Incoming Storm

Chapter 3

Chapter 3

Secrets. All her life, Brownpaw had always loved learning all sorts of different secrets. She loved knowing that cranky elder Maplewish had a secret forbidden love waiting for him in StarClan. She knew the secret that Redhaze actually skipped most of the Medicine Cat half moon meetings to go and eat kittypet food. All the secrets made her feel like she knew her clanmates more than the frosty and serious expressions that they used for show.

She was careful with the secrets, of course. She wasn't a mad gossiper like the old warrior Whitesun. He always used other cats' secrets and mistakes to make himself seem grander and tougher than what he actually was. Brownpaw didn't really care for the drama, though.

Perhaps the thing that Brownpaw liked the most about secrets was the feeling that she knew her clanmates. Knew them more than the cold and icy exterior that they frequently showed to her. Knew them beyond all the grief and heartache they shared. Knew them as her family.

"Slickpaw. Get out of my fur!"

"Not until you give me the sparrow, slowpaws!"

Brownpaw jumped as the sounds of her rambunctious denmates mocking each other caught her off guard. She stared at the ground mutely, trying to ignore the cheerful caterwauling of the two young cats. They don't really ever want to play with me, probably because I'm not clan born. Maplewish says I've got kittypet blood, and that's kind of against the warrior code...

Suddenly, a ball of brown and white fur banged into Brownpaw, and the ShadowClan apprentice tottered on her paws. Brownpaw toppled entirely off her paws, and crumpled to the ground, the breath driven out of her. She felt liquid seep up into her face, and realised that she had fallen into a mud puddle. Greenleaf always had too much mud in Brownpaw's opinion, not to mention the horrid storm that had rolled just a day or so back.

"Ugh, Slowslug!" Brownpaw looked up, gasping for air, and trying to see who was sitting on top of her.

Goops of the nasty mud fell into her eye, and Brownpaw trembled, hoping that the other cats would go away. The mud in her eye made it burn, and Brownpaw gasped for air. Gradually, she was able to take in gulps of air. Brownpaw pushed desperately against the cat on top of her, but she was too weak.

"Mmph!" Brownpaw exclaimed.

As the weight of the cat lifted, Brownpaw tentatively stretched her paws. She got into a seating position, and stared at the two cats who faced her. Slickpaw and Leafpaw. Two littermates and partners in crime.

Leafpaw blinked awkwardly at Brownpaw, eyes uncomfortable. "You were in the way," he grumbled. "Cats like that always get into trouble."

Brownpaw tried her best to suppress a wince as Leafpaw stared at her, eyes dark with memory. The tom turned his gaze away from her, and dug his claws into the soft, peaty mud. Mud stained his patches of thick white fur brown, making him look almost as brown as Brownpaw herself. His round green eyes, though, which glinted with grief, were very different from Brownpaw's own dark amber eyes.

The two littermates turned away from her. They were no longer cheerful, as they had been before, but were now sullen and upset. Brownpaw pressed herself further into the shadows of the camp barrier, wishing she had a black or splotchy pelt instead of her own warm brown one so that she could melt into the shadows. Leafpaw and Slickpaw padded out of camp, muscles tense. It was only Leafpaw who looked back at her, his expression unreadable, before the two cats were swallowed by the shadows of the outside world. Brownpaw tried to relax her quivering body.

She had always found life in ShadowClan especially difficult. Brownpaw constantly felt a deep sense of loneliness, as though there was no cat she was really close to. The only cats her age, Leafpaw and Slickpaw, tended to avoid her and play their own games. Her adopted mother, Spicefur, always seemed to be staring off into space, in a listless sort of way. Whenever Brownpaw did get Spicefur's attention, the she-cat, who was also Slickpaw and Leafpaw's mother, would chastise her, often very harshly. I sort of understand, though. What I did... my mistake, it was unacceptable.