Hi! Sorry this took so long! Reallyreally sorry! I wrote the whole thing about the new character in here just now. I'm really fast at typing! go me! sorry, self-absorbed moment...anyway, enjoy!
Disclaimer: I do not own Warriors.
Chapter 2
After a brief scolding from Rosy, the house-keeper as Mia called her, the girl went up the stairs to her room. It had off-white walls, patterned with barely noticeable flowers. The carpet was light gray, and all the furniture was either a light wood or white metal. There was a beechwood dresser close to the door with a rectangular mirror above it, longer than it was tall. It stretched all across the top of the dresser, its wood trim paited a grainy white. Directly across the room was a queen bed, white metal bent into a swirly design, while the sheets were off-white and flowery.
Not unlike the rest of the house, thought Mia, snorting to herself.
"What's up?" Foxtail looked up to the girl, his head cocked slightly to the side.
"Nothing interesting."
"Thinking about that boy?" the tom teased.
"No!" gasped Miakoda, wrinkling her nose in disgust. "I just met him! How could I like him?"
"I don't know, but I could smell something different about you." Mischief glimmered in the cat's green eyes, and Mia, turning into a cat, swiped her claws at him. Dodging, Foxtail leapt on his friend, and the two ended up locked in a play fight, claws sheathed. Suddenly, they heard heavy footsteps assending the stairs and coming down the hall in the direction of the room. The white door was still open, and the girl knew she wouldn't have time to change back into herself before Rosy came into sight of the room. She still hadn't told the woman about her powers and the story of the forest because she knew, in the woman's elderly age, she would not believe her, no matter the facts.
Thinking quickly, Mia and Foxtail darted under the bed, crouching low and hoping that the low-hanging bed spread would shadow them enough from sight. To their relief, Rosy came in, calling Miakoda's name, looked around the room in slight confusion, and left.
The cats came back out from under the bed, and the she-cat immediately changed back into a human.
"That was close, miss Waneta. How about you don't do that unless we're alone." Foxtail paused, then his lips formed a wry smile. "Or when we're with 'that boy'."
Miakoda growled. "Oh, shut up already. Why don't you go home to your beloved Flowerpetal?"
The ginger tom shrugged. "Fair enough."
"Let's go find Rosy so she doesn't get worried again and give us another lecture."
"You mean give you another lecture. She doesn't seem to think I have half a mouse brain." The tom's voice was thick with annoyance, but his green eyes betrayed his ammusement.
On their way down the white steps, Mia turned to her friend. "How about we go out again tonight, when the house-keeper is sleeping? She won't be bothered if she doesn't know."
Foxtail purred. "And maybe we'll get to see Adahi again."
The girl was in the middle of thinking up a retort, when she realized there was truth in the cat's words.
☼☼☼☼☼
A light-haired girl hopped out of her car. She was about four feet and eleven inches tall, and her brown eyes adjusted poorly to the darkness of late evening. Three other humans, her parents and her sister, followed out into the open air. A sence of freedom entered the girl's body as she breathed in deeply, clearing her mind from the concealed car ride. The white oister-shell street shone silver in the dim light from the moon, and she watched as the street lights added their golden hue to the surroundings. To her right was a forest, and the light did not quite enter there. But as she watched, the girl could have sworn she saw two pairs of shining eyes in the cover of the undergrowth. Yet when she blinked, they were gone.
A chill breeze made the girl shiver and sent goose-bumps along her arms. She pulled down the fuzzy sleves on her gray sweater, then got an idea.
"Mom," she called, turning to where a barely average-heighted woman was approaching her. "Can I go for a walk? Just outside the building?"
The woman's face turned scornful. "No, Avon, you can't. It's too dangerous."
"Oh, please? I'd stay close!"
When her mother shook her head, Avon clenched her fists and stomped her foot lightly on the oister shells, making a muffled crunch. With a great sigh, the woman gave in.
"Fine, just so long as you stay near the house we're staying in."
"I promise!" the girl murmured delightedly, and she scampered off without another word.
It wasn't long after the house had disappeared behind a small rise when two cats, looking black and brown in the night, padded silently across the path in front of her. The black one looked up at her, and for a moment brown eyes met gold-ish-gray. Suddenly, the cat's ears pricked and, with a twitch of its nose, disappeared into the trees after its companion. A few moments later, three boys appeared, one bulky and shorter that the other two, who followed on either side of him like bodyguards. They looked almost the same but the color of their hair. Both were tall and thin with lean muscles that rippled with every arm swing, and all three looked at least four years older than the twelve-year-old Avon.
One of the skinny ones sniggered. "Look—it's the animal freak!"
Then the girl recognized them. They were the three boys from her school who always made fun of both her and her friends. She had learned to deal with them, and most of the time protected the other kids they messed with. But then, she reminded herself, I had not been alone.
"What're you doin' out here at a time like this?" chimed the fat one. Avon clenched her teeth in annoyance, her nostrils flaring. Her nails dug into her palms so hard she was sure they would break the skin.
"I'm doing something that is no concern of yours," she replied, lifting her head in defiance.
"Well," chuckled the other skinny boy, "then we'll make it our business."
All three started advancing on Avon, and fear filled her eyes as she started to back away slowly. The brown pools darted around helplessly, trying to find a way of escape.
"Hey, freak, what're you afraid of, wuss? Just a little play time?"
The words made an unspeakable anger boil up inside the girl. She stopped backing up and bunched the muscles in her legs, ready to do whatever she needed to to get back at these stupid lumps of fat and bone. The laugh that they all let out only feuled the fire in her blood, and she leapt at the fat one, lashing out with teeth and nails, trying to find a grip. Finally, her teeth met his neck and she bit down, forcing out a screech of terror and pain from the boy. She felt herself being lifted strongly by the shoulders by one of the other boys, and he held her back.
"Oh, man, look out! She might give you rabies, that stupid wolf-girl will!"
Despite her anger, Avon sneered. She liked being called this, though the boys seemed to have no idea. She struggled to get free, the fire of battle still burning within her, but she could not get free. The flame was extinguished almost as quickly as it had caught when she saw the ice in the fat boy's eyes as he was helped to his feet by the other slim one.
"Now we'll see what your consiquence is, freak," the fat one spat. He rolled back the long sleeves on his shirt, and Avon knew she was going to get beaten up. She closed her eyes, ready for the first blow, but they flew back open when another girl's voice broke the eerie silence instead of her cry of pain.
"Leave her alone."
The two boys that had their hands free turned to face the speaker. She was a short girl, looking around Avon's age, with auburn hair and clear brown eyes. Beside her was the same brown cat that had run across the street, and his neck fur bristled warningly, his lip pulled back from thorn-sharp teeth. The slim boy that was holding her sniggered.
"What're you going to do about it?" he challenged. "Glare us to death? You can't possibly take on all three of us."
The girl sneered. "Don't underestimate me, boy. And, if you hadn't noticed, we're even now, three to three."
The boys laughed.
"This pitiful girl can't do anything to us, your cat is too stupid to know what to do, and you aren't strong enough for any one of us."
The cat snarled, bunching his hauches, ready to spring. Avon was left in awe when, with a glance from the girl, he loosened his stance as if she had told him not to, and she herself leapt at the tall free-handed boy. She locked a grip in his clothes with both fingers and bare feet, but at the same moment, the fat boy waddled hurriedly over and took a swing at Avon, leaving her with a spinning head and a bloody nose. She let her head fall limply in the boy's grasp, waiting for another swing.
But yet again she was caught off guard. In the blink of an eye, the fat boy was slammed against the wall of a house. The stranger had grabbed him by the collar of his shirt and one strong arm was pressed close to his neck. Her own lip was pulled back from her teeth, making her look ridiculous, and the boys would have laughed had it not been for the cat, who had slashed the other slim boy across the chest, splitting both shirt and skin in that single swipe. Avon could feel the boy who was holing her tense, as if he was afraid.
"You try doing that again, and you'll be firtilizing those ferns in the woods." The boy was about to snigger, but his face went white when the girl pressed him harder against the wall with her arm. "Understand?" she growled. Avon herself was filled with fear at the rage in the girl's eyes, and she knew she saw them flash gold. The boy nodded enthusiastically, and gasped for air when he was released. Avon felt the boy's grip on her loosen, and she pulled away, spinning around to glare at him, holding a hand over her nose to catch the dripping blood. "Now, go!"
It took only that commanding bark for the boys to go running foolishly through the dark up the street they had come from. Avon turned back to the girl, expecting her to relax now that the bullies were gone, but she started when the stranger's face was just over a foot away from hers, the same angry look in her eyes. Yet, somehow, it was different.
"And you, what were you doing out here alone at night? What could you have been thinking?"
Avon's brow furrowed with confusion. "What are you doing out here alone?"
"I'm with Foxtail."
"Foxtail?"
"The cat," she stated so simply, Avon guessed she was expected to know.
"Oh." She was at a loss for words, even after the stranger's muscles relaxed completely. "Thanks for helping me."
The girl waved her hand once as if dismissing the matter.
"Who are you, anyway?"
"Who are you?"
"Avon."
"Miakoda."
"Strange name."
"Yours too. Doesn't it mean river?"
"Yes, and doesn't yours mean, like, moon or something?"
Miakoda shrugged. "Close enough."
An awkward silence followed, which was hastily broken by a dry cough from Avon.
"Well, I should probably be getting home... oh, but wait, this nosebleed..."
"I'll take care of it. Follow me." Miakoda and Foxtail swiftly turned back to the forest that they had come out of.
"I can't go in there," Avon called. "I'm supposed to stay in sight of the house!"
The girl shrugged. "Who's going to check? Besides, you've broken that rule already."
Avon opened her mouth to protest, but closed it and sighed. She was right.
The girls and the cat reached a narrow stream. Without hesitation, Miakoda whipped off the white apron on her dress and plunged it under the water, lifting the dripping article, and squeezing all the extra water from it. She then proceeded to check if the nose was broken.
"I think you'll be okay, River. It's not broken, just bleeding. Here, hold this to your nose."
Avon smiled lightly at the nickname, though she knew the girl couldn't see the expression. She lifted the cloth to her bloody face, flinching at the cold water, then sucking it up and started soaking up the crimson liquid.
"Thank you, Miakoda."
"Please, call me Mia." Then the girl added shyly, "My closest friends call me Mia."
Well, now you met the last of the main human characters, at least for now. She's based off me and our deputy, Blizzardclaw. I thought it was kind of funny at first—the name I mean—cuz Avon is a skin care company thingy. Anyhoo, please R&R!
-Spiritwind