Return to the Clans

Return to the Clans is an original English-language manga volume written by Erin Hunter as part of the Warriors series. It is the third and final in a trilogy following Sasha, a fictional wild cat trying to learn how to live in the wild. It was released on June 9, 2009. It is drawn by Don Hudson.

Plot summary

Sasha has gone back to the forest to raise her three kits, Hawk, Moth, and Tadpole. While hunting for her kits, she gets caught by a ShadowClan patrol. Afraid that they will take her kits, she lies and says they died from the cold. Afterwards, she lets her kits play outside, but when they go back in, she tells them about Ken.

Later, she lets them outside again, but this time, Russetfur walks in on them. Russetfur guesses that Tigerstar is their father. But instead of forcing her to give them up to ShadowClan, she instead helps Sasha by giving her some fresh-kill, and warns her to leave as soon as possible. She also tells Sasha that Tigerstar is dead, killed by the BloodClan leader a few moons back. Later on, Sasha goes out hunting and the kits go out to find Ken because they want to make their mother happy. They go into Twolegplace and are confronted by BloodClan cats, whom they run from.

Meanwhile, Sasha has come back to find her kits gone. She immediately goes out to look for them when she is joined by Shnuky, one of her old kittypet friends. The kits go into an abandoned-looking Twoleg nest (house). They go through a basement window, and the last kit pushes down what was holding up the window by accident, trapping them. Sasha, still trying to find the three, gets confronted by the same BloodClan warriors as before, but is able to trick them into fear by telling them she is a clan warrior out looking for revenge of Tigerstar's death, and the BloodClan cats end up pointing out the direction they saw the kits go.

In the basement, a pipe blows and water leaks rapidly from it. Sasha rescues Hawk and Moth, but Tadpole drowns. That night, a devastated Sasha dreams of Tigerstar and asks if Tadpole is with him. Tigerstar says no, but confides that he is safe. Sasha later meets with Pine, a loner she had previously met, and he takes her and the kits to a barn where another she-cat lives.

After Pine leaves, Sasha is attacked by the queen while Hawk and Moth are attacked by the she-cat's kits, but Sasha beats her. She leaves with the kits and decides to take them to RiverClan. In the outskirts of RiverClan territory, Sasha tells the kits who their father is and says that it is their secret. Eventually, they run into a RiverClan patrol. Sasha tells them that she and her kits wish to become warriors.

At first, the patrol does not agree, but after a while, they allow them to join because their nursery is almost empty. When they get back to camp, the kits get their apprentice names, but Sasha refuses to take a warrior name. Not long into their apprenticeships, Hawkpaw and Mothpaw see other kits from the nursery pretending to be Tigerstar and kill everybody. They ask Sasha why they acted like that about him. Sasha tells them the truth about him and makes them promise again that that was their little secret.

Later, Hawkpaw and Mothpaw discover the remnants of the Bonehill, a hill of bones that BloodClan created. Leopardstar then lectures them on how horrible Tigerstar was and how much pain they suffered because of him. In the end, Sasha decides Clan life is not for her, and she also realizes that her kits are far safer and happier here than with her, so she leaves, but her kits stay.^[2]

The cover features Tigerstar and Sasha and their three kittens (Hawk, Moth, and Tadpole) at the bottom.

References