Warriors- Rising Sun: The Awakening {Book 1}

Chapter 10

Sunpaw crouched and waggled her haunches. Narrowing her eyes in effort, she sprang forward and slammed her paws on either side of the mouse and lunged, biting its spine as it squeaked before falling limp at her paws. She lifted her head, flicking her ears proudly as she licked the small blood splatter off her mouth from her successful and rewarding catch.

"Nice one," Softwing praised as she padded from the bushes, her eyes drifting from the mouse to her apprentice. "You're getting back into the swing of things rather well."

Only with hunting, Sunpaw winced as she recalled her attempts at battle training with her mentor at sunhigh. After many sloppy attempts at trying to counter her mentor's attacks, Softwing gave up and told her to go hunting. I've been an apprentice for nearly five moons, she thought with a sigh. And I can barely fight my Clanmates. She had to admit that the time spent healing in Laketail's den had dulled her battle skills.

A moon-and-a-half had gone by since the deaths of Stonefrost and Raggedfoot, and Sunpaw had been cleared by Laketail that she could return to her warrior training.

"Don't throw yourself into another fight," the medicine cat had teased on her way out, "I don't want to see you in here near-dead, again."

Sunpaw appreciated her friend's teasing, but hesitated when it came to battle training. While she knew Softwing would never shred her to mouse-dust, whenever she went to strike her mentor, she saw those who caused her injuries and would be pinned to the ground or getting her ears cuffed before she could process what happened.

"Thanks," she meowed, a little breathless from her catch. She scraped at the damp, cold earth, making a hole deep enough to not attract any foxes or badgers to her kill. "Should we keep hunting? I don't feel like I've caught enough." She looked over her shoulder where- under a clump of dripping bracken- unearthed dirt marked where she'd caught another scrawny mouse. They'd been out since sunhigh, and she'd managed to catch two mice, and miss an old thrush that flew away into the cloudless blue sky.

Softwing shook her head. "I think we have enough for now," she looked over at a bramble bush. "I caught a squirrel earlier when you ran off, but I can't scent anymore prey." Sunpaw tasted the air, her mentor was right. Other than the smell of damp leaves and wet moss, she couldn't smell any prey. "Let's head back to the camp. We don't want to freeze out here."

Sunpaw nodded and freed the mouse from the hole and went to fetch the other mouse. She looked over at her mentor as Softwing carried a squirrel and a third pathetic mouse in her jaws. Disappointment clawed at her chest as she followed the gray-and-white warrior back toward the camp, she carried the two mice she caught by their stringy, root-like tails. Leafbare will force us to starve if we don't find enough prey to eat. With the fish in the rivers and ponds getting sparse and bony, the Clan had to depend more and more on the woodland prey. Even that had become more and more hard to do as the mice, squirrels, birds, and frogs started to hide and grow thin.

As they squeezed through the hollow log into the camp, Sunpaw shook raindrops from her fur. A squeak came from the small creek and she saw Bubblingkit, Snookkit, and Blazekit playing with a bulrush with Marigoldheart's kits. Sunpaw winced in sympathy as she heard Snookkit complain that he was hungry and directed her paws toward the kits.

Blazekit rolled his green eyes and caught Sunpaw's eye. His holly-colored eyes brightened at the sight of prey and he let out an excited squeal. "Look!" He told his denmates. "Food!"

Bubblingkit bounded toward the apprentice as Sunpaw dropped the mice on the cold ground. "Are they for us?" She asked, her mouth watering.

Sunpaw nodded. "Be sure to share with your mothers and eat slowly," she warned. Her belly growled with hunger, but she ignored it by clearing her throat. "Eating too quickly will give you a bellyache." She watched hungrily as Bubblingkits scooped up the mouse- which was smaller than her- and trotted over toward the nursery with Drizzlekit carrying the other mouse, their denmates charging after them. Sunpaw sighed, pushing the gnawing hunger that clawed at her belly. They need it more than I do. She told herself. They're the future of the Clan.