan didn’t necessarily mean loyalty to the Clan leader. That wasn’t true. Firestar was ThunderClan.

“No,” he meowed to Hawkfrost, amazed to hear his voice come out strong and steady. “I won’t do it.” He recalled how Brook and Squirrelflight had freed Berrykit when the kit caught his tail in a fox trap. Leaping over to Firestar’s side, he began scrabbling in the earth, trying to dig up the stick that held the tendril taut around his leader’s neck. “Keep still, Firestar,” he panted as the earth flew. “I’ll have you out of this in a heartbeat.” A yowl of protest battered his ears; he couldn’t be sure whether it came from Hawkfrost or from the vengeful spirit of Tigerstar. Hawkfrost sprang at him, slamming into his side and knocking him off his paws. Brambleclaw was pinned under him.

Hawkfrost’s ice-blue eyes glared into his. “Coward!” Hawkfrost snarled. “Keep away and I’ll kill him myself if I have to.”

Never! Brambleclaw thrust his hind paws hard into Hawkfrost’s belly, throwing him off. While his half brother lay winded, he hurled himself at the stick again, grabbing it in his jaws. His earlier digging had loosened it; now it came free altogether, and the tendril around Firestar’s neck slackened. He heard his Clan leader draw a single gasping breath. A fierce snarl behind him made him spin around to see Hawkfrost springing at him. Brambleclaw dodged to one side, letting the stick fall. He felt the sting of Hawkfrost’s claws raking through his fur as his half brother leaped past him. Spinning around, Brambleclaw faced Hawkfrost again, and saw a cold flame in the RiverClan cat’s ice-blue eyes.

“Traitor!” Hawkfrost spat. “You’re a traitor to everything our father planned! You were never strong enough to be like him.”

“I don’t want to be like him,” Brambleclaw retorted.

“Then you’re a fool,” Hawkfrost sneered. “And stupid too. You never realized that this was a test. It was Tigerstar’s idea. He said that if you really deserved power, you would do anything to get it.”

“Even kill my Clan leader?”

“Especially that. But you’re as weak as Tigerstar feared. We have great plans for the forest, he and I, and you could have been part of them. But we don’t need you.” Brambleclaw understood exactly what his half brother was saying. He knew too much. Hawkfrost could not let him or Firestar live now; that must have been part of his plan from the beginning. He took a step toward Hawkfrost.

“Go back to RiverClan. You’re my brother. I don’t want to hurt you.”

“Because you’re weak,” Hawkfrost taunted him. “You care more for kin than for power. But I don’t.” He leaped for Brambleclaw again, carrying him off his paws and pinning him down. His ice-blue eyes blazed close to Brambleclaw’s own. Brambleclaw felt sharp claws digging deep into his fur and saw teeth snapping at his throat. He struggled vainly to rake Hawkfrost’s belly with his hind paws, feeling his own death a heartbeat away. To save himself, to save Firestar and ThunderClan, there was only one thing he could do. Writhing from side to side, he spotted the stick from the fox trap lying half under his shoulder. He strained his neck and managed to grab it in his teeth. As Hawkfrost lunged down toward him he heaved the stick around and felt the sharpened end sink deep into Hawkfrost’s throat.

Hawkfrost stiffened with a horrible gurgling sound, then fell limp and heavy on Brambleclaw’s chest. Shocked, Brambleclaw struggled free of his half brother’s body and let go of the stick. It fell to the ground, leaving a ragged wound in Hawkfrost’s throat. Scarlet blood splashed onto the earth, faster and faster until it started to spill down toward the lakeshore.

“Hawkfrost!” Brambleclaw gasped. “I … I didn’t want this.” Amazingly, his half brother pushed himself to his paws and staggered toward him. Brambleclaw braced himself, not knowing whether to expect another attack or an appeal for help.

“Fool!” Hawkfrost rasped; the effort of speaking made the blood pour even faster from his terrible wound. “Do you think I did this alone? Do you think you’re safe within your own Clan?” He coughed, spitting out clots of blood, and added, “Think again!”

“What?” Brambleclaw took a step toward him, his forepaws splashing in the scarlet pool. Was Hawkfrost accusing a ThunderClan warrior of leading Firestar into this trap? “What do you mean? Tell me, Hawkfrost! Who do you mean?” But the cold fire was leaving Hawkfrost’s eyes.

He turned away from Brambleclaw, staggered a few paces through the ferns, and collapsed beside the lake, his haunches trailing in the water. Tiny waves rippled over his body, and his blood spread out in a scarlet cloud. Brambleclaw gazed down at him. There was so much more that he needed to know—but Hawkfrost was dead. For a moment, his half brother’s voice echoed softly in his ears: We will meet again, my brother. This is not over yet. “Brambleclaw.”

Firestar still lay on his side, his neck fur stained with blood from his own wound. Weak as he was, his gaze was unwavering as he looked at Brambleclaw. “Firestar—” Brambleclaw broke off. There was nothing that he could say. Firestar had seen his own deputy struggling with the temptation to kill him. He would never be able to trust Brambleclaw again. How could he be ThunderClan’s deputy now? He stood with bowed head and waited for the words that would send him into exile.

“Brambleclaw, you did well.” Brambleclaw looked up, staring at his leader in astonishment. “Your path has been hard, harder than most,” Firestar rasped. “But you fought a great battle here, and you won. You are a worthy deputy of ThunderClan.” His voice quavered on the last few words. Exhausted, he let his head fall again and closed his eyes. Brambleclaw stood looking down at him, his half brother’s blood sticky on his paws and the reek of it in his nostrils. I won, he thought. But what will my father do to me now?