Chapter Two

It was a quarter moon, before Silverpaw remembered Bloodfang's offer. She tried her best to get out of the camp, telling Squirrelfern she was going out to hunt, but the interception of a fluffy white apprentice with hazel eyes; seeing Bloodfang again was proving far more difficult than she anticipated.

"Hey Silverpaw, where are you off to?" the cheerful white apprentice meowed.

Silverpaw bit off a stream of some of her father's favorite curses. "I'm going hunting," she replied.

"Can I join you?" he asked, flashing a smile at her.

Silverpaw's ears flattened a little bit. "Uh, I was hoping to get in some practice on my own, Thawpaw."

Thawpaw's ears drooped. "Oh, I mean, yeah okay. That's fine…."

"Somehow, I highly doubt the queen of hunting needs any extra 'practice', Thawpaw." A smoky gray tom with a white chin that spread to his underbelly and the tip of his tail meowed.

Silverpaw shot him an annoyed look. "Flintpaw, if I needed your opinion, I would've asked for it."

Flintpaw shot her a smug smile. "Ah, but that's the beauty about opinions. You never ask for them, but some cat always ends up giving one to you, eh?"

"Flintpaw!" all of the apprentices winced as Flintpaw's brother; Birchfoot, yowled across the camp. He was a handsome tom; long, slender legs combined with massive shoulders and a white pelt with flecks of black marking it. The scar on his muzzle that went through his mouth only strengthened his good looks.

"As I recall," the older tom meowed. "You have to take care of the elders for a few more days."

"I have been taking care of the elders, Birchfoot." Flintpaw grumbled.

"Then why are you pestering Silverpaw and Thawpaw? You still have work to do!"

Flintpaw shot Birchfoot a dirty look before slinking off. Birchfoot shook his head in disappointment.

"Sorry about that, you two. It'll be a miracle at this point if he ends up becoming a warrior. You can carry on hunting, Silverpaw. Thawpaw, do you want to do some training with me?"

Thawpaw brightened considerably. "Really? You'd be willing to train with me?"

Birchfoot smiled. "It would be my pleasure."

Silverpaw snuck out while Thawpaw was bouncing with excitement. Her paws padded silently through the forest as she headed to the place where she'd first seen Bloodfang. Their scents were still there, old and slightly faded. Silverpaw took a deep breath and began to call for him, like he'd instructed her to.

"Bloodfang! Bloodfang?" she yowled.

There was no response from the underbrush in front of her, and she didn't see his distinct brown-striped pelt, nor see the telltale signs of his dark blue eyes glowing.

This is pointless, she thought bitterly to herself. Silverpaw got ready to walk back to ThunderClan territory and actually hunt, but a bit of motion caught her eye and she jumped as the tom she'd been calling for, bounded into the small clearing with a combination of grace and power.

"Sorry, did I startle you?" he meowed.

Silverpaw licked her chest a few times. "No, of course not. I'm training to be a ThunderClan warrior."

"Just because you're training to be that, doesn't mean you can't get startled," Bloodfang's whiskers twitched.

Before Silverpaw could shoot an insult at him, he meowed. "Now, what do you want?"

"To talk. You did tell me I could call on you for conversation since I let you have that prey, you know."

Bloodfang blinked. "So I did. Very well then. What do you wish to speak of?"

Silverpaw thought for a moment, before she told him of what had happened before she'd set out of the camp. She told him of her family; her mother and her two younger brothers that had been born a moon before. She told him about clan life. About the drama. And she told him about StarClan.

The entire time, Bloodfang sat there with his bushy tail curled around his paws. His dark blue eyes were fixated on her, absorbing every word; paying attention to everything she said. She seemed so undemanding from the other cats, that she found herself even talking about her older brother; Fawnstream, and her father.

She never usually told anyone about her thoughts, about what she feared, but somehow those dark blue eyes managed to make her completely at ease. In fact, she was so at ease that she lost track of time. It was nearly sundown when she paused with her talking.

"Oh no, I said I was out hunting, but my clanmates will suspect something if I don't come back with more than just a couple rabbits!" she meowed, frantically getting to her paws.

"I'll help. Two cats working is better than one." Bloodfang replied, and disappeared.

Silverpaw was very pleased with the prey she'd caught, but was greatly surprised when Bloodfang approached with a fat rabbit, and several squirrels. Bloodfang's tail always was kept to the ground, as if he was proud of who he was but didn't want anyone to know about it.

"Are you sure you don't want to keep the rabbit for your own group?" Silverpaw asked.

Bloodfang shook his head and dropped the prey down. "If you bring that back to your clan, then perhaps your clan will be more likely to forgive you. Besides, I buried what I caught for my group earlier."

Silverpaw nodded. "I guess you're right. Thank you, Bloodfang." Impulsively, she leaned over and licked his cheek.

His left ear flicked, but he dipped his head. He vanished into the woods, leaving Silverpaw to carry all of her prey back.

…

Well, that was certainly interesting, Bloodfang thought to himself. To a more bloodthirsty and ambitious cat, Bloodfang was sure they'd be planning an attack on ThunderClan, but he saw no cause for this. They had nothing that interested him. He had everything he needed. But despite that, Bloodfang was no fool. Someday, he wanted to change the ways of BloodClan, and make it better.

But as it was, he needed the support of others in the group. He wanted to gain their support not from fear, but from mutual agreement. But he'd found no cat interested in it.

Bloodfang entered the camp, jaws full of the fresh-kill he'd been hunting before Silverpaw called for him. He was uncertain of the rules of the clans, but he wasn't sure if she was supposed to be seeing him like this, even if it was just harmless chatter. Already, Ebony was approaching him.

Ebony was a large, dark tabby with blue eyes as cold as ice. His left ear was so torn, it was hard to tell if he could use it, and like almost all of the BloodClan cats, his pelt bore the scars of many moons.

"You caught much for the clan today, sir. But I must ask why it took so long for you to return," Ebony asked.

Bloodfang dropped the fresh-kill in the pile they had, and selected a thrush. "I was still hunting, but found no more prey." he replied flatly, going to the mouth of his den to eat.

Ebony followed, selecting a thrush for himself. "Didn't you tell Blink and Rat they were to assist with finding us a winter home?" he asked.

Bloodfang surpassed a torrent of annoyance. Ebony was an ambitious cat. He respected Bloodfang greatly, but considered Rat weak for his reluctance for fighting. Not only that, but as Bloodfang ran the clan nearly by himself, he knew Ebony was doing his best to be chosen as second in command.

"Yes, I did. I believe they set out earlier." Bloodfang replied, his voice devoid of any emotion like always.

"May I inquire as to where we will be staying?" Ebony pursued him.

Before Bloodfang could open his mouth to meow something back at him that might have been unflattering, he was saved by Rat and Blink's re entrance to the clan. The hurried over to him, their eyes bright.

"We've secured a deal with them!" Rat exclaimed when he came close enough.

"Well done, you two. Did they say when we could come?" Bloodfang asked.

"They said at the first snow fall, we could join them," Blink replied, her excitement contagious.

Bloodfang nodded thoughtfully. "Excellent. We'll bring fresh-kill to them when we arrive, so they know we are good hunters.

The three cats around him nodded, although Bloodfang could see Ebony glaring a little at Rat. Blink was too busy staring at Bloodfang to notice, and Rat was never known for seeing the obvious, but Bloodfang decided he wasn't going to have a fight start by pointing it out.

"If you all don't mind, I'd like to eat my prey in peace and quiet," he meowed quietly, and began to eat his thrush.

The others wandered away. It was when they left, he realized he was going to miss Silverpaw, oddly enough.