A Shadow of Revenge



 A S ha d o w of R e v e ng e

Episode Five, Season Two, of Beauty.

Enjoy <3

This is for all you Snow/Lion shippers! <3

A Shadow of Revenge
“Now that you are under my command,” Shadowfang continues, “I want you to help me with a recent mission I received from our overall leader. I don’t have enough troops in this camp to finish the job.”

“So we’re the convenient scrape goats that can help you.” Finchwing growls.

It’s been a few days since Shadowfang accepted us in as rebels. We’ve done nothing so far since I haven’t been able to sneak the group in for awhile. In fact, I almost didn’t make this meeting with Shadowfang because my mother wanted my squad to have lunch with her with other important cats.

Hawkpelt and Rainstorm have been awfully close since they’ve been able to see each other more. I can see it in their eyes that they are in love.

‘Since Rainstorm is very…close to you guys, I’ll let her be part of your mission squad. But when she’s not on a mission, she will remain a recruiter.” Shadowfang adds. He ignores Finchwing’s question entirely. “Scarlet, Laura, get them ready for the mission and inform them what it is.”

“Why is she coming along?” Scarlet hisses venomously, “She’s a mere messenger. She won’t be of any good.”

The black tom gives the fierce orange she-cat a glare. “We need all the help we can get. Laura will need to be prepared too.”

Scarlet snorts and flicks her tail. I find something off about Scarlet. She never really glances at us, and she seems to avoid us at all costs.

“Wait,” I stop her, “I can’t stay for long. Whiteflicker wants me back at her den for some important lunch meeting.”

“Whiteflicker?” Scarlet jerks away from me, her eyes wide, “Why are you associated with a she-cat like her?”

“She’s…” I don’t want to tell this rebel that my mother is the top advisor of Redstar. But I have no choice. “She’s my mother,” I sigh, “And she’s been thoroughly interested in my squad for the past few days.”

Fear flashes in Scarlet’s eyes but she turns away. “This won’t take long if you’re really the fighters Rainstorm says you are.” I don’t know why she’s so afraid. I guess it’s because my mother is a strong supporter of the Beauty. She has a lot of power too.

Rainstorm pipes up. “They are! They helped Snowflake and Jet with the raid mission!”

Scarlet glances at the gray she-cat. “Did they?” She looks slightly uneasy, “I don’t think I was here at that time.”

Rainstorm shrugged. “No, you weren’t.”

We pad onwards without saying another word. “Are Snowflake and Jet going to be part of this mission?” I ask curiously, “I mean they are great fighters.”

“They are actually held prisoner in a small holding area right now.” Scarlet’s eyes darken, “This mission is for us to rescue to the two of them before they get moved.”

“How did they get caught?” Appleleaf’s eyes are wide, “They were such skilled fighters.”

“Their squadmates made a miscalculation in the planning and so they were all in danger. Snowflake and Jet got captured because they were too busy helping their squadmates escape to save themselves.”

I exchange glances with my squad. We had to save them.

~

Those brats… Shadowfang paced in his den. If he had no been in need for warriors, he would never have had accepted any of those fools. They had cost him everything. He had planned so much since he was six moons old. His father may have been completely loyal to the Beauty, but what he didn’t know was that his son had joined the rebels since he was six moons old.

''I was supposed to infiltrate the Beauty and get close to Flareheart! Shadowfang growled, But of course they had to get in the way.''

He could still remember his leader’s orders. “I want you to enroll for the Beauty and make sure you pass. You must become Flareheart’s closes ‘ally’ and use her to destroy FireClan completely.” Shadowfang had been the best of the best. He was supposed to have succeeded in his mission.

But he suppose those fools can do it themselves. They were certainly strong enough and determined enough, but Shadowfang hated failure.

“Shadowfang?” Scarlet entered the den. The orange furred she-cat was another of Shadowfang’s problems. She had a mysterious aura around her, and Shadowfang had no idea where she got her skills. “The recruits are ready for their first mission.”

The black tom bared his teeth and stretched. “Perfect. Just perfect.”

~

I thought I knew what a training session was. What I didn’t expect was Scarlet to show us all these crazy moves. And I thought the Beauty was good.

During the whole training session, I remember what Rainstorm had said. There were more than enough rebels to take down the Beauty, but just not all the rebels are willing to risk so many lives for freedom when they could just run away.

“Line up,” Scarlet snaps, “I want all of you to watch carefully. Laura, you’ll demonstrate with me.”

The light brown tabby’s eyes widen. “Me? But I don’t know anything about fighting.”

“I didn’t say show them how to fight,” Scarlet mews coldly, “I said demonstrate with me. Nobody said you had to do anything.”

She shows us a proper crouch. “While it’s the same as the Beauty would have taught you, make sure you put more weight on your hindlegs so you can actually react faster.” She darts forward and knocks Laura backwards.

She shows us a variety of moves and has us spar. Rainstorm does them too, since she never got to learn how to fight in the Academy.

“Your form is off,” she mews bluntly at the gray she-cat. “There’s a reason why the Academy stages the rounds so early in your training. They want the weaker cats that go to the poor to have no fighting skill.”

After hours of practicing and perfecting our new moves, Scarlet tells us to rest a bit before it’s time to go.

I can’t say I’m excited. I’m stark terrified but also exhilarated to be doing something. For moons in the Academy, I had dreamed of helping the rebels take down the Beauty little by little.

Now’s the time.

There are about twenty cats in the camp. Practically all of us are going. “When we get there, I’ll assign positions,” Shadowfang orders, “for now, stay in the groups that I assigned earlier.”

I glance at my group. It’s me, Brownhare, Snowflare, Lionclaw, and a tom I don’t know. There are four groups with roughly about five cats in each group.

Snowflare and Lionclaw are giggling while the serious tom glares at them.

“I bet I can get more Beauty cats than you can!” Lionclaw boasts.

“Oh please,” Snowflare rolls her eyes, “I’ll probably have to save your life multiple times while clawing more Beauty cats than you ever will.” Snowflare snorts.

Lionclaw pretends to look hurt. “Sweetheart, have more faith in me!”

“If I did, we’d all be doomed forward,” Snowflare shoves Lionclaw lightly, nearly crashing him into the other tom, “We’d all be fighting each other for the fun of it and making terrible jokes.”

“My jokes aren’t that bad!”

“What, like ‘Brownhare’s hair is so brown that they decided to name it after him’?”

“That was a good joke! Even you laughed!”

“I laughed because you fell on your face afterwards due to the fact that you almost wiped out on a root.”

“Oh please, you probably love my jokes more than you love me! And everyone loves me so…”

“That’s such a blatant lie! First of all, your jokes are utterly terrible. Second of all, nothing is stronger than my love for you.”

“Gosh you’re so-” Lionclaw blinks. “Did you really just say that?” He looks so ridiculous that I nearly burst out laughing.

“Say what?” Snowflare smirks.

“Say that again! I demand it of you.”

“Say what?” Snowflare guffaws.

Lionclaw huffs in outrage. “You’re so difficult to deal with! Why do I even bother?”

“Because when the flare of light hits snow, it makes it blinding. And since you’ve been blinded, you can’t see anything ugly, therefore I’m so beautiful and charming that you can’t resist.”

“That,” Lionclaw grumbles, “was the worst joke ever.”

~

When we finally reached the garrison in which Snowflake and Jet are stationed at, all the teasing and bantering simmers down. (Which is a shame because I was really enjoying Lionclaw and Snowflare’s talk.)

To my astonishment, we’re pretty far out from main camp. “They don’t have space in the main camp to put prisoners so they place them out here.” Scarlet looks every uncomfortable being out here. I guess she’s had a bad experience with the prison camps before.

Rainstorm pads up to me. She looks around warily, and I understand why. She told me on the way that her mother had given her something extremely important and her newfound powers. There’s a chance that someone would want to snatch her necklace.

I give her a reassuring smile and she returns it. I turn to Scarlet. “I’ve been wondering if you knew a cat called Cherrypaw. She’s been imprisoned for seven moons now, and-”

“Never heard of her,” Scarlet snaps, “I don’t have time for petty questions.” Snow that I’ve realized it, Scarlet looks about my age.

“Feisty, ain’t she?” The tom from my group snorts, “It’s a shame that she doesn’t usually participate in these battles.”

“What do you mean?” I blink, “With her skills, we’d take down the Beauty in no time!” It would be foolish not to utilize the rebels’ greatest weapon.

“She’s a spy for us,” the tom explains, “She constantly goes into the Beauty and I’ve heard that she’s gotten close to Redstar, though not quite.”

“I guess that’s good too,” I nod, “It’s only right that she uses her skills in such a way. Though I wonder how she gets close to Redstar… Is she an actual Beauty warrior?”

“Nope,” the tom looks proud, “she snuck into the Beauty and managed to be close to the tyrant that controls us all. Isn’t that fantastic?”

“Certainly impressive,” I ponder over this. Maybe one day she could help us free Cherrypaw. The prospect of having my friend back was almost too good to be true.

“Get into your positions!” Shadowfang hisses, “Amberfrost, you’re the outside. You and your group are the ones who are going to break Snowflake and Jet free. Don’t get involved in the battle, do you hear me?”

“Yes, sir,” I mutter.

I relay what the black tom said to the others. Lionclaw and Snowflare immediately groan. “Now I can’t show Snowflare the power I have!”

“What power?” Snowflare counters, “You couldn’t even defeat a mouse if you tried.”

I purr, “Maybe next time, you two.”

Brownhare is at my side. “I’m glad we’re not in the fighting lines,” he murmurs, “The group needs you to be safe, and this is the safest job.”

I can feel my cheeks flare. “You’re just as important too,” I whisper. Then, realizing my mistake, I add, “I mean so is everyone else, but-”

The brown tom reaches forward tentatively with his tail. I stop talking. Before we can do anything else, however, Shadowfang shouts. “Move it, love birds!”

I snap out of my daze and I realize that we’ve started the attack. My love affairs with Brownhare can wait. For now, I had a duty to do. “Amberfrost-” Brownhare begins.

“Come on!” I urge him. The other three are already waiting for us.

“What’s the plan?” Snowflare huffs, “Do we just rush in and hope we can get there?”

“One cat will do the whole deal of freeing the prisoners,” I mew, “the rest of us will protect them.” I look around, “The cat should be-”

“You.” Brownhare and I say at the same time. I blush furiously. Brownhare blinks.

“Amberfrost, we can’t risk you.”

“And I won’t risk you!”

Snowflare rolls her eyes while Lionclaw snorts. “As much as I’d love to see what would happen from here, I agree with Brownhare. We can’t risk you, Amberfrost. You’re our leader and if you die…”

I huff, “Fine!”

With that decision made, we hurriedly make our way through the clearing. Snowflare and Lionclaw take the lead, beating their way through the throng of cats. Brownhare and the other tom stay behind me to ensure that no one sneaks up on me.

We manage to reach the den in no time. “Be careful,” I tell my group, and then I plunge into the den.

The first thing I notice is the stink. I wrinkle my nose against the smell and make my way over to Snowflake and Jet. Both look like a complete mess. Blood oozes out of their wounds and their pelts are matted.

I quickly undo their bramble chains. The two of them stir. “Amberpaw?” Snowflake rasps, “Is that you?”

“Its Amberfrost now,” I correct, “and I’m here to save you two.”

We hobble out together. The rebels see us emerge and cheer for us. I purr as we slowly defeat the Beauty warriors stationed at this prison camp.

We did it. We’ve completed our first real mission.

The End.