A long time ago, when glaciers dominated the Great Lakes, the wild cats of the Apostles Islands lived in peace and harmony. Divided by long-respected borders, the large, prehistoric cats roamed their separate territories in five Clans: LionClan, TigerClan, LeopardClan, CheetahClan, and PantherClan.

Governed by the Stars, the five Clans rarely fought one another, depending on negotiations and guidance from their ancestors to settle growing disputes. Over the moons, a code developed from this guidance. Communally they met once a moon to share wisdom and messages from above, and once a season, they came together to celebrate their bounties under the green-leaf solstice.

But evil was lurking beneath the ice.

Seasons turned, and the peace the five Clans worked so hard to maintain, slowly started to crumble. Land disputes began to rise. Skirmishes erupted on the border. Accusations of betrayal and mistrust spread like an unfettered wildfire. Claws unsheathed and teeth bared. Great battles of conquest were fought, spurred by greed and lust. A once peaceful land became sullied with bad blood.

One night, on the cusp of leaf-bare, a warrior from LeopardClan ventured toward the murky waters and received a vision, a great omen of blood-shed and rising floods. They saw the very blood that bound the Clans together ripped apart by claws and teeth until flood waters washed them away. Desperately they tried to warn their clan-mates, but their cries of anguish swept away with the wind, unheard.

Nobody heeded their warning.

The melting ice and snow gave way to dark and unimaginable evil and planted seeds of chaos and discord across the land. Then suddenly the land that once bound them together violently broke apart in an event now known as the Great Waters.

The rapidly melting ice and snow became water and that water rose and rose and rose. The warriors that survived the Great Waters were far and few between. Those that survived had little resources and cried out, searching for answers, their Clans in ruin.

One old warrior from CheetahClan, a cat named Tide, called out, his voice louder than the rest; and the earth, full from his call, answered. The starry ancestors, desperate for peace, led him to a vision. It showed him a piece of land rising from the great waters, a piece of land that would become their new home, a place of safety and hope.

Tide called out to those who would listen and led those cats, following his vision, to the land their ancestors promised. Tired from their long journey, some of the warriors became restless and threw accusations at Tide once they realized the land was barren and inhospitable. They accused him of leading them to their death and cursing them all for eternity. With mistrust in their hearts, those warriors turned around and abandoned Tide and his vision.

This angered the ancestors.

The water then rose and rose and rose and cut the land into scattered stones - the once great Clans severed from one another forever. Those who first refused to follow Tide were consumed with civil unrest and bloodshed, limited to the island that soon became their home, and those who turned their back on Tide were forever cast out to sea, never to be seen again.

The cats who followed Tide to this new island became the Tribe of Floating Stones. To the two-legs who would eventually come to know this land, it would become South Twin Island.

Tide was the Tribe's first leader, the first Teller of the Stars, and he showed his fellow tribe cats how to listen to the earth around them, and soon that once inhospitable piece of land became a flourishing garden of hope and prosperity. They were the first to truly listen to their ancestors, and although alone, they were granted the gift of prosperous life for their loyalty.

Across the water and on the horizon, the cats who had refused to follow Tide remained on the mainland in hostile colonies. This new island would be known to the two-legs as Rocky Island; and while the land was no longer covered in ice, it was inhospitable and harsh. Leaf-bare stretched for moons at a time; and as it waned, new-leaf warm in the water, few wild cats made it to the next season alive.

The five Clans of the past were unrecognizable. They were entrenched in bad blood and primitive traditions that kept them estranged.

After many seasons, a long descendant of the unheard LeopardClan prophet received a vision from their ancestors, calling them and all pacifists to the shoreline. Urging those around them, the prophet led those who would listen to the sands near the lake and eventually to the MoonCave. Encapsulated in ice, stalactites hung from the ceiling, and at its center glistened a temperate pool, somehow its water unfrozen in the dead of leaf-bare.

The prophet, who would become the first medicine cat on the island, waded into the pool and received another vision. A soft light covered the shoreline, a beacon of hope and prosperity. Protected by their ancestors, the pacifists decided to remain in the caves on the shore, their senses devoted to the messages that their ancestors sent to them. These cats became LichenClan, named for the lichen that grows from the moisture on the trees.

Refusing to join the pacifists and instead create their own Clan, the remaining wild cats on the island watched as the water in the sandy creek suddenly dried up.

It was an omen, one they ignored.

On this land, the new Clan tried to live together under a primitive oath and elected leader, but the wild cats were too hostile, too unfettered to live in peace. It first manifested in petty fights; squabbles that would end with torn fur and minor cuts; arguments over mates and duties. The remaining wild cats found themselves divided into two separate parties. There were those who felt that the original oath should never change, and those who felt that the original oath was outdated and should be rewritten as the island changed.

Their elected leader, a cat named Star, was then found disemboweled near the waterfall. There was no conclusive evidence. Her death was shrouded in the same darkness that had once threatened the ancient colonies. Their ancestors were angry, but no one was listening. The ancient cats of the stars caused the dry creek to fill with water once more, separating the two warring parties.

The cats who believed in strict adherence to the oath remained in the original redwood forest. The newly elected leader named themselves Redwoodclan for the tall trees that populated their land. The cats who believed that the oath should be altered retreated into the dense pine and fir forest and named themselves Thistleclan. This oath would then come to be known as the warrior code.

Finally separated into like-minded factions, the cats returned to the ways of the ancient clans. Once a moon, when the moon shines full and fat in the night, the Clans will come together under the waterfall to honor the original Clan and the cats who lost their lives in their recklessness. The cats also decided each half-moon that the medicine cats would meet at the MoonCave and wade into its depths, listening, so that Starclan never goes silent again.

Separated, the Clan and Tribe cats lived in a seemingly peaceful period, completely unaware of each other, and at first, they prospered, their ancestors pleased. But violence soon returned to the Clans with the ebb and flow of the dark waters, and sickness and suffering befell the Tribe again and again.

They were never meant to be apart.