As the story begins, not much time has passed since The Lost Warrior. Graystripe and Millie have reached a Thunderpath, and Graystripe rejoices because he can see the Highstones, meaning he is almost home. After crossing a few Thunderpaths, Graystripe realizes that where they are feels similar to the forest. He now knows how to get home. As Graystripe and Millie sleep under the stars, he tells her more about Clan life.
A few days later, Graystripe and Millie are crossing another Thunderpath. Millie tenses up and is nearly hit by a monster, but Graystripe grabs her and pulls her out of the way. However, this causes them to fall into a nearby cornfield. While trying to find a way out, the two run into a combine and are separated in the ensuing chase. Graystripe ends up in a barn and meets a cat called Husker who attacks him. However, a she-cat intervenes and gets them to cooperate. Graystripe and Husker go out to the cornfield and find Millie, who has scratched her eyes on the corn. They return to the barn and Husker tries to drive Graystripe out again, but the she-cat points out that Millie is in no condition to travel. Graystripe uses some nearby moss to help Millie's eyes.
Husker introduces the barn cats. The she-cat is his mate Moss, and her brother Splash lives with them. Also, Husker and Moss have four kits, Birdy, Pad, Raindrop and Little Mew. Husker explains that the cats used to live in the farmhouse with elderly Twolegs who were good to them, however both of them died. New Twolegs, who don't like cats, moved in, and brought dogs. Whenever the Twolegs see the cats, they sic the dogs on them, effectively making the cats prisoners in their own home.
The next day, Graystripe is attacked by the dogs. Millie comes to his rescue by revealing that she can speak dog and telling the dogs to go away. She teaches the barn cats how to speak dog so that they can stand up to the dogs. The day after that, Graystripe sees the daughter of the Twolegs chasing a frog towards a pond. The parents of the girl see her, but are too far away to warn her. Worried that she may fall into the pond, Graystripe acts cute so that the girl will ignore the frog and pet him. The parents decide that the cats aren't all that bad. On the following day, Graystripe and Millie run into the Twolegs again. The young boy goes to kick a soccer ball at them, but his mom grabs him and tells him that the cats are their friends. Upon seeing this, Graystripe gets the idea to lead the family to the barn. Once there, he brings the kits down from the hayloft and the family befriends the cats. After knowing that the barn cats will have a good future, Graystripe and Millie depart.
Several days later, Graystripe and Millie are still traveling. Graystripe starts to see familiar scenery, and continues onward with increasing horror. After seeing the Great Sycamore, Graystripe knows exactly where he is. He runs to the camp, and realizes that his home has been destroyed and that the Clan is gone.
Tropes appearing in this volume:
- Adaptation Dye-Job: This volume is when the manga depiction of Millie became pinkish-brown as opposed to her silver tabby appearance from the actual books. The illustrator explained that when he got the character outlines, she was only described as a tabby, so he pictured her as rosy brown, and didn't find out her real color until he had already colored the cover of this one. He discussed with his editor whether to change it, but they decided that it would be dull to have two gray cats next to each other.
- A Day in the Limelight: This manga trilogy serves as Graystripe's.
- Colorization: Graystripe's Adventure was originally drawn and released in black-and-white, in three different volumes. James Barry later colorized it and it was re-released as a single volume.
- Confused Question Mark: When Millie starts speaking Dog, the two dogs look at each other and one has a question mark appear over its head.
- Deer in the Headlights: Millie freezes when crossing a road. Graystripe has to grab her by her scruff and drag her out of the way of an oncoming car.
- Desolation Shot: The end of the volume features devastating shots of the completely destroyed ThunderClan territory and camp.
- A Dog Named "Cat": One of Husker and Moss' kits is named Birdy.
- Hidden Depths: Millie knows how to speak the language of dogs, just enough to say the words that will make them leave a cat alone.
- Lost in the Maize: Graystripe and Millie get lost and separated from each other in a field of corn, desperately fleeing from the terrifying roar of a "monster" (a combine harvesting the corn). Some local farm cats find them and lead them to safety.
- Stargazing Scene: There's a scene toward the start where Millie and Graystripe gaze up at the stars and he tells her about StarClan. They both reflect on how much they're enjoying the journey.
- Through a Face Full of Fur: Millie blushes in the scene where she first speaks Dog and Graystripe tells her she's amazing. Even more noticeable in the full-color version, when it's colored distinctly pink against her brownish fur.
- Took a Level in Kindness: After the Twolegs see Greystripe save their infant daughter, they start to treat cats nicely, to the point where they reprimand their son from kicking a soccer ball at the cats (something they had previously condoned, if that's any indication).
- Unexpectedly Abandoned: Graystripe finally escapes from the humans and finds ThunderClan's territory and camp again, but is shocked to find that all the Clans seem to be gone, as they left for new territory without him.
- Watching Troy Burn: Graystripe triumphantly returns to the forest, only to find it completely destroyed. He wanders around the destruction for a little while before Millie convinces him that his Clanmates are still out there somewhere.
- You Can't Go Home Again: After Graystripe is captured by Twolegs, it takes him several moons to escape and find his way back to the forest... but that's when he realizes there is no forest - it's been destroyed by Twolegs.
- Your Princess Is in Another Castle!: The plot of the trilogy so far has been about getting home to the Clans. At the end of Warrior's Refuge, Graystripe and Millie finally manage to reach Graystripe's forest, but as everyone who was following the series knows, the forest was destroyed and the Clans left to find a new home. This leads to the events of the final volume, Warrior's Return.
