The Missing Clan

Chapter 24

❅

"Come on, WaterClan, we're leaving," Troutstar meowed. "Thank you, Blossom, for letting us stay here." he meowed awkwardly. 

"No problem!" Blossom beamed proudly. "Come back and see me again anytime! I'll always be waiting."

Whitestripe touched her tail to Blossom's shoulder. "We will."

"Y'know, Whitestripe, I don't know how you do that! My tail is like limp, and I can't really control the tip of it," Blossom remarked. "You guys have more control of your tail, because you can do lots of tail signals, while I can just wag."

Whitestripe shrugged. "Well, you're faster than us," she meowed helpfully. 

"Ahem," Troutstar interrupted. "If you're quite finished, my Clan would be happy to get going." "Oh, sorry, Troutstar!" Whitestripe padded over to Leafwhisker, tail high in the air.

"Every step we take, that's one step closer to IceClan," Lightpoppy told Lizardtooth. "One step closer to Snakemist. Do you miss her?" 

"Yes, of course I do. If you had a sibling, wouldn't you miss them?" Lizardtooth asked. "Snakemist is the only family I have, since Ivywing died." He bowed his head in grief. Ivywing was his mother, and had died from greencough last leaf-bare.

Lightpoppy brushed against Lizardtooth comfortingly. "Oh, I'm sorry for bringing that up," she apologized. "No, it's alright," Lizardtooth meowed. "I-really appreciate how much time I spent with her, I'm really happy to have her as my mother." 

"I'm really happy to have you as my friend," Lightpoppy meowed. "You're my only friend, if you don't count other Clan cats." 

"And I'm glad to be," Lizardtooth flicked his tail. "But, we better get going, if we're going to catch up with the others." The WaterClan cats had already started to walk, their tails high in the air.

~ · ~

After a very long walk, everyone was tired and everyone had sore pads. They had stopped to drink in a puddle, and Lightpoppy bent down, lapping up drops of water. "Wait..." she carefully inspected the puddle. "Why is this water hot?"

"Let me try." Icepool crouched to lap it up. "It's not hot." When Mouseclaw drank some, he nodded in confirmation to Icepool's words. "That's weird," Lightpoppy scrunched up her muzzle. "Lizardtooth, you try."

"It is hot!" he meowed, eyes wide in alarm. The non-WaterClan cats lapped up the hot water, and meowed their agreement to Lightpoppy's claim. The WaterClan cats thought it was cool and refreshing. 

"It could be a sign," Snowpaw spoke up. "We're close to SunClan territory." "That's right," Hawksight meowed proudly. "Snowpaw's right." 

"Could be," Rabbitflight agreed. "Let's keep going! We're so close!" Rosekit squeaked happily, bouncing up and down.

Troutstar frowned. "I'm afraid not. It's getting dark, and I don't want my Clanmates wandering around at night." "Don't worry, Rosekit," Mouseclaw nudged his daughter. "We'll get going tomorrow, so you'll have to sleep in a hurry so tomorrow will come soon." 

"Okay!" Rosekit bounded to a nearby bush. "I'm sleeping!"

Dawnpoppy let out a mrrow of amusement. "Rosekit, come on back! We're not sleeping there!" "Actually," Morningwhisker inspected the bush. "This seems good." Morningwhisker sent out hunting patrols, and fortunately Lightpoppy was in a patrol with Kestrelfur, Acornpaw, Stormpaw, and Mouseclaw.

"So," Kestrelfur instructed. "Mouseclaw, you will hunt with me, and Acornpaw and Stormpaw, you will hunt will Lightpoppy. Since you are apprentices, you will experience hunting on land, and I assume Lightpoppy will teach you." She glanced at Lightpoppy questioningly, as if asking her to please teach the apprentices. 

Lightpoppy nodded slightly, just enough for Kestrelfur to see but not Acornpaw nor Stormpaw. Stormpaw won't be an apprentice for long! Rabbitflight told me that once they get back they'll have their warrior assessment. "Show me what you know," Lightpoppy focused back on hunting. "How do we know if prey is near? I know you only see dark shapes in the water when fishing, but hunting is different. Presumably your mentors have shown you some examples of land hunting." She nodded at Acornpaw to start.

"Uh, I think we have to taste the air first? Troutstar taught me that we have to scent the prey, and they pinpoint where it is." Acornpaw meowed nervously. "You're right. Stormpaw, can you demonstrate?" The white tom nodded, and opened his jaws, breathing in all the scents. His ears swiveled back and forth, and his eyes darted in all directions. "Mouse," he breathed, straining his ears to show where the prey was.

Lightpoppy nodded. "Now what do we do?" Stormpaw thought, but shook his head in confusion. "We check the wind!" Acornpaw muttered under her breath excitedly, but not loudly. "Yes. And one more thing," she stopped Acornpaw from going to get the mouse. "A mouse can sense your pawsteps, so set them down lightly and check the ground for any twigs or leaves that can make a sound to alert the mouse."

Acornpaw nodded, and crouched. Lightpoppy noticed that her crouch wasn't that low, she would tell her that later. Lightpoppy positioned herself a little way ahead of the mouse, in case Acornpaw missed.

Proudly Lightpoppy noticed that she set her paws down lightly, and she was keeping an eye on the mouse as well as the ground, stepping carefully around leaves and twigs. Acornpaw was a little too close to the mouse than she would have liked, but the mouse was oblivious. 

Acornpaw pounced, but the mouse had detected that she was there, and skittered away, aiming for a little hole in the tree. No! Lightpoppy yowled all her yowl in her mind, and furiously pounced on top of the mouse. She quickly dealt it with a bite to the neck. 

"Acornpaw," Lightpopopy turned to the brown she-cat. "You moved too close to the mouse, you want to analyze the length of your pounce, especially the part so you don't move too close to your prey the know you're there. Your hunting crouch isn't that low, we won't spend the day correcting your crouch because I'm not your mentor, but if you can, please lower your crouch. If you can't, you can ask Troutstar to review it with you."

"Stormpaw," Lightpoppy meowed. "It's your turn. Acornpaw, you scent the prey." Lightpoppy could already scent a shrew, which was good because that meant they didn't make enough noise to scare the prey away.

They continued with this until they had caught the shrew and three voles. "You two did well today, I will make sure to mention that to your mentors." Lightpoppy, Acornpaw, and Stormpaw met up with Mouseclaw and Kestrelfur. They had caught four pieces of prey, two squirrels, one mouse, and a sparrow. 

They gathered up their prey and carried it back to the makeshift camp, and doing so, Lightpoppy meowed privately to Kestrelfur, "Stormpaw did well today." Kestrelfur nodded proudly, glancing behind at her apprentice.

The other patrol had caught seven pieces of prey, the Clan was going to feast today. Morningwhisker, the leader of the patrol, claimed they found a river and fished. When the patrols got back, they deposited they prey on the makeshift fresh-kill pile and Lightpoppy shared a squirrel with Lizardtooth. After that, she went to Sunset to visit the new kits. 

"Did you decide on names yet?" she asked quietly, the kits were napping and she didn't want to wake them. "Yes, the first-born is Branchkit, that was the name of his father but he doesn't need to know about that." Sunset looked lovingly at her kits. "The orange tabby will be Firekit, he has opened his eyes and they are blazing fiercely. The brown kit with spots will be Cloverkit, they say a four-leaf clover is lucky and that is what she will be." 

"Those are good names for your kits," Lightpoppy meowed, settling down in her own nest for the night.