River, page 7
“That’s big talk from you,” she sneered. “You’re the cat who allowed Ashfur into the Clans and then set him free!”
Shadowsight took a step back, a hurt look in his eyes. Sunbeam knew that Lightleap had been one of his few supporters during the darkest days of Ashfur’s reign. It must hurt terribly to see that she was angry enough to blame him for this.
“I don’t need your pity, or your advice,” Lightleap continued. “I’m perfectly capable of living my own life.” She whipped around and stalked out of the den.
Shadowsight cast an awkward glance at Sunbeam and Blazefire, then followed her.
Sunbeam gazed after him, then let her head rest on Blazefire’s shoulder. “This is terrible,” she meowed. “When I told Shadowsight the truth about how I got injured, I didn’t expect him to pass it on to Tigerstar. I know it’s not really my fault, but I still feel so guilty. Lightleap is my best friend!”
Blazefire turned his head to give her ear a comforting lick. “Don’t worry,” he told her. “Lightleap is just going through a difficult time.”
“I wish I could go after her,” Sunbeam responded. “If I could just leave the medicine-cat den . . .” Then she straightened up, gazing into Blazefire’s eyes. “Do you think you could go and talk to Lightleap for me?” she asked.
“Me?” Blazefire looked doubtful. “I’m not sure I would know what to say.”
“Oh, please,” Sunbeam begged. “You know me well enough—just tell Lightleap what I would want to tell her. You’re the only cat I would trust to help.”
Blazefire hesitated a moment longer, then nodded. “Okay, I’ll try. But I can’t promise it will do any good.”
“Thank you!” Sunbeam pressed her nose into Blazefire’s shoulder fur. “You’re the greatest, Blazefire.”
“Yeah, I know,” the tom grumbled good-humoredly. “I’ll talk to her later. Right now I have to go out on patrol. I only came by to see how you were doing before we set out.” He leaned over to touch noses with Sunbeam, then left with a word of farewell.
Still anxious, Sunbeam slowly finished the mouse Blazefire had brought; she was swallowing the last mouthful when Shadowsight returned, looking thoroughly uncomfortable.
“How is Lightleap?” Sunbeam asked.
“Still very upset,” Shadowsight replied. “And I’m afraid she’s worked out that it must have been you who told me about her behavior the other day.”
“Oh, I guess I should have seen that coming,” Sunbeam moaned, then added, “Lightleap isn’t stupid.”
“I’m sorry, but there’s something else,” Shadowsight mewed gently. “As soon as you’re well enough, Tigerstar wants to speak to you about the part you played in what happened.”
Sunbeam winced. This is getting worse and worse, she thought. First I’m injured, then my best friend is mad at me, even though it was her fault . . . and now I’m in trouble with the Clan leader. Where will it end?
Chapter 7
“Okay, let’s try it again,” Lilyheart meowed.
Flamepaw and his mentor were practicing fighting moves in a clearing just outside the ThunderClan camp. Lilyheart was teaching Flamepaw to dive under his opponent’s outstretched paws and knock his legs from under him.
Like I haven’t done this so many times before, he grumbled to himself. I could do it in my sleep!
“See that low branch?” Lilyheart went on. “Pretend it’s a cat attacking you. Now let’s see the move.”
Flamepaw suppressed a sigh. It was a lot more fun training with the other apprentices, he thought. Then I had a real opponent, not some stupid branch. It was just one more reminder that his fellow apprentices were warriors now, and he wasn’t.
“Come on.” Lilyheart twitched her whiskers impatiently. “The other cat would have ripped your fur off by now.”
Gritting his teeth, Flamepaw bounded forward, dived under the branch, and swiped at where the imaginary cat’s paws would be. Then he rolled away, bounced up again, and turned back to Lilyheart.
“That was very good,” she commented. “Though you might be quicker off the mark with your roll. The one drawback to this move is that you risk getting squashed under your enemy as they fall. Try it again.”
Flamepaw tried it again, making sure to roll as soon as he had delivered his swipe.
“Yes, much better,” Lilyheart praised him. “Except that your tail was waving around all over the place. Keep it tucked in. Now have another try.”
Flamepaw’s patience abruptly deserted him. “I know all this stuff already!” he complained.
Lilyheart’s eyes narrowed. “Clearly you don’t,” she snapped, “or you would be a full warrior by now.”
Flamepaw couldn’t suppress a gasp. He would never have expected Lilyheart to say something that stung like that.
Lilyheart blinked apologetically, seeming to regret her harsh words. “Look, we’re going to have to work together if you’re going to pass your assessment this time,” she mewed, her voice softer. “And you have to remember, whatever you feel about how fair or unfair all this is, you’re still my apprentice. That means what I say goes.”
Flamepaw nodded, reluctantly accepting that his mentor was right. “I know. I’m sorry, Lilyheart. Should I do the move again?”
“No, I think we’re done for now,” Lilyheart replied, glancing at the sky. “It’s coming up to sunhigh, and I have to do a border patrol. Sorry, Flamepaw, not you,” she added when Flamepaw suddenly brightened. “The elders’ bedding needs changing, so you can stay behind and do that.”
That’s so not fair! Flamepaw thought, biting back a groan. Since he was now the only apprentice in the camp, all the boring, unpleasant tasks fell to him, and they took even longer than usual. He would much rather patrol the WindClan border with Lilyheart, but having just been scolded for complaining, he knew better than to risk it again.
“Okay, Lilyheart, I’ll take care of it,” he meowed, his tail drooping.
Slipping back into camp through the thorn tunnel, Flamepaw headed for the elders’ den beneath the hazel bushes. Brackenfur was the only cat there; he moved out of the way while Flamepaw began to gather up all the soiled moss and bracken.
“Thanks, Flamepaw.” The old cat stifled a yawn. “It will be good to sleep on fresh bedding.” He paused briefly, then added, “So . . . your sister, Finchlight, is a warrior now.”
“That’s right.” Flamepaw kept his answer short. I really don’t want to talk about this.
But Brackenfur seemed not to realize that he was uncomfortable. “You didn’t make it this time around,” he went on. “Why was that?”
“I failed my assessment.”
“Yes, I heard that.” Brackenfur raised one hind leg to scratch his ear. “Tough luck. But what went wrong?”
Oh, great, so we get to go through all this again. Please, StarClan, help me not rip this mouse-brain’s ears off! “I messed up my hunting,” Flamepaw told the elder.
“Well, I’m sure you’ll pass next time,” Brackenfur mewed amiably. “It takes some young cats a while to grow into their fur.”
Oh . . . just stop talking, will you?
“You certainly come from a line of great cats,” Brackenfur declared. “I know you’ll live up to them.”
Flamepaw just gave him a brusque nod. He knew that the old cat meant to be kind, but everything Brackenfur said just made him more upset. He was relieved when a chorus of excited squeaks broke out behind him; he turned to see Spotfur’s kits, Stemkit, Bristlekit, and Graykit, bouncing up out of nowhere.
“What are you doing?” Stemkit asked.
Bristlekit sniffed curiously at the bedding. “Oh, that’s all yucky!” she exclaimed, jumping back.
“We want to help!” Graykit exclaimed.
Looking around for their mother, Flamepaw noticed Spotfur dozing outside the nursery. He wondered if he ought to wake her up, then thought she probably needed the rest, and the kits were fun to be around.
“You’re an apprentice, aren’t you?” Bristlekit asked, gazing up at Flamepaw with wide eyes. “That’s so cool!”
Well, at least some cat thinks an apprentice is an exciting thing to be, Flamepaw thought, amusement replacing his annoyance.
“We want to be apprentices,” Stemkit informed Flamepaw. “But Spotfur says we have to wait until we’re six moons old.”
“That’s forever!” Graykit groaned. “We want to be apprentices now.”
“Then we’ll be apprentices now,” Bristlekit announced. “Flamepaw, you get to be our mentor.”
“Okay, then,” Flamepaw mewed, entering into the spirit of the game. “If you’re apprentices, you have to help me clear out this old bedding.”
“Sure! We can do that,” Graykit agreed enthusiastically.
Stemkit and Graykit plunged into the elders’ den and began to shovel the bedding into heaps with their tiny paws. Bristlekit hesitated for a moment, her nose wrinkling, then cheerfully bounced into the heaps with her littermates. Flamepaw thought they were getting more of it stuck in their pelts than they gathered up, but at least they were trying.
Brackenfur let out a chuckle from deep within his chest. “You’ve got your paws full there,” he remarked.
With Flamepaw helping and directing, the kits had soon cleared two of the three elders’ nests. Flamepaw was beginning to roll the moss and bracken into balls ready to carry out of camp, when he heard a cat yowling from the middle of the clearing.
“Kits! Kits, where are you?”
Turning, Flamepaw saw Daisy, the cream-colored she-cat who helped in the nursery, spinning around with an agitated air as she looked for the kits. He waved his tail to attract her attention.
“Hey, Daisy! They’re over here.”
Daisy came bounding across the camp to the elders’ den, staring in amazement as her gaze fell on the kits. “Flamepaw, what do you think you’re doing?” she demanded. “Graykit, put that down!”
Turning back into the den, Flamepaw saw that Graykit had found a twig somewhere and was gripping it in his jaws. He was waving it around; Stemkit had to leap back to avoid having it poked into his eye. Hearing Daisy’s voice, Graykit dropped the twig and stood there looking guilty.
“They’re just playing at being apprentices,” Flamepaw explained. “They wanted to help.”
“There’s a reason kits aren’t apprenticed until they’re six moons old,” Daisy meowed, flicking her ears irritably. “They’re too young to help safely.”
“I guess . . . ,” Flamepaw muttered, beginning to feel as guilty as Graykit looked. She’s talking to me like I’m a kit!
“In the future,” Daisy continued, “if you see the kits running around unsupervised, you should find me or Spotfur. Come on, kits, time for your nap.”
The three kits trailed out of the den, stopping to give their pelts a good shake, spraying the older cats with scraps of moss and debris. “We never get to have any fun!” Graykit complained.
“Poking your eye out is not fun!” Daisy exclaimed, sweeping her tail around the kits to herd them back to the nursery.
Flamepaw watched them go, then began to gather up the rest of the bedding. He flicked his tail in frustration. I can’t do anything right, he thought. Not even play with kits.
The sun had gone down behind the trees, but there was still light in the sky when Sparkpelt, who was eating a squirrel beside the fresh-kill pile, called Flamepaw over to her with a wave of her tail. “Come and share,” she invited him.
Flamepaw felt a warm pulse of surprise that his mother had singled him out. As he padded over, he wondered if she was going to ask about his failed assessment. Even though it had happened several days ago, they still hadn’t talked about it. Because we never do talk about difficult stuff.
Sparkpelt was clearly not going to discuss it now. “Have you had a good day?” she asked; Flamepaw thought she sounded as polite and formal as if she were speaking to a cat from another Clan.
“Fine, thank you,” Flamepaw replied, equally polite. “I did battle training with Lilyheart.”
“I’m sure you did well.” Sparkpelt nudged the squirrel toward him. “Come on, eat.”
Flamepaw relaxed a little as he sank his teeth into the succulent flesh, only to look up warily as Lilyheart came striding across to him, her dark tabby fur bushed up and her tail-tip twitching.
Oh no! Flamepaw groaned inwardly. What have I done now?
“I just spoke to Daisy,” Lilyheart meowed, halting beside him. “Were you using Spotfur’s kits to help you with your apprentice tasks?”
“No, I was not!” Flamepaw retorted indignantly. “They came to me when I was clearing out the elders’ den, and they wanted to play at being apprentices. I just let them—I didn’t mean any harm.”
Lilyheart stared at him for several heartbeats, her eyes narrowed. “There’s nothing wrong with playing with the kits,” she declared at last. “But you have to be careful. They shouldn’t be doing tasks meant for apprentices.”
Flamepaw could feel frustration rising inside him and struggled to hold on to his temper. Then, to his surprise, his mother looked up from her prey and faced Lilyheart.
“Really, Lilyheart!” she mewed. “It sounds like an honest misunderstanding. The kits are very cute, and they don’t take no for an answer when they’ve got an idea in their little furry heads. I’m sure Flamepaw has learned his lesson and won’t make the same mistake again—right, Flamepaw?”
“Of course not,” Flamepaw agreed, grateful that his mother understood.
Lilyheart hesitated for a moment, then gave a satisfied nod. “Okay, I’ll see you for more training in the morning.” She walked off to the fresh-kill pile to choose a piece of prey for herself.
“Thank you, Sparkpelt,” Flamepaw meowed.
“You’re welcome. I’m sure you meant well. Now stop worrying about it and enjoy your squirrel.”
Flamepaw was happy to do just that.
Sparkpelt ate quietly for a few moments, then raised her head, giving Flamepaw an awkward look. “I’ve noticed—well, I really couldn’t miss it—that you seem to be struggling with your apprenticeship.”
While she was speaking, Flamepaw felt his pelt begin to burn with shame and discomfort. It had felt really good when Sparkpelt had stood up for him. And now she’s nagging me, just like every other cat!
“It must be hard for you,” his mother went on, “that Finchlight was made a full warrior and you weren’t. Is it making you anxious?”
“What do you care?” Flamepaw blurted, the old anger building inside him.
Sparkpelt looked even more awkward, clearly finding it hard to meet Flamepaw’s gaze. “I care because you’re my kit.”
“Oh, sure!” Flamepaw scoffed.
“There are high expectations of you because of your kin,” Sparkpelt went on, ignoring the interruption. “You belong to a family that’s done great things for our Clan: Alderheart, Squirrelflight, Bramblestar, all the way back to—”
“Firestar,” Flamepaw finished bitterly.
“Yes. And I can understand that you wouldn’t want that pressure—Alderheart and I struggled under it, too—but we can’t control who we are. We can’t control what our Clanmates think when they look at us, or how they chatter when one of us is . . . well, struggling. But it’s a gift, really, having Firestar in our blood.”
“I don’t want it!” Flamepaw snapped. He hadn’t planned to say that, but when he saw Sparkpelt staring at him in surprise, he knew he had to justify himself. “I never asked to be Firestar’s kin. I don’t feel like Firestar’s kin. Every cat says that you look just like him, and maybe Finchlight at least has a bit of orange in her pelt, but I’m an all-black cat!”
As he spoke, something began swelling inside Flamepaw, perhaps because the weight of his mother’s expectations had become too much to bear, or perhaps because—at last—he was talking about serious things with his mother.
“Besides,” he added, striving to keep his voice steady, “I don’t feel connected to you, either, because you left me when I needed you. Even Finchlight left me when you joined the exiles’ camp!”
“I didn’t have a choice—” Sparkpelt began.
“That may be true, but you didn’t even check on me!” Flamepaw interrupted, his resentment overflowing.
Sparkpelt’s eyes widened, and her ears flicked up; clearly, she was stung by his words. After a few heartbeats she mewed softly, “You are all black, just like your father.”
Flamepaw stared at his paws. “Maybe Larksong would have understood me,” he murmured. “But I’ll never know.”
Sparkpelt shook her head helplessly, seeming not to know what more to say. Flamepaw couldn’t even remember what he’d wanted when he’d said those things to his mother. Every hair on his pelt burning, he rose to his paws and stumbled away, acutely aware of the stares of a few nearby Clanmates.
He passed Alderheart, who was watching him with kind curiosity, and almost stopped to speak to him. Alderheart had never been anything but kind. But he wasn’t a father.
Flamepaw padded on, out through the thorn tunnel, and came to a halt beneath a cluster of trees, trying to calm himself. I feel like such a stupid furball, he told himself, wondering why he always felt like that when he tried to explain his problems. What did I want Sparkpelt to say? What could she say?
“Flamepaw?”
Sorrelstripe’s voice sounded from somewhere behind him; Flamepaw turned and saw, approaching from the direction of the camp, the gentle dark-brown she-cat who had nursed him when Sparkpelt was grieving.
“You seemed upset back there,” she meowed. “I’m so sorry. Is there anything I can do to help?”
Though Flamepaw still struggled to find the words that would express what he was feeling, it had always been easier to talk to Sorrelstripe than to his own mother. “It’s just . . . I let the kits help me today, just for fun, and Lilyheart scolded me about it. Why do I always feel that I’m doing things right, but every other cat thinks I’m wrong? I thought I was a good apprentice. I thought I would make a good warrior. . . .”
“You are, and you will,” Sorrelstripe assured him, pressing her nose comfortingly against his cheek. “If you’re sure you’re ready, you should ask Lilyheart for another assessment. You don’t have to wait until she thinks you’re ready. You can prove it to her—to every cat. Especially to yourself, Flamepaw. I believe in you,” she purred.
