Warriors: Distant Echoes

CHAPTER 8

Foxpaw bounded through the pine trees, followed by Honeypaw and then Sleetpaw slightly lagging behind. The three apprentices had been permitted by their mentors to go hunting together today as long as they stuck together and kept out of trouble. Sleetpaw's mind was still bogged down by thoughts of Mantisclaw and of the secret rebellion, but he tried to shake his worries away and spend some time with his friends.

After they reached a considerable distance from camp, the apprentices slowed to a walk, ears pricked up and noses sniffing for any scent of prey. All three of them found absolutely nothing. They kept on searching, moving deeper into the forest, trying to pick up on any signs at all that prey was nearby, to no avail.

"Ugh, there's no prey anywhere!" Sleetpaw sighed exasperatedly. "There should be plenty around, it's Newleaf!"
"I've got an idea!" Foxpaw grinned, his eyes glinting. "How about we climb one of these big trees? If we get the high ground, we might be able to spot the prey below from afar, then we can come down from the tree and sneak up on it!"
"Are you sure about this?" Honeypaw said apprehensively. "We're only apprentices! And even our warriors don't get trained to climb trees. This doesn't sound very safe."
"It'll be fine!" Foxpaw insisted. "Besides, imagine how proud our mentors will be that we thought of such a bold strategy to find prey! The whole clan will be using this method once we succeed! So, who's going up there?"
"It's your idea, so why don't you do it?" Sleetpaw mewed.
"Fine. I'll show you two scaredy-cats that it isn't anything to be worried about!" Foxpaw gloated.

Foxpaw placed his claws against the base of a decently large pine tree, adjusting his paws a few times until it felt right. He then dug his claws into the bark and began to try and climb upwards. His hind legs soon joined the front paws on the tree trunk as he began to slowly claw his way up. With delight, he laughed as he realised he was above the ground, not even his tail touching the grass below.
"See, it's easy!" he grinned.

He continued his way up, slowly gaining more confidence. Suddenly, his grip slipped and one of his hind paws came loose from the tree, his front paw nearly following it, but he dug his claws in deeper, gritting his teeth as he regained his composure, Honeypaw and Sleetpaw watching him struggle anxiously from below. After he righted himself it wasn't long before he was moving again until he found a sturdy branch and stood upon it, looking down at the other two apprentices.

"See, it wasn't that hard! It's a lovely view from up here, too!" Foxpaw beamed. "Come on, Honeypaw, join me up here! It's brilliant! If we get a bit higher up I'm sure we'll spot a mouse or rabbit in the distance, then Sleetpaw can go and catch it!"

Reluctantly, Honeypaw sighed, nodded and placed her paws against the bark where she had watched Foxpaw do so, beginning to make her way up. Foxpaw was still on his branch, smiling down at her, whilst Sleetpaw sat below and watched with bated breath. Honeypaw managed to make it to where Foxpaw was with relative ease, so she continued to climb, aiming to reach a higher branch as Foxpaw had insisted.

Her front paw came loose and for a moment she panicked, fur bristling and eyes wide. She managed to quickly get her grip back on the bark though and continued her climb, more slowly this time, more cautiously. She had her sights set on the next branch up from her, just a couple of tail lengths away from her. Her first paw grabbed the branch and Foxpaw grinned excitably as he watched her second front paw grapple the branch. She then tried to move one hind leg forward to make her way fully onto the branch.

Suddenly, she plummeted.

She had lost her balance completely and before Foxpaw or Sleetpaw could even shout out her name she had hit the ground with a thud. Sleetpaw rushed to her side immediately and Foxpaw began to climb back down the tree as fast as he could, losing his own footing as he did so, but catching his balance in time to prevent himself from falling to the ground beside his sister. The yellow she-cat was silent as Sleetpaw nudged her side with his paw and repeated her name over and over, trying to get a response.

"Honeypaw! Honeypaw!" Sleetpaw said. "Honeypaw, are you okay?"
"We need to get her to the medicine den!" Foxpaw anxiously mewed, having just reached Honeypaw's side. "Come on, between us we can carry her. Let's get back as fast as we can."