Hi guys! Sorry about the really slow update. See, it shouldn't have taken as long as it did. You see, 50 of people wake up the morning after their Tetanus shot feeling fine. I am one of those people. (Phew.) So what really took me this long to update was this: Camp. (Stupid camp…)
Anyway, I hope you enjoy this chapter and I hope the next update will come soon.
Disclaimer: I do not own Warriors which belong to Kate Cary and Cherith Baldry. (The whole world must be sighing in relief)
Dawnpaw sat near the camp entrance, twitching her tail excitedly. When will Stormpaw be back? I want to go hunting!
"Looking for someone?" came the familiar, surprisingly playful growl behind her. Dawnpaw whipped around and purred.
"That's the second time today one of you cats has scared me by doing that!" she mewed.
"Who was the first cat?" Stormpaw asked. "Oakstar? If so, don't worry. He does that to all the apprentices."
"Why?"
Stormpaw shrugged. "Just for the sake of scaring us, I guess." She looked at Dawnpaw, her eyes dancing with excitement. "Well, enough talking! Let's go!" And with that, she raced away into the woods.
Dawnpaw chased after her, barely managing to catch up. When they finally stopped, she mewed, "You're fast."
"Thanks." Stormpaw sat a little taller. "You are too." She stopped talking and sniffed the air. "I smell mouse," she announced. "I'll be right back." She leaped away toward a small bush.
A few moments later, she came back holding a mouse in her mouth. She placed it in front of Dawnpaw and mewed, "Got it."
"I bet I can catch something bigger," Dawnpaw boasted, eager to start a challenge.
Stormpaw nodded. "I'm sure you can. How about you show me?"
"Sure!" This was exactly what she had wanted. "But how about we make it interesting? How about we both go hunting, and the one to catch the smaller prey…has to volunteer to pick the ticks off the elders!"
"You're on. Just let me cover this mouse." Stormpaw covered the mouse with a clump of dirt. "Okay, now I'm ready. Now let's start hunting!"
The she-cats began to dash off, and Stormpaw called, "You're about to get a great chance to get to know the elders!"
Dawnpaw snorted disbelievingly and raced off in the opposite direction. She stopped as she stepped in a clearing and sniffed the air. That's funny. I don't smell anything.
Just as she was about to leave, she heard a rustle in the bushes. She flattened her ears and crept forward slowly. Then she narrowed her eyes and pounced, landing on whatever was there. She looked down at her paws to see a small black cat and two amber eyes glaring up at her.
She let out a terrified squeak and leapt off the cat. She turned to face it, hissing. As she saw who it was, she calmed down and her fur flattened.
"Oh. N-Nightpaw. Y-You scared me," she stammered.
"I scared you?" he growled. "You were the one trying to put me on the fresh-kill pile." His ears flattened. "Why were you so scared, anyway?"
"I-I thought you were…someone else." She looked at her paws, embarrassed.
"Yeah, well I'm not," he growled. "And I'm not prey either, so don't try hunting me."
"Sorry," Dawnpaw mumbled miserably.
Just then, Stormpaw came crashing through the bushes. "I heard yowling," she mewed frantically. "Is everything alright?"
"It's fine," Dawnpaw meowed. "We're okay."
"We're?" Nightpaw growled. "Maybe you are, but I'm still trying to get over the shock that I nearly became fresh-kill."
Stormpaw looked at Dawnpaw strangely. "Maybe I don't want to know."
Dawnpaw shook her head. "You don't." She looked at Nightpaw and purred, "But you should know that I caught something bigger than you ever will attempt to catch."
"Yeah," Nightpaw hissed. "Me!" He stalked away angrily.
"You caught him?" Stormpaw gasped in disbelief after he was gone. "I wish I could have seen that."
Dawnpaw shook her head once again. "Trust me. You don't."
----
As the two walked back to camp together, Stormpaw holding the only prey they had caught-the mouse she had caught earlier, Dawnpaw meowed unexpectedly, "You're so lucky."
Stormpaw looked at her friend quizzically. "How?"
"It's so nice here. And to have been raised here-it must be great."
Stormpaw suddenly felt her heart fill with grief, and she felt the sudden urge to yowl at Dawnpaw. She doesn't know, she convinced herself. She closed her eyes tightly in an attempt to leave the grief behind and mewed, "Not necessarily. A lot of kits born in leaf-bare die, and the queens don't always survive."
She stopped talking not because she was finished, but rather because she had tripped over something on the ground, and she was now lying on her side.
"Are you okay?" Dawnpaw asked.
"Yeah. I just tripped over this stupid root here." Stormpaw noticed that her friend shivered at the word. "Are you okay?" she asked.
"Of course. I'm fine. Let's keep moving," her friend mewed, a little too quickly for Stormpaw to be convinced that she was telling the truth.
"Whatever you say." She shrugged, unconvinced.
----
Later that night, when the rest of the apprentices were sleeping in their den, Stormpaw lay wide awake, too full of grief to sleep. Oh, Dawnpaw, she thought. I was so close to forgetting it all. Why did you have to remind me?
She shivered as the painful memory came back to her.
"Let me through! I have to see her!" a small reddish-brown she-kit squeaked. "I have to see her!" She squeezed through two large cats standing in front of the entrance to a small den, where a young blue she-cat was lying.
"Rainstorm," she gasped. The she-cat looked at the small kit and her blue eyes softened.
"My daughter," she murmured. "Come here." Tentatively, the kit stepped forward. "Listen," the she-cat mewed softly. "I want you to remember that I love you. Never forget that, okay? No matter what happens, I don't want you to forget that. Do you understand?"
The kit nodded and moved closer to her mother. "But I don't have to-not yet, at least, because you're not leaving now. Not now." She seemed uncertain of what she was saying.
"I am leaving," the she-cat rasped. "But I will always be with you. I will always love you and protect you." She shivered and then lay completely still.
The she-kit flung her head back and yowled in sorrow. Then she suddenly stopped, as a breeze blew through the den. It seemed to say, "I love you, Stormkit."
Okay, just in case you're confused, the stuff in italics at the end was a memory. (There will probably be a lot of these in this story.) Also, the first line of dashes meant that it was switching from Dawnpaw's POV to Stormpaw's. (There will be a lot of that, too.)
Anyway, I would really really really really really really (five minutes later) really really really really appreciate reviews. (I only got two for the last chapter.)