Hey guys! Sorry it took so long to get this one written! I got distracted by work and then lost my original plan for this chapter and my drive to write, but yesterday at school I was sitting down and realized I wanted to write! So here yall go! I hope you like it!
And thank you so much for all your lovely reviews! Also please be sure to check out chapter 53 before this one if you haven't already! I deleted my note to yall about going back to read a chapter I had accidentally overritten, so the last one couldnt be reviewed on, sadly, and I don't know if anyone was notified of it's existence.
But anyhow, on to the story! Thank you for reading!
Chapter 54: Sparrowpaw
There's a lot of blood.
That's all Sparrowpaw could really think, given the situation. That, and her burning hatred for what had just happened. Amada didn't deserve this; no one deserved this.
Well, except Blood and his cronies… Sparrowpaw thought with a disgusted snarl.
She quickly hid her anger at a wet look from Amada's eyes. She couldn't be disdainful now, while she was healing. Amada needed her.
The Hunter—well, now Addendum—was quiet and uncomplaining as Sparrowpaw hustled back to grab some tormentil from her meager cache of herbs and applied it to her wounds. She had lost a lot of blood, to the point where it was barely even trickling now, and Sparrowpaw quietly worried about the she-cat's resilience. Bloodclan cats were tough, however, and Sparrowpaw was certain Amada would be fine. They all seemed to clot quickly after blood flow, after all, and Amada was no different.
"Thank you," the cream Addendum gasped once the other she-cat was finished, quickly laying her head down and falling into a black sleep.
Wishing she had Irvine with her for help, the tiny apprentice dragged Amada over to her makeshift nest of leaves.
"I'm finally feeling a little like my old self again," she murmured, a faint whisper even to her own ears. She almost didn't even know she'd said it.
With a twitch, she heard someone enter.
"Shade."
"Yes?" the black she-cat replied. "I just wanted to see how Amada was doing."
Sparrowpaw turned to look at the other cat. Shade was merely a head or so taller than her; she visibly relaxed at the sight of a non-looming cat. Everyone here seemed so massive.
"She'll be fine," the gray she-cat said, "With time. All you Bloodclan cats heal like mice reproduce."
"You're finally starting to sound like before." At a chilling glare, the she-cat blinked and added, "Nightpaw's always telling me stories."
"Well I was young then." She turned around and curled her tail around herself. "And stupid. I should have listened to Irvine when I had the chance."
Shade laid her tail over her shoulder; she flinched. "It wasn't your fault."
"It's not Goldenpaw's either."
"I never said that."
Sparrowpaw sighed and walked away, uneased by the unfamiliar cat's presence. Why couldn't she go away?
After a moment's hesitation, Shade asked, "How's your training been going?"
"Good," Sparrowpaw lied, not elaborating further.
Shade made a sound deep in her throat. "I see." Then, without a wisp of sound, she was gone.
Sparrowpaw sighed in relief and padded back to Amada. With a sniff at her wounds to make sure they weren't infected, she slipped out of the cave and farther cavern.
I really should work in that training, she thought. I've gotten nowhere fast.
The rocks were right where she had last left them, untouched. Sparrowpaw couldn't get so much as a large pebble on her back, and when she did manage that, it would always slide right off.
Grunting, she trundled over and tried for the small stone she'd been working with, one only about as big as her two paws beside each other and tall as her dewclaw. With agonizing slowness, she shouldered her way under it and heaved the load onto her back. She then began the long, slow trek to her destination.
Once the weight was on her back and the journey directly ahead, Sparrowpaw lost sight of the world, blindly shuffling along towards her goal, a large spire of rock about fifty tree-lengths or so away from where she picked up the rock. It was a heavy burden to carry, and the apparitions of her dead kits circling around her legs made it even harder. It was as if she had dead weights on her paws. Sometimes, though, they would disappear for a while, but in that moment, it would seem as if they had climbed upon her stone to make the weight even heavier.
She was panting and cross-eyed by the time she arrived at the spire. Collapsing, she felt the stone slide off and hit the ground with a crunch, and she looked over dejectedly. Another shattered stone….
"I can help you with that, if you'd like."
Her pelt exploded outward in fear, and the tiny she-cat rounded towards the voice with a hiss. Her back remained arched and teeth stayed bared even as she recognized the intruder as Zadimus.
"Woah woah," he soothed, "calm down there! I was only offering a paw!"
"I don't need your help," she grumbled, shrugging him and her posture off and looking for a new stone instead. Every time she looked at his face, Blood's replaced it. She fought hard to not vomit or claw at him.
"Well, from here it looks like you do." The tomcat came up beside her and pointed at a nearby stone. "Why don't you try with that one?"
She hissed, lashing her puffed tail. "Do you think I'm stupid? That one's even smaller than the one I had before!"
He narrowed his eyes at her. They were orange, she noticed. Not amber. Not amber not amber, she told herself, and she felt the visage of Blood slowly melt away from him. He's just Zadimus. Zadimus, who you've trained with. Zadimus, who's always at your sister's side.
He gave her a small smile at her change in stance and awkwardly patted her back with his tail before padding forward and expertly slipping the small stone onto his back. "I used to do this all the time, growing up as a kit. I still do it now to keep my muscles sharp." He raked his claws across the spire. "And my claws."
Sparrowpaw hissed. "I don't want my claws sharp."
He shrugged. "Okay, fine by me. But you need to work on your technique."
Sparrowpaw just nodded. She knew she was failing at her task. At that thought, the image of the red kit flew across her eyes. She shook it away and turned her attention back to Zadimus.
"When you pick up a stone," he continued, "you need to first bump up the near edge of it with your paw. Like so," he said, demonstrating this action by adding a massive stone onto his back. With a small grunt, he added in a strained voice, "Then you have to take off running. Just like that."
She watched as he bounded off, noticing the slight curves of his run and the bunches of his legs. With the load on his back, he didn't curl all the way in, as cats normally did. His run was instead more like a cantering, yet it was still wickedly fast. Sparrowpaw didn't understand. Her mind kept clouding whenever she tried her best to pay attention.
The tom came running back and launched the stones off his back with a growl. "See?" he panted, trying to give her a smile.
He still wasn't good at making reassuring smiles, Sparrowpaw surmised as she flinched back from the toothy near-sneer. After a moment's hesitation, she asked, "How did you do that?"
"What? Run?"
"Yeah," she replied. "Without bending like normal."
He smiled at her, a genuine—thankfully less creepy—smile. He enjoyed teaching, she guessed. It was kind of… endearing, in a way. But then she the thought about why he could be here. Why is he here, she asked herself? It didn't make sense. This was so out of the blue, especially for Zadimus, who she usually only saw interacting with Gold or the other toms.
"I focus my concentration on the most muscled parts of my legs and my paws for balance, then just sort of bounce, in a way. You'd have to try it to understand.
"Also," he added, startling her out of her thoughts. "You shouldn't move up to larger stones until you can run with the one you have. Try that one I pointed to earlier."
Sparrow nodded distractedly and walked over. She used her left paw to lift the stone before sliding her back under it. Bending a little under the weight, she started to walk, then jog, towards where Zadimus was standing fox-lengths away.
"Good," he called, "Now faster!"
Grimacing at the pain in her weak muscles, the she-cat picked up her pace and focused on her legs and paws like he'd said to do, and despite the utter agony of the task, she found herself nearly forgetting how fast she was going. When she finally stopped, panting heavily, and looked up, she was already several tree-lengths away.
Zadimus whooped and waved his tail at her. Feeling a little invigorated with success, she ran as fast as she could back to him.
This time, the spirits of her kits seemed to run with her.
