The Darkest Hour/Chapter 22

Below contains in-depth information for chapter 22 of The Darkest Hour. If you are looking for a shorter summary of the entire book, please check the main article.

Chapter Number: 22 (of 30)

Page Numbers: 226-335

Chapter Summery
Many of the newcomers are revealed to be wearing collars. Because of this, Ashpaw, a ThunderClan apprentice, thinks they’re kittypets. He says that they would be easy to beat, but Dustpelt, his mentor, silences him, since they didn’t know anything about them.

Firestar spots a large black-and-white tom, and assumes he is the leader. Then he sees a small black tom, who goes to stand beside Tigerstar, and wonders who he could be, since he looked far too small to be a warrior.

Firestar turns to Tigerstar and asks who they are. Tigerstar announces that they are BloodClan, and that they were to convince Firestar and Tallstar to join his Clan. Thornclaw remembers scenting rouges the day he was made warrior, and tells Firestar that they were probably from BloodClan. Firestar realizes that it’s possible; a group of these cats could have come to the forest to see what they had been offered.

Tigerstar interrupts his thought by claiming that he changed the number of Clans in the forest, thus making him more powerful than StarClan. It was then that Firestar realized that he would not be able to reason with him now, so he calmly agrees to fight, if that was what Tigerstar wanted.

Tigerstar then ordered BloodClan to attack, but they didn’t listen. The small tom steps forward and revealed that his name was Scourge and that he led the Clan, and that they would listen to him only.

Tigerstar stares at him with malice. Firestar takes this opportunity to make an impression on Scourge and reveal Tigerstar’s murderous past. He first mentions that he had killed the former ThunderClan deputy, Redtail, so he could be made deputy in his place. He says that Lionheart had been chosen first, but he had died after a fight with ShadowClan. After that, Tigerstar had been made deputy.

He goes on to say that he had set a trap for Bluestar by the Thunderpath, but that Cinderpelt had stray into it instead and broke her leg. The other Clans (minus BloodClan) are shocked, as she was very popular.

Firestar then states that Tigerstar had conspired with Brokentail, a former ShadowClan leader, and brought rogues into the camp. While the rest of the Clan was fighting, he tried to kill Bluestar himself, but that Firestar had stopped him. He was driven into exile after that. He mentions that he had killed another warrior, Runningwind, as a rogue, before he became ShadowClan’s new leader.

Firestar then tells the Clans about how he had tried to use a pack of dogs to destroy all of ThunderClan. He killed Brindleface, a queen, in order to give the pack a taste for cats’ blood. He mentioned that, though the plan failed, Bluestar, their leader, had died to save them.

He looks around the clearing, and notices how horrified Leopardstar looks, though she says nothing.

Scourge says that he knew about Tigerstar’s plan with the dogs, but he had not been informed that it failed. Tigerstar tries to reason with Scourge so that he would order his Clan to attack, but he refused, deciding to wait for another day to think about what Firestar had told him. Because of this, Tigerstar attacks him in an attempt to make him order his Clan to attack.

Firestar expects that Scourge would be torn apart, but he was fast, whipping aside, and lashed out with his front paws, which reveals the dogs’ teeth strengthening his own claws.

The powerful blow landed on Tigerstar’s shoulder. Unbalanced, he fell on his side, which left his belly exposed. Scourge sank his claws into Tigerstar’s throat and cut him open to the tail.

Tigerstar lost a life because of this, but at the time, Firestar thought he would come back just fine. But then, when Tigerstar came back, he soon lost another life because the wound was too terrible for even StarClan to heal.

Then Firestar realized that he was losing all nine lives at once, and was filled with horror.

The TigerClan warriors fled from the clearing when they saw what was happening to their leader.

Tigerstar was exhausted from fighting to keep alive, and then gave up his final life.

When Firestar looked at Scourge, he saw he was unmoved by killing this cat, and he realized that he had never face a more dangerous opponent, one that could kill a leader with nine lives in one blow.

The BloodClan cats started to advance, but stopped when Scourge raised a paw. He said that this is what happens to his enemies. Firestar gives them permission to hunt before they went back to Twolegplace. Scourge scornfully replies that they were taking over the forest, and gave the Clans three days to leave, or fight.

Major

 * Firestar


 * Tigerstar


 * Scourge

Minor

 * Ashpaw


 * Dustpelt


 * Bone (though not by name)


 * Thornclaw


 * Graystripe


 * Leopardstar


 * Blackfoot


 * Darkstripe


 * Tallstar

Mentioned

 * Bluestar


 * Redtail


 * Lionheart


 * Cinderpelt


 * Brokenstar


 * Rogues


 * Runningwind


 * Dog pack


 * Brindleface

Births
None for this chapter.

Deaths
Tigerstar (killed by Scourge)

Ceramonies
None for this chapter.

Others
None for this chapter.

Errors
None for this chapter.