[ a half-written prologue ]

   A ginger she-cat let out a final cry as she brought one more life into the world. She began to pant, but when her eyes passed over her two kits, she forgot her exhaustion.

"That appears to be the last one," the tom who'd helped her deliver her kits announced from her side.

The she-cat began to wearily smile as blackness crept in from the edges of her vision and a sort of numb tiredness took over the feeling in her muscles. She managed to whisper a few words before losing consciousness.

"My lovely kits."

When the queen awoke once more, she was in a forest. And not just a normal forest. Everything shimmered beautifully, the gurgling brook to her right, the softly glowing stars shining from the blackness above that was the slowly lightening night sky, even the droplets of dew collecting on the edges of the upturned leaves of the trees. As she stepped forward, the crisp scent of the forest stole into her nose and stalks of grass snapped under her paws.

She sensed movement and turned her head to see that the starry forms of cats long past had begun to form where the forest met the edge of the clearing she was in. As she watched, one of them began to advance, but drew back the outstretched paw right before it touched the tips of the grass.

She knew she could trust these cats. She knew they were good. She raised her paw to step forward, but when she brought it down, the ground was no longer there and suddenly, she was falling, falling, falling, and everything around her was swirling together into a mass of dark colors, which suddenly began to lighten until everything around her was orange and red and yellow and she was looking down and there was an immense amount of thick orange liquid below her and she could suddenly feel waves of heat rolling off of the water and it was attacking her, the heat, the fire, burning away her fur, her pelt, her body, until she was nothing more than a mind and there was nothing but her mind and the brown rock stretching far above her and the orange liquid - and a voice. And words.

"Watch out for the fire, Sandshade, or you'll get burned."

---

When Sandshade woke up, her pelt was on fire.

It felt as if a flame was just underneath her skin, melting her insides and reaching up to lick her pelt now and then.

"Sandshade!" A voice made her turn her head upwards, causing the fire to flare up again and a cry escaped her mouth.

"Sandshade," came the voice again, this time only a whisper. She felt fur brush against her pelt and a nose press against hers. Deliriously, she wondered why it was so wet, and then realized that her own nose was too dry.

Suddenly, she was looking into gray-blue eyes that were the same shade as hers and she realized that this was her littermate, Skystreak, the medicine cat of her Clan.

"You're awake," he said, speaking slowly, as if talking too loud would hurt her ears. And she realized that in fact, there was a sort of persistent buzzing in the back of her hearing that flared up every time she heard noise.

"My kits," she managed to croak out through the horrid dryness in her throat. "Where are my kits?"

The worried expression didn't leave his face, but he answered. "They're in the back of the nest. Another queen's taking care of them. But Sandshade, you need-"

"I need...need to name them. I need to name-" she coughed, a spasm of pain going through her throat with each cough, "-name my kits."

Skystreak opened his mouth to argue, but thought better of straining Sandshade's voice, and instead scurried off into the recesses of the den.

Sandshade felt a sort of heaviness pulling at the back of her mind and she began to panic. She had to name them before she lost consciousness again.

Skystreak finally came back, ushering forward two kits. "Both toms," he said. One was a pale brown and cream-splashed tabby who was mewling quietly, nose sniffing back in the direction of the other queen. The other had a striped black overcoat and a white undercoat. He sat quietly with his head turned towards her, though his eyes hadn't opened yet. His ears, placed slightly too far to the sides, were pricked forward at attention.

Sandshade wanted to sigh at the two forms of perfection that were before her, but the impending darkness at the edges of her vision hastened her to name them.