MISTPELT
She started to fear the day would never come. Moons after the battle in the poppies, when the hawthorn over the elder's den flowered, and the promise of newleaf bloomed into the heat of greenleaf… When Tansyslip, and Kestrelstrike, and Cloverfern all earned their names a quarter moon apart from each other, and still she had to sleep in the apprentice den, the oldest 'paw' in the Clan.
The idea of making space in the apprentices' den for Beethorn's litter, growing bigger and more rambunctious by the day, had made her nauseous.
But before greenleaf faded, the Clan called her by a warrior's name. Rowanstar stood on a lower bough of the Hollow Ash, her mentor Sunfire sitting at the base of the ancient tree's gnarled roots with his tail curled around his paws.
"Sunfire, has your apprentice, Mistpaw, learned the skills of a warrior? Does she understand the importance of the warrior code?"
Sunfire's whiskers twitched, eyes glowing with pride. She wanted to rush over to him now, even if his warmest looks could still fright a pack of dogs. One half of his face might have been called handsome, but the other half was a scarred, brutal wreck, his left pupil permanently dilated as if locked on prey. It gave his stare an uneven, almost unsettling quality—but the same gentle kindness lurked beneath.
"Soon enough, she'll be training me," he answered. The moons had not been kind to his injury, but the old medicine cat only said he should be grateful he wasn't blind or dead.
Rowanstar didn't respond to his deputy's quip, adhering to the ancient words she'd heard repeated countless times for others.
"Mistpaw, do you promise to uphold the warrior code and to protect and defend your Clan, even at the cost of your life?" There were flecks of gray around Rowanstar's muzzle now, and while he'd always seemed so colossal atop the Ash when she was a kit, she had to mark how skinny he'd grown. Even among the Clan's abundance.
She'd also been afraid her voice would creak, or tremble. But the words came out proud and firm, unhesitating.
"I do."
"Then by the powers of StarClan, I give you your warrior name. Mistpaw, from this moment on you will be known as Mistpelt. StarClan honors your loyalty and dedication, and we welcome you as a full warrior of LeafClan."
He leaped from the bough, resting his muzzle on the new-named warrior's head, as she leaned to lick his shoulder.
The cheers washed over her, the shouts. Her new name, chanted over and over, as her mentor touched noses with her to complete the ceremony.
"Mistpelt! Mistpelt! Mistpelt!" Her littermates were the first to rush to her side, giving her congratulatory licks over the ear, playful bats, warm nuzzles.
"It's about time," Kestrelstrike purred. "It was breaking my heart watching you slink off to the apprentices' den all alone."
"He owes me fresh-kill," Cloverfern said with a nudge. "Kestrelstrike thought Swiftpaw and Quailpaw might make it before you."
"I did not," Kestrelstrike protested. "But you kept us in suspense, didn't you?"
She had been in just as much suspense as the rest of them.
It had not been a quarter-moon past the battle in the poppies, their wounds still half-healed, when Rowanstar had rallied his warriors again. To strike back, and strike first, and strike decisively, while their enemies still didn't expect them. Before they could regroup with their allies and threaten LeafClan territory again.
They crossed over the border hills under the cover of moonlight, fog pooling in the dips and vales, following Thrushear's lead up a rocky hillock with a creek bending around its base.
"This way," Thrushear had hissed. "Keep to the shadow of the hill. There are sentries on the crags."
They crept low and single file, almost slithering through the dew-greasy grass. Sunfire was the first to plunge into the gap, flattening a HillClan sentry without a sound, and then Rowanstar, with the rest of LeafClan at their tails to claw the HillClan cats in their dens.
When it was all said and done, smarting from her wounds, dry with rage and toil, breathless and almost flopping down into the grass… The camp stood empty except for LeafClan faces. Duskstar, Paleface, warriors, elders, queens with bundles of kits swinging by the scruff, and all had fled, and she strained her throat to yowl victory with the rest of the Clan.
Almost all had fled, except the lingering shapes huddled in the nursery.
Mousespots was the first to emerge, and then Dovefeather—followed by three small gray heads, kits barely old enough to open their still-blue eyes. Mousespots! Still Mistpaw then, she'd felt her heart leap into her throat. The queen who had nursed her and raised her as if she were one of her own kits, now standing before the Clan like an enemy.
"How now, Mousespots? Dovefeather?" Rowanstar said, stalking through his ranks of warriors. "It seems your new Clan has abandoned you."
Mousespots could only hang her head. But Dovefeather's chin was high, eyes defiant.
"I never was, and never will be HillClan," Dovefeather said, sharp as a flint's edge. "And neither will my kits."
All three of them had traces of Nettlefang in their gray kitten-soft coats. It was hard not to be reminded of his corpse among the flowers, before they buried him alongside the other LeafClan dead.
"Yet you willfully betrayed your clanmates, to flee into the safety and comfort of the enemy," Rowanstar growled. "Beethorn left a litter of eight, and died without a queen in the LeafClan nursery to comfort them after she was gone."
"And who will comfort my kits?" Dovefeather countered with a whip of her tail. "I chose my loyalty to my mate over my loyalty to you, Rowanstar. Is that what you want me to confess? If StarClan finds that wrong, then let me never find Silverpelt, and I'll live like a rogue in Twolegplace."
She flourished her tail now, gesturing to the three gray kits. One so dark she verged on black, a gray tabby, and a dusty dappled she-kit with a pink nose, white muzzle and paws. At their size, they might have only been born days after the battle in the poppies.
"But my kits are innocent, and they deserve to live in LeafClan. Nettlefang would've rather died a thousand deaths than let them stay here a day longer. So exile me, if you must. But take my kits—and raise them as LeafClan warriors."
That night, they had returned with more warriors than they had left with. A rare thing, for a raid on another Clan's camp. The kits, Dovefeather, Mousespots, and all.
Rowanstar had slipped back into the roots of the Hollow Ash as soon as the ceremony had finished. Ever since the raid on HillClan's camp, the leader seemed to be wasting away. Sickness, some cats whispered. A curse, some others said. Punishment from StarClan.
And even after being driven out of their camp, Duskstar and HillClan harassed them up and down the hills. On her journey to Standing Stones with the other senior apprentices, HillClan silhouettes constantly shadowed them over the next rise, forcing them to run half the distance and lay low among the driftwood until low tide.
MireClan, too, hadn't buried their old grievances. Their encounters were less common, but every now and then they found MireClan scent. Prey-stealing, to provoke another fight, and LeafClan was growing eager to give it to them. There were whispers of another raid, this time on MireClan camp. To finish what Rosestar had started.
But whispers were wind. Nothing could cloud this moment for her.
"I'm so proud of you. Congratulations, Mistpelt," Mousespots purred to her after the ceremony, with a quick nuzzle, but she was quick to melt into the background. Dovefeather too stood at a distance, on the far edge of camp, like Larkfeather and Asterstripe had often done in the moons after Rosestar's fall. Alone, except for the kits tumbling around her feet, growing by the day.
The same was true with Thrushear. He skirted around camp like a skittish rabbit in the early moons of greenleaf, eating fresh-kill alone, left out of every hunting patrol if Sunfire didn't order them to bring him along.
"Congratulations, Mistpelt!" Thrushear mewed with a nervous twitch of his whiskers. "And you too, Sunfire. You must be proud."
A cat could not be made deputy without having mentored at least one apprentice. That was the warrior code; at least, one of the more forgettable, inexplicable, dustier parts of it. But even if Rowanstar had forgotten, the fact that he had chosen her young mentor over literally any other warrior in the Clan…
Well, it surprised everyone. Sunfire most of all, she sometimes thought, by the look on his face whenever cats turned expectantly to hear a deputy's orders.
He had received strange enough looks as a warrior and an apprentice. Now, with his scar and his new title, ordering around warriors twice his age and sitting at the foot of the Greenstone during Gatherings, the stares had never been more searching, more critical.
And despite scars and responsibilities and all, Sunfire was still Sunfire underneath.
She sat her moonlit vigil alone, bound to silence, and bound to fast until daybreak. Ears perked to the rustling of the leaves, the quiet chatter of camp at sundown, she grew especially sensitive to every inexplicable snap of twigs or strange sound in the distance.
Sitting alone through the night was one way to get nursery tales replaying in her head. Silent conversations between herself, arguments refought and won long after the fact, apprentice age embarrassments. The kinds of things she couldn't shake from her head.
But when she thought her exhaustion might loop into delusion, the sunup came as promised. Sunfire emerged as cats began to stir for the dawn patrol, touching noses in affectionate greeting and gesturing back toward the warrior's den.
"Go on, you're done standing about for the day. Make your new nest and get some sleep."
By the time the leaves started to turn again, blushing red and gold as the days shortened, her other old denmates joined her. Quailtail, Swiftstorm, and Bluenose, and just in time, as she saw it. Each night, the air took on a more pronounced chill, and the youngest warriors had to sleep on the farthest edges of the bramble thicket.
Now, at least she had some buffer.
The apprentice's den, on the other cheek, wasn't even empty for a day. They lined up all Beethorn's kits, one by one on one blustery day, spending half the morning giving them their apprentice names. Owlswoop and Boulderstep received Wasppaw and Minkpaw. Experienced warriors, who had just finished training her denmates.
Shadepaw tried to hide it, but she had tears in her eyes as she touched noses with Honeypad. Sorreltail was a first-time mentor, but an obvious choice to take on a new apprentice, and Sedgepaw was practically bouncing on her rear paws as her new name was called out.
"Ruddkit, you have reached the age of six moons, and it is time for you to be apprenticed…"
Rowanstar looked winded with half the litter still to go. But when Tansyslip's name passed his lips, her ears perked up, and she turned her head with the rest of the Clan.
"Congratulations!" Cloverfern mewed under her breath as Tansyslip moved to greet her new apprentice.
Soon after, it was Fleckkit's turn. But when Thrushear's name was pronounced as her mentor, the clearing remained muted. Certainly, a display of trust, and every cat could sense Sunfire's influence in it. He'd been nothing but an advocate for their wayward clanmate since he returned to LeafClan.
But trust was never bountiful in the green hollow, and in these leaner moons, it was only growing scarcer.
The leader took a moment to clear his throat. "Acornkit, you have reached the age of six moons, and it is time for you to be apprenticed…"
If it hadn't been for the golden-brown kit's littermates standing beside him, Mistpelt never would've believed it. The runt of the litter, and even now, Acornpaw blinked weak-eyed in the sun. After a moment's hesitation, Rowanstar spoke again.
"Your mentor will be Goosebelly. I hope he will pass down all he knows onto you…"
"Heh?" Perhaps Goosebelly hadn't been paying attention until his name was mentioned, because he shot upright like a startled hare, blinking with confusion, but Acornpaw just staggered up to him, straining up on the tips of his paws to touch noses with his new mentor.
Sunfire just watched in silence, whiskers twitching in undisguised amusement.
That left one plain brown kit standing at the base of the Ash. Elmkit, practically on the verge of melting into the grass over being last.
"As you know…" Rowanstar started, interrupted by a cough. His voice went hoarse as he went on. "Our Clan must find its next medicine…" Another coughing fit racked his body, more violent this time, his tail jerking up to cover his mouth. The Clan waited with respectful patience, some cats exchanging silent glances.
"Our Clan must find its next medicine cat." He sounded smoke-bitten in the throat, his voice all rustling leaves and crunching sleet. "Murkpool has spoken with all the kits in the nursery, and searched his dreams for signs from StarClan… One kit, above all, showed promise. Will you step forward?"
The wizened medicine cat ambled out from the shadow of the Ash. When Rowanstar had punished Murkpool with retirement to the medicine den, perhaps he'd still had some good moons ahead of him. But now, he was well and truly overripe, blinder than a mole, trembling like a bush.
Shrikewing had been young, and capable. Perhaps he might've taken an apprentice, but the Clan should have been able to rely on him for many newleafs.
But with him gone, disappeared into the swamp, there was no one else in the Clan trained in StarClan's mysteries. Rowanstar had no choice but to swallow that punishment he'd laid on Murkpool's head and ask him to return to his medicine cat duties.
The cobwebs never seemed to stick the same, pressed by weak and shaking paws, and other cats had to chew up the poultices for him. Even now, the dark gray tom blinked watery blue eyes at the kit, squinting and straining to see, muzzle and whiskers turned to white, and going bald in patches around his ears.
"Is this your wish, to walk down Murkpool's path as LeafClan's medicine cat?" Rowanstar asked.
The kit seemed to shrink more with all eyes on them. Not able to force out the words, she gave a heavy, over-emphasized nod.
"Then by this next half-moon, you will be inducted into StarClan's mysteries at Standing Stones and trained as a healer. From this day on, you will be known as Elmpaw, and I hope Murkpool will pass down all he knows onto you."
Their noses bumped, and at the instant of the ceremony's conclusion, all the new apprentices swarmed and balled together in celebration, howling their new names to the skies.
The grass was damp from last night's rain, fallen leaves slick underfoot as they weaved through the trees. Sunfire led the hunting patrol, Thrushear close at his flank, with Mistpelt and her littermates close behind.
"Bluenose and your sister, huh, Sunfire? Can you believe it?" Kestrelstrike mewed. The nursery was bound to be full of kits again, with Ryebreeze naming herself a queen.
"With the big kitten eyes and little cute tail signals they've been giving each other across camp?" Cloverfern countered. "Are you mole-eyed? Doesn't surprise me a bit."
"I just thought he'd settle for Swiftstorm or Tansyslip," Kestrelstrike said.
"What is that supposed to mean, 'settle'?"
Sunfire just gave a dismissive flick of his tail. "I hadn't noticed. But Ryebreeze always did like the pretty wind-headed ones."
They pressed within spying distance to the border, where the forest pressed up against the stone and timber walls of Twolegplace. Even from here, one could scent the acrid stench of woodsmoke, horses, carrion, and other things she'd only ever heard in her mentor's stories.
The deputy gave a flick of his tail, and they quietly webbed out in different directions across the forest. Kestrelstrike and Cloverfern plunged into the undergrowth as Thrushear went stalking between the trees, belly low to the ground, following the not-so-distant chirping of birds.
Mistpelt trailed a length behind her mentor, a familiar routine. Even if they were not apprentice and mentor anymore, this was how they had hunted together since she'd caught her first fresh-kill.
She crouched low to the ground, letting Sunfire press ahead and slip between curtains of wet ferns, dew beading on his fur as they brushed his pelt. Ears perked, mindful of every crunchy dead leaf and castaway branch.
Parting her mouth to taste the air, familiar forest scents filled her senses. Wet, decaying growth, sharp fresh scents of pine, notes of herbs and pungent weeds, perhaps the promise of rain. Beneath it all, undertones of Twolegplace, wafting in on the chilling wind.
But more than that. Sour straw and… cat-scent. She raised her head in alarm now, pivoting in the direction of the trespasser's scent. Sure enough, clumsy pawsteps, the snapping of twigs and rustle of undergrowth. Another cat nearby, and not a clanmate.
Rogue!
Heart thumping against her ribs, she darted through the brush in the same direction Sunfire had disappeared off to. Ahead, sections of old rotten Twoleg nests could be glimpsed between the trees, a flash of ginger fur…
"Sunfire, there you are!" a congested voice purred.
Her paws slid in the mud as she came to a sudden stop, staring at the two cats speaking face to face. Sunfire and one of the rogues she remembered from the battle; a scrawny, starveling thing, with a puffy, inflamed nose and watery eyes, constantly sneezing. His muzzle looked drenched even now. Ugh.
If either of them had noticed her, they gave no sign of it. Sunfire's fur was relaxed, his claws sheathed, eyes warm, and so she made no move to pounce. Without thinking, Mistpelt ducked behind a trunk, and watched.
"Sneezy," Sunfire purred in greeting. "Careful. You'll catch a cold in this weather."
The rogue answered with the start of a chortle, interrupted by a quick one-two achoo. "Oh, I'm glad to see you, Sunfire. Goosebelly was over just the night before introducing everyone to that new little servant of his."
"He's an apprentice, not a servant. Don't let Goosebelly tell you otherwise. And you should be glad to see me and not someone else," the deputy warned, casting a glance over his shoulder that made Mistpelt press closer against the tree. Still, his eyes swept right over her unnoticed, before turning back to the rogue. "You shouldn't be out here in the forest. It's dangerous for you."
"I'm just taking a little walk, is all. I saw some baby birds flitting in the grass near here." Sneezy twitched his whiskers, sniffing up some of the liquid dripping from his nose. "You should know, Socks has been really missing you. I haven't seen you in the lodge much recently—"
Another dark blur hurtling between the trees made them all jump, but the shape had collided into Sneezy before any of them could react. A gray and brown tabby with powerful shoulders had the rogue pinned to the ground like a trapped piece of prey, laying swipe after swipe into the trespasser's face as he yelped and screeched in pain and shock.
She recognized the cat in an instant. Hawkwing, his face full of snarling fury as he raised his claws again. But Sunfire's scarred face transformed into a mask of dread, crashing into his clanmate and sending the older warrior spilling into the grass.
Hawkwing shook his head, still reeling as the deputy hovered over him. "Sunfire, what are you—"
But Sunfire slapped the words from his muzzle before he could spit them out, claws unsheathed and drawing out a scratch of red across Hawkwing's lips. Sneezy had already turned and fled, streaking back toward Twolegplace with his tail streaming behind him.
Mistpelt ran out from cover now, and more sounds of trampled undergrowth emerged behind her as the rest of the hunting patrol rushed toward the commotion.
Hawkwing answered with a swipe of his own, boxing Sunfire across the ears and kicking up with his hind legs. He rolled and spun back onto his paws in one fluid motion, tail lashing, shoulders squared as if to fight.
"Have you forgotten the warrior code?" Hawkwing spat. The bright red crimson inked a trail down his muzzle now where Sunfire had struck him. "'Challenge all trespassing cats!'"
"I don't need lessons on the warrior code from you, Hawkwing," Sunfire answered in flint-edged tones. "Remember your place."
"Remember your place, deputy," Hawkwing growled. Still, his claws were unsheathed, but he forced his hackles to relax, even as he lashed his tail. "Rowanstar would never allow a rogue to walk unbled through LeafClan territory. He is still our leader."
"I know that too," Sunfire said. "But if you ever attack a friend of mine, I'll claw your pelt off, and I don't care who tries to stop me. Are we clear on that?"
Green eyes glared into gold, until Hawkwing turned with one last whip of his tail, turning to stalk back in the direction of camp.
When he was gone, Sunfire just sat in the grass, licking his paw to groom over where his clanmate had hit him over the head. Mistpelt approached in silence, Kestrelstrike and Cloverfern murmuring between themselves as Thrushear came crashing through the brush, wide-eyed.
He glanced over with the good half of his face, offering a smile to his former apprentice.
"Ah, Mistpelt," he mewed with a flick of his ears, casual as if the entire episode had been a dream. "It looks like you haven't caught anything either yet."